Friday Nights at Blockbuster

On board, I'm the captain. So climb aboard, we'll search for tomorrow on every shore And I'll try, oh Lord, I'll try to carry on. I look to the sea, reflections in the waves spark my memory. Some happy, some sad. I think of childhood friends and the dreams we had. Hosts: Kate Vallely, Ciaran Vallely

Are you listening closely? Upon this most rewatch, Kate can confirm that Christopher Nolan's magician centric period piece thriller was the better of the 2006 movies that share nearly identical plots. But as the years have roled on, this remains arguably Nolan's best overall movie. His time tricks have rarely been better, he gets two great leading performances, the entire movie looks gorge...

Tom Cruise and Steven Spielberg team up in the middle of a great run of movies for both of them here. The Sci-fi meets Film Noir is perfect for Speilberg, and for Cruise this is another in a long line of interesting, and largely against type characters that he had been portraying for close to a decade at this point. The stage was set... but then Colin Farrell showed up in his first large American...

Catch on a specific day and I will tell you that the Before Trilogy is my favourite trilogy of movies! So with that in mind, even though only one of the movie falls within are decade of discussion, we couldn't pass up the opportunity to quickly highlight the other two. The conversation digresses a bit this week becasue anyone who has seen these movies knows there are essentially no scenes, so...

This week we are looking back at the first long awaited return of this iconic 80s movie character. Despite the reputation (some of it warranted), I think Kate and myself found quite a bit to enjoy with this movie. Still, some really rough moments (Shia LaBeouf swinging through the jungle on vines was not a good choice). Hosts: Ciaran Vallely, Kate Vallely

I don't know what I was expecting or hoping from rewatching Twilight for the first time in over a decade. Was there a deeper message that I missed? Is there perhaps some unseen brilliant filmmaking? Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart are among my favourite actors to watch in 2023, so did I overlook their performances here because it was in a genre I wasn't a fan of? I think most of the l...

I'm not sure if any of Wes Anderson's movies have ever really lit the Box Office on fire, but The Royal Tenenbaums was certainly a breakthrough moment for him professionally. His style had always been there, but this felt like a crystalization and expansion. Kate's introduction to Anderson's filmography has been up and down, but it looks like she's turning the corner. Hosts: Ci...

Arguably the best Bond movie, starring the best actor to play Bond, with the best "Bond girl", and one of the best Bond villains. The franchise was in some ways on life support before Casino Royale, but was immediately in a great place once this movie was released. I give Kate a rundown of Bond history, and a financial lesson. Hosts: Ciaran Vallely, Kate Vallely

The high watermark for the character (and no, I will not listen to arguments for Tom Holland/MCU's outings, because the best they have to offer needed to bring back the OG himself to put them over the top). Spider-Man 2 is more ambitious in terms of storytelling. Has another great villain. Continues Sam Raimi's ultimate vision of thrilling comic book action and completely over-the-top camp...

28 Days Later was many things upon its release. It was one of the major introductions to the fast zombie idea. It was a bit of a comeback for director Danny Boyle. And now it’s Kate’s first horror movie on the podcast, and she liked at least half of it! Hosts: Ciaran Vallely, Kate Vallely

Pulsating to the hypnotic beat of Kabbalah era Madonna, The Devil Wears Prada is a product of it's time in more ways than one. Kate and I discuss some of the more problematic messaging to come out of this light workplace comedy, whether we have ever worked for a Miranda Priestly-like boss, and why Adrian Grenier's Nate gets all this hate online. Hosts: Kate Vallely, Ciaran Vallely

This week Kate and I look back at the beginning of Kiera Knightley’s period piece domination. Jane Austen’s work has been the source for countless adaptations, but Joe Wright’s 2005 Pride and Prejudice stands out as one of the best. From the minor changes to the novel, to making Tom Wambsgans a credible leading man/love interest, there isn’t much about this movie that I think needs changing.

What a special day, I finally get to talk about Tom Cruise! (as if I haven’t found every chance to bring him up in the past) Not much of a breakdown on his running form, but that will come in a later episode I'm sure. Instead we focus on one of his only roles where he is an out and out villain. Kate also opens the door for another mailbag episode, so get your questions ready for her. Hosts: Ci...

Get in loser, we're talking about Mean Girls! Hosts: Ciaran Vallely, Kate Vallely

Let it be known, I will only accept copaganda in the form on Edgar Wright parody homages! After hearing Kate disparage this movie (a movie she had not seen before I will add), I knew we had to do an episode on Hot Fuzz. Thankfully, she saw the error of her ways almost immediately, and ended up loving the movie. I would also like to take this chance to apologize to any listeners in the Dundas area...

Action movies are definitely cyclical. They all seem to follow a formula until something comes along and breaks that formula. As a response to the late 90s futuristic tech sci-fi worlds, this series decided to go ultra grounded, real world cities, and back to basic combat. If he wasn't a star already, the success of this movie and franchise would eventually make Matt Damon one. And if nothing...

I think by this stage it's clear that Kate and myself have different tastes in movies. So the only logical course of action was to put two movies up in the same episode and talk about each. As luck would have it, Kate had not seen Layer Cake, and I had not seen The Young Victoria. Both deal with power, corruption, wealth, and British class divisions, which sounds good and would have been bette...

Very few studios have had as big of an impact in recent years as Pixar, so we of course had to talk about one eventually. And when deciding what to do first we chose a movie that Ciaran hadn't seen before, so Kate is the expert this episode! We rank our top 5 Pixar movies at the end (with typically chaotic results). Hosts: Kate Vallely, Ciaran Vallely

Normally I would take this space to explain a little about the movie or why we decided to watch and talk about it. Maybe tease it with a joke, or just try some creative way to allude to the movie before you click play. However, this week something so shocking, so insane, so mind blowingly catastrophic was said on the podcast (by Kate of course) that I’ve decided to take this opportunity for a PSA:...

Every week when Kate and I sit down to record and build the catalogue of this podcast, the same conversation inevitably happens.  "That should be enough episodes." ... "Do you think we need one more?" ... "You think we need one more." ... "Ok, we'll do one more."

It was a night of redemptions, a night of emotions, and a night where anything anywhere could have happened all at once…and that was just the 6 Nations Rugby.  Despite one (or ten) too many references to “The Slap", I think this was easily the best Oscars telecast in years. The speeches were good, the winners mostly deserving, they presented all of the awards live on air (shocking that that s...

This is the second Best Picture winners miniseries episode, and as we said in the previous episode, the polar opposite to Gladiator. Ciaran is slowly starting to learn how to love musicals. Until the lockdown he would have said musicals were my least favourite movie genre. However, on his journey to watch more Best Picture winners he knew he was going to run into many musicals, so might as well go...

Episode One of the Best Picture Winners Miniseries sees Kate and myself going all the way back to the first 2000s movie to win the Best Picture Oscar. This historical epic is certainly using the language of many previous Oscar winners that came before it, and at its core has two breakout roles for the leading men. Directed by a prolific filmmaker, who has become an Academy favourite, and never see...

Nothing has dominated the movie landscape and box office quite like the MCU and superhero movies in general. So with that being said, lets go back to where it all started. Iron Man actually came out pre-Disney acquisition (something that I think goes a long way to explaining why I enjoyed it). Starring Robert Downey Jr. at the beginning of his big comeback, and giving fans just enough of a hint of...

Animation, especially mainstream Western animation, has always had a “for kids” connotation attached to it. Maybe it’s because of the popularity of Disney, but people seen animation as a genre instead of as a medium. Thankfully that is not the case elsewhere, and although there are many artists who have been pushing the boundaries of animation acceptance throughout the years, one man in particular...