If two people were to make opposing claims about Jim Hosking‘s new film, that it’s twisted genius, and that it’s unmitigated bollocks, it’s somehow possible to agree with both views without necessarily feeling conflicted. This whacked-out reimagining of the meeting of minds between Stevie Wonder and Paul McCartney that resulted in the titular plea for racial harmony is that kind of movie. Full of Tramadol strength deadpan humour, Andy Kaufman-esque anti-comedy endurance tests, and knee-length prosthetic penises, to say it’s an acquired taste would be an understatement. It may be the Surströmming of the cinema world.

On the Mull of Kintyre, Paul McCartney (Sky Elobar) welcomes Stevie Wonder (Gil Gex) as the latter arrives on the beach, having rowed across the Atlantic. Stevie’s in a foul mood, but has come because it’s important that, ‘Musical legends help out other musical legends, musically’. Musical help isn’t high on the list, as the pair bicker, eat inordinate amounts of frozen veggie meals (courtesy of ‘The Wife’), and streak across the island, flapping obscenely in the breeze.

Elobar and Gex don’t even attempt to stick to the most basic signifiers of their roles. Elobar’s version of McCartney’s gentle Scouse tones keeps hopping back across the Atlantic on a dime, and Gex’s Wonder is in a constant state of variable irascibleness. But that is, of course, part of the joke. Another big part is that there is absolutely nothing in the film that relates to the writing of the eponymous song. Instead, it’s two, let’s say, eccentric performers being pugnacious at each other, for 90 minutes.

Perhaps because it’s a two-hander that goes all in on its marmite execution, Ebony & Ivory doesn’t have the rewatch potential of the consistently grotesque and demented Greasy Strangler, or the star-powered strangeness of An Evening With Beverly Luff Linn. It revels in awkward silences, meandering non-sequiturs, and painfully extended gags that go on for minutes at a time. But when it hits, it really works. Stevie’s delightfully weird way of spitting the words, ‘Scottish Cottage’, the naked dance on the beach, and every product used being made by the same company, eg. ‘Wee Willy’s Big Wee Whisky’ reminds you what is so singular about Hosking’s comic imagination. It’s just there are a few more lulls in proceedings than in his previous work.

Reviewing Ebony & Irony is a but like reviewing the most experimental, avant-garde art piece. There is very little available framework against which to judge it. For most people, it will be interminable nonsense. For the brave few it’ll be a beloved future favourite. Even by Jim Hosking’s standards, this is a film that goes out of its way to be as weird and off-putting as possible. But it’s weirdly comfortig to know that a filmmaker this idiosyncratic is getting films made.

Screening as part of Glasgow Film Festival 2025 on Wed 5 & Thu 6 Mar 2025