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when you are. Hello,

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this is Simon Brew. I'm

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the editor of Film Stories Magazine and a

0:24

very warm welcome to the end of the

0:26

year episode of the Film Stories

0:28

Podcast. Hello and a

0:31

very warm welcome to Film Stories

0:33

with Simon Brew. I

0:58

am Simon Brew, as always there's absolutely everything you need

1:01

to know about me. The aim

1:03

of the podcast though? Well, it's generally to

1:05

talk off the stories of films and I

1:07

talk about production stories, development stories, marketing stories,

1:09

release stories, all the ingredients really that go

1:11

towards making the films that we know and

1:13

sometimes love, just the films that we know

1:15

and sometimes love. But with

1:17

all that preamble I'm doing something slightly

1:20

different for this episode of Film Stories

1:22

because Film Stories isn't just a podcast,

1:24

it's a print magazine, it's a website

1:26

and all sorts of other mischief as well

1:28

and there's a team of people who work

1:30

on it. And so for the end of

1:33

the year episode of Film Stories I've got

1:35

that team of people together to stop fighting

1:37

with each other, to talk about the movies

1:39

and the movies of this year really that

1:42

we really cared for and to

1:44

highlight some of the ones that we've missed out

1:46

on. So it's as simple as

1:48

that. I'm going to jump straight into

1:50

that conversation which I cunningly set up

1:53

just the other side of this little clip

1:55

from a 2023 film. an

2:01

emergency.

2:08

Hello and a very

2:10

warm and slightly unfortunate welcome

2:13

to the End of the Earth Film Stories

2:15

Podcast. Now there is someone who works in

2:17

and around the world of film stories called

2:19

Emma who decided it would be a great

2:21

idea that instead of just having me go

2:23

on the final episode of the year on

2:25

the podcast, I invite all the other people

2:28

who've worked on film stories. So first of

2:30

all, I've got Maria. Maria is our film

2:32

and TV editor. Say hello, Maria. Hello.

2:35

Excellent. There is John who does all sorts

2:38

of things but at the moment he's trying

2:40

to stop a dog getting through the door

2:42

behind him. Hello. There's

2:45

Lauren. Lauren's our contributing editor and

2:47

Lauren is already laughing which suggests

2:49

she's going to be bringing more

2:51

of her mucky films to this

2:53

particular podcast. Hello. James is hiding

2:56

professionally behind a microphone and obviously

2:58

has all the highbrow things for

3:00

us to talk about. Hello

3:02

Simon. And then covered in sawdust

3:04

is a film stories online editor Mr Ryan

3:06

Lambie. Have you still got sawdust on you?

3:09

Loads, loads of sawdust. Hello. So

3:12

because we don't want this to go on for

3:15

54 hours, all we've each been

3:17

allowed to do is come up with three

3:19

films that we want to talk about that

3:21

we've really liked this year. I have to

3:23

get out of the way straight away that

3:25

James Harvey has tried to break the rules

3:27

just so he can go on about the

3:29

Pope's Exorcist. So would you like 10 seconds

3:32

on the Pope's Exorcist because clearly nothing else

3:34

can match that. Thank you Simon. Yes, the

3:36

Pope's Exorcist is a film where Russell Crowe

3:38

plays an exorcist and his

3:40

boss is the Pope. And it's more

3:42

like Indiana Jones than the exorcist and it's the film

3:44

of the year. Thank you. It's the film

3:47

of the year. It's better than Indiana Jones. It

3:49

is the best Indiana Jones film this year and

3:51

it is called the Pope's Exorcist. So

3:53

anyone who's been dialing into this looking

3:55

for deep insight that they otherwise wouldn't

3:57

get will no doubt be bowled over

4:00

when you said that he is an exorcist for the

4:02

Pope. He is an exorcist for the

4:04

Pope, that's what he says. And he makes little

4:06

chirping sounds at nuns. He pretends to

4:08

be a bird, makes little chirping noise at the nuns, and

4:10

the nuns all laugh and run away. There

4:12

were nuns in one of your choices this

4:14

year, James. I think Wonka has a flying

4:17

nun in it. Isn't Wonka on your list?

4:20

Wonka is on my list, I mean, probably the

4:22

newest film that we're going to talk about, I

4:24

imagine, because it came out yesterday. It

4:27

is directed by Paul King, who you

4:29

may know, from Paddington and Paddington 2.

4:31

And also very importantly, it's written by

4:33

Simon Farnaby, who's having a very lovely

4:35

time at the moment. He co-wrote Paddington

4:37

2, and he also

4:39

wrote Phantom of the Open, which was

4:41

a very nice Mark Rylance golf comedy from

4:44

last year. And it's lovely. It's very nice.

4:46

So have anyone else

4:49

watched Wonka? Are we going to

4:51

allow James's choice through? Yes, I've

4:53

seen it. So, Ryan, when you

4:55

saw Wonka, you decided it was

4:57

Scarface. Well, yeah, I mean, it's

4:59

about a person

5:01

coming from overseas to a strange,

5:03

very colourful land and selling a

5:06

very addictive product and smashing the

5:08

local cartel, which is in league

5:10

with the police. Yeah. So,

5:12

yeah, it's kind of Scarface, a bit more singing

5:14

and dancing. Just a bit. Yeah, a

5:16

bit. And,

5:18

you know, it's got lots of 80s montages,

5:20

which could be like its equivalent of song

5:22

and dance scenes. So they've been

5:24

talking about, you know, making other Scarface for years. I think they should

5:27

actually just remake it as a musical. Do you think

5:29

Simon Farnaby should write it and pull King Direct?

5:32

Why not? What's the worst of them? I

5:34

think we're letting Wonka through. I

5:37

think you're allowed that. Maria, go on. Hit us with

5:39

one of your three choices. I'm

5:42

going to go with Sissel, which is

5:44

a Finnish film about one man

5:46

going against a literal army of Nazis. And I

5:48

mean, do I say more? Do I need to

5:50

say more? I think it's got nuns

5:53

in it. I don't recall any nuns. 10

6:00

minutes, so it's a winner in my eyes. And is

6:02

this just because you're finished, that you're going

6:04

for that? Is that a bit of patriotism

6:07

in there? No,

6:09

I don't think so. I think it does appeal

6:11

to... I mean, season

6:13

is a quality that

6:16

I would hope that all Finnish

6:18

people have inherently. And

6:20

I think the film makes a really good case

6:22

for it and shows what it means to have

6:24

it. And the

6:27

film declares it as this white-knuckled

6:29

form of courage and unimaginable termination

6:31

when all hope is lost. But

6:34

it's a very fun film. It's

6:37

very gory. It's

6:39

very gory, very violent and

6:41

very entertaining. I'm not saying that it's a perfect

6:43

film. I just give it five stars and I

6:45

review this. No, no, I'm not saying it's a

6:48

perfect film, but I'm giving it five stars. It

6:50

was, yes, no. It's just what it sets out

6:52

to do incredibly well. I had it last. It's

6:54

90 minutes. It's pretty good. It's up

6:56

there. You had me at 90 minutes

6:59

there. But I think most of us can agree that

7:01

Fast X was not very good. But say that was

7:03

a Finnish film, would that add 20% for you? I'm

7:07

just trying to work out what the letter of bias is. No.

7:10

No, I've always been weirdly ashamed of being from

7:12

Finland. And it's only this year that I've started

7:14

to embrace it. And I think season was a

7:16

huge part of that for me. I

7:18

look forward to an influx of positive reviews from

7:20

Finnish listeners. I'd just like to point out, I

7:22

love people from Finland. If anyone's thinking of Dan

7:24

voting the podcast based on Maria. Go on, Ryan,

7:26

throw one in. Let's have one of yours. Oh,

7:28

God, which one do I go for? Pick number

7:30

two of your list. Well, funnily enough, that's the

7:32

creator, which might seem like a bit of a

7:34

left field choice given that it

7:36

wasn't a massive hit and reactions

7:39

to it are a bit mixed. This is Gareth Edwards,

7:41

who's turned to filmmaking almost 10

7:43

years after he made one. The

7:46

best of the more recent Star Wars films.

7:48

For my money, definitely. Yes. I've

7:50

been watching my favorite Star Wars films

7:52

since all of this film. And I

7:54

think it's telling that so much of the

7:56

TV output actually looks like Rogue One.

7:59

I think that's kind of. It's a good thing for

8:01

Gareth Edwards given how he left that film and

8:03

what that kind of gives his reputation for while

8:05

given that it was sort of said that the

8:07

film was taken away from. Anyway,

8:09

The Creator is a great sci-fi film I

8:11

thought. It's a five star genre film I

8:13

say as a sci-fi film. It's

8:15

intelligent, it's exciting, it's stunning

8:18

that it looks so good

8:20

given budget that it was made for

8:22

and also I've not seen many people engage

8:24

with it in its way like but

8:26

it's actually quite subversive. I won't give away

8:28

the ending but if you actually analyse what

8:30

the ending is and how you could read

8:33

it, it is actually quite subversive especially given

8:35

this year's conversation about AI and fears

8:37

about AI and what it means

8:39

for the future of humans. Yeah,

8:42

a classic film I thought. I

8:44

don't think that's a very contentious choice really. I

8:46

think that one gets through fairly easily. It

8:49

had a very good trailer as well with

8:51

Aeros Mr Dream on. I

8:53

like that very much. I almost like that more than the film

8:56

I'm afraid, Ryan. Ryan just gave a lovely

8:58

couple of minutes there and you just had to come in

9:00

and spoil it at the end. I saw

9:02

what you did there. Jonathan Edwards I

9:04

find really interesting because he has,

9:07

since Monsters, he definitely has a

9:09

look to his films.

9:11

He has been widely adopted

9:13

and now turns up in

9:15

virtually everything. I mean

9:18

I know he established the Godzilla look

9:20

which was then ruined quite a lot by

9:23

the two follow-up movies but the

9:25

Apple TV series has gone back

9:27

in and lent quite heavily. That

9:30

monic. Yeah, on

9:33

his style and the idea

9:35

of lived in worlds

9:37

that look post-apocalyptic, I

9:40

think he went a long way to establishing the

9:42

ideal look for that. Yeah,

9:45

that's what I love about the creator actually

9:47

is some of the ideas he comes up

9:49

with in this. It's brilliant but there's a

9:51

robot that is kind of a bomb and

9:53

a robot. It's like a massive barrel on

9:55

legs and it just runs into the

9:57

middle of the battlefield and then explodes. It's so bizarre and it

9:59

shouldn't work. work that it does. He

10:01

should write that sort of thing. Building

10:03

monsters with the signs and the general

10:05

sort of very lived in aesthetic of

10:07

it, I think has become universally

10:10

adopted now and he should get more credit

10:12

for that than he does. Well,

10:14

there's no one who's filmed used, I tend

10:17

to agree with more apart from pretty much

10:19

everyone else on planet Earth than Lauren Miles.

10:21

So come on then Lauren, let's have the

10:24

first of your no doubt incredibly contentious three

10:26

choices. Well, all

10:28

of my picks are actually filmed

10:30

from first time feature provider directors.

10:32

Don't try and justify it. Here we go. I'll

10:35

start with the recent one which is Sam. Oh

10:37

that's great. Oh that's great. Um Shoon Ping and

10:39

Sam H. Freeman. It is great. It

10:41

is actually great. Do you agree with me? Yes,

10:44

I just need to take another tablet. So

10:49

yeah, Um Shoon Ping and Sam H. Freeman have

10:51

written and directed this together and they did a

10:53

short of the same name in 2021 but this

10:55

kind of expands on the idea and takes a

10:58

different turn as well. Starts with

11:00

a really good drag show which is always a plus. Okay,

11:03

are we adding that to our list of

11:05

things that we want from films? So

11:07

huge explosion in the first 10 minutes, some nuns

11:09

are now a good drag show. Okay,

11:13

we are putting together the ingredients for the next Fast

11:15

and Furious film as we go. Anyway, carry on. I'm

11:17

not getting a needle on the phone. That's

11:20

cool. Oh

11:22

but yeah, after that it takes a bit of

11:24

a dark turn with the main character Jules played

11:26

by Nathan Stewart Jarrett gets attacked by

11:28

a gang of kind of ultra-masculine homophobic

11:31

guys led by George Mackay and

11:34

then he sees them again in a

11:36

gay sauna and sees a chance to get revenge. And

11:38

the thing I like about the story and where it goes

11:41

is it could so easily be clear cut victim

11:43

villain but it doesn't go down that road

11:45

at all in that both characters kind of

11:47

have sympathetic elements and they also

11:49

have you know bad aspects to the characters.

11:51

Even Jules, the main character goes down a

11:53

bit of a dark road in trying to

11:55

get his revenge. So yeah, it's just

11:58

a really good twisted kind of neon one. thriller

12:00

and yeah just an excellent first time feature.

12:03

Well you loved the short film as well didn't you? You're a

12:05

huge fan of that I remember. Yeah I

12:07

did yeah it was really good and it was really

12:09

good to catch up with the directors again down the

12:11

road. I'm still not

12:13

quite over nasty George Mackay. George

12:15

Mackay is supposed to be lovely and everything and now

12:17

he's not and that kind of that

12:20

kind of changes everything but I

12:22

mean with a heavy heart I turned to John

12:25

Moore who's still

12:27

keeping the dog under control and we've

12:29

already rejected Stray's as a possible candidate.

12:31

Go on John. I'm

12:33

going to challenge James on

12:36

the latest film of the year

12:38

to be I

12:40

thought you were going to challenge him on the

12:42

Pope's Exorcist because that would have been a fight I'm

12:44

ready to do. I'm always there for Russell Crowe and

12:47

an interesting accent but I'm sorry

12:50

I'm going to talk

12:52

about what happens later. A Meg

12:55

Ryan directed film which is

12:57

essentially a

12:59

two-hander between her and David

13:01

Siglachny that happens in a

13:04

dreamlike airport terminal and

13:06

has been part of a weird thing that

13:08

I've had this year about I suddenly

13:11

enjoy films where two people just

13:13

spend the majority of it talking

13:15

to each other. What happens next

13:17

is very much for the Gen

13:19

X generation which I generally am

13:21

and I very much felt like

13:23

I had been targeted by this

13:25

film where they take two people

13:27

that were instrumental in my youth

13:31

and the movies and media that

13:33

I liked put them together

13:35

and made a bittersweet unromantic sort

13:38

of comedy. As I said to

13:40

Simon I'd very much been exotic

13:42

marigold hoteled by this film. I

13:45

felt extremely old. It was almost

13:47

unfair when they started talking

13:49

about I don't know seeing the

13:51

pixies in the early 90s. I won't spoil

13:54

it too much. It is really really

13:57

lovely. It has a

13:59

very odd off-kilter sensibility to

14:01

it. You're never quite

14:04

sure whether what's happening is

14:06

real, imagined, dreamt, or just

14:08

a sort of fever dream of

14:12

a movie. I really, really

14:14

loved it. I probably shouldn't have. I've

14:16

watched this film too, actually. And

14:18

for the most part, I agree. There is

14:20

a mystery over who is the airport tanoi

14:23

man who has an anonymous credit. And so

14:25

there's still some, I kind of thought

14:27

it was 1917 in an airport, that

14:31

you were just following them around while

14:33

they're bickering for a long time, just

14:35

without gunfire and the war going on

14:37

in the background. I think the

14:39

most telling thing you can say about

14:41

it is that the final title card

14:43

says For Nora. And

14:46

I think Meg Ryan very much wanted

14:48

to make that kind of film, a

14:51

Nora reference film. And

14:53

she's gone out and she's done a very, very good

14:55

job of it in a film in a year where

14:58

it's been pretty good as a

15:00

Nora Ephraim movies that aren't Nora Ephraim movies.

15:03

I'm gonna interject with a companion piece of them,

15:05

and I'm gonna throw in one of my choices,

15:07

which is, and it's one of my absolute favorite

15:09

films of the year, it's Ry Lane, which

15:12

came out right at the start of the

15:14

year. And this is directed by Rain Allen

15:16

Miller, also another feature directorial debut, a British

15:19

feature directorial debut, and another brilliant one. And

15:21

this has that Richard Linklatter thing as well,

15:23

that we're following the characters of Dom and

15:25

Yaz as they're basically walking around

15:27

London. It starts in a gender neutral toilet, which I

15:30

thought that's a nice thing to annoy all the people

15:32

you probably want to annoy. And

15:34

as a starting point, you can almost imagine the glee in

15:37

putting that script together. There are a couple

15:39

of things I really, really, really love about

15:41

it, but none more so, you talk about

15:43

being targeted, John, at

15:45

my age, a film that comes in

15:47

at 90 minutes or less is like

15:50

bloody Christmas. And Ry

15:52

Lane, the credits started before we got

15:54

to 80 minutes. Now I'm old enough

15:56

to remember going to watch Look Who's

15:58

Talking 2 in the 90 minutes. which

16:00

is one of the worst sequels I've ever

16:02

sat through. And Look Who's Talking 2 ran

16:05

for 81 minutes, including repeating the entire opening

16:07

credit sequence from Look Who's Talking 1, which

16:09

went on for about five minutes. So you've got about

16:12

75 minutes of new material, new

16:14

inverted commas. I remember feeling cheated by

16:16

that and thinking what kind of person

16:18

would want to film that short. The

16:20

answer to that now is me. Ryan

16:23

Lane is, again, I don't want to tell you

16:25

much about it. I just thought it was an absolute

16:27

joy. And if you kind of

16:29

mixed up Nora Efron with Richard Linklater, I

16:32

think you've sort of got a little bit off the

16:34

tempo of the film. So that's

16:37

one of mine. And I think they're an interesting

16:39

double bill. Has anybody got past

16:41

lives on their list? Past

16:43

lives, anyone? Do we not put back?

16:45

Which is a brilliant film, but clearly not. So

16:47

you're not allowed to talk about it. Does

16:50

it have nuns in it? It does not have nuns

16:52

in it. That's why it's not on the list. It

16:54

was actually my favourite film of the year and I

16:56

assumed someone else would talk about it. On the legal

16:59

list. So what is on your list, James? So

17:01

next on my list, I've got Bottoms. Of

17:04

course you have. Of course I do. Which

17:07

is directed by Emma Seligman and

17:09

co-written by Emma with Rachel Sennett.

17:12

They worked together on She the Baby, which

17:14

was a very stressful looking film

17:17

that I've not done from two years

17:19

ago. Eight

17:21

stars, Rachel Sennett and AO Edebiri as

17:23

a couple of high schoolers who set

17:26

up a girls only fight club in

17:29

order to wrestle with cheerleaders, essentially.

17:31

One of my favourite films of

17:33

the last five years, I think, is Olivia Wilde's

17:35

Booksmart. And this is a very

17:39

similar set up, but you almost

17:41

couldn't have two more different films. It's joyfully

17:43

spiky. It's quite provocative in the way that

17:45

it does. It really leans into the fight

17:48

club element. You've got lots

17:50

of close-up bits of people just

17:52

punching each other incredibly hard in the face

17:55

and walking around school feeling so overpowerful

17:58

and empowered. the

20:00

Oscar-winning women talking. Exactly. And

20:02

for good reason. I feel like it kind of got

20:04

brushed under the carpet when it came out in

20:06

February in the UK. But it's

20:08

a work of tremendous empathy and I

20:11

remember watching it last year and

20:13

being completely floored by it and how

20:15

compelling a film that is literally

20:17

just a group of women talking to

20:19

each other about whether or not

20:22

to leave or to stay in a

20:24

community where the men consistently and

20:26

constantly abuse them and rape them. And

20:29

I remember being, you never see these attacks,

20:31

which I think is a very, very smart choice

20:34

on Sarah Polly's

20:36

direction. But it's

20:39

an incredible, incredible film. And even though I

20:41

did win the Oscar for Best Adapted

20:43

Screenplay, I don't think people talk about

20:45

it enough. So I really want to

20:47

highlight that and encourage people to go and watch it.

20:50

There is a little bit of a trend for

20:52

this that you get very acclaimed films at awards

20:55

time that just don't get any kind of tail

20:57

to them now. Because I looked at, I don't

20:59

know if you remember Till from last year as

21:01

well. I thought Till was extraordinary. There has not

21:03

been a DVD release of it in the UK.

21:06

And I just went looking for it. There's just an

21:09

absence of it. And I agree. I think

21:11

women talking has virtually disappeared from conversation. But

21:14

you have resurrected it single handedly, Maria. It's

21:16

fortunate to have turned apart from the Oscar.

21:19

Ryan, you like people

21:21

talking, don't you, Ryan? Yeah. Yeah.

21:24

Speaking of which. Yeah.

21:29

So my second film is Killers of

21:32

the Flower Moon, which is, I think

21:34

most people know what this is. This

21:36

is Ryan Scorsese's latest film, Leonardo DiCaprio,

21:38

Robert De Niro, Lily Glaxton. It was

21:40

amazing. It was a fantastic film.

21:42

I won't go over the plot because it's absolutely

21:44

massive and there's Wikipedia. But it's a

21:46

film about evil and greed. I think one

21:49

of the things that's important to highlight about

21:51

Scorsese's films is they're deeply moral people. I'm

21:53

going to get in a panic about his

21:55

films sometimes about dwelling on

21:57

violence or things or that sort of thing.

21:59

I think that these films always have a moral

22:01

core to them, and this one especially. I think

22:03

it's, considering he's a director in his 80s, I

22:05

think it's amazing how angry and

22:08

urgent his filmmaking still is and how

22:10

experimental he is as well. I mean,

22:12

this film at the beginning has an

22:14

awful lot of backstory and context to

22:18

impart and it does so casually

22:20

with little pieces of newsreel footage,

22:22

you know, shot in the academy and all this

22:24

kind of thing. It's

22:27

just a brilliant film. I know some

22:29

people have said, you know, it's too

22:31

long, it's 3 hours 26

22:33

minutes, which is only a little bit

22:35

longer than Avengers Endgame and shorter than

22:38

the Snyder Cut of Justice League. The

22:40

complaints about its duration I think are a

22:44

little bit moved to be honest. To me it's

22:47

moved, I thought it was just a stunning film.

22:49

Well, I saw it with you and neither of

22:51

us went to the toilet, which at our age

22:53

was quite something. But also you're talking about the

22:56

economy almost of the set up. I do if

22:58

you remember Casino, where the Scorsese, I'd

23:00

be interested to see what Scorsese would do with

23:02

Casino now because the first hour of that is

23:04

really heavy voiceover, isn't it? It's

23:07

just a lot of telling you things. I really love

23:09

Casino, but I agree with you. It's just like the

23:11

opening of Killers of the Flower Moon gets over an

23:13

absolute ton. What I

23:15

would say about Killers of the Flower Moon is

23:17

I think I'm listening to the audiobook at the

23:19

moment and the audiobook is I think it comes

23:21

out, it's about 7 or 8 hours and considering

23:25

the amount of material

23:27

that could have been cut, I do feel like Killers

23:29

of the Flower Moon is a little on the long

23:32

side. And that's not because I don't like a long

23:34

film because one of my favourite Scorsese films is

23:36

The Irishman, which I think is near

23:39

enough the same length. But I think The

23:41

Irishman needs that length to tell the expanse

23:43

of the story that it's telling. I think

23:45

Killers of the Flower Moon does drag on

23:47

a little bit for me. Obviously it's still

23:49

a very good story. The Irishman is worse

23:52

than Killers of the Flower Moon. The Irishman

23:54

is infinitely worse. I think we may have

23:56

to agree to disagree. The Irishman is better

23:59

than the Irishman. based on a book which

24:01

is a complete pack of lies as well, which is

24:03

slightly unfortunate. I don't know if Martin Scorsese knew that

24:05

when he was making The Irishman in didn't mind. Allegedly,

24:08

if the author is saying there is

24:10

lots of suggestions. He

24:13

was not all the day every major event

24:16

in the 20th century. Like Forrest Gump. But

24:18

anyway, so we're just labeling potential murderers. Gotcha.

24:20

But not for the first time in my

24:22

career. I wish that wasn't true. But actually

24:25

is true. That's not

24:27

with Sandy. But Lauren, Lauren saved me

24:29

from being sued. Yeah, changing

24:31

the subject. Yeah, so I

24:33

guess further to Maria's point about it being a

24:35

really good year for women, I caught

24:37

up last week with Fair Play, which is

24:39

the feature debut of Chloe DeMont and

24:42

on Netflix. So anyone

24:44

who has a subscription can watch that. They should

24:46

watch that now. But yeah, I

24:48

guess it's kind of going down the lines of

24:50

the old erotic thriller, which we don't really

24:52

see much of anymore. And

24:54

it's Phoebe Diniver and Alden Ehrenreich, who's very

24:57

good and should be in more films. And

25:00

yeah, just a really twisty kind of

25:02

horrible thriller where you've got a couple

25:05

who work for the same firm and

25:08

secretly because they're not actually allowed to. And

25:11

she gets a promotion over him and it kind

25:13

of wounds his pride. And that kind of opens

25:16

up this rift between them that turns really nasty and

25:18

violent. And it's just kind of a real edge of

25:20

your seat thing. It is horrible. I

25:22

don't agree. I mean, Maria, you've seen it as well,

25:24

haven't you? Yes. And I interviewed

25:26

Chloe DeMont for it and it was a brilliant chat. Would

25:28

you like to tell us some of that? I

25:31

could do, you know, I could be persuaded, I guess.

25:33

Well, I think it's a really clever film. One

25:38

of my favourite bits of what me and

25:40

Chloe talked about was how emotional

25:42

the men are. It's usually women are kind

25:44

of catered and it's seen as a weakness

25:46

of how emotional we are and it's used

25:48

against us. In this film, quite

25:51

early on, somebody gets fired and they

25:53

throw a massive tantrum. And

25:55

that's kind of a brilliant sort of through

25:57

line is that the men tend to be

25:59

more obnoxious. of an emotional

26:01

and keen on throwing pantrums,

26:04

but it's always used against women. And I

26:07

love how says this is constant

26:09

fight, a power dynamic and a fight

26:13

for the power that extends from

26:15

work to the home and to the bedroom.

26:17

We all know that I love a bit

26:19

of film. It's no secret at this

26:21

point. People who've not heard you on the

26:23

podcast before, this will be fresh news. Yes,

26:25

I think it is worth noting that whenever

26:27

a film that's slightly on

26:30

the fruitier side crops up, it's either

26:32

Lauren or Maria who tend to be

26:34

sticking their hands up for it. Yeah,

26:37

I think that's fair. But again, Lauren

26:39

and I, we have exceptional taste though. There

26:42

we go. But no, yeah, I definitely agree with

26:44

Lauren. It is such a good film and another

26:46

one that's kind of gone unnoticed

26:49

a little bit. That's

26:51

the Netflix problem now though, isn't it? I

26:53

mean, we're recording this on the day that Netflix has

26:55

released like 18 trillion lines

26:57

of data as to who watches what. I

27:00

think the night manager from years ago is the

27:02

most watched thing on Netflix.

27:04

And most of the films just seem to,

27:06

they get two weeks of noise and then

27:08

they're just completely gone. One

27:11

more note for anyone who did need convincing on

27:13

Fair Play. It also has a very nice little

27:15

chunk of screen time for Eddie Martin, who is

27:17

just excellent in everything he's in. That's

27:20

fair. That's fair. I do

27:22

wonder what the version of that, in

27:24

the 80s and 90s, that would have been directed by a

27:26

man. It probably would have

27:28

been directed by Paul Verhoeven and

27:30

it would have been a radically different film. He

27:33

would have had nuns as well, probably. Well,

27:36

he did have none film, didn't he? Right. But

27:38

Benadessa, his nuns. Yeah. Yeah. Well,

27:40

there we go. So maybe history, not

27:43

all advancements are to the benefit of films.

27:46

So Fair Play with added nuns is to add

27:48

to the list. Sister Act 3 is coming,

27:50

I think. Now we could do some kind

27:52

of crossover there. John. John.

27:57

Yes. At this point, I

27:59

was going to speak. about Spider-Man Across

28:01

the Spider-Verse. Part one. Well,

28:05

which had the biggest shock

28:07

ending of the year and

28:09

I literally gaffawed when it said coming

28:11

part two coming in May 2024. Which

28:15

it isn't. Which it was

28:17

abundantly obvious as a film that

28:19

sounds like it had a horrific production and

28:22

wasn't exactly very nice for a lot of the

28:24

people that were working on it for them to

28:27

and with changes were being made right up until

28:29

the last minute and beyond the last minute of

28:31

that film being released that

28:33

they put that up on the screen is

28:35

frankly hilarious and frightening but I'm not going

28:38

to talk about Across the Spider-Verse because if

28:40

nobody else is going to talk about it

28:42

I'll pass live because it's absolutely... No you've

28:44

done just just on beyond this on Across

28:46

the Spider-Verse you said beyond the last minute

28:49

that changes would be made was this like

28:51

kind of cat's level of stuff where they're

28:54

issuing the upgrade patch to the cinemas? Currently

28:56

the digital releases have

28:58

changes and things that were

29:01

not in the film people

29:03

were putting stuff out right up and

29:05

right up beyond that they were

29:07

getting different versions different cinemas and different things

29:09

were being seen by different people and then

29:11

there were some further changes made I think

29:14

for the digital releases. Yeah it was

29:16

treated as easter eggs wasn't it like people seeing

29:18

different versions are going oh cool I saw this

29:20

slightly different scene but I guess it is

29:22

a question as to whether that that was the intention

29:24

or whether that was the narrative to whether it was

29:27

edited post-release. That's context again

29:29

isn't it if a film is widely acclaimed

29:31

it's an easter egg if it's no one

29:33

called the upgrades to uh to cats easter

29:35

eggs did they? Let's

29:38

get the wristwatch of Judi Dench

29:40

I mean... Normally

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learn more at uh1.com interrupting

30:00

your favorite show? Good news,

30:03

Ad-free listening on Amazon Music is included

30:05

with your Prime membership. Ads

30:07

shouldn't be the scariest thing about true crime. Just

30:10

head to amazon.com/ad-free true crime to

30:12

catch up on the latest episodes

30:15

without the ads. shows may have ads. That's

30:18

an Easter egg. Yeah, I want to

30:20

talk about past lives because Oh, go on then, it is great.

30:24

Celine Song, debut film,

30:26

playwright, writer on Amazon's

30:29

Wheel of Time. Basically,

30:32

out of the blue, I guess, create

30:39

the most bittersweet, deeply affecting

30:44

reflection on getting older, the

30:48

past not taken, just how

30:50

amazing New York looks on

30:52

film, cross-cultural barriers, even

30:54

in a world that's shrinking, and

30:56

how you never really escape the

30:59

formative years of your life. And

31:02

I mean, wow, what a film. It took

31:04

me a long time to get around to

31:06

seeing it. I've seen it in the last

31:08

week, so if I sound like it's all

31:10

very fresh and affecting, it is very fresh

31:12

and affecting for me at the moment. But

31:16

to produce that kind of drama

31:20

without ever once being

31:23

mawkish or sentimental, or

31:27

taking up any of the

31:29

tropes that those kind of storylines

31:32

often fall back on, I mean, what a

31:34

piece of work. Every character

31:37

in that film, well, there's

31:39

three main characters, but to make the three main characters in that film

31:42

both entirely relatable,

31:44

likable, understandable, and

31:49

you care deeply about them, all of

31:51

them, by the time that you finish. Yeah,

31:54

I mean, just what? I

31:58

wouldn't say, I haven't seen enough to know perfect

32:00

script, but that's

32:02

quite an achievement, I think, and

32:05

should be applauded. And

32:07

to do all of

32:09

that and to still create something

32:12

that is visually arresting and uses

32:14

its environments as a character and

32:16

as a special effect, just

32:19

great, just great filmmaking. It does the

32:21

anatomy of a fall thing as well.

32:23

Anatomy of a fall is a masterpiece

32:25

of a movie, but it presents the

32:28

film in multiple languages. And

32:30

I found in Anatomy of

32:32

a Fall, I found it in Path Lives

32:34

as well. That really got under

32:36

my skin a bit more than I was expecting it

32:38

to, because a lot of the time we talk about

32:41

exploring cultures on film, but we kind of ignore the

32:43

language of it. But hearing actually authentic

32:46

language for the separate parts of the

32:48

movie, I just thought, I think

32:51

Anatomy of a Fall actually does it superbly, absolutely

32:53

superbly really affects the film a lot. It affects

32:55

it in Path Lives as well. I

32:57

just want to shout out the framing

33:00

device of Path Lives, the

33:02

voices at the start, which

33:05

set it up as something much,

33:07

much lighter than it turns out

33:09

to be. And also pass a

33:12

comment on how we

33:15

can take these very personal things

33:17

and turn them into jokes and

33:20

treat them lightly. But once

33:22

you dive into it, you come back to that

33:24

moment at the end of the film and you

33:26

realise just what is on the

33:29

line while these two people that you've heard

33:31

at the start are joking about it. It

33:33

manages in a very simple way to say

33:35

a lot about how unempathetic people can be

33:37

in the world in general, in this sort

33:39

of culture that we have of observing other

33:42

people through social media and things like that.

33:44

Yeah, I mean, just what a movie, what a

33:46

great movie. I think that neatly brings

33:49

us on to The Expendables 4. No

33:53

one's favourite film of the year. It's no one's favourite film

33:55

of the year because when I was considering

33:57

this list, I thought about all the... I really should put

33:59

Anatomy. of the four anatomy of a fallen,

34:01

which I thought was was superb. I've

34:04

got a loyalty to people

34:06

like Jason Statham, which which

34:08

has run like it's run like in a

34:10

stick of rock right through my career has

34:13

been has been his films. And

34:15

what a piss poor year for

34:17

him that the expendables for crap.

34:20

The last part of the film, I

34:22

do have to correct you it's expend

34:24

no, no, no, it's expendables for it's

34:27

called the expendable for I love David

34:29

Fincher seven is a masterpiece. However, there

34:31

is an argument that it started all

34:33

this shit of putting numbers in titles.

34:36

Just call it seven. No one calls

34:38

it the seven. No,

34:40

no, no. So Fast and Furious 10. I thought that

34:46

was crap. Although Ryan, I mean, as you've noted,

34:48

there's a moment in Fast and Furious 10 that

34:50

deserves like bringing up where Jason Momoa just goes

34:53

a little bit mad. Thank

34:55

you fingernails. I've caught this

34:58

fantastic. Yeah. It was needed DVD

35:00

out say apparently, but didn't know until they're editing

35:02

it, they were actually going to put it in.

35:04

Because it's kind of what I was on the

35:06

spot scenes. It's the best bit of the film

35:08

of a terrible film. And

35:10

so when Jason Statham lets you down, there's only

35:12

one other person in those circumstances you can turn

35:14

to. And that's Gerald Butler.

35:18

And Gerald Butler did not make his finest

35:20

film this year, but someone's got to make

35:22

a stand for the old ways. So going

35:24

in my list and suck it up is

35:27

plain. Because, you

35:29

know, we are talking

35:31

about some incredible films here films I've

35:33

absolutely adored they'll win off this we're

35:35

talking about the progression, we're talking about

35:37

the breakthrough of so many incredible

35:40

filmmaking talent, then you

35:42

get to plain and which is

35:45

a title straight away

35:47

that's been designed for the short

35:49

attention span generation of which I'm

35:51

rapidly becoming one. And my

35:53

favorite bit of playing this is a little

35:56

bit spoilery. So I will give you a second

35:58

just to tune out. My

36:00

favourite bit of planes is where they

36:02

run out of plot after about an

36:04

hour. And so you've got

36:07

Gerald Butler who pilots his plane, then he

36:09

lands his plane, then he shoots a load

36:11

of people and then they're like, what can

36:13

we do now? Let's just get

36:15

back in the plane and take off again. And

36:18

I've not gaffored so hard at a moment in

36:20

a film when they decide... It's like the bit

36:22

in Con Air where they suddenly start to drag

36:25

the plane out the sand as if like seven

36:28

or eight people with a load of ropes they

36:30

didn't have before could possibly pull anything that way.

36:33

So in terms of pure joy, it was

36:35

right there at the start of the year,

36:37

the kind of crap that cinema is rightly

36:39

fuelled by and is hugely entertaining and is

36:42

Friday night full on. I'm

36:44

going to go to plane. Is anyone arguing before I edit

36:46

you out? I actually think it's

36:48

been quite a good year for complete

36:51

nonsense. I've got a handy little lid.

36:54

I've got a completely biped

36:56

deliberately Meg to the trench

36:59

because I love Ben Wheatley

37:01

and I love Jason Statham

37:03

and I sat through that

37:05

film and I was nearly

37:07

weeping. Well again, we'll

37:09

have to agree to disagree on that sign because

37:11

when Jason Statham takes a harpoon out of his

37:13

back and it makes the little shing noise like

37:16

he's pulling out a samurai sword, I

37:19

applauded. No, the version of Meg 2 that should have

37:21

been made should have had a 15 or an 18

37:23

certificate and when the

37:25

sword came out of his back, not only did

37:27

it make a cute little noise, I wanted blood

37:29

vessels going. I wanted a gusher. Well

37:32

I also like the sequence where he

37:34

uses his deviated septum to go

37:38

beneath the Mariana trench without a diving suit. I enjoy

37:40

that very much. But it was a very good given.

37:42

There was M. Friggen, there was Evil Dead Rise. That

37:44

was very good. Can't talk about it yet. It's a

37:47

lot of goo. It's

37:49

also called Megan. It's

37:51

a good name for Egan. Megan's really good

37:53

though. That's nonsense.

37:57

It's swell. It knows it's nonsense

37:59

and it's very good. It's

40:00

beautiful and it has a lot of

40:02

filth, especially in the first 30 minutes.

40:04

So already a winner in my eyes,

40:06

but also I love how it's

40:09

simultaneously in love with

40:12

Hollywood and all Hollywood

40:14

specifically, but also very disillusioned

40:16

by it, and I think

40:18

that's a very intoxicating mix

40:21

for a film and obviously a great

40:23

cast, Margot Robbie, Brad Pitt, Diego Carla

40:27

is perfect. Perfect. It's

40:29

not perfect. It's

40:31

not perfect. It's got a frame from

40:33

Avatar in it. That's why it's not perfect. Laura

40:35

Moss smashes it at the part. As

40:38

per usual. Yeah. As a

40:41

fact period, I mean, the references

40:43

of all the stuff like the Roscoe Arbuckle thing and all

40:46

that kind of stuff that comes very early in it is

40:48

just... I love it. And

40:51

yet in a statement of intent, not only

40:54

do those references come early, they're preceded by

40:56

an elephant shitting all over people. Again,

41:00

that's why it might be my film of the year.

41:03

It also kind of came directly after we

41:05

had a lot of films that were very

41:08

much these love letters to cinema like The

41:10

Fablemen and Empire of Light and

41:12

Belfast for Comic Sense, and

41:15

they were very romantic

41:18

about the big screen. And the ending

41:20

of Babylon is very similar to that.

41:22

But yeah, there's an elephant

41:24

shitting violently on people.

41:27

So, you know, that would have been a

41:29

very different cut of the Fablemen's, isn't

41:31

it? Arguably better. I

41:33

think you really are going for it. The ending of the Fablemen's

41:35

is amazing. I love the ending of that. But

41:38

it would be improved by an elephant shitting,

41:40

wouldn't it? What film wouldn't? Exactly. That's my

41:42

whole point. OK. Oh,

41:45

God, I say this with a heavy heart

41:47

because he's just grinning at me. He's grinning

41:49

at me. James, what

41:51

one more on your list that doesn't

41:53

involve the Pope? I changed

41:55

my answer. No, so you said

41:57

at the start that I was bringing the high.

42:00

highbrow element of this podcast. And

42:02

I wish I'd known that before

42:04

I talked about the Willy Wonka

42:06

prequel and the bottom film, but

42:08

I'm actually going to put our

42:10

first documentary into the vault called

42:13

Hello Bookstore. It's a lovely documentary

42:15

about a man called Matthew Tannenbaum, who's

42:17

an old hippie that lives in Lenox,

42:19

Massachusetts. He bought a bookshop called The

42:21

Bookstore in 1976 when he was 29

42:23

years old, 10 days before his 30th

42:25

birthday. And

42:29

I was reading another review of it just

42:31

before we started recording. And the review point

42:33

now that it's the only documentary they've seen

42:35

that ends with reading it. And

42:37

I think that really sums

42:39

up sort of how lovely

42:41

and warm and just gentle the documentary

42:43

is directed by Adam Zak. And in

42:45

a way, it's sort of it's quite

42:47

a familiar story of, you know, it's

42:49

a lovely little independent business on the

42:51

rocks. COVID happens, which doesn't do any

42:54

favors. It's running out of money. Will

42:56

it be able to survive? But

42:59

most of the film is just

43:02

spent listening to Matthew Tannenbaum, this

43:04

lovely, lovely old man telling

43:06

stories about books and booksellers. And

43:08

he quite often he's reading passages from

43:10

books. It's not always clear when you

43:12

hear his voice start, whether he's regaling

43:15

someone of a story about his life or the story

43:17

of one of the books they've picked up, or if

43:19

he's reading a passage from a book and he clearly

43:21

just loves reading. And he

43:24

loves people. His bookshop has

43:26

a little wine bar in it. And

43:28

he just sits and drinks with the regulars for

43:30

hours and hours and hours.

43:32

It's a lovely, lovely film. And there's

43:35

so many moments where someone walks into

43:37

the bookstore, they're just browsing looking

43:39

for recommendations, he sort of looks them up

43:41

and down and then do a nice little

43:43

twinkle in his eye. He says, I know

43:45

just the book for you. And that is

43:47

it warms my heart. And it's very similar

43:49

to in sort of a tonal way to

43:52

another documentary from last

43:54

year, which I know

43:57

you like, Simon, a bunch of amateurs. cinema

44:00

club. But no, it's a lovely, lovely heartwarming

44:02

documentary. And I don't think enough people saw

44:04

it. It appeared in I think, a few

44:07

this year, went to a couple of cinemas

44:09

and then sort of disappeared into on

44:11

demand. If you can track it down, just watch

44:13

it and be overjoyed. That's a

44:15

lovely recommendation. Sadly, when you said reading

44:17

list, my head just went

44:19

to the start of Saltburn, where

44:21

he sat there and then said that

44:24

he's read the entire reading list and

44:26

Saltburn is just, well, a film we're not

44:28

going to discuss much, but I'd just like to point

44:30

out I take showers, not baths. Just

44:33

putting that out there. John. No, you don't.

44:36

Right. My final choice is,

44:39

I cannot justify this choice. There

44:42

is no scale on which I can justify this as the best film

44:45

of the year, but in terms of something that I 100% enjoyed, I

44:47

want to talk about

44:49

Shin Kamen Rider, which

44:51

was a Japanese film created

44:54

by Hideki Anno, who is most

44:56

famous for creating Evangelion, the

44:59

impenetrable series of anime,

45:03

which finished finally after 20

45:05

odd years, a

45:08

couple of years ago with the third Evangelion

45:10

film, which I finally got to see this

45:12

year as well. So I

45:14

want to talk about his weirdness a

45:16

little bit. Shin Kamen

45:19

Rider is the third of his

45:22

kind of Shin series, new Godzilla,

45:24

Shin Godzilla, Shin Ultraman, which he

45:26

wrote but didn't direct because he

45:28

stopped being involved with that film

45:30

in order that he could move

45:32

on to Shin Kamen Rider, which

45:36

is based on a Tokusatsu

45:38

series from Japan, which is kind

45:40

of like a kids

45:42

action series. Think like the A-Team

45:44

or whatever. It's kind of like

45:47

that kind of status in Japanese

45:49

culture from the 70s and

45:51

basically uses these things like Godzilla

45:54

and Ultraman, Kamen Rider as a

45:56

vessel to talk about the things

45:58

that Hideki Anno, like to talk

46:01

about which is what is the nature of being,

46:04

what is the soul, how

46:06

do we find happiness,

46:10

the rise of fascism, just

46:13

these overarching themes that he manages to

46:15

work into everything that he does. Couched

46:19

in, silly, anime,

46:21

nonsense which I love. Live

46:24

action film with egregious use

46:26

of piece of graphics and

46:28

some great, not great special

46:30

effects. It knows exactly what

46:32

it is. It does very, very weird things

46:34

with the camera. It

46:36

has its own

46:38

unmistakable personality about it which Shin

46:40

Godzilla did. Shin Ultraman which comes

46:42

in the middle of the three

46:46

obviously has the same themes underpinning it but

46:48

is nowhere near as interesting to watch as

46:50

either of those films and

46:52

which says a lot for the

46:54

slightly unhinged brilliance of Anno and

46:56

100% here for it and

46:59

looking forward to seeing whatever

47:01

his mind comes up with.

47:04

Yeah, can't justify it. No,

47:06

you just have. We'll let you have that. I

47:09

don't think any of the rest of us have

47:11

seen it. You've hammered us into submission. Lauren.

47:14

So yeah, my last one, I wanted to dig something out

47:16

from the beginning of the year because I think... Was

47:19

it played? No. Okay. I

47:22

sometimes get a bit unfairly forgotten amongst all the recent

47:24

stuff. So I picked polite

47:26

society which I love. I thought it was

47:28

fantastic. And

47:30

yeah, just really fun stuff. So

47:32

it's another debut writer-director, Midam Anzur

47:35

and yes, it's an action movie. It's

47:37

a film about sisters. It's a film

47:39

about family and overcoming other people's expectations

47:41

of what you should do with your

47:43

life. And so yeah, it's

47:45

Priya Kantara stars in it as Rhea. She's an

47:48

aspiring stunt woman. That's where the action comes in.

47:50

Ritu Arya is an older sister, Lena, who's

47:53

kind of like a dropout failing artist type.

47:56

And yeah, one of the things I really loved initially

47:58

is it gets that sisterly bond right. I've got

48:00

personal experience where that's concerned, where you love them

48:02

infinitely, but you also want to throttle them at

48:04

the same time. And it's a film that gets

48:06

that. I've

48:08

seen some of the action in polite society

48:11

and I agree the action is amazing. Are

48:13

you just saying you want to kick

48:15

the living shit out of your sister? No.

48:18

Okay. It's probably worth putting

48:20

that on record. Already this podcast is attracting

48:22

more legal attention than I'd like. It's

48:25

actually very specific, Simon. That's fair point. So

48:27

in terms of action, I mean, Maria, you've

48:29

suggested Sisu and then we've got polite society

48:32

as well. Is that as good as the

48:34

action cinema got this year? I

48:38

think it's up to that. I also

48:40

tremendously enjoyed polite society. Like Lauren said,

48:42

it really gets that sisterly bond quite

48:46

a lot. But yeah, I think

48:48

we also have something like John Wick Chapter

48:50

Four, which I thought, even though it's very much

48:52

not my kind of film, the

48:54

action set pieces were great.

48:56

And I can't think of any, well,

48:59

no, actually, I can think of a terrible, terrible action

49:01

film, which we've already mentioned, which is Fast Pen. But

49:04

overall, I think action cinema

49:07

in 2023 has been rather

49:09

good. I think it's

49:11

been a year for silly violence, hasn't it? Yeah.

49:13

There's been films that maybe take themselves a bit

49:15

too seriously. Like, personally, I did think that Chapter

49:18

Four of John Wick, it did drag on a

49:20

bit and it wasn't itself serious. And

49:22

polite society is more like this wall is

49:24

clearly made of paper, let's chuck someone through

49:26

it. And that's just fabulous. Also,

49:29

I think Guardians of the Galaxy Volume

49:31

Three, which was a beautiful end to

49:33

James Gunn's trilogy and the

49:35

best Marvel film we've had in

49:38

probably since Endgame, because they've really struggled

49:40

with their films. So it has one particularly

49:42

good action set piece, which is just in

49:45

a hallway. And again,

49:47

something that's a little bit silly, but also

49:49

just kick that, which

49:52

is all we could ever ask for in

49:54

any action set piece. I

49:57

will throw in on the action side out of

49:59

Birmingham Patriots. as much as anything

50:01

else. Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning Part One, because

50:03

I thought that really put in a shift.

50:05

I rewatched that last weekend. And

50:08

one of the key reasons I love it

50:10

is there aren't that many films shot in

50:12

Birmingham where I live. Steven Spielberg came here

50:15

once to make Ready Player One when he

50:17

was looking for a future dystopia shithole to

50:19

film in. And it's a genuine true story.

50:21

He came to Birmingham, he wanted a pile

50:24

of crap that hadn't been seen on screen

50:26

before. And so he picked a particular area

50:28

of the city with Dead Reckoning Part

50:30

One. We were all really excited Tom

50:32

Cruise was coming to town. It turned

50:35

out they re-dressed Birmingham New Street Station

50:37

as Abu Dhabi Airport. And we nicked

50:39

Tom Cruise's car as well while

50:42

he was here. So you know,

50:44

it wasn't me, governor. The

50:48

Benis scenes. It's incredible, Dead Reckoning.

50:50

They put in a shift, right?

50:52

Benis scenes of Dead Reckoning. Fantastic.

50:55

Pom Clemente off again. Yeah, absolutely.

50:57

Yeah. Great. Shout out to

50:59

Ritu Aria as well managed to get into

51:01

polite society and Barbie movie this year. I

51:04

mean, she is absolutely

51:06

killing it. I mean, who wasn't in

51:08

Barbie or I wasn't. Gerald

51:10

Butler wasn't. I looked. And

51:12

you're a bit salty about both clearly. Ryan,

51:16

Ryan. Hello. Tell

51:18

us your third choice. Well,

51:21

I was kind of a bit torn.

51:23

The obvious one was Oppenheimer initially. But

51:25

then I found out that Talk to

51:27

Me, even though it was a festival

51:29

film last year, was only released this

51:32

year in the UK. So I'm going

51:34

to Talk to Me, which is a

51:36

great lean 90-ish minute horror, brilliantly directed

51:38

by Danny and Michael Phillip, who it's

51:40

their debut, even though they've been making

51:42

YouTube videos since they were kids. And

51:45

they're the sort of people that can't resist

51:47

hitting each other with chairs. They

51:49

did a lot of backyard wrestling videos. So

51:52

to have them go from that

51:54

to what is actually a really

51:56

interesting, quite mature, very

51:58

off-kill It's

52:01

quite fascinating. It makes

52:04

my list because I was so surprised by

52:06

it. I wasn't expecting it to be this

52:08

interesting to look at. It's disturbing, it's freaky,

52:10

a brilliant lead performance from Sophie Wilde. I think she's

52:12

going to be a big star off the back of

52:14

this. It's atmospheric. It

52:17

actually has teenagers that talk and

52:19

feel like teenagers, characters that you

52:21

care about. It's done with horror

52:24

films. Like I say, it's

52:26

one of my surprises of the year. Ryan,

52:28

did you watch the first hour of Haunting

52:30

in Venice? I did, yes.

52:32

Which by most of my horror experts

52:35

I know, declaring it not a great year

52:37

for horror, but the two things that have

52:39

come through are talk to me, as you've

52:42

just said, and the first hour of Haunting

52:44

in Venice. Are you roughly in those camps?

52:46

I'd like to see Haunting in Venice directed

52:48

by Daniel Michael Phillipi, to be honest, because

52:50

I think they're better directors of horror than

52:53

Kenneth Branagh is. I think that the problem

52:55

I had with Haunting in Venice was the editing and the use

52:57

of lenses. It's a good film. It's a

52:59

good murder mystery. I enjoyed it. I like all of them.

53:02

But yeah, if you look at it as a

53:04

piece of horror that first hour is not

53:07

as good a piece of genre filmmaking, I would argue,

53:09

as talk to me, if you look at it, shot

53:11

for shot. But that's my opinion. And

53:13

you loved Oppenheimer as well. I did

53:15

like Oppenheimer a lot. Yeah, brilliant film.

53:18

But I think the interesting thing is, we were

53:20

kind of expected, we'd be surprised if Oppenheimer was

53:22

a load of pants coming from

53:25

Nolan. And like I said,

53:27

that's the interesting contrast is because, you know, Nolan

53:29

is this very urbane, very

53:32

crisp, intellectual filmmaker. And then you

53:34

have the Phillipi brothers, I think

53:36

they're brothers anyway, punching each

53:38

other at press conferences and

53:41

doing all these strange pranks and everything. And it just goes to

53:43

show the filmmakers come in all

53:45

forms, all classes, and from all places, you

53:47

don't necessarily have to dress like bankers to

53:49

be brilliant filmmakers. Do you think their press

53:52

conference is a Ridley Scott standard? More

53:55

violence. It's really got

53:57

kind of verbal violence, isn't it? Don't.

54:01

You'll get James started on Napoleon. Oh,

54:03

you will get me started on Napoleon. I was actually going

54:05

to mention it when we're talking about action sequences because I

54:07

do think it's a different sort of action on it. But

54:09

the battle scenes in Napoleon, I can

54:11

see Simon has ducked out of the

54:13

frame in protest, but

54:15

Napoleon is great and I won't hear

54:18

anyone else say, well, I haven't heard anyone else

54:20

say, it's good actually. I

54:23

seem to be his biggest fan. Everyone I speak to

54:25

says it's two or three stars. I think it's five

54:27

stars. A horse gets shot with a cannon. And

54:30

again, Napoleon makes weird little horse

54:32

noises when he wants to have sex. And

54:35

I don't know what more you could

54:37

want from a film. But I

54:40

agree. A film where someone doesn't make weird little

54:42

horse noises when they want to have sex. That

54:44

would be. Yeah. Now my, that wasn't expecting

54:46

to come away so disturbed. But

54:48

yeah, that haunts me. Yeah. Well,

54:50

that's just your opinion. But I do agree with

54:55

you, Ryan. I'd love to talk to me. I

54:57

do think it's the best horror film of the year, but a long

54:59

way. I spoke to

55:01

the Phillip O'Rovers for the website and they

55:03

didn't punch each other while I was there,

55:05

but they were great fun. I think

55:08

we're getting to a strange point where films

55:10

are almost afraid to set themselves in the

55:12

modern day because no one can figure out

55:14

how to do phones properly on screen. But

55:16

then between talk to me and another film

55:18

we haven't talked about, some money which came

55:20

out early this year.

55:22

I think we're starting to just

55:24

about starting to see filmmakers sort

55:26

of trying to approach the modern

55:28

day stories and make almost like modern day

55:31

period pieces. That's always been so

55:34

that hasn't it? I mean, you go back to David

55:36

Fincher's Panic Room, which is a film that was almost

55:38

undone by the invention of the mobile phone to the

55:40

point where they have to kind of write that in

55:42

a little bit to get around to it. They've always

55:44

kind of battled technology a little bit. Yeah,

55:46

I think horror was always

55:48

about people. There was one excuse for

55:51

people to be out of signal so

55:53

can they? I know The

55:56

Duffer Brothers When they're making Stranger Things, they always

55:58

for the first season. Right

56:00

in the eighty second, had no mobile phones

56:02

and radio signals but on the walkie talkies

56:04

were terrible so whenever you like you can

56:07

say oh. You can't get

56:09

through and and that. How to the book

56:11

for you Though it it it is hard but I think

56:13

it's. It. It it does feel like the

56:15

say we might. It's just about be getting a

56:17

see people making the effort and doing it, doing

56:19

it really well. As his film

56:21

is it twentieth Century Women that that was

56:23

deliberately set in Nineteen Seventy Nine or something

56:25

like that just because they wanted to get

56:27

me on. I got the device. a tremendous

56:30

film that no one talks about Annette Bening

56:32

that he. Announced. It was just

56:34

that the time so that they can

56:36

sidestep technological problems. So. That was

56:38

what I saw ongoing for seventy set

56:40

film ironically enough which is ah for

56:42

my last choice which is are you

56:44

there God it's me Margaret which is

56:47

a silver really I think is the

56:49

worst marketed film of the year. Because.

56:51

I say this eyes to some want

56:54

absolutely nothing the target audience about film

56:56

on. Neither a teenage girl knows I'm

56:58

reading Judy Blume books like forty fifty

57:00

years ago. And I am however

57:02

huge fan of it's Directed Kelly framing Craig

57:04

Fugate film in Two Thousand and Sixteen to

57:07

the Age of Seventeen which I thought was

57:09

a tremendous John Choose kind of influenced same

57:11

movies the actually had a bit of by

57:13

Terry. I'm also a huge huge huge fan

57:16

of Rachel Mcadams so I think is one

57:18

of the finest at the one of the

57:20

finances of a generation as as a comedy

57:22

performers well. That's what I thought

57:24

with are you there god it's me Margaret

57:27

Another plot loyalties just the way that they

57:29

kind of angle the it was they'd made

57:31

it weird a writing so that teenage girls

57:33

could go to it. And and these a

57:35

P G rated family movie which is really

57:37

really really rare live action one anyway. so

57:40

they have a bugbear mine. Sites.

57:42

iconic up call in who'd you line at

57:44

the people are reading a judy blume book

57:46

in not sit at the in the seventies

57:49

or a teenage girl nab a night promoted

57:51

dispel the or i would have thought that

57:53

gets to the latter great really with like

57:55

really seventy spawn a really seventies marketing campaigns

57:57

and it just i mean the film came

58:00

and came and went. There was a lot of build up

58:02

to it. There's a lot of noise, but I think it's

58:04

cost 30 million to make, took 20 million at the box

58:06

office. Nobody seems to talk about it

58:08

at all. And it's a

58:10

real, real, real delight. I went into

58:13

it knowing nothing about the book, knowing

58:15

nothing about the background really, and

58:17

was completely taken away by it. It's

58:20

one of the few live action films

58:23

this year as well that I can sit

58:25

with my kids and watch and they will

58:27

ask questions about it that are actual conversations

58:29

not related to why is Russell Crowe

58:31

on a motorbike and

58:34

exercising things for the Pope or

58:36

anything like that. Lots

58:38

of us have talked on this about the films

58:40

that we think people have missed out on this

58:43

year because we could have led with Barbie and

58:45

Oppenheimer. And I don't think there's anyone on this

58:47

chat who doesn't love films like that, who hasn't.

58:49

I mean, in terms of blockbuster cinema this year,

58:51

have a look at the take that musical as

58:54

well, greatest day. I'm really underrated and lost and

58:56

then dumped on Amazon Prime like four, six weeks

58:58

later because it had really good weather in the

59:00

UK the weekend it was opening. There are films

59:02

falling through the cracks and so I wanted to

59:04

pick one whilst suddenly getting another one in there.

59:06

And that's it for me. Are you there, God?

59:08

It's me, Margaret, which even on DVD and stuff

59:10

is already being discounted. I'm amazed it's got the

59:12

DVDs. That's good. You can go and see it

59:14

on Amazon Prime Video if you have a subscription.

59:17

Yeah. And I think all of us feel

59:19

passionately about these are the films and the

59:21

filmmakers who deserve the light on them. You

59:24

know, Ryan, you were talking about Gareth Edwards

59:26

there and how the creator, as much as

59:28

it was backed by a Disney budget and

59:30

the trailer was big, it

59:32

didn't really feel like it had the oomph behind

59:35

it. And once it had had its opening weekend,

59:37

the discourse just kind of disappeared. And I just

59:40

don't think it should. Hopefully, when it gets to

59:42

Disney Plus, that will change it. But we're kind

59:44

of clinging to that quite a lot with some

59:46

of the films we're talking about here, apart from

59:48

the people. Before we round this off and

59:50

say nice things to the people who've suffered

59:52

us this far, are there any other films,

59:54

anyone wants to name check that haven't been

59:57

named checked that we should otherwise we're going

59:59

to get shut? I don't

1:00:01

think anyone's mentioned the

1:00:03

Dungeons and Dragons movie. That was good fun,

1:00:05

Matt. It was great fun. I think, again,

1:00:07

like you were saying, I think it is

1:00:09

actually a 12-A, but in terms of sort

1:00:11

of a PG family adventure movie, I think

1:00:13

it's hard to get much better. I think

1:00:15

it's been a really good year for comedy

1:00:17

in general, actually, because Dungeons and Dragons was

1:00:19

directed by, I can't remember the names, but

1:00:21

it directed... Game 19. Yeah, Game

1:00:23

19. Brilliant film. Steer to Camp

1:00:25

as well. And there was some

1:00:27

comedy that sort of came and went under the radar. I think

1:00:29

that is on some streaming service now,

1:00:31

but that's fantastic. Excuse me, class. And

1:00:35

because no one else will mention it, because

1:00:37

everyone hates weather Anderson for some reason, I

1:00:39

loved Asteroid City. I bought Asteroid City. It

1:00:41

was just my co-op. It's very weather Anderson-y.

1:00:43

There's a little alien who

1:00:46

I would like to be my friend very much. The

1:00:49

alien makes strange noises when people have sex. The

1:00:51

alien makes no noises, actually. He's a completely silent

1:00:54

alien, but he is... He's in

1:00:56

a stop motion. I've

1:00:59

mentioned Chicken Run 2 briefly. And

1:01:02

then get back to Asteroid City, but it looks beautiful.

1:01:04

It's a really... I think it's a really special film.

1:01:07

I think it's way down to the best film since...

1:01:09

Ooh. I'm going

1:01:12

to say Moonrise Kingdom. I absolutely

1:01:14

loved it. Speaking of aliens, I would just

1:01:16

like to drop in Brian Duffield's No One Will

1:01:18

Save You. That's another one. It

1:01:20

got dropped on Disney Plus. It wasn't

1:01:23

even on the front page. Totally buried and

1:01:25

forgotten. But it's a home invasion

1:01:27

film with an alien. And

1:01:30

it's a real classic exile of alien design.

1:01:32

And yeah, just on a

1:01:34

small budget, small film, not much dialogue.

1:01:36

It's really any at all. But

1:01:39

just a really good kind of

1:01:41

capsule film that's just a brilliant genre

1:01:43

film as well. You're a fan of that, weren't

1:01:45

you, Ryan? Yeah, yeah, it was brilliant. It's

1:01:49

great in it. And Yeah, like Lauren

1:01:51

said, there's actually no dialogue at all. So It's almost

1:01:53

like a return to dual or something like that. You

1:01:55

Know, things, real-world film in its sort of economy. Yeah,

1:01:58

it's really thought-provoking as well at the end. All

1:02:00

of a bit some get really interesting

1:02:02

shoulder so. I'm going to grow

1:02:04

in December is that bailouts. Yeah to

1:02:06

figure. That. Was very

1:02:09

sobering. Key thing. Streps.

1:02:11

And a brilliant watch with no weak

1:02:13

links. And it's cough. Very. Very

1:02:16

upbeat films you putting green screen the a

1:02:18

nerve with move it really was on the

1:02:20

wanted as a are going to throw in

1:02:22

These are not this film itself but the

1:02:25

performance in it or both of the much

1:02:27

fun of nice illness knock at the cabin.

1:02:30

But. I think the emergence

1:02:32

of Dave Bautista. As.

1:02:34

A leading man has been quite extraordinary.

1:02:36

the I remember what was the bones

1:02:38

from Raw and where he was just

1:02:40

in their just a lump shit athlete

1:02:42

was expected better. Yeah yeah on so

1:02:44

he comes in bought less than ten

1:02:46

years from being asked. stars the i

1:02:49

mean the Restless and After fastest the

1:02:51

some want to go in a smack

1:02:53

seven shades of some on and be

1:02:55

a threatening imposing presence. Of

1:02:57

really nuanced an ambiguous performance and I think

1:02:59

I don't listen to i might be don't

1:03:01

care about a mile or so someone wrote

1:03:04

in just that. If you to told me

1:03:06

ten years ago the of the of the

1:03:08

Restless turned actors, it wouldn't be Dwayne Johnson

1:03:10

would be talking about as the real charisma.

1:03:13

and the real Actually Lane that does not

1:03:15

it. But it's die pretty. Sixty is turned

1:03:17

into a really really unpredictable access. Don't trust

1:03:19

him a mole. Things I think, particularly if

1:03:21

you're gonna have so many sides agreed to

1:03:24

the character are just thought he was. He

1:03:26

was exceptionally. That. Was com

1:03:28

era classes really? well. I

1:03:30

wear a pair of glasses really well, save. This

1:03:33

has been that. I mean this has obviously

1:03:35

as everyone who will leave a hugely positive

1:03:37

reviews weren't will back me up has been

1:03:39

at the lie. I thank you all for

1:03:42

your time on.if you'd like to throw in

1:03:44

like a Christmas movie or something at the

1:03:46

end, mail three on on. Get the Kenneth

1:03:48

Branagh in the Bleak Midwinter Nazi Not.that's my

1:03:50

my Christmas movie of choice at the moment.

1:03:52

I've got them the or then I'm looking

1:03:55

at me like the on the line people.

1:03:57

You know handling people? Are you

1:03:59

serious? I agree to meet the Us. Now.

1:04:02

Secretly so it yourself as shown dressing

1:04:04

a Christmas tree on a spaceship. A

1:04:06

nutshell I type boats had V Christmas

1:04:08

or any advance and Promethium Christmas five

1:04:10

thousand. What to see what his death

1:04:12

questions I I knew you were going

1:04:14

to and. It. Just leads me to

1:04:17

say they a big thank you to

1:04:19

out to a delightful bunch of people

1:04:21

and to Maria State John, to James

1:04:23

the Lauren A Mine and on behalf

1:04:25

of everyone after. Also is thank you

1:04:27

for supporting reading, listening to your things

1:04:29

You do it. We wish you a

1:04:31

lovely Christmas on a very movie. Know

1:04:33

the new Yeah, hopefully with more pipes

1:04:35

and slightly with more accidents and hopefully

1:04:37

with Gerard Butler Lundy more planes take

1:04:39

care of you. I'm polite by far

1:04:41

as I want to do or die.

1:04:43

That's a bit better than that. The

1:04:45

Pacific. Like a. Take. Care

1:04:47

issue on Thank you for listening and but I. Ah

1:04:51

I. Had

1:04:53

that is the end of our his ears

1:04:55

The year episode of Filled Sores Thank you

1:04:58

so much for tolerating it's it's not the

1:05:00

last episode of some Stories of the Year

1:05:02

we have already item in your wife I'm

1:05:04

a very special tennis brand or event said

1:05:06

that can be happy high ticket that's just

1:05:09

before Christmas spot so now obsolete you him

1:05:11

face We got more films to watch a

1:05:13

more stuff to prepare South's or if I'm

1:05:15

not bored you completely we've not board you

1:05:17

completely. You can find more from Filled Stories

1:05:20

on Twitter it's cold that at the Menace

1:05:22

or that's out film stories. Were facebook.com/from

1:05:24

store is a large you tube.com/soon Stories

1:05:26

are website still sore stopped how to

1:05:28

tie that is updated regularly every week.

1:05:31

Dice with movie news reviews features games

1:05:33

t they have bonded such things that

1:05:35

were putting on there at the my

1:05:38

months You can subscribe to a magazine

1:05:40

you to buy copies about print magazine

1:05:42

easier to stored up some sort of

1:05:45

target you tight as well as always

1:05:47

is he like this podcast please feel

1:05:49

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1:05:52

a positive review unsubscribe. at your papa so

1:05:54

much choice that stuff really helps to you get the

1:05:56

potus early and not frasier to patch on.com sauce on

1:05:58

the bridge you for that the dosage what we're

1:06:00

up to behind the scenes but that is it.

1:06:02

Now that really is it. I am winding this

1:06:04

episode up. I'm going to get an enormous cup

1:06:07

of coffee which I intend to enjoy and I'm

1:06:09

going to bathe in some more Gerard Butler films.

1:06:11

Thank you so much for listening. Thank you for

1:06:13

your time. I'll be back soon with another bunch

1:06:15

of film stories. Bye bye. Tired

1:06:33

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