The Big Picture · Review · Discussion · Rankings
December 8, 2023/ 99 min/ Sean Fennessey · Amanda Dobbins · Bobby Wagner
Godzilla Minus One sneaks up on everybody and turns into the weekend's real event movie, then a mailbag stretches across AFI's list, the Best Picture belt, and a scene-by-scene tour of the year.
94 films across 7 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.
Godzilla Minus One
Toho's first in-house Godzilla movie in eight years turns into a word-of-mouth sensation, a $15 million post-WWII war drama with better effects than movies costing twenty times as much. Both hosts call it one of the year's most fun theater experiences, even with a real emotional undertow.
The last Godzilla movie they covered on the show, back at the height of the pandemic, brought up as a tonal contrast to how sincere Minus One plays it.
The Gareth Edwards version, cited as the closest tonal cousin: played straight as tragedy rather than spectacle.
The other modern Toho Godzilla Sean says he liked going in.
An unofficial pairing: both films tell the nuclear story from the side usually left out of American movies.
Kurosawa's nuclear-anxiety drama, cited as one of the films Minus One's subtext draws on.
The Ghibli film named as another entry in the post-war-Japan-and-nuclear-anxiety canon.
A Big Year for Japanese Film
Teased for next week's show; part of Bob's top five.
The new trailer, dropped just days earlier, prompted a quick aside about Legendary's side of the Godzilla rights.
Not yet released in the U.S.; missed out on Japan's Oscar submission slot.
Hirokazu Kore-eda's latest, released the same week.
Wim Wenders' Koji Yakusho vehicle; Sean has a screener to loan Amanda.
Aki Kaurismäki's latest, which Sean liked a lot.
Poor Things (An Early Look)A full conversation is planned for January once the film is in wide release
Yorgos Lanthimos' feminist Frankenstein fable with Emma Stone, hotly touted out of Venice and Telluride, now cooling off during a slow platform release.
Lanthimos and screenwriter Tony McNamara's previous collaboration.
Eileen
William Oldroyd's Ottessa Moshfegh adaptation with Thomasin McKenzie and Anne Hathaway; Sean liked it without loving it, praising Hathaway's swing away from glamour in the back half.
The film Eileen's opening stretch initially evokes before it turns into something else.
Cited for McKenzie's similar innocent-ingenue register.
Another McKenzie performance Sean singles out.
Oldroyd's previous film, which Sean says he liked even more than Eileen.
Awards Season Mailbag
Amanda guesses it correctly on the AFI Top 10; also the star-driven Best Picture front-runner most of this mailbag keeps circling back to.
Subject of a screen-time trivia round (De Niro clocks in at 102 minutes, Lily Gladstone at 56) that Sean argues is the wrong way to measure Gladstone's impact.
Charles Melton's Independent Spirit nomination and Gotham win get discussed as an early sign of momentum against Robert Downey Jr.'s Oppenheimer campaign; also its own screen-time trivia round.
Guessed, incorrectly, as part of the AFI list.
Left off both AFI and NBR's lists, which the hosts call a blow given its Golden Globes musical/comedy chances.
Cited in a detour on Todd Haynes' recent run as a for-hire director rather than a writer-director.
Still embargoed; Sean hasn't seen it yet.
Michel Franco's Jessica Chastain/Peter Sarsgaard drama, which Sean expects to be divisive.
John Waters' number one film of the year, per his year-end list.
Glenn Howerton's Independent Spirit nomination gets a shout-out.
The unanimous answer in the ‘Best Picture belt’ game: the most recent winner both hosts think still holds up.
Named as the film Parasite took the belt from.
Traced back through the belt game as the one Spotlight took it from.
The documentary Sean watched about people who appeared in other documentaries, used to explain why it's been a weak year for the format.
Named as last year's documentary standout, with no equivalent this year.
Sean's likely favorite documentary of the year.
The Barry Sanders documentary named in the same star-driven-docs list.
Discussed as a possible Juliette Binoche awards vehicle, and later cited for its opening scene.
Rachel Sennott named as a Best Actress long shot; Sean calls it the funniest thing he saw all year.
Amy Donald's performance as the doll gets floated as a movement-as-acting nomination.
Rachel McAdams named as a wish-list nominee.
Best Scenes, Red Carpets, and Netflix's Oscar Odds
Its Rome chase named among Sean's grouping of best scenes.
The Sacré-Cœur sequence, same grouping.
The Austerlitz battle, same grouping; also the setting for Sean's story about a theater neighbor's running commentary.
Its brute-force sequence named as a best-scene pick.
The central fight scene named as a best-scene pick; also floated as a late addition to the Best Picture power rankings before losing out to The Color Purple.
Its argument scene, added as a late best-scene pick.
Cited as the example of a Best Picture win where the audience actually wants to hear from the winner.
Named as part of the Academy backlash that also hurt Roma's chances.
Discussed as a contender jockeying for the last power-ranking spot.
Cited, dismissively, as the kind of Netflix movie Sean doesn't want to see more of.
Its Best Picture loss is called out as still painful, and as the moment Netflix's awards momentum stalled.
Named as an example of a Best Picture nominee nobody talks about a year later.
Also the subject of an earlier tangent about its Best Original Song using an old officer-and-a-gentleman trick of folding the credits song into the score.
One of Julia Roberts' ‘four faves’ on a recent red carpet.
Another of Julia Roberts' ‘four faves.’
The third of Julia Roberts' picks.
Tarsem's film, Roberts' fourth pick, praised as a genuinely deep cut.
Mahershala Ali's red-carpet pick, cited as an early breakthrough in documentary filmmaking.
Best Picture Power Rankingsbest to worst
No. 1: still the favorite, though Sean thinks a Best Picture/Director split is looking more likely.
No. 10: edges out Anatomy of a Fall in the final negotiation of the list.
Also mentioned raised along the way
In passing Rebel Moon - Part One: A Child of Fire300How to Blow Up a PipelineSilver Linings PlaybookThe CroodsZombieland: Double TapCruellaLeave the World Behind
Not films filtered out: TV, games, ads
TV The CurseBeckhamArnold
Other The Ryan Rosillo ShowDirectors Guild Podcast (May December episode)Actors on Actors
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