It's here. Noted Spooky Bois™, Jack and Jeremy Kolodziejski, have watched A24's long anticipated and highly praised horror film, Saint Maud . And now, they are going to talk about one of the best movies of the year, Saint Maud . And you - yes, YOU - are going to listen. And all will be well. Now, listen on....

On the latest episode of Hot Takes , Robby chats with guest, Diana DiMuro, about Chloé Zhao's breathtakingly poignant and deeply emotional look into the lives of the modern Nomad: Nomadland . Listen on....

It’s been a year where any kind of escapism is welcome. This is especially true when the escapism dabbles in absurdity. The creative team from Bridesmaids , (with the exception of Paul Feig) are at it again with their extremely enjoyable foray: the titular soul-douching Vista Del Mar. Here’s the thing; you’ve met a Barb and a Star in your life. They are recognizable and relatable due to the down-to-earth, casual fun of Annie Mumolo and Kristen Wiig. These are two small-town ladies with teal ocean and dayglow beach dreams. You know their quiet sorrow and aspirations already, and Wiig and Mumolo are betting on that in order for you to buy-in to these ludicrous yet endearingly milquetoast characters. Immediately lulling you into a false sense of security, there is a joyous, twee-comedy introduction of an anachronistic young boy on a bike, delivering papers and lip-synching to a security blanket slow jam of early eighties goodness. This is obviously heightened, and comes off as the same tone as the sing-along at the end of Bridesmaids; which is simultaneously a tribute to the song and a mockery of the intense fandom that “Hold On” had in that film. Here, the film takes a sharp right turn into footage that feels like it ended up on the cutting room floor of Robert Rodriguez’s Spy Kids franchise. This reveals the driving plot of the film and introduces Jamie Dornan’s aloof, love-drunk Edgar - in all of his himbo glory- trying to woo Sharon Gordon Fisherman (Kristen Wiig in what looks like a cosplay manifestation of her id). The camera cuts hard to Barb and Star in Soft Rock, NE (no, it does not exist) on a couch talking it out in a Jennifer Convertibles . This is the perfect employer for Barb and Star. It is extremely outdated, yet totally endearing. For instance, you are never as excited when you enter a Jennifer Convertibles as opposed to going into an IKEA, but you go to Jennifer Convertibles for comfort, and that’s about it. After they learn that their store is closing -undoubtedly due to Barb and Star’s inability to sell anything, they head to their talking club. What a treat this was! The talking club becomes a recurring figure throughout the film. It begins with hot dog soup, Rose Abdoo, Fortune Feimster, Vanessa Bayer, and Phyllis Smith having a themed discussion every night. When not speaking, if you squint really hard, you can actually see the little daggers coming out of all of the talking club’s eyes while looking at each other. (Kidding, but you can feel it!) It becomes apparent that Vanessa Bayer is the Queen Bee, making sure all of the conversations are on-topic, regardless of how much the talking club participants may want to veer off course. After being chastised and excluded from the talking club due to veering off-topic, Barb and Star are emboldened to take a journey by themselves. To borrow the parlance of Barb and Star, when they get to Vista Del Mar, well, that’s where it gets cuckoo bananas. Yet again, the absurdity is heightened when you realize that this comedy-adventure-spy romp also has full-on musical segments. To be clear, we are not full-on Busby Berkley, but there are a lot of full-on, glorious silver-age musical numbers. The entire soundtrack for that matter feels like the forgotten yacht-rock classics of yore. It’s full of lovely surprises and forgotten gems that will make you think "all mai tais, all day." I’m honestly surprised at the omission of the Sloppy Boys and their album Dancing on the Wind. Whilst in Vista Del Mar, Barb and Star have their own prerogative of bucket-list adventures, which gets quickly derailed with a magical drink in the lobby and the meeting of Edgar. After a hypnotic, drunken tryst, both Barb and Star begin their pursuit of Edgar, which turns into a delightful, uh, C plot? That being said, if you are watching this movie for the plot, you are missing the point entirely. It’s there and has its function, but come to this movie prepared to laugh and remove your plot hole seeing monocles. They are not welcome in Vista Del Mar. Sure, Bizarro-evil-Kristin Wiig -Sharon Gordon Fisherman- has a substantial backstory, including the traumatizing catalyst which started her on a journey to destroy the annual Seafood Jam with killer mosquitoes, but like the majority of the visuals, it’s enjoyable fluff. After landing in Vista Del Mar, the film begins to truly sing, literally. The pursuit of the potential relationship with Edgar and Barb, or Edgar and Star, rightfully lampoons so many romantic comedies by taking a carbon copy of their “date” scenes and CTRL+V’ing it for both Barb, Star, and directly into our hearts. At this point, Dornan’s lust for both sides of the Kristen Wiig coin crescendos with a scene-stealing musical debut for Dornan that is as impressive as the buffet at the Hotel Vista Del Mar. There is a sharp contrast between Soft Rock and Vista Del Mar visually. In Soft Rock- like our humdrum quotidien- it is a sea of desaturated stale colors. How many shades of tan and grey are there, do you ask? Soft Rock Nebraska answers: just enough to not call attention to anything at all. In comparison, Vista Del Mar seems like if David La Chapelle had to dress David Bromstad (host of Million Dollar Dream Home) and he could only use the color palettes in his work. It is in fact, a super-saturated and borderline eye-straining bright and vivid dayglow assault. Surely, I am not the only one noticing the outfits that David Bromstad wears, right? To summarize, it is a kitsch tiki-fetishist wet dream. Coupled with the aesthetic cameos in the film are a wide array of cameos, one of which is the post-lounge mainstay Richard Cheese of Lounge Against the Machine, in addition to one of my personal favorites: that one guy, from that one thing - Michael Hitchcock. There is also a magical character interlude with a delightful new lens while still being extremely tongue-in-cheek. Finally, there is a perfect suburban lady-dream fulfillment towards the end of the movie that is too on the nose to spoil here. In a bizarre, serious twist, the set design beautifully conjures up the "Wasted Away in Margaritaville" perpetual vibes of the fictitious Vista Del Mar, so much so, that there was a feature about it in Architectural Digest. To their credit, the production team packed this film with vibrant neon quirks, eccentricities, and tourist traps, a - "Oh, is that a shell bracelet stand? Ooo, I love these!"- plenty. After their dalliances, Barb and Star take some time away from each other whilst secretly reconvening repeatedly with Edgar, and rest assured, their adventures are an intriguing, and tit-flappin’ good time. Star’s adventures lead her to ludicrous sexual encounters with Edgar, and Barb goes on a harrowing path of self-discovery -sort of. Barb’s journey is packed with parodies of all of the spring break “transformational” moments and proves to be a jarring and hilarious romp. Barb and Star Go To Vista Del Mar was such a refreshing change of tone from the eternal doomscape that was 2020. It was stupid, vibrant, beautiful, and absurd, as breezy as Barb and Star’s omnipresent culottes. Jordan Young Jordan graduated in 2009 from Susquehanna University with a degree in Creative Writing and Film Studies where he met his wife. In spite of God's will, he published his first book PESTS with Lloyd Kaufman; the CEO of the independent stalwart Troma Entertainment. You can see him being snarky and cynical on Twitter and Instagram @settlingstatic, and you can find him being deeply, deeply nerdy on Reddit @SkywardJordan.

In our latest video, Robby Anderson discusses just where our favorite television characters from the highly successful Disney+ show will end up, and how we got here. Watch on....

Before Story Screen was a movie theater, podcast, film criticism site or even a YouTube Channel, it was a pop-up screening cinema project, devoted to free screenings of all types of different movies all over the Hudson Valley, always with the intent of sparking conversation around film after each screening. Here's an awesome recap video we whipped together a few years ago, when we announced the opening of our permanent theater space, which covers every pop-up screening we ever held over nearly 5 years. Enjoy! Watch on....

Robby talks with guest, Diana DiMuro, about the latest Shaka King joint, Judas and the Black Messiah , a film so seemingly packed with talent, attitude and edge that the Story Screen Fam eagerly awaited its release throughout 2020. So, how is it? Listen on....

I. Perhaps it's the case that, in order to live, we must process our experience first rationally, and then irrationally...the various dreams that we dream at night are not criticized by anybody—there are no reviewers in the Land of Nod—nor do we need to defend our dreams or make any claims for them. But as we all find ourselves in the frustrating situation that most of the artistic objects we need and depend on for our daytime dreams must be made by other people, it's not surprising that we're finicky, critical and sometimes even angry when these objects are presented to us—we're constantly complaining, like diners in a restaurant who repeatedly send bad-tasting dishes back to the kitchen. And then, perhaps inevitably, centuries ago, analysts of art brought the concepts of "good" and "bad" into the conversation, and most of us, as irritable diners, frequently use this vocabulary in discussing our artistic meals, although it often merely adds to the prevailing confusion, because a parsnip is not really a "bad" carrot, it's a different vegetable. So. What type of dreams do you enjoy? — Wallace Shawn, "Aesthetic Preferences" Forty minutes into Richard Kelly’s fitful, monumental, maddening and unnervingly compelling blockbuster maudit Southland Tales , amnesiac superstar Boxer Santaros (Dwayne Johnson, in his first role without “The Rock” used in his credited name) is having lunch with someone who claims to be the Southland police officer Roland Taverner (Seann William Scott), both pausing their ridealong as Boxer researches his role as Jericho Cane in the script he co-wrote with porn star/multi-hyphenate proto-influencer Krysta Now (Sarah Michelle Gellar), The Power . Several wormholes of context could be further mined here, but let’s also pause this synopsis for the moment. Taverner, also suffering from amnesia, looks up from his meal at Santaros, clearly troubled. “I’ve had this recurring dream,” he begins, “I wake up in this dungeon. The walls are made of sand. As I slowly make my way through this maze, approaching a light source at the end. Guess who’s standing there, waiting for me?” Santaros inquires, “Who?” Taverner quietly replies: “You.” Santaros leans in, asking Tavener: “Do you ever feel like there's a thousand people locked inside of you?” Taverner replies, “Sometimes.” With increasing ardor, Santaros continues: “But it's your memory that keeps them glued together. Keeps all these people from fighting one another. Maybe in the end, that's all we have. The Memory Gospel.” This is as good an entry point as any into the multilayered Gordian knot called Southland Tales , a film so exasperating to explain and yet, somehow, often in spite of itself, so mesmerizing. A thousand tales are locked inside it: dreams emerge in daylight, multiple personality disorders (which must be some kind of wild trip for an amnesiac (spoiler alert: especially if that amnesiac is also an imposter)) give way to founding principles, even chapter titles. At this point in Southland Tales , we’re on the cusp of Chapter V, “The Memory Gospel” — the film opens, just like the Star Wars franchise, with a Chapter IV: “Temptation Waits.” This is also a sequence that references a separate sequence from earlier ST chapters, which have each been separately realized as three graphic novels. The hypertextual multi-directionality of Southland Tales is, one could argue, its own major theme, intent as the film is on mapping a condition in favor of effecting a tidy weaving of unruly, dense, unconventional narrative arcs, all which criss-cross with abandon towards The Big Telos: The End of the World. Obliquities abound in this multimedia work, one which Kelly has called in a recent oral history of Southland Tales’ creation , a “transmedia project,” and one which he insists remains “unfinished.” In retrospect, it almost seems inevitable that there was so much hostility meted out to this epic miasma masquerading as a Bush-era Hollywood tentpole; its debut at the Cannes Film Festival was a notorious catastrophe. Roger Ebert’s review set the tone for others to follow: “After I saw the first cut of Kelly's "Southland Tales" at Cannes 2005, I was dazed, confused, bewildered, bored, affronted and deafened by the boos all around me, at the most disastrous Cannes press screening since, yes, ‘The Brown Bunny.’” Slicing some 20 minutes from the Cannes cut, rearranging sequences and adding more expository material, Kelly’s revised edit limped into limited release the following year to similar derision, if not outright dismay. And yet, even early on, the film gained some partisans among certain critics more willing to embrace Kelly’s messy, sprawling, quixotically visionary satire. J. Hoberman, still employed by the Village Voice , identified its core compulsive sensibility, enthusing: “In its willful, self-involved eccentricity, Southland Tales is really something else. Kelly's movie may not be entirely coherent, but that's because there's so much it wants to say.” In the New York Times , Manohla Dargis was equally impressed by Kelly’s dedication to his outlandish Southland : “He doesn't make it easy to love his new film, which turns and twists and at times threatens to disappear down the rabbit hole of his obsessions. Happily, it never does, which allows you to share in his unabashed joy in filmmaking as well as in his fury about the times.” Biblical and strenuously profane; prophetic and banal; knowing and gauche; obscure and, at times, too spot-on for its own good; ambitious and juvenile; easily ridiculed and, in the final analysis, impossible to dismiss: even in the annals of cult films, there’s never been a work quite like Southland Tales , much less a Hollywood film that so revels in its own wealth of contradictions. With the new 2-disc Blu-Ray release of both the “Cannes cut,” unseen since its uncelebrated debut, and its subsequent re-edit, it’s a good time to reconsider this extravagant conundrum — barely held together by speculative centrifugal force and the memory gospel of Kelly’s own cracked cultural literacy — in all its irreducible peculiarity. II. You will want cause and effect. All right. — Thomas Pynchon, Gravity’s Rainbow I’ve been trying to track down a word or phrase in English that expresses a desire for the End Times and confess I’m surprised I haven’t found it. More specific than the death-drive “Thanatos” which Freud posited as the counterforce for the life-drive of Eros, it’s something that suffuses Judeo-Christian literature well beyond Biblical examples — there is, for example, the term "eschatomania," referring to "an intensive preoccupation with the prophetic passages or details of the Bible, eschatological charts, prophecy studies, end-times predictions and preaching.” But a general, non-denominational term for this longing does not seem to appear in the language, odd for a culture which has manifested this desire in its popular literature across the centuries, with examples ranging from Mary Shelley’s The Last Man to Will Forte’s The Last Man on Earth . Whatever we might call this craving for Apocalypse, Richard Kelly has it and it infects a number of his principals in Southland . His first film, the similarly disdained-upon-release and now-recognized cult classic, Donnie Darko , begins with Donnie sleepwalking into an encounter with the hulking, cosplayed rabbit “Frank,” who informs Donnie that the world will end in “28 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes and 12 seconds.” In Southland Tales , that desire is regularly rendered eschatomaniacal, with numerous quotes from the Book of Revelations (the revised cut providing considerably more than the Cannes), delivered in a measured Southern drawl by the film’s omniscient narrator, Pilot Abilene, portrayed by Justin Timberlake. Both cuts open in Abilene, TX, the first example of the many bizarre thematic rhymings with characters that occurs throughout Southland Tales . Effectively (not least around cost) leveraging faux “found footage” a few years after The Blair Witch Project and subsequent films like Paranormal Activity , Cloverfield and Diary of the Dead made the trope a recognizable fetish of early 21st c. horror films, a July 4th party and its camcorder documentation by two young boys is interrupted by a nuclear attack on Abilene, followed by a similar incineration of El Paso. World War III commences, although it seems little changed from Bush’s War on Terror in scope — only Syria is added to the list of combatants Iraq and Afghanistan — but changed utterly for Kelly’s journey through the looking glass of the times within which Southland Tales was made. We shift to Venice Beach, where we meet Boxer Santaros, prostrate, nervously mumbling to himself in silhouette near the surf, before rising and running to the boardwalk — in the revised cut, Pilot Abilene spells it out for us all right there in a voiceover, with others articulating it later in the Cannes cut: This is the way world ends This is the way world ends This is the way world ends Not with a whimper but with a bang This inversion of T.S. Eliot’s apocalyptic stanza finds one rhyme in the last name of the Republican presidential candidate in this alternate universe’s 2008. His running mate, Senator Bobby Frost (Donnie Darko’s dad, Holmes Osborne), and his wife Nana Mae (Miranda Richardson) — not coincidentally, also Boxer’s in-laws — are the driving force behind US-IDENT, a Patriot Act-funded “think tank” which is actually more like the surveillance and special operations wing of the new security state. US-IDENT’s very presence leads to considerable insecurity, notably for the Neo-Marxists (“the last remnants of the Democratic Party,” Pilot Abilene observes), the more radical of whom operate throughout the “Venice Beach underground” in “The Southland,” agitating for US-IDENT’s closure as they gear up for urban insurrection. Pilot Abilene himself is in US-IDENT’s employ, joining other heavily-armed, laptop-enabled snipers along the Venice Beach boardwalk, looking for enemies from without, but mostly from within. Meantime, World War III, our Pilot informs us, “was running out of gas. And there was no alternative; alternative fuel, that is. Until one day, when a renegade scientist arrived in The Southland with a cure for our sickness. He built this great big machine out in the ocean that would generate a hydroelectric energy field called Fluid Karma, a wireless network of electric power that would run machines by remote, machines that would never have to be refueled.” Enter Treer Products and its “wizard,” Baron Von Westphalen, portrayed exactly as you’d imagine by Wallace Shawn. “Have you built the world's first perpetual motion machine?” the Baron is asked at a beachside press conference. He gestures to the Pacific behind him. “The ocean is a perpetual motion machine…As long as the waves continue to crash, Fluid Karma will exist.” As Treer operates a massive apparatus offshore to mine the ocean, drawing forth the “quantum entanglements” which are its lifeblood, Fluid Karma is also being employed as a mind-altering drug, with soldiers being used as guinea pigs, resulting in many flag-draped coffins. Those tested include our narrator, who keeps a steady trade running Fluid Karma out of a boardwalk-based PX/arcade. His fellow vet Private Ronald Taverner, Official Roland’s twin brother, is being blackmailed by the Neo-Marxists into impersonating Roland, who has been kidnapped and given regular Fluid Karma injections. The Neo-Marxists hope to snare Boxer in a staged racist double-murder by Tavener, impersonating a different Tavener, thus damaging the Eliot/Frost ticket’s electability. Tavener meets Boxer — who is then the subject of an active missing person investigation at the behest of the Frost family — at the Manhattan Beach condo of pimp/dealer Fortunio Balducci (Will Sasso), where he and Krysta, to the accompaniment of Robert Aldrich’s 1955 atomic-age noir Kiss Me Deadly playing on a TV in the background, outline the premise of The Power . “The basic concept is this,” Boxer explains. “I play an LAPD cop who isn't who he seems.” There is an “apocalyptic crime rate” occurring because of “global deceleration… disrupting the chemical equilibrium in the human brain, causing very irrational criminal behavior.” “Sounds neat,” Tavener deadpans. Boxer concludes: “My character, his name…is Jericho Cane.” Ronald/Roland stands, remarking: “You're going to have to wear a bulletproof vest.” US-IDENT is on to this Neo-Marxist cell and their scheme, sending operatives to follow a supposed mole back to the cell’s lair. The mole coaxes a visibly tripping Roland into escaping just before he and his cadre are wiped out. Separately, Frost is being shaken down by USIDeath, a Neo-Marxist website seeking to bring down US-IDENT, controlled by Cyndi Pinziki (Nora Dunn), a porn director who tries to leverage compromising footage of Boxer and Krysta. She reaches the Frost brain trust via voice-scrambled web calls, referring to herself as “Deep Throat 2” (“Are you Deep Throat 2?” Krysta is asked by a Frost factotum later in the film — “Oh, I’m not in that movie,” she amiably replies). All the while, Treer is preparing to launch their crowning achievement: The Mega Zeppelin, powered by Fluid Karma. But Treer’s own brain trust also has designs on Boxer which remain unclear, as the Baron’s mother Dr. Inga Von Westphalen, as well as Dr. Katarina Kuntzler and the mysterious Serpentine (Beth Grant, Zelda Rubinstein and Bai Ling, respectively), appear as a trio of doom to inform him that they have downloaded The Power from the Net (as it turns out, they aren’t alone). “Don't look so scared, Mr. Santaros,” Serpentine scarcely assures Boxer. “The future is just like you imagined.” As the staged double-murder becomes real, courtesy of the malevolent Southland cop Bart Bookman (Jon Lovitz, hair bleached white) who has his own connection to the Neo-Marxists, Boxer and Tavener flee in different directions, the twins ultimately both searching for each other across The Southland as the double-crosses multiply, very irrational criminal behaviors proliferate, snipers take out their fellow citizens, the Mega Zeppelin launches, fighting in the street ensues, and certain truths are revealed while other remain ambiguous at best; Boxer takes it all in with a combined sense of déjà vu and inevitability. There’s even time for a trashed Pilot Abilene to engage in a song-and-dance number, choreographed to The Killers’ “All These Things That I've Done,” beginning with its refrain “I’ve got soul but I’m not a soldier.” This is far from the only instance of indie rock making an appearance in Southland Tales : Chapter VI, for example, takes its title from the soundtrack to Santaros and Tavener’s flight, post-double-murder: The Pixies’ ominous surfcore ballad “Wave of Mutilation.” I cannot even begin to outline the plenitude of additional plot points and sub-points my convoluted synopsis leaves out. It all builds to The Other Big Bang, alongside revolution, war crime guilt, space-time anomalies, a handshake (“How does it end?” Boxer’s wife asks towards the end — Boxer replies: “A handshake.”), mass murder, suicide and, come the end of the film, one final instance of Pilot Abilene partying with his crew at the PX. Is this scene a parting note of hope? One more ambivalence to put a bow on the many that preceded it? I can’t say honestly if it’s either of these or something else entirely — someone could quite reasonably see this as prima facie evidence of the film’s failure. I can’t help but feel this and many other instances of resolute irresolution mark Southland Tales as a major artwork by a serious artist. III. Memory believes before knowing remembers. — William Faulkner, Light in August “ What? You've got amnesia ?” exclaims Boxer’s incredulous wife Madeline (Mandy Moore, all aggrieved, savage-tanned, lip-glossed pout) in her eventual showdown with Boxer and Krysta — and who can blame her? This most hoary of Hollywood clichés extending to multiple characters in Southland Tales is joined by so many others: the sinister top-secret government organization, triple and quadruple crosses best lampooned on Rick & Morty , the fictional hero who “who is not who he seems,” echoed by Krysta late in the film regarding the “real” Boxer: “He's not the person you think he is.” Who is? One of Southland Tales ’ unambiguous pleasures is its use of boilerplate banalities to its advantage. As Madeline waves one of Krysta’s DVDs in her face — “ Cock Chuggers Two ? ‘Cock Chugging’?!?” — Boxer rises to her defense, while also providing a not-so-subtle critique of the then-nascent trend for self-branding: “Hey, hey! She just cut her own pop album…She's developing her own reality show, clothing line, jewelry, perfume, and not to mention an energy drink, which I tried,” pausing for effect, then concluding with quiet solemnity, “and her drink tastes really, really good.” After another pause, Boxer inquires: “Can I see the Cock Chuggers ?” That such humorous exchanges in Southland Tales often take the audience by surprise goes a long way towards demonstrating that this satire is by no means a comedy, or not exclusively. Another of the Hollywood commonplaces the film satirizes is the multi-character, interwoven plot that was the hallmark of the late Robert Altman. By 2005, multiple ambitious indie directors, most famously Paul Thomas Anderson, but also Richard Linklater, Alejandro González Iñárritu, Michael Winterbottom among others pledged allegiance to the late master’s discursive ways across a narrative, but never with the reckless near-recalcitrance of Kelly and his film. As with Altman’s masterful critique of American life, 1975’s Nashville , Southland Tales also concludes with drama on a big, flag-draped stage, with buildups that include a minor key “Star-Spangled Banner” sung by Rebekah Del Rio and a pas de trois danced by Boxer, Krysta and Madeline (“Is it some kind of an orgy or something?” inquires a puzzled Sen. Frost). Kelly himself names both Andy Warhol and Philip K. Dick as influences on the film, both of which resonate: Warhol’s embrace of pop on its own terms which then radically redefines those terms, and Dick’s similar capacity to defamiliarize the superficialities of modern life, revealing hidden forces at work behind them. Certainly, the transformation of Los Angeles, two words we never hear uttered in Southland Tales , into “The Southland” renders even the most recognizable aspects of L.A. — Venice Beach, the Staples Center, etc. — as equally iconic but swept away to a mythic realm that both is and is not the City of Angels. Another film with surprising affinities to Southland Tales is Alex Cox’ Repo Man , sharing with that film covertly evil government agencies; a nearly continuous stream of radio, television and other media providing commentary in the background; concluding scenes featuring vehicles glowing from within and flying around the LA skyline; and a similar, almost axiomatic fixation with Kiss Me Deadly (something, in this respect, both share with such unlikely films as Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction and Godard’s impenetrable adaptation of King Lear ). The “Great Whatzit” from that 50’s indictment of mass destruction, deception and their close relation to the American Dream, has mutated into various lethal, localized particulars and, towards this end, perhaps the experience of Southland Tales resembles nothing so much as the year it was made. 2005’s hangover from George W. Bush’s re-election, even after revelations of the torture at Abu Ghraib and the failure to find WMDs revealed the deceit driving the Iraq invasion but failed to prevent a second term, congealed into a queasy uncertainty about what would come next. A new surveillance state was being manufactured under the ostensibly protective aegis of The PATRIOT Act and the development of a far-from-consensual Big Brother hovered behind every press conference, every defense of the Iraq War and even the Internet itself. America was a nation uncertain, wondering how we got there and what comes next, much like Boxer on the beach at the opening of Southland Tales . Into this volatile mix of anxious paranoia, Kelly’s evident inspirations range from rock music of the era to cable news and even network comedies. One major change in the revised cut is the introduction of the framing device, the “Doomsday Scenario Interface” or DSI, resembling a standard cable news network’s layering of images and scrolling text, somewhat spelling out what is often left implicit in the Cannes cut. And then, there’s his casting, drawing on Johnson’s celebrity still very tied up with the WWF, alongside any number of middle-period SNL veterans. There’s the sense that Southland Tales’ ultimate source material is a 2005-vintage thickened reduction of post 9/11 PTSD, psychedelics, Napster and basic cable, boiled down into one very strange brew. One extra biblical reference from the in the revised cut occurs as the camera pans towards a parked ice cream truck near the Venice boardwalk, as Timberlake intones: “Revelation 6:8: ‘And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death’,” by way of an introduction to a character played by the unlikely horseperson of the Apocalypse, Cheri Oteri. Portraying the Neo-Marxist firebrand/comedian Zora Carmichaels, Oteri does occasionally play the role for laughs —her short frame in one scene needing to jump repeatedly in order to look out the peephole of her lair’s secure front door — but watching her as a revolutionary leader with several malignant double-crosses of her own sometimes strains credibility. This extends to others including Lovitz, in an effective if equally on-paper implausible turn from the former Tommy Flanagan. In fairness, the Cannes cut does seem more bloated and even more inchoate than the comparatively more direct, pared-down revision. One absolutely superfluous role in the longer version is Janeane Garofalo’s General Teena MacArthur, whose primary contribution to the narrative is to stand around in military fatigues, looking cross; the revised cut gains much more than it loses from her absence. That said, there’s also a certain depth to the Cannes cut, luxuriating not just in the extended running time but also its sequencing, evincing a greater refusal to corral Kelly’s ideas into a more coherent, more easily digestible whole. After watching both cuts, we can call this disposition towards his work any number of things, but it certainly isn’t unintentional and I’d be hard-pressed to call it laziness. And, in further fairness, there is much in both versions that simply don’t work as well as Kelly may have intended. The notion of a war effort sponsored by Hustler, its logo emblazoned on tanks, feels both farfetched and forced; the plot-critical Martin Kefauver (Lou Taylor Pucci) is a cipher, although no less intriguing for his mysteriousness; for all of Gellar’s best efforts, Krysta emerges as little more than a punchline delivery system, though Kelly has since spoken of her as more prophetic than he has rendered her cinematically; and the less said about cars and elephants fucking, the better. Fluid Karma is used as synecdoche for everything short of dessert toppings. The explosive climax also layers it on, with Christ imagery mysteriously emerging on Boxer like the Shroud of Turin and an anodyne professional voice over a P.A. announcing with stilted irony: “Have a nice Apocalypse.” Kelly has left many aporia in his characters’ wakes, but they mostly made me sit up, take notice and ponder how they and we got from A to B — for instance, what happens to Boxer after he drives off with his convertible top down into a dubious Southern California downpour, only to appear later on Venice Beach, drinking a can of Bud Light still attached to its six-pack? We aren’t told. Kelly leaving so much to be interpreted by an audience also speaks to his trust of them, his unwillingness to lead them by a nose ring, making Southland Tales , among its many other strengths, one of the most uncompromising American films to emerge this century, though it’s rarely recognized much less celebrated for this quality. I keep returning to that final party scene in the PX (and, hopefully, you’re no longer concerned about the lack of spoiler alerts here), which saves one of the biggest WTF moments in the film for last: Pilot Abilene refers to Pt. Ronald Tavener as “my best friend” — the two characters never meet once in the film, much less discuss one another. It’s inconceivable Kelly just happened to miss this connection between two of his major characters and it’s led me to one interpretation of Southland Tales I have yet to read anywhere: that what we have just watched is the inebriated fantasy of a wasted war vet, trying to make sense of the zeitgeist while dancing with his friends to the music of his times. Abilene’s reveal does privilege the Taveners’ dual role, which solidifies into something like a moral center for the film and highlights what is, for me, its greatest, unlikeliest performance from Stifler himself, Seann William Scott. The dude-iest of actors from American Pie , Road Trip and other infinitely more superficial, bro-centric comedies, Scott realizes a stoic gravity never seen before or since, though his subsequent career including the Goon films has shown a flickering ambition you might have been forgiven for thinking he’d never aspire to. Southland Tales is never more serious, anchored or searching than in its scenes with Scott, who also works unusually well with himself. The achievement of Southland Tales is undeniable and the experience of watching either version is truly incomparable. I could conjecture more and, trust me, so could you. Before I do, I have three graphic novels to obsessively consume first. James Keepnews James Keepnews’ writing has appeared in Chronogram , Pacific Sun Magazin e, New Haven Advocate and other publications. His previous piece for Story Screen Beacon was “Archives and Morals: Jean-Luc Godard and the Boundless Provocations of The Image Book”

Robby chats with Bernadette Gorman-White all about the big A24 awards darling that is sweeping the nation: Lee Isaac Chung's Minari . It is a good film, so obviously the takes are also very good to listen to. So.... Listen on....

Throughout his career, Steven Spielberg has created some of the most popular films of all time, garnering him an enormous amount of respect on both the critical and financial scale. He is considered by many to be the most famous director of all time, given his track record as both director and producer of some of the most recognizable films from the past 50 years. Movie Daddy is a series by Story Screen Editor-in-chief, Mike Burdge, which aims to cover the Beard's directorial filmography in an attempt to present just why Steven Spielberg is very much that hot fire when it comes to being an American filmmaker. In this installment, we're taking a look at Spielberg's first theatrically released feature film, The Sugarland Express. ==================== After the widely agreed upon success of 1971's Duel , it appeared movies about cars were going to be something Steven Spielberg was going to have to shake. But not right away. After jumping ship from the development of the Burt Reynolds led flick, White Lightning , Spielberg started working on an adaptation of the events that took place in 1969, wherein a couple kidnapped a police officer and forced him to take them cross-country to visit the children of the female captor. The events sparked a popular (albeit short-lived) following throughout the media, branded as a new American folktale in the making. While the story was prime for a feature retelling, Spielberg chose to take advantage of the multiple angles of perception involved with the events, creating a mish-mash of other popular road movies of the time, such as Bonnie and Clyde and Badlands . With his new found power as the youngest director to be signed to a major studio deal, Spielberg wasted no time utilizing every trick he was still writing down in his book. The film was The Sugarland Express , released in 1974, and it follows fairly accurately to the real life events that inspired it (with a few dramatic flourishes here and there). Probably the biggest alteration in events would be the entire opening act: consisting of Goldie Hawn's Lou Jean, breaking out William Atheron's Clovis, from jail. The real life “Clovis” had been released one month before the actual kidnapping that sparks the rest of the story. The couple get in over their heads fairly quickly, taking a state trooper and his patrol car, hostage on a 150+ mile ride to Sugarland to reclaim their now adopted child. From there, things pretty much play out as you would expect, with the best parts of the flick really shining through when Spielberg is forced to create character development and story exposition, all the while, (for the most part) confined to the front and backseat of a car. Luckily, Duel gave him all of the techniques he might need to stage such a show, but Duel was missing one very important thing that is the entirety of Sugarland's success as a story: characters talking to each other. It should be noted that Panavision's Panaflex camera was brand new to the market, and it was a revolution in filmmaking due to its low noise operation, meaning all of the dialogue captured in a cramped car of three people, plus a huge camera and an operator or two, could all be used in the final edit, with looping only coming into play for purely editorial means. This, in tandem with some of Spielly's signature long take stunners, lends an unaffordable level of realism to the events, another staple of most of the director's works. This would become the norm on how all feature films would be made from then on. But before treading any deeper into Spielberg's choice of techniques or themes, let's address the elephant in the room: “The movie Steven Spielberg made before Jaws with Goldie Hawn? But is it any good, Michael!?” you scream! To which I confidently reply: yes, it's actually a phenomenally entertaining piece of 70’s counterculture cinema, and don't call me Michael. Spielberg is ALWAYS nothing if not entertaining, and that's the thing that really jettisons most of his projects into becoming cultural milestones. His movies aren't just extremely well-made - presenting a clear communication of empathy both completely and expertly - they're also just a lot of fun to just watch. In her review of The Sugarland Express upon its release, the great Pauline Kael pointed out a few of the derivative aspects of the debut, but confirmed that, “It has so much eagerness and flash and talent that it just about transforms its scrubby ingredients.” In the same review, this time reflecting on Spielberg himself, Kael wrote: “He could be that rarity among directors – a born entertainer – perhaps the new generations' Howard Hawks. In terms of the pleasure that technical assurance gives an audience, this film is one of the most phenomenal debut films in the history of movies. If there is such a thing as a movie sense - and I think there is (I know fruit vendors and cabdrivers who have it and some movie critics who don't) – Spielberg really has it.” Truly the GOAT (both of 'em). For all of its huge production, Sugarland is an intimidating display of Spielberg's ability as a director with ambitious flair. There is a creative confidence present that, in hindsight, is representative of his future success. That creativity extends, even in this debut, to another one of Spielberg's strongest tools: his choice in collaborators. This marks his first work with legendary composer, John Williams, who would go on to score most of the director’s future films, but it's also his first partnership with cinematographer, Vilmos Zsigmond, who was having a hell of a good time in the early 70’s, lending his eye to such features as McCabe & Mrs. Miller , The Long Goodbye and Deliverance . Zsigmond's eye utilizes the rolling scenery of the film as an ever-shifting landscape of place and time, making some of the shots of cars venturing towards a horizon look as good as any final frame in present day film. After all is said and done in regards to the technique and talent on display, what really makes The Sugarland Express so interesting is the conversation it presents with its three main viewpoints: our “protagonists” are criminals in a car, rationalizing their actions to themselves, and (unsuccessfully) to the police. The police are bound by responsibility to rescue their captured ally, sometimes at whatever cost. And the third: the reaction of both the media and the country interpreting these events, sensationalizing our (respectfully) dumb and unlucky characters into modern folk heroes. While the media's coverage and exaggeration of the events we are witnessing is nothing new, (and unfortunately very topical today more than ever) it is the dilemma of principle between our on-the-run fugitives, and the police captain charged with bringing them in, that is by far the most absorbing. Over the span of the story, we see the character of Captain Harlin Tanner come to understand and empathize with Lou Jean and Clovis, while still feeling worried for the state trooper in their custody. He is also well weighed down by his obligation to rescue his trooper successfully, and just what that might entail to ensure its successful outcome. There is a conflict on the surface of classes, for sure, but it is the underlying moral conflict that really brings this story into full scope. You realize you don't know who you want to win before the credits roll; you just know that you hope everyone can get through this alive, and that sadly, that is not likely to happen, even with the best efforts and good intentions of our main characters. The Sugarland Express is an insane achievement for a directorial debut, even if I really don't consider it Spielberg's true debut. ( Duel was quickly extended to feature length and released theatrically, and it also kicks ass, so that's my hand). But the technicalities of such a feat are trivial when it comes to the artistry that’s on display. Spielberg has movies in his veins. He exhales cinematic magic just as casually and effortlessly as we do carbon dioxide. Lucky for us, that's rarely enough for him, as he continued to push himself in an effort to push the very medium of film into a dozen more new frontiers. Now that he's solidified that he is capable of truly great things, all he needs is the opportunity to work on something really special that he can really dig his teeth into. On the next Movie Daddy, we look at a little feature called Jaws . Mike Burdge Editor-in-chief Founder of and programmer for Story Screen. Lover of stories and pizza in the dark. When he isn't watching movies, you can find him reading things about people watching movies. He currently resides in Poughkeepsie, NY and most assuredly is going through a French Connection phase.

You either know me or you really know me, and if you fall into the latter camp, you’ll already know that I love three things: British humour, a stiff drink, and a good pub quiz. There’s nothing quite better than the weekly ritual of meeting up with your mates to tie one on and best a team of Boomers that thought they had it in the bag. (Yeah, you know the feeling.) Most often, trivia night is the event by which I set my weekly clock, and the battery I use to recharge for the week ahead. My main incentive for pub quiz patronage (besides the companionship and the beer) is the chance to put all that random, seemingly useless knowledge to use week after week. It feels good to get out and stretch the ol’ sea legs and flex some savoir faire, and it feels even better when you’re able to unearth some long-forgotten smarts to dominate in an otherwise foreign category (for me, it’s sports or geography). And even when my team doesn’t win (which happens more often than not), I’m still content knowing that I held my critical thinking skills to the whetstone whilst wetting my whistle. But to whom do I owe this pub quiz pleasure? Legend has it that pub quizzes originated in the 70’s in the south of England thanks to a company called Burns and Porter. The idea was to get people into the pub on lesser frequented nights of the week, and Sharon Burns and Tom Porter had just the ticket. In 1976, their first year in operation, the pair managed 32 different pub quiz teams that participated in three different leagues. Over time, their management extended to over 10,000 different teams participating in any given league once a week. In a competition sponsored by British Telecom PLC, their company was awarded the most efficient business in southern England in 1986, and by 1988 they were sold to Prism Leisure Corporation PLC. But by that point, pub quizzes were here to stay. While a long-beloved mainstay in Brit culture, pub quizzes migrated over to the U.S. in the past two decades, and have now staked their claim in American bar culture as well. While it can be argued that there are anywhere between six and eight surefire signs of an intelligent civilization, it goes without saying that a good pub quiz has finally cracked that list (or maybe it’s a surefire sign of gentrification?)... Regardless, pub quizzes have found their way into our hearts, homes, and multiple outlets of televised media. Whether at home on the couch or at the bar on a stool, documented general trivia has been uniting family and friends for over half a century. America’s very own Jeopardy! premiered in 1964, the Canadian board game Trivial Pursuit was published in 1981, and the UK’s Countdown premiered in 1982. These introductions, among countless others, have only bolstered the human desire to compete against anyone and everyone to show off just what we know. But with that desire to showcase knowledge came its sister desire: mastery of wit. Because with great knowledge comes a great dad joke. Thus, the comedic quiz show was born. Now, I’m not saying that Jimmy Carr birthed the original concept for humorous televised quizzes, but I am saying that he’s damn near perfected it. Jimmy Carr is a British comedian you may or may not be familiar with, but I would love to better introduce you. Born in 1972 in Isleworth, London, England to Irish parents, Jimmy excelled throughout his school career and was on the fast-track to never need to touch silly, old comedy. But in 2000 (at 28 years of age), he left his marketing position at Shell, started doing stand-up, and never looked back. This took place shortly after he had lost his Catholic faith two years prior, so, basically, he just had a lot going on, okay? But stand-up suited him, and it wasn’t long before he was getting television gigs presenting and co-presenting various gameshows. Between 2002 and 2004 he had already been the face of three different programs: E4’s Your Face or Mine? , Channel 4’s Distraction , and BBC One’s Have I Got News for You (as a co-presenter). But the real reason I brought you here today is to tout the wonders and wisdom of Channel 4’s The Big Fat Quiz . I mentioned a bit earlier that I’m a Big Fat Fan of British humour. My mum raised me on Are You Being Served? and Monty Python, and I’m not ashamed to say my sexuality as a young girl was partially awakened by Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery . As I aged, my appreciation for the comedy across the pond grew with the likes of Spaced , Coupling , Look Around You , and countless others. But it wasn’t until around ‘05/’06 when that clip of Old Gregg from The Mighty Boosh started circulating that I began to really sink my claws in. Studying the works of Noel Fielding and Julian Barratt led me further and further down the rabbit hole until I landed at The Big Fat Quiz ’s doorstep. Launched in 2004, The Big Fat Quiz has taken on many forms. Most frequently it is The Big Fat Quiz of the Year filmed at the end of the year, commemorating the events of the past 12 months in quiz format. Hosted by Jimmy, he quizzes three teams of two celebrities each about all manners of news ranging from viral videos to political statements. In the premier episode, the three teams consisted of Simon Pegg and Liza Tarbuck, David Walliams and Rob Brydon, and June Sarpong and Jonathan Ross. They answered questions posed by Jimmy, as well as pre-recorded questions from the likes of Bono (among others), and they even had to identify news stories that were adorably reenacted by schoolchildren who attend Mitchell Brook Primary School. There have been a few additional categories added to the quiz throughout the years, but for the most part, the quiz’s format has remained the same. Every year, the teams answer in varying levels of hilarity, some opting for quiz victory while others choose to answer ridiculously, but everyone has a good time and it’s a right laugh. Since its inception, The Big Fat Quiz has filmed 31 different episodes. The variations include The Big Fat Quiz of : the 80s , the 90s , the 00s , Everything , and the Decade along with two anniversary specials for when Channel 4 turned 25 and when The Big Fat Quiz celebrated its Big Fat 10th birthday. Some of my favorite guests to have graced the Big Fat stage are the aforementioned Noel Fielding and Rob Brydon, Richard Ayoade, Lily Allen, Alan Carr, and David Mitchell, but the list goes on and on. The various teams occasionally choose quiz team names, and when you witness Noel Fielding and Russell Brand team up as “The Goth Detectives,” you’ll wish you had been there. But what’ll keep you coming back for more, year after year, is Jimmy Carr himself and his infectious laughter . Now, back in my day, I had to download most of The Big Fat Quiz episodes through LimeWire and run the risk of giving my laptop an STD, but luckily most of the episodes can now be found on YouTube . Watching The Big Fat Quiz at the end of the year is like receiving a Christmas gift directly from Jimmy himself, so imagine my sheer joy when I discovered another quiz a few weeks ago: The Little Tiny Quiz of the Lockdown . Grab your pencils and round up your household, yes, Jimmy Carr has written five weeks of questions for your quarantined pleasure. He’s got a little bit of quiz for everyone, and while it is geared towards a British audience (write what you know and all that), partaking in the Little Tiny Quiz each day has helped guide my routine closer to a sense of normalcy during this period of isolation. Obviously, the historical landmark that is the COVID-19 lockdown will be somberly remembered, but at the very least it helped deepen my appreciation for one Jimmy Carr. And not only has quizzing with Jimmy each day been an absolute treat, but it’s led me even further past The Big Fat Quiz ’s doorstep in that long-forgotten rabbit hole. Upon discovering The Tiny Little Quiz of the Lockdown , I’ve stepped into a plethora of Jimmy Carr’s backlog, including his 2018 Netflix show, The Fix . The premise of the ten-episode run of The Fix is to tackle a global issue each episode, and to come up with two competing solutions that are then voted on by the studio audience. Each episode features four comedians separated into two teams of two (always led by team leaders D.L. Hughley and Katherine Ryan), and the varying issues they attempt to fix include social media, gentrification, and global warming. Believe you me when I tell you this show is a hoot and a half. And what better time to watch a show about a global fix than during a global pandemic when we need one? Ultimately, the fact of the matter is this: I know that I know nothing (I just came up with that, you can have that). Participating in pub quizzes, public debate, and general discourse is all good and well but only when you’re open to learning. Thanks to Jimmy, I’ve learned A LOT. The most valuable lesson in watching Jimmy’s various programming is realizing that you learn the most when you stop taking yourself so seriously. It’s a prevalent problem in our society that we’re groomed to not admit ignorance. We’re encouraged to know it all, and when we don’t have the answer, we’re made to feel small. Don’t get me wrong, it’s good to constantly continue your personal education, but it’s not the end of the world to say, “I don’t know.” Laughter breaks down that fear of not knowing and reminds you that we’re all on the same team, working together towards an answer. To quote another popular panel comedy, the rules are “made up and the points don’t matter.” Comedians like Jimmy Carr help to break down those self-imposed rules. It’s so important to take care of yourself, and I hope you manage to do so as often as you can...but if you need a little fix, I think I’ve got something for ya. And don’t worry, sooner than we realize, I’ll be seeing you again down at the pub. I hope you bring your chalkboard, because you’re about to be schooled. Bernadette Gorman-White Managing Editor Bernadette graduated from DePauw University in 2011 with a Film Studies degree she’s not currently using. She constantly consumes television, film, and all things pop culture and will never be full. She doesn’t tweet much, but give her a follow @BeaGorman and see if that changes.

The camp classic Flash Gordon turns the big 40 this year. Diana DiMuro takes a look at how this beautiful piece of art came together and why it has stood the test of time as an earnest adventure unlike any other. Watch on....