Shocktober 2025 spirals into demonic delirium with Juan López Moctezuma’s Alucarda (1977). This feverish blast of Mexican Gothic horror follows Justine (Susana Kamini), a sheltered orphan who finds herself drawn to the wild, otherworldly Alucarda (Tina Romero) within the stone walls of a convent that’s anything but holy. What begins as innocent friendship erupts into a blood-soaked storm of possession, blasphemy, and ecstatic madness.

Ryan Luis Rodriguez and Mark Begley join Mike to dissect Moctezuma’s infernal masterpiece — its ties to Jodorowsky’s surrealism, its place in the “nunsploitation” subgenre, and its bold feminist undercurrents that still scorch the screen nearly fifty years later.

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Mike White dives into the making of Vindication Swim with writer-director Elliott Hasler, whose ambitious period drama brings to life the extraordinary true story of swimmer Mercedes Gleitze, the first British woman to swim the English Channel. Set in the 1920s, the film follows Gleitze’s struggle for recognition and the grueling endurance required to overcome both physical and societal barriers. Hasler discusses the challenges of recreating open-water sequences, capturing the era’s atmosphere, and honoring a pioneer whose determination made history.

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Mike White sits down with journalist and author Clark Collis to talk about his latest deep dive into the world of fear and fascination, Screaming and Conjuring: The Rise of Modern Horror Franchises. Collis explores how films like The Conjuring, Insidious, and Paranormal Activity revived mainstream horror, spawned cinematic universes, and redefined the genre for a new generation. From haunted houses to found footage, Collis traces the eerie evolution of studio horror from the 2000s onward—where box office booms meet demonic possessions, and clever marketing becomes part of the scare.

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Shocktober 2025 sinks its teeth into Raw (2016), Julia Ducournau’s visceral coming-of-age horror. Garance Marillier stars as Justine, a sheltered vegetarian entering veterinary school, where a brutal hazing ritual ignites her taste for flesh—both animal and human. Co-hosts Suzen Tekla Kruglnska and Beth Accomando join Mike to explore Ducournau’s blend of body horror and female awakening, peeling back the film’s layers of appetite, identity, and transgression. Special guest Barbara Creed, author of The Monstrous-Feminine, offers insight into how Raw redefines the monstrous body for a new generation.

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Ego Fest XV cracks open The Projection Booth once again as Mike faces a barrage of listener questions from the devoted and the deranged. From the mysteries of the long-teased 2001: A Space Odyssey episode to favorite decades of filmmaking and the highs and lows of a year’s worth of interviews, nothing’s off the table. Mike talks shop on balancing multiple podcasts, favorite co-hosts, and whether a Dabney Coleman series might lurk in the future. Fans ask about Elliot Gould, Malcolm McDowell, the Weirding Way family, Kurt Cobain, and even Mike’s clarinet. It’s a revealing, and deeply personal episode that proves—once again—that the man behind the mic never stops creating, curating, or caffeinating.

Big thanks to Dallas Norvell, Captain Billy, Robert Maines, and Ben Buckingham for the thoughtful questions. Also big thanks to all of the listeners who provided such insightful reviews.

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Shocktober continues with Marina de Van’s unnerving and unforgettable In My Skin (Dans ma peau, 2002). Written, directed by, and starring de Van, the film follows Esther, a successful marketing executive whose accidental leg injury opens a darkly intimate portal to obsession and self-discovery. As she becomes fixated on her own wound, Esther’s relationship with her body—and reality itself—begins to unravel in a visceral exploration of autonomy, alienation, and flesh as frontier.

Axel Kohagen and Ben Buckingham join Mike for a deep dive into de Van’s fearless vision, its connection to the New French Extremity, and the uneasy beauty found beneath the skin.


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Crispin Hellion Glover discusses his long-awaited directorial effort, No! YOU’RE WRONG. or: Spooky Action at a Distance. Nearly a decade in the making, the surreal 35mm odyssey stars both Crispin and his father, Bruce Glover, in multiple roles that span generations, myth, and madness.

Shot primarily on sets built in Glover’s Czech stables, the film weaves together science, symbolism, and the uncanny in only the way he can—part family drama, part metaphysical riddle, all unmistakably Glover.

Mike digs deep with the actor-filmmaker about the project’s long evolution, his singular touring approach that blends live performance and cinema.

Find out more at: https://crispinglover.com/slideshow.html 

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Shocktober 2025 begins with Sutton Roley's Sweet, Sweet Rachel (1971), the eerie TV movie that launched The Sixth Sense series. Written by Anthony Lawrence, the film stars Stefanie Powers as Rachel Stanton, a glamorous woman whose husband dies under suspicious circumstances, leaving her caught in a web of supernatural intrigue. Alex Dreier play Dr. Lucas Darrow, a psychic researcher who, along with Carey Johnson (Chris Robinson), investigate the strange goings-on of the Piper family.

Mike is joined by Amanda Reyes and Kendall R. Phillips to dissect the film’s blend of paranormal thrills and TV Gothic atmosphere. Plus, Stefanie Powers herself stops by to share memories of stepping into Rachel’s haunted shoes.

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Czechtember 2025 wraps with Jan Švankmajer’s Conspirators of Pleasure (1996), a delirious, dialogue-free plunge into fetish and surrealism. Mike teams up with filmmaker Jim Vendiola and critic Samm Deighan to unravel the tangled lives of six Prague eccentrics whose private obsessions—ranging from papier-mâché contraptions to elaborate role-play—collide in hilariously unsettling ways. The result is a darkly comic meditation on desire, ritual, and the pleasures of the bizarre, filtered through Švankmajer’s singular stop-motion, tactile textures, and Surrealist imagination.

We're joined by Peter Hames, editor of The Cinema of Jan Svankmajer: Dark Alchemy.

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Czechtember charges ahead as Mike, Spencer Parsons, and Emily Barney dive into Otakar Vávra’s Romance for Bugle (1967). Vávra adapts František Hrubín’s celebrated poem into a lyrical love story set in the Czech countryside. Terina (Zuzana Cigánová), a young Roma woman, ignites passion in Vojta (Jaromír Hanzlík) and Viktor (Štefan Kvietik), pulling the two men into a tense triangle of longing and rivalry. The film also reflects back through the eyes of Vojta as an older man (Július Vašek), who recalls his youthful heartbreak. Cinematographer Jaroslav Kučera saturates the screen with striking imagery, while Vávra shapes the material into a cinematic elegy that fuses poetry, politics, and loss.

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