With Francine Stock Toby Jones reflects on his new role, a king who becomes obsessed by a flea, in the historical drama Tale Of Tales. When David Bowie announced the retirement of Ziggy Stardust to a stunned audience in 1973, D.A. Pennebaker was there to catch that historic moment on his camera. As he was when Jimi Hendrix set alight to his guitar at the Monterey festival and Germaine Greer verbally jousted with Norman Mailer at a town hall debate. Pennebaker and his partner Chris Hegedus discus...
Jun 16, 2016•28 min
With Francine Stock. Film-maker Mark Cousins and composer David Holmes discuss their documentary I Am Belfast and reveal why they rarely went to the cinema at the height of The Troubles. How virtual reality puts us in the shoes of someone with epilepsy, a migrant living in the so-called Calais Jungle, and an Irishman caught up in the Easter Rising in 1916. These are three of the films nominated for the first VR awards at this week's Sheffield Documentary Festival. The Amazon makes up almost half...
Jun 09, 2016•29 min
With Francine Stock. Francine asks Shane Black, the creator of the Lethal Weapon series, why buddy movies tend to be about men and whether The Nice Guys will ever be The Nice Gals. Director Louise Osmond and producer Rebecca O'Brien talk about their seemingly irreverent documentary on Ken Loach - Versus, and reveal how the radical director once stood as a Conservative candidate, albeit at a school election. Two independent cinema owners, Alistair Till and Kevin Markwick, tell us how they plan to...
Jun 02, 2016•28 min
With Francine Stock. The director of Love And Friendship, Whit Stillman reveals why, of all Jane Austen's novels, he decided to adapt her unfinished novella Lady Susan. And why he's written a novel of his own screenplay. The co-creator of Ali G and The Flight Of The Conchords TV series, James Bobin discusses the difficult of adapting Alice Through The Looking Glass, Lewis Carroll's well known but little read sequel. Composer Neil Brand tells us the score about another classic opening scene - how...
May 26, 2016•29 min
With Francine Stock. Tom Hanks talks about A Hologram For The King, why America is still great, and Hollywood's relationship with China. He reveals the advice he was given about what you need to have a hit film in the People's Republic. Director Pablo Larrain discusses The Club, his controversial drama set in a safe house for disgraced priests in Chile and the reaction of the Catholic church to the film. Film reviewer Tim Robey and film buyer Clare Binns assess the hits and misses of this year's...
May 19, 2016•32 min
With Francine Stock Director Antonia Bird, one of the few female directors to carve out a career in the British film industry, is remembered by friends and colleagues Ronan Bennett, Mark Cousins and Kate Hardie. The only female director to be nominated for a feature film in this year's Oscars, Deniz Gamze Ergüven, discusses Mustang, her controversial drama about the treatment of young girls in rural Turkey. Critic Tim Robey and film buyer Clare Binns reveal what they're looking forward to in thi...
May 11, 2016•28 min
With Francine Stock Director Stephen Frears and writer Nicholas Martin discuss Florence Foster Jenkins, their bio-pic of the New York socialite and would-be singer whose voice made grown men weep, mostly with laughter. Actor Angela Pleasence talks about the making of Symptoms, her psychological thriller that was nominated for the Palme D'Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 1974 and disappeared from view a year later, only to re-emerge in 2014. From Johnny Guitar to Jane Got A Gun, The Film Program...
May 05, 2016•29 min
With Francine Stock Laszlo Nemes discusses Son Of Saul, his Oscar winning film about life and death in a Nazi concentration camp. Sir Christopher Frayling takes us behind the scenes of The Sound Barrier, David Lean's celebration of British engineering and innovation that was somewhat economical with the facts. 1916 was the year that the pictures got big, but with Snow White, Sherlock Holmes and special effects blockbusters taking over cinemas, what has really changed 100 years later. Historians ...
Apr 28, 2016•29 min
Francine Stock visits the Flatpack Festival in Birmingham and tries out Blind Cinema, where she is blindfolded as a small child whispers in her ear, describing the action on the screen. The director of the record-breaking Woman In Black, James Watkins explains why the release of his new film, Bastille Day, a violent thriller set in Paris, was delayed after the terrorist attacks in the French capital.
Apr 21, 2016•28 min
With Francine Stock. "I wanna be like you, I wanna talk like you, be like you too" could easily be the refrain sung by Hollywood producers intent on flooding the market with re-boots, remakes, sequels and prequels. As The Jungle Book is the latest to get a computer-generated makeover, Francine talks to the King Of The Swingers, director Jon Favreau. Many of us who live in the city dream about moving to the country when they retire. Many cinephiles dream about moving to the country and setting up...
Apr 14, 2016•30 min
With Francine Stock Director Jacques Audiard reveals why he cast a former Tamil Tiger to star in his drama Dheepan, which won the prestigious Palme D'Or at last year's Cannes festival. Composer Neil Brand unravels the mysteries of the score to one of the greatest openings in cinema history, Citizen Kane. Location scout Philip Lobban explains how a key scene in a recent James Bond film was set in Surrey and Scotland simultaneously, with the help of some digital trickery. Couple In a Hole director...
Apr 07, 2016•28 min
With Antonia Quirke. Ex-Arab Strap front man Aidan Moffat talks about his controversial attempts to re-write traditional Scottish folk songs, as documented in the new film Where You're Meant To Be Terence Davies, the director of Distant Voices, Still Lives, talks about his love for Doris Day as a sing-a-long version of Calamity Jane is about to released in cinemas Sebastian Schipper describes how exactly he made Victoria, a heist movie that sprawls across Berlin and was shot in just one take....
Mar 31, 2016•29 min
With Antonia Quirke Ben Affleck discusses the parallels between Bruce Wayne and Donald Trump in his super-hero movie Batman V Superman. Antonia visits one of the few remaining video shops in this country, 20th Century Flicks in Bristol, which has an eleven seater cinema where you can watch one of their 19,000 films. Alan Clarke, the controversial director of Scum, The Firm and Rita, Sue and Bob Too, is remembered by writer David Leland and actor Phil Davis who explains why he is a cult hero of B...
Mar 24, 2016•28 min
With Antonia Quirke. Director Ben Wheatley discusses his adaptation of J.G. Ballard's dystopian satire High-Rise and why he's literally terrified of the 70s. Producer Jeremy Thomas explains why it's taken him 40 years to get the novel to the screen. Special effects pioneer Roy Pace explains how he made the world turn backwards in Superman using a globe he bought in Woolworths. Antonia attends the Into Film awards ceremony for young film-makers and hears from judge Michael Sheen....
Mar 17, 2016•28 min
With Antonia Quirke. Charlie Kaufman and Duke Johnson discuss their stop-motion comedy Anomalisa, how they made a love scene with puppets and why it took 6 months. Cinematographer Billy Williams recalls the tensions behind the scenes of the notorious naked wrestling bout between Oliver Reed and Alan Bates in Women In Love. Director Robert Eggers reveals the difficulties of working with a goat on his supernatural horror The Witch, and why ravens are better actors.
Mar 10, 2016•30 min
The Coen Brothers talk to Antonia Quirke about Hail Caesar, a parody of Hollywood in the early 50s and explain why they believe there were Reds under the beds in the film industry at the time.
Mar 03, 2016•28 min
With Antonia Quirke. Clare Binns and Tim Robey assess the runners and riders in this year's Academy Awards Antonia talks to Nikolene, an Inuit in Greenland, about why her local video shop is still popular, especially in Winter, and hears from Simon Brzeskwinski, whose decision to close his video shop, Video City, in Notting Hill led to very public displays of grief.
Feb 25, 2016•28 min
The Film Programme this week explores the work of American animator and film maker John Lasseter. Presenter Francine Stock talks to John about his moving making techniques and films including Toy Story, Frozen and his latest release Zootropolis. John also shares his experiences of working for both Pixar Animations and for Disney. Presenter: Francine Stock Producer: Anna Bailey Editor: Jereome Weatherald.
Feb 18, 2016•28 min
With Francine Stock. Film-maker Sarah Gavron talks about Suffragette and the marked reactions to the film since it was released in cinemas. Director Mark Jenkin shows Francine how to develop film in instant coffee. Debut director Stephen Fingleton discusses the unexpected challenges of making his low budget feature, The Survivalist, a post-apocalyptic drama set almost entirely in a small hut.
Feb 11, 2016•28 min
With Francine Stock. Toby Jones reveals why he was in two minds about playing Captain Mainwaring in the new film version of Dad's Army. Director Grímur Hákonarson tells Francine why casting the sheep was as important as casting the actors in his Icelandic drama Rams Adam Rutherford assesses Matt Damon's portrayal of a botanist in The Martian.
Feb 04, 2016•29 min
With Francine Stock. Anna Karina talks about her life and work with Jean-Luc Godard - why he asked her to take her clothes off in their first meeting and how he would disappear for weeks after apparently popping out to the shop around the corner. Stanley Tucci discusses his role in Spotlight, an Oscar nominated drama about the expose of a cover-up by the Catholic Church in Boston, and why he decided not to meet the man he was playing. Sound designer Eugene Gearty explains how he got inside the h...
Jan 28, 2016•29 min
With Francine Stock Anchorman writer/director Adam McKay discusses The Big Short, his Oscar nominated tragi-comedy about the financial crisis that hit the global markets in the mid 2000s. Taiwanese director Hou Hsiao-Hsien reveals why he cut out the plot from his martial arts epic, The Assassin, recently voted by British critics as the best film of last year. Ben Hopkins talks about his political satire Lost In Karastan in which an unemployed film-maker is hired by a dictator to make an epic ext...
Jan 21, 2016•29 min
With Francine Stock The Oscar winning director of Birdman, Alejandro Inarritu discusses his western The Revenant, which tested his actors, including Leonardo Di Caprio, to their limits and was reportedly described as a living hell by members of the crew. Director Lenny Abrahamson describes just how he made Room, a movie mainly set in a 11 x 11 foot cell. Critic Catherine Bray assesses the runners and riders in this year's Oscars race.
Jan 14, 2016•29 min
With Francine Stock. Eddie Redmayne reveals the research he undertook for The Danish Girl, a new drama about transgender pioneer Lili Elbe, and what he observed about women's body language. Celia Johnson's daughter Lucy Fleming talks about her coda to Brief Encounter, written exclusively for The Film Programme. Borgen writer Tobias Lindholm discusses A War, his new thriller about Danish troops serving in Afghanistan, and why that conflict has defined his generation in Denmark....
Jan 07, 2016•29 min
Francine Stock hosts a discussion about the roles of women in the film industry and whether anything is getting better in terms of jobs, pay and opportunities. Joining her are producer Elizabeth Karlsen, director Carol Morley and writer/actor Justine Waddell. Director David O. Russell talks Joy.
Dec 31, 2015•28 min
Francine Stock presents a festive edition with the best films of the year, as chosen by critic Tim Robey, film buyer and programmer Clare Binns and critic and producer Catherine Bray.
Dec 24, 2015•28 min
Francine Stock asks listeners: Do you remember the first time with Star Wars ? She hears from people who have seen the first film over 20 times, who could recite every line of dialogue, and were inspired to become pilots, designers and IT boffins thanks to Star Wars. And from an extra whose hair can be briefly viewed in his role as a X-Wing pilot and a listener whose father played the oboe on the famous soundtrack. Francine is joined in studio by scientist and presenter Adam Rutherford who has f...
Dec 17, 2015•30 min
With Francine Stock. Andy Serkis, best known as Gollum in The Lord Of The Rings, and producer Jonathan Cavendish, discuss their new version of The Jungle Book which was made at The Imaginarium Studios, the centre they set up for performance capture technology. Bobby Henrey reveals what it's like to be a child star at the age of nine, why he quit the business at ten, and why he didn't tell anyone about his brief encounter with fame until several decades later. Sir Christopher Frayling uncovers th...
Dec 10, 2015•31 min
With Francine Stock Terence Davies talks about Sunset Song, which has been 18 years in the making Virtual reality guru Chris Milk discusses the future of making feature films in the new medium. Mike Kelt reveals how to make it rain in the movies. Documentary-maker Mark Burman explains why he transcribed the script of Star Wars at the age of 13, after watching it 21 times.
Dec 03, 2015•29 min
With Francine Stock. Director Todd Haynes discusses Carol, his Patricia Highsmith adaptation starring Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara as clandestine lovers in 1950s New York. Writer/directors Jonathan Glazer and Clio Barnard discuss the fusion of science and cinema and the Wellcome Trust Screenwriting Fellowship with the new fellow, whose identity was revealed in a ceremony on Wednesday evening. Marlon Brando recorded hundreds of hours of audio tape of his innermost thoughts, which make up a new ...
Nov 26, 2015•29 min
