Episodes
This week, we're headed to Harvard Law (what, like it's hard?) as J Mo cashes in a recent thrift store pick-up so we'd have something light and breezy to discuss in the wake of recent events. It's 2001's Legally Blonde, directed by Robert Luketic, and starring Reese Witherspoon, Luke Wilson, Selma Blair, Matthew Davis, Victor Garber, Holland Taylor, Jennifer Coolidge, Ali Larter, Osgood Perkins, Raquel Welch and Linda Cardellini. A box office hit that spawned a sequel, a broadway musical...
Published 11/15/24
This week, like the sand-people of Arrakis and Beetlejuice audiences before us, we're afraid of worms (worms!) as guest Rachel Hadaway (of Rachel's Chart Chat on The People Are The Enemy) goes for a steeply inclined stroll with us to breathe the mountain air in beautiful Nelson, Washington as circle back to the coziness of the Steve Martin rom-com. It's 1987's Roxanne, directed by Fred Schepisi, written by Steve Martin, and starring Martin opposite Daryl Hannah, Shelley Duvall, Rick...
Published 11/08/24
Published 11/08/24
Games? Must we? This week we're leaving Spooktober behind us and kicking off No-Theme-ber with a bang, as King Bob frontman and Roxy Fever host Jackson McDonald returns with our second Hitchcock in just three weeks as he redeems himself by bringing a cross-country spy thriller to the table that set the template for summer thrills for everything that's come after it. Yes, it's 1959's North by Northwest, directed by Alfred Hitchcock, written by Ernest Lehman, and starring Cary Grant, Eva Marie...
Published 11/01/24
It's the end of Spooktober... nobody trusts anybody now and we're all very tired, as we chill out with the original prince of podcasting RJ MacReady and John Carpenter's frozen freakfest takes its rightful place in the pod pantheon. It's 1982's The Thing, directed by John Carpenter, written by Bill Lancaster, and starring Kurt Russell, Wilford Brimley, Keith David and Donald Moffat. An absolute masterclass in the art of practical make-up and on-camera special effects, it's a movie that still...
Published 10/25/24
This week, Spooktober continues with what is widely regarded as one of the most frightening films of all time, as a British master of cinema scares turns his sights to the skies with an eco-horror story that dares to ask... what if birds were jerks? It's 1963's The Birds, directed by Alfred Hitchcock, based on a short story by Daphne du Maurier, and starring Tippi Hedren, Rod Taylor, Jessica Tandy, Suzanne Plechet and a young Veronica Cartwright. Time has not been the kindest to this old...
Published 10/18/24
This week, we're checking in to the heartbreak hotel and taking the express checkout to Hell as Spooktober continues with a minor forgotbuster based on a story by Stephen King. It's 2007's 1408, directed by Mikael Håfström, and starring John Cusack, Samuel L. Jackson, Mary McCormack, Jasmine Jessica Anthony, Tony Shaloub, Isiah Whitlock Jr. and Len Cariou. The movie is not nearly scary enough to really leave a lasting impression, but it's not bad either, as its Swedish director injects a good...
Published 10/11/24
This week, we kick off Spooktober with the original horror anthology film, a collaboration between two titans of the genre from two different mediums as the king of horror movies brings to life a script from the King of horror fiction to create a loving homage to the creepy comic books they both grew up reading. It's 1982's Creepshow, directed by George A. Romero, written by Stephen King, and starring Hal Holbrook, Adrienne Barbeau, Fritz Weaver, Leslie Nielsen, Ted Danson, Ed Harris and...
Published 10/04/24
This week, SepTIMEber concludes with another charming British time travel rom-com that segues into fam-dram territory before it reaches the finish line. It's 2013's About Time, written and directed by Richard Curtis, and starring Domhnall Gleason, Rachel McAdams, Bill Nighy, Tom Hollander, Margot Robbie, Lydia Wilson, Vanessa Kirby and an uncredited Richard E. Grant. It's once again the final Friday of the month, as even this theme month can not stop the inexorable march of time, and Hayley's...
Published 09/27/24
This week, we're chasing Jack The Ripper through time from 19th century London to 1970s San Francisco and falling in love along the way as SepTIMEber continues with one of the goofier movies we've ever watched for the show. It's 1979's Time After Time, written and directed by Nicholas Meyer and starring Malcolm McDowell, David Warner and Mary Steenburgen. It's a film J Mo torrented more than 15 years ago while searching for an MP3 of the Cyndi Lauper song of the same, it's a tenuous...
Published 09/20/24
This week, SepTIMEber continues as we head back to 14th century France to launch real fireballs out of real trebuchets alongside real Montreal LARPers in a rare misstep from a true master of the popcorn flick. It's 2003's Timeline, directed by Richard Donner, based on the book by Michael Crichton, and starring Paul Walker, Frances O'Connor, Gerard Butler, Billy Connolly, David Thewlis, Anna Friel, Neal McDonough, Ethan Embry, Matt Craven, Michael Sheen, Lambert Wilson, Marton Csokas and...
Published 09/13/24
This week we're watching our fiancée die in increasingly hilarious ways, as we kick off our time-travel theme month SepTIMEber with an early 2000s forgotbuster that's better left in the past. It's 2002's The Time Machine, directed by Simon Wells, written by John Logan, and starring Guy Pearce, Jeremy Irons, Orlando Jones, Mark Addy, Samantha Mumba, Omero Mumba and Sienna Guillory. The story of a man driven mad by loss and the desire to change the past, it's a movie that was directed by H.G....
Published 09/06/24
This week, people always tell us we look like Han Solo as we're closing out P.T.August with one of Anderson's many five-star masterpieces, this time a classic rise-and-fall Hollywood story set in California's other film industry. It's 1997's Boogie Nights, written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, and starring Mark Wahlberg, Burt Reynolds, Julianne Moore, John C. Reilly, Heather Graham, Don Cheadle, Philip Seymour Hoffman, William H. Macy, Thomas Jane, Luis Guzmán, Ricky Jay, Philip Baker...
Published 08/30/24
This week we are once again fumbling our way to the end of a mystery as we're joined by our noir-comedy correspondent, as the great "Wild Eyes" Travis Woloshyn (Boom Pro Wrestling, Percy Jackson & The Olympians) returns to the program to talk a movie that is thematically linked to the last movie he was here to discuss. It's 2014's Inherent Vice, written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson from the novel by Thomas Pynchon, and starring Joaquin Phoenix, Josh Brolin, Owen Wilson, Katherine...
Published 08/24/24
This week, P.T.August continues with P.T.A.'s most recent output, and for the second time this year we're joined once again by the people's champion Matt Pollock to talk about a movie he has been smitten with since its COVID-era theatrical release: it's 2021's Licorice Pizza, written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, and starring Alana Haim, Cooper Hoffman, Sean Penn, Tom Waits, Bradley Cooper, Benny Safdie, Skyler Gisondo, Mary Elizabeth Ellis, Harriet Sansom Harris, and the entire Haim...
Published 08/16/24
P.T.August rolls on with the only PTA movie neither host had seen before embarking on this month-long odyssey, a 1950s period piece set in the London fashion world that seems on the outside like a stuffy Oscar drama but packs some hidden humour in its dramatic depths. It's 2017's Phantom Thread, written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson and starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Vicky Krieps and Lesley Manville. While most folks would might work their way through a filmography in chronological order,...
Published 08/09/24
This week, it's the first week of P.T.August as we're set to spend the next five Fridays indulging in the works of Paul Thomas Anderson, beginning with a Blu-ray J Mo's been carting around for 11 years now without having ever actually watched before now. It's 2012's The Master, written and directed by P.T. Anderson, and starring Joaquin Phoenix, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, Rami Malek, Laura Dern, Jesse Plemons, Ambyr Childers and Kevin J. O'Connor. Watching it now, it feels like PTA...
Published 08/02/24
This week, it wouldn't be the final episode of July if we weren't talking about a huge new theatrical release, but we're doing it a bit differently this time around as for the very first time (officially anyway) we review two movies at the same time! July's canon consideration is 1996's Twister, directed by Jan de Bont and starring Helen Hunt, Bill Paxton, Jami Gertz, Cary Elwes, Lois Smith, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Alan Ruck, Todd Field, Joey Slotnick, Jeremy Davies and Zach Grenier, but we...
Published 07/26/24
We're teeing up next week's big return of the MCU with Deadpool & Wolverine by looking back at the first collaboration between director Shawn Levy and the Huge Jacked Man, a futuristic underdog sports movie about robot boxing. Yes it's 2011's Real Steel, starring Hugh Jackman, Dakota Goyo, Evangeline Lilly, Anthony Mackie, Hope Davis, James Rebhorn and returning ADHD-DVD favourite Kevin Durand. While it's often described as Robot Rocky, it hues much closer to a Robot Over The Top. Based...
Published 07/19/24
This week, after a 40th anniversary sequel went straight to Netflix, we're winding it back to a 23-year-old Eddie Murphy's breakout smash as a capital-M Movie Star. It's 1984's Beverly Hills Cop, directed by Martin Brest, and starring Eddie Murphy, Judge Reinhold, John Ashton, Lisa Eilbacher, Ronny Cox, Steven Berkoff, Jonathan Banks, Bronson Pinchot, and Paul Reiser. This one comes from J Mo's collection as it's a movie he's strangely never seen before, having been burned by other overhyped...
Published 07/12/24
This week, we're getting dragged by the anchor-cable into an ancient war between angry bureaucrats and aloof teleporters as we jump in to the 2008 forgotbuster Jumper, directed by Doug Liman, and starring Hayden Christensen, Samuel L. Jackson, Jamie Bell, Rachel Bilson, Michael Rooker, Diane Lane, Kristen Stewart and AnnaSophia Robb. After a June full of five-star films, we intentionally picked a stinker this week -- though it's a movie J Mo thrifted out of genuine interest, as the talent...
Published 07/05/24
This week, we don't step behind the mic to be an audio driver... we do it because we're driven, as we go under the hood with the Wachowski sisters' much-maligned avant garde anticapitalist art film (for kids!), the 2008 anime adaptation Speed Racer, written and directed by Lana and Lilly Wachowski, and starring Emile Hirsch, Christina Ricci, John Goodman, Susan Sarandon, Matthew Fox, Roger Allam, Hiroyuki Sanada, Benno Fürmann and Richard Roundtree. Turned loose on kid-friendly fare after...
Published 06/28/24
This week, we're heading down to the basement with no regard for our own well-being as an impromptu theme emerges from our weeks-long run of perfect pictures and Masterpiece Month continues with 2007's Zodiac, directed by David Fincher, written by James Vanderbilt, and starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Mark Ruffalo, Robert Downey Jr., Anthony Edwards, Chloë Sevigny, Elias Koteas, John Carroll Lynch, Brian Cox, Philip Baker Hall, Dermot Mulroney, Donal Logue and Charles Fleischer. It's very much a...
Published 06/21/24
This week, it's the start of a beautiful friendship, as of all the gin joints in all the world, this movie had to walk into ours... Yes, Hayley is finally pulling one of the all-time greats down off the shelf as we watch 1942's Casablanca, directed by Michael Curtiz, and starring Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid, Claude Rains, Conrad Veidt, Sydney Greenstreet, Peter Lorre and Dooley Wilson. Widely regarded as one of the most beloved films of all time, it will come as absolutely...
Published 06/14/24
This week, we discover fear pays poor wages as we're joined by comedian and good old Saskatchewan boy Rory Dunn for an unseen classic from his extensive physical media collection, about desperate men on a dangerous mission. It's 1977's Sorcerer, directed by William Friedkin, and starring Roy Scheider, Bruno Cremer, Francisco Rabal, Amidou, Ramon Bieri and Peter Capell. Gorgeously shot and backed by a synth score by Tangerine Dream, it's a white-knuckle thriller, as Friedkin follows up The...
Published 06/07/24