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Some of your noticed a dodgy link in our last email, to rectify that wrong, you can watch Parkinson interview Daniel Day-Lewis about ghosts here.
Many of you also noticed an update to the RecDek app that went live of late, a more exciting activity feed with bigger film and tv posters. Comment overlays, clearer star ratings. ETCETERAAaaa. A friend called me up and said “this is just generally a lot better” and I agreed with him. Then they said “I wish I had more friends on RecDek” and I said “I wish you had more friends in general”.
That’s not true, I actually said - “use the share button in RecDek” and they said “OK I will”. Just an awesome chat. And the lesson? All good things start with sharing.
Now onwards, and to the show.
Next week is bigly for RecDek, in a world first for us, we’ll have two events in two different cities, Venice, Toronto, during two different film festivals, Venice and TIFF, on the very same night, 3rd September!
If you are in either of those cities, stay close to your RecDek app over the weekend, event details will be going live verrrrrrrrry soon.
Our Venice event awaits you
Industry events are OK and all that, but what about the God damn movies? OK that’s fair, read on for some God damn movie highlights. All available to add to your watchlist in your RecDek app.
VENICE
Bugonia - Yorgos Lanthimos and Emma Stone reunite for a black comedy adapting Korean sci-fi film Save the Green Planet. Fans are quite curious how Western sensibilities will translate this very Korean story.
After the Hunt - Luca Guadagnino's thriller stars Julia Roberts as a college professor confronting her past when allegations surface against a colleague. Features Andrew Garfield, Ayo Edebiri, and a Trent Reznor/Atticus Ross score.
Frankenstein - Guillermo del Toro finally tackles Mary Shelley's classic directly, starring Jacob Elordi and Oscar Isaac. Gothic horror fans expect this to be the definitive adaptation del Toro has been building toward his entire career. Huge news.
The Smashing Machine - Benny Safdie's solo directorial debut chronicles UFC fighter Mark Kerr, with Dwayne Johnson in his first dramatic indie role in nearly a decade. Co-stars Emily Blunt. Expect extensive prosthetic transformations.
No Other Choice - Park Chan-wook's long-gestating project (announced 2009) about a middle-aged man who becomes a serial killer after job loss. A loose remake of The Ax. Moral dilemmas explored, usual good stuff.
Silent Friend - Ildikó Enyedi directs Tony Leung and Léa Seydoux in an anthology spanning 1908, 1972, and 2020. The stars likely won't share much screen time but the casting is remarkable.
The Testament of Ann Lee - Mona Fastvold directs Amanda Seyfried as Shaker leader Ann Lee, the self-proclaimed female Christ. Brady Corbet co-writes this religious historical drama expected to generate Oscar buzz.
Jay Kelly - Noah Baumbach's meta Netflix film stars George Clooney as an aging actor being honoured at a festival alongside his manager (Adam Sandler - great pairing). Clooney’s partially autobiographical exploration of fame and loneliness.
Our Toronto event awaits you
TORONTO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL
Frankenstein as well. But also…
Christy - Sydney Sweeney gained 13 kilograms of muscle to play women's boxing pioneer Christy Martin. Chronicles Martin's fight to legitimise women's boxing in the '90s alongside her struggles with addiction and abusive marriage.
Erupcja - Charli XCX stars in this sapphic romance as a British tourist who falls for a Polish florist (Lena Góra). Director Pete Ohs workshopped characters with the cast and started filming with only half a script completed.
Sacrifice - Anya Taylor-Joy leads eco-warriors crashing a celebrity gala to kidnap and sacrifice A-listers including Chris Evans' faded movie star. Romain Gavras makes his English-language debut with this action-comedy spoof of Hollywood excess.
Levers - Manitoba filmmaker Rhayne Vermette's surreal tale of a Red River Valley town where the sun stops rising. Shot on 16mm with "broken” Bolex cameras, exploring the darkness in both town and townspeople.
Maddie's Secret - John Early writes, directs, and stars in drag as a dishwasher with a secret history of eating disorders. Described as a "stunning satire" co-starring Kate Berlant and Vanessa Bayer.
California Schemin' - James McAvoy directs the true story of two Scottish rappers who pretended to be American to get signed by Sony. Based on the memoir about the duo who fooled the music industry until it all collapsed.
The Christophers - Steven Soderbergh's art world comedy pairs Ian McKellen and Michaela Coel. McKellen plays a painter whose children hire Coel's forger to complete unfinished works for their inheritance.
Literally couldn’t care less about film festivals just wanna watch something groovy this weekend?
Very fair indeed. And thank you for your honesty today.
So Richard Osman's publishing phenomenon translates surprisingly well to screen.
The Thursday Murder Club sees Helen Mirren lead an all-star cast of retirees solving cold cases from their posh retirement home. When their evil landlord (David Tennant) threatens redevelopment, mysterious deaths follow. Director Chris Columbus (Harry Potter etc) delivers polished mainstream entertainment that feels like Sunday night television. The cast relishes their roles, particularly Mirren's icy former MI6 chief. The film works best embracing a "senior citizen X-Men" concept - these invisible oldies can investigate unnoticed. For undemanding Netflix viewing, it delivers enough charm.
But it’s not out pick of the week, that honour lies with another Netflix show.
Our pick of the week…
The creator of modern classic BoJack Horseman returns with another deceptively deep comedy that'll mess with your head and your heart.
Raphael Bob-Waksberg crafts a non-linear masterpiece following the Schwoopers, an ordinary Jewish family across six decades. Episodes shuffle between 1959 and 2022, showing characters as children one moment and elderly the next, creating a constantly shifting portrait of how people grow, fail, and repeat their parents' mistakes.
What starts as rapid-fire sitcom humor - chaotic bar mitzvahs, fertility mix-ups, harebrained schemes - gradually builds into something deeper. Lisa Edelstein dominates as Naomi, the overbearing matriarch whose suffocating blend of affection and passive-aggression makes perfect sense once we meet her own difficult mother.
Bob-Waksberg calls this "small-t trauma" - no operatic darkness like BoJack but enough psychological excavation to understand why these flawed people turned out this way. The writing feat here is relentless: creating believable character arcs across decades while maintaining joke-per-minute density.
The risk is running out of material like, but for now this feels like snapshots from real lives already lived. A comedy that could theoretically run forever - and you'll want it to.
STREAMING NOW - ADD TO YOUR RECDEK WATCHLIST
Seeyalater.
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