The 80s Movie Podcast

In this episode of The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens explores Hearts and Armour (1983), an Italian fantasy adventure inspired by Orlando Furioso. The film follows star-crossed lovers caught between Christian and Saracen armies during a sprawling medieval conflict. However, prophecy, magic, and divided loyalties threaten every chance at happiness. Along the way, we examine the film's produc...

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens revisits Dr. Heckyl and Mr. Hype (1980), the offbeat comedy that gave Oliver Reed the chance to play both a shy, awkward doctor and his outrageous alter ego. Directed by Charles B. Griffith and loosely inspired by Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic story, the film follows Dr. Adrian Heckyl as he creates a formula that transforms him into the lou...

Edward Havens, host of The 80s Movie Podcast, issues a brief apology and explains why the show paused for the past eight months. This 2m52s host update thanks listeners and provides a candid explanation of the hiatus. Thank you for sticking with the neon-lit rewind. Your support matters.

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens revisits the little-seen 1986 television thriller The Brotherhood of Justice, a mostly forgotten ABC movie starring a young Keanu Reeves and Kiefer Sutherland years before they became major Hollywood stars. Inspired by real events at a Texas high school, the film follows a group of students who form a vigilante organization to fight crime and...

Look back at 40 years of the Brat Pack, the unofficial group of young actors whose films fundamentally defined 1980s teen culture. Host Edward Havens explores the origins of the infamous nickname from David Blum's 1985 New York Magazine cover story. We trace how media hype, intense friendships, and behind-the-scenes rivalries turned a handful of rising Hollywood stars into an iconic pop-culture mo...

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens continues his retrospective on the films of director Susan Seidelman with a deep dive into her quirky 1987 sci-fi romantic comedy, Making Mr. Right. Following her massive breakout success with Desperately Seeking Susan, Seidelman used her three-picture deal with Orion Pictures to craft this unique cinematic blend of classic screwball romance,...

Step into a world of sword-and-sorcery, dark fairy tales, and practical effects on The 80s Movie Podcast as host Edward Havens welcomes author Todd Downing. Celebrating his new book Return of the Calico Kids, Downing joins the show for an expansive deep dive into the absolute best fantasy films of the 1980s.   The conversation tracks the incredible evolution of fantasy filmmaking during Hollywood'...

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens takes a deep dive into the chaotic history of Collision Course, the bizarre buddy-cop action-comedy starring late-night giant Jay Leno and The Karate Kid legend Pat Morita. Filmed at the height of the 1980s mismatched-partner craze, this forgotten cinematic curiosity paired a fast-talking Detroit detective with an investigator from Tokyo, resu...

In this episode of The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens continues his series on the films of Susan Seidelman with a deep dive into Desperately Seeking Susan (1985). The film became Seidelman's biggest commercial success and helped capture the energy of mid-1980s New York City. At the same time, it transformed Madonna from a music sensation into a movie star and introduced audiences to one of...

In this episode of The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens examines Brats (2024), Andrew McCarthy's deeply personal documentary about the lasting impact of the "Brat Pack" label. Nearly forty years after a single magazine article transformed a group of young actors into a cultural phenomenon, McCarthy revisits the people, films, and relationships that defined an era of 1980s cinema. However, the...

Our regular spotlight on influential female filmmakers returns with one of the most important independent films of the 1980s. In this episode of The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens launches a retrospective of director Susan Seidelman by examining her groundbreaking debut feature, Smithereens (1982). Long before she found mainstream success with Desperately Seeking Susan, Seidelman captured t...

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens looks back at Crimewave (1986), one of the most unusual and troubled collaborations in 1980s cinema. Directed by Sam Raimi and co-written with Joel and Ethan Coen shortly after their debut Blood Simple, the film is a surreal blend of slapstick comedy, noir parody, and cartoon violence that quickly spiraled into one of the decade’s most notorio...

In this episode of The 80s Movie Podcast, we revisit Smokey and the Bandit Part 3, the unusual final chapter in the Smokey and the Bandit series, released without Burt Reynolds in a starring role and built around an entirely different concept than audiences originally expected. Instead of focusing on Bo “Bandit” Darville, the film shifts attention to Sheriff Buford T. Justice, played once again by...

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens looks back at Threads (1984), the harrowing BBC television film directed by Mick Jackson that depicts the devastating consequences of nuclear war on the city of Sheffield, England. Originally broadcast during the height of Cold War tensions, the film follows two ordinary families as escalating geopolitical conflict between the United States an...

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens looks back at Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988), the groundbreaking live-action/animation hybrid that changed Hollywood forever. Directed by Robert Zemeckis and produced by Steven Spielberg, the film blended classic cartoon chaos with hard-boiled film noir, following private detective Eddie Valiant (Bob Hoskins) as he investigates a murder myster...

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens takes a look at one of the most difficult and overlooked films of the early 1980s: Deep in the Heart (released in the UK as Handgun), a 1983 vigilante drama directed by British filmmaker Tony Garnett. Set in Texas, the film follows Kathleen Sullivan, a teacher who relocates from Boston and is violently assaulted by a local lawyer, leading her...

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens takes a look back at one of the strangest ensemble comedies of the 1980s: Chattanooga Choo Choo (1984), a film loosely inspired by the famous Glenn Miller song and built around an over-the-top premise involving a cross-country train race for a multimillion-dollar inheritance. Starring George Kennedy as a football team owner attempting to secur...

In this episode of The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens explores UFOria (1985), a quirky cult 80s movie that blends comedy, romance, road movie chaos, and extraterrestrial obsession. Harry Dean Stanton stars as a dreamer convinced that a UFO will solve his problems and carry him away from ordinary life. However, his search for answers creates a series of unpredictable encounters that push him...

In this episode of The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens returns to the ongoing Orphans series. This time, he examines three films released by distributors that never handled another theatrical release. The spotlight falls on Heartbreaker (1983), Hells Angels Forever (1983), and Mother Lode (1982). Together, they reveal a forgotten corner of 1980s movie history. Along the way, we explore how t...

The 80s Movie Podcast returns to The Orphans series, which spotlights films whose distributors released exactly one theatrical feature before closing their doors. In Part 5, host Edward Havens examines three films with almost nothing in common except that shared fate. The Last Fight (1983) stars Fred Williamson as his signature character Jesse Crowder, alongside Ruben Blades and Darlanne Fluegel,...

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens explores Motion Picture Marketing, an early 1980s independent distributor that built its business by aggressively rebranding and retitling 1970s European horror films for the American market. Rather than releasing these films as originally presented, the company reshaped them through new titles, redesigned poster campaigns, and targeted market...

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens concludes his exploration of Miramax Films in the 1980s by focusing on the company’s 1989 releases, a year that brought increased visibility, stronger positioning, and signs that Miramax had moved beyond survival into sustained influence. After a decade of gradual growth, the company entered the final years of the 1980s with a clearer identity...

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens continues his exploration of Miramax Films by revisiting the company’s 1988 releases, a period when the distributor expanded both its reach and reputation. As independent cinema gained greater visibility during the late 1980s, Miramax increasingly positioned itself as a company capable of bringing challenging, international, and unconventional...

Rampage is one of the most fascinating and overlooked films of the 1980s. In this episode of The 80s Movie Podcast, we dive into the troubled production, disturbing subject matter, and complicated legacy of William Friedkin’s 1987 crime thriller. Written, directed, and produced by Friedkin, the film tells the story of a chilling serial killer case that pushes the justice system, morality, an...

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens continues his Miramax Films series by focusing on 1987, a year that marked an important turning point in the company’s growth. Although Miramax remained a relatively small independent distributor, its slate increasingly reflected larger ambitions, broader visibility, and stronger positioning within the independent film landscape. In this episo...