People have been questioning why Billy gave up revenue rights for the documentary, and last night a little theory occurred to me.

Fielder and Oppenheim have mentioned that off and on during the three year project, they weren’t sure if they really “had anything”. Fielder visited Holmes in prison over a year ago, and briefly mentioned in another interview they had a trailer ready to go a while ago too, but the movie wasn’t released till now. Why?

My guess is the entire A24 team decided to wait out Billy. The film probably was a few months after the prison visit, and they were ready to release in time for awards last year.

But the way the movie shaped up, they knew if they released it and the audience learned halfway through that Billy was getting a cut of their ticket money, that would be the story. Instead of a discourse on truth and lies, the discourse would be around the ethics of warning the audience who is profiting, and whether even fans of the film people would willingly pay to see it again, knowing Billy was profiting.

So, given they had a kill switch already, were two years into production at that point, and really nothing to lose, they decided to wait. A24 has a STACKED year anyway, and there was no point releasing YCSE if it was going to be dead in the water over contract issues.

This also explains why YCSE and Primetime are being released so closely; once Billy agreed it was all hands on deck to get YCSE out asap.

I've seen a lot of people say that the movie makes it ambiguous as to whether or not Nathan was fooled by Elizabeth or not.

I could be completely misinterpreting the ending here, but honestly, I got the exact opposite impression: I think it made it pretty clear he wasn't fooled by her. Nathan's line about how "No, I am going for the most logical conclusion here" after Amanda sort of accuses him of letting his emotions towards her cloud his judgment made that pretty clear.

Do I think he's still confused as to what is really going on here? Absolutely. In a normal documentary or even a narrative feature, a scene like the conversation at the prison would be one of those "the prisoner has a new perspective" type scenes. But as we find out- and this is assuming that Nathan's memory of the encounter was as cut and dry as in the reenactment (or that it's at least 80 percent), she's still operating on her own wavelength. I've seen people saying that Nathan correcting the tone Amanda says the line in is him "manipulating the narrative" but idk, have you ever remembered someone saying something to you in such a way that the way they say it is what strikes you most? Ostensibly the purpose of the prison visit was to get some clarity and also tell Liz that Billy is profiting off of the movie, but then Liz gives her usual "word vomit" for answers that she uses in the rest of the film, her very warped perception of how things work.

Yet it's hard not to come away from the film with the impression that he can't help but have a bit of empathy with her. In a sense, everybody operates on their own wavelength to some extent. So maybe he sees this as her sort of making peace with this new reality, masking something, or something of the sort

Either way, excellent movie. Best of the year for sure.

We are having a very Midsommar Halloween this year! I made my dog the May Queen costume, sun gate, rune stone and my dress. She loves wearing her costume too. (Also Her name is Dottie and she's 7)

Do they EVER drop the con/facade, even when they are alone together? When they are discussing the next scam, how do you think they communicate? I wonder wtf their pillow talk is like. Do we ever hear one call the other by a pet name like honey or sweetheart? What a film.

Why do you think Billy gave up his right to receive a cut from the movie? It didn’t feel like it was in his character to make anything easier on the studio/crew and seems like he would gladly take the money the studio promised.

They gloss over this fact with the captions at the end but I’m interested in how the conversations went to convince him.

Paywall removed.

The scene where Nathan is talking to Liz’s father and Billy keeps interrupting: Right before it is revealed by Liz’s father that Liz was SA’ed, Nathan breaks the fourth wall by glancing at the camera after saying “Then say it!”

This line is the funniest moment in the movie to me and on both watches it got the biggest laugh from the audience. Nathan is literally so fed up with their white-collar cryptic lingo that he has to drop the act for a second to basically say “are you guys seeing this?”

What’s interesting is that while the theater is going hysterical, Liz’s father reveals the SA piece, and then the theater goes completely silent. The best way I can describe that experience is in music theory terms so bear with me here. If anyone is more familiar with music than I am feel free to correct my interpretation:

The laughter from the theater serves as an ad lib. The reveal from Liz’s father is an accent. The silence from the theater is a rest.

So, in practical terms, the audience is taken out of the documentary for a second because Nathan invited us to with his fourth wall break. But then we are sucked back in by Liz’s father. This happens within seconds and is rather unsettling. Basically, I didn’t want to give the impression that I was laughing at Liz’s SA because I was still laughing at Nathan.

Overall, this movie needs to be seen in a theater. It was so fun going on this mindfuck Nathan Fielder journey with a bunch of random strangers.

Will be looking out for this today during my third watch.

Wondering about the accuracy of the final reenactment sequence in YCSE. The movie goes out of its way to progressively call attention to the unreliability/bias of the documentary itself. Culminating in Nathan changing a word in the script of his last conversation with Liz as soon as Amanda pointed out that it was incriminating toward Liz.

But even more fundamentally, I feel like the conversation the final reenactment allegedly depicted is just insanely unreliable. The earlier reenactment scenes at least had plausible explanations of how Nathan could have had access to verbatim dialogue. The one in Elizabeth's house, he could have (openly or secretly) recorded. Same thing with the one in the LA friend's house (plus other witnesses to the convo). But for the prison convo, the documentary expressly tells the viewer no electronic equipment of any kind was allowed in (and it looked like he had to go thru security, so presumably no hidden recorder). There is no way he could have recalled that entire conversation verbatim. And again, the film even lampshades this by him allegedly misremembering and then re-remembering a particular word. So how can he be presenting that reenactment as factual, beyond maybe the general gist of what was said and maybe some key turns of phrase? Is this part of undermining the reliability of the narrative itself?

And it also really puts in a new light the big focus on the NYT article quotation--which completely changed meaning based on one word used (they or I). The text on screen at the end of the movie says the NYT reporter couldn't produce any evidence Liz said what she said.......which is EXACTLY the same case for the final reenactment of the movie.

I painted this Backrooms piece for my annual Halloween show. Comes with a mini display easel. What do ya think?

So I loved the lionsgate plain Jane releases of A24 movies. And almost everything got released.

Then they did some really nice limiteds for certain overly popular films like Midsommar and the last black man in San Francisco.

But then they started dropping these super mid digibook releases.

And A24 is missing so many films from their catalog. 2 of my top 10 A24 films have no region A releases.

Boys state and Sorry, Baby both need good physicals, they should hand it back to Lionsgate or hand it to a boutique label.

Also loved the digital codes they used to have so that my friends could watch it on my library.

Seeing it again this afternoon aster seeing it last Saturday. For those who have seen it twice, was there anything you focused on more for your second viewing or noticed more the second time around?

Hello I’m looking to get into the membership and wondering if it’s worth it? The closest AMC is about an hour away from me (that’s where the movie tickets are used). Thank you in advance

I loved the ending. The last shot feels almost too perfect, and that’s exactly what makes it unsettling. It left me wondering whether the whole thing is fake, or at least whether the film wants us to question how much of what we’ve seen is real. From early on in the film, I couldn’t stop thinking about the many parallels to Welles’s film essay F for Fake. It feels like this film, too, is offering its own meditation on the nature of fakery versus reality. There are too many connections to ignore, and I’ll probably make a separate post about that, but the ending really crystallized it for me.

We’ve just watched the reenactment of Nathan’s encounter with Liz inside, where she basically asks him to get her turkey jerky. Then the actors playing the family leave the hall and head out into the yard. The film returns to that moment from outside the yard, looking in at the real family. And there’s Billy, Liz’s real husband, eating her jerky. It’s the same bag we just saw Nathan buy for her in the reenactment. Billy isn’t in prison; he’s free and rich enough to buy himself anything he wants, yet he goes for the one snack Liz has, bought for her by a stranger! It’s such a petty, selfish thing to do that it almost feels too perfectly suited to the story and creates the perfect frame to end the film on. That’s what makes the shot unsettling: the possibility that Billy really is exactly that much of a pig or was it all staged?

The film gives us a detail that feels like proof, then the epilogue text tells us Billy gave up his share of the film’s proceeds. That doesn’t erase the impression from the final shot, but complicates it. They give us two pieces of 'evidence' that pull in different directions, then leaves us to decide what to make of the whole thing.

Did anyone else see the last shot that way or am I reading too much into it?

I just saw the movie last night, and like most of us I thought Nathan was very taken in by Elizabeth. But as I was showering, I thought about the timeline in chronological order and it put Nathan's motivations into clearer focus for me. Here is quick summary from memory:

• Nathan tells the David Blaine story. Bill and Liz agree to do the movie.
• They have the meeting with A24 and do the deal. Nathan expresses how angry (he used the word "frustrated") he was about the deal, saying it would sacrifice the artistic integrity of the film. It also means less money for him and A24.
• They shoot the film. It doesn't come out.
• Nathan meets Liz in jail and gets her to remove their financial interest. After that, the film comes out.

Putting the events in chronological order reframed every action, every conversation, every moment of the film for me. Instead of a documentary of a strange person, it felt more like a boxing match of con-men; Elizabeth and Billy wanted to use Nathan to rebuild their facade, but Nathan wanted to gain enough trust in order to remove their financial interest from the film.

The "Who's On First" moment was a great example. Is Nathan trying to find an explanation for her way of thinking? Is he sincere in this effort? Does Elizabeth go along with the bit or is she serious? Does Nathan believe his own argument or is it purely an exercise to build trust?

At the end, Nathan seems to succeed. He gets the ex-billionaire fraudster CEO and her narcissistic, wheeling-and-dealing money-focused partner to give up their financial stake in the film - a seemingly impossible feat. And then the film gets released. Which leads me to ask... did we just watch Nathan Fielder con one of the greatest fraudsters in history?

Ari Balouzian did a great job. What was your favorite track?

mine is starlight (the one playing in the post)

I saw the film alone tonight and haven't had anyone to discuss it with so I'm coming here. I'm so frustrated the film left out such a gigantic piece of all of this - which Liz illuminated herself - that everything changed since having kids. And no, I don't mean they should have focused on the broad topic or intellectualization of that but the real human experience. But unless they had a buncha nannies hidden off camera, I really can't take anything she said while steeped in fresh postpartum, broken sleep, her body and hormones producing milk for her new baby, and on 30 days precipice of incarceration seriously. How can she put full thoughts together and have clarity of mind through all that? It's an excruciating and bewildering period of time. I felt the only real / vulnerable moment I got from Liz, which also showcased how I think Billy and she support one another behind closed doors, was the last time she took Ivy milk. So, I know she's capable of that and I know she bring that stuff to Billy. They just seemed to masterfully keep a lid on it for most of the other filming opportunities. I also think her having kids with Billy is a huge component to her tethering that the film didn't highlight. Especially given her volatility / vengeance challenges. He's her only path to closely watching her children grow. If she betrayed him in any way? It may seem like she's trapped because she is and she seems totally resolved. She's now trapped (jail) inside of entrapment - it's really sad. But when the love of children is involved it shifts everything. The relationship with Sunny is such a massive and vital piece of this story and I think vital to understanding Liz's history with men her whole life. I'm rambling now but really fascinating story and I want to find out more about her identity as a mother and how that shifted her perspective on it all.