The Rule of Scary
The Rule of Scary
2 Hereditary, Dear Old Grandma's Legacy
Andrew and Jason discuss Hereditary (2018). So brave!
Hello, and welcome to the Rule of Scary Podcast. I am brother Jay. I'm brother Andrew. And this week, we reviewed the movie hereditary. And for me, I know I had a great time watching this movie, but it wasn't the first time I'd seen this. Andrew,
Unknown Speaker :I watched the trailer about 10 times before building up the strength to watch the whole thing. Yeah, I got a lot. I don't know. I don't know. We'll get there. Let's get through some. Some other stuff. Okay. What's the stuff?
Unknown Speaker :Yeah, no let's let's start with this. I there are a few notes that we got from our friend Jason, about last episode. And number one. We were incorrect in saying that they were worms because they weren't worms. They were maggots. That's why there was 10 million of them
Unknown Speaker :are Megan's are maggots, not worms,
Unknown Speaker :but their worm like I don't.
Unknown Speaker :I or mess.
Unknown Speaker :I haven't. I haven't verified the facts behind worms versus maggots. I don't, I don't really know. But I know they were fucking gross and there was a lot of a lot of them. So
Unknown Speaker :I received the note on the peacock. I think it was just a cut and paste type deal. Our buddy Jason who's a good friend and a longtime listener. He says about the peacock cuz I was confused at the end why the peacock existed and Because that's how Halina Marcos gets stabbed in the neck with the feather from the glass peacock and I'm just going to read this that such exquisite yet superfluous beauty as the male peacock exists at all in the world can be seen by some as proof positive of a beneficial creator. A thumbprint, if you will, of the work done by the hand of the Divine artist, divine artists is in capital letters. By the way, this echoes the peacock as a symbol of beauty, vanity and of course, pride. Lucifer sin. So intentional, maybe on the peacock.
Unknown Speaker :Okay, well, you know what, that just adds another level of awesome. Yep. All right, very good. So, Andrew, what are you drinking today?
Unknown Speaker :Today, I made a cocktail. Well, it's actually a punch, but everything's a cocktail if you believe in yourself, um, this is called mother's ruin punch. made famous by death and company. It's a bar in New York. It's a bunch of sugar. So that's a good start. club soda, a bunch of gin. Fruit Juice lemon juice for Muth champagne as a topper. Oh, isn't that it's always nice when champagne is sort of like the topper that and a whale of grapefruit for garnish and the recipes on our Instagram if you really want to know.
Unknown Speaker :I love it. The Wheel of garnish makes it healthy, of course. So, you know, it kind of negates the sugar and alcohol as long as the grapefruits on top It's like eating a salad kind of.
Unknown Speaker :Yes, yes. Fruit fruit salad.
Unknown Speaker :Delicious. Delicious. Well, Andrew, should we just, I mean, like normally I would want to do a snap. Let's just dive right into this fucking movie. This is a movie
Unknown Speaker :I would like to call dear old grandma's legacy.
Unknown Speaker :And then the subtitle is the story of a grandchild worn down just enough so a demon can enter his body.
Unknown Speaker :That you know what? spot on.
Unknown Speaker :That's it. We're done. We're finished.
Unknown Speaker :No
Unknown Speaker :I have more notes than I'd like to admit on this thing. And you could start a drinking game at home called every time Andrew says, I have notes on this you have to drink? I don't I didn't really I don't know how to talk about this film. I think there's good reason. So, in our first episode, we covered Two Spirit, which felt like it was made up of sections or events and it was easy to be cynical about things like a roomful of razor wire, but compared to heredity, like it was a real who'd done it, you know, like it was pretty simple like in its form, this film. It just kind of felt like you kept going deeper. And I wasn't always sure which movie I was watching or what plane of existence I was sort of being asked to live on. You know, sometimes I was like hovering. Sometimes I was in sometimes I thought and he was up to no good sometimes there's obviously outside forces. But, and I don't want to get into the themes of you know the film just yet, but that was just kind of my first Take so I think I was trying to be cynical about a thing. And like, it's certainly easy for me to find plot holes in something silly. Like, if you remove like all of the horror from this film, it's actually kind of just a family drama.
Unknown Speaker :Yeah, no. 100% absolutely it is. It's a family dealing with loss. It's a family dealing with grief. You know, again, you were to strip away all the horror elements. I love that you said that because you're 100% correct that if you were to strip this down to its core foundation, remove all of the supernatural elements. You've got just a good drama.
Unknown Speaker :Yeah, I kind of like to always know, the timestamp of like when things happen so that I know how well I'm doing. And like how much of me I still need to reserve for the rest of this, you know, right. But it became apparent to me about 30 minutes and that I was not going to be able to get away with saying that Annie is nuts or that these people are nuts because like these people are genuinely suffering like an This film, and sometimes it's just really more of a drama rather than like your stereotypical horror film or maybe like horror movies. That can be dramas, you know? I don't know. But what do you take away all the scary stuff, which is the director Ari, I hope I pronounced that right. said there's like three hours of shit on the cutting room floor that is basically this is us like a family drama. Right? And they really didn't need it. So but yeah,
Unknown Speaker :right. Yeah. Ari Astor, who wrote and directed this movie it on a couple of things that I think is really, really important for modern horror for sure. That number one it was, I thought it was excellent. As far as genuine scares. It wasn't all just, you know, I mean, there was a lot of Gore, but it wasn't all just Gore. It was a great kind of had great punctuation throughout. The timing was good. Tension build in it was great. But at the end of it, it's exactly what we're saying. There's still a good story behind it. Now, whether it's a sad story, or whatever the case may be, that is what it is. But at the end of the day, it's a well told story. But we don't have to dig into that. Let's are we want to do this thing scene by scene,
Unknown Speaker :kind of just, you know, just like I was like there's a greater domestic melodrama, you know, like it like lends more to that even than it does to, to really even like a horror genre as far as like traditions that it's honoring. And the thing that I found really really difficult about this movies like, Well shit, I'm gonna have to figure out how to talk about like mental illness while doing a podcast. I don't sound like an idiot, but also at the same time like there's so many like it's further complicated like in the sense that every single thing in the field in the film feels like an important detail the beginning alone just even like the setup everything you need to know is in the beginning thing right? So she mentioned private rituals. There's the necklace you know, which is the symbol of payment the tree house, right? That's the first thing you see it pans to the miniature sets and then the miniature set becomes the reality you know, it's the dad waking up Peter. The allergy to nuts strict dad, weird tongue sound and that's just in like the first one minutes on, like, is all of this important? And it kind of is like there's so many details every step of the way that are just like breadcrumbs. And they just don't ever let up. Right. Okay.
Unknown Speaker :And and something that's kind of beautiful about this movie is that you are discovering it as the characters are discovering it. There's not there's not a ton of there's not there's not a lot of this kind of like weird weight on foreshadowing, although there is a ton of weight on foreshadowing, but you're discovering you're taking this journey with the with the family. And so what they know, you know, and you are not kind of omniscient. So I think that's very clever, because that just adds that much more tension to it. I agree with that. And honestly, let's be honest, no matter how we discuss this movie, we're not going to be the smartest people in the room. You know, bitcoiners Speak for yourself. Well, I'm not going to be the smartest person in the room. I mean, like you probably read a fucking psycho. book or something about this, but I'm the only one here. It's
Unknown Speaker :only one room.
Unknown Speaker :So you're the smartest person in the room? I, yeah, the fish in here with me. So
Unknown Speaker :I played the hereditary soundtrack before we got started in the dog got up and went to another.
Unknown Speaker :Perfect.
Unknown Speaker :So, you know, kind of like we did with suspiria. I think I want to run through quickly, like not a synopsis, but kind of what's happening right? There are a lot of points in this movie. They're just long, you know, and I think that obviously, that's a choice that already made. I think a lot of scary movies just do these quick cutscenes not a lot of quick cutscenes. In this one. I'll say to a fault for my well being and we'll get there like the head and just other stuff. We start with the obituary, right and I'm reading this thing. I've already talked about the opening scene, which I thought was incredible. The pan from the treehouse, I'm loving the score. This is something I'm probably going to say every episode. I'm really paying attention to music and this stuff. we're introduced to Charlie. I don't know what her condition is, but she's just singing weird, right? And then and it gives eulogy for her mother Ellen, as she says she's a very difficult woman, she had private rituals, which is early foreshadowing, I guess. And as it turns out, her death is really just sort of a catalyst for a string of increasingly horrific events. But everything here, like I said before, just seems like an important detail. And I just kept thinking about this, like typing up notes, um, show me a pie in the first act. And the last act, someone gets pie in the face. And in this thing, like the first act is the tree, and Ellen, and the symbol for the king of payment and like the last act with all of that becomes the pie in the face, right? Yeah, so even like the necklace, you know, the grandma, were wearing during the funeral, the symbol that is the real seal of payment.
Unknown Speaker :You know, I don't want to get into the history of that, right.
Unknown Speaker :But basically, he said, like, why did you make that choice is that I just needed to pick something that wasn't the devil. And honestly, I didn't want to get too close to anything. In fact, Aaron asked me not to research too much. Cuz she didn't want anything evil to live in my computer
Unknown Speaker :that I love that he was like,
Unknown Speaker :I don't know, I just needed something not the devil. So this is what he chose. So
Unknown Speaker :let me ask you this before we get to get too far down this rabbit hole. how uncomfortable did that because I know like for you the demonology and all of that shit is an uncomfortable space for you to be like that is a that is kind of a fear place for you. It is it's a bit of an Achilles heel, I respect it, I find it entertaining, but I respect it on a level that like, like hard drugs like I'm not touching those. Right, right. Right. those are those are not no, and you just get a glimpse of it and you just look away and you go about your business. That's kind of how I feel about demonology and stuff like I don't want to invite any kind of shit into my thing into my house into my computer. Like everything is fine, right? So when we start looking at this stuff and what I also realized this week another Achilles heel of mine is like the found footage shit, which is why I thought Blair Witch and paranormal activity was so scary but there's a similar thread here and there's like there's also paranormal shit happening that just gets bananas at the end and we'll get there. Huh? smirking, guide the coffin. Can we talk about him? I said, like, Why the fuck is this guy smiling? She sees all these strange faces right at this field. Right? These are all members of this cult. Right right. And they're all looking at Charlie with smiles because they know that she is harboring like the their demon
Unknown Speaker :K. Right. Right. So and know that phrase. And the great thing about that about that whole scene is that it's almost POV from Charlie's perspective. And that's really the only place in the movie that that is a thing. It's very, very interesting because at one point in time, you think well, I'm seeing through Charlie's eyes, you know by the time you get to the end of The movie you're starting to question like, whose eyes was it through?
Unknown Speaker :At the end? I was like, why did Charlie even exist? Why was she even here? Like for the head thing? Like, why not just start with Peter? You know if you're trying to create this King of Hell, but like I figured it out I know why I did a little desktop research you know, I get it. No, you're right though because they're introduced to the tongue sounds and Charlie's drawing and she has an allergy to nuts looks like which is essentially the makeup of this bar. I'll say this character but this character is we know possessed but we'll just say this body right? And she has this allergy again, pie in the first act. This is all going to come to fruition right? So I was confused as to why so I was confused as to why not just start with Peter when he's born and it's hard kind of hard to talk about this without knowing the ending, right? Should we just sort of say like, what the whole point is like, there's a king like Ellen the dead grandma is a cult leader. She's trying to
Unknown Speaker :No no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. No, no, no. Let's follow it from start to finish you fucking good. All right. I don't
Unknown Speaker :have to skip a lot.
Unknown Speaker :Oh,
Unknown Speaker :they're bad. Annie says you were her favorite. Right? And that seems like a passable thing by you were her favorite. She means her. Her mom who just passed away, Ellen would leave it at that. She goes, she finds a book on spiritual ism. awfully convenient. She gets a little spooked. And then it cuts to the miniatures. And the thing about the miniatures, it's nice, it adds a little additional context to sort of like what's happening. Right, right. And also the thing about the miniatures, which is a theme, fuck I miss the themes. Um, the thing about the miniatures is there's an outside force, it's always moving these things around, and it's nothing is ever in their control, which is really just a metaphor for really what's happening within the gram, fam, right? And their real house and the miniature sets are based on their real house and their real life anyway, right?
Unknown Speaker :macrocosm microcosm all of that shit. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was smooth and this is a perfect opportunity for us to talk about the fucking transitions. In this movie we're ridiculous I mean like where it would transition from you know you're seeing the miniature and then all of a sudden in a split second you're not in the miniature anymore this is this is the real life this is the actual set so well done I've looked I'm you know me I mean like I searched for places where I could find those cuts and like where I could see a seam somewhere and yeah, oh my god ridiculous. Really that was cool.
Unknown Speaker :That was a great start and that first thing like this family this gram family like they are the play things for this otherworldly force, right? Even go a little deeper. They're things scrawled on the walls inside of this, the her miniature set, right? Or miniature sets, I should say, that are really rough. Really just kind of like horrible words and demonic words and stuff, but you can hardly see them or read them. Like you kind of really have to like dig in to kind of figure out what they are. But, you know, I think we'd be Do ourselves a disservice if we didn't talk about the overall themes of this shit because I didn't know what they were I didn't always know what I was watching right? mental illness is obviously a thing like the site. There's psychotic depression and her father, there's a disassociative identity disorder and a mother, schizophrenia and her brother, which makes sense, because mom was probably trying to put payment in her brother, but also suffering in grief. Like to me this whole thing is about suffering and grief.
Unknown Speaker :I agree. I couldn't agree more. That's really where this movie takes its route, you know, is is through the suffering and the grief and then the scariness.
Unknown Speaker :Well, he said I wanted to make a film about suffering that took suffering seriously. I mean, and that's basically that's what this is doing.
Unknown Speaker :Well fucking done, young man. Well, you did it. Good job. You made me want to pee my pants well done.
Unknown Speaker :He says I knew that I really wanted to make a film about the corrosive effects of trauma on a family unit. I knew that I wanted to make A film that had sort of an quality about a family that's basically eating itself in its grief. It's a story that I have certainly had in me. I didn't really have to find it.
Unknown Speaker :No, I don't think that that had to be too far of a reach for him. Because I mean, it was that story came from somewhere. Now again, I didn't dig into any of that, but that that certainly did come from, you know, from a place of knowledge. You know, he wrote and directed so it was so well crafted that I can't believe that those aren't things that he himself may have kind of come into contact with.
Unknown Speaker :He did but he won't ever say like he won't ever say like what it is specifically. He'll say that it comes from a place of experience right? But he'll say like for in everyone's best interest. I'm not going to tell you exactly what they are. And being a first time director at least like this feature length film director, he made some crazy shorts, which are messed up like he never dives into exactly like well is a true which I think is a stupid thing to ask someone anyway.
Unknown Speaker :Right? Right, right. I agree. Let's get into some weird shit into the weird shit. This is the part that I can't wait for.
Unknown Speaker :Because I know the weird shit probably just turned you to jelly and I just I can't fucking wait to hear how it worked. Remember when I said I'd seen the trailer like 10 to 15 times already just sort of like what am I working rare? You know this part is a bird hits the window. Bird hits the window, Peter smoke the bowl, I'm calling this so we have a dead bird it hits the classroom window. Charlie is in there. She looks at scissors. Next scene. She's outside she has scissors cuts off the agent head, random lady ways from across the street. And then we're back at home. And there's an introduction to a triangle in the bedroom in which Annie says did you pull up the carpet? So this is all happening in pretty rapid succession. So what's weird about this, there's a tension and release in this film where there'll be long cuts of things. You know, let's talk you know we'll get to Peter in the car and how long that took when something really tragic are dramatic happens like they take their time with pacing, when shit hits the fan like it's quick. Like it's just one after another. There's a lot of information very quickly
Unknown Speaker :and it's designed to fuck you up. It's designed to make you miss things and rethink and think and rethink again, about did I see what I think I saw and I think a perfect example of that is when you know, we were in the in the scene earlier when she's in the shop, and she's looking at mom's stuff, and she pulls out the spiritual life book, and she, you know, sits everything down and she's ready to leave the room, flips off the fucking light. And then all of a sudden, fuckin grandma is standing in the corner. That fucking scene was amazing, because it was like it happened Quick, quick, quick, and then it carried a little too long on Grandma, which I fucking love because it was like, so grim. Yeah, I mean, like she cuz
Unknown Speaker :I rewind that. We don't really rewind anymore, but I went back. I think that's what you know, we go back
Unknown Speaker :Hey, hey Siri, let's go back 15 tickets. Oh shit, all my devices just went nuts. You can't just say that. It's like throwing a grenade in the dugout. So yeah, I had to go back on that like two times because I wasn't sure why she got so spooked. I didn't know what it was. But it's sort of the first time that we're sort of we're being introduced to an accurate apparition. Am I saying that right? Should Yeah. So any goes this meeting, right? And this meeting is something that like you could easily gloss over, you know, if you're busy taking notes for a podcast you're making, but there are some important details in there that she unpacks we found out her brother hung himself. Looking back I was like this to escape her mom, I don't know. But that scene was really powerful. She kind of gets into like the sort of like the funeral scene, like she's actually telling you a lot of things you need to know.
Unknown Speaker :Well, I think it's important to to kind of give this scene the weight that it deserves because this is the first time that you get to kind of see her be a vulnerable human being As opposed to kind of like, is she nuts? Is she not nuts? No, no, here it is. And in rapid succession, it's all out there on the table for a group of strangers. So this is a woman who's, you know, in pain, she wants that intimacy. And I mean, like, that whole scene was great for that reason. It really does kind of give you a really great sense of of what her character truly is about.
Unknown Speaker :This is the sort of my issue with this character, which that was my part where I'm like, What plane do I live on? Like, am I sympathetic for Annie? is you know is Annie doing this horrible evil stuff her husband starts to look at our one point is like you dug up you know, the body like, you know, at some point, I think the director wants you to wonder like, is Annie at fault later? You kind of reach this point, the movie where like, there's not a single protagonist that you really give a shit about. The dad. I love dad, but just because I liked that. I knew that he was gone,
Unknown Speaker :right? Yeah, no, you're exactly 100% correct. There. That guy had a fun an X on his back from the first scene, he was just too damn nice. There's a
Unknown Speaker :weird choice in the beginning where they come back from the funeral and he tells everyone to take off their shoes and they act as if they've never like taken off their shoes inside before but this is the thing the dad clearly wants to happen. I don't know he was the one with the rules. Like he was the one that was like getting me out of the tree. Nahanni sorry, Charlie out of the tree house before the rain roll. He was kind of always wrangling everyone. He's dealing with the email for the desecrated grave of Elon, you know, but not telling any like he's managing a lot. And there's a segment in here later. I just called dead breaks down. It's all pretty, pretty quick kind of what happens to him. This next one's called Peter wants to go to a party. Oh, Peter.
Unknown Speaker :Oh, god damn it, beat it. I truly like Peter throughout the entire movie. And like shooting I mean, and that's kind of why I like him is because again, that's a very real, I knew we were going to talk about you know that he is He is that kid was well acted. And I mean really well done when Peter and
Unknown Speaker :Annie have a conversation about him wanting to go to a party. This is the first time where I'm like these two hate each other. And then in the middle of a burning scene in the woods, Charlie does a tongue click. So basically one kid is seemingly possessed, and the other is just a shitty teenager. And I'm just really reminded a Why don't have children, does he or does he not have a fairly good reason to be not only distrustful of his mother, but kind of not be on best terms with her? You know, I mean, like, here's the thing she does with Joanie later when she meets Joan and I'll talk about my love for Joan in a second. But yeah, apparently she's sleepwalks, and she's standing over Peter with paint thinner and a box of matches. So he's a little distrustful of mom. Basically, at this point in the movie though, like I cannot believe this kid has to take his creepy sister to the party and she's 13 but whatever.
Unknown Speaker :I love this because He simply says, Does she want to go? And of course Tony Colette's character and he is like, well, I don't know. Did you ask her? And he's kind of like, Fuck no, I don't know where she's at that conversation
Unknown Speaker :was painful because I was like, Oh, this isn't like having kids probably like, you know, basically at this point no one is okay. Mom is making weird shit. Peter smoking Charlie is not alright, I guess she eats some nuts. And then
Unknown Speaker :wait, Okay, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, we got to talk about the build up. And this is what's so fucking great about this movie is that it has this super subtle way of unsettling you for a long, long time. And then you get the punch, you know, so you go to the party. Nobody wants to go to the party. So already you're kind of on edge because you've witnessed this family fight and everybody yelling and nobody wants to do what they're gonna do and whatever. So they go to this fucking party and Got the brother. You know, he wants what every teenager wants. He's trying to get laid
Unknown Speaker :the text message read bring your dad Yeah.
Unknown Speaker :Oh, bring the tea. I think I'll bring that with me and my little Bag of Weed. So he produces the Bag of Weed. And he says, I got really good weed. And he goes to the girl and the girls like, oh, super great. And they're having a little chat. And oh, come on the bonds back here and so she invites everybody to smoke this case weed he all he wants to do is get behind that closed door with that girl, right? Okay, so it's the same motivation that's been in every horror film since the beginning of human history. But good, there's a twist, because you've got I'm allergic to nuts girl who's like, No, I don't want to do that. I don't want to draw. I don't want to be here. I don't want to do any of this stuff. I'm gonna call you late at night and just make the fucking noise.
Unknown Speaker :I don't even care about that sound.
Unknown Speaker :So he says Being a brother like, hey, they're settling. You know, they're serving cake over there. Just go get some cake. Go get enjoy. I'm gonna go smoke the fucking weed with the hot girl. And so they go and oh, then you've got what what is it that she says she says, My throat is good. Yeah.
Unknown Speaker :And at that point I was like, I was like, This is not a horror movie like this is a different kind of horror. And we talked about in suspiria we're like you like the safe series? That was not a safe scary. This is your sister whose throat is closing up because she hadn't. She's having an allergic reaction to some nut she ate. We got to get to the hospital. It was a bunch of things we have to do. We got to get her an epi pen. And like it's sort of just left this world of like cheap, safe scares, and it just became very, like drama scary at that point.
Unknown Speaker :That no you're 100% right. And I love that because I knew this fucking part would bother you. It tickles me because again, let's be honest, it's all safe scare. She's an actress and she's wonderful. But at the end of the day, she delivered one line and it fucked your world up. And that is my throats getting bigger. And
Unknown Speaker :I just knew that was gonna work well and that should always like, it's called sandbagging. Like you just put more and more things on someone where there's something wrong with them, but they don't know what it is, like, that's always going to fuck me up. Like, whether it's just like literature or scary movies or whatever, it's, what's the shit? It's like, someone's head gets sawed off and that's like, whatever. Like if a little kid breaks their glasses and starts crying like that fucks me up, you know, this is her This is a kid who's not going to make it and not only does she not make it but she doesn't make it and like the most horrific way price well,
Unknown Speaker :and again, this is this is something that this fucking movie is perfect about. Is that okay? So you get to the part the throat is closing, she's having this reaction. You think God Damn, this is the worst possible thing. They could possibly be happening ever in the history of the world. He throws her in the car and they're going and he's like, oh, we're almost there. We're almost there. And she's like flailing in the backseat trying to get air and she's scratching her throat. She opens the fucking window. She puts her head out the fucking window. He looks around and says don't put your head out the window. Charlie, what are you doing? And next I'm fuckin head off on a telephone pole. Because he's swerving from a carcass in
Unknown Speaker :the road like like
Unknown Speaker :when that happened I made a cost
Unknown Speaker :did not see that coming. Now all of a sudden this like severed pigeon head makes little sense. There's a tie in or whatever I'm like, What is the obsession with beheading? The part that fucked me up was belong seen in the car with Peter and ham just coming to grips with what just happened. And then he drives home and I'm like, how do you take this bit of news home
Unknown Speaker :fright? Okay, so something has to be said for Mr. Wolf who plays the part of Peter Okay. That is Fucking right here that is so close up. I mean in what that 45 seconds that it's just that single close up shot Yeah.
Unknown Speaker :Already says the shipment already says like when they were like doing casting he said like when you see like a child actor who's like having PTSD in a film, he goes it's often embarrassing. He said thank God for Alex wolf because we he came in and we knew that he could just he could do it. And that scene was so far. I mean, like so well acted. I mean, because again, every feeling you're feeling is registering on that kid's face. Fucking Yeah, well done. And then it goes home and it's just sliced. Yeah. But then he wakes up and he's exactly where he lied down. And the mom was like, I don't call you 20 minutes and you could tell she's getting in the car and in the distance you hear the screaming, the next cut of the head on the highway. I'm instantly pissed off about this head on the highway. And I know why. When I'm afraid I often resort to anger I don't think it's uncommon for like white males, when they're afraid to just get really angry when they have a name for white male rage, but like you go back and like, you know, they take pictures of you on a roller coaster and you can buy them at the end. I always look furious. Like, it's because that's how I'm dealing with scary and when I saw that head on the highway, I made a cuss.
Unknown Speaker :I have no doubt but we got to talk about this scene. kind of idea of silences sound is nothing is something you know, he goes home and he lays in his fucking bed. And they do two cuts in there. I think it's the the night today outside. And he's still laying there. Exactly the same expression on his face. Tears like, wet moist eyes. Doing again. Perfect. The kid was always right. Who's the little Dewey? I think it's theater. Good Lloyd. A lot Dewey. There's just scenes where he's just like leaking. It's leaking.
Unknown Speaker :You know, it's gonna be worth, I can
Unknown Speaker :just like, man, how many shirts does this kid go through in a day? Because you know, it's like, probably quite a few. But here's, here's what I'm gonna say about that scene. It starts come, it's regular. Everything's regular. I'll see you in 20 minutes. I have to go to the store to buy wood. So you can hear the fucking click of the door and then you can hear the door open. Now it's all super subtle. And at that point in time, the volume begins to rise on this scene. And it crescendos it's a crescendo and the screaming and the fucking
Unknown Speaker :screaming you know, I mean, like the screaming the break down, when when Annie's in the bedroom on her knees and she just I just want to die. I just want to die. That's That's too real man. Like Us too much.
Unknown Speaker :It's that attention to detail. Okay, so We've all seen I have not you have seen the Friday like Friday the 13th where they're scared and they're petrified and there's, oh goodness six, there's nothing fucking viable about that. There's nothing viable about that. But we, you know, suspend, you know, because suspension of disbelief and we take that for what it is we take it at face value and this movie you are forced to feel that way. And I mean, like, I cannot say enough, Tony Colette's fucking fire in this movie. I'm gonna say that I
Unknown Speaker :don't give that designation to a lot of people but oh my god. I said the same thing about having. You know, dad, Steve Gabriel Byrne. And Toni Collette is like, having any Colette and Gabriel Byrne, who plays Steve Graham and down is just like, what, how is this happening? He couldn't believe that he had all these great actors that he grew up kind of having around him. So yeah, they're fantastic. This was a fun point. Because Aaron My wife, she does not enjoy this stuff even more so than I do. She's sitting in a chair in the corner reading a book. And but she likes to read spoilers so that she kind of knows like, well, at least I know about it, but I didn't have to watch it. And she goes, are you at the point? And I said, I think I am. She goes, I think shits about to pop off for you. Yeah. And she's right. Like it. She's right. It does. I have them an hour and 20 minutes left at this point. Yeah, the whole head thing that was sort of like the first like, FAQ to the audience kind of Right,
Unknown Speaker :right, right. It's also the first time we're introduced to ants. So God damn many ants. I love that whole scene. I like it. Because I mean, again, it's very real. It is what makes horror scary. because it forces you to go through that
Unknown Speaker :and the beheading of things and like, what's the point? There isn't really a point like Ari said like, it's just a choice he made. There's an Like King payment doesn't require people to be beheaded. This is just a choice he made as an artist right? Joan, can we move on? We can move on to Joe. Oh my god, I love Love, love, love, love and dad like she's salty and but I had hoped that she was here to say the day at this point after the head. It's just really good to see a friend at this point. I'm really excited. She's right. She visits with Joanie, we learned about Annie's sleepwalking and paint thinner. Anytime Annie has to talk about herself you learn a lot about what's happening by the right
Unknown Speaker :Yeah, exactly. She
Unknown Speaker :will give you the funeral right in the funeral talking to Joni and also at the support group. Like anytime she has like a narrative. You it really uncovers a lot
Unknown Speaker :which is pretty interesting to think that like three dialogue driven scenes really you kind of get the whole backstory of the of the picture. Which is amazing because again, Tony Colette's fire in this movie. I mean like, and the way she delivers it is almost like this kind of weird. manic you know, I mean, like the speed at which she delivers this information again, there's shit I've seen this movie probably, I don't know a half dozen times at this point in time and and
Unknown Speaker :that's that's five times too many
Unknown Speaker :no no well yeah I'm probably the only person who's ever gonna watch I bought a DVD of this
Unknown Speaker :God when people buy DVDs of scary movies What are you doing?
Unknown Speaker :Oh you Oh,
Unknown Speaker :let's move on to the dinner scene with Annie and Peter because Annie says what I've been thinking this whole time she rips and appears she says exactly what I was kind of thinking about this a hole. So now we're back in the family drama is no longer a horror movie and at the end of it she screams nobody ever admits anything they've done
Unknown Speaker :and that's followed by the line. What about you, mom? Oh yeah, hi. should one go to the party or whatever, right? She didn't want to go to the party. So if you think about this, again, this is something that has been set in motion. These events happen because someone made a bad choice. And I wrote down in my notes, everything is bad decisions in this movie. Like there's no good decision. That's there's none.
Unknown Speaker :So frustrating. Like, this is like a very pervasive thing in the family drama or the American domestic tragedy, right? Like, basically, there's a breakdown of communication so that things can later be blurted out and heard.
Unknown Speaker :Right.
Unknown Speaker :So that we're all sort of presented with this at once, like, if you watched so many things you like, if everyone had just been honest, from the beginning, we could have this movie could have been 15 minutes right?
Unknown Speaker :And the only person and I'm not gonna say he's immune, but the only person that's good at it in the movie or even fairly good at it is Gabriel Byrne is dead. And that's kind of like as he's you know, as son is coming home from school and it goes up and he said, Hey, did you sign up for the AC t prep course and you know, I mean like he's still trying to have a cheat, right have this dialogue with his family, but his family's like fucking wrecked at this point and he's like, I'm still gonna just be dead you know? You're I am
Unknown Speaker :I get into a part later dead breaks down. I hope it's as exciting as like, cuz he does. Like it's dad's demise, right right there. But this is the point in the film where like he asked everyone to calm down at the dinner table is such a fucking incredible actor. I'm like, I love this guy. I really like this guy. This is now my base. Like this is like my safe guy. And then I knew right when I felt that like he's going to die right away. Yeah, he's dead fucking me. He's dead. Next isn't seance Komodo?
Unknown Speaker :Well, it's that we need to talk about little Johnny first. We need to talk about Johnny first because we talked about Johnny Jones is a good
Unknown Speaker :she's introduced a seance in the parking lot Johnny comes up like it's very contrived. It's very convenient. Immediately. I know this is a long con by Johnny. So, Johnny, somehow she's now a medium and now I'm just kind of being asked to believe in whatever is put in front of me at this point, right? For example, like the sliding of the glass and the wind and the chalkboard Louis he's very proficient in his like chalkboard writing, like just like, boom, there it is. My thought at this point was please any don't try this at home. Your family is already you're going through enough. Let's not have a say on writing. But that's the ask. Right?
Unknown Speaker :Kind of. So I wrote a note because of course, we're headed towards Auntie's house now and Annie the whole time going, No, no, no, I'm not going to do this scary. I'm fucking leaving. This is terrible. And then you get home. And she has the dream.
