I don't see a problem with having period-specific details so long as the themes, characters, etc are realistic. Honestly, I don't know how you avoid this, especially thing set in the present day, where email, social media, smartphones etc are an inescapable part of modern life. Maybe the issue is not really commenting…

My overarching rule for trailers is that they should only give you the first act of the plot, if possible. Most shoot themselves in their own foot by revealing that, for example, the guy and girl start to fall in love or whatever. Not that such an ending would catch anyone off guard, but seeing the specifics in the…

Yeah, I kind of wish the only trailer that were ever released were teasers, because this actually makes me curious about what the film is about without giving much away.

I'm actually surprised there isn't a movie about a pizza guy having to deliver a pizza in 30 minutes lest he lose his job, and meanwhile he's beset by all kinds of obstacles. Seems like a no-brainer. (As an idea. The movie would probably suck.)

Yeah that's kind of a weird outlier. I remember it being a good one, with a powerful ending, but don't remember much else besides the fact that Lazenby quips about not being Connery. I think the general consensus is that he would've grown into a good Bond with a few more films to his name.

I think you're exactly right, and this kind of goes to the above discussion about how these stories are invariably set in NYC. If there was a more pronounced pipeline in other cities for media to flourish and be distributed*, you'd probably get a kind of geographic diversity that lends itself to a greater diversity of…

Yeah, makes sense. But it reinforces the sense that it is something that's being done out of a kind of laziness. If nothing else, this essential script set in New Orleans or something would be a lot more interesting given the uniqueness of the local color and culture. Amazing how NYC has become so omnipotent in pop…

Interesting to see a Steve Jobs-style villain back before he was broadly known. His plot is a bit goofy in the movie, but that is still a fun one.

Maybe that was part of the opening-credits music video?

When it comes to 007 I'm torn between picking Goldfinger and Skyfall as the best, which is strange because they're really polar opposites in terms of their style and tone. More broadly, I only really watch the Connery films or the Craig ones now (few films can match the fun of From Russia With Love, plus that one is…

Yeah that seems logical. I guess that doing something even somewhat ambitious, like having a lot of locations you'd need to travel to, could severely boost your budget. Trying something like doing a period film or something with big crowds, etc is even more prohibitive.

Did you read the piece in the Times today about intellectual property? It was so depressing. https://www.nytimes.com/201…®ion=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well

You really need to see The Insider, Thief, and Heat before you come down on Mann one way or the other (Collateral, too). Mohicans is one of his best, but the others are pretty essentially to grasping what people like or dislike about him.

Right. I hate to criticize what others create and go through, but I kept hearing about how amazing one online essay was a while ago, and it was literally an arc of "I used to be chubby as a kid and I felt bad about it, but then I made peace with it and also lost weight." Perhaps its just the modern economics of media…

Couldn't agree more. Do you think its a budget thing? Like, they're making these with people who already live in NYC, so you don't have to pay for trailers or whatever for everyone?

It is hard to be excited about things when it seems like so many writers just look around and write about themselves, rather than going for something truly different or imaginative (though that would also mean a lot more expensive, no doubt). Hell, I live in Brooklyn and am the age of these characters, but between…

One thing I dislike about modern Daily Show is that everyone shows too much emotion and give the game away. Obviously it'd be hard to match the deadpan nature of Colbert and Carrell when they were on, and certainly times are crazier now, but a lot of the time they seem to take on "easy" stories that don't strike me as…

Couldn't agree more on Public Enemies. Knocked it down a solid grade for me. I might love that movie if it didn't look like a bootleg VHS.

Disappointed that this isn't a rave, but she's always interesting, I love stories about 20th Century American history, and the relevance of this particular one to present day is obvious. And since seeing original films made by well-made directors for adult audiences is an all-too-rare pleasure these days, I'm…

Can you expand on that? Does Miranda read the AV Club on the regular? Do you know him personally or is he just a fan of your work? Because that's truly amazing and unexpected.