Cinema Gadfly

Cinema Gadfly

By Arik DevensTV & FilmSociety & CultureLeisure
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Cinema Gadfly episodes

  • 4. Inception

    My guest for this month is Jake Desaulniers, and he’s joined me to discuss the film he chose for me, the 2010 dreamscape heist film Inception. You can follow the show on Twitter @cinemagadfly.

    Show notes:

    • This is a film from British director Christopher Nolan
    • Richard Burton was a totally big star when The Spy Who Came in from the Cold was released
    • Star Wars and Raiders of the Lost Ark are both excellent play-acting movies
    • This movie was released in 2010, which is something like 2011
    • Ocean’s Eleven is a classic example of a heist film
    • Jules Dassin’s Rififi and the various Jean-Pierre Melville films are also excellent examples
    • Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation is a very dumb movie
    • And so is Darren Aronofsky’s Pi, don’t let anyone tell you differently
    • Hans Zimmer has done quite a few amazing film scores
    • Sweet Smell of Success, with Tony Curtis and Burt Lancaster, has an absolutely perfect score by Elmer Bernstein
    • As does, in a completely different way, the Three Colors trilogy, directed by Krzysztof Kieślowski
    • All three films in the trilogy were scored by Zbigniew Preisner
    • The inventive, but not beautiful, cinematography for this film was done by Wally Pfister
    • Sucker Punch is seriously a terrible, terrible film. Don’t watch it, you won’t like it
    • I strongly dislike most of the work of its director, Zack Snyder
    • The Fountain is another film with a score that Jake loves
    • Even though he doesn’t like the film Prometheus, he still likes the score
    • Christopher Nolan is probably an Auteur
    • The Big Chill is not a popular film with Criterion Cinephiles
    • It was directed by Lawrence Kasdan, who you may know from his writing The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi
    • My review of The Big Chill, where I talk about what it means to me
    • John Williams is probably the modern era’s most well known film composer
    • Jake also likes Clint Mansell, who did the score for Moon
    • Seeing Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey at the Castro theatre was so amazing
    • Sol Kaplan did the score for The Spy Who Came in from the Cold
    • We both absolutely adore the films of Wes Anderson, and we love the scores as well
    • All the Indiana Jones films have great scores
    • Hotel Chevalier with Jason Schwartzman, which is the prequel short film to The Darjeeling Limited, has an incredible song by Peter Sarstedt
    • The song, which I listen to all the time, is called Where Do You Go To (My Lovely)?
    • Saving Private Ryan uses a different song, but they are both by Édith Piaf
    • We should all have things to say about The Goonies

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      37 min
    • 3. The Spy Who Came in from the Cold

      My guest for this month is Jake Desaulniers, and he’s joined me to discuss the film I chose for him, the 1965 cold war spy thriller The Spy Who Came in from the Cold. You can follow the show on Twitter @cinemagadfly.

      Show notes:

      • My original review of The Spy Who Came in from the Cold
      • Although I say at the beginning that this is the second episode, it’s really the third
      • The film stars Richard Burton, AKA Mr. Elizabeth Taylor
      • It’s based on the book of the same name, by John le Carré, AKA David John Moore Cornwell
      • MI6 is a real world British spy agency
      • John le Carré didn’t like Ian Fleming’s James Bond novels
      • Tinker Tailer Soldier Spy is another film based on a le Carré novel
      • Dr. No, From Russia With Love, and Goldfinger, are very different in tone from this film
      • Technically 1970 was halfway into the Cold War
      • I remember when the Berlin Wall fell, I even brought a piece back for my mom
      • The film opens at the infamous Checkpoint Charlie
      • The British Communist Party also ended in 1991
      • The film takes place nine years after the McCarthy Hearings
      • I always notice when the title is in the film, ever since Family Guy
      • British labour exchanges have existed since 1909
      • The Criterion Blu-ray is the best way to watch this film
      • My review of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy from Letterboxd
      • British cold war spy thriller television show The Game
      • Jason Bourne is a superhero
      • Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation definitely didn’t pretend to be about anything
      • Apparently putting Scotch in your coffee is called Highland coffee
      • The director who didn’t get along with Richard Burton was Martin Ritt

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        29 min
      • 2. Katy Perry: Part of Me

        My guest for this month is Clarko Clarko, and he’s joined me to discuss the film he chose for me, the 2012 tour documentary Katy Perry: Part of Me. You can follow the show on Twitter @cinemagadfly.

        Show notes:

        • The film follows the tour for her Teenage Dream album
        • It was produced by Max Martin and Dr. Luke; musical masterminds
        • Her next album was Prism
        • The film features her relationship with Russell Brand, who is probably unmarriable
        • I’m apparently a Highbrow kind of guy, with very particular tastes in music, film, and comic books
        • Belle & Sebastian are a somewhat more laid back affair
        • I highly recommend everyone watch the Jonathan Demme directed Talking Heads film Stop Making Sense
        • I believe Life Is But a Dream is the Beyoncé documentary
        • Katy Perry’s parents are not actually Televangelists, but they’re close
        • This is what a combination of Whitesnake and Kanye West looks like
        • Britney Spears was a Mouseketeer
        • Lana Del Rey is not a good live performer
        • We find similarities between Katy Perry’s career and that of golfer Tiger Woods
        • Chris Carraba is “this guy” from Dashboard Confessional
        • NOFX is lead by a guy who calls himself Fat Mike
        • Oh Honey
        • Both Clarko and I think Disneyland is basically the best thing in the world
        • This film takes place during Katy Perry’s Candy Land period
        • Walt Disney, Steve Jobs, and John Lasseter; three people I would love to be compared to
        • June is where Clarko is currently putting his Katy Perry derived inspiration to work

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          26 min
        • 1. Kind Hearts and Coronets

          Welcome to the first episode! My guest for this month is Clarko Clark, and he's joined me to discuss the film I chose for him, the 1949 British black comedy Kind Hearts and Coronets. You can follow the show on Twitter @cinemagadfly.

           

          Show notes:
          • My original review of Kind Hearts and Coronets
          • A definition of black comedy
          • Koyaanisqatsi and my review of it
          • Charles I of England, who is mentioned early in the film
          • This film takes place in the Edwardian era
          • It stars Alec Guinness, who also played Obi-Wan Kenobi, and who was apparently similar to Eddie Murphy
          • It was released in 1949
          • Alice in Wonderland
          • Clarko likes How I Met Your Mother, Scrubs, and Grey’s Anatomy
          • Some of which feature an unreliable narrator, as perhaps does this
          • Yes, a British general really did choose to go down with his ship after making a mistake in directions
          • American Pyscho, a really apt and interesting comparison
          • Ealing Studios is actually still around, and releasing films
          • The fancier studio down the road was the Rank Studio
          • The Hays Code, which was eventually overthrown, in part by Howard Hughes
          • Making out on a fainting couch is less common these days
          • Black and white films should not be colorized, under any circumstances

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            32 min

          About Cinema Gadfly

          From the publisher's feed

          A podcast about trading films with friends. Each month I choose a film for a friend to watch and they choose one for me. Then we discuss. Two episodes a month, first my choice and then theirs.