The Projection Booth Podcast

Directed by Frank Perry, the film was written by David Zelag Goodman and based on the book Girl on the Volkswagen Floor by William Arthur Clark, Man On A Swing (1974) stars Cliff Robertson as detective Lee Tucker who investigates the mysterious murder of a young woman. When things are at a stalemate with the case, he’s approached by Franklin Willis, played by Joel Grey, an alleged psychic with uncanny insights into the case.Justin Bozung returns to The Projection Booth to discuss Frank Perry and the production of Man On A Swing while writer Dennis Tafoya and film scholar Scout Tafoya talk with Mike about this unusual film.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

While we often talk about a few movies on every episode -- one main film and some supporting works, sequels, and so on -- we're spotlighting two movies on this episode: Michael Campus's Z.P.G. (1972) and Alfonso Cuaron's Children of Men (2006). Z.P.G. (Zero Population Growth) stars Oliver Reed as Russ McNeil and and Geraldine Chaplan as his wife Carol. The film is set the near future where global resources have been strained and the environment has paid the price for the blight of human beings which have polluted the air so much that they live under a shroud of smog. The film was inspired by Paul Ehrlich's 1968 clarion call, The Population Bomb which warned of overpopulation.Alfonso Cuaron's Children of Men is a very loose adaptation of P.D. James's 1992 novel. The film stars Clive Owen as Theo Faron who's biding his time on planet earth as the population is dying -- or killing itself off. No babies have been born in over 18 years which has exacerbated social strife, leading to terrorism, mass suicide, and re

We’re looking at the Conservative comedy, An American Carol 2008. The child of Charles Dickens and Bill O'Reilly, the film tells the tale of Michael Malone -- a stand-in for filmmaker Michael Moore (Kevin P. Farley). He's a liberal know-nothing who’s inflamed hate against the Land that We Love and is visited by four ghosts -- well, three ghosts and a contemporary country singer -- to try and convince him to love country music and stop complaining about gun control, global warming, unjust wars, and other bleeding-heart liberal causes.Directed by David Zucker (Airplane!, Top Secret), the film was co-written by Myrna Sokoloff, as a reaction to Hollywood intolerance.Rob St. Mary returns to the show along with Mike Sullivan to discuss the film, satire, and falafels.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We're heading to Falconhurst and looking at the unlikely hit film Mandingo (1975), the book series that informed it and its sequel, and the knock-offs in its wake. Richard Fleischer's film stars Ken Norton as Mede, the titular Mandingo, while James Mason and Perry King are the father and son who run Falconhurst, a slave-breeding plantation.Greg Klymkiw (UFO Doggies, Careful) and writer Paul Talbot (Mondo Mandingo: The Falconhurst Books and Films) join Mike to discuss Mandingo, it's sequel Drum, and several other sordid slavery-themed films (including the remarkable Addio Zio Tom). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We're discussing the 1993 film from Joel Schumacher, Falling Down. Written by Ebbe Roe Smith, the film stars Michael Douglas as a white guy who's wound a little too tight and finally snaps.Aaron Peterson and Jamey Duvall join Mike on an episode that's not for libtards, snowflakes, or cucks.The episode features interviews with director Joel Schumacher, writer Ebbe Roe Smith, and producer Timothy Harris.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this special episode, Mike talks briefly to Pam Grier about her career from Beyond the Valley of the Dolls to Bad Grandmas.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Eric Cohen and Rich Edwards return to take a ride in a convertible time machine, be-bopping back to the year 1997 to look at Curtis Hanson's L.A. Confidential. Starring more folks from down under than you can shake a boomerang at, this jazzy flick plays with many classic noir tropes while playing fast and loose with the third book of James Ellroy's L.A. Quartet.We examine how Hanson and co-writer Brian Helgeland masterfully condensed Ellroy's compelling and complicated story to craft a Neo-Noir that some rank among the best. The film features dazzling performances from "newcomers" Russell Crowe and Guy Pearce.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Written and directed by John Huston in his directorial debut, The Maltese Falcon (1941) stars Humphrey Bogart as gumshoe Sam Spade who unravels the mystery of the titular black bird.Eric Cohen and Richard Edwards join Mike to discuss the original Dashiell Hammett story, the two other film adaptations of The Maltese Falcon, and the 1975 sequel.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Based on the 1952 Mickey Spillane novel, Robert Aldrich's Kiss Me Deadly (1955) stars Ralph Meeker as Mike Hammer, a hardboiled gumshoe who gets dragged into a mystery involving a glowing case, duplicitous dames, and two-fisted violence.Max Allan Collins, director of Mike Hammer's Mickey Spillane, talks about his career and working on Mickey Spillane's posthumous work.Writer Andrew Nette and Professor Kevin Heffernan join Mike to discuss paranoia, the cold war, and much more.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How do you solve a problem like Marnie?Released in 1964, Alfred Hitchcock's Marnie stars Tippi Hedren as the titular heroine -- or perhaps anti-heroine -- an itinerant thief who gets caught and essentially blackmailed into marriage with Mark (Sean Connery) who thinks that Marnie is broken and takes it upon himself to "fix" her, diving deep into her childhood trauma.Tania Modleski (The Women Who Knew Too Much: Hitchcock and Feminist Theory and Susan White (The Cinema of Max Ophuls) join Mike to unravel the red-tinged mystery of the film.Author and filmmaker Tony Lee Moral (Hitchcock and the Making of Marnie) and Tippi Hedren (Tippi: A Memoir) discuss the behind-the-scenes of the contentious production.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Released in 1973 in a truncated form, Sam Peckinpah’s Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid has had a long, contentious history. We’ll be talking about that as well as the film itself in which Kris Kristofferson plays the titular Billy the Kid. He’s the friend and eventual enemy of James Coburn as Pat Garrett. The film stars a host of familiar faces and character actors with this speaking to the passing of the torch from one generation of Westerns to the next... Or perhaps snuffing that flame.Author Mike Faloon and artist David Lambert join Mike discuss Peckinpah's film. Interviews include screenwriter Rudy Wurlitzer (Two Lane Blacktop), Bob Dylan scholar David Wolf, and author/editor Paul Seydor (The Authentic Death and Contentious Afterlife of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid: The Untold Story of Peckinpah's Last Western Film). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On a special episode of The Projection Booth, Mike talks with filmmaker Steve Mitchell about his 2017 documentary King Cohen: The Wild World of Filmmaker Larry Cohen. Mike also speaks to the film's subject, Larry Cohen, about his work on "Branded" and "Columbo" as well as several of his films.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

After a brief hiatus, The Projection Booth returns with a discussion of John Woo's A Better Tomorrow (1986). The film is seen as a hallmark of the “heroic bloodshed” subgenre of action films, doing for gunplay what a generation of Hong Kong films had done with swords.The film tells the tale of Ho (Ti Lung), a criminal whose younger brother, Kit (Leslie Cheung), is a police officer. He's betrayed by a fellow gangster (Waise Lee) and sent up the river. When he returns to Hong Kong he wants to stay on the right side of the law which is more difficult than it should be.The film speaks to loyalty, brotherhood, and put Chow Yun-Fat on the map as a bankable action star.Cinema Junkie's Beth Accomando and Mike wax fondly about the glory days of HK Cinema, twin brothers, strange sequels, and the true colors of a hero.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You want podcasters? On this special episode, five podcasters discuss Rob Reiner's 1992 film A Few Good Men. Written by Aaron Sorkin (and tweaked for the screen by William Goldman), the film stars Tom Cruise, Demi Moore, Jack Nicholson, and a slew of other familiar faces in this tense courtroom drama about masculinity, patriotism, honor, and duty. The episode is hosted by Jay and TJ of the We've Seen That podcast along with Joanna Langfield from The Movie Minute and occasional Projection Booth co-host Jon Cross from the After Movie Diner.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mike talks to Theo Anthony about his unusual documentary work, Rat Film from 2017.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Released in the United States as The Lure , Agnieszka Smoczynska's 2015 film Corki Dancingu is the story of two mermaids, Golden (Michalina Olszanska) and Silver (Marta Mazurek), who join the world of humans as singers at a dinner club. To say the least, the have a little trouble fitting in.Carol Borden (The Cultural Gutter) and David Rodgers (Bingecast) join Mike to discuss this modern take on Hans Christian Andersen's The Little Mermaid and Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué's Ondine. Guests include John Athanason of Weeki Wachee State Park as well as a real life mermaid!Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Finnish artist Touko Laaksonen redefined gay erotica with his intricate, fetishistic drawings of muscle-bound uniformed men. Dome Karukoski's 2017 bio-pic Tom of Finland explores the life of Laaksonen (Pekka Strang) and his legacy.Maitland McDonagh (120 Days Books) joins Mike to discuss Tom of Finland, Daddy and the Muscle Academy, and more.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mike talks to director Marc Meyers about his film My Friend Dahmer (2017). Based on the graphic novel by Derf, the film tells a humanistic story about one of America's most notorious serial killers.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Directed by Joseph Cates and written by Arnold Drake and Leon Totayakan, Who Killed Teddy Bear? (1965) stars Sal Mineo as Lawrence Sherman, a waiter at a nightclub and Juliet Prowse as bartender Norma Dain. Someone has an unhealthy obsession with Norma and keeps making obscene phone calls to her.Heather Drain and Terry Frost join Mike to talk about this sleazy thriller.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Is it future...? Or is it past...? It's a bit of both as we revisit David Lynch's Fire Walk With Me (1992) along with "Twin Peaks" Season 3 (AKA "Twin Peaks: The Return") on this final #Shocktober2017 episode. We speak specifically about the Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me - Teresa Banks and the Last Seven Days of Laura Palmer fan edit as well as Mark Frost's The Secret History of Twin Peaks.Interviews feature Chrysta Bell, who played Agent Tammy Preston, and Claire Nina Norelli, author of the 33 1/3 book Angelo Badalamenti's Soundtrack from Twin Peaks.Podcasters John Walker of Movie Schmovie and Christine Makepeace of the Feminine Critique join Mike to drink full and descend to attempt to put the latest incarnation of "Twin Peaks" in context. What year is it?Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices