The Frances Farmer Show

With the Toronto Film festival just ending and the Vancouver Film Festival one week away, Mike and Sean celebrate the Great White North with a pair of the most-acclaimed Canadian films of all-time, David Cronenberg's 1983 mind-bender Videodrome and Michael Snow's experimental classic Wavelength, from 1967. Along they way, they preview Sean's trip to VIFF 2014, make their picks for Essential Canadian Film and celebrate the life and work of the Greatest Canadian, Rick Moranis.

On this very special episode, Sean and Mike make their third annual Top Ten Films of All-Time selections. Hitchcock, Hawks, Hong and much much more!

For this year's Labor Day episode, Mike and Sean take a look at a pair of movie about the organization and collective action of workers, Sergei Eisenstein's 1925 debut feature Strike and John Sayles's acclaimed 1987 film Matewan. They also pick their Cinemassential Films About Work, celebrate the career of the hard-working filmmaker Werner Herzog, rail against the travesty that is aspect-ratio cropping and discuss the latest essay from Professor David Bordwell.

This week Mike and Sean take on a pair of modern teenage musicals. First up is Roger Corman's explosive Rock 'N' Roll High School, directed by Allan Arkush in 1979 and starring PJ Soles and The Ramones. Then they attempt to harmonize over 2012's instant classic about the world of competitive collegiate a cappella, Pitch Perfect, starring Anna Kendrick. Also this week: the latest in the Scarecrow Video Kickstarter campaign, a lament for the Leonard Maltin Film Guide, a look at the career of Joe Dante and remembrances of the late Robin Williams and Lauren Bacall.

This week Mike and Sean break from the normal routine to discuss their summer reading, Thomas Schatz's seminal study of the Hollywood studio era, The Genius of the System. In between rants about misguided and wrong-headed critics of auteurism, they also take a look at a couple examples of the studio system at work: the anarchic 1941 Ole Olsen and Chic Johnson "film" Hellzapoppin' and Joseph L. Mankiewicz's stately 1954 melodrama The Barefoot Contessa, with Humphrey Bogart and Ava Gardner.

This week, on the eve of Mike's European vacation to France and Germany, we take a look at a couple of films from those countries that just happen (a total coincidence we swear) to have the same title: Jacques Demy's 1961 film Lola, starring Anouk Aimée and Rainer Werner Fassbinder's 1981 Lola, starring Armin Mueller-Stahl.

As well we'll discuss our Essential Vacation films, celebrate the career of our Person of the Week, Jacques Demy, and talk about the greatness of pirate movies and the terribleness of Hollywood's 100 Favorite Films.

This week, Mike and Sean take a look at films by contemporary Korean directors: Bong Joonho's newly released English language debut Snowpiercer and Hong Sangsoo's third feature film Virgin Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors from 2000. Bong himself is the subject as well of the first ever George Sanders Show interview, as he sat down to talk to Mike about the new film, movies about trains and what Hong Sangsoo is really like.

This week, Mike and Sean discuss the films they caught at this year's Seattle International Film Festival. Featured are films from Richard Linklater, Kelly Reichardt, Fruit Chan and Wong Jing, along with an acclaimed documentary, a remake of an acclaimed Western, a Treasure Hunter, an animated film from Brazil and an award-winning Chinese film noir. Also which rock stars made the best movie theatre guests and hazy memories of Judgement Night.

Before diving into the Seattle International Film festival, Mike and Sean decide they needed a little vacation, so they head off on safari in search of big game: Howard Hawks's idiosyncratic 1962 adventure Hatari! and Clint Eastwood's 1990 film about the making of The African Queen White Hunter, Black Heart. Clint Eastwood is the somewhat controversial Person of the Week and they also make their picks for Essential Movies about White People in Africa.

This week, Mike and Sean talk about Jonathan Glazer's eerie new movie Under the Skin and John Carpenter's underrated 1984 film Starman. They also can't help discussing Jim Jarmusch's latest, Only Lovers Left Alive. Also: a look at Scarlett Johansson, the Essential Doppelgänger films and a preview of the upcoming Seattle International Film Festival.