Hit Factory

Get access to this entire episode as well as all of our premium episodes and bonus content by becoming a Hit Factory Patron for just $5/month.Returning Hit Factory favorites and fellow Neptune High Class on 1980 Sea Dogs Taylor Grimes and Hard Mike join for a testosterone-heavy conversation about Brian De Palma's 'Snake Eyes'. It's a throwback thriller that satisfies as both sleazy genre exercise and one of the director's most stylish metacommentaries on the craft of filmmaking itself.We discuss Brian De Palma as auteur, and how this film continues his career-long devotion to past masters like Hitchcock and their shared fascination with perversion, voyeurism, and corruption. Then we discuss the film's brilliant grasp on both form and function, as it employs its technical acuity to externalize the interiority of it's lead character (portrayed with considerable aplomb by a never-better Nicolas Cage). Finally, we discuss the film's many brilliant collborators, including the late Ryuichi Sakamoto of the influential Japanese electronic outfit Yellow Magic Orchestra who provides this movie's haunting and lyrical score.Follow Hard Mike on Twitter. Find Taylor online (if you can). ....Our theme song is "Mirror" by Chris Fish.

Writer Maggie Serota joins to discuss the 1993 comedy 'So I Married An Axe Murderer', a movie that takes inspiration from classic screwball comedies, Hitchcock thrillers, and SNL-style sketch comedy in equal measure. We discuss the rise of the film's star, Mike Myers, a gifted comedic performer who dedicated much of his 90s output to an evolving pantheon characters, often involving elaborate makeup and outlandish vocal affectations. Then, we talk about the film's stunning bullpen of comedy veterans, including Alan Arkin, and the late Phil Hartman and Charles Grodin - all contributing hilarious riffs on their signature characters. Finally, we talk about Myers's career today by way of his most recent work, the dire Netflix series 'The Pentaverate' and why audiences might welcome a career pivot in the vein of other SNL alum Adam Sandler or Bill Hader.Follow Maggie on Twitter.Read & Subscribe to Maggie's Substack. Get access to all of our premium episodes and bonus content by becoming a Hit Factory Patron for just $5/month.....Our theme song is "Mirror" by Chris Fish. 

Get access to this entire episode as well as all of our premium episodes and bonus content by becoming a Hit Factory Patron for just $5/month.

Montreal-based film programmer, writer, and critic Justine Peres Smith joins us to discuss Catherine Breillat's 1999 film 'Romance'. It's a fascinating film that challenges patriarchal views of intimacy and desire, exploring the interiority of one woman's sexuality with a bracing level of nuance and honesty. We discuss the film's graphic depictions of (purportedly unsimulated) sexual encounters and the fearless performer who gives these raw scenes life, Caroline Ducey. Then, we examine the film's uncommon embrace of the textures of feminine sexuality, subverting reductive and confining depictions in the mainstream, and offering an alternative to the capitalist impulses of "productive sexuality". Finally, we explore sex in film more broadly, and many audience's troubling aversion to exploring sexuality in ways that consider its emancipatory power. Follow Justine on Twitter. Get access to all of our premium episodes and bonus content by becoming a Hit Factory Patron for just $5/month.....Our theme song is "Mirror" by Chris Fish. 

Cenephile and severe weather head @MatineeMode joins us to discuss 'Twister', one of the biggest hits of 1996. It's a film that takes several well-worn, sometimes quaint, and seemingly disparate cinematic tropes and combines them into a transcendent and irreplicable experience.We discuss the rise and fall of filmmaker Jan de Bont, from his time as one of Paul Verhoeven and John McTiernan's key collaborators, to his work on back-to-back 90s action hits (this film and 1994's 'Speed'), to his gun-for-hire status for the 2003 'Tomb Raider' sequel that stands as his last film as director to date. Then, we talk about the film's host of influences, most notably its screwball comedy premise wrapped in a disaster movie's skin. Finally, we discuss the movie's groundbreaking special effects and champion the film as a state-of-the-art blockbuster spectacle.Follow EverydayMatinee on Twitter. Get access to all of our premium episodes and bonus content by becoming a Hit Factory Patron for just $5/month.....Our theme song is "Mirror" by Chris Fish. 

Get access to this entire episode as well as all of our premium episodes and bonus content by becoming a Hit Factory Patron for just $5/month.

Journalist and writer Séamus Malekafzali joins us to discuss the 1996 Arnold Schwarzenegger vehicle 'Eraser'. It's an above average & satisfyingly self-aware film that represents the waning impact of a once-dependable action formula.We discuss the film's gleeful subversions of action movie tropes and the ways it challenges Arnold's well-cultivated action hero status, the star's late-90s twilight years before his next era as a politiician, and the seemingly long-abandoned notion of vertically integrated tie-in materials for big studio releases. Follow Séamus on Twitter. Read Séamus's Substack on Middle East politics. Read & Listen to Burnt Nitrate, Séamus's explorations of lesser-known and lesser-discussed films. Get access to all of our premium episodes and bonus content by becoming a Hit Factory Patron for just $5/month.....Our theme song is "Mirror" by Chris Fish. 

Get access to this entire episode as well as all of our premium episodes and bonus content by becoming a Hit Factory Patron for just $5/month.

Matt Belenky returns for another Carlee-less episode to discuss Steven Soderbergh's technical tour-de-force 'The Limey'. It's both a whip-smart, crackling crime film showcasing Steven Soderbergh at the height of his power and a mesmerizing, patiently observed rumination on memory, loss, and legacy.We discuss the metatextual significance of leads Terence Stamp and Peter Fonda as mutual elegies for the British New Wave and the American films of the New Hollywood era, the film's brilliantly evocative formal techniques, and Steven Soderbergh's singular position as a prolific auteur in our current era of haphazard regurgitation.Follow Matt Belenky on Twitter.Get access to all of our premium episodes and bonus content by becoming a Hit Factory Patron for just $5/month.....Our theme song is "Mirror" by Chris Fish. 

Get access to this entire episode as well as all of our premium episodes and bonus content by becoming a Hit Factory Patron for just $5/month.