Episodes

Our Presidential Series continues with the sly, tense Frost/Nixon! Based on Peter Morgan's award-winning play, Ron Howard's film examines the real story of David Frost's landmark interview series with disgraced President Richard Nixon. Both men enter this story with something to prove: Frost seeks improve his reputation as a carousing, boozy entertainer, while Nixon wants to repair his legacy and come out looking more presidential. How much of this movie resembles reality? What was its lastin...

Our Presidential Series kicks off with an Oscar-wining masterpiece, Oliver Stone’s JFK ! This film is unique in the series, in that it doesn’t focus on the actual president, but the mystery and confusion surrounding his murder. The Kennedy assassination is the greatest whodunit in American history, and Stone approaches it like a true crime thriller. Kevin Costner plays New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison, whose obsession with the killing led to the only criminal trial in the case. Around ...

Welcome! We're taking a break this week, getting ready for our big presidential series. That's 7 movies that run the gamut--from comedies to action to intense drama. It's going to be loads of fun. In the meantime, let's check out a quick look back at our legendary Summer of Chaos. In this episode, we had a lively discussion of Rambo III. It's a dippy, overblown, guilty pleasure action epic. Enjoy!

Welcome! This week, we conclude our Odds and Ends Series, looking at flicks we've wanted to cover, but haven't found the space. Taylor chose The Game , David Fincher's thriller from 1997. It stars Michael Douglas and Sean Penn, and features the sort of mind-screw theme that was popular during this era. (See also: The Matrix and Dark City ) Still, The Game doesn't get the same love as Fincher's other works, such as Se7en and The Social Network . How does it hold up? Is it really the worst m...

Hey! This week, we close out our series looking at classics we've always wanted to cover, and this one's a classic: Twister , from 1996. It's an awesome, cheesy, epic disaster flick, and it's still a lot of fun. We've got a top cast (including the late, great Bill Paxton and Phillip Seymour Hoffman), ground-breaking CGI (which looks a little quaint now, but...), and lots of corny dialogue. Get your popcorn ready! Did you know this movie was loaded with backstage drama? Find out all the juic...

Welcome! This week, we continue our series looking at movies we've never gotten around to seeing. Each host picks a new movie each week. For this installment, it's Sean's pick--Edgar Wright's rom-com chase flick, Baby Driver ! This movie has familiar elements, but presents them in a refreshing way. It's exciting, goofy, and totally fun. We have a lot of fun discussing it, and you don't want to miss out! #BabyDriver #CarChases #actionmovie #JamieFoxx #EdgarWright

Welcome! This week, we kick off a series of movies we've each wanted to cover, but never have. My pick is Stop Making Sense , Jonathan Demme's beautiful, epic documentary of Talking Heads. It's a visionary movie, and has influential countless others since its release. Obviously, I was very excited for this one, but what did everyone else think? Some of us had never seen it, and you won't want to miss their opinions. To pair with these movies, I'll pick some wines we've never tried, from plac...

We couldn't do a Summer Series without a baseball movie, could we? For this episode, we wrap things up with an 80s classic, The Natural . Barry Levinson's epic baseball fantasy is overlong and overblown, but it's also well-cast, beautifully shot, and loaded with iconic scenes. Predictably, our opinions of this film run the gamut. Some of us view it through the glowy haze of nostalgia, while one of us is watching for the first time. Tune in and see where we land on the scale! Our upcoming seri...

Our Summer Series kicks into high gear with one of the biggest hits of the 90s: Independence Day ! From a drunken Randy Quaid to a feisty Bill Pullman, from a young Will Smith to a mumbling Jeff Goldblum...this one has it all! Did you know this was one of the most legendary marketing campaigns in cinema history? Or that the idea for the story came from a random question asked by a reporter? Tune in, and find out tons more trivia! To pair, we enjoy a few refreshing Aperol Spritzers. This has ...

Our Summer Series continues with an all-time 80s classic, Stand by Me ! Rob Reiner directs, from a novella by Stephen King. An cast of future stars appears, including Wil Wheaton, River Phoenix, Corey Feldman, Jerry O'Connell, and even cameos from babyfaced Kiefer Sutherland and John Cusack. On a side note: We experienced some technical difficulties--my mic wasn't working properly. As a result, I had to piece this episode together as much as I could. Still, there's some content here, and yo...

Our Summer Series continues with a refreshing indie dramedy, The Way Way Back ! This flick has a top-notch cast (Oscar-winners and nominees are everywhere), moments of real cleverness, and a good message underneath it all. One of the most fun things about this podcast is introducing our audience to movies they may have missed, and this one certainly fits that bill. Young actor Liam James stars with Steve Carrell, Toni Collette, Allison Janney, and a scene-stealing Sam Rockwell. Find out how t...

We're back! Our Summer Series kicks off with an all-time 90s classic: Dazed and Confused . Richard Linklater's second film takes place over the last day (and night) of the school year, circa 1976. It's a funny, freewheeling comedy that somehow manages to be a time capsule and timeless, all at once. Plus, you get to see a ton of babyfaced actors (Ben Affleck, Matthew McConaughey, Parker Posey, Milla Jovovich, and many others), before they became famous. Plus, with a cult classic like this, yo...

We'll be on a break for one more week, while my family moves into a new house! In the meantime, enjoy this look back at one of our favorite movies, Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure!

Over the next two weeks, my family will be moving into a new house. In the meantime, enjoy these flashbacks to earlier episodes you may have missed. This week, we'll go back to 2021, and take a look at Another Round . It's an Oscar-nominated flick, starring Mads Mikkelsen. The story features a group of middle-aged friends who embark on a social drinking experiment. This makes it particularly relevant to our podcast, and we go on a deep dive on its content.

Our Back in Time series concludes with one of the most important comedies ever made: Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove . This bold, brilliant satire sends up the Cold War with a bravery that's rare in movie history. It's quite the achievement that Kubrick and his collaborators find real humor in the threat of nuclear war. Every film in this series (we've gone back ten years with each installment) has faced a greater difficulty: The older a film is, the more challenging it is to stand the tes...

For this episode, we take a look at one of the raunchiest and non-PC comedies ever made: Mel Brooks' magnum opus, Blazing Saddles . As with all the movies in our Back in Time series, we tackle the most important question: Is it still funny? With this film, we also have to ask: Could Blazing Saddles ever get made today? Well, of course, the answer is no. We'll not only talk about why, but also why the non-PC aspects of this movie keep it relevant in today's socio-political climate. Blazing S...

For this episode, we cover one of the iconic movies of the 80s, and a defining piece of my own childhood: Ghostbusters . We'll geek out over this sci-fi comedy classic, and share a few pieces of trivia you may have missed. If you're a fan of the franchise, this is one you won't want to miss! As with every installment in this series, everybody will have their favorite scene Ghostbusters. Ask five different people and you might get five different answers. And they're all right. Find out which o...

In this episode, we cover one of the iconic films of the 90s, and of cinema at large: Quentin Tarantino's masterpiece, Pulp Fiction. This is episode two of our Back in Time Series, and it's crazy to think this enduring classic came out thirty years ago--almost to the day of this episode's release! Join us we take a deep dive with this all-time classic. How well does it hold up? Could it even be made today? Ask five different people to name their favorite scene from this movie, and you could g...

Our Back in Time Series begins twenty years ago with a cult classic, Napoleon Dynamite! I know 2004 seems like yesterday to most of us, but several Olympics, presidents, and a pandemic have passed since then. As such, we can now rewatch flicks like this with brand new eyes. As such, we have strong opinions. Travis and I were around college age when this movie came out, while Sean was in grade school. So, nostalgia definitely factors into our analysis. You won't want to miss how we grade Napol...

For this episode, we go back to the original story of a legend: Godzilla, King of the Monsters! I was today years old when I learned that this film was actually two productions spliced into one! The original Toho movie, Godzilla, was later combined with Americanized footage shot two years later. Actor Raymond Burr later claimed to have filmed his scenes in only one day. Come aboard as we discuss this film as an origin story for one cinema's biggest icons: Godzilla. Does this installment ma...

Elegant and refined aren’t words you’d normally bandy about Mel Brooks’ filmography, but with Young Frankenstein , they just seem to fit. This horror homage is really a delicate soufflé, crafted with care and dedicated to the Universal horror flicks of the 1930s. Brooks seems to genuinely love the James Whale/Boris Karloff adaptation of Mary Shelley’s book, and he’s very careful to steer his humor away from even a hint of ridicule. Brooks (who co-writes with Gene Wilder) builds his story as a mo...

Well, our Month of Monsters hit a bit of a snag. Turns out, Young Frankenstein is MIA from the entire internet. Never before have I seen a movie--especially a big hit, a classic-- impossible to find. So, that delayed our ability to screen it for a bit, but we'll be back on schedule next week! In the meantime, enjoy this look back at another monster movie--the cult classic, Fright Night !

Our Month of Monsters continues with a 90s classic: Bram Stoker's Dracula ! Naturally, we enjoy some of Francis Coppola's finest red wine to pair with his masterful horror flick. As with last week's episode, check our home page, cinemavino.net, for my full review of this film!

A note: I'll fill this space with show notes once my review goes live tomorrow. Or you can go to Cinemavino.net to read it there. In the meantime, enjoy the first installment of our Month of Monsters with Peter Jackson's take on King Kong! Christian and Devin Review the first two episodes of X-MEN 97. A band of mutants use their uncanny gifts to protect a world that hates and fears them; they're challenged like never before, forced to face a dangerous and unexpected new future. Now streaming on ...