The Big Picture - ‘Verity’ Is Trash. But Is It Good Trash? Plus: ‘Digger’ Flopped and Warner Bros. Is No More.

Episode Date: October 6, 2026

Another year, another Colleen Hoover adaptation. How lucky are we? Before diving into the biggest box office success from the weekend, Sean and Amanda react to the news that Mike DeLuca and Pam Abdy will not continue their roles at David Ellison’s Skydance. They look back at their biggest successes and failures, and wonder what the future of Skydance looks like. Then, they briefly discuss ‘Sicario 3’ being greenlit with all of the returning stars, but notably neither Denis Villeneuve or Stefano Sollima. Finally, they cover ‘Verity,’ an adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s erotic thriller, starring Anne Hathaway, Dakota Johnson, and Josh Hartnett. They break down why the original source material sets the movie up for failure, what they want from the erotic thriller genre going forward, and debate whether we have a “Dakota Johnson problem.” (0:00) Intro (0:50) ‘Digger’ bombs at the box office (7:32) Mike DeLuca and Pam Abdy out at Warner Bros.-Paramount, and the future of Skydance (38:04) ‘Sicario 3’ a go with Emily Blunt, Benicio Del Toro, and Josh Brolin to return (41:09) ‘Verity’ (1:02:07) SPOILER WARNING (1:23:31) Dakota Johnson temperature check (1:29:24) The state of erotic thrillers vs. what we want (1:32:46) Looking forward to the October slate Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Producer: Jack Sanders Production Support: Lucas Cavanagh and Remy Hernandez This episode is sponsored by State Farm®️. A State Farm agent can help you choose the coverage you need. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.®️ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I'm Sean Fennacy. I'm Amanda Dobbins. And this is the Big Picture A Conversation Show about Verity and endings. Today on the show, we are talking about the new Colleen Hoover Adaptation Verity, starring Anne Hathaway and Dakota Johnson. It was the biggest movie of the weekend and is also a heaping pile of steamy, pulpy trash. But is it good trash?

And what do we mean by that exactly? Amanda and I will explain. There was also a dramatic change in studio leadership at the newly merged Warner Brothers Paramount over the weekend. We'll talk about that, as well as the failure of the movie. digger, it's all coming up right after this. Okay, Amanda, a lot happened over the weekend. I've been in New York, living a fabulous life. You've been in Los Angeles, living another life. I wish you

well. How was dinner with my husband? I did, in fact, have dinner with your husband in New York. We were both away from our children and we were living it up. We went to an old haunt of ours that we dined in many times and we had a nice time. We are working here. Your husband is working and I'm working, maybe not as hard as you're working. You know who wasn't working? It was the film digger. The film digger did not work for audiences around this great nation. $7.9 million opening weekend. Was that the final tally? I didn't even update the final numbers. But boy, this movie did not perform well on a budget north of $150 million. What do you make that? Not surprised. The main reaction, the only thing that I was very sure about, well, I was sure of two things.

One, I found the experience of watching the film irritating, and two, that it was not commercial. So that seemed to be a self-fulfilling prophecy of sorts that the movie just really was so uncommercial that people gave up going to see it. And I do feel this weekend, anecdotally, everyone I saw wanted to ask me about Digger and what I thought about it, but none of them had seen it. And no one really had plans to see it. You know, we said on our Digger episode, which I hope people will listen to you after seeing the film, that we hoped they would see the film. And before they listened to the podcast, no one did. Everyone was just like, no, no, no, I'm not going to bother with this. Maybe I'll check it out on streaming.

But this is so DOA that I don't have to go. So I do think that the reviews and just the negative buzz and tracking probably pressed it down even further. I think you're right. I think the word was out pretty quickly that this was maybe not for everyone, but is still, it had a car crash quality. And so I think there was a curiosity about what it was that people were checked. So there's a lot of media about the film. There are a lot of takes flying around about the film. Yeah.

I think you and I anticipated correctly that there would also be a kind of counterwave, that there would be some defense of the movie, maybe even a rising cult of this movie. And that's interesting. I've been trying to sort it out. There's a couple things I wanted to talk to you about with respect to that. One of them is that, you know, many of Alejandro Inuritu's compatriots publicly went to bat for him. Alfonso Quaron took to X.com, the Everything app, to share some thoughts about other films historically that received negative reviews and then were ultimately praised as all-time classics, which, you know what? I love my friends too. You know?

I understand. Yeah. And as you know, there are some things about Digger that I really quite liked. Damn. I came out mixed positive on the movie with some notes. The other thing is that the movie arrived at the exact moment when Pam Abdi and Mike DeLuca were beheaded publicly by David Ellison. They're not joining the Warner Brothers Paramount merger. They're not going to run the film slate at Warner Brothers anymore.

And I do want to have a long conversation with you about what their reign meant and what it means for them to not be in that position. But there's one quick digger thing that I wanted to speak to you about. And I don't want to spoil the movie for anybody who skipped the last episode. But there's this kind of question of is the whole point of the movie to satirize satires. And I don't know that we had a very specific conversation about that. But this is the week of the social reckoning, and Aaron Sorkin has been identified as perhaps a target of the movie Digger. And I'm a little reluctant to be like that's the sum total of what the point of Digger is, because that seems like the smallest target imaginable. And I felt like it was a bit bigger than that.

And I think a lot of what we see in the crew's character's emotional complication makes it a bit wider and deeper. Do you think it's as simple as like this is just, you know, don't look up in the newsroom and shit like that is just very stupid and we should make fun of it because it doesn't change anything in the real world? No, I think that's good posting, right? I think that's using all of the proper nouns available to you and connecting the dots. And you got to have somewhere to go with the content. And also, you can't use the movie itself because really no one has seen the movie. So bring in extra memeable moments, see Aaron Sorkins-Tan. I think that the movie is both bigger and smaller than that.

I think that it is operating on a very grand, non-specific, what does it mean to make satire or make art? And what can art do in the face of the world's great complications? And I think it's also just very much about Inoritu and about the lone filmmaker or, you know, the actor. or, you know, the actor in this case, Tom Cruise, and there is a meta-Tom Cruise quality to it. But it feels very, very turned inward or on the grandest scale possible. Like, I'm not sure that...

I would be surprised if Inorito crushed all four seasons of the newsroom, three. I think it was three. Yeah. Yeah. And enjoyed it. And you don't have any Oscars, so... No, no. You think I'll get it.

to over under two Oscars for me before I die. What do you think? I think under because you are historically against people having two Oscars. So if you got the first one, then you would sabotage the second. You'd try to spread the wealth. You know, that's the kind of guy you are. Wow. Yeah. Thank you for reading me that way. I agree with you about Digger. And, you know, I suspect we'll talk about it a little bit more because people are going to start checking it out and it's going to be on VOD probably in about two weeks here. So once that happens, we'll be able to But which D? Like which, I guess it'll be paid for...

Which D and D. Which... Which... Where will it be available? You know, you'll pay for it. But once it's free on streaming, which is where most people will watch the first 20 minutes, will they even make it to the twist? Is a big question.

Oh, when will they check out? That's a fascinating. Yes, that's a fascinating note. I mean, you know, presumably it goes to HBO Max by January. Okay. And that'll exist as HBO Max? I think so. When those two things will fuse is an elegant transition into our broader conversation about Warner Brothers and Paramount and everything that happened over the weekend.

I do think that Digger is the last of its kind for now. The $150 million a tourist solipsistic fantasy with a massive movie star is the most emblematic possible movie of the Mike and Pam era for good and for ill. And when you look at the movie that triumphed over it in Verity, which did very well this weekend, and is kind of, is IP, it is the opposite of the otore driven movie that is original in theory. It's a pretty stark comp to where we're all headed here. I'm not sure that Digger should have been number one. Like it's not really qualitative judgment. I think it's just indicative of if you don't have the goods

see sinners or weapons, this business is really, really hard when trying to do those things. And one thing that I thought was quite cool about the Abdi and Duluca era was that they somehow convinced David Zazlov that this was the way. And they had, I think, about as many wins

as they did losses in this regime, which started in 2022, but probably really properly starts like end of 23, 24, because that's when the films that they chose started to hit the border. We can talk about each one kind of individually briefly. But I don't know, what do you make of this news that they're not coming and that this period, this very brief post-COVID period that from a major studio that was throwing all this stuff against the wall has ended and is now leading into Skydance. It's pretty grim. I'm feeling quite sad about it. And I and hopeless. I think we've traded places.

And maybe that's because we've literally traded places and you've been in New York, gallivanting around and seeing the future of cinema. Yeah. Look at those jazz hands. And I learned the Mike and Pam news. Like I think everyone possibly including Mike DeLuca from Matt Bellany's newsletter on Thursday night. And I read that newsletter 20 minutes before I walked into a party for a Netflix film.

And the mood was quite interesting. And it's not like I spoke to anyone. I didn't do any reporting. I just had a glass of wine and left. But the vibe of being at a party for a film that will go straight to streaming that we'll talk about that is not. It's, you know, it's not one battle after another. It's not Digger. It's just another movie. And these people have just had their, these people who at least were trying to make original projects and put them in theaters have been fired. David Ellison is coming to bring, you know, all of his aviation movies to the masses.

And everyone, lots of people are going to get fired. And the, the, the, the, the, history of cinema of in Paramount and Warner Brothers, which have existed for decades and are part of old, old Hollywood are now being, you know, re-erased with Larry Allison's money. It was just, it was kind of grim. It was like, oh, so this is the future, huh? This seems, this is exciting. Not. It's, it's pretty grim. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, in addition to the news about Abdi and DeLuca, the news that Enon cried, the former Mattel CEO would be coming in as a the CEO of Skydance and that he is an experienced business executive who will probably be responsible for executing the redundancies and reducing a lot of the synergies between the two

companies and all that business stuff. And also that, you know, that was something that he did at Mattel and he also was responsible for helping to shepherd the IP maturation of Barbie and less successfully Masters of the Universe in He-Man and the matchbox film that's coming to Apple this month. And so, yeah, Paramount and Josh Greenstein and Dana Goldberg, they will run the film division there, and they have been at Paramount for about a year. And look, they're pretty seasoned executives. Greenstein has mostly worked in movie marketing. He's been at a number of studios over the years, including he was at Paramount in the 2010s, and he came back. Dana Goldberg has worked for David Ellison as Skydance for 15 or 16 years. Look at the movies that Skydance

made. They made some cool stuff, right? They made Top Gun Maverick. Big fan of that movie. Yeah. Their first film was True Grit. Love that movie. They also made some other stuff. And that other stuff isn't great. Last night I was looking at, can we just read the slate of Paramount for the rest of 2026? Yeah. You do that and then I'll do the upside. Okay. Where is it? Yes. Okay. What makes you think this isn't an upside? Well, okay, we'll fire away. Okay, so upcoming, your most anticipated film of October, Street Fighter, October 16th.

I am pumped, I must say, I am pumped. And that's good. Listen, we all have our enthusiasms. Mine is Top Gun Maverick. November 13th, Ebenezer, starring Johnny Depp. November 25th, Falker-in-law, which is a co-production

with Universal Pictures. I guess this is international distribution for Paramount. Okay. So here we go. Angry Birds Movie 3, December 23rd. Yeah, what did you think of Angry Birds movie 2? Have you ever played any Angry Birds? Yes.

You have? Yes. That's cool. Okay. Were you really into phone games? Was I really into phone games? Angry Birds was a phone game, right? Yeah.

I've played phone games. Okay. Sure. I played some Candy Crush, but that's kind of it. Yeah, Brickbreaker? Nope. You never played Brickbreaker on your, on your, uh, on your, uh, on your, uh, on your, uh, on your, uh, do you have a blackberry?

Yes, but I didn't play any games with it. I just did the, what was the messaging called? The messaging? Yes. I don't know. Okay. I guess it wasn't called texting. I know, it wasn't.

It was something different. Anyway, Mr. Irrelevant. Yeah, I'm looking forward to that. I, I am as well. Yeah, I saw the trailer for that ahead of Verity. And I was like, yeah. Okay. Down the middle, sentimental sports drama.

Yes. Yes. But so Street Fighter, Ebenezer, Angry Birds Movie 3, and Mr. Irrelevant. Right. So I think based on that, I don't think that's the worst slate of all time. No. And honestly, Paramount has had a pretty mid-last three or four years in general with the studio, because they've been in this kind of transitory moment.

I think that you can also look at all the people that they've signed up to make stuff in the last six to 12 months as also indicative of what they're interested in. Now, I do think that there is a little bit of like Americana that feels meaningful to them. Sure. Like that there's going to be, they're making a call of duty movie with Peterberg. Yes. Right, which I think is a very smart IP adaptation. And Peterberg is very good at war movies.

But that does speak to a different kind of audience, I think, than what some of what Pam and Mike were doing. But, you know, they also signed the Duffer Brothers away from Netflix, the creators of Stranger Things, who I'm interested to see what kinds of movies they'll make. They signed John M. Chu to a multi-picture deal. I'm kind of a coin flip on John Chu movies Neither of us really cared for Wicked at all But like I like crazy rich Asians He's made some movies I like I wish it

But Crazy Rich Asians just should be so much better And that's one where I wish that they would just Like redo it And they can even give John Mchu another chance But I'm just like It's one of those where it's just not good enough Yeah I think he's like a steady Hollywood hand

Not like that's not like an embarrassing There's no code there for what it means That they hire John Chu And then there's more people. There's, you know, the first thing that Goldberg and Greenstein did was they signed James Mangold and Timothy Shalame to make a crime movie, which I mean, I'm great with that. Yes. I love that conceptually. They extended Dan Tractonberg, who's been making the Predator Films for Fox to a new deal.

Parker Finn, who made The Smile Movies, which I'm a little bit more mixed on. But now he's making a remake of possession, which I don't think is necessarily the greatest idea in the world. But it's at least it's aggressive. It's if there's something fresh about that. And then Will Smith has a new deal at the studio as well, which is complicated. And Damien Chazel's The Prison Movie is also. His Prison movie is theoretically coming out next year. Starrin Cielion Murphy and Daniel Craig.

So I think there are some optimistic notes. You know, Tiana Taylor's directorial debut comes out next year. There'll be some other stuff. I don't know if it's going to be amazing. But if you look back at Mike and Pam, and even the eras before that, right, you had a pretty successful stretch for the Warner Brothers Film Studio in the 2000s

because it's also the same time as Harry Potter and the Rise of the Nolan Batman films. And of course, all the Nolan movies all the way up until after the tenant fiasco. And, you know, we also have had The Dune movies have been coming out over this time Which are like, I'm not sure that Abdi and Dulc necessarily got credit for that.

But then when you had all that IP in place And then you stacked it on top of these movies It was pretty exciting. So like, let's go through the list. What do you think? I've put together the wins here. Yeah. And they're almost in order to me.

But I'll start. Yeah, yeah. I mean, Sinners was the first film that came to mind because Sinners was a movie where they made a really tough deal on sinners where they had to give the copyright back to the filmmaker and that was widely criticized and it turned out to be a really smart move

because sinners was such a huge hit and also an awards film and I think goes down as like a very memorable movie from if not this decade, maybe this century that people have a big relationship to so if you make just one of those that's pretty good. We'll be making sinners

a paramount, I'm not sure. I mean and they certainly won't be making that deal in order to to land the film, both from a business perspective and also that Ryan Coogler's carve-out or special contract, whatever you want to call it, was in part because of the text of the film and what the film was about. And it just does not really seem so far like this Skydance ownership is going to be sensitive to those kinds of themes and requests. But I guess we don't know. maybe that's not fair to say.

Yeah, but also, so you have in here sinners, weapons, and then one battle after another winning best picture, all grouped in a row, but those were all in the same year. They were. Yeah. So that's a pretty good job. It's a really good job, though. I do have a question for you when we get through the wins and losses about that.

Right. Yeah. I want to talk about it too, which is just kind of they stacked one amazing year that they coasted on for 18 months. and that was clearly a strategy of sorts, though I do start to wonder how much of a strategy it is because all of these movies are big productions and with lots of people and you're working far in advance. And I think you have some say of when things are ready and when things are going to be rolled out.

But I don't, do we think that they were there long enough and had enough for, you know, oversight and could arrange things enough that they were like, okay, we'll just do 20, 25 and stack all of our good movies at once so that then hopefully the sale goes through and we're in a good place. I mean, I think they and other people at the company knew which movies, not so much which movies to release. Because, you know, when you're in that environment, like, these films are tested. They have an expectation of what audiences are going to do.

There's a long range tracking for certain movies that have certain particular audiences. it's really more about what movies to hold. And what they did is they held six absolute stinkers till 2026 to make the film studio seem as attractive as possible in the negotiation phase. So that choice to me made the 2025 gambit look really good. I mean, in addition to those three movies that we talked about, and look, one battle after another is not like a massive financial success,

but it is also basically a forever movie annuity having one best picture. So you put those three together. Those are big wins. Plus you've got... Also on this podcast, we do care about, like, the quality of films. No doubt. And, like, and doing the right thing and investing in art, which is also when you were talking about how Mike and Pam were criticized for the Ryan Cougler deal.

Like, criticized by who? Bankers. We're not bankers, right? That's right. So, like, good job on that one. I know, but the problem is that, like, you're right, but they're executives. You know, they're not creative. Totally.

And we are having a conversation about their business decisions that led to a business decision of them no longer having a job. I get it. But I do also want us to remember that one battle after another was our favorite film of last year. And we like it when movies are good. Totally. There are many episodes in which you can hear me saying that very thing. I'm trying to hold on to our humanity. If no one else can, we are, we're holding on to it. No, I've lost it. Mine's gone. It's over. It's over. I'm just a banker now. Dune kept the train on the tracks with Dune. Dune is obviously a legendary. production, not, I don't mean that in the adjectival sense. I mean literally the company legendary.

Getting a Minecraft movie out in the world the way that they did. I think the, I think Toby Emmerich's regime hired the director and got that movie started, but they marketed it well, they released it well, and now it's a mega hit and they're putting out another one next year. And they signed Kirsten Dunst for a number two. So. Huge. Huge for you. Huge for all of us. Distributed F1. They didn't pay for it, but they put it out in the world and they made that movie a hit. Superman, I think Superman's a win. I think especially in the slow decay of new superhero content, they did pretty good business with that. It probably could have been bigger, but definitely wasn't bad.

Weathering Heights did pretty good business as well, and that was another deal that they signed where they really went aggressively after that movie. Right. Right. Right. by giving it theatrical. And, you know, even though you and I were not really crazy about Wethering Heights, I like that. I like the idea of Emerald Fennell getting a deal like that and putting a movie as

as big as that movie is out in the world. It's cool. It's doing cool things instead of Ebenezer. Yes, Beetlejuice, too? You didn't really like that one. It was okay. It felt a little reheated. I mean, it gave us one of the great jokes of this podcast, which was you texting us from

Las Vegas in, like, 2020, being like, like, hey, word on the street, Beetle juice, too. The new citizen came. No, that is not what I said. It was going to be huge is what I said, which is what happened. Okay.

New Line, the train was on the tracks. Conjuring 5 came out and crushed and Conjuring 4. And Final Destination 6 was a banger, and all those movies seemed to be doing just fine. And, you know, they marketed Wonka straight to success. How did your body feel as you were saying that out loud? Well, at least I said it. I tell the truth on this podcast.

Okay, here are some misses. Okay. I mean, they almost got fired twice. Yeah. And then they did get fired. And then they did get fired. That's not ideal. It's funny how they would show up in Las Vegas every year to present their slate.

And their presence was one year they were definitely. about to get fired, except then they just presented like a historic run of movies, so they were fine. And then the next year, they just tried to do a victory lap, but they were about to get fired again. And they were also like, here are all of the movies that we know that no one's going to go see, which as well. Yeah, they've been through it. I hope they don't read the comments. Yeah. I mean, they've both had really big and great careers in many ways, but they have just become so emblematic of this kind of sinophilia versus the encroaching

tech monster eating Hollywood war, so that's sort of why we're memorializing their era in this way. Yeah. I mean, Joker Fully Adieu. Yeah, didn't work out. It didn't, and honestly, I think it changed movies in a huge way because it now means that no Hollywood movies go to film festivals anymore.

It's really true, so thanks for that. So, that was interesting. Digger, obviously, is a massive L. The movie's going to lose $200 million to the studio. that's not good. That's not good, Amanda. It's not good. You don't want that.

But it's not your money. It's not my money. The bride. Yeah. Again, another movie that, like, I kind of liked, whispers, I kind of liked it.

That's good. That was another very irritating movie to watch. Yeah, and I guess in some ways it's really matched with both Digger and the next film, which is Mickey 17, which you compared it to

and we discussed the Digger last week. And those three movies are the downside, I think, specifically of the weapon sinners, one battle after another trilogy of power. Like, they are, otor-driven flops. And there's no other way around it. Mickey 17 did okay business.

You know, it did like across like 100 million worldwide. Like it made a lot more money than diggers going to make, that's for sure. But, yeah, those three movies are not total successes. The end of Oak Street is a weird one where like it was kind of on the shelf for a while, got recut. I ended up liking it. Did you end up seeing it? No, I still didn't see it.

because it got dumped in August. And it's available on streaming. I just, you know, I think about it every night and then I have to watch something else for the show, which is, I guess, how many people are experiencing it. Yeah, maybe when it hits, like HBO Max, we should chat about it a little bit. Because I'm curious what your thoughts are on.

I liked it, but it didn't totally hit the way they were hoping. Another thing that has been happening, which is so interesting, we've only talked about maybe once so far is, you know, they were not able to lobby to keep Coyote v. Acme. We don't know what their role was in terms of, of the David Zazlov decision to punt that movie off the slate entirely and eventually sell it to catch up entertainment.

But Coyote v. Zachny over the weekend crossed $100 million worldwide in the box office. That's pretty good. You know? Congratulations to catch up media. Yes, very exciting for them. They bet wisely. And people seem to like that movie. I think most of the people who like that movie

are 37 and not nine. That was our experience. Yeah. But they like it. And that's certainly something. And then, of course, the back girl fiasco, which is not Abdi and DeLuca's fault, but that, to just the lead of movie is abhorrent.

I mean, that's just horrible. Well, the back girl of it all leads into the next issue, which is D.C. more broadly. And you put Superman in the win column, but everything else has been pretty bleak. And Supergirl is still the worst movie of the year for me personally. Yeah, it's down there for me too. And there just does not seem like there's a lot of juice

With anything that James Gunn has going on And I know that I'm not supposed to count him out Because you all liked those movies with the raccoon And that's very beautiful Guardians of the Galaxy, great films Yeah, I think Man of Tomorrow will be big I think because I think he's gonna I think he's gonna pour a lot of the DC universe into that movie

And it's gonna feel more like an Avengers DC movie where a lot of figures that we know about and so they're going to, it's going to draw us in. I mean, I like Superman, so I'm curious to see what he does, but in general, I do think the future of DC is a little dodgy, and it seems like while James Gunn and Peter Safran are coming over in the transition to Paramount, it's a little bit of a like wait and see period here

in terms of what the rest of their slate looks like because after Clayface and Man of Tomorrow, I'm not sure if there's another film that's officially been greenlit yet. Okay, since we're talking about the future of DC Studios too, We should also mention the Batman Part 2, which is technically not under the James Gunn and Peter Saffrin leadership, but is a movie that is hugely anticipated. We had heard that Robert Pattinson had returned to London to start shooting that movie. This is the sequel to Matt Reeves' original film, which came out a few years ago. And then there's been some news this morning that Matt Reeves is stepping away from this movie for personal reasons.

And there had been some rumblings about that going on. And so this movie that was originally planned for February of 2028, it now may be a little bit longer. I'm not sure if there's much for us to necessarily discuss here, but it is another film that is a piece of the puzzle in this merger. Horizon? Yeah. I mean, release the tapes, you know? Yeah. I mean, that was only distribution for that first movie, but the second movie is now, is it never going to come out?

Kevin Costner's Western trilogy, cortology, whatever it's going to supposed to end up becoming? I have no idea. I know two people who have seen it. Yeah. Zach Barron and Griffin Newman. Yep. Two of the best. And you didn't go.

Two goats. I fucked up. I should have gone to the Santa Barbara Film Festival and gone to see Horizon Part 2. Then I didn't. And then there was some negative press around the film. And then I don't know. Just now it's gone. Sad.

Very, very weird. Were they part of the decision-making process that allowed the original plan of Horizon 1 premiering, I believe, in June? and Horizon 2 being slated six weeks later? I don't know. Because that's not what you want. No. That decision belongs in the L column for whoever,

whosoever it was. You're right. And thank you for reminding me of that. And the removal of it, given its performance, is ridiculous. Yeah. And yet, like, I honestly feel like they could have just dropped two on streaming and done good business.

Because, I mean, that film with its multi-story narrative, like, it kind of feels like a TV show. It feels more like a TV show than it does a film. Because it's got like five different storylines and, you know, it's like cutting back and forth between the A plot and the C plot and the D plot, you know? Who's to say they still can't? I guess I could. I assume that Horizon 2 is owned by Warner Brothers today and no, no, it's not. It's owned by Kevin Costner. It's still owned by Kevin? Yes. They're only distributing the movie. Oh, that's right. Okay. This is a Megaloplas situation. Oh, I forgot about that. That's right, because he sold the ranch or whatever, or the, you know, the Carpentaria Beach.

That's right. Yeah. So he sold it to me. Okay. You love the beach, so congratulations. He did not sell it to me. Practical Magic 2 I put on here, even though, like, whatever, its financial fortunes didn't really matter to anything. I just thought it sucked. So I just put it on here as a loss.

It wasn't very good. Big swing still to come. That's the other thing that is really fascinating about this next 12 months is there's, all these Pam and Mike movies that they greenlit that are just coming out. And some of them are like Man of Tomorrow, right, where it's like that's a big IP summer movie and, you know, anybody would have made that movie essentially, like James Gun and Peter Safran, were the ones who pushed that forward. But the first one to come is Remain, which in February comes out, the new M. Night Shyamlon movie, which actually screened at Beyond Fest last week. And I'm kicking myself that I was not there.

They did a screening at the Directors Village Theater of the Sixth Sense. Did you see this? No. They did the screening of the sixth sense of Directors Village Theater A series of Sharmelon films were shown at Beyond Fest here in L.A. And then he came out after the film and he said,

guys, if I was really cool, I would just like show you remain right now but it's not finished so I'm really sorry. You know what, fuck it, I'm just going to show it to you. And then they just ran the movie four months before it's coming out. And it got a very positive response. Now it got a positive response

from people sickos who went to go see the Sixth Sense on like a Wednesday night in Los Angeles. And then we're also able to stay in their seats for another two-hour movie unplanned, which is the target audience for that. It's very savvy. It was smart, yeah. They generated some nice buzz for the movie.

But you can't kick yourself for that because how could you have known to go see? Not to be too much of a freak, but I just had a feeling that was going to happen. I swear to God. And I thought about that with like my travel dates and stuff. Anyway, I blew it. Number two is the most important movie of the year for you in 2027. It's Paris Paramount, which could not have a more amazing type. Although it may be renamed, apparently according to Nancy Myers' Instagram, because a crew member got a Paris Paramount tattoo that she Instagrammed.

And then she noted that she told him it might change anyway. That's kind of what we know about Paris Paramount in a nutshell. That story says it all. Anyway, this is the much delayed Nancy Myers written and directed film that was at Netflix with Scarlett Johansson and now is at Warner Brothers soon to be Skydance, not with Scarlett Johansson. And a lot of, a lot of information coming about this movie right now. You know, I'm protecting my heart. We'll wait and see. It's slated for Christmas 2027.

I think it has been quite expensive. It's certainly been shooting for a very long time. And I've seen them building a lot of sets on Nancy's Instagram. I don't know. That's a big risk. It may not really matter long term because it's happening and it's coming out no matter what. So Paramount's going to have to market it. And we've got JJ Abrams as the Great Beyond, which was delayed one year from November to next October.

Yeah. We've got our friend Sam Esmail's new movie starting Julia Roberts Panic Carefully, which I'm really looking forward to. That's coming in the spring. We've got Zach Krieger's The Flood, of course, his follow-up. to Resident Evil, which is an original sci-fi extravaganza that you talked about when he was on the show. And I suspect will probably work, just given what Kregor's been up to over the last few years. And Jennifer Lawrence is going to star in it, right? She is indeed going to star in that.

Yeah, there you go. And I'm excited about that. And then Gladys, which is the spinoff of weapons. And I wonder if that will still happen. Because maybe Paramount may want to re-look at the weapons IP and do something that they want to do, rather than what was pushed forward, since this is a very valuable property. I don't know what stage Gladys is in right now,

but Craigner is not directing that movie. So if I were Paramount, I'd be looking very closely at the way they're executing on every single bit of valuable film coming along. There's a couple of other examples of that. Like Gremlin's 3 is coming out, I think in 2008 directed by Chris Columbus. Yes, indeed, that Chris Columbus.

Wow. Not the other Chris Columbus. So the famed explorer who's been dead for 600 years is directing the film, which is really exciting. Great. And yeah, gremlins. Have you seen gremlins? I don't think so.

I think that I've seen, you know, I know what the gremlins are. I guess I don't know their mythology. It is a bit of a what is her legend situation. But I do know what they look like. It's time. It's time. This Christmas, it's a Christmas film. It's time. Do you think my children will like it or is it just for me?

It's too scary. Too scary. Too scary. Seven maybe for Gremlins, I would say. Gremlin's rocks. Gremlin's two, all-time classic. One of the greatest films ever made. Simply put.

Gremlins two, colon, the new batch. An extraordinary satire. So it does things Digger could never even dream of. Okay. I believe you because Digger dreamed of a lot of things, but did very few of them. That's right. What's Pam and Mike's legacy? I mean, it feels like the end of an air.

era of Hollywood. And I don't know whether it's the end of the first hundred years of Hollywood or just the end of this very weird time in Hollywood where, as you said, big tech companies are coming in and disrupting used intentionally as the way that films are made and distributed. And so director names, movie stars, theatrical releases, big original swings don't make sense anymore. And they were the last people doing it. And now it's done. And we all march into the ocean together with Skydance and it's airplane movies. I hope not. I hope it's better than that. I hope it's better than that. I mean, you've seen a lot of things in New York this week. You know, there are many other things happening in film culture that are exciting. But they,

were old school studio heads doing a thing, trying in a lot of ways to recreate what we loved about the 90s. And every once in a while succeeding and also coming up against the market realities of the last five years. And now it's done. Yeah, we're, I'm going to keep a close watch on whether or not they pop up again because it's not out of the realm of possibility to me that they could appear at Sony if Tom Rothman retires. You know, I think he's in his early 70s at this point. Or if Apple continues to build their film department, that's somewhere that they could go. However, like even this conversation that we're having here, which is, again, an extended

conversation about executives on a movie celebration podcast, I think it speaks to a little bit of the morning and a little bit of my, our shared concern that their particular skill set is just less meaningful to the future of the business and then that impacts the kinds of movies we get to talk about on the show. But you're right, and I have been seeing some good stuff in New York

and we can talk about that because you've seen a couple of the things as well at this point that I've played here at the festival. So on Friday's episode, we'll get into some of the cool stuff that we can preview that we've liked or not liked out of the festival.

Okay, Amanda, before we dive into Verity, we do have some breaking news here this morning, which is that Sicario 3 is happening. I don't know if Jack can pipe in a CR screaming Sicario at the top of his lungs, news alert, but it's not only happening, Emily Blunt, Benicio del Toro, and Josh Brolin are returning. Have you seen Sicario Day of the Soldado, the second Sicario film? I haven't. I've consumed much content of Chris Ryan talking about it.

Yeah, sure. And I almost feel like I should have like one of those like CR, you know, cut out masks that I could just put over my face right here and then I could just pretend to be CR. very happy for him. Denisinov is not directing this, so... Yeah. Nor is Stefano Solima, who directed the second film. And I'm not seeing... I'm not seeing Taylor Sheridan's name here in the news either.

In fact, Patrick McKinley, who directed The Wait, the film we talked about a couple episodes ago, the Ethan Hawke's survival thriller, is the new director. And Stephen Knight, a very, you know, well-known writer behind Pecky Blinders, among other things, is writing the screenplay. And I guess I hadn't realized that Saccario was one of those properties that is not actually properly attached to a studio. And that it sounds, the Lionsgate released the first two movies. Not clear who's going to be releasing this movie. They're going to take it to market.

I'm sure Taylor Sheridan stands to profit from this in some way since he created it. And that's always what we worry about. I think he's doing pretty well, actually. You heard? He bought a ranch. It's crazy. Emily Blunt returning? I want nice things for her.

She was not into, just so you know. All right. Did not make an appearance. Two, one of the most depraved films. Darkly violent films. Yes. That was the top line report. And so I just thought I would leave it to Chris.

You know, I've been listening to a lot of Gwen Stefani in the past few weeks. Gwen Stefani. In honor of Emily Blunt and her performance and Disclosure Day, which has been overlooked and underappreciated. So whatever she wants to do, you know, that isn't being. being Mary Poppins again. Yeah. Okay. I'm going to keep my eye on this one.

I think we all will. Feels bit like a cash crab to me. I'm not sure there's another chapter in this story, but you know what? I await C.R.'s thoughts. That's what I'll say. Okay. Let's transition now to our conversation about Verity, which we'll do right after this. This episode is brought to you by State Farm.

There's nothing better than having friends who support whatever you're into, like rewatching a director's entire catalog in the least. lead up to their latest release. And like those friends, State Farm is there to help you feel supported by helping you choose the coverage you need. With so many coverage options, it's nice knowing you have help finding what fits for you. So you can check coverage off the list and spend more time debating movie rankings. Go online at StateFarm.com or use the easily accessible app to get help from one of their local agents.

Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Okay, Verity. This is the new feature film directed by Michael Showalter. It's written by Nick Antoska. it's an adaptation of Colleen Hoover's best-selling novel of the same name. It stars Anne Hathaway, Dakota Johnson, and Josh Hartnett. Yes. Set the scene for us.

Set the scene for us. Where were you? The screening or the story? Your screening. I saw it at the AMC Lincoln Square, one of the greatest movie theaters in America. I saw it in the Dolby Room there. Sold out crowd at noon on a Saturday. Okay.

And yeah, there was a buzz in the air. we're about to witness cinema You went alone I went alone yeah No I wasn't casting around To see if anybody would join me Spend their Saturday afternoon with me I mean it's something even on a trip to New York

Where I'm seeing the great works of cinema And an international film festival Honestly candidly meeting many cool people Some very famous people Like I'm having a very fun weekend I did go see Verity at an AMC Alone on a Saturday This is the life that we chose.

But honestly, alone at noon on a Saturday, that's freedom to a parent of a young child. You are absolutely right. And in that way, I really appreciated it. How did you see it? It's at your scene. I went with Yasi Salick to one of the Wednesday night special fans preview screenings. Oh, wow. At the, well, I mean, just that you could buy tickets for.

Did you have like a watermelon appletini or anything? No, I did have a glass of Kim Grafford, obviously. And Yasi tried to bring her cheesecake factory meal into the theater and was stopped. So that set sort of a tough tone for the night. That absolutely breaks my rule, Amanda. We do not bring meals into screenings. That's just not okay. I love Yassie, but Yassie, please.

Come on. It wasn't me, first of all. I had a meal at home alone with my child because it was, I went on my child's second birthday to see Verity alone. And I was like, good night. Happy birthday. And then... You make it sound like you left him at like 3 p.m. I did.

I was like, we really, we got to wrap this up because the tickets, they're, they're for 720 buds. So I need you to go to sleep. It was also the night before his first day of school. So I was like, yay, yeah, yeah, school. I love you. Bye. Through him in the crib, drove straight to the Americana. We had the whole cheesecake factory altercation.

And then I got a large glass of Kim Crawford. And we were, I don't know if we were in the Dolby room or like the prime room. But so I also saw it in AMC without my children. And it was pretty packed. And this wasn't like a gatekeeping screening. It was open to the public. You just could, if you were very excited about the release of Verity, go early. And it seemed to that people did.

Increasingly common now to get the two days early screening, especially at the major theater chains for movies like this. For anybody who's not aware of it, I'll give them the description of what happens in the movie. Hired to be a ghost writer for renowned author Verity Crawford, Loan Ashley's assignment takes a dark turn when she discovers chilling autobiographical notes. As she wrestles with disturbing and twisted confessions

about Verity's husband, she soon finds it hard to separate fiction from reality, manipulation from attraction, and opportunity from obsession. What did you think of the film, Verity? I've been writing for this, right? Not having read the book and not having seen it. I think I drafted it and most anticipated whatever.

I thought there was possibility for this to be my kind of fun at the movies. And I did have fun, primarily because I was sitting next to Yassie and I had a large glass of Kim Crawford. And yeah, I was in the mood to have fun. But I was quite disappointed. I was really, this was not the level of trash that I wanted. No, it's not good. It's not good for a variety of reasons. I think this is an interesting cast and we can have a long emotional conversation

about the unemotionality of Dakota Johnson at some point here. But I think given some of the folks who are involved and the sense that the movie does seem to have some relationship to its own idea of camp, its own idea of trashiness. And that it sort of finds itself in having its cake and eating it two scenario, where there are times when Anne Hathaway's performance in particular is so outsized and mannered and specific and kind of referencing things that make us think of another time. And Josh Hartnett similarly, I think, is in sort of like the Richard Gere role in this film, you know, playing a very specific kind of man who, like, maybe cuckled it, but may also be in

charge and maybe deviant or maybe isn't. Right. And Dakota Johnson is somewhere between Sharon Stone and Gene Triplehorn here, you know, is she the willowy innocent or is she the voracious, feminine psycho? And so it knows about the archetypes. It has a couple of amusing lines of dialogue or, you know, trashy exploitation style moments. It has excellent production design and costume design.

It is expensive. And when we're talking about this particular genre and even the Colleen Hoover adaptations, it is noticeably different in a positive way. Yeah, I think you should talk a little bit about what we can expect at this point from Colleen Hoover stories, though, because this movie isn't basic instinct or jagged edge. You know, it's not an erotic thriller. It's not like an erotic legal thriller. This is a new kind of brand of movie that has been born out of her fiction.

How would you describe it? Like, what are the signals of it? Very taboo subjects kind of playing into a lot. of what is popular in true crime. Right now, there is always an imperiled woman. There's always some sort of evil husband. Their relationships are complicated, sometimes abusive, sometimes violent. There are often kids in danger.

There's just, there's really, really kind of lurid conflict throughout that is packaged in a way where it serves the lurid interest of the reader, I think, but also is supposed to make them feel okay about being interested in it because they're wrapped up in some sort of weird love story or romance most of the time. And so they, I guess technically are romances, but they're always, I think the phrase is, in the industry as like, quote, dark romance because it's always something really messed up. And there's a woman who is either trying to find herself

or find someone else in these extremely, extremely fucked up situations. Yeah. So this is the fourth adaptation. And, you know, four for four in terms of success right now we've had the end, it ends with us, which is the Blake lively, Justin Baldoni, cultural fiasco.

We have regretting you, the funniest movie of 2025. We have... A thousand percent. Reminders of him, which came out earlier this year, the Micah Monroe Tyreek Withers movie. And now we have this movie.

This is a very starry cast. Michael Schoalter, you know, to me is a legend forever as a member of the state comedy troupe. One of my favorite shows as a kid on MTV and has transitioned into what has his story. historically been known as women's pictures.

You know, he directed Jessica Chastain to an Academy Award for her performance as Tammy Fay Baker. And this movie is in a somewhat similar vein. It's not a docu drama, but it's sort of a spin on that. His last movie was The Idea of You, which also started in Hathaway for Amazon, also a literary adaptation. Yes. And, you know, he has a facility, I guess, with these kinds of performers, you know, And there are not very many great male directors of female stars at this moment. So points for that, I suppose.

I just feel like this movie is tilted in an angle that, like, makes it relatively unsatisfying. And then also, I think, has, like, a truly awful ending. Stinks. The movie is at war with its source material. And you really do feel, like, show up. Because the idea of you is also a romance. I think it's broadly in the same genre. of it's very different audiences, I think,

because these audience have, you know, their own armies. It's a thing. They're very powerful, and you see that in the box office. But the idea of you is not that dissimilar in that it is adapted from a self-published romance that had a rabbit online following starring Anne Hathaway that is about a woman in a creative field who finds herself in an unusual relationship

and how is she gonna get through it? The idea of view is that she's found herself in an unusual relationship with Harry Stiles and is navigating like the media. And in Verity, it's that she's found herself in a relationship with a man who has a wife in a coma and is also, and the wife in the coma might also be haunting her. and also she wants to have the wife in the coma's life

because they're both writers. So you can just feel that the film has disdain for the source material or at least, if not disdain, feels really constricted by it and doesn't know what to do with it. And so you mentioned there is kind of a self-awareness and there are campy, funny moments where I do think the, the movie and the filmmakers are making their version of what this setup would be. And it is ridiculous.

And Anne Hathaway is basically like playing Joan Collins. And there are funny jump scares and that aren't scary that are laughing. And the reveals are sort of interesting. And then they keep being pulled back to like what actually happens. in the book. And you can tell that the film isn't that interested in the source material. And also that the source material ultimately does not really align with this campy. Aren't we all having fun here? Isn't this ridiculous take on the story? And you said it's like having your cake and eating it too, which it sort of is. But honestly, it ultimately can't have it both ways. And that's why the ending is so very, very

frustrating and falls so flat because number one it doesn't make sense but number two it just any any adaptive juice that the filmmakers bring to the material kind of gets let's go at the very end and due to its faithfulness right like ultimately by sticking to the script of what's in the plotting of the story yeah and i mean we can talk about some of the details of it um the movie the three previous Colleen Hoover adaptations are not there's no wink in any of those three movies. They're very straightforward, sincere, melodramatic explorations of, as you said, sort of women in very difficult relationships, for lack of a better phrase.

And some of them are really, you know, about mortality and some of them are about abuse. And some of them are also just like I wish I was fucking my husband's brother-in-law. You know, like there's always like... But all three. But also there was a car crash. But also, you know, there was some sort of domestic abuse. Yeah. This movie is about a young writer who is cast to effectively ghost write another writer's work after they've been paralyzed.

And I would say roughly 32% of the movie is Dakota Johnson reading. It's true. Which is one of the least cinematic things I've ever seen. I would say, oh, so you mean just visually? Well, so it's Dakota Johnson reading, but it is Anne Hathaway narrating. Correct. Right. So you're looking at Anne Hathaway reading in a beautiful house, which is a real house, by the way, in Armunk, New York.

Oh, nice. Standing in for Vermont. Yes, but the bathroom and the, like the stone tub, which is featured prominently, were the creation of the production designer working with the original designers' energy. So shout out to the production designer. Let me tell you. They get great use out of that tub. They sure do, right?

And so every once in a while, they know what they're doing. And I mean, and the house, it is house porn. It's so beautiful. And the sweaters are just so. And Dakota Johnson's hair is so shiny. It's so shiny. But you're right that she does spend a lot of time reading. There was one point where she gets in bed to read.

And she's, everyone else is asleep in the house. since she's so cozy and she's got this book and she's in this beautiful, like, primary suite. And I did think to myself, as they showed this, I was like, that's the life. Like, that's all I want in life is to get into a cozy, like, bed like this and be able to read for hours

and have no one bother me. I can't do it anymore. So even that, even your note, that it's just her reading for a while does understand something about its audience, right? It is aspirational to me. That was not my problem. The problem when they're just showing the manuscript, right, for a while,

and you're just seeing lots of insert shots of the actual text, and it's badly written and boring. That was less aspirational. Yeah, I mean, I'll make a very brief comparison to a movie I've just recently seen that I wrote about in the newsletter this week, or last week, which is Chronovisor, which is this small indie that's about a young, a PhD professor of philosophy who has learned about the potential existence of this thing called

a chronovisor, which is a device that allows you to effectively see memories of amazing historical events such as the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. And the movie is literally just about this scholar reading in libraries and trying to learn more about this magical, mystical device that was developed by a Benedictine priest in the 1990s. And The movie is a, you read the movie. The movie is constantly showing you text during the research of this project, this exploration, translated from Latin or Spanish or Italian or English, and then highlighted on screen. I've never seen a movie like it.

The way that the music is used, the way that it's cut, the reading, the act of reading, is made into a thriller. This movie is easily a thriller because there's life and death consequences and we don't know There's a, you know, a plot, a scheme of some kind that we're trying to unpack while we're watching the movie. And I just found it to be terribly inert, and I did not care where it was going. I mean, I guess I kind of sort of wanted to know what the conclusion was going to be, and I regretted wanting to know that when I got to it. But the vibe is just off, you know, it just isn't really, it never really clicks into place what the movie ultimately wants to be. And maybe you're right, it is just that this is kind of junky source material.

And she's trying to write this sort of knowing people. piece of literary inward self-mocking analysis, and it's just so schlocky and unfun. I mean, we can get to the ending because in a minute, because it does also reveal things about the premise and the setup and the source material that I think are just insurmountable.

You know, it's kind of like one night only where it's like, well, if this is what it was, then we were just, it was never going to work, you know? and you can try your best and you can, you know, condition to go to Shanzan's hair as much as you want and make it look as cozy as possible. And they did, but you can't solve this inherent problem. But I agree with you that I do think I didn't mind the reading so much. And I thought Ann Hathaway's narration was so over the top as to be funny. You know, she is doing her best audible, like on Quayludes impress, you know, impersonation and it's quite funny. The sex scenes were so poorly shot as to just be confusing. It's not even that they weren't hot,

which they weren't. And we are very far from erotic thriller territory. And, you know, it honestly seemed like they just, there was, there were some blocking issues, like they didn't have the shots that they needed. But it was so slow. and the pacing of it all, compared with the couple of moments

where they do actually manage to set up the suspense of whatever's going on with the Verity character, and there are some like creepy moments. Creepy, they figured out. Sexy, there's just, there's nothing. All there is is Josh Hartnett's short Jim shorts. That's it. You clocked those, huh?

Oh, yeah, immediately. I was an incredible choice. Anne Hathaway at a certain point in the film is a stride, Josh Hardinett. Yeah. And it's not really that steamy. No. And then, and again, there's also the source material issue of they're tied to something about teeth in a wooden bedpost and being able to see the teeth marks.

Yeah. Which is just... Have you done that? Has that happened to you before? It's not logical. You know, it's not going to work. The teeth are going to break, which is all Yassie and I could talk about in the theater. And yes, we were whispering, so we were trying to be respectful.

But first of all, that's not what you would do. Second of all, there is some ergonomic angles. Third issues, right? Mm-hmm. Third, your teeth would break. And fourth, how are you, how are your teeth going to fit into the other woman's teeth marks so perfectly, right? That's a huge spoiler.

Yeah. So you're not a biter. That's what you're saying. Not of, not. You know what? Not a wood. Not a woodbiter. I was about to say

that I didn't walk right into it. Yeah. I think a lot, it's just very mannered. You know, like a lot of it. And I don't know if the woodbiting is from the book. I assumed it had to be because it was so specific.

I should check with Eileen. You know, my wife Eileen read the novel. She read it in 48 hours effectively. And I raced to finish it before going to like a 2 p.m. screening on Thursday or Friday. It was Thursday. And she did finish the book and did not seem like she liked the movie very much and maybe even had some regrets. And, you know, we talked about this.

We talked about this coming out of cinema con and, you know, being handed the book on the way out. Yes. And then my friend Mary is saying, no, you all like it. Yeah. And, you know, assuming it is as faithful as it seems like that's the biggest problem with it. And, you know, I think generally Anne Hathaway is innocent and she's kind of having fun in a different. movie and it feels a little bit like it's the evil dark mirror version of gone girl

where gone girl operates in a very similar fashion where there's a lot of moments where we're reading amy's diary and then we're using that as a portal to flash back on a relationship in a happier time and the way that this movie kind of pivots that is that we learn late in the film and we're really spoiling at this point that a lot of what's been written in this discovered manifesto autobiography

exposition machine is that it's a writing exercise that the Anne Hathaway character has taken on to write the most kind of negative, untrue thoughts, the sort of evil reality, like unreality that could be

to get into the mind state of the very devilish female characters that she writes in her books. Which I don't... Is that a thing? Is that a known strategy? I mean, only a writer this bad could come up with a writing exercise, this nonsense. Nicole was the only way that I could justify it.

Also, the editor in question is named Amanda, who suggests the writing exercise. So I was just like, why bring me into all of this? It's tough. But the key to the whole movie, which is this is just a writing exercise, is about a 90-second flashback montage that... it is clearly filmed later and it makes no sense. It goes by so fast you don't get any of the motivation of you have no explanation to what's going on with a Verity character or how you're supposed to feel about her. And Anne Hathaway is innocent but also wasted in this movie because she doesn't really get to do anything. They don't even use that much of the flashbacks or of the evil character that turns out was just a right.

exercise. I mean, it was just a writing exercise is worse than it was just a dream or he's a psychopath in terms of explanations for thrillers. I agree with you. And because of that, we're meant to sit through this movie where she does all these terrible things where, like, she considers, you know, smothering her infant child and she, you know, regrets being a mother and plots to murder her family and has all of these awful ideas. And, you know, the movie is pitched at a register where you're like, this isn't exactly what happened I can tell. Like a lot of, particularly like the death of the daughter, which underlines so much of the movie as this kind of tragic moment that shifted everything, is shot from so far at such a distance

that you're almost meant to feel like, well, something is off about this. We know the whole time. Of course. But the explanation being this was a writing exercise is so lame. It sucks. And unconvincing, you know. And I want to give the filmmakers credit. of that they are signaling to you that something's weird here.

So you're going through, okay, so was it the other kid? Was it Josh Hartnett? Did she actually do it? And it's, you know, what's going on with the nurse? Where did the nurse go? Yasi asked me this when we got home. Where is this nurse in a terrible wig who seems to be some sort of helper? She's just wandering around.

She's always looking at Dakota Johnson's character very suspiciously, as if she's just put something in her food, you know, and then she just disappears. I think she's almost literally only there to try to represent a kind of Mrs. Danvers-esque character to remind us of Rebecca. Like, I think that's the only reason that she's there. And then there's no payoff on that or follow-through on that.

She doesn't meaningfully participate in the other than leaving. Right. And she announces. So that she's not presence. Yeah. She announces, hello, I'm leaving. And then you think that that's going to set in motion some sort of, will she come back? Will she, like, and she just announced that she was leaving.

There is absolutely no follow-through to the character. Yeah, I mean, it explains, it creates the opportunity for Dakota Johnson's character to be alone with Anne Hathaway's character in the house after the young boy injures himself and Josh Hartner needs to take his young son to the urgent care. And so then that leads to the sort of like, I thought, atrocious conclusion of the movie that I'm still kind of sorting through what actually even transpired. So let's talk about it briefly. Okay. Um, eventually, uh, Josh Hartnett does come back with his son, um, and he's been made away at that point he's made

aware of the truth about his wife that she is in fact responsible for the death of their daughter according to this autobiography that Dakota Johnson's character has discovered. And Dakota Johnson and shares all this information with him. He has handed a printed manuscript, which she printed out on a brother laser printer that we also have at home. Shout out brother for the product placement. Great.

And so she prints this out, then seems to just leave it in a trash can where no one finds it for at least a week and maybe three to four weeks. And then she finally picks it up, reads to the end of it. She sets up a baby monitor in Verity's room so that she can try to catch her in the act of not being in a coma. And she hands the manuscript over to Josh Hartman and says, look, this is what I found.

This is what's really going on. This is why I set up a baby monitor. Then they go in and he's finally in her face, right? She, because Loan at first, Loan, that's the Dakota Johnson character. The child is named crew, C-R-E-W. Anyway, just, just information. We've encountered this with every Hoover movie where all the names are like, ma'am, have a glass of water.

Come on. What are we doing? Loan? I mean, Loan is at least, Loan, I was like, crew, how are we spelling crew? It's C-R-E-W. I just feel like her trick every time is to be like, here's a normal person's name, Ashley Lohen. What if I made the last name, the first name,

first name and the first name, the last name. Like, all right. Right. Cool. You're going to keep doing this? Anyway, so Loen has tried to wake her from her coma and she doesn't wake up. But she, Loan and the Josh Hartnett character whose name I don't know or care about because he's Josh Hartnett, walk back into the room and he gets into her face and is yelling at

her and threatening her, you're never going to see us again, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then the moment when the Verity character breaks the coma and is like, you. You don't understand. I started cheering. And several people in my audience, that was the one moment where I was like, this is funny. You skipped over one small detail, which is that the way that Lowen tries to wake her is by sticking a thumbtack into her thumb and making her bleed. And Anna Hathaway doesn't flinch. She doesn't move.

Uh-huh. Nothing happens. She doesn't react at all. I did forget about that. To a thumbtack poking her body and bleeding. And then Josh Hartnett yells loudly one time. And she's like, hey, whoa, my bad. It's me.

I'm here. up. It's me Verity. Josh Hartnett threatens her access to her son, you know? And it's the power of a mother's love, right? We can withstand thumbtacks, but not Josh Hartnett threatening us. Yeah. Except what happens later, which makes this more illogical. You weren't at all excited when she woke up?

You don't even get a chance to be because within five seconds he's choking her to death. That's true. That's true. But then, then you get... They didn't even let Verity cook. Also, this was the only time we saw the real Verity and not flashback writing exercise, Verity. I still... And I was like, all right, what does she have to say? I chuckled.

Like, I was like, okay, this is funny. Because I, you know, I knew that she was faking it, but still, they, that was one of the heightened moments where I was like, okay, this at least everyone's in on the same joke right now in this moment. And this is funny. You're right. Then he starts joking her because in a calling who, adaptation, you can't be more than two seconds away from domestic abuse and violence. And so the Dakota Johnson character, Lowen, screams of Tim to stop. And then there's a pause. And then what does she say, Sean? What does she say? She says, you'll crush her windpipe. And that, which I really

also laughed at. I thought that was, I mean, it's not funny. Don't crush someone's windpipe. It's, None of this is funny, but the way that Dakota Johnson plays it so soullessly. And then gives the explanation as to how to kill Verity so that the police will not be suspicious. I mean, I didn't laugh out loud, but I chuckled. Can someone just like hand her a glass of seven up or something before doing a take? Like, wake up. See, I thought this. You can't say you'll crush her windpipe in a blank monotone.

I thought that's the only time where just the blankness makes any sense. And it was really, really, really funny to be. If you're going to be that blank for the rest of the movie, then just say you're going to crush her windpipe like you're barely awake. I laughed. I thought it was absurd. He does, in fact, not crush her windpipe, but close her mouth and nose until Verity suffocates. And then they dump her body in the lake.

And then they've conspired to be together. That's what it turns out, these two people, Mr. Crawford and Loewan Ashley are in love. They have murdered this evil woman who killed his daughter. And they're ready to ride off into the sunset. We get a smash cut to seven months later. And it appears that Loen is pregnant. and they're still in the Vermont home. The Verity death was ruled a suicide

or was ruled an accidental death and they're moving out. They got a house in, was it North Carolina? South Carolina? Where are they going? Somewhere down south? Yeah.

I can't remember if it was North Carolina or Florida. And maybe I'm just bringing in unfair Florida associations. Yeah, crew, the young boy, is excited. He's got a new mom. It seems totally over the, death of his sister and his mother seems to be handling it quite well. Right. He's getting ready to be a Southern boy, happy for him.

And he says, oh, hold on, I got to go get my drawings. He races back into his room. And I love to recap bad movies. And he gets his drawings. And Loen is like, what are those drawings? Where'd that come from? And he's like, they're my secret drawings in my secret space. Which, sure, that's something that happens.

And it appears that there's a floorboard that has been loosed. Yeah. And Lohen clocks this and this hiding place that this young boy has, she opens it up. And what does she find, of course, but an expositional letter. And I love when that happens in a film. And the letter is handwritten by Verity to Josh Hartnett's character, Mr. Crawford, explaining everything that he has done to him via letter. Everything that he has done to her?

To her, yes. Yeah, okay. Everything he has done to her. And why did she do that, Amanda? Do you know? It's not just explaining what he has done to her, but it is also explaining the mechanics of writing and writing exercises and how to get into the mind of a villain, right?

That's right. And postpartum depression and love for your children. and had a stage a death via car and tree and anger. Right. I, it's a great question. Is it addressed to him? Does it say if you're, I believe so.

It says if you're reading this, then crew and I are gone. And I think she says that she's ashamed, right? That's, so that's why she did it. That's why she agreed to be in a co-com. I'm not defending the explanation. I'm just trying to recall the contents of the expositional letter. And I think shame is part of it.

So then she was just like I wanted to stay in the coma to be near my son, crew, C-R-E-W. Mm-hmm. It's very normal. It makes a lot of sense. And it teaches us a lot about writing and womanhood. Right. But this also explains that Mr. Crawford has... has taken his wife out into the forest

and put her in a car and dropped a concrete block on the gas pedal and driven her into a tree in an attempt to murder her, which is a very ornate way to murder someone. Well, but it is the method of death that is described at the end of the fake manuscript writing exercise.

Right. Because he finds the manuscript as he learns in the letter. And he reads it thinking it's real and not a writing exercise. Yes. And then he's so angry because of what she's done and she's confessing to killing her child

in the fake manuscript. So who would ever write that? Who would ever put that to words? What are we talking? Amanda? What is happening? terrible. I don't know. It's such fucking nonsense. I agree with you.

It doesn't make sense. It's clearly all cut together and it also is just, it's garbage source material. I mean, the rot starts in the book. That's what I have to say. Anyway, so that's why he decides to bring the manuscript to life and actually kill her by a tree

the way that she kills herself in this book that he doesn't know is just a writing exercise. And then it doesn't work Or she's not fully killed. She's just in a coma. And then...

But then she's kind of not. And then the doctors don't realize that? This is a very wealthy person who's like fake, like tricked everyone into believing she's in a paralytic state and cannot respond. I don't... Well, what's this nurse doing every day? They do explain that she can eat. She can swallow. She can go to the bathroom.

Uh-huh. But that she doesn't like make eye contact or talk. and there's no brain activity. And it does sort of, they kind of yada yada with it. Like the brain is magical and unexplained, you know? There's so much we don't know about science, you know, which honestly, you go to some doctors these days and it's still like, well, there's a lot we don't know. Great.

Thanks so much. So they do yada, yada, yada. But I agree. She's faking from with everyone. Is she self-medicating to like induce a coma state or she's just play acting? I don't think so. I think she's play. acting for an extended period of time.

Right. And we do also see that she's still communicating with her son. Only one time. She makes it clear to him that this is their secret. We don't know that they're consistently talking to each other. That's not made clear to us. But he does say earlier in the film, my mommy said that I shouldn't talk to you about these things. And that is what inspires the Dakota Johnson character to go get the baby monitor. Right. Right. It also just, Yeah, it's the culmination of the Hitchcockian freak out that is set up throughout the film. Right. So.

This is good. This is good that this is how we're spending our time on this podcast. I actually feel great about it because this, to me, much like Digger, it's like, I cannot endorse this movie at all. And the success of these films I find quite worrying. And I fucking felt this way with, and it ends with us. I was like, this is not right. There's something very off about the way that these stories are being told. and this one to me is like it's not problematic, it's just lousy.

But, you know, the Dakota Johnson character discovers this letter and reads this letter that Verity has written. And then that makes her worried that she's now with a psychopath who has murdered his wife and pregnant with her child. And then they move out of the house and hop in the car for a long drive down south. And then the movie cuts to black. Yeah. I don't know.

I was like, what? So, like, are we waiting on Verity 2 to see if she seeks to avenge the slain Verity by killing the father of her child? Like, I don't. Is that, are we meant to be like, wow, life's crazy. Sometimes you accidentally marry a murderer. Like, what the fuck was that? I have no idea. Okay.

I mean, it's made worse. It's made worse, obviously, by the fact that there was a piece and variety over the weekend about the direction that the filmmakers thought about taking this story, which was there was another ending that had been filmed that, well, why don't you just read the quote that Show Walter shared? Okay. In one version, Lowen, in that car scene, has that moment where she says,

I don't know who to believe, one thing's for sure, Verity was a master manipulator, which is the last line of the film. Again, there's just like top to bottom, great writing. Well, her last line is her on Hot Ones. We forgot about to talk about hot ones and Alex Cooper as well as components of this movie. That's true. And then she puts on a pair of sunglasses, leans back, and has this very cat with a mouse in its mouth look, puts her hand out the window, and as they're driving away and a song is playing.

She's making stage directions, waves through the air with her hands. So I'm doing that roller coaster. So the idea is that Loan is the master villain. And then you cut back to Verity sinking into the lake and her eyes open. Right. So I don't think that that's a more logical ending. No. But I do think it's a much more fun ending.

Correct. And if this movie wants to land on, this is campy, self-knowing trash, I would have smirked. I would have been like, all right, cool. Yeah. That's fun. This wasn't a great success to me, but that was pretty fun. And I can forgive the plotting oddities and the writing exercise nonsense and be like, all right. Well, and the bad sex scenes. Yeah, yeah. And the Bavarian restaurant. Yeah. Yeah, man. I have no no notes on the, uh, on the tub scene. No notes. Tub scene was very fun. She looks great in the dress that she borrows from Verity's closet, which is an insane thing to do. Yes. There is an incredible single white female thing going on in this that they just completely

abandoned and well they abandoned it or they were having fun with it for a bit. Yeah. I think it is homage generally. And then they stop having fun with it. They're like now we have to feel bad about this for some reason now. And I think the ending that Showalter described to variety would at least be. in keeping with the this is all ridiculous. Yeah, but they listen to the focus groups.

They listen to audience testing. And audiences, both audiences who had read the books and not read the books reportedly did not respond to that ending. They responded to the ending that we got. Which, what? But did they? Because then the cinema score was a C.

So like, you know, what are we? Very odd. It's very odd. What I, reading between the lines, because Colleen Hoover is also, quote, in that variety piece, and she was a consultant on the film. She's involved in all of her films. And she's very happy with the ending.

The ending mirrors the book. So I don't, I guess it was focus groups. To me, it just reads like they got bullied into doing the book. And they had to stick to the original ending. Yeah, possibly. Possibly. I mean, that's just an interpretation. I don't know anything.

But that they, that the source material is what is so valuable. about this IP and it is what has the built-in audience. And so they were just kind of stuck with it. And it stinks because I think a more inventive ending would have at least made us feel better going out of the movie. Yeah, I would have softened the blow for sure. I found this to be quite poor. I thought this was really bad.

And it's got a bunch of people who I really like. I should buy a bunch of people. I mean two people, Ann Hathaway and Josh Hardin. Dakota Johnson. Let's speak on it once more. Okay. You know, she just hosted SNL over the weekend. I think she's a radically better comic performer than she is dramatic actress.

She's had a couple of dramatic parts over the years that I've been okay with that I think that have effectively utilized her emotional distance, you know, her blankness very well. But this is getting out of hand. This is becoming an issue. And I addressed this on the materialist pod. Yeah. We spoke about Madam Webb. It's time for an intervention. She's stunningly beautiful.

She seems like a very smart and cool person. She seems quite a good celebrity. But she is weighing down these feature films. This is an issue. But put someone, first of all, who do you want to put in her spot in the film? Who are you going to cast that has the same mixture of, of aspirational beauty, honestly. She's so pretty,

but also because she's willing to be blank is believable and is slightly younger than Ann Hathaway is believable as the younger figure. I mean, there are top line actors that could go into these parts. Well, I think you need that because I think Dakota Johnson is cast in this

because she's going to do the press tour and bring in a certain amount of of audience outside of the Colleen Hoover built-in audience. I mean, there's the Emma Stone, Jennifer Lawrence, Margot Robbie ring

of mid-30s actresses who just like would be bet all three of them would just make this movie better. It would just make the movie better. Then there's like another tier and they're slightly more serious act, self-serious actors,

but I'll say like if Daisy Edgar Jones or Alicia Vikander were in this movie, I think they would be better. I just think they would be better. And for whatever reason, Dakota Johnson has got a chokehold on this kind of thing right now. And I'm sure I can come up with a bunch of all that. Anna to Armis. If you put Anna to Armis in this part, it would be so much better.

I think that's true. Though they did sort of with the Adrian Line movie with Ben Affleck. Yeah, deep water. Deepwater. That's right. That I think we're the only people that ever saw the end of it. And that didn't work out so well. Incredible Tracy Lutz performance.

He's wonderful, as always. is the Elizabeth Olson Elizabeth Olson I don't know because because here's the here no no no

no no well if you're putting Elizabeth Olson in this movie or Daisy Edgar Jones in this movie then you're making

the serious Colleen Hoover version of this movie and you're making it sincere I just agree Daisy Edgar James was in Twisters

you know Elizabeth Olson was the scarlet witch like it doesn't automatically have to be serious i don't think that neither of them are as funny and elizabeth olson was in eternity which i think that she was the weakest part of eternity in my opinion and so kind of can't carry the tone that the film wants to be going for the problem is that then at the end they're still making a colline hoover movie to me the issue is that this story is really stupid and we have to stop making these books and we

we need better source material. And I think if Dakota Johnson, like the opening scene when she gets splattered with the blood and just doesn't react, and then they're in the bathroom with Josh Hartnett, that's the sexiest part of the movie. And that is campier and it's ridiculous. And you know that he's going to be the husband

and he's going to be in the meeting. Like you understand. And the film knows that you understand. It's playing in those like very broad, can't be registers. And I think the blankness works there because the blankness paired with the comedy,

like the wink wink of it all does fit in a way that those other people couldn't. And also I do think that there's something to see Dakota Johnson movie star, though is she, in one of these adaptations.

I don't think it's her fault. I do think it's the material's fault. She was funny in Splitsville. I enjoyed that. I just, I think she's a comic actress. I feel like everyone is so confused by her obvious beauty that they believe that she should

be cast in things like this and it almost never works. Very funny in the hot tub scene in this film. She was, she was many things. She was many things, but that is fun. I mean, she's going for it. Yeah. Yeah.

I don't know. This is a tough one. This is a tough one for the Dakota heads. I don't know. You know what? The movie Bafo business. 33 million, four for four for Hoover. four different movie studios. She's shepherding this stuff very smartly. She seems to know what she's doing.

How many more books does she have? I don't even know. Did she have like 10 books? I think more. I think she just cranks them out. It's a volume business. Wow. Like CR.

Damn. Okay. So we'll just be doing five more of these. Or is this a moratorium on Hoover episodes? Well, if actors we like, keep making them. I know. That's the thing.

We really like, you like two of the three and I like all three. Yeah. And they, you know, they're also doing the thing where it's like, oh, Allison Williams is in this one. And Micah Monroe, all my gals. Yeah. They keep casting all my gals. It's tough, it's tough for me.

The Allison Williams ones was so good. Hysterical. Absolute, pure. It was like going to see the hangover for the first time, rolling in the aisles. These aren't erotic thrillers. This one is as close as we've gotten to the. I guess so. When we talk about good trash, I'm trying to think of what is our version of good trash right now that is in our popular culture.

Well, I was thinking a lot about the housemaid and the housemaid too, which I believe the book the housemaid was written. I don't think in response to Colleen Hoover, but that these books, you know, come of a similar wave and that this project was, I think, greenlit as a like, okay, well, we don't have Colleen Hoover stuff, but we can buy these books that are. also very successful that have a lot of the same. I mean, you know, and that is like domestic abuse and people having sex in places that they're not supposed to be having sex. So, you know, related. I, the housemate is much more successful. And it is campier and and weirder. And I think the situation itself is also a lot more ridiculous, while also being upsetting, but it shows more. And it also has better it probably is an erotic thriller

yeah I think so yeah I think it is and that works for me a lot more than whatever this is I was more down on the house made than you were I think for similar plotting reasons but you know what if I'm being honest

it would be hard for me to have I would have enjoyed basic instinct because that movie they just Verhoeven direct the fuck out of that movie and Stone is unbelievable but like if I if we seen sliver in real time or body of evidence. It would have been hard to be like, what a great time. Like, we would have been like, ah, this story is really shitty and like doesn't really work.

And it would have been hard to appreciate its charms. So I guess there's a case to be made that in a few years you look at Verity. And you're like, oh, if I watched it at home and it's 100 minutes and it's sexy and it's got some funny stuff going on. And look at how Anne Hathaway is styled while appearing on hot ones. You know, I think Joan Collins is apt. I was thinking of Daniel Steele a bit watching her too. You know, the sort of like pearls and the, you know, the lady suit, you know, the Nancy Reagan suit and the hair quaffed in the way that it is. Her office is like a sunken living room, like circular.

And they have it styled in that very like 80s glitz sort of way. So I think that those references are intentional. Yeah. It's a little odd that she looks that way in 2024 or whatever those interviews are happening. But it's also kind of funny. How did you feel about Alex Cooper's performance? She did okay She's fine

Yeah she's fine She was better than Sean Evans is the hot ones guy But also I think That the Sean Evans questions That he asks in the Verity Hot ones are the best writing Within Verity

Because they are the truest To how he asks questions on hot ones It was a straight up Sean Evans question Yeah And he was like In your stories There are what are the nine Is like nine modes of integrity

Or whatever it was that she was using. And the delivery was spot on. We didn't get to see her eat any wings, though. So that's disappointing. When will they cast you in a film as a podcast host? Never. I wouldn't be so sure of that.

Many people out there listening, thinking about how to get Amanda Dobbins in their movie. Any closing thoughts here? You feeling good about the state of the world? No. No? No. No.

Your life at large? I'm excited for, I'm not excited for the social reckoning, but I'm excited for this weekend and the other films that we get to talk about. You know, we've been building up October. It's like October is when all the great stuff happens. And I think we're, again, we haven't seen the social reckoning yet. But we might be zero for three. It could be a very dark month.

Yeah, that's kind of where I have. I think they're all worth discussion. Of course. That's the thing that is notable. It's like they fit the bill for the mission. of the show. Yeah. But there's no guarantee

that we're getting something great. You know, I was thinking about how, um, when I was talking about Beetlejuice,

Beetlejuice, that was like a September movie and that was a really big movie. It wasn't like a great movie. It wasn't great to talk about. But then, you know, last September was,

uh, one battle after another. I remember. And then this past September, you know, we got prime time. That was pretty cool. I really liked that.

But it's been, it's been, it's very soft fall. Yeah. Which is something we were worried about. And the first of, And the festivals were soft. Yeah. And, you know, and then the Paramount Warner Brothers skydance of it all, which is official very soon becomes just, yeah, it's not ideal.

Here's two things that are happening. You can see everything. Yeah. And whale fall. Those two things, I can say with some confidence, are worth paying attention to. And we're going to see everything, including that was not a lot of. an intentional pun. But we are. We will be talking about the social reckoning, but I don't know. It's not, I'm not like, this is a little rocky. It's a little rockier than I hoped we would be at this point in the fall.

Yeah. It might be November's season. Might not be October's year. Might be November's year. Could it be December's year. Eggers season? Could be. We'll see. Great. Okay. What are you going to go do for your rest of your day? Oh, I'm going to see a film. I don't know if I'm allowed to say that I'm going to see it. I'm seeing the same film you're seeing tonight. Oh, fun. Okay, great. I'm going to say what I'm seeing. I'm seeing artificial at the New York Film Festival. Big gala premiere at the Alice Tully Hall. In fact, I have to get going very shortly to go do that. So Amanda, thank you. Thanks to our producer Jack Sanders for his work on today's episode. Thanks to Remi here in New York for helping us out. Thanks to Lucas Kavanaugh for his production support. As Amanda said, later this week, we are finally seeing and discussing the legacy sequel of one of our favorite movies of All Time the Social Network. It's Aaron Sorkins, the Social Reckoning. He's the writer and the director of that movie.

We'll watch it, and then we'll see you then.