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Episode 9: Backroom Hokum Dump w/ Nani
110 Plays17 days ago
Friend of the pod, Nani, is back to break down this summer's horror lineup: BPD biopic Obsession, pseudo-nineties fever dream Backrooms, and room-split hit Hokum. Plus Q makes the case that Love Island is the Saw of reality TV.
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Transcript
Coping with Heatwaves: Challenges and Experiences
00:00:36
Speaker
How's everyone doing? I hear it's hot over there and you guys don't have any air conditioning. That's the... Yes. It's with no air conditioning and we have insulated houses. So it's not doing it's not doing well.
00:00:51
Speaker
We're at kind of the tail end of a heat wave. Like it was like, I don't know what American temperatures is, but it was like 35, 36 degrees.
00:01:01
Speaker
so that was not nice I think that's close to 100 Fahrenheit. Yeah. Which is very humid as well. It was really like sticky, like sticky and muggy and Well, not nice. How do you sleep? What do you do? Not not very well.
00:01:17
Speaker
To be honest, like I didn't have that much trouble sleeping, but i didn't feel like I didn't feel like I was going to bed. I felt like I was just passing out at night and like not not really able to remember going to bed. um i'd just kind of wake up sort of disoriented in the morning and be like, what time did I go to sleep? um So I literally think I was just passing out for like four days. Mm-hmm.
00:01:41
Speaker
Once you've got two British people on a podcast, we instantly start talking about the weather. It's just not DNA. Yeah, that's true. i just it's I know this is so stupid and American of me, but it's like really hard to imagine going to sleep without air conditioning. But i've had it I've grown up with it my whole life, and obviously it's significantly hotter here for longer periods of time. So it's just it's it's the idea of not having it is crazy, but I know that like...
00:02:07
Speaker
Every place in America has like four months where it's miserable and there's just, that's not how the UK is. You guys have like a week where it's miserable sometimes. Yeah. yeah But it's, it's true. I think I have the air set at 71 right now. Yeah.
Horror Film Recap: Highlights and Trends
00:02:24
Speaker
Yeah, speaking of speaking of miserable, we've kind of got Nanny on for a bit a six-month recap, and specifically focusing on like some of the horror films that have come out in the past like couple of months. um
00:02:39
Speaker
But yeah, we would we were saying before we started recording, it's generally been a pretty grim year so far for... Yeah, definitely, definitely quite weak, which I think is one of the things that was nice about having um of a few weeks where there was some big films at the cinema that were actually pretty good.
00:02:55
Speaker
Because, yeah, it has been quite ah quite a poor year. I'm just to my game. I think horror is the only genre that's, like, I would say this year has had some real gems. And when I say gems, it doesn't mean that I think the movies we're going to talk about are the best movies ever made, but just some, like, solid horror films. Like, you know what i mean? Like, it's nice to just see... and Not everything has to be the best movie you ever see. Sometimes it's, like...
00:03:21
Speaker
nice to just have a string of like solid horror films, which I yeah i feel like we've had. Yeah, solid seven or eight out of 10 films is all I really want. the other day Not everything has to be a masterpiece. now to No, certainly not. Yeah.
Exploring 'Obsession': Cultural Impact and Themes
00:03:35
Speaker
um We're going to talk about Obsession, Backrooms, and Hocum today, um and then maybe touch a little bit on Leviticus, but I think I'm the only one who saw it, right?
00:03:45
Speaker
Yeah, that's not out over here yet. and I don't even think it's coming out over here. I think um I looked online the other day and it doesn't not even have like UK release date. So I don't know.
00:03:58
Speaker
Yeah. I'm sure we'll find a way where there's a will, there's a way. Yeah, we don't have to talk about it then. I mean, I will say that I think the best thing about that movie is Mia Wachowski really elevates what would be a sort of medi mediocre film into like a, like Nanny was saying, a seven-ish.
00:04:13
Speaker
But she's just so good. It's like, it's it's good they got her for that. um Why don't we start with, since Nanny's our guest, like, what was your, or maybe not your favorite, but what film are you most interested in talking about of the three?
00:04:28
Speaker
Of the three? um I think probably Obsession, just because it's been such a cultural phenomenon. um And it's ah yeah that's the busiest I've seen the cinema since probably when Dune came out was the last time that I, you know, like usually I go look at the cinema and there's like 12 seats taken. This was absolutely packed. I went to see it two nights in a row. Absolutely packed both times, um which is just such a rarity ah these days.
00:04:55
Speaker
So yeah, it's some it's clearly really caught people's um imaginations, and't it and it's been sort of memed already. and yeah And that's such a cool thing to happen for a film that's you know basically no budget, no stars. It's it's an original film.
00:05:10
Speaker
ah um It's what we want. We want more of that. Yeah. um I think we should take the listeners like kind of through the basic plot, if that's okay. Yeah.
00:05:21
Speaker
Yes. Yeah. So it's a guy which is... We comment on it as we go. But yeah, go ahead. and Bear his name. Yeah. And he's um he's sort of hopelessly in love, unrequited with his ah his friend. What's her name in it?
00:05:38
Speaker
Nikki. Nikki. And on a whim, he buys a like a magic twig from a sort of novelty store that says it can grant a wish. and He breaks it and he wishes that she'll love him more than anyone else in the world.
00:05:51
Speaker
And she does to worry in consequences. Yeah. And I guess I would add like the general setting of this film um is kind of a i i i I felt like everyone in this film could be called like diner goths, like that bad article came out. It's sort of like downwardly mobile, suburban, every everywhere anywhere America could be any sort of suburban America place. And the kind of unifying principle is you get the impression these are all like
00:06:26
Speaker
probably early 20s people all working at this like kind of sad music shop as like in like like retail that's like what they're that's that's the unifying force of this kind of like friend group um there's really only four characters i would say essentially um But yeah, so Bear, yeah, he wishes for Nikki to um love him, and she becomes essentially obsessed with him um and there's a kind of like...
00:07:00
Speaker
ah sort of back and, like, the friend the other friends are um upset and disturbed by Nikki's behavior, but Bear, for a significant portion of the film, goes along with it, I guess is what you would say.
00:07:17
Speaker
ah There is this question at the heart of the film, which I think has like kind of erupted a lot of discourse, is is is like whether Nikki loves Bear or whether some sort of like malevolent entity has taken over Nikki's body and loves Bear.
00:07:33
Speaker
did you either of you have a read on that? Because that seems like a kind of crucial, depending on how you read that, it kind of like depends on how you view the film. i would Yeah, you you get the impression that she is sort of...
00:07:46
Speaker
the The experience to her is that when he breaks that twig, she kind of takes a backseat into her own life, like a bit like to get out that that she's watching it all happen, but is not really in control of her actions.
00:07:58
Speaker
Yeah. um But it's not necessarily that the person the the person she becomes is a different person. It's more just like something is controlling her body and making her do this stuff. But you get the impression that, like, the Nikki that is, quote-unquote, real, like, has not, like, the way the spell worked or whatever is not that she was suddenly filled with this, like, intense love for Bear.
00:08:24
Speaker
that's not That's not the impression you get, necessarily. I don't think. no because i mean that's like because you have that kind of there's that moment in the film where he walks in on her and like she's asleep and the the kind of the original kind of version of nikki starts talking to him sort of asking him to like um to kill her and saying like that she doesn't want him to like wake her up um because she's sleeping and Um, and then you, there's that other scene where like he phones like the number on the back of the packets, like see if you can undo the wish. And the guy on the phone says like, Oh, do you want to speak to her? And you just hear her like screaming in the background on the phone. So like, you definitely get the impression. i definitely felt like they were, um,
00:09:13
Speaker
Like the idea that I definitely got was that she's sort of like trapped in there and this other thing is kind of like controlling the way that she's acting. I didn't feel like she was suddenly filled with love for him.
00:09:26
Speaker
No. And not not to spoil the ending for anybody, but the... um a bit we're in the it Now we're going to do spoilers. so Yeah, it goes. Oh, yeah. But in in the last moment, the way she reacts is as if she's just woken up.
00:09:38
Speaker
Not that the spell has gone away from her, but as if she's been in a coma and suddenly she's found herself in this situation with with him. So, yeah. Yeah. I think there's two main threads of like discourse about this film, one one that I find more interesting than the other, but the the less interesting one is that this is sort of an incel film, right? Like, Bear is unable to kind of make this move to initiate things differently.
00:10:04
Speaker
with Nikki and he's ignoring his friend called Sarah, who um really does seem to like him and have some interest in potentially having a sexual relationship with him of some kind. I'm going to go on the record now. She's hotter.
00:10:21
Speaker
yeah she's gone he's like ah Yeah, she's like a classic goth, like, yeah. Waysian goth. Waysian goth. And then you get the impression, and then you realize partway through the film um that Nikki maybe isn't, like,
00:10:37
Speaker
so unattainable or anything because you find out that his best friend Ian has sort of been like casually sleeping with her. um And I think, and these are the four main characters essentially. And I think the interpretation that has this, this less interesting interpretation that's kind of been spread across the internet is that it's like Bear is this kind of weak incel character that can't bring himself to like actually just make the move on this girl who, if he did make a move, it's kind of implied, would likely at least entertain some type of, ah at least go on some dates with him and stuff. And then there's this kind of like, he's not super hot or anything, but there's this like sort of more chatted character who just is like willing to make the move. And that's who Nikki has been hooking up with.
00:11:29
Speaker
um And anyway, in this in this vein of discourse is a lot of like feminist readings that like Bear is essentially a rapist and Nikki is essentially being like forced to do all of this. And I mean, I think you can easily read that into the film. I have nothing to say against that reading. I'm just like, that's sort of like one vein of discourse that I think is really kind of easy and surface level to read into it.
00:11:52
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know. i to Because i I've been thinking about that and sort of aspect of it quite a lot, because I have seen a lot of um like content surrounding the film where they're kind of presenting him as like a sort of villainous character. And I sort of think, like I don't know, like he obviously makes the wish on a whim.
00:12:14
Speaker
It's just something he does. And doesn't think it's going to work either. Who would think it would work? And even even though it like even though it does work, um he's not going to It's not immediately clear to him that it's that the wish has worked. like he doesn't he doesn't He doesn't just instantly know that like magic is real and this wish has worked and that's the reason why she feels the way that she feels like it. It's more sort of nuanced than that. So I i don't know. I i i think like i felt...
00:12:46
Speaker
I felt sorry for him, like, for, like, large portions of the film, and I didn't sort of view him as a sort of evil, white villainous character. Well, at some point, he certainly knows. But then at the point that he knows, it's sort of like a catch-22, because even once he realizes that she's being sort of controlled, ah he can't exactly just undo this, um and she's 100% dependent on him.
00:13:14
Speaker
Yeah, like and be it would be more dangerous to to stop it. And he's like, you can't you can't take it to a hospital and say, oh, for the magic wish. can like Right. The more interesting reading that I think is like a little bit more difficult to read into it, but it's just i've I've found it to be an interesting reaction to the film, is sort of like the manusphere interpretation. there's like the feminist interpretation, which I do think is like...
00:13:39
Speaker
even though I agree with both of you that it's nuanced or whatever, like, I think the feminist interpretation is pretty easy to read into it. Then there's sort of this, like, manosphere interpretation, which I was more intrigued by because it's, like, a just a little bit more of, a like, a difficult read read to make on the film. But that, like, this is actually, like, sort of like a horror, ah like, the horror of dating a BPD character. woman sort of well and then and then on and then there was ah a second sort of wrinkle real quick before you go nanny of like there was a significant portion after this man appears manosphere discourse sort of started of women saying that they felt seen by the nikki character and felt seen by like the bpd-ness so i thought that was like a more interesting way to look at the film just because like i said it's like I think the first one is a pretty easy sort of morality lesson or whatever, but the second one seems to be a little bit more like indicative of like a cultural narrative.
00:14:40
Speaker
Yeah, and i think I think they're not that distinct as takes, or you can sort of cross those takes over a bit. I mean, I think that the BPD thing, i I came out of it and I texted my friend, i said, seeing this film having had a BPDX, I feel like how my grandfather must have felt when he saw Saving Private Ryan, just like shell reliving the shell shock in the cinema. Yeah.
00:15:00
Speaker
But I think, you know, it's, I think it's both. It probably is. It is a parable about um consent and it is, and it is a parable about how crazy women can be. um But there is the crossover there because it's like, okay, if he's wrong for dating her because she can't control her actions and she's sort of you know, her brain's sort of being controlled.
00:15:21
Speaker
Is it, is it then also wrong to date somebody who's got BPD? Yeah. Because that's somebody who's also to degree not in control of their actions and has another force acting upon their brain and can be both incredibly loving and incredibly violent. or And so if you're if you're dating someone who you know has got sort of a mental illness,
00:15:44
Speaker
Is that any different to to magically raping someone with a twig? Like, I think people haven't really been able to to to cross over those two takes. And I think they're not that distinct. It's like, if if he's wrong for dating her, having made a wish, then I think every person who has dated someone with with BPD or with any kind of sort of mental illness that affects their behavior or their perception of the world is equally as guilty as Bear is in that.
00:16:09
Speaker
Sure. That's interesting. I hadn't thought about it like that. Yeah, no, me neither. Like, ah i du't know i know i don't know. I don't have an opinion on the central question you're asking, but I agree that the film brings up those questions. Yes. In an interesting way.
00:16:28
Speaker
um Yeah. I found it interesting they cast, like, a gay guy to play, like, the main lead. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah, he's He's like a gay twink called Bear. Irony is funny.
00:16:41
Speaker
I thought that was like sort of purposeful because he does have some like gay mannerisms and it kind of like, yeah, it kind of like feeds into like that he's like the weaker of the two men in the film. Like he's the one who can't just sort of get over the hump of making a move on this girl.
00:16:58
Speaker
Yeah, giving him a name that is so opposite to his own demeanor as well. He's like the least bear-like person. He's like really meek and sort of, you know, self-absorbed. Like he's not animalistic. He's not sort of, um yeah, alpha in any way.
00:17:12
Speaker
Right. I mean, i think the second that I agree now that these interpretations aren't so different, but I think that what people seeing this like BPD narrative in it is interesting because it's yeah, I mean, this is something that I think is like a cultural narrative that's gotten really strong.
00:17:31
Speaker
um where people are both like, I think I'm not surprised that women identified with her. and I'm not surprised that men identified with this difficult experience because this is like, whether it's like based in any sort of reality or not, it doesn't matter. Like this is something that people feel is um some sort of like, there's some essential truth to this very simple equation about the way men and women are able to. I think that's probably partly why it's been so successful as well, is that it has that crossover appeal, that you can watch it from either sex and and get um get something from it and and identify with either of the main characters. There's a lot of films made for men that have incredibly two-dimensional female characters that your girlfriend's going to sit there and think, she's an idiot, but why is she doing that for? it And equally, there's a lot of like you know romantic comedies or whatever, which have this view of of men that any man watching it is like, who's this guy? like I don't see myself in him at but all. And I think it has that crossover of that you can watch it and either side of that you're on you can um identify with them yeah I do think it's kind of crazy how much of a sort of talking point it is and how successful it's been because it's like I enjoyed the movie like I liked watching it and stuff but like it's not the most original concept for a movie like we've had
00:18:49
Speaker
There are so many, like, wish-gone-wrong type movies. Yeah, I mean, theres lot there's a Twilight Zone episode that's got almost identical plot to it from the last and the And a lot of the, like, a lot of the, um I felt like a lot of the sort visual elements were kind of derivative. Like, I couldn't tell whether it was sort of paying homage to, like...
00:19:10
Speaker
of the horror films are just kind of like blatantly ripping them off and um like yeah I don't know like they like the the whole like pulse like slow motion sort of stuff they did with her like ah that just kind of gave me the ick a little bit to be honest but um i think it's yeah I think it's derivative in the sense that it's like, you know, you could say like it's kind of like an it follows or even if you go far enough back, it's like a Jennifer's body. But I also think it's like, excuse me, i mean, not to American out on you guys. I'm sure Britain has this exact same thing. But I do feel like all these movies are just kind of showing like the truth of sort of like lower middle class, like,
00:19:51
Speaker
uh, American life or something. And that's just like, that's just like how it looks. you know what I mean? Like, that's just like a lot of people. um and I think that that's like, uh, yeah, I think that's why those movies look like that. This kind of like downwardly mobile young person, you know?
00:20:10
Speaker
Whereas like 20, 30, 40 years ago, all these people would have like been married and had kids and like the dad would be like ah working a job that pays for everyone's life, you know. But like this is these characters seem so ah repetitive, I think, over the last 20 years because this is just like what it looks like to be like kind of like a middle class person in America for a lot of people, you know. Yeah, it wasn't so much that, like, aspect of it. It was more like, um, I don't know, like, the bit with her, like, pissing on the carpet was clearly, like, a reference to The Exorcist, but it frank it felt like too much of a sort of...
00:20:49
Speaker
as a am riath but As a cat owner, in the Bicky, how did you find the cat stuff in it? because i was told I hated the cat stuff. Yeah. Because I was talking to my girlfriend about it after I saw it and she was like, oh, would I like And was like, no, because ah specifically because of the cat. was like, you cannot deal with anything with with cat related violence. in it And I find it uncomfortable. I just knew she would not be able to cope at all.
00:21:11
Speaker
i yeah usually like I'm so bad with cat stuff usually in movies that if I start watching a movie that has a cat in, i will like pause and like Google what happens to the cat before I can carry on watching it.
00:21:22
Speaker
Yeah, it's interesting. It's funny that you guys talk about this because the movie does break the internet rule of don't fuck with cats. But I i don't relate to this at all. But I've heard this so frequently that like animal abuse is is a lot of people's red line or like red line for seeing a movie.
00:21:38
Speaker
um I feel so ridiculously desensitized after like my time on the internet to like almost anything at this point. Like I used to like, I used to like not want to watch movies that had like sadistic or violent rape in them. But even now at this point, I feel desensitized to that. Like, it's like, there's really, there's really nothing that like will upset me enough that I'll like walk out of a film. um But yeah. It depends. It really depends on how it's,
00:22:05
Speaker
how it's sort of conveyed, I guess, to a degree. um it was pretty gross. I mean, the sandwich and, you know, the fact that she feeds him the cat, it was... that That actually didn't get me at all. and I didn't really feel anything. It was actually just when he comes home and finds the cat dead. That was the bit really, I just thought, oh that's my that's my biggest nightmare that like I go out and I come back and the cat's either missing or dead. or The actual violence against the cat's body is like, oh, it's it's not pleasant, but it doesn't really hit me. But yeah, it was the idea of finding you your cat dead and that it's because you left something out that you shouldn't have and they've eaten it. It's so relatable. There's like a fear that any cat owner has.
00:22:43
Speaker
Yeah, I agree. Like, the the cat sandwich bit didn't really bother me too much either because there that it's almost so ridiculous that it sort of becomes, like, comedy. But, like, um yeah, the the bit that really got me as well was him sort of coming home and, like, finding the cat. It kind of reminded me of, like, I don't know, like, oh, that fucking Chernobyl episode where they kill all the cats and dogs. Like, I had to, like, turn that off and, like, leave the room. But, um yeah, anything where, like,
00:23:11
Speaker
It's kind of conveyed in a very serious way and there's like some kind of tragic elements to with animals. I really don't like it, but yeah, cat sandwiches, whatever.
Unpacking 'Backrooms': Influence and Reception
00:23:21
Speaker
um We can move on to back rooms, which I think... I was just going to ask, it did did you both see it in a cinema when you went when you saw Obsession?
00:23:30
Speaker
Yeah. how was How was the audience reaction? Because I remember the scene for me when she smashes through the car window and starts bashing Sarah's head in. That's one of the biggest audience reactions I've seen in ages. Everyone was losing their shit. Yeah.
00:23:42
Speaker
I was with like a more, I went pretty far out from the city to see it. So I was with ah like a kind of older crowd. So i didn't I didn't get the experience I usually get of seeing it with a bunch of like young people in the city where there's like a big reaction. so I mean, i'm I'm sure there would have been a bigger reaction if I had been at a different theater.
00:24:01
Speaker
yeah I absolutely saw it in the cinema and didn't watch it at home by any kind of nefarious means at all. I see.
00:24:12
Speaker
Great. um Okay, Backrooms. A very different film, um in this especially in the world-building aspect, because um while I feel like ah Obsession um was so firmly rooted in an obviously contemporary sort of... ah like I said, middle-class American suburb, Backrooms is sort of like, and I'm talking before we get into the Backrooms at this point, is sort of set out of time almost. Like it's very... Yeah, it's because it's like, ah it's a version of the 90s created by someone who wasn't alive during the ninety s So it's a sort of half-remembered or re-remembered version of the that, Yeah, so the world they're in before they even get to like the mystery world is like a very strange like version of LA. I felt like it reminded me of like those images you see online of like um fake like sort of Sims cities. it's like ah It kind of had like a ben a Benzo Americana vibe. But yeah, it's like so it's set in a like a... You don't really know like where exactly this is supposed to be, but it's like vaguely L.A., and I agree. It's like a sort of simulcrumb of like maybe what the 90s was like. But um the basic plot of Backrooms is this... um
00:25:38
Speaker
man ah is going to therapy. His name is Clark. um And he's ah going to a therapist named Mary. And um he has like anger issues. He runs this kind of sad furniture store. His wife has left him.
00:25:58
Speaker
um it doesn't seem like he they had kids or anything like that. Um, and he's trying to like get better, um in therapy, whatever, that's all really not that relevant. But, um, ultimately he discovers this, um,
00:26:16
Speaker
third space, this like third metaphysical space in the back of his store um and kind of loops his store employees, which I will say the store employees in this movie are pretty similar, are probably like very similar to the characters in Obsession, although they're like more sub characters. um Anyway, that's the premise. This like, that that's what the Backrooms is. But do either of you know the lore around Backrooms? I'm not so...
00:26:44
Speaker
Only very vaguely. I'd never seen any of the the videos that that guy had made before. I sort of knew about the concept just from being online. but um Yeah, I knew about the concept and I'd played like some of the video game-y, sort first-person, low-budget horror video games that kind of based around it But like... um Yeah, I wasn't, like, I hadn't seen, like, his videos either, so I wasn't, there's, it's one of those, like, things that I think has just sort of built very naturally over time, but, like, people have interpreted it in, like, different ways, and he, he obviously has this kind of lore around it that he's built up, I think there are, like, other people who sort of taken off in different directions, and, um, but I think for, like,
00:27:29
Speaker
I don't know. I i kind of went i went into it expecting that I was going to like it because I'd heard a lot of people say that it was really good. But like on paper, it sounds awful. Like the idea of like a movie based on like an internet creepypasta that's actually decent. i I don't know. I think i think he managed to...
00:27:51
Speaker
like elevate the sort of concept into something extremely original i enjoyed this film way more than i enjoyed obsession i went to see this twice in the cinema because i liked it so much um um yeah i think the thing i that surprised me most about it was like a lot of the coverage before it came out and after it came out was about how young the guy is because because he's 20 now and he was 19 when he was making it um Which is insane. um But ah I was surprised by how non-Zooma it felt.
00:28:20
Speaker
Like, it you know, all the things people associate with Zoomers of like, you know, low attention span and sort of like um cultural references. is None of that. it such a sort of slow and and methodical film.
00:28:32
Speaker
and um yeah, I was just really surprised by that. And then hearing interviews with him afterwards, it was really refreshing how much he's not a cinephile at all. Like he was mentioning in some interview I saw that he'd not even seen The Shining.
00:28:44
Speaker
That's fucking so cool. It's the biggest horror film in the world at the moment is made by someone that's not seen The Shining, despite the fact that a film that actually has got quite a lot of similarities to The Shining. When you think about it, it's about a liminal space that turns you into one of the ghosts inside it. Like that's literally the plot of The Shining. Yeah.
00:29:04
Speaker
I the most Zoomer-ish thing about it was the way that they dressed like the younger characters. Like like the the two like store employees. like that Their outfits were like kind of like a Zoomer's idea of what people dressed like in the ninety s but like Yes, it's like somebody now doing a sort of TikTok of like my 90s fit. Yeah, like the good like the guy with like the crop top on. like Nobody was really doing that. At least not in sort of small town America, I don't think. Yeah.
00:29:31
Speaker
Um, but yeah, I agree. Like it felt, um, it felt like, I don't know what i'm saying. Um, It felt like it came from somebody with a lot more knowledge of cinema than he is. Well, he is basically a fetus. So, I mean, his knowledge of c semina since cinema will will develop over time, I'm assuming.
00:29:55
Speaker
um i mean he seemed like he was much more influenced by video games and he was talking about like port Portal and Half-Life being his biggest influences. It's cool. like um And similarly with with with with Obsession, I saw an interview with him where he was saying that He'd never read The Monkey's Paw.
00:30:12
Speaker
He was inspired because he'd seen an episode of The Simpsons that uses The Monkey's Paw as an idea. So it's again that thing of like really young people, they're getting the third, fourth-hand versions of these sort of ideas and then taking that as their inspiration.
00:30:25
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. um I liked it because the backrooms ah feels to me like it's like kind of the feeling you get when you're in like your grandparents basement or like you're in an airport or you're in any sort of liminal space. Like I liked the concept. um I was only vaguely aware of it before. i've like read like three pages of House of Leaves, which is what apparently were this sort of that was the original, original, original backroom.
00:30:54
Speaker
um But this guy also, but I don't know about Obsession, but this guy seems, I think maybe this is like, and I could be wrong, but it seems like one of the first movies to be at least good that was really born out of like kind of an an internet chat room subculture to actually yeah really be good. Because I don't know if did either of you see that Slender Man film that came out about five, six years ago.
00:31:20
Speaker
it telling they just They just try and map it onto like a really generic horror horror film idea, but just with this figure that's famous off the internet. and it It just completely flops. The only creepypastary thing that I've seen that was kind of good was, did you see that TV show that was called like Channel Zero?
00:31:38
Speaker
no but I heard lots lots of people say it was good. Yeah, that that was really good. And that was kind of based around creepypasta stuff. But go on. Um, yeah, I mean, I think that's part of the reason why this 20 year old was able to make this film is because, like Vicky was saying, it's like it was built over time um by a bunch of different people. So like he's he's sort of like the inheritor of it you know what I mean? Which some people are trying to use to like take away from him. But I think that that's actually very cool that like.
00:32:12
Speaker
he managed to find a way to steer this kind of, like, internet subculture into um the, like, ah you know, and into an actual, like, piece of art that could be, like, released in a more um mainstream form. um i I understand why it makes people upset because this was such, like, a Reddit thing and, like, a 4chan thing. Like, yeah.
00:32:37
Speaker
all these people who feel like they've been talking about the concept of the back rooms for longer than this person was sentient. But, you know, someone's got to, like... Right? so Yeah, I kind of... so That was kind of one of my sort of reservations going into it, was, like, not necessarily the...
00:32:54
Speaker
the back rooms per se but like this this sort of um either of like liminal spaces has been so overdone in like the gaming sphere for like ah probably like the last sort of five six years like it feels like every two minutes there's some low budget um like um steam horror first person game where you're in some kind of liminal space whether it's like an abandoned like pool or um an abandoned school or an office building and i kind of like i i i was so over that kind of liminal space aesthetic that i was sort of like that was my only reservation going into it that i was going to find it visually really boring but he does so many interesting visual things in the movie that i really liked and hadn't seen before i think that partly it
00:33:46
Speaker
So that partly comes from, because he's from this sort the video game background, and all the videos he made before were in, called Blender, the digital animation software, that for this film, like he built the entire, before they built the set physically, he built it all inside a computer as like ah as a game, basically, and was able to plan out every shot and every angle and all the blocking of all the scenes as if it was ah ah an animation and there and then just translate that into the...
00:34:13
Speaker
did the real Did either of you see, ah thinking about it now, and I'd kind of forgotten about this movie, but did either of you see that um Japanese movie called like Exit 8 or something? Yes, so yeah so I saw that. Yeah, it's great. That was kind of a similar vibe. This guy gets stuck in a sort of subway and he's sort of going around in a circle and he can't find his way out of the subway. And like, I thought this was more successful than I think that kind of had, I think Japanese movies in general, they don't always know when to end them and they'll have a very natural end point and then they'll just go beyond it because they feel like they're whatever they want. Yeah, Exudate felt like there was probably a brilliant 30 minute film in there, but it's just been stretched to 90 minutes.
00:34:58
Speaker
But, um, yeah, the, like, in terms of like the visual stuff in the movie that I really liked, um, I loved the bit where they're having that sort of like, sort of fucked up dinner party scene and he like says, oh, and you can eat them. And he like takes a bit off this guy. Yes. starts I loved all of that stuff. thought it was great. Um, I love the creature designs as well. Like the guy at the end, the, the sort of, um,
00:35:25
Speaker
I guess for people who haven't. Yeah, the pirates. So who's sort of like... Who was actually a seven foot tall actor. it was a what? There actually was a seven foot tall actor inside of that costume.
00:35:36
Speaker
oh cool. I assumed it was a puppet, but yeah, I guess it is a a costume. was he ah Was he white or black? White. He did blackface. That's awful. Are we going to touch on the ah the the racial discourse around back rooms?
00:35:52
Speaker
I don't know. I didn't know there was any racial discrimination. Oh, on. Let me find it. Give me give me a second. Actually, I think you maybe sent this to our group chat. I've forgotten it already.
00:36:04
Speaker
It's crazy. um So this is somebody called Charles Preston on a Twitter. And they say, Backrooms is a racist film. A big, big fucking claim there. Calm down. Backrooms is a racist film.
00:36:18
Speaker
It's technically brilliant, but racist. That's quite a common thing you find, isn't it? ah And it's a shame during a time where black studies, black is capitalised, by the way, is being eliminated on college campuses because I fear people are overlooking the obvious tropes and racist callbacks the film ridiculously displays. So before I carry on, do either of you notice any obvious tropes and racist callbacks in the film?
00:36:41
Speaker
No, I mean, I actually would say, I would actually argue that this film is refreshing. And if I would, have I could only imagine this experience, but I guess if I were black, I would be happy that there was a film with a black main character that didn't center like racism as like the main struggle of the character. Like, Yeah, i felt it it felt very like, it felt very like colorblind. It was completely, there was no, yeah the fact that he was black felt like it had no bearing on the plot. Yeah, you could have swapped that you could have swap the races of the main characters and it it wouldn't really have affected the film. However, not what this guy thinks. He says, white woman therapist plays damsel in distress and moral compass in a film that has her telling her angry, verbally abusive, alcoholic black man client who has no redeeming qualities that his white wife left him because all he does is whine. She says she, a psychiatrist, can't help him. He's wired like that.
00:37:35
Speaker
Then she gets chased by a large, caricatured, exaggerated version of an angry black man and that threatens to end her life. They made this black man a man who takes no responsibility for his actions until he's locked in an endless liminal space with a white woman shouting at him to quit whining and take some personal responsibility.
00:37:51
Speaker
Stop blaming the world, black man. You're the one who's angry, violent, and abusive in this world. His therapist. Clark, the black guy, actually starts to prefer the endless liminal space to his outside reality. He's fascinated by it. He made his home in it so much that he takes pleasure in the fact that he can eat and hurt the copied beings in the space with no consequence. The movie reads like, yes, prison is preferred for black men battling mental health. Want to talk about a place where space and time collapses? Look no further than solitary confinement in prison.
00:38:18
Speaker
So that's the that's the racial discourse around the lat rooms, which to me seems somewhat insane. But ah maybe it's because I'm white. Yeah, I want to like totally dismiss it. no offense, Nanny. um I thought it up so that people could ah could hear it, but I have no interest in debunking it because it's so obviously retarded. So I like absolutely refuse to engage with that argument. I think this is like...
00:38:42
Speaker
For Black people, I would say that this is like a massive ah W in the sense that, like if i especially knowing so many Black people in the theater and the arts, like the fact that there's a huge, massive, successful movie where a Black actor is playing a character that's not struggling with racism is, like ah I just think, a massive W. And I just i can't even...
00:39:06
Speaker
engage with this in good faith. It's fair enough. I would also refute the idea that he's... I would also refute the idea that he's an unsympathetic character. definitely... That was something kind of...
00:39:20
Speaker
that was like ah there was something i kind of I kind of understood why he sort of started to like it there. And I found that that dynamic sort of really interesting. Yeah, and I think the film plays with that in a way with the character, ah can't remember the guy's name, but the the scientist character who we we meet at the end, who we've been seeing glimpses of throughout the film. The way that...
00:39:42
Speaker
he appears to be able to go into the back rooms and it doesn't really affect him mentally. Like he's able to come in and come back. And that we see clips of him at home ah with a happy family. He's got like a wife and kids and their grandmothers there and they're all sitting down with popcorn to watch a film. And both the other main characters that we see, when we see them at home, they're alone and really depressed. And that's why the back rooms is able to bring them in is because they don't have anything in the real world that that holds them there. Whereas because he's got like a happy family life, he he doesn't really feel the pull of the back rooms in the same way that they do.
00:40:16
Speaker
Yeah, and not to mention, like, both of them get, like, serious backstory elements that tell us, like, why they're traumatized and why they are the way they are. And, like, I'm like, that's, they're they're they're very complete characters. Both characters, I think.
00:40:35
Speaker
and they're both well And they're both lonely. And like that's why it's an interesting film. It's like two lonely people kind of colliding. um i mean, and not to be, sorry, not to harp on this, but i feel like I'm being a a little bit boring with it. But like my materialist interpretation of why this film did so well, I had one i had one for Obsession, which was the BPD. ah The kind of nanny really fleshed that out for us, I feel like, that both men and women have...
00:41:02
Speaker
something they could watch with that i think this film is interesting to people because um i i thought a lot while watching it like why has this concept of the back rooms really taken off and i feel like as things have moved increasingly online like now there's just so many abandoned like malls and shit like that because it's like there's just less and less of this like irl um like interaction happening and so it's like i feel like but so first off there's these like Yeah.
00:41:40
Speaker
but then there's also this like internet element right like a lot of our lives are lived out on the internet i have never physically touched either of you and i feel like close with you in certain ways you know And it's like so like a lot of our life does um take place in this kind of like liminal kind of like backrooms ask space of the Internet. So have either of you ever gone and explored anywhere abandoned?
00:42:06
Speaker
I have, yeah. What exactly did you get? as a Well, as a kid, one of my favorite activities, this isn't quite abandoned, but I lived in like a new housing development. um And as a kid, there was like so many empty houses because they were building them so fast and there was like ah no one buying them yet. So I spent a lot of my time as a kid walking through those and sitting in those and smoking weed in those.
00:42:32
Speaker
And then I've also, this isn't quite abandoned, but in my dad's hometown where he moved back there's a mental hospital that used to be completely full. And now there's like two residents left. It's actually very creepy. Yeah. But they're elderly, these two people who are left. And so the state is like funding them to the end of their lives. But then I guess when they die, it will be fully abandoned. And that I have walked around that a lot. And it's very eerie and strange to walk through. Yeah, me and my friends used to go to place called Hellingly, which is couple of hours drive from where I live. And there's abandoned mental asylum there. And we used to hang out there and smoke weed. And one time we... This is the sort of thing, if somebody did it in a film, be like, what the fuck are you doing, man?
00:43:26
Speaker
But there was a bunch of lockers there and like most of them were open, but there was a few that were locked. We managed to break open the the the lockers there. We found an unopened bottle of wine there and and we drank it. So we drank the mental asylum wine. This is obviously, that's obviously cursed. It's obviously got all the mental illnesses were captured in that wine by some crazed doctor and now we've all taken them in. um So yeah, we used to go hang out there. It is, yes, very, very creepy and ah found a child's Zimmer frame there once as well, which my friend had in his bedroom for years. Again, one of the creepiest objects I've ever seen.
00:44:05
Speaker
Yeah, i've never really I've never really explored anywhere abandoned because I don't really go outside. But like um I used to have like um this recurrent... One of my sort of earliest memories of like a recurring dream was when I was like really little. um I used to go for swimming lessons at this old like Victorian bath.
00:44:23
Speaker
um And it's been it's been knocked down now. But I used to have like the same nightmare all the time that I was in this Victorian bath and it was like completely empty and I'd be walking...
00:44:33
Speaker
down this sort of corridor with these like big arch ceilings and like a tiled floor um and then i'd see coming down another corridor i'd see like the big bad wolf from like the three little pigs and i would have to like pretend that i was dead so that he wouldn't eat me and he used to have this nightmare like every night pretty much um and then i decided that it was all to do with my teddy bear and i locked him in the wardrobe and never slept with him again and the dream stopped but I mean, it's funny you mentioned dreams because that's like what, like when you're in a dream, right? Like I i feel like I'm often, in dreams I'm often in my childhood home, but it looks different, of course. That's like how dreams work. um And i do feel like that's like part of the appeal of like the back rooms, right? It's like it sort of feels like a dream. It's like you're walking through a space that you like know, sort of. Like when he first walks into the back rooms, it's kind of his shop.
00:45:27
Speaker
You know, but then it's like something is off, something is weird. And that's like a very common dream experience, which is, I think, like, you know, Yeah, and i think that's what the I think that's part of the appeal. That's why it feels cozy or something people like to think about and talk about, you know?
00:45:48
Speaker
do think The only suppose criticism I'd have of it, or not really criticism, but something I thought it should have leaned into a bit more is we don't really get to see anybody actually get lost in the back rooms. We said that feels like the scariest potential idea there, that you'd just be in this sort of space and just sort of go a few wrong turnings and then have no idea how to get back. And so we don't really... Yeah, that's true. I kind of... I think the most... um the scariest kind of idea like that in it for me was like, cause at the end when the therapist is in there and she's sort of like, um, gets sort of taken in by the scientist guy and he's like interviewing her, like, like, it seems like they're telling her that she's not going she can't actually leave. Like, he obviously gets the opportunity to sort of go home at night. But, like, I got the impression from the conversation that he's having with her that, like, she has to stay there. And I found that idea kind of... Yeah, it's it's great. I thought they either kill her or she has to...
00:46:50
Speaker
just stay there in that facility for the rest of her life, basically. I like that in that scene when she looks at the window and she sees the the sky outside, but you you don't know whether that's the actual sky or if that's just a you know a wall inside the back rooms and they're just in a ah hut inside it.
00:47:07
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I think there's potential. I mean, it could be really bad, so maybe it's not a good idea, but I think there's potential for ah more Backrooms films. but i think we I think we will almost certainly get a sequel and it probably won't be as good, but that's just the way things are these days, so...
00:47:23
Speaker
Um, yeah, let's move on to Hokum. Um, maybe like this might surprise you guys, but maybe like vibes wise, is my favorite of the three. um it's so, and I'll explain why in a second, but it's so, it's, it's like so classic horror in a certain way that I really
Delving into 'Hocum': Critiques and Folklore
00:47:41
Speaker
enjoyed.
00:47:41
Speaker
Even though I sort of don't love Adam Scott. um But anyway, whatever. ah So, Hokum takes place. ah There's this writer. He's depressed. He has demons. Standard.
00:47:55
Speaker
Very derivative writer character. He's an asshole. um You see very quickly early in the movie, he lives in like he's clearly a very successful writer. He lives in a nice, big, beautiful loft. ah And he's trying to finish his Conquistador series, which I thought maybe this the movie could have done without that. But the beginning and end of the movie are the world he's writing. It would have been fine to chop those two segments off, um in my opinion. Anyway, his parents are dead, and he is going to go to Ireland
00:48:28
Speaker
to scatter their ashes where they had their honeymoon. um and I guess what when I say vibes-wise, what I loved about it is like he goes to this like old Irish hotel sort of thing, and it's Halloween, and there's all these like little jack-o'-lanterns, and there's a sort of creepy old owner telling like ah the these two twins like a ah witch story. and I just thought it felt really cool. like i like i like really liked I was really very much enjoying that first act of that of the film, like just the setting of it all.
00:49:05
Speaker
um As far as the plot goes, he does um he does end up scattering the ashes, and in the forest he meets this sort of vagrant who's really into like wild magic mushrooms. um and ah while he And then he goes—I'll just do this very fast—he goes to the bar, He has a really rude interaction with kind of like all of the hotel staff um and then very quickly tries to kill himself by hanging himself. um
00:49:38
Speaker
But before that happens, the host hotel staff tells him that the honeymoon suite presumably were his parents' are ah like stayed for their honeymoon is closed off because the owner has trapped a witch in the honeymoon suite.
00:49:53
Speaker
um And then he tries to kill himself and then he wakes up. And when he wakes up, he finds out that the woman, which is probably the only um character he's semi nice to at the ab of the host hotel staff is missing. And that sort of,
00:50:09
Speaker
ah starts the whole journey of the film where the the vagrant in the woods wants to go and investigate the honeymoon suite. He thinks that she went in there. Should I say that exactly what happens real fast? No, I mean, you know... Surprise, surprise, surprise, it's haunted.
00:50:28
Speaker
Yeah, it is haunted. There is a witch in there, e etc. um Then there is sort of a subplot where you find out, like... I do think it's, like, maybe a little bit offensive to Irish people because you do find out that, like, the all the hotel staff are sort of, like, incestuously involved in each other, with each other, and um the...
00:50:48
Speaker
not no no i I worked in a hotel and that is what it's like. and Anyway, there's a subplot that's like us that's not as important of like the drama playing out between these this like kind of extended family at this in the hotel staff. But anyway, what did you guys think of Hocum?
00:51:08
Speaker
I loved the opening act and I really liked the third act. ah I felt in the middle, it it dragged a bit for me because it just felt like it's a lot of the same scare again and again. It's like basically him walking back and forth between two rooms and then there being something out the corner of his eye. And it's like, by the time you're getting to like the fifth or sixth of those in a row that you've seen, just isn't hitting for me. Um,
00:51:33
Speaker
And it tried to do sort of like a Taimou midsummer thing where the magic mushrooms are introduced early in the... Two things. The magic mushrooms are introduced early in the film. So even though it explicitly calls into question whether he's seeing what he's seeing, at the very end, you have that in your head that there's magic mushrooms about.
00:51:54
Speaker
um And the second thing that I thought was a little bit midsummer-y about it is you find out that like his great trauma... which like both Hereditary and Midsommar, Arias films do this. His great trauma is that he accidentally shot his mother and killed her when he was a kid, not in any way on purpose, like a total accident. um So anyway, I just thought that was, I i thought of Midsommar, even though nothing else about this film is like Midsommar, just the introduction of hallucinogens and the introduction of a severe ah sort of trauma, you know,
00:52:27
Speaker
Yeah, it was is interesting like hearing you when we first started talking about this, um comparing it to sort of like, I guess like classic sort of ghost story horror type films, because I love all of that shit. Like um like one of my favorite movies is The Innocents from like 1960, and that's like a sort of classic like haunted house movie.
00:52:48
Speaker
I hated this movie. ok I really, really hated it. Even though I loved the vibe at the beginning, i will admit from a filmmaking standpoint, it is the least strong of the three. or th thought... I...
00:53:04
Speaker
i Yeah, so originally, like, I had no real interest in seeing the film. I hadn't watched the trailer or anything, but I just i just had the feeling that I wasn't going to like it. And then i I watched it, obviously, because I knew we were going to be talking about it. And I just really didn't like anything about it. I don't know. i am i hated the main character. And I know that you're supposed to hate him because he's an asshole. But, like, I couldn't...
00:53:32
Speaker
I couldn't find myself emotionally invested in his story at all because I disliked him so much. Like, I didn't really care what happened to him. i guessed the sort of family... It's almost like he's so derivative that it's annoying because he's like an alcoholic, asshole, rich writer.
00:53:51
Speaker
Yeah. That's like so many characters, you know. the The sort of the traumatic twist that he killed his mother, I guessed that as soon as he took the gun out at the beginning of the film. And so I didn't, nothing really surprised me because I'd guessed a lot of the sort of twists. And then I thought like,
00:54:11
Speaker
I don't know. I like the idea of witches as, like, a concept in movies. I like witches. They're interesting to me. And I genuinely find the idea of witches scary. um But the witch in this movie wasn't scary to me at all. I think visually she wasn't scary enough. um The few sort of, like, glimpses that you get, like, during the the scenes where he's, like, being sort of haunted by her. And I don't know. i just...
00:54:36
Speaker
Well, you know what, Vicky? You get to live in a country with a lot of folklore and mystery, and I don't. So I think it's nice for me to see a sort of folklore and mystery element, because I live in a country that's like 50 years old. so That's true. but No, but I love i love like i love like folklore mystery and all of that kind of stuff. I just, some think about it just didn't...
00:55:01
Speaker
It just didn't do it for me. I wanted a bit more of, you know, at the end when he's in the underground bit and there's those of figures that are taking people away. us I wanted a bit more of that, really.
00:55:12
Speaker
I agree. I mean, there's a movie that this it's nothing like this, but I thought that a movie that did a better job with sort of folklore was Hollow Road. Have you guys seen that? Oh, I loved Yeah, I loved the film. I think that's a great film, and it it does a great job with sort of like British Isles, fae folklore stuff. ah And it does it with a lot less um than Hokum does.
00:55:36
Speaker
um So i I wanted much more of like the i wanted more of like the folklore element. Like I was hoping for like, when I saw the book that she pulls out, the the bartender, I was hoping for like, ah oh, he's going to do like ah investigate research.
00:55:52
Speaker
He's going to like, I don't know. I wanted some of that, you know? Have either of you seen either of his previous films, the director? did I have and fell asleep to Oddity yesterday.
00:56:03
Speaker
Yeah, I've seen Odyssey, and i i i vaguely remember it. I did like it when I was watching it. um Especially, i think, like, the the sort of the opening of the film, I felt was really, really creepy.
00:56:17
Speaker
um But, yeah, I don't know. I've kind of... i think he I think he really struggles with Act Two. In all three of his films, they they've got a really great idea and a really great ending, and they just sort of they flab around a bit in the middle. he isn't Yeah, I also just i didn't find it very visually interesting. like I don't know. i Yeah. Well, one thing that the movie, I think, messed up a lot is I often felt lost on, like, the spatial structure of what was happening. Yes. And that was sort of frustrating because, like, it took me a while to figure out, like, okay, he's in the suite. Because it's like you're sort of confused about, like... I mean, eventually, i mean, i'm I'm not great with spatial intelligence. Eventually, you realize that you have to go up an elevator and the elevator opens directly into this suite. Yeah. Yeah, I found that really confusing as well. That was cute. When he first goes into the suite and he's obviously discovered like the body in the dumb waiter, and then there's like a moment where he like looks back at the dumb waiter and it's empty, and then he does that thing with like the clock where he's getting the clock to like press the button of the dumb waiter. and i I couldn't figure out like why he was doing any of this, and then it kind of started to make sense. but like
00:57:34
Speaker
um But yeah, i found i found that whole sequence, I was very confused about sort of where he was. where he went believecent Which is is a big failing in a film that is on almost in, you know, probably two thirds of it set in one room or like one floor of a building. You should have you should have a really strong idea of...
00:57:52
Speaker
you know, it's ah a weird comparison, but like a film like Parasite, it's like you have such an idea of the different layers of that house and how it all fits together and how it sort of you know, how you'd move through that space. You just don't get any of that. Yeah. Even the way that the characters talked about the honeymoon suite, I found really confusing, like before we ever a get there, because they, they, when they talk about the honeymoon suite, they talk about going up there. And like, I feel like,
00:58:21
Speaker
It made it sound like it was like a separate building or something. And I was expecting it to be like a separate building because I feel like, I don't know, in English, generally, I feel like if we were talking about a room in a place, we would say like going in there, not going up there. And I don't know. I found that, I don't know. It was just confusing to me.
00:58:41
Speaker
Yeah, it's weird how successful it's been and how how like ah ah quite a few people have said it's one of their favorite horror films of the year or a horror film they've seen in ages. And I just thought, yeah, it just doesn't really, you know, I don't really get what the hype is.
00:58:56
Speaker
Yeah, it actually has a higher like Rotten Tomatoes rating than either um Obsession or Backrooms, which I find very strange. But it's made, um it has not but in any way, shape, or form blown up the way that ah those two movies are like but blockbuster moneymakers. Um, I mean, okay, we've talked a lot about the negatives. I think what it has going for it is a good vibe.
00:59:19
Speaker
Um, I like, I like hallucinogens in movies. I think they could have done more with that. I would have loved to see more hallucinogenic stuff going on. um i liked, uh, they could have done more with that, like, woman character, the one who gets murdered.
00:59:37
Speaker
um I was confused for a long period of time if whether the guy who murdered her like knew about the witch or like believed in the witch or like if that just was like so a murder that kind of was sort of eventually I think you ah come to understand it was kind of tangential to the witch plot. You know what I mean? But like it's like anyway. So, yeah. And then, like, it does get pretty cheesy at the end, like, when he, like, passes out from the smoke inhalation and, like, his mother's voice is like, Fergal!
01:00:08
Speaker
Yes. yeah Like, it does it does devolve into, like, cheeseball kind of territory. um Anyway. but yeah, I mean,
01:00:23
Speaker
i wasn't unentertained. Yeah, past the time, didn't it? Yeah. Slowly. Yeah. I thought and thought i just thought it dragged, and I thought it was really boring.
01:00:36
Speaker
Have either of you seen any other horror films this year that you would that you would recommend? Because I've seen a couple, and I've seen quite a few bad ones. I would recommend Leviticus. I do think gay guys especially should go see it. I also think there's a... nott there's ah Nanny, you're a very open guy, so I think you'd be fine even if there was super explicit sex. But if you're one of the 20 people who listens to this podcast and you happen to be the one straight guy who listens to it, which I know exists, um he's messaged me. ah the The gay sex in it isn't so explicit that it bothers you. It's kind of like a gay it follows, I would say.
01:01:11
Speaker
ah Anyway, that's like my one That's the one I would really recommend. What about you, Nanny? um I really enjoyed ah the 28 Days Later Bone Temple sequel. That's good to know. I'm about to be on a long flight, so that's good to know. Yeah, everyone's opinion seems to be that 28 Years Later is great and 28 Years Later Bone Temple isn't.
01:01:35
Speaker
they're all wrong 28 years later was fucking shit um and bone temple's really good i really really enjoyed it um it felt weird it felt like i like how tangential the zombies were to the plot um yeah i just thought it was really really enjoyable i didn't have all the kind of action film and trappings that the previous one did there's no like slow motion bow and arrow headshots and all that sort of stuff um Yeah, yeah i was saying right i can't I can't really remember what I thought of 28 years later. I think I liked Bone Temple. It was okay. um
01:02:10
Speaker
I don't know. I feel like I've not even really seen that many horror films this year. There isn't that many. I'm pulling up a list to make sure I don't like leave anything out. I'm just looking at my watch thing. I saw... um What did I see?
01:02:23
Speaker
I watched Ready or Not 2, which was not really a horror film. it was fine, but it was just like more of the same. um'm I watched... I thought Sent Help was sort of... Which also isn't really a horror film. But I thought Sent Help was like interesting enough. like It was fun like it was a fun. Yeah, it was fine.
01:02:44
Speaker
it wasn't like great, but it was it wasn't boring, I guess. I didn't think it was boring. Did either of you see Undertone, the podcast horror film? I saw Undertone, and I'm going to... Oh, yes. I feel very guilty for saying this in case you guys loved it, but I was very bored during Undertone. Oh, I really liked it a lot, actually. I'd forgotten about that one, but yeah, I did. I found that way more entertaining than this.
01:03:06
Speaker
particularly seeing it in a cinema with the proper sound mix and stuff. I thought was great. the The only thing that I, that kind of wrinkled me about it was they keep stopping and starting the podcast. They keep saying like, Oh, should we do, should we do a bit tomorrow? just thought, as we all know, trying to arrange multiple people to be on a video call that is in multiple time zones. It's like talking so difficult. The idea that you'd be like, should we, should we cut it in half and do a bit later in the week? Cause I know you've, you've got the time, but just do it now. um But so yeah, overall, I enjoyed it.
01:03:38
Speaker
What about ones you're looking forward to? i can i haven't seen the new trailer that just dropped, but I am despite myself, looking forward to Werewolf. Oh, I'm really looking forward to Werewolf. I did watch the trailer. The trailer was fine. um i think Lily Rose Depp's accent sounds good. I think she's the master of accents. but um I have nothing. i i read I really, really like her. i'm So I'm kind of, I'm worried that it might be a little bit samey-ish, but I'm still excited. I don't care. Even if it is kind of samey, I'll still wrap it up.
01:04:11
Speaker
I'm curious because I didn't like Nostro Arto at all, but I have liked his previous movie. Yeah, we both liked Nostro Arto. think we talked about this when you were on. Well, we liked it, but we also, I think, admitted in the episode that it was made so explicitly for us. Yeah, it felt like it was tailor-made. to just lap it up. But I would say Minas Verati is probably my favorite Agus film, except for maybe The Witch. I like The Witch. The Witch is essentially, I think, a modern horror classic at this point. Yes, I'll put it up there. I'm interested to see what the new Evil Dead is like. That's out in a couple of weeks over here.
01:04:53
Speaker
i thought the trailer looked quite good. um yeah I don't like the even Evil Dead films. but i'm mix I'm excited for the next Terrifier movie because I love those movies. Is that definitely coming out this year? i love i thought it would have been delayed. It's coming out. I think it's coming. Oh, it might have been delayed. I hope it hasn't. But um but yeah, I'm... like i'm i The last like few of those movies, I've gone to see them like several times in the cinema. And I realized that it's just gore porn, but like I love gore. No, they're good. They're good films. um
01:05:26
Speaker
I heard very good films, things about a film called Obex, which I've got downloaded, ready to watch, which is like a black and white horror film. It's a very low budget one, but a few people have said it's their film of the year. So I'm excited to see that.
01:05:39
Speaker
I'm not excited, but I'm sure all of us are going to drag our asses to go see the Odyssey, right? Oh, yeah, yeah. um i I have zero interest in it. I don't like i don't really like Christopher Nolan films. I do want to see, even though I think her first film dip was pretty unsuccessful, i do want to see Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma.
01:06:01
Speaker
I'm curious about it. i i liked her first film, that um Everyone's Gone to the World's Fair. i didn't like and I'm thinking of the second. I didn't like um I Saw the TV Glow. Yeah.
01:06:12
Speaker
um i also i thought it's a weirdly incredibly transphobic film for a film that is supposed to be like sort of ah the trans parable i was just like this is a film about how being trans is about being an eternal child i just thought that's quite an odd take to have on it but um i'm excited about practical magic too sorry oh no no i'm i'm angry about this because like I don't understand why Evan Rachel Woods has been like recast. his and oh like
01:06:45
Speaker
It's like they've like aged down the children for no reason. Well, it's because I actually got in trouble for saying this, I think, on Reddit. um I said, why isn't Evan Rachel Woods just cast as the girl? And apparently this is based on Alice Hoffman's like second Practical Magic book.
01:07:05
Speaker
where the daughters are supposed to be college-aged. So instead of just throwing out the whole age thing in general, because Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman are grandmother's ages, like, why can't Evan Rachel Wood just fucking play a 20-something? Who cares? Like, we're already we're already doing it. ah Anyway, they decided just to, ah yeah, don't know.
01:07:26
Speaker
I'm not sure if it's horror, but I'm interested in seeing... It's called David Gordon Green, the guy did It Follows. He's got a new film um called End of Oak Street, which is about dinosaurs. Have you seen the trailer for that?
01:07:38
Speaker
With Ewan McGregor? It's Dan Cathaway. Yeah. Anne Hathaway has another movie called Verity coming out this year that I'm kind of excited about. Anne Hathaway's just in everything this year. um I'm excited. This isn't horror, but I'm excited to see Mikey Madison and ah and the social reckoning with, um what's that guy's name?
01:08:00
Speaker
Jeremy Strong? Jeremy Strong, yeah. Yeah.
01:08:04
Speaker
Yeah, i'm i do that I don't tend to like Aaron Sorkin's films, but I'm sure it'll be quite watchable. this His stuff usually is. um But yeah, this year is not its not shaping up to be a great year for film. Although I feel like I always say that around June. And then by the end of the year, I'm like, it was like 30 films this year that were all great. But so far, it's not looking it's not looking great. ah Did either of you see the new Silent Hill film?
01:08:28
Speaker
No, I saw the the trailer was enough. Like, i I saw the trailer and I was, i was like, horrified. was shocked by how bad it was. Because I i love that original Silent Hill film. I think it's probably the best um video game adaptation film that's that's been made. um But, yeah, this new one is... ah It's bizarre how bad it is.
01:08:48
Speaker
Yeah. I just... I saw the bad wig on Maria and I was just like, this looks so shit and cheap. um So, no, I didn't watch that, but... Yeah, i've not really been I've not really been going to the cinema that much this year. I've not even really been watching that many movies. like Yeah, i'm watching lot I'm watching Love Island, unfortunately. The real horror. i started watching... um I've been watching The Terror Season 3, I think we're up to. Oh, is there a third series?
01:09:17
Speaker
Yeah, and it's kind of um like... It's it's it's is kind of like Silent Hill-ish in a way. It's it's set in like modern times and it's about this guy who gets um arrested and locked into this mental institution. Okay, cool. i'll check that out. Because yeah I loved the first series, didn't like the second one. but ah yeah No, I didn't like the second. found the second series watchable. um It doesn't feel like, um I mean, obviously they all take place in different time periods with different storylines and stuff, but It doesn't feel like there's anything that really links any of the series together, apart from that they're all called to terror. But I am enjoying this third season. I think it's cool.
01:09:57
Speaker
Well, because that first season is like so meticulously researched and are accurate to the real events. And then the second one was just like, here's just a story that happens. Yeah. Yeah.
01:10:09
Speaker
um I just wanted to say Bickey moved quickly past this in his pharmaceutical days. But um the I do think Love Island is... ah I do actually think... You said it's the real horror, but I've actually been like developing this idea that like Love Island is basically like the Saw movies, but for romance. Yeah.
01:10:28
Speaker
when Okay, let me clarify. So when you say Love Island, do you mean like the UK Love Island? I'm going to watch the current UK one. I am. But I'm currently almost caught up with the American one.
01:10:41
Speaker
I didn't really know there was an American one because it just seems like such a British thing to have. No, there's an American one. But anyway, the point is, is like the way it's structured is kind of like a Saw movie, like a horror film, because it's like the characters are put, like, just to give an example, it's like,
01:10:58
Speaker
like The last episode I watched, they go to... the they go And the and it and like all the fans know exactly like what's going to happen in the season. They have like a very intense structure. But in the last episode, the boys go to this place called Casa Amor, which is basically just like another shitty house next to like the...
01:11:15
Speaker
Oh god!
01:11:21
Speaker
relationships with like hipps with these women for like a month and then then they get taken to this new house where a bunch of new women are introduced and then like they' female companions back in the old house have to watch how they act with the new oh i god hey Yeah. And so it's like, and then once the girls get all upset watching them basically like have this new interaction with these new women, then they like up the ante, like on this episode I'm about to watch when we get off, they're like, and now the women get their revenge. But instead of six new men, it's 12 new men. so they like, so they ship in 12 new hot guys for only six women. So it is this, like, it does have a very horror element in this, like, in the fact that they do this, like, very boy-er sort of thing. And then on top of that, the only way to win, it's nightly, first off. So it's five episodes a week. And the only way to win is to both be in a couple at the end, and then you get you have to vote on the app, and, like, whoever gets voted the $100,000 whatever. Okay. I do miss having like i do miss having like a a reality TV show to get yourself hooked. every kind used this Every competition is like that. like In one, the the ah the women are blindfolded, but they're each given different color paint, and they have to try to find their man just using touch. So when the blindfolds come off, like and you can see all the where exactly where your girl like touched touch.
01:12:58
Speaker
No, like everyone else. This is like fucking Joseph Mengele if you read. Yeah. like but it's po view It's very twisted. It's very twisted. Have either of you watched Virgin Island the British? now Are they virgin?
01:13:16
Speaker
Yes. Yes. Very much so. i mean And for varying reasons. But yeah, it's ah it's worth a watch.
01:13:26
Speaker
All right. Guys, I kind of have to pee. they home. All right. Bye. Lovely to speak to you both. Bye, Twinkies.