Speaker 1: The the the the the the the the the the.
Speaker 2: The the.
Speaker 1: The the.
Speaker 2: The the.
Speaker 1: The the the the the the dout the b the
Speaker 1: the the the the the the the the the dout
Speaker 1: the the.
Speaker 3: The Alright, welcome all you chad nerds, dorks, fast boys,
Speaker 3: slow boys. It is time time to reconnect with one
Speaker 3: of our good buddies, Base lit Analyzer. You know him
Speaker 3: from the Internet as the analyzer of literature par excellence.
Speaker 3: He has a channel that will be linked after the stream.
Speaker 3: You can't tag people in the live streams that in
Speaker 3: the titles anymore. I don't know why, but I will.
Speaker 2: Add it later.
Speaker 3: And we're gonna be getting into a couple films that
Speaker 3: I like.
Speaker 4: I actually like both of them.
Speaker 3: I see some people in the chat are already not
Speaker 3: fans of weapons. I thought both films were good, But
Speaker 3: it turns out that BLA has done a previous pretty
Speaker 3: extensive prisoner's analysis. I'm told I didn't actually know he
Speaker 3: did one. I also have added Prisoners to Esoteric Hollywood three.
Speaker 3: So it's a perfect subject for both of us to cover,
Speaker 3: and both of these films have a lot of similarities.
Speaker 3: But before we get to that, BLA, how you doing.
Speaker 2: I'm doing well, man, Thanks for having me. I really
Speaker 2: got a lot to say about these I think that
Speaker 2: I was not a fan of weapons. I have some
Speaker 2: I don't know about Harsh, but I got some things
Speaker 2: to say about it. But I do think these two
Speaker 2: films go together and thematically. And Prisoners, I think is
Speaker 2: an extremely dark film, but it is really well done.
Speaker 2: The New York Times came out with a list of
Speaker 2: the top fifty films of the twenty first century. I
Speaker 2: didn't really agree with the list, so I came out
Speaker 2: with my own and I put Prisoners at number two.
Speaker 4: Oh wow, list, So what was one?
Speaker 2: One was The Passion of the Christ, which is not
Speaker 2: on any lists, and three, I think three was Children
Speaker 2: of Men. There have been a number of really great
Speaker 2: films that there will be blood. There's you know, a
Speaker 2: lot of the ones that you and I both covered
Speaker 2: are are on there. A lot of people forget. The
Speaker 2: weird thing about the list is a lot of people
Speaker 2: look at the list and they totally forget what films
Speaker 2: were made in the twenty first century, because there's been
Speaker 2: a real dearth of great films made of this century, right,
Speaker 2: and and a lot of the great films tend to
Speaker 2: be pretty timeless, but movies maybe the twentieth century, tend
Speaker 2: to be clearly put into a twentieth century category. And
Speaker 2: now we have in the last you know, twenty four
Speaker 2: to twenty five years, we have a whole bunch of
Speaker 2: films that are completely unlike anything I think from the
Speaker 2: twentieth century. And Prisoners is as a lot that it's
Speaker 2: sort of I don't know, you could place it in
Speaker 2: a framework of other films, but it is so dark
Speaker 2: and so new. There's something so new about it that
Speaker 2: I think it really should be placed there. Weapons. On
Speaker 2: the other hand, I mean, we're going to get into it, so,
Speaker 2: but I think that I think that the way the
Speaker 2: films were executed is completely different, and that says something
Speaker 2: about the way that films are made. Now.
Speaker 3: Yeah, let's start with Prisoners, because it is, I agree,
Speaker 3: a better film for sure, and I am a fan
Speaker 3: of it. I remember watching it when it came out,
Speaker 3: I watched it again, and then I recently watched it
Speaker 3: before writing us start calay with three, and that's a
Speaker 3: perfect place to start. Just briefly about Villainieux. I've not
Speaker 3: seen every villain New film.
Speaker 4: I don't like them.
Speaker 1: All.
Speaker 3: I don't like a lot of people like Arrival. I
Speaker 3: think it's a propaganda didn't care for it. Prisoners is
Speaker 3: great enemy. I'm a big fan of that. I think
Speaker 3: it's really good. It's a Caro, really good fan of that.
Speaker 3: I do like Blood Runner twenty forty nine. A lot
Speaker 3: of people don't like those. So before we get into it,
Speaker 3: just briefly, do you like or dislike those that I listed?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that this director, Denny Villeneuve.
Speaker 3: Is well, of course Doune, I love Doune, but go ahead.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think he's one of the great directors working today,
Speaker 2: and he's he's really improved. His movies tend to lead
Speaker 2: on to the next movie. You can you can see
Speaker 2: that they were all kind of leading up to Dune
Speaker 2: and Blade Runner twenty forty nine, of course was It's
Speaker 2: funny because I didn't know what to expect with that.
Speaker 2: I figured it would be good because his films prior
Speaker 2: to that were solid, solid, in a way that most
Speaker 2: directors don't tend to. He has the same sort of template,
Speaker 2: but he reinvents his movies as they go on, and
Speaker 2: I think that Blade Runner twenty forty nine really was
Speaker 2: like a launch pad for the rest of these movies,
Speaker 2: because before that his I mean, when you go back
Speaker 2: to his early films like Insnd's if you've seen that one,
Speaker 2: he was kind of an art house director. A lot
Speaker 2: of great filmmakers start off as art house directors, and
Speaker 2: then they go into his movies go into a real
Speaker 2: twenty first into the twenty first century, and into a
Speaker 2: kind of post apocalyptic or dystopian setting where we look
Speaker 2: at things with a brand new machine to them. I
Speaker 2: did not think that Arrival was Arrival was not in
Speaker 2: my top fifty. I thought Charlie Sheen's The Arrival was
Speaker 2: better than a Rival. I thought that it was like again,
Speaker 2: like you said, it was a total propaganda piece, and
Speaker 2: you know, it had Jiji and Pang, you know, saving
Speaker 2: the world at the end of the Gnostic Egg, and
Speaker 2: it was too I think the reason it was not good, though,
Speaker 2: aside from all that, was that it was too sentimental.
Speaker 2: There was too much sentimentality, and the film was like
Speaker 2: sacarine and saturated, and that plays to a section of
Speaker 2: the audience. I think that sort of relies on that
Speaker 2: sort of thing. But but the rest of the movies
Speaker 2: are hard. I mean, Sacario is like a sick movie.
Speaker 2: That movie is awesome.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And so later on and then Dune. I mean I
Speaker 2: I was very hesitant about Dune when I first sawt
Speaker 2: I actually saw it like four times before I really
Speaker 2: liked the film for some reason. And then I was
Speaker 2: I was sick one day and a friend of mine
Speaker 2: was like, dude, just if you're sick, just sit there
Speaker 2: and watch Dune. Just watch it all day. And I did,
Speaker 2: and it totally changed my mind about the movie. And
Speaker 2: we went to see into and there was a lady.
Speaker 2: There was a black lady in the front with a
Speaker 2: sleeping bag in the in the movie theater, and I
Speaker 2: was like, what is this? Is she living here or something?
Speaker 2: And then she like rolled up into the sleeping bag
Speaker 2: and she was all about she was like, was the
Speaker 2: Dune Worm.
Speaker 3: I was gonna say, you just you found out that
Speaker 3: she was the worm? She was the the worm Emperor. Yeah, Alito,
Speaker 3: the worm Emperor.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, Lisa, and I've got you. But she was
Speaker 2: yelling at in the theater and and I thought it
Speaker 2: was awesome. I thought it was really really cool. Uh.
Speaker 2: And so you know this this one, I remember seeing
Speaker 2: this one in the theater and this is one of
Speaker 2: his kind of earlier works, and I didn't really know
Speaker 2: what to expect going into I know, it was like
Speaker 2: Jake Jill and Hall. I like his movies, you know whatever.
Speaker 2: So I went to see it because the previews didn't
Speaker 2: really indicate what this movie was going to be about,
Speaker 2: and it was. So it's so much darker than you
Speaker 2: could have imagined walking into it for the first time.
Speaker 2: I mean, it really is pretty incredible. It's a pretty
Speaker 2: it plumbs the deaths.
Speaker 3: So yeah, let's start with Prisoners and then we'll get
Speaker 3: to Weapons because Weapons is more recent, kind of more
Speaker 3: in the in the popular zeitgeist, because it was a
Speaker 3: success to the box office and critically speaking. So I
Speaker 3: remember going to see Prisoners, and just like you said,
Speaker 3: it was way darker than I expected. And I remember
Speaker 3: one of the reasons I went to see it was
Speaker 3: because at the time when it came out, Lord Voldemort
Speaker 3: mentioned it because he said, you.
Speaker 2: Either got this new movie out.
Speaker 4: And the villain is called Alice Jones. Okay, the villain
Speaker 4: in the movie is named after.
Speaker 3: Me, folks, that's not accidental. And of course Paul Dano
Speaker 3: is playing a sort of villain named Alex Jones and
Speaker 3: I don't. I think it's interesting. I don't know if
Speaker 3: they really intentionally did that. It's possible, but that was
Speaker 3: the thing that made me think at the time, I
Speaker 3: need to go see this, and I think I'm thinking, okay,
Speaker 3: this is some sort of murder mystery. And as you noted,
Speaker 3: I'm sure most people in the audience have already seen this.
Speaker 3: It does end up being way darker. I think you
Speaker 3: could argue is it is a kind of a cult film,
Speaker 3: although the occult or the Satanic is not explicit in
Speaker 3: the film, because we end up thinking maybe they're just
Speaker 3: angry boomer atheists now who are going to teach everyone
Speaker 3: a lesson due to you know, the death of their
Speaker 3: of their their child. But then we have all these
Speaker 3: other elements that seem to come in, like mind control,
Speaker 3: a trauma based mind control, ritual abuse, the programming through mazes,
Speaker 3: and the use of mazes. So it definitely goes, as
Speaker 3: you said, in a very dark direction. I think a
Speaker 3: few people noticed, and I'm not sure what to make
Speaker 3: of this, but Jillenhall does wear a prominent free Masonic
Speaker 3: ring in the movie as a detective, So so yeah,
Speaker 3: going into it, you think that it's one thing, and
Speaker 3: I think everybody was kind of surprised.
Speaker 4: There was also an.
Speaker 3: Interesting theme very early on in the film between you know,
Speaker 3: Hugh Jackman being the father who loses the daughter and
Speaker 3: then of course almost loses his own life, but he's
Speaker 3: a prepper, and they make specific reference to various Christian
Speaker 3: sort of evangelical principles when he's taking his son hunting
Speaker 3: at the very beginning, and you go down and you
Speaker 3: see the basement and he's got all this prepper gear everywhere.
Speaker 3: When I saw that initially, I was like, oh, here
Speaker 3: we go. We're going to have you know, everybody who's
Speaker 3: a Christian is some sort of evil idiot, you know,
Speaker 3: fundamentalist into the world prepper. It didn't exactly go in
Speaker 3: that direction. There's a little bit of it though, because
Speaker 3: of course, when the daughter is shown gone and she's disappeared,
Speaker 3: this sort of sends Hugh Jackman into a rage and
Speaker 3: he becomes a kind of vigilante where he wants to
Speaker 3: exact his own justice, his own venge. He's going to
Speaker 3: you know, waterboard and torture Paul Dano until Alex Jones
Speaker 3: until he gets the information out that he wants. But
Speaker 3: the thing that I think rescued it from that anti
Speaker 3: sort of Christian perspective or anti fundamentals perspective was that, well,
Speaker 3: Huge Agmen is actually kind of right, right. It's almost
Speaker 3: like everybody who's kind of on the trail just kind
Speaker 3: of has a piece of the puzzle, and we as
Speaker 3: the audience are kind of on the journey of a maze,
Speaker 3: and so the movie is a kind of amaze and
Speaker 3: we're trying to figure it out, and we all kind
Speaker 3: of have these pieces of the puzzle. But as we
Speaker 3: notice with Jillen Hall, which we'll mention in a moment,
Speaker 3: sometimes the things that are sort of the the key
Speaker 3: elements of the puzzle or the things that put the puzzle.
Speaker 4: Together, they're actually in our face the whole time.
Speaker 3: And that's what Jillen Hall mentions, and I'll let you
Speaker 3: give your take.
Speaker 2: Well, we have different characters who are lost in different
Speaker 2: sections of the maze and they don't don't know that
Speaker 2: they're in them, and we see this, you know, we
Speaker 2: see it on the medallion, a kind of talisman from
Speaker 2: the guy that.
Speaker 3: They exactly well, he's a Catholic priest who has actually
Speaker 3: abused boys.
Speaker 2: Well, the Catholic priest. So so there are different layers
Speaker 2: to the maze. It's and that's interesting because when Jillen
Speaker 2: All breaks into David Desmalchian's house and he sees the
Speaker 2: the whole house is covered in a maze. And and
Speaker 2: that's when I think the movie really conveys to the
Speaker 2: audience that there's no escaping the maze, that it's just
Speaker 2: a continuous maze until he finds the this book that
Speaker 2: says if you find this, then you can make your
Speaker 2: way out. So then we realize that there is one
Speaker 2: character who's made his way out of the maze, but
Speaker 2: it seems to be by design. Then we find ourselves
Speaker 2: in along the journey, like you were saying, with different
Speaker 2: pieces of it. We find that at one point Jillen
Speaker 2: Hall has nothing to do, so he, you know, he
Speaker 2: starts knocking on doors of all the offenders in the
Speaker 2: region and then he in the in the zone, and
Speaker 2: then he finds this Catholic priest. Catholic priest is seemingly
Speaker 2: in his own maze of guilt and alcoholism and creeperdom,
Speaker 2: and he's face lying, face down in his own house.
Speaker 2: And then we go behind the fridge into an abyss.
Speaker 2: We find this this other section of the house that's
Speaker 2: in a basement, which is mirroring the later outside prison
Speaker 2: under the car at the Demon Woman's house. But when
Speaker 2: we go down there, we see this guy tied up
Speaker 2: in a chair and we're wondering, who, wonder who is
Speaker 2: this and that so we learned that that guy is
Speaker 2: the guy in the picture who is the Boomerstock guy
Speaker 2: who has the medallion on with the Winnebago who went
Speaker 2: to the priest to offer his confession and says that
Speaker 2: he has on alived sixteen human people. We'll say, and
Speaker 2: so apparently there's there's even layers of creeps in the movie.
Speaker 2: There's the creep and then there's the creep who is
Speaker 2: even worse that he left tied up down in the
Speaker 2: biss and he tries to tell the cops this is
Speaker 2: what happened, but he's also lost it. He's also kind
Speaker 2: of catatonic, like Paul Danna's character is. We see we
Speaker 2: see characters who return to the crime scene. We have
Speaker 2: the character who returns to the vigil. We have characters
Speaker 2: who return to the house. We have red herrings. But
Speaker 2: all of what's interesting about this movie is that it's
Speaker 2: not like the normal. It's not like Sherlock Holmes the
Speaker 2: End detective story or a murder mystery where there are
Speaker 2: red herrings and we're supposed to think it's one person,
Speaker 2: and we we know the whole time it's not Hugh Jackman.
Speaker 2: But Jillenhall also seems to know that it's not him,
Speaker 2: but he still has to follow him, and by following him,
Speaker 2: he ends up learning the truth of who the character is.
Speaker 2: He's like you said, he's also Hugh Jackman's character is
Speaker 2: also right, because this sort of is where I think
Speaker 2: the movie represents different layers of how complex humanity is.
Speaker 2: Because the main the reaction I think that most people
Speaker 2: would have right away when their kid goes missing is
Speaker 2: exactly what Hugh Jackman does. He goes insane. And that's
Speaker 2: one thing I think that show. It's sort of lacking
Speaker 2: that we don't see that in news stories. A lot
Speaker 2: of times. We don't see people a lot of times.
Speaker 2: You know, you get the you get the dad of
Speaker 2: the person, and they come up and they're all calm,
Speaker 2: and they give a speech and it's been a day.
Speaker 2: In this one, Hugh Jackman is insane. He waits for
Speaker 2: Paul Dano to get released, and he attacks him physically
Speaker 2: in the parking lot. Then he goes and takes the
Speaker 2: law into his own hands because he thinks that nobody
Speaker 2: else is doing it. But then what what happens with
Speaker 2: that is that he ends up in his own prison
Speaker 2: and he realizes. I think that throughout the thing that
Speaker 2: that there's a scene where he gets on his knees
Speaker 2: and he prays, and he's saying the Lord's prayer, but
Speaker 2: he can't say forgive us those who trespass against us
Speaker 2: because he's he's locked up, because he's got this guy
Speaker 2: who's locked up in a waterboard closet. And the again,
Speaker 2: the irony is that he himself is going to end
Speaker 2: up in almost the same exact pay.
Speaker 3: Each each character, in many ways is in some kind
Speaker 3: of a prison.
Speaker 2: That's right, and I think that the only are The
Speaker 2: way that the audience is supposed to maneuver through the
Speaker 2: maze is obviously through the person of Jake Jillen Hall.
Speaker 2: And that's interesting because because jill and Hall, his character
Speaker 2: who's Detective Loki, which you know, the names are significant
Speaker 2: in this movie. He's a kind of uh, he's not
Speaker 2: a he's not a trickster, but he's kind of navigating
Speaker 2: between two worlds. And I think that's the deal with
Speaker 2: the occult symbolism and the you know, he's got a
Speaker 2: his neck tattoo, it's like it's not a black sun,
Speaker 2: it's not a sun wheel, but it's like a sun
Speaker 2: with a cross in it. And then he's got the
Speaker 2: Masonic ring. He's got runes tattooed on his Speaking of runes,
Speaker 2: he's got runes tattooed on his on his knuckles. And
Speaker 2: I think this shows that he's kind of a liminal character.
Speaker 2: He's like a psychopomp. He's he's marked, and he's coded
Speaker 2: with occult symbolism. So he's navigating between the Christian world
Speaker 2: of Hugh Jackman's family life and the satanic world of
Speaker 2: the bad people. But he's our guide through the through
Speaker 2: the dark spaces of the film.
Speaker 4: Yeah, excellent point, excellent bringing.
Speaker 3: I think also it's worth mentioning, as I put in
Speaker 3: a strikeli with three that and I don't know if
Speaker 3: this is the case, but the film also perhaps draws
Speaker 3: upon real events and crimes like the Franklin cover up. Yeah, well, yeah,
Speaker 3: the first thing reminding of was, you know, Nick Bryant's
Speaker 3: Franklin Scandal book, and of course there's a there was
Speaker 3: a connection between boys town h and Catholic charities and
Speaker 3: so forth that were being used to supply male street
Speaker 3: children to politicians and elites. Although this film doesn't directly
Speaker 3: implicate political figures, again, it just sort of bear bears
Speaker 3: similarities in parallels to some of these real cases. And
Speaker 3: I even mentioned the McMartin preschool case, which also I
Speaker 3: think could be perhaps an influence on the story, all
Speaker 3: of which is real, all which is very sused, especially
Speaker 3: when the FBI declassified the Martin case stuff, and a
Speaker 3: lot of what Ted Gunnerson had said was actually vindicated.
Speaker 3: That there were tunnels, which the media and everybody made
Speaker 3: fun of, so that was all crazy, satanic panic stuff.
Speaker 4: But some of these.
Speaker 3: Elements are actually are actually real, So it's important not
Speaker 3: to overcorrect and go in some other direction.
Speaker 4: So I did want to ask you that.
Speaker 3: Because I noted that you know Loki has the the Runes,
Speaker 3: he has these marks, and of course, obviously Loki from
Speaker 3: Nordic mythology, what was the significance that you give to
Speaker 3: Gillenhall's character being Loki the only significance.
Speaker 2: I think is that one of the major things that
Speaker 2: sticks out to me is there's a scene when we
Speaker 2: see him from above and behind and he's got his
Speaker 2: hands on his head and he's sort of looking at
Speaker 2: pictures that he spread out out in front of him.
Speaker 2: So we're supposed to see what he's you know, our
Speaker 2: point of view is that we're seeing him, and we're
Speaker 2: seeing his point of view, and he when he puts
Speaker 2: his hands on his head, we see that his knuckles
Speaker 2: are tattooed with ruins and and and things from the
Speaker 2: UH and astrological symbols. But the one that really sticks
Speaker 2: out is he has an Odell run, which kind of
Speaker 2: looks like a like a like a ribbon, you know,
Speaker 2: that you would tie on your on your lapel. It's
Speaker 2: called the Odell run and it signifies heritage. And I
Speaker 2: think that this is also in political circles, can't I
Speaker 2: mean careful, but but his uh the rune signifies heritage,
Speaker 2: and that that that comes back into play when he's
Speaker 2: talking to the priest and he says that he grew
Speaker 2: you know, he spent three years in uh can Core
Speaker 2: a boy's home or something like that, so he knows
Speaker 2: what the priest is up to. He knows how to
Speaker 2: navigate the world. He knows he also it's it's funny
Speaker 2: because we see him in this dark place, but we
Speaker 2: also see that he has something to unlock the way
Speaker 2: that these people are. In other words, he when he's
Speaker 2: talking to the wife, when he when he first I
Speaker 2: think one of the key scenes is that when he
Speaker 2: goes into the house to first talk to the wife,
Speaker 2: and the wife asked him if he has children. He
Speaker 2: doesn't answer the question, but he stands up and he says,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna find your daughter, and that makes him some
Speaker 2: sort of charged character. He's a he's a marked care
Speaker 2: he's almost like a psychopomp because he knows how to
Speaker 2: navigate the world, but he also knows how to bring
Speaker 2: her out of it somehow, and we believe, we don't realize.
Speaker 2: I think till the end of the film that we
Speaker 2: believe that he's going to catch her. And this is
Speaker 2: so unlike reality. It seems to be truthful but not
Speaker 2: factual because the the you know, when when someone goes
Speaker 2: missing for twenty four hours, it's like the twenty four
Speaker 2: hours is up, then the seven days is up, and
Speaker 2: we're almost never gonna find him, but we believe that
Speaker 2: he's going to find him, and then he does.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 2: But it also means that Jake Jillanall I think is
Speaker 2: one of the even though he's sort of mediating between
Speaker 2: these two layers of consciousness or spiritual realms, he also
Speaker 2: is a character that I think we watched the film
Speaker 2: and we he's He's like the most truthful character. He's pure.
Speaker 2: He never sees he eats one time at the beginning
Speaker 2: of the film. We never see him sleep. He tells
Speaker 2: the boss, you know, you could have told me that
Speaker 2: you could have told me they were gonna be there,
Speaker 2: I would have stayed up all night. At the end
Speaker 2: of the film, he's still the case is closed and
Speaker 2: he's still up in the freezing in the cold. Afterwards,
Speaker 2: he's in the car. He's got blood on his face,
Speaker 2: covering one eye. He's you feel like he's blind. But
Speaker 2: he's still going to get the girl to the hospital.
Speaker 2: And he seems to be the only character which is
Speaker 2: different from Hugh Jackman, because Hugh Jackman's character becomes reckless
Speaker 2: and starts to break his own code. You can feel
Speaker 2: with Hugh Jackman that he knows that what he's doing
Speaker 2: is wrong, and that he ends up in an unchristian
Speaker 2: place and that he's forgotten that the Lord says vengeance's
Speaker 2: mine because he he wants to do anything to save
Speaker 2: his daughter, but he crosses the line at some point.
Speaker 2: And the weird thing about that is that he's actually
Speaker 2: right in a way, because the Alice Jones character, it
Speaker 2: is funny every time his name comes up in the thing.
Speaker 2: And I don't know if they knew. I don't know
Speaker 2: if they knew that because this is like twenty thirteen,
Speaker 2: so I don't know, but it seems like they would.
Speaker 2: It would be obvious that they would know what they
Speaker 2: were doing. But when he attacks Paul Dana's character in
Speaker 2: the parking lot, he's he tells him, you know, he
Speaker 2: was there with the girls. Later on he's singing the
Speaker 2: Batman song. He finally ends up telling him secrets from
Speaker 2: his waterboarding closet, and he knows where they are, but
Speaker 2: it took him that far to get to to get
Speaker 2: something out of him, And then you're like, well, this
Speaker 2: guy's also locked in some sort of person if he's
Speaker 2: a Johnny Gosh character, which we find out he was
Speaker 2: taken from his home when he was little. He gets
Speaker 2: reunited with his mother at the end, but he's also
Speaker 2: completely fractured in dissociated. He doesn't even seem to know
Speaker 2: where he is, but he also holds He also holds
Speaker 2: he's not just a victim in the movie Great. He
Speaker 2: is a grown man and he does make decisions in
Speaker 2: the film, even though it seems like he's completely out
Speaker 2: of his mind. So he may not face some sort
Speaker 2: of criminal justice, but he seems to face a divine
Speaker 2: justice in the film, which seems to work through Hugh Jackman.
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, we noticed that the Dano character. When Jackman
Speaker 3: eventually walls him up in that abandoned place and makes
Speaker 3: just a tiny hole and he's able to use the
Speaker 3: shower and turn the water up and all that, it's
Speaker 3: almost as if Dano returning to the type of underground
Speaker 3: darkness abyss place which he had originally been in, as
Speaker 3: all the kids that were taken were put into this
Speaker 3: labyrinth scenario. This triggers him to kind of eventually maybe
Speaker 3: come back to his actual core personality where he remembers
Speaker 3: the whole thing, and at one point he actually gives
Speaker 3: the information to Hugh Jackman about you know what's actually
Speaker 3: going on. I'm not saying it was good or right.
Speaker 3: I'm just saying that this seems to be what's going
Speaker 3: on is that he kind of returns to that place
Speaker 3: of the cave or the labyrinth or the abyss or
Speaker 3: what the underworld, which is where we find out ultimately
Speaker 3: the kids end up being put in this underground place
Speaker 3: to especially my control them or trauma based my control them,
Speaker 3: to make them into these sort of controlled operatives of
Speaker 3: these two evil hippies exippies.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's there's also a real there's a moral ambiguity
Speaker 2: that occurs when they take off the hood and they
Speaker 2: see what they've done to this character. I mean they
Speaker 2: really you know, you understand what is what Hugh Jackline's
Speaker 2: character is doing, but they've also crossed the line into
Speaker 2: something that seems to be working this they're actually working
Speaker 2: the very thing that the Satanic Lady intended, which is
Speaker 2: she says at.
Speaker 3: The end of the key to act that way and
Speaker 3: to realize, just in the rage, to realize there's not
Speaker 3: a God.
Speaker 2: Yes, and the the the key line for the folks
Speaker 2: at home is when we find out why all this occurred,
Speaker 2: and it's at the end of the movie, when Melissa Leo,
Speaker 2: the Satanic lady, says that their war is a war
Speaker 2: against God, and she says that their most this is
Speaker 2: real Miltonian satanic level stuff. She says that their purpose
Speaker 2: was to break people's faith, so it's specifically aimed at
Speaker 2: people like Hugh Jackman, and and she actually succeeds. For
Speaker 2: most of the film, she doesn't fully succeed, but in
Speaker 2: fact she succeeds to the point where she seems to
Speaker 2: break him, but he's but in the midst of prayer,
Speaker 2: and then later on he subverts his faith to return
Speaker 2: to her house as a carpenter by the way to say, oh,
Speaker 2: I'm here to do an act penance and charity, but
Speaker 2: it's simply to find his daughter. So there's a there's
Speaker 2: like a real there are layers of nuance and ambiguity
Speaker 2: with with what's happening. I think one of the other
Speaker 2: key scenes is when Terrence Howard's wife they bring her
Speaker 2: to see what's happened. She sees this man they've made
Speaker 2: into a hell bound mutant. I mean, he's just totally broken,
Speaker 2: and her response is like keep going. Yeah, she she's
Speaker 2: horrified at first, but she says basically keep going. She
Speaker 2: she kind of I mean Terrence Howard has been helping
Speaker 2: Hugh Jackman with the thing, but she provides an impetus
Speaker 2: to keep going and keep doing what they're doing, which
Speaker 2: is which is another layer. I think in the movie
Speaker 2: that is unforeseen and totally crazy. We never see that
Speaker 2: in movies. In fact, it goes so far that that
Speaker 2: Hugh Jackman ends up leaving the hospital running away. There's
Speaker 2: all sorts of things. There's the alcoholism right that that.
Speaker 2: There's the house. There's this father had committed suicide. There's
Speaker 2: there's the the relationship with his son. He ends up
Speaker 2: turning on his son in a way. He tells his son,
Speaker 2: you're gonna be the man of the house, but then
Speaker 2: he turns on him. And you notice that when that happens,
Speaker 2: when he turns out of the house, he knocks over
Speaker 2: the girl's dollhouse as if their whole house has been
Speaker 2: UH toppled toppled over. There's the violation of the house
Speaker 2: where the guy sneaks into the houses UH. In this
Speaker 2: act of UH, he's trying to recreate the events that
Speaker 2: have happened to him. There are the snakes and the serpents,
Speaker 2: that crawl over everybody. There's the relationship with Jake Jalen
Speaker 2: Hall between his boss where you know, this is a
Speaker 2: unique movie again because we always have the boss who's like,
Speaker 2: you know, you're you're five days from retirement, or who's like, uh,
Speaker 2: you know, you can't keep doing this, you're breaking theles,
Speaker 2: and this one he tells his boss, fuck you, I'm
Speaker 2: gonna you know, you should have done this, and I'm
Speaker 2: gonna keep doing what I'm doing. In the boss was like, okay,
Speaker 2: I trust you, keep going with it. So, uh yeah,
Speaker 2: it's really fantastic. I mean, it's so long. It doesn't
Speaker 2: seem like it would be so long like that. How
Speaker 2: how are they going to catch these these kids and
Speaker 2: they the fact that one of them runs away and
Speaker 2: get saved by the way at the end of the movie,
Speaker 2: which mirrors the which mirrors the Desmalcian character who had
Speaker 2: run away and who is now recreating his life in
Speaker 2: this in this cult is another thing that we just
Speaker 2: don't see in films.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I think also it's worth mentioning labyrinths and labyrinth y symbology.
Speaker 3: In the ancient Egyptian world, the labyrinth was an image
Speaker 3: of the Underworld. The film has a lot of layers
Speaker 3: like that as well, as you mentioned, with different labyrinths,
Speaker 3: and as you get to one point of the labyrinth,
Speaker 3: you think you figured it out, and there's actually another layer,
Speaker 3: another level of you know, this concentric circles getting to
Speaker 3: the center of the labyrinth. Greek mythology, you know, the subconscious,
Speaker 3: the unconscious, the.
Speaker 4: Darkn man of the id.
Speaker 3: The Middle Ages labyrinth symbology dealt with the idea that
Speaker 3: this whole life was a maze that we're going through
Speaker 3: to get to the aft life. And so the maze
Speaker 3: is a lot of neoplatonic images and symbols, taking us
Speaker 3: back to the one to utilize some of the neoplatonic
Speaker 3: philosophy of medieval maze theology, and then we get to
Speaker 3: more modern and sort of esoteric, hermatic, occultic, or even
Speaker 3: satanic uses of it, which here could apply, as we've
Speaker 3: said already, to various characters being imprisoned. They themselves are
Speaker 3: prisoners within this maze, and we are also on the journey,
Speaker 3: as you said with Jillen Hall, just to solve it,
Speaker 3: and the overall goal that this is, I think the
Speaker 3: big twist that nobody expected was these elderly hippies who
Speaker 3: had undergone I think they lost their son or something,
Speaker 3: but at one point they seem to have been sort
Speaker 3: of Jesus freak people, almost like maybe they were Jesus.
Speaker 3: You know, the Jesus Revolution in the nineteen sixties, the
Speaker 3: Jesus People of California, who many of these hippies had
Speaker 3: converted through evangelical movements, is actually the origin of the
Speaker 3: Calvary Chapel denomination, the vineyard movements. They all come out
Speaker 3: of the nineteen sixties and seventies Jesus People's stuff, and
Speaker 3: so we get the impression that maybe even these people
Speaker 3: were of that ilk and then they decided they turned
Speaker 3: a vendetta against God after that they had had something
Speaker 3: bad happened to their child and set them on this
Speaker 3: course to wake up everyone else that there's no God,
Speaker 3: which again really kind of only suggests Satanism to me,
Speaker 3: because if you're an atheist and you've come to the
Speaker 3: conclusion there's no God and nothing matters, who cares about
Speaker 3: a quest? Why do you care about a quest? You know,
Speaker 3: to convince everyone else. You're not going to convince everyone else, right, So,
Speaker 3: a very serious, committed atheist would just assume that everybody's
Speaker 3: everybody's everyone's dumb, and they're going to believe their delusions.
Speaker 3: There's no point or purpose really in exercising this vendetta
Speaker 3: unless there's something that you think you're getting out of it.
Speaker 3: But here they're not getting famous. They're not doing anything
Speaker 3: other than causing very heinous traumatic actions to happen, as quote,
Speaker 3: a war against God, which again suggests more of a
Speaker 3: satanic approach.
Speaker 4: And even though the film.
Speaker 3: Doesn't explicitly mention the satanic, they do when they when
Speaker 3: they go to what was the guy's name that the
Speaker 3: guys uh that has the this recreating his whole background Bob. Yeah.
Speaker 3: When they go to his his sort of hovel that
Speaker 3: he's living in, Uh, they they find books and texts
Speaker 3: that actually are shown on screen that discuss you know,
Speaker 3: like I forget the exact term, I put it.
Speaker 2: In the in My Visible Man, The Invisible Man.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and there's I think there's something also that's shown
Speaker 3: that mentions like mind control or trauma or something like that.
Speaker 2: Yeah. The detective has read the book Jake Killenhall, and
Speaker 2: he says it involves mind control and trauma.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And again you know, we think that this is going
Speaker 3: in one direction and it just like amazed, Oh, we
Speaker 3: actually get turned around in the other direction. And that
Speaker 3: was a good foil, right, because we were thinking, oh,
Speaker 3: this is the guy, you know, he's the weird creeper,
Speaker 3: but we're taken out of that into other directions. I
Speaker 3: think it's I think it's interesting that it mentions in
Speaker 3: the context of the mind control and all that, the
Speaker 3: cocktail of I forget what it was like LSD and academy.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so they actually talk about the.
Speaker 3: Cocktail that's used, which actually, again, when you talk about
Speaker 3: LSD and that kind of stuff, you're talking about CIA
Speaker 3: based mind control, you're talking about things like the Finders. Again,
Speaker 3: this might also bear a lot of similarities to the Finder's.
Speaker 4: Case as well, if you're from ELI.
Speaker 2: With that. The the black goo drink that they make
Speaker 2: them drink reminded me of the scene where Nick Cage
Speaker 2: ends up with the LSD maker and Mandy. It was
Speaker 2: like the same exact you know, hyper LSD drink, right,
Speaker 2: And and I see the movie as I didn't see
Speaker 2: it as as atheistic so much as theistic satanism.
Speaker 4: Yeah that's what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they don't mention it in the movie, but it
Speaker 2: has all the hallmarks of of I mean, it's really
Speaker 2: it's it's Miltonian, it's Dante and uh one, you know,
Speaker 2: it's I'm stealing this. But the difference between but C. S.
Speaker 2: Lewis says that the difference between Dante's Inferno and T. S.
Speaker 2: Elliott's Wasteland is that the wasteland is where you trudge
Speaker 2: through the wasteland, but it's truly a wasteland. It's a wasteland.
Speaker 2: Getting through it, it becomes ugly, whereas going down the
Speaker 2: Nine Circles, crossing the Abyss into the Ninth Circle in
Speaker 2: Dante is beauty. It's it's hellish, but there's a kind
Speaker 2: of a terrible beauty to it. And two of the
Speaker 2: characters that he comes across in the Inferno are Minos
Speaker 2: and the Minotaur. And it's worth mentioning that the minotaur
Speaker 2: is at the center of the maze and his fed children,
Speaker 2: so he doesn't kill Minos. And this this bring this
Speaker 2: brings to mind the Shining for me, because Jack is
Speaker 2: lost in the maze at the end of the Shining
Speaker 2: and he is trying to you know, DNA. He's trying
Speaker 2: to trap Danny in the maze. He becomes a beast character.
Speaker 2: And the interesting thing about this movie is that the
Speaker 2: beasts are all hidden, and it has all the hallmarks
Speaker 2: of Book one of Paradise Lost, because Satan says at
Speaker 2: the beginning of the book that you know, the reason
Speaker 2: the serpent makes its way into Creation is because Satan
Speaker 2: hears about this thing called creation above them after the
Speaker 2: war and heaven, and so he makes his way up
Speaker 2: as the serpent to try and invert, subvert and pervert
Speaker 2: God's creation any way they can. They're gonna heap sin
Speaker 2: upon them forever by doing this. And the person who
Speaker 2: is his confidant is beels Above. And in the scene
Speaker 2: where he goes into Bob's house and it's covered in
Speaker 2: mazes everywhere, he uncovers these snakes, black snakes all over
Speaker 2: the house, and he finds a beels Above pigs head
Speaker 2: in the sink. So there are flies, the Lord of
Speaker 2: the flies. There are flies everywhere. And like you said,
Speaker 2: you know, it's sort of a red herring in the
Speaker 2: sense that we think that he has the children's clothes
Speaker 2: and accoutrama, and instead it ends up that that's what
Speaker 2: he was doing breaking into the house so he can
Speaker 2: recreate this. Also, they dig up the yard and they
Speaker 2: find mannequins with their faces caved in real satanic shit,
Speaker 2: which is obviously supposed to mimic what he saw in
Speaker 2: real life when they were in this basement of this house.
Speaker 2: The other thing is that, unlike a lot of other
Speaker 2: movies where we have this sort of satanic ambiance atmosphere,
Speaker 2: like eyes Wide shut or something, where there's like a
Speaker 2: sheen to it, and we have these elites and they're
Speaker 2: all rich, this is full of working class people in
Speaker 2: rural Pennsylvania. It's all rainy, it's dark, it's gritty the
Speaker 2: whole time. And these are like normal, normal, steaming people.
Speaker 2: So the war, the the satanic war that they're waging
Speaker 2: on these normal people, seems to be magnified in that sense.
Speaker 2: I think they don't they're not even around to see
Speaker 2: what the harm that they've caused with these people.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think this is a grim's fairy tale kind
Speaker 3: of element going on with actually with both films weapons
Speaker 3: and with this because you have this friendly, kindly seeming
Speaker 3: grandmother character who's actually the old witch that you know
Speaker 3: in the story, like she's throwing the little kids in
Speaker 3: the oven. We'll get a similar type of approach to
Speaker 3: this sort of middle class spiritual warfare that's going on
Speaker 3: in Middle America in Weapons. And like you said, in
Speaker 3: both films, we don't have you know, high power billionaires
Speaker 3: that Tom Coomb is encountering in states with the Mask.
Speaker 3: We have working class people, grandmas. And so that's another
Speaker 3: element which I think makes it maybe even creepier in
Speaker 3: both films is because we have the presence and power
Speaker 3: of a kind of witchcraft you could say, at the local, Midwest,
Speaker 3: small town level, not at you know, Bill Harford's upstate
Speaker 3: New York invitation only elite party.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Instead of back mask Joscelyn Pook backwards orthodox chanting
Speaker 2: in a you know, insane Crowley and sex ceremony, we
Speaker 2: get Jesus songs in a Winnebago from a mind altered,
Speaker 2: mind shattered Johnny Gosh character each Alex John's, which is crazy.
Speaker 2: The one one of the differences between these two films
Speaker 2: is that I don't think it's necessarily a strength for
Speaker 2: movies to go for realism. It's not it's not realism
Speaker 2: or facts that sort of convey or you know, truth
Speaker 2: or make for a more truthful movie experience. But I
Speaker 2: think the there is something about the logistics of human life.
Speaker 2: And one thing I like about Prisoners is that it
Speaker 2: happens on Thanksgiving Day, we see Christmas lights come out.
Speaker 2: It all is linear. It takes place in a we
Speaker 2: have day to day suffering. When we see the woman
Speaker 2: in bed, you know, all knocked out on xanax or whatever,
Speaker 2: we know that she's been in bed the whole time,
Speaker 2: like she hasn't gotten up, which she finally gets up
Speaker 2: it's been three days or whatever. In Weapons, I think
Speaker 2: what's weird is that when the children disappear and we
Speaker 2: start to see again, we see another carpenter sort of figure.
Speaker 2: We see Josh Brolin as this as a contractor. We
Speaker 2: see him go to this broken house again. The house.
Speaker 2: The house in films, in literature always serves as an
Speaker 2: exterior model of the character's inner psyche and how together
Speaker 2: they are. But it's like there's a scene where he's
Speaker 2: sitting there and his wife comes in. He know's asleep
Speaker 2: in his kids bed, the kid's gone, he's pining for kid.
Speaker 2: His wife comes in and goes, I'm going to I'm
Speaker 2: going to work, and he's like okay, and he gets
Speaker 2: up and he goes to work. And it makes you wonder.
Speaker 2: It's like, well, you still have to live your normal life.
Speaker 2: You still have to keep living. You probably, you know,
Speaker 2: you can only be away from work for so long.
Speaker 2: You you gotta still pay the bills. But what does
Speaker 2: it look like when you do that? And it seems
Speaker 2: that Josh Brolin does start playing detective like the other
Speaker 2: characters do, but there seems to be something lost, almost
Speaker 2: as if the characters are cold. They don't have the
Speaker 2: kind of burning fire to find the truth that they
Speaker 2: do in Prisoners. But maybe that speaks to the war
Speaker 2: that the witch is making on people, and and you know,
Speaker 2: or the way modern life, for contemporary life is cold.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure, but that one bothered me. That bothered
Speaker 2: me in the movie. It bothered me that the you know,
Speaker 2: of course, the teacher lady goes straight to the liquor
Speaker 2: store and she's buying liquor and then she goes in
Speaker 2: the house. And but it bothered me, like, like how
Speaker 2: there's a knock on her door and she's like, who's
Speaker 2: knocking at the door. She walks outside, and she walks
Speaker 2: through the door and walks all the way to the
Speaker 2: street without looking to the left and right, like somebody
Speaker 2: could come into the house. Those sorts of logistical things
Speaker 2: in movies really bother me. We don't have that in Prisoners,
Speaker 2: but we do have it in Weapons. But I thought Weapons,
Speaker 2: you know, I thought Weapons was a much darker and
Speaker 2: away movie because both movies involve children. It always bothers
Speaker 2: me in movies when you have characters who are playing children,
Speaker 2: and they are children, so you have to cast children
Speaker 2: to play the children. But the only thing that the
Speaker 2: children go through the actors and Prisoners is like the
Speaker 2: little girl comes in on the wheelchair at the end,
Speaker 2: and she kind of says by and leaves, and that's
Speaker 2: we don't really see them much. The rest is about
Speaker 2: how people deal with the fact they're gone. But in Weapons,
Speaker 2: we continuously see the children. I mean, you have children
Speaker 2: locked in this basement, You have children chasing the witch
Speaker 2: at the end, and then they use the children to
Speaker 2: tear the witch apart at the end of the film.
Speaker 2: I found that incredibly disconcerted.
Speaker 3: Well, uh yeah, let's move on then to Weapons, because
Speaker 3: I think that's the essence of Prisoners. Appreciate your your
Speaker 3: take on that, and I also appreciate when people disagree
Speaker 3: and we have differences of takes on films before we
Speaker 3: get to weapons. I would say that really, in the
Speaker 3: last couple of years, I've not actually seen a whole
Speaker 3: lot of films that I thought were that great. Of
Speaker 3: course BLA and I did. We did The Surfer with
Speaker 3: Nick Cage, which was good, it was enjoyable. Did we
Speaker 3: do another film on that stream? I can't remember, impile,
Speaker 3: that's right. I didn't care for the second one. I
Speaker 3: did like Mission Impossible part of one of two. But
Speaker 3: I did like the the movie Long Legs. I thought
Speaker 3: Long Legs was really good horror movie. I thought Heretic
Speaker 3: with Hugh Jackman was good. I don't know if you
Speaker 3: saw that.
Speaker 4: I covered that one too, I did you, Okay, I
Speaker 4: can't remember. And then there was one of the movies.
Speaker 2: There're so far a few between, like we got to
Speaker 2: cover the movie right now.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I was gonna say, there's not a whole lot. That's
Speaker 3: why I wanted to kind of just kind of look out.
Speaker 3: I actually people probably didn't like this.
Speaker 4: I thought, uh.
Speaker 3: Until Dawn was pretty good, and I liked speaking of
Speaker 3: Julia Garner, I don't know if you saw Apartment seven A,
Speaker 3: which was supposed to be the prequel to.
Speaker 4: Rosemary's Baby. I did like those.
Speaker 3: I just wanted to touch on a few kind of
Speaker 3: bright spots that I also liked Smile and Smile too.
Speaker 3: I thought both were pretty good horror movies that kind
Speaker 3: of show aspects of you know, MK ultra pop star
Speaker 3: mind control of that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah. There was also Last Night in Soho.
Speaker 4: I did like that. That was good. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2: I thought Heretic was well done because it covered Mormonism,
Speaker 2: which in a different way. It also had the Labyrinth
Speaker 2: in it, and it was a much more philosophical movie
Speaker 2: than movies usually have time for. So I thought that
Speaker 2: was good. I thought Apartment seven A was pretty good.
Speaker 2: I covered the Rosemary's Baby book by Ira Leven along
Speaker 2: with Rosemary's Baby the film and then the sequel to
Speaker 2: sort of contrast them, and I think that I thought
Speaker 2: Long Legs was I thought Long Legs Was was crazy
Speaker 2: because it has the whole doll doll baby aspect and
Speaker 2: and the one thing that bothers me about that about
Speaker 2: that movie is they always shortcut movies where they have
Speaker 2: the half psychic FBI agent and it's her first day
Speaker 2: on the job and you give her the most difficult
Speaker 2: It's like in Silence of the Lambs, Silence of the.
Speaker 3: Leg I was saying, that's on purpose, because that's Silence
Speaker 3: of the lambstock sofya.
Speaker 2: Well, it's Silence of the Lambs is you know, considered
Speaker 2: a great film and you know, one best picture in
Speaker 2: nineteen ninety two or three, and you know, and I
Speaker 2: covered Red Drag in the book. I covered uh Manhunter
Speaker 2: by Michael Mann And but it's like Clarice, it's her
Speaker 2: first day on the job and they give her Hannibal
Speaker 2: Lecter as the guy she's supposed to be do.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I said that when I did analysis, that was
Speaker 3: making fun of that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's that's pretty crazy. And actually last week on
Speaker 2: boiler Room hasher and then pulled up a video of
Speaker 2: these guys, this community of people called maskers who it
Speaker 2: was basically long Legs. It was a guy who was
Speaker 2: long Legs in real life and goes to a community
Speaker 2: of long leggers to meet up in Vegas and they
Speaker 2: wear doll plastic seen doll masks on their face and
Speaker 2: they I mean it was it was the same exact thing.
Speaker 2: So It's crazy how that sort of predictive and you know,
Speaker 2: ends up the most freakish thing ends up being reality.
Speaker 2: I think that the two, you know, I thought Midsommar
Speaker 2: was was gross, but I thought that the two the
Speaker 2: two best horror. You know, I didn't like horror movies
Speaker 2: when I was growing up, and now I think we've
Speaker 2: found ourselves in a place where horror movies continuously end
Speaker 2: up being the most revelatory films, that they're the best done.
Speaker 3: Well, we live in a horrific age, that's why.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I thought that Hereditary and The Witch were
Speaker 2: sort of dual pieces that were very very well done films.
Speaker 2: They're incredibly dark. But the difference with The Witch and
Speaker 2: a lot of these other films is that in The Witch,
Speaker 2: when you end up with the literal Witch's Sabbath at
Speaker 2: the Black Sabbath at the end of the film, there's
Speaker 2: this exultation that occurs from the Witch, like she's finally
Speaker 2: found the place, and she literally hovers into the air
Speaker 2: like a Goya painting, But we sort of know that
Speaker 2: she's gonna come to that place and we're horrified by it,
Speaker 2: versus other movies where they do sort of the same thing,
Speaker 2: but we're supposed to have some sort of joy or
Speaker 2: exultation with the character instead of feeling horrified by it.
Speaker 2: I thought those were too really well done movies. Also,
Speaker 2: the thing about those movies is that they both end
Speaker 2: up with a climax where you don't imagine that they're
Speaker 2: actually going to go to the place where they go,
Speaker 2: and they do so. At the end of Hereditary when
Speaker 2: they they conjure pam on this prince of Hell and
Speaker 2: he is, you know, he's he's taken over this kid's
Speaker 2: body and they're doing this magic ritual. You don't when
Speaker 2: you're watching the movie the first time. I don't think
Speaker 2: you imagine that they're actually going to succeed and go
Speaker 2: into this place that they do. So I think that
Speaker 2: it's a particularly I don't know, it's it's I think
Speaker 2: that that's a strange place to be in movies, and
Speaker 2: it's it's it's dark, but it's there's some sort of
Speaker 2: revelatory I think data that we get from from that
Speaker 2: kind of film. And Weapons also did that. I mean
Speaker 2: it really, it really did go to that place. I
Speaker 2: wasn't sure how they were going to get to the
Speaker 2: way because when I went into the I didn't know
Speaker 2: anything about it, and I watched. We watched the first
Speaker 2: three minutes of the film, and I went, this is
Speaker 2: a witch.
Speaker 4: Yeah. I did the same thing to Jamie. I was like,
Speaker 4: it's gonna be witchcraft.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's either gonna be mk Ultro the Most
Speaker 2: Dangerous Game, it's gonna be gnostic, or there's gonna be
Speaker 2: a witch, and in this one it was. It had
Speaker 2: elements of mk ultran And I thought when the children
Speaker 2: were running in there, sort of that Vietnam the famous
Speaker 2: Vietnam photo where the little girls running away from the napalm,
Speaker 2: I thought, Okay, this is gonna have something. The body
Speaker 2: language is gonna have something to do with m k
Speaker 2: Ultra or Phoenix a modern Phoenix program or something, or
Speaker 2: it's gonna be a witch and this looks like a witch,
Speaker 2: and it was.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Before we get into some of the movie nuggets, I
Speaker 3: do want to talk a little bit about uh both
Speaker 3: because we mentioned long legs, and it seems like for
Speaker 3: the new reigning Horror Queen, there's a competition between Micah
Speaker 3: Munroe and Julia Garner, both of whom seemed to really
Speaker 3: be kind of the queens of horror interestingly, and of
Speaker 3: course with Michael and Roe, she really kicked it off.
Speaker 3: I mean she's in other like student films and whatnot,
Speaker 3: but it follows which I thought was a really good
Speaker 3: horror film, and then she's kind of followed up with
Speaker 3: a consistent, like consistent horror movies, right, I mean the
Speaker 3: Guest horror movie, Watcher horror movie, Long Legs horror movie,
Speaker 3: significant other horror movie. And I don't know if you've
Speaker 3: ever ever saw God as a Bullet, but once again,
Speaker 3: this one is explicitly satanic cults and human trafficking.
Speaker 4: Did you see God as a Bullet?
Speaker 2: No? I haven't seen that one.
Speaker 3: I actually recommend everybody should watch guys. It's it's hard
Speaker 3: to watch, but it's like revelatory.
Speaker 2: Do you think, why do you think they have these
Speaker 2: two these two specific actresses who've sort of gotten to
Speaker 2: fill this role. I mean, this is different from the
Speaker 2: blonde bombshell of Psycho and that role. It's different from
Speaker 2: the kind of final girl the screen queen. I think
Speaker 2: there's and it's not just like a millennial or gen
Speaker 2: X sort of thing that people can see these characters
Speaker 2: in them. I think with with what's her name Michaeh
Speaker 2: Michael Monroe. I think I think her thing is that
Speaker 2: there's a lot to be said. It's kind of getting
Speaker 2: into the minutia about actors in films, but there's a
Speaker 2: lot to be said about the the palette of a
Speaker 2: person's face, and she sort of has a blank canvas
Speaker 2: of a face that you sort of paint horror onto,
Speaker 2: you know, the reactions are slightly reserved. Julia Garner is
Speaker 2: a much more sort of wholesome looking person, so it
Speaker 2: seems to be that her thing is it's much more
Speaker 2: horrifying when she is subjected to what the thing that
Speaker 2: she's subjected to. But they also are representative of most
Speaker 2: of America.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I was gonna say, I mean, you know, in
Speaker 3: a lot of pictures, you know, Michael Monroe either looks
Speaker 3: like Marilyn Monroe or she looks like, you know, the
Speaker 3: town beauty queen. So she has this element of girl
Speaker 3: next door, but also in a way very attractive and unique,
Speaker 3: even if even though she had but I think both
Speaker 3: of them have that sort of they kind of look
Speaker 3: like they would be girl next door, but they also
Speaker 3: have a little unique appearance that makes them kind of
Speaker 3: stand out and both of them sort of being in
Speaker 3: a lot of the films at least blonde. I think
Speaker 3: there is that, like harkening back to the archetype of
Speaker 3: like you said, in Hitchcock, you have usually the blonde
Speaker 3: subject of old horror going down, and there also might
Speaker 3: be interesting you know, who knows, there might be esoteric
Speaker 3: or occult stuff going on. I mean, if you go
Speaker 3: back to one of the earliest films that Julie Garners
Speaker 3: is in, she's in that class. That's also a pretty
Speaker 3: good cult movie. Do you remember, Martha Marcy May Marlene.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's a yeah exactly, John Hawks.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's also I think, uh it ironically says something
Speaker 2: refreshing about masculinity and femininity. Uh, in the world where
Speaker 2: these these two characters, you know, these two actors are feminine.
Speaker 2: You know, they're they're girls, and it should be horrifying
Speaker 2: in a horror movie for the audience to see something
Speaker 2: bad to happen to feminine characters, versus what we're supposed
Speaker 2: to think now, which is that it's horrifying to have
Speaker 2: a person lose their identity. It's actually it's actually that
Speaker 2: it's non it's not human. And so watching these two
Speaker 2: characters go through. What they go through I think is
Speaker 2: supposed to be anathema to a normal person's sort of
Speaker 2: you know, your year.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's a good that's a good point, right. Yeah.
Speaker 3: If you one last thing, I want't to mention it.
Speaker 3: Didn't want to mention it too. I think we'd mentioned
Speaker 3: this between you and I. But the uh, the movie
Speaker 3: The Guest.
Speaker 4: Did you see that? That has Mike Monroe and.
Speaker 3: Matthew Crawley from Downton Abbey Dan Stevens.
Speaker 4: Have you seen The Guest?
Speaker 1: Oh?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm trying to remember which one of it.
Speaker 3: And that is a MK Ultra super soldier explicit you know,
Speaker 3: creation of a Phoenix program kind of assassin where he
Speaker 3: kind of goes hey wire in short circuits.
Speaker 4: But yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 2: When I think of Dan Stevens, I think of that
Speaker 2: literal mk Ultra movie he's in Cuckoo.
Speaker 4: Yeah. I didn't like Cuckoo.
Speaker 3: I was hyped for it and it ended up being
Speaker 3: this really kind of lame mass of feminist thing, so
Speaker 3: I didn't care for it.
Speaker 2: He's just uh, he's like, I don't know, he's uh,
Speaker 2: Jose Swiss, Jose Delgado.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there you go, exactly, Okay, so uh, I apologize,
Speaker 3: I'm getting this way off track here with the all
Speaker 3: the different tie in. So Weapons is just to kind
Speaker 3: of set the stage here, oddly enough, directed by Zach
Speaker 3: Krieger from Whitest Kids, you Know, and I was always
Speaker 3: a fan of that, one of the one of the
Speaker 3: best sketch comedies the last several decades, probably next to
Speaker 3: other greats like A Million Dollar Extreme, that kind of stuff,
Speaker 3: Flight of the Concords. In my view, these are, you know,
Speaker 3: great sketch shows and comedies, but I think for most people,
Speaker 3: probably Whitest Kuld you know, it's probably up there in
Speaker 3: like the top, you know, best sketch shows of all time.
Speaker 3: And he did I didn't even realize this until looking
Speaker 3: up for this film, but he had done Barbarians, which
Speaker 3: excuse me, Barbarian of twenty twenty two, which was a
Speaker 3: fun kind of ghetto horror based around an airbnb. That
Speaker 3: was a fun one that Jamie and I enjoyed. But
Speaker 3: you can see, of course, in parallels between Barbarian and Weapons.
Speaker 3: And the reason I'm pointing out why he matters is
Speaker 3: because I mean, he wrote it, and I think he
Speaker 3: tends to kind of bring horror or his comedy into
Speaker 3: the horror. So I think that what we're looking at
Speaker 3: is a kind of a Grim's fairy tale again, because
Speaker 3: we have the witch and you know, the children being
Speaker 3: taken by the witch, et cetera.
Speaker 4: And it's also in.
Speaker 3: What I didn't expect was that it was kind of funny.
Speaker 3: So again, because he's a horror or a comedy guy,
Speaker 3: he's bringing that to the horror. So I saw it
Speaker 3: as a satiric, a dark satirical Grim's fairy tale, but
Speaker 3: also with a lot of truth in it. Because just
Speaker 3: this is my overview before we get into the actual
Speaker 3: sequences of the film. Basically nobody is able to figure
Speaker 3: out what's going on because no one is considering witchcraft
Speaker 3: every other possible thing. People were saying, oh, it's it's
Speaker 3: like it's likening everything to the school shooting phenomena of
Speaker 3: Columbine and this and that. I don't think I had
Speaker 3: anything to do with that, I think, and I don't
Speaker 3: know Krieger's own personal spiritual approaches or anything like that.
Speaker 3: I do know that before Trevor Moore died, why just kid,
Speaker 3: you know, was getting very conspiratorial in a lot of
Speaker 3: their sketches. You know, they were referencing pretty much all
Speaker 3: the crazy conspiracy stuff that you could think of, and
Speaker 3: a lot of people noticed that one of their conspiracy
Speaker 3: sketches had gone megaviral before Trevor Moore died.
Speaker 4: I'm not saying that anything.
Speaker 3: I don't know or have any evidence of anything nefarious,
Speaker 3: but it is interesting that they went in that direction.
Speaker 3: And then you know, Trevor passes away, and then Kreeger
Speaker 3: makes two films, the first of which is really just
Speaker 3: ghetto horror, I guess you could say, and then this
Speaker 3: one is a little.
Speaker 4: More It is dark, but again, like.
Speaker 3: My defense of it is, and I don't people free
Speaker 3: to disagree. My defense of it is that with any
Speaker 3: fairy tale you have pretty gruesome elements, and the purpose
Speaker 3: of the gruesome elements is a kind of a warning. Again,
Speaker 3: I don't know if Kreeger actually had this as his motive.
Speaker 4: This was my reading of the film.
Speaker 3: I did like the different misdirections that we had.
Speaker 4: Throughout the film.
Speaker 3: I like the fact that it was told in a
Speaker 3: non linear way, kind of like pulp fiction or that
Speaker 3: movie eleven fourteen with Patrick Swayze. That made it fun
Speaker 3: to kind of piece it together the different perspectives of
Speaker 3: the characters storyline of the same event. As I said,
Speaker 3: a couple of them were actually pretty funny. The druggy
Speaker 3: guy was a pretty funny character. Even Paul, the cheating
Speaker 3: police officer, his version of the story is actually pretty comedic.
Speaker 4: So I think a lot.
Speaker 3: Of people overlooked that it was supposed to be funny.
Speaker 3: I thought it was funny. I didn't like the couple
Speaker 3: extremely gruesome scenes I had to turn away. I understand
Speaker 3: people's critique to that, Oh, they had to use witchcraft
Speaker 3: to defeat the witchcraft. But again, I think there's a
Speaker 3: lesson here that it's not about getting people to use witchcraft.
Speaker 3: I think the point of the film is that, like humans,
Speaker 3: are the weapons that were actually concerned with. At one point,
Speaker 3: Josh Brolin has a dream where he sees an AK
Speaker 3: forty seven or whatever floating above a house, and a
Speaker 3: dream that's directing him to where the weapons are. And
Speaker 3: you know, in light of the things that have happened
Speaker 3: in the last week or two weeks, the wild events,
Speaker 3: Charlie Kirk and other things, this kind of a movie
Speaker 3: like Weapons is very.
Speaker 2: Point.
Speaker 3: Yet, I guess because the weapons aren't what the left says.
Speaker 3: It's not guns, it's not you know this, it's actually
Speaker 3: people who are weaponized. And particularly with a tr and
Speaker 3: Z community, I believe there's a spiritual problem and a
Speaker 3: spiritual weaponizing effect that's going on. This is a lot
Speaker 3: of the research that BX has done in regard to
Speaker 3: certain cults, online groups, sex, satanic groups.
Speaker 4: Seven six', four et.
Speaker 3: Cetera the accelerationists have this approach of weaponizing, people and
Speaker 3: that's the real weapons, here not, guns and not this and.
Speaker 3: That SO i didn't read it as a literal invitation to,
Speaker 3: witchcraft but as a satirical grim's fairy tale warning us
Speaker 3: about the fact that the real delusion going on even
Speaker 3: in Small Middle, america small Town Middle, america is not
Speaker 3: corrupt politicians or a teacher that's stealing. Students, no it's
Speaker 3: spiritual and people are under a.
Speaker 4: Spell SO i love the.
Speaker 3: Aspect that this film is about pretty much everybody being
Speaker 3: under a, spell and it's not figured out until Well
Speaker 3: Josh brolin actually starts to listen to things like his,
Speaker 3: dreams which in the film kind of symbolize listening to
Speaker 3: the transcendent or to the spiritual or, spirituality and then they,
Speaker 3: realized actually we're up against spiritual, evil you, know As paul,
Speaker 3: says And ephesian six, thrones, principalities, powers dominions in high.
Speaker 3: Places so that's kind of where the film, goes which
Speaker 3: you didn't. EXPECT i, MEAN i did Expect, witchcraft BUT
Speaker 3: i didn't expect the film to go in that. Direction
Speaker 3: Where as you, said it's a very dark. Ending but
Speaker 3: you fight weapons with, weapons AND i don't mean that
Speaker 3: you fight witchcraft with, witchcraft but you fight witchcraft with
Speaker 3: other spiritual, weapons namely with real.
Speaker 4: Spirituality, yeah excellent.
Speaker 2: ANALYSIS i think that one thing you brought up is
Speaker 2: that no one considers witchcraft EVEN i think even when
Speaker 2: the teacher has the word which written in what looks
Speaker 2: like blood on our. Right, ah that is just it
Speaker 2: seems to be a word or something that somebody remembered
Speaker 2: from the memory of a of a more normal. Time,
Speaker 2: right they paint the person's car with which it's not
Speaker 2: really spoken of in any other, places and everyone seems
Speaker 2: to kind of be dead in a. Way everyone certainly
Speaker 2: controlled by the one thing that the nonlinear.
Speaker 3: Apparacha, well it's It's Josh, brolin the painter down there,
Speaker 3: right because he got the he got the bucket.
Speaker 2: Right, yeah, yeah it was he was the one who
Speaker 2: did it and his whole. Thing there was also a
Speaker 2: gamer aspect with the way that the ar was floating
Speaker 2: above the. House it was like a coin like he
Speaker 2: was on some sort of you, know, uh first person
Speaker 2: shooter game to find, perfect perfect point and and and
Speaker 2: one THING i, noticed and this was the REASON i
Speaker 2: thought it was incredibly dark and they they couldn't have known,
Speaker 2: this or it was predictive or whatever was That when
Speaker 2: we finally see the, witch she reminded me a lot
Speaker 2: of the video of the shooter of the school that
Speaker 2: happened two weeks, ago of The catholic. School remember they
Speaker 2: made the. Video the guy made the video that was
Speaker 2: released at the same time as the shoot.
Speaker 3: SHOOTING i listened To alex playing those, clips BUT i
Speaker 3: never saw the actual.
Speaker 4: Video did did he have that?
Speaker 2: Appearance, WELL i wouldn't. RECOMMEND i, Mean i'm sure people
Speaker 2: here have already seen the, video BUT i. WOULDN'T i
Speaker 2: would not recommend watching the. Videos it's incredibly dark and it's,
Speaker 2: UH i don't even like having things like that in my.
Speaker 2: Phone it was it was purposefully. Satanic you, Know i'm
Speaker 2: not gonna say what he's doing in, it but you,
Speaker 2: know weapons that are marked with sigils and marked with
Speaker 2: marking weapons with AND ammo with memes seems to be
Speaker 2: the the contemporary equivalent of marking sigils on a. Weapon
Speaker 2: it seems to be the exact same, thing sort of
Speaker 2: magically and meme.
Speaker 3: MAGIC i MEAN ghq has been studying memes as meme.
Speaker 2: Magic so, yeah and and the and the the way
Speaker 2: that that person's appearance when we saw when we when
Speaker 2: if you look up his, appearance it is remarkably similar
Speaker 2: to The witch in the. Movie it's like the exact same.
Speaker 2: Person to. Me SO i saw something, weirdly, uh sort
Speaker 2: of weird spiritual syncro that. Happened in terms of that,
Speaker 2: FILM i think, that, yeah all the characters seem to
Speaker 2: be controlled by their. Passions we. Have the most likable
Speaker 2: character is the drug. Addict he's, likable he seems to be.
Speaker 2: HUMAN i, mean he's, funny he's kind of a kind
Speaker 2: of a full character in the. Thing but even he
Speaker 2: gets controlled by The. Witch and it seems that by
Speaker 2: the end of the. Film the, problem one of the
Speaker 2: PROBLEMS i had was that there aren't any characters who
Speaker 2: are likable enough for me to see the vision of
Speaker 2: the film In AND i think that's that's probably, intentional
Speaker 2: that we don't like any of the. Characters it's it's
Speaker 2: a if The Whites, kids you, know is a has
Speaker 2: that famous sketch about The Big, nine then that is
Speaker 2: a satirical statement on the darkness of the modern. World
Speaker 2: and and that is completely different in a way than
Speaker 2: this is because they are unwitting characters playing roles in the.
Speaker 2: Game AND i thought of the Black eyed, children like
Speaker 2: the kids IN. U. C a. G. E s in
Speaker 2: the basement of the, film the whole the sort Of
Speaker 2: vietnam aspect of, it the methed out people running around
Speaker 2: the city causing, havoc the, principle and The skittles. Relationship
Speaker 2: the it sort of has. Everything AND i think that
Speaker 2: the the ultra violence in the film also was gruesome and.
Speaker 2: BOTHERSOME i think that if there's a symbolic purpose of,
Speaker 2: THAT i suppose would be to say that this is
Speaker 2: the kind of, stylized stylized ultra violence that really impacts
Speaker 2: the audience in the sense that this is the result
Speaker 2: of what these things. Are it's not just that people are.
Speaker 2: Disappearing it's not just that people are running, wild but
Speaker 2: that it results in maximum, violence maximum corruption of the,
Speaker 2: body maximum, destruction and it's repugnant to look. At, so you,
Speaker 2: know there also doesn't seem to be much redemption in the.
Speaker 2: CHARACTER i wanted the drug addic character to have some
Speaker 2: sort of redemption even when he's breaking into the house
Speaker 2: and stealing the. SILVERWARE i was, like this character is
Speaker 2: still lower down on the totem pole than the other characters.
Speaker 2: Are the schlub, COP i thought was a perfect counterpoint
Speaker 2: To Jake dillenhall's character And. Prisoners you, know one is
Speaker 2: like almost pure. Cop one is. Purposeful it seems like
Speaker 2: we're with him on the. Journey he's going to get the,
Speaker 2: people and the other one is cheating on his wife.
Speaker 2: Waking it's also funny in movies like the guy went
Speaker 2: out drinking one, night he stayed with this girl and
Speaker 2: now he's too hungover to even get the car and
Speaker 2: go do. ANYTHING i, MEAN i thought that WAS i
Speaker 2: thought that was a little. Much, YEAH i mean, NO
Speaker 2: i JUST i think that the characters were and AGAIN
Speaker 2: i think that that's probably. Purposeful that the characters are completely.
Speaker 2: Controlled and if the movie says anything it's. That if
Speaker 2: it says one thing to, me it's that in a
Speaker 2: world Without, christianity the. Characters, Ultimately witchcraft is ultimately about
Speaker 2: characters finding a. Thing it's a sort of a lens
Speaker 2: through which we see that people worship. Themselves they want
Speaker 2: to be, empowered so they find. Power they find power
Speaker 2: over other, people and they find power over the most helpless,
Speaker 2: people which is sort of what happens in the film
Speaker 2: UNTIL i guess it turns on.
Speaker 3: Them, Yeah and this is WHERE i would disagree, because
Speaker 3: first of, ALL i didn't throughout the. FILM i NEVER
Speaker 3: i was annoyed by some of the actions Of Josh
Speaker 3: brolin and some of What Julia garner, did BUT i
Speaker 3: never thought that they were unlikable or. Unredeemable in, fact
Speaker 3: it ends up being them fighting each other is part
Speaker 3: of the, spell and the whole thing is only dispelled
Speaker 3: and solved when they actually listened to each other and work.
Speaker 4: Together so the only.
Speaker 3: Two good characters overall have to actually team. Up when that,
Speaker 3: happens they end up actually Saving Josh rowland's son And
Speaker 3: alex the you, know the son of the the one
Speaker 3: that uh let me fix the audio levels since somebody's, Complaining,
Speaker 3: yeah the the.
Speaker 4: Son of.
Speaker 3: The, child that's that's not under the, witchcraft, right that
Speaker 3: the witch's nephew or whatever he.
Speaker 2: Is his Name alex.
Speaker 4: TOO i think somebody the chat said it.
Speaker 2: Was that's that's. Wild it is It's.
Speaker 4: Alex.
Speaker 2: YEAH i think. That you know when they when he
Speaker 2: when he finds her in the parking lot of the gas,
Speaker 2: station and the meth out crazy eyed, skittles Uh Jijinping,
Speaker 2: principles starts running Towards that's one of the things that
Speaker 2: always scares me in the, movies when there's someone running
Speaker 2: at you like.
Speaker 1: That.
Speaker 2: Yeah and one thing that WAS i think visceral in
Speaker 2: both of these movies is, that, uh that happened in broad.
Speaker 2: Daylight so the taking happens at, night but this happened
Speaker 2: in broad. Daylight In, prisoners they mentioned how the The
Speaker 2: Boomer garcia character had taken the child in broad. Daylight
Speaker 2: and it's, always, oh you should see the look on your.
Speaker 2: Face it's always this sort of, derision you know, that,
Speaker 2: uh seeing seeing a person horrified and they have the
Speaker 2: secret and they know what they. Did but When Josh
Speaker 2: brolin when the guy's running towards the lady and then
Speaker 2: he crawls under the. CAR i was glad that he
Speaker 2: finally not like kicked the guy in the head or,
Speaker 2: whatever you, know and and saved her and then she
Speaker 2: ran into the BECAUSE i kept, thinking this guy is
Speaker 2: gonna end up being another soy who does nothing in a,
Speaker 2: film which is such a contrast for A Josh brolin.
Speaker 2: Character norm McDonald pointed out That Josh brolin when you
Speaker 2: see the Movie Hail, caesar That Josh brolin was the
Speaker 2: archetype for the. News you, know he had a chisel.
Speaker 2: Jaw you, know he seems to be the strong, characters
Speaker 2: like knocking people, around And George clooney was the soy
Speaker 2: character of the. Movie he gets like thrown into a.
Speaker 2: Corner SO i was glad that he didn't end up being.
Speaker 2: That but you're, right they do work together in the.
Speaker 2: FILM i JUST i WAS i was really disturbed by
Speaker 2: the way that that That alex the kid was treated
Speaker 2: in the. Movie that he's forced to sit there and
Speaker 2: watches the forks in the face and all that, stuff
Speaker 2: and he's got to go to school and you, know
Speaker 2: he's he has to live his normal. Life, well he's
Speaker 2: got this witch at. Him that's probably entirely truthful.
Speaker 3: Though so, well, yeah and again you know what's what
Speaker 3: are some of the effects of the? Spell, well the
Speaker 3: people can't. Speak they become complete sort of mind controlled.
Speaker 3: Zombies they rush at you to kill or to bite
Speaker 3: or to eat, you you know. EXACTLY i, mean are
Speaker 3: they zombies or just like maniacally possessed. Individuals but they
Speaker 3: also can't. Speak and it's explained at the end of
Speaker 3: the film that after they had broken the spell that
Speaker 3: a couple of years, later some of the kids even
Speaker 3: begin to speak. Again so they were healing after this traumatic.
Speaker 3: Event and the film might not have been intinduing to
Speaker 3: talk about, this but it did make me think about
Speaker 3: how the younger you go with kids the internet and
Speaker 3: living on the, internet being raised on the internet is
Speaker 3: really and not reading is impairing people's communicative and thinking
Speaker 3: and critical thinking. Abilities and so if we think about
Speaker 3: this as a story about how we're actually in a
Speaker 3: spiritual warfare against evil, entities then you, know to young
Speaker 3: children like The alex, characters who are essentially innocent that
Speaker 3: are exposed to and see all this, trauma it's kind
Speaker 3: of the way in the world that young kids are
Speaker 3: seeing right, now, right so they're seeing an insane of traumatic.
Speaker 3: World H and AS i think the film is trying to,
Speaker 3: say even if it doesn't explicit in A christian, way
Speaker 3: is that you're really only going to be able to
Speaker 3: be evil or spiritual evil with a spiritual.
Speaker 2: Power so, yeah, YEAH i think, that you, Know corunka
Speaker 2: obviously did something to, people and it it sort of
Speaker 2: did to a twofold. Thing, one it made people who
Speaker 2: didn't seem to speak much before speak very, loudly of
Speaker 2: very you, KNOW i, mean look at the, riots and
Speaker 2: that's WHAT i saw in the, film was that people
Speaker 2: running around like that it was Like portland or. Something
Speaker 2: and the other is that it made, People it made
Speaker 2: younger people who were forced to cover their. Face and you,
Speaker 2: know and anyone knows that teenagers who have something terrible
Speaker 2: like this happening at home often do not. Speak they
Speaker 2: they're just completely silent and blanket. Expressionist and one of
Speaker 2: the most alarming things that CAN i think happened to,
Speaker 2: children and that it seems to be that kind Of
Speaker 2: both things happened in the, movie which was which was
Speaker 2: interesting because The witch character is so dynamic and, loud,
Speaker 2: like she looks. Loud she looks is a loud looking.
Speaker 2: Person AND i think it like most most horror, movies.
Speaker 3: Now those are clown.
Speaker 2: Too, yes, yeah the most horror movies tend to do this,
Speaker 2: now where they they show you that there's something to be.
Speaker 2: SAID i think this is a, lesson especially for younger,
Speaker 2: people that you really have to navigate the world by
Speaker 2: trusting your. Gut you. Know it's like that old thing
Speaker 2: that like your dad would tell you when you're walking
Speaker 2: down the street at night and you see somebody coming
Speaker 2: your way and something to unfeel right just across the.
Speaker 2: Street women are told that all the, time and we
Speaker 2: see that's increasingly gone away because we're supposed to trust
Speaker 2: people no matter, what because if we see that they
Speaker 2: don't look a certain, way then then we don't trust.
Speaker 2: Ourselves and SO i, mean look at the bus incident
Speaker 2: that just, happen you, know that's that's exactly what this
Speaker 2: ends up sort of. Being and so when The witch
Speaker 2: shows up at the school and she's got her nephew
Speaker 2: who is a grown man who's not saying, anything and
Speaker 2: the aunt is saying is saying, everything and she's this
Speaker 2: loud clown like. Character all of the characters in the
Speaker 2: movie kind of they just go with. It they don't
Speaker 2: they they have no recourse in terms of their, being
Speaker 2: in terms of their, politeness to cross any sort of
Speaker 2: social boundary or social. Line but we could we continuously see.
Speaker 2: That now those sorts of. Things you have to trust your.
Speaker 2: Gut you have to you, know if the person looks
Speaker 2: like long, legs you, know you should just what's the
Speaker 2: morment just assuming they probably.
Speaker 4: Are that they probably, are, yeah possessed serial.
Speaker 3: Killer NOW i want to mention, too it's interesting that
Speaker 3: the witch in the film is also stealing the kids
Speaker 3: and putting them in the basement under the spell because
Speaker 3: she's able to in some way through her raft sap
Speaker 3: their youth and.
Speaker 4: To make herself young.
Speaker 3: Again because she has, cancer she's on the verge of,
Speaker 3: death but she's become such a powerful witch that she's
Speaker 3: able to, utilize, uh you, know the. Youth and it's
Speaker 3: a form of cannibalism right, again which recalls, uh you
Speaker 3: Know grim's fairy. Tales, uh what's the one where the
Speaker 3: witch is cooking the kids and eating Them gretel And. Hans,
Speaker 3: yeah it recalls. THAT i think that's what's going. On
Speaker 3: but also in reality, AGAIN i, mean there are, people
Speaker 3: whether we're talking about actual satanic, witches cults and, networks
Speaker 3: or the overall vampiric nature of our, society feeding on,
Speaker 3: uh the the, youth feeding.
Speaker 4: On, prey the predatory.
Speaker 2: Classes go, Ahead, yeah feeding on happiness and, enjoy feeding
Speaker 2: On christian spirit.
Speaker 3: Garmin bosia exactly from, look.
Speaker 2: Look it's, horrible but look at The Charlie kirk thing just.
Speaker 2: Happened there's this there's a vampirical element to how that all.
Speaker 2: Happens AND i think that that the notion of that
Speaker 2: it sends people into this sort of blood. Frenzy so
Speaker 2: there's also the The Teeter peel aspect of, it which,
Speaker 2: is you, know a sort of TRANSHUMANIST i, mean, YEAH
Speaker 2: i was. IT i was. IT i met a ninety
Speaker 2: one year old lady at church the other day with
Speaker 2: the same birthday as me and asked, her you, know
Speaker 2: we were just talking and she she's ninety one year.
Speaker 2: Old lady said to, me, well they keep talking about
Speaker 2: life extension drugs and HOW i can live. Forever BUT
Speaker 2: i Think i'm just going to count my blessings to
Speaker 2: the end of my. Days AND i was, like, yeah
Speaker 2: you don't. Try you don't strike me as the Transhumanist
Speaker 2: Peter teeal type. LADY i think IT'S i think you're.
Speaker 3: Okay, NOW i did want to mention before we move
Speaker 3: into uh super chats and. Whatnot, guys Remember bla does
Speaker 3: have a book Called. Runes let me ask you briefly about.
Speaker 3: That told us about, it what inspired? IT i do
Speaker 3: have it linked in the show description for The amazon
Speaker 3: link there if you're interested in getting his Book.
Speaker 2: Root, yeah, thanks, MAN i appreciate. It this is a
Speaker 2: book of. Poetry it's about eighty four. Pages It's megalomania
Speaker 2: in The Third, Reich Imperial rome And troubles era In Northern.
Speaker 2: Ireland and they are a series of WHAT i call persona.
Speaker 2: Poems so one of the THINGS i wrote THAT i
Speaker 2: first wrote this WHEN i was in grad school In
Speaker 2: belfast twenty years, ago at the tail end of The
Speaker 2: troubles and In Northern. Ireland and one of the things
Speaker 2: THAT i was reading A Tacitus Suetonius RICHARD. J, evans
Speaker 2: and one of the things that struck me is, that for,
Speaker 2: instance we all know that when reading history it's almost
Speaker 2: impossible to get a pure account of events in history
Speaker 2: a truthful account, now and that's because there's almost always a,
Speaker 2: disclaimer there's almost almost always a pseudo moralistic disclaimer about
Speaker 2: the thing that you're, reading and look at it in
Speaker 2: the light of this instead of what they used to,
Speaker 2: have which were first person. Accounts so this is a
Speaker 2: kind of pseudo first person account of. Events and each
Speaker 2: of the poems is many of them are in a person's,
Speaker 2: name so they are. PERSONA a lot of them are
Speaker 2: in the first, person and they go into all sorts
Speaker 2: OF i think situations of especially with megalabani as sort
Speaker 2: of the guiding. Word BUT i JUST i see that you,
Speaker 2: know the book was number. ONE i was the number
Speaker 2: one living poet On Amazon poetry for about two. Days
Speaker 2: everybody else ahead of me had been dead for four,
Speaker 2: hundred five hundred, years and SO i think that ironically
Speaker 2: says something about the state of. Literature you talk about
Speaker 2: literature a lot on your share and especially in your
Speaker 2: essays on your, website AND i think that it's important
Speaker 2: that we look through the lens of sometimes of a
Speaker 2: kind of fictional historical fiction or or parables for the
Speaker 2: thing in. Parallel so sometimes it's difficult to look at
Speaker 2: specific events from what we, read because we can't get
Speaker 2: anything truthful, anymore so we look at them in. Parallel
Speaker 2: SO i WOULD i hope people will buy. It it's Called,
Speaker 2: runs and you, know runs came up. Today they've been
Speaker 2: these sorts of things come. Up but they Are runs
Speaker 2: are sign posts Of nordic vocabulary where letters are imbued
Speaker 2: with the kind of spiritual potency and in a pagan.
Speaker 2: Sense and so because the book partly takes place In
Speaker 2: germany in the mid twentieth, century those things are kind
Speaker 2: of sign POSTS i think for the human spirit and
Speaker 2: where we are.
Speaker 3: Now awesome, Minute LIKE i, Said i've got a LinkedIn
Speaker 3: and put in the.
Speaker 4: Chat it is in the show. Description my. Chance did
Speaker 4: you See?
Speaker 2: Ballerina, no, NO i haven't seen. It we meant to
Speaker 2: go see, it but had already. Left we gotta we
Speaker 2: gotta go. See that's the job.
Speaker 4: Expect it is not what you expect.
Speaker 3: EITHER i you, Know i've seen the Other John wick,
Speaker 3: movies AND i THINK i did a podcast on those
Speaker 3: a couple of years, ago AND i mean they're just
Speaker 3: kind of action.
Speaker 4: Movies for the most.
Speaker 3: Part there are some odd references and, parallels especially with
Speaker 3: a sort of guild of assassins that now we learn
Speaker 3: is a little more like a, mafia perhaps a little
Speaker 3: more like a kind of cult or. Coven and in
Speaker 3: this one they explicitly sort of bring in some of
Speaker 3: the tropes and themes and imagery of M k ultra
Speaker 3: programmed assassin type, stuff and we find out that, no
Speaker 3: it's this, one it's a full on. Cult so there
Speaker 3: were and runs and these sorts of things also coming to,
Speaker 3: play including, witchcraft WHICH i didn't expect Because Boba yaga
Speaker 3: Who's John, wick but also a manifestation of this sort
Speaker 3: of feminine divine assassination justice Through Anna. Dharmas so it
Speaker 3: goes in some odd, Directions that's What i'm trying to.
Speaker 3: Say But runes and witchcraft popped up there THAT i didn't,
Speaker 3: expect AND i also wanted to, mention as the super
Speaker 3: chat here says From jeff Ten, dollars the point made
Speaker 3: about the substitution of memes fort runs is an excellent.
Speaker 3: Observation thank, you. Gentlemen, yeah there was some years ago
Speaker 3: right around, it even before you, know meme magic was
Speaker 3: a hot topic Through Jordan peterson talking about, it particularly
Speaker 3: in regard to the usage of the grouper frog meme
Speaker 3: to Promote Donald trump via Four chan as a sort
Speaker 3: of joke candidate before the twenty sixteen. Election, again they
Speaker 3: were studying even AT, ghq which is The british version
Speaker 3: of THE, nsa the use of meme magic and how
Speaker 3: memes can function in that same kind of way like
Speaker 3: any icon or iconographic.
Speaker 4: Representation you might and they might.
Speaker 3: Call it image magic or idle magic back in the,
Speaker 3: day And orthodoxy has a similar. Idea of, course we
Speaker 3: don't think that they're, magical but that there is a
Speaker 3: truth and a power to iconic, imagery iconographic imagery to
Speaker 3: convey messages meaning in. Truth and you know the other,
Speaker 3: side the evil people do the same. Thing so, memes icons,
Speaker 3: imagery image magic so to, speak is another big part
Speaker 3: of this with the element Of.
Speaker 2: Runes, yeah the the group in the twentieth, century The
Speaker 2: nazis really convey this with their heavy reliance on symbolism
Speaker 2: and this was maximally. Effective and one example of course
Speaker 2: is the sig. Run you know they use the tote
Speaker 2: and cough the death's head on the as the badge
Speaker 2: on the hat of skull and. Bones but the sigroom
Speaker 2: which is supposed to look like a lightning bolt and
Speaker 2: is for a shock troop or. Stormtroopers really sort of you,
Speaker 2: know conveys this sense mixed in With Wabelsburg castle and
Speaker 2: The Black sun and all of these things where you
Speaker 2: have a society of people that USES i, think what's
Speaker 2: what's you, know there's a there are a few poems
Speaker 2: in the in the. BOOK i should, mention by the
Speaker 2: way that when People i'm not trying to change anybody's
Speaker 2: idea about, poetry but one thing THAT i think is
Speaker 2: important to note is that most people probably will never
Speaker 2: own a book of poetry in their, house and SO
Speaker 2: i try to you, KNOW i didn't try to make
Speaker 2: it this, way but you, know one of the things
Speaker 2: that's effective in language is the violence of. Language language
Speaker 2: is ultimately on a Monopoetic it has a kind of
Speaker 2: the words mimic. Actions and we see that language is so,
Speaker 2: important you, know we think and dream in. Words but
Speaker 2: in terms of where society becomes In united often has
Speaker 2: to do with, language and so that becomes, potent especially
Speaker 2: in terms of a militant usage in, diction and that
Speaker 2: particular group of the twentieth century which mimics the very
Speaker 2: same thing In Imperial rome is again packed in and
Speaker 2: loaded with symbolism which is ultimately. Militant and so that
Speaker 2: is a kind of proto version of meme magic, now
Speaker 2: WHICH i think is going to, be you, know unfortunately
Speaker 2: become more more prevalent in terms of what we're up
Speaker 2: AGAINST i think in the. World another thing is THAT
Speaker 2: i need to See ballerina because the stunts are done
Speaker 2: By jackson Spy. Del he did all the stunt designs
Speaker 2: for that and For John Wicki's John Wick's Stunt. Double
Speaker 2: that was my sister's prom date for high.
Speaker 4: School oh, wow it's. Crazy.
Speaker 2: Yeah ARVIA dw.
Speaker 3: Five, dollars il y Slow boy whiteboard two. Dollars check
Speaker 3: Out dangerfield's book. Runs got that link To Rachel wilson five.
Speaker 3: Dollars everybody should subscribe To bla's channel right. Now he's
Speaker 3: one of the underrated streamers on. YouTube i will give
Speaker 3: that link if you're watching this, later it'll be tagged
Speaker 3: in description after the. Stream jethrow, SAYS jd AND, bla
Speaker 3: we need A Larry nickel impression from both of.
Speaker 4: You se was?
Speaker 2: Better, Well hillary was a witch AND i wanted to
Speaker 2: tell You Alex hilary is a. Witch she was this
Speaker 2: is my normal. Voice she was stuffing babies into the
Speaker 2: carcass of a. Pumpkin.
Speaker 4: Exactly that's.
Speaker 3: Good let's see we might have some super chests over.
Speaker 4: Here let's see storm the cat ten. DOLLARS i have
Speaker 4: seen a lot of horror, movies.
Speaker 3: But the only piece of media that has really spooked
Speaker 3: me Was David bowie's final, Album Black.
Speaker 4: Star that's, funny it is. CREEPY i felt that it was.
Speaker 3: Satanic it kind of felt made me feel messed up
Speaker 3: for a.
Speaker 4: Day, Yeah i'm not a big fan of that.
Speaker 2: Album that's a good. POINT i mean THAT i think
Speaker 2: he really did wherever he was going in his, career
Speaker 2: he definitely went back to a you, know a specific
Speaker 2: kind of. Occultism he was A David bowie had been
Speaker 2: A crowley and you know the song station To station,
Speaker 2: yeah is a kabbala song from From kefer to. Malcof
Speaker 2: so that in the interviews that he did with what's
Speaker 2: the guy's Named Dick, cavott where he, was you, know
Speaker 2: talking about WHAT i was. On you, KNOW i was
Speaker 2: into all things WHEN i was In. Hollywood he's the
Speaker 2: thin white. Duke SO i agree with. You it's a
Speaker 2: pretty it's pretty dark that he went back there on
Speaker 2: his final.
Speaker 5: Album David, bowie he's sketching out the kabaalistic tree, mate
Speaker 5: glitch your rhythm ten. DOLLARS i always enjoy when you guys.
Speaker 5: Collapse thank you appreciate. That uh black orthodox foot shoulder
Speaker 5: one dollar a. Dire is it normal For greeks to
Speaker 5: get wasted on? PASCA i was offered a drink three.
Speaker 5: Am everybody usually parties On, pasco so probably.
Speaker 4: OKAY i do want to mention and ask you to
Speaker 4: before we, GO.
Speaker 3: I was reading, something SO i was kind of, preoccupied
Speaker 3: BUT i was able to watch here and there as
Speaker 3: When jamie was Watching, eddington and she took a lot of.
Speaker 3: Notes AND i want to know what your view Of
Speaker 3: eddington is because it was really bizarre at least the
Speaker 3: things THAT i caught from.
Speaker 4: It what did you?
Speaker 1: Think?
Speaker 2: Well at FIRST i, thought Like Sam hodde, says that
Speaker 2: this was another ari ast. Film you know the guy
Speaker 2: Born july, fifteenth another one of these. Guys sam, SAYS,
Speaker 2: i you know we had both Covered? Novarata did he
Speaker 2: do know that Was eggers and ARI ASTRAI i get
Speaker 2: confused with BUT i didn't know what to make of.
Speaker 2: IT i was kind of worried about going to see
Speaker 2: it BECAUSE i thought it was just going to be
Speaker 2: another critique of you, know people like us or. Something
Speaker 2: it was going to make the guy who is an
Speaker 2: anti corunka guy into a crazy. Guy and it did do,
Speaker 2: that but it covered kind of a full gamut of the.
Speaker 2: Situation at the, time it seemed to be a kind
Speaker 2: of anti or meta or dark fairy tale for the.
Speaker 2: Time and one thing that it ended up doing Was
Speaker 2: They're the one key scene in the film was when
Speaker 2: we all of a sudden get a point of view
Speaker 2: of a private jet with a group OF Mk delta
Speaker 2: operators or something that moves into the. Town AND i
Speaker 2: think my take is that the entire thing is about
Speaker 2: the people who are not in the, movie and that
Speaker 2: is the people that are running the data. Center so
Speaker 2: the data center is run by the tech overlords who
Speaker 2: push a kind of chaos through this town as a test,
Speaker 2: case and it brings out all the various elements of conspiracy,
Speaker 2: world including the kind of lost single boomer wine mom
Speaker 2: with the daughter who gets lost to A Charlie manson
Speaker 2: cult guy and who ends.
Speaker 3: UP q tards and then they get in with like
Speaker 3: this this new age kind of, uh you, KNOW q
Speaker 3: shaman type of.
Speaker 2: Bro, yeah and she ends up as the what's the
Speaker 2: What's Trump's White house? Staff the chief of staff lady's.
Speaker 2: Name she ends up as that kind of. Lady she
Speaker 2: ends up as an ARCH gop conservative influencer type who
Speaker 2: is also living with the the carcass Of Joaquin phoenix
Speaker 2: and cucking. HIM i guess with the young yoga type
Speaker 2: guy just taking over the. Town AND i think the
Speaker 2: events are so surreal towards the end of the movie
Speaker 2: when the bloodbath happens that it's supposed to indicate that
Speaker 2: you can't really trust what you're, seeing even in real.
Speaker 2: Life so most of the movie is lived through. Phones
Speaker 2: but then the phones. Start it's kind of like that
Speaker 2: the thing about how you, know we live in a
Speaker 2: triple post modern world where we've gone through The war
Speaker 2: on the, self but no matter, what you still don't
Speaker 2: use phones in your. Dreams and this movie kind of
Speaker 2: crossed over that. Path it was, like not only are
Speaker 2: they in our, dreams there the phones have become real
Speaker 2: life and we could throw the phone away because now
Speaker 2: what we see in real life ends up like we're
Speaker 2: looking through a. Phone SO i thought it was a
Speaker 2: kind of surreal anti fairy tale for a technocratic world
Speaker 2: as seen in this like dusty this dusty.
Speaker 3: Testing it's like A, western you. Know and then it's
Speaker 3: really about the placement of that data center.
Speaker 2: There it. IS i think the whole thing is about,
Speaker 2: that and it's it's crazy that the movie begins with
Speaker 2: this schizophrenic wanderer who kind of comes into town with
Speaker 2: evil on him or, something and the whole town goes.
Speaker 2: Great he brings the THE V i R u s with,
Speaker 2: him and then all of a, sudden the town goes.
Speaker 2: Crazy the world's going crazy on the. Outside it ends
Speaker 2: up with this golden shining quantum facility in the, desert
Speaker 2: like some new temple ball, temple or like The.
Speaker 3: Chaos this emerged out of the ashes The phoenix out
Speaker 3: of the ashes of The.
Speaker 4: Chaos.
Speaker 2: YEAH i thought it was surprisingly well. DONE i didn't
Speaker 2: expect it to do, that not that it was not
Speaker 2: that it was on anybody's side or. ANYTHING i just
Speaker 2: thought it was a pretty, truthful uh sort of, metaphysical you,
Speaker 2: know story about the events that have unfolded and where
Speaker 2: we are.
Speaker 3: Now, yeah this is a like you, said slow, boy,
Speaker 3: THERE i don't Think i've ever dreamed about my phone.
Speaker 3: EITHER i dream every, night every as soon AS i
Speaker 3: go to, sleep immediately. Dream i've never had a dream
Speaker 3: about a phone or my.
Speaker 4: Phone that's.
Speaker 2: Weird, yeah that's that's SOMETHING i think that people should
Speaker 2: once you notice, THAT i think it's something to keep in.
Speaker 2: Mind that's a THAT'S i think that's. Hopeful the moment
Speaker 2: that we go into that is the moment where the
Speaker 2: body mods are truly. Coming so.
Speaker 3: Bamba dill ten. Dollars i'm A. Baptist i'm interested in.
Speaker 3: Orthodocously can't wrap my head around the perpetual virginity To,
Speaker 3: MARY i don't want to lie to join the.
Speaker 4: Church have any?
Speaker 3: Advice, yeah you want to read the essay THAT i
Speaker 3: put into the. Link it Is jerome's essay on the perpetual.
Speaker 3: Virginity Saint jerome's essay is a. Classic, now, guys remind
Speaker 3: you head on over To bla's channel. SUBSCRIBE i always
Speaker 3: love catching up with him and doing these movie. Reviews
Speaker 3: really good. Stuff tonight we'll pick some new films when
Speaker 3: we can find some good ones to do in the near.
Speaker 3: Future anything else other than your. Book we mentioned what
Speaker 3: lit or films are you covering in the near?
Speaker 2: Future near, Future i'm Gonna i've covered half Of. Shakespeare
Speaker 2: i've covered half of The Jack Bean, eira SO i
Speaker 2: need to get back to covering some More. Shakespeare i'm.
Speaker 2: Covering i'm Reading Northrop Fries Fearful symmetry right now On William,
Speaker 2: blake which is a heavily esoteric, work And i'm seeing
Speaker 2: a lot of literature through kind of through that lens
Speaker 2: in terms of not my personal, lens but how he
Speaker 2: describes it in the. Book probably gonna Do Paul Thomas
Speaker 2: anderson's new movie coming out This, friday the one With Leo, oh,
Speaker 2: yes a revolutionary type. Movie there's also A daniel Day lewis.
Speaker 2: Movie he went to my drama, school So i'll be
Speaker 2: seeing his, movie which is a movie about the troubles
Speaker 2: In Northern ireland and getting married soon and Then i'll
Speaker 2: be back In october To.
Speaker 3: Yeah thanks, man awesome.
Speaker 2: Ime my book by runs On. Amazon everybody please.
Speaker 3: And remember we have a show. Sponsor was this chalk
Speaker 3: dot com the best and supplementation on The. Internet head
Speaker 3: over to chalk dot, Com choq dot Com it is
Speaker 3: in the show, description and use the promo CODE j
Speaker 3: forty THAT' j for zero to get forty percent off
Speaker 3: all of those great, products including the TON kettlei including
Speaker 3: The Male Performance. Stack it's not, pppills it's workout. Adjacent
Speaker 3: also get S R hollywood. Three it'll be coming out
Speaker 3: in about two. Weeks should ship pretty.
Speaker 4: Soon that was from the.
Speaker 3: PUBLISHER i think you Said september twenty ninth is when
Speaker 3: he expects it to. Ship that means if you ordered
Speaker 3: From Jeff, bezos WHICH i hope that you never, do
Speaker 3: you'll get it probably pretty. Quick if you order it from,
Speaker 3: me you get a signed copy and.
Speaker 4: It'll come around that.
Speaker 3: TIME i can't, promise but already got hundreds of orders
Speaker 3: in AND i thank you guys for your. Patients please don't.
Speaker 3: Complain you don't have to. Worry i'm not stealing your
Speaker 3: thirty forty. Dollars you will get your, BOOK i promise.
Speaker 4: You, otherwise, everybody have a great. Night thank you so
Speaker 4: much being