In the new episode of Film Stories with Simon Brew, the festive favourite realised on a slim budget, and a British Christmas film that had to battle to get to the screen.
It's well known that Warner Bros passed on 1990's Home Alone, but even when Fox picked the project up, the budget was tight - leading to some neighbourhood disturbance.
Get Santa was read ... Show More
Today
X-Men (2000), and how it changed superhero cinema
No two ways about it, 2000's X-Men movie was a massive gamble. At a time when studios needed movie star vehicles, 20th Century Fox found itself without a summer blockbuster due to a delay on a Tom Cruise film. It'd already greenlit and backtracked on X-Men once. When the film fin ... Show More
52m 47s
Mar 20
In conversation with Christopher Miller and Phil Lord | Project Hail Mary, Rocky IV, Geostorm 2 and more
In person, Simon got to meet - after years of interviewing them remotely - writers/producers/directors Christopher Miller and Phil Lord. Chaos absolutely ensued. In this Film Stories special, they talk about Project Hail Mary, the second best Rocky film, choosing to do a project ... Show More
35m 52s
Mar 16
The Postman (1997) and Wag The Dog (1997) | Two films. The same weekend. Very different reputations
At the end of 1997, Kevin Costner's second film as director - The Postman - made its way into cinemas, at the end of a difficult year for Warner Bros. The $80m, three hour movie would be savaged by critics, and fail to find an audience - but there was quite the story behind the f ... Show More
1h 13m
Dec 2021
#494 — Steven Spielberg, Noomi Rapace, Andrew Garfield
This week's Empire Podcast is the penultimate episode of the year, but we've brought you some cracking early Christmas presents. First up, the legendary Steven Spielberg returns to the pod to tell Chris Hewitt all about why he's remade West Side Story, and his experiences working ... Show More
2h 6m
Dec 2021
The Newscast Christmas Party 2021
...and you're invited! Singer Jessie Ware and her mum/podcast co-host Lennie, Radio 1’s Greg James and author Bella Mackie, plus filmmaker Richard Curtis and broadcaster Emma Freud, are the special guests at Newscast's virtual Christmas party this year. A bit of a family affair!I ... Show More
44m 5s
Dec 2021
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang with Shane Black
As the writer of movies like Lethal Weapon, The Nice Guys, The Long Kiss Goodnight and Iron Man 3, Shane Black is a true screenwriting auteur, known for his scripts' pulse-racing action, quippy dialogue and genre-skewing surprises. At the heart of his stories are usually two odd- ... Show More
1h 18m
Dec 2021
Christmas Classics: Home Alone 2
You can mess with a lot of things dear listener, but you can't mess with kids on Christmas (especially ones who know how to throw a brick at your face). Today we're delving into a Macaulay Culkin, Joe Pesci, and Daniel Stern classic - Home Alone 2: Lost in New York! Whether he re ... Show More
49m 33s