DZ-130: Positive Character Arcs — Transcript | Draft Zero: A Screenwriting Podcast

Chapters 29

29 chapters

1 SEP 2026

0:00 Cold Open

Stu Willis

You're just talking about the absence of a goal, that the goal, her plot goal was disconnected from where the character arc is.

Chas Fisher

Yeah, I think so. Wow, that was a long way of getting there.

0:21 Positive Character Arcs

Mel Killingsworth

Hi, I'm Mel Killingsworth.

Chas Fisher

And I'm Chas Fisher.

Stu Willis

And I'm Stu Willis.

Mel Killingsworth

And welcome to Draft Zero, a podcast where three Australian filmmakers can never quite get the intros right as they try to work out what makes great screenplays work.

Chas Fisher

And today, this is the third entry in our exploration on character arcs. The first episode was us trying to figure out how we were going to tackle this and debating what a character arc is and when it's even necessary. Previous episode was on steadfast character arcs or steadfast characters rather, where they don't arc at all. And this one is actually the first episode where we're looking at characters actually changing as we have defined it. And we are looking at films where we believe the characters have changed positively. And to do so, we are looking at Barbie written by Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach, Widows, written by Gillian Flynn and Steve McQueen, and All of Us Strangers, written by Andrew Haigh. Haigh? Haigh? Haigh. Sorry, Andrew.

Mel Killingsworth

Well, he's English, so it's probably Haigh.

Chas Fisher

And look, why I opened with what we think is positive is we wanted to break films up into films that have positive character arcs and films that have negative character arcs. But what we're already discovering is how the film makes us feel about those character arcs may be very different from how those characters internally feel about them, which may lead to a fifth episode in this series. And so ultimately, we're also trying to debate what positive and negative are both value judgments. And we're trying to avoid saying something is good or something is bad in that kind of sense. And please correct me if I'm wrong, if you feel differently, you too. But for my money, it's films that say the character is left better off at the end of the film. Internally than when they started. And the film wants us to feel that way about it.

Mel Killingsworth

I don't disagree, but I think for me, it's easier to frame it as evolving or devolving. Because also you say good or bad, right? Where a character can end something having devolved and still be miles better of a character or a person or whatever than another character who has actually evolved through their journey, right? Because again, with that four quadrant grid, the movement is what's important not necessarily whether you are quote good or quote bad it is are you evolving are you are you progressing or are you regressing.

Chas Fisher

That's I think that's a good way of looking at it.

Stu Willis

Yeah maybe I'm curious about what makes something could de-evolution as a character rather than an evolution like it's easy to get that.

Chas Fisher

When we get to negative character.

Stu Willis

Right like like are you saying that they're becoming someone that you know they regressing into the way they used to be or are you saying like like what are you meaning by progressive there what do you mean as regressive.

Mel Killingsworth

Probably some of them are and probably some of them are having an opportunity to progress or become a better person or to advance themselves or to whatever and choosing instead to take the easy road or become a worse person or I think there's going to be multiple demonstrations of that and that is something that I hope to flesh out when we get to the character arcs? Because yes, at the moment, that is the least evolved definition of this series. Yes. And we know that Chas loves the definition.

Stu Willis

What is the dictionary defined as positive, Chas?

Chas Fisher

Well, look, I do love a definition. I'm not going to lie. There's a reason I became a lawyer. But what I'm really looking for here is not definitions per se, but craft tools. And one of the ones that I do not know coming into this recording, but I'm hoping I will have learned such that it will be in our little key learnings from the future, is what is the difference in choosing a positive arc and evolving arc versus a steadfast one? Because the most, surprising thing for me from the last episode on Resilient and Steadfast was how emotional those three films that we did there could be. And they did that through still playing with emotional events and bringing characters in their relationships with other characters closer or further away, which led to Stu having a mind bomb on Discord. Care to share, Stu discord Stu the clever one.

4:47 Relationship questions as the key to dramatizing arcs

Stu Willis

Uh yes, Mel brought up this idea of carry of emotional tension as as and relating it to this idea of the emotional event the emotional event which we've now been kind of incorporating into discussions of character arcs comes from Judith Weston we did an episode on that and the idea is the emotional event is a relationship change between characters. And we're looking at the idea that maybe an arc is about a character changing relative to themselves and to the world and so the characters around them, et cetera. And that one way of thinking about it is are they getting closer to themselves or away from themselves? And the mind bomb is that emotional tension is due to what I'm now calling the relationship question. So we have in quite a few episodes talked about how there's plot questions, how there's, Character questions. So a plot question is, will they defuse the bomb in time? A character question will be, will Stu learn to accept that he isn't as good on the podcast recording as he'd like to think he is? And a theme question. Is kind of what is this film about? And there's versions of that, and we've got lots of episodes if you haven't listened to them. Now I'm going, well, a relationship question is taking what we think is an internal question about a character and defining it in terms of the relationship. Will this character grow closer to their village coming back to Moana or will they'll grow further apart? And it's just thinking about it in terms of relationships I think is quite a strong idea because it also means that you're posing the question and that's where you get the tension from. From. And I think it's important with these arcs that there's this, either it's a character question or it's a relationship question. And really what is a character question, but a relationship question with the character self, um, that help that we are a kind of aware of, and therefore we're waiting for it to be answered.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Stu Willis

That's kind of the summary of the mind bomb.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. And I think it's a super, super helpful one, if only because it's an actionable one, Right. Like we have previously done whole episodes on sequence structure, whether the sequence structure is driven by a plot question or a plot character question or a character question or a theme question. But to my mind, relationship questions are almost like a real good shortcut and a real good understanding of how to dramatize internal character changes or emotional changes. Changes because it's, I'm sure it's possible and I'm sure there are films that have done it, but I think it's really hard to dramatize an internal character change without interacting with other characters and showing how that changes over time.

Stu Willis

Yeah. Unless you do it with the kind of, you know, split character by curial, I'm saying that wrong by curious mind. Right. And what is interesting is I definitely, and we're going to do all of the strangers last, because I think it's the film that's sadly underseen, but also it's the one that challenges positive arcs. Because I think a lot of people think of positive arcs, they think arcs that make the audience happy. And for all of us strangers, it's like just stabbing yourself in the heart for an hour and a half. And I mean, it's a beautiful- In a beautiful way.

Chas Fisher

Yes.

Stu Willis

Beautiful, touching film. It isn't bleak. It isn't long- Yeah.

Chas Fisher

If anyone hasn't seen it and is going to listen to this episode and then hopefully see it, it's not grief porn. It's beautiful and devastating and sad, but it's not, I don't know. Yeah. It's not bleak is all I can say. And I think maybe that effect is part of the positive, maybe choosing to have a positive character arc is why it doesn't come across as bleak.

Mel Killingsworth

Oh, man. All right. You're baiting me right now. Like, just dangly. We're going to talk about it last and then saying, like, 18 things. And I'm like, no, wait, let me push back on that. Okay.

Chas Fisher

Are you going to write it down?

Mel Killingsworth

All 18 of them? Yeah. Like, we'll get there. I'm sure we'll get there.

9:00 Followup Questions

Stu Willis

So we've got a couple of follow-up questions from our patrons. They're using a tool that we've now got, links are in the show notes, called Speedpipe to send us like short one minutes to one and a half. So we're going to hear their questions because I think they will inform this discussion, right? But our actual kind of free-form answering for them, we're going to post as an audio recording on the patron, which you can listen to for free. We just want you to go to the Patreon page and realize we're somewhat interactive. So, this is the first one from Jay Schubert.

Patreons

And so my question for you, just in thinking about this, would be how do you think about or how do secondary characters highlight the protagonist change, and or tell the audience how to feel about the change?

Chas Fisher

Worth noting at this juncture that Jay Schubert chose Widows, you know, threw it up as an option in our homework selection that our patrons then duly voted on.

Mel Killingsworth

What an excellent... This is, I think, every time I watch this, it raises, in my estimation, it's just so dense and clever and well-constructed and well-acted. And I was concentrating on something really specific this time, which I think is... This other facet that I hadn't really paid as much attention to or hadn't noticed as much. And yeah, really, really enjoyed this specifically for this episode as well.

Chas Fisher

Great question, Jay. I think your very suggestion of us doing Widows is really going to bring that out.

Mel Killingsworth

Exactly. Exactly. My main takeaway, although it's interesting, I think, at least with Widows, the question says, how do secondary characters highlight the protagonists change and actually depending on how you define the protagonist I think most people would say the protagonist is Viola Davis and I think that Viola Davis is actually the highlights everyone else's change not to say that she does not change but yeah we'll get to that.

Stu Willis

Yeah yeah and he's an exit from Elia's question.

Patrons

For future episodes it would be great to hear you guys quick take on the theme and how the movie dramatizes it both internally and through the plot.

Stu Willis

I would say the short answer is what is theme but a character arc persisting, or what is a character arc but theme.

Mel Killingsworth

Personified.

Stu Willis

So I think they're going to be relevant because I think all of these films are using character arcs to implicitly and explicitly talk about theme. Yeah.

Chas Fisher

I mean, it was one of the questions that we had, that we asked of each film, including of The Dressmaker, which is what are the values explored by the arc and how does this relate to the theme? But Mel, we'll definitely come back to this one, given it's not exactly answered by one of the examples in this episode, we'll probably record it at the end. It'll either be Back Matter or you'll find it in the Patreon feed. All right, now can we do key learnings from the future?

Stu Willis

Bold of you to assume that I'll have anything to learn. All right. So what is our flash forward insights?

12:12 Zero Context Insights

Chas Fisher

My big insights is that the biggest, first of all, what makes an arc positive and then what controls how the audience feels about it, what creates the emotion is very deeply tied, to whether the rewards or punishments of the character are subtractive or additive.

Mel Killingsworth

Mine is that one way to demonstrate a positive character arc is to repeat beat or an event from different angles and show the character's changing response to that.

Stu Willis

My insight is that raising a question about a relationship will create tension that you resolve with the emotional event, such as how Chas and I's relationship changes over the course of this episode.

13:01 BARBIE

Chas Fisher

All right, well, should we dive into our first example, which is The Wonderful Barbie, Written and directed by Greta Gerwig And co-written with her partner Noah Baumbach Irrelevant that he is Mrs. Greta Gerwig But it does tickle me, Okay, so for anyone who hasn't seen the Juggernaut that is Barbie, it is a movie based on the Mattel doll and it sets up, the broad thrust of the story is there is Barbie Land where there are many Barbies, many Kens and one Alan. And in Barbie Land, feminism has achieved its goals and peaks and they understand that they are toys being played with by people in the real world, but they believe that their ideas and their essences have, inspired everyone in the real world to achieve the perfection that is Barbie Land.

From the film

Thanks to Barbie, all problems of feminism and equal rights have been solved.

Chas Fisher

Unfortunately, stereotypical Barbie, played by Margot Robbie, starts wigging out a little bit. Her heels start touching the ground. She gets cellulite. She has thoughts of impending death.

Mel Killingsworth

Thoughts about dying.

Chas Fisher

And this triggers a journey for her, which her Ken, Beach Ken, absconds with her into the real world to find the person that's playing with her.

From the film

What'll it be then? You can go back to your regular life and forget any of this ever happened, or you can know the truth about the universe, The choice is now yours The first one the high heel no, We'll do a redo You're supposed to want to know I don't mmm babe listen you have to want to know okay do it again I'm not adventure Barbie. I'm stereotypical Barbie. I'm like the Barbie you think of when someone says think of a Barbie That's me I'm bummed. You're a bummer. That's a bummer. Okay, I'm ready to forget now. No, you're doing this one. I just gave you a choice so you could feel some sense of control. So there is no option one? No, you have to fix the rip yourself. Don't blame me. Blame Mattel. They make the rules. I don't want to. Fine, get cellulite. I don't care. No! No, no, no, no. Okay. Yeah. Send me through the portal.

Chas Fisher

And in doing so, she discovers that Barbie Land has not inspired the real world, that the real world is complicated, that humans are complicated and messy. Ken discovers patriarchy, brings it back to Barbie Land, and Barbie brings back the person who's playing with her, Gloria, and her daughter back to Barbie Land to rescue the Barbies from the patriarchy. And then ultimately, you know, the film ends on stereotypical Barbie choosing to go back to the real world and to be human. And this will probably be the main thrust of this analysis is that decision. I know I've been talking for a bit, but can I venture a controversial opinion up front about this journey? I fucking love the journey that Barbie goes on, and I completely buy Barbie choosing to be a human at the end, and I think it's wonderful. I think the discussion that Barbie has with the creator of Barbie, Ruth, in The Void, is only confusing to me. To the point where I've now watched this film four times. And every time I watch it, I'm like, oh, I'm supposed to feel something here. And I'm supposed to understand something fundamental about this character. And by extension, the movie. And I never do any of these times. And this last time I watched it with Anna, my wife. And I was like, so Anna, what did you think of the end of the movie? She's like, we were literally watching it 10. We're having this discussion 10 minutes after watching the film. And she's like, yeah, it's a bit weird when they go into that endless void and have that conversation what was that conversation about again I can't even remember.

17:16 The void scene with Barbie's creator

From the film

You understand that humans only have one ending ideas live forever humans not so much you know that right I do being a human can be pretty uncomfortable, I know. Humans make things up, like patriarchy and Barbie, just to deal with how uncomfortable it is. I understand that. And then you die. Yeah. Yeah. I want to be a part of the people that make meaning, not the thing that's made. I want to do the imagining. I don't want to be the idea. Does that make sense? I always knew that Barbie would surprise me, but I never expected this. Do you give me permission to become human? You don't need my permission. But you're the creator, you, don't you control me? I can't control you any more than I could control my own daughter. I named you after her, Barbara, and I always hoped for you like I hoped for her. We mothers stand still so our daughters can look back to see how far they've come. So being human is not something I need to ask for or even want. I can just, it's something that I just discover I am.

Mel Killingsworth

The conversation is a producer's note personified. It is going into the void and the producer saying, so spell out the themes for me again. And you're like, okay, we've done this 18 times and you've read the script and you've watched the dailies. But let me spell these themes out. And the producer going, can you put that in the movie? I remember it feeling very long when I first saw it in the cinema. And I think this last time I watched it, I just kind of glazed over. Not the performers aren't doing a good job or any of that. But it's just that this it's just like, well, you've been showing me all these things. And now you are literally plopping me into an endless void to like rehash these things. There is a void in the script as I'm looking, but it's...

Chas Fisher

Yeah, and the discussion is subtly different from the script version that we have, which is dated 2023 and then what is in the movie. I haven't done a line-by-line analysis as to what is different, but I'm basically... I kind of agree with you, Mel, that it's a kind of a producer's note, but there's...

Mel Killingsworth

Lay it out.

Chas Fisher

Barbie starts off being stereotypical Barbie in what she describes living her best day every day in absolute perfection, when she's told to that you know she's given an option by Weird Barbie to try and fix her flat feet in her cellulite of a high heel and a Birkenstock, and Barbie's like I'm not adventure Barbie I don't want to know I don't want to understand about the truth of the world and how that's painful. So, you know, it's very sort of classical call to action and denial of the call and then being told you're just going anyway. And there is a subtle line in there where Weird Barbie says it takes two to open a portal. Like part of this portal being opened between Barbie Land and the real world is being triggered by you as much as it's being triggered by your weird person who's playing with you.

From the film

Why would you be sad? We fixed everything so that all women in the real world can be happy and powerful I don't know but if you ask me you had something to do with this too me takes two to rip a portal I can't have I've only ever wanted for everything to stay exactly as it is Well be that as it may the two of you are becoming inextricably intertwined, And you got to help her to help yourself.

Chas Fisher

And then Barbie goes through these incredibly beautiful scenes in the real world where she's experiencing the full panoply of human emotion as opposed to just, living the best day every day. And in a weird kind of way, I was reminded of Inside Out and the journey that Joy has to go on to understand the value that sadness brings. And in the end, I totally buy that Barbie comes back to Barbie land, fulfills all the plot questions and saves everyone. And then I buy that she wants to go back to being human, to having those full and complex emotions. But that is not what that conversation with Ruth in the void is about. The line that I remember her saying is, I want to be the one doing the creating.

23:13 Immortality versus death as the real choice

Mel Killingsworth

I actually well it's interesting because I I I think that actually it is about death it's about like the first question that brings the record needle scratch in the movie right is like have you guys ever thought about dying, and then in the void like the whole conversation is like you can become human like I don't have that power over you you get to decide that not me that's that's ruth the the very meta you know but the whole thing is like but if you do that it will end, like what gives value to life is is ending and you will die you will end it's not like you will get to go on and learn forever it's not like you'll get to have these human experiences forever whereas in barbie land it just goes on and on and on like I think that the thing is like making sure that before she makes the choice it's not that she's choosing between being a barbie and being human it's that She's choosing between immortality, like, foreverness to be an icon, which of course Barbie is, or to die. And crumble into dust.

Chas Fisher

I totally am on board with this because it's actually something that's seeded in the beginning. Because, like you say, that's the first record scratch. That's kind of the inciting incident. But then I don't think the film is set up. I don't feel that Barbie's whole character arc is about coming to terms with only through death and something ending can something be beautiful and full. I don't think that's either Barbie's character arc, value judgments, things she learns, or why she chooses it, or what the film is about.

Mel Killingsworth

Which I might argue is why the void scene just sort of blips out of your head, because the scene is about that, but the movie is not.

Chas Fisher

Well, the scene's also about her saying, I want to be not the subject of my creators, I want to be the one doing the creating. But that's not the problem at the beginning of the film that she has either. Either and this is me being incredibly like didactic and stupid screenplay guru, the beginning doesn't do this and therefore the ending doesn't work I fucking love this movie this is a five star movie for me but there is a reason for me that that void scene doesn't work every time and, there is so much in the film.

Stu Willis

The opening of the film is kids playing with dolls and creating.

Mel Killingsworth

The opening of the.

Chas Fisher

Film is.

Mel Killingsworth

2001 a Space Odyssey but with barbies yeah.

Chas Fisher

And again you know that's taking a big jump back you're right right so that's her not being the, uh the monolith she's not doing the creation she is the subject right but that is not portrayed as a problem either in that scene, or to Barbie as a character. Like in that scene, she's literally a statue, right? Like a big, like you said, she's the monolith.

Stu Willis

So you think her lack of personhood isn't a problem? I think you are being overly pedantic about why doesn't the exact film spell out? You would have just moved. You're the kind of person that will give a note where there was an infinite void scene at the beginning of the film explaining.

Mel Killingsworth

I also, I think part of that film is to give, like because you've already had like the meta-ness of the CEOs and now we're getting a little off track but the meta-ness of the CEOs but you needed to give Ruth the actual creator also her meta moment and it works like this especially because she becomes this like almost god-like figure in a void you know giving advice to whatever there's symmetry with that.

Chas Fisher

Maybe I think my issue is stemming from what I feel Barbie's choices are in the movie like you're both right like I've just raised two things that are discussed Lost in the Void, that you both said, well, both of these are raised in the beginning of the film. So, they work as themes of the film, but I'm not entirely sure Barbie's journey as a character.

27:02 Debating the lie the character believes

Stu Willis

It's a Pinocchio story, right? It's just, I want to be a- she realizes that she wants to be a real boy slash girl. It's AI, artificial intelligence. There's quite a few films that follow this structure.

Chas Fisher

But those are people for whom characters, Pinocchio and AI, for whom not having agency is a problem. For her, she's living her best life every day. She says, I don't want to know about the future. Her lowest point is, I never wanted anything to change.

Stu Willis

So, I'm going to use the language of the K.M. Weiland book on character arc. So, this is the lie that the character believes.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Stu Willis

Right? So, she needs to be confronted with the lie. So, you're saying that the problem is that she doesn't realize that she's living a lie, which is true. Right. But that's not the problem. The crack, the record scratch moment is her beginning to realize that what she believes about the world. It's got a whole opening voiceover about how real, you know, how the matriarch, you know, Barbie reflects onto the real world and girls can believe they're anything, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. This is all about her setting up the lie that she believes. And then she's confronted with that lie. And then she learns how to change the world that she's come from. and then she's going to the real world to have some degree of inflection on the world of the humans. So I think you're just, it feels to me like you're just mapping a different model onto what this story is doing. This is, Booksmart has the same thing. Like the inciting incident of Booksmart is those lead characters, I've forgotten the names. The protagonist of Booksmart realizing that all this stuff about being Booksmart and studying really hard, and that she was the only one who was going to go to uni, and everyone else was really dumb, and she realises that suddenly, that's not how the world works. So, like, you know, that's kind of the way that Weiland has talked about it, like that the arc, I mean she's more formulaic, but I like that idea of what is the lie that the character believes and usually your inciting incident is them beginning, to be confronted with that lie. And in some ways, Widows does exactly the same thing, that they've got a lie in terms of what she thinks is the order of her world that is changed. It's not as at the beginning, but that's how it kind of traces through.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. I mean, the more that we talk about it, the more that I realize that I'm kind of grasping for something. I'm trying to intellectualize and understand why I'm not having the, why I'm feeling a disconnect, particularly in that end scene, which is supposed to be her debating her final choice and the big character arc. I think there is a correlation or one of the reasons why I feel that way is, Barbie's emotions at the beginning, the inciting incident, the film tells us is not her own, right? It is something that's been put into her by Gloria's imaginings, right? Gloria designs irrepressible thoughts of death, Barbie. Gloria designs cellulite, Barbie. So those feel like the inciting incident is not, it's being totally put on Barbie, which is a very classical thing. Like she's living her perfect life every day. She doesn't want to change. She's being thrown out by something external. But that external thing is, there is an external character that is living through Barbie in that way. And that even happens at the end. Like at Barbie's low point Barbie's literally lying face down on the ground And it's Gloria who picks her up And says we're gonna save Barbie Land Right?

From the film

What are you doing? We gotta go We have to go back Barbie Land needs saving Barbie needs saving Wait, you hate Barbie But you don't You've always believed in what she could be Yeah, well I was wrong Barbie gave up The Kens won, You have to try Even if you can't make it perfect You can make it better I can't make anything better I'm the one who ruined Barbie Land with my stupid drawings in the first place. They're not stupid, they're amazing! You like my drawings? They're weird and dark and crazy. Everything you pretend not to be.

Chas Fisher

And then at the end, Barbie acknowledges it's your mom that did that, not me. And so I think what I'm reaching for is because Barbie initially, you know, we are, like you said, you're talking the Pinocchio story. You're talking about someone who's going from being a literal toy to having her own decisions in life and choosing to be human and choosing to have an end rather than be an idea. And I guess the scenes that I hang my hat on throughout the story that make me understand why she chooses that feel disconnected from those ideas and those values. So, you know, when she's in the real world, she's got some clothes. She's been arrested twice and she now needs to find Gloria, right? She needs to find the person who's playing with her. And she just sits down, closes her eyes and starts living the moments between Gloria and Sasha. And at the end of that, Barbie's crying and she says to herself, that felt achy, but good. And then there's another scene later where she's just been absolutely shattered, by Sasha, Gloria's daughter. And she's sitting at a bus stop and she's crying and she's looking around and seeing all these people feeling these different emotions. And she connects with an older lady and says, you look beautiful. And the old lady says, I know. And Greta Gerwig, she has repeatedly told the story that everyone, all the producers and execs were telling them to cut that scene. And she's like, no, this is what the movie is about. The movie is about Barbie. And these are the scenes that have feeling, right? I don't know. I think some way I'm getting a disconnect between the idea that- All the themes are about autonomy, agency, control, and Barbie's personal journey being about feeling more than about creation.

Stu Willis

Okay, I'm feeling an emotional event between us, Chas, where we're going apart. I think that's why Mel and I are quiet. We're just like, what? I say that because I think, yes, the themes are about agency, but ultimately she chooses to go back to the human world and become human and have that degree of agency. It happens at the end of the film, but I struggle to see how that isn't the fulfillment of what we're talking about here. And how it's portrayed, like, it's clearly she is happier with herself at the end of the film, right? Yeah. And we feel that she is putting herself in a position in order that she can literally create life. Right?

Mel Killingsworth

In a couple of different ways, yes.

Stu Willis

Yeah.

Chas Fisher

Okay, so, Stu, did you have a great experience of that void scene at the end of the movie?

Stu Willis

It's been a while since I've seen it and I can't remember it specifically. So, I mean, that answers the question around the void, which is interesting. Like, at what point is this just, it's obviously not this film's version of the architect scene from The Matrix in that everyone remembers the architect.

Chas Fisher

But not what the fuck they spoke about because we can't understand what they're saying.

Stu Willis

Yeah. I mean, I think perhaps what you're kind of reconciling is that the film has got a... Self-aware like it's playing with like audience point of view and dramatic irony right, the opening works what we're talking about about girl Barbie changing the world for better and all that stuff like we are realizing it with a degree of dramatic irony the whole journey of Barbie in the the world of of men it's like got a self-awareness to it right, while also trying to have a you know it's trying to have its cake and eat it too you know definitely people marrying as per All of Us Strangers, the oddest line that was such a great line anyway.

Mel Killingsworth

It's a great line that in in my mind like fundamentally underlines the things that straight people constantly say that actually shows that they're like, discontent with how things are and how they could be so much happier and, are completely unselfful aware that they're doing it. Kind of like, well, how do you know that they've come? Okay, honey, you're telling on yourself. Anyway.

Stu Willis

So here's the question for you. I mean, we're jumping into that, but coming back, like maybe you're reacting to, does Ken go through a bigger character arc or a character arc that you more connect to? Because some people got upset that this film was about Ken in some ways more ways than...

Chas Fisher

His character arc is connected to the plot, in a way that Barbie's character arc sits so alongside the plot that the plot all resolves and they literally have to ask, what's Barbie's ending?

From the film

I think we're good, right? All right, let's begin the work to close the portal between our two worlds. Hey, what about Barbie? What do you mean? What's her ending? What does she get? Well, that's easy. She's in love with Ken. That is not her ending. I'm not in love with Ken. What do you want? I don't know. I'm... I'm not really sure where I belong anymore. I don't think I have an ending.

Chas Fisher

Right? Like, it would not have been a good film if the film had just ended with, and everybody lived happily ever after, and Barbie went back to being stereotypical Barbie. That's not what I'm saying.

Stu Willis

You're trying to struggle why this is effective, I think, and...

Chas Fisher

No, that's not what I'm... I think I'm just struggling with that void scene. I think that void scene, for me, undermines the emotional impact. I don't want to, like, start workshopping it.

Mel Killingsworth

Do you think it undermines the character arc, which is what we're trying to...

Chas Fisher

Yeah, I think so. Because they're talking about themes of the film, not... Maybe you put your finger on it right at the beginning, which is that it just feels meta on meta on meta. And I just felt so distanced that I couldn't have the emotional connection to what they were talking about. You know, why? So they just... What's Barbie's ending? Could Barbie not have said, I'm now going to the real world and I'm going to do my own creating? You know, that would have been of agency rather than having to step back from Barbie land, go into an infinite void that we haven't really seen before, with the ghost of Barbie's creator, whom we've only met at one point before, to have a discussion where she asked permission only to be told that she doesn't need permission. Like, it just feels like those are the writers talking through the characters as opposed to the characters.

Stu Willis

It's kind of playing with a little bit of that Catch-22 is someone that feels like she always has to ask for permission. It's like the last breaking of the shackles. Right.

Chas Fisher

No, no, I'm agreeing with you. It is doing all the right things. It's just I felt no emotional connection to it. And the distancing I felt in that scene and the untethers me from what I think it's trying to say and trying to do at that point.

Mel Killingsworth

I think that's fair. I think I think mostly the reason I've mostly been quiet this whole time is of all these three examples, like this is the one where I go, well, this is self-evident, you know, like the example self-evident. And you've got this character who's becoming self-aware, whose literal character arc is, yes, becoming a real, becoming a person, becoming a better, having this arc. And then you've got sure you've got this moment it's very like Plato's cave you know near the end where she goes oh what what is what is real and then I have to die and you're gonna tell me you know loose the shackles and let me go okay but like for me of all these three it is very sure this is essentially if you were gonna teach you know character arc 101 here you go like it's a very it's a very clever movie and it's a movie that does all of these set pieces and, homages to musical scenes and all these things that I love about movies and I have a very good time. But it is not a movie that makes me have emotional events like. Not saying that the characters themselves don't have emotion. It's a movie where I go, oh, pretty fun. Yay. OK, cool. Like, of course, the character grew that. That's what the character was always going to do. OK, you did a 2001: A Space Odyssey homage. Awesome. I got to see Barbie be like 50 feet tall, real big in bright room. Yes, this makes me happy. Oh, my God. You did an MGM musical number like with Ryan Gosling sitting there dancing and doing things with his body that are just like impeccable great but that's that's what it is like it, it executes the arc it executes the theme it has like real cool speeches on feminism it makes fun of the Mattel CEOs it has incredible you know let's make a. Box but real big that human goes in okay I love all of these things but it's not something where I go this is incredibly complex how do I think they demonstrate the character of course the character arcs like that that's just it was I re-watched and then I read the script and I went yeah okay great, Correct. Not that it's easy, right? Greta Gerwig does with this what she did with Little Women, where she takes something that should be incredibly, that is actually to execute on that level, incredibly difficult. And she makes it look easy. She makes you go, oh, of course. Yeah, it's simple. You do this color theory thing. Oh, of course. It's simple. You, you know, drive the car and you have that. I'm not saying that it is easy. I'm saying that it is very straightforward in terms of something like a character arc or a you know journey if you will.

Stu Willis

Yeah I would say I reckon the first time I saw it the kind of, montage just before she transitions probably got me teary but that is very on brand for me, so I think there's a few things that we can talk about here for learning I think we we tapped onto the lie that the character believes it's a it's a it's a good concept, and the idea is that it's about a movement towards truth and how a character responds to that truth. You know, it's like learning about the lies, what starts the journey and that's what sort of it is and then she learns the truth and then what is the positive arc, she kind of lives.

Chas Fisher

I don't think she does learn the lie. Like, maybe that's another thing that I'm getting at. She basically goes on the journey so that she can avoid cellulite and keep her heels off the ground.

Stu Willis

And then we see her walk around in, like, Birkenstocks, like, sandals at the end of the film.

Chas Fisher

Yeah, yeah. I'm not saying she doesn't change. I think, like...

Stu Willis

I'm not saying she doesn't change, but I'm saying she doesn't.

Chas Fisher

No, no, no, learning the lie, being exposed to the lie, right? Like, she doesn't choose to go on the journey, she's forced to go on the journey.

Stu Willis

And?

Chas Fisher

Like, they literally present her with a choice and then say, no, it wasn't a choice, you have to take the boat.

Mel Killingsworth

Right, so pushed instead of pulled.

Chas Fisher

Yeah, and maybe that's what I'm feeling.

Stu Willis

Yeah, I think it's creating a feeling within you, but she is someone who's so indoctrinated by the system that I don't think she would choose to leave, right? Yeah. She's not a Luke Skywalker. Luke Skywalker, she's not a Luke from Star Wars expressing the desire to leave.

Chas Fisher

Skywalker is going to be one of my favorites.

Stu Willis

Right? Like she's not a character who's, she's so indoctrinated by the system, right? That she won't leave the system. She's just, and that's why she needs to be pushed on it. I don't, for me, that isn't a negative on the film. What we can be talking about is the the emotional impact of some of these choices on you yeah and it sounds like you and mel are roughly in agreement that you know you find it a bubbly good time but you don't find it like profoundly emotional you know in some ways it's similar to like a truman show right like truman it's been a long time since I've seen that film but you know he learns that his world is not what he believes in any any and then his journey has a desire to escape, that world, right?

Chas Fisher

And she- It's very much a Truman show, but Truman is the one who takes the choice to start, trying to uncover things, whereas Barbie is firmly pushed.

Stu Willis

And so, that then, we got to talk about, like, the gain and loss stuff, which I think is really interesting.

44:26 Gain versus loss framing the ending

Chas Fisher

Yes.

Stu Willis

And, like, what does she do that deserves a reward or punishment, and is that a gain or a loss? And I think in this one is a very clear example that she has saved her world, her village, to use the kind of hero's journey vernacular. She's brought back the very thing that could save it, but she's changed by the experience. She's a bit of a Frodo character in that way, that she can no longer stay within the world that she saved. So but that's not presented I don't think unlike Frodo her leaving is presented as something that she doesn't desire or something that is like a scar so I think it's more presented that she gains being human as opposed to, losing being a doll absolutely yeah so I think it's an additive reward in terms of her reaction to it and and we we're not and we sit with that her in the car we You feel that she's gained a family. The filmmakers are presenting this stuff that's all about the gain as opposed to, you know, her leaving her Barbie family behind, her leaving Ken behind. All that stuff is not shown to us at all once she makes that decision to leave Barbie land. Yeah.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. I think you're actually, so this is a discussion, a tool that Stu brought into Steadfast. Well, I'm going to credit Emma as well. It was a behavioral psychology term, wasn't it?

Stu Willis

Yeah, operant conditioning.

Chas Fisher

Thank you. I wasn't going to venture it. But the idea is like we can create different emotional feelings depending on how the world punishes or rewards. And so you applied that really interestingly in the previous episode to go, we have a different emotional feeling depending whether the quote unquote punishments or rewards are subtractive or additive and either can be both, right? And I think what I'm pulling on is Barbie, what puts Barbie on the journey, what the world is punishing her for by not engaging, by not having agency, by not being human, by not feeling, they're all subtractive. They're taking away, you know, she's having cold showers, she's having burnt toast, you know, and she doesn't feel the gain until she starts going on the journey and having these feelings and having these interactions and having these feelings. Relationships. And so, yeah, I do wonder if I would have felt differently if she'd been in some way pulled on the journey and in some way chose it.

Stu Willis

It might come back to character question or relationship questions, right? Like, you know, emotion can come from the release of tension. We'll absolutely talk about that in All of Us Strangers, right? Like the mystery, the final climactic turning point kills you because it is kind of answering a question that you need to pay off to a setup that's been made. But it's like a release of this tension that makes you go, oh, fuck, it's catharsis, right? Like it has a genuine moment of catharsis in All of Us Strangers. Widows has got a whole bunch of tension, plot tension, as well as relationship tension, I think. And it could just be that the setup in Barbie by her being going out, that we don't, As I said, it's the meta thing. It's the audience seeing the irony, that we know the irony, that she doesn't. And it's by nature, I think, of her being a comedic character. But it's a comedic character, right? Like, she's in some ways a clown, as is Ryan Reynolds, as is Ken.

Mel Killingsworth

Dear God.

Stu Willis

Ryan Reynolds. Hey, a Free Guy is also in this kind of ballpark of this movie. That's about a computer NPC who decides he wants to become human. That's what Greta does so well, is she's working within a trope, and the cleverness is partly her playing with the meta, but the meta, I think, does have an emotional quality to it, but I think it's about the audience more than it is about the specific character.

Chas Fisher

But Free Guy is an NPC. He's not being played by someone. Pinocchio, when he becomes conscious, has agency, is not being played by someone. He still wants to be a real boy, but he's not being inhabited by someone else's creation, living them out. AI, he's got a program, but he follows that programming. He's not, again, being controlled.

Stu Willis

You're just talking about the absence of a goal, that the plot goal is disconnected from where the character arc is.

Chas Fisher

Yeah, I think so. Wow. That was a long way of getting there.

Stu Willis

Right. Like her plot goal, I mean, her plot goal is like getting rid of the cellulite and stuff. And then she, that's what she wants. And, and then what she ends up choosing is effectively to abandon that plot goal. Yeah.

Chas Fisher

To embrace the cellulite. She wants it all.

Stu Willis

She wants the gynecologist.

Chas Fisher

Well, to quote the actual script, she feels and sees what a human life is, the joy and pain of being mortal, all that she will lose and gain, flashes of a life lived, unadorned home footage of many women's lives, happiness, sadness, big moments, little moments, childhood, adulthood, old age, how it all rushes by in one moment, each life drifting into the next, somehow capturing the current that runs through all things. So that's much more emotional than what I actually felt watching the movie.

Mel Killingsworth

How dare you not feel emotional by those real casting crew members, childhood videos of themselves.

Chas Fisher

And again, Greta, if you ever listen to this, Little Women is one of my all-time favorite films and I really like this. I struggle with the disconnect to that final scene. But anyway.

Stu Willis

Greta, if you listen to this, please let me swing a sword on the set of Narnia. That's all I ask.

Chas Fisher

I'm now so scared after fucking Quentin listened to us talking about him.

Mel Killingsworth

I care much more about her getting to a horse and his boy. So that's where I'm at. No filmmaker has ever made it that far.

Chas Fisher

And nor will they.

Mel Killingsworth

Oh, I know.

Stu Willis

I wonder if it's not just that the goal is misaligned with that. It's that the goal is kind of related to the reward. You don't feel like she's earned the right. You're shaking your head, so maybe I'm wrong, but I'm just kind of curious about that.

Chas Fisher

Okay. Earned is a hard one, I guess, because all those moments that are highlighted where it felt like Barbie had a real shift are ones where she was just sitting in her feelings and letting them rush over her. And that's ultimately what she wants to choose, is choose to feel, choose to create. And those are all moments that were somewhat, it's where the plot questions were put aside for a moment and right near the end Barbie is still resisting, change resisting being human like she says to Gloria I never wanted anything to to change and Gloria says that's life and Barbie doesn't get up and move right so Barbie is like resisting life resisting change, it's definitely I feel it's earned because she's so scared of it that she ultimately the reward of feeling, the reward of being overcomes, her fear of it, her fear of change, her fear of death. I'm not really sure if Barbie has a fear of death, given she was an immortal, eternal idea that at the end of the film is offered to continue being an immortal, eternal idea. But these are all ideas that are raised by the movie that I just feel like subtly sit alongside character journey as opposed to them being as tightly interwoven as I would like. Fuck me. I feel like I'm going to be set on fire deservedly by the internet.

Mel Killingsworth

If you were set on fire, that means we've gone viral so everybody wins.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Stu Willis

This is not at all a bad thing.

52:34 Contrast and affinity

Chas Fisher

So listeners who persevered with the previous episodes will know that we ask a series of questions of each of the film we've covered a lot of them already in this analysis so far but I think there's three in particular of that list that are worth asking in a bit more depth and the three questions are, if there is a change when does it happen how is contrast versus affinity portrayed through the character's journey and what is the emotional event created between the character and the audience as a result of the journey, so I think potentially there's the change definitely happens, late in the film because as we've already mentioned like at the low point Barbie is saying I never wanted anything to change and she's still not wanting to get up. And it's Gloria who gets up. It's Gloria who wakes up the Barbies. It's Gloria who takes charge at that point. Barbie only reassumes control over the story when Ken is having his hissy fit. And that is a truly beautiful and powerful scene, but it really is Barbie's character serving Ken. Barbie brings about Ken's own anagnorisis, right? And her change, if we're saying that her change is all about, accepting death, becoming human, taking agency, she still asks permission in that scene, in the void scene with Ruth, and Ruth says, you don't need to ask permission. And perhaps that's another thing, like, it doesn't feel like, you know, right at the end, if here's someone who's apparently her whole journey is about clamoring for agency, we're literally 90 seconds away from the end of the film, and she's still asking permission.

Stu Willis

As I said, I think part of this is because it's dealing with the audience's perspective on the character so like we feel emotional that she gets agency at the end potentially but it's something that she herself it's not a fulfillment of desire, right yeah maybe we could have done Barbie for steadfast because she steadfastly refuses to change until the final seconds right it just feels positive because she actually does change and they do that parlay through contrast an affinity yeah.

Mel Killingsworth

I think also though you have you have two things you have the first that she doesn't know she's never realized in her whole life that's a possibility so for her yes she refused but it's actually quite quick again relative to her span of understanding etc but also I think one of the reasons that it happened so so so late in the film is because Gloria's like, arc has sort of taken over in that middle section of the film and so you're watching Gloria's change and you're watching like all of the Kens face what they've done and all of those sorts of things and I think then she gets her sort of very end of the fourth act thing because everything else has been dealt with given over to other people's it's a huge film like a ton of characters so obviously we're concentrating on Barbie and she does have positive change but I think that both of those two things do mean that the dials just aren't turned as much as we would expect them to be for a, main slash human character of another film.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. So, how is it done through contrasts and affinities to you?

Stu Willis

I mean, Mel's already touched on it. Like, the color story in this is excellent. So, I think even just the way that... So, we've got the clear worlds. We've got Barbie Land. We've got the real world. And then we've got Kendom.

Chas Fisher

And we've also got Mattel headquarters, which I think is very much its own world. Because Mattel headquarters, as much as it's quote-unquote in the real world, it's like out of another movie entirely. Like it's got a different color scheme. Everything's shot symmetrically. It feels like something almost out of 1984, but a Barbie 1984.

Stu Willis

In the final scenes, like she changes wardrobe a lot and she looks like Barbie. And as you talked about, she wanted to be able to wear heels and her foot arching. And the final scene of her in the void is her wearing pretty chunky white wedges. Right. And then they make a distinct point when she's in the car at the end that she, as I said, is wearing sandals, right? But her whole outfit is different. They've got her hair pulled back, sort of long and flowing. Her makeup has changed. She's wearing muted colors. She's wearing browns, where they've made a whole point of her wearing these like gourdish, bright, fluoro Barbie colors, right? So they're literally just showing her being more human-yed, And less of a Barbie. And I think they've done really well. Like, she's wearing, yeah, just blue jeans and a brown blazer. Like, they've kind of made her a little bit normcore.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Stu Willis

And she's in the real world. So, I do think they're trying to suggest that character journey there. That she is able to change. Which is, you know, unlike in The Force Awakens when Han Solo turns up wearing the same vest. Because you know what? I also have found vests that I just wear for like 50 years of my life.

Chas Fisher

I mean, interestingly, it follows a similar pattern to Moana, where it's like village, ocean, back to the village, and then ending back in the ocean.

Stu Willis

Yeah. So, it's a version of that. I mean, it's a hero's journey story, but they are expressing her character's change through wardrobe, hair, and makeup. And I think it is effective.

Mel Killingsworth

Which leads to my observation about what is the last question about the relationship, the affinity.

Chas Fisher

What is the emotional event created between the character and audience?

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah, between the characters and the audiences, she became a me. She became a person. And the fact that she then dresses more like a quote unquote normie.

Chas Fisher

I too look like Margot Robbie.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah, obviously. It's a good thing this is an audio medium. But there is an affinity in, oh, she is more like me. She chose this thing that I am. That's an instant emotional event or connection in that you are also choosing mortality. You are choosing fallibility and constant insomnia over thoughts of death and, also having to go to the doctor and deal with all these other things.

Chas Fisher

Genitals all the.

Mel Killingsworth

Genitals all of the genitals as Ken says yeah I think that that's an instant affinity and the wardrobe very much you know reflects that but that that's, again it's a shorthand it's an easy layup in terms of character arc and affinity with the audience congratulations Barbie's just like you.

Chas Fisher

And I think that the part of the void scene is it is trying to create an infinity between the character and the audience it is trying to, You know, in the same way that we did the episode where filmmakers are trying to talk more directly to the audience, you know, that scene is deliberately setting us in complete contrast to everything we've seen before to set us back. And perhaps in my experience, experience something, I was, my expectations were set by that scene in that setting, but it is trying to bring the film and Barbie and all the ideas in it closer to the audience. And the fact that it ends on a massive gag is also helpful.

Stu Willis

All right.

59:47 WIDOWS

Chas Fisher

All right, Stu. Tell us more about Widows as written by Gillian Flynn and is it Gillian? Gillian? God damn it. And Steve Mcqueen.

Stu Willis

I'm glad to know that my mispronunciation is contagious. I just bring all my friends down to my level. That's why none of you have made movies yet.

Chas Fisher

Because we keep getting ejected from the Discord where we become too successful.

Stu Willis

Yeah, you're still on it. So, you know.

From the film

You have no idea, do you? Or did you choose not to know? Your husband stole $2 million from him. And because it's about my life, it never becomes about yours.

Stu Willis

All right. So Widows is a neo-noir heist thriller. As you said, Gillian Flynn, go on girl, Flynn, Steve Mcqueen, who had done like 12 Years a Slave and Shame before this, doing kind of like it's a crime movie based on Lynda La Plante's Widows from the 1980s. So it's a remake of a British TV series, miniseries. It's awesome because they cast Liam Neeson, my buddy, who's the leader of a gang of crooks. And basically, Harry and his gang of crooks die when they're trying to steal $2 million. It's a robbery gone wrong. Harry's wife, Veronica, played by Viola Davis, is given a key to a safety deposit box by her husband's kind of chauffeur slash getaway. It's not a getaway driver, but he's clearly somewhat tangentially connected and it contains a notebook with Harry's plans for stealing $5 million from this guy called Jack Mulligan, who is played by, Colin Farrell.

From the film

Listen, we're in trouble. It was Jamal Manning's money that our husband stole. Who's that? Somebody you don't want to fuck with. The money burnt up in the van, and Jamal Manning, he wants it back. From us? Or from you? Harry left me the plans for his next job. It's worth $5 million. I take $2 million, give it to the Mannings, we split the rest. You want us to... Pull off the job, yeah. A million apiece. A million? No, maybe you have a secret plan or a special skill that can make you that kind of money. But if you don't, there's an address in the pads of money that I just gave you. Meet me there tomorrow, 1115. What if we say no? She'll give them our names.

Stu Willis

And given that it turns out that she's left with nothing, because there's not really a lot of superannuation with criminals, she rounds up a gang of her fellow widows, the other widows from the dead criminals. We've got Linda, played by Michelle Rodriguez, who runs a clothing store shop that starts to get repossessed because it turns out her husband was a piece of shit and never really paid off the debt on the store. There's Elizabeth Debicki's character, Alice, whose husband was an abusive husband boyfriend. I can't remember if they're married or not. It's kind of irrelevant in that it was still an extremely abusive relationship. He didn't expect her to work. She was a bit of a kind of a sugar baby to him. And she's also got nothing. And then we've got an additional character, which comes in quite late. And I like how they do it. You've got Belle, who's a beautician, who's actually babysitting for Michelle Rodrigo's character, Linda, because the other widow, who's, Amanda, I think Carrie Coon, speaking of Gone Girl, plays Jimmy's widow, but she doesn't want to have anything to do with the plan for reasons that will become apparent as we talk about them, because. Spoilers everywhere, it's Draft Zero. That's kind of the overall setup, and then basically it's about the interweaving of their storylines of them convincing themselves, they can rob Jack Mulligan, and then we also follow Jack Mulligan's kind of battle with a who is the that character's name Jamal Manning yeah who's kind of another crime boss who's the one whose money has been stolen, by Rawlings in the first place so.

Mel Killingsworth

Who's also running for office like it's all very interwoven.

Stu Willis

It's all very interconnected and and I'm doing a poor job of I'm just giving you the setup.

Mel Killingsworth

There's so much plot there's it's It's actually insanely dense. It all makes perfect sense. It's never confusing as you're watching it, but it is so dense.

Chas Fisher

I really want to thank patron Jay Schubert for picking this film because it is so dense and there are so many characters and it is so plot heavy. The fact that they manage to have character journeys for all three primary widows and that they're all positive, but they all happen at very different points in the story.

Mel Killingsworth

And to different degrees.

Chas Fisher

I think is just masterful storytelling and almost is the sole expression of theme throughout this movie. Like this movie would be completely satisfying as a complex heist movie, but any kind of like expression as to anything deeper beyond the heist is, I think, as a result of the character arcs. Not just the widows, I think also the politics arcs as well.

Mel Killingsworth

I think we're only going to be able to sort of concentrate on the widows because it is very dense and there's a lot of stuff going on, which, you know, you can talk about.

1:05:47 Establishing character patterns before the heist begins

Chas Fisher

So, I mean, as we spoke about in one of the previous two episodes, to be able to demonstrate an arc for a character, you need to establish what their patterns of behavior are.

Stu Willis

Their habits. Yeah.

Chas Fisher

And this film does that incredibly well. Like, it's a series of montages before the team comes together and does a heist. I mean, montages isn't a great way of talking about it, but they move so quickly from scene to scene. So we've got, we go through each of their relationships before the partners die, and it establishes the pattern of each of those relationships. You've got the one between Harry and Veronica's relationship, as it's shown to us, is very loving. Like it's opening on them kissing in bed, you know. Then you've got the frustrations between Linda and her husband.

Stu Willis

Carlos.

Chas Fisher

Linda and Carlos.

From the film

It's my store, Cardinals, my store. Every time I give you a loan, it's like an I owe you. But this is a new loan. Wait, are you accusing me of stealing your money? Why do you look surprised you do it for a living? Well, you get the balls. What do I do for this family? I risk my life. Yeah, you risk your life and then you piss it up a wall. Mija, come here. I love you, huh? Listen to your mother even though she's crazy, huh? She's, always crazy. Always crazy. Come here. I love you. Always true. Always true.

Chas Fisher

There is some love there, and there's family, but there's also just like underlying frustration. And finally, Stu, the last couple, their names, Alice...

Mel Killingsworth

Alice and Florek.

Chas Fisher

Florek, God, his name is probably never mentioned out loud in the movie. So, but Alice and Florek being abusive.

From the film

Does that hurt? You need to do something with makeup. Makes me feel bad to look at that. It makes me feel bad too.

Chas Fisher

And then you've got each of their funerals and then showing where each of the women are before they've come together, before the widows have met. So there's a lot of work going on in these scenes to establish the patterns of these women so that they can go through an arc throughout the movie. It takes, I mean, in doing that, it's also establishing all the other characters that we've mentioned and all the other subplots, which it's astonishing.

Stu Willis

It's astonishing because it reminds me a bit of The Wire in that it's following multiple groups, how crime affects them. It's got commentary on the nature of Chicago, and yet somehow it's a movie. I mean, it's not a short movie.

Mel Killingsworth

Two hours?

Stu Willis

Just over two hours, but it gets through a lot in two hours. Like I look at this and I'm just, I'm in awe of the way it's put together. Cause there's also a backstory about Veronica and Harry and their dead child.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Mel Killingsworth

Which reframes their relationship in a lot of ways. Yeah. What you've seen.

Stu Willis

Played as a, as a mystery. So it's, it's very clever. And I wonder if this is, Gillian's influence, very clever in how it nests plot questions into all of this stuff. Cause it's quite engaging. Steve McQueen I like as a director, but he's not the most thrilling director in terms of like a kinetic energy and having really strong plot works. And also, Sean Bobbitt, I mean, now we're talking about the visuals, but I saw this and I was like, I bet Bobbitt shot this. It just got his style with the handheld. Anyway.

Chas Fisher

Who edited it? Because the editing is phenomenal.

Stu Willis

Joe Walker.

Chas Fisher

Joe Walker, yeah.

Stu Willis

Who does all Villeneuve stuff these days.

1:09:37 Do the widows have values before the story starts

Chas Fisher

So, I found myself asking a question, like, by the time the crew comes together, we know what has been established for us is what their relationships were like, what their life has subsequently become like since they've lost their partners. But it's so dense in storytelling and it's moving so quickly that I was struggling to go, do we know any of their values even at this early point in the movie? And I don't think we do. I think their values is who they are as people and what they believe in and whether those shift come at later.

Mel Killingsworth

Okay. I do think maybe it's more revealed later, but on this rewatch, which is maybe the third, fourth time I've seen it. I think that actually, even in that montage, you do see at least Linda and Alice's values quite clearly. And Linda, who's played by Michelle Rodriguez, her value is like hard work, right? Hard work. and she's the most steadfast of them all. And, you know, she has the store and she's taking care of her kids and she's trying to keep, you know, her partner has struggles with gambling and she's frustrated by that, but she loves him and she's trying to keep their head above water. And then with Alice and her relationship with Florek, maybe it's not quite as much of value. It's certainly a habit, but you see that he has been abusive for a long time and that her entire character arc springs out of how she responds to abuse going forward her.

Stu Willis

Mom played by Jacki Weaver is.

Mel Killingsworth

Also Jacki Weaver her mom's also abusive and then so because okay when you see her eating breakfast with Florek it's quite clear that he laid hands on her like, in the days before you don't actually see it but he did and then a few scenes later with Jacki Weaver her mother her mother slaps her.

From the film

What about the bike? If it's a Florek friend, what am I going to do with the bike? You idiot! You never ask for enough! Why? I should be like you and I ask for everything like I deserve it. Drive my husband in the ground, take care of myself before my children.

Mel Killingsworth

And it's also clear that this has happened before, right? And this is, I thought, like the first time, oh, this is a callback to like, she clearly had an abusive relationship growing up with her parent. And so that was very easy for her to fall into with a romantic partner. And then several scenes later when they're fighting over something, Viola Davis. So Veronica slaps her and she hits her back.

From the film

You're a cold old bitch. I'm done being treated like shit. Not again. Not by you. Not by anyone.

Mel Killingsworth

And it's her standing up for herself. And it's also the first time that Veronica respects her.

From the film

I'm not Harry. All this damage, I can't be responsible for all of it. Why do you have to be? Because I don't own anything. Not even the apartment I live in. I have nothing.

Mel Killingsworth

And that respect grows throughout the movie. And their relationship, I think, is the most dynamic. And it's really wonderful. And it's what the movie decides to end on is their relationship. But it's when she stands up for herself. And that is seeded in her very first scene when she not only had she not stood up to Florek before, because this has clearly happened multiple times. But in that scene, the way that she tries to appease him and the way that she tries to like, you know, yeah, she gets kind of snappy, but then when he gets mad about it back, she immediately backs off. Like that scene does set up her, like what she has become, you know, who she is.

Chas Fisher

Can I riff on that and talk through Alice's character journey? Because I think she is the one that has the most change.

Mel Killingsworth

Agreed.

Chas Fisher

It's dramatized the most and it happens over the longest amount of the movie. Because I take it back, there is an expression of her values in that early scene. In the scene where her mother slaps her, basically the mother is saying, you should become an escort, that's the way that you're going to make money and get ahead. And her mother's like, I knew you when you were a teenager. Why are you pretending to be above this? And she says, they were never paying me. There is an expression of value about her self-worth and what she believes she will do and not do. So, there is a values statement from her. And you've said correctly from Linda as well. We've probably got less of an insight as to Veronica's values early on.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah. And I think that's intentional. She's so opaque and- So you're left even at the end, like they debate, the other widows are debating, do you think she knew? And they're like, of course she didn't. You're like, okay, but how much? And the movie never answers that question. Of course she had to know something, but how much and when? And it never answers that. She is the most opaque. And I think the opening scene is that. It is more opaque. And what you learn later sort of recolors how you see that scene in several different times throughout the movie. So, like, I think her character arc is probably the least or is less dynamic, partly because of how opaque she is. It's less dynamic than Alice's, 100%.

Stu Willis

Yeah, it's less dynamic. It's kind of less fun.

Mel Killingsworth

Well, yeah, yeah. I mean, Alice is a lot of fun.

Stu Willis

Alice is like Barbie doing a heist.

Chas Fisher

Right?

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah, she's going to the gun show and pretending to be a mail order bride. And she's like, you know, flirting with guys to get them to bid on trucks for her and all that. It's fun.

Stu Willis

Yeah, so it's really fun. And I know we want to talk through possibly all the characters, but I think a key difference between this and Barbie coming back to the goal thing is the goal is clearly so, related to their lack and what skills that they either have to develop or prove that they have. So very early on, Veronica is like, if you're in, so one, we establish what they lack, which is on the surface money, but it's more that they've all been independent on their partners, whether or not they realize it. And I think Veronica is more opaque because I actually think she's a character who's going through grief, and perhaps in a relationship there was no, well, as we learn, it's a relationship that was no longer functioning, but she held on to it because I think because of what related to her son.

Chas Fisher

I think you're right, but the film deliberately misdirects us on that, right? So, the film opens with her and Harry lying in bed, very intimately kissing over a long period of time. The film is telling us- they're in love they're connected.

Stu Willis

Yeah because it's from her but it's connecting us to her point of view this is the lie that she believes.

Chas Fisher

Yeah a hundred percent.

Stu Willis

That Harry loved her and he wasn't going to abandon her and in fact him leaving her a notebook for how to steal the five million is because he loves her and wanted to take care of her in a way.

Mel Killingsworth

There's also an element though of intentional self-deception and.

Stu Willis

I think the.

Mel Killingsworth

Movie seeds that a lot of that happens because like everyone knows the stats of a couple losing a child and how that drastically impacts their relationship and I think she was clearly so, damaged by that and still trying they both I'm sure at some point or another were trying to reconnect that she wants to then when her husband is gone lie to herself a bit and she's okay with that yeah.

Stu Willis

Right so you've got what she's missing we've talked about Linda's abusive relationship and her need to stand up for herself sorry Alice And then Linda herself needing to just reclaim her shop, but she's got the kids to take care of, right? So we understand the money thing is, but the film does give her moments to explore her grief that we may or may not get to. And then Belle, this beautician, we have all this stuff about the fact that she has to run for the bus, that she's actually incredibly good at running because of the life circumstances where she is, which is she's just trying to make shit work for her kids.

From the film

Hey, mommy! Baby! Baby! Ah! You look B. I've been up since 5.30. Hello? Bailey, it's okay. Come here. Come here, baby. I can take the bus. I'll be there in about 20 minutes. Come here, sweetie. Cabs are a little hard for me. 20 minutes. Baby, you just got home. 12 bucks now. I got to take it. Bailey's been waiting for you all night. Please. Elise, let me fix you something to eat. I'm going to be back.

★ Key idea · Skills And Goals Tied To Character Growth

Stu Willis

So they all have something to need. And then very early on, Veronica, when she comes up with the plan to steal the money, is like, these are the list of tasks that you have to do. And you just have to work it out. And part of the fun is them learning who they are and what they're capable of doing in order to achieve the goal. So their character arc is tied to them being able to achieve the goal. They want financial independence and by succeeding in financial independence, they will become independent people. And there's a theme running in there about what they're trying to do in this area of Chicago with the small businesses. And there's a bunch of really cool shit about crime and the relationship between crime and politics and business. But that is very clearly related and connected. And so they have to develop the skills, but the skills are related to them becoming more independent. Like this is tight.

1:18:42 Skills and goals tightly tied to character growth

Chas Fisher

Oh, yeah.

Stu Willis

In all those ways. Right. And I think it is in contrast to, you know, Barbie in hindsight, where I don't feel like the goal is tightly tied to what she needs to learn. She goes in search of getting rid of her cellulite. And what she needs to learn is that actually it's okay if she sees a gynecologist, but we don't see old Margot. Right. Like the film doesn't, it kind of sets us up there, but it doesn't deal with the consequences of it. Whereas this is, this film is a little bit more interested. I mean, they all get, I mean, they all get away with it. They get the money and they become independent, but there's so much other colourful stuff going on. Like Alice's relationship with the, I was going to say a John, but he's not really a John.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Stu Willis

When she's escorting.

Chas Fisher

I think it was fair.

Mel Killingsworth

Sugar daddy.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. I think what I'm impressed about this movie is we've drawn an intentional, divide between characters learning things and their internal values changing. And this film, as you say, Stu, very much does the characters learning things and they have a clear plot oriented goal, like a dramatizable, we need money, we get the money. We need to learn things to get the money. We learn the things to get the money. But I'm fascinated how they manage to, through that, also have positive character journeys of these people learning things. I actually think Linda is probably the one who changes the least, but still I think has changed in terms of just purely internal. Alice's journey, I think, is so great because she goes from an abusive relationship with Florek to an abusive, returning to the abusive relationship with her mother, to believing her mother, what her mother says about her to becoming an escort, right? Actually goes into that life and into that world. And then you've got that incredible scene where, Mel, that you've referenced, where Veronica slaps Alice and Alice slaps her back and says, I'm done being treated like shit. And that's kind of in the middle of the movie. But what amazed me on this rewatch, watching it through this lens, is Alice actually continues to change. Because she is faced with another decision later. The John has got knowledge of architecture and She uses the John to get that knowledge, to have the heist. And on the very day of the heist, the John basically says, you can have this life where it's transactional. It's not emotional. You will have good things. I will have good things. We all understand where everything's at, but I'm buying you, essentially.

1:21:04 Alice's escalating value shift through the sugar daddy scene

Stu Willis

It's such a powerful scene because he's nice to her. He's everything that Florek isn't. So you're like, oh, this would be pretty tempting for her.

Mel Killingsworth

Yep.

From the film

You want to come? To Shanghai? You ever been? Uh, no. No, when? Tomorrow. I can't. You can't? I got commitments here. I can't just drop everything and fly to Shanghai. Well, that's different than yours. It seems to me if you can ask me to get the address off a permit, which I did, And I can certainly ask you to ditch your commitments and fly with me to Shanghai for a few days. Or do overseas adventures cost more? Everything just a transaction? They brought us these drinks. Next they're going to bring us a bill. It's the way the world works as far as I'm concerned. Sorry.

Chas Fisher

And she realizes that she could not do the heist. She could gain not financial independence, but financial security by choosing this life. And she makes a value judgment that no, I do not want.

Mel Killingsworth

She follows through on the value judgment she stated to her mother and then didn't follow through on, which is actually, I won't be bought.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. And there's a big difference to being, I'm done being treated like shit because he doesn't, the John doesn't treat her like shit. She is done being treated like shit.

Mel Killingsworth

They have a good relationship.

Chas Fisher

And she moves past that to, I want to be in control of my own destiny. I have value in who I am. My value is not what people will pay for me.

From the film

Look, if I ended things right now, what would you do for money? Excuse me? My money, where I live, I'm offering you a nice life, Alice. You say life like it's yours to offer, but it's mine, It's mine to be ashamed of and be proud of. Mine to fuck up or make good, it's mine. I don't have time for this right now, okay? I have to go.

Mel Killingsworth

Even her ability to articulate it to him, her response to him, shows clearly that she has a much firmer grasp of who she is and what she is willing to do to get what she wants.

Chas Fisher

And in terms of the timing of the film, all of that happens before the heist even happens. Which is incredible and Linda has less scenes like, she has the shop she has the frustration she loses the shop she has some scenes where she I think she is the glue of the team where they're having fights and yeah she's the peacemaker she's the one who.

Mel Killingsworth

Can explain to people.

Chas Fisher

Like why.

Mel Killingsworth

Is she always like well some of us have.

Chas Fisher

Kids and jobs like.

Mel Killingsworth

She's she's able to almost translate between Veronica and the others.

Chas Fisher

Alice. And she brings Belle in to the group. These are all skills. So she's the closest to being steadfast, but she has that incredible scene with the architect's husband.

1:25:04 Linda's grief scene and steadfast versus positive arcs

Mel Killingsworth

It's interesting that you like that. I go back and forth every time. It does show development. I think it's a very complex scene and I think they're both very good in it. And I think the first, like every time I watch it, I sort of flip flop. And I remember the last time being like, oh my God, this is incredible, it's beautiful, and this time being like, eh, but I'm sure next time I watch it, I'll be back. But it's complicated, and I think you're right. That does show how she is changing through grief, but she's allowing it to help her to grow as opposed to stagnate.

Stu Willis

The scene is a moment where Linda has to go to this architect. They're trying to find the plans for this particular safe. And this architect's at home. This is back before working at home. What's that common? And he's like, there's a reason I haven't been in the office. It's because my wife died. And that actually really strikes Linda. And she starts talking about her husband. She actually is vulnerable with a stranger because I think she is the character that shows her vulnerability the least.

From the film

I asked you to go. I lost my husband. Two weeks ago. Oh, my.

Stu Willis

And they end up basically making out. I'm being flippant around it because it's an incredibly powerful scene because you're like, oh, wow, this is really complex. And they just sit in it. It's not a plot question. She doesn't actually succeed in the information, right? It's just a moment. And that's one of the things I like about this film. She's allowed to fail, but we kind of feel like, oh, it's become like that is an emotional event, right? There's like a humanity between her and this other man. And we realize that the way that the widows aren't being vulnerable with each other and in fact, Veronica's character journey is in relative to Alice right I would argue that she goes on and that's what the film ends on if if are we are we done with Alice do I want to come back to that.

1:27:12 Veronica's arc through Harry's betrayal and revenge

Chas Fisher

Yeah oh yeah we're definitely done with Alice I well I feel so dismissive by saying that but like I think you're right, like the final scene is Veronica reaching out to Alice so it's definitely dramatized through Veronica's relationship and emotions with Alice, but I do think what they dramatized throughout the film is, Veronica being able to, A, come to terms with the grief of the loss of her son, and come to terms with the implosion of her marriage to Harry, because big spoiler, Harry is alive and has basically murdered his own crew and faked his own death so that he can escape his now unhappy marriage following the death of their son.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah, that is certainly a byproduct. I don't think he explicitly does that just to get out of his marriage. There are other money pressures and other pressures. And also it's really, really brutal the way that he essentially says, well, I'm doing this so that I can be with Amanda because she can give me a child, right? Because part of his crew that he kills is Amanda's husband as well.

Chas Fisher

Right?

Mel Killingsworth

Who was not going to go quietly into that good night. So there's multiple things tangled up in that. Yeah.

From the film

It was meant to be simple. Why couldn't you just sell the book to Jamal and leave it at that, Ronnie? You're not supposed to be here. You left me alone, you evil bastard. I want to start a new life with your new son, your new white, happy family. I couldn't save him, Ronnie! I couldn't save us! I had to save me! Me! You're a fucking coward! I need that money, Ronnie.

Chas Fisher

Oh, yeah. But he is, to my mind, he could have, if he wasn't running away from Veronica, he could have stayed with his crew, kept on robbing. Like, it paints him as being successful and good at his job. Like, he has a reputation. All these people know about him. He's meticulous. He's all these things. He's like the super crook. It's how other people talk about him and his notebook is, like, perfectly.

Stu Willis

And Veronica is like, I don't understand how this went bad.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Stu Willis

Harry is the best. And the answer is it didn't go bad. It went how he expected.

Chas Fisher

And that final flashback where it shows him, as you say, the plan goes exactly as expected. And the one thing that I really love it. So, Veronica realizes and the audience realizes as well that Harry is alive without them confronting each other. There's this incredible scene where Veronica and Harry's dog, she goes to visit Amanda. The dog's barking. Veronica sees the flask. She's standing at a doorway and she knows that Harry is on the other side of that door. And she now knows that Harry is alive, that he's faked his own death and that he hasn't told her. So she's been grieving for a man that is alive. And she does not open that door. She walks away. She goes through with the heist. She's almost pretending... Like he's not alive, like acting as if she doesn't know this piece of information.

Mel Killingsworth

Just a real quick, like also the dog should be higher build because the dog has very crucial scenes, including this one and some like smaller supporting role scenes like the dog should be higher build. But yeah, it does really well, especially in that scene when Brian Tyree Henry's like waving around like a mob. But yeah, the fact that she chooses to walk away, I think really demonstrates a change in her as a character. And you could, that's something I don't think the film portrays as positive, quote unquote, or negative, quote unquote. But I think she sees it as positive that the way that she was unable to sort of disentangle herself from him in the aftermath of their son being killed.

Stu Willis

I mean, in fact, you reminded me that Jamal actually says to he's waving the dog around because he's like, you owe me the money that was stolen. So there is an external plot motivation. It's not just that she wants to go and get rich.

Mel Killingsworth

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, she, he also murders her driver and they send her the Super Bowl ring where it's like, yeah, it's not like, like the fact is that we can murder you with impunity.

Chas Fisher

Yeah, she's, she's very much pushed into doing the heist. What Harry later says is you were supposed to sell the notebook, not do the heist. Like that was, that was how you were supposed to get out of it.

Mel Killingsworth

And I think that shows that he thought that she was a certain thing. And then her growth is that actually I am not going to be this like pushover that you thought I was going to be. I'm not going to take this like easy way out. I'm actually going to say, no, fuck you and do it my way. And that in itself is an arc.

Chas Fisher

Oh, absolutely.

Stu Willis

And that is part of her arc is related as a contrast to what Harry did to his men. So Veronica talks about how they need to be like the men and if one of them falls they just keep going, And Alice ends up being shot during the heist. Linda shoots the person. And there's another scene where basically the henchman, the lead henchman, Jatame of Jamal, I'm going to, sorry for butchering his name. But basically he confronts them and takes the money. And all of it is the assumption that the widows aren't going to work together to look after their own. And they do. Veronica supports them. and because they all back each other, they actually succeed. And I think there is a version of this where Veronica, earlier on the film, would have let Alice die.

Mel Killingsworth

A hundred percent.

Stu Willis

Right? And that's, you know, and they would have, or they would have just dropped her off at the hospital, right? As opposed to, we're going to drop her off at the hospital, make sure that she's okay, right?

Mel Killingsworth

Follow up with her afterwards. Yeah, absolutely.

Stu Willis

And they kill, you know, Jatem, so it's all part of her journey is her going from someone who's really isolated, I would say, probably, as you realize from the death of their child, her clinging on to disintegrating marriage, and at what point were those moments of her and Harry, her, already grieving a marriage that she was in? Right. And now she's actually got connection. And with Alice, the character, she thought she belittled the most in the part of the film. She underestimated Alice the most. And at the end of the film, she's like, hey, how are you going? Right. I'm getting emotional thinking about it because it's an emotional event.

Mel Killingsworth

It's beautiful. My question, I think we all agree, she would have left Alice to die in that first third of the movie or whatever. But my question is, do we think that she would have shot Harry, save Alice or to whatever?

Chas Fisher

Yeah, absolutely not.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I think that, I don't think we're given a clear answer the way that it's really clear between her and Alice. But I don't think she would have. Whereas by the end, she is absolutely, like, not even a little bit willing, like, almost eager.

Stu Willis

She doesn't hesitate. She wants to protect the women that she's worked with to get this money. But also, I think because she's worked out that he deceived her.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah. And has moved past that disbelief and sadness to anger and revenge.

Chas Fisher

It's been several days in between her learning that he's still alive and not confronting it. And then Harry is robbing her, right? When he comes back, he says, our marriage was done, you checked out. And all of this is only being, let's talk about the tight structuring of this film. Alice's journey plays out in front of us, right? Linda's journey plays out in front of us in chronological order. Veronica's journey, for the first half of the film, we see her holding herself together, having emotion, having waves of grief, but the flashbacks are telling us that it was a loving relationship. And then the flashbacks start to get, a little deeper right until we finally understand the the whole story but they still don't show us Harry and Veronica's disconnect even in in flashback the the closest they get, is a scene where he says I'm don't make me sorry that we had him or something along those lines.

From the film

Don't make me feel like my only regret is having a child with you well maybe you're right maybe you should have had him with someone else, then he'd still be alive.

Chas Fisher

That's the closest they get. But then when we actually see them interact in that final scene, he is robbing her. He's like, I'm going to take the money. And then he's going to shoot her, right? He pulls the gun and he's going to turn around and kill her. He is, you know, trying to cast her off of his life, but she has already done that for him. And I think casting him off of her life helps her reconnect. And I don't think we know I don't think the film dramatizes how lonely she is I mean there's she's alone in her flat the only person we see her talking to is the driver Bash so yeah I guess the film does dramatize her loneliness but it's not sitting in it it's not highlighting it we only kind of learn, of her journey almost retrospectively.

Mel Killingsworth

It does also tell us like when she runs into uh Tom she She says that she used to work for the school board, be the school board leader.

Chas Fisher

She's in the teacher's union.

Mel Killingsworth

She's in the teacher's union. That's it. She was like, it very much does seem to be that before her son's murder, she was a sort of part of the community and had more connection and knew more and that a lot of that has been stripped away from her through depression, et cetera. But she is very much alone when we meet her in this movie.

Chas Fisher

I mean, she did consciously, all of the widows knew that they were married to criminals. None of them were under any illusions. Like Veronica's in this beautiful apartment.

Mel Killingsworth

Well, Linda did not. I don't, Linda knew that her husband had gambling issues. Linda knew that her husband had, had struggled with criminality in the past.

Stu Willis

Oh, I push back.

Chas Fisher

Yeah, I push back on that because she has that argument with her mother-in-law at the funeral where she's saying he chose that life and she's like, no, he was forced to choose it because of you.

Mel Killingsworth

Think you might be right I guess I was still reading that as like once you know he went to prison which he had done and then after that his options were very limited but that she thought that he had managed to extricate himself but she knew that he'd gone to prison and I again I that might have just been there's there was so much in this yeah I just.

Stu Willis

Think it's actually the reason I push back is I think it's important because it's Linda that does not hesitate to kill Tom Mulligan after he shot.

Mel Killingsworth

Alice.

Stu Willis

Right? And amass Veronica, that I just get that sense that Linda probably grew up in similar circumstances to Carlos and so had been exposed to criminality, right?

Mel Killingsworth

Of course she has. She's the least naive of all of them, for sure.

Stu Willis

Yeah, which is why she recognized that Belle could be a good getaway driver.

Mel Killingsworth

When they came to take possession of her shop, she wasn't aware that he'd gamble the way they did because I think she wasn't aware how far back in it he was like she knew he had been but I think that she was again she's got kids and a business she's very distracted but I certainly had the idea that in the last three to five years that she thought that he was much more extricated than he was.

Stu Willis

Oh just probably not gambling them their money away which is like creating that yeah you know the action is the, Obviously, there's a lot in it, and there's four characters, but all of them go through, like, I think they've all suffered a loss at the beginning of the film, which is the loss of their husbands, their loss of their situations, right? And at the end of the film, even though we're talking about all these complexities, they've come together as a group, they've learned the skills, they've become independent, and the film rewards them with everything that goes successfully, right? Linda is able to reacquire her store, right? Belle is able to move away with her kids, right? And Alice seemingly is free of her dependence on men or her family. So I think the arc is actually relatively simple for all these characters, and it's quite uplifting. And I think particularly the Veronica and Alice moment is, to me, quite emotional because it's about emotional connection. And it's a game, like suddenly it's like this game of a friendship, even though Veronica was like, we can't know each other after this. And it's like, but I actually want to be friends with you, Alice.

1:39:33 Comparing ensemble arcs to OCEAN'S ELEVEN and THE TOWN

Chas Fisher

But let's like just contrast it with let's say Ocean's 11, right? We get zero insight to what their values are. They all have a good time together, but they don't change as characters, any of them from the beginning of the film to the end of the film. And that's a very enjoyable experience. I'm not detracting from that.

Stu Willis

But it's not emotional.

Chas Fisher

Yes. Right.

Mel Killingsworth

At the end of Ocean's Eleven, they're standing, looking at the fountain going up, and it's cool, and then they all walk away. The ending of this is these two women locking eyes and admitting, I have changed for the better because of you.

Chas Fisher

Yes.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah, huge difference.

Chas Fisher

And I think that final scene, because that's what Veronica said at the beginning, we're not friends, we're going to do this job, and we're going to walk away, and we're never going to see each other again.

From the film

We got to start thinking like professionals. We're in business together. There's not going to be some cozy reunion. After this job, we're done. We have three days to look and move like a team of men. The best thing we have going for us is being who we are. Why? Because no one thinks we have the balls to pull this off.

Chas Fisher

And that happens. They're in the cafe. It's completely by accident that Veronica and Alice even see each other. and they pretend like the other doesn't exist. And then at the end, Veronica makes a choice to approach Alice because she's now open to human connection. As you say, Stu, that's what makes it emotional. And the reason I think why I love the scene with Linda and the architect's husband, in their grief is because otherwise Linda is very steadfast. She is maternal. She is caring. she is driven she is always pulling them together the same way she's always pulling her family together, she gets Alice to the hospital at the end. She goes from losing her shop to getting her shop back, but is there any internal value change? And I think it is that one scene in the middle where she gives into her grief and it's as a result of the plot, but it's not as a result of the other widows. It's just suddenly connecting with another person who is going through her grief. I mean, the other widows are going through that grief.

Mel Killingsworth

But- Completely unexpected moment with him, with someone who has no other reason to talk to her or be connected to her, unlike the other, the widows obviously do. And it's just a very human moment.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. And I think it's the only thing that makes me feel that she is a positive arc rather than a steadfast arc is because of that one scene where there's just contrast.

Stu Willis

No, but I think she's a skeptic from memory. Isn't she a skeptic about the plan early on? And then she makes up with this guy and then she's kind of a little bit more committed to the cause, right? So, it's a character change.

Chas Fisher

My memory of it is that it was Alice who was a skeptic and Linda was like, come on, we've got to do this. But, you know, I watched it two nights ago but I'm not going to stake my life on this. It was like the second, there was a scene where the four widows are getting, well, at the time it's the three widows, where they're getting together in Harry's old hideout and that's the point where Alice goes, why are we even doing what Veronica's telling us to do? What does she do in this? What is she bringing to this? And it is interesting. I'm glad one of the characters... Hung a lantern on that because so far at that to that point all she had brought was the plan, yeah the other widows could have just taken that plan off her and said we're gonna do this like why do we owe you anything but Veronica is like, acting like a boss and it's only as Veronica acts like a friend that she gets ahead like you say Stu so it's also tightly interconnected I I think because Linda, you know, going back to Barbie, because Linda's emotional scenes happen, they're still triggered by the plot, but she doesn't need to go through them to achieve the plot outcomes, right? That's why Linda's journey feels different to Alice's and Veronica's because Alice and Veronica, they need to go through that internal- They wouldn't have pulled off the heist and they wouldn't have lived through it and they wouldn't then have overcome their grief and become independent and come closer without those value changes on top of the things that they learned.

Stu Willis

Correct.

Chas Fisher

It's just a fucking amazing movie.

Stu Willis

It is a great movie and it's interesting because people do compare it to Heat, but I need to rewatch The Town. But I've got a feeling the town explores a little bit more of the social, political stuff that this does. Like, he does ground. It's a crime movie where we're interested in the personal lives of the characters, right? And this does the same thing. But I think the town does believe, you know, has a little bit more that, like, let's draw a-

Mel Killingsworth

Kind of probably in the middle.

Chas Fisher

The town doesn't have the, I think, the same richness of the villains. Like it doesn't spend as much time with the people being robbed or the people who have been robbed and how those people are trying to have a political campaign against each other, which also comments on the-

Stu Willis

Socio-economic.

Chas Fisher

Events of those.

Stu Willis

The relationship between Colin Farrell's Jack with his father, like Robert Devall, Tom, like that in itself has a character fucking journey. Yeah, like all of these, almost all of these characters are given journeys and I imagine that the dead husbands also had a journey where they they went from thinking they can trust Harry to being dead.

Chas Fisher

The only two characters that I don't think have internal value changes would be Jamal and Jatam, but they are the antagonists of the film. They're like the sharks.

Mel Killingsworth

Daniel Kaluuya also just should have gotten like throw awards at this performance. He just doesn't say anything. This is a guy who sort of got most famous for a giant long monologue and that's what blew him up. And then he does this role where he says like eight words. Like I think he has that whole scene in the gymnasium where he says like do it.

Stu Willis

The rap.

Mel Killingsworth

Do it, rap. And then he just says, run. Like, that's it. That's all he says. And that's, as a character introduction, it's just great. But like, yeah, there's no change. He ain't changing. He is, he gonna be steadfast. Like, that's it. Straight across the board. It's great. But yes, we don't have time to do all of the characters, but you could.

Chas Fisher

Absolutely.

1:46:46 Relationship questions as emotional engine of ensemble films

Stu Willis

I would say the one thing that's quite interesting for me about this film is I do think it has emotional tension, right? There is a character question because of the nature of the ensemble that there are conflict, which is, are these characters going to be closer together or further away from each other, right? And particularly the relationship between Veronica and Alice, but by nature of being an ensemble, that those relationships are quite complex. Do they learn to trust Belle? Will they, you know, Linda open up and then relationship with their kids and stuff like that? So I think this film is actually a really good example about the concept of a relationship question, because I do think it's asked really early. It's somewhat explicit in raising the question about will these people overcome their differences, right? We could be flippant about it, but actually that gives the film an emotional quality, right? And I think that does lead us nicely into All of Us Strangers, which is a film that is all about relationships.

Chas Fisher

And similar to All of Us Strangers, the fact that we feel positive about Veronica murdering her husband, is, I think, going to tie into how this film, All of Us Strangers, ends so fucking sadly, devastatingly sadly, but I still think it's positive.

Stu Willis

Yeah.

Chas Fisher

I was the one who was framing this as positive.

Stu Willis

I'm just going to rewind slightly because I think, actually, you've picked up something without realising it. I think we feel like it's okay to justify killing Harry because Veronica doesn't open that door. She leaves, but then the audience is explicitly told by having Harry talk to his girl, Amanda, we know he's alive and that he's cheating on her. And so we believe we're ahead of that. That creates tension, but it also makes us go, you're a prick. So we are happy to see him die. Where I think if it was a reveal, like if that if we didn't have visual access to that I think we would feel differently about Harry dying.

Chas Fisher

I mean even in that interaction where it's revealed Amanda says to him why are we waiting around you always get greedy you always want to stay around a little bit longer like it's telling us he could be gone right with the money that he stole and he's wanting to hang around to rob Veronica again he's gonna kill Veronica the film makes it very easy for us to be on Veronica's side as she kills Harry.

Mel Killingsworth

Whereas I actually think that with All of Us Strangers, I connect it more to the discussion we had about the dressmaker, which sort of ties in in terms of, her saying something, Teddy dying. And we act in the dressmaker like that's punishment and in All of Us Strangers like it's reward question mark?

Chas Fisher

Question mark.

Mel Killingsworth

Giant glowing neon light up question mark.

1:49:36 ALL OF US STRANGERS

From the film

Hello. Hi. I saw you looking at me from the street. I'm assuming you're not with anyone. I never see you with anyone. Is it mom and dad? Yeah. They died just before I was 12. I'm trying to write about them at the moment. How's it going? Strangely. Hi. Hi.

Chas Fisher

So, Mel, given you've watched All of Us Strangers more recently than any of us, thank you for putting yourself through that. I mean, I only watched it maybe, I don't know, I'd have to check the Discord, but maybe three months ago, I was not game enough to go in again. Do you want to summarize what it is?

Mel Killingsworth

All of Us Strangers is a ghost story that asks, can you get closure? And if not, can you move forward anyway? It is a, it's a story, Wikipedia calls it a romantic fantasy, which is an interesting term.

Chas Fisher

No.

Mel Killingsworth

Magical Realism, I've heard a lot of people call it. And it is a story about Adam, who's played by Andrew Scott. And he is living in this giant, brand new sort of apartment building alone. And he meets a neighbor, Harry, played by Paul Mescal. And in the course of the next couple days of Adam's life, he goes to, visit a park, which at first you think is almost a beat because this man comes up and is sort of this man this hot man who's wearing a leather jacket and has this like mustache sort of following him through the park and you think that maybe he's gonna hook up because Harry came over and asked him to hook up and then he didn't and then instead, he follows him to his house and you realize that this is actually a, Adam's father except Adam's father is dead.

Stu Willis

We only learn that after this.

Mel Killingsworth

After the scene exactly which is why you think that it's a beat anyway so he, visits with his father and mother played by Jamie Bell and Claire Foy and over the course of several days and nights it starts becoming less and less clear when he is dreaming when he is drug tripping whether this is, magical realism and is actually happening. And he starts to also explore a relationship with Harry. And then he comes out to his parents. And if all this sounds confusing, it's because it is all presented as this very dream state sort of experience for him. These are essentially the only four characters in the world. And even though he goes on the train, he goes outside, there are other people around, but there are no other characters in the story and then at the end of the film he, has to let his parents go again so his parents died in a car accident when he was 12 years old and he then is visiting them and visiting them and visiting them and they finally say you have to let us go, like you can't keep coming back here and they go to a diner and his parents leave and he goes back to his apartment, and he goes to seek solace from Harry, who has become his boyfriend, and he finds that Harry is also dead in his apartment. And then as he is mourning Harry, Harry comes in to the apartment where his dead body is and he's very upset. He's like, I didn't want you to see me this way. I didn't want this to happen. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. And essentially, they go to bed and the camera spins out into the stars at the end. This is a very difficult thing to summarize because it is. A fairly straightforward story in terms of, you know, boy talks to parents about being gay, boy gets boyfriend, except it's all slightly off. It's all slightly wrong. There's all these fantasy elements. And then he does ketamine at some point. And you're wondering how much of that is related. And it's all very dreamy.

Chas Fisher

And there's lots of scenes of him on like falling asleep on the train back and forth to his parents' house, waking up. So slipping in and out of time. Yeah, the film is very deliberately making us go, this could be a dream, but also treating it very... Mundanely, in a good way.

Mel Killingsworth

It's not really a plot. It's one long emotional event.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. The mundanity, the reason why I raised that and what I really love about it is when we first see Harry go to his parents' house, they do acknowledge, they say, we didn't think you would come back. So this has already happened once before. And at certain points, they're like, we're not sure how this works. Like they're acknowledging, like he's older. Adam is older than his parents are when they're having this interaction right they're acknowledging you are our son you are older than us we died and this is somehow magical and we're just enjoying it for what it is, right they don't really go into the rules of it no and the.

Mel Killingsworth

Script at some point literally puts in brackets we don't need to know.

Chas Fisher

How like the script.

Mel Killingsworth

Acknowledges that there is a lot of.

Chas Fisher

This is.

Mel Killingsworth

A fantasy and we're not going to the rules of the.

Chas Fisher

World but but they I like that they acknowledge it and they don't understand it and they're just reaching for what it's giving to them agree.

Mel Killingsworth

Because they're also reaching for some.

Chas Fisher

Closure oh yeah everyone is they're.

Mel Killingsworth

Also reaching for how did we die and are you okay and how much did I fuck you up as a child spoiler a lot.

1:55:38 Rebuffing Harry sets up the positive arc

Chas Fisher

But But I'm just going to point out in your summary, you're missing two plot beats that to me are what make this a positive arc.

Mel Killingsworth

Which is- Yeah, because I have mine. So I'm curious to hear what yours are.

Chas Fisher

Harry, yeah, knocks on Adam's door and is basically like, do you want to fuck?

Mel Killingsworth

Oh, yeah.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. And Adam is like, nah, no, thanks. And then at the very end of the film, Adam learns that Harry then goes away and kills himself as a result of that moment.

Stu Willis

Do you think it's a suicide? I just interpreted it as...

Chas Fisher

Dies.

Stu Willis

Self-destruction.

Chas Fisher

After that being rebuffed by Adam.

Stu Willis

Yes.

Chas Fisher

So Adam refuses to be emotionally available for Harry and Harry dies as a consequence and Adam learns that, right?

Mel Killingsworth

But he only learns it after he's already become emotionally available in other ways, which is really crucial.

Chas Fisher

A hundred percent. So, he goes through this journey of learning how to be emotionally available in other ways so that when Harry is confronted with his own death, like, basically, the ghost of Harry sees his own body and, feels ashamed that no one has found him yet because it's days later, like, how was I this alone, right? And at that point, Adam is there for Harry. Adam doesn't just go, oh, this is all about me. I'm so fucking sad. I finally fell in love with a boy and now it turns out that he's a ghost of a dead person. Harry doesn't make it about him. He's only there for Harry as a result of the closure he's achieved through this magic realism connection with his parents. And that's why even though it's so devastatingly sad you are sad for harry you are sad for adam you are sad for his parents because this is coming off the back of that scene in the diner where they literally can't see each other anymore but they can just feel each other as they're fading away and it's just like oh, but I'm just going to read out what it says at the script at the end Adam grabs hold of Harry as he breaks into sobs letting out the pain he has stored for so long Adam knows that all that matters in this moment is that he eases Harry's pain. That is what love means. And I hadn't read the script. That is what I felt in that moment of the film.

From the film

Let's just go upstairs. No, no, no, no. I just need you to tell me, okay? I, can smell it. I can taste it in my throat. I don't, know. How come no one found me? It was my mum and my dad. I found you. No, but I don't want you to see me like that in there. You're not in there. You're not in there. You're not in there. You're here. You're, here. Right here.

Chas Fisher

And that's why I think even though it's so devastatingly sad, I feel it is a positive character arc because they basically, it's so clearly dramatized. One, at the beginning of the film, Adam is closing the door on Harry. At the end of the film, Harry, Adam is there for Harry no matter what.

Mel Killingsworth

There's two beats in the middle that I think, because, okay, we talked a little bit about how the dressmaker, when Teddy dies, that acts as a negative to her, like it's a punishment. I think that if all that there were were those two beats you could still say oh he's learned it too later he's only but there's two beats in between those two moments the first is that after they sleep together for the first time Harry kind of, is is clearly trying to ask please ask me to stay over and then Adam is kind of like I don't know and Harry's like oh nope that's okay that's you clearly he's like yeah you can you you can stay and Harry's like okay you don't want that it's Again, it's the, like, well, we fucked, but I can't take intimacy.

From the film

I'd like to see you again. Yeah, okay. I could stay the night if you... How about actually, better idea, not tonight. Yeah? No, no, I would like to see you again. You don't need to explain. Okay.

Mel Killingsworth

And then later, after they've slept together again, and then they've got clubbing, Adam asks, Harry doesn't broach it again. Adam asks, he comes forward and says, will you stay? And so instead of just saying, oh, you want emotional intimacy, I guess I'll give it to you, he actually is the first to offer it. And it's shown he's demonstrating that growth.

From the film

You want to stay on the night?

Mel Killingsworth

Like there are a couple other smaller moments through, but that those like are sort of four where it's really clear where he he pushes Harry away and then Harry offers like, oh, can I stay the night? He's kind of like, sure, I guess I don't really want you to. And he's like, actually, no, I want you to like this is still difficult. There's the moment in the bath as well, which is like really beautiful where he talks about part of it is because he was so scared of AIDS for so long because he's a bit older and he's got all these other experiences that Harry doesn't have. But part of it is simply because of the way he lost his parents and because of the way that he has shut himself off from the world. So you have these other moments of steps towards that final growth, which I think that last moment would be nowhere near as poignant if it were only the bookend and didn't have these other little markers in between.

Chas Fisher

Hmm. Yes, I agree.

2:02:15 Isolation to connectedness as the emotional throughline

Stu Willis

It's similar to you, Chas. I'm just picking out the fact that it's a, to me, it's an emotional tension. The emotional event is his journey from isolation to connectedness, right? The opening of the film, even before he closes the door, is him, is Adam isolated in his apartment. And they kind of, as someone who's lived in apartment blocks before, they kind of do this interesting job of making the apartment feel really lonely. Like, you don't know if anyone else lives there or not.

Chas Fisher

I think they actually talk about it. They talk about how it's not full. Like, life hasn't come to it yet.

Mel Killingsworth

It's brand new and they've just, they bought it off the plan and they hope it'll fill up soon and that people will buy it. Like, buy other apartments.

From the film

Do you like living here? I think I like it more when people move in. If people move in. You got friends nearby? No, not really. Do you? No, not really.

Stu Willis

Yeah. So I think that is part of the picking up the positiveness is that sense of this movement towards intimacy, right? This movement towards connectedness. And we feel that he lacks something in his life and we're conscious of it, even if he's not, which is the lack that is going to be fulfilled is his isolation. And somehow, even though it's awful that he finds that Harry died, it feels positive. And I think maybe it's awful to say, but by him realizing that Harry died unisolated, we kind of feel like he's going to make a choice to reconnect with the world, maybe.

Mel Killingsworth

I think it's saying he has made that choice. He's the one who says, let's go out. I want to go clubbing again. I want to feel these things. And yes, he does those with Harry. But he has already started to reconnect with the world. And I think with it, the film, it does seem to suggest that he will continue to do that. Even now that he's had this devastating thing happen, that he still does realize the benefits of getting closure from the experience with his parents. But also what he learned from Harry is that he cannot... Continue to completely shut himself off from relationships because of fear.

Chas Fisher

I just, the level of giving that he has, and the fact that the script says, that's what love is, is what I felt, right? Like, Adam, at the beginning of the film, if he knew, if he'd been told, you're going to fall in love with a boy, and it's going to turn out that boy was dead, he's going to be like, well, that's so fucking typical, isn't it? You know, that's what I deserve. He would have made it all about him and all about his life. And he can just, at the end of this movie, just be there, no matter how sad it is for him, no matter how sad it will be for him when Harry finally vanishes. Because, you know, Harry's asked, how long will this last? And Adam responds, I can't answer that. I suppose we don't get to decide when it's over. For now why don't I just hold you a bit longer fuck me sorry. And then in the big print it says Harry turns over and lets Adam hold him from behind the same position Harry was in downstairs but now he's no longer by himself and I'm just going to skip ahead to the final page where I didn't get this from the drifting away into the stars moment but the way it's described on the page gives me the emotional feeling that I have having watched the film so it says as the music soars we pull away from them it seems like they're almost dancing swaying together but how long we won't ever know further and further we come out of the room spiraling into the night Adam and Harry fall away as we rise into the stars finally as the music crescendos Adam and Harry are no no more than a glint in the dark sky and this is the bit that I didn't understand from the movie but the feeling it gives me from reading it is incredibly powerful. It's its own line. It's five words, a guide, not a warning. And then a quote, make love your goal. Anyway, sorry.

Stu Willis

No.

Mel Killingsworth

I mean, the movie is incredibly impactful, but also the fact that somebody who has been through... A something as globally horrifying and devastating as the AIDS crisis, where it was like, you cannot be touched to love someone is a death sentence on multiple levels. It was illegal, and it was very unknown what it would do to you. And they weren't planning on studying. They weren't planning on doing it. They put you in a hospital room and like you were lucky if some of the nurses would come in and touch you for like medical purposes and can come out with a statement like that is, it's wild.

2:07:24 Contrasting coming out scenes with mom and dad

Chas Fisher

Should we talk about the two, I guess, coming out scenes? I feel like he more comes out to his mom than to his dad. Like with his dad, he's talking more about their relationship.

Mel Killingsworth

He comes out to his mom and lets his mom come out to his dad for him.

Chas Fisher

And then his dad does the which is.

Mel Killingsworth

Exactly what you know some people I know have done.

Chas Fisher

But the the contrast between those two scenes is what I really appreciated is, I think in the mom scene she does react as a person from her time would react she was just struggling to come to terms with it whereas he was saying like it's super normal now like you don't have to worry about me and, like that was interesting for me in a way that the scene that he has where he's coming back to his dad and they're talking about their relationship and how distant they might have been the dad is suddenly opening up to him.

From the film

Sorry I never came in your room when you were crying oh really it's okay that's not good I really it's not dad dad I get it was so long it was so long stop.

Chas Fisher

And I kind of understood it, that his dad might talk differently to an adult man than he would talk to his son. But it did feel like the dad was coming from a more evolved place and time than his character was, in a contrast between those two scenes.

Mel Killingsworth

So that's really interesting, because what I felt was that his mother was being honest and his father was being dishonest. Because his father knew that what he thought and felt about it was much worse than his mother. And so he needed to cover it up and he needed to soft pedal it. And he knew that his son knew that he was the school bully and that he did bully his own child and that he did. Ignore him crying because he didn't want to have to like he didn't want his son to say to him by the way I'm gay because he would have not done well and so he's he's lying he's soft but like hoping for absolution but absolutely.

Chas Fisher

Like what I'm saying is like the mom is in her place in time whereas the dad if he was still in that place like this is literally just happening with his son of his age like the day the day before he would be like well I'm doing this for your own good right rather than soft pedaling and looking for absolution.

Mel Killingsworth

Sure and that's where it's that weird thing of yes but they they both know that it has been 30 years.

Chas Fisher

Like it is a very.

Mel Killingsworth

Strange you know setup yeah.

Chas Fisher

Yeah yeah and and this is where you know Stu will quote back to me that's not how time travel works, they can do whatever they want and the scene is incredibly moving and affecting but I just remember going like, not sure that I'd buy the dad in this moment and and maybe it's because this leans into the sort of fever dream of it maybe it's the conversation that Adam needs to have with his dad that it's Adam's creation because.

Mel Killingsworth

Adam does manage to confront his dad about two things that have been bothering.

Chas Fisher

Him his entire life and that's.

Mel Killingsworth

That's huge for him and we never want to admit that our parents have been monsters especially after they've died. And, you know, what else are you supposed to do with that? You know, can you admit that his dad would have beat him back in blue and bullied him and still say that, well, but he loved me and what are you going to do about it? He's dead. So it's really complicated.

Stu Willis

Emotionally it's super complicated right and thematically and yet it it does it's built on what is a really simple character arc but we have to, you know we've kind of touched on all these moments that allow him to open up you know the ketamine sequence we've talked about he's coming out so they're specific beats that allow him to go on that journey, what is the what do you think is the low point.

2:11:26 The low point as emotional violence not distance

Mel Killingsworth

It starts at the low point.

Chas Fisher

I do think it's when it's the scene that feels the most emotionally violent so Adam has had these two scenes with his parents he's reconnected with Harry uh well it formed not reconnected he's formed an emotional deep connection with Harry, and he's like Harry, you've got to come and meet my parents.

Stu Willis

Mm. Yep. That's it. Yep.

Chas Fisher

And he drags them to the house and they, the house is like, they're, they're knocking on the windows, they're trying to get in, they can't. And they can just see the parents kind of sort of through the, the, the windows.

From the film

Where are they? Where are they?

Chas Fisher

And then that does resolve. They get to both talk about it, right? Like Harry gets to talk about his impression of Adam's parents having seen them. And the parents get to talk to Adam in their final scene about, hey, he looked handsome. You know, you should go for it. You should embrace life.

From the film

You promised me that you're going to try with this Harry boy. Yeah. I'd have liked him. I know it. You might need a bit of taking care of might you he's got such a sad face, do you hear me yeah yeah I hear you.

Stu Willis

Yeah you're right it's it's a powerful scene and it's interesting this idea maybe I'm just connecting like the low point at that he's seemingly coming together closer to his parents He's growing in intimacy and it's the low point because that is suddenly reversed. The emotional event is now the opposite, that they're further away, that he can't bring Harry into that. So, yeah, kind of thinking of a film like this that's so constructed over the emotional journey, thinking of the low point as, yeah, emotional violence. Wow, that's a good term.

Chas Fisher

It's almost like John Dunn.

Stu Willis

To come back to Mel's question, and we'll do a separate recording going into, like, The Dressmaker and stuff. Theme, right? I mean, I think the theme for this is just about connectedness and love. The quote about love and, you know, not being afraid to love people. And even possibly like connectedness.

Chas Fisher

But I think it has a deep conversation on what love is as well.

Mel Killingsworth

I think it's applicable to anyone who's ever been in love, right? But I think that it really does delve into the specificity of queer love in a way that when, again, when society has, been the one to put all of these incredible limitations, that it does take a very different type of bravery to do that publicly, but also to do that privately. Like Adam is so emotionally unavailable and so isolated, not just because he can't love people, but because he is queer and because his parents were not OK with that. And because he wasn't allowed to get married and because AIDS, he grew up in this generation where he was just sort of too young and just sort of figuring out his sexuality while all you saw were gay men specifically dying. And so it is that idea of like, yes, it is love and it's difficult to love, but specifically it is much more difficult for a certain subset of people and that only means that you should embrace it harder. paradoxically. But I do think the movie is very clear that it is hard.

Chas Fisher

Oh, yeah.

Mel Killingsworth

Like, it is fucking difficult.

Chas Fisher

It's not shying away. Yeah. I also appreciate how much Adam regresses. Like, he's still an adult. He's still older than them. He still had all his life journeys. But you know how, like, all of us, when we go home and we're with our families, we, like, regress to our teenage selves. And, you know, like, I thought I was better than this. But no, I'm not. And the fact that he wants to climb into his parents' bed and sleep with them. The fact that when they say, like they're the ones who's like, we think this needs to end because we're kind of holding you back and that we need to usher you out into life. And he's like, you know, it's not been enough. And they're like, how much would ever be enough? You know? Yeah.

Mel Killingsworth

And they take him to a place that was his favorite as a child and you see him like, He orders the family meal and then all the food. The way that this film deals with food as well is really fascinating. It's fascinating on the fantasy slash ghost level, but it's also really beautiful in terms of intimacy. We see Harry cooking for Adam is one of the first things that he does after, Adam asks him to stay over. It's this intimate thing. And he can't share, they talk a lot about the family, about like what their favorite food is. His mother's like making him tea when he comes out and they are unable to eat together as the, because you know, that, that last scene, it's so powerful that they cannot do that thing together that they used to do as a family.

From the film

I'm gonna get the family special, please. It's a lot of food. That's okay. ``` I'm really very hungry. No, me neither.

Mel Killingsworth

I lost the thread of whatever I was going to say because I just got emotional about the whole thing. But, yeah, what an emotional arc. Oh, God.

Stu Willis

I mean, I think that is part of the journey, the letting go of the parents. We can hear it all.

Mel Killingsworth

That's what it was.

Stu Willis

This is completely built around. This film is built around the arc this character needs to go through. This is not an imposition. This is someone who is struggling to connect.

Mel Killingsworth

Kind of arc or die, really.

Stu Willis

Well, yeah. Yeah, I mean, in some ways, Harry's a warning.

Chas Fisher

For a film that deliberately feels dreamlike, each scene must happen in the order in which it happens for Adam to have his journey. Like, each one builds on the other emotionally. It could not he wouldn't have been able to go clubbing had he not had dinner with his parents the night before.

Mel Killingsworth

That's why he says I want to go out yeah yeah.

Chas Fisher

You know like the so as much as it feels like a fever dream feels like, you know I've heard of some people who are not big fans of the master say like it feels like a movie where the scenes could happen in any order right like it's It's a whole lot of feelings and scenes where they're not like necessarily cause and effect. Whereas this is designed to feel like... Dream-like but is very tightly structured around that character journey to in.

2:18:48 Dream logic and touch as physical arc tracking

Stu Willis

Turn explore these themes sorry I'm just now thinking of like the dream logic of the moment coming back to when he climbs into his parents bed and the camera cranes in as he rolls over to talk to his mom and then a hand caresses him from his dad's side and he rolls over and starts kissing but it's, Harry not his dad and then he flips back and his mom's gone these are very simple in-camera, techniques but it's kind of got that dream logic of you just roll with where you're going and I think it kind of gets more and more dreamy slash spooky as the film, progresses the same with him banging on the the windows the low point that you identify definitely feels like ghost movie logic right but also horror logic like like nightmare logic where I want to get inside to my my parents but I can't but, as someone who still has their night as still has night terrors in their 40s but, the the kind of dream that I would have it's.

Chas Fisher

The low point because he wants to bring these two relationships together he wants to bring the relationship he's building with his parents and the relationship he's building with Harry together and he can't.

Mel Killingsworth

And there's so there's so many little moments and the script calls a lot of them out there's so many little moments that really like, overlap Harry and his parents in straight like where they touch him on the chest and where they, have the thing that he does with his fingers like when he gets really nervous and then he does that and then Harry picks up on it and there's a mark that where he gets a, he it's weird because again with that dream like logic like after he's sort of stuck in the ring, his mom touches him on the chest that when he comes back to his place it looks like it's kind of burned and then the script calls out that it's also where exactly where Harry then touches him and then the marks are gone, and it's like and again with the overlap where you see Jamie Bell as his father in bed and then, they he has this long conversation in an unbroken take so when this hand comes in to touch him it feels you're like well this is strange and then he rolls over it's it's like literally Harry has taken the place of his father um and and there's all of that so like they're they're literalizing how how Harry is certainly replacing things that he is missing from his parents.

Stu Willis

I think at this point we just waxing lyrical about how good the film is I.

Mel Killingsworth

Mean yeah but I I think that is important in an arc because he was stymied when his parents died like he is emotionally arrested his development was arrested and then Harry comes along and is able to bring some of that like help him come of age if you will, by by helping urge on some things that he lost when his parents were gone.

★ Key idea · Isolation To Connectedness As Emotional Throughline

Stu Willis

So I think in terms of contrast and affinity, what we're talking about, there's a contrast in infinity with his relationship to physical touch that's expressed through the film. Like it literally goes through him being isolated to him, not just being cuddled, but him cuddling Harry. And the relationship between Harry, it's sex, but he talks about like, you know, we've talked about it. They fuck or whatever, but it's not as physically intimate as these kinds of little moments after. So there's a really nice bit of contrast in infinity there. And oddly, I'm just going to go into two weird directions. I actually think one of the things that stand by me of all the films I'm thinking of now has is how tactile the relationship between the boys are. And I think that's why that film feels really powerful because friendships are tactile. And I think in this age of kind of like two shot, two shot, like over the shoulder, over the shoulder, talking conversations, we don't do physical touch as much between characters. And I think that's the other thing that was good about Talk to Me. Obviously, we did an episode where I kind of trash talked the ending, but they're actually really tactile in their relationships. And it's just interesting that this uses that to track an arc. I think.

Mel Killingsworth

What was the second? Oh, you're saying Talk to Me is the second one?

Stu Willis

Yeah. I mean, I don't think it's using touch as an arc, but I just think about how they use touch to build relationships. And this film is touching on that.

2:23:20 Key Learnings & Wrap Up

Chas Fisher

So, team, what are your key learnings from having a look at these three films?

★ Key idea · Goal Must Connect To Character Arc

Stu Willis

I think the key learning will be the relationship of the goal and the arc will have an impact on the emotional impact of the ending. That only came out through your revelation. I think Widows kind of hits really hard emotionally. I think it's more emotional than Barbie because that is aligned. All of Us Strangers is not a plot-driven film, but all the actual plotting, all the events that actually happen are absolutely connected to what Adam needs to do to understand. And I do actually, I mean, it's clearly an incredibly emotional film, but I do think that is why it is the most, I think that's why both of those films have more emotional impact on me than Barbie, which at the time I cried, but I don't recollect or reminisce on moments on Barbie and find myself crying. Whereas I'm sure, like with Arrival, there'll be moments where I'm just going to be thinking of All of Us Strangers, or even Widows, oddly, and be like, have a little week.

Chas Fisher

Mel?

★ Key idea · Repeating Beats Shows Gradual Arc

Mel Killingsworth

I think the big learning is like when we're talking about positive character arcs, that if you are going to if you can repeat events or beats from different angles, that helps demonstrate positive change. And that's like, again, we talked about it in All of Us Strangers, where you have a similar beat, but a different outcome with Harry. You have almost five of the same sort of beats where Adam completely rejects him. And then Adam's like, but he doesn't really mean it. And then I was like, actually, okay, if you want to touch me in the bath. And then he's like, actually, no, I want you to stay. And then at the end, he embraces him. Like, very similar beats or events from different angles. And that demonstrates the positive arc. But we also got it in Widows with Alice, right? The slapping. Like, that is something that is repeated. And every time there's an incremental change. And then by the end, she's standing on her own two feet. Like, that is, like, you're repeating. And in Widows, it actually comes from three different characters in three very different ways, but it is the same sort of event. And that when you see her response to it change, that is what demonstrates her arc, right? So, like, I think that's a great rule of thumb.

Stu Willis

Because it's also showing gradual change.

Mel Killingsworth

Yes, exactly.

Stu Willis

So, it doesn't come out seemingly where, unlike with Barbie, where it's resist, resist, resist, resist, resist. Oh, okay.

Chas Fisher

Embrace, sort of.

Stu Willis

Embrace.

Chas Fisher

Overcome fear.

Mel Killingsworth

That's because I think we see it with Gloria. so if you're gonna but you know that that's a different argument also the doll but yes correct it is I think maybe that's where Chas is sticking on his positive arc whereas the other two it's very obvious because it's incremental with with Adam if you only got the that first beat with Harry and the last bit you're like where is that this comes out of nowhere what, but you have the the multiple in the middle that show that that gradual change yeah.

2:26:20 Additive versus subtractive rewards in character arcs

★ Key idea · Additive vs Subtractive Rewards Shape Feeling

Chas Fisher

And Widows it gets away well That's the wrong phrasing. It feels emotional throughout because they're doing this emotional handoff between the characters. They can have Veronica being very cold, being very distant, being very controlling, not really revealing the lie that she's living in until quite late in the movie, not having her confront that. And then even when she's killed Harry, the film suggests she could still go on living alone and being cold. And it's only then at the end that she takes this final jump. They only get away with that because they're doing Alice and Linda earlier. As well as all the other characters. Like it's very cleverly pacing out the emotional arcs of these characters. My big thing is to, I do think Emma has suddenly had the biggest impact on this character journey thing about the additive and subtractive rewards, I think. Yeah.

Stu Willis

On which we didn't even touch on with All of Us Strangers, but the subtractive reward is he no longer gets ghost parents.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Mel Killingsworth

Is that a reward?

Chas Fisher

Continue it's taken away from him but the additive reward is he gets to be there for Harry right he's going to lose Harry he's going to the way that he lost his parents but the film is but what he gains is the ability to be there.

Mel Killingsworth

For Harry well I think that that is a different type of art, what he really misses was his inability to be there for his mother when she was dying in the hospital because she didn't die for a couple days off the train accident and he said his, aunt was too worried that he he couldn't see her and he feels which he shouldn't a he was a child that it was not his responsibility or ability but he feels guilty that he was not able to be there for his mother when she was dying, and with harry he feels like he's able to rectify that in some way um and so that is a positive reward in some ways like because of his growth he's able to heal that wound of his childhood self.

Chas Fisher

I mean, we feel so sad for everything that's being taken away from Adam. He's regained his parents only for them to be taken away. He's found love with Harry only for it to be taken away, right? That is subtractive. But I think in the end it feels positive because the internal value change is he has gained. He hasn't lost anything internally through value change as a result of these interactions with either Harry or his parents.

Mel Killingsworth

No, if we really wanted to be pedantic about it, we could say he hasn't lost Harry because he never actually knew Harry. He saw Harry for, you know, 80 seconds in the doorway and was like, yeah, I don't actually want to bang tonight. But, you know, I say that is emotional cope.

Chas Fisher

I do for. Yeah. All right. Thank you. Look, I think when we get to negative, we will see these as in contrast. I think this tool, I'm going to really think about how, you know, I'm going into my own work, you know, Stu, you were talking about looking back for the next draft of this project that I'm working on. And I will look through these journeys, not just about the relationship questions, where the characters are going from and to, but also how the world is giving and taking away from them, both externally, right? Are they gaining money or not gaining money, but also the internal value changes that's seen as additive or subtractive. That's my main thing.

2:29:58 Patreon shoutouts and next episode preview

Stu Willis

All right. So, in some ways, we've talked a little bit about Jay Schubert's – Jay Schubert, I'm sorry. Schubert.

Mel Killingsworth

Schubert.

Stu Willis

Some ways, we spoke a little bit of Jay Schubert, and I'm just butchering everyone's names. Malay's questions. We're going to listen to them in full because we are going to answer them on our Patreon as an audio recording, unedited. Probably will be out before this episode. And speaking of our patrons, many thanks to Lily, Alexandre, and Natalie, Malay, Jay Schubert, Thomas, Paulo, Jesse, who we had a beer with at MIF. Great to meet you, Jesse. Sandra, who, well, I mean, that's my mum, which I have not seen more recently than Jesse. And Krob, who we have not seen, but in a long time, Krob.

Chas Fisher

But we got to hang out with his sister and his wife.

Stu Willis

So, you know, you two can also get name checked like this if you sign up to our patronage.

Chas Fisher

And choose our homework.

Stu Willis

Choose our homework. Speaking of, our next episode is going to be on negative character arcs. We'll send a list around. Former patron Julian complained that we don't have a book club and tell him what he needs to watch. So, if you're on the patron, we're going to start trying to do that. This is what we've voted on. This is what we're actually going to do as your homework. Possibly find the scripts. Mel loves reading the scripts, even if we don't go into detail about the words on the page.

Mel Killingsworth

We are a script writing podcast.

Stu Willis

Yeah. And we're trying to do a better job of that, of like posting that stuff that we find.

Chas Fisher

Thank you to you three for another epic recording. God knows if we'll end up breaking it into segments or not. And thank you, amazing listeners. I hope you all feel like arguing with either Stu or myself about anything on this episode or anything in general. And you can find many ways of getting in touch with us at our website at draft-zero.com. At the website, you'll also find the show notes for this and all our other episodes, as well as links to support us and spread the word for free via a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. Very important for spreading the word. Or if you think that what we do here is worth a dollar or preferably more than a dollar, then you can also find links to our Patreon page to support us getting these episodes to you quicker. Thanks. And thanks for listening. ```

↑

0:00 Cold Open #

0:21 Positive Character Arcs #

4:47 Relationship questions as the key to dramatizing arcs #

9:00 Followup Questions #

12:12 Zero Context Insights #

13:01 BARBIE #

17:16 The void scene with Barbie's creator #

23:13 Immortality versus death as the real choice #

27:02 Debating the lie the character believes #

44:26 Gain versus loss framing the ending #

52:34 Contrast and affinity #

59:47 WIDOWS #

1:05:47 Establishing character patterns before the heist begins #

1:09:37 Do the widows have values before the story starts #

1:18:42 Skills and goals tightly tied to character growth #

1:21:04 Alice's escalating value shift through the sugar daddy scene #

1:25:04 Linda's grief scene and steadfast versus positive arcs #

1:27:12 Veronica's arc through Harry's betrayal and revenge #

1:39:33 Comparing ensemble arcs to OCEAN'S ELEVEN and THE TOWN #

1:46:46 Relationship questions as emotional engine of ensemble films #

1:49:36 ALL OF US STRANGERS #

1:55:38 Rebuffing Harry sets up the positive arc #

2:02:15 Isolation to connectedness as the emotional throughline #

2:07:24 Contrasting coming out scenes with mom and dad #

2:11:26 The low point as emotional violence not distance #

2:18:48 Dream logic and touch as physical arc tracking #

2:23:20 Key Learnings & Wrap Up #

2:26:20 Additive versus subtractive rewards in character arcs #

2:29:58 Patreon shoutouts and next episode preview #

0:00 Cold Open

0:21 Positive Character Arcs

4:47 Relationship questions as the key to dramatizing arcs

9:00 Followup Questions

12:12 Zero Context Insights

13:01 BARBIE

17:16 The void scene with Barbie's creator

23:13 Immortality versus death as the real choice

27:02 Debating the lie the character believes

44:26 Gain versus loss framing the ending

52:34 Contrast and affinity

59:47 WIDOWS

1:05:47 Establishing character patterns before the heist begins

1:09:37 Do the widows have values before the story starts

1:18:42 Skills and goals tightly tied to character growth

1:21:04 Alice's escalating value shift through the sugar daddy scene

1:25:04 Linda's grief scene and steadfast versus positive arcs

1:27:12 Veronica's arc through Harry's betrayal and revenge

1:39:33 Comparing ensemble arcs to OCEAN'S ELEVEN and THE TOWN

1:46:46 Relationship questions as emotional engine of ensemble films

1:49:36 ALL OF US STRANGERS

1:55:38 Rebuffing Harry sets up the positive arc

2:02:15 Isolation to connectedness as the emotional throughline

2:07:24 Contrasting coming out scenes with mom and dad

2:11:26 The low point as emotional violence not distance

2:18:48 Dream logic and touch as physical arc tracking

2:23:20 Key Learnings & Wrap Up

2:26:20 Additive versus subtractive rewards in character arcs

2:29:58 Patreon shoutouts and next episode preview