One of the many great things about film is its ability to adapt to any scale. An intimate story about one person’s inner life can be just as effective as one spread over a huge canvas with a cast of thousands. On this week’s episode, Movies 101 will look at two new releases on opposite ends of the scale spectrum: The Odyssey, Christopher Nolan’s multimillion-dollar, decades-spanning epic, and Olivia Wilde’s The Invite, a four-person chamber piece set in a single location.

85 years ago, Orson Welles released his debut feature Citizen Kane, and movies were never the same. In the decades since, it has been exhaustively analyzed; the subject of countless books, documentaries and biopics; and regularly cited as the greatest American movie.

As we celebrate, each in our own way, the 250th anniversary of these United States, we have to admit: We don’t seem to be so united anymore. United or not, though, we Americans are a reflection of the movies that we watch. On this week’s show, The Movies 101 hosts will be discussing their choices for the movies that, for now at least, define what America is.

Supergirl & Toy Story 5

On this week’s show, Dan Webster, Nathan Weinbender, and Mary Pat Treuthart will be discussing three different studies of the bizarre. Steven Spielberg’s aliens-come-runnin’ feature “Disclosure Day," followed by a couple of surprising suspense/horror hits, Curry Barker’s “Obsession” and Kane Parsons’ “Backrooms."

Movies tend to be built around their stars, but just as important—and, at times, arguably even more important—are the actors cast in supporting roles. On this week’s show, Dan Webster, Nathan Weinbender and Mary Pat Treuthart discuss who they think are some of the most effective, not to mention memorable, character actors—most of whom may never have headlined a movie but whose performances in many cases made a profound impact.

On this week’s show, Dan Webster, Nathan Weinbender and Mary Pat Treuthart discuss a pair of streaming films that feature protagonists going through tough times. The first is the first directorial venture from the actress Kristen Stewart titled “The Chronology of Water.” They follow that with a look at the bewildering Chinese import “Resurrection.”

Looking for a new movie to watch? You now have so many options on so many different streaming services that you might get overwhelmed and give up before you even start browsing. That also means a lot of good movies inevitably fall through the cracks. On this week’s show, Nathan Weinbender, Mary Pat Treuthart and Dan Webster sift through the last 5 years of cinematic offerings and unearth a few that they think deserve a wider audience.

On this week’s show, Nathan Weinbender, Mary Pat Treuthart and Dan Webster look at the ongoing trend of so-called “legacy sequels,” films that revive cultural properties after years—and sometimes decades—of dormancy.

On this week’s show, Nathan Weinbender, Mary Pat Treuthart and Dan Webster recap their time at the recent Seattle International Film Festival. They talk about the SIFF experience and highlight some of their festival favorites.