In Jeopardy

As the 2026 Winter Olympics played out, I was an up-close-and-personal observer of a competition of another kind. While figure-skaters Ilia Malinin and Amber Glenn graphically showed us what performance anxiety is all about, I was watching perfectly nice mental athletes trying to best the reigning champ on that old TV standby, Jeopardy! The show, around since 1964, rewards arcane knowledge that contestants must offer by way of a question. Categories are obscure; clues are designed to be tricky. If you do well, you can win major money and pride yourself on being a designated brainiac. But, even though host and staff go out of their way to be welcoming to all participants, the assumption is that two out of the three contestants will eventually go home with empty pockets and dashed dreams of glory. For some of the losers it’s fun, despite it all. Others will take longer to get past the disappointment they feel about their less-than-stellar performance.

 What is it about quiz shows that we Americans love? I’m old enough to remember early game shows like The $64,000 Question, in which questions were more factual than tricky, and we in the home audience found ourselves rooting for contestants with particularly moving backstories. Our enthusiasm for these shows was of course tempered by the eventual disclosure of massive behind-the-scenes cheating, contrived by the networks to increase fan excitement. The secret coaching of contestant Charles Van Doren on the show called Twenty-One led eventually to a fascinating 1994 film, Quiz Show, directed by Robert Redford. (Ralph Fiennes played Van Doren, and John Turturro starred as Herb Stempel, a less aristocratic contestant who was forced to lose to Van Doren, scion of an impressive literary family.)

 There’s been no cheating scandal connected with Jeopardy!  One thing is clear: people really want to be in the studio audience. Jeopardy! is taped at Sony Studios, which of course used to be the fabled MGM lot. So just getting past the guard gate is a bit of a thrill, and the parking structure décor—with its towering photos of host Ken Jennings right next to the metal detector—is designed to make you feel part of something special. After some waiting around, and receiving the all-important wrist band, you are escorted . . .  not to the soundstage but to a gift shop where all manner of branded game-show merch (T-shirts, pajamas, water bottles) is on sale. After making your purchases you assemble in a large hallway where videos of excited contestants play in a constant loop.

 Finally you are escorted to Jeopardy! central, where a veteran greeter explains the code of conduct. Yes, laugh and cheer, especially when the applause sign is lit, but don’t mutter the correct answer, even under your breath, because a sensitive microphone might pick it up. The crew on hand all seem part of a very large family: the greeter makes sure to let us know how many decades he’s been with the show, how much he adored late host Alex Trebek, and how Ken Jennings (a 74-game Jeopardy! winner before snagging the host’s job) is perfect as Trebek’s amiable successor.   

 The Jeopardy! set is a marvel of exotic swirls and dramatic lighting. But perhaps even more exciting is the lobby, which guests can visit between taping sessions. There’s a huge case filled with Emmy statuettes won by the show. And you can pose for photos behind a mock-up of a real contestant’s desk. Alex Trebek’s very own desk is posed in a niche like a treasured relic, complete with futuristic lighting. I’ll take nostalgia for $800.

 

 

 

Tallying the Votes: “Conclave”

You’d think that, after November 5, I would have had enough of elections. But there I was, two days later, checking out a film that is all about what it takes to get elected. No, I wasn’t watching  Reese Witherspoon as Tracy Flick doing everything in her power to be chosen student body president in Election. (That 1999 flick—both delightful and disturbing—turned Matthew Broderick of Ferris Bueller fame into a much-beleaguered grown-up, and established writer/director Alexander Payne as someone to watch. But I digress.)

 What I saw last Thursday night was not about high school girls in very short skirts, but rather about Roman Catholic cardinals in long ones. The brand-new Conclave, based on a popular novel, takes us behind the scenes of the election of a new pope , after his predecessor is found dead in his Vatican apartment. There’s been no murder most foul: it’s clear the old man died of natural causes. Both the public and the princes of the church are in deep mourning . But life goes on, and a new man must quickly be chosen to wear the so-called Ring of the Fisherman, like the one that has just been wrested off of the dead pope’s finger.

 That’s why Roman Catholic cardinals from around the globe are locked in the Sistine Chapel, directly beneath Michelangelo’s famous frescos, to choose one of their number as the Supreme Pontiff. Each will write a name on a small slip of paper, which  will ritualistically be slipped into a chalice. An appointed cardinal reads each ballot. Because it takes a two-thirds majority to win, multiple rounds of balloting are generally required. Then, at last, the burned ballots will emit white rather than black smoke, indicating to those waiting breathlessly outside that a new pope has been chosen.

 The film Conclave makes clear that, amid all the ritual formality of the Latin rite voting process, there’s often a real power struggle going on. The papal candidates make no speeches and issue no campaign promises, but their views are well known to their fellow cardinals, and factions naturally arise in support of various approaches to the ancient institution they all hold dear. Some skullduggery is also to be expected: the always memorable John Lithgow plays a cardinal who trips up a rival by dramatically exposing a long-ago transgression. We meet also a deeply conservative cardinal who seeks to undo many of the church’s recent reforms, a mysterious Mexican cardinal who was elevated in secrecy by the late pope, and Stanley Tucci as an American cardinal who’s probably too liberal-minded to be chosen pope. At the very center of the film is Ralph Fiennes as a deeply scrupulous cardinal faced with the unenviable task of managing the ins and outs of the Holy See. I should not overlook the film’s one important female character, Isabella Rossellini as Sister Agnes, who sees bad behavior that the cardinals will not admit to. There’s one point the film makes crystal-clear: every cardinal, no matter how modest his manner, secretly dreams of being elevated  to the papacy, and has long since picked out his papal name.

  Conclave is directed by Edward Berger who won acclaim for last year’s All Quiet on the Western Front. He beautifully manages the film’s huge canvas: Conclave is gorgeous to look at, and is well served by a fascinating score. The acting ensemble proves impressive, and Fiennes is deservedly getting raves for his complex role. Yes, toward the end the plot twists become increasingly unconvincing, but Conclave remains a satisfying behind-the-scenes look at a world we’ll never fully know.

 

“The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar . . . and Wes Anderson”

I seem to be having a bit of a private Wes Anderson festival lately. Some cinematic research led me to re-watch Moonrise Kingdom, The French Dispatch, and his latest, Asteroid City. As always, I was charmed by Anderson’s enchanting visuals, and by his use of some of the world’s best actors in quirky and unexpected ways. And yet I could never shake the notion that most of Anderson’s work is much ado about nothing: that he lacks the story sense to make something that actually has meaning. With Oscar night coming up so soon, it’s appropriate to mention that Anderson’s films have never lacked for Academy love. Over the years, there have been 16 nominations in various categories,  most of them technical. The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014—perhaps the Anderson work with the most to say) actually collected 9 nominations, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Original Screenplay. And it won statuettes for its costume design, hair and makeup, production design, and original score. Still, the big prizes have eluded Anderson himself, maybe because many Academy voters see Anderson’s works as charming stunts, rather than as truly meaningful creations.

 Perhaps this will be the year when Anderson finally wins his own Oscar. He’s on the short list not for Asteroid City (which got shut out of all categories) but for his forty-minute adaptation of a Roald Dahl tale, “The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar.” Dah’s whimsical though sometimes macabre way of looking at the world seems to beautifully suit Anderson’s stylistics, allowing him to romp visually while giving some spine to his storytelling. Clearly Anderson is on a Roald Dahl kick: for Netflix he has applied  his cinematic skills to a whole 1976 volume of Dahl stories, of which “Henry Sugar” is the first and best.

 For “Henry Sugar,” Anderson enjoys the services of some of England’s finest, including Benedict Cumberbatch (as the title character), along with Dev Patel, Ben Kingsley, and (playing a version of Dahl himself) Ralph Fiennes. All seem to have been directed to play straight to the camera, delivering their lines at a speedy deadpan clip as though they were reading straight from the Dahl text. And what a text it is, comprising an exotic tale within a tale. Fiennes as Dahl introduces us to Henry, a wealthy Englishman whose only goal is increasing his substantial fortune by playing cards for money. In his countryman’s well-furnished library he happens upon the account of an Indian mystic who learned after years of strenuous concentration to read with his eyes securely bandaged. To Henry, the knowledge of this possibility leads immediately to thoughts of how he can best his card-playing cronies by being able to read the cards in a deck though only seeing their backsides. He applies himself to this effort, and succeeds magnificently, coming away with a brick-sized packet of cold, hard cash. But of course things don’t work out as planned, and Dahl’s neat twist of an ending shows us the surprising ways that greed can work on the human psyche.

 Dahl has supplied the story line: Anderson contributes his own magic, mostly of the visual variety. His locations—whether they represent Dahl’s cozy writing cottage, a baronial stately home, an Indian guru’s jungle hut, or a hospital lounge—all seem as artificial as stage sets, and they come apart and re-form (with the help, at times, of stagehands) with dazzling speed. What Anderson has achieved is a short film that gives us the immediacy, and the aesthetic pleasure, of live theatre. Which makes me wonder: why doesn’t Anderson give stage work a try?  

 

“The Menu,” Featuring Dishes Best Served Cold

After the lights came up, I went out and ate a cheeseburger, savoring every last bite. Those who’ve seen The Menu will, I’m sure, understand the implications. Let’s just say that The Menu is about fine dining, taken to a degree that’s absurd, even grotesque. It’s a film that will not be to everyone’s taste, but connoisseurs will find it strange, funny, and horrible. Which is why, on a recent evening, the prime screening at my local multiplex was completely sold out. In an era when many film lovers would rather stay home and watch Netflix, The Menu fills the bill for highly original entertainment.

 We all love to eat, and some of us love to cook. Which is why many filmmakers have produced works that focus on the cooking and eating of a meal. One of the earliest I remember is the poignant Babette’s Feast (1987), in which a 19^th century French refugee thanks the Danish villagers who’ve taken her in by way of a spectacular dinner. It took me a while to discover the Japanese Tampopo (1985)  which approaches the preparation and consumption of food in an affectionate but absurdist light. Director Ang Lee, early in his career, made a 1994 Taiwanese film, Eat Drink Man Woman, in which a veteran chef and his three daughters play out the challenges of their daily lives by way of their weekly Sunday meals. Food-making substitutes for love in Mexico’s 1992 Like Water for Chocolate, based on an acclaimed novel. There are many more examples, but I’ll stop with Stanley Tucci’s Big Night (1996), about the emotion that goes into the opening of a family-owned restaurant.

 In most of these movies, the cooking and serving of food becomes a way of showing love. Which makes The Menu a film with a difference. If revenge is a dish best served cold, the chill here is palpable, but there’s some flaming emotion as well. Not that this is obvious from the get-go, when a group of 12 beautiful people board a launch that will take them to a tiny island for the meal of a lifetime. Their host is fabled chef Julian Slowik (Ralph Fiennes), who introduces each exquisite dish in loving detail, but also rules his open kitchen like a drill sergeant. Some of the offerings are perversely humorous, like the bread plate that consists solely of tiny dabs of oils and sauces, with no bread in sight. Other courses . . .  well, it wouldn’t be fair to say.

 Part of what animates The Menu, aside from a desire to tell a helluva good story, is a disdain for the absurdities of today’s fine dining scene, in which small numbers of diners pay exorbitant sums to feast on the rare and the exotic. Some of the targets of the film’s very dark jokes are snobbish restaurant critics, roistering investment bros, burned-out Hollywood celebrities (John Leguizamo at his slimiest), elitist big-spenders, and foodies who live for moments of gustatory bliss. Chef Slowik clearly resents all those who have elevated his culinary reputation by luring him away from simple food, lovingly cooked. In the role, Ralph Fiennes is a marvel as both genius and madman, capable of both utter coldness and surprising warmth. His opposite number is the restaurant’s one unexpected guest, played by Anya Taylor-Joy. Her unusual saucer-eyed beauty seems to make her well-suited to parts in eerie projects like The Witch, Last Night in Soho, and TV’s The Queen’s Gambit. In The Menu she plays a gal who’s more than she seems, and her role here is, well, a whopper.

 

 

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