Cinemaholics

This month on Extra Milestone, we're celebrating the 65th anniversary of Akira Kurosawa's legendary action epic, Seven Samurai, which was released on April 26, 1954. As always, we dive into the historical context and legacy for the film, why it's so fondly remembered, and what we think of it all these years later.

We’re assembling some surprise guests to review Avengers: Endgame, starting with a spoiler-free discussion of the blockbuster event that’s already breaking box office records. Afterward, all of our spoiler hesitations disappear with a snap, and we have special guests Alisha Grauso and Matt Donato on deck to help us process basically everything this saga by Marvel has been building up to for over a decade.

Jon and Sam assemble this week to debate and dissect the entire MCU filmography, ranking their favorite films from best to worst. But with a twist! To create a definitive ranking, your friendly, neighborhood Cinemaholics had to compromise and collaborate on just ONE list covering all 22 films between 2018 and 2019, which includes Avengers: Endgame. It's a contentious enough discussion to spark a Cinemaholics Civil War, and the possibilities are likely infinite. So sit back, relax, and complain about our list by sending us one of your own!

Special guests Sam Noland and Julia Teti join us for a Summer Movie Preview that includes the entire writing staff at Cinemaholics for the first time! We talk about all the biggest sparks, spooks, and bops we're looking forward to the most this summer. Plus we each pick a few "dark horse" films we think might be better than they look, then cover all of our honorable mentions for the upcoming blockbuster season.

We’re traveling to hell and back this week with our review of Hellboy, a new R-rated adaptation of the monster-fighting comic book anti-hero, now starring David Harbour. We also catch up on the latest stop-motion animation family film from LAIKA, Missing Link and cover plenty of other releases worth talking about, including High Life, Guava Island, Little, The Death of Dick Long, The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, and Breakthrough.

Special guest Ryan Oliver (The Playlist) joins us for a supersized review of Shazam, the latest superhero film from DC and Warner Bros. We also bury our feelings to discuss Pet Sematary, a new horror remake of the 80s Stephen King adaptation. Later in the show, we’re covering a wide variety of other releases, including The Best of Enemies, Shrill Season 1, The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley, and Unicorn Store.

The inmates are running the asylum this week as Jon is absent for mysterious reasons and Will takes over the show to ramble about Danny DeVito, Sad Clowns, and his enemy list with special guest Cory Woodroof! Later in the show, Will is high on his own supply — i.e. the sound of his own voice — as he spews more nonsense about Harmony Korine in a prolonged, in-depth conversation about The Beach Bum, starring a far-out Matthew McConaughey. All this and more as fans begin to get worried about Jon's sudden disappearance.

This month for our Extra Milestone series, we're discussing the classic Billy Wilder comedy Some Like It Hot, celebrating 60 years since its release on March 29,1959. Joining us is Sam Noland, our Movie of the Week columnist on cinemaholics.com. In this discussion, we cover the background and legacy of the film, which stars Marilyn Monroe, Jack Lemmon, and Tony Curtis. Afterward, we dive into the plot of the film with clips and our own double entendres. Enjoy!

This week, we’re dedicating the majority of the show to reviewing the new horror film Us, the second feature by director Jordan Peele after his 2017 debut Get Out. We’ll be discussing the film entirely spoiler-free for the first half of this review, then after a fairly obvious spoiler warning, we’ll be digging deep into the secrets, meanings, and interpretations we had after our first watch. Plus, we kick off the episode with a brief review of Yardie, the first feature film directed by Idris Elba.

Special guest Sam Noland joins us for a triple review of Triple Frontier a new "soldier-heist" film debuting on Netflix and starring Ben Affleck and Oscar Isaac. We’re also getting emotional over the new teen romance dramedy Five Feet Apart starring Haley Lu Richardson and Cole Sprouse. Stick around for even more reviews, including the new sci-fi release Captive State, After Life from Ricky Gervais, and The Mustang, now in limited release.

We’re flying higher, further, and faster in our review of Captain Marvel, the new Marvel superhero film starring Brie Larson, and joining us is special guest Kimber Myers of the LA Times. We also discuss Leaving Neverland, a new HBO documentary from Sundance about the sexual abuse allegations of Michael Jackson, as well as some other new releases like The Aftermath, The Kid, and one new TV series on TBS starring Steve Buscemi, Daniel Radcliffe and many others in Miracle Workers.

Special guest Cory Woodroof joins us for a quick Oscars 2019 recap, plus we dig into the recent controversy surrounding Steven Spielberg and Netflix. Our main review is Greta, a new thriller from director and co-writer Neil Jordan starring Chloë Grace Moretz, Isabelle Huppert, and Maika Monroe. We also discuss the new IMAX documentary Apollo 11, which just hit limited release along with Gaspar Noé's dance horror Climax. Last up is The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind on Netflix, Chiwetel Ejiofor's directorial debut, which he also stars in alongside Maxwell Simba.

For our debut episode of a bonus series we're calling Extra Milestone, Sam Noland joins us as we celebrate the 85th anniversary of Frank Capra's It Happened One Night, which was released on February 22, 1934 and stars Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert. Largely hailed as the first screwball comedy and an early precursor to the modern rom-com, this is one film you'll definitely want to cross off your cinematic bucket list, or perhaps revisit.

Special guest Sam Noland joins us for a high-flying review of DreamWorks Animation’s third How to Train Your Dragon film, The Hidden World. We’re also discussing the new family sports comedy-drama Fighting with My Family from writer and director Stephen Merchant, starring Florence Pugh. Later in the show we dig into some of the Oscar-nominated short films and review Paddleton, a new Netflix indie dramedy starring Mark Duplass and Ray Romano.

We’re celebrating Valentine’s Day with some new films featuring powerful female leads. Special guest Val Complex joins us to review Alita: Battle Angel, a new sc-fi blockbuster from Robert Rodriguez and James Cameron starring Rosa Salazar. We also discuss Happy Death Day 2U, the sequel to the horror slasher comedy from 2017 starring Jessica Rothe. And Isn't It Romantic, a romantic comedy parody movie starring Rebel Wilson.