Cultural Capital

The "Hedy Lamarr came over the oceans" edition. A wave of film festivals has hit Melbourne and Cultural Capital are surfing its crest, megaphone in one hand, ticket stub in the other, calling it as we see it. Anders and Eloise get the lowdown on the highlights of the Czech and Slovak Film Festival (CASFFA)from its programmer Cerise Howard, including a review of the 1933 game-changer Ecstasy. Meanwhile, the AACTA film festival may just be screening for members but festival host Andy has all the insights about Australian films that may be winning awards and getting wider release. Andy also reviews the blockbuster The House With a Clock in its Walls within seconds of the embargo lifting. That's how we roll at Cultural Capital: biweekly, yet thrillingly relevant. 01:00 Ecstasy (1933) 11:52 An interview with CASFFA festival head Cerise Howard 24:55 CASFFA 26:45 Cultural Capital Film Diary 28:55 AACTA Film Festival with particular focus on Just Between Us, Lost Gully Road and The Flip Side. 44:56 The House With

The Fonda Fonda Fonda edition... Inspired by a talk she gave in Melbourne last week, the podcast trio turn their attention to the marvel that is Jane Fonda. Taking a look at her filmography, her politics, her workouts, her obsessions and inspiration. This is a one-off special devoted to one of Hollywood's brightest and most enduring stars. 00:30 - Jane Fonda from Henry to They Shoot Horses, Don't They? 28:07 - Cultural Capital Film Diary 31:00 - The Rereaders 34:03 - Jane Fonda from Klute to renewed political activism. Find us: Twitter: TheCultCapPod Facebook: Cultural Capital Podcast

The "LAZZaro!" edition. As MIFF 2018 disappears into the rearview, it’s time to review. Cultural Capital regroup to compare notes, look at the films getting a wider release over the coming months, pick favourites and single out disappointments, and share the Cultural Capital Film Diary. 00:50 Happy as Lazzaro 11:23 Zama 18:55 Burning 26:09 Cultural Capital Film Diary 29:08 [Censored] 32:35 Sorry Angel 36:50 Hearts Beat Loud 40:30 Lean on Pete 42:13 Ryuichi Sakamoto: Coda 43:49 TYREL 47:00 Ex Libris- The New York Public 48:15 Films that disappointed us Find us: Twitter: TheCultCapPod Facebook: Cultural Capital Podcast

The "I'm excited to going back to watch stuff on my Mac" edition. Cultural Capital invite the participants in this year's MIFF's Critics Campus on the pod to discuss the experience of spending a week as a film critic, share highlights of the festival so far and contemplate the future of film criticism. Meet Ivana Brehas, Sam Harris, Eliza Janssen, Valerie Ng, André Shannon, James Waters, Claire White and Debbie Zhou. And a big thank you to Luke Goodsell for bringing us all together. You can read the work of the MIFF Critics Campushere: http://miff.com.au/blog, and find Claire White's Teen Screen Cinemateque at @teencineteq

The mid-MIFF with a neon midriff edition. 01:08 Shoplifters 10:06 Wildlife 15:56 You Were Never Really Here 24:00 The Image Book 29:05 Let the Corpses Tan 30:42 Fugue 36:15 Hard Paint 39:24 Full Moon in Paris 41:00 What we're looking forward to Find us: Twitter: TheCultCapPod Facebook: Cultural Capital Podcast

For our final episode before MIFF we review Guy Maddin's Vertigo homage, The Green Fog, and share our impressions of MIFF films we've already seen (including Acute Misfortune, First Reformed, Shoplifters, Burning and Capharnaüm), and those we're most excited to see. Andy includes an interview he did with Genevieve Bailey, the director of MIFF sell-out documentary Happy Sad Man, and opens the Cultural Capital Film Diary. Finally, we look back at the best films of 2018 so far. 00:55 - The Green Fog 12:29 - MIFF 2018 reviews and previews 28:02 - Cultural Capital Film Diary 30:11 - Happy Sad Man's Genevieve Bailey interview 51:51 - The Best of 2018 so far That piano music played before our favourite films from 2018 is from Phantom Thread. The poll of 51 Australian critics that Eloise mentions can be found here: https://www.flicks.com.au/news/the-25-greatest-australian-films-of-the-21st-century-how-every-critic-voted/

Breathless but full of complementary hors d'oeuvres and some house red, Anders, Andy and special guest Jo DiMattia rushed from the MIFF program launch at Melbourne's opulent Forum Theatre to pool their thoughts. Is the slate of Australian films the strongest MIFF has ever had? Did the programmers get the best they could from Cannes? We have a new venue, will it be more comfortable than the Comedy Theatre? And who'll brave the Astor's 737-minute Nic Cage-a-thon? We endeavour to answer these questions, share a Film Diary, and a lot more on this, our MIFF program launch renegade recording. Buy tickets, find out more and get amongst it all here: http://miff.com.au/ Find us here: @TheCultCapPod

The “vividly rendered” / Anwen as Jeanne edition. For the fiftieth episode of Cultural Capital we show our utter professionalism by doing what we always do, we talk about films. And briefly talk about ourselves talking about films. We review Sebastian Leilo’s Disobedience, open the Cultural Capital film diary, Anders and Andy walk through Jurassic Park Fallen Kingdom, share a montage of some of our favourite bits of our two years on the wavs, and count down our favourite films about faith. Will Eloise mention Barbara Stanwyck? Can we avoid naming Night of the Hunter? And which film turns up on two lists? Listen in. 00:57 - Disobedience 16:58 - Cultural Capital Film Diary 19:27 - Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom 26:30 - Happy 50th CultCap montage 31:02 - Top 3 Films about faith Twitter: @TheCultCapPod Facebook: The Cultural Capital Podcast

An episode from the windy rooftop of Terasse des Journalistes at the Cannes Film Festival, recorded just hours before the closing ceremony. Andy takes a look at some festival highlights including reviews of Spike Lee's 'Blackkklansman', Bi Gan's 'Long Days Journey Into Night', David Robert Mitchell's 'Under the Silver Lake', Lars von Trier's 'The House that Jack Built', Ryusuke Hamaguchi's 'Asako I & II', Lee Chang-Dong's 'Burning', Hirokazu Kore-eda's 'Shoplifters' and Nadine Labaki's 'Capernaum'. Andy also shares an interview he recorded with Charles Williams, director of the short film All These Creatures. Twitter: @TheCultCapPod Facebook: The Cultural Capital Podcast

The "Is that a noir? I don't know." edition This episode, Melbournian film podcast reviews Melbournian film noir, when Cultural Capital takes a look at Paul Anthony Nelson's Trench. We share a brief interview with Nelson, the film's writer director, and its co-star Perri Cummings, and count down of our Top 3 favourite film noirs of this century. Andy takes a quick look at the Russo Brothers' Avengers Infinity War, Simon Baker's Breath and Jason Reitman's Tully, and cracks the spine on that family favourite, the Cultural Capital Film Diary. 00:46 Trench 17:25 Avengers Infinity War 20:08 Tully 22:51 Breath 25:44 Cultural Capital Film Diary 26:46 Top 3 Film noirs of the twenty-first century During the countdown Anders mentions Abby Ronner's article about surveillance noir: https://creators.vice.com/en_au/article/nz4qwg/were-living-in-a-21st-century-film-noir, and Conor Bateman's video essay about the cinematography of Zodiac: https://vimeo.com/225926387. Twitter: @TheCultCapPod Facebook: The Cultural Capita

The “Hugh Grant’s tugged forelock” edition This week we punt along the Cam in the English summer sun while a young Hugh Grant and Rupert Graves share glances full of longing as we review the reissue of James Ivory’s ‘Maurice’. We also get grubby in 80s Melbourne suburbia with John Ruane’s black comedy Death in Brunswick, and Andy and Anders share Blockbuster Filibuster duties with their pithy reviews of I Feel Pretty and A Quiet Place. 00:45 Maurice 19:55 Film Diary 23:00 Blockbuster Filibuster: I Feel Pretty 25:46 Blockbuster Filibuster: A Quiet Place 31:15 Death in Brunswick During our review of Maurice, Eloise reads from Jo Di Mattia’s essay about the connection between James Ivory’s earlier work and Call Me By Your Name. You can find Jo’s essay here: https://www.themonthly.com.au/blog

The "surprisingly short Party" edition 00:38 The Party 
14:30 Cultural Capital Film Diary 
15:55 I Am Not a Witch Cultural Capital keep it tight this week, just like Sally Potter's 71 minute 'The Party', and Rungano Nyoni's focus on the experiences of eight-year-old Shula in her remarkable debut feature 'I Am Not a Witch'. Two female directors, two accounts of shifting identity and social roles, two good reasons to go to the cinema. Facebook: Cultural Capital Podcast 
Twitter: TheCultCapPod

The “Joan Crawford. Again.” edition. 00:43 All About Eve 20:05 Film Diary 21:00 Terror Nullius 23:40 Blockers 25:46 Ready Player One 28:40 Top 3 Films about Ageing Stars of Stage and Screen This episode we look at one of the highlights of the Young at Heart Film Festival, the classic All About Eve. We count down our Top 3 films about ageing stars of the stage and screen, and Andy does a couple of pithy capsule reviews of two blockbusters opening this week. All this and the film diary too. Facebook: Cultural Capital Podcast Twitter: TheCultCapPod

The "Female directors / romantic dramas" edition 00:42 Desert Hearts 17:42 Cultural Capital Film Diary 19:02 Let the Sunshine In Melbourne is a city of many things, and most of these things are arts festivals. This week we take a look at highlights from two festivals running in March. Donna Deitch's Desert Hearts is a 1985 queer classic being showcased at the Melbourne Queer Film Festival (March 15-26), and Claire Denis' Let the Sunshine In comes to the Alliance Francaise French Film Festival (running until March 28)with a blaze of hype and the face of Juliet Binoche. This is a link to B. Ruby Rich's essay about Desert Hearts that Elo mentions: https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/5118-desert-hearts-the-thrill-of-it-all Facebook: Cultural Capital Podcast Twitter: TheCultCapPod

The "Oh I'm odd. I'm very odd." edition. 00:44 - A Fantastic Woman 15:00 - Cultural Capital Film Diary 17:50 - An interview with Melbourne Women in Film Festival director Sian Mitchell 29:25 - Love Serenade It's not enough to celebrate the Melbourne Women in Film Festival, we have to talk to its creator and find out why we'll be back again next year. The festival's opening night film, the 1996 Australian romantic comedy classic Love Serenade gets a thorough discussion, as does the new release, the Chilean Best Foreign Film Oscar nominee, A Fantastic Women. All of this plus the Cultural Capital Film Diary. If you'd like to hear our thoughts on other new releases, we reviewed Film Stars Don’t Die in Liverpool in episode 36, and The Square on MIFF 2017 Dispatch 3. Here's a link to Love Serenade writer director Shirley Barrett with her exciting new wave band The Fruit Pastilles and their song I Don’t Ever Want to See You Again: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3Sg48V1lWo Facebook: Cultural Capital Podcast T

The "Wakanda movie is this?" edition. Since Eloise is drinking coconut milk on a beach in Thailand, Anders and Andy team up to take on the excitingly Afro-centric Marvel superhero blockbuster Black Panther, Greta Gerwig's award-ridden comedic drama Lady Bird and browse through the Cultural Capital Film Diary before Eloise calls in to review the Yiddish drama Menashe. Andy takes responsibility for the awful pun above. 00:44 Black Panther 18:50 Cultural Capital Film Diary 20:24 Lady Bird 34:10 Menashe Facebook: Cultural Capital Podcast Twitter: TheCultCapPod

The "... and sausages" edition. Since Anders is drinking coconut milk on a beach in Thailand, Andy and Eloise are joined by critic and writer Jo Di Mattia to compare look-books for Paul Thomas Anderson's Oscar-nominated romantic drama Phantom Thread, and search for justice in Warwick Thornton's Indigenous western Sweet Country. We also share our Cultural Capital Film Diary, and count down our Top 3 films about fashion, which, it turns out, is a sub-genre of film with some extremely daft trailers. 00:50 Phantom Thread 17:40 Film Diary 19:45 Sweet Country 29:55 Top 3 films about fashion Interstitial music is Jonny Greenwood’s ‘House of Woodcock’ from Phantom Thread. Facebook: Cultural Capital Podcast Twitter: TheCultCapPod

The surprisingly pithy edition. For episode 40 we look at two of the most notable films opening in the first two weeks of 2018 (Andy talked about the very impressive Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri last episode). We also commemorate ACMI's Agnes Varda season with a discussion of the octogenarian cinema legend and her new documentary Faces Places. 00:44 The Post 07:48 Mary and the Witch's Flower 17:14 Cultural Capital Film Diary 19:00 Agnes Varda and Faces Places Facebook: Cultural Capital Podcast Twitter: TheCultCapPod

The "summer in northern Italy" edition: 00:50 Star Wars: The Last Jedi 29:25 Cultural Capital Film Diary 30:20 Top 5 Films of 2017 (including guests Hayley Inch, Ben Rigby, Jo Di Mattia and Donovan Renn) There were so many films released in 2017 and we barely saw any of them. Still, from the several hundred we did see, we chose our five favourites, forgot to mention dozens that we loved, and harvested some opinions from some excellent friends of the podcast. We also spent a surprising amount of time talking about Star Wars: The Last Jedi. Facebook: Cultural Capital Podcast Twitter: TheCultCapPod

The "iconic" edition. We'll be back to our normal programming next week with our Top 5s of the year and lots of other movie chat, but this week we went to the exhibition Edith Head: The Costume Designer. Our visit prompted in depth discussions about costumes, costumers and costuming. We also share our picks from MUBI. 00:00 Edith Head: The Costume Designer 21:58 MUBI 28:52 Our favourite costumes from film history Facebook: Cultural Capital Podcast Twitter: TheCultCapPod