After The Big Short won last weekend’s PGA Daryl F. Zanuck award I had the following exchange with a director friend who’s been a Big Short praiser from the get-go:
Director friend: “Do you still think I steered you wrong?”
HE: “The Big Short is a good film but calm down.”
Director friend: “Bubba, you don’t get off that easy. After your initial viewing of The Big Short you shamed me, ridiculed me, questioned my Oscar predicting manhood. I told you it was a contender and I was banished to the Elba of your mind for saying so. On the other hand, when I told you to calm down about Truth, I was ridiculed the other way. You said it was on the level of All The President’s Men.”
HE: “Truth and All The President’s Men are analagous. One is a success story, the other is about failure. Truth is a complex tale of a journalistic disaster that is ironically compounded by the fact that the reporters, despite their failure to fully vet the Killian documents, were reporting the truth about George Bush‘s record in the National Guard. They were right but they got taken down anyway when the Karl Rove brigade went after the report and CBS corporates felt they had no choice but to wash their hands.
“Yes, I found The Big Short too dense and wonky after the first viewing, but I warmed up to it with a second viewing, and now I’d actually like to see it a third time with a friend.”
I wrote the director friend this morning after Spotlight won the SAG ensemble award, which of course meant a loss for The Big Short, which had been favored to win by certain blogaroonies (Sasha Stone, Kris Tapley, Glenn Whipp).
HE: “Like I said last weekend, ‘calm down.'”
Director friend: “Dude, just because The Big Short didn’t win an ensemble award doesn’t mean it’s not a player. I told you it was going to be in the mix. You told me that I was wrong and that I misled you. Do you still think that?”