Tag: bitterkarella

134 – Ravenous

Guy Pearce in Ravenous (1999), directed by Antonia Bird

Jen and Tim take a bite out of cult cannibal Western flick Ravenous, with the help of Mike Rosen, aka Twitter’s lovable* bitterkarella!

Hear the whole episode over at our Patreon and get access to more than 50 other bonus episodes!

“The Windigo is sick because it’s cut off from its roots. It’s a ghost with a heart of ice. It eats everything in sight. Its hunger knows no bounds. When there is nothing left to eat, it starves to death. When it sees something, it wants to own it. No one else can have anything. This illness feeds on a spiritual void. Canada and US are presently in an advanced stage of the ‘Windigo Psychosis.’”

Mowhawk Nation News 

Sample a scholarly paper about Windigo psychosis thanks to the Internet Archive. 

You can buy Shawn Smallman’s Dangerous Spirits: The Windigo in Myth and History directly from the publisher online. 

As mentioned during the episode, John Coulthart’s Feuilleton blog is highly recommended!

If you missed out on the discussion of folk horror alluded to in the episode, go listen to our Eyes of Fire episode, also featuring Mike!

*unless you’re a hater

132 – Eyes of Fire

Eyes of Fire, directed by Avery Crounse, 1983

Jen and Tim host Mike Rosen, who is a witch, to discuss a very witchy cult horror movie, Eyes of Fire! Also, if you were dying to know Jen’s thoughts on Midsommar, they’re in there.

Hear the whole episode over at our Patreon and get access to more than 50 other bonus episodes!

Mike’s graphic novel, Malleus Malleficarum, is indeed on itch.io and comes highly recommended by your hosts!

Jen misidentified the actor who plays Will Smythe as “Douglas Lipscomb.” She of course meant Dennis Lipscomb.

Severin Films included Eyes of Fire in their recently released All the Haunts Be Ours folk horror boxed set. If your interest in Eyes of Fire isn’t quite up to that $170 price tag, you can of course watch the film on Shudder’s excellent streaming service.

For more on the genre, Folk Horror Revival offers a generous repository of knowledge.

130 – Loose Cannons

Jen and Tim enlist favorite guest Mike Rosen (bitterkarella on Twitter) to explicate the inexplicable Dan Aykroyd/Gene Hackman buddy cop comedy, Loose Cannons!

Not to get all fact check dot org on you all, but the Dissociative Identity Disorder website has science-based information on what was misrepresented as “multiple personality disorder” in the movie.

Busy Inside is a compassionate documentary about people with DID.

Read an article about the Southern California Sorcerers, a writer’s group which included future Loose Cannons scribe Richard Matheson and some other guys like Rod Serling, Ray Bradbury, and Harlan Ellison. Excelsior!

Hear the closing theme sung by Katey Sagal (!), ripped “straight from the uncompressed Laserdisc track.”

107 – Krull

Ken Marshall wields the Glaive in Krull (1983)
literally who cares what this thing is called shut the hell up

Mike Rosen returns to fight Tim on the merits (or lack thereof) of cult 80s sci-fantasy film Krull! Jen moderates to the best of her ability!

Krull hit screens in 1983 and failed to make its money back, although it is beloved by the kind of people who liked Ready Player One.

For exhaustive contemporary coverage of Krull, visit the Internet Archive’s scanned copy of Starlog issue 76, from November 1983.

Special effects makeup artist Nick Maley seemed to enjoy making the film, judging by his reminisces.

One valiant effort to market the movie: Krull-themed weddings! To our knowledge, none of the brides or grooms have come forward to admit to their participation. But it’s hard to see how the movie missed with marketing concepts this good:

One [marketing gimmick] suggests approaching the local bakery about creating special pastries in the shape of the Glaive and dubbing them the punny ‘Krullers’. “Everyone knows what a cruller is…a tasty glazed donut. Now comes the Kruller…a tasty Glaived donut.

Tim Kirk via The Moving Arts Film Journal

For another fantasy misfire and more of guest Mike Rosen, try our episode on Ron Howard and George Lucas’s Willow!

098 – Willow

Warwick Davis in Willow

Mike Rosen joins Jen and Tim to discuss that movie you really liked as a kid and then revisited as an adult and realized it wasn’t that good. That’s right, it’s Willow, from 1988! George Lucas perhaps wisely handed off directing duties to Ron Howard, but results are still mixed at best.

Speaking of Ron Howard, Jen and Tim depart significantly on his legacy as a director. We briefly discussed his daughter Bryce Dallas Howard in our Antichrist episode.

Tim alluded to the very fine podcast 372 Pages We’ll Never Get Back. If you’d like to hear their take on the Shadow Moon series, start here!

For another fantasy misfire, try our episode on Krull!

091 – Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon

Key art for Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon (2006)

Jen and Tim welcome back Mike Rosen so he can carve up Joss Whedon like the turkey he is and also to discuss an affectionate satire of the slasher genre.

Offensive Films by Mikita Brottman

Men, Women, and Chainsaws: Gender in the Modern Horror Film by Carol J. Clover

For more Mike, listen to our episode about a truly wretched Dan Aykroyd comedy, Loose Cannons!

078 – The Doomsday Machine

You know how sometimes a movie just sucks and is lazy and stupid and sexist? That’s The Doomsday Machine, all right! Mike Rosen joins us to discuss!

Hear the whole episode at our Patreon and get access to more than 50 bonus episodes!

You can watch The Doomsday Machine in its entirety on YouTube, but why would you? Try the very funny Cinematic Titanic version instead!

This is actually the second movie starring Bobby Van (a favorite actor of Jen’s) we’ve covered on the show. The first was lumbering musical Lost Horizon—listen to our episode about it here.