The Barista Collective

I’ll be in my trailer… watching trailers: Dead, dead, dead

06/10/2024The Barista CollectiveLeave a comment

Join us every week for a trip into the weird and wonderful world of trailers. Whether it’s the first teaser for the latest instalment in your favourite franchise, an obscure preview for a strange indie darling, whether it’s good, bad, ugly or just plain weird – your favourite pop culture baristas are there to tell you what they think.

For this week’s Six Damn Fine Degrees, Matt took us to the scene of the crime – or, in German, Tatort, one of the longest-running series on German television. Though here’s a trailer for an Austrian episode, because everything’s more charming with an Austrian accent.

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A Damn Fine Cup of Culture Podcast #85: Halloween Special – Death in Venice (and Summerisle)

05/10/202404/10/2024The Barista Collective1 Comment

The 1970s were a bad time for men travelling in Europe, doubly so if they were following the traces of a mysterious girl, and triply so if they weren’t good at listening to advice. Before you know it, you meet with a gruesome fate at the hands of cultists or misshapen serial killers, and then where will you be? Dead! That’s where. Dead in Venice or Summerisle.

For this year’s October episode, we finally fulfil a common wish of ours: join Matt, Sam and Julie as they talk about two creepy favourites of theirs, the cult folk horror that is the original The Wicker Man, directed by Robin Hardy, and the mournful, intricate, watery loops of Nicolas Roeg’s Don’t Look Now. Apart from both coming out in 1973 and being shown as a double bill at the time, what do these two films have in common? Why are they both such enduring classics, in spite of very clearly being products of their time? And – in keeping with our summer theme – why do the two films resist being remade, in spite of an ill-fated attempt by Neil LaBute and starring Nicolas Cage at maximum Cage?

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I’ll be in my trailer… watching trailers: If you go down to the prom tonight, you’re sure of a big surprise

29/09/202419/10/2024The Barista CollectiveLeave a comment

For this week’s Six Damn Fine Degrees, Julie turned the conversation to the iconic Once Upon a Time in the West by the equally iconic Sergio Leone.

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I’ll be in my trailer… watching trailers: Floating in space

22/09/2024The Barista CollectiveLeave a comment

It seems we’ve been doing our weekly feature Six Damn Fine Degrees for a while: this week saw the release of the 200^th instalment – which prompted Alan to take a time-out from the usual free association and look back on some of his favourite posts and associations. Follow him down this particular rabbit hole here.

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A Damn Fine Espresso: September 2024

21/09/202421/09/2024The Barista Collective2 Comments

We’ve talked about the Alien franchise before on our podcast, so we didn’t want to miss the opportunity presented by the release of the latest addition to the series, Alien: Romulus, which came out in August. Join Sam and Alan as they talk about Fede Álvarez’ return to the roots of the franchise. How successful is the movie’s ‘back to basics’ approach? How scary can the film be after an entire series has done a lot to strip its iconic set of monsters of their original mystery? What have Álvarez and his collaborators done to keep all things xenomorph fresh, how do they play with an almost overpowering legacy? And what about that unexpected return from the dead: an effective homage or a tacky reference?

For more thoughts on the long-running Alien franchise, check out the following podcast episodes:

A Damn Fine Cup of Culture Podcast #34: Xeno-who? The Alien franchise (the first episode featuring our very own Alan?
A Damn Fine Cup of Culture Podcast #67: Second Chances – Two Androids called David (in which Alan and Matt discuss Prometheus, as well as Steven Spielberg’s A.I.)

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I’ll be in my trailer… watching trailers: You gotta know when to hold, know when to fold

15/09/2024The Barista CollectiveLeave a comment

Our Summer of Remakes podcast series ended at the beginning of the month, but Sam – whose idea the series theme was – had some thoughts looking back. So let’s start this week’s trailer -out not with a trailer but with what appears to be the first remake ever: Georges Méliès’ “Playing Cards”.

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I’ll be in my trailer… watching trailers: Listen to them, the children of the night

08/09/2024The Barista Collective1 Comment

How do we choose the things we watch? And is there such a thing as too much choice? In this week’s Six Damn Fine Degrees, Matt wrote about the extremely limited viewing choices of his childhood – and how they are in part the reason why he’s so much into film.

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A Damn Fine Cup of Culture Podcast #84: Summer of Remakes – A Star is Born

07/09/202406/09/2024The Barista Collective2 Comments

Our Summer of Remakes is coming to an end, with a conversation about not one, two, three or four films, but a whopping five, starting with What Price Hollywood? (1932), which was adapted in 1937 into A Star Is Born – and again in 1954, starring Judy Garland and James Mason. Then, in 1976, the story got the Streisand treatment, and in 2018 we got Bradley Cooper’s version, starring himself and Lady Gaga. Join Julie, Sam and Alan as they talk about the remake extravaganza. What is it about the material that makes it so enduring? How do the films tell their story differently? And, if A Star Is Born, is such an enduring tale, what would our cultural baristas expect from a near-future remake, should one be forthcoming?

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I’ll be in my trailer… watching trailers: Back to school

01/09/2024The Barista CollectiveLeave a comment

For this week’s Six Damn Fine Degrees, Mege wrote about The Umbrella Academy. What’s this: a Netflix series that is actually allowed to run until the end?