Kent Film Club (Season 2023 Episode 2)
This week Chris Deacy is joined by Jayne Hornsby to discuss the films; The Sound of Music, Pulp Fiction, Harold and Maude, and Wadjda.
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00:00 [Music]
00:11 Hello and welcome to Kent Film Club. I'm Chris Deasy and each week I'm going to be joined
00:16 by a guest from Kent to dive deep into the impact that certain films have had on their
00:22 life. Each guest will reflect on the films which have meant the most to them over the
00:26 years and every week there will be a Kent Film Trivia where we quiz you at home about
00:31 a film that has a connection to the county. And now let me introduce you to my guest for
00:37 this week. She teaches Latin at a grammar school in Kent and has a background in classics.
00:43 She also worked at the University of Kent and is a huge film fan. She is Jane Hornsby.
00:48 Welcome Jane. Thank you Chris. Now we've got some amazing films to talk through and I have
00:52 a confession because your first film is one that I only saw, I think it was in 2018, at
00:57 the BFI, The Sound of Music. Why did you choose that film? Oh because it is the greatest film.
01:04 It is the greatest film. It's absolutely, it's got everything. It's got everything.
01:09 And I actually, I realised this week that Hugh Grant and I have this in common. It's
01:13 his film as well and I agree with everything he says about it. There isn't a second of
01:18 this film that doesn't make me weep, doesn't bring back memories and it's just always been
01:25 up there. It's not the most technically advanced or complex film but I just love it. Because
01:33 I remember when I saw it I was really riveted because in the last hour, because there was
01:37 an interval, I actually saw it in a double bill with the Douglas Sirk film. I think it
01:40 was All That Heaven Allows and that was 89 minutes. This was double the length and it
01:44 felt shorter. I mean I was completely unwrapped in all of this. Wasn't there a famous, was
01:47 it Christopher Plummer, referred to working with Julie Andrews as something like being
01:52 beaten up by a Hallmark card or something like that?
01:55 Yeah, something like that. And Christopher Plummer is famous for maybe talking down the
02:01 movie a little bit. I don't think he thought it was quite the classic that it turned out
02:07 to be but I tend to stay away from that sort of stuff because I don't want it solid for
02:14 me. For me it's just perfect.
02:15 Do you remember the first time that you saw it? It sounds like it's a ritual, it sounds
02:19 like it's something that you've watched many times.
02:20 I have watched it many times and even in preparation for this interview, Chris, I didn't re-watch
02:25 it because I know it so well. But yes, I do remember the first time. I was taken to see
02:30 it against my will by my mother who said 'oh there's this great film at the cinema, let's
02:37 go and see it' and that would have been about the mid-80s. I was a sulky teenager, it was
02:42 after school, I didn't want to go. So anyway, we went along and I was absolutely blown away.
02:50 I had the LP, sang along to all the songs and as soon as I could get it on video I did
02:58 that and DVD.
02:59 But it was the big screen that you saw it on first?
03:02 It was and that was the only time until I actually went to see it at the BFI a couple
03:07 of years ago when they did the remastered version and I took all the family to see it
03:12 and from the moment the music starts I had the tissues out.
03:19 Are there particular scenes that you remember? Any particular moments, whether it's one of
03:23 the songs or one of the action sequences, because it is really an action film to an
03:27 extent isn't it? Or suspense as they're fleeing from the Nazis?
03:32 I don't know, I did think about have I got a favourite scene. I don't think I can really
03:37 isolate any favourite scenes but I do think the sequence, particularly where Maria and
03:46 the Captain are dancing the Lendler out on the patio at the ball is just the most romantic,
03:57 sexy scene ever because they are completely in love with one another and they're doing
04:02 this dance that reflects their love for each other and for their country.
04:06 Because there's a scene isn't there, you were a teenage girl when you saw this first and
04:11 there's a scene with the teenage girl performing. So I don't know if that was something that
04:14 really connected at that moment?
04:17 Yeah, I can kind of age myself because I was in a particular house where I lived but also
04:23 because I certainly wasn't 16 because I remember thinking well when I'm 16 I'll be able to
04:29 sing I am 16 going 17 and so on. I don't think I'm particularly identified with Liesel but
04:40 I just love the whole thing. I love the choreography of it. Julie Andrews is just, she's got a
04:47 voice that is just like cut glass.
04:49 Because that was her decade with Mary Poppins as well.
04:53 I think Mary Poppins was the year before wasn't it? Or they were certainly subsequent years.
04:57 She was, I think she was pregnant during the making of The Sound of Music as well. I'm
05:03 not an enormous fan of Mary Poppins I have to say. I like it well enough but I don't
05:09 think it even holds a candle to this.
05:12 Do you think, there's a reason why some films stand the test of time and we'll look at a
05:17 few other classics in a moment but for The Sound of Music, it was made mid-60s, very
05:22 sort of Rodgers and Hammerstein, it's very much of its era in a way but there is something
05:27 about it. It's the sort of film that people go along to the sing-alongs. It is something
05:32 that maybe Christopher Plummer kind of was right but also very wrong. There was something
05:38 maybe a bit naff, a little bit too trite about it but it really worked and it resonated.
05:44 It does. I mean for me as well I should mention I was brought up a Catholic as well so the
05:47 whole thing about the nuns in the convent was very familiar and moving. There is a scene
05:55 where Maria gets married and the nuns are behind the gate and they're all watching.
06:02 They're all women who've chosen a certain path in life and she's chosen a different
06:07 one. I just think that's a beautiful moment.
06:09 You've persuaded me that I should watch it again.
06:11 I will definitely watch it again.
06:13 Well I think it's time to move on to your second choice of film which I did see at the
06:17 cinema in I think it was something like the 30th of December 1994.
06:21 Can you be a bit more specific?
06:24 Yeah it was on a Friday. No I remember this because I lived in a town without a cinema
06:30 so I had to wait to see my movies and Pulp Fiction, I think I had the poster, maybe even
06:34 the soundtrack before I saw the film. But why Pulp Fiction?
06:39 Because again it's just a film that is brilliant in every way. I had seen, obviously there
06:45 was Reservoir Dogs before that which wasn't quite such a comedic turn but it was clear
06:52 that Tarantino was some brilliant, brilliant filmmaker and so I was really looking forward
06:59 to seeing this next one. I saw it at the cinema, I can't remember which cinema, but again just
07:05 blown away by the film knowledge, the creativity, the comedy.
07:11 I mean for me it is an incredibly funny film. That's its defining feature. Yes it's set
07:20 in the world of criminality and drug dealers and assassins and stuff but in itself it's
07:27 actually quite a small movie about normal people.
07:32 I mean two things, first of all I use it with my students, it's redemption all over it but
07:37 it's also about a hitman but also the lack of linear structure.
07:40 Yeah I love that.
07:41 And Memento by Christopher Nolan a few years ago did a similar sort of thing. But when
07:46 I watched this, and maybe I hadn't seen a huge number of movies back in 1994, but watching
07:49 this it felt like something I'd never seen the likes of it before because you've got
07:54 characters dying and then coming back, they're being resurrected and you sort of know their
07:58 fate but then you're not quite sure, you're watching it thinking we think we know what
08:01 happens to him but we know that Tarantino is playing a great game with us.
08:04 Oh yeah and I love the fact that he makes you work hard to understand the film. I don't
08:08 like things that are way too easy to get and even now I really have to think about the
08:15 chronological timeline and I watched this at the weekend and me and the family were
08:20 kind of trying to piece it together and every time I have to do that, it's not automatic.
08:24 Although that says a lot about Tarantino too because he was going to do that with Kill
08:27 Bill wasn't he? He was going to make one film, one composite film but he never got round
08:31 to it and probably just as well that he didn't because it works in fragments.
08:34 Yeah it does, it does. And this is great and it's so joyous to watch all these really quite
08:44 cliché tropes of movies coming up again and again and they look fresh as daisies and yeah
08:52 I just find it hilarious.
08:54 I mean personally I saw Jackie Brown a few years later and that worked for me because
08:58 he had the same kind of characters but he went underneath them. But Pulp Fiction, and
09:03 I hadn't seen Reservoir Dogs when I saw Pulp Fiction, but it did feel like it was breaking
09:07 the mould. I know that it lost to Forrest Gump, it was a very strong year for Oscars
09:10 and I think Pulp Fiction was probably the film that really stood out from the crowd,
09:14 although the Shawshank Redemption was also there so it was a very big year for movies.
09:17 Yeah, but they're different kinds of movies for possibly different audiences or different
09:22 audiences at the same time. But yeah, this one it seems to me that he's just taken a
09:30 load of things that we're really, really familiar with like domestic situations, day-to-day
09:38 conversation and shoved them in a world which most of us will never see, never want to see
09:44 and it's that juxtaposition of the absurd with the horrific that just works so brilliantly.
09:53 I mean some of the funniest scenes are when, and the funniest lines occur when the most
09:58 awful things are happening. You know when Mia is dying of her overdose and the wife
10:06 is worried about getting stains on the carpet.
10:09 Yeah, it's full of that.
10:11 How they stab her.
10:12 And all those moments about, you know, the hitmen are about to go on this, they're about
10:15 to start killing people but they're talking about the way that they like their shakes
10:18 from a particular fast food restaurant in another country.
10:21 Yeah, yeah and Vince is the real expert on Europe and he can tell you anything you like
10:26 but he never went into Burger King, sorry. It's just so funny. I was thinking that Jules
10:30 is actually like, he looks after Vince, he's like a mother. He says things that your mum
10:35 would say. You know when he tells him off for not washing his hands properly or, you
10:40 know, I don't know, misbehaving in some other way. It's just very, very funny. Hearing it
10:46 coming out of their mouth.
10:47 Fantastic. Well, you have also persuaded me that I need to watch this one again.
10:51 Yeah.
10:52 Alright then. Okay, well that's about all the time we have for this first half of the
10:56 show. However, before we go to the break we have a Kent Film Trivia question for you at
11:00 home. Now, what 2018 film starring Ethan Hawke, Rose Byrne and Chris O'Dowd features fanate
11:09 landmarks and is an adaptation of a Nick Hornby novel? Is it A) Letters to Juliet, B) Juliet
11:18 Naked, C) Eye on Juliet? We'll reveal the answer right after this break. Don't go away.
11:24 Hello and welcome back to Kent Film Club. Now, just before that ad break we asked you
11:41 at home a Kent Film Trivia question. What 2018 film starring Ethan Hawke, Rose Byrne
11:47 and Chris O'Dowd features fanate landmarks and is an adaptation of a Nick Hornby novel?
11:53 I asked is it Letters to Juliet, Juliet Naked or Eye on Juliet? And now I can reveal to
12:00 you that the answer was in fact B) Juliet Naked. The book the film is based on tells
12:06 the story of Annie, the long suffering girlfriend of obsessed music fan Duncan and the object
12:13 of his obsession, fictional singer songwriter Tucker Crowe. Did you get the answer right?
12:20 Well, I think it is time now to move on to, Jane, your next chosen film. It's Harold and
12:26 Maud isn't it?
12:27 Harold and Maud. Oh, I love this movie. I love this movie. I saw this first when I was
12:32 a teenager. I was obsessed with films when I was a teenager and this was one of my absolute
12:38 favourites. I think I saw it one of those late night movie screenings on TV first of
12:43 all and again it was just so out there and so different. It really appealed to my sense
12:48 of quirkiness and you know when you're a teenager trying to find who you are and exploring
12:55 the world a bit it just meant a lot to me.
12:57 And it's the whole intergenerational thing. I haven't seen it in many years. Do you want
13:00 to just talk briefly about what the film is about?
13:02 Sure, sure. It's about a young man called Harold who lives a very privileged life. He's
13:10 very rich but he's an unusual young man. His hobby is faking his own suicide which
13:21 is a lot funnier than it sounds because his mother who's played by Vivian Pickles fantastically
13:27 well and her reactions to that is great. And part of his hobby is going to funerals. He's
13:33 a bit obsessed with death. And at one of these funerals he meets this old lady played by
13:38 Ruth Gordon and she's quite similar to him but instead of focusing on death like he does
13:47 she has this absolute lust for life. And she sees beauty in everything and she enjoys everything
13:54 to its fullest. And they form a friendship which then later on becomes a romantic relationship.
14:04 It's very short but they go on lots of adventures and she shows him how differently he can look
14:12 at the world and become himself without merging into the background and doing what's expected
14:19 of him.
14:20 Because in relation to the sound of music we're talking about the intergenerational
14:23 appeal. But there's something here about having the older lady, Ruth Gordon who I remember
14:26 from Rosemary's Baby, I think she won the Oscar for that.
14:29 She did, she did.
14:30 I also remember her from Columbo episodes and so on. But in this there is something
14:34 about the intergenerational thing. She's an older woman, he's a young boy but something
14:38 clicks between them. It's a very offbeat film. What is it that clicks?
14:45 I think I really identified with both of the characters actually. I was very young when
14:51 I first saw it. Probably younger than Harold is. He's probably about 19 or something like
14:56 that. And when you're a teenager you feel a bit of an outsider. You don't quite know
15:02 what your vibe is. You may be a bit scared to say just in case it doesn't resonate with
15:08 other people.
15:09 So the young man trying to find who he is, sometimes failing, resonated with me. But
15:16 also I thought Ruth Gordon's character was so attractive. She was so beautiful. I mean
15:23 properly beautiful. Because she wasn't cynical about anything. And I am not cynical about
15:32 things. I like new experiences. I don't like to say well I've been there and done that
15:37 and therefore I know all about it. I like to learn new things. And so I thought when
15:42 I'm 75 or 79 as she is in the film, that's actually quite significant. When I'm 79 I
15:50 want to be a wacky old lady like she is and just squeeze everything out of life that I
15:55 can.
15:56 And the thing that I remember is Cat Stevens, the soundtrack.
15:59 The killer soundtrack.
16:00 What's that all about?
16:01 Oh, amazing soundtrack. And it's just all of its time. It's very 70s. I mean the fashions
16:12 are terrible. And it looks very 70s. It sounds very 70s without Cat Stevens. I think probably
16:20 that was the last time we heard Cat Stevens as Cat Stevens. But he's got such a fantastic
16:28 voice. The songs are absolutely right for this film. If you want to be free, be free.
16:33 If you want to be you, be you. And I'll be singing that all week. Just even thinking
16:37 about it.
16:38 And Hal Ashby, he did Being There didn't he I think later in the decade.
16:41 He did. That's a film I haven't seen Chris.
16:43 We'll have to talk about that. But I'm sort of plotting it because there's something about
16:48 this whole era in the 70s and you've got this kind of sense. I suppose in the late 60s you
16:54 had it with Black Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate. But just that sense of something
16:57 being done quite differently. You couldn't imagine this film being made a decade or two
17:01 earlier or could you?
17:02 No. And it's very off balance all the time. All while this relationship is going on, Harold's
17:09 mother is trying to set him up because she wants him to get married and she sets him
17:14 up with some very funny dates who he tries to put off as much as possible by faking a
17:22 suicide in front of them with various hilarious consequences. But it is all… Ruth Gordon
17:32 moored in this. She's not just somebody who is Pollyanna if I can say that. She's
17:38 had great tragedy in her life and sadness and Ruth Gordon is such a class act. There
17:46 are a couple of moments that just speak volumes about her past life and it's heartbreaking.
17:53 Well again you have persuaded me to watch it again. Well Jane I think it's time to
17:57 move on to your final chosen film. Do you want to tell us about your final choice?
18:02 Probably this is the least well known of my choices. Wajda. Now I watched this, I can't
18:09 actually remember whether I saw this in the cinema or not, but I watched it having listened
18:15 to Mark Homod review it on the podcast and I just thought that sounds really interesting
18:23 and he really sold it. And it is a Saudi film directed by, it's the first Saudi film directed
18:32 by a female director who in fact had to direct from a van out of the sight of her male crew
18:40 and her male actors because of the conditions that women live in in Saudi. But it's actually
18:46 the most uplifting film. It's the perspective of a ten year old girl who lives in the suburbs
18:55 of Riyadh and she's called Wajda, it's all about her and there she is. And she's
19:00 just a regular ten year old girl. You know she's a bit cheeky, she has to go to school,
19:06 it's a bit boring, she has to do her chores at home. But at the start of the film she
19:13 has a little friend Abdullah who is a boy and he chases her on his bike and pulls her
19:22 scarf off. And all through the rest of the film it's her quest to save up enough money
19:29 to buy a bike that she's seen in a shop in the town. And she's so funny, it not
19:39 only tells you a lot about this little girl and how spirited and independent an individual
19:48 she is, it shows her navigating her life, her female life in Saudi and her mother and
19:57 her father and her family. And it tells you a lot about that kind of lifestyle. But the
20:03 point is she goes to a very regular strict school and all the girls are dressed in black
20:16 from head to foot. But all the girls are slightly pushing the boundaries in some way, you know
20:22 they're painting their toenails or they're getting in trouble for showing their ankles
20:26 or something like that. And Wajda sees she has to get 800 riyals to buy this bike. And
20:34 so she does this firstly by selling bracelets, like little handmade bracelets to her friends.
20:42 And then she finds out that there is a Quran reading competition at her school for which
20:46 the prize is a thousand riyals. And she's not at all a good student but she really applies
20:53 herself to being able to recite quite a big chunk of the Quran perfectly and answer quiz
21:00 questions on it. And the question is does she get the bike or not?
21:07 Well yes. I'm just thinking here because subtitle films.
21:12 Yes, it's in Arabic.
21:14 Exactly, and at least one or two of the films of the many I watch a week would have to be
21:19 like Wajda I think in that sense because there's something about entering a different culture
21:23 and being taken on a journey, taken for a ride literally from what you're outlining.
21:27 And actually suddenly finding that there is something here that you don't know about this
21:30 world, you're intoxicated by it and here we are a decade or so after it was made, you've
21:35 been completely, you've chosen it as one of your favourite films.
21:38 I just think it's wonderful. Not only because you get a little glimpse into this quite closed
21:46 society that few of us know about, the character, she would stand up well in any film. She's
21:54 such a great little girl. But there's really subtle things going on in this film. So her
22:02 mother is confined to her house, she can only go out when she has a driver to drive her
22:07 to work, she has to be covered up. And for reasons that become apparent in the film,
22:16 Wajda's father doesn't live with them and he subsequently takes a second wife, much
22:21 to the heartbreak of Wajda's mother. And you see all this from the little girl's point
22:27 of view, she's kind of watching what happens here. The mother is quite wedded to the values
22:34 that she's been brought up with. So for instance there's a scene where one of the mother's
22:38 friends goes and works in a hospital where she doesn't have her face covered and she
22:41 works directly with men. And she says it's great, we can chat all day, why don't you
22:47 get a job here? And the mother goes along and she finds it's just too much for her,
22:52 too much exposure. She sees her friend with her face uncovered and she can't bring herself
22:58 to do it. So it's almost as if she will accept the limitations on her life, but her
23:06 daughter's different and she knows it. And there is a change going on. So even the boy
23:14 that Wajda plays with, that she shouldn't really play with, Abdullah, when he sees Wajda
23:21 he leaves his friends to play with her because she's interesting, she's got something.
23:26 You have sold me on a couple of those because I haven't really seen them, but you've
23:30 definitely sold me on Wajda. I'm afraid that that is all the time we have for today.
23:36 So many thanks to Jane Hornsby for joining us and being such a brilliant guest. And many
23:40 thanks to you all for tuning in. Be sure to come back and join us again at the same time
23:45 next week. Until then, that's all from us. Goodbye.
23:48 (Music)
23:58 [BLANK_AUDIO]