Contra Zoom Pod

Here is part two of our Best Picture Countdown of movies that won between 1978-1987. On the last episode we ran down the bottom five films, click HERE to see the list and listen to the episode. On this episode Stephanie Prior joins Dakota again and they talk about the best of that decade. 

Here are the bottom five pictures in our ratings. Dakota’s ratings come first and Stephanie’s second next to each film.

5. The Last Emperor 7.9/10 7.5/10

4. The Deer Hunter 8.4/10 7.7/10

3. Amadeus 7.5/10 8.5/10

And for the very first time we have a tie for first place!

1. Kramer vs. Kramer 8.5/10 8.2/10

1. Ordinary People 8.7/10 8/10

If you have seen any of these films let Dakota know what you think! Follow Dakota @Dgapa and the show @ContraZoomPod on Twitter.

After more than a year off from continuing the Best Picture Ranking series, it is back with a vengeance! Stephanie Prior steps in to join Dakota to review the Best Picture winners from the 1978-1987 Oscars (the 50th-59th winners). The series also got a much overdue name changing dropping the Birdman for the most recent winner Moonlight. If you missed the last time the series was discussed click HERE.

Site photographer Cole Leuthel joins us to talk about his three favourite movies.

Here are the bottom five pictures in our ratings. Dakota’s ratings come first and Stephanie’s second next to each film.

10. Terms of Endearment 6/10 5.5/10

9. Gandhi 6.3/10 6.5/10

8. Out of Africa 6.8/10 7/10

7. Chariots of Fire 6.5/10 6/10

6. Platoon 7/10 7/10

Tune into the next episode where Dakota and Stephanie count down the top five Best Pictures from the decade.

Music from this week’s episode comes from Brooklyn Doran, a Toronto based singer songwriter. Brooklyn challenged herself to perform 100 concerts in 2017 and she completed that task just in the knick of time! Her debut full length album These Paper Wings made our top 50 albums of 2016 list last year and expect big things from her next year! Follow Brooklyn on Twitter @brooklyndoran and on Facebook.

If you have seen any of these films let Dakota know what you think! Follow Dakota @Dgapa and the show @ContraZoomPod on Twitter.

For this massive episode Sammy Feilchenfeld joins Dakota Arsenault again to talk about all things concerning the new trend of “Cinematic Universes”, starting with reviews of both Justice League and Thor: Ragnarok the films that helped kick this new style of moving making off.

After reviewing the two latest superhero movies, the guys look to see what the future holds for both the MCU and DCEU.

– For the MCU about 20 films are already in the pipeline to come out over the next 10 years barring no major catastrophe.

– For something more immediate, we learn that Marvel’s first female lead film, appropriately named Captain Marvel starring Brie Larson, has just cast Jude Law. 

– Sony wants to get in on the action after lending Marvel Spider-Man, and has decided to start its own Spider-centric universe, with the first movie being based on Tom Hardy’s portrayal of Venom.

– Sammy praises the new Monster-verse kicked off with Godzilla and Kong: Skull Island for starting a franchise off right. 

– The guys also belittle the very poorly conceived “Dark Universe” that started with this year’s The Mummy and how its poor reception has caused the entire planned universe to be scrapped.

– Also talked about is the X-Men series and how Deadpool is connected to it, the Star Wars series and how Rian Johnson is about to be given carte blanche to explore the galaxy from long, long ago to new heights and The Incredibles among other movie related offerings. 

Music from this episode is Teach Me by folk singer Caren. You can catch her December 19th at the Horseshoe Tavern and January 27th at Musiikki Café in Kingston. 

Make sure you follow Caren on Twitter @songsbycaren and on Facebook.

You can listen to her self titled album on Spotify or buy it on iTunes. 

After being out for over a month, Dakota Arsenault finally gets around to talking about the new Blade Runner 2049 movie. Sammy Feilchenfeld returns to talk about what he calls his favourite movie of the year so far. 

Since this movie has been out for so long, spoilers are talked about in this episode so listeners be warned!

– Sammy and Dakota want to heap all the praise on all the amazing actresses in this movie specifically singling out Robin Wright, Ana De Armas, Sylvia Hoeks, Hiam Abbas, Mackenzie Davis and Carla Juri

– Dave Bautista doesn’t want to be your typical leading man

– The guys talk about where director Denis Villeneuve ranks among the greatest current working directors. Earlier this summer there was an episode of Contra Zoom that Sammy guested on talking about the greatest Canadian filmmakers of all time. 

– Roger Deakins hopefully will finally win first Oscar for his cinematography after being nominated a whopping 13 times!!!

– The stunning sets weren’t all massive larger than life ones; some were miniature with really impressive detail included.

– We eagerly await Villeneuve’s take on Dune.  

If you saw Blade Runner 2049, let Dakota know what you thought! Follow Dakota @Dgapa and the show @ContraZoomPod on Twitter.

Episode was originally posted on November 16, 2017

On this very special episode Dakota Arsenault celebrates reaching the milestone of 50 episodes! The very first one was back in April of 2015 discussing the first ten Best Picture Winner’s can be found HEREand marvel at how much better the quality has gotten (and notice the run times are much shorter!) A bit of the podcast’s history is shared including the origin of our name. 

Special thanks goes out to Sean Chin, Live in Limbo’s Editor in Chief and the creator and host of Capsulewho sent in a lovely congratulatory message. 

Joining Dakota is Stephanie Prior, who has twice been a guest specializing in the Make/Remakesegment of the show. Dakota and Stephanie talk about the history of Dracula in cinema in regards to three specific films.

1931’s Dracula stars Bela Lugosi as the first “real” on screen Dracula. The film is directed by Tod Browning and with its lack of music is as close to a silent film as a talkie can get. 

1958’s Horror of Dracula stars Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing in the Hammer Production directed by Terence Fisher. The film has a historical epic feel to it while also being more of a drama than a horror flick.

1993’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula stars Gary Oldman and Anthony Hopkins directed by Francis Ford Coppola in what is both a defining and a copycat film at the same time. Paying homage to not just Dracula films but horror films in general. Easily the goriest of the three films in this series.

Briefly touched upon is both the German film Nosferatu (the original Dracula) and the mockumentary What We Do in the Shadows, which spoofs all previous Dracula/vampire films. 

Happy Halloween! Make sure you send us your favourite Halloween/Horror films to watch! Follow Dakota @Dgapa and the show @ContraZoomPod on Twitter.

Episode was originally posted on October 19, 2017

The Toronto International Film Festival wrapped a few weeks ago and Mehek Seyid makes a return to Contra Zoom where she talks about the 28 (!) films she saw at this year festival. 

The films that won top honours were Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, which won the People’s Choice award, with I, Tonya and Call Me By Your Name being named as runner ups. The top Canadian film was Les Affamés.

We also talk about the ethics of having the audience vote on People’s Choice and why it might be a bit of a flawed system. 

Here are the 28 films Mehek saw and I linked all the films that had trailers released so far. 

Follow Dakota @Dgapa and the show @ContraZoomPod on Twitter.

Episode originally posted on October 8, 2017

On this episode Sammy Feilchenfeld joins Dakota Arsenault as they discuss the end of the summer movie season. This episode includes talk on some summer movie highlights, the media’s decision to cause a panic about low attendance rates for crappy movies, the success of IT and the emergence of the app Movie Pass.

– THR talks about what a poor few weeks August was for the box office.

– Movie Pass might be the greatest idea ever, except it is only for Americans.

– A fancy infographic about the history of the summer movie season. 

Follow Dakota @Dgapa on Twitter.

Episode was originally posted on September 21, 2017

With the recent passing of Horror legend George A. Romero, we here at Contra Zoom thought we should honour him by dedicating an episode of Make/Remake to him.

In this Make/Remake series we discuss how remade films are both similar and different from each other, without going super in depth into if they are “good” or “bad” movies.

Much like the first iteration of this Make/Remake series (Seven Samurai/The Magnificent Seven), host Dakota Arsenault is joined once again by Stephanie Prior who also did the cover art for this episode. 

1978’s Dawn of the Dead directed by Romero was his second zombie film and a landmark horror movie. Combining body horror with a consumerist satire and comic book humour was a stroke of genius for the auteur as it propelled him into the mainstream movie going collective.  Throughout his life Romero made fifteen feature films. 

In 2004 Zack Synder made his directorial debut with a remake of Dawn of the Dead. At the time Synder was known for his work as a commercial director before given the reins to make his feature debut. Going for a more traditional thriller/horror film, he forwent the satirical take on the concept and made his mark on the industry, which lead him to eventually be the big shot behind the current DC cinematic universe and helming the new Superman and Justice League films. 

Follow Dakota @Dgapa on Twitter.

Episode was originally posted on August 31, 2017

On this special episode, Dakota Arsenault is joined by Sammy Feilchenfeld as they discuss the greatest aspect of Canada- our filmmakers! 

From talking about their favourite Canadian produced films like Incendies, Men With Brooms, C.R.A.Z.Y. and many more to just plain talking about their favourite Canadian directors like Denis Villeneuve, Jean-Marc Vallée, David Cronenberg and Deepa Mehta. 

Episode was originally posted on July 15, 2017

On this week’s episode Sierra Nutkevitch joins Dakota Arsenault and they talk about the latest DC film Wonder Woman directed by Patty Jenkins. In the second part of the episode the two discuss their favourite films directed by women and the importance of female fronted movies. 

Episode was originally posted on June 29, 2017