Off Screen Death

"It will warm the hearts of a lot of people, including a lot of Academy voters. Is it the best picture of the year? A) Too early to tell, and B) No, but, really, it's fine." Ty Burr of Ty Burr's Watch List damning with faint praise... which is more than one host can muster for the latest throwback to Miramar Oscar schlock of the 90s. Instead he'd rather talk about how to use a random sequence of s...

"It's at a certain point toward the finale that this SCREAM becomes almost as drearily repetitious as the reboot culture it skewers." Pat Smith of Slant Magazine lines up SCREAM for a stab wound, and sadly, we mostly agree. One of our hosts is kind to the movie, and the other is Dave. We talk about waiting too long, the lack of difference between Scream 4 and 5, and how these kids never quite live...

"All superhero movies are ridiculous. That's where the super part comes in. With good superhero movies, you don't notice the ridiculousness- or it doesn't matter. With ETERNALS, you notice." While we are just now catching up to Mark Feeney of the Boston Globe (conveniently timed for its ultimate destiny as a square on Disney+) we find ourselves looking for more comforting ridiculousness in... ......

"Venus and Serena Williams are the names we rightly remember, but KING RICHARD remains fixated on the male bravado that pushed for them to get their names out there in the first place." Allegra Frank of Slate has no time for male bravado... whereas anyone who has listened to OFF SCREEN DEATH knows that is all this podcast is. Toxic and potent masculinity. So much so that for the failed but mostly...

"Godfather sires weak son." “Coppola’s ambitions THE GODFATHER PART TWO is a slow, aimless and annoyingly restless movie which purports to be about gangsterism but is, in fact, about the boredom of waiting.” These two reviews from The Philadelphia Enquirer (Desmond Ryan) and Philadelphia Daily News (Joe Baltalke) , respectively, are placed here for your mockery (seriously, what is going on in Phil...

"Feels like SHOWGIRLS without the tits or dancing." Joshua Rothkopf of TIME OUT is a fan of two things... but not Curtis Hanson's LUCKY YOU. Is Eric Bana to blame for this Diet Coke version of ROUNDERS? Can't be. For he was nominated for Australian Film Institute International Award for Best Actor . What about America's Sweetheart for decades in Drew Barrymore? Maybe. But it most certainly can't b...

"Were we supposed to have found it entertaining? There's more horror latent in this notion of the movie audience than in the film itself." And if Pauline Kael's unkind words about Roman Polanski's REPULSION don't do it for you... how about Father Time Rex Reed for LAST NIGHT IN SOHO ? “Depraved, delirious, and downright stupid, Last Night in Soho is two hours of amateurish drivel by B-movie direct...

"A film that demonstrates that how you tell your story is just as important as what the story entails." Matt Neal of ABC Radio Australia taps into exactly what makes Rashomon truly great. Sure, many films have cribbed from this style, but none have reached the heights of Akira Kurosawa. But listen in to our discussion, because we talk not only about Rashomon and the Rashomon Effect; but also about...

"The whole film... is not thrilling or moving; it is interesting, which is fine by me but will not make it a huge success." Mark Steyn of The Spectator is washing his hands of this stalker film ENDURING LOVE starring Daniel Craig and Rhys Ifans but we are just getting into it as we learn many deep secrets about one host. Such as: Dave is afraid of balloons. Dave likes to see James Bond kissing ano...

"The lack of story or purpose is annoying and at times, the film is too experimental. Topping things off is an abrupt and unsatisfying ending which doesn't leave us with good feeling towards the film." Amy Curtis of We Got This Covered agrees with one of our hosts, especially regarding Malick’s lack of a story. We will call that host... the hero. “If you truly give in to the beauty of this amazing...

"A gaudy yet grim science-fiction horror movie of such surpassing silliness, humorless intensity and stylistic overkill that watching it may actually put you in a state of paranoia. Why are these moviemakers persecuting us?" Michael Wilmington of the Chicago Tribune does not seem okay. However we are ESPECIALLY if it involves Richard Gere, America's greatest of the silver foxes. Pair him up for an...

"Black Widow represents the MCU looking back when it should be moving forward. Everything about the movie seems small, even the big action set pieces." James Berardinelli gives words to our comments but not our feelings. Mike and Dave talk about the small scale, road trip camaraderie between ScarJo and Florence Pugh, and touch on why it’s suddenly ok to make fun of superhero nonsense. We also brie...

"Squeezed in right after The Godfather and before Part 2, just two of the most treasured pieces of cinema, Coppola made another film that actually may be his best." Sean Price of The Spool gets it just right according to both of our hosts. As is our habit on accepted classics, we veer off course a little bit to talk about THE CONVERSATION as science-fiction, Mike’s Mormon upbringing (?), and Judy...

"August is on solid ground when he's riffing on Stephen King and celebrities, but he's stretching when he tries to be David Lynch, which would require a distinctly different kind of brain damage." Robert Davis of Paste Magazine manages to be both kind and extremely unkind in one sentence. But he's got nothing on our first featured Letterboxd user Emaann ! It takes about a half hour to do not much...

"The apparent desire by the core creative team to break from their wilder, messier material by giving FALSE POSITIVE A24 gloss--is understandable. But for a movie with this much blood, it doesn't leave much of a stain." We disagree, Katie Rife of the AV Club. For if we can't count on Pierce Brosnan as an evil gynecologist in a movie... what new releases can we count on? So get in your stirrups and...

"A rather simple love story about two experienced and jaded adults." In a splat review, Janet Branagh’s of the Apollo Guide accidentally hits on what exactly there is to love about this movie! Mike and Dave talk about how refreshing it is to see two adults (each with their own problems) fall in love and build something together. Join us as we do our best to “save” CLAUDINE from the unnecessarily m...

"The film, directed and co-written by Paul Weitz, too often goes for the easy resolution, the syrupy payoff and the sense that every character in Matt's orbit is just, like, really really nice." What's wrong with nice, Kevin Maher of The Times ? Well... some things are wrong with what one host dubs ABOUT A BOY 2 (such is his fandom of The Auteur Paul Weitz) but the NICER host just wishes people wo...

"The Godfather shows that there is still life in the massive production engineering which made Hollywood studios the wonder of the entertainment world in their great days." Alexander Walker of the London Evening Standard unwittingly guides us in our conversation not only of THE GODFATHER, but of where studios should go from here. Mike and Dave both struggle to pinpoint The Godfather of streaming,...

"They don't make 'em like this any more, truly. For just a second, even those among you who won't be seeing this anyway might wish they did." Danny Leigh of the Financial Times with a strangely threatening positive review for Jon M. Chu's film adaptation of Lin-Manuel Miranda's musical IN THE HEIGHTS. We try not to threaten anybody but possibly each other and one host is bringing the film version...

"You can see the stuff 'Million Dollar Arm' throws at you from miles away, but that doesn't stop this baseball movie from being genially enjoyable." Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times goes for the obvious BALLS analogy... which we would never do. In particular when talking about Jon Hamm or Lake Bell. No... we would never do that. Wouldn't even cross our deviant minds. THANKFULLY we have a gue...

"I didn't find any great pleasure in seeing a story play out (the way) I knew exactly how it was going to play out." Peter Rainer of FilmWeek seems like a bit of a grump and if you've listened to this podcast then YOU KNOW that WE KNOW of what we speak. Look... we're not going to pick on DREAM HORSE. We are just happy that Toni Collette is not in HEREDITARY. Or something like it. Although she does...

"The scene where Sam imparts his wisdom to young buck Bottoms may be the saddest, loveliest moment in 1970s American cinema. And that's saying something." Tom Huddleston of Time Out speaks much more elegantly about Sam than we do, but we have more fun. We invite guest Derek Stewart of The Grand Gesture and Your List, My Command to talk about a formative film for him, THE LAST PICTURE SHOW!  We tal...

"These clothes are the boldest element of a movie that otherwise wears its supposed punk-rock influences like a kid discovering Hot Topic for the first time." Angie Han of Mashable isn't wrong... but that's kind of mean. Although that may be keeping in the spirit of this cat fight (for the girls, calm down) between Emma Stone and Emma Thompson in the latest attempt from Disney to keep remaking the...

"One remains staggered that sentient human beings who walk upright and use cutlery believed this was a respectable use of their valuable time." Donald Clarke of the Irish Times is harsh but fair in his assessment of yet another star vehicle that misuses the talents of one of your host's favorite leading ladies. You know... we are beginning to see a trend here of women in Hollywood not getting the...

"These are important stories that should be seen, but audiences need more than scripts that are primarily acting exercises." Nell Minow of RogertEbert.com is a true professional in her distaste for awards chasing films like FOUR GOOD DAYS... but as amateurs talking into a tin can over a Zoom call we are free to get down into the mucky muck and not care much for Mila Kunis without teeth. Even if on...