CINEMA CENTRIC

About CINEMA CENTRIC

Criterion conversations with filmmakers, writers, and cinephiles. Follow along for interviews, analysis, & inspiration.

Publisher

CINEMA CENTRIC

Category

arts

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

9 Oct 2024

Latest episode

1 Aug 2026

Latest episodes

27 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   1 Aug 2026

   Mariam Afshari & Hadis Pakbaten (It Was Just an Accident, Criterion Collection, Jafar Panahi)

   The CINEMA CENTRIC meet up for an episode with Mariam Afshari and Hadis Pakbaten to discuss It Was Just an Accident, now available in the Criterion Collection. Together, we explore the film's themes, the realities of filmmaking under censorship in Iran, and the personal risks artists face when telling difficult stories. Mariam shares her own experience after appearing in the film, including being dismissed from the karate federation and banned after refusing to apologize for her participation. Hadis also discusses the challenges of writing and producing underground theatre in Iran, and the obstacles artists face when creating work outside government approval. We also discuss the imprisonment of the film's director, Jafar Panahi, the ongoing struggles faced by women in Iran, and the courage required to continue creating art despite immense personal and political consequences. This conversation examines how cinema can become an act of resistance, and the very real price that artists sometimes pay for their work. Mariam Afshari: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/maryamraha.afshari (https://www.instagram.com/maryamraha.afshari) Hadis Pakbaten: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hadispakbatten (https://www.instagram.com/hadispakbatten) -------------------------- Episode music by: Song Title: Cerebral SD Artist: The Vase in Late Spring (⁠⁠⁠⁠The Vase in Late Spring⁠⁠⁠⁠ (https://saddatarecords.com/the-vase-in-late-spring.html) appears courtesy of ⁠⁠⁠⁠Sad Data Records⁠⁠⁠⁠ (https://sad-data-records.github.io/).) ℗ 2026 Sad Data Records

2. 

   29 May 2026

   Aidan Delbis (Actor in Oscar-Nominated Bugonia) on The Breakfast Club, Night of the Living Dead & Bugonia

   The CINEMA CENTRIC meet up for an episode with actor Aidan Delbis. We dive into two landmark films from the Criterion Collection, The Breakfast Club and Night of the Living Dead, exploring how both movies continue to shape conversations around identity, genre, storytelling, and cultural impact decades after their release. Aidan also opens up about his experience working on Bugonia alongside Emma Stone and Jesse Plemons under director Yorgos Lanthimos, reflecting on collaboration, performance, and the evolving craft of acting. Along the way, the conversation touches on auditions, improv, stand-up comedy, and a few additional Criterion titles that have left a lasting impression on him. Aidan Delbis Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/aidan.delbis (https://www.instagram.com/aidan.delbis) Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aidan_Delbis (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aidan_Delbis) -------------------------- Episode intro music by: The Vase in Late Spring Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/182taVKavVQyn2cvWN2mYP?si=SFXaP2nDRqSjXEdjRTN8hA (https://open.spotify.com/artist/182taVKavVQyn2cvWN2mYP?si=SFXaP2nDRqSjXEdjRTN8hA) iTunes: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/the-vase-in-late-spring/1877177398 (https://music.apple.com/us/artist/the-vase-in-late-spring/1877177398)

3. 

   4 Feb 2026

   S.J. Chiro (Director of Lane 1974 & East of the Mountains) Exploring Jane Campion’s Cinema Through Criterion

   The CINEMA CENTRIC meet up for an episode with filmmaker S.J. Chiro, a director whose work is quietly precise, emotionally attentive, and deeply attuned to inner worlds and moral complexity. Chiro first came to wider attention with Lane 1974, a semi-autobiographical coming-of-age film that tenderly charts identity, belonging, and the unspoken currents beneath adolescence. She then directed East of the Mountains, an adaptation of David Guterson’s novel starring Tom Skerritt, a film defined by its gentle rigor, its meditations on aging, grief, masculinity, and the quiet autonomy of a life approaching its dusk. Across her work, there is a consistent sensitivity to interior lives and a commitment to letting emotional truth emerge without fanfare, a quality that makes her an especially rich voice in contemporary American cinema. In this episode, S.J. chose to explore the work of Jane Campion, one of the most distinctive, uncompromising filmmakers in world cinema and a director whose films live in the rich terrain of subjectivity, memory, desire, and the tensions between stillness and rupture. For our Criterion segment, we watched every Jane Campion title available in the Criterion Collection and on the Criterion Channel, from early shorts to her later films. Our conversation weaves these ideas back into S.J. Chiro’s own work and creative process: how restraint can be a strategy for emotional precision, how the camera can become a companion to a character’s interiority, and how memory and longing inform both narrative and performance. We talk about the way Campion’s films unsettle simple arcs and invite the viewer into a layered, subjective space, and why, for Chiro, those qualities resonate deeply with her own artistic concerns. S.J. Chiro Website: ⁠https://sjchiro-director.com (https://sjchiro-director.com/) Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sjchiro (https://www.instagram.com/sjchiro/) IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1849850 (https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1849850/) Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S._J._Chiro (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S._J._Chiro)

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

4.0 / 5

4 ratings

Spotify

5.0 / 5

6 ratings

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Guest appearances

Does not typically book guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.