Author: James Ruzicka

Join us on the road not taken this episode, as we watch new Korean-American feature Past Lives and compare it to a very 90s take on similar themes in Sliding Doors. Past Lives is like a tiny serving of understated New York drama, filled with comfortable silences and autobiographical details. But we have to ask: […]

There have been more than 450 spy films released in the last 12 months* (*citation needed) and yet most spy films seem to involve very little actual spying. James Bond has spent vastly more of his career running, driving, shooting and drinking than he has LOOKING AT THINGS CAREFULLY. At the popcorn counter this week […]

TRCC favourite Tom Cruise returns this episode, as we look at Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning: Part One, the seventh film in the ever growing franchise, and compare it to the 1935 Hitchcock classic The 39 Steps. Trains, chases, handcuffs and the very latest technology pepper the screen with bullet holes in both films, even though […]

Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, last week’s film, is now broadly acknowledged as The Greatest Film Of All Time. Do we agree? And what, to quote LL Cool J, is on our lists of the Greatest Of All Time? Will we include works by Kubrick, Hitchcock and the Cohen Brothers, or will we play […]

It’s part two of our interview with A list Hollywood sound recordist at the Popcorn Counter this week. We talk about the early days of VHS film making, the joys of the ‘Control Track’ and in-camera effects, Mike’s secret technique for beating the popcorn counter at its own game, and why every short film ought […]

Who had any expectations for a Barbie movie? But somehow the heavily branded toy franchise has given birth to a smart and witty satire that’s started a lot of conversations about the lives of women in the 21st century. We talk about what we enjoyed and what we missed, and compare it to the 1975 […]

A special, musical Popcorn Counter this week as we talk to the star of Debutante, upright guitarist extraordinaire Steven Ray Liedlich. In between excerpts from the movie we talk about song writing, composing for film, gender fluidity, Steve’s unique playing style and the Boulder music scene of the 1990s. Make sure you listen to the […]

A new Christopher Nolan film is always an event, and there are certainly parts of Oppenheimer that we loved… but which parts? Join us to find out which sections of the film contain all the high drama, and which sections resemble ten men arguing over whether somebody’s library card should be renewed. Which characters get […]

It’s a very special popcorn counter this week, as we bump into A-list Hollywood sound recordist Michael Primmer and ask him all about his adventures in the screen trade. What’s it like to record Al Pacino? What happened to the dialogue Michael recorded for Christopher Nolan in Interstellar? How would he describe David Fincher’s set? […]

For a film all about time loops, the new Indiana Jones picture Dial of Destiny sure seems interested in repeating the past. Harrison Ford returns for the fifth Indy movie, which is filled with daring chases, speeding trains, mysterious artefacts and troublesome Nazis. But how much does the film owe to its 1981 predecessor Raiders […]