🎧 ‘One Battle After Another’: Will Hollywood Learn Anything?

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When the story of 2025 in Hollywood is eventually finished, there will be plenty of moments of darkness and cowardice to reflect on, but also one out-and-out success story in Warner Bros. The studio, which faced so much bad-faith concern over its budgets earlier this year, is now on an all-time winning streak — culminating in the release of One Battle After Another last weekend.

Yes, it’s not a slam-dunk box office hit, but the deafening acclaim and accompanying Oscar buzz — the A Cinemascore is pretty nice, too — make the Paul Thomas Anderson film yet another victory for Warner Bros. film chiefs Michael De Luca and Pam Abdy. No one has done a better job chronicling both the “Mike & Pamageddon” earlier this year and the subsequent “revenge tour” this fall than my colleague Richard Rushfield — and his column today about the significance of the Warner Bros. slate (and how it was poorly covered this year by many in the press) is an obvious must-read. Richard joins me on this week’s Prestige Junkie podcast to talk about One Battle After Another, why it was worth the financial risk and whether Hollywood will actually learn anything from its success.

That last question ultimately feels like the big one in our conversation, with both of us wondering how to reconcile the sense of optimism surrounding this one really good movie with the other signs of decline all around the industry. Still, with what looks like a very blockbuster-friendly Oscar race ahead of us — with Sinners, Avatar, Wicked and One Battle potentially earning several nominations — it could be a very “Hooray for Hollywood” type of awards season. (My favorite kind, to be clear.) After the past few years we’ve had, don’t you think we deserve it?

We discuss all of that and the highlights of One Battle After Another on today’s episode of the podcast. As always, paid subscribers to Prestige Junkie After Party can watch the full video version of the podcast and access a range of bonus content. Last week, I published my and Christopher Rosen’s longer-form thoughts on One Battle After Another and why it’s the movie of the year; Chris and I also recorded a live watchalong commentary to 1994’s Quiz Show, in honor of the great, recently departed Robert Redford. Just $5 a month gets you access to all of that and much more — join us today!