The boys celebrate Tim's birthday this year with a much better episode than the last bday one we did! We get into Guillermo del Toro's nasty, classical 2021 noir "Nightmare Alley". Tim argues for the novel was one of America's greats, we get into another tortured production, push back against the idea of "Guillermoslop", crown Cate Blanchett as the living queen of noir and agree that deep down everyone just wants to believe the irrational. Also discussed: La Jetée, Pi, Forza Horizon 6 and the Alissa Nutting novel "Tampa"*. We will be back next week talking about Ang Lee's beautiful, heartbreaking cowboy romance from 2005, "Brokeback Mountain".

* "Tampa" is basically "Lolita" with a lady so cw if you find child abuse objectionable. If you want to skip it talk goes from 11:30-18:45 Letterboxed: DeadFormatPod Bluesky: DeadFormatPod