Episode 30: 2025 Wrap Up and 1st Annual Miseys
Mise en Screen
This week we have a special episode for you. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has released the nominees for the upcoming 98th Academy Awards, and we have some opinions on them. We then wrap up 2025 with both Ben and Steven listing out their top 5 films of 2025 with special (and not so special) Miseys awarded intermittently. They also go over the best and worst punishment films that were doled out and the bottom five films of 2025. Time Stamps: (01:15) The 98th Academy Award nominations (35:29) Top 5 of 2025 & 1st Annual Miseys (1:49:00) Best & Worst Punishments...
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Episode 29: Hamnet
Mise en Screen
Hamnet - a 2025 biographical drama directed by Chloe Zhao, written by Zhao with Maggie O’Farrell, based as stated on the 2020 novel of the same title by Farrell. It stars Jessie Buckley as Agnes Hathaway and Paul Mescal as William Shakespeare, who after a courtship and shotgun wedding give birth to and raise a daughter Susanna (Bodhi Rae Breathnach) and twins Judith and Hamnet (Olivia Lynes and Jacobi Jupe). The death of one of their children sends them both into a spiral of grief, which may only be arrested by William’s work on the Globe Theater in London. Time Stamps: ...
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Episode 28: No Other Choice
Mise en Screen
No Other Choice is a 2025 dark comedy directed by Park Chan-wook, written by Park Chan-wook, Lee Kyoung-mi, Don McKellar, and Lee Ja-hye. It is adapted from 1997 novel The Axe by Donald Westlake. It stars Lee Byung-hun plays Yoo Man-su, who has lost his longstanding position at a paper mill and must search for work in a shrinking job market. To reduce the competition he enacts a plan to kill the better qualified individuals for a job opening he will create through more murder so that he may once again provide for his family. This family includes his wife Lee Mi-ri (Son Ye-jin),...
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Episode 27: Is This Thing On?
Mise en Screen
Is This Thing On? is a 2025 comedy-drama directed by Bradley Cooper, written by Cooper, Will Arnett, and Mark Chappell, starring Will Arnett and Laura Dern as Alex and Tess Novak, a couple whose marriage is on the rocks, leading Alex to discover stand-up as a way of processing it. They are joined by Bradley Cooper himself as Alex’s best friend Balls, Andra Day as Balls’ wife Christine, Christine Ebersole and Ciaran Hinds as Alex’s parents, Jordan Jensen as Jill, one of the comics Alex befriends; and Blake Kane and Calvin Knegton as Alex and Tess’s twin sons Felix and Jude. Time Stamps:...
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Episode 26: Song Sung Blue
Mise en Screen
Song Sung Blue is a biographical film about the married musical artist duo Lightning and Thunder, Mike and Claire Sardina, a Neil Diamond tribute act, though they refer to it as “interpretation,” while navigating the ups and downs of their regular lives. It is based on a 2008 documentary of the same name by Greg Kohs. Also starring Michael Imperioli as Mark Shurilla, a Buddy Holly impersonator; Ella Anderson as Rachel Cartwright, Claire’s daughter; King Princess as Angelina Sardina, Mike’s daughter; Fisher Stevens as Dave Watson, Mike’s dentist and manager; Jim Belushi as Tom...
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Episode 25: Marty Supreme
Mise en Screen
Marty Supreme is a 2025 sports comedy-drama film directed, written, produced, and edited by Josh Safdie, with Ronald Bronstein co-writer, co-producer- and co-editor. In this film we follow Marty Mauser, an aspiring table tennis player who seeks to become the world champion of the sport while simultaneously outrunning the consequences of his various scams, affairs, prideful boasts, and collectors. Co-starring Odessa A’zion as Rachel Mizler, his paramour, Gwyneth Paltrow as Kay Stone, a formerly famous actress who Marty pursues, Kevin O’Leary as Milton Rockwell, a wealthy businessman and...
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Episode 24: 2025 Catch Up
Mise en Screen
In this episode we discuss a litany of films we watched to fill in the gaps of 2025 releases, full spoilers for all films discussed. Time Stamps: (5:49) Broken Church (19:36) Star Trek Section 31 (26:07) Avatar: Fire and Ash (33:21) Black Bag (38:28) Sovereign (43:31) Eephus (49:58) Train Dreams (56:41) The Phoenician Scheme (1:01:21) The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar (1:06:15) Ballad of a Small Player (1:09:49) The Mastermind (1:13:48) Presence (1:17:37) Weapons (1:22:17) Hag (1:28:24) Novocaine (1:32:42) Flight Risk (1:37:00) One of Them Days...
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Episode 23: Wake Up Dead Man
Mise en Screen
Wake Up Dead Man is the latest Knives Out mystery film from writer-director Rian Johnson. In this film we find Father Jud Duplenticy (Joh O'Connor) under suspicion of the murder of Monsignor Jefferson Wicks (Joshj Brolin), stabbed in the back in a storage closet during his Good Friday service. The ensemble this time is played by Glenn Close as Martha, a lifelong servant of the church, Jeremy Renner as local physician Dr. Nat, Kerry Washington as attorney Vera, Andrew Scott as author-in-exile Lee, Cailee Spaeny as Simone, a disabled woman and the church’s biggest donor, Daryl McCormack as a...
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Episode 22: Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair
Mise en Screen
Kill Bill The Whole Bloody Affair is a re-release of Kill Bill Volume 1 & 2 as one four hour thirty-five minute film with one 15 minute intermission. In this film we follow The Bride, played by Uma Thurman, who is pregnant and rehearsing for her wedding when her ex-lover Bill (David Carridine) arrives with the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad (Lucy Liu, Vivica A. Fox, Michael Madsen, Daryl Hannah) and kill her. She inexplicably lives through this, wakes up four years later, and begins taking her revenge on each member. Time Stamps: (00:56) A Karate Christmas Miracle (26:41) Mishima: A...
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Episode 21: Rental Family
Mise en Screen
Rental Family is the latest feature film by Hikari, cowritten by herself and Stephen Blahut, starring Brendan Fraser as a struggling American actor living in Japan who stumbles into a job working for a rental family agency who hire out actors to play unconventional roles for clients such as hosting a funeral for a still living individual, staging a wedding, playing a father for a mother-daughter who are trying to get into an elite school, cheerleading for an older live performer, interviewing an aging and forgotten actor, and even just to play Dreamcast games split screen with a hikikomori...
info_outlinePrivate eye Honey O'Donahue (Margaret Qualley) begins investigating the suspicious death of one of her clients, who turns up dead in a car accident before they can even meet. Her sleuthing, with the help of MG (Aubrey Plaza), a police officer she hooked up with, points to the Four Ways church of Reverend Drew Devlin (Chris Evans), a sleazy preacher who brings new meaning to the term ‘Come to Jesus,’ all while she is trying to help her sister keep her niece Corrine (Talia Ryder) out of trouble.
Timestamps
- (01:35) The Ladykillers
- (18:44) Jennifer's Body
- (32:09) The Hudsucker Proxy
- (48:40) Honey, Don't!
- (1:30:27) Next week will be The Long Walk
Works Cited:
- The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (Joel and Ethan Coen, 2018)
The Big Lebowski (Joel and Ethan Coen, 1997) - The Big Sleep ( Howard Hawks, 1946)
- Blood Simple (Joel and Ethan Coen, 1984)
- Burn After Reading (Joel and Ethan Coen, 2008)
- Drive Away Dolls (Ethan Coen, 2024)
- Ethan Coen and Tricia Cooke Break Down 'Honey, Don't's Bogart Influence and Being "Out of Sync" With Joel (Mike Ryan, 2025)
- Ethan Coen and Tricia Cooke’s Queer Caper (Naomi Fry, 2024)
- The Evil Dead (Sam Raimi, 1981)
- Fargo (Joel and Ethan Coen, 1996)
- Hail, Caesar! (Joel and Ethan Coen, 2016)
- Highest 2 Lowest (Spike Lee, 2025)
- Honey, Don’t! (Ethan Coen, 2025)
- The Hudsucker Proxy (Joel and Ethan Coen, 1994)
- I Love You, Phillip Morris (John Requa and Glenn Ficarra, 2009)
- Jennifer's Body (Karyn Kusama, 2009)
- Jerry Lee Lewis: Trouble in Mind (Ethan Coen, 2024)
- The Ladykillers (Joel and Ethan Coen, 2004)
- The Ladykillers (Alexander Mackendrick, 1955)
- No Country For Old Men (Joel and Ethan Coen, 2007)
- Promising Young Woman (Emerald Fennell, 2020)
- The Tragedy of Macbeth (Joel Coen, 2021)
- Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (Michael Bay, 2009)
- Raising Arizona (Joel and Ethan Coen, 1987)
- A Serious Man (Joel and Ethan Coen, 2009)