I got home from WIFF on Friday and came down with a head cold on Saturday, which was a nice reminder that I still know how to survive a film festival.

I’m fine; this is just my way of warning you I sound like crap in the intro and outro for this week’s episode of Someone Else’s Movie.

But I recorded the episode itself a couple of weeks ago, so both I and my guest, Eric San — better known as Kid Koala — sound just fine discussing Mark Osborne’s 2015 adaptation of The Little Prince, a delicate marriage of CG and stop-motion animation techniques that pairs very well with Eric’s own CG debut, Space Cadet.

That movie, which made Canada’s Top Ten last year, is finally opening in the US this Friday, and if you’re down there you should see it. It’s a beautiful, precious little thing.

But also you should listen to the episode, right? Subscribe to the show on Apple, Spotify, YouTube Podcasts or your podcatcher of choice, or download the episode directly from the web and listen to it as you contemplate the nature of existence with your closest friends. Share your earbuds, I don’t mind.

And then it’s time to get caught up on Shiny Things, because I have been busy. Last week I tackled Criterion’s annual omnibus box, The Complete Kubrick, and subscribers to the paid tier also got my exclusive reviews of Godzilla Minus Zero, Wild Horse Nine and Awkwafina: The Unlikely Chef in Friday’s What’s Worth Watching column. If you’ve been thinking about leveling up, this would be a perfect time to do it. C’mon! Godzilla is there!

I’m down at the Windsor International Film Festival this week, introducing movies and moderating Q&As for one of the most enthusiastic audiences in the country. Also the most determined.

Seriously, people attend four or five screenings every day here, and there’s one gentleman who plans to see eighty films over the eleven days of the fest. I hope he makes it, but I’m worried I’ll find him slumped over in his seat somewhere around number 64.

One of the movies that played earlier in the festival was The Only Living Pickpocket in New York, the second feature written and directed by the actor Noah Segan. It’s a terrific little character study wrapped in the machinery of a crime picture, with John Turturro giving what might be the performance of his career supported by pros like Giancarlo Esposito, Steve Buscemi and Tatiana Maslany. And with the movie now playing select markets in the US and Canada, I get to drop Noah’s episode of the podcast!

He picked Susan Seidelman’s screwball comedy Desperately Seeking Susan, which remains a goddamn delight more than forty years after its initial release. And while Madonna’s celebrity pulled all the focus at the time, it’s now crystal clear that Seidelman’s madcap caper picture sits perfectly between Scorsese’s After Hours and Demme’s Something Wild in the continuum of New York pictures where straitlaced folks get to discover their weird, unhinged hearts — for better or worse. In Susan’s case it’s entirely for the better, and Noah was delighted to unpack the ways in which Seidelman gets her characters through it.

It makes for a really fun conversation, and you don’t want to miss it. So don’t! Subscribe to the show on Apple, Spotify, YouTube Podcasts or your podcatcher of choice, or download the episode directly from the web and listen to it as you stumble dazed through the bustling metropolis of your choice.

And then you can catch up on Shiny Things, where I covered the new Masters of the Universe movie and Arrow’s definitive 4K edition of Peter Jackson’s The Frighteners, and offered subscribers to the paid tier my exclusive reviews of The Only Living Pickpocket in  New York, Fatherhood and Kat Sandler’s Yaga in Friday’s What’s Worth Watching column. Have you signed up yet? It’s easy, fun and really quite affordable, I’m told! You can do it right here!

Oh, and if you’re at WIFF today you have two chances to see The Theft, directed by last week’s guest Aisha Jamal. It’s playing at 11:30am at the Armouries with a second show at 4pm, and I’ll be hosting both screenings and moderating the Q&As with Aisha. Tickets should still be available, so come join us! It’s a good movie, and I bet you’ll learn some stuff. Hope to see you there.

It’s Halloween week, so naturally I’ve got an especially spooky choice lined up for Someone Else’s Movie. But it’s not a horror movie, not exactly.

That said, A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night is not not a horror movie. It’s about a vampire who’s decided to put her skills to good use, feeding exclusively on men who prove themselves unworthy. That’s not exactly a spoiler for Ana Lily Amirpour’s 2014 breakout, but more of a mission statement, and the tension between what we expect from a film like this and what Amirpour is actually doing becomes part of the fun. Certainly my guest, the documentary filmmaker Aisha Jamal, had fun with it — and it was a nice way to tee up next week’s screenings of her new film, The Theft, at the Windsor International Film Festival.

Wanna hear it? Subscribe to the show on Apple, Spotify, YouTube Podcasts or your podcatcher of choice, or download the episode directly from the web and listen to it while you linger outside a gas station, waiting to pass judgment on the bloodbags within. (Also, here’s the interview with Ana Lily that I mention during the episode.)

And yes, about The Theft: I am indeed returning to the Windsor International Film Festival for a whole week — from this Thursday to next Thursday — and I’ll be hosting screenings and moderating Q&As and generally hanging out with other friendly film folks. You should check it out if you’re in the area; the movies are good, the people are swell and the local restaurants are very appealing. Plus, me!

But of course I’ll still be publishing Shiny Things, and if you’re not already subscribed you should get caught up on all the goodness! Last week I wrote about the new discs of Pennies from Heaven, Little Shop of Horrors, Frankenhooker and The Pope’s Exorcist, and if you’re on the paid tier you would have found my reviews of Wildwood, Wicker, Once Upon a Time in Harlem and the second season of The Lowdown in Friday’s exclusive What’s Worth Watching mailing. Not on the paid tier? Why not try it out? There’s all sorts of good stuff in there!

My appreciation for Late Fame continues for a second week on Someone Else’s Movie, as I follow the film’s screenwriter, Samy Burch, with its director, the former film critic, archivist and programmer Kent Jones.

Kent’s had an incredible career, from working on Martin Scorsese’s cinephile documentaries to directing one of his own, and while we’ve been in the same room a number of times over the decades, given our entangled professions, this is the first real conversation we’ve had. And I’m so glad it was about The Passenger, Michelangelo Antonioni’s existential drama — or maybe it’s a thriller? — starring Jack Nicholson as a burnt-out war correspondent who impulsively abandons his life to assume the identity of a dead man, and finds himself drifting into a shadowy world of arms dealers, mysterious women and other profiteers. It’s a film rich with themes and philosophies, and Kent is just the guy to steer us through it.

So hop in! Subscribe to the show on Apple, Spotify, YouTube Podcasts or your podcatcher of choice, or download the episode directly from the web and listen to it while you rifle through the belongings of the man whose life you’re appropriating. That’ll be a nice way to pass the time.

And then get caught up on Shiny Things, where I’ve been juggling late arrivals and shifting release dates. Last week I reviewed Via Vision’s updated collection of the Ginger Snaps trilogy and Warner’s new 4K restoration of Neil Jordan’s Interview with the Vampire, and subscribers to the paid tier got my reviews of The Social Reckoning, Mike Flanagan’s new take on Carrie and Netflix’ sea-monster show Below in Friday’s What’s Worth Watching dispatch. There’s a lot more coming this week, including two of the year’s most anticipated documentaries, so upgrade your subscription so you don’t miss a post!

We don’t get a lot of Ken Loach films on Someone Else’s Movie. In point of fact the number is precisely zero. Loach’s longtime screenwriter Paul Laverty doing the show a couple of years ago to promote their final project, The Old Oak, is as close as I’ve come.

So imagine my delight when Adam Belanger and David Lafontaine picked Kes for this week’s episode. Actually, you don’t have to; you can hear it in my voice.

Adam and David are totally up front about what their first feature A Breed Apart owes to Loach’s 1970 breakthrough drama about a troubled kid in the north of England — even though the two films are worlds apart in time and place, and even subject matter. Their film is in conversation with Kes in a unique and curious way, and we try really hard to discuss that without revealing too much about their movie.

Want to listen? Subscribe to the show on Apple, Spotify, YouTube Podcasts or your podcatcher of choice, or download the episode directly from the web and listen to it while you self-soothe with falconry in a great wide meadow, seeking the silence you’ve been unable to find at home. And if you find yourself intrigued by the themes of Adam and David’s film, come see them kick off A Breed Apart‘s theatrical run this Saturday, October 3rd, at 3pm at the Revue Cinema. I’ll be there too, introducing the film and moderating a post-screening Q&A with the cast and crew!

Fun fact: The night before, I’ll be introducing last week’s guest, documentarian Nick Davis, for a 7:15pm screening of You Had to Be There at TIFF Lightbox, and moderating the post-screening Q&A; tickets go live  on Wednesday, and I’ll add the link as soon as it’s live. Suddenly I’m doing stuff again! It’s nice!

And then, of course, Shiny Things awaits you; last week I tackled the new releases of I Love Boosters, The Invite, The Outer Threatand Scary Movie, and subscribers to the paid tier got my exclusive reviews of The History of Concrete, You Had to Be There and Apple TV’s Brothers. Are you a subscriber to the paid tier? You’re not? You know there’s a free trial, right? Maybe, I dunno, free-try it!

People have been bringing inarguable classics onto Someone Else’s Movie all year — and this week is no different, as director Nick Davis chooses a movie I am shocked to learn no one else had in 626 episodes: Young Frankenstein.

Seriously, you guys. I’ve been making this show for eleven and a half years now (and one week!) and this is the first time someone wanted to talk about one of the greatest spoofs in human history? For shame. But Nick turns out to be uniquely qualified to tackle it, having produced a doc about Wilder and — understandably — using that opportunity to pepper the legend with questions about this joke, that prop, etc. It’s all glorious.

So go find  the show on Apple, Spotify, YouTube Podcasts or your podcatcher of choice, or download the episode directly from the web and listen to it while you’re roll, roll, rolling in ze hay.

And don’t miss Nick’s new documentary, You Had to Be There, which is in the process of opening across North America over the next couple of weeks, and is an entirely engaging look at how a legendary Toronto production of Godspell launched the careers of half a dozen brilliant performers — among them SCTV stars Eugene Levy, Martin Short and Andrea Martin, Paul Shaffer, Victor Garber and this weird ball of energy named Gilda Radner … who, of course, would eventually marry Gene Wilder. It’s at the TIFF Lightbox next Friday, October 2nd. It’s very sweet.

Also! Shiny Things went into overtime last week, as I reviewed Warner Archive’s flawless 4K restoration of Out of the Past and the new releases At the Place of Ghosts, Passenger, Tunerand She Rides Shotgun. And of course paid subscribers got a brand-new What’s Worth Watching on Friday, featuring my exclusive reviews of The Beast of Mossy Bottom, Garth Jennings’ exuberant rockumentary Pulp: What Do You Do for an Encore? and the new season of Slow Horses. Didn’t get it? Worried you’ll miss the next one? Just level up to the paid tier and you’ll instantly have access to dozens of WWWs. Membership has its privileges, or something.

And now I’m off to Sudbury for Cinefest, where I’ll be doing some hosting, moderating and panel-ing in the back half of the festival. If you see me gawking at the Canadian Shield, please be gentle with me. It’s my first time.

TIFF is still rolling along, but I am pivoting to physical media for this week’s episode of Someone Else’s Movie, now resuming its regular schedule because “every other day” is basically a full-time job.

As it happens, physical media is the full-time job of this week’s guest, David Gregory. He’s the co-founder and president of Severin Films, a truly excellent producer and distributor of 4K and Blu-ray special editions. I’ve reviewed a bunch of them over at Shiny Things, most recently The War Game and Threads, but to boil it down? Severin does God’s work for genre cinema.

Want another example? Check out their special edition for Delicatessen, which is the movie David wanted to bring onto the podcast. And I was delighted, because somehow no one had ever chosen Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro’s delirious dystopian reverie about post-apocalyptic apartment dwellers grudgingly indebted to the local butcher. Also it’s a comedy. And a love story. And a horror movie, from a certain angle. And who doesn’t want to hear about that?

Not you, surely. So go find  the show on Apple, Spotify, YouTube Podcasts or your podcatcher of choice, or download the episode directly from the web and listen to it to pass the time while you carve up the latest … package … for your customers.

After that, you might as well catch up on your Shiny Things. And if you’ve already read about my visit to the brand-new Cinema Cellar store, there’s a review of Warner Archive’s glorious 4K edition of Out of the Past coming up later today. So don’t miss out! And if you haven’t joined the paid tier already, upgrade that subscription so as not to miss Friday’s What’s Worth Watching, which this week returns to its original “only good stuff, I promise” form factor.  See you there?

Turns out releasing three episodes of Someone Else’s Movie in five days isn’t that much of a challenge. Here’s the last of my TIFF run, featuring Quebec writer-director Alexandre Franchi, whose new film L’Autre has its world premiere tonight at the festival with a repeat screening Monday afternoon.

I hadn’t seen Alexandre since he brought his first film, The Wild Hunt, to the 2009 festival. He’s gone through some stuff since then, a lot of which is in this new movie. It’s pretty good; you should check it out.

And Alexandre picked another movie that’s been a long time coming: Alain Resnais’ 1959 new-wave breakthrough Hiroshima, Mon Amour, a haunting romance set against the backdrop of one of humanity’s greatest atrocities. I’m surprised it’s taken so long for someone to bring this particular film to the podcast, but I guess it was waiting for him.

Come on, then; subscribe to the show on Apple, Spotify, YouTube Podcasts or your podcatcher of choice, or download the episode directly from the web and listen to it while your lover sleeps beside you in the sanctuary you’ve made for one another.

After that, there is Shiny Things; specifically, my visit to the new brick-and-mortar Cinema Cellar store that just opened in downtown Toronto and is currently All Criterion All The Time. It’s nice there. And of course if you’re a paid subscriber you got yesterday’s What’s Worth Watching, featuring my exclusive reviews of the new seasons of North of North and The Paper and Gal Gadot’s new thriller The Runner, which is … well, it’s not good, but it is worth watching. As a cautionary tale, perhaps.

Not on  the paid tier? Level up! Five bucks a month gets you so many additional words, why wouldn’t you want that?