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In the summer of 1995, video game adaptations in Hollywood were widely considered a death sentence. The industry was still reeling from the critical disasters of Super Mario Bros. and Street Fighter , making the prospect of translating a controversial, ultra-violent arcade fighter into a mainstream film seem nearly impossible. Enter a young British director named Paul W.S. Anderson. Armed with a modest budget, a dedication to practical Thai locations, and a legendary techno soundtrack, Anderson accomplished what few thought possible. He crafted a cinematic experience that respected its source material, bypassed the curse of the genre, and captured the raw, unadulterated energy of nineties arcade culture. The primary reason Mortal Kombat succeeds where other adaptations fail is its structural simplicity. Instead of overcomplicating the narrative or drowning the audience in dense mythology, the film lifts its plot straight from the tournament structure of the original 1992 game, drawin...

Today we are talking about Above the Line, a film that hits digital and VOD today. The story follows six struggling Hollywood hopefuls who decide the ultimate way to make a comeback is to team up and literally rob the Academy Awards from the crooked producer who crushed their dreams. But as you can imagine, in a town completely built on make-believe, trying to pull off a real heist might just be the toughest role of their lives. It’s got a fantastic ensemble cast—Cedric the Entertainer, Gregg Henry, Sophia Ali, Jackson Pace—and it’s just a great, fast-paced 90 minutes. Joining me today to chat about how he put this whole wild ride together is the co-writer and director of the film, Jeffrey Scott Collins. I hope you enjoy the show.

The year 1978 changed martial arts cinema forever. It was the exact moment Jackie Chan broke free from the shadow of Bruce Lee to redefine the genre with Snake in the Eagle's Shadow and Drunken Master. Right on the cusp of that creative revolution lay one final artifact of his transitional period with director Lo Wei: Magnificent Bodyguards. As the very first Hong Kong martial arts film shot natively in 3D, it has long been treated as a legendary curio. For decades, poor home video transfers stripped the film of its technical hook, leaving audiences with a flat kung fu slog accompanied by a stolen soundtrack. With modern restoration efforts rescuing the film's original identity from obscurity, it can finally be evaluated through its intended stereoscopic presentation. Magnificent Bodyguards emerges not as a masterpiece of narrative depth, but as a wild, gimmicky piece of late-70s exploitation showmanship that demands to be viewed in all its three-dimensional absurdity. At its c...

There is a distinct kind of nostalgia that comes from a perfectly timed, sun-bleached shot of a wide Los Angeles freeway. It is the visual language of the adult crime thriller, a genre that flourished in the nineties and early aughts before largely retreating to the fringes of independent cinema or morphing into bombastic superhero spectacles. With Crime 101, director Bart Layton attempts to stage a grand revival of this classic form. Adapting Don Winslow’s 2020 novella, Layton pulls together a massive, high-caliber ensemble including Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo, and Halle Berry to construct a sprawling heist picture that consciously evokes the ghost of Michael Mann. The results are undeniably stylish, frequently gripping, and deeply committed to an old-school aesthetic. Yet, as the title implies, the film occasionally finds itself trapped by its own foundational curriculum. For all its moody lighting, social awareness, and exceptional performances, Crime 101 struggles to break out f...

Joining me on the show is Rock Burwell. He is the brilliant mind behind the dread-inducing score for the hit psychological thriller Obsession, which originally blew audiences away during the Midnight Madness program at the Toronto International Film Festival. Working in close collaboration with director Curry Barker, Rock has crafted a soundtrack packed with smart synth work and atmospheric ambient cues. It masterfully explores the emotional undercurrents of the film, layering horror with warmth into pure, confrontational dread. It is easily one of the most exciting, disorienting, and genuinely great scores of the year. The Obsession Original Motion Picture Soundtrack is available right now thanks to the team at Waxwork Records, in partnership with Back Lot Music. You can grab your copy today on vinyl, CD, and cassette, or stream it wherever you get your music. Before we jump into my conversation with Rock about taking creative risks, finding comfort in discomfort, and building this in...

Joining us today is a veteran of the screen who has over two decades of experience and more than 70 television episodes under his belt, from intense dramas like Ozark and Will Trent to beloved comedies like Modern Family . But in a movie defined by pure psychological tension, he manages to steal the show with a brilliant comedic performance that has quickly become an audience favorite. I’m thrilled to be speaking with the incredibly versatile, risk-taking man behind Harry in Obsession,  the fantastic Darin Toonder ! Thank you for listening!

The history of early Hollywood is filled with fascinating intersections where the raw mythology of the American frontier crashed headlong into an emerging film industry that traded squarely in make-believe. Perhaps no intersection is more evocative than the genuine, documented friendship between silent film megastar Tom Mix and the legendary frontier lawman Wyatt Earp, who spent his final years in Los Angeles serving as an occasional, unpaid technical adviser on early Westerns. This bizarre piece of historical trivia forms the bedrock of Sunset, a highly ambitious, deeply eccentric 1988 genre hybrid written and directed by Blake Edwards. Coming off a string of broad comedies, Edwards attempted something remarkably complex here, trying to fuse a nostalgic period piece, a breezy buddy comedy, and a dark, hard-boiled murder mystery into a single cohesive experience. While the resulting film famously tanked at the box office and divided critics, looking back at it reveals a flawed, deeply ...

The year 1990 was a transitional crossroads for Hollywood romance. On one side of the ledger, audiences were treated to the glossy, heavily sanitized fantasy of Pretty Woman, a film that corporate capitalism could easily digest. On the other side stood director Luis Mandoki’s White Palace, a sweatier, rowdier, and fundamentally more honest look at human connection. Based on Glenn Savan’s novel, the film is an interesting, deeply authentic artifact of an era when major studios still made explicit, character-driven adult dramas. While it falters under the weight of traditional Hollywood expectations in its final act, the picture remains an incredibly compelling study of how social class, profound grief, and ageism warp the architecture of a relationship. At the center of this collision are two individuals who should never have crossed paths. Max Baron, played with cold, repressed elegance by a twenty-seven-year-old James Spader, is a successful St. Louis advertising executive. Max is a n...

Physical media is having a massive resurgence, especially with a new generation of film fans discovering the simple joy of owning a movie on a shelf. Looking to tap into that nostalgic energy, boutique distributor Arrow Films has announced the launch of a brand new subsidiary label called Toy Robot Video. Set to debut this September across the US, Canada, and the UK, the new label is designed to recreate the classic experience of browsing a local video store. Toy Robot Video promises high-quality film transfers from the best available elements, but with a major twist: everything will be packaged with vibrant new cover artwork, colorfully branded OBI strips, slipcards, and art cards, all at allowance-friendly prices that leave you with enough cash for snacks. "We are thrilled to announce the launch of a new home entertainment video label," said Toy Robot Video’s Mike Hewitt. "Toy Robot Video is intended to be a fun and inclusive label, designed to complement our core Arro...

In the late summer of 1977, American cinema was undergoing a massive tectonic shift. Audiences were standing in lines wrapped around city blocks to escape into space-opera visuals, while the counter-culture grit of the early part of the decade was gradually giving way to slick, neon-drenched escapism. Tucked quietly behind these massive pop-culture milestones was a small, independently financed romantic melodrama that managed to carve out its own strange corner of history. That film was You Light Up My Life, a movie written, directed, produced, and scored by Joseph Brooks. While the film itself has largely faded into a historical footnote, its titular song became a towering behemoth of the late-seventies airwaves. Yet, looking past the shadow of its chart-topping theme song reveals a piece of cinema that is fascinatingly odd, deeply flawed, and uniquely representative of its era. The story centers on Laurie Robinson, played by Didi Conn in her first major leading role just a year befor...

  Welcome to the Following Films Podcast. I’m Chris Maynard. This Friday, a chilling new nightmare arrives on Shudder, and it explores the dark, complicated, and sometimes supernatural bonds of family. The film is The  Voices of our Mother , and it follows Harriet Scaflen after the death of her 95-year-old mother. When Harriet suffers an unexplainable health scare, her four estranged children return to the ancestral family home to care for her. But as old animosities and long-buried secrets come to light, they quickly realize their mother’s illness is anything but medical. There is a supernatural evil awoken inside her—one seeking revenge on her own children just to survive. Joining me today to discuss this tense, 93-minute psychological horror film is its writer, director, and co-star, Mark O'Brien. You know Mark from his incredible work in front of the camera on shows like Perry Mason , Your Honor , and Halt and Catch Fire , as well as his recent role opposite Simu Liu in Pe...

The 1984 teen sex comedy Lovelines (frequently referred to as Love Lines) is a fascinating cultural artifact. Directed by Rod Amateau, a veteran of mid-century television sitcoms like The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, the film exists as a bizarre, hyper-saturated time capsule of mid-1980s American youth culture. It is a movie that attempts to be absolutely everything to everyone at a specific moment in cinematic history. It tries to function as a modern teen variation on Romeo and Juliet, a raunchy flesh-baring sex romp, a fully realized rock musical, a showcase for practical high school pranks, and a fourth-wall-breaking vehicle for Michael Winslow of Police Academy fame. By refusing to pick a single narrative lane, the film careens wildly between genres, delivering a viewing experience that is simultaneously exhausting, baffling, and undeniably entertaining for connoisseurs of pure vintage cheese. At its core, the thin narrative outline centers on an intense, cross-town rivalry between...

The late 1980s neon-noir landscape is littered with forgotten titles that briefly flared in video rental shops before vanishing into obscurity. Among these, the 1987 thriller Cold Steel occupies a fascinating, almost surreal position. Directed by Dorothy Ann Puzo, daughter of The Godfather author Mario Puzo, the film attempts to straddle the line between the gritty, psychological torment of early decade urban crime and the bombastic, explosive action of the emerging blockbusters. At its center is Brad Davis, an actor whose intense, trembling energy frequently threatened to burst the confines of standard genre cinema. Watched today, Cold Steel stands as a fascinating time capsule, a film of wild tonal shifts, remarkable character actors, and a frantic, sweaty desperation that feels entirely distinct from the slickly manufactured thrillers of modern cinema. The narrative structure of Cold Steel begins with an abrupt subversion of holiday cheer. Brad Davis plays Detective Johnny Modine, a...