The Cinephiliacs

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TC #99 - James Urbaniak (The Apartment) Feb 19, 2018

Show notes

Watching an actor transform in an unexpected way—even if the particular action is so simple and its context so mundane—can be a revelatory experience, and the kind that draws us into the movies we adore. James Urbaniak has made that something of a career, giving us the quiet internal rage inside Simon Grim in Henry Fool, the secretly menacing stares of Grant in the TV series Review, and the dozens upon dozens of strange voices he's taken on for series like The Venture Brothers. In this episode, James sits down with Peter to get into the technical and philosophical ideas that drive his character actor career in a number of shows, while also discussing how his love of Classical Hollywood has influenced his decisions—including his noir homage series, A Night Called Tomorrow. Finally, the two dive into Billy Wilder's The Apartment to explore how they actors take the screwball zaniness of the script and make it melancholy, and turn the film's dramatic shifts into comedy.

0:00-2:52 Opening3:34-9:42 Establish Shots — Contemplating Curtiz10:28-50:19 Deep Focus — James Urbaniak51:11-54:02 Sponsorship Section55:33-1:15:49 Double Exposure — The Apartment (Wilder)1:16:36-1:18:40 Close

TC - 2017 Favorites With Keith Uhlich (Part Two) Jan 12, 2018

Show notes

On one hand, cinema has mutated. It is no longer contained to the theater and its methods no longer simply produce simply 3 act narrative features. But was it ever so limited? The first films were hand cranked into a box at a parlor on 34th street. The military in WWII made cinema portable in order to bring secrets across enemy lines. Films taught people their trades. Video tape launched a spiritual and later political revolution against the dominant mode. The medium was never the message, so let's just celebrate what was seen and experienced—the movement was not just in the image but in our bodies (the real movement...was love). All is this to say, Keith and Peter have good fun exploring their favorite works of 2017, debating the nature of reality in a series of works either attempting to pull it from other the rug or expose it through unsuspecting places. Is it future? Or is it past? Or is it simply the now in which me must live. And live we must.

0:00-2:27 Opening 2:28-47:16 Picks for #5 47:16-1:16:00 Picks for #4 1:16:01-1:34:31 Picks for #3 1:35:14-1:39:05 Sponsorship Section 1:40:07-2:09:39 Picks for #2 2:09:40-2:25:07 Pick for #1 2:25:08-2:27:14 Final Thoughts 2:27:31-2:29:57 Close

TC - 2017 Favorites With Keith Uhlich (Part One — Moments Out of Time) Jan 08, 2018

Show notes

A love of cinema does not necessitate a love of a total work. Often it is a moment—a person, a camera movement, a lighting choice, or an emotional beat—that strikes us. When Peter and Keith discussed returning once again for their annual countdown, they decided that the first half of their lists should do something different. Instead of highlight their 6 through 10 picks for the year, they instead have chosen five "Moments Out Of Time" within often good (though perhaps bad) films that surprised, challenged, and delighted. With such a list, they discuss a plethora of topics, including a serious examination of the structures within Hollywood that have maintained and sustained diminishing standards under increasingly dubious and especially harmful authorities. Individual artists strive to rise above the system, and here, the two critics aim to find out why that is, and what could be done to uplift the system.

0:00-6:08 Opening 6:09-31:49 Picks for #5 31:50-56:49 Picks for #4 56:50-1:23:54 Picks for #3 1:25:08-1:28:10 Sponsorship Section 1:28:36-1:51:48 Picks for #2 1:51:49-2:18:07 Picks for #1 2:18:08-2:26:07 Repertory Picks of the Year 2:26:11-2:28:04 Close / Outtake

TC #98 - Mark Toscano (Soft Fiction) Dec 25, 2017

Show notes

While every single restoration brings unique challenges, Mark Toscano sometimes has to ask a very strange question: did the filmmaker intend that scratch or speck or slice or anything that might appear like a problem or mistake as actually critical to the film? It's questions like these that bring energy to Mark as he works as a film preservationist at the Academy Film Archive, helping preserve and restore hundreds of experimental cinema works. Peter sits down with Mark to discuss his road from the George Eastman house to Canyon Cinema to the Academy, and some of the unique questions and relationships he builds as the canon of experimental cinema continue to expand under his purview. Finally, the two dive into the complex and wondrous world of Chick Strand in Soft Fiction, whose detailing of the sexual experiences and desires of women under her lyrical eye has gained complexity in today's discussions of sex and power.

0:00-3:39 Opening 4:54-12:11 Establishing Shot — UCLA's Recuerdos de un cine en español 12:57-1:25:05 Deep Focus — Mark Toscano 1:26:08-1:29:13 Sponsorship Section 1:30:41-1:51:30 Double Exposure — Soft Fiction (Chick Strand) 1:51:35-1:53:20 Close / Outtake

TC - Affairs to Remember: Selections from AFI Fest 2017 Nov 27, 2017

Show notes

This year's slate of unique films on the festival circuits are works defined by individuals. Some follow how they define themselves to others—romantically or otherwise—while others follow their relationship to work, the state, and to their own being. Performers of dynamic and unique range create compelling faces and bodies to follow through spaces both familiar and alien, traversing time through aesthetic choices. Directors thus create tones through defining space and helping us see what is beyond the camera's gaze. In this report from the AFI Film Festival in Los Angeles, Peter invites on a cornucopia of wonderous guests to discuss some of the fall's most unique films. Works by Hong Sang-Soo, Claire Denis, Sergei Lonznista, Aaron Katz, and Valeska Grisebach explore the contemporary landscape with conviction, empathy, and pathos.

0:00-3:43 Opening4:37-25:27 The Day After and Claire's Camera with Aret Frost26:28-43:39 A Gentle Creature with Carson Lund44:37-48:31 Sponsorship Section50:10-1:03:31 Gemini with Gabriel Anderson1:04:39-1:29:47 Western and Bright Sunshine In with Carman Tse1:30:37-1:32:49 Close / Outtake

TC #97 - K. Austin Collins (Margaret) Nov 06, 2017

Show notes

Since debuting in the fairgrounds during the Fin de siècle of the late 19th century, movies have never been inseparable from our culture around them. So how does one write about them in a way that gives both the text and the world a fair shake? Over at The Ringer, K. Austin Collins has been using his writing to explore how films operate as cultural artifacts, even as the machine of Hollywood has attempted to vacuum itself from any discussion. Kam dives into his interest in writing as a practice and how he moved from the academic sphere into the weekly reviewing gig, and how he finds ways to bring his training to even writing about blockbusters. The two have a long discussion in particular about movie stars and the particular pleasures of watching them and seeing them create identities. Finally, Kam brings on Kenneth Lonergan's almost lost to litigation masterpiece Margaret with Anna Paquin, which leads to a discussion of what exactly is melodrama and how and why do movies affect us.

0:00-3:22 Opening4:07-1:11:48 Deep Focus — K. Austin Collins1:12:48-1:16:33 Sponsorship Section 1:17:56-1:45:33 Double Exposure — Margaret (Kenneth Lonergan)1:46:37-1:48:36 Close

TC - Boundaries of Reality: New Non-Fiction With Agnès Varda, JR, and Theo Anthony Oct 16, 2017

Show notes

As this podcast has explored, the limits of non-fiction have been continually pushed and pulled by daring filmmakers who refuse to understand the limits of what they can do. This week looks at two new releases from three creators asking questions of space, memory, history, and often themselves. First of all, Peter sits down with legendary French New Wave filmmaker Agnès Varda to discuss her new film, Visage Villages (in English, Faces Places), alongside her co-conspirator, the elusive street artist known as JR. They discuss the ins and outs of collaboration when their work ethics seemingly clash, the personalities they present on screen, and the "work" of their images. Then, Peter meets up with Baltimore filmmaker Theo Anthony to dissect his bold directorial debut, Rat Film. They discuss the alien style of the film and its interest in both the collection of data and the relation of its human subjects, all while asking how a film can provoke emotion and ideas in a diversity of ways without ever posing obvious solutions.

0:00-5:07 Opening6:05-29:58 Agnès Varda and JR (Visage Villages)30:43-35:22 Sponsorship Section 36:22-1:00:56 Theo Anthony (Rat Film)1:01:02-1:02:46 Close / Outtake

TC #96 - Laura Major (Heaven Can Wait) Oct 02, 2017

Show notes

If more and more people are interested in shooting on film and projecting on film, there's one crucial step in between: how does film get from camera to screen? Through a lab obviously. But what does the lab do? Laura Major has been a staple at the Maryland based Colorlab for a number of years, helping the studio produce new 35mm negatives and positives of documentaries, experimental films, archival orphans, and more. Today, she sits down with Peter to trace out her own history from South Carolina to experimental film lover to a technician. They discuss the ins and outs of film processing and how Colorlab has integrated itself as a critical player in the future of celluloid. Finally, they dive into the Warren Beatty directed, Elaine May co-written Heaven Can Wait, a comedy built around a number of great performances and the strange odyssey that is the (now once again) Los Angeles Rams. 0:00-3:07 Opening 4:12-12:24 Establish Shots — Frederick Wiseman's Ex Libris 13:10-48:50 Deep Focus — Laua Major 50:34-53:18 Sponsorship Section 54:48-1:10:57 Double Exposure — Heaven Can Wait (Warren Beatty) 1:11:20-1:14:09 Close / Outtake

TC - "But Who Is The Dreamer?" Twin Peaks: The Return Sep 11, 2017

Show notes

In a summer where blockbusters felt stale and indie films became rote, cinephilia thrived every Sunday night as David Lynch put on an 18-hour spectacle on primetime television. Twin Peaks: The Return saw the filmmaker behind Blue Velvet and Mulholland Dr. return to the soap opera that would in part define two decades of serialized television. He created not just a new spin on the story of Dale Cooper and Laura Palmer, but instead delved into a mystery that felt more aesthetically, narratively, and emotionally involved than any other visual story this year. As the boundaries between cinema, television, streaming, and other categories have become less defined, Twin Peaks: The Return lept past these debates to simply create an utterly singular work about the never ending battle between good and evil. To celebrate the show's culmination (and perhaps the capstone of Lynch's career), Peter invites a Roadhouse worthy group of guests—Alison Herman of The Ringer, Scott Nye of Battleship Pretension and Criterion Cast, and Nate Fisher of Mubi Notebook—to dissect the show's use of nostalgic devices, moral dichotomies, and employment of experimental cinema techniques. Grab a coffee, watch out for the tulpas, and don't give anyone a light, we're all Twin Peaks this week on the podcast.

0:00-4:16 Opening 4:16-46:35 Discussing Twin Peaks: The Return 47:05-49:44 Sponsorship Section 50:36-1:3019 More on The Return 1:31:14-1:34:19 Close / Outtake

The Total Film-Maker: Jerry Lewis (1926-2017) Aug 28, 2017

Show notes

When it comes to a cinephilic appreciation of comedy, who better represented it than The Total Film-Maker, Le Roi du Crazy, the Nutty Professor? Jerry Lewis was a totem in the hall of cinephilia and with good reason. No one worked harder to create an entirely unique style of filmmaking that no one else could come close to matching—to the ire of some but to the adoration of a select few. While his collabrators—Dean Martin, Hal Wallis, Frank Tashlin, and Martin Scorsese among others—are equally legendary, it is impossible to take one's eyes off Jerry and what he did, breaking the rules in order to get the funniest of laughs. To celebrate the passing of one of the last titans of Classical Hollywood (even though he never seemed to fit it), Jaime Christley of The Village Voice and Slant Magazine joins Peter to discuss elements of what made this filmmaker so unique and why they still can't stop laughing at his gags.

0:00-3:53 Opening 3:53-32:05 Discussing Jerry Lewis 32:48-36:08 Sponsorship Section 36:56-48:39 Jerry and the Critics 48:39-1:07:48 Favorite Jerry Moments 1:08:56-1:10:51 Close / Outtake

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