Close Encounters of the Third Kind with J.D. Amato

[00:00:02] I have to get the right note. Do, do, do, podcast.

[00:00:33] Alright, so here's my pitch. Do, do, do, podcast. Obviously that's great. You sound really enthusiastic about that. The poster. That's not the voice of someone who's listening. No, no, I think that's good. The poster, right? It is an iconic poster in its own right. I'm gonna do the tagline. And so here's my pitch. Do, do, do, podcast. Close Encounter of the First Kind, Sighting of a UFO. Close Encounter of the Second Kind, Physical Evidence.

[00:01:00] Close Encounter of the Third Kind, Podcast. Well, you gotta put a little mustard on it. Would this be the first time that it's the tagline from the poster? No, we often used to do that. That used to be our way in. See, J.D., you- I'm new to the podcast. Well, no, here's what you're new to. You're new to year 10, a decade of dreams. Blank check, a decade of dreams. Wow. And this year we're pointing back at all our history. Wait, I'm here.

[00:01:30] The beautiful strings in the background. Do, do, do, decade. That's the theme? I'm on the episode that the theme comes from? The whole, the whole decade is a decade of dreams. Or the whole year. The whole year is a decade of- What have you new to spend the next 10 years? It's the decade of dreams. We gotta point back. Remember when we used to do the tagline? We used to, you know, focus on the movie poster tagline first. And then maybe, I guess if there was nothing, we would try a quote and it starts to become- Yeah, quote ended up-

[00:02:00] Is that true? I don't remember this. Here's another thing. Miniseries names used to be riffing on the director's names. Podnight Shamacast. Right. Oh my God, you're right. And then we eventually were kind of like, eh, it's getting boring. We couldn't do it with Cameron Crowe. Yeah, Pod, Marin, it doesn't matter. Right. It does matter, because in another universe, we could be doing Stee Pod Spielcast right now. Right. Which again, you know, there's a reason we moved on, because that's just kind of- Okay. A decade of dreams is a time to look back. Yeah, that's fine.

[00:02:28] I mean, if you want me to look back, I just want to look back to the, you know, when we just did Star Wars movies, the prequels, right? Sure. For our first year. Ten years ago. And so we didn't do quotes at all, usually. Oh, sure. Right. And there's one episode, I think a really bad one, where we just decided to do like the politics of Star Wars. I think that was for Attack of the Clones. That's our worst episode. Did I show up to a clip show? What? A decade of dreams, like clips could be coming everywhere. What's in this box? In the attic? Oh, well, look at all these memories. It's even better than a clip show.

[00:02:57] It's two guys going, hey, remember when this happened? And not cutting back to the clip. Do you guys remember the first time that I was ever on blank check? The first Star Wars episode. Dang, dang. We cut to the clip. Yeah, I know. Ben can do all that later. No, it's decade of dreams, so we don't do that. I just want to say for the politics episode. Ben is shooting daggers at me right now. For the politics episode, this ill-begotten politics episode. I'm sorry, Ben. I believe Griffin just opened the episode by going, politics! Yeah. But he's just yelling, man. Yeah, and we, you know what? I'm going to make a promise. I will do that again at some point. You should. Within year 10 decade of dreams.

[00:03:27] Ben, you didn't start the clock. Oh, David's in a great mood. I'm in a normal great mood. The greatest mood. I will say this. The greatest mood. To the average person who doesn't know David, they would be like, David's not in a good mood because he was immediately talking about starting on time and wanting to get going. Yeah. Well, we're doing the episode today. Having known David for a really long time, David's actually in a really good mood today. Why am I in a good mood? Or why do you think that? I just think you have a verve. You have an energy. You have a life to you that is exciting. It's nice to see you.

[00:03:56] You heard that verve-y sigh? The verve-y sigh. It's nice to see you. You hear the pep in that. Any types of work email? You know, nice to see you. I don't see a lot of like grownups right now. It's nice to see grownups. Well, this is where grownups live in the Blank Check Studios. Entering year 10, a decade of dreams. I don't know about that. This is where grownups live! That's the worst, like, you know, theme park. Like my- this is where grownups- like, who would be drawn to that?

[00:04:27] I guess like a sex club, but even then it would be kind of like, yeah, I hope so. This isn't a theme park. This is a place of business. This is a place of serious- The theme of this park is grownups. I used to work at a chess shop a zillion years ago. Well, that's where grownups were. My first job in New York, basically. Which one? It was called chess shop. It doesn't exist anymore. Is it the two competing ones that were across the street from each other? The chess forum was the- Was the spinoff that- Yeah, right. That employees of the chess shop had started. And I believe chess forums still exist. That was the Patsies? Exactly. Yeah, chess forums still exist. God bless them.

[00:04:57] Whereas chess shop finally has turned into a sort of different game store. I don't really know what happened there. There's that weird chain now that's called like Hex and Cross or some shit. Yeah, I've seen those. Yeah. That's like board game coffee shops. Hex and Co. Yes. Anyway, when I worked at the chess shop, which was this sort of shambling institution from back in the day in the village on Thompson Street, we had lots of chess sets for sale, many of them from India because India is the home of chess sets. And the boxes would say, like, made with no child labor. Oh, sure.

[00:05:25] And you would be like, that's great, but we have to announce that. Like, what does that mean for all the ones that don't say that? You know? So it's kind of like the sex club saying. The fairsley difference, come with your kids, leave with your kids. I think I've told you that I waited on Gandolfini once because his son used to be really into chess, I think at some point. I think Michael, right? I think his son Michael Gandolfini now a good actor. Yeah. And James Gandolfini was an incredibly nice customer, like polite customer.

[00:05:53] But that man standing and waiting. Yeah. Just breathing and like maybe looking at his watch is one of the more stressful, like work experiences. Where I'm like, yes, yes, your order is here. And I'm like rushing and he's just like. It's being rude. Just freaking me out. But I remember that being a pretty small, delicate, cramped store. Not a big store. Not a huge store. What year were you working there? 2008. 2008. The year I moved here. What are you doing, JD? Like, could I have waited on you?

[00:06:23] Is that what you're monitoring? I think you did. I mean, it's very possible. It's very possible. I didn't work 24 hours at any. Do you think David sold you a rook? I think David sold me my first chess set that I ever bought. Okay. Do you remember what you bought? Did you buy like a mat and pieces? Yep. I mean, because that was the thing. People would come in and say, hey, I just want like, can I get a chess set for like the least amount of money essentially? This is probably a screen memory that I am inventing. It's possible. But the person. I mean, you probably hung out in the village a lot back then, right?

[00:06:49] The person that I'm remembering who helped me on that day now a long time ago had David characteristics to the point that I'm like, was it David? I worked there. I mean, like, there's. That's so funny. You went, can I get a mat and pieces? And he went. No, no. The whole thing was like you knew when people came in. Right? Oh my God. Wait, I'm remembering it now. I know. The person went. Boy, if someday I had a blank check. I'd get out of here. I'm pretty sure I was like logged into AIM on the computer and like. I was going to say.

[00:07:19] Bored out of my mind. Furiously messaging. Hey, you know what? What a fun thing to look back on. As we start our decade of dreams. You're acting Griffin like this is the first episode of like 2025, which is not just to be clear. This is like the fifth episode of 204. I think it's the fourth. Is this the first time that decade of dreams has been. He's starting this. No, I've seen it in a couple other episodes, but because of us recording in advance and slightly out of order, I didn't. I didn't have the foresight to launch it on the. On the dual episode. You probably.

[00:07:49] So I'm catching up. Well, this is a more nostalgic film anyway. This is a film about. You waited. You had a friend that would. Yes. And you also. Maybe that's part of it. People would come in and then we'll talk about close encounters. People. A lot of things. Well, we got our a lot of things. Episode next is the whole. This is the whole. It's a backwards thing. It's like when we were listening. When there was that crunch of doughboys episodes where they were getting ready for Mitch to work. Yeah. Let's just call out that this episode is being recorded the week before Mitch has his colonoscopy. But it's also.

[00:08:19] We have to bank up. We're doing our silly episode next, but it'll have come out before this one. Oh, copy. You know what I mean? Yes. So like the sillies, like they are front loaded for the listener. People will think. They've gotten their sillies out, but we haven't. But yeah, we're like the Rashomon of doughboys episodes where you're like, this is day after colonoscopy? Day before? Anyway, people would come in and there'd be three kinds of people. One is a person who's just like, hi, I'm interested in chess. I have $30, you know, like what can I get for?

[00:08:48] And it's like, yeah, you just want a mat and some plastic pieces, right? Chess. People come in being like, hey, I would like a nice chess set. And you're like, great. You want a wooden chess set. It's going to cost you like $120 or whatever. Right. You want like a nice wood, rosewood chess set. Yeah. And then some people come in. The third person wanted the Simpsons set. Well, that we did sell. I was going to say it was very popular. Very nice set. But no, some people come in kind of with like, if you kind of pitch me enough, I'll drop like a lot of money on a slightly sort of absurdly expensive chess set.

[00:09:17] But they're kind of testing you. Right. They're like, you know, come on. Make me believe that I need to spend like $400 bucks on this like really fancy wrought iron or there was the Bauhaus chess set. What? I don't know what just happened. Ben just handed a phone to JD with something on it. I brought up the part in the movie that he wanted to read the quote from. Oh, great. Okay. Now we can finally start the podcast. How do we do this though? Where? Okay. I'm subtitle. You press play. Subtiles are on and I'm going to do it and you do the feedback. Okay. Ready?

[00:09:49] Okay. Okay. This is suddenly a lot of pressure, but we're going to try it. Do, do, do, do. Podcast. I don't know where we are in it, but we're going to try this. Do, do, do. Podcast. Okay. Start with the tone. Do, do, do. Podcast. Podcast. Podcast. Do, do, do, do. Podcast. Podcast. Podcast. I think he's a southern accent. I'm trying something. Up a full note. Do, do, do. Podcast.

[00:10:19] Podcast. Do, do, do. Down a major third. Podcast. Now drop an octave. Podcast. Podcast. Do, do, do. Podcast. Cool blue. Go. Do, do, do. Podcast. Podcast. Podcast. Podcast. Podcast. Give me a tone.

[00:10:49] Do. Read to the second. Upper fold tone. Pod. Meet to the third. Down a major third. Do to the first. Drop an octave. Do a perfect fifth. Pod. Wasn't that worth it, David? David is now checking two devices. We're doing the podcast. Yeah, we're doing the podcast. Hey, this is blank. That also wasn't the section that I was imagining. Whatever. Thank you for pulling that up though. Thank you, man. Hey, Ben. 10 years from now, we're going to be looking back on this moment.

[00:11:18] This is blank check with Griffin and David. I'm Griffin. I'm David. It's a podcast about filmographies, directors who have massive success early on in their careers and are given a series of blank checks to make whatever crazy passion products they want. And sometimes those checks clear and sometimes they bounce. Baby, this is a miniseries on the early works of Steven Spielberg. You know it's serious because David has unzipped his hoodie. He's wearing a sleeveless shirt. He's wearing a dickie. I'm wearing a quince shirt. Oh, hey.

[00:11:47] This is Steven Spielberg. That's right. It's a miniseries on the early works of Steven Spielberg. Yes. The first half of it. It's called Podrassic Cast. Sure. Podrassic Cast. I said sure. JD is making a face that's like, mmm, yummy. Sounds good. Of all the options? That's what you went with? Make a better pitch because we went through it all. We went through it all and you think, oh, there are a lot of options. But then you start working on them. What are you ending with? What are we ending with? Schindler's List. I heard of that. Oh, interesting.

[00:12:16] I would say not to riff on that title, maybe. No, I'm not. Steer your riff truck away. But like Pod Encounters of the Third Cast. Yeah, you're right. Actually, you're right. Pod Encounters of the cast kind. It's not until later that he gets... Which was fine, you know, but like, kind of like, eh. But you're like, there are the Indiana Jones titles, there's Close Encounters, and there's Jurassic Park. Otherwise, he has a lot of short... Yeah, what are you going to do with Hook?

[00:12:42] You know, what are you going to do with the Poderland cast? We're not going to do the color podcast. PC, the Podra Terrestrial? I pitched it. You better believe I pitched it. Yeah, you're right. That's rough. PC, the PodCast-terrestrial. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Podcasts. Well, yeah, of course. Yeah, that's probably it. Yeah. I think Podracist is fun. Podracist is fun.

[00:13:10] Maybe have, you know, art like the Al Yankovic album. Yes. You're right. It's time for our Al Yankovic album. Go on. What do you mean? Well, remember, he has the one album... It's called... I can't remember what it's called even, but... His song is just called Jurassic Park. But the album cover is just like the Jurassic Park logo with, you know, an owl instead of a dinosaur. I mean, you're laughing already. Yeah, you can hear all the laughs. Ben turned off his mic because he was laughing so much. Ben's laughing too hard right now.

[00:13:40] It's called... I mean, I won't stand... I'm scared actually. It's called Alapalooza. Alapalooza. You know, it looks like, you know. It's fun. I think we're all gonna have a great time. It's fun. It's fun. I won't hear anything against Weird Al. I think Weird Al is like one of the few pure kind of... I agree. I know you agree. I'm just saying it out loud. Like, you know how like back in the day people would be like, man, if Obama was whatever turned out to be like cheating on his wife, that would be such a bummer. Now everyone's like, oh, Obama's probably cheating.

[00:14:09] Everyone cheats on their wife or whatever. I mean, now morals have shifted, I guess. I'm waiting to see where this is going. Yeah, me too. If Al Yankovic got canceled, that would... Yeah. ...butt me out so much more than like 99.9% of celebrities, right? Like that's one where I'm like, no. I have always heard what a great guy he is and I refuse to believe otherwise. Most celebrities these days, I'm like, yeah, whatever. Hollywood is a pit of scum and they're all up to no good. He's one of the only good ones we got. You know, if he was on Jay-Z's Island or Diddy's Island or whoever had an island.

[00:14:40] I don't like it. Right. J.D.'s doing swerve gestures. Hey, our guest today returned to the show. A legend across the decade of dreams that we've lived through. From After Midnight. That's right. New credit since the last time... On CBS. On CBS. 1230. Network Television, J.D. Amato. I'm so glad to be here. I'm J.D. Amato and I love movies. Blanket. Blanket. J.D., I'm so happy to have you here.

[00:15:10] I'm so happy to be here. It's been... Worse the more we say it. We're gonna carve it into the door. It's been a minute. It's been a minute. When was it last? It's... It's been... This has basically become a yearly event that tends to happen at the end of the year where we double up a main feed episode. Boy and the Heron. And a Patreon episode where you have this sort of December slot sort of for your choosing.

[00:15:37] Yeah, I feel like the past three years we've tried to schedule something more frequently. Yeah. And it hasn't happened. And so now it's turned into we just... Last year was... We doubled a Patreon record with Boy and the Heron. Yep. Year before that, we doubled one with Coraline. Yep. And the year before that, I'm trying to think what the last main feed appearance was before... The walk? The walk? The walk. The walk. Yeah, I mean, you did talking the moonwalk with us and we ranked the walks the year before that. Oh, yes.

[00:16:06] You know, but you hadn't done a main feed since the walk. But welcome. This is your one... This is your 10th main feed episode. Oh my God. Main feed. Wow. Look at this! A decade of dreams! It's all lining up! It's a decade of dreams! That's true! Over the decade, you're about a once a year guest. A decade of dreams! I'm hearing the strings come back! It's a hit! Mm-hmm. Tenth time for the decade of dreams. Tenth time for the decade of dreams. And a big-ass movie. Uh, and this...

[00:16:35] A movie that I'm so delighted to talk about. A big-ass movie. I'm not denying this, right? Big movie at the time. Big movie in the man's filmography. Yeah. Is it the least remembered or discussed of his, like, totemic, top-of-the-pile movies these days? Yeah, but I think that's weirdly only a last 10 years then. But 10 years is a long time. It is. For example, all a blank check contained within it. The strings are back. Uh, I'm just, like... Yeah.

[00:17:04] I was just considering that because I watched this movie when I was young and I want to hear, obviously, because my dad showed it to me as this kind of, like, I am now showing you a really big movie for me. Right? Exact same experience with my mother as a child. Yeah, yeah. You know, here we go. And we can talk about what I thought of it when I was a kid. But, you know, whereas now I feel like it's like, whatever, you know, below your Jurassic Park, your Indiana Jones, your E.T., you know, all that stuff.

[00:17:29] A parent who is vaguely interested in movies and trying to show their kids important things puts, like, Indiana Jones, Jurassic, E.T. They're even saying... Lincoln, Bridges, Spies. No, but I think they're even saying, like, hey, someday you'll be old enough to watch Jaws. Like, they're calling the shot of Jaws. Yeah. They're pointing off to Jaws in the distance. Someday you'll be able to watch The Fablemans. Well, that's... You have to really grow up. You show a kid Fableman's too early, it might score him for life, turn him into a filmmaker.

[00:17:59] Yeah, exactly. It's not like this is a forgotten film. No. I just feel like it's a slightly less discussed film than its heyday, I guess. I don't know. And I... My experience on this watch of it is that, weirdly, in school, I remember there being a lot of... Learning a lot of information about this movie. And so when you... Like in film school, you're saying? Not in, like, elementary school. No, no, no. In film school.

[00:18:26] And I was like, oh yeah, I remember a lot about the... Learning about the making of this film. And then I was like, wait, are any of those things correct? And I sort of had this skepticism over my film school. True of a lot of Spielberg movies. Just right, the lore gets... And I was like, it was a legend a little bit. And there was one professor that was the one that would talk a lot about it. And so I was sort of like, do I trust this guy? So then I was like, let me actually dive into... I read the making of book and I read the Balaban diaries.

[00:18:55] I'm eager to talk about. Um... Do they always begin with, like, wake up, comb beard? Yeah. That's most of it. The beard looks soft. That's what I'm saying. I wanted to know how is he maintaining that fucker. Yeah. But in reading about all of the development of this and what happened, I was struck by how actually important this film was in Spielberg's career.

[00:19:19] And I guess, and to your point, I think it has fallen in the folds of an otherwise sterling career. Maybe not all the way in the folds. But I think people don't... This is such an important movie in his... It is! His launch. Well, also, look... And his lunch! I don't know. I don't know. The smile that David gave after that. I was just really, really searching for some kind of sandwich joke I could make, but I couldn't... I couldn't...

[00:19:47] You look at, like, the first decade of Spielberg's directing career, right? Dual Sugarland, okay? That's like developmental years, right? Yeah. Then... Jaws! Just straight through. Jaws, Close Encounters, 1941 is at least a big flashy bomb, right? And then E.T. Raiders. No, Raiders, E.T. I'm sorry. Yes.

[00:20:10] But, like, those four movies, I think were held on vaguely equal sort of esteem. Jaws, Close Encounters, Raiders, E.T. is what you're saying. Right. This guy has made four blockbuster masterpieces. And it does feel like, of those four, this one's fallen out a little bit where it feels like it's more the egghead pick. It's more the egghead pick. It's got... It doesn't have action in it. It's, you know, it's, in the best way, cheesier already.

[00:20:38] You know, like, not cheesy maybe, but like, it's very sentimental. And so, you know... But it's also, it's, in a certain way, it's, like, less emotional than a lot of... I don't know. It's funny how much this feels like a key Spielberg text and you watch it now. And there are, like, parts of this movie that almost play, like, like, verite. You know, that feel very stripped down. And a lot of the emotion is kind of, like, subtextual. Interesting. It doesn't go for, like... Do you disagree on this?

[00:21:07] I kind of disagree. I can hear both sides. Yeah. But I also think, based on what happened with Jaws, and what a disaster the production was, but how successful the film... Oh, those people. Eaten. Yeah, I mean, to have cameras there to see it all. That's the worst part of it. And not intervene. But if this didn't go well... Yeah. That would have been who he was, is this sort of, like... I think then it would, if, say, right, say this movie is some sort of giant bomb, it would be like, okay, buddy, back to, you know, make me a thriller, make me a creature feature,

[00:21:36] make me, you know, not, like, okay, anything you want. What do you want to do? Yeah. And I think the success of this, because also, I didn't realize what a huge... Learning about where the industry was at the time was very interesting and also very comforting, because we're in a dire industry place right now in film and television. Oh, great. No problems at all. It's good for podcasting. Yeah, sure. But to learn... Craven's out there hunting. Is there... Although by the time this came out, that movie is... Whatever. I have tickets for Craven tonight. Exited in theaters.

[00:22:05] Craven has been out for, I think, four days. I bought tickets for Craven and 40X. It is playing in 40X one time a day, 10, 20 PM. Yeah. In its first week. Well, he hunts at night. This is true. I didn't know this was a movie. Yeah. Like, you're saying we're telling you it's a movie that this is the first... You're familiar with the work. It has been advertised. There's like posters. I have not seen a single one. Not only that, it's been pushed back so many times. This movie has basically been advertised for two years. I did not know about this. JD, you're familiar with Craven the Hunter, his work. Ah, yes.

[00:22:34] You want to take a stab at who directed the Craven the Hunter movie? I have no idea. I don't even know who would be playing Craven the Hunter. We're going to tell you when you're naughty. Just knowing nothing about it, just who would you think would direct a Craven the Hunter movie? A solo Craven the Hunter movie where they're legally not allowed to say Spider-Man? Uh, I can't even imagine. Of course, JC Chandor, director of Margin Call, A Most Violent Year and All Is Lost. Triple Frontier. No way. Yeah. Who's playing Craven the Hunter? Aaron Taylor Johnson. Of course, your favorite star.

[00:23:04] The most hunt, hunty. He's always on the hunt. Audiences are on the hunt for his next great picture. Fascinating. Audiences are on the hunt for a different ticket to buy at the theater. Well, yeah, that's what actually happened. Seeing Wicked a fifth time. Right. They're like, they see Craven the Hunter ticket and they're like, turn right. Anyway, industry's going great now. Nope. But the movie in 1977 also going great is what you're saying?

[00:23:28] To your point, he had a blank check in a way that I would argue to a certain degree, 70s New Hollywood is a little bit more directors carving out control of their own career rather than just you're slotted into the studio system. You're assigned movies, right? He's like in the early days of like, Jaws is undeniable. What do you want to do? Well, and we'll get into the development of it. I'll crack the dossier.

[00:23:54] But it does feel like this movie is him being like, what if I'm not trying to make Jaws again? What if I'm trying to do something else? And it working is the thing that kind of is like, okay, he expanded. He showed us. He can do what he wants. So I read the Ray Morton Close Encounters of the Third Kind, the making of Steven Spielberg's classic film book. And what I, based on that, what I gleaned is it wasn't a blank check.

[00:24:21] It was, he sold Paramount on this being a $2.8 million movie and then just kept being like, we need more. And eventually it was like kind of this like, $20 million sunk cost thing where they were like, all right, we think this is going to be good. So we'll keep writing the check. But like, if it doesn't work out, we're fucked. Like we have put so much into this in a way that I'm like, I think it was a weird bet that they kept raising the stakes on. I, yes, I agree with you.

[00:24:49] I do think they wouldn't have, they wouldn't have stood by for that if he hadn't made Jaws. Like it's like. That's the way in which it's a blank check. Now obviously he eventually becomes, it's funny that his early career is defined by these movies that went over budget and schedule and stuff because he became this very like, no, I don't do that. I'm on time. I go under budget. But that's Raiders is what. Right. He was also very young. He was quite young. Only seven. Seven years old.

[00:25:17] No, he was very, but like early in his career, it's like, Jesus, this Spielberg guy is better fucking work. Like, and then 1941 is the one where it doesn't. And Spielberg himself is like, okay, I need to storyboard everything like really closely. I need to get my budget under control. I cannot become the guy who always goes over budget. Because he did it three times. Yeah. But two of those times it was so wildly successful that people were fine with it. I mean, fine with it. Let's, they tolerated it because the bet would pay off.

[00:25:46] The first time that bet doesn't pay off, people are like ready to shut you down. Yeah. It was fascinating. David. Yes. It's the most wonderful time of the year. Oh. January and February. Oh. Movie going Mecca. Ho, ho, ho. Happy January. And. Merry February. Here's the, here's the thing.

[00:26:12] It's a time of just, just wall to wall banner releases, you know. People think we might be speaking a little facetiously. Being a little sarcastic. But no, no. For me, this is the health of the movie going industry is the weirdo releases of January and February that help support this ecosystem. It is a time I look forward to because I'm always getting a little tired of award season and all these big, serious movies you got to see.

[00:26:37] And then here comes January horror, romantic comedies, weird, uh, mid budget. Genre exercises. Mid budget action through someone's on a plane. Someone's on a boat. Someone's on a jet ski. Yes. Look, and maybe they're falling in love at the same time. Should there be a whole movie set on a jet ski? Sorry. Absolutely. This episode is brought to you once again by your friends at Regal. Okay. And the Regal unlimited program is an all you can watch movie subscription pass that pays for itself in just two visits. Why is that relevant now?

[00:27:05] Because maybe this is a two month run without your obvious temple blockbusters. Maybe you want to sign up for a subscription service that allows you to sample. Yeah. Entries. Yeah. Don't you want to see one of them days? Is that what it's called? A big hit, a big surprise hit. People are a little sleeper hit for January. Written by daughter of past miniseries subject, John Singleton. Nice. I read a Singleton. And there's a movie coming out January 24th. Flight risk that I see here is from the director of Apocalypto and Hacksaw Ridge.

[00:27:35] I wonder who that could be. No name above the title. Just those two credits moving past. Who could that be? New Soderbergh presence. Yeah, presence. It's good. Check it out. I've seen it. This is a good time. Look with with Regal unlimited. You can see any standard 2D movie anytime with no blackout dates or restrictions. And if you like those premium formats, it's just a little surcharge on top of that. Right. You can still reserve those tickets. And you won't just save money on tickets. You'll save on snacks. Yes. 10% off all non-alcoholic concession items.

[00:28:03] If you're just going to see a couple movies a month, Regal unlimited makes sense. And I'm putting this the opposite way. I'm saying maybe you want an incentive to see two movies a month. Right. But go out there. Yeah, get yourself out there. Try some of these things. There's a movie where Kristen Stewart falls in love with Steven Young playing a satellite. Isn't that a movie? I think they're... Are they both satellites? I think one's a satellite. One's like a buoy or something. There is only one way to settle this. And it is to go to the theaters and see it. Yes. Sign up now on the Regal app. Yes. Or at the link in the description in our show notes.

[00:28:31] And use code BLANKCHECK to get 20% off your three-month subscription. And then you're going to be in the Crown Club. You're going to get rewards. You're going to build up points. You can get free popcorns and sodas and upgrades. 25% off candy on Tuesdays. 50% off popcorn. Discounted ticket. All this stuff. Go to the Regal Crown Club website. And as I said, it's a little deep. It's a little buried in here. There is a section where you can redeem your points for old promotional movie memorabilia like Red One Socks. Right. Follow the link in the show notes.

[00:29:01] Go to the Regal app. Click on the unlimited banner. And then follow the instructions to sign up and enter promo code BLANKCHECK when prompted to receive your discount. And find out whether Steven Yeun or Kristen Stewart is the satellite. And look, I'm just going to say it again, David. Signing up for Regal Unlimited or maybe gifting a membership to a moviegoer in your life. Sure. It's a good way to support the show. This is a dream advertiser. Yes. A dream partner for us. We want to keep this going. We think it could benefit everybody.

[00:29:30] Especially the movies. When did you first see... Before I crack the dossier. When did you first see Close Encounters? If you have a memory of that at all. Or what's your experience with the movie? So, strangely, I can't even pinpoint how or why. This is one of my earliest movie memories. I can believe it. Again, again, generationally for us, the parents, this was a big movie maybe. I don't know. Yeah.

[00:29:57] And I remember watching it with my parents when I was, I think, too young to see it. And it felt like a very serious horror movie in a way. Yeah. That was my memory of it, too. Like, of course, I have memories of seeing Disney movies and things like that before. This is the first sort of like adult movie that I can like remember seeing. And I had a lot of fears around it. It felt scary to me. Like lingering fear. Like, it sort of scarred you slightly or whatever.

[00:30:26] I think it might have. Well, not scarred me, but I think it had an impact on me. It's also like a sad grown-up movie. This is the thing. Because this is my dad showed me this movie probably way too young for the exact same reason of like, well, I really, I want you to see this one. And then I think I remember him kind of being like, yeah, I guess we got to ride out a lot of stuff you're not going to care about or understand before we get to the end, which I think you'll like, you know, like of like all the grown-up feelings.

[00:30:54] The wild thing for me is I think I was like five or six, maybe seven at the oldest. I remember it playing on the Disney Channel. My mom being like, oh my God, Close Encounters. We need to watch this, right? And sitting there and watching it with her. I remember being totally locked in the whole time. I bring this up only because I feel like within that same year, if not the year before, my mother rented Star Wars and was like, you should watch Star Wars. And I tapped out in the first five minutes. I was like yawn.

[00:31:23] She might have even done the same thing with Indiana Jones. When you're a kid, you never know when like something will grab you or not. But she was like, you're not paying attention that this is Star Wars. And it was just like playing in the background. I didn't really watch until the re-release. I'd certainly seen E.T. I think it was all in on E.T. But this was, I believe my mom framing it to me is like, oh my God, that's on TV tonight. This is the other alien movie by the E.T. guy. You need to see this. This is important.

[00:31:48] And the child abduction sequence is the thing that always like lived in my brain very large. But I remember sitting through the whole movie, being engaged. Like, I don't present this as some sign of maturity. I almost was more looking back on it and being like, right, in an era where only Disney makes children's films in the 1970s, where there are not a lot of movies made explicitly for children or families, period. This was like seen by small children.

[00:32:17] Absolutely. This is a, right, a PG movie or whatever. I mean, yeah. My like. Even a G. I don't know. My flashbulb memories of movies as a kid. I remember coming down from my room and my parents were watching Return of the Jedi and Jabba the Hutt was on the screen and it freaked me out. Yeah, well, he's no good. He's no good. He's a gangster. Well. Excuse me. He's a businessman. And he is the father of Jeremy Allen White. Right, thank God. So. What scared me about Jabba was not that he was a gangster.

[00:32:48] It was not. You didn't. It wasn't his crime. Oh, I guess you love criminality then. Oh, so you want to tax him. I guess you love racketeering. Desert racketeering. And then I have this flashbulb memory of sitting on the couch next to my parents during the child abduction scene of Close Encounters. And it's funny because I don't think I, I think I watched it then. It had a big impact. And then the next time I watched it was I. My same experience. We went and saw it when they re-released it for the 40th anniversary.

[00:33:17] I checked. That was 2017. Two years into our decade of dreams. And yes, I had the same thing where I was like the movie lived really large in my mind. I was eager to see it again because I was like, this is one of the Spielberg masterpieces. I haven't revisited since leaving this huge impression. I think both of us walked out of that screen being a little like that movie is weird. It's different than the movie. I remember that was the thing because everyone just remembers the kid abduction in the last 20 minutes.

[00:33:45] Yeah, and I really think that's what most people and then I guess mashed potatoes. I was gonna say all the obsession stuff. And when you're a kid, your perception of the characters and how they're behaving is different than your perception of it as an adult. That's the big thing. Which is my opinion of these characters as an adult is, I would say, I'm, I'm much more critical of the adult characters in this movie than when I'm a kid. I'm just like, oh, the adults must be doing the right thing. And now I look at it and I understand more of the complexity there.

[00:34:14] And it's not a movie about them doing the right thing to be clear. No. But when you're a kid, you're just not. Spike Lee made a great film about that if you want. If that's what you're looking for in your movie going experience. About people doing the right thing. Spike Lee made one of the best films on that subject. Always do the right thing. Yeah. Well, no, always Spielberg made do the right thing Spike Lee made. Well, right. Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah. Steven Spielberg. I'm gonna take you all the way back to his childhood, something he's never discussed. So I ask one thing before we dig into the dossier. Which version did all of you watch for this episode?

[00:34:42] For this episode, I watched the director's cut. Okay. I guess the third and final. The most recent cut. My dad definitely showed me, I guess, what was the special edition or whatever the sort of like, I think that's what he showed me back in the day. Have you not seen it at all between childhood and... I think I'd seen it one more time in between. It's definitely not one of my movies, but it's also, it is quite lodged in the brain, I guess for the same sort of childhood reasons. But no, I have the 4K. It's been sitting on the shelf. Mm-hmm.

[00:35:12] And I... Did you get the box that plays the music or the steel button? No, I didn't get it. I have the steel button. You know, like... It's one where you push the button and you'll never believe what sound comes out of it. Red Necks is caught Nigel! No! Um, and uh... Wait, I can't even... Oh, this time I watched the director's cut, which I don't think I'd ever seen before, probably. The one that's sort of like... Yeah. Sort of like the special edition with the little stuff out. Well, we'll get into the differences.

[00:35:39] But my belief is that, because the special edition was what was in circulation for a long time. Yeah, right. That was the one he wanted out there for a long time. Well, I think even when he regretted it, it took a while for him to be able to do the new version. So I think I must have seen the special edition originally. We saw the director's cut at the re-release. So I watched theatrical last night. I watched whatever Apple had. Interesting. Probably the theatrical... I don't... Honestly, I don't know. Couldn't tell you.

[00:36:09] Couldn't tell you. But listen, what's important is that when Steven Spielberg was a child one day, this is his Arizona era, so I guess he's a young teen, his dad woke him up in the middle of the night, rushed him out of the car in his pajamas, and they drove, you know, for like an hour, half an hour to the desert. And then there's a lot of people on the side of the road laying down, and they lay down too, and they watch a meteor show. And, you know, his dad obviously this big nerd, sort of a Paul Dano type,

[00:36:40] kind of haunted, sort of feels like Seth Rogen cucked him at some point in his life. And how would you describe his mom? You know, kind of just like this like willowy, energetic, pixie cut, Michelle Williams type. Got it. Okay. Bable man! And like one of his sisters definitely is like a Julia Butters type. Oh, sure. That gives me a lot to go off of. Yeah, yeah. An indelible memory for Spielberg. Both his dad kind of behaving in this maniacal way, I think, like,

[00:37:08] which I think was not what his dad was usually like. Yeah, right. But then obviously the majesty of the night sky and, you know, the other worlds. And of course, I think what then happens is his dad starts being like, so what's happening? There's meteors. You know, and Spielberg's like, shh, like, the majesty of the night sky is what I'm taking away from this. His dad was a nerd. Yeah. Paul Dano type. Yeah, I saw the movie. So when he's 17 years old, Steven Spielberg makes a movie called Firelight, which you cannot watch,

[00:37:35] but it's like a two and a half hour amateur science fiction epic movie. Scringed in his town, paid tickets. It's the last thing he makes before he, you know, gets his bindle and goes off to California to make real movies. Yeah. Yeah. It's like the end of his sort of teenage amateur. Amblin is the first thing that he's like showing to studios to try to get hired. And his dad helps him make Firelight, I believe. Yeah. I mean, you know, again, in the Fablemans. I mean, sorry. That's not a movie that exists.

[00:38:04] I'm in reality, you can see like, you know, how the community would pitch in his friends and all that shit. Right. Are we doing a bit where we pretend the Fablemans doesn't exist? I don't know. I was like, are you going back to the Star Wars era where you're like, well, his dad was like a Paul Dano type. I'm not saying Paul Dano would ever play. Of course not. Um, and, uh, in 1970, apparently Spielberg wrote a short story called Experiences. Do you guys know about this? No. Uh, which was sort of like a Lover's Lane set.

[00:38:32] You know, it's like a small midwestern town and it's kids at Lover's Lane watching a meteor shower. So he's plucking memories. Okay. Uh, and, uh, then post Sugarland Express, Spielberg's thinking about UFOs again. And maybe it's like, should I do a UFO movie? Should I, he wanted to maybe do a documentary about UFO. Like, you know, abductee type people, you know, people who, you know, 50, 60s said they were abducted, realizes quickly, like, I'm going to need some money.

[00:39:00] Right? I can't just fucking firelight this. Well, the thing I read was that he, he sort of goes to Columbia. They're interested in the idea of him doing a UFO film. He has that in development. And then he's sort of like, the vision I have in my head would require so much money. I couldn't do it for $2 million say, which is maybe what they would give me now. So then he starts reconceiving it as like, do I do it as a fake documentary? Right. Do I do it in the style of newsreel footage?

[00:39:27] Like, he's trying to figure out a Cloverfield approach almost. Probably to save money as well as anything else. To save money. Right. Yes. He's like, I, no one's going to give me the resources to make the vision I have in my head. Excuse me, Connoisseur. May I add some context? He also told the story on a Tom Snyder interview that I watched last night. Well, well, well. He was a, uh, boy scout. And he was like, very into it would go every single weekend to go camping.

[00:39:55] And the one time he was sick and missed it, they had a UFO experience. Fuck. Oh, so he, or at least they're all like, we saw this thing. They witnessed some kind of weird light. Yeah. And there were like 30 witnesses and that always really stuck with him. Yeah. And the, the book, it references that, that, um, he has several instances throughout his life where other people saw UFOs and he was supposed to be there. He was snoozing. And he missed it out. Including during the making of this film.

[00:40:22] Well, he, when he's making this film, he's stirring it up in people's brains too. Right? He's suggesting it to people. Okay. So he throws the alien idea vaguely at Gloria Katzenwiller Hayek, who wrote American Graffiti. They're like, eh, we don't care. Throws it to Paul Schrader. Very young Paul Schrader at that point. Paul Schrader, I think did, you know, was somewhat involved in the crafting of this script. Uh, and in 1973, he signs a development deal with Columbia for a movie called Watch the Skies.

[00:40:52] Which is largely on the strength of Duel. Uh, right. That's, yeah. Right. It wasn't at Fox, um, which I guess, I don't know why Fox would have been the first choice, but whatever. Um, Michael Phillips and Julia Phillips, who had just made The Sting, uh, really liked Duel. And so they come on as producers. They're obviously hot producers. Julia Phillips wrote the famous book, You'll Never Eat Lunch in This Town Again. She's a legendary Hollywood figure. Uh, exposed the fact that some people do cocaine in Hollywood. Crazy stuff.

[00:41:22] Um. And some people eat lunch. And some people will never. Some people. Uh, and it's set to be made in 1974. But then Spielberg gets put on Jaws. The script is seen as sort of not done. He's still got his universal deal. Exactly. If they want to put him on something, he's got to do it. And I think they're, both Spielberg and the Phillipses are like, this script needs to bake. It's not, we're not quite ready. But also at that time, it was much more like, he wanted to make a movie about like, the government hiding evidence of UFOs.

[00:41:50] Yes, it was going to be more of a Watergate style conspiracy thriller. Yes. So what I had read about was that the original premise was that it was about a guy who worked for Project Blue Book and his job was to discredit people who had seen UFOs. Someone would say, I've seen a UFO and this guy comes in to debunk. Yes. And then he sees a UFO and then his whole life is turned topsy turvy and he has to figure it out.

[00:42:17] They wrote a draft of it and then were like, this is boring. I think they were like, the times have moved on. And then had Schrader do a version. Yes. And apparently Schrader's, oh sorry, do you have all this? Well, it's okay. No, you go ahead. Sorry, I thought you were done with the script section. I'm never done. Keep going. I mean, well, I will be done. But the boy, uh-oh, the bar's pretty small on this one, JJ. Okay. Uh, no, you're like, that's the original script. And they decide that, I guess that Watergate's passe. Like it's that quickly. They're kind of like, eh.

[00:42:46] There's been a lot of conspiracy. But also- The Schrader version apparently is just like hyper religious pseudo. I can tell you that it was called Kingdom Come. And Spielberg says it was one of the most embarrassing screenplays ever professionally turned into a major studio. You might be surprised to hear that it was a film about a man struggling with guilt. Yes, it was a- Schrader was like, uh, I don't think the script is good, but I deserve credit for changing Spielberg's mind on like, it shouldn't be a Watergate thriller, essentially.

[00:43:16] It should be about someone having a spiritual experience. But I- Which is what the movie is, you know, definitely on that track. I feel like in Schrader's draft, it was a cop. Like Spielberg after that, he doesn't want to write the film. He's bringing so many other writers in. It's shortly after that that he's like, let me just fucking try it. But the other thing that's happening is these earlier drafts are coming through. He's like, that's not right. That feels too rote. What am I like trying to get at that I can't express here? But also every draft he's getting is like, they're never going to make, give me the money

[00:43:46] to make this at the level I want. Because I think what he's very aware of is not wanting to make something that feels like a sci-fi B picture. Like his whole vision for this, before he can even figure out what the story is, is like, can you make something that feels tangible and real and feels like kind of a quote unquote accurate representation of what a UFO encounter would feel like? Look, Schrader. Rather than saucer men from Mars. Paul Schrader. There is no point in Paul Schrader's life where he is a particularly commercially minded writer, obviously, or director.

[00:44:16] Master Gardner. Right? Like, and Schrader is like, I mean, like the epitome, of course, being Schrader's exorcist movie, where he's like, Studio, do you like what I made? This like very quiet throne. And they're like, is anyone even going to get exorcised? Are there demons? Where's the blood? Not only that, they're like, we need to establish a new way of telling you we don't like your movie. I also feel like for the first movie to un-exist. For Schrader, I feel like he made that weird move towards the mainstream when... Boy.

[00:44:47] No, this is serious. Yeah. He made that move towards the mainstream. This is very serious. When he was fighting the turtles under the dock. Of course. And then the dock fell on him and the ooze fell on him. Right. And then he became Super Schrader. Super Schrader. Yeah. That was a pretty mainstream sellout move to become Super Schrader. Yeah. That's... What if the turtles had said that? Like, ugh, you're selling out. Like Super Schrader's coming at them. This is so mainstream of you. What if the movie was like, yeah, the Ninja Turtle movies are good,

[00:45:16] but why are they fighting Paul Schrader? He's just like, God is real! God is dead! He's just screaming about God. But look, Paul Schrader's had a lot of ups and downs in his career, right? Sure. There was like, you know, the kind of like 90s period where he wasn't like financeable and he went back in time to feudal repair. To find the Ninja Turtle. Sure. Which wasn't a great decision. That cost him. And then eventually, you know, he goes back in the shadows. But then he came out of the shadows.

[00:45:45] He came out of the shadows. Look, Schrader says that his idea was for a modern-day Saint Paul named Saint Paul Van Owen, who is the debunker. He's still got that concept, but then he has his own encounter. And basically, Schrader says like, the only thing, like the idea of the mountain, like the sort of, like that was in my idea. So like that, Spielberg used that. But then he says, what I had done was write a character with the resonances of Lear, a Shakespearean tragic hero. And Steven couldn't get behind that.

[00:46:15] I said to him, I refuse to send off to another world as the first example of Earth's intelligence, a man who wants to go and set up a McDonald's franchise. And Spielberg said, that's exactly who I want to send. But that's right. That's the other thing. We had this instructive ideological disagreement where Schrader's like, no, it should be a modern Lear. And Spielberg's like, no, it should be like a guy in a flannel shirt. Like this is a Frank Capra thing. I want an every man. But there are two big things that come out of that, right?

[00:46:40] One is Schrader makes this film where it's like a man's looking for meaning in like the response from the skies and the aliens. And then he finds that he has to come in to terms with the spiritual crisis inside himself, that that's the answer. Spielberg's like, I don't want to make that, but you're right. This should be more of a spiritual thing. Like I want it to actually be about the aliens and not the guy. But that's the advance that gets made. Right. And then the second advance is he's making these films. He's going through these scripts and these story ideas.

[00:47:07] Where it's someone who has a role that is integral to the interaction between humans and UFOs. Someone who works for the government in some capacity or this or that. And he's like, no, it should just be some guy. There's this sort of like contagion like thing of this where it's just like make the movie about just people experiencing this. I also feel like conspiracy stuff on the edges like the missing. Well, that's the contagion. Exactly. To me.

[00:47:37] I feel like this is also the first. This is a total just me, my own taste here. But I think it's the first Spielberg that we see Spielberg diving into the self to make a movie. And it's not a capital M movie. It's him being like, I there's. I mean, we can get into all of them. But you know, the three screenplay credits he has on his own films. What are they? Close Encounters, AI and Fablemans. Right.

[00:48:05] Like something's very instructive about those being the three. Well, I also later I want to go over. I have a whole Spielberg theory of look, the types of movies. The thing about those three credits is with Close Encounters, he says, look, I only wrote it because I couldn't find anyone who wanted to write it the way I wanted to write it. So I had to do it myself. But no, there is no doubt that many, many people worked on this script. Hal Barwood and Matthew Robbins from Sugarland Express, John Hill, David Geiler, Jerry Belson,

[00:48:30] Schrader like and Schrader and Julie Phillips in her memoir says that she kind of put pressure on people to back off re arbitration. Schrader says, I withdrew from credit arbitration, which I regret because like I would have made a lot of fucking money if I had my name on that thing. But it is Spielberg's script. Like, I think everyone who worked on it will still say like it's his script. Whereas AI, it's like. And everyone who worked on it kind of helped him get there. Right. Exactly. Right.

[00:48:56] AI, it's like, well, that's kind of Kubrick's movie and Spielberg like puts it together, makes it work. And that's why he gets the credit, I guess. Babelman's, he wrote it with Eric Roth, right? Or. With Tony Kushner. Tony, sorry. That dank ass Kush. But I think the commonality between those three films is it feels like with all three of them, even though AI is starting with someone else's material, it's like there's a feeling of what I want to capture here that I cannot figure out. And I can't tell someone how to get there. Right. Like usually I can, but.

[00:49:23] Usually I can hire someone and give them a very clear like marching order. Those. Close encounters in AI feel like there's some form of therapy of him just needing to like pull something out to get it there. And then Fableman's is him like hiring Tony Kushner to be like, this one's so painful. I need you to literally sit on the other. I'll tell you the stories. Right. And help me like get this out. Distill it. Right.

[00:49:45] I feel like it is no secret that Steven Spielberg's divorce that he experienced as a child. Mm-hmm. He got divorced young, like five, six. Yeah. Uh, had an impact on the types of stories he was telling. And I think you can go through and pick out the films in Spielberg's careers that are in some way reckoning with that element of his life. And I think. What are the ones you would pick? Okay. Go ahead. I made my list. Yeah. I have to look at it. I want to see if I agree. Okay.

[00:50:15] I think close encounters is the first obvious one. Right. ET. Oh yeah. Is that one? Is that one present in that one? Poltergeist. Sure. I mean, not. Goonies. Boo. Empire of the sun. Yeah. Yeah. A little bit at least. Last Crusade. Yeah. Sure. Hook. Jurassic Park. To some extent. Saving Private Ryan. Where's that one? Where's the divorce in that one? I think. I think there is a. A lot of people get divorced from their lives on Omaha Beach. And I think.

[00:50:44] I think that is the melding of the two versions of it. Because it's about this feeling of sense of self and family and being alone. And that, that, that, the fantasy of, of rescue. Yeah. Sure. I mean, it's a movie I love to think about in that way. The amount of his films that in some way deal with the separation of parent and child. The world. Or like, yeah. Creation of new family units. Things like that. Saving Private Ryan has that thing of like the government intervening and being like, we can't. This family cannot be destroyed.

[00:51:14] This mother a fourth time. AI. Yeah. Yeah. War of the worlds. Yeah. And the family. Yeah. He kind of takes a divorce break after war of the worlds. Maybe he's even like Jesus. Enough with this. But also, I want to be clear. Eh. That is not a criticism. No. I think I, I am someone that believes that when. It's a little bit in Lincoln. A little bit of that in Lincoln. Yeah. Yes. I think when artists tell the same stories or have the same themes recurring in their

[00:51:41] work, it's often that's levied as a criticism of his. And I'm like, that's what I think is interesting. Cause it means there was something there. Like, and, and the. It's the thing that annoys me about like YouTube accounts that are like, um, he kind of redoes the same stuff where I'm like, yeah, you're talking about an artist. Like. Also, it's even Spielberg. Like he's done it in such wildly different ways. And it's been seen by so many people. Right. He's not just making like autobiography every time. Right. And that's what I think is interesting is it's like, oh, he's going to make his Peter Pan movie.

[00:52:09] And it's like, well, it actually ends up being about this theme. He's going to make his movie about rope. Well, it's. And it all gets pulled back towards the magnetic core of these things that he's trying to work out unconsciously. Like. In my assumptions. Yeah. Analysis of his work in like the seventies, eighties, even through the nineties is just like, man, this guy really never got over his parents getting divorced, which I think was a, a, a very fun thing for people to try to like. To notice. Yes.

[00:52:36] But also it's just like, I guess, you know, in the same way that he was like the first generation of filmmakers who were raised on TV and shit like this, you know, that he represented these cultural shifts. It's like divorce was becoming more commonplace. He's one of the first major filmmakers who was able to make personal films, go through an experience like that. It felt sort of novel. Whereas today you'd be like a lot of people get divorced. What are you talking about? But, but we now look back on it and you're like over the years, more and more details

[00:53:05] came out where it's like, it's not like what fucking shook him to his core is just that like his mom and dad stopped being married. Like all the weird wrinkles and the things that I think you see in like close encounters him trying to work through, which is like, why did my dad like leave and kind of never reengage with us? You know, which he ultimately comes to realize as an adult was like a combination of shame and protectiveness and whatever. The mother's reputation for the kids. But at the time the shit like in close encounters where he's just like, I would never make that movie that way today.

[00:53:35] I'd never have him just leave his fucking kids behind. I think that's what's so interesting about this movie. And that comes from a place in his journey with all of that where he's just like, this is what it looked like to me. Like my dad just got fucking like walked onto a spaceship and I don't fucking know what was driving him. It made no sense. What was pulling him out of the house? I also think there's a universality to that feeling beyond the street is called universal. Yeah. And this is a Columbia Columbia picture. So there's more of a Columbia. Columbia.

[00:54:03] That's actually pretty foolish of you to say when you've read two books on the movie. I think there's a Columbia alley to to these films, though, where it's not just about I did that as a critic. I'm like, this is a Foxy movie. He's like, you mean it was released by Fox. Yeah, it's Foxy. This thing is this thing. It's not too late to start doing that. Good. You're just going back to work now. I know. Ending your paternity leave. I'll do that with the two Fox movies a year or whatever. Whatever we're going to get. Yeah. Yeah. You should call it a complete unknown. Bustin through the lion's gates.

[00:54:35] Locks shattered. Locks shattered in the lion's gates. The lions are out. There's a universality to it. Beyond it being his personal experience, these movies all touch the zeitgeist in a major way because these feelings of child parent dynamics and feeling alone or the world feeling out of control and feeling small and large at the same time are things that are universal. So even if it's coming from a place that is a specific core feeling of his, I think

[00:55:05] what? David said Columbia again. It's such an easy joke. It's not. It's barely a joke. That's why it's easy. I think it's really funny if we say it a couple more times. No, I think you're right. And there's something interesting. I don't know. This like really worked for me on this rewatch. It's a great movie for like melancholy people in their 30s as well. And also people who are dealing with who think too much about the state of the modern blockbuster.

[00:55:33] Not that this movie was a traditional blockbuster, but you watch it and you're like, this was a gigantic movie, right? I imagine. Huh? What the sting was that? The state of the modern blockbuster. I think David, I think they're in most states. It's not bad. And I appreciate you trying to jab me back. But I don't know. I think we could do better. You think Craven's only playing in Oklahoma? No, it's playing all 50 nifty United States. You know, you're just watching it.

[00:56:02] This contemplative movie that's mostly kind of a bummer. And, you know, it's so boring to say, but they wouldn't make it like this. But this is what's so fascinating about I mean, like blank. Maybe the check wasn't blank. Right. But like he has a certain control of the checkbook at this point. He's going through this development process in the wonderkin state of just like this kid's got a lot of potential. We're willing to hear him out. He's got these two producers supporting him who then immediately win best picture. So that gives him extra force.

[00:56:32] Right. But in this pre Jaws era, he's like, fuck, can't put my finger on what it is. Revolving door of writers. My vision's too big for the budget. I don't know. I'm frustrated. They hand me Jaws. Jaws is a blockbuster. Then he goes back and it's like, I'm ready to make this my next movie. I now have Columbia is like wetting their lips. They're like, fuck, we lucked out. We got the next Spielberg blockbuster. And he's like, I don't want to make it like a kind of blockbuster thing. And they're like, please make Jaws with aliens. Right.

[00:57:01] And he then like has this new confidence to be like, I'm really going to get into my feelings. Well, so let me get back to the dossier. So he meets this guy, Dr. J. Allen Heinck. Yep. Heineck. From Northwestern. Hey, Chicago boy. Yeah. Evanston, but still, you know, who I guess is sort of an inspiration for like this kind of debunker character they were originally going to do. He's the one who has the three kinds of encounters, right?

[00:57:30] The first, second, second, third kind that Spielberg uses for the title. Good title. Because up until that point, I would still watch the skies. Yeah. Which is fine. Or Schrader's movie that was called whatever, like St. Paul Reborn or like, you know, jerking off onto the cross or whatever Schrader had submitted. Close Encounters of the Third Kind is just such an evocative title that also is so mysterious for you to explain that to me. And the tagline is what you read where it's just like a tagline being like, let me tell you what this is. Well, it's kind of intriguing.

[00:57:59] I also read that they had to originally, it was Watch the Skies, then Close Encounters of the Third Kind. And then the Northwestern guy was like, that's my thing. Close Encounters of the Third Kind. You can't use it. And that's when Spielberg and the Prussian were like, well, what if we pay for the rights to your book and then you come work on the thing? And he's like, okay, I'll do that. Right. Classic Hollywood style. Yeah.

[00:58:27] So, obviously Steven Spielberg is like, well, I had such a good time working with my friend Richard Dreyfuss. He'll be the lead of my movie. Not at all. Easy. He had told Richard Dreyfuss on the set of Jaws, like, here's a movie I'm, you know, working on. And Richard Dreyfuss spends the whole time on Jaws when he's not, I guess, being like, I'm sunburned and this sucks and fuck you. He's like, I want to do that movie. I'm your guy for that movie. I'm your guy for the joke. But Spielberg is like, no, you're Hooper and Jaws. Like, so I can't think of you as fucking another, you know, another character.

[00:58:56] Which we'll talk about this in the Raiders episode. But like, Lucas had the same thing of like, I don't want to be reusing the same guys. I think part of that is probably once again, this sort of new kind of auteurist generation as much as they adored people like John Ford and Howard Hawks and whatever, we're probably like a little weary of being like, we don't want to be in a factory line where we're making four movies a year and working with the same star and some of them mush together.

[00:59:25] No, but I think the other thing is Steven Spielberg and George Lucas, et cetera. And because Steven Spielberg's first choice of the part was Steve McQueen. I think he's like, I want to work with the movie stars that I fucking love. Like, I'm hot stuff. Right. Can I have Steve McQueen, please? Yeah. And Steve McQueen. I have Richard Dreyfuss at home. Literally. He's on my couch. He won't leave. Exactly. Steve McQueen reads the screenplay and then agrees to meet with him. And they meet at a bar called the Dune Room. And there was a fist fight apparently and Steve wanted to break it up.

[00:59:52] And I assume Steve had like a kind of a cool coat on and maybe smoke some grass and was like, hey, your script's cool. Which Steve? You're saying Spielberg had a cool coat on with smoking crap? I'm sure Spielberg was a dork. I'm sure that's what you're saying. McQueen. I mean, and like, it's so fast, you know, and McQueen is basically like, I can't cry like on film. Yeah. I just am not going to be able to play this character. Like I'm, there's a, you know, there's a self-awareness with McQueen, I think, which

[01:00:19] is always true where he's just like, I can really just do what I do. You're not going to, you know, chisel away at me and somehow get me to turn into a new kind of actor. What's interesting is also 1977, this same year, Sorcerer, which is William Friedkin's blank check movie coming off a big best picture win and such that studio really wanted Steve McQueen for that. And he put his foot down and was like fucking star of Jaws, Roy Scheider.

[01:00:49] And Friedkin always says that he regretted it, that he was just like, I thought Scheider was the right guy for the role. And Scheider is awesome in that movie. Incredible in that movie. But it is, it's interesting to imagine McQueen making a movie like that, be it Close Encounters or Sorcerer. Yeah, right. Like a new Hollywood movie. Because here's the thing, like Sorcerer is a new Hollywood movie that his type fits into. Yeah, that's not asking McQueen to do something outside of his movie star persona. Whereas Close Encounters wouldn't work.

[01:01:17] It would be a calamity if he were. It probably wouldn't work unless what if it worked? Wow. Cool to imagine. But yeah, it probably wouldn't. Sure. But I think that's an entirely different character. The script would have to be rewritten so thoroughly. Yeah. And also like, why are there talking cars in this universe would be the big question. Great point. Ka-chow. So Spielberg then goes to Dustin Hoffman. He goes to Al Pacino. He goes to Gene Hackman. He goes to a lot of like the new Hollywood people. Makes sense. They all turn him down.

[01:01:47] So finally, with his tail between his legs, he's like, you know what? Richard Dreyfuss is the modern Spencer Tracy and I'll just hire him. Because Dreyfuss this whole time is like ringing his doorbell. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Please, Steven. And, you know, Richard Dreyfuss is really good in this movie. He is phenomenal. Like, and obviously he wins the Academy Award this year for the Goodbye Girl, but it's a combo award. I never put that together somehow. Oh, really? Oh, sure. It makes his best actor win make a lot more sense when you consider this movie comes out in the same year and is such a blockbuster.

[01:02:17] The other thing that I, in looking at the Oscar year, couldn't believe was that this wasn't nominated for Best Picture. It wasn't. They gave the sci-fi spot to Star Wars. I really feel like that was it. Fascinating. Like, it was enough of a stretch for the Oscars to recognize one sci-fi movie in Best Picture. Yes. And it's going to be Star Wars. That thing is the global phenomenon of the year. That's what's wild is like in any... Spielberg gets the directing nod. Right. Whereas Jaws, they did the opposite. Jaws, they gave him like the blockbuster, look, your film was so big we have to give

[01:02:45] it a Best Picture nomination, but you're not serious enough for Best Director. And then this time they flip it. They don't give the Goodbye Girl, which got a Best Picture nom, they don't give Herbert Ross. You know, Spielberg comes in for Herbert Ross in director. Yes. But it's... But Herbert Ross was nominated for The Turning Point. He made two Best Picture movies that year. That's insane. That's why. That's why. That's why. No, it's very bizarre to me. There's a certain part of me that's like, you know, Annie Hall wins this year.

[01:03:13] People are like, Star Wars should have won. Not just because of modern cultural reappraisal of Woody Allen, but because... It's a whole winning... Oh, sorry, go on. No, but a lot of people go like, Star Wars was so transformative for the industry. There'd been no movie like that before, not just because of its success and what it pioneered technology, but that film is so culturally important. That feels like the more meaningful Best Picture win. I rewatched this last night. I'm like, this would have made sense as a Best Picture winner. It's also interesting that there's two sort of seminal sci-fi films that happen in

[01:03:42] the same year. But that fork the genre in totally different directions. Right. Like, one of them is just like, we're going total space opera, like childhood fantasy mythic. And the other one is like, this is the first real alien movie. You know, in its approach, they famously like wanted to swap their back end points on the movies because each guy was convinced that their movie was going to flop and the other guy had a hit. And they both had the feeling of like, they're not both going to work.

[01:04:11] Audiences are going to want one or the other. And it's insane that they both worked. And you're like, if Star Wars hadn't come out this year, Close Encounters would have been the highest grossing movie of all time. Is that right? Maybe. I mean, I think it outgrossed Jaws at the time. I don't think so. But it was a big hit. It made 116 million dollars. Jaws definitely made more than that. And like Exorcist and Godfather had as well, I think. Well, Close Encounters was humongous. It was a big movie. It was a big hit. But I just want to say about Annie Hall.

[01:04:40] Yeah, you know, not to say, but like that movie was also revolutionary. And like it's winning for the exact same reason. It's a revolutionary movie. Sure. And it's being recognized as such. Yes. And movies like that also didn't really win Best Picture. It's a crazy year. What were all the nominees that year? This is what's weird is it's like a couple seismic things and then a couple things that are so forgotten. Annie Hall. Star Wars. And then three, the Goodbye Girl, which is a bit of a strange thing.

[01:05:08] Stretch is a Best Picture nominee in my opinion, but was a huge hit comedy. Julia, which is like, you know, a solid Fred Zinneman, serious, based on a true story movie, World War II movie. You know, like that's, that's a, and then the turning point, the ballet movie with Anne Bancroft and Mikhail Baryshnikov, which got a ton of noms and no wins, you know, not as well remembered. But Julia, like a classic kind of 70s Oscar movie that just has disappeared a little bit. A lot of it forgotten.

[01:05:37] I think it's kind of hard to, I was going to say these days. I was going to say. Yes.

[01:06:07] Even if it's good. Um, but anyway, close in kind. Anyway, but, uh, he hires Dreyfus to, to finish that point. Uh, and then of course he had written the part, uh, of, um, Claude, Claude Lancôme for Francois Truffaut, one of his heroes. Yes. I don't know if it's a, uh, a hypocrite, but the, the story I had always heard was that Spielberg saw the wild child. Correct. And was like. One of the only movies that Truffaut had acted in before. Right. And was like, this actor's great.

[01:06:37] Writes a letter Truffaut and is like, I have a part for a Frenchman in my movie. Who is that guy? And he was like that. That's me. That's not. Well, uh, I've heard. I'll tell you that story, but Spielberg loves to kind of create. He's sort of. Heuter versions of stories. Yes. Um, he figured he was a little too scared to ask Truffaut is what he says here in the dossier at least. And so he writes it sort of thinking of Truffaut. Then he goes to Paris. He meets like. Sure. Depardieu and Philip Noirette and John Lee Trontignon, you know, all these, you know, guys.

[01:07:05] Uh, and before he's going to offer it to Trontignon and he's like, let me just, I'll just fucking do the Hail Mary. I'll just ask. And he sends Truffaut the script. And three days later, he gets a telegram that says, dear Mr. Spielberg, I read the script. Where do I report for costume fitting? Sincerely, Francois Truffaut. Cool. It is cool. It is cool. I love Francois Truffaut very much. One of the first directors I ever had a meaningful relationship with his mom.

[01:07:33] And it's very interesting having read the Bob Balbin diaries and hearing all this, like for everyone having Truffaut on set was like this. In a way, I also think what I was gleaning was that like Spielberg felt he had to be on top of his game because Truffaut was there. Yeah. Sure. Keeping him correct. Everyone was like, we have to really do good because Truffaut is here.

[01:07:59] And I was trying to think, is there a modern director? Who would be the modern director that isn't an actor, but that would act in something and people would be like, oh my God, can you believe? Scorsese. I mean, there's also like Sidney Pollack when he was sort of in his grand old man face. He's less of a totemic director. That's the thing. I think he's more respect. But I think having him on set. I think he has more had more of his own integrity as an actor and a little bit less as a director.

[01:08:28] But something like Michael Clayton, like I'm sure people are like, fuck, Sidney Pollack's here. But I think to some degree he's showing up and people are like, Sidney Pollack, God, he's a good fucking actor. Sure. Like he's a great director, but this guy's got an incredible resume just as a supporting actor versus Scorsese. If he's on set, you're like, this is fucking Scorsese, the king of movies. The Seth Rogen, there was a piece in Vanity Fair about the Apple Plus show that I guess will probably have come out by the time. Yes. That's about the collapse of the entertainment industry with Seth Rogen playing a studio executive

[01:08:58] and they got a lot of people to play themselves in Scorsese and he was just talking about that feeling of like we wrote a part for Scorsese. He agreed to do it. We're thrilled. He shows up on set. We were like, fuck. Now we have Scorsese on our set. Like he's going to be judging us. We have to do this correctly. And he was like, at one point I saw him in the corner and he was muttering to himself and I was like, is everything OK? And he was like, yeah, you were doing the wrong thing. And I didn't want to say it because I thought it might like infantilize you. So I just like held back and said to myself and then you guys came around and you figured

[01:09:28] out and you started doing the right thing. But like that exact experience of him just sitting there and being like, I'm just here to act. I'm not going to like weigh in. But they're like, we know he knows the answers. He's got it figured out. So this movie has just because we're billing boys. Some of the weirdest billing of all time in the opening credits, it is starring Richard Dreyfuss with Francois Truffaut as Lacombe and right. Those are the two names. Fascinating. Yeah.

[01:09:56] Which you just don't see that structure ever. And then on the poster, it's only marginally different, which is starring Richard Dreyfuss, also starring Terry Garr and Melinda Dillon with Francois Truffaut as Lacombe. Terry Garr. But the billing of this movie is like Richard Dreyfuss, one of the stars of Jaws, the man who's going to win best actor this year. And Francois Truffaut, we're putting multiple circles around his name. I mean, he's a weird kind of get. He's interesting. Terry Garr.

[01:10:26] Spielberg loved her in a coffee commercial. Melinda Dillon. They were like close to production and hadn't cast that role. And Hal Ashby had just worked with her on Bound for Glory and recommended her. And, you know, she turned out to be the perfect choice. I was. She gets an Oscar nomination. Balaban. Spielberg liked in Midnight Cowboy. Yeah, he's great in that. And he liked the idea of him with Truffaut. He was like, that's a funny team, like looks wise. Also, he spoke French, right? Uh-huh.

[01:10:56] Yeah. Of course, Bob Balaban speaks French. He speaks every romance. To be clear, JD's been referencing it. But Balaban kept diaries while he was filming largely about his experience just with Truffaut, but also being part of this major movie. And then those were published in the wake of this movie being a seismic blockbuster, which you read for this episode. Yeah. And then, to be clear, they have a $2.7 million budget. And as you mentioned, it went up to five and a half, and then seven, and then nine, and then 11 and a half.

[01:11:26] And it ends up at 19. Uh, and Columbia was basically like, if we had started at 19, the movie never would have been made. Yeah. Right? Like, we didn't have the money for that kind of movie. Like, that wasn't a thing. But also, Columbia was in a bad place, and this movie is so successful that it's credited with saving Columbia from the brink. Right. Uh, very interesting studio that's like, had weird peaks and valleys over the years. That was like, kind of like a trashy studio back in the day, and then there's, yeah, anyway. Uh, want to call out as well, uh, there's a great Douglas Trumbull quote talking about how overblown the budget got in this movie,

[01:11:56] where he's like, we had a $3 million budget just for special effects. You could make a whole movie with just that. And I'm like, I did the math on adjusting for inflation. In 1977 dollars, $3 million today would be $15 million. The notion of him saying like, it's insane how much we're spending on special effects. Well, since you've invoked him. Comedies have $15 million special effects budgets now. The Doug Trumbull at all. On the low end, yes. Is fascinating.

[01:12:25] So, one thing on that that was funny is that reading this one book, they were talking about how, um, when they're figuring out the budget for the special effects, they're like, how much will this cost? And he was like, I think it'll be like $6 million of special effects. Right. And the producer was like, she was like, no, you're gonna, you're gonna, you're gonna tell them it's $1 million because otherwise they won't approve it. And then later you're gonna tell them, oops, it costs more and we'll keep upping it. Yeah.

[01:12:52] And apparently she was like, this could end my career right now, but like, otherwise we won't get this done. Yes. So the fascinating thing also is Douglas Trumbull didn't want, he wanted to be doing his own stuff. He didn't want to be working on other people's films is what I, I glean from reading these books. This was always- Every Douglas Trumbull quote has that energy to it. But do you know why he ended up doing this movie? Why? It gets back to some blank check lore that is very wonderful that of course we're going full circle here.

[01:13:21] It's a fun show scan? Yes. Hell yeah. So, high frame rate shit, Ben. So, Lucas wanted Trumbull to do Star Wars. Yes. He was like, no, I'm all in on show scan, baby. Yeah. Then, Spielberg reached out and was like, hey, can you help? And he was like, no, I'm all in on show scan, baby. And then they were like, Spielberg was like, but we're shooting the film, the effects in 65 millimeter.

[01:13:50] Which, Trumbull was like, I need 65 millimeter equipment. I'll do your movie if I can keep the 65 millimeter stuff. And Spielberg's like, done. And so he was like, fine, I'll do it so I can steal that stuff for show scan. Show scan, Ben, is Douglas Trumbull's vision for- We definitely discussed on our funeral for frames. I'm sure we did. Yeah, but this is a decade of dreams. So it's time to look back. Decade of dreams. Just saying people want to listen to more.

[01:14:16] It was his, he had done studies and found that the audience's emotional reaction to film peaked when it was 60 frames a second. And he was like, at 24 frames a second, the audience's subconscious is aware that it's a movie and it distanced itself. And at 60 frames a second, they are most emotionally overwhelmed by cinema.

[01:14:40] And so he's like, cinema needs to be 65 millimeter, like IMAX, a little shorter than IMAX, and high frame rate. And this is his thing in the 70s. He is like, all in on this. This is like the most important thing. Because it's really what he's saying is like, it should hurt your head to watch a movie. It's not emotions. Because this is what, you know, Ang Lee or whatever, they're like, yes, yes, yes. And people are watching and they're just like, ah, but I just, I just love like throughout the history of cinema, there was these like Hellraiser.

[01:15:10] There's a guy. There's at least one guy trying to unlock the puzzle box of high frame rate. And everyone's like, no, we don't want this. And everyone's like this. These people are like, we have to try. It always ends the same way too. But this is what I love it. It's great. Oh, it's incredible. What's fascinating about it is that like when high frame rate does finally have its moment of experimentation in popular cinema, that is because of the digital conversion. Right? Like high frame rate film never becomes a fucking thing.

[01:15:38] There are like test things that Douglas Trumbull does that are screened like occasionally. You know, there are times it's used in like theme parks or whatever, but it like never works for narrative film like distribution and exhibition. He spends decades on this. Even when things are starting to go digital. He's like, I've come up with show scan digital. I'm going to be the guy who cracks it. He never ever cracks it.

[01:16:03] Douglas Trumbull is like the greatest special effects artist in history, maybe, or at least in the conversation. Basically, anytime he does something for hire for other people, it is like historic. He wins multiple Oscars. His career spans from like 2001 to the tree of life. He's like deeply like knowledgeable in every single form of how you could possibly approach visual effects. And yet anytime he's like offered a job, it's like, I don't want to be doing this. I have my own shit to work on and his shit.

[01:16:34] Nobody wants. No one wants his technology. And when he directs his own movies, people die. Like the balance between his career where he's just like, ah, these jobs taking me away from my work. And the jobs are 2001 Star Wars close encounters. And then his work is always like nonstarter. It's wild. It's a wild career. Uh, we love Douglas Trumbull. If there was something that I should check out of his work.

[01:17:01] I mean, most famously 2001 Space Odyssey. Yeah. I mean, it's like of his own work. Yes. None of it. Really? I mean, not to be rude, but it's like, it's experimentations. It's like odds and ends. Well, yeah, well, he is a, he is a great mind in problem solving and creative ways to do things. And I think his legacy is marked in the things that he helped make amazing. And not necessarily his own, his own works.

[01:17:29] Um, so, uh, the only thing about production that I want to emphasize that is kind of funny is like Spielberg's like this would have been a really tough and hard shoot, except I just made Jaws. So it seemed a lot easier. Yeah, right. Because the set didn't move around like on the water, you know, like, it's like I had already gone through Jaws. But there's this audacity to Spielberg that I really respect that I think he holds on to for a lot of his career, which is he's this young filmmaker who is like, no, we're going to build the biggest set that's ever been built.

[01:17:59] No, no, no, no, no. We're going to use effects that have never been done before. That is an audacious way to craft a career is to be like, I'm going to jump into the deep end on things that budgetarily and scale wise haven't been done before. And I'm just going to like assume it'll all work itself out. There's that. And I guess, you know, if it's not a blank check status, it's at least him sort of, I think, operating under the assumption that like I made Jaws.

[01:18:26] However poorly this goes, someone will hire me to do something after this. You know, like maybe they never give me this level of freedom again. Let me take the swing. Right. Absolutely. And there's like that, that new Hollywood sort of like part of it is this sort of like, hey, I'm just going to take this big old swing and I'm going to do this thing and I'm going to do this thing over like those guys all sort of trying to one up each other in terms of how audacious they can be.

[01:18:51] Another thing apparently Spielberg would do Relatable King is that him and Wilma Siegmund, the cinematographer. This movie's only Oscar or won an honorary. It won a sound effects editing honorary award back before they would like officially have that category. Right. And cinematography is only competitive. Yeah. Spielberg every night would see like one or two movies a night and like write down more ideas and sketch stuff and stuff. And interesting. I did notice that the UFOs look like the letterbox logo.

[01:19:19] And at one point, the original analog letterbox Spielberg is complaining about the schedule or something. And again, the old gaffer Earl Gilbert, my guy, you know, yeah, hand was like Spielberg. If you stop watching those fucking movies every night, we'd be on schedule. They shot in Mobile, Alabama, which I guess is they needed to control the weather and use this giant hangar.

[01:19:46] They had this giant like security detail and this massive set and these giant. I mean, there's no space big enough. Right. Exactly. And then they're originally just going to shoot that stuff in Mobile. And then they're like, well, if we're doing all these parts, why don't we just shoot the whole thing here? But then they do find Devil's Tower, Wyoming for the big location shoot outside that they realize they're like, we should do that on location. So it's weird that they found that late in a way.

[01:20:14] And then they like build the, you know, sculpturing and stuff around Devil's Tower, like having discovered it. Yeah. There was, I mean, there's a lot of fascinating aspects to this production. But another one is this, I mean, it still exists to this day, but these movies where people are sort of like making it up while they're in production. Right. Like they didn't know what the mothership was going to look like and they had a lot of different ideas. And then Spielberg sees this big like refinery in the San Fernando Valley. And it's like that, like, you know, big spokes and stuff.

[01:20:44] Or the refinery, I think, was when they were shooting the stuff in India. Yes. Well, I guess, yeah, he saw a refinery. But is it India only? And then he sees the San Fernando Valley and he like superimposes like, what if we had this structure on this structure? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But like, I mean, the ILM documentary gets into a lot of this. But like in this era, these guys, these directors would go to Trumbull where people like Trumbull and go like, here's what I'm thinking.

[01:21:13] After everyone else had said, that's impossible. I don't understand what you're saying. I don't know how I'd begin to approach that. And Trumbull's a guy who's kind of activated by like, I'm going to pioneer something new here. And they're figuring it out in real time. So there's like the whole process where like, let's hope this works. But no one has a concrete idea of how they're going to get there until it actually happens. Well, that's a part of this that I think is very interesting. is, I mean, we, sorry, I don't want to interrupt. No, no, go ahead.

[01:21:43] No, no, no, no. We've talked about how the core of this movie feels like it is about the childhood feeling of divorce and loss and confusion. Right. Family members acting rationally, you know, like, yeah. And watching the film now as an adult, right? I have a low opinion of our main characters. Especially Dreyfus. Especially Dreyfus. But also it's fun.

[01:22:11] Rewatching the scene of the abduction, the kidnapping of the child. I have this feeling where I'm like, she kind of gives up. There's like, there's not really a resiliency there. Like, like she, it's, as a kid, it felt like this scary thing where these aliens were stealing this boy. And then watching as an adult, you're kind of like, wait, she's kind of letting them. Like, it's, it's, the dynamic is different. It's, yes, I agree.

[01:22:41] It's fascinating also that when she's reunited with her son at the end, I think the first thing she says to him is something like, oh my God, I looked at her for you. Do you remember that? Did you see me looking for you? And so there's this like, she's like needing him to validate. Like, I didn't give up. Did you see mommy running after you? There's this like strange energy of these sort of delinquent or not resilient parents. That is like this theme of the film.

[01:23:06] And when you watch the movie through that lens, it's sort of like the first, you know, 70% of the movie feels like it is like what a divorce feels like, or what a family schism feels like from the POV of a child, where it's like adults acting strange, the home becoming an unstable place, yelling, arguing, people doing things I don't understand why. The home is no longer this like clean, safe place. Now it's infected with all of these things and ideas.

[01:23:36] And obviously the movie is this buildup to this like, you know, 25 minute super sequence that takes place at the top of Devil's Tower. And that's the showpiece of this whole movie. It all builds up to that and that has to work. But what's so fascinating is that reading about the making of and like the diaries and all of this stuff, as a viewer, that big finale on Devil's Tower, that is the film. That is what makes it, right? If that wasn't there, that whole first part of the movie, it would be not remembered as this great film.

[01:24:05] Not to diss this movie in comparison to Close Encounters. Close Encounters is tough, but Midnight Special, the Jeff Nichols movie, which is a very Close Encounters-y movie, right? Like it's also about disparate characters being linked to this weird, you know. Yeah, I also, I rewatched Super 8 last week. Obviously very Spielbergian. Yes, and I feel like that movie gets compared a lot to E.T. in particular and more of the Amblin-produced films and things like that. It's got the Child Adventures side.

[01:24:32] Right, but there's like a lot of Close Encounters in the structure of that movie, even if it's pushing more towards the nakedly child-perspective emotional stuff. But like Midnight Special is a movie where the, in my opinion, the ending is not spectacular enough. Or arresting enough or whatever. And that's why you exit kind of being like, I don't know if I'm going to remember that movie. Like interesting vibes. Right, Close Encounters absolutely delivers on the finale. You want to leave feeling ecstatic. But here's what's fascinating.

[01:25:01] Throughout the production of the film, Spielberg seemed not to have a vision. Right, what will that be? For that ending. Right. Like the joke is throughout the thing, Dreyfuss and Balbin and Truffaut are like, what are we looking at? And Spielberg's like, I don't know. I have no idea what the aliens look like, what the spaceships look like. There's all these things in the production of it where they change what the alien looks like like four different times, which is why in the final cut, there are like four different types of aliens. Because every time Spielberg's like, ah. Which I kind of like.

[01:25:31] Which I think is great. Yeah. It's funny because there's a making of documentary where he, I think it's a retcon. This is just my theory where he's like, well, you know, on Earth, we have all different types of races of people. And so I want to have the aliens. And I'm like, based on the production diaries. That's a stall. You kept changing what it was. That's a good justification delay. But I think it's so fascinating then that he is so dead set on this film and has such

[01:25:57] a clear vision for it, except for the thing that he seems to actually care least about is the aliens, the spaceships, what that all is, how that works, because the core of it to him is this human experience. The ending rocks, but the ending is not plot heavy or like it's nothing really happens in the ending that's like, and now everyone's everything's been totally explained because I don't think it was just like the aliens are real. Here they are. And they had abducted the guys.

[01:26:26] And good news. They're nice. They seem pretty nice. This movie is better for Spielberg not having gone through therapy at this point in his life. Like everything that's interesting about this movie is him like trying to translate something that he can't even totally justify. Well, that's that's my scorching hot take here is that based on everything that I've read and seen of this, I don't think he was ultimately not compelled by the aliens or any of the stuff. He was compelled by all of the buildup to that. And that was the story that he wanted to tell.

[01:26:55] And this was kind of like what he knew as a storyteller he had to deliver on. But it didn't feel like it actually that didn't come from his heart and soul the same way the rest of it felt. But the weird part of it is like, well, OK, so the movie that, you know, the real like incubation point for this as an idea is the meteor shower experience with his father. Right. And like capturing something that felt the way that felt to him as a child on screen, which part of that is like, could I make this happen visually? Could I, you know, whatever.

[01:27:24] So there it starts there. Right. And then he goes through so much wrestling of like, what is the story around this? And then the story he lands on that only he ultimately can like really wrestle into a script is something that then means more to him to the end than the ending. Ben, just to clarify, wishful Ben Hosley, Decade of Dreams. That's the nickname we're going for with for this episode. Just to jump ahead. This movie comes out in 1977. It's a huge hit. Columbia Pictures really wants a sequel. He does not want to do it. He plays around with it.

[01:27:53] He's just like, leave it where it is. Right. But he was like, I still have some regrets about the movie. And there's some shit I didn't film that I wish we could have because the schedule and budget. And there's some changes I'd want to make in editing and some things with the characters I dislike now. Would you give me money to do a special edition and you can re-release it? Which was the first time that ever happened. It's the sort of invention of that. He created the thing. Right. So they give him money. He goes back, does additional shooting like two years later, a year later.

[01:28:22] I think comes out 1980. Right. He kind of says like, I really wasn't finished with the movie. It is 1980. Right. And the trade-off is we'll give you the money to do this and we'll put it back in theaters and all of that allow you to recut it. But part of it is you have to use some of this budget to do more crazy effect shit. We want to go inside the spaceship. And that's like the marching orders from Columbia. Interesting. So then they shoot this new footage that's even crazier effect shit. Right. They put that in theaters. It makes a lot more money. It gets good reviews.

[01:28:53] That's the version circulation for a while. They must have just saw the original cut. The main one now is the director's cut. So then over time, Spielberg is like, I regret that. I wish we hadn't gone inside the spaceship. It removes some of the mystery for me. And then in the 90s. What does he do in the ship? He just stands there and you just see cool set stuff. It's I'll pull it up. You fine. The effects are incredible. It looks good. It looks amazing. I've I've been on the record saying I want to get abducted. Of course.

[01:29:23] Like I'm dying. But you're not going to because you're putting it out there. You know what I mean? You want it too bad. You got to play hard to get. I want it too bad. You want too bad. But it is the thing where I'm like, then what happens when you get on the ship? What do you do? Do they serve you lunch? I don't think so. I think you're lunch. So Ben, in the 90s, he's like, I'm still not happy with it. Going inside the ship was a mistake. Some of my reshoots were a mistake. There are things I cut out. I wish I could put back in.

[01:29:48] And he gets Sony for an anniversary to let him do his final director's cut. That is a mashup of the two. He resets some things back from the theatrical. He takes out some of the extra stuff, notably the inside of the spaceship. That is the version that mostly exists in circulation now. And he says like that's as close to a finished version as I... The 4K, I think maybe the Blu-ray has this feature as well. I know the iTunes version has this.

[01:30:14] If you buy it, they have a feature called a view from above where you can actually compare the three versions through branching timelines. And it like makes an interactive thing of like explaining to you this shot shorter, this here. You can just watch the clips, compare them all, whatever. The point of all of this is there's this part of Spielberg that was just like, fuck, I didn't... What is... I can't... Like for decades after this movie still being like, what's the thing I didn't quite get at, right?

[01:30:40] And a lot of these changes go back and forth of like, I think I didn't make this guy likable enough. I didn't justify his obsession or the dissolution of the family or why he leaves or all this stuff. The big scene he adds in the special edition that then is carried over is this fight that he... Terry Garr and Richard Dreyfuss have in the shower where she comes in, he's like muttering to himself.

[01:31:05] And she's trying to break through to him and the kids are screaming because he was like, it was too abrupt before that he's just building the thing in the home. And she's just like, I'm fucking out of here. And he doesn't chase after them really, you know? He's like freaking out, but he lets it happen and doesn't follow up with them ever again. And he was like, I need this scene where Terry Garr's trying to break through. And he's sort of transparently saying like, I don't know, I don't know what's going on with me. He felt the need to explain to make this guy more likable.

[01:31:32] And I'm like, the whole thing that's interesting about this movie is that this guy's annoying. But also that I think... I viewed this film the same way as a child. This is a movie about the anxiety of the family falling apart, right? Being taken away, all of this sort of shit. Now I think this movie is about being a grownup and not knowing how to be a grownup. Like that is the commonality between these characters. That is the thing that Spielberg's commenting on. And he's talked about that it wasn't until E.T. and his experience working with the kids on E.T.

[01:32:01] That he was like, huh, I actually think I could maybe be a parent. But up until that point, he was like, I will never have kids. And part of that is I think he's like, my parents fucked me up. It's the divorced kid thing. I don't want responsibility. I just want to like... And I don't want to fuck my kids up, my imaginary kids up. There's that. But the other part of it is he's like, I want to be part of the circus. I want to make movies. I want to go around and I don't want to be tied down to shit, right? That part of Spielberg is like really big in this movie.

[01:32:31] This kind of like sad, lonely kid who isn't over like what happened to his family when he was young, but also doesn't know how to be a grownup at the present tense. And it's just like, let me just like fucking make stuff and like go on adventures and just sort of like follow the light and see what happens. That part of it's really interesting to me. And the other thing that kept coming up, I was reading, came upon this in either of the books you read, J.D., but that he talked about when he was trying to find this movie to people,

[01:32:58] he kept citing When You Wish Upon a Star. Yeah. And he was like, I want to make a movie that is the way that song feels. Yes. That he was just like, I'm not literally trying to interpret anything from that, but there is like a feeling of like there's something magical, but something also deeply sad and wistful in that song. And I want the entire movie to have this tone. And in the three cuts, he's like changing how much he directly points at When You Wish Upon a Star.

[01:33:25] In a theatrical cut, like Neary is introduced with a music box of Pinocchio playing the song. And then he's arguing with his kids that we should go see Pinocchio because Pinocchio is being re-released. It would be magical. Right. And in that first version, the test screening, the end credits played over When You Wish Upon a Star. And the audience laughed and he was like, I got to my back. Too cheesy, too cheesy. Right. It's just funny that AI, the next movie he writes. Of course. So is, you know, Blue Fairy and Pinocchio.

[01:33:53] But then the special edition, the footage when he's inside the ship is orchestrated with John Williams' version of When You Wish Upon a Star. Like there was this thing of him looking back to this, what was clearly like a seismic movie for him as a child that activated something in him emotionally that he could not quite process and that he's just telling everyone, make a movie the way this song feels. And they're like, the way it feels to you, bro. I hate the mothership sequence. Wow.

[01:34:21] I hate it because I really... Wait, the sequence inside the ship? Oh, sorry. Because I really... Yeah, what if I was like, I hate the end of this movie. I was like, that's a wild... No, him going in because to me it is like, he makes an incredibly selfish decision. It's the kind of, this is kind of an ultimate boomer movie in that way. Of like the fantasy of like, what if I just fucking did get in the spaceship and left? And what if the military gave me permission? Yeah, right. I get permission. What if it's triumphant that I do this? What if the government says it's good that I go away from my family?

[01:34:51] Which is Truffaut saying I end you. Another thing, it's telling. Exactly. Telling about... What if Francois Truffaut gives me permission to leave my family forever? Yeah. Like it's so telling of his mindset at the time. Yeah, exactly. Of like kind of forgiving a person for doing that or trying to understand why they would do it. Um, and then like just seeing Dreyfuss in the ship going like, you know, while you see a bunch of cool shit. I'm like, no, he needs to vanish. And it's like, we just don't know. His line was always, it takes away the mystery. It does. He's right.

[01:35:22] Good, good eventual realization. This is the thing with Spielberg. This is the one movie he fucks with a lot. And then when he... The only one. No. E.T. When he fucks with E.T. Which is when George Lucas is sitting in the bathroom with his special edition, you know, pills being like, come on, Steve, do some special editions. And he does the E.T. special edition. It's like, worst mistake I ever made. Yeah. Why did I fuck with that movie? This is that weird scene where E.T. says, my clunky. And then shoots it in my head. Like, the E.T. special edition stinks.

[01:35:50] And Spielberg, to his credit, is like, I never should have done it. And I'll never do shit like that again. I agree. But what I'm saying is... Don't they have, like, E.T. like running and stuff? Yeah. And there's an extra sequence with CGI. And of course, he changes the guns to flashlights and all this shit where it's like, no, don't mess with your movie. But that's, like, Close Encounters, he kept going back to because he felt unsettled. Right? The difference with E.T. was he was sort of like, I guess this is the thing to do now. And he tries it. That's what I'm saying. Lucas is like, do it. Do it. And then immediately is like, wrong. No.

[01:36:19] Whereas Close Encounters, there is a part of him where he talks about today where he's like... It's unfinished. You know what? Yeah. I'm not going to futz with it anymore. The director's cut is probably the closest I'll ever get. But there are parts of this movie that still irk me. What if you do it, reshoot now with Dreyfuss now, and Dreyfuss gets to just kind of talk about issues? What if it's... Five minutes of Dreyfuss to the camera. It's just a bunch of these aliens sitting in a little, like, alien theater, like, sitting in their seats.

[01:36:48] They're kind of like, you can tell they've been, like, here for a while and they don't want to. And just Dreyfuss monologuing to all of them. And then it's on the ship. And he's just been... About woke culture. He's just been going on and on. You can tell all the aliens are uncomfortable. Right. And then Spielberg is, like, dragged on stage uncomfortably. And Dreyfuss is like, the shark didn't work. And Spielberg's like, I don't know why I'm doing this. This is crazy. I don't know why I'm in the spaceship now. Close Encounters of the Third Kind, though. We're talking so much about the big sequences.

[01:37:18] And I love this movie. I think it's a five-star movie. I agree. I think it's a great movie. I agree. But it is one of those movies where when you watch it again, you're like, oh, yeah, this scene. Right. We're setting up an air of mystery. Oh, and there's another one of these. Oh, and then there's another one. It's like, there's nothing wrong with those scenes. But once you've seen the movie and you know where it's going, you're kind of like, yeah, I get it. The plane is missing. Yeah. You know, okay. You know. See, I felt differently. And I had this experience. This is going to be the wildest comparison of movies.

[01:37:48] Is that me and my friend recently rewatched Eight Mile. Okay. A movie I probably haven't seen in 20 years. I haven't seen since it came out. Okay. The funny thing about Eight Mile is there's like two or three scenes that you remember. And then there's like 80% of the movie that you're like, oh, isn't most of the movie just kind of them hanging out like and well, it's like each other's balls and stuff.

[01:38:10] It's a weird local politics kind of class struggle. In my memory, it's a good movie. I love movies. I think movies are great. But it's so funny because I had that feeling watching this a little bit where it was like, oh, right. This scene. Oh, I forgot that there's all of this. Eight Mile is kind of like Saturday Night Fever where you're like, oh, it remembers this iconic thing that was triumphant. We all loved it. We had a great time.

[01:38:39] There are three scenes and images that get replayed all the time and parodied. And then you're like all the movie in between. Everyone forgets what it actually is. It's just like people arguing with each other and shit. Yeah. Here's what I'll say, though. Because I don't. My opinion is not that Close Encounters is Eight Mile. I actually, all the scenes that I was like, oh, right. I really like in Close Encounters. I like the buildup. I think the buildup is interesting. I like it too.

[01:39:04] And I found myself recognizing in the buildup of Close Encounters what a wonderful, amazing filmmaker Steven Spielberg is. And he does specific things so well that no one else does at all. And I say, I think a lot of them are on display in Close Encounters in a really amazing way. What are some moments that you're thinking of? I like when the spaceship goes, da, da, da, ba, ba. Have you mentioned that part? I've heard of that part. I've heard it's helped.

[01:39:33] And that's what I'm thinking of. I like when Truffaut eats a big plate of snails. No, he doesn't do that. It'd be funny if you did, though. I'm just trying to think of a French thing for him to do. I like when Truffaut and Dreyfuss touch fingers and they glow. Okay, so I think here, I had some notes written down that I'll pop open. There's things that I love about Spielberg and things that are very Spielberg-y things.

[01:39:56] So number one is the opening sort of like prologue scenes are very Spielberg. And I like them a lot where it's like you're learning about the lore of extraterrestrials. Extraterrestrials. Missing flights and the bombers and the Bermuda Triangle and stuff. And it's done in a very Spielberg-y way. It's these tricks that he does over and over again. He does the thing where it's someone speaking in a foreign language and they're clearly worked on about something.

[01:40:24] Then the translator turns and is like, he says that they come from this. You know, whatever. That seems really cool. No selling. But that's a trick. That's a trick that Spielberg does constantly. Yes. Where it's like someone's explaining something and someone like very dramatically like sums up what they're saying. Not just is it. Not only is it a trick he does. It's a trick that people then copy so much like over the years. And even just like, I feel like people still try to replicate the feeling of Spielberg family

[01:40:54] scenes in this era where he gets like the chaos of a house full of handfuls and like beleaguered stressed out parents. Like the second you get into the Neary household and it's just like everyone yelling at the same time, you know? Which E.T. is like that too. And I remember as a kid being kind of, again, kind of disturbed by it being a little too real. Like, because I'm watching these movies because I'm a kid and kids are allowed to watch these movies. Right. Because it's like, well, Steven Spielberg, you know, but mostly the movies I watch do

[01:41:22] not have that sort of sort of close to realism to, you know, Disney movies read something from the sight and sound. When I was talking earlier about this movie, almost at times feeling like sort of verite. Yeah. And obviously there is the Spielberg like big emotionality, but the moments like Truffaut with the plane out in the desert, you know, like shit like that feels like classically Spielberg what we see for the rest of his career. And then there are other parts of it in like the human drama of this movie that feel very different.

[01:41:49] His quote from sight and sound the year this movie came out, the months leading up to its release. This movie is more like the French connection as brutally realistic within a dramatic storytelling structure. I think our film does to UFOs with the French connection set about crime in the streets and narcotics in New York City. It's more of a movie than it is a film. Really? It's quite entertaining. It's about people and not events, but it's about people who are innocent until they are ensnared by the event and then have to rise above it.

[01:42:15] I don't think that's an apt, you know, I don't think I think he's maybe wrong in a way. Still wasn't quite clear about the movie. But that's Spielberg. But I also think what Spielberg is trying to do there a little bit probably is trying to be like this. FYI, this is not going to be an adventure movie. Like, guys, guys, I'm warning you. It's not going to end with the alien coming out and giving a monologue on humanity's purpose. You know, like he's just trying, I guess, to be like, no, no, no, it's more grounded.

[01:42:43] It's more grounded now saying that and then being like, it's like one of the most grounded, you know, then that's maybe a mistake. But I was watching it and I was like, aside from the key, obviously, like incredibly Spielberg-y movements, I was like, what is the movie this is reminding me of watching it? And I was like, oh, the answer is it feels at times like an Alan Pakula movie. Yeah, sure. Elements of it being a sort of like just the facts process. This is how it played out where it does almost feel like this movie is a like dramatic retelling

[01:43:13] of how things really happened. Right. Like this is a ripped from the headlines movie four years after there was a UFO encounter. But then the Spielberg thing is like that he's like, well, no, that but also that it's like, so what happened? It's like what happened was the aliens were so nice and we had this moment of transcendent, beautiful communication with them. And it was great. Goodbye. Like, you know, it's like you're like, wait, what? It's so weird. There's no guns. It's like weird.

[01:43:43] But there's no violence. No, it's super cool. But it's like, it's like crazy. To see it? Yes. I had never seen this movie before. Did you watch it last night? Oh, you'd never seen it before. I would have thought maybe just because I know your dad's kind of like a, sci-fi head or whatever. And you love UFOs. I don't think my parents want to encourage the abduction stuff. To your point, Ben. Running around in cornfields. Was this a lifelong obsession of being abducted?

[01:44:08] To your point, Ben, there is a quote in the dossier from Spielberg talking about how miffed he is that he's never had a UFO encounter. Much like you. But he's just like, can you believe I'm the one guy who's never had fucking- I really deserve it. Yeah. He said, I deserve it. Yeah. You know? He does. He deserves it. Wait, so Ben, what did you think? Yeah. There's no guns. There's no threat. They're not like planning to like somehow use the technology like to kill people and cause harm. It's like-

[01:44:38] They just want to play the piano. No, I know. How much did you know about it going into watching it? Not very much at all. But did you know like the music? Did you know like the- No. No. I didn't know. Fascinated at all. This is what I'm saying. I do think this movie has a little less cultural hook, you know, than it did 20 years ago. But it did for- Yeah, it did for 25, 30 years. Definitely less cultural hook than hook. Well, certainly. Good point. I'm trying to find- Which is the other movie you wanted to do on this show?

[01:45:05] We said Spielberg and you said Close Encounters or Hook. You got bumped for- Well, you didn't get bumped. You said two movies. Well, you texted us and said, I can't believe I'm being bumped. I wasn't going to bring any of this up. No, it's fine. This is y'all bringing this up. Because Hook is being discussed on episodes before we get to Hook. And you're a Hook. You're pro-Hook, right? I'm pro-Hook. Hook was a- There was a few movies that I watched a lot as a kid. Right. You're the perfect age for Hook. Yeah. Labyrinth is a movie that I watched like, you know, every week, I would say.

[01:45:35] I don't see that movie in your current like interests or obsessions at all. That's weird. Yeah. Yeah. And then Hook was another one that I watched a ton of times and I loved and I still have a fondness for. And it's, it was only as an adult that I realized that people are like, Hook is a bad movie. And that was like a shocker to me. I mean, I think for you, it's like when we had Emma Stefanski on about Treasure Planet and she was like, I didn't realize this movie was a bomb. Right. Like, you know, it's like there's generations where they're just like, oh, I just grew up watching that movie. It was fun. It was great.

[01:46:02] And then I'm a grown up and people are like, you know, that movie was of disappointment. Right. Yeah. And so Hook was near and dear to me. And it's something that I think is often maligned. And so that's why. But now more below. Is it? I think so. Is it coming back around? I think your generation, our generation has dredged it higher. Throwing out the Spielberg spreadsheet to people, possible guest ideas. Like four or five people lined up and were like blank or Hook. I love Hook. Give me the Hook. I'm ready to defend Hook.

[01:46:32] Maybe partially knowing that David and I dislike it. We certainly talked over the years about how we're not as pro-Hook. Now, I'm not pro-Hook because he's a dread pirate. Okay. And I don't support that kind of behavior. I'm pro-Hook because I think kids need to be kidnapped. Yeah, he's a really. Hook's not a cool dude. He kidnaps children. He kidnaps children and then like basically becomes their parent. Yeah, I was excited to talk about Hook.

[01:46:59] I think because you guys, I know canonically you're anti-Hook. And so I wanted to defend it. I'm like, but also I'm anti-Hook, but I've seen it 20 times. Also, I have an obsession with an aspect of Hook that I, my one request was that you would talk about this during the Hook episode. Do you want to put it out to us now to make sure we talk about it in the episode? Okay. There is a trend in Hook that I'm, if I had to go to grad school, it would be about trying

[01:47:25] to unearth the sort of like the, this, this trend and where it came from and, and track it and where it's gone now, which is the clubhouse for kids with skate ramps. Great. Yep. We'll talk about, we'll talk about it. And Hook turtles being another. Ninja turtles being one of them. Double dragon. Yeah. Paul Trader has one in his layer. Every kid's fantasy, right? Hackers. There's, there's a lot, there's a lot of them and there's a period of time where they came and then they went away.

[01:47:53] And I'm, I'm fascinated with where they started, where they came from and where they went. We will discuss this. I found a quote I wanted to throw out because it goes back to the, like this movie, not setting the aliens up as a conflict at all, right? Like the movie is entirely about the way these human beings process the idea of the existence, the proof coming closer, right? Like the wake of it, the sort of yearning towards it, the getting.

[01:48:21] The aliens don't come out and then say, oh, by the way, here's what we're interested in. Right. We don't know. There's no explanation. We just know they exist. There's no antagonism. There's never even really a feeling of antagonism. It's just about the idea of, can we make that connection? There is a review, I think it was from the time by Charlene Engel. Or no, I'm sorry. This was in a book she wrote called The Films of Steven Spielberg. She said, close encounters suggest that humankind has reached the point where it is ready to enter the community of the cosmos.

[01:48:49] While it is a computer, which makes the final musical conversation with the extraterrestrial guests possible, the characteristics bringing Neary to make his way to Devil's Tower have little to do with technical expertise or computer literacy. These are virtues taught in schools that will be evolved in the 21st century. I think there's this feeling in that movie that speaks to like culturally what was going on in the 1970s, which is just like reality is getting overwhelming. And people kind of almost wanted some sense of divine intervention like that, where it's like, you know what?

[01:49:18] Maybe it would make more sense if suddenly our like understanding of the universe was expanded with concrete proof because we're suddenly getting inundated with too much news. And like, you know, everything was just like all the things that we are now like fucking drowning in today. We're really starting to rear their head at that point in time. And this is people who like in that sort of way of what was going on in that moment of people who dreamt of like dropping out of society. It's like there has to be something more.

[01:49:48] There has to be a better explanation. And this movie's tension is just can we like touch that membrane? Can we just get there? Piggybacking on that, but then also about the hook versus Close Encounters. To be clear, Close Encounters wasn't like, I don't know, I guess I'll do that. This is a Close Encounters movie that is very near and dear to me. Like I said, it's one of my first adult, my grown up film memories.

[01:50:13] Um, simultaneously, I'm currently working on a project that has very similar themes that has caused me to dive very deep into this world. And a big aspect of my childhood was centered around a fascination with extraterrestrials and aliens and reckoning with those ideas. It was also just a time, the X-Files and the, you know, like it was a time of fascination with that stuff.

[01:50:40] And so I think if we're talking about the sort of like, uh, symbolism and sort of like cultural semiotics of extraterrestrials and aliens and what those represent, I think there's a really interesting, there's a lot of interesting patterns in the evolution of extraterrestrials throughout art and cinema, uh, especially movies because movies become this vessel for them. And when you think about alien stories, so much of it is about seeing, hearing, experiencing

[01:51:09] that, which is like movies are a perfect place for that. Um, but Close Encounters is a, a slight pivot in that culturally from what had been going on before that. But tying back to the, the, the whole point of aliens, I don't know if you were like this, Ben, I was obsessed with aliens as a kid. I remember one of my, uh, this is probably fourth or fifth grade. We're assigned that we have to do our first big report paper where we have to do a project on something scientific or whatever.

[01:51:36] Like you have to have a thesis statement and a this, and you have to have sources. And I was like, clearly I'm going to do mine about aliens, a real scientific thing of which there's going to be, you're going to, you're going to, I'm going to research this and I'm going to figure it all out. Oh yeah. Because as a kid, I was like, why would I, you know, you're not going to do it about like gravity. Yeah. Rebecca over there is doing a thing about, uh, the blue whales. Drag her. Right. Ben, I've done that. Actually. Yeah. Yeah.

[01:52:04] And the will is doing a thing about, um, you know, how can Canada's government is different the United States or whatever. And I'm like, well, he won't drop that shit. Little dry. I'm like, these dumb dumbs don't realize you could be doing something about aliens here. Yeah. And I'm going to get to the truth of it. You're going to crack the case. And I remember our, our school library had a little section that was like maybe like four books wide about aliens and extraterrestrials. And I remember being very excited to read all of these because I, I was a kid that wanted

[01:52:31] to learn about ghosts and monsters and aliens and magic and all this stuff. And I had this, I would say a repeating experience where I would dive into something and then be sort of disappointed. I remember as a kid being like, I want to learn how to do magic, like how to have magical powers. And then reading books on how magic was. I'm like, these are all like, mostly just tricking people. This is like tricking people. And I was like, oh no, I want to learn how to like, the book is like, here's is how to become a wizard. Yes.

[01:53:00] Here's the spell that you say that makes the coin disappear. It was like, no, you just put it in your pocket when they're not looking. And I was like, what the, and then, you know, you read these stories about Bigfoot and this and that. And then you're, you sort of, even as a kid start seeing the sort of, I don't know that this is all lining up. Uh-huh. Okay. And my experience with extraterrestrials doing this report was, and me and my friend Dale, we, we both chose the same topic and we were doing this research together and we were reading all of these now that are very famous.

[01:53:29] The classic post-war encounters. Yes. The abducting stories and all that. Right. And throughout my life, the more, starting at that moment, I gleaned this and only more now have I sort of come to understand aspects or make my own assumptions about it. But a thing that I noticed even back then was I was like, interesting. A lot of these people who had these experience also had very deep trauma in their lives. Benny and Barney Hill, right?

[01:53:57] The most famous abduction story of all time where it's like, they, right, they were an interracial couple. Like they'd experienced so much discrimination, right? Like there's all this, right? When you learn about them, you're like, right, this was like an incredibly complicated story. Yes. Outside of we got abducted by aliens. And there's a lot of these skin thing. Yeah. Yeah. And there's a lot of these stories where you hear these amazing experiences they had with aliens or abductions. And then secondary to that, you also weaved into those stories. It's also, oh, this incredible trauma that this person went through in their life.

[01:54:26] And that, that pattern sort of repeated itself. And so I have this sense that oftentimes extraterrestrials or those experiences end up being ciphers for these sort of traumas that we can't, in the same way that a lot of otherworldly things become these projections of these aspects of ourselves or our experiences that we don't know how to reckon with. And so to what you're saying about what's going on culturally at the time, there is something

[01:54:51] interesting about the fact that Spielberg makes a film where there is all of this complicated, difficult stuff happening with families and, you know, in the, the, the, the, the world of close encounters. But the result is it's, oh, it's these benevolent aliens that are just there to be our friends. Right. This is a movie that is scary and foreboding for 75% of its running time.

[01:55:19] But then the answer in this sort of people later sort of decry kind of Spielberg way is like, no, no, it's all good. Which is a, a cultural relief. It is. I mean. To be like all of these scary foreboding things happening, both in your personal life and globally are actually part of something that's benevolent and ultimately good. You could cut every visual effect shot out of this movie and it would read as a pretty, I

[01:55:44] think, thorough and like accurate portrayal of someone having a psychotic break and someone dealing with the fallout of trauma of losing a child. Right. If you remove any proof of the supernatural. It's like a collective hysteria. Their behavior makes sense is that. And like Terry Garr believes him. Right. And is like accompanying him to these like sort of trying to get acknowledgement, you know, in the wake of this event that happened to him.

[01:56:11] But then what really causes the family to like unravel isn't that she. Thinks it's it's almost not played as he's getting so obsessed with this thing and she has to leave in revolt. It's like it's scary that he can't function anymore. It is like living with someone with like a borderline personality. And you're just like their behavior is now inexplicable and extreme. And I don't think he can watch the kids safely. And like, right.

[01:56:40] The movie is them. Of course, the military is like, yeah, we'll create this cover story of like people can't come here because there's a toxic leak. But then all they're all saying like, but there will be people who come because there always are. And again, if it's a movie where there are no aliens, it's a movie about how the military is like, don't go there. It's dangerous. And some people are going to go to the thing because of that, like out of interest. Right. Like, no, no, no, you're hiding something from me. Anyway, this is like a cultural thing that maybe wasn't depicted in films up until this point.

[01:57:07] Like this notion of our relationship to you. Like, obviously, there have been alien movies and alien invasion movies and stuff. But like, yeah, had there really been like an alien abduction movie? Like movies about the phenomenon of people saying they've had an experience with UFOs. Like that feels kind of new. I think so. I'm not. I always wish I could build a sort of, you know, a timeline before one of these episodes

[01:57:34] being like where had there because there's things like Slaughterhouse Five that has like aliens in them. Right. Like and there's a movie of that. But yeah, I don't think there's much like this is the first movie that's basically. Let me say it feels to me like this is the first movie that is in conversation with the culture of like folklore of UFO abduction and like encounters and this being a thing that like the fringe press is starting to report on. Well, yeah, it's right. Yeah. An interesting aspect to it.

[01:58:04] Yes. That I don't know if that was intentional or not is that there are aspects to the finale of this that Spielberg intended or he had wrote of his own ideas of, oh, we'll have this happen and this happen and maybe the aliens can do this and that. And there's a lot more complicated aspects to the aliens. Like there is a whole section where there is these tiny glowing cubes that went and attached themselves to everyone and then went inside everyone's bloodstream.

[01:58:31] And there is a whole zero gravity thing and different kinds of aliens and all this stuff going on. But ultimately, it felt like he ended up he kept deferring back to whatever there was. Whatever aspects were part of the collective storytelling of actual ET encounters. Yeah. Or people's, you know, believed experiences with those, which I think is actually very interesting

[01:58:56] because that means that that ties in more, I think, with that sort of emotional experience of what aliens represented versus if he had invented his own thing. That's very well said. Then you're getting into lore and you're getting into a specific creation. And it might not connect. It might not be as everlasting as it is now because it's based on whatever was going on in the cultural zeitgeist. And it's the James Lipton, the greatest moment in the history of Inside the Actor's Studio. You know what I'm talking about, right? Yes. Where Lipton's talking to Spielberg and he says, like, your dad was... I have the exact... I haven't. Okay.

[01:59:26] Well... Your father was a computer scientist. Your mother was a musician. When the spaceship lands, how do they communicate? And Spielberg, I mean, you got to watch it, really, to watch it dawn on Spielberg. It's incredible. Like, I can't replicate him realizing something he's always known is like, I'm melding my parents, right? But he literally says, like, I've never thought about that before. He says, thank you for that. Thank you. That's totally right. But it's this being the unresolved man movie, right? It's why it's always going to sit weirdly with him, because this is the movie that comes

[01:59:54] out of him not having figured out all the shit in his life. Like, he's, like, speaking things that are so unsettled in his mind and in his heart. I also, you know, how much of this is once again, like, sort of Spielberg myth-making. But he says, I think especially when it was the earlier versions of the, like, sort of Project Blue Bookie versions of the script, and he was reaching out to the government and trying to get, like, you know, I want to make this accurate.

[02:00:20] Like, what is your own, what is the government sort of protocol for dealing with these types of claims and things like that? And they kept on being like, don't make this movie. And, like, NASA wrote him letters, and they were like, if you make this, we think it will have, like, a damaging effect on the public. And he was like, that was the thing that made me feel like I was onto something good and made me double down twice as hard as, like, I have to make this. I don't read the implication of that being, hey, Steven, you're getting too close to the No, it's like, we don't want kids Naruto running at Area 51. That's the thing.

[02:00:51] It'll be a hassle. Right. Making the movie in this sense feels like it's validating to people who want to believe. Yes. More than it's revealing a truth. It's like, this movie is sort of saying, like, maybe if you, like, feel it. If the mashed potatoes are, like, telling you, go out to the desert and see what happens. But then what I think is good is that he ended up not piling. I mean, this is silly to say, because this whole special effects finale and all this stuff.

[02:01:17] But to me, there's not enough artifice piled onto it to snuff out the, what I think lasts about this film, which is those very human, very relatable sort of traumas and experiences that the story is actually telling. The fact that we don't have answers to any of these things, the fact that they're, the aliens don't really communicate, the fact that we don't get answers to those questions, I think makes this film work really, really well. They don't show up and say, hi, here's why we took all those people. We're so sorry.

[02:01:46] They just show up and say, we are here. And we hear you and respond in kind. Like, that's pretty much it. And come with us. Right. You know. But they also literally say none of that. They don't say words. It is. What is so profound is, like, you have this. I mean, to jump all the way to the end. But like. Jump all the way to the end. It's the whole thing. Hey, we're going to go through some of the film scene by scene. But you have. Okay. The ramp come down. And the first reveal of the alien is like this bizarre spider-like. Like, it looks like a marionette.

[02:02:15] It's moving very strangely. And then it, like, kind of slowly unfurls itself and looks like the most classical, like, gray saucer-eyed alien. This is a Carlo Rimbaldi creation, right? Yes. Like, he was involved. Yes. And they also hired Bob Baker to help try to figure this out. But not Bob Barker. No, Bob Baker, the famous marionette. From Bob Baker Marionette Theater in eastern Los Angeles. David doesn't know from Bob Baker Marionette Theater. No, this is important. David. David. I'm going to the bathroom. No, you're not.

[02:02:43] David, you're going to stay here and learn who Bob Baker is. David. I'm going to the bathroom. I'm running away. This is unbelievable. Every fucking time he does it. And he's acting like this is some shit we do to him. Or are you guys doing this thing where you team up? And we act like, no, David. These are important artists. David, if the Atlantic. If the Atlantic. If the Atlantic. If the Atlantic. Is not of the ilk enough to respect Bob Baker.

[02:03:12] Disregard entire art forms? You're disregarding entire methods. Who's Bob Baker? I'll bite. What a good question. He's a puppeteer guy who did a lot of marionettes. He did like cool puppets. And he did a lot of cool puppet shit for movies and TV show. And then eventually opened up a little theater in Los Angeles where you can go see marionette shows all the time. And kind of in Highland Park? Yes. In Highland Park. The theater was in... A friend of mine who I stay with when I'm in L.A. lives very close by. The theater was at risk of closing and there was a big fundraising effort.

[02:03:42] Now it's had this incredible second life and all the shows sell out. And there are a lot of celebrities who sort of support it financially and it feels pretty sad. And it's like this beautiful, like, here we study and refine this one very particular ancient art form. I resent that toilet noises happen in the background. That's the worst thing. We're talking about the beautiful career of Bob Baker.

[02:04:06] And as Griffin, as Griffin was, the jazz was hitting in the, like, poetry. It was off his tongue as he's getting into the life and the career of Bob Baker. We hear the toilet flush in the background. Some stinky dookie going down the pipe. There's no stinky dookie. And then that's the smelliest pee I've ever come across. Okay, now Griffin's taking this to a weird place. I'm sorry.

[02:04:30] Bob Baker, but anyways, it's a great little marionette theater that they have these shows that feel like you're being time traveled back to, you know, the 1960s. But that makes sense because it does feel like when he first comes out, it looks puppeteered like a marionette. Then he unfurls into this sort of, like, animatronic state. Then you have these small children, you know, in these costumes fixed, just clearly just kind of, like, waddling out with these heads, right?

[02:04:56] And then you go back to the main alien and he has, like, one nonverbal sort of, like, hand signal smile exchange. Of course. But I'm saying, like, there's no dialogue. There's no monologue. It is all just, like, these two species, like, observing and acknowledging each other. And you're still like, I don't really understand the relationship between this one tall one and the munchkin ones. You know, I have no idea what their intent are.

[02:05:24] They're returning some people to us. They're taking some new people aboard. Everyone's just kind of, like, nodding and, like, then ramp goes up into the sky. Movie over. Well, the kid says bye. The kid says bye. And also, the one thing that I might not do if I'm Spielberg is that the tall alien kind of smiles, which you love, but you're almost like, I don't think I need him to smile. I already get that it's benevolent. I'm so impressed by the effect of it. It's a cool effect. It's a cool effect. But it is kind of like, yep, get that they're free, you know.

[02:05:50] Among those aliens, kind of like dogs, smiling is actually really aggressive. That's an aggressive facial. Oh, so you think it's like a Mars Attacks thing where it's like, that's actually them communicating, like, we're about to nuke you. We're going to take off from space and obliterate this fucking planet. If those aliens show their teeth, it's a sign of aggression. What are some other scenes we haven't touched on? Because obviously, Close Encounters, I feel like everyone is like, mashed potatoes, abduction of the child, the ending. Those are the big three remembered scenes, right?

[02:06:19] Him building the devil's tower. Yeah, the mashed potatoes. No. But there are multiple iterations of it. That whole scene is still freaky. I will say that the early scene of the, we're talking about the foreign language, it's like, what'd he say? He said, the sun came out and it spoke to me. The sun came out at night and sang to him. I have a very distinct memory of us going the 40th screening and after he has the, like, sunburn on half of his face from the ship.

[02:06:48] You're going, really good Halloween costume idea. It is. But no one will remember it anymore. But just a red shirt, half-burned face. Nice. I'll also say, Spielberg is, I think, one of the best directors at showing people listening. So one of the great... Watching, but also listening. Oh. At FAMU, a film school in Prague, there was a professor that I, that was where I did my study abroad.

[02:07:13] Um, Mark Yika, a cinematographer, cinematography professor, who gave me a very harsh note because the script that I was working on had a moment where you see a character have a feeling or an idea. And he was like, never show someone have an idea. Only show the actions that are a result of the idea. And I was like eviscerated in front of the class for that. And it was funny because I was watching Close Encounters and I'm like, Spielberg's always showing people have ideas. It's also one of the things he's best at.

[02:07:43] I don't understand film school. Not that I think it's like stupid. I just have never been able to. Because I don't understand people being like, you cannot do that. I'm like, there's always an example of someone doing whatever, breaking whatever rule. Well, FAMU was fascinating because this sort of, the Czech cinema universe, they had a lot of rules. Because for them, what was taught to us was that cinema was both a political and a social tool that as artists you had to use responsibly.

[02:08:13] And because of that, here's the ways that you do it. I mean, I love... Which was a completely different... Right. Because NYU was like, well, be an artist. And going to FAMU and they were like, no, this is what films are about. This is how you do them. This is how you shoot them. It was very fascinating. It's a good, right. It's a good other perspective. But that, like, I mean, the main three adult characters in this film, right? Like the three main threads that converge by the end are Truffaut, Melinda Dillon, and Richard Dreyfuss. One of those three...

[02:08:42] Three amazing performances. Yes. And I want to talk about Melinda Dillon a bit in particular. But Truffaut doesn't speak English, right? Has like five lines where he maybe like cobbles together some English. That is, in the dramatic setup of the movie, a performance that is mostly going to be about listening. It's mostly going to be he's going to blather things in an excitable tone in French without subtitles. Have a very calm man just kind of like flatly relay them.

[02:09:11] And most of this performance is going to play out on watching his face process. He's so good. But this is my point. It's like Spielberg's like just showing off at how good he is at doing this. Truffaut was writing a book about acting, he claimed. And that's why he took the part so that he could explain the experience of being an actor. There was also an abandoned film. He wrote The Man Who Loved Women while he was filming this. That makes sense.

[02:09:39] There was another movie that he never ended up making that I want to say was about acting. Yeah. Maybe some of which ends up going into the soup in Last Metro. But it's funny because in all these interviews, people are like, I think he just wanted to do it. But he had to come up with an excuse for why he was doing it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I think this movie was well liked in France, partly because Truffaut was involved, partly because France was like early on Spielberg in a way. Like, and like Jean Renoir was like, he's, I think he's very talented.

[02:10:07] You know, that is what they would say. He's like the best of his kind since Millie X. Right, right. Yeah. He was like ecstatic about it. And then eventually, of course, whatever. I'm sure France got sick of Spielberg. But now they're probably backing on him. But Fablements was huge. No, that's the thing. Like, now they're backing. France fucking single-handedly only in their countries made Fablements and Drew No. 2 blockbusters. And it's like our most beloved American auteurs are being like vaguely disregarded by the studios and audiences in France. They're like, we'll take them.

[02:10:38] And Jerry Lewis, of course, he's the third one. I also love that this movie, the beginning part of it is this parallel cutting between these sort of like disconnected UFO experiences and the family drama. Because it builds this tension where you're like, I know these things are going to collide and resolve together. Whatever happened before. But right now they're very far apart. Sure, yeah. Right now we're in India. And now we're in Mobile, Alabama. And now we're in the military base. And we're in Mobile. And you're like, something's about to happen.

[02:11:07] The movie is set in Indiana. It's set in Muncie. Sorry, yes. It's set in Muncie, Indiana. Sorry about that. They shot in Muncie. Go Muncie. Sure. Spielberg works out a lot of stuff that he ends up doing in Poltergeist. A lot of toys going crazy. A lot of houses. All those simple effects. Suburbs being weird suburbs. He knows how to do that. There's a line of mailboxes, Wild and Out, where you're just like, this is so simple and so effective. Shit like that of just like the cupboards clacking.

[02:11:33] Like, there's the great sort of first Melinda Dillon and son sequence. We're rewatching it. I'm like, does the kid get abducted this early on? And you're like, no, there's a fake out one. And it goes on really when he runs out into the field. Where he runs into the field. Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. But all the stuff that's happening around the house or even just the timing of the lights going out, like he's so good at making a scene feel really organic and lived in, not staged, not expository, even if like info dumps are happening.

[02:12:03] And then when something that's just like a little bit supernatural happens, especially when it's like a very unflashy practical effect, it feels so profound in the middle of that. Yeah. I've got a big bone to pick with the film. What's that? Not enough bones? There's not enough bones. But also there's a scene where Dreyfus's son complains that he doesn't understand how fractions work. Yeah. And Dreyfus has this toy train set and the son has to do like, I think it's two thirds

[02:12:33] of 60 is what he needs to learn the fraction of. The toy train comes around and Dreyfus picks it up and it's three cars. He picks up the three cars and then puts two of them down and goes, imagine this car is 60 feet long. How much the car would have to be? You're saying he had the perfect example. He had the perfect example. Well, he's not that good a dad. No. No. In his hand. And then instead makes it way more complicated.

[02:13:02] This goes back to my, the movie's about, I don't know how to be a grownup. Like the movie is not from the perspective of the kid. E.T.'s the one where like for how much the abduction is so iconic. Dreyfus is only like 29 when he's making this movie. Again, he always reads older, like because he's got an old fucker face. But like, yeah, like his kids are pretty old for him to be like not even 30. How did he respond with that? That how would Richard Dreyfus respond to me saying that? And that one on one interview you did with him.

[02:13:30] No, but it makes sense that he was like leaning towards fucking Hackman or whoever, you know, that like the other guys he was considering were all. Or Hoffman. Like, yeah. Or ornery, older. But it works that he's like an old child. Right. Like it works. The weirdness of Dreyfus being like a young dude who has old man energy and doesn't seem settled either. And just from that first scene, his response to his son is like, these are your problems. You solve your problems. I don't want to solve your problems. Like he he just seems so unhappy.

[02:13:59] In all aspects of his life. Hoffman is 10 years older, by the way. 10 years older. That's how, quote unquote, young Dreyfus is. Yeah. In a weird way. The argument about goofy golf versus going to the movies. What would you guys have chosen? When you were a kid. Goofy golf. When I was a kid, I did enjoy a mini golf type thing, but I probably preferred going to the movies. Ben. Ben's thinking about it. What's what's goofy? How goofy we get. How goofy.

[02:14:29] Warning. It probably won't be as goofy as you want. What you're imagining. It's not that like goofy means like there's a windmill. It's not going to be like goofy jail with the zigzag bars. Melinda. Why do I feel like we talked about her? We talked. There was a recent movie. What was it, though? Because I'm looking at our filmography in the last year that we covered. I'm going to figure out what it is. But I feel like she's she passed away recently.

[02:14:57] I feel like she's weirdly a kind of overlooked actress for this era, despite the fact that if you just reduce her to her top ballot work, you're like she is in a handful of movies that are evergreen. She's in great movies. Like some. She didn't make enough. She didn't make a ton of movies. Prince of Tides. Oh, that's what it is. That's right. And she's good in that. I mean, obviously. She's amazing and bound for glory in this like. Yeah. And then I slap shot. She rocks in close encounters. I think, you know,

[02:15:27] Christmas Story is one of the most watched movies of all time. But that's the thing. I've never seen it. Oh, that's the one. I always forget about Christmas Story because I've never seen it. But I know it's a big movie for lots of people. She got an Oscar nomination for this. Right. And for Absence of Malice. Yes. Christmas Story is the most like one of the most replayed, rewatched. I completely disconnected. She's one of the Hendersons, right? She's a mom Henderson. Yes. John Lithgow's wife. But I'm just like, if you just reduce her to. Oh, my gosh.

[02:15:56] Slap shot. Close encounters. Magnolia. Sure. Christmas Story. Right. You're like, those are like an even Harry and the Hendersons like one step below that. You're like, those are four of the like most rewatched movies. Yeah. Fascinating. She's in big movies, but she obviously in supporting roles. But pivotal supporting roles in all four. I'm pro Melinda Dilla. I'm just saying there's a reason she's undersung maybe. But it's maybe the exact effect of you never putting together. Whether that's the same person. Yeah, right. Yeah. She's so good. Fascinating.

[02:16:26] I didn't piece that together. Have you seen Slap shot group? Yes. Slap shot roles. So good. Yeah. Melinda Dillon. Yeah, but she's amazing in this. I mean, she lost the Oscar to Vanessa Redgrave. I think this is the famous where Vanessa Redgrave maybe didn't accept and. No, excepted but said incendiary things. Or she read out a statement about Palestine, right? Is that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Incendiary. Her statements were perceived as incendiary at the time. And unfortunately, probably would be perceived as incendiary. Unfortunately, it is.

[02:16:55] But, you know, that's one of those things where you're like, oh, who? Oh, Julia. Well, I haven't seen that. So I can't really weigh in. I still haven't seen Julia. Maybe I need to watch Julia. Just have a better perspective on the 1977 Oscars. I feel like the big picture and their 77 draft. It sounded like both of them watched it for the first time and kind of a little. Sturdy war drama. Flummoxed by it. Right. Yeah. But one of those movies that just like you look at the Oscar year and you're like, I guess this was a juggernaut.

[02:17:25] I mean, it won those two Oscars and it got a bunch of other noms and won best screenplay as well. Best adaptive screenplay. I don't know. I mean, but it's, you know, it's the Oscars where it's like, yeah, there was, there was acknowledgement of new stuff and excitement. But also I'm sure there were lots of ornery old voters who liked, uh, you know, sturdy true story movie about this. Yeah. World War II. I don't know. I just like think this was him trying to make something more serious and consciously like,

[02:17:53] or if nothing else, make something certainly deeply personal. Right. And like all of his kind of, um, lampshading of lampshading is the right word, but, uh, the pre framing of like, I'm not making Jaws again. This isn't a blockbuster. This is something spiritual. This is about ideas and feelings and whatever. I look at it now from modern perspective and I'm like, I can't believe they weren't doing fucking cartwheels and like tripping over themselves to give him the Oscar for this.

[02:18:22] But there was this feeling of like fucking whiz kid Spielberg, slow your roll. Like we're not going to give you everything. Who hosted those Oscars? Bob Hope. Yeah. You know, so it's like, you still got plenty of old fashions. This just feels like such a perfect mashup of like everything new Hollywood was exploring and a kind of like old fashioned movie wonder. Frank Capra ask that's, that's Spielberg for you. But I'm like, if he gets as, as much as this movie was a wild success, huge reviews, huge box office.

[02:18:51] If he had won the Oscar for this, the rest of his career probably would have been less interesting. That might be true. There's something kind of interesting about him after this needing to like sharpen his blade as just like a commercial entertainer. Then he goes through his weird period of like, how do I make grown up movies? And then he finally figures out how to bring the two together. The BFG. Finally, we got there.

[02:19:13] But there's like the interesting 1977 to 2001 space where it feels like he's not trying to make something this overtly, I don't want to say personal, but in a certain way, it feels like revealing again. You know, like E.T., he's like, hey, I'm hiring someone to write the script. I'm adding in a lot of elements that aren't about me. I'm trying to tell a story. I would say E.T.'s pretty revealing. We'll talk about E.T.

[02:19:43] Oh, we'll talk about it. Actually, we're not. We're going to skip that one. Pronounced at. The thing you said with your first comment when you saw the Fablements, I asked you how it was, and you said it's like watching your dad cry. AI. That's a great review. Close Encounters and Fablements all have that feeling to me where it's just like there's something a little bit uncomfortable here about what he's saying to me. This feels like a little too intimate rather than personal.

[02:20:09] That I think is a unique power to this one that he then maybe avoids a little bit for the next for the following two days. I feel like for Close Encounters. It's almost like I don't know that it what it comes off as is that I don't know that he realizes how revealing. Exactly. That's that's what's uncomfortable. He doesn't. I think that's the I'm sure he does. That's the intimacy for me. Whereas E.T. It's like it's perfectly packaged. And the other thing is the part of him that's like, oh, fuck, I never quite crack that neary

[02:20:39] character. His motivation doesn't make sense to me. He's a bad father. I can't get over this. By the time he gets to E.T., it's like I know how to characterize everyone. Everyone's arcs are clean and digestible. It's from the point of view of children. And this movie is not from the point of view of children. Although. A part of me. Feels like I was just talking with a mutual friend, Connor Ratliff about this. Weirdly, I think Close Encounters kind of is from the POV of children.

[02:21:08] Like, I almost feel like all of the family stuff feels more from the POV of a child. And then it almost comes off as how a child would view and understand divorce. And then like when they drive away is when the fantasy begins of like, oh, and then like dad's gone because like there's like this. He had to go. He had to go because there's this like really important benevolent thing that he's doing. That's what's going on.

[02:21:38] Kiss the lady who is like stirred by the same demons that stir him, you know, is sort of. That's a really heartbreaking moment. The movie is when he comes home and he's like trying to scrub the burn off. And he's like, Terry Gardner, you have to come with me right now. And she's like, what? I'm in my sleeping gown. And he's like, you're always saying we don't go enough places. Come on, go. And it like gets her in the truck, brings her to the site where Robert's Blossom is. Right. And her and the kids. Yes. They don't leave the kids. Right.

[02:22:06] And she's trying to provoke him with the like, remember when we used to do spontaneous things like this? Like you take me to a spot like this and you kiss me. And she just in real time has to work through like. Oh, how they got into this mess. He's he's gone. Right. Like the feeling of there used to be passion in this relationship. Now they're kind of just like worn down. She briefly thinks he's trying to reignite that. And then she's like, oh, he's even further away than I thought he was before. It's his new obsession. Yes.

[02:22:35] And from that moment, it almost feels like she's a little bit not resigned, but that she's like, I've fucking lost him. And things haven't been good. And now they've become untenable. Can we talk about the fucking ships? I want a spaceship so bad. These ships are fucking great. The three little ass ships. And then the baby one. The baby one's the best one. Truly, they look fun. Yes. They look fun to drive. They're such good designs. Griffin, would you? You're not a car driver. Would I drive a spaceship? Absolutely.

[02:23:05] And they like. I don't like roads. I love the sky. It's interesting because, right. There's definitely. I don't know. When you're in the sky, you don't want to go down. There's like a whole other. There is a whole other axis. That is absolutely right. Yeah. And what I like about these spaceships is they tumble through the air. They don't seem to have an upward. They sort of. There's a spitty guy. They just go whatever direction they want.

[02:23:29] Do you know, originally, Spielberg's idea for the ships was that the ships would present in ways that they thought people would like. Like that humans would feel comforted. And so it was the McDonald's arches. Really? And the Chevron logo. And they made these ships that were like, oh, it's the McDonald's arches going through the sky and all this stuff. And then he was like, no, this is too goofy. This is too. But they are great ships. They're cool ships. I mean, I think the mothership's amazing. You can see it, right?

[02:23:58] Like the model is viewable somewhere. Some museum or something. It's a Smithsonian, I think. Yeah, right. It's very cool. It's just lights. It's just darkness and light. But it's also very intricate. Yeah. It's like there's all these like spokes and skyscrapers on it that you can. I mean, you saw the fucking, I just showed you the footage from the special edition, but that's like when you're inside the ship, you don't see aliens any further. You just see that it's basically like a city inside. It's just crazy to think that Trumbull worked on this and Star Wars.

[02:24:28] And John Williams. He didn't work on Star Wars. Why did I see that he worked on Star Wars? I knew he turned down originally. No, he turned down Star Wars. But did he not do any work on it? He probably, maybe he gets like a thank you for something. I think he jumped in. He wasn't. He obviously didn't leave the team. But famously, he said no to Star Wars. I know that. I don't know. The thing I know is that he put R2-D2. Because Dykstra did it. Right. Star Wars. Right. But I think he fucking did some pinch hitting. I don't think so. I have no idea. Trumbull put R2-D2 and the X-Wing on the model. No, it's a TIE fighter.

[02:24:58] I'm sorry. You're right. Well, R2-D2 is on the model. Yes. He just said that. And a TIE fighter. He literally said that two seconds ago. Yes. And then I thought you corrected him and said no, it's a TIE fighter. No, he said an X-Wing. It's a TIE fighter. It's a TIE fighter. Okay? Twin ion engines. A decade of dreams. I don't like how the alien spaceship is like spotless. It bothers me. The inside of it? The inside, which is right. It's like, get rid of that. But that's what Star Wars is for. Star Wars is dirty space.

[02:25:26] Anyway, Star Trek, the motion picture is what Trumbull then works on because they're like, we want 2001 vibes, which that movie has. So was it just him being friends with the Star Wars team? Yeah, I think it's just a little joke. Him putting them on the ship is when they're in production. I know. It's funny. It's these two conversations. But he's also like, no one's telling him like, hey, years later, there'll be discs and people can go frame by frame and see your little joke. And I think, you know, he's meaning it as like, no one will ever catch that. I think it was more the miniatures guy worked on Star Wars. I think you might be right.

[02:25:56] I think you're right. And then, so something that I want to talk about is Cloud Boxes. Let's do it. But this film is one of the innovations in Cloud Boxes, which is an effect that Spielberg uses a lot and that branches off from here. So this film has these amazing effect shots where the clouds billow out from the sky. Right. They sort of, they're first clouds then ship. Yes.

[02:26:25] And this is a film with no CGI in it. It is all practical VFX done through optical tricks. And the Cloud Box was this really cool effect that basically Spielberg had this thing where he's like, I want the ships to be hidden in clouds and for clouds to sort of like form to continue to hide the ships. Because originally, the mothership was supposed to be a lack of light. It was going to be a big black. A pie plate. Yes. It was good. It was going to be like, oh, the stars go away.

[02:26:53] And that's what the mothership is, which is why when you watch the finale scene, it's very interesting. When you learn about the production of stuff and you watch the finale, you realize what kind of a mishmash because it was such a crazy production. Well, the backlighting of the aliens is like maybe the single smartest filmmaking decision makes in the entire film. Right. Every time you see a glimpse, you're like, I can't believe how good that looks. But you're like, if the shot lasted a second longer, the angle was like one degree. The only shot would show you of the face is like a boop. I know.

[02:27:22] Shot where it cuts between the kid Barry's face and the alien face really quick. And it's like, there it is. It's why the smile is effective for me, because it's the one kind of sustained thing along with the hand gesture where you're like, I can't believe this works. But there's like very dark. He's mostly silhouetted. Like there's a lot of lack of continuity in the finale. That's very fascinating where it's like they shot some stuff where it's like, oh, the mothership comes down. And when it was supposed to be a black void, you see a big shadow go over everybody. And it's like this really great shot where a shadow goes over.

[02:27:51] But then in the final thing, it's this bright glowing thing and other shots glowing everything up. And you're like, wait, what? But what I love is Spielberg just like whatever. It's more the feeling of it all. Yes. This is also his first movie with Michael Kahn. It is. Who then becomes one of his closest and most important collaborators. I think their relationship has always just been defined as like they can finish each other's sentences or whatever. It's just like very, very, very tight collaboration. But that also that Michael Kahn is like, this is an emotional arc form for me.

[02:28:20] I do not care about like maintaining continuity or like a sort of cleanness or precision. It is about like cutting to emotion and story. Like the big one they talk about is like when the mothership rises from above. It starts low and then comes up over the horizon. But then you see the wide shot and it's larger than the entire mountain. And you're like, well, then where was it to come up from? And Spielberg's like, it doesn't make sense. But who cares? It's better than it lowering. It's rising is better than lowering.

[02:28:48] But then you get to like Jurassic Park and Jurassic Park has the thing where like the T-Rex and the rain sequence. You can clearly see the other side of the fence is like forest where the T-Rex is coming from. And then like five minutes later, they're hanging over a cliff in that exact same spot and all that forest has disappeared. And like by 20 years later, Spielberg is consciously designing sequences and building sets to ignore continuity because he's basically learned it doesn't matter if you're making the audience

[02:29:17] focus on the right things and you're carrying them along in the story. Who gives a shit? Yes. So back to cloud boxes. It's this effect that I think defines the 80s. We got it. We get it in Ghostbuster. We get it in Poltergeist. We get it in Close Encounters. We get it in Indiana Jones. We get it in Never Ending Story. We get it in tons of stuff. They even use it in Tree of Life and all these things. And it's that amazing effect where it's like clouds are like appearing out of the sky and like billowing forward. It's like fast motion clouds is what it looks like. It's unbelievable.

[02:29:46] But when you think about it, you're like, how did they do that without CGI? Put a bunch of shit in a box? So what they did, so it came because I guess Douglas Trumbull was like making coffee and he put cream in his coffee and saw that it like billowed. And he's like, hmm. And then his assistant at times was this guy, Scott Squires, and was like, hey, go like buy stuff at the grocery store and like experiment and figure some stuff out. And what's cool is this guy, Scott Squires, now has a blog.

[02:30:15] It's like an old blog spot where he just tells stories about like the old days of VFX. And he has a whole thing about the cloud box and how it came to be. And so what they ended up doing is they had a tank that was like seven foot by like whatever, like 16 feet or something, this giant tank that and like three feet deep. And they filled it with filtered water with salt in it, salt water filtered.

[02:30:43] And then they put a thin layer of plastic over it and then carefully poured non-salt water over it. So at the top, because of density, the salt water stayed at the bottom and the regular water stayed at the top. And they very carefully removed the plastic so that you had this tank that had one layer of regular water and then beneath it a layer of salt water. And then they got like tempera paints, you know, like the type of paint that you might use to do like an art project. And they used a syringe and they put it in the water.

[02:31:12] And because it billows out in the regular water, but the salt water is dense enough, but you can still see through it. It doesn't go to the salt water. It just stays at the top. And they put the camera beneath it. And it looks like it, this cloud thing and it stops at the salt water and keeps building forth. So it looks, and it's just like a beautiful effect. And it's such a practical, cool thing. And this was where they sort of figured it out and started really doing that. And similar types of effects have been used with ink and water and stuff like that.

[02:31:40] But this cloud box was like the beginning of this effect that then they started using in all these, you know, famous movies. And it's such a beautiful, haunting effect. Oh, it's so good. I prefer CG though. I know you do. Regular ass CG. I know. You like when... Talking polar bear with the rock. Your favorite part of Star Wars has been like the, before the scene starts, a robot bonks another robot in the head. Yeah, I like to pull out and see more of Mos Eisley. And it's like, there's like one creature there. You like when E.T. runs. You like when E.T. runs. Yeah.

[02:32:09] God, I fucking love that. And I made that towel run. Yeah. Okay. One thing. The most 70s part of this movie, because it was a movie that I didn't really remember was a 70s movie. Sorry, what's the 70s? For some reason in my head, it's like lodged in the 80s because like, that's, you know. Carry on. More than... Spielberg, the 80s and 80s movie. The most 70s thing in this movie is that in the middle of it, they have a shot where a police car falls off a cliff, which is like, that's like the timestamp of like... The timestamp of the era. But it's like, well, it's a movie.

[02:32:38] So we have to have a car go off a cliff at some point. The other thing that I think is very funny that... Well, okay. Another thing is Spielberg. We love Spielberg. I love Spielberg. I think he's great. He's wonderful. It would be weird if two and a half hours in here are like, Spielberg, this guy's... In my opinion, a hack. This is not me trying to get on Spielberg. He's not great with foreign cultures. Well, I think also the era is not great. Yes, the era is not great. Yes.

[02:33:05] But like, there's a couple of things in this where it's like some weird stuff and I'm like, okay. But you look at Independence Day 20 years later. 20-ish years later. Where they're like, America defeats the aliens. Let's... Can we cut to like a... I don't know, Africa for five seconds where there's some like tribesmen also being like, yay, the aliens died. You're like, and that's enough of that. Let's say also, that was the third major new thing film for the special edition. It's the shower conversation between Neri and his wife. It's the end inside the spaceship.

[02:33:34] And it's the Gobi Desert thing with the ship, with the ocean liner. Yes. Which that was the big one where he's like, I had this idea in my head. No one would give me more money at this point to do an even bigger effect. And you get the sense that he wanted maybe more of a structure of like, the first half of the movie we're watching Truffaut and Balaban follow different strange occurrences before the threads finally converge. But that becomes like, to your point, David, the way that like all Roland Emmerich movies

[02:34:01] are structured after this, which is like every 20 minutes, there's a new inexplicable event happening in some other country. Right. But the other events usually like, yeah, Hong Kong, it gets obliterated. Moving on back to, you know, like, you know, and you're like, okay, sure. Great. I get that this is global now. Anyway. And then the last thing that was making me laugh was, um, that made this like very clearly a 70s movie is that the whole idea is that there's this Project Mayflower, which is these like group of people that have been like selected to like, go like, right. Be the initial. Right. Yes.

[02:34:30] Number one, my question I think is so funny is that they accept all the humans back from the aliens, right? Like all the like people that have gone. It's a straight trade. They don't look okay. And no one asked them like, hey, what happened to you before they send a bunch of humans back in the thing? They take these like traumatized looking people back. Yeah, but they're not coming out being like, don't go in there. But don't you think you'd be like, hey, before we send a bunch of new people on, like, is everything okay in there?

[02:34:59] Like, did something bad happen? But there's like, welcome. Well, no questions. And then the Project Mayflower people that they select to be the representatives of the human race on this ship. It's like 13 people. 10 of them are white dudes. There's two women and then one black guy. And they're like, great. And that's the representative of the human race. You know, it's like, oh, we have the best writing staff on our sitcom. 11 white guys and the lady. And maybe a black guy came in once in a while.

[02:35:29] The wildest thing is that's also like the writing staff of the Richard Pryor show. Right, exactly. But it was like, I'm like 10 white guys named Melvin, Sandra Bernard. You don't get it. Bob Jim was so funny. And you got to this guy like eating a sandwich. It's like they're like, this is going to be the representative of all of you. And it's like 10 of the same dude. I love those red jumpsuits. And then the one addition, the last thing, like we need to add another one. It's Richard Dreyfuss.

[02:35:58] And you're like, guys, come on. Can we get add one more white dude with really bad energy? Yeah. Let's add a guy who's here who does not seem okay on Earth. And that's because also if you're the aliens, you're probably like, who is this guy? Who's this like sunburned guy? A little too eager. Yeah. The film was released in November 16th, 1977. It was a huge hit. Delayed was originally supposed to be a summer release. Correct.

[02:36:26] Wait, I was seeing that it was released on December 14th. You are wrong. It's December 14th when it went wide. Yeah, I think it had some exclusive runs. But I was being sent a text from someone saying that people were saying like this week. Oh, it's the anniversary of when it's... I don't know what to tell you. They wanted it to be a summer movie. Yeah.

[02:36:52] And instead they platformed it and did exclusive runs, which is maybe what you're thinking of. I mean, absolutely to this movie's benefit that it didn't come out in the same summer as Star Wars. Exactly. That they had six months. Six months later, it is the second biggest hit of the year after Star Wars. The other big hits being Saturday Night Fever, Smokey and the Bandit, and The Goodbye Girl. Worth mentioning what a big hit that movie. I mean, five huge movies. Dreyfuss is in two of the five, you know. But it's opening number nine at the box office because, you know, that's how it is back in the day.

[02:37:22] So what's number one at the box office? A movie that screams number one. The Goodbye Girl? No. Okay, but it's in that zone? No. No? It's a very dark movie based on a bestseller. Okay, opposite zone. In 1977, it's based on a bestseller. Yeah. Is it based on, is it a nonfiction bestseller? No, it's sort of, no, it's based on a nonfiction. Is it Looking for Mr. Goodbar? It's Looking for Mr. Goodbar. There we go. The movie about a schoolteacher who, played by Dan Keaton, who has something of a sexual awakening,

[02:37:52] starts having random sex with people and gets, spoiler alert, moited. It is kind of funny that it's like 1977. It feels like the two big stars of the year are Dreyfuss and Keaton for the combined, like, Goodbye Girl, Close Encounters, Annie Hall, Looking for Mr. Goodbar, which is kind of like a perfect four square of where commercial cinema was in the 1970s. Well, here's another square for you, though. Number two at the box office. It's a franchise starter.

[02:38:21] We'll do this franchise one day. Okay. Comedy. It's a comedy. Is it Any Which Way? No. No. Okay. It's not Smoking the Bandit. No. No. Is it Austin Powers 1? What was that reaction? You were getting ready to say something. No, I was just like, oh, he's going to do a joke. And then he did that joke. And I was like, how do I respond to that? No. I thought it was funny. Just have to laugh with a kind laugh, a chuckle, a smile to a friend. Fair enough. Is it Oh God? There you go. Okay. We've been long for it. George Burns in Oh God.

[02:38:50] Have you seen any of the Oh God trilogy? I have not. We just feel like we will find them funny. But I think we have avoided actually doing it. I think we might find the first one funny. Because we're worried that will happen. Because there are two sequels. That it might be a bit of a jelly trilogy. Oh God Book 2 and Oh God You Devil. Okay. I don't know these movies. It's about George Burns is like, I'm God. Here's the pitch. In 1977, they said, what if George Burns was God? And America like screamed in joy. They did.

[02:39:20] More, more, more, more. Number three in its 26th week in the box office is the biggest movie of the year. Star Wars. Star Wars. Star Wars. Star Wars. Star Wars. Number four. Wait, good movie. Yeah. Is the first movie that Harrison Ford is. Frisco Kid? After Star Wars. It's not the Frisco Kid. He had made it before Star Wars. The film is called Heroes. Henry Winkler. With Winkler with like a fright wig. Winkler's got this crazy hair. And Sally Field.

[02:39:49] It's like a Vietnam sort of coming home type movie. And Ford's kind of key supporting it. Is it? Have you seen it? I have. Yeah, it's okay. Fair enough. It's okay. Heroes. Number four. Yeah, I don't know it very well. And number five is largely forgotten. It's sort of like a sports movie. It's from a big director with a big star. I've seen it. It's not bad. But it's largely forgotten. Yes. In 1977. It's not bad news. Bears.

[02:40:20] No, that's not largely forgotten. I know. That's why I'm trying to think of what is largely forgotten. But you've seen it and it's a big director and a big star. Yeah, but it's like a flop for both of them. Is telling me what sport it is, would that give it away? I'll tell you. Racing. Motor. Racing movie. Yes. And is it a McQueen? Nope. No. But it is a star that Spielberg went out to for Close Encounters. Is it... Fuck.

[02:40:48] Yeah, you probably know what it is, but can't even remember the name. Is it the Robert Redford one? Nope. No. Okay. And it's not Paul Newman. Nope. I'm trying to think of stars who did car racing movies. It's... Grand Prix is obviously much earlier. It's not Grand Prix. Well, that's what I said. I'm working through it. Big star. Big director. Big star. Big director. Big director. Yeah. It's racing. Car racing. Yep. Formula One. It's Formula One. Mm-hmm. Huh.

[02:41:17] Do you have any idea what this is, J.D.? Well, I'll tell you then. Do you know? I was not paying attention. Can you give me... That it's an Al Pacino movie. And if you don't know after that, then you probably just don't know the name of the movie. Yeah. What is this? The movie is Sidney Pollack's Bobby Deerfield. Okay. I was gonna say, I didn't... You didn't know that was a racing movie. I didn't know it was a racing movie. You just know, like, the poster... I know the poster of him with, like, a scarf. And you know that's, like, a classic bad Al Pacino. Like, Al Pacino movie that didn't work. Right. In between all the ones that did.

[02:41:45] I've seen that poster, which is, like, I feel like, black and white. You look hot. Him with a scarf. Sidney Pollack movie. And I was just like, that's probably about, like, a poet or something. Bobby Deerfield. Okay. I was almost gonna guess that, and I was like, that will sound silly that I thought that was a racing movie. Other movies in the top ten. You've got a Burt Reynolds movie called Semi-Tough. Oh, yeah. Sports movie. Michael Ritchie movie. Where is it? It's a football movie with... It's him going back to the football. Oh, well. Jill Kleberg is like a love triangle or something.

[02:42:15] Never seen it. You've got First Love, which is a romantic movie, if that might surprise you. Okay. With William Cat. Oh, sure. Yeah. I don't know. You seem excited by this box office. It doesn't... It's got some Cat Stevens songs in it. Oh, well. I don't know. That must have been novel. What? Young man works through his feelings while Cat Stevens plays? I think that's the vibe, yeah. I feel like you can sort... I feel like especially this era...

[02:42:44] I mean, I guess it happens all the time. But like, you can sort movies into like... Are they part of the future or the past? Yes. I think this is trying to be part of the future, but it's just not a very good movie. And then there are like movies that are... It's trying to be a sensitive sex drama, you know. As you list these movies, I'm like... Oh, these movies are from the 70s and these movies are about to be the 80s. But you have movies like that almost that are like... Movies from the past that are trying to dress up like movies from the future. Where they're like, look, he's got long hair and Cat Stevens is playing.

[02:43:14] Right, right, right, right. And you're like, this movie could have been made in 1925. You've also got the Richard Pryor comedy, Which Way Is Up? Which is like a... It's a remake of The Seduction of Beamy. I've never seen it. But it's like Pryor playing multiple roles. The Seduction of Beamer. Right, yeah. I've never seen it. And then you've got Julia, the aforementioned, you know, Lillian Hellman drama. Yeah. Julia. Right, the prequel to Julie and Julia. Decade of Dreams. I'm just calling out other movies we've covered in the past. Absolutely. Yeah.

[02:43:44] Hilariously enough, guess what goes to number one the next week? Hilarious? It's hilarious what goes to number one? It's making you laugh. Not really. It's just funny. David's on the floor cracking up. Number one, the weekend after, which I guess is basically Thanksgiving weekend, Star Wars. People are just like, let's just go see it again. Yeah. You know, it's been like six months and people are like, Thanksgiving. I'm feeling Star Wars then. You were right, David. That is funny. I actually think we should Star Wars. They probably also, like that was an era where movies would play for so long that they would refresh the newspaper ads.

[02:44:14] By Christmas, to speak to your point, by like the weekend of mid-December, Close Encounters has jumped to number one. So I assume by then it's gone quite wide. But they probably bought a bunch of newspaper ads where it's like Chewbacca with a turkey and then people were like, you're right, I should go again. The Christmas special drop and people are like, ah. And then Close Encounters is number one through February. Wow. Because that's how it was back in the day. It's like you would have these, right, you know, these giant hits that just played them and there's no will. You know, people want to see them over and over.

[02:44:42] I mean, people are big Bob Baalbin fans. Anyway, Spielberg, on Reflecting on the Movie, says, it's a piece of shit and I don't like it very much. That's not true. He says what you said, you know, the thing you said near the start of the episode, which is like, I was a kid when I made that movie. I didn't have a family. I didn't have kids. So I could understand following your obsession at all costs. And now I wouldn't. But hey, that speaks to Spielberg's life as a filmmaker. I think this is part of what I find compelling about this movie. And it exists a lot in Sugar Land as well.

[02:45:09] And then I'd say sort of goes away is like he becomes such an incredible kind of technician of emotion on top of everything else. Like he just figures out the codex of like the perfect narrative arcs for characters and how to express that visually and how to get that performance and all of that. That like what I think irks him about this film is that it's like I didn't make this character work.

[02:45:33] And I like that it sort of feels like his last kind of deeply unresolved, ambiguous character. You know that like even when he's making movies about moral ambiguity from this moment on, you always feel the sense of how Spielberg wants you to feel in that scene or that shot. I also think we've talked about this before, that when directors are starting around the

[02:45:59] time when they get their blank checks or just starting their careers, oftentimes the movie is bigger than them and they're trying to rein it in and wrangle this thing that seems impossible. Trying to rein it in. Maestro. Decade of Dreams. Yes. And oftentimes I find that in those moments of stress while making something that feels like this is impossible, I'm not going to pull this off, is when the only thing you can rely on is truth. Yes. And just like what is inside you.

[02:46:28] And that makes movies really special and interesting. And when movies are being like sort of like broken apart at the seams is when the only thing I can feel that is either the thing's going to not work or you have to fill it with truth. And that's the only thing you got. And I think he finds some of that unbecoming to rewatch. Yes, because also in learning about the making of this, the production was crazy. The set was insane. Balabam was fucking John Downshin a diary.

[02:46:53] I mean, one of the things they talked about is how the weather and how hot and horrible it was. And they had hundreds of extras they needed to have. And one of the things I think is wonderful about this movie is that they cast locals to be all of the extras and eventually just were like giving people parts because they're just losing people left and right. So when you watch this film now, it's not you got some really good faces. There's some really good faces of people who are just like real people that are not movie stars that will never be in a movie again.

[02:47:22] And this energy that comes through, that's very there is an unrefinement to it that I think is that mixed with the refinement of Douglas Trumbull and Spielberg mixed with the unrefinement of this giant, huge budget thing that's sort of like falling apart at the seams in some places makes it really amazing. And in a movie that's sort of about the inexplicable and the unresolvable. And that's one of the one of the Balaban moments that's really funny is he's talking about the aliens.

[02:47:50] And so Spielberg wanted the aliens to be played by like 12 year old girls, like dancers. He's like just people that are like small, lithe and will be able to like move with some sort of a femininity that isn't stunt people or whatever. And so they cast a bunch of like local dancer girls to be all of the aliens. And they're like, I think like nine and 10 year old girls.

[02:48:16] But because of that, Balaban tells us like really funny story about shooting that scene and how the girls were really well behaved, but they're still kids. And so like there's a bunch of takes where it's like, first, the idea was that they're going to have them all on roller skates and have them roller skate down. So that felt like they're gliding, but the ramp was too steep. And so instead they, all the girls just sort of like tumble and slide down the thing. And inside that the spaceship was so dangerously hot that they could only put them in there

[02:48:46] for a couple minutes and they'd have to open it and then do the scene. So when it opens up, you just see all these kids sort of like sliding down and like rolling down this thing sort of very unceremoniously. And then they can't really see. So they're all sort of like moving around. And then he tells a story where like the kids would get bored. So in the middle of the take, aliens would just start dancing and like doing like disco moves and stuff because they're just like bored and like cut, cut, cut, cut, cut. Okay, guys, you can't dance in the middle of it.

[02:49:11] And there's a story where one of the girls pulled off the other one's hand, started hitting her with it and it became this like, but when you watch it now, you see that it's not this like refined choreographed. It's like a mess of kids that they're just like using the takes where it's like they're not dancing and hitting each other and being kids. And so it feels like a bunch of like anxious kid energy. And I think those rough edges are what make this really beautiful. And, you know, I think we talked about this with Burton and other people where it's like

[02:49:39] once you get enough control and power and budget, those rough edges get sanded away and it just becomes whatever you want it to be, which is usually within your comfort zone as a creator and a lot of really great art and great films. And it's a bummer to say, but it comes from when these things sort of feel like they can barely hold together. And from those rough edges is where like interesting stuff happens. Spielberg is, though, I feel like one of the rare examples of someone who got access to

[02:50:07] everything and all the acclaim and success in the world and still found ways to stay vital and connected. And I think part of that is him being smart about knowing how to challenge himself. The challenge isn't going to come from the limitations of me not knowing what I'm doing or no one believing in me. But can I go into a genre I don't know? Can I try to make the film fast? Like, I mean, I do think much like Soderbergh, a lot of it for him is like go in and try to game it out on the day and challenge myself to see how quickly I can get through pages.

[02:50:36] Not because I'm lazy, but I need that sort of pressure and struggle. Yeah. But it is true. This is one of the last times that he has that even on Raiders where he's like, look, I'm trying to be on rails. I need to come in under budget, under schedule. That's self-discipline. He's Lucas is fucking giving him the money for it. Paramount, they got like a sweetheart deal. He doesn't need to do that. He's proving that to himself. That changes the rest of his career. But basically, he gets to do whatever he wants from Raiders. Yeah.

[02:51:06] And here are the budgets blowing up. The sets falling down. He has no idea what he wants the ending to be, what the aliens look like. And from that, you get this really personal film that comes out that has these elements of truth. And I think that's, I think those are really beautiful films when that happens. I agree. Beautifully said. JD, After Midnight. After Midnight, CBS. People love it. Yeah. Thank you. The people are talking. I see clips. I don't watch it live. I'm sorry. We're trying to do fun stuff. We're trying to do cool stuff. I walk into the office. Everyone's red-eyed. They're bleary-eyed. Oh, they haven't shaved.

[02:51:36] Their shirt's misbuttoned. I go, what happened to you last night? When I stayed up after midnight, I couldn't turn off the TV. I was watching the show. I didn't get no sleep. Taylor Tomlinson, one of the best comedians working right now. She's great. Wonderful. She's great. So funny. A fun part of that job is that we're on the Paramount lot. Hey. And it's very fun. Iconic old movie lot. I get to drive in past the Paramount Arches. You walk past that Ten Commandments tank. My parking spot is in the Ten Commandments tank. The tank. It's in the tank.

[02:52:06] The tank. That's very cool. The Truman Show. And then I have to walk through fake New York City to get to my office. And then our stage is the Godfather stage. Thank you for being here, JD. Thanks for having me. I'm excited to be back. I love Closet Towns the third time. You're excited to be back six weeks before. Yeah. This is for the real people. The working class. The people who... Not the Patreon elites. This is for... The episode just has to end. JD hates being paywall a motto. He's got to play both sides. Yes. I get the... Ben is rubbing his temples.

[02:52:36] Thank you all for listening. Please remember to rate, review, and subscribe. Tune in next week for... 1941. Yeah, right? Calamity. Bounce. Yes. Yes. 1941. Yes. Yeah. When are the blankies happening? A couple... End of Feb. Later. Okay. So yeah. Tune in next week for 1941. Yes. Which hopefully will be a good episode. We're working on it. I'm promising. That's the... We're working on it. I'm promising it'll be a great episode. You know why?

[02:53:04] Because and as always, this is... A Decade of Dreams!