Kermode & Mayo’s Take - Reality, Rob Savage, The Boogeyman, Spider-man: Across The Spider-Verse

Starting point is 00:00:00 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. General Chat, live show? That's what it says, isn't it? General Chat, live show? That's what it says, isn't it? General Chat, live show, question mark?

Starting point is 00:00:31 Well, we did the live show. Oh, I see. No, what they mean is, general chat about the live show? Oh, I see. How was the live show? Up at the end of the sentence. Live show? I thought we did.

Starting point is 00:00:44 Okay. I think everyone enjoyed it. Did you like the pulpit? I liked climbing into the pulpit, but not so much as I would want to do that for a job. Highlight for me was Oli Fox playing the clarinet when we were doing question sessions and Oli, who is a brilliant clarinet player, but famously doesn't like to be thrown curveballs. Oli likes to know what he's doing in advance, so of course he learns, note for note, the piece of music that we usually play, only to be informed, like, 10 seconds before he did it

Starting point is 00:01:14 by Simon Paul, that we didn't have the rights to play the piece that he had learned. Could he just improvise something that sounded close enough that it was recognisable, but far enough away that it would get through the PRS? And Oli, of course, did brilliantly, and then sent me a text which was Mark. We've talked about this. Can I ask you if you've noticed something different about me?

Starting point is 00:01:42 Well, you're holding up your hands. You've still got five fingers on each hand. Yes, but what haven't I got? You haven't got a wedding ring on. Yes, so is that bad news? Is there something? Yeah. But the good lady professor is,

Starting point is 00:01:53 she's finally had enough. She's gone off with someone else. So I had a, I had a thing, other people may have had this. So I haven't taken my wedding ring off since I got married, which is 30 something years ago. Or indeed my, I have a little finger ring that I wear to my grandfather's. My hands have got, well, as larger, fatter, whatever it is, over the years. And my wedding ring somehow, my finger

Starting point is 00:02:18 got started to swell and the swelling happened behind the wedding ring. And the next thing I knew, it was like, oh, this isn't good, I can't get my wedding ring off. I can't get it off because my hand's coming. And so it had to be cut off your finger. Yeah, I had to cut my finger off. So they put it back on again. All you can see is the thing. So that AI, they did that.

Starting point is 00:02:39 It is AI, did that, yeah, AI did that. But have you ever had that, anyway, so I took it to the jewelers and they're fixing it. I've now had a message from them saying, it's all ready to be fixed. But you can take them both off. Because you have slender hands. You have the hands of a Disney princess

Starting point is 00:02:53 and I have the hands of Shrek. That's actually true. I have just taken both, I have two rings on that finger. They both come off. Well, I'm going to the jewelers this weekend to get back both of my rings and then I'll feel happy about it. Actually, I feel naked. I feel weirdly undressed because you can't fiddle with it. Well, it's just because it's been there for 31 years, and it's just really,

Starting point is 00:03:13 really weird not to have it. I'm just surprised that you hadn't noticed. Well, assuming that you're not too discombobulated, what are you going to be reviewing later? Oh, we have a packed show, do we? Yes, a Reality, which is a really interesting drama, Spider-Man across the Spider-Verse, Spider-Man colon across the Spider-Verse. And are we saying Boogeyman? Well, that's how it's written. It's written Boogeyman, but because I'm, I would say Boogeyman, but Boogeyman will our special guest, who is Rob Savage, who is the director of that movie, and you'll be hearing from him later. Also, an extra takes at least

Starting point is 00:03:45 another 90 minutes of this complete nonsense. A weekend watch list and the weekend not list. One film to set the beat max four over the weekend and one to avoid. Take it all over you decide. Obviously, we're talking about succession. And it will be spoiler-tastic. So don't listen to it until you've seen success. But I think he's very enough because all the reviews basically said, we're going to, I mean, you cannot talk about succession without spoiling it. So that's what we're going to do. Yeah, exactly.

Starting point is 00:04:10 And it's out, it's out in the world. And your extra reviews are two. We have Amanda, which is an Italian comedy, which every time I say Italian, my kids laugh at me because they think I say it funny. How do you say Italian? How else do you say Italian? Tell me. I got no idea, but they just laugh about the way I say it. And then the old man movie,

Starting point is 00:04:30 Lack Topolix. I'll tell you again, the old man movie, Lack Topolix. That topolix your kids allow for you. They are. Which is an Estonian stop motion car animation, which honestly defies description. Okay, some things I look forward to. Potentials, Moire, will be back currently Mark Kermod 15 versus Mark Kermod 12. One frame back is Spider-Man movies. Yes, all of them, and you can spot us by Apple Podcasts. I head to extra takes.com for non-fruit related devices. And if you're already of Anglais, as always, we salute you.

Starting point is 00:05:05 Hey you. Yes you. Why not come along to the Commodore May merchandise store, located handily on your web browser or mobile device? Yes inside we have a wide range of leisureware clothing, drinks containers and even furniture. And let's not forget the signed posters. Or the Torch and Pen van Gardy's to Gift Set. Or for our American listeners, the Flashlight and Pen Van Gardy's to Gift Set.

Starting point is 00:05:31 You can say hello to Jason Isaacs every time you take a sip of export strength Jamaican rum or homemade bathtub gin in our Hello to Jason Isaacs bottle, as used by the celebrated actor, Jason Isaacs. You know, him off the films in that, and Tilly, yeah. So why not head to store.com.mau.com now? Now? Thanks. I feel as though we should add shiny jackets for that. Sanjeev said that every time we do an advert, he laughs.

Starting point is 00:06:04 Quite correctly. I think that's what you're... That is correct. I'm not sure if he's laughing with us or at us. Pete says, hello Sanjeev. Hello Sanjeev. Pete says, Margaret Simon, long-term listener, first time email. Last week, Sean emailed the show, asking for other suggestions for one act you move is. The idea being you can watch any movie with a dire outcome and leave after the first act

Starting point is 00:06:28 making it a rather lovely film. As Sean explained, his young kids can't handle the mildest of threat. Others are a really good idea. He then went on to suggest Jurassic Park as the film to trial this new idea. Where Sean suggested movie instantly falls down is that in the opening scene we see a man being eaten alive by a crazed and caged philosopher, raptor, on a dark stormy windswept island. Good point. While his co-workers scream in terror at the horror of what they're witnessing.

Starting point is 00:06:53 I hope Sean hasn't pressed ahead this past weekend and shown his kids this movie. As I imagine, he'll now be in a similar position to me, where he has a child who is terrified of any film I now suggest we watch, and also a wife who still hasn't quite forgiven me. Of the podcast keep up with you. Weirdly enough, the theme of children being terrified by dinosaurs will come up later on in the show. It will. Brad Hodgson in all shields. In the shining, the torrents fat, so his suggestion is for the one at you to watch the shining with your kids,

Starting point is 00:07:22 of all ages. The torrents family take over the remote overlook hotel in the Rocky Mountains for its winter season. Here, the family enjoy the cavernous expanses of the closed hotel, and young Danny has the time of his life using the hotel as his tricycle racetrack, a light-hearted and family-orientated picture. What could possibly go wrong?

Starting point is 00:07:41 Well, yes, except that you have to get through the scene at the beginning where Jack Nicholson does the interview in which he is clearly, completely mad. I mean, that is the problem with the shining is that Jack Torrent, as played by Jack Nicholson, is bonkers from the outset. So both, so that the one act you is proving slightly harder, problematic.

Starting point is 00:08:01 Kevin Rice, PhD student, microbiology, Oregon State University. I am writing this after Derafelia and the Pale Man. I am writing after your discussion last week about films where the first act is fun for the whole family, but the rest is very much not with the correspondence citing the opening 30 of Jurassic Park. This end, I would like to submit to Cassie M Mekay's 1999 film audition.

Starting point is 00:08:25 Actually, that is a good call. As an offbeat romantic comedy about a movie producer finding love after tragedy, takes a slightly different turn after that, but hey, who am I to judge? Kiri, Kiri, Kiri says Kevin Rice. So I think this could run. Any other movies which obviously are not for family viewing, but in the opening, say, 20 minutes, 30 minutes, are perfectly fine.

Starting point is 00:08:50 If I could just remind you of my own personal experience of audition, I went to see the Edinburgh Film Festival with Trevor Johnson, who's now, me married for many years to a Japanese woman. He was learning Japanese, hello Trevor and Tommy. And he said, should we go and see this film at the festival? I don't know anything about it other than it's Japanese. And I try to polish up my Japanese.

Starting point is 00:09:11 And we went to see it. We knew nothing about it at all. I auditioned. That's what we knew. And it starts off as a rom-com about an awkward movie producer who appears to be auditioning for a film, but is actually auditioning for a girlfriend. And it was sweet and funny and then it turns into hell on wheels.

Starting point is 00:09:27 Right, and it was, by the end of it, we were literally, literally hiding behind the seats in front of us. We had no idea where it was going. Okay, there needs to be like a little flag that drops in into the top corner that goes leave now. Leave that? It's not being a you from here on in. If you have anything to contribute to,

Starting point is 00:09:46 to that correspondence at www.comanamay.com, that's our email, correspondentsacermanamay.com. Tell us something that's new and groovy. Reality, do you know the story of reality winner? I do not. The person, okay, so reality winner was an NSA contract to translate a former US Air Force vet, who in June 2017, two FBI

Starting point is 00:10:08 agents arrived at her house. They said, we have a warrant to search your house. Do you know why we're here? She sort of wasn't sure why we were here. But what then happens is that they then interviewed her over a period of an hour or so, and they recorded the interview with her outside her house and then inside the house, the search team turns up, takes over the house, and then they move into the house, they're trying to find a room that they can

Starting point is 00:10:36 infuriate in bits of small house, and there's only one room, a room that she says is weird and creepy because it's out behind the kitchen, it's not clean, but there are no chairs. So there isn't an audio recording of this. That then ended up in a really, really harsh prosecution. This is a historical case so people may well know the details of it. In case anyone doesn't, I won't say any more than that because there is a possibility

Starting point is 00:11:02 that if you don't know it, you know, I want to spoil the film, although actually the fact that people don't know what happened to reality when there is astonishing, she was very, very severely punished essentially for the mishandling of classified documents. That transcript was, in 2019, turned into a verbatim play by Tina Sattern, verbatim theatre, which is you take actual transcripts and you dramatize them. That has now been turned into a film by Tina Satter, starring Sydney Sweeney, who is absolutely terrific as reality winner. And we are told very early on, there's a thing at the beginning, which says everything that you're going to see is taken directly from the transcripts of the

Starting point is 00:11:42 FBI recording, of the two FBI agents then joined by a whole other team of people who carried out the interview. So we have firstly this sense of authenticity. What you're hearing actually happened. It's a dramatized version of it, but the words are what actually happened. Every now and then during the interrogation we see little flashes of like a real photograph of reality winner social media posts. There are strange moments in which the conversation has been redacted in which what we're watching suddenly has got like a kind of weird David Lynch and ellipse in which somebody's saying something and then suddenly they'll disappear from the frame during the redacted sequence. Can I just ask is reality winner her name? It's actually the name. It's like a nickname. No, no, no, that's her name. Reality Lee winner. That is her name. Wow. Yes. And apparently, I believe this is correct.

Starting point is 00:12:30 Her parents were, they, because they wanted, as they're taught, a real winner. And apparently that's where the, where the name came from. That is her real name. So what happens over the course of this drama, it's 84 minutes long, is she comes home, the two FBI agents are there. They immediately accost her. They show that they're recording. They say they have a search warrant. There's a lot of kind of small talk about, okay, we're going to have to go into the house

Starting point is 00:12:58 and she, okay, fine, well, I've got a cat and a dog in the house and there's a lot of stuff about, well, how are we going to deal with the dog? Well, the dog needs to be taken out and put in a pen, would you please shut the door because the cat may run? So there's all this very quittity and very sort of ordinary procedural stuff going on. Have you got groceries? Do the groceries need to go into the fridge? Can we get into the thing? Yeah, you can't go into the house yet

Starting point is 00:13:16 because people are coming in. Would you know what this is about? And the whole thing has a kind of Kafka-esque quality to it because you all you hear is what she is being told, which is that they're not telling her what it's about, but does she know what it's about? Does she know what she's meant to have done? Do we know anything about the context of this? Obviously, if you do, for example, particularly interested in American politics, which I am, you do know the story, but if you don't, it's kind of even weirder,

Starting point is 00:13:45 because all the way through, there is this absolute tension between this, this is normal, but it's also completely abnormal. There's one moment in which she says, am I going to jail tonight? And there's something about the understatement of that question, also because you know that that was actually how it was asked. Am I going to jail tonight, which is such a specific question. It's not just like am I going to jail, but am I going to jail tonight. The whole thing plays out in very sort of the visuals of it, a very kind of unforgiving sort of handheld, once they get into, once they get into the house and they get into the room which she has described as weird and creepy, which is funny because there is something really, really weird and creepy

Starting point is 00:14:30 about the whole drama. It's in this kind of unforgiving, striplet environment that feels like you're watching a documentary, but also feels like everything is, there's a sense of heightened reality about it. There is an absolutely brilliant score by Nathan Mikae who did the stuff for industry on the television. And the score has got this kind of sense of throbbing unease. It's almost like a science fiction score at times it reminded me of Mika Levy's score for under the skin, which I absolutely love. So that these incredibly innocuous exchanges about, do you need to go and do that?

Starting point is 00:15:06 Do you need to just go, it's got this noise going on in the background of it that sounds maybe like it's the noise in her head or maybe it's because the whole world is shifting on its axis and the world that she knew up until this point is about to be irrevocably changed. It's also worth contextualizing it and saying that, of course, when they turned up, they're talking about the mishandling of classified documents. This is what they want to talk to you about. They are essentially carrying out a warrant

Starting point is 00:15:34 that is under the espionage act, the 1917 espionage act. Ironically, of course, that's the same act that would later be cited in the raid on Mar-a-Lago when it turned out that Trump had just quite coincidentally stashed a whole bunch of classified documents that obviously he was able to magically declassify with his mind. Should he be severely punished, do you think? Let's wait and see what happens to Trump. The wheels of justice will turn slowly. Yes, and the arc of history inclines what is it? The arc of history is long, but it inclines towards justice. Although I think it's extremely unlikely

Starting point is 00:16:09 that the kind of sanctions that were dished out to reality winner would ever come back to the, you know, mango Mussolini. But that quote, and this is a sidebar. It depends where in the world you live, I think, as to whether you might go along with the fact whether the Arc of history precisely towards justice. It depends where in the world you live, I think, as to whether you might go along with the fact whether the arc of history. Yeah, precisely.

Starting point is 00:16:25 Besides Lord's Justice. Anyway, this is a really, really gripping film. It's something so unsettling about it. It's such a brilliant technique. A fantastic central performance by Sydney Swini, who was, of course, in White Lotus as the Stroppy teenager, who's, you know, it's a really, really great performance. You absolutely believe in her there's something palm sweating there was I was watching how would you classify is is is is a thriller well weirdly enough it kind of is although it's you know it's literally a thriller in

Starting point is 00:16:54 which two people turn up and question somebody about miss handling of documents but it's I found it really anxiety inducing like really properly panic attack inducing. And I thought it was really well done. It's called Reality, which is the name of the central character. And it's directed, I say, by Tina Satter, based on a bait in play, based on the verbatim transcripts of the FBI turning up at Reality Winners' house. It's really something. Because when I get emails from streaming companies saying,

Starting point is 00:17:25 we've got a new TV series or we've got a new film, it always has like three words to discrepancy, disturbing comedic friends. That's right, you've been right. No, don't wanna watch that. So those three words, if you're writing them for this, anxiety, inducing procedural. Okay, there you go.

Starting point is 00:17:46 Okay, so that's reality. Reality. A movie? A movie, yes. Okay. I meant what I meant was cinema. Yes, and I meant yes when we said yes. Still to come on this fabulous podcast.

Starting point is 00:17:58 This involves me getting back into the script, hold on one second, because it's on me. And I know, no, no, no, no. Spider-Man into the spider-verse and the boogie man. We'll be back, oh by the way, Rob Savage is on me. No, no, no, no, no. Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse and the Boogie Man. We'll be back. Oh, by the way, Rob Savage is on the way to talk about that. Yes, that's why we've all mentioned. Moving, we're going to be back before you can say La Liberté, Esquitou Férevec, S'quita Eté Fé,

Starting point is 00:18:16 which as you know is Jean-Paul Sartre. Freedom is what you do with what's been done to you. Oh, I know. MUSIC Hi, esteemed podcast listeners, Simon Mayo. I'm Mark Kermod here. I'm excited to let you know that the new season of the Crown and the Crown, the official podcast, returns on 16th of November to accompany the sixth and final season of the Netflix epic

Starting point is 00:18:46 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 in Mel Distant. 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 props master Owen Harrison. Cast members including Jonathan Price, Selim Dor, Khalid Abdullah, Dominic West and Elizabeth

Starting point is 00:19:17 the Bikki. 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, 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. 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,

Starting point is 00:19:47 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 NordVPN plan, go to NordVPN.com slash 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. Well, here we go with an email from Tom Savage, a box of his top 10 in a moment. Tom Savage,

Starting point is 00:20:36 BA honors including history of journalism, winner of a copy of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy on the Janis Long Show in 1991. That's a prize to cherish. Dear Dashing and Dottie, I fear your talk of N-dashes, this is EN-dashes, may have woken composer's corner with a jolt. Oh dear. You'll obviously find us sitting over by the old font. Which is excellent. That's very good. It's a good joke. I assume, and maybe the best joke in the podcast. It's okay.

Starting point is 00:21:04 I assume I will be emailing number 703 on the subject, but in case it adds anything, some history. Here we go. Colon. Endaches, EN, and their big brother, M-dashes, EM, hark back to the typeset days of newspapers when every line of text was set out on a plate by hand. And compositors could use them for different purposes and to take up a certain amount of space.

Starting point is 00:21:27 An N-dash named because it's a dash as wide as a lowercase letter N would be used as your caller last week said, not caller, a writer, contributor last week said, much like a colon or within a sentence like a comma. If you use dashes within sentences rather than within words, they should probably be end dashes. But says Tom, no one cares. M dashes, E m, a dashes wide as a lowercase M have somewhat fallen out of fashion and have been replaced by the ellipsis, the dot dot dot, which I overused meticulously. Right. In your novels.

Starting point is 00:22:08 Yeah, all the time. To indicate, which is what the editors for, to take them all out together. To indicate a pause in reading. They were originally as wide as the line of font was tall and you'll often find them in historic newspaper headlines to split sections that shouldn't be read on in one go. They're historically as wide as the line of font is tall. Yeah, okay, fine, fine, got it, got it, got it. So historical headline, we go,

Starting point is 00:22:31 something bad's happened, M-loads of people are dead. To accuse these characters, sorry, to accuse, to access these characters on fruit-based devices. If you hold down the hyphen key, you get the option to choose an N or M-dash instead, or try typing two ordinary dashes together, then keep typing and see what happens. You might find Bill Gates pops up and turns them into an N or M-dash for you. So I'm going to hold down the hyphen key. Oh, yeah, look. There you go. I've never seen that before.

Starting point is 00:23:02 And you get the choice. Hope that fills in some gaps with appropriately sized punctuation marks. Tinkety, wifentonk. So this is how you write it. Tinkety, hifentonk, n- and down with the Nazis. And then PS, upper and lower case letters are so called because page compositors kept the letters they used to make up words in boxes. And the box or case for capital letters were physically above the one for normal very good So if you wanted a capital B you reached into the upper case and into the lower case for normal ones

Starting point is 00:23:34 Let's hear it for compositors corner. Where would we be without that is fantastic. Thank you. Thank you correspondence a combinoe com box over his top 10 at 17 master gardener, which I thought was, you know, it's another pull-shrader movie, therefore it is a man worrying about himself and his past and his guilt and it's all right. I mean, it's got solid performance, it's jollaged and it's good, um, trader can't write women characters to save his life, but there we go. It's mid-range, solid Shredder. Someone referring to themselves as Azdirk 1 says, a blue collar, hardcore American jiggle, a machima, a life in four chapters,

Starting point is 00:24:18 light sleeper, first reformed, putting aside his writing credentials. Shredder has made his fair share of brilliant movies, yet all we hear about is the exorcist prequel that's rather unfair as many directors have duds. No, you don't only hear about that. When I did my review of it, I said, Paul Shredder, who wrote taxi driver and Paul Shredder, who made American jiggle-o and light sleeper and Paul Shredder, who recently made first reform. So sorry, not true.

Starting point is 00:24:46 Number 10, not as in this country, God, a God, a child. You haven't seen, wasn't press screen of anybody has seen it. Please let us know. Correspondence at www.commona.com. Number nine here, number nine in the States, evil, dead rise. Guess what? You've seen it.

Starting point is 00:25:02 Excellent, great. What do you think? I haven't seen it. You're a bank holiday. Well, exactly loads of time. But you can't use bank holiday as an excuse for not seeing something. I was having to prepare other stuff. You're never going to see it. I am going to see it. I am going to see it. I don't think so. I am going to see it when it comes out on DVD. Really? Okay. Number eight, bow is afraid. I almost feel like I want to throw this ball to you. Simon bow is afraid. Self indulgent. Twaddle. Did you did you laugh at any of the jokes?

Starting point is 00:25:37 One. Which one was there was a painting of right towards the end? Oh yeah, yeah. The big eyes portrait. Okay, really. I thought there were bits of it. There were. Oh, yeah, yeah. The big eyes portrait. Okay, but really? I thought there were bits of it. There were very, I mean, there's no question that is self-indulgent. And certainly, on the question of who did Arias to make this movie for the answer to himself. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:25:58 Number seven in the UK, 12 in the States, are you there, God, it's me, Mark. Loved it. And last week, when we were doing the show from the Union Chapel, we had somebody speaking from the audience. Yes. Absolutely felt the same way, thought the characters were terrific. She was a fan of the Judy Bloom saw. Have you read the novel? No.

Starting point is 00:26:15 No, me neither. But 50 years old, and I have heard from many people who love the novel, who love the film. That's taken a long time, hasn't it? 50 years. I mean, only saying this because obviously in your case, you know, I'd like to still be alive if anyone would ever make it. UK number six, CISU, which is, you know, that great rule that we learned from the Indiana Jones movies, it's okay to do anything if they're Nazis. And so this is, you know, it's kind of, it's Jamari Honda and it's

Starting point is 00:26:47 it's a brutal black comedy set in the dog end of World War II with our hero has some gold. The Nazis want the gold. He doesn't want them to have the gold and he must kill everyone in order to ensure that that doesn't happen. Darren Leithley in Dublin. Three months after seeing CISU as part of the Dublin International Film Festival, I went to see it for a second time, to check that it was as good as I remembered. Simply yes. Yes. Like a war comic injected with Marvel DNA, the seemingly indestructible, near-silent

Starting point is 00:27:17 hero takes as much as he dishes out to a horde of Nazis who are bent on stealing his gold. The over-the-top silliness, mostly notably a landmine redeployed as a frisbee, revels in blood and body parts flying out across the screen, a very good dog too. I just, I would love to have been at the script meeting when they went, sorry, and then he throws the landmine at somebody's head. Sometimes, says Darren, you just need to experience some delirious carnage.

Starting point is 00:27:44 You do. You do. She delirious carnage. You do. You do. She delirious carnage is not a bad name for a... I have all their albums. Yeah. Very... They're early acoustic stuff. That's true, but also, that's a great name for a movie. Delirious carnage.

Starting point is 00:27:55 Delirious carnage. You could use it for a book. That's true. Each five. Delirious carnage. What can I just say? When I was saying I'd like to be alive for whenever any of my books makes it. Obviously, it's did. Are they going to do the other books? The Australian Broadcasting Company. They did two series of it. So that was two books.

Starting point is 00:28:19 Well, it was the first book and then they made the rest of it. Because there's an awful lot in the second book, which is very expensive to carry. Does it say based on characters created by? Yes. And in the title sequence. Fantastic. I just watched the title sequence every night before I go to bed.

Starting point is 00:28:33 And then you've been going to rehearsals of the opera Holland Park, which is not far away now. So you can't come to my, you can't come to my, your voice. My celebration. Because you're going to be watching your books performed as an opera very very peculiar anyway I shall report back. Number five in the UK nothing in America hypnotic. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:28:58 Originally as I said listed on the FDA list as a hypotenic which is shame it isn't called that. I mean it is dumb as nuts. And I wonder what, I genuinely wonder how stupid Robert Rodriguez thinks it is, since he is somebody who understands trash sensibility. It's just ridiculous. I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy it.

Starting point is 00:29:21 It was so ripe and stupid. And he erased his own mind and pain can keep the mind awake. It's just absolutely. You can feel yourself getting stupid while watching it. I can't have enjoyed it. Liam Young. I thought this was the most entertaining film I've seen this year. Loved it from start to finish. The first act was like the start of an episode of The Sweetie, the whole film is tongue in cheek, ex-pise of how po face chris for Nolan is. I thought it was a work of genius, but you need to be in on the joke, didn't stop laughing for the whole movie.

Starting point is 00:29:51 Sacks bend, says. I just don't know whether it is in on the joke. I don't know how much Robert Rodriguez thinks it's funny. It is very silly, but in a fun, engaging 90s way, I enjoyed spotting what looked like ludicrous blood holes and then finding out that they're allowed by the revelations throughout the film. It's not going to be close to my top 10 for the year, come December, but I had a good time. It's also only 90 minutes long, so it was a good short time. 94.

Starting point is 00:30:15 UK number four, as in America, Super Mario Bros. the movie, I think we've come in that. And number three is Guardians of the Galaxy 3. I heard an email from Oli Fox. Not on email, it takes. I heard an email from Oli Fox. Not an email, it takes. I'm gonna read this to you. So Oli was the, as I said,

Starting point is 00:30:29 the person who was doing the, you know, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the seen G of the G, I have one question. Why? Well, that's for someone else to discuss. Number two here, number two in the States is fast X, fast 10, your seat belts. Fine, I think we've covered that. And number one here.

Starting point is 00:30:57 Number one here to get merchandise that says family. That would be good. Number one here, number one in the States is the little mermaid, Lin and Billy in Chandler's Ford. There's something with Fins and something with legs. As a mum of a six-year-old girl who intensely believes in fairies, which is magic and mermaids, it was inevitable that we would make the trip to our local view to see the new Little Mermaid this half-term.

Starting point is 00:31:19 I went prior to hearing Mark's review and have still not heard it whilst writing this email, but I'm fairly sure we will agree. I was bored. It was very underwhelming with no sense of joy or wonder other than a moment of dark glee when Melissa McCarthy's poor unfortunate, as poor unfortunate soul, so I don't get it. That's the soul. Okay.

Starting point is 00:31:39 All right, okay. The diverse cast was, well, diverse, but the acting was very one note with no emotion. My six-year-old liked the mermaid tale, but told me she liked the other movie with the shells better. And she meant Marcel the Shell was shoes on. This comment made my soul happier than today's movie. Up with Isabella Rossellini and down with boring Disney remakes, Lynn and Billy in Chandler's Ford. And Lucas McQueen in Edinburgh is in a very long email,

Starting point is 00:32:01 but part of it says, I gave the live-action remake of Little Mermaid a watch in IMAX on Friday afternoon, but part of it says, I gave the live-action remake of Little Mermaid a watch in IMAX on Friday afternoon. And while my up and down relationship with each of the recent remakes had me entering the cinema with slight trepidation, I loved Aladdin, thought it absolutely slapped.

Starting point is 00:32:16 Wasn't it slapped? Yes, thought it absolutely slapped. Slapped what? I don't know. Wasn't it? That word has definitely changed its meaning. Wasn't too keen on our teams like Mulan and Lady of the lady and the tramp, but definitely wasn't a fan of Pinocchio. Okay, I'm extremely happy to say I thoroughly enjoyed it. Rob Marshall definitely played it safe and stuck very close to the original with his interpretation

Starting point is 00:32:36 of the story, but that directional decision feels more like he's trying to stay true to the heart of the source material rather than simply not being creative enough to add something new. There is something intriguing nuance added to the relationship between land and sea creatures and certain side characters enjoy a more fleshed-out role. Anyway, he says he can't wait to see it again, but he was disappointed that the crowd he went with didn't like it very much. So in terms of its box office, it's Disney, it's the fifth best memorial day opening ever in the US, 117 million over four days. And here, obviously, it's constraints number one, not really a surprise because the property is so well-known, you know, the IP is so solid. Of course, it's going to do that kind of business. Although there is something I think sort of,

Starting point is 00:33:26 heartening about the fact that if you remember that when it was announced that it was going to be a black aerial, a whole bunch of Fox News fed lunatic replacement theory wing nuts where it's suddenly going, you can't, you can't be black. Two of the reasons were given were one, the author's Danish and also she lives under the sea. You got, it's a mermaid, it's a mermaid, get over yourself and you know, I don't think any of the live action remakes have added to the, what we'll call for this purpose of this sentence, the cartoon originals, but you know, she's very good in the lead role. I think Melissa McCarthy has fun. I didn't need to be done, but I think the Lennon Billy email is interesting because if this movie really, really worked,

Starting point is 00:34:15 the six-year-old who intensely believes in fairies, which is magic, would have loved. Yeah, absolutely would have loved it. But the thing is that the original animation is so good. There is a reason why it's kind of, it's just kind of indestructible. Those classic Disney's are, I mean, funny, we talked about classic Disney's because I actually, of course, it's what's now referred to as third wave Disney because our classic Disney's is everything up until aristocrats, you know, when the, when the sort of narrative got lost, but jungle book and all that stuff. So anyway, we'll be back in just a moment with Rob Savage and we're talking Boogieman. This episode is brought to you by Mooby, a curated streaming service dedicated to

Starting point is 00:35:01 elevating great cinema from around the globe. From my Coddic directors to emerging otters, there's always something new to discover, for example. Well, for example, the new Aki Karri's Mackey film Fallen Leaves, which one 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 Aki Karri's Mackey, you can go to movie 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 a new Sophia couple of films, 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.

Starting point is 00:35:37 That's M-U-B-I dot com slash Kermit and Mayo for a whole month of great cinema for free. for a whole month of great cinema for free. You're flying to meet with a new supplier to keep your business growing. And with the business platinum card from American Express, you can earn $820 in new value and more, which includes a $200 travel credit toward your flight. Now, according to Business Class. American Express, don't do business without it. Terms and conditions apply visit mx.ca slash business platinum. Now I guess this week is director and screenwriter Rob Savage, known for the kind of Zoom video

Starting point is 00:36:24 call horror host. Which I loved. Creep me right out. Dashcam and iPhone based horror film Dashcam. And now the boogie man, you can hear my conversation with Rob after this clip from the movie. This may seem a little out there, but when my father passed away, I felt like I could sense him watching over me sometimes.

Starting point is 00:36:49 If you pay close enough attention, maybe you'll start sensing your mom too. What about other things? What other things? I don't know. It's hard to see. It's like a dark thing. I see. Well, when did you start seeing a dark thing. I see. Well, when did you start seeing this dark thing?

Starting point is 00:37:09 Right after that, man died. That makes perfect sense. Okay. So what is it? When there are scary things we don't understand, our minds try to fill in the blanks. I just like all those spooky monsters you think are hiding under your bed. But we're going to work on that together. OK?

Starting point is 00:37:32 So it's not so scary. That's a clip from the Boogie Man delighted to say I've been joined by its director Rob Savage. How do Rob, how are you? I'm very well, how are you? Well, I'm good, thank you. I'm just going out of your movie, but I'm still in one piece. A bit wraddled. A bit wraddled. Yes, so... First of all, congratulations on the picture.

Starting point is 00:37:50 Introduce us to the Boogieman. Introduce us to this story that you've delivered for us. So, the Boogieman tells the story of the Harper family, who they've just gone through a big loss, they've lost their mother, and aren't dealing with it particularly well. And the therapist father will get a very strange patient who comes in to his therapy practice and spins a story about a murderous creature that may or may not have killed his three kids. And slowly, the Harper family begin to believe they may have been infected by the same evil

Starting point is 00:38:25 and takes over their household. And that guy that wanders in, Leicester Billings, yes. So this is a Stephen King short story. It is. The fabled Stephen King short stories that produced so many fantastic films over the years. I'm right saying that the Leicester Billings character is sort of more sent to the youth,

Starting point is 00:38:43 you've just, you pivoted a little bit towards the, towards the fam. Yeah, well the short story is, the short story is basically just two people in the room. It's a therapy session between Will Harper and Lester Billings who is telling this story of the, the boogie man and creature that may or may not have killed his kids and then has a very nasty surprise at the end of it. But it's eight pages of two people in a room talking,

Starting point is 00:39:06 so it's not the most obvious king material to adapt. It's not even a short story, really, the way you might have it. Yeah. The people think we're short story, might think of 50 pages or something. Yes, no, it's from night shift. It's actually a predate, I think I'm right in saying,

Starting point is 00:39:20 it's the King Fanzel jump on me, but I think predates carry. It's before he was steving King as we know him, this was when he was angry. He was angry and he was like, waving his arms desperately trying to get attention with these very splashy short stories that he was getting published in hustler

Starting point is 00:39:34 and cavalier magazines, where the boogeyman comes from. And it's, yeah, there's a nasty streak, which I think softened a little bit over the course of his right. How did you really, he softened a bit, did he? Oh, I can't. So how did you come across it? It was one of the ones that I read as a kid that really messed me up.

Starting point is 00:39:52 I was a very impatient reader, so I read the short stories first. They were like forbidden fruit. So I was reading the bookie man and the mangler and trucks, which went on to become maximum overdrive. And all of these, all of the kind of like garishly violent short stories that he started out with. Let me ask you, just before we leave Stephen King, do you need, obviously, you need to show it to him? Yes.

Starting point is 00:40:18 Explain how that process went. He originally, he read the script just before we went into the production, which was really important for me, because this movie is both an adaptation of the short story and sort of a sequel to the short story as well. The short film was kind of encapsulated in Act One and then we carry on an entirely different story with a new family who aren't from the short story at all, or have just a vague connection to it. And so I wanted to make sure that King knew what we were doing with his material and that he felt like we were building on the themes of the short story in a way that he felt was true to his intention and he read the draft and he loved it.

Starting point is 00:40:59 And in fact, he did a really lovely thing, which is he was on a book tour at the time. And every now and then, he would just mention out of the blue how much he'd loved the script for Buggy Man, how it was a great example of building on a short story and earning a 90-minute run time with something that was from one of his short fiction. And we were shooting the movie, and every so often somebody attacked me on the shoulder and said, you see what Stephen King has said about our movie. And it was just, it was a great motivator for us as we slog through this issue. It must be a huge thrill though, you know, because he is the master. You know, just this morning he tweeted about succession. He tweeted about a New York Times

Starting point is 00:41:40 headline which said succession, why did we care? And then Stephen wrote afterwards, I say Stephen. Stephen King wrote afterwards, breaking news, a lot of us didn't. So, oh, oh, oh, okay, that was interesting. But tell us about how you decided to construct the film because obviously there is a boogeyman. There is. That's the title of the movie.

Starting point is 00:42:02 How did you sort of talk a lot about how long before we see the Boogie Man? How long? Because until you see the shark, until you see the spaceship, what's it going to look like? Is it, you think, I need to hold back, hold back, hold back, what was your intent?

Starting point is 00:42:20 Yeah, well the Boogie Man is such a kind of ubiquitous character. Everyone's got their own interpretation of him. And I wanted to leave as much space for that as possible. That being said, it is a studio horror movie. People are going to expect this family to show down against the creature at the end. So we're going to see him eventually. But I wanted to make sure that I was leaving a lot for the Units' imagination. And it's funny you mentioned Jaws.

Starting point is 00:42:40 Like when we were editing this movie, on the whiteboard outside the edit, we had the total screen time of the shark in George and the total screen time of the alien in alien, and then we had our boogeyman screen time, and we've actually got a second less of screen time of the boogeyman than the shark in George, and a second and a half less than the alien in alien, because those, you know, they're two of the best horror movies ever made, and leave so much up to your imagination. And I really wanted this to feel like a haunted house movie where a lot of it was inference and sound and dread, as well as the kind of stabby jump scares that you come to expect in these movies.

Starting point is 00:43:21 Yeah, so you came off Dashcam and Host, which Mark loved, particularly. And you mentioned studio in your last art, so just wonder what difference that felt like to you as the director to come off the back of those two, a low budget, let's say, movies into a studio picture. I was spoiling for a fight. I was ready to fight on every single thing and I thought it was gonna be really contentious. And to be honest, I thought it was spoiling for a fight. I was ready to fight on every single thing and

Starting point is 00:43:45 I thought it was going to be really contentious and to be honest I thought it was going to be a horrible experience and it ended up being completely harmonious and I think part of that is I wasn't trying to sneak in a 24 hour house horror movie. I've always wanted to make a big fun Friday night horror movie that you can go wanted to make a big, you know, fun Friday night horror movie that you can go and see in the multiplex. And this is totally that movie. And that was what I pitched to the, that was what I pitched to, to the studio. And that was, that was the intention going in that I wanted this to be those two movies, those two movies are lockdown movies, they're pandemic movies, they're very much very much movies of, you know, their 2020

Starting point is 00:44:25 and 2021 movies through and through. Or as this I wanted to be a classic horror movie that you could pluck from the 1970s or you could watch from, you could watch 10 years from now and it would still, it would still feel relevant. Yeah, you'd understand it and you get it. Quiet place was one of my favorite films of the last decade. Yes, I absolutely loved that film. And you have Scott Beck and Bramwoods who wrote the screenplay. Yes. For that working on this story, that must have been a thrill.

Starting point is 00:44:54 Yeah, that was one of the things that drew me to this originally. And they were the ones that really cracked that way of breaking the short story and extrapolating it down into this 90-minute feature. They came up with the idea of using King's story as almost act one of a larger piece. All I didn't work with Beckenwood's that much. They had a draft that I came on board. I came on board too and I worked with Mark Heyman, who's another brilliant writer who wrote Black Swan and he worked on the wrestler and all these great movies. So I worked with him to build it out into the movie that ended up on screen. But there's a lot of DNA from Beckin Woods original draft in there.

Starting point is 00:45:31 And can you... There are quite a few sequences that involve a moonball. Which is, and in fact, I think moonball is in some of the posters that have seen. I think it was a last minute replacement for a lightsaber was. But it's given you some great shots, just explain how the Moonball is important and how you ended up with it.

Starting point is 00:45:53 Well, the character of Sawyer, who's the youngest character, the one who's afraid of the dark, the one that first comes to dad and says, there's a boogeyman creature living in my closet, has had to have this central item that she was going to use to stave off the darkness. And originally it was a lightsaber toy, which is what I had as a kid. I had crappy knock-off lightsaber. And there's a pivotal sequence in the movie where she's

Starting point is 00:46:17 got this moonball toy. And originally it was a lightsaber that was then going to start to malfunction and fritz out in a creepy way. I didn't realise I'd forgotten that we'd actually cast Vivian Laira Blair, who plays young Princess Leia in the Star Wars TV show. I'm not the biggest Star Wars fan, so I was unaware of this. But Disney, obviously. A lot of people won't forgive me for that. Yes. So Disney jumped in and said, we can't really have Princess Leia with a crappy knockoff lightsaber, fritzing in her hat, not a good look for us. So two weeks before we started shooting,

Starting point is 00:46:50 they said, you gotta replace it. And we Googled madly, glowing children's toy. And we found this moon ball. And completely we wrote all of those scenes and it ended up being one of the best bits of the movie. And one of the images that's kind of, that belongs to us now to one of our defining images. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:47:08 Because you can roll it, and you can, you can go all kinds of places that are like, who needs a lightsaber when you've got a moon ball? Yeah, no, it opens up the space in a great way, and it's got a light inside of it, so it's kind of weighted, so you roll it, but it doesn't roll in a straight line, and there's lots of great stuff

Starting point is 00:47:21 that we came up with on the fly. You mentioned a Vivian Laira Blair, who plays sort of this young kid. I mean, in the movie, she feels like she's six or seven on something like that. Is it difficult to direct a child? Obviously, she is not the target audience for this movie because it is a terrifying film.

Starting point is 00:47:39 Is it difficult to make her be terrified? Because earlier on, actually, there's a kid in a crib who is screaming as well. Yeah. Well, for that kid, I'd to speak to the mom. I said, what's she most scared of? And the mom said, she's scared of dinosaurs. So on the day I got a dinosaur costume

Starting point is 00:47:58 and crept out of the closet towards that child. With the mom's consent, I might add, but I'd. So that's a properly scared child. It's a properly scared child. With the mum's consent, I might add. Right. So that's a properly scared child. It's a properly scared child. When you're working, that kid was two years old. With a two-year-old, you can only do, there's only something to acting they can do. Vivian, who was nine when we shot this,

Starting point is 00:48:17 is just an extraordinary actor. She's been acting since she was about three or four. She was in bird box and the Star Wars series that I can't remember the name of. Again, a lot of people won't forgive you for that idea. Yeah. She originally was kind of talking down to her and patronizing her.

Starting point is 00:48:36 You're talking like you were talking to a nine-year-old and she was just kind of rolling her eyes and putting up with it. But it became, after a couple of days, incredibly apparent that she was just as capable of not more so than any of the other actors that I've worked with. And I'd offer to make loud noises and give kind of scary stimuli for her to react to. And she was like, no, no, just give me a second. She'd close her eyes. And whatever process she's worked out, she would suddenly tears would start streaming down her face

Starting point is 00:49:07 and she'd work herself up into a state of panic. Do this amazing take, we call cuts and then she'd go back to playing with her toys again. The father of the Hopper family, played by Chris Bacina, is a therapist. And there's another therapist in this film, there's a lot of therapy in the film. I wonder if that two-year-old baby,

Starting point is 00:49:22 who you child, toddler, who you freaked out by wearing a dine, I wonder if that child is going to end up in therapy and it's going to be your follow. I think probably, I think Disney, Disney, are going to pay for that. Well, the certification is an interesting one, you know. What were you aiming for? What did you want and what is it? Well, it's a PG-13 in the States. I think it's a 15 over here. I wanted to make a movie that felt... I wanted to make a movie that was open to a wide audience. It's the boogeyman. So you've got to be able to have a young audience come and see this movie.

Starting point is 00:49:53 This to me is a kind of gateway horror movie. It's the movie that you'll watch. That will then, you know, you breed kind of horror obsessives and we'll go on to watch the harder stuff like the Evil Dead to the world. But I also wanted to make it about as hard as a PG-13 could be and I wanted to start with a sequence that showed that we weren't messing around and this wouldn't be that nobody

Starting point is 00:50:17 in this movie was safe just because the certificate isn't, you know, isn't 18. And also, you know, you don't need to be an R-rated movie or an 18-stubic movie to be scary. A lot of that is left to the audience's imagination. It's interesting. That reminds me a lot of a quiet place. Yeah, which is a huge reference for me. And that PG-13 movie as well.

Starting point is 00:50:38 Yeah, which is interesting, because that just means in America, anyone can see it. Yeah, basically. So what do you move on to something more hardcore next? I mean, having introduced people, if this is their gateway into her,

Starting point is 00:50:51 what do you want to do next? There's a couple of movies that are a little harder that are definitely our rated movies, but I also just love playing in this space. I mean, like, you know, you reference a quiet place. That's really the zone that I find myself having most fun in, which is to do with building suspense and paying off scares and kind of toying with the audience.

Starting point is 00:51:10 And you don't really need to be showing blood and guts for that. Although I've got a couple of blood and guts movies that are really exciting about it. Rob Savage, thank you very much for talking to us. Thanks so much. Rob Savage, the director of the Boogieman, I have to say, when I walked into the hotel room where we did the interview, my first reaction was, but you're a kid in school, because I'm old and he's incredibly young. So he's just, you know, he's making a studio picture

Starting point is 00:51:43 show, so he's doing very well. Can I just say also before you start, the Stephen King and succession will come up again, so we will be discussing succession in take two, and there'll be a full length spoiler tastic addition, and that's coming out, I will pick up on some of those points. But the Boogie Man, so you and I saw this together, we saw it in a preview screening in Leicester Square,

Starting point is 00:52:06 which had a fantastically intrusive security. An awful lot of the film is very, very dark. And the security person took it upon themselves to get a very bright thing to look across the at every wish was one of the most weirdly intrusive. I was saying, there's often security at you. Movies and then for some reason, they think critics of the people are going to be leaking stuff, which of course is never the case. Because if we were to use how? Usually you don't notice them, but this guy was,

Starting point is 00:52:34 he was like a real full on 3D performance. Anyway, it's a credit to the film that didn't distract from it. In the case of Rob Savage's previous work host, I haven't seen Dashcamber host, I thought was brilliant. Of all the lockdown films, host was the one that was like, wow, that really, really hit the nail on the head. It was such a simple idea.

Starting point is 00:52:56 It was a Zoom meeting and had a say-on thing. There's kind of an illusion to it in the new film, in the Boogie Man, Boogie Man. We have to have a discussion about that as well. But it was a really brilliant exercise in, can't show anything because there's very little to show what visual effects there are in host or all mechanical and they're so well done. So as you said in that interview, this has its roots in the Stephen King story from the angry Stephen King period. Although of course this is I drop savage, so this is kind of a sequel to that story.

Starting point is 00:53:26 And the story is that Sophie Thatcher is Sadie who is still in shock from her mother's death, Vivian Blair is Sawyer, her younger sister, who is beset by dreams of monsters in a very kind of Guillermo del Toro, where I remember Guillermo saying that when he was young, he used to dream that they were monsters in his closet and under his bed and he had to make friends with them in order for his life to carry on. And then Chris Messina, Chris Messina here, is the Willowed Father who is also a therapist and into whose office comes the young mat,

Starting point is 00:53:59 well, not the young, comes the man who says, I have been chased by demons, this terrible thing has happened to my family. And then apparently seems to somehow pass on the curse. So this is a kind of fairly well-worked horror story. There've been a couple of films in recent years, and one of them was Antlers. So another one more recently,

Starting point is 00:54:18 the name of which escapes me about somebody confronting the kind of apparition of a childhood monster that, that for the most part, you don't see the monster because the monster is really symbolic. You know, what is the Boogie Man? Let's do this now. Boogie Man or Boogie Man, in the UK,

Starting point is 00:54:36 we would say Boogie Man, I wouldn't. I mean, I never used the word anyway, but I would say Boogie Man, I think. Boogie Man is definitely an Americanization. You said that in fact, they both come from. Middle English, the word is BU double GE, meaning a frightening specter and also scarecrow and it's where we get bugbear from. Which is fascinating.

Starting point is 00:54:55 I always think bogeyman is KC in the Sunshine Band. I'm the bogeyman. I was thinking of it as an American, the whole thing I think of as more of an American. The fungus, the bogeyman. You must have read fungus, the bogeyman, don't think so. But I'm aware of it. Okay, fine. So anyway, so bogeyman is just sort of, you know,

Starting point is 00:55:11 the amorphous personification of dark thoughts, dreams, monsters under the bed. It's a very, very generic title. And weirdly enough, that very generic title tells you something that's generic about the story. It's a story about grief, about death, about a family coming to us with this. Somehow that grief is manifesting itself in a monstrous form. So there are echoes of poltergeist, there are echoes of stranger things.

Starting point is 00:55:39 You obviously drew on the connection to quiet place. The question is, is it done well? And I think that when you consider how generic the story is, and it is very generic, I think that what Rob Savage does is to get the very most out of that generic setup. So, for a good part of the film, an awful lot of the film is to do with the creeks and shadows of the mind. It's to do with what you don't see. It's to do with people in darken houses. I know one of the arguments is, turn the lights off. But I think the evocation of the darkness, it reminded me somewhat of, of, of nope,

Starting point is 00:56:15 in which there's an awful lot of stuff which is done in, you know, night time. And it's, it's kind of all the colors of the dark, which is a, you know, obviously a phrase I love. And I think it does that really well. I think it's at its most successful when it's keeping all the stuff off screen. Now, you had the conversation that with Rob Savage, but I thought it was very funny about timing.

Starting point is 00:56:36 The amount of time you see the shark in jaws. The amount of time you see alien in alien. And the amount of time you see the boogeyman for one of a better word in the Boogie Man. And although there is a pleasure to be had in creature effect, I mean, I've always been a big fan of Stan Winston and pumpkin head and of course that connects to aliens and everything. The point at which Boogie Man is at its most effective is when it's not showing you the monster. What it's doing is frightening you with the possibility

Starting point is 00:57:05 that there is something monstrous there. And I actually think that sense of mood, that sense of tension locks this right back into what was great about host. Because with the host, there was just, and I started watching hosting and I'm another lockdown movie, I've already seen on-friended, which I like, but this isn't gonna get anywhere near to that.

Starting point is 00:57:24 And then of course it did host really, really creep me out. This didn't frighten me in the same way that host did. Didn't frighten me either, actually. But I enjoyed it because what I thought was, if you're going to do stuff looking in the shadows, if you're going to do the very poltergeist, there's a scene in poltergeist, which is really famous now, when the boy looks under one side of the bed and

Starting point is 00:57:45 then under the other side of the bed and then he sits up and suddenly the clown doll is behind him and it's absolutely terrifying. There's also a scene in this which seems to specifically refer in poltergeist that she gets taken into the television and there's a sort of a slight riff on that here. But all the stuff that works the best is, the performances really make you think, okay, these are people who are dealing with genuine drive, that Sophie Thatcher was fantastic in the lead as the teenager who goes to school and her friends, aren't sympathetic, I mean, they're kind of trying

Starting point is 00:58:23 to be sympathetic, but are they really trying to be sympathetic? And then there's the thing when she's wearing a mother's dress and somebody says, well, that's really creepy. And she's wise it creepy. You know, well, it creeps me out. And that's kind of the brutality of school.

Starting point is 00:58:35 So I think he's a very fine director. I think the story is very generic. And I think that it's, as he said, a big multiplex, you know, blockbuster movie. I'd be interesting to know whether or not Eric, and I think that it's, as he said, a big multiplex, you know, blockbuster movie. I'd be interesting to know whether or not the multiplex crowd feels short-changed in terms of they've got so used to quite,

Starting point is 00:58:53 quite bang, quite, quite bang. And this, obviously this does a certain amount of, you know, creeping around and then revelation. But I wouldn't describe this as a quite, quite bang movie. I think it's much more to do with a genuine sense of creeping dread and anxiety. And I think that the performance is and the thing that root it in that. I don't, I'm less bothered when it actually gets into monster stuff, because although I like creature effects, I'm much more bothered by that cold hand on the back of the neck.

Starting point is 00:59:25 But I thought it was pretty solid work. I don't think it has the individuality of host, and it would be interesting to see what Rob Savage does next, because what I would like is for him to have the facilities, the expanse that he's had with this, but also the originality of something like host. What do you think? I think it's a surprise, it's a 15, I think.

Starting point is 00:59:47 It felt to me that I'm not a horror fan, but I thought it was perfect except for, and I would be a boardline 12. It's some, given that you can see pretty much everything in a 15, I think that would be, anyway, it is a 15, so that's what you think. So what they say is strong horror, brief, bloody images. And in fact, when you look at the BBC content advice, it does out of five stars. Violence, three stars, threatened horror, four, which is interesting,

Starting point is 01:00:13 because it means it's the mood as much as anything. Language, three, also, injury detail, it has four, but the injury detail is so fleeting. It's not salacious. So see the boogie man, let's know what you think correspondents at Curbinamere.com, adds in a minute mark. But first, let's just lighten the load one more time, not in the pull pit this week, but let's go into the laughter lift. I'm not impressed with Charles III at the moment. Okay. He tested some jokes

Starting point is 01:00:44 out on me for his stand-up set, but the one he told me was absolutely revolting and involved defecation. Oh dear. There's no need for that. Who jokes are absolutely not my favorite kind, but they are a solid number two. And also in the Mayo family,

Starting point is 01:01:00 that has a particular try-hard. Thank you. I am a little bit cross, though, Mark. I'm not sure if you saw the news, but some miscreant has been selling our laughter if jokes on the streets of New York. No. They've set up a stall next to an artisan bread shop selling our jokes for five cents each.

Starting point is 01:01:16 It's a pun per nickel. Very good. It's pun per nickel, pun per nickel. I suppose we should be too harsh on people, though, Mark. Judge less and understand more, that's what I say. You never know what someone has been through. For example, as a child, I was forced to walk the plank. We couldn't afford a dog, so that was the way that went. And finally, Mark, what's blue in smells like red paint?

Starting point is 01:01:38 Blue paint. Correct. Look. Yes. What's still to come? You don't get any points for that, by the way. What's still to come? I'm going to be reviewing Spider-Man into the Spider-verse. Back after this, unless you're a Vanguard Easter, Yes, what's still to come? You don't get any points for that, by the way. What's still to come?

Starting point is 01:01:45 I'm going to be reviewing Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse. Back after this, unless you're a Vanguard Eastern, in which case your new haircut looks so much better than the old one, and your service will not be interrupted. Metro links and cross links are reminding everyone to be careful as Eglinton Cross-Town LRT train testing is in progress. Please be alert, this trains can pass at any time on the tracks.

Starting point is 01:02:08 Remember to follow all traffic signals. Be careful along our tracks and only make left turns where it's safe to do so. Be alert, be aware, and stay safe. With banking packages from Scotia Bank, you can put money back in your pocket. That's how Marcus was able to invest in everything he needed to launch his podcast about his pets.

Starting point is 01:02:30 Welcome back to PetGasd. Visit ScotiaBank.com slash welcome offer, Scotia Bank conditions apply. And we're back, an email from Yale Grishka Cocaine, president of the Decision Analysis Society informs. Parking? Yale Grishka Cocaine. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no I'm writing with regards to the recent conversation about movie one-liners that are now part of common discourse at home. Oh, I see, yes, yes. Two sentences get used often in our house under very specific circumstances.

Starting point is 01:03:12 When one of us is upset by something that clearly isn't worthy of upsetting us or is outside of our control, like delayed travel or lost luggage, that kind of thing, in an effort to help diffuse the situation, we will say to each other, it's only noodles, Michael. This line from my all-time favorite number one movie immediately reminds us that we shouldn't get all upset and wound up over something that we cannot control, change, or otherwise, it's worth our anger. When someone brings in a totally new line of conversation

Starting point is 01:03:42 and is distracting from an important still ongoing conversation, we will say, don't cross the streams. We all know that that implies that we should get closure in the original conversation before moving on to the next. So that's lost boys and ghostbusters. Yes. Lost boys. Okay. Ghostbusters, definitely. Yale says, thank you for your show and all you do to fill in the time during my daily runs, because I listen to episodes on repeat. My long drives and otherwise whenever I need someone to keep me company. I like the idea that we're just filling in the time. That's what we do.

Starting point is 01:04:15 We're here to fill in the time. My none more black is the thing that I use a lot, although I realize that an awful lot, I saw that the ruttles is I think up there for me with spinal tap and that has all that stuff about no fixed hair style and only an amateur drinker and that's all those phrases. The phrase that gets used most for me, which isn't from a movie, but movie related, is Nick Jones, my very good friend who I work with on documentaries, often refers to an adult beverage because that was a term that William Peter Blatter used when we were around his

Starting point is 01:04:50 house doing an interview. And he said, would you gentlemen care for an adult beverage? OK. Well, I love that phrase. I mean, with nail is what you quote a lot. With no a lot, absolutely. Here, here. Adult beverage sounds as that could have come from that. I think the only thing that we ever remotely use might be too many notes. Too many notes all the time because that kind of works. And correspondence of Kermitamay.com, Spider-Man. Spider-Man across the Spider-Verse,

Starting point is 01:05:16 which is the new animation that follows on. Is there any punctuation in that? Yes. Spider-Man, Spider-Man colon. An end dash or an M dash? An N dash, I believe, because it's between the thing. Let me just call it the actual, so this is... Okay, spider,

Starting point is 01:05:33 capital S spider-n dash man. Right. Colon. Across the spider-verse. Okay, thank you very much. Okay, this is like working for the monthly film bulletin. Because that's the monthly film bulletin getting the punctuation of a title

Starting point is 01:05:50 and the exact way the title was was a really, really big deal. And they used to have this rule, which was that it had to be the way that the title appeared on screen. Yes. Well, no, because AI artificial intelligence, the way that appears on screen is that an A comes in from one side of the screen, and an A comes in from one side of the screen and an I comes in from the other side of the screen and then they cross it's you know

Starting point is 01:06:09 it's those those folk in compositors corner are really are coming. So spider-man colon across the spider-first which is the it follows on from into the spider-verse and it will be followed by into the spider verse and it will be followed by beyond the spider verse because like fast 10, your seat belts, this doesn't have an ending. It has a just stops. No, it's, no, it doesn't stop. It's to be continued because there's another one coming. So it's, you know, it's two and a quarter hours long, something like that, but it's, there's, you have to wait for the, for the next one. Screenplay co-written by Lord and Miller, who are the team behind Lego movie and Clady

Starting point is 01:06:48 with a chance of meatballs who sort of settle this in motion. New directing team, including Camp Hours, who we were talking about in relation to Soul. Also co-written by David Callahan. So this picks up, I'll do a very, very brief bit of plot, but this is not really a film in which doing a plot and opsy is going to help very much. Firstly, but I don't want to give any spoilers away,

Starting point is 01:07:10 although honestly, I don't know that I could. And secondly, because it's a multiverse movie. And in the way of proper multiverse movies, meaning everything everywhere all at once, they can't really be summed up in a simple plot because the whole point about them is there are multiple things going on at the same time. However, Mars and Marolus, you make more, teams up with Gwen Stacy, at least Timefeld, to help fight the spot

Starting point is 01:07:35 to his threatening to tear world's plural apart. Yeah. And then the adventure takes them into the spider verse, to spider society, which is land of spider people, they find themselves out of sync with the organ. There are many conflicts and there are many versions of many many versions of spider man, spider people, spider person, spider things. Actually some of them are either there are, it is a, it is a multiple world. And the way in which the multiple world is, is expressed on screen is through a series of animations that every time they go into a different world, the kind of the animation style will change. It's all very, very distinct. So each world has got its own aesthetic. And one point it looks like, you know, a Keira, the next it's all very, very distinct. So each world has got its own aesthetic. At one point, it looks like, you know, a Keira. The next, it's Gonzo. The next, it's Sid Meade futurism. The next, it's three-color comic strip. The next, it's Jamie Hewlett punk. You know, so every single world has a

Starting point is 01:08:40 distinct vision. And we pinball and career through these worlds at a rate of knots. The film moves like a bullet. I mean, at times, it's kind of like you want it to stop because during some, I know whether you remember, but during the original Sam Raimi Spider-Man films, one of the problems was whenever they started doing action sequences, the action sequences looked terribly CG. They couldn't figure it out a way of making the swinging through the streets look good on screen. And of course, it's because the origin is a comic strip in which all that stuff was, you could draw it, but it was very, very hard to render physically well. Somehow, the spider-versed movies are the best of the Spider-Man's because what they're doing

Starting point is 01:09:24 is they're taking that aesthetic and they're going, okay, well this is what it would look like if it was moving. And so it's sometimes it's like flicking through a comic book at high speed. Everything is coming out, you everything is coming out, you all the time. Also, a lot of sound and vision. Daniel Pemberton's score is absolutely keeping pace with the action. I mean, it's breathtaking. It's occasionally exhausting.

Starting point is 01:09:45 Sometimes it's kind of like being in the company of one of those people who's just got so much stuff they want to tell you, they want to tell you about it now and you really go, and then this is another thing that they were, so it's kind of a bit like, okay, fine, fine, fine, fine. The remarkable thing about it is that in the middle of all this stuff, there's so much stuff.

Starting point is 01:10:00 I mean, so much stuff. You actually find, oh, these are real characters that I care about. I, I, because there's the core things are the same. It's to do with adolescence. It's to do with identity. It's to do with finding your place in the world or the worlds in which there's more than one possible outcome of any event. It's about worrying about whether or not tragedy is inevitable or tragedy can be avoided. Whether it's possible that this version of yourself could have gone in a different way and been a different version of yourself.

Starting point is 01:10:32 What it means, and at the center of it, is a character who, by their very nature, is out of sync with where they are. They're in the wrong place. They're kind of, you know, that's the central Spider-Man thing. Of all of the comic book heroes, Spider-Man was always the kid who was suddenly saddled with this power, and you know, in the original exceptions of Spider-Man was then set upon by everybody who, on the one hand, he's friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, on the other hand, you've got, you know, newspaper things saying, well, he's a criminal, he's a terrorist, he's a terrible person.

Starting point is 01:11:07 The whole central thing about Spider-Man is he's a fish out of water, I mean, the spider is a fish. I'm not if I can hear this, you know, breaking a... In the case of this, it takes that idea and multiplies it by N, when N is any large number. And yet, what's extraordinary is that as it barrels along multiplies it by N when N is any large number. And yet what's extraordinary is that as it barrels along and as it throws all these different visual formats

Starting point is 01:11:31 and these really smart, funny gags that come by so far, I mean, like in the Lego movie, you have to watch the thing three times otherwise you're gonna miss half the gags. I mean, there are really, really good gags but they're fleeting. At the center of it is characters that you care about in situations that, despite all the madness, actually seem believable. And you go, yeah, I sympathize with the emotional

Starting point is 01:11:57 plight. And they're at these lovely quiet moments. I mean, they're fleeting. They're lovely, lovely quiet moments, which have all the sort of, you know, you think I'm effectively watching a rotoscope domestic drama about parents and children and lost ones and loved ones and longing and then it goes, and it flies off in a million different directions. So exhausting, here's what it is. I've just arrived at this. Okay. It is exhausting, but it is not exhausted.

Starting point is 01:12:28 No, because there are more to come. Not coming. Okay, but you will be exhausted. Okay, but it sounds like another hit film is what it sounds like. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Let's do what's on now. This is where you email us a voice note about your festival or special screening from

Starting point is 01:12:42 wherever you are in the world. You send it to correspondence at www.curbardermayard.com. Here we go, this week's correspondence. Sound like this. Hey Mark and Simon, Steve here from the Documentary Film Council, a new democratic member-led body for the UK's independent documentary film industry. The DFC has been developed in consultation with filmmakers and organisations from across the sector with support from the Arts and Humanities Research Council and will be launching at Sheffield DocFest on Saturday, June 17th. For more information please visit documentaryfilmcouncil.co.uk. Tinkety-tonk,

Starting point is 01:13:14 down with an RTs and up with UK Independent Docs. Simon and Mark, this is Stephen Moir, sometime actor and currently coming to you with my director hat on. MTL, FTE, although strictly speaking, this is a voice note. My dog Bonnie, one of very highly commended rosette for the dog with the wagliest tail at the her and gate May fate in 1976, and I was standing very close to her at the time. Simon, I was on your show many a moon ago for the thing I did with the teeth, and a lovely time I had. Mark, we have not met, but I like your hair very much. My second feature, a bit of light, starring the good lady Thessbian producer, Irin Dors,

Starting point is 01:13:55 plus Mr Ray Winston, pepperbellic Warner and Yusuf Kukur, written by my brilliant friend Rebecca Kellard, is playing the black tie gala performance of the South End film festival on June 8th. Ray is the patron of the festival, but may have some issues getting there as our team West Ham are in their first European final in 40 years the evening before in Prague, and it could be messy. Tickets are available at www.SouthEndFilmFestival.com, Tickety Tongue, etc. And thank you for the fantastic show. Well, extensive, but how fabulous and how actively was Stephen Moyer is talking about a bit of light, Lordship, the South End Film Festival, June the 8th. I don't remember. He says, I came on and did something with my teeth.

Starting point is 01:14:39 So I just Googled him and teeth. Well, I should probably do, he's put you in there though. Hang on, this is what came up. Never go to a newspaper website for heaven's sake. It should so many things go, pop-a-tip-pop-pop there. Fake teeth, okay. All right, anyways, Stephen, thank you very much.

Starting point is 01:15:03 We appreciate that and that, a very nice for you to perform your voice voice note like that with lots of Topical references, thank you, thank you very nice and Steve from the documentary film council. I love the way he called it the DFC which obviously but it makes it sounded like the DMZ Wow, it's like wartime Amateur led body sporting filmmakers, launching at the Sheffield Dock Fest on June 17th.

Starting point is 01:15:28 Can you outperform both steves? If you can, or you just want to tell us about the thing that you're most proud of, a screening or a festival, send your 20 second or to be honest, I mean, Steve might didn't take any notice. Did you interview him about the executioner? Is that what an idea?

Starting point is 01:15:48 Anyway, send your 20 second or 30 second or see whatever it is. Send us your audio trailer about your event anywhere in the world to correspondentsacovina.com. I think that's it. Yes, that's it, that's the end of take one. You sound on the chat. Was that it? No, we got it off.

Starting point is 01:16:04 There was nothing else. Now the piece of paper, but no. It's the end of take one. Was it the new sound on the wall? Was that a check? No, we done enough. There was nothing else. Now the piece of paper, but no. It's the end of take one. This has been a Sony Music Entertainment production. The team was Lily Hamley, Ryan Amira, Sancha Panzer, Gully Tickell, and welcome to the team, Beth Perkin. Hannah Tulbot was the producer Simon Paul was the redactor even though he didn't turn up,

Starting point is 01:16:19 claiming it was a train strike. I mean, it is a train strike, but we got here. And everyone else got here, But anyway, carry on. Mark, what is your film of the week? Well, because I'd really like people to support it, and I think it's a really interesting film, I'm going to go for reality. Thank you, Velistan.

Starting point is 01:16:32 Extra takes with the bonus review, bunch of recommendations, and even more stuff about the movies and cinema or adjacent television is available right now, including our conversation about succession, spoiler-tastic, obviously, take three, we'll arrive in your devices in Boxnex Wednesday.

Kermode & Mayo’s Take - Reality, Rob Savage, The Boogeyman, Spider-man: Across The Spider-Verse

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