Single Serving Cinema

Tim & Tay talk about world-building, documentary realism, and oners in this discussion of Children of Men . Synopsis In the year 2027, the inexplicably infertile human race suffers amidst war, famine, plague, and worse. Theo, a disillusioned activist is charged with guarding humanity’s last hope on a harrowing journey from London to the coast of Great Britain. Based on the novel of the same na...

Tim & Tay talk masculinity (toxic and otherwise) in this episode on Richard Linklater's ostensible baseball movie, Everybody Wants Some!! Synopsis Everybody Wants Some!! runs the course of a long weekend before the start of the fall semester at a Texas college in 1980. Over the course of the three days, freshman pitcher Jake meets his teammates, competes with virtually everyone he meets,...

Tim & Tay give colour commentary on the most subversive baseball movie ever made, Moneyball. Tune in for a chat about Brad Pitt, baseball stats, and strategic pixelation.    Synopsis Partly inspired by true events, Moneyball tells the story of Oakland A’s manager Billy Beane challenging baseball’s century-long conventional wisdom by building a low-budget team that could go all the way. Directe...

Tim & Tay talk Park Chan-Wook's The Handmaiden with special guest and self-described "psychotic fan" Hayley Rose Malouin. Tune in for a chat about queer media, cinematic eroticism and more.   Synopsis Based on the novel Fingersmith by Sarah Waters, The Handmaiden tells the story of a pickpocket and a con man attempting to swindle a wealthy Japanese woman out of her inheritance t...

Tim & Tay dig into eastern cinema with the listener-selected Oldboy . We talk revenge, sensory overload, and a lot more in this episode. Synopsis When freed after being imprisoned for 15 years, Oh Dae-Su seeks an explanation and revenge. Oldboy, directed by Park Chan-wook, was released on Nov. 23, 2003, and stars Choi Min‑sik, Kang Hye-jung, and Yoo Ji-tae. Oldboy is available on physical medi...

Part 2 of Blunt Month & episode 20! Tim & Tay are joined by The Grey Nato 's James Stacey to talk Emily Blunt, Denis Villeneuve, Roger Deakins, and a lot more in this discussion of Sicario. Synopsis Sicario examines the unethical nature of actions taken in the war on drugs by following idealistic FBI agent Kate Macer as she descends into covert anti-cartel operations on US and Mexican...

It's Blunt Month! Tim & Tay talk Emily Blunt, Tom Cruise, and why people love time loop movies in this discussion of Doug Liman's Edge of Tomorrow. Synopsis Edge of Tomorrow tells the story of Maj. William Cage, who enters humanity’s war against the invading aliens known as Mimics with no combat experience. After promptly dying in action, Cage awakes a day earlier, and soon realizes...

Tim & Tay finally dig into Wes Anderson, one of the most recognizable auteurs of modern cinema. Tune in to hear about formalism/contrivance, needle drops,  the Wilson brothers, and more. Synopsis An emotionally distant father attempts to reconnect with his separated wife and three adult children after he loses his place to live. The Royal Tenenbaums , directed by Wes Anderson, stars Gene Hackm...

Tim & Tay talk needle drops, the New Year, and old friends in this discussion about The Big Chill. Tune in to hear why this script is a great example of graceful exposition without the usual crutches.  Synopsis A once-close group of college friends reunites over the course of a weekend to mourn their departed friend, reflecting on how they and the world have changed since they were last togeth...

In this special episode, Tim and Tay highlight a few notable movies from 2021. Not necessarily the best or our favorites, but certainly worth seeing! Disclosures Licorice Pizza  (PTA, 2021) Drive My Car  (Hamaguchi, 2021) The Worst Person in the World  (Trier, 2021) Red Rocket  (Baker, 2021) The Tragedy of Macbeth  (Coen, 2021) Petite Maman  (Sciamma, 2021) Summer of Soul  (Questlove, 2021) Tim: I...

Tim & Tay talk family, the American Dental Association, and more on this episode about the Christmas classic Home Alone. Synopsis When eight-year-old Kevin McCallister is forgotten at home by his vacationing family, he must defend it against a pair of persistent burglars. Home Alone stars Macaulay Culkin, Catherine O’Hara, Joe Pesci, and Daniel Stern, was directed by John Hughes, and first hit...

Tim and Tay talk ambiguous and not-so-pretentious art films in this discussion on David Lowery's The Green Knight. Synopsis This adaptation of the epic Arthurian poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight tells the tale of Gawain as he embarks on a quest to make a name for himself in the eyes of King Arthur’s court and all of Britain. The Green Knight stars Dev Patel, Alicia Vikander, and Ralph Ine...

In our first audience-selected episode, Tim and Tay attempt to seize the meaning of one of the most quoted school-based movies of all time: Dead Poets Society . We explore how Peter Wier's strong direction helps unify great performances and specific camera work to serve the story being told. Synopsis An unconventional English teacher urges his students at a stuffy Vermont boarding school to “...

Tim and Tay go back to high school to talk about Mean Girls . This teen movie has palpable star power, solid writing, thoughtful direction, and undeniably meme-able lines, making it an evergreen entry in the overcrowded and easily dated high school movie genre.  Synopsis When a naive, homeschooled junior named Cady attends American high school for the first time, she is quickly accepted into the P...

Tim and Tay couldn't resist putting together what was intended to be a short episode on the sandy sci-fi epic Dune. Once we got talking about wormsign, ornithopters and "the voice", it was hard to stop.  Based on Frank Herbert’s seminal novel of the same name, Dune tells the story of Paul Atreides, heir to a dukedom and a potentially even greater destiny as he begins a new life with...

For October's second horror-centric episode, Tim and Tay talk John Carpenter's not-so-immediately appreciated masterpiece The Thing . From evergreen creature effects to unsettling philosophical implications, this movie has it all. Synopsis An American research base in Antarctica is infiltrated by an alien that can assume the shape of anything it attacks. The social fabric of the small co...

Tim and Tay dig into their first horror movie of October with John Carpenter's In the  Mouth of Madness, discussing what it means to watch horror, the movie's classic literature and real-world psychological inspirations, and more. In the Mouth of Madness tells the story of John Trent, an insurance investigator tasked with tracking down best-selling horror novelist Sutter Cane. When the i...

Tim and Tay welcome James Stacey ( The Grey NATO ) to celebrate episode #10 with a potluck — each host picks a scene from Blade Runner 2049 to discuss. Set 30 years after the first film, Blade Runner 2049 tells the story of K, a replicant who discovers the remains of one of his kind, who had died giving birth to a child. As a Blade Runner with the LAPD, K is secretly tasked with finding the child...

Tim and Tay talk comedy (Apatow & otherwise), late '90s pop, and board games in this episode that looks at Game Night. This recent comedy breathed fresh air into the genre by returning to a few simple techniques while updating a few dated tropes.   Max & Annie’s weekly game night is kicked into high gear when Max’s visiting brother Brooks arranges for a fake kidnapping. The three coup...

Tim and Tay discuss their first animated feature and first Hayao Miyazaki feature on the podcast: Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, which offers a compelling heroine for young and old viewers alike, embodying the idea that violence and war only lead to more of the same. The success of Nausicaä would allow Miyazaki to co-found Studio Ghibli and subsequently release some of the most beloved animat...

Tim and Tay are joined by Rob (our very first guest on the podcast) to talk about bureaucracy, kaiju films, and more in a discussion about 2016's Shin Godzilla. This 2016 installment in the 67-year Godzilla franchise examines how the modern Japanese government (and allied forces) would respond when a skyscraper-sized lizard comes ashore to wreak havoc in Tokyo. Shin Godzilla was written and d...

Tim and Tay talk about the career of Canadian filmmaker Denis Villeneuve, and examine a powerful scene that marks the turning point for Incendies' protagonist Narwal Marwan. Incendies tells the story of Canadian twins that travel to their mother's native country in the Middle East to uncover her hidden past amidst a bloody civil war. Told in parallel, the two generations’ stories examine...

By examining an infamous, potentially movie-breaking scene in Ocean's 12, Tim and Tay explore just how much of Soderbergh's audacity this franchise can bear before it falls apart. Ocean’s 12 , the second installment in Steven Soderbergh’s Ocean’s trilogy, finds the gang on the clock to repay their mark from the first film, casino mogul Terry Benedict (Andy Garcia). In order to pay back w...

Tim and Tay talk Sam Raimi’s post-Spider-Man return-to-horror, Drag Me To Hell , and how one scene in a parking garage shows off everything the director has mastered since his start in the early ‘80s.    Drag Me To Hell is a 2009 horror feature directed by Sam Raimi, starring Alison Lohman, Lorna Raver, and Justin Long. Lohman plays Christine Brown, an ambitious loan officer who, in the pursuit of...

In the premiere episode of Single Serving Cinema, Tim and Tay explore a deceptively simple and highly functional scene in the spiraling, multi-layered narrative of Christopher Nolan’s The Prestige .  The Prestige tells the story of two rival stage magicians in Victorian-era London, and their obsessive pursuits to gain superiority, no matter the cost. Directed by Christopher Nolan, starring Christi...