Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning 2025
The teaser Sean's 3-year-old ID'd as 'Tom Cruise.' Sean counts dozens of beautiful images, the biplane chase chief among them.
The Big Picture · Discussion
The Mega-Mailbag Is Here, and the New Best Picture Front-Runner Is …
February 10, 2025/ 124 min/ Sean Fennessey · Amanda Dobbins
The morning after the Eagles' Super Bowl rout, Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins size up a dull crop of Super Bowl trailers, then read the PGA and DGA tea leaves: Anora swept the weekend and looks like the Best Picture front-runner again. They run the last decade of winners to prove how little the old rules apply, then producer Bobby Wagner opens a 500-plus-email mega-mailbag on festivals, filmmaker deep dives, against-taste picks, kitchen islands, poker, and how you watch movies with two kids.
72 films across 4 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 Super Bowl Trailersgrading a weak batch of game-day spots
Thunderbolts* 2025
Amanda watched it twice and thought it looked like garbage, gray computer barf, a reheated Guardians/Suicide Squad team-up. Sean is milder. Long tangent on the title asterisk and the Dark Avengers theory; Wyatt Russell returns as U.S. Agent.
Jurassic World Rebirth 2025
An extended version aired; Sean found it fine.
Lilo & Stitch 2025
The live-action remake, Sean's pick for best ad of the night, with Stitch running around during the game. His daughter Alice loved it.
F1 2025
A 30-second spot, mostly Brad Pitt behind the wheel plus Javier Bardem. Sean notes the tag said 'this summer,' not June, and wonders if it's slipping.
One Battle After Another 2025
Invoked as the nightmare scenario: if the PTA spot ever signals a date move, it'll break Sean's heart.
The New Best Picture Front-Runnerreading the PGA, DGA, and Critics' Choice results
Anora 2024
Won the PGA, DGA (Best Director for Sean Baker), and Critics' Choice over one weekend. Sean puts its odds at 51 percent and notes Baker is positioned to win a record four Oscars for one film (picture, director, writer, editor).
The Brutalist 2024
The presumed old-Academy alternative that never materialized at the guilds; Adrien Brody took Critics' Choice Best Actor. Its reading room becomes a running mailbag bit.
Emilia Pérez 2024
Read as imperiled after its scandal: minimal critical support and broad opposition. Only one Critics' Choice win; even Zoe Saldaña is called vulnerable, though they still expect her to win.
Conclave 2024
Won Critics' Choice Best Ensemble; Sean flatly doesn't believe that vote closed before the Emilia Pérez fallout. A possible SAG/BAFTA overperformer that could reopen the race.
Nickel Boys 2024
RaMell Ross won the DGA first-feature award to a standing ovation from all five nominees. Sean pleads for more people to watch it.
A Complete Unknown 2024
The nominal traditional pick, but a music biopic has never won Best Picture.
The Substance 2024
Demi Moore won Critics' Choice Best Actress; if she takes SAG, a Mikey Madison win gets much harder.
Wicked 2024
Jon M. Chu won a second Best Director award of the season at Critics' Choice.
I'm Still Here 2024
One of the ballots that matters under the PGA/Oscar preferential count, where Anora sits at No. 2 or 3.
A Real Pain 2024
Kieran Culkin won Critics' Choice Supporting Actor.
The Last Ten Best Picture Winnershow little the old rules still apply
Moonlight 2016
The break point: Sean says nothing in Oscar history predicted it. Cited with Parasite as a case where the actual best movie won.
The Shape of Water 2017
Called an ignominious win and not among Guillermo del Toro's best; the del Toro-as-beloved-advocate dynamic is the Baker comparison.
Green Book 2018
Framed as a whitelash to Oscars So White, winning over a field with no rock-solid Best Picture.
Parasite 2019
The 1917-at-the-PGAs year that flipped after SAG. Bong Joon-ho theoretically won four Oscars, though the international award goes to the country, not the filmmaker.
Nomadland 2020
'No movie like that ever won before.' A strange year.
CODA 2021
First streamer win, the Will Smith slap year. Amanda dismissed it as treacle crap at Sundance, then loved it after her daughter was born.
Everything Everywhere All at Once 2022
A multiversal mom-daughter sci-fi dramedy that won it all, over Amanda's pick, Tár.
Oppenheimer 2023
The Spielberg/Schindler's List 'it's his time' win, but formally unusual: an opening montage, a black-and-white final hour set decades later.
The Living Desert 1953
The tangent: the only person to win four Oscars in one night is Walt Disney, in 1954, for four different films. This 54-minute nature documentary, essentially a 1950s Planet Earth, was his Best Documentary. Sean watched it at 11 p.m.
The Mega-MailbagSean and Amanda, with producer Bobby Wagner reading 500-plus listener emails
The Silence of the Lambs 1991
Movie-duo question: Sean floats Hannibal Lecter and Clarice as the pod's dynamic, a little captor-and-prisoner.
Fight Club 1999
Amanda's duo answer, on the dual-personas theory. 'We all know I'm Tyler Durden.'
Godzilla vs. Kong 2021
A previously floated duo comp for the two hosts.
Bringing Up Baby 1938
Where they land: classic screwball, Hepburn and Grant, witty repartee and speed. Sturges energy.
The Philadelphia Story 1940
First guess for the Hepburn-Grant comp before they correct to Bringing Up Baby.
It Happened One Night 1934
Named in the same screwball-comp breath.
A Few Good Men 1992
Bobby's read on the pod: Amanda as Bacon, Sean as Tom Cruise, himself as Weinberg, with Bill as Nicholson.
Untamed Heart 1993
Sean's against-taste pick: the Tony Bill romance with Marisa Tomei, Christian Slater, and Rosie Perez that he saw at 11 with his mom. He hasn't revisited it and wants it on 4K.
Fast Five 2011
Amanda's known zag; 'everybody knows that.'
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 2017
Amanda's other surprising-taste pick.
The Duellists 1977
The filmography-order question: don't start a Ridley Scott deep dive here, you'll be lost. Begin with the accepted classics, then go chronological.
Badlands 1973
For a director with a tight body of work like Malick (eight films), start at the beginning and go straight through.
Stagecoach 1939
The John Ford entry point, via the You Must Remember This 'old man is still alive' season: his breakthrough with John Wayne.
My Darling Clementine 1946
A pick-and-choose stop on the suggested Ford path after Stagecoach.
They Were Expendable 1945
Next on the same abbreviated Ford route.
The Searchers 1956
The other anchor of the shortcut Ford filmography.
Cheyenne Autumn 1964
Cited as a late Ford film that reverses his own conventions, told with huge empathy for Native people.
7 Women 1966
Ford's entirely female-focused final feature, unusual for him.
Magnolia 1999
The PTA question: watch him chronologically, all ten films, no skips. Sean recommends the making-of doc 'That Moment' to watch him work in real time.
Boogie Nights 1997
Part of the early PTA run where the autobiography (his mom, his dad) sits right on the surface.
The Master 2012
The turn: from here on PTA stops explaining, tells you it's not about Scientology, and makes you figure it out.
Licorice Pizza 2021
Later mentioned as unimpeded vision, the truck rolling backward down the hill looks exactly as it must have in his head.
Nosferatu 2024
On theme-hunting: Sean listened back to his Robert Eggers interview and found Eggers, like PTA, reluctant to talk theme, though that doesn't mean it isn't there.
Marie Antoinette 2006
Corey's architecture/inspiration question: Amanda bought purple Chuck Taylor high-tops after the anachronistic pair in the 'I Want Candy' montage. Later a Sofia Coppola example of unimpeded vision.
Perfect Days 2023
Named as aspirational interiors she'll never actually live in, complete with an 8-track.
Deep Red 1975
One of two vintage first-run posters a Warner Bros. listener sent Sean, a Spanish one-sheet for the Argento film.
The Candidate 1972
The other gifted first-run poster, for one of Sean's favorite movies, the Robert Redford film.
Memento 2000
Unimpeded-vision question: proof Nolan could realize an odd, technically profound idea early on a small budget.
Porco Rosso 1992
A Miyazaki example, and a hit with Sean's 3-year-old son, who wants to fast-forward to any plane. The pig smokes and drinks wine.
Hereditary 2018
A quick benefactor-commission aside, the 'that first half is awesome' movie.
True Romance 1993
Noted as Christian Slater's other 1993 title, released the same year as Untamed Heart.
The Gorge 2025
Miles Teller's new Apple TV+ film, out Friday. Sean can't recommend it; Teller might still take the Eagles' Super Bowl over a box-office hit.
Maestro 2023
The Bradley Cooper 'Oscar or a Super Bowl win' anecdote, on the Tom Cruise / what's-next question.
The Killer 2023
Sean casts himself as Fassbender's assassin, head down, listening to Illmatic, avoiding eye contact, on the poker-hobby bit.
The Card Counter 2021
The other poker-spiral comp: 'unboxing me realizing I'm acting like Oscar Isaac in The Card Counter.'
I'm Not There 2007
Sean likens his son on a toy train to Richard Gere's Billy the Kid segment.
Train Dreams 2025
The Sundance 'logging one' Amanda keeps mocking and Sean keeps defending; his example of a film he wishes he'd seen in a theater rather than on a screener.
Paddington in Peru 2024
One of two kids' movies Sean saw over the weekend and loved; he's taking his son again this week.
Follow That Bird 1985
The Sesame Street movie Sean caught at Vidiots with Alice after a birthday party; he calls it sick.
Interstellar 2014
The theatrical-future question: its re-release success as evidence moviegoing is eventizing, Record Store Day style.
Avatar 2009
Part of the large-format lineage (Avatar to Oppenheimer to the Brutalist) driving the premium-experience business.
Mickey 17 2025
On Sean's slate for the day, mentioned in the sign-off.
M3GAN 2.0 2025
Amanda, on the marketing, has heard it's the T2 of female-robot movies; she still thinks M3GAN should have performed at the Oscars.
Captain America: Brave New World 2025
The Red Hulk movie Sean has to see this week; the guys running a Winter Soldier-style paranoid-thriller comparison against it. Extended riff pretending it adapts the Huxley novel.
Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy 2025
Teed up for next week's episode.
Blue Moon 2025
Festival talk: the Linklater/Ethan Hawke film Sean expects at Berlin, one reason he wants to finally hit the European festivals in 2026.
Nouvelle Vague 2025
The other Linklater, which Sean expects at Cannes.
Also mentioned raised along the way
In passing Black WidowEdge of Tomorrow1917La La LandThe Big ShortSpotlightThe RevenantGet OutLady BirdPhantom ThreadCall Me by Your NameDunkirkTárSchindler's ListSmile 2Top GunM3GANHorizon: An American Saga - Chapter 2FerrariThree Days of the CondorAll the President's MenKluteThe Parallax ViewCaptain America: The Winter SoldierA Clockwork OrangeWayne's World
Not films filtered out: TV, games, ads
TV The Falcon and the Winter SoldierPlanet EarthInside the Actors Studio
Podcasts The TownYou Must Remember ThisBlank CheckLas CulturistasThe Press Box
Music Taylor Swift: The Eras TourIllmatic
Ads The Town (What I'm Hearing / Puck)