The Movies

First things first: Thank you for 200 episodes! It's been continuously joyful to keep showing up for y'all, to chat about the art form that fuels my love and obsession. I gave myself a goal to get here by December, so the fact that it's May tells me I've put a decent-sized proverbial fire under my ass.Today, I interview Bille August, the director of the new romantic drama THE KISS, about soldier-in-training Anton (Esben Smed) courting wheelchair-bound aristocrat Edith (Clara Rosager) in 1913 Denmark.At first, this sounds like the stuff of airport love novels, but Anton's main concern is to pull himself up by the bootstraps out of poverty. This pursuit of upper class ends up creating a rift between his feelings for Edith because his prejudice, quiet though unchecked, ensures, in his mind, that a serious romantic relationship would be judged negatively by his community.He does care for her, so he won't be callous as his fellow soldiers do behind her back, but he also won't defend her. He overcompensates with compassion to soften any blow regarding blowing off plans or sneaking in a lie to cover his whereabouts. Compassion bleeds into pity, reflecting the warning posted in the title of the Stefan Zweig novel on which the movie's based: BEWARE OF PITY.August and I spoke about pity, the idea of too much compassion being the real villain of a decidedly thorny, frustrating story. Anton hits too close to home regarding how we pity others, how our own prejudices go unexamined due to cowardice. In this, the movie's evergreen.THE KISS is currently playing in select theaters.---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Letterboxd

THE KISS is based on Stefan Zweig's novel BEWARE OF PITY. Pity is the word. It's the emotion that keeps Anton (Esben Smed) at an arm's length from Edith (Clara Rosager).Anton is a poor kid trying to raise his social status by rising through military ranks. Edith is the wheelchair-bound daughter of the wealthy Baron Løvenskjold (Lars Mikkelsen). He makes her laugh. She loves his company. He looks strapping in uniform. She's gorgeous. The movie's called THE KISS. The poster has them an inch away from locking lips; this should be a romance for the ages, right?Not necessarily. Anton's quest for a higher class leaves him susceptible to external (and subsequently internal) judgment. The ableist muttering from other soldiers and cries of "You're not really with her, are you?" are enough to keep him quiet. He doesn't join in the jeering but he also doesn't defend her. The prejudice is quiet yet strong. He flakes on commitments; he lies to her. He clearly enjoys spending time with her but a wheelchair-bound wife isn't great for the image. That's enough for him to justify his distance by extending too much compassion, by doubting Edith's abilities, pushing back on any of her attempts to let loose. Compassion festers into pity. Pity is myopic: It only sees a person for what they can't do, who they can't be.This makes for an appropriately frustrating lead. I think it's going to frustrate because for the most part, Anton's a stand-up guy. But he's got that prejudice. He recognizes it and cowardly remains inert about it. A lot of us can probably see ourselves in Anton and as much as we fear other people's judgments, we fear our own the most. THE KISS isn't the most riveting movie, but it made me point the finger back towards myself.THE KISS is currently playing in select theaters.---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Letterboxd

ADA: MY MOTHER THE ARCHITECT is a documentary directed by Yael Melamede, the daughter of the titular mother, Ada Karim-Melamede.Karim-Melamede is one of Israel's finest architects, receiving the Israel Prize for architecture in 2007, an honor she shares with both her father and brother. She co-designed Israel's Supreme Court with her brother from 1982 to 1992. This was a move intended to only keep her separate from her American-based husband and three kids for a year. 40 years later, Ada continues to live alone in Tel Aviv.This tension between mother and daughter is inherent to the story, but never beholden to it. Yael, a self-proclaimed failed architect in her own right, approaches interviewing her mother against a typical cradle-to-career-to-family path. She gets Ada to talk the most by asking about architecture.It's through Ada's breakdowns of five concepts that Yael is able to blend a primer on architectural appreciation with her mother's history. This movie coming in the wake of THE BRUTALIST's success last year doesn't surprise me. What it does do, however, is expand the horizons of my understanding. You can look at a pretty building all day, but once you understand how the architect chooses, characterizes, synthesizes each decision, almost like a filmmaker blocking each frame? It's hard to ever again look at a building with merely a passive gaze.Via Ada's conversations about architectural roots, the role of one's heart, the passage of time and the need to respect the past when it comes time to carve a creative future, I learn about this woman's devotion to the environment, history, the fulfillment of a grand ideological promise, and mostly, the benefits of creating within a community.What Yael Melamede is able to pull off in 80 minutes is astonishing. I shouldn't have expected any less from someone with such a history in design. ---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Letterboxd

This week, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced some new rule changes regarding eligibility and voting for the Oscars. The main change? Oscar voters are, as of this season, REQUIRED to watch all nominees in each category they vote in. Why this wasn't a rule beforehand is beyond me, but y'know, if the best time to throw water at a burning house is at the start, the second best time is now. Along with this is some language regarding generative AI, new submission deadlines, updates to the voting process for the Animated Short Film and Cinematography categories, and the rule reveal for how the new category for Best Casting will be decided.I was fully ready to let this Oscars news be the full episode, but Thierry Fremaux and his band of merry folx had different plans. Part deux of the 2025 Cannes Film Festival lineup dropped yesterday, adding 16 films to the official selection, including Kristen Stewart's directorial debut THE CHRONOLOGY OF WATER and Lynne Ramsay's DIE MY LOVE (which will be featured In Competition).How can I pass up an opportunity to talk about even more potentially kickass movies? Do you SEE the name of this podcast?---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!, Bluesky & Letterboxd

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This week, the Cannes Film Festival announced its lineup for their 78th edition. Taking place in the beachside town of Cannes, France from May 13-24, the festival opens up the movie lover's summer to the widest swath of exceptional global cinema, blockbuster premieres and the first glimpses of next year's Oscars contenders.This episode sees me fumbling through pronunciations to share the movies announced and highlight the ones that look most rad (Ari Aster! Spike Lee! Julia Ducournau!). Pop a squat and let's look forward to the summer movie season!For more information on the festival, click here!---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky

Just because ANORA wears the Oscars' Best Picture crown doesn't mean the movies nominated turn to dust. In fact, as the Best Picture nominees slowly trickle out to home video, discussing them feels more pertinent. A movie's lifespan isn't limited to the awards calendar, especially when it comes to WICKED.Jon M. Chu's fantasy musical, based on the Broadway show, vacuumed up the world's cash to the tune of nearly $750 million, a testament to the musical's 20+ year success. This thing's been around long enough on its own to discuss it in generational terms.But WICKED owes it all to THE WIZARD OF OZ, being a prequel exploring the college years of Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) and Galinda (Ariana Grande), who will be known later in life as the Wicked Witch and Good Witch, respectively.Grande's lovably bubbly narcissism makes me laugh. Even the camera can't stop following her hair flips and flighty trots across the sets. Erivo seems incapable of playing a false note. They carry years worth of pain behind a restrictive, poised demeanor, presenting confidence as a defense tower.Our technicolor understanding of the land of Oz is muted by a change in perspective. We're not from Kansas anymore, Toto. Director of photography and frequent Chu collaborator Alice Brooks gives Oz a more tactile, European feel, at times flooding the background with natural light that gives the sets a lived-in presence. This isn't a Marvel Studios CGI nightmare (for the most part).But this idea of a realistic Oz, marked by more serious ventures into ANIMAL FARM-esque allegories for fascist subjugations within a caste system, doesn't always gel with the magic or whimsy WIZARD OF OZ is known for. It feels as though each creative grabbed their own idea of what WICKED should be and stretched it in said direction. The result is something that doesn't coalesce but I'll be damned if I say I didn't have fun with it.Though I'm still stunned Chu got a Critics' Choice Award for Best Director. Go home; y'all are drunk.---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

THE LUCKIEST MAN IN AMERICA is now available to watch at a theater near you. And when you return home, go catch Samir Oliveros' debut BAD LUCKY GOAT for free on Tubi. It's a goddamn gem.---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

Samir Oliveros directs THE LUCKIEST MAN IN AMERICA, a comedy starring Paul Walter Hauser as a man who, in 1984, takes game show execs and a studio audience for the thrill of a lifetime as he aims to pocket the most money ever won on PRESS YOUR LUCK. The execs say he must be cheating. The audience cheers him on, a bumbling working-class zero given the opportunity of a lifetime.I interviewed Oliveros about this kind of person, someone who doesn't wish to walk the safe, paved paths to success, instead carving out their own swath of the jungle. Where do the spirits of a guy chasing a game show streak and a Colombian filmmaker pursuing storytelling as a living with - limited - resources intersect? Let's find out.THE LUCKIEST MAN IN AMERICA is available to watch on the big screen in a theater near you. Do your own spirit some good and give it a watch.After you've returned, pop on Oliveros' debut, the quirky microbudget comedy BAD LUCKY GOAT, on Tubi. It's about a brother and sister who strike a goat with their dad's truck and have to scrounge up the money for the repair before he finds out. It plays a great balance of chilled-out island life against the desperation of someone who's seemingly going for broke to tell this story as if they'll never get another shot. Lots of playful camerawork, vibrant colors, and a bickering lead duo for the books. ---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

I missed Leigh Whannell's newest film, WOLF MAN, in theaters. Bit of a bummer since he's a director who's earned my highest personal honor of earning my view purely off of goodwill - no trailer, no social media post needed.So what was I to do? Nothing, but that's where Universal Pictures stepped in and (thankfully) sent me a review copy of the WOLF MAN Blu-ray (Seriously, y'all. Thank you.)WOLF MAN changes quite a bit from the original source material. The werewolf transformation develops not as a curse but rather, a disease, an infection. Instead of a fur-covered beast with extended snout, David Cronenberg's THE FLY inspires a look that stems from the idea of two separate genomes warring within the same body. It's more akin to the creatures in Alex Garland's ANNIHILATION.But where WOLF MAN differs the most is in its family story. Christopher Abbott plays Blake, husband to Charlotte (the seriously-needs-a-goddamned-Oscar-as-of-like-yesterday Julia Garner) and father to Ginger - nickname Snaps? - (Matilda Firth). After his father's death, Blake inherits the remote Oregon farm in which he spent his childhood (complicated at best, emotionally abusive at worst).Upon arrival, Blake and family are attacked by a mysterious creature. Blake sustains a scratch wound and if you've seen a werewolf movie, you know that in here lies the inevitable. It's just a matter of time.But the real tragedy of WOLF MAN doesn't just lie in the creature of it, but rather the character. Blake desperately tries to be a kinder, less angry father and husband than the example he experienced. But old environments bring that nature-nurture battle back to a head. Some wounds may simply be too deep to overcome.This movie may be paced a little wonky and some of the ideas are executed a little too silly for its own good, but goddamn, did this hit hard for this father of a 4 and 1.5 year old.On the director's commentary, Whannell talks about the need to follow one's own barometer for success. If you laugh or cry or fear your own material, it'll translate. And I'm so happy to report Whannell, for me, at least, is 3 for 3.---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

Today on IN FOUR FILMS, we ask Tara Giancaspro: "Using only four films, who ARE you?" She's a New Jersey-based writer, poet, songsmith, pop culture muser, frequent podcaster, actress, production assistant, music video extra and doting mother to two cats, Simone & Lugosi. To call her a multi-hyphenate just feels like I'm underselling it.Tara's four movies:SLEEPING WITH OTHER PEOPLE (2015) dir. Leslye HeadlandNETWORK (1976) dir. Sidney LumetALL THAT JAZZ (1979) dir. Bob FosseBACK TO THE FUTURE (1985) dir. Robert Zemeckis---Subscribe to Tara's Substack: https://substack.com/@taragiancasproFollow Tara on Twitter/Instagram: @sweatylamarr---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

Ami Canaan Mann directs AUDREY'S CHILDREN, the story of Dr. Audrey Evans (Natalie Dormer), an oncologist whose staging system revolutionized the way we treat childhood cancers. Before the '70s, the pediatric neuroblastoma survival rate was 10%. After implementing her work, the survival rate is now over 80%. I interview Canaan Mann about meeting Dr. Evans, her collaborations with Dormer & director of photography Jon Keng and the time spent on Robert Redford's set that helped shaped her path to become a director.AUDREY'S CHILDREN premieres in theaters on March 28. Showtimes can be found here: https://www.audreyschildren.com/theaters---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

AUDREY'S CHILDREN stars Natalie Dormer as Dr. Audrey Evans, the oncologist whose staging system revolutionized how childhood cancers are treated. Before her work in the '70s, these cancers were handled with a sort of one-size-fits-all approach. The result of Evans' research was a categorization of cases, impacted by age, tumor location, length of time diagnosed with the disease and more. She advocated for more aggressive chemotherapy regiments, sometimes utilizing a combo of drugs. This wasn't a popular idea at the time, but given that era's survival rate for pediatric neuroblastoma patients was merely 10%, I think said situation couldn't hurt from tougher solutions. Nowadays, the survival rate's jumped up to over 80%.Evans' work didn't just stop in the clinic; she recognized that a child's success with treatment depended on their family's ability to sustain the burden. If they couldn't afford the treatment or the housing required to be close to their kid, families would be forced to cut the help short. Unacceptable. As a result, Dr. Evans partnered with the Philadelphia Eagles football team and McDonald's to open the first Ronald McDonald Charity House.Dr. Evans was indefatigable, which makes Dormer's portrayal that much more impressive. She's in almost every scene, carrying her gait with poise and purpose despite whatever setbacks. It's even a pain getting records with which to build a case study. Never mind trying to nab funding. Never mind having to look at nerve-shredded families in the eyes and update them on the state of their dying kids.But the upside is that the lighting seems to be on Audrey's side. Canaan Mann and director of photography Jon Keng frame their characters against large, backlit windows, which suggest that, even in a dour-looking hospital, the sun and beauty of nature are desperate to break through, giving these kids hope. I mean, it can't ALL be up to Audrey, her full-faced smile and baby blue heels, right?AUDREY'S CHILDREN premieres in theaters on March 28. Find showtimes here: https://www.audreyschildren.com/theaters---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

I interview HOOD WITCH writer/director Said Belktibia about his new thriller, which sees Golshifteh Farahani play the target of a literal witch hunt through urban France. She makes a living selling mystical products and alternative healing remedies and after one of her clients dies by suicide, is accused and then chased by the mob. Now, she, along with her teenage son, need to escape the city before it's too late.Belktibia and I spoke, with the help of a translator, about our increasingly global society, the responsibility required of each individual to examine and critique the messages received in modern media, Farahani's brilliance as an actress and human, and much, much more.---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to your podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

HOOD WITCH stars Golshifteh Farahani as Nour, a single mom living in urban France who makes her living selling supplies for alternative healing, witchcraft, spells, you name it. She sees herself akin to the ones who sold shovels during the Gold Rush. If people want to believe, she'll happily oblige them.However, after one of her clients dies by suicide, she's accused of murder by the client's father. Suddenly, Nour, along with her teen son, is the target of a literal witch hunt, fueled by the instant transmission of social media and the viral nature of mob mentality and conviction.Said Belktibia, HOOD WITCH's writer/director, crafts a story in constant conflict, both physical and ideological. Does Nour actually have powers? Can illnesses be cured via spiritual means? What constitutes an individual's responsibility for critically thinking through the messages and calls to action bombarded their way on an instant, increasingly global basis?These questions persist throughout the film, kept thrilling and moving by Farahani's ferocious performance and Belktibia's pulse-pounding sensibilities.HOOD WITCH is now available to watch in select theaters and VOD. ---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

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In Abby Brenker and Ellyn Vander Wyden's VOICES CARRY, which premiered last Saturday, March 15 at the 2025 Cinequest Film Festival in San Jose, California, a woman (Gia Crovatin) returns to her lakefront childhood home, confronting the difficult memories of her mother's untimely death.Discovering an old diary in the shed, she's shocked to discover that not only did her mother write in it shortly before her death, but also did a slew of women, spanning back to the 1700s. What starts as historical intrigue devolves into potentially supernatural obsession as the history of trauma and secrets within the diary's pages leave her swearing she can hear the voices of these women calling to her from across the lake.VOICES CARRY is, at times, too tepidly paced for its own good. Are these voices real? Are they hallucinations of a stressed mind? This tightrope requires a delicate balance to get right but the movie almost goes too delicate, leaving the mystery up to expository dumps and a flurry of beautifully shot scenes that leave me cold.Don't get me wrong. I love Mauricio Vasquez's cinematography, mainly its voyeuristic approach and techniques that help translate the protagonist's state of mind. This lakefront property looks like a travel ad at times, it's so pristine.I think with this movie, the mileage may vary depending on where expectations lie. For those interested in how woman's mental health difficulties are misdiagnosed throughout history - witchcraft, hysteria, possession, etc. - this story may provide a valuable perspective. I just wish the movie also provided a propulsive quality.---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

In 1990, millions of dollars worth of art was robbed from Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner museum. The crime remains unsolved but provides a backdrop for ANY DAY NOW to explore a story of an insecure 20-something to learn the value of self-respect and the confidence that comes with exercising such respect.Steve (Taylor Gray) is the 20-something in question and he, by all metrics, should be cool. He's good-looking with a healthy beard. He's a guitarist for a band who's earned major-label interest. He works as a night shift guard for the museum, getting paid to absorb the work of hundreds of artists every night, all to himself. No one's robbing museums like gas stations; it's a quiet gig. But Steve's Achilles heel is that he's simply a doormat. He pines for his roommate/bandmate's girlfriend. Said roommate is months behind on rent and Steve's lack of spine makes this guy comfortable with blowing off any conversation about it. Steve's boss punks him for swiping a candy bar from the vending machine (which in most cases, is owned by an independent entity and therefore, out of this guy's jurisdiction, so fuck off, copper).But it's when art thief Marty Lyons (Paul Guilfoyle) approaches Steve in a bar with a proposition to cut him in on the profits of a robbery if he'll look the other way that Steve's prospects start to change. Marty does what he wants, with no qualms or boss to answer to. He loves art, music, a good time. He's lived three lifetimes' worth and ends up taking Steve on as a mentee. I mean, sure, he's a guy who robs museums and sells the art on the market, but is that really worse than living an entire life as an unsatisfied guy without the courage to spend his remaining days on this floating rock in pursuit of what he values and desires? Life's too short to waste it for other people.---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to your podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

I interview Paul Guilfoyle, star of the new coming-of-age-meets-heist-film ANY DAY NOW about his relationship to Boston as one of its sons, the Dropkick Murphys, classism, the eternal struggle of discovering (or uncovering) one's authentic self & the delicate balance of being both vulnerable and tough on screen.In ANY DAY NOW, Guilfoyle plays art thief Marty Lyons. In his plan to rob Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner museum (which is based off of a real though unsolved 1990 robbery), he marks 20-something night watchman Steve (Taylor Gray) as his potential inside man. What starts as strategy evolves into a mentor relationship as Marty's bold pursuits for what he desires allows Steve to build the confidence needed to abandon his identity as a professional doormat.Guilfoyle brings the comedy, intensity and wisdom to ANY DAY NOW, making for an equally entertaining and thoughtful character study masked in heist film tropes. ---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to your podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

To describe Lior Geller's THE WORLD WILL TREMBLE as a rough watch seems an understatement.This tells the story of two Jewish prisoners, played by Oliver Jackson-Cohen & Jeremy Neumark Jones, who escape a Polish Nazi death camp and end up providing the world's first eyewitness account of the Holocaust.And god, what an account. This movie's less than two hours and for half of it, we're in the camp with these men, watching every indecency stack on top of each other. Humiliation, torture, extortion, you name it. Prisoners are forced to bear witness to the extermination of fellow Jews, walking in forced silence, listening to the shrieks of men, women and children rattle their skulls (and by proxy, us at home) like a hurricane howling against windows. They bury their brethren in mass graves, shoveling lime on top of the bodies to hide the stench.This isn't spearheaded by the Nazis of Auschwitz or Dachau. This precedes the Final Solution. Watching these monsters fumble their way through genocide exposes the severity of their cruelty. They don't know how to efficiently kill, but by Satan's hand, they're determined.And it's against this backdrop that these two escapees sprint and swim and drive their way to the closest town to get this message out to a local rabbi. Less than 30 minutes away from civilization, unspeakable atrocities are being committed; this might as well be taking place on a separate planet, the whiplash is so fierce.Geller's movie serves as a devastatingly beautiful warning to the rest of us, living in times of ICE raids and political disappearances. If left unchecked, this can and will be us. Act accordingly.THE WORLD WILL TREMBLE premieres in select theaters nationwide (including the Angelika in Dallas) on March 14.---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to your podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

On this episode, director Lior Geller and actor Jeremy Neumark Jones join me to discuss their new film, THE WORLD WILL TREMBLE. Based on a true story, the film centers on two men, played by Jones and Oliver Jackson-Cohen, who escape a Polish Nazi death camp, delivering the world's first eyewitness account of the Holocaust.This movie's a devastating, beautiful work, revitalizing the importance of defying tyranny and the need to, at the very fucking least, call it out for its abhorrence. In a time where Mahmoud Khalil is arrested for leading protests and the government tears parents from their wailing children for the crime of...not undergoing the designated process to enter and live in this country, stories like this ring clearer than ever: a warning to all that a cage is never built for just one use. There are no sides in genocide.We discuss the weight telling this story left on the cast and crew, the meaning behind the movie's title, an actor's need to maintain a full emotional tank and much more.THE WORLD WILL TREMBLE releases in select U.S. theaters (including Angelika Dallas, hell yes) on March 14th.---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to your podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

EMILIA PEREZ, Jacques Audiard's audacious trilingual crime musical, is our next stop on the Best Picture Showcase! The most critically divisive of the nominees tells the story of a Mexican drug kingpin (Karla Sofia Gascon) who enlists a junior lawyer (Zoe Saldana) to help her transition into living life as a woman via securing gender-affirming surgery, faking her death, moving her wife (Selena Gomez) and kids to Switzerland. It's...a lot.And it's weirdly not a spoiler to say this is only the first 40 or so minutes of the movie? This plan goes off without too many hitches. It's what follows when the kingpin, living now as the titular character, decides she can no longer live without her kids and needs them back in Mexico that leads to the film's culminating chaos.This is a movie of bold choices, wild lighting and camera operation, larger-than-life performances that play like a neon-soaked Mexican telenovela. It doesn't always work, sometimes to derisive hilarity, but sue me, it makes me smile.---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to your podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

The next stop for the Best Picture Showcase leads us to the nominee widely considered the frontrunner for this year's Best Picture Oscar, ANORA.This movie, produced, edited, written and directed by Sean Baker, follows the whirlwind romance of a Brooklyn sex worker named Anora (a hot-headed Mikey Madison, and by the way, it's Ani, not Anora, she doesn't like her full name) and her wealthy patron-turned-lover Vanya (an impulsive Mark Eydelshteyn whose face appears fixed in an eternal sheepish, inebriated grin stretched from ear to ear). Vanya's parents are loaded and back in Russia, leaving Vanya to indulge in every source of dopamine he can get his hands on, but when a Vegas trip leads to Ani and Vanya's little-white-chapel wedding, the parents send their "goons" - an exhausted priest, his bumbling right-hand man and a stoic, though gentle hired hand named Igor (a frankly excellent and deservedly Oscar-nominated Yura Borisov) - to get the marriage annulled at all costs.ANORA, shot in Baker's independent frame of mind, balances the loose, handheld reality of forgiveness-not-permission filmmaking with a formal understanding allowing his characters to exist in a heightened state. This is a world fueled by that pure, if naive, puppy-dog love, bathed in the dazzling colors and sunlight that allow people to, if even for a short time, believe in magic.The romance contrasts with the screwball-tinged comedy and drama of the second half of the movie and while I sympathize with those for whom this part of the movie sends their nerves into a frazzled state, I find it just emblematic of that enigmatic New York energy. It's a chaotic town where shit can go south quickly, so watching Ani hold her own in a city-wide crusade to resolve her new marriage problems feels me both with gut-busting laughs and deep, sympathetic sorrow. It's a bittersweet movie that promises no easy answers, but what life ever does?---Please rate, review and subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to your podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

Today on The Movies, I got a double-interview episode! I interviewed the director and actors from COLD WALLET, a new crypto thriller about a group of Redditors looking for revenge against the influencer responsible for scamming them out of a "life savings" level of money. They break into the influencer's home in pursuit of his cold wallet, a USB drive that holds millions of dollars in crypto, with a goal to return the funds back to every fellow victim.First round goes to actors Raul Castillo and Melonie Diaz, who discuss their preparation time, nailing ineptitude as a performer and how surprisingly kind Octavia Spencer is.Second round goes to director Cutter Hodierne and actor Josh Brener, who discuss the kind of character prep built less from the script and more from directorial conversations, the images serving as guiding light for the project and how they affect the movie's overall visual language.COLD WALLET is playing in select theaters and available to stream on VOD.---Please rate, review and subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to your podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram and Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

In COLD WALLET, a trio of Redditors (Raul Castillo, Tony Cavalaro, Melonie Diaz) take it upon themselves to make a crypto influencer (Josh Brener) pay for tanking the coin, freezing user assets and suddenly demanding they owe the app almost double what they paid to get to said position. Their plan? Find the influencer, steal his cold wallet drives that store ALL his crypto balances and let them loose into the wild for any victim to reclaim. It's a Robin Hood deal.But the mind games have only just begun and the danger of getting caught or - worse - only grows.I'm not a big crypto head but you don't need all the knowledge to follow COLD WALLET. It works best as a pulpy home invasion thriller with a change in perspective. It's best to know these folks aren't, in any way, professional burglars. The results make for some funny setups. COLD WALLET is playing in select theaters and available to stream on VOD.---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

The Best Picture Showcase rolls on with Edward Berger's CONCLAVE, a drama about the election of a new Pope after the sudden death of the old Holy Father. Left with the responsibilities of wrangling every cardinal from 'round the world, along with their egos and ideologies, is a soon-to-be-exhausted Cardinal Thomas Lawrence (Ralph Fiennes). As the days and rounds of voting wear on, Lawrence fears, especially after the muckraking dredges up personal and professional drama, a wealth of spiritual doubts and a fear of what kind of person will spearhead the next few decades of Catholicism, that the right candidate, the one truly best equipped to be an ambassador of God's word, may be lost to the squabbles and pettiness of imperfect men.This is a chess game, political theater on the world's stage. In some ways, CONCLAVE is brutally honest about the state of the world and its leaders. In others, I find an idealism that Frank Capra may grin at, god rest him. It's this balance between recognizing who we are and where we'd like to be that CONCLAVE dances with the most. How do we bridge the gulf and who's best equipped to lead us there?If you play enough chess, you'll be able to see the winning route from a good distance and this movie is no exception. But Berger always has a good eye and the score sufficiently ramps up the tension. It's not my favorite nominee but I'm glad I saw it.---Please rate, review and subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Bluesky & Instagram: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

ARMAND follows Elisabeth (Renate Reinsve), a single mother of the titular 6-year-old. She's called into Armand's school for a parent-teacher conference alongside Sarah (Ellen Dorrit Petersen) and Anders (Endre Hellestveit) the parents of Armand's best friend, Jon.To say it's bad news is the most severe understatement. Jon has accused Armand of sexual assault, the violent and dehumanizing kind one would expect from someone with a high-schooler's understanding of sexuality.Elisabeth is expectedly blindsided, fiercely defending her son and questioning the intents, the facts, the biases of all involved. Sarah demands justice for her son and immediate action on the school's part. Anders wants what his wife wants.The school's de facto liaison, a junior teacher named Sunna (a sympathetic and highly pitied - the kind of pity derived from being someone sent first over the hill to sustain every rock, arrow, cannonball and nasty word - Thea Lambrechts Vaulen), is just desperately hoping a dialogue between the parents can inspire some concept of a plan.If you're looking for a movie wherein you can crack the code and solve the mystery, this movie isn't it. It's more preoccupied with the parties involved. Their personalities and histories clash and it's in the discovery of the interplays that the story really plays out. Writer/director Halfdan Ullmann Tøndel drops these folks into a cavernous school with high ceilings, arched hallways. Every step echoes; secrets can be discovered regardless of whether the conspirators whisper. It's an environment haunted by the ghosts (maybe literal?) of tragedy, of the sinister and wounded natures that plague us all.Near the end, Elisabeth discusses with Sunna the manner in which best to understand and perceive other people. It's not myopic nor impressionistic, but rather somewhere in-between. It's an amorphous yet graceful stamp on a movie whose surreal darkness can be a tough ask on an audience. Humanity is fickle and imperfect. To pretend otherwise betrays the very nature of who we are. I can't say this is gonna land well with everybody who watches it, but it gave me some chewable food-for-thought.ARMAND is currently playing in select theaters nationwide (Shit, my AMC has a random 1:45pm showing of this thing and I just wanna be a fly on the wall to observe whose grandma's walking in to catch this fucker on a Tuesday.)---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

Feras Alfuqaha loves to gab about moviemaking. His directorial debut, LIFELINE, premieres in select theatres and VOD on February 21st. It's the story of a suicide hotline volunteer (Josh Stewart) who receives a call from someone he believes to be his younger self (Judah Lewis). The caller says they're at a motel with gun in hand; they'll kill themselves at midnight. Clock's ticking.Based on my interview with Alfuqaha, if I had to associate a word with him, it'd be preparation. He discusses the research needed to understand his main character's work, the decisions finalized before ever stepping onto a set in order to maximize his indie budget's potential, the discovery of characters and their intents done months ahead of time, the amount of effort required before the shoot in order to earn the luxury of on-set flexibility and so. much. more.This interview's got grins and tangents aplenty, one of my favorites in recent memory.Watch LIFELINE here: https://linktr.ee/lifelinemovie---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

Feras Alfuqaha's LIFELINE stars Josh Stewart as Steven Thomas. Steven's spending his New Year's Eve volunteering at a suicide hotline during the graveyard shift. He's the only guy in the office during a time of year in which folks tend to really feel their pain. The holidays can be rough on some of us.Steven handles a series of calls but one stands out: a college-aged kid who says he's gone to a motel with a gun with plans to kill himself at midnight. The kid's name? Steven Thomas.What's initially perceived as a prank reveals itself to extend beyond any wealth of coincidences. Steven knows he's talking to a younger self. As memories of his own abusive childhood begin to seep through repression, Steven knows he only has a few hours to A) figure out how this phenomenon is even occurring and B) convince his younger self to stay alive for the promise of a better day and life.The strength of this movie lies mainly in Stewart's performance. In his exhaustion, I see a man willing to carry the emotional burden of those to whom he extends a helping hand, regardless of the toll on his own body. As his younger, emotionally fraught self launches into self-destructive, nihilistic rants, Stewart's hesitation and expressions reveal that instinctual connection: Once upon a time, he did believe a version of this way of thinking. If you were to really crack the shell, I think he realizes he still believes in some of it, but also recognizes the need to adjust this perspective based on wisdom derived from experience. Older Steven isn't an easy role to bear and Stewart plays it thoughtfully and empathetically.Genres blend and the mystery unfurls in enticing fashion. Once all is revealed, I found myself seeing LIFELINE as poignant, hopeful even. It's an entertaining and heartfelt ode to one's desire to pursue hope against seemingly insurmountable pain. And it's less than 90 minutes? What a win!LIFELINE is currently playing in select theaters in L.A. & available to rent on VOD.---Please rate, review & subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on Instagram & Bluesky: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

I interview Michael Tolajian, the director of the new basketball documentary WE BEAT THE DREAM TEAM, premiering on Max February 17. We talk the personal impact the 1992 Dream Team had on Tolajian, the process of establishing relationships with his documentary subjects, which of his favorite directors could stand a chance in the NBA and a whole. lot. more.---Rate, review and subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on social media: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

A name like the Dream Team understandably comes with baggage. Who could make up a roster so great, the result can only be described as a dream? In the basketball world, guys like Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Scottie Pippen, John Stockton, Karl Malon-shall I go on?These men were recruited to represent the United States in the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, the first year in which NBA players would be allowed to play as Olympians. No pressure.But as Michael Tolajian's new documentary WE BEAT THE DREAM TEAM showcases, pressure builds diamonds. Pressure, in this case, comes in the form of the Select Team, a group of collegiate players and future NBA superstars (Grant Hill, Bobby Hurley, Chris Webber, Penny Hardaway and more), tasked to stress-test the Dream Team before the Olympics.And it's on a fateful day during the first scrimmage between this practice squad and their Hall-of-Fame counterparts that the unthinkable happens: The Select Team wins.WE BEAT THE DREAM TEAM is part insider basketball, part history lesson, told 30+ years later with the same youthful exuberance by the gents who achieved what was considered impossible. The best teams internationally got whooped by the Dream Team to the tune of 30-40 point blowouts. These 19-to-21-year-old college students were the only ones who - ever - beat them. Talk about your underdog sports stories, am I right?WE BEAT THE DREAM TEAM premieres on Max February 17th.---Rate, review and subscribe to The Movies wherever you listen to podcasts!Follow The Movies on social media: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

I LOVE YOU FOREVER is an anti-romcom. I don't say this in a way that suggests a cheeky, defiant stance against Valentine's Day. I say this because it weaponizes romcom tropes against us in its telling of an abusive relationship.You can track the trajectory: lonely 20-something girl (Sofia Black D'Elia) meets accomplished 20-something guy (Ray Nicholson). He's thoughtful, attentive, hygienic. (Men, we can actually trip on the bar, it's so low.) They banter. They date. They kiss. They're an item.But after this point? The tide changes. Guy calls girl every minute. Guy insinuates girl's cheating when she goes out with friends. Guy threatens self-harm at the slightest inconvenience. Girl blames herself, because obviously, if she hasn't had good romantic luck up until this point, she must be the problem. Girl loves guy even harder. Guy relays his therapist's message that girl's no good. Rinse and fucking repeat.This is a caustic, frustrating watch with a good helping of dark humor sprinkled throughout. I like D'Elia and Nicholson's committed, tailored performances. I like the panicked, energetic camera work. But I'm not gonna say this movie's gonna hit for everyone. It's too messy, too entrenched in a pained point of view. However, the people for whom which this movie clicks are gonna grip onto it like a bear trap. Simply put, I know people who've gone through this. They're gonna get it. They're gonna latch on.I LOVE YOU FOREVER is available to watch in select theaters and via digital rental services (Apple TV, Fandango At Home).---Follow The Movies on social media: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

Continuing the Best Picture Showcase, in which I cover this year's Oscars nominees for Best Picture, the road takes us to a tour-de-force of an original, pulse-pounding, "sickly entertaining" movie, Coralie Fargeat's THE SUBSTANCE.This is an audacious, whip-smart body horror movie that's bound to break your heart as much as it'll force you to recoil in disgust...and maybe even make you laugh along the way?Elisabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore) is an aging actress who, after being dropped by her network, doesn't know how to function without the kind of shallow, yet plentiful adoration show business provides. What remains are the painful reminders of her age, her beauty, her desirability, none of which are bolstered by her self-esteem. What is it that people say: We are our own worst critics?An opportunity presents itself in the form of The Substance, an injectable drug that promises the user the ability to live in a new body, derived by the user's own DNA. Spend 7 days in the new and improved body, switch back to the old body for 7 days. Elisabeth jumps at the chance, and after a revolting transformation sequence, out emerges the effervescent Sue (Margaret Qualley). As long as the balance is respected and all the rules followed, everything will work out fine. But if anyone ever followed the rules in these movies, we wouldn't have a movie, then would we?---Follow The Movies on social media: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

I continue covering this year's Oscars nominees for Best Picture with Denis Villeneuve's DUNE: PART 2, the continuation of Villeneuve's attempt to create high-minded blockbuster fantasy to a new generation. When I was a kid, I had LORD OF THE RINGS. As a 30-year-old, I have this. Think the darkness of EMPIRE STRIKES BACK with the expansive scale of THE TWO TOWERS and you'll have an idea of the second chapter of Paul Atreides' (Timothee Chalamet) journey from naive boy to insecure, megalomaniacal messianic cult leader. Via spice-driven hallucinations, Paul sees his desert planet of Arrakis, along with everyone he's ever loved, burned to ash via thermonuclear war. In a desperate attempt to stave off this future, he learns the way of the sand-dwelling Fremen people to gain their trust and help in his holy? crusade. This is the kind of movie I want 100+ million-dollar movies to be: artistically fearless on a gargantuan, sandworm-sized scale. As thoughtful as it is simply fucking entertaining. DUNE: PART 2 is available to stream on Max and Netflix. It's available to purchase for home video on 4K, Bluray & DVD. And if you're lucky, I still see some options for a theatrical viewing, if you just have to catch Chalamet's fluffy hair on the big screen. --- Follow The Movies on social media: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

Marvel Studios released the first teaser for THE FANTASTIC FOUR: FIRST STEPS, premiering July 25th in theaters. After decades of attempts to try and get Marvel's "First Family" right, this movie, directed by Matt Shakman, looks to plant its flag as the first entry in the franchise to satisfy both fans and critics alike. What did I think of the trailer? It's okay. However, we're no longer in 2005. The superhero genre has grown, gained legitimacy through the Academy Awards, earned billions of dollars and punched a hole into mainstream popularity. I don't think this trailer confirming the movie won't serve as a radical departure from the comic books should be enough for Marvel to pat themselves on the back. This needs to be a slam dunk, impressing on the levels of previous hallmarks like IRON MAN, CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER or GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY. An "okay" trailer just isn't good enough. --- Follow The Movies on social media: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

Welcome to the Best Picture Showcase, a miniseries on THE MOVIES where I review each nominee for this year's Academy Award for Best Picture. With each installment, I hope to answer the following: 1) What's the movie about? 2) What's it feel like to sit through the movie? 3) Did I like it? 4) Should it and will it win Best Picture? What's my current ranking of the nominees? 5) How can you catch this movie? I hope to make this list feel more accessible for folx intimidated or turned off by what they might derisively consider "Oscar Bait." So a 3.5 hour drama about a Hungarian refugee escaping the Holocaust to 1950s Pennsylvania is a great place to start, right? Brady Corbet's THE BRUTALIST works that artist's magic of making hyper-specific circumstances feel universal. This is a movie about a man who feels his life is robbed from him. In many ways, it was, and yet, that struggle between accepting his difficult realities of working back up from the bottom rung of the ladder & confidently striding with the experience and value earned over years of work designing buildings that stand the test of fascist regimes and war feels almost insurmountable. This is a story peeling back the layers of the American Dream, the reality behind the promise; it's hard not to feel, sometimes, as though we live in hopeful delusion regarding that journey to make our dreams into truth. It's a movie about the person made into the other, never acceptable to the dominant class outside of the immediate value they can provide. And it's all shot in breathtaking Vistavision film, capturing these grand moments in ways both timeless and timely. This is the kind of story we go to the theaters to experience: an epic that our HDTVs will, simply, never do justice. Closing Song: "Library" - Daniel Blumberg, THE BRUTALIST (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) --- Follow The Movies on social media: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

I interview John Makens, the director of ART AND LIFE: THE STORY OF JIM PHILLIPS. The 81-year-old graphic designer Jim Phillips may not be instantly recognizable, his art - the "Screaming Hand," the "red dot" Santa Cruz Skateboards logo, the myriad of custom skateboarding full-board decals, the cartoonish California outdoor mosaics, the rock posters for the likes of The Beatles & Neil Young - absolutely is. His art spans decades, hobbies and generations, cultivating the identities of skateboarding and surfing cultures in ways that inspire current public perception. Makens and I discuss what makes Phillips special, how he and his crew animated Phillips' art within the documentary, how his relationship to Phillips evolved over the course of the doc's 10+ year production and more. --- Follow The Movies on social media: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

Jim Phillips is an artist whose cartoonish mosaics of California outdoor life have informed public understanding and appreciation of skateboarding, surfing, hot rod and rock music cultures. In ART AND LIFE: THE STORY OF JIM PHILLIPS, documentarian John Makens tells his story, from the times when Phillips sketched for fiberglas companies amidst a surfer party lifestyle to when Santa Cruz Skateboards & NHS brought him in to develop the first full-board designs that would first cement skateboarding's devil-may-care attitude and rebellious public perception in the '70s-'80s. The "red dot" Santa Cruz Skateboards logo and the Screaming Hand are Jim's claims to fame, instantly recognizable to a subculture. However, Phillips, the artist, is not, despite also producing rock posters for the likes of The Beatles and Neil Young. Watching Phillips dig through drawers and cabinet to pull up old surfer magazines and prints is akin to traveling through time; the man is an anthropological nexus point, bringing together punks, skateboarders, hippies and gearheads alike. What a life. ART AND LIFE: THE STORY OF JIM PHILLIPS showtimes: https://artandlifemovie.com/ --- Follow The Movies on social media: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

On this episode of The Movies, I fulfill another listener request! My buddy Jarrett Barnard sent me a stone-cold classic to cover: 1978's DAWN OF THE DEAD, directed by George A. Romero. Widely regarded as the best of Romero's DEAD franchise, this film about a group of survivors waiting out the zombie apocalypse inside a shopping mall is a hallmark moment for horror fans, beautifully blending slapstick and viscera before Sam Raimi & Peter Jackson took their proverbial batons and ran their legs of the race. This movie's marked as a critique on mindless consumerism but I don't think Romero solely leaves the blame on the living dead. For as much as these folks rejoice in having a safe place to stay (relatively) zombie-free, the dopamine of having the world at one's disposal rapidly wears off. Even during the end of the world, we're rarely satisfied. And in a post-COVID world, the way this society responds to a global threat rings eerily and depressingly familiar. We are fickle, stupid beasts, one mere bite, one bad day away from a blue face and a lust for flesh. But hey, it's not all bad. Have you ever pied a zombie in the face? That shit's hilarious! --- Please assist animal shelters working to reunite pets with owners, treat injuries and take in evacuated animals due to the recent wildfires in L.A. County. Two lists of places you can support are down below: https://animalcare.lacounty.gov/emergency-animal-shelter-information-los-angeles-county-fires/ - (This is the list I read from in the episode, which by the time of its publishing, has drastically reduced in size. I leave the audio as is because all the places I mention still need help. As of January 24, the Castaic Animal Care center is temporarily closed due to the Hughes Fire.) https://www.fire.ca.gov/incidents/2025/1/7/palisades-fire/updates/36cabf7c-1843-4bea-bc99-851d9a6296d4#:~:text=Animal%20Evacuation%20Shelters&text=Agoura%20Animal%20Care%20Center%2C%2029525,216%20W%20Victoria%20St%2C%20Gardena --- Follow The Movies on social media: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

The nominations for the 97th Academy Awards dropped yesterday morning to the usual flurry of praise and disappointment. (No BABYGIRL? Academy, you will ROT.) Today, I list the Best Picture nominees along with their other nominations, discuss some other movies that jumped out at me and set the stage for the Best Picture Showcase. Before the ceremony on March 2nd, I'll be covering each of the 10 nominees on the show, ranking them along the way. You ready? We're over the hump of awards season and the ride down is a furious, bumpy thrill. Let's do it! --- Follow The Movies on social media: linktr.ee/themovies_pod

On this episode, I interview BIRDEATER directors Jack Clark and Jim Weir. The movie, about a bride-to-be invited to her fiance's unhinged bachelor party, has taken Australian audiences by storm since its Sydney Film Festival premiere in 2023. Featuring at Melbourne International Film Festival & SXSW, the movie's garnered audience and critical praise, culminating (as of the time I write this) in a nomination for Best Indie Film at the 2025 AACTA Awards (think Australia's combined Oscars and Emmy shows).The film starts its limited American theatrical/digital run this week so what better occasion is there to bring Clark and Weir onto the show to chat about their nuanced, chaotic, delirious pressure cooker of a thriller? For such a passive aggressive movie, these guys are really amiable...---Follow, rate & review The Movies on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you fortify your cinematic spirit with rigorous, loving opinions. Follow The Movies on Instagram, Bluesky, Facebook and Twitter: https://linktr.ee/themovies_pod---Watch BIRDEATER in theaters -Albuquerque: Guild CinemaAustin: Alamo Drafthouse Mueller Austin Mueller Boston: Alamo Drafthouse Boston SeaportChicago: Alamo Drafthouse WrigleyvilleColumbus: Gateway Film CenterDallas: Alamo Drafthouse DentonDenver: Alamo WestminsterLos Angeles: Alamo Drafthouse Downtown Los Angeles Los Angeles: Laemmle Glendale New York: Alamo Drafthouse Lower ManhattanNew York: IFC CenterPhoenix: Harkins Gateway Pavilions---Watch BIRDEATER on digital - JANUARY 17thApple TVFandango at Home (US)Google Play (US & CA)Microsoft Movies & TV (US & CA)Prime Video (US)

In Jack Clark and Jim Weir's BIRDEATER, a Aussie bride-to-be (Shabana Azeez) is invited to her fiance's (Mackenzie Fearnley) "bucks party" - a bachelor party to us in the States, but god, doesn't that just sound cooler?She's not alone, as one of the boys also brings his girlfriend to this cabin in the Outback, but it's more of a friend-of-a-friend situation. Drinks flow, silliness inflates, but that's the thing about these kinds of nights: There's always a point of no return. The alcohol tips secrets over the edge. Once those come out, it's like trying to suck toothpaste back into the tube. It just can't happen.What results is a nervous death of a thousand cuts. Every conversation grows tense, regardless of who's speaking to whom. Passive aggression becomes a de facto state and no one's coming out of this party socially unscathed. Hostile, squawking jazz pairs with a bipolar camera designed against comfort. It either swirls wildly around its subjects like a cracked-out carousel or stops still, unflinchingly observing the most excruciating social crucifixions.And yet, this movie isn't A SERBIAN FILM, MARTYRS nor anything of that explicitly vicious ilk. What unsettles about BIRDEATER is how much these people inevitably remind me of folks I know. These portrayals bound between shifting perspectives and ideologies to a degree that makes it seem Weir and Clark refute each other's concerns about these people in real-time. The movie debates itself on matters of social hierarchy, emotional abuse, consent, otherism and the simple, yet debilitating matter of leaving your '20s with something constructive to show for it, despite your hedonistic, paranoid, terrified efforts to the contrary. --- Follow, rate & review The Movies on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you drizzle velvety film conversations inside your ear canals. Follow The Movies on Instagram, Bluesky, Facebook and Twitter: https://linktr.ee/themovies_pod --- Watch BIRDEATER in theaters - Albuquerque: Guild Cinema Austin: Alamo Drafthouse Mueller Austin Mueller  Boston: Alamo Drafthouse Boston Seaport Chicago: Alamo Drafthouse Wrigleyville Columbus: Gateway Film Center Dallas: Alamo Drafthouse Denton Denver: Alamo Westminster Los Angeles: Alamo Drafthouse Downtown Los Angeles  Los Angeles: Laemmle Glendale  New York: Alamo Drafthouse Lower Manhattan New York: IFC Center Phoenix: Harkins Gateway Pavilions --- Watch BIRDEATER on digital - JANUARY 17th Apple TV Fandango at Home (US) Google Play (US & CA) Microsoft Movies & TV (US & CA) Prime Video (US)

The 2024 Movies That Stuck With Me

Welcome to Season 4 of The Movies! It's wild to think this will be my fourth year reviewing movies, interviewing critics, authors and filmmakers, waxing poetic over the majesty of one Rachel McAdams. This episode sees me addressing the state of my union, sharing goals for the new year (interview Danny Boyle for 28 YEARS LATER, because dear JESUS, that trailer) and thanking everyone who's given a hoot about the show during Season 3. So, pop some bubbly and raise that glass! It's time to celebrate a new year, new season, great movies and the pursuit of getting our collective acts together. Bring on Season 4!

FREDDY VS. JASON brings together two titans of '80s horror: Freddy Kreuger (Robert Englund) and Jason Voorhees (Ken Kirzinger). In a bid to regain his strength through surging fear through the souls of Elm Street, Freddy manipulates Jason to doing some killing on his behalf. However, when Jason starts taking the credit and hacking through more of the available body count, Freddy grows jealous and petty. The fight is on, with a group of teenagers caught in the middle.This movie underwent 17 years of development hell before arriving in theaters. That's 17 years of studios losing and gaining rights to the franchises, installments developed on both sides in lieu of a team-up, a carousel of writers and directors pitching their ideas and ditching the project, and a replacement of one of the most iconic actors to ever don a horror villain's mask. Kane Hodder, you deserve the world.With all this being said, should FREDDY VS. JASON be regarded as a hallmark of the genre? No. It serves best as a sampler of what both franchises have to offer: Freddy's surrealism & sarcasm and Jason's massacring lumbering boogeyman. The CGI effects, emblematic of the time, don't always work. They often elicit a laugh. But given that FRIDAY THE 13TH PART V and FREDDY'S DEAD exist? We could've gotten much worse. The fact this exists in this form is a mini-miracle.A massive thanks to Dakota (To quote Tarantino, he's "a buddy who's more than a brother and a little less than a wife.") for requesting this episode. You've supported the podcast and me from the very beginning.Dustin McNeill's SLASH OF THE TITANS book: https://bookshop.org/a/108651/9780692033494 (This is an affiliate link. If you buy the book here, I get some cash. It pays for gas, movie tickets and my Coca-Cola addiction. Maybe a bill or two if enough books are bought?)---Please rate & review The Movies on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever else you listen to the show!Follow The Movies on - Twitter: @TheMovies_Pod Facebook: The MoviesInstagram: @themoviespodLetterboxd: The MoviesBluesky: themovies.bsky.social⁠Threads: @themoviespod

WITTE WIEVEN, directed by Didier Konings, brings my Fantastic Fest 2024 coverage to a belated end. Frieda (Anneke Sluiters) is a pious woman struggling to conceive a child. In her medieval Dutch village, help only comes through God and the Church, via archaic fertility rituals. One day, the local butcher Gelo (Leon van Wass) assaults Frieda, threatening to rape her in the forbidden woods just outside the village. Legend says no one leaves those woods alive, but this day, something stops Gelo and saves Frieda. She makes it out of the woods. Once the villagers see this, the murmurs start. Frieda's cursed. She conspires with the Devil to conceive. She's a witch. Normally, these accusations wouldn't bear any weight, but given the voices and presences Frieda feels next to her in the coming days, including the feeling something beckons her to re-enter those mythical woods, she can't shake the feeling there's a grander design at work. Konings' movie brings to mind the best Robert Eggers movies: THE NORTHMAN and THE WITCH. This is folk horror with roots firmly planted in an anti-patriarchal worldview, one decrying religious corruption - its unwillingness to prune the festering, fallacious branches of humans committing abuses in the name of otherwise nurturing principles. In this film, as evidenced through grand wide shots firmly establishing this world's perspective: nature is king. Humans pale against the might of a forest hundreds of years old. Sluiters plays a woman whose stillness is a survival tactic. She keeps her mouth shut against her husband's cowardice, the town's baseless accusations. The performance is not one of a meek woman discovering her anger, but rather an angry woman finally failing to hold back righteous fury. Sluiters' screams make for some of the movie's most rewarding and intense scenes. And all of this comes in at just 60 minutes? What a bargain! How can you pass this up? --- Please rate & review The Movies on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever else you listen to the show! Follow The Movies on - Twitter: @TheMovies_Pod Facebook: The Movies Instagram: @themoviespod Letterboxd: The Movies Bluesky: http://themovies.bsky.social/⁠ Threads: @themoviespod

I kick off the first of 10 listener requests by fulfilling the most important one: my wife's.She chose TRIANGLE, Christopher Smith's 2009 horror film about a mother (Melissa George) whose sailing trip with friends ends with a storm and shipwreck.Their salvation comes in the form of a luxury yacht, but once aboard, the group discovers the yacht's only occupant: a masked axe-wielding killer.Sounds like FRIDAY THE 13TH PART VIII if it kept honest with its premise, right? Partially. What makes TRIANGLE special is what happens after this point. The question of "How do they get back home?" quickly devolves into a labyrinth of dead ends, the reveal of which stirs in a satisfying swirl of sci-fi.This movie's about humanity's inability to stop sabotaging ourselves, blissfully unaware of how the chain of bad choices we make slowly wrap around our own necks until it's time to hang.It's a dated watch (holy shit, the CGI seagulls) but nonetheless, a worthwhile one.--- Please rate & review The Movies on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever else you listen to the show! Follow The Movies on - Twitter: @TheMovies_Pod Facebook: The MoviesInstagram: @themoviespodLetterboxd: The MoviesBluesky: themovies.bsky.social⁠Threads: @themoviespod

Please rate & review The Movies on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever else you listen to the show!--- Kate Cobb's directorial debut, OKIE, stars Scott Michael Foster as Louie, a writer returning to his rural hometown after his father's death. Going back home is always complicated, but more so because he's unflatteringly based his stories on said town and its community. What starts as a day trip to collect final mementos devolves into a weeklong excursion through old haunts, hanging out with old friends and old flames. The difficult feelings swirl and Louie struggles to determine whether the recurring spectral glimpse of his father is hallucination or a sign of something more concerning.---Follow The Movies on - Twitter: @TheMovies_Pod Facebook: The MoviesInstagram: @themoviespodLetterboxd: The Movies or boxd.it/Ptop (looks weird to me too but hey, typing it into Google works)Bluesky: themovies.bsky.social⁠Threads: @themoviespod

Please rate & review The Movies on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever else you listen to the show!---I got to interview the creative team behind OKIE: director Kate Cobb, writer Kevin Bigley and actor Scott Michael Foster. OKIE stars Foster as Louie, a writer returning to his rural hometown after his father's death. Going back home is always complicated, but more so because he's unflatteringly based his stories on said town and its community. What starts as a day trip to collect final mementos devolves into a weeklong excursion through old haunts, hanging out with old friends and old flames. The difficult feelings swirl and Louie struggles to determine whether the recurring spectral glimpse of his father is hallucination or a sign of something more concerning.This was an energizing interview. These filmmakers burst at the seams with joy talking about the process, their influences, the ways their own childhood sneak into the art. OKIE wasn't an easy movie to make nor conceptualize so to have the director, writer and star break it down for us is a real treat. ---Follow The Movies on - Twitter: @TheMovies_Pod Facebook: The MoviesInstagram: @themoviespodLetterboxd: The Movies or boxd.it/Ptop (looks weird to me too but hey, typing it into Google works)Bluesky: themovies.bsky.social⁠Threads: @themoviespod

Please rate & review The Movies on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever else you listen to the show!--- Before we get started, no, I don't believe there's any relation to Matthew. Boston McConaughey is the director of ALIEN COUNTRY, a sci-fi horror comedy he co-produced and co-wrote with Renny Grames to kick off their production company. It follows Everly (Grames), an aspiring singer who's just discovered she's pregnant. First instinct? Get out of Dodge. Her small Utah town seems only conducive to raising shitkickers, Clint Eastwood wannabes and man-children. The third bracket is where her baby daddy Jimmy (K.C. Clyde) firmly resides. On the way out, though, Everly's car breaks down, and Jimmy's the one to spot her hitchhiking on the side of the road: a double-whammy that normally would seal her fate to spend her life as a bar-crooning stay-at-home mom. But shenanigans place a glowing orb in the couple's possession. When tampered with (because of course they would), a portal to another world opens, which lets loose a couple of tentacled insect-dog aliens into their small town. Via rules of "you let em out, you put em in," we have a movie! This is a cartoon, for better and worse, firmly devoted to its influences: ALIEN, THE WORLD'S END, GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY, SIGNS, WAR OF THE WORLDS - the list goes on. It's got drones, a demolition derby, purple blood splatters, swaths of neon, motorcycle chases - all achieving a similar effect to waving keys in front of a baby to keep their attention. I can't say I wasn't sufficiently distracted nor failed to crack a single grin but I can't also find myself recommending or remembering this movie two weeks from now. ALIEN COUNTRY is available now to watch on VOD and in select theaters.---Follow The Movies on - Twitter: @TheMovies_Pod Facebook: The MoviesInstagram: @themoviespodLetterboxd: The Movies or boxd.it/Ptop (looks weird to me too but hey, typing it into Google works)