Pod Casty For Me

Get your silly little trunks on, listener: we're headed to the octagon this week to talk HAYWIRE, Soderbergh's much-delayed 2011 (anti-?) spy thriller starring MMA fighter Gina Carano. And joining us is our friend, podcaster and musician Ryan Torgeson (@molecularlioneI)! We talk mid-2010s action cinema, mixed martial arts, Soderbergh's decision to alter Carano's voice in post, Carano's decision to blow her career up by being a hateful moron, special consultant and Duvdevan Unit war criminal Aaron Cohen, and more. Further Reading: "Steven Soderbergh, an MMA Fighter, and Five Stars Walk Into a Spy Movie" by Adam Nayman "Gina Carano took her fighting to a new level for 'Haywire'" by Nicole Sperling "Steven Soderbergh on 'Haywire,' 'Magic Mike' and Why He's Given Up on 'Serious Movies'" by Nigel M. Smith "Haywire's Body Talk" by Kiva Reardon "Covert Affairs: Why 'Haywire' is the Most Sneakily Political Movie of the Year" by Matt Singer "The Vulture Transcript: Steven Soderbergh on Haywire, Pranking Matt Damon, and His Looming Sabbatical" by Jennifer Vineyard "'Haywire' Star Gina Carano Addresses Voice Alteration Controversy" by Lauren Schutte "Disgraced actor Gina Carano denies ruining her own career with anti-trans jokes and Nazi comments" by Jake McKee Further Viewing: THE IPCRESS FILE (Furie, 1965) FUNERAL IN BERLIN (Hamilton, 1966) THE EXPENDABLES (Stallone, 2010) THE RAID (Evans, 2011) Scott Adkins movies Follow Ryan: https://x.com/molecularlioneI Follow Pod Casty For Me: https://www.podcastyforme.com/ https://twitter.com/podcastyforme https://www.instagram.com/podcastyforme/ https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe Artwork by Jeremy Allison: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

This is a preview of a premium episode from our Patreon feed, Paid Costly For Me! Head over to Patreon.com/PodCastyForMe to hear more for just $5 a month. We're trying something new this week - we've recorded a feature commentary track! Watch Clint Eastwood's 1971 directorial debut PLAY MISTY FOR ME as we talk about it. Sure, we did an episode on this movie already, but that was three years ago. We're different now! We've learned new stuff and forgotten most of what we said then, anyway. In the episode, we'll explain exactly how to sync our conversation with the film, but we've designed this as something you can listen to as a regular podcast episode, too. Let us know if you'd like more of this sort of thing! Thanks as always to Jetski for our theme music and to Jeremy Allison for our artwork.

This is an unlocked episode from our Patreon feed, Paid Costly For Me! Head over to Patreon.com/PodCastyForMe to hear more for just $5 a month. This week we're taking a look at a bunch of songs about, featuring, or otherwise related to Clint Eastwood...which is a great reason to bring on Jetski, aka Ian Ostaszewski, the composer of the Paid Costly For Me theme music! We chat Gorillaz, Metallica, the Beastie Boys, My Chemical Romance, and more - plus Ian's podcast-related birthday present! Let us know if you want more of this, because there are a lot of songs about Clint. Here's the playlist with full songs: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPxgPXB-kIxujvyWI6Wkyu0QqmdcZiLdA Thanks as always to Jetski for our theme music (duh) and to Jeremy Allison for our artwork. Follow Jetski: https://x.com/jetskitosway2 https://jetski0.bandcamp.com/ Follow Pod Casty For Me: https://www.podcastyforme.com/ https://twitter.com/podcastyforme https://www.instagram.com/podcastyforme/ https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe Artwork by Jeremy Allison: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

This is a preview of a premium episode from our Patreon feed, Paid Costly For Me! Head over to Patreon.com/PodCastyForMe to hear more for just $5 a month. Merry Christmas, everybody - here's the episode one day early just because we love ya. Not unlike a certain jolly old elf, Ian stopped by Jake's home for a quick visit a few weeks back, and the boys (plus FPG) ran a 10K race together that was, for some reason, in celebration of Bill Melendez's 1965 television special A CHARLIE BROWN CHRISTMAS. So we decided to discuss this classic short and Peanuts creator Charles M. Schulz, who like our usual subject was a Bay Area legend who loved golf and jazz. Plus we threw in a little bit of field audio from our fateful footrace. Enjoy and have a safe and happy holiday! As ever, thanks to Jetski for our music and to Jeremy Allison for our artwork. Follow Pod Casty For Me: https://www.podcastyforme.com/ https://twitter.com/podcastyforme https://www.instagram.com/podcastyforme/ https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe Artwork by Jeremy Allison: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

Wash your hands, folks: it's time to talk CONTAGION, Steven Soderbergh's absurdly prescient 2011 pandemic disaster film. We talk public health, hyperlink cinema, Soderbergh's evolving digital aesthetic, the nature of government, and the film's second life as a Covid lockdown classic. With a special Kate Winslet audio collage that Ian definitely asked for! Check it out. Further Reading: The Viral Underclass by Steven Trasher Health Communism by Artie Vierkant and Beatrice Adler-Bolton Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Human Pandemic by David Quammen The Coming Plague by Laurie Garrett Further Viewing: OUTBREAK (Petersen, 1995) THE DOUBLE LIFE OF VERONIQUE (Kieślowski, 1991) 28 DAYS LATER (Boyle, 2002) 28 WEEKS LATER (Fresnadillo, 2007) 28 YEARS LATER (Boyle, 2025) BUGONIA (Lanthimos, 2025) JOE DIRT (Gordon, 2001) Kate Winslet's 2020 hand-washing tutorial video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhIpAnDHZHc Follow Pod Casty For Me: https://www.podcastyforme.com/ https://twitter.com/podcastyforme https://www.instagram.com/podcastyforme/ https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe Artwork by Jeremy Allison: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

This is a preview of a premium episode from our Patreon feed, Paid Costly For Me! Head over to Patreon.com/PodCastyForMe to hear more for just $5 a month. In our first-ever Patreon Listeners' Choice poll, something like 52% of you voted for David Fincher's ZODIAC, the movie we probably should have done within the first five premium eps if we're being honest. But now we've done it! It's all here: Dirty Harry inspiration Dave Toschi, true crime ethics, Bay Area geography, what this movie is actually saying, and about a full hour of Melvin Belli stuff. Enjoy! As always, thank you to Jetski for our theme music and Jeremy Allison for our artwork.

Open your notebooks and fill up your glasses of water, folks: today we're looking at Steven Soderbergh's two documentaries on Spalding Gray. And Ian's pissed off! We're joined once more by our friend, writer and critic Rob Rubsam, to talk 1996's GRAY'S ANATOMY, a sort of longform music video for Gray's "monolog" of the same name, and Soderbergh's 2010 posthumous "autobiography" of Gray, AND EVERYTHING IS GOING FINE. How does a figure like Gray emerge and rise to fame? Where does we place him in the long tradition of neurotic white guys who make everything about themselves? Is Jake one of those? And why is Ian so mad about this guy? We answer these questions and more - check it out. Further Reading: "The Catastrophe" by Oliver Sacks "Vanishing Act" by Alex Williams "In New Film, Spalding Gray Tells His Own Tale" by Karen Michel A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again by David Foster Wallace Me Talk Pretty One Day, etc. by David Sedaris The World According to Dave Barry by Dave Barry À la recherche du temps perdu by Marcel Proust Austerlitz by W.G. Sebald The Mezzanine by Nicholson Baker Gargoyles by Thomas Bernhard Anything by John Berger Further Viewing: MY DINNER WITH ANDRE (Malle, 1981) SWIMMING TO CAMBODIA (Demme, 1987) VANYA ON 42ND STREET (Malle, 1994) JOHN MULANEY: NEW IN TOWN (Polito & Szymanski, 2012) MIKE BIRBIGLIA: MY GIRLFRIEND'S BOYFRIEND (Barrish, 2013) PARKER GAIL'S LOCATION IS EVERYTHING (Buono & Thomas, 2016) Follow Rob Rubsam: https://x.com/rob_rubsam https://www.robertrubsam.com/ Follow Pod Casty For Me: https://www.podcastyforme.com/ https://twitter.com/podcastyforme https://www.instagram.com/podcastyforme/ https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe Artwork by Jeremy Allison: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

This is a preview of a premium episode from our Patreon feed, Paid Costly For Me! Head over to Patreon.com/PodCastyForMe to hear more for just $5 a month. Our friend and yours Comrade Yui is back to talk two Ernest Hemingway adaptations in our wheelhouse - THE KILLERS (1946) by CRISS CROSS director Robert Siodmak and THE KILLERS (1964) by DIRTY HARRY director Don Siegel (plus the short Tarkovsky made as a student in 1956!). We get a crash course in noir history, spatial cinematography, and midcentury ideas of the self - along with our earliest-ever Pine Cone Crime Zone. Patreon.com/ComradeYui As always, thank you to Jetski for our theme music and Jeremy Allison for our artwork. Follow Pod Casty For Me: https://www.podcastyforme.com/ https://twitter.com/podcastyforme https://www.instagram.com/podcastyforme/ https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe Artwork by Jeremy Allison: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

"Would I lysine to you?" - Mark Whitacre. Hey that's just a joke but maybe they could have used it on the posters for THE INFORMANT!, Steven Soderbergh's 2009 corporate espionage caper about the lysine price-fixing scandal and one of the weirdest guys there has ever been. And joining us to talk big business, the FBI, and organized crime in all its forms is writer and podcaster Dan O'Sullivan (The Outfit)! Is business run like the mafia or vice versa? Is corruption inherent to capitalism or simply a common side effect? Did Kurt Eichenwald ever go on Twitter? We answer these questions once and for all, so give this one a listen. Further Reading: The Informant: A True Story by Kurt Eichenwald Rats in the Grain: The Dirty Tricks and Trials of Archer Daniels Midland by James B. Lieber Everybody Loves A Good Drought by Palagummi Sainath "Why Capitalism Loves Corruption" by Gareth Fearn Further Viewing: PRIME CUT (Richie, 1972) THE INSIDER (Mann, 1999) ERIN BROCKOVICH (Soderbergh, 2000) MICHAEL CLAYTON (Gilroy, 2007) BURN AFTER READING (Coen, 2008) Follow Dan O'Sullivan: https://x.com/osullyville https://bsky.app/profile/osullyville.bsky.social https://headgum.com/the-outfit Follow Pod Casty For Me: https://www.podcastyforme.com/ https://twitter.com/podcastyforme https://www.instagram.com/podcastyforme/ https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe Artwork by Jeremy Allison: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

This is a preview of a premium episode from our Patreon feed, Paid Costly For Me! Head over to Patreon.com/PodCastyForMe to hear more for just $5 a month. Finally, we've reached the end of Sergio Leone's filmography with the long-in-development gangster epic ONCE UPON A TIME IN AMERICA. This film has many admirers, to whom we say: sorry! We didn't care for it, and we'll tell you why - with a little final examination of the man's work. CW: This episode contains discussion of the film's sequences of sexual violence, so consider skipping this one if you're not in a place to listen to that right now. Thanks as always to Jetski for our theme music and to Jeremy Allison for our artwork.

Soderbergh's second film for Mark Cuban's Magnolia Pictures was THE GIRLFRIEND EXPERIENCE, a largely improvised look at life on the cusp of the Great Recession starring adult film megastar Sasha Grey. We're joined by an anonymous writer and sex worker to talk about one of Soderbergh's less-appreciated great films, sex work as work, Grey's legacy, depictions of intimacy, and Power Wash Simulator for the Nintendo Switch. Really great episode, we hope you enjoy! Further Reading: Playing The Whore: The Work of Sex Work by Melissa Gira Grant "The Teenager & The Porn Star" by Dave Gardetta "Exploitation Under Capitalism" by Mary Mother of God "Whorearchy 101" by Jack Parker Soderbergh interview by Ben Walters Steven Soderbergh: Interviews, ed. Anthony Kaufman Further Viewing: RED DESERT (Antonioni, 1964) KLUTE (Pakula, 1971) CRIES AND WHISPERS (Bergman, 1972) FULL FRONTAL (Soderbergh, 2002) BUBBLE (Soderbergh, 2005) FASHIONISTAS SAFADO: THE CHALLENGE (Stagliano, 2006) MAGIC MIKE (Soderbergh, 2012) ANORA (Baker, 2024) Follow Pod Casty For Me: https://www.podcastyforme.com/ https://twitter.com/podcastyforme https://www.instagram.com/podcastyforme/ https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe Artwork by Jeremy Allison: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

This is a preview of a premium episode from our Patreon feed, Paid Costly For Me! Head over to Patreon.com/PodCastyForMe to hear more for just $5 a month. While making CHE, Steven Soderbergh fell so in love with Bolivia's national liquor, singani, that he decided to export it to the US as Singani 63 - just like Che Guevara would have done. Nah just kidding but we tried it and it's actually quite good! Even better, Pod Casty For Me's own Hotel Detective Maxwell Pierson joins us to get a little loose drinking Singani 63 (and Casamigos tequila) and talk about all kinds of stuff: the colonial history of liquor, Soderbergh's recently revealed unmade Kylo Ren movie, our long podcast journey thus far, and more. A special ep with a special man. Per Maxwell's plug, please check out Donors Choose to support a teacher near you: https://www.donorschoose.org/ Follow Maxwell Pierson: https://x.com/MaxwellPierson1 Lots to check out here: https://singani63.com/ Thanks as always to Jetski for our theme music and Jeremy Allison for our artwork.

The leftist podcast about Steven Soderbergh movies has finally arrived at CHE, Soderbergh's two-part biopic of (Argentine) Cuban Revolutionary hero Ernesto "Che" Guevara. Joining us to provide the kind of deep historical context you know we go crazy for is historian of Cuba and scholar of Latin American and Caribbean history Andrés Pertierra! We have never read more in preparation for an episode, folks, so we hope you dig this one as much as we did. Hasta la victoria siempre, amigos. Further Reading (direct from Andrés!): Anderson, John Lee. Che: A Revolutionary Life. Grove, 1997. "The Cuban Exodus" by Andrés Pertierra The great (Pulitzer Prize!) winning intro text: Ferrer, Ada. Cuba: An American History. Scribner, 2021. Some relevant books on Cuban Revolution and other countries: Gleijeses, Piero. Conflicting Missions: Havana, Washington, and Africa, 1959-1976. University of North Carolina Press, 2002. Schoultz, Lars. That Infernal Little Cuban Republic: The United States and the Cuban Revolution. University of North Carolina Press, 2009. Yordanov, Radoslav. Our Comrades in Havana: Cuba, the Soviet Union, & Eastern Europe, 1959-1991. Cold War International History Project. Stanford University Press, 2024. Key texts for context on what's happening internally: Guerra, Lillian. Visions of Power in Cuba: Revolution, Redemption, and Resistance, 1959-1971. University of North Carolina Press, 2012. Mesa-Lago, Carmelo. Cuba in the 1970s: Pragmatism and Institutionalization. University of New Mexico Press, 1978. Further Viewing (shout out to Andrés for these, too!): THE MOTORCYCLE DIARIES (Salles, 2004) CONDUCTA IMPROPRIA (Almendros & Jiménez Leal, 1984) CHE and the Digital Cinema Revolution! Soderbergh getting heckled at Q&A FRESA Y CHOCOLATE (Gutiérrez Alea & Carlos Tabío, 1984) END OF A REVOLUTION (Moser, 1967) Follow Andrés: https://x.com/ASPertierra https://bsky.app/profile/andrespertierra.bsky.social https://originesacubanhistorypodcast.libsyn.com/ Follow Pod Casty For Me: https://www.podcastyforme.com/ https://twitter.com/podcastyforme https://www.instagram.com/podcastyforme/ https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe Artwork by Jeremy Allison: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

This is a preview of a premium episode from our Patreon feed, Paid Costly For Me! Head over to Patreon.com/PodCastyForMe to hear more for just $5 a month. We celebrate the late Terence Stamp by taking a look at Stephen Frears's 1984 proto-LIMEY existential gangster film, THE HIT. Plus: a little bit of Pasolini's TEOREMA talk for good measure. Thanks as always to Jetski for our theme music and Jeremy Allison for our artwork. Follow Pod Casty For Me: https://www.podcastyforme.com/ https://twitter.com/podcastyforme https://www.instagram.com/podcastyforme/ https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe Artwork by Jeremy Allison: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

We're going back to Vegas for one more job...it's the thrilling conclusion to the trilogy, OCEAN'S THIRTEEN! Well, maybe "thrilling" is arguable. But the episode sure is! We're talking Oprah, Steve Wynn, Mexican labor action, Five Diamond status - it's all here, folks. Further Reading: "Steve Wynn's Biggest Gamble" by Nina Munk Meet The AAA Diamond Rating Experts Further Viewing: DOWN BY LAW (Jarmusch, 1986) SEA OF LOVE (Becker, 1989) HARD EIGHT (Anderson, 1996) SHREK THE THIRD (Miller, 2007) THE TURIN HORSE (Tarr & Hranitzky, 2011) MANK (Fincher, 2020) BLOODY NOSE, EMPTY POCKETS (Ross brothers, 2020) Steve Wynn's 1983 Golden Nugget commercial Follow Pod Casty For Me: https://www.podcastyforme.com/ https://twitter.com/podcastyforme https://www.instagram.com/podcastyforme/ https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe Artwork by Jeremy Allison: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

This is a preview of a premium episode from our Patreon feed, Paid Costly For Me! Head over to Patreon.com/PodCastyForMe to hear more for just $5 a month. Friend of the show Aaron from Hit Factory joins us to assemble the definitive Tier List of characters played by Clint Eastwood. Along the way, we answer important questions like: What is a Tier List for? What makes a good character? Has Ian developed any insane theoretical frameworks lately? What happens in Joe Kidd, again? Plus, a Pine Cone Crime Zone about Tarzan. See our final tier list here (SPOILERS!!!): https://imgur.com/a/K3oBYpS As always, thank you to Jetski for our theme music and to Jeremy Allison for our artwork. Follow Aaron: https://x.com/HitFactoryPod https://www.patreon.com/c/hitfactorypod/ Follow Pod Casty For Me: https://www.podcastyforme.com/ https://twitter.com/podcastyforme https://www.instagram.com/podcastyforme/ https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe Artwork by Jeremy Allison: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

After 2005's digital day-and-date experiment BUBBLE, Soderbergh swung hard in the other direction with a Golden Age Hollywood pastiche: his (loose) adaptation of Joseph Kanon's postwar Berlin mystery THE GOOD GERMAN. Joining us is film writer and literal historian Peter Raleigh! We talk adaptation, aesthetic imitation, Denazification, CASABLANCA, and much more. Check it out! Further Reading: The Good German by Joseph Kanon Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945 by Tony Judt Commemorating Hell: The Public Memory of Mittelbau-Dora by Gretchen Schafft and Gerhard Zeidler Nazi Billionaires: The Dark History of Germany's Wealthiest Dynasties by David de Jong "Fighting Men" by Anthony Lane "Style Wars: Steven Soderbergh's 'The Good German'" by Michael Koresky Further Viewing: FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT (Hitchcock, 1940) CASABLANCA (Curtiz, 1942) TO BE OR NOT TO BE (Lubitsch, 1942) A FOREIGN AFFAIR (Wilder, 1948) THE THIRD MAN (Reed, 1949) JUDGMENT AT NUREMBERG (Kramer, 1961) EUROPA (Von Trier, 1991) BARB WIRE (Hogan, 1996) PHOENIX (Petzold, 2014) TRANSIT (Petzold, 2018) Follow Peter Raleigh: https://x.com/PetreRaleigh https://peterraleigh.substack.com/ Follow Pod Casty For Me: https://www.podcastyforme.com/ https://twitter.com/podcastyforme https://www.instagram.com/podcastyforme/ https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe Artwork by Jeremy Allison: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

This is a preview of a premium episode from our Patreon feed, Paid Costly For Me! Head over to Patreon.com/PodCastyForMe to hear more for just $5 a month. A year after ERIN BROCKOVICH, another unashamedly feminine legal professional challenged norms and won at the box office in LEGALLY BLONDE. Here to talk gender performance, turn-of-the-millennium feminism, and Reese Witherspoon's many crimes is writer Veronica Phillips! Really fun episode. Plus, Carmel gets its own Columbo in the Pine Cone Crime Zone. Follow Veronica: https://hi-femme.com/ https://x.com/vnickyy As always, thank you to Jetski for our theme music and Jeremy Allison for our artwork.

Another Pod Casty For Me Experience: we're talking Steven Soderbergh's 2005 experiment BUBBLE - day-and-date release experiment, digital cinematography experiment, first-time actor experiment, improvised script experiment - with our buddy Evan from Left of the Projector! And this one's set at a factory, so you know we go crazy on it. We get into film distribution economics, working people on film, first-time actors, naturalism, digital cinema, eastern Ohio accents, and much more. Really tremendous film and tremendous conversation. It's also Jake's dang birthday, so you better enjoy this episode!!! Further Reading: "Eight Hours Are Not A Day" by Matthew Ross "An Interview with Steven Soderbergh" by Scott Indrisek Further Viewing: Interview with Debbie Doebereiner HARLAN COUNTY USA (Kopple, 1976) STROSZEK (Herzog, 1977) BLUE COLLAR (Schrader, 1978) SLACKER (Linklater, 1990) CLERKS (Smith, 1994) CITY OF GOD (Meirelles and Lund, 2002) ELEPHANT (Van Sant, 2003) FISH TANK (Arnold, 2009) WESTERN (Grisebach, 2017) THE 15:17 TO PARIS (Eastwood, 2018) BAD TRIP (Sakurai, 2021) Follow Left of the Projector: https://leftoftheprojector.com/ Follow Pod Casty For Me: https://www.podcastyforme.com/ https://twitter.com/podcastyforme https://www.instagram.com/podcastyforme/ https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe Artwork by Jeremy Allison: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

This is a preview of a premium episode from our Patreon feed, Paid Costly For Me! Head over to Patreon.com/PodCastyForMe to hear more for just $5 a month. This week we're looking at another one of Dirty Harry's spiritual children, Paul Verhoeven's 1987 ROBOCOP. Violence, corporate greed, police stuff - much to talk about here. But we're also talking about it because Verhoeven is a Dutch guy and Jake just got back from a trip to Amsterdam, which we gotta talk about too! OCEAN'S TWELVE locations, European public infrastructure, visiting the Anne Frank House during Israel's genocide of Palestinians - big ep. Plus: a message from Hotel Detective Maxwell Pierson. Thanks as always to Jetski for our theme music and to Jeremy Allison for our artwork. Check out Jetski's new album, The Radiant Radish!