Mixed Bag

It's the start of a new miniseries, it's time for Period Princess! 👸 It's a new era and what better way to kick it off with the ultimate page turner of 2001, The Other Boleyn Girl adapted into this feature film in 2008. Starring Natalie Portman, Scarlett Johansson and Eric Bana. A sumptuous and sensual tale of intrigue, romance and betrayal set against the backdrop of a defining moment in Europea...

Cassandra filling in here for James who does the regular captions! Today we're celebrating 🎉 🌈   ᑭŘ𝕀đẸ 爪ｏ𝓝Ⓣｈ  🌈 🎉 here at Mixed Bag so it's time for a queer cinema classic that none of us have seen before. Vida (Patrick Swayze), Noxima (Wesley Snipes) and Chi Chi (John Leguizamo) are three New York drag queens travelling cross country to the Miss America Drag pageant when they are waylaid i...

It's the year 2000. It's the first 3D animated film from Walt Disney. It's Dinosaur. And it's a very unhinged episode, we had a blast with this one. Plus, we had a special guest drop in briefly, Cass' brother, Nathan! An orphaned dinosaur raised by lemurs joins an arduous trek to a sancturary after a meteorite shower destroys his family home. (Sourced from Letterboxd) It's the final of our persona...

We're back for a mini quick mix this week! Discussions include Grey's Anatony, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, A Highland Song, Animal Well and Telling Lies. See you next week for a return to our Childhood Movies!

We're continuing our childhood picks with 1995's Now and Then, starring an absolutely stacked cast including Christina Ricci, Rosie O'Donnell, Demi Moore, Gaby Hoffmann, Thora Birch, Melanie Griffiths, Rita Wilson and Ashleigh Aston Moore. But what is this film? Does it even exist? Waxing nostalgic about the bittersweet passage from childhood to puberty in this tender coming-of-age tale, four chil...

It's time for more personal picks from your hosts and James has landed on one fairly lost to time Mouse Hunt (1997). Before Gore Verbinski was documenting pirates in the Caribbean, he was making his debut feature with Nathan Lane and Lee Evans about a pesky mouse that won't go away. Down-on-their luck brothers, Lars and Ernie Smuntz, aren’t happy with the crumbling old mansion they inherit… until...

Ellie Stewart returns to the podcast with the final part of the trilogy, Ghostbusters, Hook and The Inbetweeners Movie! (2011). Based on the TV show, will this gross out boys comedy be a dream come true or will our opinion be inbetween good and bad? High school graduation just wouldn’t be complete without an un-chaperoned, uninhibited and unforgettable final holiday. At least that’s what Will, Jay...

NYAD Love her or hate her, know her or don't, NYAD (2023) and Diana Nyad herself have been in the news lately with the Academy Award nominations of Annette Benning and Jodie Foster for said film. But who is she?  Athlete Diana Nyad sets out at 60 to achieve a nearly impossible lifelong dream: to swim from Cuba to Florida across more than 100 miles of open ocean. (Sourced from Letterboxd) That's ri...

It's time. The foundational text. The Rosetta Stone of Dream Blunt Rotation. The one you've all been waiting for. SALMON FISHING IN THE YEMEN! What is there to say. The name speaks for itself. But will provide some context.  Made in 2011, it's Emily's last rotation (for now) and her scene partner has appeared on the podcast before, Moulin Rouge's Ewen McGregor. A fisheries expert is approached by...

How much you would run for a dumb hat? That's what 2011's The Adjustment Bureau dares to ask. Our third entry into the Dream Blunt Rotation, Emily is sporting full 2010s fashion in this one but she never gets to wears that trilby. We also welcome back Spirit himself, Matt Damon. Now we can see him in the flesh instead of his expertly animated horse design and we are disappointed. FIGHT FOR YOUR FA...

The Dream Blunt Rotation continues with John Patrick Shanley's Wild Mountain Thyme. But is this truly a dream blunt? After the reaction to Jungle Cruise, the Mixed Bag crew are hoping the Emerald Isles of Ireland and performances therein can dazzle us with their Irish charm. THERE’S NOTHING MORE DANGEROUS… THAN AN IRISH WOMAN IN LOVE. Headstrong farmer Rosemary Muldoon has her heart set on winning...

That's right, it's time for a new miniseries, Mixed Bag presents DREAM BLUNT ROTATION. We've got four perfect puffs of the wonderful Emily Blunt for you to take a toke of. Relax enjoy and take a cruise down the jungle with our very first offering, 2021's Jungle Cruise, directed by none other than Non-Stop's Jaume Collet-Serra! Two Mixed in a row, well done Jaume! Dr. Lily Houghton enlists the aid...

"I don't know who you are, I don't know what you want. But if it's Taken you're looking for, I can tell you, this is only a knock-off." RRRR! That's right, it's another JetBag 🚨 Emergency Landing 🚨 and this time we're covering Non-Stop (2014) with Liam Neeson, Julianne Moore and Lupita Nyong'o. Bill Marks is a burned-out veteran of the Air Marshals service. He views the assignment not as a life-...

Another year has passed and it's time to look back on the year and remember the chocolatiers of 2023. Wonka, Barbie, J. Robert Oppenheimer and more. We've taken one last trip to the chocolate factory to snack upon the confections of Paul King's Wonka starring Timothy Chalamet, Hugh Grant and Olivia Coleman.  Willy Wonka – chock-full of ideas and determined to change the world one delectable bite a...

Christmas is all around you BagHags and so it's time for our Christmas tradition, Lucas Neal joins us once again for a Christmas Mixed Bag! It's a big one this year, long requested, Love Actually (2003) by Richard Curtis! THE ULTIMATE ROMANTIC COMEDY. Follows seemingly unrelated people as their lives begin to intertwine while they fall in – and out – of love. Affections languish and develop as Chr...

The chocolate factory is back open! To coincide with the upcoming release of 'Wonka', a definitely not mixed film, we thought we'd take a trip down memory lane to the last Wonka release, Tim Burton's version in 2005 and we are joined by special guest Dryw McArthur! A young boy wins a tour through the most magnificent chocolate factory in the world, led by the world’s most unusual candy maker. Are...

It's Britney, b*tch. To coincide with the book of the year The Woman in Me, we're looking back to 2002 when Britney made a big swing making a coming of age, road movie with Zoe Saldana and Taryn Manning, Crossroads! DREAMS CHANGE. FRIENDS ARE FOREVER. Three estranged friends reunite to travel to LA to chase fame, family and romance.  Does this pop star vanity project pay off? Which is girl is each...

Happy Halloween Baghags! We hope your lolly bags are never mixed and it's bottles all the way down. We're celebrating the Spooky Season with our Foe of the Pod, Mike Bryant, bringing us another scary movie of the mixed variety for our hosts to feast upon! This year, we're going to the prom with Carrie, 2013 edition.  A reimagining of the classic horror tale about Carrie White, a shy girl outcast b...

Oh the Hugh-manity! It's another Hugh Jackson flick and we're warming up to Halloween with this action adventure Van Helsing (2004) directed by Stephen Sommers of The Mummy and G.I. Joe fame. Famed monster slayer Gabriel Van Helsing is dispatched to Transylvania to assist the last of the Valerious bloodline in defeating Count Dracula. Anna Valerious reveals that Dracula has formed an unholy allian...

Before James got bit by a dog (he's fine) he rather liked these furry animals. We take you to a recording pre-bite when he and the other hosts were 100% gung-ho on the beloved canines. Introducing Dean Spanley (2008)! Directed by Toa Fraser and starring Jeremy Northam, Sam Neill and Peter O'Toole! If you're a NZer you might vaguely recall this movie, if you're from elsewhere you probably don't hav...

It's the eighth wonder of the world, Jack O'Donnell! That's right, we've got the nicest guy in New Zealand film, Jack O'Donnell talking about Peter Jackson's King Kong (2005)! Before Peter Jackson was union busting and bringing about Hobbit Law with the NZ Government, he was transforming Petone into New York City and making a great big gorilla wreak havoc. In 1933 New York, an overly ambitious mov...

Today we're joined by the wonderful Charlie Potter to discuss the magical adventure/romance 'Stardust' (2007) by Matthew Vaughan, adapted from Neil Gaiman's book of the same name. THIS SUMMER A STAR FALLS. THE CHASE BEGINS. In a countryside town bordering on a magical land, a young man makes a promise to his beloved that he’ll retrieve a fallen star by venturing into the magical realm. His journey...

Another first for Mixed Bag season 2, our very first documentary! Cast your mind back to 2012 when Katy Perry was on top of the world, dating Russell Brand and her new movie Katy Perry: Part of Me was hitting cinemas in 3D! Giving fans unprecedented access to the real life of the music sensation, Katy Perry: Part of Me exposes the hard work, dedication and phenomenal talent of a girl who remained...

It might be the summer of Cillian Murphy in 2023 with Oppenheimer but what about 4 August 2005, when this very week 18 years ago today, Red Eye was released and the general public realised just how 'killer' Cillian could be. Starring Rachel McAdams, Cillian Murphy and Brian Cox and directed by beloved horror filmmaker Wes Craven! FEAR TAKES FLIGHT. A woman is kidnapped by a stranger on a routine f...

Pika pika! We're heading back just four years to revisit Pokémon Detective Pikachu with performer, director and Pokémon aficionado, Emily K. Brown! We get talking our favourite little 151 critters and how this action adventure starring Ryan Reynolds and Justice Smith sat with us. PARTNER UP! In a world where people collect pocket-size monsters (Pokémon) to do battle, a boy comes across an intellig...