Words and Movies

In this episode we're looking at two of the better examples of films based on Leonard's novels. First we're watching Jackie Brown (1997) directed by Quentin Tarantino and starring Pam Grier. Jackie Brown is based on his 1992 novel Rum Punch . There are a bunch of actors in this film who you may think at first are badly miscast, but as you settle in you discover just how right they were for the par...

We've got another overstuffed episode this time around as we take a look at two films from 1967.  First up is BONNIE AND CLYDE, directed by Arthur Penn and starring Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty. It's a romanticized (Claude can spell it, but he can't say it) version of the story of a pair of outlaws who came to a violent end (as so many of them do). It's also the source of a bunch of tropes,...

Happy Holidays! This episode features a couple of films that have a Christmas component and happen to have "Miracle" in the title. First we look at the 1944 screwball comedy The Miracle of Morgan's Creek , directed by Preston Sturges. From there it's on to Miracle on 34th Street , the 1947 film directed by George Seaton.  Also of note is that Claude was actually RIGHT about Kris Kringle boppi...

Back in the World War II era, the Nazi Party was so unpopular that even the organized crime syndicates didn't care for them. (No kidding, you can look it up. Start with Meyer Lansky and the Jewish Mob in the early 1930s.) And the idea of gangsters defending their territory as "good guys" made its way to Hollywood and a couple of films featuring mob figures fighting against Nazis came out until the...

Strap in, because we're in for a funky ride.  In this episode we're looking at two films that each feature a married couple and how they cope with a wartime situation. In 1967's Weekend , Jean-Luc Godard gives us a truly awful couple in Corinne and Roland, each of whom is already plotting to kill the other as the film begins. The film as a whole is a funhouse mirror of a look at a general bre...

In the 1970s, theories abounded when it came to the question of the 1963 Kennedy assassination. It probably wasn't the beginning of the Conspiracy Theory Crowd, but things certainly accelerated from there. And of course some of this stuff boiled over into Hollywood, which made a few films that touched on the events of November 22, 1963, often in the form of thinly-veiled stories.  In this epi...

There are a lot of American films that have covered wars from the point of view of the soldier. In this episode, we cover a pair of films that covered real-life wars from the point of view of the journalists who were sent to cover the events. Unfortunately these journalists learn that it's tough to be objective when they discover that they're taking sides just a little more than they initially tho...

We've got a righteously overstuffed episode this week as we look at three (and briefly a fourth) screen adaptations of Lousa May Alcott's Little Women . We start with the 1933 version directed by George Cukor and starring Katharine Hepburn as Jo March. Then we take a glancing blow at the 1949 adaptation before moving on to 1994's version, which was directed by Gillian Armstrong and stars Winona Ry...

Join us as we travel south to examine life in a couple of small towns. FIrst we're in a nondescript mid-Texas town in 1976, in Richard Linklater's Dazed and Confused (1993), a bittersweet comedy that follows a bunch of teenagers through the first day of summer vacation.  Next, we move to the Florida Panhandle, but don't worry, it won't be crowded because it's the off-season. Ruby in Paradise...

We have a pretty packed episode, as Sean shares a bunch of film history in the first half, all of which ties to the first of our films in this episode. First up on your projector is Ronin , from 1998, directed by John Frankenheimer. That gives us plenty of room to just sit back and enjoy the ride when we talk about Duplicity (2009), written and directed by Tony Gilroy. Each film takes a vastly dif...

In this episode we take a look at a pair of comedies that are set during the Great Depression: Sullivan's Travels , directed by Preston Sturges, and O Brother, Where Art Thou? , directed by the Coen Brothers. And while they couldn't be more different in overall content, they have many, MANY things in common. It's an overstuffed episode and we probably only scratched the surface.  COMING ATTRA...

Sean went to Boston and DIDN'T HAVE CLAM CHOWDER.  Claude went to Nashville to attend a podcasting conference.  We've had a busy few weeks, gang. But here's Reel 19, where we take on The Marx Brothers' Duck Soup (1933), directed by Leo McCarey, and Mike Nichols' Catch-22 (1970). Each film highlights the absurdities of war--how they start and how crazy it gets once you're in the thick of...

This episode nearly didn't make it to you, several times. The universe may have been conspiring against us. And that's a shame because this is one over-stuffed show. In this episode we take on 1988's Bull Durham , written and directed by Ron Shelton. Shelton's experience as a ballplayer shows in the minute details he presents to the viewer. After that, we move on to Without Limits , directed by Ro...

Sean and Claude close out their series on foreign films and their English-language remakes with this look at another Akira Kurosawa movie, Yojimbo (1961), and its English remake, A Fistful of Dollars (1964), directed by Sergio Leone.  It's pretty clear that Kurosawa has grown since 1954's Seven Samurai , and we talk a little more about how Kurosawa and Hollywood managed to affect and inform e...

For this episode you're going to need a lot of popcorn, movie fans, because this is an overstuffed show where we discuss a couple of very long movies. Combined, they're clocking in at over five hours and change. First up is the 1954 film Seven Samurai , directed by Akira Kurosawa. It's a favorite of both Sean and Claude, and pretty much anyone else who happens to be somebody. Seven Samurai 's infl...

Another outtake track, where I start complaining about the state of arts schools in this part of the country. 

Our look at non-English language films and their English counterparts continues with a review of the films Infernal Affairs (2002), co-directed by Andrew Lau and Alan Mak. and The Departed , the 2006 film directed by Martin Scorsese. In this case the films aren't clones of one another to the extent that we saw in the last episode, but the storylines remain quite close despite the big cultural jump...

Hi there: This is an outtake from our past episode that I had to cut because the episode was running so long. But it was just amusing enough that I thought you'd find it fun. The only sad part is that you don't get to see Sean's face, looking for a way to respond to my weird little rant before he finally finds his answer.  Stuff like this is why I think I may have adult ADHD, because he puts...

As we noted last week, we're accelerating the rate of episode releases for a couple of weeks to make up for the lengthy gap in our recent output. This week is the first of a series of films in which we look at both the foreign original version and compare it to the American English edition. This week we're looking at Abre los Ojos ("Open Your Eyes") and Vanilla Sky . Abre los Ojos is a 1997 film d...

So, where have we been? Actually, it's Claude's fault that the episode is so late. What with school reopening, plus some personal drama coming from a couple of directions, it's been a rough few weeks and apologies all around. To make up for it, Reel 14 will also be coming out in no more than a couple of days. At any rate, this time around we've got a couple of wonderful, bittersweet films that exp...

It's Women's HIstory Month! And as our means of taking advantage of a remarkable coincidence, in today's episode we're looking at two films where the bulk of the primary cast is female. That said, the theme this week is stories related to the theater. First, we're looking at a favorite of the both of us, 1937's Stage Door , starring Katharine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers and Adolphe Menjou. After that w...

In this episode we've chosen a couple of near-future films in which humanity seems doomed for one reason or another. First up in our Double Feature is 1995's 12 Monkeys , directed by Terry Gilliam, involving a plague, time travel, mental illness and, of course, World War One.  After the Intermission we're looking at Children of Men, co-written and directed by Alfonso Cuarón and released in 20...

We wrap up Sorkinfest with a look at two films for which Aaron Sorkin did NOT receive any writing credit. Bulworth, and Enemy of the State, both from 1998. Listen in as we discuss the two films on their own merits and try to figure out which parts Sorkin left his fingerprints on.  And because I can't read a calendar, Reel 11 will be released next week instead of two weeks from now.  COMI...

We're closing in on the end of SorkinFest as we get to Part 4 of our five-part series looking at the work of Aaron Sorkin. And this time around we're looking at a couple of films that Sorkin had a public hand in writing--or, more accurately, re-writing: 1993's Malice , starring Nicole Kidman and Alec Baldwin, and Moneyball , the 2011 film starring Brad Pitt and Philip Seymour Hoffman.  These...

That's a little bit of a misnomer, but not by much. This episode--the third in our series of five episodes dedicated to Aaron Sorkin's work--looks at two films he worked on that told stories about specific individuals: Steve Jobs (2015), Directed by Danny Boyle, and Sorkin's film directing debut, 2017's Molly's Game . Now, with Steve Jobs , Sorkin took some of the storylines provided by Walter Isa...