Part Two and the finale of our New Year's Ross-o-lution is here and it's FANTASTIC. Captain Fantastic, that is.
Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's a commune!
In the concluding part of our New Year's Ross-olution, we look at Matt Ross' second feature CAPTAIN FANTASTIC. A story about a family of self-sufficient survivalists who live in the woods of Washington but take a road trip to attend their mother's funeral. As you might expect the journey is shenanigan's galore and we find, they learn a few lessons along the way.
It's a solid follow-up to 28 HOTEL ROOMS with a genuine message and some 'interesting' ideas. Why is it called CAPTAIN FANTASTIC you might be asking? Well, you find out here but it's probably not what you were expecting.
Laura: Hello there. Welcome to On the BiTTE the podcast that uncovers full frontal male nudity in cinema. My name is Laura. I'm just really excited about the second part of our New Year's raw Solution. Uh, my co host, Ryan.
Ryan: Okay. Yes. Thank you for introducing me. Um, yeah, uh, Matt Ross has made an interesting film.
Laura: Oh, interesting? How dare you say that word? How dare you? The interesting film we're talking about today is the 2016 comedy drama Captain Fantastic.
Ryan: Right. Okay.
Laura: This is our second Viggo
Ryan: This will be our second Viggo
Laura: Yay.
Ryan: Yes.
Laura: Okay, well, here whatever the synopsis of this film from Letterboxed is, a father living in the forests of the Pacific Northwest with his six young kids tries to assimilate them back into society.
Ryan: He tries to assimilate them back into society.
Laura: I certainly don't think he does at all.
Ryan: I think he finds himself in a bit of a bind, and he starts to realize that he's on the other extreme end of the societal spectrum. That's what I feel like. I feel like he came to a realization that moderation was, uh, the optimal course of action.
Laura: I think that is the key. That probably is the key.
Ryan: I think so. I think Matt Ross just remade Little Miss Sunshine, though.
Laura: That's what it's just it's an indie film. You're giving it indie film vibes, which it has.
Ryan: Yes, but Laura, is it verity?
Laura: He seems to think so.
Ryan: He does seem to think it is verite. What is verite, ryan verity is a style of filmmaking that was popularized in the late 1960s, uh, more so within independent cinema. Um, but verity was a documentary style type of filmmaking.
Laura: Handheld, perhaps.
Ryan: Ah. I think it's a little bit deeper than that and it's a little bit more complicated.
Laura: Is that a part of it, though?
Ryan: Well, it's like, how do you capture action that happens off the cuff, and usually it requires you to be relatively, quite quick, and that means that you don't really have a camera on the sticks. Um, so I would say, yes, the handheld camera does help to make something feel more verity. But, I mean, I would point out films, uh, like Salesman or even Shadows, uh, the John Casavetti's movie, or probably more famously, is The Battle of Algiers as well, I would say, is like classic cinema verite.
Laura: Is it gonzo filmmaking?
Ryan: Uh, I don't know.
Laura: Okay.
Ryan: I don't think I'm the one to start that particular. We were trying to make this episode short.
Laura: Uh oh, right. Okay.
Laura: So the tagline for this film is, he prepared them for everything except the outside world. There you go.
Ryan: Not bad.
Laura: Yeah, that's better than the synopsis, because that does not make sense.
Ryan: I would prefer if the tagline bear more to the actual trials and tribulations of these children. I don't feel like these kids really kind of suffer at the hands of how they've been developed as much as I think they probably should have basis on that tagline and the basis of the telling of this story in particular.
Laura: I actually agree, because there are moments when you're watching this film, and if we can kind of wrap it up, maybe more succinctly than that synopsis did, but, uh, it was a father and a mother living in the woods in the Pacific Northwest with their kids and just kind of raising them on the land, teaching them how to hunt, how to climb, how to fend for themselves, how to set bones that have broken.
Ryan: Yeah. Like survivalist.
Laura: Survivalist self sufficient, for sure. And what happens is the mother, she kills herself because she was sick. So he's kind of trying to figure out what to do now with his kids and family gets involved in all this lady DA. But there are M moments where they get into these situations and, um, I'm thinking that the kids are going to freak out more than they do. They're introduced to video games that they've never seen before and uh, airplanes, things like that. And I imagine they've only read about these well, not even everything in books.
Ryan: Yeah.
Laura: Freak out.
Ryan: Yeah. You would I kind of feel like they take the actual realization of what they've seen relatively quite calmly, but I wouldn't really kind of delve too deep into that anyway. Just purely off of the fact that, uh, I feel like they've been taught with such a level they've been taught a level of reverence, and they've certainly been taught a level of composure that I don't think kids not taught the way that he's taught these children, um, would probably have.
Laura: They're very well rounded, very clever.
Ryan: Yeah. But the only thing I would kind of say is that the thing that they're not really prepared for is just modern society in general. And that is just in terms of just being social beings, which is what human beings effectively are, is that they thrive on being social and being around people and interacting. And whether that be with your single senses, as it were, um, they're ill equipped to just deal with people who for the most part, have been taught the conventional way or the way that society has kind of directed them in the direction to be learned, I suppose.
Laura: Absolutely. But it's also utilized in the film as comic relief.
Ryan: Yeah.
Laura: It's never used as a learning moment, necessarily. It's more just we think it's funny or people interacting with the family think it's amusing that, uh, they don't know what Adidas are or yeah. Uh, because that's not important to I don't know. It's really not important to anything.
Ryan: I mean, to be fair, I think the fact that those moments that happen in the movie are not held in any sort of dramatic way other than, let's just make a joke of how these poor children have been. Brought up, I kind of feel like is a little bit of a disservice to just, I guess that I suppose, the quality of their learning. They're incredibly knowledgeable that we found out. They are able to spout facts. But unfortunately, that's kind of about, uh, as far as it goes.
Laura: Well, it's only made out to be a joke to the other people in the film, not to the audience. To the audience. We know that they're clever, they're smart, and they're well rounded and they're good human beings to everyone else in the film. Uh, what am I trying to say?
Ryan: They've been abused, I suppose so, yeah. They've been kind of, uh, entrapped without their own choices, basically.
Laura: Oh, let me say, just we already said it's another Viggo film, but Viggo Mortensen stars in this film. Also, Frank Langella. Langella. Oh, dear.
Ryan: I mean, either way, I think Elangela.
Laura: I'm not going to name all of the kids in the film, but Catherine Hahn and Steve Zahr in this movie.
Ryan: Han and Zon.
Laura: Han and Zahn.
Ryan: Han and Zahn.
Laura: Uh, Zon and Hahn. Very happy. Very happy to see them.
Ryan: Yeah. They're always a welcome addition, uh, to any movie. We've spoken about Steve Zahn before.
Laura: Steve Zahn's fake penis is fakey balls.
Ryan: White lotus. Um, yeah, this is a pretty good cast. And I would say, like, obviously, we're not naming all of the children. There's a lot of children. You can look them up um, you can look them up yourself in the cast list. But, yes, they are also incredibly strong, very talented amongst, uh, these relatively quite seasoned actors.
Laura: Um, they hold their own.
Ryan: They do hold their own. They do hold their own. I think the fact that Viggo is there and I think Viggo is, uh, a very kind of calming presence in the film anyway.
Laura: Um, an absolute treasure.
Ryan: Yeah. So I would say that he is helping them an awful lot from ever feeling like they're drowning ah. In a big acting.
Laura: Want it?
Laura: We talked a little bit before or while we were watching the movie about how cool Viggo Mortensen is.
Ryan: Yeah.
Laura: How he would just be such a nice person, I'm sure.
Ryan: I think we've brought up quite a lot of what Viggo is able to do, but it is not outside the realm of possibility that he was just doing things that he probably does normally in real life in this.
Laura: Yeah.
Ryan: You know, like the way he uses knives and just his general demeanor. I'm assuming he's able to do a lot of the things that The Survivalist was able to do in the story.
Laura: He made that garden. Uh, he cultivated that garden in the film just so he could kind of get a feel for the land. The only things he didn't really know how to do were to play bagpipes. So he learned a little bit of how to play bagpipes. And rock climbing was not his thing. He is apparently afraid of heights, or not cool with heights.
Ryan: Oh, see, I'mixing him up with Sean Bean? Because Sean Bean climbed that mountain because he didn't want to get in that helicopter.
Laura: Yes.
Ryan: Yeah.
Laura: That was, uh I was it was weird because they don't talk about how Viggo didn't like heights in Lord of the Rings, so maybe it just didn't come up.
Ryan: Okay, well, either way, he's a very good actor, so he just pretended like he had no issue with there you go, the heights. You see, that's what you do. That's why when we're doing a podcast, I pretend that I, uh, love it. Um what the hell?
Laura: Matt Ross wrote this script back in 2012 and gave it to Lynette Howell Taylor, who is the producer, who also produced 28 hotel rooms. And she produced other things. Like a star is born and the place beyond the pines, blue valentine, things like that. But they waited until Viggo was free to film the movie. So written in 2012, handed off to a producer, and then I think, what's it like four years or so?
Ryan: Well, what was Viggo doing between 2012 and obviously when this film was released in 2016?
Laura: That's an excellent question.
Ryan: Okay. You don't know.
Laura: I don't why are you asking me things I don't know the answers to?
Ryan: I don't know.
Laura: I thought that so many notes and.
Ryan: That I thought that would be the thing. Well, either way, I think it's because he's obviously he's a talented actor, so.
Laura: They book him as typical I will look it up and I'll let you know eventually, during the course of this episode.
Ryan: Okay, perfect.
Laura: Um, the idea of the story came from Matt Ross's own struggle with parenthood. He's got a couple of kids and he was just kind of fiddling with the idea of different ways of how to parent. Obviously, we're living in this world full of technology now, and there's screens in everyone's faces constantly. And luckily, we do not or will not have children. So, no, we don't have to worry about that. But I have thought about that with people who have children. How do you wrestle with reality and technology and just trying to make well rounded human beings? It's terrifying.
Ryan: Just get them an iPad and then yeah, just let siri, I don't know, just make all your decisions for you.
Laura: This is why we have a dog, because I don't have to worry about him.
Ryan: No. Uh, on the Internet, I think parenting now and I think certainly parenting from the early two thousand s on, I think was incredibly rife. Uh uh, with Pratt Falls and, uh, uh, teething issues. I feel like I feel like we were born in I wouldn't say the perfect time, so I don't think there is such a perfect time to be born. Um, but I feel like we grew up before the advent of, say, the Internet. And certainly we grew up before the advent of having mobile phones. Um yes. Which I feel like this technology as much as it is useful, it is such a distraction. And you think about the things and the time that you spend on these devices when really you're like, well, I don't know. Would you read a book?
Laura: I really try. I probably spend an hour collectively on my phone a day, mhm. And then I go to bed and spend about five minutes reading a book. So I've been reading Dune for maybe six months, and I'm about 40 pages in. Uh damn, have I gone through my instagram?
Ryan: Are you getting yourself ready for when part two comes out?
Laura: Hell yeah, m. I want to read some hard Sci-Fi.
Ryan: Yeah, that is definitely some hard Sci-Fi coming right at you. Um, but yeah, um, I do feel like we were born in a pretty decent, decent time, uh, in history, unfortunately.
Laura: I would say that, though, anytime anyone was born, they'd go, that was a good time.
Ryan: Um, because it had I would say now that we're in our do not think we were born in a good time, because certainly, as Elder millennials, as the Internet has told me, we are, um we are also very uh, closely in the caste shadow of the boomer generation who feel like we do not deserve the things that they effectively got for free.
Laura: I just want to buy a house for $20,000. Is that so wrong?
Ryan: Um, well, obviously, yeah, you fucking thief.
Laura: Uh, just so you know, I figured out what Viggo was doing. He was in three films in 2014, so that's probably why he was busy.
Ryan: Okay.
Laura: Two Faces of January Joga and Far From Men. I've only seen Two Faces of January out of that run.
Ryan: Yeah, I don't think I've seen any of those movies.
Laura: That was a good film. I saw that film with my mother at the Enzian Theater in Maitland.
Ryan: Great.
Laura: Just so you know where I was.
Ryan: All right. Okay. Well, uh, that's what we'd refer to as perfect.
Laura: So this film starts off with a straight up murder of a deer, which is fairly unpleasant.
Ryan: Um, yeah, I don't know. It's also not a fantastic scene either, I don't think.
Laura: No, I don't like the title card when it pops up either.
Ryan: I hate it. I absolutely hate it. And I am kind of still wondering, because we have just watched it, why is it called Captain Fantastic?
Laura: Oh, gosh, I never really thought about it.
Ryan: That's the issue I'm having now is I don't know why it's called that. Uh, yeah, well, I thought, well, is it Captain Fantastic? Is he captain fantastic. Is it a reference to, say, one of the many books that are referred to in this movie? Um, but I'm still not 100% sure why it's called Captain Fantastic.
Laura: Mortensen and director Matt Ross see the title as a commentary on Hollywood's obsession with superhero fair. Oh, dear.
Ryan: What? I mean, they're not wrong, but it's also kind of like that's the only reason it's called Captain Fantastic.
Laura: It's a little bit weird because they don't really talk about that in the movie at all. It's not something that comes up as an issue.
Ryan: No. Um, right, okay. Well, then that doesn't instill me with any sense of, uh, I don't know, admiration. Um, that's kind of a weird one. Don't know if I'm a massive fan of that.
Ryan: But anyway, yeah, let's get back into the movie.
Laura: Well, you get a glimpse into their life and kind of the homey aspects.
Ryan: The campfire, it's like a survivalist commune, basically. They've built their own houses.
Laura: Yes.
Ryan: They build everything by hand. And I think I'm assuming the only way he makes money is he makes things that he sells at a local shop, I think.
Laura: Yeah, they make things they sell and they sell their veg and things like that as well.
Ryan: Yeah. Um, but then he stumbles on. I, uh, think they're cutting the deer up and they're like, where's the buoy knife? And, uh, it's been taken by the youngest, the one that wears what looks like a dead cat on the top of their head. Um, yeah, and that's not even a joke. Um, but that child, I don't know if it's a boy or a girl. Not 100% sure. But they take the knife and then he basically walks in on a Texas Chainsaw scene. It's got like, loads of skulls and stuff all kind of made up around the place.
Laura: It's a classic sociopath behavior. And I'm surprised that the hut wasn't covered in human feces.
Ryan: Yes, I'm surprised that the children weren't covered in human feces.
Laura: They're fairly clean. Everyone's very clean.
Ryan: Yeah, they seem very sterile. And I mean, I guess it looks lovely.
Laura: It looks like a lovely time. It looks like a place that you would book on airbnb and hang out in the woods for a while. But the little kid really freaked me out because I just worried about the mental health of that child.
Ryan: Well, the thing is, you do see the children, um, carving on animal bones throughout the course of this film's journey. And I'm assuming it's a survivalist kind of, uh, culture. They will be using every and all resource at their disposal, as they should, to obviously, uh, they respect nature, make tools from, um I don't know, maybe they called the film Captain Fantastic because of his Fantastic Cardigan. Maybe it was not meant to be called Captain Fantastic. Maybe it was fantastic cardigan.
Laura: Cardigan Fantastic.
Ryan: He has a fantastic cardigan.
Laura: Is it already in your shopping cart?
Ryan: Um, online, I think. It's obviously quite expensive. I have one that's very similar, but it's red. But Cardigan Fantastic is yeah, I did quite appreciate that a fair amount.
Laura: I don't know. It looks like a nice time. They're all reading by the campfire. It seems lovely. I doubt that the fire is giving off enough light to actually read since the book is covering the light yeah, but I mean, I'm worried about them having to squint.
Ryan: Yeah. I mean, I don't really care if the kids have to squint.
Laura: It's hard to read when it's dark.
Ryan: I mean, anything, uh, for a fee free education. But I would probably point out they're probably eating a lot of carrots. And as far as I'm aware, carrots make you see in the dark.
Laura: Oh, yeah. Cool.
Ryan: Yeah. So I think that's fine. Super cool. But what you find out he's got them in such a strict regimen of, uh, exercise and reading and he's also teaching them, um, so they're incredibly well read. But from the books that he's obviously giving them and from his own set of political socioeconomic views, he is also indoctrinating them to their effective way of life. Which is what, as I kind of point out earlier on, is that it's on the very far end of the liberalism spectrum. Uh, anti capitalism, very anti capitalist, very, uh, anti Marxist. Um, Noam Chomsky has brought up no less than 450 times.
Laura: Well, they have noam chomsky day.
Ryan: They have noam chomsky day. Chris kringle to them is noam chomsky. And I bet he fucking loves, um, also, you know, the way they talk and the way they kind of interact with people and it's kind of like they even bring up, uh, like trotsky as well. And uh, one of the kids refers to themselves as, uh, Maoist. So certainly they're kind of i, uh, mean, I guess in the classical sense of the word, they are very much queued, uh, into uh, a kind of communist culture which makes sense for how they were.
Laura: Well, obviously, because they don't know anything.
Ryan: Mean, I'm not I'm not saying it as ah, think I think communist it can be a very negative term, certainly in the USA. And certainly socialism is definitely a, uh, negative term. Uh, the idea of wanting, uh, to help anybody else, um, uh, is very much like stabbing someone in the fucking heart. If you ask them if they're going to give you a penny, uh, to help anybody else other than themselves.
Laura: Well, obviously at its core, it's a positive thing. But it's never turned that way.
Ryan: No, because talk about it. Yeah. Well, regardless of it being in the United States, which is obviously where this film is set and certainly in the UK. It is very much capitalism all the way. It is a dog eat dog. It is how much money can you earn? You have to put your foot on the property ladder.
Laura: Well, I do love shopping and money. I'm not going to lie. It's nice.
Ryan: You're just playing into the system, Laura. You're playing into the system.
Laura: Capitalist.
Ryan: Oh, Jesus, we need to go live in the woods. But I mean, it's not like the thing is I don't know. I mean, I think of socialism, I think of communism, I think of Star Trek. You know what I mean?
Ryan: I think about Star Trek created an idyllic world where there was no currency, everyone had what they needed, and everyone led a relatively quite placid existence.
Laura: Um, I like that in Star Trek, no one gets a headache because they cured headaches.
Ryan: They did. They cured a whole lot of things. And it's funny.
Laura: Awesome.
Ryan: It's funny how much you can cure when money isn't an issue. But anyway, uh, that's a conversation for another day, I think.
Ryan: I would say that this film begs quite a lot of interesting interesting yes. Interesting ideas.
Laura: Yeah. Well, the movie has to go forward. So what do we do to get these kids out of the woods?
Ryan: We kill their mom.
Laura: Got to kill their mom.
Ryan: Um got to kill their mother.
Laura: How else are we going to get out of these woods?
Ryan: Yeah, it can't just be all bagpipes and buoy knives. The one thing I will say about Captain Fantastic that differs from 28 hotel rooms is there's actually a plot. Like, there's something that drives the film forward at the very least.
Laura: The only reason that we would compare the two is because Matt Ross wrote them both and directed them both. But this is a good movie.
Ryan: Um, yes.
Laura: I'm not to want to say 28 hotel rooms was bad, but if you're going to compare them both, obviously, I.
Ryan: Was going to say this one is better. Yeah, this film is definitely better because it has movie yeah, this film is better. Um, it's good. I don't think it's bad. I think it's better.
Laura: Well, we're going to leave that for the end.
Ryan: We will.
Laura: Come on, now.
Ryan: All right.
Laura: Keep on.
Ryan: Yeah. She slapped me on the wrist like I'm a child or a that's right. Small dog.
Laura: So our cardigan, Fantastic ends up on the phone with his wife's, who's passed her father. And he tells Viggo that if he shows up at the funeral, he will have him arrested, which is the most insane thing you could say.
Ryan: Also doesn't really make much sense.
Laura: Um, it makes no sense. What, are you going to have a restraining order prepped before he even arrives? Uh, like an anticipatory restraining order?
Ryan: Yes, certainly. If your main concern is that he's not only going to crash the funeral, but he's going to potentially enact the actual needs and wants of the deceased from their last will and testament.
Laura: Yeah. Her will says that she wants to be cremated and flushed down a toilet, and instead they are having a funeral at a church. They are not having her cremated, and they're going to put her in the ground, which is the opposite of what she wants, which I think is really unfair for the family not to discuss her will with her husband.
Ryan: I also feel like they are what.
Laura: They think about him and their lifestyle. I think that's so there's a legal.
Ryan: Obligation that they would have had, I agree, to uphold when, uh, dealing with, uh, her final wishes. But I guess it's kind of the family's on the precipice of they've been excluded from this particular family's life for effectively, the time in which they've had quite a lot of these children. And certainly the younger ones they've also had, who have never met any other members of their family and have totally grown up in this secluded, uh, uh, commune that they've set up in Washington, when certainly everybody else seems to be located, uh, in, uh, New Mexico.
Laura: It's been about ten years.
Ryan: I would feel as if the family would be incredibly bitter, and they would also want to, uh, hurt him in any way, shape or form that they could in order to because they blame him effectively for the deterioration of, uh, their daughter's mental health. Effectively.
Laura: Right.
Ryan: Because all she's done effectively in the woods is, uh, spit children out. That's effectively what she's done. She might have been having a good time doing it.
Laura: Well, she wrote in a letter that she was having the best time.
Ryan: Yes, but she also spat out six kids. And they also kind of say that part of the issue for her deterioration in her mental health is postpartum depression.
Laura: But that was after the first kid. So that's pretty rough.
Ryan: Here's the thing. They are cut off from society. They do not have access to, say, antidepressants or any of the sort of chemical based, um, psychotropic stuff that would help you, um, when you're feeling that way.
Laura: Well, even if she had access to it, I don't think that with the way that she wanted to live her life that she would have accepted that type of medication.
Ryan: Probably not. And like I say, these people are living very much, uh, on the fringe, um, of, uh, what you would refer to as, say, like, conventional society and conventional societal beliefs in the modern earth, in the modern age. Sorry. So they are very much against any form of modernity, but at this point, they decide, uh, fuck it, we're going to go to the funeral anyway. And I've got a couple of lines. I think Viggo says it, uh, he's very honest with his children.
Laura: I really do like that. I think it's really straightforward, and I think that it's very mature just to speak to them as equals.
Ryan: I knew of a family who lived up the road from where I used to be when I grew up, who were all homeschooled and pretty much kind of lived in the same sort of family that Viggo had, except they did have a house. They were like traveling musicians. So that's kind of how this couple met. But this also because they'd led a, uh, relatively quite secluded existence. I remember the father of that family adopting some relatively quite extreme views and religious views. So there is also that double edged sword.
Laura: Yeah. I have some notes about homeschool kids.
Ryan: Yeah. Sometimes they can be a little bit strange.
Laura: A lot of at least the people that I've met or the kids that I met when I was younger who were homeschooled, it was tied into Christianity quite a bit and tied into religion. So not only were they not kind of up to speed with social skills as the other kids were, I don't know. I don't think it's a terrible thing at all. But it's m also tied to Christianity, which made it for kids like me even. It was even weirder. And I went to church as a kid, so, uh, I knew church kids. But the homeschooled church kids were on a whole other level.
Ryan: So on that note, though, there is a moment where a police officer ends up on the bus.
Laura: Yes.
Ryan: And he's asking about a taillight, but he's also asking, why are the kids not in school? When obviously it's in the middle of the day. And they put on the facade that they are obviously a traveling group of missionaries. Let's just throw it that way. And they start singing at him and they create a holy circle around him. And for whatever reason, I thought this whole part was genius because unfortunately, this would not be uncommon. But having obviously views of, uh, I don't know, a Buddhist nature would potentially be, uh, relatively quite alarming, uh, to law enforcement.
Laura: I really liked that part. I thought it was very funny. I think it was just before this moment where the cop pulls the bus over is where the kids were kind of pointing out people who were overweight and making fun of them. And Viggo says that we don't make fun of people. And then one of the kids says, Except Christian.
Ryan: Yeah.
Laura: And immediately after that, they all pretend to be Christian and sing a hymn to this cop and scare the shit out of him. And he's like, just forget it.
Ryan: Yes. There is a fantastic moment just as they're setting off on this adventure where they play Scotland the Brave, uh, in the bus, which obviously got me teared up until, obviously, the guitars started sounding off and it ended up being this horrible bastardized rock version of Scotland the Brave, uh, and immediately got a half star knocked off just for that.
Laura: Ouch.
Ryan: Yeah.
Laura: Ouch.
Ryan: Poor choice. Music Supervisor.
Laura: There'S great moments in this road trip section of the know when they go to the grocery store and Viggo pretends to have a heart attack so that all the kids can steal all the food. Operation Free the Food.
Ryan: Well, this is also the only reason they do this is purely on the basis that one of the kids was unable to execute a sheep that was just in a field.
Laura: Correct.
Ryan: She had a born arrow drawn. She was going to shoot it, but for reasons of whatever, she obviously doesn't want to kill the sheep. Um, she decides not to do it. But at which point, I think we. Were also kind of at that point in the movie, being like, you can't kill that sheep anyway. That's thievery that sheep is owned by someone.
Laura: You've already broken one law by trespassing on a farmer's land.
Ryan: Yes.
Laura: And secondly, you're going to murder one of his sheep.
Ryan: Yes. You're putting yourself in a sticky situation.
Laura: But it's okay because skirt the law the whole time, obviously, they are skirting or not skirt the law, but they're breaking the law and trying to get away with it over and over and over again, because the man yeah, you're.
Ryan: Trying to get over on the man.
Laura: Fair enough.
Ryan: Yeah. It's fine. It's a dicey way to live your life.
Laura: Um, well, they don't typically do that. They're just on a little road trip.
Ryan: They are.
Laura: It, um, makes me wonder if he actually did have money and could pay for the food, or if he's just in that mindset where.
Ryan: He'S a turbulent force in these children's lives to the point where you do kind of have to question whether his decisions are the best course of action. I think that's the struggle. Yeah, that's what I mean. I think that's a deliberate action on the part of the filmmakers anyway, um, because obviously ah, it is a redeeming character arc uh uh, that will be seen to the end when we get to, obviously, the rightful conclusion of this movie.
Laura: But we do get to hang out with Han and Zahn on this road trip. And it is quite a treat. It is a treat. So you get to see the difference between how Vigo's raised his kids versus how she's raising the kids in this kind, know, regular, uh, what we're used to going to school and having video games and all that nonsense.
Ryan: So yeah, they're brought up in the society of modernity.
Laura: I love when they've got wine at the dinner table. They ask Viggo do you want some wine? He goes, yes. And then the youngest goes, May I have some wine? He goes, oh, yeah, absolutely. And Han and Zan are just horrified by this. And I love, uh goes, well, you know, kids in Italy and France grow up drinking small amounts of wine. I don't understand what the problem is.
Ryan: Yeah, that's not a problem.
Laura: And I kind of agree with him.
Ryan: Yeah. Um, to a point.
Laura: I don't have kids. I don't care. I can do whatever I want. I can give kids whiskey. I don't know if I should tell this. I knew someone who had a child, and when they were teething, he was so worried about it's. Like that old trick, you put a little tiny bit of whiskey on your finger and rub it on the kid's gums. Um, and it kind of dulls the pain and it calms them down or whatnot. And it's just literally a little bit of whiskey on your finger. You're not giving him a shot. He was so horrified that for whatever reason the cops would show up and then take the kid from him because he put a little bit of whiskey on the kid's gums. I go, you know what? We're going too far in the other direction.
Ryan: It's like an old wives it's an old wives thing.
Laura: It's an old wives trick.
Ryan: Yeah. No, we do shut up the kids. Yeah. We do live in an age of political correctness, which I feel like, uh, everyone's, um, scared. Everyone is terrified of everything.
Laura: I'm not going to say what I would do because I'm not having children, but I'm just know calm down. Calm down, everyone.
Ryan: What's, it a child or just in general?
Laura: Everybody. So you're dealing at this dinner table with Han and Zan and Viggo and the kids. And we're kind of in this whole situation dealing with book smarts versus social skills.
Ryan: Yes.
Laura: And this is what Han and Zan are having problems with, understanding their lifestyle.
Ryan: Yeah. The thing is, there's a big obvious thing here where it's like they're all very incredibly well read. They're all incredibly knowledgeable. They can recite things. They can say this, that, and the other thing. But you put them into a situation where they have to converse. That's really all that they have. There's no sense of a sense of being relatable to somebody else, which is something that I think is very important that you do learn at school, which is you have to deal with other people and other people's personalities. And, uh, it's just a way of navigating through what is effectively a mirror of what will be adult life and working life, where you're having to navigate personalities and different people.
Laura: I do wish that that dinner conversation had maybe expanded a bit more because I think that was the most interesting part of the film in a way. You do have these different kind of cultures essentially mixing together. I wanted the parents, Haninson, to talk to the kids more and ask them questions. I wanted the kids to ask them questions instead of it being, oh, they don't know, killing each other over Nikes because they were doing crack and oh, Nike the God whatever. And the kids like, are you serious? Why can't you have a discourse over that? Because they've kind of grown up in if they have a disagreement, if they don't understand something, the family, they talk about it. And it's a very open kind of diplomatic way of doing things, which I think is refreshing and nice. But they never really got to hash that out in any of the actual scenes with other people. They're kind of silent the whole time.
Ryan: The minute they do because, uh, uh, Zan and Han, their relationship, they seem relatively quite moderate. They're like straight down the middle, middle, uh, class, uh, Americans. They're two kids. They probably have pets. They're relatively quite set in their ways. And to them, obviously, it feels a little too black and white when they start having these conversations. It's too much of Vigo's in this camp. They're in this other camp and there's no gray area in between.
Laura: The only person that would be gray about the whole thing would be Viggo
Ryan: Yeah. Because he's also dropping a lot of terms and colloquialisms that his kids have absolutely zero idea of what they are. So if he's saying something like Nikes, the kids don't know what the Nikes are. And then obviously the kids are there and they're able to use that to needle the children who the woodland children as opposed to the suburban babies who are just like, what do you mean you don't know what they are? So he's already kind of opening the door to, I guess, a small level of ridicule. But then he also is very apparently aware that he can just get his kids at the drop of a dime to outsmart these suburban kids because of their I guess the thing is they don't have a lack of knowledge. They're trained and they're taught in a public school system. And if anyone was to come up to me and be like, well, what's the Bill of Rights? I'd be like, I don't fucking know.
Laura: I know I had to look it, uh, up.
Ryan: And at the end of the day, I don't think anyone is genuinely expected to know or give that out at a moment's notice either. It's the same as kind of like if someone came up to me and was like, tell me about what Pythagoras is. I couldn't fucking tell you the theorem. Okay, well, it is called Pythagoras theorem, Laura. I'm not going to ask you. You're fucking worse at math than me.
Laura: Isn't it a squared plus B squared equals C squared or something?
Ryan: Why are you asking me? I told you, I don't know.
Laura: They go on their merry way, they get back in the bus and they're going to continue on the journey to the funeral of the wife and mother.
Ryan: But I would say that also on the steps of this journey. And I think the most important thing that comes out of them meeting, uh, Han and Zan is that Han and Zan are fairly apparently aware that what they feel like he's doing to these children is.
Laura: Yeah, yeah. I don't know. I just think they're confused by the whole thing.
Ryan: They feel like he's doing them a disservice.
Laura: Everyone seems to think that they're abused.
Ryan: Which is I mean, aren't we all, potentially.
Laura: We see Papa Viggo come out of the camper with a nice cup of tea or coffee, we never get to know. And this man is completely naked.
Ryan: He is. He is. And not only that, he is stumbling out when these couple of old these old, uh, I guess they like going out in their camper. They've saved up all their lives for this camper.
Laura: That's what my grandparents did. So it's basically like Viggo comes out of the van. My grandparents walk by.
Ryan: Yeah. Naked Viggo he's got his American flag hat on. She's got her Levi jeans, like, basically all the way up to her navel, and she looks a little bit like a, uh, Michelin Mann Roly poly with her Texan baby blue shirt on. And they see Rabid Viggo just step outside, completely in the nutty.
Laura: In all his glory.
Ryan: In all his glory. Just standing at the door of the Steve bus.
Laura: Oh, yeah, the bus's name is Steve. We haven't dropped that before.
Ryan: Well, the thing is that he doesn't bring it up until much, much later because they always shout, we've got to run to Steve, and it's the bus.
Laura: Get in the yeah. He's standing there completely nude, very relaxed, incredibly casual. And you can tell that this character, this father, does this all the time.
Ryan: Yes.
Laura: It's just a part of their life.
Ryan: Yes.
Laura: When did I bring that up? Was it the last podcast?
Ryan: Literally the last podcast.
Laura: Okay, well, good. You guys remember that story I told about I had an ex whose dad was just naked at home? I should have saved it for this.
Ryan: One, but you probably should have you ruined it.
Laura: Um, yeah, but yeah, I mean, that happens in households, and it happens in cardigan. Fantastic. So he's standing there, and the older folks walk by, and he says, it's just a penis.
Ryan: Yeah. Huh.
Laura: Every man on this Earth has one.
Ryan: Yeah.
Laura: And it's great.
Ryan: I mean, to be fair, that old man's probably not seen it or used it in a while.
Laura: That's a shame.
Ryan: Not really.
Laura: Okay, well, it's just there. It's super casual. You know, I love a casual penis. It's just there doing its thing.
Laura: So Viggo and Matt Ross had a discussion about the know. Viggo read it in the script. This man has done it before time and time again. But this is a low budget film. They didn't have a ton of time. You're also working with a lot of young actors, first time actors. You're outside, you're handheld. You're kind of just running around, and time is probably quite tight. So Viggo wanted to make sure that it was worth doing, that it drove the story forward, that it made sense for the character, that it wouldn't be distracting. And obviously, they both decided it was important to the story. It worked in the script, worked on the screen. So they went ahead and did it.
Ryan: Okay.
Laura: Um, there was an interview that I read with, uh, an online magazine called The Shelf, which made me laugh. I don't know. The Shelf didn't made me laugh, but the interview question did.
Ryan: He goes the shelf.
Laura: The interviewer goes, you were rocking a much friendlier penis than in Eastern Promises. That was an angry penis. And Viggo goes no in Eastern Promises. It was a frightened penis. I love Viggo
Ryan: That's really funny.
Laura: Viggo forever.
Ryan: Yeah. Uh, to be fair, in Eastern Promises, if you've not seen that movie or the scene that we're talking about, you can go back a few episodes because we definitely covered it.
Laura: That was a Christmas episode.
Ryan: That was a Christmas episode. Yeah.
Laura: That is a top five full frontal scene of all full frontal scenes.
Ryan: Well, it is a naked fight. Anyway.
Laura: Um, I would be a frightened penis.
Ryan: I would be very frightened too, if not a frightened penis. And also very shriveled one from all of the fear. It would probably then creep itself back inside of me.
Laura: Yeah. Never to be seen again.
Ryan: Never to be seen again. Yes. That's very true. I mean, there's a lot of it to go inside of me. I wouldn't obviously want that to happen.
Laura: Anyway.
Ryan: It would be a bit painful and it would have to go into my stomach. And anyway, um but no, they're at the trailer park. Um, and Vigo's, uh, the elder son the elder son who has become the man from slaying the deer beast at the beginning of the movie ends, uh, up meeting a girl.
Laura: Who is this girl? She's so familiar to me.
Ryan: Well, if anyone who's familiar with The Boys, what you also get is a nice version of trailer trash Starlight.
Laura: Oh, yeah.
Ryan: Ah. Uh, whoever plays Starlight in The Boys, she's in this movie. And guess who her mum is? Who the my name is Earl girl.
Laura: She's very familiar to me.
Ryan: Yes. She's in a bunch of other stuff other than those. I just thought that those were at least, uh, funny. Um yeah. As you might expect, um, she finds this young man very attractive and he's not particularly worldly. And I guess they have a little bit of a romantic entanglement. And uh, his response is to, uh, very poetically, very novelistically, very much in the art of old prose. Uh, decides to uh, ask her for a hand in marriage after just one kiss. After just one steamy kiss.
Laura: Erin Moriarty is her name. And her mother, Missy Pyle.
Ryan: Yeah. Missy Pyle.
Laura: Missy Pyle.
Ryan: Missy Pyle. She is in, uh yeah, she's been around. So, yeah, they do eventually get to the funeral.
Laura: Here's an issue. You want to hear my issue?
Ryan: Yes.
Laura: They arrive at the church the night before the funeral and still end up being late. The funeral already started. You would imagine they would have been the first person in the door. But you have to make an entrance. Right. I would have thought they would have been sitting in the front row waiting for everyone to arrive.
Ryan: As common sense is my middle name, I would also say that I think the funeral would have to be in the middle of it already happening in order for them to crash it to any level of degree. Because if they're already there by the time that they're there for the funeral about to start, they wouldn't have started the funeral if they were there.
Laura: I know it's a movie.
Ryan: It's a movie thing, but it's also annoying. It's not a very verity thing, though, is it, Matt? Ouch. Um, but anyway and it's a huge.
Laura: Funeral for a woman who's been living in the woods for ten years. A massive, massive funeral. You would imagine that someone who decided to leave society and leave everything she knew to go into the woods and have a bunch of babies and just live off the land wouldn't have that many friends.
Ryan: It seems a little bit like huge, church huge.
Ryan: Because I think, well, Anne Dowd is there. She plays the mother, and then obviously, Langel is there as the ham, um, fisted, hardened, conservative man.
Laura: If I had a drink every time he rolled his eyes or just disapprovingly shook his head at Viggo I would be hammered right now.
Ryan: There'd be alcohol poisoning, being told he's.
Laura: Only in the movie for maybe five minutes total.
Ryan: Yeah, he's not in it for particularly long, but I would say there's nice little flourishes with Anne Dowd's character and that she's a little bit more of a balance, which is what I kind of feel like, uh, zan. And Han are kind of meant to be is kind of like a nice, moderate balance because obviously you need Frank Langella to be that conservative to really face off against Viggo uh, which is for the most part it's very kind of conventional kind of movie storytelling trophy sort of stuff. I mean, this is just kind of how the stories are moved forward. You need a bit of conflict. I'm going to take your kids, take his kids. But I think because stuff happens, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, there has to be some level of agreement. Uh, I guess just this situation in general, there's some very kind of practical ideas being thrown out there to Viggo where it's like, you need to kind of let the kids, uh, out of this bubble so that they can appropriately develop for the rest of the world. Yes, it would be lovely and idyllic and grand if the kids could do nothing but just live in the woods the rest of their lives. But there's all these little kind of, um, little narrative hints the elder kids being accepted into five Ivy League universities, uh, which he's going to have to go to. He has to integrate into the modern world in order for the teachings of Viggo as the father to really be put into practice. And he's obviously taught the kid quite well, who's obviously quite smart, and he's been able to appear smart enough and intelligent enough to go to these Ivy League schools without having obviously gone through the public education system.
Laura: Pretty good essay, I would imagine he.
Ryan: Must have done a fantastic essay. But let's be fair here is that Viggo does have to come to the realization that he needs to let the kids understand the other side of the coin.
Laura: Effectively, that's fine. I do have the problem with the way that they've been raised and we've been seen how they interact with each other, where they have kind of diplomatic conversations about why, and if you have a disagreement, then state your case and we will all discuss it. When they have this conversation, it's a one sided conversation where Viggo goes, you gotta stay here with your grandparents. I'm not gonna be able to do this. You guys need to get into society, et cetera. But that bothered me because they've always had that kind of, uh, back and forth. So why all of a sudden, is it just you're making a decision? It goes against you as a character. He does kind of like a John Lithgow, Harry and the Hendersons type of thing, where he's like, get out of here. Go on and get into the woods. Harry's crying.
Ryan: It's a little ham fisted. I feel like there's a lot of very difficult decisions that are made that he doesn't seemingly think through before he makes them.
Laura: He's dropping his kids off to essentially the enemy. And was he going to fuck off back to the woods? Why wouldn't he would he stay nearby?
Ryan: No.
Laura: I don't understand. He just takes their clothes and just.
Ryan: Like, it gets a little messy at this point. So they're cutting the kids hair. He's also, like, shaving after he leaves. He's obviously distraught that he's leaving them. And obviously, as much as I'm saying, oh, this is kind of, like, hinted in the narrative, it's incredibly ham fisted by the end of the movie.
Laura: It does kind of roll a bit fast towards the end.
Ryan: Rolls way too fast. Yeah.
Laura: So, uh, I was annoyed with the whole thing where Vigo's like, I'm leaving, but then, oh, what surprise, all of the children are in the bus hiding.
Ryan: Kind of felt a little bit pointless.
Laura: Uh, yeah, it is. But then, in an incredible display, they grave rob their own mom's grave.
Ryan: Yes.
Laura: This is I kind of like it, but it's insane.
Ryan: I like it because it is insane. You wouldn't be able to get away with this in real life.
Laura: No.
Ryan: And certainly the idea that they just kind of take this body, they burn it, and then unceremoniously, as per the woman's wishes we're not going to going to disclaim that. But they do flush her ashes down the toilet.
Laura: It was in her will. But I do have to say that bones don't burn like that. So they would have had to have crushed those bones up in order to be able to flush them down a toilet.
Ryan: Yes. And anyone, um, who's ever worked in a crematorium will know.
Laura: I mean, that would have been a really fun family activity, right? Crushing up the bones of your mother?
Ryan: I, um, mean, certainly for the youngest one, who's been handling animal skulls for most of their young life.
Laura: Sure he kept one.
Ryan: I'm pretty sure he did. Keep one. He was the one wearing the dead fucking cat on its head.
Laura: They also all stand together and sing Sweet Child of Mine, which apparently was their mother's favorite song.
Ryan: Yeah. This is also where I knocked another half star off the overall score.
Laura: Do you know this is the second film that Catherine Hahn has been in where a family sings Sweet Child of Mine in an acapella fashion? Do you remember what the other one was, Ben?
Ryan: No, it's not the one I'm thinking of because the one I was thinking of had Paul Rudd in it and his wife was, like, being propositioned by the, uh they were also in a kind of hippie commune.
Laura: Oh, wanderlust. No, it's.
Ryan: Uh right. Oh, yeah. Because she's, like, desperate to fuck John C. Reilly in that. Yeah. I mean, she gets her wish in that. Um, yeah. Okay.
Laura: And I do want to point out that there are zero repercussions for grave robbing. It is totally fine. Nothing happens. Uh, no one ever talks about it. And the family langella no one comes back to do anything about it.
Ryan: No one learned anything from the antics of Birkenhair, it seems. No one learned a single thing. Just stick a microchip in those bodies and then you can track them all the way back to Washington State, where they were obviously hiding out. It's such a wild thing, but it's also within the realms of this movie. It's fine because it's not very verite.
Laura: This movie had probably more endings than Return to the King. I did want to point that out. Really feel that way. I feel like the movie ended several times.
Ryan: The film's also a little too long for as quick as it hastens towards the end. I do feel like there's kind of some fluff in it where it could have just been excised just a little bit and it could have been trimmed down a bit. But, uh, yeah, I don't think it's as pronounced as Return of the King.
Laura: But there were moments where I go, oh, it's over. And then they did more. It's over when they're burning the mom's body. No. They have to then go to the airport and drop off the son who goes away, um, to travel. And then it again ends when it actually ends when they all have a house and they're living in a house and kind of that middle ground between society and living off the grid.
Ryan: Yes. Well, it's like they're taking what they've learned and I don't know, they're becoming more moderate. I guess they're trying to find a balance, which is effectively what all of us are trying to do, is you're trying to find a balance between and I guess I hate feeling like lives are politically motivated and people get off on a sense of, uh, conflicting with others based on purely kind of political beliefs and stuff like that. But at least, though, they're trying better to integrate themselves into modern society.
Laura: So they did learn something after all.
Ryan: They did. Which is why this film is still good and not bad, is because at least this ending, it makes a little bit of sense. And you know what puts a little bit of a smile on your face, you feel like it's actually ended the right way, effectively.
Laura: Also, Vega's wearing an incredible tank top with this, uh, overalls combo. Five stars.
Ryan: He does look like a little bit like Worzle Grummage. I mean, I'm not going to lie. He looks like a relatively quite tidy scarecrow. So there is that. But I would say, yeah, I was waiting because the way he's wearing those dungarees and stuff like that, he looks a little bit like, um, a chavi chucky.
Laura: Um, I love the look. I love the look.
Ryan: Yeah, you do like that look. Just in general. But I would also kind of point out that he looks like he's about to pull out a washboard and stuff like that. He's got that look. He looks like he's about to go fishing on the river.
Laura: He probably is.
Ryan: Yeah. I mean, that's probably not a lie.
Laura: So, uh, Viggo was the first choice for the lead in this film. Um, Matt Ross said that he wanted someone that was like Harrison Ford in his 30s, is what he said. He wants someone that's strong but vulnerable. Viggo is his only choice.
Ryan: He might as well have just said, uh, I just want someone that looks like Harrison Ford. Behaves like Harrison Ford, but isn't as difficult as Harrison Ford, and not as yes. Yes.
Laura: The Mosquito Coast came up a lot in a lot of the interviews with people kind of comparing this character to Harrison Ford from The Mosquito Coast.
Ryan: That's pretty good. Yeah, I like that comparison. That movie is pretty good. That Peter Weir movie with Harrison Ford. I think that film's pretty solid.
Laura: Did you remember that Viggo Mortensen and Harrison Ford were in witness together?
Ryan: Yeah. Uh, Viggo plays one of the Amish.
Laura: Yeah. He said he was very impressed at how capable of a carpenter Harrison Ford was.
Ryan: Um, yeah, I mean, uh, he was a carpenter before he went into acting, as far as I'm aware.
Laura: Cool.
Ryan: Yeah. So Harrison Ford has definitely done the sort of thing. Thing is also and I'm going to point this out, uh, is that Harrison Ford was already part of the Coppola family fold.
Laura: Yes.
Ryan: Anyway, so there was going to be some kind of level of transition for that man. It just so happens that Harrison Ford is also an excellent actor. He's cool dude, and he's a cool guy who also hates Star Wars as much as do.
Laura: So I just was reminded of a story that my mother told me. So my mom has a sister, her half sister who was living in Vermont. And she said that one day, I don't know, she was out somewhere. But harrison Ford drove her home, like, picked her up and drove her home. And they were up there filming that oh, what's that movie where there's, like, a bathtub? What lies beneath.
Ryan: Yeah. Yeah, I think they were up Michelle Pfeiffer.
Laura: What lies beneath. And he was in town for whatever reason. Wherever she was, he drove her home.
Ryan: Okay.
Laura: So that's my Harrison Ford story.
Ryan: Oh, nice. There you go. Well, see, he's very helpful.
Laura: What a nice guy.
Ryan: Yeah. He didn't ask her about, like, Force Ghosts or anything like that, did he?
Laura: Well, no, that was so long ago.
Ryan: Oh, that's true. Yeah. There wasn't such a thing as a Force Ghost or was there?
Laura: Um, okay, I have a couple more things I want to say. So Lolita is referenced in this film. They talk about the book. Uh, and I do want to point out that Frank Langella is in the 1997 Adrian Lyn adaptation of Lolita. And he gets naked in that film.
Ryan: He does, yeah. That's a lovely little crossover, isn't it?
Laura: Boom, boom, boom. Yeah, all these crossovers.
Ryan: That movie is fucking disgusting.
Laura: It is.
Ryan: Well, the story the story is horrific. But, like, that Adrian Lin version, at least, is incredibly uncomfortable to watch. Um, but we will cover it in due course, eventually. Yes.
Laura: Uh uh okay.
Laura: So what do I have for accolades? So Viggo was nominated for Best Actor at SAG. Critics choice, Golden Globe Academy Awards and the Baftas. Um, at least at the Academy Awards and Baftas. He lost to Casey Affleck in Manchester By the Sea for Best actor.
Ryan: What? What did you mean?
Laura: So Viga was nominated for best Actor in all these different award ceremonies, but Casey Affleck won for his role in Manchester by the Sea.
Ryan: I, uh, will say Manchester by the Sea is pretty good, if you like that sort of thing.
Laura: It's a sad film. I haven't seen it.
Ryan: It's a sad movie. Casey Affleck, love it or hate him, um, he is pretty good in that movie. Um, I saw that film recently. I gave it four and a half.
Laura: Oh, lovely.
Ryan: So I, ah, think that film is pretty good. But again, it's if you're into that sort of thing.
Laura: Okay. Um and Matt Ross won uncertain regard prize for best director at huh?
Ryan: Huh. Well, good for him.
Laura: I think that's all he won because the film nor he as a director was nominated. The Academy Awards.
Ryan: Okay. Well, I mean, the Academy Awards, as we have found, will celebrate people like Jane Campion. So I'm not going to put too much onus on that.
Ryan: What do you want me to rate first?
Laura: Go with the scene.
Ryan: Oh, uh, uh, four stars for visibility and context. Yes. And here's for why I think the scene is fine. Um, contextually, though, um, having it there just to fully realize that he's quite comfortable being naked around his children in the woods, I think is fine. But I. Just don't really care that much. And also he's doing it because he's a very much, uh, a fuck you, fuck the man sort of situation. I think he's deliberately doing it to bug out the people around him.
Laura: Yes.
Ryan: To wig him out a little bit. But I'm kind of just like i, uh, don't know. I just gave it four stars because I think you can see everything. And it's also the context is which I'm like, uh, it's not full stars. I'm kind of like, okay, if that's your reasoning for it, then fine.
Laura: I think for me, I'm going to go with four as well. And it's just because of the way that we're speaking about it now, because I think he is doing it. The character is doing it, like you said, to be shocking to the people in the trailer park. Why was Problematic doing that when they were in the woods? It would have been five stars if he was in the woods where they were at home. And he would have been naked as well. The youngest kid says to him, uh, during that particular scene, clothes on while we're eating.
Ryan: Yeah.
Laura: And I'm like, okay, so obviously this is something that happens all the time, but you didn't show us that until they were out in public. And you know that he has a sense he grew up in society, in the modern world, so he knows that that's obviously not kosher.
Ryan: No, he knows it's going to be.
Laura: Frowned upon to be shocking. And the way that they're talking about it in the film, like, oh, of course it worked. It's meant to be there, blah, blah, blah. It certainly didn't need to be there at all. No, it is for shock value, and it's also for comic relief. It's not a comedy penis in the sense of how we normally talk about it for comic relief, but it is there to be shocking. It is a distraction.
Ryan: Despite what they thought, the reasoning had to be clarified, um, to an absolute t. I felt like I felt like it just wasn't clear enough. Because certainly, if you're living in the woods and you're there on your own, there would be no need for clothes within the basis of what the kid says when he's at the dinner table.
Laura: Yeah, you really probably would raise those kids not wearing clothes unless it was cold.
Ryan: Yes.
Laura: But maybe that's too far on the edge for the film, and I understand that. But I think that in order to give it five stars, you would need to put it in more of a context and not just put it out there as, oh, silly dad is. Yeah, put your clothes on, dad. We're eating dinner.
Ryan: Yeah, pretty much.
Laura: I still love it.
Ryan: Don't want to get greedy on that dick.
Laura: I'm a little bit greedy on that dick. And I'm glad that Viggo is so gracious with his nudity. He is a man of the world. He is naked in so many films. And you can't help but appreciate know and I appreciate Matt Ross for always seemingly putting a penis in his future films like Kudos to you because not a lot of people do that. And I think that it's great that you can work that in there somewhere.
Ryan: He puts them in there. But the films could obviously be better.
Laura: It makes more sense in 28 hotel rooms.
Ryan: Of course it does. He just doesn't take it far enough.
Laura: Again, he doesn't take it far enough. You're absolutely right. We need more dick. Thank you for putting it in there. Thank you for leveling the playing field. But come on, be dangerous. Give us more. But thank you for that. Four stars.
Ryan: Yeah.
Ryan: There we are.
Laura: Uh, would you like to rate the film?
Ryan: Yeah, I gave it three and a half. I, um, think the film is pretty good up until the point where you're like, wow, how quickly you fold. Like, so fast. Um, it's a little imbalanced towards the end. And there's also a few ideas in the film that I think are clever. I just wish they for a story that's basically taking a family that's on the very extreme kind of fringe of liberalism to being more moderate. I would rather saw that journey in, uh, I guess a little bit more of a balance. Just so it didn't kind of feel like it was speeding up towards the end. I felt like I needed to be cradled, needed that character arc to be a cradling as opposed to a, uh, bulldozing.
Laura: Yeah. I feel like we were pushed off a cliff a bit.
Ryan: A little bit. Yeah. Steve's handbrake was off and he just went off.
Laura: Um, I gave it four. I had it in my letterbox originally. When I saw it the first time, I gave it five. Yeah, but that's a theater experience. You're always going to have a more intimate experience when you're in the theater. First time viewing, you got too excited. I saw that dick. I got really excited. I got greedy. I got excited. But in a second viewing, watching it for the context of this podcast, I gave it four. I really like this film. I think it's fun. I think it's really sweet. That moment at the end. Uh, well, in one of the endings with the oldest son and Viggo where he's kind of telling him, giving him his life lessons in Cliff Note form, I really thought that was so sweet and such a really such a genuine moment between father and son. I love a father and son moment. Like, call me by your name. Um, father and son moments made me cry. Love them. This one didn't make me cry, but I thought it was really genuine and very heartfelt. Four stars.
Ryan: Nice. I wish I could have had a father son moment. There you go.
Laura: I can't have a father son moment.
Ryan: No, you can't.
Laura: That's why bereft of father son moments.
Ryan: We are? Yeah. And I would have been the most qualified to have one.
Laura: Wow.
Ryan: Cool.
Laura: Goodness gracious. Thank you for participating in this New Year's resolution, Ryan. I feel it's not like I had.
Ryan: Much of a choice.
Laura: I feel full. I feel elated. I feel energized. And I feel ready for this year. And I feel ready to see more wieners. And I feel ready to talk about them.
Ryan: Perfect.
Laura: I'm thrilled.
Ryan: Uh, ecstatic.
Laura: Wonderful. Coming to you from the underneath portion of Steve, where all those kids were hiding that didn't really remember existed, huh? Where that Gnome Chomsky poster was hidden, I believe.
Ryan: Okay.
Laura: I have been Laura.
Ryan: Uh, and I'm still Ryan.
Laura: Thank you guys, and goodbye.