PODCAST

Living for the Cinema

Geoff Gershon

Short movie reviews from the last 50+ years by Geoff Gershon. https://livingforthecinema.com/

tv & film film reviews

All Episodes

22:05

MULHOLLAND DRIVE (2001)

Living for the Cinema ·

2025/01/31

On January 15, the entertainment world lost a truly unique and highly influential talent….David Lynch (Blue Velvet, The Elephant Man, Twin Peaks) who passed away at the age of 78 from emphysema. Over his illustrious career, he directed twelve feature films and was nominated for four Oscars including Best Director for this acclaimed classic released in the fall of 2001. Considered by many fans and critics to be Lynch's best film, this mind-bending mystery has since garnered a devot...

en-us

18:06

THE QUICK AND THE DEAD (1995)

Living for the Cinema ·

2025/01/28

Director Sam Raimi (The Evil Dead & Spider-Man trilogies) just seemed born to apply his skills to a send-up of a spaghetti western and back in the mid '90's he got his chance. You've got Sharon Stone (Basic Instinct) at the PEAK of her star-power playing the strong-but-silent type, a gunslinger coming to the town of Redemption seeking revenge and getting roped into a gun-duel tournament....Hackman taking his Oscar-winning thug sheriff role from Unforgiven up to 11 as the main villai...

en-us

19:09

DROP ZONE (1994)

Living for the Cinema ·

2025/01/24

Chances are if that you were watching some action thriller in the '90's featuring an airplane being hijacked, there was a strong likelihood that it starred Wesley Snipes....as this would be one of three (the others being U.S. Marshalls and Passenger 57) released during that time period with such a sequence. And amazingly of all three, this would be the one to feature him most up in the air as Snipes stars as U.S. Marshall Pete Nessip who after suffering a tragedy on one such hijacking e...

en-us

16:01

WITNESS (1985)

Living for the Cinema ·

2025/01/21

Following up starring in a string of big budget genre epics (Raiders of the Lost Ark, Blade Runner, Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi) in the early part of the '80's, Harrison Ford decided to detour just a bit with this smaller-scale suspense thriller directed by the legendary Peter Weir (Dead Poet's Society, The Truman Show). Here he plays John Book, a Philadelphia police detective investigating a local murder where the ONLY witness is a young Amish boy (Lucas Haas) who happened ...

en-us

20:16

DEN OF THIEVES 2: PANTERA

Living for the Cinema ·

2025/01/16

Big Nick is BACK! And so is Donnie the Driver....as played by Gerard Butler and O'Shea Jackson Jr. respectively, they are the only significant hold-overs from the first first Den of Thieves which came out five years. That original LA-based crime thriller directed by Christian Gudegast (who also returns to direct this sequel) ended up being a bit of a sleeper hit and has garnered a significant following since then via streaming and/or cable. So how do they continue the story ...

en-us

17:08

TREMORS (1990)

Living for the Cinema ·

2025/01/14

In the small, isolated Nevada town of Perfection, two aimless handymen Val (Kevin Bacon) and Earl (Fred Ward) were just minding their own business working their latest gig when they suddenly discover strange things occurring....including the inexplicable death of some one who has hidden way up on a light pole in the middle of nowhere. What were they afraid of....something on the ground....or underground perhaps? :o Well as it turns out, this town has been invaded by large, strange creat...

en-us

19:06

THE LIMEY (1999)

Living for the Cinema ·

2025/01/09

Wilson (Terrance Stamp) is a career criminal from the UK who is now coming to Los Angeles to find out about what happened to his daughter (Melissa George) who just tragically died in a car accident....or did she? Her father suspects that she might have been murdered and he suspects that it might have been her wealthy, older record executive boyfriend Terry played by the late, great Peter Fonda. Along the way, Wilson recruits help from two local actors (Lesley Ann Warren, Luis Guzm...

en-us

19:05

The Book of Eli (2010)

Living for the Cinema ·

2024/12/29

Taking place within a future apocalyptic wasteland, Denzel Washington plays the titular Eli and he's traversing through this wasteland with an all-important book (hence the title)...along with a super-sharp machete blade, shotgun, killer instincts, and car battery-powered IPod Classic. Things get hairy once he arrives in the wrong town where the local villain Carnegie (Gary Oldman) wants to take possession of this mysterious book. And what results is an increasingly violent stand-...

en-us

21:22

ALEXANDER - THE DIRECTOR'S CUT (2004)

Living for the Cinema ·

2024/12/24

Twenty years ago, Two-time Oscar winner Oliver Stone (Platoon, JFK, Wall Street) finally had the opportunity to direct the grand-scale historical epic which he and several of his directing peers (Scorsese, Kubrick) had been trying to helm for decades.....the story of Alexander the Great who once lead a MASSIVE Macedonian Empire which at one point comprised around half of the land mass in the Eastern Hemisphere during ancient times. He lived one hell of a life conquering much of the anci...

en-us

19:16

Anora (2024)

Living for the Cinema ·

2024/12/20

Acclaimed independent filmmaker Sean Baker (The Florida Project, Tangerine) both wrote and directed this dramedy about a Brooklyn sex worker/exotic dancer named Ani (Mikey Madison) who one night meets a wealthy young Russian named Ivan (Mark Eydelshteyn) at her club. She dances for him and apparently they hit it off SO well that within a few days, they decide to get married in Vegas. They soon return to Ivan's enormous waterfront mansion to begin married life when suddenly, some u...

en-us

15:35

NATIONAL LAMPOON'S CHRISTMAS VACATION (1989)

Living for the Cinema ·

2024/12/17

The Griswalds Are Back! Only this time, they're staying home for Christmas in this third entry of the highly popular "National Lampoon's Vacation" which started in the early '80s. Chevy Chase once again returns as the enduringly hapless Clark Griswald while Beverly D'Angelo also returns as Ellen Griswald, his long-suffering wife. And for the third film in a row, their children Audrey (Juliette Lewis) and Rusty (Johnny Galecki) are played by ENTIRELY different actors. T...

en-us

20:52

2010: THE YEAR WE MAKE CONTACT (1984)

Living for the Cinema ·

2024/12/13

Coming out more than sixteen years after its beloved predecessor (2001: A Space Odyssey), this might have been the very first "Legacy Sequel." Also whereas the first film was directed by the late great cinema legend Stanley Kubrick, this one was helmed by journeyman director Peter Hyams (Running Scared, Capricorn One, Timecop) who in tandem with the author (Arthur C. Clarke) of the original source material was determined to craft a more conventional story as opposed to the ground-breaki...

en-us

20:04

ALL THAT JAZZ (1979)

Living for the Cinema ·

2024/12/10

This is the semi-autobiographical musical story of Joe Gideon (Roy Scheider), a legendary choreographer/director struggling with various addictions as he juggles developing a new stage musical and editing a film he has directed. And it was directed by legendary choreographer/director Bob Fosse (Cabaret, Lenny) who at the time was dealing with many of the struggles when he wasn't winning multiple Tony Awards and Oscars. It was a true passion project which also attracted a passionat...

en-us

23:59

ANY GIVEN SUNDAY (1999)

Living for the Cinema ·

2024/12/06

What happens when the acclaimed and idiosyncratic director of JFK, Natural Born Killers, and The Doors attempts to direct a conventional sports drama about his favorite sport? Multiple Oscar-winner Oliver Stone showed us back in December 1999 that the result would be clearly anything BUT conventional! And he had quite the cast for this epic tail of a few weeks in the life of the fictional Miami Sharks, a professional football team at a crossroads. They have a hot-headed new...

en-us

22:30

THE GODFATHER PART II (1974)

Living for the Cinema ·

2024/12/02

Fifty years ago, recent Oscar winner Francis Ford Coppola returned to write and direct what was likely one of the most highly anticipated sequels in the history of cinema.....and barely two years after the original film (The Godfather) had set the world by storm not only setting box office records but winning several Oscars including Best Picture. How could any film live up to that? Well in the opinions of most who saw it, THIS one did! Returning are stars Al Pacino, Diane Ke...

en-us

17:08

GLADIATOR II (2024)

Living for the Cinema ·

2024/11/29

STRENGTH AND HONOR!The legendary Sir Ridley Scott (Alien, Blade Runner) returns to Ancient Rome to direct this long-awaited sequel to his Best Picture-winning, blockbuster smash from twenty four years ago, Gladiator. This continuation takes place around sixteen years later as the legacy of the both Maximus and the late Emperor Marcus Aurelius has seemingly waned. Rome is now even more corrupt with two childish, manic twin emperors (Joseph Quinn, Fred Hechinger) now running things ...

en-us

19:58

BEVERLY HILLS COP (1984)

Living for the Cinema ·

2024/11/26

Forty years ago this December saw the release of the most popular AND influential action comedies of all time. This was star Eddie Murphy's immediate follow-up to his two breakout hits the previous years, 48 Hrs. in '82 and then Trading Places in '83, only THIS time he was the sole star above the title for the first time. And Eddie did not disappoint with this fish-out-of-water comedy about a Detroit cop named Axel Foley (Eddie Murphy) who travels across the country to Beverly Hil...

en-us

21:55

The Insider (1999)

Living for the Cinema ·

2024/11/22

Closing out a decade comprising two iconic hits (Heat, The Last of the Mohicans), Oscar-nominated director Michael Mann decided to next collaborate with Oscar-winning writer Eric Roth (Forest Gump) on this docudrama about a controversial story which ran at the highly-rated news-program "60 Minutes" just a few years prior. This news segment focused on an interview with "Big Tobacco" whistleblower Jeffrey Wigand (Russel Crowe) and what damaging secrets he was able to review about the ques...

en-us

15:21

CONCLAVE (2024)

Living for the Cinema ·

2024/11/19

The Pope has suddenly died and a new one must be elected via a titular conclave as soon as possible at Vatican City. Cardinal Law (Ralph Fiennes) has been tasked with running this conclave and must not only ensure that every viable candidate has been properly vetted but that the nominating and voting processes are fair among all other cardinals. And what results is akin to a courtroom/legal drama with several of the usual trappings including surprise revelations and witnesses.&nbs...

en-us

16:55

FURY (2014)

Living for the Cinema ·

2024/11/14

David Ayers (Suicide Squad, The Beekeeper) directs this brutal war drama which takes place during the last days of World War II along the German front. We follow a crew riding within tank titled the titular "Fury" which is lead by Brad Pitt's grizzled veteran nick-named "Wardaddy." Pitt leads a stellar cast including Michael Pena, Shia LeBouf, Jon Bernthal and Logan Lerman, the latter of which plays Norman who becomes the audience avatar as he has just joined this crew and has nev...

en-us

456 results

Living for the Cinema

All Episodes

Similar Podcasts

BEHIND THE VELVET ROPE

David Yontef

Nerd Culture - A Gamekings Podcast

Blammo Media

UPodcast

UPodcast

The Writers Hangout

Sandy Adomaitis

The Sarah Fraser Show

Sarah Fraser