Podcasts
A Collapsing Marriage and Tentacle Porn in Andrzej Żuławski’s ‘Possession’ [Horror Queers Podcast]
Subway Screaming.
After closing out January with a revisit of the Dark Castle slasher remake House of Wax, Joe and I settled into our birthday month with Videodrome, kicking off four weeks of ‘Weird Sex’ films! Next up is Andrzej Żuławski‘s 1981 classic Possession, which is finally available to stream on Shudder again!
In the film, Anna (Isabelle Adjani) reveals to her husband, Mark (Sam Neill), that she is having an affair. Mark is devastated, and seeks out Heinrich (Heinz Bennent), the man who cuckolded him, only to receive a beating. After a series of violent confrontations between Mark and Anna, Mark hires a private investigator to follow her. Anna descends into madness, and it’s soon clear that she is hiding a much bigger secret — one that is both inexplicable and shocking.
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Episode 216: Possession (1981)
Put down that carving knife and pull out that tentacle monster because we’re heading all the way to divided Berlin to discuss Andrzej Żuławski’s loud and proud 1981 masterpiece Possession! Joining us for the conversation is Losers’ Club and Psychoanalysis Podcast co-host Jenn Adams!
Join us as we sing all the praises for Isabelle Adjani’s mesmerizing performance (if you’ve seen the subway scene, you know why) before trying to pick apart every single bit of emotion that this film exudes. And it’s…a lot.
Plus: hot Sam Neill, deranged rocking, gay detectives, dirty-ass feathers, a queer reading of Heinrich and so, so so many slaps. Are we dealing with Sister Faith or Sister Chance? You tell us!
Cross out Possession!
Coming up on Wednesday: It’s only gonna get weirder as we continue Weird Sex Month as we take a look at Kevin Smith’s polarizing 2014 body horror film Tusk.
P.S. Subscribe to our Patreon for more than 226 hours of additional content! This month, we’ve got episodes on Roxanne Benjamin’s There’s Something Wrong with the Children, Brandon Cronenberg’s Infinity Pool, Elizabeth Banks’ Cocaine Bear, and an M. Night Shyamalan double bill: Knock at the Cabin, complemented by an audio commentary on The Village.
Aaliyah Innocent.
May was a busy subgenre-switching month. After kicking things off with disaster “slasher” The Poseidon Adventure (listen), we watched American Giallo The Fan (listen), then wrapped things up with Vincent Price’s horror comedy Theater of Blood (listen).
Now, in honor of Pride Month and the return of AMC’s Interview with the Vampire (renamed The Vampire Lestat for S03), Trace and I had to check out the straight-washed second attempt to bring Anne Rice’s The Vampire Chronicles to life.
Back in 2002, director Michael Rymer pitched Hollywood on his vision for Rice’s second Chronicle book, The Vampire Lestat. Instead, the suits opted to adapt the third book, Queen of the Damned (likely due to the ancillary opportunities of the soundtrack, written entirely by Korn frontman Jonathan Davis).
In the film, Lestat (Stuart Townsend) awakens from slumber to reinvent himself as a leather-pant-wearing rocker. Lestat’s very public vampire persona attracts the attention of Talamasca novice Jesse (Marguerite Moreau), as well as the vampire’s maker Marius (Vincent Perez). But the nu-metal has the greatest impact on Akasha (Aaliyah), who awakens and promises to take over the world if her old foe Maharet (Lena Olin) doesn’t stop her.
Whose side will Lestat join? Will Marius help his fledgling or abandon him to public sacrifice? And does anyone actually care about Jesse? (Please note: that last question is rhetorical.)
Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get a new episode every Wednesday. You can subscribe on iTunes/Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, iHeartRadio, SoundCloud, TuneIn, Amazon Music, and RSS.
Episode 389: Queen of the Damned (2002)
Practice your Egyptian accent and bare that midriff because we are talking the troubled “adaptation” of Anne Rice’s Queen of the Damned (2002).
Directed by Australian Michael Rymer, this one was doomed by the suits before it was even greenlit (which happened AFTER all of the songs were written by Korn frontman Jonathan Davis). It’s a bit of a clusterfuck.
Plus: praising everything Aaliyah (RIP); critiquing everything Stuart Townsend (aside from his abs and leather pants); a soft queer reading of Marius; and bemoaning boring protagonist/audience surrogate JESSE.
Cross out Queen of the Damned!
Coming Up Next: We’re tackling Ben Stiller’s horror-adjacent dark comedy The Cable Guy (1996), in anticipation of its 30th anniversary!
P.S. Subscribe to our Patreon for over 495 hours of Patreon content including this month’s new episodes on Hannibal Season 3 Episodes 5 & 6, Backrooms, Passenger, Leviticus, an audio commentary on the original Scary Movie (2000), and the return of our Requel Tier as we begin our episode coverage of AMC’s The Vampire Lestat.