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PODCAST

Mary Versus the Movies

Sure, the 1980s were a great decade for film. But have you seen all of them? No, neither has Mary. In fact, some pretty big films passed her by, what with being in kindergarten at the time: A Nightmare on Elm Street, Moonstruck, My Neighbor Totoro... So it"s time to fix that. Artwork, opening and closing themes by Dennis Lingg Produced and edited by Mary Jones

tv & film film reviews

All Episodes

01:02:40

Episode 114 - Risky Business (1983)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/09/15

A film that boldly asks “What if we made a good version of Ferris Buehler’s Day Off?” It has all the beats of a John Hughes teen movie—especially that one—while actually saying something about America, capitalism, and class. It’s the film that made Tom Cruise a star, and unfortunately is saddled in pop culture memory with one very silly dance scene that has very little to do with what’s otherwise a very dark, funny, nervy movie about facing adulthood and disillusionment. A smarter film than

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01:05:19

Episode 113 - Weird Science (1985)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/09/08

We're back to school and already we want to drop out, thanks to what might be John Hughes' worst movie, an obnoxious take on Pygmalian that had us begging for Bill Paxton's Chet to come back to the movie early and bully these horrible little nerds. A film with only one redeeming value--a pretty great theme song. Starring Anthony Michael Hall, Ilan Mitchell-Smith, Kelly LeBrock, Bill Paxton, and Robert Downey Jr. Written and directed by John Hughes.

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40:17

Episode 112 - Meatballs (1979)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/09/01

We wrap up the summer watching a movie that Mary loved as a kid, but Dennis has never seen--the original camp comedy and star-making vehicle for Bill Murray, Meatballs. It's the snobs-vs-slobs story that gave birth to a million imitators and inadvertantly the Wet Hot American Summer franchise. Does it hold up? Is Mary embarressed by a childhood favorite? Will Dennis regret never going to camp as a kid?

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11:12

Hollywood Avalon episode 6 - Knightriders (1981)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/08/29

George Romero's rare departure from horror is an Arthurian tale about a band of traveling performers who have a kind of Renaissance Faire-meets-motocross-meets-professional wrestling, lead by the idealistic King William played by Ed Harris. It's a defense of independent film, a rumination on selling out, a celebration of a receding counterculture, and a clear-eyed examination of utopianism and its faults and contradictions. In short, its one of the best movies we've covered for either of our shows,

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01:01:54

Episode 111 - National Lampoon's Vacation (1983)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/08/25

Everyone is shocked that Mary hasn't seen this comedy classic about Clark Griswold and his family's ill-fated trip across America to visit Wally World. From the suburbs of Chicago to the Kansas plains, the mountains of Colorado to the deserts of Arizona, and finally a sunny California full of disappointment, this turns out to be a very familiar trip for Mary and Dennis, who have a long history of very similar road trips with very similar disasters. Do these National Lampoon movies have a weird mean

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55:47

Episode 110 - Jaws 2 (1978)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/08/18

It's summer, and we're still at the beach. Unfortunately, just when we thought it was safe to go back in the water, the beach is closed because a shark ate a helicopter. That's right, we're watching Jaws 2, the unnecessary but completely expected sequel to one of the greatest films ever made, Jaws, and are, at the very least, disappointed by an unfocused story full of wasted potential, the wasted talents of Roy Scheider, and the wasted spectacle of a shark making a smorgasboard of some of the least

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01:09:13

Episode 109 - Point Break (1991)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/08/11

We wanted to hang out at the beach this episode, and felt it was time to finally see the movie that made Keanu Reeves an action star. We've got surfing, bank robbers in US president masks, Patrick Swayze spouting new age nonsense, skydiving, more surfing, a lot of guns, and Gary Busey. It's pretty great.

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56:29

Episode 108 - Victor/Victoria (1982)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/08/03

Blake Edwards' 1980s remake of a Weimar-era German film about a gender-bending cabaret singer and the mobster who falls in love with her/him in 1930s Paris, starring Julie Andrews, James Garner, and Robert Preston, is a delightful creampuff of a movie that should have absolutely no relevance to the incredibly stupid political and cultural climate of the United States in 2023, and yet here we are. What a time to be alive.

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01:05:19

Episode 107 - Miracle Mile (1988)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/07/28

We’re back in Los Angeles for Steve De Jarnatt’s apocalyptic thriller with Anthony Edwards as a musician who accidentally finds out that nuclear war has broken out, leading to mass panic through the city, and Mare Winningham as the girl he's only just met but now wants to save from nuclear annihilation. We also get a chance to talk to musician George Korein of George Korein and the Spleen, who wrote a song about Miracle Mile called “Drowning in a Helicopter” on his album Denouemort. Check out

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01:00:25

Episode 106 - Night of the Comet (1984)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/07/21

We're back just in time for the end of the world. An unsubtle but fun romp through a post-apocalyptic Los Angeles, where two sisters and a random guy fend off zombies and mad scientists bent on harvesting their blood.

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08:36

Hollywood Avalon ep. 5 - The Kid Who Would Be King...

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/07/20

We take on a more recent movie this time around, a charming British kids' film about a boy who finds Excalibur and learns he and his friends must defeat a reawakened Morgana before things get worse in Britain--and things are already pretty bad there in the dark year of 2019. We were lured in by the promise of Patrick Stewart as Merlin, and while he's not in it as much as we'd hoped--the man's in his eighties after all--the film succeeds on its own, with plenty of scenes filmed in places steeped in

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32:41

Bonus 3 - Creature from the Black Lagoon

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/07/06

We're still on hiatus, so we pre-recorded this bonus episdoe with an old friend of ours, writer Carolyn West (@Firebunny3000), a viewing of the 1954 monster movie Creature from the Black Lagoon, the last of the great Universal monsters, which was shown at Laurel Hill Cemetery in Philadelphia back in early June of 2023. We'll be back recording soon, but in the meantime, enjoy.

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02:01:04

Episode 105 - The Natural (1984)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/06/16

We welcome Dan Wade of the Wheel of Randy podcast to the show to talk about the Robert Redford baseball movie with a Randy Newman score. There's a lot of Arthurian myth talk, too, so this is a stealth Hollywood Avalon episode. We talk baseball--a lot of baseball--Randy Newman, and mythology in an episode that goes into extra innings.

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01:15:54

Episode 104 - My Life As a Dog (1985)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/06/02

It's the surprisingly sweet and often funny story of a Swedish boy coming to terms with his mother's illness and death during the late 1950s, while also learning about love, sex, and the fallibility of adults. Throw out any ideas of dire stories, black-and-white cinematography, or terrible child actors, this film is light, colorful, and thoughtful in ways that really surprised us.

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41:34

Episode 103 - Society (1989)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/05/26

We were not prepared for this absolutely bizzare horror flick, but it will stick with us forever. A perfect combination of 1980s sleaze, iffy acting, body horror, and social satire, it's also thorougly nauseating. We have no regrets.

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56:31

Episode 102 - A Passage to India (1984)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/05/19

David Lean's final film, an adaptation of E.M. Forster's novel about a white woman who accuses an Indian man of rape, is--at best--deeply flawed, but features several great performances and stunning scenery. Too bad it also features Alec Guinness in brownface, not to mention the difficult subject matter. CW: rape/sexual assault, racial issues, Brits

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05:34

PREVIEW - Hollywood Avalon ep. 4 - Knights of the...

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/05/16

Hollywood tries to give a broad adaptation of Malory's Le Morte Darthur, and is fitfully successful--bright Technicolor and on-location filming doesn't make up for Robert Taylor's defiantly-American accent, and the bowdlerized romance between Lancelot and Guinevere doesn't exactly sizzle, but as a product of 1950s studio filmmaking, it could be worse. We'd like to than Patreon-supporter Stephen Cooke for providing us with a copy of the film. This is a preview of our Patreon-only episode; to

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01:02:26

Episode 101 - Somewhere in Time (1980)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/05/12

Imaging you're really, really good at cosplay--so good you create a time loop that dooms you. We talk nostalgia, the vastness of the Great Lakes, and the San Francisco Music Box Company, among other things.

en

01:29:18

Episode 100 - Highlander (1986)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/05/04

It’s the movie that started this whole podcast: Russel Mulcahy’s ridiculous, awesome, Queen-scored tale of an immortal Scottish swordsman/New York antiques dealer who goes up against the villainous Kurgan. And in honor of the event, we have a special guest, comedian and voice actor Jason Gore from The Best Show with Tom Scharpling and 108.9 The Hawk. It’s a great chat, and we're grateful to Jason for taking the time to watch the and talk to us about it.

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01:08:12

Episode 99 - The Lost Boys (1987)

Mary Versus the Movies ·

2023/04/28

Everyone's seen this horror comedy about teen vampires--except for Mary, who apparently didn't believe in fun when she was a kid. This movie rocks.

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