Filmspotting
Adam Kempenaar and Josh Larsen review new and classic movies, offering "affable, insightful film analysis since 2005" (NY Times).
Episodes
As part of 2020's Christopher Nolan Oeuvre-view, Adam and Josh revisited 2006's The Prestige, which like his new The Odyssey, is among the rare Nolans adapted from existing material.
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Matt and Jordan give Hulu’s new multiverse revenge thriller Redux Redux a spin, crediting Kevin and Matthew McManus’s film for its low-budget stylishness and its central performance (by another McManus, sister Michaela). Then some Redux-inspired streaming recommendations, answers to a listener request for off-the-grid heist movies, and a game (“Multi-Box Letter-Verse”) hosted by Producer Sam.
Intro / The Ody...
Considering The Odyssey is one of the most famous and influential stories of all time, there had been relatively few attempts to directly translate Homer’s epic poem to the big screen until Christopher Nolan came along to do it at a blockbuster scale. It’s been more common for filmmakers, such as Joel and Ethan Coen, to use it as the loose framework for a flawed hero’s journey home, such as the one under...
Film critic Amy Nicholson joins host Michael Phillips to test a set of unofficial Hollywood axioms: Preston Sturges’ 11 Rules for Box Office Appeal.
Written (or so the story goes) in the early 1940s, the list is equal parts joke and provocation, a series of blunt, sometimes baffling claims about what makes movies work. But taken together, the rules point toward something more coherent: a theory of cinema built on movem...
The Dissident Cinema Marathon continues with Marcel Ophuls’s towering 1969 documentary The Sorrow and the Pity, which challenged the so-called “Gaullist myth” that the French people had largely resisted Nazi occupation.
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Adam and Josh take stock of the movie year with their Top 5 Films of 2026 (So Far), making picks that reflect the strength of of the year’s genre offerings, comedies, and intimate dramas. Plus: Massacre Theatre, and Best of ‘26 poll results.
This episode is presented by Regal Unlimited, the all-you-can-watch movie subscription pass that pays for itself in just two visits. Use code FILMSPOT26 to take 15% off.
(Timecod...
A good chunk of Supergirl’s DNA can be traced back to True Grit by way of the comics miniseries the film is adapting, which is why we paired it with Joel and Ethan Coen’s 2010 version of that story. But as our discussion of Craig Gillespie’s new entry in James Gunn’s revamped DC Universe details, Supergirl often feels less indebted to its space-western source material than to several...
For this week's Archive episode, we go back to 2014 for the Top 5 Movie Tattoos (That We'd Get). The "we" being Adam and Josh. 16 years later... no tats yet. But they're sticking by (most) of their picks.
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Matt and Jordan deep-dive into the free, ad-supported streaming platform Tubi. They evaluate the platform across five distinct categories: library; playback/interface; reliability; originals; and price. Plus, recommended titles to watch on Tubi, and a recommendations for a listener who is looking for a hangout comedy like semi-obscure 2005 comedy. And Producer Sam hosts this week’s game: Tubi or Not Tubi.
The State of Streami...
Welcome to The Movie Racket, a new Filmspotting production hosted by Michael Phillips.
Each week, we’ll test a so-called "law" of cinema — a bit of received wisdom about how movies work, or don’t. For our debut episode, actor Michael Shannon joins the show to examine a provocative claim from François Truffaut: that every film about war ends up being pro-war.
Is it true that a movie about combat, survival, and...
Adam and Josh celebrate Fargo's 30th anniversary with a Pantheon Project review (the show’s longest ever) of the Coen Brothers' career-altering 1996 film. Plus, Olivia Wilde's The Invite, David Wain's Gail Daughtry's Celebrity Sex Pass, and listeners choose the best pair of '90s blockbusters.
This episode is presented by Regal Unlimited, the all-you-can-watch movie subscription pass that pays for itself in just two visits....
This week's archive episode is Adam and Josh's 2018 Sacred Cow review of the Coen Brothers' period gangster film Miller's Crossing.
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Matt and Jordan review Netflix’s new comedy Little Brother, which stars Eric Andre as a chaos agent who disrupts the life of a tightly wound real estate agent played by John Cena. Hijinx, nudity, and parabolas of urine ensue. Then, in Rec Seg, they offer some related streaming titles, including a musical dramedy about brothers and a classic '70s comedy. Plus, in reply to a listener streaming request, a pair of international f...
The new Supergirl isn’t an outright adaptation of the comic-book miniseries Woman of Tomorrow, but it retains enough of its shape that it evokes that comic’s own source of inspiration, True Grit. Either of the two film adaptations of Charles Portis’ 1968 Western novel about a young girl enlisting a reluctant, drunken hero to help her enact revenge would have provided plenty of connections to&nb...
Welcome to the sophomore installment of Movie Death Match. Host Chris Klimek presides as two Christopher Nolan films go head to head in anticipation of The Odyssey. Arguing for Inception is Bilge Ebiri (Vulture), while Abigail James (@popculturescientist) advocates for Interstellar.
Which film offers the more emotionally resonant lead performance and better captures Nolan’s vision of time — its dilation and psychologica...
Adam and Josh celebrate the holiday weekend with a "Blind Cow" review of Independence Day, the #1 movie at the box office back in '96. Thirty summers after its release, Adam catches up with Roland Emmerich's alien-invasion spectacle, and Josh (originally a fan) sees if it holds up.
Plus, a summer-themed edition of Massacre Theatre and a recap of last weekend's 2nd annual Filmspotting Fest, which featured appearances from Trey Edwar...
As part of their 2020 Christopher Nolan "Oeuvre-view," Adam and Josh revisited 2014's Interstellar, a film they'd split on six years earlier.
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Matt and Jordan check out Julian Schnabel’s In The Hand of Dante, a rare midsummer Netflix prestige picture with a stacked cast that includes Oscar Isaac, Al Pacino, Gerard Butler, John Malkovich, Jason Momoa, and Martin Scorsese as a bearded medieval sage. Despite the talent and the reliably gorgeous cinematography, Schnabel’s film might be the worst thing Matt and Jor...
Is Toy Story 5 an inspired reorienting of the venerable Pixar franchise, or a tired rehash? Adam and Josh offer differing takes. Plus, Adam reviews Michael Sarnoski's bleak but intriguing The Death of Robin Hood, Josh recommends Mark Jenkin’s Rose of Nevada, an avant-garde ghost story set in a UK fishing village, and an "evil genius" ‘90s blockbuster poll question.
When the fourth Toy Story installment came to theaters in the summer of 2019, Adam invited the Blank Check podcast's Griffin Newman to join him for the Top 5 Toy Story Scenes.
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