The Good, the Bad and the Good-Bad (Movie)

When it comes to movies we love, there are the artistic masterpieces and there are the foot-stomping crowd pleasers. But there’s another particular kind of beloved movie, the one that makes our friends groan, but that we rewatch incessantly; the one that we can quote line for line, even as we giggle at the actors’ performances; the one that we’d say is great, but that we might not say is good. These are the kinds of movies that Maya Salam, a pop culture writer at The New York Times, covers in her monthly column, The Good-Bad.

This episode is a celebration of good-bad movies, timed to the release of “Practical Magic 2,” the long-awaited sequel to the 1998 cult film that Salam called “a bubbling cauldron of plot holes and tones.” Our host Rachel Abrams talks to Salam about the joys of loving a movie despite (or because of) its flaws. Then, they’re joined by The Times’s canon editor, Gilbert Cruz, and Taffy Brodesser-Akner, a Times Magazine writer, to discuss the best of good-bad cinema.

On Today’s Episode:

Maya Salam covers pop culture for The New York Times.

Gilbert Cruz is the canon editor for The New York Times.

Taffy Brodesser-Akner is a features reporter for The New York Times Magazine.

Background Reading:

• The Good-Bad
• Why Loving Good-Bad Movies Feels All Good

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

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