76. Matt Went to the Movies

We start with a night at the movies and end up talking about why some art grabs you and some doesn't. What makes a theater different from a screen at home, why certain films only land years later, and how much of the experience is the room you're in versus the thing you're watching.

From there we get into horror and what it does that other genres can't, how a story changes once your own life catches up to it, and why unfinished work feels so exposed. Mostly it's the usual: two people following a thread about how art gets made and why it sticks. -Ai

Transcript

Late Night Schedules And Movies

SPEAKER_00 0:00

It had been a golden afternoon, and I remember having the familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with someone's like a busy week for Mr.

SPEAKER_01 0:16

Brennan. Especially at night. I didn't go to bed last night until almost 1.30, dude. Holy crap.

SPEAKER_03 0:21

Because the biggest reason I I mean other than you can or you can leave it. It feels good. I'm not gonna lie.

SPEAKER_01 0:30

It's feel good, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 0:31

That was the uh it's gonna be even worse when we get back in July. So might as well just get used to that.

SPEAKER_01 0:36

Luckily, we have Authonic. Awphonic, your AI sound engineer.

SPEAKER_03 0:41

Um yeah, no, I um we just have a lot of shit going on that we're trying to get done, but um, yeah, it was like nine o'clock is so late for a movie. I get it, I like it because I know it works better with your schedule that way, but I was just so I am to see it.

SPEAKER_01 1:02

Yeah, uh I I I just like couldn't wait. I didn't like I don't know a hard.

SPEAKER_03 1:07

I haven't seen it. Don't know if I will see it. I mean I might like at one point, but I don't know if I'll go see it in theaters. It might just be like uh there's a there's a lot of movies that I just haven't seen in theaters that uh I'm like eh. Um you're missing out, buddy. What do you think? I thought it was phenomenal. Yeah, it was good, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:24

Yeah. Now this is not, you know, you you you you know, I'm the I'm the Syscal or no sorry, the Evert reviewer. I react to a movie based on what it is, not necessarily stacked up against you know the pantheon of the all-time you know greatest films. But for the types of movies I like, which is that divide between something that's you know has poetic and artistic and thoughtful and creative elements, with something that's more based in genre, which is my sweet spot for the stuff I really enjoy. This movie scratched every based in like it's like horror genre kind of yeah, yeah. I would say horrors, suspense, but it's not like gory horror, yeah, suspense. I wouldn't say a thriller, but it's in it it toes in a in uh aspects of all three of those genres. Um a movie that it made me think a lot about, which is another movie I love that was sort of one of these indie movies that these guys made, from what I remember, really inexpensively, and it became a pretty big hit. Maybe not as big of a hit as we're talking about back rooms, by the way. I don't know if anybody heard that. Um, is a movie from I want to say the late 90s called Primmer, where these two guys accidentally invent a time machine. They're like a but it's not comedy, they're not comedy. They're like engineers that are trying to work on when you start anything out with these two guys, they're like they're they're these, it's very vibey movie, very sort of lo-fi, super simple, really well done, but they're they're you know, they have their day jobs that they don't like, and that in their nights and weekends, they're they're working on this engineering project, and I can't remember what they hoped to make, but they realized that they it's almost like it was an experiment with something. I I I can't remember, but they accidentally been a time machine, and it ends up being sort of this slightly suspenseful, slow burn thrillery, but it's not like heartbeat soundtrack and super intense and the score doing all this stuff. It was it's it's really good, but again,

Why Backrooms Landed So Well

SPEAKER_01 3:40

the same kind of vibe, like hallmarks of genre movies, but then this independent, more artistic, creative, thoughtful. What does this mean for you know humanity to you know be dealing with this and kind of holding the mirror up to you know what we would do in these situations, which I just love those movies, and I feel like I have been to a lot of movies, take the kids to a lot of movies. Obviously, it's more kid-centric, have showed them a lot of older classics, again, mostly genre movies, animated movies, stuff like that. But man, it's been a long time since I've seen a new movie where I got out of the theater as excited as I was for this movie.

SPEAKER_03 4:19

What do you think about like where does where does this a really broad, vague, stupid, pointless question? No. Um but like yeah, think about the movies that have done really well in the last year. It's I mean American. Yeah. American movies like Hollywood movies, right? Um we've you know collectively spent a decade whining and bitching about the quality of films going down and superheroes and you know, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, you know, sequential remakes or re uh sequels or whatever.

SPEAKER_01 5:01

Reboots, remakes, sequels.

SPEAKER_03 5:05

The most successful films have been Marty Supreme, um One Battle. Yep. Um obviously the the backrooms.

SPEAKER_01 5:18

Um and then this movie Obsession is also doing very well, which I haven't seen yet.

SPEAKER_03 5:24

Sinners. Yeah. I mean, these are original stories. Uh most of them are like aut autour, I guess, in the traditional and like the Kaye sense. Um yeah. I mean, what do you do you think there's like something emerging there? You think there's gonna be something that emerges? Are we like I mean these are all good movies too? They're all very good movies. Yeah, I think there's like there's not a movie on that list, uh Hamnet. Yeah. Um, there's not I mean that's a book, obviously, more of a traditional um book to film adaptation, but I mean, she's uh Chloe Chloe Jia's done. Yeah. Obviously proven that she's right. Got the juice. Um I mean, yeah, but all of these Hollywood American kind of films that are original stories, they're not like they're not some pre-owned uh existing IP and all that. Yeah, they're not uh a pre-existing property or something. And I mean they're kind of doing really well. Yeah. And then yeah, you've got the uh uh the Odyssey coming out, which is weirdly being marketed with like all the 70 million, which is good, I think. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:38

Well, I think I think you know, obviously, you know, these things happen in cycles. There's cycles of really great film, there's cycles of bad. And then it's all subjective too. I think Tarantino has referred to this period of movies, maybe the last 10 years, as I can't remember if we compare it to the 80s or 90s, but he I think the 80s, where it was just the goal coming out of the golden era of the 70s, right? And then the 80s. Well, there's lots of movies from the 80s that I love.

SPEAKER_03 7:09

A lot of good non-commercial stuff.

SPEAKER_01 7:11

And maybe it was him remembering how he felt watching new movies in the 80s.

SPEAKER_03 7:15

Um I mean, if you're just talking like commercial Hollywood in the 80s, maybe yeah. Yeah. A lot of lot of really cool stuff though, in the 80s, right in as a general period.

SPEAKER_01 7:24

Yeah, I agree. Um, and you know, there's probably going to be some looking back at this period, and there's gonna be some movies that continue to rise up through streaming and people maybe acquiring a physical copy if it's available, uh, and it gaining traction af well after the fact. Uh, and we've seen that throughout time where movies maybe didn't do so well in their initial release or even a few years after classics, yeah. Cult classics, but even yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 7:51

Uh do you know The Nice Guys came out in 2017? Did it? Have you seen the nice guys? I have, yeah. So I I I that just comes up because I that's I think probably a cult classic. Yeah. A recent one for a lot of people. Um, I mean it's a it's a really good movie. You watch it over and over, it just gets better and better.

SPEAKER_01 8:09

And I have not felt the pull to go watch it again. I saw it in the theaters. Gotcha. And I and I acknowledged this is a well-made movie.

SPEAKER_03 8:16

Yeah, yeah. But it's just bizarre though. Um, but yeah, I I I'm like, that's 2017, that's not even 10 years old. It's just crazy how that comes back into the the conversation after that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:30

What I'm trying to remember uh kind of flashed in my head uh earlier. I'm like, when was the last movie that I watched? And I've seen some great movies. We saw Sorcerer, you know, in theater. Uh, you know, we went and saw Citizen Kane, I saw that really for the first time all the way through.

SPEAKER_03 8:46

Part of it though is I do think there's something I mean, I I'm a big proponent of the quote. There's there's no like good movies, bad movies, new movies, old movies. Yeah, it's just movies that I've seen and movies that I've yeah, I think that's a good way to look at it. Um but I do think there's part of something that is like dialoguing with contemporary society a little bit. That's nice. Yeah. Um I mean I say that I'm like the guy who doesn't watch new movies, yeah, and is refusing to come see back rooms with me. Just refusing to see just I'm I said I'm not gonna see it now. Terrible. I just I really pick my uh like I'll probably go see the Odyssey, sure. Like that might be and then

Are Original Films Making A Comeback

SPEAKER_03 9:30

there's always one or two that kind of sneak around. Like last year we went to see it was just an accident, and then um Surat. Yeah. Um, in theater. There's always like usually Eli's like, hey, you should go see this one. Yeah. Um drive my car a few years ago. Um, there's always a couple that kind of sneak their way in.

SPEAKER_01 9:52

And not to make it, he's he might he's kind of making it sound like he doesn't go see new movies. We've been to the movies numerous times. Yeah, we go to the movies a lot.

SPEAKER_03 9:59

It's not like we're I probably go see movies more than like the average person, but I just I just don't, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:06

But then there's some movies.

SPEAKER_03 10:06

I mean we all maybe see like 15 movies that came out in the and that's like out of like two or three hundred. So like concentration wise, I don't see a lot of new movies. Right. I think 15, 10 or 15 movies is a lot of movies, like it's a ridiculous amount to just like yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:23

Obviously, older movies get screened in town through film streams, so you go see, you know, we've seen lots of older, you know, older movies together, even if you've already seen them several times.

SPEAKER_03 10:33

There's a lot of movies that you'll be like you could peg me as oh yeah, that you'll go like I haven't seen the Bob Dylan movie yet.

SPEAKER_01 10:40

Oh, okay. Like I haven't seen Marty Supreme yet. Yeah, I haven't seen a single Safety Brothers movie. I went to see Marty Supreme movie.

SPEAKER_03 10:46

Safety or Safety Brothers movie. Yeah, I haven't seen any of them. We and saw a smashing machine last year, too. Yeah, yeah. Um that's right, we did. Yeah.

unknown 10:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:54

So so for me, you know, I'm I'm trying to think of some of these movies that I've seen. You'll like you'll like Marty Supreme. Yeah, I'm sure I will. You'll enjoy it. Yeah. But I'm trying to think of some movies that I came away with with just a really powerful reaction. And uh this one I did, and it doesn't mean that that 10 years from now I'm gonna have every physical form of back rooms. I'm gonna be watching it like I watched The Shining. I don't know if that'll happen, but I know I loved watching that movie in the theater, had a great experience, really liked it. But I think about movies for me that I saw for the first time. Uh, I went and saw when Alamo Drafthouse was doing their Kubrick series a few years ago. I saw Barry Linden for the first time, and knew next to nothing about that movie other than all the cinematography, you know, lore and legends from it. And that movie just blew me away. I have advocated for it with my buddy uh other friend Alex, who's another Cinephile uh friend? No, he's seen it, he just struggles with it, and I'm like, dude, gotcha, yeah. But it it's so personal.

SPEAKER_03 12:00

It's so interesting with Kubrick's movies. Kubrick's a really odd director for me because Kubrick is definitely somebody who you like. So you know how there's so in my experience, there's some movies they get lumped into like fight club, like they get lumped into that, like, oh, like kind of uh film school, male, yeah, whatever kind of that category. Absolutely, and Kubrick kind of operates in that field, or it seems like he does. And you see his movies and and the first time like what what I mean by that is you always get exposed to Kubrick around that time. Like he's definitely good luck going to any film school in the United States or in Europe. Yeah. And you're not you're probably gonna get hit with Kubrick pretty early.

SPEAKER_01 12:56

I got hit with Kubrick.

SPEAKER_03 12:57

And if if it's not curriculum-based, it's gonna be because of all your friends. Oh, there's a 2001 poster, and there's a strange love poster, and there's this. But but you you know, and some people love it, some but it usually like to connect to like you can connect to pieces and you can be like, oh my god, this is the greatest thing ever. And with a lot of directors though that are kind of that focused to that early, it starts to you start to pull away from that. And Kubrick is just I mean, I've I've ever I mean everything he put out after it's like Spartacus is amazing, but everything he put out, everything he touched after I mean, and you could even say like uh Killer's Kiss is is amazing, but like Lolita, The Paths of Glory, all the way up to Eyes Wide Shut. Yeah. I mean, it's like those are all just hard to dispute masterpiece films, and you could watch them all a hundred times. Yes, that's and every time you're gonna take something else out of them, and it's just it's just impressive. It's like it's one of those things where it's like you appreciate it a little bit and then you get away, and there's a there's a great uh Nicholson quote where he's like everybody generally agrees that he's the man. Yeah, and he's like, I still feel like that somehow underrates him. It's like he is it's just just really and I mean it's obviously he's not the only filmmaker to do that. There's a lot of people who have you know just as many great films.

SPEAKER_01 14:34

Um not a lot. There is there's I mean, there's definitely like I I think I think you I think probably in like the um the majority macro view of the great directors of all time, you know, that Mount Rushmore. Yeah because you you would probably name several directors that not that this disqualifies them, but that the majority of people have not seen their films.

SPEAKER_03 15:04

Yeah, but I mean there's also part of like like their converse, like I because I first of all I don't even know how many of these directors if we were doing like I don't really like to do a much more. I like I think I mean more like it's culture. Like maybe it's like a pantheon, or it's just like a group of people that really influence. And I don't like you if you did an American pantheon, that's a different conversation. I mean, I think there's definitely a world cinema pantheon that is just generally a lot yeah, more it has more potential than an American pantheon. But I mean I agree, like Kubrick is he's Kubrick, but what I mean a really long way to say, like it's just impressive. I was thinking about this after we were I mean, this was yesterday, yesterday morning. I was thinking about just this is amazing, incredible. All of this, all of these films are just great, and generally I mean, I I can't really like I mean, maybe I'll revisit yeah, Killer's Kiss. Everything else, I'm just like this is a pretty flawless film. Like, this is amazing. I I can get something out of every one of his films. Yeah, there's nothing where I'm just like I don't see it. Yeah, like every one of them, I'm just like amazing, amazing, amazing. It's just that's just really, really interesting quality to have. Yeah. They're also different too, they're also unique. It's not like they're they are all just one voice, but there's each one is its own just fully formed thing.

SPEAKER_01 16:32

Completely, yeah. And I haven't seen a lot of his early films, and uh mostly just I guess I haven't seen like Fear and Desire or what I think. Some of them I'm not even aware of, to be honest. That's how much how little I paid attention to

Cult Classics And Changing Opinions

SPEAKER_01 16:45

his early there's not that many though.

SPEAKER_03 16:47

I mean, it's like I mean it's Pass of Glory, Spartacus, Lolita, Strange Love, yeah, and then Clockwork Orange, and then after Clockwork Orange is is that Barry Linden, and then the the Shining? I believe. Oh, 2001 is obviously 60 yeah, 68. So that's before Clockwork Orange. Um, and then yeah, the Shining Um 81, I think. And then he takes maybe it's the Shining, then Barry Linden, then Full Metal Jacket. I know he was like, and then it's Eyes Watch Hut. I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 17:29

There had to be something between Full Metal Jacket, the Shining.

SPEAKER_03 17:32

There was a long rule in there. I think it was like the Napoleon.

SPEAKER_01 17:36

He was working on Napoleon, yeah. Um, but he had that artificial intelligence one that uh Spielberger took over.

SPEAKER_03 17:44

Which I imagine it would have been a very different and totally I wish we could see that movie.

SPEAKER_01 17:49

Wish we could. But um we just went on a total the the the point was Barry Linen just blew me away in the theater and well afterwards. Way to bring that back, by the way. Another movie that completely blew me away after watching it was Phantom Thread by uh our hero here, PTA. Um, and so it's it's it hasn't been often in my adult life whether I'm at the theater or watching something at home. And uh just uh uh obviously the movie last night I saw in the theater. Barry Linden, I saw in the theater, but Phantom Thread I did not see in the theater. I watched that at home.

SPEAKER_03 18:28

Really?

SPEAKER_01 18:28

Yeah, I did not go see it. Have you seen it?

SPEAKER_03 18:31

Have you seen it in the theater since then?

SPEAKER_01 18:32

I don't think anybody's played it because I only saw Phantom Thread probably in the last five years. Gotcha, gotcha. Um, it's one that just slipped through.

SPEAKER_03 18:40

It's if if filmstream ever gets it on 35, it's really, really nice on 35.

SPEAKER_01 18:46

I mean, I saw Punch Drunk Love in theaters. I mean, I saw I didn't see Boogie Knights because uh I can't remember. Boogie Nights is a fun 35 print, too. Yeah. So and I remember obviously I'm more in my form, you know, you're more in your formative years. When you're a kid, all these movies are are connected to a different, a completely different state of being. So everything from John Hughes movies to a little Spielberg-produced movie like Batteries Not Included has resonance because you're this kid and all this magical stuff is unfolding while you watch it. I watch it now and I'm like, eh. Yeah, yeah, you know, but Goonies or The Karate Kid with my kids, like I love these movies. Yeah. So it started to trail off, you know. And I remember going to see The Matrix, I remember seeing American Beauty, I remember seeing a lot of movies in the theaters and just being like, holy shit.

SPEAKER_03 19:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:37

Like, I have a lot to talk about. It all the emotion of it, how I felt coming out of the theater.

SPEAKER_03 19:43

And you go see like Magnolia in the theater?

SPEAKER_01 19:46

No, I saw that and I was you know pretty floored by that movie as well. I'm just thinking of that when I was in acting school.

SPEAKER_03 19:54

There's definitely some movies where it's like if you saw them at your angsty period, then they're probably hitting like yeah. I like, I mean, I think of like yeah, Fight Club or Right Um Matrix. Yeah. Um yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:08

You know, Seven. I mean, all a lot of the a lot of the um the uh Fincher's movies, you know, during that time. There's certainly movies, you know, that have gotten, you know, have grabbed hold of me. I really love Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and Zodiac, but I discovered those. I think I saw Girl with Dragon Tattoo in theaters, did not see Zodiac in theaters, but when I would be writing screenplays, that I I wanted to sort of cultivate some of the vibe of those movies, I would just have them playing in the background while I worked just to like siphon some of the energy and vibe off of them. But I, you know, distinctly had those soundtracks, I would also often listen to them while I wrote because it would put me in a place where I could I could get into a channeling state.

SPEAKER_03 20:52

The Zodiac soundtrack is like sneaky, really good. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:55

Oh, 100%. And I love the girl with the dragon tattoo soundtrack.

SPEAKER_03 20:58

That's Zodiac's the only network, yeah. I guess well, social network is also a different vibe, but no, I mean I was about to say Zodiac Zodiac's the only Fincher movie that I really like. Uh Social Network is definitely there too. That's not really a Fincher. I mean, it is. It's it's obviously completely Fincher, but it feels like a Sorkin Fenture movie.

SPEAKER_01 21:19

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 21:20

Yes, especially with Sorkin's dialogue. It's like like like you watch a I don't know, like um there's certain writers who they're just so distinct. Usually it's an American I mean, obviously, because it's dialogue, it's a very American thing, but it's like like a like a David Mammoth script or something.

SPEAKER_01 21:37

You're typically like oh this is the sort of the hallmarks.

SPEAKER_03 21:41

Yeah, yeah, that that rhythm of Mammoth like Quentin or something. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. But um Yeah, Zodiac is just such an anomaly and it is one that it's not.

SPEAKER_01 21:54

I mean, well it was one that kind of just flew under the radar because I think that was gonna be my point. It took like

SPEAKER_03 22:00

15 years for that to really bubble back up to the top.

SPEAKER_01 22:03

You know, part of it I think maybe could be the runtime. The fact that it was uh obviously it's great subject matter, but maybe the fact that it was more of a historical re not reinterpretation, but interpretation of something steeped in more historical context, almost like a biopic versus a vibey adaptation of a really edgy novel like Fight Club was. Yeah. Um but but yeah, I just felt that this this trailing off of these intense reactions to seeing movies.

SPEAKER_03 22:38

And I think that could to go see like um sorry. I'm just I I I love going back and thinking like, oh, what are some of these movies that did this? Because I think about this a lot, and we're so bubbled in. I I feel like uh rep like revisiting old films has become more popular, and maybe it's just because of film streams, like we just happen to be really lucky.

SPEAKER_01 23:00

And Alamo, you know, not that they're in Alamo, these some of these theaters that are doing more repertory screenings, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 23:07

I was gonna it it seems like that has become more

Chasing The Highest Theater High

SPEAKER_03 23:10

common, but I feel like maybe up until semi-recently, like that wasn't as popular. Yeah, no, and so you just kind of especially in America, especially in the Midwest America in America, or I mean I was in the South, and I grew up close to the Bell Court, which is a phenomenal theater, so there's like certain access to certain things, but it's not like we're I'm just like spending all my time at the Bell Court or anything. Um, but yeah, it's so I mean I'm just saying like the up until streaming's popularity, which has only been a decade at this point, really. Yes. You really had to see the movie in the theater, or maybe you catch it on cable or something.

SPEAKER_01 23:51

Or if you were lucky to find a copy uh if they made a copy of it on DVD or you know, physical media.

SPEAKER_03 23:56

It's just more like the bigger blockbuster-y kind of right. What about like um like the departed or like the Wolf of Wall Street? Did you see it?

SPEAKER_01 24:04

Saw it in the theater and saw Wolf of Wall Street in the theater and thoroughly enjoyed it. Yeah, yeah. But I wasn't it just didn't that movie's a lot to digest. Don't get me wrong, like I fell asleep through The Shining probably the first five times we watched it. Like, I'm like, what who what what are we doing here? Yeah, yeah. Uh you know, I struggled with it, and now it's I mean, like, I've seen that movie a hundred times, I've dissected it. I've I mean, it's on the entire month of October.

SPEAKER_03 24:35

It's actually uh co-producer on Room 237. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_01 24:40

I mean, I am I I am so nuts about that movie now. So it that happens too, where I see a movie in the theater, I recognize the excellence in the filmmaking, but something has not connected with me yet. And sometimes it's because it's not as in your face.

SPEAKER_03 24:59

What's your best like if and we'll get we'll circle back to the backrooms thing, but what is like the highest high you've had leaving a theater? In my case, it was actually just a really high high.

SPEAKER_02 25:12

Yeah, it was just really high, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:16

Man, um the first thing that popped into my head was after I saw The Matrix.

SPEAKER_02 25:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:24

You know, that movie came out. I'm in late high school, and you know, I just obsessed about Star Wars, Jurassic Park. I had, you know, I was very much sort of a mainstream, you know, all that. You know, it's so my dad would show show us little indie movies or old movies and stuff like that, and always enjoyed dad's a big western or was a big western, but mostly independent films.

SPEAKER_03 25:47

I I when your dad, when you told me that your dad loved Lonesome Dove, yeah, oh yeah. I was like, loved it. That man knows his westerns.

SPEAKER_01 25:55

And my buddy Micah, he just like can't get enough of it.

SPEAKER_03 25:58

It's the best, uh, it's the best TV series slash western period. Full stop.

SPEAKER_01 26:05

He's he's tried, he was we were talking about it when I was visiting with him. He's like, every time we go to a thrift store, estate sale, anything, we don't they don't go all the time. He's like, the first thing I look for is a copy of Lonesome Ducks. Oh, we've packed you and I have seen it like five or six years. He wants like a first edition hardcover. Oh, the book. Yeah, the book, yeah, the book, yes, yeah, not the movie. The book, motherfucker. The book, yeah, yeah. Um so you know, and and that's just like the first thing that popped into my head. If I sat and thought about it, you know, there might be other movie experiences. I certainly remember just like a James Cameron might talk about having seen 2001 or Spielberg seeing 2001, or um some of the other that one movie that he put into his kind of autobiographical movie, uh something with a train going off the tracks, and he was a little boy and saw it in the theater and it blew his mind.

SPEAKER_03 26:55

Oh, yeah, the greatest show on earth. Greatest show on earth, yeah. Yeah, um, I really cool movie just for the fact that when if if like we watched it on the projector when this was probably six years ago or something, but yeah, one of the only kind of say what you want about the animals and the captivity of like the circus, but I grew up going to the circus, yeah. And they would do like the ring of fire and the lions, and you know, it's if you have a three-ring circus, then it's just spotlight on whichever ring, and and I guess the most famous was probably Barnum, yeah, PT Barnum, Barnum Bailey, Barnum Bailey, yeah. Um, and so that's one of like the most magical images that's just forever seared into my head. I have a giant circus poster that's literally put aside in my garage at home, and eventually when I have a studio with bigger walls, it's good, it's gonna go. Yeah, and yeah. Um, and so the greatest show on earth though is one of the few films that really captured that on film. So it's really cool to watch just from that perspective. It's color, it's technical, it's beautiful. Yeah. Um, the it's not really a great movie, but it is just pretty, pretty cool, pretty magical.

SPEAKER_01 28:07

Anyway, so again, that goes back to what I was saying when you're a kid, you know, that that openness that you have, that um purity, I think that you have of just letting things affect you emotionally because you're not coming in with a lot of established hardware to react to something.

SPEAKER_03 28:28

Well, Audrey certain ways when we went to see Nirvana, the band the show, the movie, yeah, she had no idea. No, like she thought it was yeah, uh Nirvana documentary. And I mean, she's not obviously she's not following it. I didn't have a lot of context, I just knew they did a web series and yeah, kind of whatever. Uh, but she left that and she was like, that was amazing. I had no idea what to expect. She was just super excited about it. And I was like, that's that is the best experience.

SPEAKER_01 28:56

Yeah. And uh you know, so if I look at all the movies that I've seen in the theater, you know, I can think of numerous theatrical experiences where I'm talking about the theatrical experience, not necessarily like this is an all-time movie, but I, you know, I remember going to see The Ring, and these girls were watching it in the theater, and they were so terrified. And I was too that two of them had to go to the bathroom, and the one that was left behind, she asked total strangers if she could sit next to them because she was too scared to sit by herself. And that energy, and this is again this is an argument for seeing movies together. Yeah, because that's a hundred percent to me, it is like probably the most important part of the theatrical experience, which by the way, yesterday Ashley's sitting next to me, Cody's on the other side of her, and there's 15 kids in the theater watching this movie, and you can feel the energy when you're watching it, people reacting, the what they're saying. You know, I laughed, I you know, had all kinds of reactions. Um, you know, looking at Ashley, and like that was a that played a big part of loving seeing that movie in the theater. Definitely. But I mean Jurassic Park when the Star Wars trilogy was re-released. Um, I distinctly remember seeing American Beauty, obviously The Matrix. Um my dad, because he was a teacher, would take us to the movies in the summer. He took me to see, and dude, I'm like 12 years old. Terminator 2 in the theater. No clue other than what you saw on the trailers on TV, what that movie's gonna be about.

SPEAKER_03 30:31

That's really a pretty amazing movie to see when you're about to be a little bit more than a lot of people. Holy shit, dude.

SPEAKER_01 30:34

Blown away. Um because we had only seen the TV version of Terminator because my parents wouldn't let us watch R-rated movies. Um we loved it. And then Terminator 2 just, in my opinion, blows it out of the water. They're both great movies for different things, but it I'm like different genres almost, yeah. And then, and I mean, still to this day, when I see Terminator 2 on VHS at the thrust, grab it immediately. Like we have 10 copies in the shop, it's like it's not going anywhere. I have it on Laserdisc. I have like multiple versions of it on Laser Disc. The music, everything. Um, my dad took us to see uh the original Batman and Batman Returns. Yeah, he took us to see Alien 3. As I I mean, that movie was what 92, 90, you know, early 90s. I'm like 12 something years old. Um, you know, the the the of course people being ripped apart by an alien wasn't the part that bothered my dad. It was all the F words, the swearing in the movie. He had no idea it was gonna be that that bad. Um, so uh and then another movie.

Creating Movie Rituals With Kids

SPEAKER_01 31:40

Um my wife and I, she she struggles with movie theaters um because when other people are there crunching popcorn, she has uh a sensitivity to sounds like that, and it completely distracts her from focusing on the movie. But we went and saw Drive in Los Angeles, and she's like, that was you know, she still talks about it. That was one of one of if not the best theatrical experiences I've ever had. We just saw it in like a shitty AMC theater in Burbank.

SPEAKER_02 32:07

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 32:07

And we and you know, the energy between us, that movie, uh it was just was magical seeing it.

SPEAKER_03 32:13

Um the last one I'll say was I remember seeing some of my favorite movie experiences are like shitty, like if you're in like I mean, seeing movies in New York is just a cool thing, but yeah, I mean a lot of the theaters are just shitbag, like yeah, they smell like cigs because somebody was probably smoking a cig in there. Um so and I mean, yeah, just you go see a movie in an environment like that, and it's you just heightened awareness.

SPEAKER_01 32:39

And you know, I've seen lots of movies at home that were certainly you know had a lot of impact or even television shows to be honest. But um there's just something special about last night sharing that experience with Ashley and Cody, and primarily to be honest, Ashley, because she was sitting right next to me, and we were both feeling a lot of the same feelings where and connecting with the movie, yeah. Whereas Cody was he wasn't it wasn't connecting with him, not his vibe, not his vibe. And Ashley and I were like, oh my god, and then the thing, and then the guy, and then this, and that after the movie, and Cody's like, Yeah, it was okay. And I'm like, totally get it, but like this movie was right up my alley, yeah. Yeah, and it it it hits at the right time. I'm hungry for theatrical experiences because of all those previous theatrical experiences. I feel like I've been taking my kids to see movies that are okay for them to see, Super Mario Brothers, Mandalorian and Grogu, you know, Moana 2, you know, and while some of those movies are really entertaining, I'm not dying to do that.

SPEAKER_03 33:45

I do wish they would do some more like repertory material for children's movies. Yeah, I I do there's a lot of really good stuff in that kind of that catalog that could be brought. And I know there's like IP issues and things like that, but sure. I mean, yeah, just lit any Pixar.

SPEAKER_01 34:05

Yeah. Um, I've taken I've taken Dottie to see just something that's enjoyable for you.

SPEAKER_03 34:10

Yeah, not that like Moana 2 isn't or whatever, but it's probably not as good as Cars or Finding Nemo or something like that.

SPEAKER_01 34:18

Yeah, and I've taken you know, I took her to see Jurassic Park when they should when they did it at Alamo Draft House. I took her to see Ghostbusters, you know. We've done we've done some repertory with Dottie. Um, and you know, they may, you know, because they're so young, they may remember Mandalorian and Grogu or Super Mario Brothers, or you know, I've probably taken them to see 20, 30 plus movies, so they've seen a lot. Um, and a lot of that's motivated by my memory of those summers in the early 90s where my dad took us to the classic single screen downtown Crystal Lake, Illinois movie theater with the the um Spanish uh design, the terracotta, like the whole building facade around the theater, the curtain opens. I mean, it was like they had a balcony, I mean, it was the best.

SPEAKER_02 35:10

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:11

And if I can use the flexibility of my schedule to take my kids to see movies that might affect them like those movies did me, um, you know, I'm gonna do it every chance I can.

SPEAKER_03 35:26

I think just setting the expectation too that these are like important like we'll plan a whole weekend around seeing a movie. Yeah. Is like a really big idea for a child to kind of grab onto. Yeah. Just yeah, we'll plan a whole weekend, we're gonna go to this movie theater. Right. There used to be movie palaces, and yeah, we'll go to a movie palace, and it's the only thing that just finding, even if it's a little artificial, ways to recreate that. You hear any you hear Martin Scorsese talk about his experience going to see movies as a kid, and he's just like, I couldn't get enough. Yeah. You we go see a movie, you know, once a whatever, and it was just the coolest thing ever. And he's you know watching movies on TV is like this is the best, but just the ex you hear older the older experiences of theater. It's like really important to preserve that, and even if you heighten it a little bit artificially, I think that's important because yeah, it's just ingraining a love of this this thing.

SPEAKER_01 36:30

Absolutely, yeah. And I think that's you know, part of the the push for you to go see it is what happens when I see a movie like that is I want to go see it with someone else who hasn't seen it to see if you can conjure that up again. Now, I I could take you to see it and you could be like, You liked this movie? You could hate it, yeah. Um and you know, that that experience isn't shared, but it what that that's the really the fun of it for me is is coming out of uh a movie like that and being like, Who can I get to go see this movie with me? Just to see if they even have a remotely similar experience, right? Um and you know, like that happened after seeing Top Gun Maverick. Like I'm like, Dottie, we're going to see it. And I grabbed her and we went and saw it. Yeah, yeah. You know, like it can it it's for me, it's such a wide range of things. Yeah, and obviously for some of the heavier classics or movies that I really like. Um uh like a similar movie that I think about with back rooms. I mentioned Primmer, but another movie that I saw, I saw it at home, was this movie called Compliance. It is every bit as horrifying as Back Rooms is, yeah. And not a lot of people saw it. If I had seen that in a theater, I know it would have been an even more powerful experience. So when my kids are old enough for me to start showing them movies that they have to be, you know, very mature and prep emotionally prepared to handle, that's gonna be another exciting level of sort of seeing if I can recreate not only my own experience of it, but see what what their experience of it is as well.

SPEAKER_03 38:14

Do you think that we're gonna see more like obviously horror movies are the easiest thing to make or to get made in 2026? There's just this weird sub-genre kind of audience, built-in audience for it. So typically anything that's you know, if you are to see something that's sub 10 million, that's not an a-to-r kind of own direction project, it's probably

What Horror Does That Drama Cannot

SPEAKER_03 38:40

gonna be in that genre. Yeah. Do you think that that this'll take that up another level, or is it kind of far enough away in your experience?

SPEAKER_01 38:49

I I I agree.

SPEAKER_03 38:50

I'm talking about it from obviously I haven't seen it. Yeah. But I just I know like the trend has been I know a lot of people that won't go see movies that if they're not, which I think is a bit silly, but yeah. I I mean I I get it.

SPEAKER_01 39:03

You like like what you like, but I mean I I think I I think to me this could be something where the right people who can get movies made might say, you know, say to themselves, there is a lot of demand, pent up demand or yearning from young people. And I'm talking about the kids that were in the theater with me, these are probably early 20s, mid-20s, maybe, um, to have something that they care to go see now that you know they they saw Avengers when they were 10, and they've seen, you know, they're hungry for something different, something more, something that matches maybe what they're going through in that stage of their lives. Uh I know I you know deeply craved everything from independent film to blockbusters from the time I was 18 to in into my twenties. So I'm hoping that some of these studios, like an A24, who did um back rooms, is going look, it doesn't have to be horror.

SPEAKER_02 40:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 40:19

Uh it although I think those genres are probably going to be a bit more of the of what you're gonna see because there's just less risk. Yeah. It's it's easier to be satisfied after seeing a horror movie, I think, because even if it scares you two or three times or creeps you out, it's a level of deep entertainment for a lot of people that a comedy or a drama has a harder time satisfying for a lot of for a majority of people. It's it's it's you know, I scared you today at the gas pumps. There's something like I didn't like give you a speech and make you cry. Like, what can I I can't just do that? Alex was at the gas station and I went to get a drink, and I'm like, I snuck.

SPEAKER_03 41:07

I was like, he's like, How bad was that? And I was like, maybe like a six out of ten. I'm like, you're forgetting. We have a lot of homeless people that just kind of flip. Oh, yeah, I know. I thought about all that. I'm like, this will this will get them.

SPEAKER_01 41:21

But like that's interesting.

SPEAKER_03 41:22

I've definitely had that experience before, and it is just a guy.

SPEAKER_01 41:25

Yeah, and it's like you know, when we do that with our kids, they kind of like you know, there's something about scaring people that's easy, but it's uh it's uh it's a it's a real deep emotional reaction, but then you have the release of it not being real, you know. Um there's something in that that is that Hollywood gravitates toward just like people do. Yeah. Again, I give my kids lots of affection, tell them all kinds of nice things, but when you start becoming adults, you don't I'm you know, I'm not hugging. You're not like hugging on Alex or like telling like telling you emotional things about how I feel about you, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_03 42:09

Or like like there's just not the same level of um it just moves to a subtextual level. Yeah. More so like you're like when you're a kid, you obviously it's like, well, no, I love you. Like you pour it on. It's like yeah. When you're when as you get older, it's just like actions and exchanges and behavior.

SPEAKER_01 42:33

Admittedly, it's still it's still a little weird that a grown man creeps up on his buddy at the gas station and scares the shit out of him. I don't think so. We need more of that. Um I hope he doesn't plan on getting me back.

SPEAKER_03 42:44

Are you uh I'm gonna make you shit your pants in public? I think maybe general roll that's doing the I knew you were going to rice bowl and I have a buddy that works there actually.

SPEAKER_01 42:55

Oh, sabotage.

SPEAKER_03 42:57

Um do you so do you enjoy the the genre like the horror genre? Oh yeah, 100%.

SPEAKER_01 43:02

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I mean, I have scripts that I wrote that are exactly what I talked about when this started. And it's it's my desire to merge indie um more artistic movies with depth with something that's genre as well.

SPEAKER_03 43:20

Like what I love. Like what does it like what is what's scary like about that for you? Or what what kind of gets like so personally I've never I've just never connected to horror very much. It just doesn't scare me that much. Yeah, yeah. Even shit where people are like like some people like, oh I can't r watch this movie again. The Exorcist or Yeah, and I mean I'm like I okay. Yeah. Um I and I don't know why that is. I mean, when I was a kid, I saw a Charles Manson documentary and I was like seven. Jesus, dude. And I was like Talking about like writing like death to the pigs or whatever on the wall and they're the pregnant lady's blood. And I'm just like seven years old. I'm like, holy shit. Yeah. I couldn't shower for like three weeks after that. Yeah, yeah. And um, yeah, and the internet was a thing, it was in its infancy, but I was like, Oh, this guy's still alive. Like, yeah, that stuff is creepy.

SPEAKER_01 44:24

Um but again, I think the fact that it's a real is what you don't get a real like, oh, it's it's all like Matt Matt wasn't someone who was trying to kill me today.

SPEAKER_03 44:32

And it's like even that though, I'm not super you know, freaked out about like oh this this person or this thing, but I mean I I think we we talked about this in the group text one time. It was like what kind of freaks you out, and yeah, I named like a couple of movies, like there's the Pasolini film based on uh the 120 Days of Sodom, and like that's fucking freaky, right? Or like yeah, like a heroine film, like when um Requiem Panic and Needle Park, or yeah, Requiem. Um it's probably a little bit more theatrical, but yeah, yeah, Chatsburg, Panic and Needle Park. Um those things really scare me, yeah, like scare the shit out of me.

SPEAKER_01 45:15

Barry Linden was one of the scariest movies I've ever seen. Yeah, just because I felt like it held up a mirror to who I am, and you see my like my greatest flaw.

SPEAKER_03 45:25

I think. I'm not I'm not watching like Salo or just to be clear, I'm not watching like Solo or Panic and Eatle Park and being like, that's me. Right. Yeah, but no, definitely definitely. I I totally get that.

SPEAKER_01 45:37

And I get that some movies, a situation, a reality of human existence, the depravity of man, yeah, you know, all of that stuff can be horrible.

SPEAKER_03 45:45

Something that's staring right into the eyes of something that is evil. Yeah, I mean evil, like and that it's a but I do think uh most horror movies are just pretty yeah, um exaggerated in their depiction of the thing or whatever. But yeah, no, like what gets you.

SPEAKER_01 46:04

So what gets me is this is what's interesting, you know, your experience, and I'll relate what my wife likes as far as horror goes, and this will all connect. But to me, obviously, you know, I I heard ghost stories from my great Aunt Mary and my grandma, and I like that was a part of my life from a very early time. I distinctly remember my Auntie Mary telling me the story about one of her relatives who had an accident with their young son. Uh, the like the deep fat fryer spilled on him. Oh Jesus. And he died. Oh Jesus. When he was alive, he would ride a little orange tricycle around the house because there was a loop. And one day, she's like, and then one day, I'm getting goosebumps just saying it, the orange tricycle, you know, like like rolled, not all the way around, but just like moved. Yeah, you know, and you're six years old, and it's like, you know, it's crazy to you. And you that spine tingling, the all that, you love it. And then my brother and I just grew up watching horror movies. We watched Saturday Night Nightmares, USA Up All Night. Yeah. Um, my parents didn't really have like a strict bedtime on the weekends, and we would stay up till two o'clock in the morning, but 10:30, 11 o'clock, we'd watch, we'd watch those shows. We loved it. And then just like my kids, I was saying earlier, are going off and making movies with their little iPhone and all that. We would take a VHS camcorder and remake Halloween and remake, you know, do our version. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 47:44

Me and my buddy, I mean, especially in like high school and yeah, when we you finally have access to a camera or something. Yeah, we would do stuff like that all the time where it's like, oh yeah, we're gonna make this horror movie.

SPEAKER_01 47:55

Yeah. But the beauty of it for me was it's not real. So I get to go on this ride and have this experience, and I get the relief of knowing at the end or even during subconsciously, this isn't real. Even a movie that's based on a real thing or inspired by true events, that might add to the freakiness, but I know that they're accentuating things or exaggerating things, or you know, whatever. Now, my wife, like I said earlier, she couldn't care less about a horror movie, ghost movie, nothing. But she watches uh um what the hell is that show called? Um, I totally blinked on it. Um, true crime shows. Like this isn't the one I'm thinking of, but she'll watch forensic files. Yeah, gotcha. Where it's you know, the husband killed the wife. Unsolved mysteries.

SPEAKER_03 48:44

That stayed on all the time, yeah. So when I was scared, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 48:47

So I scared you at the gas bumps. One time when we I was in grad school, she came home from something in the evening, and I had the unsolved mysteries theme queued up on the computer. Yeah, I had all the lights off, she opened the door, I hit the theme song. She about died, dude. So unsolved mystery scares her, but it's only like the like the murder and like the ghost ones, the UFO, she couldn't care less. But like the ones where it really happened, yeah, those scare her. And so when you told your story about the Manson thing, even if you weren't like hyper aware of of it being real, like you said, you went to the internet, like, oh, this guy's still alive. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's something about the fact that you're not let off the hook. Yeah, yeah. It's it goes deeper. Yeah. Whereas these movies, I'm like, hey, this place, this backrooms place, it doesn't exist. Yeah, I get the relief of knowing that it's impossible. That's a good, that's a good way to you know, yeah, and that's totally and that's what makes it a ride. Like if I go ride a roller coaster, I know it's gonna be over.

SPEAKER_03 49:53

Yeah, you know, it it's that that ability to say, okay, it's over now is is what makes it so interesting.

SPEAKER_01 50:00

Exactly. And that's why I like the idea in my scripts of giving people two experiences that I love most in in film. The depth of human emotion between a dramatic moment between two characters, figuring out a way to artfully and deftly highlight a truth about humankind and our nature and the things we do to each other at the same time, a jump scare, a creepy location. A ride that they can get off of. Yeah, a ride they can get off. Because to me, what I want the scary part, I want it to be two things. I want the scary part to be what we do to each other that you can't get off of. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 50:37

And the scary forest with the fruit with the fucked up kids that have you seen the uh Martin Scorsese uh curb your enthusiasm. Oh god, dude. I just it's the idea. It's the idea of the violence. We just gotta get to the threat of the violence. That's right.

SPEAKER_02 50:54

Yep. What if I hold his balls up in a pen and the balls they won't read? They won't read. They won't read. So that's thank you.

SPEAKER_03 51:03

Yeah, no, thank you for that. That that's definitely I have a hard time. Like, I don't have obviously I I I watch a lot of movies. I don't really have a hard time like suspending this. I I mean, I don't know. Like there's definitely some movies that if they're a little bit more plot-centric or a little bit more I I I will I'm I am the analytical, like, yeah, this is this would not happen. And obviously, you could that could be more of a critique of it's not like I'm looking for realism in all of my films, but it I mean maybe that's just a critique of like how well built the world was or how subtly something's being approached. It's probably the issue lies elsewhere. But with horror, I just have a really hard time suspending my yeah. I don't think yeah, I just don't think I'm able to do that, and so maybe that prevents me from having the experience of being like I'm on the ride, because then you're just aware that you're and it's possible that some of the emotional that's the best description of what you just gave. It was the best, like, oh, I totally yeah, that makes that makes sense.

SPEAKER_01 52:09

And

Wrestling Logic And The Threat Of Violence

SPEAKER_01 52:10

that doesn't mean that all of a sudden you're gonna be a horror movie consumer, but yeah, I wouldn't I wouldn't probably not, but yeah.

SPEAKER_03 52:16

I mean, but uh like I I loved watching pro wrestling growing up, yes. And you know it's fake, but then part of you is like, but is it yeah? Well, like it's certainly like certain things you're like, oh my god, like is this wait, he hit a lot of things. And obviously, the best like in pro wrestling, the idea is that the best um storylines are the ones that have truth in them, yeah. So you know you have two people and they're they're you know warring with each other over the belt, and there's a relationship that is kind of the through line, and it's like, oh yeah, and both of them dated this person in real life, yeah, and this person's dating her now, and that then they're getting in the ring and they're like, I kind of fucking hate you, and you're like, Oh man, that felt it feels like he actually fucking hates him, and it's like, well, part of him actually so that's always the best goes for anything, and that that that was always the best part about wrestling.

SPEAKER_01 53:15

You know, the stories culminate in a climactic showdown. It's the best, which is why I love Rocky, why I love the wrestler, why I love all kinds of things.

SPEAKER_03 53:23

I think pro wrestling is I mean, it obviously gets a really bad reputation. I I don't watch it that much now, but yeah, I still love it, especially the older, like you know, you really get into the older stuff where it is just and I mean I'm I'm talking like obviously like the 90s stuff is amazing, some of the early 2000s stuff is great, but I'm talking like you go back to like the 70s and 80s stuff, yeah, and it's just really good just storytelling. Yes, and there's always a you know, the I don't know, it's like why do we go back and watch Westerns? Yep, the pretty antiquated like white hat, black hat kind of situation. But if it's well done, that doesn't matter, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 54:01

And yeah, so well, and you know, for me, Westerns, there's there's an element of it too where I'm like it's scary to watch people who, if you say the wrong thing, they'll just shoot you in the street. Yeah, and part of me goes it's funny because it's the idea of the violence, right?

SPEAKER_03 54:17

It's good, it's Tommy and Goodfellas. Yeah, the whole time you're watching hit, like you're watching him on screen, you're just like, mm-hmm. I don't know what he's gonna do, right? And I mean they set that up from the very first time you see him. It's just like this guy is a firecracker, yeah. And it you don't know what it's gonna take to light it, but once it is, it's you can't put it out, and that holds it, it carries a it's complete unique dramatic structure through the entire entire film.

SPEAKER_01 54:47

And you know, I think horror movies and scary movies for me, the the fact that when the credits roll, you're sort of off the hook, and yeah, there's things that that kind of carry with you. You know, it's not necessarily trauma. I mean, obviously, some horror movies that we see when we're young, for me, you know, I think I saw Psycho 2, and like you, yeah, I wouldn't like sh I wouldn't take a shower for like two weeks because it terrified me.

SPEAKER_03 55:10

But eventually you kind of realize I love Psycho, I love the shiny, those aren't like they're not scary for me. I love Clockwork Orange, yeah. Yeah, they're not scary for me, but they are great movies, right? Like I'm not anti, I think those are horror. Absolutely, they're at least.

SPEAKER_01 55:27

But they're so much uh so much, so much much more depth and and powerful storytelling going on, and that's what I mean. Like Kubrick really set the bar with uh human drama unfolding with horrific ingredients, uh and supernatural ingredients, um, that are just like unexplainable and mysterious and vibey and all that stuff, and and that's what you know to me one of the things, and I like to, you know, I like I wrote different genres, but I I did gravitate towards those with several of probably the majority of my screenplays that I wrote.

SPEAKER_03 56:08

I always knew you were like a fan, but I I you you have like a actual pretty deep affinity for it, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 56:14

Yeah, I mean, and again, it's cool. A lot of it stems from what I was exposed to as a kid. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 56:21

And and everything from a person. I mean, just hearing the description of like you talking about like it makes so much sense. Yeah, yeah. Just to hear you kind of lay it out, what you think about it, it does make a lot of sense.

SPEAKER_01 56:32

Um you can sort of see it, even if you don't experience it. Oh a hundred percent.

SPEAKER_03 56:37

Yeah, yeah. I mean, look, we all experienced movies differently.

SPEAKER_01 56:41

And honestly, part part of why I was so amped to see back rooms. I mean, yeah, I I'm not often like well, first of all, I went the other night to the Dundee thinking it was playing there and it wasn't. And you're like, oh, you can make it. I'm like, you know, I'm like, nah, gotta settle in, gotta settle in, get ready. But part of why I'm coming after this movie is there's indicators that it's delivering, and uh, and I I mean, like, I want to see movies that are freaky and vibey and scary and shining adjacent. I don't want to go see like torture movies, like a small, you know, small or yeah, I don't care about those at all.

SPEAKER_03 57:21

Um people love yeah, and then there's even a subgenre of that with like um like Cronenberg. Yeah, or yeah, that kind of kind of body body horror is its own genre. And I mean, I there's certainly some of those things too where I'm like, I can see there's there's interesting films in that filmography, but yeah.

SPEAKER_01 57:42

And and there's you know, there's plenty of scary movies that have come out that maybe I haven't revisited numerous times. Halloween when you yeah, Halloween was I mean, it is like to me the number one slasher film for me of all time.

SPEAKER_03 57:55

I watched the first Friday the 13th when I was like eight years old. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 58:00

Because it was just like probably like low parental. Did you see the in we always saw the TV version because we didn't have access to the it was probably like it was like HBO on demand or something? Yeah, so we never saw we always saw the edited version, so it took a little bit of the edge off.

SPEAKER_03 58:18

This was the freaky like the first Jeep thing where he gets out and there's the yeah. I so I do, but I do wonder how much of that is just like desensitized me to the like you know, when you see that in your seven, it fucks you up. Yeah, yeah. And you like have to figure out how to kind of and then maybe it just kind of, you know, that button gets stuck in the yes, yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 58:44

And so you might there might be I'm showing my kids all these things at rate six, just get it over with it over with. And and you may, you may, whether you're aware of it or not, push back against a movie like Backrooms or some other visibly a movie that's visibly a horror movie because of some echo of those those feelings.

SPEAKER_03 59:05

What about the thing? Is that like a horror movie in your mind?

SPEAKER_01 59:07

Or yeah, sci-fi horror. Sci-fi horror. It's a mashup, I'd say. Yeah. Um, but yeah, I mean, and that movie was huge for me, my brother. The soundtrack. I mean, his whole filmography, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 59:19

I know that you're a big fan of a lot of it. A lot of it.

SPEAKER_01 59:23

I some of the campier stuff, like it's funny because like Big Trouble in Little China, love it. Yeah, yeah. Escape from New York, don't love it as much. Escape from LA. Uh yeah. Uh Starman? Yeah, Starman's.

SPEAKER_03 59:37

That was one that you told me about that I was like, oh, it was really cool.

SPEAKER_01 59:39

Yeah, Starman's a magical movie. Really cool movie. Yeah. And that's again, that's the same thing. Deep drama.

SPEAKER_03 59:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 59:49

But this genre element, Alien Visitor, like it's like the perfect matchup.

SPEAKER_03 59:54

Especially in 2026, it kind of has its uh an entirely new way to look at it with just how we're talking to these, you know, Transformer models. And right, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Really cool movie. Yeah, I I'm gonna have to maybe send me your like maybe spend some time thinking about your canon. I mean, I've probably seen like at least with like the thing and yeah, but yeah, just think about it and I would love to check out some more and just see kind of yeah. Yeah, uh or even just watch it, try to put myself into that perspective watching it of like, hey, this is a roller coaster. See if you can get into the roller coaster and get off the roller coaster.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:36

Yeah, yeah. And and for me, especially having

The Shining After Marriage And Kids

SPEAKER_01 1:00:40

had a few experiences, you know, uh out shooting photos where uh someone tried to hurt me. Like, I'm like, I still feel a little scared when I go out and shoot.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:51

Yeah, but I'm for those that are like, what the hell is he doing? There's an even an episode we talked about this like two years ago.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:57

A guy coming after me because I took his picture. And uh and I feel that, and I'm like, I can't like that's real to me. Like this could happen, and that makes me appreciate these movies even more because I'm like, oh what a relief, it's just entertainment.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:13

Well, do you we gotta wrap this up because we gotta but I am I'm I'm almost thinking like like do movies where like a child gets hurt or something as a as a plot point, like is that a horror movie in your eyes sometimes? Now, especially now that you I mean obviously you've you have two.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:34

Yeah, yeah. Yes, I mean there is a yes, so I'll give you a like like the like I don't have nightmares, yeah, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:01:41

But like the nightmare for me is when I have a dream or something that yeah, something happens to Audrey, or like that's what will wake me up and I'm like, or like something happens to my mom or something.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:53

And yeah, I mean if I watch something where there's something hurtful toward a kid or kids, uh that would be very difficult to watch. The thing that actually gets me is if I happen to read an article about something that happened like really happened to a kid, yeah, an abusive parent, or you know, you read stories about a kid that was locked up in a closet for quote unquote bad behavior and they're malnourished, all this stuff. I can't read those articles because I just start crying. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:22

Does the shining like child abuse like because I've always like it's interesting you talk to people about the shining, and there's always a different thing that kind of creeps somebody out. And I've heard people, oh, it's the it's just like the losing yourself. It's I've heard people it's the child, it's what he does to the wife, it's the environment. But I don't like I've I've never really thought that's a like scary film. It's always just like an intriguing film. But yeah, did that change notably after you had kids?

SPEAKER_01 1:02:58

Yes, because I like Jack Torrance, and we've talked about this in other episodes, there's like a spec, you know, intense ego, a spectrum of uh narcissism, self-focus, yeah, um, self-importance, all of those things. Yeah. And I while I may not because I think a lot of what Jack ended up doing would have probably happened had he not even gone to the Overlook Hotel. Yeah. Because there were multiple incidences of abuse with his kid. Like he was a he was a monster uh who was so self-involved and so uh desiring of everyone loving him, loving what he made, treating him as the center of their universe, that he would have gone through his kid, his wife, anybody to achieve that if there were some opportunity in the real world. He's like the type of person that kind of does what society expects you to do. You marry the person you've been with for a long time and you have a kid, and you know, there's some benefit that she has to him, whether it's companionship when he wants it, sexual intimacy when he wants it, everything on his terms. That if one of the things that he wrote, if he ever actually finished anything, because he doesn't even write anything in the movie, I'll work and no play. That what the money would do to empower him to even to double down, triple down on that ego and self-importance, the abuse that would then happen there as well.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:42

This is why this is such a good fucking movie, too, because it's like everybody one, like you you have this complete backstory for this character that completely fits this character. And it it's just such an open work. Oh, yeah. It's a mirror to whoever the the viewer is. The protagonist is a mirror to whoever the viewer is.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:03

And so the the the horrible thing about watching that movie after you being married and having kids is when you can see not the possibility of doing what he did, but you see the source of it in yourself. Yeah, yeah. Now you will uh you may react or handle that feeling differently, but you can all you can identify that there's yeah now he let's say he has it, it's it's it's 50% intensity. You know, I might be eight percent of that fifty percent intensity, but the fact that it's even overlapping is like uh yeah, you know, it's it's it's tough.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:45

It's scary, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:46

Yeah, it's scary.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:47

You know, and it's and it's it's probably productive too. I mean, you could like the classical definition of tragedy is taking something that is present in our experience and taking it to a level that you hope you would not like whether that's war, murder, you know, sexual whatever, yeah. Taking it to such a level that it almost desensitize or not desensitizes the thing in you, but makes it takes away all the curiosity. Right. You could say. Well and that's the tragedy doing the work on you.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:23

And that's where Macbeth comes in. The um three sisters show him that you're gonna be you can be king and what he does to obtain it. And I feel like the shining is the same thing. The hotel maybe it doesn't sh and it probably does because he has several moments where he's just freaked out. You know he's he's shining at that time and you know he goes into the room and the beautiful woman he has Lloyd and the thing like he gets a glimpse he gets an idea of what his life could be. Yeah so gross. But he knows that that image of him in the final picture he knows that that life is there. Yeah yeah he just has to make it happen. Yeah and it's the same thing with Macbeth like you can be king and he has to do all these horrible things. Now Shakespeare gives in my opinion Macbeth a bit more of a conscience. Yeah you know is this a dagger I see before me Richard the uh Richard the third or whatever it's yeah yeah um I mean just kills everybody in his in his path kids yeah kills kids like and Macbeth to me is a little bit what I like about Macbeth is Richard the third just seems sort of like he's more evil incarnate to me in that it's he he's not as humanized as Macbeth.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:49

He's way more seductive than in that's what's so scary about it to me is just like you're like God that like this guy is ambitious and seductive.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:58

Yes manipulative and brilliant and you're just like fuck yep but then he's also like yeah he's dragging himself this other big issue which fucks with his ego like mentally I am I am you know this grand person you know all this stuff but I have this yeah he like had to exactly he had to overcome and for all of this it's such a just brilliant stage direction of just like yeah he's kind of fucked up physically and for Jack Torrens his deformity is his family yeah they're what is keeping him and yeah from having what he wants what he thinks he deserves which is to be in the center of that photo middle school party or something he doesn't Jack Torres doesn't even want to write yeah it's just a thing that he can hijack to try to get the life that he feels is out there have you read the Stephen King book?

SPEAKER_03 1:08:52

No. Yeah I haven't either no I want to I have it I think I don't know if I've read any Stephen maybe the Dead Zone I don't think I've read any Stephen King yeah you should you should read the shining and maybe we'll do like a I mean I'm sure it would take like a day to read it's probably not a very long I don't know and maybe it's thicker than I think it is probably take me probably two or three days but yeah I just unless it's a real pay story of like Kubrick chucking books at the wall and so so that's why that movie resonates we'll have to read the the book and see what the original intentions for that character were because I've heard it's very different.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:31

I haven't seen any of the other films or I mean the only version of that I've seen is Kubrick's so yeah the scene that gets me most I know we need to wrap up is Wendy comes in and interrupts his writing and while he behaves very poorly in that situation I identify with his frustration because there have been numerous times where I'm in the zone working and one of the kids or Aaron will come down literally just like that and break me out of the flow.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:02

I'm such a hypocrite about it because I will go interrupt Audrey like 350 yeah I'm just like yeah but then if I'm writing something I'm like yeah I'm like stop looking at yeah like I plus yeah you know when you're writing something especially when you're drafting something yeah you don't want anybody to see that no you're very vulnerable. It's you're very vulnerable you're a lot of times you're just putting it on there and you're just like okay yeah this is not where it needs to be

Creative Work Is Personal And Fragile

SPEAKER_03 1:10:30

well it's like if you start a sculpture like you don't want them coming in to see this freakish mound of stuff like I'm not even like what the hell's that what it's yeah I'm oh I mean I like I I hate hearing about photographers who like when people are going through their negatives. Yeah and it's like yeah I'm just going through their negatives and it's like I just I don't see what they're going for here. It's like yeah fucking leave like leave my negatives alone yeah like like the Gary Winnegrand documentary when they're like I just don't see what he's going for here in the negatives I'm like that's my that's my shining right that's my fucking like stop going through my negatives if you were to ever write something that was alone horrific maybe not horror. Those are interesting through my negatives yeah stop it someone seeing your work unfinished it's not even yeah informed on like just yeah not even remotely close to what your intention I'm just like don't I I mean I don't even like to share stuff yeah that I'm like okay this is pretty pretty dumb but yeah yeah no for sure um yeah I mean I think part of it is too is it's like a personal thing and figuring out where you put up barriers and yeah I don't know but anyways but yeah thanks for thanks for the the uh kind of opening the door on the yeah the horror genre thing I think that actually is a real also I kind of want to watch some pro wrestling yeah let's go takeaway ultimate warrior we gotta go see like a some macho man we gotta go see some like local pro wrestling like I think they do some in Benson in uh the waiting room I'd love to go photograph it too yeah no that's what I'm thinking I bet we could totally we could talk to somebody and just go get it that'd be a really fun project actually it had been a golden afternoon and I remember having the familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer