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- [00:00]
A
This episode is brought to you by Amazon Prime. Like an action blockbuster, the holidays move quick. But with prime fast, free delivery means those last minute gifts arrive right when you need them. Last year, while watching Singin in the Rain with my son, I realized a pair of tap shoes would be a perfect Christmas gift. And I had them under the tree for him on Christmas day. Prime's fast shipping is always there for you during the holidays. Especially when it's last minute and just can't wait. Last minute holiday magic. It's on Prime. Head to Amazon.comprime to shop now.
- [00:44]
B
I'm Sean Fennessy.
- [00:45]
A
I'm Amanda Daven.
- [00:45]
B
And this is the Big Picture, a conversation show about the best movies of 2025. Chris Ryan is here. Adam Neyman will join us shortly to talk about the year in film. And we will all share our top five favorite movies of the year. But first, so much news has been happening. We had Thanksgiving holiday and then we had a crazy avatar, the Way of Water. Watch along podcast. We did speak of some news. Very little film news. Conversation.
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C
Yogurt news.
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B
Yeah.
- [01:11]
C
Weightlifting news. College football coaching. Carousel.
- [01:14]
A
Yeah.
- [01:14]
B
As always, critically acclaimed conversation among the three of us. Thanks to everyone who participated in that. Let's get into some real news in the world of Hollywood.
- [01:21]
C
Imagine if that was your first pod after reading the Talk of the Town.
- [01:27]
B
I hadn't really thought about that. It's a good point.
- [01:29]
A
The Big Picture.
- [01:30]
B
Whoops.
- [01:32]
A
This episode of the Big Picture is presented by Amazon Prime. You know how in every great holiday movie there's that last minute scramble to make it all come together. From gifts to hosting essentials. Prime's fast shipping is always there for you during the holidays, especially when it's last minute and just can't wait. So if you need fast free delivery that saves the day, it's on Prime. Head to Amazon.comprime to shop now.
- [01:55]
B
Speaking of Hollywood, the latest breaking news in the WBD sale saga. Warner Brothers is for sale. They have accepted bids. We talked about this on our Sentimental Value episode. Kind of a bummer discussion. I'm not sure if this discussion will get much better, but news this morning. Lawyers for Paramount Skydance sent a letter to Warner Brothers Discovery CEO David Zaslav expressing, quote, grave concerns about the alleged unfairness of this process. The attorney suggested the Warner Brothers Discovery board has, quote, unquote, embarked on a myopic process with a predetermined outcome that favors a single bidder. And we were meant to believe that that's Netflix. Thoughts?
- [02:32]
A
We're in hell. I mean, we are like, we are. We're in hell in many levels. The first, that now we are all a party to the legal maneuverings of two studios. Like, every choice that I have made in my life is to not hear about the letter that lawyers for Paramount Skydance sent to lawyers for Warner Brothers discovery. Like, I just, just don't want to be involved. However, I am against my will. On top of that, the letter is going to invite another person into the process who has always been involved, but I don't want to hear from him that being the President of the United States, again, not my fault. And then we're going to have to sell a movie studio to another movie studio or another corporation, which means consolidation, job loss, and more people I don't respect in charge of artistic decisions. So, thumb down.
- [03:29]
B
Okay, now here's the greatest opportunity to zag in the history of podcasting.
- [03:33]
C
As a guy who's thinking about changing his allegiances to Newcastle United. Anyway, I have a lot of time for Petro State wealth.
- [03:40]
B
You know what I mean?
- [03:41]
C
Like, there's a land of opportunity out there.
- [03:45]
B
Okay, so does that mean you're going Big Ellison or Big Netflix?
- [03:49]
A
In some ways, she's always been Big.
- [03:51]
C
Andy and I have talked about this on the Watch.
- [03:54]
B
We're.
- [03:55]
C
We believe in Philadelphia and we believe in Comcast. Universal.
- [03:58]
A
Yeah.
- [03:58]
C
The Xfinity Tower hovers over the Philadelphia skyline. And I pray at the altar of Big Brian. I hope he.
- [04:06]
B
Big Brian Roberts. Yes. The CEO of Comcast. I don't know if anybody knows him as Big Brian.
- [04:13]
A
At the.
- [04:13]
C
At the bars across Philly. We.
- [04:18]
A
Know.
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B
I haven't.
- [04:18]
C
I still think that there is a. A lot of shoes to drop. This is also going to be played out in court in Delaware, which is something I'm parroting, that I read, but does sound unpleasant. I think this is going to take a really long time. And I think to Amanda's point, mentioning old djt, he's going to milk this for as much screen time as he can get.
- [04:37]
B
Yeah. I do think that there's a. A very good possibility that this business is not closed until he's out of office, but. Well, that's just that. Well, okay.
- [04:46]
A
I mean, just another.
- [04:47]
B
That's, again, that's a Ponzi of America.
- [04:52]
Long as you like.
- [04:54]
I think this. This is all unfortunate. Yeah. The whole. This whole story bums me out. And I. I do think we have to talk about it because it is really consequential to what we do.
- [05:04]
C
However, business is going as usual while all this stuff is happening. Like I will say in the world of Hollywood, it just seems like there are shows getting greenlit.
- [05:13]
A
There are you say you got some projects to announce.
- [05:16]
C
So, you know, you guys thought Megatron was buried at sea, but Megatron returns.
- [05:22]
B
But you play Megatron.
- [05:24]
C
No makeup, just like as I'm dressed, imagining I've taken a form you'd find reassuring.
- [05:33]
A
I'm imagining someone tuning into this podcast for the first time when you tried to hold your breath for seven and a half minutes.
- [05:39]
C
Like, Kate went, we really fucked up by not having a tank of water. I just, I. I've been reassured lightly by the swath of HBO renewals, by the swath of announcements of new Warner Brothers movies or whatever. And. And so I'm not putting my head in the sand. I think that this is gonna be very difficult for an already beleaguered industry, but I don't think it's gonna get resolved anytime soon, personally.
- [06:03]
B
You know, out of all of these movie studios, the one that is riding highest right now is Disney. And the reason for that is it has a true juggernaut at the box office right now.
- [06:12]
A
Amazing, amazing segue.
- [06:13]
B
Thank you very much. Zootopia 2, which we have not had a chance to discuss yet on this podcast. It was the big film that opened over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend, and I knew that this movie would do very well. I drafted it in my movie fantasy league. I had a strong feeling like it was going to contend not just for the animated feature Oscar, but that it was going to do very well, box office wise. My daughter having seen it, knowing kids have gotten obsessed with it on Disney over the nine years since the first film. But this movie made $570 million in one weekend, including 220 plus million in China, which is something that happened all the time circa 2018 and now never happens. And guess what? The movie's also good. And I was delighted to go see it with my child. We had a lot of fun.
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A
I'm excited to go see it with my child.
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B
I think we love it.
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A
Zootopia, the original, at least six times, really, on our flights to and from Philadelphia, which once Brian Roberts sorts out Warner Brothers, could he also fix the airlines going from LAX to like, just.
- [07:10]
B
Come on.
- [07:11]
A
It's a major metropolitan city. What a real life.
- [07:13]
C
If you've seen Taylor Sheridan's 1883, you know, travel used to be much more difficult than taking American Airlines direct. But I take it's crazy.
- [07:21]
A
Anyway, Knox watched it over and over again and laughed at the sloth scene every single Time, which is great stuff. So I knew there was some engagement, but I mentioned to you I was curious, like how much he was retaining of this story and what's going on. So I asked him the other night, hey, Knox, what happens in Zootopia? And he had. He said something about the rabbit and someone else have to go on a chase and then someone yells at them and then other things happen, which I thought that was good.
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B
Good start. Yeah, good start. I mean, almost podcast ready.
- [07:52]
A
Identified two characters. This honestly beat my expectations.
- [07:56]
B
Those characters are Judy Hopps, the bunny police officer. First film. A little bit of copy in there. And then also the sort of sly fox character, Nick, who's played by Jason Bateman. Judy is voiced by Jennifer Goodwin of Big Love fame.
- [08:10]
C
Yeah, I haven't seen her in a minute. What's she up to? I mean, I guess playing Judy, the.
- [08:14]
B
Star of the biggest film in America.
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C
If you asked Knox what happens in Marlon Brando's One Eyed Jacks, you would also say the same plot description. Like, could you.
- [08:23]
B
It's a fung. Sure. One of the things about the movie, and this really comes to the fore in the second film, which we're not going to review here because you guys haven't seen it. You'll never see it.
- [08:30]
A
No, I mean, you could come with us.
- [08:32]
B
You might enjoy it with Nox.
- [08:33]
C
Sure.
- [08:35]
B
The movie does something, or the original does something that as far as I could remember, had never really been done before in a proper animated big kids movie with wide release. Which is that it just puts animals in our society and has them run things, you know, live in the world as humans would. There are no humans in the Zootopia movies. So it's just like they all have jobs, they're all part of communities. Well, I was trying to think of another example because in children's book, there are hundreds of children's books that do just this.
- [09:03]
C
Wait is. So Zootopia is the one with the sloth working at the dmv. Oh, I've seen that.
- [09:07]
A
Yeah. Classic.
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B
It's really expensive. The first one's really fun.
- [09:11]
A
You know, I suggested to Sean, like, the Secret Life of Pets. But they're pets and they're living in a world where they're also human. So then they like open the refrigerator.
- [09:19]
B
When the dogs are gone.
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C
All secrets of the nimh.
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B
Secret. The Secret of nimh.
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C
The nimh. Like the mice, right?
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B
Yeah, but they're not like living in society as humans.
- [09:29]
C
Like, don't they have their own society? Are there humans in that movie.
- [09:32]
B
Ice cream Shops in the Secret of nimh.
- [09:34]
A
What's going on in Madagascar?
- [09:36]
B
So Madagascar and the Ice Age films I think are a good comp. But those aren't like societies. They're not like human. They don't wear clothes and go to work. You know, like. That's the thing that I'm saying. Like they're anthropomorphizing.
- [09:49]
A
Someone needs to rewatch Avatar. Okay. And get some lessons about how other people are.
- [09:55]
C
Needs to replenish.
- [09:56]
B
I just. I love stories. I don't know what to say. I think these movies are good. The fast paced jokes. There's a lot of stuff for adults, which is one of the reasons why I think this movie is doing well. You've also got the same thing that we had with the Minions movies where kids who were five when the first movie came out are 14 now. And they're going. Because they're like, I love Zootopia. It's a part of my childhood. So they're showing up. And then there's a lot of kind of like my guy Rango. There's a lot of references to movies and movie history. There are two overt references to the Shining and Silence of the Lambs in Zootopia too.
- [10:27]
A
What are some of the movie references in Ringo?
- [10:31]
C
Sergio Leone.
- [10:32]
B
Right.
- [10:32]
A
Sure.
- [10:33]
B
Spaghetti Westerns. Total recreation of Chinatown. It's a retelling of Chinatown with. With. With a frog Sheriff. Among other. There's lots of movie references in that. These ones are a little more.
- [10:44]
C
And if you've seen Caught by the Tides this year, you know that they. Rango pays it forward by influencing another generation.
- [10:49]
B
Copy the Tides. Actually a Zootopia prequel. I don't know if people know that. They should check that out. Maybe we'll talk more about it. Also, do you know about. So Judy and Nick? The Fox and the Bunny. There's been a lot of shipping of their relationship over the last 10 years. People want them to get together and the film seems to know that. And so it's exploring that idea.
- [11:06]
C
Okay.
- [11:06]
A
Okay.
- [11:07]
B
So you will. You will see it.
- [11:08]
A
A lot of assumptions about Judy and Nick and.
- [11:13]
B
Well, we don't know. Are they. Is it a heteronormative circumstance? Can there be interspecies relations? We don't really know.
- [11:19]
C
Carmi and Sid on the bear. It's just like maybe. But that doesn't really then work for the story.
- [11:23]
B
That's right.
- [11:25]
Well, good luck, Chris. Solo viewing, 10pm IMAX.
- [11:29]
A
Just imagining 11. An 11 year old like logging on to Reddit being like Judy and Nick.
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D
That'S not what they want.
- [11:39]
A
They know how to communicate.
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C
That's not what they're redditing about.
- [11:44]
B
All right, here's the big one.
- [11:46]
A
Yeah.
- [11:47]
B
Originally I was like, I don't know if Chris needs to join us for the news, but I did need you here for this. Leonardo DiCaprio pretty much confirmed to Deadline this week that he is going to be starring in Heat 2. Now, he did not clarify what character he would be playing or what role or even at what stage the film was at other than it was still a long ways away. But he effectively confirmed that he's doing it with Michael Mann. Really interesting, long conversation with Mike Fleming. He talked a lot about his relationship with Michael Mann over the years. They were going to make a James Dean movie together and then they developed John Logan's the Aviator script for a long time and he almost, they almost made it together. Michael Mann walked away. Leo brought it to Martin Scorsese in the aftermath of Gangs of New York.
- [12:28]
So this movie is not only happening, but it is happening with Leo.
- [12:32]
C
I mean, I, I've been trying to keep my reactions like, low key about this.
- [12:37]
A
I have like a, I just have a protective instinct. I'm close to you and I just.
- [12:41]
C
Want kind of like finding out God's real, You know what I mean? Like, I, I, I did, I, I did this on the watch before I read the interview. And then I went and read like every other recorded interview of Leonardo DiCaprio that I could find over the last few years. And he is very careful about when he is like, I am going to be in this movie.
- [13:01]
B
Yes.
- [13:02]
C
You know, sometimes he gets attached to things.
- [13:04]
B
Well, he very rarely talks.
- [13:06]
C
It's crazy. He's gonna be in heat too. Like this movie is going to get made.
- [13:12]
B
Yeah.
- [13:13]
C
Michael Mann.
- [13:14]
A
Yeah.
- [13:14]
C
Who's old and deaf and has like made Ferrari, who I worship like, like a pagan God, is going to make a sequel to my favorite movie ever made with Leonardo DiCaprio. And because of that, probably like the cast of the year, you know, and the names being thrown around, everyone will come out. I am still fairly certain. In my, in my heart of hearts, I think he's playing Neil. I think he's playing the De Niro part. It makes sense. In terms of his long term relationship to De Niro.
- [13:45]
B
Yes.
- [13:46]
C
In terms of just like, even the way he carries himself, the way he looks, the way he dresses when he's like doing press and stuff like that, he feels like, it doesn't feel like he's Cheryl.
- [13:57]
B
He's even really recently had that crisp Neil De Niro goatee going on. So I, you know, I know you like Heat. Yeah. You love Leo.
- [14:06]
A
I love Leo.
- [14:07]
B
What do you make of this again?
- [14:09]
A
I'm here solely for Chris. I want what Chris wants. I feel protective.
- [14:15]
C
The Kilmer casting is the most important thing of all of this, though. I'll just keep.
- [14:18]
B
I don't know what you do. If he's playing the De Niro part. I can't think of a person not only that can match Leo, because the whole story of Heat, obviously, is this union of Pacino and De Niro. The movie exists because of that. So who's Leo's counterpoint?
- [14:33]
C
Well, here's the thing, too, is that is Michael Mann going to be very, like, detailed about, like, wanting these guys to look like younger versions of characters in Heat, or is he going to be like, we're breaking the seal. And if Bradley Cooper is going to play the Val Kilmer part or what?
- [14:50]
A
Or whatever. Yes. Like, yes.
- [14:52]
C
Picking a older man, I think, because I think Bradley Cooper would be older now than Val Kilmer was in Heat. You know, for instance, Austin Butler would probably be a little bit younger than Val Kilmer was in He. So, like, you can just like, let it go and just be like, we're. We're vibing. You know, I picked the best cast, the best actors I could find to capture the essence of the characters rather than be one to one, like. Exactly. That's exactly how old and how he would look.
- [15:19]
B
We never got any clarity on what that. That image of Austin Butler at the shooting range. What was he training for?
- [15:26]
C
Right. That's the. A lot of people are suggesting. That was for Crockett. Sonny Crockett.
- [15:32]
B
Oh, interesting.
- [15:34]
A
Okay.
- [15:34]
B
Well, I wish you well. I'm excited about the film. The other.
- [15:38]
C
I'll see you when it comes out. You know, what if I just.
- [15:40]
B
Are you going into hiding until then?
- [15:44]
You should be a vampire.
- [15:46]
A
Get in your casket for three years every day. It's, you know, day 2000.
- [15:51]
B
Yes.
- [15:52]
A
Yeah, that's really good.
- [15:53]
C
It's like me, but my Wilson Ball is Waingrove.
- [15:58]
I just go to an island until this comes out.
- [16:00]
B
Leo also talked about what happens at night, which it sounds like is the next movie he's going to make, which is his next collaboration with Martin Scorsese starring Jennifer Lawrence. It's an adaptation of a 2021 Peter Cameron novel that I guess Patrick Marber is adapting. It sounds like Apple is going to get behind it, which I Find interesting. Get post Killers of the Flower Moon, not in a negative or positive way. So Leo, when he was on the show, talked about how he had been watching Vertigo because that's what Scorsese had encouraged him to watch for Their Next Thing. This had not been announced when he talked about that. And then Leo also invoked the Shining in Shutter island in the Deadline interview. So that gives you some sense of what kind of a movie this is gonna be.
- [16:39]
You excited?
- [16:40]
A
Yeah, I'm pro. Pro. All these people probably recent work.
- [16:44]
B
Yeah, I'm. I'm. I'm comfortable with it being in second. Second place behind this movie.
- [16:50]
C
Second position.
- [16:50]
B
Yeah.
- [16:51]
A
Who was in the Hawaii movie?
- [16:52]
B
The Rock and Emily Blunt. Yeah.
- [16:54]
A
I think we'll take a break. Yeah, right.
- [16:56]
B
Yeah. Leo, the Rock and Emily Blunt was there.
- [16:58]
C
They did, like, a full.
- [16:59]
B
Like, this is happening.
- [17:01]
C
The great wizard Martin Scorsese has blessed us, and we're gonna make Casino in the Islands. And it was like. I was like, damn, they're gonna make that. But now it seems like it's gone down the pecking order a little bit.
- [17:11]
B
Well, we'll have to wait and see. Let's talk about awards season quickly.
- [17:14]
D
Okay.
- [17:15]
B
A lot has transpired in award season in the last 10 days. So we've gotten. The New York Film Critics Circle, the National Board of Review, and the Gotham Awards have all given out their prizes. A couple of interesting prizes to talk through. First and foremost, one battle after another is steamrolling this season. It has won Best Picture at every single race that we've had.
- [17:35]
A
Yes. Both critics bodies and actual awards.
- [17:40]
B
Yeah. Peers. Yes.
- [17:41]
A
Yeah.
- [17:42]
B
So that's to be expected. You were kind of razzing me a little bit about that.
- [17:48]
C
I was asking. I was like, sincerely asking, how does it feel to be cheering for the 1927 Yankees?
- [17:55]
B
Good. Feels good.
- [17:57]
A
It feels good. And, you know, you don't have any nerves. I don't trust it yet. That's where.
- [18:01]
B
That's where I am. I think that's a healthy attitude.
- [18:03]
A
I think that it's early December, the Oscars are in mid March.
- [18:08]
And a lot can happen. And I don't trust the Academy. I think it's also worth noting that One Battle has won the top prize at every single one of these things. But it was just an accident. The Jafar Banahi movie has also cleaned up as well in international feature, sometimes in director, in screenplay, it is very present.
- [18:27]
B
Yes.
- [18:28]
A
So I would be surprised if it is the film that edges out one battle after another of the Oscars. But I think it's very much in the conversation.
- [18:36]
B
It's very competitive right now. Panahi won best Director at the New York Film Critics Circle. New York Film Critics Circle. Not historically predictive of the Academy Awards, but very persuasive in terms of getting people nominations and getting people to pay more attention to things. And particularly they also spotlit Rose Byrne's performance in if I Had Legs, I'd kick you, which I think is also very relevant to the race. Soon, Panahi, we'll talk about. It was just an accident. Next Monday on the show, I interviewed Panahi. It was amazing to speak to him. I spoke to him before the news came out that he has been once again sentenced to a one year prison sentence when he returns to Iran. So that news, I think also, you know, bubbling to the surface, makes the film feel more urgent. It's a very, very good movie and it's a. It's also a much more conventional movie than you would be led to believe by his previous three or four films. And because of that, I think also a lot of voters will be.
- [19:26]
D
Will.
- [19:27]
B
Will enjoy watching it, for lack of a better phrase. You know, it is a very watchable film. And so sometimes you hear a story about, like a, you know, an artist who's been under the watchful eye of a fascist regime and you expect something that doesn't have the sort of like, thriller conventionality that the movie has.
- [19:42]
C
Just out of curiosity, the new kind of. You have to watch the movies to vote guidelines which are apparent, like, they're not, like, contractual. They're just like, you're highly.
- [19:54]
B
I think they're being virtually like, clocked.
- [19:57]
A
Oh, I imagined it like when we have to do all of the security and harassment training, you know, and you have to like, click through the thing. I think that's a good comp, which, I mean, it's the most annoying thing on earth, but. And also is why I imagine people like, paying other people to sit and screen, you know, whatever movies they don't want to watch.
- [20:16]
C
Right. You can pay me to do that for you.
- [20:18]
A
I also. I would do that. I mean, I'm not voting yet. They have not yet accepted me into the Academy. But if anyone else. Not yet. Yeah. But if anyone else, I'm, you know, historically, I've been so supportive and admiring. I do, like.
- [20:30]
B
And you've donated millions. Yeah, yeah.
- [20:32]
C
And when you're rubbing elbows with CEOs from big studios.
- [20:35]
A
That's right.
- [20:36]
B
Yeah.
- [20:37]
A
So, you know, I'm going to. I'm going to be part of the lawyers branch when I get nominated to the Academy.
- [20:41]
B
So the executives have a branch.
- [20:43]
C
I was just wondering whether or not like, you know, some of the smaller films that are getting acknowledged in the Critics Circle Awards and the Gothams or whatever, once they start getting up to guilds and once they start getting up to, like, more larger precursors, do you think.
- [20:59]
Maybe some more popular films will, like, like, get a boost because they.
- [21:03]
B
Have been seen as. That's happening right now. I think the reviews for Avatar Fire and Ash, the sort of soft social reviews were positive, but a little mixed and wicked for good reviews were very bad.
- [21:15]
C
Yeah.
- [21:15]
B
And so.
- [21:16]
C
But I was surprised by the absence.
- [21:17]
B
Of Sinners at this particular award show.
- [21:21]
C
It just. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [21:22]
B
So, you know, one Mimosaku, I believe, won at the Gothams, which happened before New York Film Critics Circle. Yes, Supporting performance, Sinners did make it to the National Board of review top 10.
- [21:31]
C
Okay.
- [21:33]
B
But sinners has not been acknowledged. And Coogler won Best Original Screenplay from National Board of Review. But we haven't seen a Michael B. Jordan win yet. We haven't seen a Delroy Lindo win yet. We haven't seen a best Director win yet for him. So, you know, in theory, I still think that's a top three movie in the race for sure. But things are changing. You know, Marty supreme screenplay won for New York Film Critics Circle. Wagner Mora won for the Secret Agent, another one of those movies that, like, I think has a very strong chance to get into the 10 right now. So everything's just very unsettled. The one thing that has emerged to be true, and Amanda cited this in the immediate aftermath of one battle, was he started it.
- [22:17]
A
He should have worn a jacket.
- [22:18]
B
Straight up the front runner for supporting actor and is winning in a lot of places. And people just love him. And they love that.
- [22:23]
C
At the expense of Sean Penn.
- [22:24]
B
Right, Sean Penn and Stellan Skarsgrd, which I thought was like, three months ago, I thought that was a lock, and now I don't feel so confident about it. So anyway, a lot is going on. One other thing I wanted to cite about the National Board of review. The film F1 made the list. Now as those blockbusters are falling away, I pitched a month ago. Could F1 get into best Picture?
- [22:44]
I still think it's in play.
- [22:47]
A
Can we just read the entire National Board of Review?
- [22:50]
B
Yes. Let me start by saying that. So they choose their 10 best films of the year.
- [22:55]
C
And the National Board of Review is who?
- [22:57]
B
A curious collection of people who are film admirers you say?
- [22:59]
A
What?
- [23:00]
B
Yeah.
- [23:00]
C
Are you part of it?
- [23:01]
B
I'm not.
- [23:02]
A
And historically they can be slightly more.
- [23:09]
Well, they're both mainstream and slightly more conservative.
- [23:11]
C
Okay.
- [23:11]
B
And also historically more American. They do not specifically, by their rules, exclude international films, but they do not usually include them. Like a couple years ago they did include the Boy and the Heron, which was strange for them to include a movie like that in their top 10. But for the most part, you find a lot of American productions. So their list this year is fire and ash, F1, Frankenstein, J. Kelly, Marty, Supreme Rental Family, Sinners, Train Dreams, Wake Up Dead, Mana, Knives Out Mystery, and Wicked for Good. So first of all, that's 1, 2, 3, 4 Netflix movies.
- [23:42]
A
Yeah.
- [23:43]
B
Two huge blockbusters in Wicked for Good and Fire and Ash, plus F1 as a blockbuster. Then Marty, Supreme Rental Family, Sinners, and then One Battle wins best pick, best film. So it's not on that 10.
- [23:55]
A
So they actually got to pick 11.
- [23:57]
C
Okay. And weapons is not on there.
- [23:59]
B
Weapons is not there. Okay. Does that hurt your feelings?
- [24:04]
C
I love the pageantry of awards, but I don't know that it's gonna. Weapons will live on regardless of its haul.
- [24:12]
B
Wow. Such a full throated support for Zach Kreger. Did you hear he's being scouted deeply by the team at Paramount.
- [24:20]
C
To do what?
- [24:21]
B
To become a part of whatever it is that they're doing there. I read the Josh Goldstein, she's running the film division. Flew to like Bulgaria where he's making Resident Evil to convince him to come be a part of the gang.
- [24:31]
C
Okay.
- [24:32]
A
Yeah, Good to run Warner Brothers.
- [24:35]
Once that's been purchased.
- [24:36]
B
Yeah, somebody's gonna have to do it.
- [24:37]
C
I just want him to make movies.
- [24:38]
B
Yeah, me too. Any other thoughts about what's transpired with awards season the last couple weeks?
- [24:44]
A
Hamnet was not mentioned once in that conversation in anything that you and I just said. It is in limited release right now. We're going to talk about it next week. At the end of next week.
- [24:55]
B
End of next week. Yes. We're going to the schedule that was announced. We're going to switch it up a little bit so that Joanna Robinson can join us in person to talk about Hamnet.
- [25:02]
A
But that is something that we've had at number two on our best picture ranking list for some time. And second guess that no, because I drove by, I mean, I drove by a billboard today for Hamnet that listed every single audience award that it has gotten, which is literally every single, like every film festival, you know, in a lovely area where people go see films they love it. And.
- [25:28]
B
And it's a counterpoint to the other front row. Yeah.
- [25:30]
A
And it's a long four months. And again, it also hasn't really rolled out. Totally.
- [25:35]
C
Yeah.
- [25:35]
B
Hamnet Zootopia 2 double feature for you.
- [25:37]
C
Yeah, that sounds fun.
- [25:39]
B
Okay, well, let's take a quick break and then bring in our friend Adam Neyman.
- [25:49]
Well, as Frank Sinatra once sang, it's the time of year when the world falls in love. Adam. Naming his gears to talk about the best movies of 2025. Adam, hello.
- [26:00]
D
Hey, how you doing?
- [26:01]
B
Could you look at me when we speak, please? I desperately need you to look.
- [26:04]
D
I was looking down. I was looking down at my list. I heard something about. Something about falling in love, and then I looked up and here I am. It's very, you know, stereotypically, it's very cold in Toronto right now. If I were to pan my camera over, you would actually see snow.
- [26:17]
B
Oh, no. Well, don't do that.
- [26:19]
D
So, you know, this is why I. This is why I look a little sad. I got a shovel.
- [26:23]
C
Adam, are you shooting on VistaVision on your end?
- [26:26]
D
No, not, not, not. Not shooting on this division. This is called the first webcam I've ever had. It looks good and it's. And it looks okay, you know, and.
- [26:36]
B
Before we start, Adam and I were.
- [26:37]
A
Talking about child holiday party etiquette before this. So we've, we've wrapped that all up.
- [26:42]
B
You're caught up.
- [26:42]
A
Yeah.
- [26:42]
B
Okay.
- [26:43]
D
And I was, I was, I was going to fake my death to avoid the child holiday party etiquette tonight. But you can only do it once. Yeah. And once you faked your death once, you have to go to the next one, so I think I'll wait.
- [26:54]
B
I wish you well on that, but.
- [26:55]
C
Can'T you just come back and be like, I'm. I'm nadam, you know, like, Like.
- [26:59]
D
Yeah, with a, with a, with a, with a, with a mustache.
- [27:02]
C
And that would also be your opportunity to completely pivot towards, like, AI slop if you wanted to and be like, this new Sora video rocks.
- [27:10]
D
Do you know, do you know how close I am to needing a pivot? Chris? You have no idea. It's coming sometime in the next two years. There's a, there's a pivot coming.
- [27:18]
B
Why not start today when we do our lists?
- [27:20]
D
Don't you think that would be a good bit if I just did a complete pivot away from my actual choices and did choices? Yeah. No. What if I just completely endeared myself to, like, two members of the listenership?
- [27:33]
B
Yeah.
- [27:33]
D
You know, people who are just going to be really mad that something's not there. I'm gonna, I'm gonna do it for, for them. I'm pivoting.
- [27:39]
B
What is the cost of your integrity? That's something we'll get, get to later today.
- [27:45]
I've been selling it for years, so, you know, it has a price, I can assure you. Movies this year, movies. We usually talk when we do these top five lists at the top about whether or not this was a good movie year or not. And, and usually it's a lot of wheel spinning and excuse making, but this is a question that is being actually posed to a lot of people in the world. Paul Thomas Anderson was confronted about this in an interview this week. And he answered, he was like, you know, rumors of movies demise is greatly exaggerated. And then he listed 10 movies and he was like, these movies are great. So Amanda, I'll start with you.
- [28:15]
A
Yeah.
- [28:16]
B
Was this a good movie year?
- [28:19]
A
It's an existential question, right? In the sense of.
- [28:24]
Do you want one five star all time classic masterpiece and then a lot of other really interesting cool movies that I liked a lot.
- [28:32]
B
You can get Minecraft and then a.
- [28:33]
A
Bunch of other stuff, but you've got the one undeniable rocket ship and then another, like some interesting stuff. And like, your mileage may vary on which movies are the interesting movies versus a year where you had three or four four and a half star cinema feels alive masterpieces. And to some extent that's like, how are you parceling out the excitement? Because we had that one shining month of one battle after another and everyone's seeing it and that really was an event and movies felt really alive. And then like, we're gonna talk a lot about a lot of great films on this podcast, but there hasn't really been anything collective since then. So to me, that is fun. That one month was amazing. That was like, we had such a great time and maybe we're gonna get to do a few more months of it. But on the other hand, we've had a lot of Mondays where we're like, huh, interesting.
- [29:30]
B
Yeah. You know the Smashing Machine.
- [29:32]
A
Did anyone see that?
- [29:33]
B
Yeah.
- [29:34]
A
So I think it's like, it's always a good year when you get to go and see interesting work from filmmakers you like. And there were a lot of filmmakers who I, who I love, who released films this year. Was it like good for the, like for movie culture, for, for movies outside of this bubble?
- [29:51]
B
I don't know.
- [29:54]
A
I don't. Maybe not the best that we've had.
- [29:57]
B
Adam, what do you think?
- [29:59]
D
I mean, any year you can have two Osgood Perkins movies.
- [30:04]
Just. I'm not alone.
- [30:07]
What am I here for?
- [30:08]
B
Did you seekeeper?
- [30:09]
D
I did and I actually liked it more than the Monkey. It had some okay, kind of cozy. Cozy? There's so many. Yeah, so many like cozy couples therapy horror movies this year. Like I count at least four and then if you count comic books compound movies, there's like another four.
- [30:26]
B
And then every episode of this show there's so many.
- [30:30]
D
I think it was a good year for the festival hangover movies from 2024 that I personally liked and that people are probably sick of hearing me say that I like because they got theatrically released this year. And then in terms of new releases, I do think that whatever I think of them or whether they end up on a 10 best list, stuff like Eddington and Sinners and one battle after another and even now Marty supreme, they have a kind of galvanizing quality to them. Sometimes I wish other kinds of movies got to have that galvanizing quality or people chose to be galvanized by them rather than these kind of grand statement American culture movies. But it was a kind of heavy artillery trio or quartet of those like some good talking point movies. And then the rest is just for. As with everybody, it's not just subjective, but it's very self directed. I saw less new releases this year than. Than fewer new releases this year than I normally would because I just didn't have to. I saw some for one of my jobs and some for another of my jobs and fun for friends. Like I only went to see Keeper with my friend because she wanted to and it was fun but didn't have to. I think if this had been a year where I had to sit through some of the stuff I've had reported back to me, I would think it was very bad. But because I. I saw less in a kind of self directed way, I'm. I'm okay with it. And I like my top 10 list. It could have been a top 20 list and I didn't feel that way about last year.
- [31:46]
B
That's interesting. What do you think?
- [31:47]
C
I very much agree with Adam in that I'm very happy with my top 10 list, but don't know if I love going to the movies this year as much as I have in years past. I feel like I have experienced and obviously talking from a very privileged bubble of not only living in Los Angeles, but getting to do this show with you guys occasionally and experience film in a Very specific kind of way, but a little bit of a bifurcation in terms of there's like this experience of cinema, especially at the end of the year with like the awards favorites coming out and feeling like a kind of personal responsibility that I want to see a lot of this stuff before we get into next year debating about what was the best and what deserves what award. But for the most part over the course of the year, like I, I went to the movies that I felt like I had a professional obligation to and had a little bit of a hard time getting it up for maybe some of the other blockbuster stuff. Like I really, really, really struggled with Marvel. I really, really struggled with some of the franchise stuff. I may be aged out of a couple of things. That being said, I, I really see a lot of like glimmers of hope right now. Like even if the industry is in freefall in terms of its financials or in terms of the consolidation like we talked about earlier with Warner Brothers, I do feel like I started noticing.
- [33:08]
I started experiencing movies in a way that I hadn't since 2019 and seeing films that seem to reflect life in a way and not be like mitigated by Covid restrictions or strikes or anything like that where kind of brought me back to the place where I'm like, I'm seeing some sort of window through which to look at the world.
- [33:28]
B
I think. Yeah, I agree with everything that all three of you have said. It does feel like we are in a very transitional state for both the business and if not the art form, what is getting made. And so those franchises that you talked about, most of the major ones, Marvel, Jurassic, Mission Impossible, they all had movies this year. They all were down relative to how they performed at the box office in the past. Feels like those tricks, those tools don't work. Some new stuff has come along, your Minecrafts and your Barbies and your Super Marios and those are going to eventually fill those gaps but, but in the interim that means the franchise stuff didn't feel very fun with a couple of exceptions. And so you're really reliant on things that are not that when you're doing a day to day, week to week movie conversation show. We did get somewhere from 5 to 25 auteur studio backed big movies and some of them hit and some of them didn't. But they felt like there was more pressure on them than ever because of the slippage of everything else. And so it just felt like a very high ceiling, low floor kind of year for me when things were bad. And we were sitting here on April 18 looking at each other like, good lord, like what the hell is going.
- [34:41]
A
On right now until you bought that Minecraft ticket.
- [34:43]
B
You know, I know, it's. It just changed everything for me. It was wonderful. I think in general when you. I also similarly had a really hard time with the top five and I had a really hard time with the top 20. And that's a, that's a. That's good news. That's good news. When you love a lot, you had.
- [34:57]
A
A hard time picking it down. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [35:00]
B
And even just for my personal list making, there's just a ton of stuff that is above average. There's not a ton of stuff that is unforgettable. And we'll explore what those movies are.
- [35:11]
C
Yeah, I think what, you know, what maybe is got. Got to me this year was the feeling that the bottom was kind of falling out on B movies a little bit and that they were often.
- [35:22]
Borderline unwatchable either because of the way they were shot or how I was watching them on a streamer or something like that. And that. That lack of volume that you would get at the movie theaters back in 2017, 2018, 2019, where you could go to a movie 50 times, you could go to the theater 50 times a year and reliably be able to see something kind of feeling like, oh man, like this is. This shouldn't have been released and I'm watching it. You know, that was a feeling that. But that kind of haunted me this year a little bit.
- [35:51]
A
I had a really hard time with all of the tentpole stuff this year. And typically I. In this top five list, I like, you know, to be representative. And this is a podcast that likes Hollywood and likes like a, you know, a big dumb spectacle when done artfully. And I just. Nothing really came close and. And I really like felt that whole. And that expanded to entire seasons, right? Like the January through March that you were identifying the whole summer more or less. It was really, it was very, very stop and start this year in a way that I ended up doing a theme list instead of like a. I mean and they are my top five favorite films of the year and they identify something that like I saw going to the movie theater, but it's not, you know, Jurassic World, Rebirth is not on it. You know, I don't have a summer dumb time at the movies.
- [36:50]
C
You know what I was starting to think of, I don't want this to happen to movie going culture, but it's starting to feel a Little bit like going to concerts and six concerts a year. You're like, that was awesome.
- [37:02]
And it's becoming more and more like, all right, I'm gonna plan to go see this in the best possible theater I can, in the best seat I can at the time. I want to go see it. And for me, movies have always been like, a rhythmic part of my life where it's like I can rely on going to the theater once a week and just checking something out and that to feel that going away, which might entirely be like, personal, behavioral stuff.
- [37:25]
B
No, I don't think it is. I think. I think that's something that is sweeping over a lot of people who are not committed to seeing as many movies and even some, you know, Adam saying, I saw less than I usually do in part because I didn't have the professional obligation. But also, if you just. Just if you felt compelled to go check out whatever, the version of Jurassic World, Rebirth, it is better. You know, you would just go because you like movies. But.
- [37:48]
D
Yeah, but that's the thing. I've always been of the mind of trying to see everything. And it's not for lack of something better to do. You know, life, kids, raptor, basketball. But I like going to movies, and I felt less compelled than usual. And I don't want to think that's just a byproduct of being busy with other things. There are just a lot of things that felt like there's no point in actually sitting through this until I hear otherwise, because I'm also very easily persuaded to check things out by people I find interesting on letterboxd or by friends I trust. Like, my curiosity is piqued very easily by other people, but it's certainly not peaked by just trailers or obligations. So, yeah, less new movies than I usually see in a year. And that even was like when we talked about TIFF back in September. I saw fewer movies at TIFF than I usually do too. That might just be a stamina thing. We're just busy with other obligations. Like even a usual year at TIFF. I used to see 30, 35 mov movies. It was like barely 20, 25 this year. So I may just be slipping.
- [38:45]
B
Just Personally, I've seen 248 new releases this year.
- [38:48]
D
Jesus Christ.
- [38:49]
B
I've got at least 40 more that I feel like I want to see before the year is over.
- [38:53]
A
Okay, but that's light work for you.
- [38:55]
B
Well, it's one month.
- [38:55]
C
You probably shouldn't be on this podcast if that's how you feel.
- [38:58]
B
I mean, I don't think I'm gonna get through all of them. I mean, I am literally trying to do what Adam is saying. I'm trying to see everything, and I'm trying to see everything because I want to discover something. And so making this list feels a little silly because there's not a lot of discoveries on this year. And that's. To me, that's really the high ceiling, low floor thing. And my fear about having a chalk list in the past. This year, I kind of dispensed with that because I was like, I know what I love. I know what I want from movies. And there were a handful that really were giving me what I love in a very specific way. But I actually didn't feel the inverse of that. I didn't feel caught by surprise too often, even by smaller stuff. That might just be me. That might be the way that I'm going through, watching movies at this stage of my life, But I want to be open to. I haven't heard of this filmmaker. I didn't see this movie coming. Or what a surprise from a reliable studio hand that they really stepped up and elevated. I had a harder time with those, too. So it's an unusual year where some of the things that are clear are very clear. They're written in neon red. And then everything in the middle feels a little bit hazy. So I'm very curious to have the discussion with you guys about what your favorites are.
- [40:02]
A
Did we learn anything.
- [40:05]
About film or ourselves?
- [40:07]
B
Yeah, both. What'd you learn about yourself by going to the movies this year?
- [40:11]
A
I mean, I learned a lot about moms and dads and how they're different and how they're the same. I learned a lot about dads and a lot about what the people on a parallel but very different track from me in life right now are feeling.
- [40:24]
B
At all times two big daddies right here. Father of many styles.
- [40:28]
A
Beautiful. And I was moved by it, and I am a little amused. But also, I see you guys, and I think that's beautiful. So I don't. I. Maybe that taught me something about myself. Maybe that taught me something about my husband and, you know, everyone I work with.
- [40:46]
B
What did you learn? Tell us what you learned about men with children.
- [40:54]
C
Jake Sully has a child.
- [40:56]
B
Yeah. Did you see Avatar yet?
- [40:58]
D
I did, yeah.
- [41:00]
C
Fire and ash?
- [41:00]
D
Yeah. That's not fire and ash.
- [41:03]
B
You hate. You hate the original Avatar, right?
- [41:06]
D
No, not at all.
- [41:07]
B
You like it?
- [41:08]
D
I'm a. I'm fond of James Cameron very much. Overall, he's got the best. I'VE written this about like the best metronome internally of any action director maybe ever. He's usually really, really good with his pacing where it's just like, how much downtime can I give people till they're bored? How can I push an action scene until people are exhausted? Like, he's really great at that. You see his, his DNA. All in one of the better movies this year, which is one battle after another, which has at least as much of James Cameron as, you know, Thomas Pynchon in it. The new one, which. Are we allowed to talk about it? Is the embargo broken? This isn't an Avatar themed episode, right?
- [41:44]
B
Actually, no. And then we're going to delete the whole episode. So we've aired here? No, I mean, just if you have any impressions briefly, you feel free to share them. But we're not supposed to review it.
- [41:52]
D
No, I won't review it. I will say that I saw it and I think it has an interesting relationship to the one before. It may be to a faul. Yes, but you know, I mean, James Cameron belongs at least as much in the company of those kind of uncompromising final cut weirdo directors as he does like the consideration of franchise cinema. I mean, I don't. His great movies are extremely important to me and I find the whole back to the Avatar universe thing kind of funny. I made an offhand remark on X the other day that there's more talking whales in this one than ever before. And I just got messages from strangers being like, okay, how many whales and how much talking can you, can you. Can you give me a number? So obviously there's people who have this really endearing relationship to this piece of pop culture. I also think that however many hundred times people say there's no impact on the culture from this movie means it obviously made an impact on the culture, which is people thinking it doesn't have enough of an impact on the culture. There were a lot of things I liked less than Fire and Ash this year, let's put it that way.
- [42:50]
C
Did you think it was weird at the end of Fire and Ash when it zooms out and it turns out the entire Avatar franchise has been scored by Lydia Tar and she.
- [42:58]
B
That's.
- [42:58]
C
She's been working on since the end of Tar.
- [43:01]
D
It was, it was a real curveball.
- [43:02]
B
Yeah, yeah.
- [43:03]
D
You know that the, the, the ending of Tar is essentially her like going to a sci fi nerd convention anyway. So, you know, there could be crossover. I was actually thinking of a materialists crossover where instead of Getting leg lengthening surgery. He just gets a navi body materialist too.
- [43:21]
B
Welcome to Pandora.
- [43:22]
D
Welcome. Welcome to Adam.
- [43:23]
A
I'd like to let you know that Sean started crying on a podcast earlier this week while re watching Avatar the Way of Water. You teared up.
- [43:30]
C
When I asked you if you were, you didn't say, I'm not crying.
- [43:33]
B
I got a little lump in my throat.
- [43:34]
A
Yeah, you were a little weepy. Your eyes reddened slightly.
- [43:37]
B
It was because of this, this parentage that we're talking about, this parenthood that we're talking about, you know, this idea of the challenges of, of being a parent in the 21st century, in 2025, which is.
- [43:49]
D
So you weren't crying? You weren't crying at the whale then?
- [43:52]
B
Well, the whale is probably the most fully realized character in the Avatar films. I don't mind saying I'm extremely fond of him.
- [44:00]
D
I think he's great.
- [44:00]
B
He's wonderful. Okay, well, I guess we should just do our list. So here's what. We do this the same every year. I'd like to do it in the same way too. Let's just do our lists one at a time. We'll go five, everyone will share their number five. And four, everyone will share their number four. If your film has been one of your films that is higher ranked is identified, just kind of keep that to yourself as much as you can and you can have your time to talk about it and why you chose it. I think, I think that would be rather than try to do the. Okay, that's my number two and your number four. I think that's confusing for the listener. Listener. If we've done it in the past, I apologize. We'll do it a little bit more coherently now. Adam, I would love to start with you. What is your number five movie of 2025?
- [44:38]
D
Minecraft movie. No, I mean I want to do this list in the same order that the printed list is going to be in. But there's a couple movies on this that I've also talked about with people on the pod. So I'm debating cheating a bit, but either way. The fifth movie is the Secret Agent by clever Mendoci. This is a Brazilian film set in the late 70s. I love the opening title says A Time of Great Mischief, which understates the case in terms of a military dictatorship and this kind of trickle down corruption. And Wagner Mora, who is winning best actor awards now left and right, Best actor, New York Film Critics Circle deservedly plays a guy who is not nearly as cloak and dagger. As that title suggests. I mean, the title is kind of playful and ironic. You know, he's not a spy, he's a kind of administrative functionary, but he has beef with the local government and he's kind of trying to keep his head down and forge some passports. And this involves, you know, kind of being pursued by hitmen and, and kind of sort of trying to, you know, hide in this, this little enclave of dissidents in, in Recife. But what I love about it, and I, I don't know what you guys thought about it, it's like the best movie about movie going I've seen in a long time time. Because Brazilian film culture is one of the richest, you know, most, you know, richest, most fanatical, passionate film going cultures in the world. And that this filmmaker is just doing a love letter to that period of film going in his hometown. These movie palaces and the influx of new Hollywood films is the only movie you're ever going to see, probably where people are watching the Omen in a movie theater while also, you know, engaging in oral sex, which is a great moment. And the whole thing is, it's great, great moment. And then the whole thing is kind of shadowed by Jaws, which I find very moving too. The week I watched the Secret Agent, which includes a scene of a kid being like, I want to watch Jaws. My own daughter was like, dad, I want to watch Jaws. It was just one of those strange little life imitates art or art imitates life moments. But this filmmaker is so smart about the intersection between history and pop culture and he's so playful because this is essentially a movie about life under dictatorship and about political repression and the life and death stakes of that. It's also like two hours and what, 40 minutes long. I don't have the running time in front of me, but it's just like floating on air watching it. Some people compared it to Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, which is a bit superficial, but in terms of building out a period with cars and clothes and theater marquees, I get the comparison. So I think it's a brilliant piece of filmmaking.
- [47:11]
B
I'm really glad you picked it. This is number six on my list and I agonized over whether or not I should include it in my top five. And I rewatched it again last night and I'm having the filmmaker on the show and I like, I like it for all the reasons that you described. And he does something I don't know if I've ever specifically seen before, which.
- [47:35]
C
Is.
- [47:37]
B
Use genre Convention and history and absurdity in a blender to make something that is mysterious and emotional. And I think the once upon a time in Hollywood comparison is fair. I don't know if it's quite the same because it's not as kind of like it's the emotional opposite at its conclusion. It's not about payback or anything like that. It's about coming to a sense of peace. But it's a really, a beautiful movie. And Wagner Moore is amazing in this film and he's holding it on his shoulders the whole time. I really like this movie. So I'm really glad you picked it.
- [48:10]
D
Yeah, the performance, we should say it has a trick in it too. There's a structural trick that kind of hinges on that performance, which, when I was watching it, I sort of thought, is this too much? You know, is this too much of a stunt? But the performance is good enough that it sort of holds it, you know, that it. That it holds it together. And, you know, for people interested in this film. A couple of years ago he made a movie, I think. I know you like Chris. I don't know if you saw it because it's up your alley. Which is Bacaro, which is his sort of John Carpenter. His John Carpenter pastiche, which is sort of like.
- [48:40]
C
That's awesome. Okay, I'll check it.
- [48:41]
D
Amanda like to do, I mean, a terrific movie. So he's. He's been on it. He's been on a really good run. And this movie, for whatever reason, more than the other one, seems to have really pushed through.
- [48:50]
B
He's also. He's in his late 50s and he's. He's a lot like a lot of the 70s and 80s filmmakers we like a lot. And that he was a programmer and film critic for years and then started making movies. And you can see his love and obsession with movies is in his films in a way that's very exciting without sacrificing, like, the enjoyment of the moviegoing experience.
- [49:10]
C
I haven't gotten a chance to see Secret Agent yet, but I did see Wagner Mora's Criterion Closet, which is a really good starter pack for some of the Brazilian cinema. History of Adam.
- [49:19]
A
Yes.
- [49:20]
B
He picked Black God, White Devil in there. And I think he picked Pichote. Right. Like he picked. Yeah, he picked a few films that are like all time classics. Okay. Meta number five.
- [49:28]
A
Oh, me next. My number five is Train Dreams. I know which your whole heart is open. My whole heart is open. As I said that it was once. I actually saw it. You know, Sean saw it out of Sundance or on his couch as part of virtual Sundance and hasn't stopped talking about it. And that can often, you know, disincline me. But I thought this was a completely beautiful, wonderful.
- [49:57]
It was surprising to me in that it had so many familiar, like, indie tropes, right from the voiceover to flashbacks to a traumatic incident to like, you know, all the shots of the trees and nature. And there's a lot of stuff that done wrong feels like a road Sundance movie or something that you have seen before Xeroxed 50 times and don't care about. And this just comes together is more than the sum of its parts. I found it, like, pretty revelatory.
- [50:30]
To me, the exploration of grief and guilt, which are like entwined in this. And what is this character Robert Greener responsible for? And what could he have done differently? And what would he have.
- [50:46]
That is. It's until the very last line shown instead of told, which I really appreciated, even though there is that voiceover. Here's another thing. I have not read the Dennis Johnson novella and I just have to say how lovely to be free of all expectations of adaptation for once. It is like, really, like it's a lesson, you know, sometimes you just gotta.
- [51:07]
C
Gotta stop reading, go in.
- [51:09]
A
Well, you know, I have pretty much go in completely. And so I was able to give myself over to it in a way that I sometimes find I can't with other adaptations. And I don't know, I was just. I was very moved by it and kept thinking about specific, like, specific scenes. It's lovely.
- [51:30]
B
Everyone says that you love when, like, Mandy comes out, you know, like the bizarro Amanda who's just got a big heart. I know she's. I know it's in there. I know it's pumping full blown at.
- [51:40]
C
Her forest service station looking out.
- [51:42]
B
That's right. Park ranger man. What could have been, who she could have been.
- [51:47]
A
That lookout is so beautiful. And like, Kerry Condon shows up for 10 minutes and her American accent is. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that accent. Listen, it doesn't matter. That. And even the setup of that lookout, the production design is very beautiful. I did have some questions about how they go to the bathroom in a lookout. Like, what was the.
- [52:04]
C
Oh, I think they climbed down for it.
- [52:08]
A
You think so? Okay. You think there's like an outhouse?
- [52:10]
C
Yeah, I don't know.
- [52:11]
B
Maybe. There's like also a very notable lookout scene in the film the Wolfman, which we haven't talked about about too much this year. You see that? You see the. You see the Leigh Whannell's Wolfman. Yeah.
- [52:20]
D
Yeah. It's number four on my list.
- [52:22]
C
Was that this year?
- [52:23]
B
That was this year, yeah.
- [52:24]
C
That feels like it was like 20.
- [52:26]
B
Yeah.
- [52:26]
C
I don't even know.
- [52:27]
B
It didn't work out. I'm really glad you picked Train Dreams, I will say. And I've read a number of pieces, including Adams. I picked the book up after I saw the movie. I like Dennis Johnson. Not as much as Chris. Chris is probably the biggest Dennis Johnson fan I know. And even in the first hundred pages of the book, first page, he changes a couple things that really dramatically change the intention. I saw the movie first too, and I don't have a problem with it. But most people I know who read the book were like, ooh, I don't know if I would have done it this way. Which I find interesting. Fortunately, I don't have to read where.
- [52:57]
C
I've arrived at it. I very much like Train Dreams. It's in my top 10. And I was deeply moved by it. I've arrived at it. That that's the whole point of adaptation is that you're allowed to take what you want from a book and not necessarily make it a facsimile of the sentiment of the book or even the action of the book. I mean, look what Paul Tom Sanderson did with Vineland.
- [53:19]
B
So, okay, number five series.
- [53:22]
C
I'm really glad she took Train Dreams because my number five is eis, which I think is a very, very, very good double feature with Train Dreams because it's about the passage of time and it's about watching your life kind of pass before your eyes. This is Carson Lund, kind of aching monument to hanging out. And it came out sort of. It did the festival run in 24, came out in the spring of 25. I didn't see it until recently and it rocked me. It made me feel like I was 17 again watching a Jim Jarvis movie for the first time. It's about two rec league baseball teams playing the final game at a New Hampshire baseball field that's going to be redeveloped and turned into a school. And these guys show up. They age range from like 25 to 65. Adam. I mean about like maybe seven. Like there's some older men there too.
- [54:17]
D
And you're asking, you're asking me if I recognize that people are 65 years old.
- [54:22]
B
Just curious. He's just saying as a 65 year old man.
- [54:26]
D
Speaking as a 65 year old man. Yeah, I, I think they're mostly, mostly in their 40s.
- [54:31]
A
Yeah.
- [54:31]
C
Middle aged guys who Are like on the last innings anyway of being able to baseball with their bodies, but are still out there. And what you turns out over the course of the game is that they don't want the game to end. So, you know, the whole community is kind of sort of slowly trickling in. There's kids, there's a pizza truck, everybody's complaining, everybody's bitching. And I love that. This movie is about trying to hang on to the parts of your life that make you feel alive. And so these guys are listening to old baseball games on tapes. They're breaking each other's balls, they're trying to run down fly balls and stuff. And then it movie kind of takes a little bit more of a surreal turn towards the end as these guys refuse to stop playing this game. And it just worked for me on every level. I think Lund's an incredibly talented filmmaker. I can't wait to see what else he does. And this was a real breath of fresh air at the end of the year for the me just kind of.
- [55:29]
B
The train dreams of baseball movies, you know, life is long, but then it's over, you know, and then what do you do? Great pick. My number five is Sinners, which is one of the most acclaimed, successful, and well covered on this podcast songs of the year. And because it is the film that has come out, most recent, most the earliest on my list, I think it was fading a bit from my memory and my exuberance about it. I think a lot of people have seen it, and some people have been like, well, this is a masterpiece. And other people have said this movie's overrated. And it's kind of gone through the entire washing cycle that happens to movies. And I popped it in last night and I was.
- [56:08]
A
I noticed you say popped it in.
- [56:09]
B
I popped it in. I popped the 4K right in. And I was choosing between it and the Secret Agent. And I think just looking at it again and going back to it and getting sucked in by the score immediately convinced me that there is something really major about the synthesis between the music and the storytelling in the movie. I don't think the movie is without flaw. I do think it has some flaws, but I think it's such an amazing act of imagination and a very similar act of genre collision that Mendoza Filo is doing as well in the Secret Agent. And it's also a big, bold vampire movie and also a historical drama and also a gangster movie and also an interesting movie about the Irish, which I appreciate. Coogler set out to make a film he Honestly did. And if you listen to him in interviews, he talks about it all the time, that he did a lot of research into Irish history.
- [57:06]
And I think it's going to get a nice amount of coverage in the next few months as an awards film. And it's. Obviously, its success is already confirmed, and it's, for a lot of people, going to be one of their favorite movies of all time. But to me, it is the prime example of what Hollywood filmmaking can be specifically, which is that someone who has gone through the system and understands what audiences want and can make something at scale that is tremendously personal and gratifying and deep and worthy of reconsideration. I just love the movie. I think it's really, really good. And I was forgetting it a little bit, and so I was happy to be reminded. Okay, anybody else have Sinners on their list? I do.
- [57:47]
C
Yes, you do.
- [57:47]
B
Okay, anybody else have Train Dreams on their list? Anybody else have Ethis on their list?
- [57:53]
A
Wow. Okay.
- [57:55]
D
But ES is really good.
- [57:57]
A
It is really good.
- [57:57]
B
Yeah.
- [57:58]
D
Ethis is really good.
- [57:59]
B
Okay. Adam, Number four.
- [58:02]
D
So my number four. I'm just. I'm torn because I don't want to cheat. Like, I want to do the actual top five. But there's, like, two movies. This is one of them where I've literally been on the pod to talk about them. So I might. Might ask for, like, special dispensation to talk about an extra movie at the end. That's, like, just in my top 10. But I really like. But my actual number four is cloud, which you had me on to talk about. And I don't want to. I don't want to be redundant about it. This Kyoshi Kurosawa's film, very funny, sinister thriller about a kind of Internet reseller who pisses off his clientele to the point that they want to, you know, hunt him down and torture him on live tv. Like, we've talked about it, which doesn't mean I. I, you know, I don't want to say anything, but, you know, it was really nice. We had space to talk about it in Kurosawa and the extent to which he's broken through in the West. I mean, I think this movie being on Criterion Channel, being put out as a Criterion premiere, I mean, before that, when it was being distributed by Sideshow out of its festival, like, it just seemed to get more attention than he gets usually. So it's an excellent gateway backwards into the filmography, but also just in terms of form. You know, I've said this before, but the way he sets his camera up and the way he cuts and the way he holds your attention. I just think he's peerless. I don't know if this is even his best movie. I mean it's not. But even a kind of low first tier Kurosawa movie as a new release is just. It's going to be something that I'm going to think is great and I think Cloud in particular, the way it morphs from kind of not supernatural but a very moody thriller into just a full on action film. I loved reading reviews and seeing what people tried to compare it to. People were like, this is like Call of Duty. And people were like, this is like Reservoir Dogs or John Woo, you know, this, you know, or, or, or you know, a Johnny to film. But when it turns into the warehouse shootout, it's really quite hilarious.
- [59:49]
B
Have you seen this?
- [59:49]
C
So I now I have to leave the podcast.
- [59:53]
B
Yeah, yeah, I think you'll enjoy it is a little, A lot of people definitely watched it after hearing you recommended on the show and you know, we were like, yeah, I think I kept saying it was like heat for dumb guys.
- [60:07]
C
And so the town.
- [60:08]
B
Yeah, no, like, like heat with ups in it.
- [60:12]
C
Oh, I see.
- [60:12]
D
Yeah.
- [60:13]
A
Okay.
- [60:13]
B
And so the town. I may have, I may have wrong footed them a little bit. They were like, I did not understand this and I, I do think if you've seen other Kurosawa movies, it is a little bit more legible in terms of what he's interested in. Fair to say.
- [60:25]
D
Yeah, well, yeah, I mean he is and I. This is a very high compliment from me. He's a weirdo. Yeah, you know, he's a, he's a weirdo. And I remember when I interviewed him this year at tiff, I've been really lucky over the years getting to talk to him about different films. He said that he wanted this to have what he called a kind of movie logic. He wanted reality to unfold according to kind of film logic. And he's such a cinephile himself. He's a great fan, he said, of John Carpenter and David Croneberg. He mentioned Park Chan Wook as a director who he really admires. And there are some similarities in this to certain of, of Park's films. Films. But yeah, he's very, very weird and he's very, very funny. But filmmaking is also quite severe and I hope more people check it out in his other films as a result of a podcast like this because he's not obscure or difficult in any way. He's just odd. And I Think he's one of the best living filmmakers. Just period.
- [61:16]
A
This episode of the Big Picture is brought to you by State Farm. Having people in your corner to help you makes all the difference. For example, I'm usually loathe to trust Sean and his movie recommendations, but after many months of him waxing rhapsodic about Train Dreams, I finally watched it. And I have to be honest, he was right. It was wonderful.
- [61:35]
B
And like those people, State Farm is there to help you feel supported by helping you choose the coverage you need. Go online@state farm.com or use the award winning app to get help from one of their local agents. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.
- [61:48]
Amanda, number four is if I had.
- [61:51]
A
Legs, I'd kick you. Here come the moms.
- [61:54]
B
Yeah, let's discuss this.
- [61:56]
A
Yeah, well, we'll discuss it some more.
- [61:58]
B
Maybe this is the rise of Mommy Mommy. Not Star Wars, Mommy, not Gen Z, Mommy Mommy.
- [62:05]
A
Because you know, Train Dreams has many themes but he is a father and.
- [62:12]
His relationship with his daughter is like a central part of the film and very moving and, and you know, there is an open hearted quality to the way that story and that relationship is told. Even though it is like a. It's very, very sad. And if I had legs, I'd kick you, which is one of the mom movies, is just absolutely the most nauseous. I've been in a movie theater all year, like just hard, ugly, mean shit and, and like parenthesis compliment, you know, parenthesis complimentary. So I mean it is a movie about how difficult being specifically a mother and not a father is. It is a film by Mary Bronstein, written and directed and starring Rose Byrne. And her performance is really picking up steam in awards season as well deservedly. But she is taking care of a child with kind of an unspecified illness and her husband is away at work and on the phone. And again, I don't want to spoil who it is on the phone, but it's really funny when wonderful reveal. Really, really, really good. And she just, she just can't do it. It's impossible and it's really hard. And it is, it's a very cinematic movie that is also like a systemic critique of all the ways in which the whole world fails. Like makes it impossible to be a mother. Whether it is the people at work or the, you know, people at the hospital system, like the, the person at the motel who will not sell you the bottle of wine even though it's not quite midnight yet or 2am or whatever.
- [63:55]
B
I love the parking lot attendant yeah, her war with the parking lot attendant.
- [63:58]
A
Is great, but, like, that. It's so insane. And we all know people like that, which is just, like, how can you not see the person standing in front of you? And, like, how do you not understand the situation and that everyone is just trying to get by and, like, not even do the best for their kid, but just, like, trying to make it happen. And the world is heartless and impervious in front of that so often. So I thought this was. It's like, a really tough but, like, also very funny movie. Another. A great movie about how therapy, like, is pretty useless, which I'm, like, into as well, you know, like, we've had too much therapy on. And this is. And without spoiling it, there's a filmmaking choice throughout the movie, and then at the end, that is. It ranks up there with the endings of the movies this year and is in conversation with a lot of them, but is truly wonderful.
- [64:50]
B
So I'm really glad that you picked this. We're at the time of the year where my wife is catching up on a lot of the movies of the year. And so she's watching Screeners and she's checking in on things that I've been talking about and seeing and telling her about for months and months. So Monday night I went out to a screening to see Avatar with youh and she watched Train Dreams. And I got home and Train Dreams had been over for an hour, and she had been crying for the entire hour that the film had ended. And then Tuesday night, I went out to a screening and I came home and she'd completed if I had Legs, I'd kick you. Wow. And she was like, why did you do this to me?
- [65:24]
A
Yeah.
- [65:25]
B
Because it transports you back to a.
- [65:27]
A
Place and you're the asshole out at a movie.
- [65:29]
B
And I was at a movie. Well, we had a. She apparently had a wonderful night with our daughter, but she was like, for three years, I was inside of this mindset.
- [65:39]
A
And there was a hole in your ceiling at one point.
- [65:41]
B
There literally was a hole in our ceiling. Yes. I said to Mary when I interviewed her on the show. I was just like, I really want to recommend this movie to my wife, and I think she'll love it. But I also am afraid to recommend it to her because you really tapped into something true and with, I think, genuinely interesting filmmaking choices. So I like. I love pick. Great pick.
- [65:58]
A
Thank you.
- [65:59]
B
Okay.
- [65:59]
C
CR number four, minus Sinners. Not a ton to add to what you said. The second viewing of Sinners for me. Also the what stood out was obviously the music that's just featured in the film, but the musicality of the film itself. The way that you see very few Hollywood films go for the ecstatic in this way and be so like it's arterial spray, it's cunningus, it is like sweaty, it's dancing, it's. And I think that this movie in my mind almost was. Is now underrated.
- [66:32]
B
I was having the same feeling last.
- [66:33]
C
Night and one of the best filmgoing experiences I had this year. I think the most I've felt kind of like physically engaged in a film outside of maybe F1, you know, was watching Sinners and just like watching the other faces in the audience while I was watching it like light up at certain scenes. And I think that, you know, even the problems this is the cheat is when you're like, yeah, but like the problems are cool or like the. The big swings that missed are cool, but they are like your mileage may vary on piercing the veil. But I thought it was an amazing swing to take and I really admire the bravery of it. This film is awesome. The performances are great. So yeah, I thought that was my number four.
- [67:15]
B
Great pick. Okay. Number four for me is Marty Stupid Supreme. So it's a little hard to talk about because it's not out yet.
- [67:21]
D
Right.
- [67:22]
B
We've mentioned a couple times that we love it, that we think it's great. I think it's always a little annoying for the listener at home to have to hear someone talk about a movie that hasn't been released yet that is on one of these lists. These are just the vagaries of list making in the podcasting universe. But this is Josh Safdie's new film stars Timothy Chalamet as a competitive ping pong player in the 1950s living in New York City. And he is. Is a very aspirational, ambitious and at times hard hearted and extremely difficult person. I think one of the most interesting movies I've seen about how a lot of men are in their 20s, which is.
- [68:02]
Fast talking, rude, hurtful, intoxicating, gifted, fun to be around and also exhausting. And you know, I really love the Safdie brothers movies and I've been interested in their project for a long, long time and this felt to me like the highest that they had gotten to the feeling that they wanted to convey. I also think the movie, I think he's an interesting writer. Him and Ronald Bronstein, Mary Bronstein's husband actually when it comes to the world that he surrounds Marty with, which is. Is very lived in very real, very suspicious of everyone. I think there is a big heart, but a big, cynical chip on the shoulder about everyone that Marty is exposed to and raised by and falls in love with, and that the world is a hard world and that there's upside to being as hard as you are, and that there's also real downside. And I don't want to give away too many of our thematic discussions here that we'll get into when the film comes out, but felt like, to me, the cherry on top of what I thought movies were about this year when we got to the end. So I love this movie. I am at the disadvantage. I like to have seen the movies that I put on my list twice. I've only seen this movie one time. It was a few months ago. I don't remember every single kernel of information about it. I liked being able to go back and revisit a bunch of the ones that I'm going to talk about today. But I had a grand old time seeing this for the first time. So that's number four for me. Okay. Okay, Adam, number three.
- [69:31]
D
My number three is one battle after another, which I'm sure will come up for you guys on. On. On your lists. Should we save it? I mean, I'd like.
- [69:40]
A
It's your turn.
- [69:42]
D
It's my turn. Well, I mean, we actually talked about the movie already on this. On this podcast. I just recorded a different podcast with a different set of people about the film. I'm at the point now where also this term at U of T, I just finished doing my authorship class. We've just had like six weeks on Paul Thomas Anderson. And, you know, that's stuff that I'm teaching, but it' discussions with students and looking at movies and doing readings. So, like, on the one hand, I'm very inundated with this movie, but it also feels kind of oddly far away because I watched a long time ago for the first time I wrote about it. The second time I watched it was at home. I still haven't seen it in, like, you know, biggest format presentation, you know, possible. And it's a filmmaker who obviously means something to me, not just in terms of liking him, but I've done a lot of work, work on him. So in a way, it's almost like too much with this movie. I just hear people talk about it all the time. I'm extremely interested in the negative reactions to it. I think the negative reactions to it are fair. I think some of the negative reactions to it are kind of undeniable. And not because they're mean spirited or asking it to be something that it's not. But I think I said this to you guys last time. It's a function of how big the movie is. I'm fascinated how the film can be the most commercially successful movie he's made exponentially, but also like the closest thing to a financial disaster.
- [71:01]
I'm interested in how a filmmaker who's been criticized, I think rightly in the past for staying too much in his lane has now done this huge swerve and it's a whole other, you know, series of crashes and sideswipes that happen as a result. I'm really fascinated by how much it resembles his other work while also being in some ways, you know, very different. What I said to you guys last time, I will say this, that, that I don't think you often have to look too hard at his movies to find him. Like he's right there. And part of my struggle with this film, which I obviously like, I read a very positive review of it for the site. I'm not against the film. I just picked it as the third best movie of the year, you know, but some of my resistance has been like, where do I find the weird Paul Thomas Anderson? The ambiguous one where it's not a one to one ratio between what he's showing us and what I'm seeing. Last time I watched it, I recognized him a bit more. And I wonder if I'm willing myself towards that because I really want to like his work or if it's because it's kind of present and, and encoded into that movie. But in a way I'm also just tired of the movie because we've just started. We just have. The award season thing has kind of just started. And I think that, that the title, one battle after another is going to start to be how people feel about this discourse around it because it's nowhere near over.
- [72:20]
B
You know, we were talking about that at the top of this episode, Adam, that there's many months now of this and I had a very hard time pacing myself at the beginning, at the release.
- [72:31]
A
Did you?
- [72:31]
C
Yeah, I didn't notice that.
- [72:33]
B
But.
- [72:35]
We will have to talk about it more for a variety of reasons. Okay. Number three, Amanda.
- [72:40]
A
Another one for the Mamas, Die My Love, which. Which is the Lynne Ramsey movie starring Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson that I think, you know, has become most famous as an example of movies questionable distribution strategy in year two. But I think that that is unfair to movie and certainly to the film which.
- [73:05]
To me was electric and is the most I've laughed in a movie theater this year and is. It's another. It's another movie about just how motherhood is just absolutely impossible. And to me, it is a movie about how motherhood just, like, completely divides you from your other self. And so, like, being a human woman and a mom at the same time does drive you to some sort of psychosis. And it can be, you know, like, pretty literal, as it does become in this film, which is based on a novel which is about, like, severe postpartum depression and psychosis, and she's hospitalized and all of that. And I did feel that the representations of that literal experience were great in this movie. And it communicated something like pretty physical and feral about that time period of your life that I really responded to because it is surprisingly physical. And like, I, you know, I. I know a lot of people, like, made fun of just, like Jennifer Lawrence, like, crawling around on the floor, like, she's like, capital G going for it. But I don't know how else to tell you, though, that, like, literally is what it feels like for the first however many months when you're just something really, like, primal takes over your body. So I responded to that, but I do, to me, I liked the movie more just as, like, a representation of the very complex and troubled psychological state that she's in, mostly because she's a new mom, but also just because she's a person in the world and her husband brought home a new dog and moved her to Montana and is nice and really cute and Batman, but also useless.
- [74:52]
B
I'm waiting to hear the downside of any of those things. That all sounds great.
- [74:57]
A
I did. Also, I saw this film with my husband, and I should say I started. This is another thing where, to Adam's point, some of this is personal. I started 2025, three months postpartum, and then fires swept through Los Angeles and I left my home in a hurry. So there is some relating to aspects of the text here, but it literally maps onto it an incredible afternoon date movie with the husband and the father of your children, who also, by the way, loved it, thinks it's a really sick movie. So shout out, you know, shout out family and shout this, you know, shout out all the mamas, capital M. Do.
- [75:36]
B
You think another Lynne Ramsey film will be released on 2,500 screens in the future?
- [75:41]
A
Probably not, but I don't think that's anybody's fault.
- [75:45]
B
I like this movie, too.
- [75:45]
A
Well, I do, but, you know, it's really. It's a Great movie.
- [75:48]
B
KCR number three, Weapons.
- [75:51]
A
There we go.
- [75:53]
C
This is my Wicked. No, no. I.
- [75:58]
Like one that I think you can experience a couple of different ways. And it's been really enjoyable to piece together how I feel about weapons by. Through multiple viewings. So the first time through, it's like almost like a pure plot experience. You're racing to kind of pull ahead of and or keep up with Craigger throughout the movie as he tells this story in this kind of short story anthology way of switching POV between these characters. The second time through I felt serene because I was able to just kind of enjoy the little tricks he was playing, the little things that I hadn't noticed before. But the third time I watched this movie, I think I really started to try to understand how I felt about it and what I think he was trying to say. Probably going to be a mileage may vary for people or depending on how you look at it and where you are in your life. Life. I thought it was about why we need horror movies in the first place and the reasons why we create these sort of mythical figures at the. The monsters at the end of the Dream from True Detective to explain the inexplainable tragedies that happen in our lives. And I thought that the way it dealt with addiction and the tragedies that can befall our community was really, really interesting. And aside from that, what a fucking rock and roll movie that is just an absolute blast to watch. Still has images that are seared in my brain. The kids with their arms to the side, obviously the hysterical ending of the movie.
- [77:24]
A
It's so good.
- [77:27]
C
And the image of Benedict Wong running towards Julia Garner and Josh Brolin at the gas station. Just some of my favorites. Sort of lasting memories of film in 2025 are going to be from weapons.
- [77:40]
A
That opening when they're. And what is the music that is playing this?
- [77:44]
B
Beware of Darkness by George Harrison.
- [77:46]
A
It's really very special.
- [77:48]
C
Felt like a movie also, I mean this isn't really like, oh, and this is why it's in the top five. But I love when I'm seeing images that I think have haunted a filmmaker for a really long time and he finally got it on screen and there was something about the kids running that I felt like I was like, you saw this in a nightmare or you saw this in your childhood or something and it's been. Been percolating in your mind for a really long time. So I. That definitely. I think I'll revisit it again. But I encourage people to do So.
- [78:14]
B
I told you earlier this week that this isn't in my top five. I told you it was my number seven, which it still is my number seven after all this whinging I've been doing this week. And you were surprised?
- [78:24]
C
I was.
- [78:24]
A
I was as well. I assumed it would be on the list.
- [78:27]
B
Yeah, I love it too. I don't. You know, it's a pretty thin line here in my top 10.
- [78:31]
C
It's not like tiers are pretty collapsed here.
- [78:34]
B
I like my 10 a lot, lot. And I'm glad, like you're feeling like if I had legs, is it number 10 for me? Like there's some. Hopefully we're talking through some of these movies that.
- [78:42]
C
Adam, I know that you were a little bit less sold on weapons, but have you happened to re revisit it since your initial review for the Ringer?
- [78:49]
D
I haven't revisited it. I have read interesting things about it from friends. I think that the guy, the Craig, he's. It's an interesting trend of comedians now making horror movies. And it's not just an anecdotal thing where it's like, well, who are all these comedians making horror movies the way that they. Under the sign of Jordan Peele, like there's these strategies where they have a kind of blackout sketch mentality which is, you know, you develop the idea, you develop the idea and it's like, how long is their attention span? I thought that Barbarian worked really well because the movie kept changing.
- [79:21]
C
Yeah.
- [79:21]
D
And similarly here he keeps doubling back because it's like the sketch has almost kind of reached its end and then he kind of needs to start another one. So whether I think it works or not, I think it's an interesting byproduct of the guy being a comedian. I thought I said this in the piece that there's things about it that are effective and that work very well. And I think that some of the acting and especially at the beginning is really terrific. Like Garner's.
- [79:45]
C
Garner's amazing.
- [79:46]
D
She's so good in the scene in the bar, you know, at the beginning of the film, which is like a heavy, like a heavy load bearing scene plot wise. But she's just really good. And Brolin is. Is good as well. But no, it's not a movie that, that, that, that totally worked for me. But I like hearing you talk about it. And certainly, you know, as someone who's interested in horror and trends in horror, this is kind of a big film. I feel like we'. Lots of movies that are trying to be like this or at least be marketed.
- [80:14]
C
Yeah, this way.
- [80:16]
D
Like, you know, this is a movie where I think more than Long Legs, Like, Long Legs was all campaign, not much movie. This was like a better campaign and a better movie. But even when stuff like Shelby Oaks was being marketed in the fall, I sort of thought, oh, they're trying to market it like weapons. Because, you know, with horror movies so much about marketing, you don't have a star and sometimes you don't have existent intellectual property. So the extent to which this film was a smack hit as an original piece is obviously a thing you want to see happen.
- [80:46]
B
Part of the fun of Weapons is seeing it with a crowd for the first time who had no idea what to expect. It's a movie that multiple viewings that may or may not stand up, it's debatable, but it was just electrifying. The first time I saw it, I just had so much fun. And that's true for a lot of the movies on my list, but that one did have a very particular energy to it. I really like what you said, though, and I had not heard that identified in quite that way that his history as a sketch performer and the fact that his films do have this kind of.
- [81:13]
Structural, like, this is an episode of Saturday Night Live, full of nightmares feeling to it. And I do wonder if his future movies, if Resident Evil will be more linear or not, because he's doing things probably, as Adam says, inspired by what he knows best.
- [81:26]
C
I think he equally draws from Tarantino's script writing in that same way. But yeah, for sure, I think that there is a ticking clock in his brain that's like, I'm bored. I want to try. Like, I want to do this from somebody else.
- [81:38]
B
Yeah, that's cool. Okay. My number three is no other choice, which is Park Chan Wook's new movie, which is also not out yet. And I apologize again. We'll do a whole episode about the film in January when it gets a wide release. But this is his long, gestating adaptation of the Ax by Donald Westlake, a novel about a man who is going to be laid off from his longtime job. I believe in the film it's at a paper company. In this film. No, in the film. In the book, it's different. I don't think it's a paper company. In the movie, it's a man who. A Korean man who works at a paper company. He's a father of two children, he's married. He's living the middle class suburban dream. And then an American company comes in. Buys the company, there's consolidation. And after he is laid off, he needs to find a way to get a new job. And he has a really hard time finding a new job. And he concocts a scheme to eliminate potential contenders for. For the few existing jobs that are left at rival paper companies around town. This is an extremely funny, elaborate, absurd.
- [82:42]
High drama, high comedy work of an established master. Like a person who knows how to make a movie better than most people who know how to make it. There are formal tricks in the movie I've not seen before. There are superimpositions, cutting style transitions, metaphorical leaning, a really outsized and fun performance by Lee Byung Hung.
- [83:06]
This movie is an absolute blast. I thought it was really, really funny. Really, really, really silly. And also, if you want it to be, very cogent satire about.
- [83:18]
The corporate complex, the incursion of AI.
- [83:24]
Essentially what happens to men when they reach a certain stage of their life, how they confuse virility and economic status. There's an incredible amount of design. I also talked to Dr. Park for the show, which will air in January. That was fascinating because in the interview, I don't know if I've ever had this before, and I'm not saying this is a good thing, but every time I would ask a question, he would explain entirely how he executed on the thing I asked about, and also what it means.
- [83:57]
And I've interviewed hundreds of filmmakers and most of the time they're like, you figure it out, asshole. You know, you can't be like, what were you thinking thematically? Like, anytime you say that, people are just directors, like, shoot me in the face. And he's like, no, this is exactly what I was going for. This is what I hope you'll think about when you watch this sequence, right? And I was already in love with the movie before that, that. But it was fascinating to watch someone see how deeply he had thought through every single decision. Not just on that formal level, which is so thrilling, but intellectually and emotionally and what it meant to him. And I hope people go to see this movie because I think it's. It's a great time. Okay, Number two.
- [84:34]
D
Adam. So just gonna say no other choice. You emailed me. You were surprised you the other day, like, why didn't you like this movie? Just gonna say that of this, it is absolutely the best made movie of the year that I personally didn't like. You know, and the personally didn't like part is a whole other conversation. But like craft wise man, oh man, I mean, you know, out of this world. Absolutely. And like, in a very showy way, too.
- [84:58]
B
It is. But I emailed you because I watched it first, because you told me you didn't. You didn't love it. And then I hadn't seen it. When you said that you'd seen it at Venice and you loved it, I.
- [85:07]
A
Liked it a lot.
- [85:07]
B
And so I watched it and I was like, damn, I can't believe Adam doesn't like this. And then I watched it a second time to prepare for the interview. And that was when I emailed you, where I was like, what's going on, bro? We're usually aligned on these.
- [85:17]
D
It's one of my. One of my trademark. I'm just wrong, you know, because I.
- [85:22]
I took. I. I took shit from this, from friends during tiff, too. Like, literally walking out of the screening, people being like, so that was great, right? And I was like, you know, it's the strangest thing. I gotta go be on my phone, you know, I'll see you guys. And I just felt. I felt. I felt. I felt bad. But that thing you were saying about it, about explaining the intent, it ties to the second movie, my number two movie, which is, you know, I'm going to be very on brand and pick the Shrouds, which is a film that. I think that what excites me about it and I think why people are kind of skeptical, because I've been talking about this movie at least here, a lot. I mean, two tips ago, you know, and there's this feeling, oh, it's because it's a Toronto movie, or it's because of Cronenberg's past movies. The thing about no other choices, you can tell he's getting every effect that he wants. Wants. What I love about the Shrouds is I feel like Cronenberg's getting every effect that he wants, but it's just right on that borderline of like, is this just inept and off? You know? And I don't say that perversely. Like, people talked about it pertaining to late style, and people have talked about how much it's supposed to be funny. But of all the movies this year, it's the one I've watched the most because I take great pleasure watching it. I've watched it three or four times. And he is so relaxed. He does not care how people are going to react and respond to this movie. There's a confidence in this movie that I find moving quite apart from the things in the film that are moving because it is about aging and it is about loss. And grief and death. I think I told a story when we talked with movie on the pod that I had a friend who saw this movie during tiff who had lost someone important in their life to cancer. They couldn't get through the film. Film, which is totally at odds with how goofy it is. But it's not, because the goofiness of it and the kind of speculative sci fi of it. There is such a reservoir of grief in this movie, Personal grief from the filmmaker and an understanding of how grief and loss makes people crazy. It's easily the best, like Brain Worm conspiracy movie that anyone's made. Much better than Begonia. I like Eddington fine. As we've talked about. I think there's a whole sub genre of kind of Brain Worm discourse movies this year and how people invent. Invent conspiracy theories to kind of get over what's bothering them. And I'm like, shrouds understands this. Yeah. And the shroud sort of understands that relationship to, you know, sex and marriage and to what happens when it feels like your other part is just kind of gone. You know, I have friends who've lost partners or separate, even separated from partners who watch this movie and find it sort of impossibly moving. And he just cannot be bumped, judged from his style and from his sensibility and his tone. And I guess I see so many filmmakers now being praised or saying themselves very sincerely, by the way. I do not blame any of them for saying, we love David Cronenberg. This has been all over acceptance speeches for the last few years at festivals and festival rollouts where it's like trying to make this Cronenbergian or Cronenberg's the best or. Oh, man, you know, I grew up on those films. I respect all of that. That even though some of the filmmakers I like more than others, but, like, the actual guy is still here, you know, needing financing for the work and making films that like this, that are so small and scrappy, so obviously shot in Toronto that the milk comes out of a bag. You know, I want. I need this for me. I need this to be kind of respected and admired and celebrated while we have it. I love how close it is to seeming like a terrible movie. And I don't mean for that to be perverse. I mean, it's so confident, and I just. I think it's brilliant.
- [88:51]
B
I do chalk up some of that offness to budget. I wonder if this is a movie that has 10 or $12 million more in its budget because its conception is extremely strong. But some of the Things that he's trying to pull off visually are challenging at the scope of the movie. But I agree. I think this is a great movie. I had a really hard chuckle watching the Ready or Not to trailer yesterday and seeing that he is in the film, which is something he has done many times over the years. He's incredible in Nightbreed, the Clive Barker movie from some years ago. So he will act from time to time. But him taking that gig in the aftermath of making the Shrouds too, I was like, good, just keep stacking cheddar.
- [89:31]
C
Adam, I like when you say the Shrouds. Understands this. I like the idea that the Shrouds is like the spice from Dune.
- [89:40]
D
The Shrouds understand you're referring to the cameo. Own this. Ready or not to sequel. I think To Die For. I know it's on Criterion. I don't know if it's on Criterion Channel still. Like, not an obscure movie. That is my favorite director cameo in any film. When Cronenberg shows up at the end of To Die for as this inexplicably Italian hitman who keeps looking. Looking at Nicole Kidman and being like, no, no, this way, come this way. And it's because I think the film was shot partially in Toronto, because Van Sant definitely did. Did Good Will Hunting in Toronto. But yeah, that idea of directors who cameo not in their own movies, but just kind of show up around the edges of other people's, that's an all time. An all time funny one for me.
- [90:19]
B
Great stuff.
- [90:19]
D
Cronenberg and To Die For.
- [90:21]
B
I honestly thought this was coming in at number one for you. So now.
- [90:24]
A
Yeah, now I'm trying to figure out what. But. But don't tell me.
- [90:26]
B
Okay. Amanda, number two.
- [90:28]
A
So my number two is Marty supreme, which I. To Sean's point, most people haven't seen it. And there's not a lot that I can say or add to what Sean said that won't totally spoil it, including why it's on my themed list. But, like, to quote Stefan, this movie has everything and it's just like. It is really. And I won't enumerate what the things are, though. There, like, are many of them, you know, and some of them are just like the sweeping. They recreate the whole world again with, like. With Jack Fisk, I believe, is the production designer. Like, you know, the Darius Kanji score. Like Timothy Shalom.
- [91:04]
B
Daniel Lepaton score.
- [91:05]
A
Oh, sorry. Daniel Lepaton score. And then.
- [91:09]
Who is Darius Kanji, though?
- [91:10]
B
He's the cinematographer.
- [91:11]
A
Cinematographer. Thank you. Sorry, I was confusing them. And then.
- [91:16]
Timothy Chalamet going a million. Like a million. And really, really fun. A great supporting cast and it's just people going for it, you know, like. And that is just. It's really. I didn't feel like there were that many movies where this year, with the exception of one we'll probably talk about. So where everyone was just like, let's go really big. Like, we've got. We've got a big idea and we're gonna spend all of this time and energy and create like a whole world and have an immersive experience like you. I have only seen it the one time a couple months ago, but had so much fun and can't wait to see it again.
- [91:57]
B
This episode is brought to you by LinkedIn ads. The best B2B marketing gets wasted on the wrong people. So when you wanna reach the right professional professionals, use LinkedIn ads. LinkedIn has grown to a network of over 1 billion professionals and 130 million decision makers. And that's where it stands apart from other ad buys. You can target your buyers by job title, industry, company role, seniority, skills, company revenue. So you can stop wasting budget on the wrong audience. It's why LinkedIn Ads generates the highest B2B return on ad spend of all online ad networks. Seriously, all of them. Spend $250 on your first campaign on LinkedIn ad and get a free $250 credit for the next one. Just go to LinkedIn.com TheBigPicture Terms and Conditions apply. This episode is brought to you by Coca Cola.
- [92:41]
A
From the first time you turn on your Christmas lights till the last present is placed under the tree, the holiday.
- [92:46]
B
Season is packed with iconic moments.
- [92:49]
A
But with every exciting minute spoken for, it can feel like they're flying by faster than Santa's sleigh.
- [92:54]
B
This Christmas cherished them all with crisp, refreshing Coca Cola.
- [92:57]
A
Hissing, clinking, gulping and ahhing your way through the most exciting moments the season has to offer.
- [93:02]
B
That's a gift in and of itself.
- [93:04]
A
Enjoy a Coca Cola refresh your holidays.
- [93:08]
B
So that is actually the theme of my list, that, like, we are all going for it. So all five of my movies have that energy and I think I'm hoping that that's representative of what I want from the movies more broadly. Okay, number two for you, Sierra.
- [93:19]
C
Oh, number two for me is one battle after another.
- [93:22]
So I mean, wow, wow.
- [93:24]
B
Saving space for ballerina the gorge man.
- [93:29]
C
No, One battle after another. Only in number two by the thinnest of most personal margins. So don't take it in any kind of, like, I'm trying to be a takesman here. It was the cinematic experience of the year for me, getting to a seat at imax. I've seen it several times since then. I also really love to just piggyback off of what Adam was saying about it. The shoulders of this movie in that it supports so many different explorations, both critical, both sort of probing at it and wondering, why this choice? Why that choice. I also am deeply fascinated by it as a work of adaptation and spent the last couple of months, like, not slogging in a bad way, but slogging just because of the way my brain is now through Vineland and thinking about this guy, thinking about this book for decades and piecing together little parts of it and seeing, you know, reflections of Regina Hall's character, Tiana Taylor's character, Leonardo DiCaprio's character in the book. And also just imagining opening up that book to any page and then watching what he does with, like, a flashback within a flashback within an anecdote within another flashback, then zapping to something else and be like, how the fuck you do? Did you write exterior this after reading that, like, did. The act of writing this movie has now become, like, my obsession of, like, how he went about making this in as a screenplay. So that's where I'm. Where I'm at with it, just in terms of how I've been thinking about it. But it's just so wonderful how. How durable this movie is and how. How it's. It's been. It's. It's actually got a sturdiness to be poked at and to be thought about and to be talked about. So, yeah, One Battle.
- [95:15]
B
I've been pleased to see that it's been a number one on iTunes for the last three weeks.
- [95:18]
A
Oh, that's good.
- [95:19]
B
That's encouraging. That will not be reported in its box office receipts. Just putting that out there. I see Van Lathan through the window. That was for you, Van. That was for you, brother. I was talking about One Battles Box Office, which is doing just fine. Dude, all right, back off. Okay. Number two for me is Eddington.
- [95:36]
A
Good.
- [95:38]
B
This can be our brain worms pairing.
- [95:41]
C
Should I show you my phone for the entirety? Should I just stick it in your face?
- [95:45]
B
Eddington is on my list for a variety of reasons. I think it's Ari's best movie. I think it is. I've not quite seen a film attempt to be simultaneously a docudrama and a satire. A movie that knows that it wants to be funny. And poke you and bother you and put you in a state of discomfort and remind you of things that are not safe and not okay, while also saying, like, this is not really that far from what happened. And that thin line in the exploration of. Of that little stinker attitude that Ari Aster has about everybody, where he's like, wouldn't it be funny if I just knocked this little girl's head off? You know, wouldn't it be funny if this old man just jumped off the top of this mountain? He does that many times in this movie. There are a number of occasions in which you see atrociously painful things happen to people who could be seen as innocent. I think one of the reasons why this movie really got put in the take Blender is because people on both sides felt offended. Congratulations. That's part of the. Of the success of the film. I think there's also a case from a purely formal perspective that this is so assured and so conceived and realized. I also watched this movie again last night, popped it in as one does, and from its very opening moments, which struck me so hard the second time I saw it all the way through the end, everything he's trying to communicate is very clear. It will not come across, I think, if you are watching it casually on your couch with your phone in your hand. Hand. But that's the point. Seeing the unhoused man walking across.
- [97:11]
C
What a year for Cliff Collins, by the way.
- [97:13]
B
Giving a great performance, underrated performance. Walking past the sign about the establishment of the incoming data center and then all the events that transpire and then the closing moments of the film where we see said data center constructed, I do think is a great big statement about living under the thumb of powers that are much bigger than us and what we do to each other in the face of that loss of control. And I think it's an amazing Joaquin performance. I think Joaquin and Aster have something very unique in terms of their collaboration and what they get out of each other. But I think it is really more like.
- [97:48]
People don't like this movie because it makes them feel bad about things that have happened in the world and not in the extratextual. I am a mom and I remember feeling pain in the specific. I remember this day and I hate this day. And that's hard to do. That's hard to accomplish. We talked about 25th hour recently. And like the pain and the agony, like the sorrow of 911 in the face of that movie, that's different than what this is. This is more like we're all complicit. It's not really your fault, but you're not making it any better. And that's a bad feeling, but it's a true feeling.
- [98:21]
A
And it's also done. And there's nothing that you can do to undo it. I mean, that final shot shot is absolutely brutal.
- [98:29]
B
And I also just think it's very, very funny. So I'm a huge admirer of this movie. It really stands up, I think, to a lot of its inspection that it has gotten over the last few months and happy to have it at number two. Okay, it's time for number one.
- [98:43]
D
I was going to say the irony with Addington is that the discourse at Cannes, which is not even a year ago now, is that the movie was too soon, which is one thing, and now it's been out for five or six months and it's aged by. Well, you know, like, I think I, I, I, I. It's not in my top five. I, I spoiler. It's not quite in my top ten. But I still wrote about it in the year end thing as an honorable or a dishonorable mention because it's good for all the reason Sean said it is. But it's aged very well. And I think a lot of the initial Cannes reactions to it do not look very smart. I'll, I'll, I'll say that for sure. Speaking of Cannes, my number one film was the film that won the Pomodoro at Cannes this year, which is Jafar Panahi's. It was just an accident. I was listening in before I came on that you had Panahi on the show, which is amazing.
- [99:28]
B
It was amazing.
- [99:29]
D
And I can't wait to listen to that, as I always listen to the interviews, whether Jeanette Far Panahi or Osgood Perkins or whoever, I can't wait.
- [99:38]
B
Two filmmakers of equal stature and equal success.
- [99:41]
D
But this is a film that, beyond talking about why it's good, I hesitate to spoil it too much because it is a thriller. And this is an interesting year for Neon picking up international films and sort of trying to market them not just to an art house audience, but market them as kind of art house event experiences, like Seurat, a really interesting film that I also liked. You know, Neon did that, and it was just an accident.
- [100:06]
This is a filmmaker who is known in the west more for the details of his life than for the Western distribution of his films. And I think that people were skeptical of Panahi winning the Palm Door at Cannes this year because it's like, well, he's being rewarded for the political struggle, or he's being rewarded for what he represents, or he's being rewarded as a shot across the bow of a repressive regime. And, you know, all of that is sort of true, but the movie itself is so funny and brutal and visceral as this kind of possible mistaken identity thriller. And it's a real move back to the films he made before the period where he was making films illegally under house arrest. I mean, this movie was not made legally. We should be clear about this. I'm sure you talked to him about it, that a lot of it had to be shot on the fly, you know, unofficially. It's an amazing act of just stress to make a movie this way. And he's always been a critical filmmaker or a skeptical filmmaker, but he was a narrative filmmaker before. And movies like the Circle and Crimson Gold, they're kind of plot driven. They don't diverge too much from this Western idea of Iranian art cinema, you know, the Kirastami Mode or Moshin Makhmaboff. But he was always. He had more of an engine dramatically. And then the movies he had to make after his imprisonment and release and House Arrest necessarily had no production belt value and no scope. They had to shrink down to the size of him making the movie. Anyone listening to the pod who hasn't seen it? He made a movie called this Is Not a Film, which is his record of House Arrest, where he really was not allowed to pick up a camera at that point. So he keeps finding very acute rhetorical reasons. People, I'm not really making a movie, but what if I were to do this? You know, he has that playful, let's.
- [101:44]
B
Capture the blocking of my next film on my iPhone so that I can prepare to make that film. Yeah, yeah.
- [101:49]
D
If I were to do it. And then meanwhile, you know, I think in that movie, at one point, you see his DVD collection and Ryan Reynolds and Buried is facing right out to the screen because he's very funny. And also, this is. And it was just an accident, you actually have a guy being buried alive, which is maybe more of a reference to Taste of Cherry by Kira Stomach Rose to me than Ryan Reynolds. But it's a terrific, brutal, funny, you know, Mistaken Identity kind of ensemble thriller. And it's very slack. You know, it has one of the most amazing portraits of corruption I've ever seen, where I'll say, this is the one spoiler I'll have where the credit card machine.
- [102:24]
B
Is that what you're gonna say?
- [102:25]
D
Yeah. The security guards have like tap to look the other way. And I have a friend who just moved back to Toronto from Tehran, my friend Azadeh. And she's like, yeah, she's like that. Scans.
- [102:37]
B
I asked him specifically about that because that sequence is hilariously stunning.
- [102:42]
D
So it's just odd to see this filmmaker whose reputation precedes him in a heroic way and now the film is go. Going to be seen in a way that a lot of those other movies aren't seen because there is something more commercial about it. Films like Taxi or Three Faces or no Bears, they're all worth seeing, but they're very much festival films. And this is getting a push and a release and a kind of an awards season profile which is, you know, nice to see. So I should be clear, I'm not picking it for any of those extracurricular reasons, though those are interesting. And anyone who's listening to the pod who doesn't know about Jahar Panahi and his story, they're lucky that they're going to get to hear you fill it in an interview. I didn't know you were doing this. That. That's fantastic. The movie's also really good and you know, I think it's, it's, it's acclaim is deserved. You know, beyond the good vibes or the virtue, you know, signaling that people might feel that they're. They're doing by liking it. It's just a really good movie with the best last scenes of the year. Yes. Last two scenes back to back and it was just an accident. Are absolutely amazing.
- [103:43]
B
It's a great recommendation. I'm glad one of us has it on the list. It's a wonderful film. We'll talk more about it next week. Okay. Number one, Amanda.
- [103:51]
A
One battle after another. Not a surprise and probably not the time last time. We'll talk about it on this episode. How often do we go to the movies with this level of expectation and sit down and just walk out and be like they did it. Like just absolute instant five star mass, which it was. You know, I won't speak for Sean, he has his own turn but it was for me. And you know, P.T. he's pretty good. Like good track record, you know, but I still Leo pretty good everybody in this film. But I think.
- [104:30]
To what you were saying, Sean, like the scale and the going for it and the breadth of this film which is, you know, as Adam pointed out, like half Terminator 2 and like the Searchers and Casablanca and like it's, you know, all of film history. Incredibly rooted in our current moment. From that opening scene of the detention, you know, whatever center you want to call that.
- [104:57]
Like the performances, the set piece, like, you know, Benicio gets his moment like Sean Penn gets his moment. The Christmas adventurers get their season. I mean, I just. It's getting into the Christmas spirit is slightly different this year, and that's okay. I knew that it would be.
- [105:14]
But here we are. And you know, and then I do, you know, to my theme, the.
- [105:21]
Both the idea, like, of parenthood as it is expressed in this movie, both through the Tiana Taylor character, through Perfidia, and then through Bob, the prologue and the.
- [105:32]
And the main movie, which is kind of how I understand them and.
- [105:39]
What you give to your kids, what you do with your life.
- [105:45]
What is possible, what you leave behind, how you failed. Finding Hope for the Next Generation. I find it an incredibly moving.
- [105:56]
Story, in addition to being funny and wild and virtuosic and, and. And accessible also, you know, so I am excited to see this film again. I think we'll probably be talking about it for the next few months, but, yeah, I'm a fan.
- [106:14]
B
Well said, C.R. number one.
- [106:16]
C
My number one is 28 years later.
- [106:18]
B
Wow.
- [106:18]
A
There you go. Good for you.
- [106:23]
C
Okay, so you guys have spoken very beautifully about being parents, so I'll talk a little bit about being a kid. I think when I saw this movie in the summer, I was starting to come to terms with the idea that my mom was probably not going to live for the rest of the year. And I don't. When you're going through something like that, especially as an only child, a lot of it is logistical and mechanical, like, who needs to be where, what are we going to do about this? Is she going to get to this appointment on time, etc. I had not really thought about what it meant, and I did not expect to find the. That in a zombie movie by Danny Boyle that picked up a franchise that was pretty much forgotten after a decent sequel 20 years ago. But here we are.
- [107:06]
And you know, this film is dazzling. I have no problems putting it on there, even if I didn't have this personal narrative kind of attached to it. But I think that the creative energy that this guy brings to a story that did not necessitate this level of. Of thoughtful execution, brazen kind of leaping into the future with like, what can we do with these phones to film things? And also just like imagining a country which, you know, I've gotten to visit England several times over the last couple years. And so this was. I feel like you could just as well call this movie the Rise and Fall of the British Empire, dealing with Brexit, dealing with its own island kind of isolationism and its own mythologies. And the stories of that they're telling themselves about who English people are and their bravery. And thinking so much about Alfie Williams's character, who gives an amazing performance as the central child, which going into the film, you're not. You don't know that this kid is going to be the hero in the movie. The way he watches his parents and the way he watches who he thinks is the hero. And his dad kind of become this lout and who he thinks is this problem in his life and his mother who becomes like, you know, his responsibility. And then you get into the second and third act of this film, especially the third act with Ray Fines, who gives my favorite performance of the year. And the character, I'll never forget as this iodine. You know.
- [108:35]
B
His.
- [108:35]
C
His. Sorry. He gives this performance as this sort of doctor whose skin is tainted with iodine because he's sort of protecting himself from the infection infected. And they go through this death ceremony at the end of the film that I found profoundly moving. And so this movie just never left me. I've been thinking about it all year. I think there are movies that I. I think are more successful. A lot of people have problems with the very last scene of this movie. We'll find out in the Bone Temple.
- [109:04]
B
Yeah. If.
- [109:04]
C
If it works out.
- [109:05]
B
Yeah, but we're going to the Bone Temple in, like, six weeks.
- [109:08]
C
I know, but this was. This was. This was my film of the year.
- [109:11]
B
Chris is beautiful.
- [109:12]
A
Yeah.
- [109:12]
D
Can I. Can I add something to that? Because this is the movie I was going to try and sneak on. It's on my top 10. Yeah. Because I just wanted to talk about. I'm happy to hear Chris talk about it. This movie rules, you know. And I've been very hard writing about Alex Garland in the past because there's just sometimes things I think the tone is off or he's too severe. There's a terrific script. I think the best thing Garland's ever written. Because everything Chris said, there is not projection like it's in the movie.
- [109:38]
C
Yeah.
- [109:39]
D
The. The illusions in the film to Shakespeare and to K. And this idea of the sun setting on the British Empire kind of finally. And whether it's time or not. And that image of the land bridge, that chase across the land bridge is one of the greatest.
- [109:53]
B
Yeah. So good.
- [109:53]
D
Causeway scene is incredible. Just the athleticism of it. How it's Filmed and the Bone Temple. It's a very moving film. And this is one of those, like, I just got to give it up. I didn't think this team had it. Had it in them to make something that good together, together again. It's just. I'm so happy Chris picked it as number one because it rocks. It's a really, really great movie.
- [110:16]
B
Great job, cr.
- [110:16]
C
Thanks, man.
- [110:17]
B
You did it. Good job. I like this movie too. I got to watch it again, I think. Yeah, I watched this. Unfortunately, after getting off of a plane at 11 o' clock in the morning, the ideal service come back from Atlanta.
- [110:29]
A
Atlanta, even worse.
- [110:30]
B
Yeah, I liked it a lot, but I was like, wow, you were audacious.
- [110:35]
A
Very upset by how quickly. I mean, I was affected by it, you know, but it was. Jodie Corman was just suddenly out and I was like, well, I guess that's how it happens.
- [110:43]
C
But this is upsetting in the Bone Temple. Yeah, yeah, that's how it goes.
- [110:47]
B
I'm going to the Bone Temple for number one as well. It's one battle after another. So all five of my movies are about two things. One is thwarted male ambition, which I think is the primary theme of movies for me this year.
- [111:01]
A
Yeah.
- [111:01]
B
About big guys who are like, I got this and they do not got it. And I do think that there is something broader being communicated about the state of life, at least English speaking life as I understand it right now.
- [111:17]
D
About.
- [111:18]
B
How people are feeling about the means of control right now, who's making decisions and the powerlessness that other people feel in the face of that. Especially a lot of guys who have tricked themselves into thinking that they're in charge. And then we're discovering more and more who's really in charge. And I think one battle after another, that's a component of this. I think the other flip side of that is the kind of signal to noise confusion that comes with being a parent. When you actually are in charge of someone and you have a responsibility and how overriding that responsibility becomes in your life relative to those forces at large. We're thinking about what's going on in the world. You guys have been making fun of me for a couple years because I'm like, I'm not reading the news at all anymore. And how do you not know that the whales flew over here and now they're in Zanzibar? It's just human interest.
- [112:00]
But I have increasingly checked out of a lot of those things for a couple of reasons. I have definitely sunk myself deeper into movies in recent years and Sunk myself deeper into my work, and I've also sunk myself deeper into my family life and being with my kid. And I'm already predisposed as everyone who's listening to this point in the show to loving Paul Thomas Anderson movies. When Licorice Pizza came out, that was my favorite movie of the year. Most people who love Paul Thomas Anderson, if he makes a movie, it's probably not my favorite movie of the year, but it's gonna be my favorite movie of the year. So it's not really worth exploring in that specific way, but in the same way that you talk about the deep emotional and personal connection that you make to a movie like 28 Years later, which I think is really one of the primary reasons why this show, I hope, is a little bit different from other shows, which is that there's no pretense to objectivity. We're all alive and responding to the art in the very specific. Through the very specific lens of our life and who we are as people. And this movie feels almost fake to me because of all of the ways in which I felt connected to it. I do respond specifically to what Adam is saying about going back to the film and saying, am I convincing myself of things? I do try to check myself on those things. I do try to say, well, I have these. Not just biases, but obsessions. And are the obsessions informing the way that I perform this show? In this case, I have no doubts about that whatsoever. I think that everything that you said is right, that this is somebody at the top of their game who spent decades figuring out how to construct this. And then one of the things that I have loved, that I think makes me ultimately not a critic, because I get very informed by these things, is getting to talk to Paul about making the movie and all the ways he was like, yeah, well, you know, in this case, we just kind of made this part up on the spot. I know. And I'm like, what? How did you.
- [113:47]
In this level of production with this many important people and this much money.
- [113:51]
C
On the line, so much riding on it.
- [113:53]
B
Yeah. And all this expectation and all the incoming doubt about its box office potential, and would it stand up to previous work that they were like, you know what? Good idea, Benicio. Let's do it that way. Let's shut down production for a couple days. Let's rejigger this whole thing. And it worked. And that it flows and that it feels like. It's like. It feels like you're going down a waterfall while you're watching the movie. You're on the. The ride, and I find that just remarkable and breathtaking. And I think that the film also.
- [114:20]
Is not. I think it is what you're saying, which is that it is about the modern time, but I don't think it really is a message about the modern time. I think it is a. A suggestion of potential and maybe a snapshot of something, but it is not saying, like, it goes without saying that white supremacists, fascists are evil. Like, that doesn't need to be extreme explained. But what happens next, I feel like, is what is most critical. And the movie ends on what happens next. We don't know. We don't know where Chase Infinity's character goes. We don't know what happens to her, but we want to know, and we're excited for her and we're rooting for her. And as far as being a parent goes, I have to be hopeful. I can't be stuck in the world is shit. I'm as prone to cynicism as anyone I know, but I'm forced to reject it, at least in the face of, one, a work of art that I love, and two, the fact that.
- [115:16]
We can't let go. We got to keep going. So this was very obviously going to be my number one movie of the year. It is quite strange, Adam. Chris was asking, what's it like to root for the 1927 Yankees at the top of this episode when it comes to award season, with one battle after another, where it's like everyone agrees this is the masterpiece piece. It's the perfect narrative of a filmmaker who has been nominated 11 times but has not been awarded for his work. It's this, the film. Bros are all have all been rooting for PTA for 25 years, and he's due. And even still, I don't care. Like, you know, and if.
- [115:51]
Deserves it, like, it deserves the attention. And it's. To me, it's nice when something like that happens. Does that mean I'm part of the.
- [115:59]
Problem of the power structure? You know, is it my time now?
- [116:01]
A
Maybe so part of the appeal of this movie is that it's. Is it's to our generation and it's about how we are getting old and we're at this, you know, later phase of life of figuring out what we did that mattered and all the many things that didn't and how to. How to. How to speak to younger people, like Jack in the booth. So, you know, I guess if, like, if it does win, it would be fitting that it's the One that we're aligned with. It's reflecting us back to ourselves. I'm still protecting my heart, as I said, you know, like, I'm not. I'm. I'm ready for tomfoolery.
- [116:32]
C
It is strange to watch a movie and you get like Dirty Work and Mo Bamba in the same film and you're just like, what the fuck is happening? Like, how to. How did I arrive at this place in my life where this is what I get?
- [116:43]
D
I think that the. One of the pieces that my students looked at it was an assessment of Anderson's career from 99, like after Magnolia came out. And it's someone being like this filmmaker means entirely too much to, to people. And that was like from 1999, you know, that there's this idea of looking for heroes in film cultures. Like, what are those heroic qualities? And it's like, get stuff done their way, makes the movie they want, you know, spends money well, but not poorly. And you know, heart in right place and politics in right place. It is accessible but, you know, still has a certain kind of integrity. And there's a lot of aspects of this movie arguably that align for this looking like a kind of culmination in the filmmaker's career. But he's such an interesting director that my question at the end of the movies and just what happens to the characters? It's where does this kind of filmmaker go next? And a lot of that is going to be dictated by this award season. I say this unfortunately because it shouldn't. Right. But this movie's road to profitability goes straight through getting those awards. And unfortunately that idea of profitability is going to be what determines the size and scope and budget and scale of the next thing that they, you know, of the next that they get.
- [117:58]
C
Also, I wouldn't underestimate the degree to which he wants to embrace Academy Award winning director Paul Thomas Anderson. Or if he wants to go make Inherent Vice or Licorice Pizza again and kind of like step back a little bit.
- [118:09]
B
To me, the magic is doing both, if you can do both. And he's not shy about being enamored with great Hollywood history. Like a director like George Stevens really matters to Paul Thomas. Andrew Anderson. George Stevens is not a cool film bro pick. He's made a lot of great films that are admired, but he doesn't have that same canonical, obsessive quality that I don't like a Howard Hawks does, for example. And I think he would like a career like that where you're at the absolute top of the industry and working on your own terms, working with your own ideas and themes. So I. I don't know. I don't think he's going to have a hard time getting. Raising money. But I would be surprised if he wanted to make another $150 million movie that he hasn't shown a lot of interest in stories like that. It would be fascinating if he was like, I'm making weapons too. You know, like, I don't think that's what he's going to do with his time. But it is an interesting question to see where he goes from here because this does feel like scaling the mountaintop in a way that we have seen before from great filmmakers, Paramount plus series. You think we should get him in the Taylor Sheridan universe?
- [119:11]
C
I'm here to tell you that I checked out the news today and it's all going to be okay.
- [119:15]
B
Everything's good.
- [119:15]
C
Yeah, yeah, we're good.
- [119:16]
B
Wow.
- [119:16]
C
We fixed it.
- [119:17]
B
All the bad guys died simultaneously. No, that's amazing.
- [119:20]
C
He turned to the camera and said, ah, my bad.
- [119:23]
B
I do want to do some honorable mentions. Jack, before we do that, what's your favorite movie of the year? It's one battle.
- [119:28]
D
Okay.
- [119:29]
B
A lot of my. I think it would be one battle.
- [119:31]
D
Sinners Train Dreams. It was just an accident in Eddington.
- [119:34]
C
There you go, Jack.
- [119:36]
B
Testament of Van Lee very close by. Yeah, I was going to mention that in my honorable mentions as well. Another movie I think I probably needed to see. Again, some kookiness. Not everything is cool.
- [119:43]
C
I'll also say I haven't gotten a chance to see a lot of the very either incredibly limited or not yet released films.
- [119:49]
B
So I'll knock off some honorable mentions to start because I did have a bit of a challenge with my top 10, as I mentioned. So Secret Agent we already talked about in Weapons we already talked about. Blue Moon is pretty high on my list. I'm really, really fond of that film. I love Ethan Hawke's performance in that movie. We got two Linklater movies this year, so that was very special. I still like Sentimental Value and I'm not afraid to say it. I know the tide is turning amongst the film Liter Rotty on that film. I'm not backing down. God damn it. I think that movie is really good and really interestingly designed and very sincere and God damn it, I love stories. I love stories.
- [120:25]
And I also think Kelly Reichart's the Mastermind is really, really special and thought about putting that on and I would like to revisit that movie at some point too. Amanda we got some honorable mentions for you.
- [120:36]
A
Yeah, I made a whole list, but it's on my phone, which is in my bag over there, so.
- [120:41]
B
Well, let's throw to Adam so Amanda can get up.
- [120:43]
A
Okay. Am I allowed to go get it?
- [120:44]
B
Yeah, go get it. Adam, you got any honorable mentions?
- [120:47]
D
Yeah, Mastermind's very good. Blue Moon is very good. I like the Testament of Van Lee, which sort of plays like an episode of Drunk History sometimes, which is a compliment.
- [120:58]
You know, a pretty kind of interesting companion piece. Not B side but like double A side to the Brutalist. Because it is really similar. It's not. Not the fake perception that it's similar because it's the two same filmmakers. Really interesting approach to like assimilation in America and building something in a country from the ground up. I like Testament of an Lee and I definitely want to give a shout out because it's going to be on my ten best list too. Radu Judah's Dracula. I just watched easily the most productively annoying movie I saw this year.
- [121:28]
B
So obnoxious.
- [121:29]
D
It's so obnoxious. It's so good. As someone pointed out, I laughed when they pointed this out, that the funniest thing about it is that it's just called Dracula. Like you watch this three hour film which goes out of its way to not really be a Dracula movie or to throw so many obstacles in the idea of like, what does it mean to adapt Dracula? And he just calls it that. He's very funny. And that was one of those screenings where I thought they should have handed out. I saw it at TIFF. Not only at TIFF, but it was during Game 5 of the World Series starting at 9pm with the Jays playing in the World Series. So totally we couldn't watch the game at all. They should have given out like medals for getting through it.
- [122:08]
B
It's a 2 hour, 45 minute, episodic, sketch oriented series of Dracula adaptations that features a tremendous amount of AI.
- [122:20]
D
At least 15 minutes of pornographic AI. Okay.
- [122:23]
B
You know, it is itself a comment on it. It is not celebrating or using the AI to make a better film. It's an absurdist satire of the use of AI and making, making IP in some ways, you know, adapting the great works for film. But man, it's such an annoying movie. It's so long. It's a really elaborate prank.
- [122:45]
D
Yeah, it's an elaborate prank and sort of a troll. But he has. I mean, again, it would make a. I put it on the 10 best list as a double bill with sinners as vampire movies. But it could just as easily go on a double bill with Tillyleg Addington. Yeah, the sort of, you know, an eye, a stinker. Or as the filmmaker within the film talks about, he really should have called it Frankenstein because it's this patchwork, you know, amalgamation of all these other kind of monster movie tropes. I certainly like it as a Frankenstein movie better than Frankenstein, but I like Dracula a lot. I think it's terrific.
- [123:17]
B
Okay, you got your list?
- [123:18]
A
I do. I just made a long list. Chronological. Chronologically. And many of your top fives are on there. So I won't read those.
- [123:27]
B
Black bag Steven Soderbergh pop up on yours.
- [123:30]
A
Yeah, well. But it's on here. It is on my long list. Paddington in Peru, which I believe was released here in 2025 in the United States. Pavements. Alex Ross, Perry's movie.
- [123:39]
B
Great show.
- [123:40]
A
Phoenician scheme. Wes Anderson. Sorry Baby in Victor's film. Let's see. Scrolling Blue Moon. You said Mastermind. Begonia. I. I like Begonia.
- [123:49]
B
You know, I do too.
- [123:50]
A
I. It's.
- [123:51]
B
I. Adam does not.
- [123:52]
A
Adam does not. But I liked it. And it does make like a double header, like a double feature with a lot of the other films on this list. Testament of an Lee. We discussed no other choice. And then, you know, I wrote down 3 Rom com Rom coms where I would say it's genre experiments. I'm glad they tried.
- [124:16]
B
Okay.
- [124:17]
A
And it's Materialists Splitsville. And I'm even gonna say, even though I have a lot of notes, Eternity. I'm glad we're trying. Yeah, let's keep trying.
- [124:26]
B
There's a fourth film that I would add to that list if I was you. And I don't know if anyone here is seen it that I really like and I considered for my five and it's even more annoying than putting Marty supreme and no other choice on there. But it's a movie called Pillion, which I saw. I'll tell you about Alexander Skarsgrd movie first time filmmaker Harry Lytton. It's essentially a BDSM gay rom com about two men who sort of fall in love under servitude and is like probably the hardest I laughed in a movie this year. That and Eddington were the two, I thought the two funniest movies of the year. Alexander Skarsgrd gives an amazing performance. A couple of people have mentioned this when we've done the what's the Last Great Thing youg've Seen? The movie's coming out for like a week. In five theaters in 2025 and then opening later in 2026. That's probably when people get a chance to see it.
- [125:16]
C
Is it gonna be up for awards?
- [125:18]
B
I think that's why. So it qualifies, but it's. I mean, it's probably not gonna really.
- [125:21]
A
I think it was, like, on the indie spirit list.
- [125:23]
B
Yes, it is nominated for Indie Spirits. You're right. I hope people check it out. It's really, really funny and really, really beautiful and sweet, and I like that movie a lot. A couple of other quick ones. Two docs, One Predators, which I mentioned I saw out of Sundance, which is about how to catch a predator and the sort of sociological, anthropological meaning of living in a society in which we want to try to entrap pedophiles live on TV and then air the consequences of their actions. Just a fascinating movie by David Oset. And the other one is Cover up, which is Laura Poitras portrait of Seymour Hirsch and his work as an investigator.
- [125:58]
C
That's going to Netflix soon, right?
- [125:59]
B
That's going to Netflix, I think, end of this month, which is just.
- [126:04]
C
Can't wait to see that.
- [126:05]
B
In tradition with her work, which is always staggering, but also something that. I mean, we've probably talked about SYR stories, all three of us, multiple times in their 20 years of friendship.
- [126:14]
C
That'd be good if that only news you read was S H articles.
- [126:18]
B
Well, his substack is a flame these days, so. Cr. You want to shout anything out?
- [126:23]
C
F1, which we briefly discussed, but was kind of like the moviegoing experience of the year, and definitely broke the wall where I was like, I think I'm actually watching real sports while this is happening.
- [126:38]
Alex Garland's Warfare. I would also throw out Splitsville, which I think was the hardest thing I laughed this year in a movie, not least of which because the idea that the two leads could land Adri Arjona and Dakota Johnson. But once you get past that or go along with that, it is kind of part of the joke. And havoc.
- [126:58]
B
Havoc?
- [126:58]
C
Yeah, the Tom Hardy movie.
- [126:59]
A
Havoc.
- [127:01]
B
Right on. I do. I just remembered one other movie I want to shout out.
- [127:03]
A
I remembered one more, too, but you.
- [127:05]
B
You want to go first?
- [127:05]
A
Well, I just.
- [127:06]
C
Is it also havoc?
- [127:06]
A
Yeah.
- [127:09]
B
No.
- [127:09]
A
When you were talking about Doc Megadock.
- [127:11]
B
Oh, Megadock. Yes.
- [127:12]
A
Which is awesome.
- [127:12]
B
Just announced going to criterion channel December 16th so people can check that out. That movie was really good. No Final Destination. Bloodlines.
- [127:20]
Is so fucking fun. And again, is what it's all about. Getting in the movie theater, watching people get Mercilessly annihilated by all types of household products and medical equipment. That's what I want.
- [127:33]
D
Also picked by John Waters. Do you see John Waters.
- [127:37]
Bloodlines on.
- [127:38]
B
Eddington and Final Destination? Bloodlines. That's a. That's. I, I mean, that was his one, too. Yeah. He always has great picks.
- [127:44]
D
I had one other honorable mention. You'll forgive me the most. Actually, the thing I enjoyed watching most this year was the Ben Affleck Criterion Closet Video.
- [127:51]
A
You and me both.
- [127:52]
D
Adam Neiman Said, said, said, said, said. Without irony. My hot take is. My hot take is he should run.
- [127:58]
A
For president a thousand percent.
- [128:01]
D
Yeah, 100%.
- [128:02]
B
It's great. I don't think that would turn out.
- [128:06]
A
I know, but like, again, wouldn't you risk it all?
- [128:09]
B
Just wouldn't you risk it all? I bet he would.
- [128:12]
D
Have a good time. Amanda.
- [128:14]
A
Yes.
- [128:14]
D
Amanda. I'm not, I'm. I'm not wrong about this. Right? That's the best closet video ever. Or it's right up there.
- [128:19]
A
It's. It is really great. And I watched all of it wrapped this year. The JLO documentary where that was last year, where he talks about cameras for a while. That's also, if you. You haven't checked that out, just him.
- [128:32]
D
Holding on to Rules of the Game and the content of the Big bad Affleck.
- [128:36]
B
Rules of the Game. Miller's Crossing. The Elephant Man. The elephant.
- [128:38]
D
Oh, I'm not saying it. I'm not saying with a shred of funny.
- [128:41]
B
No, no.
- [128:42]
D
He's there talking about Rules of the Game and he's like Jean Renoir, you know, great humanist. He loves his characters. It has the great line in films. Everyone has his reasons. I'm like, testify, Ben Affleck. I. I bet. I bet everyone has their reasons. It was great.
- [128:57]
B
Well, that just about does it. We've done it again. We've celebrated Ben Affleck here on the show as we so often do. We have talked about films that we like a great deal. And we're going to get back to the real work, actually, on Monday. On Monday, we're going to talk about the Golden Globe nominations. That's where the real work starts. You getting excited about that?
- [129:15]
A
Yeah. What's our call time?
- [129:17]
B
4:00Am okay.
- [129:18]
A
Great.
- [129:19]
B
Hair and makeup at 4:00am no, I'd probably be about 8:00am a.m. okay. Our time. You can make that work?
- [129:24]
A
Yeah.
- [129:24]
B
Okay. Jack Sanders is gonna have to make it work. He's the producer of this episode. Thanks to him. Thanks so much to Adam Naman, who is not the mean pod guy. He's the beloved, beautiful perfect pod guy.
- [129:34]
D
No. And I'm, and I'm so happy to see yours. But especially Chris Ryan, my first, my first ringer contact. Always happy to see Chris.
- [129:39]
C
I don't think we've potted together since last best of so this is always whose fault is probably mine.
- [129:44]
B
Yeah, you host like nine pods.
- [129:46]
C
Well, Adam's never like I gotta get, I gotta break down severance with you, brother.
- [129:49]
B
What's your favorite TV TV show of the year? Did you watch any tv?
- [129:51]
D
Oh, Chair Company. Yeah.
- [129:55]
Which I'm not even, which I'm not even finished. I think is the best, best, best, best TV I've watched this year.
- [130:01]
B
Any closing thoughts?
- [130:02]
C
CR no, it's always just a great, great to go through a year of movies with you guys.
- [130:06]
B
Can you just do maybe like a little like an impression of a famous actor or something just to send this out? Okay, we gotta go.
- [130:33]
C
Hey, Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. You know, one of the perks about having four kids that you know about is actually getting a direct line to the big man up north. And this year he wants you to know the best gift that you can give someone is the gift of Mint Mobile's unlimited wireless for $15 a month. Now you don't even need to wrap it. Give it a try@mintmobile.com Switch upfront payment.
- [130:54]
D
Of $45 for three month plan equivalent to $15 per month required new customer.
- [130:57]
A
Offer for first three months only.
- [130:58]
B
Speed slow after 35 gigabytes if network's busy, taxes and fees extra. See mintmobile.com.