The Projection Booth

Noirvember 2019 wraps up with Billy Wilder's Double Indemnity (1944). With a screenplay co-written by Wilder and Raymond Chandler and based on a story by James M. Cain, the film is one of the seminal works of film noir. It stars Fred MacMurray as fast-talking Walter Neff, an insurance agent who gets played for a dope by a dame. The dame in question, Phyllis Dietrichsen, is played by the one and on...

Noirvember 2019 continues with a look at The Conversation (1974). Sandwiched between the first two Godfather films, The Conversation is writer/director Francis Ford Coppola’s paean to European art films of the 1960s, most notably Antonioni’s Blow-Up. Instead of swinging London, however, The Conversation is set in San Francisco and stars Gene Hackman as Harry Caul, a schlubby nudnik whose life revo...

Daniel Kremer returns to the Projection Booth as a director rather than a co-host with a discussion of his film Overwhelm the Sky (2019) along with the film's lead actor, Alexander Hero. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-projection-booth--5513239/support . Become a supporter of The Projection Boot...

We continue Noirvember 2019 with a look at Max Ophul’s The Reckless Moment. Released in 1949, the film tells the story of Lucia Harper (Joan Bennett), a mother who’s out to protect her family from the forces of evil including Ted Darby, a swindler who’s making moves on her 17 year old daughter. Mrs. Harper will go to extremes to keep her family safe. Cullen Gallagher and Samm Deighan join Mike to...

We kick-off Noirvember 2019 with a look at Joseph H. Lewis’s The Big Combo (1955). Written by Philip Yordan, the film stars Cornel Wilde as Lt. Leonard Diamond. He’s a cop with a soft spot for Susan Lowell (Jean Wallace), the main squeeze of Mr. Brown (Richard Conte). Diamond and Brown play a strange game of cat and mouse as Diamond seems to pursue justice while Brown is a psychopathic thug who th...

The 1984 film from Adam Small and Peter Stuart, Another State of Mind, documents an international tour by two west coast punk bands, Youth Brigade and Social Distortion; capturing the attitudes, ethos, and lifestyles of the time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-projection-booth--5513239/support...

On a very special episode of The Projection Booth, Bill Ackerman and Maitland McDonagh join Mike to discuss Willard Huyck and Gloria Katz's Messiah of Evil. Released under a number of titles (including The Second Coming), the film is a creepy, atmospheric horror film about a young woman who goes in search of her father only to find something far-more-sinister than she could have ever imagined. Lea...

We wrap up #Shocktober2019 with an episode on Mark Goldblatt’s 1988 film Dead Heat. The film stars Treat Williams as Roger Mortis who, along with his partner Doug Bigelow (Joe Piscopo) investigate a perplexing case that throws them into the world of the supernatural. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/...

#Shocktober2019 continues with a look at Roman Polanski's Rosemary's Baby (1968). Based very faithfully on the book by Ira Levin, the film stars Mia Farrow as the titular Rosemary who, with her husband Guy (John Cassavetes) move to a new apartment in New York where some strange things play out. Suzen Tekla Kruglinska and Kat Ellinger join Mike to talk about this seminal film as well as its made-fo...

#Shocktober2019 continues with a look at the 1981 movie from director Michael Wadleigh, Wolfen. Based loosely on the 1978 book by Whitley Streiber, the film stars Albert Finney as Dewey Wilson, a world weary New York City cop who is assigned the macabre murder of real estate mogul Peter Vanderveer. Initially thought to be a terrorist plot, Wilson is assigned a psychologist, Neff (Diane Venora), to...

On this special episode of The Projection Booth, Mike talks with filmmaker Sheona McDonald about her work including her latest documentary, Candice, all about the life of feminist, actress, filmmaker, and activist Candida Royalle (nee Candice Marion Vadala). Learn more at candicemovie.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www...

On this special episode of The Projection Booth, Mike talks to filmmaker Jacqueline Olive about her documentary Always in Season (2019) which tells the stories of Lennon Lacy, a young man found hanging near his home in 2014, as well as historic cases of lynchings from America's not-so-distant past. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Become a supporter of this podcast: h...

#Shocktober2019 continues with a look at the 1980 film from director Vernon Zimmerman, Fade to Black. The film stars Dennis Christopher as Eric Binford, a youth who spends too much of his time watching and obsessing about movies. Unfortunately, Eric’s a little mentally unstable thanks in part to his family which consists of his harridan Aunt Stella. Heather Drain and Bill Ackerman join Mike to dis...

On this special episode, Maurice Bursztynski and David Kettridge join Mike to discuss the 1980 film Die Laughing. It stars Robbie Benson as Pinsky -- a cab driver by day and folk singer/songwriter by night who gets involved in a web of international intrigue when a secret-bearing monkey comes into his life. Director Jeff Werner and co-star Carel Struycken share their experiences working on the fil...

On this special episode of The Projection Booth, Mike talks to filmmaker James D. Stern about his work as a producer and director on Broadway, television, and at the movies. Stern has produced works as diverse as Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle, Self/Less, Snowden, Murder Mystery, American Chaos, and Looper. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Become a supporter of thi...

Dahlia Schweitzer and Patrick Bromley join Mike to kick off Shocktober 2019 with a look at World War Z. It's not necessarily based on Max Brooks’s book of the same name though he gets a credit at the beginning. It’s a zombie apocalypse film starring Brad Pitt that takes Pitt around the world looking for the cause of and cure for a zombie plague. Special guest Dr. Sarah Juliet Lauro, author of The...

On this special episode of The Projection Booth, Kevin Heffernan and Samm Deighan join Mike to discuss Milos Forman's Loves of a Blonde. A mix of professional and non-professional actors, the film tells the tale of Andula (Hana Brejchova), one of hundreds of women that work in a factory who is introduced to an "eligible male" via a government-sponsored dance. The track was originally produced for...

On this special episode of The Projection Booth, Mike talks with author Matthew Asprey Gear about his latest work Moseby Confidential: Arthur Penn’s Night Moves and the Rise of Neo-Noir. Gear examines how Penn's film worked among the neo-noirs of the '70s as well as how screenwriter Alan Sharp injected a lot of his biography into the work. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adcho...

We conclude Czechtember 2019 with a look at Jan Kadar and Elmar Klos’s The Shop on Main Street. Also known as the Shop on High Street, the film was released in 1965 and written by Ladislav Grosman, based on his own story and book. The film tells the tale of Tono, a carpenter who has been refused from working on his little town’s major building project. Instead, he’s assigned to be the Aryan face o...

On this special report, Mike talks to actress Lesley Ann Warren and writer/director/producer/actor Larry Clarke about the new film 3 Days with Dad. Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-projection-booth--5513239/support . Become a supporter of The Projection Booth at http://www.patreon.com/projectionbooth 

Known chiefly for the role he's played for over a decade, the Victorian Toronto detective Murdoch, Yannick Billson speaks to Mike about his role in the popular TV show as well as some of his other work including the 2018 horror film Hellington and 2019's A Perfect Plan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podca...

Czechtember 2019 continues with a look at Jaromil Jires’s The Joke. Shot in 1968 and released in 1969, the film was adapted by Jires and Milan Kundera, the author of the book of the same name. It tells the tale of Ludvik who was ousted from the Communist party after the youthful indiscretion of making a joke. He spends the rest of his life feeling the effects of this including hatching a plan for...

As part of the University of Illinois's Masters of Modern Science Fiction series, D. Harlan Wilson has written a literary biography of J.G. Ballard examining the themes and progression of Ballard's fiction and (fictional) biographical work. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-projection-booth--55132...

It's time for Ego Fest 8 in which Mike answers your burning questions, get some advice and then promptly ignores it, and gives thanks to the Projection Booth's Patreon donors. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-projection-booth--5513239/support . Become a supporter of The Projection Booth at http:/...

Banned before it was even released, Karel Kachyňa’s The Ear is a study in paranoia. When Anna and Ludvic return home from a party they find that their front gate is unlocked and their home is open. Someone's been there but they don't know who or why and they spend the rest of the night trying to figure out if they will be part of the recent purge within The Party. Learn more about your ad choices....