The Establishing Shot

Steven Spielberg is one of the greatest filmmakers of all time. Although his career started with a bang as he basically fathered the modern summer blockbuster with Jaws, it hasn’t been without its ups and downs. One thing that you can never take away from him, however, is both his genius behind the camera and his passion for his projects. In this bittersweet episode, we finish our Spielberg series by taking a look back over his ent...

The horror genre is a beloved one, and it is teeming with multitudes of subgenres. We explore all of these subgenres in this week’s movie draft. From slashers to paranormal to monster movies and more, the exploration of our fears and anxieties are taken on in these various forms. We draft everything from old classic Universal monster movies to modern horror hits and everything in between. 

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Sometimes a new director comes out firing on all cylinders and puts out a great film with their very first feature film. In this week’s movie draft, we explore some great debut films from directors, everyone from Sydney Lumet, Rob Reiner, and even Sam Raimi may get shoutouts amongst other great directors! The main stipulation: no directors with less than 4 films (at the time of recording). As we look to close out our Spielberg seri...

In Steven Spielberg’s The Fabelmans, we get a wonderful gift toward the end of his career. We get a skeleton key that unlocks the reasons behind so much of what we know and love about Spielberg and his storytelling. This film is the culmination of a career in so many ways for Spielberg, and it is truly a key to seeing so many of his films with an even wider scope. Not only that, but we get all the things we love about a Spielberg m...

Movie Musicals used to be a staple of the movie industry, but despite them being far from driving the industry in modern times, we still have plenty of great ones! In this movie draft, we choose from 21st Century movie musicals, a draft inspired by our discussion of Spielberg’s West Side Story (which is the main honorable mention for this one). We take everything from adaptations of stage musical classics to fully original concepti...

It was a lifelong dream of Spielberg’s to direct a musical movie, and even more specifically, to adapt West Side Story. The question of whether we needed another adaptation of this beloved stage musical is a legitimate one. But with his mastery of staging, composition, camera movement, and visual storytelling, Spielberg makes the case that not only was a new adaptation ok to do but that it was needed. Enhanced by powerhouse perform...

Motion Capture technology has been around since the late 90s in feature films, starting with Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace. Spielberg has had his own run of utilizing MoCap in various capacities with The Adventures of Tintin, The BFG, and Ready Player One. In lieu of that, we took the opportunity to do a movie draft where we drafted our favorite MoCap performances. Spoiler: Andy Serkis was of course taken more than once.

At the point in his career where Spielberg took on the adaptation of the popular novel Ready Player One, he was due for another technological challenge. While not a Spielberg favorite or master work, there is no denying his touch on the movie (without which this project might have been doomed). Although this was a financial success and looked impressive, it got mixed reception and is most likely a lower tier movie by Spielberg’s st...

Whether it is journalism, novels, songs, or even emails, there are a plethora of films that celebrate writers. With this movie draft, we aim to do the same thing! In this draft, we take our favorite “writers in movies”, using that category with creative freedom. This draft was originally done to go with a discussion of Wes Anderson’s The French Dispatch, but this release is in accordance with a discussion of Steven Spielberg’s The ...

When The Post was released in 2017, it was released into a political climate that was fraught with distrust and an anxiety about the loss of the freedom to seek the truth. Many wondered then if this based-on-a-true-story political thriller by Spielberg starring powerhouses Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks was just a product of the cultural atmosphere it was made in. Little did they know that 8 years later we might be worse off than ever....

This fall, there are a lot of interesting movies being released! But don’t fret! I go through the entire fall winter movie slate for you in this episode to clue you in on what to mark on your calendar. We have everything from new entries from great directors (Paul Thomas Anderson, Kogonada, Kelly Reichardt, Edgar Wright, Noah Baumbach, Richard Linklater, Yorgos Lanthimos, Luca Guadagnino, Chloe Zhao) to sequels and franchise entrie...

With fantastical giants, dreams you can catch and blow into the heads of sleeping children, and a child who is swept away in adventure beyond her imagination, The BFG is, in a way, Spielberg getting back to his roots. While there is plenty of charm in the imagining of this Roald Dahl adaptation and a ton of humanity in the Motion Capture (MoCap) performance of Mark Rylance, the story and characters built could have done with some m...

Cold War movies have been releasing since the end of WWII, and in this movie draft, we explore the plethora of options. There are spy movies, political thrillers, sci-fi metaphors, satires, sports movies, and so many more genres to choose from. We had a lot of fun discussing the nuances of these movies, what thematic aspects make them Cold War coded, and end up with a diverse spread of films. 

Bridge of Spies might be one of Spielberg’s most underrated films, and an argument could be made for it being his best of the 2010s. Being his 4th collaboration with Tom Hanks and his 1st with Mark Rylance, this film supports top notch acting and a superb script with precise and interesting editing. We talk about all of this and whether James B. Donovan ever got over that darned cold in this episode.

Presidents are portrayed in movies in so many different ways: fictional presidents, real presidents, real presidents in a fictional role, satirical presidents, and so many more. Our movie draft this week, in which we draft both real and fictional portrayals of US presidents covers these wide varieties as we discuss what we love most about some of the best film versions of our commander in chief. This draft was in honor of our discu...

What do you get when you have one of our all time great directors in Spielberg with one of our all time great actors in Daniel Day-Lewis playing one of our all time great US Presidents? You get one of our all time great president movies in Lincoln! We talk about the incredible performances, the masterful script from Tony Kushner, the subtle camera moves, the top notch production design, and much more in this great discussion of Lin...

Animals in movies are great! When a character gets to ride a cool animal in a movie…even better! This week, we are doing a draft of “ridden animals” in movies in honor of our discussion of Spielberg’s War Horse last week. Horses, mythical creatures, giant lizard things…who knows what we will pick?! Listen to find out if we picked your favorite ridden movie animals!

This time it’s Spielberg but with horses! War Horse has its problems, such as the question of who it’s for (kids or adults) or its prolonged runtime, but overall, its beautiful cinematography and composition along with its sentimentality that toes the line of sentimental schlock without ever crossing it make for an enjoyable and even hopeful movie. Adapted from Michael Morpurgo’s children’s novel of the same name, this movie has it...

WE MADE IT TO 100! It’s been a great journey to get here. I’ve learned a lot along the way and met some amazing people. To celebrate, I share some reflections, have listeners and past/future guests share their favorite films covered so far, and I share my top 10 films of 2025 so far. You don’t want to miss this special episode!