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The Nextlander Watchcast Episode 131: American Movie (1999) and Coven (1997)
🕑 Added 2025-04-14 21:52:14 +0000 UTCIt's time to kick off our month of documentaries, and leading us off is one of Alex's favorite slice of life stories in cinema, American Movie! Join us as we talk through Mark and his motley film crew's attempt at making the next great American horror short film, and then review the aforementioned short film as well. That's right, a double feature (technically)!
CHAPTERS:
(00:00:00) - The Nextlander Watchcast Episode 131: American Movie (1999) and Coven (1997)
(00:00:27) - Intro.
(00:01:12) - Our first documentary for this month of April: American Movie!
(00:07:50) - The set-up, and who is behind this movie.
(00:13:15) - Mark's frustrations and failures (and other people's perceptions of him).
(00:18:29) - Is this a depressing movie? Also, how viable is Mark's market strategy here?
(00:27:52) - The level of access the filmmakers had to these folks.
(00:32:18) - Break!
(00:32:46) - We're back, and let's talk about the people Mark is able to bring into his orbit.
(00:39:03) - The beautiful soul that is Mike Schank.
(00:46:35) - Uncle Bill.
(00:50:38) - The various other players.
(00:56:59) - The long winter of pick-up shots and ADR, and Mark's new love.
(01:02:26) - Mark hates having a real job, and all the delightful behind-the-scenes filming footage.
(01:07:54) - Getting ready for the premiere.
(01:15:17) - We have seen Coven. It is a film that was completed, and we watched it.
(01:25:41) - Mark made a movie, but at what cost?
(01:29:35) - Where did they all go after this?
(01:35:59) - Final thoughts.
(01:42:12) - Some quick notes on next week's movie, and outro.
Comments
L
I listen to your podcast with earbuds. I have it at the volume that is good for your speaking voices. When you put a very loud screaming clip in there at the beginning, it is painful, surprising, and cruel. I don't need painful, surprising, and cruel in my ears at all, especially these days. Kindly don't do that.
Joshua Chap
What a weird and wild time capsule
Mike Lee
This was *really* interesting. I don't always check out the thing being discussed necessarily, but I will need to make an exception here. Made me think back to where I was in the mid to late nineties; a lot of the frustrations and challenges felt very familiar, and landed real hard.
Shane
I love American Movie, but watching it again as an 40's adult made it seem less funny and more depressing than I thought it was when I first watched it when I was ~20 years old.
