In all his films, Wes Anderson turns the mundane into magic by building distinctive and eccentric worlds. But how well do you know the man behind the camera? Discover the inspirations of one of our most revered auteurs with The Worlds of Wes Anderson . Anderson’s playful and vibrant aesthetic is universally admired – but how has he managed to create such a recognisable identity? From Hitchcock and Spielberg to Truffaut and Varda, there are countless homages and references scattered throughout An...
Oct 16, 2024•55 min•Season 1Ep. 184
Dr. Benjamin Halligan joins John Bleasdale to talk about Hotbeds of Licentiousness, the first substantial critical engagement with British pornography on film across the 1970s, including the “Summer of Love,” the rise and fall of the Permissive Society, the arrival of Margaret Thatcher, and beyond. By focusing on a series of colorful filmmakers whose work, while omnipresent during the 1970s, now remains critically ignored, author Benjamin Halligan discusses pornography in terms of lifestyle aspi...
Oct 09, 2024•1 hr 23 min•Season 1Ep. 183
The first major biography of the French filmmaker hailed by Martin Scorsese as “one of the Gods of cinema.” Over the course of her sixty-five-year career, the longest of any female filmmaker, Agnès Varda (1928–2019) wrote and directed some of the most acclaimed films of her era, from her tour de force Cléo from 5 to 7 (1962), a classic of modernist cinema, to the beloved documentary The Gleaners and I (2000) four decades later. She helped to define the French New Wave, inspired an entire generat...
Oct 02, 2024•58 min•Season 1Ep. 182
Jason Solomons has been a film critic, one of the first film podcasters, an author and is now moving into a new role as a film producer with his company Movie Love Productions. He's currently working on adapting and bringing the brilliant best-selling memoir A Waiter in Paris to cinemas; and on the folk horror comedy The King of the Witches, based on a true story that’s never been told. His book Woody Allen: Film by Film is available where all good books are sold. Get bonus content on Patreon Ho...
Sep 25, 2024•1 hr 27 min•Season 1Ep. 181
Jez Conolly is the author of the Devil's Advocate edition of his book The Thing ( available here ) as well as an essay in Volume 3 of Scarred for Life (see here) . Consigned to the deep freeze of critical and commercial reception upon its release in 1982, The Thing has bounced back spectacularly to become one of the most highly regarded productions from the 1980s 'Body Horror' cycle of films, experiencing a wholesale and detailed reappraisal that has secured its place in the pantheon of modern c...
Sep 18, 2024•1 hr 5 min•Season 1Ep. 180
John Bleasdale talks about Paul Verhoeven, the Coen Brothers, Paul Thomas Anderson, Quentin Tarantino, David Fincher and film bros with Adam Nayman, author of Paul Thomas Anderson Masterworks and The Coen Brothers. Adam talks about his beginnings as film critic in Toronto. He also tells John his thoughts on the current state of film criticism, including the impact on social media on the film discourse. Adam's recommended film book is Un-American Psycho: Brian De Palma and the Political Invisible...
Sep 11, 2024•1 hr 31 min•Season 1Ep. 16
Euronews journalists David Mouriquand and Amber Bryce are joined by Sarah Bradbury of the UpComing to talk the 81st Venice Film Festival with myself, John Bleasdale. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Sep 08, 2024•43 min•Season 1Ep. 179
Joker: Folie à Deux hits Cannes and I am joined by David Mouriquand and Amber Bryce of EuroNews to talk about Todd Phillips' sequel starring Lady Gaga and joaquin Phoenix, and if it can live up to expectations. Live from the 81st Venice Film Festival. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Sep 04, 2024•51 min•Season 1Ep. 178
Day 6 or 7 of the Venice Film Festival and David Mouriquand and Amber Brice from EuroNews join me to talk about The Brutalist, The Room Next Door and Queer. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Sep 03, 2024•39 min•Season 1Ep. 177
Angelina Jolie and Nicole Kidman are on the Lido with two new films which are going to put them back in the headlines. David Mouriquand from EuroNews joins me to discuss the films Maria and Babygirl in the second of our Venice reports. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Aug 31, 2024•44 min•Season 1Ep. 176
David Mouriquand from EuroNews and Nicholas Bell from Eye on Cinema join John Bleasdale to talk about Tim Burton's Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, the opening film of the 81st edition of the Venice Film Festival. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Aug 29, 2024•34 min•Season 1Ep. 175
Chris Calogero became a viral sensation with his videos skewering movie clichés, so I had to get him on the podcast to talk police lieutenants and filthy coroners. His new comedy album HUSKY BOY can be ordered here and all the information you want is available from his site, here . Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Aug 21, 2024•1 hr 12 min•Season 1Ep. 174
John Bleasdale talks to Michael Benson on his book Space Odyssey: Stanley Kubrick, Arthur C Clarke and the Making of a Masterpiece. Buy the Book Here. The definitive story of the making of 2001: A Space Odyssey , acclaimed today as one of the greatest films ever made, and of director Stanley Kubrick and writer Arthur C. Clarke- "a tremendous explication of a tremendous film....Breathtaking" ( The Washington Post ). Fifty years ago a strikingly original film had its premiere. Still acclaimed as o...
Aug 14, 2024•1 hr 28 min•Season 1Ep. 35
Ehsan Khoshbakht, curator of the Retrospective: “ How to tell the story of a leading Hollywood studio while both teasing out the nuances and stressing the significance of canonical titles worthy of continued celebration? This has been the main challenge for our 40-title retrospective mapping Columbia Pictures’ glorious rise from Poverty Row to major force in Hollywood. ‘Lady with the Torch’ is an unofficial history of Columbia Pictures that celebrates big names, Oscar winners, and era-defining f...
Aug 07, 2024•59 min•Season 1Ep. 173
Lawrence Kasdan has created some of the most influential films in Hollywood history. He is the screenwriter of such beloved blockbusters as The Empire Strikes Back (1980), Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), The Bodyguard (1992), and The Force Awakens (2015). Simultaneously, he has gained critical acclaim as the director of pictures that dissect contemporary American society: Body Heat (1981), The Big Chill (1983), The Accidental Tourist (1988), and Grand Canyon (1991). Brett Davies is Associate Pro...
Jul 31, 2024•1 hr 9 min•Season 1Ep. 172
John Bleasdale talks to Julie Salamon the author of The Devil's Candy, The Bonfire of the Vanities Goes to Hollywood. The book is available here . The book was also the basis for the podcast series The Plot Thickens which you can listen to here . “So much better, so much more fun, than the movie it is about that one must be thankful to the filmmakers for producing such a spectacle, if only so that this book could be written.”— Vogue When film director Brian De Palma invited author Julie Salamon ...
Jul 24, 2024•1 hr 21 min•Season 1Ep. 29
John Bleasdale talks to author Mark Harris about his books Pictures from the Revolution and his recent biography of Mike NIchols. Mark's recommended book is Jason Bailey's Fun City Cinema, available here . Here's the blurb to Mark's most recent book: An instant New York Times Bestseller! A magnificent biography of one of the most protean creative forces in American entertainment history, a life of dazzling highs and vertiginous plunges--some of the worst largely unknown until now--by the acclaim...
Jul 17, 2024•1 hr 5 min•Season 1Ep. 12
Movies Go Fourth is a celebration of the fourth movies in the most popular film franchises of all time. It offers behind-the-scenes stories of fourth films from such beloved series as Star Wars , Star Trek , and James Bond. It also explores infamous fourth films, including Jaws: The Revenge , Superman IV: The Quest for Peace , and Batman & Robin . This riveting book reveals the inside scoop on some of the biggest films in horror ( Halloween , Nightmare on Elm Street ), sci-fi ( Highlander , ...
Jul 10, 2024•1 hr 5 min•Season 1Ep. 171
I talk to esteemed film critic and friend Rafa Sales Ross ( find her work here ), Noaz Deshe about his new film Xoftex and Christos Nikou about Apples, Apple and Fingernails. The Karlovy Vary International Film Festival is the largest film festival in the Czech Republic and the most prestigious such festival in Central and Eastern Europe. It is one of the oldest A-list film festivals (i.e., non-specialized festivals with a competition for feature-length fiction films), a category it shares with ...
Jul 06, 2024•1 hr 5 min•Season 1Ep. 170
I speak with the the co-director of the Bologna Cinema Ritrovato festival Ehsan KhoshBakht and film restoration expert MIchael Dawson whose restorations of Stanley Kubrick's shorts showed at the festival. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Jun 27, 2024•37 min•Season 1Ep. 169
Roger Lewis comes back to the pod to talk about his small masterpiece of biographical investigation, and fitting testament to a comic genius whose place in British cultural history is now assured. Charles Hawtrey, the skinny one with the granny glasses, was everybody's favourite in the Carry Ons - but who exactly was he? Up to now the man has remained a mystery. Examining Hawtrey's origins as a child star and performer in revue and the Will Hay films, this wonderful little book looks at his care...
Jun 19, 2024•1 hr 3 min•Season 1Ep. 168
Ramsey Campbell is an English horror fiction writer, editor and critic who has been writing for well over fifty years. He is the author of over 30 novels and hundreds of short stories, many of them winners of literary awards. Three of his novels have been adapted into films. He is also the author of Ramsey's Rambles , a book of film criticism and Six Stooges and Counting, a study of the famous comedy team the 3 Stooges. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more...
Jun 12, 2024•1 hr 9 min•Season 1Ep. 167
Ian Christie FBA is a British film scholar whose work on Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, Martin Scorsese and the development of cinema has made him one of the most respected film writers today. He is a regular contributor to Sight & Sound magazine and a frequent broadcaster as well as being the Professor of Film and Media History at Birkbeck, University of London. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices...
Jun 05, 2024•1 hr 12 min•Season 1Ep. 166
Bilge Ebiri is one of the finest critics currently working. He was the critic for the Village Voice and is now writing for New York Magazine and Vulture. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
May 26, 2024•41 min•Season 1Ep. 165
Siddhant Adlakha Talks All We Imagine as Light and more Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
May 26, 2024•24 min•Season 1Ep. 164
As Cannes nears a close we have predictions and trends to discuss and ask is it time for the titans of cinema to give way? Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
May 25, 2024•41 min•Season 1Ep. 163
Hugo Emmerzael from FilmKrant joins me to talk about Kevin Costner’s Horizon: an American Saga, chapter one. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
May 23, 2024•20 min•Season 1Ep. 162
The Substance directed by Coralie Fargeat, and starring Demi Moore, Margaret Qualley and Dennis Quaid, is the most talked about film of the Cannes Film Festival, so here we go. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
May 22, 2024•27 min•Season 1Ep. 161
Thomas Schultze from German trade website Spot ( click here ) talks the latest film by dissident Russian filmmaker Kirill Serebrennikov. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
May 21, 2024•22 min•Season 1Ep. 160
Tokumbo Salako, EuroNews culture editor, joins me to review the latest films on the Croisette in the third of my special Cannes Reports. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
May 19, 2024•17 min•Season 1Ep. 159
