Steven Jay Rubin's Saturday Night at the Movies, Los Angeles, CA (2026)

07/12/2026

BREAKING PODCAST NEWS – In light of all the talk about the horror thriller “Obsession” and how it’s taken over the theatrical box office, I thought it would be a good idea this week to talk about the greatest horror films of all time. To seek out those titles, I invited film historian, author, prolific blu-ray commentator and Horror authority Nathaniel Thompson to come on the show, and he’s given us a very cool list of titles to discuss. Nathaniel created and maintains the horror film website Mondo Digital – his titles range from the classic “Rosemary’s Baby” and “The Haunting” to more contemporary scare-a-thons like “Hereditary” and “Let the Right One In.”
You can watch our spirited discussion right now on our You Tube channel, using this link: https://youtu.be/heGDP84ds1s
Or, starting tomorrow, you can find us on all the podcast platforms. Here’s a link to Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/7oG8rdYWHp5bEO3pJiVRe7
Or, also starting tomorrow, find out video on the Fast Channel, True TV Plus, using this link: https://play.truetvplus.com/search?query=Saturday
Stay frosty!

07/11/2026

SATURDAY NIGHT AT THE MOVIES – Martin Ritt was a prolific director from the late 1950s to the beginning of the 90s, with such classic credits as “Norma Rae,” “The Front,” “Sounder,” “The Spy Who Came in from the Cold” and “Hud.” But did you know that he was also a damn good actor.
The other day I was surfing the Movies! Channel (KCOP in LA), and came across what I would consider to be an obscure thriller from 1975, “End of the Game.” Directed by actor Maximillian Schell, and written by Friedrich Durrenmatt who adapted his own novel, “The Judge and his Hangman,” it stars Jon Voight, Robet Shaw, Jacqueline Bisset…and Martin Ritt as Barlach, a gritty Swiss homicide investigator. He is just terrific.
The film begins in Istanbul in 1946, with the sudden murder of a young woman who is slugged in the mouth and tossed off a bridge. We meet Barlach and Shaw’s Richard Gastmann character in this opening vignette, when Barlach accepts a bet that Gastmann can kill the girl, which, sadly, he follows through on. The story then moves ahead thirty years. Gastmann has never been convicted of any crime as he continues to be an important official in the Swiss government. The story then picks up with the murder of a Swiss cop (the co**se is played by Donald Sutherland), and the investigation begins when Barlach teams up with rookie cop Walter Tschanz (Voight). Complicating Barlach’s life is the fact that he’s dying from stomach cancer, but it doesn’t affect his doggedness to solve the crime.
What I find interesting about film discoveries like this is seeing well-known performers in unfamiliar roles. Aside from Ritt, who is a revelation, it was fun seeing a balding Shaw in a film that was released shortly after his Quint character debuted in “Jaws”. And Jacqueline Bisset was in fine form, she would shortly join Shaw again in “The Deep,” wearing that memorable t-shirt. Voight and Schell had appeared together the previous year in “The Odessa File,” which bears some similarities to “End of the Game.”
Apparently, this was a troubled production with massive issues in post. Some critics called it confusing, but I followed it, and I recommend it for the cast, especially Ritt. Happy Saturday!

07/04/2026

SATURDAY NIGHT AT THE MOVIES – Today, I asked myself “what is my favorite Independence Day movie?” For me, it’s an obvious choice – 1996’s “Independence Day,” a sci-fic epic which I’ve seem easily 50 times. Somehow, director Roland Emmerich and his co-writer Dean Devlin, captured lightning in a bottle in a big way.
For my money, it’s the cast that makes this killer entertainment, and you have to start with Will Smith. Known mostly for his television work, Smith took on this role and nailed it from the get go – turning him, practically overnight, into an international superstar. His Captain Hiller is courageous, but he’s also very funny, particularly in his repartee with his co-star, Jeff Goldblum’s David Levinson character. And Goldblum who ably shares the screen with Smith, is a lot of fun – a cable TV troubleshooter who suddenly discovers a hidden alien code on his laptop. Like Smith, he can be believably dramatic in one scene and very funny in the next.
Everything pretty much revolves around these two characters, allowing supporting performers great moments. These include Judd Hirsch, who plays Levinson’s father, Julius; Margaret Colin as Levinson’s ex-wife; Bill Pullman’s President of the United States (an ex-fighter pilot, ready to lead the counterattack); Robert Loggia’s stalwart General; and Randy Quaid’s alcoholic cropduster pilot, Russell Casse.
What makes this film a much better movie than Steven Spielberg’s “War of the Worlds” is the humor quotient. One moment you’re stunned by the ferociousness of the alien attack, the next moment you’re laughing out loud.
Kudos to the Oscar-winning special effects team for creating some of the most spectacular alien attack sequences ever. I used to be in total awe of the martian war machines that rise out of the California gully in the 1953 “War of the Worlds” (they’re still terrific) but the weapons deployed by these aliens are insane in their power.
So on this day, as we honor our country on its 250th anniversary, let’s celebrate the 30th anniversary of one of the greatest science fiction film of all time.

06/28/2026

BREAKING PODCAST NEWS – 20th Century Fox contract producer Julian Blaustein is well-known for two celebrated films he produced for the studio in the 1950s – the terrific western “Broken Arrow” (1950), and the science fiction classic “The Day the Earth Stood Still” (1951). When the studio contract system ended, Blaustein went independent and in 1966, he put together one of the most underrated historical epics – “Khartoum.”
This week on Saturday Night at the Movies, I feature a 1977 interview I did with Blaustein when he was teaching up at Stanford. He reveals that the project started as a Burt Lancaster vehicle with 007 director Lewis Gilbert helming, but how everything fell apart when violence broke out in the Sudan and they had to abandon shooting there.
You can catch that interview right now on our You Tube channel, using this link: https://youtu.be/U1x5tvtoMEE
Or, starting tomorrow, you can find it on your favorite podcast platform. Here’s a link to Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/7oG8rdYWHp5bEO3pJiVRe7
Or, also starting tomorrow, you can find it on our Fast channel outlet, True TV Plus, using this link: https://play.truetvplus.com/search?query=Saturday

06/27/2026

SATURDAY NIGHT AT THE MOVIES – I always loved the character work of Charles Durning. In 2001, I was able to hire him to play a scorekeeper working inside the Wrigley Field manual scoreboard in our baseball comedy for Showtime – “Bleacher Bums.” Now most of you will think of Charles as being that portly actor, not in the greatest of shape, but during the D-Day invasion, I learned he was a lean Ranger assigned to climb that cliff at Pointe du Hoc. He was badly injured in a knife fight with a N**i defender, survived to fight again, then was assigned the horrible task of identifying the victims of the Malmedy massacre during the Battle of the Bulge.
What’s your favorite Durning performance? I have three that come to mind. First, it’s his Lt. Snyder of Bunco in “The Sting.” He’s such a force in that film, especially when he’s chasing Robert Redford’s Johnny Ho**er character all over Chicago. I also love his performance as Jessica Lange’s father in the marvelous comedy “Tootsie,” where he develops a fascination with Dustin Hoffman’s title character. In one of his lesser known roles, he’s the outraged U.S. senator who finds himself involved in the time travel adventure of “The Final Countdown.” While relaxing on a yacht off Pearl Harbor with his secretary (Katherine Ross), he suddenly hears the outrageous sound of modern American fighter jets flying over his craft. It’s a great cinema moment in a really fun film.
Charles was a salt-of-the-earth character actor who we lost in 2012. He is sorely missed.

06/21/2026

BREAKING PODCAST NEWS – Twenty-eight years ago, the bar for World War II movies was raised considerably with the release of Steven Spielberg’s unforgettable “Saving Private Ryan,” a film that has become a personal favorite over the years. Written beautifully by Robert Rodat and featuring an amazing cast that includes Tom Hanks, Matt Damon, Tom Sizemore, Edward Burns, Adam Goldberg, Vin Diesel, Barry Pepper, Giovanni Ribisi, Jeremy Davies, Ted Danson, Paul Giamatti, Dennis Farina, Harve Presnell, Dale Dye and Bryan Cranston, It’s a movie that captivates you from the first moment that elderly veteran walks towards the cemetery above Omaha Beach. This week on Saturday Night at the Movies, film historian and filmmaker Steve Mitchell and military technical advisor for film and television Rory Aylward and I celebrate this film classic, that cast, those scenes and the impact the film made.
You can watch the show right now on our You Tube channel, using this link: https://youtu.be/xaXRNP_dP5k
Or, tomorrow, you can listen on your favorite podcast platform. Here’s a link to Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/7oG8rdYWHp5bEO3pJiVRe7
Or, also starting tomorrow, you can watch on our Fast Channel outlet, True TV Plus, using this link: https://play.truetvplus.com/search?query=sat

06/20/2026

SATURDAY NIGHT AT THE MOVIES – I do not know the work of actress Norma Shearer, but the other day I happened upon her 1938 film, “Marie Antoinette,” and I found it to be a revelation. Written by Claudine West, Donald Ogden Stewart and Ernest Vajda, and directed with enough pomp to sink the Titanic a second time by W. S Van D**e, this is a truly sumptuous MGM release, which, to save money, was ridiculously shot in black and white.
Now, admittedly, color was not a given in the 1930s – usually reserved for prestige titles like “Gone with the Wind” and “The Wizard of Oz,” – but this movie is all about the Austrian royal who became the Queen of France, and the pre-Revolution costumes and sets deserved a much more appropriate presentation.
But, getting back to Ms. Shearer, she’s simply wonderful as the naïve Austrian who arrives to marry Louis XVI (a marvelous Robert Morley), and soon discovers that he’s a total misanthrope with no interest in marriage whatsoever. She finds some romantic solace in meeting the very handsome and charismatic Swedish count Axel de Fersen (Tyrone Power, who defined handsome and charismatic). Unfortunately, the French court is awash in subterfuge, and, more importantly, the people of France are about to rise up in a tidal wave of anti-royal bitterness – leading to the Revolution. Marie Antoinette becomes a target, a prisoner, then a fugitive – and Shearer is just terrific in embodying each desperate phase. She also eventually develops a nice rapport with her husband, and Morley really evolves in his role as well.
Apparently, this was a much more important MGM project when Norma’s husband, studio production head Irving Thalberg, was alive. Once he died, the project languished, but finally got made, and promptly bombed.
Enormous kudos to costume designer Adrian, whose magnificent costumes deserved a better fate.

06/15/2026

BREAKING PODCAST NEWS – I first discovered the work of director Rod Lurie when I caught his terrific military prison film “The Last Castle, “ which starred Robert Redford and James Gandolfini. I gave it a review on Facebook and he reached out and thanked me, which was very cool. More recently, he directed the gripping Afghan war film “The Outpost,” which starred Scott Eastwood. This coming June 26th, Rod teams again with Eastwood in another taut war story – “Lucky Strike” – which follows one determined engineering officer trapped in the midst of the German winter offensive against the allies – inotherwords – the Battle of the Bulge. I was able to interview Rod all about this film, and he’s the subject of this week’s podcast.
You can watch that interview right now – it’s short, only 18 minutes -using this link to our You Tube channel: https://youtu.be/Gt2dNs2-5sk
Or you can wait until tomorrow and catch the audio on your favorite podcast platform. Here’s a link to Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/7oG8rdYWHp5bEO3pJiVRe7
Or you can also watch it tomorrow on our FAST channel outlet, True TV plus, using this link: https://play.truetvplus.com/search?query=Saturday

06/13/2026

BREAKING PODCAST NEWS – The Bond women – what a topic? But the Femmes Fatales of 007, even better. Those deliciously evil black widows – determined to kill James Bond at any cost, but also eager to spend some time in the sack with him, too. From sultry Miss Taro, with her wet hair in Dr. No to Xenia Onatopp in GoldenEye and her killer thighs, and fencer Miranda Frost in Die Another Day, they, and many more, provided us with lots of pleasure and eye candy fun. This week on Tales from Hollywoodland, my co-hosts Arthur, Julian and I survey the fighting femmes fatales of 007 who added so much to the series. You can listen to that show right now. Here’s the link: https://talesfromhollywoodland.com/

And, catching up on some of our other shows, check out our show dedicated to the memory of Rob Reiner; and our Mel Brooks show – so much fun.

05/24/2026

BREAKING PODCAST NEWS – As we honor America’s military this Memorial Day weekend, I wanted to share an interview I did back in 1974 for my first book, “Combat Films: American Realism 1945-1970.” The subject is screenwriter/producer and author Sy Bartlett, who with fellow author/screenwriter Beirne Lay, Jr., wrote the novel and its film adaptation - !2 O’Clock High.” For a movie about the challenges of commanding a bomber squadron in the early days of the war in Europe, Bartlett was ideal. Although, like many Hollywood professionals, he was recruited to make documentary films for the military, Bartlett wanted to be closer to combat. Through Lay, who was already in the Army Air Corps, he became a key aid to General Carl Spaatz, and worked closely with , squadron commander General Frank Armstrong, who became the inspiration for “12 O’clock High’s” General Frank Savage (Gregory Peck in the 1949 film). After the war ended, Bartlett would transfer to the Pacific Theater, working as an intelligence officer with a B-29 unit flying out of Guam.
In our interview, Bartlett talks about how a script issue shelved “12 O’clock High” for months, and some of his other military films including “13 Rue Madeleine,” “Pork Chop Hill” and “In Enemy Country.”
You can listen to this interview right now on our You Tube Channel, using this link: https://youtu.be/3wNbzWyJ_5M
Or, starting tomorrow, you can pick it up on your favorite podcast platform. Here’s a link to Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/7oG8rdYWHp5bEO3pJiVRe7
Or, also starting tomorrow, you can find it on our Fast Channel outlet, True TV Plus, using this link: https://play.truetvplus.com/search?query=Saturday
God bless our veterans!

Steven Jay Rubin's Saturday Night at the Movies

07/12/2026

07/11/2026

07/04/2026

06/28/2026

06/27/2026

06/21/2026

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