Week 71: The Muscles From Brussels: An Evening With Jean Claude Van Damme

Tags

Bloodsport, Cannon films, Cyborg, Double Impact, Double Team, Hard Target, JCVD, Jean Claude Van Damme, Kickboxer, Lionheart, Maximum Risk, No Retreat No Surrender, Street Fighter, Timecop, Universal Soldier, Weird Scenes Inside the Goldmine podcast

From a local child prodigy in karate and competitive bodybuilding to one of the first and most influential kickboxing film stars, tonight we talk a man who supposedly inspired the entire Mortal Kombat series, whose oft referenced but seldom imitated balletic approach to full contact martial arts is positively legendary.

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Week 70: Do You Believe in Bronson?…Because You’re About to Meet Him!

Tags

10 to Midnight, Assasination, Borderline, Breakheart Pass, Breakout, Cannon films, Charles Bronson, Cold Sweat, Death Wish, Farewell Friend, J. Lee Thompson, Jan Michael Vincent, Kinjite: Forbidden Subjects, Love and Bullets, Messenger of Death, Michael Winner, Mr. Majestyk, Murphy's Law, Rider on the Rain, St. Ives, Telefon, The Evil That Men Do, The Mechanic, The Stone Killer, Violent City, Weird Scenes Inside the Goldmine podcast

When it came to movie tough guys, Eastwood was your strong silent type, Stallone your streetwise paisan, Schwarzenegger your jokey bruiser…and Bronson the hard ass, vindictive son of a bitch nobody wanted to deal with.

Week 65: From Brixton to Brexiteer: The Films of Michael Caine

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Alfie, Angie Dickinson, Anna Karina, Anthony Quinn, Beyond the Poseidon Adventure, Billion Dollar Brain, Blame it on Rio, California Suite, Christopher Reeve, Dark Knight Rises, Deathtrap, Donald Sutherland, Dressed to Kill, Funeral in Berlin, Get Carter, Harry Palmer, James Mason, Jaws 4 the Revenge, Ken Russell, Laurence Olivier, Michael Caine, Miss Congeniality, Oliver Stone, Sandra Bullock, Sean Connery, Sleuth, Telly Savalas, The Black Windmill, The Destructors, The Eagle Has Landed, The Hand, The Ipcress File, The Island, The Italian Job, The Magus, The Man Who Would be King, The Swarm, The Wrong Box, Weird Scenes Inside the Goldmine podcast, Zulu

Born to a poor Cockney fishmonger and charwoman (you know, the
folks that come around after hours to clean the office?), Michael Caine
quickly discovered some important things about himself and the world
around during a then-mandatory stint in National Service…a shattering
of ivory tower illusions about communism, and a zest to live each day
as if it were your last.

Week 63: He Always Comes Back: the life and films of Arnold Schwarzenegger

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Arnold Schwarzenegger, Austrian Oak, Commando, Conan the Barbarian, Conan the Destroyer, End of Days, Grace Jones, Hercules in New York, Jingle All the Way, Joe Wieder, Kindergarten Cop, Last Action Hero, Mr. Olympia, Mr. Universe, Muscle & Fitness, Predator, Pumping Iron, Red Heat, Red Sonja, Running Man, The Expendables, The Governator, The Terminator, Total Recall, Twins, Weird Scenes Inside the Goldmine podcast

Born into a stiff, lower middle class Austrian background just after the war, Arnold Schwarzenegger rebelled from his rigid father and proscribed life at an early age, eschewing the family plans for his life and career to pursue a rocky road in the dubious world of bodybuilding.

Week 60: The Italian Stallion: the Films of Sylvester Stallone

Tags

action films, Cliffhanger, Cobra, Demolition Man, First Blood, Italian American cinema, Judge Dredd, Oscar, Over the Top, Rambo, Rhinestone, Rocky, Stop or My Mom Will Shoot!, Sylvester Stallone, Tango & Cash, The Expendables, Weird Scenes Inside the Goldmine podcast

Hells Kitchen brought the world two rather formidable things: my grandfather and the inimitable Sylvester Stallone.

In case you’re wondering where we are…

Tags

Weird Scenes Inside the Goldmine podcast

This post was published on the Facebook page a week and a half back.

Week 54: Eddie Romero, Gerardo de Leon and the horror of the Phillippines

Tags

American International, Angelique Pettyjohn, Beast of Blood, Beast of the Yellow Night, Beyond Atlantis, Blood Island Trilogy, Blood of the Vampires, Brides of Blood, Cleopatra Wong, Daughters of Satan, Donald Pleasance, Eddie Romero, For Your Height Only, Gerardo De Leon, Hemisphere Pictures, John Ashley, Joy Bang, Killing of Satan, Mad Doctor of Blood Island, Marlene Clark, Nancy Kwan, Night of the Cobra Woman, Roger Corman, Sam Sherman, Savage Sisters, Superbeast, Terror Is a Man, The BLood Drinkers, Tom Selleck, Twilight People, Weird Scenes Inside the Goldmine podcast, Weng Weng, Wonder Women

If you’re going to talk Sam Sherman and American International Pictures, Roger Corman and Hemisphere Pictures, there’s simply no way you can avoid discussion of the cult cinema of the Phillipines.

Week 53 – Walk Softly and Carry a Big Stick – the films of Joe Don Baker

Tags

Buford T. Pusser, Burgess Meredith, Charlie Varrick, Final Justice, Fletch, Golden Needles, Greydon Clark, hicksploitation, James Bond, Jim Kelly, Joe Don Baker, John Saxon, Joysticks, Mitchell, MST3K, Mystery Science Theater 3000, Pierce Brosnan, Robert Clouse, The Pack, Timothy Dalton, Walking Tall, Walter Matthau, Weird Scenes Inside the Goldmine podcast

Only in the 70’s could a beefy, drawling television character actor change gears and morph into not only an action hero, but even some measure of sex symbol to an audience bedazzled by an aging, Vegas Elvis and the good humored down home charm of Burt Reynolds and Kris Kristofferson…

Week 52 – Easy Ridin’ with Cap – the films of Peter Fonda

Tags

92 in the Shade, biker films, Cannonball Run, Certain Fury, counterculture cinema, Crazy Larry, Dennis Hopper, Dirty Mary, Fighting Mad, Futureworld, Ghost Rider, hippie films, Jack Nicholson, Killer Force, Lara Parker, Loretta Swit, Nadja, Peter Fonda, Race With the Devil, Roger Corman, Roger Vadim, Spasms, Spirits of the Dead, Susan George, The American Dreamer, The Last Movie, The Trip, The Wild Angels, Warren Oates, Weird Scenes Inside the Goldmine podcast

One of New York’s own, scion of an acting dynasty that includes his famed father, controversial sister and indie film regular daughter, Peter Fonda walked a very different path from the man who raised him, in short order becoming the figurehead of a generation.

Week 48: Watch Out, Baby…It’s Eddie Constantine

Tags

Eddie Constantine, Jean Luc Godard, Jess Franco, Jesus Franco Manera, neo-noir, tough guy cinema, Weird Scenes Inside the Goldmine podcast

A Russian-Pole cabaret singer and contemporary (and collaborator!) of Edith Piaf, Eddie Constantine made his fame in the bohemian Left Bank of Paris…first as a proto-Serge Gainsbourg chanteur…but more famously, as the unlikely star of a long running series of generally hard boiled neo-noir (but just as often, self-mocking and comedically oriented!) crime pictures.