The third film in the Thor strand of the MCU hit US theatres this past weekend and was met with a tidal wave of positive reviews and huge financial success. Perhaps more excitingly, at least from Matt and Ed's point of view, Thor: Ragnarok is the latest film from New Zealand writer/actor/director Taika Waititi. They discuss the ways in which Waititi retained his personality and sense of humour despite a vastly increased budget and higher scrutiny, whether Ragnarok represents a change in directio...
Nov 06, 2017•1 hr 37 min•Ep. 60
It's Halloween, and Matt and Ed are joined by returning guest Kayleigh Donaldson to discuss a suitably spooky subject: Stephen King, the prolific and influential horror writer who, between It , Gerald's Game and 1922 (less so The Dark Tower ) is having something of a moment. They also discuss the Phantom Thread trailer, pick over the complete implosion of Suburbicon , and they pitch Terrence Malick on a potential film for his purported return to more conventional filmmaking. 00:00:00 - 00:22:22 ...
Oct 30, 2017•1 hr 13 min•Ep. 59
Inspired by their shared re-evaluation of Blade Runner a few weeks ago, Matt and Ed talk about movies they misjudged, either because they dismissed them only to later discover that they were masterpieces, or fully endorsed before shamefacedly backtracking at a later date. They also discuss Netflix's decision to spend $8 billion of making original movies and $1 on marketing them, getting old, and James Toback. Ed also finds time to rail against Apple's truly appalling update to their podcasting a...
Oct 23, 2017•1 hr 38 min•Ep. 58
One of the most talked about pop culture events of this summer was the unlikely resurrection of Twin Peaks , David Lynch and Mark Frost's landmark work which brought a new level of visual, thematic and philosophical sophistication to American television before flaming out in glorious fashion with one of the most harrowing series finales of all time. Befitting a series which left its hero (Agent Dale Cooper, played by Kyle Maclachlan) trapped in a strange netherworld for a quarter of a century, T...
Oct 16, 2017•2 hr 24 min•Ep. 57
The long-gestating sequel to Ridley Scott's sci-fi classic Blade Runner hit theatres this week to glowing reviews and disappointing box office. As two recently converted Blade Runner skeptics, Matt and Ed talk about Denis Villeneuve's Blade Runner 2049 , an ambitious movie which, like its predecessor, raises a lot of questions: Was Deckard a replicant? How much does it owe to the work of Andrei Tarkovsky? And is Jared Leto "perfectly tolerable" in this movie? They also discuss the fallout of the...
Oct 09, 2017•1 hr 34 min•Ep. 56
After a gap of twelve years, Star Trek is back on television! Sort of. The latest iteration of Gene Roddenberry's sci-fi classic, Star Trek: Discovery , debuted on CBS All Access and Netflix (depending on your location) last week, so Ed (a Star Trek fan) and Matt (a Star Trek skeptic) watched the first two episodes and debated their merits, and ask what does a new Star Trek have to say about 2017? Also, is there too much exposition? Why are there so many Dutch Angles? And how is Discovery like T...
Oct 02, 2017•1 hr 14 min•Ep. 55
Pump up the world! Matt's returned from travelling around the real world and is ready to put the film world on notice. After talking about all the amazing places he visited over nine months of travel, Matt and Ed discuss some of the big stories of the year that they weren't able to cover in his absence, including Moonlight winning Best Picture, the fragility of Star Wars directors, and the horrendous summer box office. Then they talk about a very current scandal rocking the film critic and cinep...
Sep 25, 2017•1 hr 19 min•Ep. 54
To mark the end of the summer blockbuster season and the rapidly approaching glut of prestigious autumn releases, Ed is joined by returning guest and friend of the show John Hunter to discuss the movies that they're looking forward to over the next four months. They also run down the best movies of the summer, try to figure out which awards season movies are secretly Cloverfield sequels, and mourn the death of Tobe Hooper. 00:00:00 - 00:06:31 - Intro & News 00:06:32 - 00:36:56 - Summer Movie...
Aug 28, 2017•2 hr 18 min•Ep. 53
On this week's show, Ed is joined by returning guest, and producer of the upcoming London Podcast Festival , Zoë Jeyes to talk about The Leftovers , HBO's wildly ambitious post-apocalyptic drama which recently aired its third and final season (so lots of SPOILERS ahead). In addition to tracking the way in which the show evolved from season to season, debating the meaning of the finale, and marveling at Justin Theroux's a̶b̶s̶ acting talent, they talk about London Podcast Festival Presents: Wrest...
Jul 10, 2017•1 hr 3 min•Ep. 52
Film critic (and newly minted podcaster) Nathanael Smith returns to the show to talk about the recently completed Polygon web series Car Boys , an immensely funny show about crashing computer generated cars which wound up being intensely surreal and moving. They also talk about Nathanael's new podcast The VOD Pod , a show which provides a guiding light for those looking for something good to watch on streaming services, and look back on the first six months of 2017 and try to figure out if cinem...
Jul 04, 2017•54 min•Ep. 51
In this minisode, Ed breaks down Twin Peaks for newcomers (or old fans who may have forgotten the salient details) ahead of the long-awaited revival of the show. He lays out the plot (not to mention the subplots), the reasons why the show's original run fell apart, and why people are so excited about the return of a show which ended ignominously more than 25 years ago. Ed also pays tribute to Car Boys , the recently completed YouTube series from Polygon. 00:00:00 - 00:02:30 - Intro 00:02:31 - 00...
May 21, 2017•39 min
In an episode years in the making, Ed sits down with historian and friend Jack Rhoden to discuss the work of Kevin Costner. In addition to talking about specific films from the actor/director's back catalogue, they examine his status as a movie star, the almost mythic way in which he is used by some filmmakers to evoke a sense of Americana, and the peaks and valleys of a career that has had plenty of both. They also manage to compare Costner to both Lyndon Baines Johnson and indie-rock stalwarts...
Apr 24, 2017•1 hr 9 min
The much-anticipated (by a fervert and vocal sub-section of comedy nerds) return of Mystery Science Theater 3000 , the comedy series which raised mocking bad movies to an artform in the '80s and '90s, finally came to pass this weekend as Netflix aired 14 new episodes of the show. Despite new faces, new voices and new writers, the show remains pleasingly familiar and relentlessly funny. In this very short minisode, Ed offers a primer on the series for newcomers and discusses why it's a good conti...
Apr 17, 2017•17 min
This past Friday saw the release of Five Came Back , a three-part documentary series adapted from Mark Harris' great book " Five Came Back: A Story of Hollywood and the Second World War ", which recounts the story of five legendary Hollywood directors - Frank Capra, John Ford, John Huston, George Stevens, William Wyler - who left their careers behind and spent World War II making documentaries and propaganda for the U.S. military, in the process creating a series of films which shaped how audien...
Apr 03, 2017•1 hr 2 min
Jordan Peele's Get Out has been an early highlight of 2017: a suspenseful, funny, unsettling thriller that explores social anxieties surrounding race in America in a way which manages to be both subtle and undeniably pointed. It's a remarkable debut, drawing on everything from Rosemary's Baby to Guess Who's Coming to Dinner , and its continued success in the US is a testament to Peele's ability to pinpoint and deliver a swift shock to America's nervous system. Ed is joined for a SPOILER -filled ...
Mar 27, 2017•1 hr 5 min
In this episode - which, despite being inspired by a film called The Irishman and being recorded over St. Patrick's Day weekend, is categorically not a St. Patrick's Day episode - Ed is joined by critic and podcaster Kayleigh Donaldson ( @Ceilidhann on Twitter) to discuss Netflix's recent acquisition of Martin Scorsese's long-gestating gangster epic, as well as how the growth of upstart studios and distributors like Netflix, Amazon, A24, Blumhouse and Annapurna Pictures are shaking up the status...
Mar 20, 2017•1 hr 17 min
Somehow, it's been twenty years since Buffy the Vampire Slayer debuted on the WB, a humble start for a show which would go on to build a huge cult following and fundamentally alter fantasy and sci-fi storytelling on television. To help unpack this momentus occasion, Ed is joined by Zoë Jeyes and Ellie Graham to talk about the highs ("Hush", "The Zeppo", "Once More with Feeling") and lows (that weird sex episode) of the series, its continuing metaphorical richness, and the vagaries of BBC schedul...
Mar 06, 2017•1 hr 5 min
In this minisode (which in no way lives up to the term because it's just as long as every other episode but shush) Ed counts down the ten best films to ever win Best Picture from the Academy Awards. It's almost relentlessly positive, unless his picks enrage you. Listen to find out if they do! NB: This episode was recorded before the Oscars ceremony, so, er, don't be surprised that I didn't manage to predict the weirdest damn thing to ever happen at the Oscars.
Feb 27, 2017•1 hr 1 min
The Academy Awards are mere days away, and Ed is joined by returning guest Zoë Jeyes to talk about this year's nominees: the surprises (both pleasant and not), snubs and frontrunners that comprise one of the most interesting slates in years. They also try to predict who will walk away with the big prizes on Sunday, something which seems easier than usual this year, which probably means they're totally wrong. 00:00:00 - 00:46:21 - Ed & Zoë discuss the Oscar nominees 00:46:22 - 01:16:18 - Osca...
Feb 20, 2017•1 hr 21 min
Inspired by the US release of The Girl with All the Gifts , a fantastic British zombie movie that offers an exciting and emotionally complex take on the genre, Ed is joined by John Hunter to talk about the film, as well as the ongoing dominance of zombies in pop culture. They also try to explain the success of TV shows like The Walking Dead and iZombie , draw parallels between the rise of zombie fiction and the concurrent rise of superhero cinema, and discover unusual parallels between the zombi...
Feb 13, 2017•59 min
Ed is joined by Kat Chirnside and Ryan Finnigan, the co-founders of Rare Giants to talk about their work screening films that have beneifted from restoration and preservation. In addition to talking about their debut screening - which will be of In Cold Blood at Sheffield Hallam's The Void on March 6th - they discuss films which blur the line between truth and fiction, as well as the passing of John Hurt. Follow Rare Giants on Twitter - @raregiants...
Jan 30, 2017•46 min
It's Awards Season, and with a gap in the schedule between the Golden Globes and the Oscars, Ed decided to leap into the fray with Shot/Reverse Shot's first ever awards ceremony: The First Annual Anna Faris Memorial Award for Making the Best of a Bad Situation, in which praise is showered on the actors who did good work in bad movies, or who at the very least made shrewd choices when deciding to sign on to be in bad movies. Mainly, it's an opportunity for Ed to talk about how much he enjoys Bill...
Jan 09, 2017•26 min
Happy New Year, listeners! As is customary, we start a new year and a new season with a look ahead at what the world of film has to offer. To help in that endeavour, Ed is joined by this episode's guest, writer John Hunter . As they go through each month up to and including August, they wonder if xXx: The Return of Xander Cage will be Vin Diesel's Unforgiven , try to divine which films will enjoy a healthy afterlife of being endlessly repeated on BBC2, and attempt to maintain their cool when tal...
Jan 02, 2017•1 hr 53 min
Happy Holidays, listeners! As is customary, the final show of the year (and Matt's final show until Winter of 2017) is a round-up of 2016. The boys talk about the Golden Globe nominations and what they auger for awards season, the hits and misses at the box office, and some of the many wonderful artists who passed away this year. They see out this annus horribilis by counting down the official SRS Top Ten of 2016. Have a happy New Year and we'll see you in 2017! Here is a link to David Ehrlich's...
Dec 26, 2016•1 hr 41 min
After the somewhat successful performance of Star Wars: The Force Awakens last year, Disney have decided to take a punt on another Star Wars movie. As two people somewhat familiar with and amenable to the series, Matt and Ed watched Rogue One: A Star Wars Story and decided to talk about the first so-called "standalone" Star Wars movie - what works, what doesn't, and how it stacks up against the other installments. They also reveal the real reason for the much-discussed reshoots, wonder why Darth...
Dec 19, 2016•58 min
As some listeners may know, because we've been casually referencing it for months , Matt will be taking a sabbatical from the show starting in January so that he can go traveling around the Americas for much of next year. Since this is the last regular episode of the year, and we just passed the five-year anniversary of the first recording sessions for Shot/Reverse Shot, this week's episode is all about goodbyes in film and TV. Matt and Ed cover noble goodbyes, angry goodbyes, hopeful goodbyes, ...
Dec 12, 2016•1 hr 11 min
Sometimes actors and directors get stuck making one type of movie and, through their own choice or external circumstances, they try something completely new and unexpected. In this episode, Matt and Ed discuss successful reinventions, the ones that failed, and the times when whole careers were sent off in a new direction by one fateful film. They also discuss The Hamilton Mixtape, how many good films came out in 1999, and the controversy surrounding the production of Last Tango in Paris and the ...
Dec 05, 2016•1 hr 6 min
Matt and Ed are both battling illness this week, but they persevered in order to talk about loving imperfect art - those films and TV series that are close to their hearts despite having clear and glaring flaws. At the same time, Matt introduces the world to a new Star Wars character, and Ed reminisces about a wildly unsuccessful supernatural sitcom from the late '90s. Also, this is the terrible Ruben Blades song that Ed sings terribly at one point in the episode. 00:00:00 - 00:16:00 - Intro &am...
Nov 28, 2016•1 hr 10 min
It's Matt's birthday! In keeping with recent (i.e. a year old) tradition, that means he gets to decide the topic for this week's show, but instead of discussing a single subject, Matt and Ed rattle through a series of them, including nostalgia, great buddy movies, and when it's appropriate to introduce kids to violent movies. They also pitch an idea for what the second season of HBO's Westworld will be about, and it is an ironclad, irrefutable fan theory, primed for that sweet, sweet SEO bump. 0...
Nov 21, 2016•59 min
Inspired by Matt's nephew, who recently started studying film at A-Level, this week's episode finds the boys trying to develop their own syllabus of essential or gateway movies for newcomers to film, or those simply looking for starting points to expand their horizons. There's also a little bit of election talk at the start, so if you're sick of hearing about that then feel free to skip to the time code below. Here is the essay about Leonard Cohen written by Sean O'Neal that Ed mentions towards ...
Nov 14, 2016•1 hr 8 min
