¶ Welcome to Silver Screen Happy Hour
You're listening to the Silver Screen Happy Hour, I'm Chris Wiegand along with my brother Jerome.
Here to angry.
He's starting to cut out there so I don't know what that's going to sound like.
¶ Technical Difficulties and Hiatus Update
Yeah we have been at this trying to get his microphone working for some, I think there's demons in the tech and sometimes they just like to screw with us. And, uh, so we finally got it going, but we've been working at this for an hour? Yeah. An hour. And I, you know, it's because he doesn't have a Mac. I keep telling him he needs a Mac.
Oh, that's the problem?
Yeah. Yeah, 100%. I don't think that's the problem. So we wanted to give a little update today on, uh, this hiatus that we've been on and talk about some Oscar nominations. Um, so yeah, we're not going to do a regular show, we're just going to Check in with you.
¶ Drinks of the Day
Like a commercial, but first, what are you drinking?
Well, uh, I'm glad you asked. Uh Little, uh, limited edition Grit City straight bourbon whiskey.
Ooh, with the Detroit Lions logo on the front. Don't worry fans, our Lions recap is part of our agenda today, but go ahead. You know what though,
after my daughter Hannah got this for me, we lost.
You know And I'm going to tell you something about curses. Remember when I told you that Hutch's injury was mom's fault because she got me that shirt? Yeah, I told you, man. Yeah, I told her all about that. I said, by the way, I blamed you on our podcast. Um, all right. So I like the bottle. Yeah. I have a Glenn Livitt 14 here. All right. And I'm going to see if you can hear this. Hang on. I've been waiting all day for this. I should do a healthier pour because I'm angry.
Yeah, I suspect this will be a shorter than usual episode, but we just wanted to check in with, uh, with everybody and with each other because it's been a, it's been a rough season. I, at the beginning of the last episode that we uploaded, I kind of said something about that on my end about, um, you know, Just being super busy grandbabies and all that stuff and it's it's fun fun season But it's just frustrating too that I can't get to the editing like I want.
So we're gonna experiment And see if we can't just start doing lives Yes You know
now full disclosure to take some of the heat off my brother's shoulders here. I we also um For those of you that remember last year, this room that I'm recording in was built. Well, the guy is still here. We're doing an addition on the house. So there's been a lot of renovations. So the girls have been like, we moved their bed into our bedroom. So it's, it's like we're in summer camp. Getting dressed every day is a pain in the ass, just doing everything every day is a pain in the ass.
And there's always somebody here, like, pounding on the walls and shit. Like, we're adding an addition on now, so the renovation has been a problem. So there's been days where I can't record either. I think at this point, is it fair to say we're just gonna shitcan the December episode? Because we never did it. It was supposed
to be I'll end up releasing it. No, no, no, no.
I mean the one we haven't recorded. Oh yeah. That's that's long gone. We'll save that one for next December. Yeah. So that one's gone for anyone that's now eager for next December. We were going to do the ref versus home alone. Um, about, you know, dealing with dysfunctional families at Christmas. That was really going to be fun, but we'll now sell that until Christmas 2025. Um, so that explains the hiatus.
¶ Lions Recap and Frustrations
Should we move on to lion's recap? Yeah. I mean, Oh, wait, wait. Before we get to that, you started talking about
¶ Going Live: Challenges and Plans
going live. So what we want to do, folks, is because the editing process takes so long, what we're gonna do, you'll have to bear with us because the internet is forever. So if we say something, our intention is to go live, and you know that we drink during these shows, you would not believe what my brother has had to edit out. So this is real ballsy for us. To try to do these shows live and then just the other
issues are tech tech problems that we seem to have every time we try to get on microphones and internet cutting out. I mean, the internet cutting out is a big deal too. So we're going to see how that. We're just going to have to experiment. So we're just hoping you'll bear with us and come along for the ride. It'll be fun. You know, we're
honestly good people. So if we say something really offensive and there's no taking it back once it's live and on a podcast,
you may hear a regular apology, maybe at the beginning of every show for the last show.
Yeah. I think I'm going to need a lawyer once we go live. Um, I, I have no doubt I'll be canceled quickly. Um, so I'm going to try to protect myself there. Um, but anyway, let's move on to Lions recap. For those of you that don't know, today is February 28th. Uh, the conference title games are over and the Super Bowl is the next game, which is in two weeks, not even week and a half. Um, and we're not in it. Well, in
my. I was, this is the first time I'm like talking publicly about it because I've just been, it was so crushing watching them lose the way they did at home. I was
pissed all weekend. I was mean to my kids and I regret it. Like Val, my sweet little seven year old Val brought me something and said, Daddy's like, it's not working. And then she thought she was the reason the Lions were losing. Well, now she's a true fan. Yeah, now she knows. She went to mom, she went to her mommy, and she was crying. She's like, it's my fault they're losing, and V's just looking at me like, staring daggers at me. You just tell her,
it's, it's, it's good that you learned it now. Yes,
yes, yes. Because that's the way we all are. If you're not sitting a certain way on the chair every time It's the negativity that's causing the other team to win. So I gotta say
though, something I'm angry about though, and I absolutely believe this affected the lions in the way they performed, the NFL should not allow. Anyone be interviewed for head coaching jobs until the season's over? Yes. That was BS. Now those guys should have been focused on one thing that week and they weren't.
Now for you, for, for those of you that don't know, we, we did finish 15 and two, we had a first round by, so in the first week we were off, we were off. We didn't know who our opponent was yet because the playoffs were going on without us in it. Um, our coaches were interviewing with other people. Now, I will say that once the wild card round was over and we knew who we were gonna get, they say all interviews after that stopped. But still,
their heads were, yeah, it's,
it's in your mind, right? If you're a coach and you're trying to get a head coaching job into a new city, what do you agree? And even Bill Belichick said it, he agreed you should wait till after the super bowl. Like there should be the reason, like there's a non tampering date where you can't start fucking with free agents. You know, um, they should do the same thing. They should do the same thing with coaches. You can't start interviewing coaches until like two days after the Super Bowl.
Um, fine. Um, that affected us because it was
both our offense and defense and both, right. Both of those coaches are gone now. So
I will say that it affected the offensive coach more than the defensive coach. I think you're right. And what I mean by that is we I'll let you finish. Um, uh, we, uh, had. So through the season, anyone that hasn't been following the lions, just a plethora of defensive injuries, right? Like we've been running on three and fourth stringers and guys off the practice squad guys on other teams, practice squad. At one point, I think the Buffalo game that we gave up 48 points to Buffalo at home.
It was Josh Allen, but we gave up 48 points. And the reason is because like, I think they said three of the defensive starters weren't even on our team four days ago. Like it was, it was all like, it was a complete shit show most of the year on defensive injuries. But we started to get some guys back. We looked really good. The last two games of the year against San Francisco, and then clinching the number one seed by dismantling Minnesota, that was a huge win.
So we looked like we were getting guys back, but here's what happened. We had one. Really good corner left. Uh, Carlton Davis was out with that broken jaw. And Tyrion Arnold on the other side is a rookie. I mean, he was doing okay. He's a lot better than he was at the beginning of the year. But he was a rookie. Our last good corner, Amik Robertson, who shut down Justin Jefferson in the Minnesota game. breaks his elbow on the first drive when it was still nothing, nothing. And that was gruesome.
And as he laid there with his arm bent in a weird position, I looked at V and I was like, it's over like at that. And it was zero zero. Like I was so like, that's it. And, and, and true enough. Aaron Glenn, the defensive coordinator, who's now the head coach of the Jets, he, he was kind of, uh, handcuffed because he couldn't do, our safeties could no longer be blitzing. They could no longer do their game. They had to go now protect.
The corners because the corner we put in who was I believe covering Mclaurin at that point was some guy I don't think I ever heard of
yeah,
it was another one of these guys That's like I've never played it down a football since peewee and like now they're starting and and you know It's just
and ever since then it's just been more bad news cuz like so I'm like, all right Go Washington. I mean at least if they win.
We buried the lead the commanders beat us in the divisional round So
go Washington at least if they win we you know, if they go on to the Super Bowl at least we lost to them And
yeah, it doesn't look as bad.
Yeah, then they lost.
Yeah, then they lost and then their asses kicked The Philadelphia Eagles and then I'm like, all right, go Buffalo.
I don't want to see Kansas City in it again
And now we have a Kansas city and Philadelphia Superbowl. I don't even want to watch
the Superbowl now.
And both our coordinators, both our coordinators have left to coach other teams. The worst of the two was Ben Johnson because the day after I was two days after we lost, it was on Monday. Our game was on Saturday night, two days after we lost. He not only up and takes over the head coaching job of the Chicago Bears, our rival, but he already had half of his coaching staff lined up. He knew who he was taking. So that means to your point, he already had that shit in his head. And by the way.
And you know, he talked to them before the game. Absolutely. Yeah. So all those guys knew. And here's the worst part. You could tell he coached a bad game. It was one of his worst coaching jobs as far as play calls. Uh, since week two lost to Tampa at home, it was that bad in that Tampa game. We only scored 16 points in this game. We scored 31. But Jesus, not without trying. I mean, his plays were terrible.
At one point he had our receiver, not our starting receiver, our backup receiver, who, by the way, has off field problems and with his decision making they have him do an end around and then. Stop and throw the ball an interception. Of course he throws an interception. Now earlier in the game, they did the same end around, but he kept it and he ran for like a 70 yard touchdown. So we know where his skill set is and where it is not.
It was just a very poorly coached game by Ben Johnson, good riddance, I hope you, I hope, I hope, I hope my buddy Mark isn't hearing this because he's a big Chicago fan, so I hope he doesn't take it personally. I hope Ben Johnson sinks the entire franchise. I, I hope, I hope the Bears become the Raiders. And I don't mean like the Raiders, no, the Raiders, the Raiders, pretty much the Raiders as we know them of now. Uh, or the Jets, either one.
I wish good things for Aaron Glenn because the Jets are in the AFC, so I don't care if they win, but the Bears, I hope, and I heard today on a Lions podcast that Lions players have been texting Dan Campbell for the last week saying, we cannot wait to play Chicago. We want to kick their dicks in the dirt. Like they want to beat Chicago so bad now. So funny. It's like now it's like the fire has been lit. Ben Johnson. Be careful, careful what you wish for.
Yeah. More
than you're going to, you're going to get it.
All right. We need to move on because most people probably didn't even tune in to hear about the lions.
¶ Oscar Nominations and Snubs
Yeah. So Oscar nominations were released last Thursday and much to our dismay are, well, I'm not going to say my favorite film of the year. I'm going to say one of our favorite podcast on Ethan and Maya Hawks. Wildcat was shut out in every category huge snub now.
I'm not sure I I'm having trouble on Qualification, I believe that they qualified for this year But if you look if you look them up on IMDB, it still says 2023 as a release date But I don't think they met last year's Oscars qualifications I think because it was in release in LA this year like actually theater release. Yeah Uh, as well as streaming, I thought that they'd be eligible this year. Maybe it's an eligibility
issue. It might be, yeah, because it wasn't released in the theaters until 2024, but they did have it at a film festival in 2023. So,
but either way, if they were eligible last year, they also got shut out. So either way, so either
way, you can't blame the year. But at the Oscars last year, no one saw it. It wasn't available to anybody. Yeah,
right, right. So I honestly believe that this was the year of eligibility. Yeah, and it just, it just didn't work, uh, for, for voters. Uh, if you want to blame somebody, we're, we're gonna, we're gonna talk a little bit about movie politics here. Uh, not real politics, movie politics, you got to get out, you got to send that shit out. You got to pay the money to market an Oscar campaign and it costs money. And Ethan Hawke was probably like, this isn't about an Oscar campaign.
You know, this was a project for my daughter and I, it was very personal for us and anyone that sees it, we hope they enjoy it. It costs money to have an Oscar campaign. It does. It honestly does. But if you send the screeners out. And you start telling people for your consideration, Wildcat, Wildcat, Wildcat. At least it would have been mentioned in publications. It didn't, because that's all you need is word of mouth going. You need buzz going. It had none of that, man.
It, nobody talked about Wildcat. Remember all those year end lists I was sending you? That people were, the Hollywood Reporter, and Variety. And entertainment weekly, whatever, everybody had their top 10 of the year. And these are our Oscar picks for the year at the end of the year. They do that every year, every publication, I sent you all of them. And none of them had wildcat. Like nobody was talking about it.
Well, as I said on the podcast though, because of who Flannery O'Connor was and the way, like her stories were so controversial, it makes sense that it'd be weird if it was like. If it was front and center and everybody's favorite and all that.
Let's, let's, let's, I don't, I don't
want to point
fingers at the Hollywood Jews just yet. Oh no, I didn't say that. It seemed like that's where you were going. No, oh god, no, no, no. Because we know, well honestly, because we know that's why Passion
of the Christ. Well, it was even like, during her time. Um, she was banned by Catholic churches. So I'm not, yeah,
but, but you know, but I've had,
but
no, but I, I honestly believe like part of the reason passion of the Christ didn't get more nomination. I think it got a score nomination for the music. I think that was it, but that's the kind of movie passion of the Christ should have had the gamut. It should have had 12 nominations. And just about every category from set decoration to costumes to actors to best director. But I mean, but you know, they're not going to award Jim Caviezel, at least not now.
Um, you know, they're not going to give him a nomination, but so that's what I mean about that, that kind of shit. Is unfair. Pastor of the Christ, I believe was worthy of all those nominations.
Well, and that gets into actual politics because Yeah. You know, Mel's, Mel's politics are more. Right? Sure. And, and so is Jim Al's and so yeah, all that. But I mean, I don't think that was the case for Ethan Hawk. I No, I was just
messing with you when you said she's Catholic. I was like, oh, that's it. He's blaming the Jews. Yeah. Know
Yeah. No, we're just kidding. Hollywood. But there other, other, other films were nominated.
Yeah, there were, there were a lot of, but now, okay, so I'm going to give you the list of Best Picture nominees. So, every year my brother and I, we try to use some of these movies, and they've made for some good podcasts. But I texted the list and I said, we got some work to do, because I haven't seen fucking any of these. I saw one of them. Yeah. So, um, oh shit, where'd it go? Um, I have the list here. Now, on this list, I will say So Far is my favorite film of the year. But, here we go.
So here's the list. Uh, I'm just going to I'm just going to go with it in no particular order. Amelia Perez, a complete unknown. That's the Bob Dylan movie. That was a
great movie.
Conclave nickel boys. Never heard of nickel boys. I'm still here. I don't think I heard of that one either. The substance I've heard a lot about, it's actually streaming now. Dune Part 2, of course, we've heard a lot about that. Wicked, of course, is in theaters. Big Disney movie. Onora, never heard of it. And The Brutalist, which I've heard a lot about. It was just three and a half hours long. So looking at this list, I tell you right now I've seen one.
I saw a complete unknown when it came out. That was the only one. I didn't even see Dune Part 2 yet. And we did a podcast on Dune Part 1! And I hadn't even seen Part 2 yet! And
that's the one you want to see in the theater, man.
Yeah, I know, I totally dropped the ball on that one. But I saw a complete unknown. So far, even Wildcat notwithstanding. So far a complete unknown is my favorite movie of the year. Now I have to say I'm biased because I'm a huge Bob Dylan fan. And that movie opened on Christmas day. And I told V. I said, after you put the girls to bed, I'm going to the movies by myself.
As a huge Bob Dylan fan. You got to say you're probably holding your breath. Is this going to work? Right.
Absolutely. I thought it was, I was terrified it was going to suck. Yeah. And I got to say for anyone that's maybe not as big into movies, but you really love music. Go watch this movie. Yeah, because there's so much music like every scene. It's not always Bob in every scene Somebody's playing music. Somebody is performing. It's a great soundtrack. Yeah She's not
a Dylan fan. Really? I mean, you know,
but there was a lot of music a lot of great acting Timothee Chalamet who by the way coincidentally is in Dune part 2 He pulls off Bob Dylan man. He's got the mannerisms down. Is he
nominated for Best Actor for that role? He was he was he's up for Best
Actor And, uh, the girl, I can't remember, is it, it's Barbaro. I think her last name is she's nominated for best supporting actress for playing beautiful, uh, for playing Joan Baez. Yeah. Um, which was funny because I read an article that said it's ironic that the people playing Bob Dylan and Joan Baez are. far hotter than Bob Dylan and Joan Baez really were, and I'm like, well, you know, it's Hollywood. You gotta pick the best looking people you can find. Um, but, uh, but I've seen pictures.
I saw old photos. You can Google it. Old photos of, of Dylan and Joan Baez together. And they, they did look cute together, man. It was, it was, uh, and I thought the movie was a fair port, uh, portrait of that. Um,
the casting was great. Yeah. Yeah.
Casting was great. The writing was great. Edward Norton might finally get his Oscar supporting actor. Cause he disappears man. And not like the disappears the way Heath Ledger disappeared as the Joker. Cause of all the makeup. I mean, you forget it's Edward Norton. He doesn't sound like him. He doesn't look like
him. At one point, Jesse said, is that the guy that's in Ferris Bueller? What? You know who I'm talking about? She thought it was Alan Ruck. Yeah, yeah, I said, he's the guy in, uh, what's the name? What's the show he's in now? Edward Norton. Yeah. No,
no, no. Ruck. Alan Ruck. I don't know what show he's on now, but, uh, succession. He's in succession. Oh, he's in succession. I didn't know that. I don't watch succession. Uh, nothing against it. I just, one of those things I've never had time for. It's a good series, but I hear it's great. I hear it's great. Um, so no, I mean, you forget that it's Edward Norton and, and I thought he might. He didn't win, right? He hasn't won one, right?
I remember he was up for Birdman and I thought he should have won for Birdman. Um, but, um But anyway, I don't think he's one. I'm going to look it up right now, but he definitely is due. He's due for an Oscar and, um, no, he's been nominated four times. Yeah, this is his fourth Oscar nomination. Uh, he was nominated for bird man. He was nominated for best actor in American history X and of course, best supporting actor for primal fear, which is kind of was his breakout back in 96. So he is due.
And again, I loved him in this. It was great. Yeah. Um, some people. You know, we'll go to the movie. Expecting a biopic. It's not really it only focuses on it focuses about three years of Dylan's life
Yeah,
it was it was when he first it was about his break into the business for sure But then somewhere along the way he kind of abandons the folk music and goes electric
Yeah, and in fact,
I think that I think the name of the book It was based on was Bob goes electric or something like that. Like Bob Dylan goes electric That was the name of the book or something like that. And so it's really just about that segment of his life Where he went to electric guitar and everybody in the folk world was pissed! Like, they were mad! It was, yeah, it was like, it was like, uh, the big girls when, uh, Khloe Kardashian became hot.
All the big girls around the world were like, Khloe, you were one of us! Like, you know, and then they're like, they felt she abandoned them. Because she, you know, got plastic surgery and everything. So, um, um, so it was kind of like that. Like, all the folk people were like, you abandoned us. Like you went and joined all these rock stars. You were one of us. You know what I mean?
I think, I think another one of the driving forces, I'm going to say something else about this in a minute, um, was Johnny cash. Was, you know, Johnny was the one that was like, man, fuck those people, like, play what you want to play. I want
to hear it. I got a question. I should have done my homework, but, uh, the guy that directed this. Yeah, I did this. Okay. Yeah, so I was just gonna
say, I have something else I want to add. James Mangold directed Walk the Line.
Yeah.
I, I want to know why he didn't recast Walking Phoenix. Yeah, Walking Phoenix, man. Why not bring it back? And I gotta believe That would be great. He didn't for two reasons. One, he might not have been available. He might have called Joaquin and he's like, I'm doing this other thing. Or maybe he was doing Joker 2. Maybe he just wasn't available. I don't know.
The other thing is, um, it's quite possible that he purposely didn't even ask him because he didn't want the, the, the point of emphasis or attention to be pulled away from Dylan. Yeah. You know, Joaquin, Joaquin Phoenix. Is bigger right now than Timothee Chalamet, even if you might not want to admit it, even if you're a big Chalamet fan. Joaquin Phoenix is bigger right now, he just won best actor at the Oscars for playing Joker. He's bigger right now.
Much bigger catalog too, so.
Yeah, so, so, uh, as far as resume of films, absolutely. Resume.
So,
yeah, so. Um, you know, there, there's, it's possible that James Mangle was like, you know, if I bring him back to play Johnny Cash again, that will be the focus of the film. But I gotta say, that guy that
played Johnny Cash did a great job. Oh yeah, he was good too. I enjoyed him, yeah.
He was good too, but man, I thought the way Joaquin Phoenix played drunk, drunk Johnny Cash was better than this guy's drunk Johnny Cash. Uh, this guy was good, but the way Phoenix does drunk Johnny Cash was way better. Um. Uh, God, I loved Walked a Line. That was a good one that we did. For all of you listening, we did a podcast episode on that, too. Yeah, look it up. Um, okay, so we're not gonna go through last year.
We went through a lot of the arguments about, oh, this should have been, that should have been. Um, with the exception of Wildcat, which we already talked about. I don't know a lot of these films. I didn't see a lot of films this year, unfortunately. Life sort of invades. So, we have a different little fun thing we're going to do to end this episode. I told my brother. This is how I got the idea. The last episode we dropped was the campaign versus Dave on are there any good politicians.
Um, fun episode. I was re listening to it while I was folding laundry. Because I love the sound of my own voice. It's a Leo narcissist thing. Not Leo DiCaprio, Leo the astronomical sign. Astrological sign. Anyway, I like hearing the episodes to see how they came out and I was listening to it and I was thinking because we were talking about how good Dave's script was. And that it was nominated for Best Original Screenplay back in 93.
And that, I had this idea, that for those of you that don't know, After 2008, so what happened in 2008, The Dark Knight did not get nominated for Best Picture. It didn't make the Final Five. EVERYBODY was up in arms!
¶ Debating the Best Picture Nominees
Oh my god, it was the best movie of the year! By far made the most money of the year, uh, in the year, blah blah blah blah. They changed the rules the next year to allow up to 10. Now you could have six, you could have eight, but it allows up to 10. Well, they've abused it lately and they fill it with a full slate of 10 as they did again this year. And I think last year, without sounding insulting anybody, I think you and I even talked about how some of these shouldn't even.
Like they're not, I mean, they're good movies,
but
best, best picture is the elite of the elite.
¶ The Case for Returning to Five Nominees
Right. And really, honestly, I think they should go back to just five.
And I can't remember if they did it last year, but the year before, I remember that they weren't even showing clips of all the movies. And that was annoying.
It's still a two or three picture race. Yeah, but you think if you're nominated,
give me my, give me my 30 seconds or whatever and show me a clip. Yeah, I'm here. Yeah, I'm dressed up, I came out, you know, I brought my mom or my wife or somebody.
Yeah.
Give me my, give me my 30 seconds, man. Give me
my 30 seconds, and they didn't. And they don't do it. It's almost like the bottom ones on the list. They know have no shot. Well, if that's the case, then why are we giving them a best picture nomination? Yeah, like go back to five. I get why you did
¶ Revisiting Past Oscar Snubs
it. It was a knee jerk reaction because Heath Ledger had just died and the movie was left out. And there was this reaction to, we need to include more films. And Marvel was at its peak at that time, or at least getting into its peak. I think Iron Man might've been released in 08, wasn't it? I don't remember. No, maybe not. Maybe not. Maybe it was a little bit earlier. But the point was, is Uh, Marvel movies were starting to make this complaint that we want in too.
Mm hmm.
And so they expand it. And Um, I would rather do that than what they thought they might do. They said that they might have a top action, best action picture of the year. Oh no, yes. Which would be like the Transformers movies all get their own category for best picture. I hate that idea. Like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. We're not the Golden Globes. We don't have a musical or comedy, uh, category. Right? Like, it's the Oscars. You're either the best movie of the year or you're not.
Now I know that the reaction is, Well, wait, there's an animated feature, there's a documentary feature, those are both movies, it's not the same.
Yeah.
Live action feature films. Non documentary feature films. You're either in the dance or you're not. And to create separate categories, I'm against. Yeah. When it comes to that. Now, I think they should scale it back. I think 10 is too many. But, so here's the fun idea I had. Did you do your homework, by the way? Did you look it up? No,
I didn't. I'm gonna do it right now. I got IMDB open. Well, we're not gonna,
well, I'm not gonna go through every year. But I said, let's not go back any farther.
Which year are you gonna go for?
I've got, I've got four years I want to talk about.
¶ 1991: The Fisher King, Thelma & Louise, and Boys in the Hood
1990. Um, because really, if you think about it, and I looked at every single year that you're looking at. What's the first year you're gonna do? 90? So I looked at and I actually deleted out a few years that I thought, yeah, of course that one would be picked if the idea was there was still 10. So the idea is going back to 1990 if they had made this rule then and you could have up to 10 nominees.
Since 1990, which films that didn't ever get a best picture nomination, which ones should have gotten and would have been picked. So I'm going to 91 to listen to the three films that didn't make the final cut of five in 1991. Are you ready?
Yeah.
The Fisher King, which won an Oscar and was nominated for another five. It's a wait, wait, wait. Okay. Thelma and Louise. Oh my God. Won an Oscar for screenplay. Had six total nominations, including both lead actresses. Didn't get a best picture nomination. And finally boys in the hood. Now this is my hail Mary pass. Cause it did only get two nominations. It only got two nominations and it would have been a stretch to include it in best picture.
However, the two nominations were screenplay and best director. And it was. Sort of a groundbreaking movie, you know what I mean? As far as turning, uh, sort of like getting white people to open their eyes about the shit that goes on in the inner city that they've tried to pretend doesn't exist for so long. This movie crashed into everybody's living room. And it was such an iconic film.
And I think that if you expanded it to ten, The Fisher King, Boys in the Hood and Thelma and Louise EASILY get three of the nominations. Absolutely. What were the movies that were nominated? Do you have that in front of you? I don't, but off the top of my head, I'm gonna say it was Silence of the Lambs won. It beat Bugsy. It beat Prince of Tides. It beat, uh, Beauty and the Beast. Did Backdraft get, uh, No, I don't think that had any nominations.
And something else, Cape Fear didn't get nominated either. Um, but there was, There's a remake, usually remakes don't. I really feel bad, uh, what did I say? I said Bugsy, right? Did I say Bugsy? Bugsy, Sounds of the Lambs, Prince of Tides. What about, what about Bob? No, fuck. Um, uh, uh, Beauty and the Beast. Come on, I'm missing one. What's the fifth movie that was nominated for Best Picture in 1991? Oh my god, this is a lot of dead air here, but I have to because I'm bothered by this.
Best. You gotta have this up, man. Nominees. All right. Uh, are you ready? Yeah. I have it right here. Okay. Oh, JFK. JFK was the film. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But see, I, people, people feel about JFK then that I think the rest of the world feels about Boys in the Hood now. So I think if you could redo it, Boys in the Hood should have taken JFK's place. Yeah,
yeah, yeah. Is that fair? Is that fair? I, I, 100 percent yeah.
Um, okay, so, next year
¶ 1995: Braveheart, Apollo 13, and the Snubbed Classics
what do you have? I have 1995, did you have something in there?
No, go for it, let me, let me pull
it
up.
1995's best picture, the five pictures, it was like a three picture race and two jokes. Okay, here was the three picture race for Best Picture in 1995. Braveheart, which one? Apollo 13 and Sense and Sensibility. The other two dogs in the race. Il Postino, which was an Italian film. And Babe, which was about a talking pig. Really? Are you serious? You wanna know three movies that were left out of Best Picture? The Usual Suspects, which was Wait, it had two Oscar nominations and won them both.
Best screenplay and best supporting actor. Oh my god, seven? Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Heat? Seven? But wait, wait. Oh yeah, so Heat, Casino, none of these got nominated for best picture. Wait, wait, I'm gonna kill you with the last two. Are you ready? Here's the last two. Dead Men Walking and Leaving Las Vegas. Both were nominated, had four nominations. I hated Leaving Las Vegas. Wait a minute, wait a minute, listen to this though. Both films had four nominations.
Okay. Both won a lead Oscar category. Yeah. Dead Man Walking won Best Actress for Susan Sarandon. Leaving Las Vegas won Best Actor for Nicolas Cage. Both films had their director nominated. And neither one, neither one got this, they said it was too dark. They said there were too dark. And I'm like, okay, seven was too dark. You could have put in dead man walking, dead man walking was a
masterpiece
and you had heat was left out. Casino was left out. So if you think about, uh, and wait, I might be overstepping my grounds here. You have to might look this up. Did toy story come out in 95 as well? Oh my gosh. I don't know. It might have. No. What year was the original Toy Story? Oh, you're right. 95! 95! Holy crap! 95! So Toy Story wasn't included either. So if they had, if they could have gone to 10 Alright, alright, here's another trivia for you. Alright, this is not trivia.
This one is your opinion. Okay. I'm gonna say Let's take the five nominees. Although I would have taken out You know what? Fuck it. Let's take out Il Postino and Babe. And we're gonna fill those slots with Dead Man Walking and Leaving Las Vegas. Now you got five more possibles. I'm going Usual Suspects, Toy Story, Seven, Casino, and Heat. Is that fair?
Yeah. Absolutely. Oh my god. So, it's, I just looked up Toy Story. They were in, they were, they won an Academy Award, uh, for Special Achievement Award. What the
hell is that? That's because Pixar was in its infancy then, and that was the first Pixar big huge hit. Yeah. So that's why. Wait.
They got an Oscar nominee for best writing screenplay written directly for the screen.
Yeah.
Best Oscar nominee for best music, original song, which would be Randy Newman. Um, should have won that one. I don't know who won that one.
Hey, hang on.
Hang
on. This might be the one edit you have to do before we drop it. Hopefully that'll be an easy edit to make.
Yeah, Randy Newman got nominated for two Oscars that year. Best Music Original Song and Best Music, uh, Original Musical or Comedy Score. So, yeah, crazy. So,
anyway. So, um, I know I skipped over it. I was gonna say one thing. In 1993, Philadelphia probably would have been nominated for Best Picture. Yeah. 93 was 93 was 93 was another good one. That was the year of Dave. So I started with 93 because of Dave. And the more I looked at it, I was like, Dave might not have gotten nominated because there were a lot. The firm came out that year in the line of fire came out that year. So there were a lot of movies, but okay. Moving on from 95. I thought 95.
I wanted to include that one because I think 95 and 91 are the two biggest travesties so far. Um, okay. What other year?
¶ 2007: A Perfect Year for Best Picture
So 2007. Oh boy. Um. So this was the best picture race. Oh, I didn't have any. That didn't leave out, not 2007. I thought they got it right and I don't think they should have added anymore. Do do you have the nominations for 2007?
I
do. I do. So here are the 2000 sevens. I think it rivals the best picture race of 1994. Now, for those of you that don't know, I always talk about best picture 1994, because I thought that that year they nailed it. They got all five were per, so here just re. Cap refresher memory. 1994 was Forrest Gump one and it beat Pulp Fiction, Shawshank Redemption, Quiz Show, and Four Weddings and a Funeral. That to me was always like, that was the pinnacle.
That was like the year where every film was amazing. 2007, Atonement, No Country for Old Men, Juno, There Will Be Blood, and Michael Clayton. I mean, they nailed all five right out of the All five of those are Amazing films and no country for old men won. So I just wanted to mention that 07 was like a 1994 revival. Uh, and, and again, by allowing 10 movies, I think you lose out on years like this.
Yeah.
Um, okay. Here's my last one.
¶ 2008: The Dark Knight Controversy
2008 of course, the pinnacle year where, uh, the dark night was left out. Now here's the case for the dark night. And why people were up in arms. It had eight Oscar nominations. What year are you in? 2008. The Dark Knight had eight Oscar nominations and it won two of them including Heath Ledger. It led all films in domestic box office with 531 million, and it was the only film to reach 1 billion worldwide, the biggest film of the year. And it's not even close.
It had the biggest performance of the year and it's not even close. And they didn't give it a best picture nomination. Um, one of the other arguments I would make, Oh, this was actually got some love, but it didn't get nominated for best picture. If we wanted to go to that Catholic route again, have you ever seen doubt? No. Oh my God! Tonight, you and Jesse are watching Doubt. Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman. Five Oscar nominations. Did not get nominated for Best Picture. Which one won?
Slumdog? In 08?
Yeah. No, I think that was 07. Or was it Dark Knight? No, Dark Knight was a night. Obviously, yeah, they got snubbed.
Um. What won? I want to say Slumdog was 07. No, no, obviously it wasn't. I just told you. It had to have been Slugdog. Because Slumdog, I just said, might have been 07, but I just named you the five movies from 07 and that wasn't it. So, yeah, yeah, yeah, it was Slumdog. Slumdog. Now, Slumdog's a good film. But the Dark Knight should have been included,
man. Yeah, right.
I mean, jeez oh peats. What do you think? No country for old men won in 07. Yeah. And, uh, Slumdog Millionaire won in 08. Now, when we say that, we mean the year that they came out. When people say the 09 Oscars, they mean the year of 08. Because that's when the movies came out. Did you say if
Gran Torino was nominated? Gran
Torino was not nominated. What year did it Well, I don't know. That was 08. Come on.
That was 08.
Oh. Uh, 08 it was released?
Yeah. It's listed on IMDb as 08.
Okay, so the nominees that year were, um, Slumdog Millionaire, Milk, which won Best Actor for Sean Penn, The Reader, which I think won Best Actress for Kate Winslet. The Curious Case of Benjamin Buttons and Frost Nixon. Frost Nixon was actually really good. You know who
got snubbed? Tropic Thunder.
No, get out of here. You know what? Tropic Thunder, I love it, but it's not going to be nominated for Best Picture. But I tell you what, here's the funny thing. Here's how good Tropic Thunder was. There was a push that Robert Downey Jr. would beat Heath Ledger in the Best Supporting Actor category. Because he, uh, playing, uh, the, the black guy, the guy that dyes himself black to play the role. Um, he was so good in that, that they thought he might actually beat Heath Ledger.
Um, he, he also said on a podcast or an interview somewhere that they were, They were concerned when the movie came out because rightfully so. Yeah, he's going blackface, right? So they, they, they were concerned about the attention they would get, the negativity about that. And he said that, you know what? Nobody even mentioned it. You know what they were more pissed off at? Simple Jack, Ben Stiller is making a mockery of people with, you know, I think that
was on a
rogued podcast, physical handicap. Um, and they said there, he said there were more pissed off at simple Jack than they were at his black face. So he was okay. He was fine. So much. So they nominated for best supporting actor.
So the boy in the straight pajamas that wasn't nominated for best picture. That was a, we watched that. That was a really good movie. Mm mm. I don't think that,
no, that didn't get a nomination. So, um, if you think of some other, uh, the biggest other snubs aren't really nomination snubs, they're win snubs.
¶ Reflecting on Oscar Wins and Snubs
Like, um, what was it, uh, didn't Roberto Benigni win Best Actor in like 1998? Mm mm. Right? Do you know who he beat in 98? Mm mm. So, I'll, I'll go from the bottom up, okay, of the four nominees. So, um, I believe that Ian McKellen of Lord of the Rings fame, he did a film where he played the real life director John Whale in a movie called Gods and Monsters. It's arguably Ian McKellen's best film. He was nominated for Best Actor. Nick Nolte was in Affliction.
Now we've talked about Affliction because it's one of those, um Flat arcs that we talk about. It's a Paul Schrader film, Paul Schrader script. So we we've talked about affliction in podcasts past. That's easily, in my opinion, Nick Nolte's best performance out there. If you haven't seen it, you got to watch it. I showed mom when she was here when mom and dad came to visit.
I showed them the tooth pull scene from affliction where Nick Nolte reaches into his mouth with a pair of pliers and pulls a tooth out. And mom's yeah, he pulls a good he goes all Ron Swanson and mom's all oh my god, I can't watch and so But he's got like you could see the tear coming down his eye as he's doing it Like he he goes full Denzel in glory with the teardrop. And so it's it to me. It's Nick Nolte's best performance ever He didn't win.
Yeah. Next up, on this list, Um, American History X, Edward Norton, nominated for Best Actor. People say it's his best all time performance. Uh, he doesn't win. And the final loser of this group, Tom Hanks in Saving Private Ryan. Yeah. Those were your Benigni for Life is Beautiful. Who basically is the Italian Jim Carrey. And they give it to him because it's such a sweet movie. It was a good movie. I watched it. Come on, man! Best actor?!
I know.
Did you see him at the Oscars? He was playing himself! He's the Italian version of Jim Carrey! Did you ever see Jim Carrey at the Oscars? He's a riot! Whenever they ask him to present anything, he's hilarious! So, Roberto Benigni, to me, I thought was The acting, uh, we're getting loose with the language on the acting part. Um, it was a good movie. It was a fun movie. He's a fun guy. Yeah. But best actor in that year?
It's either Hanks And if you don't want to give it to him because he won two already, then you go Edward Norton in American History X. You don't want to give it to him? Then it's time to award Nick Nolte. You give it to somebody other than Roberto Benigni! Heh heh heh heh heh heh heh heh heh heh. Anyway, that's They were
caught up in the emotion of the story. They were!
And that's the funny thing when, and we saw this last year with Poor Things. Remember the girl, uh, Lily Gladstone from, uh, the Scorsese film. The, uh, the Native American The Killers of the Flower Moon. Yeah, yeah, yeah. She, she was penciled in as best actress all the way up until Oscar night. And as the Oscars were going and poor things started to get a lot of attention and started winning Oscars, it wasn't supposed to win. I texted mom. I said, Emma Stone's going to win best actress.
Like I had already called Lily Gladstone in all of my predictions. So I can't change it now. But this is why I don't think I'm going to start releasing predictions anymore until like, right before this category is named, because you get a feel as the, as the night is going on, you're like, Oh, I see where this is going. I see where this is going. And Emma stone, sure enough, just pulled off the hype. So I think Roberto Benigni had that going for him. That life is beautiful.
Caught buzz and the hype was high and everybody was high on the movie and he just steamrolled his way to it. Good for him.
Well,
all right. What else you got? Anything? Nope. This, this was supposed to be just a commercial. I know. Yeah.
¶ Future Plans and Final Thoughts
No, I'm looking for, we need to, so maybe we should, maybe we should land the plane by, uh, talking about what we're going to be experimenting with, you know, in 2025. We want, we want to experiment with live. There's a few different platforms we're going to try, or at least we'll, we'll try one at a time. If we like the first one, we'll just go with that. Um, and it'll be fun.
And, uh, You know, we could record it live and just upload it, you know, and uh, um, I want to encourage you, and I'm saying this publicly now for the audience, I want to encourage you, and I've suggested this before, Uh, whatever platform we've, we discover and that we like, and, uh, I want you to learn how to use it so you could fly solo without me when I'm not available.
And that'll enable you to, uh, invite other people to join you for a podcast because I think that would, I would tune in to hear you, you know, maybe you get Leon or someone, Lee, uh, who, from Australia. Leon? I know, Lee, I said it, the way I said it, I was like, no, not Leon.
Lee, we just made you from Detroit. We need to get Lee
back on, and yeah, get him tuned in.
Leon and
Jerome.
If, if Lee Morgan was actually from Detroit and not Australia, he'd be LEON!
I'm sending him that clip. But yeah, I mean, seriously though man, you gotta figure out how to use this in your studio there. You
just, you just, you are Dan Campbell, and you just asked Ben Johnson to run the defense. Yeah. The technical part is you, man. I don't know this shit. Listen, listen. Don't give me the, if I figured it out, you can figure it out. Yeah, for real. So, um, I, you know what, I joked around with Jesse. Jesse said something like that when we did the Wildcat episode. Those of you who haven't heard it, go back and listen to it. Um. Jesse said, you know, why don't you learn the editing?
I said, Jesse, if I learned the editing, what is your brother's job? He will have nothing left.
No, but seriously though, um, I don't want my unavailability to hinder your opportunity to get up, to just jump on. You have an opportunity to jump on with someone to talk about. Something that's released. You know what I mean? It would be good. It would be good. Good, man. I've only had a couple of drinks and it's really hit me already. I don't want you to miss those opportunities. So anyways, we're going to play with that and see if we can get you, uh, comfortable enough to with it, to just.
You know, throw it up and record it and go.
All right. Sounds like a plan. Sounds like a mission for 2025. The also the other mission for 2025, the lions are going to go undefeated and win the Superbowl.
I'm down. I'll have to buy another bottle of whiskey.
Absolutely. Alright, let's land this plane here. This prop plane we have was supposed to be a commercial.
Yeah. So if you've made it this far, you're a hardcore fan. And we just asked you to share this episode with a friend. And, uh Yeah, go support your local cinema. Keep list keep
It's been so long, I forgot my sign off. Keep drinking and keep watching. I fucking forgot my sign off! That's how long it's been! Yes. Until next time. I'm ashamed. Good night, all.
That's a good place to end it. Ha ha ha.