Historical Friction

It's part three of Treasure Island adaptations this Pirate Season! In this episode, Helen gets body slammed onto the analyst's couch, as she introduces Abigail and Sara to her childhood fave, Disney's Treasure Planet (2002). In this ambitiously animated vision of a futuristic 18th century, the familiar characters of Jim Hawkins, Long John Silver and the rest are re-imagined as aliens, cyborgs and solar surfers. We talk Disney conspiracies, transitional animation styles of the early 2000s, transhumanist funny robots, and the questionable addition of The Goo Goo Dolls. Can an adaptation be considered 'historical' when it's set in outer space? Let's talk about it!

Find the podcast on Twitter at @HistoryFriction

We're still in Pirate Season here, and this week Alice, Helen, Sara, and Abigail discuss Muppet Treasure Island (1996). Technically it's based on the Robert Louis Stevenson novel, but with some significant deviations (including a weirdly racist pig tribe, and musical interludes of varying quality). Join us as we try to convince Sara that the Muppets are good, actually, even if this film is not. 

Historical Friction is a podcast about storytelling, pop culture, the past, and why we reenact it.

Find the podcast on Twitter at @HistoryFriction

Find Alice at @aaprocter, Abigail at @onceuponafine, Helen at @HelenVMurray and Sara at @tinyredbook

Support the show on Patreon at patreon.com/historicalfriction

Arrrr me mateys! Pirate Season is in full swing here at Historical Friction, and today Alice, Helen, Sara, and Abigail discuss Walt Disney's Treasure Island (1950), based on the Robert Louis Stevenson 19th-century novel of the same name. The conversation ranges from behind-the-scenes factoids on the Disney film, to the novel's influence on pirates in popular culture, from Disney's influence on the Hollywood pirate, to navigation tools used by 18th-century sailors. Sources used in today's episode include Colin Woodward's book The Republic of Pirates, and Ryan Sweet's chapter 'Pirates and Prosthetics: Manly Messages for Managing Limb Loss in Victorian and Edwardian Adventure Narratives' in the book The Victorian Male Body, edited by Joanne Ella Parsons and Ruth Heholt. 

Historical Friction is a podcast about storytelling, pop culture, the past, and why we reenact it.

Find the podcast on Twitter at @HistoryFriction

Find Alice at @aaprocter, Abigail at @onceuponafine, Helen at @HelenVMurray and Sara at @tinyredbook

Support the show on Patreon at patreon.com/historicalfriction

Welcome to Historical Friction: Pirate Season! We're kicking off a series of episodes on pirates in literature and film with The Pirate (1948), a fabulously campy movie musical starring Judy Garland and Gene Kelly, directed by Vincente Minnelli. Today, Abigail and special guest Dr. Lisa Duffy discuss Golden Age pirates, Hollywood pirates, mid-century Hollywood musicals, Gene Kelly's short shorts, and where this film fits into all of these categories. 

Historical Friction is a podcast about storytelling, pop culture, the past, and why we reenact it.

Find Lisa on Twitter at @_LisaWithAnS and Abigail at @onceuponafine

Find the podcast on Twitter @HistoryFriction

Support the show on Patreon at patreon.com/historicalfriction

All agony, no hope. We here at Historical Friction decided that Netflix's new adaptation of Jane Austen's 'Persuasion' was a Historical Emergency, so in this week's episode Alice, Abigail, and Helen watch this film so you don't have to -- or at least, so you have people to commiserate with over it. From jam mustaches to multiple hangovers to almost-outdoor peeing to the whaling industry, we've got you and all of your grievances about this adaptation covered. We didn't even get into the costuming in this episode, there was just too much.

Historical Friction is a podcast about storytelling, pop culture, the past, and why we reenact it.

Find Alice on Twitter at @aaprocter, Helen at @helenvmurray, and Abigail @onceuponafine

Find the podcast on Twitter @historyfriction

Support the show on Patreon at patreon.com/historicalfriction

This week, we've got anachronistic leather daddies, siege-based penetration imagery, big old snake holes, and Tony Curtis in tiny hotpants - it's got to be a Viking episode!

Historical Friction is a podcast about storytelling, pop culture, the past, and why we reenact it.

Nobody asked for this! Bad Film Expert and friend of the show Dr Melissa L Gustin came back, and we watched the third Dan Brown film, Inferno. This time there's maybe going to be a plague caused by a eugenicist tech bro, kind of inspired by Dante's Divine Comedy? And Robert Langdon the "Symbologist" has to stop it? It's not good. We also got mad about the geography of Florence, museum security, and the many, many wasted opportunities in this film. Nature is very much not healing.

Historical Friction is a podcast about storytelling, pop culture, the past, and why we reenact it. 

Find Melissa on Twitter @hosmeriana, and Alice @aaprocter

Support the show on Patreon at patreon.com/historicalfriction

Follow the show on Twitter @historyfriction

This week, Abigail, Helen and Sara are your favourite exposition crones, as we take a wild ride through The 13th Warrior (1999) - a film that probably would have made a better amusement park ride. Based on Michael Crichton's 1976 novel, The Eaters of the Dead, 13th Warrior tells the story of Arab ambassador, Ahmad Ibn Fadlan (Antonio Banderas) who joins forces with a band of Viking warriors to defeat an ancient, mysterious evil. As part of our ongoing series on Viking adaptations, we talk about Beowulf and its legacy, 90s 'post-racial' weirdness, cultural appropriation, and how exactly the Venus of Willendorf fits into all this.

In this week's episode, Alice and Helen discuss 2008 film Affinity, an adaptation of the Sarah Waters novel of the same name from 1999. Affinity is an atmospheric tale of Victorian crime and spiritualism, in which Margaret Prior (Anna Madeley), a wealthy 'lady visitor' to Millbank Prison becomes fascinated by inmate Selina Dawes (Zoe Tapper), a disgraced spiritual medium. In this installment of our Murder Girls series, we talk about historical fiction's fascination with queer women criminals, modern depictions of unjust historical prison systems, the problems of adapting huge Neo-Victorian novels, the material underpinnings of the spiritualist movement - and whether the metaphysical realm belongs to the girls and the gays.

In today's episode Alice, Abigail, Helen, and Sara discuss the 2020 Netflix film 'Enola Holmes,' starring Millie Bobby Brown and Henry Cavill. The film follows the adventures of Sherlock Holmes' younger sister, Enola, as she traipses through London looking for her missing mother and attempting to save the life of a naïve marquis. We examine how the film reflects our contemporary ideas of Victorian culture -- for better or for worse -- and we have an especial focus on fashion, traditional gender roles, and the ways this film questions and plays with gender. This episode is a loose companion piece to last week's episode on 'A Study in Terror,' but the two episodes are standalone and can be listened to in any order. 

Historical Friction is a podcast about storytelling, pop culture, the past, and why we reenact it.

Follow the podcast on Twitter at @HistoryFriction

Support the podcast on Patreon at patreon.com/historicalfriction