Some late news just in And I mean late. Sorry about this. Perhaps I was working too hard on my book to notice when the BBC released this survey last month, but it was summarised in the new Amnesty magazine, which I was reading this morning, so in case you missed it:
Nearly a third of people worldwide back the use of torture in prisons in some circumstances. Although 59% were opposed to torture (the crazy bunch of bleeding-heart liberal bedwetters!), 29% thought it acceptable to use some degree of torture to combat terrorism.
More than 27,000 people in 25 countries were asked if torture would be "acceptable if it could provide information to save innocent lives." Perhaps I shouldn't be shocked that such a large percentage of those polled were totally up for a bit of nail-pulling and electrode-application, but I am.
All of the countries surveyed have signed up to the Geneva Convention.
Israel has the largest percentage of those polled endorsing the use of a degree of torture on prisoners, with 43% saying they agreed that some degree of torture should be allowed. Other countries that polled higher than average levels of acceptance of the use of torture include Iraq (42%), the Philippines (40%), Indonesia (40%), Russia (37%) and China (37%). Even the United States could only rustle up 36% support and they love a bit of extaordinary rendition. I'm pleased to say that only 24% of Brits think torture is the only language they understand.
Meanwhile opposition to a bit of creative pushing and shoving in hoods is highest in Italy, where 81% of those questioned think torture is never justified. And they only drink cappuccino for breakfast. No wonder Morrissey's so happy in Rome. What a nice bunch of people.
For the record, respondents were asked which of the two statements most closely matched their own:
1. Clear rules against torture should be maintained because any use of torture is immoral and will weaken international human rights standards against torture. 2. Terrorists pose such an extreme threat that governments should now be allowed to use some degree of torture if it may gain information that saves innocent lives.
It's a bit of a loaded question, as questions in surveys often are. (If you had to choose between losing a leg or voting for Gordon Brown which would you choose?) But when it comes to something like torture my instinct would be to err on the side of caution. It's a pretty depressing read the Amnesty magazine, but this item really made me sit up and take notice, as if perhaps someone had attached some electrodes to me, which would be fair enough wouldn't it? Where do you draw the line, eh, torture approvers? "Some degree of torture"? What are the guidelines? And isn't this a bit like supporting some of the death penalty?
OK, you've read about Michael Richards and his tirade of racist abuse at a Los Angeles comedy club a couple of days ago, which was being filmed and is now all-too-available on YouTube. It's worth watching it, for blood sport, but we must remember, I guess, that it's out of context of his freewheeling show. The reaction of the audience says it all though.
In the late 80s I saw boxer Terry Marsh attempt to re-launch himself as a stand-up comedian at a comedy club in Stratford, East London. His material was sexist - and crucially, unoriginal and unfunny - and he was booed offstage. The rules had changed and he hadn't noticed. This Michael Richards thing is different, and more complex, which is not my way of apologising for racist abuse. Here's his apology on Letterman. It's long and uncomfortable but worth seeing.
Notice how Seinfeld tries to stop the audience from laughing. It's not funny, but they are in Letterman mode and faced with Kramer. It's a sad spectacle, in some ways sadder than the tirade itself. Here's a man, loved by millions, who seems not to be a racist, but who either "played" with racism without any grace or clear signal that he was doing so, or else has racism deep in his soul that came out in "the rage". What do people make of it?
Richards clearly has an awful lot of goodwill in the bank, but he's certainly pissed a lot of it up a wall. Remember when Billy Connolly made his Ken Bigley joke? It wasn't filmed, but it got out, and he was a pariah for a few days. My guess is that he weathered it. But that was a planned, deliberately sick gag. This was an outburst, a seeming peek inside the recesses of the mind of a much-loved figure. Can he weather it? Does it matter? His good work is, after all, in the public domain, in box sets in so many homes. More to the point: should one of comedy's jobs not be to shock to a degree, to operate outside polite restrictions? Richard Herring offends with some of his material, and deliberately (albeit not in a racist direction), and it's the comedian's right to fail in front of an audience. (This is a broader discussion, because in Richards' case, it seems he just lost it.)
Super Size Someone Else It was, of course, Tony Hancock who uttered the above line when faced with a frothy coffee in The Rebel, but his words echoed back at me for different reasons today during a pleasant spin around Kingston in the crisp not-quite-yet-winter air, the perfect accompaniment to which seemed to be a sit-down coffee in a coffee shop. Good timing - weekday, thirst setting in after the traditional lunch hour - even meant comfy seats by the window. The outlet chosen, for its location, was Costa Coffee. I've been boycotting Starbucks ever since reading and obeying No Logo, so I was glad to find one of the smaller multinational food conglomerates to drink a decaff latte in. If I'm ever tempted into one of these places at all - and it tends to be an occasional West End treat, as soya milk is not the perfect dairy substitute - I choose EAT or Caffe Nero. As such, I was not au fait with the lingo in Costa. I ordered two large coffees, since a sitdown requires a leisurely amount of hot drink. The choice is between "primo", "medio" and "massimo" (Costa did use to be a family-run Italian firm before Whitbread swallowed it up and turned its expansion into a military operation with maps and pins), so that's what these were: massimo. Perhaps they should be labelled "fucking massimo."
You might call it good value for money, but the massimo comes in a bowl, rather than a mug. It actually has two handles on either side! You're looking at a pint of coffee. (Thank God for the froth on the cappuccino, although to cover it with sprinkled chocolate, you're getting a bar's worth.) I had to carry these cups to the table individually, for fear of breaking my wrist. Clearly, I should have checked the size of the cup before ordering, but this amount of coffee is insane, and would, I feel sure, cause great merriment in the cafes of Rome or Milan or Florence. After all, I wanted to drink it, not wash my clothes in it.
For a European chain, Costa has certainly taken American greed to its heart. Drink a massimo cappuccino and obey the law of the funny-shaped asymetric saucer and add one of the disgusting cakes or pastries and you're halfway to obesity in one sitting. It's little wonder this country is grinding to a halt.
sidebar In 2001, I was dispatched by the Observer to write a piece about "futurologists", that is, people employed by big companies to predict future trends. It was the last piece I wrote for the paper, after a good run of doing stuff about films and telly, because I interviewed three futurologists at great length, and they only used one of them. This is the cut and thrust of national newspapers, but I couldn't be arsed. Anyway, one of them was Robert Clewley, 45, whose job title at Whitbread was, ahem, Director of Planning & Insight. (Such pretentious nomenclature was nothing compared to the self-consciously wacky types I met at Orange, whose chief strategist was called Executive Vice President of Strategy, Imagineering & Futurology, although on the door of his office it simply said "Future Boy". He told me that AOL had a Vice President of Cool and a Director of Bringing in Cool People, and he wasn't joking.) Anyway, Clewley, a man in a suit in a boardroom who usually worked in Dunstable said, "My team's role is looking at the future, and what's fundamentally changing in our industry. It's a combination of science and crystal ball-gazing. I interpret our customers' needs for the future. I would describe myself as a veteran of the hospitality industry. I've worked in strategic planning in the UK and overseas for Whitbread over the last 15 years. I'm one of the old boys of the industry."
It was fascinating to meet him, and gain an insight into the corporate world, where how you say something is as important as what you say, until the line on the graph points downwards and you are sacked. A world alien to me. I asked him what an average day involved. "Managing my team, and through them developing better ways of listening to and understanding our customers. It's also a key part of my job to identify where people will be spending their leisure time in the future." I asked him if he was any good at his job. "I'm very good," he replied. (There was another man, from corporate affairs, in the room with us, checking that he gave the right answers.) "I'm passionate about my job. It's not all about analysis, a lot of it's about intuition, being able to smell the right answer." And there was his soundbite.
I only bring Mr Robert Clewley up because Whitbread had recently bought out Costa, and its acquisition represented job satisfaction for him: "We identified an opportunity in the marketplace, and bought a relatively small business from a very proud Italian man, Sergio Costa, who wanted it treating as far as possible as a family business. It took a long time to persuade him, but now we see Costa in 250 sites across the UK, and I can walk past every one of them and say, I started that!"
They now have over 300. Starbucks have 500 in the UK (out of a staggering 11,784 worldwide). Caffe Nero - est. 1997, so no family tradition there - have 270. EAT have 58, mostly in London. It was only after leaving Costa in Kingston, feeling like a bucket of milk on legs, that we noticed a small, organic coffee shop serving fresh smoothies. I'll go there next time. Naomi Klein will be proud.
She died too young Thanks to Paramount, it is currently possible to gorge daily on classic episodes of Man About The House (1973-6) and George & Mildred (1976-9), and if one thing shines from this unashamed wallow in sitcom's glory years, it's Yootha Joyce. A tragic figure, which is doubtless why Morrissey immortalised her on the sleeve of Ask, she died aged just 53, in 1980, of hepatitis, linked to her ongoing battle with the booze. I don't have any more details of her illness, so let's not dwell on the rumours - needless to say, she was a comic genius, and her onscreen partnership with Brian Murphy (who's still with us, and was apparently at her bedside when she died) remains one of the all-time greats. And any tribute would not be complete without a salute to Johnnie Mortimer and Brian Cooke, who wrote every single episode of both series - and a large portion of Robin's Nest (1977-81), which ran concurrently with G&M. Astonishing. Especially after having slaved over six episodes of a gag-based audience sitcom and nearly perished under the weight of it. To those that served: a sherry, a new hat and one of Mildred's pursed-lipped glares.
Bond goes to the gym I was, like the rest of the world (barring some purists), looking forward to Casino Royale. Saw it last night at a special Radio Times screening, and all round, it's a tremendously well-made series of action sequences. And a game of cards. I'd be interested to know from poker players how realistic this long, drawn-out section was. I admire the filmmakers for taking Bond in a new direction, rather than just attempting to recapture old glories with a new actor. Directed by Martin Campbell (who made such a regenerative job of Goldeneye), whose handling of the bit on the cranes in Uganda is impeccable, this is a brutal kind of Bond movie, with a lot of blood and some really tactile punch-ups. Daniel Craig's Bond is a right bruiser. He is seen with cut knuckles and scars all over his face, not to mention blood all down his evening wear. There are very few witticims or stingers. No sign of John Cleese as Q. (That was a brief fling, it seems.) And without spoiling anything, there's a homoerotic torture scene that takes the 12A certificate to new levels of violence that I'm not too sure about. The female lead, Eva Green, is charismatic and sexy, but she's not there to provide the eye candy.
That'll be Daniel Craig. He's been pumped up to a ridiculous degree, as seen now iconically emerging from the surf in his powder blue trunks, and ogled in the way Ursula Andress and Halle Berry were there to be ogled. Does this make this the first gay Bond movie? If so that would be very modern. But I fear that Daniel Craig might be the potential weak link. He looks tough, brooding and armour-plated, with a touch of enigmatic in his blue eyes, and his repeated penchant for married women ("You're not my type" "Smart?" "No, single") increases the roguishness. But would it be disloyal of me to say that looking like a body builder at worst, and a window cleaner in a Diet Coke advert at best, does not become the international superspy? For a start, how is he to blend in like that? He's bursting out of his shirt!
I still enjoyed the film. But we shall have to see whether another performance like this can carry the franchise. I've always liked Craig as an actor, ever since Our Friends In The North, and he's lent class to many a Hollywood film (if not the terminal Tomb Raider). I applauded his casting as 007 - although I preferred the idea of Clive Owen - and have no problems with him being different. I am no Fleming or even Connery purist. I'm just not 100% sure we're on the right track yet.
Oh, and the film's 20 minutes too long. But aren't they all?
Doherty gets bottled Put the hype down! The Arena bottle was bound to wash up on the litter-strewn shores of Pete Doherty at some point. Ashtar Alkhisiran spent six months on the road with Britain's most famous junkie poet and this film - premiered at the Electric Proms, because home video footage of Doherty mumbling and smoking really needs to be experienced on a big screen - is the dog-eared result. I was unconvinced of Doherty's genius before watching it, and I am equally unconvinced after watching it. Rarely has a film been so in thrall to its subject. From experience (cf: the humiliation of Max Carlish) we know that Doherty is a volatile and fickle soul, so the only way to get close enough to him to stick a camera in his face is to blend in with his unquestioning entourage. This, Ashtar Alkhisiran seems to have done. The result, as well as the seemingly endless rambling, incoherent monologues from Pete Doherty about Being Pete Doherty, is the occasional glimpse of something warmer and more "private" (and I use the word in context of being filmed round-the-clock): Doherty the unfit father with his three-year-old son Astile, holding him upside down like other fathers do, then leaving to go on tour with Babyshambles while Lisa Moorish, the mother, implores him to get clean. One wonders if his current girlfriend is as insistent on these matters.
Clean is not a word you'd apply to this lost soul. His flat is a disgraceful, graffitied hovel. Ah, the romance of being unwashed, something most people grow out of when they leave college. But then, Pete is the type of 27-year-old who draws pictures with a syringe of his own blood, another strangely teenage act. His wide baby face simply adds to the impression of a boy dressed in an old man's hat and an old man's string vest. So what insights did this meandering, absorbed film offer? That Doherty is a bit useless, onstage and off. That Doherty wishes his dad liked him. That Doherty's drummer seems to hold the band's itinerary together singlehandedly (they have no management) and is thus an example to all drummers. That there is a journalist called Tanya Gold, who seems to think she knows an awful lot about Doherty, despite or perhaps because of the fact that she sounds fresh out of a girls' boarding school adventure. Oh, and that Doherty knows some bits of poetry.
The film began with a quote from Baudelaire, smeared across the screen as if in marker pen (yeah, punk rock!), and used this as a linking device with further gobbets from Byron and Dickinson. There's no doubt that Doherty is an intelligent, sensitive fellow (he's got 11 O-levels and 4 A-levels), and wrote some bracing songs with Carl Barat in the Libertines, but at the end of the day, the creative spark has been put out by drugs. Why do we continue to adore this man? The adoration is what keeps him on drugs. Would we still be making documentaries about him if he hadn't taken up with the most photographed woman in the world? (We saw Kate, side of stage, at one point, occasionally getting up to squeak into a microphone. What a surreal life she leads.) What this film, or any film, needs is some explanation as to why we are still here. Tanya Gold, the only media commentator on offer, couldn't quite nail it, beyond the fact that the tabloids are waiting for Doherty to die, like Truman Capote apparently, even though Capote's reasons for wishing execution on Smith and Hickock were far more complicated than the Sun's death wish.
In opting to step back and allow Doherty to explain himself, slurred and confused, Arena has merely added to the baffling myth. It's porn for Babyshambles fans, of which I accept there are many, although most of them under 25, which has to be key. (A generation in search of a figurehead.) Some of his followers should have been given a voice. You had to clutch your head and stick it out till the end to see anything truly joyful - Doherty and his de facto female tour manager singing along to High And Dry by Radiohead as they were driven away from a triumphant (ie. he turned up) Brixton show. A genuinely arresting sequence, held in camera for too long, and therefore just long enough to see some light in this condemned boy's soul. Also, at least we had a decent song at last.
Quick plug A website called The British Sitcom Guide is a growing catalogue of British sitcoms, with news and a forum attached, and I must say, they've been awfully supportive of the British sitcom Not Going Out. I've been answering a barrage of questions for them about the show, and Grass should you have the slightest interest in such a thing, they've posted up the answers in full. It should also be noted that, for comedy fans, those who post of the forums seem not to be bitter and twisted, which is unusual.
Man to hang in 21st century: Margaret Beckett offers to pull lever I don't think there's much of a debate to be had about whether Saddam Hussein was a bad man or not. From Halabja to the Kuwaiti oilfields, he's wrought destruction on his own people and his neighbours, not to mention the environment. Yes, he should be put on trial. But should he be executed for his crimes? I don't think so. Lock him up, take away his liberty, remove him from the life he once enjoyed, but don't hang him. What good will that do? It makes the society that hangs him no better than the dictator being hung. I've never been keen on an eye for an eye. Anyway, so what if I'm against the death penalty. That's just my personal opinion, and I'm bloody glad this country abolished it 40 years ago. What worries me is that politicians in this country seem happy to endorse Saddam Hussein's execution, while remaining against capital punishment. How does that work?
George Bush hailed the Saddam verdict as "an important achievement in the path to a free and just and unified society." Well, he would. Thirty-eight out of 50 states in America still have the death penalty, with 60 people being executed in 2005, and in Texas alone, 378 since 1976 (good work, fellas, keep 'em coming), so why would he suddenly become squeamish about killing a man? Tony Blair, also a Christian, dodged the question at at press briefing. He was asked repeatedly by Adam Boulton of Sky News about whether he approved of Saddam being executed. He declined to answer. "So you're opposed to his execution?" pressed Mr Boulton. The Blair temper snapped. "Adam, excuse me, that's enough. I will express myself in my own words, if you don't mind." He had already stated that the government is "against the death penalty, whether it's Saddam or anybody else," but wriggled out of condemning it, saying, "What I think is important about this is to recognise that this trial of Saddam, which has been handled by the Iraqis themselves and they will take the decision about this, does give us a very clear reminder of the total and barbaric brutality of that regime." Yes, yes, we're not arguing about that - do you think he should be hanged by the neck and swing from a gibbet?
The foreign secretary Margaret Beckett laid out the government line in an interview with the BBC, saying it was "right" that Saddam should face Iraqi justice. "It is absolutely the case that we do not approve of the death penalty, never have and always try to persuade others not to use it. However, this is the verdict of the Iraqi court, it is a matter for the government of Iraq."
I think Saddam should be given special treatment for mental incapacity. He keeps saying he doesn't recognise the court.
Russell Brand leaves 6 Music: hardly anybody notices Much wringing of hands greeted the arrival of Mr Russell Brand at 6 Music in April, assisted for one week only by Karl Pilkington, and ever since, by Trevor Lock and Matt Morgan. The message boards have been alive with hyperventilating support and table-thumping dissent ever since. His style of broadcast - eloquent and yet barracking, self-aggrandising and yet 'umble, self-centred and yet sidekick-dominated - was not to the tastes of all, and the fact that he is a comedian appears to some to be a crime on a music station, even though 6 Music launched with a Sunday show hosted by Sean Hughes, has employed Dave Gorman and Bill Bailey as deps, still boasts Phill Jupitus at breakfast after four years and positively encourages Richard Herring to come in and be funny on it. What, I think, rubbed a certain section of the listenership up the wrong way were associations - the Big Brother connection, the tabloid currency - in other words, snobbery. His Sunday shows, which I always listened to, as I was upstairs preparing for my own, ranged from hilarious to a shouting mess, a by-product of freeform radio. I met Russell and he was both charming and quiet. What a surprise: a comedian whose public persona is just that.
Through little fault of his own (he was always a team player, trailing ahead to other shows and bigging up 6 Music on air), he also rubbed up some of the other presenters by being granted the sort of carte blanche to do whatever the hell he liked that many of us would like. But let's be fair, three hours of "anarchy" at the weekend is one thing, "anarchy" every day would soon get boring. I felt aggrieved that what was once a podcast comprising the best bits of 6 Music (including, yes, myself and Richard Herring) suddenly became the Russell Brand podcast. But its success speaks for itself. I concede that point.
I saw Russell onstage at the Albert Hall in March, before he started at 6, and he was a terrific turn. He pretty much repeated his routine at the Secret Policeman's Ball, and was grudgingly agreed (by some) to have been one of the highlights of an uneven night. Seeing him ply his craft makes all the difference. The biggest controversy, again not of his making, came last month when an upturn in 6 Music's fortunes were attributed to the Russell Brand Effect, a phrase used in the official press release in a quote by an "insider", whoever that may have been. It certainly gave the press their angle. You can see why anyone at 6 Music not connected with the Russell Brand show might feel that their hard work was being somewhat diminished at this point. The defence will be that you have to put a spin on the RAJAR figures, or else Media Guardian won't be interested. A 40% rise in listeners year-on-year isn't in itself a "story." Russell Brand is.
Here are the numbers. In September 2005, 6 Music's RAJAR figure was 285,000 listeners (a weekly average calculated using their rubbish "diary" system - but hey, it's the only system we've got and we must live and die by it). In December 2005, it was 354,000. In March 2006, it went up a little bit to 359,000. In June 2006, the first quarter to feel the impact of Russell Brand, it fell slightly to 354,000. However, in September 2006, our most recent audit, it shot back up to 400,000. This is a fine figure, one we're all proud of at 6 Music. Year on year, this does represent an increase of 40%, an increase that was attributed to "the Russell Brand effect." In cold hard facts, the "effect" was an increase of something like 12%, which is still worthy of note, just not quite as spectacular.
Nobody's disputing the seismic ripples Russell created while he was with us. It couldn't have been better timed. Pretty much the moment he arrived, his dalliances with, among others, Kate Moss, landed him in the tabloid spotlight, where he has remained ever since, to the point of his departure from 6 Music actually making the papers, initially and speculatively reported by the likes of the Daily Star as a sacking. Which it wasn't. He was merely moving onwards and upwards, with two shows on Radio 2 to get his teeth into. It's no secret that 6 Music and Radio 2 share a controller; such deals are bound to take place. His work at 6 Music is done. He's ruffled feathers. He's created a stir. He's brought new listeners to the network, some of whom might even stick around, and he's put a podcast with our name on it at the toppermost of the iTunes chart. Not bad for six months' work. Whatever you may think of him, and whatever you thought of his 6 Music show, he earned his money. The tabloids, though, have created a potential monster, and Russell will have to take extremely good advice to ride this tide of unwanted salacious interest into a long-term career in his chosen field, that of comedy.
As you can see from the webcam picture above, he was pre-recording the last hour of his last show while I was doing the Chart on Saturday. (He made no secret of this fact on Sunday.) I passed him and his gang coming out of the BBC as I went in on Sunday, and I wished him well. There was something exciting about having him in the building. I hope the Radio 2 message board people leave a few bones after they've done with him. I suspect he can handle it.
Night of a thousand stars Well, one. But it was a fabulous night anyway. TCM Classic Shorts, now in its seventh year at the Times BFI London Film Festival, is a short film award that dishes out kudos, prize money and valuable exposure to makers of films that are not long. This is my second year hosting the bash from the stage of NFT1 at the National Film Theatre, and once again, it was a blast. I was actually worryingly calm before taking the stage at 6.30, having been incredibly nervous last year as it was my first time, and I was taking over the gig from Richard Jobson, who'd done a sterling and sincere job the year before and I couldn't hope to match his gravitas or his form (him being a proper filmmaker and all), so I tried a "lighthearted approach". I like the responsibility of hosting to a full auditorium of sympathetic people who are prepared to give my jokes the benefit of the doubt and, at one point in my five-minute introductory speech, a ripple of applause. I live for that ripple. It's quite flattering having a big slide of your name behind you too. But tonight wasn't about me, it was about the makers of the five shortlisted films, which can be seen over the weekend on TCM (check listings for details). I presented second and third prizes, but Imelda Stauton was secured to come up and present the big one, which was terrific. Last year, they got Helen Mirren, who I was able to socialise with in the green room beforehand and become her best mate. Unfortunately Imelda snuck in mid-ceremony so I only got to meet her onstage and briefly afterwards. She seemed very nice, and was, aptly, short. (Look at me turning into a luvvy.)
I liked the winning film, Silence Is Golden, written and directed by Chris Shepherd, whom I coincidentally met once at a wedding, although the most striking of all the five shortlisted films had to be Cubs, a poignant and grisly story about urban fox-hunting. Assuming, as it says, no foxes were harmed in the making of this film, I liked its message. If a single fox was even prodded or perturbed, I withdraw my patronage.
TCM are nice people to do business with and the event was once again a well-oiled machine. They throw a decent party too, at the Cafe Royal this year, although I was too sober to really throw myself into it, and because of where I was standing, in a doorway, the waiters with the nibbles kept sweeping past with the platters held high above their heads, so I couldn't reach them. There was a man in the toilets giving out hand towels and expecting a tip. I hate this. I gave him a pound, as I reasoned that any man willing to stand in the gents all night, Cafe Royal or not, deserves some money.
There was some nail polish in the goody bag which stank.
I don't have any photographs from last night yet, so here are some from last year, which I've only just seen myself:
Me, onstage. Me, looking admiringly at Gurinder Chadha, director of Bend It Like Beckham. Helen Mirren, onstage. She heckled me during my speech, so I told her to shut up, which was exciting. Me, sharing a joke afterwards with Michael Caton-Jones, director of Shooting Dogs and Basic Instinct 2.
Perhaps I'll get my hands on the photos from last night in a year's time. For more details of the weekend and the winners, visit TCM.
STOP PRESS! Here they are.
Me, beforehand, sitting between TCM boss Alan Musa and LFF Artistic Director Sandra Hebron Me, onstage (note: exciting new transparent lecturn) Me, laughing hard at something said by John Hayes, director of third prize winner Venom, even though he said that some ants were harmed in the making of his film Me and Imelda Staunton (I hope that vein on my head is alright) Me, Imelda and winners Chris Shepherd, producer Maria Manton and the boy who was in their film Silence Is Golden