FEATURING: Georgie Harriet-King, Paul Richards, Tony Mardon, Kimberley Findeis-Sparkes, Pierce Connolly
PLOT: Diana disappears in the woods: the police know nothing about the case, a paranormal investigator knows less than he might hope, and Diana’s step-father knows more than he lets on.
COMMENTS: There’s a sensation of ensnarement in this corner of England. Widower Kenneth is trapped by dread and lingering grief, having lost his step-daughter Diana in the nearby woods nearby. A burly stranger repeatedly circles a seven-pointed star inscribed upon the ground. A local police detective is trapped by lack of insight. And quite literally, something is trapped in a valise, in a shed. Somehow a pattern emerges from this near-stasis, and ambient clues and portents conspire to trap a psychic who could be the key to the greater mystery.
This mystery, whose nature I couldn’t fully reveal even if I wanted to, seems to be both of ancient Earth and far-flung æther, and James Newton uses this unlikely MacGuffin to bring about a stylish thriller-in-miniature. Feeling alternately theatrical and abstract (and during the brief color sequences, both), When the Sun Stands Still is a delight to gaze upon as the sound design ushers the viewer in. The movie opens on Diana wandering through a copse into a clearing, with sound cues distracting our eyes as hers eventually gaze upwards into the splashy sky, and the world shakes. Crisp framing floats amid an inky void as Kenneth is interviewed by the suspicious inspector, the harsh tone of the dialogue muted by the darkness. Clock-ticks accompany the troubled father, and suddenly we hear his name—and he hears his name—and a cryptic visitor augurs the events’ unravelling.
The pieces don’t add up, and probably can’t, but this is no criticism. James Newton (with co-writer Paul Richards) are not here to tell a commonplace story. As with their previous collaboration, Katernica, there are events that can be explained, and events that cannot—and the viewer must be comfortable in the face of a deep, otherworldly inscrutability.
PLOT:A reporter witnesses a murder through the window of a nearby apartment, but her investigation leads her to a mysterious pair of conjoined twins with a dark and disturbing past.
COMMENTS: Brian De Palma loves Alfred Hitchcock. Everyone knows that. Sure, he’s capable of turning a Stephen King novel into a horror classic or an old TV spy show into a Tom Cruise-led blockbuster, but one thing we know for sure is that, once he got over his reputation as a comedy director, there’s nothing he’d rather do than a slavish impersonation of the Master of Suspense. Want proof? All you need to do is look at Body Double. Or Blow Out. Or the twisty thriller that made his name, Sisters.
Sisters does wear its forebears on its sleeve, with allusions to Psycho, Rear Window, and Vertigo among the most recognizable (to say nothing of the unmistakable sounds of Bernard Herrmann, who De Palma lured out of semi-retirement to lend his trademark screeching violins to the soundtrack), but the student demonstrates more facility with modern sensibilities than the Master, with powerful insights into racism and misogyny, comfort with sexuality, and willingness to indulge the supernatural. Most notably, he’s found a subject that would absolutely appeal to Hitchcock, turning the true story of the conjoined Krivoshlyapova twins into Kidder’s pretty girl with a very dark past. Where Hitchcock made do with doppelgängers and confused identities, De Palma uses a genuine medical curiosity as his launchpad.
Mind you, none of this theft homage would mean a thing if the film didn’t work on its own terms. De Palma opens with a classic bit of misdirection, aping a “Candid Camera”-like show to introduce our charming hero couple, coquettish Kidder with her Québécois accent and babe-in-the-woods demeanor and the charming, unsuspecting Wilson. Their romantic whirlwind occupies the first third of the film. Wilson is an almost perfect gentleman, while Kidder tries to explain away her unusually possessive ex-husband (Finley, whose Slugworthian vibes never let up). If De Palma steals anything from Hitchcock, it’s the value of a full-blown paradigm shift that justifies admitting no one after the first act.
The film sputters a bit in Act II as the baton is handed over to Salt, who is a fine heroine but suffers from the script’s need to isolate her by setting her adrift in a sea of backstory and mansplainers. (Fun Easter egg: the headline of the news clipping from her column adorning her back wall reads, “Why We Call Them Pigs.”) It’s the final act, when she finally discovers the strange truth of Danielle and Dominique’s unusual condition and upbringing, that pays off in the form of the one scene that owes nothing to Hitchcock: a nightmare sequence in which Salt imagines herself as Kidder’s conjoined twin and gets the scoop on just what screwed up the twins so many years ago. It’s a moment that DePalma gets to claim all for himself.
It’s hard to deny that Sisters is De Palma doing Hitchcock. The parallels are just too obvious, right through to the final joke of the unclaimed MacGuffin. The truth, though, is that he does Hitchcock extremely well, with a freshness and modernity that the Master’s later works struggle to capture. If this is mere copycattery, audiences were right to demand more of it.
FEATURING: Voices of Yto Barrada, Marriam Benani, Dounia Berrada
PLOT: A New York-based Moroccan coyote film director develops an autobiographical movie exploring her relationship with her mother.
COMMENTS: Directors Barki and Benami built a reputation for cinematic weirdness with their previous collaboration, the 2020 short-film series “2 Lizards,” which was featured on Adult Swim‘s surreal mixtape program “Off the Air.” Bouchra, the team’s animated feature film debut, centers on the titular heroine, a young Moroccan woman living and working as a film director in New York City. The narrative alternates between her present life and her past in Casablanca, blurring reality with reconstruction as Bouchra attempts, through her work, to process her relationship with her semi-estranged Moroccan mother. The tensions between them stem from taboos surrounding Bouchra’s sexual identity that went unaddressed and ignored for years. Through calls with her mother in the present day, and reconstructions/reminisces of a short lesbian affair in Casablanca, these issues gradually come to light. Plus, the characters are all anthropomorphic animals of various species.
Like Endless Cookie (2025), Bouchra stands out due to the dissonance between its stylized animation and its grounded themes. The aesthetic—furry-inspired anthropomorphic animals in a neon-soaked, almost cyberpunk-like urban environment—can be off-putting at first. But this isn’t sci-fi or high fantasy. Naturalistic dialogue, overlapping and full of awkward stuttering, hints at something closer to reality. This is, essentially, a tale of familial ties, sexual orientation, and the way traditional societies consciously exile whatever disrupts the status quo. It is an empathetic tale, eager to show compassion and understand easily-disturbed norms. The furry aesthetic reveals the queerness of the bodies, their hairy, androgynous nature. This is especially apparent in two short, tasteful yet erotically-charged intimate segments. The dark color palette of New York contrasts with the warmer tones of Casablanca. Often, the uncanny, detailed digital character animations are juxtaposed against real background photographs of Morocco, for a documentary-like feel.
In the end, this movie can be viewed not only as American independent cinema, but also as Moroccan Diasporic Cinema. And since Moroccan cinema isn’t that common, this work can be recommended to fans of world cinema adventures.
Cuddly Toys (2022): Kansas Bowling‘s firecracker mondo-mockumentary about the dangers facing teenage girls is screening in various cities, No official site, but the movie is available on Blu-ray or VOD (it’s even free now on Amazon Prime).
Buffet Infinity (2025): Read Giles Edwards’ Apocrypha Candidate review. Watch a series of local commercials to reveal a secret occult conspiracy in this amazingly inventive (and weird) low-budget comedy; now on Blu-ray with commentary from director Simon Glassman and producer Mike Peterson, and lots of bonus features. Buy Buffet Infinity.
Digger (2026): Tom Cruise shoots for an Oscar in Alejandro González Iñárritu‘s environmental satire that aims to be a modern Dr. Strangleove. In fact, the film has divided critics and preview screeners who see it as a “pretentious” train-wreck—just the kind of Hollywood movie we like to put on our radar! Digger official site.
Studio Ghibli Steelbooks: There are actually too many titles to list here, as it seems that this week Shout! Factory issues a limited edition steelbook Blu-ray of every single Studio Ghibli title (including 2 canonically weird movies). Buy Spirited Away, Howl’s Moving Castle, or, for rich folks, buy the entire Miyazaki set.
Next week’s guest on Pod 366 will be young director Xavier Terhorst of the new underground movie My Vegas Eyes. In written content, Michael Diamades covers the new lesbian coyote feature Bouchra, Shane Wilson stays Halloweeny with a deeper look at Brian De Palma‘s Sisters (1972), Giles Edwards reviews the new underground occult mystery When the Sun Stands Still, and, as mentioned in the podcast, Gregory J. Smalley plans to dig into 2026 Oscar hopeful Digger. Onward and weirdward!
Celebrating the cinematically surreal, bizarre, cult, oddball, fantastique, strange, psychedelic, and the just plain WEIRD!
