Why This Film?

Why This Film?
  • 5.0 (25)
  • Film Interviews

 🎬 Exploring the Criterion Collection, one spine at a time. In each episode, I sit down with film historians, critics, filmmakers, and scholars for in-depth conversations about a single film from the Criterion Collection. I'm Ron, and I guide these expert-driven discussions examining the artistry, cultural significance, and historical context of classic and contemporary cinema. From French New Wave masterpieces to American westerns, from experimental shorts to beloved classics, we unpack what makes these films essential viewing. Whether you're a longtime Criterion collector, a film student, or simply curious about cinema history, Why This Film? offers thoughtful analysis and engaging conversations about the movies that shaped filmmaking. New episodes release 1-2 times monthly. Subscribe to join me for deep dives into the Criterion Collection.

  1. 3h ago ·  Bonus Video

    Bonus: Saute ma ville (1968, Chantal Akerman) with Maggie Hennefeld - Criterion Collection Spine #1203

    "Watch Daisies. Watch Saute ma ville, but then just watch every film they ever made." In this bonus episode is Why This Film?, I'm joined again by Maggie Hennefeld, my guest for Daisies, to explore Saute ma ville, Chantal Akerman's 1968 short film, part of the larger Chantal Akerman Masterpieces, 1968-1978 collection and Criterion Collection Spine #1203. One woman, one kitchen, and a door she locks behind her. Made was Akerman was only 18 years old and starring herself, Saute ma ville depicts rituals of domestic life until reaching an explosive climax. My guest is Maggie Hennefeld, Professor of Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature at the University of Minnesota. She is the author of Specters of Slapstick and Silent Film Comediennes, co-creator of Cinema's First Nasty Women, a four-disc collection of silent-era films about feminist protest and slapstick sabotage, and co-editor of Unwatchable, a book about media that resists or punishes the act of watching it. Her latest book, Death by Laughter, is a history of women who allegedly died laughing too hard. Who better to ask whether a 13-minute film about a woman taking apart her kitchen is funny? Together we pair it with our Daisies conversation and discuss: Chantal Akerman at only 18 and the themes she tackles in her first film.The relationship to this and Jeanne DielmanDomestic laborTwo endings built around and explosionWhere to go next with Akerman's filmographyWhether you're discovering Sauta ma ville for the first time or returning to it, this conversation explores why a film this short holds the seeds of everything that came after.  Maggie Hennefeld Cinema's First Nasty Women Death by Laughter: Female Hysteria and Early Cinema Specters of Slapstick and Silent Film Comediennes Send us Fan Mail Hollywood ManeStays - Not a pin, not a clip. Just Better. Support the show Follow the Podcast: WhyThisFilm.com Instagram YouTube

    Bonus: Saute ma ville (1968, Chantal Akerman) with Maggie Hennefeld - Criterion Collection Spine #1203

  2. Oct 11 ·  Video

    Daisies (1966, Věra Chytilová) with Maggie Hennefeld - Criterion Collection Spine #1157

    "Cake fights over war." In this episode of Why This Film?, I'm joined by Maggie Hennefeld to explore Daisies, Věra Chytilová’s 1966 Czech New Wave film and Criterion Collection Spine #1157. Two young women, both named Marie, decide that if the world has gone bad, they may as well go bad too. What follows is a kaleidoscope of conned suitors, demolished banquets, and scissored bananas.  My guest is Maggie Hennefeld, Professor of Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature at the University of Minnesota. She is the author of Specters of Slapstick and Silent Film Comediennes, co-creator of Cinema's First Nasty Women, a four-disc collection of silent-era films about feminist protest and slapstick sabotage, and co-editor of Unwatchable, a book about media that resists or punishes the act of watching it. Her latest book, Death by Laughter, is a history of women who allegedly died laughing too hard. She is also a contributor to a new Journal of Cinema and Media Studies dossier marking Daisies' 60th anniversary. If anyone is built to make sense of two women who eat, destroy, and dissolve their own identities as comedy, it's her. Together we move through the film scene by scene and discuss: What the Criterion Collection's numbers say about female directors Chytilová’s career, her bans, and why she may have resisted the word "feminist"Daisies' kinship with silent slapstick cinemaWhat the Maries get out of conning men besides a free mealPhallic food, wasted food, and an attack on well-mannered spectatorshipWhether you're discovering Daisies for the first time or returning to it, this conversation explores why a film this chaotic still feels so deliberate. It's a silly film and, at the same time, one of the most serious.  Maggie Hennefeld  Sixty Years of Daisies: Perspectives on Věra Chytilová’s Anarchic Classic  Women Film Pioneers Project Cinema's First Nasty Women Death by Laughter: Female Hysteria and Early Cinema Specters of Slapstick and Silent Film Comediennes Gustatory Gratitudes by Kelly Gallagher Maggie Hennefeld's Video Lecture for Czech Center NY's Sixty Years of Daisies Send us Fan Mail Hollywood ManeStays - Not a pin, not a clip. Just Better. Support the show Follow the Podcast: WhyThisFilm.com Instagram YouTube

    Daisies (1966, Věra Chytilová) with Maggie Hennefeld - Criterion Collection Spine #1157

  3. Sep 30 ·  Video

    Lone Star (1996, John Sayles) with Domino Perez - Criterion Collection Spine #1202

    "Blood only means what you let it." In this episode of Why This Film?, I'm joined by Domino Perez to explore Lone Star, John Sayles's 1996 neo-western murder mystery and Criterion Collection Spine #1202. A skeleton turns up in the Texas desert, and Sheriff Sam Deeds starts pulling a thread that leads straight back to his own father: Buddy Deeds, the legendary lawman the whole town reveres. What emerges is a film about how a community survives the gap between the story it tells about itself and the truth sitting underneath it. My guest is Domino Perez, Professor of English at the University of Texas at Austin. She's the author of There Was a Woman: La Llorona from Folklore to Popular Culture and Fatherhood in the Borderlands, and her scholarship spans Mexican American and Latinx literature, film, and popular culture. She's also the person who wrote Lone Star's actual Criterion booklet essay, "Past is Present," which makes her about as close to the ideal guest as this show could find for a film built entirely on the questions she's spent her career studying. We discuss: Reading Mercedes and Pilar as Mexican American women rarely given this kind of complexity on screen.The La Llorona folklore and the film's relationship to water and lossHow four very different fathers are portrayed Chucho's line in the dirt and what border meansThe real world 1836 project and how this 1996 film predicted itWhat "Forget the Alamo" actually meansWhether you're discovering Lone Star for the first time or returning to it decades later, this conversation explores why a film about a murdered sheriff ends up being about everyone else in the town. It's a story where solving the crime is almost beside the point. Domino Perez La Llorona from Folklore to Popular Culture Fatherhood in the Borderlands Send us Fan Mail Hollywood ManeStays - Not a pin, not a clip. Just Better. Support the show Follow the Podcast: WhyThisFilm.com Instagram YouTube

    Lone Star (1996, John Sayles) with Domino Perez - Criterion Collection Spine #1202

  4. Sep 3 ·  Video

    The Red Shoes (1948, Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger) with Pamela Hutchinson - Criterion Collection Spine #44

    "Why do you want to live?" In this episode of Why This Film?, I'm joined by film critic and author Pamela Hutchinson to explore The Red Shoes, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's 1948 backstage melodrama and Criterion Collection Spine #44. The Red Shoes follows Vicky Page, a rising ballerina cast as the star of a new ballet built from a Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale, in which a pair of enchanted red shoes dance a woman to her death. Pamela Hutchinson is a writer, critic, and film historian specializing in silent and classic cinema. She's a columnist at Sight & Sound, the founder-editor of Silent London, and her writing has appeared in the Guardian, Empire, the Criterion Collection, and many more. In 2023, she wrote the BFI Film Classics book dedicated entirely to this film, drawing on Michael Powell's personal archive to trace how the film came together. There's no one better suited to help unpack why this film still holds power. Together we move through the film scene by scene and discuss: The real Nijinsky and Diaghilev romanceBoris Lermontov - Collector of SoulsThe blood and injury hidden beneath ballet's gracePowell & Pressburger's partnershipIs Vicky's death a choice or the red shoes' spell?The 17-minute ballet sequenceWhether you're discovering The Red Shoes for the first time or returning to it, this conversation explores why a film about the price of greatness has haunted artists for over 75 years. Pamela Hutchinson Silent London BFI Film Classics: The Red Shoes The Curse of Queen Kelly Send us Fan Mail Hollywood ManeStays - Not a pin, not a clip. Just Better. Support the show Follow the Podcast: WhyThisFilm.com Instagram YouTube

    The Red Shoes (1948, Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger) with Pamela Hutchinson - Criterion Collection Spine #44

  5. Aug 17

    Deep Cover (1992, Bill Duke) with Michael B. Gillespie - Criterion Collection Spine #1086

    "There was a great moment in the 90s with noir films, and I think Deep Cover should always be a part of that consideration." In this episode of Why This Film?, I'm joined by film scholar Michael B. Gillespie to explore Deep Cover, Bill Duke's 1992 noir thriller. Deep Cover follows Russell Stevens, a Cincinnati police officer recruited by the DEA to go undercover at "John Hull" and infiltrate the West Coast's largest cocaine supply chain. As Stevens climbs the ladder, the line between cop and the character he's playing starts to disappear. Michael B. Gillespie is an Associate Professor in the Department of Cinema Studies at NYU and the author of Film Blackness: American Cinema and the Idea of Black Film, which examines Deep Cover as a defining case study. His writing has appeared in Film Comment, Film Quarterly, and The Criterion Collection. He served as consulting producer on the Criterion release of Deep Cover, where he also wrote the accompanying essay. There's no one better suited to help unpack why this film is included in the collection. Together we move through the film and discuss: Why "neo-noir" fails to describe Deep CoverThe police department weaponizing trauma as recruitmentJeff Goldblum's and Larry Fishburne's interracial couplingWhether you're discovering Deep Cover for the first time or returning to it, this conversation explores why a film about a man forced to play a role became one of the defining noirs of its era, and why it still matters today. Michael B. Gillespie Who'll Pay Reparations on My Soul? Film Blackness: American Cinema and the Idea of Black Film Send us Fan Mail Hollywood ManeStays - Not a pin, not a clip. Just Better. Support the show Follow the Podcast: WhyThisFilm.com Instagram YouTube

    Deep Cover (1992, Bill Duke) with Michael B. Gillespie - Criterion Collection Spine #1086

  6. Aug 6 ·  Video

    Matewan (1987, John Sayles) with Jack Ryan - Criterion Collection Spine #999

    "You walk out taking away an awful lot of knowledge of American history that you were never told." In this episode of Why This Film?, I'm joined by film scholar Jack Ryan to explore Matewan, John Sayles's 1987 masterpiece and Criterion Collection Spine #999. Matewan follows Joe Kenehan, a union organizer sent to a small West Virginia mining town in 1920 to bring together workers all kept apart by a coal company determined not to let them realize how much they actually have in common. Sayles builds the tension until the ultimate massacre most of us were never taught. Jack Ryan brings his perspective as the author of John Sayles, Filmmaker (2nd ed., 2010), the definitive critical study of Sayles's career. Having spent years studying Sayles's entire body of work, Jack understands the patterns in how Sayles builds his films. This makes him the perfect guide for understanding Matewan not just as history, but as a film. Together we move through the film scene by scene and discuss: Sayles as a filmmakerHow direct contact with people of the region shapes the feel of a filmHaskell Wexler's use of darkness and palette sans primary colorsThe role of music bringing people togetherJoe Kenehan's pacifist's philosophyWhy the film refuses us any comfort at the endAmerican labor history that schools don't teachWhether you're discovering Matewan for the first time or returning to it, this conversation explores why a film about a massacre most of us never learned about became one of Sayles's most beautiful works and why it still matters. Send us Fan Mail Hollywood ManeStays - Not a pin, not a clip. Just Better. Support the show Follow the Podcast: WhyThisFilm.com Instagram YouTube

    Matewan (1987, John Sayles) with Jack Ryan - Criterion Collection Spine #999

  7. Jul 26 ·  Video

    The 39 Steps (1935, Alfred Hitchcock) with Sid Gottlieb - Criterion Collection Spine #56

    "See how far the truth gets you." In this episode of Why This Film?, I'm joined by film scholar Sid Gottlieb to explore The 39 Steps, Alfred Hitchcock's 1935 masterpiece thriller and a Criterion Collection essential, the film where Hitchcock became definitively Hitchcock. The 39 Steps follows Richard Hannay (Robert Donat), an ordinary Canadian accused of murder he didn't commit. Fleeing across the Scottish Highlands, he's handcuffed to Pamela (Madeleine Carroll), a woman who doesn't believe him. What starts as a spy story becomes a meditation on trust and survival. To survive, Hannay must convince strangers he's telling the truth. But truth doesn't always help. Sid Gottlieb is a Professor of Communication and Media Studies at Sacred Heart University, where he's taught since 1976. He co-edits The Hitchcock Annual and has spent decades inside Hitchcock's own words and interviews through books like Hitchcock on Hitchcock, Framing Hitchcock, and Hitchcock: Interviews. His writing extends to Welles, Capra, and beyond, the kind of range that comes from thinking deeply about how directors construct meaning. He's the ideal guide for understanding how a 1935 suspense thriller became the blueprint for everything Hitchcock would make for the next 40 years. We discuss: Why The 39 Steps is the film where Hitchcock's career took shapeThe "wrong man" motifPerformance and storytelling as survival strategiesHitchcock's critique on institutionsPamela refusing to be won over on charm aloneClass consciousnessThe MacGuffin and why it doesn't matterWhether you're encountering The 39 Steps for the first time or returning to it, this conversation explores a film that moves at breakneck speed while asking questions about who we trust and why. It's a thriller that is also political. It's a love story where the couple barely knows each other. It's a comedy and also a suspense. And it's the film that taught Hitchcock how to be Hitchcock. Send us Fan Mail Hollywood ManeStays - Not a pin, not a clip. Just Better. Support the show Follow the Podcast: WhyThisFilm.com Instagram YouTube

    The 39 Steps (1935, Alfred Hitchcock) with Sid Gottlieb - Criterion Collection Spine #56

  8. Jun 30 ·  Video

    Birth (2004, Jonathan Glazer) with Carlos Aguilar - Criterion Collection Spine #1298

    "It captures an uncanny feeling that relates to grief, that there's something after, the hope we could get more time with someone we love." In this episode of Why This Film?, Film critic Carlos Aguilar joins me to explore Birth, Jonathan Glazer's 2004 psychological thriller and Criterion Collection Spine #1298. Birth follows Anna, a widow living a comfortable Manhattan life who has finally agreed to remarry, ten years after the sudden death of her husband Sean. Then a 10-year-old boy appears at her mother's birthday party claiming to be him. What follows is an unsettling exploration of grief, obsession, and the desperate ways we cling to those we've lost, asking whether the person we mourn is ever truly the person who died, or just the story we've constructed in their place. Carlos brings his perspective as a film critic, writer, and member of both the LA Film Critics Association and the National Society of Film Critics. His work has appeared in The Wrap, Vulture, IndieWire, RogerEbert.com, and The Criterion Collection. He's a passionate advocate for representation and the cinematic legacy of Latin America, and his deep connection to the "mystery of the heart" in film makes him the perfect guide for Glazer's haunting formal precision. Together we move through the film scene by scene and discuss: How grief constructs the deadThe role class and wealth in Anna's griefNicole Kidman's devastating performance and why this remains one of her most daring rolesThe concert sceneWhether Anna ever truly completes the grieving processThe bathtub scene's reception in 2004What happens when we lose someone twiceWhether you're discovering Birth for the first time or returning to it, this conversation explores why a film initially dismissed and misunderstood has become recognized as one of the most essential meditations on grief in contemporary cinema. Send us Fan Mail Hollywood ManeStays - Not a pin, not a clip. Just Better. Support the show Follow the Podcast: WhyThisFilm.com Instagram YouTube

    Birth (2004, Jonathan Glazer) with Carlos Aguilar - Criterion Collection Spine #1298
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About

 🎬 Exploring the Criterion Collection, one spine at a time. In each episode, I sit down with film historians, critics, filmmakers, and scholars for in-depth conversations about a single film from the Criterion Collection. I'm Ron, and I guide these expert-driven discussions examining the artistry, cultural significance, and historical context of classic and contemporary cinema. From French New Wave masterpieces to American westerns, from experimental shorts to beloved classics, we unpack what makes these films essential viewing. Whether you're a longtime Criterion collector, a film student, or simply curious about cinema history, Why This Film? offers thoughtful analysis and engaging conversations about the movies that shaped filmmaking. New episodes release 1-2 times monthly. Subscribe to join me for deep dives into the Criterion Collection.

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  • Creator
    Why This Film?
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    20
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Why This Film?
  • Show Website
    Why This Film?

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