Anthony Perkins in Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960)

He is, you know. Psycho. At least in the hands of Guy Ritchie and Robert Downey, Jr.

On this edition of the Plastic Podcast, Rob and J. Robert talk about Ritchie's recent adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle's characters, about Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho, and about Gus Van Sant's intriguing 1998 remake of Hitchcock's classic, recklessly shaping and reshaping that trio's Venn diagram like an elementary school teacher sorting out her transparencies. Come along, won't you?

0:00 Intro
2:45 Trailer: Sherlock Holmes!
3:26 Sherlock Holmes (Ritchie, 2009)
13:49 The Manic, Mumbling Detective
16:20 The Cinematic Industrial Age
20:11 Psycho (Hitchcock, 1960), Psycho (Van Sant, 1998)
27:25 In Color
29:12 Assessing the Original and the Humble Remake
33:50 Implicating the Audience
37:09 The Moving Vernacular
44:15 Outro

Further Reading

• Rob's piece on the lesser known traits of Sherlock Holmes, with ample links into Conan Doyle's text.

Leonardo Dicaprio in Christopher Nolan's Inception

Labor Day has come and gone, and Chicago just had its first cool day in weeks, so it's a good time to glance back at a couple of the summer's big movies. On this episode of the Plastic Podcast, Rob and J. Robert talk about Inception and Toy Story 3, with a brief nod toward Despicable Me.

0:00 Intro
0:47 Trailer: Inception Story
2:02 Inception (Nolan, 2010)
20:56 Toy Story 3 (Unkrich, 2010)
25:41 Despicable Me (Coffin/Renaud, 2010)
29:25 Complications and Traditions
33:15 Outro