Check Book: Mixtapes
Inspired by Morvern Callar
IN THIS WEEK’S EDITION:
THE BARDI PARTY REPORT
Hello readers. There’s a lot going on right now, so much so that I’ve already forgotten the Oscar nominations came out only four days ago. People getting mad online about F1’s Best Picture nod seems somewhat…quaint now, no?
In the spirit of just wanting to put headphones on and dissociate - and also inspired by the mixtape talk on our Morvern Callar episode - we present to you some playlists. Some given, some received, all very reflective of the state of indie/alt at the millennium.
From Marie: “This is a retroactive playlist I made probably a decade ago as a way of sharing with someone who didn’t know me as a teen what kind of stuff I was into as a teen. Belle and Sebastian were my favorite band, I was an AP French student, and saw a psychiatrist for depression and anxiety. The Ben Kweller track feels like an outlier, but I was really into that album, so.”
From Ben: NOTE - this is a placeholder for Ben’s eventual mixtape, based on a CD he received from an ex girlfriend in 2002. Watch this space for updates.
From Emily: “I am currently out of town and dont have access to anything from high school, but I did find this tumblr post I made about some mix cds that I *received* (really putting some anonymous dudes from iowa on blast here) this one in particular I think is really endearing, I went to junior prom with this techno guy from fairfield iowa in 2002 and the last three tracks were his own creations.”
LET’S CRACK OPEN THE DOSSIER
Giddy Up
Scottish author Alan Warner’s 1995 debut novel Morvern Callar made a natural fit for director—and fellow Scot—Lynne Ramsay’s second film. As Ramsay explained to IndieWire, she loves “the outsider kind of characters” who “sometimes [are] not always likeable” found within Warner’s novel, just as she had loved James, the protagonist with an “edge” from her first feature film Ratcatcher. Warner’s novel reminded Ramsay of “a Camus novel, something like ‘The Stranger,’ but with a young woman.” In Ramsay’s eyes, the novel’s titular character felt “very modern,” its story a tale “about a slightly lost generation.”1
But, Ramsay acknowledged in seemingly every interview she gave about the film, there was also something classical, almost archetypal about the otherwise idiosyncratic Morvern. As she told RSA Journal, Ramsay felt that Morvern was “like the troubled character of the west and you don’t really know what happens in the end. She remains a mystery.”2 Through her inscrutability, Morvern was—Mitski-style—being a cowboy. In The Los Angeles Times, Ramsay made it plainer: “Even in her internal world [Morvern]’s still a mystery. It reminded me of a western when the cowboy rides off in the end and you still don’t know what the deep root of his problem is.”3 In The Guardian, Ramsay aligned Morvern with Western cinema’s most legendary onscreen figure: “In some way she felt like one of those intriguing characters in a western where you don’t get to the bottom of that sorrow - John Wayne or something!”4 While promoting her most recent feature last year, Ramsay restated this comparison in Film Comment: “[W]e always thought Morvern was like a cowboy.”5
Perhaps Ramsay was just manifesting. When Morvern Callar went to the Cannes Film Festival in May 2002, the film had yet to secure American distribution. But by the time Ramsay’s movie reemerged for fall festivals like Toronto and Telluride, a stateside distributor had been found: its name, of course, was Cowboy Pictures.6
Acting Out
Lynne Ramsay has never acted onscreen in a feature film, but she has acted offscreen for at least five. As Ramsay shared with The Los Angeles Times in 2002, Morvern Callar lead actress Samantha Morton told Ramsay that she was “the only director she’s worked with who acted it all out off camera.” Ramsay explained, “I’d get so into it, I wasn’t even totally aware I was doing it. It was like a symbiotic thing.”7 As we’ll hear throughout the rest of this series, this has remained a core part of Ramsay’s approach to directing actors. It probably reached its apex (mountain) during the production of You Were Never Really Here, when a fully clothed Ramsay spontaneously jumped into a pool of cold water alongside star Joaquin Phoenix, who later told Deadline that Ramsay “would experience what the character was feeling” on set.8 So when you watch We Need To Talk About Kevin and Die My Love, please picture Ramsay wildly pantomiming just outside of each frame.
On Morvern Callar, at least, Ramsay used one other unique method of directing (one of her) actors. While Ramsay provided the experienced Morton with the entire screenplay for the film, she withheld the full script from her second-billed actor, Kathleen McDermott, who only received the next day’s pages the night prior to shooting.9 Morvern Callar was McDermott’s first onscreen credit—prior to appearing in the film, she had worked as a hairdresser in Glasgow, that is until the actor Des Hamilton met her while shopping and recommended her to Ramsay10—and Ramsay wanted to maintain a sense of “spontaneity” and “lightness” with McDermott, as she explained to IndieWire: “I think that with nonprofessional actors the way that gets the best work is not to give them the whole script, which gets them into this kind of ‘Oh, what’s my character mean?’ That’s logical if somebody’s never done it before. But I let her find her own way as well. Just so she’s not very analytical about what’s happened in the past or whatever. Essentially, it felt very in the moment because she knew what was happening now, and that’s it. And that worked.”11
Sounding Off
In last week’s newsletter, I detailed how Ramsay’s time as a photographer and then a cinematographer shaped her image-making as a director. This week, though, I want to focus on Ramsay as a sound-maker. While promoting Ratcatcher, Ramsay identified sound as an aspect that distinguished her film from most others: “I love sound; I love that really underused, totally subconscious part of the medium that’s really, to me, incredible. Not a lot of directors focus on that aspect of a film.”12 By sound, Ramsay unnecessarily clarified in The Guardian, she did not mean the spoken word: “I love to see great dialogue in the cinema but I hate to see ‘Film TV’. When I go to the cinema, I want to have a cinematic experience. Some people ignore the sound and you end up seeing something you might see on television and it doesn’t explore the form. Sound is the other picture.”13
In Morvern Callar, that “other picture” was created by Ramsay and her sound designer Paul Davies on a “on a subliminal level,” especially with the “buzz of a light,” though Ramsay made its meaning a little less subliminal in Cinema Scope: “Even when she’s in the bath, the dead body’s there, the buzz of the light represents he’s still there.” But Ramsay knew this was a subtle feeling: in the same interview, Ramsay said that Morvern was “so quiet in the beginning” that she’d “hate to see anyone with popcorn in there.”14
And she had good reason to: prior to Morvern’s release, Ramsay was asked to present a film at London’s National Film Theatre. She chose Terrence Malick’s 1978 film Days of Heaven, but the screening proved frustrating for its sponsor: “I went and there was this guy who brought in his popcorn, this is quite a quiet film as well, even with a beautiful score. I’d’ve liked to have killed him. It was such a lovely experience, and on behalf of another filmmaker, I felt really furious! I think popcorn should be banned, man, y’know?”15 Do you agree? Sound off in the comments below.
WHAT IS THE TEAM INTO THIS WEEK?
Ben Hosley, Producer: “I recommend trudging! Ain’t nothing better than a good trudge through some snow. Awaken the spirit! Don’t walk or run! Trudge, goddamnit!”
The Boss Baby, Daughter of Host: This weekend, David and the Boss Baby watched Shrek. The Boss Baby is obsessed with it now, and was especially wowed by the twist of the dragon being nice. She was slightly bored by the musical interludes, to which Griffin replied, “Hmmm I don’t remember that being a soundtrack-forward film.”
AJ McKeon, Editor: “6 years late to this but with space being the big thing in our house currently I decided to finally watch For All Mankind. Really enjoying it so far.”
Griffin Newman, Host: “I spent my snow day watching Nickelodeon’s SNOW DAY, a peak Y2K movie with a truly demented cast. The film was originally written to be THE ADVENTURES OF PETE & PETE’s finale movie before Nick changed strategy, but fans of P&P will definitely still be able to recognize that energy running throughout. Plus it features the second best Hoku single tied to an early 2000s comedy!
(Also, trying to pull it up on steaming is how I found out there was a 2022 Paramount+ musical remake starring Rob Huebel in the Chevy Chase role?!? Cannot endorse that one!)”
Alan Smithee, Pseudonymous Editor: “If you’re looking for a fun YouTube rabbit hole to fall down in short bursts between sessions of remote schooling on Monday (#justgivekidssnowdayspleaae), go to the YouTube channel called “petscop” and start with the first video”
JJ Bersch, Researcher: “As I often do in this newsletter, I am going to recommend a little video game almost no one has ever heard about: Animal Crossing: New Horizons. The 3.0/Switch 2 update is out and the world sucks once again. It’s high time for me to return to the island of Harborcoat and repeatedly press the B button so hard while Blathers talks that I break all of my Joy-Cons.”
Marie Bardi, Social Media: “Another recipe recommendation courtesy of Mark Bittman - I made his Japanese-style beef stew this week and it was exceptional. Hearty and with just a hint of sweetness that made it pretty addictive.”
THIS WEEK ON THE PODCAST
Mommy's back! Emily Yoshida joins the gang to talk about 2002's Morvern Callar, a surprisingly tender film about grief, starting over, and taking a Jet2 Holiday.
MEANWHILE ON PATREON…..
We’re getting high and trying to ration our morphine as we jump back into the Laterverse and discuss friend of the show Nia DaCosta’s 2026 triumph, 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple.
AND ON CRITICAL DARLINGS:
Richard Lawson and Alison Willmore discuss The Oscar Nominations (And Also Some Talk About F1).
COMING SOON:
RSA Journal, October 2002.
Los Angeles Times, December 15, 2002.
The Guardian, October 28, 2002.
Film Comment, November 10, 2025.
Los Angeles Times, December 15, 2002.
The Guardian, October 28, 2002.
The Guardian, October 5, 2002.
The Guardian, October 28, 2002.
Cinema Scope, 2002.
Ibid.
Marie’s playlist is really, really hitting hard — even (especially?) the Ben Kweller track.
As someone who can’t stand someone smacking on their popcorn during a movie I agree with Ramsey about banning popcorn. Also love seeing AJ diving into For All Mankind with a new season on the way.