The Big Picture - The Best Movies of 2017 | The Big Picture (Ep. 42)

Episode Date: December 22, 2017

The Ringer’s Sean Fennessey, Chris Ryan, Amanda Dobbins and K. Austin Collins rank and debate the best movies of 2017. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today's episode of The Big Picture is brought to you by The Ringer's YouTube channel. We stepped up our game in 2017 with weekly videos like Cousin Sal's Best Bet, Sloan Newsday, NBA Desktop, No BS, Table Reads, Director's Commentaries, and Captain Morgan's Make-Believe Casino, as well as our video podcasts and mini-movies like Take Hunter, Ringer 360, and Chris Ryan's crowning achievement, Clatheism. Coming in 2018, a weekly video mailbag from Bill Simmons, Mallory out of a hat, and a slew of other new shows. Don't miss anything.

Just go to theringer.com backslash video, or even better, subscribe to our channel at youtube.com backslash theringer. This didn't really feel like any other movie, and even though i would probably need to have my arm pinned behind my back to really revisit it i'm really glad i saw it i had a blast watching it and i'm so glad people are still like thinking movies like that are a good idea i'm sean fennessy editor-in-chief of The Ringer, and this is The Big Picture. So what was The Big Picture in 2017? Were the movies good?

Which ones were the best? Why did they succeed? And how? It's year-end time, which means lists. I'm precious about my lists and the methodology that goes into tracking the year's best movies. I closely record and grade every movie after I've seen it, noting date, location, and of course, a grade. But everyone is different. So I've asked three other Ringer staffers to join me and give me their top five lists. So let's get right into that. Here are the best movies of 2017.

To my left, Amanda Dobbins, culture editor of The Ringer. Hello, Sean. To my right, executive editor of The Ringer, Chris Ryan. Hey, what's up, man? And on the line, our film critic staff writer, K. Austin Collins. Cam, thanks for joining us. Sure. Guys, we're talking about the best movies of the year.

Whenever we talk about things like this, there's always some question of criteria. What goes into making a list like this? Top fives, top tens, top twenties. Amanda, for you, how do you put together something like this? Well, it depends on the number of movies that you're listing. And this was a very troubling exercise for me because we only got five. And five is pretty concentrated. And if you're putting together five, I don't think there's room for a lot of cutesiness. But I tried to start from the best films. And then you are reserving a few slots on any list for films that represent some sort of achievement that is maybe not tied to the exact quality of the film, but is something that the film did that was important in the year

or in your own experience, I guess. And I put a lot of personal taste into it too. Chris, you've been making lists for a really long time. Yeah. You're a young man, but you're an old man. Sure. And you know that there are particular tricks that go into making a clever list,

as Amanda indicated. You know, what is your methodology? Every year I want it to have a certain rigor and that there to be almost like an algorithm to it. But at the end of the day, it's just love. It's just it's just what you feel and it's what you felt when you saw it and whether you thought about it more. This year was interesting because I did feel like certain films that in other years may not be on my list or may not be an honorable mention on my list, probably rose to the top just because for whatever reason, I had a slightly more muted reaction to the year in film. You know, I think that I loved a lot of movies, but I don't know necessarily that the films in my top 10 would necessarily make a top 10 from 2007 or 2012 or what have you. So I think that because

of that, there's some funky picks in here. And I also, so I don't think it was as rigorous as it has been in the past because I didn't have to make a lot of room. I found it much easier to make a list of everything I saw this year and then bold the stuff I liked a lot that I did to make it into the top 10 and top five. So what you've just described is something that I've been doing rigorously for a long period of time. Those of you who have heard me talk about this before, I'm obviously a consummate list maker, constantly identifying what I have seen and grading it to some extent. And the rigor that you're talking about, Chris, that I actually apply feels like a bit of content that we are selling to the world. We do have lists, and so we're going to talk about those lists a little bit. Before we let people kind of explore and explain what they did, there is some crossover among the four of us,

and so I want to talk a little bit about the movies that are on multiple lists in an effort to just identify those at the outset. I think that also set up some of the themes of why we chose these movies. To no one's surprise, Get Out and Lady Bird appeared on two and three of these lists. I think Get Out and Lady Bird are going to appear on, I would say, 50 to 60 percent of the best of lists of the year.

Oh, even more probably, right? You think so? At this point, yeah. Cam, Get Out and Lady Bird are not on your list. And so I wanted to talk a little bit about that. Obviously, Get Out is on your honorable mention in your piece that you wrote on The Ringer. It's in your top ten, but not in your top five. You've written about Get Out a number of times this year, actually, and quite well. And I think you liked Lady Bird as well, as I recall.

I love both. Yeah, I do. But I just loved other movies a little bit more. I mean, Get Out, it's complicated. Get Out's a movie that I've seen three times at this point. And every time I watch it, I like it more bit more. I mean, Get Out, it's complicated. Get Out's a movie that I've seen three times at this point, and every time I watch it, I like it more and more. But it's really, it's less a matter of what these movies didn't do and more just what other movies did for me a little bit more. Like Lady Bird, I guess I'm always suspicious of my affection for Lady Bird

because it's so in my wheelhouse. I mean, she's literally like my age. The things that she's seeing on TV with like, you know, the Bush era, etc. is like the things that were on my TV. The music she was listening to is the music I was listening to. She's very much growing up to be New York media Twitter. And so I'm just trying to like... This is sort of my take

on that movie, which is I love the movie and I think the reason everyone that I'm friends with loves it is because she has a blue checkmark. She does. Amanda's tearing up right now. It's so true in a way that I wasn't prepared for. Yeah. Chris, Lady Bird is your number one. And Amanda, Lady Bird is your number one. It is. You guys want to you could do there. You guys are fist bumping right now in the podcast. I can always trust Chris. As two living blue checkmarks. How does it feel to see something that understands you so clearly? You first.

Well, first of all, I don't have a blue check mark. But anyway. Okay, we can fix that. It's a choice. It's a personal choice. I completely agree with Cam. fights about whether the Lady Bird character is more of my generation than the generation of the two people sitting across from me, which is a span of a few years, which is really just a fight over who can own this movie the most. So, of course, this is who gets Dave Matthews. Yeah, exactly.

So this is the most biased, most. Oh, I get to see myself on screen they did it yay uh pick and that's true and it's probably not an objective pick but what what Chris said is true at some point you just have to pick the thing that you love and I do think there is something to the fact that so many of us have argued about within a small circle so many of us have argued about within a small circle. So many of us have argued about our relationship to this movie and how true it is to us that speaks to something larger about that movie. Chris, why is it you're number one? You're not the same as Amanda or Cameron.

It moved me more than any movie this year, and probably in many years. I found myself incredibly deeply affected by it. And the turn it makes somewhere around with about 35, 40 minutes to go where it becomes a slightly more melancholy movie, uh, about leaving rather than trying to make a home. It's about leaving home.

And that just, it really caught me off guard maybe, but it did just move me in a way that I think you just have to sometimes bow down to your visceral reaction to things. And in a lot of ways, my top five is a, I'm letting go. You know, it's a lot of the movies that I, that I responded to were ones where I let the movie take over and then intellectualized it afterwards. And in some ways, I mean, Amanda's joking about the Dave Matthews running argument that we've sort of had around the office, but it's honestly the only thing to talk about because it's everything else is just sort of like I tip my cap to everything in it.

It's almost too personal. Yeah. It's like almost embarrassing to be like, God, I relate to this so deeply. But it's also so universal. It's a story about a mother and a daughter. Yeah. And it's also so universal. It's a story about a mother and a daughter. Right. And it's told really well. And I took 10 members of my in-laws

to see Lady Bird over Thanksgiving. Over a generation from, I think, 40 to, there was an 11-year-old who sat beside me and had to close his eyes during the losing your virginity scene and otherwise loved it. And everyone saw something in it, if it was not Dave Matthews, that they could relate

to because there are some extremely basic themes there and they're just done better than anyone else has done them in a while. Yeah. And, you know, you can get really caught up in the specific references. But I thought that to have a film that was, I think Cam wrote about this when he reviewed the film, I believe, like just about class and about money. And there's obviously elements of depression in there. There was so much in that movie to take away from. And then it was also hilarious, you know, and it was also just an incredible experience for 90 minutes or so to just sit in a room and be like

every emotion that I could have. I'm running through this one film. Yeah, it's funny when I when Greta was on this show, I tried to ingratiate myself to her by saying at the top of the show, everybody who's 40 and under who works at this company is in love with this movie. And she immediately said, well, it's funny, people who have been coming up to me are 60 and 65 and mothers. Lo and behold, when I went home last weekend, my mom, who raised a woman who graduated in 2002, was like, Lady Bird is the best movie of the year. My mother called me to tell me the same thing. So there is a unique, all-encompassing power to what she's doing. And you know, Chris, you and Andy had Laurie Metcalf on your show earlier this month. And you can just see that

every little choice that Greta made obviously just worked well. And that doesn't happen in a lot of movies. Even in some of the movies on our list, there are little things I would have changed. There's not very much about Lady Bird I think I would have changed. It's very rare to see a directorial debut that doesn't, it feels so like this should be her sixth or seventh movie. Like she just has, she was in no rush to get everything on the screen. It's just the right stuff. And it was so many times with the first films for directors. They're like, well, what if I never get to make another one? Let me like throw everything at the screen. It's just the right stuff. And it was so many times with the first direct, first films for directors.

They're like, well, what if I never get to make another one? Let me like throw everything at the wall, every shot I've ever thought of. And you never really feel her pushing your face in it. In this movie,

it's very, very, very accomplished. Let's push Amanda's face into the lost city of Z, which does not, does not appear on her list. It does appear on, on Chris and Cam's,

and it's an honorable mention for me. Chris, I think you and I saw this together. We did, yeah. And what was your reaction to it when you saw it, and how has it changed? Real nostalgia for why you fall in love with movies in the first place for that transportive experience and literally feeling like I was being like I was

floating down the river uh and that I that I was going back to that and you know you often hear Spielberg and Lucas these guys talk about the reason why they made Raiders was because they remembered the sort of matinees that they would go see in the adventure movies that they would go see in the theater and even though it doesn't have the Smash Bang parts that Raiders does, there was a certain kind of like, what if we just made a really cool adventure film that was that just grabbed me and it

was sort of unexpected. Those early year great movies are always just sort of, they sideswipe you and you can really devote yourself to them because there's not a lot of static in the air. You can kind of just be like, I'm very obsessed with Lost City of Z. That has been a thing for Get Out. Yeah.

But for a smaller section of the population, the Lost City of Z as well. It's funny because the kind of period drama aspects of this movie are what I really liked about it. And I liked Lost City of Z. I would say it was probably 13 or 14. And the reason that it is not on my list is because I don't know what's going on with Charlie Hunnam's accent in that particular performance. But what I like about La Cite Z is kind of the old world quietness of it, which is a characteristic of so many movies that I love. And I feel that the response from certain people who may or may not be on this podcast is always

like, that's boring. So it's nice to – I was just appreciating someone else having that particular reaction. It is kind of a bro-y Merchant Ivory movie in a way. There is some adventure obviously and there is some snake killing, which when James Gray was on this show we talked a little bit about. But there is also a quietness that is really interesting. And it's not uncommon in all of James Gray's movies. You know, he's very, very thoughtful and takes his time with stuff. For sure.

And he's romantic about movies, too. Speaking of romantic, this is a movie that I suspect would be on Chris's list had he seen it, but he has not. And let's just talk for one second about the movies that some of us haven't seen. No one here has seen All the Money in the World. No one here has seen Bright. Nice one, Sean. Few of us have seen Downsizing. Some of us have seen The Post. Amanda, Cameron, and I have seen

Phantom Thread, Paul Thomas Anderson's new film. So away. So we will discuss that film in a way that is respectful of the audience listening to this podcast and also to our colleague Chris. Amanda, it's number four on your list with an addition. Cam, it's also number four on your list and it is number one on my list. We will post these lists somewhere, somewhere on the internet. Amanda, why don't you

go first and just talk a little bit about what binds Phantom Thread to something else? Well, it appears with the Beguiled and there is one reason. Thank you, Cam. It was for you. Everything I do is for you. There is one reason that I paired with Beguiled that we can't speak about, because it would be unfair to people who haven't seen the film or who haven't seen The Beguiled. The Beguiled is Sofia Coppola's most recent film. It was released this summer. I recommend seeking it out.

Aside from the specific plot point, they have a lot of similarities. They are two period pieces by very specific directors that are examining the power dynamics in a relationship between a man and a group of women. And one is from the perspective of a male director and one is from the perspective of a female director. And there are some interesting comparisons and contrasts to be made. And I don't actually know that one is righter than the other. I don't mean to imply that even though I have some takes about certain aspects of fan thread, which I loved. I thought it was very funny and really interesting and I keep thinking about.

But I think pairing them together would be fun. Cam, what do you make of that pairing? Yeah, when I finished Phantom Thread in the screening, I went to, my immediate thought was, Phantom Thread is the Beguiled plus Project Runway plus, I don't even know what else. It was Mother, Cam, you said Mother. Oh, plus Mother, yeah. plus Project Runway plus I don't even know what else. But like... It was Mother, Cam.

You said Mother. Oh, plus Mother. Yeah, plus the Dirtbag Artist movie. In a year of so many Dirtbag Artist movies, I have to say, being the most interesting one, the most screwed up one in a way. And I just,

I was a little worried to be honest because I didn't really know what Paul Thomas Anderson's relationship to fashion was going to be. I was not worried about anything but like what does he know or care about like what is he what is he going to do to aestheticize the pleasure of a fashion house and that was probably what impressed me and surprised me the most about Phantom Thread just the textures the fabrics the liveliness the liveliness, the attention that people pay to craft, which is not surprising from a director who cares about craft.

But it's different when you have like Leslie Manville inspecting the threading on things and getting people in order. It wasn't surprising to me that it was a story about monomania. All of Paul Thomas Anderson's movies are about that. It was interesting, though, to hear him talk after a screening. He did a Q&A with the production and when things happen and, you know, just the flow of things, but the director is in charge. And the way that Paul Thomas Anderson described this, you know, maybe he was being a bit self-aggrandizing, but ultimately he said this was a hardcore collaboration where Daniel and I sat together and we wrote together and we figured out who this character was together and we walked beat by beat through every step of the way. And obviously Daniel Day-Lewis's methodology is well known at this point he is method and he learns how to do the things that his characters do and you can sense

that in the movie where the texture and the action that he is doing you know just the very action of him holding a tape measure on Vicky Crapes' body is a very interesting and important scene, but it's really tactile. You know, you can really feel that this feels like someone who has been measuring bodies for 40 years. And one might say Paul Thomas Anderson's been doing the same. It's number one on my list, though, in part because of what Amanda's saying,

which is it's one of his funniest movies, even though it's really wound tightly and as intense as all Paul Thomas Anderson movies are. He seems to have a pretty good sense of how ludicrous all of this is too. It's hilarious. It's genuinely hilarious. I don't know. I mean I cracked up. Maybe the people around me weren't laughing as much as I was.

But I like deliciously dark humor. And I like power tension. And I just think this is really hilarious in a dark way kind of but yeah it's genuinely funny right like that's not a weird reaction it's genuinely funny i think so though i do i did notice a lot of people seemed afraid to laugh at certain moments at the screening that i've been to i don't know amanda do you have that reaction it was it was nervous but then you couldn't help but do it because it is really genuinely funny I would agree with Cam there there are certain scenes that have just become I already yell them in my home because they are

really the breakfast scenes without spoiling too much and have you come here to ruin my evening and possibly my entire life which is in the trailer as a very menacing sentence. But sorry, Chris, spoilers. It's funny in the movie. Or at least I found it funny. And some of my audience did. I thought it was hilarious too. And half the audience didn't really seem to know what to make of it.

And I think the film is teetering on that edge. And I think that's when it's its best. It is self-aware to a point. I think the limitations of the film are in what it thinks it's aware of versus what it's actually aware of. Again, that's true of any enterprise, but I do think it's funny. Let's just say in an effort to make a hard pivot before Chris's skin melts off of his face having not seen the film, that all movies in one form or another are about mothers. Oh, no.

Including the movie Mother. Don't do it. I did not put Mother Darren Aronofsky's incendiary and exasperating, ludicrous depiction of the Bible and the end of environmental civilization, I want to acknowledge its power while also acknowledging its pain. Do so. You know, Amanda and Cam and I earlier this year did a long podcast about this movie, so I don't want to spend too much time on it.

And I spoke to Darren Aronofsky after that, and I will say I've never felt quite so checkmated by a director in conversation. And I think it's because he had a very clear sense of what he wanted to accomplish, which is part of what is making the movie impenetrable to me, which is his total ownership of that movie that he was trying to make. And the fact that it doesn't really allow for anyone to enter its,

its realm. You know, it is a, it is an intense force of nature in a way that not even Phantom Threat could be. Um, that's all I'm going to say about it. Cam, I don't know if there's anything you'd like to add to the, uh, the Aronofsky of it all. I just want to say that I support anyone putting this movie on their list. I think it's a bold thing to do. I rewatched – so I put it in my honorable mentions for the site. Like on my top ten list, it was in my honorable mentions because there are just certain things about that movie that I cannot shake in a good way. There are things I can't shake in a bad way.

But when I was making my list, I rewatched all of Michelle Pfeiffer's scenes and I was like, all these scenes are like the best movie of the year. But I don't know. I think Mother – I think a lot about this. Like if Mother hadn't been released by Paramount, if it had been released by A24 with like a better ad campaign that more clearly explained to people what or gave the impression of what they were in for i feel like the conversation would have been different if not you know more supportive i just think that the the take on this that everyone hated it

is not quite true because a hardly anyone saw it and b i think people were mostly confused because it didn't seem to match up with what they thought it was going to be. I also think that the movie is like total fuckery that totally is alienating people in a way that seems to be deliberate. But I feel like it's one that I'm going to have to revisit in the future because I feel like I didn't see it under fair circumstances. I don't know. I mean it's also like a crazy movie. So I don't know. I mean, it's also like a crazy movie. So I don't know. I'm back and forth.

Kim, I would almost say the opposite, which is that the reason that we're still talking about it and the best case for it to be on anybody's list, though I want to be quite clear, it's nowhere near mine, is that it was released by Paramount and it was presented as something serious and mysterious that we all need to go see and argue about, which is the only fun of this movie. This movie is a trite humorless movie. And there's a reason that you couldn't break through with Darren Aronofsky.

And it's because he made a closed piece of work just for himself. And I think that that that's my take on the film. And I think all the fun from it was everyone arguing about it. It's very fun to argue about. I support absolute disasters. you know what I mean and I don't necessarily even know if mother is an absolute disaster but so much stuff feels totally pitched in the same the same zip code these days and we're all kind of like working from a similar palette I think about this a lot with watching a lot of television is starting to look the same to me and I think part of that is

the platform this didn't really feel like any other movie. And even though I would probably need to have my arm pin behind my back to really revisit it, I was like, I support, I'm really glad I saw it. I had a blast watching it. And I'm so glad people are still like, thinking movies like that are a good idea. That's a good segue to some slightly more pop excursions. I have a few

pop movies on my list that I will defend purely from an enjoyment standpoint. Baby Driver is on that list, which I think is maybe not a movie that is about very much. But when I saw it at South by Southwest, it was a rock concert. And that was the best possible way to see that movie. And it didn't require interrogation. It required celebration. Likewise, I put It on my list, which I don't think is going to appear on very many people's lists, but is one of the huge success stories of the year and is extremely conventional in a way that I found calming and nostalgic and useful for me. Would you guys have some choices like that?

You know, movies that are... Yeah, I mean, you could make the argument that some of the other movies in my top five are like that, but just in terms of honorable mentions, ones that were just really great popcorn movies, like you saw, went to South by Southwest and we saw Atomic Blonde together, which was closer to a rock concert than it was to a movie screening.

And I could not tell you the plot of that movie if I had a gunpoint in my head, but just James McAvoy and Charlize Theron doing what they did for two hours and kicking ass was just a real blast. I actually have Blade Runner on my honorable mentions because not unlike Mother, I'm glad that they went for it.

I don't think it worked entirely. I think that there's some real flaws to it, but let's just give Denis $150 million and Ryan Gosling and see what he comes up with. And that was it. And I don't necessarily think that it's sad because I think a lot of people are like, are we past the point of giving serious sci-fi

this kind of budget? I'm not worried about that. It seems like they'll give a budget to almost anything. But I did really, really respond to the majesty of Blade Runner. so I had that and Aton of Blonde on my list Amanda what's the most fun you had Girls Trip break it down yeah which is in my top five for both because I just had a great time I went by myself to see Girls Trip and just teared up at the end at the last beach from Regina Hall because I just found it really moving. But, you know, I was also laughing. And I think it's also on my list for kind of the

reasons that it is on your list. It was a huge success. There are not funny comedies for adults made at all. They don't do well. This made over $100 million. It was just a resounding success. It's great that it stars four black women. It was just fantastic. I had fun watching it. We need more of those movies. Cam, with all apologies for the we need construction. That's a good thing to know, Cam.

Apology accepted. Your list is quite specific. And a lot of the films are smaller than, say, It. Yeah. But I am curious, aside from the We Need Construction, which you wrote about on the site, what is something where you had the most fun? I would say the most fun was, for me, John Wick 2.

Although complicated because I just have a complicated relationship to extreme movie violence right now. And movie violence generally, violence generally. But I watched John Wick 2 recently, which I'd kind of forgotten came out this year. And I was just re-enjoying just seeing Keanu Reeves be really sleek and really vengeful and killing everybody. You know, it's not a perfect movie, but I don't know. You get led through like a maze by like someone who's dressed up to be homeless but is actually part of a spy network run by Lawrence Fishburne. Like I can't not enjoy that.

Let's talk about a movie that I've been calling John Wick 3, Call Me By Your Name. Call Me By Your Name is not on my list. I think it's a very interesting movie and I think there is some wonderful achievement in it but it's not on my list it is on your list Amanda Cam I believe it's excuse me Chris it's an honorable mention for you as well you guys want to talk a little bit

about Luca Guadagnino's sensual story of two men who find each other in northern Italy it's all Chris and I ever talk about who is Armie and who is Timothy in this two men who find each other in Northern Italy. It's all Chris and I ever talk about. Who is Armie and who is Timothy in this story? It's a complicated question. I think I'm more of a

Stolberg at this point in my life. I wanted to ask you guys, as a group, how much do, how much did you find expectations playing into your enjoyment of movies this year? You know, I think that we all probably would like to think of ourselves as ultimately above that

and we can exist outside of that. But Call Me By Your Name was something that, frankly, the three other people on this podcast have probably an outsized influence on my expectations of films in my life, whether you guys see them beforehand or you're tempering my enthusiasm for something with maybe not as much enthusiasm

but uh i found that there was a couple things call me by your name for one uh logan lucky was another one where i think i enjoyed logan lucky more than you guys because you were like don't get your hopes up you know and i was like but my hope should be up this was really fun i like this movie i would watch it again and call me by Your Name was something that I think I had the two poles. I had Amanda saying, this is just gorgeous. This is just a beautiful, lovely movie. And you were kind of like, sorry, it's okay. It's pretty good. You know? And I landed somewhere in the middle. I was incredibly moved by parts of it. I've enjoyed myself watching it. I thought it was 20 minutes too long, but you know, it felt very much like the Merchant Ivory films that I grew up watching with my dad. And I thought it was lovely,

but Amanda, I know you had like much more coherent thoughts than me about that, but I was curious about like expectations and how this stuff plays into our enjoyment of films. Now I had that experience with some other things, but for me, this was just personal expectations. Again,

I feel a little cheap putting, call me by your name and number two, because while I was not a teenager in the 80s in northern Italy, this is such an Amanda movie. You wish you were, though. I wish I was. You know, I love Luca Guadagnino. I think I love every Merchant Ivory film. It's written by James Ivory.

And then it's just Armie Hammer in short shorts running around at the beautiful northern Italian countryside. And they're just bringing you chocolate mousse and beautiful mousse cups. Listening to psychedelic furs, yeah. I just, there were moments in this movie where I was just staring up at it, grinning. I couldn't believe that it was real and that this movie was made for me because I was so delighted by it. So it's not even expectation so much as, again, just bias of I was so – it's hitting all the personal notes in a way. But I was really moved by it. I think that – I hate the word sensual.

It makes me gross, but it really did kind of create an atmosphere and I believed in their love and I was really moved by it. I don't know what else to say. I thought it communicated it so well. Guys, let's get down to last licks. Okay. Give a shout out to one movie that you want to make sure you get some time on. Amanda, why don't you go first? I'll do Wonder Woman, which is on, which is my number three movie.

And this is kind of the part of the list making where you're trying to make a statement. And so I think everyone who is part of this podcast and also has ever heard me talk is aware that my general feelings about superhero movies range from indifference to active distaste. Anyone who observes our superhero draft, though, may not feel that way. They may know you as one of the great bards of the superhero story. They'll know me as the victor. That's for true. The people's choice. I have to see all of them as part of professional obligation. I really have never had any connection to comics, that world.

It was just not something that I was a part of. And I went to see Wonder Woman, and I was kind of bowled over. And I put it on because of Patty Jenkins, because I think that all of its achievements are kind of important in this moment that we're having in Hollywood and the world at large, blah, blah, blah. But I also put it on there because this scene when she shows up in the no man's land was really overwhelming for me. And I kind of connected to the genre in a way that I never had before. And I think a lot of things matter a lot more, but these things matter. Seeing women in these roles matter. So sorry to be really earnest. No, not at all. That's a safe

space for that. Chris, what was your Themyscira? Let's talk about Dunkirk. Oh, brother. Yes. I'm ready. I'm so ready. This year, the more we talk about it, this year, I was interested in films that made me submit. I was interested in films that took me out of my reality. I feel like, obviously, we all spent a lot of time on our phones this year. We all spent a lot of time on our computer screens this year to have my view expanded to a widescreen, at least for two hours or whatever was just always a pleasure this year. And the movies that just almost pulverized me were the ones that I responded to the most good times.

Another one like that, that's just like almost overwhelming in a sensory way. But Dunkirk actually, a lot of what you guys were talking about phantom thread i liked the toast with jam on the boat when they come pick those kids up i like uh the sweaters they wore i loved the the jackets that they wore in the planes that tom hardy and jack loudon were in their fighter planes i know people didn't like the uh there was a lot of people who didn't like some of the plot narrative machinations. It can't not go through a Nolan machine.

But I think he is, when it comes to making you feel something and just be blown away by something, he's still probably the best we have. And it had a kind of Noel Coward in which we serve stiff upper lip heroism that I didn't find corny, that I actually really did find the end of the film, Tom Hardy landing that plane, like incredibly moving. And, you know, my dad was British. He grew up, he was born at the, uh, sort of towards the end of World War II. Um, I, I have a lot of time for those stories and I, I walked out of it completely stunned and completely head over heels. And I know it's, it's not a very fashionable pick, but it's easily at my top five. I just wanted to say, because I think people think I'm a Dunkirk hater, which is not quite true. But of the movies in the Dunkirk extended universe, which is feeling like a thing,

it's like Dunkirk, Darkest Hour, Churchill, Their Finest, and probably other things. I think Dunkirk is like the most interesting. I think also like Dunkirk is a better Churchill movie than the other Churchill movies that we got this year. And Churchill's not even really, he's not really even a factor until the last scene, the Harry Styles scene. But I think Dunkirk is kind of an interesting. I still, I don't, I definitely don't like it as much as you do, but I think it's more

interesting than we can it credit for. What's your very special choice, Kim? It's a small documentary called The Work. It's available to rent on iTunes and Amazon and elsewhere. And it's a documentary. It was of the year. It's my number two. It's a documentary about a group therapy thing that happens at Folsom Prison in California every – like twice a year where they take inmates who are from contrasting kind of gangs and have affiliations at odds with each other and combine them with civilians from outside, civilian men from outside, and they do this four-day closed-door,

burying-your-soul, extremely complicated and vexed and fraught kind of therapy session. And I don't know how to describe it in a way that – because that sounds like kind of a weird thing. But when you're watching this movie, I don't think I've ever seen the kinds of emotional breakthroughs and revelations holding a civilian back from – as he's trying to kind of work through the pain of an absentee parentage or a death in the family or things like that. It's really – it's really special and I've just – I've been stumbling for it in part because I think it's an exceptional documentary. I think it's extremely interestingly made and all that, but also just because in a year where we're talking about, I mean, in a year where it just seems like we need to be talking more about our feelings, I would just would encourage everyone to talk about their feelings. This is a documentary where you see something that should be modeling become extremely, I don't know, it just like

puts something in the pit of your stomach that you can't quite shake it's a movie that a friend recommended to me late in the year and I got a chance to see it and it blew me away so it's on iTunes, I'd encourage everyone to seek it out it's not very long and it's extremely, it's not boring you will not be bored watching these men kind of figure out what their what their lives what their souls are up to um you've teed me up really well here

to talk about what my soul is up to and feelings uh my choice will be the Meyerowitz story is new and selected which is a movie that is very important to me but I'm going to use it as an opportunity to talk about movies in general. This movie premiered on Netflix. It's written and directed by Noah Baumbach, one of my three or four favorite filmmakers. I saw it on a big screen, and that was a great way to see it because it's a big screen movie, and it's about a family, and it's about people talking and walking the streets of New York City

and spending time in hospitals and figuring out how they relate to one another. But that's okay. Movies like that should be seen on the big screen too. I'm not caping for this in the way that say Netflix needs to be disbanded. I think Netflix is a wonderful service and I use it every single day of my life. But I would encourage people to try to see movies like this, especially movies made by people that you really like already in theaters, because it has a just completely different transformative effect. The Meyerowitz stories I watched as a second time on Netflix, and it didn't really work as well for me. And I could sense that Noah Baumbach had a similar feeling when I talked to him on this show. He was slightly disappointed that the way that most people got to see this movie was on a television or on a computer or on a cell phone, God forbid. And there's something uniquely covering and warming about seeing a movie in the theater. And that was one of the best experiences I had, even though I

as I was at a SAG screening for the movie two months before it came out and I arrived five minutes late, thankfully it hadn't started yet. And I had to sit in the aisle. And I sat in the aisle. I have a very bad back, and I had no back support, and nevertheless was transported for the two hours of the movie. I had a great experience. And that is a good thing that movies can do, and that is why we're doing this podcast. I want to thank the three of you guys for coming on and talking today. Amanda Dobbins. Thank you, Sean. Chris. Shout out to movies, man.

Cam Collins. Hey, everybody. This was fun. Thanks, everybody. Chris. Shout out to Movies, man. Cam Collins. Hey, everybody. This was fun. Thanks, everybody. This has been The Big Picture. Happy 2017.