Are You Screening? Podcast

This week finds us borderline astonished with Dungeons & Dragons, though I liked it even more than Shane. This may well survive the entire year as the most surprising film of the year. Screwy fun, not too serious, and solid characters turned what could have been a "fan only" snooze into a popcorn hit.

This week we're reviewing John Wick 4 and looking at how it connects (or doesn't) with the entire franchise.  Can Keanu's neverending endurance and ability to take punishment spawn a movie on its own? Is a stunning stung/FX highlight reel a story? Is there something wrong with the financial situation worldwide in John Wick's universe? We'll look at all these questions and more, plus we've got mail!

There's finally a fair number of decent possibilities in (or approaching) theaters, but something about 65 drew us in. Tune in and we'll let you know if this somewhat screwy idea can be made into something exciting, and if Driver can carry things when he's mostly on his own. Here's a hint, this worked a lot better for one of us than the other.

It's our awards show time again as we give you our picks for the "Can't Win" awards. Our picks to help highlight performances and films that just have no chance of winning "real" awards. A very interesting selection of movies this year, although I couldn't quite follow my own guidelines and ended up giving a few nods to the same movie, which doesn't spread as much love as I want from this whole idea. Tune in and find out where we think the underappreciation was felt most strongly last year.

Some technical difficulties pushed us back with this episode, but the wait is over for the Worst Movies of 2022, which I know everyone was looking forward to. It was an easy year for picking bad movies, but we also give some insights on other worst lists, which confuse us greatly. We also give our quick take on Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, which didn't win us over.

It's finally time and despite our best efforts there are still a couple of films that made our lists that we didn't have time to cover throughout the year. Find out what blew us away and let me tell you, there are some surprises. As usual, we will also call out those movies that are on everyone else's lists that just aren't actually worthy.

It's our last show to squeeze in everything we can before we hit you with our Best of the Year lists and things get a little dodgy in the rush. This week we look at Tom Hanks remaking A Man Called Ove in a film that truly Americanizes most of the best notes out of things, and Bill Nighy remaking Kurosawa's Ikiru in a film that is nearly perfect (spoiler warning for next week's list). We also go back to The Whale and Empire of Light as we try to make sure we mention everything getting awards season attention before revealing our picks for the year.

We continue this week trying to knock out everything we can before the Oscars. We're notoriously bad at that, but we manage a good look at Triangle of Sadness and Tar. Two films that couldn't be less for everybody, but are worth checking out. Next week we are going to have perhaps our strangest episode ever as we tackle A Man Called Otto, Living, and at least five other films in one show.

This week we take a break from trying to get through every movie of the year before awards, because some awards happened. We'll run through the Critics' Choice Awards winners and discuss the highlights, great wins, and the things we think are a little silly. We're also going back to Violent Night, to further give a break from awards season, in case anyone missed this whacktastic delight over the holidays.

As awards close in (and pass by) we're trying to get to as many films as we can, but in all honesty... we're bad at that. This week we had to go back to Glass Onion, because in all the rush we passed by that one in past weeks. The main struggle with this one seems to be between those who think it is better than the original and those that find it not quite as good. Either way, high praise. We'll let you know where we fall on that strange spectrum. We're also covering The Pale Blue Eye, the Christian Bale vehicle that has gone almost completely unnoticed. The battle of Netflix titles is on and whatever rating they ultimately get, we're going to recommend watching both of them.

The big thing this week is obviously Avatar: The Way of Water and listeners may know that we don't both have the same feelings about Cameron, or Avatar. Is this one worth the mountains of box office cash? Is it worth anything? We'll let you know. We will also give you a bit of a rundown of the nominations for the Critics' Choice Awards and while I won't exactly give away my voting, it probably isn't to hard to tell where I'm leaning.

As awards season starts truly rocking, with CriticsChoice noms and a lot of critic group and other awards coming out, we're looking this week at some of the (sorry) smaller things out there. Although, Pinocchio is hitting things pretty hard on the animated front. Both Bones and All and The Wonder seemed like they were going to get a lot more attention a few months ago, but as the year winds down, they just aren't what people are taking about... but should they be? Tune in and we'll let you know where this ones ought to be sitting in the list of the year's films.

This week we are diving into awards season with our usual reckless abandon, hoping to cover the films you most need to know about as nominations hit and we close out the year. Three big titles to cover means we can't give any of them what they might deserve and as far as nominations go, these are films you are going to hear about a lot, but are they really deserving of the hype? The Fablemans practically got nominated a year ago, She Said seems like it's a lock to get attention just on the subject, and The Banshees of Inisherin is blowing everyone away.

This week is our last bit of normalcy heading into awards season and we're taking this opportunity to cover a couple of films that aren't the biggest releases. For the next two months we will probably be running through several films per week and the smaller things will, as always, not get the attention they deserve. All Quiet on the Western Front is probably our main pick for films that are going to be overlooked, and while we didn't love Wendell & Wild exactly, it's worth a look. We also chime in on Strange World, The Banshees of Inisherin, Wednesday, and a lot more.

This week we run through as many possibilities as we can at a time when movies and series utterly bombard us with choice. Wakanda Forever is the big name, but we'll also cover Enola Homes 2, Weird: The Al Yankovic Story, and many more. We may not have liked everything, but with Rosaline, Causeway, Inside Man, The Good Nurse, and still more, if you can't find something you'll love, we just can't help you.

It's obviously Black Adam week and there is a lot of talk about the disparity between critical and audience reception as this one takes over the box office. We'll let you know our take on it, and whether that disparity really even exists, and we're also going to look at a few more films including circling back to Halloween Ends again.

This week we try to take advantage of the lull before Black Adam and catch up on a few things. We'll look at Luckiest Girl Alive, Halloween Ends, The School for Good and Evil, and The Peripheral. A couple of these are pretty highly recommended, and we have to defend one of them against critics who don't seem to make a lot of sense, though it probably isn't the one you think.  

This week we look at Amsterdam, a film with a lot of stars that is taking a lot of heat from critics. Does this star-studded caper deserve the press it's getting, or is the backlash aimed at the writer/director overshadowing the merits... and is it worth seeing in theaters? We'll let you know what we think, and we'll also look at Marvel's version of a Halloween Special, Werewolf by Night. Plus, we've got a listener question to address.

This week (after a Covid break) we're hitting Don't Worry Darling, Blonde, and going back for See How They Run.  It turned into a somewhat weird week, especially as Blonde and Don't Worry Darling had similar issues, which doesn't seem like it should be possible.

This week we are catching up due to some technical difficulties so we are not only reviewing 3,000 Years of Longing, but we are hitting a few available on streamers - Me Time, Samaritan, and Honk for Jesus. Save Your Soul. Unfortunately, the oft-mentioned lull in big, theatrical releases hasn't quite been the boon for these smaller affairs we hoped, but 3,000 Years of Longing is an "adventure" we recommend, even if it disappointed.