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Ep. 230 – “Mysterious Ways” Out Now! w/ Filmmaker Tyler Eaton
156 Plays9 hours ago
This week we’re excited to welcome back filmmaker Tyler Eaton! The last time we spoke (Ep. 73 – Pure Flix Presents “Caviezel Dead: The Seventh Trumpet”), Tyler was still raising funds for a horror comedy called “Mysterious Ways” about two sibling youth pastors who accidentally summon a malevolent entity during an anti-Halloween social media stunt. Well after several years and a mountain of manhours, it’s out! “Mysterious Ways” also stars past guest, comedian and actress Alyssa Sabo (Ep. 69 – YOU’RE the One Who Sniffs Panties!). It’s a really fun movie tailormade for this audience, and we think you’re going to love it as much as we did! You can stream it right now on Prime Video, so go check it out!
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Transcript
Introduction and Comedic Banter
00:00:00
Speaker
Anyway, then me and the security guard change the sheets and he's like, yeah, man, you don't want to get tweaker juice on you. It's ah like, what is tweaker juice? He's like, well, you know, it comes to their sweat and it like ends up in the bed.
00:00:12
Speaker
And like you would have gotten high just from laying in that bed. Oh, is that a real thing? According to the security guard in Phoenix. Ben, it's true. I believe it. No one needs to fact check it nor look that up. Dude, it's like hallucinogenic poison ivy. You
00:00:30
Speaker
need a little technique to get the oils off you.
Podcast and Guest Introduction
00:00:52
Speaker
Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Growing Up Christian. I'm Sam. I'm Casey. Sorry. casey Is he operating on a delay or were you looking at your phone?
00:01:02
Speaker
I was looking at my phone. I know. we f You hit start and then immediately looked at your phone and just forgot we were doing a podcast. so My mistake. I'm Casey. Once and for always.
00:01:15
Speaker
And today we are joined by a returning guest, Tyler Eaton. last Man, how are you, dude? um good, man. how are you guys doing?
Film Development Journey
00:01:24
Speaker
Great, dude. It has been a while, uh, since we talked, uh, yeah, couple of years, maybe think three years. Yeah. It's crazy. Uh, so for the listeners, um last time we talked to Tyler, he was, I think you were, you had really just like, you were really like building the momentum to even start record. You had just kind of locked down some locations for ah a movie called mysterious ways.
00:01:51
Speaker
Um, And now that movie is alive and well and available to stream on ah on Amazon Prime. So three years in the making, dude.
00:02:02
Speaker
Yeah. it's ah I was like raising money. I just didn't see it in Spark and raised like 15 grand. And then... yeah i was living in texas that whole summer just saving up money avoiding la rent uh and then the movie just increasingly became more and more expensive and uh we show how that works right ah you know you go in with a plan and then as soon as you like lock down your shoot dates that's that's when uh everything decides to like double in price um but yeah we shot the thing and uh
00:02:33
Speaker
in October of 2022. And i edited the thing for a year, worked on VFX and color and music and all the post things and did festivals last year. And then now it's out. It's on's on Amazon Prime now.
00:02:47
Speaker
That's incredible, man. What a grind. i It never
Production Challenges and Solutions
00:02:51
Speaker
stops, man. I've got, now I have to market the thing and like figure out how to let people know it exists. So yeah, man.
00:02:58
Speaker
That's gotta be tricky. did you ah did you In your fundraising efforts, did you consider like pausing in the middle of the movie to read like a DraftKings ad? um I wish we could have consulted on that earlier during the edit. That would have been great.
00:03:14
Speaker
Some product placement. Someone orders like a Coke from a vending machine. Yeah, some Trump Bibles or something in there. Buys a 5 25 deal for Zins.
00:03:28
Speaker
Some holy liquid death. Yeah. Oh man. Something. Yeah. Some kind of demonic tie in. I don't know. I could play both sides. It could be like heavy metal bands. Yeah. If you kicked off a holy war over ad space in your movie, like, yeah, you might be able to just like play both ends to the the maximum amount, but I can tell you which one's got more money.
00:03:52
Speaker
I don't care anymore, man. I'll take
Living and Filming Conditions
00:03:54
Speaker
anybody's money. Just. Yeah. Even if it was $400 million dollar flying palace from Qatar?
00:04:04
Speaker
Sign me up. Yeah. Making sure we're on the same page. Who doesn't want a flying palace? Yeah. I mean, it looks incredible. So, yeah, so when we talked, you were in Texas. You were with, ah while you were trying to save up some money, you were with family, right?
00:04:23
Speaker
I was at my mom's place when we recorded, and then I switched over to my dad's place. I was between Houston and Austin. Okay. ah Yeah, I went to film school in Austin, and I've lived in L.A. technically for 11 years, but took six months off.
00:04:37
Speaker
Then I swooped back in and lived at this lady's Airbnb in Panorama City. was like, Kind of shadier part of town, but it was really affordable. And just lived in her guest bedroom while I was like rehearsing the movie with the actors and prepping everything with all of our like department heads. And we did an 11 day shoot.
00:04:58
Speaker
And yeah. 11 days? We shot the movie in 11 days. Yeah. with like That's incredible. With like three little pickup days. But yeah,
Night Shooting Dilemmas
00:05:08
Speaker
just... um one of our days was like 16 hours long, you know, ah that was a day with a lot of demons and a lot of dancing.
00:05:17
Speaker
ah Most complicated stuff scheduled all the same time. And a lot of the movies at night. yes So at that point, you're just doing night shoots, right?
00:05:28
Speaker
We did a lot of like blacking out of the windows, which okay I was like dubious about how well that was going to work. But now like when I'm watching the movie, I can't quite tell like what we actually shot during the day and what we shot at night.
00:05:42
Speaker
Cause yeah, we just had a great camera crew that all went to AFI and had just graduated a couple of years before. And it was their first movie too, but they had skills and resources that I, you know, don't have. And yeah, they knew how to like,
00:05:58
Speaker
make it look professional. so So, so, okay. So yeah, you have a, I've tried one of the things I was paying attention to the credits after I watched it because, um, obviously know in comparison to like a major motion picture, the credits are going to be a lot smaller.
Crew Assembly and Collaboration
00:06:14
Speaker
Um, so what kind of, it's like when you're, when you're obviously you picked your, you've, you hire your actors, um is you, I noticed like, uh, producers, executive producers, uh, and you mentioned a production company, like what kind of, uh, what kind of work are you shopping out, uh, to, to get people on board? You mentioned this, uh, this, uh, company that is their first movie. Um, and like, so is that, was that like their, had they done other, like,
00:06:47
Speaker
other projects and this is like the first feature length film, like how'd you get in touch with them? And then like, I'm just kind of curious to how you piece all those things together. Yeah. even start shooting are like oceans 11 sort of like building the team montage.
00:07:01
Speaker
Basically. Yeah. Once we um knew we were actually going to start fundraising. um so i have a the production company called head case productions with Lauren Gilbert. She's like my producing partner.
00:07:13
Speaker
She writes and direct stuff too. produce her stuff. She produces mine. And she found this DP named Zach wall. Now who had just graduated from the American film Institute, which is a,
00:07:25
Speaker
great film school out in LA. So we got dinner with him right before we raised money and just like kind of gave him the scope of the project, like the inspirations for it. Like we're doing sort of a super bad meets evil dead, but like, you know, without any money. There's a DP loves to hear, you know? um and he handled most of like hiring the camera crew and the electric and grip departments.
00:07:50
Speaker
They were all DPs. They're all director of photography. uh people who just graduated and they yeah this was their first movie too so we all kind of just like dove into it together like they've done short films uh all throughout school and commercials and yeah they're just like really well trained in lighting and like it's just a massive upgrade visually from anything I'd ever done.
00:08:17
Speaker
Um, all because we found this crew. And then, ah my buddy Cruz came on as an EP and he connected us with some financing and, um, uh, my grandma helped out a little bit.
Family Involvement and Support
00:08:31
Speaker
She's ah an executive producer. so fakeed And, you know, she was the most terrifying person to pitch the movie too, because she grew up, uh, you know, and,
00:08:42
Speaker
has been her entire life incredibly religious uh and so yeah she was a little intimidating to to pitch my my demon idea to eventually and she read the script and was just like you think this is funny like what this is this is horrifying and then ah some of my family talked to her and uh Yeah, eventually she was like, all right, well, I trust that you might know what people are entertained by, but more than me. And so ah oh I'll help you out a little bit.
00:09:16
Speaker
Anyway. um yeah, then we, we hired a production designer. We, we, um, hired, uh, you know, just, we, we filled out the crew and there's a lot of dancing in the movie and i had no idea what I was going to be, you know, how I was going to assemble these dance scenes.
Dance Scenes and Choreography
00:09:32
Speaker
Um, but a lot of it was inspired by this group, Joyful Sound I was in when I was like 12 and 13. It's like Christians. Uh, and yeah, so I was pulling from that and my sister used to praise dance at church.
00:09:47
Speaker
Um, So I had like, I had a lot of ideas, but i didn't know how to like, you know, tell the actors what to do so i had to bring on a choreographer and i ran into um my neighbor his name varta tarosian she's also a filmmaker in l la and uh i was telling her about the project and about all the dancing and she's like how are you gonna like accomplish these scenes and uh like i'm gonna hire a choreographer i guess and and she happened to be like a lifelong dancer and
00:10:18
Speaker
Um, so she came on board as the dance choreographer and just like really brought those scenes to life in a way that I never could. Um, so yeah, talk to your neighbors, you know, you never know what's going to happen. but Get those Katy Perry moves going.
00:10:33
Speaker
Oh my God. i
00:10:37
Speaker
What is going on with that? Not to take a quick detour, but.
Humorous Interlude on Pop Culture
00:10:41
Speaker
ah With Katy Perry? I don't know. I mean, injury. That's what it looks like. It looks like she's wearing an invisible neck brace. I i can't tell if like, like, it's like there, like you see that same scene over and over again.
00:10:57
Speaker
Like that same like reel going around. And I'm like, this has to be just like, are they so is it a robot portion? like Or is the entire like three hour show that bad?
00:11:11
Speaker
I'm going to be honest. I have not seen what y'all talking about. She went to outer space, and now she's there's a clip of her like dancing robotically. yeah Yeah, it was strike three. like yeah The album was strike one.
00:11:26
Speaker
Outer space was strike two. And the dance video is... it's the death knell of her career. Like she's over after this because space. It was one thing to go to space and everyone already was just like, yeah, that's cool. I guess. Sorry.
00:11:44
Speaker
I messed up the audio. No, I think you're good. Oh, I did. Okay. And it's like, you go to, yeah, she goes to space and it's like, you know, nobody really cares about rich people going to space unless it like,
00:11:57
Speaker
launches out of like orbit and they're gone forever then it gets interesting a lot faster but that didn't happen it was for celebrities and submarines yeah only ones that are managed by uh steered by gamecube controllers um my god but it was her kissing the ground upon landing that uh really just pissed people off
Audience Engagement and Satire
00:12:22
Speaker
I'm watching this clip right now. It's the one where she's wearing this sort of futuristic looking.
00:12:27
Speaker
guess she's doing lot of this. Okay. Yes. yeah yeah it was like It's like the future, like future robots meets ancient Egyptian. ah Meets like a scene from Austin Powers. Yeah. yeah The pointy machine gun bra.
00:12:43
Speaker
yeah Blending a lot in. Okay. I'm all caught up on pop culture now. Perfect. Oh my God. Isn't it terrible? What is going on with her leg when she falls?
00:12:54
Speaker
Um, anyway, it's like she forgot to stretch before she went out. Yeah. So talking about your grandma and pitching it to her, i was curious because obviously like,
00:13:10
Speaker
You know, this is sensitive subject matter for some people like demons and possession and youth group and all that kind of stuff, right? um Was there any like ideas or jokes that you had to cut out because you were just like, yeah it's too much?
00:13:25
Speaker
um That's a good question. Oh, yeah. I mean, there were some things we just could not accomplish visually. I was going to have a couple of our characters who are having an affair in the movie.
00:13:38
Speaker
I was going to have them demonically merge into one creature, sort of sort of like spider creature. And ah they were going to you know attack other people in the movie. um And then I was like, okay, like I talked to Laura, my producer, and she's like, how are we going to do that?
00:13:56
Speaker
Like, that sounds like, i you know, that could be in a Guillermo del Toro movie, but like not our movie. Yeah. And so I'm like, okay, I'm going to rewrite the scene. I'm going to figure something out.
00:14:07
Speaker
And then I just rewrote it to be completely off screen, uh, to where like, you're just hearing it behind a door and someone's just like describing it like, Oh my God, they're merging into one. And like, they're turning into a spider grid.
00:14:18
Speaker
And then, uh, that just felt lame. So I just cut it completely. But yeah in terms of like inappropriate jokes, I know. It's those old drafts are like so far back and in time now. I don't know.
00:14:32
Speaker
Um, Let's see. I mean, yeah, there's there's a sex scene in the movie. there's There's some stuff that's in the movie that she's uncomfortable with But when I finally showed it to her, she fell asleep halfway through.
00:14:45
Speaker
That's perfect. That's how you know a boomer likes a movie. Absolutely, yeah. It was calming enough. didn't walk out. She woke up at the end. i mean, we shouldn't have watched it. We watched it in her bedroom on her TV and she was like laying back in her bed. ah and then she woke up at the end. She's like,
00:15:03
Speaker
Great job. That was really good. You slept right through the altar call.
00:15:09
Speaker
Did you catch any, any flack from anyone, any complaints from randos along the way, or even family members are like, what are you doing? Like, i I mean, even still like, I feel like this would be, you know what?
00:15:22
Speaker
It's like, it does. I think it rides. ah I think it like kind of rides the middle of the lane well enough where like people who are still like, Christian with a sense of humor can could appreciate it. it's yeah It's not like really rubbing up against um but like deeply held beliefs. it's kind of Those are kind of left to the wayside.
00:15:46
Speaker
um And it's more just like cultural, like making fun of like some cultural aspects of it. Yeah. It's just like, it's just dropping you into the middle of this like evangelical world of speaking in tongues and prophesying and, you know, faith healing, yada, yada.
00:16:01
Speaker
Um, but no, I wasn't like, I just want to smash my childhood with a hammer, like with the sense of bitterness. It's like, like the people who will get these jokes, we'll get them. And, uh, you know, um, everyone else can, can like go along for the ride and, uh, just kind of gawk at this world.
00:16:18
Speaker
Um, But yeah, no, I haven't received much like negative reaction from from anybody online yet or anybody at the festivals. They've all just been, like if anything, I was like, oh, maybe i should have gone harder.
00:16:31
Speaker
Like no maybe I like missed an opportunity to be, you know, a little more ah satirical and make fun of some of the hypocrisy. But um yeah, I don't know. i'm I'm happy with like the fact that it's not like,
00:16:47
Speaker
I mean, it'd be great marketing if people were protesting it, but... That does help. That little Nas X route. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Getting some people talking about what it actually says when they when they play it backwards.
00:17:04
Speaker
Ooh, that's a good idea. i should You should have layered in some backma ah yeah backmasking. Yeah, yeah. um Yeah, I can do the director's cut. Yeah. but But no, I mean, yeah the mission of the movie was never to to just, you know, what's his name? ah Bill Maher. Like, i you know, that kind of vibe.
00:17:28
Speaker
Oh, my God. Yeah, i did I wasn't just like going to release some 90 minute like atheistic screed like, yeah. Like I still love my family and they're all and they're deeply Christian and my dad is pretty conservative. but It's more about just like, all right, so if that's your situation,
00:17:47
Speaker
how do you How do you live with that? How do you like bridge the gap between having these kinds of people in your life? And like how can you still love someone who views reality in a completely different way?
00:17:57
Speaker
um And there is there are like atheist characters in the movie. like there's there the the The two main characters are these youth pastors and their roommate is the this ah Bigfoot obsessor. He's my favorite character.
00:18:11
Speaker
Oh, yeah. He was so good. Dennis Hurley is the best. i just did a short film with him last month. and yeah he He lives in Boston and he does stand-up and sketch out there. and Every time I do a project, I fly him out.
00:18:25
Speaker
No way. I got to follow him and I got to find out when he's doing some comedy. He's doing shows all the time. I'm
Cast and Character Evolution
00:18:33
Speaker
close enough. I can't wait to ah to catch some of his stand-up and tell him ah we got a mutual friend and that I saw this movie.
00:18:43
Speaker
Yeah, I saw him. he used to live in L.A. And I saw him play this character, Herb Marple, back in the day at this little black box theater. And he would come on stage, like, just full of nerves. And his mouth would be closed.
00:18:56
Speaker
And he would get on stage and just instantly vomit. And, uh... So wild. Yeah. And, um...
00:19:07
Speaker
Just, you know, if you're into cringe comedy, which I feel you guys have referenced, like, i I think you should leave and stuff on your podcast. Like, oh yeah yeah, it feels like a character out of that world. Like Neil Hamburger.
00:19:18
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, exactly. um Nathan Fielder. Nathan Fielder, yeah. Oh, God, I've been watching his new show. it' I mean, it's perfect. I think it's like... what The rehearsal?
00:19:32
Speaker
Yeah, the rehearsal. Season 2, Episode 3, I think is one of the best episodes of television I've ever seen in my 37 years of life. I just watched it like last night. Yeah.
00:19:44
Speaker
ever I'd seen because even before i was like kind of delayed on watching that episode and I kept seeing the visual of him dressed up as Scully with like the fake mustache and everything. and I was just like, what is happening in this episode?
00:19:56
Speaker
But I never could have foreseen the like baby diaper. Have you both seen it? I haven't seen it. they actually haven't seen any of that show. you need i like Season one was really good, but it doesn't matter if you skip season one. like you I need you to watch season two right now so I can text you about it.
00:20:17
Speaker
okay It's incredible. It's all like set about the airline industry and co-pilots issues, like being too nervous to talk to their pilots and like how that leads to crashes and him like talking to co-pilots about like their relations. Anyway, check out the show. It's amazing.
00:20:33
Speaker
dude i was also pumped when i saw the pastor in the movie is eddie from uh your pretty face is going to hell eddie pepitone yeah love that show yeah i was so excited to see him does he only do satanic stuff yeah it's in his contract yeah it has to be satanic um he I've been a fan of him since college, and there's a great documentary about him called The Bitter Buddha, um which like is just kind of his biopic ah and follows him as he goes on the road. And he's just like a prophet of doom. like That's his sort of stand-up style.
00:21:14
Speaker
He's just constantly screaming, um but it's so fun. Yeah, he's very political and... um Yeah. It's, he's just like my favorite person to listen to just screaming about stuff.
00:21:27
Speaker
Um, yeah, but yeah, this is my second time working with him. I made a podcast called battle of the bald. Um, and I, I cast him as the villain as a sort of like Alex Jones type guy, but, um,
00:21:43
Speaker
you know Instead of Alex Jones, it's like his whole platform is ah misogyny about women hating them for their hair loss. ah
00:21:55
Speaker
And the lead character comes up with this cure for male pattern baldness and they all take it and they suddenly have all this, like this blossoming head of hair. And then after a few months, it starts to turn on them and their hair starts growing out of control and their skin starts sagging and they become these like giant troll doll creatures.
00:22:13
Speaker
And so they start, you know, uh, going after the lead character. so anyway, that was a really fun project to do with them. Uh,
00:22:24
Speaker
Yeah, dude, I ah there is like a couple of there's so much stuff in the movie that's like just hits the nail on the head. Like, that's what I like about it, too, is that, you know, I mean, sometimes, you know, stuff that pokes fun at church and Christianity can come across as like bitter and like. Sure.
00:22:44
Speaker
you know, it really chisels away at the beliefs themselves rather than like the the cultures where most of the problems are, you know? And like, there's so many things in the movie that are like just hilarious. Cause you see like the parallels and stuff taken directly from, you know, everyone's American Christianity experience. But like, one of the things that was funny to me is, uh,
00:23:10
Speaker
The fact that like everyone gets to perform at church, no matter how bad they are.
00:23:18
Speaker
ah you mean, like the rap, the Christian rap in the opening. yeah that would hit for me, too, because I was at a I was at a church. I've shared this before with um where this this he had probably like 14 or 15.
00:23:32
Speaker
um I was like 17. i was visiting my friend's church and he did he did like a Christian rap with his with his parents. And it was I've never been more awkward.
00:23:45
Speaker
I've never been like I've never had been more uncomfortable in church in my entire life. um And that includes like thinking back to like some weird megachurch experiences or some faith healing services in college. Like there was so, but just a 14, 15 year old, very white homeschooled boy doing like that, like, you know, the, the, like the he hot hip hop hippity hop that like real white kind of of shit where you're like,
00:24:12
Speaker
Oh, my God. And it was with his mom had a line a verse and it was just miserable. And it made like that I appreciated introducing. I appreciate you incorporating ah the the bad Christian rap into the church service.
00:24:27
Speaker
I'm glad that connected because yeah my one of my youth pastors boyfriends was a Christian rapper for a while and then it did not go well. And so he kind of quickly pivoted and suddenly was starting to play guitar.
00:24:41
Speaker
so There's like ah ah in the opening, like two minutes, they discover this woman has died in the parking lot. Nobody knows how, but it's this like traumatic shared event for all the characters. And I wanted to show like, our this is like a turning point for everyone who is there.
00:24:59
Speaker
and And so I was like, okay, what could our worship leaders change? be like Maybe he shifts. He just changes genres ah and in his musical career. oh So yeah, that's where that came from.
00:25:12
Speaker
I think one of the things that works really well for it too is that, you know, I, in a lot of, well, the, I mean, to like speaking of like Christian seminar, ah sit cinema, cinema, yeah yeah um where like,
00:25:30
Speaker
like It's hard to do and incorporate Christian things in an authentic way without it kind of being lost on people. like so you have like when when you like With Christian cinema, it's like there's nobody outside of Christianity is going to like recognize a lot of what's going on in it. like There's so much that is like baked into the cake for people it's like you have to have that experience and that cultural understanding in order to like get it. But on the flip side, you can see a lot of other people incorporate Christianity into media that's not geared towards Christians. And it as people who grow up in that world, you go, you get a lot of that wrong.
00:26:13
Speaker
um yeah And I think that you did a great job like like really with that blend of like it – Anyone outside of that world is going to recognize it, but anyone inside of that world. It's like it's not there's no like it's not like insider baseball, even though there are a lot of like nods to stuff, like those cultural ones, like the the left behind, like the the tribulation books
Cultural References and Accessibility
00:26:36
Speaker
or...
00:26:36
Speaker
So funny. The boy who died, and the boy who went to heaven 12 times in his writing is like third book about it. Like, really like such great, like, little little things get thrown in where I feel like it gives you a ah a lot more of a chuckle when you're like familiar with that whole book.
00:26:54
Speaker
What's that kid's name? Clayton Burpo? Clayton Burpo? Oh, my god My kid's name was ah Timmy Pipkins. That's like little Timmy Pipkins. is like It's so perfect.
00:27:06
Speaker
The most made-up sounding name. But, um like, it's a one-off joke that Eddie's saying. Like, this will be a fun, just like, random aside. of but Yeah, it was it's like Eddie writing a church email, like a newsletter. and I still get my parents, like both of their newsletters from their respective ministries.
00:27:23
Speaker
And yeah, that's just kind of how they come off to me. Like we're doing the glory weekend and like everyone come on down to the whatever conference. Yeah. But yeah, I'm like, I wanted to infuse it with those specific references without the plot hinging on those things.
00:27:41
Speaker
So, cause I can't stop and like, like, all right, so this is what faith healing is. And this is what speaking in tongues is like, just show it and keep moving. Um, and hope that just the sibling dynamic, like, I think that's why people are into righteous gemstones. Um, whether you went to a church like that or not, um,
00:28:00
Speaker
it's It's really that that show tackles the hypocrisy of wealth, you know, and the church. And you can still connect with these psychos because they're siblings, they're adult siblings who love each other and they're morons. And yeah, I don't know.
00:28:18
Speaker
So that's good to hear. That's good to hear. There's like a nice blend of, So it's still a watchable movie. dude yeah It's also funny how like there's just like these archetypes of people that show up over and over again in church groups, you know, like. um I remember there was always a kid that was like really. ah Like invested in something like farming.
00:28:48
Speaker
You know, like that was his whole identity and he wore like his his farm boots to church and he always had like a some sort of a holster on his side with like a multi tool or a pair of pliers in it and stuff. And you're kind of like, wait.
00:29:02
Speaker
This tells a lot about where you grew up compared to me too. I was going to say, that true at first I was like, my youth group did not have that kid, but my school did. like i i was home I was homeschooled and like eventually I went to this little like like upstart private school that was just a bunch of homeschoolers thrown together.
00:29:19
Speaker
and Our school was at this local church and there was a kid who would wear a cowboy hat and carried a multi-tool. And he just wanted to fix stuff all day. Like he was sort of like the unofficial repairman of the school, but 15 years old.
00:29:35
Speaker
um Yeah. If you ripped a piece of paper, he was running over with a little bit of tape out of one of his holsters. I got it. I got it. I got it. I got it. I got it. There is a kid like that at one of the youth groups that I went to, and he had this giant like belt holster thing with like a bunch of stuff in it.
00:29:53
Speaker
And somebody we they they gave us like sodas or something like that, like cans and his he went to open it and the like the tab popped off without opening it. So he's like just just charges for his holster like he's so excited he gets to use one of his little tools he pulls out like this Leatherman pliers thing. Yeah. And like grabs the can and tries to like, you know, wiggle it down and pop it loose. But he ends up poking a hole in the side of the can and just spraying it on his shirt.
00:30:24
Speaker
It like one of the greatest things I've ever seen. That's incredible. We also had ah like a guy that was a cowboy dude. He was one of the leaders, actually. And he wore like a cowboy hat and like a floor-length leather duster all the time. Ooh.
00:30:40
Speaker
That's a yeah tough choice. He was single. Shocking. but ah A lot of the kids, ah we like the kids in, um I feel like like in my age group, um we had a lot of public school kids at my church.
00:30:57
Speaker
And but so it was like, there weren't many that stuck out as like that person. Yeah.
00:31:08
Speaker
There was like a couple that were bizarre, but they didn't have like their archetype. But my my younger brother, who's like three and a half years younger than me, his age group had a lot more like archetypal type kids. And there was always like, there was like the group of paintball kids who were just like ah crazy into paintball and airsoft. evolved into airsoft as they got older.
00:31:30
Speaker
ah But there was like this real like para, pseudo, like military love. Like it was all like, really into camo. um
00:31:42
Speaker
Wanted, i mean, all their airsoft collections. I don't know enough about airsoft. Training to fight the terrorists. they were yeah Yeah, I think they they all were like, wanted to join the military. None of them did. some of them got into math and heroin.
00:31:55
Speaker
I can't wait to be a guard at Abu Ghraib. Yeah, those are two options. ah Heroin or the military. Yeah.
00:32:08
Speaker
ah So yeah, it it wasn't, it was like, but that was like the the big one. There was some, there was like, like an anime kid, but they were always the ones who were like, not really, you knew they weren't going to stay Christian. They were going to get really into hentai in a little bit.
00:32:26
Speaker
Yeah, you can tell like like around 15, 16 who actually has the the the real passion for this stuff and who's just kind of there because their parents are making them be there. yeah And so, yeah, that's what I tried to put into the the youth group characters. just like You have your kid who's really obsessed with being healed. He doesn't need to wear glasses anymore. And you have the one who's the most terrifying of all who's clearly going to grow up to be a homeschool mom who kind of is like...
00:32:55
Speaker
you know, incredibly into the Tribulation Squad series, which is my version of Left Behind. It's like secretly kind of excited about the Antichrist coming. And ah and then the other two, one of them is just horny and just really wants to make out with ah one of the girls. And yeah. And the last one is just sort of like, just let's just get through this.
00:33:18
Speaker
Yeah. Which it it does cover, like, it does cover a lot of the main types. I think one thing I don't, did you ever see anyone, like, change course?
00:33:29
Speaker
ah Like, because I think you're right, Tyler, when you're, like, around, like, 15, you can kind of tell the trajectory. And the youth pastors would seek those kids out. um They would spend as much time with them as they could to make sure they they tried to get them to, like,
00:33:44
Speaker
to re-engage. I never, I never have seen a kid like change core. I've seen people like turn 30 and have a kid and now they're back in church again. Like that's super normal.
00:33:55
Speaker
Right. um But none of these like teenagers i ever saw a change course and be like, actually I'm, I'm, I'm going to go hard into, into the Jesus thing.
00:34:07
Speaker
oh Oh, like change course. and Like the youth pastoring actually work. Yeah. Like the ones who are like 15 were like, this kid's not going stick with it. Um, but then like 17, 18, they're like, ah you know what? Actually I'm gone home now.
00:34:21
Speaker
We had some people who, uh, they ended up like went to public school, got in trouble, got kicked out of school and then ended up at our school as a punishment essentially.
00:34:32
Speaker
And I saw some of them come like overtly like, um, you know like They were in rehab, essentially, at our school. Jesus Rehab.
00:34:43
Speaker
so that's That's the closest I have. I've mostly experienced, for myself and others, the opposite of like I mean, I still remember the day my my like my best buddy, Patrick, telling me in the parking lot outside of school, he's like, i don't think I believe in God.
Personal Anecdotes and Controversies
00:34:58
Speaker
And it just like striking me like a, you know, like being struck by a lightning of like, can can we still hang out? Is this okay? Yeah. Not realizing I'm just like two years behind that that journey. But...
00:35:10
Speaker
but Yeah. um I mean, I started dating this girl in my youth group, ah who was like my sister's best friend at the time, ah which completely destroyed their relationship.
00:35:25
Speaker
To be fair, I asked for the record, I asked my sister, i'm like, Hey, I think so and so has a crush on me. And I think I like her. Is it okay?
00:35:36
Speaker
if I ask her out and my sister was like, that would be great. Yeah, let's like go for it. And, ah and so yeah, I did go for it. And then I dated this is my first girlfriend for like six months.
00:35:48
Speaker
and ah And it became it was such a dramatic relationship. My sister and her stopped talking for the entire time. My sister stopped talking to me. oh like yeah and i had this conflicting like, thing of like well i should probably talk to my sister again at some point but really like this first relationship and it caused a lot of drama in my youth group and we had we had several meetings about it with my youth pastors we'd all sit in a very serious circle and like discuss our relationship
00:36:21
Speaker
That is like one of the most insane things when you think back on it. Cause there's so many things that like when you're in the middle of all that stuff, especially when you're the kid in the situation is like, it does, it it doesn't seem abnormal, but like this group of adults getting directly involved in a serious way in like a teenage six month romance is so nuts.
00:36:46
Speaker
It's, it's hard to even imagine in any other context. But I think in that community, like the idea was if we stayed together, we'd be married in like two years as soon as you know we were no longer minors.
00:36:58
Speaker
Yeah, it's premarital counseling, not just a meeting about dating. i was... I just... Before I got on here, I was... ah I don't know if you watched the Detroiters.
00:37:10
Speaker
No, I need to. I love Tim Robinson. But there's this sketch where he's trying to like, they're trying, it's like a, on like a underage, like teen like a club for teens, alcohol. It's just like, this is a cool place where teens can go to dance. And it has, there's like some like that youth group element to it that made me think of, but Casey mentioning like adults interfering and just like this teen drama stuff. It's like, mm.
00:37:35
Speaker
Tim Robinson's character there for anyone who hasn't seen it. That's just, uh, they, they're, they, they do uh marketing like so yeah they try to make commercials for like local businesses and each episode's kind of like kind of sketch ish and it's the way it's built up but he thinks he's really cool and he he changes the whole like the whole direction of the commercial and it's like he's the cool adult that the kids want to part like they want to party with them and they're like i don't know what you're doing because like
00:38:09
Speaker
there's no adults at this club. He goes, I know there's no adults in the club, but like they would want to party with me if they could, because I'm like a cool older guy. And he's like begging these kids to answer the question if they'd want to dance with him, if he was allowed in the club to prove that it's like a good idea.
00:38:25
Speaker
And it's so uncomfortable. And, uh, it has a lot of like, I'm the cool youth pastor vibes to it. Uh, Yeah. like oh it's like i hang it Oh, yeah, let's get involved in all that. So it's a lot.
00:38:39
Speaker
ah But it's peak Tim Robinson. This is, i don't think it's come out ah anywhere else yet besides LA New York, but I just saw Friendship. Oh, my God.
00:38:50
Speaker
Yeah, it's him and Paul Rudd. It's sort of like a dark version of I Love You Man. And i think it's the funniest movie I've seen in the past five years. It's just, a yeah, just like the desperation of Tim Robinson.
00:39:04
Speaker
Yeah. They just took what he's already great at and and just like spread it out over 90 minutes. And anyway, I really want to check that out.
00:39:15
Speaker
Yeah. Currently not streaming anywhere. I also looked that up about 10 minutes before we started because I was just scrolling through the Internet and that one show up and ah go it was an article.
00:39:27
Speaker
Click the link to find out where it's streaming. So of course I load my phone up with cookies and it says, uh, this isn't streaming anywhere right now. I'm like, what the fuck kind of clickbait was this? You just want the clicks. I mean, I would say see it, see it in a theater if you can, like the, I don't know the communal experience. Uh, although I will say we had two kind of Tim Robinson esque dudes,
00:39:49
Speaker
in our audience that were just so obnoxious and like they just had to say something about what was happening you know like they're watching him make a bad decision in the movie they're like oh no don't do that dude um running commentary yeah theyre like they they don't understand the point of these tim robinson sketches if if this is how they behave but anyway so being that you're So in involved in like film and stuff, but you grew up in the same way that we did.
00:40:20
Speaker
was curious, it what is there like a specific movie that you remember watching back then and feeling like I shouldn't be watching this? Oh, yeah.
00:40:33
Speaker
I mean, ah Monty Python's Life of Brian is an amazing like satire on the Gospels and Jesus and the disciples. And i was I was allowed to watch Monty Python's The Holy Grail.
00:40:48
Speaker
I could watch that on a loop. But there was a divide between that movie and Life of Brian. One, because it had like full frontal male nudity. But the other is because... You know you don't poke fun at the Lord, ah even though they make sure in the movie to be like, no, Brian is Brian and Jesus is over there. He's in a season, you know, giving the Sermon on the Mount and they're, you know, they're standing way in the back trying to hear him. Like there's just like a lot of like pragmatic Bible jokes that.
00:41:19
Speaker
it I don't know. That movie was life-changing for me and and also felt like illegal to be watching. yeah
00:41:27
Speaker
I've never actually seen it, but I've heard about it. It's so good. Definitely put that on your list. That's one I missed too. and i You know what's funny? is but I remember my my mom mentioning it, like talking about it. I was allowed to watch ah The Holy Grail as well.
00:41:43
Speaker
ah That was popular in and Christian circles, actually. Yeah. And But yeah, i I remember my mom mentioning like Life of Brian. like she She had some comments about it being a little like about it being inappropriate or sacrilegious in some ways, but not in a way that made me go, I'm not allowed to I'm not allowed to watch it. Like I felt like she was kind of being like, i don't know, but not like that's horrible. Like she kind of played it cool. And I bet if she didn't play it so cool, I would have immediately tried to find a way to watch it. So she probably, that's what you need.
00:42:22
Speaker
She probably played me a little bit on that one. Yeah, I think if you're if you're a Christian parent out there listening, that's what you do. You have to like be a little like a little chill about things.
00:42:33
Speaker
But as soon as you like start putting up like a block between things, that's that's when your kid is going to stay up till midnight and watch it without your permission. yeah like Yeah, like that like Channel 99 with all the rainbow squiggles just to catch a catch a boob no that's right in between all the the graininess yeah I used to watch South Park at like 1 o'clock in the morning with the volume turned down as low as it could go ah but still being able to hear it um Harry Potter was banned, of course. ah
00:43:07
Speaker
And I don't know. Did y'all experience Harry Potter as children, or was that later? I did. Not later. i got I did as a child. ah For some reason, that one wasn't ever vetoed in my house. ah Interesting. You you got a chill mom?
00:43:22
Speaker
Yeah, she was pretty good about stuff like that. like she She didn't have any of that... like the leftovers of satanic panic, witchcraft wizardry. Like it was all just kind of like fanciful to Uh, like she had this belief and we were taught that some people really do this, but I never grew up thinking that there was any real like power to like witchcraft. Um,
00:43:48
Speaker
we didn't talk a lot about possession. We didn't tell you that all the, that side of things really. It's like the most exciting part. I know. was going to say, you missed out a lot of fun stuff, man. I did.
00:44:01
Speaker
I mean, I did like have the fear of that. I did have like a brief stint of being afraid of being possessed by Satan after watching like a Christian action movie where the devil was possessing people. and I remember like like tossing and turning in bed, being like, like oh if you could ask Jesus into your heart, like if in and Jesus comes into your heart because you requested it, and he won't if you don't, like...
00:44:28
Speaker
can Satan do the same? And can, if, if I, if I, if I said that, if I said the words to like invite Satan into my heart, would Jesus, like, if would that not allow, would it not even happen because i have Jesus in my heart, but then what if I don't really have Jesus in my heart?
00:44:48
Speaker
And then I just like kept praying for Jesus to be in my heart. And then I would try to ask Satan to enter my heart, but I would, I would stop. at like the last couple words. And that was like...
00:45:01
Speaker
There was an involuntary release of urine. yeah You were stress testing the Lord. and i know i was did did a little pit in his race car bed.
Christian Media Influences and Fears
00:45:14
Speaker
I had a crucifix bed, actually. Oh. Perfect. deliver Like a good Christian voice. That's such a funny visual. And it would hang from a chain.
00:45:29
Speaker
but Yeah. No, that was all very real stuff for me. was always afraid of demons jumping out of the bushes and then the spiritual side of it. Like I saw Paranormal Activity when I was, I don't know, 16, 17. Oh, yeah.
00:45:44
Speaker
It scared the shit out of me because... and it was all very real to me. I was like invisible forces like can creep around your bed and pull your sheets off and might want to murder you in your sleep. That that was like, I had a ah lot of trouble sleeping that night and I always had to like open my shower curtain before I could go to bed ah because some, you know, demonic creature could be back there.
00:46:10
Speaker
oh Did y'all watch like, speaking of Christian action movies, did y'all watch like Megiddo and like the the Bible code series? Yeah. No. I don't even know what that is.
00:46:22
Speaker
Oh, the Omega Code. That's one of them. Omega Code. The Omega Code and then the sequel was Megiddo. Omega Code 2. These are like proto left behind...
00:46:34
Speaker
um They came out in like 97, 98, like somewhere in there. Okay. These were big movies at the time in the Christian world. This is pre-Angel Studios. But anyway, these are big influences on yeah the whole concept of Tribulation Squad.
00:46:51
Speaker
Michael Ironside was in it. Yes, yes. ah Michael Ironside, I think, was the villain in the first one. And the british they got this fancy British guy to play the Antichrist.
00:47:02
Speaker
Dude, that...
00:47:05
Speaker
uh well i guess the antichrist we thought was going to come from somewhere in europe uh british dude nicolai carpathia that was a line yeah so Nikolai Karpathia. I mean, say what you will about that series.
00:47:24
Speaker
That's a really cool name. Like they, they had to workshop that before they found the most evil sounding. Okay. But is it as cool as Rayford Steele?
00:47:33
Speaker
Nothing can be as cool as Rayford Steele. Um, I remember being worried about my older brother because he always and everything. It was fine when we were kids, right? we When we were kids and we watched Star Wars and he he likes Darth Vader and Palpatine and this and and Star Wars Episode I comes out and Darth Maul.
00:47:56
Speaker
It's like fine. you know It's normal to like. And then like... And then we would with like even watching like left behind my brother's like, I like that guy. That guy's cool. I'm like, you can't. That's the one bad guy you can't like, dude. Now. And I started like really get that's what I knew he was like exiting.
00:48:13
Speaker
I could tell I could feel it. And of course, he he was the first in the family to call it quits on Christianity. And I get it. I blame Nikolai Karpathia, to be honest. yeah he was the og walter white you know yeah you know he's doing wrong stuff but he's he's kind of cool um yeah he's making he's making like his big thing think that made nicolai carpathia famous like he could make the desert grow food or something that's that's the evil thing evil oh i got chills and people like him he's a unifier yeah so evil
00:48:53
Speaker
You want a leader who divides everyone with tariffs. That's that's the that's how you know someone's a good guy.
00:49:02
Speaker
Oh, you know what? That's how we know he's here for us. Cutting Medicaid. What a wonderful human being. really
00:49:11
Speaker
Dude, i think ah I don't know if I'll ever fully grow out of that, like, like creeped out sensation of, cause I, I, I'm kind of the same way where like I, if I start thinking about it too much, I can get a little, more I can, I can work myself up like in the dark. I feel like, right.
00:49:31
Speaker
I do a lot of, ah I have a lot of situations where I'm like in that, like, like interim sleep period. Like when you're first falling asleep where like something happens and I'll just like stand straight up in bed And it used to be a lot of that. It was like demons and whatnot. Now it's like, I think there's a, I think I so feel a, a spider in the bed.
00:49:56
Speaker
but i i wake April up with my, my phone flashlight I'm like, there's, so there's a spider. She's like, what? Yeah. And then I slowly realized that it wasn't anything. And then I'm like, no, nothing. nothing I get the same. I get that in the middle of the night. Like if I wake up when I'm like coming out of a deep slumber, i will wake up in a completely paranoid state.
00:50:17
Speaker
of like, I'll go to the kitchen and grab a knife and get walk to the door and just like listen. Because I just always feel like I hear something. Someone's always trying to intrude. um I like to fire a warning shot just for good measure.
00:50:30
Speaker
A desk pop. Right to the door. Yeah. Have you guys ever experienced like sleep paralysis? I haven't, but i I dated someone who has.
00:50:41
Speaker
It's... I would have thought that was very demonic before i Yeah, that's how a lot of people... like but man My wife would get it like in college, and it freaked her out.
00:50:53
Speaker
But she never... Again, she wasn't too... <unk> okay well casey Okay, explain your... Go ahead. The hat man... It's like a common ah hallucination that people have. is like They and the hat man is making do an atomic sit-up.
00:51:13
Speaker
ah What? I don't know what you're talking about. that That sounds terrible. yeah This is always my favorite part. No, people, hate people hallucinate that there's like this man in a, like a wide brim hat.
00:51:28
Speaker
It's like a widely like talk about sitting on the internet, like just the back black silhouette of a man in like a wide brim hat. Got topic sit ups are part of it.
00:51:39
Speaker
but The atomic sit-up, is that where you like you sit up into somebody's ass? Yeah. Okay. and What is the atomic part of it?
00:51:57
Speaker
I don't know. always had another name for that. I don't remember what it was.
00:52:05
Speaker
Oh, my God. I hope you never meet him. That sounds, yeah. I experienced sleep paralysis for the first time over April ah this vacation, over my April vacation when I was sleeping at like this weird...
00:52:22
Speaker
uh, it was like on my way home. We stayed at like an extended stay style hotel, um where you're usually like, I always sleep poorly in hotels. Cause I get like afraid. I always like, this is like the smoke detectors in hotels. The lights blink a lot faster than normal.
00:52:40
Speaker
And I'm like, something's wrong with it. And then I think, what would I do if that went off? Like, we have to, I need to like exit plan with my kids. Like, and I get like worked up so I don't sleep good in hotels.
00:52:52
Speaker
Uh, but this one was like first floor. Uh, and it was like motel, like, you know, your exit to the outside was just your door.
00:53:05
Speaker
And there was like a sliding screen door. And I i felt when I was like, i I slept the worst sleep I've ever had. But I kept like, I woke up at one point and I was convinced somebody was looking in through the the slider door. Oh my God.
00:53:25
Speaker
In the gap. right And no, I mean, maybe, but it was like, you know, like the hotel blinds that are just like the long flaps. Yeah. Like Florida ceiling. Yeah, yeah. And it was like, I was like someone's staring at us and like watching my family and I, but I couldn't fucking move. And it felt like it lasted forever.
00:53:45
Speaker
And not I immediately felt for anyone who's ever experienced sleep paralysis and who deals with that regularly. It was it's a fucking nightmare. I have never experienced it. ah But when I was staying in ah a really shitty motel in Phoenix for a film festival for Mysterious Ways, ah I did have a guy break into my hotel room while I was gone.
Unexpected Encounters
00:54:09
Speaker
And I came back from a party at the film festival like one o'clock in the morning. And he was just laying on my mattress ah with like the TV on and like the covers pulled up. He was all tucked in.
00:54:21
Speaker
What? I'm not kidding. Yeah, I just like came back, opened the door. There he is. Like the there's no lights on. just He's just lit by the TV. And I'm just like, hey, ah
00:54:36
Speaker
this is my room. What's what's going on, man? And he's like, oh, I'm sorry. I thought i i thought it was empty. Because I had taken all my stuff out because it was not a great part of town, not a great hotel.
00:54:49
Speaker
And I just foresaw something potentially going awry. Premonition, dude. It's like, i took i I don't think that's how hotels don't. That's not how hotels work. You don't just look for an empty one.
00:55:01
Speaker
yeah Well, you do if you're trying to break in there and get, ah you know, sleep in a bed as opposed to, you know, on ah in the streets. Get your 69 winks in. right and so How did he get in?
00:55:15
Speaker
He got into the window. He broke the screen door and ah I guess it was unlocked. He was just like able to slide the window. that little like you know Some windows will have like ah like a wooden pole block it from opening. That yeah had been removed, whatever the safety thing is.
00:55:32
Speaker
um and He just slid it open and let himself in. That's wild. I found the broken screen door in the bathroom and water all over the floor. Yeah. Yeah. um I had to get a security guard and ask him to politely go on his way.
00:55:49
Speaker
you sleep in that room after? I did. i did. yeah That's the starling method. It's the oldest trick in the book. Natural natural ah approach, right?
00:56:00
Speaker
He was going to lay his egg in your nest and then you would raise his chick for him. Not knowing that it was yours while your chick starved. and I see. I see.
00:56:12
Speaker
i got one fat baby just going. a You bring some worms back, du
00:56:22
Speaker
dude. you. eat the starling weather
00:56:26
Speaker
Did they discount your room? They gave me all my money back. It took me took a while. They were dodging my calls. That's crazy. that It shouldn't have to take a while. It should be an immediate.
00:56:38
Speaker
It was a nightmare. It's the worst hotel I've ever stayed in. and i what if to like the The worst hotel I ever stayed in was in New York with a friend.
00:56:49
Speaker
um It was the first floor in a...
00:56:54
Speaker
A busy area ah with all the you know iron bars on the windows. And as soon as I walked in, you could see like hair, ah hairs on the bed, crumbs on the floor. I'm like, this is not, I'm not going to sleep well. I slept fine because I got absolutely fucking wasted before I got back to my hotel room. But yeah.
00:57:16
Speaker
Yeah, I just had asked the security guard. I was like wandering around with all my bags and my laptop looking like a crazy person at 2am. And I run into like the overnight laundry lady and this like giant security guard. And I'm like, ah you're the exact two people that I need right now.
00:57:32
Speaker
And, uh, but I'm like, somebody's in my room. And they're like somebody's in your room what talking about? And they had to like verify my ID and check this list. And, um, so me and the security guard go to like, go up the elevator to confront this guy But up the elevator.
00:57:50
Speaker
Yeah. He climbed in through a second story window. ah Well, there was like a little, it was like ah a walkway on the second level. Oh, okay. He came and did that, yeah. That was what's a cat burglar is He parkoured his way up there. He did, yeah.
00:58:09
Speaker
and backwards. um I had told the guy, I'm like, hey man, I don't want to like you know like kick you out or anything, but I'm gonna you know ah i'm going to go and get some like sheets and you just grab your stuff and go. like I'm not going to get secured or anything.
00:58:23
Speaker
and Then I immediately like could not get into the laundry room to get new sheets. ah Then I came back with a security guard. I'm like, I betrayed this guy. i I did exactly what I said I wouldn't do.
00:58:34
Speaker
and so ah kind of like hip Regular Judith. That's right. That's me. But anyway, then me and the security guard changed the sheets and he's like, yeah, man, you don't want to get tweaker juice on you. It's ah like, what is tweaker juice?
00:58:47
Speaker
He's like, well, you know, they it comes to their sweat and it like ends up in the bed. And like you would have gotten high just from laying in that bed. Oh, is that a real thing?
00:58:57
Speaker
According to the security guard in Phoenix. Ben, it's true. I believe it. No one needs to fact check it nor look that up. Dude, it's like hallucinogenic poison ivy. yeah
00:59:10
Speaker
Need a little technique to get the oils off you.
00:59:14
Speaker
So, yeah. I have another movie question for you. Okay. ah You talked about, so you did 16 shoot. How many hours of footage did you like, did you have? Uh, it was an 11 day shoot I had.
00:59:35
Speaker
and I don't know. Uh, it's a 90 minute movie. I probably had like, um, 20 hours of footage. Okay. That's cool. I just find the editing process to be really wild. to like and You said you spent like a year, something.
00:59:52
Speaker
It was like seven months of editing. That's so wild. My old college roommate, Patrick in Austin, he has his own motion graphics company called Liminal House. and so His donation to the movie was just like, I'll do a lot of the VFX for free.
01:00:06
Speaker
and Then my buddy Dave did all like the VFX. tentacles coming out of people's eyes and you know the the title like the
Editing Process and Challenges
01:00:14
Speaker
crucifix flies into the air off the woman's neck and becomes the tea in mysterious ways uh my buddy dave kind of took the like kind of flashier shots um yeah i just lucked out and had like a bunch of vfx friends and uh and yeah then it was coloring for months and doing the uh you know the original score and this guy nathan towns
01:00:38
Speaker
um yeah that's anyway i don't know that answers your question no I'm just I find the editing process to be wild because I don't I have I don't get how you can like I feel like when I have i ideas I get you know a little I might get a little attached to them right so you have all this footage that you watch and rewatch and rewatch and decide what to keep to get all the way down to 90 minutes um Did you struggle to like dislike to, I mean, was it like a, to kill my babies? Like, yeah. Is that hard for you to just give up on some of those ideas?
01:01:19
Speaker
Uh, it, it was, i mean, there was only like one scene from the script that ended up being cut out and on the next one, i'm definitely going to get someone else to edit it. This was more of like a cost thing of like, I, I'm not going to ask a friend to do that much work for free. Um, I mean,
01:01:34
Speaker
I say that and I did that for VFX, but, ah but with editing it, like, I'm like, well, I've been editing since high school. Like I, I know I could do this. um But I do wish that I had had a second pair of eyes on it.
01:01:48
Speaker
I was sending it to my friends for through their notes. I'm like, where should we trim? What's not working? What is working? And so, you know, I spent ah and another six months after that first cut, like just trying to winnow it down.
01:02:00
Speaker
And when I watch it now, I'm like, oh, let's get back to notes. 10 minutes shorter. but I feel like it would be so, I could, I could see myself being like, you know, a week into like cutting and trimming and being like, I, I, is this even coherent anymore? I can't tell.
01:02:19
Speaker
Yeah. I've lost all sense of, of, of direction here. Yeah. Yeah. That can happen. That's when you bring a friend in and just show it to them. Just whatever you have. Just like, what is happening?
01:02:30
Speaker
Like healthy. Um, yeah. Yeah. Grandma, which parts do you hate the most? Grandma, wake up. yeah
01:02:42
Speaker
Yeah. Great editing consultant. um Yeah. No, I mean, it happens. You can get lost in the woods with anything, any kind of you know. Is it ever hard to be like...
01:02:54
Speaker
ah Like, do you ever worry that people won't give you like their full fledged criticism or it or do you feel like you have a good group of people who are just be like, yeah, this is what you should or shouldn't do.
01:03:10
Speaker
And we'll just be fine with how they answer the question. Yeah, i I think I got a bit of everything. Like I do have friends who are really harsh ah and you kind of need those friends more than the ones who are encouraging.
01:03:23
Speaker
But you need both. Like you need the encouraging friends so that you don't completely abandon the project. Give halfway through. um and you need the harsh friends who can tell you. I mean, yeah, I mean, the script changed a ton as I was writing. It went from ah completely different, like there wasn't even a ah ah demonic possession angle to originally.
01:03:46
Speaker
Oh, And my buddy Devin read and he's like, the movie took place over nine months and was more of like a Rosemary's baby. Like, are they going to give birth to the Antichrist? It was a totally different like a story about these youth pastors.
01:04:00
Speaker
Oh, that's wild. And he's like, you keep talking about super bad. That's like a one crazy night movie. You need like ah a conflict that could be a one crazy night kind of conflict.
01:04:11
Speaker
It's like, what if, what what if one of the kids gets possessed and like runs out the door and like they have to, you know, ah sort that out like immediately and I was like that was the note that like clicked things into place like I need and immediate problem that is like very simple and you know and then it became me figuring out how do we get to that point but um yeah so I i'm i'm constantly wondering about who's just being really nice and ah but and
01:04:42
Speaker
you know I think you have to deal with this on every level like for everything. i I'm grateful for both. Sometimes people tell you they like your shirt and you're like, that felt patronizing.
01:04:56
Speaker
I can't tell. i think I just hate you. can Casey's saying that right now because he's feeling potentially a little insecure in his well-patterned shirt and was wondering if we would Comment on it.
01:05:12
Speaker
I love your shirt, Casey. It's incredible. That was comment bait. Thank you very much. Appreciate you calling me out, Sam, keeping me honest. Yeah, of course. We foster an environment of honesty here with each other.
01:05:27
Speaker
Yes. Beautiful dynamic. I don't know how reviewing ah movies on Amazon works, but I was trying to. and It was like, I don't know if I just don't have enough street cred.
01:05:40
Speaker
It was like, oh, anybody can do it. um Okay. Interesting. Well, I'm i'm not going to give up. i tried I tried to do it last night so I could ah so i could tell you that I did it.
01:05:55
Speaker
but Yeah, I tried to when I finished watching it too, but I couldn't figure it out and I was driving. yeah Well, I did design the movie group to be watched while driving.
01:06:08
Speaker
but The first movie of its kind. That was the one thing. That was the one idea you refused to abandon. So many things here that feel like they were made just for me. Just for you. I heard y'all's podcast, episode one. I'm like, I'm going to make a movie about youth groups for in-car experience.
01:06:28
Speaker
Yeah.
01:06:31
Speaker
yeah um But yeah, I don't know. It's on Letterboxd. It might be easier if you if you do that. um But don't give it another two minutes of your of your life.
01:06:42
Speaker
Well, I want to, so I will. What's the ah shopping film festivals navigating that world? what's that i don't I know nothing about that world. i it's like Is it an entry thing?
01:06:55
Speaker
um Yeah, it's... you make an account on film freeway and you give 60 bucks to, you know, it's always like the early fee, the middle fee and the late fee.
01:07:06
Speaker
Um, and a lot of them are scams and you have to figure out which one is actually worth, um, applying to. Scams as in they're, they're not actually real film film festivals. Like,
01:07:18
Speaker
They might be real, but they're just not worth attending. okay. You know, it's just like a lazily produced thing. um But we got into seven film festivals and for ah like half of them, we had like a packed audience that was really fun. And then the other half, you know, get like five to 10 people there. ah And like, all right, why did I drive six hours for this?
01:07:42
Speaker
But yeah, but Yeah, you just never know until you actually show up. and So you you can enter your film in and then you find out if they'll accept it. and So you're not you don't pay and then you're guaranteed a spot. It's it's based on acceptance?
01:07:59
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. They have to review. I mean, they get like thousands of movies submitted. um And people usually get like 10% of the festivals that they submit to. um Yeah, that's a little bit of a racket, but it it can be like, you know...
01:08:13
Speaker
when it's like the Phoenix film festival was incredible despite the motel experience. Um, the festival itself was, was really well run. And, uh, yeah.
01:08:24
Speaker
Um, we, we premiered in Wisconsin at this tiny festival. I flew out for that. Um, and we went to Florida for popcorn frights and went to Atlanta for the Atlanta horror festival. of all Um, all great experiences.
01:08:40
Speaker
Um, Yeah, I don't know. it's just like it's It's really like meeting people all around the country who are passionate about indie movies. well It's hard to get people in the theater for you know anything besides Marvel movies.
01:08:51
Speaker
yeah The fact that they're willing to spend an afternoon watching a movie that's produced for a fraction of that cost that they know is not going to have famous people in it. like I don't know. It's encouraging that people will actually spend their time on that.
01:09:05
Speaker
I'd like to think that Alyssa is a little famous, okay? Yeah. Yeah, I mean, she's on her way for sure. i Whether or not I i ah made a movie with her, she's she's an unstoppable force.
01:09:17
Speaker
She is. She's fantastic. um She was so great. and It's just believable. It's like she's over the top, like in and her over the top way, but in like a way that works with the character she's playing where you're like, just, she's like,
01:09:37
Speaker
just really sold on what it is that she believes and wants other people to. But i don't know. I was ah so impressed.
Cast Performances and Research
01:09:46
Speaker
I mean, I was impressed with everyone. I thought it was, um everyone did ah such a fantastic job, but she really, she really stood out and did such a phenomenal job with it.
01:09:57
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, Alyssa's drawing from her real life. but but she's She's tapping into a real version of herself, as I'm sure you've seen her ah Christian teen journal ah thing she does on TikTok. Yeah. Yeah. Just digging through her high school ah mind and all all the shame and repression.
01:10:18
Speaker
For everyone involved in the film that didn't share that background, did they ah was there curiosity on their part? Did it generate some interesting discussions around what that world was like? Yeah, like Brandon, who plays Charlie, Alyssa's brother in the movie, um he did not grow up with with Christianity, but but he had a relationship with religion that was similar with Hinduism, and and so he kind of use some of that and then did a lot of research, watch some Christian movies that I recommended. And I sent him bunch of videos, like what these meetings feel like. And um yeah, we just talked about the character a lot and about, you know, slowly losing your faith while you're still in this community and you can't really admit it to anyone.
01:11:02
Speaker
um Yeah. um I think who else? James Adomian, who plays the Antichrist in the movie, ah he immediately got it. He he grew up fairly religious. And, yeah, it felt like he was getting, he was unburdening something.
01:11:24
Speaker
There is some kind of, like, interesting... um
01:11:29
Speaker
Ideas I feel like articulated in in the movie like especially towards the end, you know, like the kind of like the sort of the conflict between ah the brother and sister, you know, and. um There's there's a point in the film where they're arguing back and forth about like his, you know, him losing his faith and.
01:11:53
Speaker
There's, you know, she has a line where she says something along the lines of like, after everything that you've seen, you don't you know, you still don't believe. And he says something along the lines of like, I don't care what's real or fake anymore.
01:12:06
Speaker
ah Something messed up is happening, but you don't have the answers. And I don't know, I thought that was kind of an interesting thing because it sort of touches on like that. You know, there's so much happening in the world that is just overwhelming.
01:12:23
Speaker
And there's kind of like an arrogant like self anesthetization aspect to just this like commitment to certainty that nobody can really have about like what's behind it and what's happening.
01:12:39
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. I think it's like, whether or not you believe this stuff, ah don't be an asshole. Like, don't be a dogmatic extremist.
01:12:50
Speaker
Which, I'm not the first person to say this. But, um yeah, I mean, it's just Denise, Alyssa's character is just doing whatever she can to hold on to her brother and his faith. And,
01:13:03
Speaker
stay on the same page with him and she's she's in denial of reality and she's she's trying to stop him from making his own choices and you know living his own life uh because yeah in the wake of their parents death they kind of just split off into complete opposite directions which is was just like a quick way of establishing relationships that i have with people in my family um But yeah, certainty is is kind of a poisonous ah point of view.
01:13:34
Speaker
think, I don't know, but my friends and the people that I get along with are, you know, they might like politically have their ideals, but they're, I don't know, still talk to them.
01:13:46
Speaker
They can still, you know, have a back and forth. But a lot of people in the church that I've left do not... seem to have that flexibility, especially lately.
01:13:57
Speaker
So, yeah, it just makes me think of like, you know, yeah have conversations with, you know, people that you're, you know, family members and stuff that are kind of still in that community to whatever extent or whatever. and you know, you'd be talking about like,
01:14:15
Speaker
war or some sort of awful natural disaster and something like that. And there's just like this irritating thing that they do sometimes where it's like, well, you know, it's, it's, it's all in the book.
01:14:30
Speaker
You know, you can see it right there. There's, there's wars and rumors of wars and earthquakes, earthquakes, you know, they love earthquakes. Yeah.
01:14:42
Speaker
Uh, No, it's ah using the book to prove things that are in the book is interesting. um I don't know anything else that that works that way, where you get to like, you know, and and like the back of a science book, it doesn't just say, see this page 23 of this book that you're reading. But yeah.
01:15:04
Speaker
um yeah So hopefully, go ahead. No, it's, I think the like the dynamic you were talking about with the brother and sister, like one, like, because I was, I was a sibling that was trying to like, make my brother see things my way.
01:15:23
Speaker
um And it's, it is interesting because like, when you have the stakes being so high on the Christian side of things, like, I mean, yeah, you can um you could delude yourself with a once saved, always saved kind of placation. But like ah yeah that never sits well, right? you're never like what that's like that's That's a nice fallback if they like died suddenly, but like ultimately you want more assurance than that. So you're go you're going to try to like get them to have some sort of admission.
01:15:55
Speaker
um Yeah, when I was in college and was losing my faith, I was like, shouldn't my family be fighting this a little bit more? Like, don't think I'm going to burn. like yeah the air but Yeah. I get that.
01:16:10
Speaker
I get that. It's like, are you guys... are you going to talk about this at all? Like you pretend that you care about it. Like you know you can't you're not even going to talk to me about any of this, you know? You're just so like awkward. Yeah.
01:16:26
Speaker
and The Lord will bring him back. He has his own way. Yeah. Yeah. But there's, I mean, though and it's funny though, because there is like, a you know, I don't, I'm trying to think if like,
01:16:40
Speaker
um since i was in ah Since I've been an adult, I'm not sure if my dad's ever tried to have a conversation with me about my faith.
01:16:55
Speaker
I mean, not even since I was a teenager, probably, but maybe it would come up a little bit of like expectations, like, oh, it's important to start the morning with your devotions, like the the little like quips. ah But like, yeah, I don't think he's ever had a conversation with me about my faith, but which is which was what he this would say is like, that's the most important thing as a as a as a father, you have to lead your family spiritually. And like for in my house, that just meant Dad prayed ah before dinner and we would go to church.
01:17:29
Speaker
But like it wasn't just socially isolated. Yeah, we weren't having conversations about it. And then. And then after we all started like branching off, ah still like to this day, the only but well, but he'll have like political. We'll try to have political conversations with us.
01:17:46
Speaker
And um that is so interesting to be like, yeah, the stakes are high according to their system of belief. And then, um but yeah, we've never had, I didn't even think about it until you said something, Casey. I'm like, oh, I've literally never had a conversation with my dad. Unless I initiated it like in college or was trying to explain to him some shift that I've had. But like, it's mostly been on on me to just be like, i'm just gonna have I'm just going to tell you where I'm at so we can stop walking around this like cul-de-sac.
01:18:17
Speaker
Yeah. Always, always ready to have a brain rot partisan politics argument.
01:18:28
Speaker
Go figure. Yeah. I got a lot of Instagram, uh, like shares from my dad where it's like interesting video from ah RFK. I don't That's what I like. It's interesting. I'd like to let me know what you think. Like, check it out.
01:18:45
Speaker
they Give it a shot. And then I'll just say, I'll just
Controversial Discussions and Proposals
01:18:49
Speaker
dive back. interest Interesting. Yeah. A study even by the Mayo Clinic says that it's good to have salt worms in your milk, and that's why pasteurization should be illegal.
01:19:02
Speaker
if I emailed Fauci, and he didn't email me back. I don't know what's going on. Antisemitism is in social contagion.
01:19:11
Speaker
That's pretty good. It is. Did you see the story floating around this week of him swimming in like that shit stream or whatever with his grandkids?
01:19:22
Speaker
No. oh oh it's it's He was like, ah for a guy who, it was like all the articles, like for a guy who is so concerned about public health, he there's a, like a stream, a river that's literally like you, it's like, it's stated not to swim in it due to pollutants from factories, uh, contaminants and him and his, he had, he took him and his grandkids to all go swimming in it.
01:19:47
Speaker
But there's no fluoride in there. Yeah. And that's what's so funny. It's like, that's all people are talking about. It's like, Oh, I guess this is how, I guess he just misses those brain worms. Like this is a great way to get those back. Like,
01:19:59
Speaker
it just so The wild contradictions and like in these people's lives is unfathomable. He was quoted today saying, I don't think people should take medical advice from me.
01:20:10
Speaker
Like, aren't you the head health? Then you said you accepted the wrong job. It's like, I saw something the other day. It was just like, if you ever feel like you have imposter syndrome and then it It was just a bunch of quotes. It was the dude. Oh, did you send it to me, Casey?
01:20:29
Speaker
So it was like the dude who had to testify before Congress about tariffs, about like the whole meeting was like tariff related. And he just kept being like, well, I don't, I don't, well, that's not what I think. And it's just like watching him stumble over himself and say nothing. And it's like,
01:20:46
Speaker
These people are all making $200,000 plus thousand dollars a year, not to mention all of their insider trading and illicit backroom deals to cushion that a little bit more. That's the thing about cabinet seats. It's a fake it till you break it sort of deal. Yeah, yeah it's so nuts.
01:21:07
Speaker
It feels like we're living in like an alternate reality at this point. Yeah, we truly are. We have the three heads of Hollywood now. the What did Trump call it? the He appointed John Voight, Mel Gibson, and ah Sylvester Stallone as his holy trinity of saving Hollywood.
01:21:27
Speaker
Oh my God. and that's I don't know if y'all saw the news of and wanting to put of Trump wanting to put tariffs on foreign-made movies, yeah which...
01:21:38
Speaker
you know is is a it was a weird day like we all went to work and we're like what is he terrifying like movies being imported like how does that work exactly it's not like a movie comes over on a boat somehow or or gets shipped over like is this like how big is the foreign film market here that it's like getting in the way of you know this is all imported jewel cases yeah yeah I thought the same thing. I'm like, I, I, and I haven't dug into it at all, but I just was like, I don't understand what we're talking about here. Like what aspect of it, how much of it, like,
01:22:19
Speaker
Any of it? It all has to be done within the boundaries here or else it's... Right, could you not film outside the US? s is that what was that Was that part of it? You want to put a penalty on like, if you you have to prove why it should be shot in another country. Like you have to say, well, it's a James Bond movie and he doesn't really hang out in Florida very much.
01:22:39
Speaker
Like, we have to go shoot this in England, France, Italy, whatever, um because that's where the story is set. ah But if you're making, I don't know, Stranger Things, you can't go shoot that in Europe. You have to shoot that in Atlanta or...
01:22:56
Speaker
whatever works. I don't think you need to go out. Look, we've got two Eiffel Towers here. One in Vegas, one in Paris, Texas. I've seen them both. Use those. yeah Save on airfare, dummy.
01:23:11
Speaker
You know, I'm glad that ah i thank God Peter Jackson already made the Lord of the Rings movies. Otherwise, we'd be seeing them filmed in Vermont.
01:23:20
Speaker
what Peoria, Illinois. yeah The minds of peoria
01:23:30
Speaker
You know, they're making that show on Amazon now. This could be reality. Well, it can't get any worse. Oh, yeah. Really? how Did y'all watch that show, The Rings of Power? Yeah, I did.
01:23:44
Speaker
I skipped it. ah Yeah, you were you were right. You saved yourself 10 hours. There's a handful of things that were insultingly bad over the past few years. And Rings of Power, that's one of them.
01:24:01
Speaker
It's the most and expensive yeah insult our intelligence. Dude, another thing that stood out like when I was watching it is um there's a line in there where they're arguing back and forth about...
01:24:17
Speaker
um You know kind of like that the concept of like apocalypse porn. You know, this like just incessant, like constant obsessing over like end times and survival, stocking up for the, you know, the, you know, martial law and this and that and the other.
01:24:38
Speaker
And I think like kind of hits the nail on the head when he says like, Well, congratulations, you don't have to figure out how to live your life now, you know, because you can just wait out the end times and stuff.
01:24:49
Speaker
And that's that's so potently true about all of that stuff that it I don't know, it's gonna that really stuck with me. I think there an attraction to it and that's kind of understandable. I mean, who wouldn't want to just be like, well, we're not doing our nine to fives anymore because ah we just need to survive and live. And like the last two day jobs I've had as was on Umbrella Academy season four, about the end of the world.
01:25:19
Speaker
Now on The Last of Us and that's about the end of the world. Like, ah We're like our whole culture, Christian or not, is kind of soaking in this like end of the world feeling, whether we're dreading it or kind of being like, oh, it's kind of nice, you know.
01:25:34
Speaker
um But I definitely succumbed to apocalypse porn ah before regular porn. Getting left behind for kids when I was like 10 years old.
01:25:47
Speaker
um um yeah there's something Yeah, there's something seductive about it. like As soon as Carpathia takes over, like that's it for elementary school.
01:25:58
Speaker
I yearn for the bellflower. I just want to eat human meat so bad. That's what we all just need to finally admit to ourselves.
01:26:09
Speaker
That's what this is all really about. Yeah, but I do think... ah Yeah, I do think there's some some truth in why it gets talked about so much.
01:26:21
Speaker
you know Because like people have been talking about the end of the world or or Jesus coming back since Jesus you know supposedly left. so It's escapism and it's a coping mechanism. It's like...
01:26:33
Speaker
Things are hard. Things are confusing. i don't see, like, I don't feel a sense of hope about my life right now. yeah So I can take comfort in the fact that, well, it's, there's a plan and it's all going to get worse because it's going to have to do that before it gets way better.
01:26:54
Speaker
What, you know, whatever it is.
Ideological Comparisons and Predictions
01:26:57
Speaker
And it warming is fine because it's just a sign that that we're getting closer. Yeah. Earthquakes, dude. It all goes back to Earth. Global warming is kind of the apocalypse porn of the left.
01:27:10
Speaker
Yeah. It is.
01:27:13
Speaker
I will say, when my politics and faith changed in college, and I went straight from looking for signs of the Antichrist to looking for how many, well, we got 20, 30 years left of breathable air, I was like, am I getting duped again?
01:27:31
Speaker
yeah yeah
01:27:34
Speaker
There's a part of it that's like, there's, cause there's a, there's a broad spectrum of beliefs about that. Right. But like, there is a segment of that, that really goes down like the televangelist predicting that, that you know, Jesus comes back on October forty you know, 30th, you know, 2023.
01:27:52
Speaker
And then it comes and goes and nothing happens. but Like there is, there is a group of people in the environmentalist movement that are like, like, we'll all be dead by 2014 right we're living in poor I think I don't have a lot to say about that had to revise his numbers for the sequel to an inconvenient what a great way to get sequels for both brands Christianity is just like oh you know what I realize now that I miscalculated and then they do their reconfigurations
01:28:26
Speaker
Yeah. So wait, y'all didn't grow up with like the Bible code yeah like at all? Do you know what that is? No, I've heard of it, but I don't i don't know anything about it. The basic idea is you can take the Bible, the original Hebrew version, and you take like every like 23rd character and you can put them all into a computer and bring them together and it'll spell out ah you know a legible sentence and it'll be like, or or or a series of words like princess, princess,
01:28:55
Speaker
tunnel, you know, car accident, or like, you know, something like that, that is supposed to predict future events. I like this. It's much easier for it to predict previous events because you're sort of looking for those things.
01:29:10
Speaker
And, you know, at the time I believed it and, but apparently you can do it with almost any book. You can do it with. Is Princess Diana's death like one of the things that they claimed it predicted?
01:29:23
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. Oh my it's god. Yeah. You can probably guess anything and be right, Casey, that someone said that that's what I predicted.
01:29:35
Speaker
Yeah. If you just have enough words together and you know have enough Hebrew characters, you can smash them together and fight something. Dodi, Al-Fayed, not white enough.
01:29:46
Speaker
It's all spelled out. i feel it got gar I feel like you've given us, I already have like two episode ideas swirling in my head. Thanks. This conversation, the Bible code is one that I think we need to look into.
01:30:02
Speaker
um and then when you mentioned, um, ah so being subscribed to church newsletters. I'm like, why aren't Casey, why aren't we subscribed to church newsletters? Oh, I know. We got to fix that.
01:30:17
Speaker
Yeah. I'll forward you my dad's. ah Yeah, you'll love it. We need to do like weekly updates. Just find to just find a random ass church in the middle of fucking nowhere that has a newsletter and just randomly update every week about what's going on there until until they've like realized that this is happening i need you to subscribe to the watchtower don't want those people coming to my house all the time but i would love to read it man
01:30:49
Speaker
ah yeah
01:30:53
Speaker
Well, dude, thanks so much for being on, man.
Film Release and Viewership Tracking
01:30:56
Speaker
i've i' it's It's crazy to think about what a colossal project this has been. I'm sure it's like surreal to finally be at this point and thinking about promotion and stuff like that. But ah dude, I i loved it.
01:31:10
Speaker
I thought it was a great movie. I had a lot of fun watching I laughed out loud at like a bunch of different things throughout the show and got my wheels turning a little bit as well. So i think it was really well done and, uh, highly recommend.
01:31:25
Speaker
Yeah. Congratulations too, man. It must feel so good to have this out into the world after the immense amount of work that you and everyone else, uh, who was part of the team put into it.
01:31:38
Speaker
Yeah. Just got to get people to watch it now, uh, one way or another, but so thanks for having me back. And, uh, Yeah, it is an immense it is immense relief to have gotten to this point. but Do you get a counter? Does Amazon tell you every time you get a watch? It goes through Film Hub.
01:31:56
Speaker
It's like an aggregator that puts it out to different places. So it's on Amazon now, but it'll be on other places through Film Hub eventually. Okay. So I have like a little dashboard that shows me, you know,
01:32:07
Speaker
who's watching and I try to avoid the like minutes watched because then my brain will start calculating like, well, that means this person only watched like 20 minutes of it. Oh no. Like, so, um, I try to just look at the, the number of people watching it.
01:32:23
Speaker
Not to, to compare, uh, what we do to the amount of work that you put into your project. But we used to, when Casey and I started that every, like every week we're like refreshing numbers and shit. And I will go like four months and be like, Oh, we haven't even looked at that. Like we don't pay attention to it at all. it doesn't. And you're happier. You're happier when you shut that shit out. Cause you have no control over it.
01:32:49
Speaker
Uh, Yeah, the movie's only been out for like three weeks, and I've been looking at it every single day, and it is a torturous experience. So I i look forward to getting to that point. Yeah.
01:33:02
Speaker
Yeah, this is great. Thanks so much for know going going through it all with me. Yeah, is there a place where you prefer people to watch it, or...? It's on Amazon Prime to rent or purchase right now. It's like three bucks to rent. um And hopefully it'll be on somewhere like Tubi or YouTube to watch with ads. And so it'll be free eventually. So um yeah, I'd say Amazon Prime.
01:33:28
Speaker
Excellent. um All right. Well, everybody, you got your marching orders. Go watch Mysterious Ways. Thank you for listening. And we will see you next time.