Episode Collection: Year 8

Double Feature Year 8 Finale

Double Feature Year 8 Finale

SPOILER FREE SHOW! Double Feature faces themes as real-world issues collide with fiction. Fuck count-downs. An episode with Little to no plot details. An episode not requiring having seen any Year 8 movies. As requested – a completely uncut live episode! How people get information in 2016. Everyone has a bubble. Reinforcing beliefs. The political result of the LA/Austin schism. 2016 US presidential politics. Racism is alive in we’ll in America. Michael has decided to embrace the Oscars. Alice learns the alternate title for “The Oscars.” Continue reading

The Brave Little Toaster + The Green Inferno

The Brave Little Toaster + The Green Inferno

Outside your element on this very special end of the year episode. Boldly leaping into unknown territory. The Brave Little Toaster, our little secret. At long last Michael becomes a test case. Looking back on an animated cult film. Unintentional character and notability. How the Pixar talent has changed as popular animation grows. The outstandingly successful Pixar formula. The most anticipated movie of Double Feature history. After ten long years, Eli Roth strikes back with The Green Inferno. The new iconography. The original impact of Hostel and the incoming impact of The Green Inferno. Perhaps the most inventive element of The Green Inferno, a brand new handle of feminism without the baggage of modern society. Continue reading

An American Werewolf in London + Clown

An American Werewolf in London + Clown

Two horror films tied by a secret thread. The last ever episode of Double Feature. Seminal werewolf film An American Werewolf in London. People said he brain was infected by devils. There’s probably Nazi wolves all over the place. Nightmarish prosthetics. The must-have werewolf transformation scene. An American Werewolf in London as a comedy, by way of music. Other werewolf movies covered by Double Feature. Clown destroys Alice’s cinematic legacy. An American Werewolf in Paris. Defying the odds. The history of scary clown films. Jon Watts takes over the world. Humor in premise, dead serious execution. The story of how Clown came to be, told using details that might be true. Convincing your audience you have a real movie! If you’re reading this, go watch the new 31 trailer. It’s such a good movie. It really is. The various forms of Clown! Child imagery that is not at Chuck E Cheese’s. A heavy decision required by legend. Continue reading

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit + Casino Royale

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit + Casino Royale

The final chapter in the saga of Jack Ryan and James Bond. Maybe not the final chapter in Double Feature, hopefully. Upon completion of Jack Ryan: Show Recruit, who is the real Jack Ryan? Continuity is finally solved. The long awaited information on Jack’s analytical character arc. Action where action is due. Casino Royale, the clearly best James Bond movie in the entire series come on really it is you know it don’t front. Hey look, it’s that guy from Hannibal again. James Bond in the 21st century. The much needed self loathing. Alice Thirteen on the set of an Eli Roth Clown thing. Continue reading

Thief + Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai

Thief + Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai

Concentrating on skill sets. Similar themes with differing points of voice on auteur theory. Disturbing news on the Double Feature Year 9 Kickstarter. Who creates a film? Holly on-set secrets. The hierarchy in a movie production. Thief compared to related films, both director and producer. What does Bruce Willis think about all this? Why auteurism matters (and why it can’t be ‘solved.’) The insane threads in the fabric of Thief. Enter Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai! When the insane name of insane movie does not serve to make it any more sane. Acting as a label and measure of a film. Filmset’s as playgrounds. Speculation on Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai. Continue reading

Taxi Driver + I Stand Alone

Taxi Driver + I Stand Alone

Pst. Get secret Double Feature episodes you didn’t know even existed. Tonight: heavy films on breaking points. A look at the psychotic from inside and outside. Keep that bagcat close by. News to no one but Michael Koester: Taxi Drive is fucking amazing! Robert De Niro doesn’t just put movie tickets on his face. As usual, the techniques of filmmaking area useful in making great films. A bit of a character study on Travis. What does Travis want, besides being a Taxi Driver? To clean up the streets or to accidentally clean up the streets, that is the exploitation-biased question. Hoping that no one else hears the fucking Godsmack song when they read the title I Stand Alone. Alice does not ask for an impression. What does Gasper really think? That goddamn Placebo video. Naked is good. Continue reading

Fitzcarraldo + Used Cars

Fitzcarraldo + Used Cars

A look into the headspace of those who are a little…off. Double Feature releases THE DOUBLE FEATURE MOVIE alongside the Year 9 Kickstarter. Out now! https://doublefeature.fm/members Fitzcarraldo in the making. Every film is also a documentary of the making of that film. Metaphors that aren’t metaphors. The line between crazy and genius (or, maybe there’s one). Fitzcarraldo could have just eaten a gum ball and avoided this whole mess. Used Cars as a screwball comedy. The time of Robert Zemekis that didn’t get enough breathing room. Getting down and dirty. The cringey feeling of watching screwball comedies (which have all but disappeared) at the height of the politically correctness in the last several decades. Revisiting – was it ok for people in backwards times to think backwards things? Staving off the full transition into socially conservative old person. Continue reading

Killapalooza 28: The Exorcist

Killapalooza 28: The Exorcist

The Exorcist films 1-5. A fresh, outsider’s guide to the Exorcist franchise. Five films, right? How many? A case for the popular appeal of a film that isn’t immediately effective to views out of the moment. Bloody Disgusting has a great series on slowing getting non-horror audiences into horror films. Rooting for the Devil in the Exorcist. Sad endings un stories about losing faith. A series of memorable set pieces. A tradition of single mother horror films. Defending the wrong underdogs. One more with strange feelings!` A horridly flawed and side-barred Alien comparison. The greatest Exorcist 3 that’s ever been. One of the greatest stand-alone films in Killapalooza history. Two films fight for forth film in the Exorcist franchise, but only one will win. Or maybe really neither will win. Continue reading

Stand By Me + Sleepers

Stand By Me + Sleepers

Kids on a rafter and what happens next. Trigger Warning: The last sentence about rafts was misleading because there are no rafts. If you are sensitive to audio programs that promote themselves as including rafts when they in fact do not include said rafts, there is a small possibility you will be negatively impacted by listening to the full show. To skip Stand By Me, skip to the twenty-four minute mark of the show and move directly to the film Sleepers. If you have not seen Sleepers, skip another 23.5 minutes to the so-called discussion regarding next week’s episode. Trigger Warning: if you are sensitive to upcoming episode discussions that are not really discussions but more a casual name drop of an upcoming special episode covering a horror franchise, blah blah trigger warning go fuck yourself. Continue reading

Honeymoon + The Taking of Deborah Logan

Honeymoon + The Taking of Deborah Logan

Degeneration and the need to overcome it. Really really no-kidding scary movies. Honeymoon: what the hell? A nice peaceful vacation into a terrible place. The hidden gem of Honeymoon. When things happen at the end, they are also very bad. A summary that refuses to spoil Honeymoon. The ending of Honeymoon, and that thing you seriously can’t believe (or understand). A time for scary faces – and that time is during The Taking of Deborah Logan. Deborah Logan is not Deborah Morgan (sorry about that!) Learning about Alzheimer’s. Determinations of a canonical natural in The Taking of Deborah Logan. Documentary handy-cam style spooky something. Credit where credit is due. The thing in that cave that is the worst thing. Continue reading

Super Fly + Dope

Super Fly + Dope

Contrasting portraits of success between decades. Super Fly and Shaft. One more job? There’s always one more job. A actual case of trying to get out of the business. Well, ‘a’ business anyways. Super Fly and the infamous score. Or Superfly soundtrack or whatever. If the Taco emoji wouldn’t destroy the feed or website or whatever, there would probably be one here. People who never update their phone wouldn’t be able to see the taco, so there’s also that to consider. HEY. What didn’t you see Dope? It was really, really great. The inevitability and unlikeliness of Dope. That 90s throwback film sort of happened, hooray! Michael defends a non-existant claim in an attempt to see what it all means. Continue reading

Gone Girl + Rachel Getting Married

Gone Girl + Rachel Getting Married

Stains on the American dream. Family life in the twenty-first century. The Gone Girl on David Fincher, Trent Reznor, and Atticus Ross down to a science. A terrible marathon of awful. Compliments to Tyler Perry. Missi Pyle on Fox News on Gone Girl. Selling the turns. No one will believe Rachel Getting Married is not awful, and, in fact, is a great Dogma95 style film. Blame the terrible cover. Not this cover, the one with Anne Hathaway’s smudged uncanny-valley face. The tragedy of no one seeing Rachel Getting Married because of this cover. Box office numbers that could have been better (had someone not fucked up the cover of Rachel Getting Married). Alright, really, look up the cover to this movie. You won’t believe it. Revisiting a conversation from Melancholia. Making time for twelve-step. Continue reading

Daisies + Bad Education

Daisies + Bad Education

Gender in the sixties and in the twenty-sixties. Daisies: not on the tv/film obscurity chart, but probably should be. Maybe it fell off the bottom. Black and white, definition, war and colors. Maybe-Robot girls do all the (bad?) things. Something about Daisies ladies and newspapers. Daisies provokes a very different kind of conversation about film, and Double Feature likes it. Bad Education requires taking notes, and then throwing them out and writing new notes. Fuck it, why not ditch these notes. Let’s Play Identity! Who does what as who and why are they doing that? Also, don’t forget, boohiss religion. Every time you squirm, known that’s because someone bumped the pretension knob. Really though, how about that Year 1? Continue reading

The Sum of All Fears + Goldeneye

The Sum of All Fears + Goldeneye

Jack Ryan and James Bond return with new faces. Trying to place The Sum of All Fears in the Jack Ryan universe. A movie that actually contains a sum of all of the fears. The continued look at analysts. The inner circles of analytics. Movie presidents then and now. The nuclear football. What happens with the bomb. Does mutually assured destruction still work? James Bond’s Goldeneye 64. Finally, actual hard evidence for the James Bond fan theory – it has to be one or the other. Or a third option. Pierce Brosnan becomes James Bond. Much love for the Alan Cumming. I’m invincible! Xena fills up her Hot Topic punch card (that’s ten skulls, by the way). Goldeneye as a progress Bond. Continue reading

Watchmen + Iron Sky

Watchmen + Iron Sky

Alternate history with very different backgrounds. The key differences between the multiple versions of Zach Snyder’s Watchmen. Another unlikely film. Watchmen at the perfect time a place. A perfect zeitgeist film that is unfortunately always in the zeitgeist. Extending the metaphor of mutually assured destruction. What does the end of Watchmen mean? Three term Nixon. Alternate history in the minds and hearts of the audience. Ah, that great ultra violence. Iron Sky. Nazis on the moon! Enabling WWII alternate fiction. How has Double Feature not see Iron Sky? Whoops Netflix. Choosing your racism carefully. The one and only excuse for anyone on earth to be racist. Alternate fiction as a writing tool. Iron Sky and the Internet! Be nice to Zach Snyder, maybe. Continue reading

Calvary + Philomena

Calvary + Philomena

Communities of faith. Finding Calvary in a sea of Calvaries. Bang! Introduction! The opening fiasco. Seven days in town. An excuse for slice-of-life. Is everyone a suspect? How suspicion taints perspective (or at least demands engagement and a careful eye). Calvary, beloved by atheists. Philomena and the weekly kick in the nuts. Hey, let’s go on a road trip! A different kind of brutality. A side of Steve Coogan we’ve actually always seen. Judi Dench wins everything always. Never trust a nun. An update on where all those Double Feature episodes went. Continue reading

Magic Magic + A Field in England

Magic Magic + A Field in England

Something is very wrong. How the comedy works. Anxiety, confusion, and an exercise in…what, exactly? How Magic Magic twists the audience in its palm. The birds, oh god the birds. Puppy metaphors, maybe. Michael makes many comparisons, none of which involve bead. To address Michael Cera in Magic Magic. A Field in England opens with an dark and amusing joke only Double Feature listeners get to experience. Stupefying through minimalism. Everything you need to know upfront doesn’t help you. A Field in England, the devil, and drugs. Two editors eat some evil. Continue reading

Crimson Peak + The Elephant Man

Crimson Peak + The Elephant Man

Four hundred episodes, one Elephant Man, and a Crimson Peak. One of those David Lynch episodes! Guillermo del Toro finally appears on Double Feature. The directors who forged your taste. Who is the true Guillermo del Toro? Crimson Peak as just the greatest. Is Crimson Peak a great example of the director’s work or some other odd thing? Finding love in a brand new thing. The ceremony of film. Death in cinema. Just how weird is The Elephant Man? How David Lynch is it? Are those things related? The time and place The Elephant Man came out.An extended sandwich metaphor. An unlikely recommendation. Joseph Merrick. Man’s inhumanity to man. No kidding class warfare. Don’t forget, food for thought: Frankenstein. Continue reading

Melancholia + Persona

Melancholia + Persona

Considering identity and withdrawal. Finally, a trip through Melancholia in another chapter of Lars von Trier’s Depression Trilogy. Hopefully that one guy still listens. Sometimes the obvious metaphor is the right metaphor. Who’s the real victim of the swell party? What Melancholia shows regarding the cognitive divide between those with depression and those without depression. Different backgrounds create different knee-jerk reactions. Naked Kirsten Dunst wins everything. Keifer Sutherland jumps into a tree. The von Trier kinship. Persona as that one film that inspired all student films. Just how obscure is Ingmar Bergman? An early example of taking advantage of / completely subverting the media of film. Persona as described to another human – or attempted, anyways. Continue reading

Big Bad Wolves + Prisoners

Big Bad Wolves + Prisoners

Taking the law into your own hands. Child abduction films. People may or may not listen to The Prodigy, but they totally should. Big Bad Wolves, from an unexpected place. Keeping up with the good old brutality. The jokes, they’re coming for you. Dark dark times, and things are only getting worse. The first films from the creators of Big Bad Wolves. Prisoners, a film that is really fucking good. Seriously, see Prisoners! Come on. A terrifying performance with interesting choices. Running those circles. The gift from an actor. Buy one Prisoners, get one Prisoners for free. Continue reading

Eyes Without a Face + American Mary

Eyes Without a Face + American Mary

Surgery, both domestic and foreign. #babysfirstsoska! Where does Eyes Without a Face fit into the history of cinema, and how can you know? Looking to more recent films that drew inspiration. True horror, even today. Timeless effects techniques. Eyes Without a Face and identity. Why the filmmaker’s intent is valuable, even if you don’t care about the filmmakers intent. American Mary. A personal journey through The Soska Sisters. Twisted Twins and Katherine Isabelle. American Mary and attempting to steal from the Canadians. The rest of the Soska twins’ discography. Continue reading

Phantom of the Paradise + Forbidden Zone

Phantom of the Paradise + Forbidden Zone

Some musical midnight movies that aren’t asking for approval. Another look at the Phantom of the Paradise. Returning to Chicago’s own Music Box Massacre. Death, Inc. A monster, a veiled threat and a whiney if not eclectic piano player. The Phantom of the Paradise’s iconography and depth as compared to Phantom of the Opera or Faust or other well-known works. Heading to the Forbidden Zone. Something something blackface! Richard Elfman hands down the Mystic Nights of Oingo Boingo. Danny Elfman borrows from his own Forbidden Zone pieces. The Oogie Boogie song originally appears in Forbidden Zone. Danny ELfman’s very first film score, sort of. Pseudo Satan, Oogie Boogie’s song and Dilbert Zone. The Freeway connection. The conspiracy of Forbidden Zone. Is Forbidden Zone satirical or just odd? Oh, also, the crowdfunding campaign for Forbidden Zone 2. Continue reading

A Tale of Two Sisters + Calvaire

A Tale of Two Sisters + Calvaire

Surreal tales of fear from a place that you dare not spoil. Alice goes to Sundance with his films Director’s Cut and 31. New details about Rob Zombie’s 31. The infamy of A Tale of Two Sisters. Spoilers and jokes about spoilers. Deconstructing a unforeseen development in the plot. Korea reveals things. Name that film. No, please, name that film. The era of Japanese ghost stories or some such country. Calvaire, also known at The Ordeal. Michael forgets what the fuck is going on. Double features that accidentally work anyways. Horrible, terrible things and the wonderful people who love them. Listeners do the craziest things. Continue reading

SLC Punk + The Fountainhead

SLC Punk + The Fountainhead

Rugged individuals resist society. The time and place of SLC Punk. Who to follow and how to follow them. Punks in Salt Lake City an Punks in the suburbs of Chicago. A young punk’s relationship with his parents. St. Charles Mall Goth. Selling out! Heroine Bob, heroine in general, and that awful social circle. SLC Punk as a companion to the film Mean Girls. How to pronounce Ayn Rand. the Ayn Rand controversy. Someone else’s problem. Comparing The Fountainhead to Atlas Shrugged. The pain and pleasure of long speeches regarding ideals. Books about architecture can be movies about architecture. Continue reading

Clear and Present Danger + The Living Daylights

Clear and Present Danger + The Living Daylights

Coming back to new and old faces in the worlds of Jack Ryan and James Bond. What a raw show without notes is like. Still an analyst at heart! Answering the cliffhanger you forgot about from Jack Ryan’s last film, Patriot Games. Obtuse and lingering danger. Batman as Jack Ryan. Respect the oval office. Is this a win for the hero? A new James Bond and the missing James Bond. The awareness of The Living Daylights. 007 and the other double-0’s. Michael Koester says some ridiculous things and some profound things. Well, maybe just one profound thing. The debunked James Bond fan theory. A little more behind the curtain talk on Double Feature. Continue reading

Citizenfour + Mysterious Skin

Citizenfour + Mysterious Skin

Coping with unbearable weight in both fact and fiction. Crime and awful. A newly discovered use of the great empathy machine. The privacy myth – it’s not what you think it is. Encrypt your business and fuck that Google! Avoiding services that steal your data as the center of their business model. The US government doesn’t realize Edward Snowden is a patriot. President Obama as a total jerk. Mysterious Skin may be the toughest film Double Feature has ever tried to cover. More pedophile jokes than you can shake a prison sentence at. Continue reading

Romancing the Stone + Sorcerer

Romancing the Stone + Sorcerer

Smuggling-ish adventure thing! Romantic adventures. Wait, what? Robert Zemekis shocks many by making more than one kind of film. Well actually, look at all this stuff. Where Romancing the Stone falls in the Zemekis chronology. Kurt Russell wants to sell you a car. Get that stone! That time Danny DeVito didn’t play that guy from that one film that isn’t real anyways. Sorcerer as a maybe-remake of The Wages of Fear. Is Sorcerer a remake and why does that matter? The end of auteurism. A broader conversation about studios, money, directors and the death of art. Is the video market to blame, or did video invent cult? The answers to everything are yes and no, all the time.. Continue reading

Happy Accidents + K-PAX

Happy Accidents + K-PAX

Personal stories through the bending of time and space, maybe. You probably don’t see Happy Accidents coming. What the fuck, this film. Vincent D’Onofrio does all of the things. Various ways to interpret the plot of the film. This description can’t contain spoilers. There’s another movie on the show. In K-Pax, Kevin Spacey is not Bono. Bono is not Bono. No one is Bono. Jeff Bridges has a fourth of July celebration with the family. Saul Williams is Gunshots by Computer on sunday, bloody sunday. More various ways to interpret a film, this time regarding a different film. Something happens at the end and it’s probably great. I hope you’re happy. Continue reading

Killapalooza 27: The Omen

Killapalooza 27: The Omen

The Omen films 1-4. Damien! The Killapalooza returns. The most insane listener thing yet. One take! Where does the name Damiem come from? That was the original Omen going for and where is it now? 20th Centuary Fox. The most horrible thing ever. The music in the Omen franchise. Characters embracing the mythology. Is watching Omen as a slasher franchise a good thing or a bad thing? Taking it to the next level, and then not pretending it didn’t happen. Omen 2: Less title articles. Puberty is a satanist’s best friend. Help out your local demon. Coming into power, which makes for a great film about having come into power. What billionaires what. What’s dogs got to do with it? Killing all the babies: a hole in your plan. Let’s just make more Omens. Come on everyone, to the manatee tank! Continue reading

Last Action Hero + This is the End

Last Action Hero + This is the End

Movies looking inside themselves. Arnold Schwarzenegger is the Last Action Hero.Wait a second, John McTernan? A criticism of the action genre by masters of the action genre. The little boy that could. Calling out escapism. Animated buddy cops and factual fiction characters. A-listers commit atrocities in This is the End. Calling into question the behind-the-scenes buddy element. How much of a real look into celebrity life is This is the End? The change in celebrity over time. The ‘what the fuck’ angle. So bizarre it’s hard to believe it is really a film. Hey James Franco, want to talk about Jesus? Continue reading

Vertigo + In the Mouth of Madness

Vertigo + In the Mouth of Madness

Gargantuan directors examine head problems. Untouchable darkness. Hitchcock and Vertigo. I’m demon speeding.Not talking about the shot by talking about the shot. It’s been a while, so just what are these Hitchcock things? A dirty black river to get you through this. A run down on Vertigo. An argument for madness. Hey, do you love me I’m a devil machine? Get into my world, all-american dream. John Carpenter’s In the Mouth of Madness. Down in the darkness there is no more tomorrow. Sam Neil gets locked in the hallow. Steven King shows up somehow. What really makes authors go crazy in the woods. Hey, do you love it when the kids are screaming? Wrecking on the road violate their dreaming. Hey, do you love to see the filth in the clean? Get into the gone, all american. Dream. Continue reading

The Insider + Wag the Dog

The Insider + Wag the Dog

Backdoor meetings and the powers that be. Catch that wikileak! Don’t steal movies. Michael Mann shows an insider getting out. Wag the Dog makes shines light into the darkness. Fist bumps a plenty. An incredible introduction to the risks of telling the truth. The lesser of two fucks. A return to the question of friend or pet. Speaking of pets, Wag the Dog is not about a dog. The president you want to changes horses in a stream with. The Internet both destroys and fosters insane lies. A real Hollywood conspiracy. The farce for the truth! Continue reading

Mad Max: Fury Road + The End of August at the Hotel Ozone

Mad Max: Fury Road + The End of August at the Hotel Ozone

Let’s spend a day in the wasteland! Boy there sure are a lot of women here. I hope they’re not savages. Then again, what is a savage when you really get down to it? Aren’t we all the future savages of the past, just living in the present? Progressive thinkers doomed to be made retroactively intolerant by a rapidly liberated society? All these questions are making me hungry. Say, you guys don’t have any pets do you? Man is there a lot of walking in the wasteland. It’s just so sandy for so long. You could really run out of things to talk about. So, has anybody here seen the new Mad Max? Continue reading

The Shootist + Bone Tomahawk

The Shootist + Bone Tomahawk

Making something of your final days in the west. Westerns where life outside the film has implication on the movie itself. John Wayne had cancer, but did 1890 have cancer? The large star of The Shootist fights for his role. Could The Shootist exist without John Wayne? Other self-referential fiction. Ron Howard has been around for a long time. Bone Tomahawk is the greatest fucking thing. Westerns for horror movie fans. Ultra violent westerns. Fuck you, foreshadowing. Foreshadowing as a crutch and foreshowing as a red herring. Continue reading

Patriot Games + Moonraker

Patriot Games + Moonraker

A unfamiliar return to the world of Jack Ryan and James Bond. People flipping out about actors playing characters. Jack Ryan comes back, sort of. The differences between the Jack Ryan of Patriot Games and the Jack Ryan of The Hunt for Red October. Samuel L Jackson pins things on people. What kind of Ted Raimi?! Why the change from A View to a Kill. James Bond goes to space in Moonraker. Exploitation! Bondsploitation! Star Warsploitation! Roger Moore. The most ridiculous moments of the James Bond franchise. Jaws and the return of Jaws. Action sequences then and now. Of gadgets and hamsters. #standWithDaniel Continue reading

Belle de Jour + Moebius

Belle de Jour + Moebius

Weird sex things. Some sex things are weirder than others. The treat that is Belle de Jour. The deal with these Luis Bunuel films. Double Feature wants more belle movies. Mixing fantasy and reality until you can’t tell the difference. Displaying an arc in more than just character. The never-failing allure of what goes on behind closed doors. Alright, it’s time to enter Moebius. Do you have your Bag Cat ready? The snip-and-toss festival. Slapping and talking and slapping. Narrative? Fuck that! Delivering a message without telling a story. Ok, I guess you could call that a story. Relentless commitment to the insanity at hand. Moebius showing an adorable amount of restraint. Michael has a dirty secret about Kim’s movies. Continue reading

The Babadook + We Need to Talk About Kevin

The Babadook + We Need to Talk About Kevin

Mothers and Monsters. Inter-relationship terror or something. Don’t get spoiled on We Need to Talk About Kevin or you will be the true monster. Alice finished directing his short film and will now become a crazy person. Female directed films! Jennifer Kent and Lars von Trier. How The Babadook terrifies. Children as warnings and also as annoyances both minor and major. The power of metaphor carries on. Don’t find out what We Need to Talk About Kevin is About. The impact of that moment. A difference in reads. Unraveling a mystery. Seeing red. Who holds the responsibility and what is to be done? The increased relevance of We Need to Talk About Kevin in the years since its release Continue reading

It Follows + The American Scream

It Follows + The American Scream

A celebration of the all-consuming spooky. ArieScope Pictures celebrates seventeen years! Alice attempts (and fails) to not worry about his film for one hour. Starting October with the festival favorite It Follows. Why people mention It Follows in the same breath as The Babadook. Creating tension out of nothing. Fighting production for a creepy, slow pace. The American Scream via American Movie. Are these Halloween enthusiasts crazy? The passionate genre fanatics of both metal and horror. Filmmaking as a project launch. Halloween down to the last perfect detail. Pragmatism vs idealism. Perfection in film vs perfection in music. Parkinson’s Principle: why you never have enough of what you need when you plan to do a thing. Continue reading

Brain Damage + The Stuff

Brain Damage + The Stuff

Off the 1980’s VHS shelf. Beloved filmmakers who very much love themselves. Special effects artists Sheila Mia Seifi and Rob Burman. Unraveling the magic of Brain Damage. An order of magnitude longer than necessary. Is there a secret meaning buried in Brain Damage? (Probably not). Getting right into The Stuff. What is the Stuff made of? More secrets never uncovered. I mean, sure, just light it on fire I guess. The cult appeal! The beauty of surface value. New information on why Paul Sorvino might be a thing. Those goddamn faces though. Continue reading

Straight Outta Compton + Cop Car

Straight Outta Compton + Cop Car

America’s evolving relationship with the police. The slasher documentaries. Buz Wallick joins Alice’s upcoming film. Straight Outta Compton is oddly relevant today. The theater experience. That goddamn Alamo Drafthouse. Knowing the NWA today. Dr. Dre’s new album Compton. Revisiting the ideal trailer. Cop Car builds the suspense out of nothing and it’s fabulous. Holy fucking awesome filmmaking. Where is this going? A return to mystery. Hey why not, let’s get some Director’s Cut news. Continue reading

Frances Ha + Ninotchka

Frances Ha + Ninotchka

A show about communism. Alice Thirteen announces the cinematographer of his next project, and it’s kind of unreal. No, really, that thing about communism from before is actually in there. Ok, fine, a show about women knowing what they want, not what they need. See, you don’t like that theme any better. So, communistic living in two female led films separated by the decades. Also, Gretta. Frances Ha, the most widely accepted totally-not-a-mumblecore-movie of all time. Joe Swanberg and Ti West. People who wander aimlessly through their 20s will soon be running the world. Ninotchka – don’t pronounce it, see it! Or you could do both, there’s really no harm in that. Melting the icy heart. Continue reading

Maps to the Stars + Peeping Tom

Maps to the Stars + Peeping Tom

The perils of human watching. Alice Thirteen is directing a new film. Finding the funding for your movie. David Cronenberg returns with Maps to the Stars. Actors who go for it without fear. Maps to the Stars is not a satire of Los Angeles. What makes LA tick? Determining the motivation of a crazy person. Or maybe she’s not crazy. No, she’s crazy either way. The curious case of LA’s medium income in a large number of neighborhoods. Voyeurism, or: Everything is a slasher film. The Alec Baldwin in the room. Peeping Tom, career destroyer. The impression of a pornographer. Continue reading

Hits + God Bless America

Hits + God Bless America

Waaah, American culture. Two comedians help audiences let it all out. Something’s happening and it shall not be talked about. The long overdue conversation about piracy, distribution, and the financial state of film. What is the David Cross directed film Hits actually about? Also, the value of Likes. The waxed mustached Etsy crowd. The price of fame. Does God Bless America represent Bobcat’s views? Surprise! Zero conversations about religion! Is reality TV still destroying everything or are we done with that? The next step in counterculture. Continue reading

After Hours + A Serious Man

After Hours + A Serious Man

Physical vs emotional character journeys, as brought to you by gigantic directors. A step outside the expected. Michael’s evolving relationship with Eyes Wide Shut. After Hours as a day in the life of. Everyone’s favorite third host of Double Feature, Franz Kafka. Martin Scorsese makes movies that aren’t After Hours. Citizens of Los Angeles tell each other secrets about Tim Burton. An odd time for the Coen brothers to make A Serious Man. Front-loaded magic and made up stories. A chain of character-driven events. The greatest trailer of all trailers. An introduction to the work of Roger Deakins. Attempting to explain cinematography without visual aids. Continue reading

Under the Skin + Spring

Under the Skin + Spring

Lady enigmas. Under the Skin, the challenging arthouse film staring a naked A-list celebrity. Like, actually. Impossible star power and the counterintuitive nature of film investment. What is Under the Skin even about? Surreal somethings. Contrast at many levels. ALEC BALDWIN FUN FACT. You’ve seen the Spring directors before, and they’re still amazing. The animal sacrifice no one has ever been able to pull off (until now). When hot Italian girls are suspect. Oh hi, skepticism. Using the language of science to take a crazy ride. Speculative fiction from by the science literature. Spring as a strange kind of HP Lovecraft romance film. Continue reading

Zombeavers + They Came Together

Zombeavers + They Came Together

Genres as plot points. Matthew Donnelly, the bucket machine. A common funding tactic that worked for Zombeavers. Also, come on, Zombeavers: the triumphant face-value monster horror feature! Animated zombie beavers. Animatronic zombie beavers. He came. She came. They came together. Is that even the tagline? David Wain makes more sense. Is it good to follow up? Michael falls in love with Paul Rudd. I’ll fucking say it until it becomes funny! An afterthought changes the entire movie, and probably for the better! Tearing apart in the edit. Alice Thirteen begins to open up about the thing that is happening. Continue reading

Papillon + Night at the Golden Eagle

Papillon + Night at the Golden Eagle

Finding a way out of your current life (from opposite sides of the bars). Alice reports in from downtown Los Angeles. Papillon, based on something that happened somewhere at some point, probably. Papillon’s instincts. The will to survive. The bad gets worse. To be labeled a survivor. Using money while in prison. Adam Rifkin has a Night at the Golden Eagle. More on Downtown Los Angeles. The financial district, the jewelry district, skid row and tent city. An old look for a new film. Fresh voyeuristic perspective. Miles Dougal’s yet to be made Night at the Golden Eagle spinoff. Finding an excuse for the b-story. A large, rapid update on Adam Rifkin and Penn Jillette’s film Director’s Cut. Continue reading

The Hunt for Red October + Dr. No

The Hunt for Red October + Dr. No

The beginnings of the Jack Ryan and James Bond universes. The Hunt for Red October as the first in a loose series of films. Another chance to talk about director John McTiernan. The unfortunate McTiernan incident. Continuing to ponder a director’s signature. Of sentimentality and submarines. The reluctant hero Jack Ryan! Dr. No in the first consideration of James Bond. The accidental Sean Connery double feature. Another book, another hero. The ability to geek out on Bond. Doctor No is not Blofeld. Another origin for petting the white cat. The dubbing of Dr. No. Talking about the ladies in the Bond franchise. An array of patriotism on display. What does the future hold for James Bond? Continue reading

Wet Hot American Summer + What Have I Done to Deserve This

Wet Hot American Summer + What Have I Done to Deserve This

Notable casts in absurd comedies. Seriously though everyone, The Movie Crypt. The moments before the Netflix series Wet Hot American Summer: The First Day at Camp. Older playing younger. An unremarkable reception. Two crazy approaches to humor. The shotgun method. The machine gun method. Foreign film invasion! Imagine Wet Hot American Summer with Jason Voorhees. What Have I Done to Deserve This? The blood lizard. Putting up the wallpaper. Spanish film trends and their influence on American films. Taking guess on What Have I Done to Deserve This? Continue reading

Oldboy + The Hunt

Oldboy + The Hunt

Unnecessary life-changing altercations as man hunt meets witch hunt! Pretending to understanding the impact Oldboy had on American cinema. Oldeuboi! The video market, or new video nasty, or the Nu-Nasty, or whatever it’s called. America looks to Asia. Something about a hammer. Alice and Michael’s nonexistant Sick and Twisted cinemation festival. It’s never too late for Spike Lee jokes. Hannibal is not the subject of The Hunt. Another secret episode theme. Where did things go wrong? Placing blame. Can a terrible deed go without fault? The game of telephone. The meaning behind the ending of The Hunt. Continue reading

Straw Dogs + The Perfect Host

Straw Dogs + The Perfect Host

Terror on the inside. Now Available: Double Feature Year 1 on iTunes. Remastered for iTunes, Year 1 of Double Feature is now available on the iTunes Store and Apple Music. The complete Let’s Play Alien Isolation is also online! Straw Dogs, Sam Peckinpah, and a checkmark on John Water’s Cecil B Demented list. That infamous complicated rape scene. Siege on the house. Gender roles! Straw Dogs and the censors. Human beings as animals. The star of the show in The Perfect Host. A Netflix survivor! Actors taking chances. Do we want to be surprised or pat on the head? Managing audience expectations. Let’s talk about Battleship Pretension. Even more Alien. Continue reading

Everly + Digging Up the Marrow

Everly + Digging Up the Marrow

Kicking off a fresh year with ArieScope pictures. Adam Green and Joe Lynch release brand new movies outside the Hollywood machine. Everly as a sample of 2015 independent film. It’s time to solve Joe Lynch. Basing your impression of a film maker on a new sample of work. Building your set and breaking your set. The return of the bottle film. Alex Pardee helps Adam Green uncover the marrow. Follow a bunch of real people who are interesting characters. Digging Up the Marrow as old school American horror. Double Feature teams up with the Battleship Pretension network. Continue reading