Podcasts – Steven Benedict

For my final podcast, I look at how Steven Spielberg effectively remade his first feature, Firelight to deliver a message of hope. The post 401. Close Encounters of the Third Kind appeared first on Steven Benedict.

In January 1954, Francois Truffaut wrote a landmark essay on film criticism. Five years later, he put his theory into practice and cinema never been the same since. The post 400. The 400 Blows appeared first on Steven Benedict.

The gangster genre is dominated by men, but in Martin Scorsese's The Irishman the most important position is held by a woman who utters barely a dozen words. The post 399. The Irishman appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Rome Open City began filming as Auschwitz was liberated and Roberto Rossellini's film marks a crucial step in the creation of art in the wake of the Holocaust. The post 398. Rome, Open City appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Puzzling audiences ever since it premiered at Cannes in 2001, David Lynch's dark masterpiece seems to address the abuse of women in the film industry. The post 397. Mulholland Dr. appeared first on Steven Benedict.

With this modernist masterpiece, Michelangelo Antonioni told a story that abandoned its initial plot. Booed at Cannes, it paved the way for a new cinematic form. The post 396. L’Avventura appeared first on Steven Benedict.

It is said a film is made three times; writing, filming and editing. In which case, editor Walter Murch deserves enormous credit for this masterpiece. The post 395. The Conversation appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Like many Fellini films, Amarcord is a contradiction; an account of his youth yet a complete fabrication, a vivid realisation of the past, but also a dream. The post 394. Amarcord appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Four years after the advent of sound in cinema, Charlie Chaplin insisted on making a silent movie the entire plot for which hinged on not being able to see. The post 393. City Lights appeared first on Steven Benedict.

This French masterpiece avoids all the clichés of American prison films while at the same time bearing an uncanny similarity to a 1960s' Japanese action picture. The post 392. Un prophète appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Twenty-one feature films, $14b at the worldwide box-office and 15 Oscars. If you ever wondered about the secret of Pixar's success, read their mission statement. The post 391. WALL•E appeared first on Steven Benedict.

In Agnes Varda's classic, Corrine Marchand plays one woman; happy Cléo and anxious Florence, walking about Paris in real time awaiting her medical results. The post 390. Cléo from 5 to 7 appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Whether it be ethically, legally, politically, geographically or even chemically, Michael Mann's multi-Oscar nominated picture is about crossing the line. The post 389. The Insider appeared first on Steven Benedict.

In adapting Wajdi Mouawad’s play, Denis Villeneuve used two time lines to push the past against the present and ask if suffering is the only outcome of war. The post 388. Incendies appeared first on Steven Benedict.

The Palme d'Or winner in 1949, Carol Reed's masterpiece drew on covert sources and unexpected styles and techniques to deliver a melancholic mystery. The post 387. The Third Man appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Master auteur, Abbas Kiarostami forged his career by defying conventional film grammar to successfully find new ways of presenting the human condition. The post 386. Ten appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Originally titled Whore's Gold, Clint Eastwood's Oscar-winning western exposes the psychosis, bigotry and misogyny at the heart of the genre's mythology. The post 385. Unforgiven appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Matteo Garrone's adaptation of Roberto Saviano's book on the Neapolitan camorra smacks down the innumerable movies that have marketed the Mafia mythology. The post 384. Gomorrah appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Forget Vertigo. Alfred Hitchcock's greatest film is Notorious. With his usual McGuffin, he wrapped a paranoid love story inside an espionage thriller about genocide. The post 383. Notorious appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Asghar Farhadi's Oscar-winning divorce drama delivers a story that is specific to a particular time and place yet also manages to resonate on a universal level. The post 382. A Separation appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Almost seventy years young, this masterpiece offers up for our modern age unexpected and pertinent meaning. The post 381. Singin’ in the Rain appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Kenji Mizoguchi's masterpiece owes a great debt of gratitude to Kazuo Miyagawa's luminous, shimmering cinematography. The post 380. Ugetsu Monogatari appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Released in 1969, Midnight Cowboy is a landmark film that examines male identity, intimacy, sexuality and trauma. The post 379. Midnight Cowboy appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Cristian Mungiu won the Palme d'Or for his unflinching drama about a single day in the lives of two young women. The post 378. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Mindhunter marks the fourth time David Fincher has depicted serial-killers. Far from resorting to tired clichés, with the second season he has again broken new ground. The post 377. Mindhunter appeared first on Steven Benedict.

In Carl Theodor Dreyer's silent masterpiece, the story isn't so much told through Joan's eyes as much as we read it on her face. The post 376. The Passion of Joan of Arc appeared first on Steven Benedict.

With his Palme d'Or winning debut, Steven Soderbergh made a modern classic as well as a how-to manual for film students. The post 375. sex, lies, and videotape appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Few film songs come anywhere near the layered meanings of Falling in Love Again, sung by Marlene Dietrich in Josef von Sternberg’s The Blue Angel. The post 374. The Blue Angel appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Superficially, Cast Away asks whether modern man can survive alone on a desert island. But Robert Zemeckis' best film is really about destiny vs. free will. The post 373. Cast Away appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Robert Bresson's masterpiece is a perfect example of less is more; natural acting, minimal music, off-screen sounds and restricting yourself to a 50mm lens. The post 372. A Man Escaped appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Tom Wolfe's superb account about the early days of NASA's space program needed filmmakers who shared a daring similar to the maverick pilots. The post 371. The Right Stuff appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Nostalgia originally had nothing to do with the past but rather a desire to return home. Cinema Paradiso resonates with the feeling that cinema is your home. The post 370. Cinema Paradiso appeared first on Steven Benedict.

If small details are the important, this is really about a woman's quest for significance and a man's need for a make-over. The post 369. North by Northwest appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Perhaps the greatest ever film about an artist, Andrei Rublev steadfastly refuses to show its subject painting let alone him holding a brush in his hand. The post 368. Andrei Rublev appeared first on Steven Benedict.

How do you make a film about a sociopath who murders his entire extended family and still get the audience to root for him? The post 367. Kind Hearts and Coronets appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Widely regarded as the greatest war picture ever made, Elem Klimov's Come and See takes its title from The Book of Revelations to deliver a vision of hell. The post 366. Come and See appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Released to ecstatic reviews in 1998, Steven Spielberg's film soon suffered a backlash. Twenty-one years on it has finally come of age. The post 365. Saving Private Ryan appeared first on Steven Benedict.

How did Wolfgang Petersen manage to get audiences to care about a bunch of Nazi sailors trying to destroy the British fleet in the North Atlantic? The post 364. Das Boot appeared first on Steven Benedict.

No matter how cinematic, all films are nothing more than a form of writing that borrows from other forms of writing. Which is why Arrival comes in code. The post 363. Arrival appeared first on Steven Benedict.

There are several good reasons to watch Bernardo Bertolucci’s controversial drama. Not all of them make for palatable viewing. The post 362. Last Tango in Paris appeared first on Steven Benedict.

What if science-fiction were not a literary genre but a political and ideological theory. If so, Alex Garland uses Ex Machina to show us how he sees the world. The post 361. Ex Machina appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Ari Folman's animated documentary is different from many other films about trauma. But it is only in its final moments that it reveal its most telling truth. The post 360. Waltz with Bashir appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Five years in the making, David Lynch's film is one of the most compelling, bewildering, original, disturbing and influential debuts in all of cinema. The post 359. Eraserhead appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Bong Joon-Ho embraced every cliché of the serial killer genre to examine masculinity, institutional repression and national identity. The post 358. Memories of Murder appeared first on Steven Benedict.

In adapting Stephen King's best-seller, Stanley Kubrick drew on a genre other than horror and used a new motif that he would repeat for the rest of his career. The post 357. The Shining appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Michael Haneke asks audiences difficult questions yet never provides easy answers. When he calls his film Hidden, can we expect anything different? The post 356. Hidden appeared first on Steven Benedict.

If such an inscrutable character sits at the heart of John Le Carré's labyrinthine plot, how is the adaptation such a lucid film? The post 355. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy appeared first on Steven Benedict.

The vampire genre is ripe with themes; sexuality, feminism, xenophobia, disease, yet Let The Right One In broke new ground. The post 354. Let The Right One In appeared first on Steven Benedict.

For a film that requires so many special effects in order to create the feeling of weightlessness, how did Alfonso Cuarón still keep Gravity so grounded? The post 353. Gravity appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Alfonso Cuarón has long flirted with the neorealist style. His latest masterpiece, Roma illustrates cinema is not about what you show, but how you show it. The post 352. Roma appeared first on Steven Benedict.

Ever since its release in 1995, Heat has been held as the greatest ever heist movie. But it has another, completely different film living... and dying inside of it. The post 351. Heat appeared first on Steven Benedict.