Kermode & Mayo’s Take - Is ICE CREAM MAN Eli Roth’s most chilling work or does it need more sprinkles? + Taika Waititi

Episode Date: August 6, 2026

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. Mark Kermode assesses Eli Roth’s gory horror Ice Cream Man, about an ice-cream van whose treats turn kids into homicidal monsters. He also reviews French drama Love Me Tender, starring Vicky Krieps as a mother whose divorce and sexuality trigger a brutal custody battle. Staying abroad, Mark then covers The Summer Book, a Tove Jansson adaptation set on a Finnish island, featuring a standout turn from Glenn Close as a grandmother helping a grieving child and her withdrawn father. And Simon Mayo chats to Taika Waititi on adapting the New Zealand novel Wild Pork and Watercress into the much-loved Hunt for the Wilderpeople as it returns in a 10th anniversary 4K release. Plus, the Box Office Top Ten jumps back in time to 1976. As does the Laughter Lift for that matter…. You can contact the show by emailing [e-mail] or you can find us on social media, @KermodeandMayo. EXCLUSIVE NordVPN Deal ➼ https://nordvpn.com/take Try it risk-free now with a 30-day money-back guarantee! Our Christmas Movie Spectacular is back! It’s in Bristol this year on Sunday 6th December. Don’t miss it! Here’s the link for tickets: https://www.fane.co.uk/kermode-and-mayo 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] Timecodes: 00:00:00 Introduction 00:11:52 Ice Cream Man review 00:21:32 Box Office Top Ten (1976) 00:33:37 Taika Waititi Interview 00:47:23 Love Me Tender review 00:55:01 Laughter Lift 00:59:52 The Summer Book review Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Queen Carvania stood haloed by the morning sun. An army hung on her every word. My champions, I have sold my chariot on Carvana. It was a lovely SUV, an inexplicably queenly offer. They're even coming to the castle to collect it. Tonight we feast! An offer you can feast on. Sell your car today on Carvana.

Pick up fees, Manify. It's Elizabeth Day from How to Fail here. My next guest is the actual Prime Minister, Andy Burnham. I have to be careful. This does make me quite emotional. She said, we all knew kind of what time you might be coming up Downing Street. So we got Roy and we got the telly right in front of him and six of us stood around him. And all said, look, look, look. Momentarily, they said, we thought he knew.

Listen to How to Fail wherever you get your podcasts. 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, Schmestians.

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. Are your headphones at the right level, Mark? My headphones are now at the right level since we're in the studio and the top production team have now managed to get. Because you, for the first time, I think, asked for your headphones to be turned up. It's usually me.

Well, normally they're too, well, yeah, also we're normally at home. So you just do it yourself. So it's my responsibility. It's too quiet. It's like all my own fault. But yeah, so I wanted some more But we're not at the Robbie Vincent level

Because Robbie Vincent had a pre-empt on his headphones, right? Yes, I mean Robbie is still doing his sole shows and R&B shows and stuff And when he was at Radio 1 I'm sure I mentioned this before He had a, the headphones are limited at the BBC Because it's a legal requirement So they're limited everywhere

Standard rules Not to deafen people But that's not loud enough for some old timers And so he had a pre-empt which he plugged into the desk and then plugged his headphones and they like jumped off the table. It was you didn't need speakers in the room basically. You just need Robby's headphones. And as we've said,

Fluff Freeman had really loud headphones. I think that generation, I mean, I suspect I listen to music far louder than the rest of the family do. Can you turn that down? Can you turn that down? Does your phone do that thing about telling you that you've been listening to music too loud and telling you off?

No. It's really annoying. My phone says, based on your listening levels for the last three, days, you need to turn things down. And I think... Does it have that tone? No, it's a message.

You know, it comes up as a thing. It probably says it, because I've disabled all the speaking parts of my phone. I've disabled Siri and I've disabled any... I want the phone to not be talking to me or not listening to me unless it, I just want it to make calls and go on the internet occasionally. But there's clearly something else you need to switch off. I know. The naggy feature.

I know. The naggy feature. That literally, they're like, what are you? My mum? No, I want to listen to it this loud. I switched off the thing. it says you need to stand up because it normally occurs like in the middle of a screening or something like that. Yeah, it says you need to stand up and exercise. No, thanks. I'll decide if I,

sometimes I can't stand up because I'm working or, you know, watching a movie. My car as well. My car does this thing. It goes, drive a coffee break or, you know, literally a cup of coffee comes up on the screen. Does it make the coffee? No. That would, now that is a feature. That will be good. You're looking tired. Here. Have some coffee. Have some coffee. But no, it just a cup of coffee comes up on the screen and it tells me I need to take a break. And it would do it like five minutes after I've been in a service station. I bet. You know Elvis's car, which is in the...

Which is in Graceland? Well, okay, there is an Elvis car in the Nashville Museum of Country Museum. Oh, fine. Elvis had more than one car. Right. What is it? The pink Cadillac? It had an LP player under the dashboard, yeah, the whole thing.

But that kind of device, like the Batmobile kind of thing, Is there anywhere a car that says you're looking tired, here have an espresso? That would be fantastic. They used to be drinks dispensers in the backs of cars, didn't they? I mean, I know when you get stretched limos and all that sort of thing. But if you've got a posh car, they'd be like, sometimes they'd be like glass, you know, plant holders. You know, like vases, glass vases and then like a little drinks. I mean, there are still little holes in the plastic.

No, but they're for putting coffee in. That's what put in the coffee in that the car hasn't made you. But how annoying is it that the car suddenly says you need a cup of coffee? It's not like I've been driving erratically. I'm on the A30 doing 55. Yeah. I don't mind. I suppose if you're on your own, maybe it's useful to be, you know, maybe you're driving.

Maybe your driving was erratic and unpredictable. My driving was not erratic or unproductive. It might have been. No, it wasn't. I tell you how I know it wasn't because I use cruise control, right? I, exactly, I discovered cruise control about two years ago and it's brilliant, right? I always thought you can't ever use cruise control.

The only place you can use cruise control is in America because in America you set cruise control at 55 and you drive for five days and you're still in the same place, right? That's why the only British road movie really is radio on, which is he gets in a car in London and he stops in Bristol. But that whole thing about, you know, not speeding is that one of the, I discovered that one of the ways to do it, it's just, you know, set your cruise control to 60.

That way you'll never drift over 70. You just set it for 65. And so I drive that. And then also in our car, it does a thing about if you're getting close to another car, it says, oh, you're close to that car. I don't know what it is. I've got like an AI car. You're not as good as driver as you think you are.

That's basically. Well, I think the way it is at the moment I could just go to sleep and the car would drive itself. But then it would wake me up and tell me I needed a cup of coffee. I mean, I think what's really, I bet there is a super luxx car somewhere, which makes emergency coffees, hands them out. Would you be happy going in one of the driverless cabs? Yes, I think so. Yes, I think so.

Because the driverless cab wouldn't go, see the football? Also, some of the, I mean, let's hear it for taxi drivers, etc. But I've had some bad ones. He was not watching his phone or whatever, you know. That's right. The driverless cab is never on the phone to its wife going, Yeah, no, I'll be back, but I've just got to do, I'm just outside. I've got to just pick this up and then...

I'm round the corner. Yeah. Anyway, what are we doing? Oh, yes, we're doing a podcast about movies and stuff. What are you talking about? We're reviewing three very different films, Love Me Tender, which is a French drama with Vicky Creeps, summer book, which is an adaptation of Somerbuken. Oh, tricky.

By Tova Janssen. And Ice Cream Man, which is the new film by Eli Roth, which sadly doesn't feature the Jonathan Richmond Ice Cream Man. What about the very popular Take 2? What's happening in there? So we will also be in Take 2. Reissues are flushed away, which is the ongoing Ardman animation reissues,

and Hunt for the Wilder people, which brings us to our special guest in Take 1. Oh, we've already done him. Yes, Tycho Wittiti. He's good, isn't he, really? Yes, and it's the 10th anniversary, and it's in 4K, and it's in cinemas and digital platforms

from this Friday. Plus a new occasional feature called Take Insert Year. Yes. And the year we are inserting is 1976. Which is fantastic. Is it? Well, I guarantee you when we get to it.

What's the idea of that then? So it's, you know, it's 50 years ago. It was 50 years ago today. I know it was 20 years ago today. 50 years ago. Yes. Was it 50? That is 50, isn't it?

Yeah. 50 years ago was 1976. So we're just going to be looking back at the chart from 1976. Rocking. Yes. And going, wow, that was a good year to be going to the cinema.

A reminder you can get take two. ad free by heading to our Patreon page. Just search Kermode and Mayo Patreon and you will find us. And there are some tickets left for Bristol on December the 6th. I can understand if you haven't grabbed a ticket because you're thinking... For the Christmas show. It's December. I haven't even had my summer holiday yet. Stop telling me about Christmas. But anyway, you don't want to miss out? The ticket link is in the show notes. People of Cleveland, Western Supermare, Gloucester and Chepstow. We're looking forward to seeing you there. It's only 75 minutes from Birmingham. So come on, Brummies. Get booking. This is sounding a bit desperate.

So I'm not going to adopt that town. I haven't done a show from Western Supermare since taking Jason Donovan on the Radio One Road Show. Not that we're going to Western Super Mayor, but, you know. You did the Radio One Road Show with Jason Donovan? Western Super Mayor completely seized up because it was the most exciting thing happening. Okay. And Super Mayor means on the seafront, does it? Super Mayor above the sea?

Yes. I mean, I'm not an expert here, but I'm imagining that that probably means that. Okay. And how was Jason? He did his super pop-tastic hats, you know, which he wore through, he changed them, I think, every other song. What was he like? He's a nice guy. Never met him?

No, I've never met him. Have you not met him? No, I haven't, no. He's reason. He did Joseph in the Amazing Technicolor Dreamco, didn't forever. Yeah. Because when, when the band that I was in won the International Street and Standards of the Year award, I don't know why you're pulling that place. Strange distra.

We're off on a strange. When we won the International Street and Standards of the Year Award in 19 blah blah blah, blah, blah. the final was held at the London Palladium. So for one night, Jason wasn't on stage doing Joseph in his amazing technical dream coat because the International Street and Standards of the Year was happening there. And we walked past what would have been his dressing room. That anecdote might be edited out, I'm thinking, but you know, you never know, do you? Melinda Roberts, hello, Melinda.

Simon and Mark, we're currently on holiday in the door doyen, and I've been enjoying relaxing by the pool whilst catching up on your podcasts. One evening last week we attended a rather lovely event at Jardin, Marquesac, which are very beautiful. On the evening we went, they were hosting various musical ensembles, stationed at various points around the vast gardens, jazz groups, Irish musicians, a saxophonist ensemble and so on. While looking out over the beautiful view, I was startled and concerned to hear a cry for help. Moving towards the direction, the cry I was reminded of your good selves as I spotted a peacock, strutting its stuff while making the crew. cry that all Vanguard Easterers will now know is not in reality a child in distress, but is Mark doing an impression of a peacock. Anyway, my real reason for getting in touch is to let you know,

now this switches into Melinda Roberts, like Christmas newsletter to all her family and friends. Okay. Getting in touch is to let you know the latest achievement of my son, Zach Roberts, you may recall him from a previous email. He was doubling for Paul Meskell in Gladiator. I do remember that. Zach and three of his colleagues have been nominated for an Emmy for outstanding stunt performance for their work in Night of the Seven Kingdoms. Zach and his wife Joanna will be attending the ceremony in September at the fittingly named Peacock Theatre in LA.

We are obviously extremely proud of him, whatever the outcome. He and Joanna welcomed their latest stunt girl, Goldie, to the family in May 25. So she's a stunt girl already. Wow. And she's already demonstrated a potential by riding horses with just a little support behind her back, I would think, like a parent. We'll keep you posted. If you want to big up your family, just get in touch.

Yeah, that's what you have to do, isn't it? Just sit there. I don't think I'd get on a horse with a baby. No, thank you. Have you seen by horse-related skull? Look. Where is that? What do you mean there?

There, that massive thing there. What did you do? I was pony trekking in Wales. Why? My parents wanted a holiday without their children, so they sent us on an adventure holiday, PGL. And I was pony trekking in Wales, and this pony kicked or whatever it was a bucked,

and it threw me off, and I went down the side of a ravine, and I put my hand out to break my fall, and it snapped both the bones in my arm in half. I'd have it plated. Wow. Yeah. So you're like the $6 million. Exactly.

You've fallen apart, or Robocop, maybe you'll Robocop. Do you have special powers? If you punch someone with that hand, you know, like Benedict Cumberbatch, would it be extra hurting? Well, it was always, I don't really you remember the thing with the $6 million man. You know, we can rebuild him. We can make him better than he was before. It was only one of his legs that they rebuilt.

So why didn't he run around in circles? That's true. It's like that doesn't make any sense. So is the metal still in your arm? No, they had to take it out a year later because I was still growing. They said to me when they put it in, they said, it's okay, it's a spiral plate. It will grow with you. And then a year later, they wrote to me and said, actually it wasn't a spiral plate.

It was just a bit of Macarno, and we'll have to take it out. And I've still got it. How did they not know what kind of plate they put in? I think they were just busy. Okay. Okay, correspondence at Kevin Mohn Mohn.com. What's out then? What are you going to review here?

Ice Cream Man, which is the new film from Eli Roth. Now, you remember Eli Roth? Eli Roth came in when Cabin Fever came out. And he was a sort of vundercind. And then he downshifted into those sort of torture-pourney hostel movies. And then he was, there was the grindhouse thing with Tarantino. And then he made the absolutely dreadful green inferno. And then he made that really weird film,

The House with a clock in its walls. Oh, yes. I do. It's just like the strangest kind of career left turn. And most recently he did that video. Is that with Jack Black? With Jack Black. I think he came on the show to talk about it.

Precisely. I do too. Actually, we just wanted to talk about all the other films he'd be. Sorry, Jack. Can we talk about School of Rock? Anyway, so this is the first film from Eli Roth's horror section label. He's co-writing and directing. It's basically, it's like an episode of the Twilight Zone,

but with massively more amounts of gore and then traditional kind of Eli Roth trademark bad taste sensibility. So set in a blue velvety type America, American suburbia, kids play baseball and they bully each other, they have dinner with their parents who go to the PTA. And then into this town comes the ice cream van, which is driven by this becapped presence who looks like John Waters, basically, and plays this cracked earworm theme. and the ice cream man hands out ice creams to all the kids who immediately turn into homicidal monsters

and start butchering their parents and their teachers. Oh. Here's a clip from the trailer. You guys see that weird ice cream man today? What do you mean weird? Like he was following me. Is everyone sick or something? Back to your classrooms.

They're not trying to kill us. They're trying to turn us. That ice is demonic. Go, go, go, go, go. What is going on here? You get the idea. So, yeah, I think I've got the whole movie there. So loads of scenes of young kids ripping out adult intestines,

squishing their parents' faces under seesaws in the play park, driving microscopes into their teachers' eyes. There is a small group of people who aren't infected by the ice cream but due to lactose intolerance in one particular case. One of them does eat the ice cream and then throws up. And the fact that throwing up solves the problem enables Eli Roth to make a joke about I'm a girl, of course I know how to throw up. So a joke about anorexia, which is kind of, that's what Eli Roth does, you know, alongside

jokes about child molestation. Anyway, so when I lived in Hume in Manchester, and there is a reason I'm saying, there was a thing that used to happen, which was at about 8 o'clock at night, this ice cream van, which we used to refer to me and Phil Gladman, who I shared a flat with, we used to refer to as the ice cream van of the apocalypse, would drive around here. I have no idea what it was selling. I'm pretty certain it wasn't ice cream. Is it hard drugs?

Who knows? It's entirely possible. Maybe it was just some very bad independent records. But it would drive around making this clang, clang, clang, clang sound. And Phil and I would go, look, there goes the ice cream van of the apocalypse. And it would be followed by a bunch of crusties with a dog on a string. You know, it's a usual. So I know what it's like.

Meanwhile, you'd hear it and you'd see it glowing through the pestilential cloud. of foul-smelling gas that came off the harp-lager factory that once literally came out of the factory and then sat over human-caused everybody's eyes. Sounds like the apocalypse. Exactly. Hence the ice cream van of the apocalypse. So, look, the thing is,

I do understand the idea of the scary ice cream van. As for this, it is not Eli Roth's worst movie by any means. It is not Eli Roth's best movie because Eli Roth, weirdly, is like Orson Wells, and I know that's going to be taken out of context, so I want to do it like this.

It's like Orson Wells. He made his best, film first and then he never came anywhere close to making another film as good as that. That is the only way in which Eli Roth is like Orson Wells. It's sort of, this is sort of mid-range Eli Roth. I mean, if you were being charitable, you'd say it's a cross between Pee Wee Herman's Big Adventure, Village of the Damned, Stand by Me and Night of the Living Dead. And I can imagine that if it was at a horror festival, people would, you know, they like

the squish. There's lots and lots of squishy tasteless gore. They'd like the fact that there are nods to Night of the Living Dead specifically. And there's one part when they're in a graveyard and there's a graveyard that says McNaughton. And I imagine that that's a joke about John McNaughton and Henry Portrait of Cirrica. So it's got all that stuff going on in it. And it's got the usual, you know, Eli Roth's squishy spatter, some of which is fun, some of which isn't. There's a certain, there's a certain frisson in the idea of the ice cream van comes, you know, gives the kids the things.

and the kids all turn into a marauding, monstrous army. The problem with that is we've had weapons. And in the wake of a film like weapons, in which that whole idea about the kids running out of their houses and then being, you remember the scene in weapons in which the kids go after. It's great. It's terrifying, right?

And when I was reviewing that film, I said that's like screamers. There's a really, really weird film from a previous century now, which used that idea about weaponized kids. So in the wake of that, it is impossible to look at ice cream man and go, oh, well, that's a, you know, that's a kind of excitingly, um, uh, edgy idea because it isn't. It's, it's just, it's just that idea played for kind of goofy, splattery. Also, the central sins of the father's thing is, is a lift from nightmare on Elm Street. So, but look, in, in a world in which you've got movies like weapons, which are, which is a really, really good film. This is just the latest Eli Roth thing. And then, as I said, it doesn't feature Jonathan Ritchie. Richmond's Ice Cream Man, which is one of my favorite songs of all time, does have music by Snoop Dog. So it's very, very much vanilla Eli Roth. And it's one central idea, which is kids eat ice cream and kill and kill the adults,

would have seemed edgier in a world in which weapons hadn't been so recently in everyone's memory as, quite simply, one of the best films of recent years. So the ice cream man is selling vanilla ice cream only and not ripple or, chocolate chip. Pretty much, yeah. Okay. Well, I might give that a miss if that's all right with them. I didn't think you were ever going to see it. There was no part of me who thought you were going to see it.

The trailer made me not want to see it. Hannah says, lads, I'm a few weeks behind, but listening to your chat on Psycho, oh, we need an ad break. Okay, so here's some ads. Queen Carvania stood haloed by the morning sun. An army hung on her every

word. My champion I have sold my chariot on Carvana. Twas a lovely SUV, an inexplicably queenly offer. They're even coming to the castle to collect it. Tonight, we feast! An offer you can feast on. Sell your car today on Carvana. Pick up fees may not buy.

Hello, it's Elizabeth Day from How to Fail here. My next guest is the actual Prime Minister, Andy Burnham. I have to be careful. This does make me quite emotional. She said, we all knew kind of what time you might be coming up Downing Street. So we got Roy and we got the telly right in front of him and six of us stood around him. And all said, look, Roy, look, look. Momentarily, they said, we thought he knew.

Listen to How to Fail wherever you get your podcasts. Right. An email from Hannah, as I was saying, lads, I'm a few weeks behind. but listening to your chat on Psycho unearthed some childhood scars. When I was eight, if you put yourself into this situation, you can see why Hannah would be traumatised.

Okay. When I was eight, we went on a family holiday to Orlando, Florida, to do all the theme parks, including universals. I'd not seen Psycho at this point, well, you are eight. But while there, my mum and dad decided to buy a new shower curtain

from the gift shop. Back home, they proudly put up the new shower curtain. Aren't shower curtains horrible things? things anyway, all of them. And when you stand in the shower, the first thing they do, they stick to your body. Which is ridiculous. And when it's in a hotel, you know that that shower curtain is stuck to the body of the previous person to stand in the shower. And there's a sign which says, please close the shower curtain. You think, no. Anyway, they put up the new shower curtain to reveal the printed silhouette of Norman Bates in a wig holding a dagger.

For years, growing up, I had to check the bath for potential murderers until they finally got rid of the bath and we had a walk-in shower instead. It took me a long time to watch Psycho as an adult. And while I agree it's an excellent film, once is enough, thank you. Keep up the good work. I love the show, Steve. Because I think we could do a shower curtain or contact the merchandise department.

But I'm sure there is kind of like a silhouette of us. I mean, apart from the fact that shower curtains are really annoying. Do you want a silhouette of us watching you while you shower? Okay, it's a stupid idea. Do you remember the bit in high anxiety? Do you remember with the shower scene in that? And the guy keeps saying to the guy, you know, I need the newspaper,

I need the newspaper, I need the newspaper, I need the newspaper, I need the newspaper, and then he's in the shower, and you see the silhouette come up, and he pulls back, and he says, a guy, you go, here's your newspaper, and he hits him with the newspaper, and then the ink goes down the thing. I think in general, anything, a shower with a curtain is a bad thing. Yes, it's a bad design. Have a shower or a bath. Yeah. Not a shower in a bath. It seems crazy. Do we need ads? No, we don't. You just done them. Yeah, but they were good. They were good, particularly the ones. I'm going to go out and buy all of those things straight away. I'm going to buy two of them. Yes.

If that's possible. But I do wholeheartedly endorse everything that we've just advertised. I could be hostage to torture. They do that in America, don't they? My name's Dingy Bong, and I endorse this message or support this message for whatever it is. That's right. Well, obviously you do because you're in the ad. That's where you pay for it.

We're departing slightly now in this section of the show because we actually, although this appears to be a live radio show, that's what people think. Yes. We actually pre-recorded it a while back. We did. At Christmas. And this is. normally where we do the chart, and we're still doing a chart, but it's just a different chart.

It's the UK top 10 films in the box office in 1976. Wow. Which is, it's an interesting thing. Before we get into it, though, I regretfully have to inform you that the redactor has created a bespoke theme tune for this feature. Oh dear. Does he just get these from his home entertainment system? On the conveyor bell. That's right.

Gully Toy. That needs some quick. Callaghan. stepped up to do the trick the sunbeed down till fields look sick and Britain baked through 76 I didn't know that's him singing he kept swimmers from the sea the pink panther browed with glee president's men uncovered tricks welcome to take 1976 Concord crossed the ocean slick the cod war gave the fleets and stick a new courtina joined the motoring mix the toast of every dad in 76 dog day afternoon match the climate mix buxie malone had splurge

Kick's a cuckoo's nest Impressed the critics Welcome to Take 1976 Sex pistol shot Bill Grundy stiff The interview went Rapidly adrift

A few choice words A culture shift And punk gave Britain Quite a lift That didn't work That was quick and fast Marathon Man was built to last The Manor would be king

Had Imperial Tricks Welcome to Take 1976 He is building his part up I thought that was just going to be like That's what I thought Music that we talked over. Yeah, and then we did start talking over it,

and then we realised that there was a voice, and then we realised that that was the redactor. Well, that was quite scary, I have to say. Also... The redactor sings could be a new album, I think, definitely. Everyone comes free with a Kermit and Mayo shower curtain. Do you remember Stiff Records released an album called The Witten Wisdom of Ronald Reagan,

and it was just blank? Yes, I think that was originally... That original joke was Tom Paxton, who had a track on an album called The Witt and Wisdom of Spiro Agnew of Spiro Agnew of Spiro Agnew is an anagram of Grow a Penus. And it was just an empty track. It was just absolutely nothing. And do you know the thing about what Spiro Agnew is an anagram of Grow a Penus? Is that right? That's not a very good thing. Anyway, we're off topic.

So we're going to run down the box office hits. You just heard them. You just heard the box office hit in the tune. He literally did a plot. spoil a jingle. But this box office is closer in time to the jazz singer and Metropolis than it is to today. Which says a lot.

Okay. It does. So we got 11 here. Why? We got 11. Anyway, well, specifically. He wanted to get dog day afternoon. Dog day afternoon is at 11. Great movie. At the Earth's core is at 10. Marathon Man is at 9. The Bad News Bears is at 8. Bugsie Malone at 7.

The man who would be king at 6. Logan's run at 5. One Flo over the Coo Who's Nest at four, all the president's men at three, the return of the Pink Panther at number two, and Jaws was number one. That's a heck of a top ten. That's pretty good, isn't it? So we asked our patronisters if they could better that year. Theo Waters says, for me, the answer is 1977. Okay, so we just moved on one year.

I could work that out from 76, 777. As it produced many of my personal favorite films, Eraserhead, Susperia, dare I say, the greatest horror movie film ever. made, sorry Mark. The Ascent. Strotsack, Herzog's greatest and most existential film, House, close encounters of the third kind, and Abigail's party.

Considering Mark's picks for 76, I think it's safe to say that the 70s were a great decade for film. Just to be clear, that's not Mark's picks, that's the box office. Yeah, that is the box office. That's like what every, that's everyone's pick. It was a thing. David Dunn says two things strike me here. Firstly, a movie that technically came out

first at the end of 75 was the biggest movie. 76. Secondly, bad news bears took more money than dog day afternoon, which is... Well, in that particular, or is that the total? That's in the total. Yeah, okay. Dogday afternoon took 993,000 pounds. Bad news bears, 1,611. Dog day afternoon, however, was also, it would have been a grown-up certificate, whereas bad newsbears would have been a lesser certificate, I believe. On the whole, though, says David, there's some absolute crackers on that list. Not the best year, however, 1977, another one, saying 77 was better because that was the,

the year, that the best film in the history of film ever came out, Brian De Palmer's Carrie, which, as any fool know, is great. And he's gone off into a whole Molesworth set of spellings there. It came out in America in 1976, so I may be wrong and right at the same time. Kim Reynolds, I amicably argue that 1974 was quite special, but there's plenty of room for them both to share some glory. I mean, just to go back to one of Mark's previous arguments, you could take any year and come up with a great top ten. Exactly. Can I just read you, very quickly, because I just checked this out. I remember seeing at the Earth's core. The reviews for at the Earth's core were not good. This was the review from the New York Times. It said the

movie is a kind of no talent competition in which the acting, the script, the direction and the camera work all via for the last place. Okay. We've got some correspondence on these. So Dog Day Afternoon, Max Seabee says, Dog Day Afternoon, it's not only the best film of the year, but also the best of the decade and continues to be influential to this day. It's a great movie. Puccino's performance is one of the best ever. Unclechunk.com ugh. It says, Jaws is the best film of all time. Dog Day Afternoon is the best film of 1976.

Work that one out. Well, that doesn't, I mean, you can't work that one. Because if Jaws is the best film of all time, it has to be the best film of 1970. So at the Earth's core at number 10. Yeah, not good. I mean, I was young when I saw it, so it was fine. Jace says, but probably not that one. He says, lovely to see at the Earth's Corps make the top 10.

Peter Cushing plays doddery to perfection. Doug McClure plays Doug McClure. Doug McClure always played Doug McClure. That's all Doug McClure ever did. He played Doug McClure to perfection. And Caroline Monroe is perfection. The special effects are as special as they could be. It's just a 90-minute switch your brain off film.

And it's the number 10. So Marathon Man is in number nine. Which, you know, easy to safe. Easy to safe. Bad News Bears, number eight. Bugsy Malone number seven. Brian Shanow says, my childhood loathing of Bugsie Malone has not waned.

Oh. In my now late 40s, may I never need to endure it again. My name is to Lou. Why? Is it a horror film? Bugsy Malone. The way you just did that little voice. I see.

Sorry. You're going to get you. The Man Who Would Be King is at number six. Here's an interesting thing about the Man Who Would Be King. Man Who Be King was originally released as an A Certificate film, which is one of those things in which you could go to see it if you were accompanied by a parent, or Guardian, which meant that you would hang around outside the cinema.

But it was A with cuts. I don't know what they cut, but it was A with cuts. Stephen Cook says, considering I have an original framed one-sheet poster for the man who would be king, prominently displayed in our front hallway, and one of my all-time favorite screenings was a special Toronto International Film Festival showing of One Flo the Cookers Nest, hosted by Chow Yun Fat. It's hard for me to argue otherwise, so he's on board with that one.

Sean Connery and Michael Cain both considered the movie the favourite of all that they had worked on, according to Wiki. Logan's Run is at number five? Which is still holds up, I think. Carrie Tolanius, hello Carrie. Logan's Run seemed to be on TNT whenever I had flu as a teenager. So I've seen it a lot more often than movies I actually like. The world building makes no sense.

So while the on-screen scenery and costume look really good, the disbelief is unsuspended once you think about it for a second. Number four is One Flover the Cookers Nest Which is majestic And it's got one of the most... Is it a theramine or is it, I think it's a saw, isn't it? I think it's a musical saw. I think it's a musical sore rather than a theramine,

but they do sound exactly the same. One Flores Ness is the first film I ever saw where people applauded at the end. Well. We're at University Film Society. I put it on. I hadn't seen it before. And, you know, the film finishes the fingers at a window

and everyone applaud it. I thought, oh, can you clap in cinemas? It has got a fantastic finale, isn't it? All the President's Men is at number three. And can I once again delight you with the story of the fact that my father took me to see it? This is where my Nixon obsession came with because my father had previously pointed to the television and said, you see that? That's the devil. And then he took me and my sister to see it.

And it was a double A certificate film and we weren't old enough. And the woman behind the counter said, are they both 14? And my dad, rather than lying, just gestured towards us. She went, okay, fine. That gesture could have meant a lot of things like, how do I know? No, exactly. And I remember looking at him thinking, that's so clever. You didn't actually lie.

You did, but you didn't actually lie. Okay, so that's all the presidents men number three. That's what we're talking about. And this is from an anonymous person. A brilliant movie, pace, relevance, even now, sadly. Tension in Spades, a terrific ensemble cast. What more could you ask? Our top production team will find out.

I think that. No, they need to get a name for that one. But thank you very much for the email anyway. The Return of the Pink Panther at number two. Dan says, Jaws is about a shark, but Return of the Pink Panther is not about a panther. And number one is Jaws. I mean, that's a good top ten, though, isn't it? That is a very good top ten. And that was kind of peak movie going for me because I was born in 63, so I was 13.

And it was like, the world is your oyster, except for the X-rated films, which is only some of it. I think the only X-rated film I saw at that point was Enter the Dragon. But that was because it was playing at this cinema, this multiplex nearest, in which screens two and screen three were joined by a toilet. So if you paid to go into screen three, you could go into the toilet, then come out into screen two. And I saw Enter the Dragon in Screen 2, in which the entire screen was full of school kids.

That's a big design floor. A big design floor. Walk out of one cinema and into the next one. That's right through the loop. Wow. Okay. We're going to take some ads and then we speak to Taika Watiti. Queen Carvania stood haloed by the morning sun.

An army hung on her every word. My champions, I have sold my chariot on Carvana. It was a lovely SUV, an inexplicably queenly offer. They're even coming to the castle to collect it. Tonight we feast. An offer you can feast on. Sell your car today on Carvana. Pick up fees, man, bye.

Hello, it's Elizabeth Day from How to Fail here. My next guest is the actual Prime Minister, Andy Burnham. I'll be careful. This does make me quite emotional. She said, we all knew kind of what time you might be coming up Downing Street. So we got Roy and we got the telly right in front of him and six of us stood around him. And all said, look, Roy, look, look. Momentarily, they said,

We thought he knew. Listen to How to Fail wherever you get your podcasts. Okay, our guest this week is New Zealand filmmaker, actor and comedian Tyco Wattiti, who I talked to about the 10th anniversary release of The Hunt for the Wilder people. Accolades include an Academy Award, BAFTA Award, Grammy Award, as well as two primetime Emmy Noms. Time magazine named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2022. Wow.

in 2022. Also, of course, Jojo Rabbit, Eagle versus Shark. Boy, what we do in the shadows. And Thor Ragnarok and Thor Love and Thunder, we will speak to Taiku Wattiti in just a moment after this clip. Hector Faulkner and Richard Baker have been missing now for six weeks. Faulkner is Hawk Asian. While they got that wrong because you're obviously white.

$10,000 to anyone who can capture them. They're alive. Alive. They should be alive So what do we do now? We run. No, we don't need to run. Oh yeah, this is fast walk.

Okay, wake him. Can I have a selfie? What's the fastest way out of here? Jetpack. Do you actually have a Jetpack? No? What? That's a clip from Hunt for the Wilder People

directed by Tykewitie. It's celebrating its 10th anniversary. You can go and see it in the cinema. And Tyker joins us on the show, Tyker. Hello, very nice to see you. Hello, nice to be here. Thanks so much. So our 10th anniversary of Hunt for the Wilder People, just to spool back 10 years somewhat more in terms of the start of the process. But how did this story come to you in the first place?

I know it's a book adaptation, but how did this land with you? I think I started writing this script in 2005, maybe 2004. So it's about 20, how many years is that? 20 years? It's about 20 years since I got asked to adapt the book. And the book is quite well known in New Zealand. It's a different title. It's called Wild Pork and Watercress, which is a dish that we make if you hunt for your food.

If you live out in the bush, you eat pork and cress. It's a very traditional dish. And I read the book. And, you know, it's this great adventure. It's like one of the touchstones for me was Paper Moon. That Bogdanovitch movie, I love the idea of like an odd couple in the form of a, grumpy old man and a young street kid on the run together out in the woods. And that story kind of just came together.

I added, I embellished a few things. I changed a little bit here and there as I usually do when I adapt things. But, yeah, essentially I wanted to tell just a sweet story that was fun and funny but at its core had something to say about the way we treat people that live on the margins, the outskirts of society. So, heck, Uncle Ector, is played, of course, by Sam Neal. Ricky Baker, who's played by Julian Dennison. Had you worked with Julian before?

Is that why? Because he's so extraordinarily fantastic in this film. Where did you first come across Julian? Yeah, I'd made a commercial with him, sort of like a PSA, an anti-drug-driving PSA. I don't know if you have them here, but in New Zealand we've also got to make anti-drink driving PSA, is we have to make anti-drug driving

because people would like to get stoned and drive. And I met him on that. I'd cast him and he was just brilliant and he just exuded this energy and just, and he was so funny. He was just a very funny young kid. And on the spot, I thought, I need you to play this role in this film. And so I didn't even make him audition. And I just, he just did it. I just gave him the part on the spot and then he came and delivered.

And he and Sam made a beautiful. couple. You know, that partnership was really, really special in the film. I watched the film again this morning and laughed a lot. It's so touching and it's so funny, but we're now with that added sadness, the fact that we lost Sam Neal just a few weeks ago, it's impossible to watch it maybe with that same lightness of heart. I don't know what you make of that. Yeah, yeah. I haven't seen it since he departed us. And I will be watching it tonight. Yeah, it will be very different. I mean, it's very fresh for all of us,

and I still feel strange when people leave. I often quite equate that with actually with the idea of death, and it's the finality of it all. You know, we would talk often, and he would just text me out of the blue and check in and things, and I won't be getting those texts anymore. No. I think you worked together quite recently,

again, on a commercial, like a Jurassic Park thing, is that right? That's right. We did a Super Bowl commercial together with the original cast of the original Jurassic Park. It was him, Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum. And there were old outfits and everything. And that was really fun. That was the last time we worked on together. But he'd been fighting his fight for a few years, but he was really on the mend and he'd bounced back. So it was quite surprising for us. I think you could tell from the outpouring of love online that so many people felt an extraordinary. connection with him, not just because of his acting skills, not just because of all the

films and TV that we'd watched. But there was something, I think maybe it was his lockdown films when he was talking about the things that really mattered to him, how he wasn't, I'm not an actor, it's just that I act, it's the thing that I do. And there was that twinkle in his eye, which is hard to explain, really, but he had something special. He really did, yeah. And he had a great love for humans and for just for people and he was a very kind and loving person he loved the environment and nature he was always just he was always on the right side it seemed he said you look forward to working with tycho when he's having fun we're all having fun well that's good i heard an interview that you did with radio new zealand a while back and you said in that interview i don't feel as

though I've felt so good making a film before or since making hunt for the world of people. Yeah, I still feel like that was the most enjoyable experience I've had. We had a very small crew and it really felt like a family. Everyone just helped each other. And when you work overseas, there are a lot of boundaries and you've got to, you know, especially with various crews, people don't like you touching their stuff. They don't want to help each other and everyone's got their own kind of little clique. but maybe it's just a New Zealand thing as well

but on that film in particular just everyone banded together and we were out in the middle of nowhere out in the wilderness and it just felt like a big adventure and I was just I just remember being happy all the time and from Sam Neal's words it sounds as though that transferred itself

to the movie itself to everyone you were working with to what we see on the camera yeah I don't usually watch my things my films again or not for many years And I did watch this about two years ago, maybe about seven or eight years after we made it. And I did think, it's a New Zealand thing as well.

We don't like to sort of talk ourselves up. But I did watch it. I thought, this is a pretty good movie. And I really enjoyed watching it. And I think there was enough distance time-wise that I felt like maybe someone else had made it so I could enjoy it more. But yeah, it is one of the films that I feel proud of

and I don't mind watching. Many people have said, and you've said quite a few times, it is a very New Zealand film, maybe the most New Zealand film that has had success around the world. What do us non-kiwees miss? What do we not get?

Is it some of the jokes? What is it that we... Nothing, there's some little inside jokes that some New Zealanders will get, but then I watched it, I thought, oh man, my kids don't unsan any of these jokes. It's probably more... They're relevant to people of my generation

and before me, probably. And a lot of them are so far. fleeting and fast. You don't, you can sort of skip over them. I think my worry was that some of them would be so obscure that it would pull people out of the picture, but I feel like that hasn't, it hasn't affected the viewing experience. This might be a crazy thought, Tyker, but when I was watching it this morning, it reminded me of Bong Joon Ho's The Parasite film.

Oh man, what a compliment. I can't see it. Well, in as much as the more Korean he made it, the more, internationally relevant it became. And it seems to be with your film, the more Kiwi you made it, the greater its appeal around the world. Well, you might be right.

I mean, maybe it's that you should just be true to where you're from and your own voice or the voice of where you're from. Otherwise, it just feels maybe repetitive and it feels like everything else that comes out of every other mainstream filmmaking industry. So I suppose if I just emulate everything

that came out of Hollywood and it's just like going to feel like just another Hollywood film. So yeah, I think that's probably something that most of my early films share. They're very New Zealand and makes them feel very unique. And it's a little doorway into a place that most people wouldn't ever experience if they weren't from there. There is a spectacular cameo from yourself in Hunt for the Wilder People where you're playing a priest, which I watched two or three times. It's just hilarious because I think we've all heard totally useless sermons. Yes.

Where did that come from? That actually came from some people when I had done it, they thought it's too much, it's too ludicrous, and they just thought it was sort of too silly. But that's actually almost word for word in the exact sermon that came from my friend's father's funeral that I attended. And I remember this guy talking about confectionery in the afterlife and these different doors. And it was super confusing. And I remember just relishing and being there and being able to absorb that. And I thought, no one else has got access to this. I'm going to steal everything from this priest.

And I'm going to use it one day in a movie. And it was about eight years later that I remembered that. And I thought, okay, this is the perfect time. And I just wrote down how I remembered it. And it was pretty much, that's how I delivered it. And it still brings me a lot of joy. I like to watch myself. I'm not like my other people who are sort of like.

Like, I really get off on watching myself and my own work. So I wanted that scene to be longer. Yeah, well, it's still very funny. I think it's the bit where you say Coke Zero, which is behind one door and behind the other door, and that which leads to another door, and then there's Jesus eventually. Anyway, I thought it's fantastic.

Code Zero and only just came out then, too, so it was a new thing, newfangled, fizzy drink. I'd like to see a whole film based around that priest, just a thought. Well, you're in luck, because I'm trying to, I've been thinking the same thing. I would love to do that character as the centre of a film.

The other bit I wondered whether it was you, Tyker, is the scene where they're singing Happy Birthday to Ricky Baker. It just sounds like something that you would have composed. Yeah, we couldn't get the rights to happy birthday, which was really surprising to me. Do you need rights for that?

I don't know if anyone who's put the right, who's put Happy Birthday in their films need to start panicking, but you're not allowed to use that, which we found out. It's still allowed to copyright somehow. And so we had to change it on the day. And Rima, who played Ballas, she happens to be a really great musician. So I had this cassiotone keyboard with me that I used to carry around, gave it to her,

and said, let's just figure out a song. And we all sort of pitched together, but I wanted it to feel like a more ridiculous version of, an original version of Happy Birthday, that she, that character might feasibly come up with. and so we all kind of just came up with these different lines and I remember wanting the trifle line but yeah there was actually more of a group effort but I'll take a credit for it of course because that's what you do when you're the director

and Sam Neal's face while whilst the other two are singing is of course a complete picture he's so unimpressed with the whole thing when you go and see it tonight are you looking forward to it or dreading it a bit what do you think when you're sort of going in and publicly watching this film?

I always feel uncomfortable. I always squirm a little bit in moments of my films where I feel like, I could have done that better. But I think enough time's passed now that I can just sort of let it wash over me. I think I'll be fine. I'll have some friends there and Carthew will be there who produced it, made the film with me, and Rachel House will be there. She plays Paula, the social worker.

And Julian also will be. then. So it'll be a great reunion for us so we can share in that awkwardness together. You've talked before about finding a film in the edit or giving the tone in the edit. Is that what happened with this film? It did, but actually I think, I feel like this is one of the films that ended up closest to the script I'd written than any of the other ones. I think all the other films I'd made were really found in the edit. But this one followed that structure pretty closely. You knew where it was going. We knew all the major beats. I just feel that. I just feel like it was sort of the easiest of the films that I've made.

Obviously, it's on streamers and stuff, but now it's in the cinema and it's such a beautiful film. Not only is it funny and very moving, very profound, it looks beautiful. That's Lachlan Millen, a fantastic cinematographer. But also me, because I'm the one who says, yes, push the red button. So I also will take credit for that. What do we get next from you, Tyca? What's new from you? Is it the James movie? Yeah. James is the plan. Anne. We're currently developing that. Percival's writing, and that's pretty exciting to me. I love that book so much.

That's Percival Everett who wrote for it. Oh, I've got another movie coming out this year, too, Clara and the Sun, based on the adaptation of the Kizuo Ushiguro novel. You might remember he wrote The Remains of the Day, and many other great books that have been turned into films. Anyway, that's coming out in late October. I think it might be playing in the London Film Festival. I may be mistaken. I'm not sure. But I'm going to be back here in October to promote that.

You guys got to see that movie. We'll do that. Maybe we'll talk about that when it comes out. But in the meantime, to keep us going, a 10th anniversary of Hunt for the World of People is out at a cinema near you. Tyke. Thank you so much. I hope you enjoy your film tonight.

Thank you so much, mate. Take care. And you can hear Mark's review of the new 4K re-release of Hunt for the World of People in Take 2. You can get that on Patreon. What else is out, Mark? What can we go and see?

Love Me Tender, which is a French drama directed by Anna Kazanav Kambay, who made Gold for Dogs. This is based on a 2020 novel. Now, you read more than I do by Constance Debray. Is that a name that you know? No, it is not a name that I know. Okay, so she was a lawyer, left her husband for a woman, became a full-time writer, and then became embroiled in a very fierce child custody battle, which then became the subject of some books that she wrote, including the one that this is based on from 2020. So this stars Vicky Creeps, who was so brilliant in Phantom Thread, as Clemens, who we first meet in a swimming pool, and she's obsessive about swimming, and the water is kind of a metaphor for a lot of the stuff that's going on around her,

a state of mind, the fluidity of water, the way in which she absolutely dedicates herself to the physical pursuit of being a swimmer, memories of birth, childhood, all that stuff. In the showers afterwards, she has an encounter with a woman, and we learn that the book that she is writing will detail the encounters that she has had with women. She has an eight-year-old son called Paul. Father of Paul is Laurent, who we hear is the first and only man that she had a relationship with. They were together for a long time. She left three years ago.

They are now separated, but they share custody, and they've never bothered to get divorced. But now she wants to get divorced. And when she first tells Laurent that she's dating girls, he seems okay about it. But then one of her friends says, well, no, now he knows that. that is angry and she's right. And the next thing is that her son doesn't want to see her and her husband, soon to be ex-husband, is shutting down all contact. Now, I'm going to play you a trailer, a clip from the trailer, which obviously is not in English. So I'm going to tell you what's said. So he said, he's my ex. We alternate custody of our eight-year-old son. Hi, Mom. And it works

fine. And then she says to him, I date other women and I have affairs. And he says, I'm just glad you're happy. Well, good night. And then he tries to kiss her and she pulls back. Oh, I can't. No. I thought maybe. Then on the phone, hello Paul, Clements, he doesn't want to talk to you. And then we hear a counselor saying, Paul was manipulated by his father. Paul said to the judge, he doesn't want to see me,

Paul was manipulated by his father, he doesn't believe what he wrote to the court. So that's the translation. Here's the clip. Luis, it's my ex. For our son, we're in one second on two. There's never a problem. I have two stories with the kids.

The stories of love. I'm, what I feel is that you're going to be a good night. No, uh, no. No, no,

not to do. No, I've got to I've cried. Hello, Paul? Clemence, I said, he never would not be to talk.

Oh, Judge, Paul had said that he never to me see. So, then for, I think I prefer your version. Exactly.

Thank you very much, yes. I brought more to the character. I think I invested in it. So, fast forward six months, things have got really horrible. The soon-to-be ex-husband is accusing her of incest and paedophilia, either directly or by third-party association because of the literature that she's got around the house. The child is now calling his mother nuts. And we start to hear the story narrated as if from the book that she is writing about this. And now, I haven't read the book,

and I didn't know the real life story before I watched the film. I only found this out in retrospect. But the writing, which I imagine, much of which must be taken directly from the book is very, very powerful. There's a section in which the central character talks about how when she was first a mother, she took her lesson from seeing a dog with its pups and deciding that she was going to become a mother in a way that didn't negate her own personality. She said, this is the quote, without womanish absurdity, the obscenity of mothers, without losing herself. And we also learn from the people around her that although men frequently abandon their children, women leaving is rarer and is quite often considered by people in general and often by the legal system to be essentially unforgivable, that it's not something that you do.

And to do so would be monstrous. And actually, weirdly enough, it's a subject which is talked about in Claire Deidre's book, monsters. And I think that the film does a really good job of showing how clemen, is othered, how because of her life choices, because of her sexuality, because of her gender, because at one point, one of the doctors actually has to point out that being an author is not in itself an indication of a personality flaw, because that's how absurd it's become. The worst thing about it is the sheer lumbering process.

I mean, you remember watching Kramer versus Kramer? Yeah. And I think that was probably, I think, the first time I had seen a drama about some, you know, a child caught between parents. The thing that this captures is the way that just the, the lumberingness of the process means that you lose because you lose the years. I mean, at one point somebody says it takes two years and you never get that time back. And there is, I mean, Vicky Creeps is terrific in everything. I've never seen a give a bad performance. And during the course of the drama, we see her change.

We see her change from being this fairly carefree character that we meet at first to somebody who is literally looks like they're carrying the weight of the world on their shoulder. And I think that they have scenes of the supervised visits that she has to have with her child in which there are two people there who have to be there to super. And the awkwardness, the difficulty of having any kind of intimate contact with your child who you haven't been allowed to see for 18 months. I mean, all this stuff, obviously it's dramatic, but it would be very, very, very. easy to do it badly and for it to become melodramatic and it never does that at all. The other thing about it is that it's also got in its depiction of her life like the clubbing scenes reminded me of some of the kind of sweaty intensity of the scenes from William Freakins cruising, which is a film I really like.

It's got the composer for it is Max Sens Ducer, who was Oscar nominated for Best Sound for Amelia Perez. It's got a very, very good needle drop by King Krull, and I confess that I only know King Krull's work because of child too, but it's a very, very good needle drop. And the sort of, you know, you know how when a film uses bits from other film, like people are watching something on television and it's always significant, right? So the two things that get, what... It's never like match of the day or anything.

It's never match of the day. It's never, you know, the Great British Breakoff. So at one point, they're watching the Incredible Shrinking Man, which I did record, and I thought, okay, that is smart because it means it's two things. Firstly, it's a thing about somebody being reducing and reducing and reducing, so nobody notices them anymore, but also it's to do with the shrinking man being the husband. And another thing is cries and whispers, which is kind of, you know, a little bit on the nose. But anyway, I thought the whole thing was really well done.

And it just reminded me how much I love Vicky Creeps as an actor. And I thought you're right there with this character up against this absolutely infernal system, which seems to just simply say, because of your life decisions, because of who you are, because of your gender, because you are basically going to be completely, othered from your life and I thought it was very powerful. Correspondence at Cumberna Mare.com is our email if you want to join in any of this. And also if you want to join in The Laughter Lift. And I mentioned this for a particular reason.

We just play the music, obviously. All the jokes in today's episode of The Lafter Lift supplied by our Ultras on Patreon. Is one of our Ultras Child 3? No, no. No, no. All literally ultras, okay. Graham Hall, Toby King and Pete Wyard. Wyard?

Wyard. Okay, great. Okay. They are the people who sent in that these three jokes in order. Okay. So you can't be that rude about that. Right, okay. Hey, Mark, did you hear about the clown who got fired on his first day at the circus?

No. He's suing for fun-fair dismissal. That's quite good. That's good. That was Graham Hall. Fun fair dismissal. Yeah, fun fair dismissal. Mark, I rearranged the herbs in my garden

in alphabetical order. My neighbour said, I don't know how you find the time. I said, it's right next to the Tarragon. I mean, everyone is there. They're just trying to think, what's the, another herb. The beginning with tea that goes before time. I know Tarragon. That's what it is.

Thank you, Toby. And Pete says, hey, Mark, I took the shell off my racing snail to see if it was. make it go faster, but it just became more sluggish. Obviously, we don't encourage that kind of thing because it's a nasty thing to do. As in putting your herbs in alphabetical order, that's not a good thing to do. Thank you very much to our ultras.

They were good, they were good. That thing about, I don't know how you find the time, it's right there next to the tarragon, reminded me of what I still think is the funniest line from Fulte Towers, when she says, I can't see the sea. And he says, yes, you can. It's there between the land and the sky. Very good. Correspondence of cabanemot.com, thank you very much indeed. Mark is about to talk about summer book. Summer book on. That's the one he's going to talk about soon after this.

Evening, buyer's remorse. Buy a new car? I'll be moving in. Let's get started. Sorry, I think there's been a mistake. I bought it from Carvana. You what? Yeah, great price. I even have seven days to love it or return it. So there's no... No, no buyer's remorse. More lives. buyers rejoice? I guess I'll let myself out. Congratulations. I mean it.

Buyers rejoice. Buy your car today on Carvana. Limitations and exclusions may apply. See our seven day return policy at Carvana.com. Hello, it's Elizabeth Day from How to Fail here. My next guest is the actual Prime Minister, Andy Burnham. I have been quite emotional. She said, we all knew kind of what time you might be coming up Downing Street.

So we got Roy and we got the telly right in front of the TV. right in front of him and six of us stood around him. And all said, right, look, look. Momentarily, they said, we thought he knew. Listen to How to Fail wherever you get your podcasts. On the subject, oh, this is an email from Philip Davis. Hello, hello, hello.

On the subject of watching films, is that Mark the Hoopal? No, no, it's his public image. Hello, hello, hello, it's the beginning of, yeah, it's the beginning of whatever that song is. It's beginning of the public image limited, isn't it? But there is, yeah. There's also Motta Hooper which starts with, Hello, which I'll, it'll come to me.

Oh, okay. On the subject of watching films at an inappropriately young age. Yes. A regular theme. In the very early 1980s, we lived in Guyana, in South America. Okay. A tropical paradise, but in those days, without a TV service of any kind.

Wow. Isn't that incredible? And limited access to cinema. As enterprising, Guyanese set up a video club, but with a difference. A contact in the USA used to record American TV onto VHS tapes and ship them to Guyana. For a subscription fee, members used to get three tapes a week. On the tapes used to be a mixture of American family shows like Fantasy Island and The Love Boat.

And feature films, the beauty of it was you never knew what was on the tape until you started watching it. I mean, that's it. The word beauty is doing a lot of lifting in that sentence. One afternoon, myself, says Philip, age 10, my two sisters, age 7 and 13, and some friends, settled down to see what we had. Alien, it said. Brilliant. Well, we'd heard of that, not to worry that my sister was only 7.

We could sit on her head at the appropriate moment so she couldn't see the gore, which is a little extreme. I mean, you could just put your hand over her eyes, maybe? But no, they sat on her head. She could still hear the sound effects. Her imagination did the rest for a truly traumatising experienced. experience for her and we loved it. Later on one of these tapes, I found

phantasm, which I watched at the age of 11 for my own truly terrorizing movie experience. No TV, no mobile phones. Guyana was an amazing place to live back then, and I'm sure it still is. Tickety-tonk, down with mobile phones and social media, Philip Davis. So I looked at this, Guyana, the official full name of Guyana,

because normally the People's Republic of, or the Democratic Republic of, and if it says, Democratic in the title, it's kind of probably not. Anyway, this is the Cooperative Republic of Guyana. Fantastic. Does any other country have cooperative in the title? And is the least densely populated country in the world?

Wow. There you go. Top facts about Guyana. Thanks to Philip Davis. Okay, summer book and summer book, midsummer. Midsomer. Weirdly, which does. So the summer book, which is an adaptation of a novel,

1970s, novel by Tovi Anson, creator of Moomin. and herself, the subject of that movie from 2020, Tov. And originally, in its original title, Somar Boken. I like the way you're fully in character now. I like the word, Somar Buchen. So directed by Charlie McDowell, apparently son of Malcolm and Mary Steemorgan. So also stepson of Ted Danson and son-in-law of Phil Collins. Really?

Apparently. What about Phil Collins? Yeah, apparently that's the game. I mean, I'm absolutely certain that I'm not making that up. I'm drawing a family tree in my head now. Yeah, no, I'm good. Yeah, no, that is right. Anyway, so, blah, blah,

has directed other stuff, although weirdly the thing that I knew his name from was that he produced Lurker, which I really liked. I think this was actually made before Lurker. This is a UK-U.S. Finnish co-production. I think it was actually made before Lurk. It was shot back in 23, played the festival circuit in 24, opened in Finland in early 2025, where it became a number one hit, big smash hit in Finland. Okay, so a young girl, six, seven, something like that, spending the summer with her father and grandmother on a small island in the Gulf of Finland, dealing with the loss of her mother.

The film opens with an image of ice melting, which sort of sets the general tone of the thing, you know, that over the course of the drama, things are going. going to thought. They've come here as mid-sommar approaches. In fact, we also, we get the wearing of the... Oh, really? Yes. Do people jump off cliffs? No, it's nice mid-sumar, not smashy-facedy mid-sommar. Although, as our young heroine says, it might as well be midwinter. Her dad is withdrawn and reclusive. He's clearly stricken with grief. He's unable to reconnect with his daughter as a result of his grief. She is looking for connections. She befriends a cat at one point, She says, the more I love him, the more he hates me, which, as the good lady professor, her indoors will tell you, is absolutely typical cat behavior. As everybody knows, if a cat walks into a room and there's one person in the room that is allergic to cats and five other people that love cats, the cat will go and sit on the lap of the person that's allergic to cats.

Which only goes to prove that dogs are better. And you think that cats are all evil. They are. And you also say, hello, Professor McGonagall. Whenever I see a cat, because it just seems wise, they'll come and sit on me. The real heart of the film, however, is Glenn Close. So Glenn Close is the grandmother. Incidentally, Glenn Close should have won an Oscar for the wife a few years ago.

And I'm still annoyed that she didn't because she really should have done it. So she's the font of learned life wisdom. She's indomitable. She also apparently invented scouting for girls. And now, because her memory is starting to fail, she can't even remember what it was like to go camping. she smokes, she would probably smoke a pipe. I think she would almost certainly be in Women Pikes Moking Corner. She communes naked with nature.

Okay, that's not necessary. Well, it's tastefully done, you know, but she's very, you know, she's earthy. And the conversations between her and her granddaughter are all about God and family and scouting and death and grief. And those are the core of the film. Here is a clip from Summerbook. What do you think there's more of? Stars in the sky or fish in the sea? Margotts would be stars in the sky. Me too, but I would not want the council.

Come with me. Mommy's favorite tree. You think it will grow? He doesn't love me since you died. That is nonsense. I'm trying. I won't be here forever. being close, doing the accent.

Doing a finished accent. I feel very guilty now because my conversations with grandchild one and two revolve around tangy worms and do you prefer chocolate stars or tangy worms? Not death, grief. Not death and God. Maybe that comes later. It's a whole different thing. Tangy worms win.

So basically they, it's those conversations that are the heart of it. There's a lovely thing in which they go to. there's another little island and it's got a private sign on it. They're not allowed to land there. So she immediately lands there. And then she says, oh, yes, all these people come in. They don't know what they're talking about. And then, of course, it turns out that the people are actually really nice.

And she says, this is socializing. You have to learn to do it. And she's doing this lovely performance of the kind of the grandmother that everybody wishes they had the fond of all wisdom. But as you heard in that thing, when she says, I won't be here forever. We also know she won't be here forever because she's, has a movie cough and nobody coughs in a movie. No.

Unless that's happening. So I thought her performance was great. One of the things that's really good about it is she's, it's a really physical performance. She moves like a much older person. It's something to do with the, the way in which she walks, the way in which she holds her up.

She just looks much older than she really is, obviously. And she does this thing which is really clever, which is that she's somehow, sticks her jaw forward that kind of reshapes her face. It's like a trans- I mean, obviously, there's a degree of background, but there's a transformation involved in it, which is all to do with the physical performance. Glenn Close is a brilliant actor. I never saw Glenn Close on stage, but she is an absolutely brilliant actor on screen, and I think her performance is terrific. I think the rest of the film is fine. There's this whole thing about they're waiting for

the arrival of Edickson, who, like, Godot doesn't appear, and he won't here because the father says he doesn't like the stench of grief that keeps him away. And she says, yeah, or self-pity, which you've got to go over. You heard also the score there. The score is very kind of tinkly. It's Polish composer, Hanurani, lots of sort of gentle, you know, piano tinkling, kind of echoing the sounds of nature. And then there's a thing about storms and guilt and the fact that the child has to come to

turn. So it's a sort of life lessons, early coming of age, bonding. between, you know, across generations. And you heard from the clip. You know what movie you think it is from the clip? It is exactly that film. Apparently the book is incredibly well regarded, which I have not read and is thought to be very, very profound and very precise, very particular. I don't think the film is those things, but I enjoyed it and I enjoyed it a lot because of Glenn Close's performance. And I just check this out. I am right about this, that the director is indeed the son of Malcolm McDowell and Mary Steenbergen

and his relatives, Ted Danson, stepfather, Phil Collins, father-in-law. Would you prefer tangy worms or chocolate stars if you had to choose? Tangy worms. Okay, I think that's right. Also, you talk about film coughs. This is quite tangential, but there was an interview that Mayor Mandarney in New York did with the New York Times.

And he obviously sounded so quite a bad guy. cough and he coughs quite a number of times and he apologises for it and the interviewer says have you had it you know you need to be checked out you know that if you've had a cough for a long time and he's and he coughs again he says yes I have had it checked out that's why I believe in universal healthcare and it was like this guy is extraordinary you know even something that probably an editor would take out of an interview even that was a politician who knows how to and child of a very good A very fine filmmaker. Indeed. Indeed.

So, you know, so media trained, knows what he's doing. That's it for this week. This has been a Sony Music Entertainment production. This week's team, Jen, Eric, Josh and Heather. The producer was Dom and the redactor was Simon Paul, who sang also. But may that be the lot. Actually, I suspect that's going to be the first of many.

There are plenty more waiting for you over in Take 2, where we head to the overflow car park. For extra reviews, more of your emails. Five question film club. Three questions, you mentioned. And questions. Schmestians, in which this week were asked, it might get dropped if we're running too long,

which films were critically acclaimed in their time, awards and all, and then simply faded from history. You get all of that ad free by signing up to our Patreon. Mark, what is your film of the week? Well, my reissue of the week, definitely Hunt for the World of People, which we're going to talk about more in Take 2, but my new film of the week, Love Me Tender. And don't forget, Avon Ladies and Avon gentlemen,

will be at the Bristol Beacon on December the 6th. And we'll be able to... You said Avon ladies. Did you mean as in Bing Bong? Yes, I think that's the joke. That was a joke. Or the ladies were a haven. That's so topical, that joke.

When did Avon calling last actually happen? Yeah. Probably the 1970s. 1970s. 1970s. 1970s, probably. Okay, so let's just say, if you live in the area of Avon, get a ticket.

The link is in the show notes. Sanjeevi's going to be me next week. And if you haven't seen it, go to which Instagram feed it's on. I think it is probably on our Patreon Instagram feed of Sange singing to Elvis by your Duke Box

in Shobbies North London. I watched it again the other day it is still one of the loveliest clips ever. He just goes straight in. Absolutely, it's fantastic. And I love Sanjeeve being me. I just wish that I could step, you know, on one of his cop shows I could be Sanjib for a day. What would you have in your rucksack?

I think I would have... Tangy worms. Tangy worms and a support cushion. probably. The ultra membership, yeah, goes, so correspondent of the week, I think I'm going to go with Hannah, who was traumatized by the psycho shower cushion, shower, shower, shower, I mean, any shower, I mean the shower cushion, no, that's not going to work, but a shower curtain is a terrible, terrible thing, and one which has the most terrifying shower scene emblazoned on it, and children are expected to take a shower under there.

Yeah, but you suggested that we make a shower. curtain with our silhouettes on it? You think that would be less disturbing? That would be equally disturbing. I have a friend who can, you know, the feeble, you know, you step into the bath, you pull the shower coat, you adjust the knobs. Start to sound like Trump, be careful. And it gets a little, you get a little dribble coming out of the thing.

And I had a friend who described those showers as Christian showers. Because they were designed by people who obviously think you can't have any pleasure in a shower. So it's a miserable shower. That's the whole point. It's a Methodist shower. It's a Methodist shower. You can have a bit of water, but don't enjoy it at all. Thanks for listening.