Clark
Hello, everyone, and welcome once again to the Soldiers of Cinema podcast. I'm Claire Coffee and with me as always, is Mr. Culinary Fader. How are you doing, Colin?
00:00:19:05 - 00:00:20:12
Cullen
Good, good. How are you? Good.
00:00:20:18 - 00:00:24:07
Clark
You're here. You had some bad eggs and your stomach was.
00:00:24:10 - 00:00:26:16
Cullen
A little Popeye's chicken and some bad eggs. Yes.
00:00:27:03 - 00:00:46:06
Clark
But. But you. But you have it covered. Here you are. Well, good. I'm glad to have you today. Episode 64. We are going to be. We're going to do something kind of unique, which I'm pretty excited about today. We're going to be discussing actually two films we're going to be discussing in 2020 Two's Barbarian. So right off the bat, this is something new.
00:00:46:06 - 00:00:49:15
Clark
We're going to be discussing a current or like you know I would still.
00:00:49:15 - 00:00:50:11
Cullen
To a new release.
00:00:50:11 - 00:01:06:00
Clark
Yeah, people are still talking about it. It's on HBO, Max. I think people are checking it out still for the first time. So we're going to be discussing barbarian, but we're also going to be discussing your film, the film that you had worked on. What was it did you work on that 2021?
00:01:06:00 - 00:01:09:17
Cullen
2020? Yes, I wrote it in 2020 and we shot it in 2021. Yeah.
00:01:09:23 - 00:01:15:23
Clark
Okay. So shot it in 2021. We're going to be discussing your film and your film's title is.
00:01:16:04 - 00:01:16:16
Cullen
Daylight.
00:01:16:16 - 00:01:53:18
Clark
Again. Daylight Again? Yeah. And the reason that we're going to be kind of discussing both of these films in this episode is because and and I agree with you. Cohen After having seen your film just this morning, these two films share a lot. They have a lot of similarities. And so I'm going to be really interested to kind of pick your brain on their on the creation production of your film and and get your take on, you know, when you when you see another film whose head that's had great success like Barbarian has and it's so similar in so many ways to yours kind of like get your thoughts on some of that, you know
00:01:53:18 - 00:02:08:07
Clark
like what's that like? And, you know, did you see things that you thought, Hey man, I did that better or vice versa? Hey man, I wish I would have thought of that for mine. And we're going to get into it. We're going to talk a little bit about barbarian first, kind of like we do on most of our previous episodes.
00:02:08:07 - 00:02:18:05
Clark
But then we're going to kind of shift into this discussion of your film as well. So I'm really excited about this. A couple of firsts for us here at the Soldiers of Cinema podcast. Yeah, So.
00:02:18:14 - 00:02:39:10
Cullen
And I just want to jump in real quick too, and just say that because these are new releases, as you said, and we usually do older movies. Yeah, you know, we are going to be talking about these in detail and spoiling the way stuff like that. Yeah. So especially with Barbarian, I saw a Barbarian with no knowledge, prior knowledge going in, I didn't even see a trailer.
00:02:39:10 - 00:02:48:20
Cullen
So this is a movie that I would definitely recommend seeing before you know anything. So if you're listening to the podcast, I think it's on Disney Plus or HBO or something like that.
00:02:49:03 - 00:02:50:01
Clark
Depends on your country.
00:02:50:07 - 00:02:51:03
Cullen
Yeah, depends on where you.
00:02:51:03 - 00:02:53:14
Clark
Are here in the States, Disney Plus.
00:02:53:14 - 00:03:20:13
Cullen
But definitely I would recommend watching it first. And then my movie Daylight Again is available for free on YouTube as well. It's under my YouTube channel called Post Roma Pictures. So if you want to perhaps be a little bit more in tune with our conversation today, pause the podcast, check out the two movies and then come back will still be here.
00:03:20:13 - 00:03:39:00
Cullen
And yeah, just wanted to say that because again, usually we're reviewing kind of older movies and talking about older movies that, that have, you know, been spoiled to death, whereas these two are quite new and recent. So I think for anyone listening, I'd recommend, yeah, go check them out and and take a listen after.
00:03:39:10 - 00:03:45:00
Clark
Yep. And we can also we'll put a link color into your film in our description.
00:03:45:05 - 00:03:45:12
Cullen
Sure.
00:03:45:12 - 00:04:06:12
Clark
Yeah. Yeah. So that just in case you know you're having trouble finding it, we'll just put the link directly to it in the description. So please check there. And I agree it's going to be a lot better if you've seen this film. We don't want to spoil anything, so And we'll just sit here and wait. We'll just be waiting and you're in your phone or wherever else you listen to podcast.
00:04:06:12 - 00:04:15:07
Clark
We'll just sit here and wait patiently. I've got some snacks, I've got some water. And so, you know, don't take too long, though, you know, because we've only can hold out for so long.
00:04:15:10 - 00:04:16:04
Cullen
Yeah, yeah.
00:04:16:04 - 00:04:24:17
Clark
But we'll be here when you get back. Yeah.
00:04:24:17 - 00:04:39:23
Speaker 3
Oh, you've got to be kidding me. Yeah. This is four, seven, six barbering, right? Yeah, I'm renting this place. I booked it a month ago. Are you sure you have the right place? Yeah, we're always supposed to do.
00:04:40:21 - 00:04:50:08
Cullen
Why don't you come inside and we'll call these idiots down here? Why don't you just crash here?
00:04:50:19 - 00:04:53:23
Speaker 3
Oh, no.
00:04:53:23 - 00:05:03:18
Cullen
I don't know if you got a great look at this neighborhood, but I don't think you should be out there by yourself. Your code is dry, and there's a lock on the door by the way, I'm Heath.
00:05:04:09 - 00:05:58:04
Speaker 3
That's right. You take the bedroom and I'll sleep out here on the couch. So shine on, Keith. Oh, he's.
00:06:13:12 - 00:06:13:15
Speaker 4
Good.
00:06:17:13 - 00:06:34:08
Speaker 4
This process might seem overwhelming, but with a little practice, it can soon become a pleasurable experience.
00:06:34:08 - 00:06:43:22
Speaker 3
This is perfectly natural.
00:06:44:03 - 00:06:52:13
Clark
Barbarian was your pick, and I can definitely see why that was the case. But tell me a little bit about your first impressions with the film.
00:06:53:00 - 00:07:11:23
Cullen
Yeah, so I again, as I just said, I knew nothing about this movie, so it came out either. I don't know if it was when I was away. I was away for three and a half months this summer. And so it either came out when I was away or just after I got back. But I had yes, I was in for tax fraud, tax evasion.
00:07:12:08 - 00:07:13:17
Clark
And we're joking.
00:07:13:17 - 00:07:30:19
Cullen
And I finally got back, got out of the pen and. No, but but it was it was interesting. So, yeah, usually I'm quite tuned in to things like this and kind of know, especially a movie that's kind of up my alley like this. I would I would know about it going into it now.
00:07:30:19 - 00:07:32:06
Clark
Are you off? Have seen like what?
00:07:32:06 - 00:07:54:02
Cullen
Yeah, no, I definitely like I like horror, I like high concept horror like this. Especially, Um, and so, yeah, I hadn't even seen a single trailer. I hadn't seen, I hadn't read anything about the plot. I literally had seen the poster and had a friend recommended that I, you know, check it out. And they didn't tell me anything either.
00:07:55:01 - 00:08:16:21
Cullen
I went pretty much at the end of its theatrical run here, so I got to see it in theaters again, knowing nothing. The theater was was mostly not filled, but there were probably five or six other people in theater with me. And I just was really, really like kind of taken for a ride, which I think is very much intentional on Zach Kreuger, who is the director writer's part.
00:08:17:19 - 00:08:39:23
Cullen
You know, he describes his writing process for this movie being something where he was like, I had no long term plan and basically says that if I was surprising myself, then I was happy with it. And you can definitely feel that like, I mean, I was sitting in the movie and we'll get into more detail about this in a bit, but just I'm sure you kind of had a similar experience.
00:08:39:23 - 00:09:05:00
Cullen
I don't know how anyone wouldn't where you're just every time a new feature of the story is kind of unfolding, you're like, Where the hell is this thing going? And so I really enjoyed it for that. You know, it's it's not too often, unfortunately, these days where you go and see a movie that kind of takes you by surprise and kind of, you know, you can't really predict where it's going and where it's going to end up.
00:09:06:02 - 00:09:32:04
Cullen
And I love that feeling. You know, I love I love not knowing what's happening. You know, there's a great moment that cuts from one thing and then suddenly you're in a completely different location. And it's like, you know, I guess the start of the opening really of the second act in a way. And I remember when that happened, I laughed out loud audibly in the theater because I just was like, I have no idea what's going on in a very good way, though, not in a negative way.
00:09:32:04 - 00:09:40:22
Cullen
So that was kind of my first reaction. I really liked it. I knew nothing about it, which was great, and I was really glad that I didn't and and had a great time with it.
00:09:41:13 - 00:09:41:20
Clark
Okay.
00:09:41:20 - 00:09:42:21
Cullen
What what about you?
00:09:43:06 - 00:10:00:12
Clark
Yeah. So, you know, I kind of a similar situation in the sense that I didn't know anything about it. I mean, I had I think I'd like seen the thumbnail, you know, on a, on a plane or something, but I've never watched, right. For the first time on a plane because I refused to watch it. I refused to watch anything like that on a tiny little crappy screen.
00:10:00:16 - 00:10:18:20
Clark
Yeah, but, but I had seen the thumbnail. I kind of heard a little bit about it, you know, that it was there was popular, that it was doing well. But I didn't know anything about the story. I didn't know anything about the filmmaker. I didn't know anything at all about it. And so it went to its theatrical run and I didn't go see it.
00:10:19:05 - 00:10:39:21
Clark
And then my brother had apparently caught it on HBO, Max out here, and he was like, Hey, I think you should check this film out. I think he would like it. And so I, I ended up catching it, you know, a couple of days later at his referral and so, yeah, so I watched it at home. I watched it alone.
00:10:40:14 - 00:10:57:15
Clark
My wife refuses to watch horror movies for the most part, so I could not convince her to watch this with me. She was like, Oh, she took a look at the cover and the name, and she was like, No, no, not watching it and not watching it. So. So I stayed up late after she went to bed one night and I watched it alone at home.
00:10:59:03 - 00:11:03:00
Clark
Yeah. I mean, look, I think this film has a lot has a lot to like.
00:11:05:01 - 00:11:12:22
Clark
I don't know if I'm in love with it as much as you are. And I've been trying to kind of figure out an articulation of why that is.
00:11:13:05 - 00:11:13:20
Cullen
Right. Right.
00:11:13:21 - 00:11:36:19
Clark
Movie is obviously very successful. It was extremely successful commercially and it was extremely successful critically. I mean, I'm looking right now at Rotten Tomatoes and it's got, you know, a 92% tomato meter. Right. A hugely successful film. Now, don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying that I think that it's a bad film, but I just don't know that I'm on the hype train.
00:11:37:12 - 00:12:08:00
Clark
A lot of people seem to be on about this film. So, you know, some of the things that I liked, like I think, for instance, like what you had talked about, you really enjoyed how we we change gears pretty radically both like temporally and geographically in the film where we're, you know, we're in the house and it's this like Airbnb, you know, confusion and there's this great tension and it kind of plays up, you know, the the fear that a woman would have in this kind of situation.
00:12:08:00 - 00:12:27:01
Clark
I think it did a really good job of illustrating that and really writing that tension and ratcheting that up. And then boom, now we're just in longs driving down the Malibu coastline or wherever he is, you know, and and it you know, and I just want to pause here and say for a second, I really love Justin Long in this film.
00:12:27:01 - 00:12:30:19
Clark
I like Justin Long in general, but I really like him in this film.
00:12:31:21 - 00:12:32:14
Cullen
Yeah, he's.
00:12:32:14 - 00:12:50:20
Clark
Fantastic. Yeah, he really is. You know, like when he was doing it, I had like the ever so slightly tiniest little brush with him. When I lived in L.A., I lived in Franklin Village, and at one of the homes that I lived in, I lived upstairs. This house was like divided into up into apartments. One downstairs, one upstairs.
00:12:51:04 - 00:13:06:08
Clark
And he was like the friend of one of the people who lived downstairs. So he would like kind of come in and out. Fortunately, this was when he was doing the Mac PC commercials, right? So what he was mostly known for and unfortunately, I never got to meet him. I never got to, you know, talk to him or anything.
00:13:06:08 - 00:13:30:18
Clark
But anyway, there's my my tiny, super little, you know, ever so barely brief touch with Justin Long. But but yeah, I love him in this. And I thought, you know, that whole thing was good and then we kind of, you know, we go back to the we're in the house in the basement, and then, you know, at a certain point we jump to back in time and now we're with another character and then we come back to the basement.
00:13:30:18 - 00:13:52:18
Clark
So there is I think that's interesting, but maybe as we talk through this, I'll kind of be able to find my way to articulate. That was just something I don't know. You know, maybe I don't know, but maybe we'll find out. But it was so, again, I enjoyed the film, but I was far from being on the hype train that seems to exist for it.
00:13:52:18 - 00:13:53:04
Clark
You know.
00:13:54:19 - 00:14:18:07
Cullen
That makes sense because it was quite it was quite divisive for audiences, I will say. Oh yeah, that audience score on Rotten Tomatoes is much lower than the critics or I believe. Yeah, I know. I saw a lot of reviews of this, of people being like they don't get what what the hype is and really not liking it.
00:14:18:07 - 00:14:22:01
Cullen
And I don't as far as I can tell, you didn't really not like it. But no.
00:14:22:01 - 00:14:23:16
Clark
I know I didn't, I didn't not like it.
00:14:23:16 - 00:14:47:11
Cullen
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've seen a lot of people say that they like, like that It was it was awful and things like that. So no, no, that, that it did really kind of divide audiences. And of course, I'm not saying that you're on you're on that side of it, but it is it always fascinates me when you see a movie that that kind of people there's a huge swath of people that really love it and there's a huge swath of people that really, really don't like it.
00:14:47:21 - 00:14:51:08
Cullen
Hum. And perhaps we can figure out why that is.
00:14:51:15 - 00:15:10:04
Clark
Yeah, well, that's interesting. I mean, I didn't know there was such a division on it. I kind of felt like everything I had heard was really complimentary of the film and really, you know, really loving it. So I actually didn't realize that existed. I mean, I think having, you know, a really people either really love it or they really hate it is usually kind of a good thing, right?
00:15:10:09 - 00:15:33:11
Clark
Because, you know, I think that's indicative of a filmmaker who's made really strong choices and either people really love those choices or they dislike them. But it's not a middling film. And I think, you know, middling films are probably, you know, the super inoffensive. They're they don't say anything. They have no opinion or perspective. They're super safe. Well, you know, whatever.
00:15:33:11 - 00:15:55:18
Clark
Yeah, it's it's, you know, oatmeal. So the you know, the cinematic equivalent of of oatmeal with nothing in it, you know, And it's like, I don't want cold oatmeal for my cinema experience. I don't I definitely don't think that's this film. But but yeah, I mean let's kind of go into a discussion of it and maybe, you know, maybe we can tease out some more of my thoughts here.
00:15:55:18 - 00:16:16:09
Clark
You know, sometimes I just get that I don't know about you, but it's like, as much as I love, you know, obviously I love cinema and obviously I enjoy talking about cinema, but I do find on occasion where, you know, something just doesn't really press my buttons and not in exactly the right way. And it takes me a long time to articulate, to kind of find my way to an articulation of why.
00:16:16:09 - 00:16:17:06
Clark
It's just a feeling.
00:16:17:15 - 00:16:18:21
Cullen
Yeah. No, no, that makes sense.
00:16:18:21 - 00:16:36:03
Clark
M Yeah, yeah. And it's, and I'm just because it's like it clearly the technical aspects of the film are extraordinary. I think the soundtrack is great. I think the cinematography for the most part is good, performances are good and fun again, especially Justin Long I so, so yeah.
00:16:36:04 - 00:16:44:18
Cullen
So maybe yeah yeah I actually, I do have to say that the the one aspect that I think excites me the least about the movie is the cinematography.
00:16:45:07 - 00:16:45:16
Clark
Okay?
00:16:45:19 - 00:17:02:03
Cullen
Not that it's in any way poorly done, you know, it's, you know, well done. It's not poorly lit or anything like that. Right. But I find that it doesn't really equal the creative trajectory of the plot. You know, the.
00:17:02:13 - 00:17:02:21
Clark
Tell me.
00:17:02:21 - 00:17:27:02
Cullen
More goes in all these different directions and kind of takes a lot by surprise and things like that. And the cinematography, for the most part is pretty safe and standard. Yeah. You know, like there's nothing really that crazy going on and you think about something like, again, like a Texas Chainsaw Massacre or something like that where you've got you know, this high octane 60 millimeter like real kinetic camera.
00:17:27:02 - 00:17:42:18
Clark
And it's just I mean, you're going to see in almost every horror movie is going to lose in its comparison to Texas massacre, in my opinion. I mean, that's you know, so that's I mean, but but I mean, I you know, just to extrapolate a little bit of what you're saying, I mean, I did feel like there was a lot of redundancy.
00:17:43:08 - 00:18:02:04
Clark
And, you know, just as an example, I felt like, you know, especially when we're in the house in that first act and I know everybody, this is kind of nit picky, but I think it aggregates to something. It's just like every single camera move felt to me like it was. We're pushing in on a dolly, Everything we're pushing, you know, everything is like a slow push.
00:18:02:07 - 00:18:02:12
Clark
Yeah.
00:18:02:19 - 00:18:21:16
Cullen
He cited Fincher for that. Like, oh, like, oh, he said that he wanted to do kind of like a Fincher thing for the Oh Stairs and oh yeah, it everything's a dollar or everything's very like a still kind of slow pan over. Yeah. So it definitely I found that that was the silent film that that it excited or Yeah.
00:18:21:23 - 00:18:30:06
Cullen
Excited me the least. And then even when they get down to the basement it just kind of immediately switches from that to like just a lot of handheld and things like that.
00:18:30:06 - 00:18:54:06
Clark
Like there's not, I guess. Yeah, I guess, you know, as I said, I mean I feel like, you know, this, this like repetitive like kind of a maybe like overly self-conscious camerawork in the beginning, like and maybe that's it. I mean, maybe it's like trying so hard to be somebody else, like Fincher with just, like, really on the note, like this really pushy score.
00:18:54:12 - 00:18:57:05
Clark
That's not that I didn't like the score, but it's like, really pushy.
00:18:57:14 - 00:18:58:05
Cullen
Yeah, Yeah.
00:18:58:05 - 00:19:18:04
Clark
It's like, it's like it's like they just really trying hard. And I felt like sometimes they were trying too hard with the setup. Like, we really want you to be tense right now. We really, really want you to see that, you know, this woman is in this, like, super tense situation. And yeah, I want you to think this guy's bad.
00:19:18:07 - 00:19:31:15
Clark
We really, really want you to think that this guy is going to hurt her. And I get it right. But I guess at a certain point, I was like, I was almost like, I get it, guys. I get it, I get it, I get it, you know? Yeah. Like, no.
00:19:31:15 - 00:19:53:04
Cullen
I think that probably a lot of that comes from and I agree with you and I actually like I think that this as a movie, it's far from perfect. I think the thing that I love about it is just that it really it's one of those movies that kind of like, masked its flaws with just kind of carrying me on on the the journey of the story.
00:19:53:04 - 00:20:00:17
Cullen
And I think watching it a second time, I was actually able to pick out a lot of the things that I, I didn't love about it, which was, you know, yeah, thank God I didn't get to see it a second time.
00:20:00:17 - 00:20:16:10
Clark
And my yeah, my point is not to to like nit pick a film to death or anything. And I mean, if anybody's listened to all of our previous episodes, that's not what we do. You know, I'm, I'm not here to, like, bash the film or anything. I it's kind of like a like a postmortem to try to kind of suss out.
00:20:16:10 - 00:20:18:20
Clark
It's like, okay, your sussing out choices, you know?
00:20:18:20 - 00:20:19:17
Cullen
How would you feel about it?
00:20:19:17 - 00:20:31:17
Clark
Yeah, filmmakers ourself, it's like we're trying to learn. So just to give some context, I mean, well, I don't have to approach it from the perspective of I want to beat up someone's film either. You know, that's never, ever because there are really good things in it.
00:20:31:17 - 00:20:54:07
Cullen
So and I think the cause of that might be the fact that it was originally written as a short. And yeah, I don't know what the short was like, what remains of the short. But if I had to guess, when you're doing a short film that's 20 minutes and the short film was supposed to just be that intro with the two of them in the house, and it was about a girl who goes to an Airbnb.
00:20:54:07 - 00:21:15:17
Cullen
It's double booked and it's like a girl basically ignoring red flags of a situation. Yeah. And so if I had to guess the stuff that you're referring to and that I frankly agree with you on, is likely a carryover from that where it's like in a short film you have so little time to really establish those things. So you really have got to drive them home and you got to drive it.
00:21:15:17 - 00:21:38:00
Cullen
Yeah. And so, yeah, it's like he, you know, he makes sure that he doesn't touch it. Then he waits for her to come out with the the wine bottle and it's like, hey, I want and he goes on that rambling thing. And so I can imagine that that is something that yeah, definitely kind of carried over. I don't know how the original short film was supposed to end, if he was actually supposed to be guilty in that and be a predator, or if, you know was, it'd.
00:21:38:00 - 00:22:01:19
Clark
Be interesting because I guess, like, I won't, I, you know, it's like music, right? It's like you don't want to hear the same tone over and over and over again, right? You want you want like a dynamic range in, you know, you want the melody to shift and then come back to a motif and then go, you know, and I guess I just felt like it was just over and over and over, like the same thing.
00:22:02:01 - 00:22:18:18
Clark
And I want to be kind of misdirected. Like, let me think. He's a really nice guy for a second and then, you know, like, like, like push and pull, doesn't it? Just hitting the same note. So to me, I felt like it was however long that first I don't know, however long that act is 15 minutes or something I can't recall.
00:22:18:20 - 00:22:42:05
Clark
It just did feel a little bit, you know, and then, you know, and then there's some other things that it's like, you know, I'm all for films who have a logic of their own. I totally am. And I'm definitely for films not having to to be perfectly logical. And I mean, I love that films can embody like a dreamlike quality and they don't have to make rational sense.
00:22:42:12 - 00:23:01:04
Clark
I love all of that, but sometimes things just kind of stand out to me. Like I can accept some wackiness in some films and for some reason I can't accept some wackiness and others. And it's like when she wakes up and she's like, outside in the daylight for the first time and it's like, this neighborhood is literally like apocalyptically horrible.
00:23:01:06 - 00:23:07:17
Clark
It's Detroit, right? And I don't know, I don't think it was really shot in Detroit. I don't think that's.
00:23:07:17 - 00:23:14:21
Cullen
The the so everything that's not on the street was actually shot in Detroit. So like as soon as she's walking the neighborhood that was all real.
00:23:14:23 - 00:23:37:03
Clark
But it's like but it's like here's this perfect house. It's supposedly owned by this TV star or movie star, whoever this guy is, Right? I can't remember if he was in TV or film, but some actor, some known actor. Mm hmm. Owns this, like, perfectly well-maintained home in a totally destroyed neighborhood that nobody in their right mind would ever go into, like a completely abandoned neighborhood.
00:23:37:06 - 00:23:43:01
Clark
Yeah, right. And like, these two people are going to Airbnb. This house. You got to be shitting me.
00:23:43:01 - 00:23:53:23
Cullen
Yeah, You know? Yeah, it is kind of like they really drive the. The aspect of, like, an abandoned neighborhood home. Well, I mean, I've driven through Detroit, and.
00:23:54:15 - 00:23:55:02
Clark
I would never.
00:23:55:12 - 00:24:00:18
Cullen
Like that, but there's. You don't see again, like you said, you don't. There's not, there's not this.
00:24:00:18 - 00:24:10:13
Clark
So here's the question. Why? So here's what I want to ask. So because this is like what I do, because I want to try it like, okay, so why what was necessary about that decision for the story to be told?
00:24:10:20 - 00:24:14:19
Cullen
Mm hmm. I guess just the isolation element, just the idea that it.
00:24:14:22 - 00:24:40:20
Clark
But why, if you're trapped in a basement, aren't you isolated anyway? Mm hmm. So I guess I'm just. Sometimes I wonder why. Like, why do you make me jump through hoops to kind of ignore things if you didn't have to write, you know? Right. And maybe there is a good reason. I mean, maybe the filmmaker wanted to make a comment about the deterioration of neighborhoods and, you know, or maybe it's tied into kind of, you know, I don't know.
00:24:40:21 - 00:25:02:03
Clark
You know, I get the house thing. This is common. And with your film, too, right, where you have a pretty veneer. So you have this pretty home, you have a pretty exterior and that's what's on the surface. So that's like the conscious. And then you have the subconscious, which is the scary, the dark, the cave, right? So you have happy, wonderful suburbia up top.
00:25:02:03 - 00:25:03:21
Clark
You have scary, terrifying.
00:25:03:21 - 00:25:04:20
Cullen
More about balance.
00:25:04:22 - 00:25:23:02
Clark
Yeah. This is this is super. You know, this is, of course, everywhere, right? This is heaven. Hell, this is. Yeah, subconscious and conscious. I get all that. But yes, you know, just tiny little things. It's like she steps outside and I'm like, Are you kidding me? Like, presumably, like, you know, I don't know. I'm like, okay, so wow, this house is so popular that two people booked it.
00:25:24:09 - 00:25:24:16
Clark
Well.
00:25:25:01 - 00:25:42:18
Cullen
Yeah. So that's I think that's the one thing that I, I did kind of question the first time too is like also when she goes to the the interview with the woman that she would be working with and she's like, yeah, the woman is adamant that she shouldn't be staying in that neighborhood, but that kind of lets her go and like she doesn't she?
00:25:42:18 - 00:25:44:23
Cullen
Okay, come stay with me instead. Yeah. You know.
00:25:45:07 - 00:25:47:13
Clark
Or let's find you another place or anything.
00:25:47:15 - 00:26:11:21
Cullen
And there's like, there's the conversation about like, oh it's, there's a medical conference in town and that. But yeah, like I was in though I will say the one thing that does work in its favor and it's really a split second moment is the way that first night when she realizes that there's no key in the lock box and she she hasn't actually taken in her surroundings at all.
00:26:12:05 - 00:26:18:17
Cullen
Right. And then she turns around and kind of looks around the neighborhood and sees that there's no lights on, that there's nothing.
00:26:18:23 - 00:26:19:09
Clark
Yeah.
00:26:19:09 - 00:26:34:03
Cullen
That it does kind of hit you like, oh, that's a bit creepy. Like, you kind of feel like someone's watching her. But I think that to your point, I think you could have had the same effect and just had it be a little bit less apocalyptic.
00:26:34:21 - 00:26:42:10
Clark
Or just, you know, like urban be like in a rural area. Yeah, Yeah. I you know, I don't know, but, you know.
00:26:42:16 - 00:26:44:05
Cullen
But then it would be too much like daylight again.
00:26:44:21 - 00:26:55:10
Clark
Ha ha. Okay, fair enough. And we will get to that. But, you know, here's another thing. Like so you mentioned that interview or why did that why did that scene even need to exist? Why is that scene even in the film?
00:26:55:23 - 00:26:56:07
Cullen
Mm hmm.
00:26:56:15 - 00:26:57:23
Clark
I'm sitting there and I'm bored.
00:26:58:14 - 00:26:59:08
Cullen
Mm hmm.
00:26:59:08 - 00:27:01:02
Clark
I need to see her interview.
00:27:02:09 - 00:27:02:13
Cullen
Why?
00:27:02:16 - 00:27:08:19
Clark
Right now? What relevance does that have to anything that happens in a movie that I. I might have missed it, but I guess.
00:27:08:19 - 00:27:16:10
Cullen
I guess. I mean, the functionality is that she leaves the house and then it comes back and the she needs to have taken the key inside with.
00:27:16:10 - 00:27:18:03
Clark
See, that's what makes me crazy about.
00:27:18:03 - 00:27:20:00
Cullen
But that's what I mean. Yeah. Like when you can report.
00:27:20:03 - 00:27:45:23
Clark
On this stuff makes me crazy. And maybe this is. I guess I feel like. So from my perspective and it's only my perspective and obviously there are many, many other perspectives and many other very valid perspectives. So this is just my opinion. I generally prefer my stories coming from a place of kind of the subconscious of the writer, and especially when it comes to horror.
00:27:46:22 - 00:28:13:04
Clark
I really prefer my horror to be visceral, right, and kind of primordial. And I don't mean in like the literal plot or monsters or something. I mean, in the writing, I mean, in, you know, the point of horror to me is that it's a it's a way to it to uncover and express the, like, deepest fears of humanity.
00:28:13:09 - 00:28:26:16
Clark
Mm hmm. And and so I feel like it's very difficult to do that when you're when you're analytical about it and you're calculating about it. I feel like, at least for me and I know.
00:28:26:16 - 00:28:27:19
Cullen
Yeah, that, that definitely makes.
00:28:27:19 - 00:28:48:09
Clark
Sense. And I feel like this film and I know that you said, like the writer didn't know where it was going to go and but I don't know that I feel that in, in the horror part of this, I can see that in kind of the plotting where it's like, okay, hard cut. We're in a totally different space with a totally different character.
00:28:48:09 - 00:28:55:17
Clark
I can kind of see it, but I guess the film feels more conceptual to me than it does viscerally scary.
00:28:55:21 - 00:29:16:19
Cullen
Yeah. Well, what would I think might again be something that and this is all me guessing, but it could also again be the fact that that because it was written as a short or initially and it was just this thing that what often happens is when you add so much on the end of a short term to a feature, you then have to go back to the initial short and be like, Wait, that make it all work and change makes things.
00:29:16:19 - 00:29:28:03
Cullen
Yeah, and put put all these things in. And so I think that could be exactly what you mean. It's just that like he went back and was like, Well, this doesn't make sense for that. This has to be here. Well, blah blah. I mean there's yeah, like, there's.
00:29:28:12 - 00:29:56:02
Clark
And I don't know, I'm guessing, you know, who knows? And maybe, you know, and obviously this is like very personal experience. I mean, it's I'm not even sure, but that that I'm kind of grasping here. But that's kind of maybe what it feels like a little to me, you know, is that it's less kind of that that nightmare kind of dream, kind of primordial, visceral fear that we that's deep inside of us.
00:29:56:02 - 00:30:18:02
Clark
You know, it's like, well, versus kind of a conceptual like, I'm going to write a scary story and I'm going to, you know, and then how can the cloud calculate that, Right? Yeah, No, that I don't know. Yeah. So, so but you know, but I could be totally off, right, if we had the director here, which would be awesome.
00:30:18:02 - 00:30:19:18
Clark
If we did, we could ask. Yeah.
00:30:19:23 - 00:30:38:00
Cullen
And I think, I think perhaps again the, I think that that might be where our different experiences with the movie came from, whereas I just, I didn't find myself thinking about that at all. The first time I watched it, I was just kind of like swept up in the trajectory and the the momentum of the plot. And so I didn't even like it wasn't even either.
00:30:38:00 - 00:30:58:04
Cullen
This time. It wasn't even until this time I watched it that I realized a lot of that stuff, or just the fact that like one of the first things she does in the movie is ignore a call from her boyfriend or her ex-boyfriend, which doesn't really come up at all again. And I think that also, again, likely is a holdover from the short film, which will probably involve that.
00:30:58:14 - 00:31:24:17
Clark
I could go out on a limb and then I could kind of go out on a limb maybe. I mean, you know, thematically, I think we see some really like some there are some themes here, right? Some somatic themes in maybe that's a part of it. But we you know, obviously, like in the first act of the film, it's like, you know, the film does a good job of kind of illustrating how men and women have to approach situations very differently.
00:31:24:17 - 00:31:55:12
Clark
Right. That we, the man who's in the house, is not scared of her. He's not afraid of her being a bad guy. He's not afraid of any violence being perpetrated on him by her. But she's terrified. And that's like what happens in the real world. Like, that's how reality is for many people. Men take many. Again, I'm not speaking for everyone, but I mean, in general, it's I think it's much more common for a man to walk through life and not be afraid of situations like this as nearly as much as a woman might be.
00:31:55:12 - 00:31:57:06
Clark
Right? Yeah, well, it's like he said that movie.
00:31:57:06 - 00:32:05:03
Cullen
Like if he had shown up on to an Airbnb and a woman had been staying and he wouldn't have thought twice about going back, I'll see you on the couch. Right.
00:32:05:03 - 00:32:26:09
Clark
So the film is like really working hard to express that, I think. And then I think the film works really hard to show Justin Long's character as it's a big, big, big part of his character, of course. Is this the sexual assault or abuse charge that has been brought against him?
00:32:26:09 - 00:32:28:19
Cullen
So and how we way justifies it to him.
00:32:28:20 - 00:32:46:21
Clark
Somehow he justifies it to himself. Correct. And all of that. So so we're pulling this this thematic theme from the first act. And then, of course, what we find out is that, you know, there's a little bit of a bait and switch and that the quote unquote, mother, this kind of monster. So to speak, isn't actually the bad guy.
00:32:47:01 - 00:32:47:20
Cullen
Yeah, Yeah.
00:32:48:02 - 00:32:54:08
Clark
The bad guy is the person that we see in the flashback. And there's the character's named Frank. I can't remember.
00:32:54:08 - 00:32:55:14
Cullen
Yeah, I think Frank. Yeah.
00:32:56:00 - 00:33:32:04
Clark
Frank. He's. And we see him, he's kidnaping, torturing, presumably raping these victims who are women. And so that's what they've discovered in the House and that's what Justin Long That's who he bumps into. And he sees all these VHS tapes of the recordings of these horrors. So, you know, and then of course, we kind of come back to the end and just add long fails to be a protector or even a reason finally honorable person and, you know, is like totally willing to sacrifice the main character for his own life, right?
00:33:32:09 - 00:33:33:02
Clark
Yeah. Yeah.
00:33:33:02 - 00:33:49:21
Cullen
Well, you also have the moment that Justin Long sees the recordings of like, Yeah, all these, you know, we know assaults and we don't see them, But he turns around and is like, You're a monster. You're. Yeah, yeah. So there's it's, there's not. So I was handed on its commentary well.
00:33:49:23 - 00:34:15:07
Clark
So so clearly clearly the writer is writing this with like some strong narrative or, you know, thematic theme, you know, themes that are traveling through the whole film. So I don't know if the call from The Boyfriend is a part of that thematically. If maybe there's a hint that, you know, because of the context that it's in, you know, she's obviously in another town, maybe she's moving away, she's trying to find a job at another place where she doesn't live.
00:34:15:12 - 00:34:31:07
Clark
She's not taking a boyfriend's call. I'm assuming that this is an unhealthy relationship or one that she doesn't want or one that she's trying to get away from. So, you know, there's like a pretty consistent narrative here thematically, so that at least that's my take on it.
00:34:31:20 - 00:34:56:10
Cullen
Yeah. No, that makes sense. Yeah. And I think that that again yeah, I just my curiosity is I wonder if in the short film version, if that came back in a larger way or if that was just the say or if that maybe, maybe it was an addition to the feature. And I that's one thing that I always, you know, that it's like the double edged sword of speculation is that I would love to read the short film.
00:34:56:21 - 00:34:57:02
Clark
And.
00:34:57:02 - 00:34:58:17
Cullen
See what carries over.
00:34:59:00 - 00:35:03:19
Clark
I couldn't even find the script. Guess Yeah, because in the feature script I couldn't even find it. So yeah.
00:35:04:02 - 00:35:12:06
Cullen
We won't get into this yet. But just because Daylight again also was based off of and started as a short. So it is interesting. Yeah.
00:35:12:06 - 00:35:33:09
Clark
You know just an idea about that. Let's see. Yeah. So I mean, you know, obviously like we said, you can go watch this for free and I highly recommend you do so. I think it's a really entertaining and fun watch. So please take advantage of that opportunity. And and if you haven't done so up until this point, pause, do so and come back because we'll probably have some spoilers here for Colin's film.
00:35:33:09 - 00:35:56:04
Clark
So yeah, well, this is a really cool opportunity. Cohen Because obviously you've got some inside information on this film. I'm imagining since you wrote it, it's a little bit so. So tell me about I'm really curious kind of now in the context of having just made this feature when you saw a barbarian, like what did you think? Were you like, Oh my gosh, like this is my film?
00:35:56:04 - 00:36:01:16
Clark
Or This is like, Whoa, this is so close. Because I've seen both now and it's like, wow, there's like a lot of similar eighties.
00:36:01:17 - 00:36:06:20
Cullen
So yeah, no. And like they're primarily, I think, surface level similarities.
00:36:06:20 - 00:36:07:17
Clark
Which Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:36:07:17 - 00:36:38:02
Cullen
It's less suspicious to me but, but no I actually I, it didn't, it didn't bother me in the slightest. It was actually a lot of fun. And I think again, maybe one of the reasons that I had so much fun with the movie was because every time, because I knew nothing I didn't know that going in. Yeah. And yet, like, down to, like the costumes, like the outfit that Tess wears in Barbarian is almost identical to the outfit that, like, there's a shot of of Tess, you know, walking down a stairwell and it's like, the exact same thing in daylight again.
00:36:38:02 - 00:37:07:14
Cullen
And so I just. I thought it was honestly, really, really funny and like, sure, really almost like, excited me about the movie because I it was almost like seeing, like, a different version of the movie and being like, oh, someone that kind of has a similar idea and like, where do they take it? And it was it kind of felt like a weird exercise when you give like, you know, I used to do this when I taught film classes where you give like three different groups the same script and see or the same like, you know, pitch it and they see where they go with it.
00:37:07:22 - 00:37:34:00
Cullen
Yeah. And so it was, it was funny seeing that. And there were things that I really appreciated about Barbarian that I, I think I didn't do as well. Like I think Barbarian gets right into the, the meat of it much quicker than my movie. And of course we're discussing right now too that version that you saw was the final cut, which is very, very different from the theatrical cut that actually was shown at the premiere.
00:37:34:00 - 00:37:46:02
Cullen
There's there's huge differences. Yeah. So the even the original theatrical cut takes like there's like a 20 minute introduction that takes place before they get to the house but.
00:37:46:04 - 00:38:08:16
Clark
Like, dig into some of that. So, I mean, let's go back a little bit. I mean, you know, obviously we can only speculate about, you know, the writer of Barbarian and kind of how that process went, you know, extrapolating from just small little pieces that that he shared, you know, in Q&A or whatnot in articles. But, you know, tell me about like a little bit about the conception of of your piece then.
00:38:08:16 - 00:38:24:23
Clark
Right? Sure. So what were you what were you striving to do? What were your inspirations? And kind of just summarize in a nutshell, just in case people don't have an opportunity to see it, or maybe that, you know, kind of summarize, kind of, you know, what that story ended up being. Mm hmm. If you.
00:38:24:23 - 00:38:44:19
Cullen
Would. Yeah, I can go. I can actually I can go right from essentially the beginning, which is that a friend of mine approached me with an idea for a short film called Hector. And so his original idea, it was actually a short film that he had shot himself and wanted to redo because he didn't really like how it had turned out.
00:38:44:19 - 00:39:00:06
Cullen
And it was basically about this person that like is in this house that he doesn't know he's staying at a cousin's house and there's a monster in the house, and he has to like he basically does the childlike thing, which is he holds the blanket over his head and hopes the monster will go away. But it actually works.
00:39:00:06 - 00:39:08:23
Cullen
And like the monster, it's like the one defense against the monster is that it can't get three blankets. It's kind of I think it was only like three or 4 minutes long.
00:39:08:23 - 00:39:11:00
Clark
And so they go through blankets. Yeah.
00:39:11:00 - 00:39:30:00
Cullen
And it was like this little silly thing. And, and so then I got, I was really interested in it, but we had some time. I think we shot it at his parents house initially, and then we had about a month and a half before we could shoot there again, because I think they were doing renovations or something. And so we were like, Well, let's actually take this and kind of maybe expand it and change it.
00:39:30:00 - 00:39:51:00
Cullen
And it changed pretty drastically into the short film. Hector, which I think turned out about 10 minutes long. And so that one's about this guy who goes to his cousin's house and his cousin's not there and his cousin's like, I'll be there tomorrow, but you don't meet my roommate Hector. He's there. Just, you know, and there's, like, a list of rules about, like, don't make too much noise, don't touch the thermostat, blah, blah, blah.
00:39:51:11 - 00:40:08:12
Cullen
And he goes in and he immediately is kind of an asshole when he kind of breaks all the rules. And so the plot is set up as this sort of like in house horror thing, but it's like it's a bit of a comedy because it's just kind of about roommates having difficult growing pains together and but you never actually see the other roommate and you're like, okay, what's going on here?
00:40:08:12 - 00:40:22:20
Cullen
And then it gets a little bit creepy. And then the ending, the twist is that it's actually like a Wendigo, which is this monster and that the roommate is dead and been this Wendigo that has been kind of pissed off at him the entire night and eventually doesn't even kill him, just throws him out because he's like, you're breaking all the rules.
00:40:22:20 - 00:40:39:20
Cullen
And so a little bit more comedy. Yeah, COVID hit. We decided that we were going to write a feature, and so we wrote two other ones that kind of ballooned in budget. And then I said to Michael, I was like, Why don't we take Hector and turn that into something that could be done on a really low budget?
00:40:39:20 - 00:40:58:01
Cullen
It's basically one location and we can kind of keep that and maybe just expand a few of the characters and things like that. So the original drafts of of Daylight again, were much more similar to like again, like a Texas Chainsaw mat, Like it was like this kind of Sam Raimi esque, high octane.
00:40:58:01 - 00:40:58:17
Clark
Evil Dead.
00:40:58:20 - 00:41:19:15
Cullen
Horror action with a lot of gore with these big set pieces and many more characters and things like that. Like there was actually another person living in the house named Jackson, who was kind of the primary conflict with Artie, who was the main character originally, the man. And then we just kind of realized like, okay, this is going to be way too complicated.
00:41:19:15 - 00:41:43:09
Cullen
We had no money. So we were like, This is going to be too complicated. We can't afford it for this actors. We can't afford this being special effects, right? So let's pare this down. And one of the ways that we did that and it was a friend of mine, Mandy, who actually kind of made this recommendation was she was like, well, a way to raise the stakes is to make the main character a woman, because a woman being in a house with a man alone is a lot different than like a man going to it.
00:41:43:09 - 00:42:08:11
Clark
Yeah, well, so let's pause. I want to yes, for sure. Because I think this is really important, right? This is this is a an extremely important trope in the genre of horror film. Right. That you the victim is is is often right. There's the last girl. Right. This is like a known thing. You know, victims are often women and that's it's it's a big part of horror.
00:42:08:19 - 00:42:40:17
Clark
And I think this is partly what we're starting to see is, you know, twists on that or, you know, different takes on that trope and the challenges that as culture shifts and yeah, as our culture, cultural awareness and like just, you know, culture in general shifts. But but I think what you just said is, is important. And in a minute it speaks to kind of what I was just saying, right, that it's like in barbarian, we're really shown very specifically how different a woman has to move through these situations than a man.
00:42:40:17 - 00:43:00:08
Clark
Right. And and that's kind of what you just were, you know, kind of illustrating, too, is like, well, look, if you want to raise the stakes, then you put a woman in this situation and an audience is automatically, instantly subconsciously going to understand that that character is at greater risk than if they were a man, which is unfortunate.
00:43:00:17 - 00:43:23:03
Cullen
And the character's going to know that, too, right? They're automatically going to be more suspicious and sure. And so it was actually a really interesting switch. But they were also original. They were still cousins like Maggie, who turned into Maggie from already were still cousins per Peter, and it was still primarily centered around Peter being out of the house for the most of the movie.
00:43:23:03 - 00:43:46:18
Cullen
And he just kind of comes in the third act. And it was it was about this dynamic between Maggie and Jackson, who don't know each other at all, who really don't get along. And then there's obviously all these secrets about, you know, spoiler, the cannibalism and all that. And Hector was in the basement and so it still was just again, I still couldn't figure out how without any money we were going to do this.
00:43:47:11 - 00:44:04:01
Cullen
Yeah. And so I thought, okay, let me just take like a break from it for a moment, watch some other stuff, spend a month just like looking at taking in other types of, of thrillers and things like that. Because again, we'd been looking at a ton of Toby Hooper, Sam Raimi, all these, that sort of thing.
00:44:04:09 - 00:44:07:13
Clark
What ended up being like a big like some of the biggest inspirations.
00:44:07:14 - 00:44:08:21
Cullen
So yeah, so actually what.
00:44:08:21 - 00:44:09:00
Clark
Was.
00:44:10:10 - 00:44:36:18
Cullen
The biggest change was when I watched Rebecca, the Hitchcock film Rebecca, which was really kind of a light bulb moment for me because it already has a very similar premise to Daylight again, which is that a woman is like basically married into this mysterious man house with with this big, you know, he's got this big house on this.
00:44:37:02 - 00:44:58:09
Cullen
I don't remember if it's an island or if it's I think it's just like an isolated house on some insula in, like New England or something. Yeah, or maybe it's England, I can't remember. But. And then she kind of uncovers all these secrets about him that he like, Oh, maybe he his wife, maybe he, you know, there's all these elements that are it's based off of the novel and this very thrilling mystery done by Hitchcock.
00:44:58:20 - 00:45:18:16
Cullen
And so I was like, okay, maybe I can make these more frightening elements or like the things that were very visceral and gore heavy and kind of action oriented, maybe I can turn those sort of more into the psychological thriller element. But it still, to me, didn't make sense that they were like, I didn't like the idea that they were cousins.
00:45:18:16 - 00:45:34:00
Cullen
Peter and Maggie. And I also was like, Well, it's difficult to juggle Jackson because he's just kind of this interim character that, you know, why is he there? And so then I watched the rewatched, I should say Phantom Thread, the Paul Thomas Anderson film.
00:45:34:09 - 00:45:34:14
Clark
Yeah.
00:45:35:00 - 00:46:03:02
Cullen
And that was another light bulb moment where I was like, Well, why don't I just completely cut this Jackson character out, turn Peter from her cousin to like a former lover that she, you know, had a fling with five years ago. Kind of like a barney without her. Clyde in a way, and turn it into this kind of what starts as this sort of drama romance, kind of like, you know, Hitchcockian, phantom thread ish, you know, romantic kind of thing.
00:46:03:02 - 00:46:22:11
Cullen
And then that slowly turns into this thriller. And so the original cut of the film, which is 15 minutes longer, which is actually available online on my website, but it's not on YouTube. That version really, you know, spent a lot more time in kind of the more romantic elements of it like it.
00:46:22:11 - 00:46:26:18
Clark
Opens on this. Curious about that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So yeah so it opens with them that.
00:46:27:00 - 00:46:28:09
Cullen
Meeting and all this stuff And.
00:46:28:09 - 00:46:44:00
Clark
Now is there more specificity to their relationship in that? Because it was because obviously in this, in this final cut or this latest cut, I don't know what you're, what you call it when you're calling it, but in the cut that you've shared on YouTube, the one that I watched, it's barely over an hour. So it's very short.
00:46:45:14 - 00:47:19:06
Clark
There's not a lot of specificity, at least that I picked up. Right. It's like we we only get these, like small hints that they you know, and it kind of unfolds like later in the film. Right. We don't learn the context of their relationship very well until we're into it. You know that there was like and it's just kind of in you know they speak kind of to each other vaguely enough because they aren't saying specifically, you know, they're not having to speak specifically about things that they know.
00:47:19:12 - 00:47:39:02
Clark
But as an audience, we're just kind of getting the pieces right where, you know, okay, they did have a history. Okay. They were romantic. Oh, okay. Maybe they were involved in, like, crime together or something. Right. But we don't learn these things and we don't really know, like, why is she why has she left her home and why is she kind of hiding out here in his home?
00:47:39:02 - 00:47:44:03
Clark
Like we don't know the specifics of specifics of any of that. Was there Tell me about that choice.
00:47:44:13 - 00:48:04:14
Cullen
Yeah. So the opening of the film was actually originally the scene with her mom in the kitchen. Yeah, that is now a flashback, right? So the film really opens with that. And so we're immediately given the context that she is on the run from the police or that she's wanted because her mother has the very distinct line of like, turn yourself in.
00:48:05:03 - 00:48:29:18
Cullen
And so we know from the get go that she's wanted. And that was kind of a balancing act. I kind of had to say like I wanted that information to be revealed at the beginning, but at the same time, I felt for the sake of the story and just for the, the progression of the plot and that it mattered more to me to get more quickly into the house.
00:48:29:18 - 00:48:47:10
Cullen
And in fact, a friend of mine, his major note that he kept kind of saying to me that I agreed with was just like, is, you know, like, is there any way to just get to that house and just open on the house? Yeah. And so I had to kind of sacrifice the larger context of her being on the run to relegate that to sort of a more.
00:48:47:21 - 00:49:08:22
Cullen
Yeah. Back element later. Yeah. But then after that, a scene that's not anywhere in the movie she winds up having to she gets like a she's at a store and she's getting materials because basically she's going have to sleep in her car because she has nowhere to go. Oh, and Peter bumps into her at the store and they have this whole conversation outside the store about like how things are going.
00:49:08:22 - 00:49:30:16
Cullen
And he asks her to come up to dinner with her, up to where he lives, and she refuses and sort of says, no, it's okay. And so there's this kind of like brief little conversation that they have that gives hints and kind of explains her situation more that she's like, really got nowhere to go. And then she her car doesn't start and he drives up and sort of says, like, your car's not starting.
00:49:30:16 - 00:49:33:20
Cullen
Like, why don't you come stay with me kind of thing? And and she gets.
00:49:33:20 - 00:49:35:08
Clark
Kind of she has no choice.
00:49:35:08 - 00:50:01:21
Cullen
Yeah. And so while those things were like technically in a plot sense, more like relatively important in that, like over establishing the setting and why she's there and things like that. I just sort of again, I weighed my options and went like, okay, what's more important, giving this really like kind of a little bit more detail into the context of the situation or just, you know, cutting the fat and getting it right.
00:50:01:21 - 00:50:03:10
Clark
And I think you were right to.
00:50:03:19 - 00:50:25:06
Cullen
Yeah, yeah. And there still are more like like you said, there are hints to things throughout that, you know, it's never even in the full extended cut really explained like fully what they did I don't I don't really I wanted to keep that vague specifically because there was a point where I was like, okay, maybe we'll have this element where she's like, really guilty about it.
00:50:25:06 - 00:50:48:22
Cullen
Like maybe she accidentally killed someone or something like that. Yeah, and that's it. And then I was like, No, that's a that's taking too much away from it's too distracting from the point of the movie. And b, I didn't want to make her any. She already is not designed to be super sympathetic. Like you're almost supposed to trust her as little as you trust Peter in a way, a little bit more than Peter, obviously.
00:50:49:04 - 00:51:05:05
Cullen
But she's not designed to be this like, darling angel. Yeah. So I didn't want to risk having her have done something really bad that would then just turn the audience against her. So I kind of intentionally left it to like, you know, kind of did some fraud stuff and, and rip some people off.
00:51:05:05 - 00:51:23:13
Clark
And that's kind of the impression that I think came across because, you know, and that's just in casting and kind of, you know, behavior of the actors and the look of the actors. I mean, I don't look at these two people and think these are hardened criminals who are murdering people. Like that's not Yeah, that's just not what I see, you know, at all.
00:51:23:13 - 00:51:36:15
Clark
They're they're younger, they're clean cut, they're good looking kids. You know, they they just don't you know, they don't impart that. That's that's not it. It's not the impression that they get from casting so well.
00:51:36:16 - 00:52:05:06
Cullen
And yeah, I think one of the interesting things too, about doing like how drastically the movie changed from the theatrical cut to the final cut is that I got to play with like what a lot of people I think, that maybe aren't involved in filmmaking don't realizes how significantly not only a story can change through editing, but how you can actually alter the motivations of characters and alter things that are going on just by changing the context of something.
00:52:05:06 - 00:52:21:00
Cullen
So in the original theatrical cut, Sami, who is the guy that comes home with them from the bar, there's a scene where, where her or him and Maggie actually have a conversation in the bar before Peter comes over and sort of says like, Oh, what? Like, you know, come back to our table and join us for a drink kind of thing.
00:52:21:09 - 00:52:45:17
Cullen
And so it becomes a little bit more obvious that like Peter was kind of orchestrating them to get together and to have that element to happen where he's at the house and then, yeah, and I cut that out just mostly because I didn't actually like the scene where they had the conversation very much. But also I found that as soon as that switched, it became it kind of put us in Maggie's shoes a lot more, where you sort of feel like, Oh, wait, while she's in the bathroom.
00:52:45:17 - 00:52:54:06
Cullen
Peter's gone and just got this, brought this guy to their table, like, What's going on? And you're kind of left in the unknown, like Maggie versus her bringing him over herself.
00:52:54:07 - 00:53:24:05
Clark
I mean, in in a parallel, you know, it's kind of parallels the themes that I talked about, that kind of that I felt from barbarian. I mean, it's you know, the male lead is is pretty douchey guy. And, you know, he speaks for the woman. He makes decisions for her. She doesn't, you know, like she'll be asked a question by another character and he will answer for her, you know, is like, you know, it's very clear that she's uncomfortable about having this third person invited over to the house.
00:53:24:05 - 00:53:36:02
Clark
But, you know, she's not she's not even asked until after the guy has been invited. So then it's, you know, what is she supposed to do? You know, it's you know, it's it's profoundly disrespectful when people do that, you know?
00:53:36:23 - 00:54:02:17
Cullen
Yeah. And I really wanted in the writing process, too, to make that so that like, it's it's not ultimately super clear. It's not just like the script staring at you, but that like every single little element of that that you just described is, is like kind of in Peter's grand design that he wants to piss her off so that she will have this conversation with him upstairs, that Hector can come upstairs and, you know, bring the guy upstairs and kill him and all that.
00:54:02:17 - 00:54:13:06
Clark
So interesting. So can I share with you because like, from when I watch it, I'm just kind of like I'm like, Oh, this guy, this is who this guy is. Like, when I'm watching the film, right?
00:54:13:08 - 00:54:15:00
Cullen
An Oh, yeah, there's definitely yeah.
00:54:15:00 - 00:54:29:04
Clark
I would just like to think that that's who that's who this guy is, right? You know, he's like, this guy kind of talks for women. He, you know, doesn't ask for her opinion, you know, And they were even a couple before. So I'm like, wow, I can see why this woman would not want to be with this guy.
00:54:29:04 - 00:54:47:14
Clark
He's not very nice, dude. You know, that's like as an audience, right? And I because I don't know anything about Hector yet. I don't know anything about that. So. Yeah, yeah. I'm like, yeah, he's in my mind. I'm like, Wait a minute. What? He, like, brought this other guy over and he's asking him if she if he finds her attractive.
00:54:47:14 - 00:54:51:14
Clark
And I'm like, what? Like this guy is horrible. Yeah.
00:54:51:19 - 00:55:34:23
Cullen
Yeah. And that's, that's and so yeah, that's definitely it is certainly a part of like that. That's what he's like. It was also kind of fun because I got to like, he is obviously way over like he a lot of like you know he's he's not he's not dumb but he overestimates his ability to kind of win her over in that way and which is ultimately his downfall because I think that, like, you know, at least from my writing angle and me and Devin talked about this a lot, he plays Peter, which is just that like he expected Maggie to be all over him too, too, you know, And he kind of plays this hard
00:55:34:23 - 00:55:50:20
Cullen
to get woman where it's like, Oh, you're going to sleep in this other room? Like, I'm not making any advances. Advances on you and, and kind of like, so she's confused about all this stuff. And so he his whole thing is like, okay, she's going to be really into me and want to, you know, join me on this endeavor again.
00:55:50:20 - 00:56:12:03
Clark
So tell me about this. So tell me about this. So, you know, again, kind of like paralleling this to barbarian, right? So you've got this this man and a woman, they're in a house and there's kind of you know, there's this tension and, you know, and kind of the different experiences that men and women have in this. And there's lots of parallels there right then.
00:56:12:14 - 00:56:33:00
Clark
Then we have something going on in the basement in both films. Right. And And by the way, I think like the location that you had, I'm assuming that was a totally different place, that that wasn't obviously under that house. But yes, amazing location. It was great. It was well shot and I really liked it. But it's so many similarities to the underground tunnel.
00:56:33:00 - 00:57:04:03
Clark
Kind of. Yes, in barbarian. But but but what I want to talk about is, okay you know, we talk about in Barbarian, where there's like this huge shift in, you know, where there's this like very, very quote unquote dramatic and normal situation that anybody could imagine experiencing. Right. Where two people have been booked for the same Airbnb. And we have kind of a similar thing going on for you outside of, you know, she's on the run from the law and they were like Bonnie and Clyde.
00:57:04:03 - 00:57:30:04
Clark
But you have a man and a woman with kind of like a strained romantic history, and they're kind of navigating that tension and they're in the air in between them, in a confined space, in a house. Everybody's experience that, you know, I mean, whether it was a significant other that, you know, that you were just dating or wife or husband or I mean, we've all been there where there's some strain or conflict in a relationship at a moment when you're navigating that.
00:57:30:04 - 00:57:49:22
Clark
Right. But then we go downstairs. I want to know where you had the idea, the impetus, at what point in the writing process where you like. And I want you to tell tell our listeners what you put downstairs. Sure. We haven't talked about that yet and the direction that goes to. But but what was the impetus for that?
00:57:49:22 - 00:58:04:23
Clark
Where were you like, okay, I've got these like two people and they're normal and they're going through a relatively normal thing, slightly heightened dramatically because of like this criminal history, but for the most part, very normal. And then the downstairs. Tell me about that because I'm. Yeah, curious. Yeah.
00:58:04:23 - 00:58:15:11
Cullen
So the the that actually kind of in the opposite order of barbarian I guess that's what came first like we knew that was when we were writing it.
00:58:15:18 - 00:58:18:19
Clark
Um, so tell me so that's why it's called Hector.
00:58:18:19 - 00:58:41:18
Cullen
That's why. Yeah. So the movie. Yes, the original film is called Hector and which is what? It's based off of the short film. And this is daylight again, of course, but this character, Hector. So essentially the twist, the third act twist when she gets downstairs is that she assumes this third roommate, Hector, is somebody that has like mobility issues or like, you know, severe like, you know, like was in an accident.
00:58:41:21 - 00:58:57:12
Clark
And we've been told that in daylight again, Right. The guy says, like, hey, like this, there's like there's somebody down there that's kind of funky or I forget exactly what he says. But we kind of get the impression that it's like somebody is, you know, I don't know what, we got.
00:58:57:15 - 00:58:59:03
Cullen
Sick or something weird.
00:58:59:03 - 00:59:09:17
Clark
And I don't. And we hear like keep experience rattles. Yeah. Something and it's like, I mean, I don't know anybody that would keep a, you know, a differently abled person in the basement.
00:59:10:08 - 00:59:12:00
Cullen
Yeah no not so.
00:59:12:00 - 00:59:25:14
Clark
And not and not be a horrible person. Yeah. So it's not like I feel any better about him from his description. I'm like, this dude is freaking horrible, man. You know? I mean, I heard chains down there. What? You know.
00:59:25:21 - 00:59:41:18
Cullen
And so, yeah, so and then we get down there and it's revealed that there's this kind of feral man living down there who, who like is, is the, the collector of victims and butcher and all that because.
00:59:41:18 - 00:59:47:14
Clark
Now, now tell me the story of Hector. I want to know what's behind that. More so. So Hector's in this dude's basement?
00:59:47:19 - 00:59:48:04
Cullen
Mm hmm.
00:59:48:14 - 01:00:02:23
Clark
Ah, you know, it's. And it's like a dungeon. The way you've got in the film is like, this hallway, and there's, like, rooms, you know, it's almost like. I mean, it's like there's, like, a slaughterhouse. Tell me about that. And the slide projector. What images are on the wall? Like, where did this come from? Like.
01:00:03:06 - 01:00:25:11
Cullen
Yeah, So a lot of that, a lot of those elements were like things that remained despite the budget being so low and things that so like Hector in the original drafts of the screenplay, was a more specific character that like he was, he was kind of the third roommate. He was a little bit less feral.
01:00:25:11 - 01:00:27:06
Clark
Lazy, feral. Why is he fat?
01:00:27:17 - 01:00:53:00
Cullen
Yeah, that's the thing is like inquiring minds kind of know in the original drafts. It's more that he's just kind of this like abused little guy that the other to take advantage of the change in the basement and has gone insane from that right and so the projector the slide projector was like the original element of that was that it's supposed to be like, that's his only entertainment.
01:00:53:00 - 01:01:07:18
Cullen
And that's kind of what he set as you know, he just spends his entire time listening to that and listening to Yeah, yeah, yeah, music that plays. And there was originally going to be this whole element on the slide director of like smut films playing in, like people being chained and and so that it makes him almost like enjoy that.
01:01:07:18 - 01:01:11:15
Cullen
And so when she's chaining him up, we were going to have like, you know, oh, actually enjoying.
01:01:11:21 - 01:01:12:15
Clark
Do you not do that?
01:01:12:15 - 01:01:21:21
Cullen
Why didn't we just like, we just didn't have the eh, the projector that we had, we couldn't afford a better one. It was way too dim to even display.
01:01:21:21 - 01:01:22:13
Clark
Imagery.
01:01:22:22 - 01:01:30:13
Cullen
And be the we didn't have any real time to like the images that we would have wanted to be on there. So it just kind of had.
01:01:30:13 - 01:01:31:00
Clark
To be a.
01:01:31:05 - 01:01:31:20
Cullen
Simplified.
01:01:31:20 - 01:01:47:00
Clark
Logistics just. But yeah, yeah. I mean, and when I say and just to clarify, it's like and because my parameter for like, oh that's good is that when you say it I'm like disgusted, right? So you say it and I'm like, there's, like the pit of my stomach. I'm like, oh, it's like, nauseating to think, Yeah.
01:01:47:03 - 01:01:57:22
Cullen
And so I like, I wish that we could have explored that more like I wish I do because I really like those elements. Yeah, yeah. But I decided kind of leave the projector in as a little hint to that and just sort of set like this.
01:01:58:03 - 01:02:21:02
Clark
Still was nice. Mean, it's nice as a visual element right off the bat. Right. So it's a great it's, it's, it's great. Just logistically from a lighting perspective it makes that room look really great. It worked really well. And you know, even though you couldn't go deeper into what that was doing it, at least I was still like, you know, I mean, I got a hint, you know, I got a hint of that.
01:02:21:04 - 01:02:38:16
Clark
And it was intriguing. I was like, what's going on? You know? So I felt like that was a great touch. I mean, I think that whole basement was shot really well, the dungeon stuff. But yeah, it would have really been able to fun to have seen what you could have done if you had more money that would have been.
01:02:38:16 - 01:02:39:10
Cullen
Yeah. Because I mean the.
01:02:39:10 - 01:02:39:23
Clark
Original.
01:02:40:04 - 01:03:08:03
Cullen
Ending too was like so there's the basement scene. And what's funny is that in a way it sort of there's like in Barbarian, she's climbing out of the window. Well, to get out of that basement window on the original way that, that sequence ended in the original draft was that Maggie is rips open a window. Well and that that's what blinds Hector and he sort of falls back and and, you know, recoils from the light and then she crawls out of it.
01:03:08:03 - 01:03:19:01
Cullen
And then there's a whole set piece afterwards in the woods where Peter's chasing her with a knife and or with a pitchfork. I think you had an actors out there, too. Like, they're both chasing her in the woods at dawn.
01:03:19:09 - 01:03:39:18
Clark
Oh, so speaking of, I enjoyed your cameo, and I. Yeah, it was like an homage to Hitchcock or, you know, because I know that you love Hitchcock and you just admitted that it was inspired, at least in part, by Rebecca Hitchcock's 1940 film. So. So I did. I like that very much. Colin That was awesome. It was fun to see you there.
01:03:41:13 - 01:04:00:12
Clark
But I what was I going to say? I don't even know. But in your mind, did you have something that that, that represented some always kind of curious, you know, kind of the way my mind works and I'm not suggesting for a second this has to be the way your mind works or something. It's everybody's got a different process.
01:04:00:12 - 01:04:17:10
Clark
But I kind of works so symbolically, either in my writing or maybe sometimes it's after the fact. I kind of, you know, I kind of write something that comes from somewhere. I don't know where it comes from. And then I have to kind of work backwards to figure out like what was this? What this? What does this mean to me?
01:04:17:10 - 01:04:34:01
Clark
Why did I write it? Why? You know, if I took the time to sit down in front of a virtual digital piece of paper and write this like it, has to mean something, Doesn't it mean, like, why? Why is this scary to me? Why is this what I put there? I was just curious kind of what your thoughts are like, why cannibalism?
01:04:34:01 - 01:04:43:20
Clark
Why this feral in a basement? Do you even if you maybe didn't think about it analytically, consciously, when you wrote it, what do you think about now?
01:04:44:01 - 01:05:05:18
Cullen
You that's so the the it actually all kind of came from an image and I can go on a short tangent here for a second Yeah do it. Which is that when I was delivering pizzas there was this one guy that used to and this is right, like the year I graduated high school, I delivered pizzas for a year.
01:05:05:18 - 01:05:21:02
Cullen
There was this one guy that used to always order pizzas and he was just like the creepiest dude in the world. He was the only house on the street that had never had any lights on and always request that you would go down into the backyard and deliver from the back door, which was like down like a slope.
01:05:21:02 - 01:05:23:20
Clark
And so you sounds like you're going to be murdered.
01:05:23:20 - 01:05:25:08
Cullen
Yeah, I know. And so why you would.
01:05:25:08 - 01:05:26:00
Clark
Be scared.
01:05:26:10 - 01:05:47:18
Cullen
Is on the basement Because it was on this slope. So it was like the basement kind of opened up into the backyard. Yeah. And so I remember the first time I went, I went down and knocked on the back like, door window, which is like a glass sliding door. And I'm looking at this room and there's this TV and I can just see the TV light flashing on this couch and everything else is dark, just the TV light.
01:05:47:18 - 01:06:03:09
Cullen
The room is just aluminum bed. It's TV and the couch is empty to my eyes. Yeah. And then suddenly the couch starts shifting and moving. And this man, like, rose out of this couch and kind of it was just the most unsettling image.
01:06:03:09 - 01:06:04:01
Clark
And yes.
01:06:04:07 - 01:06:09:05
Cullen
I saw I was like, That's really weird. And that has stuck with me since that happened.
01:06:09:13 - 01:06:10:02
Clark
Yeah.
01:06:10:04 - 01:06:20:15
Cullen
And it almost reminded me of in you know, not the lighting or anything, but in, in Nosferatu, Herzog's Nosferatu and yeah, floats into the room and he's got like his. Yes. Long dated hands.
01:06:20:23 - 01:06:40:14
Clark
And you know what else it reminds of. And I don't know if and I because I feel like and maybe this is even connected Nosferatu but Halloween carpenter's original Halloween where we have Jamie Lee Curtis's face in the foreground and in the background we have like a couch or it's like a living room. And and Michael Meyers just like.
01:06:40:22 - 01:06:42:12
Cullen
Just sits up right up.
01:06:42:18 - 01:06:48:01
Clark
And it's like the physicality of the way he rises up is almost like a floating.
01:06:48:06 - 01:07:07:14
Cullen
It's almost it almost feels like animatronic in a way. Yes, like this uncanny movement. And so so that image stuck with me for eight. And I was like, I've got to include that in a movie somehow. Okay, someday. And so that was really the spark of it was just I was trying to figure out what like I had this image in my mind.
01:07:07:21 - 01:07:16:22
Cullen
And so that initially that became the first shot of Hector when he's kind of crawling out of the shadows and you can't really see him. Yeah, on that first, you know.
01:07:17:00 - 01:07:23:08
Clark
Now the and the cannibal part, I mean, was that like, okay, I've got to have him do something or be something that's scary? Yeah.
01:07:23:09 - 01:07:45:21
Cullen
Yeah. So that wasn't that came from in the original short film, which nothing to do with handles or cannibals at all. HANNIBAL Yeah, it was just a matter of I think we had been looking at Texas Chainsaw and things like that, and we were like, Well, we need like it. We kind of thought that the element that made us laugh the most about Texas Chainsaw was that they almost had this, like, cannibal business.
01:07:46:13 - 01:07:50:22
Clark
Yeah, they selected What if we just selfishly, like, they won that. Yeah. For something, right?
01:07:50:22 - 01:08:07:05
Cullen
Yeah. And it's like, well, what if we kind of take that to the next level and have like, these three roommates that, like, each of them has a different role in this business? And so Jackson's role initially was like the cook. Peter would go out and he was a real estate agent and he would bring people in into.
01:08:07:05 - 01:08:07:06
Clark
The.
01:08:07:21 - 01:08:24:20
Cullen
Places and they would get killed there. And so there was this whole business going up. And that still is kind of alluded to in the movie when like the guests are over. And then the one guest is like, when's your next buy time? And so once you kind of see it and realize that they're cannibals, it kind of makes sense that, oh, those people are buying human meat.
01:08:26:07 - 01:08:49:01
Cullen
And so but that was kind of the interest for us was like this just funny of like this cannibal business and like, yeah, like at home, you know, just family business of, of, of cannibals very again, similar to Texas Chainsaw. Yeah. And so again because that original script was very a lot more funny like it was a lot more Sam Raimi in that way where it was it was like fun and exciting and.
01:08:49:06 - 01:08:50:20
Clark
Over the top and Yeah and.
01:08:50:20 - 01:09:13:17
Cullen
Yeah. And so, so it just we were just throwing all these things and we're like, Well, what if this happens and this happens? And you know, what if there's just like a butchers table in, the basement with all this meat on it and which of course is still in the final movie. And so I think that it kind of again went through this odd, you know, sign wave of like going really over the top and then having to get, you know, pulling back due to that.
01:09:13:17 - 01:09:13:22
Clark
Yeah.
01:09:13:22 - 01:09:36:00
Cullen
Yeah. But again, those scarier elements to me are just there's like I don't know if you picked up on it, but there's the way that I shot the first, you know, three or 4 minutes of her in the basement is just alien. You know, It's just Ripley, an alien going down the hallway with a low camera on a dolly, looking up at her, kind of silently walking through these halls.
01:09:36:11 - 01:09:37:06
Cullen
And in fact, didn't.
01:09:37:06 - 01:09:44:09
Clark
Make that conscious connection. But I can see that now, as you describe it. But I didn't I don't I didn't like say, oh, the alien shot.
01:09:44:09 - 01:10:03:22
Cullen
But yeah, and the original cut of the movie to not the one that's available online, but like my first rough draft, I actually had the alien alarm, like the Nostromo alien sound going off the entire time. She's in the basement and that became the song that Hector uses later, which that song was originally going to be through the whole scene.
01:10:03:22 - 01:10:22:15
Cullen
But I found that it just kind of war itself out if it was too long. So I had to start at the end when the projectors knocked over. But yeah, it was originally going to be this. Like there's something really scary to me about like being in a dark hallway, blaring noise and you can't hear and coming up on you, you don't know what's going on.
01:10:23:00 - 01:10:34:16
Cullen
Yeah. And so that it really, again, that the movie really revolves around that final set piece. And it basically became a writing. The writing became a matter of like, how do I get these people to that?
01:10:34:16 - 01:10:45:19
Clark
How do you get there? So so riddle me this, Batman. Now that you've seen Barbarian, I don't know why I feel like my dad used to say that to me when I was a kid.
01:10:45:20 - 01:10:47:03
Cullen
Oh, I say, riddle me this a lot.
01:10:47:18 - 01:11:15:10
Clark
So. So props to my pops. But my parents had some fun scenes, but yeah, that's it. Anyway, so riddle me this, Batman. After having seen Barbarian and gone through the process, you know, of of not just one but two cuts of your film, like what do you feel like you and you had mentioned this earlier. This is what put this in my head to ask, what do you feel like barbarian dead where you're like, Oh, I wish I would have done that.
01:11:15:10 - 01:11:25:13
Clark
Were there any moments like, Oh, man, you know, it kind of hinted that maybe there were some pieces that you thought you could have learned Barbarian Maybe for if you were going to make the film again, you know, kind of thing. No, I.
01:11:25:13 - 01:11:39:18
Cullen
Think, I think that there's a few things. Yeah. So in terms of the basement, I think that the energy that Barbarian has in the basement is, is more exciting than what I have. Like I think.
01:11:39:18 - 01:11:59:05
Clark
And there's some great editing. I do want to say this I real quickly, sorry to interrupt, but no, no worries. There's some great editing in the and the tunnel scenes when characters are being chased. It's hard to catch because the cuts are kind of matched to the flickering light, right? It goes light, dark, light, dark. I can't remember exactly.
01:11:59:05 - 01:12:00:17
Clark
I don't know if it's like a flashlight.
01:12:00:21 - 01:12:02:10
Cullen
Yeah, the flashlights maybe not functioning.
01:12:02:10 - 01:12:19:12
Clark
Or the cuts are almost but not quite hidden in that flickering light source so that they're kind of almost halfway, halfway hidden so that it's like a stutter affect them. Notice that? Yeah. And extremely effective. Very good editing.
01:12:19:12 - 01:12:46:11
Cullen
But yeah, I mean so that's that's the thing, right? Is that like I, I would have loved to in the script that that basement scene is much more expanded, much bigger. But we literally we had to sit with that basement, that entire basement set piece was shot in about 6 hours in a single day. Yeah. Like we had we just I just couldn't afford more time, so we had to I had to simplify it as much as possible and.
01:12:46:11 - 01:13:09:02
Cullen
The so yeah, like that is one specific thing is I wish I could have brought back that kind of high octane energy to the basement and expanded that set piece. The other thing is, and I tried to do this in the reedit, but establishing the kind of uncanny dangers of the situation a little bit earlier.
01:13:09:10 - 01:13:09:21
Clark
Yeah.
01:13:10:06 - 01:13:27:10
Cullen
You know, there's a lot of I think because it went through that kind of phantom thread phase with like a lot of the romance and that's what the script was. Yeah. Okay. There's there's kind of a ten minute break where it is sort of more focused on them as characters in their past and their history in their relationships and things like that.
01:13:27:10 - 01:13:52:07
Cullen
And so I think it being in that worked in the phantom thread, more phantom thread kind of theme, but the reedit is a lot more geared towards the thriller elements. I think I would have liked to have had though, just just more creepiness in the house, just a little bit more uncanny and and kind of, you know.
01:13:52:07 - 01:13:53:00
Clark
Unsettle things.
01:13:53:00 - 01:14:10:07
Cullen
At night. And because those those the moment actually. So in that one of the opening scenes, the movie right after they get back from the restaurant, he goes upstairs from the couch and she's in the kitchen and walks by the vent. And here's the chains. That scene is actually in the original cut like 50 minutes into the movie.
01:14:10:07 - 01:14:28:13
Cullen
Like that happens right before the morning that she goes into the basement. But I decided to move that scene way forward and actually works like there's nothing in it that would signify that it was, you know, shot later or set later. But I move that forward because I was like, I need to establish these more frightening elements just more upfront.
01:14:28:14 - 01:14:31:00
Cullen
Yeah, It's so difficult.
01:14:31:00 - 01:14:58:15
Clark
Yeah, it's extremely difficult, you know, And it's why people like Hitchcock are so revered for it when he's good at it consistently to to to maintain and even kind of ratchet tension. Mm hmm. That's enjoyable for an audience to watch and experience is such a tightrope because it's because you're dealing with something that's unsettling, right? I mean, by the very nature of the fact that it's tension, It's it's a une's.
01:14:58:15 - 01:15:18:07
Clark
It's a it's an unpleasant experience in your body physically that, you know, anxiety. It's literally it's causing anxiety in the audience. Right. And and to play that negative emotion in a way that's actually an enjoyable for the audience is challenging. And to be able to maintain it and to manipulate it, you know.
01:15:18:07 - 01:15:52:13
Cullen
Yeah, well, two things on that too, is that I remember right after we actually finished shooting the film when I was kind of editing it, I rewatched Psycho. MM And you know, Psycho is one of my favorite movies. I've seen it a million times, but I hadn't seen it in quite a while. And there was even like bits of Psycho that I wish I had kind of used in it, which is just that, you know, making Peter a little bit more of a psych, like actually having him twist that knife a little bit more and and rather than sort of appearing like a, like a relatively normal guy.
01:15:52:22 - 01:16:16:09
Cullen
Yeah. That like as she gets back with him that like, oh, something has snapped with him and there's kind of that, that side of him kind of comes out in it and and I think that that's one thing I would have liked. But even the second thing I wanted to say was that, you know, when it came to that basement scene, I the the moment that I show up again, when I'm like.
01:16:16:17 - 01:16:17:16
Clark
You know, you're down there.
01:16:17:16 - 01:16:24:15
Cullen
Yeah, in my my underwear. I like what I wanted was actually Sami.
01:16:25:02 - 01:16:30:16
Clark
Which is, by the way, because people can't see. But that is actually how you do every podcast episode.
01:16:30:16 - 01:16:31:12
Cullen
Yes. I mean.
01:16:31:14 - 01:16:34:17
Clark
So it's I wasn't surprised at all to see, you know, that's just.
01:16:34:21 - 01:16:36:00
Cullen
Covered in blood now.
01:16:36:01 - 01:16:43:08
Clark
Yeah. I mean, that's people we don't release video of this it's just audio but yeah anyway so just so the audience knows I mean this is just normal you Yeah.
01:16:43:08 - 01:16:45:00
Cullen
If you see what I look like, you.
01:16:45:00 - 01:16:48:17
Clark
Probably just jumped from behind the camera right? You're directing, you're shooting.
01:16:48:22 - 01:17:09:10
Cullen
You just actually did direct most of the scene like that. But that but that scene was yeah, that scene was a late addition. So I had shot the movie. That was a reshoot. Yeah. Because I wanted I realized that, like, the basement scene worked and everyone who had seen the movie and at the premiere and stuff was like, they loved the basement scene.
01:17:09:10 - 01:17:24:23
Cullen
And that was all the feedback I got was about that. It was really well-done. Yeah. And so I was like, Well, I need I feel like I want to expand that and I my number, my first preference was to have Sam come back and have him be the guy that that is chained up in the basement and found.
01:17:24:23 - 01:17:43:05
Cullen
And then, you know, but he was in he was traveling somewhere, so he was unavailable. So I was like, okay, well, I played the jogger earlier on, so I'll just say that that's who's down there. And again, it's one of those things that like we had again, I could only afford about 2 hours to rent location.
01:17:43:12 - 01:17:44:00
Clark
Yeah, so.
01:17:44:00 - 01:18:14:02
Cullen
We had 2 hours to shoot both that, that entire sequence def not the full basement sequence, but just the point that I come back. And so ideally I would have had like I would have been chained up somewhere or in a cage or something that and we would have made a bigger show of that. But yeah, on the inverse, though, I actually kind of do think that one of the scarier moments in the movie and I edited it so I don't really get like scared of it, but one of the moments I think is scarier is when she turns on the flashlight and I'm just there and I feel like that's kind of a it's
01:18:14:02 - 01:18:14:16
Cullen
a good jump.
01:18:14:16 - 01:18:25:15
Clark
It's a good jump scare. Yeah. Yeah yeah, yeah. Excellent. Well, I mean, I think you should be proud of it. I think it's a really fun film. I don't think I've seen the other cut and might be a No, I don't think.
01:18:25:15 - 01:18:26:22
Cullen
I think this is the first one they've seen.
01:18:26:22 - 01:18:36:12
Clark
Yeah, yeah, this is the first one I've seen, so I don't have anything to compare it to. But it sounds like you said that you had the full cut is on your website. Do you want to give that address again, just so people can. Yeah.
01:18:36:12 - 01:18:43:11
Cullen
So it's post pictures dot com. Okay. post-Trauma was spelt like the Joseph Conrad novel Nostromo but with a P instead.
01:18:43:20 - 01:19:02:09
Clark
There you go. Excellent. So yeah, if anybody wants to check out that or just like other other content that you've got on your website, they can do that. But yeah, well it's fun. It's fun to get a chance to kind of compare to similar films, especially when one of the authors of one of those films is here with us today, which is You.
01:19:02:09 - 01:19:04:12
Cullen
So that's yeah. And it's so.
01:19:04:12 - 01:19:04:22
Clark
It's fun.
01:19:05:00 - 01:19:12:12
Cullen
Funny talking about a lot of this stuff because it's been so long. It's been over a year and a half since we actually shot it and all that. Yeah. So.
01:19:12:12 - 01:19:31:11
Clark
Well, let me, let's, let's end with this. So, you know, especially for the aspiring filmmakers who might be listening out there, share with us. I would put you on the spot, share with us. Like what do you think was the most significant thing you learned from having gone through the process of writing, directing and post on this picture?
01:19:32:09 - 01:19:41:06
Clark
And I think this is your first feature, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So first feature. So, so what did you learn? What was the most significant thing you feel like you took away from this experience?
01:19:41:11 - 01:19:59:02
Cullen
Um, it's actually, it's an easier question to answer than I would have expected, but because I've actually shot my second feature at this point is be, have more faith in being personal. I think is, is my biggest advice.
01:19:59:02 - 01:20:01:12
Clark
And when you say personal, do you mean in the content?
01:20:02:00 - 01:20:23:11
Cullen
Yeah. Yeah. Tell me what you mean. Yeah. So I so this so daylight again was was again shot obviously really no budget and I was so focused on making it as efficient as possible to shoot I shot listed it meticulously. I wanted every because we had no time to do a lot of stuff. I was like, nothing can go wrong and nothing did go wrong.
01:20:23:12 - 01:20:48:05
Cullen
The shoot was actually really, really smooth and everyone had a great time and which is, you know, not a lot of first features that have no budget that turn out like that and. So I was really proud of that. But I think now having done that and knowing that I can do that, I have so much more faith in myself as a director that I know I can take bigger choice, make bigger choices, be more personal with it.
01:20:48:11 - 01:21:07:12
Cullen
I don't have to worry about it just being marketable. And and, you know, getting out there and being like an easy to digest kind of audience thing that I feel like I can I can shot list less meticulously, that I can show up on set and make those decisions on set. And because I know I can make them now.
01:21:07:22 - 01:21:29:02
Cullen
Yeah. So I think yeah, be be personal like don't be afraid to, you know even if you are meticulously shot, don't be afraid to make bold choices and kind of have faith in yourself that you can pull those off rather than just simplifying everything to the nth degree and and kind of making it very efficient and suitable. Yeah, because that was definitely what I was prioritizing.
01:21:29:11 - 01:21:29:22
Clark
Gotcha.
01:21:29:22 - 01:21:38:21
Cullen
And I look at it now and I'm like, wish, you know, I would have made a million different choices if I had shot that movie. Now, knowing what I know from the first time.
01:21:38:21 - 01:21:58:14
Clark
So and I think that's common. I think that's, you know, it's like you kind of I think in any art form, right. You have to kind of have the groundwork of of just the bare logistics, right? You kind of have to get the craft down. You have to to get the bones of what's going on under, you know, get it down, get it and get it in your bones so that you kind of you can do it.
01:21:58:14 - 01:22:17:07
Clark
And then the layer on top of that is, okay, next is, All right, my voice, how do I express myself? What am I saying? Right. And everything from your writing to your shot list to your cat to, you know, the allow knowing the uniqueness of you to, to, to now come through. And then because.
01:22:17:07 - 01:22:19:09
Cullen
You the last thing I'll say, maybe Go ahead.
01:22:19:22 - 01:22:28:18
Clark
Just say because you know you because know you know how to get your day right now that you know that you know you can get your day every day and you're do exactly that And we.
01:22:28:18 - 01:22:46:21
Cullen
Always and the other thing to you. Exactly. We came in ahead of schedule like nine out of ten times. So so I know that I can take a little bit more time to get you more. But the last thing I would say to tie it all up is that I have never had a more visceral experience in a movie theater than when she opened that door and saw the labyrinth in the basement.
01:22:47:06 - 01:23:06:06
Cullen
And I was like, Oh my God, this is daylight again. Like, I initially thought it a little bit. I was like, Oh, this is funny. It's two people in a house and all that. And then she opens that door to the basement and I was like, Oh my God, it's really going to do this. And it was just the most like my I, I was completely bought into the movie for the rest of it.
01:23:06:06 - 01:23:28:18
Clark
So that's awesome. That's awesome. All right, man. Well, everybody out there listening, as always, thank you so much for listening to us. BABYLON about movies for an hour and 21 minutes here. We appreciate you. We hope you enjoyed it, Colin, as always, I had a blast and I get to pick film for next time. Yes. So we'll see what that will be.
01:23:28:19 - 01:23:32:13
Clark
All right, everybody, take care. Have a safe couple of weeks. We'll see you next time.
01:23:32:21 - 01:23:40:22
Cullen
Bye bye.