Movie Musing

What's true in a fictional world and when are interpretations valid? That all depends on who you ask. There are certainly times when creators get overzealous (looking at you, J.K. Rowling), but what about when the audience is out of line and the author is validating concepts that are being overlooked? We analyze several examples of this in film, television, and literature to take a closer look.

Music courtesy of Vernon West www.facebook.com/vernonwestmusic/

After a decade-long run and becoming the biggest show in the world, Game of Thrones finally concluded in a massive, yet divisive season. In this episode, we touch upon the crowd response to this show and assess what it did so well and where the misfires were.

Music courtesy of Vernon West www.facebook.com/vernonwestmusic/

After 11 years and 22 movies, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has produced the most epic of converging climaxes with Endgame. We have differing thoughts on how this compares to Infinity War, but what we can agree on is that the character development was unbelievable and we even reflect on thoughts from the Russo Brothers from a recent Q&A session we attended.

Music courtesy of Vernon West www.facebook.com/vernonwestmusic/

Short Clip: The Last Jedi, Love It or Love to Hate It? by Quentin Hoffman

The 2018 Oscars brought us the coronation of Guillermo Del Toro for "The Shape of Water" in an unexpected twist of a three-horse race between "Get Out," and "Lady Bird," and "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri." In this episode we will reevaluate the major nominated categories by assessing how they played out, whether we would have nominated a different selection from that year, and what our winner would have been. Debates ensue. Music courtesy of Vernon West www.facebook.com/vernonwestmusic/

The 2019 Oscars brought us the best of times and the worst of times, but it's not enough to just complain about it. Instead, we will recap the 2018 year of film (1:15), discuss how steaming will impact the creation of present and future nominees (4:00), and then recap on strange decisions on the night of the awards (9:25). Finally, we will introduce a new segment: "Oscar Revisionist," a bit where we will remove one nominee, add a new one in their place from the same year of film, and name our winner- whether the same or not(20:10). Music courtesy of Vernon West www.facebook.com/vernonwestmusic/

This week in controversies... we start with why 'Green Book' has gotten backlash and whether it warrants assessing its qualities as a movie (0:45)but then we dive into the mind of Adam McKay in his sweeping post-modern critique of Dick Cheney and the Bush administration in 'Vice' (11:00). Music courtesy of Vernon West www.facebook.com/vernonwestmusic/

This year's Oscar nods had a few good surprises, but this may be the weakest year for nominations of the decade. We discuss our feelings overall and how the Best Picture category speaks to the political dynamic of the moment.

'The Favourite' is the latest bleak, but enchanting work from the maverick filmmaker Yorgos Lanthimos. We begin by discussing its one win at the horrific 2019 Golden Globes (0:40)before venturing into the strange, twisted, yet hilarious tapestry that Lanthimos wove in this iconoclastic period piece (9:30). Music courtesy of Vernon West www.facebook.com/vernonwestmusic/

Do we take the Golden Globes seriously? No. But the nominations tend to be a useful forecast for the Oscars, which has left a huge space to debate which nominations we liked and which we loathed (0:40) . Then we discuss Overlord, the most underrated film of the year (34:05). Music courtesy of Vernon West www.facebook.com/vernonwestmusic/