Today on Binger's a Symbol, the Oscar coverage comes to a conclusion with our final Best Picture nominee.

I'm still here.

We'll be back to cover that right after this.

Welcome to Binger's a Symbol, the podcast where we normally rewatch movies so you don't have to, But today we continue the Oscars coverage.

My name is Jay Scotty Saint Clair, and I'm joined by Ashley coffin.

How you doing, ash.

I'm still here?

Wrong movie?

How are you doing?

It's just us, Yes, yes, indeed, I'm good.

I'm good.

We were kind of combitsing off air that it's been not too eventful a day for me.

But I think that's kind of fitting because as we talk about this movie, it's a heavy experience and it definitely weighed heavily on me.

But how are you doing?

Really good?

Yeah, this movie was was stuff.

I feel like one thing the Oscars got right this year was telling me stories I didn't know anything about, like I think A Nickel Boys and probably others that I've seen so many at this point is just this long blair.

But yes, stories not stories, real events that happened that I knew nothing about, and I think this movie coming out when it did.

Now, I just pivoted from your question, but I'm going to just keep going.

That's that's okay.

I think this movie coming out now is good for people to take a like a good look at what living in a dictator kind of country is for sure.

Yeah, no, I'm I'm I'm great.

Okay, I'm sorry.

No, no worries.

Well, with that in mind, let's go ahead and tackle the synopsis so we can just get into this thing.

So I'm still here, which is translated from the Portuguese title of I Need to ask staw Aqui is a twenty twenty four or Brazilian political biographical drama directed by Walter Sias, based on Marcelo Rubens Paiva's twenty fifteen memoir of the same name.

The film stars Fernando Torres and Fernando Marktinegro as a Nice Paiva, a mother and activist grappling with the forced disappearance of her husband, dissident politician Rubens Paiva, played by Selton Mayo, during Brazil's military dictatorship.

Yeah.

I mean there's a subtlety and dignity in the performance that we see here from uh Fernando Torres and I completely like, I don't know this.

It took me a minute to get what was what she was doing.

But then when I finally did, I'm like, oh, you know, you would think that you know someone who would be so crushed under the pressure of what's happening to her.

You know, the police, I put quotes up are coming in and harassing her, her family, her husband, They take her husband, they take her, And I don't know the pressure of what's happening to her.

She never really lets it show through.

And the whole time, I'm just like, when's the breakdown so I can break down too, And like I was surprised I didn't cry during this because I felt like she kept me together.

I didn't cry until the very end, until we saw like the photos of the real people and got to see Rubens like on the screen.

Then like, I kid you, not, like a single tear rolled down my cheeks as the credit DEMI moored, but I'll go ahead and get this out of the way.

Like I went into this movie with a vague understanding of what it was about, but I really didn't know, and it ended up being an absolute gut punch for me.

Because it's it was kind of triggering and affecting me and things that are happening in my real life.

I haven't talked about this on air too much, and I won't spend too much time, but someone very near and dear to me in my life is currently an American hostage in a Venezuelan prison.

So to just like kind of yeah, to kind of like come into this movie and not know what it was about and effectively have like the main character in this family go through the same thing that me and my family are kind of going through, not knowing being stuck in limbo.

Yeah, it was just wildly, wildly timely, and I you know, I think if I could go back and do it again, had I known what it was about, I might have skipped it.

But I ultimately am glad that I saw it and got to learn about this.

And I agree with everything that you say.

I think this film is very powerful, very heavy, but I also think it's incredibly empathetic.

It really does focus on this family.

It feels like a real family, and to your point, she never really breaks down.

She is a pillar for her family, and it's so appropriate with the title, like she is still there She's not going to let this family fall apart.

And I think any other family, you know, the father, the patriarch gets arrested and you don't even know where he is, and then the wife gets, you know, arrested a few days later for asking about it, the oldest daughter.

And still this family managed to stick together.

And not only that, she comes out on the other side as a hero, as an activist, as an advocate for others.

Just wow, wow, what a what a what a story?

Yeah, and God, how do you follow that?

Jesus?

Sorry, sorry that you're going through that.

No, no, my God, and I it is I.

I have a fear of losing my partner more than anything.

Like one thing she did have was her family as a support system.

But you have to be the rock.

So like, you know, it's good to be able to have the kids there to be like, you know, to take care of their mom.

The like I think about, you know, something happens to Ken, like I don't know what I would do, and it I like go story, Like certain movies I won't watch because it's very like PS I love you this, Like I knew what it was going to be about, but I didn't know how or what or anything about the the the what's going on the sanctions Act or whatever it was going on in Brazil and the dictatorship.

But like that little thing alone, like it sticks with you and you think about it a couple of days after, you know, just you know, you know, in nineteen seventy one, I mean, that was brutal.

And imagine the PBT would not even admit that they had arrested Reuben, her husband, or let alone admit his death, which took a really long time for them to officially announce, like they got away with the sanctioned act of cruelty I think it was called, which is wasn't even overturned until the nineties, which just blew my mind.

And it took decades of her campaigning and not stopping for the family to finally get the government issued formal death certificate.

And what's even more gut wrenching is a couple officers were indicted in the crime, but they didn't serve any time, and nothing happened.

Really exactly, And you're just like, wow, yeah, the fact that she had to wait twenty five years to even get a death certificate and still she doesn't really know Ultimately, what happened to Ruben's and nobody really does and I did nobody well not, yeah, there are some individuals that know, but yeah, I did do some research and apparently it's you know, the understanding or the belief is that while this family's being tortured and you know, not knowing the fates of Rubens, apparently he was reportedly killed within a couple of days of being a restlers.

He was right, of.

Course, like that plate Oh yeah, I mean I felt so bad for her because he was probably killed while she was in there, because she was there for what like twenty days.

She kept writing she had something, and she was making lines on the wall while she was in a ceccle.

Yeah, oh my god.

We just saw it this Monday, twelve thirty in the afternoon.

I was like, Jesus Christ, Yeah, she's marking off how long she's in there.

She was taken with her daughter, and she didn't know whether her daughter was still there, And there was luckily a guard who was like helpful, call them nice, but he was helpful to her, like let her know the daughter was released within a day and kind of you know, being to her.

But yeah, I don't know, you just can't put yourself into having to be there alone while you're being harassed.

You know, it's secret police, it's not real police.

They're outside of your house all the time you have, you can't be on the phone.

She has a gazillion kids, what is there five of them at least?

Oh god, yeah, and they and you can't freak out because the outrage that you would if you went after them, they would take you and it would be interpreted as leftist defiance and make her look guilty of something.

So you have to keep it cool, and honestly, she keeps it like she really does it.

It's an amazing performance, oh.

For sure, for sure.

And like I think about like that scene with her at the bank, like just trying to get money to support her family, and it's like she can't because no one's acknowledging what happened to her husband, and it's like we can't say he's dead, we can't say he's arrested, and you can't take out these funds without him.

So yeah, just what a insurmountable to face.

And I agree with you.

She Fernando Torres gives a tour de force performance and really feels like a real mom.

Like I said, this feels like a real family, Like you see the way she interacts with the older siblings versus the younger siblings, Like she there are certain lies that she has to tell to those younger siblings to protect them.

Yeah, and yeah, it's.

Like fall in line.

Yeah.

Well, when the older daughter she goes to live in London for a little while and then she gets back, she's so disturbed by how disassociated her mom is from all of it and what's happening, and like, yeah, no, she doesn't ever break and that's what's crazy, and it kind of keeps the audience locked in this no release feeling, if that kind of makes sense where you want to, like I was saying, you want to break down and come pride with her, but it never comes.

And I feel like that's what we're supposed to feel.

What these families kind of felt like their emotional responses muted and shut down, and you know, they fear that they're going to be taken, But they also had this hope which broke my heart is they really did think that he was going to come back, and every but he's telling him, telling them he's going to come back, and then they get that call and she has like a moment, but she still doesn't break.

And then, like you were saying, we get like the family moves from this.

Not to be shallow, but god, I loved that house.

That house was gorgeous, supernaving that house would destroy me right on the beach, and they have to move from there to Sound Pollo to be safe pretty much exactly.

Oh god, yeah.

I think about that exchange in one of the later scenes that takes place after a time jump, and it's the adult version of Marcelo and one of the sisters, and I think it's the youngest sister and they're having the conversation like when did you accept that Dad wasn't coming home?

Oh yeah, yeah, that was just incredibly heartbreaking as well.

And you know, I hate to bring this up, but I do have to ask, like, I thoughts the dog, you know, so they have the family pet, the dog.

I'm sorry, I just.

I don't know.

Go ahead, I do want to say there's a dog, dad, And it's not funny.

But as soon as they showed the dog being saved, Ken leans over to me and he goes, that dog is definitely going to die, and sure does in a quiet Theater of seven People.

I yelled out, God, damn it.

Ah.

But that's the first time we really see her come into her power and actually like be like, get out of here, leave what are you doing here?

And she like freaks out, but she doesn't break down.

It's a more powerful kind of like get off my property, get out of here, let us grieve, right, And they do.

They do leave, Yeah, exactly, And I appreciate it for all the things that you bring up.

It is a very powerful moment for her.

But in the moment as it was happening, I was like, really, did we need to do this?

Do we have to do this?

Like hasn't this family endured enough?

But as I contemplated, I think it really was like further kind of cementing you like, if you can have, because I think it's you know, people can take umbrage with this if they want, but I feel safe kind of saying a fairly blanket statement is like I think most people when they watch a film, like they have more empathy than for animals than human characters because they're they're innocent, right, So, but if you can have.

But Reubens was effectively innocent too.

Sure he was disseminating information, but was he doing anything violent or not that we know of, and I don't think so.

Yeah, if you can have this empathy and compassion for this this dog, like, imagine how they feel about their father and I have.

You know, I am in a terrible situation currently, but I have been fortunate enough to not lose very very many people that are super close to me.

I've lost one grandma, but outside of that, so it like kind of helped me to ground me in that place, Like, you know, was it what would it feel like to lose a member of your family?

Yeah, and just like not know and like you were saying earlier, I mean, you know a family who's going through it.

And that's why I kind of want people to take a real good look at what can happen under a dictator because first they take the people who you see as enemies aka people with different opinions, but they're gonna come for you, like Brazil's military dictatorship.

I don't want to be people like political, but people should take a look.

I had no idea about this, and I know Brazil's like very proud of this movie, and I feel like I might be just in you know, the small group of people who didn't know about this, But I did read that the director of the film, Walter Sallas, he knew the family and as a teenager he spent time in that house in nineteen seventies, and he said they had this great like they always had great open minded discussions, and they love to play loud music and leave the windows and the doors were always open for people to come join in, and they had like a free spiritedness that rated it across their entire community.

And I feel like that's probably why they really entrusted him with doing the story.

Yeah, and I think that comes across in the filmmaking as well, like the use of natural lighting.

In the first scenes we get to see, you know, this beautiful house filled with boisterous laughter and drinking and cigars smoking and music, and then the scenes on the bench, it's sun soaked and it feels like paradise, right.

But then after his arrest when the agents come in there and effectively cover all the windows and shutter everything, and then everything gets a little more muted and dark.

So yeah, yeah, yeah, And then in terms of the you know, the real world parallels, Yeah, they're not lost on me.

Either I you know, obviously you cannot compare you know, people being rounded up and imprisoned and tortured and stuff like that to people losing their job.

But we're currently, you know, in the midst of an administration change, and what do we see.

There are people that are being targeted for particular programs and fields that they're in and they're losing those jobs.

So you know, it's not a one to one, but it certainly something to consider.

But it's also cautionary because you do have people in charge now who would love for this to be a dictatorship.

And it's a real slippery.

Slope, absolutely, God, So all at once it's yeah, small little little things, you know, it's.

Yeah, a little scary.

And Unice is now a human we're probably has passed by now.

I'm not sure.

I believe she passed away in twenty eighteen.

Okay, she was a humans Right campaigner for of course indigenous people, which is just an amazing job for her to do.

Like, I didn't know it was a true story.

At the end, I was like really gagged, yeah, because I didn't look.

I didn't a lot of these movies.

I was like, you know what, let's just watch them.

And I don't want to have to read a synopsis to understand what's going on in your movie, you know what I mean?

Sure, i'll do it refer like a Marvel movie because I can't help myself.

But for the Oscars, I'm like, let's let's go.

Your movie should tell me the story, and I'll let you know.

I read a very short thing.

I knew that there was a husband thing going on, and I was like, all right, but I had no idea how or wear, what and why.

I kind of went in.

Similarly, I knew it was about a woman that was dealing with the you know, displacement of her husband.

I mean, I had no idea.

I guess with the name Fernando Taurus, I could have extrapolated that it was probably South America.

I didn't really think about it.

I thought maybe it was somewhere in Europe, but what have you?

Yeah, Well, on that note the time jump, I understand why they did it, but I kind of want to make them.

I wonder what it would have felt like if they had.

If we kind of like or maybe the final scene would have been like the death certificate or something like that.

I would have been fine.

With that.

Was that the scene that made you cry though or tear to Demimore.

Once the actual photos of like Rubens and the family and you got yeah, that's when it started.

Perfect casting, by the way, for like everybody, Oh my god, and they looked exactly like them.

I wondered if that was her like trying to show emotion because her entire life she now she's we see her and she's kind of she's very old and she's a little grimacy, you know, like that old granny like I'm going to be like I get away from me.

You know.

She kind of had that like leave me alone kind of or because she's been spent like she spent her whole life kind of doing that.

And then watching it on the TV, you see her have a little bit of emotion and you're like, oh so yeah, I mean really good movie.

Definitely go see it.

Yeah.

As far as nominations, it's obviously nominated for Best Picture.

It's also been nominated for Best Leading Actress for Fernando Torres and Best International Features.

So of the three, I think Best International Features the easy win.

Yes, if Amelia Perez wins over this, I will be furious.

Oh definitely, Oh my God, because like and I don't know, I love Demi and I want her to win, and I'm going to vote for her in our game because I have to, because I loved her performance in the Substance, and I do think there's more to what she did in this.

But Fernando Torres might come out of nowhere.

What do you think it could?

Yeah?

One of the things I've learned as I become more clued in with the award season and the Academy and everything like that.

I can't speak to the source of it per se, but apparently there's a strong Brazilian contingency in the Academy and they are really pushing for this movie and for Fernandez.

So I do think there's a distinct possibility.

But I am still even as powerful and uh, just what a fantastic performance this is.

I still lean towards I give Mikey Madison the edge and to me Moore the edge, but I could totally see any any of the three taken it.

Yeah, well we're gonna find out very very soon in a very fun year.

I'm so glad we did it again.

Yes, me too, all right, anything to let the people know about other than all of the great shows on the Stranded Panda networks.

Check them all out, Sweets.

And for the final time, Deuces Bye.

Binger's symbol is a Stranded Panda podcast.

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