Kermode & Mayo’s Take - Does HAMNET deserve the hype?

Episode Date: January 8, 2026

Some exciting news—The Take is now on Patreon: www.patreon.com/kermodeandmayo. Become a Vanguardista or an Ultra Vanguardista to get video episodes of Take Two every week, plus member‑only chat rooms, polls and submissions to influence the show, behind‑the‑scenes photos and videos, the monthly Redactor’s Roundup newsletter, and access to a new fortnightly LIVE show—a raucous, unfiltered lunchtime special with the Good Doctors, new features, and live chat so you can heckle, vote, and have your questions read out in real time. It’s a New Year’s correspondence special this week on the Take. Simon and Mark will be breaking open our bursting postbag and cracking into your excellent emergency mails from across the holiday period. We’ll be hearing your top takes on the films that made your festive breaks—and one repentant confession from the poor soul who made the mistake of watching The Lighthouse with their granny... We’ve got reviews of the freshest films from 2026’s first week too. First up it’s Becoming Victoria Wood, a documentary looking for the true personality behind the comedy persona of the national treasure. Plus you’ll hear Mark’s verdict on the new British boxing drama GIANT—which follows the true story of ring star Naseem Hamed (Amir El-Masry) and his fractious relationship with trainer Brendan Ingle, played by Pierce Brosnan. Not forgetting the much-anticipated Hamnet—the Chloé Zhao-directed biopic of William Shakespeare and his family during a period of personal turmoil and tragedy—based on Maggie O’Farrell’s bestselling novel. It’s already tipped for awards success—especially for lead performances by Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal—but do the Good Doctors believe the hype? Timecodes with YT clip codes (for Vanguardistas listening ad-free) Becoming Victoria Wood review – 15:46 BO10 – 31:11 Hamnet review – 55:25 Laughter Lift – 1:10:25 GIANT review – 1:13:51 You can contact the show by emailing [e-mail] or you can find us on social media, @KermodeandMayo Please take our survey and help shape the future of our show: https://www.kermodeandmayo.com/survey EXCLUSIVE NordVPN Deal ➼ https://nordvpn.com/take Try it risk-free now with a 30-day money-back guarantee! A Sony Music Entertainment production. Find more great podcasts from Sony Music Entertainment at sonymusic.com/podcasts and follow us @sonypodcasts To advertise on this show contact: [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This is not a drill. For the first time in lipstick on the room history, a real housewife has entered the studio. And not just any housewife, Rachel Zoe, the fashion legend herself. Did we expect styling stories, glam, chaos, stories from the past decade, and a full cat eye at all times? Yes. Did we expect her to open up about divorce, rediscovering herself, joining housewives as a zero prep, and what it feels like to finally feel like her again? No. It is vulnerable, iconic, hilarious, and one of our favorite. conversations ever. The Real Housewives have officially entered the chat. Listen now. Before we begin, a quick reminder that you can become a Vanguard Easter and get an extra episode

every Thursday. Including bonus reviews. Extra viewing suggestions. Viewing recommendations at home and in cinemas. Plus your film and non-film questions answered as best we can in questions, shmestians. You can get all that extra stuff via Apple podcasts or head to extra takes.com for non-fruit related devices. There's never been a better time to become a vanguard easter. Free offer, now available, wherever you get your podcasts. And if you're already a vanguard Easter, we salute you.

I don't think you can do that now. I think it's gone. Now is the time you do it. It's 12th night. So if you remember from, I did instruct you very meticulously that if you're an old 12y, then that's sort of coming up. And it's, hang on, that's happened. I thought you said 12 was January the 5th.

That's gone. Yeah, January the 5th has gone, but it depends which calendar you're working from. So it is possible to wassail all the way up to candle mass on February the 2nd. Okay, but in the general world that we're in, January the 5th is old 12y. If someone comes knocking on your door. Try and overthrow the American government. January the 7th is pretend it didn't happen. And January the 8th is...

Invade Greenland. That's the one. I wonder if there's going to be another Greenland movie, by the way. You liked it more than I did because there was hardly any of Greenland in it. So if they're going to remake it, basically... There was a sequel in the works. I bet it's out of date already. If the movie comes out of called Greenland, it's going to be out of date,

by the time, anyone gets to see it. Anyway, happy New Year and all that. Yeah, happy New Year. Did you have a nice... There we go. There's a trailer for it. Greenland 2, migration, final trailer. Went up one day ago.

Okay. I haven't seen the trailer, but it's going to be wrong and misleading. It is an upcoming post-apocalyptic, survival disaster thriller. Okay, fair enough then. Yeah, it's happening. So they've done it already, you know. Greenland, the apocalypse.

Yeah. It's scheduled to be released in the US on January the 9th. if you're listening to the podcast on Thursday, completely coincidentally, it is due to open around now. So we have just had a discussion about whether or not a film exists that is literally opening now in America.

Right. Okay, so thanks for telling us about it. So here we go. And I apologize for my voice, but that's the way it goes. It's that time of year when your house is just coming back to some kind of order.

I've just noticed that the council have taken our Christmas tree, but they haven't taken the neighbour's Christmas tree for some bizarre reason. So it's one, you know, so the road is a wash with pine needles and my throat is recovering from reading Slinky Malinky, Superworm

and Stickman every night for the last fortnight. What's Stickman? Stick man. I'm Stickman, I'm Stickman, I'm Stickman, I'm Stickman, that's me. It's one of those fantastic Julia Donaldson books that you read if there's a three or four-year-old knocking around.

And there has been. I did. Slinky Malinky, I know. Sleaky Malinky is fantastic. It's sort of the Donaldson's Dairy. It's Harry Maclary. It's all that kind of thing. Anyway, it's nice to do that again for a brief period before your voice keels over. And you're looking fresh and vibrant, I have to say. I'm wearing my new favourite t-shirt, which you can't see on the radio, but it says, God damn it, you've got to be kind, which was one of two Kurt Vonnegut quote t-shirts that I got given. The other one was, everything was beautiful and nothing hurt. So I'm very, very pleased about that.

And here we go with another show. Don't say it like, it's like that. And here we go with another show. I know you're on well, but you should. Everything is going to be said like that. Is it? Okay. You know, you'll just have to assume that I'm excited inside

if I can't express it outwardly. What are you going to be doing later, Mark? Three very, very different films. Becoming Victoria Wood, which is a documentary about Victoria Wood. Giant, no, not that one, a new one. And Hamnet, not to be confused with Hamlet, although, as we are told at the beginning of the film,

the names were interchangeable. Plus, all the other incredibly groovy stuff, including details of all the best and worst films on TV over the weekend. Further discussion on David Bowie's film roles in one frame back. Questions, shmestians, if we actually get this far with my voice still, being audible. We answer the excellent question. What complicated problem was solved

by an amazingly simple solution? Can I just interject something here? Yes. When you said further discussion on David Bowie's roles, that's because the top production team have forgot to put into this script that in T2, we will be reviewing the reissue of labyrinth.

That will be how we begin the discussion about David Bowie, and then we will have further discussion after that. And there's a take ultra. It's a take ultra day. which is great because my voice feels so strong it might not make it till the end of this page.

Never mind that. Anyway, that's a video episode on... I'm just reading your words, by the way, Mark. I'm assuming that you've lost it. Video episode on Patreon or as an audio podcast on your usual fruit or non-fruit-based devices, along with all the ad-free takes one and two. This week's Take Ultra includes...

I'm doing you now. This week's Take Ultra includes discussion of all the streaming worth watching in Carpe Stream. And once again, we go below the line on our YouTube channel for our Points of View style feature hot takes and cold comfort, in which the most stridently expressed and sometimes extraordinary opinions about me and Simon, but largely me, and sometimes actual films, but usually just me, were brought vividly to life by the production team. Yeah. Well, you know, so the whole point of points of view was, of course, I remember on not the 9 o'clock news, they did. a, they did a Mickey take of it and said,

if you want to write to points of view, praising the BBC to the skies, here's the address. So this is the opposite of that. If you are completely out there and have a ridiculous and stupid opinion, that's how you manage to get on this particular feature.

Anyway, we'll also give an update on the runners and writers for awards season and awards. So head to patreon.com at slash kerman and mayo and sign up. There's so many features I've forgotten who's what and how everything is proceeding anyway

the very latest we can bring you from top-notch actors whose parents listen to the podcast Corner this is an email from Claire Foy's dad David Foy Oh we love Claire Foy we do very much

22nd of December he sent this one in because we rather pathetically went on our bended knee and beseeched Claire Foy to come on the podcast for Hork Anyway David says Eric Jacking Ginger is she coming Is she coming? Claire is with us

later this week, says David, Claire for his dad. Excellent. I'll pass on your message. She's working on a Danny Boyle film at the moment, but I'm sure she would love to see you in 2026, which I have to say is a very kind of non-committal answer. That's what you write on Christmas cards. I hope to see you in 26.

It won't. You don't want to see you ever. So I would think that's not going to happen. But anyway, David, if you could be a little more assertive when Claire comes to stay, Can you say, because I'm your dad and because I say so? Yeah, and that's why. And that's why? An email from Mike.

There are lots of emails which I will read in this non-committal voice. I can't read them for you because on my script, they're all blacked out because the production team think it's much more hilarious if I don't hear any of this stuff until I hear it from your mouth. Or maybe they don't trust you with the material. They might think you'll leak it. I'm going to put it on a signal group and. accidentally copy in a newspaper, yeah. Mike says occasional emergency mailer and very long-term listener to the point where I can't remember when I started listening, but I don't think mobile phones were a thing, let alone podcasts. Mrs. Mike and I recently moved home to be near all of our

parents, who we are very lucky to still have around, but who, like us all, are aging. We swap city life with half a million people to a village with a population of about 700. A few weeks back, my father-in-law who loves a project, announced he'd bought a second-hand lawnmower from their neighbor who is half a mile away. That's where your neighbors are if you live in this kind of place. He then got to explaining who the neighbor was, which in a village of this size is always a very indirect route to the answer, you know their cousin could have been in the year above you at school 35 years ago. At some point he mentioned their actual surname and much, much later that one of them, in quotes, did music.

I did one of those double takes that only seems to happen in bad sitcoms and then did a quick search on the web for a picture of Lorne Balfe. Yep, that's him, I was told. Wow! Wow! So he was technically correct. That Lorne Balfe does music.

And apropos of nothing. He does, does music, yeah, he does. And apropos of nothing, we had a cat food delivery go missing last week, despite it showing us being delivered. The courier, helpfully, suggested that I check with Edwin Collins as his house has the same

name as ours. And according to the driver, we don't really pay that much attention to addresses up here. We've got some of those delivery people around here. You'll be relieved to know that Mr. Collins hadn't stolen our cat food and that it turned up yesterday so his reputation as a wonderful

man remains untarnished. Very good. Obviously that should have been lawn mower, not lawn mower, because it came from Ralph, just an apostrophe, missing. Well, now, here's a thing. Are you ready for a thing? Yeah, as long as this is okay

and he's not actually killing you. Yeah, well, it's early days. Actually, thing, I was told by Susie Dent, is an example of semantic bleaching, which is where a word, which once was sort of very profound and important, as just, you know, the meaning of it has leached. Semantic bleaching.

Semantic bleaching, yeah. Which, when you think about it, does what it says on the tin, you know, It was a word that really meant a big, important thing. The word thing is a perfect example, because a thing was like parliament. I think the Icelandic parliament is still called the thing, or something like that. So when I say, here's the thing. That's very, very important thing to say.

Okay, well, that's how I use it. Very good. You know that the point in a review, when I go, here's the thing, it means, right, now we get to the crux of it. But also, it's, you know, oh, it was a thing. You know, he's done a thing. It's sort of like throwaway. But actually, your usage of it is appropriate. Dear Bad Boys and Bad Boys 2 says Greg in Norwich.

I wonder if anyone else has ever had an awkward family-based Christmas movie encounter this festive season. A tradition in our house during the festive period is that every Sunday, in the lead-up to the big day, our family sits down together in the evening to watch a film chosen in secret by one member of the family. It's been a fabulous addition to our family. our Christmas rituals, and I can highly recommend it. Previous selections have included Queen of Catway, a few good men, Top Gun Maverick, Stan and Ollie, Barbie, and other high-quality fare. And apart from one brief foray into Avatar-based drudgery, we'd been on a solid winning streak,

aided by a mutual agreement that the chosen person should always cross-reference their pick with Mark. Last Sunday, however, it was Dad's Turn. Having previously introduced us to Bait, a film that we were initially skeptical about, but which absolutely flawed us and has become a huge hit with the whole clan, Dad confidently announced that he'd found another perfect addition to our festive watch list. Is it Mark Kermode approved? I asked. Absolutely said Dad, he loved it.

Well, that was me sold. What could possibly go wrong? Okay. And so the whole family, bear in mind Christmas watching with the whole family is multi-generational. Yes, a very, very specific kind of film is going to work. The whole family gathered around the television to watch my dad's choice for our Sunday festive film The Lighthouse

Well, blimey Charlie It certainly is a thrill ride of a film And I can see exactly why Mark was such a fan I probably would have enjoyed it more Had I not spent its entire one hour and 50 minute runtime sat beside my 87-year-old grandma Silently wishing we had a clock installed above the television

so I could get up and wind it every time things to return for the French I have to say I just couldn't wait for that film to finish much like you Greg by the time we reached the end it was universally agreed that we'd seen quite enough of both Willem Defoe and Little Willem Defoe

and here's Granny's review I'm ready for this? Yes I can't This is exactly what Granny's say. Okay, go on. God bless them. You're not going to be able to get this? No.

It's not helping the fact that my voice is so weak. All right, come, gather, gather, gather. I do it one word at a time. Okay. I met a lighthouse keeper in Whitby. I met a lighthouse keeper in Whitley Bay once. I don't think he was into that sort of thing. All right.

That's exactly such a great comment. Anyway, Greg, I'm sorry, it's taken so long to read this email. Greg says, this Sunday it's my turn. We're watching Paddington 2 and that's it. Which you have to say, that's a perfect double bill. You've watched the lighthouse and then Paddington 2. That would be fantastic. Anyway, thanks, Dad, for suggesting that we watch that.

My word. I watched that and uncut gems on the same day, as I think I might have mentioned before. And that wasn't my favorite. That was an anxiety-inducing double-bill. Oh, my goodness me, can you imagine? Anyway, correspondence at kermanemae.com. And it's an interesting point from Greg. You know, family watching over Christmas and New Year is an entirely different thing.

You watch entirely different movies. So if anyone can beat, I met a lighthouse keeper in Whitley Baywitz. I don't think he was into that sort of thing. Have I ever told you the story about that John Gilgud told about going to see the uncut Caligula, the X-rated, I mean American X-rated Caligula in New York when it first opened in the sort of full porn version. And he paid to go and see it because he really liked it.

But he queued up behind these two old ladies. And he said the ticket prices were like expensive. And it was like $10 at that point. something mad. So, and he thought, well, I don't know, the earth of these two women going to make of this? Because he said, obviously, they've come along because it's Peter O'Toole and Malcolm McDowell and Helen Mirren and all that stuff. Anyway, so he goes in and he sits behind them during the movie, and the movie starts. And it's the, you know, it's the Bob Gucci-only porn version. So it's like four hours of utter depravity with, you know, bits of human beings doing

things they really shouldn't be doing for just, like, in huge, big screen. And John Gillis sits behind of these. And at the end of it, they walk, you know, the film finishes after all this just untrammeled filth. And the two old ladies start walking up the aisle and Chong Gilgo walks behind them and one of them turns to the other one and says, well, that was worth every cent. Really? Okay. That could have gone anyway. Wow. I think Greg's Grand should be available to, you know, to review films. Yeah. Absolutely. She could send us like Pithy. the one-sentence reviews of everything.

Anyway, speaking of reviews, tell us something that might be out. Yeah, let's start with Becoming Victoria Wood, which is a documentary by Catherine Abbott, about, you know, one of the UK's, I think arguably one of the world's most important, modern comedians, there's quite a lot of discussion about comedian and comedian, you know,

about which word we're using. What word are we used? Well, she herself talked about being, there's a song about being a comedian, because at the point that she was doing it, one of the things the documentary reminds you is just how groundbreaking what Victoria Wood did was so I mean I had I had either not known or forgotten most of this stuff that she was on new faces when she was on the television they got a name wrong she did

comedy songs for that's life for Esther Ranson she won a BAFTA for as seen on TV which was a big breakthrough she scored a whopping hit with dinner ladies and broke records with consecutive nights selling out I think it was the Albert Hall. Here's a little clip from the documentary. Well, here we are then. We made it. We're out of the house.

We're coming out. We want glamour, glitter, excitement. We're here now. She was the trailblazer. She was fearless. Victoria Wood. I'd never quite seen anybody like her. Hello.

She was just Vicky. Vick's performing character wasn't. Vick. It's one step removed. She was a very shy person. But forget then. She needed to become comfortable as herself. I was patronised either for being fat, either being a woman.

Very wild in Malcolm on a Saturday night. Or for being northern. All men dipping their Gary Baldies into another woman's hollies. But inside, I had a very, very serious streak of ambition. So here's the interesting thing. On the description of the documentary, from the production company, he says, behind the joyous persona, the singer, the satirist, the sharp-witted writer, lay a young woman navigating insecurity, anger, and self-doubt.

And what the documentary does is, it goes right back to the very beginning of her life. It has some very, very early stuff. And then it follows her through Misfit school kid who dreamed of playing music and writing and making people laugh. Then years of rejection, like absolutely years of rejection. People talk quite a lot about, you know,

this whole thing about becoming an overnight success takes years. And then how all that fed into the kind of brand of observational comedy that she really kind of excelled in and then became a pathbreaker on British television, best-selling live performer. So the documentary includes things like

the first ever recorded performance from 1973. It's got behind-the-scenes footage much of which hasn't been seen before, apparently. I mean, I don't know because I'm not an expert. And at one point, there's this discussion about the problem was that people didn't know how to describe her. And then later on, people referred to other people as being like Victoria Wood. So it's like kind of the thing that you can't describe actually ends up as becoming its own genre. It's funny because you mentioned bait.

and there was a thing about, you know, what genre are Mark Jenkin films? They are Mark Jenkins, that is the genre. And I think that what the film does is it argues kind of pretty convincing that he's got interviews with like, you know, French and Saunders who really describe her as a trailblazer, Joan Armour Trading, Maxine Peek, Michael Ball, Jasper Carrot, with whom she shared a, you know, a double bills. I mean, it's a very good, a very good roster of voices. And what it does is it sort of describes the pathway that she took to the success that she finally

achieved as being part and parcel of what it was that made her work so funny and so sharp. And essentially what she says is, I needed to find my own voice. I needed to be myself. I needed to accept myself. And having done that, that then became the thing that resonated with everybody else. You know, people use that phrase that in specifics, you find the universal. So if, for example, you're making a drama about something and you delve into the specifics of something, it weirdly becomes universal. In the case of this, the sort of arc of it seems to be that at the beginning, she doesn't fit, and she doesn't fit anyway.

I mean, for one thing, you know, women being funny. No, you can't kind of that. Women aren't funny. That's not how you do it. And then she finds her own space by being herself. And the more she is herself and the more she's able to do what she wants. She talks, you hear at one point about being required to write funny, that's life songs.

And then later on, being able to write the songs that she wants to write. And there's a little snippet of a song which other people will know, but I didn't, about an older man whose wife has died and he forgets that she's died and he gets up in the morning and he makes breakfast for her. and then he remembers that she's not there anymore. I mean, it's beautiful. It's just heartbreaking, really, really poignant. And watching the doc, I confess,

I had either didn't know or I had forgotten just how much she had done, just how hugely successful she was, and just how much an entire generation of performers sort of see her as a kind of, as a ground zero. There's one moment in it in which she was compared to Jake Thacker, which apparently causes her to flinch because she doesn't want to be compared to anybody at all. But actually, I think that there is, I kind of understand that, you know, that comparison.

There's an awful lot of stuff about her working with Julie Walters. There's plenty to laugh at because the clips are just really funny. I mean, the clips are really, really properly funny. The joke in that clip about Garibaldi and another woman's hollics was fun, yeah. And it's the whole thing is like that. But I think also it is a very kind of encouraging life. lesson because the documentary is about her. And of course, you know, her work, it's like four lives worth of work in that life. But the documentary, I think also beyond that, says if you're

insecure, if you're uneasy, if you feel that you don't fit, stick with it. You know what's that old, there's that cliche thing, be yourself, everybody else is taken. And I do think the doc actually encourages you to think. I can imagine somebody watching this, because she's so, she went through so much, so much struggle at the beginning. I mean, setbacks and being rejected by loads and things. And I can imagine somebody watching this and thinking, well, that's a lesson. The lesson is you lean into what you, what you do, what you are, who you are, who you are, and what makes you different to everybody else. And so on a sort of broader thing, it is a documentary about accepting yourself for what you are. And then just from the point of view, honestly, you could just watch

for the clips because the clips are laugh out loud funny and when she's on stage she's just like you know i never saw her alive did you ever see her perform uh no i interviewed her a couple of times and she was always she was always great and also quite shy you could tell yeah and that's the thing and everyone said they said it in that clip but talks about the fact that she was basically fairly shy and retiring and uncertain and yet you can see during the course of the of the documentary that as she finds herself on stage, that is a sort of source of, you know, of confidence. And also everyone in the documentary speaks incredibly highly of her.

So I thought it was a fine piece of work. And it was just great to spend 90 minutes just watching that stuff. And I had forgotten so much of this. She was a TV star. So presumably this will be on television very shortly. That sounds very cinematic. At the moment, it is in cinemas, and I look this up. If you go to Victoriawoodmovie.com, so it's Victoriawoodmovie.com, that site seems to have all the screening dates.

And it seems to be playing at independent art house cinemas around the country. But if you go to that site, it seems to have all the screening dates listed on it. So we'll be back in just a moment with, Mark, which are the movies we're going to be doing? We have Hamnet, which is Hamlet, but by another name, and Giant. So it's a giant It's a giant hamlet. A giant hamlet The Mould cigar Found under benches and hedges

I think that was the line Also UK and box office A US box office top ten And of course We're hugely entertaining A much anticipated first laughter lift Of 2026 Then it says in brackets

Both chuckle warmly At the enticing prospect Hey, Sal. Hank, what's going on? We haven't worked a case in years. I just bought my car at Carvana, and it was so easy, too easy. Think something's up? You tell me, they got thousands of options.

Found a great car and a great prize. Uh-huh. And it got delivered the next day. It sounds like Carbana just makes it easy to buy your car, Hank. Yeah, you're right. Case closed. Buy your car today on Carvana. Delivery fees may apply.

Mark, I need some advice before we continue with our chart. Yes. I need some throat lubrication. Do I proceed with my vocal zone or do I have one of my on-desk sherbet lemons? No, vocal zone. Do you think? Yeah, absolutely, because you've always been a firm advocate of them. I noticed they've never advertised with us despite the fact.

Aren't they tight or what? I know. So. How many plugs do I have to give to them? Yeah. They haven't even given us any free vocal zones. And we both use them. Listen, I could, you could do it with a bus load.

Which, as I probably mentioned before, I only started buying when recommended on the same day by Jamie Cullum and Tom Jones, both walked in to do interviews with packets of vocals zone. I thought, okay, well, that'll do. For one second, I thought you're going to say recommended by Jamie Callum and Tom Waits. And I thought that's not going to... Yeah, I've been trying the vocal zone.

It's really great. Okay, big industrial thing happening outside. So let's do our box office top ten. However, before we get there, an email about Goodbye June from Brother Jim Hayes. Oh, yeah.

And that's not like he's tech bro or something, he's a monk. No, that's right. Dear Simon the zealot and Mark the evangelist. I've seen Good by June twice in the past two weeks. So we're doing it now because this is on streaming. Yes. This is, we talked to Kate

Winslet before Christmas and Can I just say it went to number one on Netflix? Excellent. And so it should. And our monk friend has seen it twice and maybe that's why. Very good. The first time I was slightly bothered by a couple of early scenes that felt overcooked.

But after that, the film settled into its rhythm, and I was hooked. It's one of those rare films that can make you laugh and cry intensely, often in the same scene, a beautiful celebration of family and the human capacity to love and forgive. Considering the number of first-timers behind the camera, as Kate Winslet noted in her wonderful interview, it's a remarkable achievement. The cast are all wonderful, but Helen Mirren is totally convincing. as someone defeated by illness and yet still strong enough to care more for her family than herself. Her steady looks communicate so much love in history, an extraordinary performance.

I brought to my viewing a family history remarkably similar to the films. In 2007, my bed-bound mother in her county Limerick nursing home managed to reunite three of her five children, one from America, another from London, and myself from Liverpool, after years of estrangement. There were tears and laughter that day, just like in the film. She recovered somewhat, ultimately passing in 2011. My second viewing was in French with a colleague here in Brittany. If anything, the film moved me even more. The dubbing was excellent, especially for Bernard,

played by, brilliantly played by Timothy Spall. This big-hearted film gave back far more than I brought to it, taking me beyond my own story to something universal, which is what you were kind of just talking about. Yeah. One of my top three films of 2025. Down with, well, you know what and you know who. And up with Guinness and Crisp combinations. The colour yellow nativity plays, matching homemade jumpers,

Ray Charles, Gregory Porter, and all the angels working in hospitals and hospices everywhere. They are all references to the film Goodbye June, in case you're wondering. And then Brother Jim Hayes signs up, now I hope I'm getting this right, because he signs off with Blow Are They Mad, which is Breton for Happy New Year.

So I'm just going with it in the slightly French style. Wow. And you're multi-talented and long-suffering production team. They're not long-suffering. They love every minute. They're not multi-talented either. He then adds a PS, which I think I'm going to have to correct you with, Brother Jim. Go on at least a couple of occasions over the years,

Simon has come out with the cliched three-syllable sound, hoi-hijon, when making a reference to the French. I am 100% certain that's you, Mark, and not me. Oh, he-Hon. Exactly. This actually comes from the cry of French onion sellers who used to come over with their bicycles by boat to Britain from Finisterre, especially from the port of Roscoff,

to sell onions, often wearing a typically Breton mariner's jersey with white and navy blue stripes, topped off with a black beret. In fact, I remember one of these turning up our house in Croydon. They would shout the French word for onion, onion, oignon, whilst riding their bicycles through the streets. of the different towns and villages they would visit. This cry then got turned into hoi-hong in the mouths of uncomprehending Brits.

Some of the nine other brothers in my community here of which I am the community superior are descendants of such onion sellers. This is an entire movie in a PS from Brother Jim Hayes, the community superior of this bunch of monks. The thing about the British mishearing the French and then developing phrases

is, you know, eh-ho-in-ho. My mum always used to use this phrase. It's all my eye and Peggy Martin, which apparently, you've heard that phrase, right? Only from you. Okay, yeah.

So I've talked about it before. But it is apparently a misheard French hymn or seafaring song. And the Martin is it married, it's something. So maybe the brother knows about it. I would also like to issue one. correction to that fantastic email which you sent, there's no better culinary pairing than pork

scratchings in Guinness is the line, because it's the best line in the film. It's the best line in the film. It's the moment. Guinness and Crisp combos. Yeah. Pork scratchings and Guinness. And it's so brilliant because what it does is perfectly encapsulate the fact that Tim Spall's character doesn't know what to say. And so he says that. And I interviewed Tim Spall. I said, you get the best line in the movie. You went, yeah, pork scratching is get this. I know. Can I just say the vocal zone is working working its way. So even if they're not paying us anything, this show is brought to you. Well, my bit of it is. By vocal zone. By vocasone. In the

box office top 10, everything is taking me longer. At number 10 is sentimental value, which is number 18 in America. And if ever there was a movie which is going to generate sentimental and emotional emails, it's this film. Josh says, I recently took a long trip to see sentimental value at the world of Ciney. I'm a manager at a small independent cinema, so it pains me to visit the competition. Unfortunately, we were not screening sentimental value. I've struggled with mental health problems throughout my life, many of which stem from a feeling of abject loneliness. My father was, and still is, not particularly interested in me, and shows

much more love and care for my sibling. This film's themes of fatherhood, and uncomfortable, familial dynamics really hit home with me. I see the father's struggle particularly whenever he goes from being with others to being alone. The mask seems to drop, which for me and anyone who's ever battled depression is a common trick, the facade kept up not to let anyone else know your true feelings. Fortunately, these mental health struggles are mostly behind me and I hope that the film touches anyone who is struggling particularly with loneliness or suicidal thoughts and encourages them to connect with the world around them to find those hopeful moments and the reasons to keep going art music film family or anything else to anyone out there struggling you are not alone we

love and appreciate you thank you josh also um this from rebecca i find myself so strongly compelled to write in about a film which very much lived up to its title that i'm typing this from under the shelter of a shop front as snow falls around me in sheffield so that's how keen rebecca is to send in this email well i've just left a showing of sentimental value and it was a journey all right. I found the first third, also a bit slow going, and it struggled to captivate me. Then, as the difficult dad-daughter dynamics amped up, I found myself considering leaving as I lost my dad unexpectedly a few months ago, and it all felt a bit much. Especially so as my relationship with him shared many of the same difficult dad-daughter dynamics so masterfully portrayed in the

film, meaning after having initially struggled to be captivated, it now felt deeply personal. There's a tree being chocked down outside, by the way, for which I apologize. I stayed because I wanted the payoff, the redemption, perhaps seeking a resolution I felt that I never had. And I'm so glad I stayed because the second half completely blew me away, with an hour of cinema that seemed to pass in a flash, where the barrage of emotion was subtle in its nuances, yet also crushing with its blows. I felt fairly level watching the credits until I remembered I was sat there in the cinema with the scarf. my dad had bought me a few Christmases ago and proceeded to have a strong but satisfying cry that caused the cinema ushers to quickly exit

soon after entering to clean up in order to leave me to it. So well done to the ushers. Overall, I found it a brilliant piece of filmmaking made by people with true insight into the human condition. And for the payoff, the last time I spent with my dad before he became unwell is one of the best memories I have with him. It was one in which we spend meaningful time sharing in something we both loved and in that manifest, and in that manifested our love for each other.

So I think we did have our redemption. That's Rebecca. So, you know, here's the machine of empathy again. Thank you, Josh, for your email. Thank you, Rebecca. All about sentimental value. It's at number 10. I mean, it's lovely to hear those responses.

Have I told you that my story about doing, I did an on-stage interview with Yoakim Trey at the end of the year? Have I told you this already? I'm assuming the answer is yes, but I'm going to, okay. So, so, I mean, I love sentimental. sentimental value and I'm a big fan of him as a filmmaker and I was waiting backstage in the green room at the BFI and he came in and I and I put my hand out to shake his hand and I said yeah I'm so you know it's such a pleasure to meet you he said we've met I went what he went yeah

we've met and I looked at him he said back in the in the previous times it must have been the 90s he said you used to present a program on channel 4 and I said, about short films. I said, shooting gallery. Yeah. And he said, yeah, I did do that. And he said, and you got young filmmakers who had made short films. And every now and then, if you found one that you're like, you interviewed the filmmaker. And I went, yeah?

You went, well, I was one of those filmmakers. You watched my short film. You liked it. You interviewed me about it. And I told you at the end of the interview, my ambition is that I'm going to make a feature film and you're going to review it. Isn't that brilliant? Yeah, that is. And no, I don't think you had told that story.

Okay, well, there we go. So I'm starting the new year with a new year with a new. year's resolution of telling Simon's stories that he hasn't heard before. Okay, and there's one. Yeah, but it was, you know, I mean, partly that made me think, wow, I'm really old. But also, how brilliant that that short filmmaker did indeed go on to be Yoakim Trier. A maker of short films, as opposed. As opposed to that short, that's been like Martin Scorsese.

There's a thing on the internet of Don Rickles doing a Martin Scorsese roast. And he says, Marty, Marty, somebody get him an encyclopedia so he can see. Am I the only person who finds the whole roasting thing really quite unpleasant? Yeah, it is. It is weird and unpleasant, yeah. So someone spends 10 minutes just slagging off someone who's probably just pretty good

and has done some tough things. It's not, I don't find it funny. Well, I'd refer you again to my T-shirt. God damn it, you've got to be kind. Exactly. Number nine, anyway, look, we've been talking, we're only at number nine. I know.

Which is back to the past, a new entry. Yeah, so I haven't seen this. This is a Hong Kong historical science fiction action film. It wasn't preview screened before Christmas, but obviously we've been away for a couple of weeks. So there's a couple of things that I've missed, which is this, and also Anaconda, which is coming up in a little bit. Wicked for Good, is it, number eight?

Which I like very much, as I said, one particular friend of mine said, he was very glad that they split it in two because now he only has to watch the first part. But I watch Wicked for Good again over the holiday period, and, you know, it worked. Big Jeff is reviewing Song Sung Blue where I have some comments anyway which is at number seven

This is the Neil Young film right That's right Famously Famously the Neil Young impersonator film Hello to the Good Doctors First Time email a very long time list All the way back to the mid-90s Diploma in Drumming National College Level

In Contemporary and mostly annoying people at gigs in Bristol for the last many years I just went to my nearest multiplex To see Song Sung Blue I'd been drawn in by the film's upbeat looking trail and the fact that it had both huge action and Kate Hudson in the leading roles. What I wasn't expecting was it was to be so emotionally drained. The moments of musical performance are jaw-dropping interlaced with heartbreaking tragedy.

As good as charisma-fueled huge is, for me the real star was Kate Hudson. The physical transformation of her character and almost sheer determination really resonated with me, being someone who, for completely different reasons, has to live with life-altering injuries. So I completely empathise with her struggles to adapt to a new way. of living. I felt the film handled this in a really sensitive way because I, too, have had days when I didn't want to face the world. The whole rehabilitation process from such injuries can be really tough. I guess this is proof, once again, that you bring to a film, and it can have a very profound effect. Thank you, Big Jeff, that Song Song, Song, Blue, new entry number seven.

Yeah, I mean, when I was reviewing it and when I kept confusing young Neil Diamond, I did sort of try and say that, of course, it is based on a documentary and it is a true story. And the most remarkable thing is that the people at the center of it, the real characters, did indeed endure a quite bewildering array of fortune and misfortune. And what happens all the way through the documentary is that they somehow see it through because they have this belief that the music is everything. And I thought that's what I got from the film. And I agree about Kate Hudson.

I think it's her best performance. I think she's really, really terrific in it. And the film utterly charmed me. And I went into it thinking that it was a Neil Diamond biopic. I didn't realize it was about somebody doing a Neil Diamond tribute act. And that just made it all the more surprising. And I loved how much I loved it. And I think I mentioned this before, but if anyone likes Neil Diamond music,

the early stuff is, which I think it was on bang records. So when he was writing, I'm a believer. And when he was writing the boat that I rode, that kind of stuff, which was then taken up and was hits for other, you know, big hits for other people. It's still fantastic the way he sings them. So worth looking at the earlier stuff. Number six, you've already said you haven't seen anaconda. Yeah, I haven't. So I'm trying to try.

Oh, great. Somebody's seen it. Okay, go ahead. Yeah, Grantee has from a village near Exeter. Fab. A good old grantee. I went to see anaconda and I took my eight-year-old to keep me company. And therein lies the problem, I think.

Okay. You don't take your kids to keep your company. A few things to flag It's a 12A here in the UK But I was expecting that to be mostly down to the jump scares And large snake related incidents Which my daughter is okay with But the film certainly fills its quotas of swears

Many are spit and a couple of flips So those parents who aren't as laissez-faire As I may need to be aware of this If they're planning to take their kids on a snowy day Always look at the BBFC app It'll mention all this stuff As for the film itself, it's very average A few laughs, a couple of good Anaconda scenes

but very much played as a pure comedy but isn't nearly as funny as it thinks it is. The new Anaconda is very much the poor cousin to Tropic Thunder. My eight-year-old enjoyed it. Down with the usual, Grantee from a village near Exeter. If I can just say on the subject of the 12A, as I mentioned, I had a conversation

with somebody from the BBFC and I said, what's the regulation on spit and 12A? He said, he could have as many as you want. And I thought, when did that happen? I was still of the opinion that you could have a certain number, and then after that you'd be pushing it into the 15. But no, no, apparently. And obviously you can have a couple of flips as well because...

Yes, yeah, which is, yeah, which is... There we go. Look, we're just old, Simon. Oh, in something, I haven't seen the SpongeBob movie either because that came out in the very... Just before Christmas, and we had a packed show, so I'm sorry, it's not like... The SpongeBob movie Search for Square Pants.

Yes, but that I will catch up because I'm actually... I liked the previous stuff, I will see. Zootropolis 2 is at 4. I enjoyed that. It's kind of Zootropolis 1 was a surprise to me how much I liked it because I just I like the way it looked and it was sort of it was good nature and I enjoyed Zootropolis too. Okay and Marty Supreme is at number three here, number four in America. So here we go. Who's this? Andrew. I just went to see Marty Supreme. Loved it in many ways. I think Chalemae's performance was outstanding. I have one big gripe. Yeah. The film, the

The film's maybe crass opening title, which is a CGI rendering of a specific biological process, has Forever Young, released in 1984, played over it. The credit scene has everybody wants to rule the world, 1985, playing. These song choices seem to be purely based on the lyrics and how they mirror aspects of the film, rather than actually adding something to the film. It was really disappointing in a film set in the 1950s. Maybe music from that decade would be a bit better. If only we had someone who'd written a book about this kind of thing,

to hand. We did talk about this in the review that it's partly to do I mean it's not just that the needle drops are anachronistic there is some kind of logic as well behind the synth stuff because the 50s is really

when you get the rise of electronica in terms of music and film scores obviously Forbidden Planet being the first ever solely electronic film score so there was a whole discussion about what the anachronistic needle drops are doing. As you said, we will be talking more about needle drops in Take Ultra.

But yeah, I know it's one of those things that if it starts to not work for you, it can become very distracting. But I have a quite open-minded attitude toward it, which is like if it works for the drama, then it works for the drama. Here's an interesting observation from Oliver Cousins in the Elephanton Castle. Yes. And he says in his sign-off, he's an advertising guy, as we are about to discover. Okay.

Simon and Mark, I watch Marty Supreme at the Didsbury Cine World on opening day, which is Boxing Day, with my girlfriend, brother-in-law, sister and dad. We all thought it was great, with the most enthusiastic praise, surprisingly, coming from My Old Man, whose favourite film is The Sound of Music. I think it's Chalameh's best performance to date, as Safty takes the style and formula of uncut gems and softens the edges to make something more palatable for a wider audience. Beyond the actual film, I found myself swept up by the marketing, and I think the industry can learn from it. And bear in mind that is an advertising guy. Yeah. For example, one battle after

another is set to sweep the awards yet forecast to lose around $100 million. Why? I would argue because of lack of storytelling off-screen. My take is that Marty Supreme has the best marketing campaign since Barbie, but with more achievable lessons. First, the film created its own IP from scratch. Unlike Barbie or RuneScape, which draw from globally recognized brand, Saffty created something himself, which is instantly recognizable in the orange ping pong ball and the film's namesake. Surprisingly, the ball is a minor plot detail, yet its shade of orange has become synonymous with the film's identity. Then there was the fake marketing Zoom call. 824 released a spoof video in which an unhinged Timothy Shalamey pitches of Marty's

Supreme Blimp to nodding executives. It went viral and then the real blimp appeared over Hollywood. The centrepiece of the campaign is a jacket not even featured in the film. Pop-up shops appeared in London and New York with fans queuing for hours, which celebrities were photographed wearing it. But the cherry on top was something completely off script. Shalamey became caught up in a music industry rumour that he is the newly emerged Liverpoolian grime artist, S.D. Kid. When asked about it on Marty Supreme press junkets. He smiled and said no comment

until SD Kid released a new track featuring Chalemay himself rapping about Marty Supreme in a council flat kitchen. So yes, Marty Supreme is 824's most expensive film to date, but I'll bet it becomes its most successful. It just goes to show

you can't have the best product in the world, one battle after another, but people can't buy what they don't know exists. Marketing Supreme, says Oliver Cousin. Okay, that's very well argued. There's a couple of things which we should point out, however. Marty Supreme, and I'm just looking at this from the wiki page, the budget of Marty Supreme was between $60 and $70 million, and its box office is currently $60, so it's got a way to go to wash its face because the old formula used to be that, well, the old formula used to be that you have to do twice the box office in the US in order for a film to do. well, you know, in its international release. One battle after another has taken 205 million, okay? So it's not that people haven't seen it. Loads of people have seen it. The problem is

it costs somewhere between 130 and 175 million. So the reason that one battle after another has been talked about as being financially problematic is not because people aren't seeing it. It's because it costs the kind of money that in order to make that money back, you have to be making many hundreds of millions. So, you know, not 205 million. So although I absolutely agree, you're completely right about the Marty Supreme Marketing campaign, it was genius.

But the box office thing doesn't quite add up the way you think it does. I mean, the great example of this is Cleopatra from, you know, the Elizabeth Taylor, Cleopatra. When that film first opened, it was a box office hit, but it lost money. And the reason it lost money was it was originally intended to be two films. And, of course, they started filming it twice. They had to shut down the production here and then move it out to Cheney Chita.

So by the time it was finished as one film, it had cost so much money that to use the phrase that was used about Waterworld, many decades later, there's not enough money in the world to float this boat. There was a joke that when they were making Cleopatra, Fox had the second biggest nation. in the world. So the way in which things lose money is often to do with how much they cost rather than how many people went to see them. And number two in the UK, number three in America is the housemaid. Anna in Newcastle or Cardiff says, I wish to draw your attention to the towering inferno credit citation game. Yes. If we ever had one. Yeah, we did. As you have discussed, Paul Newman and Steve McQueen famously fought to get equal billing and even an equal number of lines. This led to the now famous spacing of their names in the credits.

Two names, left and right, with the right slightly higher. The implication is that both stars have equal status. Remember that bit? Yes. Yeah, very clear. We talked about it for months. Yeah. I have noticed three films where this has recently happened. Wicked, The Housemaid, and the Hunting Wives.

This is maybe not the good doctor's taste. And yes, all-star women. All of these shows put the two leading women as equals from the credits. Several of them are also executive producers on the shows. Hence, I want to comment on how an idea born of male ego has led to feminist coming together, or a female sisterhood, where women assert that we're both equal stars, so we deserve the same credits, the same credits, and even the same pay, rumoured in the case of Wicked, we work together and for each other and not against each other. So my second point of this email is that I was disappointed with Mark's

review for the housemate. He compared it to 90's psychological thrillers. where there was a crazy woman and women fought against women. It is much better to compare the housemaid to more recent films such as Gone Girl or a Simple Favour, where women are working against the system or working together. I won't spoil the housemaid, but it's good fun. Amanda Safreid and Sydney-Sweeney are excellent, and it's not trying to be anything clever,

it's directed by Paul Fieg, Hannah says. Also, so much of it is refreshing compared to decades of film that chastise women for certain choices or set them up as the enemy rather than, the agents in their own stories. Have any of your good list has spotted any more shows with equal credits and is it primarily women

that are doing this? That's from Anna. I don't know the answer to the question about the credits. I believe that the Taring Inferno credits it actually wasn't the first time it was done. I think somebody wrote in and corrected us and said that had been done before

and it has obviously happened since. On the thing about the movies to which I'm comparing house, but it's because actually stylistically, I mean, Paul Figue himself says this. There are two throwback things. One of them is to the kind of

the film noir, but the most sort of populist reiteration of that model was indeed in those films in the 90s. Although you make a good point about the, you know, women working together. The main thing about that film is it is ripe as cheese.

You know, I mean, it is, I think it's, the question I had about it was, is the camp intentional? Because some of the very best camp is unintentional. But of course, it's not like Paul Feek doesn't know what camp is. So, I mean, I enjoyed the housemaid. I enjoyed it, but it was

bonkers and absolutely ripe as anything. So, to no one's great surprise, number one is Avatar. It's not just number one is very number one. Yeah. So I'm just I mean, there are lots of emails with people who agree with you, Mark. But

this, but Neil all, so I'm just looking for an email that makes it makes a slightly different point. Sure, go ahead. Neil Aldridge, world press winner, 2014 European Wildlife Photographer of the Year, and ninth place in the 1995 Under 14 Single Skulls. Anyway, the photography is the key thing here. Neil says, I've spent the last 15 years working as a photojournalist, trying to capture photographs that show what we are doing to the world

and working with people who are in touch with it and trying to protect it. one thing I have learned in this time is that everyone takes in information and inspiration in different ways. Many people just aren't ready to look at the world in the way that I do and look at the stark evidence of what we are doing to our planet. And that's where the creative brilliance of Avatar comes in. If James Cameron and his team can entertain millions of people with a fantasy while also planting in them a seed that it's okay to change to stand up to agreed and that it's right to listen to the generations. They will inherit a planet shaped by our choices and lack of willingness to act. Then they will have done their job. And they will have

done so whilst taking inspiration for so many of the mythical creatures in Avatar from the real wonders of Earth that we stand to lose. Watching Avatar is like looking in one of those warped mirrors at a fun fair. Sure it makes people look a lot taller and everything a little bluer, but it's still a mirror nonetheless, and it's worth remembering that. Thanks to you and your team. Hello to Jason, of course, ticotty-tong, down with that guy over there doing that thing, and up with fighting for what you believe in. Thank you, Neil. Anyway, I just thought, you know, there are people who agree with you. Of course there are, but I just thought it was interesting. Yeah, yeah. If you're approaching it from the point of view of someone who is in despair about people not

caring about the state of the world, that if a movie comes along and says, you know what, maybe we can do something, then it's an interesting opinion, I think. It is, and that's a perfectly valid point. And I, you know, I'll refer you to the fact that I have said on several occasions, and I don't say it factuously, that almost everything I know about politics, I learned from the Planet of the Apes movies. And when I was a kid, watching the Planet of the Apes movies, which a lot of people sneered at, understandably so, was an education, because each one of them was about a different thing. And I, in the same way that later on, the George Romero, dead movies, each one of them was about a different thing,

and whether it's consumerism or racism or capitalism or whatever it is. And you're absolutely right. If a film can give somebody a positive message, no matter how much a sniffy critic like me thinks it doesn't like it, then good for it. Again, we keep coming back to this thing. People's responses to movies are so personal. A couple of people said to me,

well, you were completely wrong about Avatar. I took just taking all this money. I said, I know. I said in the review, it's going to, take a fortune. Of course it's going to take a fortune. And also, in a way, I feel, I feel fine about saying whatever I could say about Avatar, because he's not going to make any difference. No, no, no. You know what I mean? That's the thing. But thank you for that email. You make a very good point. And also, if you step back into the situation around the world,

this is particularly a point, not just from the new one, but from the last one, if a movie comes along and says, you know that very, those very powerful people with all those weapons, what they're doing is not the right thing. Yeah. And saying that to an audience, which is like 10 times bigger than anything else we're talking about. Yeah. Then maybe some good will come up.

Yes, precisely. Precisely. That's what I'm saying. So on the way, some jolly good reviews because we've been doing the top 10 and I've been reading out a bunch of stuff. Yes. So I'm going to take another vocal zone and you're going to be reviewing what, Mark? Well, we have reviews of Giant, which is a.

boxing movie, not Giants, the James Dean movie, and also Hamnet, which is a big, big awards contender. We'll be back either very quickly or not very quickly, but still very enjoyably after these informative messages. As ever, correspondence, please to correspondents at Komenameh.com, I suspect we'll get a lot of emails about Hamnet. Here we go. It's out. It's one of the big films this week. Yes, and you're going to be hearing a lot about it in the coming weeks because it is shaping up as a very big awards contender. So this is an adaptation of a historical fiction novel by Maggie O'Farrell, which recounts the story of William Shakespeare's relationship with Agnes in the film, aka Anne Hathaway, not the actor, obviously. There's a whole thing. Agnes for these purposes. The birth of their children, one of whom Hamnet is said to have inspired the play,

tragedy of Hamlet because we are told at the beginning that the names Hamnet and Hamlet were effectively interchangeable. Directed by Chloe Zhao, who made The Rider, became the second of only three women to win best director for Nomadland, wrestled with big superhero franchises in Eternals, now back on awards form with this, which she co-wrote the screenplay with the author of the book. So Paul Maskell is William Shakespeare, who we meet disappointing his parents on a number of fronts, not least the fact that he has fallen for the woodsy Agnes, played by the brilliant Jesse Buckley, who is widely regarded as something of a strange presence. Her mother was rumoured to be a forest witch, and she knows a lot about plants and wildlife, and she can

call a hawk, and she knows about old medicines. Anyway, they caught amidst moss and logs and caves. He tells her the story of Orpheus, and do we say Euritio, Uridisi? How do we say that now? What's the, what are the kids saying? What's the latest? Yeah, well, whichever one is. I think the first one. The first one is right. Euridici, is it? Or is it? Yes, Uridici. Anyway, go. She has a vision of him achieving greatness. She has a vision of her dying with two children. And it's not a plot spoiler because we've all talked about to say that they start a family, they have children, they endure tragedy, and indeed they endure a certain degree of problematic separation because he wants to be a playwright, and in order

to do that, he has to go to the Capitol to pursue his career. Here's a clip. Will we go with you this time? No, not yet. Hey. I'll miss you. But I have to go, you understand I. I know. I understand.

That's good. Because I need you to look after your mother and your sisters. Will you do that? Yes. Will you be brave? Yes. Will you be brave? Yes.

Will you be brave? Yes! Yes, I'll be brave. I'll be brave. I'll be brave. I'll be brave. So when this was first playing at festivals, it was winning audience awards. I think it won Toronto, I think also the LFF. And the thing that everyone was saying, as soon as it was seen, there wasn't a dry eye in the house. It was certainly that was when it played at the LFF, everyone came out in tears. It's been nominated for several Golden Globes. It's hotly tipped for Oscar nominations. And the narrative is a kind of sinewy mix of fact and invention

with some chubby hum things. We see at one point William at a point of despair asking himself to be or not to be. We have the portrayal of the ghost of Hamlet's father. Do you remember there was a story that Daniel Day Lewis at one point was on stage doing Hamlet? And when the ghost of Hamlet's father appeared, he fled the stage.

because it was so dramatically just overwhelming. And then there are several sort of understated nods towards stuff that we know from Shakespeare. While I was watching this, I was reminded of, do you remember from 2018, that somewhat underrated film, All Is True, which was written by Ben Elton, who'd previously done Upstart Crow, and starred Chuckles, Sir Ken Branner. Do you remember this? Yes, I had forgotten, but now it's coming back to me. Well, that portrays Shakespeare in his later life, dealing. with the tragedy and regret of his life, having then, you know, come back to his somewhat estranged family and, you know, trying to find some kind of peace at the end of his life and dealing

with a lot of the subjects that are kind of talked about in this. Now, I think that that film was better than it is now remembered. And I have a suspicion that Hamnet may be now thought of better than it will be remembered. I'll tell you why in a moment. First, let's get the good things. On the plus side, Jesse Buckley is astonishing. I mean, her performance goes from quiet mystery to strong passion and howling anguish. And it's a showcase performance. It proves that she can just do anything. I mean, honestly, I think she walks on water. And in a way, Paul Maskell has a hard job matching her because anyone would. But he does inject real pathos

into the role of William Shakespeare. The production design is eye-catching and earthy. The DP is, am I going to pronounce this correctly, Lukash Zal, who did Eder and Cold War and Zone of Interest. And all the stuff when they're in the Great Outdoors, you feel it, you feel the mossy slopes, you feel the mud, you know, you feel the kind of the grit of the ground. It's a very, very tactile film. And it's helped, of course, by the fact that it's got this fabulously engrossing sound design,

which is headed up by who else, Johnny Byrne, who just, this is what he does. He basically puts the audience right in the middle of all of this stuff by making the world sound. So tactile. There is also a superb score by Max Richter. Max Richter is one of my favorite composers. His music, seems to speak directly to the heart. I mean, it can even to the point of controlling the heart beat. I mean, if you listen to sleep, which I think has now become the most streamed classical album of Eves,

you know, it's a piece of music that literally you're meant to listen to whilst sleeping. It speaks directly to your body. And there was an interview with him about the score for Hamnet, and he said there's a lot of choral material with women's voices, exclusively no male voices. That's because I like to see it almost as a sort of back. background radiation to the score. It's like the amniotic fluid that holds this imagined world of ours. And he also uses a lot of samples, the viola, hurdy-gurdy, nickel harp, Renaissance

folkloric instruments. It puts all these things together. I mean, it's a great Max Richter score, and he's fabulous. So all of that is great. What's not so great is that it felt to me kind of, well, to me at least, profoundly emotionally manipulative in a way that sometimes felt inauthentic. I mentioned that Jesse Buckley's performance includes one scene of particularly howling, raging grief. And the film did seem to me to want to ring every drop of emotion from a narrative, which by its very nature is so steeped in tragedy that a little distance actually may not have hurt. And in the past, I think that Chloe Jow's films had a kind of sense of distance to them. And I liked that about them. And I think the sense of restraint was

absent. It felt like the film was really trying to make me cry. And as I said, I know from the LFF that people were weeping as they left the screening. But because of it was trying so hard, I didn't. Now, it's quite unusual for me not to cry in a film that is a tear joker, okay? And this is that. There is also one thing that I consider to be a howling false step, and I know there's a debate about this, but so at the end, during the sort of the emotional climax of the film, this great score by Max Richter suddenly Koizhou abandons the original score and starts using On the Nature of Daylight. Now, on the Nature of Daylight was originally conceived as it.

It was an Iraq War piece. It turns up on the Blue Notebooks album. It's since been used in several films, most famously a rival in which it basically overshadows the Johan Johansson score. But it also turns up in Scorsese-Shuthr Island. It's used in the Disney Adventure Togo. It's used in the documentary Sherpa. It first, apparently, on screen, turns up in the Will Ferrell thing,

stranger than fiction. and on TV shows it's been using everything from the last of us to the Handmaid's Tale to get this, I had to Google this, I didn't know it was true, EastEnders, right? It's been everywhere. It has, yeah. So it's basically the albinonis adagio de nosjeure.

I mean, it's, you know, that thing in the end of Manchester by the sea, when the whole of the emotional climax was blown because suddenly they're playing the music from butterflies or rollerball. And apparently, and I was, because I was quite surprised by this. And my co-author of the book that I just wrote, Jenny Nelson, had a similar response to it. Anyway, I looked around and there was a couple of interviews where apparently Jesse Buckley had suggested its use. And actually, the use of it helped redefine the scene that it is used for. There's a piece in Indie Wire, which says, I'll just read you a little bit,

when composer Max Prister came to visit the Hamlet set, the day they were shooting the film's ending. He was surprised to see the emotional scene being staged to the track This Bitter Earth, a choral version of the famous 2003 composition in the nature of daylight, which played on repeat as a large ensemble of background actors swayed to the music. So he had actually written a track specifically for the end, and he pointed out to Chloe's out, you know, this has been used in a lot of other places. And she said, it doesn't matter. It's not to do with original. It's to do with whether or not it works. And she's subsequently talked about that

in terms of adaptation. Now, there are people who now think that on the nature of daylight has been redefined by the way it's used in Hamlet. And there will be a number of people who don't recognize it and don't have the problem that I have. But I thought it was a really big misstep.

And also, it may have got away with it. Had it not felt to me that the movie was trying so hard to ring emotion out of me, that it felt, almost like a kind of Pavlov's dog, bong, okay, here's the piece of music that's going to reduce you to tears. Now, I know that that is, that is a harsh response, and I also know that it's partly because of things that are just to do with, with my attitude to the way which music is used in films. I think it's really, like I said, get this clear. I think the film is really

well made. It has reduced loads of people I know to tears. I think it has great performances. I think the sound design is terrific. I think the production design is terrific. It just didn't touch me. It left me cold because it felt like it was egging it so much. Now, I don't know. Did you have any response that was similar? No, I know exactly what you're talking about.

And also, I mean, we've talked before about other films that trivial, silly little things that take you out of them. moment. This isn't a trivial thing because, you know, there are big issues around the choice of piece of music. But if at that point the music comes in, you go, hang on, that's, yeah, that's that doing here. You're out of the moment. The other, I mean, we're going to talk about needle drops later, but, because that's in a take ultra thing. But do you remember the killing fields, the David Putnam film? Yes, of course. And at the end, Imagine by John Lennon plays

And I remember exclaiming out loud in the cinema which I think was the ABC in Nottingham You've got to be kidding You know, it was just so crass Because I There was much to admire in the film And then this piece of music

Which tells you what to think And tells you how to react Comes in over the end I'd completely forgotten that I don't think this sounds I don't think because I haven't got to the final bit yet, because I'm watching it as a BAFTA thing. But I'm now on the, I'm on the lookout for that. It doesn't sound as crass as putting in John Lennon's imagine. No, no, no, it's not. And like I said,

Chloe Jao has talked about this and she has a reason and a logic for it. Can I just ask you, in terms of the rest of the stuff, did you feel, have you felt that it has been emotionally manipulative considering the subject matter? It's a very interesting point. No, I had to, I hadn't thought that, but maybe the kicker is the bit that I'm, which I'm going to have watched before we get to next week. I was mainly just admiring whoever it was who did the casting. Yes. Because Jesse Buckley maybe wasn't the obvious person. But she's brilliant.

But she's brilliant. But she's absolutely extraordinarily brilliant. Yeah. I mean, she's brilliant in everything. And the sound design. Yeah. The sound design is great, isn't it? You know what I mean about?

You can feel and hear the moss. Oh, yeah, yeah. Yes, absolutely. Yeah. So I want to be absolutely clear. It's a very good film. It just didn't work for me for those reasons. Simon in San Francisco says,

Dear King Henry V and the Prince of Denmark, long-term listener, and Vanguard Easter. I've just seen the incomparable Chloe Zhao's new film Hamnet. What a phenomenal, incredibly moving film. The last 40 minutes especially is simply breathtaking. I've been a fan of Jesse Buckley since Wild Rose, but her acting here is on another level, hands down the best female performance of 2025.

And in my top three films of the year, Paul Maskell is great too, but this is Jesse Buckley's film. I wanted to have Paul Maskell back on the show. It didn't work out for no reasons, but mainly because, you remember the last time he came on, he was saying,

yeah, I just want to do small independent films. That's right, yeah. I'm very happy doing small independent films. Hello, Gladiator, too. And Hamlet and so on. because he is a very, very big star. He's huge. He's absolutely huge.

Yeah. Okay, so views on Hamlin. It would be very interesting to finding what people think. Correspondence at covenomere.com. Are you ready, Mark, just before the ads, as for a little kind of, a little pick you up. I've never been more ready than I am right now. Because let's step once again into our new year laughter lift.

I'm not going to try a fake laugh because it'll make me cough. So I can't even. and chortle. But anyway, Mark, I don't know how your Christmas was, but... It was very busy. Mine was very busy. I had to help move a lion, a witch, and a wardrobe. Why is that? I hear you ask. Why is that? It's Nani a business. Yeah. That's all right? Okay. Now, Mark, we're both modern men. I'd like to take this opportunity to issue a trigger warning about this week's laugh to lift. This next section contains a joke.

about an anthropomorphic children's toy known for its distinctive orange color with black stripes and springy tail. Oh, sorry, sorry, my mistake. That should be a tigger warning. Yeah. Hey, Mark, what do you call a tigger with three eyes? I don't know.

A tiga. And a bonus joke for you. I know it's been an extraordinary standard anyway. What have Winnie the Pooh and Bob the builder got in common? I don't know. Got the same middle name. Okay. I'll give you that.

I mean, this is real class, I think. I'll give you that. What are you reviewing in our final section, please? We're going to be reviewing Giant, not that one. And can I just say that I saw a thing on Instagram of an interview with Hugh Grant, in which he said that when they were naming one of their children, they gave them their middle name was danger, so that at some point the child would be able to say,

my middle name is also danger. I don't know whether it's true, but he said it. We'll be back in just a moment. Okay, just a moment. It started off, I think, as a question, Schmester in take two. It did. So over-hoc conversations, which could be the basis for an entire movie? Yeah, exactly.

May I offer two different flavours for your consideration? Both coincidentally heard in a queue. The first, inherently ridiculous one, was when I was in a tiny off-license, the person behind me was having a perfectly civil phone conversation until suddenly he erupted with unabated rage and shouted down the phone, Hummus, she doesn't eat eggs, and then hung up in disgust.

I mean, what on earth they were discussing there? I have no idea. The second one, says Jim, was when I was behind a man with no fewer than ten cartons of ambrosia custard and nothing else on the conveyor belt in Waitrose, in Angel in North London. When he calmly took a call and said,

yes, hello, darling, I've just landed at Heathrow, before winking at me. Okay, very interesting. And Jim signs off, up, down and in my ladies' chamber. Jim, thank you very much. All right, it's quite enough of that kind of stuff. Right, tell us about Giant then.

So, Giant, I kept saying not that one, so obviously not a reissue of the 1956, George Stevens American Classic, with Elizabeth Taylor, Rock Hudson, and James Dean, for which I think James Dean got one of two posthustumous Oscar nominations. We will be doing a classic reissue in Take Two, with Labyrinth. This, however, is a British set, although transatlantically produced boxing movie, whose poster is emblazoned with the legend, the UK's answer to Rocky. And it does indeed

boast Rocky creator and now special envoy to Mango Mussolini, sliced alone as an executive producer through his Balboa productions. The poster also declares the film to be, quote, based on the remarkable true story of Prince Nasim Hamid, although honestly, it could more accurately be described as being based on the remarkable true story of Brendan Ingle. Now, if you're a sporting fan, you will know both of those names. If you've just got a passing interest, you will know one of those names, possibly not the other one. So Ingle is the Irish trainer, professional, former boxer played by P.S. Brosnan. And in the movie, bear in mind, because what I know about sport wouldn't fill the back of a postage stamp. So everything I know about this story,

I know from the movie, and then from just checking a couple of things on wiki, right? So I'm taking the movie as, you know, it's based on a true story. What I know is from the movie. So he runs a boxing gym in Sheffield, attempting to get young boys off the street out of trouble, harness their energies, direct them in a positive manner. He, him, Brendan Engle himself described Harold Bomber Graham as, quote, the best person to come out of our gym. That's in the real world. That was from the wiki page. Although the most celebrated person to come out of that gym was Prince Nassim Hamid,

played here by Amit El Masri, who, if you remember, won a Scottish BAFTA for Limbo, which a film came out a few years ago, really, really liked. Anyway, we meet him in the 80s. We meet the character in the 80s first, much younger time. racial strife is terrible. P-words go home is being graffitied on walls. Skinheads are beating up, you know, kids, including the Hammered boys who, as per the film, are brought into the gym by their mum. And their mum says, would you please teach my boys to fight? And there's this very sort of plucky seven-year-old, Nassim, who Brendan sees something in him and starts to mentor him. He dances

like Ali. He runs fast. He's got footwork. He's got attitude and he's arrogant. And Brendan Engle basically says, look, build on those skills. Be more fleet-footed because the thing is, if they can't hit you, they can't beat you. And he also tells him to feed on the hostility of the times, to become more cocky, to become more arrogant, to basically more showboaty, to sort of turn all that negative energy back and turn it into something positive. And it pays off. in a matter of years, this scrappy young kid has become a featherweight sensation. As he becomes more successful, there's a thing in which that bit of graffiti that we saw, which said P-word, go home, now says something like Prince Nassim rules,

he becomes more cocky, and he spurred on by a promoter who tells him and us that this is the age of the ladsmaq, okay? This is the age of, you know, young men draped over Ferraris with, you know, supermodels and shooting their mouth off in public. And this is what everyone wants. Here's a clip from the, I think it's a clip from the trailer. Are you the Irishman that runs boxing gym? My children, they are having trouble at school. How did you get that cold on your lip?

Save me got that bent nose. You're unbelievable. 100 wannity fighters have walked through that door. You've got what they haven't. I hate it because he's different. I'll just ignore him. Embrace it. It'll make you stronger.

You could be champion of the world. I'll give every inch of my heart. If you can fight like this now, his size, his age. Who's going to stop him when he's a man? So look, all of this basically, you know, what happens to him is at odds with the ideals of Brendan, who apparently in real life was asked by a local vicar to carry out some community work in the area because, you know, the youth were, you know, needed something. And then set up this weekly dance at St. Thomas's Church Hall.

In fact, the first time we meet the Pierce-Brosden character, he's being the DJ and he's playing sweet to these kids who are meant to be just sort of drinking orange juice, but they're sort of smuggling in, you know, alcohol. But the other thing is that Brendan has also had experience of having nurtured and mentored talent, only for that talent to turn its back on him when success comes calling. And the whole story is this going to happen again?

And in this particular case, the person that he's mentored starts to say, look, my talent comes from Allah, not from you. You know, it's, it comes from God. And Brent said, what? So I didn't have anything to do with it. So, look, it's an odd little film. I didn't know the story. I mean, I presume you, Simon, because, you know, you worked on five and everything. You know the story of Prince Nassim Hammett.

You know his boxing story, yeah? I know some of his boxing story. I don't know the Pierce-Brosnan side of the story. Okay. Well, the thing is that in a way that that story is that it's the story of Brendan Ingle. Like I said, it's not really the story of the boxer. I mean, it's much more about his belief in the power of boxing to transform kids' lives of him being let down by those same kids. And I, to the point that I think that you could make an argument that he is the giant of the title and the fact that it's called giant. You know, it's specifically ambiguous. Like I said, the poster says, this is the story of this boxing legend. but that really isn't what the film is.

The film has been in development for a while. Apparently, at one point, it was Paddy Considine and Manamassoud who were going to star. And then Brosnan and Amazri came in in 24. It's written and directed by Rowan, and I hope I'm saying this correctly, Rowan Atali, a British Indian film director and screenwriter, was a screen international star of Tomorrow, made The Rise, which is also known as Wasteland, which was a big, game of BAFTA Breakthrough Brit. And it's, what, what it does is, it tells a story that I

didn't know at all to an audience who will at least probably know something of one half of the story. And it works when it works because the performances work, because I do think that the, you know, Brosnan and Almasry are a very good double act. I mean, particular applaud it's to the latter because, as I said, if you look at him in a film like Limbo and then a film like this. I mean, it's like, it's, I mean, I, almost hard to believe that it's, it's the same person. So it's a very physical performance, very sharp, very, you know, very sparky, very, very confident. There are plenty of creaky moments. I mean, there are things in it that really do, I mean, there are moments when the boxing matches are happening and the commentary sounded horribly unconvincing

to me. I don't know whether the commentary, I mean, I said, I don't watch boxing, so I don't really know, but the commentary sounded to me like a script explaining what was going on. And there are many, many moments in it in which people say things out loud that seem to be there to absolutely make sure that you are understanding that this is what is happening right now. And I've said a million times, I'm not a fan of that kind of exposition. But because you get this kind of sparkiness between the two central characters, I think actually that pretty much carried it, carried it through for me. And I think, you know, I'm a, I like Pierce Brosnan. I really do. His accent sounded weird, although that's weird because Pierce Brosnan is Irish.

But I think, Amir al-Massar. He's in this gangster drama on Paramount Plus. Right. With Helen Mirren, and they're both from Ireland. And there's been quite a few kind of internet memes about this because Pierce's accent in there is, to me, sounds not very Irish at all. As you say, it's odd because that's his heritage. Yeah, and I may be wrong. I'm playing a gig in Dublin soon.

I'll ask somebody who actually knows because I'm, you know. But we have lots of listeners in Ireland. So could we get a tutored correspondent, please, to tell us, what do you make of Pierce Brosnan's Irish accent? Because it should be absolutely tip-top. But to English ears, it sounds a little bit. strained maybe or unnatural? I don't know. A little bit theatrical. A little bit theatrical. I think that's how I would say it. But none of that with Amir El Mastri, who I think is just terrific.

I said particularly when you compare this with some other screen performances in which I found it hard to reconcile the fact that it's the same guy. I understand why they might have wanted to put the British answer to Rocky on the poster. But to me, that puts me off completely because also it's not true. That's not true. It isn't. You know, you're talking about a true story, and Rocky is this great boxing legend, which was completely made up.

So it just feels like they're entirely different films. So to actually mention Rocky... Well, I think it's just simply because, as I said, Stallone is actually on board as a producer, but Stallone's rather blotted his copybook recently, so... Yes, I'd have thought so. Anyway, once you've seen it, once you can tell us what you think, correspondence at curbinameyer.com.

That is 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 was Simon Pooley-McPoolface. And if you're not following the pod already, please do so wherever you get your podcasts. Come and join us on Patreon because we've got lots of cool and groovy stuff, including a live show and all that jazz. Mark, what is your film of the week? Well, despite my reservations, my film of the week is Hamlet. Thank you very much indeed for listening. There'll be another take which has landed. very close to this one and we'll talk to you very soon.