Spotlight (2015) / Green River Single Barrel Wheated Bourbon

0:00 In 2015, director Tom McCarthy and star Michael Keaton gave the world a studious recollection of one of the most explosive stories in newspaper. History In 2025, we returned to Owensboro, KY to try a rarer bourbon. The film is Spotlight. The whiskey is Green River weeded bourbon single barrel. And we'll review them both. This is. The Film and Whiskey podcast.

0:48 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 Brad Gee, it is 8:30 PM on a Monday nights and your boy is tired. I have. I've hit the age where 830 is like getting myself ready for bedtime now. I am right there with you. 9:30 to 10:00 PM is a great bedtime, my friend. It sure is, dude. And we're going to get ourselves there, Brad. We are going to get out of here in an hour. And we're also going to keep the energy up. I will not let this episode flag because of our own tiredness, Brad, even though, if I can be frank, today's movie is a little more on the solemn and heavy side of things. Yes, we're talking about 2015's Spotlight. This is the movie that won Best Picture for the year 2015, beating out a movie that we've already done before, The Revenant, which was its primary competition that year. Brad, I've had Spotlight kind of circled as a film of interest for us because I know that to my knowledge, you had not seen it. And I was really excited to see what this kind of small, quiet procedural drama would would do for you as a movie viewer. Yeah, so this definitely was my first time viewing Spotlight. I was familiar with the content of the film, as most Americans were.

2:18 I was very aware of all the wild things that happened in the early 2000s when the Boston Globe decided that it was time to uncover a lot of really gross stuff going on in the Catholic Church. It was a very interesting experience to watch this, Bob. I did not know that this won best. Picture. Yeah, it sure did. And it's like, I don't know how to explain it because it seems to be a very well liked movie. It has an 8.1 I believe on IMDb it's in the top 250. So in addition to in addition to winning best picture, it has checked that box in our four criteria for what could be considered a modern classic. The people seem to like it.

3:02 The awards body certainly liked it. The critics really liked this movie. But it doesn't scream Oscari movie in in that like I think a more over the top version of this movie is what people would expect. You know, like where everyone's shouting and everyone like Mark Ruffalo has the one scene in this movie where he has his little Oscar clip. Aside from that, I feel like this movie is very purposely understated and tries to be matter of fact in the way that it portrays the events that happened in the movie. I really appreciate that. It also just kind of strikes me as an oddity for a a Best picture winner because we're so used to Oscar films being bigger and more sort of, what's the word, Brad? Bombastic.

3:49 Hysterical, I guess. Yeah, exactly. Well, I'll I'll give you an easy way of comparison. The movie I would have thought would win this year might be Mad Max Fury Rd. You know what I mean? Like that, there's a world where I could see that winning Best picture in a lot of different years. It's not Even so much that it's, it's the subject matter that isn't awarded, but there was a really funny sketch that Seth Meyers did on his late night show a few years ago called Oscar Bait the Movie. And it was like a 5 minute trailer that just had every trope of an Oscar E movie smashed into it. And I, I think about movies like The King's Speech, which also won the Academy Award.

4:33 And that is, is similar in that it's like a very small movie, but I feel like it's characters get their, you know, stare right down the barrel of the camera and deliver your impassioned speech moments way more than characters in this movie do. And so, yeah, I, I'm excited to dive into it. Folks, if you are new to film and whiskey, welcome in. We talk about movies here and we talk about whiskey this season. We're looking at movies from the past 20 years. We're asking the question, does this deserve to be considered a modern classic? Now, Brad, you've already said that this is your first time watching Spotlight. This is probably like my third or fourth time watching it all the way through, but it it definitely seems to be a fixture on, if not cable channels now, then it like the stars and showtimes of the world anymore. I always see it playing somewhere. So it seems to be a movie that people have gotten around to seeing.

5:29 I'll be interested to see how many of our listeners follow up with us and tell us they have or have not seen this one. Do you think this has been a widely seen movie since its Oscar win? I have to imagine, no, mostly because I've never really heard anyone talk about it. Like even in our lead up to this, Bob, I don't know if I've ever really heard you mention it. It, it doesn't seem to garner a lot of conversation at at the very least in my world, in my sphere. So I know I don't think many people have seen this, Bob and I base this off the fact that I don't think so. Boom. That's all we can do, Brad.

6:11 All right. Well, on that note, let's go ahead and jump into our first segment of the day, which we call Brad explains. Brad's going to give us the movie plots with only 60 seconds sticking on the clock, so let's go ahead and do your take with this little segment that we call, Brad explains. Brad Explains is the part of the show where Brad breaks down the plot of the movie that he has just seen, often for the first time. This is of course Brad's first time seeing Spotlight Brad. Usually we tend to be a little lighter hearted with breaking down the plot of our films. I don't think we could get away with that today, nor would I like to. So you have 60 seconds to spoil this movie. It is based on true events, so if you haven't seen the movie folks, you might be familiar with the subject matter of it.

6:54 I would highly recommend watching the movie if, if for no other reason than you are an Oscar completist and you just haven't gotten around to it yet, Hit pause here, Go watch the movie Spotlight and then rejoin us for the rest of the episode. Brad, one minute and go. Spotlight is a film that follows 4 reporters who are a part of the Spotlight team at the Boston Globe whose goal is investigative journalism. They find themselves turned on to a story about abuse in the Catholic Church, encouraged by their new editor, guest lead editor Marty Baron, who's a newcomer to town and encourages them to pursue this story. They begin to track down leads, find lawyers who are involved in the cover up, and eventually make a discovery in the form of letters written to the Bishop, the Archbishop of the Boston area, that indicates that he knew about these abuses all along and worked to cover them up. All right.

8:04 That's Spotlight folks. So Brad, I'd like to just kind of turn it over to you when it comes to talking about this movie. Where would you like to start today? I think it's probably worth moving our way through the performances because it feels like there has to be a conversation eventually more focused on like the subject matter of the movie than the movie making itself. And I think the conversation about the subject matter could easily take up the entire episode. So I am I am curious to talk about the just the movie itself. And, and I don't say that in any way to minimize the subject matter.

8:49 The the subject matter is probably the weightiest that we have ever covered here at at the Film and Whiskey podcast. Which is like, again, thank you for the disclaimer. Not wanting to minimize anything. When I think about this movie, I'm like, oh, that's a really good movie about the work of journalists and the day-to-day, like getting down and dirty with your job and and pounding pavement and knocking on doors and interviewing people and having dead ends. And like, yes, they uncovered a big story. I never think about it from the angle of like, Oh my gosh, the subject matter of their story is, is a significant downer of a film.

9:30 Because like, I really do think to talk about the movie making here that what Tom McCarthy, the writer and director of this movie, has done is show that day-to-day life in such a frank, matter of fact, understated way that it never feels like they're going for this big, weighty, frankly Oscari type movie. It just like wants to portray just the facts, ma'am, you know what I mean? And I think that that is the best possible way they could have portrayed this subject matter because otherwise it starts getting a little bit too manipulative. And when you start being manipulative with real people stories that way, then I start to feel like this is icky, you know what I mean?

10:19 100% And and that's actually, I read an article interviewing Sasha Pfeiffer, the real life Sasha Pfeiffer, who is one of the journalists who who did this story. And they asked her about why she and the others agreed to let you know, I don't know about their life rights, but to let their to let their story be portrayed by Hollywood. And she essentially said, like I and the others were initially extraordinarily hesitant to allow our stories to be told because we didn't want it to become a glamorous thing, that we were covering this horrific story.

11:01 And it it wasn't until she sat down with Tom McCarthy and saw like, pieces of the script that he was writing that she was like, OK, I think that this is going to be done well. And upon review and watching of the film, all of all of the journalists seem to have very positive reactions to how their lives were portrayed. Let's, I mean, again, I think that's a really good thing. And to get back to your point about performances, I kind of said all that to say I don't think any of the performances in this movie are like, they didn't wow me, But that's also the intention of the movie, you know? And I think that's why sometimes people have poked a little bit of fun at Mark Ruffalo's performance. I actually think Mark Ruffalo's pretty good in this movie, but he is really the only one that's given this big dynamic scene where he gets to blow up at somebody. Nobody else gets that.

11:55 And it's because they're playing real people, and real people have to either regulate or suppress their emotions at the workplace for the most part. Yeah, and they have to keep their jobs. Exactly right. That's and that's why they have to keep their emotions in check. And I think with that in mind, you're recognizing that everybody is is operating at a pitch or at a meter that is much more like compacted. You know what I mean, that there's no fluctuations in people's behavior here. But within that sort of paradigm, I think the performances are across the board really, really good in this movie, man. And I think that the Ruffalo blow up, they do such a great job of explaining it when he and Rachel McAdams are sitting down and I think they're drinking a beer together. And he explains to her, like, I know that I left the church, but I, I always had this hope, like deep buried inside me that one day I would return that, that it meant something to me, that it, it would be a safe place for me.

13:00 And this whole story has essentially destroyed that hope, that dream, that safe place. And it's like, oh, yeah. Like, this is something that he didn't even realize how important it was to him until they were like, you know, 3/4 of the way through investigating this story. And I think that's why this script really succeeds is that it gives its characters the proper motivations and the proper understandings of the world that they live in so that they feel, like you said, Bob, just like incredibly real normal people. I I also think about Brian Darcy James, he has a realization that one of the Centers for like rehabilitation that they have housed these pedophiles in is like 2 streets over from him. And you get a really great tracking shot following him as he's like running down the streets at night and stands there staring at this house.

14:07 And like, it's not as explosive as Ruffalo's scene, but it he he gets that weighty, meaty, honest human response to the the grossness of this of the subject matter of this film. I think let's kind of start down towards the the more supporting characters and work our way up here. So you mentioned Brian D'Arcy James. I think that he's like secretly the backbone of that entire newsroom. Really unsung performance and character 'cause he is just like the quiet one, but he also has maybe the most profound little story beat. And it is that like he has small children and he is living like essentially next to one of these centers and, and, and the way he's trying to deal with that information.

14:57 And at one point he even goes in and talks to Michael Keaton, who's essentially his boss and says, like, when can we start telling people? Like I have friends who have kids in this neighborhood and they have to, they just have to sit on that information. And it it, it makes him a little queasy and it calls the audience to question like, hey, like I understand how journalistic ethics and journalistic integrity work, but like, is this really in the common good and interest to, to sit on this kind of a story? It's a really great like they use his character really well to help flesh out those ethical things of the story. And what I love about that scene and, and collection of scenes is that it points back to what we've said about this movie just feeling very raw and authentic when you compare it to something like The Imitation Game, which is, you know, pursuing the Enigma machine. And they finally break the code.

15:54 And, you know, they realize that they can't act on the information, otherwise the Germans will realize that the code is broken. And I just remember that scene being like, like a death knell. And it was so dramatic and so overwrought. And it's like if it has a very similar vibe of like we have information and we have to sit on it for the for the common good. But it felt so much more impactful in a film like Spotlight than it did in something like The Imitation Game, that which is way more dramatic and but you know, both films are based on true historical events.

16:34 All right, so moving on from Brian Darcy James, I want to talk just really briefly about John Slattery, who plays Ben Bradley Junior, who I believe is the editor in chief at the time at the Boston Herald or the OR the Globe, rather. Ben Bradley Junior is the son of Ben Bradley, the very famous editor of the Washington Post, who was there when the Watergate, you know, scandal broke. Slattery in this movie is really interesting. So this is like right, I believe right after or right before Mad Men wrapped up and he was really popular because of Mad Men. He's never really made a huge dent in Hollywood.

17:14 I really do think that if I had to pinpoint 1 performance, that's I don't want to call it the weakest performance, but like you could slot anybody into that role. It's it's this one because I feel like he's just playing the guy from Mad Men, but they put him in a more frumpy looking shirt and they said, OK, here you go, now you're Ben Bradley. I don't know. Did you have any any thoughts on him? I thought he was just OK. I, I've never been impressed with him as an actor. You know, I, I watched the entire Mad Men series. I thought he was good, not great. The one confusing piece of this script is that they make it seem like, and maybe I'm wrong on this, to me it felt like they made him seem like the guy who covered up the story in the first place, right it? It seemed like it was going that direction. So let's let's touch on this really quickly. So very early on in the movie, they they are encouraged to probe deeper into a story that was like on Page Six of the paper about this priest who had abused children and maybe possibly Cardinal Law knew about it. And so they're starting to probe, and they talk to a past victim of abuse who has a survivors network in Boston now. And the guy basically says, like, I have a whole box of stuff here.

18:32 I sent this to you guys like five years ago. You didn't do anything with it. And then about halfway through the movie, there's another revelation that a lawyer who seems like a sleazeball who's, like, doing the church's dirty work, actually was trying to be a whistleblower and submitted a whole list of names to the paper as well. And that got buried. And it seems like they are working their way towards this revelation that John Slattery's character, you know, unknowingly or knowingly, was the one that killed those stories. And it just never goes anywhere. And in fact, like, it goes in a different direction at the end of the movie. But I feel like that revelation lands with so much more of a thud because it feels like they're trying to manufacture some sort of dramatic reveal here. Yes, and I I didn't realize it until we started talking about how natural this movie feels.

19:23 I think that's why it feels so weird is because it feels like the the scriptwriter, the director who met would I guess it's the same person that right. It feels like Tom McCarthy is trying to shoehorn in some sort of drama into the story like, oh, their editor is actually the one who killed it the first time and is he going to try to do that again? And and it's like, no, Michael Keaton just it was his story back in the day and he lost track of it because he's a busy news man. And like, I actually love leave Schreiber in that moment and the the way he handles it with grace and basically is like, hey, crazy stuff happens in the news world because we're really busy and there's grace for that too.

20:11 You guys are doing great work. Now let's get this story out there. I great, great scene from Leave Schreiber. It just felt like there was a lot of time and energy wasted throughout the rest of the film, making John Slattery the bad guy when when he really wasn't. All right, let's talk about Liam Schreiber because I think I've always loved him as an actor and I feel like he is a pretty underrated actor. He's done a lot of great work. He's, you know, been the the headliner of a number of television shows. He's been the headliner of a number of movies and yet he just doesn't seem to have like the star power that one would think for a guy that's been acting for 2530 years now. I think that his turn as Marty Baron is the supporting actor nomination this movie should have gotten. So Ruffalo gets nominated.

21:03 I think that Liev Schreiber is the guy that, like, understood the assignment better than anybody else. Like, his character is a man of very few words. He doesn't seem to have much of A personality at all. And yet he is quietly like, the moral compass of this movie where everybody else is, you know, they've been too close to the story to recognize their own moral failings until later on in the movie. He is an outsider, just comes in and is like, no, we like, this is our responsibility. Let's do this thing. Absolutely dude. I, I was blown away by his performance and you know, not to not to disparage anyone else, I think he's the only person in this movie that I was like blown away by.

21:45 I think that when he looks at Michael Keaton, I believe maybe it's John Slattery when he looks at that one of those two early in the film and just so incredibly gently says this sounds exactly like the story a local paper should cover. I like the way he delivers. That line is just so freaking good. I I could not get over his performance in this movie and, and the, the scene with oh, who's who plays the Bishop. Oh, who does play the Bishop? Len carry you? I'm not familiar with him, but yeah. He is the patriarch in the TV show Blue Bloods. That is the only reason I know of him. He I thought that the scene between the two of them was so freaking good.

22:41 And when he opens up the present and it's like a catechesis, like, you can feel like the little bit of anti-Semitism. Like. In the present, it's it's just freaking perfect. And his response to it is like just kind of just could to stare at it. It's such a great performance from Liev Schreiber. I'm so sorry to to derail us here. Let's talk about Len carry you for two seconds. How am I not familiar with this guy? He's been in so many movies. He has one of those faces where it's like, I know I've seen this guy before, but he was Tony nominated for the musical Applause.

23:22 He was in the Sondheim musical, A Little Night Music. He also was the originator of Sweeney Todd on Broadway. Like, no, yeah, my guy, what a career. Unbelievable. Wow, the original Sweeney Todd. He is Sweeney. There you go. That's. Wild. I so I've literally seen him as a former police chief of New York City, and I've seen him as a corrupt Archbishop of the Catholic Church. There you go. Sweeney Todd didn't quite make it onto my list of suspected roles. All right. We've touched on Ruffalo. Let's talk about Rachel McAdams because I think that she has a really difficult ask in this movie, too. She's the only woman in this movie, essentially. I mean, she might actually be the only female person. Except for like when when Michael Keaton goes over to his buddy's house and his wife answers the door like. It's or or when the when she is interviewing the one priest at the door and he's just like, yeah, it touched kids. And then his sister comes to the door and is like, get out of here.

24:27 It's. A great Boston accent man, by the way. Thank you. Yeah, Rachel McAdams, I think a pretty thankless role once again. She she has one of the more, I don't want to call it like a boring character, but like I think that you are supposed to really empathize with her and with Ruffalo's character. And one of the bigger flaws in the movie for me was that maybe it's because they're supposed to be like they're the 30 somethings. They're the ones we're supposed to relate to. I just found myself way more interested in Liev Schreiber and even Brian Darcy James's characters than with either Ruffalo or Rachel McAdams character.

25:07 I I enjoyed Rachel McAdams. I I think that she gets a decent amount of screen time and and you're allowed to get to know her. I I think her performance is an example of where the script is so understated and so based in realism that she's not the most interesting character. And, and it's like supposed to be that way. And it's supposed to be just this, you know, girl who lives with her grandma and goes to church with her sometimes and is a reporter. And that's kind of boring. And that's the whole point. But it's also a little boring. Yeah, I will say though, like, they they really pay that off though, because as you watch her grandma read the article at the end of the movie and just like, ask for a glass of water, that is like, what a crushing line, dude.

26:01 Because you know exactly what that means. Like that woman's entire world view has been shattered. Yeah, yeah. And and that's like I said, we wouldn't totally get into the the subject matter a ton, but like, that's the brutality of what happened and why it needed to be uncovered. Is that for better or for worse, the Catholic Church can and should represent some of the most beautiful things on this earth. And and that's why it's so damning and so disgusting when you see the brokenness that was uncovered. All right, man, let's finish up this cast list.

26:42 Michael Keaton is in this movie The year after he is nominated for the Academy Award for Birdman. And I always think that he won it. And then I remember that Eddie Redmayne won it that year. And so it. I won't get into that, obviously. Yeah, I think Keaton's fine here. I think that like, he's a really good person to slot into a movie where he has lines that are like, come on, Jimmy, this is our town. We were, we're we're Boston boys. We grew up here. Like, that's a great Michael Keaton line. I don't necessarily know if he's like the perfect person for this part, but I thought he was pretty good. I I think that this is like if this was a more traditional All the King's Men, Goodnight and Good luck. This is like a classic George Clooney role. I think because they are trying to base it more in real life, they need to get a less good looking actor. And so they got Michael Keaton and like Keaton's fine, he, he's decent.

27:43 I I don't know if there's anything about his performance that really stands out to me though. I respect that Michael Keaton is always going to be Michael Keaton in a movie, though. And like, he has this, this repressed manic energy. You know, it's the thing that made him such an interesting Batman because he goes from being really calm 1 moment to like smashing the vase and saying, you know, do you want to get nuts? Come on, let's get nuts. And he's always going to have that, like, right under the surface as Michael Keaton, but for such a long time. You know, Bill Simmons makes this comparison all the time, But he talks about how, like, Michael Keaton and Tom Hanks were kind of neck and neck throughout the 80s because they were mostly comedic actors, and they were trying to branch out. And then all of a sudden, Hanks took off. And I think about like, if you put Tom Hanks in this movie in the Michael Keaton role, I think it's a significantly worse movie because Tom Hanks is going to try to do the like, I'm taking this very seriously, Tom Hanks thing, and I listen, I love Tom Hanks, but we talked about this even in like our Captain Phillips thing a couple months ago. Watching Tom Hanks try to play realism is just something that I don't think is really in his catalogue anymore. He's been a movie star for so long that he can only act as a movie star.

28:59 And I think Keaton's still able to tap into the the energy of like, I'm a guy from the streets of Boston. And it works so much better here. Yeah, it kind of reminds me of like a Harrison Ford. I was a Carpenter in Hollywood for a long time trying to get acting jobs. And like you said, Tom Hanks. Is is Tom freaking Hanks like he is a a bonafide a list movie star. I think Keaton, like I said, he gives the role the right amount of energy. I I don't I think what I'm trying to say is I don't know what to do with this movie. Bob I I like it.

29:44 I don't think I love it and it's weird because the reason I don't love it feels like it's not movie like enough for me. But it it's not trying to be movie like it's trying to be honest about a real life story that only happened 12 years before the movie came out. So I I don't know if I want this to be a more dramatic film in a more classic Hollywood style, but because it's not, there's part of me that just feels like it's a little bit inaccessible. Yeah, it's it's. Does that make sense? It kind of reminds me in a very weird way about what I said about Wolf of Wall Street was that last week where I talked about how Scorsese formatted that movie like Don Quixote. And it's like very purposefully done. But when you when you purposely structure your movie that way, like the inherent flaws of that decision also are like you're, you're acknowledging like, all right, my compromise is maybe the ceiling on this movie is like a nine and a half because it's going to be 1/2 hour too long. And I kind of feel the same way with this movie. Like, yes, I, I feel less of a visceral connection to it because I'm used to my dramatic movies being more overly dramatic.

31:04 And so I feel like the decision to make it a little more understated was objectively the right call for this material, but it also like necessarily lowered the ceiling of how good the movie could be to like a, you know, nine and a half, nine, 8 1/2, wherever you're at with it. It's weird because I I do acknowledge that it's better that they did it this way, but it's just not going to feel like as I'm not going to feel as connected to it as a result. The more we talked about it, the more I think that if they were going to make the, if they were going to raise the ceiling for this movie, I almost think they needed to go more artistic with the cinematography and like maybe the lighting or some of the design elements of it. Because one of the very few moments where I noticed like a choice by the director behind the camera or the cinematographer, whoever made the choice, was when they are talking to the expert from Maryland, I think from the Seton Institute.

32:12 And he is telling them that based on his stats, it should be 6% of the total priests. And they realize that that number is 90 instead of 13. I, I don't know if you noticed, but the camera like slowly zooms out. It, it doesn't move, it doesn't pan, it does. It just slowly zooms out till the four reporters only take up like maybe 20 to 30% of the screen and the rest of their cluttered empty office like takes up the rest of the screen. And it's a great camera shot to emphasize how small they feel in light of how huge this scandal is.

32:59 And I, I wish there were more things like that throughout the film that feel like a, a little bit more like a traditional movie. It's, it's not big or flashy or showy, but it, it helps highlight the magnitude of what was going on in this film. And, and I think if they did more things like that and, and maybe if they just had a few more artistic, like, I don't know, like a shot of Keaton sitting on a bench in front of a massive Catholic Church, like I like, you know, maybe that's two on the nose. But, well, there is that one shot where Rachel McAdams is like interviewing somebody on their front porch and then, like, the church is towering behind the house.

33:43 And it's like, this is very on the nose. But also this is a really accurate representation of how much they feel like this. The church is like breathing down their neck at all times, and they can't. They can't escape it, you know. Exactly. And and so I just wonder if they made a few more decisions like that with the camera, if it would have raised that ceiling back higher than it than it is with their folks. It's not obvious enough. That's what we're saying. Make it more obvious, folks. Come on. All right, man, let's take a break here. Let's drink some whiskey. What do you say? Let's get to it. All right, so today we are checking out Green River Kentucky straight weeded single barrel bourbon. Now, last week we tried the standard Green River wheated a whiskey that we both really liked. Brad, I am such a big fan of Green River. They are first and foremost like among the most generous of brands to work with.

34:43 And I don't just mean like they give us stuff. They're just like very welcoming, very hospitable. You know, they've got the Bardstown team behind them and the Bardstown team knows how to treat people really well. So just thank you, Green River, for being cool to work with. I will also say they are a brand that within, you know, two years has gone from being like, oh, this is pretty good to they have multiple labels now where I'm like, oh, that's among the best in its category. Absolutely. Yeah, there there's a book out there, I think it's called like Unreasonable hospitality or like Outrageous Hospitality. And, and I'm pretty sure that they have read that book because they just treat guests incredibly and that that's at Bardstown, that's at Green River.

35:33 I am so excited to drink this single barrel today. About yeah, me too, man. So they have just come out with this as a new skew. Like I said, we tried the weeded bourbon last week. The single barrel variety, depending on which barrel you're drinking from or which release you're getting, it could range from anywhere from 110 to 130 proof. The one we're trying today is 118.6 proof. It is cask strength and it's aged for a minimum of five years now. I do not currently have. Oh yes, I do. I stand corrected. I have the mash bill, Brad. Hey, 70% corn, 21% wheat, 9% malted barley. Brad, I poured this out a long time ago and it's just been kind of sitting here in my glass teasing me.

36:18 And the very first note that I will give and then I'll turn it over to you. This is back to classic weeded bourbon notes. There is like a whole bunch of cola on this thing and I am a big, big fan. Yeah, yeah, dude, the nose on this is so beautiful. There is tons of like effervescent cherry cola. It's Carmelie, there's oak and there there's almost like a cinnamon roll vibe going on. Like you get a little bit of that cinnamon spice, a little bit of frosting the the sugariness of it. I I really like this nose there. There's nothing here that is complex, but there's a lot of great notes. It is an 8 out of 10 for me.

37:00 I'm actually going to give it a nine. It has everything I want from a weeded bourbon nose. And once in a while, you know, we or our guest will mention something being perfumey. This is one of the first times that I really mean it. And and like I can think of the exact perfume that is coming off of this. It's super floral. It's not quite like Chanel #5 or anything. It's more of frankly, it's more of like an old lady perfume and I dude, it's, it's the 9. Out of 10, it's seriously know what you're into Bob dude. It's the amount of floral notes on this that it's not just rose, it's like really deep perfume notes on top of classic caramel and cherry cola. I love this man. 9 out of 10 for me. I think I'm going to lower my score knowing that it's a grandma's perfume for you.

37:50 What can I say, man, I am into the old ladies, Brad, and it's coming out here today. Are you are you starring in the local production of The Producers? What's going on soon, Bob? Yeah, You know, we've talked about Sweeney Todd. We'll just go to the producers now. Oh man. Well, moving on from that as fast as humanly possible. The palette here is delectable. There is tons of caramel for me, the cream cheese frosting is there. It gets into a little bit of like a peanut butter vibe there. There's almost some like toasted almonds that comes through. Just really a really pleasant experience.

38:32 I'm going to come up a little bit from my nose to an 8 1/2. Brad, this is an interesting whiskey. It's super prickly on the palate. I, you know, it's been a couple weeks since we've had a barrel proof whiskey, so maybe I'm just returning to being more of a lightweight, but it really packs a punch on the tongue. There's not as much of A Kentucky hug after you swallow, but we'll get to that in a minute. I think that I was expecting something a little more viscous here. It's pretty thin on the mouthfeel and it doesn't have those like deep, dark, decadent bourbon notes. To me, it stays in that kind of upper, brighter register. The floral notes are definitely there. And then I think you get a little bit more of like a raw wheat note on this.

39:13 It's similar to the one we had last week. I do like it way more a barrel strength though. I'm going to give it a 7 1/2 on the pallet. I think the finish for me is where it starts to fall off just a little bit. Still really great flavors. It it, it falls into like kind of like a honey wheat split top bread there. The cinnamon comes back. There's a little bit of those peanuts coming through. It gets a little bit oaky at the end. I'll give it a 7 1/2 out of 10 year. I still like the finish, it's just a little bit of a drop off. Yeah, I'm in the same spot, man. It gets oaky and and like a really heavy char. On my first sip I got that and then on the second sip it almost turns a bit sour towards the back end. And that was a note that we had last week on the regular weeded bourbon as well.

39:59 I think I'm also going to come down to A7 on the finish. And then overall on balance, I think I'll give it a 7 1/2. There was definitely. A drop from nose to taste to finish, which is a little bit of a disappointment, but it's not a huge disappointment because this is still a pretty solid whiskey all around. Yeah, I, I think I'll give it a 7 1/2 on balance, mostly because it, it lacks a little bit on the finish and and it's not an especially complex whiskey, although it delivers in all the ways you want it to for a weeded whiskey just doesn't have anything that makes it like really stand out. But I, I think it's worth a 7 1/2 year on balance. Now Bob, this is going to set you back MSRP $60.00, which I I think it's a fair price point for a five year single barrel product.

40:56 Yeah, it's barrel strength, it's single barrel and it's a weeded bourbon. So they're in the category of your rebels, of your wellers. I think that in general five year bourbon at $60.00, it feels a little bit overpriced to me, but that's also just kind of where the markets at right now. But I think I'll give this a 6.5 on value. It's not a bad value, but I either other green rivers that I like better than this at a similar price. I give it a 7 out of 10 on value. I'm kind of in the same place. I I think $60.00 is a little much. I think if this was a $50 bottle I I would rate it more highly, but there are a lot of other options in this price range that I'd probably recommend over it.

41:41 So I'll give it a 7 out of 10 and that is bringing me out to a 38.5 out of 50. I'm at a 37.5, so we're coming out to a 38 out of 50 or 76 out of 100 on average. I think that's a great spot for this, Brad. It's just barely over the recommend mark for us. And I don't really think that it's because of the value. Like we said, it's a tad overpriced or it feels just a bit high. But I think at the end of the day, this is kind of just like a very solid, respectable whiskey from Green River. It does not approach the the king of their lineup for me, which is that foolproof. But once again, they just continue to deliver really, really solid offerings here. Yeah, I absolutely love Green River. Aaron Harris is doing incredible work over there. And Bob, we, we need to make our way down there sometime. I completely agree.

42:40 I've been like in and around where I guess around Owensboro a whole bunch, and I've never been able to make it to Green River. So Aaron, let's make this happen, dude. All right, Brad, what do you say we get back into talking about Spotlight? Let's get to it. All right, everybody, That was Green River Weeded single Barrel bourbon whiskey that it's like almost there. I really, really like it. I encourage you to try it. I will say though, normally I would have a quippy awesome, perfect Segway into our Section 2 facts and a falsehood, but I texted Bob about this earlier. I don't know if I feel comfortable making up facts about a movie that covers a topic like this. And so we're actually going to skip 2 facts in a falsehood today, Bob.

43:36 The question is, do I receive an automatic victory because of your forfeit? That's really what what this is about, Brad. I was thinking about that. I think both of us like gain an automatic loss for the fact that the subject matter of this movie happens under our religions auspices. That's true. And that's that just kind of sucks. Yeah, man. OK, so let's let's get back into talking about the movie itself. And I do think we obviously need to touch on the subject matter a little bit here. But I grew up Catholic and I grew up Catholic at the time of the events of this movie, you know, the 2001, early 2000 when I was 10 years old. And so it's, it's very, it's weird and it's jarring to watch a movie about the abuse scandals in the Catholic Church that were happening obviously long before I was born, but that we're breaking at a time where I was at an age that a lot of these children were victimized.

44:38 And it's, it's it's weird for a lot of reasons, obviously. But I think I was not shielded from it. And my parents were not super religious. My mom grew up Catholic and I was just kind of culturally Catholic and I was an altar boy. But like we never were in the group of people that I think anyone who grew up Catholic would know what I'm talking about. In every Catholic Church there is like it, it is a, your involvement with the church is a status symbol. And like the most involved people in the church are usually like among the wealthiest people in the church because you get to get up in front of the whole church and read the announcements or whatever. And you do it in your best suit and tie. And I understand, like, I, I look at a movie like this and I, I'm not from Boston.

45:23 I didn't grow up in Southie or wherever. But like poor kids in neighborhoods where there is not much hope to get out, like rely heavily on the church, especially in heavily Catholic areas. And when that one kid was talking about, you know, the guy was saying like it was like God coming to my house when the priest came over. You know, it's it, it's a real thing. And I think that people that either don't grow up in religious households and or especially grow up Catholic, it's hard for them sometimes to wrap their mind around. And it's, it's not even necessarily that like people are brainwashed or people are in some sort of cults. It's just it is so interwoven with the social dynamics of those areas that you can't separate it from your day-to-day life.

46:13 Yeah, I it, it, it might not seem obvious to everybody in our culture, but religion has dominated the human experience for the majority of human history. But like, the amount of time that it hasn't is so vastly small compared to the time it has. And so it, it might seem wild to us, but you're right, Bob, like the, like the, the way, especially the Catholic religion, because it is so universal and worldwide, the, the way it integrates itself into a person's life is holistic. And, and I think, you know, what I said earlier is true. That's what makes this so disgusting and so warped, is that the church, when it's done right and well, ought to be the most wholesome and uplifting integrative experience of a person's life.

47:18 And yet it can be twisted into becoming one of the most dark and demonic. And like, that's just, it's so hard. And, and I will say, like I, I grew up Protestant and I do I, I did not have an understanding of how intense the Catholic Church is until I got to college. I got to know some, some people who went to Walsh and were devout Catholics. I never realized how much of an impact it had on people until I was older. Well, and I think that when you look at the scandals of like the evangelical church that you grew up in, Brad, they, I mean, they're power is at the root of both of them and the abuse of power, but they present themselves very differently, right? It's, it's more about a cult of personality with evangelicalism, whereas it's about like a, an oppressive systemic structure with Catholicism.

48:17 And I think they do a really good job of capturing that in the movie. Before we get out of here today, Brad, There's like I've, I've noted 3 scenes in the movie that I found to be not just really powerful, but also like really instructive for how to, to view the movie. And I made mention of the first one in the first half of the episode. But I want to bring it up here because one of my favorite performances in the movie is from Billy Crudup, who we haven't talked about on this podcast in a long time since we did Almost Famous. Russell Hammond. I love him in that movie. I love him in this movie as the lawyer, Eric McLeish, because you think that they're setting him up to be the sleazy, arrogant, a hole lawyer. And Billy Crudup is so good at being like both really vulnerable and easy to empathize with and also really good at playing cocky and arrogant.

49:11 There's just something about his posture and bass that he can play it both ways and he does it in this movie. They go to see this guy three times. The first time he's just getting that information on how the the church settles cases. Then they learned that he was the one settling a lot of these cases. So they go back and kind of confront him and he's like, I can't answer that. I can't answer that. They go back a third time and and you think it's going to come to a head with him. And then he's like, you guys, I tried to tell you all this. And it's this moment where I think the movie is doing a really good job of telling you as the audience, like, we are not going to go for the easy, like this guy's the villain route because a, everybody's complicit in this. Even if you weren't aware, just being around it made you complicit in it and be like even the people that you think had had their hands in doing this.

50:09 We're trying to find ways to end it, and either that structure was oppressing them into not being able to do it, or some other system or structure like the Boston Globe thwarted their plans to do it. I I thought that was a really brilliant scene, Brad. And I think for me, it's not I, I think what this movie does well is not that it just points out the system having power. It takes you through all of the different people who are supporting that system. Because I, I, as somebody who is, you know, a little more conservative in his political leanings, I find myself often skeptical about claims of systemic power and systemic violence. And not from the fact that it doesn't happen, but from the fact that systems are made-up of people. And, and it's all of these people that have combined together.

51:09 Whether it's through the forgetfulness or the busyness of Michael Keaton's character and accidentally covering up the story 5-8 years before, or it's people who are actively covering it up within the church. Like it's not necessarily just this giant system that is covering everything up. It's a bunch of individual people. And, and I think that's what this movie does so well. Is that it? It almost wants to like drown you with characters that are hard to keep track of because it's like this maelstrom of people who are on the periphery of what's going on. And yet once you get to all of the people individually, you put together this massive picture of brokenness and destruction and and vile activity.

52:05 And and I think that's what's so fascinating about it. And you're right, Billy Crudup is kind of at the center of that within the this movie. There is one stretch of the movie where I feels, I feel like it, it goes for old Hollywood style filmmaking and it's a montage basically like the night before. Maybe not the night before, but there's a montage where these children are at mass singing Silent Night and Mark Ruffalo's character like goes into the back of the church and is watching them and they're intercutting it with the, the daily lives of all of the different reporters. And it, it was like the moment where you've been watching for like an hour and 45 minutes, probably of them doing like the day-to-day work of journalistic, you know, digging. And you've seen some of the faces of victims who have like who are adults now talking about their stories. But it's really the first time you're confronted with like child aged children, you know, who are maybe, maybe not victims in this moment and no one knows.

53:15 And it's, it just crushed me, dude. The movie made me cry at a couple moments. And that was one of them because it's, again, it's really understated. They don't go over the top. There's nobody like looking at the cameras talking about like these children. It's just you see small children in a in a place that's supposed to be safe for them and they're not. And it's like, dude, it, it broke me, man. Yeah, I, I think the moment for me that really made me cry was the absolute final little bit of the movie when Keaton shows up to the office that Sunday, that the paper was delivered and the front secretary is like, yeah, it's weird. It's been quiet in here, but it seems like your office is really busy and.

54:01 And he gets down there and every single person in the room is answering phone calls. And I, I think it's Rachel McAdams that just looks at him and goes, it's all victims. They're all calling in. And I, I think that's the point for me, that just crushed me of like the power of an establishment like the Boston Globe giving voice to people who have been broken and hurt. That like, that's a place where, once again, it's not even necessarily that it's the establishment of the Boston Globe, although its reputation is something that gives its credence.

54:45 It's the fact that those four reporters and their supporting editors worked so freaking hard and put in so much time and effort to uncover such a tragedy that now all of these people are able to come forward with their stories, come forward with the truth. And if you look on the Boston Globes website, you can like look up the original story and see there was like, I think it was like 18 to 20 stories that came out through that year about all of this stuff. I think they say in the final credits that like over the course of two years, they published like 600 follow up stories. Like it was, it was a staggering number of stories that came out of this.

55:33 Yeah, I think for me, you know, along the same lines, we haven't even talked about Stanley Tucci's character. And I love Stanley Tucci to death, but he's also like one of those actors where in the same movie, he is being like the campiest person in the movie and then can also just absolutely blow everyone else off the screen with how good he can be. And he does that here like he's wearing some sort of hairpiece. Or if he did grow his hair out somehow for this movie, they judged it up a whole bunch. He's doing like the worst of the accents of anybody in this movie. He's the most eccentric, but he has this moment right at the end of the movie where there's like 2 little kids in his office. And Mark Ruffalo like came by to, to give him a copy of the paper. And he's walking out and he looks at Mark Ruffalo. He says like both of these kids were just abused 2 weeks ago. And you can tell he's like about to start breaking and he just like puts his finger in his chest and just like, just like keep doing your work.

56:30 And he his hand drops and there's so much like the weight of the world is on this guy's shoulders. And it's such a good line reading. I just, I had to say something because it also made me break there. You know, it's not necessarily a, a cynical or a pessimistic ending, but there is this acknowledgement there tacitly that like, this isn't over now, like this isn't just going to stop happening. And there are people still out there that are doing the work every day of having to care for these people whose lives have been upended by it. Absolutely.

57:11 And I think that one of the reasons I like Stanley Tucci in this film is that he has an actual arc where at the start he feels like he is completely alone in trying to not only expose what is happening, but protect the people who have been hurt. And so he's so protective of his witnesses and he does not trust the globe to actually see it through and do the job well. And because of his relationship with Ruffalo, he slowly begins to trust him to to report on the story. Well. And it all culminates in that final, final scene when he, like you said, he has his finger in his chest and he tells him, like, you keep doing this work, You keep doing what you're doing. And then he walks into the room and like the way he interacts with the kids for like, you know, 1/2 of a line that we hear before the door closes, you just go, oh, this guy is doing this for all the right reasons.

58:17 And it's it's such a great performance from Tucci. The last thing I noted about the movie, and it was the last thing that made me cry, is the the closing credits where they just say, like, here are all the places that scandals have been uncovered. And it's 3 columns on each screen of probably, I don't know, 20 names per column, city names per column. Yeah, I saw Cleveland, OH on there. You know, I saw Toledo on there. It fades out. It fades back in. There's another 60 cities, and then it fades out again and fades back in. And now it's global. And it is, it's presented again. So matter of factly, they're not, it's not overwrought. They're not overdue doing it and just the the sheer volume of names on that list is harrowing, man. It sucks dude.

59:06 It sucks a lot, Brad. It like. Yeah. Yeah, dude. And it's just such a hard movie. And I think that like that I am not in any way trying to steer us towards something lighter here, but I think this is actually a very natural segue into what I want to talk about with our next segment. Let's make it a double. We're near the end of the episode, so thanks listening to the film and Whiskey show. Let's have another film with this one, even if it's struggling. It's the final segment of the day. Now let's make it a double. Let's Make It a Double is the part of the show where we pick a movie to pair up with this one to make the perfect double feature. Brad, you picked this movie a few weeks ago and I'm going to, I'm just going to run with it. I'm going to go with Schindler's List for this movie.

59:48 And I think it's literally just the the list making element of it, that there's a moment where Ben Kingsley's character pull the last sheet of the list out of the typewriter and looks at Liam Neeson and says, like, the list is an absolute good. The list is life, right? And then in this movie you have a list of cities. That are like in a list of priests, even in in the Boston Globe's investigation that are the complete opposite of that, that are like taking life and and marrying and obscuring what is good about life. But I love that the, I love that they just called this movie Spotlight. Like, it's obviously an accurate representation of what the Spotlight team does, but there's a reason that their team is called Spotlight.

1:00:36 Like they are shining a light on something that has been hidden for far too long. And so in its own weird way, like that list is also, you know, bringing, I don't want to say restoration, but bringing the attention needed for these people whose lives have been broken to be restored back to life. And so yeah, my my pairing would be Schindler's List. That was the movie I had as well. I, I was trying to find any other procedural movie, you know, I, I feel like a lot of people would, would pair it with maybe like a Zodiac. You know what I mentioned earlier. Good night and good luck. You know, there's obviously tons and tons and tons of movie about, about such a thing.

1:01:19 For some reason, though, Schindler's List is what popped into my head as well. And, and, and, and it's the power once again of individuals who care about other individuals enough to do something about it. And I think for me, it wasn't necessarily the list. It was that idea of people going against the grain to care for those who can't care for themselves. And like that is what the church is supposed to be all about. But like you can't read the Bible and not see it saturated with evidence that we ought to be the shepherds who care for the sheep who are broken and lost that live in the darkness and we need the light.

1:02:07 It just I, I think this movie gives us a picture of journalism truly at its best. And I think it does such a great job of not the the director does such a great job of not editorializing. It just presents you with here's the story that was found. Here's how they went about exposing the story. And here are some of the results. And you know, we we've talked about the Big Short a few times throughout this season in addition to watching it. And I think I I continue to sour on that movie because it feels like Adam McKay was editorializing. He like he was trying to give his spin on how he views the world.

1:02:58 And and Tom McCarthy here just allows the reality to stand for itself and sink into you as you watch the film. All right, that was let's make it a double presented by Blackwood Distilling Company. No matter what movie you pair this up with, you can always make it a double with Blackwood Distilling Co. If you go to bourbonoutfitter.com/film Whiskey and use our Code of Film Whiskey at checkout, you can receive 5% off your bottle of Blackwood. Brad, let's get into final scores here. You know, we said in the first half that the decision for how to frame this movie was the correct one, but then it also kind of put a cap on how much I could get into it. It feels very weird talking about a movie with this subject matter that like like that I wanted this story to be more entertaining.

1:03:45 You know what I mean? Like, I feel like a hypocrite saying that. I do think that like, if I'm thinking objectively, how well done, how well made is this movie? I think it's a nine out of 10. If I'm talking specifically about like the extent to which I like vibed with this movie, I think it's like an 8. I think it's like a really, really good 8 out of 10. So I'm going to split the difference. I'm going to give this an 8.5 out of 10, Brad. I'm kind of in the same place. I, I think this is an 8 1/2 out of 10. I think it's a really important movie about a about a extraordinarily important event in human history. I just don't, Yeah, like you said, I, I don't know if I vibe with the movie to, to give it like a 10 out of 10, but I think it's an extraordinarily important movie that that everybody should watch.

1:04:42 And I, I think it's helpful that I think the movie takes faith seriously. I think it takes the important things that the church does do seriously and allows that to stand as like a testament to how dark the subject matter is. So, So yeah, I'm. I'm with you, Bob. 8 1/2 out of 10. All right, so it's an 8.5 from us, but we'd like to know what you think. Have you seen Spotlight? You know, did it deserve to win Best picture? Is it better than a movie like The Revenant or like Mad Max Fury Rd. You can let us know by reaching out to us at any of our social media accounts, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, or YouTube at Film Whiskey. Or you can join the conversation on our Discord server. You can find a link to it at the end of every single one of our show notes.

1:05:31 Next week we're going to be joined by special guest Noah Gettel, a guy we haven't talked to in quite a while, Brad. I'm excited to bring him on and talk about one of his favorite movies of the last 10 years, Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. So join us for that next week, but until then, I'm Bob Book. I'm Brad G. And we'll see you next time. Music.