Movie Madness

Sergio Mims returns with another look at the latest and greatest in Blu-rays. Along with Erik Childress they catch up on Arrow’s release of Kevin Smith’s Mallrats and Sergio’s lingering love for sword-and-sandal films with Film Detective’s Hercules and the Captive Women. They look at a pair of overseas releases of Paramount thrillers Black Sunday and Breakdown and express their great love for the...

There are a couple of great battles in the films reviewed on this episode, but Erik Childress and Steve Prokopy leave no film behind this week before debating their merits. Ten films on the docket including films about pigs with no dialogue (Gunda), werewolves with some songwriting (Bloodthirsty) and Lovecraftian fish people who want to spawn with a couple (The Deep Ones). Ed Helms wants Patti Har...

From their WHPK radio show out of the University of Chicago, The Bad Mutha Film Show, Sergio Mims and Erik Childress do another round on the current state of theaters. Where are we headed after Godzilla vs. Kong and is it really the blockbuster titles that we should be looking at to pave the way? Did Paramount make a colossal blunder in moving the Top Gun sequel off the summer schedule and what st...

We’re only halfway through April 2021 and the good movies are few and far between. But Erik Childress and Steve Prokopy may actually have a few recommendations for you this week and it arrives with horror in all its manifestations. There is a haunted house (The Banishing), backwoods farmers (Honeydew) and the woods themselves (In the Earth). But there are also toxic relationships (Monday, Slalom),...

After the recent film, Malcolm & Marie, went off on a diatribe against film critics, Erik Childress and Sergio Mims decided to look at the way films (and even television) have treated critics of all times. Sometimes satirically, but often as a reaction or a way for filmmakers to enact revenge on those who have taken shots at their work. Are film critics influenced negatively – or even positively –...

Erik Childress and Steve Prokopy look at six movies on this week’s show. They review a story of the brutal military service of South Africa (Moffie), what a refugee will do to flee civil war (The Man Who Sold His Skin), a visual landscape brought to you by one of Terrence Malick’s cinematographers (Awaken) and how one survives the night shift at a haunted hospital (The Power). Most of their discus...

Erik Childress and Steve Prokopy are back with this week’s movie reviews. Six films in a somewhat lackluster week, albeit a few recommendations. But which film(s) will it be? Can it be another corporate rise-and-fall documentary (WeWork: The Making and Breaking of a $47 Billion Unicorn)? Is Michelle Pfeiffer as a rich socialite the draw (French Exit) or is it Idris Elba as an urban cowboy (Concret...

As part of their recent show on WHPK Radio, Sergio Mims and Erik Childress discussed some of their favorite film villains. They range from Nazis to Comic Books and Serial Killers to Blaxploitation Adversaries. Evidence is provided of their evil ways and you may even hear one of them meet their deserved demise. What goes into a great villain and why do these choices stand out? The pair discuss ever...

Ten new films get time on the weekly review edition of the podcast. Erik Childress tells you about a Star Trek III reunion (Senior Moment), stealing back Francis Drake’s treasure (The Vault) and what kids sing about at Christian camp (A Week Away). Steve Prokopy covers Nazis in not one, but two historical dramas (The Good Traitor, Six Minutes to Midnight) and also takes delight in The Truffle Hunt...

The first fully virtual SXSW Film Festival is in the books and while they are already planning a return to an in-person event in 2022, Erik Childress and Steve Prokopy run down over a dozen films that played this year. It was a remarkable year for female-centric stories including standouts by Barbara Crampton, Olivia Munn and Andrea Risborough. Documentaries introduced us to the world’s greatest d...

In an epic episode of the podcast, Erik Childress & Sergio Mims rundown a whole swath of new Blu-ray and DVD titles to add to your library. They talk Cecil B. DeMille epics from Paramount and a whole batch of titles from Warner Archive including one from their Not-On-Blu-Ray show. Sergio talks again of his love for Bob Hope, Billie Holliday and a Criterion title that either inspired Beyonce (or sh...

Come for the killer pants, stay for the most anticipated four-hour director’s cut miniseries chapter play of 2021. Erik Childress and Steve Prokopy review seven new titles on the show this week including Chris Smith’s documentary about the college admissions scandal (Operation Varsity Blues), Benedict Cumberbatch as a reluctant spy (The Courier) and Johnny Depp trying to solve the murder of the No...

It’s a shorter-than-usual review week here on the show and the takes from Erik Childress & Steve Prokopy go from the highs to the absolute lows. These days that usually means Bruce Willis and he is joined by Frank Grillo in the sci-fi effort, Cosmic Sin.  Jennifer Garner won’t say no to her kids in Yes Day, a sleep study turns nightmarish in Come True and living moment-by-moment becomes a nightmar...

From the files of the Bad Mutha Film Show on WHPK Radio in Chicago, Sergio Mims and Erik Childress do their annual rundown of predictions for the Academy Award nominations. Well, Erik predicts and Sergio listens as he goes into why he is not caring about this year’s event. They also decry the Academy’s decision to extend the eligibility period and then look forward on the latest news about the ret...

On this week’s movie review episode. Erik Childress & Steve Prokopy get into some old, some new and a lot of overdue. There’s a documentary about stray animals (Stray), a restored documentary from 1972 with Jane Fonda and Donald Sutherland (F.T.A.), a horror film about a deranged hairdresser (The Stylist) and the true story of an Asian basketball player (Boogie). They also check out the long-gesta...

On this week’s movie review show, Erik Childress and Steve Prokopy get into the ambition of the opioid takes with Andrew Jarecki’s Traffic-like, Crisis, as well as the Russo Brothers’ war-and-drug epic, Cherry, with Tom Holland. Lee Daniels takes another slap at ambition singing the blues with The United States vs. Billie Holiday. Another Billie has the beginning of her career examined in the docu...

Sergio Mims returns to catch-up with Erik Childress on a number of the latest on the Blu-ray scene. They reminisce about a classic from Danny Kaye and the childhood memories of the Buck Rogers TV series. Erik defends the Cameron Crowe film that was lambasted in Toronto years ago. Sergio takes us through a collection of classic musicals from Warner Archive as well as his appreciation of a William L...

The latest from Netflix, Disney Plus and more are focused on this week’s movie review episode with Erik Childress and Steve Prokopy. They look at the latest film from the director of First Girl I Loved (The Violent Heart), a new version of a Noel Coward play (Blithe Spirit), the adventures of a superhuman squirrel or at least the humans around it (Flora & Ulysses) and what happens when a woman fal...

Erik Childress and Steve Prokopy are back with reviews of the movies you don’t need a festival to see even if that’s where many of this week’s titles originated. They talk about one of the best from last year’s Sundance (Minari) and a trio from this year’s (Judas and the Black Messiah, Land, The World To Come). A remnant of the 2019 Toronto Film Festival is a horrific take on being a true believer...

The rundown from this year’s Sundance festival continues with Steve Prokopy who shares his praise of Edgar Wright’s documentary. But he also shares his thoughts on the starring vehicle for Clifton Collins, Jr., the new film from Zoe Lister-Jones and Daryl Wein as well as Jarrod Carmichael’s directorial debut. It doesn’t end there as they discuss whether the Nicolas Cage/Sian Sono effort lived up t...

An annual tradition on WHPK Radio’s Bad Mutha Film Show with Sergio Mims is checking in with Erik Childress on the films he saw at the Sundance Film Festival. This year the fest was held virtually giving Sergio the opportunity to see some films himself. So they look in on some of the best films that Erik saw (along with some of the worst) including new documentaries about Sesame Street, Rita Moren...

Erik Childress is joined again by Steve Prokopy for a rundown of new movie reviews. Sam Neill tries to protect his flock from the government in Rams. The duo are forced to remember the Sundance movie with writer/director Viggo Mortensen having to deal with his bigoted father in Falling. Two films wonder if we are all living inside a simulation (Bliss & A Glitch In The Matrix.) While a new short fi...

On the latest episode of “The Bad Mutha Film Show” from WHPK Radio (88.5 FM Chicago at the University of Chicago), Sergio Mims and Erik Childress continue to talk about the evolving state of the pandemic and how soon vaccinations will ease people into returning to theaters. When will they be back at full strength? They also talk about some of the actors likely not to be seen on the big screen anyt...

For the 200 th episode we check in with comic book expert, Erik Laws, who along with Erik Childress take a look back upon a bad year for comic book movies. Pandemic delays did 2020 no favors and the pair did not get a chance to discuss Birds of Prey, Bloodshot, The Old Guard, The New Mutants or Wonder Woman 1984. But they do here and it does not go well for any of them. It even sent Mr. Laws into...

The latest film from Warner Bros. may be streaming on HBO MAX, but its not streaming for everyone as we find out from Steve Prokopy who had to leave sole reviewing duties for The Little Things over to Erik Childress. All is not lost though on this week’s movie review show as the duo check out Carey Mulligan and Ralph Fiennes looking for what is buried underneath her property pre-WWII in The Dig. N...