Our Acteur Spotlight kicks off with six movies starring Delphine Seyrig, beginning this episode with Alain Resnais' Muriel (1963) and Marguerite Duras' debut as a feature film director, La Musica (1967) (co-directed with Paul Seban). We find that these two films about former couples discussing, debating, and negotiating how to live with their past make a good pairing for their existential contrasts as well as their thematic and structural similarities. And in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, a New Year's Eve viewing of Trading Places (1983), the Eddie Murphy/Dan Aykroyd comedy, is a reminder of a time when unabashed criticism of capitalism and white supremacy was the concern of mainstream Hollywood (coinciding with maybe the all-time historical nadir of representation of women in film); and two more Mikio Naruse films, Lightning (1952) and A Wanderer's Notebook (1962), both starring the versatile Hideko Takamine and based on works by Fumiko Hayashi, give the hopeful and despairing sides of the search for meaning in the midst of economic hardship and disappointing relationships.

Time Codes:

0h 00m 25s: MURIEL (1963) [dir. Alain Resnais]

0h 34m 08s: LA MUSICA (1967) [dir. Marguerite Duras]

0h 57m 00s: Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – John Landis' Trading Places (1983) at The Carlton Cinema + Mikio Naruse's Lightning (1952) and A Wanderer's Notebook (1962) at TIFF Lightbox

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* Listen to our guest episode on The Criterion Project – a discussion of Late Spring

* Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s

* Intro Song: "Sunday" by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive)

* Read Elise's piece on Gangs of New York – "Making America Strange Again"

* Check out Dave's Robert Benchley blog – an attempt to annotate and reflect upon as many of the master humorist's 2000+ pieces as he can locate – Benchley Data: A Wayward Annotation Project!

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This week's Warner Brothers 1933 Studios Year by Year episode brings the studio-as-auteur question back into focus with two highly distinctive Pre-Code musicals with a similarity of style and social outlook that can't be attributed to the directors, screenwriters, source material, or the presence of Hollywood's most idiosyncratic choreographer and stager of musical numbers, Busby Berkeley. We argue for the dramatic and comedic merits of 42nd Street (directed by Lloyd Bacon) and Gold Diggers of 1933 (directed by Mervyn LeRoy), without failing to grapple with the more deranged elements of the musical sequences. And in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, the focus on sex, gender, and harsh economic realities continues with further screenings from TIFF Cinematheque's ongoing Mikio Naruse retrospective: Late Chrysanthemums, Scattered Clouds, and When a Woman Ascends the Stairs. We also briefly mention our TIFF Lightbox viewing of Hitchcock's North by Northwest, which allowed us to see Cary Grant narrowly escape multiple elaborately complicated and indirect murder attempts in 70 mm.

Time Codes:

0h 00m 25s: 1933 and Warner Brothers

0h 05m 13s: 42nd STREET [dir. Lloyd Bacon with Busby Berkeley]

0h 50m 20s: GOLD DIGGERS OF 1933 [dir. Mervyn Leroy with Busby Berkeley]

1h 30m 40s: Fear & Moviegoing in Toronto: Alfred Hitchcock's North By Northwest (1959) and Mikio Naruse's Late Chrysanthemums (1954), Scattered Clouds (1967) & When a Woman Ascends the Stairs (1960) – all at TIFF Lightbox

1h 40m 16s: Listener Jason's Top Gloria Grahame films

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Studio Film Capsules provided by The Warner Brothers Story by Clive Hirchhorn

Additional studio information from: The Hollywood Story by Joel W. Finler

1933 Information from Forgotten Films to Remember by John Springer

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* Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s

* Intro Song: "Sunday" by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive)

* Read Elise's latest film piece on Preston Sturges, Unfaithfully Yours, and the Narrative role of comedic scapegoating.

* Check out Dave's new Robert Benchley blog – an attempt to annotate and reflect upon as many of the master humorist's 2000+ pieces as he can locate – Benchley Data: A Wayward Annotation Project!

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

Write to us at therebuggy@gmail.com

We now have a Discord server - just drop us a line if you'd like to join!

Our S&xMas episode looks at two provocative, controversial, and not very sex-positive works made by aging auteurs after a long hiatus, Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut (1999) and Paul Verhoeven's Elle (2016). Join us as we trace Tom Cruise's all-American odyssey of sexual paranoia and Isabelle Huppert's very European journey away from sex with men, asking such important questions as "Is Paul Verhoeven the most masochistic male feminist director?" and "Is there a significance to Christmas in these movies beyond irony?" And in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, just one Naruse, Wife (1953), another uninspiring look at marriage that extends a surprising amount of sympathy toward Ken Uehara, the Japanese George Brent. Is there a significance to covering these movies in our Christmas episode beyond irony? Listen and find out!

Time Codes:

0h 00m 25s: EYES WIDE SHUT (1999) [dir. Stanley Kubrick]

0h 25m 30s: ELLE (2016) [dir. Paul Verhoeven]

0h 47m 34s: Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – Mikio Naruse's Wife (1953)

0h 51m 36s: ELLE (2016) returns!

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* Listen to our guest episode on The Criterion Project – a discussion of Late Spring

* Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s

* Intro Song: "Sunday" by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive)

* Read Elise's piece on Gangs of New York – "Making America Strange Again"

* Check out Dave's Robert Benchley blog – an attempt to annotate and reflect upon as many of the master humorist's 2000+ pieces as he can locate – Benchley Data: A Wayward Annotation Project!

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

Write to us at therebuggy@gmail.com

We now have a Discord server - just drop us a line if you'd like to join!

It's our final Gloria Grahame Acteurist Oeuvre-view episode, with which we also say goodbye to our comprehensive approach toward attaining a privileged vantage point on an actor's entire oeuvre. Of course, we cheated a little on this one and stopped short of Gloria's exploitation film era. Our oeuvre-view ends with two Westerns, Ride Out for Revenge (1957) and Ride Beyond Vengeance (1966), entirely unrelated despite their similar titles, which we liked for very different reasons, and a last Gloria Grahame left-wing film noir appearance in Robert Wise's Odds Against Tomorrow (1959), produced by Harry Belafonte's production company with a screenplay secretly written by blacklistee Abraham Polonsky at Belafonte's behest. After we reveal our Top 10 Gloria Grahame movies, Fear and Moviegoing returns with a vengeance (in keeping with the episode's themes) with three by Mikio Naruse from the TIFF Lightbox retrospective (Floating Clouds, Repast, and Mother) and two Carlton 90s retro screenings, Bryan Singer's The Usual Suspects and Greg Mottola's The Daytrippers.

Time Codes:

0h 00m 25s: RIDE OUT FOR REVENGE (1957) [dir. Bernard Girard]

0h 22m 08s: ODDS AGAINST TOMORROW (1959) [dir. Robert Wise].

0h 32m 36s: RIDE BEYOND VENGEANCE (1966) [dir. Bernard McEveety]

0h 45m 32s: Gloria Grahame Top 10s

0h 49m 44s: Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – Bryan Singer's The Usual Suspects (1995) & Greg Mottola's The Daytrippers (1997) at The Carlton Cinema; Part I of TIFF Cinematheque's Mikio Naruse Retrospective - Floating Clouds (1955); Repast (1951) & Mother (1952)

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* Listen to our guest episode on The Criterion Project – a discussion of Late Spring

* Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s

* Intro Song: "Sunday" by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive)

* Read Elise's piece on Gangs of New York – "Making America Strange Again"

* Check out Dave's Robert Benchley blog – an attempt to annotate and reflect upon as many of the master humorist's 2000+ pieces as he can locate – Benchley Data: A Wayward Annotation Project!

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

Write to us at therebuggy@gmail.com

We now have a Discord server - just drop us a line if you'd like to join!

For this 1933 MGM episode we focus on rehabilitating John Gilbert's sound-era reputation with a double feature of underrated gem Fast Workers, a construction worker love triangle melodrama directed by Tod Browning, and Gilbert's most famous sound movie, Rouben Mamoulian and Greta Garbo's very serious (but also very sensual) costume drama Queen Christina, about a woman whose ideals clash with her society. And in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, we discuss one of Dave's faves, Paul Thomas Anderson's morally enigmatic first feature, Hard Eight.

Time Codes:

0h 00m 25s: 1933 and MGM

0h 07m 46s: FAST WORKERS (dir. Tod Browning]

0h 33m 11s: QUEEN CHRISTINA [dir. Rouben Mamoulian]

0h 54m 22s: Fear & Moviegoing in Toronto: Paul Thomas Anderson's Hard Eight (1996) at The Paradise Cinema

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Studio Film Capsules provided by The MGM Story by John Douglas Eames

Additional studio information from: The Hollywood Story by Joel W. Finler

1933 Information from Forgotten Films to Remember by John Springer

+++

* Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s

* Intro Song: "Sunday" by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive)

* Read Elise's latest film piece on Preston Sturges, Unfaithfully Yours, and the Narrative role of comedic scapegoating.

* Check out Dave's new Robert Benchley blog – an attempt to annotate and reflect upon as many of the master humorist's 2000+ pieces as he can locate – Benchley Data: A Wayward Annotation Project!

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

Write to us at therebuggy@gmail.com

We now have a Discord server - just drop us a line if you'd like to join!

In this week's episode of our Gloria Grahame Acteurist Oeuvre-view, we explore the unique casting of unmusical Gloria in Fred Zinnemann's film version of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Oklahoma! (1955) and follow the thread that leads (through Jud Fry) from the supposedly "wholesome" musical to Charlie Kaufman's dark, experimental I'm Thinking of Ending Things. Then we switch over to British espionage curiosity The Man Who Never Was (1956), starring Gloria and Clifton Webb... although they never share a scene. And in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, another curious pairing: Cameron Crowe's quintessential 90s romantic comedy Singles (1992) and Luc Moullet's weirdo Western A Girl Is a Gun/Une aventure de Billy le Kidd (1971) offer wildly divergent perspectives on the problem of love.

Time Codes:

0h 00m 25s: OKLAHOMA! (1955) [dir. Fred Zinnemann]

0h 32m 04s: THE MAN WHO NEVER WAS (1956) [dir. Ronald Neame]

0h 40m 38s: Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – Cameron Crowe's Singles (1992) at The Revue Cinema and Luc Moullet's A Girl is a Gun /Une aventure de Billy le Kid (1971) at TIFF Lightbox

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* Listen to our guest episode on The Criterion Project – a discussion of Late Spring

* Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s

* Intro Song: "Sunday" by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive)

* Read Elise's piece on Gangs of New York – "Making America Strange Again"

* Check out Dave's Robert Benchley blog – an attempt to annotate and reflect upon as many of the master humorist's 2000+ pieces as he can locate – Benchley Data: A Wayward Annotation Project!

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

Write to us at therebuggy@gmail.com

We now have a Discord server - just drop us a line if you'd like to join!

This Paramount 1933 Studios Year by Year episode features two of the studio's defining stars of the era: the Marx Brothers, in their final, most famous, and (maybe) most nihilistic Paramount film, Duck Soup, directed by Leo McCarey, and Gary Cooper, miscast (or maybe not) in One Sunday Afternoon in the role that would go to James Cagney in the Warner Bros. remake, The Strawberry Blonde. We zero in on Groucho's authoritarian anti-authoritarianism and Cooper's embodiment of a charismatic man's class resentment. And in Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto, we share our first experience with the cinema of Nouvelle Vague primitivist Luc Moullet, his quirky and candid examination of second-wave feminism's effect on his relationship (and anatomy), Anatomie d'un rapport (1976)

Time Codes:

0h 00m 25s: 1933 and Paramount

0h 06m 53s: ONE SUNDAY AFTERNOON (1933) [dir. Stephen Roberts]

0h 27m 01s: DUCK SOUP (1933) [dir. Leo McCarey]

1h 01m 22s: Fear & Moviegoing in Toronto – Luc Moullet and Antonietta Pizzorno's Anatomie d'un rapport (1976)

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Studio Film Capsules provided by The Paramount Story by John Douglas Eames

Additional studio information from: The Hollywood Story by Joel W. Finler

1933 Information from Forgotten Films to Remember by John Springer

+++

* Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s

* Intro Song: "Sunday" by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive)

* Read Elise's latest film piece on Preston Sturges, Unfaithfully Yours, and the Narrative role of comedic scapegoating.

* Check out Dave's new Robert Benchley blog – an attempt to annotate and reflect upon as many of the master humorist's 2000+ pieces as he can locate – Benchley Data: A Wayward Annotation Project!

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

Write to us at therebuggy@gmail.com

We now have a Discord server - just drop us a line if you'd like to join!

For our November 2025 Special Subject we watched the Antoine Doinel films of François Truffaut: The 400 Blows (1959), Antoine et Colette (1962), Stolen Kisses (1968), Bed and Board (1970), and Love on the Run (1979). In addition to the charms of star/auteur avatar Jean-Pierre Léaud, we focus on the films' evolving style and increasing interest in the women in Doinel's life. And in our Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto section we discuss Paul Leni's horror comedy The Cat and the Canary (1927) and a Hitchcock double feature, Shadow of a Doubt (1943) and Saboteur (1942).

Time Codes:

0h 00m 25s: THE FOUR HUNDRED BLOWS / LES QUATRE CENTS COUPS (1959) [dir. François Truffaut]

0h 28m 50s: ANTOINE ET COLETTE (1962) [dir. François Truffaut]

0h 37m 30s: STOLEN KISSES / BAISERS VOLÉS (1968) [dir. François Truffaut]

0h 54m 42s: BED AND BOARD / DOMICILE CONJUGAL (1970) [dir. François Truffaut]

1h 05m 15s: LOVE ON THE RUN / L'AMOUR EN FUITE (1979) [dir. François Truffaut]

1h 19m 32s: Fear and Moviegoing in Toronto – Paul Leni's The Cat and the Canary (1927) at TIFF Lightbox and Alfred Hitchcock's Saboteur (1942) and Shadow of a Doubt (1943) at The Paradise

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* Listen to our guest episode on The Criterion Project – a discussion of Late Spring

* Marvel at our meticulously ridiculous Complete Viewing Schedule for the 2020s

* Intro Song: "Sunday" by Jean Goldkette Orchestra with the Keller Sisters (courtesy of The Internet Archive)

* Read Elise's piece on Gangs of New York – "Making America Strange Again"

* Check out Dave's Robert Benchley blog – an attempt to annotate and reflect upon as many of the master humorist's 2000+ pieces as he can locate – Benchley Data: A Wayward Annotation Project!

Follow us on Twitter at @therebuggy

Write to us at therebuggy@gmail.com

We now have a Discord server - just drop us a line if you'd like to join!