In this episode, my guest is Tom Lee Rutter, director of the western Day of the Stranger, the folk horror Bella in the Wych Elm, and the forthcoming 'almanac' The Pocket Film of Superstitions. We discuss no budget and guerrilla filmmaking, what it's like to make films in the Black Country and the Midlands, and Tom's own approach to making creative horror features. You can see some of Tom's work in this link; https://www.youtube.com/user/carniefilms/videos

In this episode I rundown my favourite films of cinema's best decade, the 1990s. I am joined by Chris Deacy of the Nostalgia Interviews podcast, and Amanda Reyes of the Made for TV Mayhem podcast, who contribute their top picks from the decade alongside my own. 

In this microcast, I look at the unofficial Bond movie, Never Say Never Again (Irvin Kershner), that came off second best at the box office against the EON produced Octopussy (John Glen), when they were both released in 1983. Despite it's generally low ranking reputation, I look at some of the elements I enjoy, including Bond's fashion, the shark scenes, and the witty and playful script by Lorenzo Semple Jr (with uncredited rewrites by Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais from the British comedy Porridge) 

Author Austin Fisher join me to talks about his book, Blood in the Streets, which looks at Italian crime films cycles of the 1970s, such as the police thriller, vigilante movies, mafia narratives, and the giallo, and how they responded to the violent political turmoil happening in Italian cities at the time. 

This microcast analyses the Comic Strip Presents feature film, The Supergrass (1985), directed by Peter Richardson, and starring Ade Edmonson, Jennifer Saunders, Robbie Coltrane, Nigel Planer, Keith Allen, Alexei Sayle, Dawn French, and Richardson himself. 

In this episode Dr Joseph Oldham joins me to discuss British TV spy dramas such as Callan, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, The Night Manager, and Spooks among others. Joseph is the author of Paranoid Visions: Spies, Conspiracies and the Secret State in British Television Drama, published by Manchester University Press.  

In this microcast, I talk about one of the definitive cult films of the 1980s, Alex Cox's debut feature, Repo Man (1984). As well as being a filmmaker, Cox was also presenter of the BBC series Moviedrome, which has an important place in the perception of cult cinema.

In this episode, Dr Johnny Walker joins me to talk about the video rental boom of the 1970s and 1980s in Britain, and how it impacted the film industry in terms of new market opportunities, influencing future filmmakers, and also its effect on Britain's working class and South Asian communities. 

In this episode, journalist and James Bond aficionado Lee Kenny joins me to discuss the BBC radio play adaptations of Ian Fleming's 007 novels. The first was broadcast in 2008, the most recent in 2020, and they all feature Toby Stephens as Bond, as well as other recurring cast. We talk about how they capture the overall strangeness of atmosphere present in Fleming's stories, and how they provide a counterpoint to both the books and the more famous film series. 

Between 1960 and 1964 cult director Roger Corman made eight horror films loosely adapted from poems and stories by Edgar Allan Poe. In this microcast, I present an overview of the cycle and a brief assessment of each movie.