“I thought that Covid would be the wildest time. Things have just been getting wilder” Freddie Kemp

Join the H-Hour Patron Community at patreon.com/hkpodcasts ***** Freddie Kemp returns to the H-Hour studio after three years to dive into his latest endeavors in the film industry. Kemp talks about his advisory role in the upcoming film 'Fuze,' the increasing dominance of streaming platforms in content creation, and the resilience required in acting careers. He recounts gripping untold military stories and reflects on notable war films and the evolving nature of storytelling. The discussion also touches upon the psychological impacts of military life and the intricate challenges faced by submariners. Freddie Kemp is the CEO and founder of MFS Casting Ltd, a UK-based company specializing in providing military, police, and emergency services personnel for film and television productions. https://www.mfscasting.co.uk/

This episode is sponsored by Sin Eaters Guild - sineatersguild.co.uk

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:16

Welcome back to Hey Chour. We have got Freddie Kemp in the studio today to uh to discuss everything, maybe not everything, maybe not all the secret things, but most of the stuff he's been up to since the last time he came into the Hey Hour studio, which was around about three years ago. Um be aware that so if you're new to Hey Chour and you've come here because you know of Freddie, you want to find out more about Freddie, you want to listen to Freddie speak, then uh be aware that there is a previous episode to this one called the Hey Chour Icebreaker. Hey Chour Icebreaker with Freddie Kemp. That is about 15-20 minutes long, where I asked Freddie a bunch of questions, questions which were submitted in advance of the icebreaker by patrons of Heychour, who also had the opportunity, uh certain levels of patronage had the opportunity to uh watch the live link of that interview, and they are watching the live link right now too. If you want the opportunity, then become a patron of Heych Hour. It starts from as little as a five pounds a month. The links to become a patron of Hey Chour are in the blurb of this podcast. Please do so, support the podcast. For only five pounds a month, you can support the hue. Do so. Makes me happy. It makes me happy. Do it for one month and bin it off after. I don't care, but just just start just start start somewhere. Start somewhere. Help a ginger. That's what you should do. Help a ginger. Five pounds a month. Look from the depths of the valleys in South Wales. It's for hard it's hard going. Anyway. Oh my god. Oh my god. Anyway, I need to start scripting something now. I have to do it. I have to start scripting something. Right. Freddie Kim, welcome back. Thank you very much. We are rocking and rolling. Uh the icebreaker was good. I enjoyed the icebreaker. Thank you for your questions. And um and uh especially the the first one was a difficult one, wasn't it? About reservists, standard of reservists. You are a reservist. I am reservist. Can you take that lanyard off me just while we're here? Um and but today, what's been going down? Let's talk about what's been going down. Like the three years ago, mate. You came in just after the pandemic last time. Um and I thought the pandemic would be the wildest time. Things have just been getting wilder, like just been getting wilder. Yeah. Has it been good for your industry or has it been bad? Oh god, I mean that's it.

SPEAKER_01 2:36

Yeah. Um the industry seems to be picking up, so you know, streamers have bought more and more into content creation, um, and you know, features seem to be less we're busier now than we ever have been. Long may that continue. And um some of the stories that are being told, there's a degree of history repeating. Um you think this this the story we're telling you from this particular period seems to be very relevant to what's happening in the world right now, quite alarmingly so. Um I feel that we're all just trying to do the best we can. I mean, everyone just like, you know, that's that's a tomorrow problem. I'm just dealing with what we've got right in front of us right now. Um and uh for for want of a better word, there's a to me I sent this energy of KBO, keep buggering on, just keep going. One day, one foot in front of the other. Keep what on? Buggering on. Buggering on. Yeah, it's a churchalism. Buggering on. Yeah, to churchalism.

SPEAKER_02 3:53

I mean you never heard that. Where did you first hear that expression? Were you was it growing up? Must be like keep buggering on.

SPEAKER_01 4:00

Yeah. I I forget exactly the first time I heard it, but bugger's an underused word these days.

SPEAKER_02 4:06

My parents used to use it all the time when I was younger. My dad did when I was young.

SPEAKER_01 4:09

And from a Welsh accent, it's got a particular Oh my dad's Scottish.

SPEAKER_02 4:13

Oh, well, okay. Yeah, yeah. Not that they had a Scottish accent, but he's Scottish, yeah. Bugger.

SPEAKER_01 4:17

Yeah, KBM.

SPEAKER_02 4:18

It's a good word. It is. It's like a real one of those like real miles square words when you actually learn the origin of it and what it means, you go, oh, that's a bit filthy.

SPEAKER_01 4:26

It's the kind of it's the kind of cuss you'd expect from four weddings and a funeral. It was that kind of Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Come on, Kempi. Switch on.

SPEAKER_00 4:42

Um he's thinking.

SPEAKER_01 4:48

Remembering. Who played Mr. Bean? Ronan Atkinson in uh when he's got Darling and the lieutenant uh Black Adder. Black Adder. There we go.

SPEAKER_02 5:02

Anyway, rolling back from that, right? Seeing as you were in the industry, in the industry, TV and film, the industry, the industry, right? Talking about Hugh Grant. No, I was never a massive fan of Hugh Grant, right? I felt he was quite tight cast early on for a long time. The films you were in it was entertaining, Notting Hill, you know, uh what was the one you just mentioned? Before when he's in a funeral about a boy and all this kind of stuff. And then The Gentleman Drops.

SPEAKER_01 5:36

Have you seen that film? Uh have I seen the film or have I just seen the series? I think I've just seen the series.

SPEAKER_02 5:42

Ah, the film with Hugh Grant is absolutely brilliant. Yeah. Right? And his character in it. Well, I hadn't that I wasn't expecting and I watched it. I'd just chuck it on, let's have a look. So I was just expecting like another standard Hugh Grant character, not standard Hugh Grant character. He plays like a slightly camp, is he gay, isn't he gay, journalist who is extremely clever and conniving. And it is fucking awesome, mate. Really. Yeah, it's kind it's like his character's so good and so unexpected if you know about Hugh Grant in the past. And then the film is a good film, you know, there's some great people who are well worth a watch. Well worth a watch. Well worth a watch, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:19

Uh because I thought in the series, gentlemen, uh Richard E. Grant. I think was that right?

SPEAKER_02 6:24

Richard E. Grant's in the channel.

SPEAKER_01 6:26

I think in the series, I might be wrong. I might be confusing it with with something else. Anyway. Anyway. Anyway.

unknown 6:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:38

Oh yeah, so it's been good for the the it's been the industry's growing, it's kind of been good.

SPEAKER_01 6:42

I th yeah, the industry I think is still I on a not a hundred percent recovery, I'd say the industry is now probably 70 to 80%. That's very subjective. That's from an outside viewpoint. Uh bags may say different, but um I'd say the industry is bags is on later.

SPEAKER_02 7:05

We'll ask you. Bags are the next episode.

SPEAKER_01 7:07

There we go.

SPEAKER_02 7:07

They've been this afternoon. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:09

And but yeah, I'd say the industry is 70 to 80% recovered. But it's a very different landscape than it was pre-COVID. Very different. Uh in what way? Stream well, streamers I think have the majority of budget now. And they can tell longer stories streamers. So Netflix, Apple TV.

SPEAKER_02 7:29

When you say streaming, I think if individuals sat at home doing mental videos.

SPEAKER_01 7:32

Um, I mean that that industry is booming hugely, and you know, uh some good content. But I think mainstream streamers have got the majority of budget now. I might be wrong, but that's my my casual observation. And um, they can tell longer stories, they don't have to compress their story into two and a half hours if we're Chris Nolan. They can they can expand it and go into a lot a lot more depth and and detail, and the money's there as well. Um interesting segue. We've got a movie coming out on the April 3rd called Fuse.

SPEAKER_02 8:08

Well when you say we've got a movie coming out, what do you mean?

SPEAKER_01 8:12

So I was the advisor on this particular uh number, and my uh team of consultants, subject matter experts. I brought in there was four or five of us in the end. So that's that was the that's the casual week. FUZEDE. FUZEDE, yeah. Yeah. Spelled that way.

SPEAKER_02 8:33

Fuse okay, I've just got it on the screen. You're actually gonna share my screen sharing a new development on the uh HR Studio on the live. Uh Fuse is a 2025 British crime thriller, heist film directed by David Mackenzie and written by Ben Hopkins. The film stars Aaron Taylor Johnson, Theo James, Sam Worthington, and others.

SPEAKER_01 8:59

Good names in that. Yeah. Saffron Hawking, Goo Goo. So when's it releases this year? It's yep, it's in cinemas from April 3rd. Which cinemas is it in? Uh I don't know yet.

SPEAKER_03 9:10

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 9:11

So how did you get involved with that then? Uh so I was approached to provide CVs of bomb disposal experts in in military speak, we call it EOD. Yeah. Um, explosive ordnance disposal. And uh I shook the tree of my my network and said, right, uh, who is who is qualified to come and speak? Um, CVs in, please. And so I had a handful of them from all different walks of life, but obviously from the bomb disposal world. And I put um I put a couple in to the producers, and they chose the man who ended up being the SME on it. Guy called Nick Orr.

SPEAKER_02 9:55

Nick Orr. Oh, you mentioned him off air to get him in for the podcast.

SPEAKER_01 9:58

Yeah. Um, I think he would be a great guy to have in.

SPEAKER_02 10:02

Well, why is that? What's his background?

SPEAKER_01 10:04

So he's ex-royal engineers, but he's also uh done um I want to say 2-9 commando, but don't quote me on that. Um I know this is out in the public domain, so if I get run ragged, that's that's on me. Um but he's ex-EOD um uh and has been working for an NGO doing EOD stuff out in the Middle East in Gaza until Israel banned his NGO from from Gaza as they did with lots of other NGOs recently. Um sorry Nicole, I've just outed you. Didn't mean to. Oops. Um but uh yeah, he ended up being very, very close for script um to director and writer and the producers, uh, and yeah, a lot of his expertise and experience went into the finished product. So arguably this the the definite SME on on that on that job.

SPEAKER_02 11:07

What's the release date of the film?

SPEAKER_01 11:08

April 3rd. April 3rd, so you did mention that. Um is there a premier anyway? I haven't heard yet anything about premiers. Okay. I mean it's still quite early days, but um but yeah, he was he was instrumental and a thoroughly good guy. Kind of goes back to our icebreaker question um earlier about uh who do I find e easiest working with? Absolutely humility, collaborative was the easiest guy, is the easiest guy to work with, and we're still in contact now.

SPEAKER_02 11:42

Um how did you meet Nick? Just through this. You haven't met him before, just one of the CVs that came in.

SPEAKER_01 11:46

Yeah, um, I gave him a brief in terms of how the uh the industry works, um managed expectations as best I could because he'd not done any any film work necessarily before. But yeah, he was he was invaluable and and yeah, director David was was over the moon, as was the whole production team with him. Um I came in and did the more generic military advising bit. Um Nick was travelling between the Middle East and and the UK in filming because of his NGO work. So I would provide cover. I also had another EOD man uh by the name of Will who's still serving. Um he's he's NATO for RLC, uh, but but wanted to keep his his name fairly low key. Um so he provided my second second desk, as it were, EOD cover. Um so yeah, I mean it it's gonna look like a really, really good production.

SPEAKER_02 12:49

Um what did you think of uh on the subject of uh military veterans involved with productions? What did you think of Sunway?

SPEAKER_01 12:57

Didn't see it. Sorry, sir.

SPEAKER_02 12:59

You are fucking joking me.

SPEAKER_01 13:01

I I'm yet to meet Tip, but I haven't seen it. I wanted to have a chat with him first, but I haven't seen it.

SPEAKER_02 13:06

Uh who did you mention then? Tip Cullen. Oh, Tip. Tip. Tip will be in here at some point while I can tie him down to London.

SPEAKER_01 13:15

In June, I've been invited as part of the HAC business networking group. Uh there's gonna be how many panelists? There's gonna be four of us, compared by another soldier, uh Laurie Duncan, who's a professional actor. Uh but Tip is gonna be one of the panelists alongside me. So in the HC. In the HAC.

SPEAKER_02 13:32

What date's that?

SPEAKER_01 13:33

16th June.

SPEAKER_02 13:34

Okay, 16th of June. All right, let's talk after this. I'll see if I can get him in.

SPEAKER_01 13:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:38

What a good guy. What a good guy.

SPEAKER_01 13:40

We've had chats on on the phone.

SPEAKER_02 13:42

Yeah, the good guy. I mean, we I've only briefly talked to him two or three times, maybe. Well, I mean briefly, yeah. But uh, yeah, good guy. And uh the film was great. I I the film was great. I you know, when your film was made on$300,000 or whatever it was, pounds of dollars, pounds of dollars, a little bit more, you know. The declared was a certain amount. I think it was a little bit more. You go in with certain expectations, and you go, okay, I hope this is entertaining at least. And I was not expecting it to be good, if I'm being perfectly honest, just because budget constraints, you know. And I tell you what, I was incredibly impressed, incredibly impressed. Um yeah, how good it was for that budget, also knowing how small the crew was, it was tiny, it was crew, it was tiny, the crew. Um what surprised me most though was the actor. Um almost all of the main characters are ex military, almost all of the main characters are ex boot neck, ex-marines. Do you know what I learned recently? Boot the term boot neck you reserve that term that's only used for good Marines.

SPEAKER_01 14:59

Interesting.

SPEAKER_02 15:00

So if you hear a Marine refer to someone as a boot neck, it means yeah, they were good, well respected, whatever. Right. I call all Marines boot necks. I just always common things. Now I've stopped. So anyway, it's filled with Marines. I'll call him boot necks. So they're like most of them. But it was really good. And there's one guy in there, and I forget his name, he was still serving when they filmed it. Uh, but he plays one of the lead characters, one of the main characters, and he's he's still serving, he'd never acted before, and his character is the most entertaining and engaging character on screen, really, apart from Tip. You've got Tip who's the lead, right? And then he's got this team of guys, you know, these fucking ninjas around him. Uh, and one of those, one of that team, the only might be four of them, I think, and one of those guys, never acted before, still serving, and his character is brilliant, and he just plays it brilliant, mate. He's a gobshite. He's a gobshite, and he's the he's the character that like a typical military guy, that kind of military guy always getting every unit who will drop the most inappropriate joke in the darkest of time, and you go, Oh my god, oh my god, and he's that character in the film, and he plays it brilliantly, mate. So good. I was so happy, I was so happy. I mean, their Marines are you know, if it had been a bit of a failure, they would have been inside of me thinking, Oh yeah, joking. I'm happy it was good, you know, because uh before that it was only really the like a British military movie of success was Kajaki. Totally different movies, also totally different budgets, yeah. And one was fiction, one was based on fiction, one was based on fact uh on a you know true story, yeah. Um, it's good though to have another one out there to inspire more, yeah. Definitely, you know, and why would you say just sorry, sorry, how I'm not a few people now get out and they want to get into acting, ex-military, right? Why wouldn't you say the chances are of someone leaving the military and being able to develop an acting career where it it is it is enough for them to survive on? I'm not saying become rich, Alice. No, no, but just this is my career. I'm an actor. Yeah, this is my career.

SPEAKER_01 17:22

What are the chances? I mean, I don't want to like piss on anyone's parade, but I think it it is one of those vocations that I think you need to be okay with rejection and failure. You need to be okay with that because you're gonna get fucking loads of it. Now, I mean so I do not handle that well. Qualified is you know, I obviously put put military people from UK and US onto film sets, and I give them the best experience in terms of you know making sure the squared away all of the locations, everything they need to know about turning up, doing the job, I take care of. Um, there's very little rejection. There's some because their face might not fit, and director might think no face doesn't fit on this occasion. But when you're then going up for auditions, so I was in between last time and now I've been the militia advisor on two Royal British Legion advertising campaigns, which is shot in September, to be released in late October for the remembrance commemorations every year. So the last two years, year before last, I was um invited to to cast for it. So I had self-tapes and in-person auditions in Soho. Um, and you could tell who are the trained actors: Laurie Duncan, um Alex Mason, um and uh Josh Carter, also a professional actor. All three of them were ex-military. Um, one or two others thoroughly have enjoyed their time on set with me and wanted to have a go at audition anyway, and they they did, uh, mentioning their names because it's not about shame anyone, but the difference was night and day. Um so yeah, if you it's a very honourable vocation, but to get to cast roles, you've got to be okay with a lot of rejection. And I think I've seen Robert De Niro talk to his kids. I mean, he's done like an interview or a podcast where he said, you know, just don't go in worrying about the outcome. Fuck the outcome. Go in and just be present in that particular moment. And I think there's an element of service in the military that prepares us for that. Um be present, concentrate on the here and now, the later will take care of itself, just show up, give it all you've got. It's a bit like a PT sesh, you know, you know, grizzing it out. You can't think about what's happening in this afternoon. You're pressing out your press ups, or whatever it is that you're doing. Um, but you can't do it.

SPEAKER_02 20:11

It's job interviews.

SPEAKER_01 20:12

The audition's a job interview, essentially. It's what it's a job interview, it is, but you can't have any attachment to the outcome. The more attached to the outcome you are, you're not present to give your character it comprises your performance absolutely, because your brain is somewhere else, and you need to be present in that moment with those. I mean, you hopefully you'll have learned the lines or your your ad libbing, but you need to be in that moment, and the outcome is uh again. I mean, metaphor, golf, one swing at a time, fuck the outcome literally here and now. So you're the initial question was what are the chances? I think if you can let go of the outcome, then great, crack on. But you'll go through a fair amount of rejection and disappointment first, but you need to be okay with that because you don't care about the outcome. Yeah. Philosophical.

SPEAKER_02 21:04

No, yeah, no, I know what you mean. I think I was just thinking that it's it's uh it's also maybe it's one of those uh careers where it's it is actually something that you can incrementally push more effort into while you've got something else providing your main money. For sure, you know, because you know, you can you can squeeze in an audition a week, uh, for example, while you're doing a full-time job somewhere else, squeeze an audition a week, and then as as things start becoming more encouraging or more opportunities come up, you can squeeze two or three, maybe you can add part time work or whatever. You could incrementally go into it.

SPEAKER_01 21:43

They're humble enough to come and do extra work for for me for my outfit. They're humble enough to go out on set um and be around good people and just take the pressure off their overheads long enough to go, actually, I'm I'm okay.

SPEAKER_02 21:58

Oh, for the SA work, yeah, the extra work. Yeah. Oh my god. When I like my in my brief uh foray into that uh a few years back, yeah, I I didn't realize that people did it full time. Like uh as in they did it full time with no intention of becoming actors, like they just like, yeah, I'll do I do uh essay work day in, day out, whatever. Yeah, yeah, crazy. And it it there was a lot of um retirees who would do it. We went and filmed uh Stanford Airport for two days, and one of the terminals, I wanted the whole whole terminal there, filled and and it would we were filming an airport scene, so you need to fill the terminal with travelers, as in people traveling, not gypsies. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh so there was like 200 extras. Yeah, and they were all sorts there. There was people turning it with a knitting, yeah. People turning it with their books, and you think, oh, that's the scene. No, no, I'd I'll bring the book anyway, because I know there's a lot of sitting around or whatever, just yeah, it's just yeah, I do this all the time. So it's a day out, yeah, get to see something different. Yeah, exactly. Sometimes I'm on set with someone I know, and I you know a celebrity, and yeah, I go, okay, yeah, interesting.

SPEAKER_01 23:04

One of the guys who comes out for us uh who's X H A C as well, is like, you know, this is a great break from the day job, but actually around a because you know, my organization, Shameless Plug, is is still serving in veteran service people, is actually just the fact that you can you can have a break or a a brew or a wet, depending on which persuasion you are, with people of like minds, and just enjoy being around like minds. And I will bring in people from all different walks of the military and go, you can be as grey as you like, you don't have to declare where you're from. I certainly don't care, just turn up on time, give it your all, go home, do the admin when I ask you to, and you can come from anywhere, Wink, and you can be as grey as you like, and people quite enjoy that. And Nick Orr, again, the the EOD guy, was like after we we wrapped shooting on Fuse, he said that was one of the most cathartic experiences because obviously he'd done EOD in Afghanistan, um, and he was able to therefore tell his story of his experiences in a fairly safe environment. So he found it a really cathartic experience showing leading the art department through how to make uh various different props. I don't want to give the game away. Um, but yeah, and I think lots of people have reported that there seems to be a really nice safe environment in a creative environment where service people have seen the ops, which I haven't, can actually just spend time with people who have and just share their experiences, and that becomes quite a nice warm environment for people to go, actually. This is quite cool. Really enjoy it.

SPEAKER_02 25:37

Have you ever thought about writing or directing yourself?

SPEAKER_01 25:41

Yeah. I do some small cameo roles from time to time.

SPEAKER_02 25:45

You do yeah, but you we do some roles, but what about writing directing? I would like to. Well what kind of thing would you like to do?

SPEAKER_01 25:55

I mean I like to tell a good story for sure. Um I can learn I can learn a script. I I've done scripts before and I've been able to use handrail them so I understand the core of the story and I can either stick to ver verbatim or I can handrail it and still give my own interpretation of the story, uh, depending on what the director wants. But in some senses, that's been me. Um so yeah, I do I do fancy it at some point as actually getting properly trained. Would you do military stuff? I do whatever I can.

SPEAKER_02 26:31

Do you think there's any um hidden military stories? Like unknown things that would make great stories or movies.

SPEAKER_01 26:47

Yes. So I think there's a a lot of stuff we could probably tell about the Falklands conflict in 1982 that hasn't really seen the light of the day. I mean, there was some stuff that came out.

SPEAKER_02 27:00

Let's get into that. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 27:01

I think there was some stuff that came out that was very anti-war in the late 80s, early 90s. Welsh guards. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:09

Um uh uh what do you mean?

SPEAKER_01 27:13

It was based on I think it was based on a true story, but I think it was a Welsh, and and I'm not gonna get the names right. I wanna say London or something or tumble down.

SPEAKER_02 27:24

It was the guards would tumble down, but it was I'm sure it was Scots Guards was tumbled down.

SPEAKER_01 27:28

Quite possibly. Okay. Um and I'll probably cop some heat for getting that wrong. Anyway, I think um there's an awful lot of subject matter that we can explore for how close a run thing the Falklands conflict actually was. And that includes the South Atlantic, um the glacier where the Wessex is carrying the guys from Hereford crashed, another Wessex went in, that one crashed, and then another went in to pull them all out. Pebble Island? No, this was Ascension itself. Oh Ascension, it was Ascension. Uh no, no, not Ascension. No, it wasn't Ascension, it was South Georgia. South Georgia, yeah, yeah. Um and so there's that. Then there was I want to say Paraquat, where some SF guys were then taken on a supposedly one-way mission out to Chile or Paraguay, and a helicopter was found burned out there. So I think there's an awful lot we can explore about actually what went on. I mean, enough time has passed now. I'm sure there's some declassified stuff that's come out that we could probably get into.

SPEAKER_02 28:47

So all right, so parak parquet, parquet. Alright, so this is saying I've got it up on the screen, yeah. So SES mission, 1982, Paracquat is what my search term was. Operation Parquat was the British military operation to recapture South Georgia from Argentine control in 1982.

SPEAKER_01 29:05

Right.

SPEAKER_02 29:06

At the start of the at the start of the Falklands War. It was a subsidiary of Op Corporate. Uh the mission objective was to reassert British authority over South Georgia, key units involved, D Squadron, SAS, uh, two squadron, SBS, 42 Command and Royal Marines, 42, 42 Commando, sorry, Marines, uh, and Royal Navy, a bunch of Royal Navy ships. So where's this? So something in Chile is.

SPEAKER_01 29:36

Yeah, so there was a another another operation.

SPEAKER_02 29:43

A covert mission to Chile.

SPEAKER_01 29:47

Chile or Paraguay. I think it was Chile because I think Pinochet gave his blessing because the idea was Yes, there was a covert mission related to Chile during 1982 Falcon's War, Operation Plum Duff. Great name.

SPEAKER_02 30:06

A reconnaissance mission supporting a larger, ultimately abandoned Operation Mikado. That was a objective to insert an SAS surveillance team into Argentine Tierra del Fuego to gather intelligence on the Rio Grande Air Base, Heal Grande Air Base, home of Argentina's excess missile capable super etindad aircraft. Execution. I didn't know anything about this. On the night of the 17th and 18th of May 1982, a Royal Navy seeking helicopter carrying an eight-man SAS team and a three-man crew launched from HMS Invincible. Due to poor visibility, navigational challenges, and suspected detection, the mission was aborted before reaching the target. Chile involvement. The helicopter crossed into neutral Chilean airspace, where the SAS team was dropped near Bahia in Itil. The aircraft, uh the air crew attempted to ditch the helicopter near Punta Arenas, but crashed on a beach after a failed scuttling attempt. They set it on fire and invaded capture for several days. The Chilean military detained the aircrew and later handed them over to British authorities. The SES's team's fate remains partially classified, though they were reportedly recovered. With the element surprise lost and intelligence indicating strong Argentine defenses, Operation Ricardo was cancelled. Chile under Pinochet secretly supported the UK by allowing surveillance operations and SAS, SBS use of its territory. The mission remains one of the most secretive SAS operations of the Falklands War. I need to get the gen on this. What else do you know about it?

SPEAKER_01 31:44

Very, very, very little, but I mean that there's gorgeous little stories like this that again are so unknown that actually they they form part of an interesting tapestry of storytelling. And I think the Falklands uh old man was there as as 2IC in 9 Squadron, um, and he was god, he must have been 28 when he was down there, something like that, anyway. Who's my old man? So, um, but as a whole makeup, it was such a close-run thing. Could we mount it again? No, but I think there's an awful lot of creative thinking. I've got a uh friend up in Cambridge there who's one of the RAF uh maintenance crew on the Atlantic Conveyor. When Atlantic Conveyor was sunk by Exoset, he was he had to jump overboard and was pulled into a life raft, um, and his life was saved. So as Atlantic Conveyor was on the on the was was going down, um managed to escape with his life. Um there were so many of these little stories that make up such an amazing tapestry of exactly what went down really. Uh, that I think it's there's a lot of rich storytelling material in it. Fantastic.

SPEAKER_02 32:59

So we've got some info in the chat, right, from Coke, one of the uh the platinum patron, Coke, who says that X uh X uh XSS RSM Peter Ratcliffe, uh so he was in the Falklands. Uh anyway, he he spoke he spoken before about the Chile operation. He said that the officer in charge on the ground on the ground had to resign, and the NCO was quietly sidelined. So he's talking about Hereford guys. Yeah. When they landed, the SAS patrol apparently just decided to quit the mission and didn't help the pilots before leaving. Uh Ratcliffe said he he spoke, he basically years later spoke to a pilot, one of the pilots who was pissed when he was talking to him and told him about this. I can neither verify nor nor deny these events, but that's what Peter Ratcliffe said, apparently. Um interesting. The SES was a very different beast back then, very, very different to know. And it's one of the things I've learned over the years of the podcast, actually, talking to um Herefer guys of different eras on and off air. You know, it's like uh in fact, in fact, um Chris Ryan is probably the one who's most vocal about this in terms of the ebbs, the the peaks and troughs of professionalism of the SAS over that time. You know, from there when they first became public in the Iranian embassy siege, and then there was a there was a definite period of time where sort of their the reputation which preceded them, I think compromised the quality to which they were holding themselves in terms of ability, capability, quality of what they were doing. I think, I think caveat, I've never been in Hereford, I I've never served there, you know what I mean. This is all uh you know secondhand information, that's right. But it also makes sense to me, you know. Uh, but one thing you can't argue these is I think, and especially over in the in the times that I served and you served with um the HAC, how fucking good they are. Now, you know, never mind the past. Yeah, yeah, you know. Um undeniable.

SPEAKER_01 35:19

There was one guy who sat so in if I remember rightly, just off the end of Stanley Airport, um, down south, there was a an old wreck, an old sailing ship wreck. And I believe that there was a guy, uh a Hereford bloke, who was in there with an H with uh a radio set calling in air traffic inbound, outbound, so that they could get a bit of a warning of that kind of air movement. So he was literally in an OP in that old wreck. Again, never verified that, but all of this is hearsay. Um but I follow a uh chap who was at the Iranian uh embassy siege, Robin Horsefall, who was one of the two guys into the back entrance of the Iranian embassy with guns.

SPEAKER_02 36:03

Um very outspoken, Mr. Horsefall. Very, very outspoken.

SPEAKER_01 36:08

Great history. Um I've read his book. Um he is he is outspoken, he knows his mind. Um, so yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:15

What's his motto who shares wins? Yes, he says he shares wins, isn't he? That's what he always puts on social media. He who shares wins.

SPEAKER_01 36:22

Something like that. Yeah. Um, so yeah, I mean, yeah, I think the the original question was, you know, what what other stories would I like to tell? There are things like that where there's some juicy, amazing stories of bravery. Yeah, you and I have spoken off-air about um, and I think on the last podcast about Market Garden and my grandfather's connection. The more and more I learn about Market Garden, the more courage and bravery seems to come out. It's not really the stuff. Um it's almost like the truth is more fantastic than Bridge Too Far makes out um as a movie. You know, that was that was a movie for me.

SPEAKER_02 37:01

I think that's that sometimes is that is sometimes the case where the the truth is is so mental. Yeah. Like if you were putting a film, people go, This isn't real. Yeah, this is not realistic. What they've done is it's gone over the top.

SPEAKER_01 37:12

But I think I think latter-day movie making, starting with uh Private Ryan and that that beach invasion scene, I think we are now in a better place to be able to tell stories and really put the viewer right in the heart of the action. So Warfare did a pretty good job of that. Yeah, all of the sound design. I like Warfare. Good movie.

SPEAKER_02 37:33

I like Warfare because of that immersive experience with it's very different. Yeah, very I don't think it's for everyone. It's not an easy watch, but it's not an easy watch, mate. It's not an easy watch. Uh but a good watch. Yeah, and the the the soundtrack, the or the audio experience just makes it fuck me. Yeah, so good. Just uh just off topic slightly. Um there are books which have been done, military books, fiction-based books, which I think would be amazing films. Uh, did we talk last time about um The Thirteenth Valley? No. Have you ever read it? No. Oh mate, it's one of those books, and I think that it's it it baffles me why no one's made a film of it. It was written by a guy called, and apologise to people who've heard me mention this on the podcast before. I haven't mentioned it for a couple of years, but it was written by a guy called John Del Vecchio. It's a book about Vietnam. Um, John Del Vecchio, in real life, IRL, was uh a combat correspondent. He was a war correspondent or a war photographer, one of the two, uh, during the Vietnam War. And he over I think over a period of six years, he deployed out a bunch of different times with different units, from airborne units to normal infantry units to uh support in arms and stuff like that. Um and so he wrote two books, he wrote two books I know of. The Thirteenth Valley is one, which is the one I've read, and the other one was called For the Sake of All Living Things. I've never read that, but apparently it's brilliant. But the 13th Valley, when I was growing up, my dad used to bang on to me about reading this book. It's an incredible book, best war book you'd ever read. And I was never kind of into that stuff when I was young. And also, the book is massive, right? But the story is fucking incredible, and the story is the the overarching plot is that uh it's uh an airborne unit, uh, I think it's 101st uh or the 502nd airborne or whatever in Vietnam. Uh and they are going, they get intelligence that there's this valley called the Ketalau Valley, which is the 13th in a row of valleys. Uh, and in that Ketalau Valley is the HQ element of a of an N N VA regiment, right? So they go, right, we're gonna put into operation, secure the high ground of the valley with these companies, and a company, let's call it A Alpha Alpha Company, is gonna go on the jungle floor, they're gonna move through, find the talents, find the HQ, eliminate it. Right? That's that is the plot. Uh it turns out when they do that, it isn't the HQ element, it's a reserve battalion. So all of a sudden, you've got this company of guys, and they find themselves in the middle of a reserve battalion in the jungle. It's mad. But you incrementally find out as they go through. Now, what makes the book special is that the book is made up that all the subplots in the book, from the smallest things like a contact happening, an ambush in the jungle, to conversations in camp when they're back at the camp before they deploy, to you know, disagreements between the headshed, uh, to the to the way the tax are used, all the subplots are real things that John Delvetch experienced in all his deployments over the six years. So it's it's subplots which are based on true stories brought together into a fictional overarching plot. It makes the book incredible. It's incredible. And the way it starts is each chapter, there's like six or seven uh of the first six or seven chapters, each one focuses on a main of a on a character who becomes one of the main ones later. You just following this person at the point at the start of the book. One of them's like a brand new guy, Cherry, and a new guy. Another one's like the the platoon sergeant, another one's like the the the the platoon commander, the black college educated platoon commander who's secretly gay. You know, it's like it is amazing, right? I've read it twice now, and I each time I go, holy shit, this is just so good. And you learn, it's one of those books where you learn so much about the conflict from the political dynamics to the kinds of people who are involved with it. Yeah, you know. Um uh yeah, I don't know why I've never made that film. I don't know why I've never made that film, but you should read the book. I highly recommend it. Uh I'll warn you off about this. Some there's some gay fantasies in there, which the second time I read it, I was like, I don't remember this shit. Interesting. Very graphic.

SPEAKER_00 42:02

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 42:03

It's like a dream at one point. You go, I don't think this needs to be in the book.

SPEAKER_01 42:08

Interesting.

SPEAKER_02 42:10

Interesting. My dad didn't warn me about that bit either. Right. But there you go.

SPEAKER_01 42:13

Um, I'm sure there's some good good stuff coming that that needs to be told about Afghan and Iraq as well, I'm sure. But I think everyone loves a good story, everyone loves a good, you know, triumph of good over evil. Uh, and I'm sure that there's lots of good stories of courage and bravery and resourcefulness coming out of out of those operations. I'm I'm sure. I think good stories like that are great, especially when there's a lot of jeopardy to start with. My f one of my um okay, top five war movies.

SPEAKER_02 42:49

You're asking me?

SPEAKER_01 42:50

Yeah. Oh gosh. I'm gonna put you on the spot now.

SPEAKER_02 42:53

I need to think about that. Top five war movies. Apocalypse now, Apocalypse No, Platoon, Tropic Thunder. Tropic Thunder is so good. Uh Apocalypse No, Platoon, uh Ninth Company.

SPEAKER_01 43:14

Okay, didn't know that one.

SPEAKER_02 43:15

You know that one? No, don't know. Oh, Ninth Company is a Russian movie. Right, okay. Russian war movie. Right. And it is about it's based on a true story. And it's about uh it is about a story of a a company of Russian paratroopers in Afghanistan that in the madness of the withdrawal the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, they get left behind. Right. They're like a tactical barrel behind. It is amazing. But it shows it shows like a lot they're training before they go out there. So you get it's a bit like it's a bit full metal jackety at the start.

SPEAKER_03 43:47

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:48

But it's Russian.

SPEAKER_03 43:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:49

And then they're in Afghanistan, and then it's yeah, ninth company. It's it's in Russian as well, which uh that's a good film. Um, I don't know, I'd have to think on that one. Platoon I watch regularly.

SPEAKER_01 44:01

In fact, it would be quite an interesting poll for your listeners as to what what is the voted best.

SPEAKER_02 44:07

What are your talk about?

SPEAKER_01 44:09

Okay, so I would say I would say Ryan. Mosul I think it's on Netflix, but it's about the um Iraqi SWAT teams are going after ISIS. Um and I think I didn't blink throughout the whole thing. It's a it's a decent length.

SPEAKER_02 44:44

Iraqi SWAT teams.

SPEAKER_01 44:45

Iraqi SWAT teams going after ISIS in Iraq. Yeah. Okay. Uh I'd Put Warfare up there.

SPEAKER_02 44:53

I need to watch Warfare again.

SPEAKER_01 44:54

Yeah, I just is a controversial one, but I love it as a movie.

SPEAKER_02 45:03

A friend of mine was in Warfare actually. Alex von Brock. Alex von Brock.

SPEAKER_01 45:08

I think I'd recommended him to production anyway. I'm sure his agent had already beaten me to it, but I was like, you definitely need to see Alex. And then Laurie, one of my guys at the HAC, I recommended him. So he and Aaron McKenzie, who's an ex-royal, uh, also a pro actor, uh, were both in that as well.

SPEAKER_02 45:26

Alex McKenzie. I meant Alex McKenzie's your Kajaki. Aaron McKenzie. I was thinking about Alex McKenzie, he was one of the exec producers. Yeah, he's ex-royed.

SPEAKER_01 45:35

But I'd I'd done auditions and then put well, I'd sent a handful of guys up for audition, and so those two were selected for cast, which I was quite chuffed with. Um so the one I the other the other controversial production was um 13 Hours Benghazi, not seen it, Michael Bay. So there's loads of explosions. Uh John Kaczynski is in it. Um I and I I love it as a as a whole story. It's just it's like a drug. I I love it. I can't watch it too many times. Really? Secret Soldiers Benghazi synopsis for those who haven't seen it is based on a true story. Uh in 2010, 2011, in Benghazi, so Colonel Gaddafi's been removed from power, Arab Spring and the CIA have a secret base in Benghazi, and it's uh protected by some ex-Rangers, Navy SEALs, and others private contractors um who provide security. Um and Chris Stevens, the ambassador, comes over for an unofficial well, comes over for an official visit, um, and um the the locals attack his non-official compound uh and and burn him out. That is the synopsis of the story.

SPEAKER_02 47:07

Oh, he didn't I didn't realise he was I thought he was based there.

SPEAKER_01 47:10

No, he was out for a visit. And he was a true story, he died.

SPEAKER_02 47:14

The ambassador was Yeah, well, I thought he had he was based there and and it was the it was the um embassy.

SPEAKER_01 47:22

Yeah, no, it wasn't embassy. He was there in a in an old, seemingly a rich oil oligarch's private house that had been deserted with a degree of security. Again, this is the the you know I'm I'm recounting the the film rather than the true events, but the way that they've placed this this uh rather smart looking compound, um the ambassador's got a minimal amount of security. He's got like two two guys as his close his CP plus an IT guy, the IT guy ends up being killed, uh, but they lose the ambassador, and again, that's that's true story. So it's a cracking, um cracking story, really good production, lots of Michael Bay explosions, highly recommend it. I love it. And a friend of mine worked on costume for it. So um, yeah, I I love it. It's one of my top five for sure.

SPEAKER_02 48:16

There are crazy stories everywhere, everywhere, aren't there? What that will never get told in any way like that. And some of them shouldn't be, and then others will just not be known by very many people at all. Uh or I've got a uh I interviewed a lady on you a couple of times called Biliana. Bilana's a good friend. Uh I don't say her very often anymore. Uh, but I I met her through um her now a husband, and her husband was a uh server me. Um when he left, he went to Afghanistan private security work. And they ended up he so he had so the team he went on to, and they were they were basically looking after private contractors who were doing uh provincial reconstruction. It was for aid uh for an aid aid agency in in Afghanistan in Kunduz. And uh it was him, it was another friend of mine, uh um and um I think maybe three or four other Westerners, a German, I think maybe even been a Portuguese, uh Filipino, and then there was a bunch of Afghans supplementing the security on the compound, you know, like his five-story, you know, house kundas. And uh and they got attacked one day in the middle of the night out of the blue. Um, and three so three suicide bombers, one did the gate, next one did the the next one did downstairs, followed up by uh like four or five Taliban basically to come in to just kill everyone. And they ended up in there under on the roof, just under siege. One of the guys, one of the so one of the British guys, one of my mates got killed. Um the lady uh Billy Anna, she got shot. My other mate got shot. The German got killed. But I think it was some I want to say it was like six, seven hours, we were on the roof of this building. They ended up with the Afghan police engaging them, you know, it's just crooked out there, yeah. It's getting smashed and in and on this roof and just trying to trying to get out of this building when it was Taliban trying to come up and others trying to come up to kill them, you know, or kill the remainder of them. And in the end, and they were miles from any uh NATO base, and in the end, I think it was a German, a German army unit that came and rescued them, you know, and you go fucking hell. And they're all that's a civic story, yeah. You know, you go, Jesus Christ, man. You know, it's and and on I mean on the subject of campaigns and and uh you know and military stories, so much, you know, so many stories in Afghanistan, but Ukraine, Iraq, yeah, Iraq, so many things in Iraq. For sure. When I the more I speak to guys and girls who were in who were in Iraq during the time that I I finished and I was in Afghanistan, you know, there was so much craziness going on there, which is completely overshadowed about what was going on in Afghanistan because uh Iraq wasn't the focus anymore. What happened? How did I never hear about that? That was crazy. Yeah, the Battle of Danny Boy with uh with um you know what Brian Wood has talked about and written about that. I never knew anything about that until he brought me poking up how was that not common knowledge, something that mental, you know, you know.

SPEAKER_01 51:31

Um I don't know if I'd spoken to you about this on the last podcast, going back, sorry, to uh Falklands. Yeah, the submarine who sank Belgrano, HMS Conqueror. Um Conqueror had been involved with some interesting stuff before the Falklands conflict. So this is this is quite interesting, and uh uh there's a book whose author, forgive me, but the name of the book is The Secrets of the Conqueror. Um and so the Conqueror had been equipped prior to 1982 with essentially to all intents and purposes a large-scale set of pliers bolted onto the bow of the of the submarine. So, and Stuart Preble wrote the book. Stuart Preble, who I believe was very high up in ITV as a journalist. Okay. I mean, by all means verify that. But anyway, fantastic book, and it's almost like your your draw, your jaw is on the draw for some of what came out. Um but there was this this thing called Operation Barmaid, which was a joint UK-US intelligence gathering operation about Soviet spy trawlers in the North Atlantic, and they were using toad arrays, sonar listening. Um, and in the Cold War, the UK and US had very superior submarine technology, um, but the Soviets caught up fast. So the question mark arose between um Virginia and the Pentagon and the Admiralty back here as to how are the Soviets catching up, and of course there were spy bits and pieces going on. Anyway, spy trawlers, Soviet spy trawlers would have an array of antenna on on their on their um upper surface, but behind them they would have a towed array of listening equipment on a steel cable that would be towed out the back of the of the vessel. So they'd be just chugging along on their diesel engine, and the idea of of this large-scale set of pliers is that Conqueror would come up under the guise of the trawler's own revolutions silently, and somehow use their mechanical pliers, large-scale ones, to cleave the tow d'array from the back of the Soviet trawler while they are completely oblivious, sink away, but not make it look like it was a clean cut, because then obviously it's clearly not a natural. There's no you know, there's nothing in nature that would create a clean cut like this. So the idea was to to cleave it in such a way that it would look like it had been shorn off in the night by something. Anyway, the Conqueror, once it had been clear had um grabbed hold of this toad array, would sink away again under the under the audible disguise of the trawler's own engine and and propeller, sink away to a safe distance, and then two clearance divers would come out, take the toad array, curl, curl it round, coil it round, and then place it in secure storage between the outer casing and the inner pressure hole to then be taken back to be um uh analysed wherever that might be, whether it was you know Virginia or or or back here. I think it was Virginia. Um anyway. Um, so they had had prior to the Falklands conflict, they'd had two, maybe three runs of this, no success, but they'd been going up to targets and trying to approach under the revolutions of this spy trawler to try and do this. Phenomenal that someone dreamt this up, and obviously it hadn't occurred to me until quite recently that if you were doing this under silence, could you have a periscope up to see where they were going? How on earth were you judging the distance between trawler doing X naught, you doing X naught plus or minus, to guide yourself up to know that you're in this place to go clunk, to grab hold of this Totareth and sink away again? I mean, they do say that the Perisher submarine submarine commanders course, the Royal Navy submarine commanders course is the toughest commanders course in the world.

SPEAKER_02 55:39

I've spoken about it recently with a guest. We went through it. Yeah, who was the guest? I forgot his name, but I'd never heard of Perishers before. Yeah. And we probably spoke about it at length. Yes, my goodness me, it sounds like ruth.

SPEAKER_01 55:52

You've got to have in your head And you want to get one shot as well.

SPEAKER_02 55:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 55:55

And if you fail it, you're off. You can't be in the summary service anymore.

SPEAKER_02 55:59

That's right, yeah, yeah. You're right. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Yeah, you can't be in the summary service anymore, and you can't have a second go.

SPEAKER_01 56:04

That is it's a it's a one shot. Yeah, and you've got to have surface contacts, their speed. I mean, you've got to know your mental mass, like seriously, to come up, do a sweep with your optics, whether it's a periscope or whatever it is they use these days, and grab an idea of surface contacts, their direction, speed, and and and to know that you can then place yourself under your command to get the best advantage. Phenomenal. And I think that the US sends some of their submarine commanders on the perish of course. I don't know how many are successful. I think the last documentary I watched on it was some some time ago.

SPEAKER_02 56:42

I'm just trying to find the podcast who I interviewed there for people um who want to know about perishes. Um how big were the pincers, do you have?

SPEAKER_01 56:52

Uh no idea.

SPEAKER_02 56:55

Yeah, I'm trying with I'm trying to work out how they would see where they're going.

SPEAKER_01 57:00

Have no clue. Not a clue. But is that I mean, if you want a good rip.

SPEAKER_02 57:07

This is the the benefit of having a so people watching live that listen correct to me as we go. Marcus Peters was the navy guy I spoke to about the parishes, okay. Thank you, Coke. Right, sorry, sorry, go on.

SPEAKER_01 57:17

Um, but yeah, if you want a rip roaring read, uh, and there's there's more to that book as well than just the the um the exploits of the conqueror pre-conflict. Uh you do learn about the sequence of events as per the commanding officer of the conqueror upon releasing those four torpedoes at the Belgrano. Oh. I mean, that if if you want a very, very, very fascinating and it creates almost more questions in your mind, the narrative given by Stuart Preble and his book as to what the commanding officer said at the time of that engagement versus what John Knott, who is the defence secretary for Margaret Thatcher, said to Parliament and the public at the time. There was some mismatch. Go on, explain why. Oh, I mean, I'm not as fluent as I'm because it's been a few years since I read it, but what I would point people to and get their curiosity into is that from memory, Previl had said the commanding officer of the Conqueror had told Northwood, which was command at the time, I have got con surface contact, which is Belgrano. And then they can see it. They've got it, then they've identified it, yeah, and they'd sought permission from Prime Minister Thatcher as to what to do about it. And I'm not gonna incriminate myself by getting the facts wrong, but I commend your listeners to read it and and make sure that they've they've got it down. But John Knott, if from memory, had then told Parliament and the British public at the time a different story to what the commanding officer had said was the case. There was a disconnect between his story versus the commanding officer's story at the time.

SPEAKER_02 59:11

Alright, so online, so online it says uh the decision to sink the Belgrano on the 2nd of May 1982 remains one of the most contentious episodes of the Falklands War, with conflicting narratives centered on military necessity versus political motives, British justification. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and and Admiral Sandy Woodward argued that Belgrano posed a real and imminent, imminent military threat. Despite being outside my cousins, by the way, I'll be loving that. I've got Argentine family, they'll be fucking loving this. Despite being outside the 200-mile total exclusion zone, the ship was part of a coordinated Argentine naval pincer movement aimed at a British task force. Woodford uh Woodward stated that position, capability, and intent mattered more than speed or direction. I can't argue with that. Uh in isolation. The UK government claimed that the Belgrano had been ordered to re-enter the TEZ and attack, a claim supported by intercepted signals later revealed by Major David Thorpe. Thatcher maintained the decision was based on strictly military grounds, not political calculation. Argentine and critical perspectives. Critics, including Labour MP Tam Daliel and whistleblower Clive Ponting, alleged that Belgrano was sailing away from the conflict zone and posed no immediate danger. They argued the sinking undermined a genuine peace initiative brokered by Peru, which was being discussed at the time. The ship's poor state of readiness, lacking modern anti-ship missiles, carrying mostly conscripts and equipped with wooden mock missile launchers, fuel claims, fueled claims it was not a serious threat. Argentine naval officers, including Admiral Enrique Molina Pico and Captain Hector Bonzo, later confirmed the ship was on a tactical mission and not retreating, but some acknowledged its location outside the TEZ, made the attack legally legally legally questionable. Key contradictions were that the Bolgrana was moving away from the Falklands. The UK denied awareness of the Peruvian peace plan. Uh, and the UK claims updated borders updated orders allowed attacks beyond the TEZ.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:30

So the book connects into that in terms of what the Command Officer and through Stuart Previl's book says as to the authority that was requested back at the back in the UK as to what to do about this surface contact. Do I engage or do I not? That's up to you, Prime Minister and and government to to command us.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:55

I don't think that we would have been interested in a peace deal either, if I'm being totally honest.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:01

I think the US were doing some shuttle diplomacy. Um but I think Prime Minister Thatcher had got a mind made up. Yeah, I mean I I yeah um and that I'm not criticising necessarily that, but what I do get, and I think the critics of the sinking were that the hubris of government at the time, which kind of links back to what we're seeing over the pond at the moment, the hubris of the government of the time spinning a narrative to suit its own ends, rightly or wrongly, is human nature. Question mark. Um the book is fascinating. Now, the I don't know if this is still true, but last time I read it, the ship's log of the Conqueror at the time, the months around Operation Core Op Corporate for the Conqueror went missing. And obviously the updates should be official secrets, but they would have had all of the submarines lat long locations, times, speeds, and and and so for the m uh from if remember again from the book, months of April, May, and June of 1982, that ship log for the Conqueror went missing after the con the um conflict, which would have been an incriminating for the government at the time as to where the submarine was, what it had been doing pre-conflict. Um and it was suspected by the MOD and the government at the time that the ship's log had been stolen by one of the ship's officers.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:51

Oh the log had gone missing.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:53

Log, the ship's log, which would have given again dates, times, locations, and and and convenient.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:02

Very first time it happened.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:05

I mean this is what I love about good story. I mean, it leaves so many open question marks. I'm not criticizing any party. I don't have the balls for that, sorry. But I just find it a fascinating insight, okay. Um I don't know if I'm just trained to trust the commander of the submarine at the time more than the government, probably. Um yeah, but fascinating story, really good reading. I highly highly commend it.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:35

I will especially as it's so contagious. I fancy reading, I'm I'm looking for my next book.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:41

Um Secrets of the Conqueror.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:43

Actually, uh submarine world, military submarine world, is just fascinating me more and more and more. I've interviewed a few submariners now, and they just most of what they do is sneaky beaky. I can't really talk much about where we I can give you like story, I can't tell you where we were. There's a I had a guy on, um I had a guy on I think he was the first submarine I had on, maybe. Uh I'm just giving it away, am I? Anyway, he he had an app he got MD'd. Uh I think he got MD'd. Uh he hurt his back. I say he hurt his back, he hurt his back in a diving accident. Diving from a sub. Right. Right? This guy was a submariner. He wasn't special forces. Submariner. Uh so I'm not saying he was pool, right? He wasn't. But he had a particular role and he was in a diving accident, hurt his back in a diving accident. And in the aftermath of, you know, going through the process of uh medical discharge and everything that comes with that, like I need money now to survive the compensation and the insurance and all of that. There was major problems because the specifics around how it happened, when it happened, and where it happened could not be shared. So, and there were specifics that would normally be critical information to judging okay, what do we owe this guy? Like how much we fucked up here. Yeah, you know, and it couldn't be shared. And it dragged on and on and on and on just because it's like secrets. There's no way we can tell you. Because it wasn't long ago. This isn't like the sixties, and now it's four years later we can release that information.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:43

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:44

You know, I mean, interesting and not great with him at the same time, but I love that world. Uh, the I tell you what also interests me is the psychological aspect and the nature of the people who do that job, especially now where we the technology has advanced that much where subs can be submerged and people that can live on them submerged for six months plus. I mean that's six I say six months plus because that's what's been done so far. You can do longer theoretically, yeah. But it was the British sub that did the longest submersion, didn't it? Un unsurface, unsurfaced mission, longest ever. I think it was about three years ago, and that was over six months. They went under the fucking water and didn't come up for six months. Imagine that. It's unbelievable. Yeah. Again, back to the psychological aspect of you know, you have spent time um just in the army, right? In being long periods of time with a small group of people in limited space and a limited environment, right? I've done it repeatedly, not for six months. Like I've been away in operation six months, of course, and most of that would have been with small, you know, with a small number of people, but the environment changed over time. The people would change over, not the same people in the same environment for six months. That will mess you up. One of the things I always reference when I talk about anything like this, when Big Brother comes up, the program Big Brother. And I think these people have gone, yeah, I'll do Big Brother. Celebrities are not, but now the Nolan's like, yeah, I'll do Big Brother. And I think they think it's gonna be a walk in the park. They think it's gonna be a walk in the park. They don't realize how difficult it is to walk in. This is why you see people with crazy characters who go mentally in there and just become erratic or just unexpected, unexpected behavior because it is a it's a psychological experiment. You're like a rat in a box in there getting tested. Yeah, you were the same people, limited, you cannot get away from people. There's no getting away from anyone. And if there's people in there you do not like or you rub up against, you can't get away from them. You have to deal with it. And you are being filmed everywhere, everywhere. It just plays with your brain, plays with your brain, and now that now make that a military mission for six months and all of the stresses that come with that. And then chuck into that. Maybe you've got a wife, maybe you've got a boyfriend, kids, maybe you've got kids, maybe your mother's just become ill. Maybe I don't know, pick a scenario.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:26

I mean, I I I believe, and I might be I might be wrong on this, that they are allowed to receive incoming mail once a week, but they can't send out. Right, okay. Okay. But if they do get news, they can't do anything about it. They are literally unable to do a thing until they're back up alongside. Um, so there's a sense of power, but also completely there's nothing I can do. What do you actually expect me to do now? I can't do a thing. So I I think I'd find that impossible. Part of my sense of adventure would love to spend some time on a submarine. I don't know how long I'd survive, but I mean what what an what an what an existence. And obviously, there's two different types of sub that we've got, you know, there's the hunter killer, and then there's our protection, for want of a better word. Two different jobs. Um and so yeah. I think the the limiting factor on length of submersion is food. They can make their own water, um, they recycle everything. I think the main limiting factor is how much they can store in food to get them through.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:45

Um who was I oh, I think it was Marcus Peters was saying on the on our episode that when you first get onto the ship, you get so they often they don't get an indication of like how how long they could be out. Yeah, they'll get they'll get some sort of indication, but he said he said when you get on ship, the main indicator is how much of the like the living areas is now boxes of food. He said you literally they will put it under your bed, they'll put it under your mattress, and it'll it'll be stacked up when they're trying to cram every space, they'll be stacked up. That's boot. Das boot, that's boot, that's boot, yeah. Good film. I've seen it for years.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:23

Yeah, utterly amazing, utterly amazing.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:25

Just a little anecdote um on that compassionate cases and not being able to uh expose yourselves because of military reasons. Uh Iraq. I was on um I was on uh uh a mission. The term mission makes it sound grand than what it was, but I was on a mission with platoon a platoon. We're in the desert in Iraq, it's with three power and um and news came through that one of the young lads, his father had died, right? It came over the net, update over the net. Yeah, that's in two hours, the platoon commander. The platoon commander was young, a little bit naive. The platoon sergeant was not young and naive. And news came through and a similar problem arose like shit. Okay, well we knew that his parents were divorced, right? And they knew his parents were divorced, like, right? Okay, well, we don't want to say, yeah, come and get him or tell him in case there's no need. We don't want to compromise the mission. There may not be like, for example, if he wasn't close to his dad and doesn't care, this was the this is the rationale going through Pachunka Band's mind. If he isn't close to his dad and and and he doesn't care, then he may not be bothered about going back. All right, so okay, what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna ask him if he was close to his dad. And but it's like you're gonna what are you talking about? So you're gonna go up to him out with the blue and go, hey, let's call, let's refer to him as Johnny. Hey Johnny, uh how's it going, mate? Yeah, no bad, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:09

We can just keep conversation now.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:13

Like, what? Is it good? Is it good? Oh yeah, yeah, get on well. Oh, okay. Uh I got some bad news and then like the legitimate we don't want you to speak. I don't worry about it. Don't worry about it, go back into your pit and go back and stack. Like, fuck are you talking about? Um talked him out of it and basically said, uh, yeah, Johnny, your dad wasn't bad news, your dad's. I mean we you know got him out because his mission wasn't that yeah, you could it it wasn't that important that you couldn't stop it. You know what I mean? Like, fuck me. Anyway, the quality of commanders, there we go. Submarine commanders that wouldn't do that, they just wouldn't surface.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:47

I remember seeing a um a great documentary, I think it was Heston Blumenthal who went on board a Trafalgar class submarine. This is must be in the early 2000s, yeah. On a mission to try and revolutionize the feeding of submariners. Generally speaking, the the freezer on a on a Trafalgar class sub was limited. Um, but most of the food was stodge, and he came up with a really fascinating, I think you might be able to see it, still see it online on the YouTube, um, fascinating uh thing that he was going in and showing. Actually, we could show you how to store a greater deal of food, higher quality. So actually, rather than you being sat at your set of controls, yeah, stodged out on pasta or fishing chips or just general big carbs, actually, this would be a much better way of so uh if that was an interesting um what's the word uh uh application of Heston Blumenthal's crazy genius kitchen bits and pieces. I I don't know how they do it.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:56

Have you been on a sub?

SPEAKER_01 1:14:57

No, never. No, I the only sub I have been on was the one down at Cosport, the the the museum.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:04

I went on HMS Talent um years ago. Uh because I was on a sailing trip, adventure training sailing trip, and the navy were heading on up was a mostly navy, and then it was I don't know why it was a tri-services thing, but then it was four reg cloaks. We'd never sailed before. I was one of them. And and anyway we got invited onto the the sub after, and that was an eye opener, an eye opener. A real eye opener to see that just so cramped, so small, you know. But does fascinate me and the technological side of it as well, the tech they're just amazing. Have you um I was out in France in Marseille many years ago when I used to work for a company called Blue Abyss um Astronaut Training Center company, which was uh uh in the startup phase. And we went to a company there called not Comsat. Comsat maybe. No, not Comsat. Anyway, on this at this location, we were they were a you know sub-sea specialist company, various things creating habitats as they're called, living for living under the water. And on site there, they had the oldest, they had the oldest military submarine, the very first that was invented. And this thing was, I think it was 1903, 1904, and it was like it looked like uh, you know, like a long, thin fish, not like a pilched, but a long, thin, kind of iron thing. Uh and it was like on it was on just on the grass outside, very long, very long. And I remember thinking, you're a different breed if in the 1900s you're like, right, you know those subs that people have been testing out. Yeah, we've got military one now, gonna get on, and it goes underwater, you're gonna go about in it, you're gonna come up, maybe stick some minds to things, you know. That I the the the navy in general is a service that also fascinates me because of the history of it, how long it's been around, and when you get your organizations like that, there's so much little quirks and traditions and nuanced ways of doing things that can only be brought about with the passage of time. Yeah, they don't exist in newer beasts, you know. Uh, I mean, no more obvious in that the book Jack Speaker. Have you seen that book? No, it is uh name, it's a dictionary of navy slang. Mate, it's like two inches thick. It's like a navy friend, Gav Chuak gave it to me when he first came on the podcast. My first sort of introduction to Navy people, yeah. And uh it's a two-inch thick book, uh thousands of words, slang of it's just their own language, yeah, because they've been around that long.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:04

Yeah, you know. I mean, fair fair play, kudos to them. They are they are the senior service, and as you say, it takes a certain mentality. Uh a family friend of ours uh was on Glamorgan in 1982, which was exaceted. Um doesn't he doesn't talk about that very much.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:23

That was the Welsh guards, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:18:25

Uh no, that was Galahad.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:28

Oh yeah, Galahad, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:29

Glamorgan was a navy was a na raw navy vessel rather than a um uh a troop carrying uh fleet auxiliary. Uh but um yeah, they were excessed but didn't sink. But still lots of lots of casualties from that. But yeah, it's it does take a certain mentality. I mean it takes a certain mentality to serve in all all three forces, isn't it? Really? Different different strokes for different folks. Um what was ever uh John Nichols book? Have you ever met or read any of John Nichols? He was the back seater on the tornado that got downed over Iraq in Iraq.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:09

I'd like to, I'd like to interview him, but he's very difficult to tie down. Um I could I haven't approached him yet. Oh, have I? No, I think I've approached him a few years back, but maybe because I I interviewed Mandy Hickson the last year or the year before. Mandy's tight with uh John, I think.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:26

So I may see if I can reach out to him, but yeah, he would be a good one. Have you met him?

SPEAKER_01 1:19:29

No, no, I've just read his just read his books, Eject Eject and Tornado and one other um fascinating stories, honestly. Uh he tells a fascinating story of um you know the the first Martin Baker ejection seat on Eject Eject and then the fact that you're then on uh Escape and Evasion, a different mission altogether for your own survival. Um fascinating.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:57

What did you think of uh Maverick, the second top gun?

SPEAKER_01 1:20:00

Uh I enjoyed it for for its own sake. I mean, I'm a top gun fan and a complete geek playing spotter. I enjoyed it as a film.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:09

I yeah, I thought it was I better than the first. Better than the first. I've watched him multiple times, and I'm not a big fan of Tom Cruise anymore. But that uh his acting's great. That film, the training run. That I like the fact it's just a training run, it can it can put that much suspense and like edge receat in you when you know it's just a training run, but is it gonna make the time? Is it gonna make the time? And you know it's simulated and it's all you know, there's no mount in there, and he says, Let me go. Oh my god, it's incredible. Because it's all realistic as well. Like, oh my god.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:45

I think they're shooting a third, aren't they? So good. Rumor can rumor has it, they're shooting a third one. Is that right? I didn't know.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:50

I haven't heard that. Oh my god. Let's not do that, let's not drag it out, Tom.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:55

I mean, they they did up the ante between one and two. How many years was it between the first one and the second? It was decades. Decades. Um I mean, let's let's let's see what they can come up with for the third one, but let's let's not fall into the 86. 86, 1986, Christ alive. 25, yes. And did you know, uh, I think I've seen another documentary on this, that Top Gun, when it was first released on a crowd test, uh, it's a closed audience cloud uh crowd test, tanked. So they they didn't put the so the the lovemaking scene and when they then see each other in the elevator was shot months after, in fact, just before the re-release to the wider general release audience.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:43

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:44

Because the story just didn't flow until they put those two bits in. I think it was was it Jerry Bruckheimer who was the producer on it? Um I think he was the one who said that to camera. So some interesting, interesting little mini stories behind that. But yeah, uh when it was first crowd tested before general release, uh it it tanked. It was not well received, but now look at it.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:10

Yeah. I always uh when I look back now and and look at old amazing movies, especially the sci-fi, especially the sci-fi's, and then I look at the year they were made and I go, Oh my god, that long ago, I didn't realize it was that early, like Alien. Alien is Alien, wasn't Alien released the same year as Star Wars?

SPEAKER_01 1:22:32

Quite possibly right.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:36

Well what year do you think Alien was released? Think about Alien, think about Star Wars, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:22:42

So Star Wars was Christ, 1980, or was it was it even earlier than that?

SPEAKER_02 1:22:49

No, no, it's Star Wars of the 70s.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:52

70s, yeah, so it must have been 77.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:57

I think I think Star Wars is 73, was it not?

SPEAKER_01 1:23:01

No, can't have been that early.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:06

77, yeah. All right, when do you think Alien was released?

SPEAKER_01 1:23:08

Uh 81.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:11

79.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:12

No, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:12

Now to me, Alien, the way that film is, is mid-80s.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:17

Maybe at the very earliest.

SPEAKER_03 1:23:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:19

79. And so it could it seems such a better quality and such a different type of film to Star Wars. And what a what it's sort of it's similar in like 60s and 70s music, where the film films are concerned. The the the the scope of the types of film and the qu the high quality of stuff that's being released in the late 70s, early 80s, off the charts, off the charts. When was Rambo? When was Rambo's first blood? No, that's got to be 81, 82, surely. Have you read the book? No. Spoiler alert, there's only one book for a reason. It wouldn't be possible to have Rambo 2.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:03

Right. Okay. Interesting.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:06

The book is the film was based on the book. The book came first, obviously. Well, see, obviously, yeah, obviously. The book is well worth read. It is oh much better than the film. The film is good. But the book is so much better. Rambo First Blood. Rambo First Blood.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:21

So you go. When was when was Rambo made or released?

SPEAKER_02 1:24:24

Rambo was 82.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:25

82.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:25

Yeah. 82. Brilliant film.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:29

Bridge too far was 1977.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:32

Was it?

SPEAKER_01 1:24:33

Yes. I thought it was earlier than that. I mean made in 76, 76.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:39

There's a question in the chat from Coke. Uh what do you think of the longest day? Oh. Wasn't that with John Wayne? Was he no longer? It was John Wayne, yeah. I haven't seen that in a long time.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:49

Black and white. I mean, I haven't seen it in such a long time. I'm almost not qualified to comment. Um, I've seen it a few times, but it was a long time ago. Um actually, I need to see it again through fresh eyes, Coke, to be honest. To be able to give you a um, I'm copping out here, frankly, in answer to your question. Um it's a super long film. It is a long movie. Another movie I need to see, another black and white, uh, again, risking going over the same territory is There's Is the Glory, which was made in 1945. What's it called? There's Is the Glory. Oh, There's Is the Glory, yeah. There's the Glory. So that is Operation Market Garden again, made just after the war, but all of the people who played in it were there in 1944. Black and white, so it tells the story of Arnhem uh and the bridge. Um definitely of its era 1945, um, black and white, so quite jittery in in some ways, but the the prestige of it is quite something.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:02

Yeah, the the cast. Well, it's describing their characters. I'm gonna share this screen. Okay, the okay, theirs is the glory, uh writer's the cast. Richard Lonsdale plays himself, Stanley Maxted plays himself, a war correspondent. Thomas Scullion plays himself, uh a German. Uh Alan Wood plays himself, war correspondent. Uh Jerry Dimmock plays himself, John Frost. John Frost.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:39

The John Frost. The John Frost. No, the John Frost. Company commander of 2nd Parachute Battalion for the raid um on the French coast for the uh Breville. I know Breville. Bruneville. And then ended up being um 2nd Parachute Battalion commander at Arnhem.

SPEAKER_02 1:27:04

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Fucking hell. Leo Glenn narrator, Frederick Goff, Freddie Goff, uh, Freddie Goff himself, plays in the city. Kate Horst herself, yeah, Jeff von Rissel, hisself, Bernard Boy Wilson, Bernard Boy Wilson himself. Holy shit. I've never seen this film.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:21

It's a watch. It's a proper watch.

SPEAKER_02 1:27:23

You need to watch that, yeah. Uh right. What's on the horizon for uh for you and work? What's going on?

SPEAKER_01 1:27:31

Okay, so we've got um again uh feuds coming out in April. I'm on a project at the moment, uh shooting over in Germany, but then goes to Bulgaria and Spain. Can't say what that is yet, uh, but that will be out next year on Netflix. What's the genre? Huh? What's the genre? Oh again, what what I don't I don't even want to risk it. Okay, don't. Um, and then I'm on another streamer platform, shooting something at the moment, which started on Monday. That will be a good one.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:03

Is there a major difference between being on set with a streamer or being on set with a non-streamer? No. What's the opposite of streaming?

SPEAKER_01 1:28:12

Feature. A feature. Okay. So a one-shot, as in a movie that you've seen in the cinema.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:17

Uh no, but you could no, but no, no, no. Well, BBC isn't a streamer, and they do series, for example.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:23

You uh okay, so I'm taking the opposite of a streamer. A streamer would generally do something in episodes. That's a broad, really imperfect generalization. Because obviously there are movies on Netflix, of course. But I'm I'm suggesting that the difference between the streamer would be episodic versus the feature of being a one-off. That's that's kind of in my mind the difference between the two.

SPEAKER_03 1:28:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:47

In terms of the mechanics of how How that set operates, apart from script being episodic versus a one-shot. Very little, all of the characters in terms of crew, the first AD, the second AD, all of that is can be mapped from one to the other. So very little in in in that sense from my experience.

SPEAKER_02 1:29:13

Where do you see the future of films being in terms of length and composition? Because the reason I asked is because people's attention spans are going on the part. I think Matt Damon apparently said something about this recently. Where I can't oh, that's right. I think he said that films of films now are needing to repeatedly state or in play, remind the viewer what the plot is throughout the film.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:59

Well, I think it's because of this second stream the second screen.

SPEAKER_02 1:30:01

Oh no, I totally agree. I think people's attention span is so I think he said to say I haven't seen what he said. I heard someone else say it. People at home, yeah, they're not fucking watching. So what do you think the future of filmmaking is then? For if it's for broadcast at home. Oh because I haven't seen things change much in the last 10 years where film's concerned. There still seem to be a kind of similar length to what they were before. Hour and a half, two hours.

unknown 1:30:27

Right?

SPEAKER_02 1:30:27

Generally speaking.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:29

Yeah, it depends on the marketplace. But I mean, one of my favorites that wasn't in my top five, uh, Oppenheimer. Love films. Good film.

SPEAKER_02 1:30:36

I've seen it a few times. Good film.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:37

Yeah, same, same. Uh was that two and a half hours? Yeah. It's a watch. Um yeah, if the filmmaking is or the storytelling is riveting, then of course there will be some people who will be like, this isn't really doing it for me, of course. And then there are some people like me who will be like, I'm absolutely lapping this up. Um future of filmmaking, I think we need to get back some really good storytelling. There's been a lot of rehash because there are some well, I mean, what is it saying? No, no. There's uh there's seven stories, I think I remember being told. In terms of the human psyche, and there's the seven main plots. Everything can be whittled down into these seven ideas. Oh no, nothing. Of ever uh of anything. Um, where there's a protagonist, antagonist, good against evil, that kind of thing. So it can be separated down, and I'm at risk of not sounding like I know what I'm talking about. I'm grasping in a way. Bear with me. Um none of us know what we're talking about, right? Sorry. Um the We see a lot of recycled stuff, but sometimes these things can be rehashed because actually they are still relevant because history is repeating itself in a way. So these stories are worth telling because actually they do reflect back lessons that we had learned but have since forgotten. So there is that element. The independent filmmaker, I mean Netflix or who's the other person who's looking at buying Paramount. Paramount is up for sale. I think it was Netflix or another studio who was looking at buying it. And Christopher Nolan, who in my mind is now probably the uh preeminent mainstream director, is now the president of the guild of directors. I think he took it up, took up off which last year. He's saying that again, I'm I'm uh taking his words and uh kind of resynoptizing um what he's saying. He's worried about the loss of a mainstream studio being a a a danger for filmmaking world well Western world wise. So I think Paramount is up for sale. Or is it Warner Brothers? Anyway, um more I think the fact that more people can make movies I mean AI is another another thing, very contentious in the arts. Um but decent storytelling is timeless, but that can be open and available to many people, and it doesn't necessarily have to be mainstream anymore. Where that's gonna go is anyone's guess. Absolutely anyone's guess. But I think people will we are a storytelling race. We tell stories to pass on wisdom, we tell stories to pass on danger, we tell stories to to teach lessons. We are story people. Um I don't think that will ever go out of fashion. It's just the quality of how that's put across.

SPEAKER_02 1:34:04

Yeah, yeah. Interesting to see where it goes. I one of the things that I consistently not consistently regularly sort of think in my mind is this kind of long form podcast, you know, could it be done differently? Could I achieve the same thing differently? Shorter, basically shorter. And I don't think it's the case. I I just don't I don't I you know I don't think it's the case at all. You can't you it would take away from the quality of the conversation. And and the and the difference isn't the quality of the conversation. I mean, quality the how you would how you define the quality of a conversation based on multiple things. Yeah, basically, you know, what is being spoken about, or the topics being spoken about, the way it's being spoken about, the types of people talking about it, and we talk about video, the way they look, the lighting, the the the the the the a million different things, a million different things, the timeliness of the topics being spoken about, you know. Um uh I don't think you can get that in the short, you know, it not in this way anyway. You know, you can you can do hyper focus specific topic things. I've just done actually just done my first H hour feature, actually. It's not it's being put together at the minute by my editor, David. But uh it is there's a guy who There's a guy who I thought, okay like a a podcast isn't gonna do him justice. It needs to be something bigger than the podcast, but the topic is it's something it's it would not be of interest to most people listeners who I so I don't want to release it as HR podcast number, whatever. And this guy deserves, I think, a specific thing about him. The guy is called Peter Wynne Wilson, right? Um, and for Pink Floyd fans out there, some people may recognise the name, most people wouldn't. Peter Wynne Wilson is I I just happened to meet him the year before last, and he's like 80 now. Peter Wynne Wilson is the original, he is the original lighting engineer for Pink Floyd. He is the one that designed and made and did in their shows their lighting. He made what their light shows incredible because of the light. And they are known for it, right? Absolutely. And you and arguably you could say what they did, Pink Floyd with the light shows, which was him, that influenced everyone else.

SPEAKER_00 1:36:27

Everyone else, correct.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:28

Everyone else, right? Well, this guy is the guy, the guy, right? And he is apart from just that piece, he is an amazing man. He's such a nice guy, he's still super active. He like, he he just wear he always wears dungarees with pocketing because he's always making shit. He's literally a fucking inventor, you know, and anything he puts his hand to, he's just amazing at. He's so incredibly talented in loads of different ways. And uh, so I did a so I ended a I was trying to work out how to do it. I did like a two-hour interview with him in his cottage in the up in um Oxfordshire, and then he's got a workshop, he calls it his workshop nearby. This thing's a fucking warehouse, right? I mean it's a warehouse because he's got a forklift in there, and it is just filled with decades of his stuff that he's procured, invented, you know, um uh developed from other people. Uh and then we saw and we went and had a walk around, talked to different things. Like he's got he's got um he's got a objective lens in there, which came off uh a U2 spy plane, an actual U2 spy plane, but he went, huh, that's available, I'll have that for projection purposes for projecting it across the Thames onto the Houses of Parliament, for example. No way, which he did. Honestly, mate, like he was on tours with Floyd with Jimi Hendrix and Janice Joplin, he just go, What in the fuck? Just an incredible guy's gonna have great stories to tell. So that you know, I sort of ventured into the feature side and go, okay, this deserves to be something else.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:55

For sure.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:56

It's never been done about him. He's been in the press over over the years for little different reasons, but to sit down and just get out of his and also we've become friends over time, so I you know, you there's trust there. Yeah, and some of the stories, mate. Oh my god, I wasn't expecting this kind of things to come out of, you know. These got this sort of personal stuff, and then I'm I I like I'm no engineer, but I like that engineering side and the technical side of things, especially if a people like him who's so enthusiastic at talking about it, and to articulate complex things in a moronic way for me. Yeah, not in a moronic way, in a way for morons like me.

SPEAKER_01 1:38:34

Yeah, I mean, accessible is the yeah, yeah. I reckon I'm ADHD. I I swear. I mean, I've got a 10-year-old boy, and looking at his performance, um I would say, you know, the more I researched about it, it's like, yep, on the spectrum for sure. But the more I read about it, the more I'm like, holy shit, that's me as well, easily. Um well. And my propensity my propensity for detail, I'm gonna say my degree with biochemistry. Uh, I'm an absolute plane spotter. There's not that many things about planes I don't know. That is absolutely my weakness. Um, I'm not normally found at the end of a runway with a massive telephoto lens, but I just I love it. Um and I've I find I'm definitely my happy place when I'm on set with people, less so when I'm behind a desk or a screen dealing with admin type stuff. I force myself to do it because I have to do it, but it's not not really where I like. Anyway, I rudely interrupted I no, no, it's fine.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:37

I I interviewed a guy uh recently called Alistair Sandhouse. Right. Uh Dr. Alistair Sandhouse. And the reason I didn't read it, because it came across his book uh called uh No More Normal. I think it's called No More Normal. No More Normal. It's a relatively recent interview, so for people listening to this, you can easily go and find it. Just go back a few episodes. And the book No More Normal it it's about it's an assessment and how he sees uh it's his analysis basically of this this like sort of explosion of people being diagnosed with ADHD, ASM, also other things like depression and these you know uh from from uh conditions and illnesses, right? Uh and the book is really interesting. Like I it was a point in the book. I thought I'm not saying I'm not judging you here, of course. Um I thought I was ADHD uh ADHD for sure. Um and I was reading through the book, and literally at a point I went, holy fuck, holy fuck. Like I've been misdiagnosing myself. I've been diagnosed, I've been diagnosing myself, and I'm totally wrong. Right. Totally wrong. And it was for my particular case, clear as day, and it is clear as day. I just needed to be sh you to read and understand more about what I was experiencing, to go, huh? Yeah, you've been talking shit to yourself, you you know, and I explain on the podcast at the right at the start about the more in details, which I won't go into now. I highly recommend the book for various reasons. Not to go, not to not to read it and go, yeah, and find out actually I'm fine. I'm not on the spectrum, yeah, but to understand it more, right? Understand it more, and also how to approach going, well, should I want to confirm this? How do I go about it? What's the best way to do it? How better to understand this condition I'm in now, whatever it is, whatever it is. Really good book, and it's really easy to can can could consume as well. We can start with a podcast, actually, but yeah. Uh so I've in the podcast controversial book because he talks about overdiagnosis, and there is there is a percentage of people who are being misdiagnosed, right? 100% for for different reasons. For different reasons, but he talks about that, you know. But obviously, there's a lot that are being misdiagnosed. There is actually increases in rates of certain things, so yeah, it's good.

SPEAKER_01 1:42:10

Yeah, uh, I'm wary about getting formal diagnosis. I will read the book, uh, but I believe that if I do get formally diagnosed, I'll never be able to um get a shotgun license ever again. I'm a I'm a I'm a shooter, I mean yeah, yeah. Winter sport, outdoor sports. If I got formally diagnosed, that that's it. We'd never be able to have it.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:35

What with ADHD?

SPEAKER_01 1:42:36

Apparently.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:37

Jesus, I didn't know that. That's a bit extreme.

SPEAKER_01 1:42:39

Uh so you know, I've been a serving reservist with live weapons. Um yeah, so yeah, don't bother.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:50

Don't bother diagnosis, no, no.

SPEAKER_01 1:42:53

I mean, it it's an interesting self-understanding element. So, yeah, I'll read the book. Sounds like a good good read.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:00

Well, have we not spoken about that? We wanted to cover. We didn't we did we didn't really have an agenda that came with it.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:07

I feel like we've swung a lantern and had a just good tomb over a brew.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:10

Yeah, it would exactly that. Good conversation, though. A lot on the military side. I I liked it. I liked it. I'm gonna be what was the book? Um, Conqueror of the Book Secrets of the Conqueror. Secrets of the Conqueror. I'm gonna check that out. You need to get into the 13th Valley.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:22

There is an audio book as well. And Rambo.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:24

Oh man, yeah. Ah, Rambo the book. Yeah, everyone has to read Rambo the book. Yeah, honestly, so good.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:31

Yeah, so good. Um, Mosul, if you haven't watched on Netflix, I highly recommend it. Warfare, if you haven't seen it, it's not an easy watch.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:39

Warfare, you have to watch that, you have to be immersed in it. Absolutely. You put your phone in another room, yeah. You turn the lights down, either a great sound system, yeah, or headphones, just oh man. Do you know what it reminds me of actually? The soundtrack on that when I was watching that film, there's certain films I go all movies, the soundtrack's important, and the the score is important, right? And probably from not using the right language here. I'm talking about the music in the background, right? Not just the music in the background. Some of them you go, This is absolutely critical. If if the score wasn't like this, the film would be nothing like it is, right? There's three films that spring to mind when I think uh four films that spring to mind when I think of them. Oppenheimer's one, Interstellar's another, Interstellar, Oppenheimer Interstellar, Warfare is another, right? The fourth one is the new all quiet on the Western Front.

SPEAKER_01 1:44:36

Oh, not seen.

SPEAKER_02 1:44:37

Oh my god. Honestly, there's this recurring, I want to call it like a tone. Uh it's it's almost like a uh it's not like a bell being like a low-tone bell being rung, but every so often there's this recurring tone throughout the film. Interesting, and it is it, it it that is the thing that maintains a level of darkness to that film, which is like unsurprising. I I had to watch it in three sit-ins. It's a long film, but it was that's not why because it was like this is fucking dark. This is dark, you know, it's making me feel dark. Yeah, yeah. And it's not because it's gory, it's not because it's anything, it's just the the feeling of it. Yeah, because this is my god, this is something else.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:26

I remember seeing the original, which I've never seen. I think it was black and white, but recolourized. Don't quote me on that. Uh, but I remember seeing the original a long, long time ago, so I need to watch that with fresh eyes. I also find that a fascinating experiment, is as our experience and age changes, going back to movies that we saw in our youth, and the we it's like we have a different relationship with that movie all over again.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:51

I on that topic, I watched for the first time ever Flash Dance. Oh my god. Maybe three years ago. When was the last time you watched that film?

SPEAKER_01 1:46:00

Uh probably about the same, but what a fucking movie.

SPEAKER_02 1:46:03

What recently?

SPEAKER_01 1:46:04

Uh yeah, about that. Okay, three or four years ago.

SPEAKER_02 1:46:07

Yeah, it's um yeah, Flash Hats with the girl, yeah. Right? Yeah. You could not make that film no. You could not make that film no. But what a movie. In the film, she's like her character's like 17, maybe 18. Yeah. Gets seduced by the boss. There's a moment where her friend is like basically nearly raped. Uh, and she and yeah, and there's like that whole 30-odd-year-old leader of a company man seducing the teenager. And the teenager, by the way, who's representing the film highly sexualized, you know, which I mean teenagers are, but the way it's done in the film, you go, Oh my god, this is you couldn't.

SPEAKER_01 1:46:45

And I I when I first watched it, I just didn't get any of that.

SPEAKER_02 1:46:49

No, no, no.

SPEAKER_01 1:46:51

I mean, I was looking at it through teenager's eyes myself, or or younger, because I remember it being one of my parents' uh favourite movies, and it's a soundtrack to it, epic. It's a good movie. It's a good movie. Yeah, it's a good movie. But yeah, as you say, you couldn't make it now.

SPEAKER_02 1:47:03

So many problems now, though.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:05

Couldn't make it now.

SPEAKER_02 1:47:06

Anyway, right, Freddie. Been a pleasure. Um likewise, uh you may bags will be rolling in soon. So I don't know how soon, but you're free to you're free to stick around if you want to say hello. If you need to shoot, it's no problem. Yeah. And um, next time, thanks, thanks for your attention, listeners. Oh, so I know I'm sure they enjoyed it. I mean, I know the I know the cut the chat enjoyed it, the live link enjoyed it. So um anytime, anytime come back in, mate. You're welcome. And if not, let's get a brew anyway next time in the area.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:38

Get yourself get yourself to the cinema in April. Oh yes, good luck with Fuse. Yeah, yeah. Um it it should be it should be good. It's good, good hot movie. Let's go. Um the modern day Kelly Oh Kelly's Heroes.

SPEAKER_02 1:47:52

I haven't seen it in a long time. I remember being entertaining. Very good.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:55

Terry Terry tell him again uh telly Savalis Savalis. Sabalis, is it? Yeah. Um Sabalis. Telly Savalis.

SPEAKER_02 1:48:04

Is it Saballis?

SPEAKER_01 1:48:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:48:07

Come on.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:13

Kin Eastwood, Telly Savalis.

SPEAKER_00 1:48:19

Kelly's Heroes cast.

SPEAKER_02 1:48:21

Oh look. Tin Eastwood, Terry Savallis, Don Rickles, Don Sutherland.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:25

Don Sutherland.

SPEAKER_00 1:48:26

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

unknown 1:48:28

He's good.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:29

Epic. Yeah. Anyway, Kelly's heroes, we're done. That's a that's a that's a a top, that's a top ten for sure.

SPEAKER_02 1:48:35

It's been a pleasure.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:38

Likewise. Thank you very much for having me along.

SPEAKER_02 1:48:40

No way. Thanks for coming. We are. That's it. If you enjoy this episode, why not become a Hey Chour patron? Patrons will get access to all of the episodes before anyone else. They get advanced viewing of the episodes, and you also get other perks and bonuses. All of the information is on charliecharlie1.com. Just hit the menu item, become a patron. It'll show you everything there, including access to the Heychhour Discord community and private patron only channels on there. So go to charliecharlie1.com and hit the menu item, become a patron. Easy peasy. Thank you for being a supporter. Subscribe to the channel, and I will catch you on the next episode. Thank you.