Tag Archives: podcast

FilmWonk Podcast – Episode #141 – “Smallfoot” (dir. Karey Kirkpatrick)

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This week, Glenn and Daniel are joined by a special guest…Glenn’s toddler son who’s never seen a movie in theaters before. And so we gamble, maximizing our chances of making it through tantrum-free with a bucket of popcorn and a 90-minute animated musical about yetis and…atheism? The kid made it through unscathed, and we had more to say than expected (31:07)!

May contain NSFW language.

FilmWonk rating: 6.5 out of 10

Show notes:

  • Music for this episode is the tracks, “Wonderful Life” by Zendaya and “Let it Lie” by Common, from the film’s soundtrack.
  • We actually have reviewed another animated film since our fake-review of Minions – we reviewed (and loved) Moana in 2016.
  • Glenn’s current play count on “Rewrite the Stars” is 55, although the true number is probably higher, since he started off binging the soundtrack on YouTube. (GB note: Hell, I’m listening to it as I type this. And I regret nothing!)
  • Stick around at the end.

Listen above, or download: Smallfoot (right-click, save as, or click/tap to play on a non-flash browser)

FilmWonk Podcast – Episode #107 – “Wonder Woman” (dir. Patty Jenkins), “Glory” (dir. Kristina Grozeva, Petar Valchanov) (#SIFF2017)

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In this week’s podcast, Glenn and Daniel are back at the Seattle International Film Festival to check out a lovely Bulgarian political satire. Then Diana (Gal Gadot) shows up to wreck the place by hand and sword, and we can’t complain, because it turns out she’s pretty awesome when not saddled with a lame mystery B-plot (48:06).

May contain NSFW language.

Still from

FilmWonk rating (Glory): 8 out of 10
FilmWonk rating (Wonder Woman): 7.5/10 (Glenn), 7/10 (Daniel)

Show notes:

  • [00:24] Review: Glory
  • [17:25] Review: Wonder Woman
  • [35:49] Spoilers: Wonder Woman
  • Music for this episode is the track, “Dance for Tomorrow” by Stop the Schizo from the soundtrack to Glory, and the track, “Angel On the Wing” from the Wonder Woman score by Rupert Gregson-Williams.
  • Correction: Spread the word on this one – we (and many others) have been mispronouncing Gadot’s last name. It’s not French-style, with a silent T – it’s Israeli-style, with a solid T. The actress previously made a video to address the issue (thanks to Dan A. for pointing this out).
  • Correction: Dr. Maru (“Dr. Poison”) was actually played by Spanish actress Elena Anaya. The actress from Force Majeure, Lisa Loven Kongsli, played Menalippe, one of the Amazons, and she’s actually Norwegian, not Swedish.
  • Correction: To complete the trifecta, we made a casual reference to a character played by “Kat Denning” in Thor. The actress’ name is Kat Dennings.

Listen above, or download: Wonder Woman, Glory (right-click, save as, or click/tap to play on a non-flash browser)

FilmWonk Podcast – Episode #106 – “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales” (dir. Joachim Rønning, Espen Sandberg)

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In this week’s podcast, Glenn and Daniel take a break from SIFF to return to the swashbuckling world of diminishing returns that is Pirates of the Caribbean, pondering the series’ future, and considering whether if Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) will ever slip his earthly bonds and meet the Fast and Furious crew in space (37:44).

May contain NSFW language.

FilmWonk rating: 5 out of 10

Show notes:

  • Music for this episode is the track “Cruel Mistress” by Flogging Molly, and the track “He’s a Pirate“, from the soundtrack to the first Pirates film by Klaus Badelt, because the series’ various derivative versions of this track have yet to match the original in quality.

Listen above, or download: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (right-click, save as, or click/tap to play on a non-flash browser)

FilmWonk Podcast – Episode #104 – “The Wall” (dir. Doug Liman) vs. “Buried” (dir. Rodrigo Cortés)

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In this week’s podcast, Glenn and Daniel return to the latter days of the Iraq War with a lean thriller from Amazon Studios and director Doug Liman, The Wall, and we revisit the 2010 Rodrigo Cortés thriller, Buried. It all looks a bit grim, and while there may be an ending in sight, we’ll figure out which flick handled that ending best (47:15).

May contain NSFW language.

Still from "Buried"

The Wall is in theaters this Friday, 5/12, and will be available on Amazon video later this year.

FilmWonk rating (The Wall): 7/10 (Daniel); 6/10 (Glenn)
FilmWonk rating (Buried): 6/10 (Daniel); 7.5/10 (Glenn)

Show notes:

  • [00:33] Review: The Wall/Buried
  • [24:02] Spoilers: The Wall/Buried
  • Music for this episode is the opening title theme from Buried, composed by Victor Reyes.
  • Check out Glenn’s 2010 review of Buried.
  • Clarification: We stated a figure of 500,000 deaths from the Iraq War, and this appears to be on the high end of estimates, based on a 2011 study in PLoS Medicine, which relied on census-style household surveys, and had an extremely high uncertainty interval (95%), meaning that the study’s casualty estimate was anywhere from 48,000-751,000. The Iraq Body Count project, which relies largely on media reports (and thus may be underestimating), puts the figure at closer to 120,000. The overall point notwithstanding, there does not appear to be a single, agreed-upon figure. See Wikipedia: Casualties of the Iraq War for more information.
  • As promised, according to RF Cafe, the density of dry sand is 100 lb/ft3. A standard coffin is approximately 7 feet long, and 2.333 feet wide at its widest point. If Paul was buried under 3 feet of sand, this amounts to approximately 49ft3 of sand above him, weighing just under 5,000 pounds (2,268 kg). With all respect to The Bride, Paul’s not punching his way out of this.

Listen above, or download: The Wall, Buried (right-click, save as, or click/tap to play on a non-flash browser)

FilmWonk Podcast – Episode #103 – “Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2” (dir. James Gunn)

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In this week’s podcast, Glenn and Daniel return to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and discover their limit of inconsequential action is about the first 90 minutes (53:28).

May contain NSFW language.

FilmWonk rating: 4.5 out of 10

Show notes:

  • Music for this episode is the tracks “Brandy (You’re a Fine Girl)” by Looking Glass, and “The Chain” by Fleetwood Mac, from the film’s soundtrack and trailer respectively.
  • After recording this episode, Glenn got into it offline with the hosts of The Spoilers: Wayne & Daryl (not for the first time – Glenn previously crashed their episode of The Seattle After Party podcast).
    Suffice to say, you should check out what these nerds have to say about this film, and expect some guest appearances in the future.
  • Check out Glenn’s review of Passengers here.
  • We called out the greatness of the makeup artists behind these characters, and how well Nebula, Gamora, Yondu, and Drax’s makeup held up in IMAX closeups – but there was one we didn’t even realize. Young Ego (Kurt Russell) was mostly makeup, (applied by artist Dennis Liddiard), with only a few CGI tweaks. Very cool.
  • The video that was ringing in our heads as we evaluated the atrocious character of Mantis (Pom Klementieff) was Anita Sarkeesian‘s most recent (and final) video in the Tropes vs. Women in Video Games series, “The Lady Sidekick“. And…wow, was it ever spot-on for this character.

Listen above, or download: Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol 2. (right-click, save as, or click/tap to play on a non-flash browser)

FilmWonk Podcast – Episode #94 – “Bad Santa 2” (dir. Mark Waters)

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In this week’s podcast, Glenn and Daniel review Bad Santa 2. We recorded the episode the same night. Real talk: I don’t want to think about this movie any longer than necessary (13:02).

May contain NSFW language.

FilmWonk rating: 2 out of 10

Show notes:

  • Music for this episode…you know what it fucking is. Let’s get this over with.

Listen above, or download: Bad Santa 2 (right-click, save as, or click/tap to play on a non-flash browser)

FilmWonk Podcast – Episode #86 – “Demolition” (dir. Jean-Marc Vallée)

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This week on the podcast, Glenn and Daniel struggle with the overwhelming sense that they’ve seen this movie before – Jean-Marc Vallée’s Demolition is the tale of a rich, white person’s unconventional journey of grief – but well-worn territory or not, it’s quite fun (27:13).

May contain NSFW language.

FilmWonk rating: 7 out of 10

Show notes:

Listen above, or download: Demolition (right-click, save as, or click/tap to play on a non-flash browser)

FilmWonk Podcast – Episode #83 – “Hail, Caesar!” (dir. Joel and Ethan Coen)

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In this week’s podcast, Glenn and Daniel fight their initial impulse to embrace yet another Hollywood love letter to the motion picture, and instead enjoy the Coen Bros‘ vigorous cinematic hate-fuck Hail, Caesar! Gene Autry and Kirk Douglas will be rolling in their graves…with laughter (33:53).

May contain NSFW language.

FilmWonk rating: 7.5 out of 10

Show notes:

  • Music for tonight’s episode is the “The Merry Widow Waltz” by Franz Lehár and “Echelon Song” by A.V. Alexandrov and Osip Kolychev, as performed by The Red Army Choir, both from the film’s soundtrack.
  • Glenn: Hugo was my #1 of 2011 (not 2009), and The Artist was #5 in the same year. Birdman was my #1 of 2014. Like Hollywood, it appears I’m a big ol’ sucker for movies about movies.
  • Cinema attendance has indeed been on the decline since the 1940s, and home televisions are largely credited with this decline. In 1930, more than 65% of the US population went to the movies every week. It dropped to around 10% in the 1960s, and has stayed at about that level since.
  • CORRECTION: We briefly implied that we stand with Rand. We do not. We regret the error.
  • CORRECTION: In the description above, we jokingly implied that Kirk Douglas is dead. He’s alive and kicking, and his son got him a bitchin’ 99th birthday gift.

Listen above, or download: Hail, Caesar! (right-click, save as, or click/tap to play on a non-flash browser)

FilmWonk Podcast – Episode #79 – “Everest” (dir. Baltasar Kormákur)

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This week on the podcast, Glenn and Daniel climb the mountain of conflict as they bicker on how well Everest stacks up to its IMAX and geographical namesakes. Strap on your oxygen tanks and tune in – your survival may depend on it! (37:05)

May contain NSFW language.

FilmWonk rating: 6/10 (Daniel); 7.5/10 (Glenn)

Show notes:

  • Music for tonight’s episode is “All I Wanna Do” by Sheryl Crow, from the film’s soundtrack.
  • The fact-checking website we referred to is known as History vs. Hollywood, and features quite an impressive entry on this film.
  • The world record holder for summitting Mount Everest the most times is Apa Sherpa, at 21 times. We were definitely talking out of our butts a bit on this subject – check out a complete list of the records on Wikipedia.
  • A helicopter has indeed landed on the summit of Mt. Everest – on May 14, 2005, French pilot Didier Delsalle landed an AStar helicopter at the summit, and remained there for approximately 4 minutes before taking off again. The helicopter had several unnecessary items (such as passenger seats) removed to reduce weight, but was otherwise just a stock AStar model. You can view video of this world record landing here. The search result page that contains that video has quite an impressive array of high-altitude rescue landings, and confirm that this film portrayed such flights with an impressive degree of realism.
  • CORRECTION: We conflated a pair of related conditions – high-altitude hypoxia, and high-altitude cerebral edema (HACE), both physiological effects of high altitude and failure to acclimatize, but with different effects.
  • CORRECTION: We referred to a USAF helicopter crashing on Mt. Baker during a rescue – the incident actually occurred on Mt. Hood, and was televised live throughout the region. Video is available here. While several climbers were killed from the initial fall into a crevasse which had prompted the rescue, none of the helicopter’s five crewmembers died in the crash.

Listen above, or download: Everest (right-click, save as, or click/tap to play on a non-flash browser)

FilmWonk Podcast – Episode #78 – “The Visit” (dir. M. Night Shyamalan)

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This week on the podcast, Glenn and Daniel reflect on another mediocre genre thriller. That’s three times in a row I’ve used that first sentence. M. Night Shyamalan‘s The Visit may be regarded as a return to form for the director, but the “found footage” form is one that systematically works against his previous strengths. (25:16).

May contain NSFW language.

FilmWonk rating: 4 out of 10

Show notes:

  • Music for tonight’s episode is “Everyday” by Buddy Holly, a cover version of which appears in the film’s trailer.
  • Regarding The Happening, the insect-suicide inducing parasite that we referred to was actually a confusion of two different ones. The first is a fungus called Dicrocoelium dendriticum, which triggers an ant (by way of vomit from a land snail!) to crawl up to the top of a stalk of grass at night, in order for it to be eaten by a cow. The other is Schistocephalus solidus which is even more sinister – this one triggers a stickleback fish to seek out warmer waters so it will grow bigger, then become bolder and more solitary so it will be eaten by a sea-bird. io9 has a good round-up of these and ten other parasites that effectively zombify their hosts. Sweet dreams!

Listen above, or download: The Visit (right-click, save as, or click/tap to play on a non-flash browser)