May 30, 2022
If Beale Street Could Talk / Cutty Sark
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Bob rounds out his Season Five list of movies with Barry Jenkins' 2018 masterpiece If Beale Street Could Talk. Unfairly swallowed up during the awards season, this film ultimately flew under the radar. The guys discuss scene-stealing performances from Stephan James and Colman Domingo, in addition to Regina King's Oscar-winning role.
Meanwhile, our hosts sip on Cutty Sark, that ubiquitous blended scotch. At only around $15 a bottle, what should they be expecting in terms of quality?
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Transcript
Brad
In 2018, director Barry Jenkins and star Kiki Layne gave the world a mournful look into the black experience of New York in the 1970s.
Bob
In 2022, we take one more trip to Scotland for old times' sake.
The movie is If Beale Street Could Talk.
The whiskey is Cutty Sark.
Brad
And we'll review them both.
This is...
The Film and Whiskey Podcast!
Bob
Welcome to the Film and Whiskey Podcast, where each week we review a classic movie and a glass of whiskey.
I'm Bob Book.
I'm Brad Gee.
And this week we are looking at the 2018 film If Beale Street Could Talk.
Brad, this is the last pick of my list for the season.
I'm kind of glad we held off on it until now because, like, this is a challenging movie and it's kind of a heavy movie.
And it's also, you know, I guess we might as well get the disclaimer out at the front of the episode here.
We are two, you know, straight white males and we're talking about a movie where the main character is a young pregnant black woman and it is about the black experience in America.
And, you know, Brad, I thought long and hard about, like, how do we broach this topic?
How do we offer any insights about this movie that are going to resonate or feel true?
But I also think that it's important that we don't simply get a third person to come on the show and have it feel, you know, like tokenism.
It's a very weird place for us to be in.
But I also think that these are issues that are important to us.
These are films that we think deserve to be talked about and seen.
And so we're going to do our very best to give our sincere thoughts both on what the film is getting at and also the filmmaking itself.
Brad
Yeah, Bob, I think it's worthwhile to have conversations about difficult things in our society, no matter what our background is.
And we mean this genuinely from the bottom of our hearts.
If there is anybody out there who wants to join this conversation and talk to us about it, like we always talk about, like, hey, if you want to join the conversation, jump on our social medias, get into our discord.
But like this week, that takes on a little bit of a different connotation, like the conversation around Edge of Tomorrow or Elizabeth Town just looks a little bit different than the conversation around if Beale Street could talk.
So this week is not is genuinely not a plug to, like, come to our socials so that we have more numbers, because if we're being honest, that's kind of what it is.
Sometimes this week, it's it's genuinely a sense of like we want to have healthy conversation around difficult topics in our society.
Bob
Yeah.
And and furthermore, I mean, I picked this movie because I really think that it is just a phenomenal film.
I walked out of the theater in twenty eighteen and I was like, that's my number one for the year.
Like, I don't care what else I see this year.
That movie just did it for me.
And I remember going to see Barry Jenkins film Moonlight a couple of years prior.
I had to drive.
We lived in close to Lexington, Kentucky, and the closest place it was playing was in Louisville.
So I drove an hour and a half to Louisville to see that movie.
It was a great movie.
And I thought that with Beale Street, he even topped it.
I've come to find out that I'm in the minority on that.
Like, people really love Moonlight, obviously, at one best picture controversially.
And then Beale Street came out, got really good reviews and then just didn't make much of an impact in the awards season that year.
It was not nominated for best picture, which pisses me off to this day because I still think it was better than pretty much anything that came out that year.
And I feel like I am trying to champion the cause of this movie because Barry Jenkins is, I mean, truly like one of the best living directors right now.
The guy has a sense for how to make a movie that is just like, I don't know, Brad, I feel like you could you could know very little about what filmmaking is or what it looks like.
And even if the kind of rhythm of this movie isn't your thing, because it's a very slow moving film, you could look at this movie and be like, I understand that this person has intention behind everything he's doing.
You know what I mean?
Like, you can just tell that filmmaking is in his bones.
Brad
Filmmaking is happening.
Yeah.
It is very present in this movie from like from the way he uses sound to the color in the movie, like he makes very intentional choices with every little aspect of the film in such a way that it it kind of reminds you of of like really controlling directors that are notorious for like how much control they have over their movie.
Like it makes me think of a Stanley Kubrick, like like I want to present my artistic vision in such a way that it is exactly what I imagined in my mind's eye.
And I for I, you know, I don't know what kind of a director he is on set.
I'm sure he's a great guy.
I literally have no idea what I'm talking about as far as that goes.
But the the product feels like a singular vision.
Bob
For sure.
For sure.
All right, let's jump into Brad explains.
This is the part of the podcast where Brad breaks down the plot of the film that he has just seen often for the first time.
Brad, I believe this was your first time seeing Beale Street.
Can you break down the plot of this movie in 60 seconds or less?
Brad
Yeah, there is a young black couple in the 1970s.
The girl is named Tish.
The boy is named Alfonso.
He goes by Fonny.
And the movie is simply about them falling in love, being friends as children and how they become pregnant together.
And Fonny is wrongfully accused of raping a Puerto Rican girl.
And he is sent to jail.
And it is about the struggle that ensues to free him.
The struggle to be a family in the midst of injustice.
The struggle to feel like they have control over their lives.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I don't know.
Bob
I think that's about it, Bob.
Yeah.
And I hope that, like, we're not coming across as incredibly dour.
It sounds like a downbeat episode.
Yeah, Brad.
And I appreciate kind of how careful you're being in describing this movie because it definitely is.
I mean, it's heavy.
It's a heavy movie.
And I'm not going to pretend like it's not, you know.
But I also think that there's a reason that this was my favorite movie of that year.
And it's because the filmmaking is so spectacular.
And I tried to kind of reach out to you before you started playing the movie because I know sometimes movies that move at a slower pace can be very contentious on this podcast.
What are you talking about?
Yeah, I know, right?
And this one definitely does move at a slower pace.
But I think more than any other quote unquote slow movie we've done, this one feels poetic to me.
It just, like, there's a lyricism to the way the dialogue is written, to the way the images are composed, to the music in this movie is gorgeous.
But there's, it's the way the movie is structured, too.
And I think that there is a way to tell this story.
It's adapted from a novel by James Baldwin where, you know, you do the Hollywood thing where it's just a very linear story.
Like, these two kids are in love.
This thing happens.
There is a struggle to free him from prison.
And then the end of the movie.
And I love that it not only kind of jumps around in time, but it kind of paints it as if, I don't know, it's almost like watching someone's memories.
You know what I mean?
Like, drifting in and out of, like, we used to be so happy and this is what that looked like.
And then here is a harsh reminder of our reality now.
I just really love, you know, I'm over here, like, waving my hand in the air like a feather, like the Forrest Gump feather.
And, like, honestly, I kind of feel like the rhythm of this movie is like watching the Forrest Gump feather, if that makes sense.
Brad
Yeah, there's a beautiful storytelling aspect of it.
Like, honestly, I could see this movie being bookended by, like, Tish sitting in a counselor's office.
You know what I mean?
Like, if it was her starting the film, sitting with a counselor and trying to work through her experience, like, I could easily see this being how people tell stories about trauma.
And, like, you get in the midst of, like, you know, oh, this was traumatic because, oh, well, it's because my family grew up in this fashion.
And so it hurt to have this taken away.
And that reminds me of this one memory of us playing in the bathtub as kids.
And, oh, that reminds me of what we lost when he was sent off to jail.
And it's nonlinear, but in a mostly linear way.
And I think that's just kind of how storytelling works as the human experience.
Bob
All right, man, I want to jump into performances because this really is an actor's movie.
As much as it's a director's movie, like, this is the kind of movie where you really can sink your teeth into a part.
And I think pretty uniformly this cast works for me.
There is one person who caught a lot of flack for their performance.
And that is actually, if you want to call her the main character, I guess you can.
It's Tish, Kiki Layne.
A lot of critics of the film said that they didn't like her performance, that it felt a little bit too girlish.
I actually think the performance works for me exactly because of that reason.
Like, Tish is such an innocent young girl, and she is thrust into this world that she doesn't...
I mean, she understands it, but she's never had to experience it before.
And I think it almost increases, like, the level of heartbreak that you as the viewer understand because you're watching it happen to someone that is so innocent, if that makes sense.
I don't know, did her performance work for you?
Brad
Well, her performance is contrasted against everyone else around her.
Like, even her boyfriend, you know, Fonny, has a world weariness about them that kind of allows them to survive the world.
And so, you know, from her father, you know, sitting at the bar with Fonny's dad, talking about, like, hey, we've hustled before, we can hustle for our son.
Like, they are worth it.
To her mom going down to Puerto Rico and trying to...
This is getting at an issue I had with the film.
She wasn't trying to seduce the Puerto Rican gentleman, but...
That scene just kind of confused me a little bit.
But what I'm trying to get at is that Regina understands the way the world works.
Like, she knows that you have to grease some palms to get the job done.
And so, everyone around her has this sense of heaviness with the situation.
And yet, it's her...
I don't want to call it girlishness.
She just has a lightness to her spirit that you can understand why Fonny is so drawn to her.
Why her parents love her so much.
Why her sister, who kind of gives her a hard time, is ultimately very protective of her.
Like, they see her as something beautiful and innocent in this world.
And something that needs to be cherished.
And so, I just...
I like her performance a lot.
I did too.
Bob
I think she does a really great job.
I came out of this movie having seen Stefan James as Fonny.
And I was like, that dude is going to be a superstar.
Like, there's something about his performance in this film that he is so charming.
And they do these great kind of close-ups that remind me of what Jonathan Demme used to do.
Like, if you remember in Silence of the Lambs, where they'd look directly into the camera.
They do that with the main characters a ton in this movie.
And he's just doing this thing where, like, he's trying to charm his girlfriend.
And he knows that he's poor.
He knows that he has nothing.
But he's like, he's turning on the charm for everybody.
And man, I just thought he was absolutely electric in this movie.
You know, he's still...
It's only been four years since this movie came out.
And he's made a few films in the interim.
But he hasn't blown up yet.
And there's just something in me that's like, if I was buying stock in someone to get a good role that's going to catapult them to superstardom, like, Stefan James is one of those guys.
Brad
Honestly, he came across to me as a better version of Cooper Hoffman from Licorice Pizza.
Oh, nice.
Yeah.
Like, on his hustle.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And, you know, granted, there's a little bit of an age difference there.
Cooper's, like, 16 in the movie, technically.
But he just comes across to me as stilted.
Whereas, like, Stefan James is just smooth.
Yeah.
As all get out, man.
I will say, not to just jump past Stefan James.
I'm curious, why did Regina King receive an Oscar for this role?
Bob
So I feel like we're getting back to our Laura Dern conversation from a couple years ago or a couple weeks ago.
I actually think Regina King is really, really good.
And especially in the early scenes of the film, like, there's this extended sequence at the beginning of the movie where Tish tells her parents that she's pregnant.
And then the family decides to invite over Fonny's family to inform them that she's pregnant.
And it turns into a shit show.
And in those moments, I think Regina King nails it.
They keep cutting back to her.
And there's a lot of times where she's not even talking and she's just observing other people give their dialogue.
You can tell that she is just the anchor of this family.
I think she really nails it.
And then later in the sequence where she goes to Puerto Rico.
It's really good, too.
I'm with you in that, like, she's not a constant presence in the movie.
And so I kind of feel like she floats in and out of the film.
And she's pretty darn good in all of it.
But I think sometimes when people win an Oscar for a performance like this, it almost takes away from the performance.
Because you go into it thinking, like, it's an Academy Award winning performance.
It's going to be, like, the most incredible thing I've ever seen.
And they don't really give her a lot of scenes where she's in the spotlight by herself.
And so it doesn't feel big and showy.
But I do think that it's a fantastic supporting performance.
Brad
I think it's solid.
I really enjoy her in this.
I think that she is, as you said, the rock and the foundation of this family.
And she portrays that well.
I think that I just was confused by her Puerto Rico scenes.
I think there was some directorial issues there.
And I didn't see her necessarily as, like, the linchpin as a supporting actress in this movie.
So I don't understand the Oscar.
What I do understand is she's really great in this movie.
Like you said, the scene at the start of the film, you can tell that she is weighing the cost of inviting Fonny's family over to tell them about it.
And she decides in the end, it is better to try and celebrate, even if it's rebuffed, than to not celebrate at all.
And I thought that that was, like, a really admirable decision of her character to make.
And I think you can tell that she weighs those consequences well.
Honestly, that scene kind of reminded me of Fences a little bit.
Like watching multiple families come together and deal with celebration and trauma.
And I don't know.
That was just something that kind of hit me.
It made me think of Denzel and his family trying to work their way through their issues in Fences.
Bob
I do want to spend just a couple minutes talking about a few other people in the supporting cast.
And first and foremost, I want to talk about Coleman Domingo, who plays Tisha's dad.
Dude, he's like my favorite person in this movie.
By far.
He's so good.
And he's good in everything.
He's one of those guys that, like, you don't know his name.
But when he comes on the screen in a movie, you're like, oh, this guy.
He's good in everything, you know?
And I just wish he'd gotten more recognition.
Because he is every bit as good as Regina King is.
And she kind of, like, swept the awards that year.
Very similar to, like, how Laura Dern did for Marriage Story.
And we're like, you know, what about Ray Liotta?
What about Alan Alda?
I think that Coleman Domingo is just phenomenal in this movie.
Brad
I feel like he's kind of like a better version of Idris Elba that people don't know about.
You know?
Like, they have a similar build and vibe.
But I just like Coleman Domingo more.
I think he has more charm.
And just, he's just more suave.
And I just, I like him.
I know I've seen him in other things.
I can't put my finger on what they are.
But he's, he was my favorite character in this movie.
Hands down.
The speech that he gives to Fonny's dad.
Ugh.
It's so good.
Bob
That was my favorite scene in the movie.
Brad
It's so good.
Bob
And I think my favorite scene in the movie, if I had to pick one, is the sequence where Fonny kind of runs into one of his old friends on the street.
Daniel.
And Daniel's played by Brian Tyree Henry.
Who is making a name for himself now.
A lot of people know him from the show Atlanta.
But he's been in a ton of movies.
He's, he tends to tip more into comedy.
But when he goes dramatic, it's like, it's almost like watching like John C.
Reilly.
And you forget that he's like a really great dramatic actor who made his bones in drama.
It's like a chilling sequence.
Because they go back to Fonny's place.
They're drinking some beers.
They're just kind of shooting the shit.
And all of a sudden, he's like, hey man, I need to let you know.
Like, I've, I was in prison for the last two years.
I just got out.
And they kind of start talking about it.
And Fonny's like, hey man, like, you know, you're out now.
It's going to be okay.
And he just goes, hey, I appreciate you.
And I appreciate what you're saying.
But you have no idea.
And then it just, he starts describing what happened to him in prison.
And he doesn't go into a ton of detail.
And it just kind of ends with him in tears.
And he says like, the worst thing about it is how they can make you so fucking scared.
And like, it is just like, you can hear a pin drop in the theater after that.
And what Fonny doesn't know is that Fonny's about to experience that same thing for himself.
And so it's like, it is the most horrific foreshadowing.
But man, that performance.
It's one of those like, this should have been up for an Oscar performances.
Where someone comes in for like 10 minutes and just bats a thousand and then leaves.
Because he, he knocks it out of the park, man.
Brad
Yeah, I mean, I was, I just finished reading this book called The Soul of Shame by Kurt Thompson.
It's a phenomenal book on how humans interact with one another.
And one of the things that he, that Kurt Thompson wrote in the book is that one of the most important things that humans need in this world is a place, a relationship where they are able to fully express the truth of their lives.
Without being rebuffed, without being like, shamed of it, without being rejected.
Like, they need a place to talk about, this is the truth of my world.
And it's wild that I literally just finished reading that like, two weeks ago.
And then watching this movie, in that scene, I felt like was a perfect embodiment of telling the truth of your life.
Of having a safe place to say, hey, like, this is the reality of my emotional state right now.
Like, I was freaking terrified in prison.
And, you know, initially I think that Fonny kind of gives us what we shouldn't do.
Of saying like, hey man, it's alright, you're out now.
Like, we're good.
But like, after he does that, and Daniel dives deeper and says, no man, you don't get it.
And Fonny does what every human needs to do.
They just need to sit back and listen.
And I just, yeah, I'm with you dude.
That was a spectacular example of how humans need to connect in the face of trauma.
Bob
So before we go to break, I kind of want to talk about this movie's awards season flop, if I can.
This was the year that the backlash to like hashtag Oscar so white really started to be seen.
And I feel like the Academy did a really good job of making sure that it had more diverse representation.
And that carried over to what got nominated for Best Picture.
But I've always felt, and I think a lot of people feel like, you know, if there are four or five really good movies at the end of the year.
That would typically be up for Best Picture.
And they're kind of all about what, you know, whatever it might be, black people or LGBT people or whatever.
Like they almost cancel each other out because the Academy is still not ready to just let half of its nominees be about one thing.
You know what I mean?
And I think that this movie was definitely a victim of that because you look at what gets nominated for Best Picture.
And Black Panther gets up for Best Picture.
Spike Lee's movie, Black Klansman is up for Best Picture.
Alfonso Cuaron has Roma, which is about, you know, it's about a poor woman in Mexico.
And then you've got Green Book, which wins Best Picture.
And if Beale Street could talk, it's left out.
And it pisses me off to no end because I think this movie is better than any of those other movies.
I know there are a lot of people out there that really loved Roma.
And Cuaron's a great director.
But this was my pick for Best Movie of the Year.
And we've done Green Book on this show, Brad.
This movie runs laps and circles around Green Book.
Like it's just, there's no debating that, I don't think.
Brad
Yeah, I mean, Green Book is the crowd pleaser.
I think we talked about that.
Like even despite its difficult portrayals of race, I think it does it in such a charming way that you kind of understand.
I think what Green Book does well is the fact that it takes the racial tension seriously enough that you're allowed to have a little bit of levity in the midst of it.
And that's about the best thing I can say about the movie.
I think if Beale Street could talk, it's just raw and honest.
And I think the word you use, Bob, is great.
It's poetic.
I will say, I do feel for the Academy.
Because like they had all these problems.
It's way too white.
There's not any representation.
And so at a certain point then, you're being called to change.
And as soon as you're being called to change, and this is on the individual level or on the systemic corporate level.
As soon as somebody has to tell you you need to change, if you do change, then everyone will be like, well, you only changed because you were told to change.
And people will not believe that you were genuine in it.
I can feel for them as they are trying to choose best picture in a changing world.
Bob
And I think that like, I kind of agree with you.
I think there are two things that mitigate that a little bit.
And one is that it's not like the Academy is just like ten guys in a room that pick the movie, right?
Like it's a vast voting body that determines the ten best movies of the year.
And I think the thing that people do get frustrated with sometimes is that these quote unquote crowd pleaser movies are like no one's favorite movie.
But because everyone had them ranked like number eight, it gets into the field.
And I think that's how a movie like Bohemian Rhapsody gets nominated for best picture in 2018 over this.
A movie that combined you and I gave a 3.5 out of 10 to.
That's when I start to get like, all right, whatever.
Like even setting Green Book aside, what the hell is Bohemian Rhapsody doing in this field?
Brad
Bob, can we just take a moment for like, can you play the public service announcement tone?
And like you can do it in post production.
And just announced to the world, Bohemian Rhapsody is a garbage.
It's so bad, and it's badly made.
Bob
It's badly made.
I literally can't.
Man.
All right.
Maybe, maybe it's time for us to hit pause.
Let's try some whiskey.
And, you know, in a throwback to our Green Book episode in the movie Green Book, Mahershala Ali's character drank a bunch of Cutty Sark.
So I guess we are paying homage to the year of the Green Book.
Brad, let's try some Cutty Sark.
What do you say?
I'm in, man.
Let's do it.
All right.
So today we are trying Cutty Sark.
Brad, this is one of the most ubiquitous, well-known brands of Scotch whiskey on the market.
Named after the famous Clipper ship that is still tourable in England.
I knew nothing about it, but I probably should have based on the giant Clipper ship on the label.
Yeah, it's really cool.
This brand has been around since 1923.
It is a blended Scotch whiskey, so it's not a single malt.
It is a blend of a ton of different things.
It is 80 proof, and it is like 13 bucks.
So it's the kind of whiskey that Americans in like the 1950s really went in for.
You know what I mean?
I was going to say, I think this still costs the same price that it did when it came out in 1923.
In the movie Green Book.
It was the exact same.
So I do not have high hopes for this.
And in fact, I got this bottle like a year ago, and I'm pretty sure I gave you at least half of it right off the bat.
Because I was like, I was never going to drink all this.
Brad
You know how I know that a whiskey is bad is when you give me like 300, 400 milliliters of it.
Bob
So here's the thing, though, is that I never really try the whiskeys before I dole out samples to you.
Like I always try to save myself.
You just knew.
Yeah, I was just like, you know, maybe Brad needs a good scotch for mixing.
So we're going to see how this is, man.
I'm actually pouring it out right now.
Brad, have you drank it already?
I have.
All right.
Well, then you can kind of vamp for a second and give me your nosing notes on this bad boy.
Brad
Yeah, I think that the overarching note of this nose is that it is young and pungent.
It stings the nostrils, if you will.
But once you get beyond that, there's a little bit of vanilla, some honey, a tiny bit of citrus.
Honestly, it's not an unpleasant nose.
No.
It's like I gave it like a six and a half.
Bob
It's decent.
Here's how I would describe this.
It is an aggressive Irish whiskey on the nose.
Like it has all of those sweet like honeydew and like cantaloupe and like a little bit of peach.
Those kind of notes that we get on Irish whiskeys.
And then it's just like, what if we added like three drops of unleaded gasoline?
And that's kind of what I'm getting on this.
And I know that sounds horrible.
And please don't drink that.
But it's not an unpleasant nose.
And especially at 80 proof, this has a lot more going on than I anticipated.
I'm actually going to give this a seven and a half on the nose.
Second public service announcement today.
Brad
Don't drink unleaded gasoline in your whiskey or straight.
But when I got into the taste, it is very, very watery.
It is quite bland.
And there's some nice bits of honey and vanilla going on in there.
I'm going to give it a five out of ten.
Like I think it tastes fine.
It is.
It is decently pleasant.
I don't mind this at all.
Wow.
Yeah.
Bob
It's a little.
Brad
It's a little aggressive.
Bob
Is this going to be the Canadian mist of season five?
I think it is.
It's a little aggressive.
Like if you plop this in front of me blind.
And I was under the assumption it was like a $40 whiskey.
I think I would have some more negative connotations attached to it.
But like those notes of a melon are really carrying through for me.
I like it a lot, especially on the front of my palate.
The mid palate is where it's like, okay, it gets a little bit multi.
But it also has a little bit of that like gasoline thing going on.
But it never really takes over.
And I expected like the really astringent, awful notes to take over at some point.
And they didn't.
And I think that's really to the credit of this blend.
That it doesn't taste like a whatever the hell, $13 whiskey.
Yeah.
So like.
Yeah.
I can't divorce myself from the fact that I already know what I'm drinking and how much it costs.
So like in a vacuum, would I give it this high of a taste score?
Probably not.
But for what this is, I think once again, I'll give it a seven and a half on the taste.
Yeah.
Brad
There's a reality that for paying $10, it's a decent whiskey.
I think the finish is where it kind of struggles.
The finish is short.
It's slightly bitter.
You start to lose some of those melon flavors that you had in the middle of your palate.
I'll stay at a five.
I'll give it a five on the finish.
Bob
Yeah.
It takes on a little bit of like a cigar ash for me on the finish.
But besides that, it reminds me a lot of some of the space sides that we've had.
And in researching this brand, I guess that the bulk of what is blended into this comes from the space side region.
I think this fits right in with that.
And again, is it a little bit less eloquent than its brethren?
Probably.
But I don't mind this at all.
I'm going to give it a six and a half on the finish.
And that brings us to our balance.
Brad
This honestly just offers a consistently just below average experience.
Like from start to finish, it's just barely below average.
And that's pretty impressive.
Yeah.
So I'll give it a six and a half on the balance.
Bob
I'm going to give it an eight on the balance for the exact same reason.
Brad, if I told you that you could have, I don't know, a $30 bottle of blended scotch that is like average across the board, you'd be like, all right, that sounds about right.
Like $30 is pretty much the bare minimum for any scotch.
And I wouldn't expect much better than average at the bare minimum.
And this is like $10, $12, and it's just barely below average.
Like that's more impressive to me than getting average at $15 higher.
So I'm going to give it an eight out of 10 on the balance.
And I think that kind of tips off where I'm going on value.
Brad, what is this currently retailing for in the state of Ohio?
Brad
In the state of Ohio, it's on sale.
Yeah, it is.
It's mostly out of stock from what I can see, but it's on sale for $8.35. You know what?
Bob
I think I got that bottle because every once in a while, OHLQ will do a, they call it last call, and they'll just delete something from their database.
So a lot of times, like if a bottle gets a new label or if they start bottling it in a different kind of bottle, they'll get rid of all the old ones and they'll mark those down.
And I got this bottle for like $9.
But I think, Brad, that they are either moving strictly to like liter sizes or they're moving to like plastic bottles or something like that.
So, yeah, I think that I go ahead.
I'll say the one liter is $22.99. Okay.
So let's just call it somewhere in the middle.
Let's say $14.
Yeah.
For a fifth or even $15.
Call it $15.
I think this is a really good $15 bottle of whiskey.
The only thing that I can think of, even in the world of bourbon, that's $15 that is as good as this is in the world of scotch would be like Heaven Hill Green label, which I can't get in Ohio.
So, yeah.
Brad
Plain Rebel, maybe.
Which I don't even know if they make regular Rebel anymore.
I think they just make the hundred.
Bob
No, I think they make the regular.
But I would probably prefer this over Rebel if we're just kind of talking apples to oranges here.
I'm going to give it an 8 out of 10 on value again.
Brad
I think that our scores hopefully will end up in a similar place.
I think that I scored the whiskey a little more closely to what I think it tastes like, and I'm going to show how much I like this whiskey and the value score.
I'm going to give it a 9.5 on value, Bob.
There you go.
Like, I think that it's just honestly, man, it's just really not a bad whiskey for $15.
No, it's not.
I can't get past that.
My total is coming to a 32.5 out of 50.
Bob
I'm coming to a 37.5 out of 50, and I like it when we do, like when one of us looks at it objectively and one of us looks at it as, hey, this is what it is, and let's score it out based on the fact that we know it's $15.
Because then we really do kind of average out in the middle.
We're coming to a 70 out of 100 or a 35 out of 50.
Holy cow.
That is right at the point where we typically say, give it a try and or give it a buy.
I would say, don't try this at a bar.
What's wrong with you?
That you're going to spend like $6 on this.
Just get a bottle of it.
It's 15 bucks.
If you don't like it, make some Rob Roy's with it or something like it's, there is no downside to buying a bottle of Cuddy Sark.
Brad
Yeah.
Bob
Are you regretting that you gave me half a bottle now?
Brad
I want it back.
Well, guys, that is Cuddy Sark, a whiskey that we're just really surprised by.
But Bob, what say you?
How about we go back into the rip roaring adventure that if Beale Street could talk is.
Let's get to it, Brad.
All right, everybody.
That was Cuddy Sark.
Bob
Bob, I'm happy that we chose that whiskey.
Me too.
I was not looking forward to that at all.
And that I'm very pleasantly surprised.
Brad
Yeah, me too, man.
But beyond Cuddy Sark, we have to get into Canada's favorite segment.
Two facts and a false.
That's favorite.
Two facts and a falsehood.
You guys know what we're doing here.
So we're just going to jump right in.
Fact number one, the title of this movie beyond and also the title of the book.
I'm not trying to, you know, do something weird here.
The title is a reference to the 1916 WC handy blues song called Beale Street Blues, named after Beale Street in downtown Memphis, Tennessee.
The song is on Louis Armstrong's album.
Louis Armstrong plays WC from 1954.
Fact number two, the first trailer was released on August 2nd, 2018, which would have been the 94th birthday of novelist James Baldwin.
Fact number three, the lighting of this film is based partially off 1982's Blade Runner, with Jenkins stating that he, quote, loves the use of a consistent color to shade the movie with, end quote.
Bob
I think any of these can be true.
Two sounds the most true.
So I'm just going to say two's true.
Three, I understand where they're coming from.
But Blade Runner was not what I was expecting.
Although there is some like, you remember the scene where it's just kind of like circling around Stefan James as he's doing the sculpture and there's like one strong spotlight beam coming down on that thing.
And that is really reminiscent of some moments in Blade Runner.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Hell, I'll just say three's true too.
I'm going to say one is the falsehood, Brad.
Nailed it.
Really?
One is one is true.
Brad
Three is the falsehood, actually.
So I did not nail it.
Well, I was pumped that I nailed it.
Bob
Okay, so three is the falsehood.
Now, did you see anything in your research where he talked about what the source, like the inspiration for the lighting was and you just made up a different movie or?
Brad
No, I just made that entirely up.
I think that's the best falsehood I've come up with.
That was pretty damn good.
I'm not going to lie, man.
Yeah.
Nicely done.
I appreciate it, dude.
Because I was just thinking about the lighting of the film and how it has a very consistent like red, orange lighting to it.
And so I just started looking up movies with famous lighting and Blade Runner was one of them.
Love it, dude.
Threw it in there.
I will say the first fact about Beale Street Blues being, you know, the inspiration for the title.
I think that.
So I went back and listened to it.
I pulled it up on YouTube.
I listened to Beale Street Blues.
And I think for me, and this might be getting too philosophical, but I think for me, it represents something that I think is missing a little bit in this movie because the actual song Beale Street Blues is very upbeat.
And man, I don't know how to describe it.
There's a joy to the song that I feel like you don't necessarily find in this movie.
And this is an area where I am 100% admitting I am relying on the work of others, the thoughts of others.
I am not in any way, shape or form saying that I know what this experience is like.
But from what I know of the Blues, what I've read, what I've learned, the Blues were an opportunity for black culture, for the black experience to represent and show that we are not beaten down.
Like we still have joy in our lives and in our souls.
We will still dance.
We will still create in spite of the hardship that we have endured.
And I feel that when I listen to Beale Street Blues.
I think that this movie, the only part that I really struggle with is that there's not very much redeeming in the film.
And I'm not trying to say that that's not true in any way.
Like I think the feeling of powerlessness is palpably felt in this film.
And I think it's important to understand that reality.
But I just wonder if they had room to return to the roots of Blues and have something of a rejoicing mentality in the midst of suffering.
I don't know if I am way off beat with this, Bob.
Like, like, please call me out.
I'm not trying to maybe put something in there that shouldn't be there.
I'm just kind of curious what you think about that.
Bob
Yeah, I mean, I do.
I do think I disagree.
I understand where you're coming from.
But I think this is also one of those areas where, like, we as white people, like, we we are compelled by.
A sense of faith in the American dream, you know what I mean?
And like the idea of, like, picking yourself up by your own bootstraps and people rising from the ashes to make something of themselves.
And I think that white guys, especially like we watch, we watch movies and we watch stories like this and we get inspired by people who persevere in the face of hardship.
And I think that's just something that, like, you kind of have to admit about yourself, right?
Like, it's something that's compelling to people like us.
I think that this movie and the story behind it do a really good job of just illustrating like there are situations where there is absolutely no hope that this thing will be remedied.
There is nobody coming in at the 11th hour.
That's like, you know, the judge will finally listen to us because in America, like the justice system takes way too long.
And the the ability for like in this story, a corrupt policeman to pin something on somebody he doesn't like is way too easy.
And especially in something like the NYPD.
Right.
And and I just think that that's part of why I love this movie, because it is a reminder to someone like me who has never experienced anything like that and who is always looking for the silver lining or hoping that, you know, justice will be served eventually.
There's too many real life scenarios where, you know, I feel like once a week now I'm like reading a story in the newspaper that's like about a black guy that was locked up in like the 80s.
And now they found out like, oh, everyone lied about it, but he's been in jail for 40 years.
And you just see him being like, I'm so thankful to be out of jail.
And I read it and I'm like, no, I'm still pissed.
I'm pissed to know that that happened to you.
Like, do you know what I mean?
And I think that this movie does such a good job of I don't think it beats you over the head with it.
But even like the choice at the end of the movie to play Ray Charles America the Beautiful, like as the closing credits song, it's just enough of a dig that's like this is these two individuals experience of America.
And I think that making the two of them be like this kind of almost idyllic, super innocent couple that just really love each other and want a better life like it almost seems to storybook.
But I think that it does such a good job of taking you from point A at the beginning of the movie where they're just walking, holding hands in Central Park to point B, which is like they have like a five year old kid and they're visiting Fonny in prison because he can't get out and he had to take a plea.
I don't know that the arc of it is is like watching a Greek tragedy, but set in this very real world of America for people who are not like you and me.
Brad
What they really do is they juxtapose.
Liberty and the pursuit of happiness like they are pursuing a life together.
And they are pursuing happiness and they they just want to be free together.
They just want a place to live together to raise their child together, you know, whether whether they're trying to get away from his tyrannical mother or a unjust justice system.
They're looking for life, liberty in the pursuit of happiness.
And so I think that's why the Ray Charles song at the end is so perfect.
Like they are the American dream.
And yet America didn't see them as, you know, being behooved to give them the American dream.
So they took it from them.
Yeah.
And I think that I think I don't know if that's the right interpretation, but to me, that's why they chose to play that song at the end.
Bob
Yeah, I think this movie does this really interesting thing with the characters of Tish and Fonny in that it makes them almost.
I think if you could look at this movie and be like, they weren't real people, like they're too they're too good.
They're too perfect.
Yep.
And they feel like archetypes in a way.
But for me, I think that actually gives this story this almost like mythical weight.
You know what I mean?
Like they are clearly representative of people beyond themselves, but they also they reminded me a lot of watching West Side Story and how Tony and Maria are like these beautiful people who aren't thinking about anything around them.
And they're just I love you and I love you.
But I don't know, for some reason, like when you watch West Side Story, it's like that still works because it's Romeo and Juliet and Romeo and Juliet is a 600 or like a 500 year old document.
And these kind of almost mythical tragic stories go back thousands of years.
And I feel like this really fits right in with that.
I really love the decision to make them be so sincere and earnest.
And this movie has a very earnest treatment of its protagonists.
And I don't know, for me, that actually helped.
And it made the tragic elements even more tragic to me.
Brad
Yeah, for me, I think that's actually one of the places where the movie just doesn't work quite as well for me.
Honestly, the way Jenkins portrays certain people in this movie, it kind of reminds me of Million Dollar Baby and what we talked about Clint Eastwood.
Like I think that the way Clint portrays the poor white people in that movie as just every stereotype possible, I think that Jenkins falls into that a little bit in certain parts of this movie, like the way he portrays Fonny's mom.
It is like the most stereotypical evil, you know, Christian person who is hypocritical that you can imagine and the way the daughters care for her.
Bob
Well, and not to interject too much, but like so that actress Anjanew Ellis was just nominated for an Oscar this year for the movie King Richard.
She's a great actress, but I'm totally with you.
Like, it was as if they like Barry Jenkins called cut and then went to all three of those women and said, like, no, I don't want any nuance.
I don't want any subtlety.
Like just be as over the top evil.
Like, could you make this a little bit more like you are like you're in a stage play and you're trying to project to the back row?
Yes.
So I'm with you.
Like those, those three performances were pretty rough for me.
Brad
Yeah.
And so it was little things like that.
And I think that it that carries over to Tish probably a little more than funny.
The thing is, we talked earlier about how we liked her girlishness.
So I think he kind of grows a little bit.
So I don't know, man, I think I'm just struggling with with certain choices in the movie.
But overall, I mean, if I can get into final scores, I still think this is a really great movie.
I think it's it's worthwhile viewing overall.
I like the story that this this movie is telling, not from the sense that it's a good story, but it's a real story.
And I think it's important that movies do that.
I'll give it an eight and a half out of 10.
Bob
Yeah, Brad, I just I'm still in love with this movie.
And I don't think it's perfect.
Like watching it through this time, I am slightly less impressed with it than I was the first time around.
But this immediately vaulted Barry Jenkins into my consciousness is like, oh, this is like one of the great living directors.
And it's because he has such a deft hand, but like a very gentle touch.
And I think that there is a way to make this movie that is way more heavy handed and way more overt and way more like beating you over the head with certain messages.
And I think that it's way more powerful that he lets the interactions between the characters do the talking.
He lets the silences speak volumes.
And the last five minutes of the movie where you find out like Fonny took a plea deal because they were going to keep holding up his trial.
We don't know how long he's in prison for, but you can see that their child is now like five years old.
I was in tears, man, like the ending of this movie just got me.
And there's nothing inherently about the end of the movie that is like a tearjerker.
There's no really emotional, sentimental lines.
There's no cheesy music.
It's just like, and this is the situation now.
These two people that I was rooting for did not win in the end.
And it's super effective.
And it is 58 times better than Green Book.
I'm going to give this movie a 9.5 out of 10.
That brings our average to a 9 out of 10.
But we'd like to know what you think.
If you've seen If Beale Street Could Talk, if you've seen Moonlight, can you compare the two?
What is it about this movie that draws you in?
Or what is it that has pushed you away from seeing it thus far?
Let us know on our social media accounts, Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram at FilmWhiskey.
Brad
Or jump into the conversation on Discord.
We are on there every single day talking to Film and Whiskey Nation.
And if you really, really love the show and want to support us more, you can check out our Patreon, which is patreon.com slash FilmWhiskey.
It gives you access to a special Discord server.
It gives you opportunities for bonus episodes, for content at the end of every single episode.
We just love our patrons and want to do as much as we can for them.
So you can join us at patreon.com slash FilmWhiskey.
Bob
All right, Brad, we are done with our lists for the season.
That means we have one episode remaining.
It's Harry Potter 8.
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2.
And that will close out our Season 5 movies.
So join us next week for that last installment in Harry Potter.
But until then, I'm Bob Book.
I'm Brad G.
And we'll see you next time.
