The Big Picture · Review · Discussion · Roundtable

The 'Vice' Backlash and the Oprah Bounce | The Oscars Show (Ep. 112)

December 27, 2018/ 67 min/ Sean Fennessey · Amanda Dobbins

Sean and Amanda break down Vice, weigh On the Basis of Sex and Destroyer, debate whether Oprah's Black Panther push means anything, and run the wide-open Best Picture odds heading into the new year.

26 films across 8 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.

'Vice'Adam McKay's Dick Cheney biopic

Vice 2018

Christian Bale's transformation gets the headlines, but Sean and Amanda spend more time on how the fast-cutting, fourth-wall-breaking style avoids the trap of making its subject sympathetic.

'On the Basis of Sex' and the Ginsburg Documentary

On the Basis of Sex 2018

A more traditional Ruth Bader Ginsburg biopic, starring Felicity Jones and Armie Hammer. Amanda loved it; Sean thinks it's a weaker movie than Vice and shouldn't be in the Oscar conversation.

RBG 2018

The documentary both hosts watched around the same time. Amanda found it reductive next to the dramatized version, which she thought actually explained Ginsburg's legal work more clearly.

Oprah's Black Panther Campaign

Black Panther 2018

Oprah threw a screening and gave a speech to Bob Iger about it; Sean and Amanda debate whether her endorsement can actually move the movie into Best Picture contention.

Stock Up, Stock Down

Mary Poppins Returns 2018

A quieter opening than Disney's usual live-action redo, but Sean and Amanda think it could have Aquaman-style long legs since it needs planning to get little kids there.

A Quiet Place 2018

The other half of Emily Blunt's 2018, cited as part of her Best Actress case this season.

Aquaman 2018

Keeps coming up all episode as the box-office benchmark and, separately, as the source of one more Nicole Kidman wig joke.

'Destroyer'

Karyn Kusama's grimy L.A. crime thriller, with Nicole Kidman playing a burned-out cop across two timelines. Sean liked it; Amanda found the wig work and prosthetics too meta to fully buy the performance.

Bird Box and the Roma Effect

Bird Box 2018

Sean thinks more people have watched this on Netflix, going purely by the meme cycle, than have seen Roma.

Roma 2018

Alfonso Cuarón's Netflix release, framed here as the opposite of Bird Box's passive viewing: people are telling Sean and Amanda they made watching it into an event.

A Star Is Born 2018

Its Best Song shortlist snub (one nomination against two for Mary Poppins Returns) comes up as a small data point on Academy attention. Sean also tried and failed to get his family to see it over Christmas, since no Atlanta theater was still showing it.

The Best Foreign Language Film Race

Cold War 2018

Pawel Pawlikowski's 90-minute romance loosely based on his own parents. Sean interviewed him for an upcoming episode. Fair warning from Amanda: it opens with 10 to 15 minutes of a cappella Polish folk singing.

Capernaum 2018

Part of what Sean calls the most stacked foreign-language field in memory; Wesley Morris covered it on the show a few weeks earlier.

Shoplifters 2018

One both hosts adored, still playing theatrically at the ArcLight weeks after release.

Burning 2018

The Korean film Sean counts as the fifth of his five clear contenders.

Never Look Away 2018

Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck's follow-up to The Lives of Others. Not yet released in the U.S., but already nominated for Best Foreign Film at the Golden Globes as Germany's entry.