Wind, Reel, & Print

Episode 100: LETTERBOXD TOP 250 SHUFFLE   Featuring: Ikiru (1952); Witness for the Prosecution (1957); Cinema Paradiso (1988); The Hunt (2012)   Folks, it’s happened. The pod has made it to episode 100 and what a journey it has been.  We have watched hundreds of films, made thousands of connections, and even cried on occasion. The next 100 will be legendary! And with that, we also bring an end to one of our favorite segments, the Letterboxd Top 250 Shuffle. Find out why and where we go next on the podcast about cinema, the people behind it, and the intersection of everything… Wind, Reel, & Print.

Episode 099: WR&P WRITER’S ROOM   Happy (almost) Star Wars Day! Ryan and Chris go to the edge of the galaxy to bring you the next blockbuster Star Wars trilogy. Dave Filoni - the ball's in your court now.

Episode 098: CINEMA SINGLES   Featuring: WALL·E (2008)   Kevin and Ryan delve into their second Pixar film of the podcast to discuss where it sits in the grand scheme of Pixar’s filmography, what happens when a large studio consumes a smaller one, and how Charlie Chaplin and WALL·E aren’t too dissimilar. Let’s fly!

Episode 097: DOUBLE FEATURE   Featuring: Dream Scenario (2023); The Drama (2026)   Kristoffer Borgli has made a splash, not only with these two very intriguing films, but also with past comments in regard to age-gap relationships (in this case 27 and 16 in Norway, which is technically legal but socially taboo). Naturally the conversations in this episode revolve around what it means to, or whether it is even appropriate to, separate the art from the artist. Can art extend beyond the artist? Or is their mark forever imbued within it?

Episode 096: LESSONS IN FILM GENRE   Featuring: The Terminator (1984); A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001); I, Robot (2004); The AI Doc (2026)   What started as a viewing of The AI Doc (2026), and a couple of beers, quickly spun out into a larger conversation on artificial intelligence in movies. But not the tools! Instead we look into the material and ideas. How do these movies hold up to the real AI questions we are asking ourselves in this day and age? Beep boop.

Episode 095: CINEMA SINGLES   Featuring: Happy Together (1997)   Toxic relationships aren’t so bad when they look this good! Kevin and Ryan do their first dive into Wong Kar-wai’s filmography and experience the awesome power of Hong Kong cinema.

Episode 094: NEW RELEASES   Featuring: Project Hail Mary (2026)   What happens when both Kevin and Ryan see the same movie on opening weekend? We make an episode about it! This time it is the new space sci-fi film by Lord and Miller, brought to you by the greatest corporation - AMAZON. How does it hold up in the current sci-fi landscape and why did someone fall asleep in Kevin’s packed movie theater? Let’s find out!

Episode 093: CINEMA SINGLES   Featuring: Closer (2004)   From play to screen, Mike Nichols is the king of the adaptation. But where does Closer (2004) land in his filmography? And we ask the dreaded question that has never been asked on this pod before: Which character would you date?

Episode 092: FILM MOVEMENTS   Featuring: Totally F***ed Up (1993); Mary Is Happy, Mary Is Happy (2013); Cleaners (2019); Little Women (2019)   It’s time to get meta! WR&P finally gets into metarealism, one of Kevin’s favorite topics of all-time. What started as a conversation on atemporal cinema turns into a bigger conversation on what metarealism is and how each of these films fits into the metarealism conversation. This is a fun one!

Episode 091: WRITER’S ROOM   Mmmm, that’s good! Ryan and Chris lock themselves in the grocery store to come up with FOUR brand-new food mascot movies. It’s time to gather up some new IP, and create the next major mouth-watering film.

Episode 090: DOUBLE FEATURE   Start your engines! WR&P is driving right into the mind of Stephen King to discuss the John Carpenter adaptation Christine (1983) and King’s directorial debut (and final?) film Maximum Overdrive (1986). GAS IT!

Episode 089: BAY AREA FLICKS   We dive deep into Bay Area B-movie horror and end up in the toxic sludge of Milpitas! And you won’t believe what we find! First-time filmmakers! Stop-motion! Day-for-night-for-day! It’s something that must be seen to be believed.

Episode 088: RYAN & FRIENDS   Ryan and his old friend Joe check out the new film climbing the charts, Iron Lung (2026)! Made by the YouTuber Markiplier, does it have the sauce to be an actual film? Or is it just another studio cash grab? The answer is actually quite simple, but you still gotta listen in!

Episode 087: CINEMA SINGLES   What is a podcast? Is it just a sequence of numbers, letters ,and glyphs scrolling infinitely through space and time only to be deciphered by the machine overlords of the distant future, after humanity’s grand enslavement? Or is it just Ryan and Kevin talking about The Matrix (1999)? Good question!

Episode 086: CINEMA SINGLES   Ryan and Kevin sit down to talk about A SINGLE MOVIE. This time they set their sites on a PTA classic, The Master (2012). Following a few years after There Will Be Blood (2007), PTA came out swinging once again with his take on post-war masculinity and the magnetism of desire. The desire to belong and the desire to dominate. This film is a doozy! Come and join us. But not in a cult way! Promise!

Episode 085: THE OSCARS   Ryan and Kevin go through every nominee in the new 2026 Oscar’s lineup. The shoe-ins, the surprises, and the WTFs. 2025 was a wild year, and it’s almost time to crown the champ!

Episode 084: WR&P WRITER’S ROOM   We’ve all thought at one point or another, “hey, I think this is a good idea for a movie,” or “why aren’t they making that movie… but better?” So we went down to the Wind, Reel, & Print lab and came up with a solution… for us at least. It is the WR&P Writer’s Room! The new series follows Ryan and Chris (from the podcast “How Do We Human” and the creative mind behind the YouTube channel “Sassy Milkshake”) as they brainstorm movie ideas from inception to casting. This week they talk Muppet adaptations and, man, there are too many possibilities! What will be the next "A Muppet Christmas Carol?" or "Muppet Treasure Island?" Listen and find out.

EPISODE 083: LETTERBOXD TOP 250 SHUFFLE   Featuring: Ran (1985); Princess Mononoke (1997); Good Will Hunting (1997); The Celebration (1998)   IT’S BACK. Episode 10 of the Letterboxd Top 250 Shuffle is here and it is full of late 90’s gems. From the first Dogme 95 film to a Kurosawa adaptation of Shakespeare and from one of Miyazaki’s finest to Affleck and Damon’s breakout film, this episode has it all.

EPISODE 082: SUPER-FAN SEASON   Featuring: Watchmen (2009)   Who watches the Watchmen? WR&P DOES. Ryan talks the director’s cut of Zack Snyder’s Watchmen (2009) with super-fan Danny (Ryan’s second oldest friend) and they discuss the depth of character development, faithfulness to the original graphic novel, and whether the villain got it right in the end. Put on your cowl and listen in.

EPISODE 081: CINEMA MINI SERIES   Featuring: Eddington (2025); One Battle After Another (2025); Bugonia (2025)   America is the land of guns and paranoia, and this accidental trilogy of films cuts deep into what defines this country, for better and worse. Kevin and Ryan wade into the swamp of politics and filmmaking to see what exactly these three films speak to about the American experience. GOD BLESS THE USA.

EPISODE 080: ’TIS THE SEASON   Featuring; Christmas Vacation (1989)   Old friends Ryan and Chad reminisce over the Christmas classic Christmas Vacation (1989). They talk about some of their favorite scenes, speculate about what the boss ACTUALLY got as a gift, and settle whether resistance to cold is a midwestern genetic trait (??). Listen in and Merry Christmas!

EPISODE 079: WR&P WORLD NEWS   Hot off the press! We talk about what’s going on in the news: the WBD and Netflix merger. But it’s Wind, Reel, & Print, so we go deep into money in filmmaking, the degradation of our economy, and even conjure up our own filmmaking funding alternative! Get in here!

EPISODE 078: CINEMA SERIES   Featuring: Jurassic Park (1993); The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997); Jurassic Park 3 (2001); Jurassic World (2015); Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018); Jurassic World Dominion (2022); Jurassic World Rebirth (2025)   It is time to enter the depths of Jurassic hell. Ryan and Kevin will stop at nothing to deepen their understanding of film movements, trends, and history, which has led them to a 7-film series that is both Ryan’s foundational films and his worst nightmares. Hold onto your butts!

EPISODE 077: RYAN & FRIENDS   Featuring: The Silence of the Lambs (1991); Cure (1997); Shutter Island (2010); Gone Girl (2014)   Time to get academic! Ryan brings his sister Julia on the pod, who is currently in graduate school studying psychology, to talk and analyze four movies that blend both genre and science. Did the mental health professionals of Shutter Island really follow the right techniques? What is the difference between a Red Herring and a MacGuffin? Listen to find out!

EPISODE 076: NEW RELEASES   Featuring: Frankenstein (2025)   Del Toro is back with his unique blend of victorian horror and sympathetic monsters to bring about a new adaptation of the classic Frankenstein tale. How might this film relate to today (AI, anyone??) and what might Ryan and Kevin think of it? Well you’ll just have to listen to find out!

EPISODE 075: RYAN & FRIENDS   Featuring: Zoolander (2001); Tropic Thunder (2008)   Ryan is joined by Chris (the brain behind the YouTube channel “Sassy Milkshake,” one half of the podcast “How Do We Human?” and a wonderful old friend) to talk about these two influential movies in each of their childhoods. Plus get an inside look at what their college experience was like, watching movies for free in LA, and that cameo at the beginning of Zoolander(!?!?).

EPISODE 074: FILM THEORY DISCUSSIONS   Featuring: The Threepenny Opera (1931); Vivre sa vie (1962); Palindromes (2004); Chi-Raq (2015)   Wind, Reel, & Print is going back to the classroom to take a deep dive into Brechtian cinema! A term that has come up in a number of previous episodes, these four movies finally give Ryan his “aha” moment with the idea and reveal just how much this idea/genre plays into exactly what this podcast is all about. Plus “Palindromes,” the sleeper hit!

EPISODE 073: SPOILED: THE SEQUEL SHOW   Featuring: Troll 2 (1990)   THE BOYS ARE BACK. It's Halloween and time for a scary movie. Ryan is joined by Chad and Joe, from the infamous and elusive Salad Brain Productions, to talk about the “worst” film ever made. But did we just stumble into a gem? Time to find out!

EPISODE 072: LETTERBOXD TOP 250 SHUFFLE   Featuring: Before Sunrise (1995); Mary and Max (2009); Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009); Incendies (2010)   We dive back into our favorite segment and come out the other side even bigger Denis fans. Plus two stop-motion films? The beginning of a Richard Linklater trilogy? The Top 250 is deep and we are wading into it.

EPISODE 071: LESSONS IN FILM HISTORY (DIRECTORS)   Featuring: The Big Sleep (1946); Red River (1948); Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953); Rio Bravo (1959)   It’s director time! WR&P is familiar with some of Howard Hawks’ greatest works (Bringing up Baby and His Girl Friday) and his elevation of the Screwball genre, but what about everything else? Musicals? Westerns? Film Noir? This man had his hands in everything and we take a peek at some of his most admired work spanning all of these genres.

EPISODE 070: LESSONS IN FILM GENRE   Featuring: Singin' in the Rain (1952); The Sound of Music (1965); The Little Mermaid (1989); Mamma Mia! (2008)   Lights! Camera! Music! Kevin & Ryan talk the history of musicals, the inherent meta-ness of the genre, and why The Sound of Music is one of the greatest films of all time. The longest regular episode to-date, and it is well-deserved!

EPISODE 069 (nice): CINEMA MINISERIES   Featuring: Pokemon: The First Movie (1998); Pokémon the Movie 2000 (1999); Pokémon 3: The Movie (2000); Pokémon 4Ever (2001); Pokémon Heroes (2002)   Ash, Pikachu, Misty, Brock, Ryan, & Kevin. We journeyed into our youth to see if the Pokemon movies have the sauce and find out just how close they came to greatness (one of them anyway).

There's no proper episode this week, but listen in and get a taste of what topics we are diving into in the coming weeks and months!

EPISODE 068: CINEMA MINISERIES   Featuring: Treasure Island (1950); Muppet Treasure Island (1996); Treasure Planet (2002)   ARGH MATEY. Long John Silver may be one of the most interesting characters in all of media, and in this episode Ryan and Kevin speak about how him and many of the other themes and characters of Treasure Island have evolved over the decades. Plus our pitch for the next Treasure Island adaptation!

EPISODE 067: CINEMA SINGLES   Featuring: Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001)   Following the Disney Renaissance of the 20th century, things began to putter out, or more aptly, sink into the ocean. As children of the 90’s, Ryan and Kevin remember Atlantis fondly and discuss its place in animation history. Plus the “Fart Theory™.”

EPISODE 066: LESSONS IN FILM MOVEMENTS   Featuring: Reefer Madness (1936); Up in Smoke (1978); How High (2001); Pineapple Express (2008)   WR&P goes deep undercover to expose the true ills of society: Marijuana! Ganja! The Devil’s Lettuce! Listen in as Ryan and Kevin explore the history of the stoner film genre, all the way from the propaganda film of the 1930’s to the buddy comedies of the late 20th century, and beyond.

EPISODE 065: LESSONS IN FILM GENRE   Featuring: A Bug’s Life (1998); Chicken Run (2000); Robots (2005)   At the dawn of the new millennia, animated films began its rapid transition from physical medium to computer generation and changed the film industry altogether. Steve Jobs’ Pixar signaled the move away from Disney’s 2D cell animation and Aardman’s claymation, and foreshadowed the complete tech takeover that Hollywood has been experiencing since the 2010s. With months-long labor strikes, VFX artists unionizing, and Hollywood studios monopolizing nearly every other week, the phrase “means of production” carries a double meaning when it comes to critiquing the film industry from a Marxist perspective. To gain an elementary understanding of how Marxist theory operates, WR&P cohosts Ryan and Kevin throw it back to the early aughts and the late 90s with three animated children’s flicks from three different animation studios that echo sentiments of class consciousness, consumption, and materialism.

EPISODE 064: LETTERBOXD TOP 250 SHUFFLE   Featuring: Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964); Raging Bull (1980); The Father (2020); I’m Still Here (2024)   In a new episode of WR&P’s Letterboxd Top 250 Shuffle, Ryan & Kevin pin two cinema classics against two recent Oscar darlings. Despite the drastic jump in time, this particular collection is rare in its thematic cohesion. As our own reality tears at the seams, these four films build a portrait of this slow descent into destruction. Although these stories originate in history and/or fiction, the threat of nuclear warfare, the impacts of toxic masculinity, the complete loss of identity and memory, and fascist governments ripping apart families are all current events which continue to affect our society today.

EPISODE 063: SPECIAL EVENT   Wind Reel & Print “wraps” their first season with a celebratory WR&P Awards Ceremony. Cohosts Ryan and Kevin summarize the last year of podcasting by pinpointing landmark episodes that transformed, defined, and elevated our understanding of cinematic language. The First Annual WR&P Awards closes with an exciting announcement of this year’s winners for Best Screenplay, Best Actor(s), Best Director, and Best Picture.

EPISODE 062: CINEMA SINGLES   Having mentioned the film in a number of previous episodes, Kevin’s fascination with Damien Chazelle’s “Babylon” finally comes to fruition. In a heartfelt suicide note to Hollywood, Chazelle returns to his supposed entertainment industry comfort zone, relishing in the chaos and thrilling drama that defined his early successes in “Whiplash” and “La La Land”. After bombing at the box office, “Babylon” aims to achieve a cult following status with its grotesque humor and fantastical Hollywood episodes offering more than what initial viewers gave it credit for.

EPISODE 061: FILM THEORY DISCUSSIONS   Wind Reel & Print uncovers the secrets to Soviet cinema via the guidance of filmmaker Lev Kuleshov and his humbly named theory the “Kuleshov effect”. In an introductory lesson to film editing, this founding principle of film theory draws attention to the cut as the primary building block of film-meaning creation. Despite the inherent self-explanatory nature of this concept, this episode serves as an important reminder of the impacts Soviet film theorists had on the development of cinematic language, with the “Kuleshov effect” and the montage helping usher in film as the defining art form of a modern industrial society.

EPISODE 060: DOUBLE FEATURES   Featuring: Annie Hall (1977); [500] Days of Summer (2009)   What does the Academy Award-winning Woody Allen and Hollywood hearthrob Joseph Gordon-Levitt have in common? We’re actually not too sure either. But their movies felt like an appropriate pair to cut against. Both “Annie Hall” and “[500] Days of Summer” take the romcom genre to meta extremes and WR&P cohosts Ryan and Kevin examine the formal and narrative aspects that loosely define a meta romcom, namely the use of atemporal editing and the narrative focus on memory.

EPISODE 059: BAY AREA FLICKS   Featuring: Angels in the Outfield (1994); The Fan (1996); Moneyball (2011)   In possibly the biggest reach in WR&P history, Kevin bundles three Bay Area-based baseball movies in an attempt to define the local region through America’s Favorite Pasttime. From Brad Pitt’s Billy Beane to Robert De Niro’s fanatic antics, baseball is universally cherished as a game of passion. It stands as one of the iconic symbols of American and masculine identity, with both Ryan and Kevin sharing connections with baseball and their respective fathers. While the Bay Area ties aren’t incredibly strong across all three films, Ryan proposes how “Moneyball” echoes the sentiment of how Oakland has been poached of sports vivacity.

EPISODE 058: FILM THEORY DISCUSSIONS   Wind Reel & Print puts a name to a face by introducing auteur theory, one of the cornerstone concepts of film theory. With French New Wave origins, this theoretical claim pedastaled the director as the “author” of cinema. It has since become a badge of honor, changing the way we understand filmmaking and altering the film industry away from producer-centrism and towards director-centrism. Kevin offers their own theories behind the qualifications of the term “autuer”.

EPISODE 057: LESSONS IN FILM MOVEMENTS   Featuring: Cyrus (2010); Drinking Buddies (2013); Frances Ha (2012); Computer Chess (2013)   Per our initial “Mumblecore” episode, WR&P examines the original Mumble-corps in the years following their break onto the scene. Andrew Bujalski, Joe Swanberg, Greta Gerwig, and the Duplass Brothers return for another round of complicated relationships and inventive independent film modes. Kevin coins terminology around this movement to explain the ways these filmmakers embrace bigger budgets and different cinematic styles.

EPISODE 056: CINEMA MINI SERIES   Featuring: Nosferatu (1922); Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979); Nosferatu (2024)   As a quasi-sequel to the “Vampire Movies” episode, Wind Reel & Print folds in the cinematic traditions of Nosferatu. Beginning with F.W. Murnau’s 1922 version and ending with Robert Eggers’ recent rendition, Ryan and Kevin cover the aesthetic differences between these three films and how this pertains to director style, regionality, and time period of production.

EPISODE 055: LETTERBOXD TOP 250 SHUFFLE   Featuring: Howl’s Moving Castle (2004); Winter Light (1963); The Ascent (1977); Mulholland Dr. (2001)   How do you connect a Japanese animation, a Swedish tragedy film, a Soviet WWII drama, and an American dream picture? Regardless of film form or narrative structure or country of origin, the Letterboxd Top 250 surely guarantees a “good movie” fortified with captivating stories and profound aesthetics that ultimately question what it means to be human. This week’s collection concentrates on concepts of death as a symbol of life cycles and transition, featuring films from Hayao Miyazaki, Ingmar Bergman, Larisa Shepitko, and the late David Lynch.

EPISODE 054: CINEMA MINI SERIES   Featuring: The Human Condition I: No Greater Love (1959); The Human Condition II: Road to Eternity (1959); The Human Condition III: A Soldier’s Prayer (1961)   Despite all the double features, director retrospectives, and genre reviews, Wind Reel & Print has never fully embraced the comforts of a true trilogy. Directed by celebrated WR&P alum Masaki Kobayashi, “The Human Condition” stands as possibly the greatest trilogy ever committed to film and seemed fitting for the pod’s first cinema mini series. While traversing through various settings and multiple ensemble casts, this epic narrative consistently drives home themes of humanism while providing thoughtful social critique and astounding visual imagery. Ryan and Kevin bow down at the altar of Kobayashi’s monumental The Human Condition Trilogy.

EPISODE 053: LESSONS IN FILM MOVEMENTS   Featuring: Mad Max (1979); Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975); Dead Calm (1989); Walkabout (1971)   From the outback gothic Ozploitation of “Mad Max” to the proto-Lynchian affect of “Picnic at Hanging Rock”, the impact of Australian New Wave remains resoundingly influential albeit relatively unheard of. Boasting contemporary Hollywood headliners such as Nicole Kidman, Mel Gibson, George Miller, Peter Weir, and Sam Neill, this film movement from Down Under dominated indie circuits in the 1970s and 80s with daring adventure tales displaying a determined national identity alongside unique cinematic aesthetics. WR&P cohosts Ryan and Kevin give respect to Aussie cinema.

EPISODE 052: WEIRD @ WR&P   In an attempt to repair an irreparable movie, Wind Reel & Print tackles the complicated reputation of Jim Carrey’s 1994 film “The Mask”. Despite having higher reviews than Weird @ WR&P favorite “The Cat in the Hat”, both Ryan and Kevin find “The Mask” to be rather lackluster and quite displeasing. Convoluted in its influence and intention, this comic book adaptation fares better in memory than in execution.