The Brattle Film Podcast The Brattle Theater, Ian Brownell, Ivy Moylan, Ned Hinkle, Alissa Darsa

As the dog days of summer approach, we take a look at the sweatiest movies we can think of.  Many of these films artfully showcase how oppressive heat leads to conflict. 

We welcome Susan Seidelman to the podcast in celebration of her new memoir and her upcoming live appearance at the Brattle on July 18th. In addition to listening to stories about her life in film, we talk about what her films have meant to us and what it was like revisiting many of them while reading her book. We also dive into the past couple of months of listener mail.

We kick off Season 5 with our annual Reunion Week show, talking about films celebrating their 75th, 50th, and 25th anniversaries. This year, that's 1949, the year of the first televised Oscar ceremony; 1974, one of the greatest movie years of all time; and 1999, a pivotal, trendsetting year for cinema. While our discussion is tied to the series running at the Brattle, we touch on all sorts of films from each year in this extra-long episode.

We close out our 4th season with a show about needle drops, those brilliant and sometimes lazy pop music choices filmmakers employ to set a tone, evoke an era, express a character's unspoken emotions, or just give the film a burst of energy. 

Boston Underground Film Festival programmers Kevin Monahan and Nicole McControversy join us to discuss the history of this unique fest and their 2024 lineup.

We wrap up awards season with more thoughts on the terrific year in film that was 2023, including discussions about the 10 Best Picture nominees, the documentary and international feature nominees, the idiocy of this year's Oscar controversies as well as other internet hot takes that surrounded the big movies before and after their releases, and we shine our appreciation on the big swings taken by actors and filmmakers this year.