As promised, friend of the pod Nani returns to help the boys unpack the highs and lows of this year's cinema in a festive New Year's Eve wrap up - now with 75% less vaping!
All right. Welcome back to Twink Death. I don't know if this is going to be episode four or five or six, but welcome back. Yeah, we've kind of been all over the place with our episode um continuity, but it's fine.
00:00:51
Speaker
um i think we should probably try and get this one out as like the first one of the new year. cause I was just going to maybe put this out right after record. Yeah, that could be cute, actually.
00:01:02
Speaker
so it's it's currently New Year's Eve. And we are joined by good friend Nanny again for our end of year film wrap up.
00:01:14
Speaker
Say hi. Happy new year. Happy new year. What are you guys doing for new years? um My friend is having a party at her flat, which is at the very top of a quite tall building. so we'll be able to watch all the fireworks go off on the balcony, which should be nice.
00:01:31
Speaker
Will you get drunk, Nanny? Yeah, probably. But then like leave before it gets a bit too messy. Okay. But you'll probably get there. You'll probably stay at midnight. Oh, of course. Yeah.
00:01:41
Speaker
Yeah. What about you, Vicky? i had originally planned to stay home, but my friends just texted me and they were like, we want to do something. So um they're going to come around for a few drinks later and then we'll go and watch the fireworks, I think, in the city center.
00:01:58
Speaker
So it should be cute. i I guess there are fireworks tonight in New York. i didn't even think about that. Um, I kind of hate New Year's not to be a downer.
00:02:09
Speaker
no I hate it as well. It's my worst holiday. i hate that stupid fucking song that they sing. Yeah. I hate the song and i I hate how people are sort of depressed and anxious always on this holiday, or at least there's like an anxiety in the air. feel there's a lot of pressure to like be reflective about your life and, um,
00:02:32
Speaker
I kind of think that's something you should be sort of doing when it feels natural. It shouldn't be like a kind of tethered to any like milestone, you know?
New Year's Resolutions and Personal Goals
00:02:42
Speaker
Yeah. I like, I bought myself like a, ah like a planner, like a journal this year, which I never usually do.
00:02:50
Speaker
Um, but it only has like a tiny section for each day. so I was like, okay, I'm going to write like a haiku every single day. Cause can, can't manage like a whole journal entry. I'll just give up, but I can manage a haiku.
00:03:04
Speaker
So nice. I'd love, I would love to become a person who keeps a daily journal. I don't know if i I'll ever be disciplined or organized enough to do that, but it would be, it would be a nice thing probably to have.
00:03:17
Speaker
I have some friends who've been keeping journals since they were like in high school. Yeah, I used to do it a lot when I was younger. Like, not every day, but, like, at least, like, a few times a week. But I don't like going back and, like, looking at stuff like that because it freaks me out.
00:03:32
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know if it would be, like, mentally healthy for me or if it would be, like, a disaster to have, like... To be completely honest, I find, like, if I look at stuff that I wrote when I was 16 or 17, I was much better at writing and much more creative and interesting sounding than ever had.
00:03:51
Speaker
Like, like I've read stuff that I wrote when I was really young and I've been like, God, this is really good. I couldn't write this now. So it's just kind of depressing. Yeah. I mean, I do think you had, do think we hit an intellectual wall at 30.
00:04:05
Speaker
I think you start declining a little bit. twin death. Yeah. Cause I don't feel as smart as I was in my twenties. And I don't think it's just because of drugs. I think like genuinely you're, you get a little more ground down.
00:04:23
Speaker
Yeah. Frazzled and tired. and so um Yeah. I don't know. So I have no new year's resolutions or anything to report. do you guys do resolutions? I guess Bicky's doing his haiku thing.
00:04:38
Speaker
um Yeah, I mean, I've been absolutely film maxing this year, as will be the the subject of this episode. So i'm going to carry on that. i I went 130 times to the cinema this year. so I'm hoping it would have been 150 if my local cinema hadn't closed down. you know what i'm and You know what I'm going to do? I just decided my resolution now. And I think it'll it'll be a chill, easy one to do is I'm going to be more organized like you, Nanny, with my viewing. And I'm going to like keep a letterboxd.
00:05:04
Speaker
okay That's a good idea, because I don't do this either. I actually have a letterbox, and I never bother with it. Because at the bare minimum, right the way my understanding of the way it works is like you can just you don't have to write a review, in theory. No, you can just give it a read out of five.
00:05:20
Speaker
Yeah, so I'm going to do that, because then I'll be able to say with certainty how many movies I saw this year which I'm not... um I'm not certain about, but I guess that's a good segue into, our, into our ah topic today. We're all, I would say pretty active movie goers. Um, currently childless man in our thirties. a lot of time go see movies, maybe forever childless, at least for some of us.
00:05:50
Speaker
Um, um But yeah, i I don't know. Maybe just we could start with Nanny because he's the guest, but maybe tell us about why you go and see so many movies in the cinema and then you could kind of go over your list.
00:06:04
Speaker
So... what's enjoyable about it for you, whatever, you know? Watching an absolutely terrible film, like a film that is a complete waste of time that you find annoying, you find irritating, is still a better use of 90 minutes of your time than scrolling on Twitter.
00:06:21
Speaker
And if you're watching a film at home, you can do both at the same time sometimes if it's a really bad film. But certainly going to the cinema a lot is like, that's one of the few times where my attention is 100% focused on one thing, which is not true a lot of the time at home at work. You've got your phone in your hand or you're looking at something and like, I'm completely focused on the film. It's the closest to us almost form a meditation is to just focus on just the screen for 90 minutes.
00:06:45
Speaker
And um yeah, you say even a bad film is a better use of your time than than doom scrolling for... But because I go and see almost everything, I end up catching a lot of films that I'd never get around to watching at home that no one would ever recommend to me or even films that I wouldn't think I would like that end up really enjoying because I see almost everything that comes out.
00:07:05
Speaker
Okay, cool. All right. Do you want to start your list and we can like rip off each one? i guess. Do you want to do like category by category? Oh, category by category. That's really good. That'll create more conversation, won't it?
00:07:17
Speaker
Yeah, because I thought if we just list our favourite films, it's just like any other podcast where people list their favourite films in the and we'll probably have a lot of overlap. But if we did interesting categories, then I think we'd have better conversations.
Film Discussion Approaches
00:07:28
Speaker
so All right, let's do it. Biggest surprise is the first one. Biggest surprise. So for me is a film called Afraid, but it's spelt with the AI in the middle capitalised. So it's like Afraid, which is a, the trailer would make you think it's a sort of smart home gone mad a film about someone who gets an evil Alexa, but it's not. It's much more like a sort of paranoid tech thriller um about this this family that get a sort of AI assistant that starts messing with their lives.
00:08:01
Speaker
It's got a David Desmaltian from um Late Night with the Devil plays one of the villains in it. And the film completely throws off what you think it's going to be. You think it's going to be this very schlocky thing about having an evil Alexa. And it's it's about much more about the sort of insidious effects of AI and about the paranoia that it would introduce into your life.
00:08:23
Speaker
I definitely recommend that. i was The trailer and the poster made it look like utter trash. And I went to see it. I was like, no, this is brilliant. That's my biggest surprise. seen Have you seen this film, Q?
00:08:36
Speaker
I haven't, unfortunately. i i tried to watch it and I watched about 10 minutes and I turned it off. But like i think I tried to watch it because I'm sure that I'd heard you say that it was good. And then I don't know whether like, I don't know, there was just something about it that I think I went, I definitely went in with that mindset of like, this is going to be like, slob.
00:08:58
Speaker
Yeah. Maybe i just wasn't in the right mindset for it. I feel bad that haven't seen it. I feel like want to go back and give another chance now. Did you watch it the cinema? I did, yes.
00:09:10
Speaker
See, maybe maybe I was too distracted by the doom
Surprises and Disappointments in Film
00:09:13
Speaker
scrolling. maybe That's the thing. If you watch at home, you have to put your phone in another room if you're really going to pay attention. um All right, Vicky, what's your biggest surprise?
00:09:23
Speaker
and Okay, so... we have The last time we had Nanny on, we did have a little bit of ah conversation at the end after talking about the substance, why we talked about like our films that we'd sort of seen this year. So I've tried for the most part not to repeat myself and go for films that I didn't talk about then.
00:09:44
Speaker
With the exception being my biggest surprise of the year, which i I stuck with. I went for the first at Omen. um So i I would say like my expectations going into the first omen were literally in the gutter. I thought it was going to be awful, like really, really awful, especially coming off the back of um the like Exorcist movie that came out this year.
00:10:11
Speaker
um But I loved it. I really, really loved it. I've only seen it once. I haven't gone back and rewatched it. um I think I probably am going to before before the year is out. um That might be my afternoon thing to do. But but yeah, so basically it's a prequel to the 1976 The Omen, which is...
00:10:35
Speaker
It kind of came along around the time of the sort of spate of like religious horrors and it's okay. Like it's not, it's, but it's never really been like one of my favorites. Um, but the, the way that this film kind of like,
00:10:49
Speaker
feeds into it and also kind of surpasses it in terms of like creepiness I thought was really really good like some of the scenes in this movie I just found so like unsettling to watch and I kind kind of came out of the cinema and you know and you've got that like feeling of just like I've seen a movie and yeah I don't know loved it did you see Immaculate when it came out Yeah, I did. um i also really liked Immaculate. And the plot is obviously very similar.
00:11:20
Speaker
Right. And they came out so close to each other and they were so similar. So I was just curious. I feel like if you stapled the last act of Immaculate onto the the first omen, that would be this of the sort perfect non-horror film. Because I loved the first omen, but I didn't really like the ending.
00:11:37
Speaker
And I didn't really like Immaculate, but I loved the ending. So I thought the two of them together, he could create something... Yeah, I agree with you about the ending. the I wouldn't even say like the whole ending. I didn't like the last five minutes of this film. like That kind of like final scene felt a little bit sort of Marvel movie setting up. And it feels like it's it's hamstrung by having to connect it to the original omen.
00:12:03
Speaker
So like you have to still have this little rushed bit at the end where it connects it. I kind of like it. Oh, go on. No, i was just gonna say i think I liked that last scene only because I like imagining um ah scenario in my brain where I have to hide out somewhere. Like I have a lot of fantasies about being in witness protection program or something.
00:12:26
Speaker
So, yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I felt like it did a ah good enough job of connecting itself to the original film to not really need that. Like...
00:12:40
Speaker
it was It became sort of obvious by the end of the movie that like, obviously the baby that she was having was Damien. So if I, yeah, I do feel like the last scene was sort of unnecessary, but that doesn't take away from all of the really, really amazing parts of the movie. So.
00:12:59
Speaker
Okay, fair contender. um I chose Trap by M. Night Shyamalan as my biggest surprise. um Shyamalan, Shyamalan is obviously classically hit or miss. um I really love um some of his films, like the...
00:13:23
Speaker
Oh my God, how am I blanking on the name like right now? um i really liked his, like the earliest one, which is the one, what the fuck is that called? Oh, The Village. Okay. I just want to make sure I was, I thought it was The Village. I really liked that one. Like the, con i like i like the thing with M. Night Shyamalan is I like a lot of his concepts, but I'm not sure he always manages to execute them well.
00:13:44
Speaker
Like it's like he has a really, really good idea um like a beach where you age really fast, but then he like can't quite, you know, make it work. But I felt like in trap, he really and like the concept kind of restrained his um, um,
00:14:03
Speaker
I don't know, like his like excessive whims because it was a self-contained story. had to basically all take place at this concert. um it was fun to see Josh Hartnett in something. Cause I think of him as like sort of a, you know, 20 something heartthrob, but it was fun to see him in an older, he's still very hot.
00:14:23
Speaker
um and to see him Fun to see him in like an older role. um And it was a little surprising, you know, and it actually had ah decent use of social media to advance the plot that didn't feel cringy or, um,
00:14:39
Speaker
Yeah, lame or whatever. And ah I was excited the whole time I was watching it. I was sort of, I wanted to see what would happen. So that was You're right. In an era where people are so afraid of, like a lot of films just pretend phones don't exist or find some convenient reason why no one's signal works. To see a film where that actually uses the mechanics of of of cell phones and of um social media in its plot effectively is, yeah, it's great.
00:15:06
Speaker
Yeah, I guess we're going to spoil all these films, so don't... if you I guess if you don't... Yeah, guys, keep up. it'ss It's December 31st. You should have seen them all the Yeah, but um yeah, the the idea that she was able to... you know The pop star was able to use her um you know her like social media following to sort of like get help and like solve the...
00:15:28
Speaker
you know, what was going on was, was really interesting. Um, think it's also, it's his, is it his daughter? Yeah, it is. Yeah. i thought that like, this is also on my list, but like a little bit further down.
00:15:43
Speaker
Um, and I, I,
00:15:49
Speaker
I thought she was terrible, like really, really, truly terrible. But I enjoyed the whole film the whole way through. And there's something about having the goal to put your like mid-looking daughter who like in a movie. Like it's it's so M. Night Shyamalan for him to like build a whole movie around his like relationship.
00:16:14
Speaker
unattractive like singing daughter but you know I I thought her not being like and a first off she didn't have to do that much so I thought her not being an incredible actress wasn't like that big of a you know whatever and second off there is this it's kind of like she's weirdly an okay choice for that role because I feel like the Gen Z pop girlies like aren't as hot as like former Gen Z that is definitely true I would definitely grant you that Yeah, because it's like they're trying more to be like relatable to the average girl than like and like a ridiculously hot girl. So i think she was, i think looks wise, she was like kind of realistic, like for someone that could be a pop star in today's climate, you know?
00:16:59
Speaker
yeah But I agree, she's not like a Oscar-winning actress. And the plot the plot was like pretty outlandish. But it was it was really fun. like I genuinely enjoyed it all the way through. And i'd like ah Josh Harder is my... like dream hunk. Like I've been in love with Josh Hartnett since I had the capacity to feel anything for ah man. Um, and he's just one of the, he's like a fine wine. He's just got better and better with age. So it was really nice to see him in a movie.
00:17:31
Speaker
Um, let's keep moving. Cause I realized we're gonna to get through all these, um, biggest disappointment for Nancy. The biggest disappointment for me was Furiosa. I thought it was just such a drag to watch. And I thought everything that it did to try and expand the world of um Mad Max from the previous film just made it feel smaller.
00:17:52
Speaker
So like you know when they say in the the previous Mad Max film, you know, We bring bullets from Bullet Farm and gas from Gastown. And then they go to Bullet Farm and it's just a quarry. And they go to Gastown and it's just an oil refinery. it's like It just made the world feel so much smaller. And it's just dull, just really dull and too much green screen.
00:18:12
Speaker
And the yeah, I don't know what everyone was talking about. It was, yeah, definitely the most biggest disappointment. um I'll refrain from giving too much of my thoughts on it because i it is on my list and in a different category.
00:18:24
Speaker
um Vicky, do you have anything you want to say before you give yours? I will say i did not see Furiosa for the reason that I absolutely hated Fury Road. I was one of the few that thought Fury Road was a pile of shit.
00:18:42
Speaker
um Wow, okay. Okay. Yeah, I know everybody loves it, but like I've seen it twice, so i'm I am familiar with the film, but like I hated it both times I watched it. there's There was like nothing in that movie that I could like connect with in any like way as like an audience member. I don't know. it Yeah, I don't know. I hated it.
00:19:06
Speaker
All right, what's your biggest disappointment? My biggest disappointment, and... I shouldn't be surprised, but it was Alien Romulus. um i feel Fair enough.
00:19:20
Speaker
I have such an affection for like the first... I would say the first three Alien movies. I'm not a huge fan of four, but I...
00:19:32
Speaker
I get caught up in it every single time that they do this. And I think that it's going to be good, even though I should know better at this point. And when I sat down in the cinema and the movie started, like I was loving it, i would say, for like the first like 20 minutes, because I think everything in the movie that is...
00:19:52
Speaker
new is really interesting and good. But the callbacks to like movies that haven't even happened yet in the continuity, like just, and the shot for shot, like fan service, like recreations of scenes. And it just, like my eyes were like rolling back into my head, like I know. when When the CGI Ian Holm turns up, oh is this is this what we're going to do? We're going to puppet the ghosts of the 20th century stars to observ milk them for the 21st century. It's not a cameo. he's He's the main villain in it, is is Ian Holm's ghost. I've had conversations with like people about this as well because I don't think...
00:20:37
Speaker
I don't think that we're there yet with CGI to be able to do that effectively at all. I still think it looks really weird and fake. Yeah, it looked like an Xbox 360 cutscene. Yeah, it's ah but people are like, oh no, i thought that was really good. I loved it. It was clever. I'm like, no, it's fucking horrible.
00:20:53
Speaker
Also a completely missed moment for the film is called Romulus, right? Like Romulus and Remus, the twins. You've got another Android in the film. Why don't you make the other evil Android a twin, another version of the Android? So at least there'd be some fucking thematic resonance with the film, but no, throw all that out the window and just get Ian Holmes ghost.
00:21:15
Speaker
Yeah. I will say, um, as a sort of Teaser, Alien Romulus disappeared later in one my other categories, but um we'll get back to that later.
00:21:26
Speaker
All right. My biggest disappointment was Conclave. um I actually, i was really excited about it because even though I'm like like, as you know, nominally a Catholic, um, I like movies about Catholic church conspiracies. Like I actually liked, I read the Da Vinci code when I was like 12. Um, like I'm like, I've always liked that sort of genre.
00:21:53
Speaker
Um, but the first time I went to see it, I saw it in theaters. I was alone. um And I was so bored I left, maybe about 45 minutes in um I just wasn't captured by like any of the characters. um i didn't you know I didn't feel like the mystery was like rich enough to really capture me. Anyway, then my mom ah wanted to watch it on Christmas Day.
00:22:19
Speaker
um so i was like, okay, let's try to, you know I'll get through it with my mom. um And we did watch the whole thing. And I was just really, really, really shocked that the twist that everyone was talking about was the new Pope is hermaphrodite. I thought it was just like, so on the head and like, that could have been like really camp actually. I've, I've now feel like I, every year I feel like I rediscovered the definition of camp, but um I think that could have been a really camp movie and a really camp ending, but it just didn't quite,
00:22:56
Speaker
go big enough So what what would the camp version be Throw off his vestments and have a big pair of tits? Or... No, I mean, the movie with the basic plot points could have just like been camp in and of itself, but it just like, it just, they didn't go big enough. Like they just, the the actors would have had to have been more diva-ish and and would it would have just had to have been a little more, a little more scandalous.
00:23:23
Speaker
um yeah I mean, the ba the vape meme was funny. That's like the best thing that came out of it was the the cardinal vaping. Yeah, I actually, um I mentioned in the group chat like yesterday, like, was it worth going to see this? Because I actually, I get like free single ticket codes like every month and I had like booked to go and watch it at like, I think like 11.30 at night last night.
00:23:47
Speaker
And I just didn't, I didn't end up going. i was just like, oh, I'm quite bothered. But yeah, I know what you mean about like, because I thought the trailers kind of made it look pretty interesting and I kind of,
00:24:01
Speaker
it did feel sort of campy in, in the way that the Catholic church is kind of campy. And I think if they'd kind of gone for a sort of like showgirls with bishops type angle, it could have been really fun. Um, but yeah, I can't really comment cause skipped it.
00:24:20
Speaker
mean, it's essentially a film about how it's fine to rig an election so long as you're rigging it for a progressive candidate. debate Yeah. Yeah. um I think that's why it failed at camp actually is because it was, it like too clearly had a political message.
00:24:36
Speaker
um If they had just like kind of detached the story from any political message and just sort of like had this be the story with like unexplainable motives, it would have been more camp in my opinion.
00:24:50
Speaker
um Okay, let's do most based film, starting with Manny.
Unique Film Picks and Critiques
00:24:55
Speaker
So mine is a film which, as far as I can tell, I'm the only person who's who's seen this year, and it's been completely buried.
00:25:02
Speaker
um And depending on where you live, it's either called Asphalt City, or in some countries it's called Black Flies. And it's a thriller ah with Sean Penn and Ty Sheridan, where they play paramedics. And it's just set over a few days in New York of them on their sort of um paramedic duties.
00:25:19
Speaker
And ah it is absolutely the most based film of the year. It's particularly interesting watching it in the light of like the all the Daniel Penny stuff, because there's a lot of them dealing with mentally ill people around New York who you know they're trying to help and they're just being incredibly aggressive and and violent towards them.
00:25:36
Speaker
and ah And it's sort of, yeah, it it keys into a lot of things that have been in the news cycle this year. And I'm just surprised that no one else seems to have noticed it because, yeah, it's a brilliant film.
00:25:48
Speaker
yeah i've never never heard of it i've never heard of it but i will watch it now vicky what's your most based film ah my most based film is the 2024 french action horror disaster film under paris which was released on netflix this year oh i've heard of this let's have a look It was a, so I, I have a bit of a soft spot for, um, like killer animal movies, like anything with like a big shark or a big crocodile or like something like that. I just, i just love them.
00:26:20
Speaker
And this, the basic plot of this film, I think Q has seen it too. Have you? i don't think the one with the sharks in Paris. No. and Oh, okay.
00:26:32
Speaker
So basically, like the plot of this movie is that there are sharks in the River Seine in Paris. I definitely have not seen this. they've been like they they've been like breeding in the catacombs under the city. And it's like a is a very, very schlocky thing.
00:26:52
Speaker
like a big, scary animal movie. And it's, has a, the mare is played by this woman and she's like this, like, um,
00:27:04
Speaker
narcissistic evil like girl boss character and they're supposed to be doing like the Olympic trials where they're going to be like swimming in the sand um and she refuses to call it off even though she knows that there's like sharks in the water and then there's kind of this um there's this subplot where there are these um sort of like eco warrior type blue haired um social justice, like freaks who, who really want to like rescue these sharks and like get them out and stuff.
00:27:36
Speaker
And I was thinking, oh, it's going to have a really annoying, like, um, like eco climate changey type message. But then there was a scene where like dozens of these, um, sort of eco warriors just get, um,
00:27:52
Speaker
mercilessly slaughtered under the catacombs, like when they're trying to help these sharks out. And it was, yeah, it was amazing. It was the most cathartic thing I've seen all year. So yeah, if you haven't seen it, I would definitely, definitely recommend Under Paris.
00:28:06
Speaker
Right. Yeah. I'm definitely checking this out. I think it got terrible reviews, but it's, who cares? I mean, it looks like something I would enjoy. So I'm kind of, surprised I didn't, uh,
00:28:18
Speaker
I thought I had mentioned it to you, which, so I thought you'd watched it, but um yeah, no, it's good. um Okay. My most based film was Anora.
00:28:31
Speaker
i I think because, well Sean Baker, who I love has always, i think done pretty based films in the sense that like, I'll just talk Priya Nora really briefly. Like all the characters Priya Nora are sort of like ambiguously morally coded and do things that are like, like in Tangerine, the, you know, transsexual sex worker, like kidnaps a woman and the Florida project.
00:28:57
Speaker
the single mother, you know, is also a prostitute who's like putting her daughter in the bathroom while she does her, you know, prostitution stuff. And in Red Rocket, the, you know, the main character is a male porn star who's sleeping with a high school teenager, a 17 year old.
00:29:17
Speaker
So it's like, all those characters are like pretty, like morally gray, right? Like you empathize with them, but they're all sort of doing things that are, arguably bad, but also doing things that are good or whatever.
00:29:30
Speaker
Um, a Nora is a little less morally gray. Like I do, I, which I think is kind of based right to like, accept sort of like a morally gray character and not try to like indict them or rehabilitate them. Just sort of be like,
00:29:43
Speaker
this is a person in the world, they exist. To me, that's a pretty based thing to do because so much media now is just, ah well, I think we're going to see a lot more right-wing moralizing, but so much media now is just like lib-moralizing, right? It's like basically a PSA. Anora,
00:30:03
Speaker
he gets the closest he's ever gotten to going ahead and making sort of a... you know, ah like pretty clear morality tale, but I think he still resists it, um, fully because, you know, he could have gone full like hooker with a heart of gold narrative.
00:30:23
Speaker
um but he holds back, I think, uh, by basically making it clear throughout the film that Anora is like, um,
00:30:37
Speaker
and she's like not delusional, right? Like she understands she's like not in love with this person. um But she's sort of like cravenly going for like, you know, the money. And I think that he makes that pretty clear that she's like not stupid or delusional and that she has sort of like selfish ambitions. Right.
00:31:00
Speaker
um I also think that, Instead of like having some sort of PSA moment where she like breaks down and like talks about all her trauma, he kind of just like waits until the last moment to really show us like, you know, how deeply like kind of hurt she is. Yeah.
00:31:20
Speaker
If you don't know, the last moment is she basically initiates sex with this guy, sort of like in a transactional way to kind of thank him for something kind he's done for her.
00:31:31
Speaker
um and But when he tries to kiss her, she like freaks out and starts crying. Um, so like when he tries to kind of break the facade of like transactional sex and like actually be intimate with her, as she like can't handle it.
00:31:45
Speaker
And that's like the moment where you kind of like suddenly realize like, Oh, this girl's like really damaged. Right. Like she's been through a lot, but it's such a subtle way to like show it. You know what I mean? Like we, they don't, they don't do it in this like really schlocky way that movies do now where like,
00:32:02
Speaker
she suddenly breaks down and like, you know, kind of talks about all her trauma, you know? um and I think that's kind of based too, you know, because we're supposed to just like, yeah, we're supposed to just accept this like emotional truth without getting sort of like a finger wagging,
00:32:22
Speaker
um Yeah, she's neither neither girl boss nor victim, but has elements of of both of them. Has elements of both, yeah. so um And then I think, I will say that like I'm expecting...
00:32:35
Speaker
unfortunately, um a lot of based stuff to like, I think we're going to get a lot of, we've had maybe 10 to 15 years of a lot of like live moralizing.
00:32:47
Speaker
um and unfortunately my prediction is that Anora is going to be the last film like this for a while. Cause I think we're going to get a lot of like sort of more conservative or right wing moralizing, but then it's going to become cringe, right? Because it's going to be really,
00:33:00
Speaker
um It's going to be really on the nose. And you kind of already see it starting. um And I think it's just going to get worse from here on out. Do you mean in movies or do you just mean in general? What?
00:33:11
Speaker
Do you think you're going to get that in movies, though, really? like I think so. I think there's going to be a lot of um efforts to do sort of like the 90s conservative pandering. Yeah.
00:33:24
Speaker
you know, it's going to, there's going to be some like anti-sex stuff. There's going to be some like kind of family friendly stuff. Like that was kind of the nineties, like conservatard, like, you know, moral pandering that they did. And I think it's, i think we're going to see like kind of a resurgence of that.
00:33:40
Speaker
um And we're also going to see sort of a, I think we're going to see some like really, this is my prediction. I don't know if I'm right, but I think we're going see some really cringe movies where like, you know, maybe a CEO or like a tech giant, like people like that are like kind of painted as like visionaries, things like that. I think we're going to see stuff like that happen um instead of painting those people as like, you know, horrible succubuses on society, which they ultimately are in my opinion. yeah.
00:34:16
Speaker
Yeah.
00:34:19
Speaker
So we aren't fit and nora yeah we're on to the next category, which is horror of the year. So my horror of the year this year is a British horror film called stop motion.
00:34:32
Speaker
She's about a woman that is working on finishing her aging mother's stop motion to the epic film that she's been making. And she's going mad while she makes it. And stop motion is an inherently creepy form of animation anyway. So then to sort of leverage that for horror.
00:34:47
Speaker
is ah is fantastic. It's directed by a guy called Robert Morgan, who's done quite a lot of stop motion short films before. And this is his first feature length. It is primarily live action with some fantastic stop motion sequences.
00:35:02
Speaker
and that um and it's ah But that doesn't rely just on that for its horror. It's also got some extreme gore in it. It's got some great creature effects. It's got a really good acid trip sequence.
00:35:13
Speaker
um It's got a beautiful lead actress. It's got everything you'd want in a horror film. um It was on for one night in the cinema in the city I was on, but I think you can find it on Shudder. now So yeah, stop motion is absolutely horror of the year for me. And it's been a, it's been a, not a very good year for cinema, I think, but it's been a brilliant year for horror. A lot of really good horror films, a lot of horror films that were competing for those top spots for me. But yeah, stop motion is, is number one.
00:35:39
Speaker
Becky. Um, I don't know whether I've already mentioned on the pod, but my horror movie of the year is the coffee table. I've definitely been in the chat.
00:35:50
Speaker
Um, I don't know whether I'm cheating a little bit by labeling this a horror movie because the um The horror of it is more sort of to do with the situation that the main character finds himself in rather than there being some kind of like supernatural element or anything.
00:36:08
Speaker
um But yeah, to we're going to have to go into spoilers because I need to be able to talk like frankly about it. But basically, it's a Spanish movie and it's about this couple who are sort of middle-aged and they've just had a baby and they're not really getting along very well. You can tell they're sort of like,
00:36:27
Speaker
fractures in their relationship. um And they the movie starts with them in this sort of sleazy furniture shop with this like greasy salesman trying to sell them this horrible glass coffee table with these like two gold naked women sort of holding it up.
00:36:46
Speaker
And he's like really, really overselling this table to them. And the wife doesn't want it at all, but the husband's kind of got a bee in his bonnet and he feels like, Maybe if he like gets this coffee table, it's like he's like taking control over like something in his life, like where his wife would usually just like talk him out of it. So they he end up buying this coffee table.
00:37:09
Speaker
His wife goes out to do some grocery shopping and leaves him alone with the baby. And an accident ensues, and the baby ends up getting decapitated by the glass of the coffee table.
00:37:21
Speaker
And instead of doing the the right thing and sort of telling his wife what has happened, he puts the decapitated baby's body in the crib in the bedroom.
00:37:36
Speaker
and sort of carries on with his day. And they've got like family coming around for dinner and the wife comes back from shopping. um The whole, the actual scene itself with the baby getting decapitated, it happens off screen. And that for me wasn't the, wasn't what I found sort of traumatic about it. It was the, it was the discomfort of like watching this man try and like,
00:38:05
Speaker
go through life normally knowing that like the worst possible thing that you could ever imagine has happened to him and he's like keeping it from the people that he loves. like yeah I think the most unpleasant thing about it is that there's no way he can get away with it. There's no way it's going to end him not being discovered.
00:38:22
Speaker
It's just him delaying having to have that conversation where he admits what he's done. And it's like, he's, you can just see it all unraveling and it's sort of almost a comedy of manners for the the last half hour of him trying to avoid them going into the room and trying to avoid mentioning what's, what's happened. It's a little bit like the faulty towers episode with the, ah with the dead body, except it's, it's a baby.
00:38:43
Speaker
It's very dark and it is comic. um But like, I've always had like a sort of recurring nightmare of like being in a situation where I've like accidentally killed somebody and I've like had to hide the body and there are people sort of coming in and out and I'm like desperately trying to sort of keep them from discovering it. That's been like a a sort of recurring like nightmare theme for me for like most of my life. So I think that's probably why it affected me the way that it did. But i but it just kind of came out of nowhere. And I like ah kept having to sort pause and take breaks and then start watching it again and then pause and take breaks. And it took me a few days to get over it. And I've tried to sort of um get other people to watch it and stuff. And they've they've had sort of
00:39:35
Speaker
relatively extreme reactions. What's it called again? have no idea of the kind of reaction I had. um It's called The Coffee Table. and remind What you're talking about, i haven't seen this one, but it kind of reminds me of that scene and Hereditary, which when I first saw it was so scary, where he like he had decapitated his sister and he like can't face it. and He like just drive drives back to the house. Yeah. It's like that on like a grander scale, I guess.
00:40:01
Speaker
but that I remember that that moment really, really disturbing me. um and So, yeah. um Are you guys ready for mine? Yeah.
00:40:12
Speaker
Okay. I have, I have, I kind of cheated. I have my favorite and then I have like an honorable mention. um So my favorite was actually, i picked all mainstream ones, I guess, because I, I don't know, but my favorite was smile too.
00:40:28
Speaker
um Because I thought that it like, It kind of like took just like the barest DNA from the first one and then gave us like a completely different story.
00:40:39
Speaker
And then I think that at the end it did something. I kind of hope that this is like a good, um like this is what like it follows or it's follows or what are they follows or whatever's coming out.
00:40:52
Speaker
I hope that it it manages to do something like this because at the end I was like, oh, that's really smart. Like now all these like thousands of concert goers like have the, demon, you know? Um, and I think that it follows sequel is going to have to do something like that too.
00:41:06
Speaker
Um, anyway, I thought it was cool. Another Indian American pop star displayed, um in the, in the fictional world. Um,
00:41:19
Speaker
I thought the scene in the car with Jack Nicholson's son was amazing. um Just the couple fight, the BPD girl breakdown. And I thought Jack Nicholson's son, I hope, becomes like a huge star because he really has his dad's facial expressions and talent. and Yeah.
00:41:40
Speaker
Um, and then my quick honorable mention that I don't need to say a whole lot about, and I'm not even sure if it really counts as a horror movie, but I was, I liked this movie on Netflix called it's what's inside.
00:41:52
Speaker
yes Fantastic. It was kind of like a so was like a body's body's body's riff. Um, I think it is kind of horror, horror, horror inducing. Cause the twist in the middle is of course, two of the bodies, um,
00:42:06
Speaker
that they've switched into are dead now. um and you realize like, Oh wow, they're like in a real dilemma. Um, like what they're going to, how they're going to handle this. um anyway, i thought it was really cool. And I thought, yeah, that's,
00:42:20
Speaker
but it was one of those films where I started watching it at home and after about five minutes, I put my phone down and restarted the film. I thought, no, this needs a hundred percent of my attention. I'm already confused. And like, yeah. Yeah. And I thought they did a good job of, them you know, it's, it's a little schlocky, but that like whole thing they did where like, she shows her art at the beginning. And when you put the thing over, it shows the other, the real thing.
00:42:42
Speaker
And they did that like kind of throughout the movie, which really helped people who are over 30 and their brain is cognitively declining. Yeah, I really enjoyed it. i About Smile 2, I would say, like, I i only watched that fairly recently, and I really enjoyed the first one.
00:43:01
Speaker
um I liked Smile 2 a lot. The only thing I didn't like was that the ending, even though it was good, kind of, like, meant that, like, the last sort of half an hour of the movie that you'd watched, like, didn't really happen. And I always get really angry when they do that in movies, where they sort of, like...
00:43:20
Speaker
um introduce sort of a plot twist that means that what you've already sat through like didn't really occur. like That always like bothers me. But I did like the um the idea that she's like sort of infected like a whole arena of people, and I am interested to see sort of where they go that.
00:43:41
Speaker
The car scene was honestly the best part of that movie, if I really want to narrow it down. um i thought the reveal that she had caused the accident, and I thought it actually was genuinely scary when they're flipped over and he's dead and she's screaming.
00:43:57
Speaker
um i try to i very rarely get genuinely scared, um but that did make me feel sort of deep pit of despair. um All right, Nanny, ah hottest film?
00:44:12
Speaker
Right, yes, the the Uncoordinated Intimacy Award for Hottest Film of the Year. I'm still listening, I'm just refilling. That's fine. Okay, good. ah For me, it's the Richard Linklater film Hitman.
00:44:23
Speaker
Okay. yeah I think it's it's an example of a film that we used to do a lot of about 20 years ago and have sort of fallen out of favour, where used to get two up-and-coming, extremely attractive stars with good chemistry and put them in a romantic comedy together. Yeah.
00:44:37
Speaker
But because it's Richard Linklater, it has that little sort sprinkle of weirdness on top. But I think the chemistry between Glenn Powell and Adria Giorno is is fantastic in It's got a couple of incredibly sexy sex scenes in it.
00:44:50
Speaker
I think she's probably the hottest actress at the moment in in Hollywood. And he's obviously incredibly handsome and charismatic. um And again, another one that I think because of Netflix's release strategy where they don't put things in many cinemas,
00:45:03
Speaker
It just sort of flew under the radar a bit, but um everyone I've shown it to has really liked it. and I think it's a really good romantic comedy and um yeah, definitely. everyone Everyone I know watched it. It was a pretty, I think it got a lot of, a lot of people watched it even though it was just on Netflix.
00:45:20
Speaker
um It may not have had like the meme life. You know what I mean? It didn't get like internet memed. But I think a lot of normies heard about it and liked that as their Saturday night movie. Because it was number one on Netflix for a while. um I got think that the scene where they're chatting each other up in the the bar and she's saying, I want to know how many people you've killed. oh No, I don't want to know. no i do want to know. like I think it's really genuine chemistry between them. It really captures something.
00:45:49
Speaker
Yeah, a friend of mine on Twitter ah had a a viral, like a Twitter friend, online friend, had like a viral tweet about the one of the fight scenes where they're just verbally fighting. And she said, this is a sex scene.
00:46:03
Speaker
Yes, yeah. And that's another film that does a thing which you could only do with them with mobile phones as well. There's like a scene where they're having a conversation, but they know they're being bugged. And so they're having an argument, but he's also writing on the phone where he actually thinks and showing it to her.
00:46:17
Speaker
And there's lots of layers of the conversation going on at once. yeah it's really, really clever. All right, you're back, Vicky. So ah sexiest film. Okay. um Surprisingly, mine is a gay film, but it's not it's not a men gay film. I went for like Love Lies Bleeding, even though I didn't super love Interesting.
00:46:40
Speaker
I have had like a weird crush on um Kristen Stewart ever since like the sort of Twilight days. um So getting to see her glazing out on the big screen was like very, very sexy to me.
00:46:58
Speaker
But um I didn't really like the movie that much otherwise. No, me neither. Um, mine's challengers, um which think is fun because it doesn't have actually a whole lot of like visible, I think it maybe has like actually zero literal visible sex.
00:47:18
Speaker
Um, but a lot of tension. um I think the threesome kiss was really cute and sweet. Um, and reminded me of like, you know, awkward experimental young things that people do. um that are like, you know, you feel like ambiguous and weird about, and you're not, you're not sure really why you did it. um i liked, I thought that was hot um and sort of something that you lose after your,
00:47:48
Speaker
like over the age of like 25 or something that like that like mystery. Um, and then, um i thought also the all the sweating and stuff was really hot. Um, and I thought that Zendaya, Zendaya, I never know what to say about her name, but, um, I thought that I loved the scene where, uh,
00:48:14
Speaker
she spits in his face and says all that nat lets ah si her credited to him about how she hates him, but then fucks him. Relatable. ah And i I thought that was sort of a hot thing that like, maybe like,
00:48:28
Speaker
used to be really popular in movies, like the fight that turns into sex, but maybe like sort of has post me too, has sort of like been taken out because there's just like, people are really bad at just sort of holding two things in their head. Like these people can both hate each other, but also ah part of them could want to have sex. You know what I mean? Like,
00:48:49
Speaker
that sort of like nuanced ah thinking is like not really popular or hasn't been popular. so it was fun to kind of see that trope come back because that was certainly like a... Yes, I think like, while it might not be true for real life, although it sometimes is, is that the best movie sex scenes start with somebody saying no.
00:49:08
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Eating their fists against the chest of the other person and crying. Yeah. Yeah, and that's and it's it's actually even funnier because she doesn't even really say no. She just tells him how disgusting and awful he is. It's like even funnier to me. it's Yeah, because that what she's actually doing is describing all the reasons she wants to sleep with him.
00:49:31
Speaker
Right, right. And kind of like can't stop sleeping with him, you know. Yeah. And yeah, I just thought it was good. i think it's also a, it's a contender for most based film challenges as well. Like as a film about kind of just achievement and drive and the willingness to grind others underneath your attempts for glory. It's,
00:49:53
Speaker
Totally. They're like, they're totally like, yeah, serious capitalists and stuff. And that movie, that's, that's, that's what they're, that's what they are. Um, I also, I also, it reminded me a little bit of this, movie this movie from a long time ago now, but I mean, I'm sure a lot of our listeners have heard it, uh, Matchpoint.
00:50:11
Speaker
Um, and it reminded me of that because, um the character that's played by the Jewish looking guy, although I don't think he's Jewish. What the fuck is that actor's name?
00:50:22
Speaker
The darker, swarthier one. Josh O'Connor. Josh O'Connor, yeah. The actor that's played by Josh O'Connor reminded me of Scarlett Johansson and that other actor who I never, i always forget his name. But,
00:50:34
Speaker
Anyway, they reminded me of those, the poor, the quote unquote poor characters in Matchpoint who nevertheless have a type of currency because they are like very sexually attractive.
00:50:47
Speaker
um And I felt like Josh O'Connor's character was a little bit like that character in the sense that like, He doesn't have many of the other things that would put him into an elite category. I know he's supposed to be from a rich family, but he's like otherwise pretty schlubby. Right.
00:51:03
Speaker
But he's able to sort of, yeah, he, he's still alluring to these characters because of his, yeah, sexual appeal. um Okay.
00:51:14
Speaker
Film everyone is wrong about, going to, this one's, you guys are laugh at the one I feel, but go ahead, Vicky or Nanny. Okay. ah So mine is, and I am fucking sick of the last six months of everybody telling me how good this film is, because it's not, is I Saw the TV Glow, which I just thought was, A, very dull for most of it, for a...
00:51:39
Speaker
in in a year that included both Emilia Perez and the people's Joker, it manages to be the worst trans film of the year. Um, with a film about how, if you transition, you get to be the favorite character from your kids, from a kid's TV show. You get, don't get to transition into a woman. You get transition into a child from a TV show.
00:51:59
Speaker
And that, um, if you don't transition, you are doomed to have a life of a stable job with a wife and child. But don't worry because you've got chapped lips. So the audience will know that that's the bad ending.
00:52:13
Speaker
Can I ask, I agree with everything you said about the movie, but can I ask you, because I think a lot of people are tricked into liking this film because, it and it did do this for me. I just want to hear your argument against this.
00:52:28
Speaker
um It sort of like tingles this like, if you were like a kid in the nineties, it sort of tingles this like kind of low by vibrational aesthetic that maybe you really relate to.
00:52:40
Speaker
yes And I think the best parts of the film are where it focuses on that. And the thing where he goes back to watch the TV show he liked as a kid and it's not as good as he remembers it. Like that's a fantastic sequence. I think that's why it's so annoying as a film is because there is some really good parts of it.
00:52:55
Speaker
There's some really good visual elements of it. There's some, I think justice Smith is the main character. He's fantastic performance. But I just kept waiting for the other layer to kick in for the story.
00:53:06
Speaker
There'd be something else going on. And the yeah, it just wasn't there for me. But yeah, you're right. the sort of the The element about nostalgia is is is good, isn't it? Yeah.
00:53:16
Speaker
Um, Vicky? I went for trap for this one. Um, even though you liked it, a lot of people did not. Um, but yeah, no, I, I, I thought it was really, really fun. i enjoyed it the whole way through. And I think, um,
00:53:34
Speaker
I think a a lot of the criticism that's sort of leveled at M Night Shyamalan is that he's like narcissistic and he always wants to like self-insert himself into his movies. But I think the landscape of cinema would be way less interesting without people like him on the scene making films. And um even though maybe they don't all ah quite sort of nail it, like,
00:53:58
Speaker
He always has a good idea at it And they're always enjoyable, at least to watch, even if they're not like groundbreaking, amazing sort of pieces of art. So, okay. well My second choice for this was Wicked because even though I haven't seen it, like I refuse to believe that it's good. i hate Cynthia Erivo. I think she's an ugly, evil, or... No, Vicky, no. If boy's if you didnt you didn't make the effort to go see it, you don't get to do this.
00:54:27
Speaker
You have at least make the effort to sit through it. I'm sorry. can't. I can't. I refuse. I fly. Well, you it doesn't get to be your everyone's. You have to actually see it to tell everyone they're wrong about it. That's my rule I'm making now. That's fair.
00:54:41
Speaker
Vicky, did you see um M. Night Shyamalan's other daughter's film this year? the The Watchers or The Watched, whatever it was called? i Oh, I saw that. I didn't see it because you said it was bad, actually.
00:54:53
Speaker
yeah It is. i trust it I trust your judgment on a lot of things. That's the one with what's her name in it, Dakota Fanning, right? The less hot Fanning, as we like to call Yeah. Well, I actually, okay, just quickly on that one. i went in thinking it was going to be so bad, and it was, but I think because my expectations were in the gutter, I actually sort of like kind of enjoyed it a little bit.
00:55:16
Speaker
you know, um, which is sometimes just happens. Right. You know, um, like there's no way Bicky will like wicked when he finally deigns to see it on streaming because he spent so many months building up this callous of hate.
00:55:30
Speaker
Um, all right. Mine is just gonna, I'm just going to defend like fun, sexy trash for a minute. Um, I really liked the crow. saw it. I saw it. I saw it. I'm defending it. I'm i'm saying it's not a good film, but I'm defending it on like the grounds of like, sometimes we just get to watch movies that we would have liked as like a goth teenager and they're bad. And we just get to like them for that reason alone. And that's Um, I thought that I disagree with everyone that I, that FK twigs and that scars guard don't have any chemistry. i think they did have fun chemistry in the movie.
00:56:13
Speaker
Um, I think the schlocky concept is is fun, like that the sky can make people do like dark things. I thought FKA Twigs is super charming and beautiful.
00:56:26
Speaker
um i love her little lisp. I hope that this movie doesn't stop people from putting her in movies because I think she has like a really cute... um lisp and face and she's sexy um and yeah i think it's fine sometimes to like a movie that's sort of like you know the covenant or like the craft or just something that would have been sort of like goth trash like for your teenage self i think it's fine to let that sort of tickle those censors and just enjoy it for that reason alone
00:56:58
Speaker
I think I haven't seen the Crow, and I do think Bill Skarsgard looks very sexy in what I've seen of it. I think the...
00:57:09
Speaker
And I agree that you're right. I think that like, it is fine to have sort of like and kind of trashy, like goth movies like that, that you enjoy. i think the issue that people have with it is that the original is so beloved by goths.
00:57:24
Speaker
Yeah, of course. And I, and that's valid, but I mean like this movie is like not for like, people who watched the original, like I would argue like this movie is sort of going to be like a movie if those kids even exist anymore, which I don't know if they do, but like, if there's like a goth, like a 13 year old who's sort of getting into like edgy goth content, like this is who that movie is for.
00:57:49
Speaker
i would say, would urge him to watch the original Crow, but yeah. Okay. Yeah. So that's one of only four films that I walked out of this year, The Crow.
00:58:01
Speaker
um The one thing I'll say that's good about it is I like some of the needle drops of the songs they choose in it. There's a bit in it where he's walking along and there's a Gary Neumann track that plays, but it's not one of the two Gary Neumann tracks that always gets used in other films. It's a different Gary Neumann track.
00:58:16
Speaker
I like that. just I mean, I saw it in Paris. I was exhausted. I'd been walking all day. It was just kind of like a good... I just felt it took so long for him to become the Crow as well. In the first film, that's about 10 minutes before he becomes the Crow.
00:58:30
Speaker
And I just thought all of the buildup of their relationship, it's like, it's a revenge film. I don't need to know why he loved his fiancรฉe. The fact that she's his fiancรฉe is enough for me to understand why he needs revenge. But... um Yeah.
00:58:43
Speaker
ah yeah But maybe the ending was great because I didn't stay for the ending. but No, none of it's great. I'm just saying that, like, yeah. I just think people are wrong that there's, like, that this movie should be, like, um thrown in the trash.
00:58:57
Speaker
um Okay. Next is, oh, next
Cinema Experiences and Rising Stars
00:59:02
Speaker
and last. Best screening experience. Which, Bicky, we said this before you. no this is not the last category.
00:59:10
Speaker
What's the last category on your list? My last category agree is twink of the year. Oh, okay. That's true. That's true. Okay. um But we we said we would do a best, well, you described the category because we said this while he was where we were waiting for him.
00:59:26
Speaker
Oh, just just best screening experience, your best experience in the cinema. This year. So mine would be... i went to see this When i went to see The Substance, but was ah it was a mystery horror preview. So everyone knew they were going to watch a horror film.
00:59:39
Speaker
They didn't know what it was. And I think everybody was sort of hoping it would be The Substance. So when the title card came up, there huge round of applause from from everyone. And then, yeah, just that last... the last act of the the substance, which I know we sort of criticized a bit when we we spoke about it, but actually as an experience in the cinema, the whole cinema was whooping and cheering and screeching and a lot of people's girlfriends burying their faces into their boyfriend's shoulders with all ah leg gore and stuff. And that was, um yeah, that was a great, great experience.
01:00:12
Speaker
Okay. Vicky? See, i did so I would probably choose the substance for this as well. um But I think instead I'm going to go for like my worst like screening experience instead. um My worst screening experience this year was Long Legs.
01:00:33
Speaker
um I was super excited about Long Legs. I think everyone was. The hype train was like kind of going off the rails for this movie. And I... ah was really, really, really excited. i had booked to go and see it The screening was absolutely packed.
01:00:50
Speaker
And I was sat next to a gay couple who had a endless supply of like every single food you can possibly imagine. They had like bags at their feet, and they were pulling out like half a cooked chicken or like a huge bag of crisps. And then they'd finish the bag of k crisps, and there'd be a bag of sweets.
01:01:11
Speaker
So the whole movie... All I had in my ear was and I couldn't pay attention to anything. so I hated- A cooked chicken is crazy.
01:01:22
Speaker
I, so I, I, I missed, huge portions of the movie that were really, really important to the plot. I left the film not really feeling like I understood anything.
01:01:35
Speaker
I like vaguely remember enjoying the like visuals of it, and I liked that Nicolas Cage looked like Vicky Gunvilsson from Real Housewives. But everyone knows.
01:01:47
Speaker
But other than that, I was like, I don't know if that was a good movie. I have no idea. So that would that would be my worst screening experience. My worst was definitely, I went to um the re-release. They re-released Zone of Interest just for one night. I went to see it again at the cinema.
01:02:04
Speaker
um Because the previous time I went to see it, the guy napped next to me had like a nose whistle. Like every time he breathed, he made like a little... For like two hours of a film that half the film is basically about how immaculate that sound mix is and how many layers there are.
01:02:22
Speaker
It's all just overshadowed by this, the little...
01:02:26
Speaker
yeah every time he was breathing. That's horrible. That's horrible. um Okay, well, my best, and it this is what wasn't, I agree with everything Nanny said about the movie, but I thought my funnest sort of like, it was perfect.
01:02:40
Speaker
I was mid-flight on an international flight, bored, can't sleep anymore, and I put on Furiosa, and I would say maybe that's the only way to enjoy that. Oh yeah, plain play film.
01:02:54
Speaker
Yeah, because it's like I have nowhere to go, I'm trapped, I'm in deepest economy, you know, just- I just need something to like take my mind off it. And it was like, it was like a good film for that. It's like a good plain film, you know, like it was interesting enough. um I also think Mad Max ironically is also, even though it's a much better movie is also a good plain film. It's just kind of going to like, it's like visually stunning enough and entertaining enough that it'll just kind of keep you um satiated. You know, if you've run out of,
01:03:28
Speaker
whatever you do to get through flights, drugs or sleep, or, you know, maybe if you're rich and you can be in one of those like giant reclining, amazing situations, you don't need this type of thing. But um the other thing I watched on that flight, which was also a good plane film was mother's instinct with and how, yeah, I like that.
01:03:48
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. It was pretty, it was pretty good. um and also, it also was a good plane film. I think the key to a good plane film is like plot heavy, you know, like, it's not, like, very nuanced, right? You're just getting sort of like, you're just getting sort of a plot, like, slammed into your your brain. And that Mother's Instinct was also like that. It's surprising that that didn't get more attention, because Anne Hathaway and Jessica Chastain are, I mean, I guess I think of them as A-list kind of stars. um Yeah, for sure.
01:04:21
Speaker
But it just kind of didn't, I feel like that didn't really get on anyone's radar, but... Yeah. They were both fun in that setting. And I think it's fun to watch movies on, on planes.
01:04:33
Speaker
Um, all right. I, is, is Nanny really going to give a twink of the year? Yeah, of course he is. Okay. He's on twink day. He has to. Are we, are we counting Josh O'Connor as a twink?
01:04:44
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So yeah, I'd say him, i think between challenges and, um, ah La Chimera and then also his brief appearance in Lee. I think he's, you know, he's carving out a, a good twink career for himself as sort of a scruffier, a scruffier twink than the, than we used to seeing. So yeah, I think he's, I'll be interested to see what his next couple of films are like.
01:05:07
Speaker
If you can carry that on. Okay. Okay. Bicky. Okay, mine is mine is a tie break. And foot in in honor of the podcast name Twink Death, I chose two Twinks dying on screen for mine.
01:05:23
Speaker
So I chose a mate Mason McCarty, who plays Cole in Terrifier 3, who gets fucked by a chainsaw to die. Oh, yes, yeah. And the other one I chose was Spike Fern from Alien Romulus because I was so fucking sick of every time i went to the cinema for months hearing him go, they're in the water, they're in the fucking water, that watching him get melted by Xenomorph pussy juice was the most satisfying thing that I've seen. Wait, who was the second one?
01:05:56
Speaker
Oh my God, that fucking British guy from Alien. Oh, okay, okay, okay. Oh my God, Mason McCarty. i'm I'm looking up, i I obviously very vividly remember that scene, but he is very classic twink.
01:06:10
Speaker
For sure. um Okay, I have two. I have a classic twink and then maybe one that sort of ends up... um and twunk category.
01:06:21
Speaker
um My classic yeah classic twink is, I think, Drew is Drew Starkey. um I think the only reason I'm saying he's the best on-screen twink is he reminds me of this, his very specific facial expressions remind me of this guy who was, like, kind of the king of the twinks when I was in college.
01:06:40
Speaker
um He's, that guy's old now and has, like, a receding hairline and, like, you know, it's so over, but um He was kind of like the king twink in college and Drew Starkey really looks like that guy. So I think in my mind, like the prototypical twink, like Drew Starkey kind of like fits that that look.
01:07:03
Speaker
And he's very sexy and he has like a cheeky little smile and... Yeah, I don't know. i i could see, ah and I actually did not like queer. I guess I can say that now. I did a whole podcast with friend of the pod, Basil, um where I talk about why I don't like queer. So I won't do like a whole massive list of it, but I did not really enjoy yeah And then my honorable mention, who I said also possibly twunk, is Charles Melton.
01:07:31
Speaker
um i feel like I can't remember. Has he done anything this year? can't remember. like Well, that's there were two reasons I thought this might get disqualified. I couldn't remember if May, just oh, I guess May, December was last year. yeah um I guess he was in my head because I rewatched.
01:07:50
Speaker
That's what really matters. Yeah. I rewatched it a couple weeks ago and I've remembered like how hot and cute he is. And I remember it was funny because I actually like watched Riverdale when, um,
01:08:03
Speaker
like like not because i thought riverdale was good but because i thought it was so insane and i could tell that it was written by like eight gay guys who went to harvard like on so much adderall and like a you know writing room in la and i and i remember he left and was like i want to try to do more serious stuff and they replaced him didn't they replace him with a random chinese guy who looks like almost exactly like him Yeah, they replaced him with like so another hot guy who like kind of looks like him.
01:08:33
Speaker
um i think he is Hoppa in some way. Yeah, Korean. i don't know. Whatever. um Anyway, whatever. he's he i was happy for him because, you know, all the Riverdale people got to end up being rich, but they're sort of like very mid-life.
01:08:52
Speaker
They never really broke out of that. And he left and had a really, like maybe four, four years of like a super career lull, but then he got to be in this like Todd Haynes, like, you know, glossy, whatever. So I think he's going to get a lot more because he, and yeah, I'm i'm ah excited to see what he does next. Cause he's so good in that film. And he waited, and he waited it out like to his credit. He like gave up the easy paycheck and waited out like a bigger, more artistic success. And it worked out for him because those Riverdale people just like raked it in. Right. They did like eight horrible seasons and I'm sure they made a hundred thousand or more of episode. You know, where are they now? You never hear any of them. You never hear about any of them. Yeah. Occasionally see the Latina in like made for Amazon, like romantic comedy. Wait, say that again.
01:09:40
Speaker
I occasionally see the Latina in like made for Amazon romantic comedies, but that's about it. Yeah. The main redhead girl was in that Strangers chapter one film. Oh yes. She, she, I will give her some credit. She is insanely hot. She's so beautiful, but like, it's interesting because like, she's so pretty, but I'm like, think. She looks like a, like a Brazzers version of Karen Gillan.
01:10:04
Speaker
Yeah. I mean like- like um She's not like main character hot though. She's like best friend hot. Like she just- Yeah, but that's somehow hotter, isn't it? That's somehow hotter than being main character hot. And she's like, I think her problem is unfortunately, she's just like kind of mid actress.
01:10:23
Speaker
Yeah, no I would agree. Like if she was an incredible actress and looked like that, she has like kind of A-list looks, but she's just not an incredible actress.
01:10:34
Speaker
Yeah. My like, runner-up twink of the year would be, um, that Nicholas Galatzin guy who's in, the only reason I didn't, the only reason I didn't include him, because the only thing I've watched him in this year was Mary and George, which was TV, not really a movie.
01:10:50
Speaker
Um, but I liked him. Actually, no, I watched him in that, um, that one where he shags Anne Hathaway. Bottoms was this year, right? Yeah. Oh, I didn't see that. No, that was last year. That was last year. Okay.
01:11:05
Speaker
Why is he in that too? Is that a big gay movie? Um, I mean, it's lesbian. The main characters are all lesbian. Oh, okay. but but He's, he's in it and he's like in a lot, he's in like a very, very,
01:11:20
Speaker
cute like football uniform thing the whole time. And he has like a perfect body. is hot. He he's going to get, I think it's interesting that he hasn't like, he's been smart and that he's like, has just, hasn't really said his sexuality.
01:11:37
Speaker
um which you kind of have to do like, if you're going to be what he's kind of trying to be. He's very gay hot. Like, I'm sure guy like that could easily sleep with tons of women too, but there's something very particular about his physique and face that I think is more attractive to gay men than it is to women.
01:11:58
Speaker
I know what you mean. And I think, I think he probably is straight, but he's kind of keeping it ambiguous. I mean, don't get me wrong. That dude would clean up with girls too. Like he's, he's beautiful. I just, there's something kind of specifically homosexual coded about his, his hotness.
01:12:15
Speaker
Right. We're losing nannies. So let's wrap it up. So what are you, good way to end it, what are you looking forward to for next year? Yeah, I was going to say, what's your big things looking forward to?
01:12:26
Speaker
I was actually going to ask people that. um Well, okay, do you want to go first, Danny? ah Yeah, okay, so the two for me are David Cronenberg's The Shrouds, which was supposed to come out at the end of this year. It got pushed back to to next year. um i know a couple of people have seen it at festivals and said it's great.
01:12:44
Speaker
I love Cronenberg's films, and I think this this looks to be one of his sort of saddest ones yet. Yeah. That's good. And the other one would be No Other Choice by Park Chan-wook, who did Old Boy and The Handmaiden. um He's got a new thriller coming out this year about a guy who's murdering the competitors for a job that he wants.
01:13:02
Speaker
I thought that could be... His his stuff's always got really good dark sense of humour, so looking forward to that. ah But there's a bunch. There's a bunch coming up next year. It looks like it's going to be a better year than this. You've got the Maggie Gyllenhaal, Bride of Frankenstein film. There's a new Superman film, which I know people like to look down on, but I truly believe there is the potential for a good Superman film out there.
01:13:23
Speaker
um Yeah, I think it's going to be hopefully a better year than this year for film. Becky? Um, I mean, the listeners will probably notice that none of us have mentioned Nosferatu today and that is because it doesn't come out in the UK till tomorrow. So obviously I'm excited for that, but just kind of jumping off from Nosferatu, I'm excited for a general like vampire Renaissance over the next sort of few years, which I think is already kind of started, but I think is definitely coming in a big way.
01:13:56
Speaker
um It was interesting like listening to you talk about how you think there's going to be a lot more 90s-style right-wing moralising about like sex and stuff in movies. But I think that the vampire renaissance is here to quell those fears, and I think we're going to get a lot more sexy vampire movies in the future.
01:14:17
Speaker
There's Sinners, the Ryan Coogler vampire film coming out. That looks quite good. Yeah. um I'm most excited for and this is probably not surprising given my taste, Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein.
01:14:32
Speaker
um Jacob Elordi is going to be the ah the monster. um Oscar Isaac is going to be ah Dr. Frankenstein. Mia Goth is in it. Lars Milkinson is in it um It's just going to, I can tell it's going to hit all my thoughts.
01:14:49
Speaker
soft spots. It is a Netflix release. um So I'm going to have to, well, luckily because I live in New York, I'm going to be able to see it in theaters probably because New York is one of the few places they usually, like I saw May, December in theaters. um So I'm going to try to make sure to do that, but I'm super, super excited about that.
01:15:08
Speaker
um Much to Vicky's chagrin. I'm also excited about Wicked for Good. um I think the reason I think it's, I like, I'm going to just defend very fast in maybe three or four sentences, the whole wicked phenomenon, because I think it's fun to have, there's very few monocultural moments anymore because everything is so diffuse.
01:15:30
Speaker
um It's just kind of like everything is, you know, there's a million streaming channels and stuff. So I like it when something really, breaks through and like kind of everyone sees it. It's kind of why I miss Game of Thrones, for instance, just things that like are sort of like, you know, everyone kind of feels like they have to go see it, I guess, except Vicky.
01:15:50
Speaker
um But Wicked. you know i' very far I will say on that note, um to give Wicked is due. I have had so much fun criticizing Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande on this press tour. So i as much as I will never watch these movies, I am grateful that they exist the Yeah, the press tour was so fun and so memeable.
01:16:17
Speaker
I also can't remember, i mean, like when was the last time like a someone as famous as Ariana Grande for being a pop diva transferred into a film and it was this beloved. I mean, maybe you could say Lady Gaga and a star is born possibly, but I think that that's fun when like ah someone who's known so, who's so famous and so big for something else like music um is able to sort of, yeah, become a. Yeah. And Manchester boy, I do have a soft spot for Ariana Grande.
01:16:50
Speaker
she' is ah she's She's like an honorary resident of Manchester at this point. She's so pretty. I love her. Anyway. um I think that's it guys. Any final, any final thoughts?
01:17:03
Speaker
Uh, no, but I just, everyone should see more films. I'm always annoyed that no one sees as many films as me. So if you're thinking of, uh, seeing films, go see some fucking films. I guess one thing I'll say that I hope is true is that maybe this sort of rightward cultural lean that's going to happen will get some straight guys to go back to the theater.
01:17:23
Speaker
um They sort of stopped, they sort of stopped making movies specifically geared at straight men maybe like five or six years ago. And I'm like, let's do it again, guys. Let's get, what was that? What's that director that does all the like car racing movies? Yeah.
01:17:38
Speaker
Michael Bay. Okay. Let Michael Bay make something, put some big titties and some car. Like let's get some, let's get some young straight guys back into the theaters. You know, that's Michael game or Michael Bay. Yeah. I think that'd be nice. I mean, we've gotten the gay guys and women have been eating good for a couple years. I think we can give straight guys just some like, you know, yeah. Yeah.
01:18:05
Speaker
Well, maybe we should regroup when it's the Oscars and give our ah give our Oscars takes. Well, actually, okay well, let's say bye to Twink Death and then i will then we'll check in. Bye, Twink Death. Bye, Twink Death. We love you. Have a happy new year.