MELANIA: “A piece of handsomely mounted crypto‑fascist propaganda” + Riz Ahmed

Earmark. What do the films Die My Love, I'm still here and it was just an accident all have in common.

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This is a setup for another of those terrible laughter lift jokes, isn't it? Which I thought we'd done with for another week.

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No, this is no laughing matter.

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Okay, go on.

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Well, not only are they some of your favorite film recommendations from last year, but they're also all films you'll be able to stream anywhere in the world when you travel abroad, even in geo locked territories.

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Episode is brought to you by mubi, the global film company that champions great cinema. From iconic directors to emerging auteurs, there's always something new to discover with mubi. Each and every film is hand selected so you can explore the best of cinema streaming anytime, anywhere.

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When we say the best, we mean the best because now streaming on MUBI from January 23rd in the UK is the film that I said was my favorite film of last year, which is Die My Love, the new film by Lynne Ramsey. It has an extraordinary central performance by Jennifer Lawrence, but also I think Robert Pattinson is brilliant in it. I love all of Lynne Ramsey's films, but I think that Die My Love is just a further example of what a brilliant poet of cinema she is. And that is available streaming on MUBI from January 23rd in the UK and it is wonderful. It was my favorite film of last year.

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To stream the best of cinema, you can try mubi free for 30 days@mubi.com kermodanmayo that's m u b I.com kermodemeo for a whole month of great cinema for free. Before we begin, a quick reminder that you can become a Vanguardista and get.

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An extra episode every Thursday, including bonus reviews, extra viewing suggestions, viewing recommendations at home and in cinemas, plus your film.

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And non film questions answered as best we can in questions, you can get.

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All that extra stuff via Apple Podcasts or head to extratakes.com for non fruit related devices.

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There's never been a better time to become a Vanguardista. Free offer now available wherever you get your podcasts. And if you're already of Vanguardista, we salute you. Well, here we are on the same table again.

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I know.

2:50

But in a different studio.

2:51

I know.

2:52

I'm slightly confused. What's going on?

2:53

Well, I'm. I'm still. I'm in London again for the second week.

2:55

Yeah. Okay.

2:59

Because, you know, last week it was the whole thing with the weather and I couldn't get back. And then this week there was a whole bunch of things I was doing. I. I hosted the London Critics Circle Film Awards. It went very well, thank you for asking.

3:00

I didn't know you'd done it. But how did it go?

3:12

It went very well, thank you for asking. Just check. How did you not know I've done it. I've literally put pictures all over Instagram of me and Daro.

3:14

I don't do Instagram.

3:20

You have family who have Instagram? Didn't know that? Nobody got in touch with you to say Mark hosted the Critics Circle? None of. No.

3:23

Absolutely nothing. We've seen. We've seen lots of episodes of Bath Time in Copenhagen, you know, and we've seen Walks in Copenhagen.

3:29

Very good.

3:38

And. And things like that. But nothing about you.

3:39

Nothing about me? Well, I've been very, very busy and I was.

3:41

Yes.

3:43

And I was on stage just last night with. With. I was. Simon.

3:44

Yes.

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With Guillermo del Toro and Jacob Elordi doing the IMAX presentation of Frankenstein. And then before that I was doing a thing with Jesse. Bugger. I did a whole load of stuff.

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Showbiz.

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Is that what you. Sorry. Showbiz. So I woke up this morning in London. That's why we. The same. I don't know why we're in this room, not the other room that we were in before.

3:58

Did you have it like a spankly suit on for. You know, because if you're going to.

4:03

Be with my suit, my suit. I've only got one suit. I've got the suit that I had.

4:06

Made for me, you know, Jake Malordi particularly. He's really tall. You would think he. That you would, you know, put a bit of sparkle in.

4:09

I'm not with the spot. I wore the suit. I wore the suit that I have had. I had a suit made for me 10 years ago.

4:16

Okay.

4:22

And I still fit it. Has it Got sparkle. No. Well, it's got style.

4:23

It has a great film, though. Frankenstein.

4:27

Yeah, it's a great film. Yeah. And I look fabulous. And it all went very well. Again, thank you for asking. I didn't know that you.

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That you'd done it. If I'd known, I would have asked. And I don't do Instagram, so just in case, you know, you want to communicate, but, you know, always send me a note. Look, this is me. Aren't I great?

4:34

But that would have seemed like terribly, you know, pushy. You didn't see the photograph move. Paul Thomas Anderson didn't see the photograph. Maybe Sally Hawkins. You didn't see any of this?

4:43

No.

4:51

Because you're.

4:52

Okay, fine. Just assume that I haven't seen it.

4:52

I think you can watch the whole thing on YouTube.

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But why would I?

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Because I presented it and I did like a 10 minute opening that was like, really had jokes and it had substance and it had stuff.

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What was the best joke?

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The best joke was among the flops this year, we had Jared Leto intron arse. And I'm sorry, I mispronounced that. Jared Leto in Tron arse.

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Okay. This is. This is like laughing American.

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At least one person in the control booth is laughing.

5:23

That's very good and quite in keeping.

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Yeah.

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Stephen Fry would have liked that joke.

5:28

He would have liked it.

5:30

Yeah.

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You could have written it. I did write some jokes for Stephen Fry. That way you're going there.

5:31

Okay, what are we talking animatedly about this week?

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We've got an incredibly, incredibly packed show. So we have Send Help, which is the new Sand. Raimi. Sam Raimi movie, the Chronology of Water, which is the feature directorial debut from Kristen Stewart, It's Never Over. Jeff Buckley, which is a documentary about Jeff Buckley, of whom I know you are a huge fan. I went to see a grubby advert cum bribe, which we'll talk about during the top 10 since Melania.

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A lot of people are waiting for that. A lot of people are. So two documentaries to choose from. One about Jeff Buckley.

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No, a documentary and a bribe.

6:06

Oh, I see. A propaganda film.

6:08

Yeah. And Hamlet.

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Happiness is a cigar called Hamlet. The mild cigar found under benches and hedges.

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Where did that come from? Found on the benches and hedges.

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Two. Not the. Not. I think it was not the nine o' Clock News. That would seem appropriate.

6:27

That's a good joke.

6:31

Yes. So Riz Ahmed is going to be our special guest. Talking about. It's like the H word. Because if you say the full words, then he's going to play the music.

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Should we see starring in Hamlet?

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Happiness is a cigar that's going to.

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Wear thin quickly, isn't it?

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A mild cigar.

6:49

Yeah.

6:52

Riz Ahmed is in that film and in take two. Mark, what are you up to in take two?

6:52

We have even more reviews because there's so much out this week. We have reviews of 100 Nights of Hero and My Father's Shadow, plus all.

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The extra stuff, including our new feature five Question Film Club, in which you pick a film that's airing on a free view or streaming service and Mark answers what we think are five key questions about it. Your homework is then to watch it over the next seven days, after which we reconvene for a debrief and your reactions in the following week's show. Plus we'll have further discussions discussion on the best Sam Raimi movies in one frame back. Plus questions in which we answer the question are truly provocative and avant garde films even being made anymore? Yes, and that's the end of that one. But obviously there'll be a bit more detail. Now we've had quite a lot of correspondence about the very sad death of Catherine o'. Hara. Yes. In the last few days. So I'll just zip through some of them. I think again it's because people were so. Not only was she incredibly talented because it this I think all the obituaries said died after a short illness and no one really seems to know what happened and no one really knew that she was sick.

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No.

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So therefore it kind of it came out of a blue sky. Dan in Marple, one of the greatest comedy actors of her generation. Beetlejuice. Best in show crushing all before her in Schitt's Creek. A very sad loss. Joe on Blue sky for many of us 80s kids, especially those who loved Home Alone and Beetlejuice, she was a big part of our experience. Experience growing up watching films, a brilliant screen presence and by all accounts an even better person. A huge loss. The Global Shorelines project occasionally get in touch. Yes, all of them. Obviously lots to remember about Catherine o', Hara, but her casting as Moira Rose in Schitt's Creek with Eugene and Dan Levy was absolute perfection. Gossip is the devil's telephone. Best to hang up is a quote. Andy F says her pronunciation of the word binoculars in Schitt's Creek completely changed the way I say it in public, much to the annoyance of all around me. Yes, because you could probably get away if you're Catherine on the telly, but NDF probably you can't. No, disrespect. Graham hall says her films with Christopher Guest show just how good a comedic talent she was. So quick witted and a natural with improvisation. And Kari Tulinius, one of our correspondents, says a performance in Home Alone is the emotional heartbeat of the film. Out of many wonderful moments, the scene with her old friend and collaborator John Candy, whose eulogy she gave is my favorite. The way Ohara moves from incandescent rage through confusion to joy in just two minutes is perfect. And I suspect it's one of those deaths which will provoke people to go, you know what, I should have watched more Catherine o'. Hara. And now I'm going to go back and watch a whole bunch of her films.

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Funnily enough, just a couple of weeks ago, just looking for something to watch and the good lady professor hadn't seen the studio and I said, oh well, I'll happily watch it again. And of course she's absolutely brilliant in that. That is a really, really terrific comic performance. But she's, you know, she's fabulous in so much. Obviously the films which you work with, people like Christopher Guest, that whole back catalog is there to be explored.

9:42

And she was also in the second series of Last of Us and she was going to be in the next series. And Craig Mason on his podcast, the script notes podcast, was saying yes, they, they knew absolutely nothing about what, what's happened to her. Yeah, but she, she had been written in for the third series and now obviously not. So but anyway, I'm sure this will be an ongoing correspondence thing because people will go back and watch more Catherine o' Hara films and TV shows as a result of that. Take Ultra is, is an extra show we just want to remind you about. We stream it live every other Wednesday. And I believe this is one of.

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Those when this is one of those Wednesdays.

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It's also available as a video episode on Patreon or as an audio podcast. This week we're talking about the latest awards news following both the BAFTA and Oscar nominations. And it looks like there's an actual race for Best Picture.

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We'll discuss January actual race.

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And of course it includes Hot Takes and Cold Comfort, everyone's least favorite feature apart from the production team who get to dress up and wear hats. And then Mark says we'll be announcing the latest possible entries to our hall of Fame, so head to patreon.com kermanandmay to sign up.

10:52

Thank you for leaping in there. Cause you know that I can't find the thing I was just doing was I was just Sorry, I was just looking at the whole Catherine o' Hara back catalog and realizing the thing that people need to watch is a mighty wind. Because that, that, yeah, that is absolutely, I think, you know, top of the tree.

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Correspondence@Kevinomeo.com what is out there that isn't Melania?

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Thank you. Send HELP15 for strong bloody violence, gore, threaten, language. Sam Raimi's back. So this is the new film from Sam Raimi, who was the American director who first made a splash with Evil Dead, which of course you will remember during the video nasty scare videos of the evil DE were prosecuted under the Obscene Publications act, although they famously won the case at Snaresbrook. He then went on to become this incredibly successful mainstream director with the Spider man movies. He's also made thrillers, westerns, comedies, dramas, all of them sort of largely shot through with a sort of strong sense of satire. His last horror, really horror film was Drag Me to hell in 2009. So now you have this, which is horror inflected. It is a survival horror adventure satire from the writer Damien Shay Shannon. Mark swift. So Rachel McAdams is Linda Little, who is this socially awkward woman who lives alone with a little pet bird. And she longs to be on TV on the Survivor show. She loves the whole idea about that. She sits there watching Survivor with her bird, but basically when she's at work, she's stomped upon. Despite the fact that her strategizing and her understanding of business is what's kept the business afloat. The company's new boss is coming in. The old boss understood that she was the heart of the business and promised her the role as vp. But when he goes, his hideous son Bradley, played by Dylan o', Brien, takes over and immediately passes over her for the promotion and gives it instead to some kind of American Psycho, you know, braces wearing, horror. Then on a flight to Bangkok, which she is on because she's the only person who understands the business. The rest of them are all kind of. They're just bros on the thing. They're on a plane, the plane goes down. She finds herself stranded on a desert island. And the only other survivor is Bradley, the horrible new boss. And due to her Survivor obsession, Linda knows how to do things. She knows how to build a shelter, she knows how to gather water, she knows how to hunt, she knows how to get fish, she knows how to make fire. Bradley, on the other hand, is a useless, you know, corporate stooge. He's mean, he's ungrateful. All he does is whinge about how long will it take them to be rescued? And he doesn't want to help or do anything with, you know, making the fires and all the rest. He just wants to get off. But remember Triangle of Sadness? When there's a thing. But after the shipwreck, the whole social order is turned upside down. So after the plane crash, the whole social order is upside down because she starts to thrive. Because this is where she's. Very good.

11:29

Excellent.

13:59

And we also discover that she's not quite as meek and timid as we thought. His eclipse. Where have you been?

13:59

Exploring. Found a new water source.

14:05

Great.

14:08

Oh, got an iced frappe there.

14:09

So much cleaner. So delicious. Give it a try.

14:13

Love the backpack.

14:17

You make that today?

14:18

Yeah.

14:19

What do you think? Yeah. Isn't that cute?

14:19

Mmm.

14:21

Super cute.

14:23

Okay, what's the matter?

14:27

What do you think is the matter? We've been here, what, two weeks now.

14:29

How have they not found us yet?

14:36

I don't know. I mean, I'm sure it'll be soon. Anyway, you know what the most important thing is for human survival? The number one thing. Positive attitude.

14:37

Oh, are you kidding me?

14:53

Well, I hope he gets chopped up and dies in great pain, because that's.

14:56

Clearly what he deserves.

15:01

I don't know, I haven't seen.

15:02

I was just working on the basis of that. Well, if you've seen the poster for this, the poster for this actually resembles like the old video covers for Evil Dead 2 or army of Darkness. So we're back in that kind of territory. And I said the BBFC thing said, strong bloody violence, gore, threat. And there are all those things. But as with all the Sam Raimi things, it's like when he did Evil Dead, he said it's basically the Three Stooges with blood and guts standing in for custard pies. I mean, this isn't Evil Dead, but what it is is a sort of romping horror inflected adventure, which, as I said, the artwork definitely kind of nods back to the days of army of Darkness. Dylan o', Brien, who's playing that character, is actually really good. Cause I've seen him in some other things and. Fine. But in the case of this, he is very good at playing that slimy entitled brat who does. You know, he's got the smile and he's got the thing and he's got. And yet he's exactly what your reaction was. But of course, during the course of finding himself in the island, maybe he starts to change. He's also incident. He's in an indie pic which is out this week called Twinless, which we'll probably end up reviewing next week because we're not gonna have time to get through everything this week. I sat there watching Send Help and it was the first thing on the Monday morning and it was 10 o' clock on Monday morning and the film starts and it's fine and then it goes on and then it's fine and then it really starts to find its way and I really enjoyed it. And by the end of it, I mean, people were laughing out loud. I mean, in a good way, you know, laughing with it. People were kind of, they came out of the scre beaming because it's just the right degree of nasty. It's just the right degree of surprise. Rachel McCadams really enjoys playing this character who starts as one thing and then turns into another thing. And then as you peel away the layers of her character turns into a bunch of other things as well. And it just, it just romps along with this sense of really good natured, very dark hearted satirical fun. And I think you'd enjoy it very much. I had an absolute ball.

15:04

Does she have a machete?

16:57

There is a knife.

16:59

Okay. Does she have any other weapons or does she make them herself? Spear.

17:00

Her greatest weapon is her mind.

17:06

Right, okay.

17:08

But yes, she does have a spear because at one point she goes off hunting a wild boar and that's a particularly romping animal attack scene.

17:09

Okay. So Send Help is such an interesting title because it doesn't suggest what you've.

17:17

Described because they're on the island and the whole thing is he says, you know, they need to and helps. Not coming.

17:22

Yes. Okay, that's very good correspondence at coming to mayor.com. we're going to be back in just a moment with.

17:28

With the box office top 10, including.

17:33

Also the chronology of Water. It's never over. Jeff Buckley and Hamlet.

17:38

It's gonna happen every time.

17:44

Happiness is a cigar called Hamlet.

17:45

The mild cigar.

17:48

Yes, It's Riz Ahmed who is that has got nothing. Obviously. That music is not from the film. That's the music from the 70s TV ad in case.

17:50

Thank you for clarifying that. Just in case anyone thought that Riz Ahmed had done a version of Shakespeare that included hocking cigars.

17:57

And we'll also have the box office, as Mark mentioned, and the laughter lift, which he did.

18:06

I like the fact you're now reading all my bits on the script because you realize that I've just given up.

18:10

Just given up because I would just do the whole thing anyway. BOTH CHUCKLE HYSTERICALLY at the exciting prospect ahead. Yeah, Mark. Now I've been thinking about the early days of our show just a little bit recently.

18:13

Okay, go on. When we first started out, we didn't.

18:30

Have our truly wonderful top production team, did we?

18:33

No, we didn't. How on earth did we manage?

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19:31

Okay, here we go with the box office top 10 at Dis Neuf Cinq Enuitt. Dan Air on YouTube says Nouvelle Varg is a very enjoyable film that goes some way to capturing the spirit of the time and the feeling that you could just go out and shoot a movie. Also, how frustrating it must have been to work with JF.

20:07

Exactly.

20:24

Yeah, yeah, it's your Luke number thrumblety6 is Kangaroo Bronwyn says thank God he's to MTL FTE in Melbourne. Listening to Take Two this week and your review of Kangaroo, which is set in Broome, Western Australia, I thought it might be interesting to know that Broome, which is more than 2,000 kilometers north of Western America's Western America of Western Australia, Australia's capital, Perth, so that's 2,000 kilometers north, is home to the world's oldest outdoor picture garden, the Sun Picture theater. Built in 1903 in Broome's Chinatown area, the town has a very multicultural history due to the pearl farming for which it is famous in the cinema, is still running and is a great place to visit. Its history is fascinating. It is possibly the only cinema in the world where patrons had to deal with tidal flooding from the adjacent mud flats by lifting their feet off the ground when the tide came in. Fortunately, a levee was built in the 1970s to solve this problem. Until 1967. Get this. So that's 1967. The cinema shamefully was racially segregated. No, I didn't know. This happened in Australia with non whites. Australian first nations people. Japanese Malays were also supposed to do the most dangerous work of diving for pearls. We're required to use a separate entrance and sit in a separate area. When you visit the cinema, there is a great little museum with a lot of film memorabilia and photos. I have to. Bronwyn, thank you very much. I mean, I didn't even know that that happened at all ever in Australia. My favorite part, she says, is that the cinema is very close to Broome's airport and patrons are warned that planes may suddenly appear overhead through the film as they're departing or arriving at the airport. The last time I was there in 2023, I saw Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. Perfect as it made no difference that no less than three flights blocked out sections of the dialogue for a few minutes. I guess that's if you're going to go and see a film outdoors. That's what's going to happen. Tinkety Tonkin up with Johnny Greenwood scores sublime, says Bronwyn.

20:24

Thank you very much.

22:32

Number 29 in the charts and number three three inexplicably in America. Dear. Can't think of a suitable joke, says Steve Howe. I hereby pledge 50 pounds to a charity of Mark's choosing if he will see Melania and give us an honest in depth review. Tankity Tonk, etc. Steve just played the bagpipes at my ninth Burns night of the year. Four more to go.

22:33

Oh, well done.

22:57

So for whatever you've gone through, Steve is pledging £50 to charity. So because he went to see the film and paid money to see it.

22:58

Did so I feel very dirty about having done.

23:08

Okay. But someone is going to benefit, so. Okay. So you know Melania then.

23:11

Okay. Do you want to hear a clip from the trailer?

23:15

Not really.

23:16

Okay. I think you're going to anyway. It's in the script.

23:17

All right, you can come in.

23:19

Don't want to slide this. It will be then a peacemaker Peacemaker in the fire.

23:23

Beautiful.

23:36

Together with like minded leaders we have a voice.

23:40

Is it safe.

23:47

It is safe.

23:48

Everyone wants to know.

23:54

So here it is.

23:57

Hi, Mr. President.

24:03

Congratulations.

24:04

Did you watch it?

24:06

I did not.

24:07

Yeah, I will see it on the news. Well, I mean, here in the uk, everyone doesn't want to know. I mean, I. I said I did. I paid to sit in Islington. There was two other people in the screening, one of whom might have been the journalist. I'm not sure. So just. Firstly, it's not a film, it is a bribe. It's a grubby piece of propaganda for which Amazon paid $40 million, which is a record amount from which Melania personally pocketed $28 million. They also committed 35 million to marketing, not including promotion on socials from Melania's husband, the President of the United States, and one of the most famous people in the world. So it took costs of 75 million in the US. I think it took 7 million in its opening weekend. It will lose money, but that's how bribes work. You pay money and then you get things in return. So that's that. That is what it is. It's directed by Brett Ratner, who's been a pariah since multiple accusations of sexual misconduct back in 2017. He also, of course, features in the most recent dump of the Epstein files. Photographs of him have been, you know, everywhere since they happened. Film's got lots of rubbish. Super 8 to end the illusion of depth, but obviously it never gets beyond lip gloss. Two thirds of the New York production crew have asked for their names to be redacted from the credits. Understandably so. I think the remaining third will sorely regret having left them on the film. Just before, there was a trailer for Michael, apparently Melania's favorite artist. So the film opens with the MGM logo. Ask scratch your artists arts for art's sake. There is no art here at all. This is just all about money. We hear her robotic voice talking about family, business, philanthropy, and becoming the first lady of the United States again. So it's basically the 20 days leading up to the inauguration of a convicted felon and adjudicated. Adjudicated sexual assaulter to the presidency. She says, with my film, I want to show American people my journey from private citizen to public nurturing my family. Then we go into Trump Tower, which is this looks like somebody just sicked up a bunch of gold. It looks like the Paul Raymond Review Bar office, actually, weirdly, in Soho. Melania keeps talking about working. When she says working, she means trying on frocks. My creative vision is always clear and it is my responsibility to communicate this with the people I work with. That is her work. She also says this is all leading to four days of celebration. I remember it as being a week of mourning, but there we are, we meet David, who she worked with on every single detail of this dresses and the, and the balls. She says, I honor the tradition of the White House, which obviously her husband and her then said about destroying the minute they got in. They are literally destroying it as we speak. She talks about how hard it is to get the transition between the first families, which obviously a lot harder because when it happened with her, her family didn't cooperate with it at all. They didn't graciously meet anybody. They just stormed around being snot nosed over privileged rich people. She coos over a dress that she says is very chic and elegant, but you've probably seen it, it looks like she been run over by a bike. She whines about needing to be a mother, a wife, a daughter and a friend, and carps endlessly about my be best initiative and her vision to save the children. I should point out that since her husband came to power, children have been separated from their families, have been incarcerated. You have masked ICE agents running around the streets killing people, killing American citizens on the streets, and kids being imprisoned and sent to detention centers. Apparently. It says at the end, one of the things she's done is she's raised 25 million for this kids, you know, charity that she set up. She earned 28 million from the documentary. If she'd just given them her fee, it would have been more good. There's Jimmy Carter's funeral, which is basically made to just be all about how sad Melania feels about her own personal family losses. She watches the fires in LA on television and the music tells us that she's sad. Meanwhile, we don't see anything of her husband's response to those fires and this disgraceful way in which he behaves. I mean, it is literally. You kind of think it's like somebody making a documentary in which Eva Braun feels sad about war whilst Hitler invades Poland. I mean, it's just like all this stuff is going on and all we're hearing is this person saying, oh, yes, I care about the children and just everything is for my family. And she says, I will always use my influence and power to fight for those in need. It makes Derek Zoolander seem like, smart and, you know, self deprecating. Five days away from the inordinate inauguration, she's still going on about a creative vision and it's all about the hat she talks about. About Mar a Lago as a refuge in a place I can exhale. And if you've ever seen anything from Mar a Lago, that's it. And then in its final act, it basically turns into Triumph of the Will. I mean, it's a piece of handsomely mounted crypto fascist propaganda in which Melania basically talks about the American spirit is filled with hope and optimism. And she's saying this as the Trump family prepare to move into the White House to actually destroy democr. And then you realize it's a heist movie. It's a heist movie about a crime family breaking into the seat of power and stealing the cutlery whilst destroying democracy. There's a visit to Arlington Cemetery and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. It's all theater because we know what Trump thinks about soldiers. He called them suckers and losers. Melania says this is a powerful reminder that freedom is not free. She says as her family are preparing to enrich themselves, engorge themselves, by getting into the White House and basically corruption on a level never before seen. And then it gets really ugly. A preacher thanks God for making Trump leader again. Melania drones on about her elegance and sophistication. There is Inauguration Day, which is like reliving a nightmare. She says it's all about hope and optimism. There's some stuff about, well, actually, I don't even wanna go where that is. That's just. Anyway, then there's a thing about. She says that as an immigrant, she thinks that everyone must do what they can to protect their own individual rights. Meanwhile, as I said, under ice, masked agents are literally dragging people off the streets and shooting them them whilst being videoed. There is a shot of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris looking uncomfortable. JD Vance looks like a drag addict. Addict. Don Jr looks like he's completely off his head. Trump says the golden age of America begins right now. He claims to be a peacemaker and a unifier, and the ghost of Lenny Riefenstahl fills the room. Melania claims no one has endured what my husband has endured, except for all those people who have been imprisoned and killed under his regime. Then the whole, the whole of the last section of it is just a magnet promotional reel. That's why it's taken money in in those states, because this was the very best moment of the presidency. This was the only moment of. In which he stands up and says, the golden age of America begins now. And then, of course, since then, everything has gone completely to pieces. And then it ends with her saying I will move forward with purpose and, of course, style. The only thing that's interesting about it is this, the music choices. The film opens with a shot of Mar A Lago and the Rolling Stones Gimme Shell. And Brett Ratner has clearly not listened to Gimme Shelter because they are in the car with Melania and the family. And what the Rolling Stones are singing is rape. Murder is just a shot away. And clearly they're not listening to the lyrics. Then they steal Aretha Franklin doing Amazing Grace, which of course is a song about slavery. All references to which Trump is in the process of removing from all historical buildings. Then they have the Candlelight Dinner, which they play accompanied by the theme from Midnight Express. But I know a hellhole. It's like I'm literally watching. And then there's a bit when there's. As Trump returns to power, there's Thieving Magpie, which is most famously used in Clockwork Orange in a scene of ultra violence in which Alex and his droogs are beating the living daylights out of this other gang. And then there's a scene of Trump and Melania holding hands and they start playing Ravel's Bolero, which, if you remember, is most famously used in 10, which is about an older creepy guy. You remember the thing about 10. Anyway, either Brett Ratner doesn't know any of this, or it's an act of subversion, but I think it's actually that he doesn't know any of this. It's horrible. It is the most depressing experience I have ever had in the cinema. I mean, I've seen a Serbian film. I've seen Cannibal Holocaust. I. I have never felt this depressed in my life in the cinema. I thought it was absolutely repugnant.

24:07

And just to underline everything that you said when her stuff about saving lives and all this stuff. Nicholas Kristof, who's a journalist at New York Times, very storied, very kind of acclaimed, has gone around the world documenting for the New York Times what the destruction of USAID has done. Oh, yeah, yeah. And. And how, you know, staggering and hundreds and hundreds of people have died and kids have done. Died because of what he's done to usa.

32:33

Yeah.

32:58

So let's have no more.

32:59

No, let's have. No. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It's disgusting. It's disgusting. So what do you think?

33:01

Do you think this is just gonna. I mean, it's 29 here. Three.

33:06

That's it. It's gone now.

33:11

It is. That's it.

33:12

It's good. Next week it's gone. And in America next week it'll be gone because all the maga, you know, lunatics went out to save.

33:13

Has it taken more than you thought it would?

33:19

Yeah.

33:21

Okay. I won't be. It'll. It'll end up on Amazon, won't it? It'll be because Jeff Bezos paid all that money for it.

33:22

Yeah. So, you know, I almost feel that we should boycott Amazon.

33:30

Well, there's another whole avenue to. To wander down. So anyway, that film is. Which we should just refer to as that film. Is it number 29? Anyway, now we get into the books of his top 10.

33:34

Good.

33:45

Is this thing on? Is at number 10. Number 29 in America. America. JC says long term list a second time email I wanted to share my thoughts on Is this Thing On? Like Simon, I have a child who's tried stand up. So I took him to see it, thinking he'd enjoy a look at that world. He'd seen the trailer and hoped for insights into the comedy scene since he's not yet old enough to go to those clubs. So there's obvious quite a difference between your kid JC and mine. After the film, I asked what he thought and his response surprised me. He said the trailer didn't reflect the movie at all. He expected a story about the struggle to make it as a comic, but instead it was more about self help, the end of a long term relationship and the impact on a family. He also wished there'd be more material about Will Arnott's standup writing, especially after hearing your interview. It reminded me a bit of American fiction, where the trailer emphasized the absurd satire, but the film itself focused much more on family dynamics. I personally enjoyed the film, though I disagree with Mark about the direction being unobtrusive. Okay. I found the camera getting so close to Will Arnett distracting and Bradley Cooper's appearance felt unnecessary. Presumably that's a reference to the fact he wore a hat indoors at the end. I also can't understand why this film was set in Americ, considering it's meant to be about John Bishop's life. And think if it had been set in the uk, it would have been funnier. That said, I did like the nod to Liverpool Football Club. Keep up the good work and so on. And it may. I didn't see the trailer and it.

33:46

May well be that it gave a.

35:05

Wrong impression, but it was always going to be a family. Yeah, Getting back together. Of which stand up was the glue that put them back together.

35:06

Yeah, I mean, I Liked it very much. And it's, it's, it's inspired by the John Bishop story, but it's very much its own story.

35:12

And number nine here, number 10. Number 10 in America is 28 years later, the Bone temple, which he talked a lot about. And in take two, there's a lot of stuff about Bone temple. Yeah, number eight here, number 14 in Canada. Primate, the king of old school on YouTube says it was a rubbish usual studio. I'm. I think you mean dumping ground. You wrote dumbing ground, but dumping ground. January release. But I did enjoy enjoy it in a leave my brain at the door kind of way. My friend who is deaf was impressed with the representation of the deaf character on screen, though, so credit to the film's British writer and director. But that's Primate at number eight.

35:18

Yeah, I mean, I really enjoyed it. I mean, I think leave your brain at the door. Leave your brain on the floor. I mean, it's, There is a lot of head smashing fun in it and it does exactly what it says on the tin.

35:56

Stephen Clancy in Kobe, Japan. Earlier this year, I was contacted by Paramount about using a song we made being used in the upcoming movie Primate. It's a happy little song about a crab walking to the left and then walking to the right that is used in the kindergartens used in kindergartens during English class. Unfortunately, we can't see the movie yet because the release date for Japan isn't until late February. I'm hoping your review can help us decide whether we go on a class trip to watch it together. I hear a man gets his face ripped off. Steven Clancy.

36:05

So it's very 18. It's very 18. Very 18.

36:37

Do you remember a song about a crab walking to the left and walking to the right?

36:41

I don't immediately off the top of my head, I do remember the man's face being ripped off.

36:44

Maybe it's in Stephen, maybe it's not. Get back in touch once you've seen the film. Marty supreme is at 7.

36:49

I liked it very much and I mentioned but I hosted the London Critics Circle Film Awards on Saturday. Timothee Chalamet won best actor.

36:54

Number six here. Number six there. Avatar, Fire and Ash.

37:02

And he laughed at my job.

37:05

Number five here. Number four over there, Zootropolis 2.

37:06

He laughed at many of my jokes.

37:09

In fact, number four here. Number two in America is Iron Lung.

37:11

Yeah. No, I haven't seen Iron Lung.

37:13

Josh in Doncaster. This email is sent preemptively as I assume Iron Lung will break into the top 10 this week on the idea that a film is shaped by what you bring to it. If Mark hasn't seen Iron Lung, I haven't. It's Based on the 2022 indie Game of the same name, made Almost entirely by YouTube. Markiplier. Markiplier. Markipliers.

37:15

Okay.

37:38

Markiplier, I think, which is one word. Who wrote, directed, financed, edited and stars in it. In the story, an event called the Quiet Rapture wipes out all planets, stars and life, leaving only around a thousand survivors. Convicts are then sent in cramped Iron Lung submarines to explore oceans of blood on distant moons. I mean, obviously you need a submarine for that and quickly discover they're not alone. Many have called the film slow for its first hour, but I suffer from thalassophobia, fear of deep bodies of water. So the moment we descended into that blood ocean, I was sweating.

37:38

I can imagine.

38:15

The next two hours were pure anxiety, claustrophobic shots of the sub, long stretches of isolation, oxygen depletion and guilt all building a constant sense of dread. Even though most of the film is just the protagonist navigating and taking photos, it absolutely worked on me. For a self funded directorial debut, it's impressively made with strong direction, great sound design and genuinely tense moments. I'd love Mark to watch it if he hasn't already.

38:16

Yeah.

38:41

Thank you for the Hours of Wintertainment.

38:42

So didn't come up as a national press.

38:43

Number two in America. Number four here.

38:46

So it is distributed by Iron Lung Inc. So can we get in touch with Iron Lung Inc. And see whether we can get a great. Cool. All right. In that case, I'll watch it.

38:49

You might have to pay and go back to that cinema in Islington.

38:56

Yeah, I would feel perfectly fine about paying for an actual movie.

38:59

That's incredible for a film to be.

39:01

Yeah, yeah.

39:03

Top four here. Number two in America.

39:04

Remarkable.

39:07

Entirely made by a YouTuber.

39:08

Remarkable.

39:10

Number three here. Five over there. Shelter. Tim says, as a longtime fan of the show. Yeah. I just wanted to tell you about a film that I worked on last year. I was the production designer on Shelter.

39:11

Very good.

39:23

I know you're very aware of the hard work that the art department puts into making it.

39:24

I am.

39:27

For Shelter, we built a full size lighthouse on a cliff in southern Ireland Island. The boathouse on a beach at the bottom of the cliff in the middle of winter, which was a challenge. We also built the exterior and interior living quarters, amongst others. I've supervised a lot of films, but this was my first feature film I designed and I'm really proud of it. I'M sending you this email for no other reason than I hope you see the film and that you like the design. I was the supervising art director on Hamnet just before I started on Shelter.

39:28

Wow.

39:55

And had the same fantastic art department team with me. We even is the connection. We even reused a lot of the same oak beams from Hamlet's House and the Globe for our builds on Shelter.

39:55

Very good.

40:06

We have been nominated for Hamnet at.

40:07

The BFDG Awards, which I'm presenting.

40:09

So if you are doing the ceremony in February this year, hopefully I'll be shaking your hand again.

40:11

I will definitely be using that bit of shit. I mean, the whole thing about recycling stuff when making sets is a really, really big thing now because they are trying very, very hard to make movie sets, you know, green. And that is one of the ways of doing it, is that you recycle them stuff.

40:16

So that's the connection between Hamnet and Statham.

40:31

Yes.

40:34

So, Tim, thank you very much indeed. And did you admire the.

40:35

The.

40:39

The design?

40:39

I did of, of Shelter and I did enjoy Shelter.

40:40

Number two here. Number eight over there is the housemaid.

40:43

I mean, it's done much better than I expected. It's, it's, it's rompingly ripe stuff, but it has done very, very well.

40:46

And number one here, 11 over there is Hamnet.

40:52

Yeah. And I and I will talk about this more when we talk about awards later on on. There is a lot of best film momentum now behind Hamnet.

40:54

Sarah says greetings from the Falklands congregation. 2. Okay, so I imagine that's the Iwitter app.

41:02

Okay.

41:09

Shows two. Two listeners on the Falkland Islands. Yeah. Where we tend to see films a little bit later than the uk and especially recently is the cinema's projector was broken over Christmas and we had to wait for a part to make its way 8,000 miles south from the UK before it could be repaired. However, all was well. Just in time to see how Hamnet. I was a bit worried going in as I'd forgotten to take any tissues. And generally, like Mark, will cry at anything vaguely emotional. So given its reputation, I was expecting to be a bit of a weepy mess. I was surprised to find it didn't make me cry at all and I wasn't sure why. Later, I listened to Mark's review where he said that the film was trying so hard to be emotional that it left him cold. And I definitely agree. Although the acting is strong and there are things to like about the film, the emotional tone of it is very high. At the start and it doesn't vary very much. Disappointingly, for me, the film was much less successful than the book. Oh, I see. I think that means in getting it telling your story, because it is very, very successful. However, I'm glad I saw it, Sarah. And because the Internet is so slow in the Falklands, we still get our film on actual reels, not digital downloads, thanks to Farzan, who looks after projection, ticket sales and all things film in Stanley.

41:09

Wow.

42:16

All right. So hello to all our listeners.

42:17

Two of them. Both of them, I think, is the phrase you're looking for.

42:19

Okay, we're going to be back in a moment with the chronology of Water. It's never over.

42:24

Can I do it? Jeff Buckley and Hamlet.

42:27

Happiness is a cigar called Hamlet, the mild cigar. When did they stop saying from Benson and Hedges?

42:33

Because that's it always used to be the master got from Benson, which is.

42:40

Why, hence the line found under Hedges. Anyway. Yes, and we're doing that because Riz Ahmed is our special, special guest.

42:43

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42:55

1-800-Contacts.

43:23

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43:25

Now, our special guest today is the British actor and rapper Riz Ahmed. Been on the show many times, of course. 2017, he was named by Tom Time as one of the most influential people in the world.

44:01

Wow.

44:13

Which is incredible. Academy Award Best live action. Short for the Long Goodbye. We spoke to him about that. Loads of other big shows and movies. He plays the titular role in Hamlet, on which he is also a producer. What do you read, my lord?

44:14

Words. Word, words. You should walk out of the air, my lord, into my grave.

44:33

How pregnant. Sometimes your replies are.

44:47

Happiness, though often madness hits upon my lord.

44:51

Shall I take my leave of you?

45:00

You cannot take from me anything that will not more willingly park from now except my life. Not accept my life.

45:03

And that is a clip from Hamlet. Riz Ahmed, welcome to the show.

45:13

Thank you for having me.

45:16

It's lovely to see you again.

45:17

Yeah, you too.

45:19

How you doing?

45:19

I'm doing well, thanks.

45:20

Yeah, I think it's a couple of years, I think since you've, since you've been on, you've become a dad, which is kind of relevant to, to this, to this show. So life is good.

45:21

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And, and as you said, it's something kind of that I didn't expect to play such a big part of our process when we were making the film, but being a brand new sleep deprived dad actually massively fed into playing Hamlet and finding myself in quite a raw place that was unraveling, you know.

45:33

Next week we've got Emerald Fennell coming on the show talking about Wuthering Heights and something that she's wanted to do since she was a teenager. So she read it at school and she thought, I need to tell this story. And although there are very, very few comparisons to be made between her film and your film, this has a sort of similar beginning, doesn't it? From back to when you were a teenager and an impact that it had on you when you were at school. Just take us back to the beginning of this story.

45:55

Yeah, absolutely. So, yeah, I was a teenager at school and I felt very out of place at the school and in my own skin. And I felt like an outsider to everything that Shakespeare represented. You know, felt very kind of stuffy and establishment and elitist. But I had an amazing English teacher who took me under his wing.

46:23

Chris Roseblade.

46:42

That's exactly right. And he gave me this play and in it I found how I was feeling. I was like, oh, hang on a minute. The principal character in the heart of a kind of cultural crown jewels. Prince, Hamilton, Hamlet, he feels like this as well. He feels like the world is an unfair place and he's trying to hold onto his values and his authenticity, just like I felt as a teenager at that school and just like I think how many of us are feeling today. So I was really struck by how actually radical and confronting and modern this story and this character were. And of course at the time I was big into rap music and it felt like a massive overlap between Shakespeare and what my favorite rappers were doing.

46:43

Explain how that would be.

47:24

Well, it was just very clear to me that this was. These were words that are not supposed to be read on a page. They're supposed to be performed. They're supposed to be heard out loud. And when you do perform them out loud, they have a flow and a force and a rhythm that gives them a power. And I think for a lot of people, Shakespeare becomes an academic, analytical exercise for GCSE as you're reading it. But if you read your favorite pop songs on the page, a lot of them would feel pretty nonsensical. You know what I mean? And so it was this, the performance element, reading out loud in class, having Chris Roseblade teach it to me alongside Public Enemy and Ginsburg and beat poetry, it really opened it up to me and really excited me. And I thought, okay, this is about how I'm feeling. This is about right now, and this is as urgent and contemporary as my favorite rap music. I want to tell this story, and it was 17 years old, said, I want to tell this story in a way that opens it up, democratizes it, and allows everyone to feel like they also have ownership over these crown jewels.

47:25

Do your roots in rap affect the way that you deliver the lines? I certainly feel as though you enjoyed the lines very much.

48:30

Yeah, it's interesting. You know, I think the big thing for me, I don't know if it's to do with my background in music, is I didn't want to. I didn't want to deliver a poetry recital. I didn't want to give a kind of intellectual performance. Particularly when, you know, Hamlet as a character is often accused of being overly intellectual. And the whole endeavor of Shakespeare can be over overly intellectualized. We wanted to do something that was very visceral and very, very much in the body. And so, I guess rhythm and flow and the percussion of the language and the sounds and the words themselves, I allowed that to move me before I tried to. To really excavate or analyze the words. You know, it has a musicality to it. And I think that's also came from working with Anil Courier.

48:37

Why is it a Hindu family that we find ourselves engaged with here?

49:29

Well, it's interesting because when Chris Roseblade first gave me Hamlet, one of the things I was really struck by is, hang on. This story is like growing up in Wembley. You know, Hamlet can't marry Ophelia. She's from the wrong family.

49:34

Family.

49:44

Okay, check. Everyone's squabbling over the family business, Right? Check. The ghost of your dead dad has come back to haunt you and he's disappointed in you. Right, Check. There's even a cultural tradition, both in the Jewish tradition and in Hindu and many actually kind of traditions of marrying your sister in law if your brother dies. If you yourself are unmarried and you've got these orphans, you know, your nieces and nephews, you marry your sister in law. It was a way of protecting those orphans and protecting the widow. So I've grown up with people who've had to do that. And so reading this quintessentially British play, I was like, actually if you want to do a contemporary version of this and make it feel real and believable rather than far fetched, you kind of have to set it in one of these communities in a community like mine. And that was one of the things that excited me so much. So it wasn't a kind of like, you know, a DEI imposition on the text where we said we're going to flip it. It was actually the DNA of this story lends itself most readily to be placed in one of those immigrant communities. And when you do that, it just feels more real and tangible.

49:45

People know about Elsinore. I have Danish family now and we went to Elsinore just last year. So we've been to the actual, actual place. But Elsinore. But Elsinore in your film is different. Just explain what you've done with that.

50:51

Yeah, what we've done with it is it's a kind of construction company, property development empire. That's what Elsinore is. It's Elsinore construction, you know. And what's interesting about the original play is it's about dispossessing Fortinbras and dispossessing people and stealing their land. And you know, we felt like there was a very kind of neat and authentic kind of comparison with like property development, you know, like the homelessness crisis and, and things like this that feel very true to modern London. And just like the original, it's a topic that separates the haves and the have nots and the resentments that bubble up and the revolutions and the revolutionary spirit that can kind of spark up around that issue. So Art Malik plays my uncle Claudius, who's incredible. Sheba Chadha, my mother Gertrude, also phenomenal. And Tim Spall is their right hand man and political fixer. Polonius.

51:04

He's amazing.

52:02

He's amazing. And we to want. I wanted to just flip the script with so, with how so much of this was done, like as I said the overall approach, let's make it visceral, not intellectual. Great. That's done with Aneel. His camera work the way we all kind of almost did a rehearsal camp where we tried to get under the skin of it and make it our own. But also, if you look at these characters, you know, Gertrude is often played as basically a bit thick and a bit hapless. Chiba Chadha is not gonna give you that. Shiba Chada is gonna give you the most deep, mesmeric, kind of conflicting, profound kind of presence on screen always. And so suddenly, that relationship between Hamlet and his mother becomes much more meaningful. Ophelia is often shortchanged, as we know. Essays have been written about that. In the original play by Shakespeare, we've gotten rid of Horatio, she's Hamlet's best friend, and given that whole part to Ophelia. So their relationship is more meaningful. And Polonius is always kind of a bit of a bumbling idiot. Look. Don't get me wrong, I love a lot of that kind of comic relief that Shakespeare's written. We want to do this lean, mean action thriller, vers your right hand man and political fixer. It's gotta be a bit scary and it's gotta be a man of fewer words. And Tim Spall can give you a soliloquy with the look of, you know, by throwing a look with the right intensity. So we've kind of, I hope, really reimagined who these characters can be for a new generation in a way that makes it just feel more urgent and modern.

52:03

I wanna ask you about a couple of scenes in particular. Um, the to be or not to be seen must, you know, in some productions feels like a millstone around the production's neck. You know, everyone knows it's coming. How are you going to do it? I have never seen anything as bold and exciting as the game of chicken that you are undertaking in the BMW at 100 miles an hour. Just explain what that is and how you came to that process, because it was like you've stood the scene on its head.

53:27

Simon, that means so much to me. It really does. This is the most famous speech ever written, probably in any language. And people who feel like they don't even have a relationship to Shakespeare. When I say to be or not to be, they go, okay. That is a question. Actually went around the streets recently. We just made a short doc about Hamlet and what it means for us today. Asking people in barbershops, on brick lane and street corners and school teachers and lollipop ladies they all know to be, not to be. That is a question. So we all know these words, but I feel like we've lost their meaning. You know, when you say something enough, you just don't really know. Disconnected from its meaning. The tradition around this speech, as you say, say, is it's a pause in the middle of the play. Everything stops, comes out. Hamlet philosophizes about life and death and suicide. He's holding a dagger. He's pointing at himself. Maybe my belief is that a true interpretation of the language itself is that if he's holding a dagger, it should be pointing outwards. This is not a speech about suicide. This is a speech about armed resistance, which is a taboo thing to talk about even now. This is a very confronting, radical play and very confronting, radical speech. At the heart of it, he's saying the world is unfair. Do I fight back? Even if fighting back means it's the end of me? That's a very different question to shall I kill myself or not? And so we wanted to stage it with that confronting, adrenal, radical energy and really, I hope, kind of bring out the truth. And the DNA of this speech has been buried under kind of centuries of traditional. That turned the speech into something else. And so, look, if Hamlet, as simple as this, I've got to tell you, if Hamlet's playing a game of chicken, daring himself to fight back, let's shoot it as a game of chicken. Let's have him driving 100 miles an hour.

53:53

You take your hands off the wheel.

55:36

Well, exactly. Because he's trying to dare himself to face the undiscovered country and dare himself to kind of go to the very edge of that cliff and say, do I have the bravery to lose everything, Everything, Lose even my life, if it means fighting for what's right? That's what Hamlet is about. That's what to be or not to be is about. And I'm. I'm really proud of. Of that moment. And, you know, I mean, I hope it's. I'm not speaking at school saying. But Ethan Hawk emailed me after watching it and said that he's never seen it done like that and that it's. Was really groundbreaking.

55:38

And.

56:12

And that's Anil. That's Anil Caria. That's what he does. He takes, as I said, the poetry and makes it very visceral.

56:12

So that was one scene I wanted to mention. But also the dance routine. Can you explain? People are gonna have to see it because it's very precise. It's very beautiful. It's very meaningful. It's scary as well. Just say what you and the filmmakers here are trying to do with this dance sequence.

56:19

You know, in the original play Hamlet, there's this famous thing, the play within a play. In Kenneth Branagh's version, it's Charlton Heston who kind of gets up and start kind of giving this incredible speech. You know, Hamlet is a, is a, is a fan of actors, a fan of theater. And there's this, there's this performance that happens in the middle of the play, right? That was just yet another example of how when we said, all right, what would our Hamlet be? Me and Anil, what if we said it in our community? What if we just make it as real for ourselves as possible, Suddenly what was revealed to us is like, well, actually we do have performances up our weddings. There's always a dance performance at Indian weddings. I don't know if you've ever been to any yourself.

56:41

No, I have not.

57:21

There's very often a dance performance literally slap bang in the middle of the wedding, right? It's choreographed by the boy's side or the girl's side. And increasingly, you know, wealthy family families, they pay professional dancers to come and do it rather than letting the cousins kind of like do something shambolic and cute. And so this wealthy family comes and brings in these professional dancers and Hamlet subverts it. And that is our performance in the middle of the play, that is our play within the play. And I think it speaks to the kind of approach we've taken, which is trying to preserve the DNA of the original, but making it feel more real, partly because of its setting and partly because of just the way it's shot. It's such a gorgeous sequence and we were lucky to have Akram Khan, the kind of world renowned choreographer, create that, that whole sequence for us.

57:22

What's next for you, Riz? What do we see you in after this?

58:11

The next thing that I've got coming out is a another thing that I've produced and created that's something that I'm finding really exciting and nourishing at the moment is a TV series called Bait. It's on Amazon prime at the end of March. It's a comedy, but in its own way also kind of subversing, subverting, kind of archetypal figures in our canon. This time James Bond. So the storyline is I play an out of work actor who somehow gets through to the last round of auditions to be the next James Bond. And when word gets out that he might be playing the next James Bond, this character. People have a lot of very strong opinions about it. And before long, his life starts to emulate the spy thriller that he's been auditioning. So it's very meta, it's a lot of fun. Sheba Chadha is in it again, who plays Gertrude in this? Because I just want to do everything with Sheba Chadha. Guz Kahn is in it. It's a really fun out and out kind of comedy with a strong musical element to it.

58:14

And when do we see that?

59:18

That will be the end of March on Amazon prime and the Tom Cruise film Digger. Yeah, that's. I think it's later this year. Autumn.

59:19

This year.

59:28

October. Yeah.

59:28

Never more than a few weeks away from another is Riz Ahmed project. That's the way I'm thinking. Riz Ahmed, thank you so much. Very nice to see you.

59:29

Thanks for having me.

59:36

Riz Ahmed talking about his new movie, Hamlet. Now, we should say, because Mark's about to review it.

59:38

Yes.

59:44

That because of the way the promotion for this film worked out, Riz was only available tomorrow, as we speak, on Wednesday. So.

59:45

Douglas Adams, isn't it? Yeah, that's right.

59:52

So he. So Mark hasn't heard the interview, but it was good.

59:54

You haven't done it yet.

59:57

Wasn't it good?

59:58

It was. I'm sure it was brilliant. Yes. Yeah. I love the fact that he name checked me so much. Okay.

59:58

But anyway, so that doesn't matter. Which means that Mark's. Mark's comments are now entirely separate from everything that you've just heard.

1:00:04

Yeah. So everything you just said, I haven't heard it yet. I'm sure it was great.

1:00:10

So if I repeat or concentrate, he's always enormously entertaining.

1:00:13

He is. Okay, so Hamlet 15, for strong bloody violence and implied strong language. The official tagline for the movie is a contemporary adaptation of Shakespeare's Hamlet set in a wealthy British, British South Asian family story. As you know, Hamlet returns home for his father's funeral and learns that his Uncle Claudius is now going to marry his widowed mother. And then his ghost, the father's ghost, Hamlet's father's ghost, appears to him and says that he was murdered by Claudius. And then Hamlet becomes consumed by revenge, but also filled with doubt about whether or not the ghost is real, whether or not, you know. So he. Everyone knows the story of Hamlet. So this is written by Michael Leslie, adapting Shakespeare's text. Apparently he started work on it 13 years ago. Film was first announced about 10 years ago. So this has been a long gestating project. And I'M sure that Riz Ahmed will have talked to you about this in the interview that you will. That you will have done by tomorrow. Yeah, that's right. Directed by Neil Carrier, who of course worked with Riz Ahmed on the Long Goodbye, which then went on to win the Oscar for Best Live Action Short, and was such a terrific piece of work. And which, incidentally, now looks like news footage of an ice raid. I mean, when we saw it, it was like, you know, a dystopian horror. It now literally looks like some UK ice raid footage. That director also made that brilliant Ben Whishaw film Surge, which I'm actually sure that Riz Ahmed will have brought up, because that is so urgent, so kind of breathless, so in your face. So the key thing about this version of. Of Hamlet is that Riz Ahmed reads the play very much as a story.

1:00:16

About.

1:01:53

Basically the way in which. This is a quote from him. It's about grieving your illusions of a fair world whilst being gaslit about injustice and confronting the cost of unmoored masculinity. And then Anil Carrier, the director, called it a deeply personal psychological thriller about somebody trying to hold on to their sanity in a world that makes that borderline impossible. So basically, it is a. It is very much about this young man trying to keep a grip on a world which is gaslighting him whilst also thinking that his, you know, his sanity is falling back. Which, of course, is absolutely the core of the play. But there are different ways of focusing Hamlet in this particular version. It's absolutely the world through his eyes. So one of the things that they've done is that they've taken out scenes that Hamlet isn't in. And one of the things that the camera work in the film has done is it's very much seeing it from.

1:01:56

From.

1:02:47

From him, I think, at one point described as being on the shoulder of Hamlet so that you. So that you see it through his eyes. And of course, I mean, you know, I'm a big fan of that film, the Ninth Configuration, which has a very similar take on the whole way in which madness works in Hamlet. The other thing that Riz Ahmed says he really wanted to do was to. Because he thought this story would absolutely resonate with teenagers, because when he first read Hamlet, he was a teenager, it was recommended to him by a teacher, and he was really identified with its themes of, you know, of alienation and that feeling of being gaslit by the world and the feeling of injustice. So what he wanted to make was to make a propulsive drama which was focusing on emotion and physicality rather than anything that was kind of intellectual or cerebral or that would take you out of it. And I do think that the film does that. It is. And this is very much to do with the director, who's got that very good way of kind of really making something move forward in a very physical way. And it does nowhere more so than in the scene, which is always gonna be the hardest thing to ever do in Hamlet, because the to be or not to be scene is kind of. Everyone knows it's coming. Here we go. And in fact, I think there was one version on stage recently which they put at the beginning of the play in order to kind of get it out of the way. I think the way in which they do to be or not to be in this film is really smart. Am I allowed to say, do you think. Why?

1:02:48

I think it's fine. I think it has been.

1:04:03

Has been talked about.

1:04:05

I have read about it. So I think it's perfectly fine.

1:04:06

So basically, he does that scene behind the wheel of a car, which he is driving very fast.

1:04:08

Very fast.

1:04:14

The point being that what that does is it makes the to be or not to be question very immediate. Because there is every chance that he is going to not to be correct. And I think that's a really smart way of doing it.

1:04:15

It's like a game of chicken that he's playing behind the wheel of his own car.

1:04:28

Precisely. Precisely. And again, that kind of. That brings you to the whole James Dean, trouble teenager. You know, Jim Stock is a good kid from bad. All that's a bad kid from a good home. All that. I think that is really smart. The other scene which really stands out in terms of the filmmaking is, you know, the play is the thing by which I'll catch the conscience of the king. The play which, you know, if you've read Hamlet or seen Hamlet, there's always this weird thing about. I think that he did this. I'm gonna put on a play, and then I'm gonna watch him to see whether he flinches when the. You go, really? And then in this, they do the play. And the play is really like a kind of horror show, Like a kind of fantasia. And you can think. Yeah, no, actually, that makes sense. That play actually would prick the conscience of the king. And the look of horror on the father's side. No, it's not the king, but it's. You know. But the. But the. On the father's face, on Claudius's face, which is played by Art Malik, is.

1:04:31

He's on good form.

1:05:22

He's very good. He's very, very good. You've also got Morvith Clark as Ophelia, Tim Spall as Polonius. That's great. Wow.

1:05:23

He's fantastic.

1:05:32

He's just. I mean, that man walks on water, but it is.

1:05:33

He is.

1:05:36

So the casting of him is a stroke of genius. But his performance is really, really good. There was a quote from Riz Ahmed. He said this thing about we wanted to make it feel like you're watching it in real time. And he described it as almost like a first person shooter. Hamlet. Hamlet, which they're literally looking over. A lot of that has to do with the cinematography, which is by Stuart Bennett. Anyway, I really enjoyed it and I thought that since what they set out to do was to make a version that spoke to. To that. That, you know, that young. That. That teenager that Riz Ahmed was when he first came across it. And to say it's about that internal struggle when you're overwhelmed by injustice, but you're also being gasless and you're also wondering whether you are losing your marbles and it is through your pov and make the whole thing go like that. I thought it was terrific.

1:05:37

It's interesting because Emerald Fennell and Wuthering Heights, more of which next week. And she's our. It's all about the impact that it had on her as a teenager. That's the film that she's made.

1:06:26

Okay. Okay.

1:06:37

So it sounds, though, that this is the same. That this is the Hamlet that he imagined when. When he was a teenager, which is what you.

1:06:38

If you can catch that it's really smart. And actually we should say that, for example, Baz Luhrmann's Romeo and Juliet was a hit because it did exactly that. Because it told that story to a teenage audience. Audience who went, yeah, no, absolutely, that. So I think it's a real. I think it's a really smart film.

1:06:46

And nice of Riz to say all those nice things about show. I'm sorry I was putting the show rather than you, but yes, and also about you, Mark.

1:07:05

Thank you.

1:07:12

And how much. And you liked it with you over the years. I thought it was terrific.

1:07:12

And that to be or not to be seen is. That is a really.

1:07:17

It's a stand. It's definitely a standout moment in the entire film. Because it's genuinely scary. Whatever he's saying, it's genuinely scary because you think, don't take your hands off the wheel. You're going 100 miles an hour along with income, oncoming traffic. And I don't know how they did it, but anyway, it looks genuinely scary. And in an inspired section, I think.

1:07:19

It did remind me of one very funny joke from the Last Action Hero. You remember the Last Action Hero, which we said. It's like it's all meta in the world of film. And there's a bit with Arnold Schwarzenegger. It's a trailer for a film which Arnold Schwarzenegger. Hamlet. And it's Arnold Schwarzenegger's face and there's a castle in the background and he goes, to be or not to be. Not to be. And the castle blows up.

1:07:41

That's very good. Excuse me, I'm choking with emotion because it's not nothing to do with Hamlet, it's to do with the laughter lift. And I'm anticipating the hilarity which is about to descend upon the nation and in our studio. So let's skip join joyfully.

1:08:01

Simon Paul is literally in my eye line for this and I'm finding it very disturbing. Go on.

1:08:19

Well, Mark, some good news. Some good news. I got my COVID test back. It was 63. I also got my IQ test back, it was positive. And I've been thinking about.

1:08:26

That's quite good.

1:08:36

Is that right? Yeah. I've been thinking about my dad a lot this week. He was very big on self sufficiency and self reliance. He was a. If you got up there on your own, you can get down on your own sort of man. Fantastic father. Awful air traffic controller.

1:08:37

But.

1:08:51

I was sure I was going to mess that up.

1:08:54

It was good. I wondered where it was going.

1:08:55

I was. I saw on TikTok this week. As you know, it's my main source of news. I do that by law. You have to turn on your headlights when it's raining in Sweden. Which is absurd. How the heck am I supposed to.

1:08:59

Know when it's raining in Sweden?

1:09:10

Correct. I have no idea. Anyway, comedy and chuckles all round. Throw to Mark. No, I won't do that. Coming up, It's Never Over. Jeff Buckley and the Rover.

1:09:12

Jeff Buckley. There's three films. One film. It's Never Over.

1:09:23

It's Never Over. Also Jeff Buckley and the Chronology and.

1:09:25

And of Water.

1:09:28

It also could be Jeff Buckley and the Chronology of Water. They could be his band from back in the day.

1:09:29

Very good.

1:09:35

Couldn't it?

1:09:35

So we'll be reviewing It's Never over and Jeff Buckley and the Chronology of Water. That's right.

1:09:36

All coming back after this.

1:09:40

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1:09:49

Okay, well, having thoroughly confused all the film titles, let's deal with the chronology.

1:10:54

Of Water feature directorial debut from Kristen Stewart who we like very much, directed adapted by her from the memoir book of the same name by Lidia Yuknavich, which I had not read and not heard of before. So in the book she describes growing up in the 80s in Florida, being sexually abused by her father who also abused her sister. Her mother was an alcoholic who did nothing to prevent the abuse. Abuse. Her only escape was swimming and that was a sport in which she excelled. She got sports scholarship to Austin, Texas, battled addiction which put paid to her sports career, relocated to Oregon, ended up collaborating with a group of students on the Ken Kesi Collective project Caverns. So the story is a story of trauma, addiction, escape, entrapment and ultimately emancipation through creativity. Here is a clip from the trailer.

1:10:58

Sometimes I think it arrived on paper.

1:11:52

Hey honey.

1:11:59

I wanted to write I.

1:12:06

Want you all to be winners. Disappear into your imagination. Nobody's in the room but you and that pen.

1:12:07

I love you and whatever you want to do, I'll support it.

1:12:18

That's it.

1:12:21

When there are no words for the.

1:12:28

Pain.

1:12:30

Let your imagination change what you know.

1:12:33

No one is big enough to hold what happens to us.

1:12:38

Now I think you can hear from that. It is a very full on experiential movie and it's. It is one of those there's a lot of Shawshank before you get before you get. So filmed on I think it's largely 16 millimeter split into chapters which I imagine the book must have been. And at the center of it is Imogen Poots. And remember, Imogen Poots came on the show to talk about Vivarium with Jesse. Yeah, she gives the performance of a lifetime in the central role. Like Hamnet, this is a performance that requires its female protagonist to go through a gamut of emotions from, you know, at one point, the loss of a child, the unraveling of life, the sense of being an outsider kind of screaming horror to joy and ecstasy. And now Jessie Buckley is rightly, I think, at the moment, being tipped for the best actress top honors at the Oscars. I think this performance by Imogen Poots is every bit as impressive. That is not in any way to diminish Jesse Buckley's gym. But Imogen Poots in this movie is astonishing, and she needs to be, because the film is very, very filmy in as much as there's a lot of filmmaking going on in. So it's very. It's montage. It's kind of put together in a very experimental way. It's very artistically adventurous and intense, and it's kind of a patchwork of images that sort of seem to kind of, you know, crash on and off the screen like waves on a beach. And there is this water metaphor going all the way through it. Water representing the fluid nature of memory, representing the, you know, bodily fluids of tears and sweat and excretions. And in some way, actually, the film uses. Uses water to. To discuss the female body as a shape of water, to, you know, to. To refer back to that Guillermo del Toro film that. The sound design on it, I mean, you heard a little bit of. In the. In the trailer. There it is. It's kind of abrasive and disorientating and, And. And very, very intense. And it's a tough watch, and it should be. And it's. It's not. It's. It's not an easy viewing experience at all, but as a kind of. Of. As a look, look how adventurous I can be as a filmmaker. I'm going to do this in the way that I want to do it, not in a way. It's not a film that tries to make friends with the audience. You know, it's not one of those films that goes, you love me, like me. This is nice. The ensemble cast is terrific. I mean, Imogen Poots carries it shoulder height. Thora Birch is great as Lydia's sister. Earl Cave is great again as the dorkily supportive Philip. And then James. Jim Balloon as Ken Kesey is dynamic. I've never seen him be that good before. I mean, not.

1:12:43

Indeed.

1:15:31

He hasn't been good before. I'VE never seen him be, be that good before. So it is a very, very impressive film with a dynamite central performance. It is not an easy watch. It is a tough watch. But you know, listen, hats off to Kristen Stewart for just going for it.

1:15:32

You remember that quote which we've discussed and related which was made about Robert Pattins Pattinson, that every movie choice he's made since Twilight has been designed to make him less famous.

1:15:48

Yes.

1:15:57

But Christie Stewart is kind of doing a similar thing. She's not, she's not that interested in the fame and the glamour.

1:15:58

Not at all. And not at all.

1:16:04

If you've been in such a huge blockbuster franchise, then maybe that ticks, that ticks that enormously so you can concentrate on doing other things.

1:16:05

But also, she clearly loves film and she's a filmmaker. I mean this is a film made by a filmmaker. This is made by somebody who loves the, the nature of film.

1:16:12

Right, let's have a quick what's on? We're going to hear from Junko. Here we go.

1:16:21

Hi Simon and Mark. This is Junko from Japan Foundation Touring film program. We have a fantastic lineup including the Final Piece, a murder mystery starring Ken Watanabe and Sham, the latest from Takashi Miike, the renowned director of Audition and Thirteen's Assassins. Screenings run across the country for from 6th February to 31st March.

1:16:26

The Japan Foundation Touring Film Program 2026 then takes place in cinemas across the UK 6th of February to 31st March. All the information thanks to Junco for sending that in. IP J. Sorry. Jpf-film.org.uk jpf-film.org UK if you've got something happening which is cinematic or cinematic adjacent, which doesn't mean if you've got a cafe next to a cinema, remember the.

1:16:49

Old adverts from the 70s just 50 yards walk from this cinema.

1:17:19

Or maybe it does, you know. Anyway, Taste of the east just send us a well recorded voice note to correspondence@codemaya.com okay the Jeff Buckley film It's Never Over.

1:17:22

Jeff Buckley this is documentary by Amy Berg about the career of Jeff Buckley. She had previously made Little Girl Blue Janice Little Girl Blue the documentary about Janice Joplin. So the film draws on interviews with Jeff Buckley's mother Mary as well as friends, ex partners and musicians. So the interviews include Rebecca Moore, Joan Wasser, Ben Harper, Susan Silver, Michelle Anthony, Amy Mann, Chris Cornell and is also there is a tranche of recorded voice messages and previously unseen film from the personal archive. Have a listen to those to this.

1:17:31

How Would you like your fans to.

1:18:08

Think of you just as really as.

1:18:10

A guy that's just like a really good storyteller?

1:18:13

Just somebody who does a job that they enjoy?

1:18:17

Of course. It was incredible that so many people reacted to his music, but the fame that went along with that was not the fun part.

1:18:20

Even when he acted confident, it was kind of an act. It was him channeling that bravely as a character. But I still think that really insecure person was always there.

1:18:34

Well, everybody's sensitive, but sometimes men don't want to recognize it.

1:18:44

I don't even want people to really.

1:18:50

Think of me as a face or a name or a body or anything.

1:18:51

Just the music. So, look, firstly, I know that you're a huge.

1:18:53

Well, yeah, I don't want to big myself up too much about it. I mean, I was a fan of the Grace album and, um. And obviously from which the Hallelujah. His version of Hallelujah came. And I know how he. He ended his life. Well, he didn't end his. You know, he. The accident that. That did for him. But I. I haven't really followed him devotionally, I have to say.

1:18:58

Okay, there are people who have, obviously, and in fact, I. The world tends to divide into people who don't know anything about him at all and people who. Who follow him devotionally. I'm kind of in the. I know a little bit. So I interviewed the director on stage at the bfi. This is ex Brad Pitt, who originally had wanted to do a dramatic film about Buckley in which he would play the central role. Then Amy Berg suggested a drama, but then that mutated back into a documentary, and apparently it was Brad Pitt who it quotes, restored the whole archive. Although when I said to Amy Berg, and what was he like? She said, I've never met him. I've never met him. He exec. Produced the thing, but that's. It was also at a distance. So she said when I interviewed her that what she wanted to do was to tell the story through the women that Buckley loved. So it opens with his mother and two partners. She says that he was very much a feminist, which is not something that she knew originally, but during the research, she discovered this, and she says that it's very important that he was in the 90s, which was a very misogynistic period of music history. But you've got this tranche of voicemails that make it feel real, really, really intimate voicemail messages. So in some ways it's about his relationship with his mother and the voicemails kind of really lead you into that because there isn't that much archive of him outside of this archive, which has kind of been, you know, got together by Brad Pitt, which he managed to get, you know, access to. She also uses animations. Now. The animator is sitting Sarah Gudensdottir, who she'd worked with before. And they used illustrations to kind of bring the story to life, to illustrate doodles, to kind of get inside the, you know, the head of the subject. And it's an interesting thing because I had never really thought about Jeff Buckley's voice in this way before. But people talk about the way Jeff Buckley sung and they compare it to Nina Simone, Nusrat Fati, Ali Khan, which is a really interesting comparison. There's also a touch of the kind of, you know, the fragility of Daniel Johnson in there.

1:19:19

But the key.

1:21:25

Alanis Morissette said that there was no gender in his voice. And that is an interest. I. I hadn't really thought about that. But it is interesting that his voice is very ungendered. Amy Mann, who I'm a big fan of, played bass with her once, very, very briefly, says that he was the best singer she ever heard. The other thing I didn't know. Did you know he was a massive Led Zeppelin fan?

1:21:27

No, I did not. Loved.

1:21:48

Absolutely loved Led Zeppelin and hugely inspired by Led Zeppelin. So as somebody who was kind of outside of the circle of trust of the people who were like, really, really into Jeff Buckley, I thought the documentary was really well done. It told the story in a way that, you know, led me through stuff that I didn't know anything about. I'm sure that all Jeff Buckley fans know about the Led Zeppelin thing, but I. I didn't know that. But also it is the. The voicemails are. Lend a real intimacy to it. And the archive stuff is great. Cause you kind of feel like you are getting a firsthand experience. But it's a. It's well put together because it is. It's telling the story. What it's not doing is just telling the story of a tragedy. It's not just doing that, you know, and then died tragically young. It's doing. Achieved all this stuff and struggled with all this stuff during this, this period. I think anybody who sees it will want to go out and immediately listen to the records, which is what I did. Is.

1:21:50

Is there a lot of stuff that you've never seen before?

1:22:43

Oh, it's stuff that I've never seen before, certainly. And there is also stuff in there that fans will not have seen before.

1:22:47

Okay. It's Never Over. Jeff Buckley is widely available. Would you say it's yes?

1:22:52

I mean, it's yes. Because Universal are putting out. So it's a wide release documentary.

1:22:57

Yeah. Okay, that's the end of take one. This has been a Sony Music Entertainment production. This week's team, Jen, Eric, Josh, Heather and Dom. The redactor, Simon Pool. And if you're not following the pod already, please do so. Wherever you get your podcast, come out, come over on Patreon because it's so much more fun there and Mark is actually much more fun there and so am I. Well, anyway, there's a lot of good stuff there. What is your movie of the week?

1:23:00

Well, here's the thing, because I've had such fun this week, my movie of the week is Send help. The Chronology of Water. It's Never Over. Jeff Buckley, Hamlet.

1:23:24

Nice. This is a cigar called Hamlet, the mild cigar. Still funny.

1:23:36

Still funny.

1:23:41

We'll be back next week, but also Take two has landed. Also Patreon. All the good stuff. A quick hi to new ultras. Bev Draper, Adam Novis. That's a good name. Stephen Omatuna. I'm having a go at Hope. That's close enough. Stephen. Ghost World and Sophie Goldrick, who was last week's correspondent of the week. I'll give the year's ultra membership to Tim. No surname, but we've got his email. Who was the production designer on Shelter and also did the art for. For. Don't mention it because they might have to play that.

1:23:42

Oh, hamnut.

1:24:17

Oh yes, that's right. But still he might get.

1:24:17

Does it work if you do that? If say, if you say hamnet, nothing happen. No ham nut. That doesn't work.

1:24:19

See that? But that's, that's a problem. That's problem. You see, miles ago. Anyway, so the year's membership goes to Tim, our favorite production designer. Thank you very much indeed. You can get in touch correspondence com.com.

1:24:24

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1:24:43

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1:24:45

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1:24:48

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1:24:50

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1:24:52

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1:25:00

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1:25:03

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1:25:07

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1:25:12