My Body is Disgusting: Swiss Army Man

by Cait Cannon and Rob DiCristino

The kids discuss their love of that farting corpse movie.

Rob: Hey, Cait! How’s it hanging? You and I were both big fans of Swiss Army Man, so I thought it would be fun to revisit it and talk a bit about how it stacks up to our other favorites of the year.

Cait: Huge! I get why people don’t dig it. They are wrong — but I get it. In talking with peers, the biggest problem they saw was how the ending shakes out. I didn’t go into the movie totally blind; I looked through the Daniels’ (ugh, name) portfolio and looked at work they had done pre-SAM, and it all sort of deals with the same stuff: they take movie tropes and end up totally inverting them through surrealism.

I’d like to hear what you thought about the ending: do you think it even matters? It is sort of like The Witch where (in my opinion) the last 20 minutes could have been cut?

Rob: So I just watched it again last night, and I actually think the ending is completely necessary. On a surface level, Swiss Army Man is about a guy coming to terms with his worst insecurities by processing them through someone else, which I think is sort of universal. The best way to understand something is to teach it. I heard one of the Daniels (ugh, name) explain it as “a suicidal man trying to convince a corpse that life is worth living,” and that really tracks for me. This broken and hopeless man (literally at the end of his rope) dives into his own private fantasy world, gradually building himself back up into a human being. The more Hank opens up, the more lively Manny becomes.

At first, I saw the whole last section as a sloppy and hurried way to slap an ending on a movie without a real narrative, but this time I saw it as Hank crossing that final threshold out of his fantasy land and back into real life. I love the absurdity of the final scene on the beach, with Mary Elizabeth Winstead giving that final “What the fuck?” That, plus the fart (“I did it!”) is the payoff of the entire journey.

Cait: I’m in the same boat. My boyfriend said he would have liked the movie better had they locked up Paul Dano’s character at the end or chosen something more decisive...but I don’t know if that would have done the movie justice. I also think it would have made people focus too much on the “did it actually happen?” line of thinking, ultimately unraveling the balance of sadness/delight the movie struck. I’m also not someone that needs to piece together the threads of realism in the movie, or wonder how it all came to being. There was a lot of chat online speculating whether or not the movie was a pre-death hallucination or what, but I don’t think that the story needs to be based in real life at all.

Rob: I know a lot of people were put off by the very idea of “the farting corpse movie.” What are your thoughts on how that kind of “lowbrow” comedy is used throughout the film?

Cait: I think lowbrow comedy is just using our physical existence as a punchline. We’re so uncomfortable about the internal goings-on of our bodies, especially if they don’t have a secondary purpose (the scene where Manny has an erection—the erection makes us laugh/feel weird because it’s out of the context of getting laid). Lowbrow comedy, I think in this instance, is mostly used to call out our separation from our bodies...kinda like that feeling of discomfort when you see your relaxed faced through the front-facing camera of your iPhone...if that makes sense to you? It’s sort of out of place, but at the end of the day it’s still us. So in the tradition of form fitting function, the lowbrow-ness of the movie is used in a really smart way—not as a comedic relief, but as a tool to talk about the reality of living, the animal-ness of it all.

Rob: Agreed. A fart might not be a good joke in and of itself, but it’s just like any other element in a story — the important part is how you use it and the feeling you’re trying to provoke from the audience. I think of something like Dumb and Dumber (which I love) where the joke is “He has diarrhea!” and compare it with this film where the joke is “Everyone farts, and that’s ok!” and I see an essential difference in pathos. I heard one of the filmmakers say that they chose farting because it was “the most honest sound a human can make,” which makes total thematic sense for Hank’s story. He’s afraid of himself and what people will think of him if he’s honest about who he is. What’s more dishonest than holding in a fart?

Take the “when I masturbate, I’ll think about your mom” conversation. I totally get why it’s off-putting for people, but there’s something about its presentation that immediately endears us (or at least me) to both guys. Hank is sort of explaining to Manny how his emotional trauma has led to social exclusion and suicidal feelings (and maybe coming to terms with it himself), and Manny is showing empathy for his friend in the most honest and childlike way possible. It’s like the “bag of sand” joke in The 40-Year-Old Virgin: it’s using something crude to evoke innocence.

Cait: Honesty is an interesting idea. I think it has a few ways “honesty” can be interpreted: sure, farting is one way to be an honest person in terms of your body and being vulnerable with people you love, but it also can represent our darker, more unsavory parts. It’s like holding back your ‘secrets’ or past when you’re just getting to know someone. I also think the movie tackles honesty within a male identity? Like, Manny’s and Hank’s relationship is romantic, deep, and intimate. Hank goes so far to start living as the woman he’s obsessed with to further the intimacy between Manny and himself. I don’t know if this necessarily goes so far as suggesting Hank is a trans-woman—which is another interpretation I’ve seen—but I’m wondering if this movie is challenging the distance that male friendship typically has in film (ie. the ‘no homo’-ness that exists in most buddy comedies, or male relationships existing as a punchline [see Judd Apatow movies…]). It’s especially interesting considering the directors are two men who advertise themselves as one unit. How do you feel about the gender roles they’ve got going on in this movie? Is it something that you put stock in?

Rob: That “two directors advertising as one unit” point is awesome; I’d never thought of that! It’s indicative of, like you said, how unironically comfortable this film is with male friendship. Since I read Manny as an extension of Hank’s consciousness (a kind of blank slate for him to project on) their increased intimacy reflects Hank’s increased sense of self-worth and agency. There’s that great bit on the river when Manny says, “I’m afraid that if I die, I might really miss you!” which leads to the underwater kiss of life. It’s such a romantic moment that plays totally sincere without any gender signifiers at all.

I was just thinking about some of Daniel Radcliffe’s line deliveries in this film. What did you think of his performance?

Cait: I don’t know if it was something that I paid too much attention to at first. It’s very deadpan but also very earnest and sweet. He sounds a lot like an internal monologue, but one that is without emotion or emphasis for much of the movie. I wonder if this straight read of his lines is meant to not have a bias? So we as viewers are left to interpret and soak up the information by osmosis, almost without thinking. I don’t know—what are you thinking about it?

Rob: I love Radcliffe in Swiss Army Man. I think it’s such an easy role to go big on (especially given the tone of the film), but he went for sincere, which works so much better. “My body is disgusting!” and “That’s so sad!” (in regards to the societal norm of holding in farts) are my favorite line deliveries ever. Learning that he refused a stunt double and manipulated a lot of the dummies himself gave me even more respect for the performance. I think it’s one of the very best of the year.

This has been awesome! Thanks for talking Swiss Army Man with me!

Cait: Hi bye! This has been a more fun version of AOL instant messaging, but smarter and with fewer sad away messages! So many exclamation points!

Riske Business: About That La La Land Ending...

by Adam Riske

I have a theory. SPOILER warning, obviously.

I fully admit that I might be reading into this based on personal experience, but I think the whole fantasy sequence at the end of La La Land is Sebastian (Ryan Gosling) realizing he was chasing the wrong dream. Mia (Emma Stone) was his avenue to life-long happiness and the jazz club he dreamed of opening (and does at the end of La La Land) is no longer his self-actualization. Remember way back when on the Star Wars: The Phantom Menace podcast where Patrick described George Lucas as being trapped in a Star Wars cage? I think Sebastian’s jazz club, affectionately named “Seb’s” for Mia (complete with a music note as the apostrophe), is Sebastian’s Mia cage.

Truth be told, I don’t know if Mia and Sebastian could have ever worked long-term. It’s obvious that they love each other and will think of the other fondly for the rest of their lives. However, using the structure of the four seasons of their romance, a lot happened. It might have been one of those super passionate loves that burns hot and flames out quickly. I think a reason for this is because (at heart) Mia is a revolutionary (e.g. she left Boulder City, she went for a big dream) and Sebastian is a traditionalist (i.e. he refuses to leave L.A., his dream is to revere jazz of the past). Mia is forward-thinking and Sebastian is not and he realizes that he probably should have been even though he’s (most likely) too late.

I think it’s telling that Sebastian isn’t seen in a relationship at the end of the movie. There’s ample opportunity to hint that he is, so much so that since they don’t it infers he hasn’t moved on. The giant wall advertisement for Mia’s next movie (or something she’s promoting) being on the side of the Seb’s building is also an interesting visual motif; she’s a cloud hanging over his whole life. He also comments to the other piano player in the “Five Years Later” sequence that “pretty good is great!” when the guy tells Sebastian that the club is doing pretty good. It hints that Sebastian is usually not “pretty good,” otherwise “pretty good” wouldn’t be “great.” Lastly, I don’t think the holiday card with Sebastian’s sister, her husband and his nephew being shown is a mistake. Within the sequence, it establishes quickly what happened to those characters, but they’re so slight in the grand scheme of the story that I think it’s more to give another clue that it’s what Sebastian really wants.

When Sebastian sees Mia as she comes into his club with her husband and plays Sebastian and Mia’s song, that sets off the phenomenal fantasy sequence, which is like Sebastian’s heart bleeding out for Mia to see.

• He grabs her and kisses her instead of brushing her off in the piano bar.

• Sebastian rebuffs Keith (John Legend) and doesn’t join his jazz fusion band, thus eliminating the choice he’ll have to make later of not going to Mia’s play and staying for the band’s photo shoot.

• Sebastian goes with Mia to Paris, plays at a jazz club there while Mia is groomed for stardom. The jazz club is seen as bright and lively as compared to “Seb’s,” which is darker and less vivacious.

• He imagines them married and with a family and super affectionate on a date night at the jazz club - - with someone else playing the piano. He seems happy. The jazz, while important, is not as important to him as Mia is. It still seems like Mia achieved her dream, too. It just goes to show you how delicate our lives can be based on a set of a few choices.

I love how the final shots of the movie recall Casablanca (i.e. “of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine.”) and I can easily see Mia and Sebastian getting back together even if it’s much more poetic that they do not. After all, they’re in the same town again, they are still making “do me” eyes at each other and she just has Tom Everett Scott as an obstacle. That’s no knock on Tom Everett Scott’s character. He seems like a decent guy BUT so was her boyfriend that she ran out on to meet up with Gosling for Rebel Without a Cause. Girl’s got heartbreaking in her bones. Gosling put it out there in his piano tribute to Mia and the ball is in her court.

In closing, this is just one theory I had. You could read this movie in a number of different ways (e.g. it’s a more realistic/modern take on the “happily ever after” traditional romantic musical, it’s a statement about sacrifices needing to be made to chase your ultimate dream and how bittersweet that can be, it’s about how timing is just as important as anything in a relationship etc.) which is one of many, many reasons it’s an incredible movie.

F This Movie! 369: Good Will Hunting

Patrick and Doug still like them apples.



Download this episode here. (57.5 MB)

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Also discussed this episode: Jackie (2016), Doctor Strange (2016), Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2016), Nocturnal Animals (2016), Love Actually (2003), Band of the Hand (1986), Joysticks (1982), Fresh Meat (2012), Zoolander 2 (2016)

Announcing F This Movie Fest 6!

by Patrick Bromley

The world's only all-Twitter film festival returns!

You knew it was coming, but here's the official announcement: F This Movie Fest 6 will be taking place on February 11th!

If you're unfamiliar with F This Movie Fest, it's a day every year where we all watch movies together and talk about them over Twitter. Here's the deal:

1. Secure copies of all five movies! (DVD/Blu-ray, Amazon Instant Video, iTunes rentals, public libraries, etc.)
2. If you're not already doing so, follow F This Movie! on Twitter (@fthismovie). If you're not already on Twitter, you should sign up! You can quit the very next day if you want.
3. Don't quit. Keep following us on Twitter.
4. Beginning at Noon on Saturday, February 11th, we all start watching the first movie at the same time from the comfort of YOUR OWN HOME and talk about it on Twitter (just tag all of your comments with #fthismoviefest). It will be like a running commentary. A conversation. Just like WE'RE ALL IN THE SAME ROOM TOGETHER!
5. We are not making fun of these movies. We love these movies.
6. If you have to leave for a movie or can only participate in half the festival or whatever, that's cool! Just check in or out with us on Twitter so we know who's there and when. Hopefully, we can all do the full marathon, but we know that's not easy for everyone.

This year we celebrate the 30th anniversary of 1987, one of the last great years for the kind of mainstream genre cinema the decade produced. The lineup is:

Noon

The Princess Bride

(98 min., dir. Rob Reiner)

2 p.m.

Predator

(107 min., dir. John McTiernan)

4:15 p.m.

Raising Arizona

(94 min., dir. Joel & Ethan Coen)

6:15 p.m.

RoboCop

(101 min. dir. Paul Verhoeven)

8:30 p.m.

The Monster Squad

(82 min., dir. Fred Dekker)

Start getting ready! Get your movies in order and watch this space for more details!

#fthismoviefest

Cinema Bestius: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

Heigh Ho! Heigh Ho! It’s off to work we go…

#10 – Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

How terrific is Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs? Sergei Eisenstein (Yes, the Battleship Potemkin guy) called it “the greatest film ever made.” How groundbreaking is this movie as the first feature-length cartoon? Some people at the time thought that humans could not sit through a cartoon if it were longer than ten minutes. I do not know what these naysayers thought would happen upon the eleventh minute of viewing animation: Bleeding eyeballs? Mild nausea? Madness? Discomfiting discharge? Fatal case of “the whimsies?”

There, the Pope is now officially the first critic to mention the beloved Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in the same sentence as “discomfiting discharge.”

The Plot In Brief: An evil Queen thinks she is the fairest in the land. She has an acolyte in the form of a Magic Mirror who tells her that she is the fairest on a pretty much daily basis. Then one fateful day Snow White, a delightful young lady and friend to small animals, is suddenly judged to be the fairest. This is somewhat contentious because even though the Evil Queen won the Electoral College, Snow White won the popular vote. The evil Queen loses her shit and orders Snow White killed.

The poor huntsman given this dirty job is a bleeding-heart liberal who opposes the death penalty. He takes pity on Snow White and sets her free in the forest. (Presumably he believes that dainty princess/bluebird-whisperer Snow White has had extensive outdoor survival training, and will somehow prevail.) Snow White befriends some forest creatures and eventually comes upon a little cottage.

The cottage belongs to the titular dwarfs (I keep wondering if Walt Disney deliberately misspelled “dwarves” so that he might copyright the term.) The dwarfs find Snow White charming and invite her in. She quickly improves their lives: she cleans their house, she makes them food, and she shows them how to bathe. With their chances of being right-swiped on their Tinder profiles greatly improved, the dwarfs become quite attached to Snow White. The Wicked Queen, meanwhile, learns of the huntsman’s subterfuge and vows to take guaranteed health insurance away from the dwarfs. (Actually it’s been a while since I have screened this one; this plot summary may not be 100% accurate.)

The animation here is without peer. At the time, Disney was famous for scrapping weeks of animation if it was not up to his high standard. In fact, this feature project was so close to his heart that, during the meeting in which he introduced Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs to his animation team, Walt acted out the entire story, playing all the parts himself, over the course of ninety minutes. I love Walt.

As we would come to expect from future Disney features, the songs are tuneful and catchy; highlights include “Some Day My Prince Will Come,” “Whistle While You Work,” and the now iconic “Heigh Ho.” In fact, John Lennon wrote the Beatles’ song “Do You Want To Know A Secret?” after seeing Snow White. He was inspired by the Snow White song “I’m Wishing,” and originally wrote the lyrics, “Do you want to know a secret? Do you promise not to tell… standing by a wishing well?” The Pope is not making this up.

Even Popes like to have fun—and I like to play “The Dwarf Game!” I cannot be the only one who, after screening the film, enjoys making up names for dwarfs who did not quite make it into the movie. Disney and his animators wound up choosing the iconic seven’s names from a much longer list that originally included such memorable monikers as Baldy, Burpee, Dizzy, Gabby, Jumpy, Lazy, Nifty, Puffy, Shorty, Sniffy, Stuffy, Swifty, Tubby, and Wheezy. So dive in and make up your own B-List!

Here is my list of Lesser Dwarfs: Prickly, Tickly, Scabby, Dabby, Maybe, Crybaby, Coffee, Coughy, Coffy, Slappy, Picky, Louie, Chewy, Easy, Sleazy, Anxious, Ambivalent, Cautious, Gluten-Free, Crispy Crunch, and Boss Man Jim.

Post your favorite “also-ran” dwarfs in the comments section below.

AN ANNOYING AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL PAUSE: I am old enough to still remember when the Disney organization had its classic animated features on a seven-year theatrical re-release schedule. In the days before home video, Disney realized that, about every seven years, nature would provide a new, untapped audience of children who had never seen these wonderful movies on the big screen. Thanks to that program, I got to see Snow White, Pinocchio, Fantasia, Dumbo, Bambi, and other early classics in an honest-to-God movie theater. I treasure those memories and wish Disney would bring this program back. Parents need an alternative if the only movie for kids on a given weekend is The Secret Life of Pets! What parent would not instead opt for the original Lady and the Tramp, Jungle Book, or even The Fox and the Hound?

Listen up, Disney. There is money to be made.

Snow White’s Three Miracles: A perfectly realized fairy-tale narrative with a plucky heroine, terrific comic relief, and one of the greatest villains in movie history; animation that represented a huge leap forward from Disney’s previous “Silly Symphony” shorts; and a wonderful message for children—two of the most important things in life are empathy and friendship.

In nomine Disney, et Dopey, y spiritu Grimm, Amen.

Review: The Barn

by Patrick Bromley

That poster is the best thing about this movie. That's not a knock on the film. It's just that the poster is really, really great.

Writer/director Justin Seaman's The Barn is the newest latest (to me) indie horror movie that exists to fetishize the 1980s in every way, from the aesthetics to the effects to even some members of the cast. It's the kind of film that, like 2015's Lost After Dark and last year's Secret Santa, exists less to pay tribute to '80s horror than to slavishly recreate it, all imitation and not inspiration. And yet despite being part of what I see as a depressing trend in indie horror, The Barn is charming and fun and one of the best examples of its type that I've seen. Taken on its own, I enjoyed the movie. Taken as part of a growing fad, I feel like I'm over it.

Based on a story that the Pennsylvania-based Seaman wrote when he was eight years old, The Barn tells the legend of three demonic spirits -- The Boogeyman, Candycorn Scarecrow and Hallowed Jack -- who awaken from within an old barn on Halloween night 1989 and terrorize a town. When a group of kids stop in town on their way to a concert, they come face to face with the monsters and best friends Sam (Mitchell Musolino) and Josh (Will Stout) must follow the rules of their favorite holiday to win back the night.

There's a lot that The Barn has going for it. The movie is heavy with Halloween atmosphere and a real love for the mythology of the holiday, going so far as to create its own legends to correspond with the night; each of the three monsters represents a different aspect of Halloween and feel like real stories we might have heard as kids. That Halloween vibe is probably my favorite thing about the film and is the reason I may return to it in future Octobers, as it's clear just how much affection the filmmakers have for the Most Wonderful Time of the Year. Director Seaman tries to approximate the look of an '80s horror movie without going overboard on post-production scratches or gimmicky "missing reel" bullshit (it was funny in Grindhouse and never again). The occasional cigarette burn is visible from time to time, but it's hard to hold that against the movie when Mike Flanagan did the exact same thing in Ouija: Origin of Evil just a few months back. There's some synth score, but it's never overdone; most of the music in the is metal that's not entirely period accurate. The practical gore effects are fun, particularly during one mid-movie slaughter that piles one gag on top of another. Hell, even a cameo by First Jason himself Ari Lehman manages to be super fun, with the gloved one appearing as the host of a late night video show with an opening credits sequence that's hilariously spot-on.

Linnea Quigley also appears in a single-scene cameo as an uppity religious woman who doesn't like all this glorification of Halloween, and her sequence points to a big part of my issue with The Barn. It's not Quigley. She's fine, and it's always fun to see her getting work. It's the way the scene is edited so that it feels like it takes twice as long as it needs to. This is a recurring concern in the movie, which only runs 90 minutes but when drags much more often than it should. There's a shapelessness to the narrative that makes it confusing as to when certain things are taking place; after a prologue, The Barn cuts to a sequence in which kids are trick or treating, only to reveal that it's actually the night before Halloween. It introduces the "let's go to a concert" conceit, but then there's a stopover in a town and a trip to the barn and then back to the town and all sense of time is pretty much lost. The movie feels flabby on a macro and a micro level, with a story that moves in fits and starts and scenes that are in need of tighter editing.

Allow me this digression. I keep thinking we have reached peak nostalgia, but then something comes along to prove me wrong and suggest that the movement shows no signs of slowing. There are movies I've really liked (such as last year's The Mind's Eye or even Beyond the Gates) that have a heavy '80s influence because the new generation of indie horror directors were raised on those movies, but they're also movies that feel like new works created by original voices interested in making something good. Other indie horror films I've seen of late (I won't say which ones, as there's no point in calling them out by name) appear content to rest on recreating the '80s aesthetic and use it as an excuse to make a shitty movie because, well, some of those early '80s horror movies were shitty. So now we're creating nostalgia for something we don't even necessarily like, but have fondness for because...we saw it when we were kids? Or didn't see it when we were kids, but it came out at the same time as other movies we liked as kids? As someone who is not immune to the allure of nostalgia, I'm genuinely trying to understand this phenomenon.

The Barn is taking things several steps further, as the nostalgia doesn't end with the film itself. It has become part of all of the marketing and even merchandising around the movie (made possible by a hugely successful Indiegogo campaign), which offers big box VHS copies of the film, the soundtrack album on vinyl and cassette tape (retro!), a board game, vinyl Halloween masks, old school-style The Barn action figures and an 8-bit video game. The glorification of the '80s has become its own little cottage industry as far as The Barn is concerned, and I bring this up not to damn the film or the filmmakers (this is all separate from the movie itself), but to question where the breaking point will be. Is trading in on things that are old a sustainable business model? There are communities of people who fetishize VHS, not because it's the only way to see certain movies (it still is) but because of how it looks and sounds, this despite the fact that it is an inferior format in every single measurable way. I'm guessing there are also people who prefer 8-bit video games to anything on their PS4s. So we're no longer selling a movie that feels retro, but recapturing the entire experience of what it was to be an '80s kid. This is not the way to create art that is new or exciting. This is not the way we move forward.

Again, The Barn is not really the problem here. It may be symptomatic of the problem, but at least it's a pretty good symptom. The movie is more or less successful in achieving its goals; it has a fun Halloween vibe and the monsters are cool new creations. It genuinely means well and feels free of cynicism. At the same time, I don't know if it's a movie I can revisit all that often, having gotten most of what I'm going to get from it on a single viewing. As approximations go, this one's enjoyable. But if I want to recapture the feeling of watching an '80s horror movie, I've got shelves full of the real deal here at home.

Reserved Seating with Rob and Adam: Silence

by Rob DiCristino and Adam Riske

The review duo that puts your faith…back in film criticism.

Rob: Welcome to Reserved Seating. I’m Rob DiCristino.

Adam: And I’m Adam Riske. I’ll just get it out of the way: Silence is great.

Rob: Based on the novel by Shūsaku Endō, it’s the story of two Jesuit priests (Andrew Garfield and Adam Driver) who smuggle their way into 17th century Japan in order to rescue their teacher (Liam Neeson)…

Adam: “Mentor” is more appropriate.

Rob: …who disappeared some years before. They discover a culture in which Catholics face daily and life-threatening persecution and find that their own faith is not as firm as they once believed.

Adam: In this clip, Sebastião Rodrigues (Andrew Garfield) and Francisco Garupe (Adam Driver) are in hiding, unable to go out in daylight for fear of being discovered by Japan’s military dictators, who are apprehending all priests and their Christian followers. But the two priests grow restless and frustrated as they are unable to complete their mission of locating their mentor, Father Cristóvão Ferreira. Finally, they decide to go out into the open, if only briefly. This scene is a fine example of the sense of danger and fear that fills Scorsese’s latest.



Rob: It’s a frightening scene that’s representative of the film’s first act, which is encased almost entirely in fog and obscured by brush. It’s perfect symbolism that serves a number of functions.

Adam: I’m glad you mentioned that. The cinematography by Rodrigo Prieto perfectly captures the time and place that is later described in the film as a swamp where nothing can grow. It’s a country with an enormous disparity between the haves and the have-nots, with religion being just as much political and socioeconomic as it is about the tenets of Christianity or Buddhism. This movie made me think about religion more than I have in a very long time. It’s not just affirmation for a devout audience, but rather challenges their devotion on a human and philosophical level. Is your faith worth your own suffering? And more significantly, is it important enough for you to allow others suffer for it?

Rob: As both a lapsed Catholic and a huge Scorsese fan, I was completely at home in the world he was building here. Catholicism is so much about demonstrating your devotion through suffering, more or less apologizing for even having been born.

Adam: I’m Jewish and I’ve never done any of that.

Rob: Are you done? I’m talking.

Adam: Latkes with sour cream, never applesauce.

Rob: Silence challenges us to consider how much our faith is really rooted in ego, and how willing we are to put our lives in the hands of an intangible force that may not even be listening. What happens when we lose the moral superiority that our doctrine has endowed us with?

Adam: You’re 100 percent right about the topic of ego. I found it fascinating how both the Buddhists and the Christians thought they were the ones who were right, not surprisingly, but when the priests begin using words like they have the “truth” then you open up a whole other can of worms. While not sympathetic, necessarily (they do persecute the Christians with violence), the Japanese inquisitors do have a point: who are you to tell me I’m wrong? Why are you trying to take away my country’s identity? The Christian priests in the movie will listen to this dialogue but aren’t really hearing it. They are so steadfast in their belief that they are unbending, and so are the Japanese. Unintended or not, it struck me as a statement on today’s climate (more political than religion), where each side is so firmly in their position that trying to convince the other side is like talking to a brick wall.

Rob: Including Garfield’s character, Rodrigues. I loved that our protagonist was a giant dickhead half the time, that he was so committed to his ideology for the sake of ideology, not even evidence or real “truth.” There’s a moment when he tells one of the peasants that his faith gives him strength. The peasant says (I’m paraphrasing), “I have love. Is that the same as faith?” Rodrigues says, “Yes, I think it is.” It’s so much about how subjective and incidental our own experiences with religion are, which is ironic considering how hard and fast the ideology tends to be. Life and death are played with in such absolute terms, and the religious oppression at work is so heartbreaking that Rodrigues is constantly reassessing his commitment to his core beliefs.

Adam: It really is heartbreaking. By the end instead of thinking “why would Rodrigues ever suffer and makes others suffer as long as he does?” the film gives us a moment that makes it absolutely clear why this was such an ordeal for him. I wish I could talk more about it because it’s a masterstroke type of moment that the movie builds to.

Rob: I won’t spoil it either, but it’s the only acceptable payoff for nearly three hours of this kind of emotional torment. Like you said, the title became more and more resonant as things went on. Speaking of which, did you feel the length at all? I found that the film’s structure made it so that I didn’t. It has three very distinct acts, and I think that helped me avoid complacency.

Adam: It did feel long, but not in a negative way. A movie like this should be long and draining. I don’t think having this movie be two hours would have been enough. In, say, The Passion of the Christ, the abuse is physical and for the audience emotional, we get that quickly, but here it’s much more a psychological suffering and that takes time to draw out. I love movies like Silence, where you feel like you’ve been through an experience of great strain. If any cuts could be made, I think they would be of Adam Driver’s character.

Rob: That or give him more screen time and make it more of a two-hander for the first hour and a half or so. Then again, maybe Scorsese knew that the character was just there to plant the seed of doubt? It’s hard to tell. Maybe he felt that the suffering he was depicting was so private and personal that some kind of Buddy Priest adventure wouldn’t resonate as much. Too much expository dialogue also might have spoiled the visceral experience of the film. None of this is meant to knock Andrew Garfield at all, by the way. He’s spectacular.

Adam: I’m right there with you. Garfield is a very emotive actor and I think that works so much to the benefit of Silence because you “get it” so much more than you would with a more stoic presence like, say, Liam Neeson’s character.

Rob: I love that he plays Rodrigues equal parts determined and totally vulnerable. I haven’t seen Hacksaw Ridge, but I hear he’s having a good year so far.

Adam: I’ve seen Hacksaw Ridge. The public wants us to see these pictures and share our thoughts. It’s decent.

Rob: As for the running time, the experience was worth a bit of back pain. Like you said, we should suffer a bit as an audience. Besides, Scorsese’s constantly giving us these little benchmarks to keep the drama ebbing and flowing. Like the “apostatize” sequences, when the Christians-in-hiding are told to step on the image of Christ. It starts as this lark and then gradually builds to the defining moment in the film. You can’t sell that in ninety minutes, but it’s totally cathartic after a long ordeal.

Adam: The character of Kichijiro (Yosuke Kubozuka) was another element that really impressed me. He represented, I think, many people who claim to be religious who are really just using religion as a way to absolve their pervasive weakness of character or indiscretion. I found his arc and that character’s relationship with Garfield’s character to be fascinating and complex.

Rob: He’s the best! My audience laughed this desperate, agonized laugh every time he showed up to atone for a whole new set of sins. He definitely, to me, represented the kind of religious zealot who cherry picks the rules and regulations of their faith as they see fit. He’s gaming the system, taking advantage of its loopholes. Rodrigues’ continued frustration with him was a fantastic way to illustrate his own internal struggle, too. How the hell does this guy keep getting away with it? Why do I keep forgiving him? Is this really the human race I’ve been tasked with saving?

Adam: So a big Mark Ahn for me on Silence.

Rob: Totally. Watching Silence is basically a rite of passage -- it’s both spiritually enlightening and existentially miserable. Since I hate myself, it’s a big Mark Ahn for me. Can we just talk for a second about how Martin Scorsese is still balls-deep into excellent filmmaking while many of his peers are asleep on couches somewhere?

Adam: We’re running long.

Rob: Oh, so you can drone on about politics, but I have to cut to the chase?

Adam: On next week’s show Rob & I will be discussing Live By Night, the new gangster movie from Ben Affleck where he has to shoot a bunch of hoods and decide who he’d rather sleep with — Sienna Miller or Zoe Saldana, a sacrifice almost worse than in Silence.

Rob: Truly, we should be in awe. (Saldana, by the way.)

Adam: I’d like to meet them both first and see if my desire is reciprocated.

Rob: Oh cool, you’re high-roading me? I opened up to you, and you punished me for it.

Adam: Until next time…

Rob: Dick.

Adam: These seats are reserved.