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PODCAST

Random Acts of Cinema

Mike Noyes and Charles Peterson

Each week friends Mike and Charlie have Randy (the random number generator) select a film for them to watch from the Criterion Collection. Then they discuss and review it for your listening pleasure. It"s a podcast about the love of film, expanding horizons, painstakingly cataloging the duration of every long take, and friendship.

arts visual arts

All Episodes

01:17:22

465 - Dodes’ka-den (1970)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2021/03/01

Three-peat! Director Akira Kurosawa's first color feature finds the tragedies and human strength in a small shantytown, inhabited by an ensemble cast each facing their own poverty-driven struggles. What follows is a categorization of the ways in which people contend with suffering: ranging from the inspiring and humorous, to the accepting and despairing. If you'd like to watch ahead for next week's film, we will be joined by a special guest (!!) to discuss and review Gillian Armstrong's My

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01:18:58

LD072 - West Side Story (1961)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2021/02/22

It's been a long time since we've had a musical on this podcast. And this is a big one. Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins' adapt the stage musical (which is - sort of - and adaptation of Romeo and Juliet) wherein two rival gangs sing and dance through fights and fight-dances and dance-fights. Maria (Natalie Wood) and Tony (Richard Beymer) are our star-crossed lovers trying to secure their love in the face of teen violence, police harassment, gang loyalties, and the crushing pressures of racism and

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01:20:52

738 - Tootsie (1982)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2021/02/15

Acclaimed American director Sydney Pollack examines the lives of struggling New York City actors working on a competitive and fraught soap opera. Dustin Hoffman plays Michael Dorsey, a talented, but difficult, and under appreciated actor who financial needs and uncompromising nature lead him to take a role as a woman, played by a woman. Becoming an unexpected feminist icon, Michael further challenges societal demands on the accepted gender identities in 1980s America. Hard-hitting stuff. If you'd

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01:26:36

640 - Koyaanisqatsi (1982)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2021/02/08

Shots of headlights in traffic, people going down escalators, whirring machinery in a factory, the Hoover dam, a lady smoking a cigarette, and a controlled demolition of a tenement high rise. All this is made at once familiar and deeply profound with sublime photography and a pulsing Philip Glass score. Godfrey Reggio’s first entry in the “qatsi” trilogy revels in the splendor of isolation and anonymity subjected onto humanity with our embrace of technology. Except everything looks

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01:15:20

725 - Eraserhead (1977)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2021/02/01

Get ready, Randy has picked another big one for us. And he actually picked the first film by a celebrated director for once. David Lynch's Eraserhead is such a desperately ambitious, risk-everything film that one is tempted to call it "groundbreaking" except for the fact that it's so unique in its vision and execution that you'd be hard pressed to name what it broke ground for. Jack Nance plays Henry, newly saddled with his helpless, mutated, infant offspring and coming face to face with surreal

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01:24:53

25 - Alphaville (1965)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2021/01/25

This is a big one that we’ve been waiting for: Jean-Luc Godard’s highly influential, widely lauded, experimental, sci-fi/noir mashup. Hard bitten detective Lemmy Caution (Eddie Constantine)has traveled through space in his Ford Galaxy to Alphaville, to uncover the mystery of a missing scientist. He finds a a strange, sterile, funhouse mirror of 1965 Paris, ruled by a cold omnipresent computer. Will the emotional awaking of Natacha von Braun (Anna Karina), the scientists daughter be enough to save

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01:21:02

843 - Punch Drunk Love (2002)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2021/01/18

What happens when two seemingly incompatible masters of their craft with nothing to prove get together to make an discomforting powder keg character study that dramatically ratchets its way into a desperately... sweet romance? You get director Paul Thomas Anderson's collaboration with Adam Sandler who plays Barry, a brow-beaten introvert who must contend with the demands of his bullying sisters, a phone-sex blackmail ring, and an unlikely love affair with the all-too understanding and equally

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01:14:53

200 - The Honeymoon Killers (1970)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2021/01/11

A couple of lonely hearts (played by Shirley Stoler and Tony Lo Bianco) find true love in this affecting documentary-style romanctic drama directed by Leonard Kastle. Oh, and they con then kill a bunch of women across the United States, because these is actually a shockingly brutal ripped-from-the-headlines true crime film. But I guess it's also that first thing too. If you'd like to watch ahead for next week's film, we will be discussing and reviewing Paul Thomas Anderson's Punch Drunk

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01:24:05

441 - The Small Back Room (1949)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2021/01/04

The back room boys are at it again! That’s right, we’re jumping back into the endlessly charming (so far) films of Powell and Pressburger. Sammy Rice (played by David Farrah) is a scientist working for an ill-defined problem-solving crew that the British government relies on for technical advice during the Second World War. Will his ever-suffering girl Susan (Kathleen Byron) give him the support he needs to battle his addictions, his injuries, Byzantine office politics, and a series of nefarious

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01:23:02

587 - Three Colours: Blue

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2020/12/28

Julliette Binoche deadpans. Sudden fade to black! Dum dum da dummmmm..! Repeat that about four more times and you have one of the most iconic pieces of 1990s European cinema. Does this formula hold up for two jaded cinephiles at the end of 2020? The first installment of Krzysztof Kieslowski's ambitious Three Colours Trilogy doesn't pull any punches with his breathless character study of a woman rediscovering human connection after an unthinkable tragedy. If you'd like to watch ahead for next

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01:23:30

635 - Weekend (1967)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2020/12/21

If you are celebrated auteur Jean-Luc Godard, it’s the 1960s, and your cranking out about 7 movies a year, the odds are strong that there’s going to be some winners and losers in the mix. And the question today is whether or not this picaresque travel film about a married couple (played by Jean Yanne and Mireille Darc) braving the traffic jam, car crash, and cannibal-strewn French countryside to murder a family member in get their inheritance early is a good one or a bad one. It’s even more to

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01:09:39

739 - The American Friend (1977)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2020/12/14

When you imagine the lead character in the Talented Mr. Ripley, do you picture a wild-eyed Dennis Hopper in coveralls and a cowboy hat wandering around 1977 Hamburg? No? Well apparently Wim Wenders was the only director bold enough to take Patricia Highsmith’s legendary anti-hero in that...uh...specific direction. But if that has scared you off, don’t worry: the movie is mostly about Bruno Ganz rocking a real sexy 1970s dad look while he clumsily tries his hand as a mob hitman. And it’s

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01:14:53

890 - Meantime (1984)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2020/12/07

Who is up for a largely improvised drama set in poverty-stricken Thatcher-era London? Anyone? Ok, we get it, but what if we told you it was directed by Mike Leigh and it features early virtuoso performances by Tim Roth and Gary Oldman? And that they aren’t even the best part? Hint: it’s a acerbic but tender characterization by Phil Daniels as a wise-ass brother navigating the dole, neighborhood skinheads, nagging parents, patronizing relatives, unemployment, and a society and government that has

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01:14:16

405 - The Threepenny Opera (1931)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2020/11/30

Come join us as we discuss director G. W. Pabst's adaptation of Bertholt Brecht and Kurt Weill's legendary musical set in the London underwold. Gang boss Mackie Messer (aka Mack the Knife played by Rudolf Forster) plots to marry Polly Peachum (Carola Neher) daughter of the beggar king, while his scorned lover Jenny (Lotte Lenya) seeks to have him arrested by police chief Tiger Brown (Reinhold Schunzel). With a few jaunty tunes and innumerable betrayals and getaways, this German language

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01:27:13

929 - Female Trouble (1974)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2020/11/23

[Insert eye-rolling pun about dipping our toes back into familiar Waters here]... That's right, we're once more spending the day with the Dreamland Players, reveling in the trash and the wigs of Jon Waters' decades-long seedy send-up of American culture. Divine smirks, whines, and stomps his way into our hearts as Dawn Davenport, following her sordid decline from dissatisfied youth to art experiment/serial killer. If you'd like to watch ahead for next week's film, we will be discussing and

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01:10:21

281 - Jules And Jim (1962)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2020/11/16

Francois Truffaut (clearly famous mostly because he's mentioned in our theme song) crafts an oddly gentle love-triangle period piece, full of joy, friendship, understanding, frustration, and tragedy. A kind of bohemian fusion of Edith Wharton and Henry James. Jules (Oskar Werner) and Jim (Henri Sarre) play two fast friends living in France on the precipice of World War I. A chance encounter with anarchist Catherine (preposterously absent from the title, and brilliantly played by Jeanne Moreau)

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01:30:05

LD54 - Zulu (1964)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2020/11/09

It looks like Randy finally decided to pick for us a good, old-fashioned, big-budget, mid-century, historical war epic. Michael Caine plays Peter O’Toole playing David Bowie as Michael Caine in the Role of Lieutenant Gonville Bromhead alongside Stanley Baker as Lieutenant John Chard: both men of hesitant bravery competing with one another for the command of a small regiment of British soldiers defending against a massive Zulu army in 1870s Natal. As you might imagine, there’s quite a lot to unpack

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01:22:02

119 - Withnail & I (1987)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2020/11/02

Hey maaaan... remember the 60s? Doesn’t matter, because this isn’t really that movie. Unless your idea of the decade is an hilariously acerbic Richard E. Grant (as the eponymous Withnail) drunkenly rampaging through the English countryside screaming at river fish and ladies in tea shops. Paul McGann (...and I) is there to suffer along for the ride, giving and taking timeless quotes and stumbling into one soul-crushing circumstance after another. Maybe these two booze-addled out-of-work actors

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01:27:00

124 - Haxan or Witchcraft Through the Ages (1922)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2020/10/26

As the spookiest of holidays approaches, Randy (the random number generator) has selected an appropriately themed film for us to watch. That is, if we can handle all of these darn thrills and chills. But with Benjamin Christensen's seminal half-documentary/half-historical fiction approach to his study on the history of medieval witchcraft, a rapid-fire mix of visual delights and horrors leads the audience into a terrifying world of witches, potions, curses, torture, mad monks, and Satan himself.

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01:20:20

546 - Five Easy Pieces (1970)

Random Acts of Cinema ·

2020/10/18

Will we be doing the entire episode doing our best Jack Nicholson impressions, or will we give this very serious movie the very serious attention it deserves? The only way to find out is to join us as we discuss director Bob Rafelson's character study of modern alienation starring the man himself. If you'd like to watch ahead for next week's film, we will be discussing and reviewing Benjamin Christensen's Haxan (1922) just in time for Halloween!

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