Hot Date with Dan and Vicky

Emily Watson had never acted for the camera before her career making and Oscar nominated turn in Lars von Trier's Breaking the Waves.  The 1996 film was the first film von Trier made after founding t…

An all star cast populates the tiny fictional island of Gloucester Island, MA in 1966's The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming.  Alan Arkin, Carl Reiner, Eve Marie Saint, Jonathan Winters, …

Snapped up by Roadside Attractions at the Sundance Film Festival for 3 million dollars in 2006, director/writer Chris Gorak's first film and passion project Right At Your Door only managed to make it…

Since the publication of Malcolm Lowry's novel Under The Volcano in 1947, Hollywood had tried in vain to adapt it for the big screen.  Artists as varied as Joseph Losey, Luis Bunuel and Ken Russell a…

Prolific Polish American director Rudolph Mate found early success in Hollywood as an acclaimed cinematographer.  For five consecutive years, from 1940-44, he was nominated for the Academy Award for …

By the time the script for Soldier landed with star Kurt Russell it had been kicking around Hollywood for almost 15 years.  Russell, testing his status as a reliable and likable lead actor, asked for…

Movie producer Charles K. Feldman (A Streetcar Named Desire, What's New Pussycat?) was in a bind with the rights to the first James Bond novel, Ian Fleming's Casino Royale.  Albert Broccoli, Howard S…

Humphrey Bogart, on loan from his home studio of Warner Brothers, would often show up to the set of Columbia's 1943's war film Sahara hung over and ready for battle -- both on and off camera.  He was…

What do a killer whale, Lucy Lui, rampaging trucks and crystal skulls have in common?  They all appear in the films on our Hot Date top ten lists.  For our milestone 50th episode we're giving some lo…

Australian director Russell Mulcahy had only one previous narrative film credit on his resume, 1985's Razorback, when he landed the gig directing future cult classic Highlander.  Razorback's atmosphe…

John Frankenheimer took over directing duties from William Friedkin for the sequel to the Oscar-winning 1971 film The French Connection.  He got a reluctant Gene Hackman to return to star as New York…

Alfred Hitchcock ushered in the advent of film sound with 1929's Blackmail, which became England's first talkie.  British producers, concerned they were lagging behind the Americans, who were already…

It was an arms race at the 1964 box office between Fail Safe and the similarly themed Dr. Strangelove.  Stanley Kubrick pressured Columbia Pictures, the studio that owned both films, to release his f…

Michael Almereyda's Cymbeline from 2015 was his second Shakespeare adaptation and his second time working with actor Ethan Hawke.  Hawke played the melancholy Dane in Almereyda's Hamlet from 2000. He…

Director Jeff Balsmeyer was an American film storyboard artist itching to make his writing and directing debut.  His passion project was Danny Deckchair, a romantic comedy based on the real life adve…

Director John Ford hadn't seen the film Red Dust when he agreed to direct its 1953 remake Mogambo but was intrigued by the challenge of bringing his skills with filming the wide open spaces of the Am…

With only a few documentaries and short films on his resume, Francesco Barilli embarked on his first narrative feature, Perfume of the Lady in Black in 1973 Italy. The film was inspired by research B…

Released in Ireland in 1997 and here in the US a year later, I Went Down was one of the most successful Irish films of the year.  It's story, about low rent Dublin mobsters trading barbs and gunfire,…

For Episode 40, Dan and Vicky pick their favorite scary, shocking, sad, even funny death scenes from non-horror movies.  There are some classics thrown in the mix and some you wouldn't expect so get …

We talk Odd Man Out, the classic 1947 British thriller from Third Man director Carol Reed.  It stars James Mason as Johnny McQueen, the leader of an Irish revolutionary group who ends up running for …