The Frances Farmer Show

Episode 54: Alphaville and A Separation

This week, as the annual film festival is on-going in Berlin, Mike and Sean take a look at a pair of past winners of the prestigious Golden Bear award, Jean-Luc Godard's 1965 neo-noir Alphaville and Asghar Farhadi's highly acclaimed domestic/courtroom drama A Separation, from 2011. They also discuss Godard's career in general, pick their Essential Golden Bear Winners and complain about everything in the news, from Birth of a Nation to the Dissolve, the new Varsity Theatre and martial arts movies at the Cinerama.

Episode 53: Selma and Malcolm X

This week Sean and Mike discuss a pair of historical dramas: Ava DuVernay's leading 2014 Oscar contender Selma along with Spike Lee's 1992 biopic Malcolm X. They also discuss the career of Spike Lee, choose their Essential Biopics, make shameful admissions of ignorance regarding Oprah and Denzel Washington and unveil a new project about Seattle-area film.

Episode 52: The Shopworn Angel and The Cheyenne Social Club

This week, on the occasion of a double feature of The Philadelphia Story and The Shop Around the Corner at the Grand Illusion Theatre in Seattle, Mike and Sean devote the show to their love of James Stewart, the greatest movie actor of all-time. They'll talk about his 1938 film The Shopworn Angel, with Margaret Sullavan, and his 1970 film The Cheyenne Social Club, with Henry Fonda. In addition, they'll lament the latest Seattle movie theatre closures and discuss their picks for the Top Ten Films of the Decade So Far.

Episode 51: Love Streams, Streets of Fire and the Best of 1984

Continuing an annual tradition, Mike and Sean step away from the end of 2014 festivities to take a look at the best in film from 30 years ago, with Top Ten lists and Fake Awards for the movies of 1984. Alongside that, they discuss John Cassavetes's Love Streams with Gena Rowlands and Walter Hill's gangland rock epic Streets of Fire.

Episode 50: Coffy, Golden Chicken and 2014 Discoveries

This week Mike and Sean take a look back at their favorites among the older movies they saw for the first time in the past year, highlighting Pam Grier in 1973's blaxploitation classic Coffy and Sandra Ng in the Hong Kong comedy-drama Golden Chicken, from 2002.

Episode 49: Awaara and Sholay

This week, Mike and Sean celebrate Thanksgiving with a pair of Bollywood classics, 1951's Awaara, starring Nargis and Raj Kapoor, who also directed, and 1975's epic Western Sholay starring Amitabh Bachchan and Dharmendra and directed by Ramesh Sippy. They also discuss the late Mike Nichols, celebrate Busby Berkeley's birthday, pick their Essential Movie Buddies and, for some reason, talk about an 80 second commercial for a movie that doesn't open for thirteen months.

Episode 48: Renaldo & Clara, Masked & Anonymous and Don't Go Breaking My Heart 2

This week's episode is recorded on location at an AMC theatre in downtown Seattle where Johnnie To has crashed Mike and Sean's celebration of cinematic Bob Dylan (on the occasion of the official release of the complete Basement Tapes). Before and after a trip into the movie theatre, they talk about two iterations of post-crash Dylan: his own four hour 1975 concert film/experimental indie drama Renaldo & Clara and his 2003 collaboration with Larry Charles and a cast of dozens, Masked and Anonymous. They also take a few minutes to talk about the To film, Don't Go Breaking My Heart 2, about which there is much excitement and little publicity.

Episode 47: Toute la mémoire du monde and Russian Ark

This week, in celebration of the upcoming 100th anniversary of the great film archivist, curator and programmer Henri Langlois, Sean and Mike take a tour of some cinematic libraries and museums with Alain Resnais's 1956 short film Toute la mémoire du mode about the Bibliothèque nationale and Alexander Sokurov's 2002 Russian Ark about the Russian State Hermitage Museum. They'll also talk about Langlois, Orson Welles, Princesses, the Internet and more.

Episode 46: Gone Girl and The Vanishing

This week Mike and Sean tackle David Fincher's big hit Gone Girl, starring Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike along with the late George Sluizer's 1988 film about a missing woman, The Vanishing. They'll also recap Sean's trip to the 2014 Vancouver International Film Festival, celebrate Independent Video Store Day with their Essential Films You Can Only Get at Scarecrow Video, and discuss the concept of "It" while making their picks for modern day It Girls and It Boys on the 150th birthday of writer Elinor Glyn. All this and Mike finally watched Boyhood too.

Episode 45: How to Marry a Millionaire and Down with Love

Wanting a break from all the weird and dour movies they've been watching lately, Mike and Sean celebrate the bright and colorful of Fox Cinemascope romantic comedies, with 1953's How to Marry a Millionaire, starring Lauren Bacall and Marilyn Monroe, and Down with Love, from 2003, with Renee Zellweger and Ewan MacGregor. Also, on the 150th anniversary of the birth of cinema pioneer Louis Lumière, they make their picks for Essential Early Film.