Watchcast Schedule for February 2026: Alex Loves Crime (Patreon)

Greetings, Nextlanders! Before we bail out for the weekend, we've got a new slate of movies on the way for the Watchcast, and it's time to tell you all about 'em.

This month's theme is simple: four crime films of varying stripes with one thing in common: I love them. How we got here is a bit more complicated. I was of the mind that, for as many episodes of this show as we've done, we haven't spent a lot of time specifically on the favorites of the cast. So, in 2026, all three of us are going to have a one month slate of movies that is made up of personal favorites. AND, from whatever list of potential choices each one of us makes, the other cast members are going to choose one movie each. I, of course, made a list of like 50 damn films I'd be up for doing, and from Brad and Vinny's picks, I built out the rest of the list. With both of them choosing films that exist broadly in the crime genre, I figured I'd round out the rest of the list accordingly. And somehow, we landed on four movies that NEITHER Vinny nor Brad have seen before. Best possible outcome.

Here's what's on deck for February!

Monday, February 2nd: The Conversation (1974)

First up is Vinny's pick, and a movie I was really hoping to slide in here anyway. Not just because it's exceedingly good (it is), but because I've only had the chance to see it once before, and have been itching for an excuse to go back. And here is just such an excuse.

Written, produced, and directed by Francis Ford Coppola, The Conversation is a movie about Harry Caul, a private surveillance and recording expert who is determined to keep any personal curiosities about who he's spying on out of his work. He doesn't want to know these people, or any people for the most part, yet seems racked with guilt over a deadly past job, and terribly paranoid about his latest gig, which seems primed for a repeat of history. Gene Hackman does what one might argue is the best work of his career playing against type as the awkward, alienating Caul, and a few other surprise actors of note show up in supporting roles.

I went into this thinking it might be my favorite Coppola flick. You'll have to tune into the show to find out if I confirm that belief or not!

Where to Watch

Monday, February 9th: Thief (1981)

Followers of my occasional work outside of Nextlander and Giant Bomb may have already heard I was once part of a little podcast called Mannhunting, with Rob Zacny and Dia Lacina. It was a beautiful time, once, when a major media corporation would allow one of its video game vertical editors to host a podcast about one specific director's oeuvre to what I can only imagine amounted to several dozen avid listeners. Maybe I'm selling the overall audience for that short, but it was a show I very much enjoyed doing, and as a result, I've been slightly reluctant to go back and double-dip on Mann-casting. But this seemed as good an opportunity as any to dip my toe back in with what is probably my favorite Mann flick (it's either this or Heat), and very definitely my favorite James Caan performance as the titular thief, Frank. It's a well-worn story type of a master safecracker trying to put together enough to leave the business altogether, but rarely has that story been done in a more thoughtful and stylish way than what Mann pulls off here.

It's not terribly likely we'll do a full run through the Mann catalogue on this podcast, but we'll find a way to do the heaters, and this is most definitely a heater.

Where to Watch

Monday, February 16th: Fargo (1996)

Here's Brad's pick for the month, and it's both a great one and frankly gobsmacking that it's something the other guys haven't seen. Like, I get it, not everyone has seen every movie. Totally understandable. But Fargo is such an icon of '90s popular culture (or, at least I have convinced myself that it is) that I was fully shocked when even Vinny said he hadn't seen this. How?!?

Well, we'll be rectifying that soon enough, as we will be for anyone else out there that hasn't had the good fortune to check this one out yet. There is no debate for me at this point what my favorite Coens movie is. It's this, one hundred percent. They've made a lot of great movies, but none of them better blend their particular flavor of black comedy and unusual drama than Fargo does, and between Frances McDormand, Steve Buscemi, and William H. Macy, you've got three of the best actors of a generation doing some of their all-time best work in this. I don't want to oversell this movie, but I really think it's a minor marvel of a work.

Oh, and one more thing: you do not need to be up on the several seasons of the Fargo TV show for the sake of this podcast. We'll touch on it, but we're not going to be diving much into any of that.

Where to Watch

Monday, February 23rd: Sexy Beast (2000)

I had both this and Under the Skin on the potentials list for this month, and while I tend to think of Under the Skin as the better Jonathan Glazer movie, I think this slides in much more nicely with the other movies we've got on tap this month. After all, it's another romp with some talented criminals, albeit over-the-hill criminals in this case. Ray Winstone stars as Gal, a retired, perma-tanned bank robber who has fucked off to the Spanish coast for a life of relaxation and potential skin cancer. Unfortunately, Ben Kingsley's extremely off-putting crook Don Logan comes calling one day, outright demanding that Gal return to London for one last job. Where it goes from there is best experienced unprepared, but it must be emphasized that you have never seen Ben Kingsley quite like this. Unless you've seen this movie, then you have.

This is one I've been meaning to go back to for a while. It's a movie I watched a whole bunch of times when I was in my late teens and getting a little further off the beaten path in terms of movie taste. This might be one of those where the time and place elevates it a bit in my mind, but I suspect that I'll still be fond of it. It's another movie with an abundance of style, and a profound flavor of British-ness that is distinctly different from the Guy Richie-ness of a lot of the other stuff from this era.

Where to Watch

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And that's what we've got coming this February on the Watchcast! March may end up being a truncated Watchcast month due to some vacation related things, so Vinny and Brad will likely take their full months later in the year. I think that's all the housekeeping I've got, so with that I will send you on your way. As always, thanks for listening and watching along at home with us. We'll see you at the movies!

--A