Only one more episode after this.
It has taken a long time to get to this point, and I couldn’t be prouder of Craig and Aundria and all of our guests so far. We’re showing up on podcast charts, so we know someone’s listening out there, and I’m starting to hear from people all over town… hell, all over the world… who are enjoying what we’re putting together, and that makes me absolutely giddy.
I know there are a ton of podcasts and websites and apps and streaming shows and movies and books all competing for your attention, so each and every time you choose to take an hour (or two… some of these episodes are getting a little longer now) to listen to our program, it means something. We don’t have any advertising. We aren’t on a network. There’s no support team pushing us. It’s just three people who have come to really love the time they spend talking about movies, sharing those conversations, and it makes me so happy that you find some value in that.
We are still, in many ways, just taking our first steps as a podcast. We’re still growing our audience, hoping the show will catch on. Some of my favorite podcasts are celebrating their ten-year-anniversaries this year, and we’ve already had on one of the Doughboys to celebrate. I figured we also needed to reach out to someone from the team at Blank Check for this season, since they’re also taking their victory lap for a Decade of Dreams, but I decided to reach out to someone other than David and Griffin at first. I mean, can you blame me? They do, after all, employ America’s Finest Film Critic.
BEN HOSLEY is more than just a podcast producer. He runs his own fashion line, and he produces an annual Christmas album that has become a cult sensation. He met the Blank Check boys at UCB, where they first proposed a podcast that sounded like an extended bit, a show that would talk about only The Phantom Menace, as if there had never been another Star Wars film. Who knew that ten years later, they would have the most acclaimed movie podcast in the world?
One of the most popular recurring bits on the show is when they have Ben choose a movie between their longer miniseries, and over the years, he’s picked titles like Fletch, Under Siege 2, and Clifford, the Martin Short comedy. They’ve come to know those films as “porch movies” because of the way Ben watched them as a kid, and I knew when we invited him on that we’d get some eclectic picks. He did not disappoint, either, bringing us three totally different films to discuss.
First, he picked the 1997 survival thriller The Edge. He also picked Dennis Hopper’s searing 1982 film Out of the Blue. Finally, he wrapped things up in a big warm hug of a movie, the 1989 comedy Uncle Buck.
Our response film to Ben felt like a perfect bookend to Out of the Blue in the form of 1987’s harrowing River’s Edge.
Finally, we decided to add Rock’n’Roll High School to the Hip Pocket Hall of Fame. After all, David Fincher once declared it to be “a perfect movie.” Sounds like a recommendation to me!
If you’d like to support The Hip Pocket at Patreon, you can find us at https://www.patreon.com/c/DrewMcWeeny.
If you’d like to find us on BlueSky, you can find us at https://bsky.app/profile/itsthehippocket.bsky.social.
The Hip Pocket is hosted by Drew McWeeny and Aundria Parker.
Craig Ceravolo is the show’s bandleader and producer.
It is a Formerly Dangerous Production.
NEXT TIME
It’s our final episode of the season, and our final guest is a guy who we tried to schedule all season long. He’s a writer/director currently gearing up on the biggest (and weirdest) film he’s made so far, but he took some time out to talk to us about his work, his upbringing, and how three films that seems totally different all fit together in one neat thread in his head. I’ve never even heard of A Thief in the Night until he picked it, and it made for a wild triple feature with Black Snake Moan and Prince of Egypt.
What’s the through-line? Who’s our guest? Be back here in one week to find out as we go out in a blast of fireworks.
As always, please rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen. You’re the reason other people are finding the show, and we appreciate you.
The Hip Pocket, like everything you’ll find here, is 100% made by humans, with no AI used in any part of the production process. Support human art!
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