The Big Picture · Discussion · Interview
August 31, 2021/ 110 min/ Sean Fennessey · Amanda Dobbins
Trailer-season triage on Spider-Man: No Way Home, Eternals, Spencer, and The Power of the Dog, then a listener mailbag on Dune and the mid-budget movie, plus Michael Sarnoski on making Pig with Nicolas Cage.
19 films across 3 segments.
AI-generated This episode was transcribed and analyzed with AI models. The matches aren't perfect — expect the occasional misheard title or a link to the wrong film.
The best trailers of 2021an onslaught of fall-preview cuts
The most-watched trailer ever, per the internet. Sean bailed halfway once it left the John Hughes-ish high-school stuff for Doctor Strange and the multiverse; Amanda credits Tom Holland and Zendaya as a teen-idol entry point. Tobey Maguire, Andrew Garfield, and Jamie Foxx's Electro are the rumored payoff.
Salma Hayek explaining the setup 'at a second-grade reading level,' which Amanda appreciated. A round of 'the TV remote guy' / Kang confusion follows. Sean reads it as a prequel to the whole MCU.
Pablo Larraín's Kristen Stewart-as-Diana film, withholding the accent until the last shot. Steven Knight wrote it, Claire Mathon shot it, Jonny Greenwood scored it. Premieres at Venice, opens Nov 5; Amanda measures it against The Crown.
Jane Campion's Benedict Cumberbatch / Jesse Plemons / Kirsten Dunst western, the de facto Best Picture front-runner nobody has seen. Amanda 'won' it in the movie auction with no other bids; Sean predicts eight Oscar nominations.
Jake Gyllenhaal's Netflix remake, out Sept 24. The drop was only a text-on-screen teaser, which Sean wants banned for dramas three weeks from release.
Gustav Möller's Danish original, a 911-dispatcher thriller nominated for Best International Feature.
The trailer Amanda actually loved: Gaga, Pacino, an unrecognizable Leto, Adam Driver, bad accents. Her flag for the spectacle TV can't match.
The mailbaglistener questions
Corey asks: theater or HBO Max? Sean is seeing it Wednesday and says go to a theater, safely. He won't grade Villeneuve's biggest film on box office, and warns anyone expecting Star Wars will be disappointed by the novel's strangeness.
Heather's question about original theatrical films; Sean's answer on Greta Gerwig knowing movie history without making you feel you need to.
Amanda's example of a movie-crazy director guiding you through material, start to finish, even though she'd never read the book.
Sean's case that The Chair, a three-hour series, would once have just been this two-and-a-half-hour movie.
Kinji Fukasaku's teens-killing-teens film, Sean's 6:30 a.m. baby-and-a-movie pick. His daughter 'loved it, she was totally rapt.'
Gaspar Noé's film Sean will never rewatch, for its harrowing central sequence.
Amanda's never-watch-again film: deeply moved, too upset by the ending to sit through it twice.
In conversation
Sarnoski's debut: Nicolas Cage as a hermit truffle hunter chasing his stolen pig. It began as one line in a folder called 'truffle': 'old man in the woods with his pig.' Shot in 20 days; Cage nailed the multi-page monologues in a take or two, and the Portland underground-fight scene reads to him as straightforward.
The Austrian film (Sarnoski guesses Polish) he screened for Alex Wolff: an outlaw grieving at his father's country cabin, all stillness and chopped wood.
Jim Jarmusch; Sarnoski played Neil Young's guitar score on loop while writing Pig.
The comparison everyone reaches for, though he hadn't actually seen it until after he wrote the draft.
His last-great-thing: caught it in a theater, floored by the production design and cinematography.
Also mentioned raised along the way
Around the trailers Spider-Man: HomecomingSpider-Man: Far From HomeIron Man 3Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten RingsThe Last DuelJackiePortrait of a Lady on FireThe Portrait of a LadyThe PianoSweetieOldLast Night in SohoThe Hand of GodEastern PromisesLockeLocked DownSerenityThe Dark Knight
In the mailbag When Harry Met SallyAnchormanThere Will Be BloodF9The Suicide SquadVacation FriendsPromising Young WomanThe Dark CrystalA Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood
One movie character to co-host RangoSkyfallDeadpoolOcean's ElevenOnce Upon a Time in Hollywood
Not films filtered out: TV, games, ads
TV The CrownLokiThe ChairStarstruckMare of EasttownThe White LotusSuccessionThe SopranosGame of ThronesThe Lord of the Rings (series)Real HousewivesThe Muppet ShowSesame StreetERNYPD Blue
Podcasts Gene and RogerThe RingerverseThe WatchThe RewatchablesGroup ChatBehind the MaskDeath, Taxes and Bananas
Ads Boar's HeadNetflix (FIFA World Cup game)White Claw