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Jen and Tim discover two Arkansas originals: The Town That Dreaded Sundown from 1976, and indie film pioneer Charles B. Pierce!
Hear the entire episode over at our Patreon!
Amanda Squitiero, daughter of Charles B. Pierce, corrects some misconceptions about him in this fine article from Filmmaker magazine.
Tim and Jen confront the most infamous mondo film of all time, Faces of Death! Hear the entire episode over at our Patreon!
Faces of Death may be viewed in its entirety on Tubi.
Echoing Jen’s experience in high school auto safety, two students were traumatized after their math teacher showed the film in class in 1985:
“The people at the table,” says Forget today, “beat this monkey over the head with a hammer until it died. Then they cut the top of its head off and ate its brains.” As an animal-lover, she found the film deeply disturbing and asked to leave. Mr Schwartz said no and when Feese also tried to go, he forced her to sit down, grabbing her chair and spinning it aggressively towards the screen.
via The Guardian
Schwarz was disciplined, but with only a 15-day suspension without pay.
For more upsetting reenacted violence, check out our episode on Farewell Uncle Tom! OR if ambiguously fake snuff is more your speed, try our episode on Trent Reznor’s Broken movie!
Tim and Jen struggle to make sense of one of the most persistent cultural artifacts of 9/11, Loose Change, as well as the lasting damage done by the Bush administration.
Hear the whole episode at our Patreon and get access to more than 50 bonus episodes!
View every edit of Loose Change (except the 2015 edition) at archive.org.
Watch Screw Loose Change, an exhaustive response to the second edition of Loose Change, at YouTube.
For more cogent commentary on U.S. foreign policy and the Middle East, listen to our episode with special guest Felix Biederman on Valley of the Wolves: Iraq.
Tim and Jen welcome a special guest to discuss a fan edit of a beloved horror classic, The Wicker Man: The Summerisle Cut! Listen for yourself and decide if you want to leave angry comments on archive.org!
Hear the whole episode at our Patreon and get access to more than 50 bonus episodes!
View the Summerisle Cut at the Internet Archive.
Visit the Wicker Man site mentioned by our guest, which describes all of the different cuts of the film in detail.
For more great British horror, try our episode on the BBC’s controversial Ghostwatch!
Jen and Tim agree and disagree on an also-ran Nicolas Roeg movie, Eureka! Jen really gets the bit between her teeth in this one and Tim demonstrates almost saintly patience while she babbles.
Hear the whole episode at our Patreon and get access to more than 50 bonus episodes!
Watch a short documentary on the inspiration for Jack McCann, the gold millionaire Sir Harry Oakes.
Buy Charlotte Gray’s very engaging bio of Harry Oakes, Murdered Midas, on Alibris.
For more British filmmaking, listen to our episode on The Firm and its 2009 reboot!
What if Black Panther had been the pilot for a TV show, but when they went to series they took out Wakanda and most of the black people? You’d have M.A.N.T.I.S.! HYST superfan mugrimm joins Tim and Jen to talk about what was lost when the Sam Raimi/Sam Hamm/Rob Tapert pilot became a politically toothless show with white sidekicks.
Hear the whole episode at our Patreon and get access to more than 50 bonus episodes!
The documentary Jen couldn’t remember the name of is Call Me Lucky, and it was directed by Bobcat Goldthwait. It’s an account of the life of satirist and activist Barry Crimmins.
Want to hear about a more inept superhero telefilm? Why not listen to our episode about Captain America with MST3k and Rifftrax alum Bill Corbett?
Jen and Tim look at two takes on football hooliganism called The Firm. The 1989 version is a masterpiece, the other, not so much! Hear the whole episode at our Patreon and get access to more than 50 bonus episodes!
The 20-minute documentary Alan Clarke: His Own Man is a nice intro to the director. Also, many of his works can be found on YouTube, so happy hunting!
Jen referred to a film called “WarGames” when she actually meant The War Game, a 1965 dramatization of nuclear warfare against England that the BBC withdrew from broadcast until 1985. It did not star Matthew Broderick or Ally Sheedy.
She also sorta muffed the description of Ken Loach’s teleplay Cathy Come Home, which horrified the British public with its account of a homeless couple (to little material effect, according to Loach). This short article describes the production and draws from some of the news coverage of the time.
Also, “If you know what’s good for you…Weetabix!”
For more of bleak Britain, try our episode on nuclear horror film Threads!
Tim and Jen return to Soviet filmmaker Pavel Klushantsev’s optimistic world of space exploration for 1962’s Planet of Storms! Hear the whole episode at our Patreon and get access to more than 50 bonus episodes!
The original film is available on YouTube with English subtitles. If you’re curious about the 1955 Disney short Man in Space, you can watch it here, but you won’t actually learn much about the historical origins of rocketry.
If you missed our Road to the Stars episode, listen to it here!
ERRATA: Jen speculates in the episode about the reason for the lack of cultural impact the film made in the United States. It turns out there’s a good reason. Planet of Storms didn’t arrive in the US in official, unadulterated home video form until some time in the 90s. As we mentioned, the film was cannibalized for two different American productions. One was Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet, with new footage directed by eventual New Queer Cinema trailblazer Curtis Harrington. The other, as we mentioned in the episode, was Voyage to the Planet of Prehistoric Women. They both suck.
Jen and Tim are astounded by one of the most pompous auteur statements ever made— Craig Denney’s The Astrologer from 1976! Hear the whole episode at our Patreon and get access to more than 50 bonus episodes!
The Astrologer had a theatrical run from at least 1976 through part of 1977, but was considered lost for many years. It eventually resurfaced in 2021 on YouTube. Paramount appears to have a copyright claim on the picture (amazing that they’d even want it), but that doesn’t mean it can’t be seen if you know where to look.
The story of auteur Craig Denney is as mysterious as it is surprising. Jim Vorel has a good rundown at Paste Magazine. Long story short, Denney made a bold play for notoriety, only to disappear sometime in the 80s. No one knows when he died, if he’s actually dead, or even his real birthdate! And that’s just the start of the confusion! From the article:
Denney’s friend and associate Arthyr Chadbourne (who plays business manager Arthyr in the film) has disputed these figures, suggesting instead at L.A. screenings/Q&As that Denney was notorious for exaggeration and self-aggrandizing. As Chadbourne reportedly said then, “Craig was wonderful with hype. Everything was millions … you should read some of the things we used to send out to investors.”
Jim Vorel, Paste Magazine
Vorel’s article draws from this well-researched piece by Sean Welsh over at Matchbox Cine. Did Craig Denney fake his death? Where the hell did he get all his money? Which of his claims about his life were true? Was he even as successful as he claimed he was?
If you’re curious about our allusion to Romeo & Romeo, check out our episode about possibly the greatest addition to queer cinema in the last twenty-five years.
Tim attempts to convey the charm and innovative spirit of Soviet filmmaker Pavel Klushantsev to his lazy, lazy cohost! Hear the whole episode at our Patreon and get access to more than 50 bonus episodes!
We mentioned the Klushantsev documentary The Star Dreamer, but don’t miss the original films! We loved the dog in a spacesuit in Mars.
For the exact opposite of Klushantsev’s optimistic vision, check out our episode on Paul W.S. Anderson’s space-based nightmare, Event Horizon!