Episode 34 – 'Possession' - a podcast by Phi Phenonenon

This year’s Halloween pick may not be a full-blown horror movie, per se, but it definitely qualifies as one of the most confidently batshit movies ever made. On today’s episode, Ted and I talk whether Isabelle Adjani’s performance and the subway “devil’s miscarriage” scene qualifies as some of the bravest acting of all time, the legacy of Carlo Rimbaldi’s creature FX work in what is ostensibly a European art-film about divorce, how unhinged and messy and controlled this movie is technically and thematically, the pantheon of Polish cinema, and whether or not the main character or heart of the movie is the child in a bathtub at the center of an ending marriage.

Possession is, as far as we can tell, annoyingly unavailable for streaming, though it does occasionally appear on Turner Classic Movies. Criterion, maybe you should get on that.

Ted Haycraft is film critic for WFIE-14 and co-hosts Cinema Chat on its Midday show. He can also be found on Cinema Chat’s Facebook page.

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