Trilogy in Theory

Having just passed the century mark, on episode 101 we hope we have entered into the honeymoon phase with our listeners, and so being creative geniuses we decided to talk about the recently released to DVD, and one of Chris’ favorite of 2014, HONEYMOON. This film inspires a look at two other entries in the horror genre where couples go to cabins in the woods. The movie that shows that marriage proposals are never a good idea is THE STRANGERS, and then to top that, ANTICHRIST shows us that MARRIAGES are never a good idea.

GUEST: Rilla of Soiled Restroom Cinema joins us to help the chaos reign.

On our last episode for Blackhat we talked about uninvited digital guests through cyber intrusion, so for our big episode 100 (and I mean big numerically speaking, we didn’t really go out of our way to do anything special) we chose a theme of guests making themselves at home the old fashioned way. Recent DVD and digital release The Guest allows us to pit a classic Hitchcock film in Shadow Of A Doubt against a film that was inspired by Shadow Of A Doubt, in… Stoker. It’s been a great run up to episode 100 the last nine months, thank you for allowing us to be a guest on your listening device of choice.

On this episode we celebrate the ability of computers to bring people closer together, even when one party was uninvited. Hopefully you don’t see us invading your earbuds in quite the same fashion that we view the hackers in the films SNEAKERS and… well, HACKERS. This battle between the old and young is inspired by an old standby of portraying masculinity on film, director Michael Mann’s latest work BLACKHAT.

GUEST: Patrick McGill of Role Play Craft comes in to judge the roller blading contest that is 90s cyber culture as portrayed on film.

On this episode we get high off of Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest great film that cinephiles will be revisiting for years to come, and in celebration of that we look at two older films that have been gained that classic status in Robert Altman’s THE LONG GOODBYE and The Coen Brothers THE BIG LEBOWSKI. Both films are about private investigators, one professional and one an amateur, who use their unique viewpoint of being out of step or perfectly in step with their times to figure out what is going on around them… but first… we try to figure out what is going on with Paul Thomas Anderson’s INHERENT VICE.

On this episode we talk about romantic relationships with a big age difference... other than between Mike and Chris. Instead we debate two classic films in Stanley Kubrick’s LOLITA vs. Hal Ashby’s HAROLD AND MAUDE. For the deciding vote, we are very happy to have Anderson Cowan from the awesome and well-respected movie podcast THE FILM VAULT and the comedy podcast THE AFTER DISASTER. But before we decide on Team Humbert or Team Maude, we interview David McFarland, the director of photography for THE BOY NEXT DOOR, the new film that inspired our theme.

On this episode we look at documentaries about a country’s ties to their respective sports teams with a 30 For 30 film ONCE BROTHERS about an Olympic basketball team that is broken up once the nation breaks out into civil war, which is very similar in premise to the other documentary we will review (except much different in tone) with THE OTHER DREAM TEAM. Hopefully that’s not too much sportsing for our film nerd listeners, because first, we also have an interview with Gabe Polsky, director of the new film RED ARMY.

On this episode we look at the war abroad in the Sam Mendes film JARHEAD, and the war at home in Paul Haggis’ IN THE VALLEY OF ELAH, but first, a warning to both our liberal and conservative listeners who like to misinterpret art and proudly show their ass all over social media, we talk with our guest Peter from the podcast Hydrate Level Four about Clint Eastwood’s new film: AMERICAN SNIPER.

On this episode we are inspired by the new release UNBROKEN to look at military movies that are survival stories, and how war, specifically how war is portrayed on film, has changed with the times. From the somewhat cordial but surprisingly dark gut punch of 1963’s THE GREAT ESCAPE to the very dark but surprisingly optimistic lead played by Christian Bale in 2006’s RESCUE DAWN. All of that, plus our guest Emily Mackay of Movies and Mayhem, bragging about her upcoming Sundance experience.

On this episode, we look at TOP FIVE, the recent film from Chris Rock about a comedian who wants to be taken seriously as an artist, which not only inspired the pairing of SULLIVAN’S TRAVELS and STARDUST MEMORIES, but also our own Top Five Film lists of 2014. And after you hear them you may no longer take us seriously (if you ever did).