The Top 100 Project

Making a sequel to a beloved classic was always going to be tough sledding, but the talented writer/director Mike Flanagan simply couldn’t make a great movie out of Stephen King’s follow-up to The Shining. Maybe the failure with Doctor Sleep mostly lies with King’s overly detailed book and all of its subplots. Maybe it’s that we get far too much of the top-hatted Rebecca Ferguson and her fellow steam-sniffing pseudo-vampires. Or maybe it’s that there just aren’t very many real scares in this horror show. We couldn't sneer at Ewan McGregor’s work though because he does a terrific job playing grown-up alcoholic Danny Torrance. We also liked the finale at the Overlook more than most people did. Some ups, many downs. In any case, don’t let our overall disappointment ruin your enjoyment of the 409th Ellises’ Analysis. Just crank up an omnipresent heartbeat sound effect and stuff your demons in a mind-box as we dabble in the redrum of Doctor Sleep. Well, Actually: On second thought, Abra’s mother Lucy might be the

2001 was the year of Puzzle Films and covering Vanilla Sky today means we’ve now tackled the 4 big ones. Memento, Mulholland Drive and Donnie Darko are all definitely better than Cameron Crowe’s attempt to stretch himself and they’re certainly not filled with as many maddening flaws. One big problem is that the casting is all wrong here. Both of Tom Cruise’s love interests are duds and Cruise, although giving his typical 205% effort, is a little all over the place. Bev speculates that Vanilla Sky is basically just about Cruise’s character’s vanity. Cruise and Crowe obviously wouldn’t agree because they’re straining with all their might to be deep. Whether you agree or whether you don't, we've got a full hour of theories in the 408th Ellises' Analysis. So don’t delay your pleasure. You need to hear us talk about the man who had it all and even met his dream woman, then lost everything because of his nightmare woman. Or was it ALL just a dream?! Visit the website of our sponsor (Sparkplug Coffee) and get ready

This is the rare time we’ve ever posted an episode on Labour Day, but this movie DOES star the man who has to do “every dirty job”. Harry Callahan is the quintessential good guy with a gun who has to combat a bad guy with a gun, but Harry is also a reckless vigilante in the Batman mode. This movie is also pretty much just a sadist chasing a sadist around San Francisco. Dirty Harry might be fascist and it might even be dangerous, but that doesn’t take away the flick’s visceral entertainment value. It’s a complicated movie about a complicated issue. Don Siegel directs Clint Eastwood in perhaps his signature role, but are they just pedaling right-wing propaganda in this crime classic? How does the movie play after last year’s #BLM and “Defund The Police” movements took America by storm? We had plenty to say about all that. So enjoy your hour with the 407th Ellises’ Analysis because the world isn’t getting any better and all us punks could use a little escape into fantasy right about now. Well, Actually: Popeye D

“Persona” is Latin for “mask”, which makes this Age Of The Mask we’ve been experiencing for the past year & a half an ideal time to talk about Ingmar Bergman’s masterpiece. Well, it’s one of his MANY masterpieces. Dude could direct. This is a trippy art film that gives us plenty to debate and tear apart. It’s also been imitated half to death in the 55 years since it was made, which is perhaps why it feels just a touch dated. Bibi Andersson and Liv Ullmann are terrific playing characters who deal with issues of identity, grief, guilt and deep emotional pain. But are the 2 women really just 1 woman who’s experiencing a serious mental crisis? Imaginary friend?! See, very influential. So head to your summer beach house (for the last few days of this summer) and let the 406th Ellises’ Analysis pry its way into your earholes during the trip. Well, Actually: John Ford was 8th on the Sight & Sound’s 2002 Critics poll of Top 10 Greatest Directors Of All Time, but surprisingly he wasn’t ranked on the Top 10 as

You know we’re talking about a master filmmaker when this channel has already covered more than half of the man's titles and we’re only now getting to this gritty crime classic. The Killing was early in Stanley Kubrick's career, so he wasn’t yet at the top of his game as he would be for the next 40+ years. Still, there’s plenty of examples of the technical prowess that would come to be trademark Kubrick. Fittingly, the complex plot even resembles a chess game. We weren’t seeing eye to eye about the work of tough-but-sometimes-sweet Sterling Hayden or the ultra-fatal femme fatale Marie Windsor. We DID see eye to eye that the best part of the movie is the last half-hour. So get your listening device ready and make a clean break out to the race track as the 405th Ellises’ Analysis talks about The Killing. Well, Actually: Elisha Cook Jr. is named Mr. Micklas (not “Nicklas”) and is the landlord at the Dakota Building in Rosemary’s Baby. Planning the perfect robbery would go smoother with Sparkplug Coffee in a cup

It’s not every comedy that features 2 of the brilliant stars of the Monty Python troupe, but it’s actually the Americans who stand out. Kevin Kline was known as a serious actor before A Fish Called Wanda and Jamie Lee Curtis was still mostly thought of as the Scream Queen. So when legendary cut-ups like John Cleese and Michael Palin are overshadowed, you know you’re in from something hilarious. Director Charles Crichton’s swan song runs the risk of alienating audiences (33 years ago…and especially now) by daring to make fun of animal death and stutterers. Funny is funny though. So eat your fish & chips (wait, put Wanda back in the bowl, Otto!) and don’t be DISAPPOINTED as you steamroll through the 404th Ellises’ Analysis. A pretty great addition to your fish meal is coffee. Sparkplug Coffee remains our groovy sponsor. They’ll help you out with a 20% discount when you apply our promo code (“top100project”) to your next order. Are we Twitterers? Sure. We are: @moviefiend51 and @bevellisellis Our website is

Even though it's all about dark fantasies, depression and death, Harold And Maude is a cult classic that remains solidly funny half a century later. Bud Cort and Ruth Gordon are a fun/odd romantic couple in this unique love story. Gordon is the manic pixie dream lady who has even bleaker plans than the faux-suicidal Cort. We had a serious discussion about the grim subtext, but we didn't forget that Hal Ashby's movie was and still is wacky and entertaining. There's meat on these bones. So don't be shy. Just live in the now and spend a bit of your day earing up the 403rd Ellises' Analysis. Grab life by the collar and learn to love having a big mug of Sparkplug Coffee on your countertop. They will kindly save you 20% on your next order and all you have to do is use our promo code: top100project. We lay out a tweet from time to time We're @moviefiend51 and @bevellisellis Our website is top100project.com Ryan also chit chats about sports on Scoring At The Movies

It’s probably safe to listen to the 402nd Ellises’ Analysis…although feel free to ask if it is again. And again. And again. Marathon Man is absolutely filled from start to finish with paranoia, torture and pain. Some of those themes—like the arrogant rich versus the desperate poor—have barely aged. The film’s subtext remains oh so timely even 45 years later. The acting styles of Dustin Hoffman and Laurence Olivier famously clashed hard, but that also brings sizzle to the squirm-inducing scenes they have together. And, yes, the poster isn’t lying. It’s a thriller. So go get that stash of diamonds and don’t fall on your own sleeve-knife in the process, but also just try acting as we feverishly chat about Dusty on the run. Well, Actually: We’ve covered Hoffman in 8 films now, including Kramer vs. Kramer. Also, Hoffman turns 84 later this week (on August 8th). Also also, Hoffman definitely has socks on his feet when the “is it safe” scene first begins. Sparkplug Coffee has been our sponsor for many years and they

The wannabe Ellises are here with our 401st analysis as we jaw-jack about the queen bees of Mean Girls. Lindsay Lohan was at her peak in this era and if you ever doubted her talent (admittedly, it’s easy to forget how good she was because of the messy turns her life took), just take another look at this movie. Rachel McAdams, Lacey Chabert and Amanda Seyfried (in her debut) are also pretty great as the Plastics. In fact, as tremendous as Lohan & McAdams are, the sidekicks Chabert & Seyfried basically steal the movie from them. As for a personal angle, Bev was once the sidekick of a mean girl, so this picture still has some sting for us middle-aged types. So keep an eye out for rampaging school buses as you jot down some vicious insults in your burn book (or, hey, just be nice) while we analyze the glamour, the laughs and even the mathleting in Mean Girls. If you want to make a lot of friends, buy them a few bags of Sparkplug Coffee. A 20% discount will be yours to enjoy on your 1st purchase when you a

Our 400th episode talks about one of the influential films of the French New Wave, which was also Francois Truffaut’s directorial debut. The 400 Blows is famous for all kinds of reasons (especially that freeze frame at the end), but at heart it’s a quiet character study of a young boy who makes bad decisions and has really bad parents. Jean-Pierre Leaud gives one of the great child performances in the history of cinema, whether he’s crammed into a tiny apartment, repeatedly getting in trouble in school, running the streets or getting thrown into juvie. Truffaut shot this hell-raising picture in the streets, often letting his actors improvise and making it feel gritty & real. So party with your young chum, run away from your terrible folks or maybe just go for a stroll along the beach, but make sure to have a podcast in your ears. In fact, make that podcast the 400th Ellises’ Analysis, mes amis. Sparkplug Coffee might not be ideal for kids, but it’s definitely ideal for you. And if you dig a 20% discount,

Who didn’t think George Clooney practicing real estate law in the unglamorous parts of Hawaii and being cuckolded by the lanky guy from Scream would make for a killer comedy? Well, it might not be killer, but it IS a pretty good comedy. Of course, this particular movie star playing a loser is a stretch (even in Alexander Payne’s unique “let’s dump life on the leading character” style) but the Cloon man is quite terrific in The Descendants. Nevertheless, he’s miscast (as is arguably another actor) and that shows how good a job he did to come as close to sinking into the role as he did here. Payne is curiously kind to just about all the characters in this Oscar-winning effort, which we don’t think measures up to his best work. Still Clooney’s crackling chemistry with the outstanding Shailene Woodley carries the film. As for the inheritance/trusteeship subplot, hmmm, not so hot. Anyway, the 399th Ellises’ Analysis won’t lay there comatose in a hospital bed forever, so fire up our back and forth and let’s hope it

We conclude Sci-Fi Month by going into the Mother Ship and praising/bashing one of the biggest movies of all time. Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin have made plenty of action and disaster flicks in their day, but ID4 is their best…yet also one of their dumbest. It’s also terribly fun, despite all the death and destruction. Will Smith became an alien-punching superstar, Jeff Goldblum quirked it up in his one-of-a-kind way and Bill Pullman got to give one of the greatest speeches by any movie president. Oh, and Randy Quaid got to be a loose cannon. There’s just so much to love and so much to mock. Enough pre-amble though. You need to pack a missile in your carry-on, give your special lady a tacky engagement ring and hack into the 398th Ellises’ Analysis. Well Actually: Steven Hiller is a Marine pilot, not a Navy pilot. Also, the disaster movie 2012 was released in 2009. A remarkable way to prepare for an assault on an alien invader is to load up on Sparkplug Coffee. Go to Sparkplug’s site. They’ll give you a 20%

Wait, hang on, another movie about a giant rabbit? Only this time the rabbit doesn’t drink booze and pal around with Jimmy Stewart, but leads a teenager with mental problems down the path of scientific discovery and time travel? Well, yeah! Donnie Darko has been analyzed half to death and that’s impressive considering how indifferently the picture was received 20 years ago. Richard Kelly was only 26 back then and he was making his first (and certainly best) feature film. It’s far from perfect, although it has a slew of incredible moments and a dynamite soundtrack. Jake Gyllenhaal sports a solid Kubrick glower and he showed us many glimpses of how good an actor he was going to become. The whole eclectic cast is up to the task, really, and what a trippy movie they’re in.  Okay, but, what about that plot? We give that question a shot! So stay in your comfy bed, but don’t doubt our commitment to Sparkle Motion as the 397th Ellises’ Analysis rips into the story of Donnie D. You’d like to be awake when a jet engine

We began our talk about A.I. at the ending of the movie because the last 15 or 20 minutes have always been controversial. Didn’t it already have the most poetic ending possible before wishes started coming true? We debate that hot topic. Merging the visions of Steven Spielberg and Stanley Kubrick was always going to be an odd mix, but you might be surprised to learn which of them brought the negative and which of them brought the positive to this story. What shouldn’t be surprising is that Haley Joel Osment is terrific in one of the best performances by any child in any movie. He managed to top his great work in The Sixth Sense with this beautifully crafted evolution of a robot who becomes a real boy…or as close to it as a robot can. Spielberg’s fairy tale about a mecha Pinocchio is gorgeous to look at and to listen to, even if it’s episodic and a mite too long. Maybe more than a mite. So let a teddy bear and a gigolo tag along on a quest for your mother’s love as the 396th Ellises’ Analysis continues with Sc

Be Sci-Fi Month, be very Sci-Fi Month. The 395th Ellises’ Analysis is the first of 4 flicks we’ll discuss in June that identify with that creative genre. When you talk about David Cronenberg’s 3 or 4 best pictures, The Fly has got to be a part of that shortlist. Sure, there’s his trademark body horror and some jump scares and plenty of creepiness throughout, but it’s also got more heart than almost any other horror movie. It’s really a tragic love story sold as a fright flick. Jeff Goldblum is at his best here (putting up with extensive, Oscar-winning make-up that eventually swallows him right up), but Geena Davis’ performance is wonderful too. She’s the reason the last scene could make a person require eye-drying tissues. Lauded at the time, The Fly is maturing like a fine Canadian wine and it’s even better now. So don’t liquify your food in disgusting ways. Just curl up with our podcast and a few (solid) donuts to hear us dig into the nooks and crannies of the legend of Brundlefly. Well, Actually: Ronnie’s

It’s only been about a month since this year’s weird Oscars, but this was a good time for the 394th Ellises’ Analysis to spend a solid hour unraveling the beauty of the heartfelt winner of Best Picture. As she so often is, Frances McDormand is quiet, stern and so real. She lets her fellow performers and Chloe Zhao’s story come to her. Fern/Fran accomplishes more with a simple gesture than most people do in a 10-minute monologue. And she’s working with mostly unprofessional actors! They’re real nomads basically just playing themselves, but they all shine (especially Bob and Swankie). Nomadland gets better with multiple viewings and we’ll explain why some elements were more personal to us this time than they were when we saw it for the first time back in early April. So don’t be a loner who can’t be tied down. Or do, if that’s what you want and need. But whichever path you take, toss our chat into your ears and feel every feeling in this movie right along with us. This episode is dedicated to Jason Ellis. If yo

Bonus episode! Taking a page from our COVID-19 specials last year, we each made 2 movie recommendations in this episode, using the caveat that we had to sell the flicks to you using only 19 words. Each of us also tossed around some trivia questions. And we opened up the emailbag! Gender identification at the Oscars came up. Unlikeable directors came up. Desert island movies came up. The Golden Globes controversy came up. And classic flicks that we’ve previously reviewed like The Shining, E.T., Back To The Future, Pulp Fiction, Jaws and Django Unchained came up too. So bonus it up! Note: Ryan has seen Wonderstruck since this recording. The verdict? It’s handsomely made and the actors are pretty good, but the story isn’t very compelling and, while the ending is heartfelt, it’s not very believable. If you do some Tweetin’, Tweet us: @moviefiend51 and @bevellisellis

You’ll get 2 reviews for the price of one in the 393rd Ellises’ Analysis because the sequel came up a lot in this chat about Dreamworks’ groundbreaking Shrek. The snarky and often meta sense of humour that was so fresh at the time is still pretty gut-busting 2 decades later. Getting comedy superstars like Mike Myers and Eddie Murphy to provide the voices for the two iconic main roles was not as common as it's become ever since, but, wow, did the Myers/Murphy stunt casting (not to mention Cameron Diaz and especially John Lithgow) work perfectly. And while Pixar was and is the benchmark for digital animation, the look of Shrek is comparatively awesome in its own right. Well, mostly. So as you digest our gab about the ogre, please don’t bully the bad guy about his pintsizedness when there are so many other reason to dislike him, but DO love yourself no matter what you look like. You can live happily ever after if you become a customer of Sparkplug Coffee. Man, that’s a big promise. Okay, you can just get a great

Asghar Farhadi’s fair and balanced examination of a crumbling marriage (two crumbling marriages, really) is a tremendous accomplishment. Farhadi deals in ethics, morality, sexism, secrets and a lot of lies. He’s certainly got the cast to pull all of that off. His Oscar-winner shows empathy for all his middle-class and working-class Iranian characters and finds fascinating peel-back-the-layers ways to show the humanity in all of them. A Separation is also an unusual courtroom movie that doesn’t rely on big acting moments in a mahogany-filled room. So don’t shove people out of your apartment or accuse them of petty theft. Just settle in for the 392nd Ellises’ Analysis, but forgive us off the bat for how we butchered Iranian names as badly as we did. Well, Actually: According to the IMDb, they’re speaking Persian in this film, not Farsi or Urdu. Sparkplug Coffee is the perfect drink when you’re stressed out and trying to keep things from falling apart. They’ll ship you a bag of beans and toss a 20% discount your

Charlize Theron might very well have outdone her remarkable performance in Monster with her take on a narcissistic ghost writer of Young Adult books in this pitch-black comedy. Director Jason Reitman and writer Diablo Cody reteamed 4 years after the Oscar-winning Juno to give us one of the great navel-gazers in modern film history. Their flick didn’t find much of an audience 10 years ago, perhaps because of the surprising ending that we both loved. Or maybe Joe Average Moviegoer found Patrick Wilson’s character to be as confusing as we did and maybe they also thought his typically bland performance wasn’t enough to offset great work by the polar-opposite Patton Oswalt. Anyway, don’t be a dismissive bully. Just flop face-first on the bed after you’ve had a KFC binge (and feed your dog!) as we tell personal stories and rave about Young Adult in the 391st Ellises’ Analysis. Also, fire off questions, comments & criticism at us on Twitter (@moviefiend51 & @bevellisellis) or via email (top100projectpodcast@