The 10 Most Misused Stars in Hollywood and the Gnarly Magic of ‘Send Help’

Sean and Amanda open the show by covering A24's win in the 72-hour bidding war for Olivia Wilde’s ‘The Invite’ at the Sundance Film Festival (1:16), react to the leaked photographs from the upcoming biopics about the Beatles (5:33), and share their brief takeaways from the BAFTA nominations (8:38). Then, they cover ‘Mercy,’ starring Chris Pratt, which they found to be an evil and disastrous misfire (17:01). Next, they talk through Sam Raimi’s ‘Send Help’, starring Rachel McAdams and Dylan O’Brien, and celebrate Raimi's use of his signature trademarks to explore some really morally thorny material (41:34). Finally, they use McAdams’s wonderful performance as a segue to have a conversation about the 10 most misused stars in Hollywood (1:00:16). Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Producer: Jack Sanders Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Sean Fennessey?

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• 1:27Sean Fennessey?

  I'm Sean Fennessey.

• 1:28Amanda Dobbins?

  I'm Amanda Dobbins.

• 1:29Sean Fennessey?

  And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about sending help to some of the best movie stars around.

• 1:34Amanda Dobbins?

  I see what you did there.

• 1:35Sean Fennessey?

  Thank you. Today on the show, we're talking about two late January genre movies. The AI courtroom drama crime thriller Mercy, starring Chris Pratt and the survivalist workplace satire Send Help, starring Rachel McAdams. Which movie star do you think we'll be sending help to on this episode? They show two very different potential futures for movies, so we dig into both of those. Send Help has also inspired an exercise. It's built around McAdams and we love Rachel McAdams.

• 2:02Amanda Dobbins?

  We do.

• 2:02Sean Fennessey?

  And there's not enough movies with Rachel McAdams. And I'm trying to figure out why that is. I have some theories, I'm sure you do as well, but we're going to talk about the other movie stars that have been around and with us for some time, who are misused, underutilized, not identified and supported properly. Are you excited about that exercise?

• 2:20Amanda Dobbins?

  I am. I, listen, Rachel McAdams, be in more movies.

• 2:23Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, before we get into that, we need to talk about a couple of quick things in the news. First thing is, first big Sundance acquisition happened.

• 2:30Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 2:30Sean Fennessey?

  It's called The Invite. I mentioned this to you earlier on the show. I got a lot of texts about this movie when it screened over the weekend at Sundance. 10 plus million dollars. A24 picked it up. Olivia Wilde, who is the director of this movie, which is an adaptation of a Spanish film, said she wanted it to be in movie theaters. What do you think about that?

• 2:48Amanda Dobbins?

  Pro movie theaters.

• 2:49Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, me too. Seth Rogen, Olivia Wilde, Edward Norton and Penelope Cruz. Premise of the movie is, there's a couple that's having some trouble in their relationship.

• 2:56Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 2:57Sean Fennessey?

  I think, I believe it's Seth and Olivia's characters. And they get invited to a swingers' party hosted by Edward Norton and Penelope Cruz.

• 3:04Amanda Dobbins?

  Like, I'm in.

• 3:05Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 3:05Amanda Dobbins?

  I was in.

• 3:06Sean Fennessey?

  I'm in too.

• 3:06Amanda Dobbins?

  This was on my, like, this is romantic comedy adjacent. I guess where, movies where people have sex is how we can, or talk about sex.

• 3:14Sean Fennessey?

  Sure.

• 3:14Amanda Dobbins?

  Is a way to reframe it.

• 3:15Sean Fennessey?

  One of these days, you're gonna see porn. It's gonna be huge for you. It's gonna change everything. One of these days. Until that day, you can keep looking forward in rom-coms.

• 3:23Amanda Dobbins?

  This is burgeoning, rom-coms and romances. And, you know, heated rivalry, I guess. But like, this is the thing, that you, you like to watch people have their eyeballs, eyeballs scooped out.

• 3:34Sean Fennessey?

  I do.

• 3:35Amanda Dobbins?

  And I like to watch people, like, dance around sex for a while.

• 3:37Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 3:38Amanda Dobbins?

  So this was on my, like, to-watch list. And turns out that Olivia Wilde, like, has her mojo back after...

• 3:45Sean Fennessey?

  Well, we'll see if she does.

• 3:46Amanda Dobbins?

  We'll see, I guess.

• 3:47Sean Fennessey?

  This has been a fascinating reconstruction period, I would say. That Olivia Wilde, in the aftermath of Don't Worry Darling, some of the controversy around that movie, and also just the general ineffectiveness of that movie ultimately, which we talked about years ago when it was released. She kinda went quiet for a year or so, had a lot of personal stuff. And then last year, she had a very funny cameo on the studio.

• 4:07Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 4:07Sean Fennessey?

  Which is, I assume, you know, how she and Seth Rogen connected there. And this movie is an interesting one. It was supposed to be originally Amy Adams, Paul Rudd and Tessa Thompson, and maybe another actor in that fourth spot. And they changed filmmakers. Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Ferris, who made Little Miss Sunshine, were gonna make it. Olivia Wilde comes in, she gets this movie off the ground. She also is co-starring in I Want Your Sex, which is the new Greg Iraqi movie opposite Cooper Hoffman, which got less good reviews out of Sundance. I haven't seen either of these movies yet. And she's apparently appearing in Tony Gilroy's Behemoth.

• 4:37Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 4:38Sean Fennessey?

  Which is just getting underway in production, so... The wild moment is back upon us.

• 4:44Amanda Dobbins?

  Again, yeah.

• 4:45Sean Fennessey?

  Do you like Olivia Wilde?

• 4:46Amanda Dobbins?

  I'm, I'm open to it.

• 4:48Sean Fennessey?

  Okay.

• 4:48Amanda Dobbins?

  I don't think I'm against. I, I think that I did not think there were a lot of thoughts in Don't Worry Darling.

• 4:55Sean Fennessey?

  Books, books are just fun. I like books.

• 4:56Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, it was fine. And, you know, who wouldn't date Harry Styles? So that's, that seems fine with me.

• 5:04Sean Fennessey?

  I probably wouldn't if I had a choice.

• 5:05Amanda Dobbins?

  That's your choice.

• 5:06Sean Fennessey?

  Nothing against him.

• 5:06Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 5:07Sean Fennessey?

  But I don't know a single Harry Styles song.

• 5:09Amanda Dobbins?

  You're too good for him, but Zoe Kravitz isn't?

• 5:11Sean Fennessey?

  Uh, is Zoe Kravitz dating Harry Styles?

• 5:14Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 5:14Sean Fennessey?

  Wow.

• 5:15Amanda Dobbins?

  And did you also know?

• 5:16Sean Fennessey?

  I always learn something new on this show.

• 5:18Amanda Dobbins?

  Do you also know that Harry Styles was in St. Peter's Square when the new pope was announced? To bring it back to like, Harry Styles is basically Conclave adjacent.

• 5:26Sean Fennessey?

  Got it, yes. Both Harry and I, I think, are finding God this year. That's been, been an interesting theme.

• 5:32Speaker 02

  Many people are saying.

• 5:33Amanda Dobbins?

  He was in Rome getting a haircut and then just ran on down.

• 5:37Sean Fennessey?

  That's beautiful.

• 5:37Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah. And then he was just like photographed in the crowd.

• 5:39Sean Fennessey?

  What do you think he's, does he just say, let me through, I'm Harry Styles? Like, how does that work?

• 5:44Amanda Dobbins?

  No, I, he told the story. He said, everyone, including the, like, my hairdresser, was like, oh, they're saying habemus popimus, which is what you say when there's a new pope. There's a new pope.

• 5:55Sean Fennessey?

  Habemus popimus?

• 5:56Amanda Dobbins?

  I think so. I think I have the Latin right on that. And then they, he's like, so I just ran down and wandered with people. He was like, I just followed the crowds.

• 6:05Sean Fennessey?

  How nice.

• 6:05Amanda Dobbins?

  Just happened to be nearby.

• 6:06Sean Fennessey?

  Do you think Harry Styles should act more?

• 6:08Amanda Dobbins?

  Um, that was my, that was Eternals, right? That was the end of Eternals?

• 6:13Sean Fennessey?

  Well, he was, he had that run of Eternals, My Policeman, legendary film that everyone's seen.

• 6:18Amanda Dobbins?

  I have seen that one.

• 6:19Sean Fennessey?

  And Don't Worry Darling.

• 6:19Amanda Dobbins?

  My Policeman is different than Mr. Policeman. We gave you all the clues, right?

• 6:23Sean Fennessey?

  Yes, that is the Harry hole movie, The Snowman. Is that it?

• 6:28Amanda Dobbins?

  I think so. That sounds right.

• 6:29Sean Fennessey?

  Is it pronounced The Snowman?

• 6:33Amanda Dobbins?

  Mr. Policeman, we gave you all the clues. That was, that was a fun time on the internet. We were innocent.

• 6:37Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 6:38Amanda Dobbins?

  Uh, he was my favorite part of Eternals, I think.

• 6:40Sean Fennessey?

  He was in 12 Seconds of Eternals.

• 6:42Amanda Dobbins?

  Let's, you know, again.

• 6:44Sean Fennessey?

  Good enough. Did you see the photos, speaking of Eternals and Barry Keoghan, of the Beatles guys?

• 6:49Amanda Dobbins?

  No.

• 6:50Sean Fennessey?

  The four actors in Beatles.

• 6:51Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, let's do it now.

• 6:51Sean Fennessey?

  There's some sort of screenshot situation. I did, it was, I don't think they're even high-res photography.

• 6:56Amanda Dobbins?

  Beatles photos, Beatles movie photos.

• 6:58Sean Fennessey?

  I thought, I thought, I thought I saw them this morning.

• 7:00Amanda Dobbins?

  Where is it?

• 7:01Sean Fennessey?

  And I don't even know where I saw it.

• 7:02Amanda Dobbins?

  News, Beatles movies, photos, first look, okay, Daily Mail. I'm sorry to give the Daily Mail some. Oh, okay.

• 7:09Sean Fennessey?

  This is huge in real time.

• 7:09Amanda Dobbins?

  Barry Keegan is Ringo Starr. They're doing the get back. Yeah, he looks good. Frankly, this polka dot and cravat look I'm into. Okay, I'm still scrolling. Okay, so this is a photograph of photos laid on a table, not unlike this one. I'd like to state for the record, I did not take this photograph. Sony, do not sue me for infringement of anything.

• 7:29Sean Fennessey?

  No one can see anything.

• 7:30Amanda Dobbins?

  Um, well.

• 7:31Sean Fennessey?

  You're looking at your laptop.

• 7:32Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, I know, but I'm describing it and I'm just saying, okay.

• 7:35Speaker 02

  That would even make for a better case of fair use.

• 7:37Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, there you go. So that is that guy as George Harrison, I guess.

• 7:45Sean Fennessey?

  That guy?

• 7:46Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, Joseph Quinn. That was his name. It was taking me a minute. Sorry. I can't even see Paul Meskell and I can see Harris Dickinson is wearing glasses and has long hair. I'm open.

• 7:57Sean Fennessey?

  This is scintillating commentary from you.

• 7:59Amanda Dobbins?

  I'm open to it. How do you feel?

• 8:00Sean Fennessey?

  Um, I got a little excited.

• 8:02Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 8:03Sean Fennessey?

  I got a little excited.

• 8:04Amanda Dobbins?

  Of course we did. This is why we're diseased, because this is gonna be the worst thing that ever happened to us and it's not coming out until 2028?

• 8:14Sean Fennessey?

  Uh, I think that's right.

• 8:15Amanda Dobbins?

  And we'll be dead?

• 8:16Sean Fennessey?

  No, no, I'll be alive and I will be podding.

• 8:19Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 8:19Sean Fennessey?

  Somewhere about four consecutive, four simultaneously released Beatles movies? Or is it one per week?

• 8:25Amanda Dobbins?

  I think it's one per week. It's a, it's the, a month of the Beatles.

• 8:28Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 8:28Amanda Dobbins?

  It's April, is what they've told us.

• 8:30Sean Fennessey?

  God, I love the Beatles.

• 8:31Amanda Dobbins?

  Um, me too. I really do. So it's interesting that only Barry Keoghan and Joseph Quinn get the close up on these and that they're, do you think they're holding Paul Meskell and Harris Dickinson back because they don't have the looks nailed or because they know that, you know, John and Paul are like the leaders in the clubhouse? Or are they trying to build anticipation?

• 8:52Sean Fennessey?

  I don't think a photograph of a photo that has been posted online is necessarily a coherent marketing rollout.

• 9:00Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, I think that you're wrong.

• 9:01Sean Fennessey?

  Okay.

• 9:01Amanda Dobbins?

  Uh, and once again.

• 9:02Sean Fennessey?

  You think this is a coherent marketing rollout?

• 9:04Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, I don't know if it's coherent, but I think it's like, choices have been made.

• 9:08Sean Fennessey?

  Maybe. Things do leak.

• 9:11Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 9:11Sean Fennessey?

  Things do leak.

• 9:13Amanda Dobbins?

  I just.

• 9:13Sean Fennessey?

  You'd probably want to put your best foot forward with this project.

• 9:16Amanda Dobbins?

  I'm looking at the composition of the photos.

• 9:19Sean Fennessey?

  Uh huh.

• 9:20Amanda Dobbins?

  And it's just like those two get the close ups.

• 9:23Sean Fennessey?

  You're like Susan's song tag, really digging in here. This is incredible.

• 9:27Amanda Dobbins?

  This is the kind of content that you can expect in 2028 in April as we lose our minds in front of the camera. I mean, I like the Beatles and I really like biopics despite all of, despite all biopics as evidence to the contrary.

• 9:45Sean Fennessey?

  Could be a disaster, could be great.

• 9:47Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 9:47Sean Fennessey?

  I reserve the right to love it.

• 9:49Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 9:49Sean Fennessey?

  Uh, let's stay in the British Isles for a minute.

• 9:51Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 9:52Sean Fennessey?

  The BAFTA nominations.

• 9:53Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 9:54Sean Fennessey?

  Just some quick takeaways from this. So they were announced on Tuesday, shortly after our episode went up and, you know, not a ton of surprises, but a couple of key moments that I think will close the loop on some of those discussions we were having earlier this week. First off, one battle after another, 14 nominations, the most of any film centers had 13, the all time record before I wrote that down. Did you have any idea what it would have been? Did you even look at it? Do you know?

• 10:17Amanda Dobbins?

  I do know because I have this right ahead of me. Um, it's, I mean, it's a just really classic BAFTAs. Jack, do you have the doc open? Can you guess?

• 10:27Speaker 02

  Sorry, I was messaging Kate Halliwell.

• 10:29Amanda Dobbins?

  Sorry. Hi, Kate Halliwell. Um, also I think this film was released before you were born.

• 10:34Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 10:35Speaker 02

  Oh, Gandhi. Wow.

• 10:37Amanda Dobbins?

  There we go.

• 10:37Sean Fennessey?

  Gandhi. Wow. 16 nominations for Gandhi. Uh, checks out.

• 10:42Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 10:42Sean Fennessey?

  So additionally, no Delroy Lindo.

• 10:45Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 10:46Sean Fennessey?

  Which we talked about whether Wenmima Sako and Delroy Lindo would be recognized here because they were shortlisted when Mima Sako got in, Delroy Lindo did not.

• 10:52Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 10:53Sean Fennessey?

  As an Oscar nerd, this is very interesting to me.

• 10:56Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 10:56Sean Fennessey?

  This is a very rare circumstance in which an actor has not gotten CCAs, Globes, SAG, or BAFTA nominations and has an Oscar nomination. In recent history, this had me thinking about two nominations. One, a lot of people are saying Andrew Rysborough because of the, that campaign in which we discussed and the kind of, the sort of behind the scenes relationship building. It was necessary for that. But what it really reminds me of is Lakeith Stanfield. When he came in as a supporting actor in 2022 for his work in Judas and the Black Messiah. That was kind of an odd year where that film qualified, even though it came out later in the cycle. I think it was like a February movie and then got a, got an April Oscar nomination, right? Wasn't it something along those lines?

• 11:36Amanda Dobbins?

  Yes, because of the COVID, yeah.

• 11:39Sean Fennessey?

  And that was interesting and he was a first time nominee and he was sharing that category with Daniel Kaluuya, who went on to win that year. And so that was kind of an odd, but it was a recognition of Stanfield, who had kind of been rising in Hollywood at that time, a lot of admiration for him. It's a really good performance in that movie. And then I also thought about Penelope Cruz getting nominated for Parallel Mothers, the Almodovar film, which also got no recognition at any of the other bodies, I think, aside from a couple of the European awards. This is pretty rare for something like this to happen. I, I do think a lot of it is that Lindo is very well liked inside the industry, never nominated. It's a way to kind of acknowledge his work by this particular group of voters. Any other thoughts about that?

• 12:18Amanda Dobbins?

  It reads to me both as support for Delroy Lindo and also that, that Sinners is very strong with the Academy.

• 12:24Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 12:25Amanda Dobbins?

  And I, you know, I know I was on this podcast saying like, Sinners is very strong, but I still think it'll be one battle. But this is the kind of thing where you see, you know, if, if the center's, center's strength, like led Delroy Lindo to a nomination at the Oscars, and then the fact that it couldn't get him at the BAFTAs. It just kind of means that Academy voters, or at least Academy, like nominees are very, very into that movie.

• 12:51Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, I agree with you. You think, you'd think the opposite if it got an BAFTA, you'd be like, oh, it really has a chance at Oscar. It's not really the point.

• 12:56Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, we would be remiss if we didn't mention that the BAFTAs in particular have an interesting relationship to black performers.

• 13:02Sean Fennessey?

  That's true.

• 13:02Amanda Dobbins?

  So, which is that they're often not nominated.

• 13:05Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 13:05Amanda Dobbins?

  So, and in, in that sense, I don't know whether it suggests like strength at the Academy or just that BAFTAs, despite their ever-changing roles, still have some of the same issues.

• 13:14Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 13:14Amanda Dobbins?

  But I, you know, it's great that he got an Oscar nomination.

• 13:18Sean Fennessey?

  I agree with you. A big surprise to me was no Amy Madigan in supporting actress here.

• 13:23Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, but like, does Field of Dreams matter to British people? You know? Like, seriously.

• 13:29Sean Fennessey?

  Oh, so you think it's related to just maybe her not having the same standing amongst the British?

• 13:33Amanda Dobbins?

  I do.

• 13:34Sean Fennessey?

  Voters. That's really interesting. I guess I didn't think about it that way. Um, I had, I have been picking Amy Madigan through most of this season and thinking she has a chance to win because it is a very, it feels like a very classic kind of Oscar win where the more seasoned person, who has a strong contingent of voting. In the immediate aftermath of this news, I saw a lot of people saying, well, either Tiana Taylor's locked, or maybe Inga Ibsad or Lilias, who's gotten in in a lot of places, is very strong here. I'm a little more dubious of that. She's competing against her, one of her co-stars in the category.

• 14:06Amanda Dobbins?

  I think so as well.

• 14:07Sean Fennessey?

  But it's, this is an interesting race. There's some interesting races now. And I thought, I thought it was all over with the shouting, but it's not, that's not quite the case.

• 14:15Amanda Dobbins?

  No, and especially for the acting, I think SAG will be interesting, but not necessarily definitive because not everybody's in this, like, the pools are different at all the different precursors, so you're just kind of guessing.

• 14:29Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, yeah, it's not gonna, neither of these awards, the actor awards or the BAFTAs, are not going to be predictive per se, but they're going to tell us more. So the season has some, some new juice. I'm excited about that. A couple of other quick things. Kate Hudson is in here, which is fascinating. Not a British performer. Amanda Seyfried never stood a chance. Paul Meskell, Chase Infiniti, and Yorgos Lanthimos are all in in their respective categories. And the thing is that some of these categories have five, uh, six nominees. And so that six nominee often will reveal to you who is in sixth place, if they were nominated here. So you get the impression Paul Meskell probably in sixth place.

• 15:03Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 15:03Sean Fennessey?

  In his race, Jesse Plemons possibly in sixth place in his race. Chase Infiniti probably in sixth place. Yorgos, probably not. Like, Guillermo del Toro missed the shortlist for the BAFTAs. It's kind of fascinating. And then Yorgos got nominated here. So a little bit of a wrinkle there, which makes it kind of interesting. Wagner Mora also missed the shortlist, so he's not nominated here. I don't know what that means for his Oscar chances, if anything. Might not be good.

• 15:27Amanda Dobbins?

  I don't think it's great, but it is still also confusing. I mean, not being in BAFTAs and not being at SAG. Together just means that he missed some of like the promo juice.

• 15:39Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 15:39Amanda Dobbins?

  Uh, and I do think that that matters.

• 15:43Sean Fennessey?

  I do too.

• 15:43Amanda Dobbins?

  However, once again, international voters and specifically Brazil are very powerful. So, you know, and, and people like that movie and people like Wagner Mora.

• 15:51Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah. How do you feel about the Brazilians bombing all of our social media all the time? Whenever we mention his name?

• 15:56Amanda Dobbins?

  That means we made it.

• 15:58Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, I agree.

• 15:59Amanda Dobbins?

  That is it. Like, I know that that, when the people in Brazil are paying attention and come to Brazil, like commenting in our comments, like here we are.

• 16:08Sean Fennessey?

  I would like to go to Brazil.

• 16:09Amanda Dobbins?

  I've been once. It was beautiful. I'd love to go back.

• 16:12Sean Fennessey?

  I've not been. I've not been to South America. I'd love to visit. It was on my list in 2020.

• 16:15Amanda Dobbins?

  I know. I was doing the continents with Knox last night and which ones I've been to and which ones I haven't.

• 16:20Sean Fennessey?

  Interesting.

• 16:20Amanda Dobbins?

  And I'm, I'm, I'm three for six, not counting Antarctica.

• 16:25Sean Fennessey?

  Only been to two.

• 16:25Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 16:26Sean Fennessey?

  It's tough. Uh, one last thing.

• 16:29Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, there are two things, like, because you didn't put, I swear on here, but that's what we texted about.

• 16:34Sean Fennessey?

  I was gonna say that there, there were two titles.

• 16:37Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 16:37Sean Fennessey?

  That you might have seen a lot in this BAFTA list that you are not seeing really at any other awards.

• 16:42Amanda Dobbins?

  Sure.

• 16:42Sean Fennessey?

  The first is The Ballad of Wallace Island.

• 16:43Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 16:44Sean Fennessey?

  Which came out all the way last spring. And I think I mentioned for like five minutes on one episode.

• 16:49Amanda Dobbins?

  It's very charming.

• 16:50Sean Fennessey?

  A very charming movie, uh, starring Carey Mulligan about a former indie folk duo who are invited by a very eccentric person to come perform on an island called Wallace Island. Stars Tim Key. He's one of the writers of the movie. He's very funny.

• 17:05Amanda Dobbins?

  He's the reason to see the movie.

• 17:07Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 17:07Amanda Dobbins?

  Carey Mulligan's great, but let's be real, she's a supporting actress.

• 17:10Sean Fennessey?

  She is.

• 17:10Amanda Dobbins?

  And she's nominated at the BAFTAs in, in supporting performance.

• 17:13Sean Fennessey?

  She is. She's, she's good, though.

• 17:15Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, Carey Mulligan's great, you know?

• 17:17Sean Fennessey?

  But Tim Key is really funny in this movie.

• 17:19Amanda Dobbins?

  And, and sets the tone of the whole movie.

• 17:21Sean Fennessey?

  Yes, it is. And it was a little overlooked here. So I'm, it's cool that it's getting some love overseas.

• 17:25Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 17:26Sean Fennessey?

  In its native country. Uh, and then I swear.

• 17:29Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 17:30Sean Fennessey?

  Which is a movie we haven't seen. It has not opened in America, in fairness to us. So it opens in March, I believe.

• 17:35Amanda Dobbins?

  All right.

• 17:35Sean Fennessey?

  And is a drama about a man with Tourette's Syndrome and his family and his life. But it's just one of those BAFTA things where it's just like, these crazy Brits, they got their own stuff.

• 17:45Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 17:46Sean Fennessey?

  And more power to them.

• 17:47Amanda Dobbins?

  And they're gonna hit that BAFTAs bump in March, you know?

• 17:49Sean Fennessey?

  Absolutely. I guess. We should see it.

• 17:53Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, sure.

• 17:53Sean Fennessey?

  Okay.

• 17:54Amanda Dobbins?

  If they make it available to us, we'll see it.

• 17:56Sean Fennessey?

  I think that they will.

• 17:57Amanda Dobbins?

  We're lowly Americans, you know? We don't have access.

• 17:59Sean Fennessey?

  It's being distributed by Sony Pictures Classics in the US.

• 18:02Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, yes.

• 18:03Sean Fennessey?

  Makes sense.

• 18:04Amanda Dobbins?

  Hello, old friends.

• 18:04Sean Fennessey?

  Yes. Uh, would you like to get into Mercy?

• 18:08Amanda Dobbins?

  Sure. I can't believe we waited this long.

• 18:10Sean Fennessey?

  Okay, we'll get into it momentarily.

• 18:13Sean Fennessey?

  Okay, we're gonna talk about Mercy first.

• 18:15Amanda Dobbins?

  Mm-hmm.

• 18:16Sean Fennessey?

  This is a new film from Amazon MGM. It's directed by Timur-

• 18:20Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, I know, because the Ring cameras are featured prominently throughout.

• 18:24Sean Fennessey?

  Well, we should talk about some of the cross-provo happening in there. So Timur Bekmambatov is the director of this film. This is not his first film that is screen-focused. It stars Chris Pratt, Rebecca Ferguson, Calli Reese, Annabelle Wallace, Chris Sullivan, and Kylie Rogers. The logline of the film is as follows. "In the near future, an advanced AI judge tells a captive detective that he's on trial for the murder of his wife. If he fails to prove his innocence within 90 minutes, he'll be executed on the spot." Now, I wanna just start by saying, this movie does, has one innovation that I am interested in.

• 19:00Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 19:00Sean Fennessey?

  And that I want to affirm when it comes to a dumpuary thriller.

• 19:05Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, so you're leading with the-

• 19:08Sean Fennessey?

  This is my one positive about the movie.

• 19:10Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, so it's, go ahead.

• 19:11Sean Fennessey?

  This movie has a countdown clock, so you know exactly when it's gonna be over. And that is just a damn good idea.

• 19:16Amanda Dobbins?

  And the countdown clock is almost exactly correlated to the runtime of the film.

• 19:22Sean Fennessey?

  The film's like 96 minutes, 97 minutes. The countdown clock is 90 minutes.

• 19:27Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 19:28Sean Fennessey?

  You see it often in the film. We have a clear awareness of when we're getting into the second act, into the third act, which is a great relief to me because I needed this movie to be over very quickly, because it's not very good.

• 19:39Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, I guess the other thing that you could say, like, and maybe we could save it at the end for like a compliment sandwich, is that it was like 96 minutes.

• 19:46Sean Fennessey?

  It is.

• 19:47Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 19:47Sean Fennessey?

  It is. It lived up to the billing, the same billing that this police officer who is on trial for murdering his wife was stuck under.

• 19:54Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 19:54Sean Fennessey?

  So- Did you like it? Was it your favorite movie?

• 19:57Amanda Dobbins?

  No, this is, this is a pretty, this is an evil movie.

• 20:01Sean Fennessey?

  It is.

• 20:02Amanda Dobbins?

  But, but I, I want to be clear, it's not just evil, you know, intellectually, morally, and politically, but also structurally and aesthetically.

• 20:12Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 20:12Amanda Dobbins?

  You know, and which at some points, you have to hand it its accomplishment, which is that it gets all five categories.

• 20:19Sean Fennessey?

  It's ugly, mean, and immoral. How exciting.

• 20:23Sean Fennessey?

  So, here's the problem, right? There are a variety of problems.

• 20:26Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, there are so many problems. Where to start?

• 20:28Sean Fennessey?

  There's a critical problem. There's like a, a deep problem at the center of the movie. So, the movie is about AI, right? And it's about how AI can be used as this like all-knowing, determinative justice machine, which is an idea that we've seen before, right? Like Minority Report explores this idea of what if we use technology to better make, like better control criminal activity in the world? And then what would that do to the society that uses that technology? It assumes an AI judge that is connected to a municipal network can analyze data and video.

• 20:58Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 20:58Sean Fennessey?

  And then determine whether or not someone is guilty or innocent of a crime.

• 21:01Amanda Dobbins?

  It's the municipal cloud.

• 21:03Sean Fennessey?

  The municipal cloud, yes.

• 21:04Amanda Dobbins?

  Not to trust the cloud, okay?

• 21:06Sean Fennessey?

  Um, I'm sure they have none of your information anywhere, despite being on various social media. The movie, you know, I think thinks it's well-intentioned by trying to show you how absurd this premise is by undermining the value of this system in the movie. In the movie Rebecca Ferguson is, represents the AI, she is an AI judge. She's not a real person in the film, of course. She's just a kind of digital manifestation of this code of justice. And then the movie, of course, like goes through and is revealed, like, no shit, Chris Pratt didn't kill his wife. And the whole film is about a quest to figure out whether, you know, who did it and who's responsible? And he has to be a detective while strapped to a chair. And so it shows the kind of, the fallacy of the AI and the way that we're relying upon it.

• 21:51Sean Fennessey?

  But the movie is empathetic to the AI.

• 21:54Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, it becomes like a buddy cop, like a buddy routine. And it is Chris Pratt and Rebecca Ferguson as the AI judge, learning about the world and solving the case together. And then the AI takes on...

• 22:10Amanda Dobbins?

  Like, human qualities or emotions.

• 22:13Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 22:14Amanda Dobbins?

  As it, quote, learns them from Chris Pratt in order to support and protect him and help solve the case, unquote, unquote, "serve justice." So, yeah, the movie, it's, like, throughout it valorizes using, quote, unquote, "gut instinct" and that Chris Pratt is wronged and that he, you know, what he brings as a human.

• 22:35Sean Fennessey?

  Yes. It's moneyball all over again.

• 22:37Amanda Dobbins?

  Is irreplaceable.

• 22:38Sean Fennessey?

  It's straight up moneyball.

• 22:39Amanda Dobbins?

  It's incredibly hard.

• 22:41Sean Fennessey?

  It's data analysis versus, you know, tape grinders versus the eye test. That's what this is all about.

• 22:47Amanda Dobbins?

  But then Rebecca Ferguson's AI judge also comes to see that we have to value humanity or, or learning. No, that's what we have to value, is learning. Because can we reenact, can we reenact the, literally, the last line of?

• 23:03Sean Fennessey?

  You can reenact it right now.

• 23:04Amanda Dobbins?

  Yes, okay. So, Chris Pratt says, and this is how the film ends, "Human or AI? We all make mistakes and we learn." And then, no, no, no! And then, this is in the lobby of one of the criminal court buildings in Los Angeles. It kind of looks like where I had to report to jury duty, so at least, uh...

• 23:24Sean Fennessey?

  Set in Los Angeles.

• 23:25Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah. So, but then Rebecca Ferguson appears on sort of like, you know, an ad screen overlooking the lobby, which is not technology they have available.

• 23:34Sean Fennessey?

  Truly Orwellian moment.

• 23:35Amanda Dobbins?

  Yes. And she says, "Yes, we do." And then the movie ends.

• 23:42Sean Fennessey?

  I mean...

• 23:43Amanda Dobbins?

  "We all make mistakes and we learn." Because that's, that's, you know, that's, it's all, we're all learning machines.

• 23:49Sean Fennessey?

  Yes. I want to talk to you about Chris Pratt and Rebecca Ferguson and the action or lack thereof in the film. Like, I want to get into all of that. But like, let's talk about the actual messaging of the movie.

• 23:59Amanda Dobbins?

  Sure.

• 24:00Sean Fennessey?

  Do you think there is anything purposefully insidious at work where the people that are putting this movie out into the world are trying to kind of wash our acceptance of AI and our use of AI and indicate that it is a kind of softer utility and that, say, a mega corporation like Amazon might be interested in its utility to the world?

• 24:20Amanda Dobbins?

  Yes. And they're also trying to wash the surveillance state, uh, which is presented as the municipal cloud is also, uh... The means by which Chris Pratt's character is found quote unquote immediately guilty and only has like nine minutes to prove himself, but then it's all of the surveillance footage and the like hidden cameras that prove his innocence. And like, they really, really use that ring footage a lot.

• 24:47Sean Fennessey?

  They do.

• 24:47Amanda Dobbins?

  And the ring camera footage is what ultimately helps save him and and prove his innocence. So they're like, no, see, maybe you do actually just want to tape everything and upload everything. It's not all bad. So, yes, I do believe that there was massaging to make sure that both AI and really all tech services are not portrayed as 100% evil.

• 25:17Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 25:18Amanda Dobbins?

  And I'm sure that that was a note that was given in one way or another.

• 25:21Sean Fennessey?

  It certainly feels like it.

• 25:22Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 25:23Sean Fennessey?

  And that's pretty ugly. And it's it's not above a company to that is like, has an interest in a certain kind of technology or product to, you know, Coca-Cola being a product placement when Columbia is owned by the broader corporation. It's not shocking, right? Like, that's the sort of thing that's happened over Hollywood history. At this moment in time, it seems like a pretty ugly coincidence. And so it's hard to it's hard to watch the movie and just not be thinking about that.

• 25:50Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, here's the other thing is that in addition to it being put morally gross.

• 25:57Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 25:58Amanda Dobbins?

  It like, it's obvious and incoherent because you're watching the movie and anybody with half a brain is sitting there thinking, okay, so you're telling me that AI is the reason that he's about to wrongly die, like be executed? And the ultimate resolution of this film is that the AI program is like, is bad? But no, actually, I mean, it's

• 26:23Sean Fennessey?

  But they can help too.

• 26:25Amanda Dobbins?

  But they can help too. And sometimes humans are bad too.

• 26:27Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, because

• 26:27Amanda Dobbins?

  Which

• 26:28Sean Fennessey?

  In the final presentation, the sort of the person who is ultimately responsible for the crime. It gets something valuable from technology as well. You know, that he too is kind of saved by something.

• 26:39Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 26:40Sean Fennessey?

  Which is just like.

• 26:41Amanda Dobbins?

  And then, and then also, and then also they throw the black woman cop under the bus as well, which was just like.

• 26:46Sean Fennessey?

  A crazy choice.

• 26:47Amanda Dobbins?

  When they did this, like, I can't believe that this made it through notes.

• 26:51Sean Fennessey?

  I know.

• 26:51Amanda Dobbins?

  But, and, and her, you know, covering up, her cover up is meant to imply that like, humans make mistakes too, just like AI, and then like, we all learn.

• 27:02Amanda Dobbins?

  Makes you want to die, but you are sitting there watching it and thinking, well, like, this doesn't make sense. You're contradicting yourself within the, the framework of this propaganda that you are making. Like, this is not effective.

• 27:14Sean Fennessey?

  I totally agree with you. It really wounds the movie. And generally speaking, like, I like movies like this. Like, I like kind of January thrillers that are like, basically souped up Charles Bronson movies, and Chris Pratt has a gun and is wrongly accused and needs to solve a crime. Alfred Hitchcock made tons of movies like this. You know, like, it's not, it's not that, it's not that aspect of it. It's actually what is really underneath it, what's kind of like undergirding it from a structural perspective that is very, very ugly.

• 27:39Amanda Dobbins?

  And, and I was thinking a bit while watching the movie, because it is the kind of a movie that affords some extra brain time. I was thinking, if you removed the AI, like, whitewashing from it, and it were still Chris Pratt trying to prove his innocence using screens, and, and you honestly even executed it a lot of the same ways. Now, I thought this looked pretty bad in a number of different ways, but I probably still would have watched it and not been that mad.

• 28:07Sean Fennessey?

  No, you, you make a great point, and I kind of like this, this exploration of new cinema. Like, there have been movies in the last 10 years, Unfriended, Searching, Host, Missing, screen movies that show, I mean, a lot of people spend a lot of their time on screens.

• 28:22Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 28:22Sean Fennessey?

  It's not unfamiliar. Now, it's not inherently cinematic, and in order to do it well, I think Searching does it very well. It's hard to do it well, though, and make it compelling for 90 minutes, and most of these movies end up being 90 minutes because you only want to look at a screen for so long. The weird thing about it is.

• 28:38Sean Fennessey?

  Chris Pratt being trapped in a chair is almost like an active metaphor for how you feel watching the movie. And that's not a good feeling. You don't want to have to reflect on that. Like, he's literally strapped in.

• 28:50Amanda Dobbins?

  Barefoot.

• 28:51Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah. I don't know. I don't know. Why can't the man have shoes?

• 28:55Amanda Dobbins?

  Spoiler alert when they release him and then he's like running through the bowels of the fake justice center.

• 29:00Sean Fennessey?

  I guess the idea is like, maybe they didn't want him to hang himself in his cell with his shoelaces. I agree. I agree.

• 29:08Amanda Dobbins?

  Why is this man barefoot?

• 29:10Sean Fennessey?

  I don't know. So.

• 29:12Amanda Dobbins?

  Is this a TSA thing? Like, it's just got liquids in there? What's going on?

• 29:16Sean Fennessey?

  I don't.

• 29:18Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, there are a lot of, there are a lot of specific choices that are hilarious.

• 29:21Sean Fennessey?

  Because the movie is not like searching or unfriended, where kind of like being on the computer is the point of the movie, that like you need to be on the computer to solve the crime. This is a movie where there is a lot of action, but that action is portrayed during searches or during chase sequences on grainy drone cameras or on cellphone cameras. So even though the movie has a reported $60 million budget, it kind of looks like shit on purpose.

• 29:44Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 29:44Sean Fennessey?

  Like, it just looks like it was shot with a phone, a really nice phone, maybe. But you're kind of flashing these series of screens. It's like the opening three minutes of a Mission Impossible movie for 96 minutes.

• 29:56Sean Fennessey?

  That's not a movie. Like, that's not a good idea for a movie. It's not a good idea. There's a specific chase sequence where a truck is racing through Los Angeles that if it were Michael Bay, it would be the coolest sequence of the year for action filmmaking. In this movie, you're like, we're watching it on TV.

• 30:10Amanda Dobbins?

  Like, we're using, and they, you know, and they are folding in like the local, local news and, you know, surveillance footage and all sorts of stuff. I was like, if this is a clever way to make inexpensive footage usable, then I guess, you know, if you, and or, or AI footage or, you know, uh, computer generated, non-AI footage, like, fine. But it does seem like they tried to film some of it badly.

• 30:39Sean Fennessey?

  They shot it practically.

• 30:39Amanda Dobbins?

  Practically. And then made it look bad. And also, like, you can just, like, you can see the truck braking sometimes. Like, it's, it's really, we don't have our A-Team stunt drivers on this.

• 30:49Sean Fennessey?

  No, no.

• 30:50Amanda Dobbins?

  So.

• 30:50Sean Fennessey?

  This movie is a mess.

• 30:51Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, it's really not very good.

• 30:53Sean Fennessey?

  I want to talk about Chris Pratt.

• 30:54Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 30:56Sean Fennessey?

  We're gonna talk about Rachel McAdams later and I feel that they hold a somewhat similar arc, even though their experiences have been radically different, which is that 15 years ago, you might have said, really, two of the most exciting, you know, early 30s performers that we have.

• 31:13Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 31:13Sean Fennessey?

  Chris Pratt, probably best known for launching out of Parks and Recreation, where he played Andy, where he was incredibly funny and charming on that show.

• 31:20Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 31:20Sean Fennessey?

  I love that show.

• 31:23Sean Fennessey?

  And he has spent the, almost the entirety of his career as a movie star, not doing what I thought he was gonna do. What I thought he was gonna do was, he was gonna take gigs as B minus Harrison Ford, as Starlord in the Guardians movies, as the dinosaur tamer in Jurassic World, and use those to like then make more interesting things, right? Like, most movie stars in the last 20 years have used their kind of franchise power and wealth to then fund slightly more interesting projects.

• 31:55Amanda Dobbins?

  Can I ask you?

• 31:56Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 31:56Amanda Dobbins?

  What was it about Chris Pratt that made you think that he would be doing more interesting things?

• 32:02Sean Fennessey?

  I'll tell you. I'll tell you exactly what it was. One, he's married to Anna Faris.

• 32:06Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 32:06Sean Fennessey?

  And I was like, they're, they're cool. That was just a cool couple. She's great. She's really funny. Two, he was on a sitcom that was run by Mike Schur starring Amy Poehler.

• 32:13Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 32:14Sean Fennessey?

  Seems like a cool guy. He had great chemistry with Aubrey Plaza. That show was good.

• 32:18Amanda Dobbins?

  I completely agree, but that, like, that's what we had. And then he starts doing, sure.

• 32:23Sean Fennessey?

  I'll tell you what. I mean, Guardians of the Galaxy is good. You can't tell me otherwise. And he's good as Starlord.

• 32:28Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, he's funny.

• 32:28Sean Fennessey?

  So, like, that was enough for me to be like, okay, he got, he got jacked.

• 32:32Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 32:33Sean Fennessey?

  He wants to be an action star. I get it. These are good choices. Starlord especially, that was a really good choice. He's a good fit for James Gunn's writing style. And so I think it was reasonable to assume, like, he, he's about to have kind of an interesting career.

• 32:45Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 32:47Sean Fennessey?

  Actually, like, only now wants to be like Jason Statham minus the martial arts. Like, he's like, I hold a gun.

• 32:54Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 32:54Sean Fennessey?

  I'm really angry in everything I do, or solemn.

• 32:58Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 32:58Sean Fennessey?

  And the world is in a lot of trouble and only I can save it. That's such a boring persona for a star. And I think he's been very successful, and I know there's been a lot of reporting about, you know, he's a person of faith and he seems like-

• 33:09Amanda Dobbins?

  He and Anna Faris divorced.

• 33:10Sean Fennessey?

  They divorced, yes.

• 33:11Amanda Dobbins?

  Now he's married to a Schwarzenegger.

• 33:12Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 33:13Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 33:13Sean Fennessey?

  I know a lot has changed in his personal life. I'm not really denigrating that. Like, he could still make good movies. He really just doesn't make any good movies. And then, as you pointed out, the only other thing he does-

• 33:21Amanda Dobbins?

  He's Garfield. He's Super Mario.

• 33:22Sean Fennessey?

  Yes, he voices cartoon characters. Which is fine. That's also something a lot of actors do, but it's not interesting.

• 33:27Amanda Dobbins?

  No.

• 33:28Sean Fennessey?

  And he doesn't do anything interesting. Now, I know C.R. loves The Terminal List. Haven't seen it. It's another Amazon series in which he's a guy holding a gun. I think he's in the CIA in that series. Not totally sure. Do you have a terminal list?

• 33:39Amanda Dobbins?

  So that's a list of people who I'm gonna kill?

• 33:42Sean Fennessey?

  I think, I don't know. I think so. Oh, interesting. Now, that's a good episode. Now, there, we were trying to figure out what we're gonna do next Friday.

• 33:50Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 33:50Sean Fennessey?

  Next Friday, the deadest release day of the year. We're like, I'm not totally sure what our episode should be, but maybe it's Amanda's Terminal List. You just list the 10 people you intend to kill before you die.

• 34:00Amanda Dobbins?

  It does exist in the back of my head in one way or another.

• 34:03Sean Fennessey?

  Am I on the list?

• 34:04Amanda Dobbins?

  He's a Navy SEAL. No, you're okay.

• 34:06Sean Fennessey?

  A Navy SEAL, okay, good.

• 34:06Amanda Dobbins?

  You're for now.

• 34:07Sean Fennessey?

  Okay, for now.

• 34:08Amanda Dobbins?

  The thing about The Terminal List is that the names are fixed, but the number of people aren't. So, once you get on, you can't get off. But, anyone can be added on.

• 34:18Sean Fennessey?

  You've reminded me of the most, one of the most wonderful scenes in Billy Madison, which is when Billy Madison is going through school again.

• 34:25Amanda Dobbins?

  Uh huh.

• 34:26Sean Fennessey?

  He's reflecting on his time as maybe a bully when he was a younger person. And he calls up someone he bullied, played by Steve Buscemi.

• 34:33Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 34:34Sean Fennessey?

  And he apologizes for the way that he acted. And Buscemi accepts his apology, and then as soon as they hang up, Buscemi pulls out a list of names and he crosses Billy Madison off the list.

• 34:44Amanda Dobbins?

  Mm-hmm.

• 34:44Sean Fennessey?

  So-

• 34:45Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah. I would never do that.

• 34:47Sean Fennessey?

  You would never do that.

• 34:50Amanda Dobbins?

  Once you're on, you're on for life.

• 34:51Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah. I, I really thought I was a really a

• 34:56Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 34:56Sean Fennessey?

  a vengeful person with a long memory, but you put me to shame.

• 34:59Amanda Dobbins?

  No, like out of everyone you know, including like our bosses, I think I probably am.

• 35:05Sean Fennessey?

  You're near the top.

• 35:06Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 35:07Sean Fennessey?

  That's really interesting.

• 35:07Amanda Dobbins?

  There's no forgiveness. Well, I just, because I can't, I can't be carrying around like all the stuff, you know?

• 35:18Sean Fennessey?

  Sure.

• 35:18Amanda Dobbins?

  At some point, I just need to put it in a box. Like you're dead, you're done.

• 35:21Sean Fennessey?

  Okay.

• 35:21Amanda Dobbins?

  And it's over.

• 35:23Sean Fennessey?

  Okay.

• 35:23Amanda Dobbins?

  And now I can just go live my life and we're not going to reopen this. Like I don't need apologies. I don't need whatever.

• 35:29Sean Fennessey?

  Your inability to forgive, one of the most fascinating things about you. It's honestly remarkable. It deserves, it deserves more, more study, but we don't have time for that right now.

• 35:39Sean Fennessey?

  Rebecca Ferguson, I'm sorry, my queen, but you, we gotta call you out on this. This is no bueno.

• 35:43Amanda Dobbins?

  I was thinking about like what it could have funded, you know?

• 35:49Sean Fennessey?

  A chalet somewhere, somewhere nice.

• 35:51Amanda Dobbins?

  I hope so. I mean, it's definitely more than kitchen renovation at this point, but, and I am sympathetic to the fact that they killed her off in Mission Impossible. So that paycheck is gone.

• 36:01Sean Fennessey?

  Sure.

• 36:01Amanda Dobbins?

  House of Dynamite didn't really come through with the awards bump that she was looking for. You do wonder whether there was a world where they thought, okay, we'll do like House of Dynamite for prestige and mercy for, I thought she was wonderful.

• 36:13Sean Fennessey?

  The Jessie Buckley play with the bride.

• 36:14Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, exactly. And then it'll, you know, we'll just like have a really big January and February 2026. And listen, that doesn't happen. I hope she was paid a lot. I don't think that there's enough that you can be paid.

• 36:27Sean Fennessey?

  Well, on the one hand, easiest job of all time, right? You, you're purposefully meant to act stiffly. You are just in front of a camera and not with any other humans. And you're playing AI and it probably took you two to three days to shoot the film.

• 36:41Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, it is glorified, glorified voice acting.

• 36:43Sean Fennessey?

  Yes. On the flip side, you're playing AI in a screen movie opposite Chris Pratt that's getting released on January 23rd.

• 36:52Amanda Dobbins?

  Right. It's not what you want.

• 36:54Sean Fennessey?

  You, you should, you should, you got it. You gotta know, this is not, this is not good.

• 37:00Sean Fennessey?

  You know, I love her, obviously. Most people I know love her. She's got a big year coming up here. She's in the Peaky Blinders movie. She's in Dune part three, of course, and she's in a movie called The Magic Faraway Tree. Which is not a book I'm familiar with, but a fantasy adventure book written by Ben Gregor. Hope she's happy.

• 37:18Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, yeah, Dune Part Three.

• 37:20Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, she's, she's Lady Jessica. She's like, she's like Lisa Ann Alguin's mother, you know? Um, she's been on the series Silo, which I've never seen on Apple.

• 37:29Amanda Dobbins?

  Silo's ad on the Apple TV home screen made my son burst into tears. And then run into the other room and then say, why is that man doing that? So.

• 37:40Sean Fennessey?

  Interesting.

• 37:40Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, we won't be watching it.

• 37:41Sean Fennessey?

  Okay.

• 37:42Amanda Dobbins?

  You think they're paying her?

• 37:44Sean Fennessey?

  Apple, Apple's paying her very handsomely, I would assume.

• 37:46Amanda Dobbins?

  I hope so.

• 37:47Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, so she's doing fine. This movie's.

• 37:49Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 37:49Sean Fennessey?

  Not acceptable to me. It was number one at the box office, uh, last weekend.

• 37:53Amanda Dobbins?

  Mm hmm.

• 37:54Sean Fennessey?

  Almost certainly will not be this coming weekend.

• 37:56Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, no.

• 37:57Sean Fennessey?

  Feels like it'll be on Amazon pretty quickly, which is where it belongs. It actually felt like a streaming movie, you know? It didn't feel.

• 38:02Amanda Dobbins?

  For sure.

• 38:02Sean Fennessey?

  Even though it has Chris Pratt, it just, it just felt like a streaming movie. And usually the opposite, I feel the opposite where I'm watching a streaming movie and I'm like, why is this not in theaters? This makes no sense.

• 38:08Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 38:09Sean Fennessey?

  This was one where I was like, I'm in a theater with two other people on a Tuesday night.

• 38:13Amanda Dobbins?

  The screen on the screen on the screen of it all probably will look less bad. And well, it's just, it's more in its native environment.

• 38:20Sean Fennessey?

  It'll work fine on television.

• 38:22Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 38:22Sean Fennessey?

  You don't really need to show out to support this one. Um, sometimes it's good to have just like an absolute dead fish.

• 38:29Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 38:29Sean Fennessey?

  Like sometimes just to be like, do not do this when you're making a movie.

• 38:33Amanda Dobbins?

  They really didn't think through, I thought that this was pretty insulting to, um, the recovery community as well as the unhoused people of Los Angeles. They bring in all of these hot and button issues. The script's awful.

• 38:43Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 38:43Amanda Dobbins?

  And like, it's not even a good, like, mystery.

• 38:46Sean Fennessey?

  No, you're right.

• 38:46Amanda Dobbins?

  The case is not.

• 38:47Sean Fennessey?

  It's insensitive to somebody going through A. It's insensitive to somebody who's having a difficulty in their marriage. Like, it's just like, it's a really weird, the whole thing is just kind of a mess.

• 38:55Amanda Dobbins?

  And it's like, it's like, wouldn't it be a good Law and Order episode?

• 38:58Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 38:58Amanda Dobbins?

  It's really, and, and also it seems, I guess the point is that AI is like really bad at solving crimes, but it's, it's very easy detective work.

• 39:09Sean Fennessey?

  I had one like, uh, Kind of, it's not a nitpick, it's just something that jumped out to me. So in the film, Chris Pratt's wife, who's played by Annabelle Wallace, is having an affair.

• 39:20Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 39:20Sean Fennessey?

  And she's communicating with the person she's having an affair with.

• 39:23Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 39:23Sean Fennessey?

  Via a burner phone that is not connected to the municipal cloud.

• 39:28Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 39:29Sean Fennessey?

  Is that like, easy to acquire a phone like that? If it is, why wouldn't anybody, everybody just get those phones? Why would you want to be connected to the municipal cloud?

• 39:35Amanda Dobbins?

  This is what I'm saying to everyone all the time. Don't upload your material, upload your material to the cloud. I agree.

• 39:40Sean Fennessey?

  So you're only using burners?

• 39:42Amanda Dobbins?

  Uh, no, though I did realize when I was watching The Rip, in my mind, burners are still flip phones. Like, it had never occurred to me that you could just get like a burner iPhone, you know?

• 39:53Sean Fennessey?

  So now you will?

• 39:54Amanda Dobbins?

  I guess I will.

• 39:55Sean Fennessey?

  Okay, good to know.

• 39:57Amanda Dobbins?

  No, I have two more nitpicks.

• 39:59Sean Fennessey?

  Great.

• 39:59Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, so what's up with this like hovercraft, like, single motorcycle situation that the, are we using those? Is that?

• 40:07Sean Fennessey?

  I think this is supposed to be near future.

• 40:08Amanda Dobbins?

  What is, I was like, what is going on? So it was a floating jet ski?

• 40:13Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 40:13Amanda Dobbins?

  That the cops are on?

• 40:14Sean Fennessey?

  Pretty cool.

• 40:15Amanda Dobbins?

  No, that looked really silly.

• 40:17Sean Fennessey?

  You don't want one of those?

• 40:18Amanda Dobbins?

  I thought that I would have been embarrassed if I were.

• 40:21Sean Fennessey?

  I stand on hovering exactly where I stood when Back to the Future 2 came out. Which is, give it to me now.

• 40:27Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 40:27Sean Fennessey?

  Like, I want it, I want to use it, I want it in my life. It seems obvious that it's like a technology we should be able to conquer.

• 40:34Amanda Dobbins?

  It is like, if they made Vespa's ugly and then they could float. Like, there is no way that you could ever pull that off.

• 40:44Sean Fennessey?

  Okay.

• 40:44Amanda Dobbins?

  And like, I try not to step in and be like, no, no, that's not a good look for you. Do what makes you happy, blah, blah, blah.

• 40:50Sean Fennessey?

  You do that?

• 40:51Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, you wouldn't believe it. But I don't think I'm good conscience could let you go on the floating Vespa. Like, that just doesn't work for you.

• 41:00Sean Fennessey?

  You're referring to me personally?

• 41:02Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 41:03Sean Fennessey?

  Well, what if I had it souped up? Like, what if I got Exhibit to come in and pimp my ride? Like, that would be, that would be interesting. You know, get some flames on the side, or get like a-

• 41:12Amanda Dobbins?

  No, no.

• 41:13Sean Fennessey?

  Purple Cadillac, Elvis-style look.

• 41:15Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, here's the number two thing.

• 41:16Sean Fennessey?

  What about me floating in a purple Cadillac with no wheels? Who says no to that?

• 41:20Amanda Dobbins?

  No, no, no.

• 41:21Sean Fennessey?

  I've been watching a lot of Star Wars movies lately, and they're all on speeders with no wheels. Those speeders fucking rock. They're just flat underneath.

• 41:27Amanda Dobbins?

  So, my issue is a little bit with like, the jet ski motorcycle quality of it.

• 41:31Sean Fennessey?

  You don't want handles.

• 41:32Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, no handles, nothing astride.

• 41:34Sean Fennessey?

  How does the wheel situation work when you don't have wheels on your car? Where you have a steering wheel and it just shifts you in directions? I feel like the-

• 41:41Amanda Dobbins?

  I don't know, that seems like, that's like an airplane question. Maybe, maybe that's what it does.

• 41:45Sean Fennessey?

  Oh, interesting.

• 41:45Amanda Dobbins?

  You don't know.

• 41:46Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, well, it doesn't exist. Can't say you don't know.

• 41:49Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, here's the other thing I want to bring up.

• 41:50Sean Fennessey?

  This is vital information. This is an important conversation.

• 41:54Amanda Dobbins?

  You know what? If they had explored this in the movie, maybe we, it would have caught our attention more. The other thing is that, so the, the man with whom Annabelle Wallace's character is having an affair-

• 42:02Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 42:03Amanda Dobbins?

  Is like the chef de cuisine at the Lowe's Hollywood.

• 42:07Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 42:07Amanda Dobbins?

  And then is like assaulted at the Lowe's Hollywood. And there is a climat, there is like a dramatic battle between the woman on the motor, on the floating jet ski. And she lands the jet ski on the Lowe's Hollywood helicopter pad. And then they fight on the rooftop. And I just want to say that's a really big look for the Lowe's Hollywood. And congratulations to them.

• 42:32Sean Fennessey?

  Have you been there?

• 42:32Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, I have.

• 42:33Sean Fennessey?

  I haven't been there.

• 42:34Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, it's like a giant hotel right next to the mall where they have the Oscars.

• 42:38Sean Fennessey?

  Okay.

• 42:38Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 42:40Sean Fennessey?

  I would not recommend Mercy.

• 42:42Amanda Dobbins?

  No.

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• 44:29Sean Fennessey?

  Would you like us to speak about Send Help?

• 44:30Amanda Dobbins?

  Yes.

• 44:31Sean Fennessey?

  Okay. So I want to make a quick note about this. I kind of, when we first started doing this show together, I don't think I would have asked you to be on the Send Help episode. I think I would have said, you know what? It's probably going to be a little gross. You're not going to be that into it, right? You probably, I wouldn't have imagined you would have been into Drag Me to Hell.

• 44:51Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 44:51Sean Fennessey?

  But in the almost 10 years.

• 44:53Amanda Dobbins?

  Yes.

• 44:53Sean Fennessey?

  That we've been going to see movies together. You have been evolving. Now, I want to, I want to, I want to tip my cap.

• 45:00Amanda Dobbins?

  Sure thing.

• 45:01Sean Fennessey?

  Uh, I, I had a, when this, when I saw the trailer for this movie, I was like, this would be fun to do with Amanda. That was my reaction, despite knowing what Sam Raimi likes to do in his movies.

• 45:10Amanda Dobbins?

  But the Rachel McAdams and the tropical location of it all.

• 45:14Sean Fennessey?

  Yes, but also that the thriller elements and even some of the horror elements. I know that you're you're much more up for it feels like now than you were five years ago. Fair to say?

• 45:23Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah. Um, I think it was also, I thought that I was gonna, I thought that all of those things were scary.

• 45:30Sean Fennessey?

  Mm hmm.

• 45:31Amanda Dobbins?

  And then I realized that I just am sort of annoyed or disinterested in, but I don't get as freaked out.

• 45:36Sean Fennessey?

  Mm hmm.

• 45:37Amanda Dobbins?

  So now I'm more comfortable just going to this. I didn't, I guess this was gross, but I was kind of amused by it.

• 45:44Sean Fennessey?

  It's it's it's useful to talk about around the frame of the film. So this is the new film from Sam Raimi. It's a, one of the precious few original movies we've gotten from Raimi, who is plainly one of my favorite directors of all time, clearly one of the most influential directors of the last 50 years.

• 46:00Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 46:00Sean Fennessey?

  If you include the Evil Dead films, everything he did with Spider-Man, all of his genre work in the 90s and 2000s. Um, and it's kind of reteams a lot of his, uh, longtime collaborators, Bill Pope, the cinematographer, uh, Bob Marowski, the editor, Danny Elfman, the composer, and it does star Rachel McAdams and Dylan O'Brien, and essentially just them.

• 46:21Amanda Dobbins?

  Yes.

• 46:21Sean Fennessey?

  Because the frame of the movie is that McAdams plays Linda Little, who is mistreated by her sexist boss Bradley, who is played by O'Brien, whose father wanted him to promote her upon handing the company to him, but he advises her to prove herself on a trip to Bangkok for a company merger. And the situation changes when a plane crash during a storm strands them on a deserted island in a desperate fight for survival. And then tensions, of course, between them rise.

• 46:46Amanda Dobbins?

  Mm hmm.

• 46:48Sean Fennessey?

  So you, what did you think of this movie?

• 46:49Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, I turned to you as the, the lights went down and then this film started and I said, I have no idea what this film is about. Remember?

• 46:58Sean Fennessey?

  That's great. So you didn't see a trailer? You didn't read anything? You did nothing?

• 47:01Amanda Dobbins?

  I, I knew Rachel McAdams was in it because, you know, billboard culture in Los Angeles has at least recognized that putting Rachel McAdams in front of me will get my attention. But that's, and also I thought she looked very lovely at, um, the Centhal premiere.

• 47:15Sean Fennessey?

  Okay.

• 47:15Amanda Dobbins?

  And the person who came and did our hair for one of the shoots also did her hair for Centhal. So good job.

• 47:21Sean Fennessey?

  Oh, right. I forgot about that. Yeah.

• 47:23Amanda Dobbins?

  So, so that's what I was wearing.

• 47:24Sean Fennessey?

  My hair for the record. They did your hair.

• 47:25Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, that's true. Um, that's why they were like, seems good.

• 47:30Sean Fennessey?

  Congratulations. They were like, oh, you did it.

• 47:31Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah. So, but no, I had no idea. And I don't even think I knew that it was gonna become Cast Away or Triangle of Sadness. For a while, I thought it was just kind of like Office Place Vengeance.

• 47:46Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 47:47Amanda Dobbins?

  Which I was entertained by.

• 47:49Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah. It starts out as kind of Swimming with Sharks meets Working Girl. Like, that's kind of the frame that it's using. And then it pivots pretty quickly to Cast Away meets A Perfect Getaway. And, um, man, I just love this movie. Uh, this is like so in my wheelhouse. This is exactly what I want from a January movie, a February movie, a June movie.

• 48:10Sean Fennessey?

  The most competent artisans, a fun enough script that gives a filmmaker room to apply a lot of his signature moves, a, a great and known star who does not have enough opportunities like this, and a rising star also given an opportunity to show what he can really do, and Dylan O'Brien. Um, it's so interesting that you can sometimes have more to say about a terrible movie than to say about a really fun and good movie, um, because there's so much to pull apart about Mercy. But there's a lot to kind of dig into and send help to. So with Raimi, here's one of my big takeaways from this movie. And we're gonna get a little bit into the plot of it. And so if you don't want it spoiled for you, I would recommend

• 48:52Sean Fennessey?

  you fast forward about 15 minutes as we talk through the film, and then we'll talk about McAdams and underutilized stars. But his movies are almost always pretty mean spirited. Even the movies that have like a kind of winning feeling, like the Spider-Man films, where you've got a hero at the center of it. They're, the heroes in quotation marks are often put through really trying circumstances, from Ash and the Evil Dead movies, all the way through, um, Alison Lomond in Drag Me Now. They're very funny, they're very gross. And they porch, like, in this movie, McAdams plays like a cat lady, right? Like a seemingly a bird lady in her case. But like, a single, middle-aged spinster who likes her TV shows

• 49:37Sean Fennessey?

  and reads books and thinks she's gonna like, break the glass ceiling and tries really hard, but men take advantage of her.

• 49:44Amanda Dobbins?

  Right. But, and, and she's also- But she's made ugly. It's not just that she's like well-meaning and the world is taking her apart. I, you know, there's a whole bit about tuna fish, but there's like, she's little gross. They, they try as best they can to make Rachel Adams look dowdy, which, you know, even in the moment, you're like, no, no, no, no, no, no.

• 50:05Sean Fennessey?

  It's very she's all that.

• 50:06Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, I see, I see the way that skirt is fitting and, you know, you can't.

• 50:10Sean Fennessey?

  You put glasses in a cardigan on Rachel McAdams.

• 50:12Amanda Dobbins?

  Exactly. Like, you're trying your best, but no. But yeah, sort of like a sad person. And the Dylan O'Brien character feels revulsion and you're supposed to feel like pity, I think.

• 50:26Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 50:26Amanda Dobbins?

  But, but you're not supposed to be like, oh, this is a person I want to spend all of my time with.

• 50:31Sean Fennessey?

  That's right. And, and a lot of that is accomplished, I think, in some of the filmmaking choices where it's like, Raimi is very unafraid to show you something that is gross. And sometimes that means like blood splatter or vomit. And sometimes it just means some tuna fish on the corner of someone's mouth and how uncomfortable something like that can make us when we're looking at it up close. And he shoots her so up close in those sequences and shout out to her for feeling comfortable seeming quite so gross. The, the two archetypes of the characters are really broad. Like, this is not a nuanced movie about

• 51:02Amanda Dobbins?

  No.

• 51:02Sean Fennessey?

  the complexities of being a woman in the workplace. Like, it's actually kind of almost satirizing that satire.

• 51:09Amanda Dobbins?

  Mm-hmm.

• 51:10Sean Fennessey?

  You know, it feels like a, like a very loose riff on something we've seen a bunch of times before, which is kind of fascinating. And then, as the movie goes on, they crash land on this island and their power dynamic shifts, obviously, because the Dylan O'Brien character is powerless because he becomes injured in the crash.

• 51:29Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 51:30Sean Fennessey?

  She saves his life when they've washed ashore. And she goes, she becomes more powerful and she likes having that power and she's very comfortable on the island. And this is where the movie really got extremely interesting to me because Rachel McAdams and Raimi are very comfortable making her increasingly unhinged.

• 51:51Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 51:53Sean Fennessey?

  Kind of ugly in a different way. And the fact that the movie isn't really too worried about like, who were you rooting for here? Because they both do awful things to each other. I thought was just a great choice. And if the movie had been this sort of like pro forma, like now she has the upper hand. And she will do what needs to be done. And then she gets to go back to work and she gets that promotion and she is the champion of this movie. That would have been pretty bland. And this movie doesn't take that very obvious route.

• 52:21Amanda Dobbins?

  No, it, I mean, it's helped by the Rachel McAdams of it all. And that you are rooting for this person so much. And I think the movie itself even veers a little bit towards, like that, you know, pro woman, like, let's, you know, justice for women who have been treated poorly in a, in a like emotional scene where you got a little bit of backstory from her character. And in the wrong hands, that scene is quite bad.

• 52:50Sean Fennessey?

  Did you think that scene worked, the campfire scene?

• 52:52Amanda Dobbins?

  I thought Rachel McAdams was so good.

• 52:55Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 52:55Amanda Dobbins?

  And, um, and like played the scene for what it was. So honestly, that I was willing to go along with it. And they make a smart decision, which is they let the character be all over the place. You know, and that adds to what you're this kind of batty, like insane quality unhinged of this person.

• 53:17Sean Fennessey?

  Can I, is this a reliable narrator effectively?

• 53:19Amanda Dobbins?

  Exactly, but so because they allow so many different tonal moments in the character, you're able to take that on it, or I was able to take it on its face rather than taking it as like, okay, so here is the origin story and the trauma of the person that explains why I need to root for her and all these sorts of things. But I think that's really specific to the performance and to what they're using and to what McAdams brings to it. And if you don't have that kind of star, it doesn't work in the same way.

• 53:51Sean Fennessey?

  I agree and I, I like that they, she's presented ultimately as like.

• 53:57Sean Fennessey?

  If not likeable, then someone who deserves love.

• 54:00Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 54:01Sean Fennessey?

  But then by the end of the film, you're like, maybe she doesn't. We like, we don't know. And it's like, is this a product of the environment that she has been exposed to? Or is there something really nasty under the surface? And the movie like leaving it kind of open to interpretation. And then I think having a fairly like unflattering conclusion for everybody is, I, I, I just think is a great choice. Cause and it's something that he does in all of his movies. Like in A Simple Plan, he does this. He presents people who are like, oh, these lower middle class people, they find a bag of money. Gosh, you know, anything that they do is justifiable because of the system that people operate under. But then it's like, ah.

• 54:33Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 54:34Sean Fennessey?

  Sometimes you make the wrong choice and that fucks you over really bad. And then you make another choice that compounds that. And that's your fault. That's not somebody else's fault. That's not the system's fault. That's actually your fault as a person with free will. And he's, he's always getting in the mix of that, you know, in Drag Me to Hell. Alison Loma's character works at a bank. Nobody's forcing her to work at a bank. She works at a bank. Because she works at the bank, she gets a terrible spell cast against her and she has to suffer an evil fate.

• 55:01Sean Fennessey?

  I, I really appreciate that he is like willing to go places that a lot of other filmmakers are not. I really appreciate what you said about McAdams, which is like very few actors that I think can pull off this dynamic of like, is there something wrong with her? And if, if there is, is it, is it just like a gentle version of something wrong with her?

• 55:16Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 55:17Sean Fennessey?

  Versus something a little bit more malevolent or, or dangerous. And then Dylan O'Brien, similarly, who I think is really a skilled actor.

• 55:28Sean Fennessey?

  He does get his kind of, here's my trauma moment where he explains what's going on.

• 55:32Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 55:32Sean Fennessey?

  But the movie doesn't let him off the hook just for having that either. Which I think is also a good choice where you might say, oh, well, he gets this scintilla of sympathy. But then they're like, yeah, but he's still kind of a piece of shit. Like, so he knows why he's a piece of shit, but he still is doing awful things and hurting people. Which is fascinating. And maybe he's even using his trauma in the right circumstances to engender sympathy from people and then take advantage of them.

• 55:55Amanda Dobbins?

  I think the nice thing about the movie, with the exception really of like those two short scenes is that. It doesn't spend a lot of time dwelling on the trauma or what the trauma has, you know, has engendered, or do these people deserve love or not? I mean, you can ask yourself all of these questions, but the movie is more interested in attaching you to these people. And through like kind of a twin, they both have charisma that like really sits on the edge. And, you know, it's the Rachel McAdams, Regina George thing where it is, it can be evil or it can be really charming and you can't trust it, but it still works. And so it draws you in and then you just kind of want to see what's going to happen and

• 56:40Amanda Dobbins?

  who is going to win. And at the end, there is like a kicker that makes you think a little bit about like, oh, like who was I rooting for and what was I, but it's, it's not a morality play. You know, and that's what's interesting about it is that you can, the text can withstand these questions if you want to ask them, but you really just enjoy the fact, like, how are they gonna, how are they gonna one up each other? And how many times is the movie going to be able to turn it around as well? Which was another thing I appreciated was like, we thought we had gotten to the conclusion or I thought we had gotten to the conclusion like at least five times. And I was like, oh, another one. And oh, now, now the tables have turned yet again.

• 57:22Sean Fennessey?

  Yes, it's pretty effective at doing that. And there's one other idea in the movie that I think is kind of interesting that most movies won't, would never touch, or the 10 foot pole, although Triangle of Sadness does kind of touch this. And I would say Ruben Osland is a filmmaker who's interested in this idea too, which is that, you know, these two people have kind of goals for themselves in terms of what success is, what contentment would be. And for Rachel McAdams, it's a couple of things. It's elevation in her career and maybe also getting on the show Survivor. She loves Survivor. One of the reasons why she's so good at surviving on this island is because she has read survival texts and she loves the show Survivor so much show that she wants to go on, which I was very excited about.

• 57:58Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, no, you turned to me several times as I am also not a Survivor person. And you were like, so they always do this on the first episode of Survivor, they build a shelter.

• 58:06Sean Fennessey?

  Yes. Which is, you know, I'll tell you, I've seen 48 seasons of Survivor. And I would not know how to build a shelter.

• 58:12Amanda Dobbins?

  I was gonna ask, like, so, plane crash.

• 58:15Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 58:15Amanda Dobbins?

  You land on an island. Like, what would you do? Like, what do you think you could do?

• 58:20Sean Fennessey?

  I have an idea of how to make fire, but I've never tried.

• 58:23Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 58:23Sean Fennessey?

  So, I would probably, I would gather the materials.

• 58:26Amanda Dobbins?

  Can we just cut that out of context? I have an idea of how to make fire, but I've never tried.

• 58:32Sean Fennessey?

  In a tropical setting, were I to be shipwrecked and/or cast on a CBS reality challenge program?

• 58:40Sean Fennessey?

  I mean, I love Survivor, the show. We're about to have season 50.

• 58:42Amanda Dobbins?

  I know.

• 58:43Sean Fennessey?

  Season 50 is a month away.

• 58:46Sean Fennessey?

  I would probably gather materials for a shelter and think about how I watched strong people build them in the past.

• 58:54Amanda Dobbins?

  Would you know to do the palm leaf into the coconut shell as like a water funnel situation?

• 59:01Sean Fennessey?

  That was a revelation to me. And that's not something that you see on Survivor.

• 59:04Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 59:04Sean Fennessey?

  That's not a, that was not a detail that's there. I thought that was ingenious.

• 59:06Sean Fennessey?

  Now, spearfishing is quite common on Survivor. You usually have to win the materials.

• 59:11Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 59:12Sean Fennessey?

  Like, you have to win the spear, win the goggles, win the things that you need in order to do that.

• 59:17Amanda Dobbins?

  You know, that, that is paid off in the film as well.

• 59:20Sean Fennessey?

  It is. Um, I, I can't say I think I'd do well.

• 59:25Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 59:25Sean Fennessey?

  I'm quite pale.

• 59:27Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 59:27Sean Fennessey?

  I think the sunburn would really kick my ass.

• 59:29Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 59:30Sean Fennessey?

  And Dylan O'Brien is protected in many ways by the lovely, like, shelter hang space that McAdams' character has built, but how do you think you would do? You know what to do in a survival? You don't know what to do in a survival scenario?

• 59:40Amanda Dobbins?

  No, not at all. Like, you know, I mean, I've lived this every day, right? Which is for the most part, when something breaks, I'm just like, Zach, come do this. And it's really not the most empowered woman second wave thing about me. I do think if he weren't there.

• 59:53Sean Fennessey?

  The terminal list, that's very first wave. That's...

• 59:56Amanda Dobbins?

  But like, sometimes he's out of town. And it's like, you know what? I can disable the malfunctioning fire detector if he's not here.

• 1:00:03Sean Fennessey?

  Something has just dramatically changed in society in the last ten years, which is that YouTube happened. And when YouTube happened, fixing things got so much easier.

• 1:00:10Amanda Dobbins?

  It's true.

• 1:00:10Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:10Amanda Dobbins?

  So that is true. But I also, like, I do have common sense. And I do think that, like, you know, when things are tough, like, if I'm on the island, I can probably figure out fire. I've seen this movie. I've seen other films.

• 1:00:24Sean Fennessey?

  I have watched you pull it together under tough times.

• 1:00:27Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:27Sean Fennessey?

  You, I've also seen you break.

• 1:00:30Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:30Sean Fennessey?

  You're sure you wouldn't break under the circumstances?

• 1:00:33Amanda Dobbins?

  No, I'd be fine.

• 1:00:34Sean Fennessey?

  You're 100% sure?

• 1:00:35Amanda Dobbins?

  Like, here's the thing.

• 1:00:36Sean Fennessey?

  No food for 12 hours. How you doing?

• 1:00:39Amanda Dobbins?

  I do that all the time. That's, yeah, that's called intermittent fasting.

• 1:00:43Sean Fennessey?

  That yogurt that you like, you know, you can't, that's not achievable.

• 1:00:45Amanda Dobbins?

  No, I know, but like coconut yogurt? I mean, the thing is, is that I think I could-

• 1:00:49Sean Fennessey?

  Coconut's very bad for your teeth. You gotta be careful, right? We know that from Cast Away.

• 1:00:52Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, oh, do we? Oh, that's right, yeah.

• 1:00:54Sean Fennessey?

  Too sweet.

• 1:00:55Amanda Dobbins?

  That is true, like a lot of sugar. Um, no, I think, like, I would not go hide in the shade and not get sunburned. You know, like, I could figure out the basic things.

• 1:01:05Sean Fennessey?

  Okay.

• 1:01:06Amanda Dobbins?

  I don't know how evolved I could get in terms of food supply, building shelter, you know?

• 1:01:13Sean Fennessey?

  How would you do with boar hunting?

• 1:01:15Amanda Dobbins?

  Uh, I thought that was really funny.

• 1:01:17Sean Fennessey?

  A hilarious scene.

• 1:01:17Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:18Sean Fennessey?

  Not to spoil it. Um...

• 1:01:20Amanda Dobbins?

  And then I was also thinking about, like, the, like, 20 to 50 feral pigs or whatever throughout, which is just-

• 1:01:27Sean Fennessey?

  Forgot about that. Good meme. Um, just to go back to what I was saying before.

• 1:01:31Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:31Sean Fennessey?

  You know, her version of contentment is either going on that show or having success in her career. His version of contentment is marrying a really hot woman and taking over his dad's company and being a successful guy who golfs, right? Who can relate. Um, I think that, I think it's really funny that Raimi is like, "Fuck that." Like, trying to be happy is its own trap. Like, don't even try. Like nihilism reigns? Like, that's kind of what is in a lot of his movies.

• 1:01:58Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, it's certainly in this one.

• 1:01:59Sean Fennessey?

  It's, it's a very, it's just a very funny read, and because it's kind of a rollicking thriller romp, no one's gonna be like, "Let's think about the morality of Send Help." That's not the point. But he does this in so many movies, and I just think it's a really fun signature that he goes through over and over again, where like, there's a slimy zombie ghost in the movie, there's a lot of vomiting all over somebody in a movie, you know, there's poison, there's like, uh, a gnarly extravagant set piece, there's a big plane crash, um-

• 1:02:23Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, it was, the CGI, the effects could be a little bit better on that one, but like, a very funny grace note on it, so.

• 1:02:30Sean Fennessey?

  Yes, there's a good gag inside of the crash, um, that is very effective. Anything else on Send Help you wanna put your arms around before we pivot to McAdams?

• 1:02:40Amanda Dobbins?

  Um, I really filmed sushi has really keeps making a big impact on me and I keep thinking a lot about it. Decision to leave and then now the sushi platters that are used in this in this film. Stay with me.

• 1:02:56Sean Fennessey?

  Yes, I was relieved that the reason for the sushi's beauty was clarified by the end of this film.

• 1:03:03Amanda Dobbins?

  Sure, yes.

• 1:03:03Sean Fennessey?

  And because I was mystified and almost taken out of the movie by the beauty of what she presented in the film. McAdams.

• 1:03:12Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:13Sean Fennessey?

  Man, she just tight and bright at 47. She just looks great. She's she's beautiful. She has the exact same charm that kind of she has a very interesting mixture. She reminds me a lot of 30s kind of screwball comedians where you can't tell she's the smartest person in the room or the dumbest person in the room. She's usually the smartest, but she has this ability to affect like, oh, oh, whoops.

• 1:03:35Amanda Dobbins?

  Right, yes.

• 1:03:35Sean Fennessey?

  Sorry. You know, like, that's kind of her energy in a lot of movies. She's so funny in Game Night, kind of doing that. She's very funny in, what is the Donald Gleason, Richard Curtis movie? Is it About Time? Is that the name of it?

• 1:03:46Amanda Dobbins?

  That sounds right.

• 1:03:48Sean Fennessey?

  She has.

• 1:03:49Amanda Dobbins?

  Funny, but also I like wept through that movie.

• 1:03:51Sean Fennessey?

  Bit of a sad movie as well, yeah.

• 1:03:55Sean Fennessey?

  But she's very well utilized in this. She they don't do the greatest job of making you think that she's dowdy by any means, but she does get to have like a va-va-vo moment in the in the film as well.

• 1:04:05Amanda Dobbins?

  It's that's part of that's part of the joke of the movie, right? Like, you're not supposed to watch this at any point and think, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's like a really dowdy person. You know, it's Rachel McAdams in an oversized skirt.

• 1:04:17Sean Fennessey?

  I wanted to ask you, what do you think, based on Letterboxd, are her most popular movies?

• 1:04:24Amanda Dobbins?

  The Notebook?

• 1:04:26Sean Fennessey?

  The Notebook is number two.

• 1:04:27Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, what's number one? Uh, is it Midnight in Paris?

• 1:04:32Sean Fennessey?

  Nope, that's number six.

• 1:04:34Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, uh, let's see.

• 1:04:36Sean Fennessey?

  Come on, you already mentioned it. What's her what's her most popular movie that she's ever made?

• 1:04:40Amanda Dobbins?

  I already, Mean Girls. Oh, yeah, of course.

• 1:04:43Sean Fennessey?

  Mean Girls, The Notebook, Midnight in Paris.

• 1:04:47Sean Fennessey?

  What are, what are three, four, five, seven and eight?

• 1:04:51Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, well, let's see. I'm trying to think, I mean, she's, she's been in so many movies. The movie that I always think from this period, I guess, I don't know if About Time.

• 1:05:00Sean Fennessey?

  About Time is there. About Time is four.

• 1:05:02Amanda Dobbins?

  I doubt The Vow is on there, but I remember The Vow when they were really trying to make Rachel McAdams and Channing Tatum happen at the same time. And I think that's like about Amnesia.

• 1:05:12Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 1:05:12Amanda Dobbins?

  And I don't, is it Nicholas Sparks or is it just Nicholas Sparks adjacent?

• 1:05:17Sean Fennessey?

  Um, let's, I'll tell you right now.

• 1:05:20Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:05:20Sean Fennessey?

  The Vow is 2012.

• 1:05:22Amanda Dobbins?

  Yes.

• 1:05:22Sean Fennessey?

  And it does not appear to be Nicholas Sparks.

• 1:05:24Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, but it's definitely, so she has like some sort of, uh.

• 1:05:28Sean Fennessey?

  The Vow is number 20.

• 1:05:29Amanda Dobbins?

  Brain trauma. Wow, okay. Let's see, other Rachel McAdams films.

• 1:05:35Sean Fennessey?

  There's two that you will not get.

• 1:05:37Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, because they're, oh, Doctor Strange and Doctor Strange, blah, blah, blah, blah.

• 1:05:41Sean Fennessey?

  In the Multiverse of Madness, directed by Sam Raimi.

• 1:05:43Amanda Dobbins?

  And I know that because I, when we saw the trailer for Doctor Strange 2, directed by Sam Raimi, she was in flashback and I said, oh, Rachel McAdams is in these movies too?

• 1:05:56Sean Fennessey?

  You sure did.

• 1:05:56Amanda Dobbins?

  Um.

• 1:05:57Sean Fennessey?

  Just terribly underused in Doctor Strange.

• 1:05:59Amanda Dobbins?

  They didn't market it enough to me. Like, I should have known because I would have gone.

• 1:06:03Sean Fennessey?

  That was a real like, you know, you, you had your, you know, star power forward sitting on the bench situation there. She just does not get enough to do in those movies.

• 1:06:11Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, so, uh, Game Night, Wedding Crashers, both have to be on there.

• 1:06:15Sean Fennessey?

  Game Night is on there. Actually, Wedding Crashers, fascinatingly, is number 13.

• 1:06:19Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:06:19Sean Fennessey?

  Um, Game Night is number, is number eight?

• 1:06:22Amanda Dobbins?

  Because it's not PC, you know, we're, we're older and so we put up with the humor of the Wedding Crashers.

• 1:06:28Sean Fennessey?

  Sac Ra is not PC, sorry. Uh, sorry, Gen Alpha. Um.

• 1:06:34Sean Fennessey?

  Number seven is a movie that I always forget that she's in.

• 1:06:37Amanda Dobbins?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:06:38Sean Fennessey?

  It's a Best Picture winner.

• 1:06:41Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, all right, Best Picture, oh Spotlight.

• 1:06:43Sean Fennessey?

  Spotlight.

• 1:06:44Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, she's so good in Spotlight.

• 1:06:45Sean Fennessey?

  Yes, she's also, number nine is Sherlock Holmes. I always forget she's in that. And number 10 is a similar kind of movie to Send Help, which is Red Eye. Also a movie that takes place on a plane, very good movie, Wes Craven movie. She was in Are You There Goddess Me, Margaret, she was terrific in that as a mother. Like, she is a very, very good and established and working star.

• 1:07:06Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:06Sean Fennessey?

  But we don't think of her that way. I also forgot that she was in Spotlight.

• 1:07:10Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 1:07:10Sean Fennessey?

  And then I looked at her lineup and I was like, oh, wow. So it's not as though she has gone away entirely, but, and she's, I think she's admired, she was in True Detective, season three, I want to say. She's been a part of big franchises before, she's been superhero movies.

• 1:07:26Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, but she's not one of the characters, that's the thing.

• 1:07:29Sean Fennessey?

  She's not a hero.

• 1:07:30Amanda Dobbins?

  Exactly.

• 1:07:31Sean Fennessey?

  In either of those big franchises. But then I was starting to think about her in the context of her generation. Her generation of actresses, McAdams is 47, let's say, anyone between the ages of like roughly 36 to 50 is kind of her generation, right? For the purposes of this exercise. So you've got her two Mean Girls co-stars, right? You've got Lindsay Lohan and Amanda Seyfried. Amanda Seyfried, I don't know if anybody would have predicted after Mean Girls that she would turn out to be

• 1:07:56Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 1:07:56Sean Fennessey?

  maybe the most visible and the most commercially viable simultaneously? And maybe the most celebrated?

• 1:08:01Amanda Dobbins?

  Even though you have not seen Mamma Mia.

• 1:08:04Sean Fennessey?

  Have not.

• 1:08:04Amanda Dobbins?

  Or Les Miserables.

• 1:08:06Sean Fennessey?

  I haven't seen either of them. I don't, I don't know if I will.

• 1:08:08Amanda Dobbins?

  The singing has been a good venue, but like avenue for her.

• 1:08:12Sean Fennessey?

  I see. You know, they have the same number of Academy Award nominations, McAdams and Seyfried, they both have one for Supporting Actress.

• 1:08:20Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:08:21Sean Fennessey?

  And then let's go down the list a little bit. Jessica Biel.

• 1:08:24Amanda Dobbins?

  Sure, yeah.

• 1:08:25Sean Fennessey?

  In 07, there was a decent chance she was going to be a star.

• 1:08:29Amanda Dobbins?

  And what was that film called, Easy Virtue, where she plays like a flapper or something, roaring twenties? You didn't know about this?

• 1:08:36Sean Fennessey?

  That was a fairly recent film, right?

• 1:08:37Amanda Dobbins?

  I don't think so. I definitely saw it at the Brooklyn Heights Cinema, 2008. Yeah, I remember it.

• 1:08:42Sean Fennessey?

  I haven't seen that one.

• 1:08:43Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, it doesn't, it doesn't work, despite Colin Firth and Kristen Scott Thomas also being in it.

• 1:08:48Sean Fennessey?

  Okay, let's keep going through her, the generation. Jessica Alba.

• 1:08:50Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, well, she makes diapers now.

• 1:08:52Sean Fennessey?

  She has a extraordinarily successful company called Honest. She still acts, I think she was on a Netflix show last year, but definitely doesn't seem to be the main focus of her career. Blake Lively, back in the news.

• 1:09:03Amanda Dobbins?

  Once again, I frankly think the text messages are Like, quite respectful.

• 1:09:09Sean Fennessey?

  Got it. You stand with Blake Lively, just so I'm clear.

• 1:09:12Amanda Dobbins?

  More so, when you're analyzing, and I, like, I've read them all. I don't know what to say. Like, I'm a, I read everything, not, not them all, but everything that was aggregated. I'm not going through court filings, you know?

• 1:09:22Sean Fennessey?

  But do you have access to her phone?

• 1:09:24Amanda Dobbins?

  No, I don't. I just, I saw what was published. And I would much rather get an email or a text from Blake Lively than from Ryan Reynolds. How about that?

• 1:09:34Sean Fennessey?

  Is neither an option?

• 1:09:39Sean Fennessey?

  Michelle Rodriguez.

• 1:09:40Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:09:41Sean Fennessey?

  Coming off of Girl Fight, right before she starts getting involved in the Fast and the Furious movies. Keira Knightley, in The Year of Atonement.

• 1:09:47Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:09:48Sean Fennessey?

  Jennifer Hudson. Dreamgirls was 06. Amy Adams. Things have been, you know, we've had a downturn in Amy Adams industries in the last 10 years. Emily Blunt. Right? Devil Wears Prada was, was it 07 or 08?

• 1:10:03Amanda Dobbins?

  2006.

• 1:10:03Sean Fennessey?

  2006. Zoe Deschanel.

• 1:10:07Amanda Dobbins?

  Yes.

• 1:10:08Sean Fennessey?

  Coming off of 500 Days of Summer, pre-New Girl. Zoe Saldana.

• 1:10:13Amanda Dobbins?

  Yes, well.

• 1:10:14Sean Fennessey?

  Who is?

• 1:10:15Amanda Dobbins?

  Now the most box, like, the biggest box office star.

• 1:10:19Sean Fennessey?

  And an Oscar winner.

• 1:10:19Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:20Sean Fennessey?

  You could make the case that Zoe Saldana is the most successful person from this stretch of people. Although, Zoe Kravitz.

• 1:10:26Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:26Sean Fennessey?

  Catwoman, filmmaker in her own right now. Anne Hathaway.

• 1:10:30Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, six movies.

• 1:10:31Sean Fennessey?

  Huge year for her. Kristen Stewart was on the younger end, but right, leading up to the Twilight Saga and the aftermath of stuff like Panic Room. Katherine Heigl, who might have been the most successful person on this list in 2007.

• 1:10:44Amanda Dobbins?

  That's true.

• 1:10:45Sean Fennessey?

  With Knocked Up.

• 1:10:46Amanda Dobbins?

  And now she does Poizads.

• 1:10:48Sean Fennessey?

  I'm Sfor Sol. Kristen Bell.

• 1:10:50Amanda Dobbins?

  Sure.

• 1:10:50Sean Fennessey?

  Forgetting Sarah Marshall and coming off Veronica Mars. Paula Patton. Mission Impossible.

• 1:10:58Amanda Dobbins?

  Mission Impossible, yeah.

• 1:10:59Sean Fennessey?

  I think it was right around the time of that Mission Impossible, Mission Impossible 3, right?

• 1:11:02Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:03Sean Fennessey?

  Scardio?

• 1:11:04Amanda Dobbins?

  This is before Black Widow? Is that who she was?

• 1:11:07Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, this is really in the, in the prime of her Woody Allen era.

• 1:11:10Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:11Sean Fennessey?

  This was, you know, Match Point and Scoop and all those films. Emma Stone? Debuts really in Superbad, or was it, was it a debut right before Easy A?

• 1:11:20Amanda Dobbins?

  Easy A is 2010.

• 1:11:22Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:22Amanda Dobbins?

  I just learned last night that Easy A and The Town were released on the same day. So that was an important day for me.

• 1:11:28Sean Fennessey?

  Wow.

• 1:11:29Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah. September 17th, 2010, I believe.

• 1:11:32Sean Fennessey?

  Oh, that's pretty great.

• 1:11:33Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:35Sean Fennessey?

  Rashida Jones?

• 1:11:36Amanda Dobbins?

  Uh, yeah.

• 1:11:38Sean Fennessey?

  Natalie Portman? Who had been around for a while.

• 1:11:40Amanda Dobbins?

  Sure.

• 1:11:41Sean Fennessey?

  But age-wise, we've just known her since she was 11. But, but age-wise.

• 1:11:46Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, but like, when did she start in the Star Wars prequels?

• 1:11:49Sean Fennessey?

  1999.

• 1:11:50Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, so she's been, she's been working the whole, yeah.

• 1:11:54Sean Fennessey?

  And Naomi Harris, who had also been working for a while, but really kind of starts to pop through here in the mid 2000s. So that's 22 stars. And Rachel McAdams, I think what I'm trying to reveal here is while many of these people still have careers, only about three or four of them I would describe as at the center of Hollywood, right? Like Anne Hathaway is still at the center of Hollywood, uh, ScarJo, of course, Emma Stone.

• 1:12:20Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, in movies, anyway.

• 1:12:21Sean Fennessey?

  Zoe Saldana, Emily Blunt, maybe.

• 1:12:25Amanda Dobbins?

  Kristen Bell has, you know, moved to TV.

• 1:12:27Sean Fennessey?

  She has.

• 1:12:28Amanda Dobbins?

  Some, like, I think Emily Blunt, like, Oscar nomination last year, Oppenheimer, gonna be in this Spielberg movie.

• 1:12:35Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 1:12:35Amanda Dobbins?

  That Oscar.

• 1:12:36Sean Fennessey?

  So five stars, five stars have truly emerged here.

• 1:12:39Amanda Dobbins?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:12:39Sean Fennessey?

  And some of these women have moved on to other things. So some won Oscars and then now host talk shows, you know, like Jennifer Hudson's career arc from American Idol contestant. I think she finished in like third or fifth place in her year. And then became an Oscar winner and then was a movie star for a hot minute and now is like a lifestyle person. The trajectories are fascinating. It's not totally unusual. There's a lot of experience, like, history of this in the 70s, 80s and 90s where the way people are famous changes, right? Like, think of Jane Fonda, for example, how she was very different in the 80s than she was in the 70s as a star. But I would argue that some of these people don't necessarily deserve their fates either, that they were like misused or misunderstood as talents.

• 1:13:20Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, I mean, we, we organized this episode around the misused stars and Rachel McAdams. But the reality is, is that you could just make a list of like 45 women over 40 in Hollywood. And it is everyone, Hollywood still doesn't know what to do with women past a certain age. And we know this and it's talked about all the time. And every interview that a woman over 40 who acts gives says, well, then the role's dried up. But, you know, we just made a list of a particular generation and this is the evidence of people don't really get the opportunities, or women don't really get the opportunities unless they become a superhero.

• 1:14:01Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, Keira Knightley is the one who I find most interesting on this list. Because it's not like her career is over. Her career is doing fine. She's only 40 years old. She was just in a very popular Netflix movie, The Woman in Cabin 10, last year. That was not very good, but a lot of people watched it and they were like, oh, Keira Knightley. I know her. I like her. But, I mean, here's her work in recent years. She was also the star of Black Doves, the popular Netflix TV show. Before that, she was in Boston Strangler in 2023, a straight to streaming movie.

• 1:14:30Amanda Dobbins?

  We watched.

• 1:14:31Sean Fennessey?

  Which is fine. She was in a British film called Silent Night. She was in a film called, an animated film called Charlotte in 2021.

• 1:14:39Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:14:40Sean Fennessey?

  In 2020, she was in a movie called Misbehaviour, like.

• 1:14:43Amanda Dobbins?

  She's been having kids. She has young children.

• 1:14:46Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, she has a family.

• 1:14:47Amanda Dobbins?

  And that, like, you know, that is part of it as well, is that you don't want to be working as much or it's harder in that moment, but.

• 1:14:53Sean Fennessey?

  And I'm not judging that. I think I'm more just pointing out that things don't always turn out the way that you might think.

• 1:14:59Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:00Sean Fennessey?

  Like, if you would've watched Keira Knightley in the 2010s, you might think, this is the new Vanessa Redgrave. Right? Like, she will be in consistently great work for 50 years. Or Charlotte Rampling, or, you know, whatever British actress, you know.

• 1:15:15Amanda Dobbins?

  With like a very angular face, yeah.

• 1:15:18Sean Fennessey?

  Right.

• 1:15:18Amanda Dobbins?

  No, no.

• 1:15:19Sean Fennessey?

  But you know what I'm saying? Good taste.

• 1:15:20Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:21Sean Fennessey?

  Autors love to work with her. She can sell a movie. And things change. Things evolve. And everybody's experience is different, but it's kind of fascinating. So it had me thinking about this exercise, which is, you know, very personal and specific. But I wanted to talk about who are the other people who are kind of like misused or misunderstood.

• 1:15:38Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:39Sean Fennessey?

  McAdams, not hurting for work per se, and has a unique set of skills. She's kind of like John Wick, you know? She can like, she can do a lot of different, she can kill you in a lot of different ways. Not all these actors are like this. But sometimes it's age and sometimes it's just misidentification. And so like, the first person that popped into my head when I was doing this was somebody who I mentioned earlier in the episode, which was Lakeith Stanfield.

• 1:16:01Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:02Sean Fennessey?

  Who I feel like we did put on one of our 35 under 35 lists a while ago and had had a number of interesting roles in a row, most of which were supporting, but not entirely. And he was in Judas and the Black Messiah, he was in, obviously on Atlanta, he was in Get Out, he headlined a couple of movies, like The Harder They Fall and The Book of Clarence, that didn't really come off. He was in Haunted Mansion, which didn't really come off. He started, he was the lead in Sorry to Bother You. I know he's gonna be in the next Boots Riley movie, I Love Boosters, which just got a trailer.

• 1:16:36Sean Fennessey?

  But like, he's not, he's not a movie star.

• 1:16:39Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:39Sean Fennessey?

  And I don't, I think I don't totally know why. I think some of it is like the parts he picked, some of it is maybe the way that Hollywood sees him. I don't know what to account for that, but it feels like someone needs to, someone great needs to come along and be like, I got you, you're gonna be at the center of my movie.

• 1:16:54Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 1:16:55Sean Fennessey?

  And until that happens, he's gonna continue to play second lead to Mark Wahlberg and Play Dirty on Amazon.

• 1:16:59Amanda Dobbins?

  Sure. Or, you know, he was supporting in both Roof Man and Die My Love this year, which is just a very classic, like, we like you, but we don't really know what to do with you. So people will be, people who know will be excited when you show up for like a couple scenes in this like art house-ish film that we're making and hoping people come to the theaters. And in both cases, they didn't. So that's another tricky thing.

• 1:17:24Sean Fennessey?

  The Die My Love part is really weird.

• 1:17:26Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:17:26Sean Fennessey?

  That's a really weird part of that movie. That is maybe, we didn't really explore it too much. I don't totally, was that all a fantasy?

• 1:17:33Amanda Dobbins?

  Uh, I think so.

• 1:17:35Sean Fennessey?

  Okay.

• 1:17:36Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah. I think it's just, it's not real, it's in her head.

• 1:17:39Sean Fennessey?

  Got it. Okay, good to know. In Roof Man.

• 1:17:41Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, I think he's a person that exists, like at the farmer's market.

• 1:17:45Sean Fennessey?

  Got it. Okay. But she's just fantasizing about what could be between them. Okay, got it. Uh.

• 1:17:52Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, I just, I think I want a little more for him. I think I want a slightly better movie.

• 1:17:55Amanda Dobbins?

  That's valid.

• 1:17:55Sean Fennessey?

  What was the name of the Issa Rae romance that they made together? The photograph?

• 1:17:59Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:17:59Sean Fennessey?

  Which was kind of interesting and like, didn't quite get there, but I was like, I'd like to see him try to do some more things like this. He's very, he's kind of similar to Rachel McAdams to me in that he's funny and can do comedy, but also you could believe him in a superhero movie. You could believe him in a serious drama.

• 1:18:15Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:16Sean Fennessey?

  Um, okay. Who's your number five?

• 1:18:17Amanda Dobbins?

  Uh, James McAvoy. I, I think I was looking at like the 2007, 2008, it's like Atonement. You're speaking of Keira Knightley and he had it all. I guess he like was a superhero because he was in the X-Men.

• 1:18:31Sean Fennessey?

  He was.

• 1:18:31Amanda Dobbins?

  But.

• 1:18:32Sean Fennessey?

  He was Professor X.

• 1:18:33Amanda Dobbins?

  I'm trying not to follow too closely what's happening with the X-Men. I'm just letting you share that with me, but.

• 1:18:40Sean Fennessey?

  I, I assume he'll be back in Doomsday.

• 1:18:42Amanda Dobbins?

  But he hasn't been mentioned.

• 1:18:44Sean Fennessey?

  Well, we already know Patrick Stewart is gonna be in it.

• 1:18:46Amanda Dobbins?

  Right. And so I think we're kind of just, we're ignoring James McAvoy, who I think is wonderful. And then he just had like his M. Night Shyamalan run.

• 1:18:55Sean Fennessey?

  Yes. And Speak No Evil, where he's just like.

• 1:18:57Amanda Dobbins?

  And I think he's wonderful in Speak No Evil. And I, and I really liked that. And that just like kind of came and went. So he's another one where he's like Chris Pratt. He like got really swole and was like doing, and it seemed like his lane was gonna be weird psychopath action stuff, which is funny and good for him, but he's also capable of emotions. Like he's very funny. He can sing the Bangles. Uh, like, let's, let's do more. I'm pro James McAvoy.

• 1:19:23Sean Fennessey?

  What does he have coming? He's got a movie called Control.

• 1:19:28Amanda Dobbins?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:19:29Sean Fennessey?

  Directed by Robert Schwanki, that.

• 1:19:32Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, no. It's an adaptation of a podcast.

• 1:19:34Sean Fennessey?

  Oh, dear.

• 1:19:35Amanda Dobbins?

  A man has an implant in his brain which issues him instructions. Julianne Moore is also in this? I mean.

• 1:19:43Sean Fennessey?

  Slightly worrying.

• 1:19:44Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:19:45Sean Fennessey?

  Slightly worrying. Did you know that he directed a film?

• 1:19:47Amanda Dobbins?

  I learned that last night when I was looking at his credits. I'll check it out, James McAvoy.

• 1:19:51Sean Fennessey?

  Called California Schemin'.

• 1:19:53Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:19:54Sean Fennessey?

  Which is a. I guess the story about a Scottish faux American rap pairing called S- Slibble?

• 1:20:02Amanda Dobbins?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:20:02Sean Fennessey?

  And Brains?

• 1:20:03Amanda Dobbins?

  I don't know about them not being Scottish.

• 1:20:06Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, this just ended up not really making any impact whatsoever.

• 1:20:10Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, I don't think it's been, um.

• 1:20:12Sean Fennessey?

  Released in the US.

• 1:20:13Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, or in the UK. It's scheduled to be released in the UK in April of this year.

• 1:20:18Sean Fennessey?

  I spoke of the Book of Clarence, the Lakeith Stanfield movie. He plays Punchest Pilot in that movie. He was pretty good in it. Nobody saw the Book of Clarence.

• 1:20:24Amanda Dobbins?

  Right. This is, this is my thing.

• 1:20:26Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, no, he's, he's a really good pick. Um, okay, where do I want to go with number four?

• 1:20:34Amanda Dobbins?

  Do, do this one, because this, I mean, that's an obvious one.

• 1:20:37Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, okay, so I want to talk about Angelina Jolie.

• 1:20:41Sean Fennessey?

  Because Angelina Jolie, for a period of time, was one of the five biggest movie stars in America. Now, she may not have had the raft of box office hits, but she was absolutely, you could put just her on the poster of Wanted or Salt, and then that's your movie.

• 1:20:55Amanda Dobbins?

  Salt was such a phenomenon that is also like lost to time, but her in that wig, you know?

• 1:21:01Sean Fennessey?

  It seemed like it was gonna be something.

• 1:21:03Amanda Dobbins?

  We were all there. We were seated for Salt, you know? And then it's like, and then everyone like, "Leigh Schreiber's in that movie. It's Chutel Edgifor," right?

• 1:21:12Sean Fennessey?

  If I paid you a million dollars, could you tell me who directed Salt?

• 1:21:16Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, I have, no, of course not.

• 1:21:18Sean Fennessey?

  A very well-known filmmaker, Philip Noyce.

• 1:21:21Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, yeah, of course.

• 1:21:22Sean Fennessey?

  The Australian director who made, who's made plenty of good movies. Uh, yeah, she played a CIA agent named Evelyn Salt.

• 1:21:28Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 1:21:28Sean Fennessey?

  Who was accused of being a Russian sleeper agent.

• 1:21:31Amanda Dobbins?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:21:31Sean Fennessey?

  Um, God, Angelina Jolie.

• 1:21:33Amanda Dobbins?

  Jack, you've seen Salt?

• 1:21:34Speaker 02

  No chance.

• 1:21:35Amanda Dobbins?

  Wow, you're missing out.

• 1:21:36Speaker 02

  Also a hundred and ten million dollar budget. Wild.

• 1:21:39Sean Fennessey?

  How did it do at the box office?

• 1:21:40Amanda Dobbins?

  It made three hundred million dollars?

• 1:21:42Sean Fennessey?

  Three hundred million dollars for Salt?

• 1:21:43Speaker 02

  As we say, we used to live in a country.

• 1:21:45Amanda Dobbins?

  Like I said, it was a thing.

• 1:21:46Sean Fennessey?

  This film was shot by Robert Ellsworth and edited by John Gilroy.

• 1:21:49Amanda Dobbins?

  August Deal is her husband?

• 1:21:51Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 1:21:52Amanda Dobbins?

  Listen, maybe I'm gonna re-watch Salt tonight.

• 1:21:54Sean Fennessey?

  Wow, it's exciting for you. As I recall, not a good film.

• 1:21:57Amanda Dobbins?

  I had fun.

• 1:21:59Sean Fennessey?

  I'm gonna just go through her most recent, here's the problem with, so I really, I thought of her immediately when I thought of this exercise. Because I was like, this is someone who was, when she was on as a, as an actress, was excellent. And also was pretty good at just being a movie star. She was pretty good. She could hold a gun. She could be in a period drama. She could be sexy. She could be dark and weird. She had a lot, she had range, even though.

• 1:22:19Amanda Dobbins?

  And you just, you wanted to look at her.

• 1:22:21Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, obviously, just one of the most striking people on earth. The problem, the reason why I think this is a flawed pick.

• 1:22:27Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:22:28Sean Fennessey?

  Is that I think she does control her own fate.

• 1:22:30Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:31Sean Fennessey?

  I think she has more agency than the people that were, that were kind of aiming for here. Where like, she, she can still get a movie made, maybe not the same kind of movie that she could have gotten made 15 years ago. But she can still get something made. She was recently in the awards race with Maria last year.

• 1:22:48Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:48Sean Fennessey?

  Which is a movie that I liked and apparently nobody else did, the Pablo Doreen movie.

• 1:22:53Sean Fennessey?

  You know, about Maria Callas. She has had a-

• 1:22:56Amanda Dobbins?

  Gowns, beautiful gowns.

• 1:22:57Sean Fennessey?

  Yes. I mean, her film output since 2019 is Maleficent, Mistress of Evil.

• 1:23:03Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 1:23:03Sean Fennessey?

  In which she has the titular role.

• 1:23:05Amanda Dobbins?

  A legendary podcast by us also.

• 1:23:07Sean Fennessey?

  Yes, very, very fun movie about a, a, a, a cozier time in which the war between red state and blue state seemed more navigable in a Disney property. She was a voice in the one and only Ivan. She starred in Those Who Wish Me Dead, a Taylor Sheridan film. You liked it.

• 1:23:22Amanda Dobbins?

  The fire chaser, she chases fires.

• 1:23:23Sean Fennessey?

  Smoke jumper, yeah.

• 1:23:24Amanda Dobbins?

  Smoke jumper. Yeah, how do they go to the bathroom up there? Still no answers.

• 1:23:29Sean Fennessey?

  Well, I feel like they urinate on the fire, right? Isn't that the whole thing? No, they don't do that. Eternals?

• 1:23:34Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:34Sean Fennessey?

  Second, second time Eternals has come up on this pod. And then Maria and then Alice-

• 1:23:38Amanda Dobbins?

  I was so pregnant when we saw that movie.

• 1:23:39Sean Fennessey?

  I don't think this Alice Winecker movie, Couture, which premiered at Toronto.

• 1:23:45Amanda Dobbins?

  Has distribution.

• 1:23:46Sean Fennessey?

  I don't think it has distribution. I don't even know if it's going to come out in America.

• 1:23:49Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh dear.

• 1:23:50Sean Fennessey?

  So she does have two films coming, one a Mark Foster comedy called Anxious People, that I think is maybe going to be a Black Bear movie? That stars her and Amy Lou Wood from The White Lotus and Jason Segel. And then another movie called Sunny, which is a crime thriller starring her and Charlie Plummer and Method Man.

• 1:24:08Amanda Dobbins?

  Ah.

• 1:24:09Sean Fennessey?

  Which, okay.

• 1:24:10Amanda Dobbins?

  A female gangster who fights to protect her sons and herself from an abusive drug kingpin. Relatable.

• 1:24:18Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, I'll just, I'll stick Angelina Jolie on there. We don't really know what to do with her.

• 1:24:23Amanda Dobbins?

  Fine, don't, find someone else.

• 1:24:25Sean Fennessey?

  It was a good conversation.

• 1:24:26Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:24:27Sean Fennessey?

  We gotta talk about Salt.

• 1:24:28Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:24:28Sean Fennessey?

  What's the best Angelina Jolie film? Like, what's the best film she's ever made?

• 1:24:32Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, I really like Mr. And Mrs. Smith.

• 1:24:35Sean Fennessey?

  That can't be the answer.

• 1:24:36Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, I just, it's the first thing that came to mind.

• 1:24:39Sean Fennessey?

  She just doesn't-

• 1:24:40Amanda Dobbins?

  It encapsulates the Angelina Jolie experience. I mean, she's sort of a Clooney as well. I almost put Clooney on my list and I think that's imperfect, but, and it's like, it's just, he's trying and it just goes wrong every time.

• 1:24:54Sean Fennessey?

  It's, so I have always loved Hackers. And she, she won an Oscar for Girl Interrupted.

• 1:24:59Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:59Sean Fennessey?

  She's terrific in Gia, the HBO film. I don't know if she won an Emmy or she was nominated for an Emmy for that film. But like, go down the list.

• 1:25:06Amanda Dobbins?

  No, I agree with you. Listen.

• 1:25:08Sean Fennessey?

  Zero great films?

• 1:25:09Amanda Dobbins?

  There's a reason why I said Mr. And Mrs. Smith and Salt was a phenomenon, you know?

• 1:25:16Sean Fennessey?

  Very, very weird career. I mean, a lot of hits, right? She had Tomb Raider.

• 1:25:20Amanda Dobbins?

  Sure.

• 1:25:21Sean Fennessey?

  Taking Lives, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. She's pretty good in that. You know, Alexander, A Famous Bomb. Boxfire, she's great in that. But like, what a weird career.

• 1:25:32Amanda Dobbins?

  It's very strange.

• 1:25:32Sean Fennessey?

  How often does one of the most famous people in the world make zero good movies?

• 1:25:39Sean Fennessey?

  Okay. Who do you got for four?

• 1:25:41Amanda Dobbins?

  Julia Roberts.

• 1:25:43Sean Fennessey?

  Wow.

• 1:25:43Amanda Dobbins?

  Speaking of the most famous people in the world. And this is-

• 1:25:46Sean Fennessey?

  Misused.

• 1:25:47Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, I don't, misused, underused. Some of it is underused because when we made her a Hall of Fame, a famous episode that was cut short,

• 1:26:01Amanda Dobbins?

  there's just like a 20-

• 1:26:02Sean Fennessey?

  No one thinks that.

• 1:26:05Amanda Dobbins?

  A 20-year gap, right?

• 1:26:07Sean Fennessey?

  Uh huh.

• 1:26:07Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, and that's not totally true. And she obviously had a huge amount of success in the 90s, early in her career. And then had kids and wanted to do her own stuff. And then picked some projects that didn't pan out. She, like many of her ilk, has had a hard time kind of reheating the career, the 90s career in like post 2015. But so there's not a lot. And, you know, our friend Sam Esmael is definitely and is still working with her and using.

• 1:26:37Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 1:26:38Amanda Dobbins?

  So that is great.

• 1:26:39Sean Fennessey?

  Put her in a show and a movie and they have another movie coming.

• 1:26:40Amanda Dobbins?

  I don't think that she, I thought she was great in Luca Guadagnino's After the Hunt. Even though that script does not make sense, among other issues. But we're just not using her enough. It's Julia Roberts. Like, we saw her at the Golden Globes. She walked out on stage and everyone just stood up and applauded. Like, we're not using, that is like nuclear power, you know?

• 1:27:07Sean Fennessey?

  I agree.

• 1:27:07Amanda Dobbins?

  Let's find a way to channel it that's healthy for this earth.

• 1:27:10Sean Fennessey?

  How much of it do you think is just that she's like, I'm just doing only what I want to do?

• 1:27:16Amanda Dobbins?

  I think that that's part of it, but also I think Julia Roberts has earned the right to do what she wants to do. And then other people got to figure out how to use it.

• 1:27:25Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, I'm trying to think is like, like, does Wes Anderson want to work with Julia Roberts? You know, does Paul Thomas Anderson want to work with Julia Roberts?

• 1:27:32Amanda Dobbins?

  That would be fun.

• 1:27:33Sean Fennessey?

  You know, like, yeah, there's definitely something where she has, and part of it is because like with Julia Roberts comes kind of Julia Roberts Industries, right? Like, she's going to get a big paycheck. She's like, it becomes her movie because she's such a huge figure in the world. But it would be cool to see her dip back in with a kind of like a major event film. Now, Sam's next movie might be really big, Panic Carefully, which was dated for 2027.

• 1:27:58Sean Fennessey?

  And, well, I, you know, I know it has a big scope, so that'll be interesting to see. But she has not done a lot of stuff like that in the last 10 years.

• 1:28:06Sean Fennessey?

  Okay, I came up with my next one.

• 1:28:08Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:28:09Sean Fennessey?

  It's Dev Patel.

• 1:28:10Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, this is a good one.

• 1:28:12Sean Fennessey?

  Lot of rumors over the years about could he be Bond?

• 1:28:17Sean Fennessey?

  Is he the future of a certain kind of Hollywood? He's made some really good movies, but he's another guy who you look at the CV and you're like, okay, Broke Out in Slumdog. Best Picture winner. You think it's kind of mapped to the stars.

• 1:28:33Sean Fennessey?

  The biggest movie he's in after that is Chappie?

• 1:28:40Sean Fennessey?

  From 2008 to 2015, he's in the two best exotic marigold hotel movies.

• 1:28:45Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:46Sean Fennessey?

  He's in M. Night Shyamalan's disastrous The Last Airbender. And then in 2016, he's in Lion, which gets nominated for Best Picture, which is like one of the most forgotten Best Picture nominees of all time. And makes a couple of good movies, Hotel Mumbai and The Personal History of David Copperfield. And he's in The Green Knight, which I think is fantastic, David Lowery's movie. But that came out during COVID and people don't maybe didn't see as many people didn't see that as they should. He does The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and then he directs himself in Monkey Man. And one of the reasons why he says he's going to direct himself in it is because he's like, nobody will cast me as an action star.

• 1:29:18Sean Fennessey?

  And no one has still.

• 1:29:20Amanda Dobbins?

  I don't get it.

• 1:29:21Sean Fennessey?

  I don't really know what he's got next. And somebody needs to put him in like a big mainstream movie that is good.

• 1:29:29Amanda Dobbins?

  1,000%.

• 1:29:31Sean Fennessey?

  I always find him winning on screen. I think he's really also, I'm always looking for people who are like really flexible, who can do a lot of different kinds of things as a star.

• 1:29:39Amanda Dobbins?

  Funny, endearing.

• 1:29:41Sean Fennessey?

  Could be the romantic lead, could be the guy with the gun.

• 1:29:43Amanda Dobbins?

  And he was, Monkey Man, I think, was an extended production process and flawed in many ways. But he was so watchable. And watching him run and move, I thought he was a very convincing action star.

• 1:29:56Sean Fennessey?

  Agreed.

• 1:29:57Amanda Dobbins?

  So, yeah, I don't know. Also, just every time he comes on screen, my husband is like, that's the most handsome man that ever lived. Which is true, but you know, let's use it.

• 1:30:06Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, it's weird, it's weird that he hasn't either found a franchise or found a TV series built around him. Or it's weird that there's not one thing that is like where he has some primacy. Anyway, what's your number three?

• 1:30:18Amanda Dobbins?

  This is a call is coming from Inside the House one, but it's Bradley Cooper. Who is one of our great movie stars, one of our great actors, and sometimes one of our great directors. And even when you're watching, is this thing on? Which I think the collective response on this podcast and off was why? Why? And, and also the way that he casts and portrays himself in that movie is fascinating and sort of baffling, but he's still the funniest, most watchable part. He's taken to doing cameos now. You just always like, you start crying like, yes, yes, at the scream when he shows up on Dungeons and Dragons, like, two feet tall.

• 1:30:57Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, I did like that.

• 1:30:58Amanda Dobbins?

  And he's great. He's an incredible movie star. You know, The Hangover made hundreds of millions of dollars.

• 1:31:07Sean Fennessey?

  It's true.

• 1:31:07Amanda Dobbins?

  He's done, like, you know, American Sniper, The Plastic Baby, he can survive anything. People love him. And he's just not in movies anymore? And then he's just, he's making stand-up comedy stuff? What? What are we doing?

• 1:31:21Sean Fennessey?

  What does he have coming next? I feel like he has one big project that is worth putting our arms around, that we need to get excited about. He's been-

• 1:31:27Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, I'm excited. I'm always-

• 1:31:29Sean Fennessey?

  He's been a main character of this show.

• 1:31:31Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:31:32Sean Fennessey?

  He's been one of the central preoccupations.

• 1:31:34Amanda Dobbins?

  I support him. I'm just asking for more.

• 1:31:38Sean Fennessey?

  I mean, he's, he's had the Eagles to deal with, right? That's been a thing.

• 1:31:41Amanda Dobbins?

  Sure.

• 1:31:42Sean Fennessey?

  He was Jor-El in Superman.

• 1:31:43Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, yeah, I forgot about that.

• 1:31:44Sean Fennessey?

  That was good. Yeah, I don't know if he has anything planned.

• 1:31:48Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:31:50Sean Fennessey?

  I mean, you know, Rocky Raccoon, that was good.

• 1:31:52Amanda Dobbins?

  Listen, A Star is Born was great. The Mule?

• 1:31:55Sean Fennessey?

  Well, that was seven years ago.

• 1:31:55Amanda Dobbins?

  We had a fantastic time.

• 1:31:57Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, The Mule, which made 300 million dollars.

• 1:31:58Amanda Dobbins?

  Lickers Pizza? Like, it's Nightmare Alley, you loved? Like, my guy, my guy has it.

• 1:32:03Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah. It's been, it's been a rocky road since Nightmare Alley, I would say.

• 1:32:08Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, yeah, that's mostly cameos and or films that he is directing and starring in or acting in, that we've been a little perplexed by. Maestro is like, an amazing achievement of directing. I think he's very good in it. I still-

• 1:32:23Sean Fennessey?

  Not a great Leonard Bernstein movie, right?

• 1:32:25Amanda Dobbins?

  I have like, a little bit of a Y quality to that one as well, but-

• 1:32:28Sean Fennessey?

  I, is this thing on, which we were very hard on, on the show. I understand the intent, which is like, let's pull back, back to basics, you know, a funny character piece, so that I can get away from the grandeur of Maestro as a filmmaker and I can do my James L. Brooks movie, right? Like, that's what he's really trying to do.

• 1:32:48Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:32:49Sean Fennessey?

  I get it, the intent. I think it was completely misconceived in a couple of ways. And the way, the, the style of the movie, I found really off-putting. Some people disagreed, but like, most people just didn't see it. They just didn't, they had no interest. And it wasn't being sold on him, it was being sold on Will Arnett and Laura Dern. I'd be really interested to see if he just takes like, a mainstream movie star part. Cause he now-

• 1:33:11Sean Fennessey?

  I mean, it's really The Mule is the last real movie star part he's had, which is in 2018.

• 1:33:19Sean Fennessey?

  And he's not even the star, he's just the cop.

• 1:33:22Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:22Sean Fennessey?

  And before that, The Star is Born. You know, Nightmare Alley is a great performance, but it's a great performance about like a

• 1:33:30Sean Fennessey?

  demon, like a possessed gross man, and very little beyond that.

• 1:33:34Amanda Dobbins?

  Remember Burnt? And he has to shuck all the oysters?

• 1:33:37Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, that movie's really bad. Really bad. Uh, such a strange character.

• 1:33:41Amanda Dobbins?

  This guy survived Aloha and Joy. You know?

• 1:33:45Sean Fennessey?

  Well, sometimes you gotta start asking, you know, is it the movies or is it?

• 1:33:47Amanda Dobbins?

  Limitless, number 16.

• 1:33:51Sean Fennessey?

  Number 16. I was there. I was there when that happened. Really lives on, doesn't it? Uh, okay.

• 1:34:01Amanda Dobbins?

  Who you got?

• 1:34:02Sean Fennessey?

  I really wanna do Amy Adams, but I feel like Amy Adams has no one to blame but herself for taking these parts.

• 1:34:09Amanda Dobbins?

  I think that that's unfair to Amy Adams, and I'm not usually the person saying that on a podcast, but it's, you gotta take chances.

• 1:34:20Sean Fennessey?

  I admire that she is attempting to kind of push herself and do something physically in movies that most people are not willing to do. And I do think it's possible that the comeback will happen. It's possible it happens even this year, because she's gonna be in a movie called At the Sea, a Cornell Mondrosco movie that could be exciting, could be an Oscar movie, could be a Fall Festival movie. Oh, no, actually, it's premiering in Berlin, so we'll actually know pretty soon what people think of it. Now, this could be the thing that gets her back on track, but Night Bitch, Disenchanted, Dear Evan Hansen, The Woman in the Window, Zack Snyder's Justice League, Hillbilly Elegy,

• 1:35:03Sean Fennessey?

  Academy Award nominated for Vice, Justice League, Nocturnal Animals.

• 1:35:08Amanda Dobbins?

  Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey. 2016 was a good year.

• 1:35:12Sean Fennessey?

  I'm stopping there. That's 10 years.

• 1:35:14Amanda Dobbins?

  Nocturnal animals, come on, have a little fun.

• 1:35:17Sean Fennessey?

  I don't get it. I know there's a little cult for it.

• 1:35:19Amanda Dobbins?

  I.

• 1:35:19Sean Fennessey?

  Tom Ford coming back with a movie this year, by the way.

• 1:35:21Amanda Dobbins?

  I know. I brought it to the most anticipated. Listen, Jake Gyllenhaal can have a little fun and fuck around in nocturnal animals and everyone's fine with it. But then when Amy Adams is there, people are like, oh, no, Amy Adams.

• 1:35:32Sean Fennessey?

  I appreciate that she was trying to do something. I felt it was something she was not quite capable of doing.

• 1:35:37Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, listen, you gotta push yourself as an artist.

• 1:35:40Sean Fennessey?

  Wow, look at you. You've come to bat for your, the woman who you hate.

• 1:35:44Amanda Dobbins?

  I think, I don't hate. It's just that.

• 1:35:46Sean Fennessey?

  Is she on the terminal list?

• 1:35:47Amanda Dobbins?

  She's not on the terminal list. But Hillbilly Elegy, Justice League, Woman in the Window, and then I think Dear Evan Hansen.

• 1:35:56Sean Fennessey?

  That's the low. That's the, that's, that's the bottom.

• 1:35:58Amanda Dobbins?

  I still simply cannot believe that this is a film that exists, let alone a successful musical.

• 1:36:08Amanda Dobbins?

  I was shocked by what I saw on that screen.

• 1:36:14Sean Fennessey?

  You're like, that is a disgusting act.

• 1:36:16Amanda Dobbins?

  I was, I cannot believe, like.

• 1:36:18Sean Fennessey?

  It was bad.

• 1:36:18Amanda Dobbins?

  It was successful? That was like, that was a hit. I don't know what's going on in the musical world.

• 1:36:24Sean Fennessey?

  Not a hit film. I want more for Amy Adams. You know, she also has the Tyco YTD film Clara and the Sun, which apparently is finally coming out this year. I think it was finished in like 2023.

• 1:36:34Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, I don't really feel good about, that's based on the Ishiguro, the Kazuhiko Ishiguro novel, right?

• 1:36:39Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 1:36:41Sean Fennessey?

  And then she apparently has a part in Star Wars Starfighter.

• 1:36:44Amanda Dobbins?

  It's, that's tough.

• 1:36:48Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, you're right. She's doing it to herself a little. I don't know.

• 1:36:51Sean Fennessey?

  I want a lot for her. Now, she's still, obviously, she's got some juice, you know, she's getting, these are three real movies that could be good. Clara and the Sun, I've got my doubts just given Tyco YTD, but we shall see. But Amy Adams is, is my number two. Who's your number two?

• 1:37:07Amanda Dobbins?

  She's your number two? Oh, wow. I didn't realize you were ahead of me. My number two is Regina Hall. You know, which is just let us learn always from Paul Thomas Anderson, who identified the, the capabilities of Regina Hall beyond being the funniest person in any room or on any Golden Globe stage. Never forget Kevin Costner's sheltering place.

• 1:37:30Sean Fennessey?

  That was really good.

• 1:37:32Amanda Dobbins?

  And, you know, I, I still remember the, the speech that she gives at the end of, of Girl's Trip, which is in, it's the emotional, like you were all of my friends. She has the ability to pull people in, in addition to being so charismatic and so funny. But never gets the opportunity. And PTA did this year in one battle after another. That performance has kind of fallen to the side in award season, but she's amazing.

• 1:37:57Sean Fennessey?

  Very quiet performance, right? It's him utilizing something different from her, that she has a kind of, uh, uh, power and a solemnity.

• 1:38:05Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:38:05Sean Fennessey?

  That is not usually tapped into. And she's in like this, she's gonna be in Scary Movie Six, by the way. She's in several scary movies. Like she, she's a great comedic, comedic performer. But I agree with you that she has something else really cool there. She's gonna be in a Nick Stoller movie that is kind of intriguing. She's the third lead in this Nick Stoller movie called Judgment Day. The premise is a reality television judge is taken hostage on air by a disgruntled man who blames him for his life spiraling into incarceration. That's kind of weird because that's also the premise of Money Monster? The George Clooney, Jodie Foster film? It's not funny. This is gonna be a comedic version of Money Monster. Will Ferrell, Zac Efron, and Regina Hall.

• 1:38:42Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:38:43Sean Fennessey?

  Sounds pretty good.

• 1:38:44Amanda Dobbins?

  I'm open.

• 1:38:45Sean Fennessey?

  Uh, written and directed by Nicholas Stoller.

• 1:38:47Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:38:48Sean Fennessey?

  Okay, number one. Chris Pine.

• 1:38:51Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:38:54Sean Fennessey?

  I watched a movie on Virtual Sundance last night called Carousel. A very kind, thoughtful, emotional drama about two people who dated in high school and then separated from each other and were apart from each other for a long time. And they find each other in middle life. Chris Pine plays a local doctor and Jenny Slate plays a woman who moves back to her hometown to help her parents with their, with their home as they get into their 70s. Uh, a lot of really good actors in this movie. Um, Sam Waterston, uh, Jessica Harper, Jeffrey DeMun, um, Abby Ryder Fortson, who is the young girl in Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret. She plays Chris Pine's daughter. He's a single father.

• 1:39:38Sean Fennessey?

  I liked it, didn't love it. Had, you know, a little Sundance-y on the edges.

• 1:39:42Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:39:43Sean Fennessey?

  You know, in terms of some of its dramatic choices. There's one scene in particular that happens in the center, in the middle of the movie, between Jenny Slate and Chris Pine, a kind of disagreement over a kitchen counter. Where it was like Julia Butters and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. I was like, that's the best acting I've ever seen in my life. Whereas like Chris Pine, first of all, the script in that scene is really great. It feels like it's transcribed from a real fight.

• 1:40:06Amanda Dobbins?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:40:06Sean Fennessey?

  And I've often had that feeling when I've had fights with my partner where I've been like, I wish we could just write this down and go back and look at it one day later and to like, figure out what were we really trying to say to each other?

• 1:40:16Amanda Dobbins?

  Uh-huh.

• 1:40:17Sean Fennessey?

  And he's so good at representing like a really bad habit of masculinity when you're in the fight with someone you care about. And so at least certainly a bad habit of mine. And I just always liked Chris Pine. I thought he was a very good franchise star. He's a great Captain Kirk. That should have not worked.

• 1:40:36Amanda Dobbins?

  And it totally worked.

• 1:40:37Sean Fennessey?

  And it totally worked.

• 1:40:38Amanda Dobbins?

  Even I liked it.

• 1:40:39Sean Fennessey?

  You know, he's quite winning in the Wonder Woman movie.

• 1:40:43Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, my God, he's so great.

• 1:40:45Sean Fennessey?

  Um, he's doing yeoman's work in Dungeons and Dragons. I think that movie's pretty fun. He tried with Jack Ryan, it didn't fit. Uh, his, he's similarly like a lot of the people that were listening here. It has had a pretty weird post like COVID to today run of movies.

• 1:41:01Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:41:02Sean Fennessey?

  Since 2020, he's in Wonder Woman 1984, which everyone hated, but we were mixed on. Um, The Contractor, All the Old Knives, Don't Worry Darling.

• 1:41:12Amanda Dobbins?

  Mmm.

• 1:41:13Sean Fennessey?

  Not his fault, but not a great part.

• 1:41:14Amanda Dobbins?

  Right, he's, he's like the podcast.

• 1:41:17Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 1:41:17Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:41:18Sean Fennessey?

  Um, Dungeons and Dragons, Pool Man, which he wrote and directed, which isn't, it doesn't work. He was King Magnifico in Wish, which of course means the world to me.

• 1:41:27Amanda Dobbins?

  Right, only you care about.

• 1:41:28Sean Fennessey?

  But is reviled by all Disney fans.

• 1:41:30Amanda Dobbins?

  Is Wish still hitting in the house?

• 1:41:32Sean Fennessey?

  No, it's kind of taking a backseat. We do still have the Asha dress going pretty hard, though.

• 1:41:37Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:41:38Sean Fennessey?

  She will wear the dress.

• 1:41:38Amanda Dobbins?

  Because it's purple, right?

• 1:41:39Sean Fennessey?

  Because it's purple.

• 1:41:39Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:41:40Sean Fennessey?

  Her fave.

• 1:41:42Sean Fennessey?

  A film called The Kidnapping of Arabella, not familiar with this. It's an Italian drama. He's the only American star.

• 1:41:47Amanda Dobbins?

  No, hold on. I think that that, yeah, that is the latest film by Carolina Cavalli, who directed Amanda. I still haven't seen this. It was at Venice in Orzanti, and I didn't get to it. I would like to see this.

• 1:42:00Sean Fennessey?

  He plays arrested D.

• 1:42:02Amanda Dobbins?

  I don't know. That's cool, that he's in a, yeah.

• 1:42:04Sean Fennessey?

  So this movie and Carousel, first of all,

• 1:42:09Sean Fennessey?

  a male star in his mid-40s choosing to work with female filmmakers.

• 1:42:12Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:42:13Sean Fennessey?

  Carousel is also directed by a woman, Rachel Lambert. And that almost never happens. His next movie,

• 1:42:20Sean Fennessey?

  I'm putting, I'm putting a red circle around it.

• 1:42:22Amanda Dobbins?

  Yes.

• 1:42:23Sean Fennessey?

  It's called Alpha Gang.

• 1:42:24Amanda Dobbins?

  Yes.

• 1:42:24Sean Fennessey?

  It's directed by the Zellner brothers. They directed Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter, Denzel. Couple of things I really like. They made the Sasquatch movie a couple of years ago with Jesse Eisenberg.

• 1:42:35Amanda Dobbins?

  Why are you still talking?

• 1:42:36Sean Fennessey?

  It's an insane film.

• 1:42:38Amanda Dobbins?

  Get to it.

• 1:42:39Sean Fennessey?

  Alpha Gang is about humanoid aliens who arrive on Earth seeking to destroy, but they soon find themselves compromised with human emotions. The stars are Cate Blanchett,

• 1:42:45Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, read the Cate.

• 1:42:46Sean Fennessey?

  Dave Batista, Lea Seydoux, Lily Rose Depp, Adriana Arhona, Duna Bay, Calvin Harrison Jr.

• 1:42:51Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:42:52Sean Fennessey?

  And Chris Pine.

• 1:42:52Amanda Dobbins?

  So it's like the most attractive people alive?

• 1:42:55Sean Fennessey?

  It's hot humanoids.

• 1:42:57Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:42:57Sean Fennessey?

  Come to Earth, directed by the guys who made the Sasquatch movie.

• 1:43:01Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:43:03Amanda Dobbins?

  Why not?

• 1:43:03Sean Fennessey?

  I'm paying attention.

• 1:43:04Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:43:05Sean Fennessey?

  I want great things for Chris Pine.

• 1:43:06Amanda Dobbins?

  I do as well. Listen, real one's new with Princess Diaries 2.

• 1:43:10Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 1:43:10Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:43:11Sean Fennessey?

  They did. Look at you, just selling yourself out to Gen Z right now.

• 1:43:14Amanda Dobbins?

  Excuse me, I was there. Do you know the plot of Princess Diaries 2?

• 1:43:18Sean Fennessey?

  I don't.

• 1:43:18Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, so.

• 1:43:20Sean Fennessey?

  She's a princess.

• 1:43:21Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:43:21Sean Fennessey?

  She has a diary. Go on.

• 1:43:24Amanda Dobbins?

  In the first one, you know, she finds out that she's like the princess of Genovia, right?

• 1:43:30Sean Fennessey?

  Genovia.

• 1:43:30Amanda Dobbins?

  Genovia.

• 1:43:31Sean Fennessey?

  That's different from Geonosis, from Star Wars: Attack of the Clones.

• 1:43:34Amanda Dobbins?

  And then, so, and she's like inherited, you know, Genovia, and then Julie Andrews has to teach her how to be like a proper princess of Genovia. And then, in two, she's back in Genovia, but there are some, like, some legal challenges, and I think Chris Pine is like a pretender to the throne of Genovia.

• 1:43:56Sean Fennessey?

  Oh, my goodness.

• 1:43:57Amanda Dobbins?

  And then-

• 1:43:57Sean Fennessey?

  They speak English in Genovia?

• 1:43:58Amanda Dobbins?

  They do.

• 1:43:59Sean Fennessey?

  They speak English in what?

• 1:44:02Amanda Dobbins?

  And so, you know, they're at war, but also then, of course, they find love. It's, I mean, it's, you know, a classic opposites attract, you know, people, you know, enemies to lovers can't be beat.

• 1:44:13Sean Fennessey?

  That sounds good.

• 1:44:14Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, it's great, and he's really good. Also, Just My Luck with Lindsay Lohan, like, if you don't understand how formative Chris Pine was in the mid aughts, to those of us watching garbage cinema.

• 1:44:26Sean Fennessey?

  I feel like one of the-

• 1:44:26Amanda Dobbins?

  Garbage women cinema.

• 1:44:28Sean Fennessey?

  We're, we're-

• 1:44:29Amanda Dobbins?

  Garbage women, garbage teens.

• 1:44:32Sean Fennessey?

  Garbage teens.

• 1:44:33Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, that's what it was.

• 1:44:33Sean Fennessey?

  Garbage teens is a good idea for an episode.

• 1:44:35Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:44:38Sean Fennessey?

  Like I said, next week, we don't have an episode.

• 1:44:39Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:44:39Sean Fennessey?

  And I'm thinking, like, should it be like a, a hole filler episode, where you're like, what's a hole in your movie-watching life that you've never seen?

• 1:44:48Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 1:44:49Sean Fennessey?

  I've not seen Les Mis, I've not seen Mamma Mia, I've not seen any of the Princess Diaries films.

• 1:44:54Amanda Dobbins?

  They're pretty delightful. Anne Hathaway, that's your girl.

• 1:44:55Sean Fennessey?

  It's not a movie swap, though, right? It has to be different from a movie swap.

• 1:44:58Amanda Dobbins?

  How are you writing so hard for Anne Hathaway, and you've never done Princess Diaries?

• 1:45:03Sean Fennessey?

  I think that's ignorance. She's like a teenager in those movies, right?

• 1:45:05Amanda Dobbins?

  Hmm, I guess she's in high school, yeah. I don't, I'm not really sure where in her education she is in Princess Diaries 2, and I don't know whether she has to, like, defer college-

• 1:45:14Sean Fennessey?

  She getting her MFA?

• 1:45:15Amanda Dobbins?

  To get to go- I'm not, I'm not really sure what Genovia's education structure is.

• 1:45:18Sean Fennessey?

  It's 2001. Let's go back to me in 2001.

• 1:45:21Amanda Dobbins?

  Well-

• 1:45:22Sean Fennessey?

  I'm living in the garden apartments at Ithaca College.

• 1:45:24Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:45:25Sean Fennessey?

  Wow.

• 1:45:26Speaker 02

  Let's fucking go.

• 1:45:27Sean Fennessey?

  I'm probably, I'm probably eating gas station pizza.

• 1:45:31Amanda Dobbins?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:45:32Sean Fennessey?

  Uh, 30 pack of Natty Light in the fridge.

• 1:45:35Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:45:36Sean Fennessey?

  Uh, I'm watching the Sixers Lakers NBA Finals with my roommate, college roommate, pants.

• 1:45:43Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:45:44Sean Fennessey?

  Shout out to Pants, you know, you know who you are. Um-

• 1:45:49Sean Fennessey?

  I am getting drunk pretty frequently.

• 1:45:52Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:45:53Sean Fennessey?

  Every third weekend, I'm driving to Baltimore to go see Eileen.

• 1:45:56Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, this I've heard about.

• 1:45:58Sean Fennessey?

  I'm going to a lot of movies. This is, of course, the fateful year of Kill Bill.

• 1:46:02Amanda Dobbins?

  What kind of car were you driving back and forth to Baltimore?

• 1:46:05Sean Fennessey?

  Thank you for asking. In high school, I drove a 1980 Buick Regal.

• 1:46:10Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:46:11Sean Fennessey?

  I've told this story before, I think, which was a brutal car that I inherited, a really old car.

• 1:46:17Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:18Sean Fennessey?

  We, we, in my high school yearbook, made a mini music video that featured the car prominently.

• 1:46:26Amanda Dobbins?

  So then you just-

• 1:46:27Sean Fennessey?

  That's set to the sounds of Black Rob's Whoa.

• 1:46:30Amanda Dobbins?

  But in your yearbook?

• 1:46:32Sean Fennessey?

  In the video yearbook.

• 1:46:33Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, you had a video yearbook in 2001. Wow, pivot to video. Wow.

• 1:46:37Sean Fennessey?

  Well, we had a regular yearbook, too.

• 1:46:38Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:46:38Sean Fennessey?

  Okay, so I drove a Buick Regal, didn't make it past senior year. I then inherited a 1993 Mercury Grand Marquis from my mom. 1993, maybe 1990, another old car, died freshman year.

• 1:46:52Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, no.

• 1:46:53Sean Fennessey?

  Then-

• 1:46:53Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:46:55Sean Fennessey?

  I somehow, like, gained control of Eileen's 1994,

• 1:47:03Sean Fennessey?

  I think it was a Saturn S1.

• 1:47:04Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:47:05Sean Fennessey?

  It was a black Saturn.

• 1:47:06Amanda Dobbins?

  All right.

• 1:47:07Sean Fennessey?

  And I was driving it through snowy Ithaca.

• 1:47:09Amanda Dobbins?

  But were you on the insurance?

• 1:47:11Sean Fennessey?

  No.

• 1:47:12Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh.

• 1:47:12Sean Fennessey?

  Definitely not.

• 1:47:13Amanda Dobbins?

  Eileen allowed that?

• 1:47:14Sean Fennessey?

  Well, really, Eileen's dad, it was really his car.

• 1:47:16Amanda Dobbins?

  Wow.

• 1:47:18Sean Fennessey?

  These were some bum ass cars that I drove. And so, yeah, I was driving down there to do that. So my point being, let's just like-

• 1:47:26Amanda Dobbins?

  So you weren't there. You weren't there, but listen.

• 1:47:28Sean Fennessey?

  Princess Diaries comes out.

• 1:47:30Amanda Dobbins?

  You claim to be committed to the history of cinema, and I just have to tell you that The Princess Diaries, and Princess Diaries 2, featuring Anne Hathaway, Julie Andrews, and Chris Pine, are formative.

• 1:47:41Sean Fennessey?

  It appears Mandy Moore is in this film?

• 1:47:43Amanda Dobbins?

  She is?

• 1:47:44Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 1:47:44Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, she's, is she like the stepsister or something? Is she like trying to? Jack, come on, help me out here.

• 1:47:50Speaker 02

  I was gonna say, I like how you're looking at me as if I have the answer.

• 1:47:54Sean Fennessey?

  Sandra Oh is in the film?

• 1:47:55Amanda Dobbins?

  Wow.

• 1:47:55Sean Fennessey?

  Hector Elizondo, of course, legend.

• 1:47:57Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, of course. I need to, I need to re-watch these. Anyway. Princess Diaries 2, check it out. He was great in it.

• 1:48:04Sean Fennessey?

  Did you do your number one yet?

• 1:48:05Amanda Dobbins?

  Just My Luck, not that good. No, my number one is Kirsten Dunst. Fucking cast Kirsten Dunst.

• 1:48:09Sean Fennessey?

  She's doing great stuff recently.

• 1:48:11Amanda Dobbins?

  She is doing great stuff.

• 1:48:12Sean Fennessey?

  Civil War, that rocked. Power of the Dog?

• 1:48:13Amanda Dobbins?

  Roof Man.

• 1:48:14Sean Fennessey?

  Roof- Roofman?

• 1:48:15Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, Roofman. Yeah, but she's like, she's the girlfriend in Roofman. I mean, it's a, it's a more complex part, but let Kirsten Dunst lead movies. Please go watch Bring It On.

• 1:48:27Sean Fennessey?

  You didn't think her being an accomplished photo journalist who was present for the most critical moment in American history was a good enough part?

• 1:48:33Amanda Dobbins?

  And also buying a green dress because womanhood is complicated.

• 1:48:36Sean Fennessey?

  No, sometimes you just need to see yourself in a different light. Alex Garland knew.

• 1:48:40Amanda Dobbins?

  She's gonna be in the new Ruben Oslen movie?

• 1:48:42Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 1:48:43Amanda Dobbins?

  I just, I, she is our one true, she is my one true queen. She's so good. She was on two of our 25 for 25 films.

• 1:48:52Sean Fennessey?

  She was.

• 1:48:53Amanda Dobbins?

  Melancholia and Marie Antoinette.

• 1:48:55Sean Fennessey?

  That's right.

• 1:48:55Amanda Dobbins?

  Listen, she can do arthouse, but we also know that she can do big budget. So let her be a movie star. Let Kirsten Dunst cook.

• 1:49:03Sean Fennessey?

  Who's a director you'd like to see her work with?

• 1:49:06Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, she would be great with PTA.

• 1:49:08Sean Fennessey?

  Did you see some of her, like, shade posting?

• 1:49:10Amanda Dobbins?

  I loved it. I was, I was not gonna bring it up, but yeah, she was just retweeting on the day of the Oscars, some very, or re-Instagramming, I should say, some Instagram reels and other content.

• 1:49:22Sean Fennessey?

  Well, she was, she was, she was taking some shots at Timmy.

• 1:49:24Amanda Dobbins?

  No, the Instagram reel in question took shots at Timothy Chalamet, and it just said that what Jesse Plemons did in Wagonia was more complex than what Timothy Chalamet did in Marty Supreme.

• 1:49:35Sean Fennessey?

  But didn't she also use the phrase, "This is top level," in one of the captions, which is what he was saying about his performance?

• 1:49:42Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, I thought that she, I mean, I follow her on Instagram, so I just watched her.

• 1:49:48Sean Fennessey?

  You would like this. I'm not saying you wouldn't like this. I know, I know, to be torn between Timmy and Kirsten Dunst, what will you ever do? But I do think she was taking some shots.

• 1:49:56Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, that's fine. I think she's pissed off.

• 1:49:58Sean Fennessey?

  She's, she's, you know, famously a very dedicated Oscar voter. She watches all the films. She's spoken of this. You know, maybe, maybe watch fewer films. Make, make more, you know, like?

• 1:50:08Amanda Dobbins?

  Why, why are you, talk to everybody else. Maybe cast her in things, you know, let's get that.

• 1:50:13Sean Fennessey?

  Alex Garland didn't seem to have a problem with her.

• 1:50:15Amanda Dobbins?

  Let's get the Sofia Project going again, you know?

• 1:50:18Sean Fennessey?

  Uh, yeah, that seems like a good idea.

• 1:50:19Amanda Dobbins?

  They rumored that, they was rumored that they were working on something.

• 1:50:22Sean Fennessey?

  They've made- Three films together?

• 1:50:25Amanda Dobbins?

  Virgin Suicides, Marie Antoinette, and The Beguiled, yes.

• 1:50:30Sean Fennessey?

  Same.

• 1:50:30Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:50:31Sean Fennessey?

  Beguiled Rewatchables?

• 1:50:32Amanda Dobbins?

  You already made that joke on Top 50 Rewatchables. It was really good. Not as good as Number 16 Limitless, but really good.

• 1:50:39Sean Fennessey?

  That wasn't a joke.

• 1:50:42Sean Fennessey?

  Uh, okay, that's our list. This was a fun exercise.

• 1:50:45Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:50:46Sean Fennessey?

  Hollywood's fucking up.

• 1:50:47Amanda Dobbins?

  I like movie stars.

• 1:50:48Sean Fennessey?

  You have a couple on your, on your list that I think are good, though. I really like Andy Samberg. I feel like Andy Samberg doesn't have to...

• 1:50:54Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, really, all of the SNL guys of that generation, like Jason Sudeikis is another one where he's pretty good and I guess he's just... Well, he's making Ted Lasso now.

• 1:51:02Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, and I understand that that's a cash cow for him, but he is good.

• 1:51:06Amanda Dobbins?

  But all those guys were like very likeable and very good in movies. Um, I also put Javier Bardem on here because he was so good at F1. And I was like, why don't we do this more? Just like, put him in a suit that fits.

• 1:51:18Sean Fennessey?

  Did you see I got to use the F1 gif when the Mets made a trade?

• 1:51:22Amanda Dobbins?

  No, I didn't.

• 1:51:22Sean Fennessey?

  I did get to use it.

• 1:51:23Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, congratulations.

• 1:51:25Sean Fennessey?

  I think he literally says in that scene when they win the race, he's like, I can't believe it.

• 1:51:28Amanda Dobbins?

  This is like, but it works. This man has an Oscar and he can wear a suit. Just let's, let's make it happen.

• 1:51:35Sean Fennessey?

  Well, that does it for another very special episode of the show. Once again, we've figured out Hollywood. We've solved it. We've given people all the information that they need to do a good job. Next week is what I would describe as the darkest corridor

• 1:51:50Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:51:50Sean Fennessey?

  of the year in Hollywood.

• 1:51:51Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:52Sean Fennessey?

  The award shit takes a pause. The new movies are not really coming out.

• 1:51:56Amanda Dobbins?

  That's right.

• 1:51:57Sean Fennessey?

  We gotta get a little creative. We have a couple of things, a couple of new things to discuss. So originally, we were gonna talk about The Moment, the new Charlie XCX movie, which is coming out in limited release that premiered at Sundance. I think we'll talk about it on Tuesday now.

• 1:52:09Amanda Dobbins?

  Right, we were gonna talk about it today.

• 1:52:10Sean Fennessey?

  We were gonna talk about it today.

• 1:52:11Amanda Dobbins?

  And now we're gonna talk about it on Tuesday. I thought you were telling me that we aren't gonna talk about it on Tuesday, and I was like, no, Charlie, I'm ready.

• 1:52:16Sean Fennessey?

  No, you will be muzzled and you'll never be able to speak of it. No, we'll talk about it on Tuesday.

• 1:52:21Amanda Dobbins?

  If you're able, go see it.

• 1:52:22Sean Fennessey?

  I'm gonna end up seeing 30 Sundance movies, so...

• 1:52:25Amanda Dobbins?

  Are you serious?

• 1:52:26Sean Fennessey?

  I've already seen 10, so...

• 1:52:28Amanda Dobbins?

  What is wrong with you?

• 1:52:30Sean Fennessey?

  I'm doing the work. I do the work.

• 1:52:31Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, you do, but, um...

• 1:52:33Sean Fennessey?

  So we'll talk about that.

• 1:52:34Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:52:34Sean Fennessey?

  Um, I'll just tell movie titles to you. Let us not forget Train Dreams.

• 1:52:39Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, no, you were right.

• 1:52:40Sean Fennessey?

  And what I was able to bring you.

• 1:52:42Amanda Dobbins?

  We can workshop your pitches and you're in real time on the podcast. And I can tell you, that makes me want to see it, or that doesn't make me want to see it.

• 1:52:50Sean Fennessey?

  I gotta tell you, that thing that you just subscribed, one, is already my job. Two, I'm pretty good at it. So.

• 1:52:56Amanda Dobbins?

  I have given you consistent, direct feedback that your sale of Train Dreams did not effectively communicate the power of Train Dreams.

• 1:53:04Sean Fennessey?

  The Academy says otherwise. They say, thank you for sharing that film with us, Sean, and we are going to nominate it for Best Picture. I, I want to spend a little time on People We Meet on Vacation.

• 1:53:12Amanda Dobbins?

  Yes.

• 1:53:12Sean Fennessey?

  Which is probably among the most watched movies of 2026 so far.

• 1:53:16Amanda Dobbins?

  I'll talk about it forever.

• 1:53:18Sean Fennessey?

  Okay. Uh, I don't know if you have four hours of a Mel Brooks documentary in you, but I do want to mention, I really like it. I think it's very good. Judd Apatow directed a new HBO documentary about Mel Brooks, who is turning 100 years old this year. And maybe some other stuff.

• 1:53:34Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 1:53:34Sean Fennessey?

  Some news will come out.

• 1:53:35Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, for Monday.

• 1:53:36Sean Fennessey?

  For Monday. And then we gotta come up with next Friday.

• 1:53:38Amanda Dobbins?

  Right. So we might be brainstorming topic ideas.

• 1:53:42Sean Fennessey?

  Live on the show.

• 1:53:43Amanda Dobbins?

  Live.

• 1:53:44Sean Fennessey?

  And then roulette wheel with the listeners. They get to choose what episode we do, which we've never done before, but I think would be fun.

• 1:53:50Amanda Dobbins?

  I, let's give it a go.

• 1:53:51Sean Fennessey?

  Okay. Thanks to our producer, Jack Sanders, for all of his work on this episode. Thanks to the listeners at home. We'll see you soon.

• 1:54:18Speaker 03

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• 1:54:46Speaker 04

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