Crackpot Cinema Podcast

Crackpot Cinema Ep 21 - L.A. Punk Movies, Part 1 with Allan MacDonell

In our most fluid-spewing episode to date, author, raconteur, and Mike and Aaron’s former Hustler magazine boss ALLAN MacDONELL joins us to take on Penelope Spheeris’s götterdammerüng documentary THE DECLINE OF WESTERN CIVILIZATION (1981) and the goddamnable dung heap DU-BEAT-E-O (1984).

We also delve deep into Hustler office gems such as Mike’s desktop Gatorade urinal and savage sidewalk beating outside a strip club; the invasion of Aaron’s trash can by the Pepsi Pooper; and the Jane Fonda/Ted Turner sex tape that we rated Three-Quarters Erect, but we’re still waiting to get “handled” over. Go listen and rest assured: Allan will be back.

Crackpot Cinema: Episode 20—H.O.T.S. with Mr. Skin

Hands Off Those Suckers?! Help Out the Seals?! No! In this case, H.O.T.S. stands for Hear Our Twentieth Show!!! Jim “Mr. Skin” McBride joins us for a double-X celebration of the ebullient drive-in/cable/VHS/Danny-Bonaduce-Resumé classic, H.O.T.S.!

First up, we discuss the new documentary, SKIN: THE COMPLETE HISTORY OF NUDITY IN THE MOVIES which features both Jim and CCP’s own Mike McPadden (available everywhere August 18), then it’s Mondo H.O.T.S.-O all the way.

Peaks include: Strip football! Boom Boom Bangs! Shlomo Goldberg! Arthur the Plant! Andy Sidaris! The Dingaling Sisters! Cheri Cafaro’s GINGER movies! THE HAPPY HOOKER GOES HOLLYWOOD as The H.O.T.S. Finishing School! And Mr. Skin names the two—and only two—occasions in cinema history in which an unclothed actress cavorts on-camera with a trained seal!

Crackpot Cinema Ep 19: MALIBU HIGH with Daniel Waters

HEATHERS screenwriter Daniel Waters joins the Crackpot Crew to celebrate MALIBU HIGH (1979), the bombastically berserk teen-prostitute-turb-mob-assassin blowout that Crown International Pictures sold—insanely successfully—as a beach-bunny bikini romp!

You get all that plus: Deep inside “The People’s Court Theme”! John Carradine monologues from THE BEST OF SEX AND VIOLENCE! How Dawson’s mom got to get it goin’ on! The even more heinous supposed heroes of YOUNG WARRIORS! Who else we would cast in a Danny McBride-starring remake of MALIBU HIGH! And multiple injections of that SCTV stinger!

Don your most Herculean headdress, down any and all intoxicants within reach, and storm into our salute to the titanic extra everything-ness that is Elizabeth Taylor in BOOM! (1968), THE BLUE BIRD (1976), and THE MIRROR CRACK'D (1980).

For the maiden voyage of the SS Crackpot, Mike McPadden and Aaron Lee reflect on their past as HUSTLER magazine pros with four films dedicated to the “men’s sophisticates” game: the decidedly non-obscure THE PEOPLE VS. LARRY FLYNT (1996), Steve Coogan in THE LOOK OF LOVE (2013), the documentary PORN KING: THE TRIALS OF AL GOLDSTEIN (2005), and the Don Knotts/Nat Hiken head-scratcher, THE LOVE GOD? (1969).

Bonus: we invoke one the Gods of Crackpot Cinema—Jack Webb—with an in-depth ramble on the smut-busting 1951 DRAGNET radio episode, “The Big Book.”

The Episode That Glows in the Dark! Mike McPadden and Aaron Lee pratfall into Le Cinema du John Ritter with AMERICATHON (1979), HERO AT LARGE (1980), THEY ALL LAUGHED (1981) and SKIN DEEP (1989)

Crackpot Cinema honors the dimpled-chin demigod that was Issur Danielovitch, aka Kirk Douglas, with a salute to four of his least-loved productions: MOUSEY (1974), THE VILLAIN (1979), SATURN 3 (1980), and TOUGH GUYS (1986). Find out what we "Dug More" and "Dug Less"!

Eat, drink, and explode miserable male bombast! It's Apocalypse Testosterone time as we mansplain LA GRAND BOUFFE (1972), PRAY FOR THE WILD CATS (1974), and I MELT WITH YOU (2011). Who will survive and what will be left of their boyish fragility? Nobody and nothing, that's who and that's that!

PRETTY BABY. BLUE LAGOON. ENDLESS LOVE. When contemplating "Brooke Shields movies," these leap to mind. Not here. Mike McPadden & Aaron Lee crack the pot with JUST YOU AND ME KID (1979), TILT (1979), WANDA NEVADA (1979), SAHARA (1983) and BRENDA STARR (1989).

It's all page-burners and potboilers when two behemoths of '70s lust literature turn the silver screen blue: Harold Robbins' THE BETSY (1978) and Sidney Sheldon's BLOODLINE (1979).