Show Notes
Our sixteenth film at Toronto takes us to rural Missouri for a family dramedy about grief, hoarding, and going home to a place you swore you'd never return to. We talk about Caleb Hearon's promising screenwriting debut, why Zooey Deschanel steals nearly every scene she's in, and how the film manages to avoid easy small town stereotypes while still keeping things funny and familiar.
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Three movies into the DC Universe, the weirdest one might also be the best. James Watkins turns a shapeshifting actor with a ruined face into an R-rated body horror throwback that needs zero franchise homework. We talk the practical effects, Naomi Ackie’s scientist with a conscience, the plane turbulence scene that will haunt us, and why this one actually feels like its own thing.
Taika Waititi tackles Kazuo Ishiguro’s AI novel with Jenna Ortega as a robot companion praying to the sun to be chosen, and it should have been a perfect match. It wasn’t. We talk the candy colored Friend Store, Natasha Lyonne’s den mother energy, the “Jojo Rabbit” comparison, and why a film about mortality and obsolescence ends up so obvious and tonally confused.
Ti West’s A24 horror comedy drops a crew of scrappy adult filmmakers onto a Texas farm owned by a very unhappy elderly couple, and it’s as wicked as it sounds. We talk Mia Goth in two roles, the 1970s grindhouse spirit, the slow burn tension that West does better than almost anyone, and what the film has to say about youth, sex and getting old.
Paul Bettany returns as Vision in Marvel’s “VisionQuest,” a “WandaVision” follow-up about an android trying to understand his own feelings. We talk about why a Victorian mansion full of AI assistants, including a scruffy James Spader as Ultron, is the show’s best idea, and why the convoluted lore leaves viewers as emotionally disconnected as its hero.
From Venice to Telluride to TIFF and NYFF, this fall’s festivals introduced a fresh wave of performers poised for stardom. We meet seven standouts, including Mathilde Arcel’s shape-shifting Volpi Cup win, Eldar Isgandarov stealing scenes in two of the year’s best films, and Caleb Hearon’s move from internet comedy to leading man.