The Next Picture Show

Jordan Peele’s latest film, NOPE, tells a flying saucer story decades removed from the Atomic Age concerns of Byron Haskin’s 1953 adaptation of H.G. Wells’ WAR OF THE WORLDS, but both operate from a similar understanding that an encounter with hostile aliens is never just an encounter with hostile aliens. There are other forces at work in both films, and this week we’re digging into WAR and its effects on science-fiction stories to come, from its reflection of contemporary anxieties to the unexpected bleakness of its supposed happy ending. Plus, a bevy of new feedback prompts some lightning-round responses about IP hypocrisy, alternate Baz Luhrmann timelines, and candid vs. scripted monologues. 

Please share your comments, thoughts, and questions about WAR OF THE WORLDS, NOPE, or anything else in the world of film, by sending an email to [email protected], or leaving a short voicemail at (773) 234-9730.

Outro music: “Two Little Men In a Flying Saucer” by Ella Fitzgerald

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Sara Dosa’s new documentary FIRE OF LOVE is more stylized than Werner Herzog’s GRIZZLY MAN, but it’s a remarkably close companion piece, with its interest in themes of obsession and fatalism, and in people who felt the most important thing in the world was bringing their passion to others, even if they had to die doing it — and in both cases, did. We talk over what we got from FIRE OF LOVE, and what was denied to us by the filmmaker’s choices, before bringing GRIZZLY MAN back in to compare the quixotic quest of “freelance” volcanologists Katia and Maurice Krafft to that of amateur naturalist Timothy Treadwell. 

Please share your comments, thoughts, and questions about GRIZZLY MAN, FIRE OF LOVE, or anything else in the world of film, by sending an email to [email protected], leaving a short voicemail at 773-234-9730, or commenting on our Patreon (patreon.com/NextPictureShow), where you can also find bonus episodes and more. 

Outro music: The B-52’s, “Lava”

Next Pairing: Byron Haskin’s THE WAR OF THE WORLDS and Jordan Peele’s NOPE

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The festival hit FIRE OF LOVE follows a pair of volcanologists who yearned to get up close and personal with nature at its most dangerous, eventually paying for their obsession with their lives, a tragic arc that naturally calls to mind Timothy Treadwell, whose doomed self-directed study of wild bears was immortalized in Werner Herzog’s GRIZZLY MAN. The 2005 film is a fascinating artifact and one of the most perfect matings of documentarian and subject imaginable, revealing almost as much about Herzog as a filmmaker as it does Treadwell as a self-proclaimed protector of the grizzlies. This week we dig into some of the philosophical contradictions between subject and documentarian, as well as how the film toes the line between humor and condescension. 

Please share your comments, thoughts, and questions about GRIZZLY MAN, FIRE OF LOVE, or anything else in the world of film, by sending an email to [email protected], or leaving a short voicemail at (773) 234-9730.

Outro music: “(Let Me Be Your) Teddy Bear” by Elvis

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In covering the entire scope of Elvis Presley’s career, ELVIS defies certain biopic conventions while embracing others, but it’s as distinctively a film by Baz Lurhmann as MOULIN ROUGE. Like that 2001 musical, ELVIS expands the frame of history in an attempt to recreate the earth-shattering effects of a moment in culture, while also poking at some of the uncomfortable questions raised by Presley’s popularity. It offers much to discuss, which we do before bringing MOULIN ROUGE into the conversation to compare the two films’ shared interest in the tension between art and commerce, to what effect anachronisms are used in each, and how each attempts to toe the line between appropriation and homage. Plus, some recommendations from Keith for supplementary Elvis viewing and reading. 

Please share your comments, thoughts, and questions about MOULIN ROUGE, ELVIS, or anything else in the world of film, by sending an email to [email protected], leaving a short voicemail at 773-234-9730, or commenting on our Patreon (patreon.com/NextPictureShow), where you can also find bonus episodes and more. 

Show Notes

Works cited: 

• “Can Elvis Rise Again” by David Browne (rollingstone.com)

• “Nobody Cares About Elvis Anymore” by Will Leitch (williamflietch.medium.com)

Outro music: Elvis Presley, “Unchained Melody”

Next Pairing: Werner Herzog’s GRIZZLY MAN and Sara Dosa’s FIRE OF LOVE

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Would the feverishly stylized, irreverently ahistorical spectacle of Baz Luhrmann’s MOULIN ROUGE! resonate with audiences today the way it did in 2001? We may be about to find out with the director’s latest, ELVIS, which takes a very similar approach to a very different story. Before getting into the parallels between the two musicals next week, we’re revisiting a movie that was either an “apocalyptic moment” for film or a canny predictor of the next two decades of pop culture — or maybe both? — to consider what it gains and loses in its expansive, fluid relationship to music, history, and musical history.

Please share your comments, thoughts, and questions about MOULIN ROUGE, ELVIS, or anything else in the world of film, by sending an email to [email protected], or leaving a short voicemail at (773) 234-9730.

Outro music: “Lady Marmalade” by Christina Aguilera, Lil’ Kim, Mya, and Pink

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The new JURASSIC WORLD DOMINION is in constant, open communication with 1993’s JURASSIC PARK, from its nostalgic casting to its egregious callbacks. But there’s more going on in Colin Trevorrow’s second sequel to JURASSIC WORLD — perhaps too much, thanks in part to the layers of new mythology that the 2015 film added to the original JURASSIC PARK formula. Is this merging of the two JURASSIC eras to be derided or commended for its ambition in stretching beyond the “dinosaurs on an island” conceit? We argue it out in our discussion of DOMINION, before placing it side-by-side with its source material to consider how the franchise has evolved, and not, in its anthropomorphizing of dinosaurs, its thematic interest in parenthood and reproduction, and its attitudes toward science, heroism, and corporate evil. Plus, the return of Your Next Picture Show, with a recommendation from Keith of Phil Tippett’s MAD GOD.

Please share your comments, thoughts, and questions about JURASSIC PARK, JURASSIC WORLD DOMINION , or anything else in the world of film, by sending an email to [email protected]. We may respond to it on our Patreon (patreon.com/NextPictureShow), where you can also find bonus episodes and more. 

Show Notes

Works cited: 

• “The ‘Jurassic World’ Movies Were Only About Chris Pratt Holding Out His Arms” by Miles Klee (melmagazine.com)

• “Star Wars effects legend Phil Tippett explains his 30-year nightmare project Mad God” by Tasha Robinson (polygon.com)

Outro music: George Clinton & the Goombas, ‘Walk the Dinosaur’

Next Pairing: Baz Luhrmann’s MOULIN ROUGE and ELVIS

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Let’s get this out of the way: Yes, we were so preoccupied with whether we could do a JURASSIC PARK pairing, we didn’t stop to think if we should. But if not on the occasion of JURASSIC WORLD DOMINION, the new sixth film in the two-trilogy series kicked off by Steven Spielberg in 1994, then when? So we’re traveling back to where it began to examine what made JURASSIC PARK a high-water mark for both the franchise and ’90s blockbuster filmmaking, whether its cutting-edge blend of practical and CG effects holds up to modern-day scrutiny, and how it balances theme-park spectacle with big ideas about scientific progress and the philosophical quandaries surrounding it.

Please share your comments, thoughts, and questions about JURASSIC PARK, its JURASSIC successors, or anything else in the world of film, by sending an email to [email protected], or leaving a short voicemail at (773) 234-9730.

Works Cited:

• “‘Everything new will kill you’ is the worst trope in horror” by Tasha Robinson (polygon.com)

Outro music: Jurassic Park Theme Song (Melodica Cover) by Patrick T. Lo

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Despite its box-office success in 1988, Robert Zemeckis’ WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT never received a direct sequel, but the new CHIP ’N’ DALE: RESCUE RANGERS works as a spiritual sequel in more ways than one. Recognizing that this direct-to-streaming feature based on a short-lived Disney cartoon from the ‘90s has some extremely large, squeaky shoes to fill when compared to its groundbreaking predecessor, we unpack the two films’ shared cartoon DNA through their villains, their human allies, and their common Hollywood setting, and try to parse some of the specifics of how toons in this shared universe function in both the entertainment industry and society at large.

Please share your comments, thoughts, and questions about WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT, CHIP ’N’ DALE: RESCUE RANGERS, or anything else in the world of film, by sending an email to [email protected]. We may respond to it on our Patreon (patreon.com/NextPictureShow), where you can also find bonus episodes, recommendations, and more. 

Next Pairing: Steven Spielberg’s JURASSIC PARK and Colin Trevorrow’s JURASSIC WORLD: DOMINION 

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From its Hollywood setting to its central missing-toons mystery, the new Disney+ streaming exclusive CHIP ’N’ DALE: RESCUE RANGERS is openly and carefully patterned after 1988’s WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT. Robert Zemeckis’ groundbreaking hit set a high bar for cameo-packed, self-aware stories that try to redefine the relationships between animated characters and the physical world, packing in layers of setup and reference and payoff that continue to reveal themselves on rewatch after rewatch. We attempt to unpack some of those layers in our revisit of this group favorite, as well as how it uses our familiarity with noir and cartoons alike to its narrative advantage.

Please share your comments, thoughts, and questions about WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT, CHIP ’N’ DALE: RESCUE RANGERS, or anything else in the world of film, by sending an email to [email protected]. We may respond to it on our Patreon (patreon.com/NextPictureShow), where you can also find bonus episodes, recommendations, and more. 

Works Cited:

“Book Vs. Film: Who Framed Roger Rabbit?” by Tasha Robinson (avclub.com)

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DOCTOR STRANGE IN THE MULTIVERSE OF MADNESS carries its director’s fingerprints more clearly than most films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but is it ultimately more of a Sam Raimi movie or an MCU installment? We hash out that question this week with the continued assistance of our friend Matt Singer, before bringing back in what is unquestionably a Sam Raimi film, 1993’s ARMY OF DARKNESS, to compare how the two movies operate as vehicles for the director’s filmmaking sensibility, as sequels, and as Bruce Campbell showcases.

Please share your comments, thoughts, and questions about ARMY OF DARKNESS, DOCTOR STRANGE IN THE MULTIVERSE OF MADNESS, or anything else in the world of film, by sending an email to [email protected]. We may respond to it on our Patreon (patreon.com/NextPictureShow), where you can also find bonus episodes, recommendations, and more. 

Next pairing: Robert Zemeckis’ WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT and Akiva Schaffer’s CHIP ’N’ DALE: RESCUE RANGERS

A CHIARA opens exclusively in theaters Friday, May 27. More info at CinemaMadeinItaly.com.

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