Episode 9: The Mastermind

We discuss The Mastermind by Kelly Reichardt, which premiered at Cannes Film Festival in 2025…but spoiler alert we forgot to press record on our discussion.

So what we do have this month is our recording of us dealing with the aftermath of realizing we did not actually record an episode.

SORT OF SHOW NOTES:

In lieu of proper time stamped notes, please enjoy the sources of some ruminations on The Heist Genre and Kelly Reichardt that we arrived at in our (non recorded) conversation:

• The Quiet Menace of Kelly Reichardt’s Feminist Westerns - touches on KR’s ability to maintain an outsiders point of view and ‘normal persons sense of money’.

• A piece on Showing Up that discusses the common thread of precarity among Reichardt's protagonists and also mentions her iconic early work on America’s Next Top Model

• Josh O’Connor and Kelly Reichardt discuss making The Mastermind

• Australian perspective on Kelly Reichardt’s movies and interview regarding The Mastermind

• Photographers that Kelly Reichardt mentioned inspired her and which informed the gorgeous production design and set decoration: William Eggelston and  Steven Shore’s parking lots 

• The worst heist movie: The Goldfinch - Strictly for The Birds

• The best heist movie: The Great Muppet Caper - ‘they really toss em around like wet rags in this one’

• The Mastermind included sounds (and images) from the radio, TV, and outside the windows of the historical political context of the time setting even though the main character JB did not engage directly with the social movements unfolding around him.

• This reminded Charlene a lot about the main characters studied personal absorption tuning out the historical political context around them despite a very clever use of sound to intrude in the main character’s story like in The Zone of Interest.

• The art featured in the film is by Arthur Dove, and his work, in turn both jazz influenced and influential to much of the art featured on 60’s jazz album covers, neatly dovetails (pun intended) into the films jazz score 

• Kelly Reichardt discusses the pleasure she takes in documenting processes and the small details that are often left out of films

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