Edgar Wright’s Top 1000 - Part The Third - Let’s Get Weird

I’ve been trying to come up with themes to group these together. There are plenty of themes that come up throughout the list but I’m watching them in such a haphazard order that it’s hard to find decent groupings for the ones I’ve watched so far. I’m going to go with “weird stuff” for these ones as it seems like as good a theme as any.

Mumsy, Nanny, Sonny And Girly (1970)
Dir. Freddie Francis/ Dur. 101 min

If we’re grouping films under “weird stuff” then this more than fits the bill. This is exactly the sort of cult gem that I was hoping to uncover as I worked my way through the list. It’s a bizarre little tale of a twisted family (brother and sister Sonny and Girly along with their Mumsy and nurse-like figure Nanny) who kidnap vulnerable men in order to make them into “New Friends” who must play The Game with them or risk being “sent to the angels”. It’s very British and the sort of twisted kinky stuff that a nation used to repression does very well. It leaves a lot unsaid - how did the family come to be this way, are they actually related, is there some sort of deeper history between Mumsy and Nanny (the latter of whom sleeps at the foot of the former’s bed) - all of which works in its favour. At times, it feels like a pervier, more murderous version of something like The Avengers or The Prisoner - that kind of heavily stylised faux Britishness that the 60s seemed to revel in. Enjoyed this one, a good find on the list.

Berberian Sound Studio (2012)
Dir. Peter Strickland / Dur. 94 mins

I watched Strickland’s latest film, In Fabric, last year and enjoyed it’s homage to 70s style and bonkers over-the-top plot about a killer dress. This is a more suggestive affair, although still in keeping with the affection for 70s cinema, in which Toby Jones plays an English sound engineer flown out to work on an Italian slasher film; a fact that was not made clear to him at the outset. It’s a slow burn of a piece and the film he is working on is only alluded to in terms of the sound effects and dialogue that is being recorded for the film. It’s one of those “slow descent into madness” films where the lines between reality and fantasy begin to blur. Jones is, as always, on top form and Strickland’s sense of style is undeniable. I enjoyed it but, of the two of his films I’ve seen, think I preferred In Fabric.

I was going to cover another film here but, given that it’s directed by Brian de Palma and there are a number of de Palma films on the list, I think I’ll save it for that one. See? This is where it gets tricky in trying to group stuff together. Anyway, that’s your lot for now. Next time? More stuff.