Author Archives: The Hyphenates

Our Next Hyphenate: Jess Lomas

Film critic, author and January 2015 Hyphenate Jess Lomas

Jess Lomas was very nearly our guest a few episodes ago. Quite a few episodes ago. In fact, she was nearly one of our very first guests back in 2010 when we started the show. It was conflicting schedules on all sides that thwarted it from happening back then, and we're not entirely sure why it took us four-and-a-half years to sort our diaries out, but we're just delighted that we finally stuck a pin in the calendar. Such is the advantage of a never-ending show!

Jess is an author, editor and film critic, who is probably best known to film fans as a contributor to Quickflix, writing on both new and classic films. She also writes about pop culture, health, diet and lifestyle for various publications, and has penned many titles primarily covering topics such as music and food.

Which filmmaker has Jess opted to discuss on the show?

None other than Hollywood Golden Age director Vincente Minnelli!

Minnelli is mainly known for his deft hand with some of the greatest musicals of cinema history, directing the likes of Gene Kelly, Judy Garland, Fred Astaire, Cyd Charisse and Howard Keel in films such as Meet Me In St Louis, Ziegfeld Follies, The Pirate, The Band Wagon, Kismet, Brigadoon, and the all-time classic An American In Paris.

But he was also a consummate filmmaker when it came to dramas, thrillers and comedies, with films such as the Katharine Hepburn noir Undercurrent, the Gustave Flaubert melodrama Madame Bovary, the Spencer Tracy comedy Father of the Bride, the Lucille Ball/Desi Arnaz vehicle The Long, Long Trailer, the Vincent Van Gogh biopic Lust For Life, and many, many more.

What is it about Minnelli in particular that Jess so loves? And how did he become one of cinema's most groundbreaking innovators? Check back in when the episode is released on January 31 to find out!

Our next filmmaker of the month, Vincente Minnelli

Watts On Araki

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We always knew we were going to have the wonderful Richard Watts on sooner or later, so we asked him about a year-and-a-half ago which filmmaker he'd pick. He didn't appear to need any time to think about it, immediately answering with “Gregg Araki”.

Araki's such a great Hyphenates choice: he's got a strong authorial voice, a surprising number of titles in his filmography were unknown to us, and he'd only made about a dozen films to date. (This last one sounds trite, but the occasional short filmography can be very appealing given we try to watch everything.) So we were excited by the choice, and even more intrigued once we dove into his works.

But hey, that’s not all. We also talk about some of December’s new releases (Mike Leigh's Mr Turner, Paul King's Paddington, Chris Williams & Don Hall's Big Hero 6, and Peter Jackson's The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies), and count down our respective top five films of the year.

All this in our one hour show! Crazy, right? What’s crazier is not getting it in your ear holes right now. Listen to it on Stitcher Smart Radio, subscribe via iTunes, or right here.

Hell Is For Hyphenates – December 2014

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Arts journalist and broadcaster Richard Watts guest hosts this episode of Hyphenates, talking about the films of December 2014, comparing notes on the best films of the year, and looking at the films and career of indie filmmaker and key figure in the New Queer Cinema movement, Gregg Araki.

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Best Of 2014 Round-Up

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Want to find out what all of our previous guests thought of 2014? Here's a collection of Best Ofs, Round-Ups and Compilations from all of our Hyphenate alumni. Or at least all of those who made such lists.

(The post will be continually updated as more lists are published.)

Luke Buckmaster (November 2010): Australian Film in 2014, The Top Ten Films of 2014

Thomas Caldwell (June 2010): Favourite Films of 2014

Mel Campbell (December 2013): Counting Down the Fourteen Best Films of 2014

Marc Fennell (March 2012): Favourite Movies of 2014

Giles Hardie (August 2013): The Best Films of 2014

Rich Haridy (December 2012): Best Films of 2014

Zak Hepburn (March 2014): The Best and Worst Films of 2014

Drew McWeeny (April 2014): Top Ten of 2014

Simon Miraudo (July 2011): The Top Ten Films of 2014 (text), The Top Ten Films of 2014 (audio)

Anthony Morris (May 2011): The Ten Best Films of 2014 (and their evil twins)

Paul Anthony Nelson: Rankfest 2014: The Good, The Better and The Best

Sarah Ward (April 2011): The Ten Best Films Hardly Anyone Saw In 2014, The Best Films of 2014

Lee Zachariah: The Best Films of 2014, 2014 Was a Good Year For Australian Film

Hi4H’s 2014 Year In Review

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2014 was a pretty great year for Hell Is For Hyphenates. We reached our 50^th episode, we had our first ever live show at the Sydney Film Festival, we landed guests such as Lynn Shelton and Joe Swanberg, and, most importantly, we started this blog.

We thought this would be a good opportunity to take stock, and make some lists that isn't the traditional â€œBest Ofâ€ (those will come later). Please feel free to chime in with your own answers in the comments.

Top five Hi4H film discoveries (that you hadn't seen before)?

Paul: The Long Goodbye (1973, Altman - I'm restricting myself to one film per filmmaker, so just know I could've easily filled this list with Altmans: California Split and HealtH chief among them), M. Hulot's Holiday (1953, Tati), An Unmarried Woman (1978, Mazursky), Dirty Mary Crazy Larry (1974, Hough), Subway (1985, Besson).

Lee: I'm also gonna limit it to one per filmmaker to keep things slightly easier. Images (1972, Altman), Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (1969, Mazursky), Dirty Mary Crazy Larry (1974, Hough), Dracula: Pages From a Virgin's Diary (2002, Maddin), Beau Travail (1999, Denis).

Which new filmmakers to emerge in 2014 are you most excited about?

Paul: Can't I just say â€œXavier Dolanâ€ five times? No? Okay. But Xavier Dolan is my clear #1 here. While he's been making films since 2009, I saw four of his five features - two of which were premieres - in 2014. A preternatural wunderkind who brings a unique blend of social realism, melodrama and bold cinematic style to bear, with uncommon power and moxie. Ana Lily Amirpour (just for being supercool and singular of vision), Jennifer Kent (for bringing a dramatic, thematic approach back to horror), Damien Chazelle (while Whiplash blew others away more than me, there was an uncommon command of craft - and an interesting voice - I'm keen to see more of), Joe & Anthony Russo: with one film, these frequent sitcom directors managed to single-handedly restore my faith in the Marvel Studios model.

Lee: So, so many. Gillian Rospierre (Obvious Child), Desiree Akhavan (Appropriate Behavior), Damien Chazelle (Whiplash), Jennifer Kent (The Babadook), Charlie McDowell (The One I Love), Lake Bell (In a World…), Ana Lily Amirpour (A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night), Sophie Hyde (52 Tuesdays). I'm excited about what everyone in this group will make next.

Five filmmakers you'd like to see us cover on the show?

Paul: Because they're Masters: Martin Scorsese, Stanley Kubrick, Howard Hawks, Mario Bava. Because I want to examine their career in context: John Carpenter.

Lee: I'm gonna eschew the obvious names (Hitchcock, Scorsese, Kubrick), because they are givens, and go with Kenji Mizoguchi, AgnÃ¨s Varda, Michelangelo Antonioni, Alexandr Sokurov, Douglas Sirk. Is that a bit of a pretentious list? If so, replace one of those names with, I don't know, Brett Ratner. Or, better yet, don't.

Given we're an Australian show, what were your favourite Australian films of the year?

Paul: 1) Cut Snake; 2) Electric Boogaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films; 3) The Rover; 4) The Babadook; 5) The Infinite Man.

Lee: 1) The Babadook; 2) Electric Boogaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films; 3) The Rover; 4) Charlie’s Country; 5) Canopy. The fact that this list was so difficult to curate speaks to what a great year it was for Australian cinema.

Most Anticipated Films of 2015?

Paul: 1) The Hateful Eight (was there ever any doubt??); 2) Inherent Vice; 3) Tomorrowland; 4) Foxcatcher; 5) Serial Season 2… oh, it has to be films? Okay… Mad Max: Fury Road.

Lee: 1) Paul Thomas Anderson's Inherent Vice; 2) Joss Whedon's Avengers: Age of Ultron; 3) Quentin Tarantino's The Hateful Eight; 4) Todd Haynes' Carol; 5) Martin Scorsese's Silence.

Thank you all for listening this year. We hope you enjoyed it, and we hope you enjoy everything to come in 2015. We have some big plans we can't wait to tell you about.

Big thanks to everyone who helped us out over the year, from our guests to the good people at the Sydney Film Festival, and everyone who loaned us the DVDs and autobiographies we needed for research. Huge thanks to our loyal artist Caroline McCurdy, who did all of our amazing artwork and design.

In the meantime, 2014 isn't done yet! We have our final show for 2014 coming out on the morning of December 31, featuring Richard Watts talking about the films of Gregg Araki, so make sure you kick off your New Year's Eve plans with our latest show!

The Gregg Araki Cheat Sheet

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Want to be knowledgeable about our filmmaker of the month without committing yourself to an entire filmography? Then you need the Hell Is For Hyphenates Cheat Sheet: a suggested double that will make you an insta-expert in the director we're about to discussâ€¦

TOTALLY F***ED UP (1993) and MYSTERIOUS SKIN (2004)

Gregg Araki was one of the biggest names in the New Queer Cinema movement, and of his early films, Totally F***ed Up is probably the best example of this. The first part of Araki's thematic Teenage Apocalypse Trilogy is angsty and lighthearted, dramatic and hilarious. It's stylish but also very genuine, and has a potent MTV aesthetic that makes it feel very, very 1993. And we mean that in a good way. After that, give Mysterious Skin a spin. This is not particularly emblematic of his work, but it's key to understanding Araki as a filmmaker, and features him at the height of his talents. Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays a teenage hustler, unable to shake off the memories of a childhood trauma. It's full-on yet brilliant, and is career-defining stuff from Araki as well as his cast. It simply must be seen.

Substitutions: If you can't get Totally F***ed Up, try The Doom Generation (1995). If you can't get Mysterious Skin, try Kaboom (2010).

The Hidden Gem: We like to recommend a film that's off the beaten path, but that term applies to nearly everything Araki made. Nevertheless, you should try for Splendor (1999), his polygamous romantic comedy that is equal parts parody and sincerity.

The next episode of Hell Is For Hyphenates, featuring Richard Watts talking Gregg Araki, will be released on the morning of December 31 (AEST).

Win a Lynn Shelton DVD Pack!

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The last competition we ran got such a great response, we thought we'd run another. Because giving you things gives us joy. Joy.

This September past we had the wonderful filmmaker Lynn Shelton on the show. Thanks to Madman Entertainment, we have a DVD set featuring three of Lynn's films: Humpday, Your Sister's Sister and Touchy Feely. But that's not all! In that particular episode of Hyphenates, we reviewed the brilliantly funny New Zealand horror-comedy What We Do In The Shadows, and because Madman is so great, they're also throwing that into the mix. We know. You're like, â€œBut that's too much great stuff in one single competition!â€, but we're all about pleasure overload here at Hi4H HQ.

To win the set, simply answer the following question:

In the September 2014 episode of Hell Is For Hyphenates, Lynn Shelton mentions the name of a film that is â€œabsolutely in my top five list of films everâ€. Which film is it and who directed it?

To enter, send your answer to co*********@*****************es.com by midnight on December 31 2014 AEST. All correct answers will be put into a gigantic electronic sorting machine or possibly a hat, and the winning entry will be drawn at random. The winner will then be notified by email.

If you don't want to leave it to the fates, you can order the discs right this second from Madman: Humpday, Your Sister's Sister, Touchy Feely, What We Do In The Shadows.

Our Next Hyphenate: Richard Watts

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Arts journalist and December 2014 Hyphenate Richard Watts

Richard Watts has been on our guest wishlist since about five minutes after we came up with the concept of Hyphenates, so we're pretty excited to end 2014 with him. He is, after all, the busiest arts journalist we know, and we're still not entirely convinced there isn't a fleet of Richard Watts Clones out there covering the Australian arts scene from every angle imaginable.

If this theory is correct, then we're delighted to have one of the Clones joining us. If you're somehow not familiar with his work, Richard will this Thursday celebrate a full decade as the host of Triple R's SmartArts, he is the National Performing Arts Journalist at ArtsHub, he was the Artistic Director of Express Media for five years, and spent seven years on the board of the Melbourne Fringe Festival, including three years as chair. He has been involved in the programming of numerous festivals, including Next Wave, the National Young Writers' Festival, and the Melbourne Queer Film Festival.

So which filmmaker has Richard opted to talk about?

Drumroll please: it’s US indie director Gregg Araki!

Araki was one of the biggest names in the New Queer Cinema movement, with films such as Three Bewildered People in the Night (1987), The Long Weekend (O' Despair) (1989), The Living End (1992) and Totally F***ed Up (1993) making his name on the festival circuit.

He reached a wider audience with 1995's cult film The Doom Generation, and is probably best known for his 2004 film Mysterious Skin, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Michele Trachenberg and Elisabeth Shue. This year, he made White Bird in a Blizzard, with Shailene Woodley and Eva Green.

What is it about this filmmaker that Richard so admires, and why should all good cinephiles be more familiar with Araki's name? You'll have to listen in on December 31 to find out!

Our next filmmaker of the month, Gregg Araki

Hartley On Hough

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When Mark Hartley first suggested John Hough as the filmmaker he'd want to talk about, we won't deny it: we went scurrying to IMDb to see who he was and what he'd made.

We'd definitely heard of many of those films, such as Twins of Evil, Watcher in the Woods, Escape From Witch Mountain, American Gothic, but these works were not heavily branded with the director’s name in the way of a film by, say, the Coen Bros film or David Lynch.

Hough is a jobbing director, and probably the first one we've ever talked about on the show. That in itself makes this a special episode. But we were also keen to see who the director behind Not Quite Hollywood, Machete Maidens Unleashed!, and Electric Boogaloo - three documentaries that were absolute celebrations of a type of film that rarely gets the time of day - would choose.

His choice definitely didn't disappoint. Even some of Hough's films that may seem like write-offs hold some merit, and this discussion of a lesser-known name of genre cinema is, we're confident to say, one you won't hear anyone else.

In addition, we talk about some of the month's new releases, including Christopher Nolan's Interstellar, David Cronenberg's Maps to the Stars, Susanne Bier's Serena, and Dan Gilroy's Nightcrawler. We also look at whether childhood nostalgia clouds our judgement when it comes to bad films, or allows us to see them more clearly than we would with a critical eye.

All of this in our one hour show! Which you can listen to on iTunes, on Stitcher Smart Radio, or right here.

Hell Is For Hyphenates – November 2014

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Filmmaker Mark Hartley (Not Quite Hollywood, Machete Maidens Unleashed, Patrick, Electric Boogaloo) joins the show to talk the new releases of November 2014, ask whether nostalgia ever trumps critical thinking, and explore the filmography of little-known genre director John Hough.

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