Fuel The Jet - TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN (2009)

Explicit content warning

08/30/22 • 56 min

Enter Bayhem - a world of impulses and entropy that has perhaps never been as potent and singular as it was in Michael Bay's TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN (2009)! To your hosts, it is a miracle this film exists - even moreso that it sustained commercial success in spite of its WGA strike affected script, IP origins, and near-total departure from its predecessor's setting. As Optimus Prime and Megatron dip their feet into the sense impressions of Operation Desert Storm, this episode examines its impossible assembly, jarring reliance on analog filmmaking, and this film's unholy pact with producer Steven Spielberg's coming-of-age films of old. Although we don't quite have a Linkin Park needle drop - DOLLY BACK, TRANSFORM AND ROLL OUT!
Roger Ebert's Article - "The Fall of the Revengers"

Previous Episode

Mirrors To The Wall with Ryan Akler-Bishop - THERE'S ALWAYS TOMORROW (1956)

In an odyssey into Douglas Sirk's black-and-white, melodramatic masterclass, Dolly Back is joined by Ryan Akler-Bishop, a UofT graduate student and film writer, on its 25th episode! Revolving around a toymaker who grows emotionally neglected by his family and reconnects with a coworker from his past, this German director explores the human condition through a focus on the American family, and as argued by Laura Mulvey, the moral contradictions inherent to melodrama. A swan song to one of cinema's most enduring onscreen couples, Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray, your hosts parse Sirk's strong command of mise-en-scène, intertextuality, and lighting, all of the critical embers that spark this doomed romance.
Laura Mulvey's Notes on Sirk and Melodrama
Ryan Akler-Bishop's Publication - Fluidity and Repression: The Ambiguity of Queerness in Giallo

Next Episode

It Takes Blues To Tango with Hannah Fleisch - HAPPY TOGETHER (1997)

As they brave the always-dangerous waters of Wong Kar-Wai's melancholy, Dolly Back is joined by Hannah Fleisch, a UofT graduate student with an extensive knowledge of world cinemas! Whether it's a sob at the end of the world or a family photograph at the center of yours, this famed Hong Kong filmmaker turns his viewfinder to every nook and cranny that conceals a piece of home - everywhere from a loved one and they food they make for us, all the way down to the ways we throw ourselves into work on the opposite side of the world. As Leslie Cheung and Tony Leung desperately attempt to repair a failing relationship and its many artifacts, so too do the filmmakers reach across time and space for a city on the precipice of change, thriving in the cracks of the film's editing and the numerous echoes across cultures that populate its text. It takes two to tango dear listener, and we invite you to join us on our journey into the politics of immigrant and diaspora cinemas, queer filmmaking, and how WKW's singular style brings them together into one heartbreaking experience!
Hugo Córdova Quero's Article - "Queer(N)Asian Im/Migrants’ Connectedness: An Inter-Contextual Decolonial Reading of Wong Kar-Wai's Happy Together"Svetlana Boym's Article - "Nostalgia"
BOMB Magazine Interview - "Wong Kar-Wai by Han Ong"