The 10 Most Misused Stars in Hollywood and the Gnarly Magic of ‘Send Help’

Summary

The Big Picture (The Ringer)

Episode: The 10 Most Misused Stars in Hollywood and the Gnarly Magic of ‘Send Help’
Hosts: Sean Fennessey & Amanda Dobbins
Date: January 30, 2026

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Episode Overview

Sean and Amanda tackle the winter movie doldrums by reviewing two genre entries released in late January, Mercy (AI courtroom drama with Chris Pratt) and Send Help (workplace survival satire with Rachel McAdams). Using Send Help as inspiration, they dig into a signature Big Picture exercise: naming the most “misused” or underutilized movie stars in Hollywood, especially stars who seemed poised for generational stardom but have since been sidelined by the industry.

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News & Industry Roundup

Sundance Acquisitions: "The Invite"

• First big Sundance buy: “The Invite,” directed by Olivia Wilde, acquired by A24 for $10M+.
• Cast: Seth Rogen, Olivia Wilde, Edward Norton, Penelope Cruz.
  • Premise: Couple (Rogen & Wilde) are in a rut, attend a swinger’s party hosted by Norton & Cruz.
• Amanda: “Pro movie theaters.”
• Sean: “This movie is an interesting one. It was supposed to be Amy Adams, Paul Rudd and Tessa Thompson… Olivia Wilde comes in, she gets this movie off the ground. The Wilde Moment is back upon us again.” [05:11]
• Debate over Wilde’s comeback after Don’t Worry Darling.

Harry Styles Detours

• The pair riff on Harry Styles’ acting turns and a viral factoid: Styles present at the announcement of a new Pope.
• Amanda: “Harry Styles is basically conclave adjacent.” [05:41]
• Styles’ limited acting run (Eternals, My Policeman, Don’t Worry Darling) and Amanda’s mild take: “He was my favorite part of Eternals.” [06:59]

Beatles Biopic(s) Buzz

• Early photos of the four simultaneous Beatles biopics (coming 2028) spark excitement and joking speculation about marketing, leaks, and casting.
• Sean: “I got a little excited. Of course we did. This is why we're diseased. Because this is gonna be the worst thing that ever happened to us.” [08:25]
• Amanda: “I like the Beatles and I really like biopics. Despite all biopics as evidence to the contrary.” [09:52]

BAFTA Nominations Analysis

• “One Battle After Another” leads the pack with 14 BAFTA noms; reference to Gandhi’s record-holding 16.
• Amanda and Sean dissect surprising Oscar/BAFTA divergences, like Delroy Lindo getting an Oscar nomination but not showing up at BAFTA/SAG/CCAs/Globes:
  • Amanda: “This is good. But this is the kind of thing where… nominees are very, very into that movie.” [13:15]
• BAFTAs’ persistent race diversity challenges.
• Discussion of Amy Madigan’s absence, other snubs, and international voting quirks.

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Review: Mercy (Amazon/MGM)

[18:32] — Main Review Segment

Premise & Gimmick

• “Screen thriller” set in the near future: AI judge (Rebecca Ferguson) presides over the murder trial of Chris Pratt’s detective character, with a 90-minute countdown to execution/innocence verdict.
• Big selling point: the real-time ticking clock.
  • Sean: “This movie has a countdown clock so you know exactly when it's going to be over. And that is just a damn good idea.” [19:35]

Verdict: A Morally & Cinematically Ugly Mess

• Both hosts widely panned the film:
  • Aesthetically, politically, and structurally “ugly, mean, and immoral.” [20:42]
  • Criticism for tech propaganda: heavy-handed AI/surveillance narrative and abundant Amazon Ring camera footage.
  • Amanda: “It’s not just evil… intellectually, morally and politically, but also structurally and aesthetically.” [20:26]
• Damning the film’s confused attempt at nuance:
  • Undermines dangers of AI, then delivers paint-by-numbers “AI can be good, too!” ending.
  • Amanda: “You're contradicting yourself within the framework of this propaganda that you are making.” [27:16]
• Poor, lifeless action and ugly screen-aesthetic.
• Critiques of social, racial, and recovery stereotypes in script.
• Quote:
  • Sean: “Usually the opposite. I feel the opposite where I'm watching a streaming movie, and I'm like, why is this not in theaters? ... This was one where I was like, I'm in a theater with two other people on a Tuesday night. The screen. On the screen. On the screen of it all probably will look less bad...” [38:33]

Chris Pratt & Rebecca Ferguson Discussion [31:17]

• Pratt: Once full of promise and comic unpredictability, now stuck in “gun-toting, bitter action man” roles.
  • Amanda: “What was it about Chris Pratt that made you think that he would be doing more interesting things?” [32:19]
  • Sean: “He's actually, only now wants to be like Jason Statham, minus the martial arts... such a boring Persona for a star.” [32:43]
• Ferguson: Easy paycheck, but “no bueno.”
  • Amanda: “She is our queen, but we gotta call you out on this. This is no bueno.” [36:07]

Notable Quotes & Moments

• Amanda (on the AI message): “Human or AI, we all make mistakes and we learn.” [23:27]
• Sean (on product placement): “It's not above a company...to, you know, Coca Cola being a product placement when Columbia is owned by the broader corporation, it's not shocking, Right? ... At this moment in time, it seems like a pretty ugly coincidence.” [25:45]
• Amanda, riffing on the “terminal list”: “The thing about the terminal list is that the names are fixed, but the number of people aren't. So once you get on, you can't get off.” [34:32]

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Review: Send Help (20th Century Studios, dir. Sam Raimi)

[44:33] — Main Review Segment

Setup

• Amanda arrives knowing little: “I have no idea what this film is about.” [47:02]
• Sam Raimi returns with a gross-out, satirical, genre-bending take on workplace power dynamics, starring Rachel McAdams and Dylan O’Brien.
• Premise: Downtrodden middle-aged office worker (McAdams) and her obnoxious boss (O’Brien) survive a plane crash, marooned on an island, turning corporate tables into savage survivalist ones.

Takeaways & Analysis

• Both hosts LOVED the movie—fun, mean, gnarly in signature Raimi style.
  • Sean: “This is exactly what I want from a January movie… the most competent artisans, a fun enough script that gives a filmmaker room to apply a lot of his signature moves.” [47:53]
• Film’s tonal dexterity: Able to lampoon #girlboss archetypes, gender/success expectations, and turn into a ruthless, twisty thriller without moralizing or melodrama.
  • Amanda: “The movie is more interested in attaching you to these people...through a twin charisma that sits on the edge. And… it draws you in and then you just kind of want to see what's gonna happen and who is gonna win.” [55:59]
• McAdams: Goes all-in on grotesque self-deprecation, evoking 1930s screwball heroines, on a “spectrum between the smartest and dumbest person in the room.”
  • Sean: “She has this ability to effect like, oh, oh, whoops, sorry. You know, like, that's kind of her energy in a lot of movies. She's so funny in Game Night… She's very well utilized in this.” [63:63]
• Film’s signature gross-out Raimi-isms: splatter, absurd reversals, shells of society broken down, “rollicking thriller romp.”
• Great finale: “Fairly unflattering conclusion for everybody,” ambiguous about who—if anyone—should be rooted for. [54:05]

Fun Quotes & Bits

• McAdams: “They try as best they can to make Rachel McAdams look dowdy…You put glasses in a cardigan on Rachel McAdams, you're trying your best, but no…” [50:11]
• Sean (on McAdams’ skill): “She’s kind of like John Wick…she can kill you in a lot of different ways.” [75:43]
• Survivor and real-life skills riff: “Would you know to do the palm leaf into the coconut shell as like a water funnel?” [59:05]
  • Amanda: “I do have common sense…and I do think that, like, when things are tough… I can probably figure out fire. I’ve seen this movie. I’ve seen other films.” [60:14]

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Segment: The 10 Most Misused (or Underutilized) Movie Stars in Hollywood

[75:04 – 111:10] — Main Exercise

Using the dearth of Rachel McAdams vehicles as inspiration, Sean and Amanda identify stars who should have had (or should still have) A-list, multi-faceted careers but haven’t—due to gender, taste, industry mismanagement, or bad luck.

Sample List (w/ Highlights)

1. LaKeith Stanfield
   • Brilliant, elastic, but keeps getting supporting roles and odd parts instead of leading man status.
   • “Until that happens, he's going to continue to play second lead to Mark Wahlberg and play dirty on Amazon.”
2. James McAvoy
   • Should’ve been elevated by Atonement/X-Men; now lost in supporting parts & genre fare.
   • Amanda: “He's also capable of emotions. He's very funny. He can sing the Bengals. Let's do more.”
3. Angelina Jolie
   • Once top-tier; now chooses strange or invisible projects, but still underused given her charisma.
   • “How often does one of the most famous people in the world make zero good movies?”
4. Julia Roberts
   • “Nuclear power” charm but scarce top-billed roles.
   • Sean: “Does Wes Anderson want to work with Julia Roberts? … She has more agency than the typical misused star, but filmmakers need to figure out how to use her.”
5. Dev Patel
   • After Slumdog, still unanchored as an action or romantic lead. Forced to make his own action vehicle (“Monkey Man”).
6. Bradley Cooper
   • Mega-watt movie star, but has recently receded into cameos and personal projects.
   • Amanda: “He's an incredible movie star… and he's just not in movies anymore. What are we doing?”
7. Amy Adams
   • After racking up Oscar nominations, locked in a series of “misguided” or underwhelming projects.
   • Amanda: “You gotta take chances. I want a lot for her now. She's still got juice, but…”
8. Regina Hall
   • Comedy MVP who can also do drama. “Let us learn always from Paul Thomas Anderson, who identified the capabilities of Regina Hall beyond being the funniest person in any room…”
9. Chris Pine
   • Good in everything, but stuck in strange post-franchise phase.
   • Sean: “I want great things for Chris Pine.”
10. Kirsten Dunst
    • Lately doing supporting work in indie/cult films, but “Let Kirsten Dunst lead movies. Please.”

Themes and Conclusions

• Strong female leads over 40, especially post-2015, continue to find few opportunities unless attached to franchises.
• Men, even those once boxed as “leading men,” are easily sidelined by poor project choices or lack of franchise anchoring.
• Both hosts agree: Hollywood still doesn’t know what to do with the generation of stars who rose in the 2000s.
• Amanda: “You could just make a list of, like, 45 women over 40 in Hollywood, and it is everyone. Hollywood still doesn't know what to do with women past a certain age.” [73:24]

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Notable Quotes & Banter

• Sean: "Sometimes just to be like, do not do this when you're making a movie." [38:53]
• Amanda, on Julia Roberts: "That is like nuclear power. You know, let's find a way to channel it that's healthy for this earth." [87:15]
• Amanda, on survival: “No, I would be fine… I do that all the time. That's called intermittent fasting.” [60:44]
• Amanda (on The Terminal List): “The thing about the terminal list is that the names are fixed, but the number of people aren't. So once you get on, you can't get off.” [34:32]

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Timestamps of Key Segments

• [03:11] – Olivia Wilde’s “The Invite”
• [06:29] – Early Beatles biopics buzz
• [10:09] – BAFTA nominations breakdown
• [18:32] – Mercy review
• [31:17] – Chris Pratt & Rebecca Ferguson discussion
• [44:33] – Send Help review
• [63:51] – Rachel McAdams filmography & career status
• [75:04] – Main exercise: Most misused/underutilized stars

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Closing & Teasers

• Upcoming: Deep dives on “The Moment” (Sundance breakout), “People We Meet On Vacation,” Judd Apatow’s Mel Brooks doc, and more creative episode ideas—possibly involving a “roulette wheel” of listener suggestions.
• Amanda: “Let’s give it a go.”
• Sean: “Hollywood’s fucking up. I like movie stars.”

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Overall Tone

• Warmly snarky, deeply knowledgeable, loving (especially of movie stars as a concept), peppered with sharp, punchy pop-culture asides and meta-jokes about film criticism and awards season minutiae. The episode weaves between affectionate mockery, industry criticism, and giddy excitement about the few new films worth celebrating.

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Transcript

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[Sean Fennessy]

I'm Sean Fennessy.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I'm Amanda Dobbins and this is the.

[Sean Fennessy]

Big Picture 8 conversation show about sending help to some of the best movie stars.

[Amanda Dobbins]

See what you did there.

[Sean Fennessy]

Thank you. Today on the show we're talking about two late January genre movies. The AI courtroom drama crime thriller Mercy starring Chris Pratt and the survivalist workplace satire Send help starring Rachel McAdams. Which movie star do you think we'll be sending help to on this episode? They show two very different potential futures for movies, so we dig into both of those. Send Help has also inspired an exercise. It's built around McAdams. And we love Rachel McAdams.

[Amanda Dobbins]

We do.

[Sean Fennessy]

And there's not enough movies with Rachel McAdams. And trying to figure out why that is. I have some theories. I'm sure you do as well. But we're gonna talk about the other movie stars that have been around and with us for some time who are Misused, underutilized, not identified, and supported properly. Are you excited about that exercise?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I am. Listen, Rachel McAdams be in more movies.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. Before we get into that, we need to talk about a couple quick things in the news.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

First thing is, first big Sundance acquisition happened. It's called the Invite. I mentioned this to you earlier on the show. I got a lot of texts about this movie when it screened over the weekend at Sundance. 10 plus million dollars a 24 picked it up. Olivia Wilde, who is the director of this movie, which is an adaptation of a Spanish film, said she wanted to be in movie theaters. What do you think about that?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Pro movie theaters.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah, me too. Seth Rogen, Olivia Wilde, Edward Norton, Penelope Cruz. Premise of the movie is there's a couple that's having some trouble in their relationship. I believe it's Seth and Olivia's characters, and they get invited to Swinger's party hosted by Edward Norton and Penelope Cruz.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Like, I'm in. I was in this was on my. Like, this is romantic comedy adjacent, I guess, where movies where people have sex is how we can. Or talk about sex is a way to reframe it. Sure.

[Sean Fennessy]

One of these days you're gonna see porn. It's gonna be huge for you. It's gonna change everything. One of these days. Until that day, you can keep looking for it in rom coms.

[Amanda Dobbins]

This is a burgeoning rom coms and romances and, you know, heated rivalry, I guess. But, like, this is a thing that you. You like to watch people have their eyeballs. Eyeballs scooped out.

[Sean Fennessy]

I do.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And I like to watch people, like, dance around sex for a while.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah.

[Amanda Dobbins]

So this was on my like to watch list. And turns out that Olivia Wilde, like, has her mojo back after.

[Sean Fennessy]

Well, we'll see if she does.

[Amanda Dobbins]

This is true.

[Sean Fennessy]

This has been a fascinating reconstruction period. I would say that Olivia Wilde, in the aftermath of Don't Worry Darling, some of the controversy around that movie and also just the general ineffectiveness of that movie ultimately, which we talked about years ago when it was released, she kind of went quiet for a year or so, had a lot of personal stuff. And then last year, she had a very funny cameo on the studio, which is, I assume, how she and Seth Rogen connected there. And this movie is an interesting one. It was supposed to be originally Amy Adams, Paul Rudd and Tessa Thompson and maybe another actor in that fourth spot. And they changed filmmakers. Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Ferris, who made Little Miss Sunshine, were going to make it. Olivia Wilde comes in, she gets this movie off the ground. She also is co starring in I Want yout Sex, which is the new Greg Araki movie opposite Cooper Hoffman, which got less good reviews out of Sundance. I haven't seen either of these movies yet. And she's apparently appearing in Tony Gilroy's Behemoth, which is just getting underway in production. So the Wilde moment is back upon us again. Do you like Olivia Wilde?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I'm open to it.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I don't think I'm against. I think that I did not think there were a lot of thoughts in. Don't Worry, Darling.

[Sean Fennessy]

Booksmart is fun. I like Bookmark.

[Amanda Dobbins]

It was fine. And who wouldn't date Harry Styles? So that seems fine.

[Sean Fennessy]

I probably wouldn't if I had a choice.

[Amanda Dobbins]

That's your choice.

[Sean Fennessy]

Nothing against him. I don't know a single Harry Styles song.

[Amanda Dobbins]

You're too good for him. But Zoe Kravitz is it.

[Sean Fennessy]

Is Zoe Kravitz dating Harry Styles?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Wow.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And did you also.

[Sean Fennessy]

I always learn something new on this show.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Do you also know that Harry styles was in St. Peter's Square when the new Pope was announced? To bring it back to, like, Harry Styles is basically conclave adjacent.

[Sean Fennessy]

Got it.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yes.

[Sean Fennessy]

Both Harry and I, I think, are finding God this year. That's been an interesting theme. Many people are saying he was in.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Rome getting a haircut and then just ran on down.

[Sean Fennessy]

That's beautiful.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. And then he was just, like, photographed in the crowd.

[Sean Fennessy]

What do you think he does he just say, let me through, I'm Harry Styles. Like, how does that work?

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, he told the story. He said everyone, including my hairdresser, was like, oh, they're saying habeas Pophamus. Which is what you say when there's a new Pope. There's a new pope.

[Sean Fennessy]

Habeas Popimus.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I think so. I think I have the Latin right on that. And then he's like. So I just ran down and wandered with people. He was like, I just followed the crowds.

[Sean Fennessy]

How nice.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Just happened to be nearby.

[Sean Fennessy]

Do you think Harry Styles should act more?

[Amanda Dobbins]

That was Eternals, right? That was the end of Eternals.

[Sean Fennessy]

Well, he had that run of Eternals. My Policeman, legendary film that everyone's seen.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I have seen that.

[Sean Fennessy]

And don't worry, darling.

[Amanda Dobbins]

My Policeman is different than Mr. Policeman. We gave you all the clues, right?

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes. That is the Harry Hole movie, the Snowman. Is that it?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I think so. That sounds right.

[Sean Fennessy]

Is it pronounced the snowman?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Mr. Policeman, we gave you all the clothes.

[Sean Fennessy]

That was.

[Amanda Dobbins]

That was a fun part on the Internet. We were innocent. He was my favorite part of Eternals.

[Sean Fennessy]

I think he was in 12 seconds of eternals.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Let's you know again.

[Sean Fennessy]

Good enough. Did you see the photos? Speaking of Eternals and Barry Keoghan of the Beatles. Guys, four actors in Beatles.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Let's do it now.

[Sean Fennessy]

Screenshot situation. It was. I don't think they're even high res photography.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Beatles photos. Beatles movie photos.

[Sean Fennessy]

I thought. I thought I saw them this morning.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Where is it?

[Sean Fennessy]

I don't even know where I saw it.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Beatles movies, photos. First look. Okay, Daily Mail. I'm sorry to give the Daily Mail some.

[Sean Fennessy]

Oh, this is huge. In real time.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Barry Keegan is Ringo Starr. They're doing the.

[Sean Fennessy]

He looked good.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, he looks good. I frankly this polka dot and cravat look, I'm into. Okay, I'm still scrolling. Okay, so this is a photograph of photos laid on a table, not unlike this one. I'd like to state for the record, I did not take this photograph. Sony, do not sue me for infringement of anything.

[Sean Fennessy]

No one can see anything. You're looking at your laptop.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, I know, but I'm describing it and I'm just saying. Okay, that would even make for a.

[Sean Fennessy]

Better case of fair use.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, there you go. So that is that guy as John. As George Harrison. I. I guess that guy. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Joseph Quinn.

[Amanda Dobbins]

That was his name. It was taking me a minute. Sorry. I can't even see Paul Mescal. And I can see Harris Dickinson is wearing glasses and has long hair. I'm open.

[Sean Fennessy]

This is scintillating commentary for me.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Welcome to it. How do you feel?

[Sean Fennessy]

I got a little excited. Yeah, I got a little excited. Of course we did.

[Amanda Dobbins]

This is why we're diseased. Because this is gonna be the worst thing that ever happened to us. And it's not coming out until 2028, I think.

[Sean Fennessy]

That's right.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And we'll be dead.

[Sean Fennessy]

No, no, I'll be alive. And I will be potting somewhere about four consecutive. Four simultaneously released Beatles movies. Or is it one per week?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I think it's one per week. It's the Beatles. It's April is what they've told us.

[Sean Fennessy]

God, I love the Beatles.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Me too. I really do. So it's interesting that only Barry Keoghan and Joseph Quinn get the close up on these and that they're. Do you think they're holding Paul Mescal and Harris Dickinson back because they don't have the looks nailed or because they know that, you know, John and Paul are like the leaders in the clubhouse? Are they trying to build anticipation?

[Sean Fennessy]

I don't think a photograph of a photo that has been posted online is necessarily a coherent marketing rollout.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, I think that you're wrong.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay. And once again, I think this is a coherent marketing rollout.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, I don't know if it's coherent, but I think it's like choices have been made.

[Sean Fennessy]

Maybe things do leak.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay, I guess things do leak.

[Sean Fennessy]

You'd probably want to put your best foot forward with this project. I suspect it's very expensive.

[Amanda Dobbins]

The composition of the photos and it just like those two. Get the close ups.

[Sean Fennessy]

Sewers and Shawn tag really digging in here. This is incredible on photography.

[Amanda Dobbins]

The kind of content that you can expect in 2028 in April as we lose our minds in front of the camera. I mean, I. I like the Beatles and I really like biopics. Despite all of. Despite all biopics as evidence to the contrary.

[Sean Fennessy]

Could be a disaster, could be great. I reserve the right to love it. Okay, let's stay in the British Isles for a minute. The BAFTA nominations, just some quick takeaways from this. So they were announced on Tuesday shortly after our episode went up and.

[Amanda Dobbins]

You.

[Sean Fennessy]

Know, not a ton of surprises, but a couple of key moments that I think will close the loop on some of those discussions we were having earlier this week. First off, one battle after another. 14 nominations, the most of any film. Sinners had 13, the all time record. Before I wrote that down, did you have any idea what it would have been? Did you even look at it? Know.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I do know because I have this right ahead of me. It's, I mean, it's a just really classic BAFTAs. Jack, do you have the doc open? Can you guess?

[Sean Fennessy]

Sorry, I was messaging Kate Hallowell.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Sorry. Hi, Kate Hall. Also, I think this film was released before you were born.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes, Gandhi.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Wow, There we go.

[Sean Fennessy]

Gandhi. 16 nominations for Gandhi. Checks out. Yeah. So additionally, no Delroy Lindo.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Which we talked about whether when Mimosaku and Delroy Lindo would be recognized here because they were shortlisted. When Mimi Misaku got in, Delroy Lindo did not.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Right.

[Sean Fennessy]

As an Oscar nerd, this is very interesting to me.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

This is a very rare circumstance in which an actor has not gotten CCAs, Globes, SAG or BAFTA nominations and has an Oscar nomination in recent history. This had me thinking about two nominations. One. A lot of people are saying Andrea Riseborough because of that campaign which we discussed and the kind of the sort of behind the scenes relationship building that was necessary for that. But what it really reminds me of is Lakeith Stanfield when he came in as a supporting actor in 2022 for his work in Judas and the Black Messiah, that was kind of an odd year where that film qualified, even though it came out later in the cycle. I think it was like a February movie and then got an April Oscar nomination. Right. Wasn't it something along those lines? Because of COVID And that was interesting. And he was a first time nominee and he was sharing that category with Daniel Kaluuya, who went on to win that year. And so that was kind of an odd. But it was a recognition of Stanfield, who had kind of been rising in Hollywood at that time. A lot of admiration for him. It's a really good performance in that movie. And then I also thought about Penelope Cruz getting nominated for Parallel Mothers, the Almodovar film, which also got no recognition at any of the other bodies. I think aside from a couple of the European awards, this is pretty rare for something like this to happen. I do think a lot of it is that Lindo is very well liked inside the industry, never nominated as a way to kind of acknowledge his work by this particular group of voters. Any other thoughts about that?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, it reads to me both as support for Delroy Lindo and also that Sinners is very strong with the Academy. And I know I was on this podcast saying Sinners is very strong, but I still think it'll be one battle. But this is the kind of thing where you see, you know, if. If the center. Center's strength, like, led Delroy Lindo to a nomination at the Oscars, and then the fact that it couldn't get him at the BAFTAs, it just kind of means that Academy voters, or at least Academy, like, nominees are very, very into that movie.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah, I agree with you.

[Amanda Dobbins]

This is good.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. You think you'd think the opposite if it got at a bafta. You'd be like, oh, it really has a chance at Oscar. It's not really the point.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I mean, we would be remiss if we didn't mention that the baftas in particular have an interesting relationship to black performers.

[Sean Fennessy]

That's true. So.

[Amanda Dobbins]

So which is that they're often not nominated.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes.

[Amanda Dobbins]

So in that sense, I don't know whether it suggests, like, strength at the Academy or just that BAFTAs, despite their ever changing roles, still have some of the same issues.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes.

[Amanda Dobbins]

But, you know, it's great that he got an Oscar nomination.

[Sean Fennessy]

I agree with you. A big surprise to me was no Amy Madigan in Supporting Actress here.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. But like, does Field of Dreams matter to British People, you know, like, seriously.

[Sean Fennessy]

Oh, so you think it's related to just maybe her not having the same standing amongst the British voters? That's really interesting. I guess I didn't think about it that way. Um, I had. I have been picking Amy Madigan through most of this season and thinking she has a chance to win because it is a very. It feels like a very classic kind of Oscar win where the. The more seasoned person who has a strong contingent of voting. In the immediate aftermath of this news, I saw a lot of people saying, well, either Tiana Taylor's locked or maybe. Maybe Inga Ipsdotter. Lillias, who's gotten in in a lot of places, is very strong here. I'm a little more dubious of that. She's competing against one of her co stars in the category.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I think so as well.

[Sean Fennessy]

But this is an interesting race. There are some interesting races now and I thought it was all over with the shouting, but that's not quite the case.

[Amanda Dobbins]

No. And especially for the acting. I think SAG will be interesting but not necessarily definitive because not everybody's in this. The pools are different at all the different precursors. So you're just kind of guessing.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah, yeah. It's not going to. Neither of these awards, the actor awards or the baftas are not going to be predictive per se, but they're going to tell us more. So the season has some new juice. I'm excited about that. A couple of other quick things. Kate Hudson is in here, which is fascinating, not a British performer. Amanda Seyfried never stood a chance. Paul Mescal, Chase Infinity and Yorgos Lanthimos are all in their respective categories. And the thing is that some of these categories have six nominees and so that six nominee often will reveal to you who is in sixth place if they were nominated here. So you get the impression. Paul Mescal probably in sixth place in his race. Jesse Plemons possibly in sixth place in his race. Chase Infinity probably in sixth place. Yorgos probably not, like Guillermo del Toro, missed the short list for the baftas. It's kind of fascinating. And then Yorgos got nominated here. So a little bit of a wrinkle there, which makes it kind of interesting. Wagner Mora also missed the shortlist, so he's not nominated here. I don't know what that means for his Oscar chances, if anything might not be good.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I don't think it's great. But it is still also confusing. I mean, not being in BAFTAs and not being at SAG together just means that he Missed some of, like, the promo juice.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And I do think that that matters a bit. However, once again, international voters and specifically Brazil are very powerful. So, you know, and people like that movie and people like Vagner Mora.

[Sean Fennessy]

How do you feel about the Brazilians bombing all of our social media all the time, Whenever we mention anything, I.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Feel like that means we made it.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah, like that.

[Amanda Dobbins]

That is it.

[Sean Fennessy]

I agree.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Like, I know that, that when the people of Brazil are paying attention and come to Brazil, like, commenting in our comments, like, here we are.

[Sean Fennessy]

I would like to go to Brazil.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I've been once. It was beautiful. I'd love to go back.

[Sean Fennessy]

I've not been. I've not been to South America. I'd love to visit. It was on my list in 2020.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I know. I was doing the continents with Knox last night. And which ones I've been to and which ones I haven't. I'm.

[Sean Fennessy]

I'm.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I'm three for six. Not counting Antarctica.

[Sean Fennessy]

Only been to two.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

It's tough. One last thing.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, there are two things because you didn't put. I swear on here, but that's what we texted about.

[Sean Fennessy]

I was going to say that there were two titles that you might have seen a lot in this BAFTA list that you are not seeing really at any other awards. The first is the Ballad of Wallace island, which came out all the way last spring. And I think I mentioned for, like, five minutes on one episode. It's very charming, very charming movie starring Carey Mulligan, about a former indie folk duo who are invited by a very eccentric person to come perform on an island called Wallace island. Stars Tim Key. He's one of the writers of the movie. He's very funny.

[Amanda Dobbins]

The reason to see the movie, Carey Mulligan's great, but let's be real. She's a supporting actress.

[Sean Fennessy]

She is a supporting actress, and she's.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Nominated at the BAFTAs in supporting performance.

[Sean Fennessy]

She is. She's good, though.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I mean, Carey Mulligan's great.

[Sean Fennessy]

Butlinki is really funny in this movie and.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And sets the tone of the whole movie.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes, it is. And it was a little overlooked here. So it's cool that it's getting some love overseas in its native country. And then, I swear.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Which is a movie we haven't seen, has not opened in America. In fairness to us. It opens in March, I believe.

[Amanda Dobbins]

All right.

[Sean Fennessy]

And is a drama about a man with Tourette syndrome and his family and his life. But it's just one of those BAFTA things where just, like, these crazy Brits, they got their own stuff and more power to them.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And they're going to hit that bafta's.

[Sean Fennessy]

Bump in March, you know. Absolutely. I guess we should see it.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, sure. If they make it available to us, we'll see it.

[Sean Fennessy]

I think that they will.

[Amanda Dobbins]

We're lowly Americans, you know, we don't have access.

[Sean Fennessy]

It's being distributed by Sony Pictures classics.

[Amanda Dobbins]

In the U.S. yes.

[Sean Fennessy]

Makes sense.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Hello, old friends.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes. Would you like to get into Mercy?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Sure. I can't believe we waited this long.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay, we'll get into it momentarily. Okay. We're going to talk about Mercy first. This is a new film from Amazon, mgm. It's directed by.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, I know. Because the ring cameras are featured prominently throughout.

[Sean Fennessy]

Well, we should talk about some of the cross promo happening in there. So Timur Beckmanbatov is the director of this film. This is not his first film that is screen focused. It stars Chris Pratt, Rebecca Ferguson, Callie Reese, Annabelle Wallace, Chris Sullivan and Kylie Rogers. The logline of the film is as follows. In the near future, an advanced AI judge tells a captive detective that he's on trial for the murder of his wife. If he fails to prove his innocence within 90 minutes, he'll be executed on the spot. Now, I want to just start by saying this movie has one innovation that I am interested in.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

And that I. I want to affirm when it comes to a dump, you airy thriller.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay, so you're leading with the.

[Sean Fennessy]

This is my one positive about the movie.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay, go ahead.

[Sean Fennessy]

This movie has a countdown clock so you know exactly when it's going to be over. And that is just a damn good idea.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And the count is almost exactly correlated to the runtime of the film.

[Sean Fennessy]

The film's like 96 minutes, 97 minutes. The countdown clock is 90 minutes. You see it often in the film. We have a clear awareness of when we're getting into the second act, into the third act, which is a great relief to me because I needed this movie to be over very quickly because it's not very good.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, I guess the other thing that you could say, and maybe we could save at the end for a compliment sandwich, is that it was like 96 minutes.

[Sean Fennessy]

It is. Yeah, it is. It lived up to the billing. The same billing that this police officer who was on trial for murdering his wife was stuck under. So did you like it? Was it your favorite movie?

[Amanda Dobbins]

This is. This is a pretty. This is an evil movie.

[Sean Fennessy]

It is, but.

[Amanda Dobbins]

But I want to be clear, it's not just evil. You know, intellectually Morally and politically, but also structurally and aesthetically, you know, which at some points you have to hand it its accomplishment, which is that it gets all five categories.

[Sean Fennessy]

It's ugly, mean, and immoral. How exciting. So here's the problem, right? There are a variety of problems.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I mean, there are so many problems.

[Sean Fennessy]

Where to start? There's a critical problem. There's like a deep problem at the center of the movie. So the movie is about AI, Right. And it's about how AI can be used as this, like, all knowing determinative justice machine, which is an idea that we've seen before. Right. Like Minority Report explores this idea of what if we use technology to better control criminal activity in the world? And then what would that do to the society that uses that technology? It assumes an AI judge that is connected to a municipal network can analyze data and video.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

And then determine whether or not someone is guilty or innocent of a crime.

[Amanda Dobbins]

It's the municipal cloud. So I told you not to trust the cloud.

[Sean Fennessy]

Right.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

I'm sure they have none of your information anywhere, despite being on various social media. The movie, you know, I think, thinks it's well intentioned by trying to show you how absurd this premise is by undermining the value of this system. In the movie. In the movie, Rebecca Ferguson represents the AI. She is an AI judge. She's not a real person in the film, of course. She's just a kind of digital manifestation of this code of justice. And then the movie, of course, like, goes through and it's revealed, like, no shit, Chris Pratt didn't kill his wife. And the whole film is about a quest to figure out whether you know who did it and who's responsible. And he has to be a detective while strapped to a chair. And so it shows the kind of the fallacy of the AI and the way that we're relying upon it. But the movie is empathetic to the AI.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, it becomes like a buddy cop, like a buddy routine. And it is Chris Pratt and Rebecca Ferguson as the AI judge learning about the world and solving the case together. And then the AI takes on, like, human qualities or emotions as it, quote, learns them from Chris Pratt in order to support and protect him and help solve the case and, quote, unquote, serve justice. So, yeah, the movie, like, throughout, it valorizes using, quote, unquote, gut instinct and that Chris Pratt is wronged and that he, you know, what he brings as a human.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes, it's Moneyball all over. It's. It's straight up Moneyball. It's Incredibly hard data analysis versus, you know, tape grinders versus the eye test. That's what this is all about.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Then Rebecca Ferguson's AI judge also comes to see that we have to value humanity or. Or learning. No, that's what we have to value is learning, because. May I. Can we reenact. Can we reenact the. Literally the last line of.

[Sean Fennessy]

You can reenact it right now.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yes. Okay. So Chris Pratt says, and this is how the film ends. Human or AI, we all make mistakes and we learn. And then. No, no, no. And then this is in the lobby of one of the criminal court buildings in Los Angeles. It kind of looks like where I had to report to jury duty, so at least set in Los Angeles. Yeah. So. But then Rebecca Ferguson appears on sort of like, you know, an ad screen overlooking the lobby, which is not technology they have available.

[Sean Fennessy]

Truly Orwellian moment.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yes. And she says, yes, we do. And then the movie ends. I mean, we all make mistakes and we learn because that's. That's, you know, that's. It's all. We're all learning machines.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes. I want to talk to you about Chris Pratt and Rebecca Ferguson and the action, or lack thereof, in the film. Like, I want to get into all of that, but, like, let's talk about the actual messaging of the movie.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Sure.

[Sean Fennessy]

Do you think there is anything purposefully insidious at work where the people that are putting this movie out into the world are trying to kind of wash our acceptance of AI and our use of AI and indicate that it is a kind of softer utility and that, say, a mega corporation like Amazon might be interested in its utility to the world?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yes. And they're also trying to wash the surveillance state, which is presented as the municipal cloud, is also the means by which Chris Pratt's character is found, quote, unquote, immediately guilty and only has, like, nine minutes to prove himself? But then it's all of the surveillance footage and the, like, hidden cameras that prove his innocence. And, like, they really, really use that ring footage a lot.

[Sean Fennessy]

They do.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And the ring camera footage is what ultimately helps save him and. And prove his innocence. So they're like, no, see, maybe you do actually just want to tape everything and upload everything. It's not all bad. So, yes, I do believe that there was massaging to make sure that both AI and really all tech services are not portrayed as 100% evil.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And I'm sure that that was a note that was given in one way or another.

[Sean Fennessy]

Certainly feels like. Yeah, and that's pretty ugly. And it's. It's not above a company to. That is like, has an interest in a certain kind of technology or product to, you know, Coca Cola being a product placement when Colombia is owned by the broader corporation, it's not shocking, Right? Like, that's the sort of thing that's happened over Hollywood history. At this moment in time, it seems like a pretty ugly coincidence. And so it's hard to watch the movie and just not be thinking about that.

[Amanda Dobbins]

But here's the other thing, is that in addition to it being morally uncomfortable, gross, it's obvious and incoherent because you're watching the movie and anybody with half a brain is sitting there thinking, okay, so you're telling me that AI is the reason that he's about to wrongly die, like, be executed. And the ultimate resolution of this film is that the AI program is like, is bad. But no, actually, I mean, it's.

[Sean Fennessy]

But they can help too.

[Amanda Dobbins]

But they can help too. And sometimes humans are bad too.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. Because in the final presentation, the sort of. The person who is. Is ultimately responsible for the crime gets. Gets something valuable from technology as well. You know that he too is kind of saved by something.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Right?

[Sean Fennessy]

Which is just like.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And then. And then also. And then also they throw the black woman cop under the bus as well.

[Sean Fennessy]

Which was just like a crazy choice.

[Amanda Dobbins]

When they did this. Like, I can't believe that this made it through. Notes.

[Sean Fennessy]

I know, but.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And her, you know, covering up, her cover up is meant to imply that, like, humans make mistakes too. Just like AI and then, like, we all learn, makes you want to die. But you are sitting there watching it and thinking, well, this doesn't make sense. You're contradicting yourself within the framework of this propaganda that you are making. This is not effective.

[Sean Fennessy]

I totally agree with you. It really wounds the movie. And generally speaking, I like movies like this. I like kind of January thrillers that are basically souped up Charles Bronson movies. And Chris Pratt has a gun and is wrongly accused and needs to solve a crime. Alfred Hitchcock made tons of movies like this. It's not that aspect of it. It's actually what is really underneath it. What's kind of like undergirding it from a structural perspective. That is very, very ugly.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And I was thinking a bit while watching the movie because it is the kind of a movie that affords some extra brain time. I was thinking if you removed the AI like whitewashing from it, and it were still Chris Pratt trying to prove his innocence using screens and. And you honestly even Executed it a lot of the same ways. Now, I thought this looked pretty bad in a number of different ways, but I probably still would have watched it and not been that mad.

[Sean Fennessy]

No, you make a great point. And I kind of like this exploration of new cinema. Like, there have been movies in the last 10 years unfriended, searching, host, missing screen movies that show. I mean, a lot of people spend a lot of their time on screens. It's not unfamiliar now. It's not inherently cinematic. And in order to do it well, I think searching does it very well. It's hard to do it well, though, and make it compelling for 90 minutes. And most of these movies end up being 90 minutes because you only want to look at a screen for so long. The weird thing about it is Chris Pratt being trapped in a chair is almost like an active metaphor for how you feel watching the movie. And that's not a good feeling. You don't want to have to reflect on that. Like, he's literally strapped in.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Barefoot.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. Why? I don't know. I don't know. Why can't the man have shoes?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Spoiler alert. When they release him, and then he's, like, running through the bowels of the fake justice center.

[Sean Fennessy]

I guess the idea is, like, barefoot. Maybe they didn't want him to hang himself in his cell with his shoelaces slip on. I agree. I agree. Just put on some slippers. I don't know.

[Amanda Dobbins]

So is this a TSA thing? Like, he's just got liquids in there. What's going on? I mean, there are a lot of specific choices that are hilarious because the.

[Sean Fennessy]

Movie is not, like, searching or unfriended, where kind of like being on the computer is the point of the movie that, like, you need to be on the computer to solve the crime. This is a movie where there is a lot of action, but that action is portrayed during searches or during chase sequences on grainy drone cameras or on cell phone cameras. So even though the movie has a reported $60 million budget, it kind of looks like shit on purpose.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Like, it just looks like it was shot with a phone. A really nice phone, maybe, but you're kind of flashing these series of screens. It's like the opening three minutes of a Mission Impossible movie for 96 minutes. That's not a movie. Like, that's not a good idea for a movie. It's not a good. There's a specific chase sequence where a truck is racing through Los Angeles that if it were Michael Bay, it would be the coolest sequence of the year. For action filmmaking in this movie, you're like, we're watching it on tv, like, we're using.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And they, you know, and they are folding in, like, the local. Local news and, you know, surveillance footage and all sorts of stuff. I was like, if this is a clever way to make inexpensive footage usable, then I guess, you know, if you. And. Or. Or AI footage or, you know, computer generated non AI footage, like, fine. But it does seem like they tried to film some of it, shot it practically. Practically, and then made it look bad. And also, like, you can just, like, you can see the truck breaking sometimes. Like, it's. It's really. We don't have our A team stunt.

[Sean Fennessy]

Drivers on this, so this movie is a mess.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, it's really not very good.

[Sean Fennessy]

I want to talk about Chris Pratt.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

We're going to talk about Rachel McAdams later. And I feel that they hold a somewhat similar arc, even though their experiences have been radically different, which is that 15 years ago, you might have said, really, two of the most exciting early 30s performers that we have. Chris Pratt, probably best known for launching out of Parks and Recreation. He played Andy where he was incredibly funny and charming on that show. I love that show. And he has spent almost the entirety of his career as a movie star not doing what I thought he was going to do. What I thought he was going to do was he was going to take gigs as B minus Harrison Ford, as Star Lord in the Guardians movies, as the dinosaur tamer in Jurassic World, and use those to then make more interesting things. Right. Most movie stars in the last 20 years have used their kind of franchise power and wealth to then fund slightly more interesting projects.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Can I ask you, what was it about Chris Pratt that made you think that he would be doing more interesting things?

[Sean Fennessy]

I'll tell you. I'll tell you exactly what it was. One, he's married to Anna Faris.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

And I was like, they're cool. That was just a cool couple. She's great. She's really funny. Two, he was on a sitcom that was run by Mike Schur, starring Amy Poehler.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Seems like a cool guy. He had great chemistry with Aubrey Plaza. That show was good.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I completely agree. But that's what we had. And then he starts doing.

[Sean Fennessy]

Sure. I'll tell you what, I mean, Guardians of the Galaxy is good. You can't tell me otherwise. And he's good at star. So, like, that was enough for me to be like, okay, he got. He got jacked. He wants to be an action star. I get it. These are Good choices. Star Lord, especially, that was a really good choice. He's a good fit for James Gunn's writing style. And so I think it was reasonable to assume, like, he. He's about to have kind of an interesting career. He actually, like, only now wants to be like Jason Statham, minus the martial arts. Like, he's like, I hold a gun. I'm really angry in everything I do. Or solemn, and the world is in a lot of trouble, and only I can save it. That's such a boring Persona for a star. And I think he's been very successful. And I know there's been a lot of reporting about, you know, he's a person of faith, and he's.

[Amanda Dobbins]

It seems like Keanu Faris divorced. He's married to Schwarzenegger.

[Sean Fennessy]

I know a lot has changed in his personal life. I'm not really denigrating that. Like, you could. You could still make good movies. He really just doesn't make any good movies. And then, as you pointed out, the only other thing he does, he's Garfield.

[Amanda Dobbins]

He's Super Mario.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes. He voices cartoon characters, which is fine. That's also something a lot of actors do. But it's not interesting.

[Amanda Dobbins]

No.

[Sean Fennessy]

And he doesn't do anything interesting. Now, I know CR loves a terminal list. Haven't seen it. It's another Amazon series in which he's a guy holding a gun. I think he's in the CIA in that series. Not totally sure. Do you have a terminal list?

[Amanda Dobbins]

So that's a list of people who I'm gonna kill?

[Sean Fennessy]

I don't know. I think so. Oh, interesting. Now that's a good episode. Now there we were, trying to figure out what we're gonna do next Friday. Yeah, next Friday. The deadest release day. And we're like. I'm not totally sure what our episode should be, but maybe it's Amanda's terminal list. Do you just list the 10 people you intend to kill before you die?

[Amanda Dobbins]

It does exist in the back of my head in one way or another.

[Sean Fennessy]

Am I on the list?

[Amanda Dobbins]

He's a Navy seal. No, you're a Navy seal. You're. For now.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay, for now.

[Amanda Dobbins]

The thing about the terminal list is that the names are fixed, but the number of people aren't. So once you get on, you can't get off.

[Sean Fennessy]

Can't get off.

[Amanda Dobbins]

But anyone can be added on.

[Sean Fennessy]

You've reminded me of one of the most wonderful scenes in Billy Madison, which is when Billy Madison is going through school again. He's reflecting on his time as maybe a Bully when he was a younger person, and he calls up someone he bullied, played by Steve Buscemi, and he apologizes for the way that he acted, and Buscemi accepts his apology. And then as soon as they hang up, Buscemi pulls out a list of names, and he crosses Billy Madison off the list. So.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, I would never do that.

[Sean Fennessy]

You would never do that.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Once you're on, you're on for life.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah, I. I really thought I was a really a. Yeah. A vengeful person with a long memory. But you. You put me to shame. No, I.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Like, out of everyone, you know, including, like, our bosses, I think I probably am.

[Sean Fennessy]

You're near the top.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. You're near the top.

[Sean Fennessy]

That's really interesting. There's no forgiveness.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, I just. Because I can't. I can't be carrying around, like, all the stuff, you know? At some point, I just need to put it in a box. Like, you're dead. You're done, and it's over. And now I can just go live my life. And we're not gonna reopen this. Like, I don't need apologies. I don't need whatever.

[Sean Fennessy]

Your inability to forgive, one of the most fascinating things about you. It's honestly remarkable. It deserves more study. But we don't have time for that right now. Rebecca Ferguson. I'm sorry, my queen, but we gotta call you out on this. This is no bueno.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I was thinking about, like, what it.

[Sean Fennessy]

Could have funded, you know, a chalet somewhere. Somewhere nice.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I hope so. I mean, it's definitely more than kitchen renovation at this point, but. And I am sympathetic to the fact that they killed her off in Mission Impossible, so that paycheck is gone. House of Dynamite didn't really come through with the awards bump that she was looking for. You do wonder whether it was a world where they thought, okay, we'll do, like, House of Dynamite for prestige and mercy for, I thought she was wonderful.

[Sean Fennessy]

Jesse, play with the bride.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, exactly. And then it'll. You know, we'll just, like, have a really big January and February 2026, and. Listen, that doesn't happen. I hope she was paid a lot. I don't think that there's enough that you can be paid.

[Sean Fennessy]

Well, on the one hand, easiest job of all time, right? You. You're purposefully meant to act stiffly. You are just in front of a camera and not with any other humans. And you're playing AI and it probably took you two to three days to shoot the film. Yeah.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I mean, it is glorified glorified voice acting.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes. On the flip side, you're playing AI in a screen movie opposite Chris Pratt that's getting released on January 23rd.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Right. It's not what you want.

[Sean Fennessy]

You should. You should. You got it. You got to know. This is not. This is not good. You know, I love her. Obviously, most people I know love her. She's got a big year coming up here. She's in the Peaky Blinders movie. She's in Dune Part three, of course. And she's in a movie called the Magic Faraway Tree, which is not a book I'm familiar with, but a fantasy adventure book written by Ben Gregor. Hope she's happy. Hope she's doing well.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. Dune Part three.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. She's Lady Jessica. She's like Lisa and El Ghai.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

No, no, no.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I know.

[Sean Fennessy]

She's been on the series Silo, which I've never seen on Apple.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Silo's ad on the Apple TV home screen made my son burst into tears and then run into the other room and then say, why is that man doing that?

[Sean Fennessy]

So interesting.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. We won't be watching it.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay.

[Amanda Dobbins]

You think they're paying her?

[Sean Fennessy]

Apple's paying her very handsomely, I would assume. Yeah. So she's doing fine. This movie's not acceptable to me. It was number one at the box office last weekend. Almost certainly will not be this coming weekend.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, no.

[Sean Fennessy]

Feels like it'll be on Amazon pretty quickly, which is where it belongs. It actually felt like a streaming movie. You know, it didn't feel. Even though it has Chris Pratt, it just felt like a streaming movie. And usually the opposite. I feel the opposite where I'm watching a streaming movie, and I'm like, why is this not in theaters? This makes no sense.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

This was one where I was like, I'm in a theater with two other people on a Tuesday night.

[Amanda Dobbins]

The screen. On the screen. On the screen of it all probably will look less bad and more.

[Sean Fennessy]

Well, it's just.

[Amanda Dobbins]

It's more in its native environment.

[Sean Fennessy]

It'll work fine on television.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

You don't really need to show out to support this one. Sometimes it's good to have just, like, an absolute dead fish.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Like, sometimes just to be like, do not do this when you're making a movie.

[Amanda Dobbins]

They really didn't think through. I thought that this was pretty insulting to the recovery community as well as the unhoused people of Los Angeles. They bring in all of these hot button issues. The script's awful, and, like, it's not even a good, like, Mystery. You know, there's the case.

[Sean Fennessy]

Like, it's insensitive to somebody going through aa. It's insensitive to somebody having a difficulty in their marriage.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Like, it's like.

[Sean Fennessy]

It's a really weird. The whole thing is just kind of a mess.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And it's like. It's like, would it be a good Law and Order episode? Yeah, it's really. And. And also, it seems, I guess the point is that AI is, like, really bad at solving crimes, but it's very easy detective work.

[Sean Fennessy]

I had one. It's not a nit to pick. It's just something that jumped out to me. So in the film, Chris Pratt's wife, who's played by Annabelle Wallace, is having an affair, and she's communicating with the person she's having an affair with via a burner phone that is not connected to the municipal cloud.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Right.

[Sean Fennessy]

Is that, like, easy to acquire a phone like that? If it is, why wouldn't anybody, everybody just get those phones? Why would you want to be connected?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I mean, this is what I'm saying to everyone all the time. Don't upload your material to the cloud. I agree.

[Sean Fennessy]

So you're only using burners?

[Amanda Dobbins]

No. Though I did realize when I was watching the rip, in my mind, burners are still flip flop, flip phones. Like, it had never occurred to me that you could just get, like, a burner iPhone, you know?

[Sean Fennessy]

So now you will?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I guess I will.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay, good to know.

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, I have two more nitpicks.

[Sean Fennessy]

Great.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, so what's up with this, like, hovercraft, like, single motorcycle situation that the. Are we using those? Is that.

[Sean Fennessy]

I think this is supposed to be near future.

[Amanda Dobbins]

What is it? I was like, what is going on? So it was a floating jet ski that the cops are on.

[Sean Fennessy]

Pretty cool.

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, that looked really silly.

[Sean Fennessy]

You don't want one of those?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I thought that I would have been embarrassed if I were.

[Sean Fennessy]

I stand on hovering exactly where I stood when Back to the Future 2 came out, which is, give it to me now. I want it. I want to use it. I want it in my life. It seems obvious that, like, a technology we should be able to conquer.

[Amanda Dobbins]

It is like, if they made Vespas ugly and then they could float like it. There is no way that you could ever pull that off.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And, like, I try not to step in and be like, no, no, that's not a good look for you. Do what makes you happy.

[Sean Fennessy]

Blah, blah, blah. You don't do that.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, you wouldn't believe, but I don't Think I'm good conscience? You go on the floating Vespa like you? That just doesn't work for you.

[Sean Fennessy]

You're referring to me personally?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Well, what if I had it souped up? Like, what if I got exhibit to come in and pimp my ride? Like, that would be. That would be interesting. You know, get some flames on the side or get like a no Cadillac, Elvis style.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Here's the number.

[Sean Fennessy]

What about me floating in a purple Cadillac with no wheels? Who says no to that?

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, no, no.

[Sean Fennessy]

I've been watching a lot of Star wars movies lately, and they're all in speeders with no wheels. Those speeders fucking rock. They're just flat underneath.

[Amanda Dobbins]

So my issue is a little bit with, like, the Jet Ski motorcycle quality of it.

[Sean Fennessy]

You don't want handles?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, no handles. Nothing astride.

[Sean Fennessy]

How does the wheel situation work when you don't have wheels on your car, where you have a steering wheel and it just shifts you in directions?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I don't know. That seems like an airplane question. Maybe that's what it does.

[Sean Fennessy]

Oh, interesting. You don't know. Yeah, well, it doesn't exist. You don't know.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay, here's the other thing I want to bring up.

[Sean Fennessy]

This is vital information. This is an important conversation.

[Amanda Dobbins]

You know what? If they had explored this in the movie, maybe it would have held their attention more. The other thing is that. So the. The man with whom Annabelle Wallace's character is having an affair.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Is like the chef de cuisine at the Lows Hollywood.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And then is, like, assaulted at the Lowe's Hollywood. And there is a clima. There is like a dramatic battle between the woman on the motor on the floating Jet ski and she lands the jet ski on the Lows Hollywood helicopter pad, and then they fight on the rooftop. And I just want to say that's a really big look for the Lows Hollywood. And congratulations.

[Sean Fennessy]

Have you been there?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, I have.

[Sean Fennessy]

I haven't been there.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I mean, it's like a giant hotel right next to the mall where they have the Oscars.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

I would not recommend Mercy.

[Amanda Dobbins]

No.

[Sponsor Announcer]

This episode is brought to you by 20th Century Studios. Send help from the twisted mind of Sam Raimi, director of the Evil Dead and Drag Me to hell starring Rachel McAdams and Dylan O'.

[Sean Fennessy]

Brien.

[Sponsor Announcer]

I like both of them. Comes a new film that begs the question, what would you do if you were stuck on an island with your terrible boss in paradise? HR can't hear you scream. Now playing only in theaters and 3D.

[Amanda Dobbins]

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[Sponsor Announcer]

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[Sean Fennessy]

Would you like to speak about Send Help?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yes.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay, so I want to make a quick note about this, a kind of when we first started doing this show together, I don't think I would have asked you to be on the Send Help episode. I think I would have said, you know what, it's probably going to be a little gross. You're not going to be that into it, right? You probably. I wouldn't have imagined you would have been in to drag me to hell, but in the almost 10 years that we've been going to see movies together, you have been evolving. I want to tip my cap.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Sure thing.

[Sean Fennessy]

When I saw the trailer for this movie, I was like, this would be fun to do with Amanda. That was my reaction. Despite knowing what Sam Raimi likes to do in his movies.

[Amanda Dobbins]

But the Rachel McAdams and the tropical location of it all, but also that.

[Sean Fennessy]

The thriller elements and even some of the horror elements. I know that you're much more up for it feels like now than you were five years ago. Fair to say.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, I think it was. Also, I thought that I was gonna. I thought that all of those things were scary and then I realized that I just am sort of annoyed or disinterested in, but I don't get as freaked out. So now I'm more comfortable just going to this. I didn't. I guess this was gross, but I was kind of amused by it.

[Sean Fennessy]

It's useful to talk about around the frame of the film. So this is the new film from Sam Raimi. It's one precious few original movies we've gotten from Raimi, who is plainly one of my favorite directors of all time. Clearly one of the most influential directors of the last 50 years. If you include the Evil Dead films, everything he did with Spider man, all of his genre work in the 90s and 2000s. And it kind of re teams a lot of his longtime collaborators. Bill Pope, the cinematographer, Bob Maroski, the editor, Danny Elfman, the composer. And it does star Rachel McAdams and Dylan O'. Brien and essentially just them. Yes, because the frame of the movie is that McAdams plays Linda Little, who is mistreated by her sexist boss, Bradley, who is played by o', Brien, whose father wanted him to promote her upon handing the company to him. But he advises her to prove herself on a trip to Bangkok for a company merger. And the situation changes when a plane crash during a storm strands them on a deserted island in a desperate fight for survival. And then tensions, of course, between them rise. So what did you think of this movie?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, I turned to you as the lights went down and this film started, and I said, I have no idea what this film is about. Remember?

[Sean Fennessy]

That's great. So you didn't see a trailer, you didn't read anything? You knew nothing?

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, I knew Rachel McAdams was in it because Billboard culture in Los Angeles has at least recognized that putting Rachel McAdams in front of me will get my attention. But that's. And also, I thought she looked very lovely at the Send Help premiere. And the person who came and did our hair for one of the shoots also did her hair for Send Help, so good job, Claire.

[Sean Fennessy]

Oh, right. I forgot about that.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, so. So that's what I'm saying.

[Sean Fennessy]

No one did my hair. For the record, they did your hair.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, that's true. That's right. They were like, seems good.

[Sean Fennessy]

They looked at it, and they were like, oh, you did it. Yeah.

[Amanda Dobbins]

So. But, no, I had no idea. I don't even think I knew that it was gonna become Cast Away or Triangle of Sadness. For a while, I thought it was just kind of like Office Place Vengeance.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Which I was entertained by.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. It starts out as kind of Swimming With Sharks meets Working Girl. Like, that's kind of the frame that it's using. And then it pivots pretty quickly to Cast Away meets A Perfect Getaway. And, man, I just love this movie. This is, like, so in my wheelhouse. This is exactly what I want from a January movie, a February movie, a June movie. The most competent artisans, a fun enough script that gives a filmmaker room to apply a lot of his signature moves. A great and known star who does not have enough Opportunities like this. And a rising star also given an opportunity to show what he can really do. In Dylan o'. Brien, it's so interesting that you can sometimes have more to say about a terrible movie than to say about a really fun and good movie because there's so much to pull apart about Mercy, but there's a lot to kind of dig into a send help to. So with Raimi, here's one of my big takeaways from this movie. And we're going to get a little bit into the plot of it. And so if you don't want it spoiled for you, I would recommend you fast forward about 15 minutes as we talk through the film and then we'll talk about McAdams and underutilized stars. But his movies are almost always pretty mean spirited. Even the movies that have a kind of winning feeling, like the Spider man films where you've got a hero at the center of it, the heroes in quotation marks are often put through really trying circumstances. From Ash in the Evil Dead movies all the way through Alison Loman in Drag Me to Hell. They're very funny, they're very gross and they port. Like in this movie, McAdams plays like a cat lady, right? Like a seemingly a bird lady in her case, but like a single middle aged spinster who likes her TV shows and reads books and thinks she's gonna like break the glass ceiling and tries really hard, but men take advantage of her.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Right, but, and she's also, but she's made ugly. It's not just that she's like well meaning and the world is taking her apart. I, you know, there's a whole bit about tuna fish, but there's like, she's little gross. They, they try as best they can to make Rachel Adams look dowdy, which, you know, even in the moment you're like, no, no, no, no, no, no. Like I, it's very.

[Sean Fennessy]

She's all that.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, I see, I see the way that skirt is fitting. And you know, you can't.

[Sean Fennessy]

You put glasses in a Cardigan on.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Rachel McAdams, you're trying your best, but no, but yeah, sort of like a sad person. And the Dylan o' Brien character feels revulsion. And you're supposed to feel like pity, I think, but you're not supposed to feel like, oh, this is a person I wanna spend all of my time with. Yourself.

[Sean Fennessy]

That's right. And a lot of that is accomplished, I think in some of the filmmaking choices where it's like Raimi is very unafraid to show you Something that is gross. And sometimes that means, like, blood splatter or vomit. And sometimes it just means some tuna fish on the corner of someone's mouth. And how uncomfortable something like that can make it when we're looking at it up close. And he shoots her so up close in those sequences and shout out to her for feeling comfortable seeming quite so gross. The two archetypes of the characters are really broad. Like, this is not a nuanced movie about the complexities of being a woman in the workplace. It's actually kind of almost satirizing that satire. It feels like a very loose riff on something we've seen a bunch of times but before, which is kind of fascinating. And then as the movie goes on, they crash land on this island, and their power dynamic shifts, obviously, because the Dylan o' Brien character is powerless because he becomes injured in the crash.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Right.

[Sean Fennessy]

She saves his life when they've washed ashore, and she goes. She becomes more powerful, and she likes having that power, and she's very comfortable on the island. And this is where the movie really got extremely interesting to me, because Rachel McAdams and Raimi are very comfortable making her increasingly unhinged and kind of ugly in a different way. And the fact that the movie isn't really too worried about, like, who are you rooting for here? Because they both do awful things to each other, I thought was just a great choice. And if the movie had been this sort of, like, pro forma, like, now she has the upper hand, and she will do what needs to be done. And then she gets to go back to work and she gets that promotion, and she is the champion of this movie. That would have been pretty bland. And this movie doesn't take that very obvious route.

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, I mean, it's helped by the Rachel McAdams of it all and that you are rooting for this person so much. And I think the movie itself even veers a little bit towards, like, that, you know, pro woman, like, let's, you know, justice for women who have been treated poorly in a, like, emotional scene where you get a little bit of backstory from her character. And in the wrong hands, that scene is quite bad.

[Sean Fennessy]

Did you think that scene worked, the campfire scene?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I thought Rachel McAdams was so good and, like, played the scene for what it was so honestly that I was willing to go along with it. And they make a smart decision, which is they let the character be all over the place, you know, and that adds to what you're this kind of batty, like, insane quality untamed Is there.

[Sean Fennessy]

Something wrong with her? Can I. Is this a reliable narrator? Effectively.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Exactly. But so because they allow so many different tonal moments in the character, you're able to take that on its. Or I was able to take it on its face rather than taking it as like, okay, so here is the origin story and the trauma of the person that explains why I need to root for her and all these sorts of things. But I think that's really specific to the performance and to what they're using and to what Mick Adams brings to it. And if you don't have that kind of star, it doesn't work in the same way.

[Sean Fennessy]

I agree. And I like that she's presented ultimately as if not likable than someone who deserves love.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

But then by the end of the film you're like, maybe she doesn't, we don't know. And it's like, is this a product of the environment that she has been exposed to or is there something really nasty under the surface and the movie leaving it kind of open to interpretation? And then I think having a fairly unflattering conclusion for everybody is, I just think is a great choice. And it's something that he does in all of his movies. Like in A Simple Plan, he does this. He presents people who are like, ah, these lower middle class people, they find a bag of money. Gosh, you know, anything that they do is justifiable because of the system that people operate under. But then it's like, ah, right, sometimes you make the wrong choice and that fucks you over really bad. And then you make another choice that compounds that and that's your fault. That's not somebody else's fault. That's not the system's fault. That's actually your fault as a person with free will. And he's always getting in the mix of that. In Drag Me to Hell, Alison Lomas's character works at a bank. Nobody's forcing her to work at a bank. She works at a bank. Because she works at the bank, she gets a terrible spell cast against her and she has to suffer an evil fate. I really appreciate that he is willing to go places that a lot of other filmmakers are not. I really appreciate what you said about McAdams, which is like, very few actors that I think could pull off this dynamic of like, is there something wrong with her? And if there is, is it just like a gentle version of something wrong with her versus something a little bit more malevolent or dangerous? And then Dylan o', Brien, similarly, who I think is really a skilled actor. He does get his kind of here's my trauma moment where he explains what's going on. But the movie doesn't let him off the hook just for having that either, which I think is also a good choice, where you might say, oh, well, he gets this scintilla of sympathy, but then they're like, yeah, but he's still kind of a piece of shit. Like, so he knows why he's a piece of shit. But he still is doing awful things and hurting people, which is fascinating. And maybe he's even using his trauma in the right circumstances to engender sympathy from people and then take advantage of them.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I think the nice thing about the movie, with the exception really, of those two short scenes, is that it doesn't spend a lot of time dwelling on the trauma or what the trauma has, you know, has engendered, or do these people deserve love or not? I mean, you can ask yourself all of these questions, but the movie is more interested in attaching you to these people and through, like, kind of a twin. They both have charisma that, like, really sits on the edge. And, you know, it's the Rachel McAdams, Regina George thing where it can be evil or it can be really charming and you can't trust it, but it still works. And so it draws you in and then you just kind of want to see what's gonna happen and who is gonna win. And at the end, there is like a kicker that makes you think a little bit about, like, oh, like, who was I rooting for and what was I? But it's not a morality play. And that's what's interesting about it, is that you can. The text can withstand these questions if you want to ask them, but you really just enjoy the fact, like, how are they going to. How are they going to one up each other and how many times is the movie going to be able to turn it around as well? Which was another thing I appreciated was like, we thought we had gotten to the conclusion, or I thought we had gotten to the conclusion like at least five times. And then it was like, oh, another one. And oh, now the tables have turned yet again.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes, it's pretty effective at doing that. And there's one other idea in the movie that I think is kind of interesting that most movies would never touch. Or the ten foot pole. Although Triangle of Sadness does kind of touch this. And I would say Ruben Osland is a filmmaker who's interested in this idea too, which is that these two people have kind of goals for themselves in terms of what success is, what contentment would be. And for Rachel McAdams, it's a couple things. It's elevation in her career and maybe also getting on the show Survivor. She loves Survivor. One of the reasons why she's so good at surviving on this island is because she has read survival texts and she loves the show Survivor so much show that she wants to go on. Which I was very excited about.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. No, you turned to me several times as I am also not a Survivor person. And you were like, so they always do this on the first episode of Survivor, they build a shelter.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes. You know, which is, you know, I'll tell you, I've seen 48 seasons of Survivor and I would not know how to build a shelter.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I was going to ask, like, so plane crash, you land on an island, like, what would you do? Like, what do you think you could do? I think I have.

[Sean Fennessy]

I have an idea of how to make fire, but I've never tried.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

So I would probably. I would gather the materials.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Can we just cut that out of context? I have an idea of how to.

[Sean Fennessy]

Make fire, but I've never in a tropical setting. Were I to be shipwrecked and or cast on a CBS reality challenge program. I mean, I love Survivor of the show we're about to have. Season 50 is a month away. I would probably gather materials for a shelter and think about how I watched strong people build them in the past.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Would you know to do the palm leaf into the coconut shell as like a water funnel?

[Sean Fennessy]

That was a revelation to me. And that's not something that I see on Survivor. That was not a detail.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I thought that was ingenious.

[Sean Fennessy]

Now, spearfishing is quite common on Survivor. You usually have to win the materials, like you have to win the spear, win the goggles, win the things that.

[Amanda Dobbins]

You know. That is paid off in the film as well.

[Sean Fennessy]

It is. I can't say I think I do well. I'm quite pale.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

I think the sunburn would really kick my ass. And Dylan o' Brien is protected in many ways by the lovely shelter hang space that McAdams character has built. But how do you think you would. Do you know what to do in a survival. You don't know what to do in a survival scenario.

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, not at all. You know, I mean, I live this every day. Right. Which is for the most part, when something breaks, I'm just like, zach, come do this. And it's really not the most empowered woman, second wave thing about me. I do think if he weren't.

[Sean Fennessy]

But the terminal list, that's very first wave.

[Amanda Dobbins]

But, like, sometimes he's out of town and it's like, you know what? I can disable the malfunctioning fire detector if he's not here.

[Sean Fennessy]

Something has just dramatically changed in society in the last 10 years, which is that YouTube happened. And when YouTube happened, fixing things got so much easier.

[Amanda Dobbins]

That's true. So that is true. But I also, like, I do have common sense, and I do think that, like, you know, when things are tough, like, if I'm on the island, I can probably figure out fire. I've seen this movie. I've seen other films.

[Sean Fennessy]

I have watched you pull it together under tough times. But I've also seen you break.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

You're sure you wouldn't break? Under the circumstances?

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, I'd be fine.

[Sean Fennessy]

You're 100% sure? No food for 12 hours. How you doing?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I do that all the time. That's called intermittent fasting.

[Sean Fennessy]

That yogurt that you like, you know, you can't. That's not achievable.

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, I know, but, like, coconut yogurt. I mean, the thing is, is that.

[Sean Fennessy]

I think I'm very bad for your teeth. You gotta be careful. Right. We know that from Castaway.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay. Oh, do we? Oh, that's right. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Sweet.

[Amanda Dobbins]

That is true. Like, a lot of sugar. No, I think, like, I would know to go hide in the shade and not get sunburned. You know? Like, I could figure out the basic things. I don't know how evolved I could. Could get in terms of food supply, building shelter.

[Sean Fennessy]

How would you do with boar hunting?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I thought that was really funny.

[Sean Fennessy]

Hilarious scene.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Not to spoil it.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I know. Then I was also thinking about, like, the, like, 20 to 50 feral pigs or whatever throughout, which is this.

[Sean Fennessy]

Forgot about that good meme. Just to go back to what I was saying before.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

You know, her version of contentment is either going on that show or having success in her career. His version of contentment is marrying a really hot woman and taking over his dad's company and being a successful guy who golfs. Right. Who can relate. I think that. I think it's really funny that Raimi is, like, fuck that. Like, trying to be happy is its own trap. Like, don't even try. Like, nihilism reigns. Like, that's kind of what is in a lot of his books.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I mean, it's certainly in this one.

[Sean Fennessy]

It's just a very funny read. And because it's kind of a rollicking thriller romp no one's gonna be like, let's think about the morality of Send Help. That's not the point. But he does this in so many movies, and I just think it's a really fun signature that he goes to over and over again where, like, there's a slimy zombie ghost in the movie. There's a lot of vomiting all over somebody in a movie. You know, there's poison. There's, like, a gnarly, extravagant set piece. There's a big plane crash.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, it was the cgi. The effects could be a little bit better on that one, but, like, a very funny grace note on it.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes. There's a good gag inside of the crash that is very effective. Anything else on Send Help you want to put your arms around before we pivot to McAdams.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I really filmed Sushi has really keeps making a big impact on me, and I keep thinking a lot about it. Decision to leave, and then now the sushi platters that are used in this film. Stay with me.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes. I was relieved that the reason for the sushi's beauty was clarified by the end of this film because I was mystified and almost taken out of the movie by the beauty of what she presented in the film. McAdams. Yeah, man, she just tight and bright at 47. She just looks great. She's beautiful. She has the exact same charm that kind of. She has a very interesting mixture. She reminds me a lot of 30s kind of screwball comedians where you can't tell if she's the smartest person in the room or the dumbest person in the room. She's usually the smartest, but she has this ability to effect like, oh, oh, whoops, sorry. You know, like, that's kind of her energy in a lot of movies. She's so funny in Game Night kind of doing that. She's very funny in what is the Donald Gleason, Richard Curtis movie. Is It About Time? Is that the name of it?

[Amanda Dobbins]

That sounds right.

[Sean Fennessy]

It's funny.

[Amanda Dobbins]

But also, I wept through that movie.

[Sean Fennessy]

Bit of a sad movie.

[Amanda Dobbins]

It's a very manipulative movie.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. But she's very well utilized in this. They don't do the greatest job of making you think that she's dowdy by any means, but she does get to have a va, va vu moment in the film as well.

[Amanda Dobbins]

That's part of the joke of the movie, right? Like, you're not supposed to watch this at any point and think, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's like a really dowdy person, you know? It's Rachel McAdams in an oversized skirt.

[Sean Fennessy]

I wanted to ask you, what do you think based on letterboxd or her most popular movies?

[Amanda Dobbins]

The Notebook.

[Sean Fennessy]

The Notebook is number two.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay, what's number one? Is it Midnight in Paris?

[Sean Fennessy]

Nope, that's number six.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay, let's see. Come on.

[Sean Fennessy]

You already mentioned it. What's her most popular movie that she's ever made?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I already mean girls.

[Sean Fennessy]

Mean.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Oh, yeah, of course.

[Sean Fennessy]

Mean girls. The Notebook, Midnight in Paris. What are 3, 4, 5, 7, and 8?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay, well, let's see. I'm trying to think. I mean, she's been in so many movies. The movie that I always think from this period, I guess I don't know if About Time is About Time is there.

[Sean Fennessy]

About time is 4.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I doubt the Vow is on there, but I remember the Vow when they were really trying to make Rachel McAdams and Channing Tatum happen at the same time. And I think that's, like, about amnesia.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And I don't. Is it Nicholas Sparks or is it just Nicholas Sparks adjacent?

[Sean Fennessy]

I'll tell you right now, The Vow is 2012, and it does not appear to be Nicholas Sparks.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay. But it's definitely. So she has, like, some sort of.

[Sean Fennessy]

The vow is number 20.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Brain drought.

[Sean Fennessy]

In terms of most probably.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Wow. Okay, let's see. Other Rachel McAdams films.

[Sean Fennessy]

There's two that you will not get, okay?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Because they're, oh, Dr. Strange and Dr. Strange, blah, blah, blah, blah.

[Sean Fennessy]

In the Multiverse of Madness, directed by Sam Raimi.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Sam Raimi. And I know that because when we saw the trailer for Doctor Strange 2, directed by Sam Raimi, she was in flashback, and I said, oh, Rachel McAdams is in these movies to you?

[Sean Fennessy]

You sure did. It's terribly underused in Doctor Strange.

[Amanda Dobbins]

They didn't market it enough to me. Like, I should have known because I would have gone.

[Sean Fennessy]

That was a real, like, you know, you had your star power forward sitting on the bench situation. She just does not get enough to do in those movies.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay? So Game Night, Wedding Crashers both have to be on there.

[Sean Fennessy]

Game Night is on there. Actually, Wedding Crashers, fascinatingly, is number 13.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

Game night is number.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Probably is number eight, because it's not PC. You know, we're older, and so we put.

[Sean Fennessy]

Oh, it's not PC.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Of the garage is not PC.

[Sean Fennessy]

Sorry, sorry. Gen Alpha. Number seven is a movie that I always forget that she's in. It's a Best Picture winner.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay. All right. Best Picture. Oh, Spotlight.

[Sean Fennessy]

Spotlight.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. She's so good in Spotlight.

[Sean Fennessy]

She's Also number nine is Sherlock Holmes. I always forget she's in that. And number 10 is a similar kind of movie to Send Help, which is Red Eye. Also a movie takes place on a plane. Very good movie. Wes Craven movie. She was in Are youe There, God Is Me, Margaret. She was terrific in that as the mother. Like, she's a very, very good and established and working star.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

But we don't think of her that way. I also forgot that she was in Spotlight, and then I looked at her lineup, and I was like, oh, wow. So it's not as though she has gone away entirely, but. And she's. I think she's admired. She was in True Detective Season 3. I want to say she's been a part of big franchises before. She's been superhero movies.

[Amanda Dobbins]

She's been showing up at home. She's not one of the characters. That's the thing.

[Sean Fennessy]

She's not a hero exactly in either of those big franchises. But then I was starting to think about her in the context of her generation. So her generation of actresses, McAdams is 47. Let's say anyone between the ages of, like, roughly 36 to 50 is kind of her generation. Right. For the purposes of this exercise. So you've got her two Mean Girls co stars. Right. You've got Lindsay Lohan and Amanda Seyfried. Amanda Seyfried. I don't know if anybody would have predicted after Mean Girls that she would turn out to be maybe the most visible and the most commercially viable simultaneously. And it was celebrated.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Even though you have not seen Mamma Mia.

[Sean Fennessy]

I have not.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Or Les Miserables.

[Sean Fennessy]

I haven't seen either of them. I don't know if I will.

[Amanda Dobbins]

The singing has been a good venue, like, Avenue for her.

[Sean Fennessy]

I see. You know, they have the same number of Academy Award nominations. McAdamson, Seifer, they both have one for supporting actress.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

And then let's go down the list a little bit. Jessica Biel.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Sure. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

In 07, there was a decent chance she was gonna be a star.

[Amanda Dobbins]

What was that film called? Easy Virtue, where she plays, like, a flapper or something? Roaring 20s. You didn't know about that?

[Sean Fennessy]

That was a fairly recent film, right?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I don't think so. I definitely saw it at the Brooklyn Heights Cinema, 2008.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah, I remember seeing that one.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay. It doesn't work. Despite Colin Firth and Kristin Scott Thomas also being in it.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay, let's keep going through her. The Generation Jessica Alba.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. Well, she makes diapers now.

[Sean Fennessy]

She has a extraordinarily successful Company called Honest. She still acts. I think she was on a Netflix show last year, but definitely doesn't seem to be the main focus of her career. Blake Lively back in the news once again.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I frankly think the text messages are, like, quite respectful.

[Sean Fennessy]

Got it. You stand with Blake Lively. Just so I'm clear.

[Amanda Dobbins]

More so when you're analyzing. And like, I've read them all. I don't know what to say. Like, I'm a. I read everything. Not them all, but everything that was aggregated. I'm not going through court filings.

[Sean Fennessy]

Do you have access to her phone?

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, I don't. I just, I saw what was published and I would much rather get an email or a text from Blake Lively than from Ryan Reynolds. How about that?

[Sean Fennessy]

Is neither an option? Michelle Rodriguez.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Coming off of Girl Fight right before she starts getting involved in the Fast and the Furious movies. Keira Knightley in the Year of Atonement.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Jennifer Hudson. Dreamgirls was 06. Amy Adams. Things have been, we've had a downturn up and down in Amy Adams Industries in the last 10 years. Emily Blunt. Right. Devil Wears Prada. Was it 07 or 08? 2006. 2006. Zoe Deschanel.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yes.

[Sean Fennessy]

Coming off of 500 Days of Summer, pretty new girl. Zoe Saldana.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yes. Who is now the most, like the biggest box office star and an Oscar winner. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

You could make the case that Zoe Saldana is the most successful person from this stretch of people. Although Zoe Kravitz, Catwoman, filmmaker in her own right now. Anne Hathaway.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. Six movies.

[Sean Fennessy]

Huge year for her. Kristen Stewart was on the younger end, but. Right. Leading up to the Twilight Saga and the aftermath of stuff like Panic Room. Katherine Heigl, who might have been the most successful person on this list in 2007. That's true with Knocked Up.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And now she does poise ads, comes for us all.

[Sean Fennessy]

Kristen Bell. Sure. Forgetting Sarah Marshall and coming off Veronica Mars. Paula Patton. Mission Impossible.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Mission Impossible. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

I think it was right around the time of that. Mission impossible. Mission Impossible 3, right.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

ScarJo.

[Amanda Dobbins]

This is before Black Widow. Is that who she was?

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. This is really in the prime of her Woody Allen era. This was match point and scoop. And all those films Emma Stone debuts. Really. In Superbad. Or was it a debut right before Easy A.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Easy A is 2010.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I just learned last night that Easy A and the Town were released on the same day. So that was an important day for me.

[Sean Fennessy]

Wow.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. September 17, 2010, I believe.

[Sean Fennessy]

Oh, that's pretty great. Rashida Jones.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Natalie Portman, who had been around for a while, but age wise, we've just known her since she was 11, but age wise.

[Amanda Dobbins]

But when did she start in the Star wars prequels?

[Sean Fennessy]

1999.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. So she's been working the whole.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. And Naomi Harris, who had also been working for a while, but really kind of starts to pop through here in the mid 2000s. So that's 22 stars. And Rachel McAdams, I think what I'm trying to reveal here as well, many of these people still have careers. Only about three or four of them I would describe as at the center of Hollywood. Right. Like, Anne Hathaway is still at the center of Hollywood. ScarJo, of course. Emma Stone.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I mean, in movies anyway.

[Sean Fennessy]

Zoe Saldana, Emily Blunt, maybe Kristen Bell.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Has moved to tv. She has, I think Emily Blunt, like, Oscar nomination last year. Oppenheimer, gonna be in the Spielberg movie, that Oscar.

[Sean Fennessy]

So five stars. Five stars have truly emerged here. And some of these women have moved on other things. Some won Oscars and then now host talk shows. Jennifer Hudson's career arc from American Idol contestant. I think she finished in third or fifth place in her year and then became an Oscar winner and then was a movie star for a hot minute and now is a lifestyle person. The trajectories are fascinating. It's not totally unusual. There's a lot of history of this in the 70s, 80s, and 90s where the way people are famous changes. Think of Jane Fonda, for example, how she was very different in the 80s than she was in the 70s as a star. But I would argue that some of these people don't necessarily deserve their fates, either that they were, like, misused or misunderstood as talents.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, I mean, we. We organized this episode around the misused stars and Rachel McAdams. But the reality is, is that you could just make a list of, like, 45 women over 40 in Hollywood, and it is everyone. Hollywood still doesn't know what to do with women past a certain age. And we know this, and it's talked about all the time, and every interview that a woman over 40 who acts, gives says, well, then the role's dried up. But, you know, we just made a list of a particular generation, and this is the evidence of people don't really get the opportunities or women don't really get the opportunities unless they become a superhero.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. Keira Knightley is the one who I find most interesting on this list, because it's not like her career is over. Her career is doing fine. She's only 40 years old. She was just in a very popular Netflix movie, the woman in cabin 10 last year. That was not very good, but a lot of people watched it, and they were like, oh, Kierane, I know her. I like her. But, I mean, here's her work. In recent years, she was also the star of Black Doves, the popular Netflix TV show. Before that, she was in Boston Strangler in 2023. Straight to streaming movie we watched, which is fine. She was in a British film called Silent Night. She was in a film called an animated film called Charlotte in 2021. In 2020, she was in a movie called Misbehavior.

[Amanda Dobbins]

She's been having kids. She has young children.

[Sean Fennessy]

She has a family. Yeah, she has a family.

[Amanda Dobbins]

That is part of it as well, is that you don't want to be working as much or it's harder in that moment. But.

[Sean Fennessy]

And I'm not judging that. I think I'm more just pointing out that things don't always turn out the way that you might think.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Like, if you had watched Keira Knightley in the 2010s, you might think this is the new Vanessa Redgrave. Right. Like, she will be inconsistently great work for 50 years, or Charlotte Rampling or, you know, whatever British actress, you know.

[Amanda Dobbins]

With, like, a very elegant, angular face.

[Sean Fennessy]

Right.

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, no, no.

[Sean Fennessy]

But you know what I'm saying? Good taste.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Auteurs love to work with her. She can sell a movie, and things change, things evolve, and everybody's experience is different, but it's kind of fascinating. So it had me thinking about this exercise, which is, you know, very personal and specific, but I wanted to talk about who are the other people who are kind of, like, misused or misunderutilized.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

McAdams not hurting for work, per se, and has a unique set of skills. She's kind of like John Wick, you know, she can, like, she can do a lot of different. She can kill you in a lot of different ways. Not all these actors are like this, but sometimes it's age, and sometimes it's just misidentification. And so, like, the first person that popped into my head when I was doing this was somebody who I mentioned earlier in the episode, which was lakeith Stanfield, who I feel like we did put on one of our 3535 lists a while ago and had had a number of interesting roles in a row, most of which were supporting, but not entirely. And, you know, he was in Judas and the Black Messiah. He was in, obviously on Atlanta. He was In get out, he headlined a couple of movies like the Harder They Fall and the Book of Clarence. That didn't really come off. He was in Haunted Mansion, which didn't really come off. He was the lead in Sorry to Bother your. I know he's going to be in the next Boots Riley movie. I love Boosters, which just got a trailer. But he's not a movie star.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

And I think. I don't totally know why. I think some of it is, like, the parts he picked. Some of it is maybe the way that Hollywood sees him. I don't know what to account for that, but it feels like someone needs to. Someone great needs to come along and be like, I got you. You're going to be at the center of my movie.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Right.

[Sean Fennessy]

And until that happens, he's going to continue to play second lead to Mark Wahlberg and play dirty on Amazon.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Sure. Or, you know, he was supporting in both Roofman and Die My Love this year, which is just a very classic. Like, we like you, but we don't really know what to do with you. So people will be. People who know will be excited when you show up for, like, a couple scenes in this, like, art house. Ish film that we're making and hoping people come to the theaters. And in both cases, they didn't. So that's another tricky thing.

[Sean Fennessy]

The Die My Love part is really weird. Yeah. That's a really weird part of that movie. That is. Maybe we didn't really explore it too much. I don't totally. Was that at all a fantasy?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I think so.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. I think it's just. It's not real. It's in her head.

[Sean Fennessy]

Got it. Okay. Good to know. In Roofman, well, I think he's a.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Person that exists, like, at the farmer's Market.

[Sean Fennessy]

Got it.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

But she's just fantasizing about what could be.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Exactly. Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

Got it. Yeah. I think I want a little more for him. I think I want a slightly better movie. What was the name of the Issa Rae romance that they made together? The Photograph.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Oh, yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Which was, like, kind of interesting and, like, didn't quite get there, but I was like, I'd like to see him try to do some more things like this. He's kind of similar to Rachel McAdams to me in that he's funny and can do comedy, but also, you could believe him in a superhero movie. You could believe him in a serious drama.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay. Who's your number five?

[Amanda Dobbins]

James McAvoy. I think I was looking at, like, the 2007, 2008. It's like atonement. You were speaking of Keira Knightley, and he had it all. I guess he was a superhero. Cause he was an X Men.

[Sean Fennessy]

He was. But he was Professor X. I'm trying.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Not to follow too closely what's happening with the X Men. I'm just letting you share that with me.

[Sean Fennessy]

But I assume he'll be back in.

[Amanda Dobbins]

You think so, but he hasn't been mentioned.

[Sean Fennessy]

Well, we already know Patrick Stewart is going to be in it.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Right. And so I think we're kind of just. We're ignoring James McAvoy, who I think is wonderful. And then he just had, like, his M. Night Shyamalan run.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes. And Speak no Evil, where he's just like.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And I think he's wonderful in Speak no Evil, and I really liked that. And that just, like, kind of came and went. So he's another one where he's like Chris Pratt. He got really swole and was, like, doing. And it seemed like his lane was gonna be weird psychopath action stuff, which is funny and good for him, but he's also capable of emotions. He's very funny. He can sing the Bengals. Let's do more. I'm pro. James McAvoy.

[Sean Fennessy]

What does he have coming? He's got a movie called Control, directed by Robert Schwentke. That.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Oh, no. It's an adaptation of a podcast.

[Sean Fennessy]

Oh, dear.

[Amanda Dobbins]

A man has an implant in his brain which issues him instructions. Julianne Moore is also in this.

[Sean Fennessy]

I mean, slightly worrying. Okay, Slightly worrying. Did you know that he directed a film?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I learned that last night when I was looking at his credits. I'll check it out.

[Sean Fennessy]

James McLaren called California scheming.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Which is a. I guess a story about a Scottish faux American rap pairing called Slibble and Brains.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I don't know about them not being Scottish.

[Sean Fennessy]

Man. This just ended up not really making any impact whatsoever.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, I don't think it's been released.

[Sean Fennessy]

In the US Yeah.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Or in the uk. It's scheduled to be released in the UK in April of this year.

[Sean Fennessy]

I spoke of the Book of Clarence in the Keith Stanfield movie. He plays Pontius Pilate in that movie. He was pretty good in it. Nobody saw the Book of Clarence.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Right. This is my thing.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. No, he's a really good pick. Okay, where do I want to go with number four?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Do this one. Because this. I mean, that's an obvious one.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. Okay, so I want to talk about Angelina Jolie, because Angelina Jolie, for a period of time, was one of the five biggest movie stars in America. Now, she may not have had the raft of box office hits, but she was absolutely. You could put just her on the poster of Wanted or Salt and then that's your movie.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Salt was such a phenomenon. It's also like Lost to Time. But her in that wig, you know.

[Sean Fennessy]

It seemed like it was gonna be something.

[Amanda Dobbins]

We were all there. We were seated first of all, you know, and then everyone like leave shivers in that movie. It's Chiwetel Ejiofor. Right.

[Sean Fennessy]

If I paid you a million dollars, could you tell me who directed Salt?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Oh, I have no, of course not.

[Sean Fennessy]

A very well known filmmaker. Philip Noyce.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Oh, yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

The Australian director who made. Who's made plenty of good movies. Yeah. She played a CIA agent named Evelyn Salt.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Right.

[Sean Fennessy]

Who was accused of being a Russian sleeper agent. God.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Angelina, have you seen Salt?

[Sean Fennessy]

No chance.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Wow. You're missing out.

[Sean Fennessy]

110 million dollar budget. Wild. How did it do at the box office?

[Amanda Dobbins]

It made $300 million.

[Sean Fennessy]

As we say. We used to live in a country.

[Amanda Dobbins]

It was a thing.

[Sean Fennessy]

This film was shot by Robert Elspett and edited by John Gilroy.

[Amanda Dobbins]

August Deal is her husband.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah, great.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Listen, maybe. I'm gonna rewatch Salt tonight.

[Sean Fennessy]

Wow. It's exciting for you.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

As I recall. Not a good film.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I had fun.

[Sean Fennessy]

I'm gonna just go through her most recent. Here's the problem with. So I really. I thought of her immediately when I thought of this exercise. Cause I was like, this is someone who was, when she was on as an actress, was excellent. And also was pretty good at just being a movie star. She was pretty good. She could hold a gun. She could be in a period drama. She could be sexy. She could be dark and weird. She had a lot. She had range, even though.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And you just wanted to look at her.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. Obviously just one of the most striking people on earth. The problem, the reason why I think this is a flawed pick is that I think she does control her own fate. I think she has more agency than the people that we're kind of aiming for here, where she can still get a movie made. Maybe not the same kind of movie that she could have gotten made 15 years ago, but she can still get something made. She was recently in the awards race with Maria last year, which is a movie that I liked and apparently nobody else did. The Pablo Lorraine movie. You know about Maria Callas. She has had a. Gowns, beautiful gowns. Yes. I mean, her film output since 2019 is Maleficent, mistress of Evil, in which she has the titular role.

[Amanda Dobbins]

A legendary podcast by us.

[Sean Fennessy]

Also, very fun movie about a cozier time in which the war between Red State and Blue State seemed more navigable in a Disney property. She was a voice in the One and Only Ivan. She starred in those who Wish Me Dead, the Taylor Sheridan film. You liked it?

[Amanda Dobbins]

The Fire Chaser. She chases fire.

[Sean Fennessy]

Smokejumper.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, Smokejumper. How did they go to the bathroom up there? Still no answers.

[Sean Fennessy]

Well, I feel like they urinate on the fire. Right. Isn't that the whole thing? No, they don't do that. Eternals. Second. Second time Eternals has come up in this pod. And then Maria and then Alice Winicker.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I was so pregnant when we saw that movie.

[Sean Fennessy]

I don't think this Alice Winiker movie, Couture, which premiered at Toronto, has distribution. I don't think it has distribution. I don't even know if it's gonna come out in America.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Oh, dear.

[Sean Fennessy]

So she does have two films coming. One, a Mark Foster comedy called Anxious People that I think is maybe gonna be a black bear movie that stars her and Amylou Wood from the White Lotus and Jason Segel. And then another movie called Sunny, which is a crime thriller starring her and Charlie Plummer and Method Man.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Ah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Which. Okay.

[Amanda Dobbins]

A female gangster who fights to protect her sons and herself from an abusive drug kingpin. Relatable.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah, I'll just. I'll stick Angelina Jolie on there. We don't really know what to do with her.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Don't find.

[Sean Fennessy]

No, I know. It was a good conversation. You know, we got to talk about Salt.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

What's the best Angelina Jolie film? Like, what's the best film she's ever made?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I mean, I really like Mr. And Mrs. Smith.

[Sean Fennessy]

That can't be the answer.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, I just. It's the first thing that came to mind.

[Sean Fennessy]

She just doesn't.

[Amanda Dobbins]

It encapsulates the Angelina Jolie experience. I mean, she's sort of a Clooney as well. I almost put Clooney on my list, and I think that's imperfect, but. And it's like. It's just. He's trying, and it just goes wrong every time, so.

[Sean Fennessy]

I have always loved hackers, and she won an Oscar for Girl Interrupted. Yeah, she's terrific in Gia, the HBO film. I don't know if she won an Emmy or she was nominated for an Emmy for that film, but, like, go down the list.

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, I agree.

[Sean Fennessy]

Listen, zero great films.

[Amanda Dobbins]

There's a reason why I said Mr. And Mrs. Smith and salt was a phenomenon. You Know.

[Sean Fennessy]

Very, very weird career. I mean, a lot of hits. Right. She had Tomb Raider Taking Lives, Sky Captain of the World of Tomorrow. She's pretty good in that. Alexander A Famous Bomb, Foxfire. She's great in that. But what a weird career. It's very strange how often does one of the most famous people in the world make zero good movies. Okay, all right. Who do you got for four?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Julia Roberts. Speaking of the most famous people in the world.

[Sean Fennessy]

And this is misused.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, I don't. Misused. Underused. Some of it is underused because when we made her a hall of fame, a famous episode that was cut short, there's just like a 20. No one thinks that I do a 20 year gap. Right. I mean, and that's not totally true. And she obviously had a huge amount of success in the 90s early in her career and then had kids and wanted to do her own stuff and then pick some projects that didn't pan out. She, like many of her ilk, has had a hard time kind of reheating the career the. The 90s career in like post 2015. But so there's not a lot. And you know, our friend Sam Esmail is definitely in his. Still working with her and using. So.

[Sean Fennessy]

So that is a show and a movie and they have another movie coming.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I don't think that she. I thought she was great in Luca Guadagnino's after the Hunt, even though the. That script does not make sense, among other issues. But we're just not using her enough. It's Julia Roberts. Like, we saw her at the Golden Globes. She walked out on stage and everyone just absolutely stood up and applauded. Like, like, we're not using that is like nuclear power. You know, let's find a way to channel it that's healthy for this earth.

[Sean Fennessy]

How much of it do you think is just that she's like, I'm just doing only what I want to do.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I think that that's part of it. But also I think Julia Roberts has earned the right to do what she wants to do. And then other people got to figure out how to use it.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. I'm trying to think is like, like, does Wes Anderson want to work with Julia Roberts? You know, does Paul Thomas Anderson want to work with Julia Roberts?

[Amanda Dobbins]

I think that would be fun.

[Sean Fennessy]

You know, like, yeah, there's definitely something where she has. And part of it is because, like, with Julia Roberts comes kind of Julia Roberts Industries. Right? Like, she's gonna get a big paycheck. She's like, it becomes her movie. Cause she's such a huge figure in the world. But it would be cool to see her dip back in with kind of like a major event film. Now, Sam's next movie might be really Big Panic Carefully, which was dated for 2027. And I know it has a big scope, so that'll be interesting to see. But she has not done a lot of stuff like that in the last 10 years. Okay. I came up with my next one. Okay, it's Dev Patel.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Oh, this is a good one.

[Sean Fennessy]

Lot of rumors over the years about could he be Bond? Could be great at Bond. Is he the future of a certain kind of Hollywood? He's made some really good movies, but he's another guy who you look at the CV and you're like, okay, Broke out in Slumdog. Best Picture winner. You think it's kind of mapped to the stars. The biggest movie he's in after that is Chappie from 2008 to 2015. He's in the two Best Exotic Marigold Hotel movies.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

He's in M. Night Shyamalan's disastrous the Last Airbender. And then in 2016, he's in lion, which gets nominated for Best Picture, which is one of the most forgotten Best pictures nominees of all time. And makes a couple of good movies. Hotel Mumbai and the Personal History of David Copperfield. And he's in the Green Knight, which I think is fantastic. David Lowry's movie, but that came out during COVID and people don't. Maybe didn't see as many people didn't see that as they should. He does the wonderful story of Henry Sugar. And then he directs himself in Monkey Man. And one of the reasons why he says he's going to direct himself in it is because he's like, nobody will cast me as an action star. And no one has still. And I don't get it. I don't really know what he's got next. And somebody needs to put him in, like, a big mainstream movie that is good.

[Amanda Dobbins]

1,000%.

[Sean Fennessy]

I always find him winning on screen. I think he's really also. I'm always looking for people who are really flexible who can do a lot of different kinds of things as a star.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Funny, endearing.

[Sean Fennessy]

Could be the romantic lead, could be the guy with the gun.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And he was Monkey Man, I think was extended production process and flawed in many ways. But he was so watchable. And watching him run and move, I thought he was a very convincing action star.

[Sean Fennessy]

Agreed.

[Amanda Dobbins]

So, yeah, I don't know. Also, just every time he Comes on screen. My husband is like, that's the most handsome man that ever lived. Which is true, but, you know, let's use it.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah, it's weird. It's weird that he hasn't either found a franchise or found a TV series built around him. Or weird that there's not one thing that is like, where he has some primacy. Anyway, what's your number? 3.

[Amanda Dobbins]

This is a call is coming from inside the house 1, but it's Bradley Cooper, who is one of our great movie stars, one of our great actors, and sometimes one of our great directors. And even when you're watching is this thing on which I think the collective response on this podcast and off was why? Why? And also the way that he casts and portrays himself in that movie is fascinating and sort of baffling. But he's still the funniest, most watchable part. He's taken to doing cameos. Now. You just always like, you start crying like, yes, yes. At the Scream when he shows up on Dungeons and Dragons like two feet tall.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah, I did like that.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And he's great. He's an incredible movie star. You know, the Hangover made hundreds of millions of dollars.

[Sean Fennessy]

That's true.

[Amanda Dobbins]

He's done like, you know, American Sniper, the Plastic Baby. He can survive anything. People love him. And he's just not in movies anymore. And then he's just. He's making stand up comedy stuff. What. What are we doing?

[Sean Fennessy]

What does he have coming next? I feel like he has one big project that is worth putting our arms around that we need to get excited about. He's been.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I mean, I'm excited. I'm always.

[Sean Fennessy]

He's been a main character of this show.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

He's been one of the central preoccupations.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I support him. I'm just asking for more.

[Sean Fennessy]

I mean, he's. He's had the Eagles to deal with. Right. That's been a thing. He was Jor El in Superman.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Oh, yeah, I forgot about that.

[Sean Fennessy]

That was good.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

I don't know if he has anything planned. Yeah, I mean, you know, Rocket raccoon. That was good.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Listen, A Star Is Born was great. The mule.

[Sean Fennessy]

That was seven years ago.

[Amanda Dobbins]

We had a fantastic time.

[Sean Fennessy]

Which made $300 million.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Licorice pizza. Like it's Nightmare Alley you love. Like, my guy has it.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. It's been a rocky road since Nightmare Alley, I would say.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, yeah, that's mostly cameos and or films that he is directing and starring in or acting in that we've been a little perplexed By Maestro is like an amazing achievement of directing. I think he's very good in it.

[Sean Fennessy]

I still not a great Leonard Bernstein movie. Right.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Like a little bit of a Y quality to that one as well.

[Sean Fennessy]

But I. Is this thing on which we were very hard on on the show. I understand the intent, which is like, let's pull back, back to basics, you know, a funny character piece so that I can get away from the grandeur of Maestro as a filmmaker and I can do my James L. Brooks movie. Right. Like, that's what he's really trying to do. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I get the intent. I think it was completely misconceived in a couple of ways. And the way the style of the movie I found really off putting. Some people disagreed, but, like, most people just didn't see it. They just didn't. They had no interest. And it wasn't being sold on him. It was being sold on Will Arnett and Laura Dern. I'll be really interested to see if he just takes like a mainstream movie star part, because he now. I mean, it's really. The mule is the last real movie star part he's had, which is in 2018. And. And he's not even the star, he's just the cop.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

And before that, it's the Star is Born. Nightmare Alley is a great performance, but it's a great performance about a demon. Like a possessed gross man. And very little beyond that.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Remember burnt and he has to shuck all the oysters.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. That movie's really bad. Really bad. Such a strange.

[Amanda Dobbins]

This guy survived aloha and joy, you know?

[Sean Fennessy]

Well, sometimes you got to start asking, you know, is it the movies or.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Is it number 16?

[Sean Fennessy]

Number 16. I was there. I was there when that happened. Really lives on, doesn't it? Okay.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Who you got?

[Sean Fennessy]

I really want to do Amy Adams, but I feel like Amy Adams has no one to blame but herself for taking these parts.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I think that that's unfair to Amy Adams, and I'm not usually the person saying that on a podcast, but you gotta take chances.

[Sean Fennessy]

I admire that she is attempting to kind of push herself and do something physically in movies that most people are not willing to do. And I do think it's possible that the comeback will happen. It's possible it happens even this year, because she's going to be in a movie called at the Sea, a Cornell Mondrus movie that could be exciting. Could be an Oscar movie, could be a fall festival movie. Oh, no, actually, it's premiering at Berlin, so we'll Actually know pretty soon what people think of it. Now. This could be the thing that gets her back on track, but. Night. Disenchanted. Dear Evan Hansen, the Woman in the Window Zack Snyder's Justice League Hillbilly Elegy Academy Award Nominated for Vice Justice League Nocturnal Animals hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey.

[Amanda Dobbins]

2016 was a good year.

[Sean Fennessy]

I'm stopping there. That's 10 years.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Nocturnal animals. Come on, have a little fun.

[Sean Fennessy]

I don't get it. I know. There's a little cult for it. I'm coming back with a movie this year.

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, I know. I brought it to the most anticipated. Listen, Jake Gyllenhaal can have a little fun and around and Nocturnal Animals, and everyone's fine with it. But then when Amy Adams is there, people are like, oh, no, you're right.

[Sean Fennessy]

I appreciated that she was trying to do something. I felt it was something she was not quite keeping capable of doing.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, listen, you got to push yourself as an artist.

[Sean Fennessy]

Wow, look at you. I come to bat. I think the woman who you hate, I think.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I don't hate. It's just that.

[Sean Fennessy]

Is she on the terminal list?

[Amanda Dobbins]

She's not on the terminal list, but. Hillbilly Elegy Justice League Woman in the Window. And then I think, dear Evan Hansen, that's the low.

[Sean Fennessy]

That's the. That's. That's the bottom.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I still simply cannot believe that this is a film that exists, let alone a successful musical. I was shocked by what I saw on that screen.

[Sean Fennessy]

You're like, that is a disgusting act.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I cannot believe.

[Sean Fennessy]

Like, it was bad.

[Amanda Dobbins]

It was successful. That was like. That was a hit. I don't know what's going on in the musical world.

[Sean Fennessy]

Not a hit film. I want more for Amy Adams. You know, she also has the Taika Waititi film, Clara and the sun, which apparently is finally coming out this year. I think it was finished in, like, 2023.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I don't really feel good about. That's based on the Ishigura, the Kazura Ishigura novel, right?

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes. And then she apparently has a part in Star Wars. Starfighter.

[Amanda Dobbins]

That's tough. Yeah, you're right. She's doing it to herself a little. I don't know.

[Sean Fennessy]

I want a lot for her now. She's still. Obviously, she's got some juice, you know, she's getting. These are three real movies that. That could be good. Claire in the Sun. I've got my doubts just given Taika Waititi, but we shall see. But Amy Adams is my number two. Who's Your number two.

[Amanda Dobbins]

She's your number two. Oh, wow. I didn't realize you were ahead of me. My number two is Regina hall, you know, which is just let us learn always from Paul Thomas Anderson, who identified the capabilities of Regina hall beyond being the funniest person in any room or on any Golden Globe stage. Never forget Kevin Costner's Sheltering in Place.

[Sean Fennessy]

That was really good.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And, you know, I still remember the speech that she gives at the end of Girls Trip, which isn't. It's the emotional, like, you were all of my friends. She has the ability to pull people in in addition to being so charismatic and so funny, but never gets the opportunity. And PTA did this year, in one battle after another. That performance has kind of fallen to the side in awards season. But she's amazing.

[Sean Fennessy]

It's a very quiet performance. Right? It's him utilizing something different from her that she has a kind of power and a solemnity that is not usually tapped into. And she's in like this. She's gonna be in Scary Movie 6, by the way. She's in several scary movies. Like, she. She's a great comedic performer, but I agree with you that she has something else really cool there. She's gonna be in a Nick Stoler movie that is kind of intriguing. She's the third lead in this Nick Stoler movie called Judgment Day. The premise is a reality television judge is taken hostage on air by a disgruntled man who blames him for his life spiraling into incarceration. That's kind of weird because that's also the premise of Money Monster. The George Fox is not funny. It's not funny. This is gonna be a comedic version of Money Monster. Will Ferrell, Zac Efron, and Regina Hall. Okay, Sounds pretty good.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I'm open.

[Sean Fennessy]

Written and directed by Nicholas Stoller.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay. Number one, Chris Pine.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

I watched a movie on virtual Sundance last night called Carousel, a very kind, thoughtful, emotional drama about two people who dated in high school and then separated from each other and were apart from each other for a long time, and they find each other in middle life. Chris Pine plays a local doctor, and Jenny Slate plays a woman who moves back to her hometown to help her parents with their home as they get into their 70s. A lot of really good actors in this movie. Sam Waterston, Jessica Harper, Jeffrey Demun, Abby Rider Fortson. Who is the young girl in Are youe There? Got it. To meet Margaret. She plays Chris Pine's daughter. He's a single father. I liked it. Didn't love it. A little Sundance Y on the edges in terms of some of its dramatic choices. There's one scene in particular that happens in the middle of the movie between Jenny Slate and Chris Pine. A kind of disagreement over a kitchen counter where it was like Julia Butters, once upon a time in Hollywood. I was like, that's the best acting I've ever seen in my life. Whereas Chris Pine. First of all, the script in that scene is really great. It feels like it's transcribed from a real fight. And I've often had that feeling when I've had fights with my partner where I've been like, I wish we could just write this down and go back and look at it one day later and figure out what we were really trying to say to each other. And he's so good at representing a really bad habit of masculinity when you're in the fight with someone you care about. And at least certainly a bad habit of mine. And I just always liked Chris Pine. I thought he was a very good franchise star. He's a great Captain Kirk. That should have not worked.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And it totally worked.

[Sean Fennessy]

And it totally worked.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Even I liked it.

[Sean Fennessy]

You know, he's quite winning in the Wonder Woman movie.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Oh, my God, he's so great.

[Sean Fennessy]

He's doing Yeoman's work in Dungeons and Dragons. I think that movie's pretty fun. He tried with Jack Ryan. It didn't fit his. He similarly, like a lot of the people that were listening here, has had a pretty weird post like Covid to today run of movies since 2020. He's in Wonder Woman 1984, which everyone hated, but we were mixed on the contractor. All the old knives. Don't worry, darling. Not his fault. But not a great part, right?

[Amanda Dobbins]

He's like the podcast.

[Sean Fennessy]

Dungeons and Dragons Pool man, which he wrote and directed, which doesn't work. He was King Magnifico in Wish, which of course means the world to me, but is reviled by all Disney fans.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Is Wish still hitting in the house?

[Sean Fennessy]

No, it's kind of taking a back seat. We do still have the Asha dress going pretty hard, though.

[Amanda Dobbins]

She will wear purple, right?

[Sean Fennessy]

Because it's purple. Her fave, a film called the Kidnapping of Arabella. Not familiar with this. It's an Italian drama. He's the only American star.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Hold on. I think that. That. But yeah, that is the latest film by Carolina Cavalli, who directed Amanda. I still haven't seen this. It was at Venice in Orizanti and I didn't get to it. I would like to see this. I mean, shout out him. I don't know. That's cool that he's in a. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

So this movie and Carousel, first of all, a male star in his mid-40s choosing to work with female filmmakers. Carousel is also directed by a woman, Rachel Lambert. And that almost never happens. His next movie, I'm putting a red circle around it. Yes, it's called Alpha Gang.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yes.

[Sean Fennessy]

It's directed by the Zellner brothers. They directed Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter. Damsel. A couple things I really like. They made the Sasquatch movie a couple years ago with Jesse Eisenberg. An insane film.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Get to it.

[Sean Fennessy]

Alpha Gang is about humanoid aliens who arrive on Earth seeking to destroy. But they soon find themselves compromised with human emotions. The stars are Cate Blanchett, Dave Batista, Leah Seydoux, Lily Rose Depp, Adria, Arhona Duna bay, Kelvin Harrison Jr. And Chris Pine.

[Amanda Dobbins]

So it's like the most attractive people alive.

[Sean Fennessy]

It's hot. Humanoids Come to Earth. Directed by the guys who made the Sasquatch movie.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay. Why not?

[Sean Fennessy]

I'm paying attention.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

I want great things for Chris Pine.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I do as well. Listen, real ones. New with Princess Diaries, too.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

They did. Look at you, just selling yourself out to Gen Z right now.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Excuse me, I was there.

[Sean Fennessy]

Lame.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Do you know the plot of Princess Diaries?

[Sean Fennessy]

I don't.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay, so in the first, she's a princess.

[Sean Fennessy]

She has a diary. Gohan.

[Amanda Dobbins]

In the first one, you know, she finds out that she's, like, the princess of Genovia. Right.

[Sean Fennessy]

Genovia. Genovia. That's different from Geonosis, from Star Attack of the Clones.

[Amanda Dobbins]

And then. And she's like, inherited, you know, Genovia. And then Julie Andrews has to teach her how to be, like, a proper princess of Genovia. And then in two, she's back in Genovia, but there are some, like, some legal challenges. And I think Chris Prine is like a pretender to the throne of Genovia.

[Sean Fennessy]

Oh, my goodness. And then they speak English in Genovia.

[Amanda Dobbins]

They do.

[Sean Fennessy]

They speak English and what?

[Amanda Dobbins]

And so, you know, they're at war. But also then, of course, they find love. It's. I mean, it's, you know, a classic opposites attract, you know, people, you know, enemies to lovers. Can't be beat.

[Sean Fennessy]

That sounds good.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, it's great. And he's really good. Also. Just my luck with Lindsay Lohan. Like, if you don't understand how formative Chris Pine was in the mid aughts to those of us Watching garbage cinema.

[Sean Fennessy]

I feel like one of garbage women cinema. We're.

[Amanda Dobbins]

We're garbage women. Garbage teens.

[Sean Fennessy]

Garbage Teens.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. That's what it was.

[Sean Fennessy]

Garbage Teens is a good idea for an episode.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Like I said, next week we don't have an episode.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

And I'm thinking, like, should it be like a. A hole filler episode where you're like, what's a hole in your movie watching life that you've never seen?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Right.

[Sean Fennessy]

I've not seen Les Mis. I've not seen Mamma Mia. I've not seen any of the Princess Diaries films.

[Amanda Dobbins]

They're pretty delightful. Anne Hathaway.

[Sean Fennessy]

That's not a movie swap, though, right? It has to be different from the movie swap.

[Amanda Dobbins]

How are you writing so hard for Anne Hathaway and you've never done Princess Diaries?

[Sean Fennessy]

I think there's, like, a teenager in those movies, Right.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I guess she's in high school. Yeah. I'm not really sure where in her education she is in Princess Diaries, too. And I don't know whether she has to, like, defer college.

[Sean Fennessy]

She getting her mfa, but I'm not.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I'm not really sure which in India's education structure.

[Sean Fennessy]

2001. Let's go back to me in 2001. Well, I'm living in the garden apartments at Ithaca College.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

Wow. Let's fucking go. I'm probably. I'm probably eating gas station pizza. 30 pack of Natty Light in the fridge.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

I'm watching the Sixers Lakers NBA finals with my roommate. College roommate. Pants.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Shout out to pants. You know who you are. I am getting drunk pretty frequently.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

Every third weekend I'm driving to Baltimore to go see Eileen.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. This I've heard about.

[Sean Fennessy]

I'm going to a lot of movies. This is, of course, the fateful year of kill.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Bill, what kind of car were you driving back and forth to Baltimore?

[Sean Fennessy]

Thank you for asking. In high school, I drove a 1980 Buick Regal.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

I've told this story before, I think, which was a brutal car that I inherited. Really old car.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

We in my high school yearbook made a mini music video that feature the car prominently.

[Amanda Dobbins]

So then you just.

[Sean Fennessy]

It was set to the sounds of Black Rob's. Whoa.

[Amanda Dobbins]

But in your yearbook.

[Sean Fennessy]

In the video yearbook.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Oh, you had a video yearbook in 2001. Wow.

[Sean Fennessy]

You might be surprised. I posted video.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Wow.

[Sean Fennessy]

Well, we had a regular yearbook, too.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay. So I drove a Buick Regal. Deep. Didn't make it past senior year. I then inherited a 1993 Mercury Grand Marquis from my mom. 1993, maybe 1990. Another old car died freshman year. Oh, no. Then I somehow, like, gained control of Eileen's 1994. I think it was a Saturn S1.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessy]

It was a black Saturn, all right. And I was driving it through snowy Ithaca.

[Amanda Dobbins]

But were you on the insurance?

[Sean Fennessy]

No. Oh, definitely not on the insurance.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Eileen allowed that.

[Sean Fennessy]

Well, really, Eileen's dad, it was really his car.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Wow.

[Sean Fennessy]

These were some bum ass cars that I drove. And so, yeah, I was driving down there to do that. So my point being, let's just like put it there.

[Amanda Dobbins]

So you weren't there. You weren't there.

[Sean Fennessy]

But listen, Princess Diaries comes out.

[Amanda Dobbins]

You claim to be committed to the history of cinema. And I just have to tell you that the Princess Diaries and Princess Diaries too, featuring Anne Hathaway, Julie Andrews and Chris Pine, are formative.

[Sean Fennessy]

It appears Mandy Moore is in this film.

[Amanda Dobbins]

She is?

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Oh, she's. Is she like this stepsister or something? Is she like trying to. Jack, come on.

[Sean Fennessy]

I'm gonna say I like how you're looking at me as if I have the answer. Sandra O. Is in the film.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Wow. Okay. I guess. Yeah, of course. I need to. I need to re. Watch these anyway. Princess Diaries too. Check it out. He was great in it.

[Sean Fennessy]

Did you do your number one yet?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Just my luck. Not that good. No, my number one is Kirsten Dunst. Cast Kirsten Dunst.

[Sean Fennessy]

She's doing great stuff recently.

[Amanda Dobbins]

She is.

[Sean Fennessy]

Civil War that rocked power. The dog.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Roofman.

[Sean Fennessy]

Roofman, yeah.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Roofman. Yeah. But she's like. She's the girlfriend in Roofman. I mean, it's a. It's a more complex part, but let Kirsten Dunst lead movies. Please go watch. Bring it on.

[Sean Fennessy]

You didn't think her being an accomplished photojournalist who was present for the most critical moment in American history was a good enough part?

[Amanda Dobbins]

And also buying a green dress because womanhood is complicated.

[Sean Fennessy]

No, Sometimes you just need to see yourself in a different light. Alex Garland knew she's gonna be in.

[Amanda Dobbins]

The new Ruben Aslan movie.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yes.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I just. I. She is our one true. She is my one true queen. She's so good. She was on two of our 25 for 25 films. She was Melancholia and Marie Antoinette. Listen, she can do art house, but we also know that she can do big budget. So let her be a movie star. Let Kiersten Dunst Cook, who's a director.

[Sean Fennessy]

You'D like to see her work with.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I mean, she would be great with pta.

[Sean Fennessy]

Did you see some of her, like, Shade posting I loved it.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I was. I was not gonna bring it up, but yeah, she was just retweeting on the day of the Oscars some very. Or re. Instagramming, I should say some Instagram reels and other content.

[Sean Fennessy]

Well, she was. She was. She was taking some shots of Timmy.

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, the Instagram reel in question took shots at Timothee Chalamet. And it just said that what Jesse Plemons did in Begonia was more complex than what Timothee Chalamet did in Marty Supreme Court.

[Sean Fennessy]

Didn't she also use the phrase this is top level in one of the captions, which is what he was saying about his performance?

[Amanda Dobbins]

Oh, I thought that she. I mean, I follow her on Instagram, so I just watched her.

[Sean Fennessy]

You would like this. I'm not saying you wouldn't like this. I know it's. I know. To be torn between Timmy and Kirsten Dunst. What will you ever do? But I do think she was taking some shots.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, that's fine. I think she's pissed off.

[Sean Fennessy]

She's famously a very dedicated Oscar voter. She watches all the films. She's spoken of this. Maybe watch fewer films, make more.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Why are you talking? Talk to everybody else. Maybe cast her in things.

[Sean Fennessy]

Let's get Alex Garland didn't seem to.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Have a problem with her Sophia project going again.

[Sean Fennessy]

That seems like a good idea.

[Amanda Dobbins]

They rumored that they was working on something.

[Sean Fennessy]

They've made three films together.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Virgin Suicides, Marie Antoinette and the Beguiled. Yes.

[Sean Fennessy]

Interesting.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Beguiled. Rewatchables.

[Amanda Dobbins]

You already made that joke on top 50 rewatchables. It was really good. Not as good as number 16, limitless, but really good.

[Sean Fennessy]

That wasn't a joke. Okay. That's our list. This was a fun exercise.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessy]

Hollywood. Hollywood's fucking up.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I like movie stars.

[Sean Fennessy]

You have a couple on your. On your list that I think are good, though. I really like Andy Samberg. I feel like Andy Samberg doesn't have.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Well, really, all of the SNL guys of that generation, like Jason Sudeikis is another one where he's pretty good. And I guess he's making Ted Lasso.

[Sean Fennessy]

Yeah. And I understand that that's a cash cow.

[Amanda Dobbins]

He is good, but all those guys were, like, very likable and very good in movies. I also put Javier Bardem on here because he was so good at F1. And I was like, why don't we do this more? Just, like, put him in a suit that fits.

[Sean Fennessy]

Did you see I got to use the F1 GIF when the Mets made A trade.

[Amanda Dobbins]

No, I didn't.

[Sean Fennessy]

I did get to use it.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Congratulations.

[Sean Fennessy]

And I think he literally says in that scene, when they win the race, he's like, I can't believe it.

[Amanda Dobbins]

This is like. But it works. This man has an Oscar, and he can wear a suit. Let's make it happen.

[Sean Fennessy]

Well, that does it for another very special episode of this show. Once again, we figured out Hollywood. We've solved it. We've given people all the information that they need to do a good job. Next week is what I would describe as the darkest corridor of the year in Hollywood. The award shit takes a pause. The new movies are not really coming out.

[Amanda Dobbins]

That's right.

[Sean Fennessy]

We gotta get a little creative. We have a couple new things to discuss. So originally, we were gonna talk about the moment, the new Charli XCX movie, which is coming out in limited release that premiered at Sundance. I think we'll talk about it on Tuesday now, right?

[Amanda Dobbins]

You were gonna talk about it today.

[Sean Fennessy]

We were gonna talk about it on.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Tuesday, and now we're gonna talk about it on Tuesday. I thought you were telling me that we aren't gonna talk about it on Tuesday. And I was like, no, Charlie, I'm ready.

[Sean Fennessy]

No. You will be muzzled, and you'll never be able to speak of it. No, we'll talk about it on Tuesday.

[Amanda Dobbins]

If you're able, go see it.

[Sean Fennessy]

I'm gonna end up seeing 30 Sundance movies.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Are you serious?

[Sean Fennessy]

I've already seen 10.

[Amanda Dobbins]

So what is wrong with you?

[Sean Fennessy]

I'm doing the work. I do the work.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I mean, you do, but.

[Sean Fennessy]

So we'll talk about that. I'll just tell movie titles to you. Let us not forget Train Dreams.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah, no, you were right.

[Sean Fennessy]

Was able to bulletproof.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Maybe we can. We can workshop your pitches, and you're in real time on the podcast, and I can tell you that makes me want to see it or that doesn't make me want to see.

[Sean Fennessy]

I got to tell you, that thing that you just subscribed. One, is already my job. Two, I'm pretty good at it.

[Amanda Dobbins]

So I have given you consistent, direct feedback that your sale of Train Dreams did not effectively communicate the power of Train Dreams.

[Sean Fennessy]

The Academy says otherwise. They say, thank you for sharing that film with us, Sean, and we are going to nominate it for best Picture. I want to spend a little time on people we meet on vacation, which is probably among the most watched movies of 2026 so far.

[Amanda Dobbins]

I mean, I will talk about it forever.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay. I don't know if you have four hours of a Mel Brooks documentary in you. But I do want to mention I really like it. I think it's very good. Judd Apatow directed a new HBO documentary about Mel Brooks, who is turning 100 years old this year. And maybe some other stuff. Some news will come out.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Yeah. For Monday.

[Sean Fennessy]

For Monday. And then we gotta come up with next Friday.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Right. So we might be brainstorming topic ideas.

[Sean Fennessy]

Live on the show.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Live.

[Sean Fennessy]

And then roulette wheel with the listeners. They get to choose what episode we do, which we've never done before, but I think would be fun.

[Amanda Dobbins]

Let's give it a go.

[Sean Fennessy]

Okay. Thanks to our producer, Jack Sanders, for all of his work on this episode. Thanks to the listeners at home. We'll see you soon.