After The Hype

Unfortunately we've got a bit of a downgrade this week as we talk about Mortal Engines for our month of Hugo Weaving. There are things to like here, the setting being the chief among them. It's an interesting world with some equally interesting lore, and it all looks absolutely gorgeous. Where the film loses us is with everything else. The plot is bland and at times nonsensical, and no one is giving much in the way of their performance. Hugo Weaving has almost nothing to work with here with his first draft villain Valentine, and line reads that should play with gravitas just fall flat. The leads have no chemistry, which makes the eventual "falling in love" that's required of all YA feel like it comes out of left field. We discuss plenty more about it, but you'll have to listen to find out what we say.

Remember, remember! The Fifth of November...for it is the beginning of Hugo Weaving Month here at Behind the Hype. To kick things off we're starting with the flawed V For Vendetta, which boasts great performances from Weaving and others (see: Creedy), while not necessarily aging all that well. It's tough to root for a a character who gaslights and tortures the female protagonist (Evey, played by Natalie Portman) in a movie with already so few women in it. Doesn't help either that the character of Evey is so passive. That said, the Wachowskis wrote the script and you can feel their hand in a lot of what transpires onscreen.

We decided to wrap up our Jamie Lee Curtis retrospective by reviewing the classic horror film Prom Night, the film that has inspired many horror movies since it was released and continues to inspire today. What did we think about it? Well, perhaps we should have watched Terror Train instead? There's some interesting stuff in Prom Night to be sure, but so much of it is either boring or just doesn't work or is just plain confusing. We even brought in our pal Matt Dykes to help us work through this thing and he had similar problems.But hey, if there's anything we learned from this it is that Jamie Lee Curtis is a cinematic treasure. If nothing else, watch the movie for her...and then watch Terror Train.

We continue our Jamie Lee Curtis retrospective with Halloween H20: 20 Years Later, her celebrated return to both the horror genre and this franchise in particular. We have a lot to say about the film as it's quite flawed and makes some odd choices throughout. The body count is low, and the mask changes partway through the film into something you might find at a pop up Halloween store. The film introduces Josh Hartnett and his messy hair baggy clothes combo to the world, and we see a young Joseph Gordon-Levitt get a skate to the face. Everything with Jamie Lee Curtis is quite good and she makes a traumatized Laurie Strode believable. Worth watching? Listen to find out.

We're traveling back in time to 1994 to talk about True Lies, James Cameron's take on Bond starring Arnold Schwarzenegger and our lady of the month Jamie Lee Curtis. It's quite the adventure, filled to the brim with action, humor, and fun performances from everyone involved. The only weak link is Tom Arnold, but he manages to hold on to the harrier jet, as it were.To assist us in our review of such a classic film we invited our pal Matt Dykes onto the show to give us his perspective.

October has arrived, and we decided it would be a great idea to do a retrospective on the top scream queen herself - Jamie Lee Curtis. We start the month with her most recent turn in the Rian Johnson film Knives Out. It's a tightly-paced and well-written whodunnit with really fun performances. And even though Jamie Lee Curtis doesn't have as much screen time as we would have liked, she commands every moment and makes this a great way to start our month.

We made it to the end of our very enlightening Eve Stewart retrospective and to celebrate we're discussing the divisive Tom Hooper spectacle Cats. There's a lot to love in this film, and there's a lot to hate, and really it boils down to how easy it is for you to get past Rebel Wilson and James Corden's abysmal performances. Production design here is stellar - big surprise - but Tom Hooper tries his best to focus on other things. Bad Hooper. Bad. All that said, is the film worth watching? Hit that play button and we'll tell you.

Thank you for your patience! This week we're back to talk about De-Lovely, the next film in our Eve Stewart retrospective. It's about the musical icon Cole Porter, played with zest by Kevin Kline, as he re-lives the best and worst of his life at the behest of the angel Gabriel (Jonathan Pryce). The film features songs written by Cole Porter, all sung by popular modern musicians. But the question remains: is the film any good?It's...charming, but never quite reaches "great." The real MVP of the film is Eve Stewart and her production design. It's breathtaking, and quickly overshadows everything else in the film. Join us, won't you?

The next film in our Eve Stewart retrospective is the Gore Verbinski horror thriller A Cure For Wellness, starring Dane DeHaan, Mia Goth, and Jason Isaacs. The film is a clunky mess, suffering from logic problems as well as a problematic third act. What saves it for us is Stewart's exceptional production design, which gives the film an atmosphere and mood that makes us want to keep watching despite the significant script problems. We go into all of this and more in the episode, so don't wait another minute to hit that play button on your podcast player of choice.

A new month brings us a new filmmaker and for September we decided to breakdown the lively career of production designer Eve Stewart, starting with 2002's Nicholas Nickleby, starring Charlie Hunnam, Jamie Bell, and Christopher Plummer. It's a film that's exceptionally designed and looks absolutely gorgeous, but that has almost nothing else going for it. The performances are fine, but the tone of the film oscillates so much between farce and prestige period drama that it's hard to really connect to anything the actors are doing. And don't get us started about couches being dragged outside of houses for leisure. Did we mention that the film is gorgeous?

So I guess this is hello and welcome to this week's episode of Behind the Hype, where we're talking about Superstar, starring the amazing and hilarious Molly Shannon. You want to do what? Now? Well, sure. We should warn you that what follows is a very quotable film that transcends its sketches on SNL and provides some genuine laughs. It may not be as good or considered to be a classic quite like the rest of the movies we discussed this month, but it was very entertaining.We also discuss the Marry Katherine Gallagher sketches that inspired the movie, and Macgruber...which was rough.

It's Wayne's World, Wayne's World! Party On! Excellent. Wew wew wew weewwwww! In a month of SNL films, it was only a matter of time before we discussed this cultural touchstone of a film and give it the effusive praise that it deserves. And a podcast about one of the best SNL films wouldn't be nearly as awesome without a special guest. We're joined (for the first time since our rebrand as Behind the Hype) by Brok Holliday from Damage Boost. He's the choice of a new generation.We also discuss some of the SNL shorts that inspired the film, and dove into a brief discussion about how the Wayne's World sketches worked better overall and had a better transition to film than the Conehead ones and the Blues Brothers musical numbers.

Greetings Earthlings. We come to you from the planet Remulak to provide mass quantities of discourse around the film known as Coneheads, starring Dan Aykroyd, Jane Curtin, and a myriad of fun SNL cameos. It's a movie that's held up remarkably well, and has in fact gotten better as the years have progressed. There's an earnestness to the absurdity that becomes endearing and it's hard not to fall in love with this picture as you watch it. Can you believe that people didn't care for this movie when it came out? We're a bit surprised, too.For our Where Have They Been Doing segment we go back and watch a few of the original Conehead sketches to get a sense of the movie's origins, and we gotta say that the movie did a great job adapting to the big screen.

We're doing something a little bit different from our usual "filmmaker of the month" and taking a deep dive into the Saturday Night Live library of films. To start off we've got our sights set on the absolute best of the bunch, the cream of the crop: The Blues Brothers, featuring stellar performances from Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi, and a whole slew of cameos that will put a smile on your face. Prepare to laugh out loud at the excessive police car damage, and groove along to some exceptional music from some exceptional musicians.

To finish up our month of Taika Waititi we talk his most recent film Jojo Rabbit. It's certainly a weird one, but we love it all the same. The acting is superb, the sets and costumes are powerful, and the comedy works well to offset the rather dark subject matter. We have a few quibbles here and there, but overall this one is a must see and we can't recommend it highly enough.We don't really have much of a "Where Have They Been Doing" other than watching more of What We Do in the Shadows. Turns out we covered most of his other films in the previous weeks.

The trajectory continues upward in our month of Taika Waititi as we discuss Hunt for the Wilderpeople. There's a lot to love in this movie and we struggle to come up with any significant complaints. Sam Neill, Julian Dennison, Rachel House, and frickin' Rhys Darby all give stellar performances, and even the director himself pops in for a bit to play perhaps the worst (or best) priest I've ever seen committed to screen. Wilderpeople also continues the trend of showcasing a New Zealand that's more than just Hobbit holes, although the movie makes a clever LOTR reference that nearly did this shownotes writer in.

Talk about a jump in quality! This week in our Taika Waititi retrospective we discuss Boy, his feature-length follow-up to Eagle vs. Shark set in New Zealand in 1984. It's a story about overcoming grief, growing up, and being there for your family, all told from the point of view of the title character. Taika has a larger role in this film compared to the last and his energetic and comedic touch REALLY work. Could say more, but you should probably just dive into the episode. We also talk Team Thor, Team Thor Part 2, and his Flight of the Concords episode "New Zealand Town," all of which are pretty funny but maybe don't pop in the way we've come to expect from a Taika Waititi venture.

A new month means a new filmmaker, so for this month we're talking Taika. We begin with his feature length debut Eagle Vs. Shark, which at first glance looks like the next Napoleon Dynamite. Instead it's much more down to earth and features characters that are more than just dorky caricatures. Doesn't mean the film is without flaws and we note that were this movie made today it would end quite differently.We also talk Thor Ragnarok, which provides an interesting look at the filmmaker and gives us a little bit of an idea about what to expect for the rest of the month. Boy, oh boy, are we in for a treat.

We end our John Singleton month with Four Brothers, a movie that never quite finds its tone and never really hits its stride. It's a well-directed movie, and the acting is fun across the board, but the script drags the experience down by playing more to caricature than to character. We also discuss his entry in the Fast series: 2 Fast 2 Furious and why despite his obvious skill as a director, he was not right for the job. Toward the end of the podcast we wrap up our thoughts on the month and what we found interesting about his career. There's quite a journey from Boyz in the Hood to Four Brothers.

We take a bit of a turn in our John Singleton retrospective with the film Shaft, not to be confused with Shaft, or the more recent film Shaft. It's a film that features a lot of dirty cops and dirtier criminals and the sum of all these interesting parts leave us feeling uncomfortable. It's a film that features the line "It is my duty to please the booty" along side a frat boy version of Patrick Bateman beating a black man to death and getting away with it. Well, at least until the end of the movie. There's a lot here, and while some of it doesn't quite work, and awhile some of it is tough to watch in 2020, it stands out as another strong piece of filmmaking from John Singleton.