Brennan 0:00
You’re listening to Dodge Movie Podcast. Your hosts are Christi and Mike Dodge the founders of Dodge Media Productions. We produce films and podcasts. So this is a podcast about films. Join them as they share their passion for filmmaking.

Christi Dodge 0:17
Welcome back, everybody to the Dodge Movie Podcast. Congratulations to Stacey out of key Stein who successfully guessed the theme for January. It was road movies or movies about traveling. Stacey was our only winner. You guys, she’s got a leg up on you. So you gotta get get your guesses in this next month for February. Look at our social media for clues and look at the four films we chose for clues. I think this one should be easy for everybody. So get those guesses in through email christi@dodgemediaproductions.com, text or call and leave me a message of what you think the theme is 971-245-4148.

Congratulations, Stacey. All right. We’re kicking off February with a whole new theme that nobody knows but you all are welcome to guess as many times as you want. We are kicking off with The Photograph which came out in 2020. We watched it on Prime for $3.99. It is written and directed by Stella McGee. We know her from Jean of the Joneses from 2016 and The Weekend from 2018. The Photograph stars Issa Rae, LaKeith Stanfield, Chante Adams, Y’lan Noel, Kelvin Harrison, Lil Rel Howery, Teyonah Parris, Jasmine Cephas Jones, Courtney B. Vance and Chelsea Peretti.

Mike Dodge 1:49
Am I correct in remembering that Lil Rel was in Tag which has been previously talked about?

Christi Dodge 1:55
Correct. He was.

Mike Dodge 1:56
And in Tag, I believe he plays a Portlander, what what!

Christi Dodge 2:01
The DP for the Photograph is Mark Schwartzbard and he’s done a lot of episodic stuff like the Reservation Dogs and Loot and The Next Thing You Eat, Love Victor, which was the TV episodic follow up from Love Simon.

Mike Dodge 2:17
Oh, but I remember you did when you mentioned there what was the second one?

Christi Dodge 2:23
Loot?

Mike Dodge 2:24
Yeah, Loot is another one with Maya Rudolph.

Christi Dodge 2:26
Yes, it is.

Mike Dodge 2:26
Yeah. Good. Yeah. Now Faxon? Yeah, yeah.

Christi Dodge 2:29
The synopsis for The Photograph is a series of intertwining love stories set in the past and the present, which I didn’t really feel like that explained anything at all.

Mike Dodge 2:41
No, yeah.

Christi Dodge 2:42
And listen to this tagline.

Mike Dodge 2:43
Okay.

Christi Dodge 2:44
When famed photographer Christina Eames dies unexpectedly, she leaves her estranged daughter Mae hurt, angry and full of questions. When Mae finds a photograph tucked away in a safe deposit box. She assumed delving deeply into her mother’s early life, an investigation that leads to an unexpected romance with a rising journalist.

Mike Dodge 3:07
That does not describe this movie.

Christi Dodge 3:09
Well. Oh, I feel like that describes The Photograph but I think the IMDB got the tagline and the synopsis mixed up.

Mike Dodge 3:17
Yeah, it ain’t a tagline. But I would say, Wow, not to pick it apart just on the tagline but die suddenly didn’t get that famed photographer didn’t get that. I would not argue that this is two intertwined stories, I would say this is mostly about Issa Rae and LaKeith Stanfield’s characters in the modern time.

Christi Dodge 3:37
I’m fascinated because to me this nails that on a tee she was famed because she’s being highlighted. She’s gonna have her own gallery opening. So,

Mike Dodge 3:47
Okay, this, this gets to one of my big problems with the film.

Christi Dodge 3:50
Okay.

Mike Dodge 3:51
It’s called The Photograph.

Christi Dodge 3:53
Yeah.

Mike Dodge 3:53
And supposedly, that character who is played by think the third billed actress there, if I recall correctly?

Christi Dodge 4:00
No. Chante Adams is the young Christine.

Mike Dodge 4:03
Okay. Anyway, um, that character, we don’t see what two of her photographs. It was called The Photograph. And one of the main characters is a famed photographer. There should be a whole lot of photographs. And I refer to, I believe it is, Take Me Home, which is Sam Jaeger’s film where he’s a photographer. We see more of his photos than we do of hers in this and she’s famed.

Christi Dodge 4:25
The title of the movie isn’t The Photographs.

Mike Dodge 4:29
It was right there. Singular. I should have known. I should have seen it.

Christi Dodge 4:33
I think it’s a one where she’s sitting in the kitchen. That’s THE photograph.

Mike Dodge 4:37
Yeah, but famed photographer? Right? Oh my gosh. Just wow.

Christi Dodge 4:42
All right.

Mike Dodge 4:42
Well, I was thinking the entire camera department just threw their script up in the air.

Christi Dodge 4:48
Well Stella wrote The Photograph in 2015, that took her five years to make it and she worked with Issa in Insecure and so when she worked with her on Insecure then she, you know really liked working with her and wanted to wanted to work with her again. And so she wrote this. They found actually Jada mag girl. And she did all the photos. She did, Chris, I’m doing air quotes “Christine’s” photos for the film.

Mike Dodge 5:16
Air quotes are great for the podcast.

Christi Dodge 5:17
I know, that’s why I called it out.

Mike Dodge 5:19
So, so she probably could have done more than one photo. Just throwing it out there.

Christi Dodge 5:24
Well, apparently she did. Okay, um, kick us off with your pickup line. Does this film hold to your theory that the first line of the film sets up the film?

Mike Dodge 5:36
I would say so. Cuz it’s Billy, why are we doing this? Well, I mean, I’m not being snarky, but,

Christi Dodge 5:45
A little bit.

Mike Dodge 5:46
Okay for humor, because that’s what I do. But I do think it works the at least the why are we doing this part? Because I think that was LaKeith Stanfield’s character I think his name is Isaac in the film. I think that was a good question. Why is he doing this? Right? He kind of you know, uncovered it as the story went on. Why was he hooked into the story?

Christi Dodge 6:07
Michael Block was his name.

Mike Dodge 6:09
Okay, his name was Michael. Yeah,

Christi Dodge 6:10
There was, oh, young Isaac. Um Isaac was, I think Christine’s love interest.

Mike Dodge 6:18
Okay. Yeah. Okay. Oh, yeah. That was the guy that actor was on Insecure. Right?

Christi Dodge 6:22
Right.

Mike Dodge 6:23
Name starts with a Y, but it’s difficult to pronounce for me.

Christi Dodge 6:26
Yes. I felt like early in the Photograph, the cinematography, everything kind of had this blue hue, even, like inside and outside.

Mike Dodge 6:39
Everything was was dark, underexposed. I have a note here that most scenes were under lit, and I thought perhaps what RDP was trying to do is make it more like black and white, which is what the photograph was black and white of an era.

So that was my thought, but I did notice it was really dimly lit. So much so that it didn’t make a lot of sense to me. In some cases. For example, when Michael and Mae first meet, I think that’s Issa’s character right? They’re in this curator’s room. And there’s a bunch of stuff, and it has like, one 40 watt bulb.

Christi Dodge 7:20
Yeah.

Mike Dodge 7:20
And I don’t believe any curator would have that crappy of lighting when they’re looking at stuff, right. I mean, it would be really well lit.

Christi Dodge 7:29
It’s almost like a 911 center that’s really poorly lit.

Mike Dodge 7:32
Right? Well, I’d love to send an ambulance your way, man, but I can’t read my notes. Yeah. Okay. It’s moody. I get it, but…

Christi Dodge 7:40
Yeah, yeah, it was. I mean, it was kind of cool. Sometimes, like if they’re in a bar at night at work,

Mike Dodge 7:42
Yeah, that made more sense. Bars are very dark.

Christi Dodge 7:43
Yeah, right.

Mike Dodge 7:43
But it was just kind of, and so they had when there is the storm. And when they’re working on the streets, some of that made some degree of sense. But then there are other times when it was done. And I was kind of like, huh, but it was moody. Yeah, definitely.

Christi Dodge 8:06
Yes. And then it opens with a video clip. And we can tell, you know, we’re kind of, I believe it fills the whole screen. I don’t think we’re seeing the TV. But it’s almost like we’re watching somebody watch this clip.

And it’s very dated, it’s clearly a 1980s kind of esq, and somebody’s interviewing, Mae’s mom, Christine, and she says, I wish I was as good at love as I was at working. And I felt like I think we had to kind of get into it so that the audience doesn’t lose the impact of that line. But that also would make a great first line because Mae goes on to almost mimic.

Mike Dodge 8:46
Right?

Christi Dodge 8:47
Her mom’s inability to express and accept love.

Mike Dodge 8:51
Right? That was 4:3 aspect ratio, which would be accurate for something shot in 1989. But the picture quality was 2020 high def and I was curious, you as a filmmaker, in that situation because that was a choice, right? They obviously consciously chose not to grainify it or make it look crappy. I’m curious where you land on that because my instinct was oh, maybe they should have made it look like VHS from 1989, the picture quality, lower the picture quality to match the the aspect ratio so that it looks exactly like you’d be but so I’m just curious where you landed on that.

Did that bump you to see that it was really high def picture quality even though it was a 4:3` ratio. It was supposed to be shot in 1989?

Christi Dodge 9:38
Well, now I feel like I’m taking crazy pills because I felt so I know in the bottom corner was the like, pixelation digitized timecode and are you saying? And I felt that the picture quality was grainy?

Mike Dodge 9:55
Okay, well, I don’t know. Maybe I remember the 80s is being worse video quality. But I mean, I just I made a note here that it was really good picture quality for 89.

Christi Dodge 10:06
Well, I mean, I’m sure that obviously, they shot it in 2020.

Mike Dodge 10:12
Yeah, yeah. And digitally,

Christi Dodge 10:14
Yeah, you can add grain. I’ve done it.

Mike Dodge 10:16
Yeah. So that was I was just curious, but you felt like there was some. Okay, well, that answers a question then. Right. I think,

Christi Dodge 10:22
In my memory, but now I’m questioning my right.

Mike Dodge 10:26
Well, sorry about that. But it’s interesting that you mentioned that line is good at love as in working because I feel like the character of Mae’s mother, and maybe maybe Mae to a certain extent, but particularly her mother had a character flaw that you tend to see in men in movies that she was hard, she has a hard time committing and that she would run away from commitment, like literally run away physically go to a new town, and if you swapped the gender that would have been, no one would have blinked, right, that we’ve seen that many times. So I thought that was an interesting writing choice.

Christi Dodge 11:01
Yeah, I think that they explained it as we learn who Christine was. And her mother was not affectionate and loving to her. And I think that Christine felt more comfortable in the realm of her photography. So I think that we’re just to see that and I think it’s Mae’s wrestling with, I’m repeating what she did. I didn’t like it because she wasn’t affectionate and loving towards me. But now I’m having an inability to receive affection and love from men.

Mike Dodge 11:37
I wasn’t being critical of that writing choice, actually thought it was a neat choice. Yeah. And I thought the character was believable. I just noted that that’s a character flaw that we don’t often see written for female characters, right?

Christi Dodge 11:52
I’m thinking Isla Fisher character from Wedding Crashers.

Mike Dodge 11:55
Yeah, exactly.

Christi Dodge 11:56
She’s the exact opposite.

Mike Dodge 11:57
Yeah. And in fact, you see how it carries through because after Hurricane Nikki, the he doesn’t, he goes to her. And she’s very tolerant of that, which again, goes against like these Isla Fisher.

Midway through The Photograph

Christi Dodge 12:10
I liked how they used Michael, the reporter who is doing a piece about Christina. I like how they used him so that we could get to know her mother, which also kind of introduces the flashbacks, so that through his eyes, and through his investigative reporting, we learn more about Christina and Isaac, and then the man that she ended up marrying who, who, who may felt was that father figure even though it seemed like they both knew that he wasn’t her father. And I feel like he knew he wasn’t Christina’s true love, that she always longed for Isaac.

Mike Dodge 12:53
Yeah, it could be I can see that. I felt like I liked that character. And wouldn’t mind seeing a bit more of him. I felt The Photograph was stronger in the first half. And then it kind of for me lost steam in the back half. And I don’t know if that’s strictly because she spent more time with her biological father. But from my perspective, the story began to bog down a bit again, as I mentioned, live when we were watching it, I apparently really liked Lil Rel’s performance. He’s a hoot. I’ll watch him on anything.

Christi Dodge 13:24
Yeah. So you were talking about steamy and you said it. It happened more in the early in the early part of it. So let’s see, probably about a third of the way through as Michael kind of wears her down because she’s trying to give him the brush off. They have an evening at I believe her apartment, or was that his apartment?

Mike Dodge 13:46
I think it was supposed to be her apartment and boom, chicka wow.

Christi Dodge 13:49
Right. And so he says, you have your head down. Like you’re praying, what are you praying for? And she says willpower, and then they cut to two naked bodies in bed and thus then begins the sex montage.

Mike Dodge 14:04
Right? Yes, I thought it was both simultaneously classy and Skinemax. So.

Christi Dodge 14:12
I thought it was very sexy. I got a little warm. Yeah, yeah, it was it was steamy.

Mike Dodge 14:20
I don’t know if I kind of got that. Well, I can watch it again. Maybe and let you know.

Christi Dodge 14:27
Michael also had his issues because he, an inmate. This is funny because this is his Is this a male trait? Let me ask you. Is this a male trait?

Mike Dodge 14:39
Okay.

Christi Dodge 14:40
He had trouble sharing information, information that I felt was vital to the person that you’re kind of dating with doing.

Mike Dodge 14:48
I’m I’ve applied for a job in a foreign country on the other side of an ocean?

Christi Dodge 14:52
Yeah. And how do you feel about that? Like, if I were to get it, what would you think?

Mike Dodge 14:58
I think that’s a weenie move from either gender, I would not say that as a stereotypical male trait. I could see it more be he would tell her once that he was applying and then not update her. And she’d say, what’s going on with the job? And he would say, well, nothing, because I haven’t told you anything. So thus there, I can see that. But no, he was definitely very much feeding back to her, her distance her running away.

Christi Dodge 15:24
Yes. And I think he was even frustrated, because I believe there’s a moment. This is why we have to record the podcast right after we watch the movie. I feel like he felt like she was giving him the brush off. And so he was like, All right, well, then I’m gonna carry forward with my life, and I’m gonna go get this job. Then she was like, Oh, wait, I think I like that guy. And so then she went to kind of chase him down. Then he tells her about the job.

Mike Dodge 15:52
It’s too late.

Christi Dodge 15:52
Yeah.

Mike Dodge 15:53
Right. Again, I think if we swapped the genders, this would be very recognizable,

Christi Dodge 15:58
Meaning that he would be the female or he would?

Mike Dodge 16:02
That the male character doesn’t want to commit until the female character then moves on. And then he’s like, Oh, wait just a second. I really do. So like I said, I don’t say that’s a “don’t know”. I think it’s kind of interesting um gender switch.

Christi Dodge 16:17
Yes, I like it. And then later in The Photograph, her mom says pictures took the space in my heart took more space in my heart than people did. So her mom even realized that she wasn’t behaving in a quote unquote. And I hate to say normal, because nobody’s normal, but in a traditional way, or in a

Mike Dodge 16:35
A way that is consistent with a functional relationship.

Christi Dodge 16:39
Yeah, she knew that she was prioritizing our pictures. I think that was safe. She controlled the pictures. She even controlled who saw the pictures.

Mike Dodge 16:48
Yeah. See, this is where I think there is a lot of material to be mined there. It’s maybe a little cliche, but I think a lot of photographers do enjoy being behind the camera capturing others, and there is a certain distance in that a certain objectivity. And I think, given that character, looking a little bit more into her working as a photographer would have, I think, allowed us to explore that a bit more.Right?

Christi Dodge 17:17
Yes. Yeah, I think she tried, but not not nearly as long and as involved as The Holiday but it very much this, this was a telling of two love stories. And they are kind of intertwined because of the familial relationship. But it’s a balance. How do you fully tell Christina’s story while still telling Mae’s story?

Mike Dodge 17:40
Right. And, and that was what we talked about earlier, as I felt like, Mae got more weight in that storytelling than Christina who didn’t. And to me, I think it would have worked better. I would rather have a little more weighting toward Christina, in my opinion.

Christi Dodge 17:52
But I wonder if it’s Stella saying, kind of looking more introspectively how we are influenced by our former generations and kind of what they went through. And because we saw that Christina’s mom was very abusive.

Mike Dodge 18:13
Or, to be a bit cynical, it is the business of show and Issa has a big name.

Christi Dodge 18:18
So, show her more. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. At the very beginning, I liked it’s a, it’s a common trope, but I appreciate it. When he’s listening to music.

Mike Dodge 18:31
Yeah, he’s in the car. And it’s non diegetic. And it moves to diegetic.

Christi Dodge 18:36
So it sounds like it’s just music under the film, not part of the,

Mike Dodge 18:41
Right.

Christi Dodge 18:41
the movie, and then it’s it they lower, kind of or increase the boom or something kind of until it feels enclosed into the car. Was there any head trauma in The Photograph?

Mike Dodge 18:52
Uh, not that I caught?

Christi Dodge 18:54
I don’t think so. But as we previously spoke, there was some smoochies.

Mike Dodge 18:58
Smoochy smoochy smoochy. There were some smoochies. I made note of Michael and Mae kiss in the bar, and then during the hurricane in her apartment, and then later he kisses her to shut her up outside the kinder performance, which is a classic romantic move, stop talking smooch.

Christi Dodge 19:18
Chicka chicka wow wow.

Mike Dodge 19:20
Presumably there’s some kissing there but I believe the parts that we saw, I apparently didn’t respond to them quite as much but I thought it was just general naked bodies rolling around with poor lighting.

Christi Dodge 19:32
The, well, the power had gone out, that is in that scene.

Mike Dodge 19:36
And Issa Rae doesn’t want to do nudity. That’s also fine. It’s a business of show.

Christi Dodge 19:40
It’s artfully done.

Mike Dodge 19:42
It was.

Christi Dodge 19:43
That well, so I’ve already mentioned the car. So driving review, please.

Mike Dodge 19:47
Okay, so I thought the late model Ford Taurus rental car that Michael has when he goes to talk to her bio father is appropriately boring, but I but he seems to get this same exact car every time he goes down there and then doesn’t have a lot of rental cars.

There’s a 70s era Dodge Ram pickup. Great choice. I strongly support that. There’s a brown forder? Cadillac. Oh my gosh, I love that’s why I love Cadillacs. Did you see you could sit four adults comfortably in each one of those bench seats. That car is the size of a battleship. I loved that.

Christi Dodge 20:24
Aw, those were the days.

Mike Dodge 20:26
They were. Uncle Bud and I would have really enjoyed driving that car around. I wanted to know how hard it was to get an 80s era correct Greyhound bus because they did a good job of that. And lastly, though a little bit of a criticism here, from the eyes on the road department Isaac spends more than five seconds straight staring at Christine in the passenger seat when he is driving the motor vehicle. And that is not allowed.

Christi Dodge 20:52
True

Mike Dodge 20:53
Yeah, true dead. So guys, when you’re at the controls eyes on the road.

Christi Dodge 20:59
Shall we go to the numbers?

Mike Dodge 21:00
Let’s go to the numbers.

Christi Dodge 21:01
Okay, before we go to the numbers, not to trigger anyone, but The Photograph came out February 14, 2020. So it made that weekend $12 million. By the next weekend, it had increased to $17 million.

Mike Dodge 21:17
Okay, doing well.

Christi Dodge 21:18
The week after that. So now we’re at the end of February. $19.6 million.

Mike Dodge 21:23
Okay.

Christi Dodge 21:24
And then two weeks later, it capped out at $20.5 million, because basically after that theaters closed, so it made $20 million. And it had a budget of 15.

Mike Dodge 21:41
Okay, so,

Christi Dodge 21:43
Not good but I don’t blame The Photograph, because it was going along pretty good. I wish it could have had its full run.

Mike Dodge 21:53
Yeah, yeah. I do think that it wouldn’t have done gangbusters because as I said, I think the second half of The Photograph started to lose its way a bit. But I think it would have done much better if they had kept the theatres open. So curious. Unfortunately, I hope that’s not held against the director, or the stars because I don’t really feel like those numbers are representative of what their work was.

Christi Dodge 22:18
I agree. I agree. It got a 6.1 out of 10. Which I do feel is low. What did what what would you give this on IMDB?

Mike Dodge 22:26
I think that’s about right. Yeah, yeah.

Christi Dodge 22:29
Oh I would totally give this a 7.

Mike Dodge 22:30
So I try to I mean, just my personal metric is I if everybody like kind of did their job, and it just didn’t land I have a hard time going beneath a six. So that’s kind of where this was. I felt like the acting was fine. There were no obvious problems with writing or direction. The cinematography was fine. The sound was fine. Everybody did their job. It just it was it was okay. But it wasn’t,

Christi Dodge 22:53
Right.

Mike Dodge 22:53
You know?

Christi Dodge 22:54
Well, critics on Rotten Tomatoes gave it 75% and audiences liked it a wee bit more than you and the critics. They gave it 81%.

Mike Dodge 23:03
Yeah, I can see that.

Christi Dodge 23:04
They liked it. It’s an hour and 46 minutes. It’s rated PG-13, although I’m a little surprised with that sex scene.

Mike Dodge 23:11
Wow, wow.

Christi Dodge 23:13
It is a Drama Romance. And let’s see. It was filmed in Queens, New York City and Louisiana. It’s a Universal Pictures film and Issa Rae was nominated for favorite drama movie star at the 2020 People’s Choice Awards and Outstanding Actress in a Motion Picture at the NAACP Image Awards.

Mike Dodge 23:37
That’s an interesting thing because getting back to box office I feel like Issa is box office gold. I think she’s got the it factor, very charismatic. So yeah, I I’m not surprised that she got nominated for some things especially like a People’s Choice because I do you think she’s got that the magnetism the charisma that would really open the film strong.

Christi Dodge 23:59
I think she’s great because she she’s we obviously know she’s very comedic. But then she also I feels nails drama as well like in this piece. And we’ve seen it in Insecure, she can be dramatic. And and do a good job.

Mike Dodge 24:16
Yeah, I think she’s very talented. Yeah, but that kind of the business side with that smile, I’d put her on the red carpet any day. I was I mean she would put butts in seats I think.

Christi Dodge 24:26
Yes.

Mike Dodge 24:26
And speaking in whichever agent is looking for some short film work. So you know it’s really good quality independent filmmaking let us know.

Christi Dodge 24:34
I feel like she’s a little busy right now.

Mike Dodge 24:36
Maybe so but you never know.

Christi Dodge 24:37
You never know.

Mike Dodge 24:38
She might want to come up to the northwest and hang out for a bit.

Christi Dodge 24:40
All right, well, that does it everybody for this episode of The Photograph. Like I said we watched it on prime for $3.99 and this is airing on February 5th. So we are kicking off our new month, be checking out our social media, as well as the four movies listed for February to see if you can guess the theme, and guess the theme and if you win, you win all kinds of prizes. Check out our website, dodgemediaproductions.com for more information. And never forget

Mike Dodge 25:12
Dodges never stop and neither do the movies.

Outro

Brennan 25:14
Thanks for listening to Dodge Movie Podcast with Christi and Mike Dodge of Dodge Media Productions. To find out more about this podcast and what we do, go to dodgemediaproductions.com. Subscribe, share, leave a comment and tell us what we should watch next. Dodges never stop and neither do the movies.