Cinema of Cruelty (Movies for Masochists)

The Cultists are back! And in honor of The Resurrection, on this week’s annotated deep-dive, The Cutlists Present Ivan Reitman’s Ghostbusters (1984). A humble little film of grandiose origins (including a writer born into a family tree of generations of ghost hunters, a un-producable fever dream of a first draft, a 13 month time budget, and a die hard commitment to keeping the SNL and Second City comedy players as the B-plot to the film’s one true core purpose of introducing the doctrine of Spiritualism’s main tenants to the youth of the 1980s), Ghostbusters is one subtle but wild trip. 

Notoriously simultaneously a film about everything and nothing, the finished print of Ghostbusters has prevailed through the decades as a largely nostalgic comedy. So much so thusly remembered in the larger cultural zeitgeist that it can be all too easy to overlook just how deeply rooted nearly every line of the script is in esoteric references to over a century of real world Spiritualist practices and lore…

Deep-dives include:  The history of parapsychology; J.B. Rhine, Zener cards, the Milgram experiment, and other such ways to gaslight undergraduates in the name of quantitive research; Hittite vs. Sumerian myth (and where our lovable otherworldly gods of Gozer to Zul falls); Dan Akroyd’s real life family business of talking to ghosts; the plight of the EPA; Theosophy and the ethereal vs the etheric; Institutional Review Boards (and the film’s violations therein); Ivo Shandor Revival style cults and the occult appeal of selenium; the film’s myriad folklore references from the 1943 Philadelphia experiment to the Tunguska event; turn of the century cheese cloth regurgitation (or how you get ectoplasm); the film’s offhand references to trepanation, hypnotic dentistry, and menstrual psychosis; the special effects and the unapologetic cocaine-fueled frenzied genesis of everyone’s favorite childhood ghost; and how ultimately this film is, above all else, an esoteric love letter to a new turn of the century Spiritualism. 

Episode Safe Word: James Randi 

On this week's five-by-five bonus interlude, London and Benji each present 5 recommendations for films with a color in the title. 

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Baz Luhrmann’s 90s frenetic teen angst extravaganza, Romeo + Juliet (1996). Known for his kinetic color-fueled explosions of images and sound, Luhrmann's second offering in his “red curtain trilogy” put him on the film world’s map as an Auteur with a distinct and immediately recognizable style. Bright, brash, and unforgiving to anyone who prefers a more minimal Mise-en-scène, Luhrmann’s penchant for decadence was ripe for a world of high octane emotions, brawls, masquerades, and the lush arc of an epic demise. However Luhrmann’s vision of bringing the dusty pages of the oft produced Shakespearean play into the hearts and minds of the notoriously apathetic 90s teenage market was a rather unprecedented and hard sell for commercial studios at the time. Particularly when Luhrmann insisted that not only would he win over a teen audience, he would do it all without altering a single syllable of the original Shakespearean language of the play. And he would use a cast of mostly young people to do it. Luhrmann’s vision succeeded, jumpstarting a subsequent decade stuffed with Shakespearean film adaptations for teens, and yet, ‘R+J’ remains distinct among them all. A burning strange indefinable star that shall not be defied.

Deep dives include: The film’s production history, editing and cinematography; the lineage of the Romeo and Juliet literature cycle that lead to Shakespeare’s 1596 adaptation of the tale; the 1996 film’s comparisons with the exactly 400 years older play; the historical roots of the warring Guelph vs. Ghibelline factionalism that led to such constant civil brawls; how amazing it is that Romeo spends a full third of the play desperately and despondently in love with someone else; why the developing teenage mind lacks impulse control; and why even Dante personally hated the Montagues and Capulets enough to write them into his levels of Hell two centuries before Shakespeare was even born.

Episode Safe Word(s): “impulse control”

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Bernardo Bertolucci’s 'The Dreamers' (2003). Known for his “hot house” cinema, in which characters are crammed into isolated intimate spaces until they burst, Bertolucci returns again to offer up a claustrophobic yet sprawling visual love letter to his own memories of the French New wave —albeit through a lens of decadence, incest, and as many Jean Luc Godard references as one can still stuff into such an already compact space. Based on Gilbert Adair’s 1988 novel ‘The Holy Innocents’, which itself is an adaptation of Jean Cocteau’s 1929 novel ‘Les Enfants Terribles’ (The Holy Terrors), The Dreamers purposefully positions itself in a curious temporal space — one in which the continuous creative power of sex and cinema are the only realities worth living for. There’s also just a lot of twincest.

Topics include: Adair’s adaptation of Jean Cocteau for his own 1988 novel, as well as his tweaks when adapting his own work for The Dreamers screen play; The 1968 Parisian student riots; The French New Wave Movement; Auteur theory (and the cinema of Nicholas Ray); The incorporated collage of film references; Bertolucci’s seeming obsession with Jean Luc Godard; the protest-inspiring film archival and preservation efforts of Henri Langlois; the retrospective dark cloud Bertolucci’s past casts on the film today; and what esoteric reference this movie and Joel Schumacher’s 1997 ‘Batman and Robin’ have in common.

Episode Safeword: “vanilla”

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Cameron Crowe’s “indie” millennial LowFi-SciFi flick ‘Vanilla Sky’ (2001). The self described American “pop song” remake of the 1997 Spanish film, Open Your Eyes, VS was and remains a film of lukewarm division. Part of that reception has to do with early expectations. Made on a budget of 68 million, staring Tom Cruise, and marketed as a love story, the film that audiences got instead — an unapologetically unreliable plot of paranoia and bio-rapture dreams of immortality, where Cruise is either maimed or masked for 75% of the film — was not exactly what most watchers were anticipating. But when you check all those expectations, lay back, and let the film happen (depending on which of the many interpretations you subscribe to), the movie actually has some interesting things to say. Particularly when taken alongside the original as part of a larger, cyclical whole.

Episode topics include: the production and filming history; the musical inclinations of Cameron Crowe and/vs Nancy Wilson; comparisons to Amenabar’s original 1997 film, Abre Los Ojos; the subtle but blatant homages sprinkled throughout (from Kurt Russell mimicking Greggory Peck to Cruz and Cruise having distinctly French New Wave sex); the film’s original and alternative endings; the foundation of Alcor and the rise of bio-rapture philosophy; and why the most fun interpretation of this film boils down to a warning about the ways in which futurists might succeed in creating their own inescapable secular hell.

Episode Safeword: “awake”

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Bill Lustig’s controversial killer classic 'Maniac' (1980). Initially pitched as "Jaws but on land," Maniac tells the tale of Frank Zito, our man-about-town who can’t help but prowl the streets at night, scalping the women who remind him of dear old dead mom and thumbtacking his permed late-night winnings to stolen store front mannequins. And what’s more, we get to stay with him as he does it. Making the bold decision to focus entirely on our little maniac as the central protagonist, Maniac presents 90 minutes of the life of Frank. No Cops, no Campers, just Frank. And what a life it is.

A self-admitted homage to the great grind house horror flicks of Lustig’s youth, and coming out right on the first wave of a new generation of resurgent horror (with it’s first screening at Cannes even premiering the same weekend as the release of the first Friday the 13th), one would think the world would have been ready for this seedy gore fest of a lone man’s zany past time. But it wasn’t. Reviled by critics as nothing a “civilized” human could stomach, to this day there remains a camp of people who maintain that Maniac is a vile, misogynistic insult to human decency. The other camp, however, sees in its gritty celluloid frames nothing but a shinning gem of genre cinema—an under watched and under appreciated relic of something truly unique. But love it or loathe it, this film seeped into the horror cannon in a way that remains inarguably influential and important. (It’s also just a f*** ton of fun).

Topics Include: Maniac’s production history; Production notes and trivia gleaned from the multiple director commentaries; Tom Savini’s special effects; Kem-Tone film processing, F-stop pushing, and other technical reasons the film looks the way it does; The film’s pioneering of dolby stereo and hi/low frequency sounds; Comparing Frank’s passions, kills, and paraphilia to other real-life serial killers contemporary to the film’s release; and all (or at least many of) the laws and regulations this movie violated in the real world from start to finish during filming (from tricking SAG, to bribing off duty cops to distract subway attendants, to ditching a car filled with blood to disappear in Harlem); and the wonders yet unforgettable smell of rigid collodion...

On this week's annotated deep dive, The Cultists present 'Urban Legend' (1998). A classic tale of a disgruntled heartbroken serial killer who seeks vengeance by re-enacting even more classic tales of contemporary lore, UL is the kind of film that has a surprising amount of depth lurking beneath its colorful, campy surface. Taking inspiration from the foundational urban legend scholarship of Jan Harold Brunvard and stuffing references to a wide range of contemporary tale cycles into every turn, UL’s most lasting, yet oft forgotten, legacy is that it helped bring the term “Urban Legend” out of the pages of Brunvard’s collegiate books and into the mass culture of a vernacular teenage audience. That’s right, this is the kind of film that academics (re: folklorists) love, even if no one else will admit that they do too. (We will though).

Deep Dives include: the film’s production history; the subtle but stunning lighting and camerawork; the folklore sources and evolved cultural meanings of the multitude of the film’s referenced urban legend cycles (including the static enduring threats that lurk around and under your car, the ever-shifting concern of birth control pill swapping, the Victorian marriage rituals of Bloody Mary, and the 70s flash fear of the danger of BubbleYum and Pop Rocks, etc.); the foundational folklore scholarship of Brunvard, Dundes, and Degh; why if you decide to kill a bunch of people by re-enacting urban legends it’s called “ostension” ; and how even after all that, the strangest thing of all is that this film’s top billed cast member is pretty sure he was never in it.

Episode Safeword: "veracity" 

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present David Lynch’s ‘Dune’ (1984).  A  byproduct of nearly two decades of active studio efforts to bring to the big screen, the 1984 highly anticipated “picture event” of Frank Herbert’s 1965 sci-fi classic was for some disappointing, for others baffling, and for a select special few the kind of sleeping celluloid wonder just on the precipice of awakening into something great. But whether you love it, hate it, or are just left simply overwhelmingly confused by its tormented world of Baroque excess, Dune (1984) remains a spectacularly cruel film on its viewers. One that despite being almost nothing but exposition, requires a knowledge of a galaxy of prerequisite reading materials to understand.  So we read them.  

Deep dives include:  The production history of David Lynch’s Dune and the genealogy of the failed film attempts that came before; comparisons with Frank Herbert’s 1965 novel and the complexities created by opening the plot up to the rest of the often self-contradicting full book series; Frank Herbert’s extended world build (from the Holtzman Effect, to nerve induction machines, to the mutated spice-huffing, space-folding guild junkies); the cinematic dangers of working with ground glass; and why you shouldn’t ever trust a messiah, even if he can correctly put on a pair of pants.  

Episode Safeword: “subdued”

On this week's annotated deep dive, The Cultists present the Universal Studios Hollywood Horror Classic, 'Frankenstein' (1931).  Helmed by the great James Whale, this first installment of a legacy of undying gems tells the well-known tale of Dr. Victor (or in this case "Henry") Frankenstein and his "Creation" - a life composited from scrapped together pieces of other men.  A creature that begs the age old question: how many parts of a man does it take to make a monster?  Well, Let's find out. 

Deep Dives Include: The film's history and production; comparisons (and contrasts) to Mary Shelly's 1818 source novel; the mystery of Peggy Webling's 1927 stage play (upon which this film claims to be based); all those pointed homages to German expressionist classics (from the Metropolis laboratory, to Caligari's somnambulist window entry); the cinematic editions of life-granting electricity and "criminal brains"; the historical precedent for electrocuting corpses and marrying-off orphans; a slew of sequels; and why the Igor-you-know is neither a hunchback nor a lab assistant.     

Episode Safeword: "vitality"

This week on our annotated deep dive, The Cultists Present 'Tales from the Darkside - The Movie' (1990).  The year was 1983 when George Romero, inspired by the EC comics of the 1950s such as "The Vault" and "Tales from the Crypt", pitched a humble horror TV anthology that would harken back to the golden age of pulp fiction. Seven years, four seasons, and a major motion picture later, Tales has accrued its own fanbase throughout time, and yet this film remains relatively obscure considering its roster. With attached names like George Romero, Steven King, Donald Rubinstein, Christian Slater, Julianne Moore, Steve Buscemi, Mathew Lawrence, Debbie Harry (aka Blondie), David Johnson (aka "Buster Poindexter"), Michael McDowell (the dude who wrote Beetlejuice), and even Arthur Conan Doyle, this film is a zany time capsule of 20th century horror. From Debbie Harry's chipper and casual cannibalism, to Christian Slater's electric mummy carving mania, to cats on a vengeance spree from hell, "Tales" is above all else simply a whole lot of fun. 

Deep Dives include:  the production’s major players (from Romero, to Slater, to King); the film’s source materials, including: Arthur Conan Doyle’s "Lot 249," Steven King’s "Cat from Hell," Lafcadio Hearn's "Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things," and "Tales From the Darkside" (1983) (the TV show);  The British “Egyptomania” of the late 1800s; the origin of the monstrous mummy in Mummy fiction; the three kingdoms of Ancient Egypt and the process of mummification; Zuni fetishes and the semantic evolution of “Fetish/Fetishism”; the editing techniques of 1940s action-adventures; the glory of theatrical scrims; the Japanese folklore of ghostly ice women; the mathematics of cannibalism; and whether champagne is really what you want to pair with cooked children.

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Terrence Malick’s ‘Knight of Cups’ (2015). Often regarded as a particularly “tough watch” (even by those who enjoy the film), Cups is a slow and mangled feast of images that will delight some and utterly baffle others. Adding to the challenge is that grasping the more concrete structure of the film demands a familiarity with a rather eclectic back catalogue of source materials that range from a working knowledge of the tarot’s major arcana, to John Bunyan’s 17th century allegorical novel, a spattering of gnostic hymns, and the regret-fueled works of Kierkegaard. And all this to tell what is essentially the lead-up to the beginning of a story that we don't even get to see.  In other words, this film is incredibly cruel. But it’s also beautiful.

Deep Dive’s Include: The film’s production and the truly unique filming strategies of Terrence Malick; The adapted source material of The Pilgrim’s Progress and The Hymn of the Pearl; Gnosticism (or why everyone is stuck in the water when they really just want to get closer to the sky); The Knight of Cups and the film’s other Tarot chapter cards; existential angst and other Kierkegaardian philosophy; the statistical likelihood of an earthquake wiping out Los Angeles, and why, according to one of the film’s selected source materials, Christian Bale's "Rick" is the lesser, memory-addled and drugged-up twin brother of Jesus…. Maybe.

Episode safe word: “clarity”

On this week's annotated deep-dive, The Cultists present Catherine Hardwick's wondrously absurd adaptation of Twilight (2008). 

The tale of a self-loathing undead stalker who has been stuck repeating high school for one hundred years, and the clumsy death-welcoming teen of his dreams, Twilight is a wild trip.  Known as the phenomenon that brought a reinvigorated interest in teen paranormal romance to the masses, Hardwick's first and only adaptation circumvents any of the potential softer angles of the genre to instead create a masterpiece of the bizarre.  Three parts absurdism, two parts angst, and a healthy dash of the "imp of the perverse," this strange concoction of a film stands alone outside the rest of the subsequent franchise as something truly spectacular.  (That's right, we love this movie. And we aren't even joking). 

Deep Dives include: 

The film's history and production; the myriad of practical effects; filming locations, comparisons with the novel source material; the joy of teen angst; the aesthetic paradox of May-December romances; Native American lore (from New Brunswick sea serpents to (the lack of) Cold Ones); and why, as even Hardwick herself claims, we have the special tonal peculiarities of this film thanks to a little thing Edgar Allen Poe once called "The Imp of the Perverse." 

On this week's annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Panos Cosmatos's 'Mandy' (2018). The anticipated (mostly unrelated) follow-up to Cosmatos's first cult film, Beyond the Black Rainbow (2010), Mandy hit the scene marketed as a heavy metal, genre-bending, "cosmic opera" of the psyche. Set in a 1983 (that may or may not be *our* 1983), Mandy is still stuffed with references, homages, and abstract nostalgia. And yet, set as it is under a plasma-churning landscape of "crimson primordial skies," swimming in Jungian mysticism, and unleashing Nic Cage wielding a giant Manowar battle axe, somehow, despite relying on a spine constructed out of the bones of so many old troupes, Mandy remains otherworldly and fresh.  (Oh and it is FULL of annotations...). 

Deep Dives include: Douglas Roberts and that death row opening quote; The Jungian Red Book; Abraxas and his horn; Regan's "Spiritual Awakening" speech; the primordial lens of Galactus's comic origin story; the world of Dungeons and Dragons; Tor publishing; the (failed) singing career of Charles Manson; the pale emerald light of Heavy Metal's Loc-Nar (vs. the serpent's eye); that swimming mystic Joseph Campbell quote; the paradox of mysticism and psychosis; the myriad of 80's movie references; and that "Red" storm on Jupiter...

On this week's annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Kenneth Branagh's 'Murder on the Orient Express' (2017).  The technically ambitious 65 mm adaptation of Agatha Christie's murder mystery classic, MoOE tells the tale of the magnificently mustachioed Hercule Poirot -- the world's greatest detective (also known as the man who thinks and thus suffers). Yearning for a vacation, Poirot boards the famed Orient Express, the sparkling sleeper train that historically made its trek from Paris to Istanbul, and finds himself in an opulent flick of murder, mystery, mayhem, and downright astounding production design. Say what you will about Branagh's ability to cast himself as his own star and chew up a scene; from historical flourishes to insider Easter eggs, this movie is meticulous in it's details. (And we are all about the details...). 

Deep Dives include: the stunning beauty of 65 mm cinematography; the surprisingly practical set builds, next level rotoscoping with 3,000 screens; comparisons to Christie's 1934 novel; the SVU style "borrowing" of the Lindbergh baby kidnapping; the transnational-nationalism paradox of the belle epoch; the history, food, and legacy of the famed Orient Express; and how, overall, we have one of the most enduring and endearing forms of transportation all because a dude named Georges Lambert Casimir Nagelmackers once wanted to bang his cousin.  

On this week's annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Mel Stuart's 'Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory' (1971). Considered a flop during its initial release, ‘Wonka’ has grown overtime into a beloved classic of psychedelic sadomasochism of the childhood nostalgia variety.  Ostensibly the tale of a poor, starving child with nightly dreams of confectionary sweets, and an eccentric chocolatier who is primed to hand pick his heir through a very specific form of death-and-occasional-dismemberment natural selection, this movie is a trip. One that, in the words of Wonka himself, showcases how life must maintain that perfect balance of fear, anxiety, and whimsey to keep moving forward. (Even if that final destination is already pre-ordained by The Chocolate God himself).

Episode Deep Dives Include: The writing of Roald Dahl (from his childhood hits to his lesser known screenwriting creds in the James Bond franchise); comparison’s between Charlie and the Chocolate factory, the book, and Willy Wonka, the movie; All the literary quotes and references sprinkled throughout the script; The psychedelic movement in cinema (and whether ‘Wonka’ truly qualifies); and why this entire production was principally possible due to the capitalist-venturing sweet tooth of the Quaker Oats Company….

Episode Safeword: “free will”

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Roger Kumble’s iconic “teen” flick, 'Cruel Intentions' (1999). Based on the 18th century French novel, Dangerous Liaisons (1782), about a group of bored (and very adult) aristocratic power-players living in a morality-absent void of entitlement and sociopathic values, CI hit the late 1990s YA landscape in a way no other film within the genre had quite done before.  A hedonistic embrace of cold, sociopathic teenagers lavishly shot in cozy golden light, CI became a milestone of the revitalized Victorian child model, in which kids were simply seen as miniature adults—bodies to dress in adult attire and be shown off as reflections of their parents and their social class.   Showcasing themes of incest, entitlement, sexual manipulation, consent issues, blackmail, assault, and even federal cyber crimes in what is technically trafficking and distributing child pornography, CI left no softcore taboo out of the reach of its highschool cast of characters, a decision that culminated in perhaps the film’s most daring choice of all: to create and accept an R rating for a film about teenagers—a demographic who wasn’t even allowed to see it in theaters as a result.   (And yet see it they did). 

Deep Dive topics include: CI's production history and details; the multitude of filming locations; comparisons with the OG aristocratic French novel; insights from the director’s commentary; all of the CI direct-to-video sequels; and the glorious but forgotten 2016 reboot test pilot in which Katherine returns to try and get it on with her dead step brother’s son.   

Episode Safeword: “altruism”

On this week's Five-by-Five interlude, The Cultists present the top "Dark Night of the Soul" films, as London and Benji each offer up their respective Top 5 films that all take place over the course of a single night. 

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present John Guillermin’s ‘King Kong’ (1976). A remake of the classic RKO production from 1933, Kong ‘76 retains many of the high adventure staples popular in the pulpy 30s: the treacherous island, the perilous climb, and the classic meet cute of blonde bimbo pawn meets giant monkey during a casual ritual sacrifice.  But in all its surface similarities, this Kong makes some changes. With references to the porno chic movement, the OPEC oil embargo, primate astrology, real-time bicentennial fireworks, and a slew of full-formed facial hair, there is no doubt that this film was made in 1975. However, this movie is also another film produced by our Blue Velvet (1986) man, Dino De Laurentiis, and as such, Kong ’76 spared no costs in getting things done, becoming one of the most expensive films of its day, boasting a six second near 40 foot animatronic robot, lavish set builds, and the dream team effects efforts of Carlo Rambaldi and Rick Baker (who also happens to play what can only be described as the horniest primate in cinema). In short, although very few people would claim the 76 version as their favorite Kong, this film left its mark in movie history (and not just because it features a brand new-to-the-scene Jessica Lang playing a character named…Dwan).

In addition to our regular episodes, we are adding a new format into the mix! "Five-by-Five" eps will each be a Top Five list of films featuring different random topics, sub-genres, or objects. As we are often asked what our personal favorite episodes are, first up on the Five-by-Five front are each of our respective "top" favorite films/episodes we have done thus far and why.... 

For our one year anniversary episode, The Cultists present David Lynch’s ‘Blue Velvet’ (1986). The premise is simple enough: Jeffery (Kyle MacLachlan) returns home from college to his small 1950s-tinged nostalgia town, finds a severed, moldy ear in a field, and embarks upon a self-guided odyssey into the darker parts of the town’s worn-down crevices, only to find that his thirst to drink in the dark might be stronger than he’d like. The premise is simple, but the film that unravels from beneath its surface is anything but. Relying largely on sensory instincts and “day dream logic”, Blue Velvet presents a rather loose and tangled web of threads that people love to try and straighten, only to find that the harder one pulls, the quicker the strings curl into something new. Is this film an oedipal psychodrama? A coming of age story? A heartland conspiracy? Or is it simply a mystery about mystery? Well, lets find out.

Episode Safeword(s): “red pleather”

****THIS IS PART 2 OF A TWO-PART EPISODE***

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Stanley Kubrick’s final film 'Eyes Wide Shut' (1999).  An incredibly faithful adaptation of Arthur Schniztler’s 1926 Austrian novella, Traumnovelle (“Dream Story”),  (albeit set in a contemporary 1990s New York), Eyes Wide Shut remains a timeless dreamlike odyssey of paranoia, jealousy, (in)fidelity, occult desire, and institutional critique.   Infamous for both its status as the final offering of one of the most exacting and perfectionist director’s in cinema, as well as being the longest consecutive shoot in the history of film making; EWS was further plagued by conspiracies surrounding Kubrick’s death five days after the film’s completion and the alleged unveiled messages hidden in its frames.   Even without all it’s outside baggage, the film makes a lot of demands.  Stuffed with references and allusions from Ovid to Zarathustra, Eyes is a film that is incredibly complex considering the base premise is Tom Cruise goes on a two-part dark night(s) of the soul breakdown through the lusty cult-infested New York streets just because his wife once wanted to fuck a sailor.   In other words, this one is going to be a long one, but Kubrick makes it worth it.

Deep Dives Include: production history; comparisons with the film’s “Dream Story” (1926) novella source material ; the Gustav Klimt color pallet; the meaning behind those neon Eros/Thanatos street signs; secret societies and other occult inspirations (from the Freemasons, to the Illuminati, Hellfire clubs, and Alister Crowley); Ovid’s Art of Love; what it means to “reach the end of the rainbow”; and how the film’s seemingly abrupt and hollow end comes straight from Friedrich Nietzsche’s “Thus Spoke Zarathustra”....  (Bonus: We also watched the two other film adaptation’s of Schnitzler’s Dream Story that came before, and one in particular gets Crazy).

Episode Safeword(s): “the morning after”

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Stanley Kubrick’s final film 'Eyes Wide Shut' (1999).  An incredibly faithful adaptation of Arthur Schniztler’s 1926 Austrian novella, Traumnovelle (“Dream Story”),  (albeit set in a contemporary 1990s New York), Eyes Wide Shut remains a timeless dreamlike odyssey of paranoia, jealousy, (in)fidelity, occult desire, and institutional critique.   Infamous for both its status as the final offering of one of the most exacting and perfectionist director’s in cinema, as well as being the longest consecutive shoot in the history of film making; EWS was further plagued by conspiracies surrounding Kubrick’s death five days after the film’s completion and the alleged unveiled messages hidden in its frames.   Even without all it’s outside baggage, the film makes a lot of demands.  Stuffed with references and allusions from Ovid to Zarathustra, Eyes is a film that is incredibly complex considering the base premise is Tom Cruise goes on a two-part dark night(s) of the soul breakdown through the lusty cult-infested New York streets just because his wife once wanted to fuck a sailor.   In other words, this one is going to be a long one, but Kubrick makes it worth it.   

Deep Dives Include: production history; comparisons with the film’s “Dream Story” (1926) novella source material ; the Gustav Klimt color pallet; the meaning behind those neon Eros/Thanatos street signs; secret societies and other occult inspirations (from the Freemasons, to the Illuminati, Hellfire clubs, and Alister Crowley); Ovid’s Art of Love; what it means to “reach the end of the rainbow”; and how the film’s seemingly abrupt and hollow end comes straight from Friedrich Nietzsche’s “Thus Spoke Zarathustra”....  (Bonus: We also watched the two other film adaptation’s of Schnitzler’s Dream Story that came before, and one in particular gets Crazy).  

Episode Safeword(s): “the morning after”

The peculiar tale of a young Spiritualist medium listlessly going about her day job as a personal shopper for a Parisian model/actress while awaiting a sign from her recently departed twin, ‘Personal Shopper’ is an incredibly ambitious meditation on what it means to be alive in a contemporary haunted world. A languid ghost story interwoven through an erotically mundane day (plus a bonus sideline murder thrown into the background), “Personal Shopper” flirts with a full spectrum of different genres, while somehow avoiding falling into any of them by proverbial miles. Another polarizing film for audiences, PS is a challenging story-telling exercise, not only in its melding of different tones and devices, but also in its dedication to pull from and incorporate nearly two centuries of real-life history, philosophies, and perspectives from Spiritualist practice. From the bright abstract bursts of Hilma af Klint, to the lingering spirit guides of Swedenborg, and those double exposure apparitions, this film is overflowing with insider references—A working knowledge of which is fairly essential for truly appreciating the film for what it is: an exquisitely crafted insider love letter to a very specific outsider art.

Deep dive topics for this one include: the abstract art of Hilma af Klint ; the Fox Sisters, Emmanuel Swedenborg, Franz Mesmer, and other Spiritualist superstars; the rise of Spiritualism during the Second Awakening in the “burnt over districts”; Helena Blavatsky and her “High Masters” Theosophy; the double exposure ghost and its roots in early spirit photography; that old vomiting-the-cheese-cloth ectoplasm trick; Victor Hugo’s table tapping exploits on the Isle of Jersey; the importance of technology in the historical development of ghost-based beliefs, and why using your cell phone to send a text is really not all that different from talking to ghosts.

Episode Safeword(s): “out of reach”

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Steven Lisberger’s cult classic ‘TRON’ (1982). The story of a “scruffy” programmer (Jeff Bridges), who gets sucked into the glowing gridlocked world of The Computer, where avatars who remain devoted to their “users” are forced by the evil “master control program” to fight for their lives in gladiatorial combat, is, on the surface, your standard 80s action pitch—albeit with a shiny, future flair. And yet, what is often taken for granted is just how spectacular Tron’s physical production and lasting industry impact was. From filming in actual nuclear research facilities and utter black box voids, to employing old school stage magician styles of optical illusion, to pioneering the computer’s place in cinema at a time when no one else wanted to touch it, Tron stands alone as a remnant of a bizarre intersection of time and technique. A dazzling combination of practical lighting hacks, computer graphics, layered exposures, and backlit animation, no other film looks like Tron (and given how hard it was to make, it’s likely that nothing else ever will).

Deep Dives include: The “expert systems” revival and the thaw of the first AI winter; the Lawrence Livermore Lab locations; the benefits and drawbacks of shooting in 65mm; the trouble with lightcycles; the “neats” and “scruffies” of A.I. development; Dumont’s forgotten TV network namesake origin; and Alan’s ‘Day the Earth Stood Still’ (1951) not-so-hidden killer robot reference.

Episode Safeword(s): “off the grid”

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Agnieszka Smoczynska’s ‘The Lure’ (2015) (Córki Dancingu).  In an alternative 1980s outside of Warsaw, Poland, two mermaids, “Silver” and “Golden,” wash up onto the shore.  Soon taking up temporary refuge in a night club cabaret, the two sea-bound sisters do what any classic fairytale finned creature would do: perform nightly as singing mermaid flight attendant burlesque strippers, while trying to decide if people are for sex or for food.  Ostensibly a dark coming of age fairy tale set against a gorgeously mixed spread of glitter and grime, The Lure evades any specific genre classification, while taking all the best parts from several: the surrealism logic of fairytales; the metaphors of monstrosity; the glistening gore of body horror; the haunting pitch of minor key musicals; and the carnivorous carnage of romantic tragedy.  In other words, this film is weird, which is what makes it wonderful. 

Deep Dives for this one include:  The biographical basis for the mermaid sisters (from the singing duo, The Wronska Sisters, to the director’s own experiences growing up in the Polish nightlife scene); the Soviet influence on 80’s Polish Cinema;  the surprising influences of Polish cartoons and  David Cronenberg’s Crash (1995); general mermaid lore; the sex lives of dolphins; and how some of the film’s most raw and jagged parts actually come from Hans Christian Andersen’s 1837 original “Little Mermaid” tale.   

Episode Safeword: “pescatarian”

On this week’s deep dive, The Cultists present Eugene Kotlyarenko’s dark social media satire, ’Spree’ (2020). Loosely based on the 2014 Isla Vista spree killer, Elliot Rodgers, Spree twists the foundations of its tragic origins into something a little more universally tangible with Joe Keery’s “Kurt”—an Uber-style driver and aspiring internet streamer who will do anything to finally be seen, even if that entails racking up a body count for the views. Curiously opting for incorporating detailed reconstructions of Rodgers’ own real-life videos in the process; stunt casting a slew of known social media faces; compositing an impressive array of archivable camera feeds; and asking David Arquette to drop in “to recreate a cringe compilation of his life”—all in order to present the uneasy relationship between murder, mayhem, and fame—Spree is yet another polarizing film for audiences. One that above all else upholds the old McLuhan doctrine that, for better or worse, “the medium is the message.”

For this one, Benji dove deep into the Marshall McLuhan of it all (from message-bearing-mediums, hot and cold forms of media, the tetrad of media effects, and the new school of the hologram), while London went even deeper into the dark waters of 4chan to recover Elliot Rodgers’ videos, posts, and 140+ page manifesto to contextualize the oddly specific details of his life, death, and delusions that pop up throughout the film.

Episode Safeword: “lovable”

On this week’s deep dive, The Cultists Present Quentin Dupieux’s  ‘Rubber’ (2010). Notoriously known as that movie where a tire gains psychokinetic powers and just enough sentience to go on a killing spree, this film often gets tragically mis-labeled as your standard B-rated monster movie horror romp. And yet, Rubber is anything but.  Once and best described as ‘Samuel Beckett by way of Roger Corman,’ from surface to core, "Rubber" is a modern staple of absurdist theater lovingly transposed to celluloid. Pulling from classical absurdist plays like Eugene Ionesco’s The Chairs; enacting human-pawn replicas of the weirder particulate behaviorisms of quantum mechanics; and weighing in on the old Aristotle debate on the proper use of The Chorus in Attic dramas, Rubber is A LOT of things. (And all of those things are pretty damn spectacular).

Deep dives for this one include: Albert Camus, Martin Esslin, and The Theater of the Absurd; Absurdism vs. Surrealism; psychokinesis vs. telekinesis; the music of “Mr. Oizo”; The August Schlegel vs. Aristotle approach to interpreting the function of the Greek Chorus; Eugene Ionesco’s use of chairs; Tom Stoppard’s use of the invisible conceit of the actor-audience bond, and, of course, quantum mechanics.   

Episode Safe Word: “rationality”

This week, The Cultists present Craig Denny's The Astrologer (1976). In 1976 a man named Craig Denny completed a very special film.  A film of significant grand importance to, well, only Craig Denny, really.  Essentially your standard vanity project to showcase Denny’s range of “skills,” The Astrologer tells the abridged tale of the alleged autobiography of Denny’s life as a conman, psychic, astrologer, business tycoon, jewel thief, and all around international man of star-blessed leisure.  Once lost, but later found, restored, and uploaded to the internet a full 40 years after its completion, The Astrologer remains a testament to the enduring prevailing mystery of how some films—through a single surviving release print and a twist of “fate”—manage to cling to life, and how some of the greatest mysteries of all, no matter how mundane, still remain frustratingly unsolvable.   

Episode Safeword: “skepticism”

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Tom Ford’s ‘Nocturnal Animals’ (2016).  The sophomore film by fashion industry icon Tom Ford, on its surface, “Nocturnal” is a gorgeous technical showcase of Ford’s skills behind the camera.  Which is why it comes as much more of a surprise that, for a film so beautiful, the core of Nocturnal Animals is all about the ugly underbelly of humanity and the savage destructive process of creation.  Adapted from the 1993 novel “Tony and Susan” by Austin Wright, Nocturnal is essentially three stories in one that, when woven together, explore the boundaries of life, art, and the odd liminal overlap that inevitably bleeds between the pages. A space that if sharpened just right can ensnare and gut everything in its wake. 

Topics include: comparisons between Ford’s film and Wright’s novel. Tom Ford’s fashion vs. film career; the not-so-hidden objects and symbols that tie the multiple stories within the film together; the art of “Texas justice” vs. postmodern revenge; and that amazingly esoteric, blink-and-you’ll-miss -it Prada, Marfa reference.   

Episode Safeword: “Romanticism” (capital R)

On this week’s annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Richard Kelly’s sleeper cult epic, 'Southland Tales' (2006). In 2006, the writer and director of 'Donnie Darko' (2001), Richard Kelly, released a very special film into a world that was simply not yet ready for it.  Sprawling in scope but jam packed with content, “Southland” is an anti-linear mosaic of fervent energy, ineffable tones and bursts of mid range colors, all presenting the pieces of an encroaching apocalyptic puzzle whose full picture will likely never be fully completed.  But that doesn’t mean it isn’t fun to try and assemble it anyway.  Requiring a prerequisite reading list of a multi-volume set of prequels, a handful of Modernist poetry, and The Book of Revelations—plus a viewing mandate of both the film’s original and theatrical cuts alongside Kelly’s own supplemental commentaries—this film might be our cruelest one yet. (And that’s pretty great).  

Deep Dives include: The Cannes Cut vs. the theatrical release; breaking down “the doomsday interface”; the huge cast of characters’ prequel backstories; the bleaker critical readings of Robert Frost’s poetry; the inverted apocalyptic end of T.S. Eliot’s the Hollow Men; The Power screenplay(s); if the New York Times really said that god was dead;  the dual endings provided by Southland’s use of 'Kiss Me Deadly' (1955); and how what Southland ultimately borrows from the book of Revelations, more than anything else, is actually its narrative structure.    

Episode Safeword(s): “Linear Plot Structure”

On this week’s deep dive, The Cultists present Excess Baggage (1997).  An utterly perplexing and largely forgotten film, “Excess” tells the tale of a young sociopath with a penchant for pyromania whose impulsive plan to fake kidnap herself sets off a chain reaction of inconsequential events that will culminate in a sexual rendezvous with a mumbling high luxury thief in a car trunk.  Sporting an eclectic cast of Alicia Silverstone, Benicio Del Toro, Harry Connick Jr and Christopher Walken (and peppered with THE SAME Dave Mathews Band song throughout to tell us that this is technically supposed to be a Rom-Com), this film remains a tonal oddity—One that would have faded into total obscurity if it wasn’t for the fact that it’s initial production contract set off its own curious chain reaction of events that would forever set the bar for industry salary inflation...   

Episode Safe Word(s): “market value”

This week The Cultists present the Daniels’ bizarre and beautiful film Swiss Army Man (2016).   On the surface a WTF film about a lost man and a flatulent corpse, at its depths ‘Swiss’ is an introspective visual poem about life, love, and the devastating emptiness of loneliness and isolation.  Yet again an indie flick that is completely divisive among audiences, the one thing that can be said of this bizarre celluloid treasure is that no other film is quite this gross and yet this beautiful.  For this one, London and Benji enlist fellow caster Robby (of the K-Bae cast) to talk about the musical score (and why it’s the most essential guide in how to interpret the film’s existential musings on loveless isolation), while London finally gets to talk about corpses and the preliminary stages of body decomposition.  (Oh, and did we mention that this film is technically a romantic comedy...?)   

Episode Safeword: “vitality”

On this this week’s deep dive, The Cultists Present Hercules in New York (1969). Known largely as the film that starred a 22 year-old Arnold Schwarzenegger in his first ever film appearance, "Hercules" is everything it promises to be: A film in which the demi-god son of Zeus, Hercules, well...goes to New York.   In prep for this one, Benji does the figurative heavy lifting by researching body building competitions and competitive gym lingo, while London brings in all the salacious details from the murderous, incestuous, vengeance-fueled Herculean myth cycles that the film (kind of) draws from.   

Episode Safeword: “fallible”

On this week’s deep dive, The Cultists present The Blair Witch Project (1999).  Marketed upon its release as a true story of real footage showcasing a group of lost filmmakers and their grisly demise, "Blair" quickly became a proto-viral obsession. And what started out as a simple, unassuming experiment in film-making-on-a-budget, quickly turned into one of the most profitable movies in the history of independent cinema.   But what is it about this “found footage” film that makes it so unique?   Is sending three fresh-faced actors into the Maryland woods armed with nothing but old protein bars, High 8 video cams, and a plucky attitude really all it takes to make a film? And just how well does this film hold up two full decades later? London and Benji head back into the forest to find out.  (In prep for this one, London waded through all the film's commentaries, interviews, and old press releases to find out exactly how this film got made—from the creation of the Blair Witch's folklore origins to actually starving and sleep-depriving the film's actors into a "true fear" response—while Benji finally gets to feel like his cache of knowledge of 90s filming equipment matters. (He also watched the sequels)). 

Episode Safeword: "steadicam"

On this week’s deep dive, The Cultists Present Harmony Korine's controversial cult flick ‘Spring Breakers’ (2012).  Booze, bikinis, pissing in the streets, temporal existentialism, Disney-girls-gone-wild, flirtation with French New Wave, Brechtian theater... this movie has a little bit of everything.  The one thing this film doesn’t have is an audience consensus on what to do with it.  Is this film—once described as a 'a sleaze-fest akin to Michael Mann on mescaline'—good? Bad? A shallow exploitation film? A masterpiece of cultural critique?  A tasteless ultra-violent beach noir? Or a deeply emotion-driven love story about the purest kinds of love?   The answer, it seems, is, “yes.” 

 Episode Safeword: “moderation”

On this week’s deep dive, The Cultists Present The Blob (1958).  It came from outer space— a red gelatinous goo of surprisingly hardy structural integrity with one thing on its mind: slow, meticulous, all-consuming hunger-based homicide.  Starring an already very adult-looking Steve McQueen playing the haggard but charming 17-year-old boy who cried extraterrestrial wolf, this plucky little flick tells the chilling tale of celluloid’s most enduring (and endearing) glob.  In prep for this one, London and Benji travel back to the early years of a very Cold War to excavate the surprising evangelical origins of the film’s production crew; the folklore of “Star Jelly”; and why the 1950s were already talking about those melting polar ice caps...  

Episode Safe Word(s): “climate change”

On this week's deep dive, The Cultists Present Walter Murch’s Return to Oz (1985). The first and only directorial endeavor by the man who literally wrote The Book on film editing, Murch’s follow up “sequel” to the 1939 MGM classic, The Wizard of Oz, is a sequel like no other.  Produced four decades after its predecessor, and taking the stance that Oz is now a desolate horror show of a crumbled city whose citizens have all been beheaded and turned to stone, “Return” is as bleak as it is bizarre. Throw in a dash of electroshock therapy, screaming heads, and nihilist skeletal pumpkin puppets, and this was one film that many an 80s child would never quite forget.  In prep for this one, London set forth on a deep dive journey through the history of electroshock therapy; horror studies of The Uncanny; and the brief but glorious dark Disney period of The Ron Miller Reign, while Benji once again read the novel source material—two books that seemed to have been put through a very odd blender to spit out this particular plot.  

Episode Safeword: “sanity”

This week The Cultists Present Michael Lehmann’s ‘Heathers’ (1989). On the surface, Heathers seems like just another flick about mean girls in high school, but lurking not even all that deeply under the film’s pastel veneer is a downright savage satire of the teen experience. Initially written by a young Daniel Waters as a three hour long film in the hopes of baiting Stanley Kubrick, Waters’ script does what only the aspirations of a fervently fresh writer with a slight sense of ego can. Packed with unexpected references from Hitchcock to Hollywood horror to Sherwood Anderson’s ‘Winesburg, Ohio’ —and heavily reliant on the metaphors of nine-wicket croquet—Heathers is a lot more than it seems.  

Deep dives include: the films “myriad” of source materials and references; “cutthroat” croquet; all the Kubrick-bait; the trouble with finding sponsors for your teen suicide-homicide movie; script excerpts from the original ending(s); and why Heathers remains a revelation of irreverence.   

Episode Safeword(s): “school spirit”

This week, The Cultists Present Dominic Sena’s ‘Swordfish’ (2001). A film that on its surface is just another Hollywood bank job flick about cyber hacking and hostages, Swordfish still manages to stick out among the cache of big budget action films. But why? Is it the film’s notorious green and orange color pallet? Its heavy-handed hypocrisy? John Travolta’s mind-boggling facial hair? Hugh Jackman’s strangely earnest cyber hacking “dance”? Or is it simply the fact that the film remains above all else an accidental magnum opus of pretension? London and Benji set forth to find out.  

Episode Safeword: “lowbrow”

This week The Cultists Present Nicolas Roeg’s ‘Don’t Look Now’ (1973). Heralded for decades as the inspiration for countless filmmakers that have come after, Don’t Look Now is a staple of nearly every seasoned director’s “Must See” list, and has inspired an almost baffling array of homages, from Schindler’s List to Pretty Little Liars.  London and Benji once again take the slow scenic route, this time through the haunted waterways of a wintery Venice, to discuss the film’s foreshadowing motifs; groundbreaking non-linear editing; that background serial killer subplot; and why a possible explanation for one of cinema’s most shocking and baffling endings might reside in an urban legend from Detroit, Michigan.

Episode Safeword: “hindsight”

Craig Schwartz is a puppeteer with a problem. He remains dedicated to The Craft, but the cold cruel world only cares about the gimmicky hacks that think that size matters. His only choice is to endure until one day he finds the key: a portal hidden behind the filing cabinets of his tedious day job, which directly allows him to slid into the cranial cavity of actor John Malkovich like a human meat suit. And that's only really the beginning of the movie... 

This feature debut from both director Spike Jones and screenwriter Charlie Kauffman still hits all the cruel, bizarre beats that the duo would become known for.  An exploration of the “problem of personal identity” and the salience of “The Self,” this film is at once a deep meditation on long-standing philosophical quandaries and a veritable quagmire of a plot.  It’s also just gloriously weird.  

Topics Include: how this got made; the visible lack of fill-lighting; the real John Malkovich’s thoughts on the film; the specter of Anton Chekhov over Kauffman’s writing; all those weird insider quote references; the continuity-consciousness theories of John Locke; and the original Charlie Kauffman script (including the full breakdown of the notorious original un-filmed ending’s truly insane twists.)   

Episode Safeword(s): “free will”

Meet Jesse. She can’t read, she can’t write, and she delusionally wishes the moon would just look at her already, BUT she’s pretty. And, well, that’s all that matters, really.  From the neon-fueled mind that brought us the likes of ‘Drive’ and ‘Only God Forgives,’ Nicolas Winding Refn’s ‘Demon’ takes us on an alternate, but no less perilous and candy-lit route through the stucco jungle of Los Angels’ fashion underworld, resulting in a dark macabre fairy tale about the most dangerous kind of girl.  With extremely mixed reviews from both critics and casual watchers alike, the ultimate consensus is that this film is not for everyone.  The celebratory themes of narcissism were hard for many to swallow, while the plot, although linear, relies heavily on abstract narration, esoteric symbols, and source materials that range from Greco-Roman Mythology to quasi-historical vampires. . .   In other words, this film makes you work for it. (And it’s worth it).   London and Benji deep dive in and break it all down, from cinematography to symbolism, to ultimately get at the heart of why those who are drawn to this film remain utterly enchanted by its synthetic and savage beauty.  

Episode Safeword: “altruism”

On this week's annotated deep dive, The Cultists present Rob Cohen's The Fast and the Furious (2001).  This unassuming summer flick, filmed on a shockingly modest budget of only 40 million in the early days of 2001, was never supposed to be anything other than a one-off— a “lifestyle movie” examining the intimate network of the LA Street Racing scene with a bit of petty larceny thrown in. With a title borrowed from Roger Corman to evoke the heyday of 1950s teen drive-in exploitation, and packed with homage action recreations of 1930s Westerns, no one anticipated that such an effort would grow into one of the longest and highest grossing international franchises in history, turning from a love letter of the local quarter mile into Mission Impossible with high luxury imports. Where the Fast series will go is fun, but really stopping to appreciate its origins is better.  The Cultists do just that, examining where it all began and how this first film, if one slows down enough to really appreciate the scenic details, is an unexpectedly unique and earnest gem of incredible technical skill.   

Deep dives include: how this got made; breakdown of the digital effects, editing; camera work and composites; those real-life street racing extras; the “borrowed” action homages (from Stagecoach to Bullet); filming locations and the home base allure of Echo Park; That House that confusingly has nothing to do with Eddie Fisher or Elizabeth Taylor; and the history and uses of the lifeblood that is NOS.  

 Episode Safeword: “slow”

This week The Cultists Present Robert Longo's Johnny Mnemonic (1995). The year is 2021. A mysterious virus has swept through the globe and one man holds the cure. The catch? That cure is embedded in the 160 GB neural cortex implant now seeping data all over his brain. It will kill him. Or, at least, it would, if that man wasn’t one Keanu Reeves.  With a screenplay by cyberpunk founding father, William Gibson, Johnny Mnemonic was meant to herald in the gritty underground subgenre of consul jockeys and biohackers into the mainstream. It was an 80s fanboy dream, one anticipated by many, and one that ultimately failed. Utterly. (The Cultists set for to try and figure out why.)  

Deep Dives include: Robert Longo’s fine art series “Men in The Cities”; William Gibson and the origins of Cyberpunk; Comparisons of the film vs. Gibson’s short story; comparisons of the American film edit vs the Japanese cut;  and the real world history/context of that military weaponized dolphin...  

Episode Safeword: “offline”

This week The Cultists Present Walter Hill’s ‘Streets of Fire’ (1984).  Following the success of '48 Hours' in 1982, Hill and co. were given carte blanche by Universal to do whatever their hearts desired. Hill’s greatest wish? A Rock and Roll fable set in an unknown time and place. A world filed with motorcycle chases, rockstars, gang wars, neon lit diners, and wet hardboiled streets—and all shot in the pure cinema “extreme realism” style that had become synonymous among industry insiders and film critics alike with the name “Walter Hill.” Enter: Streets of Fire.  A commercial failure in an otherwise high note career, this film is not exactly Hill’s finest, but it is Hill at his most free.   

Deep Dives include: Walter Hill’s “haiku” screenwriting style vs. his “extreme realism” directing; How this got made; the essential role of Lazlo's cinematography ; the original (and unnecessary) voiceover narration;  and why neither of us would watch the sequel. (Yes, there is a sequel...). 

Episode Safeword: “verbose”

This week, The Cultists Present Stephen Herek's Critters (1986). Once upon a strange and otherworldly time—otherwise known as 1986—the cinematic landscape gave us a gift. Sporting the tag line “hangry hairballs from outer space,” the titular Critters have only two goals: fuck shit up and then eat it.   Brought to us by the fever dream team who would later go on to create the likes of ‘Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure,’ ‘Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead,’ and ‘The Ginger Dead Man,’ this movie is just pure filmed fun. A joyful romp wrapped in the grinning maws of mischievous alien muppets that somehow oddly manages to be both behind and a head of its time.  

Topics include: the Chiodo Brothers' EFX work; all those packed in 80s references; creating the (not so) alien language of the Crites; and ALL OF THE SEQUALS in the 30 year and counting franchise.   

Episode Safeword: “satiated”

This week The Cultists Present David Cronenberg‘s  A Dangerous Method (2011). A not-so-intimate insider film about the foundational years of psychoanalysis and the Will They/Won’t They smoldering friendships of Carl Jung,  Sabina Spielrein, and Sigmund Freud, A Dangerous Method is all about its source materials. From reproducing the personal letters of Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud’s private correspondences during their whirlwind friendship to replicating the leitmotifs from Wagner’s Ring Cycle in the score, this film does its homework, but it also expects that its audience has as well—A brash choice which may not have been the best one...  

(*Featuring special guest and practicing clinical psychologist, Dr. V)

Episode Safeword: "hindsight" 

 This week The Cultists Present Peter Greenaway’s The Pillow Book (1996). This film was marketed as your standard mid-90s soft-core erotic tale, and yet, in typical Greenaway form, there is nothing standard about it. A deeply insider film about calligraphy fetishism, formalist objectification, and 10th century Japanese literary references—all culminating in a climax of Ewan McGregor getting turned into a literal book because his skin is an art that’s just too pretty to let go— The Pillow Book unfolds in a manner that is singular to itself.  A film that despite it’s bizarre premise and turns, remains indeed surprisingly hot.   

Deep dives include: film formalism; The 10th century Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon; the hemisphere cognition of sound processing; and how (not) to make a book out of human skin.   

Episode Safeword: “vanilla”

This week, The Cultists Present, John Waters’ Cry-Baby (1990).  Inarguably the most mainstream and accessible of Waters’ oeuvre, Cry-Baby’s technicolor array of costumes, camp performances, and impeccably mixed sound still bears all the markings of John Waters’ loveably perverse and whacky soul. In a charming parody tale of 1950s cinema nostalgia, Cry Baby Walker—the matchstick chewing, leather clad “Drape” who can only ever cry that one lonely tear drop—has met a girl. The only hurdle between their atomic-defying love? Dead, homicidal parents; jealous, sociopathic and marriage obsessed boyfriends; and a long stint in Juvie.   Oh, and she’s also a square.  

Deep Dives Include:  Waters’ personal childhood influences on the film; the immeasurable importance of Bob Mizer’s photography; that jaw-dropping eclectic cast (from Traci Lords to Joe Dallesandro, to Iggy Pop to Patty Hearst); and the 1950s film homages that pop up throughout.)  

Episode Safeword: “mass-appeal”

This week The Cultists Present Werner Herzog’s Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (2009). Technically (kind of, maybe) a remake/sequel/spin-off of Abel Ferrara’s 1992 film Bad Lieutenant, Herzog’s film remakes someone else’s the only way Herzog can: by openly never having heard of Ferrara’s film, nor caring.  Instead, with a screenplay written by the man who brought the world the glorious television musical madness of “Cop Rock,” front-lined by the "Neo-Shamantic" master of polarizing accessibility, and helmed by a man who self-admittedly has no interest in the genre of crime films, Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call-New Orleans, is a crime film like no other. So sit back and munch on some prescription opioids as we head down south for a film that to some is a confusion of celluloid, to others a dark comedic masterpiece of satire, but above all else, a love letter to iguanas.   

Episode Safeword: “mammals”