The Cinematologists Podcast

A decade ago John Maclean made his debut feature, the brilliant Western Slow West (2015).It followed a run of brilliant short films and music videos, as well as some of the late 90s and early 2000s most distinctive music during his time in the Beta Band.

Tornado - Set in the rugged landscape of 1790s Britain, Tornado (Kōki) is a young and determined Japanese woman who finds herself caught in a perilous situation when she and her...

We're back with an episode featuring just Neil and myself discussing a cinematic topic we both are invested in: The crime/heist genre. The core of this chat is an examination of how the structures of the genre intersect with social, racial, and economic contexts in four specific films. Sparked by our shared admiration for Justin Kurzel's The Order, we trace the lineage of socially conscious crime narratives from classic noir to con...

In late March 2025 we screened Oliver Stone's 1991 epic myth of 1960s America, The Doors, at Newlyn Filmhouse at the invitation of regular Cinematologist, filmmaker Mark Jenkin. The conversation following the screening covered Jim Morrison and the band, 1960s America, Vietnam, film form and the longstanding influence of the film on Mark's work, up to and including his new film, Rose of Nevada, due for release later this year. 

A fe...

As part of this year's Kinoteka Polish Film Festival, currently running in London, Michael Brooke has curated a complete retrospective of the criminally under-known Polish director Wojciech Has. The retrospective, starting from the 1st April 2025 and featuring screenings at the BFI and the ICA, contains Has's short and feature film work in gorgeous restorations. There are talks and events around the films, and the ICA has an exhibi...

For the latest episode we are honoured to share a recent talk at Falmouth University's School of Film & Television by Rod Stoneman titled 'Amongst Artistic Forms of Thought'. Rod's talk discussed different and often radical uses of film form to move the art form and audience thinking into different, not literal, not factual, non information-driven places. To illustrate his talk he drew on a number of filmic examples including t...

It was an absolute joy to welcome actor, director, producer and writer Mario van Peebles to The Cinematologists Podcast. In London to show his new film Outlaw Posse as part of the Black Rodeo season at the BFI, I was able to talk with him and his son Mandela, who also stars in the film, about his lifelong interest in Westerns, particularly in the often cliched, often forgotten role of African American's in the Western mythos.

Outla...

We are really excited to be collaborating with the BFI once again, particularly for an episode on Belgian auteur filmmaker Chantal Akerman as they begin an in-depth retrospective of her work.

In the autumn of 2022, Akerman's masterpiece Jeanne Dielman, 23, Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles, was voted the greatest film of all time in Sight and Sound Magazine's once-a-decade poll. We covered that moment with a double episode - which w...

We kick off season 21 and the tenth year of The Cinematologists with a special conversation with Belgian filmmaker Tim Mielants about his work on recent release, Small Things Like These, written by Enda Walsh (Hunger) and starring and produced by Cillian Murphy.

In the conversation, Neil and Tim discuss film form and style, particularly the use of close-up, space and the Gothic, masculinity, grief and how being an outsider can prov...

This is part 2 of our end of year review show in which we countdown from 5 to 1. As requested from our Patreon members and several other long time listeners, we've gone back to a top ten countdown, which was great fun to compile. Although Neil and I did not agree on our top choice, we did share several films that made both our lists. There was also one major disagreement, and it was fascinating to spend some time hashing that out.

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In a bumper episode, the penultimate one of the year, Dario interviews Jessica Hausner about her new film Club Zero and Guy Maddin, Evan, and Galen Johnson about Rumours. Both films have limited UK releases this week (Friday, December 6th), and, interestingly, though they are very different films, they have thematic connections, particularly in relation to contemporary crises, social critique, and satirical modes.

Club Zero stars a...

In this return to the long-form interview format, The Cinematologists are deeply honoured to welcome Professor Vivian Sobchack to the podcast. In an incredibly profound and wide-ranging conversation, Dario discusses with Prof. Sobchack a diverse array of topics related to her work and life as one of the most important and influential thinkers and writers on cinema. The subjects covered include:

• The Evolution of Film Studies: ...

In what is something of a throwback episode nowadays, Neil hosted a screening of Jeff Feuerzig's film about Laura Albert [JT Leroy] as the opening event of the 2024 Falmouth Book Festival, recording the post-film conversation for the podcast.

For the post-film chat Neil was joined by the director of Falmouth Book Festival, Colin Midson, who had a unique perspective on the story, as he was the publicist for JT Leroy's first book, Sa...

Our second London Film Festival main episode is here, and it's a bumper edition. Dario is in Falmouth visiting Neil, so it's something of a nostalgic live taping from the place where The Cinematologists started. The first film on the agenda is Alex Ross Perry's Pavements, which is a meta-documentary on a mercurial 90s band, Pavement. Neil, with his music film expertise, gives detailed context to the history and mythology of the ban...

In the first of our 2024 LFF double header on the main feed, Neil and Dario are joined by one of the two correspondents joining us for this year's coverage, Ben Goff.

The focus of the episode are deep dives into key films for Neil, Dario and Ben from their early and pre-festival viewing, on the digital platform and at press and industry screenings on the ground in London, at BFI Southbank and Picturehouse Central. Each of the cinem...

In our second episode of the season, we discuss Neil's superb, recently published book Music Films: Documentaries, Concert Films and Other Cinematic Representations of Popular Music.

We explore their significance, evolution, and the complexities surrounding their creation and reception, along with Neil's reflections on the challenges of writing for diverse audiences and the expectations of music fans. The conversation touches on th...

We are back for the 20th season of The Cinematologists Podcast and our 10th year. Neither of us when we started out could have envisaged that we would have done what we have with the Podcast, spoken to so many fascinating film people and cultivated such a loyal audience. 

Indeed, this season represents something of a renewal, as is discussed in the first episode of the season. After taking a break from the last season Dario is back...

In the final episode of the latest season – Neil’s solo adventure – Neil talks to filmmaker, writer and comedian Scott Tanner Jones about collecting physical media. In an episode with a similar approach to the previous one with Kat Flint-Nicol, Neil brings to the podcast a conversation about themes and ideas that permeate his thinking around a particular area of film, and wider popular culture. In this episode Neil an...

In the penultimate episode of the season, Neil sits down with friend and colleague Kat Flint-Nicol to think through British cinema. The aim was to focus on regionality, but the conversation is much-more wide ranging than that. It captures the complex intersectionality of place, class, genre, industry gatekeeping, and the relationship between industry and culture. 

Films, places and texts discussed in this discursive chat include...

As we enter the final weeks of the latest season, it is an honour to share this mini episode (a 45rpm single as opposed to 33.3rpm LP if you will) ahead of two final regular episodes before our summer break and the return of Dario for the autumn season.

Neil was invited at short notice to chat to filmmaker Gary Hustwit about his revolutionary, generative film, Eno, about the life, creative practice and p...