In what might be our longest episode ever, but is certainly an epic installment in any event, your friends in podcasting delve into the potential new relevancy of late night television, the frightening potential merger of Paramount/CBS/Skydance with Warner Bros/Discovery, and the power of TikTok (and other social media platforms) in turning this year’s Superman into a box office hit. Four of the all-time great films (Carl Thodore Dreyer’s 1928 The Passion of Joan of Arc, Luis Bunuel’s 1961 Viridiana, Jean Vigo’s 1934 L’Atalante, and Charles Laughton’s 1955 The Night of the Hunter) receive deep-dive analyses. With pal of the show Jon Lawlor adding support, the influence of Robert Redford’s training as a painter on his work as an actor and filmmaker gets discussed as does Burt Bacharach’s (terrible) music score for (the great) Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

For what it’s worth, awards season in Hollywood is firmly upon us and on this week’s show, your friends in podcasting examine the top ten 2024 releases at the U.S. box office, the top ten films according to critics, and the ten films selected by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for the Best Picture Oscar nominations. They analyze the surprises, the snubs and the meaning behind the Oscar nominations, before taking a deep dive into Gladiator II, Wicked: Part One and A Complete Unknown. And speaking of the Academy, Phil had a terrible experience at an Academy Museum screening – so terrible, he might never return. He fills Dean in on the details and they share memories of a colleague about whose death in 2020 they just learned.

Your friends in podcasting have a great deal on their minds … Cold weather in the nation’s capital, the hell of home renovations, fire and long-term unhealthful air and the Olympics in Los Angeles … And they discuss it all on this week’s show. They also remember the late David Lynch, suggesting that no artist has ever loved Los Angeles more than he did. They discuss the latest in the Justin Baldoni-Blake Lively (and now Ryan Reynolds!) lawsuits, and this leads to a discussion of the “abuser’s playbook”. The programming glories of the Detroit Film Theater (at the Detroit Institute of Arts) and the Renzo Piano-designed Academy Museum (at the L.A. County Museum of Art) get celebrated and lead to a discussion about “old school” wide-screen filmmaking, and big screen “pacing”, as well as cyber punk and yacht rock! Finally, analysis will be directed onto the Directors Guild and Producers Guild awards nominations and what they portend for this week’s Oscar nominations. Oh, yeah, and the show opens with an epic Dean Haglund meltdown!