Kermode & Mayo’s Take - Rachel Weisz and Alice Birch, Dead Ringers, Evil Dead Rise & How To Blow Up A Pipeline

Episode Date: April 21, 2023

Rachel Weisz and Alice Birch discuss remaking David Cronenberg's chiller ‘Dead Ringers’ and the importance of depictions of birth on screen. Super subs Rhianna Dhillon and Robbie Collin stand in whilst Mark and Simon are away. Robbie reviews ‘How To Blow Up A Pipeline’ - about a group of environmental activists who want to make their voices heard and disrupt an oil pipeline; ‘Evil Dead Rise’ an American supernatural horror film written and directed by Lee Cronin, which is the fifth installment of the Evil Dead film series; as well as Prime Video series ‘Dead Ringers’. Time Codes (relevant only when you are part of the Vanguard): 09:18 Evil Dead Rise Review 19:30 Box Office Top 10 36:14 Rachel Weisz and Alice Birch interview 52:53 Dead Ringers Review 59:22 Laughter Lift 01:02:26 How To Blow Up A Pipeline 01:10:17 What’s On EXCLUSIVE NordVPN Deal ➼ https://nordvpn.com/take Try it risk-free now with a 30-day money-back guarantee! You can contact the show by emailing [e-mail] or you can find us on social media, @KermodeandMayo A Somethin’ Else & Sony Music Entertainment production. Find more great podcasts from Sony Music Entertainment at sonymusic.com/podcasts and follow us @sonypodcasts To bring your brand to life in this podcast, email [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Get holiday ready at Real Canadian Superstore. Will you find more legendary ways to save than any other major grocery? Until December 13th, you'll get a free PC turkey when you spend $300 or more. That's right, free only at your Super Holiday Store. Conditions apply to fly for details. Hello and welcome to Cermode and Mayo's take. Or should I say, Rihanna and Robbie's take? Sounds good to me. How you doing, Robbie? Very well, thank you, Rihanna. How you doing? Yeah, really well. Thank you. What have you been up to? I know you've been away? Yes, I've been away for the Easter holidays back up

in the homeland visiting Perth Show with the family, which is very lovely. Have you ever heard of these woodland activity things? So the one we went to was called a loft. Now, other arboreal recreational facilities are available, but this is one of these things. A loft. A loft, yes. So you take your children into the forest.

Okay, so hands on the grid. Sounds brilliant already. Lead your children to the forest. I mean, climb up up. I mean, even more. So you climb up this ladder that's propped against the trunk of like a mighty pine and get up to the top and then sort of tie your children to cables and then throw them out of the tree. So and then have if they're not so been tied correctly, they will then swing gracefully to the next tree and then the next tree, and you know, you climb around and go for obstacles and go. There's one of these activities that you do in a state of abject panic for two hours, okay,

because I was in the middle of it, so kids are at nine and eight, and so I was between them, and so kind of tying one here and then untying one there, and then, you know, quarreling the whole thing. So you go around with your, And so I was between them and so kind of tying one here and then untying one there and then you know, quarreling the whole thing. So you go around with your, all of your internal organs in your mouth every single one. And then at the end, after two hours of misery, you feel really good about yourself. Oh, that was great.

What a hero, you know, I could do that again. So it was, it was, it was great fun. It was amazing. And also terrifying. And I sort of, I don't know why you would do that to yourself. No, I don't know why, but it was actually really enjoyable. The other thing that I did was took them to see the Super Mario Brothers film.

Oh, of course. You're one of them. Because I'm afraid, yes, because there was, there was no family press screening for that. Normally when studios are bringing a big family animation, they'll do like a Sunday before a release. Get the kids into town, you know, sort of, get them to play on sugar. Get them as high as possible on sugar. Get the kids into town, you know, sort of...

Get them a pie on sugar. Get them as high as possible on sugar. Get the critics as high as possible on sugar. And just so that people can see the film and the kind of optimum child-friendly environment. This did not happen for the Super Mario Brothers film. Not oh. And so...

Hence my point of wine. So I was very happy. Wine, you face it as a point of wine. I saw this film at 10 AM. So a point of wine was out of the question. Yes, I did. No, thank you. Point of mind would have been, listen, we'll come to this, okay?

But of the two things I did for my kids during the whole days, throwing them out of the tree was probably the better part. Better part of the painting. But we'll come, you know, when the top 10, we can definitely come to that. Well, definitely come to that. What have we got coming up on the show actually today? Yeah, so we've got our reviews of the following films,

how to blow up a pipeline and evil dead rise and also the Amazon series, Dead Ringers. Yes, Dead Ringers, I was so excited. This kind of fell on my week because I got to speak to the star of Dead Ringers, the double star, Rachel Weiss and the show's brilliant writer, Alice Birch, who when I was kind of doing my research,

there is not a show that she has written on or been involved in in some way that I haven't loved. Yes, right. She also called the Wonder, the Great Sebastian Leroyal Film, which is phenomenally clever piece of adaptation. It is, and also obviously succession. She's been a story editor on and conversations with friends and normal people, basically everything that I've loved. There's also going to be more stuff in Take Two for subscribers and the Vanguard this week. So extra content includes the three musketeers, D'Artagnan, which I've got to that I've not seen yet, but it's very highly on my list because of all the honky French musketeers in it. Ghosted, pretentious, moire, so Robbie, this is your second go,

your second runoff. One for one so far. far yes I can't wait for this I recognize that piece of writing I did ten years ago of course and then we've got take it or leave it you decide so our word of mouth on a podcast feature this week is the death of Dick Long I don't know why is it like that we've got one frame back which is films featuring twins because of dead ringers. And Trinklybox is also at free on Tuesdays alongside all our other extra content on the take channel and support us, please via Apple podcasts or head to extratakes.com for non-fruit related devices.

So we've had perhaps a surprising number of people get in touch about a phantasia, which is the inability to create mental imagery. So, we're going to kick off with these two emails, but we'll go more on this topic and take two. Dear in a monologue and mind's eye, and a tip top production team. Following on from last week's email, I'm writing in as another person with Affantasia. Like Mark, many people I know find it particularly confusing and interesting, and I often deal with a lot of questions from friends and acquaintances when they find out.

In one line, it's essentially the opposite of a photographic memory. Like the other emailer, I also have a similar response to horror films. No matter how grim and gory, once the credits roll, I simply cannot recall the images, so they have very little long-term effect on me, but I absolutely love horror nonetheless. I write this on the tube to a preview of the new Evil Dead. A good story, a memorable plot development, or a perfect bit of dialogue can all leave a lasting impact. The three things that sum up a Fantasia for me that help explain it to others. When you read a book to imagine the characters and the scenes as they are being described, I cannot. I love reading, but this is perhaps why I particularly look forward to film and TV adaptations.

It's my first chance to see the things I read. The next one is, if you think back on a favourite holiday, can you remember scenes, moments, or images? I cannot. I've seen the Eiffel Tower, the Las Vegas Strip and the Pyramid at Giza, but I cannot picture any of them. I can recall no memories, just the knowledge that I was there. Gosh, this is fascinating. And finally, they said, when you think of a family member, a parent, a child, or a best

friend, can you imagine what they look like and hear their voice? I can't. I genuinely cannot picture what my mom and dad look like, or my flatmate I've known for over a decade, who I'd just said goodbye to 15 minutes ago as I left the house. This is the way life has always been for me, it's absolutely my normal and I don't feel like I'm missing anything. When it comes to films, if anything, it's a blessing, because rewatching something visually spectacular is essentially like seeing it for the first time.

I might remember what happens, but I can't recall what it looked like, no matter how much flair, pizzards, bayhem, and lens flair. Hello to Jason, so you both in the Union Chapel soon, Ian, in Rainy Finchley. I would be fascinated to hear what Ian and Rainy Finchley thought of evil dead rights. I mean, we'll come to this in the review,

but the way in which that film was built, it is pure experience, right? There's not necessarily, I mean, there are obviously incredibly vivid and graphic images to take away with you and to torment your all hours of the night, but it's very much built for that in the moment experience. And I think it may be the kind of film that works especially well with that condition possibly. Yeah, that sounds exactly what would be perfect for Ian. We've got another one from Paul Redmond who says,

Dear All-Seeing-I, and I've seen it all. Following one from your discussion about A Fantasia last week, I wanted to let you know that there is also a condition at the opposite end of the scale. I am hyper-fantastic. I'm sure you do. Which means I can picture life-like, very real images when I think of them in my head. It's not uncommon, about 10 to 15% of people, as opposed to a Fantasia, which is about 3 to 4% of people, but it has its positives and negatives. On the plus side, when I read a book, I see it like a film, which always makes me think I should have probably been a director.

Yeah, I always think that would be such a huge boon for any director. And after watching a film, I can play it back in my mind. It's not always exactly as I saw it on the screen, but rewatching something in a whim can be fun. The downside is I don't do horror. They don't give me nightmares, but they can stop me from sleeping as I replay them later on at night. Thanks for all of the good work that you and your production team do,

TT, et cetera, Paul Redman, and he's got a load of letters after his name. I wonder how many filmmakers, how many great filmmakers are hyper fantastic. It sounds almost like part of the qualification for the job, but I remember interviewing Steven Spielberg once after he made Bridgest Spies and St. John, oh my goodness, it must have taken you so long

to storyboard all these shots, the incredible angles and the officers, you know, making sure Tom Hanks was in just our position, communicating his mental state through all these kind of incredibly intricate camera moves. And Spuibo was like, no, I just kind of turned up in the morning and blocked it on the spot. So obviously he has such a kind of an intuitive understanding of what one image will communicate to an audience that he can just turn up and go, yeah, there, you know, this

is where the camera has to be. I wonder how that works with communicating that to everyone else on your team. Because if you have that shorthand, you know exactly what you want. And then kind of to be able to effectively communicate that to everybody else who needs to know, that must take the longest time. We're gonna have more on Aphantasia in Take 2, but now it's time for our first review. This is Evil Dead Rise, which people who know and love me have warned me off watching. Yeah, and it's so frightening.

I don't know who's going to do the same. But I want to preface this with a quick kind of story, but my first encounter with Evil Dead. It was actually Evil Dead 2, and I know people say, you know, the best placed experience any film is in the cinema. I think it's not always the case. I saw Evil Dead 2 on TV when I was a student. I had no idea what Evil Dead was. In those days, you know, pre-kind of omnipresent discussion

of cinema online, you could kind of stumble across something in this really organic way. And I remember seeing him watching it and thinking all the way through, you could kind of stumble across something in this really organic way. And I remember seeing him watching it and thinking all the way through, you can't show that. You can't show that. And then sort of realizing at the end of the film that, you know, cinema could do anything. That was the kind of, I think a really formative moment

in my experience with film was just kind of having seen what Raymy does not feel like to thinking, this is it, you know, anything you can imagine and you can you can build me to paint some and cinema's kind of limitlessness in credible way. There's a really vivid sense throughout evil that too that nothing is off the table, okay? That anything that can be imagined no matter how kind of horrifying or depraved or you know funny could happen.

And that is something the Evil Dead Rise recaptures incredibly well. So it was written by a young Irish filmmaker called Lee Cronett who made a film called The Hole and the Ground. Which was a changeling film, and I found that incredibly unsettling. Yeah, yeah, definitely.

And went down really well at Sundance in 2019. I think, while he was at the festival, he had had a meeting with Sam Remy and they'd discussed various projects, Remy had seen a film and was very impressed by it. And he'd sort of suggested, oh, by the way, where are we to do another evil dead film? Would you be interested?

And I think like all kind of horror filmmakers of a certain age, evil dead is, you know, the very kind of unholy Bible on Old Jean-Ret. And so, and so, Croulin kind of jumped at the chance to do this. And what he's kind of done with this is it's like a horror franchise experiment. So he's taken a winning recipe because we know what has to happen in an evil dead film, but he's transposed it to completely new setting. So there is a prologue set in the forest, you know, Cabin and the Woodstyle stuff, which is kind of saying, okay, so it's evil dead,

so we need to do these. There's a very, very funny joke about the famous demonic PV shot, you know, in Evil Dead. I think, I think, really tied the camera to a plank of wood, I think, and then ran around with someone else through the forest to kind of make it look like this evil presence was, you know, flying low over the ground, looking for someone to kind of invade and devour and do horrible things with. There's a very, very funny joke about the kind of the death

of an engineer in ND filmmaking based on that camera shot, which I don't want to kind of give away because it's very, very fun to discover in the moment. But after that kind of prool I'll get then kind of rewinds it all sort of one day, one day earlier, and it goes back to this decaying apartment block in Los Angeles. And so what he's doing is basically saying, okay, so we're going to do evil dead like stuff, but we're going to do it in a completely new setting that there's not been tried in before. And the object is to make a film, I think, that feels at once kind of comfortably familiar, I have for people who love the franchise, but also really gleaming the fresh, and it's doing things that you've not necessarily seen in the evil dead film do before, even though the kind of machinations are the same. And the result of this experiment, in this case,

I think are resoundingly successful. And I think it's because it's done with such incredible ingenuity and unlike a respect for the source material, but also this willingness to push it in new directions. So before we get into what happens, let's have a little clip. Now we did ask for a suitable clip for this lovely podcast audience. Unfortunately, it's just mainly squelching that came back, so. But that's fairly representative of the film. I'm sure. So we're going to play a clip from the trailer and then perhaps you can tell us what's going on It was a perfect day And all I could think about was how much I wanted

To cut you all open and then climb inside your body So that we could still want to be family. When I was just a little girl. Okay, there's a little girl in this. Yeah, and even the usable clip was about 50% squelching in fairness. Mainly eggs, though. So, yes, the main speaker that was early, who's this single mother played by Alyssa Sutherland, who lives in this decaying apartment block, where there are three kids, Danny Bridget and Cassie, and her sister, Beth, who's played by Lily Sullivan, has come to state, she's a guitar technician who's been on a world tour,

and we find it very, very early in the film, with the first or second scene that she's become pregnant a world tour. And we find it very, very early in the film, I think it's first or second scene that she's become pregnant on the tour. And there is a tension, there's this, they're not kind of estranged, but there's a tension between the two of them that suggests a tough upbringing. And there's certain ambivalence around motherhood. Perhaps their own mother was not necessarily

the most nurturing person. And they're both kind of resting in their own way with this idea of what it is to kind of, now what's, I mean, we're gonna get back into this with dead ringers, but this idea to kind of, what's the word I'm looking for, to nurture something within you that then comes out into the world, right?

Which is, of course, in a horrible, disgusting way, what the evil dead films are all about. So the oldest kid, Danny, finds, there's an earthquake and finds in this vault under the block of flats. This ancient book and also sees a vinyl recordings of its most kind of terrifying incantations. He puts these in a spine teacher, he puts this onto his decks in his room, and of course summons forth all these chloros, which then invade the mother,

and then she's chasing them around with various household utensils. If you've seen a trailer, you'll know there's a nasty bit of business with a cheese grater. Oh, God, I keep hearing about this cheese grater scene and it just makes me out so much. That's not the half of it. Oh! That's mild.

And I'm hearing the smell. The film works so well for two reasons. The first one is that the way that Krone and Strutches it is that it's constant escalation. So it starts with all this kind of smart psychological stuff about motherhood that's kind of taking away bubbling away in the background. And then things get worse, and then you get worse,

and worse, and worse. And there's a sense like, where are we gonna stop here? You know, what's gonna be, what, where's the limit? What can't we show? In that same way that I felt while watching you will do too. And then by the time you reach the finale, you can realize, well, there is no limit.

Because what we're seeing here is completely disgusting. I mean, it's completely disgusting. But in a really strange way, tone of the, it doesn't feel sadistic. And I have this kind of allergy to when horror films, like the Saw Films, get a little bit too pleased with themselves about what torture is there in flaked in the book. And somehow, this doesn't do that.

So that's one reason it works so well. The other is that the post-possession performances by Alyssa Sutherland and by a Gabriel Eccles who plays Bridget the middle child are really, really scary and they're augmented by some of the most terrifying practical makeup I've seen in ages, which has been really artfully tweaked with CG. So just to kind of boost the uncanniness, you never look at something and go, okay, this is a VFX, this is clearly been fiddled with. But there's just kind of, you know, grins slightly kind of unhinged and eyes made more glaring in non-human ways. It's very, very well done. I think that my one issue with it is with a little bit of tweaking,

it needn't have been an evil dead film at all. And you kind of think, It's very, very well done. I think that my one issue with it is with a little bit of tweaking, it didn't have been an evil dead film at all. And you kind of think, well, maybe it would have been fun to have an homage to evil dead style film that was the start of a completely new horror creation, rather than just kind of burning all this talent on what is essentially a fifth franchise entry.

But if this is the way we're going to get people sitting down in front of really great horror I was going to say this is going to introduce people presumably to earlier. Hopefully not the remake because that was terrible. I thought the remake was okay. I thought it was perfectly decent. I had an experience in this animal where it was a critic screening. I was sitting in this animal and Alan Frank walks in late in the middle of this. It was incredibly tense scene. Alan Frank of in late in the middle of this. It was incredibly tense scene.

Alan Frank of the Daily Stars. Yes. Late of the Daily Stars, he's illogoriously. Yes. And he walked in and just searching for a seat, just landed, planted his hand on my head very hard. And I screamed incredibly loudly. And that's sort that's my overwhelming memory

of watching the remake of Evil Dead. Yes, right. I mean, it's like Bruce Campbell's scutling thing. Yeah, probably over your shoulder. And the thing is, Krulen does do a little bit of fan service. So he says, OK, I catch, raise, we'll pop up here. Of course, there's a chain saw. There's all this stuff.

The tendrils and the woods, the tree roots, are they become the electric cables and a left shaft. So there's all this kind of stuff, but he's not kind of mainly interested in being on my, or paying tribute, he's kind of wanting just basically to scare you, witness, it succeeded. And just really quickly, does it kind of pay

much of the whackiness and the sort of humor of the originals? It does, but with a straight face. So it's kind of relying on you to understand, like there's no winking, which I think and maybe that's why it doesn't feel sadistic to me. It's not kind of chuckling away on the outside of this torture that's,

because the whole thing is basically taking place in one apartment. You're in that apartment. You're not kind of outside the apartment, scoffing and tittering. It's, you're actually in there with them. So yes, yes, it does. You've sold it very well for horror fans and definitely not for people like me.

You can't handle that level of, you know, of scare. So still to calm, what do we have? Yes, still to calm, we have reviews of dead ringers and how to blow up a pipeline. And we've also got Rachel Rice and Alice Birch, which I'm so excited for you to listen to. We're going to be back before you can say, identical. [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ Happy Nord Christmas. Protect yourself whilst Christmas shopping online

and access all the Christmas films from around the globe. Plus, when you shop online, you'll have to give websites your card details and other sensitive data like your personal addresses. Those websites should already have their own encryption built into their payment systems, but to be on the safe side, you can use a VPN to ensure that all data coming to and from your device is encrypted. Even if you're using an unsafe Wi-Fi, you'll still be able to shop securely with a VPN.

And you can access Christmas films only available overseas by using streaming services not available in the UK. To take our huge discount of your Nord VPN plan, go to nordvpn.com-take. Our link will also give you four extra months for free on the two-year plan. There's no risk with Nord's 30-day money bank guarantee. The link is in the podcast episode description box. Hi, esteemed podcast listeners, Simon Mayow. I'm Mark Kermot here. I'm excited to let you know that the new season of the Crown and the Crown, the official podcast,

returns on 16th November to accompany the sixth and final season of the Netflix epic Royal Drama series. Very exciting, especially because SuperSub and Friend of the show Edith Bowman hosts this one. Indeed, Edith will take you behind the scenes, dive into conversation with the talented cast and crew from writer and creator Peter Morgan to the crown's Queen Elizabeth, Emelda Staunton. Other guests on the new series include the Crowns Research team, the directors, executive

producers Suzanne Mackie and specialists such as Voice Coach William Connaker and propsmaster Owen Harrison. Cast members including Jonathan Price, Selim Dor, Khalid Abdullah, Dominic West and Elizabeth Tabicki. You can also catch up with the story so far by searching the Crown, the official podcast, wherever you get your podcast. Subscribe now and get the new series of the Crown, the official podcast, first on November 16th. Available, wherever you get your podcasts. This episode is brought to you by Mooby, a curated streaming service dedicated to elevating

great cinema from around the globe. From myConnectDirectors to emerging otters, there's always something new to discover, for example. Well, for example, the new AkiKarri's Mackey film Fallen Leaves, which won the jury prize at CAN. That's in cinemas at the moment, and if you see that and think I want to know more about AkiKarri's Mackey, you can goaves, which won the jury prize it can. That's in cinemas at the moment. And if you see that and think I want to know more about Atki Karri's Mackey,

you can go to Mooby the streaming service and there is a retrospective of his films called How to Be a Human. They are also going to be theatrically releasing In January Priscilla, which is new, so if you're a couple of film, which I am really looking forward to since I have an Elvis obsession. You could try Mooby Free for 30 days at Mooby.com slash Kermit and Mayo. That's M-U-B-I dot com slash Kermit and Mayo for a whole

month of great cinema for free. So before we get into the box office top 10, we have a comment on last week's streamer, which was obsession. You might remember Anna and I's review of this. Yes. This is from Heather Ruth, who has said, just finished it, I couldn't stand how the male protagonist, I like that you didn't even bother to find out his name.

That's Richard Armitage, had the same pain and expression on his face through the whole thing. Horny, sad, angry, all the same damn face. Also, not only was there no relationship development between him and Anna, but there was really no representation of his relationship with his family, especially Jay, his son, at all.

There were no real connections between the characters. I'm omitting the next line because it's a massive spoiler and I sort of feel like we should have put you off watching this, but in case I don't wanna give it away. I'm no determined to watch it. Thanks to you and Anna's stuff. Anna and this. There was going to be say, hated this series in inverted commas,

watched it because I thought it would be hot, but it was not. Incredibly damning stuff. I also had a message from my friend Rachel, who asked if I'd been watching obsession. And it said, yes. She said, so terrible, the sex made me die. Well, it was so British and bird song,

pumping her totally naked on the floor for two minutes was so awkward. Is there more sex or was that it? Because that's where I switched off. So she didn't enjoy the sex? No because that's where I switched off. So she didn't enjoy the sex? No, she wanted to do more. It's like, you know, such such dreadful food and such small portions. Yes, it's kind of going, does it get better? It must get better, right? Is there better sex?

No, there is not better sex. So there you go. If you watched obsession and you want to let us know what you think about it, please do. Listen, I've cleared the weekend. I was gonna let this breeze pass me, but no. No, absolutely don't do it. So, time for the box office. At UK number 10 and US not charted, it's one fine morning. Yes, and full of extremely good sex. I would say yes.

The best, sir. Lovely sex. It's new, nice. Yes, this is actually me a Hansen Lovas highest grossing film in the UK now, which is, sir. Lovely, sir. This is new, nice. Yes, this is actually Mia Hansenliver's highest grossing film in the UK now, which is incredibly satisfying. Oh, awesome. She's such a goodness.

She has many critical fans in the UK of which I am one. I absolutely loved it. I think the way in which, I mean, exactly, as you and Anna were singing last week, the way in which intermingles all these strands of life and says, you know, life doesn't unfold in clean narratives. You can have this terrible sad stuff going on with your parent on one side, then this incredibly thrilling love affair on the other side. And these things run into each other in awkward ways. Of course, the great irony of it is that Mia Hansen lived as script for this.

Actually, makes these work beautifully in tandem. And there's such kind of elegance in which it's put together. So yes, I'm delighted it's done as well as it has, I would urge anyone who is remotely considering seeing it to see it in the cinema, it's so good. We actually have an email. They've said, I had the pleasure of seeing one fine morning at the weekend and while I'm sure there'll be plenty of people who can sadly identify with a story on a deeply personal level, I thought I'd share why it resonated with me quite so much. It's coming up to two years since I lost my mum to Louis Body Dimension, a hideous disease that saw her bedridden and barely recognisable

after three years of heartbreaking decline. Going through the painful, gradual loss, and subsequent grief, I've often thought about how being a single mid-30s female came to shape so much of my experience. So to see that play out on screen so precisely by a phenomenal layace do, help me feel validated and seen, things which I feel define the story of Sandra too. Like her, I landed in a whole world of messy relationships throughout this chapter of my life. So seeing her choose the unavailable and non-committal man made perfect sense to me. It's a connection fueled by the purest of desire, the only antidote to the feeling of invisibility

that overwhelms you when your fading person becomes the center of your universe. And as the nurse in the home makes quite clear, your feelings don't factor anymore. It also struck me as a smart choice to make Sandra a translator. Someone without any real identity of their own, just a useful conduit, back to anymore. It also struck me as a smart choice to make Sandra a translator. Someone without any real identity of their own, just a useful conduit, whose sole purpose is to

make sense of things for other people. I love that, that sort of thing in the code of me sports on. It's an incredibly astute observation. The burden of responsibility that comes with caring for someone pushes your own needs so far away that you do end up losing your own voice. But in contrast, when Sandra receives messages from Command, we see her glow so brightly that her reflection in boss windows makes her look twice the person she felt moments before. This for me epitomizes the trauma of going through an experience like this. It was only after my mum had died that I realised just how deep I was in the place that we see Sandra in and how hard I've worked to return back to the world and to myself. I'd like to say

thank you to me, Hanson Loover, for creating such an important film and I hope other people take comfort from the validation it brings. Thanks, an H2JI, Lucy Sanderson. Thank you, Lucy. Great email. That was beautiful. Really, really lovely. And really lovely and also I like I say I feel like maybe you should come Sub one week because that that was gorgeous Moving on to a very different film from the sublime to the shazam UK number nine US number 15 as Robbie says it is shazam fury of the gods Yes, I mean it's twaddle isn't it and I like the first one I thought the first was really fun What can we talk?

This has been out for five weeks. Can we talk about the post credits scene yet? Is that too smiley? Yeah, this is a great moment at the end because you know behind the scenes all these machinations of what's gonna happen next with the DC franchise and is Shazam gonna be in it? Or is he not?

And I love that at the end of this, two of the James Gun characters from peacemaker kind of rock up and see this buffoon, you know, doing his thing and some kind of captain, the forest. And they're like, should we have this kind of team? Yeah. I mean, who could disagree? You can number eight, US not charted. It's mummies, which I guess did really well for Easter. Yeah, I mean, it actually went up by 59% week on week because of the Easter holidays. And because with one notable exception, which we will come to, there's nothing else for

children to minimize. The last children's film released, made, or major children's film released, was Pusson Boots back in February, which is disgusting. You know, what are we doing when when, when, you know, things are months apart like that? But yes, that's why it's not well. And then number seven, UK number seven, US number two, it's the Pope's exorcist, Russell Crowe doing his fine. Yeah, I'm very sad they didn't screen this for critics and I'm not a chance to catch up with it yet. I want to show you to the headline on the telegraph review,

which was written by my colleague Tim Roby. The headline, I don't know who did the headline, but whoever in the office deserves a mass of peer rights, who are you going to call, cruise pastor? Come on. Yeah, that's good. That's an old timer. That's really good. You say number six, you ask number seven, it's Susume. Yeah, which made 469,000 in its opening weekend, that's a massive result for anime. And it shows that there's a core audience for anime in the UK that is being nurtured and can be nurtured more, which is really exciting.

UK number five and US number four, it's Renfield, which I had a great time with, and I last week did not. And we do have an email from Darren Leithley, who said, I went to see Renfield on Friday night, only one of a handful in the cinema. The lights weren't turned down for the main feature, which minimally impacted what I got from a bloody silly and bloody silly film. Nicholas Holtz-type, I sort of feel like you should have maybe gone and told the lights

were on and going, you know, do go and kick up a fuss about that kind of thing. Nicholas Holtz title character seemed to be channeling Hugh Grant's 90s roles. This is what I said, I said exactly this, that he was just being Hugh Grant. As a bumbling, mumbling sort of Oce, sweary Englishman, not quite reconciled with the circumstances in which he finds himself. Nicholas Cage's Dracula is without doubt the best thing in the film, arguably stronger in the scenes, whether Van Pyrr is at his weakest, looking every one of his many undead centuries, but still biting with words.

The action scenes are ridiculously over the top. Their cartoonish quality reinforced by all two obviously CGI splatter. Unfortunately, the police comedy connective tissue between the Gonzo bloodlettings doesn't match with several plot threads feeling quite anemic despite the short running time, I see what you did there. It's a nice idea to try a new way to adapt to well-worn story, and the film doesn't overstay its welcome, yet it neatly illustrates why no adaptation has

previously focused on Dracula's dog's body rather than the count himself. One thing I did like in its favour, the end credits were very nicely rendered, not once simply being a scrolling list of white text on a black background. Thank you, Darren, from Dublin. I'm just relieved that Jonathan wasn't in it because Jonathan, is it Jonathan Harker? Yes, the character. Well, from, yeah, Bram's total, I hate the character of Jonathan so much.

He's the absolute pits. He's an unreliable, dull narrator. And any film without him in is a better film. Thank you. OK. UK number four, US number five, it's air, which I've not seen. Yeah, look, I'm kind of with Mike on this. And it is fundamentally a film boat to shoot.

But I'm glad that it's doing as well as it is because it shows that there is a enthusiastic market for this kind of star driven, accessible studio made drama. I think it's the ultimate dad film. It's on a polygetic, the ultimate dad film. There is a sequence in this where it shows Matt Damon. I mean, we know it's about the creation of the O'Jourking Shoot. We don't need to go through the whole. So Matt Damon is the sports agent who's trying to bring Michael Jordan on board with Nike to be the face of this new shoe. And so when he's driving up to see the family, there is a sequence in the film in which he kind of pulls off this flawless overtake on the motorway soundtrack to a big country.

And it's just delighting in how great that maneuver is pulled off. And the film kind of takes time to do that. Every day in the audience going, yeah, this is it. Represent, we feel seen. So yes. If you say so. If that craft has been applied to a less kind of cynically corporate story, I would have probably loved it. I just kind of cannot get past the fact it's about, you know, seeing this sportswear conglomerate win, which is a little bit kind of, ugh. It should be the other way around, right?

This is what we're used to now, more with indeed, filmmaking, is that the little guy? UK number three, and US number three, is John Wick, chapter four. Doing miraculously well, it's wonderful four weeks, 14.9 million, the more I sit with this film, the more I love it.

I think it's probably the best before for me. Interesting. UK number two, US number six. Again, this is the kind of preteen aimed, right? Dungeons and Dragons honor among thieves. I think it's everyone aimed, right? I mean, I, I, I, I, I'm preteening up.

I was like, yes, yes. I mean, so I, my kids are sort of on the, so eight, nine years old. They're kind of on the borderline of, of, of seeing this. I, I, I'd probably take and see it. I think it's been out for three weeks. It's made more than £10 million. A really small 27% drop week on week, which is impressive. I think probably because the other big release, which we're about to come to,

doesn't necessarily, you know, excuse much younger. I thought this was delightful. I thought it was really good fun. And one thing it captures, so as a sometime, Dungeons & Dragons player, although not for many years, it really captures that fun dichotomy between the kind of grand, fantastical pomp of the Dungeons & Dragons world. So you know, these kind of amazing glaciers and mountains and castles and what have you. And also the fact that to play the game is to mess around with friends for a couple of hours. And so that kind of game night chemistry

between the main cast, which was really, you know, whoever hired the game night people to make this film made an incredibly smart choice. That's what playing D&D is like. And for it to have pinned that down, but in a very, very accessible kind of non-fanservice-y way, I think is kind of the magic formula here.

And Robbie has been teasing this quite a lot. At number one in the UK and the US, you have guessed it. It's the Super Mario Bros movie. It's not Super Mario Bros movie. It's the Super Mario Bros movie. It's not a Super Mario Bros movie. It's not a Super Mario Bros movie. It's not a Super Mario Bros movie.

It's not a Super Mario Bros movie. It's not a Super Mario Bros movie. It's not a Super Mario Bros movie. It's not a Super Mario Bros movie. It's not a Super Mario Bros movie. It's not a Super Mario Bros movie. It's not a. It's literally bros on the poster. Super Mario Bros. It is bros, right? Which has been it is brothers. Which has been it for two weeks and has made 35.8 million pounds in two weeks. It's absolutely incredible. Of which 30 pounds very resentfully is mine. I mean, these are ludicrous numbers, ludicrous. I mean, even allowing for the fact that Mario is incredibly popular across at least two generations. Right, people might grow up playing on the NES, the Super Nintendo, everything. Through some of my kids who know, lovely Mario games on the Switch.

I had an advanced Game Boy. Right, OK, came by advanced, yeah, the kind of oblong one. Yeah, the sideways oblong one. So, yes, so it was, Mario's very popular franchise. There is nothing else for kids since Poozenboots with the exception of mommy's night one other thing. It's the Easter holidays, okay? Even despite all these things,

I think that's an enormous sum of money. Does it mean that Hollywood's cracked the video game movie probably not yet decisively because Mario was such a kind of peculiar thing to itself? But look, I mean, it's, credit to the, it's not incredible, the thing is it's a vacuous slope is what it is. It's absolute rubbish.

I think the second one's gonna be better. I think now that I've left. I think they've kind of laid this groundwork. And I think, yeah, I actually quite enjoyed it. The problem is people are saying that, oh, you know, the kids like it, so therefore it's good and it does the job. Kids like all sorts of rubbish.

I mean, mine was sitting in front of Minecraft YouTubers for, you know, Ios on the end. That does not mean the Minecraft YouTuber, it's a great work of art. That has somehow kind of, you know, miraculously connects with the kid's psyche. It's just that it's pandering twaddle. And that's exactly what the film is.

It's just showing kind of stuff that might happen in a Mario game or that has happened in Mario games. I mean, the dramatize the vehicle selection menu from Mario Kart 8. That's a scene in the film. And when I was watching it, my kids, I was watching, so they wasn't watching the film again.

I was watching how they were reacting to it. And they enjoyed it, but the way in which they enjoyed it was pointing at stuff and nudging each other and saying, Oh, look, this is from this and this is from that. Yeah, yeah. It's an Easter Egg film. So look, it's nothing but Easter Eggs and that annoys me massively. We do. We have an email actually. Yes, sorry. Go ahead.

We have an email from James saying, ironic that the Super Mario Bros. movie was released for Easter Weekend, as it's basically a film full of Easter eggs. I was trying to work out if that is irony or not. But seeing as Mario is one of the most iconic characters in video game history, it would have been nice if the makers afforded him the courtesy of a script. The movie felt like it was directed by a countenance from a screenplay generated by an AI. The games have an addictive gameplay and a merciless in surreal worlds that the play and ever questions. In the movie, hearing Mario say things like,

oh, why are these blocks floating seems to run counter to this? And does anyone say, no they're doing it. So why raise it? However, Mark's citation of the Lego movie is a good point. If this film was to be genuinely inventive, it should have tapped into the quirky and eccentric. Occasionally, about three times, there were flashes of what the movie could have been, such as Bowser, channeling Elton John and the nihilistic star. But as soon as that star, that whatever, was it a star?

The one that's engaged. The little little from our柏 Galaxy. Yeah. Oh, I got to love that so much. Robbie look very disappointed. As soon as these moments began, they ended and we returned to a checklist of characters and moments from the games. Significantly worst in the fine Sonic 1 film, but I'm sure it will finish in the top five

highest-grossing films of the year. I mean, I'm quite... Undoubtedly it will. That's from James, the nihilistic star, dimly shining, but of Bayzing's dope. Yes, I mean, look, Sonic, Sonic 1 is dreadful, but Mario makes a look like the readers of the Lost Ark. I mean, the thing is, I suspect Nintendo were so having been burned by the first version of Super Mario Bros. film from the 90s, the creative control was just absolute, and it's like, you may not do anything that is not in the games.

And that's why the film is like, because you know, it's directed by the Teen Titans people. And we're here. We've dedicated 10 minutes of talking about it. Isn't it just awful? OK, like, move on, move on. Today's guests are the star of the new prime video series, Dead Ringers, Rachel Weiss,

who you'll know from the mummy, the constant gardener, more recently, Rachel Weiss, who you'll know from the mummy, the constant gardener, more recently the born legacy, my cousin Rachel, the mercy, the favourite, let's go on. Plus, we were lucky enough to have Alice Birch, esteemed writer on, as I said earlier, succession normal people, and the writer of dead ringers. You're going to hear my interview with them after this clip, and they were so lovely. Um, in two minutes. 22 brittle stubborn, frankly unpleasant, but I really liked the pressing sterilization. What's the trauma?

I don't think there is one. It's a surprise. Does it seem to be and what's the issue? Very clear, very persuasive, the pressing sterilization for years. Yes, years. Yes, it's just 22. Remember she said, see me, not you. Who have you got?

Jennifer Cotta, referral. Cotta, as in the actor. Referred from Peterson, Family History, Fibroids, Pertility Check. She's on that show. I love that show. You love that show. That was a clip from Dead Ringers, and I'm delighted to be joined by the brilliant Rachel Weiss

and Alice Birch. Hello to you both. Hello. Hi. I'm very excited for this. Everyone has been so envious about this particular pairing and they've not even seen Dead Ringers yet. So just wait until they do. Often when people kind of talk or think about Cronenberg with the original Dead Ringers, they think of Body Horror. How much did you want to lean into that really visceral, grotesque nature that we associate with the original dead ringers? I mean, it's, yeah, it's the, he's kind of the master of it, and it's so iconic in the film that I think it never felt like something we wanted to do, or just a direct repeat of. It's sort of like how can we find as many different ways

for it to kind of exist in a new language? We've got six hours. It's a different story. So there are, yeah, there are so many tones that we wanted to build into the show. So I think it shows up in a different way, maybe with a different lens on it. Well, even from the opening, do you consider the portrayal of giving birth body horror? It's kind of a question that you seem to pose with this.

I think it's the question. The question is the thing I'm interested in is that that's a question that's being asked. I mean, we, and I understand why it's being asked, I think it's really interesting. We're really used to seeing death and violence on screen. We're so not used to seeing birth. And so it was really about just that being interesting to us. Yeah, so I'm very interested in the question.

Yeah, it's a brilliant question. And what we were interested in seems to be something that hasn't been shown very much. Yeah, absolutely. But also I was watching it as somebody who hasn't given birth but wants to and wasn't off put by watching it. Those scenes are often made to us to go, what? No. And actually, I was like, oh, wow, this is incredible. It's a very different lens, I suppose. There's something very apt about the work that these sisters do. They kind of want to modernize women's health.

So was it kind of rewarding to portray this work given the current climate around women's reproductive rights and the recent overturning of Roe vs Wade? The overturning happened after we'd finished the show. I mean, I think that women's bodies have always been politicized throughout history. So I think, unfortunately, so I think it would always be timely in a sense. But the sisters have very different things that they want to do in relationship to women's health, Beverly, it has very noble dreams about changing

a broken system in the way in which women give birth and opening a birding centre that would be accessible to women from all different economic backgrounds and it would be designed by women for women that it would be safe and comfortable and somehow you have to like get in and out of within a day. You know she's got these great great dreams Elliot, she'll go along with that, not really that interested in that particularly, but she loves her sister. And she wants her privately funded lab without any regulations to monitor what she's doing. She wants to work with lots of money in private and she has got some pretty radical and brilliant ideas about fertility and other forms of reproductive health.

Yeah. Yeah. Rachel, you've described Alice's writing kind of previous sedentary as miraculous, but I really love that term. Can you kind of unpick that a little bit? I'm sorry to embarrass you. Yeah, it is miraculous because the characters, they're so incredibly real on the page and the way that they speak. They speak in speech patterns and the way that people, they really speak like that and they swear and the way that people really do when they're talking

to each other, I think. And they're complex, they're psychologically layered and they have so many contradictions to them. And they're often flawed as we all are. They're human and I think her writing has incredible amount of empathy as well, for humans and all their different forms. And she's also like, can write a racist stonkey good tale

with really great conflict and drama and it's really, really, really funny as well, her writing. So yeah, she kind of, yeah, she kind of got it all there. I'm actually that the humour is something that is, it's just wonderful to see in this kind of series and you kind of, at the very you set the tone with the with the man asking do you guys have sex with each other to a pair of twins and there's there's a kind of sense of getting that out of the way early which I kind of loved so tell us why you wanted to start off with that sort of tone. Yeah that I mean that was there from from the first first draft um I think that

just felt like a question that people ask of twins. The assumption is often that they're creepy and that there's a kind of fetishisation, there's a sexualisation that sort of happens straight away. But it was also about, I mean, they have a lot of fun about, I mean, they have a lot of fun, you know, taking him down. Maybe. I think that it's like, it was kind of like, well, this is their sport as well, that if you're going to try and mess with them, then they're going to have a really good time responding to you. So that was like a lot of fun to write, and it was a lot of fun to you. So that was like a lot of that was a lot of fun to write and it was a lot of fun to film. I mean, yeah. My dad is an identical twin so I guess I've kind of always grown up with that as being quite normal and quite familiar but obviously like you just said some people do find it creepy or

don't necessarily understand all of that. So did you wait Rachel when you were kind of doing your research development of these characters? Did you go on any sort of twin rabbit holes or anything like that? How did you want to develop them as people? Alison, I met together two women who are identical twins, which was really interesting, one of whom I knew quite well. And we watched some documentaries about a twin festival in America where twins of America go and spend a day together. Yeah, it's really interesting thing. You can see it on the internet. It's really great. But then after that, I think it was all the writers' imaginations

that created these particular twins who are much more heightened than goodness than anybody that we met in real life. Yeah. We talked on the podcast last week about a show all about sex and then goodness, then anybody that we met in real life. Yeah, yeah. We talked on the podcast last week about a show all about sex, but completely lacking in any female pleasure. How many conversations were there about centering female gratification in dead ringers?

And pleasure was a word that we used all the time, like all the time, from, you know, from our early conversations, and then all the way through the writer's room, we talked. I mean, it's in the Cronenberg, the Jeremy Irons twins, they're having a lot of fun. They're like drinking martinis and they're partying and they're wearing like fabulous suits. And that's wonderful until it's not. And so that was always really important that it would be a part of our story as well. But we also talked about jury songs,

an idea of a very specific type of female pleasure. And that feels sort of radical to put on screen. Yeah, I don't know. Pleasure was a huge, huge part of it. So it's really wonderful that that's something that came up in your question. Well, it was just, yeah, it's a lot, it was a really lovely contrast to watch this compared to that. So that you had an all female writers room as well, which you were part of as well Rachel. So what came out of that writers room that would have been different or perhaps watered

down if there had been a male perspective in there that you're really proud of? It's hard to know, but yeah, it just would have been so different that it would have been really interesting. Yeah, we just approached the best writers, the writers who felt like they would really respond to the material and all of the writers have backgrounds in theatre, which is my background as well. That's really interesting. Why do you think? Again, it wasn't sort of the agenda or like intentional, but I think that they're incredible screenwriters, Mae'n gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweith really brought the research that they were kind of finding their own experiences, things that they'd heard from friends or family members, and then used their imaginations altogether. It was, and I think that sort of informed the show so much that we really sort of returned

to the notes and to that time. Sean Dirkin has a way really unsettling his audience with the uncanny almost and there are different elements of that in Martha, Marcy, Mae, Marlene and the Nest. So how do you think he does that with the opening episodes of Dead Ringers? I don't know how he does it. I mean, Alison, I was a huge fan of Martha, Mae, Mae, Mae, like, Marlene, I wanted to work with him since I saw that film. Oh, really? So it was a real proper, like, dream come true to get to work with him. And then also the nest, I thought, was so brilliant and Southclare

for three-part drama that he did for Channel 4, which was, I don't know how he manages to get a tone of disquiet and discomfort and foreboding, because it's not through... Don't, don't, don't, don't use it. No, you know. It's just something about where he puts the camera and something alchemical in his point of view that creates that. I don't know how to answer that question. I wish there was a little bottle you could drink it and then you could do it, but it's just his gaze that does that. What do you do?

No, totally, totally agree. It's how he works with the cinematographer as well, and just everybody on set. But on set and in the whole way through preampost production, he's the lightest, loveless, kindest, warmest man. So that's sort of creeping dread. A who knows? Yeah, you do. That's magic. Don't feel it when you meet him. He's aest, warmest man. So that's sort of creeping dread. They who knows? Yeah, you do. Don't feel it when you meet him.

He's a brilliant collaborator. And we just love being directed by him. Yeah, and he's very funny and quite silly, you know. He's a real laugh. So yeah, I don't know where that comes from, that thing that he does. Did you find that when you were portraying one twin or the other, that the mood on set was slightly different

or did people kind of react to you in slightly different ways as interpreting you as Elliot or Beverly? I think because I was being there, like I can't really tell what was, I'd be more maybe a question for you, Alice. I don't know, I don't know. Yeah. Or maybe not.

There are a couple of moments, I think, when we were shooting the dinosaur, Elliot, Elliot was, like she had to, you know, it's three o'clock in the morning where 14 burgers down. She's got a lot of energy still. She's kind of like talking to everyone and moving and, you know, really thrilled to be there. So that sort of feels like a particular

kind of alien with them, but no it was, no I didn't feel like you were retaining the characters when you went, when cut or. Oh no, not off to cut then I just go back to being myself. Yeah, yeah. Don't stay in that, stay there, yeah. No. You had to like film sort of pretty much on top of each other, right? You just had to switch from one to the other, presumed to keep the set the same. And how easy was it for you to... Did you have a technique of being like, right, this is me? Is it really it? This is me as Beverly to get into that headspace? I'd spent after the brightest room and pre-production period

with Sean and Alice, before the end of the pre-production period, they'd still had a lot of work to do. I was like, guys, I'm going to have to go and learn my lines, but by so I shut the door to my office, and that's when I did the first part of the pre-production period, they'd still had a lot of work to do. I was like, guys, I'm going to have to go and learn my lines, but by so I shut the door to my office, and that's when I did my work on my own with the two characters, and I just got to know them through speaking the lines out loud and learning them, the Alice had written.

And they just were, yeah, just two radically different people. So when I had to be earlier, I just opened that door and now there she was speaking Alice's lines and then close the door and then Beverly. So they, yeah, I could just alternate. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it was a learning curve, technically, to do it at first. What we got better and better is time went on. You've both talked about, you kind of use the word complex to describe the characters that we see. What do you actually see as the complexities of Beverly and Elliot? Because that's, yes, flawed.

And yes, they have kind of, there's a lot of conflict between them, but when you talk about them being complex characters, what do you actually mean by that? I mean, I think we're all complex. I think every single human being on the planet is incredibly complex and how interesting to try and kind of begin to understand or try to understand

like every single later. So which is what I think we were trying to do when we were building them and making them, I think they're incredibly ambitious, both of them. The relationship obviously, that central relationship between them is so intense and particular and they kind of know everything about each other but also maybe they don't. In writing them, their drives and their ambitions felt particularly big. That's a lot to maintain. Yeah.

Yeah. And Beverly's incredibly kind to her patient. She's really empathic, sensitive, and then she's not that kind to herself, I think, often. Elliot throws people away, like she'll just consume people in food, but I think she's incredibly kind to her sister, we'll do anything for her sister.

Beverly is altruistic, but she's willing to take money from a morally dubious source. I mean, as soon as you start talking about them, there are so many contradictions and different layers. And sort of like I says like real people have. These are just quite extreme versions because it's drama and hopefully, hopefully entertaining. Yeah. Alice Rachel, thank you so much. That was a real pleasure.

Rage of Ice and Alice Birch, what did you think of Dead Ringers? Well, look, the first thing I think we have to say is it's extremely different from the Crayonberg film. Even though it shares some plot elements like either there's a love affair with the actress, which is a part of it. And obviously a premise,

so you have these identical twin gynecologists who are kind of, I don't know, psychopathically fixated on pushing the field forward and kind of bold and strange ways. It doesn't feel at all like the Krulenberg. So it's, I think the Krul Conan Berg has this really interesting sort of, I mean, it's about men playing gorge, right? And it's about this, they almost have an abhorrence

of the reproductive process itself. Like they're kind of wanting to bring it to heal, I suppose, and kind of control something that men have no control over, right? And that's what makes the coronavirus film interesting. Yeah. The barge version is basically starting from the sense of, okay, so look, if these two characters have the same personalities, but were female, how would this play out differently?

And of course, it plays out completely differently because as I think was, Rachel, I mentioned in the interview, there's this sense that obstetrics and gynecology is failing women because it treats pregnancy and childbirth as a disease, right? And that's actually something one of the Beverly says in one early episode, is that pregnancy should not be treated as a disease. And so the idea of bringing up this lab in this clinic that will treat it very differently is kind of completely integral to how it works. Even though there's the same kind of weird sort of

half-central, half-alienating mood, like a lot of the decor in the lab is red, in the same way as the good life. So there's this kind of ritualistic quality to the operations, the procedures that they're doing, remind me slightly tragically of snopes, Pretorian guards, and the last Jedi everyone, kind of dressed in this red armor,

there's a certain religiosity to what they're doing, and it kind of connects with this idea that this is something very spiritual and very fundamental to the human condition. I have to, okay, so look, I've not given a straight opinion on this. I have to say, okay, so look, I've not given a straight opinion on this. I was kind of with it to an extent for most of it,

and then at the end, so this is in episode six, it really clicked for me, and I was massively impressed with it. It ends, I think, much more strongly than the Krunenberg film. I think the Krunenberg film is doing a lot of interesting things, but slightly kind of peaters out of it. I grade, yeah. This does something very, very, very clever, which was not what I expected it to do.

It kind of, there are hint dropped in the first few episodes about where it might be going, and I think we're meant to, you know, take those on board and run with them as our pet theory throughout the rest of the series. Right, yeah, lulled, yeah. And then there's this, I mean, the last episode, I mean, it's a really kind of directorial feat. There's a lot of interesting technique stuff that is quite kind of heightened, quite surreal in a way that rest the scene.

I think it's the last episode as well. He directed last week. He directed the first two and called directed the last one. Right. And I think the first two, you certainly feel it's going for this kind of slightly fincher-like style, but not kind of outfincher. The music has this kind of megalave equality too,

but it's not out in mygalavev because it's kind of palatable, you know, it's kind of high-end, you know, bold but manageable, and then it becomes something much stranger towards the end that is really, really exciting and connects very, very fundamentally with like we're doing this from a female perspective, you know, we're kind of plowing into what it means, and it's really interesting that he said, you know, this is not meant to be body horror. And it's not. And yet in the first episode, there is such a kind of, I mean, what like, montage you could describe it as like, gynecologically robust. I don't know what the way of describing it is. But it's like they're doing all this stuff in a clinic. It's like

a sewing furniture or something. I don't know. It's really kind of like full on in this very much. Like this is this is the core of what being on our on earth means. This is this is what we came from, this kind of incredible. Well, that's it. It's so natural, isn't it? Yes. That's the point. But yes, there's none of the kind of the echinace of the drone and berg and you know, there's that great classic drone and berg leg crossing moment where I think it's Beverly kind of unveils his new gynecological instruments that he's commissioned. And there are all these kind of awful alien-looking contraptions that he wants to kind of inflict on women. That is absolutely not what this new version of Dead Ringers is doing. I think some of the supporting characters are really strong in the others.

Jennifer Ely, who plays this kind of mega-rich financier, is really, really good. And she kind of has this, there's a very fun, unhinged dinner party. Yeah. In episode two, I think it is. It's where they're trying to drum up the funding and kind of convince Ely to come on board. Which is quite recognizable, isn't it, with the sort of either rich thing that we have going on at the moment

with a lot of, you know, white lotus, etc. It feels very much like it fits into that. Yes, totally, totally. And I think, yeah, so the reason it works quite as well as it does is mostly down to Rich or Vice And I think, yeah, so the reason it works quite as well as it does is mostly down to Rachel Vice. I think there's this. She has a subversiveness in her performance style that doesn't necessarily come through

in those kind of English rules rules that she was, you know, early in her career, was cast in, but we saw in the lobster and we saw in the favorite very much. It really gets to kind of shine the freak flag, the freak flag is flying, okay, in this, in this. And the, her dual performance is so good, and so kind of natural on screen.

But I've got to watch, you think, oh, they find someone who looks so much like that, and I'm just reminding myself, no, you idiot, that's her again. It's really seamless in a way that it just melts away within seconds. So I- I'll follow that freak anywhere. Okay, so it's doing this really interesting thing with the, you know, the duality of this, you know, what will it take for women to have it all, you know, career, mother,

and it's playing that really fascinatingly and subtly with the two twins. This idea that it takes two people to be a full person, if you're fever, which is obviously completely ridiculous and untrue, but it's kind of playing with that very cleverly. I think I went with it because of Rachel Vicer's performance for the first bit, and then when the themes really click in, I was just very, very impressed. And you will want to watch the last episode with someone else

because there is a lot to discuss afterwards. What was that? How did this fit with? But hang on, if that was, then surely, and ugh. OK, so there's a lot of that going on at the end. Yeah, I'm glad you've kind of picked up on just how much fun this is as well. It's so entertaining. Big thumbs up. Yes, there's a lovely episode where her parents come to visit from England and it's all very kind of this kind of charming detour. It goes on. Yes, lots of fun, lots of fun.

So it's the add in a minute, Robbie, but first we're going to experience the renowned laughter lift. So Robbie, the good thing about this week's jokes is that they're going to be twice the fun and none of them are identical. Here we go then. As you heard in that interview, my dad has an identical twin brother, but do you know what their favourite fruit is?

No. Pez. Not even a titter. Okay. What did the drummer name his twin daughters? Don't know. And a one. And a two.

Yes, I got into love. Okay. Yeah. Anyway, what have we still got to come? Do you know what we still have to live for your family? You knew you were on to a winner. I did. Yeah.

What have we still got to come? We're doing a review of how to blow up a pipeline. Nice. So we're going to be back after this, unless you're a Van Gogh Deaster in which case we'll be back before you can say flesh-possessing demons. Metrolinx and cross-links are reminding everyone to be careful. Flash-Bezzing Demons! along our tracks and only make left turns where it's safe to do so. Be alert, be aware, and stay safe. Your business has grown fast, from opening your first location to planning an expansion in no time.

And with your business platinum card from American Express, you can access spending power and payment flexibility to fuel your growth. Sarah, the contractor is here with the plans. American Express, don't do business without it. Terms and conditions apply visit mx.ca slash business platinum. Day 35 mail projector and digital laser projector. There has been justifiably much correspondence to your show about some of our wonderful

local independent cinemas, but some of the big-chains cinemas get a more mixed review. I've just come back from a wonderful tour of the Salisbury Odeon, which is held once a month to race funds for a charity by Naomi, one of the managers. And I want to celebrate the amazing role hard-working people like her do to keep these amazing places of entertainment alive for us to enjoy the films that you whiter about each week. The Souls' Brioidean is a unique and much-loved cinema. You enter through the medieval dining hall of a 15th-century wall merchants house

which was restored in the 19th century by Pugin before he went on to build the current houses of Parliament. You then enter what was built in the 1930s as the Gaulmont Picture Palace as a 1500-seat cinema, slash theatre, which as well as showing all the great films of the last 90 years, has also hosted concerts by the Stones, Buddy Holly and Syna Black. Talking to Naomi also gave us an insight into the hard work and passion the team need to keep a listed building like this in commercial operation in the 20th century. All of the managers had to be projectionists, first aiders, decorators and toilet unblockers

as well as having the skill to replace seats when a non-code of conduct compliant customer decides to test their cigarette lighter on them, which apparently happens more often than you'd expect. I hope that in a decade I'll still be visiting this wonderful cinema and will be able to be part of the celebrations for a hundred years of cinema history on the site. Up with all those who keep wonderful buildings like this living and breathing, down with those who had demolished them and build a metal shed outside the town. That's from Nick Baker, LLB, MA, PGCE. Second place in the Croydon top of the form competition, 1983, Heritage Listener, first time emailer.

Thanks Nick. Amen. So time for our final review, how to blow up a pipeline. Yes, this is a really unusual film. I think unless you count four lines, which I don't, it's the first terrorism procedural, I think. It's certainly the first one I can recall. Yeah.

And now terrorism is an extremely loaded word in this context. I will say, first off, it's one that many of the film's characters openly use to describe themselves. And part of the issue that the film is grappling with is to why extent is it terrorism? And even if it is terrorism, to what extent is it justified? So it's an adaptation of a nonfiction book by an author called Andreas Malm, which is a polemic about climate activism. And it makes the argument that sabotage is fair game

because the stakes around climate change are so incredibly high. Pacifistic action is no longer kind of getting us far enough. So you need to kind of do something dramatic. You need to do something arguably violent, or certainly violently as property destruction, in order to kind of shift the needle on the debate and affect change. So it's directed and co-written by Daniel Goldhaber and it's imagined a group of

young people from all sorts of different backgrounds but who are all disaffected for very different reasons, who bands together to blow up an oil pipeline in the Texas wilderness. It's the film. I mean, there is no cat-cling boardroom denizens here from the oil company. There's a literally faceless corporation. All the film wants to show is, for the most part, a step-by-step depiction of how this bombing unfolds, literally, here's what you do, here's the next thing you do, and here's the next thing you do. And then it's intercut with flashbacks, which explain why all of these young people

are involved in the effort. We have a clip of the group when they are laying the first explosive charge on a stretch of exposed pipeline out in the wilderness and they get spotted by one of the oil companies Surveillance students here it is. What is that? I think it's a surveying drone.

What's it doing? Well, using light-hearted detector erosion, we got to hurt you. What's the matter? Oh, no. Well, using Lidar to detect the erosion we got to hurry. What? What's the matter? Just mulling into that? Oh, you got to hurry. What is it going to see? I think it'll see if you guys barrel, we got to get out of here.

Don't panic. Just be slowly. Guys, I'm going to drop. OK, OK, slowly. Yeah. I'm clear. So deep. Clear.

OK, OK, okay, drop. Oh! What do I do with it? Just leave it. We don't want them to track us. Wait, so did I get a song video? No, it just scans me. It'll shun really. Caps. Be careful with them.

Yeah, buddy, Careful with them. Hi, buddy. That was hard. So, do you think this is effective as an anti-fossil fuel film? Well, this is the thing, isn't it? Because I don't know if it is. And I don't know if the film is necessarily wants to be as much of a polemic as the book was. I mean, I should say, so the guy who knocks

the drone out of the sky with that length of cable, if you're actually watching the clip, what happens is the take out the drawn with this kind of a ratchety thing on the end of our strap. I mean, you can tell how kind of practice combined. With this rubbish description of kind of manly stuff that's done out of doors. But yes, he like, let's do this. He hits it with the thing and it falls down back. Okay. That's Dwayne, he's played by Jake Weary,

and he is against the oil company because they have used the law to essentially commandeer a stretch of his own land on which to build some more pipeline. He's obviously from a very different background to the character Theo played by Sasha Lane. She's got terminal cancer because she grew up near to some kind of chemical plant that made the rain kind of chemically active and poisoned as a kid. There's also Logan played by Lucas Gage from the White Lotus, who's this rich kid who

also sees himself as a kind of Bonnie and Clyde style figure, his girlfriend, Rowan, they're part of a two-some who join the group. So people are coming together from all sorts of different places and I think the youthfulness of the movement is very well portrayed, the determination of the movement is very well portrayed and also the immaturity of the movement is very well portrayed, the determination of the movement is very well portrayed. And also the immaturity of the movement is very well portrayed. There's Bonnie and Clyde Stalker couple, become this spanner in the works later on, because they are kind of obsessed with the, or they have a certain kind of feeling of their own self-methologising when they're doing this, that they are this kind of peer-of-amazing outlaws.

And they're so very romantic. They stop to have sex. They do stop having sex. Halfway through, which just felt like, now is not the time. You need to go and turn the valve. Yeah, yeah, just just turn the valve. And not that valve. Yeah, exactly. You know, there's a certain pipe that should be laid here and it's not that. So look, all of this is done very, very plausibly. I think it, arguably, the film threads the needle between as this terrorism or as this activism so neatly,

it's almost a fault. I think like a morally messier film. Maybe one that I would have bridled against actually would have been more effective possibly, but I will see it's hugely elevated by its style. The look of the film is very 70s and 80s. There is this incredible synth-driven score by Gavin Bervic. I was going to ask you about that. Very tangerine dream, right? It's very much tapping into that kind of film.

It has this kind of quite metallic sleazy edge that is really helpful in kind of making a film not feel like documentary. Also in terms of the way it's shot, there are kind of zooms to build tension, which is a very kind of all that period technique you don't see much nowadays. And it feels very much like tapping back into conspiracy thrillers of the 70s and you know, bemovies of the 80s. Yeah, as I say, I think it's really it's very compelling to watch the plan unfold. I'm not sure I was left with much to morally wrestle with afterwards

because it is so I felt, it carefully charts that course, but I don't know, maybe you felt differently. I suppose I really enjoyed the film and I thought the tension was incredible and so much of that was thanks to the music. I suppose the very personal stories actually leave quite little room for just your average viewer who haven't gone

through these really extreme experiences. And of course, you want to absolutely buy into what they're talking about and why and you are behind them, I think, for the majority of the film. There was maybe just a very slight disconnect, but I think I wonder if, you know, growing up in Brighton as opposed to growing up in Texas. Or, you know, I think it's, it was mainly because of that. Obviously, I think films have a duty to bridge that gap for you. I'm not sure how effective it was here. Yeah, I mean, it's a very US style of activism that's, that's portrayed. And of course, because it's happening in the US, so why wouldn't it?

Yeah. But yes, I think arguably when you're watching all these different voices come together, it feels maybe like an anthropological survey, rather than something a little bit more visceral. I think that's what it is. I think because it lacks slightly deliberately kind of emotionless towards each other. They don't really have any resonance with each other, apart from the ones who come as couples. I don't know.

But I mean, I'm intrigued. It's an interesting film. I'm intrigued to know what audience is going to make of it. Yes, and I would say it works very well on the big screen. If there's something you can see at the snow, if it's playing near you, that's the place in which to see it because the style is so kind of well calculated and because the score on the speakers will sound good.

It's time now for what's on. And this is where you email us a voice note about your festival or special screening from wherever you are in the world. and you can email yours to correspondents at comodameo.com. So here we go then, with this week's correspondence. I'm Yifan Kui, which is also a cross-lendent from 18th to 30th April, and features the most exciting, bold and daring new LGBTQ+, cinema, from South Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, the

Philippines, Myanmar and more. Join us for the incredible programs that will push boundaries and challenge expectations. Tickets and full line up at queereast.ode.uk This is Harriet from Project Market, vintage poster market. And our next event is on the 28th of the 30th of April at the Copeland Gallery in Peckham, as featured on Rylane. It's the only event of its kind in the country. 10 amazing dealers, thousands of original vintage posters,

the vast majority of which are filmed, it will be mega. So that was E from the queer East Festival, who runs an event celebrating East Asian, the LGBTQ plus diversity and pride, and you can find out more at QueerEast.org.uk. And that then followed by Harriet from Project Market slash vintage poster market, whose event is on the 28th to 30th of April, in Peckham. Send your 22nd audio trader about your event anywhere in the world to correspondence at kermodeomeo.com. Correspondence about anyway.

And that's the end of take one. Production management and general all-round stuff was Lily Hambly. Cameras also by Lily. Videos were by Ryan O'Meara, Studio Engineer was Josh Gibbs last week before paternity Josh. Congrats, very exciting! Josh Gibbs last week before paternity Josh congrats very exciting! Get researcher was Bashak Erton, Johnny Socials was on the socials and Hannah Toolbert was the guest booker, producer and stand-in redactress. Robbie, what's your film of the week? It's Ted Ringeris. Is it? I think mine is the same, actually loved it so much. Robbie Collin, thank you so much for joining us and where can people find you?

Oh, goodness. The telegraph every week and on Twitter or every minute. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha and even more stuff about the movies and cinema adjacent television is available on your podcast feed right now. Thank you so much for having us. Bye!