For all you proper film enthusiasts who would like to peruse the films of TruStory FM’s entertainment podcasts by release decade. Get ready for a firehose of film history in these here stacks.
This month on Movies We Like, writer, producer, director, and former agent Jim Jermanok (Passionada, Homophonia) joins us to talk about one of his favorite movies, Harold Ramis’ 1993 film Groundhog Day.
It was billed the most anticipated film of the decade, yet Francis Ford Coppola had spent that entire decade turning down requests to make it. It was only his failing finances that finally drove Coppola to accept the job of writing and directing The Godfather Part III, and for a lot of people, they probably wish he never bothered. But whatever issues they may have had getting it made, it was the casting of a key role with his own daughter Sofia that created ridiculous vitriol and hatred aimed for the writer/director. This element also ended up being a huge part of the reviews when the film finally came out. But did the film deserve this? Join us – Andy Nelson and Pete Wright – as we wrap up our Godfather trilogy series with Coppola’s epilogue to the Michael Corleone story, 1990’s The Godfather Part III.
Time heals all wounds, but the rift between Jeffrey Katzenberg and Disney may not apply. When Katzenberg, former chairman of Disney’s film division, left Disney after a bitter feud with CEO Michael Eisner, he formed DreamWorks with Steven Spielberg and David Geffen and soon began plotting his battle in animation with his former employer. So while Disney began working with Pixar on A Bug’s Life, he started working on Antz. And the great cinema battle of 1998 began. And while time may never heal the rift between Katzenberg and Disney, it certainly has shown us that Pixar knows how to make strong films and with their second film, they proved that they had staying power, regardless of what DreamWorks put out. Join us – Andy Nelson and Pete Wright – as we continue our Seven Samurai Family series with John Lasseter’s and Andrew Stanton’s 1998 A Bug’s Life.
This month on Movies We Like, cinematographer Jayson Crothers (The Ghost and The Whale, Chicago Fire) joins us to talk about one of his favorite films, Michael Mann’s epic 1995 crime drama, Heat.
After making Das Boot, Wolfgang Peterson came to Hollywood and began a new period in his life making big spectacle films, often action thrillers. Unfortunately, that meant when it came time to make his 1995 film Outbreak – stemmed from the world’s curiosity in the Ebola outbreak in Africa paired with the release of Richard Preston’s article “Crisis in the Hot Zone” and subsequent book – the powers that be felt that it too needed to be an action thriller. True, compared to something like The Andromeda Strain, a little more action could really help a story out, but they really seemed to go the wrong direction with this film, adding in an infuriating military conspiracy subplot to really kick things up a notch. Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we continue our Disease Films series with Peterson’s ‘95 film Outbreak.
Movies We Like is an ongoing series of ours in which we invite an industry guest to join us and bring along one of their favorite movies to talk about. In this month’s episode, costume designer Sarah Trost joins us to talk about one of her favorite films, Terminator 2: Judgment Day.
When New Line Cinema bought Shane Black’s spec script “The Long Kiss Goodnight” in 1994 for $4 million, it created a new record for the selling price of spec scripts for more than 10 years until 2005 when Terry Rossio’s and Bill Marsilii’s script “Déjà Vu” sold for $5 million. While Black walked away with a hefty paycheck, he had no idea that this sale and the subsequent underwhelming performance of the resulting movie would have a hand in the end of the halcyon days of spec script sales. The way that studios saw screenwriters changed. The way they approached projects changed. Some say the industry has changed for the better, some say for the worse. Whichever side you fall on the issue, Black found himself struggling to get work afterward. Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we continue our Shane Black series with Renny Harlin’s 1996 film “The Long Kiss Goodnight.”
When Shane Black was paid $1.75 million for his spec script “The Last Boy Scout,” it was the most any screenwriter had been paid for their script up to that point. It wouldn’t take long before that record was broken, but the bar had been set – and more importantly, the expectations – for what Shane Black the screenwriter could deliver. Unfortunately, the production was riddled with problems and the film struggled to make its money back. It didn’t kill Black’s career, but it may have signaled the beginning of the end for the spec script boom happening in the early 90s. Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we continue our Shane Black series with Tony Scott’s 1991 action extravaganza “The Last Boy Scout.”
Lee Tamahori’s first foray in Hollywood, ‘Mulholland Falls,’ didn’t fare all that well. Luckily, his follow-up with 1997’s ‘The Edge’ made money and allowed him to keep working in the business. (Though if you look at his foray in the Bond franchise, ‘Die Another Day,’ maybe it’s not so lucky after all.) But does the movie feel like something from a David Mamet script? Or does it fall into formulaic Hollywood junk? Join us—Pete Wright and Andy Nelson—as we wrap up our ‘David Mamet as a screenwriter’ series with ‘The Edge.’
David Mamet won the Pulitzer Prize in 1984 with his play “Glengarry Glen Ross.” The play really exemplified Mamet-speak and its transition to film retained that, despite the fact that it took eight years to make it to the silver screen. Join us – Pete Wright and Andy Nelson – as we continue our David Mamet as Screenwriter series with James Foley’s 1992 film Glengarry Glen Ross.