Sunday
Aug182013
Podcast: "Butler" History & "Elysium" Nonsense
Sunday, August 18, 2013 at 10:00PM 
On this week's podcast Joe, Nick, Nathaniel and Katey discuss Foxcatcher's release date, and Elysium's fast fade nonsense from unsanitary exoskeletons to Jodie Foster's unplaceable accent.
But the bulk of the conversation is devoted to Lee Daniels' The Butler which has us all confused. Is it a terrible movie with good moments or vice versa? Whatever it is it might well be an unmissable oddity given all the celebrities crammed into it from Mariah Carey to Vanessa Redgrave and the ability to see Forest Whitaker and Oprah Winfrey in matching track suits.
We'll also tell you which celebrities weren't in the movie that should have been. You can listen to the podcast right here or download it on iTunes.
Reader Comments (25)
My only complaint about this podcast is that I wish it were longer! Could listen to you four talk for hours and hours and hours.
I feel like all historical biopics from now on should be made by someone as dazzlingly bonkers as Lee Daniels. Harmony Korine's J. Edgar, Werner Herzog's Harriet Tubman, Leos Carax's Napoleon. And then people like Ron Howard and Clint Eastwood can go make movies about people getting eaten by gators. This would solve so many problems.
Joe K, someone should hand you the keys to the movie-making kingdoms - pronto!
Given the recent Russell Simmons incident, I don't think Herzog is even close to having the most bonkers take on Harriet Tubman. Actually, I'd watch his version of her story.
My bonker biopic entries:
Gaspar Noe's Gorbachev
Nicolas Winding Refn's Henry Kissinger
I would pay any amount of money to see Yorgos Lanthimos' Mr. Rogers.
I think what The Butler was running into was that its goal was to educate rather than to entertain. It proceeded like a history lesson because its primary intention was to be a history lesson. Part of the reason I have a hard time gauging how I feel about the movie is that I thought it was pretty clear that Lee Daniels made this movie as a survey history course for the people in the audience who don't know the civil rights movement. I'm not the target audience. And there's got to be a place for films like that. I think that's something that's important.
So even when I was rolling my eyes at the inelegance of everything with the presidents, I also kept asking myself if I would be rolling my eyes if I had never heard of Selma before, or if it would just be a very clear, very concise explanation of what was going on at the time. Made it a whole lot easier to enjoy what I liked (Oprah! Yaya! Elijiah! David! Jane's wiggly walk! Soul Train!), and let the rest go. That said, I'm with Nick on Forrest Whitaker. The rough parts of that movie could have been made a hell of a lot more palatable if there were a stronger performance anchoring it all.
Again though, really great podcast! Love love love how regular these are!
Also Joe, don't even get me started on that final elimination in cycle 3......ROBBED.
I remember Yaya being very good in her supporting performance in the little-seen John Sayles movie Honeydripper. So good for her.
I'm holding out for John Waters' Stonewall Riots movie... though, truly, if Roland Emmerich ever gets to make the Stonewall movie he's actually planning, we could have something wonderfully insane there.
But somebody like John Waters (who sadly has trouble getting funding for any movie these days) or Almodovar doing something on Stonewall would feel right and welcomed especially when gay representation in Hollywood has just jumped straight to the most inoffensive, politically correct you could possibly make them. Roland Emmerich, however.....
I almost originally wrote Refn doing a Versace movie. Gianni or Donatella or both, do not care, he needs a movie centered around fashion. But to me that is a great idea for Refn to do as a biopic so it is hardly a bonkers choice though it could be a bonkers movie.
John Waters needs to do the Octomom story. I know it would have a groovy soundtrack.
Eva winning over YaYa in season 3 ANTM is still one of the worst travesties EVER. Yes, I went there, gurls!
Loved "Lee Daniels' The Butler." And I was nowhere near the target audience of blue hairs either.
My biggest takeaway from Jodie Foster's Cecil B. Demille speech was that line "Maybe it will be so quiet and delicate that only dogs can hear it whistle," because I thought that was such a beautiful, poetic sentiment. Now I can't help but view that as a precursor to her performance in ElysiumThe Butler. It's weird to say that I agree with Nick and Nathaniel at once about Oprah's performance in it. It's so much fun to watch and she does not seem (as an actress) interested in anything other than...what she's doing, much like in The Color Purple. I don't want to overstate the Oprah acting in parallel thing because it's not like, in either case, she's going full-tilt Ruby Thewes. It's definitely something I noticed. At any rate, she's totally a threat to win. She'll certainly campaign, she has so many famous friends and...there are just so many reasons, to exclude the performance, why she could win. And Joe's right in that there will definitely be pushback, but there are so many cases, especially in supporting actress, of actresses sailing on through when it seems like no one is rooting for them or their movie. Not just the obvious example of Anne Hathaway. I remember when Renee Zellweger won and it seemed like she was met by such a frosty reaction from the room...other than Nicole Kidman who loves everyone and is a blinding light of smiles and warmth at awards shows. Maybe I'm projecting, but I distinctly remember cutaways during Zellweger's speech to the four other nominees, Oprah herself, Scarlett Johansson and her co-star Jude Law and just...shade. Anyone? Point is, I think far worse performances, from much less loved performers in movies that people have felt much more ambivalent about have won Oscars, so Oprah's definitely in play.
*Also, Sally Kirkland as Ronald Reagan.
Yikes: Should read:
My biggest takeaway from Jodie Foster's Cecil B. Demille speech was that line "Maybe it will be so quiet and delicate that only dogs can hear it whistle," because I thought that was such a beautiful, poetic sentiment. Now I can't help but view that as a precursor to her performance in Elysium, which is anything but quiet and delicate. Viewing that speech in context of her then impending performance in Elysium is more puzzling than the confusion about whether she was coming out.
Very interesting to hear so many varied opinions about The Butler. It's weird to say that I agree with Nick and Nathaniel at once about Oprah's performance in it. It's so much fun to watch and she does not seem (as an actress) interested in anything other than...what she's doing, much like in The Color Purple. I don't want to overstate the Oprah acting in parallel thing because it's not like, in either case, she's going full-tilt Ruby Thewes. It's definitely something I noticed. At any rate, she's totally a threat to win. She'll certainly campaign, she has so many famous friends and...there are just so many reasons, to exclude the performance, why she could win. And Joe's right in that there will definitely be pushback, but there are so many cases, especially in supporting actress, of actresses sailing on through when it seems like no one is rooting for them or their movie. Not just the obvious example of Anne Hathaway. I remember when Renee Zellweger won and it seemed like she was met by such a frosty reaction from the room...other than Nicole Kidman who loves everyone and is a blinding light of smiles and warmth at awards shows. Maybe I'm projecting, but I distinctly remember cutaways during Zellweger's speech to the four other nominees, Oprah herself, Scarlett Johansson and her co-star Jude Law and just...shade. Anyone? Point is, I think far worse performances, from much less loved performers in movies that people have felt much more ambivalent about have won Oscars, so Oprah's definitely in play.
*Also, Sally Kirkland as Ronald Reagan.
TPKIA - i'm glad you made that one error in the post because I got to read the sentence
twice.I liked Jodi Foster in Elysium. I think the problem is that it's a horrible character with a ridiculous last minute change that goes against everything the character was. Foster's playing with accent the same way Blomkamp played with the universal language/race idea. The villains are all unhinged in this film. I don't know why Blomkamp pushed her and Sharlto Copley to go so cartoon with it.
The first scene where Foster is the perfect host and then snaps into military supervillain mode is very good. She just never gets to go back to the human side of the character.
Perfect way to start my week.
Great podcast! It's so much fun to listen to. Not naming any names, but it's much preferable to an hour of "let's listlessly discuss the year that Kramer vs. Kramer won best picture and also...isn't Argo terrible?"
-OR-
It's so much preferable to twenty or so minutes of "there's nothing to talk about, also I hate my job because it's so horrible to write about/watch movies for a living." Many of the other film and Oscar outlets out there are so profoundly morose, helmed by deeply uninteresting or reductive people. Even when the four of you dislike something or disagree, the love of cinema always comes threw
All I'm going to say is that I'm already against this whole Oprah infatutation. I don't have a soul, I know.
PS I would looove to hear a podcast about the year Kramer vs. Kramer won.
The Oprah hatred on the internets is so damn tired. Next.
She did exactly what the film demanded of her and did it well. All of this "worse performances than this have won Oscars you guys" is so backhanded and reductive. Oprah was the best aspect of "the Butler" like it or not, and she's completely deserving of the Oscar win.
@Wes
I certainly understand your perspective and I do think that Oprah does face (and will face should an Oscar nomination and/or win materialize) a lot of unfair criticism simply because of who she is. I'm talking about a former talk show host with a perceived softball, middle-America outlook; a perceived bombast personality ("John Tra-Voltaa!" "YOU get a car!"), etc; perceived upper-crust insularity, etc, etc, etc. Combine all that with the fact that she's a black woman and you get a lot of resentment from many people...resentment that I agree (unless I'm misreading your underlying point) a white man or possibly even a white woman would not be subject to under similar circumstances. There are a lot of people who will be against Oprah winning an Oscar, which would have been true regardless of the quality of the performance and I agree that that's tired and it kind of stinks.
I get how saying that "worse performances have won Oscars" seems backhanded. Personally, I read it as judging a performance is so subjective to taste in the first place. You're rarely going to get a consensus about what is "best." That being the case, I think saying that worse performances have won Oscars is not only true but a pretty accurate and tempered statement to make. I guess I'm hesitant to adopt the polar opposite viewpoint of the Oprah hatred thing simply because so many things about The Butler, including her performance, were a mixed bag of good and...not so great. I'm also hesitant to say that anyone is completely deserving of the Oscar win when it's August and it's unlikely that we've seen any of her competition at this point. For instance, at this point last year, no film containing an eventual supporting actress nominee had even been released yet. In fact, of the 20 acting nominees, only one performance had had a theatrical run at this point in the year last year. That most of the acting nominations tend to come from the latter half of the year is its own discussion entirely and not always reflective of quality, but there's much of the cinematic year left to take in and discover, regardless of who gets nominated. You may see a performance in September or October that knocks your socks off. I think it needs to be somewhere more in the middle, when we look at someone like Oprah. "I hate her. She shouldn't win an Oscar" and saying "she definitely deserves the Oscar" in August are two sides of the same coin for me in that it takes the focus off of the movies--evaluating them and considering them critically and thoughtfully. It's this school of thought, on either end of the spectrum, that leads Academy voters to not watch all the movies and just vote for who they "like." I could not have cared less about Charlize Theron as an actress prior to seeing her in Monster, but she would have gotten my vote in her Oscar year. Ditto Mo'nique. Ditto Javier Bardem, who actually would have gotten my vote each time he was nominated, yet is a personality I react to with a visceral, irrational dislike. I'm talking in circles now. Point is it should be about the performance and the movie.
There's nothing wrong with saying a performance is worthy of an Oscar this early on. Yes, I could certainly think differently down the line, but I'm not going to wait until December to say that if I think this way right now. And early performances can certainly go the distance. I was a firm Viola Davis supporter in 2011 for "The Help" and despite all the I saw down the road that year, nothing really changed that FOR ME, especially the awfulness of "The Iron Lady." Your mileage certainly may vary. I just personally find the Oprah hatred to be hateful for reasons that go beyond the work she did in "The Butler," which, like it or not, has received more favorable responses from critics than negative. That gets lost in the shuffle b/c it's Queen Oprah who is a lightning rod for supporters and haters alike. I can judge the merits of a film perfectly fine without your lecturing, for starters, and I think I did that with this film, which I personally thought was a fine one.
@Miko G: Thanks so much for saying that the joy we all feel in movies and the happiness in klatsching with each other comes through.
@Wes: Sorry if the conversation about Winfrey's work felt reductive to you. I would say, though, that it's also reductive to conflate agnostic feelings about this performance or its Oscar buzz with "hating" Oprah. For my own part, I think she's fine in the movie, though I don't think it's incontestable that she's the best part. For me, David Oyelowo and the Gooding/Kravitz duo were the best parts. From my POV, Oprah's best scenes were scenes that were so well and loosely directed that everyone in them came across terrifically, like the four-way dinner-and-drinking scenes with Whitaker, Winfrey, Lenox, and Howard. I don't have any predisposition to Oprah, positive or negative. If I'm tetchy about anything, it's the idea that a good, enjoyable performance and an Oscar-worthy one are the same thing, or that stoking Oscar buzz is what we really want to be doing in August. (That's why I probably sound more engaged in parts of our podcasts where we discuss our own favorites of the year or what we're personally most looking forward to, rather than that Oscar will or will not nominate eventually, at least until December or so)
Regarding the question "Can historical epics can be surprising?":
Of course they can! I know Argo gets a lot of flack for being so standard, but one thing it did amazingly well was take an event where the ending was a forgone conclusion and, through the craft of editing/music/shot selection, leave the audience on the edge of their seats. Titanic did a similar thing with an infinitely more well-known event.
The key seems to be 1) finding a lesser known part of a more commonly known event (the Argo strategy) or 2) focusing heavily on people caught in the middle of famous events (the Titanic strategy). The Butler tries #2 to an extent, but commits more to the education aspect of the film than the characters, at least in the scenes outside the home.
But I agree that there were some spectacular parts. I think more and more that Lee Daniels just lucked out with Precious as even that film lost a little steam once Precious left home.
I had to laugh at the group's remarks regarding how the earlier summer releases already feel like distance memories from a further past because I feel the same way. It's probably because most of the season's output tends to be remakes, sequels, and the like, so it becomes difficult placing the appropriate movie in the correct time. Couple that with the fact that each week sees a big-budget action/sci-fi/visual effects extravaganza, and they all become that much more indistinguishable from one another -- even the good ones.