The Big Picture - The 2018 Movie Draft

Episode Date: February 24, 2022

We are drafting again! Sean and Amanda are joined by Chris Ryan to pick their faves and foil their pals in another hotly contested draft of a memorable year in recent movie history: 2018. Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Guest: Chris Ryan Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Yo, I'm Evan Mack with the Mack Mania podcast with my two fellas. I'm Brooklyn Zone's Love My Voice. And I'm the Hall of Farmer, Jack Farmer. Follow and listen on Spotify and catch us on the Spotify Greenroom after major wrestling events. I'm Sean Fennessey. I'm Amanda Dobbins. And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about the year 2018. We're drafting again. It's the movie draft, 2018 edition.

CR is here. Hello, Christopher. Oh, whoa, whoa! Chris, how are you? You okay? You hanging in there? Yeah, man. I'm doing okay. How are you guys? Living the dream, brother. Just living the dream every day. Amanda, how are you? You okay hanging in there? Yeah man I'm doing okay how are you guys? Uh living the dream brother just living the dream every day. Amanda how are you? I'm fine. Amanda this is a pre-recorded podcast so who the hell knows where you are at this point. I don't know where I'm right now. I'll tell you where I am right now in space to future me. I'm just so uncomfortable. I just can't believe that like this is going on for this long. My back hurts so much.

So everything that is going to happen in this draft, keep in mind that I'm really cranky because my back hurts. You've just given me the incredible opportunity to share my first ever dad joke. Because when I was a kid and I would say to my dad, my dad, my back hurts. He'd say, well, your front is killing me. That's pretty good also you having back pain as a child is a very incredibly you experience you being like an umpire for literally games yeah i'm like not trying to be mean but well uh yes i've had back pain for several decades now i don't feel good about it remember when you uh when you realized that you had debilitating back pain because you'd been sitting on your money clip

in your back pocket for like nine months? That was a really, really bad beat. Should I tell the story of my, the originating story of my back pain? You were there. You were there. Of course I was there, yeah. It wasn't quite 2018.

I want to say it was 2016 when this took place. So we're going a little bit further back than our draft year. But we were staying at the Madonna Inn. We were on a trip to Big Sur. We were headed back. In between Los Angeles and Big Sur. It's pretty much right in between.

Which is a very kitschy hotel. What a kooky spot. Yeah. It is. Each room is themed. You may have seen it in some of your favorite television shows and films over the years. And for whatever godforsaken reason, after a long night of drinking and dining with you and your lovely wife, Phoebe, and my wife, Eileen, I woke up at six o'clock in the years. And for whatever godforsaken reason, after a long night of drinking and dining with you and your lovely wife,

Phoebe, and my wife, Eileen, I woke up at 6 o'clock in the morning and nobody else was awake. I'm not usually an early riser. I was like, you know what? This is great. 6 o'clock in the morning,

I'm going to head out to the gym at the Madonna Inn, which I'm sure is a top-flight gym. And I'm going to get a run in. I'm going to get a run in. Get on the treadmill about 6 10

you know getting a good pace going i'm moving along walk jog start the run as soon as i start the run lightning bolt down my back it was as though thor struck me with mjolnir and i fell and i fell off of the treadmill. Like you face planted and rolled down the treadmill. It was sort of a side fall. Okay. But I was just like, I can't be on this machine anymore because I may die. And I rolled over onto a mat

and I laid on my back stricken for about 45 minutes waiting for someone to discover me because I could not move. And who did discover you? I eventually dragged my carcass back to the room. And then Chris can attest because he saw me shortly thereafter because he drove us home. Yeah. And the way that I had to gingerly be put into and removed from the car from my Camry.

It was like, I was like Harvey Keitel in Reservoir Dogs and Sean was Tim Roth and all the way back to Los Angeles I was like you're gonna be okay you're gonna be okay say it with me say it with me also the image of you allowing Chris to drive and he lets me drive he used to let me drive I can't drive his car he won't ever let me okay I would always be like oh you want me to drive and you always be like, oh, you want me to drive? And you'd just be like, I'll fucking chop your hands off. You look at my Audi once. So Chris did ably drive me home, which I appreciated. And much like Tim Roth, I bled out that day.

My back died that day and it has never recovered. And I've been in a lot of pain ever since. But nevertheless, I'm hoping- Can I just ask, was this the same weekend as the Edible Spanglish experience? No, that was Paso Robles. Okay. That's a whole other podcast. You can understand my confusion.

Yeah. That's just a whole other podcast. That's where me and my wife reenacted the end of Annihilation. Just a beautiful little glimpse into what goes on between the podcasts here on this episode. Amanda, who were you in 2018? Tell me about yourself. I was just a professional woman trying to see the wife.

That's all I was doing, was trying to see the wife. And I spent most of this year... Can you believe that this was the year of the wife? That feels so far ago, but also so recent. We were podcasting. We saw a lot of movies.

That was pretty much it. Yeah, I was reluctant to do this year because it is so recent. And then I thought, it's actually four years ago, which is chilling, frankly, that this is four years ago and our lives are soldiering on.

Ciara, I was spending a lot of time with you at this time, but who were you? How did you conceive of yourself in 2018? Yeah, I mean, if you ever walked up and down Hollywood Boulevard at this time but who who were you who how did you conceive of yourself in 2018 yeah i mean like if you uh ever walked up and down hollywood boulevard around this time i was the guy dressed as deadpool uh giving people directions um i was working with you i was i mean we were doing all of the same stuff we were doing i don't know if i had as big a role not i

have a big role but i don't know if i was on the big picture as frequently as I was now and back in 2018. Was I? No, not as much. Not as much. You were in our hearts though. For sure. And the thing is, is that I do remember the act of going to the movies, obviously is a big part, but the movies that happened this year, the movies that we really cared about this year, wound up being these really cool, big events. I just really do remember the screening that I was at or the theater that I was at or the showing that I was at for a lot of these movies.

And then there's a few here, which I'm sure we'll talk about, which have really risen in my estimation, especially getting ready for this pod, where I was like, damn, we did not know how good we had it yeah amanda what do you when you look at the year in movies of 2018 what do you what jumps out at you the depth of the the chart i guess is that the correct way to describe a chart a football chart sports i don't know i've been watching a

lot of sports um i like chris have like a very long list of movies both that I enjoyed at the time and I remember having you know the screening the room the experience but also movies that I've since like discovered or reconsidered and um that we maybe didn't even talk about as much in 2018 and we're like oh we were like let down by yeah um it was it was a good year. And I think also sort of the eventual Oscars conversation around this year perhaps dampened our enthusiasm for what was otherwise a great time at the movies. Yeah, this was a very noisy awards season for us, Amanda. And so I had the same exact reaction, which is that I was thinking actually too much about January and February of 2019, as opposed to this bounty of really cool stuff and a nice balance, I think, of that mainstream comic bookie franchise stuff with, you know like the blending of high caliber auteurs working in

you know low class popular art spaces and sometimes we bemoan that about what's happened to the industry but you know compared to 2021 i'm feeling pretty damn good about 2018 right now yeah there are also i realized a few movies on this list that were critically acclaimed or we talked a lot about and and I have just like pretty violent, negative feelings about, which is sort of fun. I don't really, I mean, you know, screw red notice and free guy and whatever, and all of that stuff. But when we could actually argue about movies with some sort of substance or merit and that people really loved or kind of that got a rise out of people like me that was that was fun i missed that

i don't really get to get angry as much the funniest thing going back through this list and actually just remembering this year is uh there's this brief window this brief moment of uh kind of like wild experimentation that was happening with how movies were being released or distributed, which I thought would be kind of fun to talk about because this is when Amanda comes in and sings the AT&T

as a telephone company song. But this was this like brief pre everybody's got a streaming service moment where it was like, what if we put a movie up after the Super Bowl? What if this movie was Choose Your Own Adventure? What if you made your movie on an iPhone? It was kind of an exciting little quick

moment before it was like, the thing that's important is my fucking shareholders. Yeah, you're totally right. This was well before Clifford the Big Red Dog will be appearing on Paramount Plus on August 10th and you will like it, you clown. And please subscribe. It felt novel something felt different and we we assumed that we would see movies big and small in theaters and if we didn't it was a treat and now it's sort of the opposite it feels like we have fewer and fewer movies to go check out in theaters and i mean you can just tell by looking at the box office from this year. You know, this is an Avengers year.

It was, of course, the year of Black Panther. It was Incredibles and Aquaman, Deadpool 2, The Grinch, Mission Impossible, Fallout, Ant-Man and the Wasp, Bohemian Rhapsody. Not necessarily great movies, but movies that there were no mistaking that they were going to be appearing in movie theaters. And, you know, consequently, there were also a lot of movies i'll just name one as a point of conversation it's a pretty good business that for sure would be a streaming movie right now

that movie's widows which was one of the best movies of that year had an incredible killer cast but was also basically a fun genre movie. And I think did like $75 million in business. And that seems impossible right now. Was like 35 movies made more than 100 million bucks this year? That's crazy. But even at the time, we were mad about the reception to Widows because we felt it was certainly overlooked

by all of the awards bodies. And it didn't seem like it had the heat of, I mean, as Chris said, a lot of movies made $200 million at the box office. So 75, like, God, were we ever so young, I guess, that we were mad about 75 million. Yeah, feels crazy. This is also the year that A Star is Born and Venom were released on the same day. One of the greatest days of my life.

So I just want to honor that day. I believe it was October 5th, 2018. I just want to say this day in like 1996 when like Wilco and Ghostface put out a record on the same night and I bought them both at Tower Records. And I was like, Jeff Tweedy and Tony Starks are the two sides of my soul. Well, this is how we memorialize our life. You know, we use popular culture to tell ourself a story. Um, what else? What else jumps out to you about the year? Anything you guys want to say before we start digging into the drafting? Well, this is how we memorialize our life. You know, we use popular culture to tell ourself a story. What else?

What else jumps out to you about the year? Anything you guys want to say before we start digging into the drafting? I really just wanted to mention, just because God knows if we'll ever go back to this, but you and I, I can't remember, Amanda, was this your year or were you the next year where we went to South by Southwest and it was like a really, really, really good- This was your year because you guys saw the first 20 minutes of A Quiet Place. That's right. I think.

And then I went 2019. But yeah, I remember you coming back and being like, but in a nice way. It was very fun. I remember a couple of very memorable screenings. I remember seeing Roma at the New York Film Festival this year

and being like, oh, wow, cinema. This is great stuff. I remember seeing Roma at the New York Film Festival this year. And being like, oh wow. Cinema. This is great stuff. I imagine you coming out like throwing your scarf over your shoulder. Oh yeah. I've completed my memoir that night. I said I need to get my story out in the world. After Cuaron got to tell his.

I guess, let's talk about the Oscars quickly. We always talk about the Oscars before we start drafting. This is a green book here. And that sucked because every other movie that was nominated for Best Picture was at worst interesting. And Green Book, I recall very

vividly at the time seeing it for the first time and liking it and feeling like it was a kind of like a fun, light-hearted, coming-of-age movie. Maybe not putting the critical lens on it that I really needed to, and certainly not knowing anything about the real life story.

And then of course the movie really went into the take cycle and it really got kind of run through in a lot of really aggressive ways. Upon closer examination, the movie didn't work as well for me, but also it just kind of, there's an ickiness surrounding that movie now.

But also I'm trying to figure out if it's like a last gasp of a certain kind of prestigious Hollywood movie. Like could a movie like this ever compete again in this way? I guess we're going to find out during this Oscar season because there are a couple on the board that are a little bit, I guess, more controversial for lack of a better word. But I don't know, Amanda, like looking back on that, having been through the whole award season cycle, what do you remember? I remember more just the length of the award season cycle what do you remember i remember more just the length of

the award season cycle because i had a similar reaction like we went we saw it and i think i was like this is you know like sort of a charming rom-com between friends and we also did say this seems like the kind of thing that academy of voters will like and i don't think that we were like really prepared for uh for anything that happened and certainly the real life story and everything that was revealed after we saw it, but also just like how much Academy voters would like it and how, uh, intense that particular take cycle would come become. And it's the Oscars are always fraud and we're always kind of yelling at each other, but it really seems like this is when the cycle got turned to high. And I don't know if we've gotten back from that.

Do you guys look back on this year with some distance and feel like the films that were still good this year, your Romas, your Black Klansmans, your whatevers, got their proper due in the sort of long tail of history against the Bohemian Rhapsodies and the Green Books that wound up did taking down some awards? It's a good question. I think we're maybe just not yet far away enough to know. And Chris, you hit me up about a movie earlier today that came out this year that I think is going to be significantly critically reappraised over time. There's a handful of those. And then as I look through some of the nominees here, let's look at Best Actor, for example. Rami Malek's incredibly talented. That performance as Freddie Mercury was really not one of my

favorite. And I think it was considered kind of a joke that he won that. And it's also a year that Christian Bale was nominated for Vice. Bradley Cooper, of course, for A Star is Born. Willem Defoe was nominated for At Eternity's Gate.em Dafoe was nominated for At Eternity's Gate did more than like 150 people see At Eternity's Gate I still don't really know how that happened that's one of those movies that like it's like it doesn't exist like it has no it has no reputation really

except for the handful of people who supported Dafoe's work and so it's a funny thing where it's a little bit hard to tell like maybe 10 years from now someone will say At Eternity's Gate is one of the greatest portraits of an artist in the history of film. But I don't really know if enough people have seen it yet for something like that to take place.

Is that him playing Van Gogh? Yeah. That is correct. Yeah. I can't say that I've seen that film. Nor have I. I've seen it. It was on the list of things

that I definitely meant to get to before Oscar night. And then it just, it didn't happen. The Truth of the Matter is the most talked about movie this year, which will inevitably get drafted, but it's Infinity War. Like that movie wound up being, and this whole Marvel thing only grew and grew and grew out of this. And I think that people probably go back. And while there are Marvel movies before Infinity War and Black Panther,

that people were like, that was pretty good. That had some stuff I really liked in it too, or there were fans who were just like, I'll snort this. This was the year where people, I think, were like, this is going to just be the movies now. We need to reckon with the fact that all the movie stars are going to be in these movies. The directors are going to want to make these movies. This is the only thing that people are going to want to put in theaters.

And at its best, it can get pretty good. Yeah. I think, furthermore, this isn't just going to want to make these movies. This is the only thing that people are going to want to put in theaters. And at its best, it can get pretty good. Yeah, I think furthermore, this isn't just going to be movies. It's going to be TV. I mean, I feel like all of these TV shows that you and Andy have been covering and the Ring of Earth has been covering over the last 12 months

are all kind of like responding to everything that started in Infinity War. You know, they're like all this like reflection on this story that they started or ended there, however you want to see it. I don't know. Is that a movie that's going to like

stand the test of time? I wonder that. I think about that sometimes. Like 20 years from now, how will these huge blockbusters be looked at? I just made a reference

to this on another podcast, but like in the 70s, the Tower of Inferno was one of the biggest movies of all time. It was huge. The budget was huge. It even got some Oscar nominations because of the huge cast and they're very credible people in it. You go back

and watch that movie now and you're like, this is a pretty mediocre blockbuster with dated special effects and an okay story. And some things are cool about it, but like it has no critical reputation. No one's like going back and checking it out and being like, actually, this is the true genius of this filmmaking. And it seems very plausible that a lot of these films are looked at that way on the other hand who knows maybe the generation behind us is going to cherish it forever and it will be their star wars i really don't i really it's really hard for me to say that's the one with the scarlet witch and the vision backstory right yeah i think so the infinity war it ends with the blip right i mean i remember that chris

but like you know there's two and a half hours before it i was trying to engage with some you know continuous storytelling or whatever yeah i think it's the i think it's the one where we find out a little bit about this and then because he has to take the stone out and then he dies right and it's sad that's correct see you're a big Viz guy. So as a Viz guy, what was it like watching the stone removed from his head? It was heartbreaking, man. It was really tough. You know, I mean, everybody processes trauma differently. I think I'm still processing mine.

Yeah, I'm still processing falling off that treadmill, honestly. That's my trauma. Shall we draft? Sure. So, you know, we've had a movie auction since this conversation, but our last draft was the holiday movie draft. Who won that? I actually don't remember.

Did I win? You've won the last two. I have. Okay. Yeah. That's exciting. Thank you to all the people who love and adore my drafting style. I'm grateful to all of you.

I'm grateful to the way that you use your fingers on Twitter. Shall we talk about the categories? Sure. Okay, here's what we're going to do. Six categories, six picks each. We do it snake style. This time around, we're drafting a drama, a comedy, an Oscar nominee, an action or horror movie, a blockbuster, and $100 million or more is the threshold there. And a wild card

so pretty broad palette here see are you feeling excited you feeling like you're gonna do some damage here I think that this is a really really strong field I can't

wait to find out what we all wind up with because there's there's not a lot of duds in the draft pool Amanda Mary Poppins returns is on the board still for you which is huge

should we bring Bobby in to help set our draft order yeah Wags you ready yeah I'm ready to go 2018 was the year that I met all of you guys

so you guys started working at the Ringer wow that's nice tell us a little bit about it what happened what were you doing well I spent the first

half of the year in New York and then I got hired at the Ringer and then spent the second half of the year in Los Angeles. So it was a big adjustment period. Got to hang a lot with Chris Ryan

and learn his intricacies. Big handshake guy, I learned very quickly. Can we also just... Dap me up. I haven't dapped anybody up in two years. Just note that he's wearing his second piece of outerwear in this draft. My house is very strange.

It's because it's like... I had this hipster soccer sweatshirt on, but it's, it's because it's like, I had this like hipster soccer sweatshirt on, but it's like, honestly, it's like being inside of a fucking tauntaun. And so,

but then when I took it off, it got a little cold in here. So I threw my jean jacket. So you've always got a layer on hand, which is, yeah, we've got a denim jacket now.

I just want to give people the visual experience. I want to make a short documentary about the last two years in Chris's life called The Dying of the Daps. Yes.

And it's all about how you can no longer make physical contact with men younger than you and show them how cool you are. And I just like stand at my screen door seeing if anybody walking their dog wants a pound and nobody does. Incredible stuff. My memories of 2018 are like a flip book of Chris opening the same door and giving the same dap to the same five people a hundred times. All right. Let's do a draft. All right. Thank you for the tiles, Bobby.

Is that a Mets hat? No, it's a Top Gun hat. Amanda has the first choice in this draft, 2018 movie draft. No, Chris, it's a Top Gun hat. Oh, cool. Come on. Got to keep the spirit of the, Chris, it's a Top Gun hat. Oh, cool. Come on. Gotta keep the spirit of the big picture alive, even if Top Gun 2 may never be birthed.

Yeah, before you pull the next tile, the movement for Let Amanda See Top Gun Maverick has been very strong thus far. I want to encourage all of our listeners. Have you heard anything back from Paramount? Believe it or not, Chris, no one in this house has heard from Paramount. My guy, Backish,

didn't holler back. No, radio silence. But we will not be silenced. And the listeners of this show will not be silenced. Have we brokered an alliance with the CR heads to start hacking their material

and getting a... I don't know if we need We stand at the ready. We stand at the ready. Okay, that's beautiful. And let me also say this. I am doing so much fucking street teamwork

for the Taylor Sheridan universe right now. Paramount owes us. That's true. This is what I'm saying. I just think it's a real winning opportunity for everyone. I watched 1883. You got me? Choosing second overall is Chris Ryan.

Good. I'm third. Amanda, you haven't had first in a while, right? No, I think I have. have but you did but when i have first sometimes is great and sometimes i'm just like drafting on my own you know and so like robin dancing on her own but for drafting that's your remix god that's that was such a amazing time 10 years ago more than 10 years ago at this point. We're incredibly old. But so I think that there are like a lot of shared,

there's like a shared pool of movies that all three of us want in this draft. And then there are a lot of like Chris and Sean favorites. So. You say that every time. Well, I know that's true because that's how Hollywood and also the world works. I'm sorry that you've had everything catered to you

your entire life. Yeah. We thank you, Hollywood. But so when I'm setting off first, it's like, am I going to try to fight for one of your movies, or am I going to fight for one of my movies, or, you know, my strategy's a little different. But I think I know what I'm going to do here.

That was a little bit of vamping, but I think... I don't know whether this is like the obvious pick or really stupid pick but i don't really care in oscar nominee i'm gonna take black panther okay um which forget infinity war which i barely remember what happened i remember black panther i remember being really invigorated by this movie and thinking oh like maybe i like marvel movies after all because they can contain ideas and and can be visually like really stunning it didn't look like garbage like most movies do and even if i have uh some issues with the michael b jordan performance uh you know, that's okay. Otherwise, it was just like an exhilarating time.

And that's another one I remember being there. I saw it opening weekend at the Hollywood Arclight. People were very excited. Like kind of the platonic ideal of those Marvel movies as a place where people like go together and get really excited about something. But it wasn't entirely just beholden to its origins. It also stood alone for me. And then I was nominated for Best Picture, so Black Panther.

I mean, it's hard to argue with that pick. Great pick. Great category for it, too. You said Oscar? Or you said Blockbuster? I said Oscar. Amanda, we have not talked at all about the complex and controversial production of Black Panther 2, which is supposed to come out this year. I mean, I'm trying to stay away about the complex and controversial production of Black Panther 2.

Which is supposed to come out this year. I mean, I'm trying to stay away from the 5G stuff. You know, just a hard pass for me. Seems tough. What do you think, Chris? Do you want to weigh in on all those controversies? No? Sidestep that one?

You have some thoughts. Just text them to me and I'll read them on the next episode, okay? Okay. Next time you guys do like a caller episode sure yeah where i can maybe call in from atlanta just be like hey brother just uh i wanted to uh weigh in uh okay chris you're up you have number two uh i'm gonna pick the movie that i had the most fun watching in 2018 and that was Mission Impossible Fallout. Damn it. Good one. Let's just fucking fight in some bathrooms.

This is just an amazing Mission Impossible movie. What an incredible shout out to the Cinerama Tome experience of just getting your wig pushed back by Tom Cruise and Henry Cavill fighting. This was the Macquarie Mission Impossibles

have kind of found a new gear for these movies. But I thought even this, by those standards, was just like a cut above. And I think I saw it at least twice in the theaters. I may have seen it three times that year, like once it finally came out on streaming or whatever. But God damn it. Mission Impossible Fall. We've talked about it endlessly. But this is just an awesome, awesome blockbuster.

So I'll go there. Amanda, do you remember how we saw this? Yeah, this was our birthday movie chris saw it with us we saw it in the arc light it was delightful we got beers and everything and then i i had to go to the bathroom so badly but i was like no i can't miss a minute of these two people fighting on a cliff with a helicopter and then we've got sushi afterwards for dinner it was awesome the one thing i will say about these movies and especially fallout is if you read the synopsis you're like sir excuse me there's like 18 different like side plots about plutonium and then going to like a refugee camp in kandahar or whatever. And you're, you forget when you're watching the movie because the, like the stunts are so incredible and the set pieces are so incredible,

but there's some like absolute nonsense in these movies, but I love it still. One of the more underrated aspects of this movie is Sean Harris's return as Solomon Lane. Yeah. The like terrorizing Ethan Hunt's dreams. Just wonderful movie. Okay. So I movie. Okay.

So I have two picks. Hang on. Chris didn't select a category for that one. Blockbuster. Blockbuster. Okay. I feel like I'm in a great spot. Okay.

I just don't know what categories to put these things into. Because they can actually go in one or the other. I can flip flop them. Well, that's fantastic, Sean. We admire your flexibility. I wonder how weird you're going to get if you're going to get weird early. I'm not going to get weird early.

There's two very obvious things. These are two of my favorite movies of the year, two of my favorite movies of the decade. I'm going to go Oscar nominee for A Star is Born. Damn. Which, of course, is the directorial debut of Bradley Cooper.

Are we getting Coops' sophomore shot this year? Maestro, right? The Maestro? Theoretically at the end of this year. Amanda, you're going to say something? No, I want to hear your second pick. No, I want to hear your second pick. Why? Because what do you think is going to happen here?

Well, I'm just up to say something. No, I want to hear your second pick. Why? Because what do you think is going to happen here? Well, I'm just, I'm trying to decide how rude I want to be to you. Amanda, you could have taken A Star is Born with the first overall pick. I understand. You are the author of your own fate. I just think you're already sort of abandoning your principles. And the things that you love most. His principles are only just that he wants to win every time. Yeah. Me and DJ Khaled have the same philosophy.

Right. But then I have to sit through months and months of you talking about how important movie X that you're not about to draft is to you. And I just, I think it's kind of lame. I think that if you're going to pick a spot, you should stand with the spot, but go ahead, pick your other movie. I think you've just overplayed your hand here, as usual, Amanda. That's all I'm going to say. My second pick is Spider-Man Into the Spider-Verse. Yeah.

Under Blockbuster, which is, of course, one of the masterpieces of not just the decade, but the century. We didn't have an animated category here, but didn't have to worry about that because this movie was a huge hit. And I'm curious to see if it tilted the axis long term in terms of what we're looking for in animated movies come award season or come viewers because it raised the bar um artistically creatively who the heroes of that story were love that movie getting a sequel to that movie later this year lots to live up to part what how do you guys feel about the part one of a sequel

where they're like this is how you feel about it yeah how do i feel about it you fucking hate part ones i do hate part ones give me dune other than the hobbit you liked that you liked the hobbit that's not true that's not true was there a hobbit movie this year chris no man because we didn't spend christmas holding hands in glendale watching a hobbit movie like we used to i I miss those days so much. Okay, so I got two. So, Ciara, you're up again. Damn it. So, boy, there's a lot of head and heart

going on right now. Well, I'm just going to take Infinity War. Wowzers. Okay. And I'm going to put it, actually, is it nominations or does it have to have won?

Nominee. I'm going to put it in Oscars. Okay does it have to have won nominee i'm gonna put it in oscars okay okay because it was nominated for visual effects eligible yeah so i really did love this movie i mean it was it was an awesome like marvel movie i just i feel i have like some i'm trying to figure out what category to put it in um how often do you go back to the audience reaction video when thor arrives in wakanda and he says bring me thanos like do you go back to the audience reaction video when thor arrives in wakanda and he says bring me thanos like do you watch that like once a week is that the one that everybody has now sort of started memeing in like other videos like movies and stuff into it because

somebody made one for tom sizemore saying the action is the juice i think the one people have been using lately is um the most recent spider-Man movie okay you know where people are just hooting and hollering at the screen Amanda did you hoot or holler at any of Infinity War was there any part of it that spoke to you like I said like I said the only thing I remember is that the witch liked

the robot and they had a nice little domestic adventure and then they had to take the yellow stone out of his head yeah CR needs the yellow stonestone out of his head. Much like CR needs the Yellowstone taken out of his head. That seemed pretty sad. Even though please don't answer this

question, but it seems like if he's a robot perhaps we could have figured out some alternative technologies in order to keep my guy running and in a nice domestic relationship with do scarlet witch what about what wanda vision is but she's still but so he's around but she's still grieving they stay downloading vision from the cloud okay yeah he's in dropbox all right then i've kind of feel like i was oversold on the drama of that moment where there's no right answer then it either frustrates you from a customer service

perspective were you emotionally affected by spider-man turning into ashes while saying to iron man mr stark i don't feel so good me oh you mean that's like the snap you know the snap was pretty cheap because you knew that all of the people i'm, but half the people who disappeared had movies already announced for two years from now. So no shit. They're still going to be alive. I know how to read a release. Detective Dobbins.

Sometimes you're just kind of an asshole. You're so like, you really are just like in like a dime store detective novel. Sorry. There's nothing new under the sun. That was very clear in the theater. All right, Mickey Spillane,

let's just settle down. This is what you get when you tweet this. Can I just say, I don't love my pick. I think it's important sometimes, like everybody, we always have like all this confidence in ourselves. Like it's all right to just be like, I felt boxed in here. This is good though. I think this is a new persona for you, Chrissy Popcorn.

I feel like this is a good way, a good angle for you long-term. There's plenty of movies left. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Okay, so Amanda, you got two picks. Okay. So in drama, I am actually going to go with Roma, which was another just extremely memorable screening experience for me. Though I did not see it at the New York Film Festival. I just saw it with two other people in a screening room at Netflix, but was just rocked.

Chris, do you remember me like kind of wandering into your office in a daze and being like, wow, the power of cinema. I was just completely moved by it. It's obviously so beautiful and parts of it are so harrowing. I was emotionally engaged. I don't know. I just that that's a very good movie that I think we kind of like make jokes about now because it lost a green book and because everybody's trying to make their Roma now but and now Cuaron is making an Apple show yeah right so here we are now we live in hell but I thought

Roma was beautiful and special so funny I was literally gonna say now we live in hell Amanda that's that's brutal that Cuaron is making a tv show i mean maybe it's got kevin klein and kate blanchett it's not like it's gonna be like fucking csi you know traverse city it's gonna be pretty good okay roma's very good it's gonna be weird when when belfast wins best picture and roma only nabbed best director but it it did. Cora did get best director. That's true. Okay, so that's in drama. And then I'm gonna go with my heart here in comedy and take Game Night,

which was the funniest movie of this year, I feel. God damn it, Amanda. I mean, I know. I know that we all love it and we're all sort of agreed like, wow, we really should have appreciated Game Night and that tiny little dog who also shows up in widows and jesse plemons like being the king that he is this is a sort of where i feel like the real jesse plemons momentum we all knew but now we're like living in the in

the fruits of that moment um this was also the peak of me i'm thinking maybe Jason Bateman was Orson Welles for me. But it's just also like, again, we didn't know that we would literally never have a studio comedy or frankly, just a comedy with jokes that would be funny again. There are a couple other this year that I don't want to be too rude to, but I think this is like the last great one. And I still enjoy those types of movies in this movie good stuff um funniest moment in this movie is when someone is about to attack rachel mcadams when she's standing next to an airplane and the guy gets sucked into a turbine and she just goes oh no he died incredible scene rachel yeah it's so funny in this movie uh it's a great pick uh this is comedies died they died but game night lives lives on yeah um okay so you got two so cr you're up and you can't get game night now okay i guess for my for my action horror i'm gonna go with a movie

that i did not appreciate when it first came out, possibly because I was too big of a fan of the book. And I think also my expectations were too high, but I'm going to go with Annihilation for horror. Thought you were about to say Red Sparrow. No. The spy who fucks. No, I'm going to go with Annihilation.

One of the best third acts, I think, that's been in a theatrical movie in the last 10 years or so. It's just so mind-blowing that they let Alex Garland go full 2001 at the end of this movie. And I think there are parts of it that I... I think when I first saw it, I was just like, that's not what this book is like. That's not what the book is like. And then once you kind of watch it again with a little bit of distance from both the original release and the... I think I was like, when I first saw it, I was just like, that's not what this book is like. That's not what the book is like. And then once you kind of watch it again with a little bit of distance from both the original release and the, and the novel itself,

uh, Jeffrey Vandermeer's novel, you just kind of like, Oh, take, taking on it, taking on its own terms. This is just an extraordinary movie and,

and quite stunning to look at. I don't know if I had a place for this on my roster, but it is one of my favorite movies of that year. And this is what I'm saying. Why don't know if I had a place for this on my roster, but it is one of my favorite movies of that year. This is what I'm saying. Why don't you have some conviction? What are you talking about? I just drafted Spider-Verse. It's one of my favorite movies of the year,

but I didn't have a place for it. I'm really coming under attack here for no reason. I literally have only picked two movies. I have no idea what you're saying. I know, but you're just pissing me off. I picked Infinity War and was like, I'm a piece of shit. She's yelling at you.

No, it's a great pick, Chris. Alex Garland, he made a TV show after this movie, but he's back to movies. Are you excited for Men? I am. I'm not excited for anything Alex Garland does. I also, yeah. I mean, I think he's got a lot of stuff in the hopper.

Because he was supposed to do some more stuff out of devs that was essentially using the devs cast as a rep theater but doing different stories. What happened to that? I don't know. I'm sure.

Honestly, it does seem like you can just get a lot of stuff made right now. So I'm hoping Alex Garland can do whatever he wants. What are you getting made? What's in the hopper for you? 1884.

What aren't we talking about that happens next year? You know? When in the history of our friendship have I ever put a ball in the tee like that and you not smashed it 440 feet? Honestly, it's your superpower. It's unbelievable. Okay. I got two picks done vamping by complimenting Chris and fighting Amanda.

Comedy. Tough one. I'm going with the favorite, which is one of the best movies of the year. Definitely a comedy, right? You guys agree? No, I completely agree. I had it as a backup in comedy. Yeah.

You know, there's only a handful of really good comedies in this year, and Amanda's already gotten one. So I figure I have to go comedy early here. Of course, this is the movie that Emma Stone won Best Actress for her performance in. Olivia Colman. Features a revelatory Olivia Colman performance. Directed by Yorgos Lanthimos.

Written by Deborah Davis and Tony McNamara, who are now writing on The Great, which is a really good TV show on Hulu. Do you guys watch The Great? I do. I'm like halfway through the second season. I need to start it. I'm saving it for when I have less movies to watch. That and Mayor of Kingstown? Yeah.

I didn't listen to your spoiler podcast, just so you know. You certainly should not. I'm very excited for your child's first TV show to be Mayor of Kingstown. Thank you. But yeah, The Favorite is great. Here's a weird thing the favorite

made 96 million dollars worldwide which a lot of that is from my mom we haven't even really talked about what the movie it doesn't matter we need to talk about these movies are I've often thought about this like is the purpose of these conversations to celebrate films and

help people discover things and give context around them or for just a fight with each other? Like, what do you, should we be going more in depth into the films themselves? I often have, I feel a little bit like, a little bit behind the eight ball

when I'm like, what am I supposed to say about Mission Impossible Fallout that I haven't mentioned before? That would be, and maybe it's like, oh, here's why I'm picking this over everything else.

But there is a little bit of suspense embedded in draft. So I don't like to say a lot of the names of movies in case somebody else picks them and wants to have the second of being like, oh, yeah, game night. So I don't know. I like do people need us to like talk about why the favorite is good. The favorites also like a very hard one to be like. Now I'm going to give like a capsule summary of what happens in the favorite because it's all just like you know pretty screwed up comedy and people going at each other and I think the fact that we all agree that this is a comedy when it's ultimately like a very sad story

is is correct but also messed up so if you want want to try to explain the varying layers of what's going on with Olivia Colman's Queen Anne and Rachel Weisz's... She's the Duchess of Marlborough. Is that correct? Yeah. Yeah. I pulled that off the top of my head. So you guys got to be impressed. You know who disappeared in the snap.

And I know all the titles of the people in the favorite. Did I misidentify? Did Emma Stone not win for this? or did they both win and olivia coleman beat glenn close for this that's right gosh like shocker because we spent the whole year making the wife jokes and then it was olivia coleman i'm so confused yeah is olivia coleman the lead of this film she was for for the purposes of the Oscars. But in your opinion, do you think she was the lead? She's the supporting character, I feel like.

Well, I mean, she has scenes with Rachel Weisz. She has scenes with Emma Stone. And it is almost like Rachel Weisz is in one half. And then Emma Stone's character is ascended and gets replaced. And the person who's standing there in the middle is Olivia Goldman. I mean, it's one of those category on the line things, but I'm the only person in the world who doesn't

care about category fraud. Okay. I care. I'll be bringing it to Congress and I'm going to have a bill written to ban all category fraud. Next time the Carlisle group meets, you'll be like, you guys. It's actually the Bilderberg group

that I'll be taking this to. This will not stand. Yeah. Okay. So I have another pick. I'm going with drama. I'm going with one of my favorite movies of this year.

First Man. They should all be one of your favorite movies of this year. There's only six of them. What's going on here, you guys? You guys are trying to get under my skin? I'm feeling good. I'm choosing from the heart here.

I'm choosing only movies that I really like that year. First Man is at least somewhat from the heart. You and me, the Predator shaking hands meme, Ryan Gosling going into space. That's what's happening right now. This movie is incredible. It fucks. And I undersold it like a motherfucker this year.

And I apologize to Damien Chazelle. I apologize to Neil Armstrong. I apologize to NASA. Let me tell you my story behind it. Amanda can attest to this because she was present for a lot of these conversations. So I saw this movie at a screening in IMAX in Burbank. And there were like three people in the theater. This was the ideal condition to see this movie at a screening in IMAX in Burbank, and there were like three people in the theater.

This was the ideal condition to see this movie. And this movie is majestic and beautiful and has extraordinary sound design. Incredible score looks unbelievable. It's clearly a movie that was inside of Damien Chazelle's head for 15 years. And the movie ended and I walked out and I like that was okay. I think I said that to him. I think I remember you were like, that was okay. I think I said that to him. I remember you were like, eh.

I know this story. I get it. I see what he's trying to do here. He walked on the moon. It's all good. One step for man. And then, I love Whiplash as you guys know.

I'm kind of mixed on La La Land, but I really liked what he was going for there. Then Bill hit me up and he was like, hey, I'm going to to interview damien chazelle do you want to interview him with me and i was like i love damien chazelle's movies and i was like do i love them actually and then i went back and re-watched all of them and then i ended it with first man and the second time i watched it at home on my tv i was like this is one of the great films this is truly an amazing movie and it looked like shit compared to the way I saw it the first time. But for whatever reason, I was able to better click into what he was trying to show about, you know,

this sort of like isolation and desolation that the, the Gosling character is going through. And basically like what those men who went through that we're going through. And it was, it's done in a very different way than like, say one of your favorite movies, Amanda Apollo 13, which is like actually about like camaraderie and heroism and this is something that was like a little bit more distant than that it's also done differently than the right stuff which has like a kind of comic undertone and some satire to it and

kind of over it definitely is like the guys like chuck yeager were the real heroes you know and these dudes were just strapped to tin cans. But these were the pilots. I think that First Man when you watch it and maybe this is the Apollo 13 part of it is like you're waiting for some sort of emotional catharsis and neither the movie nor Gosling ever gives it to you.

Gosling is just like this is a dude who was not capable of expressing himself emotionally and Chazelle doesn't give us the fucking you know the mission control going yeah which is what you need you know you want that in every space movie instead you get that like completely amazing and devastating like quarantine scene at the end with gosling and claire foy and this like this is an incredible if really depressing portrait of a marriage and typically the you know the wife character in these types of movies is like the maryland level apollo 13 i just

like want my husband to come home and i'm obviously a claire foy stan but also what she's doing and the way it's written of this person who's like why why can't you open up like why are you doing this why are you being such a monster or putting this ahead of all the rest of us it's tough but it's really good it seems really i don't know if this necessarily matters it seems very true you know this sort of like the way that he is like retracted inside of himself to accomplish this and the way that he's unable to connect to other people and the way that you know as as you understand is you if you read about neil armstrong the way that like he never really connected to other people. And the way that, as you understand, if you read about Neil Armstrong, the way that he never really connected with other people as he went on in his life,

even though he's widely considered an American hero, he was not Buzz Aldrin. He was not trying to run for the governor of his state. He was not trying to be a celebrity. Buzz Aldrin's a different story. Maybe Chris Ryan should develop the Buzz Aldrin biopic and star in it. I would really enjoy that.

Could be a good one. You think I have Buzz energy? I think I like it for you. Buzz Lightyear, I would say. I thought I always had a little bit more Deke Slayton going. Oh yeah, sure. We both like outerwear. Okay, so those

are my two picks, which means we're going back to Chris. Okay, so I have to get drama wild card and comedy done here um for drama i'm gonna go with a movie that we mentioned earlier which is uh widows um this was another movie that when i saw it i was like huh okay but in retrospect after seeing it a couple of times since, and I think re-watching it during the awards season rerun of that point, I was like, boy, oh boy, was this a good fucking movie. And it's basically like, we don't deserve Steve McQueen making a crime movie set in Chicago, but we got it. And what a cast. Very good Colin Farrell villain in this movie and I just thought it was excellent that opening sequence is so good in this film and I would

just I would love to go back to the days where Steve McQueen was like you know what I'm going to give you like I really taught thriller with Viola Davis like raining threes on people I wonder if the this movie has a lot in common with first man i think in that they were both considered slight disappointments from hugely celebrated oscar

anointed filmmakers and they were both considered bids for a kind of you know like mainstream old school commercialism you know a true life dramatic biography of a great man and a real kind of intense crime thriller that serves as an allegory for the problems of american cities and both of them the reception you're right amanda before but when you were talking about this was like kind of muted i think even though you and i were like holy fucking shit these movies yeah we saw that like we were in the same theater, but not sitting together. Oh, yeah, that's right. Yeah, and texting each other,

just being like, holy shit, that's a movie at the end of it. That's right. Gillian Flynn wrote the script for this, right? She did. I believe so, yeah. What a world. So no one's picked a bad movie yet.

Amanda, you gonna break the street? I mean, you don't... I guess I deserve that, but no, Sean, I'm not. So in action horror, this is sort of a surprise for me. I was going to take widows, but it's now off the board, but still on the board is a quiet place. So I'm going to take a quiet place.

You know what? That's a very good movie. Yeah. I didn't revisit it because I am supposed to go into labor at some point in the next four to six weeks. And, you know, when is the hereditary screening gonna leave that reference for another time but i remember it being very effective when i did see it and like like lean and engaging and terrifying but in a way that i am anna dobbins can

handle and also like obviously like a huge success and starts a whole career for John Krasinski as a director and I think Emily Blunt is one of our most underrated and underappreciated actors working so a quiet place that's action

horror I chose a horror movie look at me I will say this it was it was not 20 minutes of this movie it's on South by was the whole movie oh it was and it played like a like a house on I will say this. It was not 20 minutes of this movie at South By. It was the whole movie. Oh, it was. And it played like a house on fire.

It was like, people were like, wow, that was great. Nothing will distort your concept of how good a movie is going to do, like seeing it at South By, because people will like, I mean, we saw a long shot at South By, and you'd think Prince was doing a three-hour concert on stage like it was just like people were like rolling around in the aisles and then that movie only ate like 30 million bucks yeah I still liked it um okay so I'm gonna do something interesting here I'm gonna go with wild card and I didn't expect to do this but it's a film that i know all of us have real

affection for so i'm gonna go early and do wildlife which is uh paul dano samantha i know sean looks really mad at me um i i again another actor who i think is just like primarily underused and under celebrated is carrie mulligan and this is like the Carrie Mulligan performance of a lifetime. And it stays with me. I think about it. Another one where I'm on the precipice of some things. And thinking about it some more. But this was just like a completely beautiful and lodges in your head film that we all liked at the time,

but I guess it just kind of went under the radar. I don't know. It just wasn't noisy, but it is fantastic. And if you haven't seen it, I recommend it. So Wildlife and Wildcard. The first interview I did when this show was spun off onto its own feed was a conversation with Paul Dano. He's of course one of my favorite actors. Soon to be the Riddler.

Sure. Which is a little different from Wildlife, I would say. And of course is based on Richard Ford book, one of my favorite authors. Not necessarily one of my favorite Richard Ford books. It's actually quite different than I think the books he's best known for.

Baskin books. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But this is an amazing movie and it's still a little undiscovered. It is in the Criterion collection now, which I thought was cool that it was added so early. This is an awesome pick, Amanda. I think this was in definitely my top 10 at the end of the year when I did the pilot.

Yeah. We all were just like, we saw it kind of independently but then found each other and we're like, wow, wildlife. Yeah, it's really brilliant. This is the movie that Carey Mulligan should have gotten the recognition that she ended up getting for Promising Young Woman. That scene with her in the

diner with her son is crazy good. Oh my god, yeah. She's drinking the beer. Yeah, exactly. Okay, Chris, you're up, right? Yeah uh for comedy i'm gonna go death of stalin oh so uh good good pick this was uh this was in my top 10 that year i think it was very high i watched this movie like three or four times since 2018 it's um you know like this was really like a moment where you can just see iannucci's kind of like umbrella really is it is it fully open because you've got veep on you've got the favorite you've got i think succession was first season was 18 is that right i think so because we had

two years off between season three so jesse armstrong is is from the Iannucci school, but Iannucci's movies, I think, have been beloved by hardcore fans, but maybe haven't broken through. So this, In the Loop, which was the movie extension of The Thick of It, and then Copperfield

that came out last year, right? That was him. But man, Death of Stalin, once you get past the sort of conceit that it is all of the best british actors in the world pretending to be the russians in the moment of the revolution it is the fucking funniest and honestly one of the darkest movies i have ever seen it like even for unity it's like really safety off like which the last like 20 minutes you're just like oh yeah like humanity is hell so amanda when we had a conversation about don't look up you asked me off top what's the last great satire and i think all i could come up with was idiocracy but it's actually

death of stalin this is one of the few movies and it does exactly what satire needs to do which is it tells a compelling story, in this case, a historical story. But, I mean, it is just so clearly about what has been happening with autocracy in the last 10 years around the world. And, you know, Iannucci is as good at kind of rendering a story like that as anybody.

And for people who don't know what this movie is about, it's essentially, like, as the revolution, it's not even, as Stalin dies, it's all of the hangers-on in the various Politburo cabinet-level positions, jockeying for power

and avoiding blame. It's just this amazing portrait. It's worth mentioning that that movie came out when there were these 45 anonymous sources tell-alls about things that were happening in the Trump White House that were not too far off.

I mean, not as much murder, but just in terms of backbiting and fucking one another over, it felt like it was drawn very much from the moment that we were living in. Amazing pick. Amazing pick. Okay, so I'm up?

Yeah. Damn, this year was fucking awesome. It was in. Amazing pick. Amazing pick. Okay, so I'm up? Yeah. Yeah. Damn, this year was fucking awesome. It was good. All these movies are good. Okay, so my remaining categories right now are wild card and action horror. I'll tell you the truth.

You know, I put together a little document before we pick, and I have like all of my possibilities for each category. I'm sure you guys do some version of the same thing I've only got one movie left in both of these categories oh action horror another film I saw at South by Southwest that I believe debuted at Sundance that year Ari Aster's Hereditary one of the best horror movies of the last 10 years. I think it's now in the critical community,

a little bit like people are a little suspicious because Ari came in in the elevated horror wave. And so now it's sort of like, I'm not sure if I need my horror to be quite so prestigious. Yeah, it's like, can you make a good Ouija movie? Yes. Yeah. And horror fans are very difficult to satisfy

and they're all over the place. To me, I saw this movie not as a great horror movie, but as an incredible movie about family trauma and people who just don't know how to talk to each other. Obviously, that's the purpose of the movie. There are horror elements and there's a big horror finale in this movie that is exciting.

But in general, another kind of performance that like will never ever be recognized by the Academy. But Tony Collette in this movie is out of her fucking mind. So, so good embodying this woman who's slowly losing control. And there's some like genuine scares this particularly like the crawling on the ceiling near the end of the film is a genuine the car upsetting and then the car accident yeah the the head issue i'll just is that a good way to describe this movie amanda no all i've seen is that so zach has a hereditary t-shirt from 824 which he's also never seen the movie, but he just like wears it to kind of mess with Sean.

And so I've seen that several times. A lot of text. It's very designed. It's an image of Gabriel Byrne on fire. Yeah. And then my dad saw it and was like, this is the worst movie I've ever seen. So bad take. That's a real bad take. That's kind of the spectrum that I'm working with right now. You should not see the film. That's kind of the spectrum

that I'm working with right now. You should not see the film, is my advice. I'm not going to. It's very good. I saw it at a midnight screening in an empty cineplex in Texas on the far east side of Austin. Didn't you get in a car accident on your lift?

I did. It's a true story. I probably told that story on this lift? I did. On the way back? That's a true story. I probably told that story on this pod. But yeah, I took an Uber home at three o'clock in the morning after this movie was over.

I remember we got in a car accident. I was at the bar and then I went home and then you got home at like four in the morning and I was like, damn,

Sean really loved Hereditary. I was like, whatever. I was being questioned by the police on a street corner in the middle of nowhere and I had to walk home. It was a tough scene.

This has been an interesting episode about my trauma. Speaking of trauma, my wild card is, of course, First Reformed, one of my favorite movies ever. Paul Schrader's masterpiece starring Ethan Hawke about a reverend who's lost his way, who's having a crisis of faith in the face of ecological disaster,

personal tumult, perhaps alcoholism, perhaps a sickening inside of him. Amazing movie. A movie that's like so dark and twisted that it's went all the way around to the other side to hilarious and memeable.

And I'm just, you know, I just love this movie very much. So I would feel really weird if I did not get a chance to take it in the draft. So, first reformed. So,

is that back to me? Back to you, brother. You got one more pick, right? Let's go with the 400 blows of garbage crime Den of Thieves. That's good. Finally.

It's real tight between Den of Thieves and Day of the Soldado. Oh, yeah. But, I'm going to go with Den of Thieves because it's given meado. Oh, yeah. But I'm going to go with Den of Thieves because it's given me so, so much big nick.

Everybody, please pre-order my appreciation of Christian Guttegest's work coming in 2024. What's that book called? Towards Enlightenment. The Unbearable Cinema of Guttegest. I don't know if that works seo wise um no uh this movie's fucking awesome you know i don't think we've done a rewatchables about it it's like one of those you know what i really miss and and i actually i ache to see you guys

socially to do this but i miss dumpy wearing movies, man. Yeah. I miss when we would just go see absolute fucking turkeys about bank robberies and alligators and fucking like, you know. Shout out to Crawl. Like, just like what happened to us? You know, we used to,

you just get like a pizza afterwards and be like, that was good. That was an incredible spending of ten dollars that i just did you know chris this is you turning to all of hollywood and saying you used to be beautiful man you used to give me 13 hours yeah i was thinking about that recently because amanda these are these are tough times in the yeah in the in the big picture sense of things you know it's how many conversations can you have about whether Spider-Man should be nominated for best picture

and I was like we can't even really do a Dump You Area episode there's not even really a way to look at the landscape and say like well these are the ones that suck that they're trying to get out of the way before the good stuff comes because the whole landscape has changed so much I don't know and

nobody will be able to see them or or watch them yeah it's a damn shame um yeah well i think we're down to one pick right yeah i have blockbuster left so i'm i'm gonna take crazy rich asians which is a is a movie that i really enjoyed please make more movies like this i will say wish it had a large budget wish we could have spent uh more time on location we could have spent more money on the house wish we could have spent more money on the clothes this is a book that is i think very smart and funny but also knowingly frivolous and i am looking for some knowing frivolity in my movies but i i had a lovely time i really really enjoyed these books by Kevin Kwan. And it did well, which is great.

And I think it was seen as a real success in Harbinger in the box office, which is always a good thing. But also, I had a nice time. So Crazy Rich Asians, please spend more on the sequel. Thank you. This film made $175 million at the US box office. That's great. Where is the sequel? I think it probably production got slowed down by COVID. I mean, it's definitely they're making another one. Do you guys want to talk about some other films before we do a wrap up that we neglected to mention here?

There are so many. There are quite a few. I think people will be very angry, in particular, that Chris failed to draft Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom. Is that the one where they're in the little glass bubbles falling down the mountain? Uh, I believe that's the first one. I believe that's Jurassic world.

I believe fallen kingdom is the one where they create a new dinosaur and they sell it. You know, they're like auctioned off and they break free somehow on the mainland. Kind of a callback to Jurassic Park 2, The Lost World. Oh,

I thought this was the one where it's like a volcano is going off and they have to, like they're out running the volcano. Oh, maybe you're right.

Is that it? I don't even. This is the last one because there's been another one since then, right? That came out. Dominion?

Oh, Dominion is after Fallen Kingdom. And is there another one coming this year there's another jurassic world wow is did dominion come in 2019 be like you guys gotta fucking stop making these uh here's a here's a little summary update regarding blue owen is driven to find blue his lead raptor who's still missing in the wild and claire has grown a respect for these creatures she now makes her mission so sounds like blue is still in the wild. Okay. And Claire has grown a respect for these creatures. She now makes her mission.

So it sounds like Blue is still in the mix here. Okay. Surrounded by lava. I forgot. You're right, Chris. That is the one. This isn't the auction

dino movie. Yeah. Well, I didn't pick it. Oh, that's too bad. What else? What did we miss? What do you guys want to talk about?

If I had like a couple more picks, you would have heard me talk about a little movie starring like a couple more picks you would have heard me talk about uh a little movie starring john ham called beirut i can't believe that it took this long to get to beirut i checked the beirut slack channel yesterday a movie i care so much about that i started a slack channel about and one of the saddest things that's ever happened to me in my life is i started the slack channel in 2018 and invited it was it was invite only it was like this the

San Vicente bungalows of Slack channels and I invited my friends in and I would do little screenshots of Beirut and then one by one fucking my close my closest friends have left this channel in fact I'm looking at it right now and it's like Sean

fantasy has left this room Sean's probably in like 800 fucking Slack channels. Do you know what I mean? That is true. And you know who's still in the Slack channel? You. I'm still in Beirut.

Because you're my ride or die. I still have access to this Slack channel, which I joined before I had seen the major motion picture film, Beirut. But then I did see it. Take a step back. Chris, what was the thinking

behind launching the channel? Like, what was the purpose? Nobody was talking about Beirut, but then I did see it. Take a step back. Chris, what was the thinking behind launching the channel? What was the purpose? Nobody was talking about Beirut, and it was important. It was an important movie that Tony Gilroy wrote. Jon Hamm just straight up 18 cores light sweating out through his armpits just jamming on this

fucking B-grade Michael Clayton vibe. It's so good. Roz Pike in there? Yeah. Is Brule in this one? I feel like Brule is in this. Daniel Brule? Is Brule in Beirut? I don't think so. I feel like he is. Beirut's

not even in the top 35 first things that come up in Google when you're like, when did Beirut? If you search Beirut IMDB, it's still the seventh thing that come up in Google when you're like, what's, when did Beirut? If you search Beirut IMDB, it's still like the seventh thing that comes up. It's Jon Hamm, Shea Whigham,

and Larry Pine, who plays Sandy on Succession, is in this. Oh, cool. Yeah, directed by Brad Anderson and it was written

by Tony Gilroy, which you can definitely tell it made seven and a half million dollars at the box office. So you're saying no Brule? No Brule. Sheesh. Okay. Amanda, what are some movies that you want to call out i've got like a little list here that i had for wild for wild card that i didn't use which is not a complete

list but i'll start here set it up remember set it up oh yeah charming rom-com that was basically about the ringer featuring glenn powell was, yeah, that was when Netflix like, you know, made good rom-coms for adults and not babies. That's rude to the teenagers. I hope you guys love the kissing booth, which I think was also this year, but I still have never seen Beale street.

If Beale street could talk. Like it was under, like it was nominated the Oscars, but I think sort of like under discussed in 2018 and underrepresented in this movie draft uh what else jenkins had some incredible tweets during the uh during the alabama georgia game oh that's yeah he's like bill o'brien just cost nick a chip barry is good at two things making incredible movies and tweeting about college football those are his two greatest skills. Also tweeting about airplanes and air routes.

Oh yeah, he loves airplanes, right? That's a good one, yeah. Okay. What else? Anything else you want to shout? I mean, Black Klansman, Chris, you mentioned that earlier, Spike's movie.

Not really one of my favorite Spike movies, but I thought an interesting attempt to kind of like evolve the kinds of movies that he makes. Kind of like blending the Jordan Peele style and tone, I think, because he was like a producer

and a co-writer on that movie. Minding the Gap is my favorite movie from this year. Minding the Gap and Venom not being in your draft is why I think you're a coward there's a other there's another movie why that i cannot believe did not get picked by you or me sean or you amanda and then i'm mid mid 90s yeah yeah that that actually is a movie that i could see having

a critical reappraisal another movie that maybe did not get it got the love from a very specific demo. Actually, Bill Simmons was telling us that his son, Ben, loves mid-90s. I bet. And that's not surprising. Mind in the Gap was my favorite movie of the year. I guess I am an absolute coward for not picking it. I just suppose I didn't know where to put it. Yeah. I mean, I guess it goes in wildcard?

I don't know. I think so. I guess it could have been Oscar nominee, but I just went Oscar nominee with my first pick. It's funny though. In the moment you pick the thing that you're like, you're most sort of like entranced by and appreciate its artistic merits. And then four years later,

you're like, what's the thing I've watched six times since then. You know what I mean? And the answer is infinity war. Well, the sad part is, yeah, because every time they,

they make one of these shows, I'm like what happened in infinite war um there's a lot more that we haven't we haven't talked through here uh let me see if i can think of a couple the first i kind of like oh the first purge i was going to mention uh sean overlord uh is a pretty good gory uh world war ii horror movie with wyatt russell i like that movie a lot i I interviewed that director, Julius Avery, when that movie came out. Another movie that maybe didn't totally get the love

I thought it deserved. You know, there's a little bit of... I noticed that the guys who host the Blank Check podcast were having some recontextualization around Ready Player One, the Is Ready Player One good conversation. I just want to say I saw that movie also at this same South by Southwest.

And at the time, my take was Ready Player One is good. And I'd like to watch it again. So maybe I'll do that tonight. What do you guys think? Amanda, you should watch Ready Player One tonight and report back. Please don't report back to me. Amanda, what did you think? Do you ever think about Unsane?

No, because it was like, I love that they did it. You know, like an experience that I would have loved to be nearby, but not actually then have to watch the product. You know what I'm saying? It's like all my people together. I think we could have had a nice time on set, but it is a tough hang as a movie. I also recall, I don't want to say not fondly, but a perplexing podcast about Fantastic Beasts, The Crimes of Grindelwald with Mallory Rubin and Jason Concepcion. Perplexing.

That's a caught Dumbledore, right? It is. And that one, that's just an absolutely horrendous movie. Yeah, it was really bad. So, so bad. But I basically just asked those guys to explain the movie to me for like an hour and a half. And Mal was in her bag.

It was weird. I was like, you are on the other side. It's a movie that's based on a fictional textbook about magical creatures in the Harry Potter universe. So I'm happy for Mallory, genuinely. But also, yeah, it's a hard no for me. I got a couple more. Yeah, go ahead. So remember Free Solo?

Yeah. Oh, great movie. Sure, but also I just want to let people know if you haven't been checking up on Alex Hanold and also Alex Hanold, sorry, but really Sani, the girlfriend who's in her contested girlfriend in the movie, just want to let you guys know they're also having a baby due date close to mine.

So that worked out for them long term. Even if maybe you think that it wasn't the most supportive relationship based on the documentary. Maybe you guys should get in like a baby pod together. Yeah. Raise your children together. Baby rock climbing. Guys, sorry to bother you. Oh, yeah.

That's another great one. When is Boots going to make another another movie what's going on with that somebody should give boots some money you you love that movie because it's a socialist manifesto yeah of course yeah uh i distinctly remember uh sean you and chris really having a moment about thunder road which came out in 2018 hell yeah yeah my guy j My guy Jim. I watched that movie on a couch in a dank room in Atwater Village

where Jim's production company was based out of. Not an ideal setting for watching the film but really, really enjoyed it. Good flick. Cold War was this year. Shoplifters this year.

Incredible movie here. What about Solo? A Star Wars story? Oh yeah. My guy Alden. Have we forgiven him? No, we haven't. And is that movie actually not that bad in retrospect?

I didn't have a terrible time. But he wasn't very good. He didn't really have enough sex with Han Solo. It's an impossible job. There's nobody who could have done that job. That's true. One of the very first things we did here at The Ringer, the three of us in particular, were instrumental in the cast miles teller as young

han solo i tried i tried they didn't listen to us you guys don't want my help i'm not going to give you my help it's fine is that you speaking to kathleen kennedy yes straight straight to tiger. Iger's, you know, on on a yacht now having having a great time. There's one other one other comedy that we failed to mention,

which is blockers, which I also think is really funny. And I don't know. I don't know what happened there. There's also a lot of junkie stuff.

Rampage equalizer to 50 shades freed, which is literally the name of a movie. 50 shades freed. Yeah. That's the name of a movie 50 Shades Freed yeah that's the last one right yeah what is that about isn't that

James didn't James Foley wind up directing that I think he directed two of them yeah that's tough man that guy made that close range he made Glenn Gary Glenn

Ross I know come on a movie that a lot of people love from that year is a simple favor do you guys like that movie oh yeah I had that sort of on like a long list it's pretty good I like that they did it yeah it was fun

what about the overboard remake no what about was ballad of buster scruggs this year it certainly was and that was the last coen brothers movie yeah it's also pure heat check it out again if you haven't seen it in a while did anyone mention burning yet no oh yeah another movie that was on i think that was the number one movie on me and adam's list that damn bobby's in his fucking letterbox right now we're just listing them off the mule fire one of my fucking mule the mule was shot and i saw the mule together and i remember we just like turned to each other 20 minutes and being like oh clint's doing this huh yeah he was like i'm a horny old Uber driver.

Let's go. That's incredible. That was such a funny movie. I love it. Okay, we've talked about a lot of different kinds of films. Should we just recap what we picked? Yeah. Okay.

Do it the new way. Yeah, Bobby has asked us to do this in a way that is more coherent for the listener. So off we go. We're going to start with Chris Ryan's picks. Chris Ryan selected in the drama category Widows, in the comedy category Death of Stalin, in the Oscar nominee category, he selected Avengers colon Infinity War, one of his favorite movies ever. In action or horror, he selected Annihilation. In Blockbuster, he chose Mission Impossible Fallout. And in Wildcard, he chose, of course, the greatest work of Guttagest, Den of Thieves.

Let's do my picks now. For drama, I chose First Man from Damien Chazelle. For comedy, I chose The Favorite. For Oscar nominee, I chose A Star is Born. For action or horror, I chose Hereditary. For Blockbuster, I chose Spider-Man Into the Spider-Verse. And for Wildcard, I picked my paul schrader's first reformed and of course amanda for drama she chose roma the oscar winner from alfonso cuaron for comedy

she chose game night for oscar nominee black panther for action or horror a quiet place inspired pikmin for blockbuster she chose crazy rich asians and for wild card she chose fittingly wildlife how you guys feeling pretty good this is a fucking good yeah there is i think not a bad movie on this list with the exception of infinity war uh how dare you that's you know thanos will not forget that you say that have you seen dead of thieves i honestly don't know if i have because I feel like I've heard you talk about it for three running on four years now to the point that like I have in my,

like I have memories of it, but I don't know if they actually involve me sitting down. So you don't remember Gerard Butler confronting Pablo Schreiber at a Benihana? I mean, I do because you've talked about it. Amanda, the movie is literally 48 minutes of Pablo Schreiber and Gerard Butler shooting guns at each other from 100 yards away on a bridge. Like the last like two hours of the movie.

I know, this is why I've seen it that I turned it off. But it's A Den of Thieves lives with me every day because I know Chris. Chris, when are you joining A Den of Thieves? That's when nobody will shake my hand, so I had to do it. I had to join Robinin hood's merry men any closing thoughts who do you guys think won i honestly think amanda might have i mean i i think everybody has like a block of of movies that corresponds to a certain block of online voter so that's right i'll be speaking directly to my first reformed heads yeah cool

cool um thanks to Bobby Wagner for his work on this episode thank you to both you guys and thank you for allowing me to beat you on one more movie draft okay see you soon