Skip to content

Talk Radio (Oliver Stone 5)

December 15, 2025 · 2 h 58 min

Show notes

Continuing our Oliver Stone series, we analyze the psy-ops within his 1988 film Talk Radio. Starring and co-written by Eric Bogossian, this film is strangely out of place in this era of Stone's filmography, and we discuss why Stone was led to direct such an unusually impersonal film. Based in large part on the career and assassination of liberal shock jock Alan Berg, the film gives us occasion to look at cultural engineering campaigns related to fears of right-wing extremism and anti-semitism. To that end, we also take close looks at the 1988 film Betrayed (directed by Costa-Gavras) and the 2024 film The Order (directed by Justin Kurzel), two other movies that showcase distorted depictions of the events surrounding Berg's murder. Finally, Brett also explains the relevance of Reversal of Fortune and Iron Maze, two other joint production credits for Oliver Stone and Edward Pressman (also a producer of Talk Radio, along with Wall Street and Blue Steel).

If you enjoy Psyop Cinema, check out the Decoding Culture Foundation and Cultural Engineering Studies magazine - https://decoding-culture.com/magazine-home/

https://twitter.com/CinemaPsyop
https://www.patreon.com/PsyopCinema
https://psyopcinema.com/
https://linktr.ee/psyopcinema

[email protected]
[email protected]

All episodes of Psyop Cinema

Settings

Display

Language

Decides which stations you see first on the home page.

History

Recently played stations and episodes and your latest searches are only stored in this browser.

Notifications

A short notice when a podcast you follow has a new episode. Turn off single podcasts with the bell on their page.

Account

Save favorites – in the app and on the website.

Keyboard shortcuts

/
Open search
Space
Play or pause
← →
In the player: back 15 s, forward 30 s (episodes) · in a row: next tile
↑ ↓
In a row: target within the tile
Home / End
In a row: first or last tile
Esc
Close window or menu
?
This overview
Now playing

Go to station page

Play next

    Add episodes with “Play next” – they play after the current episode.