In the second part of our Oscar’s special, we shift our focus from the Best Picture race to the rest of the ballot for the 98th Academy Awards. We dive deep into the remaining 23 categories, including the highly competitive acting races, technical achievements, and the debut of the Best Casting award.

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Music by Mike Natale

In the first half of our special, we dive deep into the ten films vying for the night’s biggest honor. We analyze the frontrunners and the dark horses in a year defined by record-breaking genre hits and intimate international dramas.

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Our annual tradition kicks off once more, despite delays from both us and the Library of Congress (thanks government shutdowns). Once again, Mike & Tom went in blind, avoiding finding out what got in this year until Kyle revealed it to them live on air. Hear the boys react to a slate of six underseen silent films and then...well, the shelf at a Blockbuster Video in 2003. Enjoy!

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This week, we’re talking about Chulas Fronteras (1976), Les Blank’s vibrant, soulful documentary celebrating the music, culture, and communities of the Texas Mexico borderlands, and we’re joined by Maureen Gosling, whose work as a filmmaker and editor was instrumental in shaping the film itself.

More than a music documentary, Chulas Fronteras captures a living cultural tradition in motion. Through performances by artists like Flaco Jiménez and Lydia Mendoza, the film becomes a record of identity, migration, and creative exchange, all observed with care and curiosity rather than explanation. It’s no surprise the film was added to the National Film Registry. It preserves not just songs, but a way of life.

Our conversation with Maureen Gosling offers a rare, firsthand perspective on the making of the film: how it came together, what it meant to document these musicians at that moment in time, and why the film continues to resonate decades later. It’s a reminder of how preservation isn’t only about images on screen, but about honoring voices, traditions, and communities that deserve to be seen and heard on their own terms.

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"My mother thanks you, my father thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I thank you."

Dr. Vaughn Joy joins us on the show to talk about the musical biopic that won James Cagney his Academy Award, the patriotic propaganda piece Yankee Doodle Dandy. We talk George M. Cohan's cultural significance, the film's seemingly waning place in the consensus cinematic canon, and how the film laid the groundwork for the type of Hollywood pro-American propaganda films of the Cold War (the subject of Dr. Joy's new book, Selling Out Santa: Hollywood Christmas Films in the Age of McCarthy).

Buy Selling Out Santa: Hollywood Christmas Films in the Age of McCarthy here, or wherever you buy your books.

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“All I want is a place to live and a job.” – Nothing But a Man (1964)

This week, we’re taking time to honor the life and legacy of filmmaker Michael Roemer, who passed away in May 2025. Roemer’s work has always stood apart as quiet, honest, deeply human, and we start with the film that introduced so many people to his voice: Nothing But a Man. It’s a landmark in independent cinema, a National Film Registry inductee, and one of the most compassionate portrayals of Black working-class life ever put on screen.

From there, we spend some time with Roemer’s other major works, Vengeance Is Mine and Dying. Each of these films shows a different side of what made him such a singular filmmaker: his empathy, his curiosity, and his ability to sit with people at their most vulnerable without ever forcing sentiment or judgment.

This episode is both a reflection and a celebration: an appreciation of a filmmaker whose perspective mattered, and whose films continue to resonate in ways that feel as immediate now as they did when he first made them.

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A quick update on an upcoming absence

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"The Year's Wildest, Wittiest Whirlwind of a Love Battle... Outrageously Racy... Sparkling... Gay!"

Bella Zaydenberg returns to the show to talk about the beloved Howard Hawks screwball comedy, His Girl Friday (1940). We'll talk about journalism, rom-coms, and weddngs.

Wait, weddings? Why weddings? Listen to find the worst kept secret in the history of our show!

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Music by Mike Natale