Blank Check with Griffin & David

Jennifer Kent, Australian filmmaker behind The Babadook and The Nightingale, joins to unpack Peter Weir’s Gallipoli and the history of Australian cinema. They explore Gallipoli’s national resonance, Weir’s intimate anti-epic approach and visual style, Mark Lee’s underrated performance, and the film’s marketing and cultural legacy.

Ben David Grabinski, filmmaker (writer/director of Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice). He dives into Peter Weir’s soggy, mystic 1978 film The Last Wave. They talk colonial law clashing with Aboriginal Dreamtime, the film’s relentless wet imagery, striking blue cinematography, the ambiguous tidal ending, and on-set rain effects and practical filmmaking anecdotes.

It’s Critical Darlings’ biggest morning! After a marathon season, we react to this year’s Academy Awards: the winners, losers, presenters, performances, and awkward play-offs. One Battle After Another and Sinners nearly split the ballot with One Battle and Paul Thomas Anderson taking the biggest prizes in Best Director and Best Picture, while Sinners took home Best Actor, Score, Adapted Screenplay, and Cinematography. But for as many questions as the ceremony answered, it raised more: Do Sinners and Amy Madigan’s wins signal a shift in how the Academy sees horror? What exactly is the Best Casting Oscar tracking? Are we now doomed to see Timmy eat a raw elk in an Iñárritu film? As part of this special episode, we also check in with Critical Darlings fashion correspondent Ben “The Other Ben” Hosley on this year's Oscars fashion, review the best popcorn buckets of the year with Vulture’s Rebecca Alter, and reveal the future of Critical Darlings.  ✨Subscribe to our new feed in your podcast player of choice, and join us next week for Project Hail Mary!✨ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/critical-darlings/id1885681327Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/60n6Z9BUUMUR81CQoHbE8bPocket Casts: https://pca.st/1beh8dxuAmazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/a3598b5c-6f4a-4819-9457-44082cfea1fc/critical-darlings Sign up for Check Book, the Blank Check newsletter featuring even more “real nerdy shit” to feed your pop culture obsession. Dossier excerpts, film biz AND burger reports, and even more exclusive content you won’t want to miss out on. Join our Patreon for franchise commentaries and bonus episodes. Follow us @blankcheckpod on Twitter, Instagram, Threads and Facebook!  Buy some real nerdy merch Connect with other Blankies on our Reddit or Discord For anything else, check out BlankCheckPod.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jane Schoenbrun, filmmaker and director of I Saw the TV Glow, joins to unpack Peter Weir’s Picnic at Hanging Rock. They explore the film’s eerie first act, dreamlike cinematography and frame-rate tricks, casting choices and dubbed voices, themes of repression and Australian dreamtime, plus the pan flute’s haunting score.

David Sims, film critic and writer known as David “Rocketman” Sims, returns to dissect Paul Thomas Anderson’s One Battle After Another. They debate its political allegory, generational revolutions, satirical details, and Leonardo DiCaprio’s weary lead. The conversation ends with tight Oscar predictions and surprises to watch for on awards night.

A romp through Peter Weir's debut and the roots of the Australian New Wave. They trace Weir's early shorts and influences, the film's strange tone and car-crash visual style, and the quirky town economy built on wrecks. Conversation covers casting, the climactic violent festival, and how this wild first film launched Weir toward Picnic at Hanging Rock.

They dissect a record-breaking awards run for a genre-adjacent film and argue over whether it counts as horror, action, musical, or something else. They debate campaigning tactics, studio mergers and how industry shifts shape Oscar momentum. They unpack sexuality, race, music, visual style, and a provocative post-credits coda. A spirited defense of a surprise Best Actress nominee rounds out the conversation.

Joe Reid, film critic and frequent collaborator, returns to help hand out the annual Blankies. They riff on Oscar season tactics, debate supporting and lead performance shortlists, salute craft categories like cinematography and casting, and trade playful superlatives and Putters & Murmurs for the year’s quirkiest moments.

Joe Reid, Vulture journalist and host of This Had Oscar Buzz, digs into Joachim Trier’s Sentimental Value and its surprising Oscar surge. They trace why auteurs’ follow-ups sometimes get awards love after early snubs. Short takes on international visibility, acting race volatility, and which buzzy films fizzled this year.

Alison Willmore, Vulture film critic and cohost of Critical Darlings, joins to unpack Jennifer Lawrence’s career and Lynne Ramsay’s Die My Love. They trace Lawrence’s star arc from franchises to daring indie choices. The conversation digs into the film’s tonal audacity, provocative scenes, casting risks, Cannes buzz, and MUBI’s big purchase.