Got followed by a bunch of new people today so I’m gonna signal boost this thing I wrote last week about Conclave.

Well this is grim

There is never a wrong time to watch this movie. That includes caramelizing onions or any other vegetable.

I watched Conclave maybe a week ago and I was so gobsmacked by its incurious narrative and weirdly safe ending that I felt compelled to write about it. As a Catholic who likes his potential blasphemies searing hot, this one left me feeling cold. www.brianjroan.com/essays-revie...

If you're seeing many end-year lists for 2024 movies and feel behind, I humbly suggest my list of notable 2024 films that have been added to streaming services in the US. I tried my hardest to include a variety of genres, represented countries, services, etc. letterboxd.com/msnydel/list...

Saw Conclave. Kinda weird how perfunctory it all felt. Very little investigation of the spiritual and, yes, even political power of the papacy. Fails to work to invest the seat with any meaning and so the (surprisingly pretty tame for how much talk it got) twist lacks punch.

Feel like it’s super fucked up to see a robot and go “ah, very neurodivergent-coded.” That said, yeah it’s a great movie.

Publisher: Do you want to put an LLM clause in the copyright statement? Me: Definitely. How specific can we get? Publisher: As specific as you like.

Makes sense.

When I was a boy I got coal once (among real gifts) and it reaffirmed for me the truth of Santa. No harm done. That said: I wasn’t recorded for internet clout. I was engaging with lore—not being exploited. So this to me feels like another situation of the internet making this worse.

Over at The Film Stage Show we went deep on wrestling and family to talk about The Iron Claw, one of the best movies of the year. Consider this my Christmas present to you! thefilmstage.com/the-film-sta...

FROM: [email protected] What a year! While the events of last Christmas left much of the office destroyed and several of our Nakatomi family deceased, we appreciate everyone’s flexibility with work from home. That said, Nakatomi prides itself on its office culture so effective immediately all employe

📽️ Never really done an intro, so here's a late one. I'm a Chicago-based writer/podcaster who is fixated on streaming culture. You might have heard me on The Film Stage Show from 2016-2021 (my first episode was Ayer's Suicide Squad/last was Minari). Now I run a 1-on-1 podcast called Intermission.