Extra Milestone – Classic Film Reviews

Celebrating 55 years since its release in 1966, Au Hasard Balthazar is considered by many to be one of the greatest films of all time, and yes, we’ve been long overdue to tackle a film from the one and only Robert Bresson, whose work has influenced filmmakers of all stripes for over half a century. The film stars Anne Wiazemsky a young French woman who develops a striking bond with a donkey she’s known since its birth, and we see a chronicling of her hardships as they parallel the inhumane treatment of Balthazar, a creature representing innocence in its rawest form.

MUSIC IN THIS EPISODE: Franz Shubert’s Piano Sonata No. 20 in A major, D. 959, as heard in Au Hasard Balthazar.

LINKS:

• Follow us on Twitter: Jon Negroni, Julia Teti
• Check out our Cinemaholics Merch!
• Leave us a voicemail using The “Swell” App. We post new prompts every week or so.
• Check out our Patreon to support Cinemaholics!
• Email your feedback to cinemaholicspodcast [at] gmail.com.
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Our film anniversary this month belongs to the romantic drama Charlie Chaplin once called “the greatest movie ever made about America.” That’s right, we’re diving into A Place in the Sun, starring Montgomery Clift, Elizabeth Taylor, and Shelley Winters, with supporting turns from Anne Revere and Raymond Burr. Directed by George Stevens and written by Harry Brown and Michael Wilson, this awards-heavy favorite among classic film lovers celebrates 70 years since premiering at the Cannes Film Festival in 1951, and it was the second film adaptation of the 1925 novel An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser, which was also a place of the same name.

MUSIC IN THIS EPISODE: The opening theme of A Place in the Sun, composed by Franz Waxman and Daniele Amfitheatrof.

LINKS

• Follow us on Twitter: Jon Negroni, Julia Teti
• Check out our Cinemaholics Merch!
• Leave us a voicemail using The “Swell” App. We post new prompts every week or so.
• Check out our Patreon to support Cinemaholics!
• Email your feedback to cinemaholicspodcast [at] gmail.com.
• Connect with Cinemaholics on Facebook and Twitter.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This month on Extra Milestone, we jump back in time 75 years to discuss Gilda, a cult classic film noir starring Rita Hayworth, Glenn Ford, and George Macready. Directed by Charles Vidor and co-written by Jo Eisinger and Marion Parsonnet (with an uncredited contribution from Ben Hecht), the story is adapted from the work of E.A. Ellington, and it centers around gambling con man Johnny Farrell (Ford), whose amoral casino boss Ballin (Macready) surprises him with the revelation of his new, striking wife Gilda (Hayworth). We discuss the film’s resonant themes all these years later, its impact on the noir genre, and how the film relates to other iconic dramas from the era.

MUSIC IN THIS EPISODE: The opening theme of Gilda.

LINKS

• Follow us on Twitter: Jon Negroni, Julia Teti
• Check out our Cinemaholics Merch!
• Leave us a voicemail using The “Swell” App. We post new prompts every week or so.
• Check out our Patreon to support Cinemaholics!
• Email your feedback to cinemaholicspodcast [at] gmail.com.
• Connect with Cinemaholics on Facebook and Twitter.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This month’s Extra Milestone discussion is The Silence of the Lambs, which recently celebrated its 30th anniversary. We discuss the ongoing legacy of this perennial classic from director Jonathan Demme and screenwriter Ted Tally (adapted from the novel by Thomas Harris), including how it shaped the modern landscape of true crime filmmaking and left a lasting impact on perceptions of the transgender community. We also discuss the iconic performances of Jodie Foster, Anthony Hopkins, and Ted Levine, who portray Clarice Starling, Hannibal Lecter, and Buffalo Bill, respectively. Then finish with a deep dive on the film’s ending.

HOSTED BY:  Jon Negroni and Julia Teti

MUSIC IN THIS EPISODE: The opening theme of The Silence of the Lambs.

ADDITIONAL READING: 

• Harmony Colangelo's piece for the AV Club: "30 years in, The Silence of the Lambs' Jame Gumb still deserves better"
• Aja Romano's piece for Vox: "Understanding Silence of the Lambs’ complicated cultural legacy"

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For our first official milestone of 2021, we’re discussing Charlie Chaplin’s classic silent film City Lights, which this month celebrates its 90th anniversary since release. This long-celebrated romantic comedy was of course written, directed, and produced by Chaplin, who also stars in it as his iconic character, the Tramp. Along for the ride is Virginia Cherrill as the blind girl who wins the Tramp’s heart, Florence Lee as her grandmother, Harry Myers as the drunken millionaire, and plenty more.

HOSTED BY:  Jon Negroni and Will Ashton

MUSIC IN THIS EPISODE: The opening music of City Lights and music from the final scene. All composed by Charlie Chaplin himself!

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To officially conclude this year's Extra Milestone lineup, Jon Negroni and Will Ashton of the Cinemaholics podcast joined forces with me one last time to discuss two distinct (and oddly holiday-centric) auteur-driven classics. We start our conversation by digging through the muck of Terry Gilliam's Brazil, a bureaucratic odyssey of madness often regarded as one of the greatest films of all time. After that, we jump forward to Edward Scissorhands, an intensely personal story from Tim Burton that is both lighthearted and melancholy, and which has affected us all at one point or another.

SHOW NOTES:

• 00:02:06 – Brazil
• 01:04:16 – Edward Scissorhands

HOSTED BY: Sam Noland, Jon Negroni, and Will Ashton

MUSIC IN THIS EPISODE: "Office Theme" from Brazil composed by Michael Kamen and based off Ary Barroso's "Aquarela do Brasil," music from Edward Scissorhands composed by Danny Elfman

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Welcome to (perhaps) the largest Extra Milestone yet! In an Anyway, That’s All I Got reunion for the ages, I’m joined by Anthony Battaglia, Guy Simons Jr., and Jason Read to discuss three of the biggest epics of the 21st century! First up is Barry Lyndon, the passion project of Stanley Kubrick released in 1975, and a film that’s quite well-loved among hardcore cinephiles. After that, we circle back to Spartacus, an earlier Kubrick film that is rarely discussed in the context of his filmography, and perhaps for just reason! Finally, we jump forward to another one of the great directors with Ran, Akira Kurosawa’s massive and operatic masterpiece from 1985, and which only one of us had seen!

SHOW NOTES:

• 00:05:54 – Barry Lyndon
• 01:06:33 – Spartacus
• 01:48:21 – Ran

HOSTED BY: Sam Noland, Anthony Battaglia, Guy Simons Jr., and Jason Read

MUSIC IN THIS EPISODE: Music from Barry Lyndon composed by Georg Friedrich Händel and performed by The Gold Rush Studio Orchestra, music from Ran composed by Tóru Takemitsu

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Emily Kubincanek makes her welcomed and triumphant return to Extra Milestone, and this week's selections are among the most varied yet! We begin by celebrating the 95-year anniversary of Sergei Eisenstein's magnum opus Battleship Potemkin, a film more fundamentally significant than almost any other when it comes to the art form of editing and propaganda storytelling. After that, we take a lighthearted and melancholy stroll into the world of Henry Koster's Harvey, a rich and complex comedy featuring one of the best performances by the great James Stewart. Finally, we get to the bottom of Jonathan Lynn's Clue, a cult-classic murder mystery that neither of us had seen before, and were delighted to discover was great!

SHOW NOTES:

• 00:02:26 – Battleship Potemkin
• 00:38:22 – Harvey
• 01:14:01 – Clue

HOSTED BY: Sam Noland and Emily Kubincanek

MUSIC IN THIS EPISODE: Music from Harvey composed by Frank Skinner, music from Clue composed by John Morris

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This week on Extra Milestone, I'm joined by returning guest and fellow cinephile Andrew McMahon to break down an enticing double feature spanning numerous decades and genres. First up is a cinematic and musical appetizer in the form of Gimme Shelter, the iconic Rolling Stones documentary directed by Charlotte Zwerin and the Maysles Brothers, chronicling the doomed Altamont Speedway concert outside of San Francisco in December of 1969, a tragic failure that swiftly signaled the downfall of the Counterculture Movement. After that, we jump forward to Michael Mann's Heat, a stylish and captivating crime drama featuring the first onscreen collaboration between Al Pacino and Robert De Niro, and which has maintained its legacy as one of the best films of its kind.

NOTE: Andrew mistakenly refers to the late Brian Jones as 'Brian Taylor' early in the show due to a confusion with Mick Taylor, Jones's replacement band member.

SHOW NOTES:

• 00:02:02 – Gimme Shelter
• 00:45:26 – Heat

HOSTED BY: Sam Noland and Andrew McMahon

MUSIC IN THIS EPISODE: "Gimme Shelter" by The Rolling Stones, "God Moving Over the Face of the Waters" by Moby

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This week on Extra Milestone, I'm joined once more by my good friend Guy Simons Jr. to dissect a pair of (relatively) recent classics that have garnered acclaim over the years, and which have almost nothing whatsoever to do with each other! First up is Pixar's groundbreaking debut feature Toy Story, the first-ever wholly computer animated movie that has gained a reputation as an indispensable landmark in special effects and storytelling. After that, we jump ahead to M. Night Shyamalan's unconventional superhero story Unbreakable, a grounded deconstruction of the genre that arrived before cinema as a whole had become swept up in comic book storytelling, and which has amassed a sizable (and well-earned) cult following.

SHOW NOTES:

• 00:05:27 - Toy Story
• 00:56:15 - Unbreakable

NOTE: The final 5 minutes of my audio track were lost, so I had to use a backup recording that sounds slightly different.

HOSTED BY: Sam Noland and Guy Simons Jr.

MUSIC IN THIS EPISODE: Music from Toy Story composed by Randy Newman, music from Unbreakable composed by James Newton Howard

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