Edinburgh Film Podcast

40:16

EFP 89: John Boorman's Excalibur with Dr Ralph Moffat...

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/09/30

Host Dr Pasquale Iannone marks 45 years since the release of Excalibur, John Boorman’s epic re-telling of the legend of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. Released in 1981, the film was shot in Ireland and features Nigel Terry as King Arthur, Nicol Williamson as Merlin as well as several future Hollywood stars such as Helen Mirren, Gabriel Byrne, Patrick Stewart and Liam Neeson. Joining Pasquale to discuss Excalibur and its approach to Arthurian lore are two specialists in both history

EN

15:01

EFP 88: IberoDocs 2026 with Luna Carmona

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/09/16

Host Dr Pasquale Iannone discusses the upcoming Iberodocs Film Festival which opens this week across various venues in Scotland.IberoDocs is an annual showcase of the most exciting and innovative documentaries from Spain, Portugal and Latin America. This year, the festival runs between 16th and 26th September and it will open with the Scottish premiere of Argentinian filmmaker Lucrecia Martel’s Nuestra Tierra (Landmarks)(2025).Joining Pasquale to explore some highlights from IberoDocs 2026 is

EN

50:15

EFP 87: Writer-director Louis Paxton on The Incomer

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/09/01

Host Dr Pasquale Iannone is joined on this episode by Edinburgh filmmaker Louis Paxton to discuss his feature debut, folk comedy The Incomer (2026).The film tells of thirty-something brother and sister Sandy and Isla who live on a remote Scottish island. The pair live cut off from society in a state of arrested development. One day, the local authorities decide to send one of their workers to the island to serve notice of eviction. But the siblings won’t give up their home without a fight.Starring

EN

33:25

EFP 86: Deniz Sarisakal on Kaurismäki's Drifting Clouds

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/08/19

This episode of the podcast takes us to Finland and the irresistibly dry and droll comedies of Aki Kaurismäki. A major figure in World cinema since the early 1980s, few filmmakers have created such a distinctive universe through their films. As critic and historian Michael Brooke has noted, in Kaurismäki’s films ‘we’re in ‘a never-never land somewhere between the 1930s and the 1980s, where people drive Cadillacs, listen to old-time rock’n’roll, dance the tango, and issue such wise aphorisms as 'Life

EN

26:36

EFP 85: Rachael Nisbet on Danger: Diabolik

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/08/05

On this episode, host Dr Pasquale Iannone is joined by film critic and historian Rachael Nisbet to discuss one of cinema’s most dazzling comic book adaptations, Mario Bava’s Danger: Diabolik (1968). Based on the comics written by sisters Angela and Luciana Giussani, Diabolik chronicles the escapades of the masked master criminal and his lover and co-conspirator Eva Kant. The comics have been massively influential since their first publication in 1962 and have spawned various film adaptations,

EN

30:52

EFP 84: Olivia Laing on Fellini, Pasolini and The...

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/07/21

On this episode, host Dr Pasquale Iannone is joined by award-winning writer Olivia Laing to discuss their latest novel The Silver Book. Olivia’s book is part thriller, part queer love story set against the backdrop of the Italian film industry in the mid-1970s. Skilfully merging fact and fiction, The Silver Book shines a light on the work of real-life costume and production designer Danilo Donati. It tells of Nicholas, a young English man who flees London after a traumatic event and moves to Rome

EN

37:31

EFP 83: Caroline Young on Fashioning Hitchcock

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/07/01

Host Dr Pasquale Iannone is joined by author Caroline Young to discuss her new book Fashioning Hitchcock (Bloomsbury, 2026).Caroline is a prolific author and critic based in Edinburgh. Specialising in fashion, pop culture and classic cinema, her previous books include The It Girls: Glamor, Celebrity and Scandal (2025), Single & Psycho: How Pop Culture Shaped the Unhinged Woman (2025), Crazy Old Ladies: The Story of Hag Horror (2022) and Hitchcock’s Heroines (2018).Spanning more than fifty years

EN

51:18

EFP 82: Professor Mark Goble on the Art of Slow Motion

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/06/16

On this episode, host Dr Pasquale Iannone is joined by Professor Mark Goble to discuss a visual effect that is used in everything from action films to football matches.Whether it’s to extend or amplify, to lyricise or clarify, slow motion is everywhere on our screens.Published by Columbia University Press, Mark’s book Downtime: The 20th Century in Slow Motion (2025) takes a close look at an effect which has been strangely under-explored in film scholarship, despite this near-ubiquity. Mark is

EN

37:00

EFP 81: Professor Martine Beugnet on cinema and the...

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/05/25

On this episode, we dial down the sharpness and celebrate cinematic blurriness.Going against the common assumption that blur is only for backgrounds, a new book by Professor Martine Beugnet explores the power and poetics of the blurred image. Originally published in French in 2017,Blur (2026) is part of the Cutaways series from Fordham University Press, where authors take a close look at one particular cinematic theme or motif.Martine has published widely on film theory and aesthetics since the

EN

30:01

EFP 80: Neil Brand on 100 Years of Laurel and Hardy

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/05/06

On this episode, we discuss the work of legendary comedy duo Laurel and Hardy, whose careers straddled both the silent and sound eras.They were active between the 1920s and the 1950s, making more than a hundred films together and their unmistakeable big man-little man dynamic would go on to influence many a comedy double-act, from Abbott and Costello to Morecambe and Wise.This year marks the centenary of Laurel and Hardy’s first appearance in a film together and to mark the occasion Neil Brand has

EN

35:15

EFP 79: Writer-director Valerio Ciriaci on Elvira Notari

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/04/20

Host Dr Pasquale Iannone goes back to Naples in the early 1900s to discuss a pioneer of silent cinema and Italy’s first woman filmmaker, Elvira Notari (1875 - 1946). Notari directed dozens of features and documentaries, but like so much from the silent era, only a small percentage of her work has survived. Most notably there are three films she made between 1920 and 1927 - A'santanotte (1922), È piccerella (1922) and Fantasia e surdate (1927) - a trio of passionate, visually daring, often subversive

EN

22:06

EFP 78: Michał Oleszczyk on Andrzej Wajda

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/04/06

On this episode, host Dr Pasquale Iannone marks the centenary of one of the towering figures of world cinema, the Polish filmmaker Andrzej Wajda. Born in 1926, Wajda was a clear-eyed and sensitive chronicler of Polish history, literature and culture in a film career spanning more than 65 years. He is probably best known for his war trilogy of the mid to late 1950s - A Generation (1955), Kanał (1957) and Ashes and Diamonds (1958) - politically-committed, formally daring films which chronicled Polish

EN

39:30

EFP 77: Dr Lin Feng on John Woo's Hard Boiled

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/03/25

On this episode, host Dr Pasquale Iannone discusses one of the finest action films ever made, John Woo’s masterpiece of Hong Kong 'Heroic Bloodshed'Hard Boiled (1992). The film has recently been restored in 4K and is about to be released in a special edition box set courtesy of Arrow Video.Starring Chow Yun Fat and Tony Leung, Hard Boiled tells of a hard drinking Hong Kong cop Yuen (aka Tequila) and his investigation into a violent arms smuggling ring.Joining Pasquale to discuss the film is Dr Lin

EN

24:06

EFP 76: Writer-director Ben Wheatley on Bulk

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/03/12

Host Dr Pasquale Iannone's guest on this episode of Edinburgh Film Podcast is the acclaimed British filmmaker Ben Wheatley.Since his 2009 debut, the crime thriller Down Terrace, Ben has specialised in highly inventive, unsettling, darkly funny pictures, often written in collaboration with his partner Amy Jump. From the hitman thriller Kill List (2011) to English Civil War drama A Field in England (2013), J.G. Ballard adaptation High Rise (2015) to 70s-set action film Free Fire (2016).Ben's

EN

42:24

EFP 75: Ashley Clark on The World of Black Film

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/02/24

On this episode of the podcast, host Dr Pasquale Iannone is joinedby author Ashley Clark to discuss his new book The World of Black Film (2026).Ashley is a writer, critic and broadcaster. He is also Curatorial Director at the Criterion Collection. His previous roles include director of film programming at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Ashley has curated film series at BFI Southbank and the Museum of Modern Art amongst others. He has written for Film Comment, Reverse Shot, and Sight and Sound, and

EN

35:00

EFP 74: Professor Jennifer Coates on Nagisa Oshima

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/02/10

On this episode of the podcast, host Dr Pasquale Iannone goes back to Japan in 1969 to discuss a lesser-known film from the iconoclastic New Wave filmmaker Nagisa Oshima. Oshima is best-known for subversive, controversial works such as the erotic drama In The Realm of the Senses (1976) and the David Bowie-starring war film Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence (1983)The episode focuses on Boy (1969) an earlier picture from Oshima which is based on a remarkable true story. The film follows a con artist couple

EN

25:23

EFP 73: Leith Kino

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/01/26

On this episode of the podcast, host Dr Pasquale Iannone reports from Leith Kino, a micro cinema initiative set up by a veritable supergroup of film professionals and enthusiasts. The initiative - which is hosted by bar, restaurant and event space Leith Depot on Edinburgh’s Leith Walk - aims to provide a space for engagement with avant-garde, experimental, arthouse and trash film.Since September 2025, the Leith Kino team have hosted an eclectic series of events, with members taking it in turn to

EN

49:36

EFP 72: Michael Brooke on Zoltán Huszárik

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2026/01/12

The first episode of 2026 is dedicated to extraordinary films of Hungarian filmmaker Zoltán Huszárik (1931 - 1981).Huszarik’s shorts and two feature films are dazzling in their formal experimentation and their attention to detail and texture. His work has gone on to influence contemporary filmmakers such as Peter Strickland (The Duke of Burgundy, Flux Gourmet).Huszárik’s small but remarkable filmography has been beautifully restored and released in a box set by Second Run. The set includes the

EN

50:35

EFP 71: Professor Sir Christopher Frayling on The...

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2025/12/16

On this 20th and final episode of 2025, host Dr Pasquale Iannone is joined by Professor Sir Christopher Frayling. Christopher is an internationally renowned educationalist, historian and broadcaster who spent more than 35 years at London’s Royal College of Art as Professor of Cultural History and then as Rector. Across more than five decades, Christopher has published widely on film, literature and the arts with volumes exploring everything from the Middle Ages to the Gothic. He is as a pioneer in

EN

37:45

EFP 70: Professor Sue Harris on Bertrand Blier

Edinburgh Film Podcast ·

2025/12/03

On this episode of the podcast, host Dr Pasquale Iannone is joined by Professor Sue Harris. Sue is Professor Emerita of Film Studies at Queen Mary University of London and an internationally-renowned specialist in French cinema. She has also published noted volumes on the Hollywood film musical, film stardom and production design.Sue is a trustee and collaborator of the long-running, UK-wide French Film Festival. During this year’s Festival, Sue sat down with Pasquale to discuss the controversial

EN

All Episodes

Similar Podcasts

The Slowdown: Poetry & Reflection Daily

Eliana Benavides

The Moth

The Moth

About Art

Heidi Zuckerman

Stage Whisper

Andrew Cortes and Hope Bird

Podcast Patapoe

0d0a