Whit Stillman on ‘Metropolitan,’ a Christmas Movie

Welcome back to the Bulwark goes to Hollywood. I’m Sunny Bunch, Culture editor the Bulwark, and and I’m very, very pleased to be joined today by Witt stillman, the director of the last days of disco, and Daniels in distress among other features. We’re here today to discuss a subject near and dear to my heart, and that is mister stillman’s first feature Metropolitan, which has, in recent years, become, my favorite Christmas movie, and I feel like it’s become a stable of the, the the Christmas movie conversation. I think folks are folks are starting to, buy into that. And I like that.

He will be on hand to discuss Metropolitan this Saturday, December sixteenth at the Dryden Theatre in Rochester, New York, and if you’re not in Rochester, you can watch Metropolitan by yourself or with friends on either the criterion channel or Max, a k a h b o max. I still have a problem with Max. As a stand alone name. It’s also available on Bluray from the criterion collection, which is currently having thirty percent off sale. So pick it up.

There, if you don’t own it already, and if you haven’t picked up a copy of Fireflies, presses, with stillman not so long ago, do yourself a favor and do so, my understanding, is that they are almost sold out and, no more copies are going to be printed. It’s gonna become a collector’s item. So go pick it up. Mister Stillman, thank you for being on the show today.

Thanks for having me.

So on the on the commentary track that accompanies, that criterion disc that I just mentioned, you or one of your colleagues said something that has always stuck with me, that Metropolitan is at heart, a movie about finding, the universal and the very specific and and I do think that the universe the universality of the film is kind of key to this idea of Metropolitan as a, you know, quote, a Christmas movie, unquote, have you been surprised to see it embrace that way the same way that I mean, to to a lesser extent, I think, but in the same way that, like, it’s a wonderful life. Or more recently and somewhat more controversially, something like, diehard has been embraced in that in that way.

Yeah. I mean, I think when you’re making a film, you’re super hopeful. And then there’s discouragement. And then over time, you hope that your film becomes survivable. And it’s been really Metropon has had sort of after unlucky breaks, it’s had nothing but lucky breaks.

And being with criterion has been really helpful because they took all the rights and got it on Max and got it on the criterion channel. And I just saw someone saying that it’s gonna have a four forty five AM, airing on TCM. So after your debutante party and the first and second after parties, you can go home scramble eggs and, watch Metropolitan.

Well, I it is it it’s it it’s interesting to kind of put into the to the the this category with you know, some of these these other films because it is, it is very much a hangout picture. I feel like this is a movie where you’re you’re almost sitting there with friends having conversation, which is how I spent I mean, this is how I spent most of my Christmas breaks during high school and and college you know, it was just going home and hanging out with folks. That’s that’s what this movie feels like.

Yeah. Someone said it’s not really a chris christmas movie. Exactly. It’s a Christmas vacation movie. Yes.

It just sort of divides into the, the first week before Christmas and then the decadent period after Christmas. There’s a lot of decadence in the film we should say.

Well, let’s, like, can we talk about Christmas as a hinge point? Because it does it does, you know, the the the first half or so of the film up until the actual day of Christmas is, it feels like this, nineteen fifties, you know, early nineteen sixties era with the dead balls and all that. And then afterwards, it’s, you know, the group splintering apart. There’s you know, there’s more it’s a little bit more risque, some of the activities. It’s Orgy weak.

Orgy weak.

I mean, I think an interesting thing about cruise vacation is that it divides into two pretty neatly. And there’s a certain, quarantine period where you’re not with your friends. So you’re with your friends for a certain number of days, and then there’s the sort of forty eight hours of family. And then you’re back with your friends again.

Can can we talk a little bit about the actual, the actual use of religion in the movie because, you know, Metropolitan is not explicitly a religious film in the way that I think we think of, you know, kind of faith based films now. But it is a film that touches on faith and the pageantry of the Christmas season. Right? You know, again, there’s that hinge point, but also I really, the most the most poignant scene in the film takes place in the church where Audrey is near tears, were in tears actually thinking about her relationship with Tom and how it hasn’t quite gone how she wanted.

Yes. I mean, one of our big breakthroughs, the professor John Murray, wonderful sociology professor, at, City University. He attended Saint Thomas Church, which has a beautiful Christmas Eve service. It’s really legendary. They’ve got, a wonderful voice choir and and and adult choir.

And, he helped me go to them to ask permission to shoot in, Saint Thomas during Christmas Eve service. And we had to speak to the verger as opposed in this very rich church. And, the verger, I think, was saying no to us when he said Yes. You can shoot our our conceived service, but with no lights. There can be no no film lights.

And fortunately, with sort of super fast Kodak films, hence we’re going to Eastman House, in Rochester. Superfest Kodak film, we could shoot with that lights. And, That was among the first things we shot. And, being able to tell locations later that, oh, yes, we’re a positive film about New York and, Saint Thomas church allowed us to ch shoot there. Chris and Eve Service, it was sort of a magic, Taliban for the rest of the shoot.

And there is a lot of religious content in the film, I’d say. Really, the first scene that was supposed to be opening of of the film is the fluster of doom Charlie Black talking about why there is a god to of luctress, young lady. And, and then we added Earlier beginnings to sort of set up the story better, but it also starts with the mighty fortresses our god. I think of him on the soundtrack. And so we tried to weave that into the film too.

It’s part of Christmas, and it’s part of the lives of these characters.

Yeah. I I that that was another thing that, that was kind of interesting from from the commentary was you you mentioned that that was the that was the original shot was Charlie talking about god, which is, again, just a it is a it’s a it’s a it’s a fascinating moment because it’s also one that I identify with in a in a weirdly specific way. But I I another thing you discussed in in that is the is finding the film in the edit and and kind of putting it together. So why when you when you were sitting there putting the movie together, why does that sequence get moved to, essentially the third scene.

That that wasn’t after the That wasn’t an editing change. That was the screen ring process. And sometimes I find it’s easier to think of of beginnings and endings than all the middle stuff. So Had that beginning and then had another idea for a beginning, which is sort of the meet cute fighting over a taxi cab outside the end of a dead party. So the meet cute, outside the Plaza Hotel, was the next idea to introduce the characters.

To to Tom Thompson and how they how they linked up. And then in writing the script, I realized that Tom Thompson was really not a very sympathetic character. It was not really a Tom Thompson point of view. Film finally, it was that Entry Point was Tom Townsend. But there really was, it should be Audrey’s story more.

And I couldn’t make the whole film Audrey’s story, but I I tried to increase the Audrey content in the movie because I think she was the sympathetic character. She was sort of the heart of of the film. And so we put in put in that first scene, of showing her sort of her problems. And I think a lot of the girls who are having a coming out party or they’re gonna be the Deb They actually enjoy it less than anyone. They feel that they’re on display.

They’re all sort of torn about it, how they look, all this kind of stuff. There’s a lot of angst. And it’s also doing the factor of trying to get the audience to hate the group sociologically less by showing their problems. And, because I think a big problem for the acceptance of the film was the sort of radioactive social media that’s portrayed.

Well, can we can we talk about that a little bit? Because I do I I it’s a fascinating problem to think about, in the sense that The the ultimate villain of the film, in so far as it has a villain, right, is Rick von Salonaker, and Rick von Slonica is a fascinating character because he shows the audience that this group of, you know, the the Sally fella rat pack, they they they are or at least the people we identify within it are also, annoyed by the kind of masters of the universe type that would that would come out of out of out of that whole scene. And it but he’s, like, he’s also almost unique in your filmography, maybe not quite unique, but it like, I feel like there aren’t a lot of heroes and villains in your stories. It’s just life, which is kind of what life is. He’s I I I’m I’m sorry.

I’m lost. I don’t know where I’m going with this. Rick von Salonaker, interesting guy. Great villain. Is that the key to making the people identify with these characters more?

Yes. And I think you’re really onto something about the films, and it’s a bit hoist by your own petard in the sense that sometimes I sort of brag that we don’t, do two dimensional characters. We don’t, sort of create, villains and stuff like that. It’s all three-dimensional, blah blah blah sympathetic to all these people. And then I think a lot of the success of Metropolitan was the fact that we really had a dastardly cat, in the film that really helps the film.

It really helps the film to have a really bad bad person. I think in last days of disco, from my point of view, there is someone similarly bad, which is the Bernie, character who is the, owner of the club, and, and he’s he’s kind of a bad guy. And also, the doorknazi character played by Bursteers, who later became a film director. He’s sort of humanized towards the end when he’s just going to employment before he heads to Florida. Which is identifiable.

And, and and so, yeah, a two dimensional cat ish character to hate, can really be helpful. And the fact that he is sort of the title, aristocrat, the real bad guy villain, sort of salvages all our people to be less bad than than that guy.

Well, I you mentioned the re the initial response to the movie, and there was if I remember correctly, there was some kind of hesitance to accepting that this was not a, a movie that was openly mocking this set, that it was it was, sympathetic to them, which is unusual, frankly, in films about class. Like, I it is it is it is not a thing that you see a lot.

It’s unusual now, but if you go back into the thirties cinema, they had a much more interesting attitude towards class. Where they just sort of dove into it. And we’re, you know, not doing the thing with the sort of outsider character and the insider characters and and all those, very familiar sort of pandering to the audience. Tactics used in in in cinema intelligence in the last forty years.

What would you what would you recommend, folks watch if they wanna get a taste of that. What what are some some films of of that milieu that that you think people might enjoy?

Well, I think there’s a fascinating, film, it’s not flawless, like the ending is is a little too, wincingly crowd pleasing. And there’s a lost phone for many years because he was in Mary in Cooper’s, collection, and he hadn’t let it out. And I think TCM exceeded in in unlocking. It’s called double harness, a student with William Powell, And it’s really interesting in its sort of class point of view because the outsider character who marries this rich guy is not necessarily Fully of heroin. There’s moral complexity that you almost never see.

Of course, there are other things that that that portray decadent milieu, sympathetically, such as, the awful truth. I mean, Leo McCarrie was was great at a lot of these things.

Let’s see if we can find double harness on streaming. Maybe it’s on the TCM.

It’s on YouTube.

App. It is okay. It’s on YouTube. You know, accessibility of film is an interesting thing. I because I I do feel like we are simultaneously in an era when there’s more stuff available than ever.

And yet there is still a the the streamers have not been great about bringing the nineteen thirties, nineteen forties, nineteen fifty stuff. Outside of, again, criterion channel, TCM. But it is it it does feel like audiences are missing out on large periods of film history.

Yes. I mean, Luke Lemeneck from formerly from New York Post has a wonderful Twitter feed about old films appearing on TV during the fifties and sixties and when they had their premieres. And a lot of us grew up particularly if you’re close to New York on these independent channels that used to fill their programming day with old films. And, we got to watch them. The editor I worked with on Metropolitan, and Barcelona, who’s brilliant, Chris Telson, he said he became interesting in film editing seeing the different versions of these films would be on the TV channels, because they cut them up for the commercial breaks.

And the films would have different sizes and different, implications. I sort of saw this when, Warner’s put out Barcelona syndicated on TV, and they did, cuts in order to fit into the, the ad format, and they cut out the, the shooting joke and the subtext joke. And I got them to restore the shooting joke, which I somewhat regret because I think it’s kind of a bad joke. But, The subtext joke, actually, by taking it out, it really strengthened the dramatic build of the last third of the film. And it was really interesting to see these brilliant, editors at Warner Brothers going over a film and and reconstituting it for ad breaks.

I am I am fascinated to hear you say that because the subtext joke is I would I it is it is it is the joke that I think most people remember who are only casually familiar or maybe not familiar with Barcelona. Remember, I I like that is that is it’s it’s a great line. It’s a great line, but you you you think it hurts the dramatic arc of the film?

Yes. I mean, there’s a real trade off with comedy because it’s very rare that comic material advances a story or helps the plot or things like that. And, it sometimes I find critics slip into the habit of doing kind of a checklist of a film when they’re reviewing it. And they say, oh, it has no plot. It has no forward momentum.

You know, and things like this because just the nature of the material, if it’s comic, it’s not gonna have certain amounts of tension and and dramatic. I mean, when you can get sort of velocity in a form of a mentor of a story and still having it funny. That’s really great. And actually, Leo McCarrie was great at that when he was doing silent films. Keystone cops and that’s kind of stuff.

But, film isn’t checklist. If you’re doing the comedy, you’re not gonna be doing something else.

It’s interesting. That is interesting. The the comedy in Metropolitan is interesting as well because a lot of it does come from the edits and the juxtapositions. Of the some of the reaction shots, you know, when when people are are are talking. Could you could you discuss putting that together in in the edit room and how it different how it differed a bit from the script stage?

Well, Metropolitan I mean, the the first I mean, really all our films are very script based. And so it’s really all in the script, and the changes in editing are minor except you put your finger on what’s really important, which are the reaction shots. And so it’s not changing the script. It’s not changing the nature of the scenes. But it really, changes the humor and the way it plays.

And there’s a lot of criticism of a sequence in metropolitan in the script, a very long Polyperkin story. So long monologue by the Chris Eigemann Nick Smith character, and sort of people who read screen, playbooks, said, oh, you can’t have this. You can’t have a, like, a five page monologue or whatever it was. But once it was cut together, by then, you sort of know who the characters are, and we kind of play it on their reaction as they listen to the story. And it really, really ended up working well.

And also it profited by that whole thing that, sort of, Woody Allen sometimes talks about, and other people talk about of threes. Of you set something up, and then you come back to it, and that coming back to it is kind of cool. And then you come back to it a another time, and that is sort of the total payoff. And I think that’s when It’s sort of Poly Perkins as a composite like New York Magazine does. And that was also true in Barcelona, the shaving stuff.

And, I mean, it’s great when you get that kind of material when you’re writing a script. It sort of puts a, a, a thread line of the comedy through, through the script. And, and that can be really helpful. But you’re right that The, editor was really shocked the first time we had a screening is Casson’s Coose screening that all the laughs were on the reaction shots. They’re not on the line.

It is a it’s a it is it’s a really interestingly cut together sequence if you just watch it for the reactions. I you you mentioned you mentioned how it plays with audiences. And I I feel like I see, from your Twitter feed that you’re you’re you’re almost constantly on the road touring showing these movies to audiences. And this might be a slightly weird question, but I I’m curious. What are you looking for from an audience when you go and watch it?

When when when you when you go and, either either sit there and watch it with them or I assume you you probably go out for dinner while the movie is actually playing because you’ve seen it so many times. Or or from their reaction to the film questions afterwards, what are you what are you looking from audience for from audiences? At these things.

I’m looking for a rich investor to step outside and say I wanna finance your next three films. That’s what I’m looking for. But, you know, the, the sort of writing, the preparing on process for films is is pretty solitary and and and kind of grim in certain ways. And it’s really fun to get out and, and show the film and have it circulating and talked about. And I think it’s been helpful, keeping kind of Metropolitan alive.

And, like, they’re not, a lot of people pushing the film and have a wonderful distributor re rialto pictures who, does this kind of programming. And it it’s a lot of fun.

I I will say that there are a lot of people on Twitter pushing this film, with film and foot favorite of film Twitter, I feel like, which is always nice to see. You mentioned finding, a a a rich, a a rich investor to finance your next few films. But I I the thing that has always jumped out, well, I don’t know about always, but has has jumped out to me, about your movies and reading about them and reading about their making is that they are not particularly expensive movies. I mean Metropolitan obviously is a is a nineties classic nineties indie is very cheaply made and then and then kind of comes together as a success. But, you know, my understanding is eleven friendship, which is a period picture with big costumes and great great settings and all that.

Cost about one point five to two million dollars. Is that is is that more or less right?

I mean, one point five would be, Damsolson distress, I think that when deferments were paid, love and friendship was probably three million or so.

Okay. But it’s still that’s not.

Hugely well, it was hugely profitable. The thing is, what I find sort of frustrating about the film business is I see these people making films all the time. I just know their films are losing lots of money, even though they’re prestigious and getting a lot of attention, and that we make these films that are all all profitable except for disco, I get, I guess, because the, the the the the budget was for a studio film, in a small way, like nine million dollars. And, there’s probably too much money spent on advertising or certain pointer. I don’t know what, that one I don’t think is it counts as profitable, but all the others do.

And, you sort of it’s like the film is this is kind of non economic. You’re not getting kind of rewarded for being profitable. I guess maybe they’re not profitable enough for some big deal producer to take a producer’s fee out of it. Or to change the direction of a film company. But it is a little frustrating to see the fact that on the one hand, They’re telling you, oh, it’s a business, it’s all this, you know, and then when you sort of check all the boxes as far as business, it doesn’t really help you get all the money from the next film.

It’s it’s wild to me because I, you know, I had, I had Roy Price formerly of Amazon Studios on the show a couple of months back and we we talked to we talked a little bit about this, but I, you know, it seemed like what they were doing at the beginning there was exactly what you should be doing with a kind of an upstart, independent film company. You had a bunch of films that were made for relatively small amounts of money from well known directors and they all more or less either broke even or or came out ahead plus provided, you know, movies for the Amazon streaming service and all that. But, you know, and that and nobody seemed interested in that. Now we have a billion dollar Lord of the Rings TV show on Amazon. That’s what Amazon’s doing I it makes it makes no sense to me.

It makes no sense to me. That’s great. Sorry. There’s not really a question.

That’s great. You had that’s great. You had Roy on. I’m I’m gonna go go back and listen to that one. I mean, Roy Price and his collaborators at Amazon were really, really great.

That was a great moment. I was so sad to see it, dissolve and disintegrate, such a shame. In my entire career, like, I’ve been in films like forty years or something because I was doing the Spanish films before and preparing Metropolitan and Barcelona scripts. And all that time, the only two people who sort of stepped up and were really enthusiastic and helpful were Roy Price, and unfortunately, that was sort of cut short. And Martin Schafer at Castle Rock Martin Schafer back three of the films, Barcelona, the last days of disco, and, and damsels in distress.

And damsels in distress, they did privately, like Rod Reiner and Martin Shaffer, and others writing personal checks. To, to get the film off the ground, which is unusual in our business. And fortunately, they got, you know, good profits from damsel’s and says, that’s a really profitable film. And, and it’s so funny when people sort of mock you, oh, it only grows to a million. That million gross kicked off all the Sony TV deals across the world.

People Outside, a film production, have no idea what’s profitable and what isn’t profitable. And even inside inside the box, You don’t always know until much later.

I let’s let’s talk about it because this is a business of showbiz Secret Podcast, and I I I I am fascinated by the revenue waterfall and and how much, how much money is kind of hidden from from view because everybody can go to box office, Mojo, and say, well, this movie only made. Eight hundred thousand dollars at the box office, it’s clearly a flop, but nobody understands DVD or TV or VOD or any of those sales. So on on damsels in distress, Where did the bulk of the money come from? Was it TV? Was it home video?

How did that work?

Yes. I think, I think pay TV and TV and international deals, is where the bulk of the money comes. And Sony Pictures Classic is loved by producers. Because they don’t spend too much on advertising. They spend very little on advertising.

I mean, I got on Twitter and Facebook and all those things because at a certain point, the kind of great guy told me, you know, we’re not gonna beat spending any more advertising sushi against social media. And we actually kept the film going, like, five more weeks in New York just with social media. And, the I mean, Each case is different. In the case of, love and friendship, we had an absolutely wonderful experience, Amazon, bought it early off a three minute sizzle reel, and they got roadside attractions to handle it theatrically. They gave us a you know, open window theatrically.

And, it was just a terrific experience. It’s super well. So I’ve had the luck of two Cinderella films, Metropolitan and then then Love and Friendship. And, but there’s one thing that’s happening was they had a different agenda and purpose than we did. So our purpose was yes to have successful film.

We get a good release, but also make money back for our investors. So we made all the money back right away for the investors and profit. But it could’ve been really a golden egg for our investors, but Amazon had the agenda of making the film really big for their streaming platform, and it’s one of their first theatrical releases in in that thing. So there was huge spending. And I think at a certain point, people are saying, you know, you don’t have to spend this much on this film because it’s doing really well.

It doesn’t need the advertising. And so it was a little bit the Miramax strategy of, like, overspending and advertising awards. Everything looks great, except the producers aren’t getting any profits. And so we did get, you know, profits and, and, but the agenda was different. So you can never sort of anticipate everything in a contract, but In addition to a minimum spend, sometimes you also want kind of a maximum spend, so that all the money that should be coming as profits to investors is not being spent to glorify the company releasing it in a, in a way.

And I love Amazon. I don’t, you know, it’s just they’re their interest is different from our interest at that point?

No. It is it it it is interesting. If you go back and read, I mean, there there are an are now multiple books about Harvey Weinstein and Miramax and all that. And there there is an interesting kind of undercurrent throughout those stories, which is that Miramax was spending a lot of money on advertisements, but also parties and travel and that sort of thing, and that kind of aid into the profit of most of their films, which as you as you mentioned kind of comes out of the the none of the producers, none of the people who actually you know, made the film, like to see that happen.

Yeah.

Because, obviously, cuts into their money. The, the, the business of the, the industry has changed obviously, greatly over over the years. I mean, we are now very much, you know, we’re two decades, three decades into the billion dollar blockbuster business. And and I’m I I just wanna get your take as, as somebody who entered the business in the in the you know, that early nineties indie boom era, how how things have changed for younger filmmakers. If you were a if you’re a young filmmaker today and you’re trying to, do do what you did with Metro pollatin.

Is that even possible? Do you think?

Yeah. I I think it’s probably a pretty good situation now because, the technology is is is much friendlier. There were real economic hurdles, in our period. So we were a super sixteen Shoot. So I’m not enamored of film.

I I shouldn’t say this before going to Eastman House maybe. Financed for the Eastman codec company. But, there are just so many problems, with film. We, Super sixteen, is was sort of a genius adaptation to do low budget and be able to have the right format for blowing up to thirty five in a way that looked pretty decent. And, the Stuart film laboratory was sympathetic to people in our situation and would give us a camera, for free And then we’d later pay a fortune to blow it up into thirty five.

And so there are all these huge expenses related to these formats in film. And you no longer have that now with digital. You know, you can do it with your with your phone.

Yeah. I I I mean, it’s it again, this is, you know, when you when you look at the stories of that era, you hear about, like, Kevin Smith spending thirty thousand dollars on, putting thirty thousand dollars worth of film on his credit card which is a it’s a it’s a wild thing to think about now because I go down to the Apple store. I get a phone that’s probably ten times better than the camera he had. And it costs eight hundred bucks. You know, it’s it’s a it’s just a different era.

So when I guess my takeaway from this or an Android. You’re gonna you could get an Android. My my my takeaway from this is you’re not going to be doing the Christopher Nolan, IMAX, fifteen seventy millimeter format anytime soon?

No. No. I won’t. Okay.

But the, but it the one of one of the another of the big changes is the, the advent of digital, restoration and and being able to save. And and and I will say that, you know, going back and watching, Metropolitan, Barcelona, Last days of disco, It is those movies look great because they were they were shot on film. They were restored by, or, you know, transferred by the criterion collection. They they do. There is there is something to be said for for having that.

There forever.

The metropolitan transfer doesn’t look very good, actually. It was done in two thousand five or two thousand six. And I think things have gotten better since then. Also, at a certain point, The grain from super, sixteen, from the super sixteen origin sort of shows up is the whole HD thing gets to be a double edged sword because there’s some stuff you don’t really want to see too crispy. Too crispy the aim to correctly, a little bit of vignous helps certain films.

And, I I it’ll be interesting on Saturday night because we gave one of our thirty five millimeter prints to to Eastman House, and that’s the film they’ll be showing this is one of the original prints from nineteen ninety. That we printed on Kodak stock, at Duart. That’ll be shown on Saturday night. And so I really want to take a look at that because, maybe I’ve been too hard on film. I know when Dancils screened at that wonderful place in a family in in its good good era in Los Angeles.

They, brought back one of the two premier prints that Sony struck. And, the woman who was projecting had been at the arc light when it was being shown digitally, and she saw the film, version. And she said it was just unbelievably beautiful. And that was a kind of a cool process. Damsos came out as their changing format.

So we shot it digitally, and we color timed it digitally, and I was really happy with the color timing digitally, then we got to go to Technicolor, and, I’m not sure what’s called Technicolor then or deluxe. They keep changing form. And did a film out with another colorist, and they made it even better. I mean, it was just incredible, what they could do. So there was kind of a great moment And, apparently, those two premier prints of damsels look really fantastic.

Yeah. That would be that would be great to see. I I is there The

police prints looked the worst things ever because the roots fences is is two generations down. There’s an inner negative and then release prints. And everyone was going out of business in that. And, the printing was just terrible. Friends would call me up and say, I couldn’t believe how terrible your film looked.

And it was because the releasements were so bad. So there’s the ideal dream version of thirty five, and then sometimes the reality.

Well, I do think that well, there there is a There is a nostalgia tinged, element to to film, I think, because I do I do think You know, we we we look at the the rep houses, who are sourcing, you know, immaculate prints, and we forget that Not everything always looked, that good. I I am curious. Is there any, this is a note if you can’t answer or if you don’t know, but feel feel free to pass. But is there any, effort or movement to get damsels on the criterion collection? Cause I do feel like that would be a natural fit with the Woodstillman kind of collection over there.

Yeah. That’d be great. I mean, the times did this sort of number on us by complaining that criterion at three of our films and only two of spike lee. So there’s this kind of weird campaign, in the times, about diversity and representation, which we were the the bad guy, not sort of taking into consideration that, well, it was a trilogy. And I had little to do, try to get my films on, criterion for thirteen years, while Spike was out making, you know, studio films and all that.

And so I’m not sure. I think that maybe, you know, criterion doesn’t want more of our films. I’m not sure what the story is, but, we have our three films on criterion, and I’m happy for that.

Yeah. The, I damsels is is now streaming again. Right? It was it was gone for for a bit. I believe it’s

Unfortunately, it’s off again. It was such a great moment. Is

it off again?

It’s such a great moment. Like, right after Barbie was released, Damsos is finally streaming on Hulu, and I think on on Amazon. And, He was just terrific timing because damsel’s kind of, suffered quite a few brick bats, people not really getting it. And I think Barbie helped people kind of approach damsel’s the right way. And having it, come out streaming just then was was great timing.

It’s it’s great. People should watch it. I’m maybe you can find it on VOD or, there there is a Blu ray out there. You can buy it and it’s it’s, you should check it out, but I do feel like, you know, I Greta Gerwig’s probably about to get a best director, nomination at the Oscars for for Barbie. I feel like is the perfect time for somebody to swoop in and put out a real, a real, you know, this is this is, an early Greta Gerwig picture that you could put.

I never thought I’d be grateful to Barbie. I remember when the Ken doll first came out, I thought it was like I was only ten maybe, but I thought this is the decline of the west. There’s a a guy tall.

So decline has been, a steady part of your of your life that’s Ever since the the early days. Okay. It’s it’s all downhill, from Ken. I, no. I I am, Again, if if folks can folks can track down a copy of damsels in distress, you should absolutely actual absolutely check it out.

It’s great. I don’t know. That was, that was that was pretty much everything I wanted to ask, I’ve run through my questions here. Again, Metropolitan is available on the criterion channel. It’s on Max.

And and if you, if you enjoyed as much as I do, you really owe it to yourself to pick up the the Blu ray from criterion. It is it is, it is interesting. There was actually one thing from that. I’m sorry. I I as I mentioned, I was I was listening to the, to the, commentary track the other day.

And there there was a moment where you guys were talking about color timing. And the the color timing and the dream sequence on that Blu ray is, I believe, different from the theatrical. Yeah. And And it sounded like your editor was not thrilled with it. I

don’t know. I I don’t know about that. I I think we tried to respect, what we originally did in the theatrical. I always worry that, when you do the color timing later for the transfer you’re going to change it in the wrong way, make it all to sort of sepia. But, but I I think we respected that.

I I I

It’s interesting because I, like, this is a this is, again, this is an invisible part of the filmmaking process that even people who own a number of films at home don’t entirely understand, which is that, you know, when you when you were, transferring something from from film to to home media, you have to do the whole color timing thing over again. And you do have the you you can you can make changes or you can try and stick closest to what happens, I know, some folks get annoyed with Michael Mann’s home video releases because those tend to be a little bluer in the in the home video than they were in theaters, but the, but it’s but I I’m just curious from your from your perspective as the direct you know, when you’re sitting there trying to do the color timing, what are you what what is your what is your, creative says like.

Well, I think it’s interesting you mentioned the blue because that is a temptation. There is a kind of temptation to make it sort of conventionally pretty and to lose sort of the thread of the look. And, I don’t know what you’re referring to about sort of mistiming those dream sequences for the transfer because I think we respected The original idea, which is those stream sequences are supposed to be sort of disturbing and cold. So they are bluish in the cold sense. Well, the blue in the sort of conventional timing is is sort of an Ecticrome prettiness, postcard prettiness, approach, I think.

And so, yeah, all these things are big issues, and you worry a lot about it. And, one thing that happens when you’re doing it, it can really burn some money is you time some sequence in a new way and you like that and then you go back to the whole thing and try to make it the same thing and there’s a lot of sort of self doubt and worry about what you’re doing.

I so like I said, that that was pretty much everything I wanted to ask. I always like to close these interviews asking if there’s anything I should have asked, if there’s anything you think folks should know about, your movies, or, or or the state of the business, or where they can send where the rich investors who are listening to this can send their checks to get the next, Will Saletan Moving.

If they sent them to you first, that you can take a small cut. Just very small. Thank you. Excellent.

Excellent.

But, you have covered the bases so thoroughly Really, if I if I was wearing a hat, I’d I’d take it off to you. So hats off to Sony for a great talk. Thank you, very much.

Thank you. Thank you very much. Again, I’ve been talking to Will Saletan, who is the director of many great films, check out his movies. If you are in Rochester, go see Metropolitan, this Saturday. Hopefully, you’re listening to this and you’re you’re gonna go see it.

And again, pick up the Fireflies Pressbook, which, I believe you told me is going out of print. Yes.

Yeah. It seems like it’s going out of print.

So pick it up because it’s gonna be a collector’s item. You can pass it down to your kids, as a, as a as a nice little family heirloom. I have my copy. It’s wonderful. It’s really it’s actually a really nice, handsome little book.

I I like it a lot. With some great production materials from Metropolitan in there and, a new interview and, some collected essays, very, very good stuff. I like it a lot. Anyway, thank you for being on the show. Mister Silman, really appreciate

it.

My name is Sunny Bunch. I am the culture editor at the Bulwark, and I’ll be back next week with another episode. We’ll see you guys then.