THE WRONG MANS: Join me and filmmaker, podcaster, author and film scholar, Steven Jay Rubin (The James Bond Encyclopedia) as we talk North by Northwest and Tell No One, two films about men accused of a murder they didn’t commit and have to go on the run to prove their innocence.

“You gentlemen aren’t REALLY trying to kill my son, are you?” It happens to the best of us. We’re just going our merry way when someone gets murdered. We get blamed for it when we’re totally innocent. So do we work with the authorities and hire a good lawyer and private investigator? Of course not. We do what any normal person would. We go on the run and find the murderer ourselves. Ah, fun times, fun times…

Sounds like it’s time for Episode 99 of Pop Art, where we find the pop culture in art and the art in pop culture. It’s the podcast where my guest chooses a movie from popular culture, and I’ll select a film from the more art/classic/indie/foreign side of cinema with a connection to it. For this episode, I am happy to welcome as my guest, filmmaker, podcaster, author and film scholar, Steven Jay Rubin, who has chosen as his film the Alfred Hitchcock classic North By Northwest, while I have chosen Guillaume Canet’s Tell No One, both films about someone who has been accused of a murder they didn’t commit and have to go on the run to prove their innocence.

And in this episode, we answer such questions as: What is the appeal of wrong man films? Who is the murderer in the book as opposed to the film of Tell No One? What about that crop duster scene? What about that chase over the freeway and through the market scene? Whose idea was it to make Marin Landau’s character gay? What actor in Tell No One plays the lead in the French version of The Office? Why do the French adapt so many American and British authors of thrillers and mysteries? Where does the title North by Northwest come from? Is Hercule Poriot French? What is the age difference between Cary Grant and Jessie Royce Landis?