BONUS We Love This - American Movie
Guest:I noticed at the end of one of your guitar sessions the other day, you ended with a line of dialogue.
Marc:Do you remember what you ended with?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It's all right.
Marc:It's okay.
Marc:I got something to live for.
Marc:Jesus told me so.
Marc:That's right.
Guest:I think you might have just said the Jesus told me so part, but it was clearly fresh in your mind, I think, right?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:To the point where I wanted to make sure I knew the quote.
Marc:Oh, really?
Marc:Well, yeah, because I've been saying it around the house a bit.
Marc:It's all right.
Marc:It's okay.
Marc:Something to live for.
Marc:But I didn't know if he said the Bible told me so or Jesus told me so.
Guest:Oh yeah, it's definitely Jesus.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I recently watched the film, so I know that it's Jesus.
Guest:Me too.
Guest:How was it for you?
Guest:It was great.
Guest:That line is from the documentary American Movie, which is probably, I don't know about for you, but for me is my favorite documentary ever made.
Guest:It's one of my favorite comedies, filmed comedies ever made.
Guest:I rank it right up there with the greatest comedies ever made.
Guest:It is a movie I can watch maybe once a year, maybe more, but I revisit it a lot.
Guest:And in fact, Jason Walliner said he was inspired by it quite a bit in making Paul T. Goldman.
Marc:That makes sense.
Marc:I mean, I can see that.
Marc:I could see that in structure and in intent in a way.
Marc:But I definitely was able to muster up much more empathy for all of the people in American movie than I was for Paul T. Goldman.
Guest:It's definitely a good thing to talk about because you're absolutely right.
Guest:And then the kind of real question is why this thing that you're saying is similar in form and function, but in the emotional resonance is much different.
Marc:Well, because there's, you know, the type of delusion that is driving, what's the guy's name in an American movie?
Marc:Mark Borchardt.
Marc:Mark Borchardt.
Marc:It's much different.
Marc:You know, he's acting in earnest.
Marc:He has no idea how he's going to manifest or finish his movie or get it to where it may need to be for it to be sold or make money or anything.
Marc:But he's just very passionate about filmmaking.
Marc:And his blind side is completely human in that whether it's self-sabotage or a kind of weird compulsion of perfectionism.
Marc:But
Marc:But with with Paul T. Goldman, you know, his sort of delusion that's driving him is a kind of grandiosity.
Marc:And he's in a tremendous deal of denial and fabrication.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And I think as we as we talk through American movie here, I think something that came up over and over again when I was watching it is that people aren't really familiar.
Guest:feeding a delusion of Mark Borchardt.
Guest:In fact, a lot of them are trying to discourage him from what he's doing.
Guest:However, he does find a very big support system and they're not supporting him blindly.
Guest:They're supporting him as friends.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:And they want to be part of it.
Marc:And he has a contagious charisma and energy.
Marc:Yeah, does he?
Marc:And I could see how being around him would make you believe that, you know, it's like that great quote.
Marc:I'm not comparing the two, but...
Marc:When that writer who wrote Apocalypse Now, what's his name?
Marc:Oh, John Milius?
Marc:Yeah, John Milius is being interviewed in Hearts of Darkness.
Marc:And he's like, Francis had convinced me that we were making a movie that would win the Nobel Peace Prize.
Marc:Or something like that, or the Pulitzer.
Marc:The Nobel Peace Prize is so perfect.
Guest:I mean, if that's not true, let's print it.
Marc:Pretend that's true, because that's great.
Marc:And there's definitely a mania to Borchardt, and there's definitely a vision there.
Marc:But as the movie goes on, you realize that he's just one of those guys that's going to undermine himself, right?
Marc:you know, all the way through on purpose.
Guest:I mean, he, he, he acknowledges it basically that he is as to why, what is it?
Marc:What do you mean?
Guest:Well, he's, I mean, we could get into it because he, there is a point in the movie where he draws out.
Guest:He draws the direct line to why he hasn't completed this movie that he's been working on for 20 years or however long.
Guest:And he's like, I'm afraid to finish it.
Guest:Basically.
Guest:He's like, if it finished, if I finish it, then it's a concrete real thing and it could suck.
Guest:And that would be too painful.
Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I mean, I've talked about that, too.
Marc:I mean, I understand that fear of completion because then, you know, you will be judged.
Marc:It is out there.
Marc:Right.
Marc:You know, and I'm aware of that stuff.
Marc:But in order to to do things, you have to kind of push through that.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And, you know, one thing about American movie is you wonder about I know the the other guy, his buddy died.
Marc:Because that was news.
Marc:What was his name?
Marc:Mike Shank.
Marc:Mike Shank.
Marc:Mike Shank passed away.
Marc:And he's an odd sort, a slightly brain damaged drug casualty with a big heart and, you know, a loyal friend.
Guest:but you know i don't know what happened to that guy borchard well let's it's interesting let's get into it because uh i the i had the same feeling recently like man i wonder what happened to mark borchard and uh then watching the movie again and then looking into what did happen um it's more interesting than i expected to to conclude around his life and and what's happened since this film and whether it matters that's another question
Marc:Well, I mean, the one thing you see in the doc, and I don't know who chose what, but there were choices being made about what parts of his narrative will really be shown.
Marc:And he obviously, with the thrust of making the film,
Marc:is a focus and he clearly has, you know, some sort of drinking issue.
Marc:And also he, you know, he's got a family that he's either at odds with or trying to support or negligent of.
Marc:So there's a lot of stuff about his life that would have sort of undermined the kind of go, go, rah, rah,
Marc:feeling you get about the movie yeah definitely so i i have to assume that whatever's become of him what he succumbed to whatever that life was interesting well you just watched it recently and you watched it with kit like it was the first time she'd seen it and what was her reaction
Marc:Well, she loved him.
Marc:I mean, she's from the Midwest, right?
Marc:Yeah, she's from the Illinois.
Marc:So she's like, I know these guys.
Guest:Of course.
Guest:Right.
Guest:That's the big thing.
Marc:Like, it is a thoroughly Midwestern film.
Marc:Yeah, every part of it.
Marc:Just even the terrain, you know, which plays such a big part of it.
Guest:Yeah, you can feel it.
Guest:You feel the coldness.
Guest:You feel how you have to live in that coldness.
Guest:You just have to accept it.
Marc:Every time you're in his uncle's trailer, you're like, oh, my God.
Marc:Someone get a space heater in there.
Marc:Absolutely.
Guest:Well, this is American movie directed by Chris Smith.
Guest:It was filmed between 1995 and 97, played at Sundance in 1999, where it won the Grand Jury Prize for Documentary.
Guest:Then was released in theaters in the fall of that year.
Guest:And it's interesting because, you know, their names are never mentioned in it.
Guest:But man, the specter of that Sundance generation, like that looms large in the whole movie.
Guest:All the Tarantinos and Kevin Smiths and Allison Anders.
Guest:Yeah, the possibility.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:that we can do this.
Guest:Right, right.
Guest:And I don't know, did you see it when it came out?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, same.
Marc:I must have seen it around there, yeah.
Guest:Yeah, I saw it at the same time.
Guest:And so I was just leaving college, actually.
Guest:It was in my later years in college when I saw it.
Guest:And so it served, I don't think I found, I didn't draw inspiration from it, but I definitely found it to be profound and clarifying for this idea of moving into the next phase of life.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And what risk looks like.
Marc:He's sort of a great hero of just kind of blindly pursuing one's dreams and the hustle of it.
Marc:I think he was sort of fascinated with his own hustle.
Marc:You know, there are moments where you could have been watching in terms of temperament and
Marc:And focus a movie about a much more successful director.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Right.
Marc:So so I could see it how it's almost an inspirational film to somebody who wants to enter the creative world where, you know, it's like anything's possible.
Marc:And if it's not, we can work around it.
Marc:Right.
Guest:Well, if you haven't seen it, it is available for rental on Apple for $3.99, or you can just buy it.
Guest:This is, as I said, one of my favorite films.
Guest:And the soundtrack, which you get right away, it starts immediately after the Sony Pictures Classics logo.
Guest:You start to hear Mr. Bojangles on guitar.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And that, as you find out later in the film, the entire movie is scored by Mike Shank, his friend.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he's a good guitar player.
Guest:The guitar sounds good throughout the film.
Guest:But so you have this very kind of plaintive Mr. Bojangles playing.
Guest:It's very nice.
Guest:And the first things you hear outside of that music is Mark Borchardt's voice.
Guest:And it's one of the great quotes to open up a movie.
Guest:He says...
Guest:I was a failure.
Guest:I was a failure, and I get very sad and depressed about it, and I can't be that no more.
Guest:Like, that's as good as anything from, like, on the waterfront.
Guest:Like, that's great.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It's not scripted.
Guest:No, this is just him driving around in his car.
Guest:And, you know, it's like his way with words is so instantly, obviously a positive trait.
Guest:Like it's something that's helped him get where he's gotten, even if it's not that far.
Guest:But like, it's just, it struck me watching it again recently, how many, like I wanted to start writing down things he was saying.
Guest:And I'm like, I can't do this.
Guest:I'm gonna start writing the whole movie.
Guest:It's like almost anything he says is,
Guest:And just sometimes, though, it has this crazy poetry to it, like this patter where he's like driving around the car and he's telling this guy what his future is like and why he's thinking the way he's thinking.
Guest:And he goes, it's important not to drink and dream, but to create and complete.
Guest:I'm like, man, he's got that like bop, bop, bop, boop.
Marc:I read it as mania.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Oh, definitely, because there are parts where it's depression.
Guest:Where he falls out.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:Well, so this is Mark Borchardt we're talking about.
Guest:This is the aspiring filmmaker at the time.
Guest:He's about 30 years old, living in Menominee Falls, Wisconsin.
Guest:The first thing we really see him doing outside of driving around in his car is he's creating a live radio drama, I guess.
Guest:They never really explain what that is, but he seems like he's making a show for the radio for Halloween.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And this is a great thing in the movie where they kind of use this scene to set up a lot of the players that we're going to recognize later, like these local actors and amateur talents that are in there.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:We also meet his friend, Mike Shank, who we mentioned already, who tells the camera that they're good friends, but that he doesn't party no more.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He's got brain damage.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, they are also instant.
Guest:As good as like, you know, you're watching this thing.
Guest:It's already started.
Guest:You're five minutes in or whatever.
Guest:There's two things that are undeniable.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:One is that they hit the jackpot with this guy, Mark Borchardt.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You could just put a camera on this guy and listen to him and it's going to be amazing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The second thing is that this is a classic comedy team.
Guest:Like these two guys, like the way they look, the way they sound, the personality types, like you couldn't draw up a comedy team better than these two guys.
Guest:Perfect.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:We finally get about five minutes in and the opening credit sequence has him opening his bills almost in tears.
Guest:Like he's like opening a thing.
Guest:It's like, oh, legal action and one bad thing after another.
Guest:And this is just to kind of get the tone of the comedy of the whole movie out there.
Guest:The last thing he opens, it says...
Guest:like your master card has arrived he's gotten approved for a credit card he's like oh yeah kick fucking ass i got a credit card after this slew of bills and delinquency notices yeah uh and then the title comes up it says american movie subtitled the making of northwestern which is a great title for the movie
Guest:especially once you soon find out what happens to Northwestern.
Guest:It doesn't take very long for the movie to establish it.
Guest:You meet his whole family.
Guest:He's got his mother, this Swedish woman from Wisconsin.
Guest:He's got two brothers, his father.
Guest:They all have varying kind of opinions about him.
Guest:One of the brothers is very ungenerous, except basically was like, I thought he was going to grow up and be a serial killer.
Guest:Maybe he would kill me.
Right.
Guest:You meet all the other locals that are working with him.
Guest:These are great real people, real characters.
Guest:I love their like varying levels of competence.
Guest:Like there's a guy who's ostensibly hired to be the casting director and he's like basically sitting on his bed with no pants.
Yeah.
Guest:Like, cold calling local actors and actresses and seeing if they want to be part of this film.
Marc:But it's nice that he knows all the jobs that you need for a film.
Marc:That, you know, he's hired these people to do these jobs.
Guest:Well, that's something also that's very...
Guest:apparent early on is how film literate he is like he's outside in front of like a house and he's talking about the great expanse of how he can shoot it and he's like okay have you ever seen Manhattan or the seventh seal yeah and it's like he knows what he's talking about then at the same time he's like super naive um
Guest:about what it would take to shoot.
Guest:Like, he's talking about the actual shots that, you know, Bergman used.
Guest:He fully gets it.
Guest:And he's like, so we're going to do that.
Guest:And what we'll have is we'll have a bunch of second directors standing around.
Guest:They'll just be saying, hey, could you stay back, please?
Guest:Like his enthusiasm about making it does not translate into actually how to make it.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Well, he romanticizes the process.
Marc:Totally.
Marc:He's got a grandiose sense of like he's got it envisioned in his head.
Marc:But, you know, what's really going to happen is different.
Guest:And about 10 minutes into the movie, I noticed this time, I had already been laughing for about five of those 10 minutes.
Guest:Solid, big laughs.
Guest:He's got this audition where you're just watching these kind of local Wisconsin actors kind of...
Guest:yeah amateurs going through his his scenes and he he see him outside the audition room talking with mike shank and he's like they're making a mockery of my words man this is a theatrical mockery i'm gonna i'm gonna have to go in there i'm gonna have to show him how it's done yeah he just goes in and tears rip shit through the through the scene and it works like the actors get better because he's like look at this fucking bill you got me
Guest:It's screaming at this woman about her phone bill.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:I also wrote down right here, this was where he says, he's talking about his own script and he says, there's some corny dialogue in it that would make the Pope weep.
Guest:I'm like, my God, what an amazing way to describe your own stuff.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Around this time is when we meet Uncle Bill, who will be the other kind of comedy duo member of the film.
Guest:Uncle Bill, who has some money, clearly.
Guest:Although when you see Uncle Bill's life, I remember the first time I thought this, I thought it was going to be bad.
Guest:Are we going to learn that he's hoodwinking this old man out of social security checks or something?
Marc:No, it turns out something broke Bill.
Guest:Yeah, and he's like sitting on hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Marc:And he's an intellectual.
Marc:Like, you know, at first you're like, who is this hobo?
Marc:But like, you know, but he's talking to his dad and, you know, apparently Bill was quite the bon vivant.
Marc:He says he was quite the scholar.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:He says like, oh yeah, if you ever had a question or needed to know how to spell a word, like Bill would be the guy to do it.
Guest:But wasn't he a teacher?
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:It never really come up with anything about his background.
Guest:There's one point where he starts singing songs that he wrote and poems and things.
Guest:And they sound fairly depressing, like something about a love that died of his and he's going to visit her grave.
Marc:But I think what you see, too, in that is the future of Mark.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Is that these Midwestern dreamers who are tapped in enough and romanticize the myths of whatever, whether it's being a poet or an intellectual or a filmmaker.
Marc:And you're up there in the barren country where all you have to sort of get you out of it are these dreams.
Marc:And so few people really manifest them.
Marc:But there are these sensitive sorts and these creative sorts that lock onto them.
Marc:And they're usually the town weirdo.
Marc:And, you know, so they're under that pressure.
Marc:But the community generally in Midwestern towns is a little more tolerant and nicer than than other places, perhaps.
Marc:So they indulge these kind of characters.
Marc:But you kind of see, you know, the what a broken kind of dream looks like in Bill.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And now he's just kind of playing the role that Mark sees a guy in his station should play, which is like, oh, this is the one person I know who has money.
Guest:So he's going to play the role of mogul.
Guest:Like this is like a studio mogul to Mark.
Guest:And to the point where he sits him down at the kitchen table and to sell him on giving him the money for the film just shows him like cheesecake photos of some actress.
Guest:And he's like, look, Bill, she wants to be in your film.
Guest:And Bill's like, cool with that.
Guest:He's like, yeah.
Guest:It's totally like what actually happens.
Guest:It's real Hollywood.
Guest:Like that could be a scene in a Coen brothers movie.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, so at this point in the film, he realizes that the prep is going very poorly and his funding is shot and he's going to need to finish another film to gain the seed money to make Northwestern.
Guest:And we find out that that movie is called Coven.
Guest:yeah uh and in one of my favorite parts of the whole movie uh where he's kind of just pontificating and his kind of stream of consciousness wrapping yeah and the director behind the camera asks him what is coven and he just boom right launches into it he goes coven is a 35 minute direct-to-market thriller film shot on 16 millimeter black and white reversal
Guest:boom has it oh that's the big plan right he's gonna sell that to make the money so yes so he's going to he's going to sell coven uh i guess the idea is to sell it in like film magazines or something and it's going to be a 35 minute vhs tape that costs 14.99 and that's what he's got to finish right
Guest:Right, and if he finishes that and sells 3,000 units... He can make Northwestern?
Guest:He'll make Northwestern.
Guest:We also find out that, yes, he is pronouncing it coven.
Guest:Everyone is pronouncing it coven.
Guest:And only about, like, 50 minutes into the movie does someone finally say, no, it's pronounced coven.
Guest:And Mark says, whoa, whoa, no, no, no, no, no.
Guest:Coven sounds like oven, and we can't have that.
Yeah.
Marc:I'd like to see who's that big actor from, you know, the giant that's in all the movies now.
Marc:He's, oh, come on.
Marc:He hasn't been on our show.
Marc:He was just in White Noise.
Marc:He played Adam Driver to play Mark.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:They're very similar.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Totally.
Marc:Energy-wise, size-wise.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Adam Driver is a little more laconic.
Marc:Right.
Guest:You know, it's that mania that's really important.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:But there's something about the tone, you know?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I love that you called Adam Driver a giant.
Guest:Like, that's your perception of it.
Guest:Like, I was running through my head of, like, you know, Andre the Giant-sized people.
Guest:I know he strikes me as a giant.
Guest:Yeah, there's also this moment where he's talking about getting going on COVID again, and he sets up this shot with these scarecrows.
Guest:He has Mike out there in the field with him.
Guest:And it's another one of these great moments where you can see...
Guest:his actual, in some ways you could call a kind of brilliance, right?
Guest:Like he has a good sense of the art around this and how to apply it.
Guest:He just has no language of how to communicate it or the type of people around it who can interpret a genius or an artistic brain, right?
Marc:Well, yeah, but I like that they're all still playing their roles.
Marc:You know, all the people...
Marc:are, you know, that he's cast as AD or whatever.
Marc:They're all kind of like, you know, looking to him for, you know, for the answer of how to act like they're supposed to act, you know?
Guest:And he, yeah, he can't really articulate it to them.
Guest:So they're at a double disadvantage, right?
Guest:They don't have a real leader.
Guest:And he puts these scarecrows, he's like, we're going to put these in here on a killer slant.
Guest:And then can you, he's like, can you see it?
Guest:And it's going to, I mean, can you get it?
Guest:completely inarticulate like off all of his talking and he you know he's such a motor mouth but then when it comes time to try to get people to understand the vision that's going through his head you cannot understand it at all until the end of the movie you see that it pays off with those actual shots that look like how he's described i know the shots are great
Guest:i love that he's also still explaining this to uncle bill on the way to the bank in the bank and after they've left the bank like like something that should have had to have been explained months ago like to set up a bank account to get like but he still has to try to convince him no no you'll get your three grand back like it's you sign all the checks
Guest:He's the most reluctant financier.
Marc:And Bill's sort of like, oh, I don't know.
Marc:Yeah, he's like, this doesn't sound kosher to me.
Guest:So slowly throughout, as this process is going, they're showing how he's making the film.
Guest:He's recruiting people to shoot the shots.
Guest:He gets his mother to give up her shopping days so she'll come out in the woods with him.
Guest:And that wasn't easy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But they're also, as they're doing this, slowly doling out like some biographical information about him.
Guest:So, you know, we find out that these scenes where you're seeing him driving around talking to the camera, well, that's because his job is he delivers newspapers early in the morning.
Guest:So that's a goldmine for them.
Guest:They could just get in the car with him and drive around and he talks his shit.
Guest:But it's also like, it's a child's job.
Guest:Yes, yes.
Marc:And it's so funny, like with the mother thing,
Marc:you start to realize like, like this people have been dealing with this nut for years.
Marc:Like, you know, like, Oh, what?
Marc:You know, like she's like, I have so much shopping to do, Mark.
Marc:And it's just like, that is something she's had to say to this kid since he was five.
Marc:Yes.
Yes.
Guest:Yes, but he convinces her to do it.
Marc:That's the thing.
Guest:His skill is, in a way, if he didn't have such disdain for normalcy and capitalism, he'd be a good salesman of something.
Guest:I mean, probably self-sabotage in any job he had, but he can sell.
Marc:Yeah, he got his Uncle Bill to give him some money.
Guest:Oh, and he's very skillful about it.
Guest:Like there's one point where Bill is giving him shit.
Guest:Like he's like explaining how he's going to make COVID happen and that, you know, we'll sell this to the buying audience and to the direct to market to consumers.
Guest:And Uncle Bill's like, who's the buying audience?
Guest:And he's like, people want to see this.
Guest:Who want to see this?
Guest:And he just keeps shooting him down at everything he's saying.
Guest:And then he's like, we're going to make it, Bill.
Guest:And you know what I'm going to do?
Guest:I'm going to bring over a bottle of wine.
Guest:You want red or white wine when I come over, Bill?
Guest:And then Bill's thinking about him, hmm, red or white.
Guest:He's like, yeah, yeah, now you're thinking.
Guest:we also find out that he has a second job at a cemetery so there you go it's like a childish job and a like a job that you're facing mortality every day every day yeah uh he also has a girlfriend his newer girlfriend but this is in light of the fact that he's estranged from his ex who he has three children with you don't find that out until about halfway through the movie
Guest:yeah um three kids with three kids who he takes to see they ask the kids what was the last thing your dad took now these kids wait before i say this line these kids are what would you guess they were nine seven yeah four maybe right nine is maybe even given too much credit might be like eight yeah
Guest:They say, what was the last movie your dad took you to?
Guest:They all three in unison answer, apocalypse now.
Guest:And they're like, did you like it?
Guest:And they look, they shake their head.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And one little kid goes, yeah, he kept saying the horror.
Guest:It's like on the list of inappropriate shit to take your kids to, like Apocalypse Now is very high.
Guest:So you get to know a lot about his family life.
Guest:You see, clearly he didn't have a good time growing up, that there was definitely problems with the mother and father that they don't get into detail with.
Guest:But they kind of leave it there for you to understand this was not a good household.
Guest:And this kid definitely retreated to fantasy a lot.
Guest:Mm-hmm.
Guest:I think it's interesting that when the director asks him, what were your, what were the films that inspired you?
Guest:It's like, he takes no time to think.
Guest:And he just says, Dawn of the dead, night of the living dead, Texas chainsaw massacre.
Guest:Like those are like, he just has it ready to go.
Guest:That's like his Holy Trinity in his head of what, what makes him who he is.
Guest:And the guy asks him like, what,
Guest:what about those things and he was like oh they were just they were things i didn't see in other films people talked the way that i would expect people to talk it didn't look like a fake hollywood film it had gray skies and dead trees and like as he's talking about all the things he likes in these movies they they're showing clips from the like amateur super eight movies he's made as a kid and yeah and
Guest:It matches up.
Marc:Like he was getting it to a certain degree.
Marc:There are also movies that make you think it's possible to make movies.
Marc:You know, like I just have to get these guys to walk stupid like zombies.
Marc:Right, right, right, right.
Guest:And then I can do it.
Guest:Yeah, and he talks about how it looked like these industrial grainy films that you'd see, like something they'd show you in shop class or something.
Guest:It didn't look like an actual film.
Guest:It was also around this time where he talked about what I was mentioning before, this kind of fear of finishing something and having it be complete and be real, which almost makes it even more astounding that he gets Coven finished.
Guest:He actually does complete this thing.
Guest:What we see then is as he's making Coven, we get the first of like one of two huge comedic set pieces in the film.
Guest:And this is the kitchen scene.
Guest:Oh, with the guy trying to put his head through the cabinet?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:They call it shot 37, which was apparently storyboarded to show that this guy's head was going to get rammed through a kitchen cabinet.
Guest:So their idea is to unscrew the cabinet door.
Guest:and score it, right?
Guest:You put a little scoring on the back.
Guest:So it'll break away, yeah.
Guest:So it'll break away, right.
Guest:And then the strategy is slam the guy's head through it.
Guest:Like not like take his head like right up into it, cut, then break through or whatever.
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:In real time, put this lawyer, doctor, whoever this guy was, some guy from the town who very patiently suffers through being part of this film.
Guest:And they do one shot.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Slam this guy's head into the cupboard.
Guest:Not only does it not break, the other cabinet opens and blocks the camera.
Guest:So the shot is completely ruined.
Guest:And the guy's hurt.
Guest:Oh, like it looks worse.
Guest:You know, Chris Lopresto and I've been watching a lot of wrestling lately.
Guest:It looks worse than anything in wrestling.
Guest:Like this guy's head slams so hard into this door.
Marc:And the fact that he stays game to do it, it's crazy.
Guest:Well, then they try it again.
Guest:It doesn't work again.
Guest:Mark starts trying to put his fist through it, which is not working.
Guest:They realize that there was nothing they were going to put through this thing that's going to actually break it.
Guest:They have to take the thing apart, basically saw the whole door, and then tape it back together.
Guest:So now it's a prop, not an actual cupboard to put somebody's head through.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:I remember the first time I saw that, I was one of those times of like having a hard time breathing.
Guest:I was laughing so hard.
Guest:I think because it was real.
Marc:Like you were really watching him do this to this guy's head.
Marc:And it's also, I mean, part of the comedic threat of this thing is just,
Marc:you know, Mark's kind of persistence and that this is all, it all has to happen.
Marc:So like everyone's operating in relation to that.
Marc:Like there's also this vibe of sort of like this guy's like bleeding on his head almost.
Guest:right but but but mark is it but he's like he doesn't want to disappoint mark yes he literally says it that guy he's like and not about the getting his head slammed but he's talking about how he always tries to have a time where he's going to leave because like who this guy's probably like a school teacher or something and he's like you know i always give him a deadline but i realize it's mark's dream to finish the film so i try to strike a balance on that level yeah
Marc:It's so Midwestern.
Marc:There's a sort of a neighborly element to it.
Marc:It's like a barn raising, you know?
Guest:Right.
Guest:And I do love that the movie takes time to just stop and show the kind of friendliness.
Guest:And there's the scene that comes up shortly after that cupboard scene in the kitchen where they have Thanksgiving dinner.
Guest:And you see his real tenderness for how he cares for Uncle Bill.
Guest:He gives him a bath and he gets him plowed with peppermint schnapps.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, yeah, but it also like you have to realize that in this kind of community, you know, this is like it's exciting.
Guest:This doesn't happen.
Guest:Well, that's indicative at the end of the movie when they premiere Coven and there's a line around the block.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Like these people were excited that Coven was made.
Marc:Yeah.
Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, I mean, it's like, and they'll talk about you.
Marc:Like, remember when Mark made the movie, you know?
Guest:Yeah, there's also that great scene where he is asking his mom to help him shoot, like, some insert shots.
Guest:He's got, like, her behind the camera.
Guest:And you can totally see through, like, it's completely transparent, their frustration with how they're communicating to each other.
Guest:Because he's like, Mom, is my head in the frame?
Guest:And she's like, oh, yeah, it's in the frame.
Guest:And then, like, he goes down slightly and his head is not in the, you're seeing the actual shots.
Guest:that's being shot and she's like oh now you're off the screen and you're and he's like wait mom what are you talking about what part of the screen he's like okay all right with all this film burning what are we doing now what you just tell me what to do
Marc:But he was on it.
Marc:He knew exactly what he wanted.
Guest:And so that's, that's the crazy thing.
Guest:The whole thing is in his head, which he says at one point, like he's doing this.
Guest:He's like, he's like trying to impress people where he's like, all right, I see this shot and you have dilapidated warehouses and you have, and he's like, and I've been here.
Guest:I've been to these locations.
Guest:So I see what's in here.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You know what would be a great double feature is this and Hearts of Darkness.
Marc:Totally.
Marc:It's like two versions of the same thing.
Marc:It's the yin and yang almost.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, then we got to talk about, especially because of the way we opened this up, the second set piece, comedic set piece of this movie, again, a thing I laughed at when it was happening...
Guest:so much i was losing breath yeah and this is um while he's in the process of doing adr for the film yeah he goes to uncle bill's house apparently uncle bill has played a small role in the film in fact in the opening scene of the film yeah and keeps telling him that it's the opening scene yeah yeah
Guest:Yes.
Guest:He's like, it's got to be on the money.
Guest:This is the first line of the movie.
Guest:And the first line of the movie is supposed to be Uncle Bill saying, it's all right.
Guest:It's okay.
Guest:There's something to live for.
Guest:Jesus told me so.
Guest:For some reason.
Guest:This takes 31 takes.
Marc:And you're showing the exasperated Bill.
Marc:He's like, no, no.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, my favorite thing is that on take one, they should give a shot of Mark and he knows he's fucked.
Guest:He knows this is totally fucked, but he's indomitable.
Guest:The spirit that he has through this whole thing, he is...
Guest:even as hopeless as this seems to get uncle bill to say these words they are going to do it they're going to do it until what happens where uncle bill just shuts it down and he's like i'm done i'm not doing any more of these yeah and they all start to sound the same like it's all right it's okay he somehow starts to mangle it and starts to like put the first part last and it told me at one party he tells him this shit is shits for the birds
Guest:Ever since I've seen this movie I've said that all the rest of my life Like there's something not going right I say this shit is shits for the birds Yeah
Guest:Basically, the last 25 minutes of the movie is just the dash to complete the editing and the processing of it.
Guest:And they have a premiere date at a local movie theater set up where he's literally working right up to hours before the premiere to get the film in the can.
Marc:I just love it because it's like this.
Marc:It's got this sort of Hollywood pacing like that.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:If it doesn't get delivered on this day.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You know, what's the fucking point of anything?
Guest:But to be perfectly honest, that probably was true.
Guest:They rented that movie theater, I'm sure.
Marc:Money-wise, yeah, yeah.
Guest:They had a deposit on it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, it's interesting at this part where you're seeing this kind of montages of him editing and putting stuff together, and you don't actually even see them on camera saying this, but he talks to Mike Schenck.
Guest:It's in voiceover.
Guest:You hear him say, Mike, what are the rewards of this?
Guest:Like earnestly asking him, like, what are the rewards of this?
Yeah.
Guest:And Mike says, I don't know, you'll be a famous movie producer.
Guest:And he's like, what are the rewards of that?
Guest:Like, like, it's this like, I don't know what, you know, obviously you're not seeing them on screen.
Guest:So you don't know why this conversation is happening.
Guest:But it really does feel like this moment where he's like, hang on, what am I doing this for?
Guest:Right.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And when he says, what are the rewards of that?
Guest:Mike Shank kind of laughs and he's like, I don't know.
Guest:Sex, money, power.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he's just sitting there and he's like, you hear Mark kind of considering this and he's like, sex, money, power.
Hmm.
Marc:and that's all you get and it's like oh yeah he is realizing i'm not sold on this as anything other than what it is right now right like but that's the way his brain works it has to be that way it's part of mania like yeah he's probably at that moment where he realizes he's done he's about done he's going to release this thing into the world and he wants to fucking you know just throw in the garbage well and that's what they say he's really depressed right now well
Marc:he just doesn't want to give birth to this thing.
Marc:Cause then it's all going to be over and people are going to move on, be able to judge him.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, that's true too.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:What's he going to do?
Guest:Well, the, the, despite any of those feelings, the premiere scene is like this truly celebratory moment.
Guest:That's how it's presented in the movie.
Guest:Other than uncle Bill, who clearly seems like he's on death's door at the premiere.
Guest:And he was, um,
Guest:But the great thing about that premiere is that you get the shots that we've seen set up through the whole movie.
Guest:So like, you know, in Coven, there's those scarecrows and they're in a killer slant in the field.
Guest:And you hear that soundtrack go, like, just like he said, even though he couldn't articulate it, he got it.
Guest:You get the Jesus told me so scene.
Guest:It sounds fine.
Guest:Like he got the good audio out of uncle Bill.
Guest:You see, you know, the cupboard scene, you see that guy's head go through the cupboard and it's cut fairly well.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I've watched COVID.
Guest:I don't know if you've seen it, but it's, uh, it's not good, but the, the shots are there and like the assembly of it is there.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:It's there.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It takes a lot to finish something like it is an accomplishment.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Definitely.
Guest:I remember even thinking at the time, it is not important whether Northwestern ever gets made.
Marc:No.
Marc:And it hasn't.
Marc:No, there's no way it was ever going to get made.
Marc:Right, right.
Marc:That guy was done, and then he's got to get out of the hole.
Guest:Well, the aftermath of it is, if we zoom up to present day, Mike Schenck died last year of cancer.
Guest:He was 27 years sober, though.
Guest:He kept his sobriety all through after making this film.
Yeah.
Guest:Mark never completed Northwestern or really any other feature.
Guest:He'd been making another feature since 2004 called Scare Me.
Guest:That never got finished either.
Guest:He did, however, make a documentary called The Dundee Project about UFO obsessives.
Guest:And that actually went around, like festival circuits and stuff.
Guest:I know it played here in Brooklyn.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:What's interesting is his life today, and I don't know what his life is like on a day-to-day basis, but if you go look, he's on all socials and you can see plenty of his work on YouTube and stuff.
Guest:He seems fairly entrenched in the kind of creator economy that exists now with YouTube and Cameo and TikTok.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:You know, if you look on his socials, he'll, like, you know, make you a video of him, like, introducing something for you for money.
Guest:And, like, I'm sure he gets some money doing that.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:It's almost like his type of...
Guest:kind of aggressive can-do spirit is better suited for this day and age than it was 25 years ago, 30 years ago, when, you know, there were not the resources to kind of have a far-reaching platform and for people to get in touch with you whenever they wanted to.
Marc:I guess.
Marc:I mean, you know, I don't know.
Marc:I don't know what he really saw himself as or it seems like he had a fairly romantic idea of the filmmaker and the process and, you know, doing something for himself.
Marc:I imagine that most of whatever he's got now is in direct...
Marc:a direct result to being this character in this documentary.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:And in Minnesota, him and Mike Shank for a while, they were just like local celebrities, right?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:In Wisconsin, rather.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:You know, they were on all the local shows and they, you know, they were the kind of people where if you were doing some type of thing in the film community of Wisconsin, you invited those guys to be there.
Marc:But there's no way that doesn't get sad.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Maybe not for Shank, but, you know, I mean, you know, the local character thing, it's sort of a heavy cross to bear after a while.
Guest:Well, all right.
Guest:Well, here's... Maybe this will make you think about that a little differently.
Guest:I did not, at the time, find this movie sad.
Guest:And 23 years later, 24 years later, I don't find it sad now.
Guest:I find that there are some parts that are bittersweet, and I feel sad for the situations that the people are going through.
Guest:But...
Guest:This was also lining up with the other day when we did another Good Morning Geniuses episode with you and Dan Pashman talking about the old morning sedition times.
Guest:Right, yeah.
Guest:And we played a clip of Brian from Everett.
Guest:Brian from Everett, yep.
Guest:And I started going back.
Guest:I was listening to some of the stuff he sent in to us or the stuff we did live on the air with him.
Guest:That was like a talented guy on the piano.
Guest:He would whip songs up out of nowhere.
Guest:Now, was there anything that was going to happen?
Guest:We don't know what happened to Brian from Everett.
Guest:We don't know if he...
Guest:is alive today or anything.
Marc:It was just a caller on the radio, but I saw him at a show when I went out there and met him in person.
Guest:And I don't think there was anything that could have possibly been really a payoff for that guy in the, in those terms.
Guest:But the full compliment of like fame and fortune and success is,
Guest:Like that doesn't have to be in the cards for people.
Guest:And you know who proves that?
Guest:Mike Shank in that movie.
Guest:No, Mike Shank.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He's sitting there blindfolded playing Bach on his guitar.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And it sounds good.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No, I get that.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:He's the version of himself that he wants to be.
Guest:And he's not tortured by it.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Yeah, but he's right.
Marc:But that guy, you know, the interesting thing about that guy is you can't quite understand his disposition in terms of his sort of acceptance and positivity or at least his relatively optimistic movement through life.
Marc:But it does seem like he has brain damage.
Marc:Like, I don't find the movie to be sad.
Marc:And I think that Shank's a different sort of situation.
Marc:than Mark.
Marc:But for Mark to sort of, not even rest on his laurels, but just have no choice but to take the fame that came along with him being himself as a character in this documentary, in my mind,
Marc:It kind of makes it doesn't make fun of him.
Marc:But if he's not going to be a filmmaker, he's not going to finish a movie.
Marc:He just becomes this caricature of himself.
Marc:And I feel that over time, even in the community, that eventually you just be I've known guys like that.
Marc:You know, it's like Rodney Bighamheimer, dude.
Marc:You were a thing, and now it's like, is he at the restaurant?
Marc:Yeah, he's always there.
Marc:So I don't know.
Marc:It may not be heartbreaking or tragic, but it is what it is.
Guest:Well, right.
Guest:And I don't know.
Guest:I didn't have this language for it when I saw the movie in the first place because I don't think I had read it yet.
Guest:But what I was reminded of is it started to get me thinking about one of my favorite essays.
Guest:which is by Camus.
Guest:And it's called The Myth of Sisyphus.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And the actual myth of Sisyphus is the story of rolling the rock up the hill for it to just get to the top and roll all the way down the other side and being doomed to that for eternity, this futile task.
Guest:And it's often presented as a kind of cautionary tale about getting in a rut and being stuck, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:What really with the Camus
Guest:essay is about is that this is a response to the meaninglessness and absurdity of life, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The struggle is the whole point.
Guest:And the last line of that essay is, the struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart.
Guest:One must imagine Sisyphus happy.
Guest:And I do have to think Mark Borchardt is happy with being Mark Borchardt.
Guest:I think he's a tortured person and he's sad in a lot of ways from things we couldn't even have access to, even though we've seen quite a bit of him.
Guest:I think the life he's led, I have to believe,
Guest:because he's still here, right?
Guest:Because he hasn't done anything at his own hand, right?
Guest:Sure.
Guest:He believes this life has been satisfying.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:You know, I'd be interested to talk to him, you know, but you're probably right.
Marc:Especially if he, you know, if he's relative, if he's just even just a little medicated, if not, he's probably, you know, got plenty of time where he's pretty chipper about being Mark Borchardt.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, the one kind of secret success in this movie, which I don't know that a lot of people know, is that the guy who directed it, Chris Smith, who went for almost 20 years not having a real follow-up to this.
Guest:There's a few small things that didn't hit.
Guest:Well, in 2017, he makes that documentary, Jim and Andy.
Guest:The one that had all the footage from Man on the Moon with Jim Carrey.
Guest:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:So he makes that.
Guest:It's a huge hit on Netflix.
Guest:And they hire him.
Guest:He's like basically the Netflix documentary guy now.
Guest:He made the Fyre Festival one.
Guest:He made Bad Vegan.
Guest:He made the senior, the Robert Downey senior one.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:He's an executive producer on the Tiger King.
Guest:Like he is now like doing what he was doing for American movie, but like to a very mainstream audience.
Guest:Like that to me is as interesting as anything that went on with Mark.
Guest:It's like, here's this guy made this masterpiece of a film over 20 years ago.
Guest:And it took him just about as long to find himself and find something, find something that could translate that.
Guest:What was he doing during the 20 years?
Guest:You can look at his filmography.
Guest:It's smaller documentaries that didn't get a whole lot of attention.
Guest:Huh.
Guest:Look at that.
Guest:There's a nice story.
Guest:It is.
Guest:And the other interesting thing about it is if you really think about what Borchardt is talking about through the whole American movie about how he wants to make these films about where people live and about America and American people and rust and decay.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:like he had his movie around him the whole time and chris smith went and made it like you know like there's a scene in that movie where where mike shank is telling him about this crazy lsd trip he had or pcp or something and that he almost died and that the doctors barely brought him back to life and they're like this was the worst case we ever saw and he's just telling him this as like mark is like editing film at a edit bay and
Guest:And then he's like, yeah, I got a I got a whole lot more of those stories if you ever want to hear them.
Guest:No, no desire to hear those stories like you could make many movies.
Marc:He's right there.
Guest:That guy is right there.
Guest:But, you know, it just goes to exactly what we're talking about.
Guest:It's like that wasn't real.
Guest:He's not.
Guest:Mark Borchardt was not sitting there in Menominee Falls, Wisconsin, going like.
Guest:what film studio should I invent here in this small town of Wisconsin?
Guest:And how should I start all these careers off?
Guest:And he wasn't going to become the Judd Apatow of Wisconsin.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, it's funny because when he gets Mike to do that scream, that's like one of the best points of the movie.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Is that this guy who is just like speaking in almost a medicated monotone is asked to do a scream for ADR.
Marc:And it's like blood curdling.
Marc:And it just sits there.
Marc:And when you're watching that movie, no matter when you watch it or how many times you watch it, you're like, oh, my God.
Marc:What's inside that guy?
Guest:It's so satisfying for everyone.
Guest:It's satisfying as watching it.
Guest:It's satisfying clearly for everyone who's in the room with him.
Guest:They're like, whoa.
Guest:He just nails it.
Guest:Oh, man.
Guest:Well, it is a very satisfying movie.
Guest:It's so satisfying.
Guest:I may go watch it again, even though I just watched it recently.
Marc:I feel like I have to watch it again now that you made all these notes.
Guest:Yeah, I recommend it to anyone.
Guest:Like I said, it is on Apple.
Guest:You can rent it or buy it.
Guest:You can buy it on Amazon.
Guest:If you can get a... I don't know if they're still in print, but the DVD, which I have...
Guest:has a commentary track that's basically a sequel.
Guest:Because the commentary track has Chris Smith and Sarah Price, the filmmakers, and Mark and Mike.
Guest:And they just talk the whole time.
Guest:It's fantastic.
Guest:There's also about an hour of deleted scenes.
Guest:I mean, I think they had...
Guest:you know, dozens and dozens of hours of footage.
Guest:So you get some choice deleted scenes in there and Coven.
Guest:Coven is on the DVD.
Guest:Oh, wow.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So if you, I don't know if it's like the kind of like, you know, Amazon used or if you have a good place where you can get used.
Guest:It's not Criterion Connecting?
Guest:It's not on Criterion, like physical Criterion though.
Guest:So I think the only place you can get Coven and get that commentary track is on the DVD.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Well, if you haven't seen it, please do.
Guest:If you have, I hope you enjoyed us talking about it.
Guest:And, you know, this, I think, lines up well with our show this week with Jason Walliner and Paul T. Goldman.
Yeah.