Enter The Void

ENTER THE VOID is back for our fifth season, and this time around Renan and Bill have set themselves the task of talking about only films by directors they haven't covered on the show. How did they do? Pretty good! Except for the last episode, but we think you'll find it a forgivable exception. Starting next week, ETV will appear in your podcast feed each Wednesday, and here is the lineup so you can watch ahead: Solaris (Tarkovsky, 1972) The Lobster (Lanthimos, 2015) Heavy Metal (Potterton, 1981) Another Earth (Cahill, 2011) Melancholia (Von Trier, 2011) El Topo (Jodorowsky, 1970) Coherence (Byrkit, 2013) Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (Lynch, 1992) Show links: Subscribe: iTunes  Archives: enterthevoid.fm Follow us: Facebook + Twitter

At last it is the final episode of the fourth season of Enter The Void. And to mark the occasion we're not just talking about Wong Kar-wai's 2046 (2004) but also the two films with which it forms a loose trilogy: 1990's Days of Being Wild and especially 2000's In the Mood for Love. Better still, Bill and Renan are joined by Wong aficionado Samarth Bhaskar from the New York Times. In this, they cover: lucking into a theatrical screening of Wong's films; a valiant attempt to describe what happens in 2046; how the three films relate to each other; what exactly the number "2046" is supposed to represent; how the films relate to Hong Kong's precarious political situation; which camera angles Wong favors for his actresses; what Quentin Tarantino thought about 2046, and why TF is this movie so damn hard to find? Film links: 2046 on IMDb 2046 on Wikipedia In the Mood for Love on IMDb In the Mood for Love on Wikipedia Days of Being Wild on IMDb Days of Being Wild on Wikipedia Film Comment on 2046 Manohla Dargis on 20

Our penultimate episode of season 4 is about Richard Linklater's A SCANNER DARKLY, a 2006 adaptation of Philip K Dick's quasi-autobiographical novel of the same name. A blip on the screen—er, scanner?—at the time it was released, the film is now remembered best for its innovative rotoscope technique. But it's also a showcase for Robert Downey Jr. just before he became a superstar, a rare bright spot for Winona Ryder in her wilderness years, and also Keanu Reeves is here, being Keanu. In this episode, Bill and Renan also talk about other Philip K Dick adaptations, drug movies, Radiohead, Alex Jones, and the new FilmStruck streaming service. Film links: A Scanner Darkly on IMDb A Scanner Darkly on Wikipedia Den of Geek on A Scanner Darkly Dissolve essay on A Scanner Darkly AV Club comparison of book and movie Dissolve interview with Bob Sabiston Wired on behind-the-scenes trouble Analysis of the novel and drugs Snack and Drink on Vimeo Show links: Rate us on iTunes!  Friend us on Facebook! Reblog us on Tumbl

This week Renan and Bill welcome back season 2 guest Mark Netter to talk about what might just be the original mindfuck movie: 1961's French-language LAST YEAR AT MARIENBAD, directed by Alain Resnais in collaboration with novelist Alain Robbe-Grillet. If you've never seen Marienbad, worry not, there is nothing we can say about it that will ruin this movie. Even after multiple viewings and a long discussion, we still don't know what it means—but that doesn't stop your hosts from trying! Also discussed: how Bill and Renan failed Marienbad on first viewing; how WWII and the Nazi occupation influenced the filmmakers; what major philosophical rabbit holes the movie opens up; how Resnais staged things to disorient the viewer; what that matchstick game is all about; how it was received in Paris and New York upon release; what Kubrick and Lynch and the Nolans—and even Blur—borrowed from it; plus, the "cameo" by none other than Alfred Hitchcock. Film links: Marienbad at IMDB Marienbad at Wikipedia Ebert on Marienbad

For the first time since ETV began, Renan and Bill examine a film that is actually in theaters at the time of recording: Denis Villeneuve's ARRIVAL, starring Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, and Forest Whitaker. It is not every day that Hollywood releases a sci-fi movie aimed at adults, let alone one that messes with your head like this one does, and it's certainly rare for a film to be built around linguistic theory. Also in this episode: other big budget "puzzle" films and how they get made; examining the work of the Nolan brothers, Twin Peaks and Westworld in particular; the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis and Fermat's principle of least time; the short stories of Ted Chiang (and George Saunders, for good measure); and Bill has a bit of a cold, so bear with us here. Film links: Arrival at IMDb Arrival at Wikipedia Story of Your Life at Wikipedia LA Times on alien language development The Verge on Arrival's plot twist Eric Heisserer on writing Arrival THR on Arrival's journey to screen Wired on Ted Chiang The Ringer on Ar

In 1991, Wim Wenders leveraged the success of his crossover hit Wings of Desire to mount a project he'd dreamed of for years: a globe-trotting sci-fi epic he considered the "ultimate road movie". That film is UNTIL THE END OF THE WORLD, and if you've never heard of it.... well. Warner Bros. made Wenders trim his nearly 5-hour cut by almost half, and the resulting film confused audiences and critics and sank without a trace. (But what a soundtrack!) And yet, the film all but predicted GPS navigation, smartphone addiction, and even free travel within the Euro area. Until very recently, American audiences had only seen the truncated version, but that is starting to change. This week, Bill and Renan watched one version or both—more than 10 hours' combined viewing between them!—and in this week's episode they unpack it and try to explain what worked, what didn't, and which version you should watch. Film links: Until the End of the World on IMDb Until the End of the World on Wikipedia Differences between original

Today Bill and Renan are joined by season 2 guest host Brian Gluckman for a wide-ranging discussion centered around Park Chan-wook's 2003 South Korean thriller OLDBOY. Among the topics covered: that famous hammer-hallway scene, that famous octopus scene, Spike Lee's misbegotten 2013 American remake, did you even know there was an unofficial Bollywood remake?, how it compares to the original Japanese manga, other films of Park Chan-wook including this year's The Handmaiden, and other daring works by South Korean filmmakers. This is a fun one! (But the audio’s a little hinky, we admit.) Film links: Oldboy on Wikipedia Oldboy on IMDb Roger Ebert review Original Guardian review Sequart on Oldboy The Definitives on Oldboy The Handmaiden on Wikipedia Oldboy (U.S. remake) on Wikipedia Zinda (Bollywood remake) on Wikipedia Zinda (full movie) on YouTube ETV season 4 Spotify playlist Guest links: @bgluckman Show links: Rate us on iTunes!  Friend us on Facebook! Reblog us on Tumblr! Follow us on Twitter! Email us

Whoa, OK, have you ever seen a movie that's more a midnight movie than BEYOND THE BLACK RAINBOW? We're not sure that we have, and in this episode Renan and Bill get way into what at least they think Panos Cosmatos' 2010 custom-built mindfuckery is really all about. Discussed in this episode: the amazing music, the incredible art direction, and the kinda maybe just so-so story and characters. Whatever you take from Cosmatos' visionary project, after this you're totally gonna want to rewatch Tombstone. Film links: BTBR official website BTBR on Wikipedia BTBR on IMDb BTBR trailer AV Club on BTBR 366 Weird movies on BTBR Chuck Kollar explains it all ETV season 4 Spotify playlist Show links: Rate us on iTunes!  Friend us on Facebook! Reblog us on Tumblr! Follow us on Twitter! Email us at void@enterthevoid.fm! Read more at http://enterthevoidpodcast.libsyn.com/#2D42hLLgsYRuJE7t.99

Kicking off the fourth season of your favorite podcast about mindfuck movies, we look deep into ADVANTAGEOUS, a 2015 low-budget sci-fi darling of Sundance. Directed and co-written by Jennifer Phang, starring and co-written by Jacqueline Kim, with a welcome understated performance by Ken Jeong, the movie explores eternal themes amid a futuristic backdrop that looks all too familiar: How will competition for the best jobs work in a more crowded world? What happens when technology is good enough to make many careers obsolete? When it comes to self-improvement, how far is too far? And will we become almost totally inured to terrorism? This week, Bill and Renan are joined by Nisha Chittal, aka Renan's better half, who brings a feminist perspective to this subtly socio-political speculative fiction.  Film links: Watch Advantageous on Netflix Advantageous on IMDb Advantageous on Wikipedia Review at The Dissolve Review at WIRED Review at NY Times Review at Gizmodo Watch original short film on YouTube Show links: R

The wait is over: Season 4 of ENTER THE VOID is right around the corner. This season we'll be talking about eight new movies—one of them in fact brand new—with double the guest hosts, bringing new perspectives to Bill and Renan unpack some really, really strange films. This season ETV will take on: Advantageous (Phang, 2015) Beyond the Black Rainbow (Cosmatos, 2002) Oldboy (Park, 2003) Until the End of the World (Wenders, 1991) Arrival (Villenueve, 2016) Last Year at Marienbad (Resnais, 1961) A Scanner Darkly (Linklater, 2006) 2046 (Wong, 2004) Show links Subscribe: iTunes  Archives: enterthevoid.fm Follow us: Facebook + Twitter

Closing out season 3 of Enter The Void, Renan and Bill consider Don Hertzfeldt's Oscar-nominated animated short WORLD OF TOMORROW, which asks more brilliant and terrifying questions in its 17 minutes than many feature length sci-fi movies put together. For Emily, the 4-year-old central protagonist, and the viewer alike, it's a head-spinning tour of the medium-near future where cloning and life extension, virtual reality, autonomous robots, "discount" time travel, and even living on the moon are all part of the same tedious experience as our own smartphones and instant communications. Also discussed: what happens when our memories become art, or commodity?; in this Netflix-YouTube age, why aren't more short films being made?; what themes from this resonate with Hertzfeldt's earlier work?; and how close are we to virtual reality with the Oculus Rift and the 2016 procedurally generated adventure game No Man's Sky? Film links: World of Tomorrow on IMDb World of Tomorrow on Wikipedia Rent World of Tomorrow on Vim

Wong Kar-wai's CHUNGKING EXPRESS is a little different from the psychological thrillers and existential horrors this show usually talks about, but it's no less experimental and just as much a ride through crazytown. It's appropriate that the 1994 film could be called Pulp Fiction meets Reality Bites, since the film's Western popularity is largely thanks to Quentin Tarantino, who brought it to U.S. theaters. Today, Bill and Renan also discuss: whether it matters that Faye Wong is a so classic "manic pixie dream girl"; the cinematography and contributions of Chris Doyle; how it relates to Hong Kong's recent history; also: Bill buries the lead and eventually gets around to sharing his personal experiences of Hong Kong, Chungking Mansions, and mid-level escalators. Film links: Chungking Express on IMDb Chungking Express on Wikipedia Roger Ebert 1996 review Quentin Tarantino gushes about the movie The Dissolve on "22 seconds [of] eternity" Amy Taubin essay for Criterion Janet Maslin's misbegotten review Feminist

Darren Aronofsky's first feature and still one of his weirdest, PI (or "π") is a B&W-shimmering orb providing a view to several convergent trends of the late 1990s: young independent directors scraping together a mainstream career; the use of obscure math and especially chaos theory in popular art; and the low-level burbling ambient electronic music of artists with names like Orbital and, well, The Orb. In this week's episode, Renan and Bill consider all of the above, and with it: pop mysticism and numerology, the whiter whites and blacker blacks of reversal film, the long arm of Gilliam and Serling's influence, and how PI compares to another ETV favorite, PRIMER (S1E2). Film links: Pi on IMDb Pi on Wikipedia Roger Ebert review AV Club on Pi and Primer Aronofsky + Gullette interview The Stygian Port on secret numbers in Pi Passwall on secret numbers in Pi James Gleick's Chaos on Wikipedia Tom Stoppard's Arcadia on Wikipedia YouTube: The Fibonacci in Lateralus Orblivion by The Orb on Spotify In Sides by O

If you think you've ever had an uncomfortable dinner party experience, well, THE INVITATION will remind you just how boring your life really is. The most contemporary film we've discussed on the show to date, Karyn Kusama's 2015 slow-burn seriocomic ensemble drama / psychological thriller is one worth seeing knowing as little as possible, but still an absorbing study of character and group dynamics even if you know where it's going. This week Renan and Bill are joined by Emily Gaudette of Inverse.com to talk about her interview with Kusama, other dinner party films, how we react to grief and trauma, and gendered things which are not obviously so—including, alas, this show. Film links: Wikipedia IMDb The Atlantic review The Guardian review Film School Rejects review @emilygmonster Gaudette Kusama interview for Inverse Show links: Rate us on iTunes!  Friend us on Facebook! Reblog us on Tumblr! Follow us on Twitter! Email us at void@enterthevoid.fm!

Many years after directing SECONDS, John Frankenheimer reflected, the 1966 film went from failure to classic without ever having been a success. It was too arty and weird for Rock Hudson fans, and too Rock Hudson-y for weird art film fans. Though rejected by the public upon first release, the story it tells is no less compelling 50 years later. And now, thanks to Criterion and iTunes, this once obscure-for-a-cult-classic is available for rediscovery at the push of an Apple TV remote button. In this episode Renan and Bill are joined by guest host Ray Patnaude, who first saw it on TV late one night more than twenty years ago, and had it stick with him long enough to recommend for this show. Film links: Wikipedia IMDb Slate The Atlantic Senses of Cinema Film School Rejects Show links: Rate us on iTunes!  Friend us on Facebook! Reblog us on Tumblr! Follow us on Twitter! Email us at void@enterthevoid.fm!  

What exactly is one to make of INLAND EMPIRE? Certainly, it's the kind of film only David Lynch could make. But it's unusual even by his own famously weird standards. It seems to have no plot or maybe three or else a secret design connecting it all together; it deliberately confuses you about its characters' identities, but at least its characters are confused, too; even the symbolism seems to have been sliced apart and glued back together as if to deliberately frustrate the viewing audience. Oh, and it's three hours long! But considered as a work of art, and for Laura Dern's brave (and bravura) performance, INLAND EMPIRE is nonetheless compelling and made for an entertaining discussion in this week's episode. Love it, hate it, or still don't know what you think, listen in as Renan and Bill try to sort out their own thoughts and feelings about it. Film links: Wikipedia IMDb Lynch / Dern interview at Collider Jim Emerson review at RogerEbert.com Keith Uhlich review at Slant I Talk You Bored "road map" IE out-

Why isn't JACOB'S LADDER better known than it is? It's director Adrian Lyne's best film, Tim Robbins' first starring role, secretly way more influential than you know, and one of the few Hollywood movies to avoid flinching at the implications its psychological horror implies. Besides that, it has has Biblical allegories, military testing of psychoactive drugs, and is one of the few films to sustain a commitment to dream logic through its entirety. In this episode, Renan and Bill unpack its possible meanings, its long gestation period from page to screen, how it relates to movies like The Sixth Sense and video games like Silent Hill, and what to make of the upcoming remake. Oh, and by the way, what happened to Tim Robbins' film career? Film links: Wikipedia IMDb Roger Ebert review Jacob's Ladder Biblical story on Wikipedia An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge by Ambrose Bierce 3-Quinuclidinyl benzilate (BZ) on Wikipedia "Rabbit in Your Headlights" music video  Show links: Rate us on iTunes!  Friend us on Faceb

For the first episode of season 3, Renan and Bill consider their second Jeunet et Caro film: 1995's THE CITY OF LOST CHILDREN. Featuring Ron Perlman in his first starring feature role (in phoenetically-memorized French!), six times the Dominique Pinon as Delicatessen, incredible constructed harbor town sets and all the water to go with it, Rube Goldberg-inspired sequences, and conjoined twins, CITY is a feast for the senses. So, how does it stack up against other Jeunet films? What makes it work (or not) as a story? How does it borrow from Charles Dickens? What tropes does it trade on? And what went wrong with Alien: Resurrection? This episode has all that, and more! Film links: Wikipedia IMDb 366 Weird Movies Roger Ebert review Stephen Holden review Disenchantment and the City of Lost Children Show links: Rate us on iTunes!  Friend us on Facebook! Reblog us on Tumblr! Follow us on Twitter! Email us at void@enterthevoid.fm!

Season 3 of ENTER THE VOID is almost here! And because our episodes come with absolutely no spoiler warnings, we want to give you advance notice of what we're watching and discussing so you can keep up with us. In this short episode, Renan and Bill discuss a modest change to the show's schedule, and then get on to previewing the films themselves: The City of Lost Children (Jeunet et Caro, 1995) Jacob's Ladder (Lyne, 1990) Inland Empire (Lynch, 2006) Seconds (Frankenheimer, 1966) The Invitation (Kusama, 2015) Pi (Aronofsky, 1998) Chungking Express (Kar-wai, 1994) World of Tomorrow (Hertzfeldt, 2015) Show links: Rate us on iTunes!  Friend us on Facebook! Reblog us on Tumblr! Follow us on Twitter! Email us at void@enterthevoid.fm!  

The final episode of season 2 attempts to grapple with Terrence Malick's 2011 THE TREE OF LIFE, a wildly ambitious epic concerning matters both micro and macro, from small-town family life in midcentury Texas to nothing less than the birth and death of the universe. Starring Brad Pitt, Sean Penn, Jessica Chastain with behind-the-camera contributions from Douglas Trumbull and Emmanuel Lubezki, your hosts aren't entirely sure what it all means, but it sure is fascinating to think and talk about. In this episode: the state of grace vs. the state of nature; comparisons to 2001: A Space Odyssey; a curious advisory before the film begins; "shibboleth nicknames"; and what's up with those dinosaurs, anyway? We hope you enjoyed season 2 as much as we did, and we'll return in July! THE TREE OF LIFE links  IMDb ◇ Wikipedia ◇ Trailer ◇ NYT ◇ New Yorker ◇ Globe Enter The Void links  iTunes ◇ Tumblr ◇ Facebook ◇ Spotify ◇ @enterthepod We did good? Rate us on iTunes! Got a movie for us? Email us at void@enterthevoid.fm!