The Rewind Movie Podcast

Our Hail to the King series concludes (for now) with another anomaly from the venerable author's assemblage of adaptations - director Fraser C. Heston's 1993 take on his 1991 megatome Needful Things.In the quaint New England town of Castle Rock, the opening of a new store causes quite a stir - but just how big a stir will soon become explosively apparent. Local Sheriff Alan Pangborn (Ed Harris), recently transferred in and looking for a break from the chaos and violence of the big city, referees minor skirmishes between neighbours - while the owner of the mysterious emporium Needful Things, Leland Gaunt (Max Von Sydow), spies an opportunity to turn up the heat by offering each citizen in town the one item they desire most in the world, for impossibly low prices. At least, in cash terms - each deal involves a favour, a prank, a simple trick played secretly on a fellow citizen. Tricks that threaten to ignite long-simmering tensions that may engulf the whole place in flame and fury.With the book an early King favourite for Devlin, he introduces Gali to this Golden Age of King movie version, released when the author's ubiquity was absolute. But, will it still take pride of place on the cinematic mantle, or does he now have buyer's remorse? Buy now. Pay later.Rewind Movie Podcast merchandise, and shirt designs from some of our favourite films, available here.If you have a film you’d like the gang to tackle, send us an email at rewindmoviepodcast@gmail.com. For introductions, essays, playlists, and the full back catalogue of episodes and specials, find us at rewindmoviecast.com.

“I feel you will have to deal with this matter in the harshest possible way, Mr. Torrance.” Our Hail to the King miniseries continues with Stanley Kubrick’s now-legendary, then-controversial 1980 adaptation of Stephen King’s 3rd novel The Shining.Frustrated writer Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) takes his wife Wendy (Shelley Duvall) and son Danny (Danny Lloyd) to a reclusive shift as the winter caretaker of the remote Overlook Hotel, where Danny’s burgeoning gifts for telepathy are put to the test as malevolence, both internal and external, infests the rooms and hallways that the family are trapped within.Our film picker Matt tackles another of his all-time favourites, as he takes Gali, Devlin and Patrick on a picaresque tour of how a once-terrifying, dread-soaked experience became a comfort watch of sorts. We talk the burden and bravado of creativity, the fear and fury of King, Kubrick, and their respective Jacks, and the legacy of a film overcame a muted debut to rise to the mantle of horror classic. Head to our website for an extended introductory essay, and shop merchandise from this episode at Devlin’s webstore.

“I'm uh, investigating a laundry folding machine with a bad case of demon possession.” We’re on the road to haunted Maine for Tobe Hooper’s 1995 Stephen King Bargain Bin curio The Mangler.  When the gigantic industrial speed iron at Gartley’s Blue Ribbon Laundry Factory graphically swallows an elderly woman, bug-eyed, troubled local cop Officer John Hunton (Ted Levine) and his amateur mystic brother-in-law Mark (Daniel Matmor) begin to see this as more than just a freakish industrial accident when strange occurrences and gruesome injuries follow, under the grotesque, watchful eye of the company’s mad owner (Robert Englund) who harbours an ill-concealed secret. Released after the 1980s horror boom had long-since peaked, and before his fellow genre veteran Wes Craven breathed new life into it with the sly meta-horror Scream, Tobe Hooper had struggled to capitalise on his post-Poltergeist success, with his Cannon Films-funded Texas Chainsaw sequel flopping, leading him to embark on a pinballing career directing TV episodes and low budget features. This South Africa-shot would-be shocker, one of many adaptations of tales from Stephen King’s 1978 short story collection Night Shift, came at a time when the King name was increasingly ubiquitous. But with a spectrum of quality that ranged from the estimable Shawshank Redemption to the inexplicable Lawnmower Man, where does this mad tale of evil appliances land? Join Gali, Devlin and Patrick as they talk haunted refrigerators, magic legs, and expository antacids, and debate whether this is a forgotten gem, or a justly discarded sock in the cinematic laundry basket.Rewind Movie Podcast merchandise, and shirt designs from some of our favourite films, available here.If you have a film you’d like the gang to tackle, send us an email at rewindmoviepodcast@gmail.com. For introductions, essays, playlists, and the full back catalogue of episodes and specials, find us at rewindmoviecast.com.

“Well, we took a vote. Predator's cooler, right?” Our LV-RMP series, running through the combined Alien and Predator series, arrives at Shane Black’s 2018 sequel, the confusingly named The Predator. A military sniper (Boyd Holbrook) witnesses a runaway Yautja ship crash landing in a Mexican jungle, and barely escapes with his life and a rucksack full of the creature’s hunting tech, which he intends to stash as evidence of extraterrestrial life. While a shadowy arm of the government tries to keep him under wraps by sending him to a psychiatric ward alongside a gang of misfit soldiers and marines with a colourful array of sweary conditions, his package inadvertently ends up with his estranged young son, necessitating a guns-blazing rescue mission as our alien hunter is in hot pursuit - while an even more deadly interloper stalks them all.30 years after appearing as a supporting actor in the seminal original, Black leveraged his post-Kiss KIss Bang Bang career renaissance to helm an $88 million project from a screenplay written alongside his key early collaborator Fred Dekker. Hopes were high for a return to form, but a lukewarm critical reception and middling business ensued. Were Gali, Devlin and Matt any more enamoured, or was this another underwhelming entry that failed to recapture the magic of John McTiernan? Rewind Movie Podcast merchandise, and shirt designs from some of our favourite films, available here.If you have a film you’d like the gang to tackle, send us an email at rewindmoviepodcast@gmail.com. For introductions, essays, playlists, and the full back catalogue of episodes and specials, find us at rewindmoviecast.com.

In the early- to mid-1990s, a deluge of enterprising, low-budget filmmakers sought to cash in on the erotic thriller craze that swept into cinemas in the wake of the incredible success of the likes of Fatal Attraction at the end of the preceding decade - films that we at the Rewind Movie Podcast have been lauding in our dubiously-named RErotica series. We bring the series to a (maybe temporary) close with a look at two of the biggest stars to emerge from the DTV erotica craze - Shannons Whirry and Tweed - as they star in 1992’s Animal Instincts and 1994’s Scorned AKA A Woman Scorned, respectively. Boiling down the generic elements of their big budget forebears with ruthless efficiency, laced with the quirks of maverick creatives responding to fast turnarounds and budgets skimpier than the costumes, these staples of the video store, after-dark cable, and, for UK listeners including our panel, the nascent Channel 5 sought to match the daring sexual politics, dangerous thrills, and indulgent visual titillation of Hollywood productions on a shoestring.We discuss the directorial work of notorious adult filmmaker-turned-videauteur Gregory Dark, and journeyman actor-turned-cottage industry multihyphenate Andrew Stevens, in two prime examples of this once-lucrative subgenre that has been all but swept under the rug. Is there some insight to mine from revisiting these sketchy late night sleazy features; can it tell us anything about the minds and lives of the audiences of the era who ploughed millions into these films, only to see them drop off the face of the earth just a few short years later? Travel back with Gali, Devlin, Patrick and Matt to an era of slumming C-list stars, ambitious models-turned-actresses seeking their big break, and their cut-price misadventures behind the net curtains and under the bedsheets of suburban California in our B-rotica special. Check out our blog to learn more!Rewind Movie Podcast merchandise, and shirt designs from some of our favourite films, available here.If you have a film you’d like the gang to tackle, send us an email at rewindmoviepodcast@gmail.com. For introductions, essays, playlists, and the full back catalogue of episodes and specials, find us at rewindmoviecast.com.

“Don't bother to buckle up - you may not want to survive this.” We’re scaling the Rockies with Sylvester Stallone in his Renny Harlin-directed, vertiginous 1993 action adventure thriller Cliffhanger. After a tragic accident sends Mountain Rescue climber Gabe Walker (Stallone) into an eight month self-imposed exile, his attempts to reunite with his ex-partner Jessie (Janine Turner) are disrupted by the crash landing of a jet full of mercenaries in hot pursuit of $100 million worth of stolen currency that was cut loose in a daring, botched mid-air hijacking led by international bad man Eric Qualen (John Lithgow). Gabe and his former best friend Hal Tucker (Michael Rooker), who holds him to furious account for the aforementioned tragedy, are press-ganged into leading the recovery of Qualen’s spoils from the steep mountain tops - leading to a brutal chase across the snowy peaks as greed and survival collide. A much-needed hit for Sly following a troublesome box office run that included the notorious comedy flop Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot, join Gali, Devlin, Patrick and Matt as they discuss the peaks and valleys of his career, the concomitant rise and fall of Finland’s most famous filmic export Renny Harlin, the appropriate level of angry swearing for a henchman, and the simple pleasures of a banana eating a monkey. Pick up merchandise based on this episode’s artwork here!If you have a film you’d like the gang to tackle, send us an email at rewindmoviepodcast@gmail.com. For introductions, essays, playlists, and the full back catalogue of episodes and specials, find us at rewindmoviecast.com.

“Mistletoe can be deadly if you eat it.” We’re spending our Rewind Christmas in Gotham, with Tim Burton’s eccentric 1992 comic book sequel Batman Returns.An abandoned aristocratic child, born with unfortunate physical deformities, grows up in the sewers below the city streets, eventually waging a circus-centric war on the populace at the big tree-lighting ceremony some three decades later. The guest of honour at that event, business magnate Max Shreck (Christopher Walken), is kidnapped, coming face-to-face with The Penguin (Danny DeVito). The fast-thinking Shreck concocts a plan - orchestrate Penguin’s reemergence into polite society, and use him to depose and replace the incumbent mayor for his own greedy ends. Caught up in these machinations is mild-mannered executive assistant Selina Kyle (Michelle Pfeiffer), seemingly murdered for learning too much, who finds herself resurrected as a slinky, whip-wielding feline agent of mayhem and revenge. Also Batman (Michael Keaton) is there.After the pop culture phenomenon of his 1989 original, Tim Burton kept corporate paymasters Warner Bros. waiting, establishing himself as the inky, gothy outcast du jour with passion project Edward Scissorhands. When he finally returned to the franchise, he amped up the weirdness as the German Expressionism-meets-Gothic Noir aesthetic of the city reached new heights of abstraction, matched by a fevered, weird psychosexuality. But, is it Batman? Join Gali, Devlin, Patrick and Matt under the abandoned zoo for a festive feast of gadgets, goo, and grotesquerie.Pick up merchandise based on this episode’s artwork here!If you have a film you’d like the gang to tackle, send us an email at rewindmoviepodcast@gmail.com. For introductions, essays, playlists, and the full back catalogue of episodes and specials, find us at rewindmoviecast.com.

“Okay. But dogs can look up.” We’re grabbing a nice cold pint and waiting for all this to blow over by spending our HalloRe’ewind episode with Edgar Wright’s beloved Brit rom-zom-com Shaun of the Dead, which celebrates its twentieth anniversary this year.Developmentally-arrested 29-year-old electrical store employee Shaun’s slacker lifestyle, mostly spent whiling away his nights with crass childhood friend Ed in the local pub, sees his girlfriend Liz give him the boot at a most inopportune moment - the advent of a zombie apocalypse that seems only slightly more grim and shambling than your average workday in North London. Armed only with a box of 12” records, a child-sized cricket bat, and his flatmate’s ‘borrowed’ Renault Megane, Shaun tries to rise to the occasion to bring Ed, Liz, and his mum to an impenetrable fortress (which is also, coincidentally, his idea of a romantic nightspot) …his local pub.Capitalising on the cult success of Channel 4’s Spaced, director Wright and star/co-writer Simon Pegg hoped to break a streak of poor quality TV-to-film transitions from British comedy stars, by infusing the movie with their genuine love for classic 70s/80s zombie fare. Matt and Devlin discuss the film’s part in the 2000s zombie renaissance and the British film industry’s brief hot streak, and talk influences, ripoffs, zombies-as-allegory, and other pearls of wisdom we gleaned from a Guinness Extra Cold beermat. If you have a film you’d like the gang to tackle, send us an email at rewindmoviepodcast@gmail.com. For introductions, essays, playlists, and the full back catalogue of episodes and specials, find us at rewindmoviecast.com. For specially designed merchandise, movie shirts, posters, and our famous Bingo Trope Totes and a poster based on this week’s episode cover image, head to DevlinDoesDrawing on Teemill. 

As we are still on a short break and preparing our Halloween 2024 instalment we thought we would celebrate the OG for the podcast...Halloween III: Season of the Witch as a LATE RETRURN FEE, enjoy reliving the horror and we will see you next week with a brand new episode!BOO! It’s Devlin’s favourite time of year, and he’s selected the strange outlier of the Halloween franchise, 1982’s Halloween III: Season of the Witch. A near-catatonic patient is brutally killed on Dr Dan Challis’ (Tom Atkins) shift, and the mysterious assailant sets himself ablaze. Desperate to make sense of this, Dan accompanies the murdered man’s daughter to the factory of Conal Cochrane (Dan O’Herlihy), Halloween mask entrepreneur and small-town philanthropist, to investigate. Robots full of lemon curd, drunk doctoring, stolen 'henge', and an advertising jingle that’ll burrow in to your head like a tonne of bugs – join Gali, Devlin and Rewind Movie Podcast debutant Patrick to see if we’re in for a treat, or a trick (like, say, sticky toilet paper, or the Dead Dwarf Gag). If you have a film you’d like the gang to tackle, send us an email at rewindmoviepodcast@gmail.com. For introductions, essays, playlists, and the full back catalogue of episodes and specials, find us at rewindmoviecast.com. For specially designed merchandise, movie shirts, posters, and our famous Bingo Trope Totes and a poster based on this week’s episode cover image, head to DevlinDoesDrawing on Teemill.