Another Kind Of Distance: A Time Travel, Twin Peaks, Film, Doom Patrol And Nostalgia Podcast

  For our Valentine's 2024 episode we looked at two movies about obsession that interrogate the notion of romantic love: Alfred Hitchcock's Marnie (1964) and Chantal Akerman's La Captive (2000). If you think an extensive discussion of sexual assault and of what it would mean to be "pressed to death" by your partner's love sounds like essential Valentine's Day content, this episode is for you. And in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, a very brief discussion of Douglas Sirk's Written on the Wind, focusing on the wild performances of Robert Stack and Dorothy Malone.  Time Codes: 0h 00m 35s:      MARNIE (1964) [dir. Alfred Hitchcock] 0h 55m 47s:      LA CAPTIVE (2000) [dir. Chantal Akerman] 1h 20m 42s:      Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – TIFF Cinémathèque – Written on the Wind (1956) by Douglas Sirk +++ * Listen to our guest episode on The Criterion Project – a discussion of Late Spring * Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s * Intro Song: “Sunday” by Jean Goldkette

Our Fox 1945 episode features two of the greatest and greatest-looking film noirs: Otto Preminger's Fallen Angel and John M. Stahl's Leave Her to Heaven. We unpack the movies' love triangles, in which two strong-willed women exert their influence over a passive man; their treatment of the topics of love and obsession; the unique cinematic qualities of Alice Faye's presence and Gene Tierney's face; how Gene Tierney and Linda Darnell differ from the stereotypical femme fatale - and much more.  Time Codes: 0h 00m 35s:      FALLEN ANGEL [dir. Otto Preminger] 0h 36m 39s:      LEAVE HER TO HEAVEN [dir. John M. Stahl]    Studio Film Capsules provided by The Films of 20th Century-Fox by Aubrey Solomon and Tony Thomas Additional studio information from: The Hollywood Story by Joel W. Finler                                     +++ * Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s * Intro Song: “Sunday” by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Arc

For this week's Acteurist Oeuvre-view episode we watched two films pairing acteur Lilli Palmer with then-husband Rex Harrison. We discuss the potential relationship of thriller/courtroom drama The Long Dark Hall (1951) to the scandal plaguing their marriage at the time and consider The Four Poster (1952) as a "marriage film," and what it has to say about that social and spiritual state. And in a packed Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto segment, we talk about five films from the TIFF Cinematheque's “Alone in the Arena” series: Rounders (1998), When We Were Kings (1996), He Got Game (1998), Any Given Sunday (1999), and The Color of Money (1986). Elise reveals that one of these movies finally made her understand what it feels like to care about a sport.  Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:      THE LONG DARK HALL (1951) [dir. Anthony Bushell & Reginald Beck] 0h 20m 06s:      THE FOUR POSTER (1952) [dir. Irving Reis] 0h 37m 37s:      Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – TIFF Cinémathèque’s “Alone in the Arena” series – Rou

For our January Special Subject, we look at three silent "family comedies" by Ozu, Tokyo Chorus (1931), I Was Born, But... (1932), and Passing Fancy (1933), although we argue that "comedy" doesn't entirely encompass the emotional range of these films. We argue that the melancholy of late Ozu is already discernible in these tales of father-son conflict and confrontation with life's disappointing nature, although Passing Fancy offers a different kind of father-son relationship and unique brand of comedy. Then in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, we discuss Robert Rossen's The Hustler as a blacklisting allegory and the cinematic pyrotechnics of Brian De Palma's Snake Eyes.  Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:      TOKYO CHORUS (1931) [dir. Yasujiro Ozu] 0h 26m 53s:      I WAS BORN, BUT… (1932) [dir. Yasujiro Ozu] 0h 38m 36s:      PASSING FANCY (1933) [dir. Yasujiro Ozu] 0h 57m 41s:      Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – The Hustler (1961) directed by Robert Rossen & Snake Eyes (1998) directed by Brian De Palma +++ *

This Lilli Palmer Acteurist Oeuvre-view episode tackles two more films made with leftist colleagues, Elliott Nugent's My Girl Tisa, a Popular Front-style tale of early 20th century immigrants and the American Dream, and Lewis Milestone’s quirky, stylistically inventive comedy No Minor Vices (written by Arnold Manoff). We also watched François Villiers' fascinating Hans le Marin (also known as Wicked City), a vehicle for Maria Montez co-starring and co-written by her husband, Jean-Pierre Aumont, which Elise considers the Frenchest movie she's ever seen; Palmer co-stars as the Romani rival to Aumont's obsession. And in our Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto segment, we talk about Kira Muratova's The Long Farewell (1971), a saga of the tormenting love between a mother and her teenage son, told in a distinctive style that did not find favour with the Soviet authorities during the Brezhnev era.  Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:      MY GIRL TISA (1948) [dir. Elliott Nugent] 0h 25m 40s:      NO MINOR VICES (1948) [dir. Lew

For this round of Warner Bros. 1945, we take on a very successful movie with two very big stars and one very terrible reputation, Saratoga Trunk, with Ingrid Bergman and Gary Cooper, and a fascinating little B noir, Danger Signal, with Zachary Scott being his usual cheeky self and getting women upset. We discuss the stylistic risks of Saratoga Trunk, the genius of Ingrid Bergman, the subtleties of Gary Cooper, and Danger Signal's unusual feminist screenplay (from a novel by FOTP Phyllis Bottome). And in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, we deliver a quick verdict on the final entry in TIFF Cinematheque's Lubitsch series, Design for Living.    Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:      Warner Brothers Overview, 1945 0h 03m 59s:      SARATOGA TRUNK (1945) [dir. Sam Wood] 0h 35m 05s:      DANGER SIGNAL (1945) [dir. Robert Florey] 0h 55m 38s:      Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – Ernst Lubitsch Retrospective at TIFF Cinémathèque: Design For Living (1933)   Studio Film Capsules provided by The Warner Brothers Story by Cli

In this Lilli Palmer Acteurist Oeuvre-view episode, we discuss Palmer's first two Hollywood films, Fritz Lang's anti-fascist spy drama, Cloak and Dagger (1946), and Robert Rossen's socially critical boxing noir, Body and Soul (1947). We dig into the social context of these films, asking why these progressive writers and directors wanted to tell these stories at this moment, and how their political sympathies shaped the stories. We also talk about the persona emerging from Lilli Palmer's wartime British and American films, and her character in Body and Soul as representing the filmmakers' perspective on John Garfield's protagonist. And in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, our attendance of the Lubitsch retrospective at the TIFF Cinematheque continues with Trouble in Paradise and a Christmas Eve viewing of The Shop Around the Corner, which prompt us to a brief consideration of the underlying (and sometimes overt) social criticism of Lubitsch's Depression-era films.    Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:      CLOAK AND D

For our December 2023 Special Subject, we're having ourselves a Monty Woolley Christmas! We look at three Christmas-adjacent movies from the 1940s featuring the anti-Santa in roles big and small: The Man Who Came to Dinner, in which he stars as  waspish radio personality Sheridan Whiteside, who takes over the home of a bourgeois Middle American couple; Life Begins at Eight-Thirty, in which he plays a great actor who's been broken by alcoholism; and The Bishop's Wife, in which he adds some New York Bohemian intellectual colour to the holiday classic. We discuss the cultural and political implications of The Man Who Came to Dinner and the uncanniness of Cary Grant and debate the appeal of alcoholism. Then in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, we briefly discuss Ernst Lubitsch's Cluny Brown (fully discussed in our Jennifer Jones series) and a new release, a Christmas movie even darker than our Monty Woolleys, William Oldroyd's Eileen, starring Thomasin McKenzie and Anne Hathaway (a rare spoiler-free exchange of im

In this week's MGM 1945 episode, a Vincente Minnelli double feature: The Clock, a wartime romantic drama with two very intense stars, Judy Garland and Robert Walker, that doubles as a love poem to New York City; and a Technicolor musical fantasy about, in Dave's words (more or less), "A woman who wants to bleep an angel," starring Lucille Bremer as the woman and Fred Astaire as the angel. And in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, four Lubitsch movies over two weekends: To Be or Not to Be, The Love Parade, Heaven Can Wait, and Ninotchka. Play "Masterpiece or Meh?" with Elise with these six movies, and hear Dave defend two "mehs" as "masterpieces"! (Or "meh-sterpieces"?) (No, "masterpieces"!) Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:      MGM/Hollywood Overview, 1945 0h 04m 27s:      THE CLOCK [dir. Vincente Minnelli] 0h 40m 20s:      YOLANDA & THE THIEF [dir. Vincente Minnelli] 0h 56m 00s:      Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – Ernst Lubitsch Retrospective at TIFF Cinémathèque, Part I: To Be Or Not To Be, The Love Parade

In this Lilli Palmer Acteurist Oeuvre-view episode we take a look at a Lilli Palmer who's (mostly) new to us, Lilli the victim: the victim of self-destructive womanizer Rex Harrison (Palmer's real-life husband) in Launder and Gilliat's enigmatic social satire The Rake's Progress (1945), and the self-destructive paralysis victim of Beware of Pity (1946), based on the Stefan Zweig novel. Which of these adversaries is harder to contend with? Listen to find out!  Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:      THE RAKE’S PROGRESS (1945) [dir. Sidney Gilliat] 0h 42m 03s:      BEWARE OF PITY (1946) [dir. Maurice Elvey] +++ Bibliography: Babington, Bruce, Launder and Gilliat, Manchester University Press, 2013.   +++ * Listen to our guest episode on The Criterion Project – a discussion of Late Spring * Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s * Intro Song: “Sunday” by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive) * Read Elise’s piece on Gangs of New York –

For this Paramount 1945 episode, we look at a couple of male melodramas: The Man in Half Moon Street, a Gothic B-movie starring Nils Asther, "the most beautiful man who ever lived," according to Elise, as a scientist who becomes unscrupulous in his pursuit of eternal youth, and Salty O'Rourke, a Raoul Walsh-directed hit starring Alan Ladd as a racetrack gambler who manipulates an unruly young jockey. The movies also boast fairly substantial love interest parts for Helen Walker as a socialite who sympathizes with Asther's Ubermensch impulses and Gail Russell as a schoolteacher who's caught up in Ladd's schemes. We dive into the question of how to create audience sympathy for a villain-protagonist and the curious nature of the Ladd phenomenon.  Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:      THE MAN IN HALF MOON STREET [dir. Ralph Murphy] 0h 31m 53s:      SALTY O’ROURKE [dir. Raoul Walsh]   Studio Film Capsules provided by The Paramount Story by John Douglas Eames Additional studio information from: The Hollywood Story by Joe

For our Ozu Noir-vember Special Subject, we look at three silent films by Yasujirō Ozu, Walk Cheerfully (1930), That Night's Wife (1930), and Dragnet Girl (1933), that not only bear a fascinating relationship to each other but also seemingly inaugurate the gangster film in Japan and anticipate (we argue) American film noir more closely even than French poetic realism, as well as the Nouvelle Vague. Join us as we marvel at Ozu's rapid evolution as a stylist and storyteller in the space of three years, and stick around to listen to our Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto segment on Scorsese's Killers of the Flower Moon.  Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:      WALK CHEERFULLY (1930) [dir. Yasujiro Ozu] 0h 23m 49s:      THAT NIGHT’S WIFE (1930) [dir. Yasujiro Ozu] 0h 37m 54s:      DRAGNET GIRL (1934) [dir. Yasujiro Ozu] 1h 01m 53s:      Fear & Moviegoing in Toronto – Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon (2023)  +++ * Listen to our guest episode on The Criterion Project – a discussion of Late Spring * Marvel

We dig into some substantial British cinema offerings in a Lilli Palmer Acteurist Oeuvre-view episode that's heavy on wartime themes: Thunder Rock (1942), a philosophical examination of the disillusionment of a leftist; dramatically illustrated in a surprising way; The Gentle Sex (1943), Leslie Howard's eccentric and affecting semi-documentary about women in the British Army; and English Without Tears (1944), Terence Rattigan and Anatole de Grunwald's examination of the transformations taking place in British society as the result of the war in the form of a romantic comedy with a slightly kinky outlook (but don't tell Aunt Edna). Lilli Palmer contributes her comedic and dramatic talents and the gravitas of her personal history to these wonderful ensemble casts.  Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:      THUNDER ROCK (1942) [dirs. Roy & John Boulting] 0h 46m 08s:      THE GENTLE SEX (1943) [dir. Leslie Howard] 0h 59m 38s:       ENGLISH WITHOUT TEARS (1944) [dir. Harold French] +++ Reading on THUNDER ROCK from Ha

We weren't sure what to expect with our Universal 1944 "scary woman"-themed episode, but Cobra Woman, starring the riveting Maria Montez, delivered, and the completely unknown Weird Woman, starring the less-than-riveting Lon Chaney Jr., was a surprise gem that seems to be nodding to Val Lewton's work at RKO. This episode causes us to ask such questions as: what is acting? Can anyone in these movies "act"? Does it matter? When are B-movies inherently sophisticated, and when are they deliberately sophisticated? Does that difference matter? To hear the answers to these questions (or, let's face it, probably just more questions), just press play and enter the Inner Sanctum of our pulsating flesh! (Our mind, what did you think I meant?) Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:      WEIRD WOMAN [dir. Reginald Le Borg] 0h 40m 20s:      COBRA WOMAN [dir. Robert Siodmak]    Studio Film Capsules provided by The Universal Story by Clive Hirschhorn Additional studio information from: The Hollywood Story by Joel W. Finler          

This week's Acteurist-Oeuvre-view shows us two sides of Lilli Palmer: Bad Lilli in a comic supporting role, brawling with fellow chorus girl Renée Houston and competing with a demure Margaret Lockwood over wealthy patrons in Carol Reed's A Girl Must Live (1939); and Good Lilli assuming the lead in B-mystery The Door with Seven Locks (1940), seeking adventure with comic sidekick Gina Malo. It ain't Noël Coward, but we had fun.  Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:      A GIRL MUST LIVE (1939) [dir. Carol Reed] 0h 24m 30s:     THE DOOR WITH SEVEN LOCKS (1940) [dir. Norman Lee] 0h 42m 57s:      Listener mail from Richard +++ * Listen to our guest episode on The Criterion Project – a discussion of Late Spring * Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s * Intro Song: “Sunday” by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive) * Read Elise’s piece on Gangs of New York – “Making America Strange Again” * Check out Dave’s Robert Benchley blog – an atte

For our Halloween 2023 episode, we take you on a tour of Peyton Place—the 1956 novel by Grace Metalious, 1957 Fox movie starring Lana Turner, and the mid-late-60s TV series starring Dorothy Malone and Mia Farrow (among many others) that reinvented television. We discuss the strange journey of Metalious's scabrous and scathing vision from satire to soap opera, in the course of which the story of shack-dweller Selena Cross's violation by her stepfather becomes the story of lower-middle-class Betty Anderson's resentful ambition, while ostensible protagonist Allison MacKenzie goes from being a bit of a jerk to being a nightmare of willfulness. But which versions of the story influenced David Lynch the most? We give our surmises.    Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:    Peyton Place by Grace Metalious 0h 42 m 52s:   PEYTON PLACE (1957) [dir. Mark Robson] 1h 02m 26s:    PEYTON PLACE – TV SERIES (1964 to 1969) +++ * Listen to our guest episode on The Criterion Project – a discussion of Late Spring * Marvel at our meticulo

This week's RKO 1944 episode brings a Hollywood slant to an English working-class perspective on the war. In her only first-billed feature film role, in Passport to Destiny, Elsa Lanchester plays an indomitable charwoman who embarks upon a self-appointed mission to assassinate Hitler after coming to believe that she's magically protected, while in None But the Lonely Heart, American playwright Clifford Odets' directorial debut, Cary Grant plays a Cockney dreamer who struggles with the reality of lower-class life during the Depression after trying to settle down and take care of his dying mother. We discuss the similarity in style and subject matter between None But the Lonely Heart and the poetic realist films of 1930s French cinema, and the curiosity of this underrated art movie being made by RKO so soon after its infamous entanglement with Orson Welles' similarly grim and poetic Magnificent Ambersons. If you've ever wanted to hear Dave start crying by recounting a crying scene, this is your chance.  Time

Our second Lilli Palmer Acteurist Oeuvre-view episode sees the rising young star second-billed as the love interest in a couple of strange enterprises: Command Performance (1937), a vehicle for popular American tenor Arthur Tracy, and Crackerjack (1938), an unhinged crime comedy starring Aldwych farces alumnus Tom Walls as a criminal superhero. As Lilli tries to orient herself in film acting, Dave and Elise try to orient themselves in this unfamiliar territory of 30s British cinema and its popular figures.  Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:    General Lilli Palmer talk + a little from Change Lobsters and Dance (Palmer’s autobiography) 0h 04m 17s:    COMMAND PERFORMANCE (1937) [dir. Sinclair Hill] 0h 25m 12s:    CRACKERJACK (1938) [dir. Albert de Courville] +++ * Listen to our guest episode on The Criterion Project – a discussion of Late Spring * Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s * Intro Song: “Sunday” by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Int

Our Fox 1944 episode features a prestige production, The Eve of St. Mark, based on a Maxwell Anderson play and directed by John Stahl, and a modest marital drama, In the Meantime, Darling, directed by Otto Preminger just before he makes a name for himself in noir with Laura. Between the two, the problems facing the men at the front and the women who love them are covered, as well as the kinds of moral dilemmas each might face. We discuss Preminger's handling of Jeanne Craine's character, and Bosley Crowther (back to being Nemesis of the Pod) inadvertently describes John Stahl's distinctive style/outlook. Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:      THE EVE OF ST. MARK [dir. John M. Stahl] 0h 33m 04s:      IN THE MEANTIME, DARLING [dir. Otto Preminger]       Studio Film Capsules provided by The Films of 20th Century-Fox by Aubrey Solomon & Tony Thomas   Additional studio information from: The Hollywood Story by Joel W. Finler                                     +++ * Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Vi

In our first Lilli Palmer Acteurist Oeuvre-view episode, we spend some time with Lilli in England and take in her screen debut, in the "Quota Quickie" Crime Unlimited (1935); her small role in Hitchcock's eccentric Secret Agent (1936), in which she gets to play with an unhinged Peter Lorre; and a thankless role in a lyrical ode to Canadian nation-building a.k.a. labour exploitation, The Great Barrier (1937). Then, in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, we grapple with Angela Schanelec's Music, the one 2023 TIFF festival movie we got out to see, and our first time seeing a Schanelec on a really big screen, which was the right way to see this visually stunning film.  Time Codes: 0h 00m 45s:    Preliminary Words on Lilli Palmer    0h 05m 12s:    CRIME UNLIMITED (1935) [dir. Ralph Ince] 0h 22m 51s:    SECRET AGENT (1936) [dir. Alfred Hitchcock] 0h 34m 47s:    THE GREAT BARRIER (1937) [dirs. Milton Rosmer and Geoffrey Barkas] 0h 47m 51s:    Fear & Moviegoing in Toronto – TIFF’s presentation of Angela Schanelec’s