Ari Aster – This Had Oscar Buzz

Happy Halloween! Quickly following up his paradigm-shifting Hereditary, Ari Aster took to Sweden for Midsommar. The film stars Florence Pugh as a young woman who follows her boyfriend on a study trip in the wake of a major personal tragedy. As the running-on-fumes romance disintegrates, things get very weird and very sinister in the remote town in which they’re staying. Though the film earned him the vocal respect of the likes of Martin Scorsese, its Oscar chances were swiftly cut short.

This episode, we talk about the film’s morbid (and often quite funny) depiction of cult behavior and the backlash against Aster’s cinematic sensibilities. We also talk about Pugh’s Little Women performance in the same year, how the film doesn’t completely spell out what’s happening just offscreen, and the director’s cut that has gained popularity in the year’s since.

Topics also include Joe’s current spooky watching, 2019 Best Actress, and Midsommar‘s memeability.

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Happy Halloween, listeners! Naturally, this week we are returning to the shallow well of horror films that made it into the Oscar hunt with a recent highly debated and lauded terrifier. In 2018, Ari Aster made his feature debut at Sundance with Hereditary, the story of a family invaded from within by a demon worshipping cult. Aster’s bizarre vision quickly earned the film a reputation as one of the scariest ever made, but Toni Collette’s performance as a terrified and grieving mother received some career-best notices and feverish hopes that she could crack the Best Actress lineup. As you might expect, Hereditary was simply too much for the Academy.

This episode, we talk about everything that makes the film so divisive and Ari Aster’s whole thing. We also talk about Collette’s career and our favorites in her filmography, the rise of character actress Ann Dowd, and what makes the conversation around “elevated horror” so frustrating.

Topics also include putting the Saturn Awards on notice, coin parties, and the Gotham Awards.

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Tag: Ari Aster

410 – Midsommar

261 – Hereditary