The Secret Movie Club team (Connor Lloyd Crews, Edwin Gomez, Daniel Ott, Craig Hammill) discuss movies that have a next life as re-purposed art by other moviemakers and artists. Whether that's the Coen Brothers' The Big Lebowski inspiring a new religion and Lebowski fest, the fan re-imagined features for Star Wars A New Hope or Robocop or even comedic re-dubs of movies like Gamara 2 or Mystery Science Theater 3000. The team notes how these often wildly funny original re-imaginings introduce folks to movies they might have otherwise never watched.

The SMC Team (Connor Lloyd Crews, Edwin Gomez, Daniel Ott, Craig Hammill) discuss erotic, sexual, and horny movies (and the differences between them). Edwin praises Helen Mirren. Craig and Connor agree on their belief that one of the core difficulties in making successful movies with explicit sexuality resides in story structure. Daniel notes why PORTRAIT OF A WOMAN ON FIRE is so successful as both a narrative and a movie about sexuality.

On our second off-shoot podcast DEFEND THIS MOVIE, Secret Movie Clubber Edwin Gomez demands that Secret Movie Clubber Daniel Ott defend Ott's love for the 2008 jukebox musical MAMMA MIA! starring Meryl Streep, directed by Phyllida Lloyd, with music by ABBA.  Daniel's unshakeable good heartedness and love of feel-good movies meets Edwin's relentless burning hatred for anything schmaltzy.  Who wins? Listen and decide!

The SMC Team (Edwin Gomez, Connor Lloyd Crews, a strangely ethereal Daniel Ott, Craig Hammill) return to SMC's occasional series on different elements that go into making a movie. Today, the team discusses production design, costume design, makeup design. Basically all the design elements that go into the world building of great movies.  Daniel, as if like a God from high, floors everyone with his pithy observations. Craig laments the doughnuts and beer he is consuming.

Returning special guest Bri Robert (@brirob9) and the SMC team (Connor Lloyd Crews, Craig Hammill) discuss David Lynch's 1984 DUNE which Lynch feels to this day was the worst movie experience of his life. The team then discusses other horrible experiences for their filmmakers, if even awful experiences can end up having good results. Bri and Connor also talk about M. Night Shamalyan's most recent movie OLD.

The Secret Movie Club Team (Connor Lloyd Crews, Edwin Gomez, Daniel Ott, Craig Hammill) discuss the Talking Heads' & Jonathan Demme's all-time great concert film STOP MAKING SENSE as well as when narrative filmmakers branch out to do documentaries, commercials, music videos, etc.  A sleep-deprived Craig, now with three children, overshares an actual nighttime dream he had 6 hours earlier and feelings about people who don't utilize more than 10% of cinema's capabilities.

The Secret Movie Club team (Connor Lloyd Crews, Edwin Gomez, Daniel Ott, Craig Hammill) finally (!!) after a year of podcasting gets to one of Craig's top three directors, the Japanese master Akira Kurosawa. We discuss some of our personal favorite Kurosawas, his techniques, and his relevancy to filmmaking to this day.  Also Craig tries to talk to Edwin about the Taoist view of war and violence.

Special Guest Sound Designer/Re-recording mixer Jamie Hardt (@jamie_hardt) who has worked on everything from THE HURT LOCKER through Netflix's most recent TRANSFORMERS series joins the team (Connor Lloyd Crews, Edwin Gomez, Daniel Ott, Craig Hammill) to discuss the absolute importance of sound to cinema and great examples of it throughout movie history.  The Wachowski's SPEED RACER gets much love, Edwin drops a Tarkovsky nod, Connor yet again mentions EVIL DEAD.

The Secret Movie Club team (Connor Lloyd Crews, Edwin Gomez, Daniel Ott, Craig Hammill) discusses the surprisingly deep and diverse genre of parody/spoof movies. They come to realize this genre encompasses everything from Buster Keaton to Mel Brooks to Edgar Wright to the spoof movie craze of the 2000's.  Edwin asserts his dislike of Ingmar Bergman yet again.  Craig discusses the birth of his daughter Pamela Aida Hammill.

New Secret Movie Club team member Kelly Jean Janich (@kllyjjn) joins regulars Connor Lloyd Crews, Edwin Gomez, Daniel Ott, & Craig Hammill to discuss Japanese anime (both features & tv series) as an amazingly rich and diverse cinematic genre. Kelly takes us through a brief history of anime from its manga origins through TV to the present day. She also shouts out some great off the beaten path anime recommendations. Everyone chimes in on how they love Cowboy BeBop. Edwin gets frustrated when Gene Hackman gets brought into the conversation. And Daniel points out how anime fosters fan creations that are often mind-blowing.