As Richard Lawson writes in his review of Aaron Sorkin’s new courtroom drama The Trial of the Chicago 7, “In such a talky piece, full of ideology and exposition, the right company of actors is required.” The film, which drops on Netflix this Friday, is something like an actors showcase times 10, offering virtually every single member of its massive ensemble a moment to shine—or, more often than not in this film structured around courtroom speechifying, a monologue all their own.
It’s an extremely satisfying ensemble effort to watch—but if your mind is already on the topic of Oscars, it presents a puzzle. How do you pick a single actor to push for an acting Oscar campaign? How do you prevent several of them from being nominated against each other in the supporting actor category, and cannibalizing their own votes? And if you’re Netflix—which is releasing multiple Oscar contenders at a time when so many major studios have essentially taken the year off—it’s a valid concern: what happens if every single nominee in a given category comes from a movie you released?
On this week’s Little Gold Men podcast, Lawson, Katey Rich, and Joanna Robinson ask all these big Oscar questions, and dig into why The Trial of the Chicago 7—a story steeped in the Boomer era— eels so bracing and relevant today. They also discuss a wide range of new films, all of them available to watch at home now. Shithouse, this year’s SXSW Grand Jury Prize winner, is a talky college-set romance that, as Richard writes in his review, “is one of the most charming movies of the season, even though it has the worst title of the year.” Also on Netflix, Dick Johnson Is Dead—a major Sundance hit–is director Kirsten Johnson’s cinematic effort to cope with her father’s mental decline and inevitable death, a movie that is both more cheerful than that sounds, and a clear-eyed look at mortality that is rare to see on screen.
Another documentary, Alex Gibney’s Totally Under Control, is a clear-eyed look at something very different: the coronavirus pandemic, and how the Trump administration mishandled it. (It’s now on Hulu.) And finally, there are two filmed versions of recent Broadway hits: David Byrne’s American Utopia, directed by Spike Lee and now on HBO, and What the Constitution Means to Me, directed by Marielle Heller and now on Amazon Prime. With the recent Tony Awards announcement, it’s a great time to think about Broadway, which will remain shut down until next June at the earliest. If you miss the experience of watching something with a crowd, either of those films will recapture that experience.
The episode ends with a conversation with Randi Emmerman and Carol Marshall, co-founders of Film Fest 919 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Like so many other film festival programmers this year, they weren’t sure if this year’s event would even happen. But starting this weekend, they’re presenting local audiences with films like One Night in Miami and MLK/FBI after some creative problem-solving. They custom-built two outdoor venues in Chapel Hill, in addition to the newly reopened theater where the festival usually takes place. It’s not the usual festival experience, but it’s a safe way to return to the communal moviegoing experience many people have lost in recent months. “People long for movies,” Marshall said. “It’s comforting. It’s an opportunity to step out of your reality. So, I don’t think they’re going to go away by any means. It’ll take a while to recover though.”
Listen to this week’s episode above, and find Little Gold Men on Apple Podcasts or anywhere else you get your podcasts.
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