CFQ Post-Mortem: Prep for BLACK SUNDAY; del Toro Enters THE HAUNTED MANSION

Podcast: Download (Duration: 21:45 — 19.9MB)

Following up on this week’s in-depth discussion of EYES WITHOUT A FACE, Dan Persons, Lawrence French, and Steve Biodrowski launch into an informal chat about horror, fantasy, and science fiction films of 1960, including BLACK SUNDAY (which will become the subject of a future podcast in August). Also on the menu: another look at DESPICABLE ME and reaction to the news that writer-director Guillermo del Toro  will be helming a film based on Disneyland’s Haunted Mansion, reviving a franchise that has lain dormant since 2003’s  disappointing THE HAUNTED MANSION, starring Eddie Murphy.

Podcast: Download (Duration: 48:10 — 44.1MB)

The First Face/Off: Pierre Brasseur (left) and Alida Valli (right) carve up another victim in EYES WIHTOUT A FACE.

With theaters offering no new genre films this weekend, The Cinefantastique Podcast turns its all-seeing gaze back through the mists of time to a 50th anniversary examination of EYES WITHOUT A FACE, director George Franju’s moody masterpiece of art house horror. Imagine a dream of lyrical black-and-white images, of a lonely young woman, flitting through her home like a silent spectre. Her face, hidden behind a placid, mannequin-like mask, is a ruined mess. Her father, a brilliant but monomaniacal surgeon, is trying to restore her beauty – a process that involves kidnapping look-alike victims and transplanting their faces onto hers. When you see the operation in full view of the unblinking camera, you realize that your dream has erupted into a nightmare whose shock derives from the horrendous manner that the graphic imagery violates the poetic beauty of the film. The result is a classic not only of the genre but of cinema, easily one of the greatest horror films ever made. Follow Dan Persons, Lawrence French, and Steve Biodrowski as they dare to look beneath the mask – it’s all part of Cinefantastique’s ongoing Celebration of the science fiction, fantasy, and horror films of 1960.

IN THIS EPISODE:

1. News
2. Opening in Theaters
3. 50th Anniversary Discussion: EYES WITHOUT A FACE
4. New on Home Video
5. New at cfqmag.com

Podcast: Download (Duration: 44:52 — 41.1MB)

In the latest weekly installment of CFQ’s Post-Mortem Podcast, Dan Persons, Lawrence French, and Steve Biodrowski offer a free-form follow-up to this Cinefantastique Podcast, including further in-depth insights on the dreamscape of Christopher Nolan’s INCEPTION and a look at the big-budget disappointment, THE SORCERER’S APPRENTICE, starring Nicolas Cage and Jay Baruchel, and loosely inspired by the Mickey Mouse episode of Walt Disney Pictures’ FANTASIA (1940).

Podcast: Download (Duration: 1:02:57 — 57.6MB)

Warp the World: Joseph Gordon-Levitt copes with the new physics in INCEPTION.

Dream a little dream with the 23rd episode of the Cinefantastique Podcast, as Dan Persons, Lawrence French, and Steve Biodrowski analyze INCEPTION, Christopher Nolan’s multi-leveled special effects extravaganza about invading other people’s dreams to steal or plant ideas. Is it the thinking person’s action-packed blockbuster? Or is this dream one in which (to paraphrase Freud) an exploding car is just an exploding car? Find out, along with the usual recap of weekly news, upcoming events, and home video releases.

IN THIS EPISODE:

1. News
2. Opening in Theaters
3. Discussion: INCEPTION
4. New on Home Video
5. New at cfqmag.com

Podcast: Download (Duration: 41:14 — 37.7MB)

In CFQ’s Post-Mortem Podcast (or should that be Podcast Post-Mortem?), Dan Persons, Lawrence French, and Steve Biodrowski offer a free-form follow-up to the regular Cinefantastique Podcast, including further in-depth insights on the minutia of PREDATORS and a look at the week’s other big genre release, DESPICABLE ME, the hilarious 3-D animated film from Universal Pictures. Also included at no extra cost: films that inspired Stendhal Syndrome-like reactions (i.e., mind-blowing) and films that inspired “morning after” regret (i.e., “Why did I ever think that was any good?”).

Podcast: Download (Duration: 1:06:59 — 61.3MB)

An Even Dangerouser Game: Adrien Brody (right) and Alice Braga (center) take point in PREDATORS.

This week, the Cinefantastique Podcast sets its sights on PREDATORS, produced by Robert Rodriguez and directed by Nimrod Antal, from a screenplay by Alex Litvak and Michael Finch. Is this sequel to PREDATOR (1987) a brilliant pop culture mediation on the ability of the human spirit to triumph in dire circumstances, or is it merely a crushing disappointment that fails to deliver on the promise of its trailer? Listen in to find the answers to these and other intriguing questions, along with the usual roundup of news, events, and home video releases in the world of science fiction, fantasy, and horror film.

Podcast: Download (Duration: 18:22 — 16.9MB)

Left to right: Annette Bening, Julianne Moore, Josh Hutcherson, Mia Wasikowska, Mark Ruffalo in THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT.

In my discussion with director Lisa Cholodenko about her new film, THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT — about a sperm donor (Mark Ruffalo) abruptly entering the lives of a lesbian couple (Annette Bening and Julianne Moore) whose children were spawned from his seed — I mentioned to her that the tone felt distinctly Southern Californian. Just to be clear: Despite my typical, knee-jerk attitude as a chauvinistic New Yorker, that comment wasn’t meant as a slap. It’s just that there’s something in the trappings of the characters’ lives, in their careers (Ruffalo plays a locavorish restaurateur; Moore is a landscaper), and in the overall sunny feel of the film even as relationships are being fractured and reassembled, that left me feeling that, though this story could really have taken place anywhere, it couldn’t have played out quite as it does in this particular setting.

Which is good, I think. The left coast locale provides context to the way Bening and Moore style themselves as models of a progressive, twenty-first century couple, and a affords a certain, reassuring optimism as the complications thrown in the characters’ paths become increasingly challenging. As with her previous film, HIGH ART, Cholodenko knows how to dig under the skin of modern relationships, without shortchanging her characters or overselling the drama. Turns out it’s not suprising that this is coming out in the summer — KIDS is a cool counterpoint to all the massive explosions and CG aliens that have invaded theaters elsewhere.

Click on the player to hear the interview.

This Episode is Brought to You by:
THE KARATE KID
Play the Game!

Read the rest of this entry »

Podcast: Download (Duration: 39:30 — 36.2MB)

In the second Cinefantastique Post-Mortem Pocast, your trio of talented talkers (i.e., Dan Persons, Lawrence French, and Steve Biodrowski) leave the recorder running after their episode dedicated to PREDATORS, THE LAST AIRBENDER, and THE TWILIGHT SAGA: ECLIPSE – offering free-form observations, rants, suppositions, and confessions. Included is a discussion of the non-horror – but still frightening – hard-boiled film noir, THE KILLER INSIDE ME, based on the Jim Thompson novel. Explored is the subject of whether 3-D is better suited to theme park rides – like Universal Studios Hollywood’s new King Kong 360 3-D – than it is to narrative feature film. And answered is the question: Is watching DARK SHADOWS an adequate antidote for sitting through THE TWILIGHT SAGA: ECLIPSE?

Podcast: Download (Duration: 1:22:30 — 75.5MB)

Bent Elements and Straight Love: THE LAST AIRBENDER (left) and THE TWILIGHT SAGA: ECLIPSE.

It’s a double-dose of photodramatic discussion, disputation, and dissention on this week’s episode of the the Cinefantastique Podcast, as Dan Persons, Steve Biodrowski, and Lawrence French take on romantic vampires, macho werewolves, and elemental airbenders. Does THE TWILIGHT SAGA: ECLIPSE deliver? Can the post-production 3-D conversion process add depth to M. Night Shyamalan’s live-action adaptation of Nickelodeon’s THE LAST AIRBENDER? Plus: an interview with director Nimrod Antal about his work on the upcoming PREDATORS, and other news from the worlds of science fiction, fantasy, and horror, all delivered with lightning rounds of rapier wit and incisive analysis.

Podcast: Download (Duration: 43:10 — 39.5MB)

This week features a bold new experiment in podcasting, the likes of which have seldom if ever been seen in our lifetimes! At the end of this week’s Cinefantastique Horror, Fantasy & Science Fiction Podcast 1:20, we let the recorder run on just to see what happened. The result is the Cinefantastique Post-Mortem Podcast, a free-form chat among Dan Persons, Lawrence French, and Steve Biodrowski, who hash over uber-geek details and issues too esoteric to be included in the regular podcast.

For this week’s debut, they follow up on the Cinefantastique Podcast 1:20, which delivered 50th anniversary tributes to a trio of classic horror films from 1960. The Post-Mortem Podcast delves into some of the myths and legends surrounding Alfred Hitchcock’s PSYCHO. Also on the menu: a discussion of whether the legacy of STAR WARS and JAWS can be held responsible for today’s summer blockbusters, an issue addressed in this previous Sense of Wonder editorial.