Episode 10 - 5 - 14

Back in action for a minute or two, The Gaffer takes a break from the cornfields to help out, helping to review Gone Girl and pitch a movie about deadly butt electrocutions. You heard me.

We heard music from:

Cannibal Holocaust, 1980 - Riz Orlani
The Fearless Vampire Killers, 1967 - Krzysztof Komeda

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Episode 9 - 15 - 14

Rambo is getting a sequel. And maybe a TV show? Ok. "Jaws" Richard Kiel passed away, notable as Bond henchman and "Happy Gilmore" cameo, respectively. Nothing came out on DVD. I caught Blue Ruin on Netflix, and thought it was a pleasant surprise, so the week was not lost.

We heard music from:

Rambo: First Blood Part II, 1985 - Jerry Goldsmith
The Zero Theorem, 2014 - George Fenton
Italian thrillers - Various

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Episode 9 - 8 - 14

This was the slowest box office weekend in six years, which is sad, because I really feel like we could've made that number larger. Wow, there was nothing to talk about this week.

We heard music from:

Flash Gordon, 1980 - Queen
The Color of Money, 1986 - Various, Robbie Robertson

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Episode 9 - 1 - 14

Labor Day! Tiny, pitiful respite from the unrelenting, brutal erosion of working life in a post-industrial society!

Naked pictures of several starlets were recently hacked from the iCloud, reinforcing our cultural notion of celebrities in general and female celebrities in particular that they are part of our entitlement consumer consumption. Sad shit.

I only caught one newish film this week, David Mackenzie's British prison drama Starred Up. I don't know why prison dramas have such a legacy in film history, but they do, I guess mirroring the prison narratives in literature. Many of them are about escape, but some are simply dramas about life on the inside - the principle of realism being that escape isn't a possibility. Starred is good, a fairly straightforward look at British prison brutality with a slight critique of the system. It ultimately doesn't dive very deeply in any respect, but is worth catching for the performances.

Music from:

The Hunger, 1983 - Michel Rubini
Ghostbusters, 1984 - Elmer Bernstein
The Adventures of Buckaroo Bonzai, 1984 - Michael Boddicker

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Episode 8 - 25 - 14

Richard Attenborough died age 90. Minority Report TV show. Managed to see Richard Linklater's Boyhood and Jonathan Glazer Under the Skin; the former's use of real-time lapse as storytelling overshadowed it's ability to actually create a narrative. The latter however, relied completely on narrative but not story and profited immensely.

Ferris Bueller's Day Off, 1986 - Various

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Episode 8 - 18 -14

Hmm, what exactly is there to talk about this time around? Wiener-cleavage? George Takei? Yes indeed. I won't give you context, you'll have to listen in.

I keep meaning to see Boyhood, which is playing at our local Cinemark. Low-fi artsy-fartsy using real-time aging experimentation for film? I'll check that out. But what I really want to see is this recently unearthed gem:

Music:

Bloodsport, 1988 - Paul Hertzog
No Retreat, No Surrender, 1986 - Paul Gilreath

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Episode 8 - 11 - 14

Robin Williams passed away today, losing a decades-long struggle with depression informed by bipolar disorder and alcoholism. I prefer the expression, "Death by depression" to suicide, since it decenters the individual as the cause and focuses on the illness, much as if he died from a stroke or congenital heart failure. I don't accept the simplistic rational that an individual is solely responsible for their mental illness - we understand that there are biochemical issues in the brain that can be treated with medication and cognitive therapy. It's hard for someone to fight these demons forever, though, and whether it was a momentary mistake or a deliberate decision from a perceived rational state, Robin Williams decided it was time to stop fighting. It's irrelevant to think this entails weakness or failure; if the success Robin Williams achieved and the millions of people he made happy couldn't beat this, maybe nothing could. He was wrong, however, because he believed he was not loved. If only he could see now how much we all wanted him to stay with us.

It's a shame to muddy that somber note with what we talked about on the rest of the show: the goddamn new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie.


Music from:

What Dreams May Come, 1998 - Michael Kamen
Aladdin, 1992 - Alan Menken
Mrs. Doubtfire, 1993 - Howard Shore

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