The Big Picture - Five New Films to Stream, ‘Top Gun: Maverick’ for Best Picture, and a Summer Movie Mailbag

Episode Date: August 2, 2022

Sean shares five new films to stream (1:00) before opening up the mailbag to answer your questions and beat the summer doldrums (22:00). Host: Sean Fennessey Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The NFL preseason is here, so check out the Ringer Fantasy Football Show on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Also, if you need fantasy rankings, we've got our rankings and sleepers at fantasyfootball.theringer.com. So come listen to Danny Kelly, Danny Heifetz, and me, Craig Horlbeck, on the Ringer Fantasy Football Show. I'm Sean Fennessy and this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about the summer movie doldrums. It's a quiet August here on The Big Picture. It's a quiet August in the world of movies. There's a few exciting releases that we'll be hitting in the next couple of weeks, but not as many as I'd like. So today we're going to talk about a couple of films that are streaming out there for you to see, a couple of films that are in movie theaters that you can go see. Maybe not enough people are seeing them at the moment. And then we're going to open up the mailbag. We're opening up the mailbag one more time before we get to our 500th episode, which

is coming later this fall. By then, Amanda Dobbins will be back on this show. She's intermittently made appearances during her leave, but she's been greatly missed and she'll be back in full force in September. I'm really excited about that. So I won't just be solo potting my way through mailbag questions, throwing to Bobby to make sure I need friends. I appreciate everybody who's been coming on the show the last few months since Amanda's been out. Everybody who's been on has been fabulous, and they'll continue to be on the show, obviously. But I'm eager to get my podcast partner back, and it just so happens to be her birthday. So all you out there, that's at AK Dobbins. Send a lot of birthday wishes. She loves to look at social media these days. Okay. We miss you, Amanda. We'll see you soon. Let's talk about some movie stuff. So movies are increasingly streaming. This has been a theme of the pod for the last oh three years. And there's a bunch of stuff streaming right now, some of which is really good. So I thought I'd take a chance to talk about that right now. The first of which is,

I guess, technically a series, but I think of it as a movie. It's a six part documentary series called The Last Movie Stars. If you haven't heard of this, it's on HBO Max and it is directed by one of our favorite people on this podcast, Ethan Hawke. And it's the story of not just one movie star, but two, Joanne Woodward and Paul Newman and their relationship, their marriage, their careers, their work, their art, their movies, their philanthropy, their essence in a lot of ways. It's a fascinating movie. It's not a standard documentary. It's really more of a, I guess it's a doc memoir would be the phrase I would use. It also is a sort of table read. And the way that Hawk does this is fascinating. The film was obviously made during quarantine because Hawk

appears in it frequently, as do many of his very famous actor friends, among them George Clooney and Laura Linney, who voiced Newman and Woodward respectively. And it's this sort of chronological tale of the work that they did together and pages and pages of transcript of interviews that were done for an ostensible Paul Newman biography slash memoir that he had been working on. And while the audio tapes from these recordings were burned by Newman himself, transcripts were preserved for years and years. So what Hawk does is, in an effort to sort of tell this story,

is he blends interviews with surviving members of the Newman-Woodward family and conversations between Hawk and his pals like Sam Rockwell and his daughter, Maya Hawk,

with these transcripts. And so we hear, you know, in a way, the voice of Paul Newman talking about his experiences making films in the 60s and 70s via George Clooney. Really unusual movie. For someone like me, one who absolutely worships Paul Newman, who I think is the quintessential movie star, not just of that 60s and 70s era of Hollywood, but just in general in terms of what he brought as both a screen presence and a screen performer, a guy who is sort of trained famously at the actor's studio,

who had all of the tools, but who also is just the most magnificent looking person who's ever been on a movie screen. It's amazing to watch the story of not just the famous work that he did, not just Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, not just Hud, not just the iconic roles that he had in The Hustler and then later in Color of Money, but also in the smaller movies, the less successful movies, the passion projects, the times when he directed Joanne Woodward, his wife, who when she started her career was a hugely successful person very quickly, who was an Oscar winner, who was a movie star really before he was, and then who eventually became the mother to his children and someone who, while she continued to work throughout the 70s, her career really

took a backseat to his as he became the ultimate movie star. And Hawk is so interested in this dichotomy and in what a woman is asked to do at this time and what a man is asked to do, and the way that Newman, despite some struggles with alcohol, despite some struggles as a father, was afforded the opportunity to continue to pursue his career and his stardom. And Joanne Woodward had to make some sacrifices. She had to make some changes in her life. She's a little bit overlooked, I think, in terms of the sort of hall of heroes in Hollywood history recently. In the 60s and 70s, she was a big, big deal and very famous. And they spent some time looking at the sort of the mantelpiece and

all the awards that they both won together. And I think she won something like nine Emmys in the 80s and 90s for all the work that she did there. So even after she moved away from starring in big screen films, she continued to work amazingly well. And then they both worked together in the theater. And this film, it really captures 60 years of their life. And it's just a remarkable document. And also, it's fun. It's fun to watch Ethan Hawke engaging with people that he really cares about, nerding it up with Richard Linklater about The Hustler and The Color of Money,

and watching Richard Linklater recite lines Hustler and The Color of Money and watching Richard Linklater recite lines of dialogue from The Color of Money. It's almost like a little mini rewatchables inside of this six-hour documentary film. I really love this. I really slept inside of it. And I really wish that there were more massively overdrawn projects about movie star history. It's obviously a sweet spot for me personally, but I think there's something for a lot of different people. And if you don't know very much about Joanne Woodward or Paul Newman, this is a fascinating crash course. You'll be adding lots and lots of titles to your letterbox list, not just those classic movies, but like, you know, I watched WUSA for the first time this week, which is a sort of failed film that Newman

directed about a kind of conservative radio talk show host in which he attempted to kind of address the ills of the world. And Newman and Woodward were both very socially conscious and very politically active and marched with Dr. King in the civil rights marches and were close friends with Gore Vidal, the great thinker and novelist and critic. And it's just so interesting to watch how they blended together these worlds in this American life and sometimes put it in their art and sometimes just kept it separate from their art. But we're constantly thinking about who they were and what they're putting out into the world while also being these really flawed, at times frail people.

So pretty special thing, The Last Movie Stars. Check it out if you have six hours of your life to spare. I know that's a lot. Slightly different kind of thing I wanted to talk about quickly is called Not Okay, which is a new film starring Zoe Deutsch that is available on Hulu. And it's a sort of like a morality tale satire about the dangers of influencer culture and it's really on the other end of the spectrum in terms of 2022 content it's about a misguided young woman who is really desperate to make friends and she's trying to get famous online and so she fakes a trip to paris to update her social media presence and then when something terrifying a kind of terrorist incident takes place in the real world in Paris, she becomes sort of the star of the moment because she is deemed a survivor of this

very traumatic series of events. Of course, she's not a survivor of those events, but she puts on a front and then she kind of uses that to sort of launch herself into a certain kind of notoriety. It's a weirdly lighthearted movie for something that is about such a serious topic. I did think it was a really fascinating entry into this new subgenre that I have been thinking about a lot that I am, I hope you'll forgive me, I'm calling it the zillennial panic. And in the last 10 years, there've been a lot of movies about this topic. In fact, there's another movie like this called Bodies, Bodies, Bodies that is coming out at the end of this week in limited release. And that's from A24. And we'll be talking about it a lot more. But even just in the last few years,

if you look at the number of movies, we talked about Unpregnant on this show. We've talked about Booksmart. There was a movie Moxie on Netflix a few years ago that Amy Poehler directed. Big Time Adolescence, the Pete Davidson movie fits into this. The Hate U Give, To All The Boys I've Loved Before in a Weird Way fits in. Obviously, Eighth Grade, Bo Burnham's movie, Happy Death Day, another Zoe Deutsch movie, Flower fits this mold. It Follows, I think it's fair to say, fits this mold. The Fault in Our Stars kind of fits this mold. It's basically about young people born in the 90s going through a kind of crisis of personal faith, of friendship, of love, of anxiety about the world

and the way that social media and the internet is affecting them. There are a lot of examples of this in the movie world right now. I think because a lot of filmmakers who are just a little bit older than these folks are starting to make films. And so it's been interesting to watch them

translate the experience, the intense emotional experiences. Not Okay is not a great movie. It's solid. It's interesting. I really like Zoe Deutsch and always have. I think she's a really good screen presence as well. But it's interesting to watch

these films start to populate i guess youth movies for lack of a better word and i always wonder when something like this is happening are these movies beloved by people that are the same age as the characters or are they more these sort of like objects of fascination from older people who are trying to better understand their children or the generation that is beneath them and using these movies as evidence of their preconceived notions of how young people move through the world it's a little bit of a dicey game i'm not sure i'm looking at not okay and imagining it to be evidence of how things actually are right now for people who are breathlessly on

social media all the time. But I thought it was interesting that this is officially where movies for young people are headed. They are headed towards representation of their very odd online lives. So I thought it was worth shouting out. It might be worth your time if you're interested in a movie like this. A couple more I want to shout out. Never got a chance to talk about the Sea Beast. I'm a chance to talk about the sea beast. I'm not allowed to talk about animated movies when Amanda or Chris are on the show. So I'm doing it right here.

Thank you very much. Um, does the new Netflix movie. We give Netflix a really hard time. We gave Netflix a really hard time on the gray man podcast for their film development. This is a very good Netflix original movie. It's animated.

It's directed by Chris Williams. Who's a sort of Disney expat. He's the guy who directed big hero six, uh, six or seven years ago, which is a very good family film. This one is not so much a futuristic science fiction story. It's much more of a throwback movie. It's a movie set on a ship. It's about a young girl who stows away on the ship of a legendary sea monster hunter. And that turns his life upside down as they venture into uncharted water waters questing for this

monster this beast is a very classical very old-fashioned very sweet very thoughtful very vibrant and energetic and gorgeously drawn movie it's it feels like it's from another time and i mean that in a good way it's not uber wber winky. It's not necessarily there to entertain parents more so than children. It feels like a movie for kids. It's got a really strong female hero, young female hero at the center of it. And I thought it had great pace. It was really brisk and the adventure was truly adventurous. And I was really fond of this. And I just kind of stumbled upon it on Netflix one day. I hadn't really thought too much about it.

And we've gotten a couple of requests over the last few weeks to talk about it. So I'm really happy to recommend this movie. Especially if you have kids, if you have like a seven-year-old son or daughter, I feel like they would love this movie. So that's the Sea Beast on Netflix right now. A couple of movies in theaters

I want to shout out really quickly. Maybe we'll talk about Marcel the Shell with Shoes On as we get further into award season. There's some debate now as to whether or not this film should qualify for Best Animated Feature or not as a stop-motion movie from Dean Fleischer Camp that is based on the critically acclaimed and viral YouTube video series starring his then partner, Jenny Slate, as Marcel Dechelle. Jenny and Dean are no longer together, but they still collaborated on this film, which it seems like a fairly slight concept to expand into a feature-length film, but

they weirdly draw a lot of emotional resonance and deep thought out of this very odd, cutesy, viral video. In particular, I think there's something fascinating about Jenny and Dean collaborating on this in part because Dean's character in the film has just gone through a breakup of sorts and is kind of processing how he feels. And he's building this relationship and this documentary that he's making about Marcel, this tiny little shell to process his feelings and better understand the world the same way that Marcel is trying to process the way he sees the world when he loses his family and better understand the world the same way that Marcel is trying to process the way he sees the world when he loses his family and loved ones are threatened. And this sounds like

kind of a ridiculously serious movie for a movie about a shell. And it is in its way. I don't know if this should qualify for best animated feature, but I do like the idea of pushing the boundaries of the Academy's very particular rule set. And this is a movie that could do that. And it would be really nice to see something that isn't just explicitly for children in the best animated feature category. So Marcel the Shell with Shoes on still in theaters right now, probably coming to VOD at some point in the next couple of months, but also a very nice movie, a warm movie, a movie that will make you feel better. Bobby, you've seen the Marcel the Shell with shoes on YouTube video, right? Yeah, the whole marketing of this movie is completely confounding to me.

Because again, like you're saying, I don't know how you turn that into a feature length film. I haven't seen the A24 product Marcel the Shell with shoes on that you're talking about and recommending here. But just the fact that Chris was like was like i saw this i like this i was like why how what chris chris seeing it was a major that was a twist that was for for the guy who won't watch spider verse but but we'll see marcel the show i i suspect stop motion is a longtime passion of his uh he does that at his kitchen table every night i know that's not true i wish that were true i would love to learn more about stop motion animation from chris but that's just not happening i mean the movie is very short it's like an hour and 20 minutes and so it is just just barely a feature

film and when it ended i was like okay this is over now i can go on with my life i didn't reflect on it deeply but it it has a kind of inherent sweetness that is doesn't feel cloying doesn't feel over determined it feels earned and also i just love jenny slate she's been a guest on the show before she's one of my favorite actresses comedians i just think she's really wonderful and um she's very good in the role as the voice of a shell which is a thing i just said on this podcast um one more movie in theaters i guess two more movies in theaters one is fire of love which i might have talked about out of sundance directed by sarah dosa uh it's a documentary about these scientists katya and ma Maurice Kraft, they're volcanologists. And in the 1970s, they traveled the world exploring volcanoes. And the footage in this film of volcanoes and lava and Katya and

Maurice embracing and nerding out over these volcanoes is freaking amazing. It is truly one of the most beautiful movies that I've seen in years. And I still, I haven't even had a chance to see it in theaters yet. I saw it at my home during virtual Sundance. I'm eager to see it on a big screen. That being said, it's from Nat Geo, which means it's likely going to be available pretty soon on either Disney Plus or Hulu. I'm not sure where it's going. It will probably be in contention for Best Documentary Feature at the Oscars. I'm not sure if it's necessarily a front runner, but it has an extraordinary soundtrack. This movie pulses with the energy of the earth. It is really an exciting and unusually poetic and elliptical movie. I really, really recommend this one if you have the chance to go out to see it on a big screen. One last one on the big screen, also Resurrection, which is in theaters this week, but is on VOD on

Friday. It stars Rebecca Hall and Tim Roth. It's by Andrew Siemens. This is another movie I saw out of Sundance. Very unnerving film. It's about a woman who's trying to protect herself and her daughter from an abusive ex-boyfriend who returns to their life after 22 years. And Tim Roth plays this tremendously menacing, seemingly quite evil, almost rebirth of a figure from Rebecca Hall's character's past. And I don't know if it's 100% successful, but it has that thing where it really gets under your skin. And it is disquieting and awkward. I watched it at 1 o'clock in the morning during virtual Sundance, which I would not recommend people do. But I thought it was effective.

And I liked it. So that's five movies for you, which I think are all kind of interesting in their own way and unique. The Last Movie Star is by far the best thing I'm talking about here. A lot of things coming this weekend that I just want to flag. We'll hit on some of them on the show later this week or next week. One in particular, Prey, which is the prequel to Predator. I think it's the seventh Predator film that we're getting. That's on Hulu. CR and I are going to talk about this movie. We're going to talk about Predator movies. I'm

going to talk to Dan Trachtenberg, who's the director of this movie. I thought it was really good. You'll hear more from me about it later this week or next week. 13 Lives is a movie that was produced by MGM, directed by Ron Howard, that is about the Thai cave rescue that was featured in the documentary from 2021, The Rescue. This movie was originally slated for movie theaters. Going to Amazon Prime this Friday, Colin Farrell, Viggo Mortensen as two amateur professional divers who participate in this incredible story of rescue. I saw this movie. I thought it was pretty good. It's a very down-the-middle docudrama about this extraordinary act and event. It features the performances from Farrell and Vigo and Tom Bateman who people may have

seen in the movie Death on the Nile earlier this year. I thought were really really strong. If you know what happened. Did people see him

in that movie? May people have seen him in the film Death on the Nile? Tom Bateman also is one of those actors too. When you see him

you're like oh yeah I've seen that guy in like 100 movies and then you look at his CV and you're like he's been in four films. So why do I think

I know him? No one saw Death on the Nile but uh that sucks for amanda's expanded universe desires but 13 lives um i don't know bobby do you know the story of the tide cave rescue do you know what happened yeah yeah i mean i followed it like as a news story okay did you read any of the long feature writing about it in magazines or anything like that? No. I can't read, so. Just listen to pods. That's all I can do. But you know how to tweet somehow. I don't know. How is that possible?

I'm like an AI that formulates takes from pods into tweets. It's built in a lab. That actually exists. I'm quite certain. Oh, yeah. For sure. A couple of other recommendations. Not recommendations, preview, I guess.

New animated feature on Apple TV+, Luck, coming on Friday. And then this thriller horror movie, They Them, from the acclaimed screenwriter John Logan,

is on Peacock. Plus, three new movies in theaters. Bullet Train, we're definitely covering Bullet Train. The David Leitch new movie.

The Train is a freaking bullet. It's a bullet. And Brad Pitt is on it. I haven't seen this movie yet. I'm seeing it tonight. And then later this week, me and Van are going to talk about it. We're going to talk about movies on trains,

which is one of my favorite subgenres. I mentioned Bodies, Bodies, Bodies. And then Easter Sunday, Joe Coy's sort of big screen comedy debut is also coming out. So that's like seven new films coming on Friday, august 5th and then it gets freaking grim it's really dark times after that bob good thing you're going out

yeah that's the thing is so i'm going on vacation we're taking a week off i'm just going to preview this we're taking i think it's our first ever week off on the big picture is that right seems right based on based on thinking about how many podcasts we've made. Yeah. Based on your life for the last three plus years. Making this show, yeah. The week of August 16th will be off. We'll be back after that with a very special draft.

I'm very excited about that draft. I've been plotting it, scheming it. I don't know if we can follow up the 1987 movie draft in any meaningful way, but I have some ideas. And then after that, Telluride. And then after that, the 500th episode. So we have a banger September coming, and then Oscar season

will be here, and it'll all be very exciting. In the meantime, you had some questions for me. Bobby, how were the questions? Were they bad? Were they good? Just horrible. People needed to step their game up. No, of course, they were good. Listeners of The Big Picture, they're smart people who care about movies. Do you want to

tease what we're going to do for 500? Yeah, sure. It'll be a similar concept, a mailbag. However, we're going to blow it out a little bit more. We're going to open up a voicemail line for the listeners of the big picture to finally get their voices heard out there in the world. Please do not use this as an opportunity to

politically stumped for Chris Ryan, or I guess you could, if you really want to, if that's what you want to spend your time doing. And, you know, we're going to ask you to ask a little bit more wide ranging questions to

share when you first started listening to the show, what you like most about it and something that you've always wanted to know. So more communication on that front in the, in the coming weeks where you can call in what you should be asking about and what you should not be asking about. I'm excited for that. Should be fun.

It'll be Amanda and I at some point in early September. So we will definitely share that number that you can call and communicate when that's all going to happen. It's just going to be Sean's personal cell phone number. Yep. Just please call Sean at all hours of the night. Definitely doesn't have a

baby to worry about. Definitely. Definitely. It has a Philly area code and it's a huge Eagles fan owns that phone. Huge Sixers fan owns that phone.

Host the watch. The owner of that phone hosts the watch. Okay. Let's go to the mailbag. All right. Jason asks, what film that was pushed to 2023

were you most anticipating this year i feel like the answer to this a lot of people asked about this film is it killers of the flower moon yeah yeah a lot of people wanted to know what are you now anticipating most because there's no killers of the flower moon how upset are you about killers of the flower moon one person called it flowers of the Killer Moon, which I thought was kind of funny. That's my sequel to the film. It's set in space, which I'm really excited about. Yeah, it's obviously Killers of the Flower Moon is the answer to the question.

We just found out last week that Martin Scorsese's next collaboration with Leonardo DiCaprio, an adaptation of the David Graham nonfiction book starring Jesse Plemons as well, among other people. Jason Isbell starring in this film. Really?

Yeah. Interesting cast. Not just writing music for Jackson Maine in this one. He's actually going to be on screen. He will be acting, apparently,

which is exciting. That's been pushed to, I guess, next summer, presumably. It's tabbed to premiere at Cannes next year and so maybe we have to have a conversation about

whether or not we should go to Cannes which is something I've never done and Amanda has never done and I don't know maybe this is the year to do it 2023 we shall see that's something that I we were really hanging our hat on that I was I was looking forward to making six more episodes about Martin Scorsese we've only

made about 35 thus far of the 492 episodes we've made of this show. So somebody asked here later on the doc here, I have it written down, BKS asked, can you explain why you refuse to send Amanda to Cannes? Is it because there hasn't been a Martin Scorsese movie yet?

Let's just say that that's the reason why. That there are not any other reasons. I like the pres why um that there are not any other reasons i like the presupposition that you're personally refusing to send amanda to camp as if i have that level of approval here at the ringer um i simply do not uh it i think if we're gonna go we should we should go together um but we'll see maybe maybe that would be a good good thing to do i'm trying to think if there's anything else that was pushed. Obviously, Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning Part 1 was pushed out of 2023. I was really excited about that.

It's a little hard to know what year movies were supposed to come out. I was reading over the weekend that DC League of Super Pets, which I know you saw on opening night on the Thursday preview screening, Bobby. Sometimes you say titles of movies, and I think you might actually be pranking me. It's the number one film in America, Bob. now yeah dc not my america not my america i haven't seen the film um but that movie was moved to that date to this this past friday because black adam was supposed to be on this date which is the forthcomingcoming superhero movie from DC starring Dwayne Johnson, but they had to push it back because related to a question we'll get to in the future,

the VFX houses are so overwhelmed right now with all of the films coming out of COVID that the effects were not going to be done in time. And so it's like, I, I didn't, I had not put together that July 29th was Black Adam Day as recently as six months ago but apparently it was the dates are moving like crazy oh you know what else is the Spider-Man across the spider-verse part one that's that was supposed to be a 2022 movie as well I

looked back at our results from the movie auctions man we just terrible like half of the movies are not coming out this year it's painful yeah but what are we supposed to do about that? Like how are we supposed to know? We're just supposed to pick bad movies just because we're not sure that the good movies are going to come out. It's a good point. It's a good point. I'm regretting letting Amanda get Avatar the way of water. I just want to put that out there.

I can't believe that she committed so hard to that. Yeah. Spend a lot of money on it, but you know what? It might be good. You know my feelings on Avatar. Are there any 2023 movies that you were anticipating? mission impossible those were the two mission impossible and colors of the flower moon i was gonna like show up and make a tiktok account like a fake tiktok account to do the minions thing for those two films dye my hair red for jesse plemmons that's just that

that uh that would look good on you i wish you i wish you well don't contact me when you do that okay okay i won't i'm not gonna do that. Okay. Okay, I won't. I'm not going to do it in any official capacity as the producer of The Big Picture, I promise. You should try to intro every screening you attend.

Just be like, hey all, it's me, Bobby Wagner. You may know me from The Big Picture podcast. You may know me from Tipping Pitches. Yeah. You can tout your wares. Imagine New Yorkers responding to me trying to do that. I don't think that would go over so hot. Yeah. You can tout your, tout your wares. Um, imagine New York, New Yorkers responding to me trying to do that.

I don't think that would go over so hot. No, don't, don't attempt to, you know, it reminds me actually of a really funny story. Uh, in,

in Zach Barron, Amanda's husband, my dear friends profile, Francis Ford Coppola. He, he tells the story of going to a screening of west side story at a local theater i guess in in northern california where coppola lives and he introduces the film but he's not there in any official capacity i think he just goes and stands in front of an audience of like paying customers

and introduces the movie and talks about his friendship with steven spielberg which i really want to get to that place. We're just like me showing up somewhere. You just hang out around the Spotify offices. You know, anytime there's about to be a podcast, you just walk in and you just introduce the podcast. But like, okay, so my brother works at Chipotle, right? He's worked at Chipotle for many years. Like, I want to just start going to Chipotle's and being like,

welcome to Chipotle. I'm Sean, Kyle's brother. I'm very excited to tell you about our burritos today. Me being an expert in burritos because of my relationship to my brother. That would be weird, wouldn't it? Yeah, that would be really weird. Especially you claiming that you're the burrito expert. Yeah, I mean, that's sort of what Coppola was doing.

It's like, and in the same way, I've eaten a lot of burritos. I can speak on burritos intelligently, but I don't think Coppola was like on set for West Side Story. That's a incredible flex. Yeah, but he made The Godfather. So you're saying me eating burritos is not equivalent well have you ever made the godfather equivalent burrito maybe i have well that's a skill that i needed to know that you had because i would have exploited it more that's a future podcast is the godfather burrito where we make the best possible burrito the most magisterial the culmination of all burritos and then we eat it

on microphone i think people would really like that they people love when we eat on microphone that's their favorite thing um we're off topic what's our next question you mentioned the vfx um storyline that's going on right now so we should just get to that i think simon asks with recent news about marvel sport treatment of vfx companies do you think we will reach a breaking point in hollywood around the treatment of vfx workers do you think we will reach a breaking point in Hollywood around the treatment of VFX workers and the often rushed and unfinished nature of the Marvel movies?

Yeah, it's interesting. So Chris Lee had a big kind of expose VFX artist in Vulture talking about how overworked and overtaxed all the houses are and how all the individual

employees are. Daniel Chin on The Ringer wrote about this and kind of how it's impacting the films and some of the quality of the films, especially on the Marvel side. It's clearly an issue. I would argue that the issue is more macro than micro. Obviously, if people are being mistreated in the workplace, obviously, if the quality of work that is being

put into these films is lesser than the artists want it to be, that's a huge issue and I don't want to undermine that. I think the bigger issue is just this incredible reliance on digital animation and digital effects technology in filmmaking. It's just so clear that we've gotten so far away

from what people are emotionally responding to in movies. And obviously, we are in the highest of times for IP and intellectually driven property or, excuse me, intellectual property is just so important to the box office and to holding people's attention that we don't have enough artisans who can make this work and make it work on the budgets and on the timeframes that the producers expect. I think in particular, it feels like ever since the launch of this rash of streaming services, and more specifically, the Marvel and Star Wars shows on Disney+, has this really become a huge

issue. Because one, those shows, as skillfully made as they are, don't look very good. They certainly don't look as good as that sort of phase two, phase three era of Marvel. And you can feel it infecting the films a little bit. A lot of people point out that Love and Thunder looked kind of chintzy.

And that's very odd for a film that is this important to their slate. And there's no way this is just going to change because one guy says something on a podcast. But the industry, it has to evolve out of this somehow.

It has to find a way to be less reliant on this. It has to find a way to continue to depend on practical effects, practical humans, stories that are not about superheroes and monsters and really fast race cars flying into space. I don't know if that's going to happen anytime soon. It doesn't seem like it. Seems like the whole industry is built on this. But look at Top Gun Maverick. There's plenty of digital animation in Top Gun Maverick,

and they had the good fortune of being able to spend three whole years on the production and post-production of the film. But that's a movie that really leaned into practical, and it's probably the most exciting movie of the year. So I don't know what to say other than like i think studios need to reimagine the way that they tell stories in order to improve this and also the whole industry just needs to kind of um i think more greatly respect what is still a relatively new art form and the people who are working on it and that's something that we see like across the world is when something

new comes along like we don't really know how to organize it we don't know how to manage it we don't know how to manage people's time we don't know how to make the best product because it's just go go go go go so i think that in the same way that like you know the writers guild and the actors guild and all these bodies have formed over time and become more and more powerful and more and more respected the same will happen in the vfx community it just needs it needs some time to grow into the industry it just feels like the mask is totally off with vfx but it has feel it's felt like this has been going on as long as i've been conscious of how movies were made like the first time i remember an over reliance on vfx being a problem for the movie goer was the hobbit remember

like and peter jackson was very upset about how much they forced him to use vfx on this and then he didn't have the budget to do things like he had done when he made the lord of the rings films but now i just think that's just industry standard and the problem is just so widespread but back then it was just sort of like an omen that it was coming yeah i mean i think it's as much about how much of a film takes place in a digitally created world you know i, I think this was true when I was a kid. You know, when Jurassic Park was coming out, there was like a lot of anxiety around the idea of digital animation replacing what made something like John Carpenter's The Thing so great.

I always felt like a blend was the way to go. Jurassic Park was a brilliant blend of VFX and practical technology. If you look at the top 10 movies at the box office this weekend, two of them are animated films, which of course use digital animation. And then you've got Nope, which has digital VFX. You've got Thor Love and Thunder,

which has digital VFX. You've got Top Gun Maverick, which has digital VFX. You've got Elvis, which uses digital VFX. If you've seen the movie, you'd know what I'm talking about. You've got The Black Phone,

which uses digital VFX. You've got Jurassic World Dominion, which uses visual VFX. If you've seen the movie, you'd know what I'm talking about. You've got the black phone, which uses digital VFX. You've got Jurassic world dominion, which uses visual VFX. That's six films plus two animated films. You've only got vengeance, the new BJ Novak thriller and where the crawdads sing are the only two films. And I'm, and frankly, I'm sure that there's plenty of digital imagery in those films too. Cause there's a lot of work that gets done on these movies and posts that, but this sort of like improve the, the set the visual setting or certain sequences that need touching up or something needs to be removed or changed i mean this is it is rampant and so there's just not enough hands frankly to make this stuff um i don't know it's a little hard to not sound like get off my lawn when talking about this but it is clearly a real problem because people are seeing

the movies and they're like this isn't good this doesn't look good to me yeah and sometimes when people are on your lawn they should get off though you know it's a very it's a very good point um okay what's next uh jub jub asks growing up i got the sense that there are a lot of movies that were not considered critically good but are now revered like 80s action movies do you think the same thing will happen 30 years from now and if so what movies what movies? It's a very good question. Got a really funny reply on social media from somebody about our conversation about the gray man, about the arc of taste and how it started out where these sorts of action films and genre movies were kind of critically reviled.

And then they were what this person deemed sort of ironically appreciated. And then they were earnestly appreciated. And then they become these kind of objects of obsession. It's interesting that this is the week that Prey comes out because I feel like Predator is kind of one of these movies. Predator is a movie that was a hit. It was considered very well made at the time, but it's a ridiculous action movie with lots of Arnold Schwarzenegger laugh lines. And now, when I took it in the 87 movie draft, I'm like, this is easily one of the best movies of the year. This is one of the best movies of the 80s. And I'm not exaggerating. I'm not ironically liking it. There's no tongue in cheek at all. But I'm not exaggerating I'm not ironically liking it I'm not there's no tongue-in-cheek at

all but I'm also not earnestly valorizing it the way you would at the untouchables or another movie from that year where you're like this is cinema right it's it's it there's like a kind of a unique difference between those two things and so I think what jub j, shout out to JubJub, is asking about is sort of like, what is the thing that we like but we don't say is good? Yeah, it's not cool to like it. Yeah, but it's hard because those things were still considered, even if they were big budget films, the studios were not overwhelmingly proud of making those movies they knew that they could make good business on them but it was during a time when rain man could be the biggest movie at the box office or back to the future could be the biggest movie at the box office and so those were quality films from quality auteurs with great scripts original stories and you know predator

was like it was a movie that is for the masses, but it's like Hollywood executives looked it down on their audience that went to go see movies like Predator. Now, Marvel movies, which are frankly the equivalent to a kind of Predator, are also the movies that are most touted by the studio. Now, maybe the people who work in the studio are most proud of them, but are the studios are nothing without predator without jurassic world dominion without the dc films without any franchise like that so it's a little hard to locate like well what's a cool like a successful thing that is not considered cool but that one day we will say this is great art or misunderstood art in its time and will evolve into something great i do think there's a lot of animation right now that people take for granted that they don't necessarily say.

I mean, like mainstream animation for children that is legitimately great. I think Turning Red is still my, you know, one of my three or four favorite movies of the year. I think that that is a movie that because it went to Disney Plus, because it's like the 30th Pixar movie, people are like, yeah, it's good. It's good. And then let's move on. And then I think it's possible that many years from now we'll be like we were living in a true golden age of animation like the technology the voices that were able to tell stories who had not been able to tell stories for disney for 70 years are finally getting the chance to do it that feels like the closest thing to me

because ironically or semi-ironically or even sincerely like loving an action movie that has a good box office, that just like is movies now. It is the centerpiece of movies. There are no comedies. There are no rom-coms. They're like, there are so few versions. Now, maybe, maybe, maybe it's Netflix movies,

which we're not celebrating really very much unless they're the kind of more awards-driven fare from filmmakers who have been widely celebrated. But we've really been bagging on Netflix this year. The industry at large has been bagging on Netflix this year. They churn out a lot of films. And the way that I love to rediscover 70s crime movies that I've never seen

and just make insane lists on Letterboxd and say like, I need to see every single one. And even if something is like less than perfect or problematic or what have you, like I watched Freebie and the Bean the other day, the Alan Arkin and James Caan movie. There's a lot that's wrong with it, but there's a lot that's right with it. It features like two of the coolest car chases I've ever seen in a movie. And I was like, more people should watch Freebie and the Bean. That was my takeaway from that. Even though it wasn't the best, it wasn't the 100th best crime movie

of the 1970s. But I could see a world in which we were like, we didn't know what we had with the gray man. That's a little scary. That's dark. But we might feel that way.

But I think this question is even harder because criticism is in such a different place than it was when the 80s were coming through and movies could actually fall through the cracks movies that were good could fall through the cracks much

easier than they can now because everybody has a podcast now everybody has a blog can have a blog now and so these like little pockets of interest in movies that maybe are not reviewed well in the new york times or the new yorker or wherever else that has the widest reach for film criticism, they are still loved. Good movies that get made now don't have no fans the way that they might have if they just showed in theaters and then went to cassette in the 1980s. And so, I don't know, this is a hard question to say because really there's only a couple options, just like Netflix movies that get churned out or Marvel movies and I don't know that those are going to have like a critical re-examination because they've already been critically re-examined 12 months later every year for the last 15 years like we've already gone through that on this show

and elsewhere through many cycles it's a it's a fantastic point Bob it's exactly right. There are so many. I mean, just thinking of what Twitter, Letterboxd, YouTube, any number of new places for people, amateur or professional people to put their thoughts. It just so widens the pool of critical thought and critical consensus and critical reclamation. You make a really, really good point. And so it makes the idea of discovery or reviving the idea of something like i saw adam naiman over the weekend um was touting hail caesar you know the coen brothers film from uh five or six years ago and saying like you know in many ways this is like now an underrated movie he wasn't saying that literally but i think that was the intention

behind what he was trying to say which is that people kind of disregarded it as like slight coen brothers at the time when in fact it's this like tremendously sophisticated funny awesomely um cast and written film and he's right of course but then it's like so we have to like reclaim late period coen brothers you know what i mean like this is where we are now at this where it's like we know like and i say this with no disrespect to adam i i love adam and he's right he's right about this very specific thing insofar as like we now have to be like crimes of the future david cronenberg has a new film turns out it's amazing like no shit it's amazing like i know and we're also thirsty for to love things that are not made by these like not made by netflix and not made by

disney that people already do love them when they come out. People don't, because we're scraping for those few films that come through, that people are already excited about them. They don't let them fall through the cracks. That's exactly right. And whenever, that's why when I'm like, it's going to be Martin Scorsese month on the big picture,

it's like, because I need this. I don't know how much longer I'm going to have this. And so I'm sort of like preemptively over-celebrating something because I feel that it's so vital to keep a very, very close watch on the things that are happening. Like, as they roll out. There have been, like, examples of this too. Like, I was thinking about, they released the trailer for Pearl,

which is the prequel to X, the Ty West movie that came out earlier this year, the horror movie. And Ty on this show, like, revealed that he had been shooting this. He'd already almost concurrently. He was already shooting it. Which is amazing. And I don't think X is. More filmmakers should do that on this show.

It's just my, it's my humble opinion. Reveal news of their forthcoming prequels. Break news on the big picture. Where better? Marty, come on and tell us about Flowers of the Killer Moon. You know,

we want to hear about it. I, I thought about Pearl and I was like, X is good. It's not the greatest horror movie ever made. It's a very, very clever and savvily drawn, like kind of postmodern representation of what a horror story can be.

And Pearl feels like it's going to be very similar and they're going to work together. But I'm way more excited to put my stamp on something like that than i am trying to make the case for thor the dark world at this point you know i mean like i'm just i i can't i'm not in that game at this point of my life and i don't know if i'll ever get back to that game so it's a really interesting question and i think you very wisely like underlined the challenge of the actual act that jub jub is asking about thank you jub jub good question good fodder for conversation um another really good question that

i liked a lot going off topic asks is there an actor or actress whose first movie would go into their hall of fame yeah i made a short list it's a tougher question than you think most people's first movies are not very good it's true and people usually take small roles right and very few people are cast as sort of like ingenues with major breakthrough performances. The first four on my list came to mind immediately. And then I looked at some lists and stuff for the final two. But the one that immediately popped into my mind

was Jamie Lee Curtis in Halloween. Part of that is, I don't know if this would have been acclaimed if Halloween were not as well made by John Carpenter and Debra Hill as producer, if this would have been on the list, or even if Jamie Lee Curtis would have gone on to the career that she went on to.

But her work in that movie is tremendously iconic. Theoretically, her last Halloween movie is coming out in just a few months. So she's kind of top of mind for me. And you can't talk about her career without halloween it's it's the essential film of her career i think so she was the first one the second one i thought of almost at the same time was edward norton primal fear because i remember that was a part of the story of the film was who the hell is this guy who is giving this jaw-dropping eventually oscar

nominated performance um and if you haven't seen primal fear i hope we do primal fear on the who is giving this jaw-dropping, eventually Oscar-nominated performance. And if you haven't seen Primal Fear, I hope we do Primal Fear on the rewatchables one day. It really is one of the more, not just exciting film debuts, but renditions of a kind of psychological thriller that is also on that list of movies

that I'm just like, why don't we have more of these? Why are there not more movies like this at $40 million that is also on that list of movies that I'm just like, why don't we have more of these? I don't, why are there not more movies like this at $40 million with people at the absolute top of their game? Anyhow, um, a couple of other ones,

Kate Winslet, heavenly creatures. That's her first movie. Peter Jackson, one of his first films. Um, we haven't done the Kate Winslet hall of fame. I hope she stops making TV shows and goes back to movies.

She keeps making free. I guess she's in the shows and goes back to movies. She keeps making. I guess she's in the Avatar the Way of Water. That would be a weird episode to do, though, for Avatar the Way of Water. The Kate Winslet Hall of Fame. Yeah, I don't think that quite fits thematically unless we're going to do multiple episodes pegged to Avatar the Way of Water. Well, we will. Which we have to.

We have to. Come on. Avatar. Okay. It's more like we're probably going to focus on jim cameron when avatar to come big big jim big jim yeah we will we'll do we'll do both i i think is kate winslet and navi in the film she is right couldn't tell you okay honestly couldn't tell you a couple more debuts perhaps you've heard of them eddie murphy 48 hours it's a little bit of a cheat because he

was on snl for a few years there so he was a very well-known quantity and he had done some big stand-up specials but dramatic performance in a movie 48 hours is an amazing debut julie andrews and mary poppins a little shout out to amanda there that's her first movie pretty good she's still acting what did she act in this year she voiced a character in a movie this year shoot what was it it's minions the rise of grew yes she was grew's mom yes yes wow she's been grew's mom through and through whole time she has pickable me films yes original minions god legend her pivot into making content for teens princess diaries

it's julie andrews like 86 years old how old is she she was born on october 1st 1935 80 87 she'll be 87 in october yeah amazing um one last one orson welles in Citizen Kane. Heard of that.

Heard of him. Are you familiar with that film, Bob? Yeah. That film is based on the film Mank. He like traveled back in time. Yeah. Well, Mank was made in all, it's like 2001 A Space Odyssey.

It's on the astral plane. It's like, okay, so time doesn't operate the same. Yeah, Mank went to Jupiter and then went all the way around the universe and came back again. And so everything is kind of born from Mank. Like Mank is the star child. Right.

You know, like it all emanates from the Black Monolith. Does that make like Amanda Seyfried's debut performance Mank too? Or does that not count? Yes. So everyone who was at Gary Oldman? Yes. Mank is both the first film and the last film.

It is the alpha and the omega of film. I see. Orson Welles was more of a radio guy early on. So I'm thinking I'm going to have my first debut film be like Citizen Kane. How is your Citizen Kane going? What's it called? DeGrom's Folly?

I can't talk about that. Studio hasn't let me yet. Okay. What's the next question? The next question is actually really tough. Eliseo asks, what's the funniest film

you've seen so far this year? Okay, so I have a very easy answer for this, which is Jackass Forever. That's the funniest movie I've seen by a mile especially in a movie theater

and I probably laughed a lot in Ambulance in a sort of like the balls on this guy kind of way. Yeah. But I can't find a comedy that I liked. I'm literally scrolling through my list

of films that I've seen this year the Bob's Burgers movie that was pretty funny hmm Chippendale Rescue Rangers was pretty funny and like I get that joke like I understand that reference sort of way I mean it's grim times for comedies the movies I guess the Lost City that might be the one

which I was very mixed on the Lost City but the funny parts were very funny um that's a sandra bullock channing tatum movie that you know we actually didn't devote really any time to on the show that feels like one of our biggest misses this year for not doing an entire episode given that we've done entire episodes about significantly less successful films um i want you back was pretty funny that was pretty good speaking of jenny slate yeah i enjoyed that um you know what i think the funniest movie was that's not jackass because that kind of a different thing like kind of maybe not what this person is asking um nope was pretty funny

i laughed a lot during nope yeah i did too i felt like it was subsumed by egg-headed big brain this is what it's really about conversation of which i am guilty um but yeah i mean it's jordan peele he's like one of the funniest guys in the last 20 years well it's funny because someone asked us georgio asked what genre is nope i feel like it has a rep as a horror film, but is maybe not exactly that. I mean, I think it has two sequences that are truly horrifying, um, that effectively qualify it.

I would say that all of his films, you know, he's, he started out, I think describing his films as social thrillers when get out came out, which, you know, many horror movies are effectively social thrillers when get out came out which you know many horror movies are effectively

social thrillers especially the movies made by his heroes you know the Wes Cravens and the John Carpenters and the Toby Hoopers and all of those folks they all made movies

that were effectively about society and the way that we organized our world and use genre storytelling to kind of amplify some of our faults and failures I feel like his movies are

now fully satires yeah like nope in particular is just so openly satirical about constantly trying to capture what's in front of us without actually seeing it and I love

that idea so much I'm so consumed by that idea of like I think about this even with Alice in the house she sees me on my phone all day and all she wants is my phone. She has all the toys in the known universe, but she, and if I turn the camera on

and she can see herself in the camera, she's never happier. She is absolutely delighted by her own moving image on this glass screen. And this seems like kind of an odd way to describe nope but that is kind of what nope is about it is like constantly tracking these things and like trying to capture them and hold them hold these moments and mocking us for it you think she's gonna turn into like the michael wincott character in the in the movie because of that as long as she doesn't have his voice i think

that would be fine i mean, if I had a child who was a cinematographer, you know I would be happy. That would be a great outcome. I'm not going to force her into anything, but I'm going to teach her. Here's what this character does in the film and here's what he does in real life.

Just build her a little turnstile. Yeah, a little crank. I love Nope. Did you like Nope? I did. I liked it a lot. I'd like to go see it again i would too i have only seen it once i feel like whereas the first film like get out was like a very obvious metaphor that was so pleasing because he was just going deeper and deeper and deeper on

the metaphor that you already understood and then us was like a metaphor that was kind of confused like intentionally obscuring your viewing experience and nope was like kind of halfway in between those two things like i got it i obviously heard you guys talk about it ahead of time so i knew what to expect when i was going into it but what you're talking about with the the desire to capture everything to control the natural world for our own benefit to profit off of it to record it to document it and i i felt like it was just confusing and symbolic enough in going through that process throughout the movie that i liked it i found myself thinking about it a lot afterwards after seeing it but then at the same time it was just tremendously entertaining while watching it

in the theater and much funnier than i think that i was expecting it to be the the scene of uh kiki palmer and and Daniel Kaluuya just like dapping each other up where that totally might've been improv is one of the funniest things I've seen on screen all year. That was good. I think the latter point that you're making about it being very funny

and just sort of engaging and entertaining is I think that in the kind of discourse, Peele is being a little overlooked as someone who's good at that at this point. And he's, I don't think he's not in danger. He's not in danger of anything really. But the headiness and the headiness being so at the forefront of the last two films,

I think is being used against him in terms of talking about what it is that he does. And I think we've lost a little bit of sight of exactly what you're citing, which is just like, these are fun movies. Nope is really fun. Is it perfect? Are the characters perfectly drawn?

Is it easy to dissect and say, well, I didn't like that part as much as that part, of course. But that's part of the amazing risk of the movie is he's trying to put so many pieces together to make you think about all these ideas.

So I'm glad you liked it. I think he's pretty special. Who's getting better performances out of actors than him? I mean, that's just so obviously true. There are no bad performances in any of his movies. You can count the directors on one hand.

It's amazing. I mean, I think Van might have mentioned even like the Lupita performance in Us is like one of the great overlooked performances ever now. It's two different performances. I know, I know. And she's just not,

when you look at her IMDb, she's just not in anything else for like the last 10 years, really. It's great. It honestly is. Besides Black Panther. she's just not in anything else for the last 10 years, really. It honestly is. Besides Black Panther. It's just so exciting that he's getting $80 million to make movies. It's really cool.

I mean, I'll watch Daniel Kaluuya in anything, Zone. Me too. I've been there for a long time. I'm interested to see where he takes it because he's getting very particular about how he wants to be portrayed. I thought him skipping out on Black Panther was really, really interesting. And it feels like, in a way, he's sort of like, I don't even need to be doing stuff like this. I only want to be doing something that is of my own conception. I don't want to be inside of a world that is part of a larger universe.

Maybe I'm wrong about that. Maybe he's going to be, I don't know, maybe he's going to be i don't know maybe he's gonna be reed richards for all i know who the fuck but i don't think so um okay let's go to the next question uh next question emily wants to know if you could describe you and amanda's personalities in three movies from 2022 so far what would they be and why i guess you need to do three for each of you but you know maybe a couple movies that have come out that you feel speak to who you are and who amanda is sure um amanda has really carved out the movie that is her brand kind of energy you know top gun maverick yeah do we feel that top gun maverick represents amanda it certainly represents her taste and her ability to call her shot.

I wonder, I mean, pulse pounding, fearless intensity. I guess that's kind of, that's kind of Dobbins. Um, yeah,

I don't know. I mean, the Northman is me making an outline for, for a movie podcast. It's absolutely 100% sure. Just furiously typing through all of my ideas and all of the data points of something, but Alexander Skarsgård

killing people. Yeah, exactly. On the movie podcasting world. That's one for sure. I think Deepwater is pretty close to Amanda's personality. Yeah.

Maybe not in terms of quality, but just in terms of like what is exciting. Men, the film Men. That's probably me about the evil that men do still haven't gotten there still haven't gotten the uh the energy up to see that one personally i had a hilarious conversation with uh chris ryan and his wonderful wife phoebe a few weeks ago where they very earnestly were like should we watch men tonight what do you think should we rent it and i i was like, well, I loved it,

but here's some things you should know before you spend $7 and two hours of your life on this film and then really like talked them out of it. And I just want to say I regret it. You know, I wish I had pushed them to watch it because I liked it. And I know that it's not a popular film and people thought it was grotesque

and a little bit simple, but I thought it was great Alex Garland when he makes stuff he's like what if you just maybe lost the will to go back out into society after watching what I made and that's like the animating principle of his art I think that's exactly exactly right he's trying to scoop you out okay that's not three movies each but I think it's pretty close. I think so too. Here's a tough one for you, Sean.

Drew asks, do you think you've reached your apex mountain? Evidence for this. The Mets are in first. There will be blood rewatchables. Draft pod with Quentin. And of course,

the new mustache, which is no longer. I shaved it off. Yeah. Damn. I shaved it off. I think, I think my family

was not really appreciating it even though it was really coming into full bloom i was like right on the edge of it being great and uh i got rid of it is this my apex mountain well as one as listeners of the rewatchables know i don't know what apex mountain means so i don't know how to answer this question um a really funny moment happened to me in my first six months of work at the ringer where um we were making new merch for all of the different podcasts on the network uh and selling them and one of the shirts for the rewatchables was gonna say i survived apex mountain and liz kelly slacked that phrase to me and said as someone who listens to the rewatchables do you

understand this and i had to be like well yes and and no but i don't think i'm supposed to understand it so i think that that works out of shirt uh does liz know what apex mountain means at this point that was years ago certainly not um i if i said this was my apex mountain i should probably just retire right well it depends on your philosophy do you want to go out on top or do you want to just kind of peter out sadly well can i continue to do my job make shows root for the mets without it necessarily being considered petering out see i think it's fine to to peak and then continue to make good stuff like there's no way martin scorsese thinks the killers the flower moon is going to be his apex mountain right i mean he does he does what are you talking about of course he does because as you get older and of course this is not true right this is musicians are legendary yeah for saying like

my new album is my best work yet this is the most because you feel you have accrued a kind of skill and knowledge and depth that you didn't have when you were 25 the rolling stones right now they think that they are absolutely at the top of their game even though mick jagger is 80 years old that's deranged i agree but they're like you know the blues for example and they play the blues like that's something that it takes decades to understand and immerse yourself in and feel movie podcasting i don't i don't know if it's like the blues i don't really think every time you put out a pod like it's friday morning you're like this is the best work i've ever done i mean here's the thing there's a at the risk of being too earnest about a very silly question

i think that the shows that we're doing here we're trying to make them simultaneously informative thoughtful critically minded like exhume ideas and new art, like films and stories that people haven't seen before and kind of put them in front of people. But we're also trying to have

a fun time and be entertaining. And so like, when you get better at the latter, the former suffers. When you get better at the former,

the latter suffers. Film criticism is not inherently entertaining. It's fascinating to me. But how do you get better at being on the rewatchables? I don't know. Have an extra cup of coffee?

Like, I don't really... I don't know. You know I always support that. I was sitting over there in the corner during the 1987 movie draft. Heartbeat 145 because I had like

six cold brews before it. But that's you every day. Yeah. That's literally you every day. I was a little nervous about being too caffeinated for's you every day. Yeah. That's literally you every day. I was a little nervous about being too caffeinated for Quentin and Roger Avery. That's definitely a thing. Your brain can just shut off

as like a survival technique if you do that. I don't know how... The drafts in particular, I don't know how we can go bigger than Quentin. So, you know, I think you should make... In the construction of this in your mind, I think that you should be thinking more like, did Quentin top the Rango moment?

Did Quentin top? That's the point though. That's the point is, is that that is the version of the entertaining podcast that I can't, one, I can't do that by myself. I need Amanda and Chris to be able to do that. Two, you can't plan for that. You can't try to make that happen.

I would just like the record to state that I think the exact opposite of musicians. I think their first album is almost always their best album because it's everything that they wanted to say. And then for the rest of the albums, they're just like, I have to come up with other stuff to say.

I'm with you 100%. I mean, writing about rap for years and years, it was particularly true of rappers who just had this enormous wealth of experience and stories to tell. And they just dumped it all on the page in their first album. And then the truly great artists, not just in hip hop, but in every genre are the ones who found new ways to kind of iterate on

their personas and their experiences. So maybe the same will be true of this pod. Yeah. How do we get Jordan Peele to do a movie draft? How do we get Greta Gerwig to do a movie draft? You know, that would be a lot of fun. That'd be great. Gerwig,

Baumbach, me, Amanda, and Chris. Who says no? Yeah. While he's touring for White Noise. Yeah. I mean, wouldn't that be wonderful? Noah's been on the show many times. I love him. He's a great guy. He's a wonderful filmmaker. Okay.

Next question comes from Mike. It's the year 2032. cr and amanda are gathered for the 10th anniversary 2022 movie draft and at this point what movie is the first pick in your opinion that's a really good question it's am i including movies that have not been released yet i guess you can if you're not impressed enough by the movies that have been released yet? I guess you can if you're not impressed enough by the movies that have been released. I think the Fablemans is on the menu. The forthcoming Steven Spielberg sort of memoiristic I guess for lack of a better phrase it's like his Roma. The story about how he came to be I guess inspired to make

films and his family life in Arizona at that time. You know I think obviously people will say Top Gun Maverick, Top Gun Maverick, but in 10 years, I genuinely don't know if Top Gun Maverick is still as celebrated in the moment as it is right now. I'm not sure if there have been a lot of movies that feel legendary. I guess everything, everywhere, all at once has a chance to become an authentic cult classic, like a movie that people watch over and over and over again. It probably depends a little bit on what the Daniels do going forward, too. Like if they continue to cement themselves as like huge filmmakers in the next 10 years, that could be one. I'm trying to think of another film that has not been released yet that you could see getting into that space.

I mean, I'm really interested in Tar, the Todd Field movie with Cate Blanchett, which is now the buzz is really starting to build on Tar. And I guess it will be at the fall festivals. I'm going to be a Telluride. I'm hoping it's a Telluride this year. That feels like one of those kind of dark horses where it's like,

maybe this is going to be the best film of the year. And maybe one of the best films the last five years. And then maybe that will be the consensus critical pick for number one. They're just, it's just not a great time for big blockbuster movies. The Marvel movies this year have not been great. It doesn't, I mean,

I guess black Panther Wakanda forever could be this beautiful elegiac tribute to Chadwick Boseman and, and this transition story, but it is still ultimately a Marvel movie. So I don't know. That's an interesting question. It's really, really hard to predict. I think it's almost definitely Top Gun Maverick. You think so? For what the draft is and what you're trying to accomplish with the draft, I think that that's basically like a few good men, but 10 years from now. If we're doing a draft in 2032,

you need to drown me in the shallow depths of the LA river. That's just not, I got, I got, I with all love and respect and I love the drafts and I love doing them with all of you guys. I can't be there at 50. That's scary.

That's fine. You, what am I going to be doing? You're going to take them over. I don't know. You tell me, I don't think that I have that many, enough movies that I like to fill it out.

Yeah, that's a challenge. Well, you've been watching a lot since you started doing the show too. That is true. You're building up your reservoir. What's our next question? Next question comes from Aaron. A few people asked about this film.

What are your thoughts on Oppenheimer, his teaser, and the predictions on Nolan's direction and style for this film? And then someone else asked, I forget, I didn't write it down and I apologize to this person for this film. And then someone else asked, I forget, I didn't write it down

and I apologize to this person who asked this question, but someone else asked what I thought was interesting. If this film to you is a masterpiece, does this start to change the direction of your opinion about Christopher Nolan?

Because that will have made two movies that, two or three movies now at this point that you kind of thought were pretty amazing yeah i like dunkirk yeah i know this i like dunkirk i love tenet i'm i'm excited for oppenheimer for a variety of reasons one obviously big bold story about one of the most important humans of the 20th century and one of the most significant acts of the 20th century. Obviously the idea of the atomic bomb and nuclear warfare and those ideas

that the kind of the, the headiness and the visual explosive quality that Nolan can bring to it is exciting. I wouldn't say I'm necessarily like changing my tune on Nolan. I think it really, because there are Nolan films that I do and have praise. Like I, I really wish he had made Nolan films that I do and have praised. Like, I really wish he had made more films like Memento and The Prestige.

And I don't think that Interstellar and Inception are as successful, which is why I think everybody's like, why do you hate Nolan? I don't hate him. I just think he is a little more. You just weren't doing a movie podcast at the time when those movies were coming out. Yeah. And I think I would have been able to share, I think, a little bit more distant, like clearly what I think some of the struggles of some of his storytelling is and some of his, like some of the tricks he leans on that I think can, can be a little bit tiresome. And it feels like he is kind of dissembling some of those ticks as he gets longer into his career. I mean, I'm really excited about this. It's a huge summer movie from

one of the most talented filmmakers in the world from a major studio with tons of stars, a huge cast. I will say I've kind of already started preparing for it in part because so as I mentioned on a show a few months ago, like I started rewatching all of Kubrick's movies this year. Um, and I hadn't done like a big Kubrick rewatch in probably five or six years. So I watched strange love over the weekend in 2001 over the weekend. And then after I watched them, I watched two films, two documentaries. One's called The Day After Trinity, which came out in 1981 and is about Robert Oppenheimer. It's available on YouTube for free. It's a really, really good film. And then after that, I watched the movie that came out one year later called The Atomic Cafe, which is available for free on Tubi. The Day After Trinity a really, really good film. And then after that, I watched the movie that came out one year later called The Atomic Cafe, which is available for free on Tubi.

The Day After Trinity is a really, really serious film about the development of the bomb. And The Atomic Cafe is this sort of archival black comedy about the way that we told the story of nuclear annihilation in our country and the kind of like cheery way that we got people excited about devastating foreign lands. They're both really, really interesting films. And I think I'm starting to like put together the beginnings of a nuclear panic episode of the show for when this comes out. And this is a huge subject in American movies, especially American movies in the 60s and 70s. And there's a lot of thrillers from that time that I really, really like a lot. Like Twilight's last gleaming comes to mind and seven days in may. And I really, really love those movies that are around that

period of history or the aftermath of that history of Oppenheimer. So yeah, I'm really looking forward to this. I mean, I don't know if every time Christopher Nolan, you know, farts, I need to be like, Hey, I've reconsidered my take he's actually good like that's not how things work like you watch movies you change your opinion on certain things i still think that some of the things that were flawed someone runs into christopher nolan in the elevator at the glendale amc burbank amc that's right yeah i i i hope to i hope to enjoy oppenheimer because what would be the what would be the upside of wanting to hate it that would be just a dumb way to approach any piece of art i'm pretty excited for it yeah of course of course it's gonna be a huge thing next year yeah um and and universal to their credit has done an amazing job with someone like jordan peele and i think one of

the reasons why nolan chose universal is not just not just because they're going to give him the theatrical window that he so desperately wants, but I think because with certain filmmakers, they really, really support their vision and give them what they need. And he's the kind of guy who needs that. He needs to be indulged. And it seems like he will be on Oppenheimer. So I'm looking forward to it. You want to do a couple more? Yeah. This next question comes from someone whose Twitter name is just an ellipse. So I don't know how to say that out loud on a podcast however they asked what are the chances multiple blockbusters top gun maverick wakanda forever avatar 2 get nominated for best picture i will say high to very high um we are seven months through the year. I'm trying to think of what I would deem.

We're going to do a way too early best picture race episode, probably in about a month. So I don't want to step on that too much. But at the moment, the only movies that have not come out that I feel strongly will be nominated for best picture are she said the Fablemans, Babylon, and probably Empire of Light, the new Sam Mendes film. Babylon is a Damien Chazelle film. After that, I think it's a real crapshoot. And so with that in mind, I think both Everything Everywhere All at Once and Top Gun Mavic are potentially in a good position to be nominated for Best Picture. Black Panther, Wakanda Forever, there's a big story to tell. And don't forget, Black Panther, the first Black Panther was nominated for Best Picture. And Avatar, of course, was nominated

for Best Picture too. And up until the last few weeks of that race was considered, had a really, really strong chance to win. So you're talking about a year in which the credibility of the blockbusters is significantly higher than it usually is. So one, I think that would be tremendous for the show. I always talk about that. I always think it's important that there be mainstream films that people love potentially being celebrated. I don't think we're getting into best actor Tom Cruise territory necessarily, but I think it's a celebration of the box office returning and a celebration of really well made movies I mean I haven't seen Wakanda Forever Avatar 2 yet as much as

I'm anticipating them but Maverick is sick I mean it's so good it's so well made and people so universally love it that it would be a huge missed opportunity to you know nominate a small art house movie that very few people have seen that is okay you know if it's a great art house film if it's very special of course go for it but so often the oscars just like

decides you know its body decides kind of organically but oddly through by means of campaigning that something is you know something small should be celebrated over something big and that's not always the case in my opinion. What's next? Austin asks, over the years, how many movies have held the title of Sean's favorite movie? And what is the current title holder? I mean, I always say The Third Man, the Carol Reed espionage film. I think I say that not just because I love it, but because it makes it easy to deal with this question which is a weird question when especially as i get deeper and deeper into the world of

podcasting and talking about movies all day every day people the first thing they ask is like what's your favorite movie i feel like i'm on a first date like every every time i meet somebody who wants to talk about movies and so i always say the third man there have been other movies that I have probably loved more than the third man I mean for my 40th birthday Bobby we rented out a movie theater at the Alamo Drafthouse and me and my closest friends watched Pulp Fiction together on the big screen and when I introduced the movie to the folks at the party, I said, this is my favorite movie, and the movie that changed how I think about movies. And that is and was true, and will be true again.

And when I watched it, I just took my breath away. I was like, this is just absolutely amazing. Samuel L. Jackson is scintillating in this movie, and it is so exciting, and brutal and so weird and so inappropriate and fascinating. And so it can change every day. I mean, there are a handful of other movies that I've cited many, many times in the show. The Wizard of Oz, Singing in the Rain. We talked about The Thing just a few weeks ago on the show and how much I've always loved that movie. Just talked about Halloween too, another movie that is on my list.

I've talked about Juice many times. That's a movie that really flipped a switch for me. Do the right thing. There's like a handful of movies that probably like a 10 or 15 movie list that is kind of always circulating in my head. It's been interesting rewatching the Kubrick movies and thinking about which ones work better and which ones don't work as well on me now. And that's changing too. I'm in more of a Barry Lyndon phase than I am a Clockwork Orange phase. When you're 17, you're like, oh, Clockwork Orange, this is so transgressive and brutal and fearless in the way that it's made. and then you get older and i don't really have a taste for the ultra violence you know what i mean like i'm not really

as interested in that i'm much more interested in films that are slower and more methodical and more beautiful and thinking about how they were made and why they were made certain ways less showy sometimes um so it's hard because the favorite movie of all time thing is it's a faint it's fake like it doesn't mean anything what does it mean to because the favorite movie of all time thing is it's a faint, it's fake. Like it doesn't mean anything. What does it mean to be the favorite? Like, I don't in, in what, in the universal, like leaderboard of movie watching life. That's not a thing.

As much as I love spreadsheets, there is no totalizing feeling of favorite for me. I think that answered the question though, because how many movies have held the title of your favorite movie implies that that title can pretty easily go back and forth it's not like a you win it one year and then you have to win it the next year it's it's it's it's fluid it is it is without a doubt fluid um shall we do one more jacob asks if you could put pete alonzoets star slugger first baseman for people listening to this movie podcast who don't know anything about the Mets if you could put Pete Alonzo

in one film not about baseball what film would it be um the Batman because he's not the hero we need he's the hero we deserve is there too much like Matt Harvey resonance with that because he's not the hero we need. He's the hero we deserve. Is there too much like Matt Harvey resonance with that though?

But Matt Harvey was never the dark night. That was a lie. He was a false prophet. He was magnificent for 18 months and then he was not Pete. We've now, we now have four years with Pete where it's like Pete is, this is really happening. He is a true blue slugger and the Mets have never had someone like this that they developed I mean they had Darryl Strawberry

I guess but obviously Straw you know had a lot of struggles and he never really had the career that he wanted we've never really as fans right i mean am i crazy i mean david wright obviously was a tremendous hitter yeah you know there were a handful of other guys over the years who were tremendous hitters and we had delgado and and beltron and oh six and we've had great players but like a guy who was drafted by the team developed by the team and then turned out to be a 50 home run hitter for the New York Mets. The list is one name. It's one guy.

Yeah. It's this guy. It's this big galoot from Florida who could be a moron. I have no idea. I'm not even really thinking about it. And just like he's just

tremendous at crushing baseballs. I love it. And he can start any movie he wants. Turning red? Put him in it. Jackass forever?

Yes. Absolutely. Top Gun Maverick? Absolutelyverick absolutely polar bear right on his call sign I don't think he could fit in the cockpit it's a good point he's such a beefy boy platoon yeah you want to be in a foxhole with Pete for

sure I love him he's great can't believe people are still listening to this pod where we talk about Pete Alonzo crazy times anyhow thanks Bob thanks for all these great questions everybody thanks for sticking with us on the big picture if we've reached our apex I apologize I'll continue to try to make good shows I know Bobby will too thanks for his work on this episode

later this week like I said Van Lathan will be here and we're going to review the film Bullet Train. We'll see you then. Train's a bullet.