The MacGuffin

Spencer is joined by Jen from Scarecrow Video for the MacGuffin Podcast’s Sweet Sixteen. They open the episode with a discussion about movie viewing habits. Next, they move on to a preview of the upcoming releases for the end of 2009. Finally, they spend some time sharing their movie regrets – about films they’ve seen and DVD’s they’ve bought.

Spike Jonze is easily the most adventurous filmmaker working in Hollywood.  His success has allowed him opportunities to take chances on projects that movie studios might otherwise reject.  It might even be possible to argue his success on unconventional projects in part inspired the studios to tackle projects like a Facebook movie or a Battleship movie.  Thankfully, Spike Jonze has never caved to studio pressure to repeat his films successes by making sequels, though I’m sure there was interest in Being John Malkovich 2, etc.

Conceptually Couples Retreat has everything to make it a good film. It has a great cast including Vince Vaughn, Jon Favreau, Jason Bateman, Kristin Bell, Kristin Davis, and Malin Ackerman. It was written by Vince Vaughn and Jon Favreau – this is Jon Favreau’s first major script since Made. The director Peter Billingsley hasn’t directed much, but has been a long time collaborator of Jon Favreau and Vince Vaughn, on film such as Made and Iron Man.