School of Movies

One of the most passionately beloved movies of the 1990s, and indeed all of film history, it is peculiar that while you will meet people who haven't seen this film, you will never meet people who don't like it and gleefully tell you so. The fact that when Shawshank first emerged it was largely ignored or made fun of for having a convoluted name, and lost almost every award it was nominated for to Forrest Gump (coming next week) is remarkable in retrospect. It really only hit and became abidingly popular when it reached television screens. Perhaps the story itself does not suit being sat in a cinema with a lot of strangers feeling awkward and emotionally charged over this prison drama, and it in fact calls for a more intimate, quiet level of attention One thing is for sure, it made for one hell of a podcast, and we were lucky enough to get back Ryan Estrada, our man in South Korea who once again holds a deep connection with this very special movie: www.ryanestrada.com Guest: Ryan Estrada

[School of Movies 2026] Truman Burbank lives a charmed existance, residing on a little island town that is distinctly old fashioned and twee. In reality, Truman's every movement is being broadcast to the viewing planet, and has been since his infancy. But Truman is beginning to suspect something is up, and his unseen father figure Christoph (compellingly played by Ed Harris) is working hard to restore the show to its comforting routine. A surprisingly abiding dramatic sci-fi classic from the late 90s and one of Jim Carrey's finest (and least irritating) performances. This movie is somehow more relevant today in the era of parasocial fixation on people who broadcast their lives all day and night, than it was in the late 90s when this wasn't possible. And welcome back to the show, Ryan Estrada, our man in South Korea who has a special attachment to this multilayered film: www.ryanestrada.com Guest: Ryan Estrada Next Week: The Shawshank Redemption

[School of Movies 2026] 'The Lies of Casablanca'. That was going to be my original title for this episode. When I got to sit down and watch this impeccable film on the big screen, it struck me how often the main characters lie; to each other, to themselves, to us... and yet we as the audience are almost always in the advantagous position of being able to clearly discern each lie. So, Sharon and I delved into a true classic, venerated throughout the second half of the 20th Century, but now somewhat in decline on lists of Greatest Films of All Time, unseated by the works of Christopher Nolan and Denis Villeneuve. However, there is something so very fitting about going back to something powered by nostalgia, its original audience now long-dead, but its central message; 'For the love of god, we must defy Nazis' delivered at a point in history that Hitler still hadn't been beaten, feels more relevent than ever.

[School of Movies 2026] One of the greatest thrillers of the 20th Century, we recorded this show on the 30th Anniversary of Michael Mann's crime epic. This is most definitely NOT a film to watch in twenty-minute chunks on your phone at work! It is a masterfully crafted presentation of the tension between professionalism and emotion, punctuated with ferocious gunfire and transcendant, eliptical music. It is a one-time head-to-head between two of the most celebrated actors of that age, Godfather veterans Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro as a detective and a thief who keep themselves at peak focus to the detriment of their personal lives. It is lightning in a bottle, the kind of career-peak for all involved that you may not instantly adore, but it will linger nonetheless, and whenever you find yourself in a silver-blue pre-sunrise, it will come back to you.

[School of Movies 2025] It has been ten years since Disney relaunched Star Wars in the cinema, delivering what felt like a special globally-unifying grand, historical event... that a bunch of Star wars fans complained felt too much like the 1977 original special globally-unifying grand, historical event. J.J. Abrams has proved over the years that he is far better at restarting big, exciting new worlds off with a bang (as he did with Mission Impossible and Star Trek before this) rather than somehow closing them out with anything approaching that same level of satisfaction (as with Lost and The Rise of Skywalker). But after all these years with all the Star Wars movies and TV and books and comics and video games that have played out since then, is The Force Awakens STILL my unlikely favourite of the whole series that has been with me since my life began in 1980? Yes. Put simply, this film transcends its own oversimplifications to become a joyful celebration of Star Wars, retreading many previous paths with a heartfelt energy the world badly needs again. And in this revisit show, Sharon and I talk about what has changed since we first recorded nearly four hours on it at the end of 2015 along with multiple guests at the opening of the gates to new adventure. That show can be found here, and since we also revisited the third film in the Sequel Trilogy back in 2024 after a serious re-edit allowed me to make peace, that leaves The Last Jedi for some point in the near future.

[School of Movies 2025] Jim Carrey plays Ebeneezer Scrooge in this unsettling adaptation (sometimes intentionally so, sometimes not). Here, we get to talk about what was possible in this performance capture version that has been done nowhere else, making it strange and special and awkward and precious. Continuing our season of going back to the start, we resurrected the Robert Zemekis incarnation of the perennial yuletide Dickens classic (which we covered back in December 2011 in conjunction with Muppet Christmas Carol... the froggy one we subsequently revisited in 2022). This is also part of an ongoing series analysing the five very uneven performance capture animation films of Image Movers Digital, starting with The Polar Express in 2004, graduating to Monster House in 2006 and closing out with the death-rattle of Mars Needs Moms in 2011. All three of those will be featured on our After School Club over the next few weeks. The remaining oddball adaptation of Beowulf from 2007 is our personal favourite of the quintet and we will finally be talking about it next year. This sub-series is also a part of the overall Zemekis Season we are conducting. Coming next year we will also showcase Forest Gump, Here, The Witches and the riotous Death Becomes Her. Also for Carrey fans, we have his second-finest dramatic performance, The Truman Show, coming very soon (the first-finest being this).

[School of Movies 2025] This is another revisit to one of the first films we ever covered, way back on Digital Gonzo at Christmas in 2010. The quintessential Holiday movie for those who want violence and swearing with their jingle bells. But if you go back and watch all five films (the final low-point didn't even exist when we covered this before) you will find some exceptional strengths in this one alone that all relate to precisely how it was constructed. A creative team that didn't realise they were all at the top of their game, impeccable cinematography, editing, pacing, a red hot screenplay that fleshed out a rich supporting cast, a nervy, brooding score that builds and crescendos along with the perfect pacing, and two actors in the antagonistic lead roles of John and Hans who were hungry to prove themselves and turned in the most memorable big-screen performances on their first try. But also, it had something the others lack, as did almost all other action thrillers of the era; The story is about a broken argument, and it weighs on estranged husband and wife for the duration. Also, in deciding that the villains be robbers rather than terrorists, director John McTiernan sealed the deal on this story being something it otherwise couldn't; colossal fun! Guest: Matt Ramsey Those early Digital Gonzo shows can be found on the School of Movies Archive podcast feed. They are rough as hell, amateur hour on my part and this one doesn't even break the sixty minute mark. The best bits are featured at the end, same as with Back to the Future. Many thanks to my vintage guests, Matt Ramsey, Nikki Taylor of GameBurst and Mike Philips of the Fanboys Lunchcast.

[School of Movies 2025] We return to the format of the first film, trapped in a specific, focused time period, lovingly recreated for modern audiences. The big obstacles to be overcome are both based on the ticking clock point-of-no-return, and are unexpectedly and deeply personal for our protagonist. This one is Emmet's movie. While Marty still has to learn a harsh lesson about whether other people think he's chicken or not, he is on a rescue mission and this third film puts Doc Brown front and centre. This is because being saved from temporal exile and murder-by-Tannen externally pales in comparison to the urgency in which Emmett must save himself internally, philosophically, and in key regard to his until-today strained relationship with the rest of the human race beyond Marty. Christopher Lloyd brings it, in this sweetly tragic, broken-and-mended love story through time, opposite the luminous Mary Steenburgen as doomed schoolmistress Clara Clayton in the Hill Valley of 1885. This is a bittersweet goodbye that punctuates this madcap, majestic trilogy with a firm and definite full-stop, ending on the highest of notes that defies all modern conventions of the permanent strip-mining of exhausted IPs. Guest: Jesse Ferguson @TheDapperDM from the Recorded Tomorrow Podcast Those early Digital Gonzo shows can be found on the School of Movies Archive podcast feed. They are rough as hell, amateur hour on my part and each barely breaks the sixty minute mark. The best bits of all of them are featured at the end of each of these three new shows. Many thanks to my vintage guests, James Batchelor and Nikki Taylor.

[School of Movies 2025] A sequel where the plot is hugely influenced by one of the original cast members playing hardball for a higher fee and getting left off the project should not be this great, and yet here we are. Likewise, the whole first act being set in the (then) faraway future of 2015 was almost entirely only there to fulfil promises from the end of the first film (even if Marty and Jennifer being in the timeline twice actually doesn't even make sense). How is it still wonderful? A second film that utilises time travel to go back to the first from a new angle in such a singular and unique fashion that any subsequent occurrence is shorthand "doing a Back to the Future II", this also presents us with a nightmare dark alternate timeline where a gaudy, dangerous moron becomes so powerful that he pretty much ruins America. Thankfully none of us have to live in THAT reality. Most of all though, of the three films this is the most lively, taking the form of a time-hopping adventure and allowing the two amazing leads to play off each other and the wildly up-for-it support cast, aging and de-aging across sixty changing years of Hill Valley. Guest: Jesse Ferguson @TheDapperDM from the Recorded Tomorrow Podcast Those early Digital Gonzo shows can be found on the School of Movies Archive podcast feed. They are rough as hell, amateur hour on my part and each barely breaks the sixty minute mark. The best bits of all of them are featured at the end of each of these three new shows. Many thanks to my vintage guests, James Batchelor and Nikki Taylor.

[School of Movies 2025] Teenager from 1985 accidentally winds up in 1955 and meets his parents as teenagers, endangering his very existence. Bob Zemekis and Bob Gale made time travel immense and exhilarating, yet fun, intimate and personal, wisely choosing to focus (in a way that was rare at the time) on the everyboy hero's family relationships. And to illustrate quite how the alchemy of casting and crew was so key, they got several weeks into the original shoot with a completely different actor for Marty McFly. Things only finally clicked into place when Eric Stoltz exited the project and Michael J. Fox entered the scene, simultaneously filming day-shoots of the sit-com Family Ties. Three of the greatest movies ever made, and perennial occupants of my most beloved top spots, Back to the Future, both as a trilogy, and as a stand-alone film is so close to perfect that it can be rounded up to perfect with minimal argument. It has been fifteen years since I first recorded a show on each of these, and more than any other previous show, they were in desperate need of a revisit. Guest: Jesse Ferguson @TheDapperDM from the Recorded Tomorrow Podcast Those early Digital Gonzo shows can be found on the School of Movies Archive podcast feed. They are rough as hell, amateur hour on my part and each barely breaks the sixty minute mark. The best bits of all of them are featured at the end of each of these three new shows. Many thanks to my vintage guests, Nikki Taylor and Giles Thomas

[School of Movies 2025] This is a commissioned episode for our hardworking Pez-loving Discord moderator Mike Hasko. It's a relic from 1993, a period just after the Cold War and not too long before the War on Terror, and the focus is on a middle-aged, white, American, divorced, straight, cis, male office-worker who one boiling hot Los Angeles morning decides that he has had enough. The man known throughout most of the movie by his personalised license plate as D-FENS (played with vigour by Michael Douglas in this memorable and divisive Joel Schumacher joint) steps out of the car he leaves stuck in traffic, walks across a city that is not designed for pedestrian travel, and clashes with everyone who gets in his way. The creative team are really trying to have their cake and eat it by making the protagonist also the antagonist and how much they succeed or fail is very much down to the perception of the viewer. Pull up a breakfast 'Whomelette' and an ice-cold, aggressively-priced can of Coca Cola and we shall guide you through this eventful day.

[School of Movies 2025] In an unprecedented show-type for us, what we have here began life as an After School Club commission by Tylor Long. Before it could be released it got upgraded to become a full Main Event show after this wonderful, darkly-funny, warm-hearted ghost story got included in our Discord Halloween watch-along. The premise is familiarly bureaucratic, and simple enough for little kids to understand; In the afterlife ghosts must work to scare the living in order to be remembered. The results are what feels like the Taiwanese Beetlejuice, utilising the trappings of horror movies without ever actually being scary. It also seems to have a hell of a lot of things to say about the attention economy in a world where MrBeast is the highest aspirational figure for so many young people. What Dead Talents Society hints at is that there's so much more to existence than just being talked about by strangers. Released straight to streaming in 2024, this movie is ironically virtually unseen and unheard of, but you should absolutely listen to this show and track this film down. It's going right at the top of our films of the year list.

[School of Movies 2025] Several years ago, Sharon and I recorded an After School Club on this 1994 film, the botched production of which took the life of its young star Brandon Lee. We were scathing and derisory, having never much liked it (and the awful DVD transfer did it no favours) whilst expressing contempt for director Alex Proyas (I, Robot, Knowing, Gods of Egypt). But this time (actually a year ago on its 30th anniversary) with Willow in tow, in conjunction with watching the appalling remake, we finally took in the 1080p blu ray, and I subsequently brought it to my editing bench to see if I could file off the sharp, jagged corners that bothered us so much and shape it into something worthier of the last screen appearance of the son of Bruce Lee. And wouldn't you know it... now we LOVE The Crow.

[School of Movies 2025] "Adapting is like marrying a widow; You respect the memory of the husband, but at some point you gotta get it on." - Guillermo del Toro. In preparation for GDTs long-awaited take on Frankenstein we delved into some of the most significant onscreen versions of Mary Shelley's book. Taking our cues from the excellent piece by Overly Sarcastic Productions we recruit Gothic enthusiast Willow and together as a family talk you through the story, referencing different movies regarding how closely they cleave to the source novel, and how and why they choose to deviate. Many of the elements people take for granted, lightning, green skin, bolts in the neck, flat head, tendency to talk like a caveman all seem to stem from the 1931 James Whale film and its 1935 sequel starring Borris Karloff and Elsa Lanchester. Turns out that the monster, the creation or as he is sometimes called, "Adam" was, as-written a great deal more complex, something some films have expressed in the interim near-century, nearly all of the most significant we talk about, including the 1994 Kenneth Branagh version, the 2011 stage version with Benedict Cumberbatch and Johnny Lee Miller, the Hammer Horror versions with Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing, Frank Roddam's The Bride from 1985, Tim Burton's Frankenweenie, and a surprisingly great two-part TV miniseries from 2004. Accompanying, we have a Cutting Class episode releasing this weekend with a bunch of other adaptations we talked about here but were trimmed out for time and focus, and we will of course be back to talk about Del Toro's version very soon.

[School of Movies 2025] Topping lists for film of the year, this is the first Ryan Coogler-directed film that is his own. Not a comic book adaptation like the Black Panthers, not a legasequel like Creed and not a direct real life account like Fruitvale Station. This one puts Ryan on the map as a genuine visionary and master of his craft. Clarksdale, Mississippi, 1932. Twin brothers, Smoke & Stack (both played by Michael B. Jordan) after returning home with stolen money from gangster shenanigans in Chicago, spend the day setting up an illegal juke joint for the local black community. As the sun goes down and the place starts rocking they attract the attention of some covetous vampires. Rich, bloody, tragic and complex, with otherworldly music, this story will knock your socks off and haunt your dreams. Guest: Brendan Agnew from Cinapse @blcagnew.bsky.social‬ Next Week: Adapting Frankenstein

[School of Movies 2025] An absolutely blistering black revenge fantasy by a white guy at the top of his game. Aside from the name, some repurposed music and the presence of carnage, this has nothing to do with the 1966 Sergio Corbucci spaghetti western, Django. What it does present us with is a deep immersion in the ugliness and inhumanity of slavery in the pre-Civil-War American South from the perspective of a freed black man and an increasingly disturbed German gentleman as they hunt bounties together and ultimately quest to rescue Django's beloved Brunhilda from the hellfire of the Candyland plantation, presided over by the hideous Calvin Candy. The stage is set for some of the most tense standoffs and explosively violent culminations in cinema history. This film is a masterpiece, and has proved wildly influential on my own work. This episode kicks off a Tarantino Season that will be running throughout the next year. We will be covering the films intermittently and out of chronological release order (and we will be recording a brand new pair of episodes on Kill Bill). Next Week: Sinners!

[School of Everything Else 2025] This is a follow-up to our 2021 episode on the legendary 1998 original PS1 Metal Gear Solid. This time I have brought in Willow to explore the two major PS2 instalments. We begin with what feels like creator Hideo Kojima answering the impossible question as to how to improve upon his first masterpiece (which goes so far beyond the two MSX games as to leave them feeling like prototypes) by trolling the fanboys who wanted a power fantasy. In the most audacious bait-and-switch of all time, our grizzled hero Solid Snake is snatched away from our control, and instead we are slid into the skin-tight bodysuit of blonde-haired rookie, Raiden. What follows is metatextual in the extreme, frequently absurd, occasionally groan-inducing and at times frighteningly prescient. Then we go back in time to the mid-1960s with Snake Eater; an epic Cold War crawl through the Russian jungle. This entry in the series houses one of the most memorable and tragic antagonists in video gaming history, coupled with one of the most powerful conclusions. This one, with its overly complex camouflage, foraging and first-aid most definitely warranted its recent Delta remake. In my playthrough the mechanics effected the story in a way that even meta-minded Kojima could not have intended. (NOTE: These were originally released as barebones, raw footage After School Club episodes. This presentation involved an editorial overhaul with music and game clips finally in place.) Next Week: Django Unchained

[School of Movies 2025] A bold new direction for the transforming robotic life forms. Fully digitally animated, with no need of Shia Lebeouf or Marky Mark, specifically an animated film theatrically released for the first time since 1986, and for the first time neither Peter Cullen nor Frank Welker is lending their voice to proceedings, despite this being an origin story for both Optimus Prime and Megatron. Instead Chris Hemsworth and Brian Tyree Henry step up to lend unexpectedly Shakespearean weight to the dramatic dissolution of a friendship between these two eternal foes. It's a Transformers movie that's actually about something for a change, rather than just a McGuffin hunt, and Bumblebee won't SHUT UP! Guest: Dan Hoeppner  @MightyMegatron0  of Leftover Army Monsters

[School of Movies 2025] This one came out of nowhere after seven years of development and production at Sony Pictures Animation. Yet after all that, Sony execs had zero faith in its success, so they sold it (along with all sequel rights in perpetuity) to Netflix for the modest budget of $100 million and then a nominal $20m that they could call profit. Then it broke the goddamn internet! For many reasons that we will go into, this one hit just right with a huge audience, and is now the basis for decades worth of sequels and spinoffs and live action remakes. Netflix got more than they could ever have wanted. At the last minute on this commissioned show (many thanks to Chris Finik, Toby Skeels-Jungius, Tylor Long, Holly Dotson, Nama Chibitty and Tripas) we brought in our buddy Ryan who lives in Busan, Korea, and was able to give us a rich cultural perspective on many details that we as westerners completely missed. Huge thank you to Ryan for being so generous with his time. You can find his many adventures and projects here: www.ryanestrada.com Guest: Ryan Estrada Next Week: Transformers One

[School of Movies 2025] Time for a surprisingly good Marvel that meant a lot to a great deal of people... and still somehow underperformed. This thing was brewing for years, from as far back as the second Disney Plus show, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, back in Lockdown 2021. The original comic premise was simple enough; have a manipulative scumbag assemble a super-team of disguised villains in the absence of The Avengers. However, this team is only mildly superpowered, and are wildly unbalanced. They're all either prior living weapons or experiments gone badly wrong, most of them have been being used for shady corporate black-ops and all of them are a hot mess, emotionally speaking. Plus the scumbag decides the best thing to do is kill them all off, rather than get their own Avengers. What we end up with is a collection of disturbed individuals who have to work together as a team to deal with a very specific, exceptionally dark situation with one of their own. It is DC's first Suicide Squad movie from 2016 done far, far better. Let's peel back the surface and dive into the murk beneath. Next Week: K-Pop Demon Hunters