Jan. 26, 2026

I Shot Andy Warhol: Mary Harron’s Uncomfortable, Brilliant Debut

I Shot Andy Warhol: Mary Harron’s Uncomfortable, Brilliant Debut
Season 1

What if the most famous moment in Andy Warhol’s life wasn’t really about him at all?

In this episode of Only On Video, I kick off a season focused on director Mary Harron, with her debut feature, I Shot Andy Warhol.

This isn’t a true-crime thriller or a political screed. It’s a character study that forces you to consider Valerie Solanas without telling you how to feel about her. And as a starting point for Harron’s career, it already contains the DNA of American Psycho: dark humor, moral ambiguity, and an obsession with outsiders who don’t fit cleanly into cultural myths.

In This Epsiode

🎬 Context: The Film and the Moment

  1. The mid-1990s indie film boom (Fargo, Trainspotting, Dazed and Confused)
  2. VHS, Sundance, and why forgotten stories suddenly had an audience
  3. Andy Warhol as a canonized pop icon—and Valerie Solanas as a cultural footnote
  4. Why Harron was drawn to Solanas instead of Warhol

🎥 Why Mary Harron?

  1. How American Psycho made me start paying attention to directors
  2. Why Harron’s worldview—not genre or actors—is the connective tissue
  3. What makes I Shot Andy Warhol such a confident first feature

👥 Cast & Crew Breakdown

  1. Mary Harron and her background in punk journalism and outsider culture
  2. Ellen Kuras’ gritty, claustrophobic cinematography
  3. John Cale (Velvet Underground) scoring a Warhol-adjacent story
  4. Christine Vachon’s track record producing marginalized, character-driven films
  5. Lili Taylor’s unsettling, fully committed performance as Valerie Solanas
  6. Jared Harris as a deliberately hollow, distant Andy Warhol

📕 Storyline

  1. The film’s fragmented structure and why it avoids procedural storytelling
  2. Valerie’s trauma, radicalization, and obsession with being taken seriously
  3. The SCUM Manifesto as ideology, satire, and emotional anchor
  4. Paranoia, rejection, and the slow march back to the opening crime

🎞 Highlights

  1. Lili Taylor’s fearless performance
  2. Unexpected dark humor (“I don’t wanna get into that right now”)
  3. The Factory as a strange, temporary refuge
  4. Campy moments like the anarchist “militarization” montage
  5. A restrained, effective soundtrack

🧠 Legacy

  1. How this film launched Mary Harron’s career and set her thematic blueprint
  2. The clear through-line to American Psycho
  3. Why the film gave Valerie Solanas context without redemption
  4. The SCUM Manifesto’s renewed cultural life after the film’s release

Fun & Weird Trivia from the Episode

  1. 🎥 Almost a documentary: Harron originally planned this as a doc but pivoted due to lack of archival material and reluctant interview subjects.
  2. 🖼 Replica Warhol art was destroyed after filming at the request of Warhol’s estate.
  3. 🎸 Lou Reed hated the movie—specifically the idea of giving Solanas attention at all.
  4. 🎶 Yo La Tengo appears as the Factory band, channeling ’60s art-rock through a ’90s indie lens.
  5. 🤝 John Cale scoring the film adds a meta layer—he and Warhol actually knew each other.

Next Up

American Psycho, Mary Harron’s most famous film, Christian Bale’s breakout role, and one of the most misunderstood satires of the last 30 years.

If you enjoy thoughtful, director-focused deep dives that go beyond plot summaries, follow the show and share it with a fellow film nerd.

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