The Goods: A Film Podcast

In honor of Dan's birthday, he and Brian watch and discuss one of Dan's favorite movies, the classic 1993 hangout comedy Dazed and Confused. Join as they discuss Richard Linklater's career, the most beautiful word in the English language, the complexity of nostalgia, Dan's favorite needle drops, and how Dan is L-I-V-I-N at age 38. Dan's movie reviews: http://thegoodsreviews.com/ Subscribe, join th...

Dan and Brian embark on a journey exploring the many movies about a man from a colonial force falling in love with a native and learning the "noble" ways of her culture, including Avatar, Ferngully, Dances With Wolves, and their focus of the week, Pocahontas. Next, they look at the StarKid Production musical paying tribute and parody to the sci-fi films of its ilk, Starship. Lastly, and most impor...

Dan and Brian catch up with neo-noir The Kid Detective, a longtime watchlist entry for Dan. Join as they discuss Canadian cinema, Adam Brody, the boundaries of film noir, arrested development, a post-Simpsons world, census-designated places, structure-based riffs, and delicate tonal descent. Dan's movie reviews: http://thegoodsreviews.com/ Subscribe, join the Discord, and find us on Letterboxd: ht...

Dan and Brian try something for the first time in their 250 episode run: a "mailbag" episode taking questions written in by listeners. Topics include iconic screen kisses, film noir, dream podcast guests, and KPop Demon Hunters vs. Zombies 4. Dan's movie reviews: http://thegoodsreviews.com/ Subscribe, join the Discord, and find us on Letterboxd: http://thegoodsfilmpodcast.com/  

Dan and Brian are joined by their friend Gavin and his lawyer father Kevin to discuss the courtroom comedy classic My Cousin Vinny. Join as they discuss their own courtroom experiences, the accuracies and inaccuracies of My Cousin Vinny's depiction of a jury trial, whether or not the film's farce gags work, the remarkable casting and lineup of performances, whether Marisa Tomei deserved that Oscar...

Dan and Brian convene to discuss how they are feeling after a quarter-thousand episodes of The Goods: A Film Podcast and what lies ahead. Then, they hand out awards to films covered in the 50 most recent episodes of the show. Thank you as always, listeners, for nearly six years of great times, and many more to come. Send us questions for our mailbag: thegoodsfilmpodcast@gmail.com Dan's movie revie...

Brian and Dan celebrate TWO HUNDRED FIFTY episodes of The Goods with a big-time double-whammy of two oft-mentioned but never-reviewed films: Armageddon, the Michael Bay space-disaster blockbuster, and Amadeus, the Best Picture-winning story of competing classical music composers. Join as they discuss The Criterion Collection, laser discs, the critical merits of "Bayhem," the goofy charms and demer...

Dan and Brian welcome back Gargus to discuss a video game adaptation that goes out of its way to channel the spirit of its impish source material, for better and for worse. Join as they discuss Uwe Boll, Gamergate, tax evasion, 9/11 jokes, the fine line between crass and provocative, and a finale for the ages.  Dan's movie reviews: http://thegoodsreviews.com/ Subscribe, join the Discord, and find...

Dan and Brian celebrate their cherished annual April Fools Day episode by each selecting a not-quite-a-film, and each has brought a source of their own joy. Dan has forced Brian to play the 2007 Popcap game Peggle, which has sparked in Brian some compulsions and mixed emotions. Brian, meanwhile, shares with Dan a training video parody he saw in German class in high school. Join as they discuss the...

Dan preps for air travel by bringing Steven Spielberg's strange post-9/11 comedy The Terminal to discuss with Brian. Join as they discuss Tom Hanks' silly voice and tremendous performance, influences of Capra and Tati and Kafka, the messier narrative elements of the story, the provocative and allegorical reflections on immigrant experience, the Spielberg touch, and our unsorted feelings on where t...

In honor of the director's Best Picture nomination and Brian's curiosity about the filmmaker, Dan and Brian consider the surreal and dark comedy-drama The Lobster by Yorgos Lanthimos. Join as they discuss St. Patrick's Day, the Oscars, menacing names, vibes-based filmmaking, expectations about on-screen transformation effects, the pros and cons of big storytelling swings, and tantalizing ambiguity...

Dan and Brian wrap Musical Decades Month with a look at a movie from the '80s and the '90s -- the start and the end of the Disney Renaissance. Join as they discuss the history and significance of Disney's rebound in the late '80s, the surprising role of Steven Spielberg, CAPS, the tight script of The Little Mermaid, the different coming-of-age readings of the 1989 film, the different approach to m...

Dan and Brian continue Musical Decades Month with a look at two musicals written by Andrew Lloyd Webber. Join as they discuss the influential and divisive career of Webber, his style and cinematic approach to stage production, and his legacy. Then, they discuss their own relationships with Phantom of the Opera, its contradictory view of romance, its high and low points as a story, and whether we'd...

Dan and Brian continue Musical Decades Month and also honor Black History Month by looking at two films depicting the Black experience with Black casts: the groundbreaking Faustian musical Cabin in the Sky from 1943 and the bold musical take on The Color Purple from 2023. Join as Dan and Brian discuss the ways they consider representation when watching movies, the charming casts and productions of...

Dan and Brian continue their Musical Decades theme month with a look at two Disney live action-animation hybrid films, the beloved Julie Andrews-starring Oscar winner and its less heralded (but adored-by-Brian) follow up. Join as they discuss Walt Disney's later career and his obsession with Disney Land, the film's multifaceted look at living your life with a "spoonful of sugar," Dick Van Dyke and...

Dan and Brian invite film critic and musical cinema lover Hunter Allen from Kinemalogue to join as they kick off a new theme month: Musical Decades Month, where they plan to discuss 100 years of musicals in five weeks. To kick things off with the 1930s and 1950s, they discuss two strands of early musical technique: the Busby Berkley style of geometric chorus numbers pioneered in 42nd Street versus...

To celebrate Brian's birthday, he and Dan invite Brian's brother Andrew to join the podcast and discuss the 2001 animated film Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius. Join as they ponder the ravages of age, the podcast's history of birthday episodes, their most-watched movies, the various influences informing the film, its overabundance of chicken jokes, its unusual format of serving as a TV show pilot, why Br...

Dan and Brian count down their top 10 movie endings, with the proviso that 5 of them must be movies they've discussed on The Goods and 5 of them must be movies they have not discussed previously. Join this joyous (spoilery) celebration of our favorite finales in cinema. Also check out Part 1 of this discussion, a review of The Usual Suspects. Dan's movie reviews: http://thegoodsreviews.com/ Subscr...

Dan and Brian discuss The Usual Suspects, that famous purveyor of narrative misdirection. Join as they debate the extent to which the film's famous ending revelations enhance everything leading up to it, the tarnished legacy of some of the talent behind the film, the tug-of-war between heist procedure and noir murkiness, and which Oscars the film deserved. Check back in soon for Part 2 of this epi...

Dan and Brian are joined by Stephanie Bendoraitis to discuss the delightful fantasy comedy The Princess Bride. Join as they discuss Rob Reiner's remarkable life and tragic death, William Goldman's distinctive personality, the film's nostalgic pull, the outstanding and immersive production, the bifurcated structure, the perfect casting, the quotable script, and the powerful theme of passing down st...

Dan and Brian kick off 2026 discussing a little-seen, time-hopping, breakup musical starring Jeremy Jordan and Anna Kendrick. Join as they discuss nonlinear timelines in movies, showtunes, Jordan's talent and connections to The Greatest Showman, the complicated life of being a creative, depicting subjectivity on screen, the many La La Land connections, and a tribute to Adam the Woo. Dan's movie re...

The Goods send off 2025 with an epic and somewhat discursive look at the history of Dr. Seuss's How the Grinch Stole Christmas, starting with the beloved book by the influential children's author, through the animated classic by Chuck Jones, through the Ron Howard/Jim Carrey adaptation of our childhood, and through the Illumination retelling from a few years ago. Join as they discuss what makes Se...

Dan and Brian approach the end of 2025 pondering what makes a "movie year" -- how to measure and rank it, what they've watched on the podcast, and what eras of film history they've under- and overrepresented. Then, they fill an important hole in their podcast's lineup with a look at two 1974 Christmas movies at very different ends of the spectrum: a family stop-motion TV special and a terrifying p...

Dan and Brian welcome Brennan Klein from Alternate Ending to celebrate some of their shared cinematic interests and then dissect a strange COVID-era holiday romcom, Dear Christmas. Join as they discuss the ranking of Disney's Zombies movies, the Hallmark-and-co holiday romcom industrial complex, the alien qualities of a quarantine production, the many occupations of Jason Priestley's character, ep...

Dan and Brian discuss four adaptations of Charles Dickens' famed holiday novella for a sixth consecutive holiday season. This year, they each share their feedback on two different entries randomly selected from a giant list. Join as they consider the perils of low-budget cinema tackling high-budget material, British humor, and the compatibility of western tropes with Scrooge. Then, they look inwar...