JaZ Make a Podcast

The first summer blockbuster. The movie that changed Hollywood forever. The JaZ Make a Podcast Season 1 finale is dedicated to Jaws (1975) — and after rewatching it, both John and Zac are in complete agreement: this is a masterpiece. They go deep on why the broken mechanical shark was the best thing that ever happened to Spielberg's direction, how Roy Scheider's Brody works as the ultimate everyma...

James Gunn's Supergirl film was on the horizon, so John and Zac went back to the 1984 original — and it delivered far beyond anyone's expectations. Helen Slater is a genuinely charming Supergirl/Linda Lee, who enrols in high school while Argo City presumably ceases to exist. Faye Dunaway plays Selena, a villain whose primary motivation is getting laid. Peter O'Toole exists as Zoltar — clearly oper...

Shutter Island (2010) is a film so meticulously constructed that a second viewing transforms every scene. John and Zac go deep on Martin Scorsese's psychological masterpiece: the Hitchcockian and Kubrickian visual language, the deliberate breaking of the 180-degree rule as a disorientation technique, the way frozen bodies thawing represents suppressed memory returning, and the glass continuity tri...

Steven Spielberg executive-produced it. Irvin Kershner — director of The Empire Strikes Back — directed the pilot. Roy Scheider stars as Captain Nathan Bridger. So why does SeaQuest DSV feel like it's missing everything that would make it work? John and Zac dig into the 1993 NBC pilot for this ambitious underwater sci-fi series. The production design holds up. The 1993 CG is impressive for its era...

The Caped Crusader has had more cinematic lives than any superhero in history — and John and Zac are ranking them all. This episode is a chronological tour through every Batman film: from the gloriously campy 1966 original through Tim Burton's gothic reinvention, Joel Schumacher's ice-pun disasters, Christopher Nolan's unimpeachable Dark Knight trilogy, and beyond. The big answers: Who is the grea...

With The Devil Wears Prada 2 on the horizon, John and Zac return to the 2006 original — and their verdicts diverge. The cast is undeniable: Meryl Streep delivers one of the great screen performances of her career, Anne Hathaway brings real charm, Emily Blunt is razor-sharp, and Stanley Tucci elevates every scene. The moment Miranda Priestly shows vulnerability is extraordinary. But the script mean...

Generally considered the greatest WrestleMania of all time. Also four hours long, which John consumed across multiple sittings. Zac — a lifelong wrestling fan who once ran an annual family Christmas wrestling league called Christmas Chaos in his grandmother's basement — guides John through the full card from Houston's Reliant Astrodome. The highlights: TLC II between the Hardy Boyz, Dudley Boyz, a...

It was supposed to launch a franchise. It bombed at the box office. Thirty years later, John and Zac are here to explain why it absolutely shouldn't have. The Phantom (1996) is one of the most purely enjoyable action adventure films of the decade: Billy Zane as the Ghost Who Walks, Treat Williams as a villain of boundless charisma, Kristy Swanson as a Marion Ravenwood-worthy love interest, and Cat...

The 98th Oscars are this Sunday. John and Zac head back forty years to the 59th — the 1987 ceremony celebrating the films of 1986 — and find the Academy getting some things defensible, some things wrong, and largely missing the bigger picture. Platoon wins Best Picture and Best Director (Oliver Stone, Vietnam veteran — defensible). Sigourney Weaver loses Best Actress for Aliens to Marlee Matlin (n...

Zac's all-time favourite comedy. The funniest thing John has seen in years. Wet Hot American Summer (2001) is David Wain's absurdist masterpiece — a summer camp comedy in which everyone is obviously in their early 30s playing 16-year-olds, children die and nobody notices, Paul Rudd gives the greatest comedic performance of his career as the most aggressively bad boyfriend in screen history, and a...

An A-list cast so large it had to be printed in two columns. A budget of $52 million. A global box office of $216 million. And a film that John and Zac can barely figure out how to recommend — or not recommend. Garry Marshall's Valentine's Day (2010) is a Love Actually riff with a larger cast and a thinner script: Anne Hathaway has the only storyline that approaches a real arc; Taylor Swift and Ta...

Part Two of the tribute continues. Robert Redford — Butch Cassidy, The Sting, The Natural, and the man who built the Sundance Film Festival from nothing. Rob Reiner, whose directing career is so quietly remarkable it almost defies belief: This Is Spinal Tap, Stand By Me, The Princess Bride, When Harry Met Sally, Misery, A Few Good Men. John and Zac agree he deserves his own dedicated episode. Also...

2025 took some giants. In Part One of their tribute to the icons who passed this year, John and Zac spend time with the ones who shaped their lives as fans: David Lynch, visionary behind Twin Peaks and Blue Velvet, whose influence on the strange and surreal in cinema cannot be overstated. Gene Hackman — Zac's all-time favourite actor — who gave us The French Connection, Hoosiers, Superman, and The...

It's the last episode of 2025, and John and Zac are closing the year the only way that makes sense: a deep dive into the greatest Christmas songs ever recorded. Three categories, two very different musical sensibilities, and almost no agreement. Pop Christmas: Zac goes full Mariah Carey (All I Want for Christmas Is You — correct), while John leans toward the classic crooners. Tearjerkers: John pre...

It's a beloved holiday film. The Dickens source material is exceptional. Michael Caine plays it admirably straight. The Ghost of Christmas Past is genuinely unsettling. And yet — The Muppet Christmas Carol can't quite commit to being either a great Christmas Carol adaptation or a fully-realized Muppets film, and the tension between those two things undermines both. John and Zac dig into why: Gonzo...

It was supposed to be a magical holiday film. It is, instead, a cinematic catastrophe. John and Zac sit through Christmas in Wonderland (2007) so you absolutely don't have to: a film shot almost entirely inside West Edmonton Mall, starring a deeply confused Patrick Swayze, Tim Curry doing an inexplicable Scottish accent, Chris Kattan, and Carmen Electra. There is no discernible plot. There is a co...

After Van Helsing nearly broke them, John and Zac turn to something beautiful: the music behind the movies. This is the bracket-setting episode of the Film Composer Death Bracket — they narrow the field to eight seeds and argue about who belongs. John Williams is #1 (obviously). Howard Shore earns #2 on the strength of The Lord of the Rings alone. James Horner, Elmer Bernstein, Danny Elfman, Alan...

On this episode of JaZ Make a Prologue, Zac closes off the Baseball episode with your feedback and kicks off the Film Composer Death Bracket episode, which drops next week! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Baseball and cinema were made for each other — and John and Zac are here to prove it. This episode covers the full lineup: the tear-jerking mysticism of Field of Dreams, the scrappy underdog chaos of Major League, the pitch-perfect period drama of Eight Men Out, and the raw authenticity of Bull Durham. They debate whether A League of Their Own holds up (yes, obviously), revisit the enduring magic...

In this mini-episode, Zac wants to be taken out to the ball game as he previews our full episode on baseball coming out next week! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Van Helsing (2004) is a movie. John is quite certain of this. He finished it — eventually — after a viewing process he described as "almost breaking" him across 2.5 days. Hugh Jackman and Kate Beckinsale fight Dracula, thousands of unexplained bat-baby offspring, Frankenstein's monster, and the concept of consistent tone, all within a single two-hour-plus runtime. The CGI is very much of its era....

In this mini-episode, Zac previews our upcoming episode on Van Helsing and does his best to not spoil our thoughts before the full review episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A genuine 10 out of 10 from both of them. Sleepy Hollow (1999) is Tim Burton operating at his most focused and fully-realized: a film so beautifully constructed, so committed to its atmosphere, and so perfectly cast that even its real flaws — a clunky third-act revelation, some dated CGI — barely register. Johnny Depp's cowardly, fainting Ichabod Crane is the best performance of his career: more g...

In this mini-episode, Zac previews our upcoming episode on Sleepy Hollow and announces our Instagram handle and email address! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this episode of JaZ Make a Podcast, John and Zac dive into a celebration of the oft-misunderstood Star Trek V: The Final Frontier! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.