The Big Picture · Draft
June 22, 2021/ 78 min/ Sean Fennessey · Amanda Dobbins · Chris Ryan
A three-person snake draft of 1975 movies, with Chris Ryan joining Sean and Amanda. Each drafter fills a six-slot roster: Drama, Comedy, Action Thriller, Oscar Winner, Blockbuster (min. $30 million at the box office), and Wild Card. A wheel spin gave Sean the first pick, then Chris, then Amanda, snaking back each round. Every pick below is confirmed by the hosts' end-of-episode recap.
18 films across 1 segment.
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 teams drafting 1975 movies
Kubrick's Thackeray adaptation. Sean avoided it for years for being long and slow, then first saw it in 2006 recovering from having his wisdom teeth out and says it 'poured over me like a warm bath.' Ryan O'Neal, Marisa Berenson, shot by John Alcott.
Rudy Ray Moore's blaxploitation vehicle, recently the subject of Eddie Murphy's Netflix movie about its making. 'Real-time satire' of the format rather than nostalgia for it, and an early Black independent film.
John Huston's Kipling adaptation, Michael Caine and Sean Connery as two men trying to become rulers of a land they've never seen, Christopher Plummer as Kipling. 'One of the best endings of any movie I've ever seen.'
Swept Best Picture, Director, Actor, and Actress. Milos Forman's Ken Kesey adaptation, Nicholson and Louise Fletcher, who was 39 when it was shot.
'The most important film of this year, one of the most important movies ever made.' Taken first overall, days after Spielberg's Netflix deal was announced. Often called the first modern blockbuster.
Norman Jewison's dystopian sports drama, James Caan as an athlete the corporate powers want retired for getting too popular. Sean's last pick of the draft.
Antonioni, with Jack Nicholson as a journalist in Africa who assumes a dead man's identity. Maria Schneider co-stars. Ends on a long unbroken take that's one of the best-known closing shots in movies.
Chris grew up on the midnight showings in Philadelphia. He says it's more a great time than a great movie, and calls Tim Curry's performance one of the best leading turns ever.
Arthur Penn's Hammett-style noir, Gene Hackman as an ex-football-player-turned-PI hired to find a runaway teenager, played by Melanie Griffith. 'A top five, top 10 detective film of all time.'
Robert Altman's big ensemble film. Chris first tried it in Blockbuster, then Comedy, before it landed here, where it did in fact qualify.
Warren Beatty as a womanizing Beverly Hills hairdresser, set over one day on the 1968 election. Julie Christie, Goldie Hawn, Lee Grant (who won an Oscar for it), a young Carrie Fisher. Chris calls it pound for pound the best movie of the year.
Peter Fonda and Warren Oates chased across Texas by a satanic cult. Chris says the trailer-set cobra sequence is the direct model for a scene in Kill Bill: Vol. 2.
Peter Weir, three girls vanish from a Victorian-era Australian boarding school. Marketed at the time as based on a true story with the records lost; Amanda calls it a forerunner of true crime.
Amanda's introduction to Monty Python, via PBS reruns rather than the Flying Circus DVDs. 'The really only type of comedy that I enjoy.'
Bryan Forbes directs a William Goldman script, Katharine Ross. Schlocky but pointed commentary on the women's movement, with a grocery-store ending Amanda calls genuinely unsettling.
Originally drafted in Blockbuster, then moved here once Amanda realized the Oscar Winner pool had dried up to just The Sunshine Boys. Pacino's bank-robbery-gone-wrong; Chris calls the 'Attica' scene one of the only times Pacino truly plays off every other actor in a scene.
Robert Redford as a CIA researcher who trusts no one, running around a very paranoid, post-Watergate New York.
The Maysles brothers' documentary on Big and Little Edie Beale. Amanda says she thought of it constantly during lockdown.
On the board, undrafted honorable mentions
Rancho Deluxe92 in the ShadeTommyLisztomaniaMahlerFunny LadyAt Long Last LoveDeep RedThe Return of the Pink PantherThe Other Side of the MountainThe Apple Dumpling GangSalò, or the 120 Days of SodomSupervixensThe Happy HookerEmmanuelle 2Dersu UzalaThe Sunshine BoysFriday FosterSheba, BabyHester Street
Also mentioned raised along the way
In passing Godzilla vs. KongExcaliburKill Bill: Vol. 2Big Trouble in Little ChinaThe Devil's AdvocateCrossing Delancey
Not films filtered out: TV, games, ads
TV Saturday Night LiveMare of Easttown
Podcasts Larry Wilmore: Black on the Air
Ads FIFA World Cup Launch EditionBoar's HeadNespresso Vertuo