Speaker 1: Gid A, Peter Helly here, welcome to you Ain't Seen
Speaker 1: Nothing Yet the movie Podcast, where I chat to a
Speaker 1: movie lover about a classic, aw beloved movie they haven't
Speaker 1: quite got around to watching until now, and Today's guests
Speaker 1: Journalist TV hosts broadcaster mate Haimi's McDonald.
Speaker 2: The first rule of fight Club is you do not
Speaker 2: talk about fake.
Speaker 3: Club now always. You're afraid of you broke my heart.
Speaker 2: I admire your luck, mister Bond, James.
Speaker 1: Bond, they have an right now.
Speaker 2: Don't see nothing here.
Speaker 1: Hamish McDonald is not only an outstanding journalist but quite
Speaker 1: simply one magnificent bloke. Hamish has done the hard yards
Speaker 1: over the years, working for everyone from Al Jazeera Channel
Speaker 1: four and ITV in England, ABC both in America and Australia,
Speaker 1: and of course Channel ten where he hosts a Sunday
Speaker 1: project alongside Lisa Wilkinson and or when Lalitez the Sniffles
Speaker 1: he joins us during the week. Like god good journalist,
Speaker 1: Hamish is always prepared to listen and debate to put
Speaker 1: his point forward. But it never feels that Hamees's mind
Speaker 1: has ever shut off to possibilities, even when he's talking
Speaker 1: world affairs with an unqualified braffoon like myself. Hamish's great
Speaker 1: fun on and off the screen. He's curious about the
Speaker 1: world and the people around him. He's empathetic with He's
Speaker 1: no pushover. Hamish knows how to put his argument to
Speaker 1: those in power and never takes a backward step. He's fun,
Speaker 1: he's intelligent, he's bloody handsome, and I'm bloody stoked to
Speaker 1: be hanging with him today? Could I?
Speaker 3: I'm Hamius McDonald. My three favorite films are Forwardings in
Speaker 3: a Funeral, I Think, I Love You, Summersault, I Love
Speaker 3: and head On I love that fucking film. And until recently,
Speaker 3: I'd never watched Punch Drunk Love.
Speaker 2: I believe this is a small piano.
Speaker 3: It's not a piano.
Speaker 1: I've got a piano.
Speaker 4: Did you get it? It was strapped in the street.
Speaker 3: Why are they here?
Speaker 2: Barry Mary.
Speaker 1: Following on from the twin successes of Boogie Knights and
Speaker 1: his Magnus Opus Magnolia, Paul Thomas Anderson wanted to show
Speaker 1: Hollywood that he could make a movie that runs under
Speaker 1: ninety minutes. At the Carni International Film Festival, when the
Speaker 1: press were lavishing praise on the young auteur over magnolia.
Speaker 1: They asked him how the packed press conference, who would
Speaker 1: he like to work with next? He gave two answers.
Speaker 1: The first were met with fervent nods. It was Daniel
Speaker 1: day Lewis. The next dame that came from PTA's mouth
Speaker 1: was met with roars of laughter. That name was Adam Sandler.
Speaker 1: The press were then discover a few years later that
Speaker 1: Anderson was not joking. He wanted to make an art
Speaker 1: House Adam Sandler comedy. The result is two thousand and
Speaker 1: two stunning punch drunk Love. We first find Adam Sandler's
Speaker 1: Barry Egan, hunted over his desk alone in the factory
Speaker 1: warehouse as he negotiates with a slightly disinterested voice on
Speaker 1: a helpline something about barcodes and putting his blue soup,
Speaker 1: making him almost disappear into the war behind him. Sandler's
Speaker 1: turn as the repressed, socially awkward Barry, a man whose
Speaker 1: blue suit may as well be a strait jacket, is
Speaker 1: still the best of his career, although his work in
Speaker 1: Uncut Gems is in the conversation when Barry's one of
Speaker 1: seven Hally sisters, brings work mate Lena Lennard played by
Speaker 1: the always great Emily Watson, into officially introduce them. Barry's
Speaker 1: life is about to take a dramatic turn. Will Lena
Speaker 1: be able to drag Barry out of the shadows and
Speaker 1: into the light? Add to this an abruptly abandoned harmonium,
Speaker 1: a shitloader putting, and a phone sex call that goes
Speaker 1: as horribly wrong as it could possibly go, and you
Speaker 1: may just have one of the most unique American romances
Speaker 1: of recent times. John Brian's magnificent, deliberately disjointed score shot
Speaker 1: by frequent PTA collaborator Robert Elswiz, whose use of lighting
Speaker 1: and lens flair is a masterclass. A movie about letting
Speaker 1: people in, letting go, and finding strength through love. Hamish McDonald,
Speaker 1: have any of your phone sex calls ever gone this family?
Speaker 3: They've all been brilliant, they've all.
Speaker 1: Been romantic, and this gentle and there's a real, real
Speaker 1: yeah push up from humanity.
Speaker 3: None of them have ever tried to extort me afterwards.
Speaker 1: It's nice. It's nice when you can this. It's a
Speaker 1: business transaction. Hey, we've had a great time. Let's just
Speaker 1: leave it at that now. Thank you for joining me.
Speaker 1: You are one of the busier guests I've had on
Speaker 1: So thank you for dragging your ass to Collingwood in
Speaker 1: the you know, on a wet Melbourne.
Speaker 3: Day, it's de rightful to be here.
Speaker 1: Why I won't ask you why you haven't seen Punch
Speaker 1: Drunk Love, because it's not like you haven't seen Star
Speaker 1: Wars or George. This is a particular kind of classic movie.
Speaker 1: I think it feels like, you know, it's it's more
Speaker 1: on the cult kind of side of classic. But are
Speaker 1: you what's your worldview of Adam Sandler going into this
Speaker 1: cause I think this is an important question for anyone
Speaker 1: watching Punch Drunk Love.
Speaker 3: I have come to the realization that he's quite a
Speaker 3: polarizing actor, and I probably fall on the skeptical side.
Speaker 3: I don't particularly like those kind of American comedy films
Speaker 3: that he's normally in. It's not a personal thing about him,
Speaker 3: but I guess the types of movies that he is
Speaker 3: in just don't particularly appeal to me. I think Emily
Speaker 3: Watson actually is someone that I would probably watch a
Speaker 3: film for. I can't remember why I didn't watch this
Speaker 3: when it came out in two thousand and two, but
Speaker 3: I reckon it probably would have been the Adam Sandler component.
Speaker 1: It's funny because Adam Sandler is I think such a
Speaker 1: strength in this film. I think once you watch it
Speaker 1: and he's I think we'll get into it. I want
Speaker 1: to talk too much about it. I think he's so
Speaker 1: great in this movie. But he also I think turns
Speaker 1: people away from the people who don't like Adam Sandler
Speaker 1: that generally it takes a lot for them to go
Speaker 1: It probably takes ten people to say you must see
Speaker 1: this movie for them to actually go see it.
Speaker 3: I guess oception of him, rightly or wrongly. And I
Speaker 3: know we're going to talk about this movie later on,
Speaker 3: is that when you go and see an Adam Sandler film,
Speaker 3: you're watching Adam Sandler be Adam Sandler. That there's not
Speaker 3: a lot of dynamism or diversity to the characters he
Speaker 3: plays as or it seems to be a bit of
Speaker 3: an iteration of the same thing. And so I definitely
Speaker 3: came to this with a fair amount of curiosity. You know,
Speaker 3: why is this one on this list? You know, I
Speaker 3: was aware of it. It wasn't, you know, a film
Speaker 3: that I'd never heard of. I was enthusiastic about sitting
Speaker 3: down and watching it, and I tried to come at
Speaker 3: this with an open mind. I also knew that he
Speaker 3: had been in what was the one You Just Uncut Gems,
Speaker 3: and I definitely did think. I read the reviews of that,
Speaker 3: I thought about watching them, and I didn't get to it,
Speaker 3: probably for the same reason, just that inherent skepticism that
Speaker 3: I have about about him. So yeah, I was ready
Speaker 3: for the journey of this film.
Speaker 1: Paul Chomas Sanderson certainly saw something. It's a remarkable press
Speaker 1: conference as in Car, which I mentioned in the intro,
Speaker 1: where they just laughed that he wanted It does sound
Speaker 1: like a joke when you say Daniel day Lewis and
Speaker 1: then Adam Sandler. Yeah, and you haven't made like a
Speaker 1: comedy yet Book United. That's some comedic elements, absolutely, and
Speaker 1: so people actually do kind of consider it a comedy,
Speaker 1: but I see it more as like good Fellows in
Speaker 1: my mind. So to kind of go from these big
Speaker 1: ensemble pieces, usually like the best character actors Philip Seema Hoffman,
Speaker 1: Julianne Moore, to then say you want to work with
Speaker 1: Daniel da Lewis, Yeah, fair enough, and then at Adam Sandler.
Speaker 1: I mean, if you're a comedian. That's that's the joke
Speaker 1: you do.
Speaker 3: I quite like that, though, So I do a bit
Speaker 3: of second screening if I'm watching films generally, and I
Speaker 3: did do a bit of reading about this and the director,
Speaker 3: and actually that really appeals to me. It made me
Speaker 3: think about White Lotus, the series that did pretty well
Speaker 3: during the pandem and the director had this fascination with
Speaker 3: Jennifer Coolidge. He played Stiffler's mum in the American Pie franchise,
Speaker 3: and you know, she in a similar way, always seemed
Speaker 3: to play the same character, the kind of blonde bimbo
Speaker 3: milf I think she was called in American Pie. And
Speaker 3: he was fascinated by her, and he did, in fact,
Speaker 3: I think I read a New Yorker magazine article about
Speaker 3: it subsequent to White Lotus. He had been so fascinated
Speaker 3: by her and so interested in what the layers were
Speaker 3: to her, underneath these very surface level portrayals of characters
Speaker 3: that she had delivered, that had actually written a whole
Speaker 3: series for her with her in mind that didn't get up.
Speaker 3: They then landed on White Lotus, and he wrote that
Speaker 3: character for her and for me, she was really a
Speaker 3: standout in that in that series, So that really appealed
Speaker 3: and the idea that he saw something in Adam Sandler
Speaker 3: beyond the kind of almost caricature of you know, characters
Speaker 3: that he plays. It was something that I was enthusiastic about.
Speaker 1: And I think, if you're right, if you're trying to
Speaker 1: break into the industry, and we get a lot of
Speaker 1: feedback from people who are trying to get in and
Speaker 1: and and it's occasionally I'll just try to kind of
Speaker 1: pick up on something that maybe helpful if you can
Speaker 1: find an actor and then maybe, you know, if you're
Speaker 1: local in Australia, it may be somebody who's you know,
Speaker 1: you know, a local actor. I did it. If I
Speaker 1: love you too. I love Peter dinkliche station agent, and
Speaker 1: I thought that guy is phenomenal and I wanted to
Speaker 1: write something for him. And it felt ridiculous. It felt
Speaker 1: like Peter thinklige is this is pre Game of Thrones,
Speaker 1: this is even pre death of a funeral. Peter Dinklish
Speaker 1: I didn't like. But it felt so bizarre for me
Speaker 1: to say that that loud, that I've written this for
Speaker 1: Peter Dnklage and then we send it to him and
Speaker 1: he had he got to like that he has some
Speaker 1: notes on that on the draft that we sent him,
Speaker 1: and we kind of you know, we took some of
Speaker 1: those and other things we said, well, this is why
Speaker 1: this has done that way. So he accepted that, but
Speaker 1: he came on board. There is a thrill of having
Speaker 1: something written for you, So don't try to write something
Speaker 1: for George Clooney. He's got But if you can find
Speaker 1: an actor who you don't think has been used in
Speaker 1: the right way to give them a comedy or to
Speaker 1: give them a drama when they're you know, usually done comedy,
Speaker 1: then then that's that's If you can excite an actor
Speaker 1: about doing that, that's that helps I think, you know,
Speaker 1: get a script SCREENLT sometimes.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I recently watched the I think it's a binge
Speaker 3: series maybe or Stan with Boyana Love Me. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: Boyana and Novakovich.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I haven't seen it, but I've only heard amazing things.
Speaker 3: And I was only vaguely aware of her, And I
Speaker 3: wouldn't put her in the same category as Adam Sandler,
Speaker 3: you know, always playing the same thing. But she is
Speaker 3: her career. She's Australian, Australian Serbian, but mainly has had
Speaker 3: a career in the United States, and I guess the
Speaker 3: characters that I think you know, She's in Suicide Squad,
Speaker 3: she was in Ititonia. She was in a series with
Speaker 3: Alan Cummings where they're sort of these detectives and they
Speaker 3: were kind of quite well, I guess they're kind of
Speaker 3: comedic roles. Probably you would you would describe them as
Speaker 3: I don't know whether you'd say Aitonia is, but I
Speaker 3: guess it was. But in Love Me and it's with
Speaker 3: Hugo Weaving. She she's the main character, and there's just
Speaker 3: so much depth to her and so much emotion, and
Speaker 3: I found her one of the more transfixing characters and
Speaker 3: actors I've watched in a long time. And she did
Speaker 3: something I think in that series that stayed with me
Speaker 3: for quite a long time and really made me ponder.
Speaker 3: And I love things that you go away reflecting on
Speaker 3: for a substantial period of time and wanting to talk
Speaker 3: to people about. And so I don't think it was
Speaker 3: written for her. I think actually it was a series
Speaker 3: that was originally made somewhere in Scandinavia maybe, and it
Speaker 3: was an Australian adaptation, but it felt actually very Australian,
Speaker 3: and I thought she was just incredible.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she is an incredible actress. And she also she
Speaker 1: is very funny. Like I don't know her particularly well.
Speaker 1: I think I've met her at maybe a handful of times.
Speaker 1: I've we interviewed a couple of times. She's for the
Speaker 1: whole years ago. When what I really admire about her
Speaker 1: is she she doesn't stop, like she just kind of
Speaker 1: if she's not working sher correct work, Like she's just
Speaker 1: doing this tennis character that's like Russian. I might have
Speaker 1: been serving on a tennis character that was just and
Speaker 1: she's just doing her own little videos hilarious.
Speaker 3: I think she has a YouTube series where she goes
Speaker 3: I've really gone down a few rabbit holes here research.
Speaker 1: There always rabbit holes to go down.
Speaker 3: And then yeah, she goes on dates with people. Yeah,
Speaker 3: and it's filmed for you for YouTube, I think, and
Speaker 3: she plays a character.
Speaker 1: Yes, I spoke. I think I spoke to somebody who
Speaker 1: actually appeared in one of those. Was on the other
Speaker 1: end of the day, Yeah, was working on these.
Speaker 3: I think someone we work with has done it, because
Speaker 3: I feel like I've had this conversation at work. Yes,
Speaker 3: project it was well, but she's actually one of our
Speaker 3: makeup artists at Channel ten. Went to high school with
Speaker 3: her at I think it's McDonald College, one of the
Speaker 3: performing arts schools in college. Yeah, my performing arts school.
Speaker 1: Give it a plug, go on.
Speaker 3: And was talking about her the other day actually, and
Speaker 3: because I think they were planning some kind of reunion
Speaker 3: or something something along those lines, and she was like,
Speaker 3: she was so cool when we were in high school.
Speaker 3: She taught us how to smudge.
Speaker 1: I forgot all about smudging.
Speaker 3: Wow, the woman of many hidden talents.
Speaker 1: We're talking smudges in on paper and that's not cool
Speaker 1: or code for something else.
Speaker 3: It could be you know, when you were at high school,
Speaker 3: primary school and you do like drawings, and then you know,
Speaker 3: you'd sort of put a bit of spit on your
Speaker 3: fingers and smudge the end of the the yeah line.
Speaker 1: I thought it might have been like code and all
Speaker 1: of a sudden condoning smudging and that's going to my face.
Speaker 1: I might have to go down that rabbit hole as well.
Speaker 1: It's much better than the rabbit hole. You're not much safer.
Speaker 1: Let's say about your three favorite films. It's really interesting
Speaker 1: ones here, four Weddings and a Funeral. Let's begin with that.
Speaker 1: What a one of the quintessential romantic comedies. You know.
Speaker 1: I remember seeing this in Glasgow. I was traveling by
Speaker 1: myself as an eighteen year old. I may have turned
Speaker 1: nineteen by the time I saw it, and just felt
Speaker 1: all the feels of you know, like missing my friends
Speaker 1: from back home, and I remember crying in the cinema
Speaker 1: watching it by myself. Did you see when it came
Speaker 1: out or did you catch it later on?
Speaker 3: I think probably I saw it when it came out,
Speaker 3: but I think I I it's a film that I've
Speaker 3: There's only a handful of films that I've watched a lot,
Speaker 3: and it's a film that I do go back to,
Speaker 3: you know, if it's a rainy day or whatever and
Speaker 3: i'm filming a bit, you know, blue, It's a film
Speaker 3: that I might put on. I think I've lived a
Speaker 3: lot of my adult life overseas, and a large chunk
Speaker 3: of that in the UK, in London, and so a
Speaker 3: lot of the locations became very familiar to me, and
Speaker 3: so I ended up, you know, I lived in a
Speaker 3: place in Islington for a long time and bits of
Speaker 3: that film shot around there, you know, the sort of
Speaker 3: the opening scenes where they're running late and she's sort
Speaker 3: of half dressed running down the high street. That's that's
Speaker 3: up the street in Islington. The sort of final scenes
Speaker 3: where you know, Any McDowell's in the in theane and
Speaker 3: Hugh Grant sort of turns up at the door. That's
Speaker 3: filmed at a house on the edge of Highbury Fields,
Speaker 3: which is where I where my place was.
Speaker 1: Was it raining in that scene? I didn't notice. God,
Speaker 1: Charlie Pickering, I'm sure it was, had a has a
Speaker 1: violent reaction to Dany McDowell, and I feel, I feel
Speaker 1: she was mostly good. She did her job in that role.
Speaker 1: Is that last scene, and I'm sure it's direction from
Speaker 1: Richard Curtis or not, but that last scene where she's
Speaker 1: yeah that line, yeah, look, he doesn't ruin the film
Speaker 1: for me.
Speaker 3: I get why people don't particularly like those films as well,
Speaker 3: you know, Richard Curtis films, they're a particular thing. But
Speaker 3: I guess I really I really loved living in the UK.
Speaker 3: I loved living in London. I felt, you know, my
Speaker 3: time there work wise and personally was was you know,
Speaker 3: really formative period in my life. And I think that
Speaker 3: and love actually it just reminds me of that time
Speaker 3: very strongly. And you know, I think I think when
Speaker 3: I first moved to the UK, I think Love Actually
Speaker 3: had just come out, and Bits of Love actually a
Speaker 3: film on the South Bank and in South London, which
Speaker 3: is where I was living. I was dossing at that point,
Speaker 3: you know, sleeping on someone's couch just near London Bridge.
Speaker 3: So it was it was all I guess I was
Speaker 3: sort of in that space, in that in that geographic
Speaker 3: space as that film came out and was a huge
Speaker 3: hit obviously, and so I think those Richard Curtis films
Speaker 3: remind me of that time in my life, and and
Speaker 3: so you know, it just connects me with that.
Speaker 1: And for the record, I love Richard Curtis films. I mean,
Speaker 1: maybe don't listen to it Love Actually episode with Eddie
Speaker 1: Bannon because he and I joined a little bit. There's
Speaker 1: a lot wrong with that film, but Richard a largely
Speaker 1: about the fields, I think, and and those you forget
Speaker 1: that four Weddings and even you know and Nodding Hill
Speaker 1: really kind of it was just so wonderful to see
Speaker 1: a group of friends and in a way that you know,
Speaker 1: a completely different kind of show. But Seinfeld kind of
Speaker 1: that kind of aspirational. Oh, these might be my friends
Speaker 1: when I get older and I'm living in a big city,
Speaker 1: and and and Seinfeld. Their characters are more unlikable. They're
Speaker 1: funny and we love them, but they're unlikable characters. Where
Speaker 1: notting Hill that it was surrounded by these warm, supportive
Speaker 1: friends of family. He'd like to take the piss out
Speaker 1: of each other, but also were there they had each
Speaker 1: other's backs. You know that that kind of scene in
Speaker 1: notting Hill when they're in the cafe when he's kind
Speaker 1: of said, you know, I can't be with you and
Speaker 1: send her away and then what are you doing? You know,
Speaker 1: it's it's a warmth of Richard Curtis film that is intoxicating.
Speaker 3: You're right, and I agree with that one hundred percent.
Speaker 3: I think the funeral scene in Four Weddings and a Funeral.
Speaker 1: Is the poem is incredible.
Speaker 3: I struggle to think of a scene in any film
Speaker 3: that touches me more. I think a cry every time
Speaker 3: I think as well. The depiction in that movie of
Speaker 3: a gay relationship or same sex relationship within a group
Speaker 3: of friends was very meaningful to me. It wasn't a
Speaker 3: gay movie, it wasn't a gay story. It just existed
Speaker 3: in a very you know, in a way that was
Speaker 3: more familiar to me.
Speaker 1: It's interesting because Ship's Creek has one a lot of fans.
Speaker 1: I love Shit's Creek for the representing a gay relationship
Speaker 1: without all the judgment and from the small town that
Speaker 1: you might usually expect in American or Canadian any kind
Speaker 1: of films. Really, and I didn't really thought about it,
Speaker 1: but for Winnings in the Funeral almost does that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, thirty years earlier.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it's an old film, and I think
Speaker 3: there was a time, I guess where where gay stories
Speaker 3: or same sex stories were almost set to the side,
Speaker 3: or treated differently, and or were somehow if they were depicted,
Speaker 3: were very controversial within a broader context. This is just
Speaker 3: a group of friends. Yeah, A couple of them happened
Speaker 3: to be in a same sex relationship, and I I
Speaker 3: suppose I saw a version of love in that, particularly
Speaker 3: in that funeral scene, that it was very meaningful. I
Speaker 3: guess when you when you are young and you know,
Speaker 3: learning about yourself and thinking about your future, that that is,
Speaker 3: you know, is important.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, something it was a bit more controversial was
Speaker 1: head on with Alextati artists. That's a different kind of
Speaker 1: relationship and the representation of a gay man's life. So
Speaker 1: remind me was the character in head on incredible film?
Speaker 1: Was he straight with his family or was he like
Speaker 1: not out of the closet?
Speaker 3: Was had? He wasn't really out? No, he definitely wasn't out.
Speaker 3: He was he was on a bit of a journey
Speaker 3: of discovery. Yeah. I actually rewatched it last night to
Speaker 3: refamiliarize myself with it because I was thinking through, hang on,
Speaker 3: what you know, how do you choose these three favorite films?
Speaker 1: And I guess there was a discussion you were having
Speaker 1: Georgia Toney and Kate Lambrook at the desk which I
Speaker 1: was trying not to listen to, about what your three
Speaker 1: favorite film should be.
Speaker 3: And I I was a little uncertain about naming this
Speaker 3: as one, but I guess I you know, it came
Speaker 3: out at a time when I was young and was
Speaker 3: learning about myself, and I guess what stood out in
Speaker 3: my memory was Alex Dimitriat's this incredibly hot guy. There
Speaker 3: was some pretty full frontal scenes in that film, and
Speaker 3: it was just incredibly exciting to see that. I think,
Speaker 3: excuse me now, when I rewatch it, it's actually a
Speaker 3: pretty dark film and it's very challenging to watch, and
Speaker 3: I think probably more than anything, it probably scared me
Speaker 3: about being gay because it's depiction of what it was
Speaker 3: like exploring that. You know, he was in a lot
Speaker 3: of back alleyways and you know, random hookups with you know,
Speaker 3: a factory worker or a restaurant worker, and not that
Speaker 3: there's anything wrong with that, but it was all A
Speaker 3: lot of it was very sort of spontaneous, and some
Speaker 3: of it was a little bit scary, and the reactions
Speaker 3: within the Greek community or sort of those traditional conservative
Speaker 3: families two characters that may be gay or cross stressing
Speaker 3: or whatever they were doing, were pretty ferocious. And yeah,
Speaker 3: I think it probably came at a time for me
Speaker 3: when I certainly wouldn't have been out and probably was
Speaker 3: just coming to terms with it myself.
Speaker 1: So looking at that where you're going to think, Wow,
Speaker 1: if I'm going to go down this path, is that
Speaker 1: is that what it's going to be like?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean I don't consciously remember that, but watching
Speaker 3: it rewatching it last night for the first time in years,
Speaker 3: I thought, my god, this must have absolutely scared this
Speaker 3: shit out.
Speaker 1: Of me, because there was a time when I think
Speaker 1: society the straight world kind of thought, oh, well, this
Speaker 1: is what gay people are, like they must they're all
Speaker 1: the same. There's not you know, Hannah Gasby talks about
Speaker 1: the quiet gays. You know, Yeah, there's a there's a
Speaker 1: whole like like like straight people, there's a whole speaking
Speaker 1: of people, you know, and.
Speaker 3: It's not a homogeneous grouping. Yeah, there's a lot of
Speaker 3: letters in that alphabet. But even within that, Yeah, there's
Speaker 3: a lot of diversity and dynamism and different interests in
Speaker 3: different backgrounds.
Speaker 1: So I can I can't even And when you're young
Speaker 1: watching a movie like Head on It and you know,
Speaker 1: there's probably other films that, you know, like a lot
Speaker 1: of a lot of films that depicted gay lifestyles around
Speaker 1: that time were like on the edge of like edgy cinema,
Speaker 1: art house cinema. Yeah, and that kind of almost that
Speaker 1: alone takes it to edgier spaces.
Speaker 3: It certainly does. And I mean, I love Christos Chokis's
Speaker 3: writing generally. I think he's totally brilliant and clearly what
Speaker 3: he was doing with that film was trying to start
Speaker 3: a kind of a conversation, and it did have that
Speaker 3: impact that film had a big impact design understand it
Speaker 3: on the Greek community in Australia. I mean, I also
Speaker 3: think the Paul Kapsus. Is there other actor in it
Speaker 3: who I've gotten that if I've got that wrong, but
Speaker 3: absolutely true. Actually I was blown away watching it last night,
Speaker 3: how great he is in it. And he is someone
Speaker 3: that's experimenting with with with gender or is I suppose
Speaker 3: living a gender fluid existence to some degree and calls
Speaker 3: himself Tula, which is the name of his dead mother,
Speaker 3: and his father is appalled and this leads them into
Speaker 3: some fairly brutal scenarios and it is actually an incredible performance. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: and very current.
Speaker 1: Mm head on check it out if you have a
Speaker 1: little movie around that time which I saw called Priest.
Speaker 1: Do you even see Priest by Antonio Bird, Robert Carlisle
Speaker 1: and Linus Roach about a Catholic priest who all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, all of a sudden, but you know, started
Speaker 1: experimenting And it's an incredible, incredible I took I think
Speaker 1: I spoken about on these podcast before. I took a
Speaker 1: girl on a date and she was a Catholic fearing
Speaker 1: you know, you know, straight girl, as I was a
Speaker 1: straight guy, we went to the Melbourne.
Speaker 3: At that point in my life.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, yeah, yeah it's still open. It's
Speaker 1: still open, and yeah, I yeah, so wow, these things
Speaker 1: are really these are really full on scenes and it's
Speaker 1: a very different moved to the head on. But I
Speaker 1: imagine if I was watching that in your situation kind
Speaker 1: of thinking, it's still even even though there's some tenderness
Speaker 1: in that movie, it's still kind of depicted. There's like
Speaker 1: people doing the wrong thing in a way. That's how society,
Speaker 1: I guess.
Speaker 3: Was totally. I mean, look, of course, it's amazing how
Speaker 3: far we've come. Actually, and so just from a I
Speaker 3: suppose social observation standpoint, watching it last night and reflecting
Speaker 3: on you know, that's really in the time of my
Speaker 3: adult life, yeah, which is sort of twenty years. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I think we attitudes have really changed and that's that's
Speaker 3: obviously a wonderful thing. But yeah, I think when you
Speaker 3: are back in the eighties and nineties growing up gay
Speaker 3: or or learning about yourself in that way, coming I come,
Speaker 3: you know, it came from a pretty conservative background, from
Speaker 3: a very small rural community. I was at a very
Speaker 3: conservative religious boarding school, all male, pretty sort of violent,
Speaker 3: aggressive environment. It was. Actually it was a fairly terrifying
Speaker 3: experience and isolating and lonely, and so I definitely I
Speaker 3: think there were things in that movie that definitely resonated
Speaker 3: and just that you know, there's a scene where the
Speaker 3: sort of these two the Alex Demitriads and the Caps
Speaker 3: as characters end up in a police sell. One of them's,
Speaker 3: you know, poor Caps's addressed as Tuller. Alex is sort
Speaker 3: of gearing up for a night out, and then they
Speaker 3: sort of have this violent interaction both physical and verbal
Speaker 3: with the with the police. Yeah, I guess I was
Speaker 3: surprised at how familiar that felt. Weirdly, having grown up
Speaker 3: in the in the environment that I did. That sort
Speaker 3: of sense of genuine not just fear of like what
Speaker 3: happens if and when I tell my parents what happens
Speaker 3: you know about coming out, but just a genuine physical
Speaker 3: fear is something that that is, you know, is familiar
Speaker 3: to me and I don't think about much, but watching
Speaker 3: the film last night, you know, it certainly certainly resonated
Speaker 3: and it made me think about that, and.
Speaker 1: That actual Metritist's performance was revelatory, like he had gone
Speaker 1: from almost like heartbreak High in those kinds of roles
Speaker 1: and this kind of shocked everyone. This was like, wow,
Speaker 1: this is we weren't expecting this from from the sky
Speaker 1: and has continued to go on and to give great performance.
Speaker 3: I was actually remembering I think he I think he
Speaker 3: was found like by the Heartbreak High producers, Heartbreak Hid
Speaker 3: Juices on the Street Yeah, yeah, with friends, yeah, Sydney, and.
Speaker 1: Considering that usually you might get a film or two
Speaker 1: out of someone that. I mean sometimes you hear those
Speaker 1: people going and having great careers. But to give those
Speaker 1: kinds of performances, to go from playing you know, heartbreaking
Speaker 1: and became heart Rack High, where you know we're good performances,
Speaker 1: but yeah, head on was like full on and you know,
Speaker 1: doing some things for young bloke and you know, confronting
Speaker 1: for an actor. It also started I think a string
Speaker 1: of films where Alex to Mitchiada's characters did like seem
Speaker 1: to perform or sex on people like it like seemed
Speaker 1: to be. It seemed to be even in films where
Speaker 1: you weren't expecting Its Okay, there he goes again, adjusting
Speaker 1: it to the director, should I go down to this guy?
Speaker 1: It's not really the script that's got nothing to do
Speaker 1: with the plot, but I sure, why not will throw
Speaker 1: it in there. We'll use it, maybe we won't. Who knows.
Speaker 1: They're a fantastic performer. Alex tomichiatis another breakthrough performance. And
Speaker 1: I do want to get on the top of back
Speaker 1: Punch Fronk Love very soon, so we'll keep this a
Speaker 1: bit quick. But Kate Shortland a rise in the scene
Speaker 1: as a direct, and that brings Abbie Cornish, who's had
Speaker 1: a wonderful career as well in Somersault, and.
Speaker 3: Sam Worthington Sam worthing of course, and also Eric Eric
Speaker 3: Thompson Eric Thompson. So I suspect probably if you're listening
Speaker 3: you might not have seen Somersault. It wasn't like a
Speaker 3: big hit or anything. Would you call it art house?
Speaker 1: I call arthouse. I think that'll win at Carnt or
Speaker 1: maybe very well at Cahn.
Speaker 3: So I going this probably almost twenty years ago. I
Speaker 3: was living in London. I hadn't been home to Australia
Speaker 3: for a number of years, and I went to go
Speaker 3: and see a movie in Covent Garden one day and
Speaker 3: when I got there, I saw like a sign board
Speaker 3: up for an Australian film and I was just I
Speaker 3: was just feeling a bit homesick, and I thought, maybe
Speaker 3: I'll watch that instead of what I'm here to watch.
Speaker 3: And I knew nothing about it. I didn't know anything
Speaker 3: about the story, where it was set anything. And I
Speaker 3: went and sat down and the film is set in Ginderbyne.
Speaker 1: It I was gonna ask, Yeah, I knew Gindabad was
Speaker 1: set in Ginderbyne, but yeah, I was sure if it was.
Speaker 3: And not only that it was largely filmed on my street.
Speaker 1: Oh wow.
Speaker 3: Yeah. And I had no inkling of this before I
Speaker 3: went in. And the emotions that I went through watching
Speaker 3: that movie were so overwhelming. I still feel them a
Speaker 3: little bit when I think about going and sitting in
Speaker 3: that cinema in London and watching this film and seeing
Speaker 3: the place where she lives is at Siesta Villa Motel,
Speaker 3: which is at the end of Gerrara Drive, which is
Speaker 3: where I grew up.
Speaker 1: That's incredible.
Speaker 3: The Leah Purcell character lives in a house which is
Speaker 3: also at the end of our street. That or the
Speaker 3: Animal House. The servo is the survey that we go to.
Speaker 3: The Sam Worthington character is about a guy that is
Speaker 3: sort of going home to visit it was.
Speaker 2: It was.
Speaker 3: It's a great film anyway, but that experience for me
Speaker 3: initially of watching it was incredible.
Speaker 1: I mean, we're all get to kick when a movie
Speaker 1: is shot in our own city. You know, we've discussed
Speaker 1: on this podcast how many people you know, I've spoken
Speaker 1: to love the Matrix just because of shot in Sydney.
Speaker 1: You recognize, Ah, there's you know, there's George Street or whatever.
Speaker 1: But for one to be shot in your street is
Speaker 1: pretty incredible.
Speaker 3: And for anyone listening that that doesn't know if Ginnervine,
Speaker 3: it's in the Snow mountains of New South Wales. It's
Speaker 3: a tiny little community, only a few thousand people. It's
Speaker 3: close to the ski resorts. Outside of the ski season,
Speaker 3: it's a very quiet place there always was. It's changing
Speaker 3: a bit now, but it's a place that I feel
Speaker 3: incredibly and deeply connected to every time I go. But
Speaker 3: you know, lived overseas for about fifteen sixteen years and
Speaker 3: whenever I came back, I would always make sure I
Speaker 3: got home to Ginderbyne. And there's a bend that you
Speaker 3: drive around as you as you come from Sydney into
Speaker 3: the mountains there's one particular bend just before East Ginderbyne
Speaker 3: where you turn on this corner and the whole mountains
Speaker 3: and the lake revealed themselves to you. And I always
Speaker 3: in anticipation of that bend, put the window down and
Speaker 3: just taking the air. It smells different there, and it's
Speaker 3: often very cold and crisp, and I love the feeling
Speaker 3: of putting the window down, taking a really deep breath
Speaker 3: in through my nose, feeling that kind of coldness at
Speaker 3: the back of my nose, and I I feel more
Speaker 3: at home and at peace there then I reckon anywhere
Speaker 3: else in the world.
Speaker 1: That's amazing. Do you have a soundtrack to that moment?
Speaker 1: Do you do you put anything on?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 3: I don't know. I mean probably just whatever is on.
Speaker 3: It's not about sort of trying to recreate something. I think.
Speaker 3: Something that is incredible about that landscape is that it
Speaker 3: is so ever changing. You know, the seasons all occur
Speaker 3: within one day, it can be within one hour, and
Speaker 3: it's really dramatic. And that viewpoint when you're coming is
Speaker 3: quite high up on a hill, so you get this
Speaker 3: just but it's an incredible reveal and it's you know,
Speaker 3: we live our home was in East Ginduvine on the lake.
Speaker 3: So you know you're literally in the last four minutes
Speaker 3: of your journey from from Sydney or Canberra or wherever
Speaker 3: you've come from. You know you know it's coming. If
Speaker 3: you're taking people down for the first time, you know
Speaker 3: you know they're out to see it. Or I look
Speaker 3: forward to that moment, you know, like when I took
Speaker 3: take my partner down for the first time, just you know,
Speaker 3: you know, for the five ten minutes leading up to
Speaker 3: that reveal that they're going to be like, wow, yeah,
Speaker 3: this is beautiful.
Speaker 1: That's an exciting moment.
Speaker 3: This place that you talk about all the time is
Speaker 3: actually quite stunning.
Speaker 1: I hope Jake enjoyed it and didn't say just won
Speaker 1: the window up.
Speaker 3: What are you're doing?
Speaker 1: It's freezy? That could have been a deal. Brecord I
Speaker 1: at the same time, when I saw four weddings over
Speaker 1: in London, so I was eighteen, basically traveling by myself.
Speaker 1: I've gone to scand the Navia next well now a
Speaker 1: next girlfriend actually even then a next girlfriend in Finland's
Speaker 1: I said there for a while, went worked in Scotland
Speaker 1: for a while and was I remember getting a bus
Speaker 1: in Glasgow up to a place on the west coast
Speaker 1: called Inverary, very small town, beautiful town like the picture
Speaker 1: I kind of a lock and you know, and the
Speaker 1: green rolling hills of Scotland and almost a one street
Speaker 1: town with a pub on it. That's basically where I
Speaker 1: worked for about only about a month. But I remember
Speaker 1: driving up there and playing I had a walkman. This
Speaker 1: is in ninety three, so literally what when a handful
Speaker 1: of cassettes and one of them was Paul Kelly Live,
Speaker 1: and I remember playing winter I didn't deliberately play. It
Speaker 1: just came on as my head was against the kind
Speaker 1: of the window of the bus and the rain was
Speaker 1: kind of coming down, and Winter Coat came on by
Speaker 1: Paul Kelly, and it was just so whenever I'm in
Speaker 1: the if I ever go to Ginderbyne, I'll probably put
Speaker 1: Winter Coat on and listen to it. That'll be my moodset,
Speaker 1: all right. Haim's McDonald can't put it off any long.
Speaker 1: It's been a couple of days where we've avoided talking
Speaker 1: about this film because we wanted to save it all
Speaker 1: fresh for the podcast. But this is an amazing film.
Speaker 1: In my mind, it's two thousand and two Paul Thomas
Speaker 1: and Its is his false film. He made Hard eight
Speaker 1: is his debut. Then Into Boogie Knights was incredible. Into
Speaker 1: Magnolia I did say he wanted to make a film
Speaker 1: under ninety minutes. He wanted to show Hollywood could do that,
Speaker 1: because Magnolia was three hours and Booie Night was close
Speaker 1: three hours too. This comes in at ninety four minutes,
Speaker 1: so if you take away the credits, he's done his job.
Speaker 1: But Hami's McDonald, did you like Puns Drunk Love?
Speaker 3: He did do it in ninety minutes. It felt like
Speaker 3: three hours, like a.
Speaker 1: Knife to my heart. Hamish, Okay, let's let's discuss it.
Speaker 1: So I got a text message from you when you
Speaker 1: watched you about halfway through, and you said you want
Speaker 1: to remember what you said, this film is creepy. His
Speaker 1: film is creepy, and I replied, well, yeah, I don't
Speaker 1: think it's a creepy movie. There are certainly creepy characters
Speaker 1: in there. And then you said something like I don't
Speaker 1: like the way it makes me feel.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I found it unsettling. I think in large part
Speaker 3: that was the soundtrack.
Speaker 1: It's a very and I mentioned it in the Into
Speaker 1: John Brian genius deliberately does this discombobulated soundtrack because it
Speaker 1: kind of matches the film in a way. And this
Speaker 1: is like an absolute master class in composing and like
Speaker 1: giving the film what it needs in very I mean,
Speaker 1: there's a beautiful, lush movie we hear when they later
Speaker 1: on go to Hawaiian it it's becomes romance. But there's
Speaker 1: that awesome scene I find where everything's just coming down
Speaker 1: around you know, there's the fork with and then there's
Speaker 1: crashing and and all the dialogue is completely is this
Speaker 1: coombobulated as well? It's like what's it the pudding? Are
Speaker 1: you having crying fits? Like what's what's He's just going
Speaker 1: Toledo like this, and it's just so that just just
Speaker 1: matches the dialogue perfectly. But so in talking to people
Speaker 1: over the years about this film, and it's it's a
Speaker 1: divisive film. Adam Sandler plays I think a part now
Speaker 1: I think he's magnives in it. But I more than
Speaker 1: any other film perhaps I know it gives people a
Speaker 1: feeling and either it seems to me either that feeling
Speaker 1: falls on that. I love this film because it's it's sweet.
Speaker 1: See I'll find it a sweet film. I'm not saying
Speaker 1: it's not without its darkness. Obviously it is. But ultimately
Speaker 1: I find it the sweet film. But if you don't
Speaker 1: find fall on that side, you follow this side where
Speaker 1: it's a bit unnerving.
Speaker 3: Well, what did you find sweet though? The relationship between.
Speaker 1: I find this is a movie about a guy who's
Speaker 1: hiding from the world, and and we know why he's hiding.
Speaker 1: He's had a horrific upbringing because his sisters are hellish
Speaker 1: and and he just he doesn't want any part of it,
Speaker 1: and he gets dragged out. He gets dragged out. Like
Speaker 1: you don't see movies with Barry Egan. They don't make
Speaker 1: movies about Barry. He's somewhere on the spectrum I suspect,
Speaker 1: and you don't put him in romantic comedy films. Like
Speaker 1: Barry Egan found out he was the protagonist in the movie,
Speaker 1: he wouldn't know what to do. His head would actually explode.
Speaker 1: He's not an interesting person, he doesn't he has nothing
Speaker 1: to offer, he thinks, so to put him in this
Speaker 1: thing and the match up with somebody who just sees him,
Speaker 1: I think there's very powerful when a film can depict
Speaker 1: characters where one sees the other, one sees something that
Speaker 1: nobody else sees.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so I I will grant you that I.
Speaker 1: Before you even say that, I always make this point.
Speaker 1: I think it's a good point for you to be
Speaker 1: comfortable that I'm making this point and the reminder audience,
Speaker 1: this is a movie that I've seen about twenty times.
Speaker 1: I saw it when it came out in the cinema.
Speaker 1: I've loved it from day one. I've got to know
Speaker 1: the movie more and more as i've watched even more
Speaker 1: the last I've watched it two times this week. This
Speaker 1: is a movie you watched literally two or three days ago,
Speaker 1: and you are in probably many ways still processing Yeah,
Speaker 1: this movie.
Speaker 3: And I do think you're You can go on a
Speaker 3: journey with any film or piece of literature, right, you
Speaker 3: can come to appreciate it more over time. And I
Speaker 3: wouldn't say that I don't appreciate some of what's in it.
Speaker 3: And to the point I was making earlier about the
Speaker 3: Jennifer Coolidge thing, identifying something in people that tend to
Speaker 3: play similar characters, I think I can see that that
Speaker 3: the director obviously was interested in what's beyond these characters
Speaker 3: that he plays, Like, what is that awkwardness? Why does
Speaker 3: he end up in these strange situations, you know, playing
Speaker 3: the characters that he's played in other films, like what's
Speaker 3: the depth, what's the nuance to these people? And I
Speaker 3: think with the character in this film, you know, it's
Speaker 3: almost a split personality. He'll be sitting there at a
Speaker 3: dinner table having a what seems like a fairly ordinary
Speaker 3: date conversation, and then he'll something will be said and
Speaker 3: he'll excuse himself, go to the bathroom, and smash up
Speaker 3: the bathroom. And so I can imagine that the director
Speaker 3: might be thinking, well, there must be two sides to
Speaker 3: these characters. There must be multiple dimensions to these characters,
Speaker 3: and is that one of those dimensions? But I found
Speaker 3: for myself watching it may be quite uncomfortable.
Speaker 1: It made me.
Speaker 3: Wonder how thin the line is between this person managing
Speaker 3: those emotions and those violent outbursts by excusing himself and
Speaker 3: going to the bathroom, or you know, somewhere down the
Speaker 3: track with this relationship evolved just taking it out on her.
Speaker 3: That's what that scene made me wonder.
Speaker 1: That's absolutely valid. I didn't get that because I feel
Speaker 1: like this he is in desperate need of help. Let's
Speaker 1: have a listen to when he and the reasons for
Speaker 1: him being like this. It does a really good job.
Speaker 1: Everything's done so economically. This is a filmmaking masterclass on
Speaker 1: every single detail. Now I'm not saying that that means
Speaker 1: you needed to light the film, but we know a
Speaker 1: bad way, you know, a hacky way of doing this
Speaker 1: is to really explain you know this. You know his
Speaker 1: parents died. We don't really know anything about his parents.
Speaker 1: But yeah, when I was young, and that's why he is.
Speaker 1: But he's not. We just we just see these interactions
Speaker 1: he has with his sisters. He's forced to go to
Speaker 1: this dinner party that they've organized, and this is him
Speaker 1: as he arrives. He's not nobody's ever't seen him yet,
Speaker 1: and he's at the front door, and this is what
Speaker 1: he hears.
Speaker 4: Remember and barries to get all mad.
Speaker 1: Ron used to cause gay boys.
Speaker 3: Spying, glass doors.
Speaker 1: Sliding, remember homes he himself in the mountain, the hammer rembo.
Speaker 2: He was down here just talking about you.
Speaker 1: Remember we used to call you gay boy, You get
Speaker 1: all mad.
Speaker 5: What we used to call you gay boy?
Speaker 2: Remember you'd be fine, and then we call you gay boy.
Speaker 3: You just freak out.
Speaker 1: We would calling you gay and you got so mad.
Speaker 4: You put the hampers with the sliding glass door.
Speaker 2: You remember, I don't remember that, Yes you do.
Speaker 4: You're calling you Gabe or and you got so mad?
Speaker 4: Are you gay?
Speaker 1: Now?
Speaker 4: I don't know, trying to figure out or do you
Speaker 4: have the wear suit?
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 2: You Are you using that dandel champ?
Speaker 4: You? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Very, very very Why do you have the hammer?
Speaker 2: Why did I have?
Speaker 5: He was building a dog now, okay, okay, you have
Speaker 5: a kid, you okay, I was just thinking about you,
Speaker 5: glad you can make it ship.
Speaker 1: So that almost tells everything we need to know why
Speaker 1: Barry is hiding away in his warehouse from the world now.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I mean basically the conversation we had about
Speaker 1: the other films was that, was that something that because
Speaker 1: that happens raised me early in the film that you
Speaker 1: kind of I don't want to say triggering, but was
Speaker 1: it like this is making me feel uncomfortable.
Speaker 3: Or this is Yeah, of course, I think it's hard
Speaker 3: to listen to that and not feel uncomfortable.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's but I take it and kind of go
Speaker 1: and obviously, you know, we maye come from a different
Speaker 1: point of view, but I look at the go and
Speaker 1: I just feel for Barry. I'm just like, it makes
Speaker 1: me just feel more empathy for Barry. He's lived his
Speaker 1: life like this and he's an only he's got seven
Speaker 1: sisters and this is what he's put up with. I
Speaker 1: want this guy to win. I want this guy to
Speaker 1: have a win. Please have a win. And that's why. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we won't go race through a film just yet, but
Speaker 1: later on I feel this kind of elation because it's like, yes,
Speaker 1: like when he does tell his sister fucking leave, fucking lie,
Speaker 1: like I can understand the outbursts because I see where
Speaker 1: it's come from. That that that uncomfortableness that you felt,
Speaker 1: and I get that, and it is it is uncomfortable,
Speaker 1: like they did. There's no air in anything that Like
Speaker 1: it's one thing after another. If it's not the gay
Speaker 1: boy thing, it's the hammer thing, it's it's the dandru thing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like there's no.
Speaker 3: But soon after that he smashes up the glass doors. Yeah,
Speaker 3: and so any I guess, yeah, I see this. I
Speaker 3: see that you're being invited to feel sympathy, but then
Speaker 3: the violent outbursts are also discombobulating.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely. I just want to point out a magnificent
Speaker 1: shot when he does actually break those doors. Just notice
Speaker 1: he smashes the doors. This is where everything is thought through.
Speaker 1: Smashes the doors. The one of the right breaks, one
Speaker 1: of the middle shatters a bit, and then the one
Speaker 1: of the left kind of it doesn't completely all shatter,
Speaker 1: but you can see through, and you Barry is behind
Speaker 1: the one that hasn't fallen through. So you come see
Speaker 1: almost his silhouette. He's colored silhouette, and then you see
Speaker 1: the sisters all on one side, in the left and
Speaker 1: on the right hand side there's just a photo of
Speaker 1: Barry on the wall. That is what his life is.
Speaker 1: He is by himself. He is completely isolated. He has
Speaker 1: nobody his parents for what they don't say that I
Speaker 1: can remember what happened to him. But so he is
Speaker 1: completely he doesn't have any friends. He's in this situation.
Speaker 1: He's putting the situation because of the abuse to these cops.
Speaker 1: I'm going to allow him to have an a purse.
Speaker 1: And then when he does have the aburse, what's the
Speaker 1: next thing that he does? He asks for help.
Speaker 4: I'm sorry about that, Sorry about what I did. Sorry,
Speaker 4: I wanted to ask you something because you're a doctor, right, Yeah,
Speaker 4: I don't like myself sometimes. Can you help me, Mary,
Speaker 4: I'm a dentist.
Speaker 1: Day.
Speaker 4: What god of help do you think I can give you?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean one, It's it's a great tag. The
Speaker 1: city doesn't end there. He goes on talks about his
Speaker 1: crying problem that he has, but again that gives me more.
Speaker 1: We want to see characters in movies try to try
Speaker 1: to make themselves better. Barry has a problem. No, I'm
Speaker 1: not doubting these outbursts are an issue, but Barry is
Speaker 1: also recognizing that they're an issue. He's reaching out to
Speaker 1: a man, maybe one of the only men in his
Speaker 1: life that he can maybe outside of Rico play with
Speaker 1: Louis Guzman in the factory, who's bloody, hilarious and I
Speaker 1: love him. But he tells Walter Walter's going to betray
Speaker 1: that when his sister comes in later the factory, he says,
Speaker 1: Walter says, you have a crying problem, and it's just
Speaker 1: like he's as said, Lea's obviously he says, don't tell anyone.
Speaker 1: And maybe watching this in twenty twenty two, outside of two,
Speaker 1: where we look at violence and we know violence amongst
Speaker 1: the men is an issue, and we kind of we
Speaker 1: our minds go to different places. It's certainly that didn't
Speaker 1: go in my mind in two thousand and two when
Speaker 1: I'm watching, and it still doesn't to me because I
Speaker 1: think he's not it's not directed at anyone, it's.
Speaker 3: But across the through the film, he seems to lack
Speaker 3: agency at so many points, right, and so he is
Speaker 3: capable of it, as demonstrated in the clip that you
Speaker 3: just played. He's capable of saying to someone I sometimes
Speaker 3: don't like myself. I need some help. But and he's
Speaker 3: also not unable to communicate. You know, there's there's moments
Speaker 3: where he communications, communicates quite clearly and.
Speaker 1: Well he's on the phone in that very first scene,
Speaker 1: but he is trying to find a connection through those conversations.
Speaker 1: I mean, he's having conversations with the guy. You know,
Speaker 1: there's a scene where he's on he's on the phone.
Speaker 1: He says, do you have my home phone number? And
Speaker 1: the guy goes, I don't need it, Yeah, I just
Speaker 1: saw you might want to call.
Speaker 3: I want to connect me.
Speaker 1: Yea yeah, And he is looking for this connection. He can,
Speaker 1: he can communicate, and you're right about the agency, but
Speaker 1: he does do a couple of things that I think
Speaker 1: where he takes He takes on a bit because like
Speaker 1: so those listening agencies basically means you want your protagonists
Speaker 1: to He can't be passive like Emily Watson comes to him,
Speaker 1: which is which is passive. But what he does a
Speaker 1: couple of things. One he collects, he collects pudding. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's got a plan. So he's got a plan to
Speaker 1: get out, uh tow he takes a harmonium and we'll
Speaker 1: talk about that. That that that scene and obviously it's
Speaker 1: it's a strong opener. He makes a phone sex call.
Speaker 1: But these aren't things where like agency can you and
Speaker 1: usually most films that they're usually much bigger things, you know.
Speaker 1: And he does get there later on in the second
Speaker 1: half of the film. He definitely does. He does take
Speaker 1: things on, like he really takes things on once he
Speaker 1: has that love that he's been lacking in his life.
Speaker 3: He he strength, Yeah, but I think I struggled to
Speaker 3: accept that you could be so desperate and so sad
Speaker 3: and so hurt by these relationships with the sisters, for example,
Speaker 3: and not do anything about it, not make the decision
Speaker 3: like he He's obviously made a lot of decisions in
Speaker 3: his life, like hiding himself away in this factory or
Speaker 3: whatever it is.
Speaker 1: But isn't this the moment we are seeing. Isn't that
Speaker 1: what this film is about, like.
Speaker 3: The transition even yeah, like but even that, he doesn't
Speaker 3: make that happen. It comes to him.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, but he is still making He's making choices,
Speaker 1: or we want from our characters to make choices. He
Speaker 1: makes the choice to what he calls. And I think
Speaker 1: it's important when he's in Huai, he calls his sister. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because he doesn't know Lena's numb, but so he calls her.
Speaker 1: That's a decision he's made. It didn't have to do
Speaker 1: that makes it. And then when she fights him on it,
Speaker 1: he actually he goes here. We can actually and we
Speaker 1: will jump around a little bit, but he calls his sister.
Speaker 1: And this is a little fun fact that the sister
Speaker 1: he calls, the one who's like really on him, the
Speaker 1: one who comes to the factory, Lena's co worker, is
Speaker 1: the only actor out of the sisters. The other non
Speaker 1: actors were quite incredible because I thought they're thinking in
Speaker 1: the kitchen that we had played where was actually really
Speaker 1: nicely performed, as hard as it was to watch, but
Speaker 1: see when he's yelling at his sister. I think that's
Speaker 1: him at least taking that on. What I love about
Speaker 1: it is it's a smallness, is a real intimacy to
Speaker 1: this film, like it's not and he makes these ordinary
Speaker 1: things seem quite beautiful. This true the way it's shot,
Speaker 1: and these really ordinary things, like it's basically the harmonium
Speaker 1: is basically hard rubbish, and there's beauty in that. There's
Speaker 1: a I have a theory which I share with Brendan
Speaker 1: cow which is a harmonium is love, and it's about
Speaker 1: his connection with that harmonium that he is willing to
Speaker 1: accept and when so when Lena kind of comes in
Speaker 1: and he meets him, him going back out and taking
Speaker 1: the harmonium, putting into the office. Now you can say
Speaker 1: it's love, or you can say he's even if it's
Speaker 1: his heart.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's certainly a symbol of what he needs to
Speaker 3: do to take that relationship that she's offering to him. Yes, right,
Speaker 3: that's what that was my reading of the of the
Speaker 3: because it appears out of note you know, this is
Speaker 3: suddenly his truck.
Speaker 1: But his car, his car flips like a van taxi,
Speaker 1: like a maxicab, drops it off both red. By the way,
Speaker 1: there's a big thing going on with colors, which I'll
Speaker 1: get to blue and red. Okay, keep the blue and
Speaker 1: reds in mind. I would love to know poor Thomas
Speaker 1: Anderson had any kind of thought about, even in his
Speaker 1: own head, a backstory of who was in that car wife.
Speaker 1: I think basically the harmonium represents love, the car represents
Speaker 1: chaos because his life becomes chaotic after that. And that's
Speaker 1: where there's this feeling of where it becomes a little
Speaker 1: bit uneasy that the score kind of this kind of
Speaker 1: changes and it becomes this kind of you start hearing
Speaker 1: you know, it's started almost like a lush kind of
Speaker 1: instrumental in the opening titles, and it becomes more like, yeah,
Speaker 1: like this. And you have that scene where we spoke
Speaker 1: about where Lena comes in and it's it's it's almost
Speaker 1: I don't think it's one shot, but it's almost one shot.
Speaker 1: He goes in for along. I can almost see you
Speaker 1: getting this certain discomfort on your face listening to this.
Speaker 1: You got the gaffer tape, the electrical tape there. John Bryan,
Speaker 1: who did the score, actually worked on it whilst I'm
Speaker 1: making the movie, even beforehand so on set he could
Speaker 1: actually play some of this.
Speaker 3: The soundtrack of the score. It makes me push my
Speaker 3: toes up into the roof of my shoes.
Speaker 1: I love it.
Speaker 3: I love that.
Speaker 1: I love that because that's what he's like. They're wanting
Speaker 1: you to feel something. You know, Well, that's what it
Speaker 1: makes it just I listened to this, but I'm driving
Speaker 1: around and like you do, I love I love this soundtrack. Well,
Speaker 1: it takes me back to the movies. I'm I don't
Speaker 1: necessarily have the same like we're not watching the movie
Speaker 1: when everything's happening.
Speaker 3: I have the same friends.
Speaker 1: But I've watched this movie so many times that I
Speaker 1: watch it sometimes now I still get all the fields.
Speaker 1: But I'm also watching it on a you know, on
Speaker 1: a PTA masterclass level. It is amazing what he's done
Speaker 1: for this film. Let's talk about these Let's talk about
Speaker 1: his decision to call a phone sex line. But he
Speaker 1: takes some agency and he and he calls, we spoke
Speaker 1: about your your you've had some happy memories with phone sex.
Speaker 1: I'm glad. I'm glad it wasn't triggering. I'm glad there
Speaker 1: wasn't something else that was triggering for you in this
Speaker 1: And I actually from I have written here in my notes.
Speaker 1: It gives very agency here there's a sweetness again. He
Speaker 1: calls a phone sex line and he wants to talk
Speaker 1: about almost anything he's trying to avoid. He's trying to
Speaker 1: connect with somebody he's trying to avoid, actually anything about sex.
Speaker 1: She's asking you putting yourself off, and he's like, oh, no,
Speaker 1: what's your dick doing. I don't know what it's doing,
Speaker 1: you know, like it's yeah. He asks about the money
Speaker 1: and his company, and he goes he wants to diversify,
Speaker 1: and he's actually pretty happy with the way it's going.
Speaker 3: So obviously subsequently the people that run that phone sex
Speaker 3: line turn out to be baddies, but he doesn't know that, right,
Speaker 3: He just is calling a phone sex line.
Speaker 1: Amount of times he says, it can't come back and
Speaker 1: they can be jack, you know, he's just confidentially asked
Speaker 1: like two or three times.
Speaker 3: And it's obviously something that you see depicted in film
Speaker 3: or television shows from time to time where there's the
Speaker 3: guy that's in need of you know, comfort or sympathy
Speaker 3: or love going down that pathway of sex lines or
Speaker 3: you know, sex workers. So that's not that's not altogether unfamiliar.
Speaker 3: But I suppose when that when that call happens, it
Speaker 3: did also make me wonder, you know what this woman,
Speaker 3: you know, probably a young woman working on a phone
Speaker 3: sex Imagine how weird that would have been for her.
Speaker 3: I know we're supposed to sort of see the world
Speaker 3: through him because he's the protagonist.
Speaker 1: But so, yes, you have sympathy for Georgia.
Speaker 3: Well, I'm acknowledging that Georgia turns out to be not
Speaker 3: a good character. But in the moment, I'm thinking, why
Speaker 3: is he doing this to this woman?
Speaker 1: But you could say that about anyone who goes to
Speaker 1: a sex worker. Like he's been really nice. He gota
Speaker 1: says you sound nice. He actually says you sound nice
Speaker 1: and personable. Like I think there's a version of what
Speaker 1: you're saying where somebody is really aggressive and it's like,
Speaker 1: well that's you know, everyone deserves respects. I think Barry's
Speaker 1: being disrespectful in any single way outside of using the service,
Speaker 1: which I don't think is disrespectful.
Speaker 3: But she clearly doesn't. I mean she is sort of
Speaker 3: She keeps attempting to have to do the phone sex call. Yeah, yes, yes,
Speaker 3: and he just wants to talk about all this other
Speaker 3: random stuff.
Speaker 1: Yes, but I don't one. I suspect that would actually
Speaker 1: happen a lot. I suspect phone sex lines you will have,
Speaker 1: you would have men calling and trying to connect on
Speaker 1: a more human level than actually just to rub one out.
Speaker 3: It's not it's not what I do.
Speaker 1: You are there for business, you know what you need,
Speaker 1: You get in, you get out.
Speaker 3: No fucking about did they still exist? Do you think?
Speaker 1: I was thinking about that on the way in. I
Speaker 1: called one many many, many, many many years ago. It
Speaker 1: would have been not in this millennia. It was twenty seven,
Speaker 1: it was pre pandemic. Actually might have been, it might
Speaker 1: have been during a pandemic. And I found the weird experience.
Speaker 1: And I actually do think I did kind of like
Speaker 1: try to kind of like just ask. I think once
Speaker 1: I was on the line, I was like, I'm not
Speaker 1: sure if I really want this. I think I was.
Speaker 1: I didn't quite believe it. I didn't believe the facade
Speaker 1: like what they see what you see later on with
Speaker 1: the you know when you see the mattress Man, you know,
Speaker 1: and philis Simah Hoffman, and you see the lovely little
Speaker 1: shot of the you know, the Tally workers just of
Speaker 1: their headsets and sitting at desks like they're, you know,
Speaker 1: working for Optus. That's how I kind of imagine imagine
Speaker 1: it being. So you never kind of brought him, so
Speaker 1: I kind of get that idea of kind of going, well,
Speaker 1: I don't want to just jump into any kind of
Speaker 1: sex stuff. But I also kind of really connect with
Speaker 1: that idea of going I think I was also I
Speaker 1: only did at once because I was so fearful of, like,
Speaker 1: you know, somebody finding out where is my credit card?
Speaker 1: This mum said, my credit card state? You know there
Speaker 1: there's this what happens, you know? And and do they
Speaker 1: have do they have my credit card details? Now, I
Speaker 1: think all this comes from a very human and real place.
Speaker 1: I don't I didn't have. I've never even thought of
Speaker 1: having kind of that sympathy for empathy for Georgia because
Speaker 1: she signed up for this as her job, you know,
Speaker 1: and this because the boat wants to She's trying to
Speaker 1: steer it back to sex, but she end up she
Speaker 1: does engage to an extent of she does eventually and
Speaker 1: then takes advantage of that. I feel you have really
Speaker 1: gone in hard on not liking Barry, And I think
Speaker 1: that makes it hard to then, Yeah, I feel like
Speaker 1: if you don't have empathy for Barry Egan, you can't
Speaker 1: enjoy it's hard to enjoy probably your life and the
Speaker 1: beautiful world around you, and then the complexities of the
Speaker 1: human nature. No of this film. I mean, at some
Speaker 1: point I thought, because when you I think you'd watched
Speaker 1: maybe half of it and you're kind of have a
Speaker 1: rebrief conversation, and I've got a sense of this hasn't
Speaker 1: come as a surprise today.
Speaker 3: But I think though it's I don't think it's that
Speaker 3: I have no empathy for him. I think I just
Speaker 3: found that at every at every turn, as I felt
Speaker 3: that sentiment emerging, something else would happen which would would
Speaker 3: throw me about him. Yeah, you know, the violent outburst,
Speaker 3: the Yeah, you know, I was kind of into that
Speaker 3: scene where he's having dinner with her, and and you
Speaker 3: do lean into that to the possibility of romance, and
Speaker 3: he does display this more communicative, eloquent, thoughtful side, and
Speaker 3: then she raises something.
Speaker 1: She seems like the adult in the room in a way,
Speaker 1: Lena Lena Leonard, and it is a slight misreading of
Speaker 1: the room on her situation to bring up the sisters
Speaker 1: and the hammer story and intend it's his funny story.
Speaker 1: I would have maybe read the Tea Leaves a bit more.
Speaker 1: I love that story. And I do love that scene
Speaker 1: because you see him actually enjoying himself, like he's starting to.
Speaker 1: Because everything he basically up until then, he just he
Speaker 1: just he lies, and you can understand why he lies.
Speaker 1: I kind of wrote down some of the lies he
Speaker 1: that he spills out.
Speaker 3: Have you got seven pages loads of notes?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Maybe even maybe even more, even when they're they
Speaker 1: Lena and Barry meat after that chaotic scene, you know,
Speaker 1: the fork lift and everything is this combubbler. We spoke
Speaker 1: a little bit that before, right at the end where
Speaker 1: she comes back in and he says, he says, he
Speaker 1: says four things, they're all four four things are lies.
Speaker 1: He says, I didn't ask about therapy. The pudding's not mine.
Speaker 1: I'm wearing this suit because they have an important meeting today,
Speaker 1: and I don't have a crying problem. Now we understand
Speaker 1: why he's lying about those things. They're not they're not
Speaker 1: they're white lies. But there's there's still lies. There are
Speaker 1: so many times.
Speaker 3: Why why is it? How do you justify him doing that?
Speaker 1: Are you above a lie, a white lie to impress somebody,
Speaker 1: would you would you on your first date with Jake
Speaker 1: and you kind of put out or that if somebody
Speaker 1: had given you giving Jake Ord your skeletons in your closet,
Speaker 1: would you would do you not want to water some
Speaker 1: of those down?
Speaker 3: And kind of yeah?
Speaker 1: But I don't think that's again, it's a reasonably human
Speaker 1: kind of reaction.
Speaker 3: I think it's it's a bunch them all together and
Speaker 3: hit them all out.
Speaker 1: Like I think he's somewhere on the spectrum, So let's
Speaker 1: let's have that as part of the you know, the
Speaker 1: microscope that we view Barry through. It's odd. He's an
Speaker 1: odd guy. There's no doubting he's an odd guy. So
Speaker 1: the fact that he's like best not the same the thing.
Speaker 1: Just let it, let it rest, and hopefully she hasn't
Speaker 1: heard those things or not taken those things. She's still
Speaker 1: seeing him for who he is. These lies like Rico
Speaker 1: remind me to call that guy in Toledo. He comes
Speaker 1: back into the opposite who's going to Ledo.
Speaker 3: I feel that she to your point, I not that
Speaker 3: she ever says it explicitly, but you get the impression
Speaker 3: that she is happy to overlook.
Speaker 1: Yes, I agree, all agree. And I think she knows
Speaker 1: that it must be tough on him because she knows,
Speaker 1: she knows his sister, Barry's sister.
Speaker 3: But it's interesting, right that it's sort of almost a setup.
Speaker 3: Well it is a setup, but a suggestion to the sister, right.
Speaker 1: Yes, So she sees Barry on the wall, which I
Speaker 1: mentioned earlier, and and she then based on just how
Speaker 1: he looks. He's a handsome guy. She wants to meet him.
Speaker 1: She has her own quirks, you know as well. She's
Speaker 1: completely you know, I'm a normal inverted commas ah. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I I I think she does. She she sees him
Speaker 1: which I which I think is you know, really lovely.
Speaker 1: It's really I think that's a sweetness that I like.
Speaker 1: And and she reveals her oddness, you know, you know,
Speaker 1: a bit later on when they have that Pellow talk
Speaker 1: when they finally get together and they're talking about smashing
Speaker 1: each other and she she says, I want to chew
Speaker 1: your cheeks. I want to eat them. He says, I
Speaker 1: want to smash my face. Chairment Like, now, yeah, that's
Speaker 1: confronting in a way. But like if they if they're
Speaker 1: saying it. It's like the way I see that is
Speaker 1: the way you know people want to say about a baby. Oh,
Speaker 1: I could gobble you up. You know, somebody will say
Speaker 1: it's such a way, and I go, I wouldn't be
Speaker 1: surprised if my auntie eats my baby, like keep them away,
Speaker 1: because they are.
Speaker 3: But the way that's delivered though, the bits by him,
Speaker 3: it's a little more threatening though than your auntie saying
Speaker 3: I want to gobbled the baby.
Speaker 1: Yes, but she but but she she initiates the conversation.
Speaker 3: And the way she responds to him is she undercuts
Speaker 3: it by going further. Yes.
Speaker 1: Yes, so they're they're they're playing on a consensual same page,
Speaker 1: you know. It's not like it's not like Barrie's misread
Speaker 1: the room and has come out with I want to
Speaker 1: I want to smash you with a sledge up. That
Speaker 1: becomes a different thing. And I think, you know, if
Speaker 1: we're honest with each other, we all have things that
Speaker 1: we will say to our partners that we would never
Speaker 1: want to, you know, just say, or to be heard
Speaker 1: or to be you know. Yeah, so this is a
Speaker 1: like there's a line in Hawaii which I just it's
Speaker 1: just fucking such great writing. So when they finally get together,
Speaker 1: he calls and and and he says, and all the
Speaker 1: line is, there's two lines, there's two lines. So he's
Speaker 1: he's called. He's got got a great scene where they
Speaker 1: kind of you know, he have the hanshat. We'll talk
Speaker 1: about that soon. And then there's the band. The band's
Speaker 1: in red blue ocean in the background, blue and red
Speaker 1: and all she says, like you can you can imagine
Speaker 1: they finally got together. As the writer, you what's the
Speaker 1: most romantic thing, the most amazing prophetic things that I
Speaker 1: can write? She just says, you came and got me
Speaker 1: out of my room. Thank you. And he takes the compliment.
Speaker 1: He doesn't say much, you just you take, but you
Speaker 1: can tell he's taken it on. And then he looks
Speaker 1: around and he says, it really looks like Hawaii here,
Speaker 1: doesn't it.
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 1: And others think that's that is perfect writing. And then
Speaker 1: they walk up and they walk away, and I love
Speaker 1: the walks they do from the date. We'll go back
Speaker 1: to the date in the seat. But when they walk
Speaker 1: away and he reaches out and she eventually kind of
Speaker 1: reaches down, holds his hand, and what I love about
Speaker 1: this movie and when I see this kind of kinds
Speaker 1: of movies and they do it. You can watch Lord
Speaker 1: of the Rings and you can follow Frolo's journey and
Speaker 1: Sam's journey that they get this ring in a volcano,
Speaker 1: and the courage that it takes, and the bravery it takes,
Speaker 1: the courage and bravery it takes for Barry Egan evidence
Speaker 1: to extend his hand not knowing he doesn't know. He
Speaker 1: has a feeling that she might because you know, things
Speaker 1: have gone better for her to take his hand. You
Speaker 1: had a feeling it must have been like if he
Speaker 1: put out his hand and she doesn't got to you know,
Speaker 1: it's like saying I love you to somebody and not
Speaker 1: know like then, and from where he's come from to
Speaker 1: get to that point. That's one of the reasons I
Speaker 1: love this movie.
Speaker 3: Do You Reckon? She dropped off the harmonium? Oh m,
Speaker 3: because she reveals that she deliberately came with her yes, car, yep,
Speaker 3: that she'd seen the photo that you know it was
Speaker 3: all deliberate.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and supposedly I always forget to look out for it.
Speaker 1: But the first time Barry Egan is in the supermarket,
Speaker 1: there is a flash of red in the background red,
Speaker 1: Hamish red and supposedly I'm not sure if it actually
Speaker 1: was Emily Watson on the day or it's represented it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so what's what's the red and blue?
Speaker 1: So it's just it's largely it's a filmmaking thing that's
Speaker 1: going on, but it's about you know, you know, visual literacy.
Speaker 1: I guess of somebody who's working at port Thomas Anderson's
Speaker 1: level and what he does. So blue kind of represents loneliness.
Speaker 1: That's Barry. That's why he wears his blue suit. Lena
Speaker 1: is red, Okay, Lena representing love passion. She wears red
Speaker 1: or colors that are closely at lined to red. I
Speaker 1: think she may be changing the pink purples you often
Speaker 1: see the lens flares when they first meet. There's a
Speaker 1: lens flare that's in the middle of them. It's both
Speaker 1: red and blue, like a little tiny, little two colored rainbow,
Speaker 1: both pointing kind of at each other. There seems like
Speaker 1: when Barry finally decides to go, and I mentioned earlier
Speaker 1: the car and the taxi that drop off the Flip
Speaker 1: and the Harmonium both red. When Barry decides to go
Speaker 1: to the airport, when he decides I'm going to go.
Speaker 1: He races out of the factory. A red truck just
Speaker 1: kind of goes by. It's very strong, you know, you
Speaker 1: never really see any really cars, you see. It seems
Speaker 1: to be traveling at quite always with momentum. Barry kind
Speaker 1: of you know, runs through it. That then cuts to
Speaker 1: Barry come down the airway walk in his blue and
Speaker 1: I think, I think it's like blue carpet shade of
Speaker 1: blue two Hostess in red. When you are in Hawaii,
Speaker 1: you'll see that the box is blue. Barriers in the box,
Speaker 1: the dancers in the street are wearing red. The parade
Speaker 1: a big Hawaiian parade. Also there's a mesh. There's a
Speaker 1: little mesh gate like little mesh you know, things that
Speaker 1: can be folded up. They're folding it up as they
Speaker 1: as they're doing it. Where as soon as Barry starts
Speaker 1: talking to Lena, it folds up almost gets out of screen.
Speaker 1: So there's almost no barrier now between the blue and
Speaker 1: the red. When Lena's voice comes up a little note
Speaker 1: the light comes up in the lighting is another thing.
Speaker 1: I'll get the lighting in the sec And then when
Speaker 1: he's running from the from the brothers and he does
Speaker 1: that kind of dive that kind of style. It's kind
Speaker 1: of a stylistic dive. There could be another reason for that.
Speaker 1: We'll get onto a superman theory soon. He dives and
Speaker 1: there's a red arrow facing the direction that he dives,
Speaker 1: like in a neon light arrow in the shop front there.
Speaker 1: When they leave the dinner, there is a truck with
Speaker 1: it goes along beside them or they whilst they walk,
Speaker 1: and it's got a blue it's largely blue logo, but
Speaker 1: it's got some red riding as well. And then that
Speaker 1: leaves and it's overtaken when they walk to their car
Speaker 1: by a car yard which has largely it's got it's
Speaker 1: shut down, but it's sill, got some lights. It's got
Speaker 1: red and blue lights. And then there's a final scene
Speaker 1: which I'll get to when we discuss another theory. But
Speaker 1: when he finds Lena, this really interesting. When he finds Lena,
Speaker 1: they've been red and blue and there's this light thing
Speaker 1: going on as well. So when Lena first meets Barry,
Speaker 1: you would have noticed a lot of blown out lights.
Speaker 1: Lena kind of represents the light. So Lena when they
Speaker 1: first meet, when she comes down together a car fixed
Speaker 1: the sun is right behind Lena, and it's shining on
Speaker 1: Barry a lot. There's all these lens flares, there's lots
Speaker 1: of light bouncing off trucks and things, and it's all
Speaker 1: really beautifully placed. So even when a good example is
Speaker 1: when Barry goes and he doesn't kiss Lena, and then
Speaker 1: she goes downstairs and she says, I just want you
Speaker 1: to know I wanted to kiss you, and it just
Speaker 1: gently moves and there's a there's a lamp on the
Speaker 1: desk and it gently moves in. And when she says
Speaker 1: that the more the more light and the more he
Speaker 1: talks to Lenna, that the more light appears on his face.
Speaker 1: So when Barry meets Lena in Hawaii and goes with
Speaker 1: the big awkward handshake, it's the only time she's wearing white, right,
Speaker 1: Lena is the light dragging him out of the shadow.
Speaker 3: Samish, I think you've watched it too many times.
Speaker 1: You haven't watched it enough. You have not watched it.
Speaker 1: It's a it's an incredible film, but clearly.
Speaker 3: It's made for people that have a passion for filmmaking.
Speaker 3: So if all this is correct, yes, I'm not doubt.
Speaker 3: I'm not casting down on what you're saying. But if
Speaker 3: that's all correct, it's not may need for the average consumer.
Speaker 3: These are things that likes a Richard Curtis film.
Speaker 1: When I watched, but they'll be stopping Richard Curtis films
Speaker 1: that would be not at this level. I don't think.
Speaker 1: I'm not saying that Curtis is a great filmmaker, but
Speaker 1: you know there's more art if you like, in Paul
Speaker 1: dams Anderson's films, No disabout it. I'm a Rachi Curtas fan,
Speaker 1: I really am. But I don't watch this in two
Speaker 1: thousand and two in a cinema and pick up all this.
Speaker 1: This is from seeing it twenty times. And so you
Speaker 1: probably won't watch this film twenty times.
Speaker 3: You watch it twice, but I'll go back and watch
Speaker 3: it again.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so it's picking up those things. Also, these things
Speaker 1: exist to work on a subconscious level. Like it's only
Speaker 1: when you really sit down and do some reading on
Speaker 1: it and you know, I'm looking around that you discover it.
Speaker 1: Some of these things I discovered for myself. I thought,
Speaker 1: there's there's a lot of red and blue. Oh, there's
Speaker 1: more red there. And there's there's other things that I
Speaker 1: you know, like the light I knew there was light.
Speaker 1: There's something to do light. There was overblown light. It's
Speaker 1: really blown out when it's outside and.
Speaker 3: So glaring.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's and it's yeah, it's just really interesting. Also,
Speaker 1: lots of white walls, you know, and there's really interesting
Speaker 1: stuff to take out. So Superman, Superman, let's talk Superman.
Speaker 1: All right, let's talk Man. There's a theory which I
Speaker 1: this is I only became aware of getting ready for
Speaker 1: this show. There's a theory that Barry Egan is Superman.
Speaker 3: As in this is you know, this is his day
Speaker 3: job at night his Yeah.
Speaker 1: That there are like, now, I don't want people thinking
Speaker 1: that that Barry Egan is going to enter the DC
Speaker 1: universe or anything, but that that as a as a
Speaker 1: source of inspiration Superman is there are three lines from
Speaker 1: Superman to Barry Egan. I'm going to take you through it. Now.
Speaker 1: This is not this is a bit of fun. It's
Speaker 1: not one of the reasons why I love the film.
Speaker 1: Like I said, it's I could take it or leave it.
Speaker 1: And at first I was like, oh, come on, and
Speaker 1: then when they started listing all the things, you kind
Speaker 1: of go okay, all right. Poor Thomas Anderson had this
Speaker 1: you know, I don't know. He feels a big superhero fan,
Speaker 1: big Superman fan. All right, so you've got the obvious one.
Speaker 1: He wears blue. He wears blue. Also, flight is a
Speaker 1: big thing for Superman. Barries after freaking fly miles, he
Speaker 1: talks about DJ Justice. He's one of my favorite scenes.
Speaker 1: I have mentioned this, and you know, I feel like
Speaker 1: a wanker every time I say I had the pleasure
Speaker 1: of having dinner with poor Thomas Anderson, and the one
Speaker 1: scene I got to asking about was that dinner scene
Speaker 1: about DJ Justice. I loved it. There's justice. There's a
Speaker 1: whole truth thing going on with the lies, and he
Speaker 1: tells lies, and then Lena starts telling the truth, you know,
Speaker 1: and then he starts telling the truth. He discovers great strength,
Speaker 1: like almost superhuman strength. Lois Slane is his girlfriend in
Speaker 1: this movie. It's Lena Leonard. After they after they kiss,
Speaker 1: Barry's tie is red, symbolizing a little more the famous
Speaker 1: Sibman outfit. There's a villain in this movie. The mattress
Speaker 1: Man sounds quite quite like a villain when he confronts
Speaker 1: and we'll get the philisimahoffins and we got to at
Speaker 1: Philipsim Hoffen. He when he gets to that, he he's
Speaker 1: wearing he's getting his haircut, and he's wearing this thing
Speaker 1: that almost looks like a cape that a villain might wear.
Speaker 1: Superman had his Fortunes of Solitude, which was I forget
Speaker 1: the name. I don't know sub Man well enough, but yeah,
Speaker 1: the place where he was from the planet where he
Speaker 1: was from almost had those ice Remember the glass, he's
Speaker 1: either ice or glass kind of shards. The way that
Speaker 1: some of the and Barry's Fortunes of Solitude is his factory,
Speaker 1: and he has his plunges. The way they're shot, and
Speaker 1: when Lena and he says to come in, they kind
Speaker 1: of almost walk through these plunges that are set up
Speaker 1: look like these kind of shades of glass. And perhaps
Speaker 1: the most compelling one is fine the very final shot
Speaker 1: of the film, which is Barry at the Harmonium. They've
Speaker 1: gotten together, they've had their kiss and at her apartment,
Speaker 1: and then they go through the factory and he's in
Speaker 1: the Harmonium and he's wearing his blue suit and Lena
Speaker 1: comes up from behind him and this gives him a
Speaker 1: hug behind him in her red which looks like a cape,
Speaker 1: and she says here we go, which could be something
Speaker 1: you hear when you're about to take off.
Speaker 3: It feels like a little bit of a stretch to me.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think it's fun. I think it's I
Speaker 1: don't really care if it's true or not. I'd like
Speaker 1: to know if if Paul Thomas Anderson used it as
Speaker 1: some kind of even if it's a bit of fun
Speaker 1: for him.
Speaker 3: But what I do like about that theory, though, is
Speaker 3: that someone has admired the film and and have reflected
Speaker 3: on it enough to think that up, Yeah, that.
Speaker 1: Is a film, by the way, this is a film
Speaker 1: that those who love it like, absolutely, absolutely absolutely love
Speaker 1: it like. It is one of those absolutely one of
Speaker 1: those films. Let's sa way Philisima Hoffman, the great, late
Speaker 1: great Philisima Hoffman. I mean, let's we got to just
Speaker 1: have a listen to the phone call between Adam Sandler
Speaker 1: and Philoema hoffin two greats.
Speaker 6: I'm gonna connect her with my supervisor.
Speaker 7: Now you're in trouble, honey, Hello, sir, my name is
Speaker 7: Barry Egan. I called your service. Oh what's that?
Speaker 1: I should calm down and shut the fuck up.
Speaker 2: What's problem? The problem is if your character to explain
Speaker 2: one of your employees. That girl I was just speaking
Speaker 2: with has been threatening me, and four blonde gentlemen just
Speaker 2: attack me and smashed my car and hurt my girl.
Speaker 1: All right, go fuck yourself. That shit has nothing to
Speaker 1: do with me. I run a legitimate business here. Listen
Speaker 1: to me. What's your name?
Speaker 4: Sir?
Speaker 1: Answer me?
Speaker 5: What's your name?
Speaker 6: I'm sorry, I.
Speaker 1: Know it could be anybody.
Speaker 3: You're a bad person. You have no right taking people's
Speaker 3: confidence in your service.
Speaker 1: You understand me, sir?
Speaker 3: No, no, no, shut up.
Speaker 5: Shut the fuck you're out right to take shut up.
Speaker 4: You shut up, shut up, shut shut shut shut shut up,
Speaker 4: shut up.
Speaker 1: Now are you threatening me? Dick? An't you you go
Speaker 1: fuck yourself?
Speaker 4: Oh?
Speaker 3: Fuck?
Speaker 1: Did you just say go fuck myself?
Speaker 3: Yes?
Speaker 7: I did.
Speaker 1: That wasn't good?
Speaker 3: You dead?
Speaker 1: I mean you probably felt sorry for Philaxine my hot
Speaker 1: run in that scene.
Speaker 4: It is.
Speaker 3: It is an unsettling well.
Speaker 1: Originally this was going to be a gangster film, funnily enough, yeah,
Speaker 1: And this was going to be Barry was going to
Speaker 1: be a thief and Lena was going to be I
Speaker 1: think his ex wife, and it was heading towards a
Speaker 1: more Tarantino style affair. But I I love this film
Speaker 1: because it's so unique, Like it is the characters are,
Speaker 1: you know, and the direction it goes without without feeling
Speaker 1: like like Guy Ritchie movies can feel like a bit
Speaker 1: cake donn. It's like, wow, there are so many you've worked,
Speaker 1: really had. You can always see Guy Ritchie on a
Speaker 1: whiteboard kind of mapping it out. This is not like that.
Speaker 1: This is kind of pretty effortless. This comes from a
Speaker 1: you know, it's also the the repercussions of making not
Speaker 1: even a mistake, you know, he just he's just a guy.
Speaker 1: He was trying to connect. He rang a phone's ext
Speaker 1: light and then all of a sudden this is put
Speaker 1: on him and then he he he takes control. I mean,
Speaker 1: I love it when he takes control.
Speaker 4: It is so.
Speaker 1: It is like, yes, I don't care where you've got
Speaker 1: these skills from. Where you can you know, beat up
Speaker 1: like four blonde brothers. Yeah, but you're doing it. You
Speaker 1: found strength and it's just a sing. It's not a
Speaker 1: complicated message. That's why I like. That's why I think
Speaker 1: sometimes there is that car flip and why he does
Speaker 1: dive off in that scene and for no real reason
Speaker 1: and it kind of runs off. It's like there are
Speaker 1: things that happen that are we Sometimes I'm critical of
Speaker 1: films because I think real life can be stranger than
Speaker 1: what we you know, and sometimes when you're trying to
Speaker 1: develop something and we go, oh, that happened, it's like
Speaker 1: anything can happen. Yeah, life is stranger than fiction. And
Speaker 1: I just think, so let's, you know, let's embrace the
Speaker 1: weird and then you.
Speaker 3: Know, could I could I turn your argument for this
Speaker 3: character back on you though a little? Do you think
Speaker 3: the director is deliberately challenging you to find it difficult
Speaker 3: to be on his side.
Speaker 1: I don't think he is. I really I understand. I understand.
Speaker 1: I'm well aware that this movie divides people. I think
Speaker 1: poor Thomas Anderson. The reason he one he just loves
Speaker 1: Adam Sandler. There's always loved these movies, and it surprises
Speaker 1: people to find that out that the guy who made
Speaker 1: There will Be Blood and Magnolia and the Master just
Speaker 1: happens to be a big fan of Adam Sandler movies,
Speaker 1: like he likes generally goofy stuff. And I think he's
Speaker 1: ace in the whole, and I think he's well aware
Speaker 1: of it. Is that even though this is almost ironic,
Speaker 1: based on what we've talked about and the reaction of
Speaker 1: people thinking, oh, well, I don't like Adam Sandler, is
Speaker 1: that he knows that people do love Adam Sandler, even
Speaker 1: though that's probably not giving.
Speaker 3: Consideration to the whole crowd.
Speaker 1: There's a whole other crowd who don't. I think Adam
Speaker 1: Sandler his comedies, like you mentioned earlier, aren't necessarily my
Speaker 1: cup of tea. But there's something so endearing about Adam
Speaker 1: Sandler that I will sit through and I will enjoy
Speaker 1: Happy Gilmore, the wedding singer fifty First Dates, because he
Speaker 1: is genuinely so likable. There are things so many things
Speaker 1: wrong with those movies, but you don't watch them, you know,
Speaker 1: discuss the you know, the lens layers and the colors
Speaker 1: that they use. It's Adam Sandler has a presence. He's funny,
Speaker 1: and there's something human about Adam Sandler that comes across
Speaker 1: on screen for me that I've always connected with. Even
Speaker 1: though there are some films if he's that I half
Speaker 1: watched it, I very rarely do that are half watched,
Speaker 1: and I think I don't need to see the end
Speaker 1: of this or some about right hated, you know those
Speaker 1: fans like, what are you doing? But there is something
Speaker 1: I think very humane about Adam Sandler on screen, and
Speaker 1: I think, I, you know, we all come from different places,
Speaker 1: and I just had immediate empathy. I think for Adam
Speaker 1: Sam and his rage. If his rage, if I didn't
Speaker 1: understand his rage, he would be more of a concern.
Speaker 1: If we don't see how much the sisters put on him,
Speaker 1: then it's just like what the what the this goes
Speaker 1: off the charts. But I can see and he asked
Speaker 1: for help. He asked for help. What do we want
Speaker 1: people to do? We want them to reach out. He's
Speaker 1: got no one to reach out to. The one look
Speaker 1: like Walter who does reach out to betrays him doesn't.
Speaker 3: Actually get into a doctor's surgery.
Speaker 1: Well, of course you can do. You can say the
Speaker 1: about any movie, why did I do this? Well, then
Speaker 1: there's no fucking movie. You can always say why why
Speaker 1: don't I just get over that heiccup and just get together?
Speaker 1: In the first Why doesn't Harry just love Sally straight away? Well,
Speaker 1: because we want to go on a journey, we want
Speaker 1: to make a movie. You want to have a few
Speaker 1: laughs here. So that's that's my point. I do love
Speaker 1: that scene did remind me you seen Booie Knights.
Speaker 3: Funnily enough, Yeah, I think a long time ago back, Yes.
Speaker 1: There was a there was a certain kind of like
Speaker 1: I feel like those scenes are related. There's a scene
Speaker 1: where Dirk Diggler goes into a car park and jerks
Speaker 1: himself off for cash and it and then it gets
Speaker 1: beaten up. It felt like it felt like it may
Speaker 1: have been shot in the same carpack. I don't know
Speaker 1: if it was or not. Yeah, I do. I love Philfit.
Speaker 1: I mean the exchange they had when he goes after
Speaker 1: the car accident, he gets his superpowers, takes it at
Speaker 1: the hospital, then leaves. She does go back, yeah, after
Speaker 1: they and she's already been discharged. But like even though
Speaker 1: with stuff, like he runs, like he goes in the store,
Speaker 1: well sorry, he goes, yeah, in the match of store.
Speaker 1: And that's in Ohio. So there's gone Californian to Ohio.
Speaker 1: And but we don't think this is where you can
Speaker 1: create your own culture, create your own time lines, landscapes.
Speaker 1: We don't question, we don't, we don't. We don't really
Speaker 1: think about it. The jumps on a plane and goes Ohio.
Speaker 1: I don't know how Long, Ohio is from California. Imagine
Speaker 1: it's a plane trip, but he goes there. He's still
Speaker 1: on the phone in his hand, and it's and it's gorgeous.
Speaker 1: It's brilliant. You know, we don't, we're not. It's just
Speaker 1: a little detail that's kind of funny if you're watching
Speaker 1: it again. Craft when look how por Thomas Anderson reveals
Speaker 1: when Adam Sandlers can't go one and he's getting his haircut,
Speaker 1: and it's such a simple little move and they use
Speaker 1: a mirror and and things to kind of disguise the
Speaker 1: fact and they just Phil simah Hoffen turns around and
Speaker 1: Georgie who's cutting his head, turns around and he just
Speaker 1: like moves the camera a little bit reveals Adam standless
Speaker 1: standing in this almost there. I say, it's superhero pose
Speaker 1: and it's just like a very simple but brilliant directorial move. Okay,
Speaker 1: it is gorgeous, mate. This podcast comes with homework. I
Speaker 1: feel like more for you than most.
Speaker 3: I feel like I've let you down.
Speaker 1: No, no, listen, I like always say you're just process
Speaker 1: in his film. I'm not gonna say you're gonna watch
Speaker 1: it again and love it, but you might you might
Speaker 1: watch it again and have a slightly slightly different view
Speaker 1: on it. Perhaps not, I don't know. Some quick fun
Speaker 1: facts before we go. The pudding said plot was actually
Speaker 1: a real based on a Time magazine I got to use.
Speaker 3: I saw that, yeah, because yeah, I read about it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so it was a Time magazine article. A civil
Speaker 1: engineer called David Phelps bought three thousand dollars worth of
Speaker 1: putting US hundred and fifty cups and end up receiving
Speaker 1: one point two five million mile fring of flying miles.
Speaker 3: And they asked him if they could use his story.
Speaker 1: I did that. I didn't know that, yeah, and he
Speaker 1: said yes, yes, And then he saw the film and
Speaker 1: he's like, that guy makes me anxious. The movie's original
Speaker 1: titles were Knuckle Sandwich and Yeah. I mentioned it was
Speaker 1: like a Tarantino style one hundred and forty pages long,
Speaker 1: and then he wanted to make a shorter film, so
Speaker 1: that all changed. The idea of having seven sisters was inspired,
Speaker 1: believe it or not, by an episode of Cops four times,
Speaker 1: Andazon was watching a I get arrested and he's talking
Speaker 1: about all the things wrong with his life, and he
Speaker 1: mentioned he's got seven sisters and Anderson thought, okay, that
Speaker 1: sounds fun. Sean Penn was going to play Dean Tremmel.
Speaker 1: Even though Philips my Hoffin nails it, Sean Penn was
Speaker 1: going to play it was unavailable. They always wanted to
Speaker 1: work together. Has recently worked with him on Licorice Pizza,
Speaker 1: which is an extraordinary film as well. This feels like
Speaker 1: poor Thomas Anderson's most personal film, but Lickorage Pizza is
Speaker 1: in a completely different film vibe, but it also feels
Speaker 1: very personal as well. But so mate, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 1: We're heading into the project office. Well no doubt, continue
Speaker 1: to talk about it. I'll look at you across the
Speaker 1: desk and go.
Speaker 3: How there is this guy? Buddy? What?
Speaker 1: Oh god? I don't understand it, But thank you so much,
Speaker 1: and thanks for hanging out, Thanks for having me. There
Speaker 1: we go the ultimate episode of season four. If you
Speaker 1: ain't seen nothing yet, yes, one more ago, and I
Speaker 1: want to thank Hamis McDonald for coming in and having
Speaker 1: a chat about that film. I get the feeling he's
Speaker 1: going to go back at some point and watch it
Speaker 1: again and maybe have a different vibe about it. I
Speaker 1: don't know, I might be wishful thinking, but I love
Speaker 1: chatting to him. I love working with him. I love
Speaker 1: being his mate and very thoughtful, sensitive guy, sensitive not soft,
Speaker 1: I mean he he cares, He's empathetic, so I really
Speaker 1: appreciate him taking the time. He's very, very very busy man.
Speaker 1: And I loved that. I loved him talking about the movies.
Speaker 1: That story he told about about seeing Somersault in London,
Speaker 1: and then also what the movie head On kind of
Speaker 1: meant to him as well. That was really that was
Speaker 1: really really honest, kind of soul bearing stuff in a way.
Speaker 1: So thank you Hamish for being so honest. Sure do
Speaker 1: I wish you'd loved Puns Strung Love more than you did, Yes,
Speaker 1: but that's the way to cookie grumble. And I still
Speaker 1: it doesn't change the way I think of the film.
Speaker 1: I think it's a perfect film. I think everything Paul
Speaker 1: Thomas Andersen tried to do he achieved and I will
Speaker 1: always love that film. And for anybody listening to this
Speaker 1: episode who loves Punt Drunk Love as much as I
Speaker 1: do and may feel frustrated that Hamish didn't love it,
Speaker 1: that's not what this podcast is about. It's just about
Speaker 1: sharing our cinematic experiences, and yeah, it should not even
Speaker 1: when I when we did Love Actually and I kind of,
Speaker 1: you know, joined in and the shredding of that film,
Speaker 1: I didn't. I certainly did not want anyone to change
Speaker 1: their views on Love Actually. You know, it's just about
Speaker 1: having a revisit of some films. So yeah, puns strung
Speaker 1: Love imma will always be perfect. And I hopefully Hamish
Speaker 1: will give me a tap on the shoulder in the
Speaker 1: year's time we go, Actually, Pete, I apologize, let's record
Speaker 1: that podcast because it's actually the most brilliant film ever.
Speaker 1: I won't hold my breath, but we'll see Derek Maya
Speaker 1: Skaisway Studios. You have not seen Punk Drunk Love.
Speaker 3: I believe you know what I'm going to now, we've achieved.
Speaker 3: If we've achieved something today.
Speaker 1: It might be the deciding vote.
Speaker 3: I'm a no Sandler guy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, okay, So.
Speaker 3: Definitely listening to the clips and listening to the discussion,
Speaker 3: I'm going to have to just just toughen up and
Speaker 3: have a look at it.
Speaker 1: There was an article because we're actually recording this little
Speaker 1: behind the scenes. We're recording this a week or so
Speaker 1: after we recorded the interview with Hamish and he sent
Speaker 1: me an article that was written by somebody because he's
Speaker 1: got Hustle out on Netflix now, which is a he
Speaker 1: plays a basketball coach, I think, and somebody who was
Speaker 1: writing in the age. I believe that everyone really needs
Speaker 1: to rethink their Adam Sandler prejudices, so good chance to
Speaker 1: do so. He's got Hustle on Netflix. Uncut Gems was amazing,
Speaker 1: but maybe start with Punks drunk Love. It is a
Speaker 1: phenomenal experience, I believe. And performance next week sadly the
Speaker 1: last episode of If You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet for
Speaker 1: season four. It has flown by in many ways. Other
Speaker 1: times I feel like it's gone exactly over about twenty
Speaker 1: weeks or so. I'm so excited. The classic film, an
Speaker 1: iconic film with an iconic, brilliant Australian. We have Claire
Speaker 1: Bowditch coming in for the final episode next week. Claire
Speaker 1: is somebody who I could not have more respect for.
Speaker 1: She radiates positivity. She speaks so beautifully, and particularly about
Speaker 1: creativity and the importance of creativity. She really believes in
Speaker 1: what creativity can do and that everyone is creative. And
Speaker 1: I'm sure we'll get all kinds of insights. I've got
Speaker 1: my fingers double crossed. She's going to enjoy the movie
Speaker 1: that she has nominated. She has never seen. Claire Boats musician, author, broadcaster, entrepreneur,
Speaker 1: or amazing woman has never seen the nineteen seventy six
Speaker 1: winner of the Best Picture Oscar that year is the
Speaker 1: highest grossing movie of nineteen seventy six. It spawned eight
Speaker 1: spin off films over five decades. It gave us sevesteris
Speaker 1: the Lione you know you can hear it. It's Rocky
Speaker 1: Where Votage watches Rocky for.
Speaker 6: The first time next week on your eighteen Nothing yet
Speaker 6: until then, take care, And so we leave.
Speaker 1: All Pete save Van Sult, and to our friends of
Speaker 1: the radio audience, we've been a hasn't good time.
Speaker 5: M