Tom Secker

Today we have a special Election Day episode of the show. We are joined by good friends Tom Secker and Aaron Franz from Transresister Radio and Themes and Memes to discuss all things presidential. We begin by discussing our general outlook and feelings on the election and the traumatic effects it has had on us. Later we discuss the occult overtones through out this election and voting in general. The three of us touch on the “Spirit Cooking” scandal surrounding John Podesta and how this is yet another example of the mainstreaming of alternative culture.

In the first hour I am joined by Tom Secker of Spy Culture. We discuss his recent article examining the 1975 conspiracy classic Three Days of The Condor. We examine the film and its bizarre history; having former CIA Director Richard Helms on set for a day of shooting. Tom and I explore the notion that this was a first step for the CIA and their evolving relationship with Hollywood. Next we move on to the recently declassified CIA report on the Watergate scandal. We talk about the admission by the CIA that they had an active operative, Eugenio R.

Rounding off this second season we take a look at SALT, the 2010 action thriller starring Angelina Jolie as a CIA officer accused of being a Russian sleeper agent. We chart the development of the film, from its origins as an attempt to recreate the Bourne franchise, through Amy Pascal and Jolie’s conversations about making a female-led spy thriller. SALT is one of the less well known CIA-assisted productions, but along with technical advice from former CIA officer Melissa Boyle Mahle the producers also consulted with the CIA themselves in a video conference.

James joined Pearse and Tom for episode thirteen of 'The CIA & Hollywood' show to dissect the 2009 Disney UFO adventure, 'Race to Witch Mountain'.

Robbie Martin is our final guest for this season as we dissect the 2012 docudrama Zero Dark Thirty. We discussed the difficulty in defining what kind of film this is – somewhere between a spy thriller, a documentary and a dry European art house movie. We get into the well-documented CIA support for the film and ask why this is the only major movie about the Abbottabad raid to get ‘Bin Laden’ and why it wasn’t particularly successful. Was the film meant to serve as a substitute for any real evidence of what happened in Abbottabad in 2011?

For this inaugural episode I am joined by my good friend and frequent collaborator Tom Secker. We begin by discussing the bizarre life and career of the CIA Hollywood liaison Chase Brandon. We then move onto the relationship between entertainment and the security services. We explore the notion that this going beyond mere propaganda, and instead represents a significant distortion of our culture and perception of reality and world events.

From Our Interesting Times:

James Evan Pilato is our latest guest as we dissect the 2009 Disney UFO adventure Race to Witch Mountain.  We start off looking at Disney as a corporation – its long standing interest in UFOs and extraterrestrials, the connections to government agencies and their recent takeover of the fantasy genre.  We then get into Race to Witch Mountain itself – a strange blend of a kids’ movie, a love letter to the UFO culture and an homage to spy thrillers especially Enemy of the State.  Next, we examine the deliberately hyperreal natu

Adam from Themes and Memes is our guest to talk about the 2015 action comedy American Ultra.  We start by trying to define this film, which is an intense mixture of cartoonish ultra violence, CIA covert operations, romance, comedy and horror, looking at the dissociating nature of this blend.  The intentions of screenwriter Max Landis and the director Nima Nourizadeh are discussed and we ask whether they were reaching out to the CIA or trying to flatter them by making MKULTRA seem cool to stoners and young people.  We go on to look at the prominen

Jay Dyer joins us for this episode where we analyse the 2009 comedy The Men Who Stare at Goats, loosely based on Jon Ronson’s book of the same name. It tells the story of a journalist who is inducted into the world of psychic soldiers during the Iraq war. The movie goes on to explain some of the history behind the First Earth Battalion, an experimental Pentagon unit devoted to developing a new generation of super soldier informed by the hippy and New Age movements.