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In our first episode for this year's Spooktober season, Hal has gone with the famous British Folk Horror cult classic The Wicker Man, a first-time watch for us both!

The film's plot centres on the visit of a police officer, Sergeant Neil Howie (Edward Woodward), to the fictional, isolated Scottish island of Summerisle in search of a missing girl. What will he discover there?

Director: Robin Hardy

For Izzy's latest selection she has selected the historical romantic drama The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (2018), based on the 2008 novel of the same name.  After the Second World War, Juliet Ashton (Lily James), a writer, decides to write a book about the residents of Guernsey. However, Juliet's life changes completely after she visits the island. Director: Mike Newell  

For Hal's latest selection, we have watched the highly rated 1957 Ingmar Bergman road movie Wild Strawberries, starring Victor Sjostrom as Dr Borg, an elderly emotionally-distant professor, who travels to Lund University with his daughter-in-law (Ingrid Thulin) to receive an honorary degree.

The trip forces him to re-examine past choices and his future.

Director: Ingmar Bergman

Izzy has selected the latest Hollywood blockbuster that the whole world has been talking about all summer, The Odyssey (2026), starring Matt Damon as Odysseus the Greek king of Ithaca, who undergoes a long and perilous journey home after the Trojan War and encounters mythical beings as he attempts to reunite with his wife Penelope (Anne Hathaway). Director: Christopher Nolan

We have something rather left-field this week with Hal's choice that is the TV Pilot movie that launched the iconic police crime drama Kojak in the 1970's.  Prior to the official launch of the series in 1973, Universal Television released a 2-hour TV movie special: The Marcus Nelson Murders, that was based on a real-life New York case in 1963.  Lieutenant Theo Kojak (Telly Savalas) leads an investigation into the murders of two women who were found in their Manhattan apartment. A young black man is arrested and confesses to the crime, but Kojak feels something is off about the case. Using his connections on the streets, he gets a tip from a drug addict about the real killer. Soon Kojak realises that his department contains crooked cops, and that the accused man was forced into the confession. Director: Joseph Sargent

For Izzy's latest choice, we have treated ourselves to the popular 1987 American Romantic Comedy starring Cher as a widowed Italian American woman who falls in love with her fiance's hot-tempered, estranged younger brother, played by Nicolas Cage. Director: Norman Jewison

Hal has selected the next major Hitchcock movie this week with North by Northwest (1959), the iconic spy thriller starring Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint.  A New York City advertising executive (Grant) goes on the run after being mistaken for a government agent by a group of foreign spies. Director: Alfred Hitchcock

Izzy has this week selected the 1991 remake of the romantic comedy Father of the Bride, written by Nancy Meyers. Steve Martin portrays George Banks, a businessman who becomes flustered while he and his family prepare for his daughter's marriage. Director: Charles Shyer

For our latest episode, Hal has chosen the 2011 American crime comedy film Horrible Bosses, that follows three friends, played by Jason Bateman, Charlie Day, and Jason Sudeikis, who decide to murder their respective overbearing, abusive bosses, portrayed by Kevin Spacey, Jennifer Aniston, and Colin Farrell. Director: Seth Gordon

Izzy has gone highbrow this week and has selected the much-acclaimed 1959 French New Wave Romantic Drama Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959).

A French actress (Emmanuelle Riva) talks to her lover (Eiji Okada), a Japanese architect, about their past and shares her perspectives on the Hiroshima bombing before separating from him.

Director: Alain Resnais

We are back with another episode covering the Jeremy Brett Granada TV Sherlock Holmes series, this time discussing the fourth episode of the series, first aired in May 1984: The Solitary Cyclist. The plot follows a mysterious man on a bicycle who repeatedly trails a young music teacher as she cycles along a lonely country road in Surrey. Director: Paul Annett

Today, we are joined again by Scott to review the wonderful British classic A Matter of Life Death (1945) set in England during WWII, where a British pilot (David Niven) who had cheated death must argue for his life before a celestial court, hoping to prolong his fledgling romance with an American girl (Kim Hunter). Director: Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger  

Izzy's latest choice is the 2007 highly acclaimed Neo Western Crime Thriller No Country for Old Men, that follows three main characters: Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin), a Vietnam war veteran and welder who stumbles upon a large sum of money in the desert, Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem), a hitman who is sent to recover the money, and Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones), a Sheriff investigating the crime.  Director: Joel & Ethan Coen

For Hal's selection this week, we are covering our first Charlie Chaplin movie for the podcast, with The Gold Rush (1925), that we were fortunate enough to view at a London cinema screening in the presence of Paul Merton and Spencer Chaplin. A prospector goes to the Klondike during the 1890s gold rush in hopes of making his fortune, and is smitten with a girl (Georgia Hale) he sees in a dance hall. Director: Charlie Chaplin

Izzy has returned to the musical genre this week and has selected the 2018 musical drama Wild Rose starring Jessie Buckley and Julie Walters. Amidst several difficulties, a single mother of two (Buckley) and a former convict from Scotland, Rose-Lynn, tries to pursue her dream of becoming a country singer. Director: Tom Harper

Hal has gone big this week and has selected what he deems his favourite film of all-time, with the next movie from our Hitchcock marathon, the haunting and intensely psychological Vertigo (1958).

A former San Francisco police detective (James Stewart) juggles wrestling with his personal demons and becoming obsessed with the hauntingly beautiful woman (Kim Novak) he has been hired to trail, who may be deeply disturbed. 

Director: Alfred Hitchcock

Izzy has selected another classic this week with Sophie's Choice, the 1982 psychological drama based on the novel of the same name by William Styron. Meryl Streep stars as Zofia "Sophie" Zawistowska, a Polish immigrant who moves to America with a dark secret from her past, who shares a boarding house in Brooklyn with her tempestuous lover Nathan (Kevin Kline in his feature-film debut), and young writer Stingo (Peter MacNicol). 

Director: Alan J. Pakula

Hal has gone for another hugely important film classic for this episode with David Lean's romantic period masterpiece Brief Encounter (1945), adapted from the Noel Coward 1936 play Still Life. Brief Encounter tells the story of two married strangers (Celia Johnson & Trevor Howard) living in pre-World War II England, whose chance meeting at a railway station leads to a brief yet intense emotional affair disrupting their otherwise conventional lives. Director: David Lean

Izzy's latest choice is the iconic 1961 romantic comedy Breakfast at Tiffany's which saw Audrey Hepburn deliver a career-defining performance as the eccentric and unpredictable socialite Holly Golightly, who is determined to make it big and marry a wealthy husband. But when young writer Paul Varjak (George Peppard) moves into her apartment building, her past threatens to get in their way.

Director: Blake Edwards

Hal has gone back to one of his standout TV dramas from the archives and has selected one of the early episodes from the Jeremy Brett Sherlock Holmes Granada TV series that was broadcast on ITV from 1984-1994.

In this episode, titled "The Dancing Men", a gentleman is baffled when the childish drawings of dancing men terrify his American wife. Sherlock Holmes is drawn to the case and soon discovers why.

Director: John Bruce

Izzy's next choice is the highly rated Merchant Ivory production The Remains of the Day (1993), based on the Booker Prize-winning novel by Kazuo Ishiguro, about the story of the unexpressed affection between Mr Stevens (Anthony Hopkins) - head butler at an English stately home shortly before World War II - and housekeeper Miss Kenton (Emma Thompson). Director: James Ivory

For Hal's selection this week, we ventured to London to see the Oscar-nominated period horror film Sinners (2025) on the big screen for the full movie-going experience.

Set in 1932 in the Mississippi Delta, the film stars Michael B. Jordan in dual roles as criminal identical brothers who return to their hometown in the Jim Crow South, where they are encountered by a supernatural evil. 

Director: Ryan Coogler

This week we are delighted to be joined again by Scott Phipps (host of the Talking Pictures TV Podcast, as well as his own shows Reel Britannia, The Stinking Pause and Rainbow Valley podcasts) who has selected Hal and Izzy to review Paper Moon (1973), the wonderfully endearing road comedy-drama starring real-life father and daughter Ryan and Tatum O'Neal as protagonists Moze and Addie, who forge an unlikely partnership during the Great Depression. Director: Peter Bogdanovich

Izzy's choice has landed on Valentines Day this week so she has decided to go big and select one of her all-time favourites for the podcast with About Time (2013), the British romantic comedy starring Domhnall Gleeson, Rachel McAdams and Bill Nighy.  At the age of 21, Tim (Gleeson) discovers he can travel in time and change what happens and has happened in his own life. His decision to make his world a better place by getting a girlfriend turns out not to be as easy as you might think. Director: Richard Curtis

Hal has chosen the second French movie for the podcast this week with Priceless (2006), a romantic comedy starring Audrey Tatou and Gad Elmaleh.  A shy waiter (Elmaleh) who works at a high-end hotel is mistaken for a young millionaire by the beautiful and intriguing fortune hunter Irene (Tatou).  Director: Pierre Salvadori

For Izzy's choice this week, she has chosen the popular early 90's sports comedy film Cool Runnings, which is a first-time watch for Hal. When a Jamaican sprinter (Leon Robinson) is disqualified from the Olympic Games, he enlists the help of a dishonored coach (John Candy) to start the first Jamaican Bobsled Team. Director: Jon Turteltaub

Hal is back on the Hitchcock marathon next week and has chosen the movie that he labels as the most underrated Hitch film from his canon of work. The Wrong Man is unique for being the only movie by the filmmaker based on a true story, based in 1953, where we see an innocent man named Christopher Emanuel "Manny" Balestrero (Henry Fonda) who is wrongly arrested after being mistaken for an armed robber. Director: Alfred Hitchcock

Izzy's next choice is the much-acclaimed Hollywood biographical political thriller about the Watergate Scandal, starring Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman, as two reporters whose investigation for The Washington Post sheds light on the controversial scandal that compels the president to resign from his post. Director: Alan J. Pakula

For Hal's first choice of the year, we are going with the much-beloved Scottish coming-of-age romantic comedy Gregory's Girl, starring John Gordon Sinclair as Gregory, a teenage boy, who falls in love with a classmate and tries to win her love. The girl (Dee Hepburn) who he holds affection for bags a place in the school's soccer team. Director: Bill Forsyth

We kick off 2026 in style with a big epic Izzy has been wanting us to cover for a long time, The Sound of Music (1965). Maria (Julie Andrews), an aspiring nun, is sent as a governess to take care of seven motherless children. Soon her jovial and loving nature tames their hearts and the children become fond of her, leading to her eventual marriage with their father Captain Georg von Trapp (Christopher Plummer) and their escape during the Anschluss in 1938.  Director: Robert Wise

To round off our first full year of film reviews, we have decided to record a special one-off Oscar awards episode to reflect, debate and celebrate our most respected movies that we have enjoyed watching in 2025. Our nominees in the given categories are as follows: Best Costume/Makeup: Phantom Thread (Mark Bridges) Little Women (Jacqueline Durran) Boogie Nights (Mark Bridges) Barry Lyndon (Milena Canonero & Ulla-Britt Soderlund) Pride and Prejudice (Jacqueline Durran) Amadeus (Theodor Pistek) Best Musical Score/Soundtrack: Boogie Nights (Michael Penn) Amadeus (Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) There Will Be Blood (Jonny Greenwood) Charade (Henry Mancini) Little Women (Alexandre Desplat) Best Cinematography: Rear Window (Robert Burks) Barry Lyndon (John Alcott) Aftersun (Gregory Oke) Portrait of a Lady on Fire (Claire Mathon) There Will be Blood (Robert Elswit) Pride and Prejudice (Roman Osin) Most Memorable Moment: Boogie Nights (Jessie’s Girl: Firecracker scene) There Will Be Blood (Milkshake scene) Strangers on a Train (Carousel final scene) Rear Window (Thorwald catches Lisa) Smith Goes to Washington (Jefferson Smith filibuster) The Bridges of Madison County (the kitchen confrontation scene) Little Women (Amy’s speech) Best Supporting Actress: Thelma Ritter (Rear Window) Marlene Dietrich (Stage Fright) Florence Pugh (Little Women) Lesley Manville (Phantom Thread) Susan Kohner (Imitation of Life) Best Supporting Actor: Robert Walker (Strangers on a Train) Paul Dano (There will Be Blood) Joe E. Brown (Some Like It Hot) Burt Reynolds (Boogie Nights) Philip Seymour Hoffman (The Master) Best Actress: Vicky Krieps (Phantom Thread) Grace Kelly (Rear Window) Meryl Streep (The Bridges of Madison County) Bette Davis (Whatever Happened to Baby Jane) Lee Remick (Days of Wine and Roses) Liv Ullmann (Autumn Sonata) Best Actor: Clint Eastwood (The Bridges of Madison County) Jack Lemmon (Days of Wine and Roses) Ray Milland (Dial M for Murder) Daniel Day Lewis (There Will be Blood) Murray Abraham (Amadeus) James Stewart (Mr. Smith Goes to Washington) Best Director: Alfred Hitchcock (Rear Window) John Carpenter (The Thing) Billy Wilder (Some Like it Hot) Paul Thomas Anderson (There Will Be Blood) Blake Edwards (Days of Wine and Roses) Greta Gerwig (Little Women) Best Picture: Dial M for Murder Rear Window Some Like it Hot The Bridges of Madison County There Will be Blood Days of Wine and Roses

For Hal's Christmas selection this year, he has chosen his favourite and "definitive" screen adaptation of Charles Dickens' festive novel of Scrooge ("A Christmas Carol") with Alastair Sim delivering an unforgettable performance as Ebenezer Scrooge, a spiteful and miserly man, who encounters three spirits on Christmas Eve who show him the folly of his ways. Director: Brian Desmond Hurst

Our first Christmas selection for the podcast this year is one of Izzy's all-time favourite films, The Holiday, the romantic comedy starring Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet as Amanda and Iris, two lovelorn women from opposite sides of the Atlantic Ocean, who arrange a home exchange to escape heartbreak during the Christmas and holiday season.  Director: Nancy Meyers

Hal's next choice is the 2011 black comedy film directed by Roman Polanski, based on the Tony Award-winning 2006 play by Yasmina Reza.  Two pairs of parents hold a cordial meeting after their sons are involved in a fight, though as their time together progresses, increasingly childish behaviour throws the discussion into chaos. Starring: Jodie Foster, Kate Winslet, Christoph Waltz, & John C. Reilly Director: Roman Polanski

Izzy's latest selection is a highly-rated Swedish drama that marks not only our first film directed by the renowned filmmaker Ingmar Bergman but the final acting role for the exquisite Ingrid Bergman. The tale of Autumn Sonata depicts a world-renowned pianist (Ingrid Bergman) who visits her estranged daughter, Eva (Liv Ullmann), for the first time in seven years. Upon her arrival, she is confronted with suppressed bitterness which Eva has been harbouring for years. Director: Ingmar Bergman

For our final movie in the month of "Spook-tober", we were lucky enough to watch the iconic horror movie "The Thing" at the local cinema, on Halloween night.  The film tells the story of a group of American researchers in Antarctica who encounter the eponymous "Thing" an extraterrestrial life-form that assimilates, then imitates, other organisms. The group is overcome by paranoia and conflict as they learn that they can no longer trust each other and that any of them could be the Thing.  Starring: Kurt Russell Directed by: John Carpenter

Hal has chosen one of the all-time iconic gothic horror movies starring two of the most important female acting stars from Hollywood history.

A former vaudeville child star (Bette Davis) torments her paraplegic sister (Joan Crawford), who eclipsed her as a movie star, in their decaying Hollywood mansion while desperately clinging to hopes of a comeback.

Director: Robert Aldrich

Izzy has selected the wonderful cult musical horror classic The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) this week, for our first official selection of "Spooktober" this year.  The story centres on a young engaged couple (Barry Bostwick & Susan Sarandon) whose car breaks down in the rain near a castle, where they search for help. The castle is occupied by strangers in elaborate costumes holding a party. They then meet the head of the house, Dr. Frank-N-Furter (Tim Curry), an apparently mad scientist and alien transvestite from the planet Transsexual in the galaxy of Transylvania, who creates a living muscle man named Rocky. Director: Jim Sharman

Hal returns us to the next film in the Hitchcock marathon with the 1956 version, and remake of his own 1934 movie, The Man Who Knew Too Much. A couple (James Stewart & Doris Day) vacationing in Morocco with their young son accidentally stumble upon an assassination plot. When the child is kidnapped to ensure their silence, they have to take matters into their own hands to save him. Director: Alfred Hitchcock

This week Izzy has chosen one of her all-time favourite period romances Pride & Prejudice starring Keira Knightley, Matthew Macfadyen, Brenda Blethyn and Donald Sutherland.  When Elizabeth Bennet (Keira Knightley) meets the handsome Mr. Darcy (Matthew Macfadyen), she believes he is the last man she could ever marry, but as their lives become intertwined, she finds herself captivated by the man she has sworn to hate forever. Director: Joe Wright

Hal has selected a real coming-of-age sex comedy with the first instalment of the popular American Pie franchise from his early teen years. The story follows a group of high school classmates who make a pact to lose their virginity before they graduate. Starring Jason Biggs, Chris Klein, Mena Suvari, Eugene Levy and Jennifer Coolidge. Director: Paul Weitz

Izzy's latest selection is the highly acclaimed Stanley Kubrick historical epic Barry Lyndon (1975) that recounts the early exploits and later unravelling of an 18th-century Irish rogue and gold-digger (Ryan O'Neal) who marries a rich widow in order to attempt to climb the social ladder and assume her late husband's aristocratic position.  Director: Stanley Kubrick

For our latest podcast, we are delighted to be joined by a true podcast inspiration with Scott, host of numerous incredible shows such as Reel Britannia, Stinking Pause, Rainbow Valley and the official Talking Pictures TV Channel. 

Scott joins us today for a deep-dive into Hal's latest film selection in the Hitchcock marathon, none other than Rear Window (1954). 

A newspaper photographer (James Stewart) with a broken leg passes time recuperating by observing his neighbors through his window. He sees what he believes to be a murder.

Director: Alfred Hitchcock

Izzy's latest choice for the podcast is last year's popular romantic sports drama film Challengers, which follows the love triangle between an injured tennis-star-turned coach Tashi (Zendaya), her low-circuit tennis player ex-boyfriend (Josh O'Connor), and her tennis champion husband (Mike Faist) across 13 years of their relationship, culminating in the match between the two men on the ATP Challenger tour. Director: Luca Guadagnino

Hal has selected the first of one his many favourite tv shows to cover for the podcast with Foyle's War. A British detective drama set in Hastings, England, during and after the Second World War. Created by Anthony Horowitz, it follows the quietly determined Detective Chief Superintendent Christopher Foyle (Michael Kitchen) as he investigates crimes on the home front — from black market rackets and espionage to murder and treason. Balancing historical accuracy with gripping storytelling, the series explores the moral complexities of wartime Britain through its four central characters: Foyle himself, his spirited driver Sam Stewart (Honeysuckle Weeks), the steadfast DS Paul Milner (Anthony Howell), and Foyle’s RAF pilot son Andrew (Julian Ovenden). 

The episode of Among the Few (2003), is set in autumn 1940. As the Battle of Britain rages overhead, Foyle investigates the death of a young female lorry driver, Connie Dewar, whose work ferrying fuel to a nearby RAF base puts her close to a dangerous black-market petrol-theft ring. The case draws Sam undercover at the transport depot and entangles Andrew Foyle when fellow pilots fall under suspicion. Beneath the veneer of heroism “among the few,” Foyle uncovers a web of theft, betrayal, and personal tragedy.

Director: Jeremy Silberston

Izzy has selected a really groundbreaking 1950's drama in what was the last ever work directed by the great Douglas Sirk with Imitation of Life. The film tells the story of Lora Meredith (Lana Turner), a white single mother who dreams of being on Broadway, has a chance encounter with Annie Johnson (Juanita Moore), a black widow. Annie becomes the caretaker of Lora's daughter, Suzie (Sandra Dee), while Lora pursues her stage career. Both women deal with the difficulties of motherhood: Lora's thirst for fame threatens her relationship with Suzie, while Annie's light-skinned daughter, Sarah Jane (Susan Kohner), struggles with her African-American identity.

Director: Douglas Sirk

Hal has chosen another of his favourite with the iconic romantic suspense thriller Charade (1963) where we witness intrigue that ensues in Paris as a woman (Audrey Hepburn) is pursued by several men who want to get their hands on a fortune her murdered husband had stolen. She soon loses trust in those who claim they want to help her. Also features some glorious romantic scenes and witty one-liners featuring a certain Cary Grant. Director: Stanley Donen

Izzy's choice this week is a highly-respected German BAFTA and Academy Award winning movie called The Lives of Others (2006), set in East Berlin in 1984, an agent (Ulrich Muhe) of the secret police conducting surveillance on a writer and his lover finds himself becoming increasingly absorbed by their lives. Director: Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck

Hal has returned this week with one of his all-time favourite Hitchcock movies, Dial M for Murder, the incredible one-room mystery thriller starring Ray Milland as Tony Wendice, who plans to murder his wife (Grace Kelly) when he finds out that she had an affair with someone a year ago. He blackmails an old college associate (Anthony Dawson) to execute the crime but things don't work out as planned.

Director: Alfred Hitchcock

Izzy has selected yet another emotionally heavy movie for this week's episode with the 2022 coming-of-age drama Aftersun. Sophie (played by Frankie Corio) reflects on the shared joy and private melancholy of a holiday she took with her father (Paul Mescal) twenty years earlier. Memories real and imagined fill the gaps between miniDV footage as she tries to reconcile the father she knew with the man she didn’t. Director: Charlotte Wells