Join us every week for a trip into the weird and wonderful world of trailers. Whether it’s the first teaser for the latest instalment in your favourite franchise, an obscure preview for a strange indie darling, whether it’s good, bad, ugly or just plain weird – your favourite pop culture baristas are there to tell you what they think.
We all love a good Agatha Christie yarn here at A Damn Fine Cup – but they’re not all cosy and twee. There’s plenty of Christie beyond Death on the Nile and Murder, She Said, and in this week’s Six Damn Fine Degrees, Matt writes about the darker sides of cosy crime.
Matt also wrote about his favourite cinema (once again), and his enjoyment of movie theatres that offer a good, curated programme that goes beyond the big releases of the year – giving a shout-out to the summer and early programming of the REX Bern, featuring first the films of Mads Mikkelsen and then Lauren Bacall.
And what else does the trailer bag have for us this week?
Sam: I’ve always been incredulous at the fact that over 50 years of his amazing career in film composing, there has never been a comprehensive biography or proper documentary about John Williams! Sure, he featured in a million different making of snippets, briefly allowing a glimpse into his conducting skills and musical concepts, but as a soundtrack enthusiast, I’ve always been left craving more. Well, with Music by John Williams, Disney+’s newest entry into their excellent Star Wars-adjacent documentation, the wait is over and I can’t wait to see it, probably still craving more. A great alternative has come in the world of podcasts, by the way: The Baton – A John Williams Musical Journey features one dedicated episode on each and every single one of his soundtracks. Still, I’m still missing that big bold biography book for Christmas now!
Matt: When I read Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall, shortly after its release, I bounced off it. I could see that the writing was strong and the story and characters complex, but there was something about the main character, Thomas Cromwell, that kept me at arm’s length, so much so that I found the novel unengaging on my first read. However, I greatly enjoyed the BBC adaptation that came out a few years later (which told the story of Mantel’s first two Thomas Cromwell novels), and that in no small part because of Mark Rylance’s portrayal of Cromwell – and when I later returned to the book, I got it. The adaptation had unlocked it for me. Now that Wolf Hall: The Mirror and the Light, the BBC adaptation of Mantel’s final book in the series, is coming out, I’m very much looking forward to it: the cast is still fantastic, featuring the likes of Damian Lewis, Jonathan Pryce, Harriet Walter and Timothy Spall, and the creative team is largely the same. Even better: The Mirror and the Light is sitting on my book shelf, waiting to be read by me for the first time.
Mege: That trailer is not particularly scary, is it? No jump scares, no body horror. Just a rattle – could be an earthquake or a sinkhole, right? I want to see what that presence is, and if it‘s Soderbergh telling us about it, the questions are as interesting as the answers. And there are Lucy Liu and Mira Sorvino, two artists that I could watch for hours.
A Damn Fine Cup of Culture 