The Pink Smoke podcast

Hosts John Cribbs and Christopher Funderburg discuss Patricia Highsmith’s 1960 crime novel, This Sweet Sickness. The novel follows a stalker who constructs a perfect marriage in his mind and goes to horrifying extremes to make that vision of domestic bliss a reality. It’s a book about the psychosis of a romantic worldview, about the insanity lurking behind the ideas of a One True Love. The Pink Smoke site: 
www.thepinksmoke.com Patreon:
 www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke on Twitter:
 twitter.com/thepinksmoke John Cribbs on Twitter:
 twitter.com/TheLastMachine Christopher Funderburg on Twitter: 
twitter.com/CFunderburg Intro & outro music by Marcus Pinn of Pinnland Empire.

Hosts John Cribbs & Christopher Funderburg sit down to pay tribute to one of the greatest screenwriters who ever lived, Jean-Claude Carrière. When Carrière recently passed away the hosts decided to pick a handful of the writer’s films to discuss as a way of exploring his long and incredibly varied career. From his career-defining work with Luis Buñuel to his long-running associations with filmmakers including Miloš Forman & Pierre Étaix to his more off-beat one-off projects, few screenwriters were as fearless & unpredictable. Carrière’s career began in the early 60’s & spanned decades - he kept working right up until the end, with screen credits as recently as 2019. This is our remembrance of the novelist, ghost-writer, conversationalist, adapter and screenwriter who collaborated with everyone from Umberto Eco to Nagisa Ōshima to the Dalai Lama. Rest in peace, Carrière. Support our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke site: www.thepinksmoke.com The Pink Smoke on Twitter: twitter.com/thepinksmoke Christopher Funderburg on Twitter: twitter.com/cfunderburg John Cribbs on Twitter: twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / “Tea for Two” Outro music: Marcus Pinn / “Vegas”

“Who speaks of realism here?” This is it: our mammoth exploration of the work of Japanese iconoclast Seijun Suzuki. Hosts Christopher Funderburg & John Cribbs are joined by poster illustrator and peerless cinephile Tony Stella to examine the legendarily idiosyncratic and uncontrollable director. From Suzuki’s start as an impossibly lazy assistant director at Shochiku to his his period as a relentlessly prolific genre filmmaker at Nikkatsu to his second act as an esteemed independent artist. His films long-suppressed by Nikkatsu and unknown outside of his native country, Suzuki’s reputation took off in America in the 90s when filmmakers like Quentin Tarantino and Jim Jarmusch sang his praises (Jarmusch’s Ghost Dog is famously an extended homage to Suzuki’s career-breaking Branded to Kill); after a few tumultuous decades, Suzuki finally achieved the international renown he deserved. Join us as we follow the director’s journey, beat by beat, film by film; from his early “youth in revolt” films like Everything Goes Wrong to his wild genre experiments like Youth of the Beast & Tokyo Drifter to his notorious “flesh trilogy” that caps off his early career with the brilliant Carmen from Kawachi. We go after it all: the Taisho trilogy, his Lupin III anime, his golf comedy, his late-period curtain call. It’s here, the most comprehensive podcast study of a filmmaker like no other. Support our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke site: www.thepinksmoke.com The Pink Smoke on Twitter: twitter.com/thepinksmoke Tony Stella on Twitter: twitter.com/studiotstella Christopher Funderburg on Twitter: twitter.com/cfunderburg John Cribbs on Twitter: twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / “Tea for Two” Outro music: Marcus Pinn / “Vegas”

Host John Cribbs is joined by John Arminio to discuss the James Bond films of the 60s. Looking at what many fans consider the series’ untouchable golden age, Cribbs & Arminio go film by film through every cinematic portrayal of Bond in the decade, not even skipping over 1967’s Casino Royale! Starting with Dr. No and Ursula Andress (as iconic as Venus de Milo) emerging from the ocean, touching on the duo’s consensus for the best film in the series, and capping off the conversation with a discussion of the series’ transition away from lead actor Sean Connery to George Lazenby with the undervalued On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Cribbs & Arminio drill down into what makes that era of Bond films so irresistible! The Pink Smoke site:
 www.thepinksmoke.com Patreon:
 www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke on Twitter:
 twitter.com/thepinksmoke John Cribbs on Twitter: 
twitter.com/TheLastMachine John Arminio on Twitter:
 twitter.com/QuasarSniffer Intro & outro music by Marcus Pinn of Pinnland Empire.

On this month's pulp fiction episode, Funderburg & Cribbs discussed former cop Joseph Wambaugh's brutal, depressing & hilarious Hollywood conspiracy thriller, The Glitter Dome. It's a masterpiece of the "sleazy cop" genre that depicts a world of casual racism, violence, and depravity in a chaotic story about cops wildly failing to live up their duty.

“Most great art has been commission work. Bernini didn’t sit around making statues because he liked making statues, he did it because Pope So-and-so wanted a bust of himself on his elaborate tomb… Rembrandt, I’m sure, would’ve been happier doing something other than painting fat businessmen most of his life.” No name is as synonymous with the art of novelization as “Alan Dean Foster,” known for his work reverse engineering novels out of films like The Thing, Alien and, most of all, Star Wars. We’re joined by the prolific sci-fi author to discuss his storied career - the novelizations, continuation novels and original work - in the context of his recent dispute with the Disney corporation over unpaid royalties after their acquisition of Lucasfilm and 20th Century Fox. We start at the beginning with his adaptation of a crummy Italian gender-swapped Tarzan rip-off before the conversation explores everything from when Frank Frazetta’s artwork suggests stories far more compelling than the source they’re portraying, why world-building in novelistic writing is the same in original stories or adaptations, and how he came to write the first Star Wars expanded universe novel Splinter of the Mind’s Eye (which spawned an entire ecosystem of ancillary material.) Foster is a legend in his field and this discussion explores his crucial role in modern pop culture - and why the Disney company’s ambivalence about paying him the royalty money he’s unquestionably owed is so repellent in a larger context that extends beyond Foster himself. The Pink Smoke site: www.thepinksmoke.com The Pink Smoke on Twitter: twitter.com/thepinksmoke Christopher Funderburg on Twitter: twitter.com/cfunderburg John Cribbs on Twitter: twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / “Tea for Two” Outro music: Marcus Pinn / “Vegas”

“We’re tigers, the three of us, but who the hell are we to make decisions for the world just because we’re compulsive?” For this special international episode, we’re joined by Nicolás Virviescas and Daniel Castro, founders of the Colombian online film criticism portal Filmigrana. Our guests selected Alfred Bester’s The Stars My Destination to discuss for the occasion, the story of a stranded astronaut whose only motivation for survival is revenge. The book, a favorite of filmmaker John Carpenter, recalls the work of William Gibson, Stephen King, J.G. Ballard, Philip K. Dick and Warren Ellis - despite being written in 1956 before any of those artists came to prominence. Join us for this NYC to Bogota transmission of our thoughts on the book’s sci-fi satire, violence, betrayal and metaphysics - it’s William Blake meets psycho-surgery, The Count of Monte Cristo & corporate espionage in Bester’s cult classic. Support our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Filmigrana site: https://filmigrana.com/ The Pink Smoke site: www.thepinksmoke.com Nicolás Virviescas on Twitter: https://twitter.com/valticam The Pink Smoke on Twitter: twitter.com/thepinksmoke Christopher Funderburg on Twitter: twitter.com/cfunderburg John Cribbs on Twitter: twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / “Tea for Two” Outro music: Marcus Pinn / “Vegas”

Host John Cribbs is joined by Emmy-winning editor/producer & longtime Pink Smoke contributor Eric Pfriender to discuss the soundtrack work of Tangerine Dream, the experimental music conglomeration best known for their scores for films like Risky Business, Sorcerer, Thief and Near Dark. Inspired by the recent re-release of Sorcerer’s soundtrack (featuring cover art by the great Tony Stella!), this is an in-depth exploration of pulsating electronic psychedelia that feels like a chase scene leading straight into despair. Way more Ghost Dad talk than you were expecting, guaranteed. The Pink Smoke site: www.thepinksmoke.com/ Patreon: www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke on Twitter: twitter.com/thepinksmoke John Cribbs on Twitter: twitter.com/TheLastMachine Christopher Funderburg on Twitter: twitter.com/CFunderburg Intro & outro music by Marcus Pinn of Pinnland Empire.

Hosts John Cribbs & Christopher Funderburg are joined by filmmaker, podcaster & critic Martin Kessler to discuss his new book, Maya Non Grata. An exploration of Apocalyto’s bizarre relationship to history, historicism and art, Kessler’s authorial debut is available for only $2 via our Patreon: patreon.com/posts/44478461 The group discusses this a deeply strange Hollywood action flick set at the dawn of European conquest of the Yucatan peninsula, a vanity project by disreputable actor-turned-director Mel Gibson. Maya Non Grata is Martin Kessler's engaging, meticulously researched odyssey into the controversies surrounding Gibson's representation of historic Mesoamerica, diving deep into the film's idiosyncratic approach to period drama and addressing the charges of inaccuracy leveled at its depiction of a nearly-vanquished culture. Kessler takes an inquisitive approach to Apocalypto's peculiar relationship to the spotty historical record concerning the post-Classic Maya, attempting to unravel the elusive historical truth and exploring the film's frequent whimsical reliance on the idea that "there's no reason this couldn't have happened." In 138 captivating pages, the author examines his own relationship to the movie - Kessler's deeply personal, colloquial, unpredictable book considers the question, "What does art owe to history?" The Pink Smoke site: www.thepinksmoke.com Support our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke on Twitter: 
twitter.com/thepinksmoke Martin Kessler on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MovieKessler Christopher Funderburg on Twitter: twitter.com/cfunderburg John Cribbs on Twitter: twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / “Tea for Two” Outro music: Marcus Pinn / “Vegas”

“There wasn’t a word for the way he felt about Melinda, for that combination of loathing and devotion.” Hosts John Cribbs & Christopher Funderburg discuss Patricia Highsmith’s 1957 novel, Deep Water, a cruel and curious marital thriller about a shamelessly philandering housewife and the seemingly meek husband who not only puts up with her affairs but invites her paramours into their home. Highsmith’s 5th novel might be her masterpiece; the writing combines the author’s cutting psychological insights with a slow-burning plot organized around capricious lies and equally capricious murders. It’s the story of slugs, a small press specializing in poetry, and when an unwillingness to address domestic strife becomes a kind of dangerous psychosis. The Pink Smoke site: www.thepinksmoke.com Support our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke on Twitter: twitter.com/thepinksmoke Christopher Funderburg on Twitter: twitter.com/cfunderburg John Cribbs on Twitter: twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / “Tea for Two” Outro music: Marcus Pinn / “Vegas”