The Bulwark Goes to Hollywood

On this week’s episode, I talked to Christian Swegal, the writer-director of the new film Sovereign , about his new film and its focus on the cult-like behavior of the Sovereign Citizen movement. We discussed Nick Offerman’s commanding lead performance, how you adapt a movie with an ending and setting as tragic as this one, and the difficulty of finding compassion even for those who seem to deserv...

Always glad to talk to the Entertainment Strategy Guy (read him here !) about the state of play in the world of streaming and beyond. Among the topics discussed this week: Whether or not F1: The Movie is a hit (and what being a “hit” means for a $200 million original for Apple as opposed to a different type of movie for a different type of studio); whether F1, the sport, is a butts-in-seats phenom...

On this week’s episode, I’m joined by Daniel Drezner—cohost of the Space the Nation podcast with Ana Marie Cox and proprietor of the Drezner’s World Substack —to discuss the eternal popularity of zombies (most recently via the hit movie 28 Years Later , which I reviewed here ) and the continued relevance of his book, Theories of International Politics and Zombies , which is now in its third editio...

On this week’s episode, I’m rejoined by Bart Weiss to discuss the evolution of the iPhone-shot movie from Tangerine to 28 Years Later and his recent book, Smartphone Cinema: Making Great Films with Your Mobile Phone. You have the power to make a movie in the palm of your hand: will you use it? If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with a friend!

On this week’s episode, I’m joined by Lane Brown of New York magazine to discuss his feature on an increasingly rare phenomenon: the film or TV show shot in Los Angeles. From foreign tax credits to the cost of permits, Los Angeles is getting more expensive to shoot in, meaning that more productions are moving out of Los Angeles altogether. If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to read Lane’s piec...

On this week’s episode, I’m joined by New York Magazine features writer Lila Shapiro to discuss her feature story on the growing utilization of generative AI by Hollywood studios to cut costs and speed up production times. From a party hosted by an AI studio to the work being done by Runway to the growing sense that, hey man, this is just The Future, it seems like AI is, as several folks in the pi...

On this week’s episode, I strayed a bit from Hollywood to talk to David C. Lowery of the bands Cracker and Camper Van Beethoven about his new album, Fathers, Sons, and Brothers. You can check out the album here and peruse the accompanying Substack here . We had a fascinating chat about how the industry has changed over the last 40 years (for better and worse), how folks discover new music, and how...

I’m joined by Ann Foley this week to discuss her work as costume designer on the hit HBO show The Last of Us . From sourcing vintage clothes to weaving the infected’s fungal-explosions in with the clothes they were wearing when they died to her graduate school on the sets of Agents of SHIELD , Ann’s insights into translating the world of the game to the world of the screen are pretty fascinating....

I’m joined by Matthew Specktor, author of The Golden Hour: A Story of Family and Power in Hollywood . Part novel, part memoir, and entirely entertaining, Matthew’s book is a revealing look at life in Hollywood when you’re not on the A-list but occasionally adjacent to it. In addition to relating the drama that makes any family intriguing, Matthew’s book is a keen look at Hollywood in a time of flu...

On this week’s episode, I’m joined by Evan Jonigkeit, the star and producer of Henry Johnson . Based on the play of the same name by David Mamet, Henry Johnson is Mamet’s first film in a dozen years and a beguiling provocation; I greatly enjoyed discussing not only the meaning of the movie with Jonigkeit but also how difficult it is to get a picture like this—a series of Socratic dialogues, a movi...

On this week’s episode, I’m joined by Jeremy Workman, the director and producer of Secret Mall Apartment . We discussed the difficult process of getting your subjects to trust you, the trickiness of distributing an indie documentary in the modern cinematic landscape, and the importance of having a big star like Jesse Eisenberg willing to do a little press for you. The movie’s playing in theaters n...

On this week’s episode I’m rejoined by Scott Mendelson of The Outside Scoop to talk about the state of the box office thus far through 2025. It’s better than 2024—thank you, Minecraft —but not as good as 2023. Plus, we delve into some of the discussion surrounding Sinners ’s box office, particularly the foreign and domestic splits. Does its strength in North America demonstrate that Hollywood shou...

On this week’s episode, I talked to Andrew Ortenberg of Briarcliff Entertainment about distributing tricky movies like The Apprentice and Magazine Dreams . How have the economics of cinematic distribution improved for distributors with the infrastructure in place to handle it? How have the various video-on-demand tiers shifted over the last few years? What should folks keep in mind before they dec...

On this week’s episode, I’m joined by New York Times film critic Alissa Wilkinson to discuss her new book about Joan Didion, We Tell Ourselves Stories . I mentioned the book in a newsletter a couple of weeks back, but I wanted to focus on the ways in which the political world has borrowed showbiz’s penchant for image calibration, from the ways in which issues are decided upon to the means by which...

On this week’s episode, I’m joined by Ray Mendoza, who cowrote and codirected the new A24 movie Warfare with Alex Garland ( Civil War , Ex Machina ). We discussed the journalistic process of rebuilding the day’s actions portrayed in the film from the memory of those who participated, Mendoza’s work with Garland on Civil War , and the cinematic experience of trying to help people understand what it...

I am pleased to be rejoined this week by Bobby Miller to discuss his new novel, Situation Nowhere . Imagine Brazil by way of Idiocracy but goopier: That’s Situation Nowhere . We talked about some of his influences, the state of our increasingly recursive culture, and why we need to bring back shaming folks for selling out. If you’re in Los Angeles, check out Bobby’s event on Saturday at The Redwoo...

On this week’s episode I’m joined by Ross Benes, the author of the forthcoming book 1999: The Year Low Culture Conquered America and Kickstarted Our Bizarre Times . It comes out in a few weeks and I hope you take a gander at it; we spent most of our time discussing the ways in which professional wrestling and the Insane Clown Posse help explain the phenomenon that is Donald J. Trump and his ascent...

Sonny Bunch sits down with filmmaker Jonathan Gruber to discuss his new documentary, Centered , which explores the life and legacy of Joe Lieberman. As the first Jewish Vice Presidential candidate, Lieberman made history—only to later shake up politics by breaking with his own party. With the film releasing today, they dive into his career, key political battles, and the impact of centrism in mode...

A weird question I sometimes get is this: “I want to get into buying movies on disc, Sonny, but I don’t know where to start.” I say it’s weird because the answer seems obvious to me: just buy movies you like to watch! But there are issues I take for granted like formats and resolutions, so I thought it would be useful to talk to Aidan Ryan of the Boston Globe about his recent piece in that newspap...

On this week’s episode, I’m plesaed to be rejoined by Brandon Struessnig to discuss one of my favorite packages of the year, Vulture’s annual stunt awards. Who were the big winners? What were some of the surprises? Just how long did it take George Miller to shoot that war rig sequence in Furiosa anyway? All that and more on this week’s episode. Make sure to check out the winners before listening t...

This week I was joined by Jake Rademacher, the director of Brothers After War to talk about his new documentary checking in with folks who have returned from the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq and how they are reintegrating into society. It’s a powerful and moving documentary, and I highly recommend checking it out if you get the chance, particularly if you have a veteran in your life. You can...

On this week’s episode, I’m joined by the New York Times’s James Poniewozik to discuss SNL’s (rather lengthy) 50th anniversary celebration. (Here’s a gift link to James’s piece on his favorite episode of SNL.) We discuss the show, how it has changed, and how changes in how people watch the show change its meaning (and our relationship to it). I also asked James about his book, Audience of One: Don...

On this week’s episode, I’m joined by Jake VerKesen—some of you in the comments might know him by his handle, Jake VK—on the long and winding road to turning an idea for a micro-budgeted indie movie like I Agree With You from a dream into a reality. We discuss the paperwork, the delays, the fundraising, the shooting, the food, the editing, and, finally, the showing, that goes into getting an indie...

On this week’s episode, I’m rejoined by writer/director Philip Gelatt and novelist Paul Tremblay (author of Horror Movie and The Cabin at the End of the World , among other scary books) to discuss the new Substack-hosted docu-horror series Etch . The concept is pretty cool: Philip has interviewed a quintet of horror authors—Tremblay, Stephen Graham Jones, Laird Barron, Elizabeth Hand, and Mariana...

On this week’s episode, Sonny Bunch is rejoined by Jesse Nelson of DiabolikDVD and Cauldron Films to discuss the state of home video. We get to the tariff discussion around 32 minutes in, but before that, Jesse dispels some of the concerns about Sony’s recent announcement that they’re discontinuing recordable media like Blu-ray, what collectors are looking for from his store, and how he and his bu...