Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics

Fifteen Minute Film Fanatics

episodes

Two friends with strong opinions watch films separately then discuss them on the show for the first time. Can their friendship survive? Join Mike and Dan as they discuss one film each episode--and in only fifteen minutes, give or take a few. There are no long pauses, pontifications, or politics--just two guys who want to share their enthusiasm for great movies. On Twitter. On Letterboxd. Email: fifteenminutefilm@gmail.com.

Defending Your Life

March 18, 2024

Defending Your Life

Hosted by Daniel Moran

We are supposed to get smarter as we get older. Do we? If the meaning of your life had to be found in nine representative days, which days would you …

Magic

March 11, 2024

Magic

Magic is misdirection, and Richard Attenborough and William Goldman do a terrific job of misdirecting the audience in this 1978 thriller. Like The Ki…

Baby Face

March 4, 2024

Baby Face

Baby Face is the 1933 film that created the archetypal Barbara Stanwyck character and famously laid everything bare before the production code tried t…

Conan the Barbarian

February 26, 2024

Conan the Barbarian

It’s easy for some people to laugh at Conan the Barbarian, John Milius’s 1982 film about Robert E. Howard’s most famous creation: it seems like the ci…

Tucker: The Man and His Dream

February 19, 2024

Tucker: The Man and His Dream

A genuine crowd-pleaser that couldn’t please enough crowds in 1988, Tucker: The Man and His Dream has finally found an audience. Tim defends 80s Copp…

The Hunting Trilogy

February 12, 2024

The Hunting Trilogy

We all know the rules of the Looney Tunes universe: rabbits can outrun bullets, shots to the face don’t kill, and the laws of gravity don’t always app…

Limelight: A Film by Charlie Chaplin

February 5, 2024

Limelight

Being lighthearted and amusing can be a painful business. That’s one of the themes of Limelight, Charlie Chaplin’s 1952 portrait of the artist as an …

Anatomy of a Fall

January 29, 2024

Anatomy of a Fall

We all know the rules of courtroom dramas. We welcome the confusion we feel during the case and the sense of release upon hearing the jury’s decision…

My Best Fiend: A Film by Werner Herzog

January 22, 2024

My Best Fiend

Werner Herzog is a filmmaker with an intuitive sense for showing the right thing at the right time, whether he is offering the story of a maniacal con…

Eyes Wide Shut

January 15, 2024

Eyes Wide Shut

In a past episode in which they discussed the films of Tom Cruise, Mike told Dan, “You’re the smartest person I know who ever made it all the way thro…

The Omen: A Film by Richard Donner

January 8, 2024

The Omen

Can a film do everything wrong yet still find its defenders, who not only acknowledge each of the film’s faults but find these faults endearing? Such…

Meet John Doe

January 1, 2024

Meet John Doe

Have you seen that other Capra film in which the protagonist in a moment of crisis, attempts suicide on Christmas Eve? Join Mike and Dan for a conver…

The Sting

December 25, 2023

The Sting

There’s nothing like being conned at the movies. Join Mike and Dan as they talk about George Roy Hill’s beautifully-constructed toy, The Sting. Dan …

Donnie Darko

December 18, 2023

Donnie Darko

If we had seen Donnie Darko in high school, we would been drawn to the Easter eggs throughout the film and made videos in which we pointed them out wi…

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

December 11, 2023

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

A Film by John Ford
Hosted by Daniel Moran

How should one deal with evil? What are people capable of doing when they are given unconstrained liberty? Why does democracy work when people run t…

Wild Strawberries

December 4, 2023

Wild Strawberries

What if you could receive the adulation and respect of strangers but not from your own family-or even yourself? In Wild Strawberries (1957), Ingmar B…

I Know Where I’m Going!

November 27, 2023

I Know Where I’m Going!

Samuel Johnson once asked, “What enemy would invade Scotland, where there is nothing to be got?” He must never have seen I Know Where I’m Going (1945…

Spirited Away

November 21, 2023

Spirited Away

We are used to entering cinematic fantasy worlds in which we learn the rules of how the world works and then watch our hero navigate through it: think…

Minority Report

November 13, 2023

Minority Report

Minority Report (2002) is Exhibit A of how screenwriters love the premises of Philip K. Dick’s source materials and then adapt his core thought experi…

Point Blank

November 6, 2023

Point Blank

In 1962, Donald E. Westlake used the pseudonym Richard Stark and published The Hunter, the story of Parker, a betrayed thief who seeks vengeance with …