The Movies of 1999

In this, our very first proper episode, Craig and Jason talk about Princess Mononoke, which didn't make our official list of movies to watch due to a technicality. We then cross live to the first of 52 movie nights at Jason's house for the spinning of the bingo ball, to find out which movie we'll be watching this week and talking about on next week's episode.
Resources mentioned at the beginning of the podcast:
1999: The Podcast
1999: The Year That Rocked Cinema
Best. Movie. Year. Ever.: How 1999 Blew Up the Big Screen
Margaret and David - At The Movies
Princess Mononoke:
YouTube Trailer
IMDB Page
Podcast:
Letterboxd List
Website
Discord Server

Listen in as Jason Hutchens and Craig Talbot talk about the background of our year-long project to watch 52 movies from 1999, one each week for the entirety of 2024. In fact, we may watch 104 movies, as I've paired each of my A-list movies with an optional B-list movie. We also talk about the 26 F-list movies which didn't make the cut; the full list of these is available as a Google Sheet.
Finally, we announce that we'll be starting with one movie that didn't make the A-list on a technicality; Princess Mononoke. You can watch the trailer on YouTube and see the list of movies on Letterboxd.
Listen next week to hear our review of Princess Mononoke, after which we'll be selecting the first of our 52 A-list movies to watch in 2024. See you at the movies!

Something wonderful happened to cinema in the nineties.
The decade started slowly, hungover on the popcorn spectacles and high school dramas of the eighties, until---BANG!---Tarantino burst onto the scene with Reservoir Dogs and made cinephiles everywhere sit up and take notice.
Young directors emerged from the fluoro-spandex ruin of the previous decade in response; directors who grew up with videotape and Nintendo instead of super 8 and cowboys and black and white war movies; they threw away the rulebook and told their stories in their own unique way. Like the French New Wave, these movies re-defined what cinema could be.
It all reached an astonishing apex in 1999 when films that would formerly have been written off as arthouse hit the mainstream; dozens of cinema classics that continue to influence filmmakers of today were released one after another in a seemingly endless cascade of creativity with no sequels or superheroes in sight.
2024 marks the 25th jubilee of what is considered by many to be the greatest year of cinema in the history of cinema! Nineteen Ninety Nine. To celebrate this landmark year I'll be hosting a pot-luck watch party at my place each weekend for the entire year, where we'll randomly selected a movie from a hat containing 52 examples of the very best of what 1999 has to offer and watch it on the spot.
This podcast is my invitation to you to join us for the ride. Venture back with us to the beforetimes; before doomscrolling, filter bubbles and the attention economy. Back when the mainstream media didn't know what an algorithm was and movies could be daring and unpredictable and different to anything anybody had seen before. Before Y2K and 911 and the MCU ruined the party. Before streaming services - six years before YouTube even - when studios were using their gut instincts to place big bets on originality and when directors had the freedom to call the shots. Strap yourselves in, it's going to be one hell of a ride!