CinemArcade

Yippee-kay-ay, everyone! We're climbing into the ducts to cover the timeless, indisputable Christmas classic and ur-text for modern action films, 1988's DIE HARD! John McTiernan's classic revitalized the entire action genre and made an instant superstar out of Bruce Willis, and it's earned it's place in many people's yearly tradition. We're also digging into the unusual video game franchise that s...

Punch your ticket and hop onto our one-way trip to the Uncanny Valley, because we're kicking off an entire month of Christmas movies with THE POLAR EXPRESS! Robert Zemeckis' expensive, high-tech animated feature highlights some cutting edge motion capture but an unavoidably creepy style. We'll break it down before playing the PS2 game adaptation that casts a surprising new villain for it's minigam...

We're concluding our deep dive into the ALIEN franchise this week with a look at 1997's ALIEN RESURRECTION, the weirdest, goopiest, kinkiest movie in the franchise to date! Sigourney Weaver returns with an entirely new take on Ripley, and while your mileage may vary on how successful it is, it's undeniably fascinating. We're also playing our first PlayStation 1 game this week, with the long-delaye...

Strap into your power loader and get ready for the ride of your life, because this week we're taking on James Cameron's ALIENS! One of the most influential action movies of all time, this film has an outsized impact on video games in particular, with more game adaptations than any other title we've covered so far! We narrowed it down to the 1990 arcade version and the 2011 Nintendo DS game ALIENS:...

Strap into your power loader and get ready for the ride of your life, because this week we're taking on James Cameron's ALIENS! One of the most influential action movies of all time, this film has an outsized impact on video games in particular, with more game adaptations than any other title we've covered so far! We narrowed it down to the 1990 arcade version and the 2011 Nintendo DS game ALIENS:...

Light your flamethrowers and check your ducts (ducks?), because we're kicking off our longest and slimiest miniseries yet with our look at the ALIEN franchise! We're starting with Ridley Scott's terrifying 1979 masterwork, ALIEN, with it's iconic creature design, tense atmosphere, and the proper debut of the great Sigourney Weaver as Ripley! We're also looking at two games: the 1982 Atari 2600 ada...

We bid a fond farewell to spooky season this week with a look back at the seminal indie film sensation THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT! Love it or hate it, it's impossible to deny the huge impact this movie had on pop culture. We're also playing the 2019 game adaptation, BLAIR WITCH, a first-person survival horror game that features a real good boy named Bullet.  Hosted by Steve Guntli, Jennifer "JBan" Ba...

The 1989 horror flick WARLOCK was slow to build it's audience, but it found a dedicated cult thanks to it's witchy atmosphere and great performances from Julian Sands and Richard E. Grant. Today, we're talking about the original film, plus the long-delayed tie-in game for the SNES! The awesome Christian Lewis subs in for Justin this week to talk about all the lightning-shooting, child-eating silli...

Puppet Master and video games in the same room? What is this, a crossover episode?! This week, Jarrod Hornbeck, Steve's co-host on Puppet Masters / Castle Freaks, joins the gang to talk about PUPPET MASTER, the direct-to-video icon that launched the expansive Full Moon universe of horror! We're talking over the original film, and then playing the new indie horror game, which lets puppets take on h...

This week, we're kicking off an entire month of horror with THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE! Tobe Hooper's visceral 1975 classic has been turned into a hit asymmetrical multiplayer game, and we're here to test out both that game and the oddball 1983 Atari version that you may not know about!  Hosted by Steve Guntli , Jennifer "JBan" Bannister, and Justin Wilhelm  Logo by Douglas McCambridge  Email: ci...

Our friend Hayato DeSouza comes by this week to help us talk about ADDAMS FAMILY VALUES, the 1993 sequel that improves upon the original in almost every way! We discuss Joan Cusack's iconic performance, the film's place in the gay canon, and of course the SNES game adaptation, which places Uncle Fester into a LEGEND OF ZELDA-like adventure.  It's our spookiest, kookiest, altogether ookiest miniser...

It's our spookiest, kookiest, altogether ookiest miniseries yet! We're kicking off a two-part exploration of the live-action ADDAMS FAMILY movies, starting this week with the 1991 original! Barry Sonnenfeld updated Charles Addams' classic comic strip for the 90s with this fast, funny, and creative blockbuster starring Raul Julia, Anjelica Huston, and Christopher Lloyd. We're also looking at two ga...

We're watching the first of many Disney movies for our show this week, and we'll be hard-pressed to find one quite as charming as 2002's LILO & STITCH! The story of a little Hawaiian girl and her killer alien best friend, the movie has a vibrant color palette and a distinctive style all it's own; it also has a Game Boy Advance game that pays tribute to SNK's METAL SLUG! We're talking both this...

Get your paddles ready, because this week, we're taking on the forgotten ping-pong comedy BALLS OF FURY, from the creators of RENO 9-1-1. The movie didn't make much impact in 2007, but does the Wii video game adaptation give it a boost?  Hosted by Steve Guntli, Jennifer "JBan" Bannister, and Justin Wilhelm  Logo by Doug McCambridge  Email: cinemarcadepodcast@gmail.com   Instagram: @cinemarcade_pod...

WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT is a damn near perfect movie, a great blend of the familiar and the innovative with groundbreaking visual effects and great performances across the board. The NES game based on it is slightly less prestigious, but that didn't stop our guest from playing hundreds of hours of it as a child! We're joined by the great JR Ralls from Thirty Twenty Ten to break down both the movie...

How do you make a sequel to a 20 year old movie when half of the titular duo is dead? The infamous 1998 flop BLUES BROTHERS 2000 answers that by just adding three new guys and basically do the same movie again. We're talking about the deeply weird movie with the surprisingly stacked soundtrack, and then we're visiting the old Nintendo 64 to talk about the wildly weird game adaptation, a clunky BAN...

It's time for a new miniseries! This time, we're looking back at the iconic SNL musical from 1980, THE BLUES BROTHERS! John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd's charmingly chaotic comedy is also the basis for a pair of wildly misguided platformers for the NES and SNES, which features baffling level design and the Blues Brothers fighting evil robot trucks.  Hosted by Steve Guntli, Jennifer "JBan" Bannister, a...

Good morning, Angels!  We're donning our best early-aughties fashions for the flashy, goofy action flick CHARLIE'S ANGELS, based on the hit 70's TV show. Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore, and Lucy Liu play the ass-kicking ladies in McG's popcorn flick, and surprisingly lend their likenesses to the 2003 GameCube game, which is, shall we say, somewhat less than polished. ANGELS fan Ailish Collins joins...

Say hello to our little... episode about SCARFACE!  Brian DePalma's infamous 1983 gangster flick has an iconic performance from Al Pacino and dozens of quotable lines, but is the movie more than the sum of it's flashy parts? We'll find out, and then take on the 2007 video game adaptation, SCARFACE: THE WORLD IS YOURS. This GRAND THEFT AUTO clone boasts a lot of cool features, but does the game mis...

Just when you though it was safe to listen to a podcast...  This week, it's all about JAWS, Steven Spielberg's masterful adventure film that popularize the entire concept of the summer movie! We're talking through the famously troubled production that turned into the biggest movie of all time, and made Spielberg a household name. Then, we're diving in to play the JAWS game for the NES! Developed b...

This week's episode features the game adaptation of a movie who's central thesis is that video games are evil; try squaring that circle. This week we're watching TOYS, the 1992 Robin Williams flop that brought wild production design to an incomprehensible story to create one of the weirdest Hollywood misfires of all time. The movie's failure didn't deter game developers from adapting it, resulting...

We've got chills and they're multiplying this week, because this week is all about GREASE, the smash-hit musical that became the game no one knew existed! The 1978 film was one of the most successful movies of it's era and made superstars out of Olivia Newton-John and John Travolta. The tie-in game for the Wii, released in 2010, is a bizarre collection of cheapie minigames and karaoke that might a...

We conclude our GREMLINS miniseries this week by taking in the madcap masterpiece that is GREMLINS 2: THE NEW BATCH. This 1990 sequel upended all expectations to became a weird, subversive, experimental comedy that blends monster movies and Looney Tunes in equal measure. We're also playing the 1990 game adaptation for the NES, which itself may be deserving of a cult audience.   Hosted by Steve Gun...

Welcome to our first miniseries! Once in a while, we'll break from our usual format to focus on multiple entries in a series, so this week and next week, we'll be discussing the GREMLINS franchise! It all starts here, with the 1984 smash hit original, directed by Joe Dante! The film is a wildly fun blend of horror, adventure, and comedy that has become a perennial Christmas favorite. The hugely po...

This week, our show eats itself like a snake eating it's tail: we're talking about the game, based on the movie, based on the game RATCHET & CLANK! The furry fighter and his robot pal debuted with a classic game on the PS2 and have built a high-quality series of hit action platformers. The 2016 film adaptation tried to capture some of the game's cartoonish wit and space opera thrills, but it's the...