Angel Belsey

Joining me this week, Angel Besley

Angel began her publishing career in 2016, working both as an editor and as a literary agent. She believes some books just need to be read. Her new book Six Mile Store is available now via Angel's linktree, linked below. 

Honey’s working weekends down at the Six Mile, trying to figure her life out. Her boyfriend’s about to leave the country, her college advisor hates her guts, her momma ain’t listening, and she’s got this cop breathing down her neck just about all the time.

She finds a friend in her new colleague Lisa, but when one of their regular customers turns up dead, everything goes sideways faster than a greased hog at the county fair…

I hop eyou enjoy the episode, we had fun recording it. 

Angel's linktree

Angel's Instagram

My letterboxd: 

My film Reel Terror: 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to Your Life and Film. I'm your host, Ted Bennett. Joining me this week, A.M. Belsey, the author of Six Mile Store. Honey's working weekends down at the Six Mile, trying to figure her life out. Her boyfriend's about to leave the country. Her college advisor hates her guts. Her mama ain't listening. And she's got this cop breeding down her neck just about all the time. She finds a friend and her new colleague, Lisa, but when one of their regular customers turns up dead, everything goes sideways faster than a grease hog at the county fair. Angel, uh how I talk to her, I I call her Angel. Because we're close. No. Uh it's actually introduced herself to me. Angel's book, six-mile store, is available most places. Amazon being for one. We do discuss self-publishing in Amazon and its benefits and you know some of its uh downsides. I've linked it in the notes, by all means, check it out. There's an audiobook of it as well, which we talk about in the thing as well. In the thing, in the episode. Jesus Christ. I'm rambling. Anyway, here's Angel. Uh enjoy. Um so your your book that you've just released. Is this your obviously it's not the first thing you've written, but is this sort of like your debut published piece?

SPEAKER_02 1:13

I think so, yeah. I've um I I did, you know, at university. Um I had things published in the literary magazine at university.

SPEAKER_03 1:23

Oh nice.

SPEAKER_02 1:24

Um I uh have done some flash fiction that has been published sort of on an online magazine. Um and there might be something even in a a printed thing that that guy uh has done. But uh apart from that, nothing, you know, nothing uh in a more uh formal sense. No yeah. So this is the first thing.

SPEAKER_00 1:45

And does your style of writing is that how would you describe it? Because it's it falls into that camp for me of that sort of 20th century literature, which is you've you you verge into sort of uh you that bukowski or that burrows sort of feeling of just like the ambling of your life where there's a a story to be told.

SPEAKER_02 2:09

So I think that the my style is probably um pretty dry uh and and um I don't I'm not too overly descriptive or flowery. I when I was in school, I tended to not be able to meet a word count. So if if a if I got an assignment that was 5,000 words, I would hit 3,800 and just be like, I I don't have anything. I've said it all now. I've said it, I've said it right, I've said it efficiently. Yeah, I've said it exactly give me all the information you need. You don't need me to restate it and uh you know make it very overblown. And I I've I've always struggled with that. And I've always been amazed by people who say, Oh, this assignment, it's you know, 5,000 words, I've written 8,000, what am I gonna do? I'm like, why on earth?

SPEAKER_00 2:59

What have you written?

SPEAKER_02 3:02

Yeah, the answer could be done.

SPEAKER_00 3:05

Exactly. I I'm the exact I remember there's one formative memory from my childhood where I had there was like a series of questions and I answered one, and then in the next question I was like, oh well I've already answered it. Uh like I've kind of two-parted that answer into this. And I handed that in, and they were like, uh, why have you left this one blank? I'm like, oh, because the answer is kind of there. And they were like, well, no, do them both. And I was like, but it's there, you've got the answer, you don't need it anymore. And I I do find I don't know whether it's just um the way that the the sort of brain connects a sentence. Like, I don't see feel the need in a similar way to make things overly sort of verbose. Like if I'm writing a note for myself, it's just get milk, you know. Yeah. Character does this, you know. And and and when I'm reading something and someone's being like, Oh, the rocks were so wet with moist, no, they couldn't do and I'm just like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, where are we going? Like there's there's a mossy wall. Like, what's happening around this mossy wall?

SPEAKER_02 4:18

Yeah, that's right. That's right. The kind for me, the for me, character is important, and I'll I'll describe character, and plot is obviously crucial, you know. Um, but in terms of surroundings, um I I like to give people a flavor, but also they they need to be able to use their own imagination a little bit, in my opinion. That's what I like to do as a reader, and so that's how I I like to write. But I'm I'm also I'm so spare about it sometimes that I I don't even like giving characters names. So most of my short fiction, I in fact, I don't think I've ever written a piece of short fiction where a character has had a name. They're he and they are she and they are it. Um and in fact, the protagonist of my book, Honey, did not have a name until I was ready to until the book was finished. And it was only because it's complicated. I had have different sections of the books that are titled like yesterday and tomorrow, whatever. And I added an extra section, and I was like, Well, I had yesterday and I had today and I had tomorrow, so what the hell is that section gonna be? And I had to rename them. And um, my editor suggested renaming with the names of the characters who are the you know, the protect the the the ones who are the point of view characters. Yes, and I thought, well, I guess I gotta give her a name. And then I looked through and I realized that actually everyone just calls her honey, um, you know, like as a term of endearment. Um and no one calls anyone else honey, and I thought, well, God, I guess her name's honey. So that's how she got, that's how she's honey. Um, but yeah, I would rather, I would rather characters don't even have names on that sort of spare about things really.

SPEAKER_00 6:01

I I'm I agree with you. I'm I'm I'm very similar where whenever I'm writing a script, I think I always think who would I like to play this character based on how I know the character is going to be. And let's say the actor I know is called James something. I'm not gonna name who it is, but I'll think of a name called James. And then I'm like, right, then the character's called James. Just because then I know it's a shorthand. I'm thinking it's this person. Okay, so when I'm writing, I know I'm thinking of that person. And then at the end, it it doesn't matter, that's their name now. It doesn't I yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:33

I don't I always like it don't make it easier for James Spader to pick up the script and go, ooh, that's me.

SPEAKER_00 6:38

I'm glad you noticed it was Spader. Um it's always gonna be always Spader. Um I always liked in uh Snow Crash, where the main character is called hero protagonist.

SPEAKER_02 6:51

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 6:53

Perfect.

SPEAKER_02 6:53

Perfect.

SPEAKER_00 6:54

I know exactly where we are. Um and your your um you did the audiobook as well. Was that was there a when Well I didn't narrate it.

SPEAKER_02 7:06

Someone else narrated it. It was not me. Is it AI?

SPEAKER_00 7:09

We don't put this in. Is it AI?

SPEAKER_02 7:11

No, no, no, no, it's not AI. Interesting. It is a lady, it's a real life lady.

SPEAKER_00 7:15

I gathered it was lady. There was almost when I was listening, I was like, I that sound like that sounds like it could almost be. And it's not every sentence, every now and then. It's just sort of like, I don't know. But I liked that sort of that feel to it. Anyway, that I won't put that in there.

SPEAKER_02 7:30

No, no, it's not a it's it's a real it's a real lady. Um when when you go, uh I I'm poor, I'm a poor little church mouse who can't afford uh big production um for my uh audiobooks for my press. And um in fact I don't do them because they're so expensive to make. Uh but if you do it with Amazon, um, who actually as a publisher, just as an aside here, I don't really have a problem with Amazon. They give good royalties compared to other self-publishing platforms, which is what I use as a small press. I'm using these print-on-demand platforms. And in in terms of uh reach, you know, obviously they're they're very good. Uh I I I can't really complain about them as a publisher, um, even though I know that when you do an audiobook with Amazon, then libraries don't have access to the audiobook. Other, you know, it you have a trade-off all the time. The for me, it it's either either I do an audiobook with Amazon or I don't do one at all. And I would, I guess, on balance rather have an audiobook, but I don't want to do them with AI. Um so when you look at the um when you look at the uh people who do the audiobooks, some of them will do it uh for a cut of the profit of the book sales without any up any upfront payment. And then there's like a hybrid thing where you pay them a little bit upfront and then they get a smaller cut of the sales. Um and I can afford to do that. Uh so that's that's what I've done. This this woman who had a perfect accent for uh the the book um agreed to do it without any upfront um cost, and I was like, great, fantastic, I'll I'll do that. And and she was really good. And in the end, I was able to pay her a little bit, but I did that outside of the Amazon uh ecosystem. Um, but yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:18

I think it's a good sign as well when someone's willing to work up front, it's they like the project enough that they they they believe it has legs that they'll be like, no, no, no, this I believe there will be money on the back end of this, so let's do it, you know. But um Amazon as a publisher, I I think there was a period of time when I was very anti Amazon as a publisher and purely out of uh historical loyalty to bookshops, right? And it's the same way I feel about streaming services for film. I think like, no, no, no, films should have a cinema run. If not, they're just straight to video and all that kind of stuff. And then you have to remember that's what you personally want, but that's not what the audience is consuming. The audience isn't consuming books and audiobooks in the same way that we did 20 years ago. We're not buying an audiobook on a CD anymore. We're just getting Audible. And what can I listen to on Audible? And if I can't get the book I want specifically on Audible, I'll search a little bit, but 90% of the books I want are on it. I may as well use it. Same with the Kindle. So now whenever I see things that are because I've read some absolute belters that have been published through Amazon. And I just think like, yeah, this is the this is a uh a market that I would have not seen had they only had the ability to submit it to smaller independent bookshops, maybe close to them, maybe a bit further. So they are offering a much wider spectrum of um like listeners and readers. And I think for all the bad that they do, that is very good. Like, so it's terrible.

SPEAKER_02 11:05

There are elements again, they're a trade-off like everything in life, right? You end up having to compromise. And um, and I I'm gonna say something slightly controversial, um, which hopefully will uh you know make a big splash in the press and get me like massively cancelled and then magically, you know, yeah, that would be great. Uh which is that I'm not uh having become a publisher, uh I am now less a fan of bookstores than than I was.

SPEAKER_03 11:36

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_02 11:37

That is because bookstores require a massive discount on the uh RRP of a book.

unknown 11:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:46

And when you're producing books uh at a at a at a more expensive price point, which you must do as an independent publisher, unless you want to take the risk of taking on a bunch of pre-printed stock. So if you're producing uh smaller print runs or print on demand, it's more expensive. And then the bookstore requests, you know, 40% off the RRP in order for them to stock your book, then you cannot make you you'll make a loss, right? Unless you then put the cost of the book up, the RRP up, which impacts the the the reader, right? Yeah. And so for me to have books that are at a price point that I think is appropriate for readers, I cannot have bookstores in my strategy. I can't, because I can't afford them because they require such a big overhead. And that's because they want to make personally, each bookstore wants to make a profit of say three to four something, maybe maybe slightly more than that, maybe slightly less, but three or four pounds per book that they sell. But you know, the person who writes the book will get 10 to 15 percent of what the cover price is. So they'll get a pound per book. As a publisher, I will get less than that. Um, the people who are making the money uh at a cost to writers, readers, uh, and uh publishers, the people who are actually doing the work involving the art, right? Yeah. Are the distributors in the bookstores and they're doing nothing except move a book from place to place. And I find it so infuriating. It drives me up the wall that they think that they have the right to a profit that is three or four times bigger than the author of the book. So um I I've I uh it's complicated. Again, it's complicated because I I do have a love for bookstores in my in my heart, but I I now do not have a love for them in my uh professional time.

SPEAKER_00 13:48

Yeah. And I'm completely the same, as you'll see, the series of physical media I have everywhere around me. It's a similar vein where I would love for a film I make to be get a general release DVD or a Blu-ray or 4K, whatever. Financially, that is the most irresponsible decision to do. What you should do is sell it for an amount and get it on a streaming platform and let your film be consumed that way.

SPEAKER_02 14:17

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 14:17

And 100%. If you want I know it's a very difficult, like obviously everyone needs to make money. I'm not financially driven, luckily. Yeah, need the money, but not driven by it. Um there is that thing of do you want to make money or do you want to tell stories? Because if you want to make m money, probably don't be in this business.

SPEAKER_03 14:39

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 14:39

If you want to tell stories, then what the fuck does it matter how it gets out there? You know?

SPEAKER_02 14:44

100%. I cannot agree more. And this is exactly why I became a publisher, and um it's exactly for this reason. And I was listening to your podcast with that lovely uh young guy who was um uh a producer or a director of films. Uh I mentioned I was on the on the WhatsApps with you saying I agreed a lot with what he said.

SPEAKER_00 15:06

Oh yeah, Logan, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:08

Yeah, yeah. So I was listening to him going, oh my god, this guy and I seem to share a lot of opinions on things. Uh, I did, I became a publisher because I have been working as an agent. It was very difficult to get books in front of uh uh editors who were uh who had the bravery or the interest uh in doing something that wasn't profit-driven, right? And I thought, I I don't I don't need these people's permission to publish this book. I I only need the permission of the author and like the guts to do it myself. And like who who who cares whether it's published by like, you know, Harper Collins or Simon and Schuster? Like they they are profit-driven machines, you know, they're they're producing book-shaped products that go into the world to make more profit so that they can't.

SPEAKER_00 15:51

Book shaped products is the perfect.

SPEAKER_02 15:53

They're not really, you know, um any any kind of work of art. And and to be fair, they're businesses, they're not like artists council.

SPEAKER_00 16:00

Yeah, it's not their business to make art, it's their business to make money.

SPEAKER_02 16:05

That's exactly right. And it's very much not their business to make art because they they simply don't do it, or if they do, it's underfunded. And and so, so I was like, I don't who who needs these people? And so I was just like, well, all that I have to do is do it. And all that I've done is do it. And and like my sales are are small, but some of some of them are really good. Like one of my books, um Chocolate Cake for Imaginary Lives by Genevieve Jenner, I've just found out is being taught in a university class in Oregon. Like, oh my god, I am what in the world? I can't I can't even believe it. I can't, you know. So sometimes these things just get picked up and they, you know, the people love it. It doesn't matter that I would I'm a one person in this office that is full of shit because I can't I don't have the time to get rid of it, and it's just me and I'm doing the covers and I'm doing the the marketing and I'm doing the publicity, and it ever it's just me. It doesn't matter because that book has value that other people have found and they're and they're they're taking it into the world. And it's it's wonderful. But yeah, it does require a lot of work and the will to just do things. But I wish we could all just remember that we can just do things. If you want to do a thing, then do the thing. Do the thing, good.

SPEAKER_00 17:14

There's no matter the gatekeepers that everyone says some exist by all means. The the barrier of entry can be run over by cost of things, but if you just want to do a thing, go do it. Like if it is in your abilities to sit at your computer and write a novella, a short story, whatever, and then just post it.

SPEAKER_02 17:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:38

You know, just go do that.

SPEAKER_02 17:40

And there are so many ways. There are so many ways to get a story into the world as well. Like, um, so for example, uh one of my authors, Bibi Burke, and I, you know, I came on this, I was like, I'm gonna talk about my book, I'm gonna talk about me, everyone's gonna, but actually, I I love to talk about my other authors as well. So my author, Bibi Burke, she is a wonderful fiction author who had a story that was about two women, it's a very complicated, intriguing story, and she couldn't get it published, so she ended up making it as a podcast because she also, like anyone, has uh has done something herself. She's she's done this pop podcast production company, and she was like, Oh, I'll just and it's it's been a success for her. And it was like, this is a story she wanted to tell. She couldn't get it published traditionally as a book, so she put it into a different format, and voila, here it is in the world. And it was the right way for the story to be told because there's a conversation between two people. Oh and yeah, like exactly, and you know, you can write things uh serially, you can put them on a blog, you can write them in flash, you can write them as a novel, but why just a novel? There's so many things other than a novel. You can, you know, you can make a short film about it. Like, there are so many ways you can tell stories. You don't have to rely on other people to give you permission at all. And I would say, even if you're an author and you just want to write stories on paper in books, there are now no gatekeepers because you do not have to approach an agent or a publisher. You can publish anything yourself, you can do it, and all that is gonna stop you from achieving massive success in the world is the the amount that you can market and find publicity for your work.

SPEAKER_00 19:21

Um, one person with one platform can blow up your book, you know, and it doesn't matter doesn't matter whether they found that book via Waterston's or uh you know Barnes and Noble, where wherever they buy their book, there are other bookshops. You know, it doesn't matter where you buy your book, but if you were just you found a blog and you read this thing and someone starts talking about the blog that they found, there it is, it blows up. All it takes is for your small community to find it and blow it up. And there are big authors and big filmmakers who just they make these big budget things, but they don't go anywhere, those films, they're not great films, and it's like, yeah, if that was an independent, it wouldn't have done anything. But then there are independents who get this mass cult following on YouTube, let's say, and then they blow up. And it's like, so it doesn't matter how it's put out there, I'd sooner write short stories, print them, bind them myself, and leave them at bus stops.

unknown 20:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:23

I I'd sooner do that than try and pursue agents because I'm like, I just want people to read it. I don't care.

SPEAKER_02 20:29

Yeah, that's right.

unknown 20:30

That's right.

SPEAKER_02 20:31

You know, like I and the other thing for people, I mean, I could go on about it forever, but the the one thing for people to remember if they're if they're an aspiring author, is that you know, I think that people feel like um traditional publishers, large publishers, give them uh like a legitimacy, like, oh, I am a real author now because I've been published by a big publishing house. But but you know, the the thing is um no one who read your book when you were getting published at a large publishing house had to like it. Um what they had to do was think this can make some money. How much can we make? That's that's precisely it. Even your agent didn't have to like it. Your agent had to think, well, I can sell this. And so it doesn't necessarily give you more legitimacy in in the sense that I think that what people think is that actually I've done something that people really like. I've I'm gonna get this sort of like approval and approbation because like what I've done is really it's a good thing, it's a really good thing, but and it might be a really good thing. I'm not saying that it's not. I mean, many books are great. I love books, obviously. I love books, I'm a I'm a publisher, but what it is if you're published by a large publisher, is it might be good, but it's definitely profitable, and that's really all that they care about. And so why not just bind it up yourself and put it on? Because the people who read it might actually really like it and they might pass it to someone else, and maybe at That point, you know, two people who really like it.

SPEAKER_00 22:02

I'd rather two people who love it than 40 people who were indifferent to it.

unknown 22:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:08

I wouldn't a friend of mine when he wrote a novel, it was quite a hefty tone. And he said, Do you mind reading this to let me know? And I was like, Yeah, of course I'll read it and I'll, you know, whatever. And I read through it and I was like, This is really good. There's an end point in my opinion. And then you kind of keep going. And he was like, Well, I I wasn't done with the story, and I was like, it's not a critique. What I'm saying is, like, how do you want this published, essentially? And he was like, Well, I was gonna send this to uh some agents and try. And I was like, I'd hold off on that for the time being, and I'd stop at this point and I'd make this part a second book, and then I'd plan for a third book.

SPEAKER_01 22:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:48

And then when you pitch to your to an agent, you have a trilogy of books, which is probably more juicy for them to sell because they don't want you to be a one-hit wonder. And he was like, Oh, I I I I guess. And I was like, if you just want to release it, put it out as it is, it's good. But if you want to go to an agent, and he did it in the end, he cut it into three, and I think he's actually having more fun as a writer now doing it because the now he's thinking of it in a different perspective and he's able to go. But there is that thing of like, if you want to sell it, you're not selling this idea, you're selling yourself as a continually bankable commodity to them.

SPEAKER_02 23:25

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, I could I could even go on about how publishers will require, you know, three book deals or five book deals, and then you're you end up in a cycle of having to produce at their on their timelines or you're out, and then it's very difficult to get back into being a published author. Um so yeah, I think that that kind of uh advice was actually really good, especially if he was going to get a three-book deal. Well, at least then he doesn't have to work too horrific timelines. Um, but yeah, I won't go on because I could, I could for hours and hours go on about publishing and how awful it is.

SPEAKER_00 24:08

It does it does feel like uh the publishing world and the filmmaking world at the independent level seem like they're at very similar sort of places where it uh I can see how they are they don't encourage new creators to keep going. It's very much a how long can you afford to keep pushing this? And if you can wait longer than the next guy, then maybe you've got to take a look at the stuff.

SPEAKER_02 24:36

But what they are presumably really good at doing is letting indies take uh huge creative risks, um, fail or succeed on the back of those risks, and then say, Oh, we like that idea, we're gonna steal it from you, or we're gonna poach your author, or not author, your your actor, or we're gonna poach your idea, and then they're gonna pretend that they brought something new to the mainstream world of cinema. Um, when in fact it was the indies who took all the risk and were able to capture the zeitgeist in the moment and do something that was really interesting and creative that people liked, uh, so that the big big guys could then just swoop in and go, Yeah, that's our idea now.

SPEAKER_00 25:11

That was our idea.

SPEAKER_02 25:12

Are they good at that? Because publishing's pretty good at that.

SPEAKER_00 25:15

They are pretty good at it. They I think they've learned their lesson from a few years ago, where they liked an idea and then gave it to a um more steady set of hands, let's say. And then they realized, oh, it wasn't the steady set of hands that made this what it was. It's not just the idea, it's the person's vision and it's the person's way of handling their team and handling their idea. I think now they're a bit better at sort of going like, okay, we really liked what you did there. We'll give you something else, the director, and maybe to like, you know, try and get that done. But then it goes straight into the money aspect of, oh, but it didn't make sixty million. And it's like, well, it's a one it's a one million pound film that that that's not gonna make sixty million. It's either gonna make a million back or it's gonna blow up. It's not just gonna be a nice middle of the road, made its money, let's get another one going. And then it just turns into, well, we'll just give it to Christopher Nolan again.

unknown 26:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:15

I think that's uh you know let's just give Christopher Nolan.

SPEAKER_02 26:20

Why do we even do it? Why do we do it?

SPEAKER_00 26:22

Oh, because I can't not.

SPEAKER_02 26:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:25

That that's the thing. Like, I I I've been sat here sort of the last few weeks trying to polish off two or three scripts, and the amount of times I've just thought, like, I can finish these scripts, and then what? I've then got to go and hunt for the money, and then I've got to try and get it together, and then once it's together, I've got to get it into festivals, and that costs loads of money, and festivals can be hit and miss. They're either really good or they're just scams to try and rip people off. And then if you're not in the top five, are you even bothering? Are you not doing this? What are you but and then it was like, yeah, you're right, I could just uh go quit and go work a job, and it was like, yeah. And it's like, uh now you're right, I'll keep trying. Because what am I gonna do? Fair enough, a normal job that'd drive me mad.

SPEAKER_02 27:14

Absolutely not.

SPEAKER_00 27:15

So yeah. Is your uh husband is he a uh a literary person or is he he's a he's a lawyer, he loves to read.

SPEAKER_02 27:25

Um we we have we sh have a relatively shared or overlapping taste in in literature. Um he he does like books. I I don't think he's read a single book that I've either either written or published.

SPEAKER_00 27:38

That's that's very supportive.

SPEAKER_02 27:41

But but he is he's uh he's very supportive in terms of the fact that like I I can do this, and that means that I don't have to concentrate on another job. Um so I I I appreciate that very much. And then then also it doesn't, you know, I don't then have to worry about his opinion about anything that I'm publishing either. So that might be awkward if he's like, No, I I hate that book, and I'll be like, Well, uh, I like it. So we can argue about it. So then you don't buy it. Yeah. Well it won't.

SPEAKER_01 28:11

Yeah. That's that's not a worry. No, but I doesn't even bought my book.

SPEAKER_00 28:15

Yeah, oh come on. I'd be buying copies just to keep under the bed so no one else can have it. No, um I uh I I know what you mean. There is that thing of sometimes I want the sort of the reassurance from my partner that like the films I make or the promos I make or the short things I make are good. And then another part of me is reminded that it's like, do you think it's good? And it's like, oh I think it's good, and it's like what's it matter?

SPEAKER_02 28:44

Yeah. I mean, I don't know your partner, but I imagine that you you might be more the expert in in in the sense that you might have more experience with the with the format.

SPEAKER_00 28:54

Um I think anyone that watches a film has an opinion that is worth listening to.

SPEAKER_01 29:03

That's so beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 29:05

Because if you've if you've consumed and you know what you like, then you have to listen to that person. You know, it's just I don't think there's any point dismissing because like yes, I'm formally trained in it, but they've they've watched. You know, they've watched it.

SPEAKER_02 29:19

Well, here I was ready to completely dismiss my husband's opinion on anybody. Compared to me. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:27

My partner's supportive and I love them, but you can be whatever now.

unknown 29:32

No, no. No.

SPEAKER_03 29:35

Oh my lord.

SPEAKER_00 29:35

No, Kirsty is um yeah, I I I know I know what you're saying. There is an element of I think, yeah, it's a hard sort of uh area, isn't it? Because there are people I know who I wouldn't their opinion about what I've made, I I I I couldn't care less. Only because knowing what I know they like, this wouldn't appeal to them. So I'm like, it doesn't matter. There are other people who I who I know what they like and I think I've made something that I think they might like, and then I'm like, oh, I hope they like it, but that's purely from a professional standard of like I kind of want them to like it because then they could be.

SPEAKER_02 30:14

Because you trust their opinion.

SPEAKER_00 30:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 30:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:16

But then when it comes to people that are just like I know you've got good taste, and if you like it, you like it. If you don't, you don't. That's none of my business. Like, I I I I I think that's a fun one to be. But I mean Kirsty is a a big reader, so when it comes to novels. I think if I was to write a novel, I'd be more I'd be more wary about showing her that. Only because she's such a reader, I'd be like, oh no, no, no, no, no.

SPEAKER_02 30:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:42

That would that that might mean something to you, but yeah. If you'd like to do a a promo for your book.

SPEAKER_02 30:49

So uh my book is a novella, not a novel, probably because, as we mentioned, I can't write to a a word count. Uh, but uh it was it did start off as a short story, and that got expanded through the help of uh an editor that that that I found very helpful. Um it is about a young woman um who is apparently named Honey, who works at a gas station uh grocery store that sits right on a crossroads in the middle of nowhere. Um and she is unaware of all of the horrible things that are going on around her in her community. Um it is told from her perspective for the first two-thirds of the story, and then in the last third, we get another person's perspective that sort of illuminates what has been happening for the first uh two-thirds of the of the book. Um I was explaining the plot to my daughter, and my she was like, There's so much is happening, like this is you know, you should have it should be a full novel. And I was like, well, I think that that actually I managed to get everything in there without it needing to be at a novel length. Um it is in many ways my story, uh, but in many ways, absolutely nothing to do with me. So my family and friends who are coming to see the launch, I think um when when I go back to Arkansas in April, I'm gonna be launching the book in a library there. Lots of family and friends are coming, and I think that they think this is like my autobiographical story, and I think they're gonna be a little surprised when they when they read it and they realize it's very much not my autobiographical story. But I did work in a gas station grocery store that is precisely as described. It is very much a real place, um, just a just a mile from from my house that I grew up in. Um and uh yeah, it's a it's uh it's rural the uh the the genre is uh rural noir. This is a very difficult genre to say, uh, probably in my accent. Rural noir. Rural noir. Um or you could maybe call it crime to an extent, maybe some kind of I don't know, slightly literary, crime-ish. Um uh I I don't know. You you read it, so um, would you put it in uh crime fiction or would you put it somewhere else?

SPEAKER_00 33:10

I would uh thriller, if that makes sense. Yeah, maybe thriller because it's like it's not crime crime, but it isn't crime adjacent. It's that sort of I don't know. I would definitely go more thriller, but I think the noir is more uh a fitting uh title for it.

SPEAKER_02 33:25

It's more southern gothic, maybe southern gothic. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 33:29

I think so.

SPEAKER_02 33:30

Sometimes it's hard to categorize these things.

SPEAKER_00 33:32

Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's always there's so many, you know, niche subsets now that you are like what it it it is what it is, read it, you know. But it's interesting that your daughter said that there was so much and it could have been a novel. What I what I loved about it is that by giving everything just a taste or a hint or a short, like, oh, we put us we put a fund out to save m raise money for that thing. I loved how it was actually like, no, no, no. What this is saying to me is that this community has so much going on that you're not aware of. Like, and there is this, you get these hints, you get these moments. It's the every time you see a a missing cat poster, you think for a second, oh that's sad, but then you're like, well, hold on, there's a cat that has a life, and there's a family that have that cat, and there's all of it in there, but all you're getting is this this missing cat poster, and then you're like, Well, hold there there's so much story, but you're only getting this little bit. And I know it's a bit of a tangential way of saying this, but it feels very much the same way that when when you're told about little moments, little vignettes of someone's life, it hints at a bigger world and don't necessarily need to be told everything. A bit like what you're saying with how you write, it's you're hinted at it, which then gives this even more scale, so you don't need to write about it because you've got it. You've got the scale just through those hints, and I think it's either.

SPEAKER_02 34:56

That's what I like. Thank you very much, because that's that's really what I aim for is to provide a slice. And you know, you slice down the middle of a thing, and you'll see edges of all the things that are running through it. And I don't need to slice it anymore because you you can you can use your imagination about what that's gonna look like as it as it goes through. Um so yeah, that's that's what I was aiming for. So thank you very much. I'm glad to hear it worked.

SPEAKER_00 35:21

Luckily, it was well written. So I was able to get that. I think as well, like I think a lot of audiences are spoon-fed, and um some audiences like to be spoon-fed, and I think to assume all audiences like to be spoon-fed is disrespectful to the audience. It's yeah. Some people like to use their imagination, some people like to look at it and go, ooh, that was good. What was that bit? What was this little nugget? I'm gonna think about that little nugget for a bit longer than I probably should, but oh, that was good. And then that's when maybe their own imagination triggers. And they write something, they say something, they paint something, and then you're like, oh, that's inspired. But if you give someone A to Z here's everything, then there's no room for interpretation. And it's like, well, alright, that's fine.

SPEAKER_02 36:08

Yeah, I completely completely agree. We are of one mind.

SPEAKER_00 36:13

Perfect. Perfect. Do you think there is a uh an interesting interesting perspective being an American that's lived in the UK for 30 odd years nearly? 30 years? Must be about that now.

SPEAKER_01 36:26

Oh almost, yeah, almost 30 years.

SPEAKER_00 36:28

Because you were saying that it's very dry, and I did think like it is very dry, but it also has that sort of southern hospitality feel to it as well, where it's sort of everyone knows everyone's business.

unknown 36:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:39

And it's not not in a prying way, but it's just in a course we do. But then you also pick up that English dryness. Do you think that's quite a unique voice that you're capturing?

SPEAKER_02 36:50

Well, you know, I think that this has always been my voice. Um, and it might be that I I I had to come to the United Kingdom in order to uh become, you know, to fully realize this voice. Maybe I was drawn here, I was lured here by the uh culture and the the dry and everything except weather sense. Like maybe uh maybe maybe it was an inevitable inevitability, perhaps. Um I I don't know. And it could also be that, you know, as I've said before, um, it's impossible to live somewhere without picking up the intonation of the people around you. Perhaps uh my voice has become uh a little more sardonic or uh wry in a sense because I am I'm permitted to be this way uh more by the culture. Um as I say, I think I've always been this way. It's just that I wasn't a very good southerner because most people are a little more earnest, a little more open, a little more uh culturally cheerful. Um so yeah, I don't know. It's um maybe maybe I just had to be here in order to sound like you're a native British person. Well, I've been here now longer than I was there, right?

SPEAKER_00 38:09

Yeah, that's fair, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:10

You know, it's it's hard to be someone who's um got one foot in each culture. I was a child in America and I've really I came here when I was 21, but you know, uh I'm I'm an adult. I've always never been an adult. I've only done things like buy a house, uh be involved in like arranging my own affairs in in this country. So I I don't know. It's kind of it's it's difficult to know what I what I would have written had it been had I stayed there if it could have been the same as it is.

SPEAKER_00 38:40

Yeah, I know what you mean. Because it may not have been it may have been too close to home that that you'd feel like, oh, is this a story that needs writing? It's too close to home. Whereas taking yourself away from it, you realize, oh no, it is. It is a unique story, it is a good story to to tell. But if you're too in it, you become almost like, well, that's just day-to-day. And it's like, no, no, no, it's not day-to-day, it's not day-to-day for me, it's not day-to-day for them. So it it is better to step out. Have you has your daughter is it just the the one daughter?

SPEAKER_02 39:11

I have one daughter and one son, but my daughter is she she's 14. I'm not sure that she should read it yet. I mean, I think there's some fairly explicit um scenes in it that she might not be ready for. I mean, she can read it if she wants to, but I've I've told her just so you know, you know, there's a a sex scene. Also, you know, there's a rape scene in it, which I'm not so sure would be something I want her to read. But, you know, she as I say, she's 14. She can, I mean, God knows. I was reading God the Danielle Steele novels that went around my school when I was 12 years old. And like, I remember one of them, and the the book literally just opened right at a page that was just sort of like a full, I mean, and I was, you know, I was 12 and that was going around, so I'm sure she would be able to handle it. Um, my son is 11 and he definitely wouldn't read it. Although he has read other things that I've published and enjoyed them. Um he could I don't think he'd enjoy this one, like, and also he's too young for it. And I also don't want my elderly relatives to read it for the same reasons, although they're they've all said they're gonna be buying reading it. So I've told them you're not gonna like it. They're they're reading it anyway, so I can't stop them.

SPEAKER_00 40:26

Let them. They might love it. They might love it. Um, have your kids gone over to the States and seen Yeah?

SPEAKER_02 40:35

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. They they they like Arkansas's a very beautiful place. Um lots of natural beauty, really just a stunning place to drive around and to find it's also there are places of it that are really trashed out and and not too attractive. You know, we have very lax building codes. There's there's nothing that's stopping you from from putting up a big billboard that says whites only or whatever, which they have done up in the north, north, north, uh, northeast, northwest part of the state.

SPEAKER_00 41:06

Um, is that the town that's like out and out?

SPEAKER_02 41:10

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Just just just white folk. They they just want to have a white white town. Um, so and also this is where the yeah, I I mean, yeah, like you don't want to live with them anyways.

SPEAKER_00 41:23

It's like if you if you want to all put yourselves in one area, yeah. By all means, fuck up.

SPEAKER_02 41:31

I kind of feel that way. Like I, you know, I obviously I don't approve of their uh, but I I do approve of them all just getting together and just making it an easy target for the bomb to fall on. That's fine with me. That's that's what I want to do. I don't care.

SPEAKER_00 41:47

Did you ever see that um Sasha Baron Cohen film? Um oh, what was it? Grimsby.

SPEAKER_02 41:54

Oh, you know, I didn't see that one. I didn't see that one.

SPEAKER_00 41:57

It's fine, but the whole premise of the thing is that they want to kill all the stupid people in the world, so their plan is to blow up the World Cup. Like, I I wasn't sure about the film, and then when I heard what that was, I was like, Well done.

unknown 42:16

Well done.

SPEAKER_00 42:18

So yeah, similar. Oh my lord. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 42:21

Yeah. I mean, the northwest part of the state is also where the Ku K Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard lives as well.

SPEAKER_03 42:28

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_02 42:28

Um you know, the part in my book where I mentioned that the KKK had adopted a mile next to the school, that that happened when I was in school. So yeah, it is um, there are places like that in Arkansas too. But my children, going back to your question, they they've been, they love it. It's a it is a beautiful place. Um, we don't go back a lot, and now they don't want to go back because they're frightened of Donald Trump, they're frightened of getting shot. They're you know, all of these things that are I'm like, well, yeah, it's good to be afraid of Donald Trump. And I guess you could get shot. I can't say that you're not gonna get shot, and that's also why I don't particularly want to take them because I'm like, well, it's not actually a safe place to go.

SPEAKER_00 43:07

So no, my brother lived in Manhattan up until about three years ago. He was there for about 10 years. Uh then they had their daughter, and they decided that it it just they don't like the idea that she might go to school and there'd be a school shooting. And they were just like, That's not that's not how children should be raised.

SPEAKER_02 43:27

No, no, no.

SPEAKER_00 43:28

With the fear of gun control. It's like, I don't know. So they moved up to Edinburgh. Perfect. Yeah. Where it's just cholesterol. Yeah. Yeah. Uh was there a was there a good theatre in your hometown?

SPEAKER_02 43:42

There were there were two theaters. I think there was one when I was small, and then uh maybe when I was like nine or ten, there was a second one that was built over by the new Walmart. So the the first one was by the old Walmart, and then the second one was built by the new Walmart. And so then there were two. Walmart is a very important place. Yeah, really important. Um, yeah, so there were two. I mean, I wouldn't call them good, but they were serviceable, they did what they needed to do, and I have very fond memories of them. So yeah, that I in that sense they're good, they're good cinemas.

SPEAKER_00 44:16

Yeah, I mean they're dark and they showed films, that's good enough for me.

SPEAKER_02 44:18

Perfect, and they have popcorn.

SPEAKER_00 44:20

Excellent. Um with weird liquid butter, but we won't get into that.

SPEAKER_02 44:25

Delicious liquid butter.

SPEAKER_00 44:26

So uh what was the first film you saw at the theater?

SPEAKER_02 44:29

Already a complicated question. Um I will I'll give you the I will give you the um the nice version. The first film. The first film that I saw in the theater uh was Annie. Um so that was in so I'm just I I prepared for this. I put together a letterboxed so that I could see all of the off like the the actors in case I couldn't remember a name. And like the so 1982 Annie came out. I was uh either five or six, depending on on what time of year it came out, and I loved it. I loved Annie so much, I loved it so much that I had to use the bathroom so bad in the cinema, and I did not want to leave for a moment because I wanted to continue watching Annie so bad that I was absolutely not and I I wet myself, I wet myself in the cinema because I could not leave. I could not leave that room because I was watching Annie singing and dancing and doing my thing. I loved Annie so much, it was brilliant. Excellent.

SPEAKER_00 45:32

I I I miss that uh that wonder of going to the cinema as a kid and being so jazzed, so excited, and so like, oh I can't miss it for a second. Oh and just having to do it. I miss that.

SPEAKER_02 45:47

Yeah, well, I I don't miss wedding myself, but um I I am I am I did love Annie so much and and I know you I know what you mean, like the wonder of like the excitement of going in and and like the the lights going down and the the the the things coming up the showing all the producers and the what are those called the credits those this the not the credits but you know like where it comes up in the logo of the the company comes up and then the next logo of the next company you know um does that have a name? I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 46:19

I I just when it shows all the uh production credits, I would always think it's still yeah, it's still just the credits, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:26

Okay. I love that. I love I love it's the excitement of seeing like a production company you already know you love.

SPEAKER_00 46:32

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:32

Oh it's so nice.

SPEAKER_00 46:34

And they might change Yeah, they might change their logo a little bit and you're like who's oh it's you I like that. No, uh trailers used to be the thing for my mum. Like if you'd said like I went to go see this film, she'd be like, Oh, what trailers did you get? Yeah, couldn't kick doesn't need to know about the film, but like what trailers did you get? They're the good bit. Yeah, and it's yeah, that's true. It's interesting though, those memories of being a kid and going to the cinema because there was we grew up near sort of Crouch End Turnpike Lane area, and um I remember the Odeon that was there and going in to see the Power Rangers movie in '95 or something. And I just remember sort of like walking in this dimly lit corridor, and we're all going, all going through to watch this thing, and I'm holding a parent's hand, I can't remember which parent it is, but I just remember like being that little and looking at the cardboard standees and being excited. I'm gonna go see Power Rangers on the big screen. This is gonna be amazing, and I love it. I love it. There's nothing beats that feeling.

SPEAKER_02 47:33

Yeah, and I try to I try to give this to my kids as well. I'm like, ooh, should we go to the movies? Do you want to go and they're they seem they seem less excited than I was, and I find it a little annoying actually. Yeah, and annoying is the right, yeah. Why are they not so excited? But I guess you know, they have everything at their fingertips. Like, but but since we have the nice um Odeon with the lieback seats and the delivery.

SPEAKER_00 47:55

Oh, the luxe, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 47:58

We have a luxe near us, um, so I can often tempt them by a by a sofa and uh bring they'll bring you a coke and they'll bring you some popcorn.

SPEAKER_00 48:06

But being of people of a certain age, now a dark room and a reclined seat, how long do you last? Because I'm not lasting very long anymore.

SPEAKER_02 48:16

No, I I'm I'm fine. I'm totally fine. Usually because it's really cold. It's too cold to fall asleep.

SPEAKER_00 48:23

Oh, really? I that I love a nice chilled room. Nice little chilled room. I'm like, mmm, getting cozy in my seat. And then I'm just like, well, I'm just gonna, just gonna go, gone, out.

SPEAKER_02 48:35

I think if it were warm, that would be me as well. But no, I can't I can't do it if I'm if I'm if I'm too cold. But no, no, it's totally fine. Also, I like I love movies, so I love going to the movies so much that I I don't actually, I'm not one of those falling asleep on the sofa while the movie is on for people like just going into it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 48:51

I think my brain has associated sitting and watching a film as being nice and relaxed, um, but only because it's like ah, we're gonna watch a film. That means for the next two hours we don't have to worry. We are being shown this story, and then my brain will just be like, Well, then we're out. And it's like, no, no, no, brain, we're still engaged because we're watching the film. It's like you watch with your eyes, mate, not with your brain. I think gone. Like, I can't. But it's fine. It's fine. Um, did your kids see the Jamie Foxx remake of Annie?

SPEAKER_02 49:27

No. No, no, I don't think they've seen any Annie. I maybe I showed my daughter, maybe I showed my daughter the first Annie when she was little, but I don't I don't really remember. Um, no, I I haven't seen the Jamie Foxx remake either. Have you seen it? Is it good?

SPEAKER_00 49:42

No, I haven't seen it.

SPEAKER_02 49:43

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_00 49:44

I I haven't seen it in in only I it I wasn't of the right age when it came out to to care, if that makes sense. Like, and nor am I such a fan of Annie that I'd be like, oh, I'd wonder what they're gonna do with it this time. There's no there's no shade on it, you know what I mean? I'm I'm sure it has its moments, but yeah, I just didn't. Um you say that that that was the nice story, is there a pissing yourself is the nice story?

SPEAKER_02 50:16

Well, I was gonna come on to it when you asked me about the 18s.

SPEAKER_00 50:19

Then we'll wait, then we'll wait.

SPEAKER_02 50:20

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 50:22

Um, what film did you watch over and over again as a kid?

SPEAKER_02 50:26

Oh, yeah. So let me pull up my letterbox here. There are a few. So um on getting things out on video, um, my my mother, I didn't grow up with my mom. I grew up with my uh grandmother for complicated reasons. I would go and see my mother uh at the weekends, and I would occasionally ask if we give Ren to film. And I think just like I was punished by my daughter for um having a television and a projector, um, I watched Frozen about 365 times because we watched it every single day for a year. Yeah. Um, my mother was subjected to this for every weekend for probably three years with the never-ending story.

SPEAKER_03 51:11

Oh shit.

SPEAKER_02 51:12

Yeah, so I loved the never ending story so much that I have watched it uh, I mean, countless times. I've probably watched it a good 50 times in my life. And then when I, you know, stopped watching the never-ending story over and over again, it was The Breakfast Club over and over and over again. So I've probably watched The Breakfast Club. Um that might be the film I've seen the most in my life.

SPEAKER_03 51:40

Oh really?

SPEAKER_02 51:41

Because yeah, I've never stopped watching The Breakfast Club. I watch it, I I could watch it right now. I could I could just put it on and watch it while we're sitting here talking. I I would I would love every moment of that.

SPEAKER_00 51:52

The the film club that I um help organize in Shrewsbury, uh, we're putting on the Breakfast Club at the end of the month.

SPEAKER_02 51:59

Oh, what I'll come. I'll come and watch it. It'll be a good one.

SPEAKER_00 52:02

Perfect. Perfect.

SPEAKER_02 52:03

But but also um I was gonna say that I grew up in um with my grandmother and my auntie in a household that was quite religious, kind of conservative. And so um I wasn't uh I have a big gap in my uh movie and music history because I was not allowed to watch anything that was above a PG for uh probably until I was an adult. Um and so in my house with my grandmother, my auntie, we rented tons of films. Um, but I remember um we rented What About Bob over and over and over and over again. Have you seen that? Yeah, it was a brilliant film.

SPEAKER_03 52:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 52:41

Um also a bunch of Doris Day and Rock Hudson films.

SPEAKER_03 52:44

Um I remember lovely.

SPEAKER_02 52:46

Wonderful. So a lot of these sixties films like Swiss Family Robinson, Pillow with 60s, yeah. Pillow Top, 100%, yeah. Um all of that kind of stuff. So I have a lot of 60s films in my in my repertoire. Um but yeah, I I loved Doris Day and and and Rock Hudson in in those movies. Um and whoever the other guy that she's she uh she was on screen a lot with um someone else as well. But yeah, you know, fantastic movies like that. Uh the other thing that I was gonna say that I watched a lot of uh weirdly is on TV we would get movies repeated a lot in America where you just see them over and over and over. And for some reason it was always the world according to Garp. Always the world according to Garp. That's not true. It was on I know, but I think every American, at least where I'm from, who's my age, could probably tell you the complete world according to Garp. Um, because it was just on TV and we didn't we had three channels and TV on that was it. So yeah, there are a few of them, but they're from different kinds of like if I had my choice, it was Breakfast Club, never ending story. At home, it was all the 60s stuff. And then what about Bob for some reason? We all love that. And I would have and guard, guard.

SPEAKER_00 54:04

I the 60s films, I think they're it's such a shame that like kids kids nowadays, you know me. I'm such a such an old soul here. But kids nowadays, uh they because their attention span has been ruined by YouTube shorts and the TikToks, they can't appreciate a lovely slow burn of a 60s film. Like I would love to show, I mean, I don't have kids, but my niece, I would love to show her it's a mad, mad, mad, mad world. And they'd be like, you're gonna love this, this is so fun. And then I have to remind myself, like, it's three hours long, and to be honest, like not a lot happens until they really start the hijinks, and the hijinks are about halfway through, and you're like, uh, but it's so much, it's so worth it. Like, alright, then I'll I'll put on singing in the rain instead. It's like uh she ain't gonna watch that either. Just put on Frozen 2, put on Moana, and it's like, alright.

SPEAKER_02 55:03

Yeah, thinking about it, like, I think even if you put on something like the original uh parent trap with Hayley Mills, or is that the I mean that is the original that I think of. Was that even a remake of something? I or was that the original original? It always surprises me sometimes when I think a thing was the original and it had been something even before then, but yeah, but um it even if you put on like the Hayley Mills parent trap, I don't think they would find it as compelling because it's not as glitzy, right? Yeah, like maybe like the Lindsay Lohan one would be maybe I d I still don't think they'd watch that one. No, I don't I don't think so either. Um, but yeah, no, I I agree with you. Like we had the time because there was nothing else to do unless you wanted to read a book, right? Um, which God, who wants to do that? The fuck we do that. No, we also never, never. Um you had the time, right? You and so you could you could just easily sit down and watch, you know, uh The Parent Trap and then Swiss Family Robinson, and then you know, maybe even uh Breakfast at Tiffany's or whatever, which is a deeply weird film now to get out and start start watching it.

SPEAKER_01 56:10

You're like, what, what, what?

SPEAKER_00 56:12

It's the it's the when you said I mean I like it now, but uh when you were saying about um growing up in a very religious household having to watch only things that were PG, I did think like, well, I'm sure there's parts in the Breakfast Club that I imagine your grandmother would be like my mom. Oh, that was with my mom, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 56:32

So like with I was I was utilizing the different situation to get something very different from from what I would be getting at at home.

SPEAKER_00 56:40

Yeah. So I was I was just thinking, like, there are PGs out there that just aren't like from a certain time period where it's sort of like, yeah, it's a PG, but it's not for kids. And it's like, oh yeah. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 56:51

Yeah. Well, famously Gremlins created the PG13 uh rating, right? Because it was too terrifying.

SPEAKER_00 56:58

It's like this isn't this isn't an R, but it's not for kids.

SPEAKER_02 57:02

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 57:03

But I love that. I love that.

SPEAKER_02 57:04

I loved it. I loved Gremlins when I was a kid too, because we went to see it at the cinema um whenever it came out, so that was not in my earliest film, but yeah, and I found it was terrifying, but it was funny. And like I've I've never been a scaredy cat kid, so I was like, give me more, give me more, and like those other I was a scaredy cat kid. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 57:24

What's what's so weird is that like my brother actually said to me recently, he was like, It's so weird that you're a horror guy now because you are such a coward, and I was like, Yeah, I I was such a coward until I realized how they made prosthetics and how they made like the scary stuff. Then I became really interested in like, ooh, how do you you do a cast and then you break it, and then you get some like bones, like beef bones. Oh, and then as soon as I got into all of that, whenever I watch a horror, I'm like, how did they do that? And then there'll be a big jump scare, and I'm like, Yeah, I know you do a jump scare, but how did you do that bit over there? And it's like then horror films.

SPEAKER_02 58:02

We like the technicality of it.

SPEAKER_00 58:04

Oh yeah, now like I I really struggle to watch anything that gets me, really gets me. Because I'm so invested in like, how did they do that knife gag? How did they it look like it went in? How did they do that? And then I'm too I'm too invested in how they did it. Like aliens and ghost things still get me, but not really.

SPEAKER_02 58:26

This is the the struggle that comes from being um in the field, right? It's the same with reading books. I can I can now see how they were put together, and it's it's hard to get your head out of the work mindset and into the enjoyment mindset. So getting into the things you love is a really great way to stop loving them.

SPEAKER_00 58:47

100%. I will say that my favourite sort of palette cleanse of whatever, it's 90s thrillers. 90s thrillers are done so well and so like they're a tight 90, they've got a couple of people you know in them, and the story is so easy but fun that I can just watch a 90s thriller and be like well done, perfect. I didn't need to think about film at all during that. It's great. Yeah, so yeah, that's that's the dream. Just watch those over and over. So, hinted at earlier, but what was the first R-rated film you saw and how old were you?

SPEAKER_02 59:30

So I was, let me just look at when it came out. Okay, so depending on the time of year it came out, I was three or four, and it was The Shining. Uh and I I saw it in the cinema with uh none other than my mother uh who who apparently wanted to go see it. It was her weekend with me, and probably didn't imagine that I was going to be paying any attention. Um, so uh actually um I don't recall this to be fair. Um I I've been told this, so if I'm maligning my my mother and her uh her common sense, then I I apologize uh to her. Although we haven't spoken in many, many years, so I don't I have no need to apologize for anything. Um uh nothing, I'll never apologize. Um but I think it's very possible because she uh was a big Stephen King fan, although he hates Donald Trump, so she's probably not a big Stephen King fan now. Oh, it's because she's a big Magabro.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:33

It's very subtle, but I I I can't imagine why you've not spoken to her for a few years.

unknown 1:00:37

Right.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:38

Um and so she was a huge Stephen King fan, and I, you know, I know that people were massively excited about this adaptation that was coming in um into the cinemas, so it's very possible that she just really wanted to go on that particular day and needed to bring me with her. And to be fair, it is a belter of I mean, I love it. I love exciting now seen it. Like um, I know people are divided on Cubic's treatment of lots of things. Um I and even Stephen King himself, but I don't care, it's a good film. I think it's a great film, really.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:09

Uh yeah, it's a really good film, it's a tight film.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:11

And maybe I was traumatized by it, or maybe I wasn't. Maybe that's why I'm not a scaredy cat, because you know, once you've seen an elevator full of blood rolling towards you at the age of three, you're like, yeah, cool. What else you got? Gremlins, gremlins, gripplins, who cares? So yeah, no, um, that was the the film that I saw, uh, apparently, first uh, or the first 18 that I saw. Um if we want to go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:38

Yeah, I was gonna say it's so bonkers that in America the R rating means that as long as you're with an adult, anyone can go see it. And you just think like, uh, I get that, but also no.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:51

Like But we also then have the NC17 rating.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:56

Um nothing really gets NC17, do they?

SPEAKER_02 1:02:00

I think some things do. Um uh I don't know these days. I mean, I'm so out of the loop with what with how with what's on what's getting what rating in America, I don't know. But you know, we do at least have that place where an adult can I mean for example, I I let my children my daughter can watch a 15 if she wants. My daughter can watch an 18 if she wants, um, although I don't think there are very many 18s that she wants to watch.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:27

And they're not the same, they're not the same as 18s.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:30

Yeah, I I don't know. It's it's um for me, like allowing your parent to be the one to make the decision seems to make sense. And then having a category where the parent can't even make that decision seems also to make sense to me. Um, but yeah, I I mean having only ever been an adult in this country, I totally see where you're coming from. And and um I you know, I don't I don't totally disagree. It is a bit weird, it's a bit bonkers that my my mother could potentially have taken a three-year-old to see the shining. Like that is that is kind of crazy.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:02

But I think when we were kids, um we would, you know, mum and dad would rent two films from Blockbusters, one for the family and one for them for later, and not like you know, Pornogs, but like Terminator or you know, something else. You know, something that was just like Leon, something that was just like, oh, this is for adults, it's not for kids. Yeah, but they would sometimes like we'd watch the family film, and then they'd be like, Alright boys, you can watch an hour of this, or you can watch half an hour of this, then you've got to go to bed. So you'd sort of be like, okay, and they'd you'd sit up and watch half an hour or an hour of like Terminator 2. And if there was a bit where like there was like there was this a threshold of like mum would be like that this is fine, this is fine, and then she'd be like, Alright, boys, don't look at this bit, and that would be it, that would be your whole thing. And for some reason, I feel like that's completely fine in the comfort of your own home, being able to say, like, oh hang on.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:52

Oh, you have to leave the room now, but you can do that in the cinema.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:55

You can't do that in cinema, and I think that's just the thing. It's like if you're in the yeah, and also if you're a kid in the cinema, you might not have the same uh respect for a certain scene that might have some emotional weight, and then you're like, This is boring, and someone's over there just like weeping.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:11

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:11

But Andy Dufresne's finally free, you know, it's not it's a twirl.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:16

You know, in my household, uh in my my grandmother's household, the my normal household, my day-to-day household, we had a similar kind of thing, which was um they would rent films, not there would be nothing that was more for the adults later, it would only be the for the family. But um, I remember very specifically renting Top Gun, and there was like a hint of like maybe does he does he just kiss her or do they go into a is there a mild sex scene? I don't know because I never I never got to see Top Gun because the moment it came on it was like nope, it was off. And and so I didn't see Top Gun until I was an adult because of these this very thing that you're you're discussing.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:54

I love how the mild sex scene between him and Kelly McGuinness, whatever, uh, but all of the homo eroticism of that beach ball scene, like volleyball scene, it's just sort of like right over their heads.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:06

Right over their heads.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:07

This is just men having a lovely time in the sun.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:10

Good red-blooded Americans.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:12

Look at them high-fiving each other. Yeah, they're just you know, they are fucking Reagan would love them. And it's like maybe. But yeah, madness. Madness that is. Do you censor what books your kids can read?

SPEAKER_02 1:05:30

No. If they're reading a book, um, I'll be too sure.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:34

That's better than not, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:36

I'll be so I'll be so surprised. I'll be like, read it, just because you'll read a book.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:41

Just Lady Chatterley, whatever, just read the fucking thing. I don't care.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:44

I tried to give my daughter, like, I'm so desperate for my daughter to read a book that I got her the uh Sarah J. Mass uh Court of Thorn and Roses or whatever it was series. The first book is, I mean, I've read only a little bit of it, but I know it gets spicy. I hope that she knows it gets spicy so that she'll just read a book. No, even that. I can't even tempt her into it with like a you know a promise of some else.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:10

Soft-sell like this could open your mind. Just saying.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:15

She won't read a book. So no, I don't censor. I don't censor when the children read. If they're reading, I'm happy. I do um I don't let them watch YouTube without supervision because of the whole algorithm.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:30

Yeah, I I've been around a friend's house with his kids, and like I we uh when I came in, they were watching something definitely for children on YouTube Kids, everything was fine. And then like we went off, got a coffee, like in the house, just went into the kitchen, got a coffee, had a little chat, came back through, and it just started autoplaying the next thing. And he was like, What the fuck in the hell is this? And I was like, Jesus Christ, man, I thought this was on YouTube Kids, and it was like it is, but they can game the algorithm, and it wasn't like it was just spooky, you know, and I was like, Oh, that's that's spookier than I'd want children to watch.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:12

Like, that's not that's not cool, and I don't know, I just don't I don't yeah, but only for that reason, for the same reason I I I don't censor, but I pay attention to the media that they consume from particular uh outlets. But no, in terms of books, no. And I I I'm pretty liberal about these things, and also I don't care about swearing so much. I don't I don't I mean, I grew up with all kinds of violence on TV, right? Like, um and I don't even really care about sex scenes so much. I think they'll be more traumatized by a sex scene in something than if they were with me than than than I would be. Um but my husband, he has he seems to have no, he doesn't really care. So he'll put on a film and they'll be like effing and blinding all the way through the film, and my kids are like, Are they speaking French? And Charles will be like, ah, you gotta hear these words. And so I think my children now know all the words. Yeah, but they don't they don't use any of the words in front of me.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:07

So I guess it's it doesn't have any context to them.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:10

Like you gotta, you, you gotta know the words though. Like, um, I tell my now that my children are traveling to and from places kind of more on their own. Yeah. Um, my rule for them is if someone tries to like bother you in any way, whether abduct you or sort of like, you know, wank in front of you or something, you need to shout the worst obscenities, you know, because people don't pay attention to kids who are like yelling normally because kids just yell, but it's just noise, yeah. Fuck off, you you know, whatever, then they're gonna pay attention to like the the 11-year-old who's who's like screaming, you know, don't be a shit bag uh at me, at you know, not me, whoever's waking at them. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:58

Hope you're not. No, it's no, it's I mean, yeah, I remember when we were young, they they always said like, don't yell, uh don't yell for help, yell fire. Because people are more likely to want to help you in a fire than out of like getting attacked. And I was like, that's that's fucking horrible. And I feel like this is just the next generation of it. It's just if you're yeah, if you hear a kid just you're like, oh for fuck's sake. If I had a little actually, I don't know, actually, if I heard a kid yell, like, fuck off you little cunt, I'd be like, I hate you, kid.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:35

I agree.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:38

I don't know. I mean I live in a very odd part of town where I hear kids yelling some weird shit, and I just have to end up being like a curtain twitcher, like what's going on? We doing, what's going on out there through the Venetian blind.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:54

They need you, they need your attention.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:56

They uh they don't because I'll be like, it's shit, triada. Whatever you're doing. That's not a kickflip. Kids aren't skateboard. I don't know. Kids skateboard? I don't know what kids do.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:07

These days, no, they don't do anything, they just watch YouTube on their iPad.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:13

To be honest, I watch far too much YouTube Shorts, so I agree.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:19

I do too. Um I I watch TikTok all the time. I'm I'm no I'm not casting any aspersions here.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:25

I had to I had to delete TikTok. I couldn't, I couldn't, I couldn't deal with TikTok. It was getting too much, and YouTube Shorts is getting to that point where I'm like, oh, I am just that's funny, and then saving them for later to show Kirsty, and then she's like, How many have you got? And I was like, shut up.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:45

Yeah, don't watch another one, watch another one, watch another one.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:48

Look, I'm in my office working, okay? That's all you need to know. Not just watching TikToks. Um, so yes, actually, I feel like that that feels like a nice segue into this next question, which was uh, what was the first film you watched that you felt was grown up?

SPEAKER_02 1:11:03

Well, so going back briefly to the point about how we only watched uh PG films in my household, and they were tended to be sort of 60s type films. Um when I was probably, I don't know how old I was, because I can't remember when it came out, I could have a look. But I was a kid and we rented uh Mommy Dearest, right? Okay, yeah because you know, obviously this is gonna be about her and her, you know, and I remember being like, wow, because it was obviously not a PG film. This was before, it was made before, I think it was made before Gremlins, and so it didn't have the right rating because PG 13 didn't exist. It probably was close. I mean, it's not gonna be an R film, as is, but anyway.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:51

Um when themes maybe, but not anything specifically, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:56

When she said, Don't fuck with me, fellas, this ain't my first time at the rodeo. I was like, Woohoo! Oh my god, this is like the most, this is like the best thing I've ever seen in my life.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:11

Too late, grandma. I've heard it.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:13

I've heard it now. Now I know the word. Uh, and like the whole the whole no-wire hangers bit where she's beating one Christina. I'm like, yes. So obviously it was a mistake on uh whoever decided making uh but it wasn't a mistake as far as I was concerned. I I loved it. I'm sure it's so campy now. I haven't I haven't seen it since I was probably 10 or whatever. Um, I have no idea how good a film it is, but I will never forget. Don't fuck with me, fellas. This ain't my first time at the rodeo. And I I say it, I say it in my own mind all the time. It's like a little, you know, someone's bothering me. I just I just repeat it in my mind. It's a mantra for me.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:54

We have a similar one in our household because when we were watching uh like Inkmaster, the sort of reality show about tattoo artists, someone pronounced rodeo rodeo.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:04

Oh no.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:06

So now we always say, like, hey, this isn't my first rodeo.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:09

And that's whenever we're it's probably gonna morph that way in my mind now. My first time I heard Rodeo.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:16

On the Rodeo.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:18

Um, but yeah, like in terms of after that, uh, I think it was when I um I went to this thing called governor's school when I was uh 16, which is a like a summer camp for like bright kids in in Arkansas. It was started by I can't remember which governor, um, but it was a kind of a uh it was a thing that was um what's the word for something that is is seen as prestigious, uh like a prestigious thing to go to. Um and it's a camp where they you stay there for six weeks, you're not allowed to call home for the first three weeks to avoid sort of um getting homesick. Yeah you immerse yourself in very grown-up ideas, probably things that you haven't been taught at school. So we did a bit of philosophy, um, you we did a little psychology. Um, I was there in the capacity as a musician. So um I was in a choir that was doing like 20 20th century music that you know was really weird and unusual. Um, and there were things like um there were film nights that you could sign up for, and I went to see Koina Scotsi, and it was unlike, I mean, I didn't even know anything like this existed. I didn't know what it was, it was incredible. Um, and then that kind of opened my mind to what film was outside of like all these quite cheerful things I had been watching in my youth. Yeah, and it, you know, clearly it's nothing like with six you get a girl, right? Like it was just something totally beyond that. Um, and and also another film that we watched in that uh time was uh Do the Right Thing, uh, the spikely one. And again, my eyes were very open to um what filmmaking could mean, you know, how it could be a meaningful piece of work uh that was saying something political rather than you know just a piece of entertainment. Um, and I love entertainment, uh, and I still probably seek out things that are more entertaining than political, but um I I hadn't really been aware of filmmaking like that before. And when I saw that, I thought it was very affecting, it was very emotional. So I I would say that those that that was that experience at governor's school where I got to watch things that were outside the norm, yeah. That that really uh made me feel more like grown-up uh and probably pursuing more grown-up things.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:01

I think Koyono Scotsi as well is definitely one that makes you feel if you've never seen anything that doesn't technically have a narrative, but it's been given the exact same credibility as Shawshank Redemption, let's say, and you have to sort of look at it and go like, oh film can just be a series of images connected, and it's like film and art are technically the same format. It's just you know, sometimes you consume art in a very like how fucking things are designed to sell products, that's just pop music, that's just art, still art, and then there's high art, and like it's just a different, you know, way of looking at it. And you're like, oh, oh, and I can enjoy both. It's like, yeah, yeah, you enjoy both. You can love both, it doesn't matter.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:48

I was learning about I I experienced Koyan Scotsi at the same time as I was learning about John Cage and his experimental way of doing music, and and how uh you can even just have a stretch of silence and it's the the sound around you that's the music. And and I think that that kind of thing, when you're growing up in the middle of a very rural place where culturally education is not seen as particularly important, um, and having people suddenly open your mind just that little bit more about what art is or what what the potential that things can have beyond what you might have uh perceived them to be previously. Um incredibly valuable, so so valuable as an experience to have.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:34

Also, I imagine do the right thing, Arkansas, in a certain time period.

unknown 1:17:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:41

You've never been shown just stuff.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:45

So if you remember the um the riots in Los Angeles, those were really heavily televised. And so, you know, you're aware we were, I think we're all aware of these things. Um race racism, as I've mentioned, was still a very um very much a thing in Arkansas. And I think it still is, although fortunately um things have improved a lot. I see a lot more mixed couples when I go back. Um I see a lot more people of color just in general. Uh the area where I grew up was very segregated before. Um, and I think it's it's more integrated now. Um we're we're aware of these things, but having it kind of in your face in such a visceral way was, you know, clearly nothing I'd ever seen before. And um it was it was a very emotional film to watch. I mean, I guess if I watched it now, I probably wouldn't feel quite the same way.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:40

I watched it recently. Um, did you not for the first time, like I had my accursed he had never seen it before, and I'd bought the criterion of it, and I was like, oh well I'll save it for you then because it's I love it. And I was watching it and I was just sat there and I was just like, God, that's such a that's such a good film. It's so powerfully lovely and miserable at the same time, and just it's a bit like whenever I watch like Black Klansman, another one of Spikes, where I at the end I'm just like, God, I fucking hate racism. Like I just don't understand it.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:15

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:16

But yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:17

And I think maybe it's very possible. I mean, I don't know for sure, but I think it's very possible maybe that's the first film I had seen by a black director.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:27

I mean, you definitely didn't see anything from the 60s by a black director. No, I know.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:31

That's that's what I'm thinking. I I can't. So, you know, it wouldn't the perspective, obviously. Um, people don't necessarily tell stories from a perspective that is um that that requires them to have a particular identity. But I think it would have been very unlikely for me to have seen a piece of art about racism from a white director at the time. I'm not sure that I'm not sure I ever will have. It's a difficult question. Although we did we did watch Guess Who's Coming to Dinner when I was a kid. Oh nice.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:06

Yeah. I mean, my my my my household was not a racist household.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:10

Like, you know, no, but I will say, like, Sidney Poitiers was that like he was um I want to use the language that was used without sounding like it's my opinion. He was uh the black actor that was acceptable to the white community because he was more threatening. And so he was used a lot in those films because then people didn't feel as intimidated about him, and it's just sort of like, oh, that's that's good.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:45

I don't know, it's baby steps, baby steps, going back to what about Bob, it's all baby steps, baby steps.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:50

Nice circling it back to what about Bob always. Um what film holds a special place in your heart?

SPEAKER_02 1:20:58

I would say that uh when I was growing up, the the film that was most special to me, and that is still really special to me, that I want to share with my family, but they don't seem very interested, is It's a Wonderful Life. Um, from I think of 1942. Um have you seen It's a Wonderful Life?

SPEAKER_00 1:21:20

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:21

But okay, so I wasn't sure how popular it was in the UK. I don't think how many people have really seen that.

SPEAKER_00 1:21:27

Quite uh for a Christmas film, it's one of those ones that everyone my mum watched it a lot as a kid. Well, as a kid, when I was a kid, my mum watched it a lot.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:21:35

And my friend Vince and his wife went to Seneca Falls, which is where they shot it.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:43

Yeah, yeah.

unknown 1:21:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:21:46

So yeah, that's like it's brought up in my community a lot.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:49

Yeah, in in your community.

SPEAKER_00 1:21:51

In my community.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:52

In your community, yeah. No, I think it's such a beautiful and just I feel like foundational. Like it I I wouldn't say that I'm a massively uh optimistic person. Um and I wouldn't say that the film is really actually as optimistic as people think it is. No, um, I think that people see it as some kind of like uh well it life is just so much better because you're in it kind of film, but but actually when you watch it, you realize like um how he had to how it was in some way good for him to give up his dreams and settle. And um that is kind of a bleak message for such a film that is seen as such a uh uh a heartwarming classic.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:41

I mean, that's quite an American message.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:44

I guess I guess it is.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:45

Don't don't follow your dreams because we can't monopolize on that. So that's right. Get into the system, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:52

Get get get the wife, get the kids, get the failing business. Um, but it's not really about that, obviously. Is it's that nostalgic feeling. Um, but I would I would also say that on a similar kind of note, and I don't know anyone else who has seen this film, it's a it's a Thanksgiving film uh from 1995, directed by Jodie Foster called Home for the Holidays with Holly Hunter and Robert Downey Jr. in it. Um have you seen this film? I haven't seen it, but no one has seen this film, and there are no Thanksgiving films. Uh and I don't think. Oh, I suppose so. I suppose so, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Well, there are very few Thanksgiving films. Yeah, right. Um, which is odd to me, given that in America, Thanksgiving is on a par with importance, uh, of importance with Americans, because it's just such a big, a big deal. You would spend Thanksgiving with one set of parents and Christmas with the other set of parents, and the next year you can swap them around, and no one feels like they've been shortchanged because Thanksgiving is massively important. But there are very few Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving films. But Home for the Holidays is such a cool film film because it it highlights the sort of uh boomer millennial divide. Um, it before anyone was using those words for boomers or millennials, right? And the people who are stuck right in the middle are the Gen X, right? And they're they're all getting uh ignored, obviously, by everyone. Um Bancroft is in it. Uh Claire Dane's in it is in it. Like, and they are they are like it's a massive cast list, actually. And they're at odds with each other, uh, you know, generationally. Um, but that's not really the main point of the film. The main point of the film is um, you know, being just just sort of the experience of being at home on Thanksgiving um while your life is sort of like, you know, you maybe it's crumbling around you, but you've got to, you know, pretend like it's all good at home. And I I love this film. I wish more people would watch it. It is really special to me.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:01

I wonder if they don't make as many Thanksgiving films because it's only applicable to North America.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:09

Probably so.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:10

Whereas they can probably repurpose a lot of Thanksgiving films into Christmas films, and then that has, you know, sell it internationally. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:18

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:20

Maybe.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:20

Maybe so. I I think that that's um that's probably a very good good point because people um obviously uh corporations and producers think that people don't want to watch something that's outside of the niche that they are familiar with, even though that's not necessarily true. You know, um people do enjoy media outside of their niche, but it's maybe it's a harder sell.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:43

Also, I wonder if it's got something to do with that trying to sell a Thanksgiving film in November is too early for people to start going sort of like Christmas mad at that point, if you know what I mean. Whereas second week of December, if you put on uh is it driving home for Christmas with uh GTT, whatever, yeah, I'll watch that. I'll watch that yeah happily. But if you were to put that on mid-November, I'd be like, what the hell is this? I'm not watching this in November, I'm I'm I'm not a lunatic, so maybe that's the same sort of way, yeah. But then again, I would watch Planes Trains uh happily, like well, but that's that's a very special film, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:26:24

That's its own special thing. So I can see, I can see that. Okay, interesting.

SPEAKER_00 1:26:30

Do you celebrate Thanksgiving at home?

SPEAKER_02 1:26:32

As in with your No, no, I don't ironically, given I've just said that's a very special film to me, I don't I don't really believe in Thanksgiving. I find it a little bit distasteful actually. Big gauche also and I don't like turkey, so oh fair enough, yeah. Many things going going wrong with it, in my opinion. Um no, I don't I don't celebrate Thanksgiving. Um I just really love seeing the the big cast in that film and the way that they're they're very subtle and moving interactions with each other with with each other. It's just really nicely done.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:09

Also, I think that kind of goes into what I was saying about 90s thrillers that you can't top the the the cast in 90s thrillers, you know most of them from either TV or what they've eventually done.

SPEAKER_03 1:27:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:25

And they just seem very good at what they do. And I and I don't know, there's something about it. When you see a a film that's got so many names in it and it didn't have to cost 250 million, it just so happened to be that these people were all jobbing actors at a certain point, and you're like, oh, this is good, this is nice. Also, pre losing his his life to drugs, RDJ is always a wonderful when you see RDJ uh high, essentially, I know it's a horrible thing to say, but he was such an intense, wonderful actor that unfortunately I think he had to have his um I guess it's not a breakdown, but like there had to be a moment where it was either he died young or he got clean.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:08

And yeah, we never ex never thought that he was gonna be what he is now, right?

SPEAKER_00 1:28:13

No, no, like he was uninsurable, even on Ali McBeal, they didn't want him, and it's you know, like it's it is really nice whenever you see him like whenever you see a young RDJ, it's always like, Oh, you're such a good actor.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:28

Like, yeah. This one was right on the cusp of that, so I think it was probably one of the the last things he was doing before the the fall apart.

SPEAKER_03 1:28:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:36

I mean, if you watch it, I would be interested to know your opinions on it because it's a quiet film, and it's it's not maybe it's not well known for for good reason, and maybe I'm just missing it. You know, I am the person who loves emerald fennels weathering hides, you know, to be clear. So you may you may have to come back to me and go, actually, no, it's a turkey.

SPEAKER_00 1:28:57

Uh it's a dry, miserable turkey.

SPEAKER_02 1:29:03

But you know, I'd be interested in your opinion.

SPEAKER_00 1:29:05

Okay. What is your controversial opinion on a famous film? We've had controversial opinion on the uh book industry, but what about famous?

SPEAKER_02 1:29:12

Oh yeah. My uh my controversial opinion is that the new Wuthering Heights, the Emerald Vennel Wuthering Heights, is really brilliant. It's really good. Okay, fucking love it. It's absolutely fantastic. It's a it's it's a visual feast. It is absolutely I mean it it takes a radical departure from the book. But actually, every film adaptation that I've ever seen of Wuthering Heights radically departs from the book. So and no one no one cares about that. Like they all stop, you know, at a similar stopping place.

SPEAKER_03 1:29:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:29:50

Um, I don't want to spoil it for anyone, you know. Um, but they they all stop, they don't tell the full story, and and the reason for that is taking Wuthering Heights as a book and trying to film it accurately to the book would be uh I think almost impossible and also kind of pointless.

SPEAKER_00 1:30:09

Like read the book.

SPEAKER_02 1:30:11

Yeah, you know, read the book. But if you can take, uh, and she has said this in interviews that it sort of is like the feeling that she got when she was 14 and she read the book. If you can take uh a concept, a feeling, and then take a story and allow that to express a concept in such a such an incredibly uh unique visual, uh, visceral and uh dangerous way, which is what she did. Um she made it, she made it like the inside of the mind of a 14-year-old girl who is reading this book. It is absolutely 100% the visuals of any modern 14-year-old girl reading Wuthering Highs. The the the the wedding dress did not have to be historically accurate because it's a 14-year-old imagining a Kathy getting married, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:31:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:12

It didn't have to be, it it is a fee like the the house that is um, you know, the ri the rich people's house, uh, the Lynn uh God, I can't even come up with the name. I've been I'm I'm so overwhelmed by it that I can't remember any characters, but uh the house, the rich people's house, is so beautifully, weirdly, incredibly furnished, and all of the outfits are exactly what a 14-year-old is gonna picture when she's like, oh, she's rich now. She's got everything that she could possibly want. It is perfect. It is such a weird, it's almost like um uh the guy who uh did um oh the other thing recently. Uh I can't remember his name. Uh Yar Yar Yargus Lemon.

SPEAKER_00 1:31:51

Oh yeah, um Yargas Lathema.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:54

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um it is it feels like that kind of film in a way because everything is just so weird and oh, like with poor things. Yeah, with poor things. That's that's exactly it feels like his work to me. But it's it's obviously it's Emerald Fennel's work. And um I and all the sex, right? Like obviously this didn't happen in the book, but it happened in the 14-year-old's head. It did. It is a perfect distillation of exactly what she wanted, right onto film, and we all got to experience it, and it's gorgeous, it's gorgeously done, and I love it. I love it, I love it. And I I I do not have any truck with the those who do not, those who do not do not understand the vision. That's not controversial.

SPEAKER_00 1:32:37

Fair enough. I think that's fine. I think it's good. I like I like it when people uh like films that are considered bad. I like that's their controversial opinion. It's a nicer thing than being like, oh, this good film is shit. No, this shit film is good. No, I haven't I haven't seen it. Um I don't know if I like Emerald Fennel's storytelling tropes enough, and I don't know the source material at all. So to me, it's like, oh, I got no skin in the game for this. Yeah, you know? Yeah, yeah. So I probably won't see it. But I am more inclined after your like uh review of it.

SPEAKER_02 1:33:17

That's good. Did you so did you not like Saltburn or did you see Saltburn?

SPEAKER_00 1:33:20

I saw Saltburn. Um there was moments where I quite liked some of it because um my family are not uh high society, but they are uh I I I don't know, I'm not gonna say well connected, like in the art community, but they're like they know people in the art community, and there's a very similar sort of like uh the relationship between certain people in that film. I was like, oh yeah, my mum and dad are friends like that. Like I know these people, you know, I like I know them, I don't know them, but I know them. Yeah, and then when it got into the whole, oh everyone's just jealous of rich people, I was like, well, hold on, that's not that's not what this is. This no, and I don't know, like I didn't quite like that. And then when I sort of like looked into some more of like Emerald Fennel stuff, I was like, uh I don't know, I don't know. And then when I saw it was a Withering Heights, I was like, Oh, it could be nice, and it's gonna be shot on VistaVision, oh it's gonna look nice, and I saw some of the like the costumes and some of the like set things, I was like, that looks beautiful, and then all the reviews came out, and people are complaining like Heathcliff should have been cast as a black person, and I was like, Okay, like and I but in my head I was like uh it's amazing, you you're the same people that were complaining that Doctor Who shouldn't have been a person of colour, and it's like so like you're just complaining for the sake of complaining, you know what? I'm out like I haven't got time for this, I'm out. So I I I don't know. I I haven't I haven't got much time for Emerald Fennel. Yeah, but as a female, is she British? She's British, isn't she?

SPEAKER_02 1:35:07

Oh, or is she uh she British or is she South African? Her parents own an emerald mine? Or am I thinking of Elon Musk?

SPEAKER_00 1:35:15

I think that's he had a his dad had an emerald mine. No, her dad is uh designer, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:35:20

Oh, it's original designer. That's right, that's right.

SPEAKER_00 1:35:22

Um but either way, like if it's a female filmmaker who is getting the the big money to make her films, I got no complaints with that.

SPEAKER_02 1:35:32

Like they're just for me, they're fun as well. Like they're they're they're interesting and fun in in a in a world where like sometimes things aren't that interesting and fun.

SPEAKER_00 1:35:42

So it maybe they're not perfect, but god, who what is like like I said, if I don't like them, but if enough people like them that she keeps getting money, yeah, then it's not a bad thing that more female directors are out there getting what they fucking deserve for a change, and people can look at that and go, Oh, I can be a filmmaker as a woman? Yes, yeah, yes, you fucking can. Don't listen to the dickhead men.

SPEAKER_03 1:36:07

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:36:08

White men have run it for long enough, people. That's my controversial opinion. Um so what have you been watching recently?

SPEAKER_02 1:36:18

Um I have actually been um this this very week watching uh X, Pearl, and because I I'm um I've just realized that I'm a big uh fan of Mia Goth. Uh and I hadn't I watched uh X a long time ago, meaning to watch Pearl. And when when you sent you you sent the list of questions, which is what are you watching recently? I was like, well, actually I haven't been watching a lot of film, I've been watching TV uh a little bit, but I haven't actually been watching even that much TV. Yeah. And I'm catching up on stuff that like Twin Peaks or Sopranos that gotcha, which you know, like everyone has watched a million years ago, and it's me.

SPEAKER_00 1:37:04

I only just finished watching Six Feet Under, so Oh god, that's a great series. Oh, it was fucking excellent.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:10

But I remember that I had watched X and I wanted to watch Pearl and Maxine because Mia Goth is just so cool. Um so yeah, I I've just been uh watching those. And I I love I love it. I I'm only halfway through Maxine, um, but I've finished the other two. And um what I really loved, I mean, A24 is just like one of my favorite uh places to get movies. I've I haven't watched everything that they've put out, but I do like everything that they've seen.

SPEAKER_00 1:37:39

It's a relatively safe bet, you know?

SPEAKER_02 1:37:41

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:37:42

Um Pearl is excellent. It's so I think Pearl is my favorite of the three.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:49

Yeah, it's so excellent. But but it's the way that they have managed to um give the the right feel to everything. So the way the first one did feel like a 70, it was so 70s, and then going with Pearl, like it was was it deliberately? I I haven't looked up any anyone's opinions, but it felt like The Wizard of Oz all the way through. Was it supposed to feel like The Wizard of Oz all the way through?

SPEAKER_00 1:38:13

Oh, I imagine so, because it's the time period, isn't it? It's meant to enact the time period in the films of that era, and Wizard of Oz, it's meant to be that she's got this wonderful imaginary land that's in her head where everything's gonna go well.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:27

Yeah, yeah. It was just so evocative. I god, it was so uh I I I can't I don't have the uh vocabulary, unfortunately, to say any anything other than it was just so good. But it was so good. Yeah, so good. Yeah and and a Maxine I'm enjoying because it is so 80s, and I just I love the the approach they've taken. There they're obviously three um uh in entangled films that are very related to each other, but they didn't feel the need to make every film look like the the last, you know what I mean? Like they made it appropriate to the time period, which I think was a nice choice.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:05

And when people say, you know, you know, when you suggest a film, they're like, oh, do I have to watch the others to have seen this? It's like yeah, but there's they're great standalones that happen to be interconnected. It's it's uh the same way I feel about the first three alien films. So it's like you don't need to have seen any of them. That you can just watch whichever one you want in any order, they're they're great fun. And I think like with the Maxine films, it's just like they're great fun, like just watch them.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:31

Just you know really but I would say with the alien films that um because life is short and we could get hit by a meteor at any time, you must simply watch Alien because you might die before you get to, and it's just such a good film. But then all the others are good, so then watch those two.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:51

Sure. I would go Alien, uh the director's cut of Alien 3, Aliens, uh maybe Alien Resurrection, and then the rest.

SPEAKER_01 1:40:01

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:40:02

I think that's fair.

SPEAKER_01 1:40:03

I think that's that's a good choice.

SPEAKER_00 1:40:05

And controversial. I know everyone loves Aliens, and it's like, yeah, Aliens is a great film, but it works better as a horror film than it does an action film. So yeah. Whatever. So what TV have you been watching?

SPEAKER_02 1:40:20

Like literally, um I've I never saw The Sopranos when it came out, so I'm watching Sopranos, and and I did um watch the first season of Twin Peaks when I was a kid, but I couldn't remember anything about it, and so I thought, you know, I'm gonna I I didn't watch the second season, I haven't seen the films. Um, so I thought, well, I'll just re-watch Twin Peaks, and uh I got I got so much more out of it than I did when I was a kid, it's so good.

SPEAKER_00 1:40:46

Do you think you're gonna go and watch the second series?

SPEAKER_02 1:40:50

Um, yeah, I think I will because I I know that I know that people don't like it, but but I want to love it. So I'm going to fair enough, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:40:58

Uh I made a horrible realization about myself uh after David Lynch passed away, and that is I don't think I like his work. I like what he does, I like what he represents, and I love the way he thought, and I loved him as a person.

SPEAKER_02 1:41:14

His films, I think they're very good. So I I heard also um on the the same episode that I listened to before where where you guys said that you didn't like Maholland Drive.

SPEAKER_00 1:41:27

And I was gonna- Yeah, I always bring it up apparently.

SPEAKER_02 1:41:30

What's wrong with you guys? I love Maulholland Drive. It's uh it's abs it's just bonkers and beautiful. Maybe this is it. Maybe I just really love insane fever dreams in my filmmaking.

SPEAKER_00 1:41:43

Maybe that's Oh, but like, have you seen End to the Void?

SPEAKER_02 1:41:46

No, I haven't.

SPEAKER_00 1:41:47

Oh, Gasper Noe does a beautiful, miserable two and a half hours of fever dream, and I love it.

SPEAKER_02 1:41:55

Like so it's just a lynching sensibility that you're you're not so big into.

SPEAKER_00 1:42:01

I think it's the the amount that people uh claim hits greatness, and I'm like, Oh, okay, yeah. Let's take a minute and think about it. Is it greatness or is it you just don't quite get it, and you don't want to say you don't get it.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:19

Like Emperor is new clothes kind of thing.

SPEAKER_00 1:42:23

Yeah, I yeah, I would definitely say that because straight story, I love straight story, um Wild at Heart, I think is my favourite of all of his films. Blue Velvet, I think, is great. But Inland Empire, I've got no time for Lost Highway. I couldn't, I couldn't understand Lost Highway. Maholland Drive, yeah, A Razor Head, I cannot do a razor head again. And Twin Peaks, I feel like the first Twin Peaks, first series, it's really good. It has that same problem that 90s shows have where it's you've got X amount of episodes, a third of them are really good. Yeah, and then there's a lot of filler, and then it gets worse in season two. And I just I just I'm just like if you were to go pound for pound, I don't like his work as a whole. The things I like about his work I really love.

SPEAKER_03 1:43:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:43:17

But as a whole, I just don't, you know. There are other filmmakers that I would say they hit their their hits for me are a lot stronger and more consistent.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:29

I think that's fair. I I think that maybe um what I would say in his defense, not that he needs defending from me. David, wherever you are, I hope you appreciate this.

SPEAKER_00 1:43:43

Is that no one else is standing up for him?

SPEAKER_02 1:43:46

Is that um he uh had a vision uh that was unique to him, which he pursued relentlessly. And I think that you and I would both agree that that is what we want the most from everyone in the world. And the problem with the world is too many people do not pursue their own religion, uh religion, their own vision with intensity.

SPEAKER_00 1:44:13

No, I 100% agree. It's the same, I think, that I was saying about Emerald Fannel, where it's if you're making it, it meant that someone like you is allowed to make something, and then that might give someone else the ability to think that they can do it and try harder, or trust try in the first place because they thought there was no point trying, and then it's a hundred percent worth it.

SPEAKER_03 1:44:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:44:35

So yeah, like I said, I like what he does as a concept, and I like him. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:44:43

But the output maybe isn't for you.

SPEAKER_00 1:44:45

The output isn't quite for me, yeah. And I mean, there's like authors which I feel the same way. I'm always annoyed that I don't like um the neuromancer, the William Gibson book. I absolutely adore cyberpunk literature, but that Mona Lisa like Hyperdrive, I cannot get on board with it. I'm just like, I get it, I get what you've done, but fuck me, I cannot read your books.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:09

Yeah, yeah. It's fair enough. It's fair enough. It's the same. I mean, obviously, with the I don't love every author, but yeah, I appreciate I appreciate almost every author.

SPEAKER_00 1:45:20

Almost every sure. I think if you're able to uh put something down and record it as a piece of artwork, great. Great just always do that. Do that as much as you can. Okay, well, thank you very much for coming on.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:33

Um Thank you for having me. It's been lovely talking to you. I very much enjoyed it.

SPEAKER_00 1:45:38

I've had a lovely time. I will link your book in the notes so everyone can go and uh get themselves a copy, which I insist that they do. It's good. And I hope you uh and I hope you uh keep going. I hope you got any have you got anything else that you plan on writing soon?

SPEAKER_02 1:45:53

I am um also writing uh another book set in the same area um of Conway, Arkansas. Um kind of a uh a story of someone who wants to do a luxury club on the shores of Lake Conway, which is not a place where you would put a luxury club. Um and um maybe some things that go a little bit wrong with that. So yeah, I'm putting that together and it's tentatively titled uh Razor's Edge, but we'll see whether that continues in the same vein.

SPEAKER_00 1:46:29

How do you do the title? Do you come up with a good title and then you think what happens in this title?

SPEAKER_02 1:46:34

Or do you know as mentioned, I don't like anything to have a team. Uh it's just that book two in this case, um Arkansas's team is the Razorbacks. Um, and this guy's on the edge of uh Lake Conway. And for some reason, I guess in my own like fever dream, uh the Razor's Edge came to me in uh in a dream, and I thought, oh that that'll that'll do. I'm not gonna think of any other title.

SPEAKER_00 1:47:01

So that'll do. That's what you want to hear from a creative. That'll do.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:05

That'll do. That's fine.

SPEAKER_00 1:47:07

Well, thank you very much for coming on. And uh I hope there's some films that people want to add to their letterbox. There are some things that I will add. Annie, I think, has won. I don't know if I've watched it.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:19

Have I got it? You might have it.

SPEAKER_00 1:47:21

I don't have it. They're all advertised. Procure it. Oh, yeah, yeah. Got a wonderful second hand DVD market in this town, and I go bonkers there. Um but yes, thank you for coming on and thank you very much. Yeah. Uh lovely to speak to you.

SPEAKER_02 1:47:38

Lovely to speak to you.