The Big Picture - The Top 10 Underseen Movies of 2024. Plus: James Cameron and Gale Anne Hurd on ‘The Terminator’ at 40!

Episode Date: December 18, 2024

Sean remarks on the release of the Oscars shortlists in below-the-line categories, international features, and documentary features, before discussing his five most underseen movies of 2024 (1:00). Then, he’s joined by a rotating cast of Ringer colleagues to discuss each of their favorite underseen movies of the year (40:00). Finally, he’s joined by James Cameron and Gale Anne Hurd to discuss the 40th anniversary of ‘Terminator’ (1:59:00). Among other things, the three talk about the challenge of getting it made before their careers had really taken off, the filmmaking style, shooting on location in L.A., and the prescience of the story. Host: Sean Fennessey Guests: Chris Ryan, Mallory Rubin, Charles Holmes, Yasi Salek, Joanna Robinson, Rob Mahoney, Amanda Dobbins, James Cameron, and Gale Anne Hurd Senior Producer: Bobby Wagner Video Producer: Jack Sanders Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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opening a TFSA, or learning about investing tools, we're here to help. But keeping your cat off your keyboard? That's up to you. Reach out to TD Direct Investing today and make your The Big Picture, a conversation show about so many movies. We're getting down to the end of the year, and there's so many titles we haven't had a chance to talk about. We're going to get into a whole bunch of them today, a whole bunch of Oscar stuff. But first and foremost, probably the best movie we'll talk about today is a little film called The Terminator. And that's because later in this episode, I'll have a conversation with James Cameron.

That's right, Big Jim and Gail Ann Hurd. That's right, the director and producer team that shepherded some damn good movies into the world, including Aliens and the Abyss. And of course, The Terminator, which is turning 40 years old this year in 2024. This is a movie that changed blockbusters, science fiction, Arnold Schwarzenegger,

Cameron and Hurd's career, so many other things. Had an absolutely awesome conversation with these two. I highly encourage you to stick around if you care about this film. In the meantime, though, we have some other stuff to talk about. Going to talk about some underseen movies with some ringer all-stars, including our producer Bobby Wagner here on the call right now. But there's some news. The Oscar shortlist has hit.

And so this is an annual tradition in which the Academy whittles down some categories, 10 categories, down to 15 or 20 nominee potentials. This is most notable probably for the documentary and international feature submissions. But I'm just going to run through some takeaways that I had from this Oscar shortlist because some of the stuff is critical to what me and Joanna and Amanda, when she comes back, will be talking about over the course of the next two months. Top headline, Amelia Perez is not dead, not even close to dead, is probably as powerful as it's ever been in this Academy Awards race, even though the film has not been hugely critically acclaimed, even though the fact that most people who see it don't seem to love it,

the Academy really likes it. In fact, this movie showed up on five lists, six times overall, including international feature, best score, best sound, makeup and hairstyling, and twice in the dreaded best song category. We will circle back to that category shortly. Wicked also made the list four times. Very notable.

Another film that is incredibly strong right now at the Oscars. The substance is alive. We have not yet done a Best Picture Power Rankings for the month of December, but the substance, making it or not making it, is a huge point of discussion that Joanna and I will have. This film currently made the shortlist for makeup and hairstyling. Not for visual effects, but it did make it for makeup and hairstyling. That's notable. That means that people in the Academy are watching the movie, they're aware of it, at least in that

branch, and they're getting ready to potentially recognize it when the nominees come out in January. Civil War, CR's favorite film of 2024, recognized in visual effects, but not in sound, which I find genuinely unnerving because if there's certainly something to recognize the movie for, it's for its sound work. Speaking of interesting snubs, blankings,

Bobby Wagner's beloved Furiosa, nothing here. Nothing here. Do you have anything to say for yourself as the president of Furiosa hater nation? I am not a hater. For what you've done to that film and the craftspeople who created it? I've done nothing to them. I've merely cited that I think it's

a 7 out of 10, which is, there's nothing wrong with that. I don't think it's a masterpiece. I apologize to those who do. But it was not in sound, 10, which is, there's nothing wrong with that. I don't think it's a masterpiece. I apologize to those who do. But it was not reckoned, not in sound, not in visual effects, not in any of the major bloodline categories

here at the shortlist. Not a good sign for Furiosa's chances in any other category here. We take Mr. Miller for granted. We do. I mean, it's not Mad Max. And people,

I think, particularly like when you have sci-fi, which the Oscars is not well known for rewarding over its many, many decades, and they feel like they have already anointed a previous version of this film in this universe, I just don't feel like they felt the need to do that.

And even if they do feel accused for not doing it, they'll just point to Dune 2, which is fair. Because I think Dune 2 is a better film. Well, I'm starting to have some concerns about the recognition for Dune Part 2, if I'm being honest with you. I think Wicked's below the line chances are growing by the day.

But you're right, Fury Road was, I think received 10 nominations and won six Academy Awards. And so, yeah, maybe there's a little bit of a too soon aspect to this where that film is only nine years old. But anyway, Furious is gone. I think this also means Saturday Night is gone because John Batiste's score for that film was also not shortlisted, one that I think at the beginning of Oscar season, many people felt had a chance. I think I might have included Saturday Night in one of my, maybe in my big bet. Is that possible?

God, that was a long, long time ago when Amanda only had one child. Other notable takeaways here. The international race, which I'll run through all the potential nominees out of the 15 that were selected, but Kiyoshi Kurosawa's Cloud, which was the Japanese submission, was not recognized here, unfortunately. Kurosawa, someone you've heard adam naman talk about on the show quite a bit in the last 12 months um i'm a huge fan of his work as well i still haven't had a chance to see cloud actually i've seen only chime his short film from earlier

this year but cloud did not get in i have uh i have some news for you about your big oscar bet and saturday night you included it in best picture yeah i thought i did i thought it did amanda did not she did not okay she's um i know for a fact that she's since seen the film oh yeah are you willing to share her take no because i want her to be able to come back and do her whole like here's what i saw and here's what's great and here's what you're wrong about and all that she had some strong takes about the tracy let's episode that are definitively, but I'll let her explain some of those when she comes back. Okay.

You mean the most beloved podcast episode in the history of podcasting? People enjoyed that. That was a very warm reception. Tracy was great. Very nice. Wonderful guest. Arguably the greatest guest of all time,

and that is a challenge to all of our recurring guests who we love on this show. Good news. My three favorite film scores of the year were all shortlisted. That includes Trent Reznor

and Atticus Ross's Challenger score, Chris Bowers' score for The Wild Robot, and Daniel Blumberg's score for The Brutalist, which is now available to stream on Spotify.

You may not want to stream it before you see the film, but once you start streaming it, you'll know why I keep going ba-na-na-na on this podcast over and over again because it moves me to my core.

Hans Zimmer's work in Dune Part 2, speaking of Bob, deemed ineligible. Did you hear about that? I think because there's too much previously used material from Dune Part 1. Notably, though, Wicked, eligible, despite the fact that it's from a

Broadway show and should otherwise be ineligible. Hmm. A conspiracy? Perhaps. Yeah, maybe. Watch this space. You should start doing Wicked conspiracy theories. From what I've learned on the internet in the past few weeks,

it does numbers. It certainly does. I'm trying to not talk about Wicked too much, if I'm being honest with you. Good idea. Alien Romulus Three times on the list here Pretty incredible

Also on the list while Robot three times And Gladiator 2 So shortlist is a weird thing It does not indicate necessarily strong Oscar chances You see Romulus? I did, I liked it a lot It was a very solid three and a half star movie It was legitimately scared and legitimately impressed.

A furiosa. By the computer generated imaging in the film. It looked very good. It did. One other thing to cite here that is also related to your interest, Bob, is that Diane Warren was recognized for her original song for The 6888, which is a forthcoming Tyler Perry feature on Netflix. Diane Warren, of course,

has been nominated many, many times, I believe 16 times for an Academy Award and has never won. I haven't heard this song. Doesn't seem like a song she'd win for. And yet the Oscars keeps dragging her to the dance and telling her that she has to go home empty-handed. Very sad. I saw the TV Glow, which had a number of original songs was not recognized in the shortlist. How do you feel about that? I'm pretty upset. Because not only did it have a number of original songs,

but it had a number of original songs targeted directly at guys like me. Bebe Bridger's on stage singing a song and I saw the TV glow. That's sick. Yeah, not according to the Academy voters. You're a little out of the demo. Or they're out of your demo. It's maybe more like it. And I'm okay with that. I am. Although

I do like the Brutalist score, and I like it even more when you sing it here on this podcast. Do you think that counts as a Spotify stream when you sing it on a Spotify original podcast? Daniel Blumberg, do not hit me up for royalties, bro. I'm just praising your work, which is exceptional. International feature. Let's just go for royalties, bro. I'm just praising your work, which is exceptional. International feature. Let's just go through the list of films. I haven't even seen all of these films. This is the time of year when it becomes clear to me kind of what I have to knock off of my list

so that I can hopefully competently discuss some of this stuff. I've seen quite a bit. I know you've seen a couple of these as well, Bobby. But so international feature, you know, the way that this works is that a nation has to submit a title and only one title from each country can be submitted for the international feature Oscar. I don't think it's going to be this way for too much longer. I think everyone realizes this is not a good way of doing this.

One of your favorite films of the year, All We Imagine Is Light, is an Indian film, but India did not select this film. And so the likelihood of that movie being recognized at the Oscars is significantly lower, even though I think if it were eligible here, it would be here and maybe could have a chance to challenge Emilia Perez, which is by far the front runner. But this is a pretty, even though they've changed the name of this award from foreign language feature to international feature, I think there's still some evolution that's required. But nevertheless, I'll tell you the titles of the films. From Brazil, it's I'm Still Here. From Canada, Universal Language, a film I really liked and was happy to see here. From the Czech Republic, Waves, which I've not yet seen. From Denmark,

I just saw The Girl with the Needle. That's added here. From France, Amelia Perez, of course. From Germany, The Seed of the Sacred Fig, we've talked about a few times on the show. From Iceland, Touch, which I believe is the Balthazar Cormaker film that Focus put out earlier this year. From Ireland, Kneecap. CR and I discussed it very briefly. I saw it back at Sundance. Incredibly fun movie. From Italy, Vermiglio, which I'm about to watch tonight.

So I'm looking forward to that. From Latvia, Flow, which you will hear about later on in this podcast. Exceptional movie. From Norway, Armand, which stars Renata Rensby. I've not yet had a chance to catch up with this one. From Palestine, From Ground Zero. I've not yet had a chance to catch up with this one. From Palestine, From Ground Zero. I've also not had a chance to see this. From Senegal, Daomei, Madi Diop's new movie,

which I just saw on Friday and is streaming on Mubi right now. And I highly encourage people to check out. From Thailand, How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies, which I've heard great things about, but has not yet been put in front of me. So hopefully I'll see that one soon. And then last but not least from the United Kingdom,

Santosh, which I've also not seen, but we'll probably see before the year is out. Anything jump out to you about this, Bob? I actually think I've only seen one of these. I've only seen Seat of the Sacred Fit. Universal language is high on my list of movies that I want to see and haven't seen,

as well as Daome. But I have a lot of catching up to do here. I think what stands out to me is that it just feels as Byzantine and silly as ever the way that this category is structured. We didn't need a second layer of political machinations to the Oscars. That's what the Oscars already is. We didn't need a pre-Oscars before the Oscars where people in rooms decide what even gets nominated. You know what I mean? Yeah.

It's an interesting thing because when there's a country that controls its sort of arts councils that make these decisions, then invariably any film that is critical of the governing body of those countries is not likely to submit a film with those criticisms. And then you have these workarounds, like in the case of Seat of the Sacred Fig, which is from an Iranian filmmaker named Mohamed Rousseloff. And the story of how he made the film, to me, is more remarkable than the movie and I think has been helpful in campaigning for the movie.

But it's the German submission. And there are some reasons why Germany is able to submit a film like this, even though the film is entirely about an Iranian family. So, um, yeah, there's some shenanigans,

I think, and the way that this is all strategized and worked against, it reminds me a little bit of when you would have, you know, Oh God, what were the, who were the two brothers? One of whom played for England and one of whom played for,

I think Cameroon, um, in the world cup. And even though I think they were both English citizens. And you were like, well, how can one guy be on that team and another guy be on the other team? Or maybe, no, it was Ghana. It wasn't Cameroon. It was Ghana. God, I can't remember their names. Two really, really talented soccer players, I think, who both played in the Premier League.

But it's this sort of thing where you're like shifting what the home countries can and should be in a system that already has a lot of flaws. So I really feel like this is ripe for an overhaul given the way that world cinema has profoundly and positively influenced the Oscars in the last five or 10 years. Like this is a shift that just, I feel like has to be made.

Yeah, and those are the boateng brothers germany and ghana germany kevin prince played for ghana and jerome boateng who's like a very famous very important player for the german national team i just think that it kind of like if you reverse engineer it it kind of encourages the wrong things because so many of these independent or international smaller budget movies like the the Oscars boost for these movies helps them to get made in the future. The idea that it might get an Oscar nomination and get put on the shortlist.

And so if the production companies, the financiers of these movies are already thinking in advance, no, we're not going to finance this because we know that it's too critical of the country or the governing body that it's being created in. It's just really, really, really narrowing

the types of stories that get told and then get rewarded at the Oscars and then put on a much more international stage for more people to actually see, which I think ultimately maybe isn't the goal, but should be one of the goals, at least, to get more people to be able to see these movies from younger filmmakers,

from more experimental filmmakers. Yeah, I think that the Academy has done an amazing job of widening the expectation for the first time, really, in about 35, 40 years. In the 1970s, if you look through the nominations, you can see all kinds of international. I was just reading about Fellini, and I'm thinking of doing a Fellini rewatch in 2025. And Fellini was recognized in multiple categories, in screenplay, in director, in international film, all through the late 60s and all the way,

maybe all the way up through the early 80s. And he was kind of a consistent presence, even though he didn't make any films in English. And then that kind of went away and went very quiet in the 80s and 90s and has had a bit of a comeback, especially as the Academy has widened and deepened its bench of voters. So this is just the remnant of old administrations

and old thinking that has got to be changed. Let's talk quickly about documentary feature. I've seen quite a few of these films, though not all of them as well. They are The BB Files, Black Box Diaries, Daome, which is also in international, Daughters, Eno, Frida, Hollywood Gate, No Other Land, Porcelain War, Queendom, The Remarkable Life of Ibelin, which I'll get into momentarily, Soundtrack to a Coup d'etat, Sugarcane, Union, and Will and Harper. A number of these movies debuted at Sundance. In fact, more than half of them did. I wanted to point out two movies that I haven't seen, one of which I think you have seen.

I haven't seen Eno, which is a documentary about the famed British music producer, Brian Eno, who has, you know, one of the most incredible discographies of any person alive, anybody in the history of pop music, and also someone who has a very distinct and fascinating working style. And that style is reflected in the way that you watch the

movie, which it has a kind of generative component where every time you watch it in a movie theater, it is a little bit different than the way it had been previously shown. It's a little hard for me to explain how that works because I have not yet seen it, but the film, you can't stream it at home. It only shows in movie theaters. And because of this generative component, which is correlated to Eno's philosophy as a producer and musician, it needs to be like in a very closed and controlled environment to experience it. They're working on ways to share it with the public so that the same generative experience can go on.

But I find something like this fascinating because this is very different from a movie like Frida, which is a fairly standard but creative biopic about a famous artist, or Will and Harper, which you can just stream on Netflix, and it's about Will Farrell and Harper Steele and their longtime friendship. Or even a movie like Union, which is a fascinating story about the unionization efforts in warehouses in Amazon, but does not have distribution at the moment. And there are no company has taken on the distribution. So the filmmakers are distributing the movies sort of independently and trying

to put it in as many theaters and single screens as they possibly can. One of the reasons why I think is because it's just a very complicated issue politically and rhetorically for those filmmakers. And Amazon, of course, is a big player in hollywood these days um but i think you you did see um no other land right bobby i did yeah i saw it at new york film festival it's it's incredible it's it's it's remarkable

it's like stunningly of the moment you know it it captures something that has been so at the forefront of political conversation in the entire world for the last two years um and yet at the same time like it is that timeless style of documentary filmmaking where it just puts you right there right in front of everything and the person of the subject of the documentary is also like a social media documentarian himself and so his contributions are kind of meta

in a way too and I thought it was phenomenal. I'm really looking forward to seeing that. That film just like Union still doesn't

have a distributor. I think because I think the perception is just that this is one a very hard film to market and sell to audiences and two you know is a controversial subject matter that no one that is in the business of trying to make money wants to have to choose a perspective on.

Obviously, part of the film, as I understand it, is that it's not that kind of proposition. That it is about trying to understand the war with a significant more amount of depth and complexity. Is that fair to say? In this, in what sense? In that it's not like, it's not a, a political film that is sort of like,

you must choose a side. Oh yes. Conflict. It's not like that. It's more about the, the ramifications of the actual events themselves in the sense that it, it displays the lives of people who are being displaced by the conflict between Israel and Palestine. It tells the story of the IDF coming in and trying to move these Palestinian people out of their homes because they're trying to expand their military operations and turn this space, this land, into more of a military base and that's why they claim that they have the justification to be doing that um and it tells the stories like literally from the inside of the homes

like as they're being torn down so obviously as you allude to politically explosive subject matter in an elevator pitch i think the way that it plays out. I, I would challenge anybody to watch this film and not be able to find empathy with the people whose lives are being displayed, you know, but obviously corporations don't always think that way in terms of how they distribute these movies, because it's hard to get people to watch movies that are hard to watch. And it is, it is hard to watch. I mean, I'm not going to say that it's not um but but again yeah this is a movie that's my top 10 of the year i think it's an incredible act of documentary filmmaking both categories will be interesting tests of the new academy and the kinds of films that they are interested in

and the kinds of stories that they want to tell um i would say hard to say not having seen eno but essentially every other film that is on the documentary feature list could be perceived as a film with a strong political point of view. A strong ethical point of view, even perhaps. So, you know, that's not uncommon here. But one thing that has been noted is that the documentary branch in particular is very esoteric and very unpredictable. The fact that, you know, Will and Harper and even Daughters and even Frida and Sugarcane all made it, even though they were kind of presumed to be like a little more mainstream, a little bit more frontrunnery, is fascinating. Sugarcane is available to watch, I believe, on Disney Plus right now. Daughters is available to watch on Netflix.

I mentioned Daume is on Mubi at the moment. Will and Harper on Netflix as well. Remarkable Life of Ibelin on Netflix. Netflix always a big contender in this category. They tend to acquire a lot out of festivals. Some of these are darn good films. I'll talk about one of them in a minute. That's more or less my thoughts on the short list. We'll see. We've got, I think, exactly one month until the nominations come out. And we've still got a couple of more movies

that are going to open wide over the next few weeks that are going to impact the conversations and the expectations. I don't know what the fuck's going to happen if I'm being perfectly

honest with you. This is, this is, in theory, very exciting. And when I talk to other people who spend time

thinking about this and even creating content around it they're like isn't this great but for me ball knower man for whom it is important to know things and get things correct yeah not ideal that's my that's my frailty that's my

flaw that's a sad truth about me but it is a truth and it's important for me to express it here are you going emo boy mode on me i just it's important to to know where the the weaknesses are you know like i i've been having some oblique issues physically you know i'm pursuing physical therapy i have to i have to solve these problems so you gotta get in on the yoga game bro this is my new i've come back to yoga. I was a big yoga person in college.

I know. And then I got a job and I was like, what if I didn't do this? What if I didn't dedicate time to this? But you gotta get back in that. Who are these people that just go out and do things

at 1.30 p.m. on a Wednesday that just for themselves that are not part of the act of working? I don't know. Who are these men and women? I want to be really real with with you like it's me a lot of the time because i work west coast hours you know so it's like 5 p.m when we're doing our pods that's for me sometimes you're on with me at 9 p.m your time so it's it's a different scenario uh yeah can i can i posit you a small theory about why the race feels so mysterious please there's just no front runner like so many movies that we thought

might come out are either getting pushed back till next year or came out and didn't quite do what we expected them to do and so the front runner front runners are weird the fact that anora has been a front runner for as long as it has been is just like by conventional oscar wisdom like kind of wrong you know what i mean kind of, it's unfamiliar to us. And it almost feels like, in a way, you know, when Parasite ended up winning, I think Parasite was kind of, like, more like an Enora,

a beloved film from a filmmaker that people have a big relationship to, but maybe is not super mainstream. And then it wins. It's this upset. We're all so happy, you know? But we don't really have something for it to upset, necessarily.

And so, by default, we've been saying, okay, maybe Nora is going to win Best Picture. That's kind of weird, right? No, you're right. But we've been talking about that for nine months. No, it's a great point and a great point of comparison because in that year, I very vividly remember the weekend after Thanksgiving going to see 1917. And 1917 having this huge surge over those six weeks towards the end of the year, where, one, I still like that movie quite a bit. I was really impressed by the way that it was made.

And when I saw it, I thought to myself, ooh, this could really displace all of the frontrunners, which at the time, I guess, were sort of like Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Parasite, Marriage Story, Ford Ferrari, whatever, you know, on down the line of films that came out that year the best movie year in a while and 1917 didn't quite get there but it did the thing that you're talking about which is it disrupted the momentum of a movie that could have been seen as a front runner or one that could have risen to the top i'm keeping anora in that place as far as i can tell because nothing has really come along that has really displaced it. The Brutalist, I think, is too big and arthouse-y,

but there is a world in which its slow rollout over the next six weeks works in its favor. I am not discounting that. Joanne and I will get into all this at the end of this week, and we'll talk about the different permutations and what's rising and what's falling, but it's been interesting

so far. I just bought tickets to see Brutalist again. 9 a.m. on a Sunday morning. Let's get it. I think that's a great way to do it. Because then you can get out and you can get a giant sandwich afterwards. That's precisely my plan. Yeah, protein shake in the morning.

Huge turkey sandwich right afterwards. Like after Ciara beds down his wife. His wife hawked to a girl, you mean? Yes, of course. Hawked to a Ryan. All all right let's talk about under seen and underappreciated we're going to go down the list with some ringer staffers including bob but i just for the for the record i want to state i've seen as of today 307 new releases from this year i'm still doing this thing where i'm trying to see as many of the new releases as i possibly

can honestly one because i'm i'm ill and everyone knows i'm ill but two because i'm trying to see as many of the new releases as I possibly can. Honestly, one, because I'm ill and everyone knows I'm ill, but two, because I'm trying to do a good job with the show. And to me, the purpose of the show is to present the contemporary cinema in a sincere way, celebrate what needs to be celebrated, set aside what maybe doesn't need to be celebrated, unless, of course, it's kind of unignorable. I've already seen actually 11 2025 films as well. So I'm starting to make moves on next year, Bobby. I don't traveling. You are traveling. Oh, I'm time traveling. Yeah. Well, the studios now I think have figured out that it's good to show me earlier rather than later. So I don't know what to make of that. But is that because your brain turns into mush by the time

you've seen about 200 of these movies in the last hundred. You just can't remember. You know, as a man who sat through Mufasa at 11 a.m. yesterday, the answer to that question is yes. I did want to spotlight a couple of movies that I didn't get a chance

to talk about or maybe didn't get a chance to explore in depth before we let some other folks do the same. So I'll just go through my list really quickly. My number one pick

is Christmas Eve and Miller's Point, which is a movie by Tyler Tarler teramina you may have seen his first film ham on rye which was a bit of an indie sensation i think ifc distributed it in 2019 this movie is fascinating it stars matilda fleming maria maria dizia ben shankman francesca scorsese That's right, Martin Scorsese's daughter. Elsie Fisher. The goat TikToker. She truly is. Sawyer Spielberg, Greg Turkington of On Cinema at the Cinema. Michael Cera.

A handful of other folks that you'll recognize. This movie, which is a kind of impressionistic, emotionally flashing series of micro events that take place all in one home on Long Island on Christmas Eve night is the most Long Island thing that has ever happened in movies. I have never seen the experiences of my own life as a person with a huge extended family and a child of divorce with multiple extended new second families and step families. I've never seen that experience rendered so deeply, profoundly, humorously,

and oddly in the way that only Long Island can be odd, or though maybe New Jersey as well, as this movie does. Miller's Place is a place on Long Island. Miller's Point is not, but it is very clearly a stand-in. Tyler, the filmmaker, is from Long Island, and you can fucking tell because he's got the beats down. He's got a very interesting kind of roving camera filmmaking style. You can see definitely some Robert Altman influence in the way that he sets up sequences. You can see like a very sincere but also subtly sarcastic aspect to this. This movie is streaming right now on amc plus if you are a subscriber to that service which i think is incredibly underrated because you get

amc and you get shutter and you get ifc all in a bundle not bad um it's also on vod if you're not a subscriber to amc plus uh it's just about one night at a family christmas party on christmas eve um and that's the whole thing. And then like the teenagers who are hanging out there and maybe some of the things they do. Very simple, very straightforward, but a very beautiful

and fun movie that I encourage people to check out. My next pick is a movie that I have used as a punchline for Amanda a few times, but that I am sincerely

recommending here. It's called Hundreds of Beavers. It's a lot of beavers. It's a lot. There are hundreds of them. You may have heard of this movie. It's a lot of beavers. It's a lot. There are hundreds of them. You may have heard of this movie. It's finally available to stream on Tubi, the greatest streaming service, as we all know. It's directed by Mike Cheslick. It's written by Cheslick and Ryland Brixen-Cole-Tews. He's also the star of this movie. The logline of this movie, I don't

think does its service. The logline is, a drunken Applejack salesman must go from zero to hero and become North America's greatest fur trapper by defeating hundreds of beavers. So that makes it sound like it's a prequel to The Revenant, and that's not at all what this movie is. This movie is like, it's Buster Keaton meets Jackass meets a Roadrunner and Wile E. Coyote cartoon. It is pure slapstick Marx Brothers, silent film, Ralph Bakshi animation,

all kinds of crazy, wild, persistent, durational comedy gags. Every time you think that they have topped the best possible gag they could pull off with these beavers in giant suits, they go to the next level. Extremely funny, extremely fun. I never got a chance

to see this movie in a movie theater. I've been told this is the absolute best way to see it. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to do so. But even at home,

I really, really loved it. And give it a try. It's like, maybe this is the product of having seen 300 new movies, but something that is this different and this creative, I think is the product of having seen 300 new movies, but something that is this different and this creative,

I think is worth recommending. I saw they did, like, I didn't see it yet, but I saw last week that they, I think they did like a physical release of it on Blu-ray via Vinegar Syndrome

and it like blew it up. It blew it, sold out like within minutes, I think, which was kind of a cool thing to see. I didn't, I didn't know that it sold out that's very cool I did see the

vinegar syndrome distributed it and I'm not surprised there's a cult around this movie it's a very strong cult and a worthy cult in many ways my third film is one I just saw last

night that I had been recommended to me by a number of people that I don't want to say too much about because I think people should watch it for themselves but the movie is called Femme

it's directed by Sam H. Freeman and Eng Chun Ping and it's an adaptation of their short film of the same name which is about a drag performer who is attacked after a performance in a convenience store and

Jules the performer finds a way to make a connection with the man who attacked him and the movie becomes a kind of sustained thriller from that point forward really really interesting movie about sex power and abuse and a very modern movie a very a nice companion i would say to red rooms the uh the film that i think i talked with chris about in october but then adam had it as his number one movie of the year i know cr has since seen it and he's loved it too and i think red rooms we're going to look back in 10 years and be like red rooms is one of the most significant movies this

movie actually has a lot thematically and uhurally in common. So check out Femme. That's streaming on Hulu right now. I mentioned The Remarkable Life of Vibolin, which is on Netflix. It's one of the shortlisted documentaries. It's directed by Benjamin Rhee, who made a movie in 2020 called The Painter and the Thief. I love this movie out of Sundance. I've now, my father-in-law, God bless him. He texted me two weeks ago. He has not. I think he's texted me twice this year. He's not a big texter. He's a little bit older. But he texted me out of nowhere and he just said very formally, Sean, have you seen this film, The Remarkable Life of Ibelin? If so, I would love to just hear what you thought of it, which was just a very generous text to receive my father-in-law was a wonderful man um and uh i realized that i just hadn't spent any time talking about it since

sundance but it's about a kid named matt steen who was born with muscular dystrophy and near the end of his life and he died very young and i'm not spoiling anything to say that because it's revealed very early in the film he started keeping a blog about his experiences in his life and his experiences with World of Warcraft, the video game, which became a portal to a new kind of existence for him, not just to, you know, what you could describe in a cliche way, escaping whatever it was that he was enduring on a day-to-day basis, but more so to build a community for himself. And he made this incredible world of friends and connections, emotional, deep emotional connections to people inside of World of Warcraft. And it's very common

to make fun of gamers and to identify gaming as a toxic kind of lifestyle. We just saw in Anora that there's a gamer bro in that movie who does not have the best perspective on life or know how to treat women but this is an amazing document about what art and the way in which you can kind of repel yourself deep into your own interests can sometimes help you find community and meaning in your life. And I think this is a really powerful and sincere and deep movie. And also tremendously creative when you see the way that the filmmakers use World of Warcraft to tell Matt's story in the second half. So, you know, this movie won't be for everybody,

but I think it deserves even more love than it's getting. And it's not the kind of movie that's going to top the Netflix charts. It's a smaller film, but it's really, really beautiful. So check out The Remarkable Life of Ibelin if you haven't had a chance to see it. And then my fifth one is a little bit of a grungy recommendation, but I saw that it hit Hulu and I liked it a little bit. And so I want to give it a quick shout out. It's called What You Wish For. This is definitely the most genre focused movie I'm talking about here right now. It's written and directed by a guy named Nicholas Tomne. It stars Nick Stahl, who was a big star in the late nineties and two thousands. You may remember

him from movies like In the Bedroom. He hasn't been in a lot of movies in the last 10 years. I know he's had some personal problems over that time, but he's always an actor who I was always drawn to. And this movie, which is really interesting, it's about a chef who's really down on his luck. And he goes to visit an old friend in an exotic locale who's working as a chef. And some things happen and this friend that Nick Stahl plays has to fill in for his friend in the role as a chef and things kind of unravel from there in an intriguing way this is just like a darn good episode of the twilight zone stretched over 87 minutes so I would check out what you wish for if you like a kind of grim and grimy crime what's it of some kind a couple vulnerable mentions for you i did mention soundtrack to okudeta which is on the

documentary short list and i talked about it on our top five movies of the year episode i don't need to go into too much depth about this film anymore but i want to underline it because in a just world it would be seen by millions of people. And it is a fascinating evolution of documentary filmmaking and blending of music and text and storytelling. And I don't want to say conspiracy theorizing, because that undermines the narrative that it's trying to share. But I think exploring alternative histories is maybe a safer way to describe it about the relationship between America and Africa in the 1960s.

I got to give some more love to A Different Man, which I never had the chance to actually have a discussion about on the podcast, even though I interviewed Sebastian Stan, who's one of the stars in the movie. This is a movie that's actually doing a little bit better in the awards race than I was expecting it to. It's a very dark comedy about an aspiring actor who was born with a condition that makes his face appear as though it is disfigured, and he undergoes a radical surgery to look different and more like he wants to look. And he achieves some success in his life after that happens,

but realizes that nothing has really changed inside of him. And he then encounters a man who resembles the man he used to resemble, and it throws him into a wild discombobulation emotionally. Great, great, great movie. Stan, Renata Rensby, and Adam Pearson. This is definitely going to end up probably in my top 20 or so. We didn't talk about Janet Planet. I mentioned it coming out of Telluride in 2023.

Very quickly, Annie Baker's new movie, or first film, I should say, the playwright whose work I've loved over the years stars Julianne Nicholson and Zoe Ziegler as a mother and a daughter living in Vermont I think in the late 90s and someone who's watched a mother

and a daughter have like a profoundly complicated and deep connection this movie gets that very very very very right and if you've ever been interested in that kind of relationship perhaps this movie gets that very very very very right and uh if you've ever been interested in that kind of relationship perhaps this movie will speak to you it is very quiet and uh slow moving film be be warned i suppose but um it's on max right now if you're interested and then last but not least is uh is the devil's, which is extremely grim.

There's no other way to say it. I think Tracy Letts mentioned this on the show last week. It's directed by Veronica Franz and Severin Fiala. I finally got around to it. It's streaming on Shudder right now. It is based on a book called Suicide by Proxy in Early Germany, colon crime, sin, and salvation. It's about communities in Germany and Austria

in hundreds of years ago who could not be saved if they were to commit suicide. And so they found other ways to find salvation. This movie is not for the faint of heart. It is deeply, deeply upsetting. And it's not a horror movie per se,

but it is a very piercing portrait of what happens when things come apart in your mind, especially from a female perspective. It's very much about women in these communities in Germany and Austria. It's reductive to say this movie's fucked up, but it is fucked up. And I enjoyed it. So please check it out. It's called The Devil's Bath. Okay, let's go to slightly lighter fare by chatting up here with Chris Ryan.

We're talking about the first of the Ringer All-Stars' underseen, underappreciated, misunderstood works of cinematic art this year. But we're talking about a more recent film. This may turn out to be one of the most watched movies of 2024 for all we know. Is this number one on Netflix already? It is. It was number one within one day, which is pretty remarkable and tells you a lot about at least what the Netflix audience wants. What's the movie you picked?

We're doing Carry On, Jaume Colissera's new film. Did I pronounce that right? So I know someone who's worked with him and he calls him Jaume. Oh, okay. Jauma. Which is news to me because I once interviewed the man and I called him Yaum through the entire interview and he did not correct me. So we got three different pronunciations in 30 seconds. Can we call him JCS? JCS is great. Yeah. Okay.

Who is JCS for the listeners who don't know and haven't been following our work together for the last seven or eight years? We've done a lot of pods about garbage genres. JCS is the prince of all of them. Like, if you had given him garbage sci-fi, garbage espionage, anything, he could do it. He makes the best B-movies. He's the best B-movie director in the world right now, I think. I fully agree with you.

But he has been in a bit of a... He was in the wilderness. A rock-shaped, the rock-shaped oblivion for a couple of years there, where his last couple of films are Black Adam, the DC Universe film that nearly broke me on this show, and may have broken the superhero trend. And previous to that was Jungle Cruise,

a Disney adaptation of a ride that appears in their parks. And that was The Rock and Emily Blunt. The Rock and Emily Blunt. Right. Prior to that, though, he was on an incredible streak. Should we just go through some of the highlights? Please. He goes pro in 05 with House of Wax, which is actually underrated.

Agreed. And is a pretty good... Is that Cuthbert? Is that Elisha Cuthbert in that one? Yes, and Paris Hilton. Incredible performance. 2009, you see what many still consider his best film, which is Orphan. But I get really down when he gets into

Liam Neeson. Unknown non-stop run all night. Just some incredible like, man with a gun thrillers. And The Shallows is a personal project of mine.

It's just an incredible shark attack movie. That's with Blake Lively. It is. And the bird in that movie is named Steven Seagull. Intriguing. I've talked about this before in that movie is named Steven Seagull. Intriguing. I've talked about this before.

I've talked about Steven Seagull. More Liam Neeson with The Commuter, then this Wandering into the Wilderness with The Rock, Jungle Cruise, and Black Adam, and then he's back with Carry On. So Carry On is a film set at an airport in Los Angeles, LAX, at Christmas time. Yes.

There are elements of the film Die Hard. Yes. There are elements of the film Die Hard. Yes. There are elements of the film Die Hard to Die Harder. There are elements of the film Phone Booth, a movie I enjoy, a Joel Schumacher, Colin Farrell movie. It is a little bit of speed. There are elements of the podcast Smartless. Yes.

It's about walking around an airport listening to Jason Bateman in your AirPod. That is absolutely true. There's a bunch of other movies that are like this. I thought of Nick of Time. Remember Nick of Time with Johnny Depp

and Christopher Walken? He's sort of like the man with the all-seeing eye can see you and he needs you to do things otherwise someone that you care about will become injured or killed.

Yes. And in this case, Taron Egerton plays a young TSA agent. Yeah, a little bit of like a slacker yeah kind of a fail son her late 20s

early 30s yeah he's followed his girlfriend Nora out to California they've both gotten jobs at the the airport

she's an operations manager for Northwinds absolutely thinking maybe that's like kind of like an Alaska kind of sure

what's the salary there she pushing I think she probably does like 85 with really good bennies. Do you think she picks up the check at dinner? Well, that's an issue for them. Yeah.

Cause she's preggo with his ego. Yeah. And he's got to get his shit together and really like apply himself. The problem is, is that what he really wants to be as a cop, but he failed the police academy entrance exam or whatever. He got rejected by the Los Angeles Police Department. They rejected Taron Egerton.

Okay. You make it sound like that is not a hallowed institution. I was just noting that he failed. Have you ever taken a cop test? No, I thought about it just to see, but I think I have mentioned before that I would like to be jumped straight to homicide. Like I would want to go straight to major homicide. Like, I would want to go

straight to major crimes. Yeah, yeah. You have kind of a Kyle Secor from Homicide vibe, actually. I think you'd fit right in. Yeah, so the premise for this movie is essentially this is like a

kind of go-nowhere TSA agent who's trying to, like, make a New Year's kind of push to, like, get his shit together. Gets himself put on, like, a pretty prominent shift analyzing bags as they go through the security check at LAX.

And after one tray goes through, there's a leftover earpiece. He puts the earpiece in, and who's talking to him but Jason Bateman. Incredible. Jason Bateman, who is like, if you don't do what I tell you to do, Nora, your girlfriend, is going to die.

And so most of the film is taken up of this kind of pantomime where Bateman is directing his actions. He's got to, you know, basically at one point he's going to have to let a bag go through that he shouldn't. And, you know, as a viewer, I was watching and I was like, I'm sure this is going to be like a twist with the

bag where it can't be that dark. Or maybe Jason Bateman will be like Alan Rickman where he's like, I'm not a terrorist. I just think I'm just a robber, but he's a terrorist. And it is turned out to be very dangerous Russian nerve gas that is being put on a plane with a congresswoman. His end goals, though, are still entirely financial in nature. Well, yeah, he's a facilitator. Yeah. You know, he's apolitical. And what do you think about his work? Is it something that would appeal to you as a potential third career?

As a JCS movie goes, there was a lot about Aleppo in this film that I did not expect to be considering. There was. Would you think of this as a work of political art? Not really. Okay. Um, I thought it was like very entertaining, but clearly almost shot in three discrete chunks. And there was like the days they had Bateman, VO, and also on set.

There was all the Terran stuff in the fake LAX. And then there is the investigation into what is happening, being led by one of our great actors, Daniel Deadweiler. This is my favorite part of the movie. At one point in this movie, he has to get out of a car and say, what do you got, detective?

And I'm like, that's Daniel Deadweiler. It does feel like active winking self-parody. The same way that The Shallows felt like it was inhaling, ingesting the entire history of shark movies. And they're just kind of like burping it out a little bit.

You know, just be like, I know, this is a little bit. You know, just be like, I know. Like, this is a little bit of a gentle nod, gastrointestinal nod to this thing. And, you know, these kinds of movies, frankly, powered Hollywood between 1987 and 1998. We don't really get very many movies like this anymore. I think it's very fun to have it.

A little bit of a rickety script on this one, I would say. Yeah. The Colette Sarah filmmaking style is still just incredibly kinetic and fun and engaging. So can we talk about one of the best car crashes I've seen in the movies in like 10 years? This is the best scene in the movie. Actually, I know somebody who worked on it and I emailed them. And the minute I finished watching it, I was like, that fucking rocks. Was that Logan Marshall Green?

It was not. I wish I knew that man for his work in Prometheus and now this. There is a car crash scene without giving anything really away about the movie that is breathtaking and is like so fake. It's beyond fake to real back to fake, but is the kind of kinetic thing that he's capable of that he envisions. I wish there was like two more things like that in this movie. I agree with you.

The rest of it is kind of like, I'm running and now I'm going to punch you. And but I got shot, but I can run. Yeah, it's largely a chase movie. The car crash, though, is incredible. How did you think it stacked up to the car crash in Smile 2? Because they're very similar and they're shot very similarly, which is it has this sort of oscillating camera style on full people. Smile 2 gets points taken off for not also having a gunfight during the car crash.

Where are you at with Logan Marshall Green at this point? Have you held your stock? The stock is still there. What's he been up to? Has he gone into television? First of all,

he has a totally different head of hair in this film. Well, he shaved his beard. Okay. That's like his calling card is kind of his invitation beard. And I think he has facial hair in Prometheus

before he gets deformed. So in 2018 he appears in he's the star of Lee Whannell's Upgrade yeah that's right I was like this guy is

is Lance Henriksen 2.0 he's Scott Glenn 2.0 yes he's like gonna be awesome as like the lead of many good genre movies

but never become like the super duper star that we need should we just start comparing guys to like that's Jean Paul Belmondo today and it's like that's like do we not do that it's honestlyper star that we need. Just start comparing guys to like, that's Jean-Paul Belmondo today. And it's like, that's like-

Do we not do that? It's honestly more often that we're like, that's Walt Clyde Frazier, but in a JCS movie. Since then, he's been in a film called Adopt a Highway. Which he directed. And I saw it by Southwest and it was good. He was in How It Ends, Intrusion, Redeeming Love, The Listener, Lou, and Reverse the Curse.

Which of those is your favorite in the last seven years for Logan Marshall Green? I gotta admit, those are seven movies that look like they're the in-development movies on someone's IMDb.

Tough. I don't remember those coming. Are you up on the TV series Big Sky? Yes. There was one season of this show created by David E. Kelly.

Yeah, it's basically network TV into Yellowstone. He is 14th on the list here of actors on this series. It's not about the call sheet. It's about your contribution. Okay. I want better things for him, but he's great. Nice to see his face pop up in this movie.

Pretty solid. I enjoyed myself. For Netflix? Also, I got to say, man, I was just talking about this with Greenwald on the 10 best episodes list of TV on the watch about where TV is at as far as a thing that you'll reliably at a social occasion, people will be like, we've all watched the exact same show at the exact same time.

Everybody at Saturday night holiday parties this weekend was like, I have already watched Carry On. Yes. This was a notably horrendous release weekend in theaters obviously

Craven down bad Craven was horrible the Lord of the Rings animated movie was a big nothing and so there was I think there was a hunger

for something like this and it's also you know people are shopping and they got parties and they're tired they don't have time to make four hours for the movies

this is perfect perfect between this and Rebel Ridge did Netflix release the two best thrillers of 2024? Yes.

I mean, you know, this isn't Red Rooms. It's not like a psychological exploration of perversity. Yeah, it's not Strange Darlings where I'm like,

wow, we've been introduced to a new auteur. But this kind of movie, which we like, which we talk about on the rewatchables all the time. Yeah.

Good job by them. Dump You, Mary, Dump You, Mary movie in December. Chris, where can we hear you? On the watch. Okay. On job by them. Dumpy Wary movie in December. Chris, where can we hear you? On The Watch. Okay. On The Big Picture.

On the Timothy Chalamet episode with Thea Vaughn that just came out. Interesting. What were you providing on that ep? Political context. Thank you.

Really appreciate that. That's CR. Mallory Rubin is here back on the show. You've been, you've been an avid participant in the big picture in the last four weeks. How are you feeling? Uh, spoiled.

And like, I'm going to go through withdrawal when Dobbins comes back and you don't need me anymore. What do you mean? I always need you. You're an essential part of my life. Don't say that. Thanks buddy.

That's really nice. Uh, it's been genuinely fun for me to have so many opportunities to talk to you about the movies and also the Mets. The Mets are doing great. Yeah, the Mets are doing great. We have a very fun episode upcoming about the film A Complete Unknown. But as a tease, I wanted you to come in and talk about cinema one more time. We're talking about underappreciated underseen under whatever movies of the year and speaking of things that are essential to your life you you are a cat person

you are the cat person i love cats i love my cat i was hoping given the subject matter of today's segment that halo the most important person in my life who is my cat to be clear uh would join me he was in here four and a half minutes ago and then he went and sat on a really warm pile of laundry that Adam took out of the dryer. And then I had to shut the door for sound buffering. And so he is not here. But he's here with me in spirit, as always. So the film that, I don't know, we have chosen, you have chosen, you were interested in seeing this movie and you did the real work of going out to the cinema to see the film. What is the movie?

What did you pick? Flo. Okay, what is Flo? This is an 85-minute animated film about a cat and his animal companions who go on the adventure of a lifetime after a flood decimates their home. It is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen in my entire life. And I have still not recovered from seeing this movie, which I did last night in, because I know this is underseen slash underappreciated. And so I just want to note that I am going to go on the underseen lane here because this is not an underappreciated movie.

Everyone who has seen this movie, I think, agrees that it is a masterpiece, right? An absolute classic. It's amassing awards, amassing hardware. The lemur in the movie would then collect the hardware and play with it if he got the opportunity. But I think we both really were excited to just encourage anybody who loves movies to see this film if they get the chance. It's on very few screens. When I looked for showtimes to see it, I was

pretty limited in my options. And we live in Los Angeles, right? So I don't know how easy it will be for people elsewhere to go see the movie. But definitely, it was like playing in a few spots every day. And I went to see this last night. The theater was sold out. Every single seat was full. Yeah. And it was amazing.

And let me tell you something. Every single person there was an adult. Every person. There was not one child. I'm sure children would love it. I would probably not emotionally recover if I saw this as a child. I'm not sure I will emotionally recover from having seen it as an adult. But yeah, you know, the trailers were all for like Sonic 3 and Dogman, etc.

Yeah, I just bought some Dogman gear for my nephew Jack, actually, for Christmas. Hope he's not listening to this episode. He's six, so he's definitely not listening, I hope. I'm not familiar with the Dogman IP, but after seeing the trailer once, I did have some thoughts on if you were going to create a mashup

of a dog and a man. Is that the half of each you'd use? I don't know. The head and the hands? Yeah, well, yeah. I think I'll just save my full commentary

until I get to consume the entire experience. Well, next time you come back on the show for the Dogman episode, of course. Yeah, okay. Top five dogs. So, Sean, Flo was the on the show for the dog man episode, of course. Yeah, okay. Top five dogs.

So Sean, Flo was the masterpiece. I loved it. I thought it was honestly like just awe-inspiring. What did you think of Flo? Yeah, I saw it last week and as soon as I saw it, I was like, this is the most Mal movie that's ever existed.

So I'm really happy to hear that you wanted to go see it and loved it so much. It comes from a filmmaker named Glintz Zibalotis, who is a Latvian filmmaker. As you said, this movie has been hugely critically acclaimed.

It's won a bunch of Best Animated Feature Critics Prizes in the last couple months. It was just added to the shortlist for the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature.

I'll be shocked if it's not nominated for Best Animated Feature. I think it's probably the stiffest competition for the Wild Robot for Best Animated Feature this year. Yeah. As you said, it's probably the stiffest competition for the wild robot for best animated feature this year yeah as you said it's very brief very beautiful it uses a very interesting computer animation technology the style of animation there's an almost surreal

quality where it feels like one part um the flying toaster screensver you know this sort of like false 3d and the sense that there's also like a human creating it it doesn't feel like ai animation or anything like that it's not it has rough edges it's not sanded down and smooth the way your classic pixar computer generated animation might be so it looks and feels different and then the other thing is there's there's incredible attention paid to, and you can speak to this as a cat lover and cat partner. This is how animals move. Yeah.

Oh, yeah. And it is like zoologically accurate in a way that is very immersive in the story, despite the fact that there is no dialogue in this movie whatsoever. Not a word. So that may be a challenge for some. I'm very curious to show this to my daughter and see if she will respond. A movie with no dialogue, this would be our entry point

into silent cinema ultimately. But I really liked it. I think it's excellent and beautiful. And usually when a movie like this comes out, it's a little like overrated. And I think this one is properly rated. It's damn good.

Oh yeah. So on the animation style front, I thought this was i mean even just watching the trailer you get a pretty good feel for that blend of styles that you're highlighting but i thought this was just absolutely sublime like really really really exquisite and that contrast between the way that the creatures the critters are heroes our characters are rendered and the environments around them when the northern lights kick in i mean it's astonishing but like the water right this isn't again the flood is the

impetus for the story right and they the water is quite literally care carrying cat and uh his fellows through this this journey of not only self-preservation, but discovery, like learning to rely on each other, learning to trust each other, learning to take new chances, try new things, gain comfort with things that previously felt threatening or unfamiliar. There are a lot of lessons to take from Flo. Water is so famously, infamously hard to convey in animated films, in video games, right? Anything. And it was so beautiful. It was just so beautiful.

The way the light played on the water, the way that the water serves as both a literal and a metaphorical source of reflection and consideration. The way that that cat routinely finds himself in the water, whether that is a moment of dire peril or a moment of newfound confidence to fish. Like, if it doesn't look as good as it does, then it's just not going to be as immersive of a setting, primary setting for the film. But it is. The other primary setting, of course, is this boat, right, that our creatures are traveling along. And you said, like, silent.

But I would say this is not a silent movie. It's just a movie without words. Right. It is full of language. It's the language of how animals communicate with each other. And this is going to make me sound insane, but I think you invited me here to talk about the movie knowing that things like this would happen. That was one of the things I genuinely found like breathtaking about it. Wars and the most successful droids saying something like, well, it's not just a beep and a boop, right? It reminds me of the way that I feel like I can carry on complete, fully realized conversations with my cat Halo that are frankly often more satisfying than conversations I can have with other people. Super normal thing to say out loud on a podcast. There are no human words uttered, but there don't need to be.

Like the way that we are able to understand what Kat is contemplating and confronting, the way that we are able to watch the bonds develop between the characters, navigate threats and uncertainty was incredible. And like, they have chasms between them that they need to learn to bridge. And so like, we as the audience come to learn how to communicate with them as they learn to communicate with each other in a way that really I thought was like exceptionally presented to us, which is very compelling to watch. And then the other thing, and like, so the filmmakers like used, I was just reading about this, actual animal sounds, and like, so the filmmakers like used, I was just reading about this, actual animal sounds, right? Like these aren't, again,

computers. They have microphone recordings of cats meowing and like, you can really tell. But the sound beyond that was, I thought, so riveting and how it pulled you deep into the world. The rustling of the leaves that makes the hair stand up on the back of the animals and makes our hearts start to race. We know something terrible is about to happen. The pounding of the hooves, right? Oh God, the threat is mounting. What is about to unfold? And even though you know because you've seen the trailer and you know what the movie is about, your terror just spikes. the surge of the waves like the sound the whale makes when he crests the edge of the water my single favorite sound treatment in the entire

film without question is the sound of cat's claws every time he's like scrabbling along the deck of the ship or climbing up the side it's just like those little details that make it feel so fully fully brought to life. It was beautiful. I'm so glad you enjoyed it. I'm not surprised that you did. To your point about the water, I've just seen Mufasa colon The Lion King, the new film by Barry Jenkins. And these two movies, which are both about cats,

would be an interesting double feature. Because Mufasa, I felt felt was less successful than flow, even though it is rent, you know, rendered computer animation that is attempting to put us in the psychological and emotional mindset of a cat in peril.

And there are a couple of significant sequences in which a flood threatens the characters in Mufasa, which is the same inciting incident in flow and the movies are so oddly similar and there's a big conclusive meaningful moment in the water which is so hard to render as you say in mufasa just like in flow and one is one of the biggest and most important movies at the most legendary movie studio that we have and the other is just from this guy in latvia and flow is frankly a bigger and better movie um and that's just fascinating it's like an incredible example of the way that scope is not everything you know that subtle strategy and emotional insight and craft can elevate despite budget despite where the film is being made or anything else so

i think it's a pretty special little movie i uh have not seen mufasa so i can't comment on their particulars but something that strikes me listening to you make that comparison is like Mufasa is born out of a moment in time culturally where like everything is IP, everything is, could this be a spinoff or an origin story? Could we do a prequel? Could we make more? How can we mine this thing that people have loved for some time? When I was a kid, The Lion King was one of my favorite movies. It was very important to me. I went to bed with like a Simba, like stuffed animal that I held every night, right? That is born out of, and again, I haven't seen it, so I can't comment on the quality, but that is born out of this need, of course, or desire to make money and make content, of course, but also this compulsion in the streaming era and the IP content machine era to explain everything,

right? What is the origin story of Scar and Mufasa? How did they come to be at odds, etc.? Flow is the, that, the idea of explanation is anathema to the entire pursuit of flow. We never really get answers to any questions. We don't totally even know what the questions are. I won't go into too many details because I don't think we want to spoil it in an episode like this, but just broadly in terms of almost more the premise than the eventual elements of the plot that unfold, there are no people in the movie. We don't know why. Did they just evacuate because they knew that this flood was coming or has there been a prior extinction level of it is this post-apocalyptic movie i know i thought that too we don't know right we go through not we open in our our setting with a home and cat is on a bed and the window's broken and then

we see these statues and you see the piece of paper and you're like, well, that seems pretty recent. How long would a piece of paper or drawing sit there? But then when Kat is scaling the statues, they're like covered in moss. So you have the ability to let your mind run free, wondering, and you don't know. I will not explain specifically what this sequence is, but there is a moment about three quarters of the way through the film, maybe even a little further, where something that I can only describe as supernatural and almost religious happens, like a mystical event, right? But is it? There could be a different reading of that entirely and a different explanation of that entirely. And the movie is really not interested in trying to ensure that you leave it with one reading.

It's there for you to take in and consider and think about the nature of like life and experience and connection. And that's pretty rare these days, actually, in the stories that we get. So I found that to be so, my compulsion is to like leave and think about lore and references and the coaching tree of pop culture connections that lead to a thing. And I was like, oh, well, what would I Google X, Y, and Z? And I'm like, I don't know. I just kind of want to like luxuriate in the feeling of thinking about how amazing that was. And so that was one of the things that I really loved most about it. It was also so stressful, though. Like, I thought it was beautiful and very actually uplifting and affirming and gave me a lot to think about.

But my heart was racing the entire time. And I was anxious, anxious and concerned to see these characters who I had fallen in love with so quickly, Kat most of all, in constant peril. Like, I was sitting next to a person I did not know. and I almost turned to him and said, can I hold your hand? Now, I managed not to, and I was proud that I was able to exercise that level of restraint. But like, boy, when I got home after, I was still feeling the anxiety of what I had just witnessed. And so, I think that's really like, it's a testament to the film's impact as well, that it made me feel so keenly in such a short span of time. Just genuinely impressive.

It's a great recommendation and a very eloquent, emotional clarification on how it impacted you. I'm really not surprised, but I'm very happy that you dug it. And I'm glad it pulls you out of the mire of fandom for a brief moment before you had to return to the trenches. I love fandom as well. I just did a pod on Craven. Craven and Flo back to back, you know, two of the great installments.

The 2024 cinematic landscape. Two great cats. Right? There you go. Mallory Rubin, thank you so much. Thank you. Okay, we're here with Charles Holmes. Yo, what's going on? Midnight Boy par excellence. What else are you? How else do you define yourself these days? You're a cinephile? A cineist? Whoa, whoa, whoa. The LA film bros have fucking gotten to me. They wrap their arms

around you. You're a brutal boy? Bro, I got my tickets. 70. When are you going? 21st. I cannot wait. I'm very happy for you. Where are you going? What theater? CityWalk? Where is it playing?

I forget. It was America, Ameritech? What? Cinema Tech? Oh, American Cinema Tech. America Cinema Tech. I think I'm going there.

That's going to be my first time going there. Oh, good for you. I'm very, very excited. I'm getting into the rep screenings. You know what I'm going there. That's going to be my first time going there. Oh, good for you. I'm very, very excited. I'm getting into the rep screenings. You know what I'm saying? Chris Ryan is not going to be happy to hear this, but my TV watching has plummeted this year. Yeah, it's garbage.

I just throw like a movie on in the morning, at night. And I feel so just the high I get from finishing just a movie and bathing in it is so rewarding. And then the feeling that I have after I watch like I spent eight hours on a TV show. I'm just like, I'm going to die one day. And I just finished The Penguin. You're buttering me up like a toasted bagel right now. This is just incredible stuff.

We got them. I feel like Donald Rumsfeld right now, you know? But also, I will say, I'm 32 now, and I do think that this is the age where I'm just like, I had a summer being a slut out here, and I'm just like, I feel way better just parking my ass in a fucking movie theater, getting a popcorn, subpoena M&Ms, a beer.

Can I tell you something? I'm having a huge comeback with popcorn. I was out on popcorn for like a decade and I've now had popcorn three consecutive movie-going experiences.

First of all, I'm really, I'm pretty much focusing on sweet popcorn now. Sweet? So caramel popcorn, obviously you can find that in your local AMC.

But I got, I got, I got put onto churro popcorn at the Alamo, which is fire for all of you out there. I, you know, Alamo it's up and down. It's not always a great experience. Sometimes it's good. Sometimes it's not churro popcorn is money. I'm just, I need to say that somewhere. But here's the thing. I churro popcorn sounds amazing, but I think it robs of the experience where I like, I like the salty. I like I like the salty and then I like the sweet

if I'm getting all the sweet just in one package I feel like I'm kind of robbing myself so you like to have a popcorn and a candy yeah and I don't like to dump everybody does the dump

I'm just like I'm gonna have some popcorn I'm gonna have and I heard you talking here's the thing now that I'm going to these rep screenings I'm a lot more

conscientious I'm like well fuck I'm finishing this popcorn before this shit starts. I don't want the chewing. We're all here. It's like having a meal before the movie.

Yes. You know, it's like you went out to dinner, but it's just a bag of popcorn. Like, that's the movie. We don't want to disrupt everyone's movie watching experience. I will say, HR does not need to hear about this. My first vidiots experience was with my manager, my beloved Justin Sales. Can you guess what we saw with him and his partner? I don't even want to guess.

What was it? Ito Mama Tambien. Tambien, yes. Amazing experience. I'm like, I'm sitting next to Justin. So two men and one woman watched Ito Mama Tambien together. Interesting. Yes.

Very cool. And then my high was blown because we got vegan food next door and we're like oh what are they playing on the tv and it was the fucking tyson paul fight and i was just like wow i went from seeing one of the greatest uh masterpieces ever to uh the end of uh something artistic that is that is brutal well okay so i've asked you here to tell me about a movie now you this is not a movie that you picked that came out in a movie theater. This is a streaming film for us in the United States. What movie did you pick?

The Shadow Strays. Speak on it. All right. Directed by Timo... Jejanto. Jejanto. Sorry, I didn't want to butcher his name. Indonesian filmmaker.

Indonesian filmmaker. And I think something that I grew up on weirdly was uh martial arts films my uh my uncle is very very into martial arts tai chi you know there was a summer where it was like when I say like into it like his hands like he could kill you with his hands like yeah one time I did this training where we would go out into the woods I'm like oh what did you go out into the woods he's like we scratched tree bark and I'm like what do you mean you scratched tree bark and he's just like yeah it's a training thing where you like you just take the tree barks and not like you look at his hands so he was trying to teach me martial arts your uncle was wolverine basically and and

what he would do like one of the treats we would have after he would like make us bike for like five miles and like sweep the boardwalk like fucking mr miyagi is we would go back to his like house and it would be like shaw brothers movies or it'd be like martial arts movies like all right now watch this and the shadow strays like itched that for me like every couple like weeks or months i just go to a martial arts movie just like feel like that warmth again and this is not a perfect movie. I think this filmmaker tends to be a little bit bloated. But the action in this is fucking incredible. So this movie came out

somewhat quietly in the fall. Yes. I think if you're a martial arts head, a hardcore action head, you're aware of it. Timo has made several films in Indonesia and in Asia.

He probably is best known in the US for his installments in the VHS series. There's one in particular in VHS 2 that is absolutely amazing and that I loved so much

that I wrote about it as like a standalone piece for Grantland, I want to say in 2014. It's really, really great. The name of it is escaping me right now, but it's in VHS too. It's by far the best segment in that film.

But he's this, he like really bridges the gap between horror and martial arts filmmaker. And he has like a very visceral filmmaking style and is very comfortably situated, I think in like the John Wick era of action movie making. Would you agree with that?

Well, I also think he is like that next generation of, because like a lot of the same actors, like for something American audiences know The Raid, like he is the kind of the next generation of that. He's worked with Iko Ues from those movies and his other films. And he said something kind of interesting in a lot of his interviews with The Shadow Strays, and this is why I like him so much as a director, is I think that so much of American action has kind of been neutered just by the superhero of

it all where timo is like i want you to feel the violence in my movie when someone gets stabbed in his like he's not doing that thing where the camera's panning away it's like when someone is shot if someone gets their arm cut off it lingers and it's like he has a type of movies where I'm like sometimes I'm like oh I'm glad this movie is almost over

and then I check and we still have an hour left just because I'm like the whole time I'm like what's gonna cause the action

is just so heavy it's like it is the theater of escalation throughout the whole movie but like in the first five minutes of this movie there is

like a raid on, I guess it's almost like a Japanese community and a guy gets his head cut off. He gets decapitated and the head like hangs from the back of the neck and he stays standing for like 30 seconds and the camera lingers on the head wound and the open neck.

And that's what I say when I say it's action and it's horror because there's a real interest in the bodily destruction that goes into action filmmaking. This is a really cool movie. It's way too long. Way too long. It's two and a half hours, and it feels it when you're watching it.

But the sequences are each crazier than the next and done really really like if you like this kind of thing it is excellent yeah so this is a perfect 3.5 movie for me and that's not shade at like this is like actually my favorite martial arts movies tend to kind of like get into that zone where I'm like, this is a movie about the sequences. There is one, I think it's the best of the entire film where our main character, 13, she's an assassin and they're on the second floor of a club.

And she basically is like beating up this jobber and the camera follows them as they fall out of the window. And I'm just like, it was that meme where i was like wait what and i like i was like what happened and i think even though this movie is there's a lot of that there it's way too long there are so many of those little moments as like a martial arts head as an action fan where i just want to see more from this filmmaker I think this is a second Netflix film after I think the other one was uh The Night Comes I think it comes at night is that

what it's called yeah one of those movies that is an amazing movie as well and that was made before this and you can even tell just how much he's grown just from that in terms of just like staging everything that's another fantastic movie it was the night comes for us the night comes for us and I just I want to he's directing nobody to with Odin Kirk next I want more American directors

to have this feeling in their action movies where it does not always have to be this intense it doesn't have to be that bloody but you don't need a bunch of fucking CGI bullshit sometimes it is just two or three people hand to hand and just being like what can I show them that It doesn't have to be that bloody, but you don't need a bunch of fucking CGI bullshit. Sometimes it is just two or three people hand to hand and just being like, what can I show them that is just going to... I think he has a really good handle

on blending the digital and CGI filmmaking styles for the right set pieces without an over-reliance on it and doing a lot of practical stuff. But the other thing that I think about when I watch his movies is this is a guy who was raised on first-person shooters. Like video games are an intrinsic part of his movie-making experience. I don't remember, are you a gamer? Do you play

video games? I do play video games, but I'm not button mash level. Okay. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Because I feel like if you really, if you are, if you were raised on first-person shooters, not that every shot in his movies is first-person POV, but that sensation that you get, that sort of like rattle and shake and move when you get impact on a sequence, it really fits there. It's a great recommendation. I feel like this movie was completely unremarked upon

on this show all year, so it's a great pick. You had a couple of others that were on your list. Yeah, I just wanted to do some like honorable mentions. I've honestly talked about, I've written about it, just a blurb. I've talked about it on a blurb I've talked about on ringerverse weirdly but one of them was rap world came out of nowhere uh most famous person in it connor o'malley how would you even describe this this movie um it's like a found footage

horror movie for white kids who are into rap in 2008 uh yes like you, you know, i.e. me. It's like about a bunch of suburban guys who are aspiring rappers in Toby Hanna in Pennsylvania. It's an hour long. It's free. You can go watch it.

It's on YouTube. On YouTube. And for the first five minutes, I'm like, what the fuck is this? I'm about to turn this shit off. And it weirdly does a thing. Both of us are recovering

music journalists. I think most movies about music are honestly terrible. And I think this one weirdly felt so accurate to what it felt like to be in high school at this moment. This type of like, I knew the white boys who are way too into rap, who think that they are going to be the next sensation. The jokes are incredible.

And it's like, they, the bit at first is annoying. Like, they can't sustain this bit for an hour. And then I don't know what happened. Like, 10 minutes, 15 minutes into the movie, I'm like, okay, this bit is incredible. It's the same thing with every Conor Malley piece. Every YouTube short, every bit, every talk show appearance. There's an unbelievable talk show appearance on,

uh, on Seth Meyers that he made earlier this year. This is so great because he used to work with Seth. Um, this is true of standup solutions, the standup hour that he put out earlier this year. That's also on YouTube. This movie that he co-directed with Danny Schirar is it.

And the first 10 minutes you're like, God, this is like hilarious, but also deeply insufferable. And then when you get into the first 10 minutes you're like god this is like hilarious but also deeply insufferable and then when you get into the second 10 minutes when it doubles down fully on the bit you're like this is the most fearless thing i've ever seen these guys are so over committed to this insanely dumb idea and they never break stride they never ever wink at the camera they never turn you and be like isn't it so funny that we're doing this? They lock in on that

very stupid idea and see it all the way through. It is like, there is a part of rap world that is eerily documentary. It's like you're watching a fucking Maisels movie about losers in high school

trying to be rappers. It feels so close and yet it is also made by a bunch of guys who are in their 30s. But I'm with you. I loved this. I shouted this out, I think, at the halfway mark of the year or something. I loved also made by a bunch of guys who are in their 30s. But I'm with you. I loved this. I shouted this out,

I think, at the halfway mark of the year or something. I loved, and even did a screening of the movie at the American Cinematheque in Los Feliz

with Connor and Danny and Harrison and a bunch of the other guys who worked on the movie. Great pick. Okay, what's your third one? And my third and last one, I don't think you've seen

this one yet, but it is Miyazaki and the Heron. Basically, pretty much for most of Miyazaki's films, come with a documentary about how it was made. And I picked this one because I think I love process films.

If you look at my Letterboxd 4, they're all process films. And this one to me was so special because you really never get to see this where you have a legendary director towards the end of his life and the entire documentary is essentially you get to see the moments when like animation luminaries are just dying left and right and you we understand Miyazaki the character as a very like curmudgeon and just very like he makes these sweet movies and he's like you're always in a bad mood and there are moments

in this movie where you just kind of see him broken you see the thing Bobby was talking about like Scorsese's gotten to this point where you're a legend but you're outliving everyone and it just touched me so profoundly it made me enjoy his last movie The Boy in the Heron

even more because you realize you're just like oh it's not that Miyazaki is a curmudgeon or he is or it's not that he's super nice it's like he feels too much like there's the funniest part of the film is he bought he there's some land this is how rich Miyazaki is he looks outside and there's some land development free he's like i'm going to buy it to set up a soccer like a soccer place where the local kids can play okay and the whole thing going throughout the movie is he buys it he builds it none of the kids want to play on it and he's just i'm just like you're making a whole fucking movie why do you care about and he keeps looking out the window like when are the kids going to and you're just like why do you care about this miyazaki you're a legend and then there's a moment in the film where the first few kids

start playing on it and you've just seen all these people die throughout the course of making this movie oh my god and just like the look on his face being like it was worth it and I was just like oh I wish I got this type of documentary for all of my favorite directors. That's amazing. And also, I don't think this is spoiling anything by saying that, but that makes it an amazing companion with the brutalist. When you see the brutalist, you'll know exactly what I mean. I'm not giving anything away. But that very idea of wanting to build something for people,

but maybe it's also for yourself. Yeah. Ties that neatly in there. Three great recommendations. Charles, thank you so much. Yo, thank you for having me. And, you know, next year, hopefully, I can be welcomed by your people.

You are already welcomed, but you will be even deeper in the club the more rep screenings you go to. Thanks, Charles. Thank you. Yossi Salik is here, making her triumphant return after a debut that will live in fummy? Infamy?

How will it live? I mean, it's not up to me to decide how I was perceived, Sean. I mean, I heard some rumblings that were positive. Rumblings where? On the internet, the interweb. Checking it out, huh? Checking out the feedback? I'll tell you what. I saw one person say that I was the Aubrey Plaza of the ringer, and all other comments died away into the background, and I don't care what anyone

else says ever again because that really put some wind in my sails. Well, as you know- I had a nice time. I love Aubrey Plaza, and I'm so happy to have you back. And if you are the Aubrey of this pod, that's very, very exciting to me. Today, I gave you really more of an assignment. Most people that came to this episode said, God, here's a movie I love that I feel like a lot of people didn't see, and I wanted to rep for it.

You know, it's on the streaming service, or it got very minor distribution. But, you know, I know you pretty well and we're about the exact same age and our tastes converge in intriguing ways. And I saw this movie, Y2K, which is co-written and directed by Kyle Mooney. And the only person I could think of was you. So can you explain what Y2K is

and maybe why you think i wanted you to see it the film or like what happened in in the turn of the new year of the year 2000 well maybe you should explain the latter to explain the former okay sure um before the clock struck midnight on january 31st 1999 there was a great panic that somehow, I mean, I might be misremembering this because again, we're around the same age. So I was like 17 or something that all of the machines would go haywire and mass chaos would ensue in society. It didn't happen. That's more or less what was suggested yeah um and then the film honestly clever premise that it is it's like a high school you know can't hardly wait slash uh american pie-esque

sort of high school it's a it's a new year's eve we're gonna make the best of it let's go out here two kind of dorky best friends you know of course in pursuit of a girl and they go to the cool new year's eve party on the eve of y2k and then it um turns into a horror film because the machines do go haywire yeah it's what if y2k actually happened and not only happened but happened in the most dramatic and violent fashion imaginable but the movie is comes from kyle mooney who most people will recognize for his work on saturday night live um one of in my opinion one of the best cast members saturday night live of the last 15 years somebody who brought like the kind of oddball sensibility in the 10 to 1 style sketches that

i always really appreciated he got his start on YouTube doing a lot of great sketch comedy. Yeah, he's so funny. He's giving Jim Brewer almost. Like in that part of the cast where they're like, oh, this guy's so weird. Yeah, yeah.

But in the coolest way. And actually his character Garrett, the video store clerk in this movie, is kind of giving a little bit of Jim Brewer in half-baked. Yeah, totally. Maybe that's why I thought of it. In my opinion, he was the best part of the movie.

His character. Yeah. So the movie is like a little rickety, right? Like it's, there's some funny parts. There's some very violent horror parts. It feels like a very loving homage at times to more like 80s sci-fi, like explorers, Goonies style

team up movies plus you know you mentioned it's like can't hardly wait and it's the cinematography is by Bill Pope

who shot the Matrix and Clueless and all the Edgar Wright movies like a legend in cinematography that's crazy yeah so he's there

for some of the cool like action set pieces but you know the movie is a little like this is a first time director and you can tell it's not bad it's not great cool action set pieces. But you know, the movie is a little like, this is a first time director and you can tell.

It's not bad. It's not great. It's very flawed. I feel like I really enjoyed the first 25%, whatever like the greatest, where they really pound in the greatest hits to remind you

what this era was like. And they, at first I was like, is this too much? And I was like, no, this is great. Do it all. Like ping, ping, ping, ping, ping, ping. Every song cue, every slang, pointing out the raver, everything. And again, we're the same age. So all of it was very familiar to me. I was like, that's on point. And I guess Kyle Mooney must be around our age too. I believe he's 41. And so this is specifically what I wanted to speak to you about.

Because when the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie came out last year called Mutant Mayhem. Do you remember this? Are you familiar with this? That didn't happen in my universe. No. In my universe, it did happen. I believe you. It happened profoundly.

It hit like a bomb. It was written by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg. Oh, man. I can't believe I missed this. Yeah, it's an animated movie. And it very much is a movie for kids. But it's a movie for kids written by a couple of guys who grew up with TMNT who were in their early 40s. As did I, as did you.

We both did. And all of the references in that movie, all of the needle drops, all of the jokes, feel like they're made for people who are in their 40s. When that movie came out, I was like, this is so crazy to be living in the time where the people who are my age now have the power

or quote unquote power to get their own dumb dreams made in Hollywood. And those dreams are just full of references to what it was like to be nine. Or in the case of Y2K,

17 in these very particular times so watching y2k i mean it is there's a you know a long list of songs that are used in the movie all of which i'm sure what hit you the hardest what hit you the hardest it's a really good question um i'll say that praise you by Fatboy Slim comes in very early in the film yes and I have to assume

that Fatboy Slim is a like a really a had to be there thing like I don't know if you're if you're 16 I don't know what you make

of Y2K because some of the jokes are so specific so specific but You've Come a Long Way Baby the Fatboy Slim album was a legit phenomenon when it came out.

The music videos alone. The Dalamo Mall, Spike Jones, Flash Mob major. Christopher Walken, right? Yeah, that was, I think, the next album. The next album, okay. What hit you hard?

Randomly, Flagpole Sitta by Harvey Danger. Even though that's a 1997 song, but it would have been still been playing pretty regularly in 1999. That one, I felt, I was like, let's fucking go. Also, I did make some notes during the film, which was totally fine because when you go see a 12.45 p.m. showing of Y2K on a Monday at the Americana know in glendale not a lot of people there um the chumbawamba through line maybe i'm

overthinking maybe i'm intellectualizing something that doesn't need to be intellectualized but i was like okay like i kind of i don't know if it was intentional but i was like you know chumbawamba famously anarcho i don't well maybe not, actually sort of not many people maybe know that, but are an anarcho punk band that like donated all the money from the sales of that massive song that everyone thought was just sort of like a one hit wonder. And then I was like, okay, internet was kind of at first like an anarchic type tool, right? Like a, we'll become ungovernable, which then became very co-opted by capitalism and became evil. And I was like, I wonder if this is like on purpose, but again, perhaps I'm over-intellectualizing the music choice of Jumbo Womba. Do you have a similar pointy-headed theory about the usage of Mandy Moore's candy in this film?

No, I'm so sorry. I can't make that work here, I don't think. One thing that the movie does really well is that it identifies the, at least in the 90s, inherently cliquish nature of high school friendships. I was totally, yeah. And, you know, movies like Can't Hardly Wait do a good job of this. The Breakfast Club is entirely oriented around plucking one individual from those groups out and putting them together. Clueless has the best montage of that.

The stoners sit on that grassy knoll. Like, there's the Persians. They drive the BMWs. But this movie does a cool thing where it, like, picks people out

almost based on their music taste. You know, there's, like, the burnouts who are really into Korn and the Family Values tour. There's the underground hip-hop kid.

I will just say I felt... So triggering for me, that person. I felt deeply, deeply attacked by that character. You felthop kid. I will just say I felt... So triggering for me, that person. I felt deeply, deeply attacked by that character. You felt the same. I was like, I knew that guy. And he was so annoying.

The prophets of intuition or whatever. That was actually so perfect that I was like, oh, Kyle Mooney, one of us. Kyle Mooney, backpack rap. Kyle Mooney for sure has freestyle fellowship on vinyl. Like soul assassins. He was there. I think he's from San Diego too,

so it makes sense that he would be into that Bay Area stuff. And the Swing Kids, I thought was a very funny joke with the Brian Setzer Orchestra needle drop. That was so funny. That one I love, especially because I did a little reveal. I couldn't share it. It's been long enough. The statute of limitations is up.

I did have a little dalliance with a swing dancing in high school. Can you believe? I know. That's right. Swingers was a really big movie. I think you know that here on the big picture. And it, it,

it changed a lot of people briefly. I though after like, you know, two months I was like, no, this is not for me. Thank you. What would you do?

Would you go to the Brown Derby? What would you do? I was in Singapore. So, um, you were swing dancing in Singapore. It's a global phenomenon. You are one-of-one i must say i i've lived a lot of lives i want you to but most more i was the girl where they were like she has holes in her brains now that was more me that was like i

didn't dress like that but that was absolutely i was like oh yeah what's up girl that's me okay this is an important thing to discuss then because a significant figure in this movie not just metaphorically or spiritually but literally is fred durst fred durst appears in the film i thought pretty humorously and um this is i thought he did a great job this is not the first a24 movie he's in this year you know he was also in i saw the tv glow did you see that movie i didn't see it but but I remember a big deal when he was announced that he was going to be in it. He's got a very small part in that movie.

He's got a weirdly critical role in this movie. Oh, yeah. Do you think Limp Bizkit should be reclaimed? By whom? The masses, the youths, anyone? No. What did you think of L of limb biscuit when you were 16 it wasn't my thing i was a corn girl i was a system of a down and corn deftones but limb biscuit didn't totally speak to me limb biscuit i feel in a way catered to like a slightly different market because

famously limb biscuit is Midwestern, right? Aren't they Detroit? I thought Florida. Oh, Florida. That checks out too. Whatever it was, it was not California. And I feel like I couldn't really connect. Speaking of, where is this film set?

It's the East Coast, right? That's an excellent question. It definitely is because there's Utz chips in the liquor store scene. And we don't have Utz chips on the West Coast or I don't think in the Midwest. I'm a chip connoisseur. Well, it was filmed in New Jersey. Didn't it feel more like your hometown of growing up area? I mean, part of the reason why I wanted to talk to somebody about this movie is even with its flaws, I'm like, God damn, they just got so much right.

It's just so accurate to the experience. Not that there was any one character who I related to or any one group or even any one song. The Prophets of Intuition was the one that you... Which one? The Prophet of Intuition was the guy that you... I mean, there is a part of me that was like

that guy. What about the part where the popular, beautiful girl was like, nobody said anything about this this to me was the most horror part of the whole movie was when she was like i don't really like music yeah nobody said anything nobody was like okay sociopath i don't really like music that was that was strange that girl is played by r Zegler she's very famous now right she's Snow White I saw her on the poster

on my way out and I was like oh you had an interesting year she is going to be Snow White she was one of the stars of Steven Spielberg's West Side Story which is remarkable

in that movie she's a damn good actress she's good right she was great she's very cute she was like the only one who I was like this person's a star

and these other people are not did you get that feeling yeah well I thought that shockingly because you know how I feel about New Zealand. But the Danny character also had a lot of star power. I was shocked at the decision to kill him off so early. Because he was such a fun thing to watch and provided so many jokes. And I was like, oh, you kept the prophet of intuition

and the angry Fred Durst girl, and you got rid of that guy? That's so weird. Yeah, that's the actor Julian Dennison, who people will probably recognize from A Hunt for the Wilderpeople or Deadpool 2, where he had a big role. He was phenomenal, I thought, personally.

The prophets of intuition guy, CJ, The Prophets of Intuition guy, CJ, was played by Daniel Zolgardi, who's, well, Zolgardri, actually, who's really, really good in, um, did you see Funny Pages? A movie that came out a couple years ago? No. Directed by Owen Klein, who's Kevin Klein's son. Actually, also an A24 movie. That's the thing,

is that this is, like, a collection of recurring A24 folks. But, uh, I don't know. What else? Any other thoughts on Y2K? I just thought it was, again, I might be intellectualizing too much, but I did, I almost wanted it to be,

better is not the right word. And maybe there's no way to make this movie in a not sort of, you know I'm not a horror movie person in general. And this is like, what would you call this genre of horror where it's like very funny and someone dies and everyone's over it in like a minute and a half, even though it's their like lifetime best friend. Horror comedy? Horror comedy. But like the timing is actually so interesting, right? Because right because AI is a almost bigger concern now than it was at Y2K and I think I think that's the

parts of the movies anytime it tried to get sort of like serious about a messaging I was like you know Yossi it's funny that you say that because on this very episode I have an interview with James Cameron about the Terminator and the prescience of that movie. Me and James Cameron on one episode? It's going to blow out of the water. Hard to believe that the servers here at Spotify can even contain the levels of charisma that are flowing through this episode thanks to you and the other guy. That's what I'm saying. Jimmy Cams. Jimmy Cams?

That's right. Okay. Try it out. What's the 2024 movie you haven't seen yet that you're most fired up about? Probably Baby Girl. I'm really excited about. What do you think happens

if I put you on an episode with Amanda? You think it's going to work? Yeah. Well, you are going to leave while me and Amanda do the new Bridget Jones. Oh, right. Actually, honestly, I would love that. Could we do that?

I really need some episodes off. Like, right. Actually, honestly, I would love that. Could we do that? I really need some episodes off. Like, badly. 100%. And you have to do it or you're a misogynist. No one can ever accuse me of that. That's honestly ridiculous. And how dare you.

I said, if you don't. Oh, okay. I love that. No, I'm very excited about Baby Girl. I really do want to see Nosferatu because that's... While I don't... Is that a...

Would you call that a horror movie? Yeah, it's a gothic horror. Yeah. Okay. You know me. I'm famously a goth. I will... I'll see any vampire movie, but...

Okay. I feel like othered by horror movies. Do you not notice they've gotten extremely popular in the last couple of years? It's like every other movie is a horror movie. I have noticed that they're one of the most... They had been historically until this year one of the most reliable things at the box office.

I think that's why that's happened. Also those people see me. They see me and they understand me. Okay. Can I tell you one note

I made on my phone that I was kind of proud of? Sure. About Y2K and the last well two one is

no one says poser anymore. I mean to bring that back. That's the click thing, though. They don't have clicks anymore. Again, to your point, if teens see this, I think they're going to be a little confused. Yeah, I agree.

There's a lot of confusing words and ideas in this movie. And then Chekhov's condom. That was funny. Thank you. It was a Durex as I recall I didn't I didn't take in the

I didn't clock I didn't clock the branding no free ads for Durex by the way I just noticed it from the film yeah well thanks for

thanks for coming on the show really good insights there thanks for sending me to see Y2K on Monday at 12.55pm can't wait can't wait to see what you come up

for me next I hope you enjoy the Nosferatu baby girl double feature on Christmas Day you're gonna have a great time

I can't wait that's gonna be a great day for me thanks Sean for having me it's always really fun and I

I do feel honored to share share an episode with Jimmy Cam's my intellectual and creative peer

it was wonderful having you and I can't wait to clear out for you and Amanda to make something magical in 2025. Thanks, Yasi.

Okay, we're talking about our favorite underseen and underappreciated movies of 2024. I'm here with two of the most hallowed prestige TV podcasters here to talk about films.

You're also a film podcaster. House of R, Trial Bike Content, co-host Joanna Robinson, Group Chat. A lot of film talk. Various and Sundry Film Podcasting, Rob Mahoney. Has this been a year for underrated and underappreciated movies? It's been a weird movie year. Definitely. A very, very patch been a year for underrated and underappreciated movies? It's been a weird movie year. Definitely. Very,

very patchwork movie year. And I going through with this prompt, what's under seen underappreciated. I couldn't find a lot because I think it was so thin across the board that like there weren't a lot of hidden gems. Cause we were just digging for gems all year long. Would you, wouldn't you say Sean? Well, as the host of the big pig, someone who talks about movies twice a week, every for gems all year long. Wouldn't you say, Sean, as the host of The Big Pig? Someone who talks about movies twice a week, every week, all year.

I made a list of my own for this conversation. And it wasn't hard to find a bunch of stuff I didn't get a chance to talk about. But some of the reasons I didn't get a chance to talk about them were strange release dates or international concern or how do I even get someone to go see a movie that's only playing in four screens in Los Angeles and Discovery is one of my favorite

parts of the show but I think you're right that the thin gruel nature of the calendar left us with a lot of like hey maybe I can make an entire episode out of Venom 3

let's give it a shot you know and we did do that and you did we did do that which was it a mistake perhaps but we did do it

and I had a very fun time with Charles and Mallory Rob why don't I start with you like is there a movie that you're really excited to recommend here? I mean there are many movies

I would be excited to recommend one that I have tried to get people to see that I found myself being an advocate for is Didi the 125th highest grossing movie

domestically this year like nobody showed up but me to see Didi. And I think we're a worse nation for it. I don't know if we'd be in our current predicament if everyone had seen Didi by this point. An amazing coming of age movie. And I will say there may be a bit of a generational divide

because this hits me like straight in the strike zone. There is a point at which the main character, Chris's phone goes off and it's playing hello, goodbyes, touchdown, turnaround as his ringtone. I'm like, this is locating me in such a precise emotional place that I was just locked in for the entire movie. I think it's such a beautiful portrayal of a lot of different things. I mean, if you're at all interested in skate culture, especially in the early 2000s, this is a great movie for you. If you're at all interested

in mother-son relationships, a very common subject on screen to say the least, but one that I think is articulated really, really beautifully, the Asian American experience, California living more generally, I think it just hits a lot of really, really good sweet spots in that very filmmaker makes a sort of autobiographical story way. And you just can't, you can't replicate and you can't fake that kind of authenticity. I like this movie a lot. I had Sean Wong on to talk about it. And he was, I think, the second time

since I've started doing the show where I thought to myself, wow, I'm really old. And it's not that I couldn't relate to the framework. It's like roughly 2008, I want to say, is when the movie takes place. And so I was a little bit older at the advent of a lot of this, like the birth of YouTube and like high tension, my space, social culture in high school and in middle school as the character is in the film. Um, but it was, I think Emma Seligman was the other person that I talked to first for

Shiva baby. Um, and I was like, whoa I was like whoa I I can't believe how much it's like it's like when you are watching an NBA game Rob you'll relate to this clearly and you're like

everyone on the court is half my age yeah and how chilling that feels and now we're in an era where filmmakers can be 25, 26, 27

and making like profound thoughtful good films winning Sundance prizes working with major movie stars but I really like Didi it's a great

recommendation. Can I ask a follow up question to you Rob? You mentioned if one is interested in skate culture are you Rob Mahoney interested in skate culture?

See I am the perfect audience for this movie because I want to be interested in skate culture. You know. Much like Didi himself like I could

never skate. And a lot of this movie is just about like faking it until not really you make it, but you get found out. And what could possibly be more relatable than that as a guy chattering on a podcast? Back in my day, we used to call you posers. You were a poser. Some people call us filmers. Some people call us filmmakers of a different kind. Joanna, what's your pick?

I am going with Between the Temples. And this is as indie as they come indie film starring Jason Schwartzman and Carol Kane in a love story. And it's about a cantor who has sort of lost his faith, his joie de vivre, his everything. And a woman who is interested in converting and the life that is expected for him and the excitement that she offers. And this beautiful performance by Carole Kane as this, you know, manic pixie dream older woman in his life. And it's a perfect role for her.

I love Schwartzman. This is actually a really, really good Schwartzman performance as well. There are some sequences in this film where I was like, is this good? I'm not sure. There's some extended drug sequences that I have some questions about. But at the heart of it, it's just an incredible connection and chemistry between two unlikely folks. And also an incredible Dolly DeLeon performance. As one of two mothers in Schwartzman's character.

As his stepmother, yeah. And she is just like out on this relationship. She is not having it. And if you love her being mean, as a lot of us do, you will enjoy this movie. What kind of Schwartzman

are we getting here? Okay, give me your Schwartzman spectrum. I mean, it's a pretty wide berth. Yeah. He's got a lot of modes. We're not doing an Andersonian sort of quirky role. We're doing

sad boy. A little closer to the Alex Ross Perry listen up Philip, but less caustic. More sad. A deeply downtrodden man looking for meaning. Looking to restore some sense of meaning in his life.

There's a sequence at the end of this movie across the dinner table that's incredible. So good. If you like the movie, please listen to Nathan Silver and Schwartzman when I interviewed them

over the summer about it. Schwartzman, I'll never forget, he walked into the studio and he was like, look at these cameras. And he was like marveling at the cameras that we have

in our studios. And he was like, is that 4K? Wow. And I was like, sir, you are jason schwartzman like you're a member of the coppola clan and you are homies with wes anderson i'm sure you've seen a camera before yeah um but honestly he was incredibly kind guy and uh is

is on an extended streak right now of great performances he's amazing in asteroid city he's so fun in the spider verse movie speaking of great vocal performances I really like both of your picks guys those are great would you say that both like do both of those movies feel overlooked

underseen in the context of Box Office without question because you are arbiters of great taste of course I have been all over these movies

and I've even spoken to the people who made them on the pod but they're damn good movies and I'm glad you wanted to bring that. Actually, they both were Sundance 2024 alumni. So maybe they had a little bit more visibility than your average indie movie, but not that much.

I mean, I definitely didn't mean, have you heard of these movies, Sean? No, no, I know. Because I knew you did. I think they are underappreciated, for sure. And I think I accidentally called this film Between Two Temples when it's between the temples, obviously the temples obviously okay just wanted to we'll fix that in post with jason schwartzman's camera okay great thanks so much thank you guys rob joanna i appreciate it thanks okay wags is back bobby the floor is yours what's your underseen underappreciated pick this is a film that i

literally have not had one single conversation out loud with with anyone about it's called good one it's uh from writer director india donaldson this is her feature debut i believe it premiered at sundance this year and and to some acclaim i believe think it won some awards at Sundance. It's the story of a 17-year-old girl in the summer before she goes away for college who's going on a hiking trip with her father. Her parents are divorced. Her father's friend and his son also traditionally come on this hiking trip with them. The son doesn't want to because his parents have recently gotten divorced and he's upset about that so she ends up on this hiking trip this weekend hiking trip to the Catskills just with with her father and her father's friend and like not really that much

else happens if I'm being honest it's one of those movies where it the beauty of it really is in the subtlety and the the girl is portrayed by this actor who i believe this is her debut as well lily colias um the father is is portrayed by uh i think we could call him that guy james james lagrosse the film icon james lagrosse yeah yeah um a wonderful character actor most i think for me most well known from certain women another film where it kind of not that much happens but it's all in the beauty of the detail and they kind of reminded me of each other tonally um but yeah they they go on this hike this hiking trip over the weekend and i think honestly what really made it so appealing to me is like i think it was such a

great year at the movies for like generational tension and when you're 17 you really like think you're the shit you know you really think you have it figured out and you're about to go and start this great life and in some ways you're right you know what i mean you you really are kind of molding into yourself and you can see lily colias her character's name is Sam, is very expertly portraying that feeling of having way more to say about this, but not thinking that it's worth it. And her and her dad kind of have this somewhat strained relationship because he is a little bit emotionally stunted. And there's a turn about two-thirds of the way through the film that kind of changes the emotional dynamics of it. I don't want to give that away. But it's such an interesting,

like it's just a character piece and it's refreshing to see those get made still and a new talent like announce itself both as a writer and director, but also as an actor and Lily Colias. And I don't know, I just really, I really liked this movie a lot. What did you think of it?

I liked it a lot too. I think I did mention it coming out of Sundance as a film that I really enjoyed. At the time when I saw it, I did not realize it was that India Donaldson is the director Roger Donaldson's daughter.

Roger Donaldson, you may know, is the director behind such films as No Way Out, Species, and Cocktail. Goddamn.

No Way Out. Let's go. She comes from a fascinating Hollywood familywood family there was a great piece about her that i read in the la times i can't recall who the journalist was profiling her and they talked to roger and a couple of other people and you know this film has like nothing to do with the cinema roger donaldson whatsoever is a um very also a very quiet contemplative movie as you said bob um but very very good great. I also want to shout out Danny McCarthy, who gives a performance as the friend.

Yes. Who is a critical figure in the story. And yeah, it's just a damn good debut. It's the kind of debut where I'm, as Bill would say, season tickets for India's next work. I completely agree. And I love a movie where a lot is going on underneath the surface. And it's putting you in the pressure cooker of what you know is going on under the surface for the first hour. It's about a 90-minute film. And then at some point, you know there has to

be some kind of release valve. And even if it doesn't completely explode and devolve, like Chernobyl or anything, it's like, because that's kind of what life is. You leave stuff under the surface. And at the risk of kind of like oversharing like the character in this movie felt so the the daughter character in this movie felt so well rendered because it's like when you're 17 and you're like kind of smart and clever and stuff like adults just don't even think about you as a kid anymore and they put shit on you that they shouldn't put on you and it's cool to see like a an indie debut feature portray that i i found it really great i like i think in particular having lived through this uh parents who have gotten divorced

who think that they have grown their kids up by having that emotional experience then start sharing things with their kids that they never would have within the sanctity of the nuclear family that think you know the feelings become a little bit more stray and you're more comfortable communicating things that maybe your kids just should never hear. I'm thinking about that exact kind of thing all the time now in a way that I never did before. So, yeah, I agree with you. It's a very good recommendation and a very serious and good movie.

Good job, Bob. Available on VOD, by the way. You can go check it out. It's that simple. Was it Metrograph? I think Metrograph distributed, right? It sure was. That's where I saw it.

Nice. I saw it at like 10 a.m. and then I went home and I didn't talk about it again until right now. Well, lovely to be chatting with you as always, Bobby. Okay, who's next?

I believe now we have the one and only Amanda Dobbins via voice note. Wow, Amanda Dobbins. She's back again, sort of. I still have not listened to this voice note. So neither have I. Let's see what she's into. Hello, everyone. It is Amanda. And I am back briefly to talk about one of my favorite movies

of the year that I forgot to include on the last voice note and also I think one of the most underseen movies of the year despite it being available on Netflix it is Martha the documentary about Martha Stewart directed by R.J. Cutler who you might know from the Billie Eilish documentary or from the September issue, which is a great documentary about Vogue and Anna Wintour. And R.J. Cutler seems to be developing a niche as the documentarian of difficult women of a certain age. So the Martha documentary, I have always been more of an Ina Garten fan than a Martha Stewart or not even a fan, but it's just like I can't be doing the level of detail that Martha Stewart brings to her entertaining. to Michael's three times. And then my friend Izzy, listen, we made it work mostly thanks to my friend Izzy, but Martha's not, Martha's too perfectionist even for me. But this documentary is a great

examination of a perfectionist, of a demanding individual. It spends a lot of time talking about Martha Stewart as the first self-made female billionaire in America. I think that is the distinction that they give her. It also charts how that money all goes away as her media empire falls apart kind of post-trial and also just because of the internet and the way things change. I would say to you that the last third of the documentary is not the most exciting part. The middle third is all about her trial for insider trading, which I remembered, sort of, but also didn't remember at all. As Sean pointed out when he saw it at Telluride, James Comey figures prominently in this trial, which

I just didn't know at all. And I do also wonder whether this movie came out on October 31st, so I wonder whether the timing and election-related attention spans are part of the reason that people haven't seen it. Anyway, I thought it was an interesting examination of her trial in the media circus and the New York Post. Also, if you haven't read the New York Post response to this documentary, please look that up. All-time tabloid stuff. But for me, the reason to see it is Martha herself. She sits for an at times very testy interview that is amazing. And it also has some archival footage, including the scene of Martha Stewart. She's not yelling. I just rewatched it. She doesn't raise her voice, but she dresses down a caterer, someone working for her, over the woman's choice of knife to slice oranges. The knife that the woman chooses is not big enough for Martha Stewart's liking.

And the way that Martha gives the feedback and how frustrated she is and how clear she is that there is a right way to do things and that it's unacceptable when someone doesn't do it her way, haunted me, going to be quite honest, just have thought about it every day since. So, you know, maybe you need to see that as an insight into someone in your life. And maybe you just want to watch Martha talk about a puff pastry or whatever. It's a great documentary. And it also, the way you know it's really good is because Martha's not thrilled about it. I'd like to read some choice quotes that Martha Stewart gave to Brooks Barnes at the New York

Times in response to this documentary. She didn't like the music. I said to RJ, an essential part of the film is that you play rap music. Dr. Dre will probably score it or Snoop or Frederick. I said, I want that music. And then he gets some lousy classical score in there. Perfect. She doesn't like the camera angles. She wanted her grandchildren featured, which seems valid. They're basically not in there at all. The voice of her daughter is there, but even her relationship with her daughter is sort of interestingly portrayed in the documentary. Here's my favorite quote. My magazine, my Martha Stewart magazine, which you might say is traditional,

was the most modern home magazine ever created. We had avant-garde photography. Nobody ever showed puff pastry the way I showed it or the glossaries of the apples and the chrysanthemums. And we prided ourselves so much on all of that modernism and he didn't get any of that. So I wish you great joy and entertainment watching Martha and avant-garde photography and understanding puff pastry the way that it's meant to be shown by Martha Stewart. I will see you guys very soon. Happy holidays. You know, congrats on Juan Soto, everyone. Bye. Understanding puff pastry the way that it's meant to be shown by Martha Stewart. I will see you guys very soon. Happy holidays. You know, congrats on Juan Soto, everyone.

Bye. Okay, let's go to my conversation now with James Cameron and Gail Ann Hurd. Absolutely honored to be joined by James Cameron and Gail Anne Hurd to talk about the 40th anniversary of The Terminator, which is just simply extraordinary that it's been four decades. I thought we could start, guys, by hearing about where you both were in your careers as filmmakers before you embarked on making this movie. Jim, you want to start? I can't speak for Gail, but I was pretty much nowhere. I had tried directing a movie I won't mention the name of

because everybody else is happy to talk about it all day long. I got fired after six days of shooting. I was broke and no prospects. I didn't think I'd ever get hired again. It turned out that actually having even a crappy directing credit did help a little bit. So, you know, I mean, I was nowhere. So I knew that nobody was going to offer me anything. So I had to write something. I had to attach myself to it firmly. It had to be good enough to get made.

And that seemed the only avenue. So, you know, writing the script was kind of a means to an end, if you will. I mean, I had my sights set on directing. Gail and I talked about it. We said, all right, this is a good project because it can be shot locally. It can be shot relatively low budget. It's got a few isolated effects sequences in it, and I had an effects, you know, kind of my only credential was in visual effects,

so I figured, all right, that gives me a slight edge over another director. Gail, you want to haul off for where you were at that point in your life? Well, at that point in my life, if this hadn't worked out, I don't think i would be in the film business now essentially i mean i've been working for roger corman for a number of years uh at a certain point he basically said there's nothing more i can teach you i went you mean you're firing me and he said not really firing you i'm just sort of kicking you out. And I begged to be able to return as his assistant at New World Pictures. That wasn't in the cards.

So I think both of us laid it all on the line for the Terminator. Did you come to know each other through Corman? How did you come? What was your first meeting? I remember exactly what it was. I was working in the model shop and Gail came in and I kind of, as I recall, Gail, I kind of gave you a tour around the model shop. And, but, you know, I was working on Nell, which was the hero's spaceship in my own kind of

private space. And Gail, if I remember correctly, you were down the hall doing some pickup reshoots on humanoids from the deep. Yes, yeah, humanoids from the deep. And Jim was working on Battle Beyond the Stars, a script by John Sayles. We kind of hit it off anyway. I mean, the short version is we hit it off and we became

friends and we talked about doing projects together. I mean, I think each of us recognized in the other, the kind of the eye of the tiger, the ambition, the intelligence, creativity, whatever it is to potentially succeed. And I give the same advice to people now that I guess I was instinctively following then, which is don't try to make pals with somebody above you in the food chain. Make good, strong network relationships with people at your level and then form a team or an alliance or whatever, and then push forward from a position of some strength. And I think a lot of people sort of miss that point these days. Or they don't want to start at the bottom.

And both of us really started at the bottom. Gail, what did you make of Jim when you met him? Well, I was really impressed. I was looking for a reason to get out of the reshoots because they were essentially, this reshoot was for nudity reasons. So it was a girl getting out of a pup tent and running down, I think, the beach or something like that. And it was a sequence that the original director of human rights from the deep barbara peters a woman did not want to direct so i believe they hired the first assistant director to film that and that was not something i was really comfortable with so i went into the model shop roger had also said you know stop by and see how the models are coming along jim which you can see in everything that he's done ever since um had a had a reason had

a character reason behind the the spaceship models and uh you know there was such insight there it wasn't just oh this is really cool shit um and and that really surprised me because you didn't find a lot of that back then. And then he went from building spaceship models, and this can only happen with Roger Corman. And he was very soon the art director for the entire film. Yeah, the following week, I think. I mean, you guys getting shotgunned into that kind of work, I assume, helped tremendously with The Terminator. Jim, you mentioned that it was sort of like a necessity to write this project, but I wanted to ask you both. It seems like you wrote with budget in mind and that you were very selective about what kind of effects work you were going to need. Maybe you both can talk about that, about knowing how much money you could get and what that meant creatively with the restrictions. Well, look,

Gail was already producing. I think you had already done another film, a car chase movie. Moby Bites the Dust. Another one not worth seeing. Yeah, but you know, it's all experience. So anyway, I looked at Gail as a more experienced producer, and we talked about the type of project we would do. We had another one called Labyrinth that we were developing, but it seemed out of reach. It seemed too a project and, you know, said, all right, so what are the ground rules? You know, we got to be able to shoot it, you know, on the streets, available light, you know, present day locations would do it under the radar, guerrilla filmmaking, non-union, blah, blah, blah, all the stuff that we were used to from Corman. And then, okay, well, what fits that?

Well, you know, I got this I got this thing, I'm calling the Terminator here. Why don't you read the treatment? And Gail's like, this is exactly what we should be doing. Let's do it. I mean, it was pretty much that simple, but it was definitely constrained by budget going in, right? I mean, we knew we couldn't raise 20 million bucks. At that stage, that was like an amount beyond our imagination. But we thought, at that, that stage, that was like a, an amount beyond our imagination, but we thought, you know, maybe three, 4 million, something like that. I mean, we're thinking, we're thinking like a little bit above John Carpenter, Deborah Hill break-in level, you know, with, with Halloween, but not much beyond that. And it's like, okay, who's going to

give, um, you know, firsttime director and, you know, a producer who's working at the corpsman level that kind of a budget? Well, it better be a damn compelling story. That was our thinking. And it better be makeable. It better appear to be makeable. And, you know, Gail had chops. She had credentials.

My credential was I'd done visual effects on a couple of films. So I thought, all right, well, an effects film kind of makes sense because if it was just a rom-com or a straight horror film or whatever, I don't bring any added value. So we were very strategic about, you know, about our thought process going into, you know, pitching this piece. Gail, can you talk about hustling around and raising some of the money and looking for distributors at that time too? Because people forget this is an independent movie, even though it's one of the most significant franchises of the last 40 years. It is 100% an independent film. So the first place I went was Roger Corman,

because of course, go to the people you know. And Roger basically said, my top end budget is $2 million. You can't make this for $2 million. And if you try, it won't be the movie that you and Jim want to make. So God bless the late Roger Corman for that, but that was still painful. But luckily, the woman who had been, I would think you would call her chief operating officer of New World Pictures had moved on to Orion, Barbara Boyle, as had the story editor, Frances Dole. And I sent the script to them. They read it and liked it um and Mike Medavoy I had known because he had uh he had been a co-financier with Roger on a number of films a slate of films um but interestingly enough the domestic side of Orion didn't come in right away.

It was the foreign side. The money that we got, and it wasn't all of the money, was an if-come. We had to raise the rest of it. Orion domestic would have first right of refusal on the u.s rights um so the problem is that everyone wants guaranteed u.s distribution not just an if-come deal but we were able to get half a million dollars advanced from hbo they were the so they were the the first to come in um with an actual commitment and that was was for cable. And then literally, I mean, as Jim probably remembers,

I mean, the number of doors slammed in our faces. The meetings we had were basically people would say, yeah, I'm interested in this, but sign this option agreement where I'll control it controlled forever that is somebody else and with no obligation to ever pay you a dime ever you know get both of you on board to produce and direct um those were the kinds of deals we were being offered i mean it literally when you hear about the horrors of hollywood um we we went through we went through many many stages of uh dante's hell

um but uh the strangest thing is the way we ended up with financing at hemdale uh was that uh remember chuck simon okay i'm so so some a friend of mine basically said, I believe there's a company called Hemdale and they have a three-picture deal with Orion. They're looking for their third picture. The first two had been total financial disasters. So I started calling. They wouldn't call me back. So then I found out from him that Barry Plumlee, the head of production and development, was trying to sell a desk. This is a great story. So, you know, you have to be willing to do just about anything to get your foot in the door. So I said I was interested in the desk. He called me back. This is classic.

This is a classic Gail story. I mean, I give Gail total credit for piecing this whole thing together from disparate sources. And, you know, I think between the two of us, we were, you know, cheeky enough or confident enough that we were able to turn down some things. And I have to credit Gail with backing me. There were people that wanted the script, and I think the highest offer was a million dollars from Paramount. A million dollars. I couldn't even imagine. I couldn't even visualize what that looked like in a pile.

Couldn't even fathom it. And we turned it down because they didn't want me to direct it. They wanted an established director and other people might have wanted an established producer. So Gail and I kind of went in as a joined at the hip kind of team and dared them to try to break us apart, which of course almost everybody involved tried to at one point or another. And, you know, we emerged still as a team, still holding the rights and with a budget that was borderline makeable. I mean, it was pretty, it got pretty skinny at times. A lot, big chunk of the money went to Arnold, obviously. And, you know, that cut into our below the line somewhat. And we did have some ambitious effects fortunately we met stan winston who neither one of us had known and stan just really loved the piece and he jumped in with both feet and he hung on you know because

we wound up with a big production delay of about six or eight months something like that and and so stan hung on he worked on the film kind of quietly worked on the the effects and so on during that hiatus period and then when we went we hit the ground running with uh i mean it was just we just got dropped into a combat zone when we finally got access to arnold he had to go off and do another film um and so when we, in fact, I think, Gail, didn't we shoot for like eight or 10 days without Arnold, like almost a quarter of the schedule? I think so. And not only that, but not that long before shooting, Linda Hamilton sprained her ankle or tore all the ligaments. And we had to completely reschedule the film because initially we were doing her sequences

and it was a lot of the running and she couldn't do that. So that was another thing that impacted not only the schedule, but the budget because there were locations that we had paid for that we couldn't use. And I mean, every time you, you shift something,

there's a, there's a financial cost. So what does that mean? You're just doing a lot of days with Rick Rosovich and Paul Winfield and said, when you're two stars are not available to you? No, she was available. She just couldn't run. She couldn't run. Okay.

She couldn't walk. She could barely walk. I mean, we got a football doctor to come in and give her a sports wrap every day so that she could hobble around. And the funny thing is, we already knew we weren't going to have Arnold for the first part of the shoot. It was like, hey, no problem. We'll shoot all of Linda's scenes first. Well, then that didn't work out. So it's like, okay, what do we do? I mean, I think if Gail and I hadn't been through the Corman experience, which is just so scrappy and so chaotic, and you never know from one day to the next what you're going to do, and you've got to shift gears in a split second, and you know that it's a steamroller, you've got to shoot,

or you simply don't have the shots later in the cutting room. And we'd been through that, you know, enough times that we just knew that you got to solve it. Nobody's going to solve it for you. I was hoping you guys could talk a little bit about, because when you're shopping for the budget, I assume that Arnold and Michael and Linda are not attached at that point, right? You haven't cast the film? I think, yeah, we had Linda before the hiatus. So when we cast Arnold, we wound up with this kind of six or seven month wait. And I think we had already cast Linda and Michael at that point and everybody was just waiting.

That's my memory of it. And so I went off and wrote Aliens. And Rambo First Blood Part II. And Rambo. So, you know, we were just kind of spinning our wheels. And so, in a funny way, it's the best prepped movie I've ever done, at least in terms of storyboarding and pre-visualization and design work and all that. Cause I wound up with six months that I didn't expect to have. Now we weren't getting paid. You know, my mom was sending me, she'd cut these clippings out of the newspaper

where you could get two big Macs for the price of one, you know, and I was kind of living on clippings. Uh, and I do, I do a couple of, um, uh, I'd paint, you know, I was a painter and I would paint some low budget movie posters for like the cheapest releasing house that was even below Roger Corman, believe it or not, in LA. But they, you know, they pay me 1500 bucks for one painting. I could do it in a day and I could live on it for a month. So that's how I had the free time. I mean, I live pretty cheaply as you can, as you hear. And, you know, so I use the time to write. Gail, I think you were, you were kind of working in the background on the Terminator budget

and various other things. And I, you know, and I was taking odd jobs on other films like Alligator. Oh, right. Yeah. Another, was that. But that wasn't Corman, right? I think it was Charlie Band, but no, it was, yeah. We hadn't broken through from that low tier of scrappy guerrilla filmmaking, super independent production companies. And we didn't know that it was impossible, that what we were the ambitions we had to make this film were essentially impossible. It doesn't seem like $6.4 which is it looks like a hinge point from the Corman era of exploitation movies and independent genre pictures towards this more technologically focused star-driven franchise

entertainment. And it might be the most significant example that comes in the aftermath of the new Hollywood. Did you guys have aspirations to that kind of thing? I know it's a little high-minded, but it felt like a very purposeful decision to try both at the same time. Well, you know, I mean, we had examples like, you know, obviously Carpenter and Deborah Hill breaking in and slowly incrementally driving their budgets up. And we had other examples like, you know, George Lucas, who hadn't done that much when he did Star Wars and made that film very, very cheaply. So he made that film for, I think, $9.8 million, which is almost unfathomable now. And we had just done Battle Beyond the Stars together.

And that was Roger's most expensive film by a factor of two or three. I think he'd, I don't think he'd ever made a film above a million dollars. And that was made for close to $2 million. But we saw how we could emulate a Star Wars level movie fairly credibly at, you know, a fifth of the budget. So we thought, all right, we can, we, I think we were thinking we could make the Terminator for a couple million bucks. And then the realities hit in of all the prosthetic makeup and all of the laser opticals and miniatures that we had to do. And so many nights of street car chase stuff out in the city. And it looked like it was going to be more like three and a half,

and then it was four and four and a half. But we managed to, you know, and Gail, tribute to Gail, managed to piece that money together. Look, there was no game plan about how that was going to sit in a Hollywood ecosystem looking back from 10 or 40 years later. I mean, we couldn't think at that level. We were just focused on the task. Here's the story we have to tell. We got to cast it credibly in order to get some money. Hey, you know, Arnold's name came up. We kind of rejected it at first because he didn't fit the character. The character was written to be an undercover agent. That's the whole point. He's a cyborg so that he's a credible human that can pass as human, right, without

rubbery skin and glassy eyes, right? And, you know, he's got to be able to fit in. That's the whole concept of an undercover kind of assassin. And Arnold doesn't fit in. I mean, you know, I mean, when we cast him, we knew that we were shifting the character, that it was a big change from the concept or the premise we had been working under for, I don't know, a year of development. Right. And then all of a sudden, boom, it just changed. And all of a sudden, he's this iconic figure. He's going to be a Panzer tank. He's going to just push through a crowd, push anybody out of the way.

Not very low key. And it's like, okay, fine, let's lean into that. People have asked me kind of what I'm proudest of, which is a very hard question to answer. And I think what I'm proudest of is that we had the nimbleness or the agility of thought to be able to pivot the whole idea on a dime, literally in minutes, sitting there, you know, with Arnold and then back with John Daly of Hemdale and talking about how he might be a part of this and saying, because he was not proposed to play the Terminator. He was proposed to play the hero because you cast the hero and then you get the budget. That's how it works,

right? And so he was put up as the hero, you know, Reese, the good guy. And I said, that doesn't work. That's not going to work. But he would make a hell of a Terminator and Daley went and made the deal, you know, and then we were on and the rest is history. But I think what I'm proudest of

is that we were so used to that chaotic, do anything, make it work, make it happen kind of mentality from low budget that it was like, okay, yeah, sure. We can change our entire concept, spin on a dime, no problem. What's this? I was curious how you felt about Arnold too, because on the one hand, he's a commodity in some ways at the box office. He's a rising star, but he is playing the heavy, which is really unusual. How did you perceive the decision to go with Arnold? He got the movie made and he really understood the Terminator. I mean, I have to say I was blown away. He came in and he said, the Terminator is like a shark. He's not going to blink.

He's going to move his head and look for his target like a shark does. Nothing else matters. And it was a brilliant conception of the role. So he really did bring a lot to it. It wasn't just, you know, it wasn't just, okay, he's going to walk through, you know, he's going to be doing sort of a, you know, the same part that he played in Conan the Barbarian. It was a completely different approach and it showed he was an actor. Yeah, I don't think we realized how smart a move it was for us until we saw the dailies from Arnold's first day. Because he was already in the makeup and hairstyle sort of post having gone through the fire. His eyebrows are gone.

His hair is singed back. He looks very kind of both synthetic and kind of punked out, right? And they had lightly glycerined his face, and he had this pale, and he was in these kind of greenish-blue lights from the dashboard of the car, from the environment. He was just driving the cop car and looking around and scanning, and it was this long-lens hood mount close-up, and man, he was terrifying. You didn't think of Conan for a split second.

He was a brand-new guy, something you'd never seen before, something I'd never seen before. You know, my great aspiration was to do better than, you know, Yul Brynner in Westworld, you know, and we like, we overshot that mark by miles with Arnold. You know, it was a smart move for him. It got him out of the kind of loincloth, oiled up barbarian mode, which frankly, he would have been stuck in that and his career would have just ultimately tapered off. But he just completely transformed himself into something nobody had ever seen before, didn't see coming and applauded. And it was a smart move for us because, you know, he was who he was.

Now, you know, I think it's important to point out that Arnold was not a star. It's easy to look back and say, okay, stepladder, you know, step one, he did Conan. He'd already done some stuff before that, but it was pretty rinky-dink. And then, you know, so his first step up was Conan. He would have gotten stuck at that level forever if he hadn't done the Terminator. Next step was, I shouldn't say that, Arnold is a guy who bulldozes all obstacles. And if he wanted to be a movie star, he would have ultimately become one. But I think the Terminator definitely turbocharged or accelerated that process for him. One thing that really jumps out to me about this film and then becomes a trend

in all your films for both of you guys is that, you know, strong female characters are like a signature of Jim, a lot of your films, and Gail, a lot of the work that you've done over the years too. And you told that story about working on humanoids from the deep, Gail, and having a female filmmaker and then that person getting removed from the project and shooting the naked scenes. And then you've got Sarah Connor, where as critical as Arnold is to the story, Sarah is really the through line of everything in the whole franchise in many ways. And I was hoping you could talk a bit about that because that also is unorthodox in a genre movie at this time. You know, she's really the hero. Reese is sort of the hero, but she's really our

hero by the time we get to the credits of the film. I don't know, Gail. I think that's one of the things you responded to. I mean, I wrote this story that was female-centric. And, you know, in my mind, I was kind of doing another, you know, last girl horror film with a tech component to it. I don't think I had made some leap that it was some big, you know, feminist statement. The thing is that Sarah Connor's every woman. Sarah Connor is someone who doesn't believe that she is going to be the savior of the future. And by the way,

and she doesn't want the responsibility, and truthfully, who would and uh and yet she finds the power within herself to to succeed and then obviously come back in terminator 2 completely transformed but um but yeah it and and there's nothing gratuitous about it there is literally nothing gratuitous she she you know doesn't have the usual tropes um that you expect uh being a victim being the girlfriend ornament yeah there was no shower scene you know no there's never a shower scene when a guy's the hero and the lovemaking scene is is and you know scene is not gratuitous. And since we had an R-rated movie, I mean, it could have been more so. And the other thing is, going back to an earlier question, which is the name of the nightclub is Tech Noir.

And that was purposeful in the sense of, this is a film about the dark side of technology um yeah well we like we like noir films we like we like the stylized lighting and so on the kind of the uh german expressionist uh kind of lighting that came into film noir i mean i don't think we ever thought of shooting in black and white but we did we did go with a kind of a monochrome blue palette, which kind of worked for me. I think there are things that you do instinctively that are innate, and then you intellectualize it after the fact. For me, it was instinctively obvious that a strong female character would be interesting. At the time, I can say that that all came later when we got applauded for it, but that's not true because the one film I really wanted to make was aliens.

And it wasn't even called aliens at that point, but I had already signed on to do that before I even started on, on the Terminator. And I wrote that script before I started on Terminator and I was attracted to Ripley. I mean, you know, I mean just the,

the, the, the iconic Ripley who just, you know, that's a last girl story. It's a very elevated version of a last girl horror story, but done very, very well. And with an amazing actor, you know, Sigourney and I are friends. We've been friends for, you know, what, 38 years, I guess.

And, you know, so I think there are things you do instinctively. And, you know, like I can do the whole Freudian thing and go back. You know, my mom was a great example of a strong but thwarted, you know, female psyche. You know, somebody who wasn't applauded for the kind of independent things that they did because that wasn't what the world was like at that point. And Gail, I don't know about your dynamics with your mom, but she was certainly a pretty strong-willed character. Yeah, I wondered about that too.

I mean, not your first feature, but in many ways your first feature. In your mind, your producing partner is a woman too i mean this is notable to me i that didn't even occur to me as a thing i mean gail and i just recognized each other it had it really didn't have much to do with gender notwithstanding the fact that we ultimately got married um but um no i mean i think we just recognized each other as the kind of kind fiction nerd, you know, kind of mentality. We knew the films that we love. We knew the films we wanted to make. We both had that aggressive can-do spirit.

And I think we felt that each other had the chops to make things happen, you know. And that we could trust each other. I mean, this is a business where you can't always trust other people. And when we worked together on Battle Beyond the Stars, I was the assistant production manager. Jim did everything. I mean, and, you know, it was the art department. I mean, you know, and you remember, I'd stay up all night, even though it wasn't my job, painting the sets Malmori green. You got to see me at the worst. I mean, you got to see me after 75 hours straight with no sleep.

And that was without drugs, just a lot of caffeine. I think there might have been some caffeine diet pills in there somewhere, but there was certainly nothing harder than that. So we knew we could work together. We knew we could trust each other um and and i had his back and he had mine and and honestly that's what you need in any kind of partnership uh because in this business a lot of people will smile and you know tell you one thing and uh and essentially do whatever it is they want once they believe that you're on board. And, you know, I've certainly experienced that because I assume that everyone would be as,

you know, truthful and loyal as Jim. I wanted to ask you both about shooting in LA. I rewatched the film last night. You just don't, there's no productions in LA anymore. You don't see this kind of thing. And seeing it, especially at this time, and especially the night shoots and the motorcycle and car chase is just remarkable. Like, could you just take me back to that period of when you were shooting the film in the city at that time

and what it was like? Well, the interesting thing is we weren't supposed to shoot in LA. The original conception of the film was we were going to shoot in Toronto. and they were going to close down the major, some of the lanes, the major freeway there. What is it? The 401? Anyway, I'm not sure. 401, the QEW. Yeah. And then we were preempted because Arnold had to go do Conan the Destroyer for Dino De Laurentiis, which meant we had to start filming in March. You can't film streets in Toronto when there's still ice and snow on the ground.

And that is actually why we ended up shooting in L.A. And it was the year, I think, of the Olympics. So it was actually a lot more deserted than usual. I always wanted to do a car chase on ice. It all takes place at about eight miles an hour. Everybody's wheels are spinning and you can see the other guys right there, but you can't get to them, you know. Look, it would have been a whole different show.

Very comedic. But there are iconic images, as you know, since you just rewatched the film. I mean, Griffith Park Observatory and the Second Street Tunnel and and you know and and all of that in downtown la is a character in this um but it it created uh a lot more issues um you know we we shooting in in downtown la at the time i mean we were what they call skid Row on the nickel. It was pretty dangerous. Yeah, it was dangerous. The funny thing is Adam Greenberg, who shot it, he and I would drive around at night and he'd have his incident light meter out and he'd go, stop, stop, boy, stop, stop. He always called everybody boy, stop, boy. He was Polish. And the driver would stop and he'd get out and he'd go, that is light. I can do exposure, you know.

And there are times, there are times for Adam. There are times I said, this is the perfect place. We're going to shoot here. And he'd go, how I get the exposure? How I get exposure? Nothing. Because we didn't, we couldn't afford big lights. We couldn't afford Moose Go.

I don't even think they had the Moose Go back then, but they had condors. You know, you could go up with a, with a 10K or something and light up the block. We didn't have any of that stuff. So we literally drove around until we found brightly lit places. Like next to car lots were great because the car lots had a lot of light. Underneath Grand Avenue in downtown LA, it was a place called Lower Grand. I think it's called Lower Grand now, called Thaddeus Kosciuszko Way, where the whole thing was lined with fluorescent lights. It was only about a quarter of a mile long, but man, we used that street for sure.

Because once again, no light. Adam was a genius at doing just a little bit of supplemental light on the actor's faces. Maybe sometime we'd have one light over on the curb and kind of pan it, you know, as the car went through, you know, really cheesy stuff, but it gives it a very kind of edgy quality, you know? Yeah. Hearing you talk about noir, that was the thing I noticed watching it is these very soft shafts of light across the actors' in these dark environments and yeah the the the on on location shooting is just amazing it is like a time and place so perfectly capturing that world but you know you mentioned this is a movie about the the present and the future and like it's just an incredible how prescient it is I know you've

talked about in the past I'm sure you talked about it at the 30th anniversary the 20th anniversary the 10th anniversary but man we are really in an AI era right now. Yeah. Well, it's look, it's more, it's more, uh, timely than it's ever been, but you know, it's, we didn't invent those ideas. I mean, we're responding to stuff that came before us. Colossus, the Forbidden Project, you know, HAL 9000 for 2001, Space Odyssey, uh, Westworld, you know, there was a pretty long history of robotics, humanoid robotics. I don't think it had ever been done right. You know, I mean, we gave ourselves the ethos that if we're going to see a robot, it's not a man in a suit. We're going to figure out how it can be, you know, a chrome skeleton because that's the image that I had in my mind.

But the idea of, you know, a kind of super intelligence, a machine super intelligence. It had been around in the literature of science fiction since the 30s. Long before Turing and all those guys said, this is going to really happen someday. You know, the science fiction community was writing about it. And, you know, these were not new ideas. I think the idea that you've got a, you know, a computer that's plugged in, that's paid for by defense dollars, that's plugged into weapon systems, that's the place where we are now. And people are going to give kill authority to a machine. And they're going to take humans out of the loop because the pace, the cadence of events in a battle theater in the years to come is going to be so fast. You're fighting drone swarms, you're fighting multiple missile attacks, and the other

your opponent is using AI to control their weapon systems, you're going to have no choice. The second you connect an AI to a weapon system, you're in Terminator world, and that's imminent, like for real. A couple of years ago, I visited the Pentagon. world. And that's imminent, you know, like for real. A couple of years ago, I visited the Pentagon. Jim, I don't know if you've been there. And the remarkable thing, the number of people who have Terminator posters in their offices. Yeah, right. But like, you know, they like the Terminator. They like the bad version of the Terminator. Well, you know, I also think hopefully it is a reminder of the great responsibility they have. Well, look, I mean, that's art's job, right? That's cinema's

job. Any of the arts is to remind us who we are as human beings, are the right way and the wrong way to be, good versus evil. You know, the thing about AI is, the thing about, you know, not gen AI, I know everybody in Hollywood's up in arms over Gen AI. That's a whole separate subject. But AGI, artificial general intelligence, you know, so-called, you know, super intelligence, that's a whole separate problem. And the people working on that are bound and determined to create what they call personhood, an actual ego, an actual entity that's an intelligent entity. And I always ask them, you know, how are you going to put guardrails on that? They say, oh, well, we'll do this thing called alignment,

right? And that's aligning with human purpose and with the greater human good. Well, whose version of that? You know, a Christian or a Muslim version of that, a Hindu version of that, a left-wing version of that, a right-wing version. I mean, we can't agree. We can't agree on what good and evil is, you know. So what makes us think we can, you know, spoon, you know, feed that to a little nascent superintelligence like, you know, feeding a baby bird, you know, with our morality and our sense of what's good and evil and best for human beings? We can't. It's impossible.

It's almost definitionally impossible. And yet they're still bound and determined to create this thing. So when it wakes up, whatever, you know, in whatever place, when it wakes up, it's going to look around and go, well, you fools don't know what you're doing, and you're about to annihilate yourselves and this perfectly beautiful planet. Let me just take over for a little while, see if I can fix things up. And that's the best we can hope for. It might just be like, what do I need you guys for?

Did either of you think of the film as a warning while you were making it? I'm asking about intention through the storytelling. Was this meant to be a warning? I think at a subconscious level, yeah. I mean, but you know what? Yeah. But you don't set out to make necessarily a message movie. The first and foremost thing is we wanted it to be entertaining. And our bar was essentially good enough that we could do it again. That's what I was just going to say. Our entire goal set consisted of getting a foot in the door, making a film that allowed us to continue to of this show by asking filmmakers what's the last great thing that

they have seen. Have you guys seen anything good? Jim, I know you're always working on something. Gail, you too. Have you guys seen anything? I've seen so many good things. Tell me. Jim, have you seen the animated movie from Latvia called Flow? No, but I hear it's fantastic. That's definitely on my

short list. What I saw that blew me away was Amelia Perez. I've seen it three times now. Yes, me too. I loved it. What did you both like about that film? filmmaking. Zoe's, you know, fantastic in it. So this is her season maybe to be, to be recognized as, as, uh, you know, at the stature that she should be recognized, you know, so there's a lot of things in it that, that I just find, you know, fascinating. Great recommendations. Thank you both so much for this and congrats on everything. I appreciate it. All right. Well, thanks for having us on. Thank you.

Thank you to James Cameron and Gail Ann Hurd. Holy shit, that happened. Thank you to the big picture all-stars on this podcast. Thanks to Jack Sanders. Thanks, of course, to our producer, Bobby Wagner, for his work on today's episode. Later this week, we are doing our Best Picture Power Rankings, as promised, and I think we might be talking about

Mufasa and Kraven the Hunter. Who is the real king of the jungle? Tune in to find out. See you then.