The Twin Geeks

It’s 1991, and Bigelow has made a nominal name for herself in the cutthroat world of the American film industry. Point Break , Bigelow’s high-octane action thriller about a band of surfing bank robbers and the youngblood FBI agent in desperate pursuit of them, drops in July with a major splash, garnering her greatest receipts to date and continued cultural acclaim as a high point in ‘90s action th...

Bigelow’s directorial career is often recognized for its unique consideration of traditionally masculine subject matters from a more nuanced and deconstructive perspective. While her works aren’t traditionally seen as overtly feminine then in their juxtaposition to masculine subjects, there’s no denying that Bigelow brings some greatly appreciated inquiry into her mainstay genres of action and war...

Christmas Eve is upon us as we ring out the old year with this final collection of holiday features to round out the season. We've dug deep for this final handful, boasting the longest collective runtimes thus far, including one which almost made its way to the theaters. It's perhaps also the weirdest batch of the bunch, featuring such oddities as sentient logs, Christmas leprechauns, and...

We continue our trek through a frosty winter wonderland with six more Rankin/Bass holiday productions, adding to our mixed bag of Christmas goodies with some timeless holiday classics and some other unwieldy misfires long since forgotten. The seasonal canon expands here, as we see the first of several entries in which the directing duo continues the mythos of their previously established works, br...

The annual Christmas specials of veteran stop-motion legends Alan Rankin Jr. and Jules Bass have permeated our pop culture in an unforgettable fashion. The many iconic expansions they rendered, formatting old holiday songs into forty-minute television specials, has encapsulated for so many of us the very essence of the season itself. To decide once and for all which of these stand the test of time...

It’s Thanksgiving over at The Twin Geeks HQ. Calvin and David take a break while the guest hosts take over in true substitute teacher style. Listen as known Brit (and former guest) Stephen is quizzed on Thanksgiving by former guest Murph. Stick around for a review of Ghostbusters: Afterlife and our Thanksgiving treat: a discussion of Best in Show . Prepare for shambolic chaos and, don’t worry, Cal...

As the thinning veil of autumn grants us passage into the darker days of winter, our spirits are lifted and renewed by the holiday season. It's Halloween. The greatest holiday of them all. The one day of the year where what happens above the ground reflects the way it all must end. The one day where our spiritual contact is a little closer. Where the veil itself becomes visualized. Where we un...

Would it truly be Halloween if we didn't revisit the beloved Halloween franchise? Probably, but we'll do it anyway, as its always a seasonal treat to dive into a series of increasing mediocrity defined by its weakening representation of its famous masked killer. Highs and lows abound in this infamous autumnal franchise, with the second entry being one of the supposed better entries in the...

Each year, film lovers flock to their screens for the month of October to partake in an annual ritual of Halloween-themed viewing. Most often, we pack the month with the goriest, most terrifying, horrific movies we can find, but that has never been the true essence of the Halloween spirit. There will always be room in our ghoulish hearts for the likes of Micahel Myers and Jason Voorhees, but growi...

It's a podcast overflowing with enthusiasm! The Twin Geeks' newest Editor, Vaughn , an enthusiast of all things, debuts on the show to discuss a plethora of exciting new topics ranging from massive blockbusters to crafty art films. We begin with Denis Villeneuve's Dune , after returning from an early theater screening. Julia Ducournau's Titane is also spotlighted, in proximity with...

This week, we're joined by the Marvelous Matt Farley, The Earl of Christmas, Freaky Farley, the composer of 23,000 published songs, friend of the show, and the star of many site favorite cult movies such as Don't Let the Riverbeast Get You! (2012) and Local Legends (2013) . There's even a new Motern Media film coming this month, Metal Detector Maniac — releasing on Vimeo and Blu-ray fr...

How many horror movies can truly claim to have changed the landscape of popular culture as we know it, becoming such a widespread influence on everything to come after that the very conceit upon which its built becomes as ubiquitous as centuries of prior genre myth-making? George Romero's legacy will forever be associated with his first feature film, the groundbreaking and pioneering zombie pr...

Last week, we lost one of the people who made us laugh the most. Iconic comedian Norm Macdonald left behind a vast legacy of work and we've spent the last week chewing over his great contributions to comedic storytelling. What we've found is a veritable treasure chest of profoundly funny material spanning diverse forms and functions. Today we celebrate the endless joy Norm Macdonald has pr...

After many attempts of conjoining in person yet again, a mutual love of the French comic auteur and his gargantuan masterwork  PlayTime  have reunited our two cohosts for an in-person discussion of their various misadventures throughout the day, as well as the setting and spectacle of Tati's grandiose playground for his signature Monsieur Hulot character. Tati's recurring themes about the...

The inimitably stylish worlds of American Film Noir and pre Nouvelle Vague French crime cinema collide in the most commanding display of technical execution ever implemented in translating the artistry of the heist to the silver screen. After getting caught in the crosshairs of Hollywood's blacklisting during the McCarthy Era, director Jules Dassin found himself excommunicated to France, with...

Summer is coming to a close, but before we pack it in for the season we’ve got one last major thrill to end it on.  Point Break  is the ludicrous, amazing, exhilarating action spectacle which still defines the high point of Kathryn Bigelow’s directorial career. It embodies the best of what we love about Keanu Reeves and is brimming with career-best performances from the likes of Patrick Swayze, Lo...

The titanic scale and legacy of Fritz Lang's monolithic Sci-Fi epic is undeniable, despite a tumultuous and storied history of arduous ambition, calamitous failure, enduring influence, and eventual resurrection. The history of  Metropolis ' evolution within the public conscious is at least as fascinating as the innovative film itself. Its nearly complete form has only existed for little mo...

Paul Newman and Robert Redford pair as another couple of aces in this sleek, stylish portrait of a fantastical Depression Era Chicago in which grifters and gamblers run amok making their way the only way they know how.  The Sting  is a textbook example of great screenwriting, with a meticulously crafted narrative brimming with colorful characters and satisfying twists, you can't help but be en...

Stephen King and Frank Darabont's second prison-set adaptation captures the same sense of literary and cinematic symbiosis that its more famous predecessor is most lauded for. Though  The Shawshank Redemption  (1994) reigns supreme amongst King adaptations,  The Green Mile  is perhaps an even more compelling reverse side of that same coin, aligning its perspective with the prison guards instea...

The famous film that brought together the power couple of Bogie and Bacall, Howard Hawks'  To Have and Have Not is an enigma of sensual fascination. Ostensibly an adaptation of the famous Ernest Hemingway novel of the same name, but in actuality anything but, Hawks' laissez faire pairing of the hard-boiled Bogart and the sumptuous ingénue Bacall marinates in electric chemistry sparked betw...

As the fifth entry in his famous  Six Moral Tales , Éric Rohmer's  Claire's Knee tackles a range of sexual themes in a singular approach that is both laid back and biting in its criticisms. The careful maneuvering of Rohmer's storytelling, novelistic in nature, allows him to explore the fallibility of human desire and manipulative nature of lust and infatuation without outright demoniz...

There are few things in the history of cinema more iconic than Chaplin's Little Tramp and his many adventures. His exploits in the snowy landscape of The Gold Rush (1925) are perhaps the most recognizable of all, from the innovative miniature trickery to the famous rolls dance which has permeated pop culture ever since. The purest rendition of Chaplin's indelible persona is perhaps also hi...

Often proclaimed as the greatest script ever written, the intricate detective plot, thoroughly sketched characters, grand unfolding conspiracy, and riveting narrative developments of Chinatown  are undeniably difficult to compare. Adopting all the sensibilities from the highly stylized and sizzling American crime films from the 1940s to the less restricted and more politically astute era of the mi...

We like to remember Billy Wilder today more for his outstanding efforts as the foremost comic director of his time, but before the days of  Some Like it Hot (1959) and  The Apartment   (1960) Wilder's greatest successes were of the dramatic kind, and none more so than his multi-Oscar winning study on the disease of alcoholism.  The Lost Weekend  still resonates today because its subject is a p...

With his first directorial feature Damien Chazelle lit up the screen with a sensational depiction of musicality and determination, both as his subject and his prowess as a filmmaker.  Whiplash  often feels like Jazz in cinematic form: kinetic, vibrant, and masterful in its expression. The sleekly told story of an enterprising jazz drummer and his struggle to achieve greatness under the tutelage of...