The Big Picture

The Top Five Ethan Hawke Movies and a Double Shot of Richard Linklater, With Ethan Hawke and Richard Linklater!

November 17, 2025

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  • The hosts view Richard Linklater's *Nouvelle Vague* and *Blue Moon* as a compelling pair, contrasting the former's focus on an ambitious young artist (Godard) with the latter's elegiac portrait of an artist at the end of his career (Hart). 
  • Ethan Hawke's performance in *Blue Moon* is highly praised by the hosts as extraordinary and outside his traditional range, showcasing intense self-loathing and flickering charisma. 
  • The hosts believe Ethan Hawke's filmography allows listeners to map their own life experiences onto his career trajectory, particularly through the *Before* trilogy and *Boyhood*. 
  • The collaboration between Ethan Hawke and Richard Linklater on *Blue Moon* was a decade-long, meticulous process involving numerous table reads to ensure the film hit its extremely small bullseye, reflecting their deep commitment to the project. 
  • Hawke and Linklater believe the current cultural climate, dominated by short attention span theater and digital distraction, necessitates a conscious rebellion to preserve meaningful art forms like literature and cinema. 
  • The enduring, trust-based 30-year collaboration between Hawke and Linklater allows them to be rigorously honest with each other, which was crucial for Hawke to achieve the demanding, transformative performance required for *Blue Moon*. 

Segments

Sponsor Messages and Introduction
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(00:00:00)
  • Key Takeaway: The episode of The Big Picture features Ethan Hawke and Richard Linklater to discuss their new films and Hawke’s career.
  • Summary: The episode opens with advertisements for Coca-Cola and State Farm. Hosts Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins introduce the main focus: two new Richard Linklater films, Nouvelle Vague and Blue Moon, and a ranking of Ethan Hawke’s top five movies. The conversation with Hawke and Linklater is scheduled for later in the episode.
Movie News Headlines Reaction
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(00:02:03)
  • Key Takeaway: Tom Cruise received an honorary Oscar, which the hosts view as an ‘also-ran award’ that doesn’t count as a competitive win.
  • Summary: The hosts reacted to the Governor’s Awards, noting Tom Cruise received an honorary Oscar, which was presented by Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, potentially setting up a future competitive bid for Inarritu’s next film. They also discussed the teaser trailer for the live-action Moana remake, expressing skepticism about the necessity of remaking a culturally significant film released only a decade prior.
Sense and Sensibility Remake
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(00:10:04)
  • Key Takeaway: Focus Features is releasing a new Sense and Sensibility adaptation in September next year, directed by Georgia Oakley and starring Daisy Edgar-Jones.
  • Summary: The announcement of a new Sense and Sensibility adaptation is noted, which will be released 30 years after the 1995 Ang Lee version. The hosts acknowledge that Jane Austen adaptations are plentiful, citing Bridget Jones’s Diary as an update to Pride and Prejudice. They express surprise that Oakley’s version appears to be a traditional period piece rather than a modern reinterpretation like her previous film, Blue Jean.
Analysis of Nouvelle Vague
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(00:16:03)
  • Key Takeaway: Nouvelle Vague is an ambitious, loving, and nostalgic recreation of the making of Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless, notable for its commitment to 1959/1960 aesthetic details.
  • Summary: The film Nouvelle Vague recreates the essence of the French New Wave cohort, focusing narrowly on Godard’s process while shooting Breathless over 20 days. The movie is praised for its charming ‘hangout’ vibe among the young filmmakers, though the recreation of Zoe Deutsch speaking fluent French as Jean Seberg felt implausible. The film’s attention to detail, including aspect ratio and subtitle style, makes it feel like a genuine artifact from that era.
Analysis of Blue Moon
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(00:29:05)
  • Key Takeaway: Blue Moon is a tremendously beautiful and sad film about Lorenz Hart confronting his obsolescence and shattered self-confidence on the opening night of Oklahoma.
  • Summary: Blue Moon, starring Ethan Hawke as Lorenz Hart, is described as the inverse of Nouvelle Vague: outwardly charming but deeply sad underneath, focusing on an artist losing his relevance. Hawke delivers one of his best performances, embodying a desperate, unloved character who cannot regain his past effervescence. The film also features amusing, invented cameos, including a young Stephen Sondheim offering withering takes on Hart’s work.
Ethan Hawke Performance Ranking
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(00:48:45)
  • Key Takeaway: Ethan Hawke’s career is characterized by his ability to toggle between mainstream Hollywood roles and smaller, passion projects, with Before Sunset topping the hosts’ personal rankings.
  • Summary: The hosts noted that Ethan Hawke is currently ranked number one for Best Actor by Variety’s Clayton Davis, though another tracker placed him lower, highlighting a competitive year. The hosts agree that Hawke excels at portraying earnestness, anxiety, and emotional openness, often mapping his on-screen evolution onto the audience’s own life stages. Their top five selections included Training Day (for his dynamic with Denzel Washington), Blue Moon, Boyhood, Reality Bites, and Before Sunset.
Blue Moon Development Process
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(00:59:08)
  • Key Takeaway: The script for Blue Moon was given to Ethan Hawke by Richard Linklater around 2012, preceding the filming of Boyhood.
  • Summary: The development of Blue Moon spanned many years, involving table reads in New York where the collaborators refined the script over time. The minimal, no-budget film was shot in only 15 days, but the preparation was treated as a process requiring perfection due to the small margin for error. Hawke felt ready to play the role of Larry Hart after aging into the necessary emotional space, which Linklater had anticipated during early readings.
Hawke’s Role Transformation
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(01:05:24)
  • Key Takeaway: Ethan Hawke’s performance in Blue Moon required him to shift from his typical acting ‘position’ (like rhythm guitar) to a fundamentally different one (like the violin) to embody the character of Larry Hart.
  • Summary: Linklater recognized that the demands of Blue Moon required Hawke to shed his usual confident persona, which Linklater described as a masculine gesture from a tall actor used to success. Hawke viewed the role as a significant push beyond his own identity, requiring him to access the feeling of profound rejection and self-hatred experienced by Hart. This rigorous transformation was possible because of the deep, 30-year trust between Hawke and Linklater, allowing for direct, non-malicious critical feedback.
Artistic Longevity and Fear
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(01:15:03)
  • Key Takeaway: Hawke was drawn to Blue Moon as a portrait of an artist facing an expiration date, a poignant theme for performers whose careers can be taken away by falling out of vogue.
  • Summary: Hawke found the story of Larry Hart compelling because it addresses the sad reality that artists, unlike athletes, often believe they can perform forever until the industry or times leave them behind. This theme resonates with artists who fear losing their relevance, contrasting with those like Stoppard or Dylan who maintain their creative vitality. Both Hawke and Linklater expressed no personal fear of time running out, asserting their creativity is intrinsic and not dependent on industry validation.
Filmmaking Philosophy and Audience
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(01:30:47)
  • Key Takeaway: Linklater is optimistic that the current cultural ’exhale’ will lead to an ‘inhale’ of exciting new artistic movements, as audiences tire of manipulated, short-attention-span content.
  • Summary: Linklater views the end of one artistic era as an inevitable arrival for the next, noting that audiences are growing weary of manipulated images and superficial content. He cites Scorsese’s observation that past eras produced collective masterpieces because audiences cared about challenging art, suggesting a similar collective shift is imminent. The true adversary is the external force attacking attention and consciousness, which individuals must counter by engaging in community and art.
The Value of Unclear Art
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(01:41:49)
  • Key Takeaway: Art that invites mystery, rather than providing clear answers, is powerful because it invites the audience into a dialogue and consideration of complex realities.
  • Summary: Literary fiction, like Marilynne Robinson’s Housekeeping, provides substantive value by speaking to the collective human experience, which is currently lacking in the mainstream. Well-made art acts as an invitation for the audience to join a conversation, not a directive on what to think. Mystery is essential to art’s power, as it allows the audience to engage with the unknown aspects of life, such as birth and death.