Tag Archives: Gaspar Noé

Climax + The Beach Bum

Climax + The Beach Bum

Maybe Gaspar Noé and Harmony Korine can be friends. Michael Climaxes all over a Beach Bum. The never-ending journey to give Harmony Korine a playmate. Alice has not figured out how to release Disposition. If you’re a Patreon, send in lists of films you want on the show. Climax is not a good time. The alternative to art is sometimes suicide. Building up to hell, then hell. Leaving the audience outside the character’s experience. Dancing. Leaving the alarming things unexplained. Maybe there aren’t drugs in Climax, as opposed to Beach Bum. Finding places in that feel like another planet. Secret wealth, privilege, and accomplishments. Pushing wheelbarrows of weed. Tripping into a Pulitzer without showing any labor. Alice gets upset that others might have wild success without doing much work. (No one tell him about his president.) Not letting the audience see how the character sees the world. Shit’s gonna work out, though. Michael on sharks.

Love + Nymphomaniac

Love + Nymphomaniac

The longest orgasm in podcast history. What is the line between art and pornography? An unpopular opinion. Sex is a dangerous thing. It changes your life. Consent, monogamy, a depression trilogy fuck-epic and the intersection of love and sex. Sexual exclusivity as the default. Nymphomaniac’s two parts should be viewed as a single film. Biological acceptance versus emotional consent. Starting with consent and finishing without it. Infidelity and experimentation. 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

Irreversible + The Woman

Irreversible + The Woman

Ladies night. Gaspar Noe’s Placebo video. The enthusiasm in eccentric filmmaking. Michael’s theory of self-indulgent French movies. Realizations in reverse. Cinematic mechanics in backwards storytelling. French extremism and, as always, brutality. Commentary on homophobia. When you know what’s coming.The last good thing you will ever know. Teaching the audience a humanistic lesson about murder. It’s so very good to have Lucky McKee back. Tension already. The Woman and the family. Where you don’t belong. Rooting for someone you’re afraid of. Finally, a case of justified violence? Forced alignment with uncomfortably terrible characters. Sexually shaming an audience. Bad gets worse, again. After the credits. The Woman’s a sequel?! Continue reading