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Speaker 1: This summer, serve up the cookout classics Heinz Ketchup and

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Speaker 1: Craft singles. Every good burger needs a layer of perfectly

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Speaker 1: melty cheese and thick rich ketchup. We all know it's

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Speaker 1: not a cookout without Heinz and Craft.

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Speaker 2: It's very difficult to keep the line between the.

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Speaker 3: Past and the press.

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Speaker 4: You believe that someone out of the past can enter

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Speaker 4: and take possession of a living being.

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Speaker 3: We may be through with the past, but the past

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Speaker 3: is not through with us.

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Speaker 5: Welcome back to the next picture show a movie the

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Speaker 5: Week podcast devoted to a classic film the way it

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Speaker 5: shaped our thoughts on our recent release. I'm Keith Dipps

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Speaker 5: here again with.

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Speaker 2: Tasha Robinson and Genevieve Kowski.

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Speaker 5: And we're once again joined by our special guest, Tim Grierson,

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Speaker 5: co star the Grierson and Leach Podcast and a writer

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Speaker 5: for Screen International, The Los Angeles Times and other fine publications.

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Speaker 5: He's stubbing in for Scott to Bias. Hi again, Tom, Hello.

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Speaker 3: So.

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Speaker 5: In our last episode, we discussed Ron Shelton's classic nineteen

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Speaker 5: eighty eight baseball film Bull Durham and at times rollicking,

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Speaker 5: at times sexy comedy about a love triangle between an

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Speaker 5: up and coming pitcher, an agent catcher, and a local

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Speaker 5: worshipper at the Church of Baseball. Ephus is the first

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Speaker 5: film from Carson Lund, and it's not really rollicking and

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Speaker 5: never particularly sexy, but it bears a spiritual kinship to

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Speaker 5: Bull Durham nonetheless. Scripted by Lund and co writers Nate

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Speaker 5: Fisher and Michael Basta, Ephis takes place in smalltown Massachusetts

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Speaker 5: in the final years of the last century, where two

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Speaker 5: recreational league teams attempt to play out their season's last game.

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Speaker 5: In most respects, it's a meaningless contest, but in the

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Speaker 5: grand scheme of things, it's quite momentous. This is the

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Speaker 5: last game they'll play on the field, soon to be

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Speaker 5: demolished to make way for school rooms, And because it's

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Speaker 5: kind of a schlep and most of the players are

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Speaker 5: already deep into middle age, there's a very good chance

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Speaker 5: this will be the last game many of these guys

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Speaker 5: will ever play. As the sunsets, it starts to look

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Speaker 5: like they may not even get to finish. That's what

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Speaker 5: counts as a plot in Ephis, But there's a lot

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Speaker 5: going on within that loose framework. We'll talk it over

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Speaker 5: after the break.

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Speaker 6: This episode is brought to you by Redfinn. You're listening

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Speaker 6: to a podcast, which means you're probably multitasking, maybe even

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Speaker 6: scrolling home listings on Redfinn, saving homes without expecting to

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Speaker 6: get them. But Redfin isn't just built for endless browsing.

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Speaker 6: It's built to help you find and own a home

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Speaker 6: with agents who close twice as many deals. When you

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Speaker 6: find the one, you've got a real shot at getting it.

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Speaker 6: Get started at redfin dot com. Own the dream.

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Speaker 4: Gentlemen, let's play.

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Speaker 7: The voter has been passed. Begin construction on the currently

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Speaker 7: unnamed middle school in Douglas.

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Speaker 5: Let's call the last one. Let's make it come.

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Speaker 7: It means building on top of Soldiers Field, where recreational

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Speaker 7: baseball teams but faced off for decade. Is just one

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Speaker 7: big vacul.

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Speaker 5: My Baculin.

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Speaker 4: I need to be put down.

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Speaker 5: Last game? You play ball? Kid? Yes, do yourself a favor,

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Speaker 5: don't All? Right? Well, this is a film. We're kind

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Speaker 5: of talking about this off air already, But this is

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Speaker 5: a film with a lot of characters, and some of

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Speaker 5: them none necessarily played by recognizable actors. It's a great ensemble.

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Speaker 5: Everyone's terrific but we're talking about the difficulty of just

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Speaker 5: like sorting out who's who and who does what and

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Speaker 5: who plays what. But in some ways I feel like

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Speaker 5: that's kind of baked into the film, which drops you

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Speaker 5: into this relationship between these people who've known each other

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Speaker 5: for a long time, who've either played against each other,

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Speaker 5: playing on the same team together, who are all more

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Speaker 5: or less from the same town, the same part of

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Speaker 5: the world. Allge relationships are already established. We're just kind

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Speaker 5: of getting to drop into the middle of destroy that's

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Speaker 5: been going on for a long time, Right?

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Speaker 8: Could I suggest that the protagonist of this movie is baseball?

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Speaker 8: Suggestion because I certainly couldn't tell you who else it

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Speaker 8: might be.

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Speaker 2: I think the protagonist of this movie is darkness. I

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Speaker 2: think darkness wins in the end.

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Speaker 8: Fair enough, fair enough, I will.

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Speaker 2: Say, as far as deciding that the protagonist of this

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Speaker 2: movie is baseball, I think that that is a solid idea.

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Speaker 2: But I think one of the things that's interesting about

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Speaker 2: it for me is that, again we have just a

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Speaker 2: very unconventional sports movie. And one of the things that

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Speaker 2: that's most unconventional about it is just sort of the

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Speaker 2: shape of you think of a sports movie as something

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Speaker 2: that's building up to a climax, you know, building up

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Speaker 2: to a decision point the big game. Do they win

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Speaker 2: or lose the payoff for a characters arc? Do they

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Speaker 2: learn what they needed to learn? Do they come to

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Speaker 2: some deciding point, did they sign the big contract? Do

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Speaker 2: they they quit the sport? You know whatever. It is

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Speaker 2: a movie build up to a climax, and this movie

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Speaker 2: builds down to an anti climax. It's expressly built around

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Speaker 2: this this game that's the last game that they're going

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Speaker 2: to play in this space, and they just keep playing

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Speaker 2: as the game runs on and is tied and untied

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Speaker 2: and retied. As the light fails. Some members of these

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Speaker 2: teams go home, some most of them don't, and it.

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Speaker 5: Gets darker and darker.

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Speaker 2: One leaves for a family event that he completely forgot about,

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Speaker 2: and the game itself becomes more and my diffuse, they

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Speaker 2: have more and more problems playing because because they can't see,

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Speaker 2: and they literally circle the wagons, they pull their cars

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Speaker 2: up to the field and turn on their headlights to

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Speaker 2: illuminate the game, and still can't play very well and

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Speaker 2: keep kind of losing balls, and the steam just goes

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Speaker 2: out of this movie and for me, at least there was.

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Speaker 2: It did get a little harder to pay attention towards

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Speaker 2: the end, as it got harder and harder to tell

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Speaker 2: people apart in the dark. It got harder to kind

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Speaker 2: of follow where the game is and what the action

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Speaker 2: is because it's falling instead of rising, and it kind

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Speaker 2: of peters out in a way. It's very deliberate, it's

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Speaker 2: very conscious, but also it's just so uncinematic in terms

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Speaker 2: of the way we're used to thinking of sports movies.

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Speaker 2: At the same time, to my mind, the longest movie

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Speaker 2: goes on, the more visually beautiful it gets. The coming

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Speaker 2: of sunset, the arrival of magic hour just makes everything

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Speaker 2: look different. The darker it gets, and the more we're

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Speaker 2: kind of seeing people like peering through the gloom, the

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Speaker 2: more striking it gets. And then once everything is lit

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Speaker 2: by headlights, you just get some really really rich, gorgeous,

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Speaker 2: dramatic lighting that looks prettier than anything else in the film.

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Speaker 2: So you've got this weird case of like falling action

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Speaker 2: and rising filmmaking in a way that again it's just

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Speaker 2: very unconventional.

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Speaker 8: You know, we were saying that we'd be kind of

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Speaker 8: hard pressed to name any of these characters or the

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Speaker 8: actors that play them for the most part, but then

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Speaker 8: I remembered Bill Belinda, who is married to Linda Belinda

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Speaker 8: is one of my favorite gags from this movie. And

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Speaker 8: there are like lots of little moments of humor just

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Speaker 8: sprinkled throughout this but they're almost entirely divorced from the

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Speaker 8: quote unquote plot. Again, like the game is the plot

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Speaker 8: such as it is, And you know, I get what

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Speaker 8: this movie is doing. You know, it's called if as

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Speaker 8: it's named after this incredibly like slow moving pitch that

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Speaker 8: you like, it's so slow you lose track of time

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Speaker 8: and then it's over, you know. And it's clearly like

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Speaker 8: just a metaphor for this game and arguably baseball as

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Speaker 8: a spectator sport, especially like baseball played at this level

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Speaker 8: sort of the dig against it is it's fun, much

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Speaker 8: more fun for the people playing it than it is

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Speaker 8: for people watching it. And I think, like this movie

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Speaker 8: is kind of engaging with all of that purposefully. Like

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Speaker 8: I get that. I am, as I said before, like

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Speaker 8: not a huge baseball fan, so I'd be lying if

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Speaker 8: I said I loved it, but I certainly respect what

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Speaker 8: it was doing. And like I said, found these there

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Speaker 8: were lots of little just like moments of delight in

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Speaker 8: it and on the field, so it wasn't like a

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Speaker 8: bad viewing experience. But you know, I'm generally someone who

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Speaker 8: enjoys some plot and characterization in their movies, so I

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Speaker 8: found myself missing it.

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Speaker 5: To be clear, I think that there are a lot

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Speaker 5: of standout characters, so that there's just a lot of characters,

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Speaker 5: so it just kind of they kind of were together.

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Speaker 5: But like I was thinking about Franny played by Cliff Blake,

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Speaker 5: I got that one, right, the scorekeeper who seemed to

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Speaker 5: exist us to keep score with these things, and like

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Speaker 5: and like the thing you're talking about, Tasha, about things

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Speaker 5: just kind of winding down, like the you know, I

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Speaker 5: think about him finishing up, and like what happens to

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Speaker 5: this guy? I mean, what what is his life apart

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Speaker 5: from he can score at these games? I mean it's

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Speaker 5: it's there's something kind of you know, really not quite tragic,

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Speaker 5: but deeply melancholy about this about this film, for as

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Speaker 5: as funny as it as it often is. You know,

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Speaker 5: I also just love like the way just for the

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Speaker 5: ritual of this, like the way, like you know, they're

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Speaker 5: calling out these these these really these baseball chestnuts like Catacorn,

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Speaker 5: you know, things like that that they're just kind of

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Speaker 5: just what you do. It is like people would always,

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Speaker 5: you know, at every level of the game and have

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Speaker 5: always done, and it's it's there's you know, it's it's

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Speaker 5: it's It's a lovely film in many ways that way too.

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Speaker 2: I definitely didn't think it was short on characterization. Like

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Speaker 2: I'm now I'm looking at the IMDb page and I'm thinking,

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Speaker 2: I couldn't have told you that that character's name is Rich,

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Speaker 2: but looking at at his page, like I immediately recognize

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Speaker 2: his face. I feel like by the end of the movie,

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Speaker 2: apart from getting people getting lost in the dark, at

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Speaker 2: least by the midpoint of the movie, almost anybody popping

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Speaker 2: up on screen, I could tell you, Oh, that's the

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Speaker 2: guy who he's not the heaviest guy on the team,

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Speaker 2: but he is on a diet and he's suffering, and

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Speaker 2: the other team makes fun of him by calling out

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Speaker 2: food names when he's up to bat to throw him Like,

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Speaker 2: that's the character who brought his family to watch him

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Speaker 2: play and they're bored and they want to go. That's

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Speaker 2: the character that I'm calling out. Rich played by Ray

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Speaker 2: Herb is the guy who gives the speech about how

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Speaker 2: everything in life is combat, you know, just everything that

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Speaker 2: you go through is combat. And I believe that character

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Speaker 2: is a veteran and he's delivering some just very thousand

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Speaker 2: yard stare wisdom to everybody, and they deal with it

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Speaker 2: with differing levels of humor and different levels of comfort.

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Speaker 2: And the button on that scene is is somebody talking

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Speaker 2: about how going to the doctor at his age, Yes,

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Speaker 2: that is combat. I really loved that scene, and I

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Speaker 2: really loved that characterization. That's he's also the angry guy

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Speaker 2: who keeps picking on the teenagers who are trying to

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Speaker 2: pick on people on the team, and eventually like heads

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Speaker 2: into the woods looking for a foul ball and sees

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Speaker 2: a kid who's in the woods trying to smoke. You know,

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Speaker 2: just a lot of little moments with that guy.

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Speaker 5: What a face that kid has too, right, Yeah, I.

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Speaker 2: Feel like there's plenty of characterization to go around. I

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Speaker 2: didn't feel that the movie like lost on that. It's

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Speaker 2: just it's not heavily associated with specific names for anybody.

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Speaker 8: Yeah, And I guess I kind of what I mean

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Speaker 8: it more is that it's not also not really that

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Speaker 8: related to the plot, because again, there isn't a plot,

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Speaker 8: like you know, like this characterization doesn't necessarily affect what

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Speaker 8: happens in the movie. It's just you know, stuff we

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Speaker 8: learned about these people on the field, and like, yeah,

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Speaker 8: there there is like a pleasure to them. There is

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Speaker 8: a fair amount of success in it too. But I

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Speaker 8: couldn't necessarily like dig into any one of these characters,

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Speaker 8: you know, their their motivations or their background for more

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Speaker 8: than ninety seconds or so at a time. So that's fine.

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Speaker 8: But Tim, we haven't heard from you yet. How are you?

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Speaker 2: How did you take this movie?

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Speaker 3: So I'm I'm a pretty big fan of it, and

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Speaker 3: and I've seen it a few times, and I think

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Speaker 3: that helps, to be perfectly honest, because I do think

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Speaker 3: that some of the character relationships become more apparent with

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Speaker 3: multiple viewings. I do think that you do get more

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Speaker 3: of a sense of just the small little dynamics between

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Speaker 3: different people. But even on a first viewing. One of

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Speaker 3: the things that is I think really strong about the

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Speaker 3: movie we talked about with Bull Durham being in the

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Speaker 3: minor leagues and that being sort of a purgatory Keith

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Speaker 3: mentioned that, and I see this movie as sort of

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Speaker 3: this really great melancholy, existential look at like a purgatory

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Speaker 3: on Earth, in that these guys who are with one

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Speaker 3: exception one of them plays college ball. But these guys

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Speaker 3: are older, some of them are not in great shape.

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Speaker 3: They're actually not great baseball players. But this is a

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Speaker 3: thing that they do. This is the thing that they have.

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Speaker 3: And one of the telling lines of dialogue you mentioned

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Speaker 3: Bill is hu can. Bill is the only person whose

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Speaker 3: family comes to these games, and it's not answered. And

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Speaker 3: I love the question that is asked because it's like,

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Speaker 3: have all of these guys and it's all guys, I

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Speaker 3: have all these guys, have everybody in their families just

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Speaker 3: gone Listen, that's just that thing that he does on Sundays.

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Speaker 3: We don't bother going because it's just his thing. Or

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Speaker 3: is it the opposite where this is a ritual for

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Speaker 3: these men that is harder and harder to defend and justify,

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Speaker 3: but they still do it anyway, and there is something

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Speaker 3: that is unspoken. This movie is very unsentimental, which I

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Speaker 3: really like. We talked about this in terms like Field

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Speaker 3: of Dreams in the last episode, but this is for

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Speaker 3: the most part an unsentimental movie. But it's a movie

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Speaker 3: about guys who kind of can't let something go. They

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Speaker 3: can't let go of the aspect of their lives where

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Speaker 3: they are still fit enough to play baseball. And I

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Speaker 3: think there's a lot of poignancy in that, even though

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Speaker 3: it doesn't play out until we get to near the

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Speaker 3: end of the movie and the umpire leaves because he

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Speaker 3: has to get home, and then the lights that the

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Speaker 3: sun goes down, and then they have to turn on

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Speaker 3: the headlights, And even though a lot of them complain

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Speaker 3: and they want to get the thing over with, there

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Speaker 3: is this constant refrain of we've played the game this long,

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Speaker 3: We've got to finish it. There's this idea of it

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Speaker 3: wouldn't be right to end with a tie. Even though

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Speaker 3: we can't see the ball anymore. We can't not finish

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Speaker 3: this game. We have to finish it. And all of

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Speaker 3: that I think speaks to something I think think about

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Speaker 3: people of a certain age where you know, they all

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Speaker 3: have a nostalgia connection to baseball, but that time like

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Speaker 3: they're you know, they're not in shape. There it seems

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Speaker 3: like pretty unhappy in their lives. A lot of these guys,

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Speaker 3: they don't have much going for them, but they need

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Speaker 3: this thing, and as the movie ends, I would suggest

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Speaker 3: that by the time you get to that Tom Waits

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Speaker 3: song at the end, I think a lot of people

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Speaker 3: may not realize just how moving the film is because

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Speaker 3: the movie does not telegraph the sentimentality that we often

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Speaker 3: get in sports movies. It doesn't sort of telegraph the

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Speaker 3: nostalgias so much that we often get in these types

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Speaker 3: of baseball movies. And so it is a baseball movie,

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Speaker 3: but I feel like it's one of those baseball movies

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Speaker 3: that you actually don't have to know much about baseball

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Speaker 3: to kind of get, because it's more about the changing

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Speaker 3: of seasons in a person's life and having to let

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Speaker 3: go of something. I love the fact that the baseball

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Speaker 3: field is going away. Like Keith mentioned in the opening,

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Speaker 3: the reason why it's going away is because the school's

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Speaker 3: being put in and people are like, yeah, that's stupid school.

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Speaker 3: It's moving in. Like it's not like it's not likely

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Speaker 3: the typical thing where it's like, oh, there's a there's

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Speaker 3: a terrible like you know, factory or or like you know,

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Speaker 3: a shopping mall.

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Speaker 2: It's not it's a greedy developer is going to put

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Speaker 2: up condos.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly. It's it's a school, Like most people would

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Speaker 3: not be upset about that, but these guys. And also

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Speaker 3: I think undercuts any sort of romantic notion about like, boy,

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Speaker 3: you know, things aren't the way they used to be.

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Speaker 2: It's they're just modernizing everything. It's like a paradise and

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Speaker 2: putting up a parking lot.

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Speaker 3: Exactly one hundred percent. And I think that that's all

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Speaker 3: to the credit of what Carson Lund has done with

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Speaker 3: a film, in that he grew up being a baseball fan.

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Speaker 3: He grew up wanting to play baseball. He got to

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Speaker 3: a certain point where he's like, well, that's not going

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Speaker 3: to happen, and he switched over to movies. And I

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Speaker 3: think that there is as an indie filmmaker, he understands

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Speaker 3: an inherent connection between loving baseball and loving movies, especially

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Speaker 3: independent film, this idea of you can be romantic about it,

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Speaker 3: but you also have to kind of acknowledge that maybe

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Speaker 3: the good times are over and you are going to

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Speaker 3: have to move on to a certain degree. I mean,

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Speaker 3: he's mentioned Goodbye Dragging In as an inspiration for the film,

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Speaker 3: and there's I think these things make the movie go

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Speaker 3: beyond just the typical baseball thing, though, Keith, You're totally

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Speaker 3: right that there's so many references like can of corn

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Speaker 3: and things that if you know baseball, you know what

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Speaker 3: they're talking about. And there are like these little interludes

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Speaker 3: where we hear famous baseball quote. So there is a

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Speaker 3: romantic element and you have to know maybe a little

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Speaker 3: bit about baseball. But I do think the movie extends

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Speaker 3: beyond that in a way that by the time it

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Speaker 3: gets to the end, it's like something has ended and

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Speaker 3: none of the guys have really come to grips with

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Speaker 3: it because they don't know how to They just know

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Speaker 3: how like to play baseball, but they can't actually like

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Speaker 3: express their feelings in any meaningful way.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, there's no Catharsis. There's no you know, big big

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Speaker 2: send off speech, Nobody Kevin Costner speeches like what they

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Speaker 2: believe in to represent how everybody feels. They It all

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Speaker 2: just sort of peters out in a sad sort of way.

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Speaker 2: I love the school element of it, like I think

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Speaker 2: that's really key and really smart, and the fact that

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Speaker 2: you hear over the radio at the beginning in a

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Speaker 2: broadcast that just kind of like frames everything really nicely

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Speaker 2: in terms of what this local community must be like,

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Speaker 2: you know, you hear advertisements for local businesses and you

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Speaker 2: just really get a sense of how small and remote

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Speaker 2: this community is. But there's also a news piece talking

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Speaker 2: about the school coming and how it means locals are

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Speaker 2: going to be able to send their kids up the

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Speaker 2: road to the school instead of driving forty five minutes

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Speaker 2: to the nearest school. So you know, not only is

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Speaker 2: this just an unimpeachable use of this land, that's better

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Speaker 2: than having a place where some some very sore and

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Speaker 2: aging men kind of try to keep up their youth.

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Speaker 2: You just you know it's going to make the community better.

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Speaker 2: But you also get a sense of just how rural

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Speaker 2: and remote this place is and how there isn't a

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Speaker 2: whole lot else going on for a lot of these folks.

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Speaker 5: I mean, something is always lost with progress, right, I

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Speaker 5: mean forever whatever. Even if it's like a net, you know,

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Speaker 5: an obvious net good for the community, there's still something

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Speaker 5: that disappears to make way for it.

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Speaker 8: There's also if I have this right, and this is

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Speaker 8: a movie that I wish I could have watched a

365
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Speaker 8: second time before we recorded this, but one of the

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Speaker 8: river dogs is somehow involved with the school being built

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Speaker 8: a Graham. I think his name is right exactly, Yeah,

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Speaker 8: which is an interesting element to have in here too,

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Speaker 8: and it adds a layer to the melancholy that you

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Speaker 8: were talking about Tim with with that character in particular,

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Speaker 8: who is losing something here that he you know, obviously

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Speaker 8: cares about and he's involved with the reason that that's

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Speaker 8: going away. You know. Again, to go back to my

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Speaker 8: maybe snide comment about characterization, like, I think there's a

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Speaker 8: lot going on there that we really only get a

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Speaker 8: glimpse of, but I would like to know more.

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Speaker 2: There's also you know, Bill's kids are possibly the right

378
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Speaker 2: age to be going to the school, you know, so

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Speaker 2: he also has a potential investment in it, even if

380
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Speaker 2: it's one that you know, they don't they don't spell

381
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Speaker 2: out like there's in addition to they're not being a

382
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Speaker 2: big Catharsis or a big send off. There's not a

383
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Speaker 2: big scene where they like debate the merits of the

384
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Speaker 2: school over the field or anything like that. There's not

385
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Speaker 2: a point where they take sides. You get the impression

386
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Speaker 2: that if conversations like that were going to happen, they

387
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Speaker 2: probably happened a long time ago. I think one of

388
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Speaker 2: the things that just makes this film feel so interesting

389
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Speaker 2: is because it kind of feels like a lot of

390
00:21:05,280 --> 00:21:08,840
Speaker 2: the edges have been rubbed off the relationships between these men.

391
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Speaker 2: You know, there's not a lot of coming to a

392
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Speaker 2: very beginning of Filler on the roof place he sold

393
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Speaker 2: him a horse but delivered a mule, Like, there's not

394
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Speaker 2: a lot of community strife or like grudge holding going on.

395
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Speaker 2: But these guys do have like long standing relationships. They

396
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Speaker 2: know each other well, they know the dudes on the

397
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Speaker 2: other team just as well, and any like bigger conflicts

398
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Speaker 2: that they have, they probably argue about these things at

399
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Speaker 2: other times, or they've already argued about these things and

400
00:21:38,480 --> 00:21:42,480
Speaker 2: they're tired, and this isn't really the space for it.

401
00:21:42,960 --> 00:21:45,400
Speaker 2: These just all feel like people who've known each other

402
00:21:45,560 --> 00:21:48,000
Speaker 2: for a long time and very well, and so they

403
00:21:48,040 --> 00:21:50,359
Speaker 2: don't have to talk about most of this. There's a

404
00:21:50,359 --> 00:21:54,360
Speaker 2: little bit of just sort of you know, male field bullshitting,

405
00:21:54,800 --> 00:21:59,359
Speaker 2: like the conversation about everything being a combat or you know,

406
00:21:59,400 --> 00:22:03,840
Speaker 2: people talking about about their knees or you know, making

407
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Speaker 2: fun of each other in small ways. But it just

408
00:22:06,680 --> 00:22:09,840
Speaker 2: feels like most of what might have needed to be

409
00:22:09,920 --> 00:22:13,920
Speaker 2: said between any like pairing of these these men has

410
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Speaker 2: already been said, and what we're seeing is like the aftermath,

411
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Speaker 2: the aftermath of their youth, the aftermath of however many

412
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Speaker 2: hundreds of games, the aftermath of a lot of the

413
00:22:24,760 --> 00:22:28,040
Speaker 2: bigger decisions in their lives being made. We're just watching

414
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Speaker 2: everything kind of quietly wind down.

415
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Speaker 5: It's also a very grounded movie, except for the section

416
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Speaker 5: where we're almost like some kind of guardian angel. Bill

417
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Speaker 5: spacemanly one of the one of baseball is Great Eccentrics

418
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Speaker 5: and you know, the most famous, probably the most famous

419
00:22:42,680 --> 00:22:45,000
Speaker 5: person to throw the Ephis pitch shows up to get

420
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Speaker 5: three outs, which is I think, you know, kind of

421
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Speaker 5: a jolt of energy and uh, in the middle of

422
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Speaker 5: the movie that that that really kind of helps it

423
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Speaker 5: push it to the next, you know, the next phase.

424
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Speaker 5: But uh, but what a what a what a what

425
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Speaker 5: a fun cameo, right, and.

426
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Speaker 2: What a mystery?

427
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Speaker 4: You know?

428
00:22:59,040 --> 00:23:01,560
Speaker 2: The sect is the one knows that and then he

429
00:23:01,600 --> 00:23:05,959
Speaker 2: disappears like almost like he's he's been assumed back into heaven.

430
00:23:06,480 --> 00:23:08,320
Speaker 2: I had no idea who this guy was until you

431
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Speaker 2: sent the.

432
00:23:08,720 --> 00:23:09,720
Speaker 8: Article song about him.

433
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Speaker 2: Yeah, so I'm very curious how that played out for you. Tim.

434
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Speaker 3: I like the idea that he's sort of like a

435
00:23:16,920 --> 00:23:19,880
Speaker 3: dream or like a mythic figure. One of the things

436
00:23:19,920 --> 00:23:21,800
Speaker 3: I was going to say in general about how I

437
00:23:21,880 --> 00:23:25,639
Speaker 3: relate or connect to the movie is post college, I

438
00:23:25,880 --> 00:23:29,680
Speaker 3: was part of like a pickup basketball team. Like we'd

439
00:23:29,680 --> 00:23:33,280
Speaker 3: all like just go to a court and play three

440
00:23:33,359 --> 00:23:35,359
Speaker 3: on three and it always be this thing, like you

441
00:23:35,359 --> 00:23:38,960
Speaker 3: would start to know certain guys every Saturday mornings, they

442
00:23:38,960 --> 00:23:41,720
Speaker 3: would just show up. But then every once in a while,

443
00:23:41,760 --> 00:23:46,679
Speaker 3: this like weird prodigy would just be there to basically

444
00:23:46,720 --> 00:23:49,320
Speaker 3: like show up the rest of us, and then we

445
00:23:49,359 --> 00:23:51,760
Speaker 3: would never see that person again, and we were like,

446
00:23:52,040 --> 00:23:54,400
Speaker 3: did that person just need an ego boost that day

447
00:23:54,480 --> 00:23:58,040
Speaker 3: to kick all our asses essentially or what? Or what

448
00:23:58,240 --> 00:24:00,760
Speaker 3: wasn't And it's not exactly that way with the character

449
00:24:00,800 --> 00:24:03,000
Speaker 3: in the movie, but there is a little element. He

450
00:24:03,080 --> 00:24:05,720
Speaker 3: is as close as we get in ephis to the

451
00:24:05,760 --> 00:24:09,000
Speaker 3: bull Durham like I was in the show story Like

452
00:24:09,040 --> 00:24:11,360
Speaker 3: he is the mythic like can we touch the hem

453
00:24:11,400 --> 00:24:15,800
Speaker 3: of your garment kind of thing with it. So it's

454
00:24:15,840 --> 00:24:18,359
Speaker 3: such a perfect, nice little touch in the movie, and

455
00:24:18,359 --> 00:24:21,440
Speaker 3: I love that he just like they literally Carson Lunn

456
00:24:21,680 --> 00:24:24,479
Speaker 3: cuts to a shot of the forest or the woods

457
00:24:24,480 --> 00:24:27,919
Speaker 3: nearby as they're looking for him, and he's just gone.

458
00:24:28,119 --> 00:24:32,080
Speaker 3: He just completely he completely disappears. It's one of those

459
00:24:32,119 --> 00:24:34,400
Speaker 3: types of things where if you play in that league,

460
00:24:34,359 --> 00:24:37,000
Speaker 3: would be a fun story to tell your friends, like

461
00:24:37,080 --> 00:24:40,399
Speaker 3: this guy came and got three outs and then we

462
00:24:40,440 --> 00:24:41,600
Speaker 3: don't know what the heck happened to him.

463
00:24:41,600 --> 00:24:42,120
Speaker 5: He just left.

464
00:24:42,200 --> 00:24:45,679
Speaker 3: And that feels in the spirit of these kind of

465
00:24:45,800 --> 00:24:50,080
Speaker 3: rec league kind of games like you see in Ethis.

466
00:24:50,600 --> 00:24:53,240
Speaker 2: It's interesting that he doesn't. I mean, he gets three outs,

467
00:24:53,280 --> 00:24:56,000
Speaker 2: but he doesn't do it in a show stopping way.

468
00:24:56,080 --> 00:24:59,639
Speaker 2: He doesn't despite all of the talking up of the

469
00:24:59,640 --> 00:25:03,280
Speaker 2: ephis pitch, he doesn't lead up to it. He does

470
00:25:03,320 --> 00:25:06,359
Speaker 2: it with the first pitch and then says, like the

471
00:25:06,640 --> 00:25:08,520
Speaker 2: key the ephis is you don't throw three of them.

472
00:25:08,800 --> 00:25:12,160
Speaker 2: But also that pitch didn't look like anything particularly spectacular

473
00:25:12,200 --> 00:25:15,520
Speaker 2: to me. After all the conversations about how how time

474
00:25:15,720 --> 00:25:18,199
Speaker 2: stops when somebody throws one of these pitches and it

475
00:25:18,280 --> 00:25:21,399
Speaker 2: just seems to hover in the air, I really wondered

476
00:25:21,400 --> 00:25:23,119
Speaker 2: if we were going to get some kind of like

477
00:25:23,600 --> 00:25:27,840
Speaker 2: magical realism, like break with reality when the ephis pitch

478
00:25:27,880 --> 00:25:30,680
Speaker 2: finally happened, and to me, it just looked like a pitch.

479
00:25:30,760 --> 00:25:32,960
Speaker 2: You know, it didn't look like a fastball, but it

480
00:25:33,000 --> 00:25:35,359
Speaker 2: didn't stop time for me. I didn't think, oh my gosh,

481
00:25:35,400 --> 00:25:38,960
Speaker 2: that that ball looked so slow. It's just guy throwing

482
00:25:39,000 --> 00:25:42,520
Speaker 2: a baseball, so you know, it's It's another way in

483
00:25:42,560 --> 00:25:48,199
Speaker 2: which the film doesn't doesn't dramatize or over emphasize what

484
00:25:48,320 --> 00:25:52,640
Speaker 2: it's doing in terms of even even creating that strange

485
00:25:52,720 --> 00:25:55,000
Speaker 2: little legend around a strange big legend.

486
00:25:55,200 --> 00:25:55,639
Speaker 5: Yeah, it has.

487
00:25:55,760 --> 00:25:57,359
Speaker 3: I mean, I think the movie in general has this

488
00:25:57,440 --> 00:26:01,919
Speaker 3: real Altmanesque quality, both in terms of its huge ensemble

489
00:26:02,440 --> 00:26:05,080
Speaker 3: that does not explain to us who the ensemble is.

490
00:26:05,080 --> 00:26:07,840
Speaker 3: We just sort of learn as we go. But I

491
00:26:07,840 --> 00:26:11,320
Speaker 3: think the other Altmanesque quality of the movie is an

492
00:26:11,320 --> 00:26:15,800
Speaker 3: almost sort of shrug at genre, which is, oh, you

493
00:26:15,880 --> 00:26:18,160
Speaker 3: expect this, like you said, Tasha, like, oh, we've heard

494
00:26:18,160 --> 00:26:20,040
Speaker 3: so much about the ephis pitch. Here we go and

495
00:26:20,080 --> 00:26:23,760
Speaker 3: it's oh, it's just it's that's the pitch. That's that's

496
00:26:23,760 --> 00:26:24,480
Speaker 3: what it is.

497
00:26:25,040 --> 00:26:26,000
Speaker 8: Correct me if I'm wrong.

498
00:26:26,200 --> 00:26:33,240
Speaker 3: Is he the character who says that strikeouts or fascist?

499
00:26:33,640 --> 00:26:37,960
Speaker 2: It happens off screen? So it certainly seems the continuity

500
00:26:38,000 --> 00:26:41,080
Speaker 2: certainly suggests that it's him, but you don't actually see

501
00:26:41,119 --> 00:26:41,920
Speaker 2: somebody say it.

502
00:26:42,000 --> 00:26:45,720
Speaker 3: Because rewatching both movies this week, I did not remember

503
00:26:45,920 --> 00:26:50,680
Speaker 3: that both films use that line. And I'm so curious

504
00:26:51,240 --> 00:26:53,840
Speaker 3: because Crash says it in Bull Durham, and I was

505
00:26:53,920 --> 00:26:57,159
Speaker 3: so curious. I have an interviewed Carson Lund, but I

506
00:26:57,160 --> 00:26:59,359
Speaker 3: would love to know, like if that is supposed to

507
00:26:59,440 --> 00:27:02,440
Speaker 3: be because this way, that's not what we're talking about

508
00:27:02,480 --> 00:27:05,720
Speaker 3: baseball expressions and things. I'm not familiar with that being

509
00:27:05,760 --> 00:27:07,760
Speaker 3: a baseball expression, so I don't know if that's actually

510
00:27:08,280 --> 00:27:09,520
Speaker 3: a nod to.

511
00:27:10,320 --> 00:27:12,520
Speaker 8: I absolutely took it as a nod because we watched

512
00:27:12,560 --> 00:27:15,520
Speaker 8: Ephis after a Bull Durham and heard that line and

513
00:27:15,560 --> 00:27:18,960
Speaker 8: it was Leonardo pointing at the screen and you know moment,

514
00:27:20,240 --> 00:27:23,760
Speaker 8: and and like there are other like moments of quoting

515
00:27:23,800 --> 00:27:29,280
Speaker 8: baseball movies throughout Ephis prior to the Yankees, and first,

516
00:27:31,280 --> 00:27:33,879
Speaker 8: it absolutely makes sense that they would just drop that

517
00:27:33,960 --> 00:27:37,520
Speaker 8: in as a as a nod there. I absolutely loved it.

518
00:27:37,560 --> 00:27:41,040
Speaker 8: I actually I wrote it down in Connections just to

519
00:27:41,119 --> 00:27:43,240
Speaker 8: make sure that we touched on it. But I'm glad

520
00:27:43,240 --> 00:27:44,200
Speaker 8: we got it here.

521
00:27:44,080 --> 00:27:47,520
Speaker 2: There was definitely another line early in the film that

522
00:27:48,359 --> 00:27:51,480
Speaker 2: was you know something pretty mundane about baseball, but was

523
00:27:51,520 --> 00:27:54,639
Speaker 2: definitely a direct quote that you know, again, could be

524
00:27:54,960 --> 00:27:56,760
Speaker 2: could be met as an acknowledgment, or could just be

525
00:27:56,800 --> 00:27:59,639
Speaker 2: people talking baseball talk. But I did have that moment

526
00:28:00,040 --> 00:28:03,440
Speaker 2: at least one other time during the movie of Oh okay,

527
00:28:03,480 --> 00:28:07,320
Speaker 2: this is this is an open acknowledgment of influences.

528
00:28:07,600 --> 00:28:09,200
Speaker 5: Well, I was trying to remember which film was in

529
00:28:09,280 --> 00:28:11,919
Speaker 5: and now I realized it wasn't both films, which actually

530
00:28:11,920 --> 00:28:13,639
Speaker 5: seems like a good time to take a short break,

531
00:28:13,680 --> 00:28:16,159
Speaker 5: and we were right back to talk about connections between

532
00:28:16,160 --> 00:28:22,760
Speaker 5: these two films in a section we like to call connections.

533
00:28:23,920 --> 00:28:26,040
Speaker 4: Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. I don't know if

534
00:28:26,040 --> 00:28:28,960
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535
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536
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537
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538
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541
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544
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Speaker 3: Sum I'll crooking nose kid fella that can fellas?

545
00:29:02,760 --> 00:29:05,680
Speaker 8: Am I in a deli? Is this a meat market?

546
00:29:05,840 --> 00:29:09,240
Speaker 8: Am I selling you? Ham? Cut the ship and play

547
00:29:09,960 --> 00:29:10,960
Speaker 8: you like pizza.

548
00:29:10,600 --> 00:29:13,880
Speaker 6: On him, Pizza on him, him on pizza.

549
00:29:14,640 --> 00:29:15,400
Speaker 7: Yeah, it's pretty good.

550
00:29:15,520 --> 00:29:17,280
Speaker 5: Now it's time for connections, where we bring these two

551
00:29:17,280 --> 00:29:19,200
Speaker 5: films together. So we've already kind of started to do,

552
00:29:19,280 --> 00:29:22,160
Speaker 5: and I talk about all the things they have in common.

553
00:29:22,320 --> 00:29:26,480
Speaker 5: I guess our strikeouts fascist well made. Why why would

554
00:29:26,480 --> 00:29:28,520
Speaker 5: they say strikeouts are fascist?

555
00:29:28,920 --> 00:29:32,520
Speaker 3: I don't I haven't punched.

556
00:29:32,320 --> 00:29:34,560
Speaker 5: Dominating the other. It's not giving the other, your opponent

557
00:29:34,600 --> 00:29:36,920
Speaker 5: a chance. I guess you're just dominating them, right.

558
00:29:36,840 --> 00:29:41,160
Speaker 3: I suppose that's I suppose that's right. I mean feels

559
00:29:41,160 --> 00:29:44,920
Speaker 3: more in keeping with crashes. Like we were saying before

560
00:29:45,280 --> 00:29:48,280
Speaker 3: in that episode about just his he has a theory

561
00:29:48,280 --> 00:29:51,000
Speaker 3: about a lot of things that he does in his monologue,

562
00:29:51,400 --> 00:29:55,960
Speaker 3: so I could see him thinking that strikeouts are fascist,

563
00:29:56,640 --> 00:29:58,840
Speaker 3: but it doesn't resonate with me. I have to say.

564
00:29:58,880 --> 00:30:00,960
Speaker 3: It's a great line, but as a baseball fan, I

565
00:30:01,000 --> 00:30:03,000
Speaker 3: don't go, oh, that makes sense.

566
00:30:03,400 --> 00:30:05,560
Speaker 8: If I had to tease it out, I think it

567
00:30:05,640 --> 00:30:09,400
Speaker 8: might be getting at the idea that a strikeout doesn't

568
00:30:09,800 --> 00:30:12,880
Speaker 8: allow anyone else on the team to do anything. It's

569
00:30:13,040 --> 00:30:15,840
Speaker 8: just the picture, just like cutting it off. And there

570
00:30:15,920 --> 00:30:18,680
Speaker 8: is that other in Boulderham there is that other speech

571
00:30:18,720 --> 00:30:21,000
Speaker 8: about baseball being a simple game, like you hit the ball,

572
00:30:21,040 --> 00:30:22,960
Speaker 8: you catch the ball, you know, but there are these

573
00:30:23,040 --> 00:30:25,280
Speaker 8: other It's not just you throw the ball and get

574
00:30:25,280 --> 00:30:29,080
Speaker 8: the guy out, you know. There's different components to the game.

575
00:30:29,200 --> 00:30:33,479
Speaker 8: So I would maybe suggest that strikeouts being fascist is

576
00:30:33,680 --> 00:30:37,040
Speaker 8: just like the idea of overriding all those other elements

577
00:30:37,080 --> 00:30:39,080
Speaker 8: of the game by one person.

578
00:30:39,440 --> 00:30:41,800
Speaker 3: And it's interesting because in ephis I forget which character

579
00:30:41,840 --> 00:30:43,720
Speaker 3: says it, at one point he makes a joke about

580
00:30:44,040 --> 00:30:48,920
Speaker 3: baseball being democratic. I think it's about voting on once

581
00:30:48,920 --> 00:30:51,480
Speaker 3: the umpires leave. So there's also this idea that maybe

582
00:30:51,480 --> 00:30:53,959
Speaker 3: baseball itself is not democratic.

583
00:30:54,240 --> 00:30:55,480
Speaker 2: There's no voting in baseball.

584
00:31:00,080 --> 00:31:03,560
Speaker 5: Hi, this is Keith Phipps again. I'm interrupting this podcast

585
00:31:03,560 --> 00:31:06,320
Speaker 5: with a message from the future of this podcast recording,

586
00:31:06,360 --> 00:31:10,760
Speaker 5: because immediately after we recorded this, I resumed reading Ron

587
00:31:10,800 --> 00:31:14,240
Speaker 5: Shelton's book The Church of Baseball, The Making of bull Durham.

588
00:31:14,920 --> 00:31:17,280
Speaker 5: So here is a quote about this particular line. The

589
00:31:17,800 --> 00:31:21,680
Speaker 5: strikeouts are fascist. This is I'm gonna read two paragraphs

590
00:31:21,960 --> 00:31:25,440
Speaker 5: from this very good making of books. Here's Shelton. The

591
00:31:25,520 --> 00:31:28,680
Speaker 5: lines are a direct deal from Bill Spaceman Lee, former

592
00:31:28,760 --> 00:31:31,520
Speaker 5: Red Sox star and one of the game's great iconoclass.

593
00:31:31,960 --> 00:31:34,440
Speaker 5: When I met Lee years later, I asked permission to

594
00:31:34,520 --> 00:31:37,000
Speaker 5: use his line, which I'd done ten years earlier. He

595
00:31:37,080 --> 00:31:39,120
Speaker 5: granted it. Socialist that he is, he didn't feel that

596
00:31:39,160 --> 00:31:41,520
Speaker 5: he owned it. I thought Lee was the kind of

597
00:31:41,560 --> 00:31:44,280
Speaker 5: guy Crash would get along with, not because they would

598
00:31:44,280 --> 00:31:47,240
Speaker 5: share political ideologies, though they would have argued about them

599
00:31:47,240 --> 00:31:49,480
Speaker 5: over a good scotch, which I would also argue about,

600
00:31:49,760 --> 00:31:53,320
Speaker 5: but because they'd respect an informed other opinion, and neither was,

601
00:31:53,520 --> 00:31:56,880
Speaker 5: in the end an ideologue. The next paragraph is kind

602
00:31:56,880 --> 00:31:59,000
Speaker 5: of interesting too, I'm gonna read that as well. The

603
00:31:59,120 --> 00:32:01,360
Speaker 5: turn in the scene how happens not when Crash tells

604
00:32:01,360 --> 00:32:03,960
Speaker 5: the batter what pitch is coming, but when Crash then

605
00:32:04,000 --> 00:32:07,080
Speaker 5: tells Nuke what he told the batter, which leaves no

606
00:32:07,200 --> 00:32:09,880
Speaker 5: doubt about which man is in charge. A couple of

607
00:32:09,960 --> 00:32:12,440
Speaker 5: years after the movie came out, I ran into Joe

608
00:32:12,440 --> 00:32:15,520
Speaker 5: Garagiola and Johnny Binch, who were having launched in my

609
00:32:15,600 --> 00:32:18,760
Speaker 5: office at Raleigh Studios where they were shooting a commercial.

610
00:32:19,080 --> 00:32:21,760
Speaker 5: Garagiola said he didn't like my movie because the catcher

611
00:32:21,800 --> 00:32:24,880
Speaker 5: would never give away a pitch. Bench said, the hell

612
00:32:24,920 --> 00:32:27,800
Speaker 5: he wouldn't. I did it all the time. Okay, you

613
00:32:27,840 --> 00:32:33,320
Speaker 5: can now resume the regular chronology of the next picture show.

614
00:32:33,920 --> 00:32:36,720
Speaker 5: You know, if I were say, there's one element that's

615
00:32:36,760 --> 00:32:38,480
Speaker 5: all over both these films is the idea of aging

616
00:32:38,600 --> 00:32:41,000
Speaker 5: and the idea of you know, we talked about age

617
00:32:41,080 --> 00:32:43,280
Speaker 5: out of seasons of life, you know, baseball, you know,

618
00:32:43,360 --> 00:32:45,680
Speaker 5: being a part of people's lives for a certain period

619
00:32:45,720 --> 00:32:50,120
Speaker 5: and then and not after that. So I mean it's

620
00:32:50,200 --> 00:32:52,960
Speaker 5: kind of like the whole of ephis is that in

621
00:32:53,000 --> 00:32:55,360
Speaker 5: a way where it's it's part of Bullderm or or

622
00:32:56,000 --> 00:32:58,480
Speaker 5: is it all a Boulderm? Maybe I'm wrong there.

623
00:32:58,600 --> 00:33:00,880
Speaker 2: Well, it depends. I mean, if if you thought Kevin

624
00:33:00,920 --> 00:33:04,080
Speaker 2: Costner was the protagonist of bull Durham, then it would

625
00:33:04,080 --> 00:33:07,000
Speaker 2: definitely be about aging and aging out. I mean, I

626
00:33:07,000 --> 00:33:09,560
Speaker 2: think that that's one big thread in Buldurham. But much

627
00:33:09,560 --> 00:33:12,840
Speaker 2: as we discuss like who's the protagonist, if the protagonist

628
00:33:12,880 --> 00:33:15,320
Speaker 2: is romance. Then no, it's not a movie about aging out.

629
00:33:15,360 --> 00:33:18,080
Speaker 2: It's a movie about how you may age out of

630
00:33:18,120 --> 00:33:21,360
Speaker 2: some things in your life but not others. I feel

631
00:33:21,360 --> 00:33:24,920
Speaker 2: like in both of these movies there's a strong, unspoken,

632
00:33:25,640 --> 00:33:30,840
Speaker 2: just I guess, cultural connection rather than stated connection between

633
00:33:31,320 --> 00:33:36,320
Speaker 2: baseball and masculinity. You know, your prowess in sports as

634
00:33:36,480 --> 00:33:41,720
Speaker 2: representative of your masculinity, and in ethis we just sort

635
00:33:41,720 --> 00:33:44,080
Speaker 2: of have a sense of, like, we don't know what

636
00:33:44,120 --> 00:33:46,480
Speaker 2: most of these men do for a living, We don't

637
00:33:46,520 --> 00:33:50,120
Speaker 2: know a lot about most of their families. We don't

638
00:33:50,200 --> 00:33:52,960
Speaker 2: have a sense of kind of their bigger lives, and

639
00:33:53,040 --> 00:33:56,680
Speaker 2: like what else they identify with, what else they consider

640
00:33:56,760 --> 00:33:59,880
Speaker 2: important in terms of defining them. What we do know

641
00:34:00,200 --> 00:34:02,960
Speaker 2: is that they cling to this sport, They cling to

642
00:34:03,000 --> 00:34:06,000
Speaker 2: this game, they cling to this place, and they cling

643
00:34:06,040 --> 00:34:09,240
Speaker 2: to this specific game. And who's winning, you know, who

644
00:34:09,280 --> 00:34:13,000
Speaker 2: actually wins the final game does matter to them, even

645
00:34:13,040 --> 00:34:15,919
Speaker 2: if they don't over emphasize it in the same way

646
00:34:15,960 --> 00:34:19,480
Speaker 2: we see Crash. You know, he is aging out of

647
00:34:19,520 --> 00:34:22,000
Speaker 2: the game, he's aware of it, he's angry about it,

648
00:34:22,080 --> 00:34:24,959
Speaker 2: he's frustrated about it. But we know a lot more

649
00:34:25,000 --> 00:34:27,759
Speaker 2: about him off the field and who he is, and

650
00:34:27,880 --> 00:34:30,600
Speaker 2: one of the things that the movie expressly leads us

651
00:34:30,640 --> 00:34:34,920
Speaker 2: to is he feels a certain like robbing of his

652
00:34:35,040 --> 00:34:38,640
Speaker 2: masculinity in being too old for this sport. But he's

653
00:34:38,680 --> 00:34:42,040
Speaker 2: also expressing that same masculinity in other ways, you know,

654
00:34:42,200 --> 00:34:45,440
Speaker 2: in being smart and controlled and being able to train

655
00:34:45,840 --> 00:34:50,040
Speaker 2: younger men, in being able to impress and woo a

656
00:34:50,120 --> 00:34:55,200
Speaker 2: woman who's had a lot of baseball like baseball related lovers,

657
00:34:55,600 --> 00:34:58,879
Speaker 2: And by the end of the movie, he's seriously thinking

658
00:34:58,960 --> 00:35:02,680
Speaker 2: in terms of like homing a major league coach, which

659
00:35:02,719 --> 00:35:05,640
Speaker 2: is something we've had the suggestion that he could be

660
00:35:05,680 --> 00:35:09,080
Speaker 2: good at. So he's finding his masculinity in other ways.

661
00:35:09,239 --> 00:35:12,000
Speaker 2: He's finding ways to make this not an ending. He's

662
00:35:12,000 --> 00:35:16,239
Speaker 2: finding ways in which his maturity can benefit him and

663
00:35:16,280 --> 00:35:19,880
Speaker 2: his experience can benefit him. Whereas in Ethis, we just

664
00:35:19,920 --> 00:35:22,480
Speaker 2: sort of see we narrow in so much on this

665
00:35:22,640 --> 00:35:25,920
Speaker 2: one aspect of their lives that we don't necessarily see

666
00:35:26,160 --> 00:35:29,560
Speaker 2: how that effect might come into play in other aspects

667
00:35:29,600 --> 00:35:30,240
Speaker 2: of their lives.

668
00:35:30,600 --> 00:35:33,560
Speaker 3: Yeah, I love all of that, and I totally agree.

669
00:35:33,560 --> 00:35:37,480
Speaker 3: I think the aging theme and the masculinity theme are

670
00:35:37,520 --> 00:35:43,080
Speaker 3: so tied together in the two movies, And I would

671
00:35:43,080 --> 00:35:45,720
Speaker 3: also say, there is also a bit of a connection

672
00:35:45,760 --> 00:35:48,160
Speaker 3: when we talk about aging. I think, not for nothing

673
00:35:48,280 --> 00:35:52,520
Speaker 3: the Ephis is set in the nineteen nineties that it's

674
00:35:52,640 --> 00:35:57,040
Speaker 3: also like the technology that we see in the movie,

675
00:35:56,760 --> 00:36:00,960
Speaker 3: the boombox, the radio that they have, and they're listening

676
00:36:00,960 --> 00:36:03,560
Speaker 3: to older games. I think the games from the nineteen

677
00:36:03,640 --> 00:36:07,520
Speaker 3: seventies that they're listening to. There is this constant idea

678
00:36:07,760 --> 00:36:11,400
Speaker 3: of the past and sort of a kind of an

679
00:36:11,400 --> 00:36:16,480
Speaker 3: irretrievable past that I think is really strong in Ephis.

680
00:36:16,640 --> 00:36:20,320
Speaker 3: And Carson Lund, who wrote and directed it and also

681
00:36:20,520 --> 00:36:25,080
Speaker 3: edit it, he is part of this la film collective

682
00:36:25,120 --> 00:36:29,000
Speaker 3: called Omnus Films, and they also did Christmas Eve and

683
00:36:29,080 --> 00:36:32,440
Speaker 3: Miller's Point last year, and that movie was also about

684
00:36:32,440 --> 00:36:37,640
Speaker 3: like sat An unspecified past, where there is an element

685
00:36:37,680 --> 00:36:40,600
Speaker 3: of nostalgia. But the both movies, at least to my mind,

686
00:36:41,080 --> 00:36:46,920
Speaker 3: are not necessarily romanticizing nostalgia. It's almost about people not

687
00:36:47,200 --> 00:36:50,239
Speaker 3: knowing that the time that they're living in is going

688
00:36:50,320 --> 00:36:53,000
Speaker 3: to go away. Because we're in the president, we're seeing it,

689
00:36:53,320 --> 00:36:56,200
Speaker 3: and they don't know that their time is over and

690
00:36:56,239 --> 00:36:58,200
Speaker 3: that that time is gone. One of the things I

691
00:36:58,280 --> 00:37:00,319
Speaker 3: watched I thought, why I watched Ephus this time was

692
00:37:00,520 --> 00:37:04,000
Speaker 3: so if this movie's maybe mid nineties, this movie is

693
00:37:04,080 --> 00:37:07,040
Speaker 3: set thirty years ago, how many of these guys are

694
00:37:07,080 --> 00:37:11,239
Speaker 3: still alive now, you know? And to this idea of

695
00:37:11,320 --> 00:37:16,160
Speaker 3: aging the Keith brought up, it's the unremarkableness that we

696
00:37:16,239 --> 00:37:20,280
Speaker 3: keep talking about with Ephis, and the unremarkableness about these

697
00:37:20,280 --> 00:37:24,160
Speaker 3: individual men is so striking to me. If I remember

698
00:37:24,200 --> 00:37:26,760
Speaker 3: the line of dialogue correctly, one of the kids who's

699
00:37:26,800 --> 00:37:29,680
Speaker 3: watching the game says something like, yeah, I think they're

700
00:37:29,840 --> 00:37:33,360
Speaker 3: plumbers or something. And I don't know that side character

701
00:37:33,440 --> 00:37:38,040
Speaker 3: is correct, but they have unremarkable jobs. They're unremarkable people,

702
00:37:38,560 --> 00:37:42,759
Speaker 3: and that idea of I think a lot of times

703
00:37:42,840 --> 00:37:46,360
Speaker 3: in sports movies, we also have the comeback story, we

704
00:37:46,440 --> 00:37:50,880
Speaker 3: have the Rocky story essentially, and they become somebody. Ephis

705
00:37:50,880 --> 00:37:55,120
Speaker 3: about people who never became anything. They never ever became anything.

706
00:37:55,400 --> 00:37:59,080
Speaker 3: And so for me, that's attached to aging immortality and

707
00:37:59,160 --> 00:38:01,279
Speaker 3: also to Boulder because so many of those guys in

708
00:38:01,320 --> 00:38:04,120
Speaker 3: Bull Durham never get to go to the show, they're

709
00:38:04,120 --> 00:38:05,360
Speaker 3: gonna be able to tell their friends like, yeah, I

710
00:38:05,360 --> 00:38:06,719
Speaker 3: was in the minor leagues for a while and that

711
00:38:06,880 --> 00:38:10,240
Speaker 3: was fun. We've got to travel, But in both movies

712
00:38:10,719 --> 00:38:15,200
Speaker 3: it's telling that the guys smokes cigarettes and drink beer

713
00:38:15,760 --> 00:38:20,399
Speaker 3: like these are not like elites athletes, They're just they're

714
00:38:20,440 --> 00:38:23,719
Speaker 3: just kind of regular dudes. And so for me, that's

715
00:38:23,760 --> 00:38:27,200
Speaker 3: another kind of connection. I guess between the two films.

716
00:38:27,080 --> 00:38:31,959
Speaker 2: That Plumber line is particularly brutal because it's the exchange

717
00:38:32,280 --> 00:38:34,799
Speaker 2: starts with one of the two kids asking the other

718
00:38:35,320 --> 00:38:38,640
Speaker 2: why do they care so much? In a tone that

719
00:38:38,760 --> 00:38:43,879
Speaker 2: just implies, why would anybody care about this game or

720
00:38:43,920 --> 00:38:47,400
Speaker 2: this place or this sport. You know, it's it's not

721
00:38:47,480 --> 00:38:51,920
Speaker 2: even contempt, it's almost revulsion at the idea of people

722
00:38:52,000 --> 00:38:55,400
Speaker 2: caring about such a thing. And when he responds like

723
00:38:55,440 --> 00:38:58,600
Speaker 2: they're all, I don't know, plumbers or something like, he's

724
00:38:58,600 --> 00:39:02,960
Speaker 2: basically just saying they have no other lives. But the

725
00:39:03,000 --> 00:39:06,840
Speaker 2: way younger people, as we're talking about aging, I guess,

726
00:39:07,000 --> 00:39:10,560
Speaker 2: looking at the difference between the way younger people respond

727
00:39:10,640 --> 00:39:13,960
Speaker 2: to the game and the players in ephis with something

728
00:39:14,000 --> 00:39:19,560
Speaker 2: between like mystification and sort of amused hostility and bewilderment,

729
00:39:20,360 --> 00:39:23,880
Speaker 2: versus say, the the younger woman that is one of

730
00:39:23,920 --> 00:39:28,200
Speaker 2: Annie's best friends in bull Durham, who really like is

731
00:39:28,600 --> 00:39:30,680
Speaker 2: there Yeah, Millie is just there for all of it.

732
00:39:31,000 --> 00:39:33,440
Speaker 2: She's there for casual sex in the.

733
00:39:33,920 --> 00:39:38,080
Speaker 8: She's kind of Annie's protege, like she's kind of mirror crash.

734
00:39:38,200 --> 00:39:41,480
Speaker 2: Yeah, She's, She's, She's she's coming up in the sport

735
00:39:41,560 --> 00:39:44,400
Speaker 2: of pick a baseball player and have sex with him

736
00:39:44,440 --> 00:39:46,440
Speaker 2: for a season and then and then drop him. But

737
00:39:46,600 --> 00:39:50,160
Speaker 2: she she sidelines herself on that one. She she finds

738
00:39:50,160 --> 00:39:51,200
Speaker 2: another way to go with it.

739
00:39:51,480 --> 00:39:54,000
Speaker 5: She gets a whole story. She and the fiance get

740
00:39:54,040 --> 00:39:55,400
Speaker 5: a whole story that kind of plays out in the

741
00:39:55,480 --> 00:39:57,839
Speaker 5: Side and the and the Margins of Bulldurham, don't they.

742
00:39:58,000 --> 00:40:01,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, And it's a really really cute story. But it's

743
00:40:01,120 --> 00:40:03,520
Speaker 2: sort of the exact opposite of kind of the aging

744
00:40:03,560 --> 00:40:06,160
Speaker 2: element that's going on in these two films. And I

745
00:40:06,160 --> 00:40:10,080
Speaker 2: guess having young people around to contrast to your your

746
00:40:10,120 --> 00:40:13,200
Speaker 2: aging protagonists and your message about aging is just another

747
00:40:13,200 --> 00:40:14,200
Speaker 2: way of highlighting it.

748
00:40:14,400 --> 00:40:16,880
Speaker 3: Well, I like Whatatasha, what you just said is I

749
00:40:17,040 --> 00:40:19,720
Speaker 3: like that in Ephis we have all these like side

750
00:40:19,800 --> 00:40:24,959
Speaker 3: characters who constantly are just it's almost pity like, why

751
00:40:25,000 --> 00:40:28,160
Speaker 3: are these guys? And I think it's a testament to

752
00:40:28,200 --> 00:40:30,759
Speaker 3: the movie and how Carson Lund has the right perspective,

753
00:40:31,160 --> 00:40:33,759
Speaker 3: which is that the movie does not say, well, those

754
00:40:33,800 --> 00:40:37,040
Speaker 3: people just don't understand the beauty of baseball. The movie

755
00:40:37,560 --> 00:40:42,360
Speaker 3: allows two conflicting viewpoints to exist. One is, if you

756
00:40:42,440 --> 00:40:47,400
Speaker 3: love baseball, you love it. But for everybody else, you're crazy.

757
00:40:48,000 --> 00:40:51,880
Speaker 8: Or there's a soccer game over there. Yeah, the soccer

758
00:40:51,920 --> 00:40:54,839
Speaker 8: game kind of also feels like a representation of like

759
00:40:54,960 --> 00:40:59,520
Speaker 8: a younger era, you know, especially if this being set

760
00:40:59,560 --> 00:41:03,439
Speaker 8: in the nineties, which I did not catch that that's

761
00:41:03,480 --> 00:41:06,239
Speaker 8: when Ephus was said. I don't know if it was stated.

762
00:41:06,040 --> 00:41:08,239
Speaker 5: At some point, it's just it's like the cars in

763
00:41:08,239 --> 00:41:08,919
Speaker 5: the boom Box.

764
00:41:09,000 --> 00:41:12,960
Speaker 8: Yeah, I mean I was actually thinking of earlier technology. Yeah,

765
00:41:13,160 --> 00:41:15,960
Speaker 8: but it is kind of set in this nebulous past,

766
00:41:16,120 --> 00:41:18,440
Speaker 8: and like tim you were starting to get into this

767
00:41:18,520 --> 00:41:21,240
Speaker 8: with the sort of timeless feeling and how that's wrapped

768
00:41:21,320 --> 00:41:24,680
Speaker 8: up in you know, nostalgia and all that. But I

769
00:41:24,719 --> 00:41:28,440
Speaker 8: wanted to talk about how Bull Durham is like set

770
00:41:28,640 --> 00:41:33,480
Speaker 8: in the modern day. But Annie in particular, and a

771
00:41:33,520 --> 00:41:36,799
Speaker 8: lot of the movie beyond her, is styled like much

772
00:41:36,840 --> 00:41:39,320
Speaker 8: more mid century, Like like Annie looks straight out of

773
00:41:39,360 --> 00:41:41,160
Speaker 8: the forties, you know, like she looks like she should

774
00:41:41,160 --> 00:41:42,520
Speaker 8: be in a league of their own, and like I

775
00:41:42,520 --> 00:41:45,080
Speaker 8: found myself a lot of times thinking like when is

776
00:41:45,120 --> 00:41:47,719
Speaker 8: this movie taking place? Like, you know, some of the

777
00:41:48,440 --> 00:41:51,440
Speaker 8: music cues had like kind of like jazzy swing feel

778
00:41:51,480 --> 00:41:54,680
Speaker 8: to it, and it, just as with Ephis, it had

779
00:41:54,680 --> 00:41:57,880
Speaker 8: this feeling of being set in sort of a nebulous past,

780
00:41:58,200 --> 00:42:02,799
Speaker 8: even though it wasn't. And I think there is kind

781
00:42:02,800 --> 00:42:06,120
Speaker 8: of a through line there with the idea of nostalgia

782
00:42:06,440 --> 00:42:12,239
Speaker 8: and baseball maybe being something that we think of as

783
00:42:12,520 --> 00:42:15,040
Speaker 8: old fashioned or like part of our past, like our

784
00:42:15,080 --> 00:42:19,759
Speaker 8: cultural past, and with Epis in particular, I feel like

785
00:42:19,840 --> 00:42:24,680
Speaker 8: it's slowness is part of that too. Like no shade

786
00:42:24,760 --> 00:42:29,319
Speaker 8: to baseball broadly, but it feels like a sport that

787
00:42:29,480 --> 00:42:33,000
Speaker 8: is not paced at the level of our modern day.

788
00:42:33,120 --> 00:42:35,719
Speaker 5: Yeah, there's it's a lot of attention with baseball is

789
00:42:35,760 --> 00:42:37,600
Speaker 5: how how to keep an interest in this sport with

790
00:42:37,640 --> 00:42:39,920
Speaker 5: so many ties to the past that has not I mean,

791
00:42:39,960 --> 00:42:42,719
Speaker 5: there have been attempts to modernize it fairly successfully. I

792
00:42:42,760 --> 00:42:45,120
Speaker 5: think the pitch clock's been good, but like before the

793
00:42:45,120 --> 00:42:49,080
Speaker 5: pitch clock, you know, it would take forever between between pitches,

794
00:42:49,120 --> 00:42:51,720
Speaker 5: and the game would not you know, did not adjust,

795
00:42:52,680 --> 00:42:56,520
Speaker 5: not even necessarily to contemporary attention spans like human attention

796
00:42:56,600 --> 00:42:59,799
Speaker 5: spans at times, you know, so there is a little

797
00:42:59,840 --> 00:43:02,520
Speaker 5: bit I mean it is, you know, what makes it

798
00:43:02,560 --> 00:43:05,560
Speaker 5: timeless also makes it, uh so maybe something a little

799
00:43:06,360 --> 00:43:08,920
Speaker 5: not as accessible to new fans in some ways.

800
00:43:09,200 --> 00:43:11,759
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, like Keith said, like the pitch clock

801
00:43:11,800 --> 00:43:14,520
Speaker 3: has definitely helped. But in terms of like the four

802
00:43:14,719 --> 00:43:19,560
Speaker 3: major North American sports, you know, hockey, basketball, football, baseball

803
00:43:19,640 --> 00:43:23,319
Speaker 3: just has a lot less action in it. And to

804
00:43:23,360 --> 00:43:26,319
Speaker 3: Jenevieve's point, like in the modern times, it is a

805
00:43:26,360 --> 00:43:30,840
Speaker 3: harder sell because there is more downtime in baseball, and

806
00:43:30,920 --> 00:43:34,480
Speaker 3: I think ephis gets that element really right, because there's

807
00:43:34,520 --> 00:43:37,600
Speaker 3: a lot of times where it's just people like literally

808
00:43:37,600 --> 00:43:40,759
Speaker 3: sitting around and just kind of shooting the bowl or

809
00:43:41,120 --> 00:43:44,240
Speaker 3: you know, goofing off in the outfield or daydreaming or whatever.

810
00:43:44,280 --> 00:43:46,279
Speaker 3: And that, for better or words, that is actually how

811
00:43:46,320 --> 00:43:51,040
Speaker 3: bad baseball feels now fans. So I like that, but

812
00:43:51,200 --> 00:43:54,719
Speaker 3: it is it is harder to get people interested in

813
00:43:54,760 --> 00:43:56,840
Speaker 3: it in the modern era. In terms of a connection,

814
00:43:56,880 --> 00:43:58,360
Speaker 3: I just like to throw up really quick that I

815
00:43:58,400 --> 00:44:01,480
Speaker 3: thought while watching The Two Moves is if the two

816
00:44:01,480 --> 00:44:07,480
Speaker 3: movies existed in the same universe, I feel like Crash

817
00:44:08,000 --> 00:44:11,920
Speaker 3: would want to play with those guys, oh yeah, for sure,

818
00:44:12,120 --> 00:44:15,400
Speaker 3: and Nuke would have no interest. And I'm curious how

819
00:44:15,400 --> 00:44:16,480
Speaker 3: you all felt about that.

820
00:44:16,920 --> 00:44:20,240
Speaker 2: I could see Nuke showing up like later in life,

821
00:44:20,280 --> 00:44:22,200
Speaker 2: Like I don't know that either of them are ready

822
00:44:22,200 --> 00:44:26,400
Speaker 2: for this game at this moment, but Crash potentially like

823
00:44:26,600 --> 00:44:30,200
Speaker 2: settling into to life in the small town and then

824
00:44:30,280 --> 00:44:32,920
Speaker 2: like leaving for the show to coach, but coming back

825
00:44:33,320 --> 00:44:35,840
Speaker 2: to the small town and to Annie. I could definitely

826
00:44:35,880 --> 00:44:38,840
Speaker 2: see him being involved in this kind of like aging

827
00:44:39,040 --> 00:44:43,840
Speaker 2: out local just like you know, Beer League game, because

828
00:44:43,840 --> 00:44:45,799
Speaker 2: it reminds him of his youth, and it reminds him

829
00:44:45,800 --> 00:44:47,799
Speaker 2: of his skills, and he's also playing with a bunch

830
00:44:47,800 --> 00:44:49,960
Speaker 2: of people on his same level. But we do have

831
00:44:50,080 --> 00:44:53,080
Speaker 2: like the one the one younger dude on the team,

832
00:44:53,480 --> 00:44:56,680
Speaker 2: you know, who's hitting hitting balls into the fence and

833
00:44:57,239 --> 00:44:59,760
Speaker 2: making a point of how he's he's better than other folk.

834
00:45:00,080 --> 00:45:04,000
Speaker 2: And that to me is the Nuke character, you know,

835
00:45:04,040 --> 00:45:07,640
Speaker 2: the character who feels on some level that he's above

836
00:45:07,719 --> 00:45:10,600
Speaker 2: all of this, but at the same time, like showing

837
00:45:10,680 --> 00:45:13,879
Speaker 2: up to play with these guys allows him to kind

838
00:45:13,880 --> 00:45:16,120
Speaker 2: of kind of like wait his superiority a little bit.

839
00:45:16,560 --> 00:45:18,600
Speaker 2: And I feel like we get that from Ebbie at

840
00:45:18,600 --> 00:45:21,640
Speaker 2: the beginning of Bull Durham, when he hasn't earned it,

841
00:45:21,760 --> 00:45:23,680
Speaker 2: he shows up and he feels like he's better than

842
00:45:23,719 --> 00:45:27,600
Speaker 2: everybody else there, even though most of his balls go

843
00:45:28,760 --> 00:45:34,480
Speaker 2: into absolutely wild places, including repeatedly clocking the mascot like

844
00:45:34,680 --> 00:45:38,600
Speaker 2: I could see him, especially not too much later in life,

845
00:45:39,200 --> 00:45:44,879
Speaker 2: where as Crash keeps telling him like his arm might

846
00:45:44,960 --> 00:45:47,120
Speaker 2: be good, but a lot of his pitches they're just

847
00:45:47,120 --> 00:45:49,560
Speaker 2: going to take the cover off of in the major leagues.

848
00:45:50,080 --> 00:45:52,239
Speaker 2: And if he bottoms out of the major leagues, I

849
00:45:52,239 --> 00:45:54,680
Speaker 2: could easily see him being the guy that shows up

850
00:45:54,719 --> 00:45:58,480
Speaker 2: for like his local baseball game with these shmos because

851
00:45:58,960 --> 00:46:03,000
Speaker 2: he's like years younger and therefore he can regain that

852
00:46:03,040 --> 00:46:05,120
Speaker 2: feeling of just being better than everybody else.

853
00:46:06,400 --> 00:46:10,600
Speaker 8: My question is who on the field in ephis would

854
00:46:10,600 --> 00:46:13,440
Speaker 8: Annie choose as her target for the season.

855
00:46:19,040 --> 00:46:21,960
Speaker 2: What would she say about the stance for the larger

856
00:46:22,040 --> 00:46:26,439
Speaker 2: guy who says mother McCree every time something happens, which

857
00:46:26,480 --> 00:46:29,080
Speaker 2: is just a little character beat that cracks me up.

858
00:46:30,200 --> 00:46:32,760
Speaker 2: I think he's also the guy that says the worst

859
00:46:32,800 --> 00:46:36,560
Speaker 2: part of this sport is all the running. Yes, I

860
00:46:36,600 --> 00:46:38,319
Speaker 2: feel like she could achieve, she would have a lot

861
00:46:38,360 --> 00:46:41,880
Speaker 2: to do to improve his his stance, like where he

862
00:46:41,920 --> 00:46:44,240
Speaker 2: puts his hips and where his follow through.

863
00:46:44,200 --> 00:46:47,879
Speaker 5: Is, and it's knowledge of Walt Whitman, probably, I think

864
00:46:47,880 --> 00:46:48,800
Speaker 5: would probably improve.

865
00:46:50,400 --> 00:46:52,680
Speaker 2: I like to think of her as just tying a

866
00:46:52,719 --> 00:46:55,080
Speaker 2: series of dudes to her bed in order to read them.

867
00:46:55,080 --> 00:46:59,439
Speaker 2: Walt Woodman. We are given to understand that she likes

868
00:46:59,600 --> 00:47:02,279
Speaker 2: reading poetry to her men and them reading poetry to her.

869
00:47:03,160 --> 00:47:06,759
Speaker 2: We don't necessarily see her tying up more people, but

870
00:47:07,040 --> 00:47:09,200
Speaker 2: I like to think that that a lot of those

871
00:47:09,239 --> 00:47:10,520
Speaker 2: relationships start that way.

872
00:47:11,040 --> 00:47:13,960
Speaker 3: One small thing in Boulderham I forgot to mention that

873
00:47:14,000 --> 00:47:16,160
Speaker 3: I never knows until this time watching it. When she

874
00:47:16,280 --> 00:47:20,400
Speaker 3: reads the poetry, she has a baseball card as her bookmark.

875
00:47:21,920 --> 00:47:25,080
Speaker 3: It's such a small, nice little like of course she would.

876
00:47:25,160 --> 00:47:28,360
Speaker 3: That makes total sense. It's such a nice little beat

877
00:47:28,400 --> 00:47:29,480
Speaker 3: there by Ron Shelton.

878
00:47:30,000 --> 00:47:31,040
Speaker 2: Now I wonder who it is.

879
00:47:31,760 --> 00:47:34,080
Speaker 3: I could. I couldn't zoom in close enough to see,

880
00:47:34,080 --> 00:47:35,920
Speaker 3: but I was curious.

881
00:47:35,719 --> 00:47:37,799
Speaker 5: As long as we're just putting up small things like

882
00:47:37,840 --> 00:47:40,839
Speaker 5: One of my favorite jokes in Ephis is the fact

883
00:47:40,880 --> 00:47:43,560
Speaker 5: that one team is called the River Dogs, another team

884
00:47:43,640 --> 00:47:49,880
Speaker 5: is called Adler's paint have a sponsor. We should actually

885
00:47:49,880 --> 00:47:52,160
Speaker 5: talk about women in ephis because there's not a lot

886
00:47:52,200 --> 00:47:54,279
Speaker 5: of them and they don't stick around for very long.

887
00:47:54,320 --> 00:47:57,919
Speaker 5: We get the one player's girlfriend, fairly recent girlfriend who

888
00:47:58,480 --> 00:48:00,600
Speaker 5: shows up and for what I'm I'm gonna say, it's

889
00:48:00,600 --> 00:48:04,160
Speaker 5: probably her only game that she shows up for. And

890
00:48:04,200 --> 00:48:09,520
Speaker 5: then we get GNDA Belinda, and that's kind of it, right, I.

891
00:48:09,440 --> 00:48:11,560
Speaker 8: Mean their daughter who sings.

892
00:48:12,160 --> 00:48:16,719
Speaker 2: You know, there's the there's the invisible niece who's being confirmed,

893
00:48:16,840 --> 00:48:19,120
Speaker 2: which leads one of the one of the men to say,

894
00:48:19,280 --> 00:48:20,480
Speaker 2: this is why I'm never going to.

895
00:48:20,520 --> 00:48:21,160
Speaker 8: Have a niece.

896
00:48:23,320 --> 00:48:25,600
Speaker 3: And then that's the way the actor who picks him

897
00:48:25,680 --> 00:48:27,200
Speaker 3: up and says, you have to come. That's the guy

898
00:48:27,320 --> 00:48:32,200
Speaker 3: from Uncut Gems right. Yeah, you cannot mistake those teeth

899
00:48:32,360 --> 00:48:35,160
Speaker 3: and that hair is just amazing in a way.

900
00:48:35,600 --> 00:48:39,719
Speaker 2: US's equivalent of Annie and Bulldurham is Franny, you know,

901
00:48:39,840 --> 00:48:42,440
Speaker 2: who is not sleeping with any of the players as

902
00:48:42,440 --> 00:48:45,480
Speaker 2: far as we can tell, but in terms of showing

903
00:48:45,560 --> 00:48:48,279
Speaker 2: up to every game and being present and involved and

904
00:48:48,320 --> 00:48:52,120
Speaker 2: sitting there with a scorecard and keeping track. I never

905
00:48:52,120 --> 00:48:55,840
Speaker 2: got the impression, especially given how far back he's sitting

906
00:48:56,360 --> 00:48:59,359
Speaker 2: somebody said earlier that he was the scorekeeper. I think

907
00:48:59,360 --> 00:49:01,600
Speaker 2: they were doing a job of keeping the score themselves.

908
00:49:01,640 --> 00:49:04,160
Speaker 2: I think he's the equivalent of a train spotter, and

909
00:49:04,200 --> 00:49:07,320
Speaker 2: that's why he's got like the forms that he's filling

910
00:49:07,360 --> 00:49:10,560
Speaker 2: out with, like all of the little the little official marks,

911
00:49:10,560 --> 00:49:13,400
Speaker 2: and he's just sort of like muttering little notes to

912
00:49:13,560 --> 00:49:18,680
Speaker 2: himself about the play. I think that he's presented as

913
00:49:18,800 --> 00:49:24,279
Speaker 2: a character who maybe he's neuroatypical, maybe he's just like

914
00:49:24,360 --> 00:49:29,800
Speaker 2: a lifer who's obsessed with baseball, but like much like Annie,

915
00:49:29,920 --> 00:49:32,920
Speaker 2: he's very involved in the micro of the game, and

916
00:49:32,960 --> 00:49:36,440
Speaker 2: he's a loyalist, and he we're given to understand that

917
00:49:36,440 --> 00:49:39,560
Speaker 2: he shows up to every game and sits and fills

918
00:49:39,600 --> 00:49:43,680
Speaker 2: out those little scorecards, noting what everybody does, you know,

919
00:49:43,719 --> 00:49:49,160
Speaker 2: every inning. So yeah, he doesn't have the same presence

920
00:49:49,320 --> 00:49:53,040
Speaker 2: in terms of bringing femininity or bringing romance to it,

921
00:49:53,320 --> 00:49:57,160
Speaker 2: but in terms of just being the what would you

922
00:49:57,200 --> 00:49:59,600
Speaker 2: call it, just sort of like the loyal fandom, the

923
00:49:59,680 --> 00:50:03,600
Speaker 2: hang on that isn't there to participate in the sport,

924
00:50:03,800 --> 00:50:07,160
Speaker 2: but loves the sport, even if you would articulate in

925
00:50:07,200 --> 00:50:09,759
Speaker 2: it a very different way. I think that's what we

926
00:50:09,840 --> 00:50:10,960
Speaker 2: end up getting out of Franny.

927
00:50:11,400 --> 00:50:11,760
Speaker 5: Yeah.

928
00:50:12,400 --> 00:50:17,400
Speaker 3: I mean, I also think with Bull Durham, it was

929
00:50:17,440 --> 00:50:20,160
Speaker 3: such a smart choice on Ron Shelton's part to have

930
00:50:20,719 --> 00:50:24,200
Speaker 3: Annie not just love baseball but really know it, to

931
00:50:24,360 --> 00:50:27,640
Speaker 3: really really know it, you know, in modern times with

932
00:50:27,719 --> 00:50:31,000
Speaker 3: all the different major like North American sports, is this

933
00:50:31,040 --> 00:50:34,520
Speaker 3: real attempt to get more women fans and be as

934
00:50:34,640 --> 00:50:39,080
Speaker 3: inclusive in terms of advertising to them specifically, Whereas I

935
00:50:39,120 --> 00:50:42,920
Speaker 3: would argue that in the nineteen eighties baseball, though a

936
00:50:42,960 --> 00:50:46,000
Speaker 3: lot of women are baseball fans, it was primarily seen

937
00:50:46,040 --> 00:50:50,920
Speaker 3: as more of a male sport. And to have that

938
00:50:51,080 --> 00:50:53,839
Speaker 3: character in Bull Durham be a woman and to know

939
00:50:53,920 --> 00:50:56,560
Speaker 3: so much about baseball and have her lead the movie,

940
00:50:57,040 --> 00:50:59,320
Speaker 3: to have her talk about baseball from the very beginning,

941
00:50:59,680 --> 00:51:03,920
Speaker 3: gave that movie a different perspective than almost any baseball movie,

942
00:51:04,160 --> 00:51:07,319
Speaker 3: just because it's more seen from a woman's perspective than

943
00:51:07,360 --> 00:51:11,920
Speaker 3: most baseball movies are. And with ephis I think carson

944
00:51:11,960 --> 00:51:14,480
Speaker 3: Lund does a really good job of really kind of

945
00:51:14,480 --> 00:51:18,160
Speaker 3: focusing on the masculinity of it by having almost no

946
00:51:18,360 --> 00:51:21,040
Speaker 3: women present. It's almost like it's not that women aren't

947
00:51:21,080 --> 00:51:24,719
Speaker 3: allowed into that space, but I think carson Lund is

948
00:51:24,719 --> 00:51:28,040
Speaker 3: almost suggesting that there's no reason for women to be

949
00:51:28,080 --> 00:51:32,600
Speaker 3: around there because it's such a guy thing. It's such

950
00:51:32,640 --> 00:51:37,320
Speaker 3: a guy bonding ritual that the women in their lives

951
00:51:37,440 --> 00:51:40,400
Speaker 3: know there's no reason for us to even bother showing

952
00:51:40,480 --> 00:51:41,160
Speaker 3: up to this thing.

953
00:51:41,480 --> 00:51:42,560
Speaker 5: This is something that.

954
00:51:42,480 --> 00:51:45,440
Speaker 3: My husband or my boyfriend has to do, and I

955
00:51:45,440 --> 00:51:49,560
Speaker 3: don't understand it, and that's fine. And I find that

956
00:51:49,600 --> 00:51:54,720
Speaker 3: to be such an interesting choice on carson Lund's part

957
00:51:54,880 --> 00:51:59,080
Speaker 3: in terms of just intentionally having almost no women in

958
00:51:59,120 --> 00:52:03,279
Speaker 3: the movie, making it like kind of a sad playground

959
00:52:03,280 --> 00:52:06,719
Speaker 3: for middle aged men essentially where there is no room

960
00:52:06,719 --> 00:52:08,960
Speaker 3: for women because it's just a space for guys to

961
00:52:09,040 --> 00:52:13,080
Speaker 3: be sad with each other in a way.

962
00:52:13,200 --> 00:52:15,279
Speaker 2: I wouldn't go that far. I mean, I think it's

963
00:52:15,280 --> 00:52:18,359
Speaker 2: fulfilling for them. I think it's a form of communication

964
00:52:19,239 --> 00:52:22,640
Speaker 2: that's comfortable and supportive for them. You know, there's a

965
00:52:22,680 --> 00:52:26,760
Speaker 2: certain amount of ribbing, but it's it's not overtly hostile.

966
00:52:27,320 --> 00:52:29,800
Speaker 2: They do care about the competition, they do care about

967
00:52:29,800 --> 00:52:33,439
Speaker 2: who wins, but it never gets nasty. They're like, this

968
00:52:33,480 --> 00:52:38,200
Speaker 2: is not about you know, masculine anger or toxicity or

969
00:52:38,520 --> 00:52:43,280
Speaker 2: like inability to express yourself or you know, emotional repression,

970
00:52:43,400 --> 00:52:46,880
Speaker 2: like the all of the aspects of like all male

971
00:52:46,920 --> 00:52:51,040
Speaker 2: spaces that we sometimes see in films, because bringing all

972
00:52:51,120 --> 00:52:54,279
Speaker 2: that stuff in is dramatic. This just seems like it

973
00:52:54,360 --> 00:52:57,040
Speaker 2: is a very male space. But it seems like this

974
00:52:57,160 --> 00:52:59,680
Speaker 2: because this is a place that they're comfortable and that

975
00:53:00,040 --> 00:53:02,399
Speaker 2: they find fulfilling for the most part, and that they're

976
00:53:02,480 --> 00:53:04,840
Speaker 2: sad to see go away. I don't see that as

977
00:53:04,920 --> 00:53:06,279
Speaker 2: quite as sad as I think you do.

978
00:53:06,719 --> 00:53:06,839
Speaker 3: Well.

979
00:53:06,880 --> 00:53:08,640
Speaker 5: I think I think the darker read is that they

980
00:53:08,760 --> 00:53:11,360
Speaker 5: used to find a fulfilling and now you just do

981
00:53:11,480 --> 00:53:15,040
Speaker 5: it and like it's it's yeah, just like the game itself,

982
00:53:15,040 --> 00:53:16,839
Speaker 5: they're just playing it out to the end because they

983
00:53:16,840 --> 00:53:17,600
Speaker 5: started something.

984
00:53:18,120 --> 00:53:20,360
Speaker 3: I agree with Keith, but I also agree with Tasha.

985
00:53:20,480 --> 00:53:23,200
Speaker 3: Let me just sort of clarify. I like the idea

986
00:53:23,320 --> 00:53:27,400
Speaker 3: in ephis that it's not it's not a toxic space

987
00:53:27,440 --> 00:53:30,080
Speaker 3: and it's not that kind. This is not the Glengary

988
00:53:30,080 --> 00:53:33,880
Speaker 3: Glenn Ross of like Baseball, like wreck Baseball movies. But

989
00:53:33,960 --> 00:53:35,680
Speaker 3: I think that there is a little bit of a

990
00:53:35,920 --> 00:53:40,600
Speaker 3: sadness of they don't have many other spaces like this

991
00:53:41,160 --> 00:53:44,480
Speaker 3: in their life, and so I think maybe there's a

992
00:53:44,480 --> 00:53:47,719
Speaker 3: bit of projection. Frankly, in terms of me looking at

993
00:53:47,800 --> 00:53:50,759
Speaker 3: looking at those guys and thinking, I think in some

994
00:53:50,800 --> 00:53:55,160
Speaker 3: ways I do see it from the bystanders perspective, Like

995
00:53:55,239 --> 00:53:58,239
Speaker 3: you said of why do they why do they care

996
00:53:58,320 --> 00:54:01,800
Speaker 3: so much? I think whether it's baseball or movies or

997
00:54:01,800 --> 00:54:04,920
Speaker 3: whatever it is that you really love, other people from

998
00:54:04,920 --> 00:54:07,440
Speaker 3: the outside are always going to say, so you spend

999
00:54:07,440 --> 00:54:10,200
Speaker 3: a lot of time doing this, huh, like that's your thing,

1000
00:54:10,280 --> 00:54:12,920
Speaker 3: it will always be like mysterious to other people. So

1001
00:54:13,320 --> 00:54:16,160
Speaker 3: I think there is a certain sadness because they're not

1002
00:54:16,320 --> 00:54:17,920
Speaker 3: super great at One of the things I also I

1003
00:54:17,960 --> 00:54:20,839
Speaker 3: think is great. An ephis is when a player hits

1004
00:54:20,840 --> 00:54:23,239
Speaker 3: a home run and it's the one moment there's like

1005
00:54:23,480 --> 00:54:28,759
Speaker 3: slow motion in ephis and I really love it because

1006
00:54:29,360 --> 00:54:32,439
Speaker 3: other than like the slam dunk in basketball, I don't

1007
00:54:32,440 --> 00:54:34,759
Speaker 3: think there's anything that's more amazing in sports than a

1008
00:54:34,800 --> 00:54:38,960
Speaker 3: home run. And there's something about like, as a kid,

1009
00:54:38,960 --> 00:54:41,360
Speaker 3: I'll just speak for myself. As a kid, the idea

1010
00:54:41,400 --> 00:54:44,880
Speaker 3: of hitting a home run seemed impossible, and also to

1011
00:54:45,040 --> 00:54:48,319
Speaker 3: Keith's point before about like this idea of masculinity, there

1012
00:54:48,400 --> 00:54:51,400
Speaker 3: seemed to be something macho and cool if you were

1013
00:54:51,400 --> 00:54:54,560
Speaker 3: a young guy who hit a baseball that far it

1014
00:54:54,680 --> 00:54:57,640
Speaker 3: meant that you were strong, especially when you I think

1015
00:54:57,640 --> 00:55:00,920
Speaker 3: a boy who's into sports that the way do you

1016
00:55:01,040 --> 00:55:03,839
Speaker 3: sort of prove it's like like a male right of passage.

1017
00:55:03,920 --> 00:55:06,279
Speaker 3: And the way the movie like slows down for a

1018
00:55:06,320 --> 00:55:09,480
Speaker 3: second and just watches the home run, it's almost as

1019
00:55:09,520 --> 00:55:12,719
Speaker 3: if it's saying, even at these guys's age, there's this

1020
00:55:12,920 --> 00:55:16,719
Speaker 3: awe about, like can you believe a human being just

1021
00:55:17,120 --> 00:55:20,040
Speaker 3: did That's that's amazing.

1022
00:55:19,800 --> 00:55:22,160
Speaker 8: To go back to sort of the question of is

1023
00:55:22,200 --> 00:55:27,359
Speaker 8: it sad? Seems like these guys are there less out

1024
00:55:27,400 --> 00:55:30,640
Speaker 8: of passion than almost a sense of inertia, and I

1025
00:55:30,680 --> 00:55:34,120
Speaker 8: feel like that is something that you feel as you

1026
00:55:34,200 --> 00:55:39,400
Speaker 8: get older. It's like it's harder to reclaim your youthful passions,

1027
00:55:39,480 --> 00:55:44,000
Speaker 8: whatever they may be. And that home run moment is

1028
00:55:44,440 --> 00:55:48,440
Speaker 8: a glimmer of that old feeling, you know. But the

1029
00:55:48,560 --> 00:55:51,759
Speaker 8: game overall, they're a little more going through the motions

1030
00:55:52,000 --> 00:55:54,480
Speaker 8: of it, which does kind of bring us back to

1031
00:55:54,520 --> 00:55:58,759
Speaker 8: the theme of aging and aging out of something that

1032
00:55:58,840 --> 00:56:02,920
Speaker 8: you once loved ones maybe defined you. That's more in

1033
00:56:02,960 --> 00:56:06,160
Speaker 8: the case of Bull Durham than an ephis, but there's

1034
00:56:06,200 --> 00:56:07,160
Speaker 8: certainly a link there.

1035
00:56:07,360 --> 00:56:09,920
Speaker 2: I think another interesting link is just looking at how

1036
00:56:10,080 --> 00:56:13,799
Speaker 2: differently the two movies address home runs, because you've got

1037
00:56:14,120 --> 00:56:17,560
Speaker 2: a couple of different threads around home runs. In Bull Durham.

1038
00:56:17,760 --> 00:56:21,799
Speaker 2: One is Crash is quietly setting a record that he

1039
00:56:21,880 --> 00:56:24,520
Speaker 2: doesn't want acknowledged, that he doesn't want in the press.

1040
00:56:25,040 --> 00:56:28,360
Speaker 2: He's just, as he says, knocking out dingers, which I

1041
00:56:28,360 --> 00:56:32,080
Speaker 2: will never hear without thinking of the Simpsons Baseball episode,

1042
00:56:32,680 --> 00:56:35,279
Speaker 2: just quietly knocking out dingers to hit that record that

1043
00:56:35,400 --> 00:56:39,640
Speaker 2: only he and Annie are going to notice and commemorate

1044
00:56:39,800 --> 00:56:43,479
Speaker 2: and celebrate. He's just doing the work, and he's doing

1045
00:56:43,480 --> 00:56:46,120
Speaker 2: it kind of privately for himself more than anything else.

1046
00:56:46,440 --> 00:56:49,000
Speaker 2: But you also have the big comedic moment where somebody

1047
00:56:49,000 --> 00:56:52,600
Speaker 2: scores a home run off of Nuke and it hits

1048
00:56:52,719 --> 00:56:58,680
Speaker 2: the bowl display that exists specifically to field home runs

1049
00:56:58,760 --> 00:57:01,280
Speaker 2: hit to that arena, and then there's like the mechanical

1050
00:57:01,280 --> 00:57:04,040
Speaker 2: effect of like it's eyes light up, but it's tail wags,

1051
00:57:04,080 --> 00:57:06,959
Speaker 2: and you know, the local restaurant gives you a free

1052
00:57:06,960 --> 00:57:10,400
Speaker 2: steak for hitting the bull, So you know that turns

1053
00:57:10,520 --> 00:57:14,480
Speaker 2: the home run into a comedy element, something that probably

1054
00:57:14,520 --> 00:57:18,560
Speaker 2: happens fairly regularly at that field, But that also becomes

1055
00:57:19,320 --> 00:57:23,959
Speaker 2: a completely commercial marketed thing for a local restaurant, which

1056
00:57:24,000 --> 00:57:26,080
Speaker 2: is sort of funny given that ephis has its own,

1057
00:57:26,240 --> 00:57:31,680
Speaker 2: like really awkward radio commercial for a local steakhouse that

1058
00:57:31,840 --> 00:57:35,840
Speaker 2: is probably like the direct equivalent in that setting. But

1059
00:57:35,920 --> 00:57:38,600
Speaker 2: you contrast that with that slow motion run around the

1060
00:57:38,640 --> 00:57:42,880
Speaker 2: bases where even members of the other team congratulate him

1061
00:57:43,000 --> 00:57:45,360
Speaker 2: for having hitten that home run. He does not go

1062
00:57:45,480 --> 00:57:49,200
Speaker 2: in for the hug with mother McCree guy. He leaves

1063
00:57:49,240 --> 00:57:52,360
Speaker 2: him hanging, which is tragic, but he does like give

1064
00:57:52,400 --> 00:57:55,080
Speaker 2: somebody from the other team a weird sort of not

1065
00:57:55,120 --> 00:57:57,200
Speaker 2: a risk, not a fistbump so much as a wrist bump.

1066
00:57:58,320 --> 00:58:00,680
Speaker 2: But you know the other team is congratuate him because

1067
00:58:00,680 --> 00:58:03,560
Speaker 2: it's such a big deal for somebody in that game

1068
00:58:04,120 --> 00:58:05,720
Speaker 2: at that point of their lives to hit a home

1069
00:58:05,800 --> 00:58:09,000
Speaker 2: run that it demands to be celebrated, and the in

1070
00:58:09,040 --> 00:58:11,760
Speaker 2: Bulderham it doesn't demand to be celebrated except maybe with

1071
00:58:11,800 --> 00:58:13,960
Speaker 2: a free stake from from your local steakhouse.

1072
00:58:15,400 --> 00:58:19,880
Speaker 5: So both these films are in some ways about future

1073
00:58:19,920 --> 00:58:23,600
Speaker 5: last games, right and with with Ephis, the whole movie

1074
00:58:23,680 --> 00:58:26,919
Speaker 5: is the last game. With bull Deram, it's it's it's

1075
00:58:26,960 --> 00:58:30,280
Speaker 5: a side where we hear about Crash getting the home

1076
00:58:30,360 --> 00:58:32,800
Speaker 5: running needed to break the record. But they're both kind

1077
00:58:32,800 --> 00:58:35,840
Speaker 5: of anti climaxes, right, I mean, neither of these films

1078
00:58:36,320 --> 00:58:39,560
Speaker 5: build to a big dramatic moment. I think they're both

1079
00:58:39,680 --> 00:58:43,120
Speaker 5: extremely successful films in different ways, but they're not You

1080
00:58:43,160 --> 00:58:45,240
Speaker 5: don't get the traditional payoff you get from from well,

1081
00:58:45,320 --> 00:58:46,440
Speaker 5: honestly most movies.

1082
00:58:46,920 --> 00:58:47,080
Speaker 7: Yeah.

1083
00:58:47,120 --> 00:58:49,760
Speaker 8: I mean, I think we've said multiple times about both

1084
00:58:49,760 --> 00:58:53,280
Speaker 8: these movies that they're, you know, non traditional sports movies,

1085
00:58:53,440 --> 00:58:56,080
Speaker 8: and the fact that they both end in the sort

1086
00:58:56,080 --> 00:58:59,720
Speaker 8: of anti climactic matter is a big part of that.

1087
00:59:00,120 --> 00:59:03,200
Speaker 8: And as you say, it's about a last game, it's

1088
00:59:03,240 --> 00:59:07,120
Speaker 8: not necessarily about a big game, you know, and the

1089
00:59:07,160 --> 00:59:10,840
Speaker 8: big game is such a trope of the sports movie,

1090
00:59:10,960 --> 00:59:13,840
Speaker 8: you know. So the fact that both of these kind

1091
00:59:13,920 --> 00:59:17,040
Speaker 8: of peter out in their own way and just end

1092
00:59:17,760 --> 00:59:20,120
Speaker 8: links them as very non traditional.

1093
00:59:20,400 --> 00:59:23,560
Speaker 2: Tim said something in the first half of this conversation

1094
00:59:23,640 --> 00:59:27,320
Speaker 2: about one of the themes of Bulderham being baseball has

1095
00:59:27,360 --> 00:59:30,880
Speaker 2: an expiration date. I actually wrote that down because I thought,

1096
00:59:30,960 --> 00:59:33,400
Speaker 2: you know, we definitely need to bring that up with Ethis,

1097
00:59:33,400 --> 00:59:36,920
Speaker 2: because that's the whole movie. The whole theme there is

1098
00:59:37,760 --> 00:59:42,840
Speaker 2: sports careers. You know, can flame out spectacularly with an

1099
00:59:42,840 --> 00:59:47,440
Speaker 2: injury or you know, something tragic or dramatic happening off

1100
00:59:47,520 --> 00:59:51,120
Speaker 2: the field, but more often they just you just see

1101
00:59:51,160 --> 00:59:53,520
Speaker 2: people not hitting the numbers that they used to hit,

1102
00:59:54,080 --> 00:59:57,760
Speaker 2: and you know, sliding down in terms of their fame

1103
00:59:57,840 --> 01:00:02,160
Speaker 2: or there's their numbers, there their sabermetrics, what have you.

1104
01:00:02,800 --> 01:00:05,840
Speaker 2: And I think a lot of people have maybe experienced

1105
01:00:06,000 --> 01:00:09,800
Speaker 2: that sense of including like people who peak in high

1106
01:00:09,800 --> 01:00:13,800
Speaker 2: school or people who have you know, college scholarships and

1107
01:00:14,200 --> 01:00:17,600
Speaker 2: studying college sports careers, but then like don't pick up

1108
01:00:17,720 --> 01:00:19,720
Speaker 2: or don't go on too the majors. I think a

1109
01:00:19,760 --> 01:00:23,320
Speaker 2: lot of people are probably familiar with that, like slow

1110
01:00:23,400 --> 01:00:26,120
Speaker 2: anti climactic petering out of a sports career.

1111
01:00:26,440 --> 01:00:29,160
Speaker 5: Well, I don't want to us peter out anticlimatically, but.

1112
01:00:29,120 --> 01:00:34,560
Speaker 8: I appropriate, yeah, well should we should?

1113
01:00:34,600 --> 01:00:37,040
Speaker 2: We maybe just sort of like mutter exchanges to ourselves

1114
01:00:37,080 --> 01:00:40,240
Speaker 2: and we slowly turned the plates down.

1115
01:00:40,520 --> 01:00:43,960
Speaker 5: Someone plays a melancholy Tom Waite song and then we're done. Well, no,

1116
01:00:44,280 --> 01:00:45,720
Speaker 5: that's not how Ruini and we have a little bit

1117
01:00:45,720 --> 01:00:48,240
Speaker 5: coming back after the break. But for now you should

1118
01:00:48,280 --> 01:00:50,520
Speaker 5: know that ephis is currently in select theaters. It's a

1119
01:00:50,560 --> 01:00:52,880
Speaker 5: small release from from Music Bock Films right here in

1120
01:00:52,920 --> 01:00:56,200
Speaker 5: Chicago U and but it'll be rolling out throughout the country.

1121
01:00:56,240 --> 01:00:58,480
Speaker 5: Look forward. I think it's really good. Bull Geram is

1122
01:00:58,480 --> 01:01:01,800
Speaker 5: widely availble to stream, you know, usual spots. There's also

1123
01:01:01,840 --> 01:01:05,200
Speaker 5: a very nice criterion collection edition of the film which

1124
01:01:05,240 --> 01:01:08,720
Speaker 5: features extra footage of the clown prints of Baseball, So

1125
01:01:09,040 --> 01:01:11,400
Speaker 5: it's got that going for it. We'll be right back

1126
01:01:11,760 --> 01:01:12,960
Speaker 5: with your next Picture show.

1127
01:01:13,520 --> 01:01:16,600
Speaker 2: Wait. Wait, we never asked the most important question about ephis,

1128
01:01:16,680 --> 01:01:18,960
Speaker 2: which is which one of those men is wearing the

1129
01:01:18,960 --> 01:01:31,440
Speaker 2: garter belt, how he plays.

1130
01:01:33,080 --> 01:01:35,240
Speaker 5: Finally, it's time to recommend a film or film related

1131
01:01:35,280 --> 01:01:37,720
Speaker 5: item that compliments this set of episodes. We call it

1132
01:01:37,800 --> 01:01:39,880
Speaker 5: your Next Picture Show in hopes it'll put some interesting

1133
01:01:39,920 --> 01:01:41,760
Speaker 5: choices on your radar. We always love it when one

1134
01:01:41,800 --> 01:01:44,080
Speaker 5: of our guests does our work force side. Tim, you

1135
01:01:44,080 --> 01:01:47,600
Speaker 5: have a recommendation that you want to share with everyone.

1136
01:01:48,160 --> 01:01:52,680
Speaker 3: Yes, in terms of baseball movies, and it's appropriate more

1137
01:01:52,920 --> 01:01:56,120
Speaker 3: for Bulderham, but I think it actually works with both

1138
01:01:56,160 --> 01:01:58,120
Speaker 3: movies and what we've talked about, and that's the two

1139
01:01:58,120 --> 01:02:01,560
Speaker 3: thousand and eight film Sugar, which was directed by Anna

1140
01:02:01,600 --> 01:02:07,680
Speaker 3: Boden and Ryan Fleck. It's probably among their lesser known films,

1141
01:02:07,680 --> 01:02:10,440
Speaker 3: and now they're known for that Captain Marvel movie, I guess,

1142
01:02:10,920 --> 01:02:14,320
Speaker 3: But this is back in the Half Nelson days and

1143
01:02:14,520 --> 01:02:20,880
Speaker 3: it tells the story of a young prospect who has

1144
01:02:20,960 --> 01:02:24,520
Speaker 3: this amazing arm and he seems like he is going

1145
01:02:24,560 --> 01:02:27,320
Speaker 3: to be the next big thing. He is from the

1146
01:02:27,320 --> 01:02:32,720
Speaker 3: Dominican and the movie is told from his perspective, working

1147
01:02:32,760 --> 01:02:37,280
Speaker 3: his way through the Dominican leagues and then being drafted

1148
01:02:37,400 --> 01:02:40,880
Speaker 3: and going to America and playing in the minor leagues.

1149
01:02:41,640 --> 01:02:45,600
Speaker 3: We've talked during these two episodes about this idea of

1150
01:02:45,920 --> 01:02:49,680
Speaker 3: when are baseball movies getting away from the tropes or

1151
01:02:49,720 --> 01:02:52,720
Speaker 3: not necessarily a baseball movie, And I think Sugar really

1152
01:02:53,400 --> 01:02:56,160
Speaker 3: checks both of those boxes, because I would almost argue

1153
01:02:56,160 --> 01:02:59,959
Speaker 3: that this movie is a political film in certain ways,

1154
01:03:00,080 --> 01:03:02,840
Speaker 3: because it's very much about a topic that is very

1155
01:03:02,960 --> 01:03:06,040
Speaker 3: rarely talked about in baseball or baseball movies, which is

1156
01:03:06,560 --> 01:03:10,400
Speaker 3: what is the immigrant experience in baseball. So many players

1157
01:03:10,840 --> 01:03:14,080
Speaker 3: in the major leagues do not come or do not

1158
01:03:14,320 --> 01:03:16,880
Speaker 3: grow up here in America, and Sugar, I think is

1159
01:03:16,880 --> 01:03:20,960
Speaker 3: a pretty clear eyed portrait of what the challenges are

1160
01:03:21,560 --> 01:03:24,080
Speaker 3: from someone who doesn't speak the language and could very

1161
01:03:24,120 --> 01:03:27,840
Speaker 3: easily be exploited when he comes to the US, and

1162
01:03:27,880 --> 01:03:31,640
Speaker 3: because it's mostly set in the minor leagues, we see

1163
01:03:31,960 --> 01:03:35,280
Speaker 3: the complications that he deals with, the pressures that he

1164
01:03:35,320 --> 01:03:38,600
Speaker 3: deals with because he does want to get to the majors.

1165
01:03:38,840 --> 01:03:41,720
Speaker 3: And it's a pretty I think, kind of frank it's

1166
01:03:41,760 --> 01:03:44,000
Speaker 3: not bleak, but I think it's a very kind of

1167
01:03:44,080 --> 01:03:47,280
Speaker 3: honest portrait of just how difficult it is, because to

1168
01:03:47,320 --> 01:03:50,520
Speaker 3: our conversation about the idea of getting to the show

1169
01:03:50,640 --> 01:03:53,720
Speaker 3: is really kind of glamorous, but Sugar, I think, really

1170
01:03:53,760 --> 01:03:57,760
Speaker 3: kind of casts a dim eye on just how difficult

1171
01:03:57,800 --> 01:03:59,800
Speaker 3: it is. And if you did not grow up in

1172
01:03:59,800 --> 01:04:02,240
Speaker 3: this country, and if you don't make it to the majors,

1173
01:04:02,600 --> 01:04:05,360
Speaker 3: then what happens to you? Where do you end up

1174
01:04:05,840 --> 01:04:09,280
Speaker 3: in the US or back home? What does your life

1175
01:04:09,400 --> 01:04:12,680
Speaker 3: actually look like. It's a little bit of an underrated film,

1176
01:04:12,800 --> 01:04:15,800
Speaker 3: a bit underseen, I think, but in terms of great

1177
01:04:15,840 --> 01:04:18,760
Speaker 3: baseball movies from this century, I think it kind of

1178
01:04:18,800 --> 01:04:22,640
Speaker 3: stands head and shoulders above everything else. It's available for

1179
01:04:22,760 --> 01:04:27,200
Speaker 3: streaming and renting at the usual places, but I really

1180
01:04:27,200 --> 01:04:29,520
Speaker 3: really recommend it. I think it's a really, really just

1181
01:04:29,680 --> 01:04:31,040
Speaker 3: terrific movie period.

1182
01:04:31,480 --> 01:04:32,720
Speaker 5: Yeah, I'll suck up that one.

1183
01:04:33,000 --> 01:04:37,840
Speaker 2: Yeah. Third, I as somebody who's just not generally engaged

1184
01:04:37,920 --> 01:04:41,560
Speaker 2: by sports movies, sports stories. The fact that this one

1185
01:04:41,600 --> 01:04:44,600
Speaker 2: is just such a kind of a personal narrative and

1186
01:04:45,120 --> 01:04:48,840
Speaker 2: kind of subversive in the way it addresses the idea

1187
01:04:48,840 --> 01:04:52,560
Speaker 2: of these like baseball schools that are just trying to

1188
01:04:53,040 --> 01:04:58,600
Speaker 2: propel people out of you know, poor environments into countries

1189
01:04:58,640 --> 01:05:01,360
Speaker 2: that just have a completely different idea of you know,

1190
01:05:01,440 --> 01:05:05,120
Speaker 2: monetary compensation for sports and how much it feels like,

1191
01:05:05,480 --> 01:05:09,200
Speaker 2: you know, dangling a golden ticket in front of large

1192
01:05:09,200 --> 01:05:12,520
Speaker 2: communities of people, and then you know, knowing that people

1193
01:05:12,920 --> 01:05:15,440
Speaker 2: who do make the cut, who do step up, are

1194
01:05:15,520 --> 01:05:20,920
Speaker 2: basically just being imported into America to entertain these sports

1195
01:05:20,960 --> 01:05:25,040
Speaker 2: fans and make money for very, very rich people. It's

1196
01:05:25,160 --> 01:05:27,760
Speaker 2: very clear eyed. But then at the same time, it

1197
01:05:27,800 --> 01:05:31,680
Speaker 2: doesn't feel like a political polemic. It's political without being preachy.

1198
01:05:32,240 --> 01:05:36,520
Speaker 2: It just finds the personal side of engaging with a

1199
01:05:36,520 --> 01:05:39,560
Speaker 2: lot of like pretty complicated issues in a way that

1200
01:05:39,680 --> 01:05:43,120
Speaker 2: just feels feels effortless. It's a really great movie.

1201
01:05:43,160 --> 01:05:45,160
Speaker 5: Well that's it for this episode of The Next Picture Show.

1202
01:05:45,200 --> 01:05:47,200
Speaker 5: That's what I think we've steered you toward a lot

1203
01:05:47,200 --> 01:05:50,040
Speaker 5: of good movies. These last two episodes. We'll be back

1204
01:05:50,120 --> 01:05:52,120
Speaker 5: next week with another of episodes, Jimmy, can you tell

1205
01:05:52,160 --> 01:05:53,040
Speaker 5: us about our next Pairan?

1206
01:05:53,680 --> 01:05:56,600
Speaker 8: In Mickey seventeen, the new sci fi comedy from Parasite

1207
01:05:56,640 --> 01:05:59,240
Speaker 8: director Bang June Hoe, a group of columnists from Earth

1208
01:05:59,280 --> 01:06:01,360
Speaker 8: look to settle on an ice planet, but they don't

1209
01:06:01,400 --> 01:06:03,360
Speaker 8: yet know the dangers they might be facing from the

1210
01:06:03,440 --> 01:06:07,000
Speaker 8: environment or from creatures native to the planet. To that end,

1211
01:06:07,160 --> 01:06:10,120
Speaker 8: Robert Pattinson stars as Inexpendable, a guy who can be

1212
01:06:10,200 --> 01:06:13,400
Speaker 8: killed over and over again in scientific experiments and then

1213
01:06:13,440 --> 01:06:15,960
Speaker 8: be reborn through a printer that more or less maintains

1214
01:06:15,960 --> 01:06:19,280
Speaker 8: his personality and his memories. As the columnists try to

1215
01:06:19,320 --> 01:06:22,080
Speaker 8: forge a new home in this frozen landscape, they encounter

1216
01:06:22,200 --> 01:06:25,640
Speaker 8: mysterious space bugs they call creepers, and seem inclined to

1217
01:06:25,680 --> 01:06:30,040
Speaker 8: exterminate them. This seemingly unprompted hostility calls to mind Paul

1218
01:06:30,120 --> 01:06:34,520
Speaker 8: Verhoven's Starship Troopers, another subversive sci fi comedy about moronic

1219
01:06:34,560 --> 01:06:37,240
Speaker 8: Earthlings sending their best to defeat wave after wave of

1220
01:06:37,280 --> 01:06:40,640
Speaker 8: deadly iraqnts. In next week's set of episodes, we'll talk

1221
01:06:40,640 --> 01:06:43,720
Speaker 8: about two acclaimed foreign filmmakers coming to Hollywood to make

1222
01:06:43,760 --> 01:06:48,040
Speaker 8: satires about pointless intergalactic conflicts. If you'd like to know more,

1223
01:06:48,200 --> 01:06:51,680
Speaker 8: all you have to do is download our podcast for now.

1224
01:06:51,760 --> 01:06:54,480
Speaker 5: We welcome your feedback on Bull, Durham, Ephus, and anything

1225
01:06:54,520 --> 01:06:56,720
Speaker 5: else film related you'd like to talk about. Email us

1226
01:06:56,720 --> 01:06:58,800
Speaker 5: at comments at Nextpicture Show dot net, or leave us

1227
01:06:58,800 --> 01:07:01,320
Speaker 5: a voicemail at seven to seven three two three four

1228
01:07:01,440 --> 01:07:04,520
Speaker 5: nine seven three zero before we close out this week's episode.

1229
01:07:04,520 --> 01:07:06,439
Speaker 5: Where can you find everyone these days? Tim, We'll start

1230
01:07:06,440 --> 01:07:06,640
Speaker 5: with you.

1231
01:07:07,000 --> 01:07:10,200
Speaker 3: I am on social media in the usual places Twitter,

1232
01:07:10,560 --> 01:07:14,360
Speaker 3: I guess, Instagram and a blue sky at Tim Grierson

1233
01:07:14,720 --> 01:07:17,640
Speaker 3: that's g R I E R S O N. I'm

1234
01:07:18,080 --> 01:07:21,240
Speaker 3: writing at Screen International and the Los Angeles Times and

1235
01:07:21,360 --> 01:07:25,000
Speaker 3: Rolling Stone and Roderibert dot com. And I also have

1236
01:07:25,040 --> 01:07:28,680
Speaker 3: a weekly film podcast with my longtime friend Will Leach

1237
01:07:28,760 --> 01:07:33,360
Speaker 3: is called Grierson and Leech, and it's a podcast where

1238
01:07:33,360 --> 01:07:37,400
Speaker 3: we review new releases every week and get listener requests

1239
01:07:37,400 --> 01:07:39,840
Speaker 3: to go back and look at movies and talk about

1240
01:07:39,880 --> 01:07:43,160
Speaker 3: them from before we started doing the podcast nine years ago,

1241
01:07:43,200 --> 01:07:45,720
Speaker 3: so we've done things from the nineteen forties, we've done

1242
01:07:45,800 --> 01:07:49,120
Speaker 3: things from the twenty tens. And that's a weekly podcast

1243
01:07:49,160 --> 01:07:52,040
Speaker 3: we do every Sunday Night and Genevieve how about you?

1244
01:07:52,640 --> 01:07:55,439
Speaker 8: Oh, I am still the TV editor at Vulture dot

1245
01:07:55,480 --> 01:08:01,400
Speaker 8: Com and increasingly sporadically on Blue Sky also at Genevieve Koski.

1246
01:08:01,880 --> 01:08:04,880
Speaker 5: Do you mean increasingly present or increasingly.

1247
01:08:04,680 --> 01:08:07,960
Speaker 8: No, increasingly I was doing real good. I had like

1248
01:08:08,000 --> 01:08:09,800
Speaker 8: a like two or three weeks stretch there where I

1249
01:08:09,800 --> 01:08:11,560
Speaker 8: was like, oh, yeah, this is how I used to

1250
01:08:11,560 --> 01:08:13,920
Speaker 8: be on social media, and it just all fell apart again.

1251
01:08:14,680 --> 01:08:17,080
Speaker 8: It's like the New Year's resolution to go back to

1252
01:08:17,120 --> 01:08:19,120
Speaker 8: the gym, you know, I was. I was really good

1253
01:08:19,120 --> 01:08:20,160
Speaker 8: for a little while there.

1254
01:08:20,640 --> 01:08:23,880
Speaker 5: In a long run, it's healthier.

1255
01:08:25,240 --> 01:08:27,800
Speaker 2: Tasha, how about you, Well, you can find me at

1256
01:08:27,800 --> 01:08:29,720
Speaker 2: the gym if you want to come hang out with

1257
01:08:29,720 --> 01:08:32,600
Speaker 2: me at the gym. That's mostly where I am. Hashtag

1258
01:08:32,640 --> 01:08:37,200
Speaker 2: gym life, hashtag. Jim rat Halftag totally ripped I am

1259
01:08:37,240 --> 01:08:39,960
Speaker 2: on Blue Sky at Tasha Robinson. I also have been

1260
01:08:40,360 --> 01:08:43,519
Speaker 2: tailing off as of late. I will be back when

1261
01:08:43,520 --> 01:08:46,960
Speaker 2: I'm less busy, But right now I'm busy and everything

1262
01:08:47,000 --> 01:08:49,679
Speaker 2: seems a little Everything that I do seems a little

1263
01:08:50,160 --> 01:08:54,280
Speaker 2: flippant and lightweight for social media these days, they were

1264
01:08:54,360 --> 01:08:57,320
Speaker 2: just operating the wrong social media spheres. I don't know,

1265
01:08:57,760 --> 01:09:00,800
Speaker 2: but yeah over on Blue Sky at Tasha Robinson and

1266
01:09:01,000 --> 01:09:05,320
Speaker 2: I am the entertainment editor at Polygon dot com, where

1267
01:09:05,360 --> 01:09:08,000
Speaker 2: you can find my writing and the writing of many

1268
01:09:08,000 --> 01:09:12,040
Speaker 2: other people that I curate and edit. Keith, how about you, I'm.

1269
01:09:11,880 --> 01:09:14,640
Speaker 5: A freelance writer. You can find my writing at places

1270
01:09:14,680 --> 01:09:17,479
Speaker 5: like you find a place to like currently The Ringer

1271
01:09:17,520 --> 01:09:20,080
Speaker 5: and Vulture and TV Guide. But you can really find

1272
01:09:20,080 --> 01:09:22,640
Speaker 5: my writing at The Reveal, which is the newsletter I

1273
01:09:22,800 --> 01:09:25,760
Speaker 5: co write with our absit co host Scott Tobias as

1274
01:09:25,760 --> 01:09:28,760
Speaker 5: the Revealed dot substack dot com, where we do a

1275
01:09:28,760 --> 01:09:31,840
Speaker 5: lot of a lot of talking about movies basically. And hey,

1276
01:09:31,840 --> 01:09:34,760
Speaker 5: if you ever want to play baseball with me on PlayStation,

1277
01:09:35,080 --> 01:09:37,439
Speaker 5: I play MLB the show. My handle is s O

1278
01:09:37,560 --> 01:09:43,720
Speaker 5: P h W E r K. I'm moderately okay, so

1279
01:09:44,800 --> 01:09:46,960
Speaker 5: the only plug I had for any sort of athletics

1280
01:09:46,960 --> 01:09:50,639
Speaker 5: skill whatsoever. As for the podcast itself, you can stay

1281
01:09:50,680 --> 01:09:52,920
Speaker 5: updated on the Next Picture Show at Next Picture Show

1282
01:09:52,960 --> 01:09:55,800
Speaker 5: dot net and on Blue Sky at the Next Picture Show,

1283
01:09:55,880 --> 01:09:59,679
Speaker 5: get bonus content and open discussion at Patreon dot com

1284
01:09:59,680 --> 01:10:02,400
Speaker 5: slash Jack's Picture Show, and as always, we appreciate your

1285
01:10:02,439 --> 01:10:05,920
Speaker 5: radiant reviews on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or wherever you

1286
01:10:05,960 --> 01:10:08,879
Speaker 5: listen to the show. Thanks to Dan the Bake Jakes

1287
01:10:08,920 --> 01:10:11,760
Speaker 5: for his assistants producing this podcast. The Next Picture Show

1288
01:10:11,840 --> 01:10:13,679
Speaker 5: is proud to be part of the Film Spotting family

1289
01:10:13,680 --> 01:10:15,639
Speaker 5: of podcasts. Please tune in next time.