Casey on You Can Count on Me

Casey is back to dive into his next pick, the wonderful indie sibling drama, You Can Count on Me.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Movie Crush, a production of I Heart Radio. Hey, everybody,

(00:30):
Welcome to Movie Crush. Friday, Casey a Dish, Casey and
his Ridiculous history t shirts, sucking up to knowl Yeah
about that. Like, I end up wearing this on an
inordinate amount of like remote podcast recordings where there's a camera,
just because this is one of the more comfy T
shirts I have around at the moment um, and I'm
always self conscious about it. But then I'm always going

(00:51):
for comfort over wanting to, you know, not choose something
that's so on brand. But there you have, right, Well,
I'll tell NOL. I'll pass it along that your comfy
as shirt is his. Well it's not his face, but
I guess rescuing face. Yeah, it's rescuing wrapped up on
your body. How you doing? You know, I'm doing Okay.

(01:12):
I'm just kind of sick of, you know, being at
home all the time. But that's everybody's, uh state of
affairs if they're lucky enough to be able to stay home,
so I can't complain too much. But yeah, I mean,
I'm just eager to kind of, I don't know, be
in the world again. I hear you me too, buddy.
I appreciate these hangs with you that that makes life

(01:34):
a bit more worth living, it really does it. Really, Um,
you get that sense of connection back a little bit,
which is super important. You know. Actually I saw you
one time since this all started. We didn't we didn't speak,
but I had to run by the office for something,
and you happen to be in the studio, um, probably
doing something remotely, and I was gonna like tap on

(01:55):
the window, but I think you guys were actually like
actively recording, so I just kind of kept it moving.
But that's funny. I've been in there a couple of
times and heard you know, the exit door is right
there next door studio. I've heard that door open and shut,
which is a little eerie. When it's you know, the
walking dead town. You hear a door open and you're like,
who is that? No. I'm always like when I'm going

(02:17):
in the office now, which is not frequent, you know,
once in every few weeks at most, but um, it
is always sort of like, is somebody else here? Somebody
gonna come come around the corner and scare the crap
out of me? Well, uh, we're all masking up in there,
and unless like there's nobody there, but if there's been
a couple of times there's been like like Ben came

(02:38):
by when I was in there the other day, and uh,
ironically Ben's desk out of that huge office is the
one closest to mine, which is probably like ten ft um.
But yeah, Ben had a mask on and I had
a mask on, and I was like, all right, good
to see you. I'm going in the studio. Yeah. Yeah,
it's weird. I mean that the social interactions now where

(03:00):
there's like this low level like I kind of wish
this other person wasn't here. H It's very very strange,
but I've definitely gotten it where like I'm just walking
around my building or something, and you know, you passed
by somebody in the hallway and you have that moment
of like I kind of wish, you know, if I
don't know my mask with me or something. Yeah, there's
like another person. There's an obstacle. Yeah, I went to
get I was getting on the elevator. I had called

(03:22):
the elevator at work and it opened and right when
it dinged, I went to step on and this guy
can kind of hustling up behind me, and I was like,
go ahead, dude, I'm not getting on a fucking elevator
with anybody. I'm not in that big of a hurry. Yeah, no,
not at all. Well, but than that, I mean, I'm
I'm having a good time. It's just um. Yeah. Like
I said, I don't know, I missed going to the movies,

(03:43):
and that's that's a big thing to kidding. I miss
live music. Yeah yeah, oh and this is that's live music.
See me the last thing, Casey, I know they're they're
getting Do you see Gray White play the show? No?
Who's that great White? This is an awful story. Why
does the band that back in the two battle band?

(04:04):
Yeah yeah, the one that played the show with the
pyrotechnics and spire started like a hundred people died. They're
playing a coronavirus show, are they? Well? I figured we
we blasted people up. Yeah all right, dude, so you

(04:26):
were here to your next movie pick was The two thousand.
Hard to believe this movie is twenty years old, but
the two thousand uh sibling indeed drama you can count
on me From writer director playwright Kenneth Law Again, although
this was not a play first, I believe this was
just his first abbot of movie, right. I think he

(04:47):
had written he had written some screenplays before this, like exactly. Yeah,
And I'm sure he probably did script doctor and maybe
sold some more that that we haven't heard about. Um,
but this is certainly his first one as like writer
direct here, you know, writing something that he himself wanted
to put up on screen. Yeah. I read a little
bit with him yesterday. He wrote, analyzed this and he

(05:07):
wrote the Rocky and Bullwinkle movie, and uh, I think
it was like a ten years on sort of piece
and you can count on me, which those are always
kind of fun to read, like retrospectives. But he said, yeah,
he said, you know, I made my name sort of
writing those movies that We're fine, but this is clearly
when I got a chance to direct my own film.

(05:28):
This is way more of my speed. Uh. And the
he said, the initial idea just came to him very simply,
which was, what about a story of two siblings where
one is kind of a consummate funk up and one
is always worried about him and they and they were
orphaned when every young. And that's one of the things

(05:50):
I love so much about this movie, and it's one
of my favorite films. The first time I saw this
movie in the theater twenty years ago, Uh, it resonated
with me a lot because I talked about my brother
a lot. But I have an older sister who's six
years older than me, and we are very close as well.
And I was always sort of the black sheep of
the family, and I was the wanderer all over the country,

(06:14):
and I never had a job that was not waiting
tables or something, and everyone was always like, what's chucking
to do? What's where is he going to end up?
And low level worried. I wasn't getting in bar fights
and thrown in jail, but you know, bopping around the
country smoking weed and like just living my best life,
which is not what they were doing. And she was

(06:36):
one of those that got married young were young to me,
you know, in her early twenties to our high school
sweetheart and um, great dude that he's awesome and they're
still married, but just different paths in life. So this
movie really really resonated with me as uh, like I'm
kind of him and she's kind of my sister, Michelle.
It's a very very special movie to me. Absolutely the

(06:57):
same with me. Um, I found myself watch it, you know,
for the first time in a number of years last night,
and it was it was just interesting. I mean we
talked about this a lot on this show, with movies
that I've seen maybe twenty years ago and then I'm
seeing again now, although I have seen them in the
years in between, but there's just something about the shift
in perspective, and I felt like this time I could

(07:18):
I could basically see everybody's side of it much more clearly,
whereas before I was maybe a little bit more like,
even though he's a funk up, I was still on
you know, uh, what's yeah, Terry's Terry side of things, Like,
you know, it's just like and the guy's cool, just
give him a break, you know, And watching it last night,
it was really like, No, he really does like he's

(07:39):
kind of a he's kind of a trainer w reckon
and he needs to pull it together and he is
actually hurting people around him, so it's not as if
it's just his own trip that he's on. But um,
especially like his girlfriend is pregnant, that that whole part
hit a lot heavier to me. Um, the way that
he's clearly almost kind of running out on her in
a way at least he's tempted to. First seen with

(08:01):
him is really tough. Yeah yeah, and and just so
well played. And this was the first time I had
seen Mark Ruffalo, who, as I think, as the stuff
you should Know listener. He tweeted out an episode of
ours once, the Trail of Tears episode, and I got
no further confirmation of anything, but I think he listens
to stuff you should Know, which made me super super ou.

(08:23):
Oh man, that's so cool, that's really great. I'd like
to get him on this show. Yeah, yeah, killer, yeah,
But I don't, I don't. I didn't look up his filmography.
Do you know if this was his first role, it's
like his breakout role. So he'd been some stuff up
to then, but I don't think. I don't know if
you necessarily had any leading roles, and he certainly hadn't
had anything where, you know, he felt like he could

(08:45):
fully embrace the material and become that character and and
really give it like a thousand percent the way he
does in this film. So this is definitely like a
big breakthrough for him. Yeah, he's so great, and that
the acting, I mean, Laura Lenny so good, it's so yeah, man,
I'm just in love with her. She's as an artist,
she's uh, she's one of those people that and she's

(09:06):
so well cast in this and I think Ozark because
of this quality, which is the warmest human you could
imagine and the warmest smile. But there's also this thing
where she's not to be trifled with and she's not
to be fucked with a little bit. Oh yeah, and
that's a that's a tough one, too punch to pull off.
I think absolutely. Yeah, she she remains very warm and

(09:29):
open and sympathetic, but at the same time, you don't
want to cross her, and she's going to call you
on your bs, so you better be on top of things. Yeah. Yeah.
That scene later in the movie when Matthew Brodrick is
essentially trying to fire her, and we'll get into all
this stuff, but I love that because I remember the
first time I even saw it thinking, oh, dude, don't
do it, because you just had an affair with her

(09:50):
and she could fucking take you down. Yeah. Not smart,
he's he's he's very um. He's great in this too. Yeah.
Matthew Broder. I love Matthew Broder, whose apparently he's um
Kenneth Lanagan and he have known each other since they
were like fifteen. Um they go way back and UM
yeah yeah, they're like they went to the same school
and um the school actually that they both went to, um,

(10:15):
which I think we're sort of talking about making this
a little mini directors series. Is that correct? Uh? Yeah,
so we'll do Margaret Manchester by the Sea and then
that'll be I haven't seen either one of those, No kidding,
why did I see Margaret? Who was Margaret? Uh Anna
Paquin is the is the lead and Margaret nothing in

(10:39):
either one of those. And I avoided Manchester by the
Sea on purpose because I knew it was such a downer,
and uh, I was like, yeah, I'm gonna get to it.
I'm gonna get to it, and then never got to it.
Watching watching this again, it was it was definitely like, oh,
this is almost like a companion film to Manchester by
the Sea in a way. I mean, all his films

(10:59):
center or own kind of prominent deaths and then the
fallout the effect that that has on on the characters
that are left alive. But um, definitely that one is
in a in a heavier register than than this one,
which remains a little more comic and light at times,
even if beneath the surface there's there's real stuff, heavy
stuff going on. Um Manchester by the Sea is a
little bit more self consciously like bergman esque or something

(11:23):
where it is kind of like pretty dark, and there's
a lot of humor in it too, but no, no
question a darker film. And Margaret, I want to say,
is a little bit more of a blend of the two.
Margaret has a more kind of expansive view of the world,
even though it is still based on this one central character.
There's so many like peripheral characters and they all kind

(11:43):
of get their their moment to shine anyway. We'll we'll
talk about that when we get to it. So but
the thing that I the reason I brought up Margaret was, um,
Matthew Broderick and Kenneth Lanagan went to the same kind
of like prep school together, and there's a prep school
and Margaret that is basically there see in that film
that he's writing with his recollection of like class discussions

(12:04):
and arguments and so on that happened to them when
they were in school. And now is is he in
either one of those? Because he plays the Priest in
this movie. He's in both. Yeah, it's a great effect.
I think him, he's he's very understated in this role.
It's great, doesn't require some huge range, but uh, he's
just so kind of perfectly played. I think now he's great.

(12:25):
I love his his his character as the as the priest. Um,
you get the feeling he has a crush on on Sammy. Yeah,
and he seems he seems a little spaced out. He
seems a little bit like he could be a stoner
or something, or or maybe he just comes by that
disposition naturally, you know, because he's he's very much like
he he is so opposite the whole black and white,

(12:47):
you know, good and bad sort of evaluation. He's not
a fire and brimstone guy. He's like, uh, yeah, what
do you think? You know, it's a little bit of
this is a little bit of that. I can't really
tell you the right answer, but you know, do with
it what you will. And I'm trying to have to
hurt anybody. That's that's about it. Ideal priests. Yeah, yeah,
you know, it's like almost like a therapist really, you
know for the town. Yeah. Absolutely, And that scene is

(13:09):
great too, when she h when Sammy calls him in basically,
and Terry is just so fucking pissed and it's just
boiling beneath the surface. But there was also this, um
there's so many layers, I think, to so many of
these scenes, Like he was upset, but the way that
the priest was challenging him was working and you could

(13:32):
tell and that kind of made him a very sincere answer.
Once once he kind of cracks that armor. Yeah. The
the one thing that especially watching this last night and
then watching it again immediately after with with the Lanagan
commentary on the DVD, UM you you quickly realized that
all these scenes have multiple layers happening at the same time.

(13:55):
And Lanagan talks a lot about how in terms of
writing the dialogue, like you really enjoys writing dialogue, but
at the same time, on a certain level, the words
are not what it's what is important. What's important is
what the scene is quote unquote really about, and all
the sort of behavioral stuff that's happening parallel to the dialogue.
So you know, if somebody's telling a story, they were

(14:16):
having a conversation about their day, it could just as
easily be something different. Happened to them in their day.
But it's more about how much is this character really
listening to this other character? Is there something else on
their mind? Um? Is there something that they're trying to
get out of this interaction that's going on? Said and
and but we as the audience are kind of becoming
aware of it and so on. It's all that stuff

(14:37):
that that you don't You don't just give an actor
or a character one thing to do in a scene,
because that's so flatten boring. It's sort of like you
want things to be a kind of cross purposes or
parallel to each other or um, just just to give
the sense of like life is going on. It's not
just that these people are chess pieces on a board.
They're these three dimensional human beings and they have these

(14:58):
kind of conflicting impulses um at any given moment, like
they're being pulled in different directions and against their own
like worst instincts are better instincts. So all of that
gets thrown into the knicks um pretty much in all
the scenes of the film. Yeah, I think that's um.
When you start writing scripts, it's one of the biggest

(15:19):
lessons you can learn, is uh, like you were saying
the dialogue isn't and I don't want to say rarely,
but um, a lot of times it's not even what
is going on in the scene, and that's the best stuff.
Otherwise it's too on the nose. And if you think
about real life, how many times do you have, um,

(15:41):
just even passing conversations with someone from work where what
you're saying is not really what's either going on or
what's on your mind exactly. Yeah, and it happens all
the time. Yeah. People people talk around whatever it is
that they're really thinking so often because maybe they're averse
to confrontation in or they just don't want to worry

(16:01):
the other person with whatever is actually traveling them, or
they have a huge asshole and you can't let them
know that. That's all right, that's right. You have to
keep things kind of civil. So you know, you have
the quote unquote professional relationship, but in the back of
your mind, you're really thinking, by that guy is just
a pain of the you know whatever. Um. Long Agan
is so good at at doing that, and it's I

(16:22):
think it's very rare for especially for a writer director
to have that kind of attitude towards their language towards
their words. He's he's definitely not like in the Coen
Brothers school of like you left out a period or
a comma sort of thing, um, which is works wonderfully
for them as well. But you get the senset for
Long again, if if if a line is is giving

(16:43):
an act of trouble, it's sort of the thing of like, well,
how would you say it, or how would the character
say it? Or what what what would work better there?
And adjusting things on the fly on set, as opposed
to like the script is this thing that's written in
stone every pause in comma and hesitation and has been
like scripted out in advance. It's it's definitely not that.
And I think that's that's something rare, like I said,

(17:04):
for a writer director, because they tend to be very
uh into the language and the words and the precision
of of that and the control it gives them over
the drama right exactly, um. And so for long Agan,
he says that even though he is a screenwriter, he
when he puts on that director's hat, it's sort of
like it might as well be somebody else's script. He

(17:25):
will cut stuff, he'll change stuff, he'll rework if it's
not if it's not what he wants it to be.
And um, yeah, it's it's great that people that some
some directors can really have that level of perspective and
not get overly like attached to play the words. Yeah. Um.
Another thing that really knocks me about, knocks me out
about this script is how much is not said. Um.

(17:48):
There are a bunch of examples in this movie where um,
and he does it in a bunch of different ways.
There's a few examples I can think of. There's at
the very beginning after Uh, and of course we're spoilers
as always everybody, but the very first thing that happens
in the movie is is the parents are killed in
a car crash. Um did not recognize that was Amy

(18:08):
Ryan by the way, Yes, I know, I know. This
is like a one minute scene, not even twenty second scene. Yeah,
it's funny. Um, this is like the first of two
that I can think of, Um, beloved things with both
Amy Ryan and Steve Roll featured in some way the
other way of course, Oh right, right, of course, yeah,

(18:28):
all over this too, great effect. Yeah, and I didn't
I didn't pick up on the Steve Roll until like
the credit song. I was like, Oh, that's Steve Rolls singing,
and then like as the songs are going by, I'm like, oh,
there's like seven Steve roll songs movie. But um, the
first example is when that that state trooper shows up, um,
and you know that's sort of a trophy scene where
the state trooper knocks at the door in the middle
of the night, you know what's happening, and the babysitter

(18:51):
answers the door and he asked, you know, to tell
the kids you're going to be back in a second,
and then he kind of inhales and it cuts like
he you don't see him say it, so that's left unsaid. Um.
Later on the Priest, when you have the woman priest
during the wake, Uh, she's talking and giving a you know,

(19:14):
I was about to stay performing the wake. Whatever you
say leading the wake, and the music is is bad
is laid over at this great classical score. And then
the most famous of all is that the last scene
of the movie, which we're going to get to. But um,
the thing that they always said to each other as kids,
clearly as you can count on me right, And I

(19:36):
love that they never say it because that is how
that would happen between those people. Yeah, you wouldn't say
it out loud, no, I mean in in the really
bad like corny notes from the studio version you would.
But oh, I bet you somebody tried to get him
to put that in there. Yeah, because it's almost like
he's like rubbing your face in it that like, yeah, no,
I'm not going to see the title of the movie.

(19:56):
You're gonna have to fill that piece in yourself. But
I mean it reflected those just how it's like in
um in movies, you know, um or in real life,
people don't really call each other by their names that often.
And when you see that in screenplays where people are
constantly like you know, or a couple is sort of
like rehashing their recent history. That again, you would have
no reason except for exposition, just to deliver. Yeah. So

(20:17):
he's he's so um, he's so well attuned to those
little subtle things, and it just I don't know why,
but the effect is so powerful when you yourself have
to kind of fill that gap in your mind because
you know they're both thinking it, and it's you're almost
like a participant in the scene in that way. And
it's just it's so effective. It's you know, it gets
me every time, every fucking time. That last scene destroys me.

(20:41):
Emily went to bed last night because we had a
big day yesterday with Ruby's birthday. But she, uh, she said,
how was it? Seen it again? And I was like
it was unbelievable. I said, I didn't wake you up
at the end. She said, you know, I was like,
I was fucking sobbing, dude. I was. I was losing it,
like it midnight in the dark in my room. I
was just could not keep it together in that scene,
and I knew it was going to reckon me. It
always does. Yeah, there's there's that moment in the film.

(21:04):
There's the one a little bit earlier on where um
he's sitting on the bed. She sits down next to
him and she says, you know, maybe be a good
idea if he stayed at home for a while. And
he breaks almost immediately, and it's again like something about
just the way he he performs that bit. I'm getting
like goosebumps just thinking about it, because it's so a
little bit like a little quiver in the way he

(21:24):
lowers his head and he just like, you know that
feeling where he can barely get the words out. It's
just like he's having such a hard time, and yet
he he wasn't gonna say anything. You know, he was
going to just act like it was all fine, because
he's always okay. That's who he is, no matter what's
going on. Even if I went to jail, it was like,
it's all fine, It's all fine, which is one of

(21:47):
the things I love about that last scene between them.
He says things a couple of ways that um make
you realize that he knows this and he's not being
uhum a Pollyanna and just saying everything's great and gonna
be great. He says something like, you know, comparatively, it's

(22:08):
not going to be that bad. Nothing that bad is
going to happen. Nothing that bad is going to happen.
He's just reassuring your like, you know, I'm going to
go back to Wooster, I'm going to see this girl.
I'm gonna be depending on how that goes, I might
head out west, i might go to Alaska, I might
do this, and might do that. But you know, throughout it,
he's sort of saying like, and if that doesn't work,
I'll figure something else. Out like I'm a grown up.

(22:28):
You can relax. You don't have to like but hes
or three lives, you know. For all, he wasn't saying
I'm going to be awesome. He was saying I will
be basically okay, I'll be a grown up and I'll
deal with it as it as it comes. And it
won't be perfect, it'll it'll be far from it. But
you know you can you can rest assured that. Um,

(22:49):
you know, you don't have to be there to supervise.
It's not like it's that desperate of a situation. Yeah. Well,
and this is a sister who keeps a file drawer
labeled Terry Fun, which is just so sweet. Um, And
what a jumping off point to have these two siblings
that are in real life separated by about four years

(23:10):
and you kind of get the picture. That's about what
it is in the movie that just you know, they
they're they only have each other. And that's such a
powerful place to start a dramatic storyline. You know. Yeah,
so many other family dramas you would have, like the
kind of extended family to fill things out, or to
complicate things, or maybe to kind of keep things a

(23:31):
little bit beneath the surface or something. But because it
really is the two of them and they are kind
of alone in the world except for with each other. Um,
it just makes it. Yeah, it just makes you emotion
more palpable, and the relationships are that much more dynamic
and um critical, you know, because that's like you said,
all they have is each other in this world. Yeah. Uh.

(23:52):
The other one another line that really stands out to
me early on is when that that scene with the
his girlfriend, Um in what that Gabby Hoffman, Yeah, I
believe so, I believe so. But he says, and it's
such a brilliant one liner that says so much about
this character, was I'm not the kind of guy that
everyone says I am. And that just says it all

(24:15):
about this guy that's constantly defend having to defend um
the things that he's done, knowing that he's done a
lot of wrong things. Yeah. And it's it's the Lanigan
talks about in the commentary. How it makes him even
more interesting and maybe frustrating as a character is the
level of self awareness he has about all this. And

(24:36):
yet even with all that articulateness and self awareness and
and just kind of knowing quote unquote the kind of
guy he is and the kind of guy that people
think he is, he seems like he's unable to kind
of get a grip, get a hold on it. And
men make those changes in mature a little bit and
no longer be sort of like the professional screw up.
But you know, it's like he he knows he's doing it,

(24:59):
but he he can't he can't resist it in some ways.
And I found myself, especially throughout this viewing, kind of
feeling like at certain moments maybe he was going to
take that next step and mature, and then he would
just do something that would kind of like you go, oh, Terry,
come on, man, like, you know, especially like after the
Priests visit, for instance, where he's obviously angry at Sammy

(25:21):
and he wants to get back at her in some way,
and so he uses the kid by proxy the fishing trip,
and it's like, man, that's such an immature, dickish move,
you know. But I mean that that that he himself
could see clearly for what it is, but maybe only
with a little bit of removed because in the immediate

(25:41):
moment he's just angry, you know, And of course it's
it's it's so rich, like, Um, there's such an undercurrent
of he is hyper aware that he is the black sheet,
that he is the outcast and so on, and that
she's looking at him as the failure, the thing I
have to worry about and deal it and so on.
So all throughout when he's living there, anything that she

(26:04):
does that's not completely above board, he like sees on
it to say, as if to say, like, look, you
screw up, to like you make mistakes, you're having an
affair with your boss, etcetera, etcetera. Um, he wants to
kind of like break out of that that role as
the screw up because if he feels like it's it's
something that's mutually reinforcing, you know, like everybody perceives him

(26:25):
as this thing, and then he just continues to be
it and it wears him out. He talks about that
in that first lunchtime scene when they first meet up. Yeah, yeah, totally. Um.
The other thing that I feel like, because there's the
reference to her being the wild child, but she's gotten
it together. But there's something about his presence that I
think has allowed her to be bad a little bit. Um,

(26:48):
maybe because he's so much worse. Um, but she's I
think she kind of brings out that wild in him,
and you know, smoking a little pot with them, something
that she sounds like she hasn't done a long time,
starts this affair. She can't decide whether to marry this
guy who's just sort of I mean, he's not a

(27:09):
bad guy at all, but you know, she's boring. Yeah,
and then that line that she has when she's talking
to the priest really says it all. She's like, I
feel sorry for them, yes, and that's why she's sleeping
with him. I mean, that's she feels sorry for for
both the guys. She feels sorry for her brother. You know,
she she she basically feels like she has the whole

(27:30):
world on her shoulders. It's not she's an impact, Yeah,
it's it's not just her life that she's living. But
she's really trying to manage and make sure that all
these other people are going to be okay. And I
think that I hadn't really thought about it before, but
I think there's such a deeper connection there in terms
of them having lost their parents at such a young age.
I think for her that just drove her to feel

(27:52):
like it was on her as the older sibling right
to to be this kind of guardian for everybody. So
that's a role that she feels very comfortable in, and
that has extended to just her boss at work or
this guy that she's dating. You know. It's just like
the mode that she operates in is that, um, I
don't know. She she likes uh, she likes a flawed person,

(28:16):
a project somebody that. Yeah, and it's like she she
sees that and she's kind of like, well, nobody else
is gonna take care of this person. So I guess
it's got to be me because it the thought of
somebody just being out there in the world without anybody
to look after them brings to mind like her in
his situation as kids. So I think that's you know,

(28:36):
to a large extent where where that impulse comes from. Yeah,
for sure, I mean she's she's definitely someone who makes
for him being the funk up. She makes us just
a series of bad decisions. And then when we meet
uh an asset ex husband they probably weren't even married,
but um, Rudy sr And that that great kind of
short scene by Josh Lucas, that is a bad mistake,

(29:00):
you know, she's clearly drawn to the wild side a
little bit and had a kid with this guy, and
uh that scene, man, talk about another heartbreaking scene. The
whole time that Mark Ruffalo is in the car and
you know, there's a good launching off point to talk
a little bit about Rory Culkin and one of my
favorite kid performances and kid relationships with an adult in
a movie. But the whole time where he's like talking

(29:24):
about wanting to become meet your dad. He didn't live
far from here. I'm just going, no, no, no, don't
do this, don't do it. And and it's just so
fucking tough to watch that scene. I was thinking about
that too last night, Like the the argument that um
he and in Sammy have afterwards where she says, like, look,

(29:44):
he's going he's eight or nine years old. He's going
to realize soon enough that the world is is terrible
and people are shitty and you know, there's there's no good,
there's no everything is bad about this world. He's going
to figure that stuff out soon. Why do you have
to like go and ub his nose in it? But honestly, like,
whether whether he's thought about it consciously or not, he's

(30:05):
kind of re enacting the same sort of bubble bursting
that he and she experienced as kids. Too. It's almost
like they didn't really get to have a childhood. They
had to grow up real fast after they lost their parents. Yeah,
that's what he knows, and that's he kind of thinks,
like that ought to be the natural state of a kid,
is being confronted with reality, being confronted with like the

(30:25):
screwed up nature of things, as opposed to He's so
angry with his sister for quote unquote sheltering him, you know,
And and I think partly it's maybe because he's had
a rough life, and so he thinks of the world
that way as something that's going to chew you up
and spit you out, and you better be tough to
deal with it. And he sees this kid who's kind
of living this charmed existence, very sheltered, and he wants

(30:48):
to toughen him up a little bit. But at the
same time, what he's really doing is kind of, you know,
reenacting his own trauma in a way of like it's
not the same thing exactly, but it is both about
they're both kind of quote unquote losing a parent in
a way or never having one to begin with. Um, yeah, well,
Terry kind of Um. He he punishes other people when

(31:10):
he feels bad about himself. Uh. He lashes out, um
like you were saying earlier when he's mad at Sammy.
So he's taking it out on Rudy and she that
scene where she calls him on it in the hallway
is so great where she's just like, he's son of
a bitch, Like he's a child and I know you're
mad at me, but like and that flips him. You know.

(31:32):
He shows up the next day with the fishing poles
after church and kind of just shrugs. You know that
that's such a great exchange because there's another another dialogue
less just you know, an exchange of of looks basically
absolutely um. But yeah, he he feels bad about himself
a lot through this film, and it feels a lot
of guilt and then takes that out on other people. Yeah,

(31:54):
which is a human thing to do, you know, absolutely,
And whether he even consciously realizes that's what he's doing,
that he has this pattern of punishing people for his
own shortcomings, you know, it's it's I mean I love
that about about this film that the characters really are
three dimensional. We can see that they have some very
deep flaws in some cases, but they're never really unsympathetic.

(32:17):
It's just like we we recognize our own kind of
foibles in that as well. I think, yeah, and I
think he's a character who, um, in a very non
Hollywood way, does end up at a slightly different place
than where he came in. UM, not in some great place.
But that line early on is such a sad line

(32:40):
where he says, I'm just trying to get on with it,
like that's what life is to him. And I feel
like at the end he and he even says this, Um,
he wants to see her again, He wants to see
Rudy again. He wants to spend Christmas with them, not
something he's going to do out of obligation. And you
can tell what's important for him that she knows that

(33:02):
that he is, that this stay there changed him just
like this much. It's you know, it's kind of like
the whole Boyo cried wolf thing a little bit, because
he's probably made these same promises and so on many
many times before in his life, and it's hard in
a way to know, well, is he going to really
make good on these promises, because you still can't, even

(33:23):
even when you're supposed to, like go see the kid
before he leaves his last day. He's late by like
an hour and they almost leave, and then he finally
shows up and he's like sorry, I'm like, you know this,
that is just his state of being is to be
perpetually like a little bit behind where the rest of
the world is, and to be very apologetic about it,
and yet seem incapable of making any changes to to

(33:46):
improve on that. And you know, it reminded me of
a line. Um, there's a line in a Wilco song,
all my lives are always wishes, you know that one
from Yeah it really he is true. It's the sort
of thing where like it's kind of an attic thing too,
where every time there it's like, this is the time

(34:07):
I'm going to quit, or this is the time I'm
gonna stop doing that, or that's never gonna happen again, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.
You know, you wake up with a hangarbar That's the
last time I'm ever gonna drink, And then it's sort
of like it just it just floats into the ether
and then the same behavior happens over and over again,
and um, so I don't I don't know. It's part
of the human condition, I think, Oh yeah, yeah, absolutely,
it's it's for for a lot of people. Yeah yeah, yeah,

(34:31):
to be to be caught in a in a perpetual
cycle of something that's not great for you, um, and
and to to to realize that and yet yeah, you
haven't quite yet reached the point where you can actually
change that, and some people of course never do. Yeah. Absolutely, Um.
I love that scene earlier to where he's first kind
of gotten into town and he smokes the joint in

(34:54):
the alleyway and then kind of goes out to the
main street and he sees the sheriff is an old
friend and he sees the old man, and you know,
it's a small town and everyone knows the orphans. Um,
everyone knows these two, uh, Sammy and Terry. And one
of my favorite sort of plots and movies is the

(35:16):
or at least themes is that you can't go home
again thing. And this is about a lot more than that,
but it definitely has that thread and it's always impactful
to me. There's something about leaving and coming home that's
just really resonates with me. I think in films that
scene where you know, it's it's very early, it's I

(35:36):
think it's maybe his first night or second night at
home where he goes out to the bar by himself. Yeah,
and he's just sitting there wordlessly, like drinking the beer,
smoking the cigarette. Nobody's sitting next to him. There's really
nothing going on. He's looking across it like one guy,
and he's doing that thing where he kind of nods
and he's like bouncing around, but there's really nothing to
be excited about. And you can just tell he's like

(35:57):
he's so alone, he's so utterly alone, and yeah, um,
maybe that's a bar that he used to go to
with friends and so on, but it's it's completely not
the same anymore. And um, and he obviously he feels
very very ill at ease and like uncomfortable in his
skin in that moment of just being confronted with like
there's not really any distractions. I just have to like

(36:19):
sit here and you know, think about the time that's
past and what has or hasn't gotten better changed for
for the better in my life and so on. Yeah,
there's that scene in the bar and then the other
great great bar scene when he takes really out to
shoot pool and uh, I mean that that's one of
the really sweet, sort of great moments of this movie

(36:40):
is because you're waiting for something bad to happen, and
nothing bad happens. It doesn't getting a bar fight, he
bonds with him, the kid wins the pool game, and
uh they get busted trying to trying to sneak up
the stairs, and um, it's such a great scene, but
it also plants the seed of uh something that comes
back around later, which is he really gets Piste off

(37:04):
because he thinks Rudy has sold him out. Yeah and
read it on him. He didn't do it. And I
love that part where Laura Lenny it's like he didn't
fucking do that, you know, Sheriff what's it called? Told me?
And he's he's just he plays it so well because
he's like, well, uh, and he says something dumb and
she's just like, you're an idiot, Like she's just so

(37:26):
over him at that point. Yeah, that's that's such a
real moment when um, I mean, I love that. That's
always very interesting to me in movies where you have
kind of an adult child relationship that gets beyond just
the sort of niceties of like you know, authority and
and and so on, where where they're really having a
more of a connection as quote unquote equals, although they're

(37:47):
not equals, but they meet each other where on this
ground where it is possible for them to have arguments
and get angry with each other and for one to
feel like they disappointed the other one and so on.
And um, yeah, I love I of that moment where
the various moments where he really he really treats the
kid like an adult, for better and for worse, you know, yeah,

(38:08):
in times where it's appropriate, in times where it's not
so appropriate. But um, definitely like he's he's he's treating
him as as somebody that he doesn't just have to
talk down to. Yeah, it's up here. He can really
be honest with him. And it's great a lot though
that first scene when he comes home from the bar
when he had been out by himself and he goes
to his room and the and the rant about yeah,

(38:30):
and Rudy wakes up and he's like, you know, this
used to be my room. He's actually want it back,
you know. And then Rudy has one of the best
lines in there when he's talking about what a ship
town it is and uh, and he says, he's like,
what do you even like it? Like, He's like, I
don't know, I like it. He's like, what do you
like about it? And he goes, I don't know. My
friends are here. I like the scenery. Yea, so great?

(38:52):
So yeah, I love yeah. And and of course the
rant that he's going on where he's like this this
place is so small minded and all these people are
so con chanel and they don't you know, there's a
big world out there and I've seen a lot of
it and these people know nothing of it and um,
and that's when he and and he says. It's a
great line too though, when he says so, he's like,

(39:15):
but your mom is the best. He's like, so you
had some bad luck and he got some read luck. Yeah,
two parents in one with the super mom. Yeah yeah, absolutely. Um.
The other part that I loved when they went to
smoke the joint was and this is one of those
movie moments that just you can't plan for and it

(39:35):
just happens and you use that take. But when the
moth lands on him. Yep, it's so cool. I didn't
even remember that from from when I had seen it before,
and yeah, watching it again, I was like, oh my god,
Like that probably only happened that one take the way
that Ruffalo was so in the scene and the character
in the moment, Yeah, he could just take that and

(39:56):
use it and not even there's a moment even later
I'm where I think the moth kind of comes back.
It lands on Laura Lennie for a second. It really
kind of flies off past Ruffalo's head. And at that point,
they've they've kind of the scene is taken a turn
and they's gotten a little more serious and he's really
paying more close attention to what she's saying. He's intent
on her, and so the moths just kind of goes

(40:18):
past him without acknowledgment. It's really really interesting the the
way that even within that one scene, even within that
kind of like semi improvised thing with the moth, that
like it was all oriented around the character and the
tone of the scene and his motivation from from moment
to moment is just like really really great work. Yeah,
and he didn't like if I was outside talking to

(40:40):
Emily and a moth landed on me. I'd say, oh
my god, look exactly like I've got this moth. But
he just sort of cares for it for a brief
moment and then it goes away and he stays in character.
Um did Lonegans mention that in the commentary? You know,
I didn't. I don't believe so. But I'm also not
sure if I got quite as far as that scene
this time with the commentary, I don't think so. I

(41:02):
think actually, um, he was talking about something something different,
But I do know, like in in interviews, I think
it's it's come up once or twice. Yeah. Uh so
let's chat about Broderick for a bit. Um, he's so
great in this, and this is sort of the Matthew
Broderick that I love the most. It reminded me a
little bit of the election character. But you know, this

(41:26):
guy that is doing all the wrong things as the
new boss, but he's not aggressive, he's not coming in
there and yelling at people, but he's just and she's
she said later, she's like, you're making everybody miserable. It's
like he's he's enacting whatever his own internal like uh,
dysfunction and and sort of neuroses or whatever like whatever

(41:50):
that whatever that sense of Um, I don't know. He
feels like he feels like in order to be a boss,
he has to micromanage everybody obviously, or maybe it's a
control he needs because his wife does not like him
very much exactly. Yes, he's like domestically, maybe he feels powerless,
and so in the office that's like his domain. And
so even though it's just like backwater branch that like

(42:11):
nobody's really even paying that close of attention to, He's like,
we're gonna get this thing up to like major market standards,
and you know, I'm going to run a tight ship
around here. And the fact that everybody has his attitude like, oh,
it doesn't really matter. It's a small town. Like that's
the thing we need to take care of, you know.
And like if you're going to get your kid at
three fifteen, that is just just non negotiable. We can't
have that, you know. Yeah, which is such the wrong

(42:33):
way to come in. Uh, you you need to come
in and say like you know, of course you can
go get your kid, because that's important. Um. I love
the part where they go to dinner later and they
finally kind of are breaking bread and having a beer
together in a shot. And it's another way things that
sort of left unsaid is when she goes, oh, well,

(42:55):
you know, it's hormones with your wife and she's pregnant
and it's a lot, and instead of really getting in
to it, he just goes, now that it's not that.
He's like, it's not it's it's more than that. But
we'll exactly and that's all you need to know. And
that one little brief moment when she's in the office
and you see her just kind of shove his hand away,
you know they're they're gonna get divorced before she even

(43:15):
has that kid, maybe, you know, and he kind of
glances back at Sammy like, well you see what I
have to deal with here, and again like that, even
that little moment, it's like he has more of a
connection with her than he does with his wife. It's
right next to him. Yeah. Yeah. So they start the affair, um,
and you know she likes being bad for a little while.
She uh, you can tell that she's she's partially like

(43:38):
and she even has that one line where she's like
this is unbelievable or whatever. After they have sex, like
that what I'm talking about. But she can't believe that
she's in this situation where she's between these two guys
that she doesn't even really like either one of them
that much, and goes to the priest and asks about
like she goes I feel like she goes to the
priest because she needs somebody to tell her to stop. Yeah,

(44:01):
she wants like some absolutism, you know, she doesn't want
shades of gray. She just wants very clear, black and white,
like you're in the wrong, You're going to hell if
you don't fix this. That that sort of thing. Which
is interesting though, because she admonishes Terry for doing the
same stuff, Like she can't stop it on her own.
She knows it's the wrong thing to do, but she
needs a priest to tell her, like, you can't do this,

(44:23):
and he doesn't really do that. Actually, he doesn't really
do that. And even after the conversation, she kind of
keeps it going for a little while. So, yeah, you know,
she's she's slowly moving in that direction, but it's just
gonna take time. It's it's not like anything that somebody
else can sider her. She has to do it for herself,
you know. She has to learn that lesson or make

(44:43):
that decision to really um change things. Yeah, there's something
about that role reversal with her being the irresponsible one
and then as Terry is starting to be a little
responsible that I think that's sort of such a key
crux of the film that moment. It's hardly I mean,
they're they're both enabling the other one to do that.
So she's had to be the single mom who's just

(45:06):
ultra responsible, never lets loose, never never relaxes, is always
just having to be on top of the next thing
coming and um hit bye bye Terry being there. Now
she's got a babysitter, right, she's got somebody that can
like get him after school and you know keep keep yeah,

(45:26):
maybe keep keep him occupied and and and entertained and um,
you know, nothing too bad. It's going to happen presumably
when it's just the it's just Terry and the kids.
So she can she can relax a little bit, even
though not really, but she can rox a little bit
and then you know, start up like these flings and
just kind of like have that have that aspect of

(45:46):
her life that she really hasn't had before. And on
the flip side with him. You know, you think about
that scene very early on when he's just gotten home
and he's in the bathtub, and it's it's just a
quick scene, but he's in that blue tile bathroom with
like the blue towels hanging on the towel hanger, and uh,
you know, it's this moment of like serenity, of quietude,

(46:09):
and he kind of looks around like he's on like
a different planet, like how he grew up in. Its
probably the tubby grew up bathing himself in. Yeah, but
he feels like a million miles away from that, you know,
it all feels so strange. Well, one thing I've always
noticed about like my child at home, which my parents
still live in, is that going back as an adult,
the room's always seems so much smaller than they did

(46:29):
when you were a kid. I don't know if you
had the same have the same phenomenon, but um, it
is very much that thing if you can't go home again.
So whatever this bathroom meant to him at some other
point in his life, it doesn't feel that same way now.
And it's it's more like, I think it's less about
what that room even is like when he's in it
versus him just thinking like these he's in such ordered, clean,

(46:55):
calm surroundings, and everything in his life before then has
just kind of we get the feeling it's been chaos
and disordered disarray. Yeah, and he you know, he operates
in chaos, but I feel like and he operates as
someone who's continually sucking up. But I feel like he
wants to be more. You don't see him strive to
be more much. But I think one of the key

(47:17):
sequences is when um, it kind of spells that out
as the plumbing thing, Like he's trying to fix his
plumbing upstairs and it really really upsets him that he
can't do it, and then he has to call that
plumber in. And that's just such a so symbolic I
think of who he is is like I couldn't even

(47:38):
do this one thing that I was trying to do
the right thing. It hurts his pride because I mean,
that's you you get the sense that he's been kind
of like a handyman, just like doing odd jobs a
lot of the time for work and um, and so
he takes a certain amount of pride in that, I'm
sure and um, and it hurts him that, um, you know,

(47:58):
here he is back with his big sister her and
he wants to show that, hey, I can do stuff too,
I know how to do stuff. And she doubted him,
you know, and she was like when we just call
it plumber and he was like, he's gonna do the
same thing I'm doing. But but he was wrong. He
couldn't do it. And then when the plumber is there
and he's downstairs smoking the joint, just like seething, but
seething how Terry seethes like Mark. Mark Ruffalo is just

(48:21):
so great in this there's so much below the surface.
The only time you really see him, uh let loose
is when he kicks the ship out of Josh Josh Lucas,
which was great, yeah, but also awful because it was
right in front of Rudy. Yeah. That one, that one
is definitely feels like he he crosses a line big
time in that scene. And that is kind of the

(48:42):
moment where you're like, man, maybe he really can't be
trusted with the kid unfortunately, as great as he is
with a kid in so many other ways. And it's
such a contrast to see like the quote unquote father
figured that he is able, is capable of being for
his kid versus you know, the Josh Lucas like, I
don't know that kid like even though it's heartbreak clearly.

(49:04):
I mean they even have like a little bit of
a physical resemblance, I think, but he has that moment where,
you like, the only thing he really ever says to him,
he's like, there you saw me, see me? Great? Like,
are we done here? That was hard? It's brutal, um.
And you know, the thing that's so frustrating when you
watch this movie is that Laura Lenny. She's she's starting

(49:25):
to get the one thing she wants more than anything,
which is Terry to be in Rudy's life with some
kind of consistency, uh and even some kind of influence,
even though she doesn't always agree with it. Uh, Like
when she's early on, when you know, she doesn't think
he gets picked up from school and it's frantic and
goes and he's at the house building site together teaching

(49:48):
him how to swing a hammer. Again, I don't think
any dialogue there when she shows up. It's just that's
what she wants more than anything. She wants Terry to
be okay, and she wants Terry to be in her
life in some way and in her son's life. Yeah,
that's that's what she wants more than anything in the world.
And she feels like she's almost going to have that
and then it just doesn't happen. And um, yeah that

(50:11):
that that scene is interesting because the way it cuts,
like she she kind of comes up behind them as
you know, as he's started showing him how to swing
the hammer and everything. She doesn't say anything, and then
the next cut she's like back in the office again.
So I almost wondered, like, did she just kind of
turn around and leave them alone and like not even
acknowledge that She's Yeah, she's just kind of like, oh,

(50:33):
this is fine. I don't have to like worry so
much about He's got it. He's gotta handle on it,
you know, he's I mean, she's she's very happy to
see that moment between the two of them, so it
kind of makes everything okay. Um, but yeah, I love that.
That's That's something that the movie does a number of
times where rather than like hearing the next line that
we all know is coming, we just cut to the

(50:54):
next scene. There's you know, there's uh, like I said,
there's there's many moments the one you talked about at
the very beginning with the sheriff at the door and
you know where he's like he's about to make his speech,
he's about to say whatever he's gonna say, and there's
nothing to say, and so it just cuts away. And
there's there's the moment where, um, it's the it's the

(51:14):
date with with Bob, the first time that they're kind
of back together, and there's just sort of like a
little pause in their relationship and she goes to take
a you know, a little simple wine or something, and
then it just cuts to the two of them that afterwards,
and in that cut, we we we can just fill
in the whole evening how things progress from there and
um um. In an interview I read uh the Tenures

(51:38):
on Thing where he was talking about going into a
film for the first time as a director. He said,
everything that I had written looked great on paper, and
it read great, and he said, but I realized that
every scene had a beginning, in middle and an end,
and he said, so it kept. He said, it felt
like they were I was always stopping and starting and
stopping and starting, and there was no flow. And he

(52:00):
really credited his editor. I think with a lot of
those choices, which was lopping off that end or maybe
lopping off that beginning and letting the audience in fur
the rest. And that's such a valuable lesson for UM
and I bet you, I bet that helped us writing.
I mentally like from that point on as well, you know,
oh yeah, I mean he talks on the commentary about

(52:20):
there was a tremendous amount of material that was cut
from the film because so much of it there would
there would be a scene that he had written to
make sure the audience understood this or that about the character,
and maybe that entire scene could be replaced just with
a glance with a certain look or a certain gesture
that was nonverbal in a different scene while something else

(52:41):
was going on. But if we're paying attention as viewers,
that will pick up on and so, you know, a
lot of it ended up being redundant, even though as
a writer it felt good to kind of fill in
all those gaps and and just kind of make sure
he covered all the bases. When you're thinking about it
as a film, and there is so much that can
be done visually on verbally and so on. Um so

(53:02):
much of that material could be could be lopped out,
and it is very very elegantly done the way um
the film is edited. I mean that's something that for instance,
during the big initial lunchtime conversation scene, the way that
the rhythm of that scene, the way it's edited. Suddenly
it's very like kinetic in a way that most of

(53:23):
the rest of the film never is. It's much more
still and calm, and he likes to sit on shots
for a longer time. But with that conversation and argument
is kind of like heating up, and Terry is really
nervous because he knows he's got to like drop this
bombshell at any moment now. Um, the pacing of the
editing and the way that he's overlapping dialogue and clearly

(53:43):
using different takes and so on to kind of construct
this scene that never quite happened the way it happens
on screen. When they were actually performing it. He says
that there were like four minutes in the middle of
that scene somewhere that they just lopped out because again,
like emotionally, they were already where they needed to be
without having to do any of that stuff. So, yeah, man,
this makes me want to write again. A movie like

(54:06):
this really inspires me. So let's talk a little bit
about the music. The there's a great mix of classical pieces,
notably Bach, the very famous one performed by Yo Yo Ma,

(54:26):
that cello piece, and then um, a lot of the
Steve Earle and I think Loretta Lynn and just some
sort of fringe country stuff and it really all works
well together somehow. And it doesn't seem like those two
things would fit together great, but um, yeah, you wouldn't
wouldn't work but one one sort of you know, you
could say classical is a little bit more high brow

(54:47):
and countries a little bit more just like popular. Um,
but like you said, it works great. It shows the
two tones in a way that the film is working on,
Like there is this small town, folksy kind of feeling
to it it. But at the same time, you know,
the film is taking a little bit more of like
a cosmic view of things, and I think that's where
some of the classical stuff comes in to give it

(55:10):
just another another another tone, another level um of feeling
into kind of um, I don't know, just just bring
our minds somewhere else, because I feel like if this
were all country and all kind of um, you know,
diegetic music. Let's say he wouldn't have the same feeling
nearly as as having this kind of like outside classical

(55:31):
music that's almost a little bit more of a commentary
on things or it just it comes from a different
place than than the country music does. But they both
have their place in the film. Yeah, and when he
chooses to use the classical pieces are really impactful too. Um,
Like the last the last set of sequences, like the
last maybe ten or twelve minutes of this movie are

(55:51):
just so beautiful when he when he goes to the
cemetery and like hikes up that hill. Um. I got
this script, yes, today, and I was reading it and
it was all very much written to direct, you know,
which is a very different thing than just writing a
script to submit. You can be a lot more flowery
and you can just add a lot more stuff in there.

(56:11):
But he talks about walking up the hill to the
grave sites, putting his hands on the graves, the gravestones,
and that's where you've got that great classical vocal piece,
and the sun's kind of going down, but it's not
you know, you see the sort of cat's low level
cat skills in the background, but it's not set up
to be all right, this is going to be the

(56:31):
most beautiful shot you've ever seen, and we're gonna have
this great pink sunset. The movie is very subtly beautiful,
I think, but not because he's trying to wow you
with shots. Yeah, I mean, I think it's it's beautiful
in the way that a place that is beautiful is
beautiful to the people who live there, right, yeah, man,
so you're not. It's it's not just that like you're

(56:52):
the tourists from out of town who's like taking all
these postcard pictures. It's more something that it almost becomes
a part of you, this natural beauty, and you can
still notice it at times, but it's it's a little
bit more subdued, even though you do enjoy it. Um.
It just it just makes the backdrop of your life
as opposed to like the main attraction. So it doesn't
really call attention to itself in that way. Even if

(57:12):
it's I mean, you can tell him that scene, maybe
he's thinking like, oh, this is like a really nice,
peaceful resting place for them, Like at least they have this,
you know, it could be could be worse, there's that
there's that scene, um, and I only kind of noticed
at this time when he's initially coming into town on
the bus he's driving by stuff, that he goes past
that cemetery and he kind of he looks out the

(57:34):
window at it, and even though there's no words spoken,
we can kind of assume because we've already seen uh,
Sammy there, that it's the same place and so on.
But UM, yeah, I really like that scene. That's another
scene that by another director in another film could be
very very cliched or overwrought, but another just right in

(57:54):
this film. I think he would have talked to the gravestones,
you know, like it could have been that on the nose. Um,
what you just mentioned that when he was going into town.
There's something about the way that these characters feel so
real in this space. Um, there's just it's hard to define.
I don't think you can even direct it necessarily, But

(58:17):
when he's walking down that sidewalk earlier, or when he's
smoking that joint in the alley, you get this feeling
that he has smoked a hundred joints in that alley,
or had a hundred, you know, a thousand Budweisers in
that maybe same barstool that he was sitting in. It
just feels like these people have grown up there without
being on the nose about it. It's so lived in

(58:39):
and I don't know how they managed to pull that
off because of magic. I think, yeah, it's it's magic.
And I mean even in terms of like the shooting, Um,
you know, this being a smaller budget film, that's being
a first film and so on independent. Um, I don't
think they had like the luxury of a ton of time, right.
I think I think every day there in that indie
situation of like we have to get all these shots.

(59:01):
There's even there's even a moment on the commentary where, uh,
it's the moment where he's trying to fix the plumbing
and uh, the pipe kind of comes out of the
ground and it's sprayser skirt that she's just kind of
put on, right, and uh and Longagan on the commentary
talks about we only had like four of those. You know,
it was reversible, so we had to one color to
the other color and uh, and and like even in

(59:24):
terms of like the cutting of the scene whatever whatever,
it's like he has to pick because it was the
other color skirt and the other two takes right, so
it's you really only get like two times of two
takes to to do it. And you know they were
having trouble with like the water coming out of the
pipe correctly and everything, and like it's just one of
those things where you realize all the things that he's

(59:46):
having to juggle just on very real practical levels at
the same time that they're trying to do this very subtle, emotional,
heartfelt thing. Um. And it really is just it's just
super impressive that despite all that, you know, despite shooting
had a sequence and all the rest of it, that
it just feels like the relationship between the two of
them is so real and solid and genuine. Um. He

(01:00:09):
he talks a little bit about how, in terms of
the scheduling of the scenes, he didn't want to have
any of the major big set pieces too early in
the schedule. Um. I think I think it was either
the lunchtime scene or one of the other kind of
big blowout scenes in the movie was originally scheduled to
be like the first thing in week two, and he
had the a D moving back to like end of

(01:00:31):
week three so that they could at least, you know,
build that rapport a little bit before they had to
jump into the deep end. Um. But it's yeah, I
mean he despite the fact that they're all under pressure
at every moment to like get the shot, move on
to the next setup, and so on, do it is
in his few takes as needed and so on. Um

(01:00:51):
that it's it's still has this like lived in feeling
as if the crew in the cast have been hanging
out there for like months on end and just like
getting to know the place, getting to know the people,
getting comfortable with everything. Uh. It's it's it's very interesting
how how that all manages to kind of coalesce. Yeah.
I think sometimes, man, there's there is a bit of
magic that happens and you just can't these movies come

(01:01:13):
along that just it all comes together. Uh and and
a lot of times they are these little indies, um
that are so dear to my heart. And you know,
first movie as a writer director is just pitch perfect.
Everything about this movie is perfect. There's not a single
false note. No, there's there's no moments where you're kind
of like, oh, that's like a first director thing to

(01:01:33):
do or yeah, there's there's no like there's no shots
that are just you know, here's my big like steadicam
one take thing that doesn't really need to be here,
but I'm just gonna show off as a director. There's
none of that. It's not flashy. Um. And the kids too,
it's to bite off such a um, such a substantial

(01:01:56):
role for a child in the first movie. Is that's
tough to pull off. Everybody would tell you, don't do
it right, don't do it, but it's yeah, he just
he just he nailed it in every way, such a
beautiful movie. Um. I encourage you, Casey to read the
script or at least read parts of it. The I'm
gonna read a bit from the end and this is

(01:02:18):
after and by all means read that whole last scene
as it's written. Like. I don't know if this was
transcribed afterward or not, but he's very much has every
single word sort of nailed down. Um. But after they
embrace and he gets on the bus, um, Sammy you know,

(01:02:39):
waves goodbye to him, and then she gets in her
car for that last bit and that same sort of
shot driving into town and she's late for work. This
is one thing you got to remember for this part.
She's blown off work again, and it says interior Sammy's
car moving day. The morning sunlight flickers through the windshield
into the car. As Sammy drives along toward work, she

(01:03:02):
passes the town hall clock and sees that it's She
drives her damp cheek with a forearm and rolls down
her window to let the morning breeze blow through, squaring
her shoulders a little. She drives through town at a
slow and easy pace. That's great. Boom, So they have it?
Do you have? Like there has been changed? There has

(01:03:23):
been She's learned to like ease up a little bit,
you know, it's not hearing back to work, and of
course her situation with the boss has changed, so she
probably knows she has a little bit of that leeway.
But even if she didn't, you get the sense that
she's kind of reoriented herself a little bit, and she's
no longer going to be quite as tense and you know,

(01:03:46):
just like yeah, panic from moment to moment. She can
kind of slow down experienced life again, not just as
this never ending series of like tasks and things that
she has to worry about all the time, but really
just like feel the sunlight coming in through the window
and enjoy the music and see the town and you
know the cliche stuff stopping smaller roses all that, but

(01:04:08):
it really is true. Yeah, and that's when Steve Orrel
comes in. Uh. And then the very beginning of the movie,
you know, the very first line, I think this is uh,
there's like there's something about what are you doing the
moment you die? And they get they get hit by
this truck and you know the mom It opens the
movie with the mom just saying they're clearly like coming

(01:04:30):
back home. I guess after a date. She goes, why
do they always put braces on teenage girls at the
exact moment whether the most self conscious about their appearance,
And it's just such a real moment. And he goes,
I don't know. And then four seconds later they're dead. Yeah.
It's so um the way the way you would think
it would probably go down, like yeah, there there, you

(01:04:52):
have no idea they're about to die. They're just making
small talk in the car from right, Not even small talk.
I mean, it's it's a genuine thing like she she
had this thought pop into her head. Yeah, and and
he um. His response is kind of like, I don't know,
like that's a good point and and then it's all
over and um, yeah, it's interesting that I read one

(01:05:15):
one review I said that the kind of framing device
of the film of the parents death to him felt
maybe a little bit overdetermined, like everything that follows is
just cast in the shadow of this happened. Therefore their
relationship is like this, or their lives turn out this way. Yeah,
I don't know. That's yeah, it's a big it's a
big deal when your parents die in a car wreck

(01:05:37):
like that. I mean, like that, that's just that's just
the way it is. I mean, I can I do
understand his point that if the same exact thing happened
to someone else, maybe they still grow up to be
fully functioning, well adjusted adult that you know, move past it.
Let's saying the age that they were at and everything,
and and just the fact that the two of them

(01:05:59):
had to go through this together, and um, there doesn't
seem to have been I mean, we don't really learn
how what happened to them after that. It seems like
they did stay in that small town. It's not really
clear exactly who raised them after that, right, there doesn't Yeah, yeah,
and I think you know, they may have shot that,

(01:06:19):
who knows, But I think a lesser writer would have
put that stuff in there, or in the in the
scene right before the wreck in the car, he would have.
A lesser writer would have been way more on the
nose about like talking about the kids in a certain
way that really kind of gives you a bunch of
information about who they are, rather than this just sort

(01:06:39):
of beautiful moment about talking about braces and how funny
it is in life. You know how cruel it is
in life to get the braces when you are self conscious.
And they don't have to say the names of the
kids or anything. It's it's so part of who they
are in every moment they're living that obviously it goes
without saying that's who she's talking about, but she doesn't

(01:07:00):
have to say it that way, which is great. It's wonderful.
All right, dude, I got nothing else. See this movie everyone.
It's on Amazon Prime right now. Yes, it's yeah, it's
on Prime. It's a nice like HD transfer. It looks
considerably better than the DVD. Um, I've got to sign
DVD from Mark Ruffalo. No way. Yeah, my friend's amazing.

(01:07:22):
My friend worked with him on which one was that
I can't remember. My friend Stacy, who's as a wardrobe supervisor,
worked with him and told she knew it was one
of my favorites and said, my friend Chuck is just
like you can count on me as one of his
favorite movies. And she brought in the DVD and he
signed it to me personally, and it was very very sweet.
Oh that's great. That's so many many many years ago. Man,

(01:07:44):
before he was a story. I mean, that's yeah, yeah,
I'm gonna dig that thing up. And I think rewatching this,
I mean, Ruffalo was still great, but it was almost
like rediscovering in a way, just like how amazing he
was right out of the gate. Um. He's made a
number of films that I really like, but I still
kind of wish that there were more films like this

(01:08:06):
that he was able to do that are just still
character driven and small and perfect. And I mean, it's
this is it's hard to top this, right. So I
understand that careers move on and people take on bigger
roles and so on, and like I said, I mean,
he's he's done a number of things that I really like,
but at the same time, I still sort of feel
like man like, there's there's even more potential there um

(01:08:30):
that that I hope he will. He will be able
to um to tap into you know, in in the
and and what's what's left of his career. Yeah, he's
got a long way to go and he's made all
that marble juice. So that's right. You got to be
able to do some some small stuff now, right. Uh
So I agree, Man, let's continue with long again. I

(01:08:51):
have not seen those other movies, so that's perfect. Um
Margaret is um is that next? Yeah, Margaret is next.
And there's there's a lot, a lot to say about
that film, a lot of the backstory. I don't know
if you're you're aware of much of the difficulty and
even getting that film made, uh ended up in court
with re cuts and arguments with the studio and all
kinds of stuff. And it actually it will. It will

(01:09:13):
play into how we watched the film, because there's a
theatrical version that I think is about two and a
half hours long, and there's the director's cut that's a
little over three hours, and and they're not even it's
not even that there's thirty minutes more scenes in the
longer version. It's essentially like a different movie. The there
there's different sequences, there's different takes, there's different music. Um,

(01:09:36):
the sound mixing is is extremely different. He goes for
this like altmnesque kind of twelve tracks of dialogue, all
overlapping kind of thing in in the longer cut. In
the theatrical version, all that stuff is rained in and
it's much more just about one character. So both versions
are available. Ideally we would maybe watch both, but but

(01:09:59):
I know that's a tall order, so maybe maybe we'll
just go with the the extended version because I really
is like his vision of the film and the one
that he was in court for multiple years battling to
get this thing out there the way he wanted it to. Um,
So yeah, that'll that'll be next up. Sweet. All right,
thanks brother. This is as I say, you're one of

(01:10:21):
my favorite people to talk movies with. Man and I
really really really uh enjoy these a great deal. So yeah,
me too, brother. So let's uh thank everyone else for listening,
and uh, I encourage you all to watch this film
and go ahead and get Margaret the Director's Cut going
and Manchester by the Sea and get prime for those,
and I'll have you back in and whatever five or

(01:10:42):
six weeks. Awesome, looking forward to it all right, See
Buddy See a Man movie. Brush is produced editing an
engineered by Ramsey Yutt here in our home studio at
Pont City Market, Atlanta, Georgia. For I Heart Radio. For

(01:11:04):
more podcasts For my heart Radio, visit the I Heart
Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows.