It's The End Of The World As We Know It (and I Feel Fiennes) ft. guests Ralph Fiennes & Chi Lewis-Parry; Brendan Fraser & Hikari

27:45I think I carry quite a lot of adrenaline on set, and I like it when the director just goes, yeah, yeah, go again, that's fine. And you feel that they are solid in their choices and when they've got it, and I think that permeated our dynamic, that we were kind of, yeah, we just play the scenes. I don't know, I can't explain it. I mean, I think the film renders us in a great way, as this Bond, but I think we as actors, it's actually essentially very simple you know you come you're ready you do you act with your screen partner the camera's hopefully in the right place and and the director guides your instincts and if an instinct is off they guide you you know to somewhere where it makes sense but i don't i think i always felt that we were just we were just there present with each other i think that's the big the big key to playing a scene is just being present with each other and that's what that's what I felt we were and that was a great a great thing to to discover we've done the the once you've done the work then it's it becomes easy and and to have that relationship already from shooting the first film even though it was only brief yes um I remember that day and I just remember how welcoming Rafe was you know and and even though we don't well we do we do we have a very sort of intense moment yeah um but it was it was like i'd been working with him for the whole film you know he's very open yeah right if i was really struck there by what you said that you you you kind of carry a lot of adrenaline into into scenes when you're on set how does that manifest itself and well there you carry some apprehension how is the scene gonna go what's yeah you know you want you just there's always an arc which you go through an arc of different energies in the scene i suppose you You know, you come, you don't know.

29:30This is where the director would like you. They're going to come from over here. So there's a kind of technical geographical element to, they'll call it blocking, you know. Of course, yeah. What's the blocking? And then sitting in it because you've gone through it in your head and then, you know, the energies of the other actors. So you're discovering things and hopefully discovering them on camera. But I come with, you know, I think most actors have the kind of, say, adrenaline or kind of apprehension, you know, because it's healthy to come with unknowns, but the unknowns give you a sense of, well, what's it going to be?

30:05How's it going? And then you go through a process of what they call, we find it. Not that you ever have, you never, I think you never nail it. You just go on these different levels of finding it. And then you can barely come off a take and think, yeah, that felt quite good. And then the next one and the director wants something of you and you try it and it's not so good. but your your sense of your own performance is really how do you know at the end of a take you don't necessarily feel some sense I was in it I was in it but yeah I was in I was just present with the other person sometimes you can feel self-conscious and also if it take is long you you go through on a whole lifetime of an X you know if it take is in two minutes hmm then you start off You could start off in one place in your head and go to another.

30:58I mean, you can sort of find stuff. And having made a couple of films, my biggest learning curve was in the editing room where, you know, you can go into a take on an actor and you can just go, well, that moment. Yeah. Then there's something. Let's take that. Elsewhere, the actors sort of, okay, but they just suddenly there's a sort of little thing in the eyes or a little turn of the head. but I don't think you should go into a scene thinking you just should be just be present try to be really present and react and let the director guide you and um yeah don't don't try and control don't control that be let it all run run through you and let the other actors performance inform your responses and yeah I think the thing is it I think film likes spontaneous energy yeah however subtle or even strong but I think film likes a thing that hasn't been worked out before I think it likes that sense of absolutely present discovery of something in the face of the actor something you may not even be aware of that's right there's definitely like an unplaced energy waiting to be placed like you need to find it and I think committing to your decision is something you have to have faith in yourself if you don't believe in what you're doing then why should anyone else believe it so it probably is the wrong decision and i'm i'm a like a thousand mile an hour type person so if i'm if i've made that decision then i've already committed to that so now i can just throw myself at it otherwise i'm hesitating and second guessing and then i'm probably self-conscious and nervous and then ultimately don't do it so i think having being committed to it probably sounds quite generic but that's the best way to put it is you have an idea of what it is who knows better than you it's your part yeah absolutely commit to it and i found that that worked for me incredibly and in terms of that uh the overall arc don't even we won't get into spoiler territory but the overall arc for both your characters is really really fascinating across both movies when you first spoke with danny and i presume alex at the same time or maybe it was just danny a little bit with alex yeah okay How much of that arc did they lay out for Kelson and Samson?

33:17I had conversations with Alex, but they were just, he didn't say too much. I mean, I think Kelson was a very important character for Alex. Kelson's humanness, his ability to survive. I think in this landscape of horror, it was important that Alex had this figure who was a kind of priest, doctor, sage, healer, communicator. He's a doctor and he's a proper doctor, so he comes from a place of care and healing. I mean, yeah, but he's aware that death happens, death will come. I don't think he's... I don't think there's any cruelty in him. No, absolutely not. I'm a Samson, Chai. I understood quite early that Samson was a really important character to both Danny and Alex in the beginning.

34:11And I remember a specific time we had a table read. It was the first time we actually met. And it was an opportunity to go through the script but then ask questions because I needed to understand what Samson was to both Danny and to Alex. So that when I took him on, not only was I doing it justice, but I understood how to perform that. Like, what did they want to see? who was he to them before who he was to me so once I understood that and I asked the right questions I've still got the script it's full of notes then I got to understand more because it does read very much like the depth of him isn't there you have to find that so that comes from asking questions and I did a lot of question asking this is a table read on the first movie yes in the first film, yes, which obviously naturally carries over into the second film.

35:08I'm fascinated by that. How full bore do you both go into table reads? For example, were you terrifying your other actors by Samson's bellows? I did it once and then I got a look from him and I said, I'm not going to do it again. There was a, I mean, there wasn't really much for me to say, but there was a moment where it said that the alpha Samson lets off a roar. And I was sitting there for maybe 20 minutes. I hadn't said anything. And I thought, I want to give him something, give him some energy. So I banged the table, I think I banged the table and roared. And Rafe just tipped his glasses and said, really?

35:47Because it was a bit startling. I was a bit loud. It was a bit misplaced. Did they say really? No, you didn't know, but your eyes did. No, it was all in love. I'm sure I was entertained. No, but impressed. it was oh this is what I'm going to be playing I'll take that one I'll take that one interesting maybe that's my own insecurity that is taking on that maybe but it was a bit loud and I remember Jack jumped no I mean it was great it was great I think my look was like wow but it was my kind of laugh he's just trying to make me blush the whole time let's go

36:29let's see it right right so you're reading ready ready ready ah yeah what does that really mean to you I would never more again wow killer killer

36:47I'll take that and that was really like 30 % of what you did on the day that's the thing is I always really go for it when the camera's rolling I'm in it 100 % but as soon as we're done hey man how you doing you alright You know, like the energy's got to come back to normal because it's a hard energy to upkeep, Samson. Oh, yeah, I can certainly imagine. I have to let you guys go in a second, but I will say music plays an incredibly important part in this movie. We get to see, and again, I won't spoil everything, some of Dr. Kelson's record collection. There's quite a bit of Duran Duran in there.

37:24Now, do you share Dr. Kelson's musical taste, Rafe? I like Duran Duran I mean to be honest they were not massively on my radar I've enjoyed their songs over the years but this sort of brought me back into full proximity with them because I had to sort of attempt to sing I think they're great great, great unusual, wonderful sound and lyrics of a certain era that I think I have a big nostalgia for that time but you had to learn the words to girls yeah yeah yeah they weren't just a story on Rio absolutely yeah no I loved it I loved it I had a couple of moments of coaching from Simon Le Bon but you know I'll stick to the day he was great they very generous spayton's ah it was really fun to watch him perform as well like to go into I could see that Rafe was really into the song did you pay over your glasses at any point and go on I did yeah my little reading Samson's reading specs yeah is that how you're going to do it is that how you're going to do it yeah not impressive yeah absolutely well perhaps another time we will get into Samson's musical tastes and what he likes as well we'll see how it goes in the meantime it's been an absolute pleasure thank you so much thank you thank you for us too okay that was Chai Lewis Parry and Ray Fiennes some people call me Ralph talking about 28 years later The Bone Temple it's out right now we'll be talking about later on in the review section right now though it is time to talk about movie news has there been any in the last few days well there was a trailer for lee cronin's the mummy yes which is um scary looking stuff mummy light horror heavy i would say i mean there's bandages scary bandages but it's not like it's not you know i'm not getting like uh rick vibes from i'm not getting you know the campy fun times and not present.

39:21No, I'm not getting Imhotep fun stuff. It looks gnarly, doesn't it? It's a good trailer. It's a teaser. It's very much like, still no idea really what's going on with this film, but I really loved Evil Dead Rise. I mean, this is interesting that this came out because there was a report only a few days earlier that said maybe this film was in trouble. Maybe it wasn't even going to be called The Mummy. There was a rumour it was going to be called The Resurrected, and now it is very emphatically called The Mummy and is not in any way related to the Tom Cruise Dark Universe mummy nor the Brendan Fraser mummy, which is also apparently getting its own sequel.

39:57So this is its own mummy. It's very much Lee Cronin's mummy. They've gone for the John Carpenter's... Yeah, that's really interesting. I like Lee Cronin a lot, but he's, what, three films into his career? He's not a main director. And now he's getting Lee Cronin's The Mummy. Yeah. That's interesting. It feels less of a vanity thing and more just to help with the nomenclature, right? So you keep it confused. Yeah, I think so. It's not Brendan Fraser's Mummy. Yeah, I mean, but that would have been a less catchy title, not Brendan Fraser's The Mummy. It just doesn't really have that same zing. Yes.

40:27And seems disrespectful to Rachel Weisz, if we're honest. Rachel Weisz. That could be a rental family sequel, couldn't you? Rental Family The Mummy would be an interesting way of doing it. You rent the mummy to be your mummy. Rental mummy. You rent Imhotep to be your mum. A mummy from another tummy. Oh, I think that would be terrible. Yeah, okay. Okay, and also, what? I don't know. I don't know. I was hoping no one had picked up on that. I'm still laughing at that. That was great. I liked it. I don't understand it. I understand. What do you mean? I understand it perfectly. Mummy from another tummy.

41:04Yeah. Well, first of all, your mummy doesn't come from the same tummy as you did. Otherwise, that would be weird. But nobody's mummy does. We don't need to unpack. Every mother, by definition, is a mummy from another tummy. Yeah. So it's redundant. I mean, yeah. You've made that joke significantly funny, Helen. And I appreciate it. Pointing out the redundancy of our jokes is going to make this podcast a lot shorter. Also, technically, babies don't come from tummies. They come from wombs. Tummy generally refers to the digestive system. Okay, this has to stop. Can I... Thinking of things... Before John walks step by step through the miracle of childbirth, please.

41:43When a mummy and a daddy love each other very much. Look, look, can we talk about Lord of the Rings again, please? Because they had, in the sort of, in the vast sort of secret corners of the Shire. Have we talked about The Mummy? Because I like the trailer, by the way. Yes, I like it too. Okay, good. Thanks, move on. People have whispered about the mithril cuts of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. The extended, extended cuts. Apparently there's all this extra footage, and somewhere there's like a five-hour cut of all of these films, and people have talked about, they're going to come, he's going to release them, Jackson's going to finally release them.

42:11He has told us, exclusively in the new issue of Vampire, which we'll talk about in a little bit, that there is no mithril cut I'm so sorry there are a few kind of bits of scenes but it's not enough for a release and it's really not very interesting so yeah it's a myth it's a fable it's apocryphal a myth real cut a myth that's right putting the Y in mithril cut yeah not a thing I mean this is like the people who thought that there was a secret episode of Stranger Things that was the real finale that's right it's like there's a wild conspiracy extended extended extended cut of Lord of the Rings I still think that's possible really why I can't wait to see those guys again 11 and 12 and Mikey and all those good kids oh boy so yeah I'm not surprised by that I feel like they put it all they put it all out there they left it on the field they did to use sports nomenclature I don't know why I said it that way yeah none of us can say any words this week what's happening no it's very difficult life is your proclamatory powers proclamatory powers proclamatory powers have dimmed over the break Anyway, but it's not surprising, I think, and makes sense.

43:19I'm a little bit sad that there isn't another couple of hours sitting on the shelf, but I think it's probably best to leave the miracle as it is. Yeah, it's perfection. Because those films are a miracle. Yes, I mean, having done the 10-hour marathon, I don't want that to be any longer. Yeah, fair enough. What would have been in these cuts? What do people think is not in them? Another ending? Probably the... Six or seven more endings, yeah. The Lodging of the Shire or something, or Tom Bombadil. Tom Bombadil. But they never filmed Bombadil. No, they didn't. Of course they didn't, because it's the obvious thing when you're adapting those movies, you immediately cut Tom Bombadil.

43:52Like, I love the guy, but come on. I'm enjoying Rory Kinnear. Yes, so am I. In Rings of Power, playing the role and getting him on screen finally, but there's no scenario where that is an essential part of the story. Thank you. I've been listening to Andy Serkis do the audiobook for The Lord of the Rings, and it's very entertaining because Tom Bombadil essentially sings all of his dialogue. He does. And Andy Serkis has to sing it so he's obviously come up with loads of songs and he's like, Bombadil is walking down, walking down the street. Literally everything is just him narrating himself in song.

44:29That's amazing. Does he do all the voices? He does all the voices, yeah. Right. Does he do impressions of the fellowship? Like, does he do your impression of Gandalf? No, it's not a direct impression of the actors. It comes up with his own take. It's his own take, but it is very close approximations to the takes because they're so embedded now, the films, that it's very hard to think of anything else. That's true. My big note about the films when I saw them the first time was that the Balrog wasn't how I had conceived the Balrog for years reading the books, but I couldn't tell you now what that looked like.

45:03But that was the one thing when I first watched Fellowship of the Ring, I'm like, that's not what the Balrog looks like. And I don't know what I thought it looked like now. The film has completely usurped my original concept. Isn't that weird? A lot of Lord of the Rings chat on this week's podcast. Shall we continue it? Yay! By talking about the new issue of Empire Magazine. Fuck it, let's do our brief shameless plug. Because don't forget, folks, we have an entire new show dedicated to shamelessly plugging the new issue of Empire Magazine. But it is on sale today, as a matter of fact, as we are recording this Thursday, January 15th.

45:3815th. It's on sale on all good and evil and virtual news agents. A brand new issue of Empire and this is a real treat. A real treat. We have reunited some of the fellowship. Some of the fellowship. But we have all the fellowship and more in this celebration of the 25th anniversary. Oh my god. It's been 84 years. I feel so fucking old. Of the Fellowship of the Ring. The first and some would say one of the three best lord of the rings movies it's a tough call but i think it is one of the three best yes yes uh so on the cover we reunited and shot not like that uh ian mckellen oh yes uh sean astin dominic monaghan billy boyd and elijah wood they are together again at last uh it's exciting this is a coup this this cover gives me the warm and fuzzies it's just so nice to see them they're just hanging out just you know old pals yeah it's just nice it's just a nice nice cover good people good people good film yeah absolutely and inside we also got I think virtually got Vega Mortensen and Sean Bean together I talked to the ladies of the of the ladies of the lamp ladies of the lake Liv Tyler and Kate Blanchett and yeah, it's a lot of Rings goodness in there.

47:06Yep. Orlando Bloom, John Rhys-Davies, they're all in there. Peter Jackson, we talked to Peter Jackson, Andy Serkis wrote something for us and dropped a couple of Hunt for Gollum snippets in there as well. It's very exciting. Yay. Very exciting indeed. Jimbo, you're remarkably quiet. I feel like you've heard me talk about Lord of the Rings quite a lot already this podcast, but it's a great issue. Love it. It's fantastic. There's other stuff in there as well, but I'll be fucked if I could tell you what it is. You wrote about Send Help, Chris. Did I? Yep. Is that this issue? Yep. That's exciting.

47:36And you spoke to Bradley Cooper? Did I? Will Arnett? No. Will Arnett and John Bishop. John Bishop. That's right. Yes. I did. Thank you, John. I can never remember. But listen, people are going to buy this for the LOTR content alone. But if you want a little something extra to get you over the line, then yes, I spoke to Sam Raimi and Dylan O 'Brien and Rachel McAdams for Send Help. And I spoke to John Bishop and Will Arnett for Is This Thing On? Why? Because it's essentially, but also kind of not, but kind of is, John Bishop's story on screen with Will Arnett playing John Bishop and Bradley Cooper directed it and it's a really great film.

48:16And so I was very, very happy to talk to those two together. That was a lot of fun. So yeah, it's a fantastic issue. Nick and I will be sitting down and digging into it in the future episode of Shameless Plug. We're also for that one going to be taking listener questions anything you have about Empire about the process of making Empire about the history of Empire things we've done in the past things we may do in the future so slide into my DMs or just respond to me on any social media platform that I'm on be it Twitter or Blue Sky or Threads or Instagram find me, ask me questions and Nick and I will tackle them in the next episode of The Shameless Plug but right now run out by the latest issue of Empire Magazine because this one folks is an absolute belter.

49:03Speaking of gold things that people find precious. Oh, good segue, Hells Bells. The Golden Globes were announced at the weekend and we should probably mention them. So the big winner numerically was one battle after another. This is exciting because I genuinely have no idea who won the Golden Globes. I pay very little attention to this. So I am learning live. through you. So One Battle After Another One. One Battle After Another. It's a best motion picture, musical or comedy, as I'm sure you know. It definitely is both of those. Sure. It's at least maybe one of them at times. And it also took home best director and best screenplay.

49:48Oh, who won that? That, what, Paul Thomas Anderson? Oh, did he direct that? Yes. Oh, that's good. Yes. See, I'm learning. I'm learning live through you. This is amazing. And Tiana Taylor took best supporting role. For the rip. No, for one battle after another. Oh, is she in that? Oh, this is amazing. Good Lord. We're going with really great grunts. Great grunts? Great grunts. Great grunts. Fuck me. Hamnet took best motion picture drama, but also best actress. Did it. For Jessie Buckley. For Jessie Buckley. Yes. The Sinners took home cinematic and box office achievement. Absolutely. Cinematic. Fucking mad category.

50:25Yes, that feels like a thanks for turning up. here's an award category that we've made up just for you. That category is the Mad Men meme. That's what the money's for. Exactly. Like, they've already won. They've got lots of money. Yes. I hate it as a category. I'm glad Sinner's got something. It also took home best scores. It did get two things. But, yeah, it's a mad, mad category to have, especially when you're already separating out drama and quote-unquote comedy or musical. Mad awards. anyway Stelman Skarsgård got supporting actor for sentimental value which is fantastic Timothee Chalamet took home best actor in a musical or comedy over Ethan Hawke and DiCaprio for Marty Supreme for Marty Supreme and Rose Byrne took female actor in a musical or comedy for If I Had Legs I'd Kick You and Wagner Mora took home best actor in a drama for The Secret Agent which has given his awards hopes I think a bit of a boost and put him back maybe a bit in the conversation Again, the Golden Globes have zero predictive effect for the Oscars, but they do keep the conversation going.

51:32In the TV side of things, the pit got two, the studio got two, and adolescence took home four. Did. Which is pretty fantastic for it. All right. Exciting. I only saw a couple of jokes that the host, Nikki Glaser... She was pretty funny. ...said. Yeah, she seemed to be pretty much on top of things, which was nice. It's always fun to be the first out of the gates with big awards ceremonies. And then, like, you know, the Oscar, the people who are writing the Oscar jokes are like, oh, fuck, can't use that one. Can't use that one. Can't use that one. You get to the dregs of the jokes by the time they come around.

52:05Who's hosting this here at the Oscars? Is it Conan O 'Brien again? It's Conan again, yeah. He's in a film. I didn't know this. He's actually in If I Had Legs, I'd Kick It. He's very, very good at it as well. Wow, how's that going to work? Like, Jimmy Kimmel's not in anything. No, but like, we've had, like, Anne Hathaway was, was she nominated? Yeah, but these are actual actors. Conan O 'Brien's, like, not an actor. Yeah, but he's good in the role. Wow. It's exciting. What if he tries to steer the footing live? I don't think that's how that works, Chris. What if he opens an envelope and just keeps reading out, if I had legs, I'd kick you in every category?

52:38That's why they don't have him open the envelope, probably. But what if he tries it, Helen? Is there a plan in place for that? I hope so. Although he is very tall and can perhaps reach past the people trying to stop him. He has an Irish reach. Is that a thing that we have? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. All right. I just want to know if there is a contingency plan in place for should Conan O 'Brien go absolutely nuts and try to sort of hijack the Oscars. I just want to know if that plan is in place. Sure. I'm not reassured. I'm not reassured. I don't think there's a plan in place for that right now. Okay, but that's good.

53:11Well done, the Golden Globes, and congratulations to everybody who won them. Hurrah. Well done them. Scott Cooper has a circle. He's circled or is circling or has just closed a deal to direct a thriller. He's going to write and direct a thriller based around Roswell. So this is Scott Cooper, obviously the director of Springsteen, Deliver Me From Nowhere and Black Mass and Out of the Furnace and Crazy Heart and films like that. So he's someone who flits around from genre to genre, hostiles, things like that. Really, really good, solid director. and this is going to be a thriller, a sci-fi thriller.

53:54That sounds like a very dark and serious approach to Roswell given that his films tend towards the dark and serious. They're not lolfests, I'll be honest. Deliver Me From Nowhere is like at the lolier end of the spectrum and it's not very lolie. There is a joke. It's 37 minutes in. Okay, all right. That does ring a bell. I remember it well. I remember going, huh, at the time. and then the misery took over. There was darkness on the edge of town. But that's exciting. That's exciting. Well done, him. And there is, of course, people, you know, as I said earlier on, we have recorded a Traitors breakdown special for the Avengers Doomsday Traitors, the fourth and final one of which is now online.

54:38I think people now know who appears in that. So we have the likes of Shuri, M 'Baku, who is now the king of Wakanda, Namor, the Submariner, and one Benjamin Grimm, a.k.a. The Thing. So that is an exciting trailer and Helen Amon and myself squeezed into the pod booth and we talked for a long time about those trailers, what they might mean, what it means for Doomsday, all that sort of stuff. So if you want to listen to that, go check it out. All right. Anything else? Or should we move on to our second pair of guests? Let's do it.

55:44I'll do this And he gets a very interesting and odd job offer one day to go along to a pretend funeral and be a rental mourner, essentially. He discovers that there's a company that essentially rents out actors to be whatever you need them to be. And he becomes many things to many people across the course of this movie. It's called Rental Family at various points in the movie. He's a rental journalist who interviews an allegedly old Japanese actor. He becomes a rental dad to a young girl who has trouble at school. And can he help her heal? It's a really touching, really affecting, quite funny movie, I thought, that sadly seems to have fallen out of the Oscar conversation.

56:32But nevertheless, it's well worth your time. And I was delighted to, late last year, go along to a London hotel room, you guessed it, to have a lovely sit down with Brendan Fraser and Hikari. And they were a delight. Here we go. Enjoy. Brendan, Hikari, welcome to the AppRap Podcast. How are you both? Doing great. Fantastic, thanks. Good, good, good. Excellent. First things first, were you tempted at all to hire actors to pretend to be you for List Junkets so you could go off and see the sights of London? That's a good one. Good idea. Yeah, my name is actually not Brendan Fraser. You look just like him.

57:10I just look alike. Exactly. My name is Jennifer. I just look like a guy. Jennifer and, yeah. Yeah. And Clint, I'm guessing as well. I don't want to spoil your true identity, of course. Good one. Good one, Chris. But it makes you think, right? You can see the appeal because this is such a, on the face of it, this concept is so alien to a lot of people. This film explains it beautifully. But you can understand the appeal of a rental family or a rental person to take a role in your family, I guess. Is that something that you've thought about? I guess you have as you were making this movie. Yes. The story of the little girl, Mia, is kind of inspired from my own story.

57:57And I was raised by a single mom. And while I'm very happy with my mom, I will never fix anyway. I was curious, too, what is it like to have a dad? So if I were to rent somebody, I would definitely, you know, think about that part. And also I kind of like to just play anybody people ask. You know, I'll be your wing girl. I'll be your best friend, girlfriend, dancing partner, whatever you want. Oh, you'd like to be a rental actor yourself? Yeah, I'd love to. I'll totally rent myself. Happy to. Brendan, what about yourself? I'll be your daddy. Thank you, Daddy. Does that cost extra? We'll talk. We'll talk afterwards.

58:45Did that appeal to you as well, last side of things? Can you see the appeal for people? Absolutely, because in this world that's so busy and there's such division for all the reasons, we're looking to connect with one another. And we can't do it in an authentic way, scrolling with that thing in your hand in a meaningful way. Yeah. And as is the example in Tokyo, any metropolitan city, for all its population, there is a great deal of seclusion. Yeah. Loneliness. Yeah. And that's actually a public health concern. Yeah. And it should be. So as mental health issues are stigmatized to an extent in Japan, there's a workaround.

59:31people find a way to have a surrogate of sorts come into their lives and make a connection with them that fills that void even if it's make-believe even if it's pretend it still has value to them and the film rental family explores the world between um the the uh the acting the the the guys and the reality of it and what happens when a client and provider blur those lines of who they really are to one another. And that's where this film thrives. As an actor, that must have appealed to you as well. Is that something you've experienced over the years where maybe those lines blur between the role you're playing and yourself?

1:00:22It's a funny old profession because it's like a family that you make typically, you know, dysfunctional or otherwise when you make a film come together for a short while you create something hopefully meaningful that you works best when you connect with one another um and then it stops abruptly and your life goes on but you have something to show for it afterward the movie when there's a draw you did something you created something together um i can identify with feeling a sense of that kind of connection and that need to create that little tribe each time you set out on each particular project.

1:01:03But I've been doing this long enough now that I like the idea of saying farewell instead of goodbye. Because you see each other down the road. Down the road, yeah. Campus gets smaller all the time. If you're lucky enough to still be in the game. Absolutely. Hikari, what was your tribe on this movie? You had Brendan, obviously. Yes, yes. As well. And you found this incredible, you know, coterie of actors. Yeah. I think, you know, just as he says, when you make a movie, right, we have a tribe, we have a family, and you spend day, morning, afternoon, every single moment and talk about the, you know, creative ideas, and you just share so much with it.

1:01:43And especially a story like this, Rental Family, it's such a, it might feel, for Western people's eyes, it might be, you know, very unique and very odd jobs but it really rooted into our current you know society to again epidemic you know the loneliness that it goes around the world um so uh we really looked into deep in make sure that we're not making fun of make sure that that we are really telling the honest story and that story would resonate not just to japanese audience but people from around the world. And so as we were discussing about those things and just as you know, there's 50 of us, it's a small crew, it's a small independent movie.

1:02:27So coming together to tell this one particular story of Philip and then all these people around it, it was really a joy. And we became really a family and I will do it all over again. I guess I can never finish you know i always want to make a sequel let's do it let's do it as well which is rental families yes in the uk oh yeah in london i could absolutely go for that indeed but there's um the fact that it's an independent film and you were shooting it kind of i don't know how on the fly you were shooting it but yeah uh i was really struck by the the scenes of philip in his apartment building.

1:03:09That is such a beautiful visual, first of all. You have this wonderful sense of isolation. You have this guy who is in this apartment building and he can look across the street to another apartment building that is teeming with life, but he doesn't connect with any of it. He feels so alone and he's dwarfed in this giant, giant building. And then gradually you get closer and closer and he gets a little bit warmer and he gets a little bit more connected with the life going on around him. Was that a visual you came to very early on? Yeah, it was all written pretty much in the script. When we were writing, for us, me and Stephen, how can we tell us visually, if there's any dialogues, there's no dialogues involved, how can we tell a story and show the isolation, right?

1:03:51So there's a glass first. He's looking everybody through the glass. And so there's that, even though it's see-through, there's still a block. You see something you want to be a part of. But then he still can't. Yeah, exactly. And but then as he continued to, you know, his life and meets all these people, all these people comes into his life. He start opening up a little bit. Right. Like and then when he decides to take this old man, he's outside in the balcony looking at everybody else. So there's the steps that he makes, you know, as he connects with everybody else. It's definitely we talked about it.

1:04:27We saw through it. Color, obviously, and locations, everything we yeah, it was all planned. It's so beautiful. It really is. Thank you, Brendan, for you filming those scenes. Because I imagine you filmed them all accordioned together. They were very much, I imagine you filmed those over a couple of days or maybe even a day. That was on a soundstage. No. Yeah. What? I love that. Designer is that good. Yeah. I was going to say where it was. No, there is an apartment that that old right outside. So we took we took exactly same measurements from the apartment out exterior apartment shot that you saw.

1:05:12And then we recreated that in the onstage. My flabber has been well and truly gassed it. That is extraordinary. That's extraordinary. Wow. And then with the incredible production designer. His apartment alone tells his story. It really? Yeah. Yeah. I thought maybe the apartment might have been a set, but maybe you went on location for some of the scenes. Wow, that's amazing. That apartment was actually built so, it's one of the oldest apartments in Tokyo. And as you can see, outside is very run down compared to other parts of, right? And then somewhere that, you know, Philip can only afford. He's a big guy.

1:05:49He can live in a tiny place. But then old apartments are usually cheaper. Right. So we literally, we created that. to his size. But then kitchens are very old in the 70s. There's a kitchen sink from the 70s. You have, this is blowing my mind. Next you're telling me that the rock was not real in Money Returns. He wasn't. I don't know. But those scenes, presumably then you filmed them all roughly together on that soundstage. Yeah. Because that's Philip's arc in microcosm. It is. So what was it like for you suddenly playing the breadth of this man's arc on the soundstage in just a couple of days?

1:06:37Well, we didn't come to Tokyo to work on the soundstage specifically. Yeah. That all the crafts were so talented to create the illusion. Worked. I'm flattered to hear you say that. But his journey takes place on the streets and among the people, on trains all the way down to the island of Amakusa. Amakusa. Amakusa. And that's the authenticity of working on location. Those locations are all real, right? Yeah. There's only a few places. Phil's apartment and then the bathroom, surprisingly, is the wedding sequence when he's high. Oh, that's it. That was a soundstage. That was a soundstage. Yeah, that was a creation.

1:07:25Everything else were locations, I think. That's right, yeah. Everything else was location, regular streets, you know, wedding banquet hall. Yeah. Yeah. And we waited for the cherry blossoms to come in. They were late blooming that year. It was a really cold spring. This is around April, isn't it? Something like that. Yeah, usually April, but then it was supposed to be end of March, and then that pushed for about two weeks and we just kept pushing the schedules like oh yeah yeah the final scene cherry blossom wasn't cherry blossomed so we're like okay we got to look for a new place because that location doesn't work anymore we can't shoot there and we found this bridge and when the cherry blossoms are gone they're gone it's ephemeral that's the beauty of it yeah and we were able to capture that none of that's cgi anything it's the real mccoy and it was worth waiting for this this film is, it's a love letter to loneliness.

1:08:22Yeah. Yeah. It's a dress in Tokyo, but it could be anywhere. But we're all recipients in the end of this. That's amazing. The Cherry Blossoms, where did you film that? That's in Tokyo. That is in Tokyo. Yeah, part of Tokyo, but not in the major area. Okay. We shot, we really didn't shoot as much in the Shibuya or any places. Like we picked up a couple of B-rolls. I went back and then shot some locations later, but it was just kind of all around Tokyo area. But one of the things that we wanted to do was to show the Tokyo that people didn't know, people are not aware of. It's like really where people live and have meals, go to the bar and all this everyday life I wanted to show.

1:09:12But never came off like a travel journal, you know, or like a... And Phillip's been there for seven years, so he's used to... He knows, yeah. He's familiar enough with the customs and the locals, and he's been there long enough to feel like he is an outsider. He doesn't belong, but he wants to learn how to be. And that's really largely one of the reasons why he doesn't realize it at first, why he signs up with his rental family agencies, because he has such a paucity of connection of his own. And when he stops acting as he is needed to play the parts of these people in their lives, in the client's lives, and he just gets real and invests in them, that's when he starts to make traction in his journey.

1:10:00Absolutely. We talked, Brandon, you and I, we talked for Empire Magazine a couple of months ago about your Japanese experience and how you've been to Japan over the years. and you were recommending the egg sandwich from 7-Eleven. The argument never ends. Family Mart? Are you a Family Mart man or a 7-Eleven man? In the end, I think it was a Family Mart man, I've got to say. I think I was. I think so. I saw a video the other day of people taking those egg sandwiches from the 7-Eleven and putting chicken inside them. Have you done that? I've done it. I've seen it. I want to go back so I can. I haven't done it.

1:10:38I'm Japanese. I didn't do it either, but I was like, I visited Japan a couple of times, I haven't done it. I need to go back. This is the thing. That's awesome. But, because Philip has been there for so long, I know that you were learning a language, and you had a little bit of help with the language as well, but in terms of that familiarity, how did you find that, establishing that so quickly? That's the thing about working on location. As long as you remember, it's not vacation, there's a job to do, and just live and breathe, and inhabit the space that you're in and rely on the people around you.

1:11:12Then that gets created. And for my part, he is an outsider. I do stand head and shoulders amongst your average person in Japan in a crowd. But it's possible to feel very lonesome even though you stand out. Yes. And I think that's a point of the film, too. It could be anyone. And then like the way the Philip is, even though he's been there for seven years, like his language is not perfect Japanese, right? He speaks, he'll be able to communicate the way he, you know, sit on the chair and all that stuff, all the gestures he's really trying to belong. But then, you know, Japanese doesn't have to be perfect, but the way he really told, you know, spoke, it's an emotion is all there.

1:12:01It doesn't have to be, doesn't have to speak exactly the way Japanese does. But then all his emotion against performance is there underneath the language. So it was very, it was really refreshing and just like the witness, great to witness that it's like you feel, you know, wow, that's, you know, much about Japanese. Don't be too impressed with my Japanese. Akireamoto learned to speak more English to play this part than I learned to speak Japanese. And he never spoke. That was his first time speaking both English and new Japanese performing in different languages. So it was very beautiful. Hikari, was this what you were hoping for when you cast Brendan?

1:12:41When you were thinking of him, was he writing a script? No, I wrote a script without thinking anybody. We just wrote it. We wanted to write a story that talks about loneliness, talks about how we can bring people together. Because the idea all came. and when we're writing a script, we're doing it during the pandemic. And at that point, we didn't know where we were going, right? Remember that. And so for us, it was important to write a story about the connection, human connections, and where that leads to. And, but yeah, I didn't have a burden in my mind. But then when I saw the whale, how incredible he was, I saw him speaking on this giant screen because he couldn't be there.

1:13:26I couldn't be at the screen. It was a BFI? BFI screening. Because of the pandemic. Because I tested positive that week and I couldn't go to the Q &A, but they cleverly stuck me, projected on a screen to the audience. And it turns out it was a giant Brendan, Big Brother hit. And then that's when I said, there's my fella. The giant guy on the screen speaking to you. There's my fella. That's the man. That's him. That's him. And Brendan, for you, after The Whale and after the Oscar, This is your first film after that. Not the first film released, but the other films have been shot before then. So what were you looking for post-Well and then this came your way?

1:14:08Whatever would not be expected of me. I wanted unique. I wanted out of the ordinary. I wanted simple, no big colliding set pieces and fantastical premises, but a human story. Yeah. That can even fit the bills of those. It can have the emotions be the special effects value in it. The size of it wasn't important at all, but the quality of it being a story that people could find a way to change their thinking about after they see it. When you see the title, what is a rental family? It's in the title there, you wonder, and it's easy to maybe even just dismiss that. But then again, that's the reason.

1:15:05That's the one that I want. It's the one that is a little out of the ordinary because that's what distinguishes it. So those are the elements that I was looking for. And I found it in this script. Amazing. I've got it to go, but you've mentioned colliding set pieces and fantastical stories, which brings me neatly to The Mummy. Can you say anything at this point in time about what we can expect from that? I want to answer this question. I do. I really do. My lives have been thrilled.

1:15:42No way. Wow. That's about all I can tell you. I cannot wait for that. Okay. But Hikari, you can talk about the mummy. Are you excited? Absolutely. I saw what you did there. I was circumvented. Well, we do mummy five. I'm your director. Five? Oh, yeah. I'm fully on board for this. Guys, that's going to be amazing. Clint, Jennifer, what a pleasure. Thanks so much. Thank you. Thank you, Kent. Thanks, guys. Thank you. Merry Christmas. Happy holidays. Okay, that was Brendan Fraser and Hikari talking about rental family. Yeah, I really like this movie, Hell's Bells. Tell the good folks about it. Yeah, so this is, as you said, an actor, an American actor living in Tokyo who's down on his luck.

1:16:37He takes this tiny quick job, which his agent doesn't fully explain to him. And he's so he's a bit baffled when he turns up and he finds he's meant to be a mourner at a funeral. But that puts him in touch with this company rental family run by Shinji, who's played by Takahiro Hira, who basically explains the deal to him. You're basically being whoever these people need you to be. For example, their younger co-worker, Mari Yamamoto, is often hired by men who are cheating on their wives to pretend to be the mistress. So she can apologize profusely to the wife for threatening their marriage. It's a really quite twisted job at times.

1:17:20But it can also be very kind of helpful to people to actually have the thing that they were maybe missing in their life. So this little girl is helped potentially by having this pretend dad in her life. She isn't aware that he isn't really her dad because they've never met. And it's all about trying to solve an immediate problem with the application of a random person so that you can get past a particular roadblock in your life and move on and do something different. And through doing this, Philip, the Brendan Fraser character, also finds, I think, himself going past some of his own roadblocks and some of the stuff that's been holding him back in his own life.

1:18:00So it's kind of a story about lonely people finding some kind of solace, finding some kind of way forward, trying to figure out just the complications of life and everything else. I think it's very sweet. I think it's very warm-hearted. It's not, you know, it's quite an old-fashioned film. Like, in some ways, it feels like a sort of, literally, a 1930s, 1940s kind of a premise. I mean, I don't know if they had rental families and that kind of thing in that time, but the sort of farcical elements of this pretense do feel like something that, you know, Billy Wilder or somebody could have glommed onto and made hay with in those days.

1:18:41And it feels just really classic interpersonal human drama and comedy for a film. And I just thought it was really nicely played by everybody involved. I think Brendan Fraser is such a warm guy, but he also gives so much kind of hangdog energy in this. Like he's really down on his luck and he's really, really isolated. There's a kind of almost rear window moment where he's basically just looking out his apartment window with all the people around him and has all these kind of weird parasocial relationships with all of his neighbors who he doesn't go and talk to. He doesn't know, but he can sort of see, oh, look, they're doing this.

1:19:17Oh, look, he's having this for dinner, you know, and that's the only real contact he has with people some days. And it's just, it's really, really moving. It's, I think, probably a little bit slight and a little bit probably too sweet for some reviewers. This kind of came with a little bit of Oscar buzz early on there was some talk of maybe brendan fraser being nominated again and that seems to have just died away um but it's a really really lovely likable beautifully played film and and a really really good cast i mean takahiro hira is good in everything i've seen him in um he's really likable here um mariam amoto was great um shannon mahina gorman as the little girl half japanese and needs a father figure i just thought she was wonderful um and uh akira emoto is the retired actor who Fraser is hired to pretend to be a journalist and pretend interviewed to kind of make him feel important again he's wonderful I really loved him he's very very energetic so yeah just lovely lovely lovely film really lovely little film and you know I guess it's devoid of histrionics so Fraser never really gets that that great big emoting Oscar clip that you probably need to be nominated these days it's not the movie I was expecting I think if you If you hear there's a comedy called Rental Family, which Brendan Fraser stars 25 years ago, it would have been a much more broad affair.

1:20:42But this is really, really delicate. And I think it's just a really, really lovely film about Japan and about life in Japan as well. Tokyo, I haven't been there in a long, long time, but it's one of my favorite cities. And if you've ever been to Japan, you'll know what a bewildering, intoxicating, beguiling mix that country is. it's absolutely incredible and I think Brendan Fraser really nails that Philip's been living in this country now for seven years he has a decent mastery of the language but it's also a city that you can be incredibly lonely in you can be living across London's the same in many many ways but you can be living across from someone and be completely and utterly disconnected from them and this film goes somewhere I think towards kind of healing that in a way and trying to get people to reconnect and reconnect with their friends and neighbors.

1:21:38I really liked it, but we gave it three stars. Three stars then for Rental Family. Next up is the return Jimbo of Matt Damon. Matt Damon. And Ben Affleck. Ben Affleck. In The Rip, which is the new cop thriller on Netflix by Joe Carnahan. Joe Carnahan tell us about this one Jimbo written and directed by Joe Carnahan yes yes the return of Matt Fleck which is very exciting first time together since the last duel was that five years ago two years ago was it two years ago yes oh how time flies when you're getting old well it feels like it's been a while it's been a moment but they play a pair of somewhat rowdy I would say Miami cops in this who are part of this task force that raids drug houses and seizes halls of cash which to a certain extent sounds a bit like The Shield if people are fans of that particular TV show, where it's kind of a group within the police force who have no oversight.

1:22:33They have broad latitude to do what they want, and corruption often results in that case. But this isn't actually that kind of film, certainly not on the face of it. So Damon is the lieutenant in this, Affleck is the sergeant, and the whole team is basically reading from the loss of one of their members, who is murdered in the prologue by masked killers. And they get a tip-off that there is a ton of cash in this stash house somewhere, and they rock up with the rest of their team, only to discover that the haul is much, much, much, much more than advertised. Other parties take an interest, the people who own it aren't exactly thrilled to see it go, and it all goes a little bit pear-shaped.

1:23:09Not least because there's a question hanging over the whole endeavour as to whether with this amount of money, they're quite as happy to just count it and hand it over as they might have been if it was a lot less. You know, as opposed to, say, buying a jet ski, which you might otherwise think to do with it. So I really, really, really like this. It's a really well-constructed thriller. It's really tense. It's gripping. It very much keeps you guessing all the way through, which I really appreciated. And to be honest, Matt and Ben, they have great on-screen chemistry. Their friendship kind of shines through.

1:23:42And even here, where it's friendship with a little bit of antagonism and they're yelling at each other, you never get bored of that. I think it actually is the lifeblood of this film, and I actually hope they do a lot more films together. They're slightly different. It's like Damon's grieving. He's slightly more brooding, intense. He's a very self-contained performance. And Affleck's is showier and angrier and throws someone almost through a window in one of the first scenes. He's a bit of a bully, gives no fucks whatsoever. They both give excellent narco beard. They do. Which I thought was impressive.

1:24:09With Damon, you can see, this is the beginnings of his Odysseus beard. This is like stage one, and Nolan's like, yeah, keep going, keep going. And by the time we get to Odysseus, more, give me more beard! But both of them give very, very good beard. understated I thought but great turn from Sasha Kelly as Desi and she's the woman living in the stash house yes it doesn't it doesn't come off the rails at any point I think it maybe loses a tiny bit of momentum in the final act it's slightly less guessy it feels a little bit more by the numbers but it didn't really spoil my enjoyment of it I actually really like the way it played out so yeah I had a really good time with this and I don't say that lightly of a Netflix movie so yeah I think this is really really interesting this movie it's quite tense all the way through.

1:24:52It keeps you guessing about who is on the up and up, if indeed anybody. And I think it uses that to a great advantage, John. Yeah, I agree. And I agree with you, James. I did think the last act maybe was the weakest one for me. I think the whole film is so suspenseful and on the edge and it feels like there's tension about to boil over that when it does actually boil over, it's almost slightly disappointing just because it's lots bang, bang, shoot, shoot, drive, drive. that's exactly how I would have described it but it's still very entertaining it's still very very competently shot it feels a little bit Michael Mann-ish it almost feels a little bit the thing in some ways because you sort of don't know who to suspect and everyone's in this very claustrophobic space it's real paranoia and yeah it genuinely kept me guessing I was predicting I didn't predict any of the reveals except I think the last act is perhaps the bit where up to that point you've been absolutely clueless as to what's going to happen next and then it gets to one where you're like, okay, I know where this is going.

1:25:54Yes, yes. And at that point, it feels like it just coasts along to the finish line but it's still satisfying. Yeah. Yeah, I had a great time with it. I think it's Netflix's best sort of action movie slash thriller in a very long time. Proper, proper solid storytelling. I didn't know who to trust and... Because your initial instinct is to trust Matt Damon. Always. Right? Always. But then I started questioning that a lot. I started thinking about The Departed. I was like, wait. The Departed. The Departed. Yeah. And I think that I just thought that there was nobody I trusted throughout at all. And in some cases, I was right.

1:26:36In some cases, less so. There's one person that you will be suspicious of from minute one, and you probably should be. But everybody else, I came and went on them. and I didn't also know what was going to happen at the end in some respects you know I thought okay yeah this person's going to have a fight and this person's going to do that but I didn't know some of the outcomes so I just really fun because you feel like at one point this is going to be like assault on Stash House 13 like it's going to be a siege movie and it isn't but it is but I thought it was going to be a combination I thought it was going to be the thing plus assault on Precinct 13 like it was the dangers inside the house and outside the house you know It really makes you paranoid that way.

1:27:18Two great movies by a man called JC, John Carpenter. And this is a great movie by a man called JC, Joe Carnahan. And yeah, I really, really like this so much. So I gave it a spoiler, special treatment. I spoke to Joe Carnahan just the other day. Also, there's an unexpected emotional layer into this movie that I don't think a lot of people see coming as well. And Affleck and Damon are just terrific. Really, really tense. And then, yes, it goes bang, bang, drive, drive, shoot, shoot. but I enjoyed that stuff as well I think it's Carnahan's best film in a while actually you know liked Cop Shop liked Boss Level but this is the next level it's a cut above yeah definitely a cut above what did we give this one?

1:28:00I'm still writing the review but I think it's going to be a four sounds like a four in the room it's a four there we go alright four stars then for the rip it rips folks and finally we're going to finish off the review section with 28 years later of the Bone Temple, which is out already in the UK. It opens today in the States. Hell's Bells. Yeah. Yeah, this is obviously the sequel to 28 years later. So we pick up once again with Spike. That's the Alfie Williams character. Who is now, well, he was seen briefly on his own at the end of the last film and then fell in with the jimmies. So we basically pick up immediately after that initially and find that he is basically forced to fight for a place in the jimmies to the death with one of the other members because there's only so much room, apparently.

1:28:47And also, they are led by Jack O 'Connell's Sir Lord, Jimmy Crystal, who is a total psychopath and quite the most brutal thing that has happened in any of these films to date. Yeah, I think it's something that we've not seen in these movies to date, where we haven't really had a human antagonist, a human villain in the 28 movies. Yeah. Can we say this isn't really a zombie film, is it? Well, of course, I think you'll find they're infecting. No, I know, but from a genre perspective, it's more of a folk horror, I guess. It is. Yeah, I think it's just a really interesting way to take this series.

1:29:25So you have the Jimmys. There's kind of two different plot threads here. You have the Jimmys and Spike's experience within them and his attempt to, I think, hold on to some kind of humanity in them, which looks pretty doomed, if I'm honest. you have this towering performance by Jack O 'Connell at the head of the Jimmies and it is kind of fascinating because I think the film has some compassion for him because this is a character who has been shaped by 28 years of living in a survival situation since he was a tiny child actually and this is in some ways his response to that and it is a really deeply fucked up response to that, but it is a response to something outside of himself as well as maybe some screws loose inside.

1:30:12And then you also have the story of Dr. Kelsen, of the Ralph Fiennes character and of Samson, this alpha who he has formed this kind of, again, weird parasocial relationship with because he has been drugging him for so long every time he comes close that Samson has come to associate him with a high. So they've got this really weird thing where Samson is now actively seeking out Dr. Kelson to get his fix, which is an odd twist on the kind of infected that we've seen before. And you can see Kelson start to wonder, well, maybe there's something in there that can be rescued. Is there something, maybe not a cure, but is there something, is there some shred of humanity still inside this terrifying monster?

1:30:59So it kind of is about the shreds of humanity that may or may not exist inside terrifying monsters, this film. But it's also really scary, really at times upsetting. I mean, the jimmies are really, really terrifying, terrifying things, maybe worse than the infected. But the infected are still pretty scary. They're worse than the infected because the infected will kill you quick and it'll be over in 20 seconds. Then you become an infected yourself. And so, whereas the jimmies will kill you slow. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. and take pleasure in some kind of shit well some yeah exactly some of them will yeah um it's a yeah it's a very very scary situation and it's it's something that i think nia da costa balances really well because just when you think it's unbearable it she she gives you something else to hold on to and to think about for a minute and then kind of brings you back to the scary bits and i think it's just really really well well put together well structured well conceived as a film that way and really interesting just to as you say move away from just scary fast zombies or fast infected running after people and introduce these new wrinkles into this world what would it look like after 28 years of apocalypse essentially at least in this country um and i just think it's i think it's fascinating i i immediately wanted to watch the third installment which i believe they are now moving ahead with thank goodness um and rightfully so i think it's fantastic for Nia DaCosta to have, you know, I think the Marvels wasn't as bad as its box office made it seem, but I think it's great to see her storming back with first Hedda and now this, and I think this is even better than Hedda was.

1:32:40And yeah, I really just loved it. It's tough. It's a tough watch, but it didn't leave me despairing or overly haunted because there's also so much compassion in it there's also so much humanity in it oh ray fines is terrific ray fines is off the charts brilliant in this um and exactly the sort of performance that will be overlooked when it comes to the awards conversations and and because it's a genre film and it shouldn't be because you find such humanity in kelson it's there is there is there are so many grace notes to that man and even when he is doing extraordinary things there is so much humanity to him and and so much compassion and so much just love and i absolutely adored him in this he is he's the thing that makes the scary bits you know bearable for me as is chai lewis parry who is terrific and we're going to do a spoiler special on this we'll get into samson a little bit more in detail on that but uh this is an extraordinary performance great really really really is um if you want to say quote-unquote zombie performance uh it's my favorite quote-unquote zombie performance in a movie since Howard Sherman as Bub in Day of the Dead.

1:33:52He's really, really great in this. I've seen a lot of people say they think this is the best 28 movie. I don't know if I'm willing to say that just yet. I want to see it again before I make that proclamation. Can I fucking say that? Proclamation. My proclamatory powers are terrible this week, but I know someone who might not say that. Isn't that right? James Bowe. I did not have a good time with this, but for very specific James reasons. Like, Helen, you said, like, frightening. I didn't find it frightening at all. I found it horrifying. And so it didn't scare me, but as you know, I'm a sensitive soul.

1:34:29I found the gore and the torture scenes in this unbearable. Like, I could not watch them, and they upset me so much, it actually ruined the film for me. That may just be a very me problem, but there is one particular extended torture sequence that is incredibly graphic, incredibly upsetting and just I mean on the one hand it works very well what they set out to do they 100 % achieved Nia da Costa that is the intended outcome of this sequence but there's a part of me that's just like I just don't need or want to ever see something like that and I don't understand why you would want to see something like that or whether you'd want or quite why you'd want to show something like that because I feel like there were other ways of conveying who the Jimmies were and who you know Jack O 'Connell's character in particular was without that.

1:35:17But equally, like I say, this is a particular issue that I have with films. But beyond that, there's a lot to love about this. It's a very different film, I think, to 28 years later. It's more of a macro study. It slows down. It zooms in. It looks at character. It looks at form. There's some exploration slash demystification of the rage virus that I was mixed on. I thought it was, on the one hand, really clever and interesting. But on the other hand, I worry about, I don't want to know too much about things. sometimes I think mystery is part of the appeal so I'm undecided on that we'll see how that kind of plays out I love the way it sets up the third film and I'm really really excited to see that I didn't like it as much as 28 years and I definitely didn't like either one of them as much as I liked 28 days but there was a lot about this I did like the fine sequences were the best there is a and I kid you not there is a musical sequence in this film which is something for the ages it is extraordinary and there are some fantastic bits in this all the Ralph Fiennes and all the Chai Lewis Perry stuff I thought was fabulous.

1:36:14And actually, I didn't mind the Jimmy stuff at all once we get past that scene. But for me, that scene kind of ruined the film for me. It has ensured I will never, as long as I live, ever watch this film again, because I wouldn't survive it. And I would say, if you are of a sensitive disposition, do take this warning to heart. It is a lot. Natasha Kaplinsky has given us an 18, by the way. So, it is an 18. So, I think people will know going in. But even for an 18, it's a lot. It's gnarly. it's pretty gnarly it is gnarly but yeah I really liked it but we're gonna have a spoiler special we talked to Nia DaCosta already for this and we've given it four stars four stars then for 28 years later The Bone Temple Jimbo do you want to say your joke?

1:36:59really? you want me to do my joke? you did did? have you done the interview with Nia DaCosta? I did well no it's in the spoiler special oh okay it was Ben did it yes well the interview was being done for the Spoiler Special and I said to you, Chris, you should do the interview for this in Pret. And you said, why? Why, James? And I said, because it's near to Costa. Oh. Oh. Oh, that's terrible. And that was my joke. Two stars then for James' joke. So there we go. Worse torture than the actual scene in the film. All right. And on that note, folks, that is it for our first in-studio Empire podcast of the year 2026 hooray we got through it all we learned a lot about ourselves my inability to say proclamatory fucking nailed it nice there you go join us next week for more film related fun we'll be joined by a combination of people a combination of people clarify star of H is for Hawk or if you're Helen H is for Hawk and we'll also be joined by Park Chan Dan Wook, director of No Other Choice, and Steve Coogan and Anna Hardwick, stars of Saipan.

1:38:17So already our guest cup overflow authority. I'm working on ways around that. I'm going to a class. I'm trying to wean myself off over booking. But anyway, until then, until we meet again, until that auspicious occasion, it is goodbye from my three colleagues of such lethal cunning, the young man of the podcast, John Nugent. Goodbye. Goodbye. can I just say James' joke more like the grown temple that's good you went to hear my Claire Foy joke that's even worse okay alright go on then I knew she was going to be on the podcast next week why is that James? because I'm Claire Foyant I bet she's never heard that either ever ever once she'll be in the studio in about an hour and a half so maybe you could do that interview and that could be your opener and see how far you get goodbye James Dyer goodbye Chris you have not yet earned another nickname Avalon Camino Kid but we shall see what happens goodbye Helen O 'Hara toodaloo toodaloo to you and it's goodbye for me I'm off to edit this in my nearest branch of Pret why?

1:39:20because it's near to Starbucks the joke doesn't work it doesn't make any sense why would you want to be near somewhere that you're you're already in a cafe I see what you're saying yeah the coffee's right there thanks for listening see you next time bye

1:39:37you