9. MAY DECEMBER, or how many hot dogs do you really need?
Chatting about the new Todd Haynes film on Netflix.
9 Oct 2023
8. A.I. ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE and the heterosexuality of the future
We're back.
24 May 2021
7. THE DISCIPLE (it's on Netflix!), Unsustainable Passions, and the Mentor's Body
(0:00) The Watching Film podcast has a theme song!
(8:29) Radiohead as a phase of early life
(10:50) RED ALERT (is Manohla Dargis a Trekkie?!!)
(13:50) "Your ego must die to hear the sounds you can't yet play or play again."
(18:30) How THE DISCIPLE reminds us of hot streaks in the NBA (i.e. Lou Dort and Jeremy Lin)
(39:15) “To want a guru is just a search for someone to disembody.”
(41:10) How the fact of the teacher's body enters the experience of learning in different models of universities
(1:11:00) The categorical difference between a film and a movie (spoiler: one of them stars Tom Hanks)
11 Apr 2021
6. MINARI, aka Asians in the Outfield (feat. Anna B. Gatdula)
(1:00) Anna finally gets the WATCHING FILM shout-out she deserves ... from herself
(3:16) MINARI wins the Golden Globe for "Best Movie That Involves Reading"
(7:12) The movie's gender dynamics, both chicken and human
(14:33) Anna's backstory, in which Y2K panic plays a prominent role
(24:45) The trope of worried parents and zany grandparents
(29:07) Movies about children's experiences have to negotiate between what a child can't know about their world and what the adult film viewer necessarily knows
(45:20) On the film's depiction of rural Southern Pentecostalism: "If Asianness isn't going to be the other category in this film, there has to be another category that everyone can understand as exotic"
(53:33) Reproduction in this family happens through the son, not the daughter
(57:42) What it would mean to see yourself in the movies as a minoritized subject
(1:06:09) Sean Baker's THE FLORIDA PROJECT as a version of MINARI that takes risks
(1:10:54) The different vibes of American Asian films and Korean Asian films (both involving Steve Yeun)
(1:15:32) A trifecta of haikus
28 Feb 2021
5. What Disney-Pixar's SOUL Ends Up Saying About Race
TT and Dan talk about Disney & Pixar's newest movie, SOUL (2020), and what it says about race (often without seeming to be aware that it's saying anything). They also talk about the evolution of Pixar and what's changed about the fantasies in its movies.
(0:00) TT attempts to tell Dan a joke
(2:28) Our affective check-ins w/ one another, 12 months into the pandemic
(17:30) TT's haiku: "If a Black man fell / without a white soul inside, / would it make a sound?"
(22:23) Strange moments in SOUL that seem obviously to be about race, except the movie doesn't seem to realize it
(37:50) How to think about the film's message that Black death is not permanent
(40:00) SOUL is a remake of TITANIC (shout-out to Žižek)
(52:18) Dan really wants to talk to TT about flowy aesthetics
(1:03:00) Dan's haiku: "SOUL is made / for kids. But too bad there are / no kids left."
(1:05:40) The increasing preachiness of Pixar since WALL-E
(1:11:20) In TOY STORY, the toys' separate existence from the child is a metaphor for the child's parents
10 Feb 2021
4. The Utah Spectacular (PART 2) | TT's Lessons Learned from Sundance, from '90s NBA Basketball & from Academia
Note: This podcast is not sponsored by the Utah Tourism Board
(9:15) What TT learned from standing in lines at the Sundance Film Festival
(11:50) On Napoleon Dynamite & Mormon fashion
(33:10) "For our academic, non-basketball-viewing listeners, Michael Jordan of the Chicago Bulls was like the Jacques Derrida of the NBA. Undefeated."
(36:30) Steph Curry & the dilemma of whether or not to play "hero ball"
(49:00) The problem w/ learning about basketball from NBA highlight reels: "They only show you the makes, not the misses."
(55:00) Local Cleveland man, circa 2016: "First the Republican National Convention & now the Cavaliers! Things are really looking up for Cleveland!"
(1:17:00) Dan + TT ask: Who are the worst teams in the East & West that could still make it to the Championships this year?
(1:20:00) What it takes to win a Championship & what it takes to finish writing a dissertation
2 Feb 2021
3. The Utah Spectacular (PART 1) | EL PLANETA at the Sundance Film Festival
TT + Dan go to Sundance (virtually) & toast the Utah Jazz's #1 spot in the Western conference. We talk about our love for Amalia Ulman's EL PLANETA (our festival discovery of the weekend). Plus, how the NBA is like academia.
(5:15) Being at your peak as a basketball player and as a writer
(10:06) What it means when Steph Curry puts a towel on his head
(12:44) The particular style of movies that premiere at Sundance
(18:42) The difference between quirky, cute, and zany
(22:50) The plot of EL PLANETA from the Sundance catalogue (we’re not going to Cavell-patchwork it this time)
(24:18) “A divine peace falls when the only unknown is the question of when”
(26:03) A poem that TT wrote about Zara (the clothing brand) and the movie
(28:03) The class-blurring quality of animal prints
(37:40) “Part of the tragedy of EL PLANETA is that these characters haven’t realized yet what kind of movie they’re in”
(46:04) “How many feminists does it take to change a lightbulb?”
(1:00:13) On the inherently melodramatic nature of beach scenes, and how this movie’s beach scene isn’t one
(1:04:25) Ending a movie ambivalently vs. ending a movie with a specific move
(1:16:03) On how FRANCES HA (2012) is the super-American, privatized version of EL PLANETA
28 Jan 2021
2. TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH (Kurosawa, 2019) and the magic of the travelogue film
(0:45) Background on Kurosawa Kiyoshi and the role of his movies on the arthouse/festival marketplace
(6:50) "Let's Cavell-patchwork it!" (a reference we will not go on to explain)
(24:20) TT: "You'll edit this part out, I hope." Dan: "Sure."
(31:30) On the importance of privilege and wholesomeness as specifically Japanese projections
(43:00) "Give me something as bled of local specificity as possible, please."
(44:00) On TT's Greyhound trip across the U.S. & the comforting bare minimum of sameness that is McDonald's food
(52:00) The intrusion of the Musical genre into the film, and question of sincerity vs. irony
(56:20) "The tourist camera is not about memory, it's about control." On the powerlessness of the tourist experience vs. the capitalist framing of tourism as empowering.
(1:06:10) "This might be racist, but she looks really Asian for a white woman"
(1:20:00) Which NBA player would Kurosawa Kiyoshi be? Who on the surface is chasing control and the perfect image but actually is at their best when they let their defenses down? (spoiler: it's Kevin Durant)
TT and Dan talk about their basketball origins. Then they talk about Christmas horror movies BLACK CHRISTMAS (1974) and RELIC (2019), and what's horrific about the holiday.
(1:35) Dan’s basketball origin story
(10:23) TT’s basketball origin story
(22:18) Comparing our training in watching movies
(38:40) Natalie James's RELIC (2019)
(1:13:07) Contemplating podcast ending strategies
28 Dec 2020
0. Christmas movies + Are all happy basketball teams alike?
The "dry run" episode. TT and Dan talk about families and what we learn about them from Christmas movies and NBA teams.
(1:45) How Asian is this podcast?
(3:55) TT’s favorite Christmas specials
(4:54) Is it more embarrassing to have a therapist or a life coach?
(6:40) What we feel comfortable talking about on this podcast
(9:11) DR. SEUSS' THE GRINCH MUSICAL LIVE! (2020) and “heart” under capitalism
(15:10) JINGLE ALL THE WAY as a nativity parable of the deferred father
(31:18) Are all happy basketball teams happy for the same reasons?
(35:14) Affective check-in
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