Politics of Cinema

Films are cultural artifacts. There is a political and artistic message in every one and we're here to document. On each episode we pick a film; sometimes current and sometimes from the riches of world cinema's 100+ year history, and take a deep dive into what the film is really saying about the world. Both overtly and covertly.

Politics of Cinema is a tv podcast hosted by Aaron & Isaac, with 113 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Aaron & Isaac hosts Politics of Cinema, a tv show with 113 episodes published.

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  Episode #17

  Hanging Out With The Return of the Secaucus 7 (1980)

  Jan 23, 20261 hourS15

  <p>Need a warm cinematic hug from a group of close friends? Want to spend some time with people who get all your jokes? In this episode, we discuss The Return of the Secaucus 7 (1980), a foundational work of American leftist cinema. We also look closely at John Sayles' early career as a novelist and screenwriter in the buildup to his debut as a director.</p> <p>Follow us at: Patreon / Instagram / Letterboxd / Facebook </p>

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  Episode #16

  How to Mock a Tyrant in The Great Dictator (1940)

  Nov 28, 20251h 15mS15

  <p > In this episode, we wrap up our look at depictions of fascism and authoritarianism on film with Charlie Chaplin's The Great Dictator (1940). Chaplin had the nerve to go fully anti-fascist and anti-racist at a moment when much of Hollywood was still pretending Hitler was just a distant "European problem".</p> <p > Chaplin mercilessly skewers Riefenstahl-style fascist pageantry and spectacle while also refusing the era's usual antisemitic caricatures. He centers half of the narrative on a working-class Jewish barber whose daily life is shattered by storm trooper raids that feel uncomfortably close to those carried out by modern ICE agents...

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  Episode #15

  Imagination as a Form of Resistance in Pan's Labyrinth (2006)

  Oct 24, 20251h 3mS15

  <p > This week, we descend into the dark fantasy fairytale of Guillermo del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth (2006). Amid the rich craftsmanship of the fantasy world that Ofelia imagines, the film lays bare the horrors of Francoist Spain—all captured through Del Toro's anti-fascist cinema. The calculating evil of Captain Vidal, a devotee of Falangism and a violent patriarch, stands among the most iconic of Del Toro's villains. </p> <p > With fascist rhetoric disturbingly mainstream in contemporary US politics, Pan's Labyrinth feels less like a historical fantasy and more like a warning. It is a portrait of how fascism seeps into the everyday an...

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  Episode #14

  Silencing Opposition in The Act of Killing (2012) & The Look of Silence (2014)

  Sep 26, 20251h 6mS15

  <p>After spending a number of episodes in the past, today we're jumping to the 2010's. We're looking at two documentaries from Joshua Oppenheimer; The Act of Killing (2012) and The Look of Silence (2014). These docs reveal two different aspects of the chilling aftermath of Indonesia's 1965-66 anticommunist massacres, one looking at the perpetrators and one looking at the legacy of the victims.</p> <p>We also draw on Vincent Bevins' book The Jakarta Method: Washington's Anticommunist Crusade and the Mass Murder Program that Shaped Our World for our discussion on how the Washington-backed violence helped install a regime where the p...

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  Episode #13

  The Third Generation (1979) & Other Instruments of State Sponsored Terror

  Aug 29, 202548 minS15

  <p > After examining Robert Kramer's Ice (1970) fictionalize America in our last episode, we shift to West Germany to explore another cinematic portrayal of resistance to fascism in Rainer Werner Fassbinder's The Third Generation (1979). Set against West Germany's postwar society, Fassbinder sharply exposes how insincere revolutionary acts can become hollow gestures, exploited to justify expanded state control and surveillance.</p> <p > Though rooted in 1979, the film eerily anticipates our contemporary world: a society numbed by constant surveillance, manipulated by capitalist tech moguls profiting from manufactured crises, and how citizens are caught in a struggle against the technocratic elites. Additionally, Fassbinder's overwhelming a...

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