Episode 4: NomadLeech
Episode Summary
The guys consider Nomadland, Chloe Zhao’s elegiac ode to the pilgrims of the Mountain West.
Episode Notes
After considering leech migratory patterns (1:46), Aaron, Banks and Evan dive into Nomadland’s leechiest themes (6:20), scenes (13:48), and characters (24:48). To get some relief, the guys head to the shore for Leech on a Beach (35:29). They conclude by considering the film’s medicinal qualities (38:45) and giving an overall rating -- from 1 to 4 -- of the film’s leechiness (48:43).
We’re always looking to expand our pond -- please reach out!
Series URL: www.theleechpodcast.com
Public email contact: theleechpodcast@gmail.com
Social Media:
@leechpodcast on Twitter
theleechpodcast on Instagram
External Links:
AO Scott review [link]
Leech Anatomy 101 article [link]
Housekeeping [link]
Shakespeare, Sonnet 18 [link]
Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet [link]
Credits:
Hosted by Evan Cate, Banks Clark, and Aaron Jones
Editing by Evan Cate
Graphic design by Banks Clark
Original music by Justin Klump of Podcast Sound and Music
Equipment help from Topher Thomas
Transcript
Evan 00:25
Hello, everyone. Welcome back to the Leech Podcast, the most visceral podcast. I am your host, Evan Cate. I am joined by two travelers from the Rubber Tramp Rendezvous, Aaron Jones and Banks Clark. What's up guys?
Aaron 00:38
Hey, hey!
Banks 00:39
How's it going?
Evan 00:40
The Leech Podcast is a show about movies that suck the life out of you. They also stick with you, and they may even be good for you, like a leech. Today we will be discussing Nomadland, the 2020 film that won Best Picture at the 2021 Academy Awards. It was written and directed by Chloe Zhao, who won Best Director for this film. It's based on a novel by Jessica Bruder. And it stars the one and only Frances McDormand, who won her third Best Actress Oscar for this performance.
Aaron 01:16
Oh my gosh, she has three. Holy Cow.
Evan 01:16
She is a legend.
Banks 01:16
The hattrick.
Evan 01:17
Now, before we dive into this film, we want to remind you here at the Leech that we are always looking to expand our pond. So to that end, please hit us up on Twitter @leechpodcast, @theleechpodcast on Instagram, and theleechpodcast.com. Okay. This is also an educational program. And so Aaron, we would love for you to teach us about leeches.
Aaron 01:46
This is an educational program– that is so true. So I often like to connect the subject matter of our films with my own research into leeches. And with this film, there's lots of traveling and journeying, and I was wondering, are leeches migratory creatures? Do they travel about? Took me a while to find anything, because really, leeches, the ones that we're familiar with, live in lakes and ponds, which are kind of enclosed kingdoms, right? They're enclosed environments that you don't leave. But– turns out there are some leeches that 'get around' so to speak. [Okay.] And they are a group of leeches in the subfamily Praobdellids, I believe, the Praobdellids. And they're leeches who have mouths with very few and not very sharp teeth. Which means that they need to find the softest kinds of tissue possible to latch on to and feed. [Okay.] Which means they're the kind of leeches that go for the orifices. Turns out that orifices are just like van doors. And hosts become like vehicles, my friends, become like vehicles. Let me give you a quotation. I'm looking at an article here. It's called "Leeches in the Extreme," from the International Journal for Parasitology, of course. The quote says, "By seeking refuge in orifices, Praobdellids have been dispersed through inhospitable environments via vertebrate migration, and global airline travel."
Banks 03:21
Oh no. Who's doing the traveling?
Aaron 03:24
Which means that some of these leeches are traveling the world on their hosts. And that is how some leeches become nomads.
Banks 03:34
Well, what do you do with that?
Evan 03:35
It makes me not want to fly on a commercial airline anytime soon.
Aaron 03:38
I mean, I think it has to do with what kind of environment you're spending your time in before you get on the plane, buddy. It's not that the planes are filled with leeches. But be careful where you swim before you get on the plane, let's say.
Evan 03:50
Yeah, I'm envisioning like a sequel to 'Snakes on a Plane.' [Haha!]
Aaron 03:56
The imagination runs wild.
Evan 03:57
Well, that's wonderful Aaron, and I feel like I should have given my content warning prior to that.
Aaron 04:03
Before Leech Anatomy, not after!
Evan 04:05
Listener, be warned, there are themes and scenes, perhaps, from this film that are maybe more for adult audiences. And we are going to spoil the contents of this movie. So if you've not seen it, please go home and watch it, and then come back to the episode now. Banks, what happened in Nomadland?
Banks 04:26
This is an interesting movie! This movie kind of blends the line a little bit between, you know, fiction and nonfiction. So Frances McDormand actually spent about four or five months on the road between, like, seven different states in the course of making this movie, so it's almost documentary-like, and a lot of the characters are actual, real, quote unquote 'nomads.' They're just people who live this life. That said, it's also telling a story in a really powerful way. The basic plot is that Fern, played by Frances McDormand, she's a widow, she's a former substitute teacher. Pretty much, a sheetrock factory in Empire, Nevada closes and the entire town gets displaced. And she ends up living– and is sort of forced to find a new way of living– and she lives out of her van. And the story is about– her van's named Vanguard– and how her and Vanguard go on the road, and learn how to do this, and the stories and the people that they meet. They, you know– go to a van-dwelling convention, they meet these fun people– one of them's name's Swanky, and she, like, helps her restore the van. They work in these different odd jobs, from Amazon to working as a camp host at different National Parks. And as they go on, she sort of develops a relationship with Dave, played by David Strathairn, who ends up having a liking to Fern and they end up at various jobs and following around one another, and in the end, Fern decides that she does not want to settle down and she ends up staying on the road. And the movie ends with her returning, after going around to all these places, to Empire in Nevada, where she returns to the home that is no longer hers. And she stays there, she goes to all these abandoned places, and then picks up, and the movie ends with her back on the road. And there's a lot more to go into. But it's a movie that's very nomadic in its own way, and just sort of takes you from place to place.
Evan 06:20
Okay, well, I think your summary, Banks, picks up really nicely with the theme I want to highlight, which is 'homekeeping.' [Hmm!] Not housekeeping– as Fern says, she's not homeless. She is houseless. [Yes.] She does have a home. You named it as Vanguard, and that is her home throughout the journey of the film. But there are all sorts of homes that are part of this film: the Rubber Tramp Rendezvous, which is that van convention you mentioned; Linda Mae, one of her friends, one of her nomad friends, describes a home made of recycled materials; Dave takes Fern to his son's home, meets his family, it's in California; and as you said, Fern eventually will go back to her home in Empire that she shared with her late husband, Bo. So I want to think about, as a leechy theme, what it takes to keep a home, what it takes to make a home. What does home mean for Fern, for the characters in this film? And I think for her, ultimately, it's a rather lonely place for her in this film– home is a very lonely place. It's many other things too. But I want to hit that theme of loneliness with homekeeping. And I couldn't help myself, I had to bring out a quote from a great novel called 'Housekeeping' by Marilynne Robinson, also set in the Mountain West. And the main character Ruth says, "Because once alone, it is impossible to believe that one could ever have been otherwise. Loneliness is an absolute discovery." And I think part of the journey of this film is recognizing that Fern's attempts to keep and make a home is a lonely road. It's a lonely path. And that is an absolute discovery for her. And so that's leechy for me, it's painful, it sucks life out of me. There may be medicine there, but it is deeply leechy.
Aaron 08:10
Can I just add to that– that I think for Fern, the meaning of home has become a funeral home? [Oh wow.] And that her journey of making her van a home is also about sort of keeping an altar to her dead husband. So there's a sense in which her home is also a tomb in this entire film.
Evan 08:32
Yes. And can I add to that? [Please.] I'd like to bring in another quote from the great novel, 'Housekeeping.' Because I think Fern lives between these quotes, which is, "Memory is the sense of loss, and loss pulls us after it." And I think Fern, when she talks to Bob at the end, describes how she's lived in memories her whole life. [Yeah.] And what we realize by the end of the film is that the loss of her husband has been driving this journey. And I think you're right, Aaron, it is a funeral home. And it is the loss that drives her back into that memory. It's this sort of cycle of grief and loss and loneliness.
Aaron 09:06
I'm going to come back to that later. Because I also think that it's not just that she lives in memory but feels a compulsive duty to remember– that through the act of journeying, through the act of remembering, she keeps her husband alive, even though he's dead. More on that later. Now memory was a theme I considered, but a leechy theme for me is actually– it has to do with transience. [Okay.] Transience, and the sense that everything is just temporary, temporary. Because that's– the Fern that we know in the film is not the Fern who lives in the past, but the Fern who lives in the present affected by the past. And for whatever reason, her relationship with each person she meets and each place she goes is temporary. And now what's interesting is that she stayed in Empire for a long, long time, but Empire itself was always designed to be a temporary place, a temporary home. It was built around this mine, and it was only going to be a home for anyone as long as it was productive, and as long as it was making profit– productivity and profit. And I think the name of the town is so potent: Empire. [Yeah.] It's an image of American Empire, which says that everything and every person is disposable. Everything we build, every place we go, every person we meet is disposable. Only in terms of productivity and profit are we interested. I think this film does offer some critique and condemnation of American Empire. Ooph, it hits deep for me to watch the people–
Evan 10:44
It's like Little Boston! [Yes!] It's like Little Boston in 'There Will be Blood,' right?
Banks 10:48
Yeah, that's right.
Aaron 10:49
We're watching Little Boston be built in 'There Will be Blood'– we're watching it be abandoned in 'Nomadland.' [Yes. There you go.] Transient.
Banks 10:58
It's interesting, because so much of the movie is about things breaking down, as well, whether it's the cars breaking down, or bodies and people breaking down and dealing with loss and grief– whether it's just– there's a lot of trash in the movie, there's a lot of refuse, and there's a lot of things that get discarded, and people finding value in those. And there are people finding life and meaning and creating what they hope are little things that are timeless in the midst of all that. [Wow.] And like –that's this really fundamental interaction throughout. I never thought of it. There's a lot of just breaking– there's a lot of breakdown here. [Yes.]
Aaron 11:38
And I think, Banks, you're helping me see that the people in this film are people who've been discarded. [Yeah.] People who feel themselves to have been discarded by the system, like Linda May, for example. And they are seeking permanence and security through transience.
Banks 11:57
But there's like an ownership of that transience as well. They're like, cool, this is the game, we're going to start counting the cards. We're not going to turn out– we will work for Amazon, and then we're going to give you the finger and go the other direction [yes, yes!] at the end. It's like they're playing the system in their own way and just trying to make their lives work.
Evan 12:14
There is a kind of agency about it, and dignity [absolutely] and in doing so, many of them find dignity and even beauty, right? [Absolutely.]
Aaron 12:23
What about you, Banks? A theme, a theme?
Banks 12:25
My theme? It's similar– it's not so much transience so much as transition-ality. [Okay.] Transition, like, this is a movie that's all about transitions. Yes, which has to do with like, yeah, nothing is permanent. But it's also about the fact that the moving between things– this movie explores the going between– the traveling. There's no scene that lasts very long in this movie. And there are so many scenes that are just about, you know, Fern going for a walk, or cuts of her driving, or somebody banging on the window saying, 'Hey, you can't sleep here. 'And so, you know– I'll talk about this a little more when we talk about scenes– that this movie is really like– we think of life a lot of the time as being between these moments. And this is a movie that really says 'Well, what about the transitions? What if everything is about this transition-ality?' And the movie itself has a sort of nomadic form to it. And I really appreciated– just for that agreement of form and content– but also it really has stuck with me when I think about– What are the things that we look forward to so much that we forget that– that we let ourselves be in a transitional moment, rather than just enjoying the drive and the nomadic life in between? And so it's something that I've been chewing on a little bit, but I think the movie has a lot of that.
Aaron 13:48
Well maybe I can come in here with a leechy scene, actually, if I may, that I think ties together both of your themes a little bit. So Evan, you're talking about kind of homemaking, homekeeping; Banks, you're talking about transition. And a really leechy scene for me is when Fern is at Dave's house. [Yeah.] On the west coast, the one moment, I think, where there is a genuine temptation, an open-door invitation for Fern to stay somewhere– [that's right}– to really claim a traditional sense of home and to end this cycle of transition. And for me, the leechiest moment is where Dave has to leave the room, because Dave– why has Dave been pulled home? Because of a child, the birth of his grandchild. And the moment where he has to leave the room and Fern holds the child– he passes the child to Fern, who's obviously uncomfortable, saying 'Oh, no, no, no, no, I don't think no, no, not me.' And has to hold the baby. It's brilliant filmmaking to me because at the beginning of the film, it's Christmas time. Why is Fern working in Amazon? Because they need help packaging the Great Christmas Rush. And on the way to work Fern is singing, "What Child is This?" She starts singing that song again as she holds the baby in Dave's home. It's like the child is a miracle that she doesn't know how to hold– that she doesn't know how to say yes to– and she and Bo, her dead husband, they never had children. Bo was her world, probably the only permanent thing in her life she ever really said yes to. And as she holds that child, I'm so brokenhearted because I can see how uncomfortable she is with everything that child represents. And oh, my heart is breaking as I see after that moment, her beginning to step by step leave that home and say no, silently and quietly, to the invitation to be near that child and the hearth and home that Dave offers. And it's just painful to me and it hurts. But yet I understand, somehow, because I feel I know her in the film. That's– that's my leechy scene is watching her hold the child and sing to it in such discomfort and unease.
Banks 13:54
Yeah, what stands out to me is the thing that she says right when Dave leaves the room– like, "Don't be gone too long," or something like that, right? Like, don't leave me here! There's this discomfort.
Evan 15:42
This is speculation, but since we know that she and Bo were not able to have, or didn't have a child [wow], I wondered in that scene, if there was actually a memory that had been triggered there, or a story that had been triggered from her her past life. Even as you were saying, 'Don't leave me here,' that made me think about– I imagined throughout the film her saying that to Bo, like, 'Don't leave me here. I can't believe you've left me here.' I think you could read the scene as just her discomfort around children. It also made me wonder if that had triggered a long, painful story in her own married life.
Aaron 16:58
I think it's a question about whether that childlessness was a choice [yeah] or whether it was something that was reckoned with, and has been internalized and not addressed. And if know anything about Fern, it's that when she has something big and difficult in her life, she internalizes it, and it enters into silence. She doesn't speak about it. And so that wouldn't surprise me at all. And actually, an odd echo in the film of this is that early on when she's speaking to the young lady, I guess in middle school–
Evan 17:29
At Dick's Sporting Goods?
Aaron 17:30
At Dick Sporting Goods, of course, her former tuttee, or the student, starts to quote Macbeth back to her. [Right.] And Macbeth, one of the key points of drama in that whole play is his inability to have children [oh wow], his own infertility, and his constant struggle to live– to seek kingship without an heir. And so why was that the play she decided to teach to that young person? And why was it this speech about 'tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow' and life leads on to nothing, because maybe you don't have any one to give what you got in life to– maybe there's no one to carry it forward for you. I think that's part of Macbeth's grief. Could be part of hers, too.
Banks 18:12
It's funny. My scene actually kind of picks up on that a little bit, but also the opposite. So much of this is about the start of life. My scene has to do with the end of life, and it's Swanky's monologue. [Ah yes! Leechy!] So Swanky is this great character that Fern meets, and [she] kind of takes [her] under her wing a little bit to show her how to do this life, and like, they renovate the the van together, and really helps her out. But there's this moment when they become friends, and Swanky is about to go on this trip, which is kind of her last trip, her sort of swan song in life, because she knows that she's dying, and she has a book by Dr. Kevorkian. She's like, 'I got this if I run out of ideas.' Like, it's really funny, actually. But like, Swanky in general is wonderful. We'll go to a beach with her later. [Ayy!] But there's this beautiful monologue that she gives about what it means to have legacy, what it means to weigh one's life. And she tells the story about coming around this bend in a kayak and all of these swallow nests on the wall of a cliff. The babies are hatching out– she's just talking– and the quote is, "That was just so awesome. I felt like I've done enough, my life was complete. If I died right then at that moment, I'd be perfectly fine." It's this really beautiful sense of contentment and ownership, and it's something that I just keep returning to because she then goes on her trip, she goes back to this one place in her kayak and sends a video to Fern, and she gets to see the swallows. And one of the final scenes is her memorial service. And it's just a really profound sense of transience, as you were saying Aaron, but of the stories that keep moving, and the things about what really matters. It's such a profound way of thinking about what matters to us, and what doesn't matter to us.
Evan 20:11
To me, Swanky is the character who finds beauty in the nomadic life– maybe par excellence, maybe her and Bob West. I feel like Swanky's– you know, she's seventy-five, she has a terminal illness. You know, she could do the whole hospital thing. But she's chosen to seek beauty. And there is something– I think it's strange, it feels weird to me, and yet it's so lovely. And she actually is a human person, a creature who can experience the beauty of nature. Appreciate it and know it in the moment. Like how many people live their whole lives without doing that? [Right.]
Aaron 20:49
She is an elder version of Mrs. O'Brien from 'Tree of Life.' [Ahh!] She's learned to love every blade of grass, every swallow egg, every nest [Lovely.]
Banks 21:00
Every rock.
Aaron 21:01
And the rocks put in the fire at her funeral. Absolutely.
Evan 21:04
Oh my gosh. So Banks, that was the runner-up for me for leechiest scene [uh oh!]. I love that scene so much. The one I've chosen though, is the final scene, or the final scenes where Fern returns to Empire and returns to her home with Bo. It's empty. Frances McDormand is so incredible in these scenes, because you can on her face read the memories of a life lived. As she walks through each room, you can see that she's remembering so many things, and yet it's empty. She's not gonna live there again. And in fact, she walks out the back door, through the open fence, toward the desert mountains. And then she walks off screen. And then it fades to black and that's the end of the film. And I felt like it was this return to home [yes], but she's different. There is, I think, some level of growth, or I don't know, grappling with her grief that has happened, she can't go back to this house. But she goes through the house into what is next. And it did remind me of a poem by T.S. Eliot, it's somewhat famous. He says, in Four Quartets, "We shall not cease from exploration. And the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time." [Ahh, Little Gidding.] And I think there's something happening there with Fern. She has returned to this place that she knows every inch of, but now she knows it for the first time, in a new way. And then the next line of that poem says, "through the unknown, unremembered gate," and I think Fern walks through an unremembered gate into whatever is next.
Aaron 22:44
Would you say she's crossed the threshold into "a new territory of the spirit," even?
Evan 22:48
I think so. And it's a little bit ambiguous. I think there's a way in which you could read it as, her wandering is just continuing, and there's a cycle, actually; not so much a new thing but a cycle. But I tend to read it as, growth has happened, something is different. She has changed from this year of nomad life. But I do think there is a threshold. It's just strange, and I don't quite know what to do with it.
Aaron 23:08
I think this film shows us the ways in which life doesn't really have circles, it has spirals, right? [Yeah.] It's not that she just returns to the same place, but that she has been elevated as a person. She has climbed higher up the mountain, so to speak, the inner mountain, by the time she returns to that same place at the end. [Yes.] And I think she's a new person. I'm gonna go back to 'The Master' here [okay!] and talk about the hero's journey. I mean, I just think that– I think she is a new person and a different person by the end of this film.
Banks 23:41
Yeah.
Evan 23:41
How would you describe that new person?
Aaron 23:43
This new person is someone who has learned a lot more about what they don't want to be. And I think that goes back to my leechy scene, which is her being offered this beautiful, I think, image of family, and just saying, 'Actually this, maybe this is good. And maybe this is beautiful. But I don't want this. This is what I am not. This is a no.' And I think actually that she didn't know that at the beginning of the film. Because as you see, her friend Linda May is the one who tells her about the kind of nomad convention and helps her enter in and find these new mentors, like Bob and Swanky. Like, the film is an education, also. [Yes.] Right? [Yep.] It's a conversion story just like The Master. The Master's a conversion story [haha] that doesn't really go terribly well.
Evan 24:38
So is Tree of Life.
Aaron 24:39
Oddly enough, oddly enough indeed. But I really do think– yeah, I'm thinking I see a new person who understands a lot more about what they do want, and a lot more about what they don't.
Banks 24:48
Yeah, for me, Fern is leechiest character [yeah] by far. This movie in some ways is challenging because it is so lonely and focused so much on Fern and her experience. But the movie does it so well. And for me, the thing that is so leechy about Fern is– it's the grappling that she is doing with her grief, with her loss. There's a stubborn willfulness there to just keep going, and I find that both endearing and painful to watch. [Yes.] I mean, the ways in which she just has the hardest time staying in place. Just knowing that the reason for that is just a searing pain of loss that cannot be brought back– the loss of home, the loss of a people, of a village, loss of a spouse, the loss of– in some ways– the loss of a future, and learning how to then let go and take to the road to explore and discover anew– all of it's just happening over and over in this film. Both in the sense of, yes, spiraling to new progress, but also of circling back and there's lots of moments where there is a numbness to the movie, a little bit. Whether she's scraping the gristle off of a stove, or you know, like when she's in the Badlands at the camp as a host. She's like, doing some really gross tasks, and the sense is, this is just happening over and over and over. And anyone who's gone through moments of loneliness in life knows just the ennui that that inspires. And this movie depicts it so vividly. She is a character that is just caught within that dynamic. Yeah, I think Fern is very leechy for me for that reason.
Evan 26:36
It's hard to argue against Fern. Do you think, Banks, that her leechiness is affected at all by the place she ends up? I mean, if it's true that she's on a hero's journey, and she has some sort of deeper self-knowledge, does that make her more or less leechy for you?
Banks 26:52
Here's the thing. I think if this was like an Aesop's Fable sort of deal– in which you could see, and it was a really clear sense of growth– you know, I wouldn't care. But like, this isn't that. This is complicated. It's complex. [Yeah.] However, I think Aaron's right, there is this clear sense of growth and strength [yes] and knowledge that's there, but it is elusive. [Yeah.] It is hard to pin down. And, you know, it's almost like the landscape of the movie itself. This beautiful landscape that is desolate. [Yes, yes.] It is in lots of ways, lifeless. And I think that is such a perfect backdrop for this feeling of leechiness. Yes, there's growth. Yes, there's strength. Yes, there's beauty here. But also, it is the sort of beauty that comes from mountains on a desert. [Yes.]
Aaron 27:43
Can I just offer briefly the imagery of– the plant imagery– in this film, which is often cacti? [Yes.] Which are these plants that endure in desolation, and their lives so little resemble flourishing as we normally think of it? But there are some gorgeous images even during her final conversation with Bob Wells, where he kind of cracks open this stone of incredible beauty at the end when he talks about his own son's death. What do we see? We see the cactus right before this moment. [Yeah.] And I think we're getting winked at here, where we're saying like, look, this is a desolate environment. This is a nothing place. This is a wasteland. And yet, what is here? [Yeah.] What has Fern become?
Evan 28:24
So not only does the documentary style, the form match the content, the sort of nomadic form match the content– the geography mirrors the content as well. Right? [Yeah, absolutely.] So again, Banks, I think we're on some similar similar wavelengths tonight, because my runner up for character was actually the Mountain West. [Wow!] It was going to be the topography of the land. We could talk more about that. My real leechiest character, though, is Vanguard.
Aaron 28:53
Eww, yuck! Vanguard! Say more.
Evan 28:56
Yeah, I went with the van–
Aaron 28:58
Not just a funeral home, but an outhouse.
Evan 29:01
It is everything, is it not? It is a literal guard. Right? It is her place of safety and security. It's her home on a literal level. But I want to pick up the political valence of the term 'Vanguard.' I've already given you, Marilynne Robinson and T.S. Eliot. I might as well also bring in Lenin and talk about the 'vanguard of the proletariat.' [Oh, geez.] Stay with me.
Aaron 29:22
I'm only barely there, but yes.
Evan 29:23
This was the the early political organization of workers of the proletariat. They would overthrow the bourgeoisie and set up the socialist state. Lenin talked about this 'vanguard of the proletariat.' And I think in this movie, maybe symbolized by 'Vanguard'– that seems like an intentional choice to me– the director, Chloe Zhao, the writer, I wonder if she's seeing some kind of political force in this movement, the Rubber Tramp Rendezvous. These people who are living off the grid, who are living an alternative lifestyle, who have been chewed up and spit out by Late Stage American Capitalism. These folks that we meet tend to be very sweet and nice. But you can imagine folks who have been treated this way being angry, and maybe even turning in sort of populist directions. You know, this is set not long after the financial crisis. It makes me wonder how many of these nomads, you know, were drawn to Bernie Sanders or were drawn to Donald Trump. You know, what is the sort of political and spiritual energy undergirding this movement? Because it does feel like there's a sense of spirituality and community that these folks find together. And so I guess, what's leechy about the van, but really what the van represents, is the sense of like– how broken is our political and economic system that a spiritual movement like this might emerge, where people would choose to live a nomadic lifestyle? Would choose to find dignity and beauty in it, even though it's hard, even though it's very costly, and you're vulnerable to the elements, you're vulnerable to the knock on the door, you're vulnerable to so many things? What is the spiritual energy that is driving folks to choose this lifestyle? It makes me really uncomfortable. I don't want to choose that. But maybe that's because I'm just so comfortable in my middle class-ness that the Vanguard is pressing on me in some leechy ways?
Aaron 31:20
Well, let me offer an image of what the Vanguard provides a contrast to. Because I think Vanguard is the opposite of empire, both the town and the 'capital E' sense of Empire. And it's funny that you went to T.S. Eliot because I went to T.S. Eliot as well in my reading of this film. As I'm sitting there watching the film I'm thinking of– a few weekends ago, I spent several hours sitting and digesting T.S. Eliot's 'The Wasteland,' and listen to the way that Eliot describes how Late Stage Western Civilization is actually a ruin. Or he says– he talks about the people out in the desert wasteland, who are these "hooded hordes swarming over endless planes, stumbling and cracked earth, ringed by the flat horizon only. What is the city over the mountains? [Empire.] Cracks and reforms and bursts in the violet air, falling towers– Jerusalem, Athens, Alexandria, Vienna, London, unreal." And what I think these people have found in the desert is actually something that's real, that all of this– these civilizing forces have built something that looks and appears very solid, but it's actually incredibly fragile and unsustainable and unsatisfying. And it leaves people, again, discarded, and they, these hooded hordes who should be out thirsty in the desert, experiencing desolation, have actually found a strange oasis in each other's company. [Wow.] And that's what the Vanguard– that's what it is. That's what it's leading them toward– this profound alternative and answer to a wasteland– a ruined empire experience.
Banks 33:03
And what's fascinating is like, even when Vanguard goes to the hospital, right [haha]– there is this very capitalist mentality, like, 'Don't pour money into this thing, put that money towards a different car.' And that's unfair. There's this very clear, stark contrast, like, of– this is how the world values it. This is how capitalism would value something like this, and how unthinkable that is for Fern to even imagine; so much so that she's willing to like go to her sister and sort of go into this very difficult space just to be able to get her home back.
Aaron 33:48
Can I just say, that's one of the leechiest scenes in the film as well?
Evan 33:51
It is, yeah, it is.
Aaron 33:53
To go to her sister's house. Because I think, actually Banks, you're helping me see– before, I thought her sister offered a way to understand her. Remember when her sister says, 'Oh, Fern is participating in this long American tradition of being a pilgrim, being a wanderer.' But now I'm starting to think, wait a minute, has her sister misunderstood her entirely? Where she's not participating in American tradition– she's overturning the American tradition. Where Vanguard is not leading back toward familiar roads that have been traveled– but to a new place altogether. I'm just wondering.
Evan 34:34
Hmm, yeah, that's a great question. I do think that this nomadic lifestyle is within a certain stream of American tradition, but it's not the majority stream. It's far more Jack Kerouac, and even Thoreau, but in a post-industrial wasteland.
Aaron 34:51
It's a post-apocalyptic kind of–
Banks 34:53
Yeah, it doesn't have the same Manifest Destiny feel.
Aaron 34:57
No! What's interesting, right, is that the original kind of pioneers into the American West are part of this project of capturing and plundering the West. But here these are the ancestors, or the descendants of those same colonists, who have now found themselves again in the ruins.
Evan 35:17
It's like Israel wandering in the wilderness rather than Israel entering the promised land.
Aaron 35:21
Except the promised land is the wilderness, buddy! The promised land is a wasteland in America. [Ooph.] God I feel like I need to go on vacation after that.
Evan 35:29
I do too, man, and one similarity between a wasteland and a beach is– I guess– sand? [Haha!] So let's go to the beach guys. Leech on a beach.
Aaron 35:40
Nothing I like better than the presence of sand, mmm, between my toes, under my fingernails.
Banks 35:49
That's where I like my leeches.
Aaron 35:50
Ha! Between my toes, under my fingernails! Leeches can also get behind your eyes, throwing that out there.
Banks 35:54
Good tender skin there. They can migrate there.
Evan 35:58
I think where I go to the beach in this movie is in a couple of the National Parks.
Aaron 36:05
Don't tell me where. Oh gross!
Evan 36:08
Primarily South Dakota actually. There's a lot of kitschy Americana stuff happening [oh wow] in these odd jobs that she works. And so, the place of delight in so many parts of this movie for me are when she's taking a selfie in front of a very fake Mount Rushmore. Or when she's like, marveling at an eighty foot plastic dinosaur, or when she gets a job as like a short order line cook in Wall Drug, which, if you've never been, is just the kitschiest place you've ever seen. It's like South of the Border in South Carolina. But it's like– you see signs for it one hundred miles in either direction. Yeah, that cracks me up.
Aaron 36:51
A place for me is– to go back to capitalism– the moment where they go to this weird parody of their own lifestyle, which is essentially the car dealership for all of the fancy RVs. [Oh yeah!] Which is this– it's like so satirical and absurd, where you see their life and its strange kind of grotesque beauty. Then you go to the sales lot. And they walk into this fancy RV and someone says, "It's like a disco. It's a magic bus." And watching them–
Banks 37:27
You could drive it to Hawaii!
Aaron 37:29
–watching them like marvel at that is very pleasant to me.
Banks 37:34
One of my personal favorite moments is when they're looking and you see that there's this van, and you later learn that this is Swanky's van. And the way that Swanky tells the world that she's sleeping is she drapes a pirate flag over her van. And like one of the best scenes is when Fern goes to like– because she has a flat tire and she needs help– so she starts banging on the– on her [van]– you hear Swanky just get so pissed, like, 'I put this flag on my car so that you'd keep away.' So, it's just great. Like, here's this incredible, wonderful woman. But our first interaction with her is this road pirate.
Aaron 38:16
Ohh, is this not the pirate tradition that we're looking at here? Did this get more beachy or what?
Evan 38:21
It really did. Wow. Nomads of the seas.
Aaron 38:24
Although can we be real? They actually make a comparison to sort of like, find your sailboat. 'My sailboat was parked in my garage. Don't leave your sailboat parked in your garage.' Let's say if someone who died suddenly. [Yeah.] The comparison between vans and boats– just throwing it out there.
Evan 38:38
I think they even say, 'My sailboat is in the desert.'
Aaron 38:43
So again, we're out at sea. We're at the beach.
Banks 38:45
There it is.
Evan 38:46
All right. Well, that I think that wraps up another brilliant Leech on a Beach segment. Gents, we need to think about the medicine in this movie, the hyrudotherapy. Why do we need this movie? What did we learn?
Aaron 38:59
Well, if I had to look for medicine in this film, I would turn to the moment where Fern is speaking to another young wanderer who maybe offers her a cigarette– and he's this young guy with a guitar. You remember this? [Yeah, yeah.] And he has maybe a girl back home kind of thing? And he's asking her for recommendations of love poems. Remember this? [Yes.] And she comes at him with Shakespeare again. So I mentioned Macbeth. Well now comes with a Sonnet 18, which looks like, on its surface, a love poem. "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?" But secretly it's not that. I used to teach this poem and I have read it so many times. I love to see my Shakespeare references. And what's interesting is that the poem is actually a funerary poem. [Wow.] It's a poem about death, where near the end, it says, "Thy eternal summer shall not fade, nor shall death brag that wanderest in his shade." This is about the loss of a loved one. And a sense that, does death get to have the last word. Does death get to brag? That death possesses them now? That death has claimed ownership? And this is why I come back to that line from Fern, about memory, where she says to Bob, "What's remembered lives"– "nor shall death brag thou wanderest in his shade." And the sense is that Fern's life after the loss of Bo becomes this continued ritual performance of memory. And it's interesting that in Shakespeare, Shakespeare promises that his loved one will never really die because he'll preserve them in poetry. But my argument is that Fern decides that she will preserve Bo through journey– by remaining in perpetual motion. And I'm intrigued, especially by the insight that Bob Wells offers Fern, where he talks about the loss of his son. And listen to this quote, he's talking about the loss of his son, I'm not going to quote Bob, I'm going to quote a different friend of mine.
Evan 41:31
Rilke?
Aaron 41:32
Haha. Yes.
Banks 41:36
Called it!
Aaron 41:36
Bob says, essentially, 'What is the only thing I can do? Because every day I've woken up asking, How can I live when my son is not here? What am I supposed to do?' And Rilke says, that "fate, when it takes someone from us, imposes an incomprehensible task, an incomprehensible task." He says, "You must continue his life inside of yours. Insofar is it was unfinished, his life has now passed on to yours." There's an odd sense that Rilke has that through our own lives, those whom we have lost, their lives are continued through us. And I really believe that what Bob knows, and what Fern learns, is that how we choose to live after we've lost can be a beautiful gift to the one who's gone. And can through us– as Fern moves through that house– can through us make their lives permanent, and make them never really gone.
Banks 42:51
One of the things that really strikes me about that, when I hear and think about just the ways that the movie really invites you to think about the things that are forever, the things that matter most. It also talks so much about the things that pass on, the things that wilt away. And I think about even the hardest moments, the hardest pains of the movie, no scene lasts too long in this movie. Whether she's, you know, standing on a cliff, marveling at nature, or whether it's [the] pain of Dave breaking all of her dishes, right? And like all the memories that are right there. Every scene just moves eventually on. There is a sense in this movie that I get that reminds you that every moment is going to pass. And I don't think it means it in the sense of like, you know, time heals all wounds or things. [No.] And I think this movie is actually a very strong counter argument to that. I think it is a movie that says, 'Your choice is whether or not to cling on or to keep moving.' And I think that this movie is discussing what it means to keep moving, and what it means to try and process and learn and grow in the midst of that. What does it mean to, as you were saying, to try and carry the pieces of loss within you? What does that mean, to try and give that– to give life to something through your own life?
Evan 44:23
I think that's right. And I think Fern carries these fragments with her to use that word that, Aaron, you've used so often this season. I think it's a good one. And there's a way that by the end of the film, I have such respect for Fern, I have deep care for her and that clearly this journey has been rooted in so much pain, and she has made decisions that are hard and that I may not agree with, but I think she's also been so true to herself in a way there's been so much dignity, there's so much growth, that I'm really compelled by her and challenged. It raises this question for me– and I think this is where the medicine is for me– this film pushes me to ask, 'Does Fern live more authentically than the rest of us? Fern, and maybe people like her, maybe others on the Nomad trail? 'I don't know, I don't know the answer to that. But but the question sits with me. I think it's right when her sister says that she's part of this tradition, this American tradition. And it may be a sort of minority tradition within the American one, but it is a good one. It is one that sort of calls out, you know, the complacency of the suburbs and the smugness of money. At the same time, though, I'm troubled by certain parts of the life that Fern has chosen, especially her relationship to the land. She is off the grid, right? She's in a way living on the land, but she's not living off the land. And you see this when she goes to David's house, she has no idea how to farm or garden. She and the camera admire the Mountain West– it admires the cactus and the mountains and the sunsets, and the trees, the redwoods. But she doesn't really make any effort to live on it, to live with the land or to cultivate it. I mean, they eat a lot of fast food. [Terrible food.] And you know, I don't want to be too harsh here. I mean, some of that is her biography and her geography, right? Empire was a town she went to with Bo, it was a mining town, it was not a farming town. And it's not really her fault. She went where the work was, Bo went where the work was. And ultimately, I mean, the problem is this capitalist system that is extractive and exploitative of the land. But I am struck that– I'm just sitting with this tension of– she's off the grid, but she's not living off the land. And so there's an authenticity to the choices she's made, and yet that disconnect from the land is really troubling. I don't know what to make of that.
Aaron 46:42
Yeah, I think that's one of the griefs of the film is a loss of the world, a loss of the land– that the land and the world are possessed in snapshot. [Yeah.] They're possessed in film clip and snapshot. But they're not possessed in permanence. There's not a sense of belonging. And so Fern's loneliness is both a loneliness and isolation from people but a loneliness from her place. I think she's doomed in a way to be an eternal wanderer. I think it's really funny early in the film, that when she's working at Amazon, one of her coworkers has a tattoo that is a quote from Morrissey, I believe.
Evan 47:24
The musician?
Aaron 47:25
Yeah. And it says, "Home. Is it just a word? Or is it something that you carry within you?" Which seems so profound, and I was thinking, "Leech, is it just a word? Or is it something that you carry within you?"
Banks 47:40
Oh come on!
Evan 47:42
Especially in orifices on airplanes!
Aaron 47:44
Where was I going with that? Oh– but this sense, right, that she thinks she's claiming this tradition that says, well, 'Home, I can't find it outside myself. The only place I can find it is with and in myself. And that's where my husband lives now [yeah] is within me and through the continuance of my own life and journey.' But you're right, I think it does– it creates a sense of exile. Permanent exile– external exile, but internal homecoming.
Evan 48:21
And I think what's leechy about that is that it's both tragic, and I'm like so proud of her. [Gasp.] Right, that feels deeply tragic to me that you would live that internal exile. And then I'm just like, proud of Fern, like, there's growth, and she– like, we've watched something transform there. And yet, the choice still, at the end of the day, is deeply lonely, I think.
Aaron 48:43
That is so beautiful and so strange. Honestly, this film, I watched it one time, and I thought, 'Okay, that was kind of sad and miserable.' And I watched it the second time, and now I'm– guys, this is unbelievable to me. I think I'm at four leeches. [Whoa.] What? I don't even know what I'm saying right now.
Evan 49:09
You didn't even know you were gonna say that till you said it.
Aaron 49:11
I did not know I was gonna say that.
Banks 49:12
Four leeches.
Aaron 49:14
Well let me tell you why. [Oh yeah.] As I was watching the movie the second time– I mean, this movie makes me cry. It makes me hurt. I think the first time I watched it, I was like, 'Yep, never that again.' But as I watched it the second time, I have not– in almost any experience in the past few years– felt more certain and more troubled by my own mortality than I have than when I watched this movie. [Wow.] It made me sort of like stand ten inches closer to my own venture into nothingness. I just felt like an assurance, a painful assurance that I am impermanent and it took a lot out of me. And it stuck with me, and as I continue to discuss the film, it just opens up like this strange dark lotus flower. I think I'm at four. [Wow.]
Evan 50:08
It makes me wonder if a cactus should also be a symbol for our podcast, right? Painful, prickly, and yet, you know, inside of it, there are these deep reservoirs of water and life. [Beauty, ohh.] I'm at three leeches. I respect the four. It's a bold claim, but I'm at three. The medicine in this film and the allusions clearly that we've all made to American and other letters have, you know– it is allusive in so many ways, and rich and worth considering. And so that's a really strong piece of it for me. I think, you know, it didn't quite suck as much out of me when I first watched it. I think maybe I was in a good mood. But there were just these moments of brightness– from Bob, from Swanky in particular. I think for me the film, yeah– it shone– had a luminescence about it to me that many other Leech films on first viewing don't. So it's still very leechy. I'm giving it three, but to push it to four– I'm not quite there.
Banks 51:11
Mmm, yeah, this is a leechy film. I've been going between two and three leeches this entire episode. I don't think I can quite make it to four. There's so much I respect about the film and so much that this movie is pulling together. But for me, when I think about it, I also don't feel it taking a lot out of me. Now I've only seen it once– I haven't I haven't gotten the experience– maybe my own dark lotus flower will start to blossom when I watch it a second time. Maybe the leech will crawl into me in some terrible way I don't want to think about. But there's a lot of meaning here, there's a lot to chew on. But I think that I'm probably sitting around a two leecher on this one. So I think I'm doing two leeches. Because it just it didn't take as much out of me as I thought, and it does shine really bright in some way. And so much about this film– there's so much about it that's just about how kind of good people are. [Yeah.] Like, everyone is so nice! Everyone's just– and I guess I also kind of wonder, is that really what this life always is? Are people always so kind? And one thing that the movie does say is it has a very optimistic view. And I really respect that.
Aaron 52:28
I think you're right that that should pull me back to three leeches, actually. Because I was just watching an interview with the director before we got onto the pod. And is it Chloe Zhao? [Yeah.] She says in her acceptance speech for Best Director, she quotes this poem that she learned in China as a young girl. And the first line of the poem in translation is that 'people are inherently good.' And she goes on to say that she's so inspired by people who quote, "Hold on to the goodness in themselves and the goodness in each other." And I think you're right there is a deep optimism. A golden thread, yeah, that runs through the film.
Banks 53:10
I'm going to defend your four leeches though. Like there's something– that can be leechy too.
Aaron 53:17
This goes back to that question that is haunting the season, which– Can goodness be leechy?
Evan 53:22
It's true. Well, we will let that question linger again. We will pick it up I'm sure in future episodes on the Leech Podcast. We are so grateful for everyone listening, tuning in to our episode on Nomadland. As always, we'd love to hear your thoughts, comments, ideas, so please reach out to us on Twitter @leechpodcast, on Instagram @theleechpodcast, and on our website, theleechpodcast.com. On behalf of Banks and Aaron, I'm Evan Cate, it's been such a pleasure being with y'all. Look forward to leeching again soon. This episode was hosted by Evan Cate, Banks Clark, and Aaron Jones. Editing by Evan Cate. Graphic Design by Banks Clark. Original music by Justin Klump of Podcast Sound and Music, and equipment help and consultation from Topher Thomas.