Soundtracking With Edith Bowman

We are very excited to be bringing you the first of a series which we hope will be a  long-running addition to the podcast - namely the Soundtracking Everyman Film Club. This new project will see Edith get together with people who bring you a film ... their film ... and have a wee natter about it before or after a screening, and then share conversation with everyone who couldn't be in the room on that day in pod form. On this occasion, it's Emerald Fennell talking about the music of Saltburn, which is incredibly important to the movie's narrative drive, and an element, as you'll discover, she thinks an enormous amount about. As a bonus, Edith also caught up with her composer Anthony Willis, in an interview you'll get to hear after the conversation with Emerald.

We recently had Charlotte Regan on the podcast to discuss her brilliant debut feature, Scrapper, and we're following up on that episode with her composer Patrick Jonsson. Scrapper tells the story of 12-year-old Georgie and her estranged father Jason, who comes into her life for the first time after her mother dies. Told very much from Georgie's perspective, the music had to communicate her innocence and wonder - and also the childlike way in which she is dealing with her grief.

We have a double-header on our latest episode of Soundtracking - so busy are we at the moment. First up are writer/director Molly Manning Walker and songwriter, producer, DJ and composer James Jacob - who goes by the professional soubriquet of Jakwob. They join Edith to discuss Molly's powerful and important debut feature, How To Have Sex, which has already scooped a major award at Cannes. How To Have Sex deals with that very particular rite of passage for girls of a certain age, as three young female friends travel to Crete in search of sun, sand and, possibly, you know what ... We also have writer / director Kitty Green to talk about her psychological thriller, The Royal Hotel, which sees two backpackers land jobs in a remote Australian bar, with events uncoiling thereafter in a truly gripping and suspenseful fashion.

We are taking a deep dive into the music of Top Gun: Maverick in this bonus episode of Soundtracking, as editor Eddie Hamilton and music editor Cecile Tournesac join Edith to discuss their work on the film. Needless to say, this conversation features plenty of spoilers, but it's not one you'll want to listen to unless you've seen the film, so wonderfully granular is the detail they go into. They give us the stories behind the original songs, the needle-drops, the score and the sound design - and also serve up a rather lovely easter egg for you to look out for next time you watch the movie. Trust us when we say it is a BRILLIANT chat.

We can't quite believe our luck to have David Byrne, Chris Frantz, Tina Weymouth, and Jerry Harrison of Talking Heads to discuss the remastered re-release of their seminal concert film, Stop Making Sense. These guys are so lovely and humble and, of course, groundbreaking and brilliant, it really is a pleasure to bring you the interview - with a little taster of the live recordings from Jonathan Demme's film thrown in for good measure.

Our latest guest on Soundtracking is Garth Davis, who makes a welcome return to discuss his psychological sci-fi thriller, Foe. Based on the book by Iain Reid, it stars Saoirse Ronan and Paul Mescal as a couple whose life is turned upside down when a stranger arrives at their farm to tell them one of them will be sent to a space station, while the other will be left in the company of a robot. Unusually, Foe is scored by 3 composers, so find out right here what Garth had in mind with that decision ...

It's three for the price of one this week, as Edith is joined by writer / director Philip Barantini and composers Aaron May & David Ridley to discuss their collaboration of Phil's BBC television spinoff of his film, Boiling Point. Featuring many of the original cast, the episodic format allows Philip and his co-writers to flesh out the characters, as you can see by checking out the whole season on the BBC iPlayer right now.

Our latest guest on Soundtracking has scored one of films that has most profoundly affected Edith in recent years, such is the gravity of the subject matter. 20 Days in Mariupol is genuinely harrowing, but also genuinely necessary and important documentary, charting in quite heart-wronching fashion the besieging of the Ukrainian city during the Russian invasion. Jordan Dykstra composed the music for the film, and we're thrilled he took the time to talk to us.

As Edith has noted before, our latest guest on Soundtracking has effectively created his own genre of naturalistic musical cinema, in which the songs featured feel organically rooted in the landscape of the narrative. John Carney is the man who brought us Once and Sing Street - and now blesses us with Flora And Son, which you can watch on Apple TV and in selected cinemas. It tells the story of a mum struggling to deal with her rebellious son, whose fortunes start to change after she rescues a beat-up guitar from a skip. John enlisted the help of Gary Clark of Danny Wilson fame for the original songs and the score, and you'll hear examples of his music throughout the conversation.

Our latest guest on Soundtracking was also one of our very earliest, when he joined me to discuss his brilliant contribution to the Star Wars franchise, Rogue One. And Gareth is back with The Creator - which he wrote and directed, and is a quite simply extraordinary addition to the sci-fci canon. It's hard to tell you too much about it, aside from the fact that it puts a hugely compassionate twist on the classic battle between humans and machines and artificial intelligence. Oh yes, and it's scored by our old friend Hans Zimmer ...

We continue to celebrate independent film on Soundtracking this week in the company of Prasanna Puwanarajah and Niall Lawlor - respectively director and composer of Ballywalter, a bittersweet comedy set in the Northern Irish village, which counts among its stars Seána Kerslake and Patrick Kielty

She's back, with that infectious laugh of hers, and we couldn't be more delighted. Hildur Guðnadóttir is one of my very favourite composers of film music, and she joins me to discuss Kenneth Branagh's latest take on Agatha Christie, A Haunting In Venice. Darker and more claustrophobic than the previous two Poirot mysteries he directed and starred in, A Haunting In Venice sees the Belgian detective investigate a murder while attending a Halloween seance at a palazzo in the floating city.

Continuing our recent theme of featuring low-budget British films on Soundtracking, our latest guest is Charlotte Regan, writer and director of the superb Scrapper. Featuring a remarkable central performance by 11-year-old Lola Campbell, Scrapper tells the story of Georgia, who is forced to confront a new domestic reality when, among other things, her estranged father turns up out of nowhere. The film is scored by Patrick Jonsson, who was kind enough to share some of his as yet unreleased cues for us. 

For the second week running, we're celebrating a low budget British film. Last week, writer/director Neil Maskell and composer Andy Pettitt joined me to discuss Neil's Klokkenluider, while this week Ryan Hendrick is here to discuss his horror thriller, Mercy Falls. Set in the Scottish Highlands, it sees a group of friends head off in search of a long lost cabin, only for tragedy to strike and carnage to ensue. Mercy Falls is scored by Stephen Wright, and Ryan was very kind to furnish us with a couple of his yet unreleased cues.

Director Neil Maskell & Andy Pettitt of Shortwave Set fame join Edith to discuss Neil's writer / director debut, Klokkenluider, which also saw Andy make his first foray into writing screen music. It's a cracking chat with two pals who are simply thrilled to have collaborated on a film together.

We have something slightly different for you on our latest episode of Soundtracking, as I'm joined by producer Matthew Metcalfe and journalist and organised and cyber crime expert Misha Glenny, author of McMafia and Dark Market. They joined me separately to discuss Billion Dollar Heist, a documentary about one of the most daring cyber heists of all time - the Bangladeshi Central Bank Theft

Our latest episode of Soundtracking is with composer Paul Saunderson, who has scored the BBC documentary Earth, which is available to watch now on the BBC iPlayer. Hosted by the wonderful Chris Packham, the show explores some of the most significant moments in our planet's history, from asteroid bombardments to extreme changes in climate to the collision of continents, using groundbreaking science and effects. The fact there are informed recreations of seismic events in the past affords Paul plenty of scope to push the sonic envelope - almost as if he were scoring a science fiction film rather than a traditional documentary. The results are magnificent.

What a joy to welcome Ludwig Göransson back for a fourth time to reflect upon the incredible music he provided to Christopher Nolan for Oppenheimer. And in person, too!

In a change to our billed interview with Ludwig Göransson, we're putting out Edith's chat with Kathryn Ferguson. Kathryn directed the Sinéad O'Connor documentary, Nothing Compares, which very specifically concentrates on the tumultuous period in her life between 1987 and 1993, during which she became a global sensation, but also the victim of a character assassination in the media, having spoken out against abuse in the Catholic church. In a cruel twist of fate, Kathryn and Edith spoke just three days before Sinéad passed away, but - with Kathryn's blessing - we thought it timely that we share the story of the beautiful, powerful and illuminating film.

Recorded before the SAG strike began, our latest guest on Soundtracking is the legend that is Christopher Nolan. Criminally, it's the first opportunity Edith has had to speak to him on the podcast, so it was an absolute joy to welcome him on to discuss Oppenheimer, which sees him reunited with our good friend, Ludwig Göransson.