We close out the holiday season with one of the all time greats, The Muppet Christmas Carol. Joining us is friend of the show Jackie; a librarian, Muppet aficionado, and the wife who fuels the revolutionary love of one of our hosts (it's the host that name drops his wife more than he does Marx or Lenin).

Widely recognized as one of the most faithful adaptations of the Dickens' classic, the film stars Michael Caine as Scrooge, Gonzo the Great as Charles Dickens, Kermit the Frog as Bob Cratchit, and Rizzo the Rat as himself and was the first Muppet film directed by Jim Henson's son Brian Henson following the death of his father. We discuss the accuracy of the movie, the influences that led Dickens to write the story in the first place, what the story has to say about alienation, and how two Marleys is better than one amongst other things.

Only two more sleeps 'til Christmas 2025, and here at Left of the Projector we wish for a world where all us meeces can have cheeses.*

*Cheeses in this case is a unified and liberated working class working towards fully automated luxury gay space communism. Obviously.

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This week we are joined by a very special guest. Activist, organizer, horror aficionado, friend of the show, and the woman that holds up more than half the sky for one of our hosts, Joy, joins us to talk about the 1974 classic Black Christmas. Written by Roy Moore and directed by Bob Clark, this seminal horror classic starring Olivia Hussey and Margot Kidder is widely considered the earliest iteration of the slasher film and contains feminist themes that run counter to many of the films that would follow in its footsteps. We discuss the absolute failure of every man in the film, how police in Canada are apparently as incompetent as the police in the US, and how almost every slasher since Black Christmas has failed to live up to its standard of intelligent characters being failed by others as opposed to being too dumb to live.

Left of the Projector Links

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Today we are joined by longtime friends of the show, Caitlyn and Cullen of Caitlyn's Conspiracy Corner to talk about not one, but three movies, one of the greatest trilogies of all time, Robert Zemekis's Back to the Future 1, 2, & 3! These movies need little introduction, but for the uninitiated, the films star Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd as they travel back and forth through time to remedy the mistakes they both inadvertently cause for their own past and future selves.

We discuss what the films mean to us, how they may or may not be indicative of the culture of Reagan's America, and how the third movie is either a worthy entry to the franchise or a terrible tacked on addition to an otherwise perfect duology. Your mileage may vary on it, and it doesn't seem like any of us got 88 mph out of it.

Left of the Projector Links

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We are joined by author and screenwriter Briana Cox to talk about one of her favorite vampire movies, A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night. Released in 2014, the film is a Farsi language horror film written and directed by Ana Lily Amirpour, and stars Sheila Vand, Arash Marandi, Mozhan Marnò, Marshall Manesh, and Dominic Rains. The film was promoted as the "first Iranian vampire Western" and was partially funded through an Indigogo campaign.

We discuss the vampire as a symbol of both alienation and predation, the vampiric nature of capitalism itself, and attempts to break the cycles of predation and parasitism thrust upon us within this system and the bleakness of Bad City's "dead body ditch" being the only source of community within the film.

You can follow Briana on Instagram or Threads, preorder their book Indigent, visit their website and support them on ko-fi.

Left of the Projector Links

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We return to our happy place, the bleak and horrifying universe of Alien with a deep dive into the newest entry in the franchise, Hulu's Alien Earth. Created by Noah Hawley, and starring Sydney Chandler, Alex Lawther, Essie Davis, Samuel Blenkin, Babou Cessay, Adarsh Gourav, Erana James, Lily Newmark, Timothy Olyphant, Jonathan Ajayi, and David Rysdahl alongside the breakout star of the series, the Eye midge (among others), the series brings the Alien universe home to Earth for the first time ever on the big or little screen. Joining us again is fellow Alien/Predator superfan and friend of the show, Joe Wrote to discuss how the show explores the arrested development of capitalists, xenomorphs as an allegory for capitalism's need for infinite growth in a world of finite resources, and how science fiction is meant to serve as a warning to not build the torment nexus. Not an inspiration.

Left of the Projector Links

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https://www.instagram.com/the_red_gobbo/

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https://leftoftheprojector.com

Left of the Projector Links

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https://leftoftheprojector.com

Spoilers beware! This episode contains important plot points and major spoilers for the end of the film! Don't say we didn't warn you!

We talk about the newest entry in the Predator franchise, Dan Trachtenberg's "Predator: Badlands" in theatres now! Starring Elle Fanning and Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi, "Badlands" has been rated 3.5 or better and certified fresh by those who saw it, and too woke for dudes moldering in their basement. Join us for this special Box Office Drop episode as we discuss why we think "Badlands" is a worthy entry to the Predator franchise and tear apart some of the internet's worst opinions on the film.

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This week we are joined by Jason Christian of Cold War Cinema to talk about 1984's propaganda vehicle, "Red Dawn." Directed by John Milius, the film stars Patrick Swayze, Charlie Sheen, Lea Thompson, Jennifer Grey and C. Thomas Howell as teenagers engaging in a guerilla war against the completely improbable and nonsensical invasion of the United States by the combined forces of the Soviet Union, Cuba, and Nicaragua. We discuss the paradox of the Soviet Union in cinema as the most dangerous evil in the world while simultaneously being incredibly stupid, how that is a more accurate representation of the US in reality, Milius's reputation as a right wing crank, the deep ties between US cinema and anti communist propaganda, and ask Jason why he made us watch this absolute dog's dinner of a movie.

Cold War Cinema:

https://coldwarcinema/

https://x.com/Cold_War_Cinema

https://x.com/JasonAChristian

https://jasonchristianwrites.com/

Left of the Projector Links

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https://leftoftheprojector.com