Screens & Better Man

Better Man

Reegs: Welcome to Bad Dad's Film Review. The podcast that is to film criticism as a mammogram is to foreplay. This week we're polishing our top five screens from silver to sun, and we'll be examining more barriers between you and reality than a schizophrenics medication cabinet. Schizophrenic. Did I schizophrenic maybe.

Anyway, our main feature this week is 2020 fours Better Man, A film where Robbie Williams is played by a CGI Chimp, which is still more believable casting than Jared Lito as a human. It's a bold, creative choice that raises important questions like why and seriously what the fuck. We'll be discussing whether this artistic decision elevates the material or whether it's just expensive proof that you can polish a turd if you've got enough rendering power. A quick disclaimer before we, before we lower the resolution on your day we're about to reveal more than your phone does to Apple, and our vocabulary would make a Tourette support group un uncomfortable. So if you are the sort of person who thinks podcasts should enrich [00:01:00] society, or that film criticism requires knowledge of and respect for the medium, I'm afraid you've fundamentally misunderstood what we're doing here, and you should return to your prescribed antidepressants.

But for everyone else, it's time to meet this week's dead pixels in the display of life. Starting with Dan, he's having a kilometers fuck up right now as I speak.

Dan: Yeah. Just bought a load of red wine.

That's a good start. It's all right. I'm, I'm squeezed it

Sidey: tissue. It's your losing your motor skills, aren't you

Dan: and,

Sidey: your, in your old age?

Dan: I'm squeezing them it back into the, into the wine glass from once it came.

Reegs: He's so old. He remembers when screens were for hiding ladies' ankles and his capacity for giving a fuck evaporated faster than Victorian modesty at brothel.

Not with us this week is gorgeous. Chris, who's presumably watching someone getting garroted in Danish as we speak so buffering indefinitely in second place. The man who's been warned that excessive exposure will make him go blind, though his optician was very specific. It's not the screen that's the problem.

[00:02:00] It's sidey,

Sidey: Hello?

Reegs: and then there's me regs. Hello. Well not have you recovered over there.

Dan: over? I dunno. I mean, I think the trousers may never recover.

Sidey: Just Unfortunately,

Dan: I did have a,

Reegs: That chair is kind of wiped

Dan: Yeah.

I did have a an

Sidey: watched it happen. I couldn't quite believe that he mostly spill it just by holding it.

Dan: Yeah. You saw that. It just kind of slipped out my hand.

I dunno. I, I am always like that. After three or four bottles, you know, it's what you gonna do. Have

Reegs: had a better week than that?

Dan: Yeah. Mainly I've been watching Pennyworth. Have you ever seen that? No. Did you ever see that?

Sidey: I was in a butler. Yeah. Alfred.

Dan: Yeah. I thought it was such an interesting premise that you would have a. A backstory on Alfred Batman's Butler, and it's. He's kick ass actually. I mean, he's a Marine. He was

Reegs: he'd have to be a fairly capable guy to be Batman's right hand man, [00:03:00]

Dan: wouldn't he?

Yeah. And, but I'd never really given it that because he is so old, isn't he? And Batman, whenever you

Sidey: your ageist. Oh

Dan: well, he, he must be my age

Sidey: Yeah, that's true.

Dan: if not maybe even the year above.

But in this, he's a lot younger and he's. Quite quite the dude, but the actual show itself, it doesn't shy away from calling people a cunt when they need to be called a cunt. And

Reegs: he's got a potty mouth in,

Dan: he's got a bit of a potty mouth and

Sidey: a bit of that in the movies this week as

Dan: And you get a kind of a good pace of action and everything through it.

There's his friends, he's been in, you know, he's a Marine and he's been in like wars and, and things like that. But his friends around him, they're not, I dunno, they're not shy people. And I quite liked it. It took me some, probably six episodes in at the moment. Like all these things, I'm not sure, I'll watch the second series because it was three series, but I've [00:04:00] enjoyed this first one.

so far? Jack Bannon. Not seen the, the young man before, but he's he's someone that's pretty good. The barman,

Sidey: isn't he? Like, wasn't he Trump's sort of Yeah. Campaign guy.

Dan: I don't think it's the same guy though. I think he may just band.

Sidey: Oh, wrong Bannon.

Dan: Yeah. He may just share, share a similar name, but but I've been, yeah, six episodes into.

Into that as well as the homework. Of course. That crazy monkey thing. Well chimpanzee thing. Yeah. Keep saying monkey monkey's got tails. Chimpanzee documentary work. We watched Project Nim. On the midweek.

Reegs: an extraordinary and unpleasant story many

Dan: Yeah. But it's one of those things that stays with you, isn't it?

Mm. You, you don't just.

not think about it like herpes. Yeah. Just pop, pop up every now and again, I guess.

Reegs: What about yourself side?

Sidey: I don't think I watched anything new.

I had [00:05:00] quite a full on week at work, so I didn't think I found time to watch

Reegs: Yeah, I've been in a similar boat, but we did have nominations from last week, which will save our lack of chatter now.

Should we, do you wanna look at, should

Dan: we, yeah, we should reveal those. You know, people have taken the time,

Reegs: Let's overlook, what was it we did Top five neighbors. Darren says, how could we forget Randall from the video store in

Sidey: Oh, yeah.

Reegs: He's the neighbor. He seems to spend most of his time there, annoying Dante, the customers, his own customers, and anyone else who crosses his path.

He said, did regs nominate my neighbor to Toro or just throw it in at the end? It was, I remembered it literally as we were switching the microphones

Sidey: Yeah. And it was right there in the title.

Reegs: Yeah. Bottom, he talks about gas. The episode gas riche and Eddie of their gas hooked up to their violent neighbor's supply played by never knowingly under directing Brian gl Glover.

And Mel gives us annoying neighbors in tv. Mrs. Kravitz in Bewitched. Did you watch that one?

No. Mrs. Oh. [00:06:00] Monic In Alf

Sidey: Well, alien life form,

Reegs: I guess, yeah. Mrs. Manel on Neighbors. How did we not get that? And Kristen Bell in a very funny show called The Woman In the House Across the Street from The Girl in the Window.

Highly recommended, if you haven't seen it, a spoof of mystery

Dan: Nice.

Reegs: good recommendations there.

Dan: Have we heard from Jeff Kitchen?

Yeah. Hopefully it'll reach out at some point. Again,

Reegs: There was that thing. Somebody sent us a link, haven't they? That, that there was, they'd seen that Jeff Kitchen had died in

Dan: Oh, that's right. He died in an airplane. Didn't he?

Sidey: we had a seance, maybe he could, he could reach out to us from the beyond.

Dan: Well. Okay, so top five silences. We'll see if we can get Jeff involved again, but otherwise yeah, we'll just have to deal with those. Was one of those noms going in?

Reegs: Yeah, all of them.

Sidey: Boom. Done.

Reegs: It was a top nine last week.

Sidey: Top

five.

Screens. Should we do that? Screens.

Dan: This was a, a [00:07:00] fairly mainstream choice, I guess. One we've probably done six or seven times before screens. Yeah.

Reegs: Yeah.

Dan: Okay. No, we've never done this before and it's never been done before. I think this is the first time

Sidey: through line to the, the movie content?

Reegs: Yeah. You watch it on a screen, don't you?

Oh,

Sidey: okay. Yeah.

yeah. I guess you do.

Reegs: yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. It's really is thought well thought out as that, isn't it?

yeah.

Dan: Depends what kind of screen you're thinking of though, doesn't

Sidey: Well, what, what are you thinking of right now?

Dan: Well, I was thinking of Nia.

Sidey: That's

a wardrobe.

Reegs: Yeah.

Dan: And also in check, it's called a screen.

Reegs: Oh,

that

Dan: there you go. So, that was gonna be one of mine that you've, they go through a screen to Tonia screen.

they go Tonia, right? Is that right? Yeah. Yeah. They do.

Reegs: yeah.

Dan: the lion, the witch in the wardrobe.

Reegs: I don't think anybody else here is gonna have had that. No, no.

Dan: no, [00:08:00] no. That's all I've got.

There's also the one in ET

when ET is in the screen. And and there's various other moments, '

Reegs: cause it's top five wardrobes next

Dan: Yeah. What is very Well that's wardrobes cut or closets. But this is yeah, screen.

Reegs: but you can think of screen in, in many different ways, right?

Not just the thing that we look at. You've also got, you know, to filter or examine something like a mammogram or whatever. Or you've got a modesty

Sidey: just automatically think of tears.

twice then

Reegs: Twice in the row.

Dan: Yeah. Just like the shadow of them.

Sidey: Yeah.

Well I have got some more TV screens. Should we do those?

Reegs: I've mostly got TV screens, but,

Sidey: a couple of horror ones. Yeah. The ring.

Reegs: The ring.

Dan: Yeah. Oh, I tell you what, that the ring, when I first got with Yna, we was, I was renting a place out. In St. Peter's.

Sidey: Oh, It's terrifying. in its own right.

Dan: scary enough. And that came on on channel four and you know that Channel four, [00:09:00] they used to do the, the preamble about the movie

Reegs: Yeah. Yeah.

and

Dan: then

you get into it.

Reegs: and which was this, by the way? The original

Dan: Japanese? The original Japanese,

Reegs: ringu.

Dan: yeah. Yeah. And and actually it's. If you turn the sound down and you close your eyes, it's not that scary. But if you don't

Sidey: if you watch it and listen to it,

Dan: Yeah. It's really fucking

scary.

Sidey: is also though, loads of good cosplay of it.

Reegs: Yeah. People walking around like half emerging from TVs and wells and stuff.

Sidey: And then Poltergeist.

they're

Reegs: Tobe Hooper.

Sidey: Yeah. The little girl reaching out through the

telly.

Reegs: Yeah.

Sidey: Yeah. So I had those.

Reegs: That's some good stuff.

I got some, a couple of movies where the story is told only via a screen.

It's like a fairly newer genre of movie, but, you know, the horror scene has embraced this particularly with like simulated zoom type movies. So a couple of those that I can think [00:10:00] of. His host was an excellent one. Takes him place entirely in the screencast of a. Of a Zoom call and it's a, like a seance that's done.

And it was released in COVID times when obviously everybody was Zoom calling all the time. So hit a little bit harder. There was searching, which was a 2008 John Cho movie. He plays a worried father trying to track his daughter down. Entirely through, you know, done via essentially like Zoom calls and internet searches all done on a laptop.

Unfriended had a similar premise to host but was about 10 years earlier. Dead stream was 2022. Found footage one, which took it to the next level, had. Sort of somebody live streaming a sort of comedy horror that was really a good yeah, so there's a few of those, like told through the medium of different screens.

Oh, and then of course, war of the Worlds. Which is also, if, I don't know if you've seen it, it's on

Sidey: oh, not the, [00:11:00] the ice cube one.

Reegs: Ice Cube one. Yeah, the Ice Cube one. It's all done through like a series of Zoom calls and i's great. Oh, it's, oh it's dreadful. Absolutely dreadful. And it just nonstop product placement for a certain Amazon as

Sidey: Really?

Yeah. God. Down anymore.

Dan: Well, when you first said this, I thought of Hugo. Remember the 3D? Did you, what was it like in the

Reegs: It was great. Yeah. Because the 3D was really good and it's a real part of the storytelling. The 3D

Dan: Yeah. Well this was it. I think it's Scorsese. Yes. And it was about this little boy who's, obsessed with cinema and gets kind of lost in the train station and all that kind of thing, isn't it? And it all add, comes out on the,

Reegs: there's a great, there's a great moment where they transition from 2D to 3D where they're showing you people watching that old, the, one of the very first movies of a train arriving at station and everybody being, whoa, it's gonna hit us and come out the screen.

And then in that moment they transition from 2D to 3D in the cinema. [00:12:00] That was like a really powerful

Dan: So it almost gave that

Reegs: Yeah. To, to you

Dan: people watching it. How clever.

Reegs: Very clever.

Dan: So I, I didn't actually watch it in 3D at the cinema, so it, it is a different effect, but I remember Scorsese giving an interview about it being one of the most untapped kind of potential things for that kind of moment, I guess, that you can actually get.

The, the audience to jump out if you use it just, just right at there at, at Good Times. And there's been a few different 3D movies. We haven't done really many. 3D we

haven't

Reegs: we haven't, and I actually really like a 3D movie. Especially a gimmicky

Dan: Yeah. Well the Jaws was a a 3D movie at one, at one point, wasn't it?

Sidey: Tin. Tin was supposed to be good if you saw it on didn't see it though.

Dan: as well. But yeah, Hugo Will,

Sidey: there was a documentary series, I think released this week. Was it about Scorsese, like a bio

Reegs: right. Yeah. On Apple, isn't

Sidey: Supposed to be very, very good.

[00:13:00] What about actual cinema screens depicted

In

the cinema? I have a couple of examples. One is in glorious bar studs. that's what I watched this week.

I watched that Jenga.

Reegs: Well that ends with them in the cinema, doesn't it? With the, got the, all the Nazis.

Sidey: They, they off all, it's like Tarantino's got this thing about changing the history of events. And they machine gun Hitler into oblivion

from behind us. That's just on the thing. But they, they use the chick that's got the cinema.

Yeah. To set off a fire, don't

Reegs: they? Mm-hmm. They trap 'em all inside, don't they?

Sidey: And I was, the first one I was actually thinking of was Cinema Paradiso, which is like the actual real, like definitive love letter to cinema. Where he's in the projections booth and all that and see all the whole life of it. Finn Little was as I've seen it, but I do remember it being a real homage to cinema.

Good.

Reegs: Some people [00:14:00] call suntan lotion, sunscreen, and it's good job. They do. 'cause they know I can talk about it now. In about time that we watched for this pod Tim, not long after he discovers in fact that he has the.

Power to travel back in time. His super hot friend turns up Charlotte and he saw, she asks him to apply some suntan lotion to her back and he's all nervous and like squirts it on her back, like he jizzed on her. So then goes back in time to undo it and all that sort of stuff. And it's a trone like that kind of, yeah.

Oh, I get to touch you and I sunan on you. And it's the start of lots of movies that Peter watches on his iPad. So what else we got asked him? Powers, you get the same thing in the Spy who Shagged Me. He's lost his mojo, if you remember in this one. So when Felicity asks him to give him a massage, he just kind of puts the sundown lotion on him all over our back.

And in Kick Ass, we get pretty much the same thing again. So that's some sunscreen for you.

Dan: I think we get it in total recall as well. When the lady goes out for, she's [00:15:00] gotta put on a load of sunscreen for about

Reegs: Oh yeah.

Dan: seconds in the sun.

Yeah.

Reegs: yeah, yeah.

Dan: look, I can have 30

Reegs: that's Robocop, isn't it? I

Dan: isn't it? Is it Robocop?

Reegs: Yeah. Where they're putting the it's one of those dystopian ones where

Sidey: lead paint.

Dan: yeah, I thought it was, total recall, but maybe, maybe not. But I, I do remember that scene. It was like an advert. Yeah. It goes on other screens, I suppose, laptop screens.

You had that in Snowden where there was lots of I've seen that actually. Have you not? No, it is good. It's with the guy Levin Merrick the one that I watched Gordon Levin, Merrick. that his name?

Reegs: Yeah, it's

Dan: something like that. I quite like him actually. He's, he's Joseph Gordon, Levin Merrick,

Sidey: John Merrick.

Yeah.

Reegs: Yeah. That's

Dan: John Merrick. John Merrick's in it. And, it's there's plenty of laptops screen under a bed cover

action in that. You've also got Keanu Reeves in

Sidey: Matrix.

Reegs: That's more telephone [00:16:00] e though. Oh yeah. On

Dan: screens, telephone screens. I mean, there's loads of screens. There's there's searching. I think there was a John W film,

Sidey: there is

Dan: with lots of screens A girl goes Missing.

Reegs: That's what I was talking about before. John Cho searching. Yeah,

Dan: yeah. Lots of screens. Well, it's worth because there's an extra screen there. Screen,

Reegs: Screening,

Sidey: dark Knight,

Dan: screens

Sidey: Bruce, Wayne slash Lucius Swift hijack mobile phone screens to create a kind of sonar. Yeah. Which Lucius gets real ty

Reegs: He does. Yeah. The surveillance state and

Sidey: the veil, like he is like stopping like mass murders. But anyway and we talk about screen, well, we don't, but Pete, it's like people are concerned about the amount of time people spend looking at their phone screens.

I was thinking of her Spike Jones. Yeah. Hakeem Phoenix, where he actually falls in love with his operating system. Yeah. But it's scar your hands and so how could you not?

Reegs: Yeah.

Sidey: So yeah. Huh.

Reegs: I've got some actors who sound a bit screeny if you're [00:17:00] interested in them.

Screener Davis or Charlie Screen. I wasn't sure which one to go with.

Monitor Lucci. Veil Kilmer, IMAX Von Sidal. 4K Simmons, Samsung, l Jackson Pixel Lot. OLEO, led Zeppelin.

that.

Panasonic Youth, LCD sound system. It's all there. And if you, if you like a bit of mu reading HD Salinger

Sidey: and Bruce Springs screen.

Reegs: Yeah, there

Sidey: you go.

Reegs: you go. There you go.

Dan: These all super screens. Yeah. I wouldn't know which screen to choose.

No, I'm out screen.

Sidey: What about those screens that you get in old timey, or not necessarily old timey or fancy kind of bedroom slash dressing rooms? Yeah, the, the screen. Screen,

Reegs: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Sidey: like a free standing. Yeah, like for three parts.

So you get those.

Reegs: little partition type thing?

Sidey: Yeah. Oh yeah, I know. You get them in such things as some like a hot Marilyn Monroe. Yeah. Tony [00:18:00] Curtis actually. What did you watch

Reegs: a one of the Sherlock Holmes things had him changing behind the screen as well.

Sidey: Breakfast at I was gonna say something stupid.

Breakfast at Tiffany's holy go lightly. She's. Behind the,

Dan: something stupid.

Sidey: breakfast atlo and Moin Rouge, Nicole Kidman does it. It happens like all the time. Thinking

Julie Robertson pretty women does

Dan: of big trouble in little China. I'm sure they've got a, a screen like that in there.

Reegs: Well, they like one in an oriental house, don't they?

Dan: They do. Yeah. Okay.

Reegs: What about screen shaking?

I really think of Star Trek in this context,

Sidey: but Oh, as a, as a visual effect?

Reegs: Yeah. Anytime you've ever seen like an earthquake or you know, somebody activating a self-destruct or, or a huge animal or creature roaring or something, they shake the screen to show it.

Sidey: Right? I was watching something. This is very loosely related because there was a, I think, 30 year anniversary box set of the different class pulp album [00:19:00] out last week. Okay. Which I didn't know was coming out. I saw that and then I saw Jarvis Cox on something, on YouTube talking about it. One of the, I dunno, someone put a link to it or, I can't remember if it was in the, but there's a William Shatner covers album where he covers one of the songs off that album.

Wow. And it is incredible.

Reegs: Covers one of the pulp songs

Sidey: different class. Yeah. I can't remember if it's disco 2000 or so of that. It's absolutely fucking wild. Wow. Yeah, It's

Reegs: I might have to look

Sidey: an incredible piece of art. Worth, worth your time. Just you saying about Star Trek reminded me there.

should we Norm?

Reegs: Yeah, let's, norm

Dan: could you do any touch screen? I suppose that would be a good, yeah, that'd be a, that'd be eligible, wouldn't it? Or

I would, I would say then something, a, a touch screen. Any of the Star Wars ones would be, they'd have a, a touch screen on, wouldn't they? Yeah. Can tell I'm running outta screens, can't [00:20:00] you I think my, no, let, let go round Gimme a a bit more thought because it's quite serious, isn't it?

Reegs: Yeah, it is a

Dan: a serious topic, serious business. So, I see

Reegs: I'll go, I'll go. I am gonna nominate airplane two, the sequel that also involved William Shatner, this particular scene.

Do you remember this one? Did you ever see it? It's the one where they go to the moon. Yes.

Sidey: Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

and

Reegs: He's talking on a view screen to Sha Earth like, and then you realize that it's not actually, it's just a wall with like a pit cut out and he's actually just stood behind it. So yeah, that's my view screen side.

What have you got

Sidey: going for a shower screen.

Yeah, it's the character's name is to fucking escape me. It's friend of the pod. His name's also escaped me. Lester Burnham. Played by Kevin Spacey. Yeah. And we see him in the shower through the shower screen. Wanking at the start of the film. Alright. And he is saying about how that's the [00:21:00] high point of his day.

So they go,

Dan: You've got screen one. That was an actual movie, but I think I'll have to go for the wardrobe screen and yeah, it will, let's go back to Narnia,

Sidey: a linguistic screen. Yeah, I like that. Yeah, it's good.

Reegs: clever. And then let us know your favorite screen. as we are about to start recording, port Vale versus Stockport is about to kick

Sidey: The sacrifice is massive that we've foregoing that.

Reegs: But Port Vale is the football team.

Sidey: Yeah.

Reegs: Of Robbie Williams.

Sidey: Robert Yeah.

Reegs: subject of this week's movie.

Better Man.

Sidey: So I read it when he put the norms out and I didn't, I hadn't remember that, that was the name of this film. So when I looked, what is this thing we've gotta watch? Oh, really? Because I, I don't wanna upset breach, he who's fan of the pod and is also an even bigger fan of Robbie Williams, but I have not really ever connected with.

Probably wouldn't.

Reegs: I would go so far as to say one of his songs made me feel [00:22:00] disconnected from the rest of humanity in an enormous way. Angels, because people would sing it

Sidey: we get it. We get it in this as it's in its most

Dan: Well, I'm actually the opposite. He was my favorite. Was he? I,

Reegs: I would, you have sung along with angels with everybody in the

Dan: I definitely did a,

Reegs: there was something missing with you

Dan: I, I definitely did at a certain time in and place. And I always felt that no, I think it was, it was out on a, having a good night. And there was, I mean, I wasn't a huge take that fan, but it was hard to get away from

Sidey: pop. I don't believe you.

Dan: I was a huge p take that fan and didn't want to get away from the, the culture of take that my sister went to, to see, I think see them. I've seen them. They came over here.

Sidey: of course. With Darryl. Yeah.

Dan: Robbie though. Yeah. It was just.

Mark, Jason, Gary and Howard.

Sidey: Howard. from the Halifax

Dan: That's him. Yeah.

Sidey: Should we just get into it? 'cause there's a monkey.

Dan: [00:23:00] Yeah,

Reegs: a monkey. Yeah. And that

Sidey: knew that going in because that was the big talking

Dan: point. Well, it's on the poster, isn't it? Yeah.

Reegs: And it was my number one reason for picking it, I have to say, because it's seriously, I was like, really?

Dan: I, it, it was quite

it went, it went to this, it went to the cinema and I heard that it was, it had been received quite well. I'd not seen it before. So,

Sidey: well,

Reegs: I just nail my colors to the mass then and say that I think the monkey choice is fucking genius. And I would not have enjoyed this movie anywhere near the amount that I did, were it not for the fact that you get to see him a, a very realistic CGI chimp, do all of the standard music biopic stuff, have a cocaine binge, get a hand job from a girl all that stuff.

But it's a chimp.

Sidey: Yeah. Yeah. He says something at the start about how he seems himself. The story of the film, the making of the film is really weird. It's a joint, sort of UK Australian production. Cost fucking [00:24:00]

Reegs: Yes. This is a $110 million Humble

Sidey: Yeah.

I don't think it made that back.

Reegs: No. Well, because I, the US never cottoned on to Robbie Williams as a performer.

Did they? I don't think take that either was a thing, particularly over there. They were huge in Europe and everywhere else,

Dan: think is they were getting to break, if you like,

Sidey: well, they would've already had,

Dan: broke up.

Sidey: they would've already had Bash Street boys and nsync and they're not interested in things from other places.

So.

Reegs: But this is brought to us by director Michael Gracie. He was a, this is his sophomore feature after doing The Greatest Showman, and you can

Sidey: really that Oh yeah, definitely musical vibes. Yeah.

Reegs: So should we get into it? It starts with, let me entertain you in some cheeky narration. By the man himself.

He says I've been called many things, narcissistic punchable shit-eating twat. And while I'm all those things, I want to show you how I really see myself. And that's when we pan back to seeing him as a monkey. So

Sidey: yeah,

Dan: in a port veil

Reegs: it's nothing more than a [00:25:00] metaphor of I see myself as a performing monkey. There literally is nothing else to it than that.

And it's part of his sort of self-deprecation.

Dan: I dunno. I mean, yeah, it's, it's definitely self-deprecation, but I didn't know whether it was performing monkey, cheeky monkey whether he just felt him less than than other people because he does go, you know, he's an early scene. He's. Got one friend basically in the, in the group of children that would play outside around his house.

Reegs: in, Stoke in the early

Dan: Yeah, he was rubbish at football. And there was just that, that one guy that liked him. Nate, Nat, I dunno if that's Jonathan Wilkes. Isn't that, didn't that guy become famous just for being his friend?

Reegs: Oh, it may be. Is that he, oh, yeah. It could have been, actually. I didn't think about that. Yeah, I, it may was a made up character

Dan: he was good at football. So yeah. I, I

Sidey: oh, did he play all that? The charity games, all that? Yeah.

Dan: Yeah. S

Reegs: he talks about [00:26:00] that where he's from in stoke. People expect you to be small, and he felt that he was never small. He, he has DNA in his cabaret. He says he was born, he came out the womb with jazz

Sidey: Must have been awful for my mother.

Reegs: Yeah. And he goes home after this calamitous game of football and commiserates with.

Grandmother Betsy, who's a big part of his life, or Nan and his father, a policeman, I think an aspiring com comedian comes home singing my way, and it's a big sort of

Dan: habit.

Well, that, that's it. They're singing my way. He's Frank's on the TV and as they've got this kind of well worked routine that you can imagine, he's sung this with his dad a few times. He knocks the TV air wheeler over and, and dad, instead of. You know, going, oh, that's, you know, nevermind whatever. He, he has a bit of a stronger go at him than normal and it's like, oh, you've just brought me day kind of thing

Reegs: Well, it's also as well, he talks about Sinatra's star power and how he

Dan: light him up

Reegs: his dad is [00:27:00] desperate to be a sort of celebrity or famous or something of some doing his act.

And it makes a big impression on Young Robert and later in the bath. Bearing in mind, he's still a chimp. He'll ask his grand what it is and wonders whether he has it. He's full of that sort of self-doubt

Dan: which his nan gives him

Sidey: crisp. She gives him crisp quite a lot.

Dan: Yeah. She's

Sidey: super supportive of him. Yeah. No matter what

Dan: And she says, you've got it. No matter what it is, you've got it. He licks the crisps before eating them. Do you see

Reegs: I've seen people do

Dan: yeah.

Reegs: His first sort of brush with kind of stardom I guess is as a 9-year-old in a local school play the pirates of pen ants they're

Sidey: he's dead nervous about going

Reegs: really insecure and he, you know, he thinks people think he's stupid and he trips up when he comes on stage, I think.

But he

Sidey: he starts out, he

Reegs: sort of style it out. Yeah, exactly. He turns it

Sidey: what you are laughing at, is that mean? Yeah. Yeah.

Reegs: And then there's a really great transition here from some great directing and the way the set moves to like go, because he [00:28:00] looks out into the audience, he visualizes himself. Like a, a horrible inner critic who sits in the audience saying mean things

about

Sidey: Yeah. It recurs throughout the

Reegs: And he looks for his father out there and he doesn't see him in the scene. Transitions to kind of see his father at the same time as in a two bit local talent contest. He's Ben off his son's first performance so he can

Dan: and so he can win this for a fiver.

And that for his dad is. the most important thing.

Reegs: And in fact, one day he's gonna go off to the FA cup and not turn up again. In fact, he'll just dip in and out of Robbie's life essentially when it's convenient for him.

Sidey: Yeah.

Dan: Yeah, really quite sad because it, it's, it's the way that it's done as well.

It's

Sidey: they, yeah.

Dan: him to

Sidey: Which is sort of jumping around everybody. His dad does phone him at one point, and so he should come down and that becomes like horribly, horribly depressing later on. Yeah. The reveal of that.

Reegs: yeah. Well, it's clear throughout the movie, obviously the relationship with his dad, you know, has

Sidey: He still wants [00:29:00] his dad's approval. Yeah. Even though his dad's abandoned him. It's really awful. But, but yeah, we we're going to see him sort of doing various different performances and, and getting his, yeah. But I think he's 15 when he goes to the,

Reegs: he hears a, an audition. He hears about an audition that's taking place for this band to take that and he turns up to meet Nigel. What was his name? Nigel Martin Smith.

Sidey: He calls him a cunt,

Reegs: a sweetheart and a first class cunt. Yeah. They agreed that the lawyers could, the, the lawyers agreed. He could say that.

And he does like an old sort of Dean Martin, I think. Is it? Straighten Up and Fly, right? He does. Is it Dean Martin? Is that, or is that

Dan: yeah,

it's

Reegs: it's an old

Sidey: It would've been one of 'em. 'cause he is got them pictures on the, on the mirror and he,

Dan: King Cole, one of those

Sidey: and he,

Reegs: he does it at the audition and he's,

Sidey: the guys are not that impressed and he sort of fucks him off and he gives him like knowing Wing.

'cause he walks out like a cheeky sort of and says if I

Reegs: he says, and I tell everybody else that they've not, you know, they can fuck off or

Sidey: guess if it wasn't for that wink, I wouldn't be talking to you now. Yeah. But they are. This is the [00:30:00] formation of, they're not an existing band. They're not going concern, they've got

Dan: They're being created

Sidey: like, and they weren't. I sort of recall around that time that maybe they weren't, but they felt, this felt like the first really massive boy band in the uk.

Reegs: Definitely,

Sidey: Definitely. I don't, I don't know who it

Dan: you had the American ones. Didn't you? Had new

Reegs: New kids On the Block

Sidey: but we didn't have one. No. That I remember.

Reegs: No. So they put the band together, which includes Gary Barlow. They make him out to be such a dork in this. He's been, is he doing Bonnie Tyler tunes or something at working men's

Sidey: he's been doing things Merk men's Ubstance. He's nine and he is already

Dan: got a panel beater.

Sidey: making more men than the teachers at, at the time.

Yeah. And

Reegs: And then, yeah, you've got one of them as a panel beater and they show him as such a gay icon,

Sidey: It reminded me the Simpsons one, you know? Yeah. Rasco

Reegs: But genuinely he seems to have a fair amount of affection, I would say, for his band mates. Even if he does take the

Sidey: this, this all just felt like having a dig at Gary Barlow.

'cause they show the dance routines and he can't fucking do any of it. Yeah. But he's obviously the songwriter [00:31:00] and he could do that. He does actually, he does call him an actual genius. Said he's a genius songwriter. Yeah. So he, he's quite

Reegs: But he's obviously also quite bitter because Gary Barlow clearly was the only one who made any money out of take that because he was credited on all the songs and you know, they, they

Sidey: just

Reegs: when he goes on his solo career, it's pretty cl clear.

He is got virtually fuck all. Yeah. Anyway. Yeah.

Dan: Whereas Gary Barlow's got a Butler.

Reegs: massive mansion. Yeah.

Dan: And a

Reegs: So we do

Sidey: and don't pay much tax neither.

Dan: No.

Reegs: the, the band sort of come together, take that I call 'em a band. They're not a band are they? But they, they start off in like gay clubs and

Sidey: Yeah, I didn't realize that.

Reegs: And

then they graduate to

Sidey: they just book, he just happens to book a, a, a concert that's full of women and that's where it fucking goes.

Reegs: it sort of spirals from there because a record executive's daughter gives Robbie a hand job. He calls him Gary. He says, my name's Gary to her. and it eventually gets them through,

Sidey: because they've been coached. The, the one thing you've gotta be is like accessible, attainable. And you've seen like the extrapolation of that to like the [00:32:00] Kpop people, they are so mad. They're not allowed to have got, you know, it's then they to the point that these people are fucking suicidal control.

Yeah,

Dan: Yeah,

Reegs: they go massive, don't they?

Dan: and they are under control.

Reegs: celebrate that by doing Rock dj, which is one of Robbie Williams's tunes not to take that one.

But it's a great number. This one where it's all going through the streets, a lot of dancing and flipping.

Sidey: and choreography was good

Reegs: of one very inventive,

Dan: but you learn that the band is, is super controlled by ni Ni and Gary who, Nigel's favorite.

They have various opportunities where. Robbie wants to take lead and take opportunity to perform.

Reegs: But he's not, he's shown to be not quite good enough in the recording booth. He doesn't have any songwriting

Sidey: ability,

They're quite mean about him when he sings, aren't

Reegs: Yeah. And he's starting to sort of go out of control with drink and drugs as well, and he's gonna have. He's sort of gonna get by on his innate charm and [00:33:00] likability and get through a few performances where he is off his head.

Yeah. But it's not long before it's like too much for the rest of the band to put up with.

Dan: and they ask him to Gary's house and say, we're gonna do the next bit as a foursome.

Reegs: He takes it quite, you know, on the chin. I think he says it's gonna have that watermelon and

Dan: well, yeah, he's it's defensive, isn't it? Is everything defensive? He's just he's, he's down and he's

Reegs: but this was big news. You remember? I mean, they took, they, they, they briefly quoted in this, they set up suicide hotlines because people were so upset that take, that had split.

Dan: Yeah. And I remember they didn't feature it in the film here, but his first song back was George Michael's Faith

it Freedom.

Freedom? It was, yeah, freedom. But that time he, he had his peroxide blonde hair and he was hanging around with.

Liam Gallagher.

Reegs: which they actually show in. This is fucking amazing.

Sidey: I I felt like they were running outta time. And the casting joke said, whoever the next fucking person comes in the door, just cast him as Liam [00:34:00] because we ain't got time.

And this guy was pitifully bad. Yeah. Like, unbelievable.

Reegs: It's, they, they, they sort of rush through very quickly. It's like a sort of up style montage in the middle where he meets Nicole, is it, was it Nicole Appleton? She, he doesn't realize who she is at first, and he talks about the pressure of trying to achieve solo stardom now at this point.

But they fall in love and, you know, very quickly her career grows and she becomes pregnant. And it seems at the behest of

The band, what was the band called? All Saints, all Saints' Manager. She has an

Sidey: also a company. He says,

Reegs: Yeah. Also a cu has an abortion putting paid to sort of Robbie's dreams

Dan: father

Reegs: a family and perhaps being the father that he never had.

And starting to write

Sidey: his, he was in a lyrics a bad way. At this point though, I don't think he was ready to be a father

Yeah.

Yeah.

As her success grows, he's, he's writing lyrics down and little notepad.

Reegs: He's desperate for sort of credibility and [00:35:00] respectability, which is how he finds himself hanging out with Oasis, who treat him like a bit of a twa, basically.

They just abuse him. He says, alright, no. And he goes, fuck off, cunt. It's so funny. But yeah, he ends up being a bit of a hangar on and, and being part

Sidey: of that's at the party where they've is it never, ever they're celebrating That's gone to number one.

Reegs: and Robbie just goes off to get hammered.

Sidey: he yeah. He can't cope with it. He he goes off with Oasis gets, Howard comes back and she's, oh, did you have a good night? And it turns out she's had to make a load of excuses for him not being there. And he's really just bitter about, he's jealous that she's successful

Reegs: He's jealous of her success. And he's bitter about losing his chance at her family.

At least in the

Dan: yeah. And

Sidey: have a big fight.

Dan: He's, he's also, you know, with Oasis, terribly jealous of their success and

Reegs: and they've described the peak of success as playing networth. Yeah. In front of 150,000. So he then becomes obsessed by this idea of playing

Dan: Networth. Yeah, he's never good enough for anybody [00:36:00] else. But he's doesn't look at himself at any point say, am I good enough to be myself?

Am I happy in myself? He's always trying to prove it to somebody else. And all the way through everything have I got, he is always worried about what other people will, will think, and never thinking him himself is enough. The entire, I mean, it's a theme the entire way through

Sidey: It's, but I, I think in this kind of, well, this time period, but not exclusive this time period, but this sort of kind of music, it is pretty much determined by how many records,

Dan: Yeah.

Sidey: yeah. Units sold. And you know how, how many people, it's not about making a great record.

They probably, maybe they, I don't know, maybe I just be a fucking music snob, but.

Reegs: well, I think that's at the heart of Robbie's thing, he's sort of desperate to be thought of as, as like a musical person, but also like desperate for success and all that stuff.

He's sort of at the end, you know, has a kind of, I'm in, I'm great at cabaret and fuck you type message to the [00:37:00] audience. But I don't know, he strikes me as being like really insecure and just,

Sidey: yeah.

Dan: Well he was, yeah. I think, and obviously the drugs and the drink and, and all that, just.

Magnifies that feeling. If you're feeling a little bit insecure and a little bit under prepared and everything, then the drugs eventually is gonna. Make you think more of that. It might short term as you do a, a line of Coke and then go out and at the big man for the next hour or so, great. But then you're gonna need another line of Coke and you're gonna need some more

Reegs: Well, they show that, don't they? Because he, he does get, he, he meets up the guy chambers and is able to write a few songs, including Angels, I think it? And it propels him into a, into a pretty big,

Sidey: it gets big quite quick and, but he's still being a be end and he's a be end to his one mate from, from back home.

Who's. He's trying to say to him, you know, about his life. And he said, you never fucking asked me. But yeah, my MR has left me. I've got a [00:38:00] kid, but I can only see the kid once every fortnight, you know? And he

Reegs: you are spend, you are putting up your nose there. What I'm earning in a week,

Dan: month.

Reegs: Yeah. And also, but you know, his, it is difficult for him as well.

His dad turns up and he is like. You know, there is a constant thing of Robbie acknowledging how lucky he is in some ways, in many ways, to get through all this, but also being deeply unhappy with achieving all the things

Sidey: that, which doesn't fulfill him, what he thinks he wants. When he

Reegs: his father turns up and is like, oh, why, you know, is essentially like can't just pushes him, keeps pushing him, and he's, he's desperate for his father's approval.

So he keeps going at the expense of it as

Sidey: because he does, he does get to Networth. Yeah, he gets that. And his old man's there now, like ringside say, you know, this is amazing, blah, blah, blah.

But he's just a fucking hanger on like the rest of them really. And he, yeah.

Dan: Well, there's one point, his dad's got this girl back in the hotel room and it's clear. He is go, oh dad. And he goes there, look. And he brings this girl and says, I told you he was, he's just used his son's fame to pull [00:39:00] himself a gal.

And you

Reegs: if I use your toilet? It's a number too.

Sidey: he's

Dan: yeah, go for it. Yeah, it's really just productive, really strange kind of. Situation.

Reegs: Was pretty fucked up.

His dad, you know, obviously a big problem and influence in his life. but anyway, yeah, like you say, we could skip through it. It's sort of a rise and fall. And rise and fall. He does eventually get to networth, oh, he misses his grandmother's death

Sidey: He, he, well, he has the, before she dies, he has the, I think the saddest bit of the film is when he goes home and because see, she's, she's got dementia. Yeah.

Reegs: She thinks he's much younger than he is, that he's still at school.

Sidey: She

Dan: also lets it

Sidey: she says oh no, I spoke to your father and she.

Basically spills the beans that she had got in touch with the old man and basically fought, begged him, pleaded with him to get in touch with Robbie and invite him down just to fucking see him. 'cause you know, he'd been absent. And she obviously like hit, just has a moment of fucking clarity where she realizes she's fucking.

You know, she [00:40:00] said too much. And she starts fucking wailing and then Robbie's mom has to come over and they're all really sad. And then the next time we hear about her, she's unfortunately passed away and he's missed it. Yeah. So he's super sad about that. He takes a bag of crisps to be her 'cause the crisps have been like a recurring

Reegs: He takes a television. Yeah. Later

Sidey: to watch

Reegs: end as he reconciles to watch

Dan: yeah. This is as he starting pulling himself to together. And he goes on this kind of lap of dishonor if you like to go

Reegs: well,

that's, hang on. We haven't talked to, that's after Networth that, that happens. 'cause he def, he def he goes to

Dan: the monkey gods. He

Reegs: have this triumphant performance there, which looked to me to be real footage that they'd composited the CGI monkey over into, which was interesting.

And then at this thing he's been called at every performance, it's been a thing that you see these inner, you know, demons. Yeah. Portrayed as these monkeys in the audience. And at Networth, at some point, the entire audience will become a sea of critics, essentially him throughout various phases of his career.

And he'll [00:41:00] enter a sort of matrix like fight with them

Sidey: It's like Battle of the Bastards or something. Yeah,

Reegs: just like a really blood thirsty, horrible fight in which he slays his inner demons, not, you know, not even metaphorically, just right there on the fucking screen.

Dan: Ter terribly nervous, I think is, is basically what he's, he's saying anxiety levels are through the roof each time he's going through these performances. Because he's not really comfortable. But then that kind of finishes and he seems to have won that battle.

And he obviously goes through rehab as well. And you start to see him. Talking about some home truths. And then he goes on this tour of talking to people, including, nicole,

Reegs: Yeah, Nicole, he apologizes

Dan: to his, his

Sidey: she's now with,

with Liam.

Dan: They have got a kid together. Yeah. And he goes then to yeah, d different kind of

people that he's

Reegs: a [00:42:00] watermelon saying sorry

Dan: to Gary. Yeah.

Reegs: penis scribbled on it. And yeah, he put, what else does he do?

He goes, he goes to Betty's and reconciles with her grave and sort of, he learns to let her go.

Dan: And then he has

Reegs: oh, and he's had a big fucking fight with his dad as well, where he is basically said, you know, you were always supportive for Robbie, but why weren't you there for Robert? And we've had this thing about Robbie being the persona that was invented by Nigel Wright at the beginning.

And it was a good thing for him because he could project Robbie and not be Robert

trying to

Dan: kind of hide behind this character, couldn't he? And yeah, that was then the, the beginning of his. Finding himself as an entertainer, I guess.

'cause he went and did this big show where he'd always loved

Sinatra and, and things. And he went and did that Croner album. And he brings his dad onto stage at one point to sing with him. Although I went back and watched. Some of the YouTube

Reegs: and his dad, wasn't it? His

Dan: his dad wasn't there.

Reegs: [00:43:00] no. I was also con really a bit confused about what it meant to bookend the movie with two performances of singing my Way with his father when, when we're supposed to have seen him move on to the growth.

But he still

Sidey: still needs his dad

Reegs: needs his DA dad and all of, and he still asking us for approval and all that stuff. Literally as the movie's ending.

Dan: Yeah, he's, he's still quite a,

Reegs: needy.

Dan: Yeah, I, I think he's obviously had, I was really quite worried about Robbie Williams at one stage, actually thinking that he wasn't gonna turn the corner from the amount of drinking drugs that he'd, he'd done.

Yeah. And it looked like he might have.

Gone too far. I see him now on tv and he's becoming a bit of a national treasure, I think because he's starting to be one of those people that he's got a good heart.

Reegs: got some way to go before he, Danny dies it for me.

Dan: Yeah.

Sidey: I'm overdue. Theres, yeah,

Dan: he, [00:44:00] he's but I think he's on, he's on that kind of path.

I do. I think he's

Reegs: he's gotta do something first though, isn't he? What's he done?

Dan: Well, I think he's,

Sidey: I still think that when you see him on a chat show or whatever, it's a performance. You never, you don't. You don't see Robert the way they're saying it in this rb, you never see that. So when he is saying

Reegs: he does say an interesting thing about you become frozen in time at the moment you become famous.

And when he became famous, he was 15 and he's kind of like frozen as a 15-year-old forever. And you can sort of see

Sidey: Yeah, you can. Yeah. Yeah, that's true.

Reegs: But I have to say the monkey thing is fucking genius. It recontextualizes everything. 'cause I could, this movie would've been absolutely unwatchable for me, I think without the monkey thing.

But it manages to make things like the cocaine binge spiral or the emotional break. You know, all those beats that you've seen in a thousand other movies somehow feel quite fresh because there's a CGI chimp in it and I thought it was. Directed beautifully. Lots of energy, lots of camera movement. And even through the songs that I didn't [00:45:00] appreciate, there was lots of lovely imagery.

He does a lot when he's really reconciling with his emotions. There's a lot of water themed stuff in a lake in the bathroom there's all sorts of stuff, so visually a treat.

Dan: Yeah, it was. But yeah, I mean, maybe because I, as I say, I, I do quite like him. I think he's I think he's one of those guys with a good heart.

I think he's almost esque in his naivety, you know, that

Reegs: but it's like the whole thing. He's, he keeps saying all the way through about how like lucky he is and how unhappy he was. It's hard to feel that. Sorry for him, really, isn't it? Let's be

Dan: I dunno. I've got a heart though, you know, reg. So, you know, it's not that hard for me.

No. He's,

you know, he's made mistakes, there's no doubt about it. And he's not been totally without his absolute kind of cunt moments. But I think. As a 15-year-old, getting into a kind of [00:46:00] band where you're in as big as they got. By the time he, he was the youngest one, you know, sort of the oldest was probably 21, you know, five or six years, between 15 and 21 or,

Reegs: but for them to have never made any money out of that as well.

Dan: and not, no, not enough money. I mean, as I say, just kind of. The, the, the band's guy and Gary, Nigel and Gary made all the money. Really? Yeah, he's, but he showed that he had some talent, I think afterwards, you know, that he, he wanted to try and be taken seriously.

He'd written down songs. He was, he said,

Sidey: I don't believe, I don't believe that he wrote any of those. I just don't.

Reegs: He had some lyrics.

Dan: He had some lyrics that he worked with, with another guy to kind of get out the best of those lyrics, if you like, but still went and did it. And as a performer, I dunno, I think he's, he's, he's an excellent performer.

I think he's really like an entertainer. He, he's built for that kind of stage and everything. See him nowadays. And I think he's, [00:47:00] you know, found a, a new. Sort of level where he can not, you know, he is trying to sort himself out really after a lot of drink and drugs and, and, and trauma and anxiety and things.

He still looks he's, kind of got a little bit of the wobbles when he goes on TV for but

Reegs: yeah, but straighten up and fly, right?

Dan: That's right. And and this was as you say, not a terrible way to spend two hours. That's not how you put it. I know, but it was, was it two hours? Was it a long, two hours, 15

Sidey: was worried when I put it on and saw the runtime, I thought, oh God. 'Cause it's not, I would not have ever watched this film had it not been nominated. But it didn't drag actually. So I must have enjoyed it in some way, shape, or form,

Yeah, it does look good.

I actually didn't get much out of the chimp thing that I just

Reegs: well, [00:48:00] about 30, about 30 minutes into it you sort of forget that it's a chimp until he does something a bit more chimpy. But yeah,

Sidey: I was waiting for her, like him to snog the Natalie

Reegs: Yeah. And for that to look weird. Yeah.

Yeah.

Sidey: Yeah. But no, I wouldn't, I dunno if I'd say strong recommend, but certainly a strong recommend.

Reegs: Oh yeah, certainly strong recommend.

Dan: Mm-hmm.

Reegs: Was that a

Sidey: mic? It's

Dan: Strong

Sidey: elephant, wouldn't it? Is it

me then to No, 'cause it was, well,

Reegs: well you are away. You are, you are cha

Sidey: Oh, hang on. Yeah, so we got a, we got an issue. You are, are you here next week?

Reegs: I think so. And the week after it might be a problem or the week after that. I'm not sure. One of those.

Sidey: Okay. So we should be able to cobble something together next week

Reegs: as opposed to the other weeks where we

Sidey: and then we will figure, well, I'm just, I can't think that far in advance.

Okay, Sam, so I'll come up with some norms for next week. Yeah. Cool.

Dan: Nice. Yeah, because I will be,

Sidey: in phyland and enjoying the nice weather.

Dan: exactly. Enjoying the, the rain in

Sidey: a brawly.

Dan: But. You know,[00:49:00]

sweaty cup,

Sidey: all that remains is to say Saudi signing out,

Dan: Dan's gone.

Reegs: and it's Good Night from Riggs