School of Movies

Dazed and Confused

[School of Movies 2024]

What is a "hangout movie"?

It's a film that concerns itself far less with telling one grand, overall story of one or two people's development or journey, and far more on literally spending time with the ensemble cast of characters. In this show I draw the comparison between the characters we see here and animals in a safari park, but I don' mean they are simply placed there for our amusement, and don't matter. What I mean here is that we are experiencing a world based on memory and authentic experiences being described to us through the medium of what might be a dopey comedy where nothing happens.

It is the last day of school in Texas 1976, America is at a fragile place and the young people, following the mess of the Vietnam war, the betrayal of their government and under increased scrutiny from adults just itching to banish them from Civilisation if they so much as inhale a wisp of pot smoke. This is Richard Linklater's second film, his first under the critical eye of a studio with financial priorities... and it is a sweltering, comforting place to return to, filled with characters both lovable and scummy, jut trying to party before life breaks them.

It also has one of the top five curated soundtracks of all time.

Damsel

[School of Movies 2024]

This is a special show for Chris Finik. It would have been a relatively straightforward endeavour for Sharon and I to delve into this one. It's a story that feels familiar and contains many of our very favourite elements; A betrayed lady thriving on her own untapped resourcefulness with help from a chain of women begun long ago, a dragon with an AMAZING voice and a Royal Family squatting on an exploitative predatory system that all needs to be burned down. Plus, we love Millie Bobby Brown.

But we went one further, twisting around to examine the novelisation by Evelyn Skye, based on the early screenplay by Dan Mazeau. Both versions are lacking in certain departments, which the other compensates for... but there's some crazy business that folks who have only seen the film on Netflix will definitely want to know.

Avatar: The Rise of Kyoshi

[School of Everything Else 2024]

This was a commissioned show for Self AKA Selfproclaimed. Ever since The Legend of Aang wrapped in 2008 there have been comics expanding upon what followed the defeat of Fire Lord Ozai. This, however, was a pair of books; 'The Rise of Kyoshi' and 'The Shadow of Kyoshi' detailing what occurred four centuries prior to the adventures of Team Aang.

And the 2019-2020 release of these two novels, penned by F.C. Yee with consultancy from co-creator of Avatar Michael Dante DiMartino was met with wild adulation. Both books have astronomical five star reviews on Amazon, with more than 9K ratings corroborating that.

What I personally got from the books was a lot more of a mixed bag. There is amazing potential here, however, not all of it was fulfilled. Luckily we also have longtime friend of the show Nama Chibitty on, to counterpoint my hang-ups.

And this episode launches on the same day as School of Movies unveils the second in our series of short story anthologies, written by members of the community. 'Shared Footprints on Crossed Pathways' is the follow-up to 'The Lights from Distant Bonfires' in 2022. This collection sees legendary public domain characters like Sherlock Holmes, Winnie the Pooh, Zorro, The Phantom of the Opera, Captain Nemo, Cthulhu, Minnie Mouse, Don Quixote, Scheherazade, Tarzan and King Kong meeting up and examining one another's worldviews. Each story given a beautiful illustration by Nama's sister Bunny Boughamer.

The paperback is available here

Klonoa

[School of Everything Else 2024]

This was a commissioned show for Dean R who just happens to sit at the ideal age to have discovered Klonoa 2: Lunatea's Vale on PlayStation 2 in 2001 as a kid. After it had a profound effect upon him, he went back to examine the original Klonoa: Door to Phantomile on PS1 from 1996.

And while these puzzle-platformers with their poochified, Sonic-looking rabbit/cat thing might on first inspection hold nothing of particular interest I was glad to have been contracted to dig deeper. There's an existential element beneath the surface that left a lot of kids bewildered, introspective, maybe even depressed.

And I played through both games in their Phantasy Reverie Switch remakes (as well as completing the original on PS1, part of the second on PS2 and the ill-fated first remake of the original on Nintendo Wii, that many Klonoa fans HATE for resons we will go into.

So, strap in, grab your ring, and do not trust your friends, they're lying to you!

No One Will Save You

[School of Movies 2024]

This is a commissioned show for Chris Finik. And unlike the marketing for this straight-to-Hulu film our show is going to be a little more mysterious about the details, because it definitely was worth going in completely ignorant like we did. I even made some arresting artwork for this episode to better convey that this is not your regular thriller. If you have Disney+ that's your evening.

It's a silent movie, and I say that as A Quiet Place: Day One is doing quite well in theatres, and having watched the Mel Brooks comedy "Silent Movie" (1976) only last night. It keeps us, the audience in a state of tense, breathless isolation along with intense and extremely compelling leading lady Kaitlyn Dever (Booksmart, Justified, Dear Even Hansen) as Brynn.

Directed by Brian Duffield, writer of The Babystitter (2017) and its sequel, both of which we liked, along with Love and Monsters (2020) an under-watched Lockdown gem on Netflix. This gentleman is one to watch.

Beavis & Butt-Head Do America

[School of Movies 2024]

After many years of thinking about how to tackle these two absolute idiots, we found the best angle for us. Ostensibly this is about the 1996 movie, which still holds up today and makes for an appealing, surprisingly general-audience-friendly and brisk hour and 21-minute comedy. This is an achievement, considering their extremely sketchy first incarnation as a pair of cruelly observed Texas teenagers being horrible to frogs.

What Sharon and I do here is fill out the absence of texture in this rare 2D American-animated adult(ish) film by delving into who the boys are, and their pitiful background, as portrayed in various key episodes of the original show, which ran for only four years, but made two comebacks -both solid- with the current one still ongoing on Paramount Plus (which means most people can't see it, or the 2022 sequel movie which propels them into the 21st Century).

If you HATE Beavis & Butt-Head this podcast probably won't change your mind, but if you have never delved into this grubby world or indeed have some fond memories from their mid-90s heyday we may bring you a persistent giggle.

 

10 Recommended Beavis & Butt-Head Episodes to Watch

1. No Laughing (S2E12)

2. The Great Cornholio (S4E31)

3. Prank Call (S6E13)

4. Walkathon (S5E7)

5. Butt Flambé (S7E28)

6. Candy Sale (S5E23)

7. Werewolves of Highland (S8E1)

8. Dumb Design (S8E12)

9. It’s a Miserable Life (S6E8)

10. Choke (S5E4)

Out of Sight

[School of Movies 2024]

Cloon June finally comes to a close with a magnificent romantic thriller, written by Elmore Leonard, the author of Get Shorty, 3:10 to Yuma and Rum Punch, which became Jackie Brown. This one hit at the tail end of the 90s, and became a significant landmark in the careers of George Clooney, director Steven Soderbergh and George's co-star, a relative newcomer named Jenifer Lopez.

Deliberately stylised to evoke the crime thrillers of the 1970s, we do time with smooth-talking bank robber Jack Foley, finally hitting a point of realisation that he is going to die of old age in prison. However, in striking out against that eventuality with an audacious piggybacked prison jailbreak he crosses paths with Karen Sisco, a U.S. Marshal with a shotgun and a Chanel Suit. Against all odds, after spending time in the trunk of a getaway car, the two of them wind up separated, with thoughts dwelling on each other. Karen pursues Jack from Miami to Detroit, but does she want to lock him up forever or bed him and find herself a new way of life?

This absolute cherished favourite has been hugely influential on my work, especially The Princess Thieves: Available on Bandcamp.

Tomorrowland

[School of Movies 2024]

Initially we were going to cover this 2015 movie as the After School Club to close out Cloon June, but the more we delved into it, the more weighty and disturbingly messy it became.

From the mind of visionary animated filmmaker Brad Bird (Mission Impossible 4: Ghost Protocol) comes a movie based on a themed area of Disneyland from 1955 which envisioned a great big beautiful Tomorrow. Now, 60-70 years later, having arrived at a mild dystopia, how can we reconcile what our grandparents thought the Future would be like, against what we've had building up around us our whole lives?

  The YouTube channels featured in this episode include. (but are not limited to...)

• Jenny Nicholson

• Climate Town

• and Undecided with Matt Ferrell

We recommend you subscribe to all three, and specifically track down those latter two videos featured to get full links to ways that you can proceed with the concepts discussed.

Next week: Out of Sight closes out Cloon-June in Clooni-July.

Ocean's 11, 12, 13 and 8

[School of Movies 2024]

Cloon June continues with the slickest and arguably best Las Vegas heist movie. This 2001 remake of the underachieving 1960 Rat Pack original is less about establishing characters with any kind of arc and more about setting up the perfect mousetrap with eleven skilled individuals we can have fun with. It's a big old magic trick, with the prestige reveal to us, the audience being the punch that makes it satisfying.

We weren't going to cover the sequels on the main feed, but we got curious and delved back into 12 and 13 for the first time since the cinema in 2004 and 2007, finding most of the best drama in there. And finally, a re-edit of our 2018 After School Club on Ocean's 8, featuring Toby Jungius.

Finally, we round off with a dream-team cast pitch for a rebooted Ocean's 9. Next week, we make an unscheduled stop at Tomorrowland, to see what Brad Bird thinks of the future we wound up in. After that, extending Cloon June into July, Soderburgh and Clooney, along with Jennifer Lopez and composer David Holmes hit their absolute cinematic peaks with Out of Sight.

From Dusk till Dawn

[School of Movies 2024]

Cloon June, the month dedicated to George Clooney movies continues apace with his first significant lead part after over a decade of appearances in shonky Z-List horror and then two years of his breakout role in E.R. as eminently desirable paediatrician Doctor Ross. This is a firestorm of a counterpoint to that gentle healer, fugitive thief Seth Gecko is a deeply angry man, though he is a charming picnic next to his monstrous brother.

This episode is also an intersection between two director-seasons we have in preparation, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino. Rarely has a collaborative movie been made that is such an appealingly riotous showcase of the distinct styles of two auteurs, whilst being humbly grimy, memorably quotable, and so very excited just to exist.

WARNING: This movie is nasty, and we will be discussing sexual assault, extreme violence, florid language and Quentin being a weird creep.