If, as you’re browsing through Netflix’s latest offerings over some other countless nights in a row, you feel like you’ve already seen every single compelling movie out there, well, you’d be wrong, but you’d also have a bit of a right. With any luck I can say that you will never run out of smart movies to watch, but only if you know how to locate smart movies to watch. It’s like searching for new music, discovering what adds value to your playlist beyond the latest blockbusters and awards. -Winners require time, effort and attention. And increasingly, one of my favorite tactics for doing so is through podcasts. Ever since two guys with annoying voices plugged microphones into a computer, there have been movie podcasts; However, today, some 15 years after the podcast boom began, there are many that go far beyond the colloquial “can-we-still-call?” -them-niches” (laugh at shitty movies; obsessively analyze the Oscars). While I still enjoy many of those shows (probably because they’re made through and for men precisely like me), there are also movie podcasts from a wide diversity of voices: black men, black women, gay men, etc. For those who don’t watch, think, or live a life like me and don’t talk about movies, I can locate a ton of new movies that I need to see, even if I rewatch movies I’ve already seen from a new perspective. Here are 15 of my favorite podcasts, to deepen my love of cinema and locate new films to watch.
It might be more advisable to think of The Flop House as a podcast to listen to if you want to know what movies not to watch, but there’s also something to be said for learning to appreciate how watching a bad movie can be just as entertaining (if less rewarding) than watching a good one. Across more than 400 episodes, hosts Dan McCoy (a former writer for The Daily Show With Jon Stewart), Elliot Kalan (ex-Daily Show head writer and contributor to the reboot of Mystery Science Theater 3000) and Stuart Wellington (er, co-owner of several bars in Brooklyn, but hey, they are pretty great bars) have made doing so into something of an art.The trio (and sometimes a guest) bring a goofy, good-natured exasperation to their analyses of films that failed either at the box office or with critics (usually both) as they recount their ludicrous plot turns and poorly developed characters and find fun even amid the most torturous of cinematic experiences. Few of the movies they’ve covered are “worth” watching (Cats excepted), but I often end an episode wanting to watch them anyway. And if bad movies don’t float your boat, they end each show with recommendations of others that are actually worth your time.
The Academy Awards have been referred to as the Gay Super Bowl, and on This Had Oscar Buzz, co-hosts and film critics Joe Reid and Chris Feil certainly dive into analyses of historical Oscar races with all the zeal and expertise of your office’s most dedicated fantasy football enthusiast. Each week they choose a film that the Oscars forgot—movies that featured big stars or accomplished directors, cred that got people talking about their awards potential… but then, “the Oscar hopes died and [they’re] here to perform the autopsy.” What I love about this show is that it covers a lot of movies I’ve “heard were good” (hence the buzz) but haven’t gotten around to watching. It isn’t a bad-movie podcast, per se—some of the films they cover are truly great and were unjustly ignored (I heart I Heart Huckabees)—so it’s a great way to find worthy, watchable films, and as an Oscar geek myself, I love their chatter about why a particular film didn’t quite make it onto the ballot.
The Big Picture, an offshoot of online sports network The Ringer, is a must-watch if you’re the type of user who likes to keep up with everything that’s happening lately in theaters and generate buzz at festivals. , and will likely compete for the top prizes. Regular presenters Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins give their candid reactions to new releases, from blockbusters to arthouse films, and comment on (or sympathize with) the state of modern cinema along the way. Thematic episodes abound, adding normal and highly debatable drafts, and with two fewer episodes at a maximum of weeks, you’ll never have a problem getting more content.
Inspired by a quote by director David Lynch, this exhibition is based on an in-depth investigation of films and their context, through “duck-eye” scenes, those moments or sequences in a film that outline the whole. Animators Dom Nero and Adam Volerich take earlier versions (usually grouping them into themed series, from ’80s fantasy to videos set in space), and dive into their production history, analyze what’s actually on screen, and reflect on their position in cultural memory. Of course, at the end of each episode, each animator identifies their personal “duck eye” for a given movie (it’s unexpected how they disagree).
Fighting in the War Room is a celebrity movie podcast of sorts aimed at incredibly online users, presented through 4 of the loudest voices on Twitter Film (I can’t call it Movie X, sorry): Vanity Fair’s Katey Rich, Polygon’s Matt. Patches, Geek. com’s Dave Gonzales, and IndieWire’s David Ehrlich. They get together in each episode to talk about recent releases and talk about recent breakthroughs in the world of pop culture. It’s also a bit broader than most of the others on this list. Immerse yourself a bit in the TV, but the communications are still entertaining and (despite the name) a bit debatable (in a friendly way).
Linoleum Knife was recommended by a reader in the comments of an earlier version of this post, and I’m so glad it was, because it has become a favorite comfort-listen for me. Hosted by married film critics Dave White and Alonso Duralde (who are both regular presences on a whole bunch of podcasts, including others on this roundup), it’s a laid-back, intimate chat show looking at the movies from a queer perspective. If it feels like listening to your old married friends bicker over the dinner table, well, that’s exactly what it is. (True fans can sign up for the Patreon to listen to a whole range of spinoffs that take you deeper into the duo’s lives and relationship).
If you’ve been in the online film fantatic space for a long time, you might remember the late, lamented site The Dissolve, founded by former core staffers of the once indispensable pop culture site The AV Club and intended to offer a sort of “Pitchfork for movies.” (Which made sense, as it started as an offshoot of Pitchfork itself.) The Dissolve had a podcast that I loved, but it, er, dissolved (along with the rest of the site) when Pitchfork shut it down in 2015, shortly before being acquired by Condé Nast. Out of the ashes of that podcast arose The Next Picture Show, featuring one-time Dissolvers Genevieve Koski, Keith Phipps, Tasha Robinson and Scott Tobias. It retains the earlier show’s irreverent but seriously knowledgable vibes, with a new and catchy conceit: Each episode is part of a duology examining two films that are linked in some way, whether because they represent two eras of a filmmaker’s body of work, or because they operate on similar themes (they are currently halfway through a two-pronged discussion of Hayao Miyazaki’s Spirited Away and The Boy and the Heron). I’m so glad to have these folks still in my ears after all these years.
One of the wonderful ironies of my life is that I rarely have time to watch the many two-and-a-half- to three-hour movies I need to watch, and yet I pay attention to podcasts about movies that are three or three hours long. . more. (Admittedly, I sometimes listen at double speed, which I know many of you consider a crime. )Screen Drafts is always one of the longest shows I listen to (one episode was over six hours), but I love it. it. The concept is that a rotating organization of moviegoers would combine to “write” the ultimate list of the most productive films on a given topic, whether it’s the most productive Disney animated films of all time or a screenwriter’s must-haves. to have first films. ” Editors” Clay Keller and Ryan Marker make it a genuine game, introducing quirks like limited bans that can get a movie crossed off the list, and players bring their own biases and tastes to the recording booth, so you’re never quite sure. Be sure where your own favorites will land.
A favorite of Lifehacker podcast expert Lauren Passell, You Are Good is “a tabloid podcast about movies” from host You’re Wrong About Sarah Marshall and Alex Steed. In each episode, they invite a guest who chooses a movie they like. for sentimental reasons. It’s less about analyzing movies for what they are or the awards they’ve won, and more about how they make us feel, which in the end is what matters, right?It’s exciting to hear other people talk blatantly about why they stick to a movie (even one that’s considered “bad”), and it’s rare that you don’t finish an episode before watching (or rewatching) what was just discussed.
What started as a mad attempt to break down the Star Wars prequels has become one of my favorite podcasts, as hosts Griffin Newman (an actor you might recognize from Prime Video’s The Tick) and David Sims (a critic from The Atlantic) take a long look at the miniseries that focuses on the entirety of a specific director’s cinematographies. The concept behind Blank Check is that those filmmakers made a movie that was so successful that it gave them the strength to make whatever project they pursued next, so see what movies they chose to make and hear from the presenters and their visitors. the considerations of why they made them are addictive. It’s a wonderful way to explore the deep cuts of a director you may not be very familiar with. If The Silence of the Lambs is the only Jonathan Demme movie you’ve seen, his mini Jonathan Demme’s “Stop Making Podcasts” will definitely make you need to watch a few more. The screen can wander because the hosts spend a lot of time talking about anything other than the movie of the week at the beginning of an episode, but you get used to it. They do indeed approach things from a white man’s perspective, but in recent years they have made great strides in being more inclusive in who they invite as visitors and which filmmakers they cover; Take, for example, the recent series on films by South Korean director Park Chan-wook and African-American filmmaker Gina Prince-Bythewood. If you spend $5 a month on Patreon, you’ll also be able to enjoy a huge catalog of feature-length watch movies from mega-franchises like the Marvel movies, Toy Story, and. . . Crocodile Dundee?
Over the course of more than 250 episodes to date, Black on Black Cinema features Terrence Carpenter, Jay Jacksonrao, and Micah Payne (who, as you probably won’t be surprised to learn, are all black men), talking and analyzing, with equal portions of humor and insight. reviews, works by black Hollywood filmmakers, but also films by white writers and directors focused on black actors and characters. I discovered the series thanks to a friend’s advice about its episode on The Help, which premiered amid police protests in early June 2020. when that 2011 movie was inexplicably trending on Netflix. I already knew the film was very problematic, of course: Green Book before Green Book, in the same category “White People Learn and Solve Racism” as Driving Miss Daisy, but its sharp and hilarious research was enlightening. It’s a wonderful access point to an engaging and entertaining module.
The show formerly known as Who Shot Ya?, Maximum Film is explicitly “a podcast that’s not just a bunch of straight white guys. “Maximum Film is presented through comedian Ify Nwadiwe, filmmaker Drea Clark and film critic Alonso Duralde. The concentrate is more general than some of the other submissions on this list, in that it doesn’t explicitly aim to explore issues of race and representation (in fact, they do arise). Episodes tend to concentrate on a single new film, rarely adopting an old film or analyzing an entire franchise.
Bechdel’s check has become something of a meme: a way to analyze how women are portrayed in videos by counting scenes that don’t involve or revolve around men. The cast of Bechdel was animated through the original parameters of the check, but it goes a step further. In addition, animators Caitlin Durante and Jamie Loftus (both Los Angeles-based comedians) take a feminist look at the films, contemplating how well female and female-identifying characters are treated in them. The discussions are a clever combination of humor and knowledge, and regularly feature a guest from the world of film or comedy. The films they concentrate on tend to be catalog titles rather than new releases (recent screenings run the gamut from Y Tu Mamá Tambin to Videodrome), so there’s a healthy dose of old-fashioned attitude in the combine.
If you think old black and white videos are stupid, slow and boring, this acclaimed podcast will quickly reposition your mind. It’s something of an exception on this list, as instead of reviewing or talking about a single film in any of the episodes, host Karina Longworth, who also researches, writes and produces the series, dives deep into Hollywood history to position old movies. , mythical stars and forgotten examples of either in their proper context. While you don’t want to watch the videos she talks about for entertainment, you do want to: Her recently concluded series, 90s Erotica, has had one and either of the two I’m sticking to on Letterboxd, diving back into Basic Instinct and Showgirls. Listening to Longworth talk about the rise and fall of MGM or the sad stories of the many doomed dead blondes of Tinsel Town helped expand my knowledge of film history far beyond any course I took. I stayed tuned in college and since then she names tons of old videos. In either episode, I’m never without a new name to add to my watch list. Better yet: she gave me a wonderful approach to choosing which one to watch next.
The concept of the Black Girl Film Club was born out of presenters Ashley and Britney’s preference to talk about videos from their “often underrepresented point of view,” that of two black women, and it’s a super funny, super clever exhibit that covers everything. Types of themes. Films; episodes focused on everything from Sofia Coppola’s design of dresses for Marie Antoinette to the over-the-top staging of Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo Juliet (one of this little girl’s private favorites from the ’90s). Even an undeniable glance at his catalog reminded me of a dozen videos I had intended to watch, and his discussions of them are a wonderful preview (or hunter) for your viewing experience.
Joel Cunningham is Lifehacker’s Deputy Editor. Previously, he was the Managing Editor of content marketing for Barnes & Noble, where he also founded The Barnes & Noble Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog and published a novelette by the Malaysian fantasy author Zen Cho that won a Hugo Award in 2019. At the start of his career, Joel won awards of his own from the Illinois Press Association for his work as a local journalist. He currently lives in Brooklyn, NY.