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Episode 1 - Beau is Afraid
62 Plays2 years ago
Join us for the inaugural episode of The Study Pipe, where we peel back the layers of Ari Aster's latest film, "Beau is Afraid." This manic masterpiece has left audiences gripping their seats and questioning their sanity. With our signature blend of introspection, wit, and passion, we'll dissect the cinematic elements, committed performances, and the intricate symbolism that makes "Beau is Afraid" a must-watch experience. So light up your metaphorical study pipe and embark on this journey with us as we discuss Aster's newest odyssey. Don't miss out – tune in now!
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Transcript
Introduction to The Study Pipe
00:00:05
Speaker
Welcome fellow thinkers and movie buffs to The Study Pipe. I'm Zach. And I'm Andrew. Together we're here to ignite your intellectual curiosity and delve into the fascinating world of film, current events, and thought provoking topics. That's right, Andrew. Our mission at The Study Pipe is to create a stimulating haven for film enthusiasts and curious minds alike, offering in-depth analysis, engaging conversations, and a warm sense of camaraderie.
Exploring Hidden Cinema Gems
00:00:35
Speaker
We specialize in unearthing the hidden gems of cinema, exploring the artistry and complexities behind your favorite movies. Our passionate discussions go beyond the surface, examining themes, symbolism, and the intricacies of filmmaking. But we don't stop there. We also venture into the realm of current events and other intellectually stimulating subjects providing fresh perspectives and insights that will challenge your mind and spark lively debates.
00:01:03
Speaker
By joining the StudyPipe community, you're not just subscribing to another channel. You're becoming part of a vibrant tribe of like-minded individuals who share love for film, a thirst for knowledge, and an appreciation for meaningful discourse. So come, pull up a chair, light up your metaphorical StudyPipe, and let us embark on this captivating journey of discovery together. Don't forget to subscribe now and become part of the StudyPipe experience. We can't wait to have you join our conversations. Awesome.
00:01:33
Speaker
All right, so what are we talking about today, Andrew?
Ari Aster's 'Bo is Afraid' Discussion
00:01:38
Speaker
Today, we're talking about Bo is Afraid, Ari Aster's new film. It just came out, I believe that would be Friday, April 21st. It is a wild movie. We have both already seen it. I cannot say it enough. This movie is wild. Wild to say the least. And Bo is very afraid from what I gathered.
00:02:04
Speaker
The entire movie is like watching a guilt trip on acid. I thought I've ever done that. Yeah. I mean, I think it's like supposed to simulate in the viewer a manic episode. At least that's what I took from it. I felt very manic when I was in there watching it. It's almost like having a three hour panic attack. Yeah, I think that's accurate.
00:02:33
Speaker
And you know, so Ari Aster is the director. He did Hereditary, he did Midsomer, which, you know, I'm a big horror fan. I love both of those films. This, I don't think Bow is Afraid is a horror movie. I don't know if advertising and whatnot is kind of billing it as that. I thought it was more of a
00:02:59
Speaker
very dark comedy. I mean, it's suspenseful and all that. But, you know, I would say it is a departure from his previous two films. Oh, 100%. There's horror elements, but this is a comedy through and through. And for anyone who's not familiar, if you haven't seen the trailer, this movie stars Joaquin Phoenix.
Film's Star and Journey
00:03:25
Speaker
It's about a guy who
00:03:28
Speaker
without spoiling anything, he's very dependent on his mother, and he goes on this odyssey to return home. And so you're almost taken through with like, there's not really a good way to explain it without spoiling anything, but just a big journey of anxiety. It really is, I think, an odyssey, right? With this idea of,
00:03:53
Speaker
You know, he's starting from one place at the beginning of the film and he needs to get to his mother, you know, to put it very vaguely. He needs to get to his mother. And there's obstacle after obstacle, you know, before him, I mean, preventing him from getting there, you know, in a timely
Comparisons and Critical Reception
00:04:14
Speaker
manner. But
00:04:16
Speaker
I think the hype around this right now, one of the things that really stood out to me is this comment from Martin Scorsese praising Aster as being one of the leading voices right now in cinema and being bold and courageous.
00:04:38
Speaker
He compared it, the film, and I don't know if it was a direct comparison from the clip I saw, but, you know, it was this, he brought up Barry Lyndon and really like, there are films that will divide people, they're divisive. And, you know, people may come out initially and think, you know, oh, that's terrible, or I don't get it, or I'm not about it.
00:05:01
Speaker
But many years later, they're back rewatching it, loving it. And I can see this film kind of doing the same thing, for sure. Definitely. I think the number one thing I heard from people leaving the theater now that I've seen it twice was this was an experience. They didn't necessarily always mean that in a good way. I personally, I loved the movie. I'd give it a 10 out of 10.
00:05:29
Speaker
It's early in the 2023, but it's my favorite movie of the year. It's the most inventive movie I've seen in years. I think that's easy to say. Just the world building, the character development, just how the movie gets into your head and makes you feel everything that Bo is feeling.
Film's Impact and Viewer Reactions
00:05:46
Speaker
But there's going to be a large portion of the population that sees this movie that's going to feel very uncomfortable. And their first thought is not going to be that they like this movie.
00:05:59
Speaker
Yeah, I can definitely see that. Especially, I mean, if you go and you take a peek at the Rotten Tomatoes user reviews, I think that's already starting to spring a little bit. But I wanted to ask you before we really share how this film impacted us,
00:06:21
Speaker
What would you do, I mean, if Scorsese was praising you like that? I mean, to me, Scorsese is one of the best directors of all time, you know, obviously. And to sit there three films deep on my resume and to get that praise, I would be, I'd be freaking out, man. I don't know how you, I mean, you gotta be graceful, but that, that means something.
00:06:50
Speaker
I wouldn't be graceful. That'd be at the top of my resume. He's Scorsese endorsed. You go and you pitch any new films. And look, love this Instagram reel. Martin Scorsese telling me that I'm a defining voice in cinema right now. Give me four million dollars for this film. But who knows? Maybe I'm the definitive voice now. I'd be at every coffee shop just be like, did you hear what Scorsese said about me?
00:07:22
Speaker
I would have made it. You should know who I am. I'd be doing the same thing. I'd be like, good fellas, man. He made good fellas. I understand what I'm talking about. I'm a bad man, Doc. Yeah. I don't know, though.
Economics of Filmmaking
00:07:41
Speaker
I think there are going to be a lot of people who
00:07:47
Speaker
kind of knocked the film, but also I'm kind of curious if, you know, the first two, I think Hereditary was like $9 million to make. And then Midsomer was like 10, I mean, they're both close to 10 million. And Beau is afraid coming in at like 35 million, if I'm not mistaken. And I'm kind of,
00:08:09
Speaker
worried that if it's not a box office hit, which it doesn't seem like it's going to be, he might not get that budget again. I think he's talented enough to tell these kinds of stories with a smaller budget. But to me, because I love the movie so much, I want this kind of budget for these kinds of projects to be a thing. Yeah, that's what's so hard about
00:08:39
Speaker
films nowadays. 10 years ago, we could say, all right, this movie made $4 million. It's opening weekend, a $35 million budget. It's going to lose money. But we have no idea what the equation is going to be when it goes to video on demand or when it goes to streaming services, like how the return on investment is going to be viewed.
00:09:01
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, that is a good point. I'm for sure going to buy this and watch it multiple times at home, stream it. I mean, I hope that it develops that word of mouth kind of cult following if the box office isn't there. But yeah, man, it's wild. It's a wild trip.
00:09:25
Speaker
I felt like I was losing my mind watching it. I felt like I was going insane.
Repeated Viewings and World Building
00:09:33
Speaker
The second time I saw it, I felt like I was going even more insane. It wasn't like I was like, oh, I've been here. I've been on this ride before. I know all the twists and turns. No, the second time was just as insane as the first.
00:09:47
Speaker
It is insane like that or it doesn't lose its sense of manic atmosphere because there's so much happening kind of in the background. There's so much detail that Astra has sprinkled throughout the world he's built because
00:10:04
Speaker
You know, the world that Bo exists in in this film is not, you know, our world. At least that's not my takeaway from the film. I thought it was this world where, you know, everything is really turned up, like the saturation is turned up. All the dials are maxed out to 10. It's hyper.
00:10:27
Speaker
you know, violent and insane. It's almost like if you looked at the news, you know, the news cycle in America, it's always like,
00:10:39
Speaker
You know, negative shootings and, you know, all this kind of crazy stuff going on. To me, the world that Bo exists in is like if the news, the way the news portrayed, you know, our world was the actual real world. I mean, day in, day out, like.
00:10:58
Speaker
That is what you're getting. You're getting crazy crime in the streets. It's not just a one-off that's being amplified by news media. It is the world he exists in. 100%. It's like if Fox News was talking about Chicago. Yeah. That's how they describe Chicago. Yeah. Yeah, we're San Francisco.
00:11:27
Speaker
That is his world. So are we avoiding spoilers here? Are we getting into spoilers? I think we can do spoilers, but let's give everyone a chance here who hasn't seen the movie.
Diving Into Spoilers
00:11:43
Speaker
We're going to be talking about spoilers from here on out. So maybe fast forward about another 10 minutes and you'll be past the spoiler part because there's a lot to talk about.
00:11:53
Speaker
There's a lot to unearth with this movie, and talking about this movie is like playing Minecraft, or not Minecraft, like the Minesweeper game, where you can't really discuss the film itself without heavy spoilers, because the entire film's almost a spoiler.
00:12:09
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's an accurate way of summarizing the film. So yeah, if you don't want spoilers, skip ahead or end now. I guess to conclude the spoiler-free discussion, your review, Andrew, you said 10 out of 10. Anything else to add before we dive in? Yeah. When I think back to a good review, I think back to what Roger Ebert would say, which is,
00:12:39
Speaker
the people that are listening to this, would you recommend it to them? And I love this movie. I love balls to the wall movies. I love things that are surprising or shocking and things that make me uncomfortable. So if you like all those things, if you like to spend three hours where you don't know what's going on, you don't know what's going to happen next, and literally anything can happen. It can be good. It can be bad.
00:13:00
Speaker
this movie is for you. But if that makes you very uncomfortable and anxious, that's not a good experience, then don't see this movie, or at least just be ready for that. Yeah, and I'd build on that by saying, you know, I loved it 10 out of 10.
00:13:16
Speaker
I like when a movie is bold and it is willing to do things that are not mainstream to really challenge the viewer, to really think about like, what can a film be? What kind of typical storyline be other than the movies we see, these blockbuster box office films, the Marvel films, all these cookie cutter kind of,
00:13:43
Speaker
machine films that are being manufactured and churned out. This is a movie that is not that. It directly challenges your understanding of the world that the characters live in, your understanding of what is even going on, what is the point and purpose of the things that are happening. And even kind of challenging whether the things you're seeing on the screen are really happening because the behaviors exhibited by the characters are so
00:14:12
Speaker
They were on contrary to normal human interaction. So to me, all of that is very fascinating. And what I found really surprising about this film is that it is really funny. And it's dark humor. But I've seen it twice like Andrew. And in both showings, in seemingly very dark moments of the film, the audience is laughing. The whole theater is really roaring with laughter.
00:14:42
Speaker
I think Aster did a really good job of presenting the audience with something that's really dark and finding humor and just the absurdity of it. It was refreshing to laugh at just absurd things happening in that way. If that all sounds interesting to you, definitely check it out. All right. Now on to the meat of potatoes, the spoilers.
00:15:15
Speaker
And are there many? Yeah, those were all sad because it's a very funny movie. And I'm excited that we can talk now about the things that we found really fucking funny because it was a very funny movie. Yeah, it's hilarious. The whole beginning, you know, opens with, you know, Bo is in this session with his therapist. He has
00:15:44
Speaker
some anxiety or what appears to be anxiety, you know, about visiting his mother. He has to to go and see her on the anniversary of his father's death. And, you know, very early on, I mean, right there in the opening scene, his therapist floats, you know, this this idea plants this idea in his mind of like, wouldn't things be easier if she were dead? You know, and he's kind of like, no, no, why would I think that? And then
00:16:14
Speaker
very rapidly that happens, you know, his mother dies and he's dead. What's that? She said, does she die? She has a
Bo's Chaotic Home Life
00:16:25
Speaker
chandelier dropped on her head. Yeah. A big chandelier. Um, although they don't show the chandelier, do they? They only show where it was hooked. Yeah. They eventually show where, where it was hooked to where it was dropped.
00:16:41
Speaker
But the way Bo finds out is, Bo's very dependent on his mother. And the reason he's going to this therapist is that he's got this very dark and distorted relationship with his mom who might say she's like a narcissist. And so he's trying to get his head sorted out and sees his therapist and they are mostly just focused on his relationship with his mother and it's a pending trip that he's going to go to see her.
00:17:09
Speaker
And so he leaves the therapist and he find out that the next day he's supposed to go see his mom for the anniversary of his dad's death, like he said. And as he, you know, the night before he's supposed to go on this trip, you know, you have a bunch of more weird stuff that's just happening in this world. He lives in this rundown apartment and his next door neighbor keeps coming by and leaving notes in the middle of the night underneath this door, saying, turn down the music and Bo's not playing any music.
00:17:37
Speaker
And the guy just keeps coming back, progressively more and more irritated, begging on the door. And eventually the guy gets so upset, he just starts blasting techno. As loud as he could possibly like blast music. And Beau's just sitting there, just taking it, laying in bed, just trying to let the night pass by so he can go see his mom the next day, this trip that he's dreading to take. And because the music's so loud and because he can't sleep, he ends up finally falling asleep, but then waking up an hour before his flight is supposed to take him. From here on out,
00:18:07
Speaker
is three hours of anxiety, I would say. Yeah, just straight, you know, dialed up 10 out of 10 anxiety. You know, even kind of in the beginning, as it's leading up to that, as you said, he lives in this world that is crazy, you know, he's basically lives in skid row, they don't say where the film takes place. It looks like
00:18:31
Speaker
Actually, no, I think it is in California because I remember seeing a clip of his ticket to go visit his mom, I thought he was leaving California or going somewhere in California but it's essentially
00:18:46
Speaker
skid row, but dialed up to a 10. I mean, there are people dead in the street in front of his home. There are people being violent, attacking each other right in front of him. And he's trying to navigate very early on this crazy world and keep himself safe. And immediately something that I thought was hilarious and I loved is that
00:19:11
Speaker
He leaves his apartment to go get water for this medicine that he has to drink water with. And all of the people off the street invade his home and destroy his home. This is all before he finds out about his mom and tries to leave to go see her. But it is just insanity. It's like madness that this is occurring.
00:19:37
Speaker
You know, he loses his keys. He can't get into his home because all these people are in it. He has to wait out the night outside and he goes back into his home and, you know, it's utterly destroyed. And he's trying to figure out, you know, how to get to see his mom. And, you know, then he calls her and the news is broke by some UPS driver, that founder and great cameo, my belator.
00:20:04
Speaker
Yeah, great cameo. I love that, you know, he's when they do show him later in the film, they're doing a TV interview. And you only see kind of from the back, he doesn't want to be filmed. But you can tell it's him and it's hilarious. And what was cool about that cameo that I noticed is that it's not him on the phone. So when Bo talks to him,
00:20:28
Speaker
earlier in the film, he was trying to call his mother to get a hold of her. But this UPS driver picks up the phone and says, you know, who is this? And they're trying to figure out what's going on. And he said, I walked in, I found this body. She doesn't have a head. Maybe it's your mom. Maybe it's not that whoever is on the phone. That's not Bill Hader's voice. No, definitely not. That's definitely not Bill Hader. Yeah, if it is a voice acting, it's nothing like him.
00:20:54
Speaker
Yeah. And it just is a huge payoff when you do see him later. He's my extern. He's like, I just found the body. Yeah, I just found it. I just found it. Dogs are barking. But yeah, I mean, then I think really what kind of moves the story forward is, you know, Beau is setting out to go see his mother.
The Stranger Encounter
00:21:18
Speaker
He finds out that she dies and is devastated.
00:21:25
Speaker
gets hit by a car when he's outside by this couple who basically kidnap him and want to make him their new son. At least that was my take. They had lost their son in the war. They want a surrogate son. Yeah, a surrogate son and he's on house arrest.
00:21:45
Speaker
is playing family. He's a growing, what, 50, 50 years old, 40 something? He's a grown man. Yeah. The kicker is that they already have a daughter that's alive, doing just fine. That they are pretty much just ignoring the entire time that he's there. It doesn't only interact with the yell at her.
00:22:05
Speaker
Very dismissive, you know, the whole thing. And he's like in her room, which is like a typical teenager's room. There's boy band posters and all this stuff all over the walls. And it's funny because, you know, he's this grown man sleeping in her bed and shouldn't be there, you know. And it's just it is very cookie cutter, clean family stuff. But what is going on is not that. And it's very eerie, but funny.
00:22:34
Speaker
And then there's the soldier that they're also nursing or taking care of. Part of the son's platoon. Yeah. So the son died and then his friend in the war gets through taking care of once he returned home and he has PTSD.
00:22:53
Speaker
He's running around in the background of, you know, all of this, doing crazy stuff. And even getting to a point where he's like kind of threatening Bo silently, you know? Yeah. This is like the most horror aspect of the movie too, is like this part of the film. Cause you're, every night Bo goes to sleep and the daughter is upset that she's watching Bo replace her brother. And she goes out and talks to the,
00:23:22
Speaker
to the PTSD soldier kind of bangs on this guy's room and Bo can see through the window that she's just pointing eerily at Bo and telling this guy something that's not good. Not good at all. No. And it just escalates slowly. It's like a pressure cooker of him being in this house with these strangers who are way over the top nice
00:23:49
Speaker
but are also like not giving him his autonomy. You know, he's injured. He got hit by them. They were driving a fan. He's damaged. He also got stabbed, which I don't know that we want to spoil how he got stabbed because that was funny movie. Yeah. Yeah. We won't spoil how he got stabbed. Probably we probably shouldn't spoil why he leaves the house just that he does.
00:24:16
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, I agree because that was also a very dark but funny moment in the film. Very wild. But he is propelled out of the home with that family and just say, I guess,
00:24:33
Speaker
the least they no longer love him or want to care for him. And he runs off into the forest and is being pursued by this former soldier that was his adopted brother. He's the adopted brother, I guess, his fellow platoon member.
00:24:56
Speaker
But I mean, it leads to one of the most interesting and bold, I think, parts of the film on Astor's part is he flees, he ends up in this forest and he meets a traveling band of like thespians who put on plays all around the country in forest for people.
The Theater Troupe and Alternate Life
00:25:17
Speaker
And he meets this troop of actors and it leads to him watching a play
00:25:26
Speaker
and then cutting into him being a part of the play. And it's this whole 20-something minute sequence where you're taken out of the main plot of the movie and you're following Beau through this epic life that he thinks he has had. He has a wife and has kids.
00:25:50
Speaker
And it's very trippy. The visuals are awesome. That's probably where a good portion of the budget went was on that. It was awesome. Super cool.
00:26:03
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, that was, I love that he did that. I mean, I could see people maybe complaining that, you know, what was the point of the purpose? But I thought it was great because I thought it kind of spoke to the life that Bo wish he had, but also being true to kind of the nature of his bad luck. Exactly. It's almost like a fantasy of the life that he wishes he had.
00:26:31
Speaker
a metaphor for the life that he's currently living mixed together. And this is my favorite part of the movie. Like he said, he shows up in this into the woods and gets rescued by this band of actors. It's almost like that TV show on HBO station 11 where you're like, what the hell? It's just this almost like they're in a post-apocalyptic world. These people form together to tell plays across the forest. And then he's watching this play.
00:27:01
Speaker
And the story is very similar to his journey. And it just transports him into this trippy 20, 30 minute sequence of this new life that he's imagined that he lives. And he becomes an old man alone. And he has kids that he can't have because, you know, as you find out in this sequence, he, you know, through a flashback that he was conceived
00:27:27
Speaker
by his father, the same moment that he died, he had a heart attack, this heart condition that's passed down from generation to generation through men. And so it's this dual situation of Beau imagining this life of having kids and being able to live off the land and then also having to come to terms with his reality that he can never have kids, he can never have sex.
00:27:56
Speaker
Yeah, I think it is at a point in the story, too. Because at this point in the story, there are hints throughout the film up to this point, but you really don't know what's going on. I mean, you kind of have an idea. His mother's diet, he's trying to get back to her. But you don't really understand why Bo is the way he is, why he has the anxiety that he has.
00:28:26
Speaker
You kind of have been given hints throughout. But I think what this sequence of the film does really well is it starts to feed you a coherent narrative of what it could be. Because it's filled with half truths, what's going on within this sequence. At least for me, when I watched it the first time and the second time,
00:28:53
Speaker
it made me think like, oh, this could be what the story is actually about. Or like, this is what's really going on with him and where it could go. Not all the way, not completely, because there are certainly things that happen within the play that don't reflect what's going on with the main plot. But
00:29:13
Speaker
It started to tie things together for me and make me think, okay, how's this thing going to close out? Because at that point, you're probably already like two hours into the three-hour film and not really sure where it's going.
Third Act and Themes of Autonomy
00:29:29
Speaker
Exactly. It does a great job of showing you this fantasy and then also filling you in and showing you what's really going on with Bo, why Bo's afraid.
00:29:45
Speaker
And it, you know, I'm going to come out and say it like it. He has no idea that he's being hunted by this PTSD guy and the play tells him. Yeah, that's true. There's a whole sequence about like the watchdogs. Yeah. This force is going to be after you and you'll have a sense that it's there. It's in the background and it even kind of speaks to the general anxiety, you know, that follows him around through the whole film.
00:30:14
Speaker
Um, but yeah, very well done. I mean, after he kind of like snaps back to reality from the sequence of, of thinking he's been in this play, uh, it all goes belly up, you know, the guy who's been hunting him, the PTSD soldier just crashes the party and starts shooting everyone up, killing people. I mean, it's incredible. It's insane. Yeah.
00:30:43
Speaker
I don't know about you, but I'm hesitant to even go further than this in the spoilers just because I feel like the payoff in the third act is so big. I agree. I was going to say, I think that's right. Maybe there's a future episode where there's a full like, you know,
00:31:04
Speaker
description, discussion, dissection, if you will, of the whole story and what it means. But yeah, man, after that, when you get into that last, I would say that's probably the third act after the play.
00:31:21
Speaker
Really, I mean, it gets crazy. There's a couple twists and turns that you weren't expecting. There's some characters that make an appearance that kind of close some threads and then you find out the nature of really what's been going on, even though
00:31:42
Speaker
Maybe the answers and the reveal don't make sense in our world, but they do make sense in the world that Bo exists within. You get closure. It's a film that I think, when I talk to other people who've seen it that didn't really like it or didn't understand it,
00:32:04
Speaker
I think they didn't feel like they received closure, but me, I did. I think that by the end of it, I understood, you know, at least that like face value surface, you know, level, like I understand why it ended the way it ended and, and what that means for the overall characters. Yeah. I would say there's definitely closure for me. I can, I can see.
00:32:33
Speaker
I can definitely see why people would think it didn't. But to me, this is cut from the same cloth that you saw a lot of 1940s books on absurdity and existentialism are cut from. And the closure comes from whether or not Bo can finally find autonomy. I'm not going to get into these spoilers on that.
00:32:59
Speaker
the entire movies about whether or not Beau could make decisions or whether or not he's going to be controlled by this outside force. I think after the first time, we both had watched and
00:33:14
Speaker
We both called each other because it's so absurd. It's so crazy. You immediately need to discuss it. I think even if you hate it, you need to discuss it because it's just so different than the current crop of films that are coming out.
00:33:29
Speaker
You had said something about that autonomy that I didn't really realize until the second showing that for a split second right there at the end, I think it is apparent that Bo did get his autonomy. There was a decision
00:33:47
Speaker
that he finally made. I mean, the whole film, he's hesitant to make a decision. He's looking to others to act for him. And at the end, I think he does. It may be subtle, but I think he does take action. And it closes the loop for me. And I think that's what I meant when it ends that I felt like I knew where the characters were at, why they were there, and
00:34:17
Speaker
why things happen the way they did. Exactly. Well, the loop was closed. And man, I asked her, oh, you got to give it to him. This guy is, I mean, he's wild, man. He's out there making movies. Whatever he does next, I'm excited.
00:34:39
Speaker
Oh, yeah. I mean, after Hereditary, I was like, I'll see all of his movies because you know me. I love horror. I thought Hereditary was like.
00:34:50
Speaker
wonderfully done for like a psychological horror and, you know, yeah. And thank you. Cause I think what he did well in that movie was just forcing you to be uncomfortable rather than relying on like jump scares and stuff like that, which are cheap and easy with horror movies.
Aster's Style and Creative Freedom
00:35:10
Speaker
But it was, you know, let me put something on the screen here and present real hard, difficult situations and realities and imagery that really gets into your head and forces you to sit there. So and, you know, sit there and be present with it. You can't really run off and.
00:35:29
Speaker
know, extended shots on certain things that are disturbing, like all of that I thought was great. So, you know, after that, I was a lifelong customer, you know, a fan. But I think it's just it's kind of
00:35:47
Speaker
You know, he's three films in the first two were relatively safe in terms of like the business of moviemaking, right? He did a great job with hereditary made money. He stuck to horror. Did the folk kind of, you know, horror. The Wicker Man.
00:36:05
Speaker
Yeah. And that made even more money, did great. Both of them made great money. And you would think like, okay, third entry, stick to the formula, let me do something that is within the horror space or what I'm kind of known for.
00:36:24
Speaker
and make some more money. He had the balls to just say, you know what, you're going to give me the money and you've seen what I've done with two films. I'm going to make the movie I want to make and I'm going to make it absurd and crazy and ambitious and large and wild and
00:36:44
Speaker
You know, I need more movies like this. I need people who are willing to challenge the status quo, who are willing to like go out there and explore kind of pockets and corners of film and storytelling that don't get enough light, that don't get enough time in front of audiences. Oh, yeah. And I don't think I like it or hate it.
00:37:10
Speaker
or it's your favorite movie ever. I think everyone that left that movie doesn't have a large list of movies or similar. No. No one's like, I saw that before this.
00:37:23
Speaker
Yeah. And I think because of that, you have to respect it. Even if you don't like it, I feel like you have to respect that there's, you know, a professional, a person, he's working a job, he's doing a job. He's a director, a writer, um, who had the courage to like do what he wanted to do. And you know, they, some people are saying he may not get the budget again and you know, he may not be able to make a film like this again. And it's kind of like,
00:37:52
Speaker
Well, you know, I respect that. Like you made something that wasn't safe. You made something that might not have mass appeal and that a lot of people might not understand, but you stayed true to what you wanted to do, which is create something that was absolutely wild. And, you know, obviously can't speak for the guy, but you know, my take was that.
00:38:15
Speaker
he made something that was true to him and he had the courage to go out there and do it, to swing big, you know, swing for the fences. Oh, definitely. Yeah. Even if you never see a movie with him with that big of a budget again, he made the movie he wanted to make. I don't think anyone can say that he didn't.
00:38:40
Speaker
Yeah, and I don't know how many directors get to actually even do that, you know, make the movies they want to make. I feel so much, um, a film nowadays is like safe. It's like, it's this business case by the studios of, you know, what's going to make money, what's going to, you know, appeal to,
00:39:01
Speaker
the most amount of people, what's politically correct is a sure thing. And you need people who are taking chances because they push the boundaries of what people after them are willing to do or be inspired by. So you need movies like this, even
00:39:20
Speaker
I mean, obviously it's a business. Everyone needs to make money. Everyone needs to be able to pay their bills. But I think for the overall industry, a film like this is good. Even if A24 loses out, they don't make their money back. They're taking one for the team. I suppose I see it.
00:39:44
Speaker
You and I both got to see a small part of this just with our first jobs in college where we were getting market reactions for movie trailers that hadn't been released yet and just saw how much everything gets pushed towards a common denominator almost where the studio spent a lot of money trying to research what makes everyone the most happy.
00:40:12
Speaker
It's amazing that something like this can even get made. Yeah, everything now is just like focus group driven, you know, which isn't a bad thing. I mean, there are a lot of, you know, I love mainstream blockbusters and they're fun.
00:40:32
Speaker
you know, there needs to be a certain percentage of films released every year, you know, that aren't just the typical safe business case, but are exploratory, you know, R&D films, if you will, that are out there doing the work, taking the risks, you know, having the courage to really
00:40:58
Speaker
find out what do
Dark Comedy and Audience Resonance
00:41:00
Speaker
people like. I mean this this movie was a dark comedy and I like dark comedies but I didn't really know that I could laugh at such
00:41:10
Speaker
dark things that happened in this movie, you know? And, you know, when I was starting to laugh, I kind of, oh, you know, am I bad for laughing? You just maybe feel a little bit. Yeah, you look around with the whole theater is laughing and then you realize that there is something innate, something primal, you know, this
00:41:34
Speaker
on the human level amongst all of us where we're all laughing and maybe it's your laughing in the face of absurdity because it really is absurd and maybe that's the only thing you can do and things are so dark and so absurd is to laugh to get some sort of relief. But I think he was tapping into a part of our humor that we all share.
00:42:03
Speaker
because it wasn't just a couple chuckles in the theater. I mean, it was the whole theater was laughing at some of these really- Yeah, at least half of it, half the theater. There was definitely a portion that was just like, what the hell is going on? We're not laughing at anything. They were still processing. They couldn't get up to the laughter, for sure. But yeah, I don't know. I mean,
00:42:30
Speaker
I think that's cool that it's a movie. He's doing something where you're really kind of reaching people in a way that other films aren't without getting into any huge spoilers on the direct money stuff. I think that's a perfect wrap up of how I see the movie is. Just what we've been talking about is it was a great exploration of absurdity,
00:43:00
Speaker
a little bit of mental illness, relationships, and just all tied together with this really on point dark humor. Oh, and one other thing too. Moriah Carey. Moriah Carey. Yeah. That was legit. Let me restart that real quick. Not going to spoil, but Moriah Carey. That was great. That was great.
00:43:32
Speaker
Yeah, the whole thing was great. I remember seeing on social media right around the premiere, Ari Aster posing with Mariah Carey in a photo, and everyone in the comments was like, that's random. Why is Mariah Carey there? She had big horror, suspense, thriller fan. She loved his other movies. And everyone was kind of like, what? And then when I saw the movie, I was like, oh, that's why she's there. That makes sense.
00:44:06
Speaker
I'm not going to say anything because I'll just spoil it. If you're a Mariah Carey fan, see this movie. If you learn nothing else from this, if you like Mariah Carey, you can just immediately go buy that ticket. Yep. Amen.
00:44:23
Speaker
So I guess that kind of concludes Beau is afraid, but yeah, I guess one last question I have for you is what do you think is next for him?
Aster's Future Directions
00:44:33
Speaker
You know, you think he's going to stick with like horror, like go back to that. You think, I mean, I guess it all depends on what the box office says. Yeah. I feel like I can see him feeling like he's
00:44:48
Speaker
He needs to make a surefire hit so that way he can get some more leverage for future movies. I mean, this movie did not do well. It's hard to imagine that word of mouth with how uncomfortable it makes about half the audience. It's going to really propel it past that 35 million, but I hope it does. I would have to bet that he goes back to horror just to groove one out and get the numbers up.
00:45:20
Speaker
Really? That's a bold prediction. Going back to horror. I wonder, I was thinking, especially with the Scorsese endorsement, I was thinking, what if he leverages, yeah, maybe A24 says, we don't want to give you more money. That didn't do as well as we thought it would. But maybe he has more clout now, and he can get another studio interested in
00:45:48
Speaker
working with him and giving him a budget to explore something else. I mean, it would be crazy if he just flipped genres like he got out of horror, the suspense, dark comedy that is Beau's afraid. But what if he went into some crazy period piece or something like- Or sci-fi.
00:46:12
Speaker
Yeah. Ooh, sci-fi. That'd be cool. The thing is, he knows how to compose a shot, beautiful shots, beautiful cinematography. The teams he's working with, I mean, his films look great. They look excellent. And I think he's a master of creating an atmosphere, an ambiance with his films. So I think he could really make any
00:46:38
Speaker
He could make a good film in any genre. And I think he has the talent to do that. And that's probably why Scorsese has given him so much praise. But man, it would be kind of wild to see him go and do, you know, like, I don't know, a story that's, you know, maybe fiction, but like most of it's nonfiction and historical or just something epic, you know.
00:47:03
Speaker
Yeah, no, I agree. I guess it depends because he made this $35 million movie look like $100 million movie. So excuse me. So I mean, really like he I can imagine that he can go any direction with the $20 million budget and make something just fantastic that also might have a little bit more mainstream appeal if that's what he wants to do.
00:47:34
Speaker
If this movie gets a lot of award recognition, it might not matter what it does at the box office. That might be enough to get that prestige endorsement. Like you're saying with Scorsese liking him as a director, that might be enough to give him another shot. It's hard to say because the marketing for this movie didn't really do a great job of showing what the movie was.
00:48:04
Speaker
Yeah, I agree with that. I don't think it did. Not even, I mean, I don't know how you would really show it, but like the trailer is absurd, but it's a different tone. Yeah, it really is. I mean, I can't even, now that I've seen it twice, I can't even remember the impression I had from the trailers before, but
00:48:32
Speaker
I just remember, you know, as I watched the film, I was like, this is a lot different than I thought it was going to be. I mean, it's like comedy, fantasy, you know, anxiety, little horror, maybe. I mean, I don't really think the things that happen are horror. I think they're more just like thriller-esque, you know, but
00:48:58
Speaker
It, I don't know. Frankly, I don't even know how you market this film because it's so wild. Oh man. Yeah, I don't know. He almost seems like a director that might be built for the streaming platform where you don't need to get people to go pay to see it, but to build through word of mouth. Well, it's funny you say that because that's kind of where Scorsese is at nowadays, right?
00:49:25
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. He's making movies for Netflix. He's making movies for Netflix. I don't know if Killer of the Flower Moon, is that going to be Apple or is that Netflix too? I thought it was Netflix, but I could totally be wrong on that. Yeah, I'd have to look it up. Well, I don't know. I think that's a good take that you have Scorsese praising him and Scorsese's
00:49:52
Speaker
films currently can only really exist in the streaming environment that we live
Streaming and Future Film Anticipations
00:49:58
Speaker
in. So maybe that is, you know, Aster's next play. Maybe, you know, it doesn't work out with A24 or maybe they keep betting on him, you know, he's their guy. But if not, it would be cool for him to go to Netflix or Apple or one of these streamers that
00:50:18
Speaker
don't care. They want to spend the money because they want to have something in their catalog and he can go hard. The Irishman, three-hour movie, a lot of people said it was slow and boring or whatever, but I thought it was fantastic. Without Netflix, it probably wouldn't have been made. All hell Netflix, I guess. Yeah, or Apple TV, whichever one's making the
00:50:47
Speaker
Flower Moon because that's going to be a three and a half hour movie too. Yeah. We should do a whole maybe next episode on Flower Moon and kind of what we're expecting with that because I was excited then I read news and I don't know. That would be a good episode I think. Yeah. It'd be down to talk about the movies that we're excited about, Flower Moon. Maybe have it be a
00:51:15
Speaker
What movies that were most anticipating for 2023? Yeah. Oh, I looked it up. Flower Moon, Apple TV Plus, and also Paramount Pictures. There we go. They'll do their little small display around the country in theaters for the awards, and that's it. Yeah, that's it. Thank you, Tim Cook, or Tim Apple as Donald Trump calls him. Tim Apple, what a guy.
00:51:43
Speaker
Great guy. Any parting words for this episode, this stranger? Yeah, thanks for sticking with us and going through the spoilers. And if you've seen the movie, you know what we're talking about. And if you haven't, hopefully we left you some nuggets to still surprise you. It's a great movie. It's fun to talk about. It's a great movie. I think people will be talking about it at parties and
00:52:11
Speaker
future showings, cult showings probably, because it was awesome on the big screen.
Viewing Recommendations
00:52:17
Speaker
IMAX, I saw it in, you did both of our first showings where IMAX, and then second showing was great too, but definitely need to see it in a theater. I mean, I definitely will watch it at home, but theater experience is awesome. But yeah, thanks all. Thanks for tuning in. Like, comment, share, drop questions.
00:52:40
Speaker
All kinds of stuff. Send us to your mother, your father, maybe not your brother, whoever. Not your sister, not your sister. No siblings. No siblings. We forbid it. We need grandparents in on this. We're here for your grandparents' attention. Mother's in honor of Beau, too. Mother's for sure. If you hate your mother even more, bring her over. Yeah. Your mother needs to see this movie.
00:53:10
Speaker
No one see it with your mother. So it's very awkward and you feel weird and then she can bring up a bunch. She can bring up a bunch of stuff and bullshit about things you felt. Now you could have been a better son. It'll be a great time. Mother's day. Hey, hopefully it's still running. Mother's day. Perfect mother's day movie. Thanks everyone. All right. Thanks everyone. Catch you next time.