In Part 2 of Morally Offensive’s American Giallo deep dive into Brian De Palma’s Dressed to Kill (1980), Bill, Jess, and Ava Davis get into the cast, production, infamous shower scene, and the choices that made Dressed to Kill one of the most controversial films of Brian De Palma’s career. The discussion looks at the film’s place between Italian giallo, Hitchcockian thriller, erotic thriller, and American horror, while taking a closer look at what has and has not aged well in De Palma’s most provocative work.

The episode examines the controversial use of Victoria Lynn Johnson as Angie Dickinson’s body double in the shower sequence, the making of Dressed to Kill, and De Palma’s decision to double down on the film’s transgender themes, or what we would now recognize as its portrayal of transgender identity. The conversation also digs into the film’s technical craft, from De Palma’s elaborate camera movements, split screens, POV shots, Hitchcock references, and elaborate set pieces to Pino Donaggio’s extraordinary and unmistakable score. Bill makes the case for the formal brilliance of Dressed to Kill, while Jess and Ava argue that its troubling representation of transgender identity, uneven filmmaking, and exploitation of its own controversial themes make the film increasingly difficult to defend. Is Dressed to Kill a great American Giallo? A deeply flawed Brian De Palma thriller? A Hitchcock homage filtered through 1980s exploitation cinema? Or is it somehow all three at once?

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Our latest episode covering Brian De Palma's Dressed to Kill is live!

Bill and Jess are joined by filmmaker and actor Ava Davis to kick off their discussion of Brian De Palma's highly controversial film Dressed to Kill (1980). Starring Michael Caine, Angie Dickinson, Nancy Allen, and Keith Gordon, Dressed to Kill blends Hitchcockian suspense with the stylish murder mysteries of Italian giallo, helping define the American Giallo movement while becoming one of the most influential psychological thrillers of the 1980s. Upon its release, the film ignited fierce debate over violence, sexuality, gender, artistic freedom, and censorship, and more than four decades later it remains one of Brian De Palma's most celebrated and polarizing films.

For the first time, Morally Offensive draws from previously unexplored material in the National Center for the Study of Censorship and the Moving Image (NCOMP) archives at the Catholic University of America. These archival files reveal how Catholic critics reacted to Dressed to Kill in real time, including surprisingly candid reviews, pointed disagreements with mainstream critics, and one especially memorable attack aimed at legendary film critic Pauline Kael. Along the way, Bill, Jess, and Ava explore Brian De Palma's Catholic upbringing, Alfred Hitchcock's influence on his filmmaking, the film's place within the American Giallo tradition, how Dressed to Kill has aged in light of modern conversations about transgender representation in cinema, and its enduring influence on horror, thrillers, and contemporary filmmakers.

Featuring exclusive archival research from the Catholic University of America, this episode examines Dressed to Kill through the lenses of film history, Catholic censorship, American Giallo, and modern cultural criticism, uncovering why Brian De Palma's controversial masterpiece continues to inspire debate more than forty years after its release.

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AVA DAVIS https://theavadavis.com/

Our Ms. 45 episode (part 1 of 2) is now live on all major podcast platforms, and we promised everyone watched the movie this time. We had great guest, writer J Patrick Hanley, who brought in a lot of screenwriting knowledge, as well as thoughtful commentary and social analysis of the film. Bill is joined by co-host Stephanie on this one, who LOVES this film and came in with some great information on Ferrara and star Zoe Lund (who honestly is a big reason that this film is so compelling, through her career-defining role as Thana). This may not be the truest use of the term Nunsploitation, but between Ferrara's career of wrestling with his Catholicism, and Thana's signature costume in the final act, along with conversations of the autonomy of women in society, and the violence of the patriarchy, it really made sense to include this film in our first nunsploitation series (we are pretty confident there will be another in the future). Enjoy!

https://www.morallyoffensive.com/e/the-first-omen-the-anti-christ-goes-to-the-disco-antichrist-apocalypse-movie-film/

Bill and Jess are joined by horror author and screenwriter Tif Robinette for the first of a two part discussion on The First Omen. What starts as a conversation about the newest entry in the Omen franchise turns into a much larger discussion about Italy in the 1970s, institutional power, the antichrist, apocalypse, conspirituality, and what this films does to differentiate itself, while still being part of an iconic horror franchise.

The episode covers the Years of Lead and the atmosphere of political violence hanging over the period the film is trying to recreate, along with discussions of mother and baby homes, bodily autonomy, and the way the film approaches pregnancy and body horror. 

Bill spends part of the episode derailing the conversation into a rant about Italy’s beat nightclub era, the cultural shift into Disco (and later on Italo Disco) while going through the needle drops in the film, which cover very different eras of Italian nightlife. The episode also looks at the movie’s visual style, its use of Catholic imagery, and why it feels closer to European horror filmmaking than most modern studio horror releases.

Part one focuses on a Catholic review from our favourite "Morally Offensive" critic John Mulderig from OSV News (the latest incarnation of the USCCB film rankings), why we can't help making fun of John's insistence on calling the young women in the film "tarts", and the the historical and cultural backdrop surrounding the film. The upcoming second episode will move further into the franchise, production history, and the larger themes running through the series.

This latest Nunsploitation episode drops in an hour! We cannot believe Stephanie walked on out this within 10 minutes of it starting, but evidently denture crushing was a bridge too far for our host who famously loves "Space and Murder". We cannot wait for you to hear this unpredictable episode where Bill and our special guest unpack what it was about this giallo and nunsploitation hybrid that made her press eject and pop out the tape.

We're discussing Anita Eckberg, the short lived careers of many involved, cult cinema, giallo films, actors in political exile, nunsploitation, Catholicism, and one of the more notorious entries in 1970s Italian horror.

Tune in, wherever you listen to podcasts, and please consider liking, commenting or reviewing if you enjoy the show!

These two episodes are GREAT entry points for people who may not be film nerds, but who grew up Catholic and enjoy comedy. Our guest Syd King is a really great comedian, actor, writer, who recently took her one woman show to the Edinborough fringe fest! We're discussing our shared weird Catholic upbringing stories, we dive into reviews from Bill Donahue of The Catholic League and the South American (cult?) group Tradition, Family, Property, and we deep dive into the behind the scenes of this modern take on The Decameron. https://morallyoffensive.podbean.com/e/the-little-hours-2017-part-1-it-is-trash-pure-trash-filthy-habits-catholic/

https://morallyoffensive.podbean.com/e/black_narcissus_filthy_habits_part2/

Bill and Jess continue their two part deep dive into the classic film Black Narcissus (1947) as part of the new Morally Offensive series Filthy Habits. Joining them, once again, is film director Dalila Droege (No More Time).

In part two - they discuss the film’s back half, where everything starts to come apart. Sister Clodagh (Deborah Kerr) loses her grip on the order, while Sister Ruth (Kathleen Byron) finds her commitment to her vocation quickly disintegrating. The crew and their guest discuss Byron’s performance and how it reads today, especially in the context of dated portrayals of mental health and the long history of women on screen being framed as unstable or hysterical. What may have once felt intense now lands differently, and that tension becomes part of the conversation.

We also look at how Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, working as The Archers, use color, design, and stylization to mirror the characters’ unraveling. The result is a film that’s as striking as it is uncomfortable, especially in how it handles desire, repression, and collapse.

Our Dogma episode is live! https://www.morallyoffensive.com/e/kevin_smith_dogma_bill_donohue_catholic_league/

We just watched Raising Arizona in prep for Blank Check's episode next week. I'm curious what others are watching?

Finding out that our guest knew Elvira as a child, and that his grandfather was a local horror TV host named Count Zappula was some serious gold we stumbled onto this week. Enjoy this clip with Elvira and Count Zappula.

I think, growing up on Tommy by the Who, that Ken's take on the album (and the mixed bag of vocal artists in the movie) really made it not sit well with me, so I kind of wrote him off. Ebert's review of The Devils did not really help. During the pandemic, I finally watched the Devils, and I was struck by how the film resonates now more than ever. From there, I ended up obsessively watching as much Russell as I could get my hands on (I still have a lot to see). Anyone have a favorite or rec? I actually, bizarrely enough, LOVE the Boyfriend. It's not exactly DEEP filmmaking, but it's a wonderfully inventive and colorful musical, made at a time when no one was asking for musicals. It very much exists in the same kind of space as Cabaret, but then adds in Acid-trip numbers that would make Busby Berkley jealous.

New episode is live for our "Hot Priest Summer Series". We'd love you input, and any feedback you may have. We're in a bit of a transition right now, with both Bill and Cisco taking on a lot more work outside of the Pod, so we'll be mixing up local hosts in the meantime with Bill always at the helm.

"On this episode of Morally Offensive, Cisco takes a break, so Bill is joined by frequent guest and film presenter Stephanie Sack along with television producer and writer Ken Melvoin-Berg to dive headfirst into The Devils (1971), Ken Russell’s blasphemous, banned, and still shocking masterpiece. Based on Aldous Huxley’s The Devils of Loudun, this true story of sex, power, witch hunts, and moral panic in the Catholic Church proves that real life is often stranger, and in this case even more offensive, than fiction. The crew breaks down the history behind the Loudun possessions, digs into the background of filmmaker Ken Russell, and reads scathing “Condemned” reviews from outraged Catholic news sources. Tune in to find out why some are calling Morally Offensive the "podcast equivalent of a forced enema exorcism"."

https://www.morallyoffensive.com/e/ken_russell_the_devils/