183 - Priscilla

Dallas and Lee explore the unseen side of a great American myth in Elvis and Priscilla Presley’s long courtship and turbulent marriage, from a German army base to his estate at Graceland in the latest film from Sofia Coppola

Episode Transcript

(00:03):
Welcome to the nerd Party. Helloone, Welcome to the A twenty four
project here on the nerd Party network. They own the podcast to take you
through the back catalog of A twentyfour, review the latest releases, and
bring you interviews with the cast andcrew behind these movies. Our first show

(00:24):
of twenty twenty four, we takea trip to Heartbreak Hotel with Sophia Coppolas
Priscilla, which explores the complicated coachshipof Priscilla by Elvis Presley. I'm asking
and with me is the Elvis tomy colonel Tom Parker in that he's white?
It's Lee Hudgerson. How are you? Happy New Year? A happy
New Year to you and everyone aswell. I think we've got an exciting

(00:46):
few months ahead. But yeah,I haven't seen that Elvis film yet.
I've own it and I'll keep me. I need to kind of get round
to watching it. But if Ican tell anyone that I've seen a clip,
I have seen that it's white clips. So when I was when kind
of they mentioned this this kernel inthe film, I was like, that's
the it's white Tom Hanks, guys. So I will definitely have to bump

(01:06):
up watching Elvis in the coming weeksnow after having seen Priscilla anyway, indeed
that will indeed actually changed the slightrunning order of the discussion then. But
you know, it's been it's beena really quiet, fessive season for us,
but you know, in terms ofreleases, But we're gearing up for
February because the UK will finally getthe Iron Claw and the Zone of Interest,

(01:30):
and we'll also look to take offthe blind spots in our resume,
which are showing up Earth Mama andMeduca Deluxe, which one or either of
us have seen at some point butstill need to get around to actually reviewing.
So but before we get to themain event, have A twenty four
dropped any big news while we've beenaway? Well the answer is yes,
including just a couple of minutes ago, as Lee tagged me in a tweet.

(01:53):
So first up, I guess thebiggest news over the last couple of
weeks is that A twenty four areprobably going and they all in on what
would certainly be their biggest production yet. I believe technically their biggest production budget
at the moment is still around seventymillion dollars for both afraid, but in
terms of popularity and just scale andscope of what they're attempting to do.

(02:17):
They have partnered with video game engineerHideo Kojima to produce an adaptation of Death
Stranding, a very very popular videogame. So when this news broke along
with the option to buy an officialeight twenty four T shirt based on it,
so you know, you know they'reall in at this point. This

(02:38):
was huge news because I mean,I'm sure there was a lot of companies
sort of battling to get the rightsfor this, but the fact that someone
like you know, for certainly upuntil the for ten eleven years of their
existence, have been considered the smallsort of independent distributor and producer this.
You know, we were talking probablyat the end of twenty twenty three about

(02:58):
how what did the future holds fora twenty four that was talks about getting
into ips about Halloween. You know, they have the rights for the Camp
Crystal TV series and stuff like that. This is probably their biggest ip yet.
What did you make of this news? Yeah, like you I wasn't
too surprised that we kind of werestarting to get these this ip news.

(03:20):
I guess one of the ones thatwas a kind of inclination it was maybe
heading in these sorts of ways.Was when we last spoke that we kind
of heard that there's going to bemore maybe emphasis on sort of ips and
bigger budgeted movies and so on,and we debate, well, what form
does something like that take? AndI remember maybe like just sort of before
this one, they kind of announcedthat that if you've passed through an airport

(03:43):
or train station recently, there's beenthat kind of official biography of sort of
Elon Musk and so on that's outthere, and there was talk that Darren
Aronovs, Who's going to do that? You're like, okay, interesting,
I wonder if this is kind ofgoing down that way of you know,
we're optioning this kind of quote unquoteBlockbuster stylele book and so on, and
doing something that could be kind ofa Steve Job style Oscar kind of push

(04:05):
and so on, a controversial figure. It's going to get attention, generate
clicks and so on. So Ikind of started to think, oh,
that's the kind of first inclination ofthem moving into this, and then you
get something like this on the completeother side, where I mean it meant
nothing to me really outside of videogame big budget. You know, you

(04:27):
know, I've heard kind of it. Did a bit of research into these
kind of games, and people oftentalk about them as being quite cinematic,
and you know, it feels likea natural bedfellow to kind of turn this
into a film. But I haveno idea what to expect from from something
like this, And it'll be curiousto see the budget, because, as
you were saying, you know,bo Is Afraid was apparently the biggest one

(04:50):
with seventy million, but then Isaw sort of recently the actually it's civil
War and that's at fifty million.So it feels like there's a lot of
unknowns go going on just now behindsort of where they're spending their moneys and
so on, and probably maybe fiftymillion and something like civil war might be
a better return than seventy million onbo Is Afraid. It's hard to know

(05:12):
what's what at the moment. Well, we'll get onto the civil war debate
in a second, but I meanthis, I mean, I'm just sort
of reading the article here up infront of me, and Jujima seems to
be all in on A twenty four. His statement was A twenty four was
born into this world about ten yearsago. Their presence is singular within the
industry. They are like no other. The films they are delivering to the

(05:33):
world are high in quality and veryinnoative. Clearly hasn't watched the entire back
catalog, but I've been attracted totheir creations and they have even inspired my
own work. Their innoative approach tostorytelling aligns with what we are doing for
the last eight years. Now we'remaking a movie together. There's a lot
of game adaptations out there, butwe are creating is not a direct translation
of the game. The intenders forthe audience to not only be fans of

(05:55):
the games, but for our filmto be for anyone who loves cinema.
We are creating a death Strand universethat has never been seen before, achievable
only through the medium of the film. So yeah, it sounds like probably
for the best and maybe not adirect adaptation of a video game, but
a sort of expansion into the widerworld. It'd be interesting to see if

(06:16):
the stars of the video game,including Norman Readers made Nicholson, Lesido,
and Margaret Qualley come back for this, because you know, they're all sort
of scand and sort of, youknow, appeers of the characters appear in
the form of those actors will bein since if they come back. No
director has been Annoinne yet, butI expect we'll get something in the new

(06:38):
year. So, yeah, interestingtimes ahead for A twenty four And yeah,
so I guess allows them to tackleanother new market as well. So,
but you talked there about Civil Warand just over so the Christmas right,
we got two trailers. We've gottrailers for Civil War, which is

(07:00):
written about Alex Carland, and alsoone for Love Lies Bleeding, which is
a new film from Rose Glass,who did the incredible Saint Mode, which
was also distributed by A twenty four. Both of those films will be out
in April. And it was sortof hinted there before the thing that you
haven't have you seen either of thesetrailers, that you like to keep your

(07:21):
powder dry and avoid them if possible. I guess it's easier when they're just
out on the internet at the moment. Yeah, I've avoided them, and
it's one of those ones. I'mso I'm so curious about Civil Wars like
a concept, and what Alex Garland'sgoing to do with something like this.
I can't quite visualize what way he'sgoing to do this. Is this going

(07:42):
to be something that's big and sweeping. Is this going to be sort of
more of an intimate drama amidst thebackdrop of war. I don't really know,
So I'm quite I'm quite curious andexcited about that one. And yeah,
likewise, like we've discussed that samemode as one of my favorite A
twenty four films, and I can'twait to see what she follows that up
with, especially with the cast ofsomeone like Kristen's Schure as well. But

(08:03):
I've avoided that one for now andso on. But yeah, I think
it's gonna if I can avoid themlong enough, I think I'm gonna be
be richly rewarded. But I'm soso curious about these kind of their next
E twenty four films, that's forsure. Yeah. Well, I mean,
no spoilers, but it's Love LiesBleeding. You know, you'll have

(08:24):
seen the synopsis and it certainly playsthat way. But this looks like a
very different type of film to SaintMaude, but very I'm not even gonna
say any more than that. Itjust looks like a very different type of
films, but I'm still very excitedto see it. And Civil War.
Even though you maybe didn't watch thetrailer, you might have seen some of

(08:46):
the discourse on the internet fallout fromthat, and it was very interesting to
me. I watched the trailer andwas immediately taken back by going, Wow,
this looks like a twenty for hisfirst blockbuster. It was full of
action. However, knowing how Atwenty four in the past have marketed certain

(09:11):
horror films, who knows. Perhapsall the exciting action bits were shown in
the trailer and the rest of itis, like you say, a rather
more sort of small scale debate overAmerican politics, and they're just using the
trailer to bring people in. However, what was clearly I mean this in

(09:33):
the film, there is a civilwar where it sounds like the states of
Texas and California have succeeded from theUnited States. I mean, the fact
that those two states are working togetheris enough, you know, to start
any sort of policable way. Butthe fact is that there were two types
of reaction to this trailer. Onewas, oh my god, this looks

(09:54):
amazing, I can't wait to seeit, and the other one was this
is an incredibly potentially dangerous and inflammatoryfilm which we do not need right now.
And of course it was basically ifyou looked at the people saying each
statement, there was basically international criticswho were like, Wow, this looks
fantastic, and then there were Americancritics who were like, hmm, I'm
not too sure about this, Alex. So, I mean, what did

(10:16):
you make of the discourse? Yeah, I mean, as much as I've
dodged the trailer, that little bitabout sort of California and Texas kind of
broke through and should be told tome, and it didn't really bother me
like i'd seen. Sort of thejustification was, you know, correct me
if I'm wrong, this might besomething that said in the trailer or just
speculation was that sort of Texas andCalifornia are kind of two huge, sort

(10:41):
of tech hubs, and that's sortof where they kind of partner together.
So it's maybe sort of more kindof kind of capitalist connection and for seceding
there, and it kind of makessense. You know, often you hear
it sort of when it comes topolitics and so on. You know,
California has such a huge kind youknow, financial infrastructure, and you know,
it's bigger than a lot of countrieson the planet, like they could

(11:03):
succeed, secede and sort of stillkind of keep on going. So I
think some loyal I guess exactly,So stuff like that kind of makes sense
to me and so on. Imean, when I'm watching these things,
I'm not necessarily expecting it to beyou know, full on nuanced with like
the inner connections on something like that. And I actually think it's going to
make a really good double bill withdo you remember Boys State Dallas. We

(11:26):
reviewed that on Apple TV plus whereand remember what they had it where it
was like a kind of model sortof American Texas government or something like that,
and the whole thing was someone waspitching that, oh, Texas should
secede from sort of America, andthere was the whole debate and discussion around
that. So you know, definitelyit's definitely got an A twenty four connection

(11:46):
there. So I'm really curious todefinitely see this one. And you know,
if people are saying something's not necessarilyneeded, especially politically, I tend
to think that actually means it shouldbe. I mean, I appreciate why
people, especially in an election year, will be traumatized enough as it is
in America, where kind of thefate of the Western world hangs hangs again

(12:07):
by the balance and so on.But I think it's going to be a
very interesting watch and so on.I'm Alex Carland. I know Men was
a bit more missed than hit forsome people, but he's always a filmmaker
and a writer that's had me interested, So I can't wait to see what
he does. Yeah, I meanhe's yes, he is. I think
quite a divisive film yet certain youknow, Men. It had a lot

(12:31):
to say. Whether it said itin the right way, who knows.
But I mean he of course alsoproduced the incredibly underrated for me Annihilation,
and that sort of showcase some ofhis sort of sci fi action credentials.
So yeah, I'm very excited tosee what this is. I mean,

(12:52):
the cast. You've got Nick goFrom in this President United States, You've
got Kristen Dunns, and you've gotJesse Plemons in there as well. You
know, three sowards for the priceof one. How can that be profitable
for America? I guess we'll findout. But actually, on a side
note that you mentioned Boys State,and I know that this is not,
as far as I'm aware of,being distributed by A twenty four. But
did you know that there is aGirls State documentary coming out where basically they've

(13:16):
gone through the same process but withgirls instead of boys doing the same camp.
I think I heard that, hintedthat a couple of years ago because
people were like, where's girls Stay? And people like, oh, Girls
State does exist, and so onth it might I think I did.
I think I read it because Ithink it might have been in the lineup
for Sundowns, So yeah, itmight be being screened at Sundance later on

(13:37):
this month, I think. Ithink that's why I read it. So
yeah, I wonder what a twentyfour future film they're going to pitch that
in a few years time will belike remember a Girls States and entirely basically
men are wiped out and women ruleeverything in America. That will really annoy
some people, wouldn't the Illinois theright people as well? Exactly exactly?

(14:00):
So final bit of news, actuallyknow, so there was two bits of
news. One bit of news thatyou just sent me just before that is
that from another Armis updates on Twitterstates that another Armist will start as Twins
and then a twenty four fantasy epicfrom director Nicholas ash Bateman, but with
being executive produced by David Lowry,who has obviously done eight twenty four stuff

(14:24):
in the past, including The GreenKnight and of course one of our favorites
full time, a Ghost Story.So you just dropped this news to me,
What did you make of it?Yeah, I saw it, hinted
that yesterday, and yeah, I'mcurious, Like I really love the kind
of the fantasy element of The GreenKnight and so, and it's not a
genre I tend to be drawn towardsit. Yeah, it is a Christmas

(14:45):
film and it was quite good tosee it over kind of a couple of
the kind of I think it wasthe Glasgow Film Theater was showing that as
part of their Christmas season. Ithink that's the second Junior Row that's kind
of happened as well. So it'sdefinitely becoming a bit of a staple of
these indie cinemas, which is agood sign. But yeah, I'm curious
to see kind of. I thinkwe've got a couple of really interesting films
on the horizon involving David Leiray.I think His next film is again one

(15:07):
I'm trying to keep myself kind ofa bit surprised by. It is sort
of like a kind of a bandor music or something like that, kind
of maybe similar in the vein tosomething like Her Smells for A twenty four,
So again that's what I'm very excitedfor. So yeah, curious to
see what you Dike does with thefantasy genre. Again. Hopefully it's more
Green Knight than Peter Pan and WendyWell. I guess we'll just have to

(15:31):
wait and see. But the finalbit of news, obviously, I was
very excited about one of the upcomingreleases being The Iron Claw because I was
going to be getting to talk abouttwo of my favorite things in the world,
A twenty four and then meeting theWorld Wrestling. However, possibly even
greater than that as a crossover forme is the news that came out just

(15:52):
towards the end of December that Dwaynethe Rock Johnson will be starring in a
biopic of UFC fighter Mark Kerr,to be directed by Benny Safti. So
Saftie is obviously one of the reasonsthat I got into A twenty four.
I think good Time was one ofthe sort of first films around twenty seventeen
twenty eighteen that started to recognize thelogo, along with films like First Reformed

(16:15):
in Hereditary and of course they didyou know, amazing uncut gems as well.
So the fact that The Rock,you know, we just talked about,
you know, on that one ofour previous episodes there, but it
had taken you know, thirteen yearsfor Nicholas Cage to finally appear in an
A twenty four film. We're finallygoing to get The Rock appearing in an
A twenty four film. And Ithink it's safe to say that this is

(16:41):
a few worlds away from his typicalfamily friendly blockbuster fair and potentially more in
line with something like his performance inDare I Say It South Entails, Yeah,
Pain and Gain maybe as well.And yeah, this one, I'm
really it's one of those ones.I don't know if you've had the chance

(17:03):
yet. I'm certainly making my wayslowly through it. We're trying to savor
it. But me and my partnerwatching Benny Safty and The Curse just now
and absolutely loving, loving it.And then yeah, it's been interesting to
kind of see the news like Ithink person something we've kind of noticed but
maybe not really kind of clicked to, is sort of Benny and Josh Safty

(17:23):
kind of becoming a bit more sortof Benny Safty and so on, and
sort of brothers, aren't they.They're sort of quietly separating and do it
working on their own projects. Yeah, there seems to have been a bit
of tension there. I saw thatsort of Adam Sandler has fallen out with
I think it said like sort ofI think I was drawn in by the
headline, oh Josh Adam Sandler fallsout with Josh Saftie. I was like,

(17:45):
oh my god, what's happened withthem and the Safty brothers? And
then it sort of dived into kindof talking about how sort of the two
seem to be going their their kindof separate ways, which is a real
shame. But in terms of BennySafty, I mean, for someone that
really just started act thing in twentyand seventeen, you know what, you
kind of see his career continuing togo with obviously good Time and Uncut Gems,

(18:07):
which we've been spoken about so much, but you know, he's worked
with some amazing directors in that timeand I say, I'm absolutely loving the
Curse. I don't know what you'rethinking of it. I've only watched the
first episode. I just haven't reallyeven though I've been off for the last
couple of weeks, I just haven'thad the time to It's a tough one
to send down and watch. Ithink, yeah, it's it's like,
oh, this is so I'm almostI think I'm going to wait until all

(18:32):
the episodes are available and then I'llalso get into it and then yeah,
get through. But it was thefirst episode was like, all right,
okay, I mean I'd heard thatit was a tough watch. It's like
it's very very unique television in theway that it portrays its characters and stuff
like that. But I'm very veryinterested to see where this is going to

(18:55):
go. But I mean, it'sit does cap off quite a fantastic year
for for Benny. You know,he started off the year in the Obi
Wan Kenobi series very well done,and remembering that was a TV show that
came out last year, then yeah, yes, so yeah there was that,
and then yeah, supporting performances inthe likes of are you there,

(19:17):
God, It's Me Margaret, andthen of course Oppenheimer as well, So
you know, he's really, Iguess, been focusing on the acting side
of things this year. But it'sgreat that he's going to be getting back
into the director's chair. Hopefully theSaftis will be able to come back and
work on a porty. But Imean it hasn't really hurt the combows.
You know, they've managed to dotheir own thing. There'll probably still always

(19:38):
been known as the Saftie brothers.But actually, I guess I did notice
there was a bit more separation onTwitter, wasn't there. Yeah, who
knows, who knows what's happened thereif anyone does give us a ship.
But anyway, time for the mainevent, which is Priscilla of course,
the big release which is been whichis has been in cinemas in the US

(20:02):
for a few weeks already and isnow out in UK cinemas and it has
been written and directed by Sophia Coppla, based on the memoir Elvis and Me
by Priscilla Presley star as Kayle Spennyand a Vaulpa Cup Best Actress wanting performance
at the Venice Film Festival as Priscillaand Jacob Alordie, the Man of the
moment as Elvis Presley. When teenagerPriscilla below meets Elvis Presley during his military

(20:26):
succlement in Germany, the man isalready a meteoric rock and roll superstar,
but becomes someone else in private moments, a thrilling crush, an ally and
loneliness, and a vulnerable best friendthrough Priscilla's eyes. Fake couple of tells
the unsigned, unseen side of thegreat American myth in Elvis and Priscilla's long
courtship and turbulent marriage in this portraitof love, fantasy and fame. So

(20:51):
Lee, I mean, I imaginethat you were looking forward to that.
I know that he was a fai, a couple of fan. He had
to wait longer than me. Iwas lucky enough to see at the Venice
Film Festival, but you were ableto catch it just a couple of days
ago. I think on a thirtyfive milimeter print, which I imagine,
given what I know of the filmand having seen it, I think it
would have suited the film perfectly.Yeah, it was the best way to

(21:12):
watch that film and so on.It really brought kind of this period piece
to life and so on. AndI was watching it in sort of a
kind of independent cinema and just beingable to just sort of just sit there
and kind of watch it in thosekind of like you know, you've got
the curtains, you've got the kindof the pillars. You know. It's
felt like I just a really authenticway to sort of watch a film that

(21:33):
felt like it was sort of pulledfrom from a different era. Even just
listening to kind of the sound designand so on. I was so glad
we got the opportunity and privilege reallyto see the thirty five mil print.
And yeah, it's been one I'vebeen waiting for it for a while.
Actually, as you mentioned, Ireally do love Sophia couple of his work.
You know, she obviously has somefilms I like a little bit less,
but I'm always curious to see it. And I've seen every film of

(21:56):
hers the cinema since seen Lost inTranslation way back when in the early two
thousands, and Virgin Suicide has gota nice re release a few months ago,
so I think I've oddly enough seenthat one numerous times over the years
and in cinemas and so on.And I got the Lovely Sophia couple of
archives books so I had a goodread through that, but kind of stopped

(22:17):
at the Priscilla section. So,but it had been weird kind of the
build up to this film in theUK, as you mentioned, we've had
quite a bit of a weight behindso Mobe obviously choosing to release this sort
of again the tail end of kindof Christmas into the New Year and sort
of that classic UK that's when theprestige pictures come out and we have to
wait months after everything. I mean, it was even on digital to buy

(22:41):
in the week before. But thetrailers had been really weird. I don't
know if you'd seen some of it, but it had got really good representation
in sort of like the kind ofmultiplexes and local indie cinemas of sort of
having this like at most forty secondlittle trailer where it was just sort of
just showing some just little images andflashes of things to come, and you're
like, okay, that's that's interesting. It's it felt like more of one

(23:03):
of these things you sometimes see inthe beginning of a YouTube trailer before the
main trailer. But in the pastweek it seemed to upgrade from the forty
second trailer into a bit more ofa traditional trailer. It was a really
weird one. I don't know ifyou've noticed that as well. I think

(23:23):
I don't think I actually did noticethat, to be fair, I mean
I think it did. Yeah,there was a short one. I think
it was almost like certainly sort ofmy well, since I only have a
multiplex at the moment, I don'tknow if it was maybe slightly different marketing
depending on where you were watching them. But yeah, there was that sort
of short when that showed the sortof the emphasis on sort of hair,

(23:45):
makeup, dresses and stuff like that, and then one that sort of did
the fuller. I guess maybe oncethey sort of knew they were definitely going
to be screening it, because Ithink it was still given it was movie,
it was probably still a slightly limitedrelease, certainly in probably the sort
of chain cinema as you probably wouldhave been able to find it pretty much
every sort occurs in picture house,et cetera. But the change will maybe

(24:06):
is slightly like, oh, dowe take it? Do we not?
Because obviously you know it's it's notgonna it's not gonna have that mass breakout
of Peel that Elvis did last year, because you know what one. It's
I mean, I'm sure someone,you know, if it wasn't movie,
if it was maybe a bigger studiothat had done this, they might have
played up the elvis aspect to tryand get people in. But then I

(24:27):
think they would have quickly realized they'rebeing missold that film. Although I think
there's a discussion to be had onon the sort of the production side of
it, because I was lucky enoughto see it in London on a preview
with a Q and A with SophiaCoppoler and she actually talked it's it's incredible

(24:48):
that you know, a filmmaker ofSophia Coppola standing, who has won an
Academy Aboard, who's one, youknow, best film at Venice and stuff
like that, apparently still has troublegetting financing for movies. You know,
she admits herself that none of herfilms are blockbusters. You know, they're
not going to make hundreds of millionsof dollars at the box office. But

(25:08):
I'm pretty sure they always would havea very decent return on them. But
I think what she found with thisone in particular was there was a lot
of resistance from male studio heads andstuff like that, potentially slightly nervous or
perhaps there was I think at timesa bit of backlash about the representation of

(25:30):
Elvis himself. You know, isI think it's fair to say it's probably
not the most flattering portrayal of Elvis. But you know, this is from
you know, a very particular viewpoint, and I mean, I'm actually keen
to sort of discuss that. Imean, there is, obviously, you
know, the one element which isthe elephant in the room, which is
the what I think severe does youknow, to her credit here it's fairly

(25:55):
non judgmental, but there is antenure age gap. And at the time
of their meeting, Elvis was twentyfour and she was fourteen, and there
are several times on your kind ofaudiences I expect her probably feeling a bit
uncomfortable about this whole sort of thing. You know, back then, maybe
it wasn't that big a deal.I think if you had a two people

(26:18):
being romantically linked at this day andage in social media where one was fourteen
one was twenty four, there wouldbe more opinions probably placed on it.
But I mean, what did youmake of the representation of Elvis in this
before we get we'd bring it backgroundto the Elvis is someone I only kind

(26:40):
of know things about really in brushstrokes. You know, I know how he
died, I know some of hishits. You know, the highs and
the lows of his career, youknow, the kind of the film industry
aspect of his career, going offto military service, you know, fag
packet stuff. Really. But Iwas kind of I kind of just not
got round to watching the Bazsler filmand so on, and and you know,

(27:02):
it's one I own and I'm keento definitely watch it, but you
know, with this one, Iwas surprised when Sophia Coupla mentioned, and
I'd seen it written as well,that there was maybe a lack of sort
of funding to go towards this typeof film and so on. And you
know, even though I didn't watchthe film, it was impossible not to
be aware that that was a bitof a breakout film last year. And

(27:25):
often you find these things are like, Okay, how can we ride the
coattails of something like that and kindof strike strike that kind of Elvis nostalgia.
I mean, there's a theater nearme that's doing the best of Elvis
Night with them some impersonator and ahuge theater of like eight thousand people.
So yeah, things like that kindof I was surprised that a little bit,

(27:45):
even the kind of the age difference. I was. I was very,
very surprised by that. And it'sit's weird. You know. I
may avoid these trailers sometimes, butyou don't avoid the discourse that you can
see. And I was surprised tosee really none of that in the build
up to this film, where evenin the past week where it's been out
in the UK, maybe Saltburn finallyarriving on Amazon Prime has swallowed up most

(28:08):
of the online discourse in about andyeah, and maybe everyone just got bored
of it after the Liquorice Pizza one, where everyone just talked about that for
years on end every few months andso on. But yeah, apparently it's
all right if it's a man anda woman in age evan forbid, it's
the other way around. Yeah,I was very surprised when that kind of

(28:30):
happened. Like in the first thingthat she's like forty, I was like,
oh, hold you, and I'mtrying to do the little mass mix
beause they don't really necessarily say howold he is? You kind of have
to make that kind of judgment yourself. And I did like the non judgment
approach of it. That's a differentfilm, and the fact that it didn't
seem to have a judgment at thetime and so on. It would have

(28:52):
felt disingenuous to make that something thatit wasn't publicly or personally at the time.
We can have those discussions, butthat wasn't the story there to be
told. And maybe that says somethingin itself, but you know, it
was really interesting to see that kindof slice of life of them together and

(29:12):
their relationship. I think it reallyfollowed that through for really well for a
while before perhaps sort of rushing towardsthe tail end of it all and so
on. It was interesting to see. You know, I think the dad
of Priscilla I oupposed it best,like you have every woman in the world
throwing themselves at you. Why wouldyou be attracted to our daughter? And

(29:34):
even then it's not in a wayof like she's fourteen, it's like why
her? You know, It's veryfascinating the way it approaches that, and
it certainly sits with you as asan audience member. Yeah, it's I
mean, it's sort of the filmsort of says I mean, next sense
it is based on Priscilla's own memoiris all from her point of view and

(29:57):
what she saw as the relationships.So yeah, I mean it does hint
at the parents sort of initial sortof questioning and misgivings around it. I
mean, I think the only realdisco I've seen online about it is that,
well, if I was a parent, I would never let my child
go off to Graceland and stuff witha rock star and stuff these days and

(30:18):
things like that. But again,you know, it was a different time,
and you know, it seems tosuggest that, you know, Elvis
was respectful of her, and apparently, you know, they maybe did not
consummate their relationship until after they married, So you know, I guess,
you know, that is something tobe looked at. And but for me,
I thought it was very sort ofinteresting, and I can see maybe

(30:42):
why certain people might have felt thatthey didn't want to put money into it,
because you know, they have thisidea of Elvis. I mean,
everyone has an idea of Elvis.If you were to ask someone to do
a portrayal of Elvis based on whatwe know of him. As the public
performer, you will get someone likeAustin Butler's performance in Elvis. That is

(31:06):
the Elvis that everyone thinks that theyknow from the media. I mean,
you've got other portrayals like Kurt Russell'sone. You've got I'm going too.
I think Elvis came out last year. I said that Austin Butler's one.
It's probably one of the best performancesI've ever seen because it's it's one of
the only Elvis I've seen that couldnaturally have turned into Bruce Campbell's Bubba Hotep

(31:29):
belt. Yes, I always Ilike the Michael Shannon one. And was
it Elvis meets Nixon or something likethat. I can't remember the exact name
of the thought. I thought thatwas a really good one too. I'd
forgot about Bubble Hotep. Yeah,but they've all got a through line that
you can see that that is,they're all born from the Elvis that we
know. Where is this is theElvis that we don't This is the Elvis
at Priscilla and you, And that'swhy you know. Jkblorready's performance is very

(31:56):
very different, but for me,it completely works. You know, the
voice is. It's not what wewould completely expect. You know, it's
not the spot on impersonation which manybut other people put on. You know,
it's got the accent there, butyou know it's a sort of softer
portrayal on that. But then it'salso there's a darkness to his one.

(32:19):
You know, there's hints of controllingbehavior. There's you know, giving her
drugs to help her sleep, youknow, controlling how she looked in public
and stuff like that. The sortof manipulation of you know, saying he
wants to break up and then hedoesn't, and sort of gaslighting her at
times. You know, there's somehorrendous behavior, but you know it's all
set within this. Actually, Ithink when I wrote my review, I

(32:44):
compared it actually very similarly to PabloRine Spencer in that you know, this
is a woman who was brought intoa situation and she's almost sort of like
trapped in this sort of empty houseat times, you know, trapped in
shadow of her husband, and youknow it's about her trying to find strength

(33:04):
to escape it. Really, Imean, did you notice any sort of
parallels between that. Yeah, that'sa really good point, and I suppose
you could argue, you know,America doesn't have a royal family. I
mean this because without saying, butthey certain relate so exactly, and how
they revere and treat their celebrities ison par with that, I mean similar

(33:25):
there behind these gates and so on. And what I liked about it was,
you know, Elvis as an asan individual and a human being in
his own right, but so muchof that is performative, from the way
someone dresses and interacts, performs tothe world, even what he's like around
his friends. And it felt likewhat I particularly liked about this film and

(33:46):
so on and was that it wasvery much about those behind the doors things.
You know, it wasn't very littleif it was about them going on
on dates or holidays or trips orwhatever together, which probably does lead into
kind of that controlling behavior that she'skept behind closed doors to an extent,
But that's where you got to seehim being at his most kind of realistic

(34:10):
works in all kind of way,you know, whether way they were taking
the photos of themselves, which wasquite quite romantic and cute. And then
it just ends with sort of abit of a play fight that goes that
little bit too wrong. And Ireally liked that where it was like,
we're just focusing in on this thisperiod of time, what we what we
maybe didn't see behind those those doors. And you know, certainly the media

(34:31):
coverage probably spoke very much to whatlife was like outside, and I really
liked that and sort of what itmust have been like for Priscilla to be
basically stuck behind the doors of Graceland. She couldn't go and pick take a
part time job if she she wantedto, or you know, was really
kind of doing anything other than beingable to shop and so on. And

(34:52):
I found that really really fascinating,And you know, that made for the
type of story I was more interestedin, and perhaps quite a broad kind
of story of her life from beginningto today, and you know, covering
being in the naked gun films andyou know, being the grandmother's to an
A twenty four regular. You know, I liked the period they focused in

(35:14):
on, but I do feel theyrushed things towards the end. I mean,
so in terms of your awareness ofPriscilla, I mean, I think
you maybe mentioned it there. Imean, was your first exposure to her
probably similar to me in the fact, and was her performance appearance in the
Naked Gun. Yeah, Naked Gun, that she was the mother more sort

(35:37):
of kind of knew more sort ofabout her her daughter, you know,
sort of her you know, herdaughter was certainly someone Michael Jackson. Yeah,
all that kind of stuff of like, ok, yeah, and just
that and just that sort of celebrityculture around her sort of daughter. And
then again sort of you know whethershe you know, she was the wife

(35:58):
to Elvis, she was this daughterto this celebrity, et cetera. You
know, her story seems to havekind of fallen through the cracks a little
bit. You know, she's beenovershadowed by her you know, former husband
and sort of her kind of daughter, which is quite a fascinating way to
find yourself in. Yeah, becauseI know that sort of the Q and

(36:19):
as well, there was a coupleof sort of things that came up.
One was, you know, thefact that apparently, you know, this
film would clearly gone ahead with youknow, Priscilla's blessing. You know,
Sophia had phone draw up and askedher, you know, would I be
able to make this film? Youknow, I will write the script.
You can have a look at thescript. If there's anything you're not happy
with, you know, then we'llwork around that. You know, they

(36:39):
talked about the you know, hetalked about that moment with the photographs and
the polaroids and stuff like that,and that was something that came up apparently
out of a discussion that wasn't inthe book, just one of the sort
of the meetings here and she's like, and Sophia was like, do you
have any of those polaroids? AndPriscilla just sort of no, and then

(37:01):
would could you at least sort oftell me what was in them? And
that she just went secretary and stufflike that. So she used that as
the inspiration for that scene. Butthen apparently there was once the film had
been finished, there was apparently arather angry letter that had been sent by
sort of Lisa Marie I think,very sort of scared and worried about I

(37:23):
guess how it was going to portrayher father and stuff like that. But
you know, some would argue maybepotentially you know, justly you know,
worried about that. But unfortunately,that is she was unable to be resolved
before her death, sadly, butyou know, it's it's interesting that you
know, this is it's all aboutyou know, it's it's her story,

(37:45):
and it's about putting that forward.And you know, she is at the
forefront of the movie, and youknow, in order to do that you
do need a very strong actress,and you know, this is, you
know, a tour de force Ithink for Kelly Spenny. I mean she's
someone that I wasn't really familiar withgoing in, but then having recently caught

(38:06):
just part of a Pacific room uprising, turns out that she was in that.
It's one of the sort of coreads along with John Boyega. So
there you go. But you know, she won Best Actress at Venice.
You know, I think it's avery good performance. I think if the
system, I think the system waspotentially rigged in that Damien Chiselle could not
award Best Actress to his friend EmmaStone, who he directed in Lala Land.

(38:29):
But I think this was a veryexcellent choice as well, because I
think she's got a wonderful sort ofethereal beauty to her that works for the
role. But in a snap ofa finger, you can she can basically
go back just with a look inher face that indicates that she is still
a child in this situation, andI thought it was a really really strong

(38:51):
performance from her. What did youmake of this star making turn? I
was the same when I looked atsort of her IMDb after, it's like,
oh, I've kind of oh,yeah, she was in that as
that little child or things like that, and yeah, she has that kind
of presence where she looks so physicallysmall and young, and I think that
works really well to to the film'seffect. I mean, that's something we

(39:12):
kind of have seen through through countlesskind of Sophia couple of films sort of
these young characters, whether it's Virginsuicides somewhere, bling Ring, Beguiled,
et cetera. So it felt kindof quite natural. But I felt like
that really kind of again showed thatsort of difference in dynamic where again it's
not passing the judgment, it's justthere on the screen for you to think

(39:35):
about and reflect on, where youhave someone kind of like that kind of
you know, the Elvis, youknow, sort of played by Jacob Elroddy
where you're kind of like he's quitetall, huge presence and some one,
and she does look quite dwarf.She does look really young as well in
it. And I think that reallysort of worked well to again telling that
story through sort of that visual mediumof casting that I think we could all

(39:59):
agree so Via Coppla does so well. I was I was really impressed and
really excited to see what she shedoes next. It's nice to have,
you know, surprises of people reallykind of essentially coming out of nowhere and
you start to feel like, Okay, I'm curious to see what she she
does next. I thought she didso well in this as well, and
you know, it was great tosee that kind of strength and that character

(40:20):
grow as the film went on.Yeah, it's weird thinking about it now
in that sort of thinking about anothersort of relationship with a Syvia Copla movie
where there was a huge age gapand I'm just thinking lost in translation here
where you know, Bill Murray wasin his mid fifties by that point and

(40:40):
Scarlet Hansen was I think maybe seventeeneighteen at the time. Yet looking back
on that film, it's like itfeels like Scarlet Hansen's character was older and
that she had a more old soulin that, whereas here, I'm pretty
sure Kayley Spinning was older and Scotanswered when she filmed this, but she

(41:02):
just has a younger look to her, and the way she plays it is
much more childlike and innocent to herthat yet it feels like there's a larger
age gap almost between between her andElvis and this than there was in Lost.
I think it's just down to probablythe writing in the in the acting
as well. And I mean JacobElodie, you know, he's you know,

(41:25):
we've obviously talked about him a lotwhen we did the sort of podcast
episodes on euphoria and stuff like that, but he's probably sort of the man
at the moment at the at thispoint in time, you know, he's
just Saltburne has come, has beenout for a couple of months, but
it's also hit prime just before Christmas, and people have opinions. It's impossible

(41:46):
not to have opinions. There's memes. It's just one of those movies where
it's like, yeah, you know, it's like, I think, what
was it? I saw a letterbox review? Was it? So?
He Ryan and Brian and he said, Jacob already is so hot on this
movie it drives everyone else insane.So and I mean, he certainly has

(42:08):
a presence, you know when youneed someone with a presence, if you
know, in order to play Elvis. And Sophie Copplo was looking around had
been recommended Jacob, so she methim in a restaurant and apparently just all
it really took was, you know, they had a good conversation about the
film anyway, but it was justseeing the reaction of young girls to his

(42:28):
presence in that restaurant. Have youseen the video of his of her daughters.
Yeah, absolutely brilliant, isn't it. Yeah, and it's like,
no, we're doing we're shooting here. Maybe afterwards it's like, yeah,
it's just like, oh, mom, what's the point of you being a
director if we can't meet Jacob Aloradiand you've for God's sake? But yeah,
no, I thought he was fantasticin this, and yeah, it's

(42:50):
he is. He is a realsort of star as well. And I
think, yeah, he's he's onlygot a bright future ahead of him as
well. I think it's it's verydifferent to what he's I mean, actually,
I guess actually in some ways Iwas about to say they're all different.
Actually all of his roles do havea similar quality and that people are

(43:10):
just essentially drawn to him, youknow, in the roles, you know,
Saltburn. You know, he drawspeople into his world, you know,
to obsessed with you know, Elvis'speople just are drawn to him.
And I guess actually, you knowa lot of the girls in the Euphoria
were drawn to him, for betteror worse. Absolutely, yeah. And
I wasn't blown away by his performancereally in Saltburn, and you know,

(43:36):
it's not a film. I'm onthe opposite side. I didn't think it
was a great film at all,really, but you look at him and
you go, oh, he's there'ssomething there. But having seen I think
it ha been a bit more cynicalabout him had I not seen Euphoria.
And he stands out so well inthat showing amongst a lot of you start
to see it now obviously the gapbetween Euphoria Season two and three is growing

(43:59):
and growing by the day. Andso much of these actors, you know,
from him to Sydney Sweeney, toZendaya to mod Appetite, who I
saw on stage a couple months ago, like there are going on to bigger
and bigger things and so on,And I just thought he was fantastic in
that. And you can imagine maybeas good as the show is in my

(44:19):
opinion, I know, it's certainlygot its flaws and detractors. You can
imagine a lot of them were justwouldn't be complaining if the show just sort
of had comes to a natural conclusion, especially after the sort of Angus Cloud's
passing as well and so on.It's just it's so exciting to see that
that kind of cast that we've kindof followed from quite the early days,
not the Kissing Booth certainly, butfrom those early episodes of Euphoria go on

(44:44):
to great things. And I likehow I think one of the things that
seemed to go against the film wasthem not being able to use the the
Elvis music. I mean, that'show movie ended up with him Booby where
Sony, We're like, oh,you're not going to get the rights to
the Elvis picture the Elvis music.Hey, we don't care about problematic age
gaps whatever, but you don't getthe music. Okay, forget it.

(45:05):
It's back for sale, which obviouslyhints it why there was a delay and
song. But I think even justlike something like that has just made sure
that you know, Elvis was sortof in the kind of the back.
It was never the music wasn't goingto overthrow things, and even just these
songs, their songs now you associatewith Priscilla, Priscilla in the movie as
opposed to Elvis's songs kind of beingthe influence over it, which I think,

(45:27):
again just little, small touches thatI think worked in its favor.
Yeah, no, because you know, you've been talking earlier about the fact
that he's saw on thirty five miland how that medium worked for the look
and the feel of the film.It did feel like a sort of timeless
period classic. Yet you gotta balanceit out against the fact that the soundtrack,

(45:51):
you know, as Sophie Coppla does, you know, she will take
songs from any period of time andput them into a film if it works
for the film, and you knowshe does that here. You know,
there was a mixture between sort ofclassic music of the era and sort of
modern, sort of pop songs laidover to sort of I guess give people

(46:13):
a glimpse into well, this iswhat a teenage girl would have potentially been
sort of listening to, and ithelps connect the teenagers of the day with
the teenage Bascilla back in that similarto Marie Antoine, And it's crazy when
you think about it, like whatyou think of that film did with like
modern pop songs, and so whenpeople were like at the time, like,
oh this is really unique, Idon't know how we think about something

(46:36):
like this. And it works reallywell here where again the songs are are
quite timeless in a way. Thereare songs of the time, not of
the time, and I think that'sit's such a good touch as well.
And again just sort of brings itsown unique soundtrack and it's not just a
period piece, but like what youassociate sometimes with Sophia Coppola, a bit
of a tone piece as well.Yeah, and you know, I've just

(47:00):
really got that. We ran outa time at Q and A because I
did have a question lined up,but it was basically going to be asking
about two very specific needle drops,and one for me was at the moment
where Elvis proposes to Priscilla, theyuse the main theme from Terrence Malick's bad
Lands, a film which features aman in his twenties mid twenties absconding with

(47:28):
a young girl in her teens,where things do not work out particularly well
for the couple and I thought thatwas a rather pointed reference to the potential
doomed fatality of their relationship, Andthe other one was the fact that this
was the second twenty twenty three filmwhere a woman's identity, independence and agency

(47:50):
are threatened by an insecure man whostruts around to the disco version of also
Spraque Zastuda, the other one,of course, being Barbie. That song
was used as Ken suddenly discovers theworld of patriarchy, which is more than
just about horses. So there yougo. You've blown my mind that So

(48:13):
I guess that sort of brings usto the final sort of moments in the
film. I'm not gonna spoil itfor you, but you know it's I
think it's it's common nods that thecouple did divorce, and the final moments
feature Priscilla leaving Graceland to the tuneof Dolly Partons, I Will Always Love

(48:35):
You. Yes, people, WitneyHouston, do not actually do it.
First. It was a Dolly Partonsong first. Even if you watch The
Bodyguard you'll have heard the Dolly Partonversion first. But Sophia talked about the
fact that this song is not onlya liberating one, from you know,
using a woman's voice, but thefact that Dolly Parton refused to sell Elvis

(48:57):
the rights to this song. Hewanted to record it himself, but she
refused to sell on the rights andkept her hold, which was a very
wise choice on her because you know, she would have made a pretty penny
full in The Bodyguard as well.So I thought that was a nice sort
of bookend to the story as well. I mean, what did you make
of those sort of final moments.Yeah, that's where it felt just that

(49:17):
little bit rushed and so where maybeyou know, I'm often of the things
that some of these things can bea bit bloated, self indulgent, but
you know, I felt this filmI wouldn't have complained with an extra twenty
odd minutes or so, where itjust felt that sort of time of sort
of things unraveling, sort of thatfat Elvis era was just like, oh
this this seems really interesting. Ohwe're kind of racing through it, racing

(49:38):
through it, and you know,we it felt like it was really well
paced, sort of the beginning andsort of that really middle strong part of
their relationship and everything was going onwith it. But then as it got
towards those final years. It reallyI think it felt like harder to grap
over like where are we in thissort of timeline and giving it kind of

(49:59):
it's full juice, which was alittle bit frustrating and just kind of really
stopped it being you know, whatcould have been a five at five for
me. Yeah, yeah, no, I totally get that. Yeah.
The sort of the final act isI guess a little bit rushed in terms
of there's maybe not you, maybeneeded a couple more moments of her coming

(50:22):
to that realization, whereas this whatit does really feel like it reminds me
remind me of the film Closer,where Natalie Portman's just sort of goes to
at the end, I don't loveyou anymore. It's over, goodbye,
and that's it, and that's it. She walks off, and that's the
relationship over. It's just like,yeah, I don't love you anymore.
It's over, goodbye. But youknow, I mean I did, I

(50:45):
did really that final moment. ButI can I totally understand where you're coming
from. For me, this isa four star film as well, and
yeah, it's potentially just slightly,ever so slightly rushed during the final act.
But if you are looking for moreof sort of like fat ill this
than Vegas phase, then definitely stickon Baslerman's elvis in the next couple of

(51:05):
days and you'll get your fill ofthat. Expect absolutely, Yeah, I'm
looking forward to to that. Yeah. So that brings us to the end
of our Piscilla episode. Thanks forjoining us for the first one of twenty
twenty four. We've got a greatyear ahead. Like you said, there'll
be a double bill towards the startof February with the sone of interest in

(51:27):
the Iron Claw, but before thatwe'll try and drop a couple more episodes
as we catch up on the likesof Earth Mama and Maducid Deluxe as well.
But thanks as always for joining uson the twenty four project, and
here's to a great twenty twenty four