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Talk Cinephilia to Me

Arch Obeler, anti-fascism, the zombie, and post nuclear apocalypse, Episode 2 Notes

Continuing a theme begun last week on Cold War era films with streets depopulated by killer radiation poisoning or a plague, the focus of this episode is Arch Obeler, not only his post nuclear apocalypse film "Five", but his fantasy-absurdist anti-fascism radio shows, his move into film, the anti-fascist movie "Strange Holiday", and his media as controlling agent film "The Twonky".

We also discuss "White Zombie" as as another thread in the episode is how the zombie came to be used to represent authoritarian/fascist control of the population.

"Talk Cinephilia to me" is a podcast about watching cinema--artistic, outsider, experimental and B movies--brought to you by author playwright, Juli Kearns, and her son, Aaron Dylan Kearns, an experimental filmmaker who, though he was raised on great cinema, loves tawdry horror. He knows things I don't about film. I know things he doesn't. Most importantly, we know enough to be very aware of what we don't know. We promise to be humble, somewhat meandering hosts because we're disaffected dyslexic leftists with opinions and our filters are busted.

Arch Obeler's film, Five, had as setting a portion of his Frank Lloyd Wright designed complex, which was never completed. When I first saw the film in 2008, I immediately thought, "Oh, that's Frank Lloyd Wright!", and the setting became for me one of the uncredited stars. Below, I compare screengrabs from Five with some shots I took at Wright's Taliesin West in Scottsdale, Arizona.

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