Eye of the Storm Movie Podcast

This week we review and discuss Toy Story 5, a adventure comedy movie directed by Andrew Stanton and starring Tom Hanks, Tim Allen and Joan Cusack, about Jessie, Woody and Buzz Lightyear as they deal with their human Bonnie receiving her first tablet and the threat of being discarded in favour of electronic toys.We discuss the movie's handling of the impact on electronic devices on children, whether it leans on the scales too much in showing the dangers of screens or whether there are upsides to online communities the movie downplays, whether Toy Story is a movie for children in the first place or whether it is more for their parents and how the movie's impact and relatability depends on whether someone has children themselves, how the movie's conflict is more nuanced than we expected, and much more.Check out our other reviews and clips on all major platforms here:https://linktr.ee/EyeOfTheStormMoviePodcast00:00 Intro00:20 Movie Recommendations (Mr and Mrs Smith Season 1, Evil Season 1-2)08:44 Synopsis & Overall Impressions14:19 Spoiler Discussion49:52 Conclusion & Ratings

In "Have You Seen?" we discuss a movie that some of us know well and others have just now seen for the first time.This week we revisit Hollow Man, a 2000 science fiction horror movie directed by Paul Verhoeven and starring Elisabeth Shue, Kevin Bacon and Josh Brolin, about a scientist who volunteers to test an experimental serum that renders him invisible. When the process cannot be reversed, he becomes increasingly unstable and violent.We discuss the movie's special effects that were spectacular in 2000 and still hold up extremely well today and their role in selling the reality of the invisible man in ways that a lot of other movies struggle with, what the movie has to say about morality and society and how it uses the conceit of invisibility to explore these topics, how the movie despite receiving negative reviews when it came out actually has strong writing that communicates what the audience needs to know very effectively, why invisibility is a surprisingly underused superpower, and much more.Check out our other reviews and clips on all major platforms here:https://linktr.ee/EyeOfTheStormMoviePodcast

This week we review and discuss Backrooms, a science fiction horror movie directed by Kane Parsons and starring Chiwetel Ejiofor, Renate Reinsve and Mark Duplass, about Clark, a furniture store owner, and Mary, his therapist, discover a dimension of seemingly endless liminal spaces accessed through the basement of the store.We discuss the impact the backrooms had on us as a concept, what it means for movies that a movie studio gave a 20 year old first time director full creative control over an original concept, whether the backrooms are scary in the first place and whether the movie succeeds in realising the horror of liminal spaces and building on the original idea effectively and whether explaining the backrooms aided or diminished the horror, how liminal horror compares to its cousin cosmic horror and to real world horrors such as global warming and pandemics, and much more.Check out our other reviews and clips on all major platforms here:https://linktr.ee/EyeOfTheStormMoviePodcast00:00 Intro00:18 Movie Recommendations (Fuze, Don't Trust The B--- in Apartment 23)06:58 Synopsis & Overall Impressions11:58 Spoiler Discussion54:38 Conclusion & Ratings

This week we review and discuss Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu, a science fiction action movie movie directed by Jon Favreau and starring Pedro Pascal, Jeremy Allen White and Sigourney Weaver, about Din Djarin and his apprentice Grogu who are enlisted by the New Republic to rescue Rotta the Hutt in exchange for information on a target.We discuss our reactions to the first Star Wars movie in 7 years, why every aspect of the movie while competent left us cold and struggling to care about the story of its characters and what lessons should have been learned from previous Star Wars movies, what Disney's failure to do so means for the future of Star Wars and whether Star Wars will ever be exciting again and whether that matters, why the movie feels like a video game in the worst ways and how this impairs the story, and much more.Check out our other Star Wars reviews here:https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6U5nBLtmb5sr3DzWAJG1g6Check out our other reviews and clips on all major platforms here:https://linktr.ee/EyeOfTheStormMoviePodcast0:00 Intro0:19 Movie Recommendations (The Simpsons Season 37, The Boys Season 5)06:18 Synopsis & Overall Impressions10:32 Spoiler Discussion54:03 Conclusion & Ratings

In "Have You Seen?" we discuss a movie that some of us know well and others have just now seen for the first time.This week we revisit Misery, a 1990 psychological horror movie based on a Stephen King novel and directed by Rob Reiner, starring James Caan and Kathy Bates, about a novelist who is held captive by Annie Wilkes, an obsessive fan who forces him to rewrite his last novel to her expectations.We talk about how the movie creates a sense of suspense and tension with only two characters while avoiding all the cliches of typical horror movies, why Annie Wilkes is one of the great villains of the psychological horror genre, how the movie anticipated modern fandom culture and when fans lose their humanity in their treatment of artists and how our reactions to movies we disliked in the past compare to that, we discuss what if anything artists owe to the fans that made them successful, and much more. Check out our other reviews and clips on all major platforms here:https://linktr.ee/EyeOfTheStormMoviePodcast

This week we review and discuss Hokum, a supernatural horror movie directed by Damian McCarthy and starring Adam Scott, Perter Coonan and Florence Ordesh, about a man who travels to a hotel in Ireland, unaware that it may be haunted.We discuss the movie's metaphor dealing with grief and guilt and the associated symbolism, why this movie worked so well for us when it came to creating dread and suspense and how this movie succeeds at the difficult task of making an unlikeable character likeable, how the movie lives from meticulous detail when constructing its plot and whether plot and allegory are always in alignment or whether they at times clash, why horror monsters in recent years seem to be so generic, and much more.Check out our other reviews and clips on all major platforms here:https://linktr.ee/EyeOfTheStormMoviePodcast0:00 Intro0:19 Movie Recommendations (Man On Fire, Little Mosque On The Prairie)03:28 Synopsis & Overall Impressions08:03 Spoiler Discussion52:36 Conclusion & Ratings

This week we review and discuss Michael, a biopic movie directed by Antoine Fuqua and starring Jaafar Jackson, Nia Long and Colman Domingo, about the life of Michael Jackson from his beginnings in the Jackson Five to the Bad tour in 1988.We discuss to what extent it matters how much of a Michael Jackson fan someone is when watching the movie and what we got out of the movie, how that explains the massive split in audience versus reviewer scores the movie has received, whether the movie's storytelling holds up outside the concert scenes, what a Michael Jackson biopic should be and do and how this movie compares to that, the challenges and quirks of biopics in general, whether we think there will be a second movie covering the less glamorous parts of Jackson's life and whether there should be, and much more.Check out our other reviews and clips on all major platforms here:https://linktr.ee/EyeOfTheStormMoviePodcast0:00 Intro0:17 Movie Recommendations (The Negotiator (1998), The Adjustment Bureau (2011))09:16 Synopsis & Overall Impressions16:19 Spoiler Discussion01:02:35 Conclusion & Ratings

This week we review and discuss Cold Storage, a horror comedy movie directed by Jonny Campbell and starring Georgina Campbell, Joe Keery and Liam Neeson, about attempts at containing a parasitic fungus that leaks out of an abandoned military base.We talk about how the movie stacks up against its inspirations which include classics such as The Thing, Tremors and The Blob, discuss the movie's solid premise that sets up an interesting scenario with likeable characters who all explore the theme of living with the consequences of past mistakes in various ways, how the movie's ending disappointed us by turning into generic action without making good use of what was set up in the beginning, whether the movie succeeds in critiquing government incompetence through its sci fi scenario of the mutant fungus, and much more.Check out our other reviews and clips on all major platforms here:https://linktr.ee/EyeOfTheStormMoviePodcast0:00 Intro0:19 Movie Recommendations (Waste Man, Men in Black)02:55 Synopsis & Overall Impressions07:41 Spoiler Discussion47:13 Conclusion & Ratings