“Like a rose in the gutter...” Mira Nair got her start with documentary projects, so it makes sense that her first feature, Salaam Bombay! , is a gritty and realistic depiction of life on the streets for a kid in the slums of Bombay. It also feels logical that Nair would use real street kids as her cast to imbue the story with a more authentic sense. Should she have just made a documentary though? Or does the film work as is? Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we kick off our Coming of A...
Mar 24, 2022•1 hr 3 min•Season 11Ep. 57
“I’m curious, Rose. I’m very curious.” Coming of age stories come in all shapes and sizes. The adaptation of Calder Willingham’s 1972 semi-autobiographical novel ‘Rambling Rose’ into Martha Coolidge’s 1991 film of the same name was one that captured a slice of life of a teenager and his family growing up in the South during the Great Depression. His coming of age largely happens when the new housekeeper moves in and piques his sexual awareness. Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we wrap ...
Mar 17, 2022•1 hr 23 min•Season 11Ep. 54
“You want there to be a connection. That doesn’t mean there is one.” Penny Marshall came on to Awakenings after Steven Spielberg stepped off the project apparently. Perhaps that’s why it feels a bit different for a Marshall film. But how well does this pseudo-true story work as it recounts Dr. Oliver Sacks’ experiments on patients with encephalitis lethargica in 1969? Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we continue our John Heard series with Marshall’s 1990 film Awakenings . Is Awakenings...
Mar 10, 2022•1 hr 18 min•Season 11Ep. 53
“This doesn’t just happen. This guy — this doesn’t happen. He doesn’t just come to a meeting and say ‘bugs.’” The script came easily to Gary Ross & Anne Spielberg, but finding the right team and cast to make Big still took some time. By the time the film released in theatres, it was the fourth body-switching comedy to come out in a few years, even though it had been the first to be greenlit. But the script was smart and didn’t truck in dumb jokes, the casting was impeccable, and Penny Marsha...
Mar 03, 2022•1 hr 18 min•Season 11Ep. 51
“Why didn’t I meet you first?” After working with John Heard on her 1977 film Between the Lines , writer/director Joan Micklin Silver knew that she wanted to cast him in her next feature Chilly Scenes of Winter . He plays a fairly complex, lovestruck character that dances right on the edge of being a bit too crazy, but he pulls it off with an authenticity that leaves you rooting for him, even when you’re shaking your head at some of his decisions. Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we co...
Feb 24, 2022•1 hr 6 min•Season 11Ep. 50
“We are still about telling the truth. We are still about something big here, and not many people can say that, man.” After her success with Hester Street , it seemed fitting that director Joan Micklin Silver would make an ensemble film about a group of journalists at an alternative paper. She’d worked at The Village Voice, so clearly knew that world. Her writers did as well. Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we wrap up our ‘Journalist’ series and kick off our ‘John Heard’ series with M...
Feb 17, 2022•52 min•Season 11Ep. 47
“I thought you were snapping a few photographs, not reopening the whole case.” We’re not sure how Kathryn Bigelow came to direct the adaptation of Anita Shreve’s book “The Weight of Water” for the big screen, but it feels a bit odd in her body of work. It’s arguably the least masculine film she’s made, and is a mystery told between two time periods, so it feels different for her. But what did we think of it? Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we continue our Journalists series with Bigel...
Feb 10, 2022•1 hr•Season 11Ep. 46
“Gentlemen, I give you the holy state of matrimony, modern style! Single lives, twin beds, and triple bromides in the morning!” Dorothy Arzner is a filmmaker we want to look at more closely. It’s surprising and a tad shameful to learn this late in the game about Dorothy Arzner. There had been other female filmmakers in the early days of the Hollywood system, but Arzner was largely the only woman regularly working as a director in the 30s and 40s. Her film Merrily We Go to Hell has some comedy in...
Feb 03, 2022•51 min•Season 11Ep. 44
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Jan 20, 2022•1 min•Season 11Ep. 42
"The government doesn’t let us mix with foreigners. You’ll get us into trouble if you take photos here.” Ann Hui had been working on a documentary for a Hong Kong network when she interviewed a number of ‘boat people,’ people fleeing Vietnam from the rule of China. This piqued her curiosity in the subject and defined her next two films, The Story of Woo Viet and Boat People . This ‘Vietnam Trilogy’ of hers, and particularly the last film, gave Ann Hui a boost in her career as it took off around ...
Jan 13, 2022•1 hr 5 min•Season 11Ep. 41
“See you after the victory.” As a filmmaker in Hong Kong, there’s an inevitable balancing act they need to do with their stories and how they depict China. This story portrays an interesting element of World War II that wasn’t often taught in Western history classes – the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong. Having it told from the Hong Kong perspective is also unique to us. That being said, the film was made to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Hong Kong’s return to the fold of China. Does that af...
Jan 06, 2022•1 hr 9 min•Season 11Ep. 38
There are a lot of elements from Ann Hui’s own life in her film Song of the Exile . It’s not a biographical film, though. Knowing that, what are we meant to take away from it? Is it an exploration of Hui’s own life? A chance for her to exorcise some demons from her youth? Or did she simply use those elements as a way to frame this story about a daughter slowly growing to know her own mother? Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we continue our Ann Hui series with her 1990 film Song of the ...
Dec 30, 2021•55 min•Season 11Ep. 37
"No one gets an unwrapped present on my watch!” The original idea for Arthur Christmas , at the time called Operation Rudolph , had a much darker thread in it involving reindeer burgers. Luckily, the story evolved and turned into a wild story about a hereditary line of Santas running things with a million elves helping out (really doing all the work). The story is one of commerce and efficiency, but also about the meaning of Christmas and believing. Sarah Smith had experience with complex storie...
Dec 23, 2021•1 hr 17 min•Season 11Ep. 35
Ann Hui has had a long career and was close to retiring in 2011 when she made A Simple Life . Luckily, she enjoyed making that film so much and enjoyed its success that she decided to keep directing. The film is a quiet one about a maid who has served the same family for over 60 years, now looking after Roger, the son who has become a film producer. After a stroke, however, she decides to retire. And Roger has to now figure out how to take care of her. Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as ...
Dec 16, 2021•1 hr 13 min•Season 11Ep. 33
"Your fiancée can’t crash your bachelor party!” Bollywood has overtaken Hollywood as the largest center for film production in the world, but we have yet to talk about a Bollywood film on this podcast. Well, we’re changing things with today’s episode. Zoya Akhtar, co-writer and director of this film, is from a prominent film production family. This was her second film and it became an immediate success, following three friends as they take a periodic adventure vacation merged with a bachelor par...
Dec 09, 2021•1 hr 16 min•Season 11Ep. 32
Nadine Labaki started as an actress but starting in 2007 with Caramel , she started working as a writer/director. Her films look at life in Lebanon but through unique prisms that aren’t confined by the grim realities. In her 2011 film Where Do We Go Now? , Labaki uses a magical realist tone with musical elements to craft a story about the women in an isolated village working together to stop the men – divided by Christian and Muslim faiths – from constantly fighting. Join us – Pete Wright and An...
Dec 02, 2021•1 hr 9 min•Season 11Ep. 30
"You don’t look happy.” “Have I ever?” Tackling a film that looks at a school shooting is a challenging prospect, but writer/director Lynne Ramsay and her co-writer Rory Stewart Kinnear decided to accept the challenge when they signed on to adapt Lionel Shriver’s book “We Need to Talk About Kevin.” The film is a tough film to watch, but the focus on the mother dealing with what her son has done allows us to explore thoughts about the role of a parent in this sort of situation, nature versus nurt...
Nov 25, 2021•1 hr 7 min•Season 11Ep. 29
"It’s kind of complicated, actually.” Céline Sciamma had already proven herself a strong writer/director of complicated love stories involving people figuring out their own sexuality when she wrote and directed Tomboy . The film tells a story of a 10-year-old girl – our titular tomboy – who tells all the kids she’s a boy when she moves to a new neighborhood. It’s a small decision but an important one as this young kid works to figure out who she is. Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we ...
Nov 18, 2021•1 hr 5 min•Season 11Ep. 27
"You’re not the podcast I knew ten years ago.” “It’s not the years, honey, it’s the mileage.” It’s fun revisiting Spielberg’s 1981 classic Raiders of the Lost Ark , the film that we used as our launching point for this podcast. In honor of our ten year anniversary, we thought it would be fun to return to where it all began and have another conversation about Raiders as well as what we’ve been doing over the last ten years. So join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we dig back into the archiv...
Nov 11, 2021•1 hr 15 min•Season 11Ep. 26
“I’m not running. I’m choosing.” While in film school at NYU, Dee Rees directed a short film called Pariah that was essentially the first act of a feature script she was developing. Spike Lee, her professor and mentor, helped her get the feature version financed and in 2011, she released it to much acclaim. Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we continue our 10 Year Anniversary series with Rees’ feature version of her short film Pariah . There’s a lot to discuss about Pariah , from the pe...
Nov 11, 2021•1 hr•Season 11Ep. 25
"This place is a real find!” Brazil’s economy has certainly had its share of ups and downs over the decades. The struggle to create a capitalist economy hasn’t been easy, and allowed for rich fodder for the filmmaking duo of Juliana Rojas and Marco Dutra to write and direct a story about a middle class family struggling in the labor market. This film, Trabalhar Cansa or Hard Work in English, came out 10 years ago now. Does it resonate today? Does it resonate for people outside of Brazil (or Bras...
Nov 04, 2021•1 hr 4 min•Season 11Ep. 23
"So for all practical purposes, in a month, that’s it for us.” Miranda July spends more time as a performance artist than as a filmmaker, so it makes sense that her second film, The Future , feels a bit like a performance piece. That also likely speaks to why its quirky charm works for some but for others, they feel it represents the worst side of independent film. But that’s what art is, right? Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we continue our 10th Anniversary celebration series with J...
Oct 28, 2021•54 min•Season 11Ep. 22
"Remember how devastated you were at first? So why get others to do the same?” In 2008, 18 students at Gloucester High School in Gloucester, MA, all got pregnant. At the time, the principal said that there had been a pact between a number of the girls to all get pregnant together. The mayor later came out to say that there wasn’t a pact, and later some of the girls said there was a pact but it had been made after the pregnancies and more about helping each other raise their babies together.The i...
Oct 21, 2021•1 hr 16 min•Season 11Ep. 20
We’re done talking about the movies. Now let’s talk about the series. We have come to the end of our Horror Debuts series, exploring six films and one extra as our September 2021 Member Bonus Episode. All told, we looked at Messiah of Evil , Goodnight Mommy , A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night , The Babadook , The Lure , Saint Maud , and Relic . Each director (or pair of directors as the case may be) brings a unique vision to their story, and perhaps the fact that they chose the horror genre as th...
Oct 17, 2021•56 min•Season 11Ep. 19
“Meryl Streep is not in enough movies where she feeds on people with the mouth in her armpit.” Who rules the roost in this month’s Flickchart Re-Ranking? Pete or Andy? Pete and Andy are back for yet another cockfight, this time for our October Flickchart Re-Ranking for our wonderful members. Also, Andy challenges Pete to remember which series each movie was featured. Here’s a breakdown of the battles. Based on this list, what would you pick to win? And which one will win as we duke it out? Here'...
Oct 15, 2021•32 min•Season 11Ep. 21
"We don’t need anyone else.” The release of Rose Glass’s 2019 film Saint Maud was cut short due to the pandemic. That being said, the film still garnered enough attention from festival play and the awards circuit to become a talking point in movie circles as the newest horror film worth seeing. Glass received a lot of the praise as a new director who clearly has a sense of vision and story with this, her debut feature. And the performances of both Morfydd Clark and Jennifer Ehle were discussed a...
Oct 14, 2021•1 hr 7 min•Season 11Ep. 18
“To me, you’ll always be a fish, an animal.” There is clearly a coming of age story in Agnieszka Smoczynksa’s 2015 film The Lure , which is also a horror and a musical. And it’s likely that genre mashup that made it difficult for people to connect to the movie and why it did poorly at the box office. Smoczynska created a strong vision for her first film, though. Because of that, the film’s cult following is already growing not to mention people taking it seriously because of its placement in Cri...
Oct 07, 2021•1 hr 17 min•Season 11Ep. 17
"It’s here. Under the bed.” Relic delivers on the haunted house tropes. There’s a tone and mood that often permeates horror films that give you a constant sense of dread and terror. Sometimes, it’s broken up with laughs or jump scares, but that’s clearly not what director/co-writer Natalie Erika James is looking for. Her debut film Relic generates this sense of dread and terror but maintains it throughout in a quiet way that for some keeps them on the edges of their seats but for others leaves t...
Sep 30, 2021•54 min•Season 11Ep. 16
"I promise to protect you if you promise to protect me.” What is it about Jennifer Kent’s film The Babadook that draws so many people in? Before writer/director Jennifer Kent made her debut feature film The Babadook , she made a short film called Monster which bears a lot of similarities with her feature. What it doesn’t have is the metaphorical element that the feature carries, but it’s got a mom, her son, and a monster living in the closet. In some ways, the streamlined short story works bette...
Sep 30, 2021•1 hr 11 min•Season 11Ep. 15
A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night is a unique take on the vampire mythos. Ana Lily Amirpour had written a dozen screenplays but wasn’t getting any traction with getting them made. That’s when she had the idea for her Iranian vampire story. The script came easily and was something she could make in the small town of Taft CA on an ultra-low budget. Watching the film, though, Amirpour clearly had a vision and was able to bring it to screen. The film is hypnotic, dark, full of mood, and surprisingly ...
Sep 23, 2021•1 hr 3 min•Season 11Ep. 14
