The Big Picture - The Top Five Movies of 2023

Episode Date: December 5, 2023

Sean and Amanda are joined by Chris Ryan and Adam Nayman to share their respective lists of the five best movies released in 2023, including titanic works from master filmmakers, blockbuster hits that captured the zeitgeist, and smaller movies that challenged viewers to consider their artistry deeply. Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Guests: Chris Ryan and Adam Nayman Senior Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Learn more about the albums you love with Dissect, a music analysis podcast hosted by me, Cole Kushner, a lifelong musician. Each season of Dissect dives deep into one album, examining the music, lyrics, and meaning of one song per episode. We've covered albums by Kendrick Lamar, Tyler, the Creator, Frank Ocean, just to name a few, and our brand new season just launched all about Radiohead's 2007 masterpiece In Rainbows. Listen to Dissect on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts, because a great art deserves more than a swipe. I'm Sean Fennessy. I'm Amanda Dobbins.

And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about the best movies of the year. And for the fifth consecutive year, we are joined by two of our most esteemed and important pals in moviegoing chris ryan of course and adam name and hi boys two of the great minds in criticism hey everybody how you doing are you ready to to mix it up today adam are you we've got three of us in the studio here you're in can Canada. This is really a USA versus Canada proposition. You've already taken shots at us

based on our opinions of Ferrari. How are you feeling? There are some who would ask what I'm doing here. I mean, the three of you are already there. Right. And yet, the invitation keeps going out, and I'm so fond of you all. And, you know, I mean,

I actually write the words on film on the site, so I'm happy to be here. It would not be a year-end pod without the mean pod guy. Yeah, absolutely. Let's talk about the year in movies. So, Amanda. Oh, boy. Was 2023 a good year in movies and for the movies? Yes. It was pretty fantastic, right? I was texting, you know, Adam, I don't have your phone number, so I couldn't put you on this text. But I had a bit of a crisis of confidence last night when finalizing my list because I had too many movies that I wanted to put on it. And that has not been the case for many years. Probably since 2019. Yes. I mean, certainly not during the pandemic. And even last year,

there were a few movies that I was extremely passionate about. And then, you know, some other movies just kind of filling it in that were good, but haven't stayed with me. This is amazing. This, like across genres,

across filmmakers, obviously it was a year with big works from a lot of major filmmakers. So that helps. And if anything, I do think my list is a little over-indexed on known names. But that's okay. It's a great year when you get talented filmmakers making work at a high level. You promised us that your list would be Amanda-coded.

It ultimately is. I went, as I always do, with my heart. There also seemed to be like you got straight off of a plane and immediately jumped into mind games where you were like, are you guys doing this? Because if you do, you're dead. There was some brokering,

but ultimately we didn't reveal anything. That was actually supposed to be a collaborative text as opposed to a mean text. And I just wanted to announce... Perhaps that says something about the energy that you're bringing to your texting. I, of course, and also to every aspect of our relationships. But on that note, I want to announce that I am taking one week off my trolling, specifically just for this episode. Starting now.

Starting now. This is going to be about positivity and celebration. I was originally going to make it a whole month, but I don't honestly think I have that at me. So today, whatever you guys choose, I will be nice. Understood. Chris, was 2023 a good year for the movies? Yeah, you know what? It was. Although experientially, like in terms of going to the movies i i think that

there was some real like dead zones throughout like the calendar year so i think that's always kind of interesting to get to this point of uh of a movie going year for myself because i don't see as many screenings and i don't get to go to as many or i just don't get to go to as many festivals so it's always a bit of a catch-up season. I watched quite a few movies this weekend in order to get ready for this podcast, because some of the stuff is available on streaming or from screeners and stuff. And any year where you have this caliber of filmmaker

putting out really major works, and also you have a race to get nine films into a top five or 20 movies into a top 10. That's a great year. But I was like looking at like my list and I was like, I wish that this product had been distributed more evenly over the course of the entire year rather than the gold rush that happens pretty much around this time. Before I ask Adam, I did want to ask you, Chris, did you get a chance to get Under the Wire, a screening of Lady Ballers, the recent film from Daily Wire Films? Did you get a chance to check that one out? We actually, I can't really comment on that as a seed investor in the film. I see.

Okay. Very notable. Adam, you approached us from a slightly different perch, reviewing films full time. For you, was this a good year in movies? I just want to go back to something Amanda said, which is I would be very happy to get Amanda Dobbins' phone number. Just so the record can show. Okay, we'll do it afterwards. Should we give it out on the show? Let's do it now. I have a lot of great basketball takes.

So if you just want to loop me in on that group chat. Social security number two. The first person to ever get a girl's phone number on a podcast. This is great. I mean, in terms of my approach, which is like, yeah, reviewing movies, it's an exhausting approach because I don't just write for you guys.

And I'm very lucky. I don't have to do the like deep in the trenches, Wednesday night press screenings of animated movies because that was what it was like back in the day, writing all weekly in Toronto. But no, you do see a lot of stuff, which means you have more to choose from, but it doesn't make you feel necessarily like any year is a good movie year, because you look through

your list, you're like, Oh, I could have probably done without those 45 movies, which are 90 hours of my life, which is rapidly receding as I move through time, you know, so you tend to feel a little, you know, a little kind of bad about that. But I mean, it was certainly a year where people promised lots of great directors coming back, and they they were here i don't know if there was anyone on that list whether it's the list we have in front of us or the list in our heads of like the great directors making their absolute best work there's a couple i'm willing to at least hear the argument out for but there were lots of movies that surprised me were better than i thought that there were going to be and there's a little note sean has later on about like a year for good

franchise movies or decent, you know, series and franchises. I agree with that. It was not a tortuous year in terms of watching like a blockbuster franchise stuff, which may or may not have to do with the fact that Marvel is pretty much done,

which makes it like easier to take. I think. Yeah, that was a point I wanted to emphasize there. This of course is the year of Nolan, Gerwig, Scorsese, Michael Mann is back, Sofia Coppola is back, Ari Aster, Wes Anderson, Jonathan Glazer, all of these filmmakers we talk about on the show ad nauseum.

We're always saying, remember in 2014 when this person put a movie out? We kind of got a lot of those names on the board this year, which is wonderful. I do agree with what you said, Adam, which is I don't know that this was the... I don't think any of those filmmakers made their best film either, although it's always hard to tell in the moment. And we were even thinking about this specifically because we were talking about a Wes Anderson movie over text last night. And where Asteroid City lands this year is really interesting. And I think it's a movie that over time, my opinion is going to continue to evolve because I always appreciate his movies more as time goes by.

The franchise thing is perfect, though, because to me, there are three good, truly good franchises. John Wick, Mission Impossible, and Spider-Verse. Those are in terms of like actual quality films that land in my top 25 every year. The Marvel stuff, for the most part, has obviously been on the downturn. DC is literally ending and restarting. A lot of other big franchises have been kind of dormant or resetting as well. What did the apes ever do to you?

I love the apes too. I'm holding judgment on the new apes since it's not a Matt Reeves production. So we'll, we'll see on the new, the new one. I do like the apes quite a bit, but that's not very many.

But the thing that really defines the year is, is Barbenbenheimer, is Barbie and Oppenheimer and the extraordinary story. And I think to Chris's point earlier about the density of experience, like Barbenheimer felt like it was the only thing happening in the popular culture for roughly three to four weeks. And then there was a huge gap in August and September where it felt like very little was happening in the movie culture. Yeah, it was like, yeah, talk to me. Yes. Was pretty much it. Yeah. Yeah. And so that's not ideal, obviously. And you want to feel like it's being dispersed. But there are a variety of reasons for that. One, I genuinely think movie studios are very stupid when it comes to scheduling. We're experiencing it right now. I have no idea why there are not

more movies going wide next week, especially considering how well the box office did over this past weekend. There should be a much bigger dispersal of movies across the release calendar. The other reason, of course, is the strikes. I mean, the strikes, I think, will really define this movie year two. You know, WGA and SAG strikes in particular were not framed by the movie business. They were more framed by the TV business. Totally different conversation today if Bike Riders, Dune, and Challengers came out. It's a great point.

Yeah. For the year-end list that'll be up on Ringer later this week, which I just submitted this morning, I said those exact titles, Chris. And you add to that stuff, even the Batwoman movie and Acme vs. Coyote, which I think sounds great. There's at least as many commercial movies that, for whatever reason, didn't come out that I think looked good as there were ones I actually saw. And Dune is such a huge absence in the last six weeks of the year. Cause it's such a discourse movie and such a box office behemoth kind of movie. I really feel that it's missing.

Not even cause I think it would be great. It just feels like it's mistimed now. Yeah. This was, this was the time. Yeah. That really was the movie that probably would have defined the final quarter of the year. And so its absence really sucks.

But in general, I had the same trouble that you had. I have, I think, nine movies for five spots right now. And I'm still kind of, up until this very last moment, a little bit undecided. But I did want to do a little bit of a quiz with you guys. Okay. Are you guys ready for this? You ready, Chris? Sure.

So do you know what the top three movies at the Worldwide Box Office are this year? I think so. Why don't you guess them? Barbie. Barbie. Oppenheimer. Oppenheimer. Taylor Swift Arrows.

Nope. Super Mario Brothers. Super Mario Brothers. That's right. That's why you have this second chair. Yeah, that's true. That's right. That's why you have this second chair. Yeah, that's true. That's true. So 2023 is the first year,

assuming these results hold, and there's no Avatar the Way of Water coming in the final month of the year. Well, that would be pretty funny if it did. Yeah. Wonka? If James Cameron's like, Has anyone here seen Wonka?

I have seen Wonka. Why are you doing this without me? Doing what? Why aren't you just at least sending me the info? Because you're traveling around the world. I mean, that's true. But like, do you think that our experience is going to be better if like we go individually sit and watch Wonka?

I'm embargoed on the film Wonka. So let me share my data point, okay? 2023 is the first year in which all three movies at the top of the worldwide box office are neither sequels nor remakes since what year? Take a guess. Each of you get a guess on this. 95. 93.

1941. That's not as crazy a guess as you might think. The year is 2001. Any guesses as to what those films are? In 2001? Yes. The top three films at the worldwide box office in 2001. Paranormal Activity?

No. Does that come out then? Now, remember the phrasing I'm using. Neither sequels nor remakes. So you're asking for the top three films in 2001? Yes. Shrek is not on the list. Was Shrek 2001?

I believe it was 2000. Okay. Was Gladiator 2001? 2000. Beautiful Mind? No. Okay. Ocean's Eleven? was Shrek 2001 I believe it was 2000 okay was Gladiator 2001 2000 2000 Beautiful Mind no okay Ocean's Eleven

no so is it Harry Potter it is Harry Potter is number one Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone well that's like yeah okay

number two that's a technicality but that let me let me let me try my point is it Pixar there's a Pixar film on the list yes number three is Monsters Inc Monst Is it Pixar? There's a Pixar film on the list.

Yes. Number three is Monsters, Inc. Monsters, Inc. is correct. It's a pretty good one. There's number two, and number two is a very large film. Number two is The Lord of the Rings, The Fellowship of the Rings. I was about to say Lord of the Rings, and you said it before. Okay.

Yeah. So, obviously, all- What's Sesame Street recently where they were just doing Lord of the Rings, but it was like cookies instead of- God, I hope Knox gets into Lord of the Rings. it was like cookies instead of God I hope Knox gets into Lord of the Rings I'm really upset that's inevitable

there was also they did one that was Comic Con but instead it was Numbers Con that's actually sick I'm all about that I don't know whether

I appreciate that when we run out of movie drafts we should draft hobbies and interests for Knox and like MMA Lord of the Rings

would be like axe throwing yeah maybe maybe soap creation a la Fight Club Blue Man Group okay so obviously all three of those movies spawn franchises basically yeah um and they were some most of them were intended to be franchises but I thought just for fun it would be notable to put some context around where Hollywood is because 2001 like that is when Hollywood changes forever like the next next year, Spider-Man comes out, and then that's all this is. This is defined entirely by that. So you could look at this and say, on the one hand, this is a huge change that has happened. Like Barbie Oppenheimer and

Super Mario Brothers feels new. There's something new happening. Audiences want something new. On the other hand, there will definitely be another Super Mario Brothers movie. Despite Margot Robbie's protests, I suspect there will be a second Barbie film. I think it would be hard to do a sequel to Oppenheimer. I'm not ruling it out.

You never fucking know. Maybe Kissinger is the next Oppenheimer film. You know, it's all in play. But I thought this was really interesting. Does anyone want to guess the last time

the top three films at the box office failed to spawn a sequel, remake, or wider franchise of any kind? Is that 1941? No, it's not that far back. 70s? Not the 70s. Sooner.

Wait. Guess a year. What does sooner mean? Does sooner mean 1988? No, in fact, it was 1988 up until 2021. In 1988, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Rain Man, and Coming to America were released. But in 2021, a sequel to Coming to America was released. Right. So the year is 1982.

Can you guess what came out in 1982? Rocky III. Nope. That's a sequel. E.T. E.T. is one, yes. 1982 is E.T., Gandhi, but that's probably not that big a hit. Nope. That's a sequel. E.T. E.T. E.T. is one, yes. And T.D. 2 is E.T. Gandhi, but that's probably not that big a hit.

Nope. Officer and a Gentleman. Yes. That's one. Shout out Rewatchables. Shout out Bill. And you guys, that was very good. Thank you.

That was our best Rewatchables in like two years. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that was a funny episode only because of Chris. E.T. and Officer and a Gentleman are up there and there's a third film. And it's amazing that this is one of the top three films of the year, but it was a sensation. Trading Places 82? It's Tootsie.

Oh, yeah. That's the last time the top three movies in worldwide film release did not spawn a sequel or a franchise. You are, like, locked in as trivia host. Well, I think this is so interesting. No, no, no, I know. But I'm just like, is this like the next chapter for you? Is this when we run out of drafts?

Are you just going to start doing... I think I've told you this before. When I was in sixth grade, I was asked to make a presentation to the class. Everyone had to make a presentation about what they could do really well. And my presentation was be a game show host. And I also didn't write anything down and ad-libbed it that day because I was an inveterate procrastinator. A plus on the presentation.

You're doing very well. It also, I much prefer this energy to competing against you in trivia. Right. I need to be Pat Sajak or Alex Trebek and not one of the contestants. Fair enough. I just thought that that was relevant because this never happens. Part of the reason why I think everyone has such a positivity about this moment is they're like, we've never seen Barbie before.

We've never seen Oppenheimer before. We've never seen Super Mario Brothers and on down the line. Now, obviously, once you get past the top three, there are a lot of franchises, but it feels like they are kind of dying franchises in many respects. Nevertheless, very good year. Is everyone ready to share their lists? I think so.

So, I have a question. How do you want to handle overlaps? I think we should just do our lists. I think that because we have not shared with each other where we're going. Though Adam Naiman, who takes his responsibilities very seriously, did put his list. It's a great list, Adam. And you and I have some overlap, but not at the same spot. So that's kind of, how do you want to handle that? I think we should just say what we've chosen in order. In the past, we've done the, my number four is your number one is your number seven. And I think for the listeners at home,

that is a wildly disorienting process. So let's just think of this as an opportunity to wax philosophic on our individual picks. Okay. Sound good? Wonderful. Okay. Who should begin? Chris, would you like to begin with your number five?

Okay. I can do that. Yeah. Do you think it's not representative of the year at large? No. I mean, I always have

this funny thing when we do this, which is I always think that my six through ten are more interesting to talk about than my one through five. If you want to share

ten through six, you can do that. That's all right. Maybe down, maybe honorable mentions when we get to the bottom. Is Lady Ballers in the top 10? Just blink if it is. But I do have a lot of B-roll from the Sound of Silence. Sound of Freedom.

Speaking of films that did not have a sequel or franchise attached to it that did very well at the box office. My number 5 is Ferrari. Michael Mann's Ferrari, which I got a chance to see this weekend and I think is kind of a return to the insider style

pretty straightforward filmmaking from him. Completely agree. And has some flaws but I think it's triumphs far far outpaces flaws and I think that I will watch this movie 50 more times

because it is so fucking like, I want to live inside of the double-breasted suits and eat the pasta and walk from the church to my office, back to my mistress's home, back to my wife's home. I don't think you can walk to the mistress's home. Then take me in my car. Yeah, there you go. I'll have my man pick me up.

6 a.m. And I can't wait to watch this movie so many times. Like this feels like Insider and Miami Vice where it's like, oh, I think people are going to be like unpacking parts of this movie and sequences from this film and scenes from this film. Once they get over maybe like the, that guy's not Italian. I think that there was almost like a throwback nature to it.

Like as soon as Adam Driver walks on screen, I was like, I don't give a fucking shit what this guy's accent is. This is an incredible performance. So this is the only movie this year that you asked me to not share with you how I felt about it. Yes.

In fact, I've watched you say it to a few people. I haven't seen the trailer. I didn't read any of the stuff that was coming out of the film festivals. I did not want to go into it with any kind of influence just because I've had the experience with things like Black Hat where it's like, I just prefer it that way. I'd like to have my personal communion with God. I'd like to tell you that I acquired the 4K UHD copy of Black Hat.

I will be revisiting it over the holiday. To see if it matches with my in-person live re-HD copy of Black Hat. I will be revisiting it over the holiday. To see if it matches with my in-person live re-edit of Black Hat? Yes, we shall see if that works out. I ask you that because I want to know, did it live up to the expectations and the cone of silence that you created for yourself? It exceeded them. It exceeded my expectations because I was worried.

Yeah. I was worried. I was worried about his ability to kind of like get projects executed at this level, at this point in his life, which is understandable. He's an aging man, Michael Mann. And yeah, I thought this was like a really, really, really, really, really awesome return to form. Amanda, number five. My number five is to me what Ferrari is to Chris uh and it is of course Priscilla by

Sofia Coppola a lower than I would have guessed you know I almost as I said to you last night I almost wasn't true to myself and then I was true to myself uh because there are other films that I want to that I was very sure I would include in my list that like are not similar, but you will see a theme emerging. And maybe as a list maker, it's not, you know, my most perfect, perfectly formed object. But here's the thing. I love Sofia Coppola. I have for many years. It's just like Ferrari.

It is a return to form. I feel that it is like an evolution of the form. If you're paying attention, which you should with all Sofia Coppola films, it's also just been gratifying to have everyone come back into the tent, you know, which I built and have been maintaining for many years.

In fairness, I think she built the tent, but you have been maintaining the tent. Sure, that's fine. Yeah, she built it. I, you have been maintaining the tent. Sure. That's fine. Yeah. She built it. I, you know, make sure that every, like the, I don't really know enough about tents to continue this metaphor. You're a very well-paid janitor. That's great.

Yeah. Thank you so much. You're a docent in the gallery of Sophia. You know, and a Sophia tent is more of a glamping experience. So I'm, exactly, I'm there curating the glamping tent. Anyway,

it's great. It's also the 28th anniversary of Lost in Transition. So it has been very gratifying to, like, get to talk about her work, to get to talk about

what she does with the camera and detail and observation and young women, which is also in some ways a theme of this year at the movies. And I just, I'm glad to have her back. Adam, number five.

I'll use this as the opportunity to say there's a biopic-free top five. Okay. And that Priscilla Ferrari, Priscilla, Priscilla, Ferrari, Maestro wrote about them all for the side. They're not all the same movie. Like they're all very different because they're different kinds of directors and different relationships to their,

you know, to their side. Like those three movies are all kind of strong. And the one thing they kind of have in common is I think each of them, if you're really invested in the filmmaker kind of unlocks like a secret compartment of kind of self-portraiture yes yes about Michael Mann I'm like absolutely

someone wants to say Maestro's with Bradley Cooper I'm like he wishes you know but there's definitely an extent to which there's like a crossover between the personality and the and the subject so while I didn't have any of them in my top 10, that's definitely a node that's worth writing about this year,

is biopics that are really deeply invested, as opposed to just going through the motions or going through the cliches. But I suspect Amanda might have this move on her list too, just because she said she might. And it's not that I've been looking to displace it, it's just it stayed there. When I did the half year roundup for ringer it was in the top five and even though i've seen some good movies in the last week it stayed there and that's kelly craig freeman's adaptation of are you there god it's me margaret which when you're talking about like the

80s or the way movies used to be all i can think is how old school this film is not just because it's got the 70s needle drops and the period design and it's a judy bloom adaptation it's because it feels like something that was made before this like ephemeral streaming non-movie era i'm talking in real mystic abstractions here but it's like a real movie you know that i could imagine people going to and enjoying without special cause or special pleading and it's made with such care and precision and love by that filmmaker who is an acolyte of james l brooks and i don't know if any of the last couple james l brooks movies are as good as her movie is not trying to show throw shade on j L. Brooks, who is a master of that multiplex, serial comic form. But her movie is swift and funny and emotional

and we're not doing Oscar stuff here. I know that you have two months of that coming up with awards season, but what does it take to get Rachel McAdams an Oscar nomination for this movie? She's so lovely. She does such detailed work playing this woman who's sort of caught between, you know, these, these tropes and cliches of being like a school mom and the PTA. She has her artistic aspirations.

Her daughter's really going through it. She underplays it so beautifully. Like she's never been bad for a second on screen in her career, as far as I'm concerned, she deserves an Oscar nomination at some point. So if it wasn't going to be for Game Night, I think it should be for this. And it should also be said that of the two performances that Betty gave this year that I saw that Betty Safdie gave, not counting The Curse, which is a whole other thing, I liked him in this way more than I liked him in Oppenheimer.

As the sort of laid-back, caring, slightly out-of-it dad, I thought it was a really lovely performance. I just sort of laid back caring slightly out of it dad i thought it was a really lovely performance um i just sort of defy anyone to show me five better movies than that this year and of course because it's not in a big masterful auteur mode and because it's not a formal show-offy kind of movie gets lost in the shuffle but i think it's fantastic adam when i saw that you had written down this movie you wrote it down in the list in the document as God slash Margaret. And I was like, damn, Adam's in his bag. There's like a Swedish movie called God slash Margaret. That's like nine hours long that I didn't even see or hear of. I completely forgot about this.

I do think that the movie is, despite it not being formally showy, very cinematic too. It is made to be a movie. It is not made to be a streaming, you know, tossed off piece of crap. It's meant to be something much deeper than that. And the innovation of the movie for me, and we may have discussed this when we talked about it, but I think it is the deepening of the mother character. That's the thing that the movie does that the book doesn't quite have. And that, you know, it allows, and maybe it's just appealing to people like us with young kids, but it really like,

I felt very locked into this movie emotionally. Yeah. And I thought it was really, really effective. I think the magic of it is that it does both. And I agree with you, Adam. This is on my long list, but it is not in my top five. But the Rachel McAdams performance

and everything that the adaptation adds to that character is really powerful. And it also still captures the Margaret energy. I have thought a lot of the scene when I think she's, is she trying on a bra? Anyway, she's dancing around Harry Belafonte. And speaking of like pure cinema and just a moment of being like a young girl, like encapsulated perfectly. It's so funny, so heartwarming. So that it can do, you know, both generations is remarkable.

It's a really good pick. I'm glad someone shouted it out today. My number five is a movie that I've talked about a couple of times that has not yet been released. It'll be released wide in February. And I'm sorry that that's really obnoxious, but that's just the case because the movie is called The Taste of Things. It is the French selection for the Academy Awards this year. It premiered at Cannes under the title The Pot of Foo.

This is one of the most, it's impossible to talk about this movie without slipping into really bad Cook's illustrated verbiage, you know, just like delectable, you know, exquisite and sumptuous at every turn. But in many ways, it is... Would you say it's mouthwatering?

Yes. It really, it whets the appetite emotionally. It's directed by Tran Anh Hung, who, you know, I have not seen a bunch of many of his movies in the last 15 years. He made The Scent of Green Papaya, and he's a really talented Vietnamese-French filmmaker. And this movie is about a French couple

who double as colleagues. One is a kind of master chef in, I believe it's 19th century France, might be early 20th century France. And his kind of aide-de-camp, who's played by Julia Pinoche and their relationship portrayed as life goes by and easily the best romance I've seen probably this decade maybe even this century and like the most beautifully shot movie that you'll

see this year like very similar to your feelings Adam about Are You There God It's Me Margaret in terms of a very small scale film a film very much about people in rooms working together, often making beautiful food. Before I was a parent, I was a food connoisseur, at least aspired to be. I tried to learn as much about food and fine dining as I possibly could. I've abandoned that post, but this movie reminded me of why I cared about that. And I just was just swept away by this movie. I don't know if I've had a more deep feeling experience at the movies this year. Sort of a reverse, I've abandoned my child.

I've abandoned my meal. I have claimed my child and abandoned exquisite 11 course meals. So I just love this movie and I can't wait for more people to see it. That opening set piece after John Wick 4 is like legitimately,'s like legitimately that no but it is the best action filmmaking that i have seen this year after like after is our

career it's unreal you haven't talked about it i didn't know you saw it also um yeah and i actually i thank you to josh who arranged for me to see it with my husband um so we saw it together which is nice um because it is about partnership. It is like, it is another sneaky wife movie in like in the best possible way. It really, it is, it is the year of the wife.

It's a, it's a wife who is sneaky or it's a, the way that it is a wife movie is like a very much like a part of the movie and their, and like what their relationship and what they mean to each other and how, like how they interact in a relationship is like is is an amazing very moving part of the text more movies about sneaky wives though i do want to shout out to um so ben wama jamel plays the the chef in the film and he is in another movie this year that i absolutely loved that i thought might have been on adam's list, but since it isn't, I'll just give it a quick shout out. It's called Pacifiction, which is like

a fascinating French drama, sort of, sort of a spy movie, sort of an existential crisis movie that I mentioned very briefly earlier this year, but that people should check out. And those two parts could not be more different. I mean, it is like an incredible transformation. Chris would be, Chris should watch Pacifiction. It's actually kind of Michael Mann core. Vaguely point break core as well. While Steel is still being a two and a half hour

slowly mosey in art movie. That's someone like that Michael Mann droning and it has incredible wave footage all up when it breaks. It's kind of like morphine drip Michael Mann. It's really leisurely morphine drip Michael Mann. Okay. You know, it's like really leisurely. I can take it.

Okay. All right. Number four, Chris. Oh, mine is How to Blow Up a Pipeline. Okay. So technically 2022 TIFF, I guess, but really hit in April of 2023. It's a 2023 movie.

Released in 2023. And I picked this for a lot of reasons. One, for much of the year, it was my favorite movie of the year. And in a year where I think that we're obviously celebrating achievements from career filmmakers, it was really awesome to be electrified by a new-ish filmmaker and a cast of largely new faces about something very current

and contemporary with a really modern sensibility. And so even though Daniel Goldhaber, I think, approaches this subject matter, which is about a group of young people essentially trying to... I mean, it's in the title, Blow Pipeline. He approaches it essentially like it's Ocean's Eleven, not in tone, but in sort of filmmaking style.

And it's like a thrilling, gripping, traditional movie in that sense, but it feels new and fresh in so many different ways. And especially because of Ariella Bearer, who plays the sort of main character and also had a hand in writing the screenplay. So I've just, I think when I saw this movie in the spring, I don't know, I think there had been,

there was still like COVID hangover for the movies in general. And I was like, you know, everybody was sort of waiting for Mission Impossible and waiting for Oppenheimer and Barbie. And I threw this on one night and I just felt like my blood just became pumping again. It was like the fucking movies are back in a different

way than oppenheimer and barbie did definitely on my long list movies on hulu in america right now if you have not had a chance to see it i don't think enough people have had a chance to see it it's um at a minimum well one it's very pointedly political in a way that almost no mainstream american releases are but two it's the i think the real signal of like a very very talented smart thoughtful filmmaker um and someone who you know he's he's adapting faces of death next and that sounds ridiculous but i am very intrigued by it because he's doing it so it's a great shout cr um okay amanda what's next for you um my number four and you know i apologize adam for stepping um on on Adam Versepping on your list is Showing Up, which is kind of the opposite to me of Priscilla,

even though it is, you know, another restrained film by a celebrated female filmmaker. But it's a filmmaker who I have admired for some time, but never really connected to one of her films before and showing up was like a pretty instantly exhilarating movie going experience and when I realized it was time to do our top five list this was the first thing that popped into my mind um and I am like now maybe a little nervous that it's too low on my list because I found this is a film starring Michelle Williams as a maybe another director's stand-in you know I don't really know she's a sculptor who is is making art and slightly frustrated in that pursuit but just kind of keeps going and is like dealing with a life outside of trying to make art and so it is about the creative process and one of the amazing things of the movie is the way that shows how like how like actual physical art gets made at set in an artist college and you just see people

sculpting and painting and doing you know earthwork as they say at one point, in a way that is knowing but still, to me, fascinating and exciting and beautifully filmed. And then it's also just about a person, I guess it's about ambition to some extent, and it's about relationships. It's about trying to get stuff done in life and everything that comes in the way and what do you value and what do you not and how do you deal with the world? I watched it again last night. I truly can't recommend it enough. Love this movie too. Also on my long list. Adam, why don't you hold your thoughts on that one since it's coming up for you? Okay, Adam,

what's your number four? Well, I want to, you know, number four is a May, December by Todd Haynes, who is as smart, an American filmmaker,

you know, as currently working, uh, last few days, uh, because it's a netflix movie it's open to a huge amount of viewership and discourse i'm not saying that todd haynes isn't like a well known you know filmmaker that people don't talk about his stuff but it's like

the timeline in a wider sense is talking about may december maybe more than you know if it had a limited release and some people are sort of saying that there's a danger in that. You don't want to put Todd Haynes in too many people's hands at once because now we've had like three days on what is camp to the point that the producer, Christine Vachon, had to kind of weigh in on Twitter being like, the movie's intentionally funny.

If you think it's funny, that's because it's funny, which doesn't answer the question of whether or not it's camp, but does sort of suggest what happens when a really rarefied niche filmmaker is working on a big public platform streamer like this too and i have a lot of issues with good directors working with netflix but one of the issues that i don't have or one of the good things is like please do give todd haynes money to make movies if this is what it takes for him to make movies, I will take him taking it from Netflix, the kind of blank check, no oversight thing.

Because this film, which is about an actress played by Natalie Portman, who is sort of studying to play a scandalized sort of 90s pariah played by Julianne Moore, very much based on Marie-Claude Tourneau. The film is sort of about their coming together, their meeting. Portman goes to Georgia to kind of study her and ask some questions, and ostensibly it's about her art and her craft, but the whole movie is about performance and scrutiny and identity and sort of bad faith, exploitative arts. And then in the middle of it, you have another one of the performances of the

year, not from Moore or Portman, who are both terrific. And if they get Oscar nominated or awards, they deserve them. But Riverdale's Charles Melton, playing the now 36-year-old lover of Julianne Moore's character, Husband, who they first hooked up when he was like, I think 12, she was 36. And the portrait that he makes

of someone who in living seemingly the life he like wanted to live and you know defiance of societal norms and true love and all that has grown up in some way so stunted and so arrested and so sad it's not visible to the naked eye but then he starts having this prolonged not so subtle breakdown in the second half of the movie and he's just amazing. Haynes, the way he works with actors, the way he works with different kinds of American backdrops, the way he works with multimedia,

and how close he himself is coming to making a lifetime movie while very sharply drawing distinctions, that's not what he's doing. So a great piece of directing and a great piece of acting. And, uh,

you know, his winning streak just continues. He's, he's one of the good ones. This is in fact, my number four as well. Oh, great.

And I'll, I'll make one very minor correction to everything that you said. Otherwise I totally completely agree, Adam, this movie was not funded by Netflix. It was acquired by Netflix, which I think is actually important because this movie was received funded by Netflix. It was acquired by Netflix. That's right. They bought it at... Which I think is actually important because this movie was received

kind of quietly after Cannes. I think there was a lot of anticipation. There's obviously a lot of star power and it's a very zesty story. And I think because of the curious mix of tones, critics didn't really know what to do with this movie. And I have seen over the course

of the last couple of weeks, a lot of critics kind of revising their feelings about it, having revisited the movie. The first time that I saw it, I loved it. I'm very much, I just have always felt on the same exact wavelength as Todd Haynes. I just, I'm very, feel very connected to his style of filmmaking, but it is a particular flavor.

And I don't hold that against other critics being like, you know what, actually there's more here. I've watched the movie three times now, deeper every time. First hour is funnier every time. Second hour is sadder. This is probably both the funniest and saddest movie of the year for me. I agree with you completely about the Melton performance. The thing that really hit home for me, and I hope this is not spoiling anything for anybody who hasn't seen the movie yet. And I hope they do is there is such a profound. So you, so you did it all for this feeling at the end of the movie,

like the absolute end of the movie is like, so it's, this is what you, all of this was destroyed for this. The two best, the last, the last two scenes are the two best last two scenes of a movie that i've seen in like a long time so good so so special um and i do i'm really interested in just him

just doing a pocket history of american popular culture like that has been his project has been like over the court basically going through the decades and saying you know if bob dylan defines this decade if david bowie defines this decade if silent cinema defines this decade, if David Bowie defines this decade, if silent cinema defines this decade, if frankly, like tabloid exploitation defines the 90s and the kind of like, you know, lifetime of vacation of movies defines the 2000s. Like that really is a resonant theme for him. But also like the laugh lines, you know, I was thinking even more since you and I talked about it Amanda last week about the Natalie Portman project and right a lot of people this weekend have as they've been reflecting on this movie have said things like I think she might be a bad actress and so this is the ultimate test of that because she is of course playing a bad actress and I think she's like masterful in this movie there are times where like when she visits the pet shop and it's kind of like luxuriating in the corner it's

fascinatingly weird it's so weird she's really funny it also you know the story goes that she found this script and brought it to todd haynes and so that she saw something in it that like spoke to her and she wanted to do i think speaks well of her self-awareness and also being in on the joke just like she's acting that's not that's all intentional you know which as

I think she's a good actress like the head moves a lot but you know like in this case it serves the text really well I kind of feel like she's we don't have to go do a Natalie Portman

or a May December pod maybe we should have done a Hall of Fame honestly she kind of reminds me of Keanu Reeves oh that's a good call she's like incredible at being Natalie Portman

and has now found the material that supports that hypothesis. You know? Yes. She stopped doing fun rom-coms. Or being in Thor or being like

the doctor who walks in and says, there's no way we can do this in time. And now she's kind of like building this persona. I loved the idea of Todd Haynes as like hired gun though.

Like this, Dark Waters, him kind of just being like, yeah, Apple, I'll do a Velvet Underground documentary that is going to literally be a cinematic representation of what the Velvet Underground did musically. Like he's such an interesting filmmaker. Credit should go to the writer too, because I believe she won the New York Film Critics Best Screenplay, Sammy Burch, right? Because I mean, this was not, it's not the writer, too, because I believe she won the New York Film Critics Best Screenplay, Sammy Birch.

Right. Because, I mean, this was not it's not a writer director film. So free free standing screenplay by Sammy Birch, who I also believe is the writer of Coyote versus Acme. She was. Oh, wow. Which is the movie I want to see more than anything. Well, more particularly about that, she's a casting director. So this is a movie written by a casting director who understands performance and actors. So there's just a really, it's a very onion-like layered experience. And the movie, I just think it's so rewarding. I hope people give, if they watch it the first time and they're like, what the fuck was that?

And I watched my wife do that in real time this weekend. I hope they give it another try having heard people talk about it or read some good criticism about it because it's very rich. Okay, number three. I also just want to say that I've been working really hard and over the weekend

on something I hope to bring to market soon, which is, you know, like David Ehrlich does like the year in movies montage. I'm doing that, but I will be doing it with the voiceover of Gracie from May, December doing Skinnamarink.

Still workshopping. Okay, do you want to preview it for us? I'm working on it. I think we can make the case that that voice is just my daughter's voice. My daughter with her beautiful lisp and her child-like face. Okay, Chris, number three.

Killers of the Flower Moon. Okay. I think we're... I mean, so do we do a Killers of the Flower Moon round now? Let's... You do yours and Adam also has it at number three

if you guys want to start your conversation. Yeah, I mean, we... You know, I think... We've talked about this film a lot. I regret not being able to see it a second time. I got a chance to see Oppenheimer for a second time over the weekend and found that to be like a fascinating experience. So I'm kind of looking forward to whenever Killers is on streaming and I can get a chance to like kind of make my way through it again. But it still sticks with me for all the reasons we talked about the first time, it just feels like a crowning achievement at the end of one of the most important careers

in American pop culture and gave me a ton to think about. And speaking of just really creative ways of thinking about material in the same way we were just with May, December, what a fascinating execution of Grant's book. You know what I mean? And this idea that you could take a piece of material

that is very beloved and very important and just be like yeah but let's twist it this way and let's talk about it like outside looking in or inside looking out and i i just think that's the thing i've been thinking about a lot with killers in the last couple of weeks adam do you want to talk about killers of the fire moon since chris brought it up for his number three yeah i mean i've uh you know i wrote about it for the site i've been reading a lot on it. There's some stellar writing that's inspired, including by a critic, Adam Pierron, who wrote about it very, you know, provocatively with a lot of admiration, but also to sort of suggest, you know, one of the implications of the ending is that as good as it is, Scorsese is sort of saying it can't help but be a failure of representation because of who it is who had to make it and how and when right and that's not taking shots at Scorsese it's sort of saying that he's one of the few Hollywood filmmakers who's willing to accept that part of the discourse actually integrated into the movie as kind of admission of how stories get told and who gets to tell them so you know I kind of agree with. Not that I think I would lead with the film being a failure,

but I think it definitely is a movie made with a lot of tentativeness and thoughts and second guessing, which is not the way Scorsese usually works. He's such an effortless filmmaker in here. You feel him working his way through it. It's obviously not just something he can, he can't just like make it out a whole cloth right craft is great the acting's impressive the material's fascinating and infuriating i got lucky enough to do an interview for a different publication with lily gladstone recently and she talked about how where we talked together about

how it's also such a load-bearing movie saying that it can't hold up every single part of the equation is also kind of not fair, right? It's taking on a lot of weight. It's a big, ambitious project. And while Scorsese can't tick every box and he can't solve everything that's problematic about taking the story on, you know, the effort is pretty impressive. So, yeah, I have it as the number three movie of the year. In some ways, almost all the other movies next to it look small. I mean, it's definitely to me the major auteur work of the year.

And even some of the things about it that might fail, or even some of the things about it that prompt people to be frustrated or skeptical or questioning of it, I fold into a kind of admiration towards him for doing it. I do think Lily Gladstone's going to win an Oscar for this movie, and I think it'll be hugely deserved if she does. I think she's terrific. It's going to be fun to talk about best actress this year because it's extremely competitive.

Amanda, what's your number three? Past Lives. So you may notice- I really wanted to put this on my list. Yeah, and so- number three? Past Lives. So you may notice- I really wanted to put this on my list. I couldn't quite get there. Right. And I really wanted to. I mean, my anxiety stemmed from the fact that I have now included three A24 films directed by women. But if you make it, I will show up, as they say. Your field of dreams. This is my field of dreams.

If you will it, it is no yes um give women under the age of 50 money to make films so i am aware that i that is very cliched and i'm self-conscious about it but i this was another of the most exhilarating movie going experiences the year for me and for a lot of other people like past lives has been i, rightfully celebrated. It felt like seeing sort of like how to blow up a pipeline, something familiar but new at the same time because it is about, you know, it is a romance, but it is also about regret. about immigration and identity as a person and how your relationships define your identity and whether you can make choices again. All hallowed fiction themes, but expressed in a very modern and fresh and moving way.

I don't think Redale Lee will win Best Actress because I think Lily Gladstone will, and rightly so. She's transcendent, but Greta Lee is wonderful. And the ending is just, you gotta hand it up to this ending. I gasped the first time that I saw it. Obviously, you know, that final shot and the acting and the writing, it's just people don't always know how to finish a movie,

and Celine Song did. So, Past Lives, number three. I like that pick a lot. My favorite interview that I've conducted this year is with Celine Song. So, if people are just seeing the movie now at home, I encourage them to listen to it because you can see the level of intent

that went into the decisions that she made to make it such a good movie uh my number three is Oppenheimer um which I feel like we're in an inevitable moment of just Oppenheimer non-stop for the next three months and I want to say that that's okay I think that everybody needs to just accept the the the Nolan wave is here and that the town is ready to acknowledge that it has happened. Whether or not it wins Best Picture, I'm not so sure. I feel very confident now that he's going to win Best Director at the Academy Awards. I've talked about the movie many times on the show now.

I do think that it is like the ultimate synthesis of what I think he's good at. And I found his approach to be very appropriate for the story. And I think the other thing that really recommends the movie is I really like high-toned, big-budget, kind of quote-unquote Hollywood filmmakers who have incredible taste in, for lack of a better word, department heads. People who know who the best cinematographer is for the project, the best composer for the project, the best casting director or editor. This is a movie that certainly Christopher Nolan has the vision and the

conception and read this, you know, great book, American Prometheus and transmogrified it into this complicated three act story. But Jennifer lame and Hoytavan Hoytama and, you know, a little bit Granson and all of the incredible people who contributed to the

movie, plus the cast, which I think is exceptional. The most tense I was at the movies this year was the Trinity Test, which is absurd because it's a historical event that I knew the results of.

I had read this book. And the most exhilarated I think I have been is in the first 10 minutes of the film when we start to see the kind of visual manifestation of both scientific ideas coming to fruition and also what might actually be happening inside of J. Robert Oppenheimer's mind. I think those are like strides in Hollywood filmmaking that we don't really see very often.

My relationship with Nolan is a big joke. I get it. But I really, really, really connected with this movie. I've seen it three times, all on the big screen every time. And'd like to see it again on the big screen honestly because i really uh connected to it in a big way does it have flaws it does have flaws it's okay to say that i think amanda your your claims are like i said this is a week long retirement of the bit and an embrace of positivity great number two ch. Up and over. Yeah, there we go. My boys! Yeah.

I mean, I feel weird not having a number one. Bring the sheets in! Honestly. Bring the sheets in. You insulted him a little bit. You insulted him a little bit. That's history. Watching this weekend,

even on my TV screen, I was really curious to know how it was going to play. And not surprisingly, the second half of the film after Trinity works really well on TV. It is actually really kind of fascinating to honestly be able to back up 10 seconds and re-hear a piece of dialogue that you may have missed in some of the layering stuff. I think all the stuff with Hill, the scientist that Rami Malek plays, is a little bit more broadcast early on, whereas in

the theater, you're like, this fucking guy is really Dennis Eckersley, huh? He's coming in. It's like a little bit more projected throughout the film, which was one of my sort of like, that seemed a little deus ex machina at the end to have like a testimony.

But he's Chekhov's Rami Malek in the movie. There's just, I think that first hour, Sean, for me was really like mind-blowing. It was like the Picasso and the Stravinsky and T.S. Eliot and this guy seeing raindrops and explosions in his head and watching that kind of come into the real world.

You know what I thought about when I was watching it, maybe the second or third time, was in contrast to Napoleon and all the gripes I had about Napoleon, where I was like, what was really happening in these in-between times? There are a lot of gaps in time in Oppenheimer as well, but it is not actually,

to me, the movie is not ultimately about Oppenheimer. Of course it is about Oppenheimer, but it kind of moving quickly through time is that Oppenheimer is a stand-in for this moment in American history. And that I didn't feel like, oh, well, what was Bob Oppenheimer doing in 1938 instead of in 1937?

You know, I didn't really feel any anxiety missing those moments. I'll just say also, since Nolan's obviously going to be up for awards, Murphy's going to be up for Best Actor. Do we think he's going to probably win? I think he's a frontrunner. Downey will probably be up for Supporting Actor.

He's been taking some hits lately, though. There's some oncoming Melton wave happening here. He's going to get back out there. Matt Damon kind of makes this movie. He's so fun. He's so good. Because when Matt Damon shows up, the movie becomes a lot more, I wouldn't say palatable, but like,

you're like, Ooh, a nice 72 degrees in this pool. I love it. You know, like it's, it's much more like a Hollywood movie for the hour that he's in it. And when he leaves,

you actually feel the bottom drop out of your stomach because you're like, ah, shit, this is really dark. Yeah. He's like, if Kevin Pollak and a few good men had power, you know,

like he's there for a lot of laugh lines, energy to deflate our hero. Well, it's like his last on-screen moment pretty much, except for the testimony that he's giving, is when Oppenheimer's like, you'll keep me informed. And he goes, as best I can, you know? And that's kind of like when the whole thing changes for him. So just, I do feel odd not making it number one, but I am who I am. I know Adam's supposed to go next, and he's also our guest, so this is rude, but can I go next?

Of course. Because my number two is Barbie. Great. Yeah. And, you know, we can have that conversation and then Adam can bring the temperature down a few degrees. Rightfully so. Yeah. Barbie. uh rightfully so um yeah barbie i feel a little bit you know now that it's so successful and has

made billions of dollars and it's it's like very mainstream you know and pop and here we go pink no it's fine here's the thing i really liked it you know and and like i my instinct is to distance myself from all the other people being like hi bar, Barbie, and all of the nail polish color tie-ins or whatever. I thought that this was an imaginative and funny and moving and incredibly well-executed, big-budget romp through the 90s female subconscious and I appreciate it when they make giant wacky movies for me you know like I just do I go to the movies a lot and I see a lot of things where they spend honestly even more money on nonsense that I don't care

about and I have thought a lot about it. Obviously, it also saved movies. That's cool. But I just... It's an amazingly well-done version of what it is, which was sort of an impossible task. And Ryan Gosling forever. Did Amanda step on your number one with Barbie, Adam? Yeah, I know.

No, I mean, it's interesting because in making the top 10 list this morning for? Yeah, I know. No, I was, I mean, I was interesting because I'm making the top 10 list this morning for ringer. I mentioned both those movies, but neither of them was on the top 10 list. And I said for Oppenheimer, I felt bullied by about 600 people this year for not liking Oppenheimer enough to which I said,

I wrote about it pretty seriously. I tried, right. And it's not a bad faith review. Nolan's interesting to me because when he makes his showmanship, the subject, like the prestige, said i wrote about it pretty seriously i tried right and it's not a bad faith review nolan's interesting to me because when he makes his showmanship the subject like the prestige kind of in tenant i like him and then the flip side to that is sometimes i think not that like um you know the the trinity test and the atomic bomb aren't a big subject but like sometimes just

becomes about how big a movie he can make, and really it's out of control. The intricacy and the latticework of this thing is almost too much, even given the complexity of the subject. His subject becomes his own ingeniousness and the intricacy with which he makes movies. A lot of people say to me, that's just not fair, man.

It's good. What's your problem with the movie? Your problem with the movie can't be that it's too good. And I will say that between those movies, Oppenheimer's pretty rigorous to a point that kind of bothers me. And Barbie's almost a little too goofy, given how smart some of it is. I wish some of it had been more worked through. Because there's stuff in Barbie that just sucks. Like the Will Ferrell, Mattel stuff.

It sucks. Bad. It doesn Mattel stuff it sucks bad it doesn't have to be that bad and it's sort of like they hit pay dirt with a few things in Barbie that are extremely funny the pay the the Matchbox 20 song is like the funniest thing I saw in a movie this year right so in Oppenheimer I'm like ah too rigorous and in Barbie I'm like maybe not quite tight enough. But people are going to write about those two movies together as a box office saving phenomenon for a long time. And I wish it wasn't so gender essentialist. Because I don't think even the movies are.

But the discourse just is. That's just what's happened. I think that you could make the case, though, that it would not have happened if it wasn't so gender essentialist. That there was a... No, but that's the thing. Sort of them being pitted against each other and together which is kind of unseemly but is true that in our culture it's sort of like this is my thing that i identify with and this is my thing that i identify with and that is kind of how our culture operates today you know that we need

to define our personalities by the things that we like and we're constantly communicating publicly about those things obviously that's what we do on the show professionally in theory. But I do think that if, if this was Christopher Nolan's story of Henry Kissinger, I don't think it would be

the same thing. You know, I don't, I don't think it would, it would be able, we'd be able to operate in the same way. You can't see this,

but I just started bleeding from my eyes with the Henry Kissinger, Henry Kissinger biopic. But look, I mean, those are,ry kissinger biopic but i mean those are i mean there's no question those are the movies of the year you don't have to put like best in front of them for them to be the movies of the year like that's the epicenter of box office discourse the whole talk and talk and talk about movies ecosystem those two movies are in the in the exact middle of it like you got to give it up to them

then i think when you deal with them as movies you got to look at what works and what doesn't which is why i didn't have either of them in my top five or ten but i did feel bullied enough by my friends to give oppenheimer an honorable mention and i wonder what that says about me that i didn't have barbie get the honorable mention as well it means you're a man in his 40s adam yeah. Yeah, right. What's your number two? Number two, I don't know if any of you guys have it or if you're all just waiting to use it. It's number six for me, just for the record.

It's on my long list. Which is Jonathan Glazer's Zone of Interest. This is one I haven't seen along with Maestro. Which I have to say, this is going to seem like a weird thing to say, but a movie I have at number two, I'm dying to read negative criticism of it. Yeah, there will be.

Yeah. Because I think the negative criticism and the positive criticism are not going to be people somehow seeing different movies. I think it's going to be people seeing the same movie. And there's no movie this year that I went into with more trepidation because I'm just like, I don't want to see this material which is about a nazi commandant and his family living on the outskirts but not the outskirts like literally on the one wall over from auschwitz in the early 40s tending the house next to the concentration camp i'm like blazer's such a showman and such a ruthless image maker and a horror filmmaker like i don't want to see that and the movie seems to have

anticipated and internalized that skepticism because it won't show it to you all right right and i think that as a piece of direction that um makes horror ambience and unseen that uses negative space to basically be the movie again it's amazing it is an amazing piece of filmmaking an amazing piece of shooting and editing i don't know if you're going to have glazer and co on the pod but there's pieces out about them about how the movie was made basically with like camera operators in a hidden bunker they shot it like a reality show it shot like big brother with multiple fixed cameras and microphones and scenes going on simultaneously and as much as i think you can criticize the film for this kind of one-to-one ratio between what you see and what it's saying and i know there's some major critics

who don't like it they haven't published on it yet um as a technical achievement and as conceptually rigorous movie it's kind of my oppenheimer you know like the rigor of it the intricacy of it the way it's put together i just think it's um it's really of my Oppenheimer you know like the rigor of it the intricacy of it the way it's put together I just think it's really impressive and I think it's the best thing Glazer's made by a mile I'm impressed so I've really agonized

over whether to put this on my list and I think it probably ultimately belies something about my taste and maybe the taste of this panel but this is the only movie that i think is being talked about on the lists that is not conventionally entertaining and it is to say the least to say the least it is like it is a work of fine art it is like looking at a richard serra sculpture it is and it is as intricate and massive and kind of deadening as something like that can be. And it obviously is laden with ideas and technical skill.

But there is a, I'm, I'm like reluctant to be like, there's something otherworldly. I don't want to use any like bullshit language to kind of classify it. But yeah, there's, there's a room.

I mean, I, I'm, I'm sorry to keep like cutting in front of people, but can I do my number one because I thought a lot about if it's related yeah about zone of interest while seeing zone of interest made me think about killers of the flower moon in another way um you know the like they're both movies about genocide and but the way that it they approach um telling the story and what they are presenting to the audience

and even to some extent how they are trying to involve the audience, which is, you know, a high wire act for sure, is opposite. And I too felt the distance. And to Adam's point, I think that is very intentional. And I too felt the distance. And to Adam's point, I think that is very intentional. I saw at my screening, there was a Q&A afterwards with Sandra Huller. And she talked about trying to play this character and that empathy was not even on the table. That that was not what they brought to, which, you know, given the circumstances and the text,

like that makes sense. But they're just, it is a different and intentional and horrifying and totally, like astonishingly effective portrayal of something that you don't see and that you can thus only imagine, which is, to Adam's point,

in some ways more horrifying and really effective. Killers, on the other hand, is, as Adam said, probably its fault is that it's too much trying to make it about like the audience as opposed to or or Scorsese as opposed to the people whose story it's telling and I understand

the criticism that as well but I like have not stopped thinking about it and um about you know obviously it's an amazing an amazing work of craft and performances and writing and adaptation. I think it's an extraordinary, like, maybe not even reimagining, but an interpretation of the David Graham book. You know, but then ultimately it's about filmmaking and storytelling and Scorsese's project. And I think it's amazing as like one of the later works in a career. I think it's amazing as just to think about as a viewer and people who watch movies a lot and killers of a flower moon. I see, you know, it seems ridiculous to say see a three and a half movie hour, three and a half hour movie again. But I think it does also reward repeat viewing.

Can I say something off Amanda's point? Because I agree very much with her that those two movies make a lot of sense together. does also reward repeat viewing so can i say something off amanda's point because i agree very much with her that those two movies make a lot of sense together they each have a point where the real breaks like the reality that the movie is making breaks and it's different in both movies but it's also kind of the same because they're near the end of both movies it's not a plot spoiler because you cannot spoil the plot of zone of interest it's a plotless film and glazer said that when they pitched it, I interviewed him about this movie very early on.

I interviewed him about this movie actually before it was at Cannes. And the pitch was like, it's like a family drama where the father is trying to get a job somewhere else and the wife doesn't want to leave. How are they going to hold their family together? Also, they work at Auschwitz, right? That's what the movie wants you to feel when you watch it you can't spoil the plot at the end of cameras of the flower moon the reality breaks and martin

scorsese it's not a spoiler at this point to say that he basically directly addresses you with like here's what my movie was about he steps out of from outside of the machinery and the artifice of the movie to say it's not adequate and And Zone of Interest kind of does the same thing. And regardless of which movie is better or which movie works better, it's really refreshing, as opposed to those movies that assume that if you just recreate the past meticulously

and shape it into a dramatic framework, you kind of get the last word on something. So these are filmmakers who are really thinking through what they're doing. And I think that when you guys are saying that Zone of thinking through, you know, what they're doing. And I think that when you guys are saying that zone of interest isn't entertaining, I know you don't mean it negatively. I know exactly what Sean means when he says it's kind of sculptural. I'm just imagining that if that film had given even an inch in the other direction of entertainment, we wouldn't be talking about it as one of the best films. I agree.

It would be another Holocaust drama. Yes. is one of the best films. I agree. It would be another Holocaust drama. It would be framed in much more... It would be dismissed, I think, in a way as part of a series. There's never been a film quite like this.

I think it's fair to say that. I've only seen it one time. Again, I feel like the more you see it, the more it comes out in limited release on December 15th. So,

I would encourage... If you care about films it is required viewing this year in my opinion um i i definitely would like to see it again uh it's completely absurd to be put in the position to have to praise spider-man across the spider-verse is my number two movie of the year after that conversation number two or number one number two we oh i skipped you yeah sorry um but uh i've had i've had a long think about this because at first i was like that's not that shouldn't be on your list be an adult why are you being such a child about this but i think actually in the light of day of the first marvel

film not making 100 million dollars a broader acceptance at least among the media class that this era is, if not over, deadened and needs revitalization, that there is not something inherently wrong with these kinds of movies. The thing that is inherently wrong is the way that they are made. And this may sound blasphemous, but this movie to me, which is the sequel to Into the Spider-Verse, is The Empire Strikes Back of comic book movies. Now, when the movie came out, people were like, God fucking damn it. This is a cliffhanger movie? I have to go wait and see another movie?

Once upon a time, that was fine. It was very frustrating when you'd have to wait a few years to see the sequel to a movie, but it was not the agony of modern culture. And now that it is, that was very much held against this movie, despite the fact that everyone I know who saw this movie,

including people who don't like animated movies and don't like comic book movies, were like, I got to give it up. I was pretty creative. For my money, I'm speaking, of course, to my colleagues here at The Ringer. Chris and I give it up.

It was creative. But for somebody like me who cares about animated films, cares about comic book stories in a way, and particularly cares about stories about young people growing up in New York. I thought that this was like one of the most breathless

and imaginative and nonstop movie experiences that I've ever had. And Amanda can attest, she was sitting right next to me when I saw the movie. I was just like ear to ear. And I'm so cynical

and annoyed at every movie these days. And this movie took me away. And I think the fact that it ends on this hanging note is a gift. It is honestly the good thing because we had this before we had this with infinity war or whatever infinity war was fun. It was not a great film. This to me is great filmmaking. It is great writing. It is immensely collaborative and it is form-breaking. It is a new kind of animation that levels up from where the last film was. And I think probably signals where the, um, where the form is going. Like it's not a genre. It is a style of filmmaking the same way that the zone of interest is a style of filmmaking. Are there lots of Easter eggs and

things placed to satisfy video game consumers and people who read comic books from 10 years ago, 40 years ago, 80 years ago. Yes, of course there are, but it's a very sincere story about a person trying to figure out who they are. It's part of the reason why most of the Spider-Man movies honestly work for me. This one in particular, I feel like is a head above. I think this is the best Spider-Man series. I think this is the best thing they've ever done with this character. And I look forward to the third film, but I think it will be very hard for the third film to achieve what this one did. So that's my

soliloquy on Spider-Man. Okay. Chris, you have a number one. Everybody else is leveled out here? Yes, even but Amanda has shared her number one. You and I have the same number one. Do we? I bet. I have the same number one as Amanda. Oh, wow. You don't have the killer. I have it at number one do we i bet i have the same number one as amanda oh wow you don't have

the killer i have it at number seven wow i'm super i almost put it in as well but then i knew chris would so i i want to talk about the killer but i want chris to speak first uh oh well i just this is the best experience i had in a in a movie theater this year I had a lot of like uh internal debate about what your favorite versus the best versus the greatest achievement is and and I just decided to go with the pure pleasure of seeing this movie on a big screen and then re-watching it on Netflix like just days later um he I think right now it's my favorite filmmaker uh working um I think right now it's my favorite filmmaker working. I think that this is a guy who is taking essentially the barest of

bare bones of a story and just imbuing it with so much humor and so much drama and so much action and filling out frames and spaces with so much interesting, so many interesting ideas and I think on one hand you could look at that and say like what a waste of talent on such like a kind of b movie idea but that is literally why i go to

the movies is to watch incredibly talented people make b movies um like that's this will be the movie like haywire that i watch like once a year for for many years to come and just an extraordinary extraordinary achievement, much in the way you were talking about Oppenheimer, just the feeling that every single part of this movie is being done as good as can possibly be made. You know, the editing, the music,

the cinematography, the direction, the acting is just so top-notch. I don't think it's for everybody. I think it's a very, very, very dark, fucked up movie. But for me, it was like the feel-good movie of the year. The highest compliment a movie can get from me is that it becomes a nightlight movie.

You are just living in a special world. I think I'm living a very normal existence. When I was in college, when I was in college, this is what was on the nightlight list. The Big Lebowski, Boogie Nights,

Chasing Amy. I'm sure there were five or ten more. I'm sure Dazed and Confused. Did you see the other day the Lakers DJ played the GoldenEye menu music? Like the video game GoldenEye?

I did not. And many men on Twitter were like, I'm fucking crying. Right. This is very much the same. The DVD menu of Chasing Amy's theme song is my version of the Goldeneye theme song. I say all that to say, obviously, I'm making fun of myself. But if I want to put a movie on to go to sleep to, I feel very safe with the movie. I feel like the movie is doing something very special for me.

And Michael Fassbender's narration in The Killer is that for me. It is the funniest script, bar none, of the year. Your jest bit is really good, to keep it positive. So let me just ask, so when you're putting this on to fall asleep, is it on in the room competing with the noise machine? Are we doing earbuds? Like, how is, how is Michael Fassbender's narration,

you know? Or is it just the narration and you don't even watch the movie? I should download it as a podcast. If I could download the film as a podcast, I mean, that's obviously making a mockery of what is, part of what is such a,

so incredible about the film, which is the actual filmmaking. But I just feel, I just laugh every time I think about the film which is the actual filmmaking but I just feel I just laugh every time I think about the movie I love this movie I think that there

are reasonable complaints about it's kind of thinness sure and it's thinness is by necessity of course

but I can't get my head around the fact that when I think about or about what my number one is versus what this movie is, I will watch The Killer more times than any movie I've talked about today by the time I die. It gets to that question of

favorite versus best, which is unanswerable for me often. I think I feel less responsibility to best. Because I come in here and I have fun and then I go home. I don't really feel like I have to put my shit up against like the other critics of the world so I'm

just like look like on a five movie basis like this is what it was you know I'm just going to say with the killer if I could you had me on before to talk about it right so you know my thoughts on this figure well known I wrote or on the record I wrote about it for the ringer spent

a lot of time in the Fincher trenches. I spent two years with his movies to write my book. I'll say this about The Killer. It has inspired some criticism so bad. And I like the movie that much more as a result. I agree and I'm trying to resist

that. I'm trying to resist the reactivity that some reading... I mean, I'm like appalled by incredibly intelligent critics writing about the movie the measure to which they are not getting the joke is extraordinary to me but I think that people it also makes me think

that people don't actually like Fincher movies does your blue apron delivery get fucked up today it's really weird it's made me feel weirdly defensive of Fincher which is the opposite of how I usually feel, right? Here's a bulletproof filmmaker. The interesting thing to do is to chip away at him.

Then this movie comes out, and I'm the opposite. I'm like, really? This is how you're reading this film, and this is how you're engaging with the sense of humor and also the sense of the present and contemporary-ity that it has. So in a kind of like very like petty way,

I already liked the movie. I like it a little more having read about it from some people who are just beyond out to lunch. I, I, I completely agree with you. Adam, why don't you give us your number one?

Yeah. I mean, quickly, just cause I think we've talked, you guys have talked about it on the pod. Amanda's already sung its praises. i know sean that you like it too but we talk about you know the the killers with a character who misses once you know kelly reichardt is not missed i just want to say this you know on a big podcast she is not missed she's

not made anything less than an excellent movie since 1994 when she started 93 and having written about some of the big, we talk about gender essentialism, you know, big, big, thick auteur directors. They can't say that no American director has not missed in 30 years like

her. I think she's the greatest. And I think that this movie is all the things that people have said about it. It's, it's tender. It's funny. It's a self-portrait.

It's the epicenter of the Andre 3000 flute album that just came out, where we see the scenes being sewn for Andre 3000's flute extravaganza. But I think it's a movie, and I don't want to get too grandiose about it, but sincerely, it's about making art because you have something to express,

and then the mercenary reality that that doesn't mean people will pay attention or that doesn't mean people will get it. You can't be a genius if people don't show up to your opening, you know. And she does it in such a small way, this tiny little corner of Portland with these people who do not matter outside the larger sphere but it feels inhabited and urgent about how hard it is to uh make art if it's not saleable or to make art that announces that it is art or to make something that's personal to you it's in that small category of movies like inside lewin davis that i think you know which with which it shares a wonderful cat as a character and also in this case very metaphorical pigeon my favorite pigeon i've ever seen in a movie is in showing up but the idea that art making is frail and fragile

and frustrating and basically turns you into like a real grumpy you know anxious person is such a worthwhile thing to put out there and again without overdoing the auteur part of it because a lot of people helped make even this very small movie look look good i've not seen a frame in a movie that kelly reichardt has made that isn't something she wants to put there who can you say that about you can say it about david fincher but look at the level of resource he's working with and the genres he's working and with the ones that she is too it's not about picking one or the other. I actually think showing up in the killer would be a great double bill in

some ways, but for me, it's the film year. And while I don't want to put down a distributor that I like, and sometimes, you know, engage with why this movie didn't come out at the end of last year, where it might've actually ended up on a lot of 10 best lists and maybe

gotten some award nominations instead of being stranded in the spring. I do not understand because recency bias is real right you put your movie out in december that's how you win critics prizes and that's how you get whereas i mean showing up was well reviewed enough to win new york film critics circle awards but it didn't even place i mean i think there's a reason that this happened which we may have even discussed in the past which is that michelle williams had another very big and important role at the end of last year in The Fablemans. And I think if The Fablemans were not released last year, showing up would have been released at the end of the year. Maybe there would have been more of a celebration of Kelly Rickard's work.

Amazing film in my top 10. For a long time was my number one movie of the year until the summer kind of kicked off. If anyone has not seen Showing Up, it is well worth your time. My number one is killers of the flower moon in talking about it. I'm going to use a perhaps ill-advised metaphor. Um, I am a very reckless and fast driver and I drive around LA angry all the time. And invariably the reason for my discontent behind the wheel is, um, an old person in the left lane. And, uh, every time I'm driving and I have to get into the middle lane on the highway to get around an old person and I pass by the old person, my rage dissipates when I see that they are an old person that is locked into their thing, their vision of the world, because they're old enough that they do not give a fuck. And in a way, I want to get to that place in my life where I do not give a fuck. And that is where Martin Scorsese is. And I've been thinking about this a lot in the aftermath of whatever the hell people are talking about, about Killers of the Flower Moon bombing at the box office. Killers of the Flower Moon obviously is an incredible artistic statement. You've heard

Amanda speak very eloquently about what makes it makes it such an achievement we've we had a very long conversation about the movie on the show this is a movie that very easily could have been a barn burner at the box office if it was two hours and 12 minutes and was a procedural manhunt movie starring leonardo dicaprio as the man who's responsible for helping to birth the fbi that movie is a shoo-in for success and probably still awards recognition. It would have been very easy, quote unquote, for Martin Scorsese to make that movie. It would have been very easy for any studio to greenlight that movie. The fact that as he thought about pursuing that movie, he and Leonardo DiCaprio and whomever else was part of this decision decided to not make it

and to make something far more searching, far more grand, far more operatic, emotional, and devastating is a testimony to the power of age. The fact that someone has accrued all of this credibility and is using it in a way to seemingly present what you think the movie is going to be in the first 30 minutes, and then take all of that away from you, and then just make this a persistent three hour pain journey. Honestly, it's a tour of

the agony of the country. And, of course, I agree with what Amanda said. There are, of course, going to be Native people and other people who are going to feel like we've seen this before, and we don't want to see our culture portrayed this way. it does not change history and the only thing that martin scorsese if he chooses to make a movie like this is to do the best job he can the most respectful thoughtful etc um i think he exceeds that i think he is doing something

that is new um and to be in your 80s and doing something new after you've made 50 films over 50 years is an incredible accomplishment. So I've seen this movie multiple times, Chris, to the point I think the movies I've seen the most are the movies that are on my list. And I'm sure there's something to that. And I'm sure when I see The Zone of Interest again, or when I see Maestro again, or movies that I liked a lot, they could rise and fall into my top five. Five Nights at Freddy's again. Definitely, Five Nights at Freddy's. People live in the machines.

Yes, they do. But Killers of the Flower Moon is the one that when I think about the year, it'll be the movie that I think about. So I hope more people see it. That's the other thing. I think I read this morning that it will be available for digital purchase

starting the day this podcast is released. So if anyone has not seen the movie, and I know a lot of people haven't. Or if you've been waiting to watch it in that regard because you know for a variety of reasons that you're not going to be able to do a three and a half hour movie in a theater, have at it. Sierra, what was your toughest cut? It was the holdovers. Oh, you looked over at me as you, what? I thought that was a nice movie. I watched it this weekend and I loved it.

I really, really, really loved it. How about like Boston coded? Yeah, I mean, but it was also like, it felt like a movie. It just felt like, I was just like, goddamn damn like I really felt connected to these three people I was moved I laughed I thought the movie had gas in the tank as it came around the last bend he's just a really like you know lovely filmmaker I think that he holds human moments for an extra second or two that kind of elevates the film beyond just being like here's a really sweet story about like these three people who find connection

in a lonely week. You know, it's like, it really, it really, uh, it was very affirming to watch that movie of like why we do kind of like what we do and talk about this stuff.

I, I really loved that. So that was right on the edge. And did Phoebe go with you? She watched it with me. Did she? It's a really good Christmas movie. That's why I asked about.

Yeah. We both really enjoyed it. Yeah. It's, it's the, the timing is right for that one I asked about it. We both really enjoyed it. Yeah. The timing is right for that one. What about you? Hard cut? Asteroid City. Which is not on any of our lists and I feel

a little bit bad about that. Yeah, that was like 7 or 8 for me. And I revisited it last week and it is just incredibly astonishing in terms of the intricacy of thought and also the worlds that he is building. You know, there are so many moments in it that are like, oh, I forgot now, you know,

Maya Hawken, Rupert Friend sing a song and dance and like, you know, and like, oh, here's Adrian Brody looking like hotter than Adrian Brody has ever looked for two minutes, just search it. It's a rich text. And in line with the rest of my list, I have been a Wes Anderson disciple for many years now. And so I really like it as an evolution of the Wes Anderson project. And Sean, as you said, I think it will probably rise, in my opinion, as the years go on so it's i mean that was number six it's really wonderful see it if you haven't adam any tough cuts for you you want to mention roles band together have you seen that has your family seen that film no i don't know i do know my my daughter has you know my wife took her text me she said the least of the trolls movies okay wow

um you know i almost put in the top five movie i watched last night i did put it on the 10 best list but didn't want to take away margaret i watched out andrew haig's uh all of us strangers yes which is an interesting film uh kind of a kind of a good one to interpret we won't start talking about it now has anyone else seen this am i the only one I've seen oh yeah I'm reluctant to say too much I think we'll do a long episode about it at

the beginning of next year yeah very very very very interesting film and I'm trying to think if there's anything else there's a tough cut yeah I had a tough tough time not

putting a fire by top five the Christian Petzold movie which I think is fantastic and definitely made the top seven currently streaming on the Criterion channel of Fire, if people want to check that out.

Thought about Anatomy of a Fall. It's on my long list. You're a little more dubious on Anatomy of a Fall, Adam, I can't recall. I'm somewhat dubious on Anatomy of a Fall, though it's better made and acted than like 98% of what opens. I mean, it's good. I just, I put it this way,

if that won the Palme d'Or, then Basic Instinct should have won the Nobel Prize. Basic Instinct played out a competition at Cannes because what's happened is that now everybody at Cannes wishes they were Verhoeven or Cronenberg. Those guys could barely get an invite in the 90s, right? And now everybody's making this elevated, gentrified genre stuff.

And there's so much in this movie. You don't agree with that? No, no. I don't think... I know that you really, really understand and admire Verhoeven and Cronenberg and have done more thinking and writing about them than I have,

but I don't see what she's doing in the same class. I think it's something different. Bisexual writer accused of murder. Spoilers. Spoilers. Spoilers. Yeah. It's a,

what I'll say is that it's, it's being marketed and written about hugely as a kind of whodunit. And there's a reason for that because it has trashy contrivances to it that it doesn't seem eager to own it's not it's not attempting that's also just because the like french courtrooms are so boring yeah even like more boring you know and which i think is played purposely in this one but it's was it saint omer was is that the name of the other very similar courtroom well but but that was just way more affecting french court you don't don't think the courtrooms stuff in Anatomy on Fall works?

No, it's good. I mean, just like they spend. No, it does work, but it's like a long time. It's a lot. It's a lot. Yeah. Anyway, I liked Anatomy on Fall was on my long list too. There's probably a bunch more that we could list, but we'll save it as we get deeper into the year.

Adam, thank you so much for sharing your feelings and your list. Great to see you, man. Say hi to Pascal Siakam for me. I'm just happy to see Chris Ryan. This is rare for me visually to see Chris, so that's great. How does he stack up visually based on what you've been hearing? Well, he's barely in focus at the back of the room. Right, yeah.

On a scale of one to five Enzo Ferraris, what do I look like? I don't know about that, but I thought of you, Chris, because we're showing in Toronto. I've got the writer-director of The Empty Man coming to TIFF. We're actually showing it theatrically. I think my favorite memory of ever potting with you was when you came on as The Empty Man and I asked you who your guys were. That's a really good memory for me. That was a highlight. Remember the pandemic?

That was tough. You remember the pandemic. Anyway, no, thank you guys for having me. And I'll get Amanda's phone number later to make this just a better day across the board. We'll start the group chat. Adam, congrats on talking to a woman. Thank you to Chris Ryan. Thank you. Thank you, Amanda. Thank you to Chris Ryan. Thank you.

Thank you, Amanda. Thank you to Bobby Wagner for his work on this episode. Later this week, I guess we're going to dig into poor things. I'm learning about this by scrolling to the end

of the doc right now. How am I going to see that again? I have a way. Okay. But I'm not sure if we need to do the deep dive. Okay. Because it's not opening

enough indicators. What are we doing here? Well, we're going to talk about cinema. I'm going to go see Godzilla Minus One. I don't know if you're going to do the deep dive. Because it's not opening in enough theaters. What are we doing here? Well, we're going to talk about cinema. I'm going to go see Godzilla Minus One. I don't know if you're going to do it. You should consider it. Very good. Godzilla Minus One. Yes. Everyone is saying, many people are saying that Godzilla is back.

I'm pleased to go and see him. Toho is flooding the block right now. They are doing great work. We want to thank the fine people at Toho for their seven decades of monster content. And we want to thank the fine people at Toho for their seven decades of monster content. And we want to thank the listeners of this podcast.

You know what I didn't do? I didn't thank the listeners of this podcast for sharing their rap stats. Yeah. And it is like the only heartwarming marketing materials

in the world. And I'm very, very grateful to everybody who listens to the show and not only listens but publicly says here's how psychotic I am about the world. And I'm very, very grateful to everybody who listens to the show and not only listens, but publicly says, here's how psychotic I am about the show.

Very, very sweet. Obviously, we all love making it and we're having a great time doing it, but to spend that much time with it is remarkable. So thank you. Anything you want to say, Amanda,

to the listeners? You guys are just wild, but we love it. Thank you very much. It is very sweet. And I do encourage you guys to go outside still, but you can it. Thank you very much. It is very sweet. And I do encourage you guys to go outside still, but like you can take us with you

when you go. It's okay to have hobbies, especially if your hobby is listening to the big picture. We'll see you later this week. you