The Next Picture Show Podcast

#509: Captive Audiences, Pt. 2 — Dead Man's Wire by The Next Picture Show Even without the Al Pacino connection, Gus Van Sant's new dramatization of a real-life 1970s hostage situation turned public spectacle was destined for comparisons to Dog Day Afternoon.

DEAD MAN'S WIRE takes some clear scene-for-scene inspiration from Sidney Lumet's DOG DAY AFTERNOON — but then, they're both based-on-a-true-crime thrillers about ordinary people taking hostages and winning unlikely fandoms. We compare and contrast this week: cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

New ep! Gus Van Sant's DEAD MAN'S WIRE has us looking back to a previous true-story crime drama about a hostage crisis set off by ordinary people. Sidney Lumet's tremendous DOG DAY AFTERNOON has a thousand moving parts, and we unpack them layer by layer. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

Timothée Chalamet in MARTY SUPREME: Lovable rascal? Irredeemable asshole? Just a twerp? We had different takes on the character, the film, and the UNCUT GEMS BUT WITH PING-PONG experience. Plus, we compare it to Robert Rossen's 1961 sports-brat movie THE HUSTLER. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

This week, we look at the underrated (and maybe too weird for the mainstream?) 2025 fantasy-comedy ETERNITY, and consider how its oppressive afterlife bureau, hard postmortem choices, and big emotions compare to the ones in Hirozaku Kore-eda's lyrical AFTER LIFE. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

This week, the new rom-com ETERNITY inspired a look back at a different film about an afterlife bureaucracy forcing people to make sense of their lives via difficult, personal choices after death: Hirozaku Kore-eda's dreamy, earnest 1998 movie AFTER LIFE. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

In our latest ep, Netflix's TRAIN DREAMS reminded us of Terrence Malick's 1978 movie DAYS OF HEAVEN, featuring a young Richard Gere as a man more in touch with the natural world than his own emotions. Let's discuss Linda Manz's voiceover and what it really means! cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

It's our 10th anniversary and 500th episode, so we celebrated by breaking format: This week, we discuss the movie we're named for, Peter Bogdanovich's forlorn, star-packed 1971 drama THE LAST PICTURE SHOW, then revive the ol' Barnyard Buzzers for an NPS trivia game. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

A silhouette of a man in a fedora and suit, seen behind with his arms extended outward , palms up as if he's directing traffic. The man is hovering above a street full of cars, in a black-and-white city.

New ep! Radu Jude's latest wild provocation, DRACULA, inspired a look back at a previous surreal story about a filmmaker fumbling for ideas: Federico Fellini's startlingly meta 1963 movie 8 1/2, with a thinly veiled Fellini trying to define the movie as you watch it. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

#497: First Strikes, Pt. 2 — A House of Dynamite by The Next Picture Show Is Kathryn Bigelow's hooky premise enough to support a successful movie?

The second episode of our FAIL-SAFE/A HOUSE OF DYNAMITE pairing, with special guest @jasondashbailey.com, is posted. Come celebrate 60 years of plausible, sleep-robbing nuclear scenarios with us! megaphone.link/FILM2925391917

This week we're comparing Akira Kurosawa's HIGH AND LOW with Spike Lee's reimagining HIGHEST 2 LOWEST. The new film tells the same story, plus a lot of modern wrinkles and familiar Lee touches, and a battle-rap the original is notably missing. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

New ep! Spike Lee's HIGHEST 2 LOWEST, now on Apple TV Plus, prompted us to look back at the original adaptation of Ed McBain's KING'S RANSOM: Akira Kurosawa's stunning morality play, police procedural, and class drama HIGH AND LOW, still an absolute stunner. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

This week: In honor of the 2025 NAKED GUN, we look back at the 1988 OG movie, talking about what distinguishes ZAZ comedies from Mel Brooks or more modern SCARY MOVIE-type send-ups, and breaking down what makes some gags timeless, while others age like dead fish. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

New ep! Chris Klimek (ctklimek.bsky.social) joins us to talk Superman, this week starting with our favorite on-screen Supersmen, then taking a deep dive into Richard Donner's 1978 movie, with its classic choices and its extreme ones. Can you read our miiinds? cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

New ep! Inspired by PAVEMENTS, we're talking about movies that prioritize conveying a musician's essence over covering biographical fact. @noelmu.bsky.social joins us this week as we start with Todd Haynes' freewheelin’ approach to Bob Dylan in I'M NOT THERE. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

This week, we consider the terrifying worlds Tim Robinson characters create just by existing. And we consider how the writhing discomfort comedy of FRIENDSHIP works as a double feature with PT Anderson's THE MASTER, also about a squirmy mentorship/friendship. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

This week, inspired by the thorny tragicomic Tim Robinson/Paul Rudd mentorship in FRIENDSHIP, we worked on unpacking the fraught, complicated, endlessly mysterious Joaquin Phoenix/Philip Seymour Hoffman mentorship in Paul Thomas Anderson's THE MASTER: cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

Last week, we revisited 1999's MYSTERY MEN, about a group of inept amateur superheroes operating in the shadow of a more popular, powerful hero. This week, we turn to Marvel's THUNDERBOLTS*. These films have a lot more specific, surprising parallels than we expected. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

Thank you, we appreciate it! (More coming -- we've gotten a lot of fun feedback.)

Let's get furious! This week, inspired by THUNDERBOLTS*, we look back at MYSTERY MEN, another third-string-superheros movie about an awkward group of street-level types with self-esteem issues and family problems, living in the shadow of a much shinier hero. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

This week, David Cronenberg's THE SHROUDS inspired a look back at his most mainstream movie (and, as we discuss, his last horror film?), 1986's THE FLY. These movies have so many parallels, from terrible possessive exes to obsessions with decay — and "the flesh." cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

This week, Steven Soderbergh's BLACK BAG prompted a look back at another couple solving a mystery via fancy dinner party, in 1934's THE THIN MAN. This franchise-launcher is notable for many things, but especially Nick & Nora's casual, breezy loyalty and chemistry. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

Last week: Paul Verhoeven's STARSHIP TROOPERS mocks fascism. This week: Bong Joon-ho's MICKEY 17 mocks capitalism. Both do it via doofuses at war with space bugs, and via exaggerated, over-the-top satirical rancor. We dig into how they line up and how they diverge.
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Have you been eavesdropping on our planning meetings?

Unforch, we can't do VIRGINIA WOOLF, we already paired that one early on, back in 2016!

We're back! This week, Bong Joon-ho's MICKEY 17 has us looking back at Paul Verhoeven's STARSHIP TROOPERS, another book adaptation where "idiots needlessly go to war with space bugs." We argue about his intended satire of fascism, and whether it lands as intended: cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

Guess what?

This week: Inspired by EEPHUS's feature-length subversion of “the big game,” we're joined by pinch-hitter @timgrierson.bsky.social to look back at 1988’s BULL DURHAM and see how what's often cited as one of the best baseball movies ever lives up to that reputation: cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

This week, we're breaking from the usual pairing format to discuss our top 10 movies of 2024. Some of these picks won't be a surprise if you've followed along with the show. Others… well, we all ended this recording with some new catch-ups added to our watch lists. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

This week: We explore NICKEL BOYS, RaMell Ross’s adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer-winning novel, and compare it with THE DEFIANT ONES (which Ross draws footage from) in terms of themes, perspective, and how to unpack those two pregnant, haunting endings. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

This week: NICKEL BOYS' use of footage from Stanley Kramer's 1958 race-relations thriller THE DEFIANT ONES made us curious, so we checked it out to see how the two connect. Sidney Poitier and Tony Curtis are tremendous in this message movie about convicts on the run: cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...

This week, we talk WICKED: PART I: the material added to the stage show, the odd treatment of the songs, the audacious approach, the believability of the Elphaba/Glinda friendship. Then we compare it with WIZARD OF OZ's heroic journey, resolutions, and more. cms.megaphone.fm/channel/FLM2...