Remainders

This week on Remainders we watch The Big Heat. A gripping 1953 film noir directed by Fritz Lang, The Big Heat follows determined detective Dave Bannion (Glenn Ford) as he exposes corruption within his own department after a fellow officer's death. Gloria Grahame is essential as one of Darren’s all-time picks for noir femme fatales. With intense performances, dark atmosphere, and themes of cor...

This week on Remainders we discuss the 2018 crime thriller Dragged Across Concrete. From director S. Craig Zahler (Bone Tomahawk, Brawl in Cell Block 99), Dragged stars Mel Gibson and Vince Vaughn as two cops caught committing police brutality who turn to robbing criminals out of desperation. Filled with his trademark violence and considerable runtime, Dragged is a movie that further cements Zahle...

This week on Remainders, we watch the 1946 noir classic Gilda. An iconic role for Rita Hayworth, she plays the femme fatale shrouded in secrets. Set against the backdrop of a post-World War II casino in Buenos Aires, Gilda’s past collides with her present as Johnny Farrell (Glenn Ford) steps back into her life. An all-time great in the noir genre. Other topics include Oppenheimer, favorite Christo...

This week on Remainders, we talk the 1999 crime thriller A Simple Plan. Directed by Sam Raimi, mostly without his signature chaotic style, Bill Paxton and Billy Bob Thornton play brothers who discover a duffel bag of money and decide to keep it. Almost immediately, this apparent blessing turns into a curse as greed, violence, past trauma, and death all arise as a result. Paxton and Thornton reunit...

This week on Remainders we watch the 1992 crime film One False Move. From director Carl Franklin and co-written by Billy Bob Thorton, Bill Paxton and Thorton lead this forgotten gem about three criminals clashing with a small-town sheriff. Paxton, the all-time great everyman, is at his best as naïve Chief Dale “Hurricane” Dixon, who is excited at the opportunity to become a real cop. But when his...

This week on Remainders, we talk the 1981 neo-noir Body Heat. Written and directed by Lawrence Kasdan – around the same time as writing Raiders of the Lost Ark and the Empire Strikes Back – Body Heat was inspired by Double Indemnity and launched the careers of William Hurt and Kathleen Turner. Ned (Hurt) is a hapless lawyer who falls hard for the sultry but married Matty (Turner). Their affair tur...

This week on Remainders we watched the 2017 film First Reformed. An all-time best performance by Ethan Hawke, First Reformed follows Hawke playing a small-town minister as he grapples with despair brought upon by the looming threat of climate change. Hawke’s crisis of faith leads him down a dark path as he bounces between hope and despair in a world that often leaves little to have faith in. Paul...

This week on Remainders we watch the 1997 drama Cop Land. James Mangold’s urban western was Sylvester Stallone’s return to drama after a slew of over-the-top 90s action bombs. Giving one of the best performances of his career, it helps that the rest of the cast is a list of all-time greats, including De Niro, Keitel, and Liotta. A tale of justice and grit, this sleeper hit is almost a hidden gem t...

This week on Remainders we continue De Palma Days and talk about 1984 film Body Double. Possibly De Palma’s most Hitchcockian film, it’s the story of a man caught in between voyeurism and murder – essential Hitchcock tropes. We discuss its horror and pornographic elements, De Palma’s use of over-the-top acting and direction style, lead actor Craig Wasson’s effectiveness as the lead, Melanie Griffi...

This week on Remainders, we talk Brian De Palma and his 1981 film Blow Out. A classic in Travolta's and De Palma's filmography, the story of a movie soundman uncovering a murder plot against a presidential candidate has grown in appreciation amongst cinephiles since its release over 40 years ago. De Palma's innovative camera movements and focus on doubles and murder mystery do not g...

This week on Remainders, we talk about the 2008 documentary Anvil! The Story of Anvil. Anvil is the story of a veteran heavy metal band that influenced the genre, but never saw their own success. Childhood friends Steve ‘Lips’ Kudlow and Robb Reiner made a pact to become rock stars and they never looked back, despite the doubts, setbacks, day-jobs, and all the other mundane chores that got in thei...

This week on Remainders, we talk the 2007 documentary King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters, the story of die-hard gamers competing for the record high-score on Donkey Kong. Steve Wiebe, a down on his luck everyman, needs a purpose and discovers it in classic arcade gaming. As he attempts to break the record in Donkey Kong, he is exposed to the power and corruption in the underbelly of competitive g...

This week on Remainders we continue Cage Fest with the 2018 metal-revenge nightmare Mandy. Red and Mandy are living a serene life in the Pacific Northwest woods when a demonic cult sets their target on them and destroys everything they know and love. Red, in an all-time great Cage performance, is forced to descend into madness in a pursuit for revenge. Biker monsters will snort coke, Cage will for...

This week on Remainders we begin Cage Fest with the 1999 underrated gem, Bringing Out the Dead. Directed by Martin Scorsese with a screenplay by Paul Schrader (Taxi Driver, Raging Bull), the Dead follows Frank Pierce, an insanely burnt out emergency paramedic working the night shift in 1990s New York City. As the stress and unpredictability of the job start to wear him down, Frank begins to see th...

This week on Remainders, we finish our Fritz Lang double feature with the 1931 noir classic M. A German suspense thriller ahead of its time, Lang’s first sound film is his most pivotal and is widely considered one of the greatest films of all time and his magnum opus. Peter Lorre sets the stage for decades of creeper performances playing Hans Beckert, an incarnation of evil that still forces a mor...

On this mini-episode of Remainders, we check out the shady side of classic Hollywood with the new film Babylon (w/ Spoilers!), and look back to see how it compares to the notably sunnier 2011 film The Artist. Both dive into the silent-film era and try to illuminate the transition into modern films, but with different vibes on how it affected the lives behind the scenes.  Website Facebook Instagram...

This week on Remainders, we begin Part One of our Fritz Lang Double-Feature with the 1927 sci-fi classic Metropolis. A German Expressionist story of broken down workers toiling away to produce a life of luxury for the rich. Sound familiar? We discuss the recurring themes that are still around today and how Lang created something that not only still resonates with society today, but also the visual...

This week on Remainders, we get ready for the holidays and put on the fantasy-goth-comedy-romance classic, Edward Scissorhands. Tim Burton upends his suburban youth upbringing with a modern-era Frankenstein story about a misunderstood boy who just wants to belong. Possibly Johnny Depp's most iconic role, we look at the lasting effect Burton's melancholy love story has had on what it mean...

This week we discuss the 80s cult classic Razorback. An eco-horror set in the outback, the tale of a giant killer boar rampaging against the exploitation of the natural land is a poetic masterpiece, despite its admittedly ridiculous premise. We get into director Russell Mulcahy’s ability to weave visual artistry and horror aesthetics while also giving us the most badass hunter from down under, Jak...

This week on Remainders we talk about the 1999 documentary American Movie. A tale of Midwestern grit about a man who will stop at nothing to complete his low-budget horror film and prove to himself that dreams can come true. A Sundance Film Festival winner and the origin of two immortal characters in Mark Borchardt and Mike Schank, we’ll look at its enduring legacy and why art is worth fighting fo...

This week on Remainders we cover the 1955 classic The Night of the Hunter.  A one-and-done directed movie by screen legend Charles Laughton, this noir/thriller stars Robert Mitchum as a faux preacher serial killer targeting housewives by the score. Although largely ignored at the time of release, Hunter has grown in status and is now regarded as one of the best films of all time with clear influen...

As David Gordon Green's Halloween trilogy comes to a conclusion with Halloween Ends, we take a look at the entire film series. We give our complete rankings of every Halloween movie (including Halloween Ends) and celebrate Carpenter's legacy in the franchise that just keeps on giving. Hot takes are had, Rob Zombie gets some major attention, and we learn that every Halloween sequel ages l...

This week on Remainders, we take a look at witchcraft and satanic orgies with the 1922 silent film classic Haxan, or Witchcraft Through the Ages. As we settle into our favorite October horror movies, Haxan is largely where it all started. Part historical document on witchcraft in the Middle Ages, part fictionalized account of how Satan and his wild tongue seduced women to witchcraft, ALL horror in...

This week on Remainders, Darren and Patrick cover the 2005 Australian western The Proposition. Directed by John Hillcoat (The Road) with a screenplay and score by Nick Cave, the outback never looked or sounded so violent. The plot is simple but commanding: a vicious criminal must hunt down and kill his older brother in order to save his younger brother from execution. The poetic nature of death an...

This week on Remainders, Darren and Patrick take a look at Darren’s classic pick A Woman Under the Influence by John Cassavetes. Cassavetes was never one to shy away from tough emotional turmoil in his films, and Woman is no exception. In what may be a favorite performance on the podcast, Gena Rowlands displays a masterclass in acting and how to show the slow realization someone may be beyond help...