The Big Picture · Discussion
May 14, 2019/ 49 min/ Sean Fennessey · Amanda Dobbins
Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins skip the year's best-of list for its strangest one, working through a listener-submitted pile of confounding, over-cast 2019 releases.
12 films across 11 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.
Dragged Across Concretethe on-ramp into the conversation
S. Craig Zahler's Mel Gibson/Vince Vaughn cop thriller is what put Sean on this whole line of questioning. Amanda skipped it on the advice of everyone in her life. They flag Zahler's polarizing political streak and point to Chris Ryan and Adam Nayman's conversation about it on The Watch.
Serenitythe most-requested pick in the callout
Steven Knight's Matthew McConaughey/Anne Hathaway noir, in which McConaughey plays a fisherman chasing a tuna, Hathaway plays his abused ex-wife, Djimon Hounsou is his first mate, Jason Clarke is the new husband, and Diane Lane and Jeremy Strong round out an absurdly overqualified cast. The reveal that the entire story is a video game programmed by the couple's son splits them: Amanda calls it a legitimately bad, hysterically overplayed movie; Sean is more forgiving of what it might have been going for. They also compare notes on where in the runtime each of them caught the twist, since Amanda's husband swears he saw a cut that revealed it much later.
The HustleAnne Hathaway's other May release
A gender-swapped remake of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, with Anne Hathaway and Rebel Wilson as rival con artists in the south of France. Amanda calls it a dinosaur of a studio comedy that never quite comes together, but singles out a con built around Lord of the Rings and says the clothes and locations are doing a lot of the work. They get into how the ending inverts the original's twist, and into a broader pattern of 2019 comedies (this one, Long Shot) swapping genders into old formulas without really reckoning with what changes.
Wine CountryAmy Poehler's directorial debut
A Netflix hangout comedy about a group of longtime friends (Amy Poehler, Tina Fey, Maya Rudolph, Rachel Dratch, Ana Gasteyer, Emily Spivey, Paula Pell, plus Maya Erskine and Cherry Jones) on a Napa birthday trip. Amanda enjoyed it, calling it a '100-minute movie hang' with a dead-on ear for Airbnb and wine-tasting small talk, though she flags the Brené Brown cameo as blatant Netflix product placement and thinks the film handles its BRCA-gene subplot too lightly.
Under the Silver LakeSean's controversial favorite
David Robert Mitchell's follow-up to It Follows, starring Andrew Garfield as an aimless obsessive chasing conspiracies around his neighbor's disappearance. It premiered at Cannes to a sharply divided response, and A24 later pushed it to VOD after a soft theatrical run. Sean calls it one of his favorite movies of the year and defends its satire of nostalgia and movie obsession; Amanda pushes back on whether the film's excesses (particularly around its parade of naked women) actually critique what they claim to critique, though both agree Mitchell has a real eye.
The Souveniropens Friday, not yet seen by either host
Joanna Hogg's fourth feature, starring Honor Swinton Byrne (Tilda Swinton's daughter). Sean, freshly caught up on Hogg's filmography via the Criterion Channel, calls this her best work yet and specifically recommends 2013's Exhibition.
NonfictionFrench media people, arguing
Olivier Assayas's ensemble comedy about a group of French publishing and digital-media people, starring Guillaume Canet and Juliette Binoche. Amanda enjoyed it and jokes that it's basically a French, better-dressed version of the podcast; they also point to Assayas's Kristen Stewart film Personal Shopper as evidence he can make any premise work.
High LifeClaire Denis in space
Claire Denis's sci-fi film about death-row inmates sent into space to test human reproduction, starring Robert Pattinson, Juliette Binoche, Mia Goth, and Andre 3000. Amanda saw it eight months earlier at the New York Film Festival and was surprised by how much it stayed with her, calling out Pattinson's stillness and a widely discussed Binoche scene in the ship's sex chamber; she wishes Andre 3000 had gotten more to do.
Isn't It Romantica rom-com about rom-coms
Rebel Wilson plays an architect who wakes up trapped inside a PG-13 romantic comedy after a head injury, opposite Liam Hemsworth. Co-written by Katie Silberman (Set It Up, the upcoming Booksmart), it wins Amanda over as smart, self-aware genre commentary and the least demeaning use of Wilson she's seen; she and Sean also make the case for Liam Hemsworth as an underrated comic performer.
The Standoff at Sparrow CreekSean's low-key thriller recommendation
Henry Dunham's tense, cheaply made thriller about five militia members interrogating each other overnight after a mass shooting at a police funeral, in case one of them did it. Sean praises the cast of character actors, James Badge Dale, Patrick Fischler, Robert Aramayo, Chris Mulkey, Gene Jones, and Brian Geraghty chief among them, and calls it a smart, stylish movie that's easy to miss.
What's left to catch up onclosing round
Asghar Farhadi's Spanish-language drama/thriller starring Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem. Sean admits, to Amanda's mock horror, that he still hasn't seen it despite it sitting on his list for months.
Sebastian Lelio's English-language remake of his own 2013 film Gloria, starring Julianne Moore as a middle-aged woman rebuilding her life after a relationship ends. Sean regrets missing it and, having interviewed Lelio, wants to pair it with Wine Country as a double feature about women figuring out what's next.
Also mentioned raised along the way
Already covered this year Ash Is Purest WhiteTransitUsLong ShotApollo 11
In passing Dirty Rotten ScoundrelsOcean's 8It FollowsPersonal ShopperGloriaPretty WomanAvengers: EndgameViceBooksmartSet It UpExhibitionPokemon Detective Pikachu
Not films filtered out: TV, games, ads
TV Peaky BlindersSuccessionPen15The Bold TypeGame of Thrones