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PODCAST

Flicks with The Film Snob

Flicks with The Film Snob features a weekly film review focused on new independent releases and old classics. Chris Dashiell knows film, and he knows enough to know what’s worth watching and why. Produced in Tucson Arizona at KXCI Community Radio.

tv & film visual arts

All Episodes

00:03:30

Only the River Flows

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/11/26

“Self-aware cinema” is a nickname, that I just made up, to describe a kind of film that uses its style, genre, and characters to symbolize meanings that go beyond and even subvert the movie’s linear narrative. Well, that definition proves how hard it is to speak clearly about this kind of film. The idea isn’t new, but now it’s become sharper and more prevalent. An interesting recent example is Only the River Flows, from Chinese director Wei Shujun. The

00:03:30

The Ghost and Mrs. Muir

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/11/18

Somebody asked me recently if I had a “comfort film.” I’d never heard that phrase before. You might even think I would reject the concept, since my customary angle as a critic is to highlight challenging films that might even cause discomfort sometimes. But movies can play many roles in our lives, and I realized that comfort can be one of them. My answer, the first that came to mind, is The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, from 1947, directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz

00:03:30

The Ghost and Mrs. Muir

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/11/18

This 1947 film about a woman who moves into a house that is haunted by the ghost of a sea captain is a tender understated beauty. Somebody asked me recently if I had a “comfort film.” I’d never heard that phrase before. You might even think I would reject the concept, since my customary angle as a critic is to highlight challenging films that might even cause discomfort sometimes. But movies can play many roles in our lives, and I realized that comfort

00:03:24

Frankenstein

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/11/10

Guillermo del Toro’s epic reimagining of the Mary Shelley novel is a marvel of Gothic style. It was inevitable that Guillermo del Toro, with his love of fantasy, monsters, and everything Gothic, would create a version of Mary Shelley’s great novel Frankenstein. So of course he has, in a style of giant painterly excess that storms the heights of melodrama. What I’m saying is: it’s a thing of beauty. Del Toro is a director in the mold of classic Hollywood

00:03:24

Frankenstein

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/11/10

It was inevitable that Guillermo del Toro, with his love of fantasy, monsters, and everything Gothic, would create a version of Mary Shelley’s great novel Frankenstein. So of course he has, in a style of giant painterly excess that storms the heights of melodrama. What I’m saying is: it’s a thing of beauty. Del Toro is a director in the mold of classic Hollywood in its epic moods. He loves sets, props, costumes, and the craft of art direction. The film’s

00:03:31

Vermiglio

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/11/04

The life of a family in the Italian Alps in 1944 is profoundly affected by the presence of a Sicilian deserter. Vermiglio, a new film by Italian director Maura Delpero, takes place in the village of the title, located in the Italian Alps near the Swiss border. The time is the winter of 1944, the last year of the Second World War in Italy. We meet a large family scraping out a living in this harsh environment. The father, played by Tomasso Ragno, is the

00:03:31

Vermiglio

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/11/04

Vermiglio, a new film by Italian director Maura Delpero, takes place in the village of the title, located in the Italian Alps near the Swiss border. The time is the winter of 1944, the last year of the Second World War in Italy. We meet a large family scraping out a living in this harsh environment. The father, played by Tomasso Ragno, is the village schoolteacher, with his own children among the students, offering basic literacy and other primary school

00:03:29

Orwell: 2+2=5

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/10/28

Raoul Peck’s documentary explores the life and thought of George Orwell, and how his political insights are relevant today. Haitian filmmaker Raoul Peck has been a prominent creator of radical cinema for four decades. Most probably know him best as the director of I Am Not Your Negro, a 2016 documentary using the words of James Baldwin to describe structural racism in the U.S., which got an Oscar nomination. His latest is called Orwell: 2+2=5. It’s about

00:03:29

Orwell: 2+2=5

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/10/28

Haitian filmmaker Raoul Peck has been a prominent creator of radical cinema for four decades. Most probably know him best as the director of I Am Not Your Negro, a 2016 documentary using the words of James Baldwin to describe structural racism in the U.S., which got an Oscar nomination. His latest is called Orwell: 2+2=5. It’s about the work of the English novelist, journalist, and social commentator George Orwell, particularly his writings about politics

00:03:20

The House of Mirth

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/10/21

The English filmmaker Terence Davies died two years ago at the age of 78. He’s a director I always admired, and an artist that I think has gone underappreciated by general audiences. One of the films I wish more people knew about is his adaptation, from 2000, of Edith Wharton’s great novel The House of Mirth. Rather than using the material as a vehicle for his own concerns, or creating “entertainment” through the distancing effect of dramatic spectacle,

00:03:20

The House of Mirth

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/10/21

Terence Davies adapts Edith Wharton’s novel about the price of trying to fit in to wealthy New York society in the early 20th century. The English filmmaker Terence Davies died two years ago at the age of 78. He’s a director I always admired, and an artist that I think has gone underappreciated by general audiences. One of the films I wish more people knew about is his adaptation, from 2000, of Edith Wharton’s great novel The House of Mirth. Rather than

00:03:23

One Battle After Another

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/10/15

An aging former revolutionary must try to save his daughter from a racist colonel, in a satiric action film about the current American predicament. We’re living in a time when the news is stranger than fiction. What should filmmakers do in such times? Paul Thomas Anderson, one of our best film directors, has chosen to face this moment by combining the action film with satire. The result is his latest movie, One Battle After Another. In a sort of alternate

00:03:23

One Battle After Another

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/10/15

We’re living in a time when the news is stranger than fiction. What should filmmakers do in such times? Paul Thomas Anderson, one of our best film directors, has chosen to face this moment by combining the action film with satire. The result is his latest movie, One Battle After Another. In a sort of alternate version of recent history, a revolutionary group called “The French 75” breaks into an immigrant detention camp, freeing all the prisoners. One of

00:03:09

The Long Walk

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/10/07

Stephen King, America’s most popular fiction writer, is an expert at writing books and stories that get adapted into films, the majority of which are horror. King’s excellence at horror I attribute, at least in part, to his frank recognition of evil as a powerful force in society. Evil in his books is something we participate in, whether we want to or not. The latest King adaptation is called The Long Walk, directed by Francis Lawrence and adapted by JT

00:03:09

The Long Walk

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/10/07

Young men compete in a punishing walking race for which there can only be one survivor, in an adaptation of a Stephen King allegory about male-dominated society. Stephen King, America’s most popular fiction writer, is an expert at writing books and stories that get adapted into films, the majority of which are horror. King’s excellence at horror I attribute, at least in part, to his frank recognition of evil as a powerful force in society. Evil in his

00:03:36

Taipei Story

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/09/29

Edward Yang’s second feature, about a couple in crisis because of their different responses to changing conditions in Taipei, was a breakthrough for Taiwanese cinema. Taiwanese director Edward Yang showed a willingness to take risks in his short films, and in his first feature, That Day on the Beach, from 1983. Two years later, in 1985, he released Taipei Story, putting all his money into the project. It failed at the box office, while getting some

00:03:36

Taipei Story

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/09/29

Taiwanese director Edward Yang showed a willingness to take risks in his short films, and in his first feature, That Day on the Beach, from 1983. Two years later, in 1985, he released Taipei Story, putting all his money into the project. It failed at the box office, while getting some recognition at international film festivals. Despite its less than spectacular showing, it marked the beginning of a new era in Taiwanese film. Up until then, movies in

00:03:19

About Dry Grasses

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/09/22

A teacher at a rural middle school in Turkey is unjustly accused of impropriety by a girl student, but this crisis confronts him with his own lack of awareness. Over the past thirty years, Turkish filmmaker Nuri Bilge Ceylan has been gaining stature as one of the world’s best living directors. His style features long takes, wide shots, and minimal camera movement. Lately, though, he’s been making what I would simply call “philosophical” films that examine

00:03:19

About Dry Grasses

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/09/22

Over the past thirty years, Turkish filmmaker Nuri Bilge Ceylan has been gaining stature as one of the world’s best living directors. His style features long takes, wide shots, and minimal camera movement. Lately, though, he’s been making what I would simply call “philosophical” films that examine human nature and culture, moral responsibility, the individual versus the mass, and the doubts and inner struggles that human beings always go through. Ceylan

00:03:34

Earth Mama

Flicks with The Film Snob ·

2025/09/15

Earth Mama, from first-time filmmaker Savanah Leaf, tells the story of a young Black pregnant single mother in Oakland named Gia, and played by Tia Nomore. Successfully avoiding tiresome exposition, Leaf introduces us immediately into Gia’s world. First we witness her answering questions at an office in Child Protective Services. Her two children, a boy and a girl, were taken into foster care when the office was alerted to Gia’s drug use. She’s been

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