Category Archives: Film Noire

Robert Stark talks to Count Isidor Fosco about creating New Retro Futurist Sub Cultures

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Robert Stark and co-host Pilleater talk to returning guest Count Isidor Fosco.

Topics:

Retro-Futurism and it’s sub-genres
Whether Retro-Futurism and fusing past genres can evolve organically or end up being a “cut and paste”
Merging an Aristocratic or Traditional Genre into a Futuristic one
How fusing genres is most effective when there is a distance in eras(ex. Art Deco and Cyberpunk, Baroque and 80’s Retro-Futurism)
How futurism overlaps with the archaic in architecture(ex.Arcology)
Steampunk; Victorian era Train Stations in London, the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele in Milan, and shopping centers inspired by European shopping arcades
The Toronto Eaton Centre in contrast with the Underground City in Montreal, which is more Retro-Futuristic
Why “Decopunk” Deserves to Be Bigger than Steampunk
The Art Deco revival during the New Wave Age
Batman: The Animated SeriesBatman & Architecture, and Anton Furst’s visions for the Aesthetic Of Gotham City(1989)
Alicia Silverstone in Batman & Robin and playing piano in the film The Crush
The aesthetics of Mishima: a Life in Four Chapters and the manga Kaze to Ki no Uta
New Retro Wave, Italo Disco, Falco, and Alphaville’s Forever Young and Big In Japan
The “Vaporwave” Babylon Club from Scarface which was featured in Miami Nights 1984’s Early Summer
How we are in post-post modernism and must rebuild cultures from scratch
Subcultures based on ethnic and cultural identity; cultural and ethnic fusionism(ex.Asian Aryanism)
How the future will either be mass global homogenization or forming new cultures from scratch but there is no returning to the past
Asian and Israeli Aryanism as memes
Count Fosco’s hierarchy of fetishes

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Robert Stark interviews Filmmaker and Author Pablo D’Stair

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Robert Stark and co-host Pilleater talk to author and filmmaker Pablo D’Stair. He is the author of sixty books of fiction, twenty-four plays/screenplays, five collections of poetry, and numerous essays and dialogues. A former contributor of cinema critique/commentary for the UK film site BRWC: Battle Royale With Cheese and of fiction, interview, and essay for the Montage: Cultural Paradigm (Sri Lanka), he is also the writer/director of six (very underground) films and the co-founder of the art-house press KUBOA . More information can be found at pdstair.wordpress.com and pdstairfilms.wordpress.com. Check out his films on Vimeo.

Topics:

Pablo’s work as an associate producer on the film The Canyons directed by Paul Schrader and written by Bret Easton Ellis
Early influences including Robert Bresson who was also an influence on Schrader
Pablo’s first film A Public Ransom about an author who stumbles across a crayon-scribbled missing child poster with a scrawled telephone number
Pablo’s film Mississippy Missippi Tu-Polo which is about a young indie author who is no longer young and “indie”
The band Left By Snakes who have done music for Pablo’s films, and he has also worked on their music videos
Pablo’s film Science Fiction about Five unknown, unread, and well-past-their-prime science fiction authors grappling with obscurity, infinity, and obsolescence
Pablo’s recent film Mr Pickpocket about two young boys drawing a comic about their dad being a Pickpocket
Pablo’s cinematography style; long shots and techniques to make films look grittier and older
Pablo’s films are about implications and invoking feelings rather then plot driven
Comparing being a writer to being a filmmaker
The Alt-Lit Genre
The Art for the book covers which are designed by both Pablo and his friend artist Goodloe Byron
KUBOA Press and Pablo’s criteria for selecting writers
Pablo’s writing process and style, linear writing and writing from the perspective of one person’s perspective
Pablo’s latest novel LUCY JINX  which is an intimate epic, spanning eight years in the life (and innermost mind) of the titular poet as she navigates cities, jobs, ambitions, and friendships
Pablo’s book Dustjacket Flowers about a man loitering in the public library and the theme of perceiving reality
Pablo’s book Regard; the theme of life rendered in minute by minute physical description with only as much as psychological insight
Pablo’s set of novellas The Unburied Man and The People Who Use Room Five; Life Cycle Horror
Pablo’s Noire novel man standing behind which is being adapted into a film


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This show is brought to you by Robert Stark’s Paintings!




Robert Stark interviews Jay Dyer about Esoteric Hollywood

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Robert Stark and co-host Pilleater talk to Jay Dyer. He reviews films at his blog Jay’s Analysis and is the author of Esoteric Hollywood.

Topics:

The entertainment complex and deciphering propaganda
The power of cinematography and aesthetics in film
How computer generated special effects have impacted the quality of cinema
The concept of the Hollywood establishment and speculations about which filmmakers and films are anti-establishment
Why Jay focuses on the symbolism of the films rather then trying to analyse the director’s motive
Stanley Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut
David Lynch’s Dune, Eraserhead, Inland Empire, and Lost Highway
Surrealism, Neo-noir, and the David Lynch aesthetic
Jay’s review of David Lynch’s Twin Peaks and Mark Frost’s book The Secret History of Twin Peaks
The Ancient Greek concept of time  being a never ending repeat
The Folk Horror Genre; The Devil Rides Out
Blade Runner
Dark City
Enter the Void
The Dark Crystal
The film Labyrinth, the Jungian achetype of the Labyrinth as the subconscious, and the Labyrinth in Ancient Mythology
The Labyrinth theme in The Shining and Hellbound: Hellraiser II
The symbolism of basements as the subconscious in the films House II and The Hole
The Esoteric Meaning of Time Bandits and the significance of the abyss
Robert Stark’s show about Alicia Silverstone and The Film The Babysitter
Natalie Portman in Léon: The Professional
John Carpenter’s They Live! and Big Trouble in Little China
Jay’s upcoming TV Show with Jay Weidner, which will be aired online at www.Gaia.com


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This show is brought to you by Robert Stark’s Paintings!




Robert Brenner returns to talk about his Time Square Tours

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Robert Stark and co-host Pilleater talk to Robert Brenner. Robert Brenner is a writer, critic, satirist, futurist, urbanist, and porkatarian. His work has appeared in the Huffington Post, New York Magazine, Salon, the Barnes & Noble Review, Medium, Different Truths, Antiserious, and Theory In Action. He is a graduate of the Writers’ Institute at CUNY.

Topics:

Robert Brenner’s upcoming Gritty Old Times Square Tour on Sunday March 19th hosted by Untapped Cities
Midnight Cowboy locales including the defunct Hotel Claridge
Taxi Driver locales including the Lyric theatre, and the notorious now defunct Terminal Bar
Pilleater’s recent observations from Time Square
How to walk like a New Yorker
The Hotel Carter, the “dirtiest hotel in America,” which is currently under renovation, and the seedy Elk Hotel which recently closed
The Knickerbocker and the New Yorker Hotel
The closure of Bond 45
The Time Square Police Station
The Time Square Subway Station(not included in the tour)
Martin Hodas, the King of the Peep Shows
Chelly Wilson, who pioneered Homosexual S&M Porn in Time Square’s Grind House Theatres
East Harlem, the last remnants of gritty old New York where Robert Brenner is researching a future tour
Josh Allan Friedman’s Tales of Times Square, published by Feral House Books
NYC That Never Was: Alternate Plans for Times Square from 1984-MAS Competition
The 1982 Horror Film Basket Case set in Time Square
Robert Brenner’s review of David Lynch’s Blue Velvet
Robert Brenner’s Tour from the Empire State Building to Penn Station for the The Municipal Art Society
The Historic Tenderloin District, which predated Time Square and is now Korea Town
Robert Brenner’s Midtown Cheap Ethnic Eats Tour every saturday for Local Expeditions
Custom and conceptual Tours
Robert Brenner’s article Will Robots Take Our Jobs?
Sex Robots and Virtual Sex
Movie Review: Japanese Musicals, the Beyond Godzilla series about Japanese Science Fiction, and the manga Akira


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This show is brought to you by Robert Stark’s Paintings!




 

Robert Stark talks to Greg Johnson about the Alt Left Dilemma

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Robert Stark, co-host Pilleater, and AltLeft blogger Rabbit talk to Counter-Currents editor Greg Johnson.

Topics:

The Concept of the Left Wing of the Alt Right; The Alt Left
Greg Johnson’s essay on SWPL Identity and Rabbit’s Alt Left Manifesto
Millennial Woes’ talk with Rabbit and Greg Johnson about the Alt Left
The 60’s Left Counter-Culture as a fusion of Tolkien and Marcuse, and the need to reclaim the positive attributes of the left, such as ecology, historic preservation, and anti-consumerism
The Alt Left dilemma identifying with SWPL Culture, and urban aesthetics, while supporting forms of identitarianism that often lack strong aesthetic visions
The lack of cultural sophistication among conservatives, and the left’s monopoly on cultural institutions
Suburbia as a by product of the middle class being cleansed out of cities, and the need to sustain a strong urban middle class
Affordable family formation
The Basic income, how it should be implemented, and who it should favor
Putting caps on high incomes with the exception of artist and inventors
The Nietzschean concept of the artist as the ruler
The conservative outlook that judges people on their material wealth over their aesthetic taste, and creative potential
Overpopulation, and how the ideal is to have immigration reduction with a stable or slowly rising birthrate
Greg’s experience living in San Francisco and Berkeley, San Francisco as a SWPL Utopia, and the aesthetic and ecological attributes of the region
The Transamerica Pyramid and Embarcadero Center in San Francisco
Rabbit’s interest in Mid-Century Space Age aesthetics, and his observations going to Mid-Century Modern home tours
Frank Lloyd Wright
Art Deco, which was a heroic vision of the future with respect for tradition; Art Deco in New York and San Francisco
Film noir, and the Blade Runner
David Lynch’s Archeo-Futurist aesthetic in Dune, and ruin porn
The tradition of right wing modernism; Italian Futurism which captured the vitality, optimism, and new possibilities created by technology
The concept of degenerate art, distinguishing between modernism and postmodernism
Defining what is degenerate; Robert and Pilleater’s show on Avant Garde Film

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Robert Stark interviews Thom Young

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Robert Stark and co-host Pilleater interview writer Thom Young. He is from Texas and sees outlaw country as an influence. You can buy his books at Amazon.

Topics:
-Young’s background in Texas, the culture, and the environment.
-Young’s books: Westworld, Noir, Patsy, GrindhouseDead Flowers, Champ
-Outlaw Country, Jim Goad, Louis L’amour, Feral House, Nine Banded-Books
-The influence of Texas within Young’s writing
-Dark themes in Young’s work, alienation
-Hunter S. Thompson, Jack Kerouac, Charles Bukowski, Hubert Selby Jr.
-Young’s work in Poetry Quarterly and other magazines
-Purple Onion
-The cover art on Young’s books
-Thom’s brother Jeb, who designs many of his covers and runs Tumbleweed TexStyles
-The Brutalist Marina City Towers on the cover of Dead Flower,  Film Noire, and Mid Century Road Signage
-Young’s Instagram and his she poems
-Wilco’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot compared to Dead Flowers
-Grindhouse films
-David Lynch Films
-Typewriters, The Astrohaus Freewrite
-Jonathan Bowden, KMFDM, Wyndham Lewis, …single word titles.
-Anthony Burgess, Conspiracy Theorist Jim Marrs
-Traveling, Road Trips, San Juan Mountains, Colorado
-Interest in History,  the Old West, Civil War, WWII novel Voices of the Pacific
-How Young had a new sense of creativity after his Stroke when he was 13
-Young’s upcoming project Instapoet


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Robert Stark interviews The Adventure Kid

Robert Stark and Co-host Pilleater talk to the Adventure Kid. His Moniker is based on the erotic manga series Adventure Kid. The Adventure Kid describes himself as a Locofoco, Jeffersonian, Red Tory, Christian anarchist. and Socially Conservative Socialist

Topics:

Robert and Pilleater discuss the films The Amazing Panda Adventure, and The Crush with Alicia Silverstone
Pilleater’s youtube interview with The Adventure Kid
The Adventure Kid’s interest in Anime, and the avant garde anime of the 70’s and 80’s vs. the “disneyfied” anime of today
The Anime Angel Cop, which has fascist themes
Batman: The Animated Series as the Adventure Kid’s ideal utopian society, and the Art Deco, Film Noire, aesthetic
Art, Architecture, Peter Moruzzi’s book Classic Dining: Discovering America’s Finest Mid-Century Restaurants
Old School R & B, Bobby Brown’s Korean love interest in New Edition’s If It Isn’t Love, and “Death and the Maiden” (The Verlaines song)
Alt porn, Porn stars Nina Hartley, Mia Khalifa, Nadia Ali, Bailey Li, Priya Anjali Rai all of which have made x-rated movies like those shown on https://www.hdpornvideo.xxx/, and Robert’s favorite erotic model Emily Bloom. He’s also parital to tuning into some of the live cam girls shows over on Babestation when the mood takes him; Hannah is one of his favourites, see here – babestation.tv/girls/hannah-claydon. Part of what attracts him to Babestation, apart from the girls (of course), is the ineractivity.
Avant Garde filmmakers Gaspar Noé, Harmony Korine, Alejandro Jodorowsky, and John Waters
Kerry Bolton’s Artists of the Right, Wyndham Lewis, and Italian Futurism
The origins of the Alt-Right in Avant Garde Culture
How The Adventure Kid’s views have evolved since starting out as an SJW Obama supporter
The Alt-Right, Alt-Left, Anarchism, and why the Adventure Kid does not want to be pinned down to one movement, and considers himself a man of multiple movements
The Adventure Kid’s interest in Counter-Currents and Keith Preston’s Attack the System
Bill Kauffman, the America First movement, and the early 20th Century Populist Movement including Robert M. La Follette
The Adventure Kid’s Black Identity, assimilationist vs. Black Nationalist, Afro-Asianism, and how that relates to his interest in the Alt-Right
Social Conservatism and Christianity
The Adventure Kid’s Left leaning views on the Environment, Drug Legalization, Banking, and Healthcare
Donald Trump, and why the Adventure Kid supported him primarily because of trade and immigration, and where he is disappointed with Trump
Economic automation, Robots as a solution to mass immigration, and the need for a basic income


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Robert Stark interviews Robert Brenner about his Gritty Old Time Square Tours

Robert Stark and co-host Pilleater interview Robert Brenner. Robert is a writer, critic, satirist, futurist, urbanist, and porkatarian. His work has appeared in the Huffington Post, New York Magazine, Salon, the Barnes & Noble Review, Medium, Different Truths, Antiserious, and Theory In Action. He is a graduate of the Writers’ Institute at CUNY.

Topics:

Robert Brenner’s Gritty Old Times Square tours, which are offered on Saturday’s once a Month, hosted by Untapped Cities
Adult Entertainment is the focus of the tours, but they also cover the general history of Time Square
The remnants of seedy Time Square, including The Playpen, and the Show World Center on Eighth Avenue
Robert Brenner’s experience in Time Square as a youth in the 70’s
That era of Time Square portrayed in the Films Taxi Driver and Midnight Cowboy
The gentrification of Time Square in the 90’s, and how the area went from an interesting but dangerous area to a safe and boring one
The Deuce on 42nd Street, which was the center of adult entertainment in the 70’s
The Porn Industry in Time Square, and premier of 70’s porn films such as Behind the Green Door and Deep Throat that paved the way for the future of the pornographic industry, spawning many different adult sites, live cam sites, and even the Babestation blog.
Robert Brenner’s point that every city needs a Red Light District
Peter Sotos’s Pure Filth about the pornographer Jamie Gillis
San Francisco’s Tenderloin, where Robert Brenner lived in the early 80’s, and Robert Stark’s observations from his trip to the San Francisco Bay Area
The decline of neon signage in favor of LED, Robert Stark’s interview with Thomas Rinaldi of New York Neon, and the company LET THERE BE NEON! which restores old signs
The history of the Broadway Theater District, the New Amsterdam Theatre, and the defunct Paramount Theatre
The closing of Carnegie Deli and Maxie’s Delicatessen
The Bond Clothing Store Signs in Times Square
The John Portman designed Marriott Marquis in Time Square
The Tour of the Remnants of Penn Station, and plans for Moynihan Station inspired by the old Penn Station
New York Skyscrapers


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Robert Stark interviews Director Matthew David Wilder

matthew-david-wilder-and-paul-schrader

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Robert Stark and Alex von Goldstein talk to Director and Screenwriter Matthew David Wilder

Topics include:

Matthew’s background, growing up in a trailer park in Des Plaines, Illinois,  studying theatre at Yale, and his mentor Peter Sellars
Matthew’s first major project was writing for Clive Barker’s The History of the Devil
Matthew’s work with Oliver Stone on a film about the war on terror right after 9/11 which was never released
The film Dog Eat Dog, staring Nicolas Cage and Willem Dafoe, written by Matthew, directed by Paul Schrader, which will be released to theatres next month
Matthew directed, and wrote Your Name Here, staring Bill Pullman, which is a surreal dramatic fantasy biopic loosely based on the life of Philip K. Dick
Director Paul Schrader, how he inspired Matthew as a screenwriter, and his concept of the monocular film, which is one protagonist alone against the world
The notion of God’s lonely man, and how Matthew wrote a one act play in college by that name
Film noir, the aesthetic, the story of fate hanging over the characters, and the Neo-noir genre
Matthew’s interest in combining genres, rather than sticking with one particular one
Brett Easton Ellis praises Matthew in his interview with Paul Schrader
Matthew’s upcoming film Morning Has Broken, about a young runaway girl who moves in with a seemingly harmless, elderly, Academy Award-winning songwriter, staring Lydia Hearst and Peter Bogdanovich
Matthew’s point as a filmmaker, that what influences you is not the most obvious
The importance of breaking taboos, and taking the audience out of their comfort zone
The upcoming film, the Looking Glass, written by Matthew, staring Nicolas Cage, about a couple who buy a desert motel where they find out that strange, mysterious events occur
The film is inspired by a story of a motel owner who watched guest have sex through peep holes, and David Lynch’s film Lost Highway
Mid-century Roadside Architecture and Vintage Vegas
Matthew’s political views, how he identifies with the left on the hard issues, but is critical of the micro-issues and political correctness
Alex’s point that troll culture is a form of critiquing society, and how that’s lacking in Hollywood today
True Detective
LA culture, vapid conversations in coffee shops, obnoxious roidheads, and capturing LA in film
Matthew’s experiences directed a play at CalArts, and his observations of young actors wanting the celebrity status more than valuing the content of the work
The shortened attention span and how it effects our culture
Alex’s point that there is no longer a mainstream culture, and people have the freedom to find their own creative niches


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Robert Stark interviews Thomas Rinaldi about New York Neon

NY NEON Cover_r2_Final.indd

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Robert Stark and co-host Rabbit talk to Thomas Rinaldi. He is the author of New York Neon and blogs at  nyneon.blogspot.com

Topics include:

How Thomas got interested in Neon growing up, and how he noticed it’s decline
His project charting and photographing existing  Neon Signs before they disappear
The History of Neon, how it was invented in Victorian England in 1898, and latter made into signs by French Scientist Georges Claude
How the peak of Neon was in the late 1920’s and  30’s(Art Deco Era), but already started to see a decline in the 40’s
How Neon was originally used by Corporate chains but latter delegated to small businesses
Churches & Neon
How Neon  was originally seen as glamorous but latter became associated with seediness
Neon in Cinema, contrasting Dick Powell’s  glamorous Gold Diggers Of 1933 – The Shadow Waltz and his 1944 detective film Murder, My Sweet, which depicts Neon as seedy
The 1946 film It’s a Wonderful Life which also uses Neon to depict seediness
Hotel Neon Signs and and Hotel Neon in the Film Noire Genre
Neon in future films including the utopian 1927 film Metropolis and the dystopian 1982 film BLADE RUNNER
Incandescent Bulb Signs
The history, decline and revitalization of Time Square, and how there are very few Neon Signs left
How Neon has become replaced by LED Signs
The myth that Neon signs are not eco friendly
Historic preservation issues regarding Neon Signs
New Neon Signs designed in the Vintage style
Neon in San Francisco and the book San Francisco Neon
Las Vegas, how newer casino’s have rejected Neon, and how older signs are preserved at the Neon Museum
The popularity of Neon in Asian cities
How there is a renewed interest in Neon
Artist who depict Neon in their work including Robert Stark
Neon in 1960s Pop Art
The importance of patronizing businesses that have Neon Signs

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