The 80s Movie Podcast

In this episode of The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens shines a spotlight on filmmaker Amos Poe, one of the most influential yet least celebrated figures in American independent cinema. As a leading force in New York's No Wave movement, Poe helped create a new model for low-budget filmmaking that inspired generations of directors. However, this episode arrives under difficult circumstances a...

This week, we look back at one of John Carpenter's lesser appreciated works, which was released 35 years ago this week.  

In this episode of The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens dives into The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984), one of the most original films of the decade. The story follows Buckaroo Banzai, a brain surgeon, rock star, scientist, and adventurer who battles alien invaders from another dimension. However, the film never pauses to explain itself. Instead, it throws viewer...

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens concludes his look at the films of director Alex Cox with Walker (1987), one of the most ambitious and controversial movies of the decade. The 80s Movie Podcast and Edward Havens explore how Cox transformed the real-life story of American adventurer William Walker into a bold political satire that challenged audiences, critics, and studio exec...

On this episode, we continue a look back at the 80s movie of iconoclastic British filmmaker Alex Cox with his wacky 1987 movie Straight to Hell.

This week on The 80s Movie Podcast, host Edward Havens revisits Sid and Nancy (1986), director Alex Cox’s raw and uncompromising portrait of Sex Pistols bassist Sid Vicious and his turbulent relationship with Nancy Spungen. Featuring a career-defining performance by Gary Oldman alongside Chloe Webb, the film captures the chaos, romance, and tragedy surrounding one of punk rock’s most infamous coup...

On this episode, we reflect on the recent unfortunate late summer release of an Easter-themed movie by looking back to the 1987 unfortunate late spring release of a Christmas-themed horror movie, Silent Night, Deadly Night: Part 2.

On this episode, we take a look back not at the career of an actor or director, nor about a specific movie or a distributor, but at a movie theatre that opened forty years ago today, that would change the course of the theatrical exhibition industry forever: The Cineplex Beverly Center. ----more---- The Beverly Center and its flagship movie theatre, the first theatre in America to have a double-di...

On this episode, we speak with film historian, author and UCSB professor Ross Melnick about his new book, his 80s cinema class, and five films from the decade he thinks you should watch again. ----more---- Ross Melnick was also named as a 2017 Academy Film Scholar, one of only two film scholars who were bestowed this honor by the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences. His new book, Hollywoo...

From distributors barely remembered and films long forgotten, to the biggest actors and filmmakers of the decade, The 80s Movies Podcast is your ticket to the movies.

On this episode, your host, film historian Edward A. Havens III, delves deep into the 80s film vault to visit one of the movies from the 1980s he had known about for forty years but had never gotten around to seeing: Nick Castle's 1982 directorial debut, The Assassination Game. ----more---- Castle would go on to a career that included writing and/or directing such films as The Boy Who Could Fly, D...

On this episode, we discuss one of the biggest hit films ever in Australian cinema, that was pretty much ignored in the rest of the world, Yahoo Serious' Young Einstein. ----more---- Yes, you read that right. Yahoo Serious was the name of the director of Young Einstein. And its main star. And it's co-writer, co-producer, supervising editor, and he even wrote and sang a song or two on the soundtrac...

On this episode, film historian and host Edward A. Havens III briefly talks about one of the quintessential 80s movies, that didn't actually come out until May 1990. Mel Damski's Happy Together.   ----more---- We talk about the creation of the movie, its two lead stars (Patrick Dempsey and Helen Slater), and the one supporting actor who would go on to become one of Hollywood's most successful acto...

On this episode, we take a look back at the history of the First Blood movies. ----more---- From its beginnings as an idea by Penn State English student David Morrell in 1968 to its publication as a novel in 1972, First Blood would spend nearly a decade in development in hell, attracting filmmakers like Richard Brooks (The Blackboard Jungle, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Elmer Gantry, In Cold Blood), Joh...

On this episode of The 80s Movie Podcast, we work our way through the history of American movie censorship, the creation of the MPAA rating system, what lead to the creation of the PG-13 rating in 1984, and examine how little has changed in the battle for morality in entertainment has changed in the past 100 years. ----more---- Movies discussed during this episode include: The Flamingo Kid (1984,...

This episode, we take a look back at the short-lived production and distribution company American Cinema Releasing, pioneers of two ways of finding financing for independent films and releasing them into theatres, and the company responsible for making Chuck Norris a star. ----more---- Movies discussed on this episode include: Beatlemania (1981, Joseph Manduke) Charlie Chan and the Curse of the Dr...

On this episode, we discuss the history of 3-D movies, and take a look at the ones that were made and released during the 1980s. ----more---- The titles discussed during this episode include: Amityville 3 (1983, Richard Fleischer) Bwana Devil (1952, Arch Oboler) Chain Gang (1984, Worth Keeter) Comin' At Ya! (1981, Fernandino Baldi) Dial M for Murder (1954, Alfred Hitchcock) Friday the 13th Part II...

In time for the start of the baseball season, we talk about the numerous baseball movies that were made for movie and television screens during the 1980s. ----more---- Movies discussed during this episode include:  Amazing Grace and Chuck (1987, Mike Newell) Blue Skies Again (1983, Richard Michaels) Brewster's Millions (1985, Walter Hill) Bull Durham (1988, Ron Shelton) The Comeback Kid (1980, Pet...

On this episode, we take a look back at the life and career of director Peter Bogdanovich, with a focus on his forgotten 1981 comedy They All Laughed, and the love affair with one of the film’s leading ladies, Playboy Playmate Dorothy Stratten, which would lead to her murder at the hands of her estranged husband, Paul Snider. 

On this episode of The 80s Movie Podcast, we continue The Orphans series, focusing on one-off distribution company films. We discuss Out of the Blue, directed by and starring Dennis Hopper alongside Linda Manz, and examines its place as a singular release within its distribution context. We break down the film’s tone, production background, and its unique position within 1980s cinema. The Orphans...

On this episode, film critic and historian Edward A. Havens III concludes his two-part look back at the 1980s films of one of cinema's truly gifted storytellers, John Sayles. ----more---- We talk about his three movies from the second half of the decade, as well as many of the films he would make after the end of the 1980s.    The movies discussed in this episode, all directed by John Sayles, incl...

On this episode, film critic and historian Edward A. Havens III begins a two-part look back at the 1980s films of one of cinema's truly gifted storytellers, John Sayles. ----more---- We talk about his beginnings in upstate New York, his college years, where he would meet several of his regular future collaborators, his early career as an author, his time as a screenwriter for the legendary film pr...

On this episode of The 80s Movie Podcast, we continue The Orphans series exploring one-off distribution company films. We take a look at Union City, Head-On, and Wired to Kill, three films that reflect the experimental and genre-driven side of standalone distribution releases from the 1980s. We discuss how each film was shaped by its production context and how they collectively reflect a broader p...

On this episode, film critic and historian Edward A. Havens III takes his Wayback Machine back forty years, to look back at the movies you could have seen after Christmas dinner in 1981. ----more---- The movies covered during this episode include (released in 1981, unless otherwise noted): Absence of Malice (Sydney Pollack) Arthur (Steve Gordon) Atlantic City (Louis Malle) Buddy Buddy (Billy Wilde...

On this episode of The 80s Movie Podcast, we continue The Orphans series, focusing on one-off distribution company films. This time we explore The Texas Godfather, Vasectomy: A Delicate Matter, and Willy/Milly (aka I Was a Teenage Boy, aka Something Special), three films that highlight the wide range of tone and genre these standalone distribution releases can cover. We discuss their production ba...