Monthly Archives: December 2019

TEASER – Frotcast Bonus: Star Wars The Rise Of Skywalker



This episode available to $5 patrons at Patreon.com/Frotcast!

As Robert Evans once wrote, “Fighting is healthy. If everyone has too much reverence for each other, or for the material, results are invariably underwhelming. It’s irreverence that makes things sizzle. It’s irreverence that gives you that shot at touching magic.”

That, in a nutshell, is what was wrong with Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker, in this podder’s opinion. A film needs to have a point of view, and this film’s point of view seemed to be “We really like Star Wars movies! Hooray, Leia! Hooray, Lando!”

That being said, Star Wars movies tend to range in quality from B+ to B-, so even when I say it was “bad” I mean that it was still more or less okay, and only marginally worse than the last couple of Star Wars movies. I do think it was the worst of any of the new ones. Matt liked it more than I did, but we both agree that it was better than the prequels, which is a low bar indeed.

Anyway, we discuss all of that, including whether the original trilogy is a story about how the Boomers “beat” the Empire, and whether the principals in the latest trilogy (millennials?) should be taking the Boomers’ advice on how to defeat the reformed Empire once again (with all due citation to Matt Louv‘s comedy bit that inspired this whole discussion). There are smaller matters too, like how the hell people are riding horses on top of ships in outer space, whether Lando was horny at the end there, and why all the black characters seem to know each other. Oh, and Matt debuts a few new characters, including “Bubba Fett,” intergalactic bounty hunter and former long-haul trucker. Please enjoy.

For all this #Content and more, become a patron at Patreon.com/Frotcast. You’ll never be lonely when you have the Frotcast.


Frotcast 422: Matt Tries To Get Fired, The Exciting Conclusion, With Jessica Sele



Ho ho ho, Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah and sure, Happy Kwanzaa, I suppose. It’s the most wonderful time of the year and to make things just that much more wonderful, Matt and Vince have invited Jessica Sele to the Frotquarters for a very special episode of the Frotcast. It’s special because Matt finally got the Christmas present he had been hoping for… he got his ass fired right before Christmas with severance and – since he was fired without cause – unemployment. IT’S A CHRISTMAS MIRACLE! Also, he may have yelled at a couple of his bosses.

We also discuss things like Trump owning the libs for their need to conserve water, the true story behind Noah Baumbach’s Marriage Story, and Matt’s trip to Disneyland with Francesca (his girlfriend who he loves very much and who loves him back.) So don you now your gay apparel and fa la la la la la, la la la listen to this dope ass episode of the Filmdrunk Frotcast. Get bonus content at Patreon.com/Frotcast.


TEASER: Marriage Story With Francesca Fiorentini



This week’s Bonus Frotcast and all Bonus Frotcasts are available at Patreon.com/Frotcast. You can add our premium feed to your regular podcast app.

In this week’s bonus movie Frotcast, Francesca Fiorentini from The Bitchuation Room and The Young Turks joins us to discuss the year’s most talked about film, Marriage Story. Boy, people sure do love middlebrow dreck about sexless intellectuals, don’t they? Starring Adam Driver and Scarlet Johansson, Noah Baumbach’s latest is yet another work to remind me of John Dolan’s takedown of Jonathan Franzen:

Yes, it’s time someone said it outright: Manhattanites are the new  hicks. The mall kids are generations ahead of them. Things that are  stale jokes to the mall kids strike the NY publishing world as fresh and  hilarious. Maybe they just don’t watch enough TV, or they spend too  much time drinking cocktails with F. Scott Fitzgerald’s ghost — whatever  the reason, the Manhattanites have lost it completely. The  scriptwriters of Christmas Vacationare Flaubertian chroniclers  of provincial mores next to Franzen. When you compare Franzen with  really talented observers of Minnesota life, like the Coens in Fargo, or even Garrison Keillor inLake Wobegon Days, his incompetence stands out even more sharply.

And  if one were to compare him with the great novelist of “pelagic  America,” Charles Portis… no, it would be an insult to Portis even to  compare a hack like Franzen with him. And yet Portis is all but unknown,  while Franzen is everybody’s darling…. Agh, ya buncha idiots!

Now just re-read this passage so that it’s about Brooklynites, Marriage Story, and Mrs. Fletcher (which is kind of like Marriage Story only much better). Yes, unfortunately (or fortunately?), none of your Frot pals liked this movie so much — which is kind of weird, since Francesca is divorced, Matt and I are both dating divorceés, and all three of us work in the arts and/or entertainment, so we should be the target audience (Francesca and I even lived in Brooklyn!). As Matt puts it, their fights are like a montage of every relationship argument in a play you’ve ever seen. I contend that this movie is either about a couple where a person is too cowardly to admit that they don’t love the other person anymore, or a couple who still loves each other but whose relationship couldn’t survive them wanting slightly different careers. Oy. No more stories about sexless New York intellectuals, please.

We finish things off reading about the Topanga tea ceremony and listen to your weird voicemails. You guys are sick, truly. Frot on, and you’ll never be lonely when you have the Frotcast.


Frotcast 421: Gender Fluid On My Billy Dee, With Anna Valenzuela And Zack Chapaloni



We recorded this podcast on Tuesday night, so keep that in mind when you listen to Matt Lieb predict the news cycle of the “Billy Dee Williams is gender fluid” story — none of the stuff he predicts had happened yet! He even anticipated a Jung quote! It’s very impressive. Anyway, this was a fun old school podcast with all of us in the same room cracking wise and having fun, with guest comedian Zack Chapaloni and Anna Valenzuela from the Brujaja podcast. Other topics include, encountering “hoes” in the wild, Tomi Lahren’s brand of athleisure wear, Clint Eastwood’s directorial output, “fake news,” people trying to substitute liking fancy sneakers as a personality, and Matt trying to get fired again. Update: Matt has since been fired! Great job, Matt! No one gets fired like you do, buddy.

We finish things off with your emails and voicemails. Don’t forget to subscribe for our bonus content on patreon.com/frotcast, and love yourself. You’ll never be lonely when you have the Frotcast.