:00:10. > :00:15.This programme contains strong language.
:00:15. > :00:22.On the review show tonight, Tarantino's back, with all guns
:00:22. > :00:25.blazing. Yes! Is Django Unchained's
:00:25. > :00:30.reinvention of the western too bloody to stomach. Prime Minister
:00:30. > :00:36.Prime Minister returns to our screens after 25 years.
:00:36. > :00:41.What kind of leak? About joining the euro. But is sir Humphrey
:00:41. > :00:46.really a match for Malcolm Tucker. The Vikings return to Scotland,
:00:46. > :00:52.this time bringing treasure to Edinburgh.
:00:52. > :00:57.And teenage angst about obesity in California with Navel Gazing, and
:00:57. > :01:07.Lincolnshire with Fatou. I've got the biggest screw up in the history
:01:07. > :01:07.
:01:07. > :01:13.of screw ups for a parent. Joining me tonight is playwright
:01:13. > :01:16.Denise Mina, writer and class cyst, Natalie Haynes, and journalist and
:01:16. > :01:23.broadcaster, John Sergeant. Quentin Tarantino has written and directed
:01:23. > :01:28.some of the most violent and provocative films of recent years,
:01:28. > :01:32.think Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction and Inglourious Basterds. In his
:01:32. > :01:36.latest film he has turned to the theme of slavery in mid-19th
:01:36. > :01:44.century America. He has generated more controversy by daring to
:01:44. > :01:49.tackle such an historically sensitive suggest as entertainment.
:01:49. > :01:55.Be warned, there will be blood. Django Unchained is a tribute to
:01:55. > :02:02.the spaghetti western. His theme is the brutality of slavey. What is
:02:02. > :02:08.your name? Django. Then you are exactly the one I'm looking for.
:02:08. > :02:13.Jamie Foxx plays the film's hero, a slave who is freed by the
:02:13. > :02:17.flamboyant Dr King Schulz, a German bounty hunter played by Christoph
:02:17. > :02:21.Waltz. The state place as bounty on a man's head, I track that man, I
:02:21. > :02:26.find that man, I killed that man, after I kill that man I transport
:02:26. > :02:32.that man's body back to the authorities, sometimes that is
:02:32. > :02:39.easier said that done. The suave Schulz trains Django as his partner,
:02:39. > :02:44.and they have a killing spree across the Deep South, hunting down
:02:44. > :02:51.wanted hen. Django's mission comes to the freeing of his wife,
:02:51. > :02:56.Broomhilda. The unlikely duo infiltrate a Mississippi plantation,
:02:56. > :03:03.owned by Calvin Candie, played by Leonardo DiCaprio. I heard you been
:03:03. > :03:09.telling people them dingos ain't no good, and nobody is selling
:03:09. > :03:13.anything worth buying, what makes you such a dingo expert. Django
:03:13. > :03:17.Unchained may be Tarantino's most violent movie yet, which is
:03:17. > :03:21.certainly saying something. So does the film present an important
:03:21. > :03:27.narrative about America's relationship with slavery? Or does
:03:27. > :03:32.telling the story with a mixture of graphic violence and comedy fail to
:03:32. > :03:37.give due weight to this important historical subject. What you said
:03:37. > :03:41.was that this was my world, and in my world you got to get dirty, so
:03:41. > :03:47.that's what I'm doing, I'm getting dirty.
:03:47. > :03:51.Natalie, we have these amazing opening titles, technicolor,
:03:51. > :03:54.spaghetti western, and then at the heart of it, rather deep thing
:03:54. > :04:03.about slavery. How did you find that juxtaposition? It worked
:04:03. > :04:06.really well for me. I'm a big Tarantino fan, I have seen all his
:04:06. > :04:11.films. Generally when anybody says about something that deals with
:04:11. > :04:14.things in a pop cultural way, comedians and Tarantino for sure,
:04:14. > :04:17.people are dealing with the subject and not taking it serious because
:04:17. > :04:21.they are frivolous, that person making the criticism is kind of an
:04:21. > :04:27.idiot. He hasn't brought out a film since Cannes 2009 when Inglourious
:04:27. > :04:31.Basterds came out. He spent four years working on this. To suggest
:04:31. > :04:35.he's not giving it his undivided professional attention would be
:04:35. > :04:40.folly. If you are suggesting it is so serious nobody can make a joke
:04:40. > :04:44.anywhere near it, I don't feel that way, I think he gives an incredibly
:04:44. > :04:48.respectful treatment in what he describes as the Holocaust of
:04:48. > :04:50.slavey, and as it happens in his type of film doesn't seem
:04:50. > :04:56.disrespectful. You mentioned Inglourious Basterds, there are
:04:56. > :05:00.similarities, that was, in a way, a revenge fantasy about the Jews
:05:00. > :05:04.getting revenge on the Nazis, here it is the turn of the slaves?
:05:05. > :05:07.extraordinary the way he can take the subjects and say I know it
:05:07. > :05:17.isn't historically accurate, but wouldn't it be great if in
:05:17. > :05:19.Inglourious Basterds, a Jew West, and a black -- Jew ess and a
:05:20. > :05:24.blackman kill the whole of the Nazi high command, and you think,
:05:24. > :05:28.wouldn't it. And this, slavery, couldn't be worse or a more serious
:05:28. > :05:33.subject we all need to k and he thinks, wouldn't it be great to
:05:33. > :05:36.have Super Black killing all sorts of people in the southern states of
:05:36. > :05:41.America. And suddenly you find yourself thinking, yes, instead of
:05:41. > :05:49.saying no, no, you say, yes, and I like that bit. That thought it was
:05:49. > :05:54.terrific, I really enjoyed it. has got flack for it, Lee low?'S
:05:54. > :05:57.Annoyed, stop the press, he's always annoyed. He said this was
:05:57. > :06:01.disrespectful to my ancestors. There is a place for saying that.
:06:01. > :06:05.You are absolutely right, until these stories are in a populist
:06:05. > :06:10.medium, they won't become familiar. You can only make films about
:06:10. > :06:14.slavery that are serious and show how unremittingly grim it is, it
:06:14. > :06:17.won't become a national story that people are aware of. It is amazing
:06:17. > :06:21.that there aren't more stories about slavery, part of the reason
:06:21. > :06:27.is it is put in the bracket of gigantic tragedy, and you are not
:06:27. > :06:30.allowed to deal with it, except in a ref rent way, and it has to be
:06:30. > :06:34.historically accurate. Actually the historical truth of it is, it is a
:06:34. > :06:37.tragedy and carried on being a tragedy and they are still living
:06:37. > :06:40.with the legacy today. The films are not the truth, films are
:06:40. > :06:44.stories, and it is a great story. You are talking about an evening
:06:44. > :06:49.out. You end up, although it is enormously long as a film, you
:06:49. > :06:52.think, God that was incredible. And, it is in a cinema, it wouldn't work
:06:52. > :06:57.so well on television, and you're back there in enjoying films like
:06:57. > :07:00.when I was a kid, going to the movies thinking this is really
:07:00. > :07:04.something isn't it. Even the statistics about the number of
:07:04. > :07:11.people who went through one plantation in a year. In some ways
:07:11. > :07:16.he is much more informative than a really dour miserable documentary.
:07:17. > :07:22.It is different from everything the cow boys and Indians of John's
:07:22. > :07:26.childhood given the level of violence? I'm not sure if the end
:07:26. > :07:30.of Kill Bill 1 was as bloody, that might be the only rival. They are
:07:30. > :07:34.paying tribute to the old cowboy films. There is a great moment I
:07:34. > :07:40.don't want to give away, where somebody make as play on the Clint
:07:40. > :07:43.Eastwood film, I won't spoil it is near the end. This man adores films,
:07:43. > :07:47.he has gone through every single film of the period that used to
:07:47. > :07:52.excite me, when I saw those titles, just like the technicolor titles of
:07:52. > :07:56.my youth, I thought, yes! How does he know? Because he has gone back
:07:56. > :08:00.through all this stuff. He has absorbed it and become obsessed by
:08:00. > :08:04.it. He's a purist film maker, everyone talks about how can he do
:08:04. > :08:08.the pulp stuff, he's always celebrating it t hardly anyone is
:08:08. > :08:13.consistently writing brand-new screenplay, not remakes, not
:08:13. > :08:17.adaptations, based on a book or comic or something else in another
:08:17. > :08:22.field, he loves film, he makes films about how much he loves film.
:08:22. > :08:27.I was watching Shane two weeks ago, everyone gets shot with one bullet
:08:27. > :08:30.to the torso and that is them dead, there is no blood, it was really
:08:30. > :08:35.disturbing. Watching this with all the gore. What is interesting,
:08:35. > :08:41.there is two types of violence in the film, there is the almost
:08:41. > :08:45.cartoon limbs spurting, and all this slightly Monty Pythonesque
:08:45. > :08:49.stuff, but then there is the violence in how the slaves
:08:49. > :08:54.themselves are treated, that is really horrific. The trouble is, at
:08:55. > :09:00.the end of it you think, gosh, why am I accepting all this, there are
:09:00. > :09:03.scenes of torture, so it is not just a matter of oh it is all
:09:03. > :09:08.stylised violence, it is not, it is very unstylised some of the
:09:08. > :09:11.violence. You do feel, shouldn't I be more shocked, shouldn't I think
:09:12. > :09:15.this is reprehensible. That is a kind of awful trick that Tarantino
:09:15. > :09:19.has played on us. Because some of these things you do wonder, it is
:09:19. > :09:24.all very well if you are over 18, you are allowed to watch it, but
:09:24. > :09:30.some people over 18 thinking that the answer lies in the gun, do you
:09:30. > :09:34.really want them to see films like this? That does worry me. And in
:09:34. > :09:38.Reservoir Dogs, he cuts off the things, it is not the gun relevant.
:09:38. > :09:41.I say the when the issue of violence comes up in the film, I
:09:41. > :09:51.think pain hurts big time in Tarantino, it is not casual, it is
:09:51. > :09:51.
:09:51. > :09:55.not a beat like in the first Total Re-call, I didn't see it,
:09:55. > :09:58.everything here hurts. The moment where she is shot in the leg, it is
:09:58. > :10:02.nasty, and not casual. The big killing sprees look casual because
:10:02. > :10:05.there is so much of it, but they are very theatrical rather than
:10:06. > :10:09.anything else. It gives you the impression that if you have a
:10:09. > :10:12.serious problem, a really serious problem, what do you do, you start
:10:13. > :10:16.killing people. That is undeniably the way the narrative works. That
:10:16. > :10:21.is true of all westerns. That is true of every single western ever
:10:21. > :10:26.made. If you have the biggest gun you will probably win?
:10:26. > :10:30.shouldn't we now worry about all these things. I should have worried
:10:30. > :10:35.about it more n the cinema I'm watching this, why did I go along
:10:35. > :10:38.with it. It is the massacres caused by these sorts of films, if you
:10:38. > :10:41.think about something like The Wild Bunch, you would have had these
:10:41. > :10:47.sorts of massacre, we are talking about the massacre that happened,
:10:47. > :10:50.you would have had those sort of massacre happening then. He's
:10:50. > :10:54.referencing Peckenpal, this is not a new thing. You have a mentally
:10:54. > :10:57.ill teenager living in a house with machine guns, that is more likely
:10:57. > :11:07.to be a cause. Everyone is talking about the influence of the media,
:11:07. > :11:08.
:11:08. > :11:12.that is so transential, stop having machine guns with guns. They
:11:12. > :11:14.delayed the opening because of the shooting. In the states it is so
:11:14. > :11:17.controversial to say stop having machine guns throughout the house,
:11:17. > :11:21.they didn't want to have the conversation. He got very angry in
:11:21. > :11:25.an interview when he was asked about it. In another controversial
:11:25. > :11:29.aspect of the film, picked up almost as much as the violence, is
:11:29. > :11:34.the use of language in the film, what did you make of it? I went to
:11:34. > :11:40.America in 1963, then it was a very, very, there was apartheid in the
:11:40. > :11:43.southern states. I couldn't travel with the black maid in the house I
:11:43. > :11:48.was staying at, she couldn't travel alongside me in the station wagon,
:11:48. > :11:51.she had to sit in the back. In the buses in New Orleans, you sat in a
:11:51. > :11:58.different place if you were black and white. I know what it was like
:11:58. > :12:03.then, of course people used the word "nigger". We are talking about
:12:03. > :12:09.the 1960s, this is 100 years before, and that was the way people
:12:09. > :12:17.referred to them, "them"! That happened. For him to be criticised
:12:17. > :12:22.for that, I didn't think. I thought, yes, this is absolutely correct.
:12:22. > :12:27.you think it was necessary? In the context of this film, I absolutely
:12:27. > :12:30.do. The character of Calvin Candie, Leonardo DiCaprio's character,
:12:30. > :12:35.utterly villainous, this won't do great Oscar business, because there
:12:35. > :12:39.isn't a single nice white American in the whole film, it is over two
:12:39. > :12:43.hours long, it won't matter for the foreign press but it will for the
:12:43. > :12:50.axe cad me. He's a brutal and poisonous person, it would be
:12:50. > :12:56.strange if they did that. In The Patriot, where Mel Gibson who have
:12:56. > :12:59.employees who happen to be black and everyone pretends there isn't
:12:59. > :13:05.slavery. It would be wrong not to use language that was hateful in
:13:05. > :13:10.its time. It sounds less vile than in Pulp Fiction. You find that word
:13:10. > :13:16.so loaded you wouldn't comfortably use it. Of course I wouldn't, I
:13:16. > :13:24.wasn't alive when it was in the 1960s. People think it is giving
:13:24. > :13:28.currency to the word it is being normalised. In an historical drama?
:13:28. > :13:32.In contemporary language you would be uncomfortable. I sat through
:13:32. > :13:35.Pulp Fiction and I thought it was awesome. I find it troubling when
:13:35. > :13:41.people themselves are watching it as a teenager and think they are
:13:41. > :13:48.the same as Samuel L Jackson, no. You wouldn't say the word "nigger"
:13:48. > :13:53.in the studio. No, I wouldn't. if you are sitting discussing the
:13:53. > :13:57.film and they say it 90 times. say Broomhilda 90 times.
:13:57. > :14:02.Let's move on to a very, very different subject, the Civil
:14:02. > :14:08.Service where people don't use rude words at all. It has come in for a
:14:08. > :14:13.lot of flak from the Conservatives this week for being unfit for
:14:13. > :14:17.purpose and change. Even Tony Blair said time had passed them buy. It
:14:17. > :14:20.is topical that we saw the return of the old favourite, Prime
:14:20. > :14:25.Minister Prime Minister, a sitcom which David Cameron admitted
:14:25. > :14:31.contained elements of truth. The characters are familiar, only the
:14:31. > :14:35.faces and channel have changed. Weak willed Prime Minister Jim
:14:35. > :14:39.Hacker, is played by weighing weighing weighing, and Henry
:14:39. > :14:45.Goodman is the adviser Humphrey Appleby. UKTV Gold is home to a
:14:45. > :14:49.series that used to be one of BBC Two's biggest hits. Sorry I'm late
:14:49. > :14:53.t has been a terrible day. particular reason? You have read
:14:53. > :14:58.about the cabinet split. Yes. you have seen what happened to the
:14:58. > :15:02.FTSE, and the pound and the inflation forecast? Yes. And the
:15:02. > :15:07.rising unemployment figures? Yes. How many particular reasons do you
:15:07. > :15:11.want. The political sitcom began in the 1980s as Prime Minister Prime
:15:11. > :15:16.Minister, starring Paul Eddington as minister of affairs, and Nigel
:15:16. > :15:20.Hawthorne as his permanent secretary. According to the writers,
:15:20. > :15:24.the programme showed MPs for what they really were, self-serving
:15:24. > :15:27.people, concerned with fame, re- election and keeping their expenses.
:15:27. > :15:33.Anybody else have an opinion, quickly? Prime Minister I don't
:15:33. > :15:38.know very much about it, but it does sound a serious upheaval.
:15:38. > :15:42.Rather expensive. A rather big move. I'm very much in favour of the
:15:42. > :15:46.proposal myself. Me too. Absolutely! The brand was revived
:15:46. > :15:50.in 2010 as a stage play, now turned into a six-part series. Jim Hacker
:15:50. > :15:55.is now leading a coalition Government, and hopes to solve the
:15:55. > :16:05.UK's financial crisis with cash from a transEuropean oil pipeline.
:16:05. > :16:10.
:16:10. > :16:16.Here's the route. That looks pretty straight forward! With audiences
:16:16. > :16:23.now more used to Malcolm Tucker's foul-mouthed outbursts in The Thick
:16:23. > :16:30.Of It, does the silver-tongued sir Humphrey make an impact, or will it
:16:30. > :16:35.nestle inbetween the reruns of The Good Life and Open All Hours?
:16:35. > :16:41.John, you were at the recordings of these episodes, do you think it is
:16:41. > :16:45.worth reviving. Given we have had so many other satirical programme,
:16:45. > :16:49.particularly The Thick Of It? think so, but I would, wouldn't I.
:16:49. > :16:52.I was the warm-up man for the series, whenever the cameras
:16:52. > :16:57.stopped and they moved the fuorn tue about, I would talk to the
:16:57. > :17:01.audience and tell them stories, funny, I hoped! I got very much
:17:01. > :17:06.involved in it. I just thought it was terrific, I must say. For me, a
:17:06. > :17:14.lot of these arguments that they put over, all right, the format is
:17:14. > :17:18.as old as it was, it's 30 years old. It is a classic sitcom. I worked in
:17:19. > :17:24.my first BBC job in comedy, I was in the same studio, gosh, more than
:17:24. > :17:29.30 years ago, with Alan Bennett, performing in that way. The way
:17:29. > :17:32.that works now does seem hopelessly old fashioned. But, compared with
:17:32. > :17:37.the stage version, it is interesting how on television
:17:37. > :17:40.people can listen, the reparity is much faster, and the actual
:17:40. > :17:45.problems they are dealing with, of the permanent officials and the
:17:45. > :17:48.politicians, is exactly the same. It rings very true to me. I spent
:17:48. > :17:52.most of my professional life working at Westminster, and to me
:17:52. > :18:02.this is it. You learn more from this than you would from The Thick
:18:02. > :18:02.
:18:02. > :18:07.Of It. Reggie Maudling says he regards Prime Minister Prime
:18:07. > :18:11.Minister as more documentary than comedy, is it relevant? I do think
:18:11. > :18:15.it is relevant f it had been me, I would have, perhaps, kept the
:18:15. > :18:20.character of Sir Humphrey, and changed the others. The trouble is,
:18:20. > :18:23.the best case scenario, the absolute best case scenario, if
:18:23. > :18:26.they nailed every single performance, it is karaoke, you
:18:26. > :18:29.will do a reasonably good impression of people who gave
:18:29. > :18:33.definitive performances of definitive characters to our
:18:33. > :18:37.national pop culture. For me, at least, Henry Goodman is probably
:18:37. > :18:41.the most successful in doing a reasonable job of being Nigel
:18:41. > :18:47.Hawthorne, but David Haig is too shouty for me to play Jim Hacker.
:18:47. > :18:52.To me Jim Hacker is still Paul Eddington, venal and terribly
:18:52. > :18:59.haunted, which is what makes him tragic. The aggression of Haig
:18:59. > :19:04.doesn't work for me, it is a theatrical performance. People
:19:04. > :19:09.often change the characters and different actors play different
:19:09. > :19:13.parts. They are so well known and they are iconic. What about
:19:13. > :19:18.Shakespeare's plays with actors constantly playing different parts.
:19:18. > :19:21.There is a lot of time between them playing it and then a second lot
:19:21. > :19:25.came in. Can't we get over it? We do know the characters well, we
:19:26. > :19:29.know the characters of lots of plays. How will that actor, what
:19:29. > :19:32.will he bring to the part what will she bring to the part, that is
:19:32. > :19:35.rather nice, isn't it, I rather like that. How much do you think
:19:35. > :19:39.they have updated it when it comes to the subject matter, the Prime
:19:39. > :19:43.Minister is head of a coalition, but not that much play is made of
:19:43. > :19:53.that? I didn't like this at all, I thought it was very stagey. I
:19:53. > :19:54.
:19:54. > :19:58.didn't like Prime Minister Prime Minister, I didn't like - Yes
:19:58. > :20:01.Minister, and I didn't like others things. There is a documentary
:20:01. > :20:04.after the first episode, it became so asolted with the Thatcher
:20:04. > :20:09.Government that -- associated with the Thatcher Government they
:20:09. > :20:13.wouldn't give it a chance. I'm sure it is eloquent about the dynamics
:20:13. > :20:16.between a minister and their permanent civil servants, I'm sure
:20:16. > :20:20.that is all very eloquent, but it is a one-trick pony, they are all
:20:21. > :20:23.trying to get one over on each other. It is very stagey to the
:20:23. > :20:28.studio audience. I'm sure because it comes from a stage play. They
:20:28. > :20:32.make a joke and look to the audience for a laugh and move on.
:20:32. > :20:37.If The Thick Of It is still too heavy going and intercut for people.
:20:37. > :20:41.This is a nice, gentlele political comedy. These characters are nice,
:20:41. > :20:44.The Thick Of It characters are all horrible? I don't think so. They
:20:44. > :20:52.are funny, this wasn't that funny. There were jokes, you could see
:20:52. > :20:55.them coming from four miles away. Those are the jokes I like! Is this
:20:55. > :20:58.why you moved from comedy to journalism? I don't know, that's
:20:58. > :21:02.the trouble. You are looking at it through different eyes. I spent a
:21:02. > :21:06.lot of time at Westminster. A lot of people are fans and will watch
:21:06. > :21:10.it and love it. It is not The Thick Of It, and it is very gentle.
:21:10. > :21:15.characters are amusing, the way that they deal with the subjects
:21:15. > :21:18.are incredible in the sense that you are getting a perpect
:21:18. > :21:22.description of the relationship, however obscure, between the civil
:21:22. > :21:26.servants and the politicians, and some of these subjects, these
:21:26. > :21:29.actual issues, it is not The West Wing, because we prefer jokes
:21:29. > :21:32.decribing our politics. That is interesting, the way that we do
:21:32. > :21:37.treat politics on television in a different way from other countries.
:21:37. > :21:41.The West Wing, Borgen is back on our screen. Very serious, but also
:21:41. > :21:45.a more benign view, I would say, generally, of politicians, than we
:21:45. > :21:50.tend to do? It is true, both the Americans, and deorn certainly the
:21:50. > :21:54.Danes, as we know extensively, if they don't necessary approve of all
:21:54. > :21:58.politicians, you can still write a piece which suggest a real
:21:58. > :22:06.reverence and respect for the political process itself. It seems
:22:06. > :22:13.to me that taste is rather less than that, when we have a political
:22:13. > :22:18.drama, there is always skullduggery, nobody is good. Why do a million
:22:18. > :22:22.people switch on to Borgen in Danish with subtitles. Because it
:22:22. > :22:27.is awesome. It is interesting that we have not, as a country, we some
:22:27. > :22:30.how can't cope with this, where as little Denmark, twinkles on with
:22:30. > :22:35.perfectly sensible people doing things, their there are marriages
:22:35. > :22:39.falling apart and so on. They are not intrinsicly evil. There is
:22:39. > :22:43.something about us that -- intrinsically evil, there is
:22:43. > :22:49.something about us that wants to think of our politicians as corrupt
:22:49. > :22:53.and evil? It is about shambolic political process, you must say is
:22:53. > :22:56.true. And in itself is quite funny because of. That maybe it is the
:22:56. > :23:00.British sense of humour. I wonder if it is. I would argue with John,
:23:00. > :23:05.I think it does have moments where I think it is absolutely spot on
:23:05. > :23:07.about the political process. Omnishambles has passed into the
:23:07. > :23:11.political discourse. There was one episode where the hapless
:23:11. > :23:14.Government minister came up with an initiative about fourth sector
:23:14. > :23:19.Pathfinders, I could almost seen that written in some policy paper.
:23:19. > :23:22.A lot of it was, the only thing is, The Thick Of It was very much of
:23:22. > :23:26.that sort of Alastair Campbell, Tony Blair period. The trouble
:23:27. > :23:32.about that, it was wonderful, of its time, and think did they really
:23:32. > :23:35.do this and behave badly, did they, in fact, spend a an awful lot of
:23:35. > :23:39.time being concerned about how it was presented and there was mayhem
:23:39. > :23:45.behind the scenes, but in the front it was all concerned about how it
:23:45. > :23:49.will work. That was correct. There is something much more timeless and
:23:49. > :23:55.effective about that Yes Minister humour, that's all. People can
:23:55. > :24:00.judge for themselves by looking at Yes Minister, which continues on
:24:00. > :24:05.UKTV Gold on Tuesday at 9.00. January can be a tough month,
:24:05. > :24:10.navigating our way through all this terrible gold weather, detox and
:24:10. > :24:14.dieting as well. Perhaps that's why weight loss and memoirs have come
:24:14. > :24:24.together this month on screen and on the page.
:24:24. > :24:29.
:24:29. > :24:34.This week saw the launch of E4's new drama, My Mad Fat Diary, it
:24:34. > :24:43.tells of the battle against weight and mental breakdown. The 15th of
:24:43. > :24:48.July 1996, something had to be done. One, past through the mystical
:24:48. > :24:56.orgasam gateway, two, see someone naked, three, kiss someone. Must be
:24:56. > :25:03.human. A different teenage perspective on body image and self-
:25:03. > :25:09.loathing, comes in Navel Gazing, the debut work of blogger, Anne H
:25:09. > :25:11.Putnam, Ann was 17 years old and 20 stone in weight, when she underwent
:25:11. > :25:17.gastric bypass surgeon at the same time as her father, the story
:25:17. > :25:21.begins before the operation. Ann was a young, overweight girl in all
:25:21. > :25:25.George Osborneia, facing daily struggle, both emotional and
:25:26. > :25:30.physical. This time it is a swimsuit. "I spwend down and grab
:25:30. > :25:35.the straps of my suit, I pull down, trying to make it as fast as
:25:35. > :25:40.possible. The suit takes a second to move, once it does it sweeps up
:25:40. > :25:47.my body as a tidal wave, pushing mounds and rolls of fat out of its
:25:47. > :25:50.way. When I put the straps into place, it digs into my flesh ".
:25:50. > :25:56.Those scenes were sort of difficult to write, because I had had to go
:25:56. > :26:02.back there. Which, you know, I don't do very often. I do think
:26:02. > :26:07.that your brain tries to protect you from your own bad memories, the
:26:07. > :26:13.book isn't all bad memories, but I didn't want to lose that immediacy.
:26:13. > :26:17.Despite losing seven stone from the gastric bypass, Anne then undergoes
:26:17. > :26:24.cosmetic surgery twice, hoping to achieve the mythical perfect body
:26:24. > :26:30.in her mind. Instead, she begins to understand her problems run deeper.
:26:30. > :26:33."Sometimes I hear myself talking to God about the thoughts going
:26:33. > :26:38.through my mind about my body, sometimes I want to say shut the
:26:38. > :26:45.fuck up, it is so boring, if I can't find a way to control my body
:26:45. > :26:48.to my will, I have to do my mind, I have to get on with my life."
:26:48. > :26:52.People ask how do you write a personal story without thinking
:26:52. > :26:55.about the world's response, I never thought the world would see it. I
:26:55. > :26:59.wrote this book for me. At the same time it is comforting and
:26:59. > :27:07.validating to know that people are relating to the story. People from
:27:07. > :27:10.all different walks. Do you think this is purely a memoir, or does it
:27:10. > :27:15.have literary merits as well? couldn't stop reading this book,
:27:15. > :27:17.there is quite a lot to object to, she's very open, she tells you
:27:17. > :27:24.things about herself you don't necessarily know, but she can
:27:24. > :27:28.really write. I couldn't stop reading it, it was a compulsive
:27:28. > :27:31.read. It is half way between a blog and a book, she tells you very
:27:31. > :27:35.personal things, that you might find in a blog but shocking in a
:27:35. > :27:41.book. The chapter structure copies one another, which often happens in
:27:41. > :27:44.blogs, you have half an event, skreptive event, then she describes
:27:44. > :27:50.feeling really fat or being fat in the second half. It becomes
:27:50. > :27:55.repetitive after a while. I feel for her, she, you worry for young
:27:55. > :27:59.writers, because she can write. If she writes War In Peace next, all
:27:59. > :28:03.she will be asked is what weight is she. Bloggers have a short life. We
:28:04. > :28:07.are one act, and for a writer, hopefully it is much, much longer,
:28:07. > :28:10.writers traditionally hold back much more, you feel like maybe
:28:10. > :28:15.she's exposed herself a bit too much at the beginning. She can
:28:15. > :28:20.really write. I feel she has been cruelly let down by her editor, to
:28:20. > :28:25.be honest. It is true that blogs are of necessity more repetitive.
:28:25. > :28:29.If you are reading it once a week, or every few days, you don't mind
:28:29. > :28:34.hearing the same phrases over again, this book, I kept thinking I have
:28:34. > :28:39.come back off an ad break, you get a recap of what happened beforehand.
:28:39. > :28:47.You just told me this, and you used the same language. It must have
:28:47. > :28:53.been edited in America, the chapter heading is hilarious, given it is a
:28:53. > :28:58.British edition, San Francisco, California, Milan, Italy, oh, Milan,
:28:58. > :29:03.Italy, England, OK! It is imported wholesale and they could have done
:29:03. > :29:06.with a cut. Beyond the editing floor, it is painfully honest, she
:29:06. > :29:11.goes into huge detail about exact loo what has happened to her and
:29:11. > :29:16.what she feels about -- exactly what has happened to her and what
:29:16. > :29:21.she feels about? I'm not the target audience. I didn't feel like an
:29:21. > :29:24.overweight 16-year-old girl, I thought, oh for goodness sake. I
:29:24. > :29:27.was very put off by the fact that there seemed to be so much money
:29:27. > :29:31.involved. There is a lot of money involved. The parents had paid for
:29:31. > :29:35.this gastric band thing, and for her father, and this idea that
:29:35. > :29:39.travel was some how sort of impressive. It is not impressive
:29:39. > :29:43.any more. If you have money, get on an aircraft and go to Rome and all
:29:43. > :29:49.these place. But the idea that we are meant to be impressed by all
:29:49. > :29:53.this. I felt felt it was horribly American. It is not part of our
:29:54. > :29:57.culture. We don't talk about things like this. I'm not sure about that.
:29:57. > :30:01.I think people do increasingly, obesity is something a lot of
:30:01. > :30:07.people wrestle with, perhaps it is more of an issue for women than men.
:30:07. > :30:10.It is not the dealing with obesity that is problem mattingic for me.
:30:10. > :30:14.She doesn't go into depth about why she's eating or the family
:30:14. > :30:19.background. She actually says diets don't apply to her. It is hard to
:30:19. > :30:24.be sympathetic, she's a really handsome woman, there is a big
:30:24. > :30:29.picture in the back, as soon as you open it up and you think, I don't
:30:29. > :30:37.feel sorry for you. It is predicated on her getting what she
:30:37. > :30:41.want. I felt she didn't want to be thin but Carrie Bradshaw, and not
:30:41. > :30:45.just a boyfriend but a beautiful boyfriend. She goes I don't know
:30:45. > :30:54.how I got here, I thought as a human being I'm glad you got there,
:30:54. > :31:00.but as a reader I need causes. other programme about teenage
:31:00. > :31:04.obesity out on E4 My Mad Fat Diary. This is Rae Earl from Lincolnshire,
:31:04. > :31:10.with her problematic mother. Do you know...and then I said it, the
:31:10. > :31:15.worst thing I have ever said to my mum, and, as I'm feeling megaguilty
:31:15. > :31:25.any way, we might as well do the top three...Mum, Why is your bum
:31:25. > :31:26.
:31:26. > :31:30.bigger than all the other mum's? Rae Earl! Come on. I wanted a Kylie
:31:30. > :31:40.one. Maybe we couldn't afford a Kylie one. Maybe if you hadn't made
:31:40. > :31:42.
:31:42. > :31:46.dad leave we would be able to get nice things. Rachel Earl! It's no
:31:46. > :31:56.wonder I went mental is it, when I've got the biggest screw up in
:31:56. > :31:56.
:31:56. > :32:01.the history of screw ups for a parent. Go on, say it.... Rachel
:32:01. > :32:06.Earl! John, I don't imagine you are the target audience for this either.
:32:06. > :32:10.Maybe I have been softened up by Navel Gazing, maybe it worked on me
:32:10. > :32:17.and changed me. Because I found myself rather liking this. I
:32:17. > :32:20.thought that the acting was superb. I don't know, I did feel, oh good
:32:21. > :32:25.this is British. I shouldn't say that, but I felt the way it was
:32:25. > :32:29.being approached was very much more what I could be used to. Maybe
:32:29. > :32:33.because there were jokes, maybe because of the way it is described,
:32:33. > :32:36.maybe it was sort of realistic, maybe you were much closer to the
:32:36. > :32:41.character for whatever reason. You did feel you hadn't got all this
:32:41. > :32:47.American bullshit, I'm sorry, I shouldn't use that word. It is
:32:47. > :32:51.shocking! It is too late. You go for shock value throughout! Going
:32:51. > :32:56.for word after word now, that is what I felt about it. I thought
:32:56. > :32:59.this was fantastic. It is everything you want Navel Gazing to
:32:59. > :33:02.be. It is poetic, beautiful, it feels true. There is this brilliant
:33:02. > :33:05.relationship between the mother and daughter, where they are feeding
:33:05. > :33:09.each other, they are co-feeding each other. They have this big
:33:09. > :33:16.cupboard that lights up full of food you are not supposed to eat. I
:33:16. > :33:22.think even talking about, if you meet someone like Caitlin Moran
:33:22. > :33:26.about the meaning of fatness, she doesn't seem to have read Fat is a
:33:26. > :33:30.Feminist Issue, or any seminal books about what it means. This
:33:30. > :33:34.defence into women's sexuality, you have a millennia of women policing
:33:34. > :33:38.their sexuality, and all of a sudden we are entitled to it t and
:33:38. > :33:42.suddenly we are all policing one another's physicality, there is a
:33:43. > :33:46.total consistency to that history. We see that very vividly in her
:33:47. > :33:53.relationship with her mother, the mother is feeding her and she's
:33:53. > :33:59.feeding her mother. It is clearly a terribly dysfuntional relationship,
:33:59. > :34:04.in that moment where she says what she said, she's right. But they
:34:04. > :34:09.keep it unjudgmental, she loves her mother and she loves her. All
:34:09. > :34:16.through Navel Gazing, I was thinking "show don't tell", you are
:34:16. > :34:19.telling me you're sassy and smart, show me. All through this we see
:34:19. > :34:25.Rae fronting out the horrific situation she finds herself in,
:34:25. > :34:28.that is what I needed, I'm totally on her side and completely believe
:34:28. > :34:32.all these people want to be friends with you is believable, and the
:34:32. > :34:36.fact that you are fat is not defining for them, you are showing
:34:36. > :34:39.the other side of your character. It is the cusp of her being funny
:34:39. > :34:45.and then you can't bear to watch it when there is the fire alarm when
:34:45. > :34:50.she's in the change room in the bikini she doesn't want to be in,
:34:50. > :34:54.she drapes herself in the gigantic alligator? I think Natalie is right
:34:54. > :34:58.about this, you have this, she's really decribing a situation, but
:34:58. > :35:02.the message is quite clear, the message, of course, is that she's a
:35:02. > :35:06.person, if she can accept that, of course she will have friends, of
:35:06. > :35:10.course she will be one of the gang. We all know this is the case. The
:35:10. > :35:14.way it is played is if it might go wrong. She might not be able to
:35:14. > :35:18.manage it, that is a terrific, a cliff edge, isn't it, the idea that
:35:18. > :35:23.she's going to escape that dilemma because she as going to understand,
:35:23. > :35:27.unlike the other woman, I won't go there! She's going to understand if
:35:27. > :35:32.she's just herself, she has all sorts of qualities. That then comes
:35:32. > :35:36.over, and we're all relieved. Aren't we? You don't feel this is a
:35:36. > :35:42.horror story against this young woman. Very interesting in the way
:35:42. > :35:46.it is produced, a flavour of the graphic, bringing the diary to life.
:35:46. > :35:49.It is gorgeous. It is so beautifully directed. There is
:35:49. > :35:52.shots where she's having a binge, and she talks about her
:35:52. > :35:55.relationship with food, which Anne H Putnam doesn't go into at all.
:35:55. > :35:59.She talks more about her relationship with her surgeon than
:35:59. > :36:07.her relationship with food. She's eating and she gets up and shuts
:36:07. > :36:13.the blinds. It is just that absolute self-disgust. Ian Hart who
:36:13. > :36:18.plays the psychiatrist, he should be on tele, every night. And the
:36:19. > :36:24.lead, I didn't know she was a Scottish actor, she's really good.
:36:24. > :36:28.She gets more beautiful as the episodes go on, she is very
:36:28. > :36:34.beautiful. What tends to happen. sounds like we all recommend that
:36:34. > :36:42.one. The traditional image of the Vikings as wild-haired dirty
:36:42. > :36:45.savages, wearing horned helmets doing barbaric acts of pillage go
:36:46. > :36:52.back from accounts of early Christian travellers to Wagner's
:36:52. > :36:56.Ring cycle. Now a new programme about them sets out to overturn
:36:56. > :37:01.stereotypes. The national museum of Scotland is the only UK venue for a
:37:01. > :37:05.touring show of over 500 art facts from the Swedish History Museum.
:37:05. > :37:10.Through a host of treasures, including jewellery, weapons,
:37:10. > :37:13.carvings, and household items, the exhibition builds up a picture of
:37:13. > :37:18.how people from the Viking era actually lived. It sets out to
:37:18. > :37:23.dispel a number of myths, not least the true meaning of the word Viking.
:37:23. > :37:27.It doesn't denote a race but activity. Men and women would go on
:37:27. > :37:33.a Viking, which could have been a peaceful trade trip, we are told,
:37:33. > :37:37.as much as a more violent raid. The vibrant bading and elaborate
:37:37. > :37:45.metal work of Norse craftsmen, reveal in their designs connections
:37:45. > :37:51.to Britain and Ireland, and to the Baltic and as far as the Black Sea.
:37:51. > :37:57.The exhibition includes extensive finds from individual grave sites,
:37:58. > :38:01.ills straigt the lives of a wealthy woman and a child. One of the
:38:01. > :38:07.misconceptions is it was a strict male society. In this exhibition we
:38:07. > :38:11.may show very traditional "female" objects, but they tell different
:38:11. > :38:16.stories to the traditional female objects. That way we can show that
:38:16. > :38:22.the role of women was very diversified. You could be many
:38:22. > :38:32.kinds of different women, they also participated to a much larger
:38:32. > :38:33.
:38:33. > :38:37.degree in traditionally male activities. Am lets and statues
:38:37. > :38:42.show pagan rituals, honouring the Gods of Norse mythology, they were
:38:42. > :38:46.never gods of organised religion. The Vikings had well established
:38:46. > :38:53.customs relating to life and death. One of the centre pieces of the
:38:53. > :38:58.exhibition is the outline of a burial boat, recreated by the only
:38:58. > :39:04.surviving parts, the metal rivets. There is an attempt to de-horn the
:39:04. > :39:08.Viking helmet, will visitors be convinced by the new perspective on
:39:08. > :39:13.ancient warriors. Natalie, were you convinced by the new perspective?
:39:13. > :39:16.was, I liked the exhibition very much. I felt I only had a limited
:39:16. > :39:19.knowledge of Vikings, because this exhibition emanates from
:39:19. > :39:25.Scandinavia, it was an exhibition there which has travelled pretty
:39:25. > :39:29.much intact to here, and then had some bits of the national museum of
:39:29. > :39:32.Scotland's Viking collection added to it, essentially it is their home
:39:32. > :39:36.crowd. Our vision of the Vikings, I think, pretty much, we see them
:39:36. > :39:40.when they are over here, having a bit of a pillage. And then we don't
:39:40. > :39:43.really think about where they go home to. This exhibition is all
:39:43. > :39:47.about that who did the farming, who was left while they were away. I
:39:47. > :39:51.always thought of the Vikings, as you see the clothes when they come
:39:51. > :39:59.in, bland, plain colours, suddenly you go around a few corners and
:39:59. > :40:03.there are brightly coloured strings of Beads and other things. They
:40:03. > :40:07.were like the Romans. There was a number of keys, said to be the
:40:07. > :40:11.symbol of Viking women being in charge, or having a strong role in
:40:11. > :40:15.the home? That misconception of Vikings as men who come and take
:40:15. > :40:19.your stuff, is, you know, automatically excluding women at
:40:19. > :40:24.all. It is nice to see women represented at all. That is the
:40:24. > :40:29.point of the exhibition, women are represented. I found it, I wasn't
:40:29. > :40:32.quite sure what the exhibition was about. I came out and wondered why
:40:32. > :40:35.did they go travelling, it didn't answer. That it is a beautiful
:40:35. > :40:38.exhibition, there are lots of beautiful examples, as soon as you
:40:38. > :40:42.go in you start reading, you are reading all the way through. I
:40:42. > :40:47.wanted to get a book and read it and then go and see the exhibition.
:40:47. > :40:49.But, if you are interested in jewellery, there is incredible
:40:49. > :40:54.jewellery, absolutely beautiful. And for me, one of the outstanding
:40:54. > :41:00.things was the boat, the burial boat and the nails. That is amazing.
:41:00. > :41:04.It is an art exception. I thought it was an installation, it was like
:41:04. > :41:09.corn kneelia Parker art? What a great thing, you would see the
:41:09. > :41:14.rivets on a tray and think, meh! To give them a three dimensional
:41:14. > :41:18.aspect, it is like, look what you did, a wonderful moment. Our own
:41:18. > :41:24.warrior battled through to the snow and didn't get to the Viking
:41:24. > :41:27.exhibition. In general what did you think about the approach, it is a
:41:27. > :41:32.revisionist approach? Every age has to look at these things again. The
:41:32. > :41:36.Vikings were incredibly impressive in a military sense. Of course they
:41:36. > :41:41.went abroad, largely to fight and again territory. That was the
:41:41. > :41:46.tremenduously important part of their lives. And then they settled.
:41:46. > :41:51.We have got to accept, as time goes on, we will look at those things in
:41:51. > :41:56.different ways. The recent series on the dark ages, it was a
:41:56. > :42:00.wonderful series, they turned out to be full of light, and the
:42:00. > :42:06.Vikings turned out to be friendly farmers. That is a British
:42:06. > :42:10.misconception, I lived in Bergen as a kid, there is no misconception,
:42:10. > :42:15.it is typically British to say they are guys to steal your jewellery.
:42:15. > :42:20.It was lovely to see jewellery and crosses stolen and melted to make
:42:20. > :42:28.hat. They were fighters. And there was even a Buddha, to show how far
:42:28. > :42:34.they travelled and traded? Yes, some copies again of glass beakers,
:42:34. > :42:38.and it makes you understand how far the Roman reach was. Tarantino's
:42:38. > :42:44.next film, the Vikings. They had slaves, that makes sense. Good
:42:44. > :42:47.thought. I would have had a few more dates. Vikings runs until the
:42:47. > :42:50.12th of May at the national museum of Scotland and Edinburgh. More
:42:50. > :42:54.details on the website, along with everything else we have discussed
:42:54. > :42:58.this evening. Now that's almost all from us tonight. I thank you very
:42:58. > :43:03.much from Natalie Haynes, Denise Mina and John Sergeant. Next week
:43:03. > :43:12.Kirsty will be here to look at Spielberg's new film, Lyndon, and
:43:12. > :43:18.an exhibition of portraits by Manet. We leave you with a brief taste of
:43:18. > :43:28.one of Quentin Tarantino favourite spaghetti westerns, out on DVD, it
:43:28. > :43:54.