Blockbusters and Birdwalks
At Blockbusters and Birdwalks, you’ll listen to reviews and conversations about all kinds of movies, from Academy Award winners to exploitation masterpieces with a mix of commercial hits and obscure favorites thrown in for good measure. The point is recognizing that movies present our culture with the building blocks of social memory, enabling each of us to enjoy ourselves because movies are fun.
- Update frequency
- every 8 days
- Average duration
- 21 minutes
- Episodes
- 165
- Years Active
- 2021 - 2025
1971, a conversation – “The Beguiled”
This is part of a series about movies from 1971.
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Referenced media:
- “The Big Doll House” (Jack Hill, 1971)
- “Song of the South” (Harve Foster and Wilfred Jackson, 1946)
- “The Birth of a Nation” (D.W. Gr…
1971, a conversation – “Duck, You Sucker!”
This is part of a series about movies from 1971.
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Referenced media:
- “The Big Doll House” (Jack Hill, 1971)
- “The Wild Bunch” (Sam Peckinpah, 1969)
- “Jules and Jim” (Francois Truffaut, 1962)
- “Brokeback Mo…
1971, a conversation – “The Decameron”
This is part of a series about movies from 1971.
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Referenced media:
- “The Big Doll House” (Jack Hill, 1971)
- “The Devils” (Ken Russell, 1971)
- “Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom” (Pier Paolo Pasolini, 1975)
- …
1971, a conversation – “Punishment Park”
This is part of a series about movies from 1971.
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Referenced media:
- “The Big Doll House” (Jack Hill, 1971)
- “The Omega Man” (Boris Sagal, 1971)
- “The Last Movie” (Dennis Hopper, 1971)
- “The French Connect…
1971, a conversation – “The Devils”
This is part of a series about movies from 1971.
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Referenced media:
- “The Big Doll House” (Jack Hill, 1971)
- “Crimes of Passion” (Ken Russell, 1984)
- “Deep Throat” (Gerard Damiano, 1972)
- “Behind the Green…
1971, a conversation – “McCabe & Mrs. Miller”
This is part of a series about movies from 1971.
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Referenced media:
- “The Big Doll House” (Jack Hill, 1971)
- “Benson” (Susan Harris, 1979-1986)
- “First Cow” (Kelly Reichardt, 2019)
- “Dances with Wolves” (K…
1971, a conversation – “Klute”
This is part of a series about movies from 1971.
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Referenced media:
- “The Big Doll House” (Jack Hill, 1971)
- “The Deuce” (George Pelecanos and David Simon, 2017-2019)
- “Halloween” (John Carpenter, 1978)
- “…
1971, a conversation – “Bananas”
This is part of a series about movies from 1971.
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Referenced media:
- “The Big Doll House” (Jack Hill, 1971)
- “The Muppet Show” (Jim Henson, 1976-1981)
- “The Benny Hill Show” (Benny Hill, 1955-1989)
- “Satur…
1971, a conversation – “The Andromeda Strain”
This is part of a series about movies from 1971.
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Referenced media:
- “The Big Doll House” (Jack Hill, 1971)
- “Jurassic Park” (Steven Spielberg, 1993)
- “The X-Files” (Chris Carter, 1993-2002, 2016-2018)
- “D…
“Mom and Dad” (1945), a conversation about a Blockbuster
Garrett Chaffin-Quiray and Ed Rosa learn something new about the birds and the bees: avoid “the Great Imitator”.
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Referenced media:
- “Johnny Dangerously” (Amy Heckerling, 1984)
- “Gone with the Wind” (Vi…
“She Done Him Wrong” (1933), a conversation
Garrett Chaffin-Quiray and Ed Rosa glory in Mae West as the avatar of Pre-Code Hollywood
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Referenced media:
- “Looney Tunes” (Leon Schlesinger, Hugh Harman, and Rudolf Ising, 1930-now)
- “Angels with Dirt…
“Airport” (1970), a conversation about a Blockbuster
Garrett Chaffin-Quiray and Ed Rosa embrace a soap opera in the sky.
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Referenced media:
- “Airplane!” (Jim Abrahams, David Zucker, and Jerry Zucker, 1980)
- “Zero Hour!” (Hall Bartlett, 1957)
- “One on Top of…
“An Officer and a Gentleman” (1982), a conversation about a Blockbuster
Garrett Chaffin-Quiray and Ed Rosa visit where the eagles cry, on a mountain high, far from the world we know, where the clear winds blow.
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Referenced media:
- “Police Academy” (Hugh Wilson, 1984)
- “Top …
“Cleopatra” (1963), a conversation about a Blockbuster
Garrett Chaffin-Quiray and Ed Rosa assess prestige kitsch and consider carrying a spathae to defend a London-born Egyptian matriarch.
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Referenced media:
- “My Fair Lady” (George Cukor, 1964)
- “Who’s Afra…
“Walk the Line” (2005), a conversation about a Blockbuster
Garrett Chaffin-Quiray and Ed Rosa consider Johnny Cash, a man with many chapters in his book of life, and wonder if they got to see the right one get made into a movie.
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Referenced media:
- “Terminato…
“Doctor Zhivago” (1965), a conversation about a Blockbuster
Garrett Chaffin-Quiray and Ed Rosa examine one middle brow entertainment that earned an inflation-adjusted box office gross of over $1,000,000,000 in North America.
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Referenced media:
- “The Bridges of…
"Sound of Freedom” (2023), a conversation about a Blockbuster
Garrett Chaffin-Quiray and Ed Rosa analyze the sleeper hit of summer 2023.
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Referenced media:
- “The Passion of the Christ” (Mel Gibson, 2004)
- “Law & Order: SVU” (Dick Wolf, 1999-now)
- “God’s Not Dead” (H…
"The Mule" (2018), a conversation about a Blockbuster
Garrett Chaffin-Quiray and Ed Rosa consider whether it’s worth having the best-paid, part-time job in the history of movies.
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Referenced media:
- “Saturday Night Live” (Lorne Michaels, 1975-now)
- “Gran T…
"Turn Me On, Goddammit!" (2011), a conversation
Garrett Chaffin-Quiray and Ed Rosa discuss Alma, a high school girl boiling over with sexual curiosity in a small Norwegian town.
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Referenced media:
- “Top Gun” (Tony Scott, 1986)
- “The Hunger Games” (Ga…
"Beau Travail" (1999), a conversation
Garrett Chaffin-Quiray and Ed Rosa consider how Herman Melville’s novella, “Billy Budd”, was translated into a movie that the 2022 “Sight and Sound” poll of the greatest films of all time maintains i…