On this special mega episode, co-host Veronica sits down with critic Fran Hoepfner and our producer Eli Sands to postmortem the 62nd New York Film Festival. This is a mainly spoiler-free conversation! We get into: Hard Truths, Caught by the Tides, Nickel Boys, April, Harvest, The Brutalist, The Seed of the Sacred Fig, The Shrouds, Queer, Maria, Stranger Eyes, Eephus, I’m Still Here, Anora, The Room Next Door, one stray line about Misericordia, plus: wife guy directors, the surveillance motif, doing Mike Leigh homework, critic versus public screenings, do we need subtitles to understand Scottish accents, stop describing Brutalist as monumental, are movies too long, Almodóvar’s secret to killing it at Q&A, what lipstick is Mikey wearing in Anora, and more. Further reading and listening: Fran’s NYFF report for Bright Wall/Dark Room and her incredible piece on Dick Pope, and more of Eli on the festival at Deep Cut. Find Fran online at Fran Mag, Twitter, and Letterboxd. -- The Bright Wall/Dark Room Podcast is co-hosted by Veronica Fitzpatrick and Chad Perman, produced by Eli Sands, and edited by Buczar. Our theme music is composed by Chad. Please: follow, rate, review! Find all 135 issues of Bright Wall/Dark Room at brightwalldarkroom.com (and be sure to check out our upcoming November issue, Neo-Noir 2024). We’re on Twitter (@BWDR and @TheBWDRPodcast), Bluesky, and Letterboxd, and welcome feedback and ad/sponsorship inquiries at podcast@brightwalldarkroom.com. -- This episode is sponsored by Galerie: a new kind of film club. Listeners can currently sign up for three months of full access to essays, curated film lists, live screenings and much more at join.galerie.com.