Film Utopia

In-depth movie talk hosted by three fellas with a passion for film. Detailed retrospective movie reviews and filmography discussions of directors, actors, composers, and more! In addition to new episodes, we are actively republishing our older episodes. Please check back regularly! 🙏

Episodes

112. ‘80s Fantasy Part 4 – Inconceivable!: The Late-Eighties

September 22, 2025 • 58 mins

Film Utopia’s summer quest reaches the tail end of the 1980s as Steven Benjamin, and Sean reminisce about the fantastical twilight of the decade. From the muscle-bound chaos of The Barbarians, to the satirical fair-tale perfection of The Princess Bride, the surreal stop-motion wonder of Alice, the “best leave that one in childhood’s memory” Willow, and the gleeful absurdity of Erik the Viking, we explore how the fantasy boom began ...

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111. ‘80s Fantasy Part 3 – Goblins, Gods, and the Kurgan: The Mid-Eighties

August 30, 2025 • 120 mins

The Film Utopia summer quest thunders onward as Steven, Benjamin, and Sean venture into the fantastical mid-80s; 1984 – 1986. An era when fantasy cinema became darker, more kid-friendly, and occasionally farcical.

From the dreamy surrealism of A Company of Wolves and the childlike wonder (and childhood trauma-inducing) The NeverEnding Story to the neon-drenched Dungeonmaster, the ever-present loincloth-clad barbarian sights of Red ...

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110. ‘80s Fantasy Part 2 – From Hawk to Krull: The Early 80s

August 9, 2025 • 122 mins

The Film Utopia summer quest continues in this second instalment on fantasy cinema of the 1980s as Steven, Benjamin, and Sean tackle the shimmering, sword-swinging, and body oil-drenched years of 1980 to 1983.

From popular mainstays such as Hawk the Slayer (1980), Clash of the Titans (1981), Conan the Barbarian (1982), The Dark Crystal (1982) and Krull (1983), to side quests veering into the more eclectic cult offerings of Heavy M...

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109. '80s Fantasy Part 1 - Before the Boom: A Brief History of Fantasy

July 24, 2025 • 52 mins

Before the loincloths, elf-muppets, crystal balls, dying horse trauma, and mullets of 80s fantasy cinema, there was… quite a lot, actually! In this opening episode of our new series on 1980s fantasy films, Steven, Benjamin and Sean gather round the mic to set the stage and trace the tangled narrative roots of fantasy, both on and off the screen, from a time before things got all neon-coloured and swordy.

We dive into everything fr...

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108. Lamberto Bava - 1980 to 1992

June 26, 2025 • 94 mins

Steven and Sean continue their exploration of Italian genre cinema with a laid-back chat about the filmography of Lamberto Bava.

Unlike his father, horror maestro and Giallo godfather Mario Bava, Lamberto carved out his own unique legacy by straddling the line between art horror and sleaze – usually opting for the latter – with a mix of gore, kinetic pacing and trashy fun; trading in typical Giallo elegance for rubber demons, dodg...

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107. David Lynch Part 2 - 1990 to 2017

June 5, 2025 • 89 mins

Steven, Benjamin and Sean conclude their retrospective of the late director, David Lynch, and find themselves heavily in agreement in some areas of the auteur’s directorial filmography, but completely opposed in others. On this episode, we discuss Twin Peaks (1990 – 1992, 2017), Fire Walk With Me (1992), Lost Highway (1997), The Straight Story (1999), Mulholland Drive (2001), and Inland Empire (2006).

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106. David Lynch Part 1 - 1977 to 1990

May 29, 2025 • 82 mins

With the recent passing of auteur filmmaker David Lynch fresh in mind, Steven Benjamin and Sean reflect on the director’s legacy and discuss their thoughts on his innovative and influential theatrical filmography. In part one we cover Eraserhead (1977), The Elephant Man (1980), Dune (1984), Blue Velvet (1986) and Wild At Heart (1990).

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105. James Bond - 2025 Update

April 24, 2025 • 180 mins

With Amazon Studios now in control of the Bond franchise, we thought we’d share our hopes and fears for the future of 007. At least, that’s how this episode was originally planned! However, as Sean wasn’t part of our original Bond retrospective review series back in 2015 that we’ve just republished over the last 10 days, we have decided to hear out his ranked list of the 25 Eon produced Bond films, in ascending order, while Steven ...

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104. ARCHIVE EPISODE (2021): Bond Part 9 - No Time to Die (2021)

April 23, 2025 • 69 mins

Originally recorded and published in 2021. Please excuse our less-than-stellar audio quality efforts back then!

With Bond in the news again, and in the run up to our 2025 Bond update episode coming later this month, we’ve decided to reach way back into the depths of our archives and resuscitate one of our classic filmography review series’, our nine-part, complete James Bond movie retrospective, originally released back in 2015 to ...

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