Weekend Watchlist: Armageddon Time, Wendell and Wild and Holy Spider

Episode notes

[Izon by Trent Walton fades in, plays alone, fades out]

MIA Hi! Welcome to Weekend Watchlist, a look at what’s screening and streaming brought to you by The Letterboxd Show. I’m Mia, they’re Slim...

SLIM Hello!

MIA And together we’ll dig through what’s dropping this weekend, last weekend, recent trends on Letterboxd and we’ll also take a peek at our own watchlists—all under 30 minutes or your money back.

SLIM Mia, we’re one week removed from Black Adam and it’s Armageddon Time—so Black Adam gets released and it’s Armageddon, Mia, you do the math. [Mia laughs] This week, we’ll talk about James Gray’s new movie Armageddon Time, the return of Henry Selick with Wendell & Wild on Netflix and we’ll drift into thriller territory with Holy Spider. And after that, we’ll look back to see what everyone thought on Letterboxd about last week’s releases, your community reviews tagged ‘Weekend Watchlist’ and of course, most important of all, we’ll talk about our own shuffled watchlists later in the episode.

MIA This might be our biggest episode ever.

SLIM Are you for real?

MIA Yeah, because it’s Armageddon Time, which is this searing, apocalyptic sci-fi that—

SLIM Nope.

MIA Hm... Okay, uh... I’m reading the synopsis... [Slim laughs] It seems...

SLIM You’ve been swindled by James.

MIA I’ve been a little swindled by Mr. James Gray. Armageddon Time is on 27,000 watchlists and it is actually a deeply personal story about the strength of family, the complexity of friendship and the generational pursuit of the American dream. Slim, I heard a rumor that you and Gemma may have talked to Mr. Gray himself. Is this true?

SLIM This is a real rumor. This is fact. Gemma and I talked to James yesterday for The Letterboxd Show, so that will be out next week. And he came on the pod to talk about his four faves, really, related to Armageddon Time. Great guest, super knowledgeable about movies—cinephile is a word I would use when discussing James Gray. His four movies were: The 400 Blows, A Woman Under the Influence—

MIA Woo!

SLIM Yeah, I knew you’d like that. [Mia laughs] Zero for Conduct and Amarcord from Federico Fellini. And outside of Ad Astra, I don’t think I’d seen a ton of his movies, so beforehand I watched We Own the Night and The Lost City of Z before I saw Armageddon Time—I love The Lost City of Z.

MIA Starring my man...

SLIM Your boy?

MIA My boy, Rob! Robert Pattinson! Gotta shout him out!

SLIM He plays the secondary character in this one. In another lifetime, I would have seen him being the lead if this had come out maybe just a few years later, right?

MIA I wish—sorry, no shade to Charlie Hunnam. [Mia laughs]

SLIM No, Charlie Hunnam is amazing in The Lost City of Z. I loved The Lost City of Z. I loved the ending. It’s on Prime. But Armageddon Time is sort of an autobiographical movie about his childhood—in school, his family, you know, dealing with being Jewish in New York, but also trying to assimilate but also when to speak up in really tough situations in New York. So a departure a little bit from maybe what you have seen James do in recent years.

MIA It’s also Reagan-era New York.

SLIM Mmm.

MIA Hoohoo—yucky, yucky. [Mia laughs] So it has a lot of themes of, yeah, balancing white-guilt and complicity with a marginalized Jewish identity—and it’s all through the eyes of this child who’s kind of on the cusp of losing his innocence. Jeremy Strong of Succession also co-stars—so we have that for the Suc Heads out there. [Slim & Mia laugh]

SLIM We go from Holy Horror to Suc Heads. What else will you come up with on this pod?

MIA I know, you’ll just have to keep listening.

SLIM There are some reviews on Letterboxd already—so I think it’s out limited this weekend and going wide very soon, so your theater might have this. Oliver wrote a review: “It’s rare to find a biographical film that so openly deals with questions of privilege.” And I know that there was some criticism about the film, about this topic, as Tony wrote in their review: “A very thin line between being a movie about white-guilt and giving agency and comion for its minority characters.” So I think that is a worthy topic of discussion for this film. So recommend people go out and see it in theaters and leave your own review on Letterboxd to see what you thought.

MIA We’ve got another coming-of-age story, but this one’s... more goth, more my speed, more spooky, more creepy. It’s from Henry Selick of [The] Nightmare Before Christmas and Coraline. It’s called Wendell & Wild! It’s on 25,000 watchlists and it is coming out this weekend on Netflix. It’s about two demon brothers who enlists the aid of Kat Elliot — a tough teen with a load of guilt to summon them to the land of the living. But what Kat demands in return leads to a brilliantly bizarre and comedic adventure like no other. We’ve both seen this!

SLIM We have seen this. Stop-motion, Halloween, Netflix, we’re back, Mia, we’re back. What did you think about this one?

MIA So I’m hardwired to love it because I’m also a punk-girl. And the lead is, in Selick’s words, an afro-punk princess. She’s so effing cool. She’s blasting these awesome riot-girl bands out of her boom-box, like X-Ray Spex and Big Joanie—they really did their research into the riot-girl soundtrack, which I always appreciate. So I actually, I really enjoyed this. Stop-motion animation lives—which is good because I was a little worried for it. [Mia laughs]

SLIM Yeah, it looks gorgeous.

MIA Yeah!

SLIM The stop-motion is amazing. And co-written by Jordan Peele—I mean, what more can you ask for? Halloween, get a Jordan Peele co-written stop-motion feature with some demons. And I have to say, Jordan Peele is the cutest demon I’ve ever seen.

MIA I was just gonna bring that up! So the Key and Peele demons are designed to look like them. [Mia laughs]

SLIM Yeah, yeah.

MIA So they’re—oh my god, the Jordan Peele one especially is so adorable. I’m obsessed with him. [Slim laughs]

SLIM It reminds me of, I was thinking back, the Santa Claus from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer stop-motion.

MIA Oh yeah!

SLIM And who was the guy that was narrating that story? Everyone listening probably knows. But the old—it’s not Father Time or... I don’t know. Someone yell at me in my Twitter comments.

MIA Oh my god, someone’s gonna yell at you. [Slim laughs]

SLIM Pushing their glasses up as they’re typing the Twitter reply. So this is a great weekend watch. David Sims—world famous David Sims—left a review: “So busy and overflowing with ideas but very sweet and good hearted. Glad he got to make it.”

MIA There are a lot of ideas brimming about in this one.  There are themes of the prison-industrial complex, gentrification, childhood grief. Really, really heavy themes but balanced out with, you know, Key and Peele humor and whimsy.

SLIM Kristina left a review that cracked me up: “Overall an actually funny animated movie with a pretty bangin soundtrack. Mercifully 0 “ermmm so that just happened” moments.” Just seeing that in text form, makes me think about how often I do see that in comedies and it makes me want to crawl under a blanket never come out.

MIA A lot of modern comedy is just kind of pointing that stuff that happened.

SLIM Mhm...

MIA And that’s the whole joke. [Slim laughs] There’s not a joke.

SLIM That’s it!

MIA That’s the entire joke. So it was very refreshing to watch Wendell & Wild.

SLIM Alright, let’s move to thriller territory. Holy Spider directed by Ali Abbasi. On 17,000 watchlists and a limited release. “A journalist descends into the dark underbelly of the Iranian holy city of Mashhad as she investigates the serial killings of sex workers by the so-called “Spider Killer”, who believes he is cleansing the streets of sinners.”

MIA Euuh...

SLIM This one sounds heavy. This one sounds very heavy, Mia.

MIA It does. It does sound very heavy but it’s from the director. Director Ali Abbasi of Border and he’s also directing a couple of new episodes of the new Last of Us series—yay.

SLIM Ohhh...

MIA So it seems like ‘dark’ is in his wheelhouse. I also just want to add that the lead, Zar Amir Ebrahimi, won Best Actress at Cannes, I want to add. Yeah, and also the director again, won Best Director at Fantastic Fest. So it’s getting a lot of acclaim—this is going to be, I think, in the running for certain awards coming up this season.

SLIM Right. I have seen the poster for Border on Letterboxd often—that’s in my watchlist right now, I really want to see that. But you’re a Last of Us mega-fan—is it safe to call you a Last of Us mega-fan?

MIA It is safe to say it, yes, yes. I’m a huge fan of the Last of Us series, I think it’s... Oh god, what do I even say? I'm all flustered thinking about it.

SLIM I’ve never played Last of Us, because this one’s a PS—

MIA Oh are you a gamer? Are you not a gamer? [Slim laughs]

SLIM This one’s only on PlayStation, I’m an Xbox boy.

MIA Ohhhh, that’s why. That’s the divide between us. I’m a PlayStation girl. Okay, okay. Well, I’m a big Last of Us fan and I think that all of the trailer and the behind-the-scenes photos that are coming out, it’s all very promising. So I’m very excited and I’m excited to see this director’s take on it.

SLIM Yeah, I’m also an HBO boy, so I’ll be giving this a shot, you know, love to my little startup HBO Max, as best I can. [Slim laughs]

MIA HBO will bring all the gamers together—Xbox and PlayStation alike. [Slim laughs]

SLIM We have to spotlight Jack, our own Jack, left a very positive review: “Horrifyingly powerful and stomach-churningly bleak. It reminded me of the way The Vanishing and The Act of Killing make you feel.

MIA We also have a review from Afra Nariman: “A raw and shocking new addition to Iranian cinema; Holy Spider is particularly unsettling and stressful to watch considering the current circumstances in Iran. The film is patient in scenes depicting violence, making such scenes truly difficult to keep your eyes on at times. If anything, the film perhaps leans into the spectacle of violence a bit too much; but overall I think that it is effective in what it sets out to accomplish.”

SLIM Speaking of a stressful watch, just a quick mention, lightning round, All Quiet on the Western Front hitting Netflix directed by Edward Berger, also on 17,000 watchlists. “Paul Baumer and his friends Albert and Muller, egged on by romantic dreams of heroism, voluntarily enlist in the German army. Full of excitement and patriotic fervor, the boys enthusiastically march into a war they believe in. But once on the Western Front, they discover the soul-destroying horror of World War I.”

MIA Remake of the Best Picture winning film of the same name from... 1930? I believe? So it’s about time—

SLIM Oh my god.

MIA It is about time for a remake, perhaps... [Mia laughs]

SLIM 90 years, that’s when it starts to happen, that’s when a conversation start to happen—90 years or nine months, that’s when the remake procession start. [Mia & Slim laugh] So let’s look back at last week—many, many, many releases. Your [The] Banshees of Inisherin—did I get that right?

MIA Inisherin!

SLIM The Banshees of Inisherin.

MIA Thank you very much.

SLIM 4.2 average on Letterboxd!

MIA Yes! We’re climbing.

SLIM Cripes alive. Maybe now’s the time to spotlight that it jumped into The Letterboxd Top 250 at 186. It’s already in The Letterboxd Top 250—that’s nuts.

MIA Oh, I’m so proud of my boys—Colin and Brendan and Barry.

SLIM Freya left a review: “colin farrell i am so fond of you and your unnatural eyebrow acting abilities.” Are those real eyebrows? Are those real?

MIA Yes. And they’re gonna net him an Oscar one day. [Slim laughs]

SLIM Real quick, Barbarian—one of my favorite movies of the year—is on HBO Max right now. HBO Max boy, got to show my . [Mia laughs] Fire it up, watch Barbarian with your loved ones or alone in the dark, whichever your preference is.

MIA Eugh... [Slim laughs]

SLIM What about you? What do you want to spotlight?

MIA Oh, Slim... I bought my Ticket to Paradise...

SLIM Oh no... How did it go? The rom-com—is the rom-com back, officially?

MIA I wish I could say it was. It would give me the greatest pleasure in the world to say that the rom-com was back. Ticket to Paradise, it was a little bit of a bumpy ride—I’m not gonna lie to you, Slim. But the charm and charisma of Julia Roberts and George Clooney almost makes up for that—plus, we have the addition of Lucas Bravo from the beloved Netflix Original, Emily in Paris. I presume you’ve seen every episode of Emily in Paris, Slim?

SLIM No, no, no, no, no.

MIA What? It seems right up your alley.

SLIM I’ve never even heard of that.

MIA That can’t—stop. [Mia & Slim laugh] I just want to say, Lucas Bravo, keep that name on your radar even though it sounds fake—he’s gonna be an international star.

SLIM Ticket to Paradise.

MIA Ticket to Paradise.

SLIM “The rom-com is finished.” Quote, I just quoted you, I’m paraphrase quoting you.

MIA Nooo!

SLIM The rom-com is over. It’s dead and buried.

MIA Ohhhh, don’t worry. I’m gonna revive it. Somebody’s got to do something.

SLIM You want to talk about a rom-com revival... Halloween Ends. Halloween Ends saved the rom-com, a love-story for the ages. I need to get up on my pedestal and talk about how I gave Halloween Ends four stars.

MIA Whoaaaa!

SLIM It’s in the twos on Letterboxd right now. I’m not even gonna look—

MIA It’s got a 2.9—no...

SLIM I think it might even be lower.

MIA Hold on.

SLIM Let’s see...

MIA I’ll check for you so that you don’t have to see it.

SLIM I don’t even want to look.

MIA Yeah, you don’t have to look. Don’t worry. Okay... It is at 2.3... If that—[Slim laughs]

SLIM That is so low! I do not agree with that whatsoever! I had a lot of fun. In my second review—I rewatched this—my second review, I call this “David Gordon Green’s The Last Jedi.” You know? Very divisive movie. Some nerds didn’t like it, some nerds did. But it’s dividing the nerds, the nerds are divided.

MIA Halloween Ends was a psyop to divide the nerds. [Slim & Mia laugh]

SLIM Psyop is one of my favorite words—you just spring that on somebody, they don’t know what to do after that.

MIA It’s a psyop in itself. [Slim laughs]

SLIM review: “Paul Mescal is Daddy. And, we couldn’t be luckier as filmgoers that he has chosen to take on the parental responsibility. ” Very nice review, a longer review from Theriverjordan, we’ll have linked in the episode notes.