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PODCAST

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics

Fifteen-Minute Film Fanatics

Two friends with strong opinions watch films separately then discuss them on the show for the first time. Can their friendship survive? Join Mike and Dan as they discuss one film each episode--and in only fifteen minutes, give or take a few. There are no long pauses, pontifications, or politics--just two guys who want to share their enthusiasm for great movies. On Twitter. On Letterboxd. Email: fifteenminutefilm@gmail.com.

tv & film film reviews

All Episodes

25:16

Cutter’s Way

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/10/16

There may be some dated or downright silly elements of Cutter’s Way, Ivan Passer’s 1981 mystery—but what’s great about it outweighs any of its clumsiness and stays in the viewer’s memory. Not enough people know about John Heard’s performance as the unhinged, unlikable, yet undeniably compelling Alex Cutter; this film without any scenes of military conflict is one of the best about Vietnam. Join Mike and Dan for a conversation about the ways in which the title character resembles Captain Ahab

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21:34

Lost in America

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/10/09

“What makes something funny” is difficult to articulate, but Mike and Dan try with one of their favorite comedies, Albert Brooks’ Lost in America. His 1985 film about married professionals who yearn to hit the road (like they saw in Easy Rider) works because there’s nothing to rescue the viewer from the awkwardness and downward spiral of every scene. The characters’ conflicts and anxieties are hilarious—just not to them. Many of us have yearned to start life anew in a world elsewhere or live like

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24:44

The Vanishing

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/10/02

If you have seen Sluizer’s original 1988 thriller—not his 1993 American remake with Jeff Bridges and Kiefer Sutherland--you’ll know exactly why we are doing it as a companion piece to Rope. You’ll also nod along with us when we praise the film’s cold precision: it’s not surprising that Sluzier states in the opening clip that Stanley Kubrick admired the film and saw it ten times. Why we often tell people to watch films but to not read anything first about them, the thrill of assembling pieces of

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21:46

Rope

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/09/25

Rope (1948) may not be top-shelf Hitchcock, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t interesting and worth repeated viewings. After arguing back at those who find Jimmy Stewart miscast, Mike and Dan talk about how the film stands as another example of Hitchcock using violence to dramatize the sex lives of his characters. Mike lists the ways in which the director resembles the killer, specifically Brandon: a Nabokovian figure through which Hitchcock shows the audience what it’s like to have an artistic

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30:41

Sorcerer

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/09/19

In 1973, William Friedkin terrorized the world with The Exorcist and then decided to make a film even more grim: a remake of George Clouzot’s The Wages of Fear. This was an audacious move, since the 1953 original was already well-loved and regarded as one of the most suspenseful films of all time. But Friedkin followed his muse and created Sorcerer (1977), which belongs in the pantheon of Great Underappreciated Films. Like The Exorcist, it’s a frightening peek into Hell; unlike that film, however,

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18:46

The Blues Brothers

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/09/11

Jake and Elwood sing “Everybody Needs Someone to Love” and everybody loves The Blues Brothers: “You … me … them … everybody!” Join Mike and Dan for a conversation about John Landis’s 1980 film that has become movie comfort-food for people raised on the original SNL and others who have come to the film without any knowledge of John Belushi or Dan Ackroyd’s careers. So many comedy sketches fall flat when stretched into the length of a film, but Landis and Ackroyd avoided this when writing The Blues

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27:06

The Wages of Fear

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/09/04

Clouzot’s 1953 thriller may be the ultimate bait and switch, moving from a character study of four desperate men in limbo into one of the most suspenseful films ever made. The Wages of Fear shows us the triumph of human ingenuity much like Robinson Crusoe or Castaway, but it’s also a grim statement about how we all carry our deaths within us: the thing from which we try to flee every morning when we wake up is closer than we can imagine. Everything hangs by a thread, and Clouzot exposes that thread

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21:59

In a Lonely Place

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/08/28

Halfway through Casablanca, we learn why Rick Blaine is so cynical, angry, and embittered; we also feel glad at the end when he takes off his armor and begins that beautiful friendship. But how would we respond if we never learned why Rick acted as he does? The answer is that he’d be Dixon Steele, whom Bogart portrays so well in Nicholas Ray’s 1950 thriller In a Lonely Place. Join Mike and Dan for a conversation about a Bogart film they think deserves a wider audience and how it predicts what Martin

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21:15

The French Connection

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/08/21

How much will a viewer tolerate? What if you took away all the quick and easy ways in which movies dole out information? What if you made the hero less-than-wholly-admirable and the villain less-than-wholly-terrible? Would audiences still come along for the ride in that brown Le Mans with Popeye Doyle as he tries to catch the sniper who missed him? William Friedkin bet that they would--and won. Join us for a conversation about The French Connection, the classic 1971 police procedural. Topics include

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26:35

California Split

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/08/14

“Drifting” seems like a great word to describe many of Robert Altman’s films, especially California Split, his 1974 buddy film with Elliott Gould and George Segal as gamblers whose friendship is strengthened by their losses. But Mike argues that the film has a deep structure—and one based on a Disney film that we’ve all seen a hundred times. Elliott Gould’s special brand of cool, how gambling relies upon a combination of conviction and control, and the ways in which the film is as interested in

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34:22

Raging Bull

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/08/07

What is it like to experience emotions without being able to identify their sources? What happens when a person feels intense self-loathing but cannot articulate why—even as his star rises? Join Mike and Dan for an extended conversation about Raging Bull, Martin Scorsese’s 1980 masterpiece and a film that it took the guys three years of podcasting to get the nerve to tackle. Dan explains why Raging Bull is a film that Flannery O’Connor would have admired; Mike talks about what happens when the

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23:30

The Great Dictator

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/07/31

What’s the most edgy film you’ve ever seen—one that makes you uncomfortable and doesn’t tell you how to feel or react? We’d bet that it isn’t as close to the bleeding edge as Charlie Chaplin’s 1940 The Great Dictator, his first talkie and still highest-grossing film. Chaplin’s beloved Tramp fumbling with a soup spoon is one thing; his running from stormtroopers is quite another. Join Mike and Dan for a conversation about the issues raised in Chaplin’s greatest work as well as his bravery in making

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19:34

Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part One

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/07/24

Ethan Hunt’s mission in this seventh installment of the series might seem as challenging as Tom Cruise’s: to get people back in theaters for an almost three-hour movie that they know won’t be resolved at the end. But is there anything Tom Cruise can’t do? Mike and Dan react to Dead Reckoning Part One and how it fits in the chain of the Mission Impossible films. Along the way, they talk about how Tom Cruise is like Jackie Chan, why creating the character of Gabriel lets the filmmakers have an AI

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22:16

The Matrix

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/07/17

Do you possess ideas—or do ideas possess you? Is it better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a pig satisfied? Why is The Matrix so universally loved by people of all political, moral, and philosophical attitudes? Mike and Dan plug into The Matrix, the action thriller that surprised everyone who saw it in 1999 as well as first-time viewers today. What would have happened if James Cameron had directed it, how the film resembles the best installment of the Star Wars films, and how Keanu Reeves depicts

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19:17

Ball of Fire

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/07/10

When Mike casually remarked to Dan that he had just re-watched Ball of Fire, the 1941 Barbara Stanwyck / Gary Cooper screwball comedy co-written by Billy Wilder and directed by Howard Hawks, Dan replied that he had “always wanted to, but never gotten around to seeing it.” Mike made demands, Dan pressed play, and here’s their conversation about what it’s like when a friend takes one of your film recommendations and wholly enjoys it. They also talk about the ways in which dancing, slang, and falling

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25:50

Mulholland Drive

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/07/03

David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive (2001) is in the same neighborhood as Billy Wilder’s Sunset Blvd and asks us to think about similar ideas: the power of self-delusion, the seductive nature of fame, and what happens to a dead dream. Join Mike and Dan for a conversation about what they call “red arrow videos” on YouTube and what good directors know about their audiences. We all know that movies are illusions—but we keep falling for them anyway. So grab that blue key and give it a listen! Just watch out

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20:38

Stella Dallas

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/06/26

Stella Dallas, the star vehicle for Barbara Stanwyck, hinges on a thought experiment: if you knew that by pushing a button your child would be happy for the rest of her life—but the cost of this happiness was that you could never see her again—would you do it? Mike and Dan talk about King Vidor’s 1937 melodrama as an example of what movies do so well: getting viewers to understand why people make decisions that defy logic but which are emotionally reasonable. Mike calls Stella a character who

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22:47

Sunset Blvd

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/06/19

How would you handle years of adoration and fame? Do you think you’d still be, essentially, yourself but with a better car—or would you become a different person? Join Mike and Dan for a conversation about Sunset Blvd, Billy Wilder’s 1950 look at the movie industry, the drug of fame, and what happens when the public no longer buys what a star is selling. Norma Desmond may be a figure of fun—but she’s not wrong. Network, Some Like it Hot, and the biggest trial of 1995 all enter the discussion. So

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38:50

Heaven's Gate

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/06/12

After the success of The Deer Hunter in 1978, Michael Cimino wrote and directed Heaven’s Gate, the 1980 film that has been grouped with Ishtar and The Bonfire of the Vanities as an example of artistic self-indulgence that led to financial disaster. The film was universally panned and Cimino’s career never recovered. Since then, Criterion has released Michael Cimino’s Heaven’s Gate, which corrects the technical errors in the hurried theatrical release and restores the film to its full run time; the

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21:52

Elephant Man

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics ·

2023/06/05

George Orwell said, "By fifty, every man has the face he deserves." To what degree does David Lynch's The Elephant Man (1980) respond to the idea that our appearances define our moral selves? Join Mike and Dan for a conversation about the ways in which the story of John Merrick resonates in contemporary reality-TV and how Meririck is trapped in a series of performances. There's a sense that Lynch does to Merrick what the characters--good and bad--do to him in the film: does Lynch get to use Merrick

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311 results

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