The Iron Claw

The true story of the Von Erichs – a 1980s US wrestling family. The father, a star wrestler who never got the world title, pushes his five sons to get the title for the family – with inevitably tragic consequences, including two deaths and a lost foot. I was reminded of the family of Ludwig Wittgenstein: three of his brothers died by suicide, partly as a result of their father’s obsession with them continuing the family’s steel business.

My third Curzon film with Jeremy Allen White (with Fremont and Fingernails).

Wonka

Another business… This is basically a founding-myth story about how Willy Wonka got to be running the amazing magical chocolate factory in that other Ronald Dahl story. And it does the job well, with amazing visuals, cheesy musical songs, a great cast of ‘Oh that’s wossisname from x’ moments, and some decent satire of evil cartel-ery. Three faces from Ghosts, the nice English teacher from Sex Education who believes in Maeve, Sally Hawkins, Matt Lucas, the nice old chap from Shakespeare in Love – they’re all in it. And apparently the lead – Timothée Chalamet – is also well known (even I’d seen his face in posters for Dune 2).

How they are related

Both are about business, about working hard to achieve business success, and about family.