Best Pick with John Dorney, Jessica Regan and Tom Salinsky

Episode 322: Beau Travail

Released 24 September 2025

For this episode, we watched Claire Denis’s 1999 story of three men in the French Foreign Legion, drawn in part from Herman Melville’s unfinished novella Billy Budd. The film stars Denis Lavant, Michel Subor and Grégoire Colin and Denis also wrote the script along with Jean-Pol Fargeau. It has an 87% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and it’s at number seven in the 2022 Sight & Sound poll.

We also feature an exclusive clip from Tom’s new podcast All British Comedy Explained. Check it out here. https://podfollow.com/all-british-comedy-explained

Next time we will be discussing 2001: A Space Odyssey. If you want to watch it before listening to the next episode, you can buy the DVD or Blu-Ray on Amazon.co.uk, or Amazon.com, or you can stream it via Apple TV+ (UK) or Apple TV+ (USA).

• Blood Shine https://mubi.com/en/gb/films/blood-shine
• The One I Love https://www.netflix.com/gb/title/70299863
• https://www.earwolf.com/episode/the-snowman-live-w-erin-gibson-bryan-safi/

BEST PICK the book is available now from all the usual places, and the paperback is out now.

• From the publisher https://tinyurl.com/best-pick-book-rowman
• UK Amazon https://amzn.to/3zFNATI
• US Amazon https://www.amzn.com/1538163101
• UK bookstore https://www.waterstones.com/book/9781538163108
• US bookstore https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/best-pick-john-dorney/1139956434
• Audio book https://www.audible.co.uk/pd/Best-Pick-Audiobook/B09SBMX1V4

To send in your questions, comments, thoughts and ideas, you can join our Facebook group, email us on bestpickpod@gmail.com, or find us on Bluesky.

You can also visit our website at https://bestpickpod.com and sign up to our mailing list to get notified as soon as a new episode is released. Just follow this link: http://eepurl.com/dbHO3n.

If you enjoy this podcast and you’d like to help us to continue to make it, you can now support us on Patreon for as little as £2.50 per month.

Best Pick with John Dorney, Jessica Regan and Tom Salinsky

Episode 321: In the Mood for Love

Released 27 August 2025

For this episode, we watched the Wong Kar-wai’s modern classic In the Mood for Love, starring Maggie Cheung and Tony Leung which debuted at the Cannes Film Festival in 2000. It sits at a hugely impressive fifth place on the 2022 Sight and Sound list and has a 92% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. It has also run at the Prince Charles Cinema in London for a record-breaking 75 consecutive weeks, so we take a look at the history of that UK institution as well.

• Tom Cruise breaks his ankle. https://youtu.be/KCm7uhCqo9c
• https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/movies/best-movies-21st-century.html

Next time we will be discussing Beau Travail. If you want to watch it before listening to the next episode, you can buy the DVD or Blu-Ray on Amazon.co.uk, or Amazon.com, or you can download it via iTunes (UK) or iTunes (USA).

BEST PICK the book is available now from all the usual places, and the paperback is out now.

• From the publisher https://tinyurl.com/best-pick-book-rowman
• UK Amazon https://amzn.to/3zFNATI
• US Amazon https://www.amzn.com/1538163101
• UK bookstore https://www.waterstones.com/book/9781538163108
• US bookstore https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/best-pick-john-dorney/1139956434
• Audio book https://www.audible.co.uk/pd/Best-Pick-Audiobook/B09SBMX1V4

To send in your questions, comments, thoughts and ideas, you can join our Facebook group, email us on bestpickpod@gmail.com, or find us on Bluesky.

You can also visit our website at https://bestpickpod.com and sign up to our mailing list to get notified as soon as a new episode is released. Just follow this link: http://eepurl.com/dbHO3n.

If you enjoy this podcast and you’d like to help us to continue to make it, you can now support us on Patreon for as little as £2.50 per month.

Best Pick with John Dorney, Jessica Regan and Tom Salinsky

Episode 320: Man with a Movie Camera (Chelovek’s kinoapparatom)

Released 30 July 2025

For this episode, we watched the 1929 experimental Soviet documentary Man with a Movie Camera, written and directed by Dziga Vertov. Our version had a soundtrack composed by Michael Nyman. For its age, it’s a relatively recent entry to the Sight and Sound list, making its first entry in 1992, making it to the top ten in 2012 and settling in ninth place in 2022. It has a 98% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Next time we will be discussing In the Mood for Love. If you want to watch it before listening to the next episode, you can buy the DVD or Blu-Ray on Amazon.co.uk, or Amazon.com, or you can download it via iTunes (UK) or iTunes (USA).

BEST PICK the book is available now from all the usual places, and the paperback is out now.

• From the publisher https://tinyurl.com/best-pick-book-rowman
• UK Amazon https://amzn.to/3zFNATI
• US Amazon https://www.amzn.com/1538163101
• UK bookstore https://www.waterstones.com/book/9781538163108
• US bookstore https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/best-pick-john-dorney/1139956434
• Audio book https://www.audible.co.uk/pd/Best-Pick-Audiobook/B09SBMX1V4

To send in your questions, comments, thoughts and ideas, you can join our Facebook group, email us on bestpickpod@gmail.com, or find us on Bluesky.

You can also visit our website at https://bestpickpod.com and sign up to our mailing list to get notified as soon as a new episode is released. Just follow this link: http://eepurl.com/dbHO3n.

If you enjoy this podcast and you’d like to help us to continue to make it, you can now support us on Patreon for as little as £2.50 per month.