28 thoughts on “Movie Podcast Weekly Ep. 225: Gold (2017) and The Founder (2017)”

1. Jason Pyles – I’m all for re-watching movies we love, especially when it’s at the behest of our children, but I’m shaking my head at you for still not watching The Wailing. Josh and many others of us have urged you to watch this film. It’s required viewing for a horror fan, and I would argue it’s required viewing for anyone interested in foreign cinema – it currently holds a 99% on Rotten Tomatoes with an average rating of 8/10 (and holds an average rating of 4/5 from viewers). The Wailing isn’t just a great horror movie, it’s a great movie. Period.

   This might also be one for Andy. Can we still give him homework?

   Reply ↓

   • Hello Dino,

     I saw the wailing and it was ok, it did drag on some of the scenes which could have been edited better. I must not love horror films and I am giving it a 6.5/10.

     J should see “I am not a serial Killer” first which is a great film and had me totally engrossed.. 8/10

     Also Dino I would love to hear your thoughts on the Amazon original series “Patriot” which you can stream the first episode now and rest will be available 2/24. Based on the first episode alone I am giving it a 9.5/10 and looking forward to more. Let me know what you think.

     Mario

     Reply ↓

     • @Mario,
       “I Am Not a Serial Killer” is going on the list.
       Thanks!
       J

       Reply ↓

     • I Am Not a Serial Killer was one of my favorite horror films of 2016. My 5th favorite, to be exact. Excellent film, to be sure. A ton of fun…

       But it’s no The Wailing. 😉

       I’m glad you posted this comment, though. Hopefully it will help temper Jason’s expectations.

       Reply ↓

   • Dino,
     You’re exactly right. But I have good news! I’m watching “The Wailing” within the next 12 hours before tomorrow night’s HMP recording. You’ll soon hear my report! : )
     Thanks,
     J
     P.S. Yes, Andy is more or less “back” on MPW again (I think), and he does still accept homework. : )

     Reply ↓

     • I’ll believe it when I see (hear) it. 😉

       Just a word of warning (which I’m sure Josh and others may have already alerted you to): the beginning 20-30 minutes does have some odd humor. Tonally, it’s very different from where the movie goes, but it’s also important that it’s included in the film. Just stick with it.

       Reply ↓

2. I’m really excited for the upcoming launch of the Movie Podcast Network special features feed. Would you guys consider also doing a MPN master feed that collects all the regular releases from all the network shows? I’m not sure how that would affect your download numbers from an analytics perspective, but from a completely self-ish place it would make my podcast app a little tidier. 😉

   Reply ↓

   • Thanks, Dino.
     That’s a smart question, and yes, we’ve been considering that. People may not want to read all this inside baseball, but here’s the real answer thus far:

     We’re leaning toward this exclusive content feed only (and not ALL episodes), because my Horror Palace days taught me that not everyone wants to receive automatic downloads from every show. In fact, some people avoided “The Monster Feed” for this reason. We have a number of listeners who listen to every podcast, Network-wide, but we gather from our download numbers that most people sort of cherry-pick the shows that interest them most, cafeteria-style.

     The other consideration is all our individual websites and feeds are already well established. And some shows even have various little sponsors set up with those numbers they’re currently getting. So, if people left our individual feeds to join the one Special Features feed, it might throw off some of the things we have in place thus far.

     But I can certainly appreciate wanting a “one feed to rule them all” to simplify things.

     My other concern is, I honestly think we’re going to overwhelm people with the amount of content that’s coming… If you got all the Network’s free episodes each month, and then the number of bonuses that are coming, people might just get overwhelmed and quit us altogether… ha ha

     I will say, we recorded the first Special Features episode this past Saturday, and I’m very proud of what we’ll be delivering to our listeners. I think y’all are gonna dig it.

     Thanks,
     J

     Reply ↓

     • Fair enough, Jason. I certainly don’t mind subscribing to each show individually. Just trying to simplify my own life! haha

       Reply ↓

3. You brought up there being no major nominations from films released in the first half of the year and how that was irritating. I’m just curious, other than maybe ‘Deadpool’ and ‘The Witch’ what movies do you feel from the first half of this year should have earned some noms? I personally felt that the majority of the best films of 2016 came in the 2nd half, and most were after September.

   And I think the first half of the year has been represented in the past more than you realize. Just a quick look, and I found 22 Best Picture winners released between January and July. These include ‘Silence of the Lambs,’ ‘Braveheart,’ ‘Casablanca,’ and ‘The Godfather’ to just name a few.

   It’s an interesting topic for sure and I think the studios definitely back load their releases with what they consider to be Oscar bait.

   Reply ↓

   • Also, while Hell or High Water wasn’t necessarily released in the first half of the year, an early August release is not exactly “Oscar season.”

     Reply ↓

     • Hell or High Water has stuck with me more than probably any movie I’ve seen from 2016.

       Reply ↓

       • Yeah, some people seem to have reacted a great deal to it. I felt it was a good movie, but frankly I’m a bit surprised it’s a best picture nominee. Whether or not I agree, it’s good to see a movie like that get the nom.

         Reply ↓

         • It was a movie that did an amazing job of building on each scene. To get really nerdy, it has one of the best story structures I’ve ever seen.

           When I was watching it initially I wasn’t really into it; I thought it was fine, but just wasn’t completely feeling it. Then around the 30 or 40 minute mark I started getting more invested and then within twenty more minutes I was on the edge of my seat. And the best ending I saw in 2016 hands down.

           And Chris Pine and Ben Foster are just so freaking good.

           Reply ↓

           • I had a similar experience of getting more invested in the story as it progressed. Ultimately, though, it just didn’t have as much of an impact on me as something like Moonlight or Arrival.

             Reply ↓

         • But I definitely seem to be in the minority on that around here.

           Reply ↓

           • Still need to see Moonlight but I had Arrival ahead of it. In fact Arrival was my number 1 and Hell or High Water was number 2.

             Reply ↓

   • Good research, Jonathan. I’ll ask Karl to weigh in on this, too. But I know one we lamented all last year was that John Goodman’s performance in “10 Cloverfield Lane” (released in March 2016) was going to be overlooked…

     And really, I think we’re complaining about the symptoms, rather than the problem here, which is if we didn’t have this “award season” time of year, then perhaps we could enjoy “good movies” year round, and not just November through January…

     J

     Reply ↓

     • The John Goodman performance is a good example. I was just looking at Best Pictures because I was curious. It really does feel like Goodman did something to piss someone off for never getting a nomination.

       Reply ↓

4. I haven’t listened to this episode yet, but wanted to chime in to thank Andy/Randy/Mandy/Brandy (or whoever it was that week) for the recommendation of “3 Mics” by Neal Brennan. Excellent show! I kind of wish he gave a little bit more time to the first mic with the one-liners, as I like that kind of thing… it was more like 2 1/2 mics. But the meat of it on the other two was truly great.

   Speaking of comedy shows on Netflix, a friend had recommended Bo Burnham to me and I watched his two Netflix specials recently. I think the newer one (Make Happy) is much stronger than the other one (what.), but man, is he talented and creative, and I think only like 26 years old now. Really in your face and pushes the boundaries of what you expect from a show like that. I would highly recommend checking him out if you like live comedy. Might not necessarily be your thing if you enjoy and expect more traditional stand-up, but I think you would at least appreciate some of what he brings to the genre (including some very funny songs).

   My favorite comedian (that is still doing comedy; George Carlin and Richard Pryor are dead and Steve Martin hasn’t done live comedy in decades) is Demetri Martin. Super clever stuff. That being said, his latest special, which is on Netflix, is not as good as some of his earlier shows, which you can listen to from iTunes/Apple, etc. He also has two books that are excellent; This is a Book (a collection of funny stories, essays, oddities and pictures), and Point Your Face at This (a collection of his picture humor).

   ——————

   Also, Lego Batman is awesome. I’d say very comparable to the Lego Movie (uh, I guess that means J won’t like it) in terms of entertainment and fun, and it is actually a pretty decent Batman movie in its own right, with a solid story and good message and resolution. I’ll give it an 8.5 for now, but that might go up when I see it again at some point.

   Reply ↓

   • Eric,

     I loved the hell out of the first thirty minutes of the Lego Batman movie and the rest was kind of hit or miss for me. But still overall I really enjoyed it; it’s a 7.5 for me.

     And you are correct, it’s a decent ‘Batman’ movie in its own right. It’s definitely better than ‘Batman Forever’ (although this movie made me realize how much I love the color scheme of that movie), ‘Batman and Robin,’ 1960’s ‘Batman’ movie, and ‘Dark Knight Rises.’

     Reply ↓

5. Jason, about “Meet the parents”, I think you should watch the second movie, it’s really good. In fact, in my opinion it’s better than the first one.
   I can’t say the same about the third movie, though. You should probably skip it…

   I love your podcast! Great job!

   Reply ↓

6. Watched the first Young Pope and like Karl, I didn’t love it. Younger, edgy pope… okay, fine. The premise is interesting, but I just wasn’t grabbed by it.

   My understanding, though, is that he was given that position as sort of a conspiracy. There’s that group of 3-4 guys that meet together and are talking about how they should be able to control him. And I thought there was something said there about them voting him into his position to begin with, for that purpose. I may be remembering that wrong, though.

   Reply ↓

7. I would like to expand on Mario’s comment…

   More Karl than J.
   More Ry than J.
   More Andy than J.

   😀

   Reply ↓

   • I feel like this is probably what hating the cinema (and loving Gods of Egypt) gets you, in the end.

     Reply ↓

8. We watched A Dog’s Purpose last night. I’ve tried to read the book twice and found the writing too irritating to finish. It’s in first person/dog, and sometimes he has funny ways to describe objects he comes across that he doesn’t understand and other times his narration has much more obscure (for a dog) vocabulary.

   I’m sorry to say the movie would be better if they’d had someone other than Josh Gad as the narrator. And the screenplay also had too much narration to start with. There were several moments where the audience is smart enough to figure out what’s going on without being told – even the little tykes. So it pulls you out of the scene a bit instead of drawing you in.

   The movie is fine for dog lovers – despite the fact that you have to go through multiple death scenes. The dogs are cute. The main story line is compelling. There are several giggle moments. (Though for a PG show, there’re an awful lot of abusive relationships.)

   We’ll certainly see it again with our teenagers. But we won’t be buying the DVD. 6 out of 10. Rental.

   PS. I saw the behind the scene video that stirred up some controversy. Meh. If making your little one take a bath when they don’t feel like it is abuse, a lot of us are in trouble.

   Reply ↓

9. “I feel like we at least showed up and did something on here, right?”

   Hit it, John Cougar Mellencamp: https://youtu.be/qOfkpu6749w?t=57s

   Reply ↓

   • Also, can we please make “I feel like we at least showed up and did something on here, right?” the official slogan of the new Movie Podcast Network? 🙂 Pure gold, Jay. I back that idea 100 percent.

     Reply ↓