WEEKLY RECAP #118: "The Adventures of Cliff Booth" Begins Filming, "The Wizard of Oz at Sphere" & MORE!

7/27/25 -- 8/2/25

Tudum(n)

David Fincher is currently shooting his newest project in Los Angeles! And to quell your excitement, no — it’s not a new season of Mindhunters, nor is it a sequel to his 2023 modern classic, The Killer. It’s actually… a Netflix-funded spinoff of Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood based on Brad Pitt’s character, titled “The Adventures of Cliff Booth”. This is not fake news, nor is it a rumor. Photos of the production have now leaked online. It is officially happening, folks.

This Fincher-helmed OUATIH spinoff was announced many months ago, but I made a choice not to discuss it at all in these Recaps. (After being hoodwinked countless times by a certain filmmaker whose name rhymes with Buca Puadagnino, I have made a vow not to cover any alleged productions until they are actually proven to be shooting. No use getting worked up over a movie that’s never going to happen in the first place.) But now that this project is confirmed, I have to admit… this feels weird. A Netflix spinoff of a Tarantino film is already a crazy concept, and the fact that it’s being spearheaded by a director as accomplished as Fincher makes it feel even more bizarre. To be clear, it’s not the worst idea in the world — Pitt’s portrayal of Cliff Booth was easily the most entertaining aspect of that film — but given that Fincher is the man behind Fight Club, Se7en, The Social Network and Gone Girl, most of us annoying film fans would prefer he choose an exciting new project instead of investing the next year or two of his life on someone else’s characters.

This comes at an especially tough time for Fincher fans (Finchies? Finchers? Finch-heads?), as he extended his deal with Netflix in January of last year, meaning he will continue to make film and television intended to stream exclusively on their site for the next few years. Also in the works, reportedly, is an American remake of Squid Game, the smash-hit Korean series, with Fincher being tapped to direct some episodes. Before any of you reading this shit your pants in outrage, this series is not yet confirmed, but Fincher has been very outspoken about his enjoyment of the creative freedom Netflix gives him, so a similarly bizarre future endeavor is not out of the picture just next. Obviously, it would be ideal if Fincher was still making mid-budget studio fare that got theatrical runs — instead of stuff like Mank and The Killer that are relegated to underwhelming streaming releases — but the man’s gonna do what he’s gonna do. Regardless, I have no idea what to expect from The Adventures of Cliff Booth, and given that none of you are even close to my level of insight and taste, neither should you.

Emerald Shitty

Ah, sweet! Man-made horrors beyond my comprehension!

This week, The Wizard of Oz screened at the Las Vegas Sphere, the infamous gigantic dome-shaped landmark with a 360-degree internal wraparound screen that is so blatantly dystopian it’s become kind of endearing. How did the producers at the Sphere format the 1938 film to screen in such a unique space? AI, of course! As you can see pictured above, artificial intelligence was used to create new visual information in certain shots (added backgrounds, depth-of-field adjustments, and additional artificially-generated footage of actors in shots they weren’t originally in) to have it fit everyone’s field of vision properly within the Sphere. And, uh, yeah — it looks like shit! The images are warped, the color is all weird, and again, SOME SHOTS INCLUDE ARTIFICIALLY-GENERATED FOOTAGE OF CHARACTERS THAT WEREN’T MEANT TO BE IN THE FRAME!

I know that, to most of you, this seems like incoherent nerd ranting from a pretentious cinema elitist. (Surprising for this Substack, I know.) Look, fucking around to see how The Wizard of Oz would look in the Sphere isn’t a crime at all. What *is* a crime — to the craft of film, at least — is charging people $100 to watch what is supposedly an “enhanced” version of a canonical American movie, only to show a version of it that has a half-hour shaved off the runtime for no reason other than to fit in more showtimes, and also looks like it was shot with a GoPro, and also includes fake footage of actors who never consented to their likeness being used in this way, and also recolors and “extends” the backgrounds to look like high-saturated dogshit.

Some people have played defense for this excursion, claiming that this desecrated version of The Wizard of Oz will help introduce the film to a new generation of fans. Those people are smoking crack. Don’t even give this bullshit argument the time of day. In no sane world is Gen Alpha “discovering” The Wizard of Oz for the first time by taking a trip to the fucking Sphere. These new Wicked movies are likely doing that a thousand times more effectively and ethically! The Wizard of Oz at the Sphere is nothing more than a gimmick designed to justify atrociously ugly uses of AI in “improving” works of art that don’t need to be improved, as well as justify the existence of a venue that has been losing the city of Las Vegas hundreds of millions of dollars each year since it was built. Do not believe the hype: it is a gigantic psyop.

“If you wanted to be in the Facebook movie, you would’ve been the Facebook movie.”

Speaking of David Fincher movies and things that shouldn’t get sequels… a follow-up to 2010’s Mark Zuckerberg biopic The Social Network is officially in development. Aaron Sorkin, the oh-so-talky screenwriter who wrote the first film, will be both writing and directing this new one, which is… a bit troubling. Sorkin’s writing was undeniably fire in the original Social Network, but a lot of it was filtered through Fincher’s rigorous vetting process, and unfiltered Sorkin can be a bit indulgent for many. His directorial outings (Molly’s Game, The Trial of the Chicago 7, Being the Ricardos) only have proven that theory — to me, at least. Regardless, Sorkin has finished his script for this new installment in the cinematic tale of the Zucc, which presumably covers how Facebook has influenced American politics since the events of the first film. That’s right, baby: we’re gonna get a two-hour breakdown about how GOP propaganda and Minion memes have fried your grandparents’ brains!

Actors like Jeremy Allen White and Mikey Madison are currently in talks to star, but the one person everyone was expecting as a guaranteed star will actually not be present. Jesse Eisenberg, whose reptilian portrayal of Zuckerberg earned him an Oscar nom, has apparently turned down the opportunity to play him again for the sequel. This means he either read the script and didn’t fuck with it, or he did fuck with it and just doesn’t feel up to it. With both Fincher and Eisenberg not returning, it certainly doesn’t bode well for people who are hoping for the same lightning-in-a-bottle chemistry that The Social Network captured. Regardless, it’s going to be very interesting to see who replaces Eisenberg for The Social Network 2: Meta Boogaloo — even more so, how this new actor pulls off the classic sunscreen surfing photo of Zuckerberg that I think of at least once a week.

Naked and Unafraid

I’d like to end this week’s Weekly Recap with a dire PSA.

The Naked Gun, a legacy sequel to the classic Leslie Nielsen-led comedy series from the ‘80s and ‘90s, just released this weekend. This new version is led by Liam Neeson (whose casting was most likely a joke itself, based on the similarity of his and Nielsen’s names), directed by Akiva Schafer of The Lonely Island trio, and co-produced by Seth MacFarlane. Even if you love The Naked Gun series, you might be hesitant to check this new one out, and I don’t blame you. With all of the painfully unfunny revamping of old comedic IPs that Hollywood has churned out in recent years — Ghostbusters, Baywatch, CHiPS, et cetera — it seems as though taking something that worked back in the good ol’ days and remaking it in today’s world is a recipe for disaster, right?

Wrong! I saw this new Naked Gun movie on Thursday evening, and it is so much better than you would expect it to be. It stays in line with the original series’ tradition of a tight sub-90 minute runtime, with about as many visual gags and written jokes crammed into each scene as possible. I genuinely haven’t seen an American studio comedy this funny in years, point-blank, period. And what makes 2025’s The Naked Gun so special is a unique quality that I’m not seeing people talk about enough.

The writers of this new movie make several references to the fact that The Naked Gun was birthed in a different era, and our current world — filled with social media, electric cars and different standards of what is “funny” and what is “offensive” — have changed. This is something that more than a few snarky comedians point out when decrying today’s world as too woke, claiming that comedy is now being policed by PC-minded youngsters who are too sensitive. But The Naked Gun (2025) does not wag its finger in condescension and whine about the changing times. Instead, it proceeds to deliver a movie full of jokes that are just as edgy, irreverent and delightfully nonsensical as the ones in the original movies! It knows exactly why the absurdist humor in the originals works, and it employs that sense of humor to the modern world of technology and American policing that we see today. In short: it proves that, if you are actually funny and good-spirited, you can do comedy in any era and get away with it.

In conclusion: please go see The Naked Gun in theaters this week, or the next week, or whenever it’s most convenient for you. This is the type of well-written, non-cynical studio product we don’t get from Hollywood anymore, and if there’s any type of movie you should be investing in, it’s this. Vote with your wallets, people. Legalize comedy!