Film

Film

episodes

Interviews with film makers and scholars of film about their new books.

Biopic

December 1, 2024

Biopic

Laura Stamm

In this episode of High Theory, Laura Stamm talks about the biopic. One of the oldest forms of narrative cinema, biographical pictures are a mainstay …

Sam Langsdale, "Searching for Feminist Superheroes: Gender, Sexuality, and Race in Marvel Comics" (U Texas Press, 2024)

November 30, 2024

Searching for Feminist Superheroes

Sam Langsdale
Hosted by Miranda Melcher

It’s no secret that superhero comics and their related media perpetuate a model of a straight, white, male hero at the expense of representing women a…

Chris Berry et al., "Taiwanese-Language Cinema: Rediscovered and Reconsidered" (Edinburgh UP, 2024)

November 27, 2024

Taiwanese-Language Cinema

Chris Berry, Wafa Ghermani, Corrado Neri, and Ming-yeh T. Rawnsley
Hosted by Bing Wang

Taiwanese-Language Cinema: Rediscovered and Reconsidered (Edinburgh UP, 2024), edited by Chris Berry, Wafa Ghermani, Corrado Neri, and Ming-yeh T. Raw…

Steven Swarbrick and Jean-Thomas Tremblay, "Negative Life: The Cinema of Extinction" (Northwestern UP, 2024)

November 23, 2024

Negative Life

Steven Swarbrick and Jean-Thomas Tremblay
Hosted by Jules O'Dwyer

In Negative Life: The Cinema of Extinction (Northwestern UP, 2024), Steven Swarbrick and Jean-Thomas Tremblay enact a dialogue between cinema, philoso…

Shalini Kakar, "Devotional Fanscapes: Bollywood Star Deities, Devotee-Fans, and Cultural Politics in India and Beyond" (Rowman and Littlefield, 2023)

November 21, 2024

Devotional Fanscapes

Shalini Kakar
Hosted by Raj Balkaran

Devotional Fanscapes: Bollywood Star Deities, Devotee-Fans, and Cultural Politics in India and Beyond (Rowman and Littlefield, 2023) examines how fans…

Vivian Asimos, "Cosplay and the Dressing of Identity" (Reaktion, 2024)

November 20, 2024

Cosplay and the Dressing of Identity

Vivian Asimos
Hosted by Miranda Melcher

Cosplay, born from the fusion of ‘costume’ and ‘play’, transcends mere dress-up by transforming enthusiasts of TV shows, movies, books or video games …

A Serious Man

November 18, 2024

A Serious Man

A Serious Man (2009) may seem much different from the Coens’ adaptation of No Country for Old Men, which they released two years earlier. But they bo…

Nicholas Baer, "Historical Turns: Weimar Cinema and the Crisis of Historicism" (U California Press, 2024)

November 16, 2024

Historical Turns

Nicholas Baer
Hosted by Miranda Melcher

Historical Turns: Weimar Cinema and the Crisis of Historicism (University of California Press, 2024) by Dr. Nicholas Baer reassesses Weimar cinema in …

Erin Lee Mock, "Changed Men: Veterans in American Popular Culture after World War II" (U Virginia Press, 2024)

November 16, 2024

Changed Men

Erin Lee Mock
Hosted by Miranda Melcher

Millions of GIs returned from overseas in 1945. A generation of men who had left their families and had learned to kill and to quickly dispatch sexual…

Elsie Walker, "Life 24x a Second: Cinema, Selfhood, and Society" (Oxford UP, 2023)

November 14, 2024

Life 24x a Second

Elsie Walker
Hosted by Pete Kunze

Life 24x a Second: Cinema, Selfhood, and Society (Oxford UP, 2023) highlights the life-sustaining and life-affirming power of cinema. Author Elsie Wal…

Laure Astourian, "The Ethnographic Optic: Jean Rouch, Chris Marker, Alain Resnais, and the Turn Inward in 1960s French Cinema" (Indiana UP, 2024)

November 14, 2024

The Ethnographic Optic

Laure Astourian
Hosted by Arya Rani

The Ethnographic Optic: Jean Rouch, Chris Marker, Alain Resnais, and the Turn Inward in 1960s French Cinema (Indiana UP, 2024) traces the surprising r…

Hunter Hargraves, "Uncomfortable Television" (Duke UP, 2024)

November 12, 2024

Uncomfortable Television

Hunter Hargraves
Hosted by Cory Barker

From The Wire to Intervention to Girls, postmillennial American television has dazzled audiences with novelistic seriality and cinematic aesthetics. Y…

Sarah Cleary, "The Myth of Harm: Horror, Censorship and the Child" (Bloomsbury, 2022)

November 12, 2024

The Myth of Harm

Sarah Cleary
Hosted by Jazz Walker

The horror genre has endured a long and controversial success within popular culture. Fraught with accusations pertaining to its alleged ability to ha…

True Believer

November 11, 2024

True Believer

Actors win awards and gain our admiration when they convince us that they have “become” someone else–it’s what we mean when we say that so-and-so “inh…

Daniela Berghahn, "Exotic Cinema: Encounters with Cultural Difference in Contemporary Transnational Film" (Edinburgh UP, 2023)

November 9, 2024

Exotic Cinema

Daniela Berghahn
Hosted by Arya Rani

Daniela Berghahn's award-winning monograph Exotic Cinema: Encounters with Cultural Difference in Contemporary Transnational Film (Edinburgh UP, 2023) …

Blow Out

November 4, 2024

Blow Out

Political noise is as American as baseball and apple pie and in this election season it’s impossible to tune it out completely: it’s on our television…

The Fly

October 28, 2024

The Fly

There’s a moment in The Fly (1986) in which Seth Brundle–well into his transformation into Brundlefly–explains that he must vomit on a donut before ea…

Landon Palmer, "Rock Star/Movie Star: Power and Performance in Cinematic Rock Stardom" (Oxford UP, 2020)

October 26, 2024

Rock Star/Movie Star

Landon Palmer
Hosted by Pete Kunze

During the mid-1950s, when Hollywood found itself struggling to compete within an expanding entertainment media landscape, certain producers and studi…

Manchester by the Sea

October 21, 2024

Manchester by the Sea

You can’t judge a book by its cover or a movie by its poster. When Mike suggested Manchester by the Sea (2016) for the pod, Dan hooted and derided hi…

Kevin Sanson, "Mobile Hollywood: Labor and the Geography of Production" (U California Press, 2024)

October 20, 2024

Mobile Hollywood

Kevin Sanson
Hosted by Dave O'Brien

What is the future of the film industry? In Mobile Hollywood Labor and the Geography of Production (U California Press, 2024), Kevin Sanson, Professor…