The Unbreakable Movie Chain

Don't forget your flamethrowers, it's time to enter The Hive...   This episode, we're discussing Paul W. S. Anderson's adaptation of the ground-breaking video game phenomenon, Resident Evil. We cover the thrill of playing horror video games, the genius of amnesia and Michelle Rodriguez having an absolute blast.    “It takes a while for her to turn into a zombie because she's fucking nails.” - Ed “...

Hello and welcome to this first Off The Chain episode of The Unbreakable Movie Chain. This time out we chat Denis Villeneuve’s epic Dune 2, Alex Garland’s horrifying Civil War and Dev Patel’s kick-ass directorial debut Monkey Man. Also, there’ve been two scary nun movies (one good, one bad) and two lesbians-on-the-road crime movies (one good, one bad) for us to delve into! But wait, there’s more!!...

Earth! Fire! Wind! Water! Mila Jovovic? That’s right, Ed’s showing his age by banging on about Captain Planet again as we try to make sense of Luc Besson’s whacky sci-fi adventure The Fifth Element. Featuring the human torso, classic farce and Chris Tucker being far, far too much. Also Treasure hunting in CEX Sick day films Hate-watching Eli Roth movies “It’s not nourishing, it’s a packet of McDon...

Get ready for a twist! This week we’re covering our first M. Night Shyamalan movie:  2000’s real-world superhero flick, Unbreakable. All seems to be going well until Ed starts picking at the threads. Featuring shattered bones, shoddy parenting and vaguely-defined superpowers!   “None of it makes a drop of sense.” - Ed “M. Night Shyamalan has got a gift when it comes to working with child actors.”...

Brum brum brum. Fasten your seat belts, we’re off drag-racing around Southern California with one of the stupidest movies we’ve ever had the pleasure to absolutely rinse over a couple of pints. That’s right, it’s the The Fast and The Furious. Featuring: Cars, babes, and other things fourteen year old boys like to stare at.   “Vin Diesel is this juvenile petrolhead Fagin with all these boring car n...

Take the phone off the hook and the plastic off the couch! This week we’re opening up our cosy, black and white existence to the seductive danger of colour. That’s right, we’re covering one of Ed’s all time favourites… Pleasantville. Featuring: the warm greeting, proper nutrition and, of course, safe sex.   Also: Poor Things The joys of the National Trust Did Gould’s Mum enjoy Saltburn?   “Watchin...

The Wizard of Oz (1939)   I don’t think we’re in our cupboards anymore! This week, we’re strapping on our ruby slippers and hitting the yellow brick road to find out if there really is no place like home. That’s right, it’s time for a certified classic… we’re watching The Wizard of Oz! Featuring apple fights, homesickness, and “I want” songs!   A word of warning. One of us quite strongly took agai...

“If you dream, dream big”. This week we’re taking one last look at the studio system, this time it’s Vincente Minnelli’s multiple Oscar-winner The Bad and the Beautiful, from 1952 – a tale of Hollywood ambition and betrayal starring Kirk Douglas and Lana Turner. Featuring eavesdropped phone calls, drunken starlets and OSCARS!!   Also: Festive comfort watches Bleak crime drama The Boy and the Heron...

Ho ho ho! We hope you all had a wonderful Christmas. Now that the festivities are out of the way, it’s time to pull the Movie Chain crystal ball out of the attic, and gaze upon the wonders that 2024 promises to inflict upon the movie-going public. Turns out there’s a lot to get excited for, including new offerings from Bong Joon-Ho, Jonathan Glazer and Yorgos Lanthimos. But first we have to cut a...

Checking in? This episode we're feeling the heat and peeling back the wallpaper to take a look at the Coen Brothers' early masterpiece, Barton Fink. What's in the box? It may look like a long one, but the last 15 minutes of this ep are dedicated to a spoilery Saltburn stand-off.   Also: Napoleon, The Peasants and some tough truths about 2001: A Space Odyssey.   "The Common Man is a choir of Fishmo...

"Howdy!" We’ve cleaned off the Alabama mud from our last time out, and we’re heading to the bright lights of The City of Angels to take in David Lynch’s fevered Hollywood nightmare, Mulholland Drive. Armed with Lynch’s own clues/red herrings. Informed by the wild theories of internet obsessives. We do our very best to get to the bottom of this enigmatic puzzle box of a movie… one that placed 8th o...

Welcome to Alabama, land of guns, grits and the electric chair. Don’t accidentally confess to any murders while you’re here, or it’s death row for you... and if you don’t have a fast-talking New York lawyer for a cousin, you’re a goner. That’s the predicament we find ourselves in this week as we take a look at cult 90s courtroom comedy My Cousin Vinny. Featuring mud, inappropriate courtroom attire...

Sometimes dead is better. For this week’s episode we’re continuing our dalliance with the undead as we peak from behind our hands (at least, the more squeamish of us did) at the 1989 version of Stephen King’s most horrifying novel… Pet Sematary. Featuring terrible parenting, inevitable roadkill and the most adorable zombie in cinema history. Also Killers of the Flower Moon The joys of film festiva...

What’s your favourite movie monster? This week we’re shamelessly jumping on the Halloween bandwagon to bring you a special bonus episode… counting down our all time favourite movie monsters. Will we agree on what constitutes a monster? Gould can barely agree with herself!   Also Which actor pops up no fewer than three times during this discussion? Gould has a bet with herself. Confusion over alien...

It’s alive!! This week we’re getting down and dirty with the resurrection men to retrieve bodies for reanimation, then sitting back to watch the horror unfold in James Whale’s 1931 adaptation of Frankenstein. We all know that Frankenstein’s the doctor and his creation’s the creature, right? But which one’s the monster? We try to untangle this conundrum while examining the film as an early example...

What did you watch this summer? We’ve been on our holidays and we came back with so much to talk about that we decided to put our highlights (and lowlights) in a special bonus episode. Kicking off with a long overdue discussion of the summer’s biggest hits, Barbie and Oppenheimer, we then take a whistlestop tour of the best, the worst, and the weirdest films we watched over the summer. Featuring s...

Hold onto your butts! This week we’re off on prehistoric safari through Jurassic Park – featuring Laura Dern’s lopsided running, Samuel L Jackson’s severed arm and Jeff Goldblum’s bare chest. Will we be consumed by our nostalgia for childhood dino-thrills? Only one way to find out! Also Giving up on bad movies Gould’s controversial thoughts on Scorsese Past Lives and Scrapper “I don’t know how to...

Another bonus episode for you, and this time we’re letting our imaginations go wild as we run through our all time favourite animated movies. These movies have everything: talking animals, dancing skeletons, soaring dragons… and Satan’s beautiful singing voice.   “There are a lot of really wonderful, wonderful, wonderful films that are not on my list.” - Ed “With animation you’ve got the scope to...

Wait, what happens to Beth? In the latest episode we tackle Greta Gerwig’s 2019 adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s classic novel (or, more accurately, pair of novels) Little Women. Featuring marriage refusals, narrative whiplash and Beth’s Death.   Also Asteroid City leaves us cold. The horrors of a Festen/The Hunt double bill. Ed tries to sell Gould on Christopher Nolan.   “It’s nice to know what...

In this, our first ever bonus episode, we run through our top ten favourite screen performances. Including a crossdressing musician, a sweary scotsman and a mountainous magic man.   “There’s the overblown romance of one of the relationships and this is the quiet, subtle romance that touches my heart” - Gould “If he doesn’t end up on my top 10 list when we do villains, then something’s gone wrong f...

Which character’s which? On this episode of The Unbreakable Movie Chain we get lost in Sofia Copolla’s hazy, dreamlike debut feature The Virgin Suicides. Featuring sack-like prom dresses, questionable parenting, and Josh Hartnett’s Lego hair.   Also David Fincher’s Zodiac, Guillermo Del Toro’s Pinocchio, and the indie-horror double whammy of Last Shift and its remake Malum. Which film franchise ha...

Here’s to you, dear listeners! On this week’s Unbreakable Movie Chain, Gould and Ed come of age chatting Mike Nichols’ The Graduate. Taking your date to a strip show while doing the dirty with her mum? We call that a summer well spent. Also: Ed went to see the 4k restoration of The Wicker Man. The omnipresence of the actor Kevin Eldon. Why wasn’t Sidney Poitier nominated for an Oscar at the 40th A...

On this week’s episode, Gould and Ed head out on the campaign trail for Clinton era satire Primary Colors. Featuring sex scandals, apple fritters and John Travolta’s dad-dancing. Also: Thoughts on the blood-drenched war epic Sisu and Hereditary director Ari Aster’s latest Beau is Afraid. Our hosts lose their minds over a single long shot of a diner. The art of seguing from American politics to Pet...

Strap on your two-way wrist radios and get ready to hit the streets with Gould and Ed as they face off against cinematic crime – in the form of 1990’s Dick Tracy. Featuring painted backdrops, gratuitous nipples and all the latex in the land! Also Did our hosts enjoy their recent trips to the theatre? Which of us let the side down by sitting in the sun rather than watching Beau is Afraid? What on E...

This week on The Unbreakable Movie Chain, Ed and Gould calypso dance through the lurid bureaucracy of the afterlife in Tim Burton’s Beetlejuice. With sand snakes, roadkill civil servants and bioexorcisms galore! Also: The impossibility of getting through a Blue Velvet / Mulholland Drive double bill with brain intact. Someone thinks Mars Attacks is a snooze. A brief rant about the state of comedy i...