Truth & Movies: A Little White Lies Podcast

On this week’s show, Michael Leader, Greg Evans and Adam Woodward have the final word on the 91st Academy Awards before looking ahead to two brand new releases. Florence Pugh grapples with challenges in and out of the wrestling ring in Stephen Merchant’s crowd-pleasing Fighting with My Family, while in Irish horror The Hole in the Ground a single mother makes a disturbing discovery about her young...

On Truth & Movies this week, Michael Leader, Elena Lazic and Hannah Woodhead preside over a pair of very different courtroom dramas. First in the dock is On the Basis of Sex, Mimi Leder’s Hollywood biopic of Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, starring Felicity Jones and Armie Hammer, followed by Nadine Labaki’s Cannes-winning Capernaum, about a young Lebanese boy who sues his...

With the 91st Academy Awards almost upon us, Truth & Movies tackles the key issues surrounding this year’s ceremony, as well as giving our predictions for whose acceptance speech will be cut short this year. Joining regular host Michael Leader is The Telegraph’s chief film critic and Oscars pundit Robbie Collin, who offers expert insight into Hollywood’s awards machine – while fielding some pr...

Wizardry, war and wisecracks are on the T&M menu this week, as Michael Leader, Matt Thrift and Adam Woodward chew the fat over Joe Cornish’s youthful modern twist on the Arthurian legend, The Kid Who Would Be King, followed by Matthew Heineman’s A Private War, starring Rosamud Pike as the late war correspondent Maria Colvin. And with the BFI’s Barbara Stanwyck season in full swing, we revisit...

How do you follow-up an Oscar-winning breakthrough like Moonlight? That’s the question on our lips this week as Michael Leader, David Jenkins and Kelli Weston weigh up Barry Jenkins’ hotly-anticipated third feature If Beale Street Could Talk, adapted from James Baldwin’s celebrated novel. This week also sees the release of Australian actor-turned-director Joel Edgerton’s Boy Erased, based on a tru...

Two of LWLies’ favourite films of 2018 are finally released in UK cinemas this week – and Michael Leader, David Jenkins and Beth Webb are on hand to offer their thoughts on both. First up is Marielle Heller’s true crime saga with a twist, Can You Ever Forgive Me?, starring Oscars hopefuls Melissa McCarthy and Richard E Grant. That’s followed by the majestic mystery romance that is Burning, South K...

Physical transformation is the name of the game on this week’s Truth & Movies, as Christian Bale dons a bald wig and rubber chin to play former US VP Dick Cheney in Adam McKay’s unconventional biopic, Vice, before Nicole Kidman ditches her signature blonde locks to play a hard-boiled detective in Karyn Kusama’s noir procedural, Destroyer. Michael Leader, Sophie Monks Kaufman and Hannah Woodhea...

It’s an M Night Shyamalan special on this week’s show – but don’t let that put you off. Host Michael Leader is joined by Manuela Lazic and Kambole Campbell, to discuss Glass, the director’s sequel-of-sorts to Unbreakable and Split, before revisiting his breakout feature from 1999, The Sixth Sense, in Film Club. Between that, we check in with star-on-the-rise Timothée Chalamet, who’s been earning p...

Strained relationships are the flavour of the day on this week’s Truth & Movies, as we weigh up the respective merits of Stan & Ollie, a Laurel and Hardy biopic starring Steve Coogan and John C Reilly, and Colette, in which Keira Knightley plays the eponymous French popular author alongside a larger-than-life Dominic West. Forming a more harmonious union are host Michael Leader and regular...

In the first Truth & Movies of 2019 we hitch a ride back to the heady days of Queen Anne care of Greek absurdist Yorgos Lanthimos. Michael Leader, Hannah Woodhead and Adam Woodward are on hand to heap praise on The Favourite’s cast, in particular the sublime Olivia Colman, before turning their attentions to Robert Zemeckis’ less successful – but no less strange – Welcome to Marwen, starring St...

In this special end of year episode of Truth & Movies, Michael Leader, David Jenkins and Hannah Woodhead look back over the past 12 months of moviegoing to select their 10 favourite films of the year. Before that, there’s just one more new release to review – and it’s a big one. Mary Poppins Returns does exactly what it says on the tin, with Emily Blunt in the iconic title role, but is it...

On this week’s show the podders heap praise on world cinema heavyweights Alfonso Cuarón and Lars von Trier. Joining host Michael Leader to discuss Roma and The House That Jack Built – two very different but similarly astonishing works – are David Jenkins and Matt Thrift, who also find time to reassess 1971’s The Last Movie for our Film Club. Is it Dennis Hopper’s most under-appreciated role, or si...

To mark Robert Redford’s retirement from acting, this week’s Truth & Movies is dedicated to the veteran Hollywood icon. Alongside host Michael Leader this week are Manuela Lazic and Adam Woodward, who give their thoughts on David Lowery’s The Old Man & the Gun, starring Redford as an ageing bankrobber who’s on the run but nearing the end of the road. Next up is Boots Riley’s urgent, endles...

It’s gloves off on Truth & Movies this week as Michael Leader, David Jenkins and Christina Newland weigh in with their thoughts on Creed II, the eighth film in the Rocky franchise and sequel to 2015’s surprise hit. That’s followed by one of our highlights from this year’s Cannes Film Fesitval, Turkish writer/director Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s sweeping drama The Wild Pear Tree. And in Film Club, our...

On Truth & Movies this week Michael Leader, Hannah Woodhead and Adam Woodward give The Girl in the Spider’s Web a spin. Claire Foy stars as punk Scandi hacker Lisbeth Salander, but how does she compare to the Rooney Mara and Noomi Rapace versions of the girl with the dragon tattoo? Next up is Hirokazu Koreeda’s delightful family drama Shoplifters, which took top honours at the Cannes Film Fest...

We’re spellbound on Truth & Movies this week, as Michael Leader, Simran Hans and Kelli Weston cast their verdicts on not one but two dark arts fables. First up is the JK Rowling-penned sequel Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindlewald, which sees Eddie Redmayne reprise his role as ‘magizoologist’ Newt Scamander. There’s witchcraft and plenty of weird goings on too in Luca Guadagnino’s reinter...

Michael Leader is back in the hot seat this week as we heap praise on not one but two Steve McQueen movies. David Jenkins and Sophie Monks Kaufman are on hand to dissect the British writer/director’s red-hot heist thriller, Widows, followed by Paul Dano’s charming ’50s set character study, Wildlife. And in Film Club, we give McQueen’s New York sex addict drama from 2011, Shame, a second spin.&nbsp...

On this week's podcast, Nick Duncalf welcomes regular contributor Beth Webbe and a debut appearance from Kambole Campbell who tackle another trio of films. First up, it's Mike Leigh's latest, the historical political drama Peterloo. And in Film Club, they look back at Leigh's nihilistic drama Naked from 1993, featuring a powerhouse but disturbing turn from David Thewlis. And finally, there's the c...

Easy come, easy go. On this week’s episode, Nick Duncalf, Ella Kemp and Hannah Woodhead assess the highs and lows of Freddie Mercury biopic Bohemian Rhapsody, starring Rami Malek as the late Queen frontman. Next up is Possum from write/director Matthew Holness, who joins us for a brief chat about his bleak psychological thriller. And in Film Club, continuing our recent run of scary movies, there’s...

Guest host Nick Duncalf is in the hot seat this week as Truth & Movies gets spooky... First up is David Gordon Green’s Halloween, a direct sequel to John Carpenter’s iconic ’70s slasher, which sees Jamie Lee Curtis face her old foe one more time. There’s plenty of violence and tension too in Neapolitan crime drama Dogman from Gomorrah director Matteo Garrone. And lastly Nick, Adam Woodwar...

One small step for Truth & Movies, one giant leap for podcast kind... On this episode, David Jenkins, Anton Bitel and Hannah Woodhead orbit Damien Chazelle’s Moon landing saga First Man, starring Ryan Gosling and Claire Foy, and Panos Cosmatos’ heady backwoods horror Mandy, which sees Nicolas Cage journey to hell and back on a nightmarish revenge mission. And in Film Club, we ask whether 1983’...

This week’s Truth & Movies sees Tom Hardy climb back into the superhero movie saddle for Venom, quite possibly the strangest odd couple comedy of the year. Elsewhere Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga hit all the right notes in the melancholy musical drama A Star is Born. Adam Woodward, Elena Lazic and Hannah Woodhead offer their thoughts on all that before taking a dip into the murky CGI waters of...

This week’s Truth & Movies sees Michael Leader, Manuela Lazic and Hannah Woodhead sing the praises of veteran leading lady Glenn Close, who’s on unbeatable form in Björn Runge’s marital drama The Wife, alongside Jonathan heady tale of female friendship and skate culture, Skate Kitchen. And for Film Club the podders reappraise Close’s Oscar-nominated performance in the 1987 “bunny boiler”...

Michael Leader is in the host’s chair this week as Truth & Movies gets spooky with director Lenny Abrahamson’s gothic ghost story The Little Stranger. There’s still stranger goings on in Climax, a drug-addled danse macabre from Argentine provocateur Gaspar Noé. Adam Woodward and David Jenkins are on hand to offer their thoughts, and they’re joined by special guest Sharm Murugiah...

On the show this week, Michael Leader, Matt Thrift and David Jenkins scope out Shane Black’s loose sequel to ’80s action-horror classic Predator, starring Boyd Holbrook and Trevante Rhodes. Also on the docket is Harry Dean Stanton’s swansong, Lucky, in which the late acting icon gives one of the finest performances of his career. And in Film Club, the gang revisits Shane Black’s directorial d...