NOTE: This episode contains spoilers. If you haven’t seen the film yet, you might want to hit pause and come back when you’re ready.

This episode explores Interstellar, examining it through the complex scientific principles of Einstein’s relativity as well as the profound emotional humanism that underpins its narrative. Nolan’s expansive space epic masterfully bends the fabric of time and space, creating a mind-bending voyage across cosmic horizons. Yet, amidst the vastness of the universe, the story remains anchored by what truly matters—the enduring love we carry with us and the hope we send ahead into the unknown. In Interstellar, it becomes clear that what ultimately saves us isn’t raw force or technology but the depth of our feelings, connections, and hope that propel us forward.

If you’d like to read more about Vivian Sobchack’s approach to phenomenology, her landmark texts are:

• The Address of the Eye: A Phenomenology of Film Experience (1992)

• Carnal Thoughts: Embodiment and Moving Image Culture (2004)

Both works dive deep into how film is not just a story we interpret but a lived, bodily experience we inhabit.

NOTE: This episode contains spoilers. If you haven’t seen the film yet, you might want to hit pause and come back when you’re ready.

In Logan’s Run, life is programmed to end at the age of thirty, a brutal societal norm that is unquestioned by its citizens. This episode explores the film from Michel Foucault’s perspective on biopolitics, examining how rituals surrounding death, a techno-theocratic government, and a society founded on artificially constructed belief systems serve as tools of silent control. The society manipulates perception, turning gentle light into an instrument of subdued authority. Obedience to these rules is mistaken for purpose, rebellion is deemed heresy, and death is transformed from tragedy into a ceremonial act, a dark celebration of societal order.

NOTE: This episode contains spoilers. If you haven’t seen the film yet, you might want to hit pause and come back when you’re ready.

This episode explores Blade Runner through Alison Landsberg’s theory of prosthetic memory.

In a future where memories are manufactured and identity is built from fiction,

the question isn’t whether your past is real—it’s whether it feels real enough to matter.

Because in Blade Runner, the soul may be synthetic,

but the sorrow is always genuine.

Learn more about prosthetic memory in Alison Landsberg’s Prosthetic Memory: The Transformation of American Remembrance in the Age of Mass Culture.

NOTE: This episode contains spoilers. If you haven’t seen the film yet, you might want to hit pause and come back when you’re ready.

In Alex Proyas’ Dark City, reality is portrayed as a fragile construct, meticulously crafted and easily manipulated. Memory, within this dystopian universe, transforms into a potent weapon, used to control, deceive, or conceal the truth. This episode explores the film's themes through the lens of sci-fi existentialism, examining questions about the nature of identity when memories are deliberately altered, erased, or fabricated altogether. As John Murdoch begins to unravel the hidden truths embedded within the mysterious city, we are confronted with a haunting question: if all that you hold as memories are illusions, then who are you truly beneath the veneer of falsehoods?

NOTE: This episode contains spoilers. If you haven’t seen the film yet, you might want to hit pause and come back when you’re ready.

In this episode, we explore the intricate tapestry of Chinatown, examining it through the provocative lenses of Marxist political theory and existentialism. Jake Gittes embarks on a labyrinthine journey, grappling not only with the pervasive corruption that envelops him but also unearthing a deeply entrenched system where the very notion of truth is rendered powerless. In this bleak landscape, justice assumes a haunting irrelevance, and the noble pursuit of righteousness ultimately leads to a chilling silence. In the world of Chinatown, resolution is not an outcome; it is a concession. The mysteries that Gittes confronts remain unresolved, leaving an unsettling void that echoes the futility of his quest for clarity in a place where shadows loom larger than light.

NOTE: This episode contains spoilers. If you haven’t seen the film yet, you might want to hit pause and come back when you’re ready.

This episode dives deep into David Lynch’s Blue Velvet, a film that peels back the polished layers of suburbia to reveal the chaos crawling underneath. We explore themes of voyeurism, suppressed violence, and the illusion of innocence, examining how Jeffrey Beaumont’s descent reflects our own discomfort with the truth. In Lumberton, the birds chirp, the lawns are green… and the rot never left.

NOTE: This episode contains spoilers. If you haven’t seen the film yet, you might want to hit pause and come back when you’re ready.

This episode examines 'Out of the Past' through an intricate exploration of fatalism and the fragile nature of memory. We follow Jeff Bailey across time via flashbacks, false starts, and fleeting moments of hope, only to discover that in film noir, history doesn’t simply repeat itself. Instead, it pulls you deeper into its dark, unrelenting grip.

NOTE: This episode contains spoilers. If you haven’t seen the film yet, you might want to hit pause and come back when you’re ready.

In Billy Wilder’s Double Indemnity, doom isn’t a surprise; it’s a destination. This episode explores the film through fatalism and post-war disillusionment, analyzing how Walter Neff’s descent into murder is driven not by passion, but by weariness, control, and the illusion of escape. In Film Noir, every perfect plan is just the slowest path to ruin.