Michael and Us

PATREON EPISODE - https://www.patreon.com/posts/58734680 In this very special episode, the boys have a riff session about a range of movies of wildly varying quality, from the McDonald's biopic THE FOUNDER (2016) to Edgar Wright's quasi-quasi-feminist horror film LAST NIGHT IN SOHO (2021) to BERGMAN ISLAND (2021) to the hilarious Christian oddity BILL WALLACE OF CHINA (1967)

THE QUEEN (2006) brings together a mismatched-buddy duo — one a symbol of stiff-upper-lipped British tradition (Liz Windsor), the other a radical left-wing politician (uh... Tony Blair?) — who both slowly realize that they might be able to learn from each other. We discuss why this is the ultimate film of the New Labour era.

PATREON EXCLUSIVE - https://www.patreon.com/posts/58634648 Multilevel marketing is a scam. But thanks to protection by political elites and well-funded industry propaganda, it keeps growing. Cracking down on it would be as simple as enforcing the laws against fraud — if only the political will could be found. Luke talks to MLM expert Robert FitzPatrick for a wide-ranging conversation about the his...

A month or so on, we're releasing this one from behind its Patreon paywall. If you want to hear more interviews like this, and get an extra episode each week, sign up at Patreon.com/MichaelandUs. In this interview, recorded in September, Luke talks to Guardian columnist and activist George Monbiot about the extreme right’s appropriation of countercultural idioms and revolutionary language in the a...

FALLING DOWN (1993) features Michael Douglas as an ordinary man who's mad as hell, turning into a Travis Bickle for the Rush Limbaugh era. It's Hollywood's attempt to make a serious statement about a post-Cold War malaise, and folks, it's a very, very bad movie. PLUS: we share memories of Canada''s greatest bad filmmaker.

PATREON EPISODE - https://www.patreon.com/posts/58314876 In this very special episode, Luke talks to Academy Award-winning filmmaker Alex Gibney (Taxi to the Dark Side, Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, and many others) and investigate journalist David Sirota to discuss their new podcast series Meltdown. The series looks back on the 2008 financial crisis and mounts the case that the institutio...

PATREON EPISODE - https://www.patreon.com/posts/58157534 To tweak a phrase from Jeff Goldblum, so much time was spent asking IF the Superdelegate Patreon tier can vote for us to discuss Steven Spielberg's JURASSIC PARK (1993) and not whether they SHOULD. Just kidding, folks - we had a fun time revisiting this certified Popcorn Classic and discussing the ideological evolution from Spielberg's origi...

We travel to postwar Vienna to visit THE THIRD MAN (1949) and discuss how this classic film's style perfectly articulates a bleak and despairing state of being. PLUS: thoughts on the dark 'n' gritty new Buzz Lightyear origin movie, AND we finally answer whether politics is upstream or downstream from culture.

PATREON EPISODE - https://www.patreon.com/posts/57836336 We're joined by our old pal Branko Marcetic to discuss the viral sensation that is the New York Times' "B*d *rt Fr*end" article. Why is it popular right now? Is either "friend" in the right or wrong? And is capitalism really the worst friend of them all? PLUS: we discuss the "debate" around the watered-down reconciliation bill.

EASY RIDER (1969) has been encrusted in so many layers of Boomer nostalgia that we were wondering: is there anything still there? So we sat down and watched one of the most iconic films of the 1960s, and... the answer may surprise you! PLUS: more memories of student journalism.

PATREON EPISODE - https://www.patreon.com/posts/57533296 In some ways, no movie franchise is as responsive to trends and fads as the James Bond series. And in other ways, no franchise is more stubbornly resistant to change. We discuss how the latest entry, NO TIME TO DIE (2021), positions itself in the zeitgeist. PLUS: the Dave Chappelle discourse.

At long last, we are finally tackling something related to The Sopranos. We discuss the many things wrong (and some things right) with the big-screen prequel THE MANY SAINTS OF NEWARK (2021); the spirit of American decline that The Sopranos captures at its best; and what the recent surge in prequels and reboots tells us about this world we live in.

PATREON EPISODE - https://www.patreon.com/posts/57270569 The great thing about bad articles is: they don't stop makin' 'em. In this chill and jolly episode, we toss around some of our most beloved bad pieces of bad writing, including articles by such living legends as Jeffrey Wells, Jonathan Chait, and Jerry Seinfeld. PLUS: we discuss Toronto's most eccentric film exhibitor.

We have discussed many bad films on this podcast, but now we finally turn our attention to The Worst Movie Ever Made™. We analyze how Ed Wood's PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE (1957) turns the movie industry's flotsam and detritus into a Hollywood dreamscape. PLUS: The Sopranos, Necromania, and Justin Trudeau's recent vacation.

PATREON BONUS - https://www.patreon.com/posts/bonus-political-57123129 For many, the phrase "ruling class" symbolizes jet-setting metropolitans. Historian Patrick Wyman argues that an entirely different and more banal group wield a level of power and cultural influence that is out of proportion with their identity. "American Gentry" by Patrick Wyman - https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021...

PATREON EPISODE - https://www.patreon.com/posts/56985194 The Superdelegate patron tier has selected BEYOND THE MAT (1999), a warts-and-all documentary about the lives of professional wrestlers like Jake "The Snake" Roberts and Mick "Mankind" Foley. We discuss what "the movie that Vince McMahon doesn't want you to see" has to say about the art and business of pro wrestling, and what pro wrestling c...

Nine years after the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, cinema's most enduring symbol of the perils of nuclear proliferation first crawled out of Tokyo Bay. We discuss how the original GODZILLA (1954) channeled the mood of its time. PLUS: how the media talks about the congressional wrangling over the reconciliation bill.

PATREON BONUS - https://www.patreon.com/posts/bonus-problem-is-56805720?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copy_to_clipboard&utm_campaign=postshare With the scale of our current social and political crises, it’s unsurprising to see a proliferation of conspiracy theories across unusually broad swathes of society. Luke talks to Guardian columnist and activist George Monbiot about the extreme right...

PATREON EPISODE - https://www.patreon.com/posts/56663705 When we were teenagers, George Carlin offered a gateway to more radical ways of thinking about politics and the world around us. But does his sledgehammer brand of satire hold up for us now? We re-immersed ourselves in Carlin to find out. PLUS: we discuss Andrew Yang's new political party, and dredge up our old disagreement about Andy Warhol...

The mockumentary DEATH OF A PRESIDENT (2006) imagined what would happen if then-president George W. Bush was assassinated. Though briefly very controversial, this justly-forgotten film is a perfect encapsulation of just how conservative a liberal movie could be in the years following 9/11. PLUS: we analyze the recent Canadian federal election.

PATREON EPISODE - https://www.patreon.com/posts/56380720 In 1980, the legendary journalist Gay Talese first learned of a peeping-tom who bought a motel to spy on his guests. In 2016, he finally got this man to speak on the record in a New Yorker cover story... but further reportage revealed that the peeping-tom was a less-than-reliable narrator. This scandal is the subject of the Netflix documenta...

Tucker Carlson reigns as the most-watched personality on cable news. How did he get that way? How important is he really? And what does he actually believe? To answer these questions, he enlist the help of Tucker scholar and returning guest Alex Shephard, who guides us through Carlson's trajectory from a Tom Wolfe-ish magazine scribe to a Jon Stewart punching-bag to the living embodiment of the GO...

PATREON EPISODE - https://www.patreon.com/posts/56092187 The fastest fists of the east enter a junior partnership with the biggest mouth of the west in RUSH HOUR (1998), a film that represents the United States' view of its relationship with China during a moment of unquestioned U.S. hegemony. We discuss this Jackie Chan/Chris Tucker semi-classic, which every millennial has seen at least several t...

In Apichatpong Weerasethakul's UNCLE BOONMEE WHO CAN RECALL HIS PAST LIVES (2010), the boundaries between life and death, past and present, ghost and human, and human and animal fade away. We discuss some possible philosophical and political readings of this cryptic masterpiece. PLUS: the 20th anniversary of 9/11 and the media is covering the Canadian election. "Why Justin Trudeau’s snap election...

PATREON BONUS - https://www.patreon.com/posts/duffygate-w-luke-55808939 With Will on a temporary hiatus, Michael and Us is pleased to welcome Luke LeBrun, editor of my journalistic alma mater PressProgress, for a chill discussion of media coverage in Canada's ongoing federal election. With that behind us, Luke and I turn to a decidedly low-stakes political scandal from the already forgotten Harper...