The Pink Smoke podcast

"A captain's job is a lonely one. He's easily misunderstood." On this episode, we welcome back John Arminio and his father, Captain Tom Arminio, USN, Retired, to tackle a double feature of classic WWII-set Naval melodramas: 1954's The Caine Mutiny and 1955's Mister Roberts. Both films deal with the tricky subject of bad military leadership, how it trickles down the ranks and threatens the effectiveness of an entire ship. Whose is the worst captain, Humphrey Bogart's erratic and incompetent Queeg or James Cagney's oppressive and oblivious Morton? When is the right time for officers to take a stand against a potentially mad or tyrannical leader? When is the right time to pitch the palm tree into the ocean? Organizing movie screenings and discussions with his geographically separated family during the height of the pandemic, John Arminio has enjoyed regular movie talks with his father, whose 24 years of Naval experience give him a unique insight into these depictions of faulty leadership on the decks of wartime ships. Support our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke site: www.thepinksmoke.com The Pink Smoke on Twitter: twitter.com/thepinksmoke John Arminio on Twitter: twitter.com/QuasarSniffer John Cribbs on Twitter: twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / “Tea for Two” Outro music: Marcus Pinn / “Vegas”

“Perhaps when one is about to die one sees every kind of bird pass; when one sees the crow it means one’s time has come.” A bit of a weird one: hosts John Cribbs & Christopher Funderburg each picked a “war story” to discuss. The podcast loves to dig into short stories (in the past it has looked at everything from Edogawa Ranpo to Patricia Highsmith) and, as a way of exploring the short fiction format, this episode deeps on a pair of only tangentially stories brought together around a loose theme. The two “war stories” selected are Harlan Ellison’s hugely influential sci-fi classic “Soldier” and Italo Calvino’s bizarre & poetic “The Crow Comes Last.” While these two stories couldn’t be more different in approach, the conversation ends up being surprisingly revealing about both works and how they relate to each other. At very least, it provides the hosts an opportunity to talk about two of their absolute favorite authors! All episodes of the Pink Smoke podcast are available to Patreon subscribers a week before their release to the general public! Support our Patreon:
 www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke site: 
www.thepinksmoke.com The Pink Smoke on Twitter:
 twitter.com/thepinksmoke Christopher Funderburg on Twitter: 
twitter.com/cfunderburg John Cribbs on Twitter:
 twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / “Tea for Two”
 Outro music: Marcus Pinn / “Vegas"

The Daniel Craig Era of James Bond has officially ended, allowing John Cribbs and special guest John Arminio to conclude their comprehensive review of every Bond movie, which they began in April of 2020 (the original premiere date of the much-delayed No Time to Die!) Starting with 2006's series reboot Casino Royale and finishing with their thoughts on the latest 007 adventure, Cribbs & Arminio reminisce on the things that got them excited and the things that made them disappointed in the last 15 years of the fabled franchise. Why did Craig always have to be a rogue agent? Why was he so bad at protecting women? Did SPECTRE really need to subsidize Quantum? Was the overall characteristic of Craig's superspy really embarrassing failure? These are just some of the questions tackled by our duo of double 0 analysts as they wrap up the Pink Smoke's series of Bond reevaluation. And don’t fail in your duty to check out our previous Bond episodes: Bond in the Brosnan Era: http://thepinksmoke.com/PSP74BondBrosnan.html Bond in the 80s I: thepinksmoke.com/PSP62Bondinthe80sI.html Bond in the 80s II: thepinksmoke.com/PSP63Bondinthe80sII.html Bond in the 70s: soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/user-564624820/psp-ep58-james-bond-in-the-70 spotify: open.spotify.com/episode/2t6MQIIbFBKzzKfdtZaQ9x apple podcasts: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ep-5…i=1000489551247 Bond in the 60s: soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/user-564624820/psp-ep52-james-bond-in-the-60s spotify: open.spotify.com/episode/3g6UHop4amOmuBpljaxx3F apple podcasts: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ep-5…i=1000506773799 The Pink Smoke site: www.thepinksmoke.com Support our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke on Twitter: twitter.com/thepinksmoke John Arminio on Twitter: twitter.com/QuasarSniffer John Cribbs on Twitter: twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / “Tea for Two” Outro music: Marcus Pinn / “Vegas”

“Bad luck isn't brought by broken mirrors, but by broken minds.” This is it: our mammoth exploration of the work of Italian aesthete Dario Argento. Hosts Christopher Funderburg and John Cribbs are joined by filmmaker and illustrator Patrick Horvath to explore the career of one of horror cinema's most notorious and beloved artists. They cover it all, from the brilliant beginnings of the "animal trilogy" of The Bird with Crystal Plumage, Cat O' Nine Tails and Four Flies on Grey Velvet to the some of the highest points in the history of horror cinema with Suspiria and Deep Red all the way through to the bitter end. They pair each of the films from Argento's golden era with a film from the more dispiriting later portion of the filmmaker's career in order to explore the continuity of his themes and artistic ideas. They look in-depth at the classics like Opera and Inferno while keeping their eyes open for silver linings such as his two Masters of Horror entries and his "Max von Sydow teams up with a parrot to solve mysteries" late-giallo Sleepless. It's here, the most comprehensive podcast study of one of the artists who defined the genre. Support our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke site: www.thepinksmoke.com The Pink Smoke on Twitter: twitter.com/thepinksmoke Patrick Horvath on Twitter: https://twitter.com/PatrickHorvath Christopher Funderburg on Twitter: twitter.com/cfunderburg John Cribbs on Twitter: twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / “Tea for Two” Outro music: Marcus Pinn / “Vegas"

“Looks like his pecker was blowed off, Lydell.” Join hosts Christopher Funderburg and John Cribbs as they team up with film writer and podcast stalwart Stephanie Crawford for a journey down to Dasharoons, an idyllic Arkansas estate where you can expect scenic sunsets, Creole dishes and the occasional testicle explosion. That's right - for our annual October horror read, we delved into the pages of All Heads Turn When the Hunt Goes By, a lyrical and trashy epic of 70's genre fiction written by John Farris! This southern gothic gets going quickly and doesn't stop barreling down its dark and twisted hill. A groom runs amok and slashes family members with a ceremonial saber at his own military academy wedding. A fingernail-less detective investigates a series of inexplicable lightning bombs. A traumatized WWII soldier might be possessed by the spirit of his decapitated father. Somehow it all involves magical vengeance and an ambidextrous Voodoo rainbow serpent-goddess (could it be otherwise?) It's all Crawford and our hosts can do to keep their heads above the putrid water of this book's strange, fascinating, tawdry world. You can get updates on Stephanie Crawford’s most recent publications and podcast appearances on House of a Reasonable Amount of Horrors: hoaraoh.com. Support our Patreon:
 www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke site: 
www.thepinksmoke.com The Pink Smoke on Twitter:
 twitter.com/thepinksmoke Stephanie Crawford: twitter.com/scrawfish Christopher Funderburg on Twitter: 
twitter.com/cfunderburg John Cribbs on Twitter:
 twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / “Tea for Two”
 Outro music: Marcus Pinn / “Vegas"

For October's horror fiction pick, The Pink Smoke welcomes back Wendy Mays of the Pet Cinematary and Losers Pod podcasts to talk about the swarm of killer-cats-descending-on-rural-Long Island-community classic Feral by Berton Roueche. Among the topics discussed: if it's possible to sympathize with city couples who abandon kittens on the side of the road at the end of the summer, the right way to deal with cannibalistic strays who decide to add human flesh to the menu and whether or not a 1991 TV movie totally ripped off Roueche's novel. Snuggle up with your favorite feline and follow along! The Pink Smoke site: www.thepinksmoke.com/ The Losers podcast: https://theloserspod.podbean.com/ Pet Cinematary podcast: https://petcinematary.podbean.com/ Patreon: www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke on Twitter: twitter.com/thepinksmoke John Cribbs on Twitter: twitter.com/TheLastMachine Christopher Funderburg on Twitter: twitter.com/CFunderburg Intro & outro music by Marcus Pinn of Pinnland Empire.

“A guy wants to name his cock ‘Macho,’ it’s fine by me.” We’re joined by filmmaker Bill Teck to discuss the latest film from Clint Eastwood, Cry Macho. Mr. Teck previously joined us to discuss Eastwood’s 2019 film Richard Jewell and remains our favorite person with whom to discuss the 91 year-old star-auteur. We place the film within the larger context of Eastwood’s complicated career and its nearing end. The film follows a deeply washed-up rodeo star who travels to Mexico City on behalf of his former boss to find the man’s teenage son. We discuss how the film takes on the gentle rhythms of its aged star’s physical movements, the sweetness and generosity of its approach, and how satisfying it is to watch Eastwood slowly pet animals that are clearly calmed by his presence. The Pink Smoke site: www.thepinksmoke.com The Pink Smoke on Twitter: twitter.com/thepinksmoke Bill Teck on Twitter: twitter.com/billteck Christopher Funderburg on Twitter: twitter.com/cfunderburg John Cribbs on Twitter: twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / “Tea for Two” Outro music: Marcus Pinn / “Vegas"

Aleksei German month at The Pink Smoke kicks off with this primer spearheaded by Martin Kessler of the Flixwise: Canada podcast. Kessler is one of the English-speaking world's leading authorities on German - this episode is intended as an entry-point into the filmmaker's work, a titan of Russian cinema who remains surprisingly unknown outside of his native land.

Hosts Christopher Funderburg and John Cribbs dig into the work of the Belgian author Georges Simenon via his crime novel La tête d’un homme, featuring his wildly popular character Inspector Maigret. The ultra-prolific Simenon wrote 11 novels in 1931, the year that he wrote La tête, and rarely slowed down during his legendary career - even at the reduced pace of his later years, he would purportedly write a novel in 11 days. La tête d’un homme (also known as A Man’s Head or Maigret’s War of Nerves) begins with the story of a prisoner escaping from prison... with the unexpected help of Maigret. From there, it builds to a confrontation with a criminal whose manner & belief system disturbs the detective on a profound level. It’s a classic of detective fiction - we discuss its place in culture, the film adaptations, and how to approach Simenon’s work even as a total novice. Support our Patreon:
 www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke site:
 www.thepinksmoke.com The Pink Smoke on Twitter: 
twitter.com/thepinksmoke Christopher Funderburg on Twitter:
 twitter.com/cfunderburg John Cribbs on Twitter: 
twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / “Tea for Two”
 Outro music: Marcus Pinn / “Vegas"

How do you solve the aesthetic-philosophical problem of Michael Ritchie, the not-quite-auteur/not-quite-journeyman director of satirical social comedies like The Candidate and Smile and such eccentric comedy classics as The Bad News Bears and Fletch? Christopher Funderburg and John Cribbs decided to go at it the hard way by diving into Prime Cut, Ritchie's sort-of second feature (it debuted a day before The Candidate) - hands-down his weirdest and nastiest movie. What on the page seems like an easy grand slam - a 70's crime thriller that pits an M76-packing Lee Marvin against Gene Hackman under the vast and gorgeous Kansas sky - is in practice more an outlandish curio with its scenes of mob rivals fed through a slaughterhouse, young naked women auctioned in pens like cattle and extended set piece featuring Marvin and rookie star Sissy Spacek running from a deadly combine harvester that threatens to harvest them. Is it a case of Ritchie tripping himself up, finding his sensibilities as a filmmaker at odds with the gritty material, or is there more to it than that? Join us in appreciating the clear merits and murkier demerits of this bizarre tale of meat and machine guns. Support our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke site: www.thepinksmoke.com The Pink Smoke on Twitter: twitter.com/thepinksmoke Christopher Funderburg on Twitter: twitter.com/cfunderburg John Cribbs on Twitter: twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / “Tea for Two” Outro music: Marcus Pinn / “Vegas"