CHRISTMAS SPECIAL: Batman Returns (1992)
Alcohollywood
Happy holidays, listeners! Every year, we take on an unconventional Christmas movie around the Yuletide season, and this time we (along with returning guest Mark Soloff of ) dip back to investigate 's deeply strange, fascinatingly weird superhero flick Batman Returns! After Burton's first Batman revitalized the superhero movie as a pop culture phenomenon, he decided to get real strange with it in Batman Returns. Ostensibly, the film features a pitched battle between the Caped Crusader () and his arch-nemeses, the Penguin () and Catwoman (); but it manifests itself in a...
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CONNICKUH SPECIAL: Memphis Belle (1990)
Alcohollywood
Every year, the Alcohollywood podcast takes the week before Christmas to celebrate the life and works of Sir Harry Connick Jr. - actor, musician, Renaissance Man. Harry Connickuh, listeners! For this episode, we take our appreciation for all the way to the beginning - his breakout film debut in the 1990 WWII drama Memphis Belle. Connick joins a cavalcade of other young 90s stars (, , , , and more) as the crew of a B-17 bomber on its last mission before ending its tour of duty. While director () does an admirable job replicating the oo-rah spirit of old WWII pro-US...
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Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)
Alcohollywood
We only had time for one episode last month, so we're double-dipping this week by extending 00-vember into 00-cember! We move from to with the 1997 007 flick Tomorrow Never Dies! Sure, Goldeneye revitalized the Bond franchise, introduced a stellar new Bond in Pierce Brosnan, and updated the secret agent to reflect more on his "sexist, misogynist dinosaur" nature. But then Austin Powers came out and made a bunch of money, so 007 had to get goofy again with his next adventure. And goofy he gets, as Tomorrow Never Dies is a quaintly dated spy caper in which James...
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The Living Daylights (1987)
Alcohollywood
As a busy Thanksgiving month winds down, we realized that we haven't talked about a James Bond film for . To that end, we decided to get in a little 00-vember action with the severely underappreciated James Bond film The Living Daylights! The first of 's two films as 007 (a criminally short tenure), The Living Daylights is one of the most thrilling Bond pictures no one talks about. Sure, the story is a bit muddy and convoluted - a disorienting spy caper involving botched defections, diamonds, opium, arms deals, cellos and two different villains ( and )- but...
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Interview with Olympia's Cast and Crew (Chicago International Film Festival)
Alcohollywood
As we continue to wrap up our coverage of the , it's important to take a look at some of the smaller stuff that came out of the fest, especially those set in the city the festival calls home. 's vibrant, energetic indie coming-of-age dramedy Olympia is a rather fun breath of fresh air - the tale of a conflicted thirtysomething (writer/star ) struggling to make ends meet at a dead-end job, dealing with a dying mother in the hospital, and fighting with her boyfriend () about whether Chicago is really the right place for her. Chinn's script is relaxed and acerbic, the performances are...
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Episode 3 - True Grit
Alcohollywood
Howdy, listeners! Today we're saddling up and sucking back some moonshine to an old Western classic, 1969's True Grit! (NOTE: I have used my pun quota for this episode; the rest of this post is safe for consumption). Along with guest panelist Gavin, Jared and Clint tackle the impertinence of Mattie Ross, a little history of Oklahoma, and the nuances of a John Wayne performance, as they provide their signature drinking rules for this film.
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HORROR OCTORBOR: Friday the 13th (1980)
Alcohollywood
Happy Alcohol-loween! We close out our Seven Deadly Sins edition of Horror Octorbor by going old-school for Wrath - the vengeance-filled slasher Friday the 13th! Sure, this is the one that doesn't have Jason in it - see our episode for our thoughts on the hockey-mashed butcher - but Mrs. Voorhees () still has some bloody fates in store for the counselors at Camp Crystal Lake. From 's horny teen to, well, the less-famous fodder around him, 's inaugural effort in the long running franchise serves up plenty of arrow piercings, machete decapitations, and more. ...
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Interview with What They Had Writer/Director Elizabeth Chomko and Actor Robert Forster
Alcohollywood
While dysfunctional family dramas are arguably a dime a dozen, Elizabeth Chomko's Chicago-centric debut stands out substantially from the pack. A touching, heartfelt tale of a woman () who returns home to help her brother () and father (Robert Forster) care for her Alzheimer's-afflicted mother (), What They Had is refreshingly nuanced, filled with strong, witty dialogue and incredible performances from its lead cast. While at the , we sat down with Chomko for a roundtable discussion (along with Pat McDonald of and Al and Linda Lerner of ) - with Forster popping in as a...
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Interview w/The Price of Everything's Nathaniel Kahn
Alcohollywood
The world of contemporary art is a wild, wild thing - millionaires bidding incredible amounts of money to collect works from modern artists based on reputation, potential future valuation, or even (on occasion) the actual aesthetic value of the piece. In his upcoming HBO documentary The Price of Everything, filmmaker (My Architect) takes an in-depth look at this strange mix of art and commerce, getting unfettered access to art collectors and the artists who themselves toe a precarious line between artistic statement and financial solvency. We were lucky enough to sit down with...
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HORROR OCTORBOR: Single White Female (1992)
Alcohollywood
Horror Octorbor keeps a-chuggin' along this month, as we continue to break down the seven deadly sins! This week, we take a look at Envy in the context of 1992's erotic psychological thriller Single White Female! In the vein of other 90s domestic horror films like and , Single White Female explores the kind of dangers that could happen even in the safety of your home. Here, that's manifested in Hedy (), the mousy new roommate of recently-separated fashion designer Allie (). The more time Hedy spends with Allie, though, the more she affects Allie's speech, mannerisms...
info_outline(CONTENT WARNING: use of the word 'gypsy')
We explain the full context of its usage in the episode, and its ubiquity in the film itself makes it relatively unavoidable as a term. However, we understand its seriousness as a pejorative to the Romani people, and apologize in advance for anyone who might be offended.)
Seven years in, and Alcohollywood is on its seventh Horror Octorbor! Some Kind of Goblin sets upon us a mission to explore films related to the seven deadly sins, so we're temporarily back to weekly episodes as we try to take this on!
For our first foray into sinful horror films, we dig into the sin of gluttony with 1996's Thinner, a goofy, more than a little racist bit of Stephen King schlock in which an unscrupulous, obese attorney (Robert John Burke) gets cursed by an elderly Romani (Michael Constantine) as punishment for running over his daughter. His curse? To grow "thinner" each day, no matter how much he eats, until his body consumes itself.
It's a wackadoodle premise told with incredible relish by director Tom Holland (the original Fright Night), and the film's latter half is full of fun beats courtesy of Kari Wuhrer and Joe Mantegna. But all of its outsized pulp can't quite overcome its unsympathetic, ugly characters. And, well, the whole "gypsy curse" premise itself doesn't age well (much like the makeup, though it's not like horror master Rob Bottin could anticipate the coming of HD).
Enjoy a heaping helping of our podcast, along with our drinking game for the film!
(Thanks to our sponsor Cards Against Humanity as part of the Chicago Podcast Coop!)
DRINKING RULES FOR THINNER:
- Any time you hear the word "gypsy"
- Every time Billy's appearance changes demonstrably (i.e. changes in the fat suit)
- Whenever a character eats
FINISH YOUR DRINK WHEN:
Tadzu Lempke tells Billy to "Die clean, white man from town! Die clean!"
Join us next week as we continue our exploration of the seven deadly sins, moving on to Lust with the sexy-alien movie Species!