20: Lee Daniels' "The Paperboy" & "Shadowboxer" (with Nick Laskin)

In 2010, Lee Daniels became the second Black director in history to be nominated for the Best Director Academy Award. That's right, the second in eight decades. Today on the podcast, we're diving into two of the history making director's two more critically maligned films: the 2005 assassin-cum-incestuous romance thriller "Shadowboxer" starring Cuba Gooding, Jr. and Helen Mirren as assassins/lovers/adopted mother and child, and the 2012 notorious Cannes Film Festival bomb, "The Paperboy" starring Nicole Kidman, Zac Efron, Matthew McConaughey, Macy Gray, and a very sweaty, slack-jawed John Cusack. We're joined by return guest Nick Laskin, who has written critically for The Playlist and Little White Lies. So turn up the AC and get ready for a sweltering double header of genre-bending melodrama and Southern Gothic thrills as we probe the singular visions of Lee Daniels. "The Paperboy" is streaming on Kanopy and Peacock. "Shadowboxer" is available for free on YouTube.