The Rhetorizer
Activity Overview
Episode publication activity over the past year
Episodes
NOIR: Songs About Schemers and Losers
26 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
After spending a year with scoundrels, schemers and various other losers, we're wrapping up our noir season. We share some noir-themed songs and d...
NOIR: Crook Manifesto (Colson Whitehead)
12 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
When the Jackson 5 come to town, furniture salesman Ray Carney slips back into the criminal underworld to secure tickets for his daughter. We return t...
NOIR: The Many, Many Talented Mr. Ripleys (Patricia Highsmith et al)
21 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
With the arrival of Netflix’s Ripley, we revisit Patricia Highsmith’s 1955 novel, The Talented Mr. Ripley, about a charming murderer’s European ...
NOIR: Harlem Shuffle (Colson Whitehead)
07 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
A furniture salesman keeps getting pulled into the criminal underworld of 50s and 60s Harlem. It's part heist, part revenge plot and part social ...
NOIR shorts: Harlan Ellison's sci-fi crime thriller
24 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
One of science fiction's greatest bastards, Harlan Ellison, brings us a story of a telepath's encounter with a serial killer on death row. Th...
NOIR: The City and the City (China Miéville)
10 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Worlds collide in this fantastical police procedural that's as much Borges as CSI. A detective who lives in a city that shares physical space with...
NOIR: Out (Natsuo Kirino)
26 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Four women who work the night shift at a factory in Tokyo get pulled into the criminal underworld after one of them murders her husband. The most grue...
(Film) NOIR: Cutter's Way (1981)
12 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Is it a secret prequel to The Big Lebowski? A "sunshine noir"? The last gasp of New Hollywood? Cutter's Way is a grimy adaptation of Cu...
NOIR: Cutter and Bone (Newton Thornburg)
22 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In this overlooked gem of the mid-70s, two aimless losers get involved in a blackmail plot, or maybe a murder plot, or maybe just a paranoid fantasy. ...
(Film) NOIR: L.A. Confidential (1997)
08 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Is L.A. Confidential a neo noir masterpiece... or a total snooze? Was director Curtis Hanson a hack who got lucky? Or just a hack? Were players like ...
NOIR: L.A. Confidential (James Ellroy)
23 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Dig it: today we're gabbing about THE James Ellroy's classic neo-noir L.A. Confidential, the tripartite, sybarite, dynamite journey to the dar...
NOIR shorts: The Lady Says Die (Mickey Spillane)
09 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
"The Lady Says Die" is a sick, vengeful short story by one of the biggest crime writers of the 20th century and former professional trampoli...
NOIR: Black Wings Has My Angel (Elliott Chaze)
26 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
An escaped convict and a woman with a mysterious past concoct the perfect scheme: move to the suburbs! We read Elliott Chaze's 1953 novel Black Wi...
(Film) NOIR: Strangers on a Train (Alfred Hitchcock)
12 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Hitchcock adds a big dose of tennis, a maniacal carnival scene and a lobster tie to Patricia Highsmith's story in his classic 1951 adaptation of t...
NOIR: Strangers on a Train (Patricia Highsmith)
29 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
A rich man-child with a huge zit takes a special interest in a promising young architect he meets on the train. He shares his dream of the perfect mur...
NOIR: The Expendable Man (Dorothy B. Hughes)
15 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Drop the top on your white Cadillac and crank up the stereo, because on this week's episode, we're discussing Dorothy B. Hughes 1963 political...
NOIR SHORTS: The Homecoming (Dorothy B. Hughes)
24 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
A jilted lover confronts war hero Korea Jim. Dorothy B. Hughes titled this story "The Homecoming", but she could have named it "Benny a...
(Film) NOIR: Double Indemnity (1944)
10 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Some say it's the greatest film about insurance ever made. We watched the 1944 adaptation of Double Indemnity, a film largely credited with making...
NOIR: Double Indemnity (James M. Cain)
27 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
An insurance agent is brought low by a bored housewife in a sexy sailor outfit, a big payout for murdering her husband, and the opportunity to outsmar...
(FILM) NOIR: The Postman Always Rings Twice, twice
13 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Who wore it better: Lana Turner in a turban or Jack Nicholson in a fedora? We dive into film noir with the 2 most famous adaptations of The Postman Al...
Intro to NOIR / The Postman Always Rings Twice (James M. Cain)
29 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
There's a fried cat, a woman who trains pumas, and a murder plot that goes sideways. Our new season explores the gritty world of noir, full of cri...
Introducing Season 2
22 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We're back! For season 2, we're diving into the gritty, crushing world of noir. Here's our reading list, so you can read along: The Post...
Valis trilogy pt.3: The Transmigration of Timothy Archer / Final thoughts on Philip K. Dick
07 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
It’s our season finale! We discuss the last book Philip K. Dick wrote, a non-scifi story about a radical bishop. It’s part three of the Valis tril...
Valis trilogy pt.2: The Divine Invasion (Philip K. Dick)
23 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
A woman has to smuggle a god to Earth in her womb in Philip K. Dick's 1981 novel The Divine Invasion. The pink beam of light from VALIS reappears,...
Valis trilogy pt.1: VALIS (Philip K. Dick)
09 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Horselover Fat experiences a religious awakening when he’s hit by a beam of pink light. Fat's quest for meaning is populated with rockstars, a g...
ADAPTATIONS: Minority Report (Philip K. Dick / Steven Spielberg)
26 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Steven Spielberg takes on Philip K Dick’s 1956 story Minority Report. We’ve got future crimes, we’ve got gross eye stuff, we’ve got moldy sand...
ADAPTATIONS: The Lathe of Heaven (1980 PBS movie)
12 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We watch PBS's 1980 made-for-TV version of The Lathe of Heaven, a cult classic based on the Ursula K. Le Guin book. You can watch it on Youtube:ht...
The Lathe of Heaven (Ursula K. Le Guin)
28 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Today, a detour: we read The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. Le Guin. Le Guin and Philip K. Dick went to the same high school and admired each other’s ...
Dr. Bloodmoney (Philip K. Dick)
14 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Dr. Bloodmoney (1965) is a surprisingly upbeat novel about the nuclear apocalypse. It’s also one of Philip K. Dick's most narratively cohesive b...
Total Recall x 3
31 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
All three versions of Total Recall on one podcast! We compare the Philip K Dick short story We Can Remember It For You Wholesale, Paul Verhoeven's...
The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch (Philip K. Dick)
17 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
With Earth overcrowded and overheating, colonists on Mars take drugs to escape the awful hovel lives in their hovels and briefly inhabit the miniature...
ADAPTATIONS: A Scanner Darkly (Richard Linklater)
03 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Jon and Jacob watch Richard Linklater's 2006 movie adaptation of Philip K. Dick's A Scanner Darkly, starring Keanu Reeves. Kevin takes a long trip to ...
A Scanner Darkly (Philip K. Dick)
17 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
It's 1994. Undercover narcotics agent Bob Arctor has a new assignment: to investigate drug addict Bob Arctor. Arguments ensue about bike gears and how...
SHORTS: Beyond Lies the Wub (Philip K. Dick)
03 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
A thoughtful, lugubrious space pig tries to convince a swashbuckling captain not to eat him, in Philip K. Dick's first published scifi story.
Now Wait for Last Year (Philip K. Dick)
20 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
There’s a war, an important man who won’t stop dying, multiple dimensions, and a drug that induces time travel. We try to make sense of Philip K D...
ADAPTATIONS: Blade Runner / Blade Runner 2049
07 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Without the movie Blade Runner, this podcast probably wouldn't exist. The adaptation of the Philip K. Dick novel Do Androids Dream of Electric S...
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (Philip K. Dick)
23 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Philip K. Dick’s 1968 classic Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep is the story of a man’s search for meaning as he murders androids on an Earth th...
BOOK AND A MOVIE: The Golden Man / Next (Philip K. Dick / Lee Tamahori)
09 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Nicolas Cage plays a lacklustre magician who can see exactly 2 minutes into the future. Except when he’s in love. This is somehow based on The ...
The Penultimate Truth (Philip K. Dick)
25 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Humanity has been driven underground by war. A man goes on a quest to find a fake pancreas and discovers a big lie. A propaganda writer for an artific...
ADAPTATIONS: Paycheck (Philip K Dick / John Woo)
11 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A consultant accepts a job where he must have his memory wiped, and wakes up to discover he's traded his paycheck for an envelope of random trinkets t...
UBIK (Philip K Dick)
28 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A cream curdling, soul-sucking mystery featuring psychic spies, objects reverting in time and a man getting into arguments with his door. One of TIME'...
SHORTS: The Electric Ant (Philip K. Dick)
14 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A man pulls out his guts, but they’re not man guts. They’re tape.
The Man in the High Castle (Philip K. Dick)
30 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
It's 1962. The Nazis have colonized Mars, but can’t crack show biz. A vendor of fake antiques finds himself. A bureaucrat has an urban planning nigh...
Coming Soon
28 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
This is a trailer for Book Show: A Show About Books.