Muthsarah

Well, near as I can tell, you're not being very transparent about your selection process. How am I to draw conclusions? Based on today's episode, you gave Amy a list of choices, and she picked one. That still comes off as more your choice than hers, from where I stand. It's kinda like "Chinese Democracy", y'know?

Well, if Labyrinth doesn't get in either, the line is drawn a little tighter then, isn't it? I do feel it's a little weird that both of you would acknowledge that 80s' "boy" films would be so well-represented, and that "girls'" films wouldn't, then you turn right around and go for an all-boy 80s movie. Maybe instead of just giving Amy a list of choices, you could let (if "let" fits, is she not an equal co-host?) Amy program a month's worth of episodes. To start. If you really believe there's a disparity in The Canon thus far. Whether she picks "chick flicks" or not, I think you'd at least get a slate of films that could be easily viewed from a female perspective.

Well, I do love The Muppets. But every movie they've made has had flaws. I don't know how much of that to base on Henson and co.'s focus on puppeteering over...other filmic stuff. But all Muppet films have the same shortcomings, I think: shallow characterizations, a focus on the puppet-related visual over the...I guess, substantial? Movies that occasionally stop dead in their tracks to show off the latest puppeteering trick they spent several weeks working on. Which must've meant a lot to the, but which only translates to us over a few-second clip. I can't hate any film that shows this much crazy ambition. But, sometimes, it just comes off as a stunt reel of a different sort. And not a fully-cohesive cinematic experience. EDIT: Just watched it again, after may two years. Still love it. A perfect template for how I want all action/comic book movies to be.

You mean, you're gonna watch The Rocketeer tonight? I sure hope so. I think I'm gonna watch it again too. It's one of those films I can't get enough of.

I won't try to change your mind about Labyrinth (I get where you're coming from), but I nonetheless feel compelled to ask, on the topic of The Muppets: How many Muppets film do you love, and do any of them, you feel, belong in The Canon? Personally, I love The Muppet Movie, The Great Muppet Caper, Muppets Take Manhattan, and A Muppet Christmas Carol. But, aside from perhaps the first (on a greater legacy-based vote), I wouldn't vote any of them into The Canon. Which...kinda hurts, in a pre-phantom-pain kinda way. I can easily vote for stuff like The Neverending Story or Labyrinth, films that, aside from their wonderful merits, apparently made ZERO impact on filmmaking of their day, and which, at best, can claim to have become cult films that inspired future studio moguls....to greenlight one Transformers movie after another. At best. Pre-LotR fantasy is a lost era, I understand. Probably forgotten, by the masses. As if nothing preceding Fellowship ever impacted anything in the fantasy realm. Total BS, really, but.....I fear it's nonetheless true, given....everything. I'll just stop this post here. I think I kinda had a point. Now, I think I've just depressed myself.

Absolutely not. Duck Soup, all the way. We all know it's widely considered their best, among their fans. The best of the "pure" Marx Bros versus the best of their "studio" fare. It can't be any other way.

We need this episode. Sooner rather than later.

Not enough warnings! I still clicked. Drawn to a shiny hyperlink like a moth. ...Are we meant to derive from these photos that the..."junk"...in question is Bowie's? It really doesn't feel right to say, but....I....just don't feel like those photos really....add much to the "not a codpiece" argument. Just saying. I haven't yet taken a side (for the record: I 100% don't care if it was a codpiece or not), but...how this "evidence" backs up your conclusion. Not seeing it. Gotta say.

I just have to add: Given the amount of (understandable) criticism thrown Jennifer Connelly's way in this week's episode....she did get better as an actress. I first saw her In The Rocketeer, one of the most - honestly - influential films of my coming-of-age years. Not only is it a wonderful film from top to bottom, but literally EVERYONE in the cast gives a good performance. Billy Campbell, the INCREDIBLE Timothy Dalton (long before I knew him as a very under-appreciated James Bond), Paul Sorvino, Alan Arkin, Terry O'Quinn. Connelly plays the damsel-role (not a shocker ever, but for a 1930/40sish serial-inspired adventure, all the more unsurprising), but I still appreciate that the film - for an early 90s mainstream film - still spends a good amount of time looking at the events on-screen through her perspective, motivated by her desires. She's not objectified, she's just the only female character in a movie almost entirely about dudes. Which...happens. But I maintain that it's nonetheless a really fun movie for kids, adults, men, women, genre-philes or history-phobes. It's an Art Deco, pre-WWII campy blast. Easy to love, easy to watch, fun all around. Holds up wonderfully. And, to the point, if you've been hung up on Connelly's less-than-great performance in Labyrinth, but don't want to go the full-on wrist-slittingly depressing Requiem For a Dream to see her do something good...well... ...Darren Aranovsky's Noah wasn't bad. Very, very interesting film, with a kinda-crazy take on the pre-Biblical Bible stuff, with good production values and a solid supporting cast.... ...But if you wanna see young Connelly in a really, really, really, really, really under-rated film: The Rocketeer. $3 rental on Youtube or Amazon. I'd totally do it right now, if I haven't done so many times over the years. And if I knew how to hook either up to my television. Stupid 00s-brain. Comparing Phoebe Cates, or Mia Sara, versus Jennifer Connelly, as Devin and Amy did for a good five minutes, just doesn't seem fair. More than most, we know these actresses were limited by the material they were given, more than by anything else. So, to be fair, look to the best material they were given. I feel comfortable in saying that - apart from that one episode of Arrested Development that Mia Sara guest-starred in - The Rocketeer is the most enjoyable film any of them have been in. Not necessarily best, from a dramatic standpoint, just most enjoyable. Which is absolutely worth something. A lot of somethings, actually. It's well worth a watch. Two hours, $3. For the best of early-90s Disney fare. An easy sit, and a pulpy delight. And if you see it, and don't like it, by all means give me $#!+. I guarantee I will reply. I love the film that much. I just, really, really wanted to pimp that out. Because I love that film, and I grew up loving it. So...why not?

Y'know, Damn you both, Devin and Amy. With love, but still. I've been such a stick-in-the-mud, fuddy-duddy, gatekeeper, whatever over the last year or so. Bitter that fully 3/4ths of all films put up should be so easily put into the Moste Vauntede Canone. But **** it, I wanted Pennies From Heaven put in, and I want Labyrinth put in. Have I been possessed by a poltergeist? Or have I been hypnotized by A) nostalgia B ) Bowie (I won't say what part of him), C) Very positive memories of later Jennifer Connelly films, D) the Python connection, or E) the Henson connection. Who cares? I'm not so much a critic this....month....I'm just a fan. I have no limits to my lack-of-objectivity. I'm running wild on something! Why Labyrinth? Because I want more films like it. Sure, it doesn't quite work. But it's EXACTLY the type of film I'd want young, hungry (probably well-connected) filmmakers today to look to for inspiration. I want young Hollywood execs saying "I want to make this generation's Labyrinth!". Not re-make (though that wouldn't be the worst idea given recent trends), but to make a new film based on what Labyrinth was trying to be, and the approach the filmmakers took to making it. Fury Road beat out Road Warrior, despite 30 years of riDICulously out-sized influence, because Amy really wanted to push it, not just as "the better film", but as a movie to inspire others. And so with Labyrinth. Inspire. And improve. I can't think of a better flawed film to base your own filmmaking dreams on. The world needs more Labyrinths. Faulty productions. Rough-around-the-edges. Editing....problems. But nonetheless a film that brought tons and oodles of good people together to make something they hoped would be special to a generation. And which succeeded, even if not exactly as they had intended. It's a cult film. It's a film that should inspire more filmmakers. It's well-worth watching, if only to better understand what wonderful things the Jim Henson workshops and Greater Muppetsylvania has meant over the years. No amount of $100 million CGI can fully replace this kind of simple inspiration. Damn the faults, full speed ahead! YES, YES, YEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSS on inclusion to The Canon!!! P.S. I will, almost certainly, revert to form with the next movie. "Stand By Me", while a competent film, just doesn't strike me, in any way, shape or form, as a movie that really means anything, except maybe to the people who grew up watching it. Which I didn't. Sorry. River Phoenix? Corey Feldman? Guy from Sliders? Wesley Crusher? Jack Bauer? Meh.....the film is OK. I don't feel the feels. I suspect part of my vote (not the result, just this post), is partly based on how bored I suspect I'll be next Monday. I'll listen all the same. But I just don't connect with this film, and I doubt I ever will.

Bigelow was already put up, with The Hurt Locker, but didn't make it in. Most of the films you've listed, I've never seen. Including American Psycho, which I have heard so much about over the years (for all the talk of satire, it still feels so toxic, I'm certain I'd hate it), but not until now did I hear it was directed by a woman! !!! <----- Seriously! The only one I have seen is Lost in Translation. Which, given its crazy popularity among people of a very Canon age (including me, for once, I wasn't too old or too young to miss the boat on this one, I was the perfect age!), as well as all the controversies that have, if anything, gotten more pointed over the years, I do feel it would make for a fantastic episode. Even if, I guess, it would be the "mainstream" pick of all the titles you've provided.

This was a weird one. I voted many hours ago, but I had no idea how to explain it. I'll just try to keep it simple: The film doesn't really work for me. But I admire the HELL out of what they were trying to do. Science teaches that there are no failed experiments, just experiments that don't work out they way you intended them to (and some of those end up resulting in some damn-near magical findings, see also penicillin). I could easy argue that Pennies From Heaven doesn't belong in The Canon, because it didn't accomplish what (I suspect) it set out to do: transplant a 1930s musical into a 1970s world (it's still New Hollywood, thus 70s). It has the surface, but it flatly rejects the core. All that ends up doing is stripping the varnish off of the old formula (EDIT: OK, those analogies don't mesh, but you get me I think, since the surface WAS the core of the 30s musicals, just the happy emotional bits of it), and replace it with....a depressing acknowledgment that A) they don't accurately reflect the very non-fluffiness of reality and B ) that filmmakers don't even WANT to make those kinds of films anymore (unless maybe you're Peter Bogdanovich). So what did you accomplish? I think I understand where Astaire was coming from; while paying homage to the world he grew up and thrived in, they were also clearly trying to bury it. But....it's a ballsy production. It's an original. It doesn't come together, but it's got really good parts. It's a worthy failure of a film. Or, perhaps, just a belated, depressing, coda to an era as much as an homage to it. But it still says a lot about both its time, and about the time it's reflecting. And if it failed at the time of release, and if it's been forgotten since then, all the more relevant it seems. Funerals are depressing, but they still have meaning, BECAUSE something is gone and is never coming back. This film was a funeral. Pennies From Heaven just doesn't work as a film. But it's still a worthy attempt. A worthy homage. A worthy counterpoint. And a meaningful nail in the coffin of a time in film that had passed. And, while I typically feel that the bar for The Canon tends to be set too low....I still wanted to vote yes on this one. But it's a borderline, kinda confused yes. It deserves to be remembered, and to be seen. Even if it, technically, isn't very good. Just see a couple of the original 30s musicals first, so you know what it's referencing. And if it doesn't work for you, try The Purple Rose of Cairo. That's a less-ambitious film on a similar subject, but one that's a lot easier to like. Together, they make for an excellent reflection on a very big decade in Hollywood's past, and the long shadow it created for those who remember it. I'd vote for that film too, and probably pick it in a versus, but I won't take anything away from the makers of this film. Only in New Hollywood could you see a movie like Pennies From Heaven. For that alone, it's an illustrative film. Just not an easy one to love. For me, at least. $#!+, Cannibal Holocaust is in.

1. Dark City happened. More specifically, its box office. His next movie, six years later, was "I Robot"*. Yeah...... 2. As for Gods of Egypt...that's one of the most baffling productions I've heard of in a while. Not that I've heard anything specific. I'd love to. There's gotta be a story there. A baffling one. $140 million. For a film not based on any existing IP, but based on a subject 99% of the audience probably know next-to-nothing about. By a writer/producer/director who, while coming off of two modest successes (at best, international grosses are hard to account for), never had a true blockbuster. He's made five films in 22 years. And he's not Kubrick. I'm sure we all want more original big-budget films. But every time a Gods of Egypt is made, probably five original ideas get the axe. * - Yes, I know that title was added really late in production.

I still have a soft spot in my heart for the first two episodes, Goodfellas and Temple of Doom. They weren't MY first two episodes (I started with Casino Royale, because Matt Gourley), but they did a great job setting up the series. Devin trying to provoke Amy and acting totally condescending, and Amy (at least in my mind) spending most of the episode sitting back, incredulous, but never backing down. Devin's 11th-hour twist in the Temple of Doom-cast made a great episode perfect. I knew then that this podcast was a keeper.

I'll take that, if that's that's the only Wachowski Starship I'm likely to get (other than boring slam-dunk Matrix). I haven't seen it [speed Racer] in any form, but I know it's a highly-controversial technical-failure, so I have no doubt it would make for a fun episode. But I've actually read Cloud Atlas, and seen it, and bought it, and seen it again. So I'm horribly biased. That could be a landmark episode, I feel, if either/both Devin and Amy were sufficiently teetering on the line, as I suspect they would be, since almost every critic was. Ambitious failure? Certainly. But still easy to grok. And several movies in one. Crazy film. What more films should be.

I 100% believe Amy's putting her heart on the line when she put this up for her indulgence pick. Like with "Creed", Devin plays the odds as much as anything. Like, above all else, he doesn't wanna lose. He'll pick his most winningest personal pick, then call in everyone and La Grande Armee to vote for him. Re-Animator wasn't half so daring a pick as Pennies From Heaven. A decades-long genre staple versus a forgotten film from a forgotten genre in a forgotten era. Amy picked something she's all-but-certain will lose, which really honors the idea of an indulgence pick, as laid down long before the Re-Animator episode. I gotta admit, it really builds up the feels. I really wanna give her every benefit of the doubt. I just haven't seen the film yet. I rented it on Amazon. I'm just waiting. Hopefully, I'll pull the trigger before Monday, so I can honestly vote on it. But, however it goes, Amy's pick just makes me like her, as a movie lover, more than ever. She's got guts.

I'm so ****ing down for this! Granted, I'd rather the less-attention-grabbing A Very Long Engagement get the attention, as I personally prefer it as a watch, but as I have a rudimentary understanding of Canon probability, I know it'll never happen. 'Cuz ain't nobody's heard of it who hasn't already seeen Amelie. Any Jeunet. City of Lost Children. S'all good. We still haven't gotten a Gilliam, but Jeunet's plenty good for scratching that itch, I must say. Also, Dark City, Director's Cut if at all possible. See it if you like ANY film mentioned here. Any. And that's all I got here.

Tree of Life at #7. ... OK.... Good thing I don't take these kindsa lists seriously. Somehow, whether they're uber-critically-tilted or uber-pop-tilted, they never fail to go way over the rails. No, I don't think The Dark Knight is one of the greatest films of the last twenty years. I also don't think Mulholland Drive is one of the best. What is? I don't know, but neither of those. Honestly, I could buy almost all of these films being in the Top 100. But I can't hardly buy any of them in the Top Ten. Whatever that means. Sure, #4, #21, #73, #87, and #95 are all personal favorites. But even they I don't necessarily see as Top Ten. OK, maybe the first two. I guess I'm against the idea of any kind of list. It's hard enough making my own Top Ten (I don't currently have one, and haven't for about a decade), but limiting to films I've seen maybe once or twice? Just impossible.

These were good films, but they made me feel real bad afterwards (EDIT: Well, and even moreso during). I prefer their early, funny ones.

Piss on you, I'm voting for Mel Brooks! This movie is fearless satire that not only defined an era in comedy, but revolutionized the whole genre going forward. It's both low comedy and high comedy. It trades in adult gags, and Looney Tunes. It has four great comedians (Brooks, Wilder, Khan, Korman) at/near the tops of their game. And it's the greatest (EDIT: American) comedy of the 1970s. A few jokes don't work anymore, but the vast majority do. Pretty damn good for a 40+ year old comedy.

It's been a long time since I've seen Pennies from Heaven, and I don't even remember if the music is any good (I'm sure Bernadette was good, at least). Based on fresher memories, though, I wonder if I'll get flashbacks to Russell Crowe's Javert. Oh, Amy. However I end up voting, you're still the cool one. EDIT: Oh wait...they're all lip-synching? So....what's the big worry? Just that the leads aren't dancers? Actually, now that I'm reading up (I really didn't remember much), this sounds like a mash-up of Purple Rose of Cairo and Dancer in the Dark. As a conceit, that sounds pretty interesting.

That technically didn't, I think you mean. Dreamworks didn't pick up from Prince of Egypt AT ALL. Honestly, if there's any film that it reminds me of most of all, it's Anastasia. Prince of Egypt felt more Bluthian than Disney. Or Dreamworks-ian, really. Heartfelt, sincere, but derivative. It copied off of the established formula, rather than either develop it, or perfect it. Shrek set the tone for all future Dreamworks films (even A Shark Tale......*Sideshow Bob/rake noise*). HtTYD is a tale of modern teenagers in vaguely Viking times, mostly of an outcast nothing who makes good when the situation demands it of him, just as Kung Fu Panda is about a chubby, schlubby under-achiever who makes good when the situation demands it of him. Same formula as Pixar's A Bug's Life, or Dreamworks' Antz, or, back to the point, Shrek. Which preceded all of them by years. And whereas HtTYD has the beautiful animation (especially the 3D, which would be hard to talk about in a podcast), and whereas the first Shrek had some pitch-perfect genre satire (Welcome to Dulock, such a perfect town...."You’re meant to charge in, sword drawn, banner flying-that’s what all the other knights did....Yeah, right before they burst into flame!"), like modern Fractured Fairy Tale, Prince of Egypt was a 90s Broadway musical that came late to the party and was probably lucky to stiill be acknowledged once the party's energy (after Hunchback and Mulan, etc.) had moved on.

I too haven't seen Prince of Egypt for a long time. I remember finding it...interesting enough, but being really pissed off (I was a teenager) by the comic relief and the musical numbers. I think I just wanted a more-identifiable, modern take on "The Ten Commandments" (freed from all its old-school operaticness), but what I took away was a film that seemed split between an earnest and emotional personal story of Moses and Rameses, and a wannabe-90s-Disney Broadway production. It's been a long time since then, though. I'm hardly primed to re-watch it, but I totally could. I do understand that it's pretty well-thought-of these days. It WOULD make for a fun episode, I think. I really, really want The Canon to try more honestly borderline picks. Court controversy. Risk rejection. Talk about the non-slam-dunks. -- (EDIT: I mean, who the **** is gonna vote AGAINST Blazing Saddles?) -- I know we all love film here, but...harping an an old point...I am SOOOOOOOO much more interested in sussing out where that line between Canon and non-Canon lies. Safe, great films can be fun topics as fluff, but if you know going in that the film is clearly gonna get in, it just isn't that interesting. Versus episodes, at the very least, insist that the sponsors/defenders of the less-popular film bring their A-game to try to make their case, just as episodes of borderline picks spark a real debate, soul-searching, etc. The Prince of Egypt would make for a pretty good discussion, I would think, because, while I understand it's well thought-of (and I didn't hate it), I honestly don't know if it would make it in. And that makes for an exciting episode. Where will Devin and Amy fall? Where will the forum fall? I don't know! That's genuine bomb-under-the-table Hitchcockian suspense, I tell you what!

Dare I suggest The Iron Giant v The Incredibles...? Either one would surely get in on its own (since it seems pretty easy to get in if you're generally popular), but which of the two mid-20th-century pulp-inspired Brad Birds would come out on top?

Yeah, as much as I love Shrek (only the first, ONLY the first!) and the HtTYD films, I wouldn't call any of them "great". They all have their great moments, but are also very uneven films that fall back on decades-old tropes. The sequels keep riding over the same ground, instead of making small, but impactful, developments like the Toy Story films, and the more satirical movies just feel like Looney Tunes, minus the brevity. And the only films Dreamworks' formula seems to have inspired are low-budget clones like Hoodwinked. I don't know which one I would nominate first. Not because there are too many candidates, but because there are too few. Whereas you could put any two Toy Story films up for a versus, and I can see a good episode. Also, Wall-E, The Incredibles, maybe even Finding Nemo.