This week we grapple with the problematics of Chinatown (1974), arguably one of the greatest neo-noirs, with a fraught and complicated history thanks to its director, Roman Polanski. Starring Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway, Chinatown represents the bleakness of noir amid the sunniness of LA, with a hefty dose of political and sexual corruption. Oof. TW for discussions of sexual assault and incest. Next week, we conclude Noirvember with a far happier entry: Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
We continue our look at Los Angeles-set neo-noir films, this time with the 1997 Academy Award-winning L.A. Confidential. Russell Crowe, Guy Pearce, and Kevin Spacey star as three very different LAPD detectives in a changing city where some cops embrace the corruption, some look the other way, and some are determined to root it out. An investigation into a series of murders in 1950s Los Angeles threatens to expose what's really going on beneath the sunny, shiny surface. Based on the novel by James Ellroy, L.A. Confidential was directed by Curtis Hanson and also stars Kim Basinger, James Cromwell, Danny DeVito, David Strathairn, and Ron Rifkin. It was nominated for 9 Oscars including Best Picture, winning two: Best Supporting Actress, Kim Basinger; and Best Adapted Screenplay, Brian Helgeland and Curtis Hanson.
The Dames are back with Halloween hangovers and the start of Noirvember! This month, we're looking at neo-noirs set in 40s/50s LA. We begin with Devil in a Blue Dress, starring peak Denzel Washington as Easy Rawlins, an out-of-work machinist who gets caught up in the search for a missing woman, leading him into the seedy underworld and racist high society of the City of Angels. Next week, we'll go into even more sun-soaked political corruption and police brutality with LA Confidential!
It's Halloween week! And what better way to celebrate than with the ultimate spooky movie season movie: HALLOWEEN! John Carpenter and Debra Hill's 1978 slasher is a must for fans of the season. But we only recognize the original as the One True Halloween movie. Jamie Lee Curtis stars as Laurie Strode, a 17-year-old babysitter whose night is ruined by 21-year-old mask-wearing, knife-wielding hospital escapee Michael Myers. Happy Halloween from the Dames!
Spooky Movie Month continues as the Dames discuss the 1986 horror film The Fly. Directed by David Cronenberg, this adaptation of the 1957 film stars Jeff Goldblum as Seth Grundle, an eccentric scientist whose teleportation experiment goes horribly wrong when he splices himself with a fly. The film also stars Geena Davis and John Getz. Clip from THE FLY courtesy of 20th Century Studios.
Spooky Movie Month continues as we look back at the zany 1980 Disney horror movie, The Watcher in the Woods. Adapted from Florence Engel Randall's 1976 novel, John Hough directed the film that was widely panned by critics, pulled from theaters, and given a new ending. The film stars Bette Davis, Carroll Baker, Lynn-Holly Johnson, Kyle Richards, David McCallum, Richard Pasco, and Ian Bannen.
Spooky Season starts in earnest, and we're kicking it off with a movie that scared the hell out of four-year-old Lauren: Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein. Comedy team Abbott and Costello play baggage handlers who run into a bevy of Universal Monsters including Count Dracula (Bela Lugosi), the Wolf Man (Lon Chaney, Jr.), and the Frankenstein Monster (Glenn Strange), in a creepy castle in...Florida? The film would go on to become a template for horror comedies, and the most successful movie in the Frankenstein series since the original. Next week will be The Watcher in the Woods (1980), which is weirdly hard to get a hold of (but well worth the effort!).
This week, we're finishing up our first Cary Grant series AND welcoming Spooky Movie Season at the same time with the 1944 comedy, Arsenic and Old Lace. Adapted from the hit Broadway play, Frank Capra's classic was originally slated for release in 1942, but the stage production was such a big hit that the film was delayed two extra years. Grant stars as Mortimer Brewer, a playwright and confirmed bachelor who surprises even himself by marrying Elaine Harper (Priscilla Lane), the girl next door. After their city hall nuptials, the pair run home to Brooklyn to announce their big news, but Mortimer is shocked and dismayed to discover his sweet, elderly maiden aunts Abby (Josephine Hull) and Martha (Jean Adair) are serial murderers with a dozen bodies buried in the basement. And hilarity ensues! Arsenic and Old Lace also stars Raymond Massey, Peter Lorre, John Alexander, Grant Mitchell, Jack Carson, James Gleason, Gary Owen.
Get ready to cry! This week, we're discussing An Affair to Remember, director Leo McCarey's 1957 remake of his own film Love Affair, this time featuring Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr. Come for the mature love story, stay for the soap-operatic melodrama. It's the ultimate chick flick, but you will be sobbing by the end. We also chat a bit about the current state of media and what the Hollywood Blacklist has to do with our contemporary moment. Next week, we gear up for Spooky Season with our final Cary Grant film of the month: Arsenic and Old Lace!
Cary Grant month continues as we discuss THE quintessential screwball comedy, Bringing Up Baby. Howard Hawks directed the 1938 film which stars Cary Grant as engaged paleontologist David Huxley, who is trying to score a one million dollar grant for his museum when he crosses paths with Susan Vance (Katharine Hepburn), a wonderfully chaotic disruption to his plans. From a missing intercostal clavicle to a leopard named Baby (played by a charming cat named Neissa), Grant and Hepburn are delightful in this very funny classic. To read more about Neissa the leopard and her handler Olga Celeste, click here.
Happy September! It's Cary Grant month (because we say it is), so we're starting out with Suspicion, the first film that brought together Grant and Alfred Hitchcock. They would go on to work together on three more films, but Suspicion is probably the most contentious for casting Cary Grant as a maybe-murderer who falls under suspicion from his wife (Joan Fontaine, who won an Oscar for her portrayal). Next week, we'll be discussing one of Grant's most famous screwball comedies, Bringing Up Baby!
We conclude this Hitchcockian August with the 1967 film, Wait Until Dark. Audrey Hepburn was nominated for an Academy Award for her role as Suzy, a woman blinded in an accident who finds herself the accidental target of dangerous drug traffickers, one of whom is a particularly deadly menace. Directed by Terrence Young and based on Frederick Knott's 1966 play, the film also stars Samantha Jones, Alan Arkin, Richard Crenna, Jack Weston, and Efrem Zimbalist Jr.
Our Hitchcockian August continues with Michael Powell's 1960 film, Peeping Tom. Credited as one of the films that influenced the slasher genre, Powell's film tells the story of Mark Lewis (Karlheinz Böhm), a lonely London photographer who murders women, capturing their fear on film in hopes of creating his own documentary. Creepy, macabre, and bold, Powell's film was not well received upon its release in 1960, but has won over horror fans in recent decades as an essential work.
This week, we talk about the meaning of "gaslighting" with the film that originated the term: George Cukor's 1944 film Gaslight, starring Ingrid Bergman as a woman slowly driven to the brink of madness by her abusive husband (Charles Boyer). This film also featured the cinematic debut (and first Oscar nod!) for Angela Lansbury, who turned 18 during filming. TW for discussions of domestic abuse and abusive relationships. Next week, one of the most Hitchcockian of the films we're discussing: Michael Powell's psychothriller Peeping Tom, which premiered two weeks before Psycho in 1960.
For the first of our Hitchcockian films, we discuss the best "Hitchcock film not directed by Hitchcock": Stanley Donen's Charade (1963), a somewhat satirical, fantastically entertaining globe-trotting thriller with a stellar cast featuring Cary Grant, Audrey Hepburn, and Walter Matthau. Next week we'll be chatting about Gaslight (1944), which somehow Hitchcock also did not direct.
It's Alfred Hitchcock's birthday month and we're kicking off the celebration with one of his quintessential films: North by Northwest. Cary Grant stars alongside Eva Marie Saint and James Mason in this tale of mistaken identity, espionage, and intrigue. From an attempted assassination via crop duster to the face(s) of Mount Rushmore, one of Hitch's biggest and more iconic films is thrilling, romantic, and funny.
We close out Pride Month this year with a brand-new film (that's technically a remake, but shhhh): The Wedding Banquet, from Fire Island director Andrew Ahn, and starring Bowen Yang, Han Gi-chan, Lily Gladstone, and Kelly Marie Tran as two gay couples who have to try to play it straight. The result is a beautiful (and hilarious) film about found family and queer identity. We'll be on a break for the rest of July, returning in August with our annual Hitchcock coverage (starting with North by Northwest!), but our patrons can continue to listen our Alfred Hitchcock Presents bonus episodes all through July! To join their number (and get some other bonuses as well) you can go to Patreon!
We continue our Pride Month series with the 2005 lesbian spy rom-com, D.E.B.S. This gem of a movie, directed by Angela Robinson, is the story of a super hot super spy and a super hot super villain who meet and fall in love. Underrated in its time, but finding new popularity in recent years, D.E.B.S. is the kind of funny, silly girl movie we wish there were more of. How this didn't launch a whole subgenre is beyond us!
The Dames continue Pride Month with the seminal queercore punk-rock musical Hedwig and the Angry Inch, directed by and starring John Cameron Mitchell. While Lauren tries to explain Judith Butler, Karen wonders why Hedwig is kind of a dick? Next week: D.E.B.S. and lesbians committing espionage!
The Dames are celebrating Pride Month! And we're starting off with the 1994 road trip movie, The Adventures of Priscilla Queen of the Desert. Terrence Stamp, Hugo Weaving, and Guy Pierce star as a trans woman and two drag queens who embark on a road trip across Australia, encountering good, bad, and dangerous challenges along the way.