Zombies want brains. Vampires want blood. Cannibals want human flesh. All monsters need feeding. Horror has been embraced by mainstream pop culture more than ever before, with horror characters and aesthetics infecting TV, music videos and even TikTok trends. Yet even with the commercial and critical success of The Babadook, Hereditary, Get Out, The Haunting of Hill House, Yellowjackets and countless other horror films and TV series over the last few years, loving the genre still prompts the...

Terrence Malick's first film Badlands (1973) introduced the world to a new visionary talent. Tom Shone joins me to talk through the film. The biography The Magic Hours is available from all good book shops and online sources, including here. Camille Saint-Saëns: Le Carnaval des Animaux Performers Pianos: Neil and Nancy O'Doan Orchestra: Seattle Youth Symphony, conducted by Vilem Sokol. Composed 1886; recorded c. 1980. Source The Al Goldstein collection in the Pandora Music repository at...

Dr. Sheri Chinen Biesen is Professor of Film History at Rowan University and author of Through a Noir Lens: Adapting Film Noir Visual Style (Columbia University Press, 2024), Blackout: World War II and the Origins of Film Noir (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2005), Music in the Shadows: Noir Musical Films (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014), and Film Censorship: Regulating America’s Screen (Columbia University Press, 2018). She received her Ph.D. at the University of Texas at Austin, M.A....

The best horror film ever made? The Texas Chainsaw Massacre for me is certainly the most unnerving and scariest to this day. Leatherface and his family wreak terror on a group of unsuspecting teenagers as they stray onto the family farm. James Rose's monograph for Devil's Advocate is a superb introduction, explication, and an in depth history of the making and reception of the film. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about...

Steven Cohan talks about his new book: On Audrey Hepburn: an Opinionated Guide Provides an original take on fashion in her films and shows how it was key to her popularity Focuses on Hepburn's abilities and craft as an actress; Offers a substantive and critical analysis of her “Cinderella” films as a discernible cycle; Argues that her striking success and popularity as a movie star was not only due to her unique physical features but to specific factors of postwar culture in the 1950s. Get...

I talk to Professor Jie Li, the winner of the Kraszna-Krausz Prize Moving Image Book Award. Please note she will be delivering a lecture in London later in November, details below. Friday 29th November, 6pm Venue: BLOC, ArtsOne, Queen Mary University of London, Mile End Road London E1 4NS Free to attend, booking essential Click here to book The Foundation is delighted to be collaborating with Queen Mary University, London to present an evening celebrating the winner of this year’s Moving...

In all his films, Wes Anderson turns the mundane into magic by building distinctive and eccentric worlds. But how well do you know the man behind the camera? Discover the inspirations of one of our most revered auteurs with The Worlds of Wes Anderson. Anderson’s playful and vibrant aesthetic is universally admired – but how has he managed to create such a recognisable identity? From Hitchcock and Spielberg to Truffaut and Varda, there are countless homages and references scattered throughout...

Dr. Benjamin Halligan joins John Bleasdale to talk about Hotbeds of Licentiousness, the first substantial critical engagement with British pornography on film across the 1970s, including the “Summer of Love,” the rise and fall of the Permissive Society, the arrival of Margaret Thatcher, and beyond. By focusing on a series of colorful filmmakers whose work, while omnipresent during the 1970s, now remains critically ignored, author Benjamin Halligan discusses pornography in terms of lifestyle...

The first major biography of the French filmmaker hailed by Martin Scorsese as “one of the Gods of cinema.” Over the course of her sixty-five-year career, the longest of any female filmmaker, Agnès Varda (1928–2019) wrote and directed some of the most acclaimed films of her era, from her tour de force Cléo from 5 to 7 (1962), a classic of modernist cinema, to the beloved documentary The Gleaners and I (2000) four decades later. She helped to define the French New Wave, inspired an entire...

Jason Solomons has been a film critic, one of the first film podcasters, an author and is now moving into a new role as a film producer with his company Movie Love Productions. He's currently working on adapting and bringing the brilliant best-selling memoir A Waiter in Paris to cinemas; and on the folk horror comedy The King of the Witches, based on a true story that’s never been told. His book Woody Allen: Film by Film is available where all good books are sold. Get bonus content on...

Jez Conolly is the author of the Devil's Advocate edition of his book The Thing (available here) as well as an essay in Volume 3 of Scarred for Life (see here). Consigned to the deep freeze of critical and commercial reception upon its release in 1982, The Thing has bounced back spectacularly to become one of the most highly regarded productions from the 1980s 'Body Horror' cycle of films, experiencing a wholesale and detailed reappraisal that has secured its place in the pantheon of modern...

John Bleasdale talks about Paul Verhoeven, the Coen Brothers, Paul Thomas Anderson, Quentin Tarantino, David Fincher and film bros with Adam Nayman, author of Paul Thomas Anderson Masterworks and The Coen Brothers. Adam talks about his beginnings as film critic in Toronto. He also tells John his thoughts on the current state of film criticism, including the impact on social media on the film discourse. Adam's recommended film book is Un-American Psycho: Brian De Palma and the Political...

Euronews journalists David Mouriquand and Amber Bryce are joined by Sarah Bradbury of the UpComing to talk the 81st Venice Film Festival with myself, John Bleasdale. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/writers-on-film. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Joker: Folie à Deux hits Cannes and I am joined by David Mouriquand and Amber Bryce of EuroNews to talk about Todd Phillips' sequel starring Lady Gaga and joaquin Phoenix, and if it can live up to expectations. Live from the 81st Venice Film Festival. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/writers-on-film. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Day 6 or 7 of the Venice Film Festival and David Mouriquand and Amber Brice from EuroNews join me to talk about The Brutalist, The Room Next Door and Queer. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/writers-on-film. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Angelina Jolie and Nicole Kidman are on the Lido with two new films which are going to put them back in the headlines. David Mouriquand from EuroNews joins me to discuss the films Maria and Babygirl in the second of our Venice reports. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/writers-on-film. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

David Mouriquand from EuroNews and Nicholas Bell from Eye on Cinema join John Bleasdale to talk about Tim Burton's Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, the opening film of the 81st edition of the Venice Film Festival. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/writers-on-film. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Chris Calogero became a viral sensation with his videos skewering movie clichés, so I had to get him on the podcast to talk police lieutenants and filthy coroners. His new comedy album HUSKY BOY can be ordered here and all the information you want is available from his site, here. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/writers-on-film. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

John Bleasdale talks to Michael Benson on his book Space Odyssey: Stanley Kubrick, Arthur C Clarke and the Making of a Masterpiece. Buy the Book Here. The definitive story of the making of 2001: A Space Odyssey , acclaimed today as one of the greatest films ever made, and of director Stanley Kubrick and writer Arthur C. Clarke- "a tremendous explication of a tremendous film....Breathtaking" ( The Washington Post ). Fifty years ago a strikingly original film had its premiere. Still acclaimed...

Ehsan Khoshbakht, curator of the Retrospective: “How to tell the story of a leading Hollywood studio while both teasing out the nuances and stressing the significance of canonical titles worthy of continued celebration? This has been the main challenge for our 40-title retrospective mapping Columbia Pictures’ glorious rise from Poverty Row to major force in Hollywood. ‘Lady with the Torch’ is an unofficial history of Columbia Pictures that celebrates big names, Oscar winners, and era-defining...

Lawrence Kasdan has created some of the most influential films in Hollywood history. He is the screenwriter of such beloved blockbusters as The Empire Strikes Back (1980), Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), The Bodyguard (1992), and The Force Awakens (2015). Simultaneously, he has gained critical acclaim as the director of pictures that dissect contemporary American society: Body Heat (1981), The Big Chill (1983), The Accidental Tourist (1988), and Grand Canyon (1991). Brett Davies is Associate...

John Bleasdale talks to Julie Salamon the author of The Devil's Candy, The Bonfire of the Vanities Goes to Hollywood. The book is available here. The book was also the basis for the podcast series The Plot Thickens which you can listen to here. “So much better, so much more fun, than the movie it is about that one must be thankful to the filmmakers for producing such a spectacle, if only so that this book could be written.”—Vogue   When film director Brian De Palma invited author Julie...

John Bleasdale talks to author Mark Harris about his books Pictures from the Revolution and his recent biography of Mike NIchols. Mark's recommended book is Jason Bailey's Fun City Cinema, available here. Here's the blurb to Mark's most recent book: An instant New York Times Bestseller! A magnificent biography of one of the most protean creative forces in American entertainment history, a life of dazzling highs and vertiginous plunges--some of the worst largely unknown until now--by the...

Movies Go Fourth is a celebration of the fourth movies in the most popular film franchises of all time. It offers behind-the-scenes stories of fourth films from such beloved series as Star Wars, Star Trek, and James Bond. It also explores infamous fourth films, including Jaws: The Revenge, Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, and Batman & Robin. This riveting book reveals the inside scoop on some of the biggest films in horror (Halloween, Nightmare on Elm Street), sci-fi...