Film Review Podcast Episodes

The Bad Dads turn to Netflix for The Life Ahead, the 2020 Italian drama directed by Edoardo Ponti and starring Sophia Loren as Madame Rosa, a Holocaust survivor and former sex worker who now cares for the children of other sex workers in Bari. The conversation begins in properly jaded Monday fashion — recorded after England’s glorious defeat of Mexico at the Azteca, naturally — before moving through recent watches including The Armstrong Lie, Marco Pierre White YouTube rabbit holes, the new Cape Fear, Shot Caller, The Boys, and a brisk top-five round on dynamite and explosions. When the dads get to the film, Sidey sets up Madame Rosa’s world: she is elderly, Jewish, traumatised, proud, and scraping by, pawning her candlesticks to cover the rent. Into her life crashes Momo, a young Senegalese orphan living with Dr Cohen, who steals Rosa’s bag in the market and is then forced to apologise. The apology goes badly, but Dr Cohen persuades Rosa — via an increasingly persuasive cash of…

The Bad Dads return to early Scorsese with Mean Streets, the 1973 New York crime drama that helped put both Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro properly on the map, while giving Harvey Keitel one of his defining early roles. The conversation opens with the film’s famous line: “You don’t make up for your sins in church. You do it on the streets.” From there the dads immediately spot the Scorsese DNA that would later become unmistakable in Goodfellas: Catholic guilt, low-level gangsters, bar-room rituals, restless needle drops, family obligation, small neighbourhood pressure, and men who confuse loyalty with self-destruction. Sidey walks through Harvey Keitel’s Charlie, a small-time operator caught between his Catholic conscience, his uncle Giovanni’s criminal world, and his need to look after Johnny Boy. Dan highlights Charlie’s religious conflict — the guilt, the fear of hell, and the candle-burning self-punishment — while Cris and Reegs pick up on how tight and claustrophobic th…

In this episode of Bad Dads Film Review, the crew is completely out of their depth covering the "Top 5 Floods" in cinema history, before diving into the 2025 Latvian animated masterpiece, Flow. After navigating the high waters of cinematic floods (including a nod to the flipped cruise ship of The Poseidon Adventure), the main feature takes center stage. Flow follows a cat surviving a catastrophic flood alongside a capybara, a lemur, and a large dog. With no humans, no explanation, and zero dialogue, it still managed to beat out Inside Out 2 for Best Animated Feature at the 97th Academy Awards. The Dads break down why this quiet film earned their absolute strongest recommendation.

In this episode of Bad Dads Film Review, the crew (minus Dan) takes on Christian Gudegast's 2018 heist thriller *Den of Thieves*. Reegs and Cris break down the high-testosterone showdown between an elite crew of ex-military bank robbers and a morally bankrupt Sheriff's unit led by a swaggering Gerard Butler. Described as *Heat* on protein shakes and tribal tattoos, the film delivers intense action and a surprising amount of fun. Despite Sidey not having seen it yet, the glowing review and strong recommend from Reegs and Cris (who gave it "Five tens outta five") have convinced him to add it to his watchlist.

God's Pocket (2014) In this Pocket Week episode, the dads dig into *God's Pocket* (2014), one of Philip Seymour Hoffman's final releases. They unpack the film's bleak tone, grimy neighborhood setting, and chaotic chain of events around Leon's death, Mickey's funeral-money horse bet, and the escalating violence that follows. The verdict: strong performances (especially Hoffman), interesting moments, but an uneven film that lands as a moderate recommend.

In this episode of Bad Dads Film Review, the hosts venture into the Australian Outback to review the 1971 classic Walkabout. Directed by visionary filmmaker Nicolas Roeg in his solo debut, the film stars Jenny Agutter, Luc Roeg, and David Gulpilil in a haunting story about two civilized schoolchildren stranded in the wilderness who are rescued by an Aboriginal boy on his traditional rite of passage. The Dads (Dan, Reegs, Sidey, and Cris) discuss the film's stark contrast between modern, regimented society and the natural world. Topics include the film's almost entirely improvised 14-page script, the stunning cinematography, the absurdity of maintaining a formal school uniform in the desert, and philosophical debates on human evolution and modern conveniences. Despite Dan initially confusing it with another desert survival movie involving a dog, the hosts uniformly praise Walkabout for its hypnotic pacing and powerful thematic depth. If you enjoy visually driven 1970s cinema or t…

The Conspiracy (2012) Trust no one. Question everything. And definitely don't answer your phone if it just repeats your own number back to you. This week, the Bad Dads (minus Pete, who is off skiing) review the 2012 found-footage thriller The Conspiracy. Directed by Christopher MacBride, this low-budget Canadian indie starts as a fake documentary exploring the psychology of conspiracy theorists before spiraling into a full-blown survival horror about the very secret societies it's investigating. The Setup: We meet Aaron and Jim, two documentary filmmakers who set out to profile Terrence, a stereotypical street-preaching "kook" with a megaphone and a house completely wallpapered in newspaper clippings connected by red string. Terrence is arguably the best character in the film, blending wild paranoia with genuine historical psy-ops (like the Lusitania and the Gulf of Tonkin) to make you question reality. The Disappearance: When Terrence suddenly vanishes, Aaron inherits his…

In this episode of Bad Dads Film Review, Dan and Reegs review I, Swear (2025), the BAFTA-winning biographical film about John Davidson — a Scottish man whose Tourette's syndrome shaped his entire life, and who went on to become an MBE and a prominent advocate for people living with the condition. The episode opens with the BAFTA controversy: John Davidson experienced a tic during the ceremony, saying a racial epithet while two Black actors were on stage. Dan and Reegs address the internet reaction, the BBC's editing failures, and why watching the film itself provides the clearest possible answer. The film charts John Davidson's life from 1983 in Galashiels — played as a child by Scott Ellis Watson in a debut performance both hosts describe as exceptional — through a devastating adolescence, a diagnosis with no support infrastructure around it, a remarkable friendship with Dottie and her son Murray, a series of community jobs and landmark legal moments, and ultimately a clinical …