→ March 15, 2022
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The Worst Person in the World.

Joachim Trier’s The Worst Person in the World earned two Oscar nominations this year, for Best International Feature Film and Best Original Screenplay, and should have gotten a third for Renate Reinsve as Best Actress. It’s a blast to watch, particularly because Reinsve is so charming and so convincing as the main character, but there’s a superficiality to the story that made the movie less satisfying than it could have been in a different writer’s hands.

Reinsve plays Julie, a woman about to turn 30 who is trying to figure out her life, dropping out of med school as the film begins to become a photographer, where she meets Aksel, an author of underground comic books who is about 14 years her senior. They begin a relationship despite his warning to her that she still needs to find herself, that he’s too old for her, and that they’ll want different things – which, of course, eventually turns out to be true, as they meet his friends, discuss having children, and, of course, meet other people. The movie unfolds in twelve ‘chapters,’ as well as a prologue and epilogue, each showing a small anecdote or slice of Julie’s life, ranging from funny to tragic, as she navigates her love life, her family, and more.

This film succeeds because of Reinsve, who looks younger than Julie’s age despite being about 32 when the movie was filmed. She’s so compelling from the moment we first see her, with a smile that fills the screen, yet over the course of the twelve episodes that constitute the film, she not only gives the character depth but makes it clear why she is the center of this particular universe. Julie is flawed but full of life, so that we can see her make mistakes, or at least what might be mistakes, and still be completely invested in her story. She’s the prototypical character who you just believe will come out all right in the end, without becoming hackneyed or unlikeable.

The script, however, is another matter. The plot is a bit beside the point, but it depends on two very fortunate twists that seem awfully convenient for the purposes of Julie’s story, getting her to the right people and places at those moments in the film. It serves to underscore how shallow the story is: this is a woman’s late 20s as seen through the eyes of a man. Julie doesn’t seem to have any friends of her own, and never has a conversation with another woman in the film without a man there – even then, those conversations are nearly always about a man, often Julie’s father, who lives with her stepmom and their daughter and takes no interest in Julie’s life at all. The movie views the life of a woman turning 30 primarily through the question of whether she wants children, and how that affects her relationships with men. Her career is an afterthought – we barely see her pick up a camera for about 10 chapters, and when she’s working at all, it’s in a chain bookstore, with no mention of photography or another career. Even the essay she writes that goes viral is about her relationship to men. Julie does have agency, and shows it in romantic relationships, so it’s puzzling to see her portrayed as lacking initiative or authority in other aspects of her life.

The Worst Person in the World has some gorgeous shots in and around Oslo, including a running scene – every great film this year had to have a running scene, it’s in the rules – that might be the most memorable sequence of 2021 for me. There are many fantastic shots, and Kasper Tuxen’s cinematography makes this a film in which you want to just exist. It’s also funny and bittersweet and often heartwarming, but in the end, I found it all a bit exasperating, not least because Trier ends the film with an improbable epilogue drowned out by the pretentious “Waters of March” by Art Garfunkel. Reinsve is so incredible that I’d still recommend the film – and can’t get over the nominations of three women doing impersonations for Best Actress over her – but wish that the two men who wrote it had considered getting a woman’s perspective on it.

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→ March 14, 2022
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West Side Story.

StevenSpielberg had wanted to film a new version of the 1957 musical West Side Story, which was first adapted in 1961 in a film that won Best Picture, for several years before filming began in July of 2019. This new version, with a script by Tony Kushner that hews more closely to the original stage play at several points, was delayed by a year due to the pandemic, but came out in time to be eligible for this year’s Oscars, earning seven nominations, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Supporting Actress for Ariana DuBose. It’s better than the 1961 film in some ways, worse in others, making it a perfectly fine film that nobody actually needed.

The framework of the story is the same as that of the first film: Two gangs of street toughs are engaged in a turf war on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, the largely Puerto Rican Sharks and the white Jets, led by Bernardo (David Alvarez) and Riff (Mike Faist), respectively. Tony used to be in the Jets before he went to jail, and is trying to go straight now that he’s home, but at a community dance where both gangs arrive with their girls, he meets Bernardo’s sister, Maria (Rachel Zegler), and the two fall immediately in love. Tony works at Doc’s, which is managed by Doc’s Puerto Rican widow (Rita Moreno), who advises him against pursuing Maria while helping him learn some Spanish phrases. Bernardo isn’t happy to see his sister with a white guy, and wants her to marry his friend Chino (Josh Andrés Rivera), while Bernardo himself is with Maria’s friend Anita (DuBose). The two gangs decide to hold a “rumble,” a fight that ends up leaving two dead and has disastrous consequences for the star-crossed lovers.

I’ll save the biggest problem for last, but one major flaw in this version of West Side Story is that Ansel Elgort sucks. He wasn’t good in Baby Driver, where he barely had to do anything, but he’s awful here in every way – he’s stiff, uncharismatic, and dull, and his singing is the worst of any major character. Casting him was a poor choice, underscored by how much better Faist is as Riff – he’s a rascal, but has all the charm that Elgort lacks, and he owns every scene the two have together. Zegler is far better as a singer and actor than Elgort is, and unlike most of the cast, looks close to the age of her character. In general, the women in the film outshine the men, and the Jets’ big number, “Officer Krupke,” is one of the songs that’s clearly inferior to that of the original film.

There are some small differences from the 1961 film that do improve the end result, not least of which is employing Latinx actors as the Sharks and their girlfriends. The original had Natalie Wood, the daughter of Russian immigrants, in the lead role as Maria, and George Chakiris, the son of Greek immigrants, as her brother Bernardo. Both used comically bad accents that sounded more like mockery than imitation. Zegler and Elgort do their own singing, which neither of their counterparts did in the 1961 film. The character of Anybodys, a tomboyish Jets wannabe played by Susan Oakes in the original, is now much more fleshed out here, depicted as a trans man and played by iris menas, a nonbinary and trans actor. It’s a win for representation, but also adds substantially to the story, with Anybodys the character who gains the most in depth and screen time between the original and the remake. The audio quality is improved, of course, although sometimes that works against the singers, such as the men in “America,” whose vocals sound tinny, especially in comparison to the women on that song.

West Side Story can’t escape its fundamental, ontological problem: There is no good reason for this film to exist. The story is the same. The songs are all the same. The choreography is the same – perhaps captured more effectively by better camerawork and modern technology, but it’s still the same old song and dance. Elgort is a dud, a poor actor and mediocre singer whose hold on Maria is hard to believe. It’s a nostalgia play for Spielberg, and I’m sure 20th Century/Disney thought it would be a huge moneymaker, although that was foiled by the pandemic. For this film to get seven Oscar nominations while the superior In the Heights got zero – not even one for a song! – is a travesty.

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→ March 13, 2022
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Stick to baseball, 3/13/22.

I released my first ranking of draft prospects for 2022 over on The Athletic, and held a live Q&A to take questions about it. I also wrote up the two trades from Saturday night, involving Chris Bassitt and Isiah Kiner-Falefa/Mitch Garver.

Over at Paste, I reviewed The Adventures of Robin Hood, a narrative game from the designer of the Legends of Andor, but with simpler mechanics and a clever encounter system with a two-layered board.

I spoke with the Locked On Dodgers podcast in a two-part interview you can watch here and here. I also sent a new issue of my free email newsletter, talking about Monty Python and the development of my sense of humor.

And now, the links…

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→ March 10, 2022
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Out of Line.

I don’t play many video games, just because of the time involved in them, not due to any lack of interest – I often enjoy them and get very sucked in, and I can lose dozens of hours to a good narrative-based game, almost regardless of genre. Somewhere along the way last year, I heard about a shorter puzzle-based game called Out of Line, and was caught immediately by the novel 2-D art style. I picked it up last week when it was on sale on Steam, and played through the whole thing in a couple of hours this week. I think it’s fantastic, and that shorter play time works so much better for me than a 100-hour game like Elden Ring – even if I might really enjoy the latter game too.

You play as the very cute character San, and must complete a series of tasks as you move left to right through an underground space to try to escape whatever weird situation you’re stuck in. Early in the game, you get a spear, which is the only weapon you’ll own in the game, although you can use it to do a number of things, like severing branches, creating tightropes, or, most often, shooting it into a wall so you can use it to climb. You get a couple of instructions in the game when you encounter a very specific new challenge, but otherwise, you’re left to figure it out on your own, using nothing but the left and right arrow keys and the two mouse/trackpad buttons. You’ll get some help from NPCs along the way, but you nearly always have to do something to ‘earn’ that help.

The majority of the puzzles involve a combination of figuring out what you need to do, usually using your spear, and some difficulty executing it with a combination of mouse clicks and keystrokes, often before something bad happens. When you do fail, you just restart from a point usually just prior to the point of failure, so it’s not that devastating if you can’t do it the first time – I did one task at least eight times before I got it right, and I was annoyed, but I wasn’t driven to give up or think the game is impossible or something. There was also one sequence in the game that I couldn’t figure out, and went to a playthrough video on Youtube to get the first clue.There was another puzzle I did know how to solve, but couldn’t execute, and thought my idea was wrong, so I went to the walkthrough and it turned out I just had to do the steps more quickly. I don’t have a ton of experience with games like this, but that seems like a reasonable ratio, and it’s possible the issue was my inexperience rather than anything with the game.

San and his spear.

There’s a story behind the game, but it doesn’t matter much to the game play. You don’t need to know anything of it to play, and getting to the end doesn’t give you a conclusion to the narrative, either. The lack of a prologue, combined with the absence of any sort of tutorial, did mean that I didn’t realize there were certain tasks I could have completed to get to 100%, some of which were as simple as just moving to the left in a new environment to collect a cube before resuming the endless scroll to the right. There are 16 achievements in the game, and I only got 12 of them, so I clearly missed some cues here.

I do recommend Out of Line, based solely on how much I enjoyed the playing experience. It looks incredible, with a unique hand-drawn art style that also made it simple to see the goal for each challenge – crossing a chasm, climbing something, opening a gate, and so on. Some puzzles were very simple, some appropriately difficult, but nothing was impossible, even the one where I had to go online for a tip. I’m not sure if there’s much replay value here; twice might be the limit, once to learn the game, then once to try to do it 100%. The walkthrough I found online only takes about 70-75 minutes all the way through, while my one play probably took me 2.5 to 3 hours of active playing time. For the $5 and change I paid for the game, that’s great value.

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→ March 9, 2022
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Belfast.

Belfast nabbed seven Oscar nominations this year, including nods for Best Picture, Best Director, and both Supporting acting categories, which seems like a decided lack of ambition for the voters. It is a perfectly fine film, pleasant and funny with enough of a serious underpinning to make it more than just a slice-of-life story, but there just isn’t that much to it, and if anything, the Academy whiffed on the one category where it deserved a nomination – Best Actress.

Belfast follows nine-year-old Buddy, a Protestant boy in 1969 in the titular city, the capital of Northern Ireland and the main site of the sectarian violence known as the Troubles that had begun just a few years previously. Buddy’s father (Jamie Dornan) works in England, only returning home every few weeks, so Buddy spends most of his time at home with his mother (Caitrona Balfe) and grandparents (Ciaran Hinds and Judi Dench, both of whom got Oscar nominations). He goes to school, where he has a crush on the smartest girl in the class, Catherine (Olive Tennant – yes, David’s daughter), and gets into trouble with his degenerate cousin, Moira, whose only role in the story is to shoplift. Buddy’s father also has to deal with the Protestant thug Billy (Colin Morgan), who insists that he must come to fight on the Protestant side or be considered a traitor and a target. When the August 1969 riots come to their quiet street, the situation becomes untenable, and forces the family to decide whether to stay in the neighborhood where they’ve always lived or take a job offer in England.

Branagh can be a heavy-handed director, but he works with a lighter touch here that reminded me of his work on Much Ado About Nothing, where he hammed it up as Benedick but largely let his actors (and the outstanding dialogue) do the work. Other than the decision to make this film black and white, a showy choice given the year in which the film’s events take place, Branagh stays out of the way, and the script has just one scene that doesn’t work (the club, although it was surprising to hear Dornan can sing), while the rest of the film provides the contrast between the mundanity of quotidian life and the stress of knowing that the place you were made is now less safe for you and your kids. It’s a slight film, but strong for its size, and gets in and out in about 90 minutes, just right for this sort of story. I just keep coming back to the film’s total lack of ambition – I’d say it’s like a novella, rather than a novel, but it’s not a matter of its running time (or page count). Belfast isn’t trying to do anything. It has very modest goals and it executes them well.

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→ March 6, 2022
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Music update, February 2022.

February turned out to be a loaded month for music, especially album releases, with The Wombats’ Fix Yourself, Not the World and Frank Turner’s FTHC two of my favorites, while Gang of Youths’ angel in realtime was a letdown after three great singles leading up to the release. I still need to listen to Black Country, New Road’s new album, and re-listen to the new LPs from White Lies and Band of Horses (which came out on Friday). In the meantime, here’s my latest playlist, which you can see here if you can’t see the widget below.

Everything Everything – Bad Friday. I love the way this song recalls the frenetic energy of some of EE’s best tracks, from “Cough Cough” to “Kemosabe” to “My Kz, Ur Bf” and “Planets.” The English art-rock quartet will release their sixth album, Raw Data Feel, on May 20th.

Portugal. The Man – What, Me Worry? Five years after Woodstock made the band into stars, led by the all-timer hit “Feel It Still,” the Portland-based rockers will return with their ninth album this June, and have just begun a U.S. tour with alt-J.

Arlo Parks – Softly. Parks’ first new music since her Mercury Prize-winning debut album Collapsed in Sunbeams came out in January of 2021 is this shimmering new track that contrasts sunny music with melancholy lyrics about a dying relationship. She told NME that she’s expanding her musical palette, which I take as a great sign.

Mattiel – Lighthouse. Featuring one of the best pop hooks of the year so far, this is the second single in advance of the Atlanta indie-rock duo’s third album, Georgia Gothic, on March 18th. I get a big Swing Out Sister vibe from the song, maybe just because of the lead singer’s voice.

Pillow Queens – Be By Your Side. I think this is the first Pillow Queens track I’ve heard, but their 2020 debut album In Waiting earned some very positive reviews; I’m fairly sure Spotify’s algorithm put it on my Release Radar because I love whenyoung, another Irish band that mines similar sonic territory.

Foals – 2am. Life is Yours, Foals’ seventh album, is due out on June 17th, and this is the second banger so far from the record, after last fall’s outstanding “Wake Me Up.”

Sunflower Bean – Who Put You Up to This? Great guitar work here, unusual for Sunflower Bean, whose previous songs have been more muted and driven by bright melodies.

Just Mustard – Still. This Irish shoegaze band first showed up on my playlists in 2019, with the singles “October” and “Seven,” but this is their first new music since then and comes with an announcement of a new album, Heart Under, due out in May. I enjoy the hard-edged guitar work contrasted with the clear vocals of Katie Ball.

Mdou Moctar – Nakanegh Digh. This bonus track on the deluxe version of Afrique Victime absolutely rocks, like so much of that album, and I can’t believe I have a college game to attend on the same night Moctar and Parquet Courts are playing near me.

Melt Yourself Down – Balance. I don’t even know how to describe MYD’s music; it’s not eclectic so much as it smushes together a half-dozen genres or styles, notably jazz, American R&B, and dance. They’ve been around for a decade, with their fourth album, Pray for Me I Don’t Fit In, coming out in February, but this was my first exposure to them. The guitar riff here is fucking incredible.

Johnny Marr – Ghoster. Marr has never quite hit the right melodic notes as a solo artist – I hate to say he needs his former bandmate, given what happened to that guy, but he needs someone like that – although the early singles from Fever Dreams Parts 1-4 have had some decent hooks.

Joy Oladokun w/Tim Gent – Fortune Favors the Bold. I love Oladokun’s voice, and here she finds another strong hook in the chorus; I’m not sure if Gent’s rapping adds much here, though.

Belle & Sebastian – Unnecessary Drama. I can never tell the direction in which Stuart Murdoch et al are going, but this sounds like a shift back to the more uptempo, rock-oriented sounds from Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance.

Wet Leg – Angelica. I hated Wet Leg’s single “Chaise Longue,” which got all kinds of critical praise despite being annoying and juvenile, but this track is far better in every way. The lyrics are actually funny and clever, the melody is stronger, and they’re not repeating the same line ad nauseum. It won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, as they’re still quite distinctly in that vein of British indie rock where everything’s a bit off kilter, but if you’ve read my music posts for a while, you know I’m usually a sucker for that (from Gang of Four to Yard Act).

Blossoms – Ode to NYC. Another band I feel like I should have known before, Blossoms are English but remind me of Lord Huron and The Head and the Heart in all the good ways.

The Head and the Heart – Virginia (Wind in the Night). These folk-rock stalwarts will release their fifth album, Every Shade of Blue, on April 29th.

The Afghan Whigs – I’ll Make You See God. Good to have Dulli and company back. Age hasn’t blunted their sharp edges at all.

Killing Joke – Lords of Chaos. I assumed these post-punk icons were done after 2015’s Pylon, a fantastic album that would have served as a perfect coda to a long career of genre-expanding albums and influencing several generations of punk, metal, and alternative bands, but they’re releasing a new EP with this as the title track. Also, the show Euphoria really should have used Killing Joke’s song of the same name for the theme music.

The Beths – A Real Thing. The Beths return nearly two years after the New Zealand power-pop band’s last album, Jump Rope Gazers, with a song that talks obliquely about climate change. There’s no word on a new album but the band is about to finally embark on their first North American tour.

Alt-J – Happier When You’re Gone. The Dream, alt-J’s fourth album, represents a further shift in a less ambitious, more overtly commercial direction for the British trio, who have never managed to reach the heights of their debut An Awesome Wave in the decade since its release. This track bears some resemblance to that first album in its music, although there’s nothing so daring anywhere on this record.

Kreator – Hate Über Alles. The German thrash legends are still at it, forty years after they first formed, and I don’t think they’ve lost a step or even changed their sound much in that time.

Zeal and Ardor – Death to the Holy. This is about as good as Z&A’s marriage of gospel and death metal can get, where the extreme sounds actually work to enhance the more traditional elements between those moments.

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→ March 5, 2022
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Stick to baseball, 3/5/22.

I answered some questions on the Blue Jays’ farm system this week, which was a transcription of my appearance on our Spin Rates podcast. The Klawchats returned this week. I’m planning to start written draft coverage this upcoming week with a top 30.

On my own podcast, my guest was author and journalist Kathryn Schulz, talking about her wonderful new memoir Lost and Found, about the death of her father and how she met and married her wife, the author Casey Cep. Listen via The Athletic or subscribe on iTunes, Amazon, that other site, or wherever you get your podcasts. I appeared on the Romantic About Baseball podcast as well.

And now, the links…

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→ March 4, 2022
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Klawchat 3/4/22.

Subscribers to the Athletic can see my top 100 prospects ranking, ranking of all 30 farm systems, and top 20 prospects for every organization. I also have a new game review, the tableau-building game Subastral, over at Paste.

Keith Law: That’s right, here’s where the talkin’ ends. Klawchat.

TomBruno23: Moreno, Castellini, Kendrick, Illitch are quite a Mt. Rushmore
Keith Law: Yep. Kendrick and his wife are among the biggest donors to right-wing dark-money groups, along with Charles Koch and the Uihleins (boycott U-Line, folks). And we know where Moreno’s loyalties lie. It’s some of the strongest anti-labor voices in the country.

Dave F: Hi Keith. Can you explain again your resistance to a salary cap if MLB also had a salary floor? With the lucrative regional tv deals of bigger markets, it seems like they are able to buy out their mistakes and take on salary for a playoff push. I would think a salary floor would still get the Union what they want with higher wages and also level the playing field for teams, similar to the other major sports.
Keith Law: The cap does more to limit player incomes than the floor does to help it – and a floor doesn’t guarantee higher wages, either. Teams could easily reach the floor with one or two bloated deals for veterans. You want to raise wages? Make the minimum salary $1.5 million. Then the floor is automatically $39 million.

Dr. Bob: Greetings, Keith. Moneyball’s Michael Lewis tried to paint the analytics revolution as replacing traditional scouting. You have opposed that position and credited the work of scouts. So, here’s my question: Have the methods employed by scouts changed? If so, can you speak as to how?
Keith Law: Absolutely. Lewis was wrong – what analytics has done is changed the way teams evaluate players, including by empowering scouts to look at players in new ways while also helping streamline the process of figuring out who best to go see and when. Most scouts I know talk comfortably in the language of the analytics era, discussing spin rates and extension as much as they talk about feel and pitchability.

JT: I abandoned hockey once upon a time after it lost a season to a strike. I can’t even remember: 2003-4 or 2004-05. I only watched out of habit, an easy thing to fall into in Canada, esp. when you grew up with 3 channels and 2 were hockey some nights.

Does MLB not have any sense that it might lose similar casual fans?
Keith Law: No. I said on a radio hit in Jacksonville this morning (the Drill was the show) that MLB might be banking on the fact that live sports is one of the most coveted places for advertisers now, since people stream so much more content than they watch live. That could be driving the false confidence.

Ken (Cleveland): I know your more player than owner (understandably so for a multitude of reasons).  I’m curious, is there any specific position that you support the owners’ perspective of over the players?
Keith Law: In this current round, not that I’m aware of. They’re so focused on breaking the union that their policies seem aggressively geared to that end. Labor should earn its marginal revenue product. MLB doesn’t want to be subject to this general economic “law.”

Jim: Hey, Keith, hope you’re feeling better.  In the absence of anything constructive coming out of MLB, re you going to continue your “Keith answers x questions about Team Y’s farm system” interviews, or are they an ad hoc exercise?  Thanks as always.
Keith Law: I just did one for the Blue Jays today and will do one for the Angels in the next few days (Sam just sent the questions).

Kip: Thanks for all the great content over the last few weeks.
Keith Law: You’re welcome. Thank you all for reading and subscribing. Links to all the prospect content are up top.

Francisco: Hi Keith, Thanks for chatting. I would like to know your thoughts on Tommy White. Thanks !
Keith Law: Let’s see what happens in conference play. He wouldn’t be the first guy to go off against non-conference pitching and then come down to earth when the better pitching shows up.

JBisson: Hi, Keith. Thanks again for taking time out of your day to chat with us die-hards! I realize it might be difficult to narrow this down to one, but if you can, which player on your top 100 prospects lists do you believe has the widest range of potential outcomes?
Keith Law: I don’t think I could answer that off the cuff – I’d have to give it a lot of time and thought. Might be fodder for a future column or something.

Brutus Beefcake: Would you mind explaining why you didn’t vote for Billy Wagner for the HoF?  I don’t mean to suggest you needed to or should have–he seems very borderline–just that in your HoF column I didn’t see his name come up, and I was curious.
Keith Law: Not even close. He pitched less than anyone in the Hall of Fame – I don’t think there’s a HoF pitcher under 1000 innings, and he barely cracked 900.

Tony: I don’t know if you’ve gotten into the latest Alt-J album at all, but I found parts of it quite good while other parts sounded like the band was parodying itself. This isn’t a question, I guess, but I’ll hang up and listen, regardless.
Keith Law: I’m just out on them at this point. I agree with you that they’ve descended into a sort of parody of their earlier selves. They’ve certainly become less ambitious musically and lyrically, and seem more geared towards the commercial than ever before. It’s a shame; An Awesome Wave remains one of the most interesting and inventive albums I’ve ever heard.

Evan: Favorite restaurants in New Orleans
Keith Law: god, it’s been so long since I was there. I’m sure the best destinations have turned over a ton since then. I think the last time through I went to Cochon and/or Cochon Butcher, which were great.

Adam D.: Any under-the-radar college prospects on the west coast we should know about? I follow San Diego State and Cal pretty closely, but wondering who else I should be keeping an eye on. Thanks!
Keith Law: I think it’s too early to say. I’ll have a draft ranking up next week, hoping midweek after I make a quick trip to GA.

Condor: Chris Russo has been, not surprisingly, pro-clubs and pro-Manfred. He works for MLB and golfs with Manfred. Plus, if you differ from him, he yells over you.
Keith Law: Look at the voices who support owners right now and see who might pay some of their bills. A lot of them have ties to MLB (via TV or radio), or to individual clubs. Not all, certainly, but many do.

Gil: In your time w the Blue Jays were there ever any specific moves based solely on saving the owner money?
Keith Law: I mean, we traded Raul Mondesi just to get rid of his contract. I don’t think that’s that bad or unusual, though.

Steve F: Point of order: 2004-05 in the NHL was a lockout not a strike, and the owners locked the players out again in 2013.
Keith Law: Important distinction. Thank you.

Dr. Bob: Thanks. Follow up, please. Did most scouts at the time (1) resist the new ways and fade away, (2) slowly get on board, (3) quickly adapt to the changes?
Keith Law: I would be reluctant to make generalizations like that. I couldn’t possibly know enough people to give a fair and accurate answer.

Dave: Could a whole bunch of problems or “problems” (pace of play, lack of baserunners, pitching to strikeouts) be solved by changing walks to 3 balls? I’m sure there would be initial growing pains but it seems like a quick way to increase offense without weird shit like moving the mound back.
Keith Law: Eek. No thank you.

David: Hi Keith, When evaluating prospects for the Top 100 list, do you consider a person’s character as much as it can be known? For example, I know you’ve been a critical of the Pirates’ Ji-hwan Bae (and rightfully so). Would you exclude someone from your list if they had a history like his? Thanks!
Keith Law: Bae was on my Pirates list a year ago, with the note about his assault on his girlfriend. He wasn’t on it this year because I just don’t think he’s that good a player – beyond any considerations about whether he should be employed by the team.

Zac: The Jackson Jobe pick is a huge risk as you’ve pointed out, but what is his ceiling in compared to the Tigers other pitching “prospects” (Mize, Skubal, Manning)?
Keith Law: As high a ceiling as any of those guys, with the higher risk of zero return as well.

Sage: Thoughts on recent Jack McDowell interview about current state of MLB?
Keith Law: Didn’t hear it. Not sure I need to?

Anthony: I know its REALLY early as neither are draft eligible this year but do you have any thoughts on Tennessee RHP Chase Dollander and UCLA RHP Thatcher Hurd?
Keith Law: I almost never spend time looking into players who aren’t eligible. The audience for that information is close to nonexistent and it doesn’t support my draft coverage.

Jace: Is there any scenario where we get away from the performative dip-shittery that we saw at the SOTU, on Twitter, talk shows, etc or is this just who we are now?
Keith Law: I think this is who we are now. Those people do that stuff because it works. If you want a behavior to stop, don’t reinforce it with attention.

Nick: I know the MiLB players are not part of the union, but will the lockout impact the minor league season?
Keith Law: It shouldn’t. About 14 players will be missing from every system, because they’re on the 40 man and thus are locked out, but everyone else can play. MLB teams will have to decide what to do – do they sign some extra indy ball types or other older FAs to fill AAA rosters, or promote players in the system and backfill in low A with guys who’d be in extended or some undrafted college seniors from 2021?

Mike: Why you gotta rank everything and make lists ?  What put things in box?
Keith Law: Gotta give the people what they want!

Jace: Austin Eats beyond Franklin BBQ? Qui is closed
Keith Law: I have to look up one place, stand by…
Keith Law: Better Half! I always forget its name. Loved that place. Backspace pizza was solid. People rave about Interstellar BBQ; I haven’t been, and Texas Q is tough for me since i stopped eating cow about five years ago.

Insert Witty Name Here: Keith, been reading you since time immemorial. You were always open with mental health and your struggles with it. Two parter: 1) How have you been doing? 2) Do you think the national conversation regarding mental health is doing a good job communicating and educating on causes and conditions of mental health?
Keith Law: Thank you for asking. I’m doing well, I think. I’m in therapy regularly, and I at least know what I need to work on, and what I need to do to take care of myself. I’m exercising again, as the weather allows, which will only get easier going forward (we belong to a gym, but I will take running outside over the treadmill any day now that I’ve gotten accustomed to it). Any conversation about mental health is a good conversation, but there’s still too little understanding and way too many opinions from people who don’t have the background or knowledge to insert themselves into that conversation.

Guest: Would there be a different attitude among the owners if the owners had to answer any specific labor issues to the media themselves instead of having the commissioner do it?
Keith Law: Probably. Also, we assume the owners are monolithic. I guarantee you there are at least two or three saying, “just strike a deal, we don’t care, we’re making plenty of money even if we take the players’ last offer!” But we don’t hear that – we hear one voice.

Romorr: I think it’s funny when Oriole fans harp on rankings. I looked at your list and came away thinking, I need to pay more attention to Joey Ortiz. Same with Gillaspie.
Keith Law: I think it’s funny too. When someone accuses a national writer of bias against a team, they’re telling on themselves, not the writer.

Deeeedeeee: What new films are you looking forward to this year?
Keith Law: I have to admit i don’t track what’s coming, unless I happen to catch a trailer. We’re still catching up on 2021 – we have four BP nominees left to see, and all five international nominees as well.

chauncey: thoughts on the lockout?
Keith Law: I mean, could you narrow it down a bit?

JT: I don’t only subscribe to the Athletic for you, but I definitely value having access to your writing a whole lot. Keep passing this along to your editors.
Keith Law: Thank you! I wouldn’t expect anyone to subscribe just for me, or if they did, they’d probably realize we have a lot of great writers.

Phil: Is it fair for Lia Thomas to compete in Ivy League women’s swimming?
Keith Law: Yes. She’s a woman.

Nick X: Have you ever listed to a musical artist who was on Top-40 radio?
Keith Law: Is top 40 radio still a thing? Anyway, yes, of course. I grew up listening to top 40 radio – literally, in the case of America’s Top 40.

TacoCharlton: hattie b’s or princes for Nashville hot chicken ?
Keith Law: I tried Hattie B’s for the first time last year and really liked it, but I also think my limitations in that department are pretty clear. I was not made to eat really spicy foods.
Keith Law: Like, I think chili particles show up in my sweat after I eat it.

addoeh: Still out on Top Chef?  New season started last night.
Keith Law: Well, after they glossed over an alleged sexual harasser winning last season, I haven’t felt the call to return to watching. Are they hawking NFTs now too?

TacoCharlton: What are your go-to sides at bbq place ? Get pecan pie ?
Keith Law: Fried okra, if they have it.

Paul: Random question but are you loyal to a specific airline and hotel chain in order to increase your status/upgrades with a particular company? Or do your employers just book you on whatever flight they can.
Keith Law: I am, not for status purposes but to collect points for personal travel.

Anthony: I kind of struggle with believing in Chase DeLauter but given his ranking I seem to be in the minority. Does him not facing top competition on a regular basis make his evaluation tougher? When he actually did play a team with a solid amount of talent he did not do well.
Keith Law: Florida State’s two main lefties depantsed him – and word got around. He’s going to go in the first round, I think, but people are aware of the very issue you raise.

bobby: You’re need to lift heavy waits broseph.
Keith Law: This has to be a joke.

Frank Thomas the Tank Engine: I know you’ve discussed this elsewhere, but lost track between your chats, articles, and tweets:  where do you stand on the three proposed rule changes for a pitch clock, larger bases, and no shifts?
Keith Law: Pitch clock is a double-edged sword – it may increase some pitcher injuries. Banning the shift is stupid. I have no opinion on the bases.

Matt: You may have addressed this before, but with Sal Perez under contract for 4 more years, could you see the Royals breaking MJ Melendez in in some sort of hybrid role where he’s the backup catcher and plays somewhere else in the field other days? I know these things tend to work themselves out, but Melendez is essentially knocking on the door at this point and Sal’s not going anywhere!
Keith Law: I did, in fact, address it right here in my Q&A with our own Alec Lewis.

mss: Your’re telling me you don’t eat Italian Sausage !?!!
Keith Law: I do if it’s pork, which it should be.

stixx23: Do you think we will see a woman play in the major leagues in our lifetime (say, next 30-40 years)?
Keith Law: I’d give you about even money odds on that. She’ll face discrimination at every possible step, though.

Paul: Given everything going on – would it make sense for Biden to come out today and announce another massive infrastructure/energy bill? One that in the short term, yes increases the amount of drilling for fossil fuels, but longer term projects of nuclear plants in WV, wind farms in the midwest and solar farms in the southwest? Surely if there is ever a chance for us to break free from our dependence on autocratic petrostates this would be our last best chance?
Keith Law: Agreed. It could even force some Big Oil advocates in Congress to take a stand on the issue – would they turn down a short-term investment in our petroleum industry to score a political point?

Dave: Any sense of how teams are planning to handle April for prospects on the cusp of the bigs, but not on the 40-man? Thinking of Greene and Tork with the Tigers specifically, but I think Julio Rodriguez fits that bill too. Start them at AAA? Keep them around for big league camp?
Keith Law: There is no big league camp, right? So they’ll go play in AAA. Not the perfect outcome but a good enough one.

TomBruno23: We have discussed him before in the chat, especially in regards to graduating HS early and enrolling at Vandy…what is going on with Christian Little pitching in middle relief this season?
Keith Law: Is he just another kid who enrolled in college early only to end up worse off? Nate Savino looked like he’d be one of those guys, but he’s had two good starts in non-conference play for UVA.

Mike: Have you read any of Erik Larson’s books? They seem up your alley.  Also just finished A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles that had a very “Confederacy of Dunces” vibe.
Keith Law: I have not; I read part of Devil in the White City and his emphasis on the lurid aspects of the HH Holmes half of the story really turned me off. I have zero interest in that.

TomBruno23: What can I, as a schmuck living in St. Louis County, Missouri, do to help the Ukrainians? Donate to organizations and, if so, which ones?
Keith Law: I gave to World Central Kitchen, Jose Andres’ nonprofit.

Omead: Will Jeren Kendall ever figure it out?
Keith Law: I highly doubt it.

JT: There’s no hope left for the GOP now. How does America play out over the next decade? How far from democracy will your country descend?
Keith Law: I don’t think there’s a bottom. We are headed towards a theocracy, in a country that is becoming more secular all the time.

Tim: One of the players’ main grievances is that some teams are not trying hard enough to compete. In that vein, aren’t deadline trades problematic? How is it good for competition when bad teams send good players to good teams for the last two months of the season, leading to greater competitive disparity? Max Scherzer hates “tanking,” but he was happy to abandon the listing Nats for the already loaded Dodgers. It seems hypocritical.
Keith Law: I don’t see this parallel at all, sorry.

Guest: Is this the hardest year to rank prospects given how atypical the development path has been for so many in the last two years? e.g. Ed Howard might suck or might just have a huge learning curve due to time off
Keith Law: Last winter was harder, with almost no new information available on players. At least this past cycle, we could discuss 2021 performance and scouting reports, with the caveat that the lost 2020 season affected different players in different ways. I would counsel all fans to be more open-minded on players who struggled in 2021 than they might have in previous years.

Aaron G: Please, won’t you think of the owners? You’re such a shill for the players, some of whom might even play in the majors for a few years at minimum salary!
Keith Law: There’s a weird group of Twitter accounts who love to run around calling anyone who advocates for the players’ positions a “Boras shill” or something similar. It seems artificial – like someone spoonfed them that phrase.

Nels: Am i wrong to be a little annoyed at some of the reporting that went on in Florida last week? There was a lot of over-dramatization of people walking across parking lots and at the end of the day the reporting was filtered through PR anyways. Not sure I saw the point of a lot of it.
Keith Law: It ended up much ado about nothing but I assume there was value in having people on the ground there in case the two sides had struck a deal.

Anthony: I know injuries to pitchers definitely vary player to player but given how some college teams really overwork their pitchers, is it fair to be wary of said teams in terms of projecting their starters for overuse? (UCLA comes to mind as relatively recent starters like James Kaprielian and Griffin Canning have definitely struggled with health)
Keith Law: I know teams consider this. There were several Rice pitchers who were drafted later than they might have been from other schools because the whole industry knew that, under Graham, Rice pitchers got hurt a ton.

Nick X: My buddy Joe F. once got schooled by you on Twitter in a Pete Rose debate.  We were roasting him about it recently and he claims he won because MLB promotes gambling now.  We already made fun of that point but would you care to roast him one last time? We’d truly appreciate it
Keith Law: I’m pretty sure MLB doesn’t promote its own players gambling. That’s kind of the key difference, no?

Jasper: Ever had overnight oats ?
Keith Law: I just can’t get into them. I have tried it, but despite the fact that I like almost anything with oats in it (okay, perhaps not haggis), I find oatmeal pretty boring. It needs way more salt than most people put in it – it’s a grain, like rice, not a ‘cereal’ like Lucky Charms.

TomBruno23: My lovely state of MO is considering a bill that will finally legalize sports gambling but only in casinos and inside pro sports stadiums. Cannot make this shit up.
Keith Law: Sure. Follow the money and see who funded those legislators.

John: You’ve often referred in passing to your belief that a drafted HS player should go ahead and sign, rather than going to college. I apologize if you’ve done this and I missed it, but can you elaborate? I suspect part of your opinion is based on MLB’s scholarship for players after they stop playing. But considering that scholarship is taxable income (still valuable, but effectively not a full scholarship), is there a certain level in the later rounds of the draft where the player should consider going to college instead?
Keith Law: It’s a generalization, but yes, the scholarship plan is a big part of it, as is the need to capitalize right now in case your value as a player is peaking. The blanket assumption that all players will be better at 21 than they were at 18 is not accurate. Guys get hurt. Guys plateau, or regress. Guys get out of shape. They flunk out of school, or get in trouble. Sometimes you peak at 18. I’m not a Bruce Springsteen fan but isn’t that the whole point of that insipid song?

Sage: Any interest in coming to Chicago’s pizza fest?  
https://chicagopizzafestival.com/
Keith Law: Are they serving actual pizza, or just the thing they call “pizza” in chicago?

Daniel: Does Will Smith or Diego Cartaya have the versatility to play a different position? Seems that will have to come up soon
Keith Law: Cross that bridge when you get there – which I think is at least two years away.

TomBruno23: What are your thoughts, if any (I guess some if you post this Q) about Jeter leaving the Marlins?
Keith Law: I really don’t know what the cause was, which leaves me feeling like there’s little I can say of value here. I did point out that Jeter brought Gary Denbo and some other people over from the Yankees, and I don’t know if their job status was tied to him at all.

Dr. Bob: It seems to me that the guys who might really benefit from the lockout are guys who were probably going to be called up this year but aren’t yet on the 40-man roster. They’ll get a normal ST and then play in AAA to show how they’re advancing. Then when play starts, they’ll be ready.
Keith Law: Quite possible, and then maybe they get a full year of service out of the shortened season?

Matt: Honest question, not intended to be confrontational. Is there any political issue that you lean right (or even moderate) on? You seem to take a very left, progressive position on every issue I’ve seen discussed.
Keith Law: I don’t think that’s accurate at all; I take pro-science, evidence-based positions. I believe in the separation of church and state, as the Establishment Clause of our Constitution guarantees. I believe that tax policies should be guided by evidence on what is likely to do the most economic good, and that using the tax code to guide behaviors is, at least, not always good policy, and often amounts to paternalism. (A tobacco tax to fund health care may make economic sense; a tobacco tax to deter people from smoking may not, and do I really care if you smoke yourself to death as long as I’m not trying to eat over here?) I think your inaccurate impression is a framing problem: When the “right” is this far from the center, rational, evidence-based ideas may seem “left.”

David: For the reader who asked about New Orleans food, I can vouch for Cochon. I still remember the ribs, pickled watermelon and iced tea that I got there.
Keith Law: Glad to hear they’re still going.

Mike P: Isn’t it sad that we consider things like acknowledging the threat of climate change, making it easier rather than harder for people to vote and allowing women to control their own reproductive rights to be “liberal” or “progressive,” and not mainstream?
Keith Law: Or accepting what scientists have known for a half a century, that gender and biological sex are not binary? Or that vaccines are safe and effective, which is backed by a hundred years of evidence?

Brian: We’ve officially hit the point where Tucker Carlson is demanding to see the LSAT’s of the first ever African-American female Supreme Court nominee (which even potting aside the obvious and not subtle racism is stupid for about 10000 different reasons) because he can’t possibly believe a black woman would be smart. But hey teaching CRT is still clearly the biggest issue in this country (eye roll)
Keith Law: I think 90% of the CRT “debate” was astroturfed bullshit designed to rally the right’s base, but there’s 10% “we don’t want to teach kids how bad our history is” so they don’t realize how racist that Carlson thing was.

stixx23: Following up on my Q about the first female player. Any thoughts on a more likely position? Reliever seems the easiest path (don’t have to hit usually and could be a specialist – lefty, knuckler, etc.) especially since it would take an exceptional talent to overcome the “horror” of a “girl” replacing a position player on the roster.
Keith Law: Pitcher. Not sure whether the role matters necessarily and they’d never have to it. Why couldn’t a woman develop the arm strength to throw 90-92 and get high spin rates on a breaking ball?

Insert Witty Name Here: no question I just find this funny: this guy at work agrees with every single principle that Bernie says, but still claims he’s a conservative.
Keith Law: That is funny.

Nick: Do you enjoy Brandywine coffee from Wilmington? They have it at my local shop in Detroit, and I find it to be quite delicious..
Keith Law: They sell it in Detroit? Crazy. We can walk to one of their shops (Brew Ha-ha) and I think as local coffee shops go they’re solid. I do prefer the coffee from Re-Animator in Philly, as my nearby options go, though.

Paul: To respond to the earlier question about leaning right – eliminating tariffs (lower manufacturing costs) and having looser immigration policies (lower labor costs) have, from my understanding, been at least right wing from an economic perspective. (I may be wrong that those are two positions of yours, but I thought I read a previous chat where you were in support of eliminating tariffs.)                                  With today’s republican party though – who the f- knows.
Keith Law: Agreed. I’ve always advocated for open immigration. Most economists will tell you tariffs are bad. I’d certainly oppose federal or state wage/price controls. I don’t agree with the idea of government ownership of industry, which is, you know, what actual socialism is. (Ask anyone who throws that word around as a pejorative to define it. Fun will ensue.)

Mike P: Knowing how strongly you feel about climate change and fossil fuels’ unmistakeable contribution to it, I’m surprised that you are OK with even a short-term nod to that industry on more investment. Don’t mean to be rude or antagonistic, just a bit confused.
Keith Law: I’m a pragmatist. And if we do nothing, and then the GOP takes over again in 2024, the long-term damage to the planet may be irreversible. If passing an energy bill like that now creates some positive change, while also decreasing the changes of a right-wing autocracy coming, so much the better.

Jay’s friend: Does Jay Allen have 30/30 .300/.400 CF potential? Possible top 20 end of year? What could stop him from reaching his ceiling?
Keith Law: I’ll send you to my Reds top 20 for the answer to that. What could stop him = what could stop 95% of HS position player prospects: We have to see how he hits decent pro pitching.

Greg: If Jeter had played a different position (more adequately than SS I mean), would he have been a surefire Hall of Famer?
Keith Law: If he’d been an average defender at third base for 20 years? Probably.
Keith Law: Might actually improve his statistical case, at least.

Insert Witty Name Here: Any thoughts on the possibility that analytics are the root cause of the current labor strife? I know owners always repressed salaries, but once the really smart people got into the FO, the shift of player salaries for really skewed.  So basically this is all your fault? /s
Keith Law: I don’t buy that argument at all. The owners were always going to find a way to win more while paying players less. Analytics were just another tool. If it wasn’t that, it would have been something else.

Clay, Rutherford: What can MLB do differently to expand the game to Europe and develop more quality players? A handful of their teenagers get signed every year, though most are released before they even graduate from the complex leagues. I know Mike Piazza manages the Italian National Team; more involvement from MLB veterans seems like a good place to start.
Keith Law: I joked on Twitter a week ago that MLB players who are locked out should go play overseas to stay ready while also growing the game. Imagine if Xander Bogaerts and Didi Gregorius went to play in the Honkbal Hoofdklasse for a month – crowds would swell, it’d be front-page news, and even though everyone would know they were leaving in a few weeks, it would help expose the sport more in that country. (Gregorius was born there, and Bogaerts is a Dutch citizen as an Aruba native.) There are smaller leagues all over the world, some of which only play in the MLB offseason, but many of which play now. Send a few to Italy, a few to Germany, a few to Czechia, a few to China, and so on. It’d be a bit of a goodwill tour. I know the counterarguments – if a player gets hurt, then what happens – but from a top-down perspective, I think it would do so much good for the sport.
Keith Law: That’s all for today. Thank you all again for reading. I’ll have my first MLB draft content for 2022 up next week – I hope a top 30 ranking plus some notes on Jones and Johnson, if the weather is more favorable this time around. In the meantime, you can see all of my pro prospect rankings content here, on this handy index page. Stay safe everyone.

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→ March 4, 2022
→ By

Escape from Mogadishu.

The South Korean film industry has produced some remarkable, world-class films in the last few years, highlighted by Parasite, of course, but with Burning, The Handmaiden, Train to Busan, and more all earning critical acclaim and often significant followings outside of the Korean-speaking audience. So even when South Korea’s submission to the Academy Awards doesn’t make the shortlist, I try to catch it if possible, as I did with this year’s Escape from Mogadishu, a very strong, exciting action film based on the true story of how diplomats from South and North Korea worked together to escape Somalia when the country collapsed in 1991. (You can rent it on Amazon, iTunes, and Google Play.)

The film opens with scenes of intrigue, as the South Korean delegation to Somalia tries to curry favor with the African country’s longtime dictator, Sian Barre, against a similar effort by the North Korean diplomats as both nations fought for UN recognition. This early bickering and gamesmanship quickly becomes trivial as Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia, falls to rebels, turning the city into a war zone as competing rebel factions fought each other and the remnants of the Somali national army, a civil war that engulfed the country and still has not entirely abated thirty years later. The two Korean missions were both stranded without transportation out of the country or ways to communicate with their parent countries, and the two groups decide to mount a daring escape together to get to the Italian embassy, as the Italians have promised them space on a cargo plane out to Kenya that will allow them to get home.  (You can read one of the diplomats’ recollections of the escape and his criticism of the movie in this English-language article.)

Escape from Mogadishu bounces around between genres in the first third or so of the movie, with some outright comedy, inept spycraft, and a general air of disdain for the scheming of the Cold War era, which makes it more incongruous when the movie follows actual events and becomes a straight-up action film – although this may be a deliberate choice to try to recreate the feeling of shock the diplomats, staffers, and family members must have had when the country fell apart around them. The last two-thirds of the movie are an intense, often relentless rush of movement and peril, punctuated by moments of humanity that arise between the two sides. There’s never the over-the-top recognition that you might expect in an American-made movie, where someone says ‘why can’t we all just get along’ or ‘we’re all the same’ or some other cliché, but the point here is quite clear, and only further underscores the human tragedy when the two groups can’t even acknowledge each other on the runway in Nairobi for fear of getting the North Koreans killed.

It’s an ensemble film and very much a group performance, but there are three more or less central characters, including the North Korean ambassador to Somalia (Heo Joon-ho), the South Korean ambassador (Kim Yoon-seok), and the South Korean intelligence officer (Jo In-sung), the last of whom is younger and far more dapper than the two ambassadors. Heo has earned wide praise for his performance as the strict North Korean leader, dressed in officer’s clothing with a taut military bearing, but who is also the leader of his group, and thus when he softens his attitude towards the South Koreans, his comrades are willing to do the same. Jo is the more memorable character, and gets some of the film’s funnier moments in the first third, but I can see the plaudits for Heo given the tighter reins around the character’s display of emotions. It all looks incredible – the re-creation of the city and the subsequent destruction of it as the civil war hits its streets is remarkable, and the filming of the final action sequence, with the two delegations packed into four cars trying to navigate the streets to get to the Italian consulate, is white-knuckles stuff all the way. I’m not shocked it didn’t make the shortlist for the Oscars, since it feels so much more like a big-budget, popular movie than the sort of film that usually makes the cut, but it’s a well-made film that executes its action scenes well, a sort of On Wings of Eagles or Argo for an even less well-known escape.

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→ March 3, 2022
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Red Rocket.

The idea of the con man as amiable rascal goes back decades, at least, but the archetype has been overtaken by current events, not least from our four years with a con man in the White House. In Sean Baker’s latest film, the hilarious dark comedy Red Rocket, Baker plays with the format by giving us a charming, fast-talking con man as the lead character, making it clear in stages that he’s a self-aggrandizing loser who does not care whose lives he destroys as long as none of them is his own. (You can rent it on Amazon, iTunes, or Google Play.)

Baker’s previous film, The Florida Project was my favorite film of 2017, anchored by an incredible performance by a 6-year-old actress, Brooklynn Prince, with no previous acting credits. Red Rocket is almost as good, and once again he’s cast two unconventional actors as leads: former MTV VJ and unserious actor Simon Rex, and an unknown actor named Suzanna Son, who had just one minor movie credit before this one.

Rex plays “Mikey Saber,” a former porn star who has returned to Texas City after his career ended for unknown reasons, and tries to move back in with his estranged wife, Lexi (Bree Elrod), who at least for a time was in adult films with him. After a few futile attempts to find regular work, stymied by the long gap on his resume, Mikey begins selling weed for Leondria, who distributes with the help of her kids, especially her stoic daughter June. When Mikey has enough money to finally pay Lexi and her mom Lil something for rent, he takes them to the local donut shop, where he meets 17-year-old Strawberry (Son), and immediately sets his sights on seducing her, with an eye towards taking her to LA and using her as his way back into the porn industry.

As in The Florida Project, the majority of actors in Red Rocket are non-professionals; only Rex and Elrod had more than one acting credit before this film, with Elrod mostly working on the stage since she was in Shutter Island a decade ago. Baker’s skill for finding people who can fill these roles is remarkable, with Brittney Rodriguez (June) especially standing out once her character finally gets to talk, in the film’s funniest scene by far, a family squabble near the end of the movie that was, of course, provoked by Mikey.

But it’s Rex and especially Son who make this movie. Rex is perfectly annoying as the guy who never shuts up about himself, his plans, how greatness is just around the corner, how he would already have been rich and/or famous except that something happened. He has an external locus of control large enough to enclose his giant ego, and he never tires of telling everyone who’ll listen about it. Son is a revelation as Strawberry, a convincing teenager (she’s actually 26) who leans a little into the Lolita role Mikey sees for her, but who is also naïve enough not to realize how sinister Mikey’s motives are and to appear to fall for him and his schemes, even when some external factors should tip her off. She evinces the superficial worldliness of the teenager who thinks she’s an adult, especially since the world often treats her that way, but who’s also too trusting and sometimes misses obvious points about how the world works. She also gets to sing in one of the movie’s stranger moments – it comes after a sex scene, which is awkward like every single sex scene in the movie, almost always because of Mikey – and has a lovely voice that had me convinced I’d heard her before. (She sounds like one of the many indie singer/songwriters out there right now, although I haven’t been able to figure out which one yet.)

The film is dark, despite being incredibly funny, and never quite grapples with how awful Mikey is other than letting you see the person under the hood (quite literally, near the end of the film). He’s a 40-something creep who seduces a 17-year-old and sees absolutely nothing wrong with it, even when he tells her ex-boyfriend to leave her alone because she’s with Mikey now. He uses his closest friend, or the closest thing he has to a friend, for free transportation for weeks, only to land that friend in a world of trouble from which Mikey escapes. He weasels his way back into Lexi’s life, clearly giving her false hope that he’s sticking around and will allow her to put something back together – her mother is addicted to opioids, and Lexi might be as well – only to have him ditch her the moment he locks in on Strawberry as his mark. He’s irredeemable with no interest in redemption. I have known several people, all men, just like him, convinced that a huge success is just around the corner, that the world simultaneously owes them this success and is the only thing denying it to them. They’re insufferable even as friends or acquaintances, and that’s if you don’t get caught up in one of their schemes. It’s a testament to Baker’s script and Rex’s performance that Mikey is so familiar and recognizable, and that he can entertain us even as we want to throttle him.

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