Taissa Farmiga – This Had Oscar Buzz

StaightioLab cohost and Gawker editor George Civeris returns to us this episode, and we’re going to Paris’. In 2013, Sofia Coppola delivered another tale of disaffected youth, this time ripped from gossip column headlines with The Bling Ring. With a post-Harry Potter Emma Watson at the center, the film follows several Los Angeles celeb-obsessed teens who famously got busted for breaking into the homes of tabloid staples like Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan. Already demoted to Cannes’ Un Certain Regard section (after Marie Antoinette was notoriously booed in competition), the film was one of the director’s most harshly received films for its depiction of teen misguidedness.

This episode, we talk about our varying opinions on Watson’s performance and our picks for the weakest films in Coppola’s oeuvre. We also talk about comparisons to another film from A24′s first year, the film’s atypical portrayal of the gay teen experience, and the film’s precisely-timed soundtrack.

Topics also include how mid-aughts celeb culture has evolved to today, Secret Celebrity Drag Race, and another round of Alter Egos.

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Many of Clint Eastwood’s most recent films have arrived in quick turnaround, going from announcement to filming to release in a head-spinningly short amount of time. In 2018, he had one of his fastest productions ever with The Mule, a story of an 80-year-old man estranged from his family who takes on a job hauling drugs across the border in his pickup truck. Inspired partly by a true story, the film’s sprint to theatres set expectations that it might be another of Eastwood’s successful late season arrivals like Million Dollar Baby. The result was a Christmas season box office success, but a film that ultimately didn’t attempt much of an awards campaign to make voters take notice.

This episode, we don’t mince words about how we feel about the film’s offensive stereotypes and clunky pseudo-comic character study. We get into Bradley Cooper reuniting with Eastwood for a thankless role here in the same season as his triumph with A Star Is Born, and how Cooper shockingly missed out on becoming the season’s frontrunner. And we discuss the film’s trolling tactics, the work of screenwriter Nick Schenk, and the free pass the film received by critics.

Topics also include an egregiously underused Dianne Wiest, flirting at flower conventions, and Eastwood grumbling the word “internet.”

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Tag: Taissa Farmiga

212 – The Bling Ring (with George Civeris)

161 – The Mule