Deep Dive: Hereditary

The episode title says it all friends, this one’s all about Ari Aster’s 2018 masterpiece of dread: Hereditary. Your hosts dive deep into all aspects of this film, (character, plot, music, cinematography), and most importantly, how it makes them feel! 

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:26

Welcome to Terror in Tandem, a podcast about finding entertainment in the macub. Hosted by the knowledgeable and lovable Laura and Richard Mathiason. Each episode we discuss the horror genre, from books to film to TV and beyond. And you know what? Sometimes even from the beyond. Yeah. You can find us online at uh terrintandem.com. You can find our latest episode wherever you get your podcasts, or on YouTube at Terrentandem. Check us out on Instagram at Terrentandom. As we like to say, Terrantandem. I'm trying new things. I know.

SPEAKER_00 1:05

It's great. Hello.

SPEAKER_02 1:06

You know, that's my uh movie voice. Oh.

SPEAKER_00 1:11

In a world where podcasts are hosted. Amazing.

SPEAKER_02 1:17

Anyway.

SPEAKER_00 1:18

I could sell any movie.

SPEAKER_02 1:20

Not everything we try to sticks. Um hello host. Welcome back to another gloomy day in spooky haunted New England. I saw a kind of funny post. I don't even know what tweets are anymore. Um thing, sure. Someone just writing a thing. But it was, you know, basically essentially like I always thought Stephen King was making that shit up until I moved to New England.

SPEAKER_01 1:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:52

Um you know. It's true. Um, but we love it here. That's why we love it here. Honestly, I thrive in uh in like an overcast, rainy, gloomy sort of environment.

SPEAKER_00 2:07

You also thrive in a sunny day.

SPEAKER_02 2:09

Yeah, like fungus, like a mushroom, like a mushroom person, you know, like just wet, dank, dreary environment, and I fruit. Fruiting everywhere.

SPEAKER_00 2:23

Wow. Well, you sh you listener, you sure are probably so delighted by the direction of this conversation. It is an amazingly fruitful conversation, wouldn't you say?

SPEAKER_02 2:36

Yeah, I I wouldn't, but you just did. Um, so you know, getting along with things that are exciting, upbeat, and life affirming. What are we getting into in today's episode?

SPEAKER_00 2:48

None of that.

SPEAKER_02 2:49

Oh. That's too bad.

SPEAKER_00 2:51

Well, dark, dismal, damaging, grief, dark.

SPEAKER_02 2:57

Hope y'all like trauma because we're gonna be doing a bit of a deep dive today into Ari Astor's debut uh class now classic, uh, 2018's Hereditary.

SPEAKER_00 3:10

Yeah, if you remember at the end of last year, we had done uh episode where we talked about um some of our favorite films of all time. Perhaps maybe that was the episode. We're not quite sure. Could be. Do your own research, listen to our past library, people. Exactly. Anyway, I mean we had meeting.

SPEAKER_02 3:31

Oh, we're already getting a lot of messages.

SPEAKER_00 3:33

People are our phones are lighting up.

SPEAKER_02 3:35

They know.

SPEAKER_00 3:36

Um, we had promised that we were going to do a deep dive on one of Richard's all-time favorite films, Hereditary.

SPEAKER_02 3:45

And this is how long it took me to convince the other co-host to watch it again.

SPEAKER_00 3:49

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 3:50

Because it's only one host's favoritist movie.

SPEAKER_00 3:54

Yep. And I'm feeling, you know, am I lowest, so I decided why not?

SPEAKER_02 4:02

And I am exhilarated. Um, so yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:05

So now I'm very, very sad.

SPEAKER_02 4:08

Excellent. Let's uh let's just go with that. So um we first saw this movie together in 2018. Um, speaking of Haunted, up in spooky old Maine.

SPEAKER_00 4:19

Yeah, we sure did.

SPEAKER_02 4:20

Um, yeah, uh that's right in the old backyard, King Territory. So it was projected onto a tombstone in the pet cemetery. Um we had to cut our hands. No, no, no.

SPEAKER_00 4:31

We we um You said protected.

SPEAKER_02 4:33

I did?

SPEAKER_00 4:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:34

No, so I have this thing where T sound like Jay's. I um remember you and I went to the theater and we saw it, and um we walked out, and I think I fell to my knees and cried out peak cinema, the the dawning of a new talent, a voice is awoken.

SPEAKER_00 4:54

And I looked at you and I said, I want a divorce. Why, why do you keep doing this to me?

SPEAKER_02 4:59

You actually did, I think, I think that's actually what you said. Why do you keep doing this to me? Um that's a direct quote from from yeah, and and it is an Ariaster vibe too. But we didn't know that because this was this was the first, right? So um, and God, if you've seen Bo is Afraid, this is not even anywhere near his most like anxiety-inducing film.

SPEAKER_00 5:20

Um Yeah, I I had of the same reaction this watch. Um, you know, I I I and we'll get into it, but I appreciate I appreciate the um the genius of the cinematic quality of the film and the acting and the story, and you know, just the cinematography and everything, and I guess that it's super successful because it makes me feel like if Sunday Scaries had if Sunday Scaries was a a a being, like a little monster guy, right? And they had their own Sunday Scary experience, that's how this film makes me feel.

SPEAKER_02 6:07

Neat.

SPEAKER_00 6:08

We also did watch it on Sunday, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:12

Yeah, deep in the scaries, best time to watch it. Um, now uh it's an A24 film, and this was the movie, I think. I mean, The Witch had already come out, but this was one that sort of solidified A24.

SPEAKER_00 6:27

I thought he did The Witch.

SPEAKER_02 6:28

That's Robert Eggers. Oh, right, Robert Eggers. So this is the movie that came out, I believe, in 2015.

SPEAKER_00 6:34

Have beef with.

SPEAKER_02 6:35

Yes. Another movie that I enjoyed very much, but co-host not as much.

SPEAKER_00 6:40

And I've watched it twice.

SPEAKER_02 6:41

Yes, wonderful. But getting back to hereditary, um, yeah, like a few movies had been released in the sort of same vein of I don't I don't like the word elevated horror. What how do you feel about that term?

SPEAKER_00 6:55

I like it. It's I think it's appropriate for certain movies.

SPEAKER_02 6:59

It suggests to me that like anything else is lesser. I don't know. I don't like to to subdivide movies like that. It's just really good, right? It's like saying literary horror. I don't know, it's an all-horror literature in some form. Um, but nitpicking. Um, this was the movie though that like really I think cemented A24 as sort of the place to go for this kind of movie. You know, it later came midsummer, and um, they do other kinds of films, but like elevated genre horror of this vein. This is the movie I think that really made A24 the home for that. So Hereditary, when it was released, was a financial, like a big financial success for them, um, and a critical success. Uh made, you know, over 90 million on a $10 million budget. Um, and critics went pretty nuts over it. It still has, I think, like a 90% or something on Rotten Tomatoes. But people, um, you may be surprised to find, Laura, uh not so much. People didn't like this movie. Uh had a really low cinema score. That's the um the one they just give to audience members that ignores critics. So you are pretty vindicated, in your opinion, of not having a good time at this.

SPEAKER_00 8:17

Yeah, I mean, it's the general population, I think, that didn't, you know, like general moviegoers.

SPEAKER_02 8:25

Yeah, most folks didn't like this. It um was one of those, it and it's sort of the reason I brought up like the elevated horror thing is that's kind of been a bit of a debate with A24 movies, is they sometimes have a big disparity between critical rating and um what the audience thinks.

SPEAKER_00 8:44

I don't know what the most successful A24 is if Civil. Backrooms. Oh, it's certainly financially, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:53

It was Civil War, I think, and now Backrooms has not only beaten so I think it's like made almost double what Civil War made. It's like it broke a three the 300 million mark.

SPEAKER_00 9:04

Well, I know before this came out, Ladybird was their most successful.

SPEAKER_02 9:09

Oh wow. Um, and then I think this either came close or yeah, they I mean it's just been doing better and better over there at A24. One of our favorites. Yeah. We love them and Neon and Focus and all the fun ones. Um but yeah, no, I mean there and that's sort of been a thing with me too, is I I like a lot of movies that maybe they get like a good critical reaction, but audience doesn't respond to them, or um I don't know, mainstream critics really hate it, but maybe a couple of like weird nerds are are super into it. Like that be it's it's important, I think, to look at what people are saying and take that into account, but I don't know, it's so subjective.

SPEAKER_00 9:52

Yeah, it is really subjective, and I think I mean, at least from my perspective, uh obviously you already know that this movie fills me with great deep dread and um grief and um existential woe, but uh there still value to, like I said, about the acting and um the the plot and how it's filmed. There are so many beautiful gifts that this movie gives.

SPEAKER_02 10:22

Cinematography by Pavel Poggerzel Pogerzelski. Oh yeah, Polish Canadian. Um he also did uh Midsummer, so man knows how to shoot a movie.

SPEAKER_01 10:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:34

Um, yeah, no, you're you're you're not wrong. It's beautiful. So it it it stars um Tony Colette as Annie Graham in the in the Graham family. Uh now Ann Annie Graham Nay Lee. Um Annie is a miniature artist.

SPEAKER_00 10:50

L-E-I-G-H, yes, for those following along.

SPEAKER_02 10:53

Yes, exactly. Um she uh is a she paints miniatures, makes like little dioramas, and that's a big thing in this movie, is uh a lot of the shots and framing make the um movie look like it's in a diorama or a dollhouse.

SPEAKER_00 11:10

Um can I speak us about something about the dioramas? Go right ahead, do um there's a lot of uh it's it's used as a plot device also, the miniatures where it's telling like some experiences because her mom I know you're gonna probably get to that, her mom passes away. But there's some dioramas that have happened while she was still alive that give information about why their relationship is estranged. So it's showing and not telling things.

SPEAKER_02 11:42

Yeah, she's like um uh a like she's not painting like Warhammer miniatures, she's she's doing an working on an art exhibit, and that's another framing device in the movie, are these these calls from the uh art gallery basically being like, hey, where's uh we need some where's this thing? Um it's a sort of a adds to the pressure of of her psychological breakdown, but she's creating an exhibit that is like her life. So the dollhouse is her house, the characters are people in her life. She's had an extremely traumatic and weird life.

SPEAKER_00 12:15

Can we talk about the exhibit really? Sure. But I think the grief has set, like grief does, sent her into a different Well, things keep happening throughout the movie that make her that send her on different directions.

SPEAKER_02 12:38

So like she's been building this thing and then something happens and she starts making something else. Yeah. So yeah, and and it's it's kind of in you know, it's purposeful that we never see the gallery, we never see the people that own it, we only get it through like an email, a voice message. There's no conversation with people.

SPEAKER_00 12:56

But the title for the exhibit.

SPEAKER_02 12:58

It's all like left the the family, doesn't really bring it up. I think maybe Gabriel Byrne does once or something, but it's like it's she's disconnected working in that. It's a sort of Damocles that's over her head the whole movie, but it's disconnected from us as the audience because we stay entirely focused on this family.

SPEAKER_01 13:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:18

Um, the whole movie is the Graham family. So um as the movie begins, there's that incredible shot taking you into the dollhouse, into Peter's room played by Alex Wolfe, um, and then it becomes the actual shot. So it's like dollhouse transitioning into real life. It's really cool.

SPEAKER_00 13:38

But it also still looks like they're human-sized people in a dollhouse.

SPEAKER_02 13:44

Yes, all of the rooms are all of the rooms are decorated and and laid out in such a sterile way. Even the quote unquote mess in the room seems like it's placed there purposely, like uh, you know, show a messy room. Okay, there's a jacket on the couch on the chair. You know, it's not like an organic mess. Everything in this house looks crafted. Um, and that adds to the sense that these people live in a terrarium. Um, and Ari Astor in an interview said that was purposeful because throughout the movie you start to realize that they're under constant observation from the members of this cult. There are people living at the house with them. And control. Yeah, and control. Like they are living in a zoo, they have no real agency, despite whatever they might think at any point. The real tragedy of the Graham family is everything that happens into them in this movie essentially was always going to happen. Um, they're fucked from the start. So at the beginning of the movie, Annie is getting her family ready together to go to her mother's uh wake. Um, and uh they go and she gives a very cold and kind of disturbing eulogy about how disconnected and weird her mother was, and how there are so many new faces at this wake, and I don't recognize most of you, and blah, blah, blah. And so a couple of people are weird. We notice early that Annie's wearing this very distinct-looking necklace, and then when we see her mother Lee, uh, her mother, um, Ellen, Ellen Lee, which I knew the whole time, um, uh, we see her wearing the same necklace uh in the casket. And we see like, you know, some weird shit, like uh someone's kneeling over, putting like oil on her lips, like anointing her, kind of.

SPEAKER_00 15:33

You see that guy in the back?

SPEAKER_02 15:35

And we're gonna see is smiling in with a weird smile on his face at Charlie. Um, and we're gonna see him again, that guy. Um looking a little different, but still smiling. Um nude. Yes. So, and then we see we see her family. Um, Gabriel Burn Byrne plays uh um, you know, Dad. Um why can't I remember anybody's goddamn name? Steven. So he plays Steve. I know hard one, um, who is a therapist, um, and very grounded. And Gabriel Byrne plays him like with such a sad, quiet resignation. Yes. He is a put upon man and really desperately trying to hold this family together. Now, in the eulogy alone, Annie mentions her dad died when she was a baby of starvation, uh, which is a weird way to go, that her mother had dissociative identity disorder, that her brother killed himself after saying until she goes to the group.

SPEAKER_00 16:35

I don't think she does that in the eulogy. I think she does that in the group.

SPEAKER_02 16:38

But she does she does mention that her yes, you're right. I'm excuse me. She mentions later in a grief group that that her father died of starvation. Her brother killed herself after saying that her mother was trying to put people inside of him.

SPEAKER_00 16:50

Which is the first I think.

SPEAKER_02 16:52

We'll get we'll get to that. Um, so yeah, the the the funeral happens when we we meet um Charlie, who is uh Annie's 13-year-old daughter, played by first-timer Millie Shapiro. And there's something up with Charlie. She's got a this weird tick where she makes a clucking sound.

SPEAKER_00 17:10

Um find out she has a peanut allergy right away because her dad's like, are there nuts in there? She just eats chocolate. That's all. And they're very, very worried about it.

SPEAKER_02 17:19

They set off that Chekhov's peanut real early. Yeah. Um, and um, yeah, there's something up with her. She's weird, she's withdrawn, she makes things out of garbage. She just like instantly you're like, fuck is up with this girl. And everyone at the funeral is staring at her with like loving smiles on their face. They love Charlie.

SPEAKER_00 17:40

So um And then she also says that um grandma wanted her to be a boy. Yes. They had a very close relationship.

SPEAKER_02 17:48

Yeah, later on when they're putting the kids to bed, Peter's basically like, I don't really care that grandma's dead, she was mean. And Steve Steve and Peter have a nice relationship with each other, it's a little bit closer. Um, Annie is not close with Peter.

SPEAKER_00 18:02

Well, she we find out why later. And we'll talk about that. But we also during that scene where she goes to the um grief group, she talks about how she was estranged from her mother when Peter was born and would not let her have access to him. And I think Steven is the one that kind of made her have access again when when uh yeah, as a therapist, like it's better when Charlie was Charlie.

SPEAKER_02 18:30

So the thing is, um, all the stuff happened with Annie's family. Annie had Peter, who was the the eldest, and she says very distinctly, I did not let my mother anywhere near him. Then we had Charlie, and she says to Charlie that night when she's tucking her into bed, you know, your grandmother loved you, she you were her favorite. She she said you were supposed to be a boy, and that is significant. We see later that um there's mention of Charlie as Charles in some embroidery and stuff that was made before she was born by by by um you know friends and and and grandma and grandma's grandma's weird friends' son's name.

SPEAKER_00 19:08

That was Ellen's son's name, Annie's brother's name was Charles.

SPEAKER_02 19:14

Yeah. Um so the um the family is um starting to suffer at this point. Annie is a pretty intense woman. She's lying about uh going out alone to the movie, she's attending these grief groups where she drops these incredible trauma bombs about her crazy, crazy family, but she's also starting to see people. She's she sees her mother, like her dead mother when she turns the lights off. She finds weird pictures and stuff, but she sort of like is ignoring these things, she's pushing them all away. And that becomes a lot harder to do once a certain thing happens. Why don't you t take us through that part?

SPEAKER_00 19:50

So, um, you know, the kids are like in school and struggling. Um, Charlie chops the head off of uh a pigeon. As you do, um, and then comes home and starts putting together her weird, like little sculptures, and ends up being called, would you say it's being called outside to the tree house, and she's we don't see her in the tree house this time. She has been known to sleep there. Yes. She was asleep there before the funeral. Anyway, she likes to see her walking away.

SPEAKER_02 20:26

It's a pretty nice tree house. Like it is like an enclosed like room, and you know, it's nice in the sense that it will keep you dry. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:34

But um there's no furniture in there.

SPEAKER_02 20:36

There's this thing, there's this weird glimmery light that coalesces and leads her outside. It's like a shimmer.

SPEAKER_00 20:45

Yeah, we see um her walking away from the tree house, and in the distance in the field is a old woman with her back to her kneeling with fire all in front of her. Yes. And before we can she can move forward, or we will find out later information who that old lady is. Yeah. Um, before all of that happens, we see um Annie running and being like, Where were you? Where have you been?

SPEAKER_02 21:14

The other detail um that we we both watching this again, I should mention this is like my fifth time, maybe, and it's Laura's second time. So there was a lot of poking each other and being like, Ooh, did you see that? Did you see that? Um when Charlie is walking away from the treehouse like she's been there and back, we can see that there is another set of footprints in the opposite direction that is much bigger. Yeah. Like adult size footprints. So just another one of those like mounting senses of like, what the fuck? What the fuck is going on? What's going on?

SPEAKER_00 21:47

So Annie basically brings her inside and says, Doesn't notice the body and the footprint.

SPEAKER_02 21:53

Yeah, you're gonna go to a fun party with your brother.

SPEAKER_00 21:55

I mean, she's like late middle eight. She's thirteen. Yeah. She's

SPEAKER_02 22:00

Peter's 13, Peter's 17. So he's she's like seventh grade. Peter's like pretty nice to her, but she's a stone cold weirdo, like psychopath, weird kid. And the reason for that is because she's never actually been a girl. Yeah. She's always been payment. Paymon. Yeah, but you know, you know, it doesn't work.

SPEAKER_00 22:21

The ritual doesn't really work unless you're a boy.

SPEAKER_02 22:23

We'll talk about the ritual at the end.

SPEAKER_00 22:25

So anyway, they go to this party, he takes her, and you know, we see, as the audience, we see in the kitchen people chopping walnuts.

SPEAKER_02 22:35

Chopping lots of walnuts to make a walnut cake.

SPEAKER_00 22:38

We see people on their laptop watching some kind of like hanging. And we see Peter uh trying to impress this girl he likes with a bag of weed, and they go into a back room to smoke that weed. And he's basically like, Charlie, look, go get yourself cake. Because as I mentioned before, all the girl eats are chocolate bars.

SPEAKER_02 23:00

He does an extremely 17-year-old thing and is like, Can you mind yourself for a few minutes while I go smoke weed with this chick?

SPEAKER_00 23:07

So she eats a cake with nuts. Oh, yeah. She starts to go into anaphylactic shock. Peter rushes her out there, and on the drive home, she cannot breathe. And that is this is one of the most terrifying.

SPEAKER_02 23:20

It's an incredibly shot sequence. My gosh. We should mention. Oh, you know what? We will mention. Yeah, it's a really intense. Peter's driving his best.

SPEAKER_00 23:31

He's doing his best.

SPEAKER_02 23:32

You can see on his face he's terrified. He's made he's made a mistake, but it's like a forgivable mistake.

SPEAKER_00 23:41

Crazy didn't have it there.

SPEAKER_02 23:42

Crazy the number of times they mention how deadly allergic she is, and yet keep forgetting the EpiPen. Annie's not a great mom.

SPEAKER_00 23:52

No. I don't think her mom was either. No, no. Never had a chance. Gabriel Byrne has pretty much just given up and he just wants to like hold really disconnect the kid's hand. Put a hand on the shoulder.

SPEAKER_02 24:02

He wants everything to be better, and they're not gonna be. So anyway. Charlie's in the backseat, her throat's closing up. She rolls down the window, pokes her head out, and right at that moment, Peter sees a dead dog in the road, swerves to avoid it.

SPEAKER_00 24:17

And was it a dog or a deer?

SPEAKER_02 24:19

A dead something.

SPEAKER_00 24:20

Yeah. Swerves to avoid it.

SPEAKER_02 24:22

And right at the moment, Charlie's sticking her head out, they cross a telephone pole, and pop goes the weasel.

unknown 24:29

Boop.

SPEAKER_02 24:29

Right off.

SPEAKER_00 24:30

So, yeah. So she dies.

SPEAKER_02 24:33

We saw that telephone pole very briefly in a shot before the party during the day. And on that telephone pole, if you look closely, it's a quick shot, but etched right on it is the same exact symbol on Annie and Ellen's necklaces.

SPEAKER_00 24:46

Yeah. And so that's her undoing. The head is gone, the body's in the car, and shocked Peter just total shock. Just drives home. Drives home, gets into bed.

SPEAKER_02 24:58

Gets into bed. Now, quick aside, Ari Aster said later he that was based on something that really happened. Like that's a true story.

SPEAKER_00 25:05

It's a true story. Somebody's fucking around.

SPEAKER_02 25:08

And the kid was in such shock. He went to bed, didn't tell his parents, and the parents found the body. That's what happens in the movie.

SPEAKER_00 25:15

So this is one of the brilliant scenes of the film. My God. Peter is laying in bed, not sleeping. His eyes are awake. He's probably still in shock, but he knows that something's gonna happen. And he hears the morning voices of people getting ready to go shut out. Goodbye. And then he hears the screaming, and it's you don't see it. You don't see the parents find the body. You don't see any of that.

SPEAKER_02 25:41

But there is a decapitated daughter in the back seat of the car in the driveway.

SPEAKER_00 25:44

So you know like that's what they found.

SPEAKER_02 25:46

Yes. And then you they do cut to a shot of the head on the side of the road.

SPEAKER_00 25:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:53

Uh covered in flies.

SPEAKER_00 25:55

So many flies. Then we move into, you know, the next scene, which is Tony Colette hysterically crying on the floor, which is worthy of an Oscar. Just this one scene. It is there's so many scenes in that Tony Colette.

SPEAKER_02 26:11

Tony Collette not not just being given the Oscar for this movie is it's like the Oscars are bullshit.

SPEAKER_00 26:20

But if you think of Sally Field's performance in um Steel Magnolias in the cemetery.

SPEAKER_02 26:27

Or in Marissa Tomei in the bedroom, um, which she did win an Oscar for that.

SPEAKER_00 26:32

If you think about those actors No, excuse me, Sissy Spacek. Right. Sissy SpaceX.

SPEAKER_02 26:36

Sissy Spacek, who did win an Oscar. Yeah. But uh reaster cited in the bedroom as one of the inspirations for hereditary.

SPEAKER_00 26:45

But that this scene is on par, if not, you know, higher level than those scenes. It's incredible. It's what not to take away from those other scenes and those other actresses, but this was like It's next level. You know that Tony Collette herself has felt grief like this and probably needed not fake what she did.

SPEAKER_02 27:08

Probably needed some time to recover from shooting this scene. It was one of those scenes.

SPEAKER_00 27:12

I said it was a tough film.

SPEAKER_02 27:13

An actor like giving I can imagine, yeah. She gives everything. She gives she she hits depths in this movie that look, I know the the way it makes you feel, it's it's so raw and it's so very much about that one thing we never ever want to think about that it is hard to watch.

SPEAKER_00 27:34

So now we know the malevolence that is been trying to kind of break through to this family, right? Is is in full power now.

SPEAKER_02 27:45

And Annie is being broken down. I mean, we begin with the death of her mother, we move on to the death of Charlie, so then we see this brief scene of mail being shoved through the mail slot, and there is something uh about an open seance. Contact the dead. That's weird. No one pays attention, the mail is like piling up, everyone's kind of fucked up in their grief cloud. Annie goes back to that grief class, grief counseling session, excuse me. Um, and she decides she's not gonna get out of the car, she can't do it. She's driving away when this woman runs up in front of the car and waves her down.

SPEAKER_00 28:22

That was at the first grief group, if you pay attention.

SPEAKER_02 28:25

Yes, if you pay attention, there are some people at that grief group that you will see later in the movie.

SPEAKER_00 28:31

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 28:31

Um that's something I only picked up on like a couple times.

SPEAKER_00 28:35

Like it's almost like they had that group just to lure Annie in.

SPEAKER_02 28:39

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Interesting. So um the that's the thing. The few scenes in this movie where they are outside of their house, the grief group, Peter's high school, the cemetery, they're never without someone from the cult. His teacher, you know, all of that. They're all so it's like they're never actually out of the house. They're never really out of the terrarium. The grams live their lives in this like fish tank. Um so um Joan, played by hand out, uh, you know, runs up to her and she's like, Hey, are you are you not gonna come in? Like, I saw you at this meeting uh last time and I really wanted to talk to you. And Annie's like, just leave me alone, uh, you know, and then she blurts out with my grandson died, and my son. And you know, that stops Annie. So she gives her her name and number and it's like, call me. And Annie keeps the page, puts it in her office, but you don't really get the sense that she's gonna follow through with that. Annie's not a call me type of person, you know, not a people person, not a friend maker. So a couple scenes later, she's in there and uh in her miniature's office making, you know, little miniatures, working on stuff, and you see a familiar little shimmer of light right over her shoulder, and as she reaches for something, a paint pot that is nowhere near her hand tumbles over and starts spilling paint onto the piece of paper with Joan's name and number on it.

SPEAKER_00 30:13

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 30:14

So, you know, she rushes out, rescues that, sees it, thinks, fuck it. So they didn't get her with the flyer for the seance, but they got her with Joan at the um at the party, at the uh at the grief council. So um she goes over to Joan's, they meet, they talk.

SPEAKER_00 30:32

Um just very innocent, very like helpful.

SPEAKER_02 30:36

She does notice that the little mat that says her name, Joni, on the front, the little doormat, looks a lot like this one her mom used to have. Um, but you know, nothing, nothing to that. Um, and they have a nice little thing. Now, the next time Annie sees Joan, Joan is euphoric, just rapturous.

SPEAKER_00 30:55

Yeah, she um Annie's getting supplies for a new like new diorama, which she's already started to make one of her daughter's accident, and her husband understandably gets so angry. Like, I think that's kind of the end of the thing. You know what?

SPEAKER_02 31:12

Before we yeah, before we get into the second Joan meeting, let's talk about that. I'm sorry, I skipped over a big, big part.

SPEAKER_00 31:18

That's okay, but we want to talk about the dad too, because he gets a call like right after the funeral from the funeral home, and he says, What do you mean desecrated? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So we know that something has happened. Ellen's grave has been desecrated.

SPEAKER_02 31:32

Yes, something has happened. Um, now, in the in the meantime, Annie does make that real true to detail installation of the the telephone pole, the car, the blood splatter, uh, and her daughter's head. Um Steven gets pretty upset about that. Says, you know, like what if Peter sees us? How do you think he's gonna feel?

SPEAKER_00 31:52

And she like has She said it's nothing to do with Peter.

SPEAKER_02 31:58

Yeah, she has a real weird reaction. And they have dinner together in one of the best scenes of the movie. I think one of the more iconic scenes. Just the most gut-wrenching, traumatizing, abusive family dinner where Annie unloads on how much she hates her son, and he's just sitting there basically staring at her, silently begging her to just look at him. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:27

And she won't. She won't even look at him.

SPEAKER_02 32:30

A detail we we didn't mention is any mentioned at her grief council meeting was there was uh this time where she used to sleepwalk a lot. And in one of the sleepwalking fugues, she woke up in Peter and Charlie's room. Both of them were just much younger, and they were sharing a room, and all three of them were doused in paint thinner. Annie was holding an empty paint thinner can in one hand and a box of matches in the other hand, and striking the match woke her up, but it also woke the kids up. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:04

So they all freaked out. She doesn't think that Peters ever recovered from that.

SPEAKER_02 33:09

Which I wouldn't, but it's pretty telling that when she's sleepwalking, Annie seems to be trying to protect her family by killing all of them.

SPEAKER_01 33:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 33:20

Um, which is arguably better than what does happen to them.

SPEAKER_01 33:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 33:24

So um they have this horrific dinner fight that is the scene itself. Tony Colette's facial control, and like she has a very expressive, like Willem Dafoe, Jim Carrey level, like rubber face. She can move her face in magnificent ways. She scowls. I think it's become a meme at this point. Yeah. Her fucking scowl in this movie, but she also says something very interesting about Peter, says you just look at me with that sneer and that fucking face on your face. Yeah. Which in the moment you're like, that's a weird thing to say when you're screaming and angry.

SPEAKER_00 34:01

And you just say things, are like weld up with tears and he's like broken. Yeah, he's a broken kid.

SPEAKER_02 34:07

But it's a it's it's it's a detail that comes in later. So, you know, following trauma dinner, um, she runs into Joan that second time.

SPEAKER_00 34:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:17

And Joan is like, You gotta come with me, come to my place. I met a medium, she taught me how to contact people. I contacted my grandson. Annie doesn't want to do this, but Joan like kind of strong arms her into it. So they perform a seance, they light a candle, and she says there's this sheet where it's got a bunch, they say this a few times throughout the movie. What language is that? Yeah, no one knows. It's so I'm guessing it's not Latin because no one would look at Latin and go, What is that? You know it's Latin.

SPEAKER_00 34:51

She busts out her grandson's favorite chalkboard because that was something that hit was his, even though we see the recently purchased chalkboard and Jones purchases. It's amazing.

SPEAKER_02 35:04

It's all bullshit, everything. It's so well.

SPEAKER_00 35:08

And that communicates and it freaks Annie out.

SPEAKER_02 35:11

Now, Annie, so the thing is that this this page of weird writing that you're supposed to read, you just have to read it the once, it opens the connection. We never see that happen, right?

SPEAKER_00 35:21

Well, we uh she and she gives candle the candle to Annie.

SPEAKER_02 35:24

But then she does she she does the ritual, she contacts somebody, it moves a glass around, Annie has a panic attack, but she's convinced it's real. So then she takes all this shit home. She gives gives Annie the candle, gives her the sheet of paper with the weird language on it, tells her what to do. We see her get up in the middle of the night, we see Steven sleeping in bed, and we just see the outline of light around a closed door next to him. That's when Annie's reading whatever's on this fucking page because the next scene is her waking uh Peter up, her son, being like, I'm so sorry I said all that shit to you, but I'm gonna make it better. Yeah, she gets Intensely. Yes, that's the thing about Annie. Annie's downfall uh later when she's trying to warn everybody is her delivery. She's so desperate, frantic, and manic, and she does suffer from pretty severe mental illness. That why would you believe her? Why would you? It's perfectly understandable why nobody listens to her because she is acting and looking like a mad woman saying crazy things. Um, you know, before we get into Yeah, let's take a break. Yeah, because what happens next is a big deal. Here, light this candle. Picture this. It's Christmas morning. The fire is so delightful, and little Timmy runs downstairs to open the biggest box under the tree. What's inside? Why a starling rabbit dog, of course! Introducing America's newest sensation, rabbit pets. Rabbit pets are cheap, find their own sources of food, and are guaranteed to die before racking up those expensive veterinary bills. They make the perfect gift for that enemy you've been waiting to smite, or for a loved one who's outstaid, they're welcome. All of our rabbit primates, canines, and cafe bearers are 100% guaranteed to transmit the disease before subcoming themselves, making them the gift that keeps on giving. Neighborhood busybodies on your case over an unapproved edition? Watch a horde of rabbit bats bring opinion back in your favor. Pesky in-laws still don't approve? Why not get them a cat for Christmas? A cat with rabies? Think of us like any other black market pet factory, except our little darlings are just foaming at the mouth to meet you. So come on down to Rabbit Pets and get yourself a furry companion, and rabies, from our herds of infernal goats, blood-crazed poodles, and otters that have developed a taste for human flesh. Located right next to the contaminated fracking wells by the nuclear waste dump, don't miss our bite the hand that feeds you two fur. That's two rabbit pets, or as many as we decide you can carry for the price of one. This is a fake ad for a fake product on a horror-themed podcast. That squirrel you're trying to make friends with right now is likely insane with pestulates. Don't say we didn't warn you. Looking at me with that face on your face. And we're back. Hey, um, so Annie gets her family out of bed. And her remaining family.

SPEAKER_00 38:31

In many ways.

SPEAKER_02 38:32

She says, you know, blah, blah, blah. I've got, I I can contact Charlie. They don't want to uh now Stephen doesn't want to do this. Peter? Peter's open to it. And a very interesting thing happens.

SPEAKER_00 38:43

Peter, um Does she doesn't she try to burn the book before this?

SPEAKER_02 38:47

No. That happens later. So she's got Charlie's sketchbook. She's got Charlie's sketchbook, her connection, right?

SPEAKER_01 38:54

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 38:55

She does the ritual, she lights the candle. Um, they're like, what language is that? She doesn't read it, they just see the paper because we never see anyone read this. But she's already done the reading. So Peter is like, something's weird. Stephen feels nothing.

SPEAKER_00 39:11

Annie and Peter Except anger, after that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:14

But Peter says, Don't you it feels like the air is flexing.

SPEAKER_00 39:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:18

Um, there's something weird. And then he becomes And then he gets really agitated, and he's like, please stop, please stop. Like it's like, we get the sense that Stephen wants this to stop because it's like an obscene desecration of his daughter who died days ago. And Peter wants it to stop because he can sense something in the room. Now, the reason for that is the tannis root. Now, tannis root is never mentioned in the movie. No.

SPEAKER_00 39:47

It's in the we see we do see it once.

SPEAKER_02 39:49

We see it's in the screenplay.

SPEAKER_00 39:51

Do we see a tannis root?

SPEAKER_02 39:53

We do. Okay. We see the screenplay. So if you read the screenplay, you know it. Now, Tannis Root, you might remember from Rosemary's Baby, it's just a witch thing, right? When Joan when Joan and Annie are having tea together in her apartment, Annie spits out a little black leaf. When Annie is telling stories about how Ellen used to feed Charlie as a baby, we see a picture of her holding a baby bottle. And if you look super, super, super close, that baby bottle has milk and a bunch of stuff floating in it.

SPEAKER_01 40:28

Oh.

SPEAKER_02 40:28

The root.

SPEAKER_01 40:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 40:30

Now, in the movie, um, Peter is smoking a bowl with a couple of his friends, one of whom has a man bun that you will see later on somebody in the movie. And Peter has a really he's the one who kicks off the bowl, and he has a really powerful, strong reaction to it. Total, like, but he also he's like losing himself.

SPEAKER_01 40:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 40:56

So, and but when the other guys smoke it, they don't really have that. So, those are the way so in that room, Annie and Peter have imbibed the the root in some way. Stephen has not. Annie and Peter, before any physical manifestations happen, are both like something's happening. Then the candle flares up, and Annie becomes possessed by Charlie. Um, or somebody pretending to be Charlie. She screams out, there are multiple voices screaming. It's like a cacophony of voices. Uh Steven throws water in her face and turns the light on. She doesn't know what's going on, but that is it. Baby! Now it's in.

SPEAKER_01 41:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:39

That's the moment Annie. They were honestly, the cult would have found a way, but that's the moment they were fucked for good.

SPEAKER_00 41:47

And now Peter's And Annie did it. Peter starts to.

SPEAKER_02 41:52

Peter starts to fall apart.

SPEAKER_00 41:54

Peter, not what happened to him.

SPEAKER_02 41:57

Now at school, Peter starts to hear his name being yelled at him, along with some other weird words, and he looks across the street to see Joan. Way's friend.

SPEAKER_00 42:08

She first she first um goes through, doesn't she go through the um her mother's belongings? This sort of is happening like all at the same time. Yeah, her mother's belongings, she finds the book with the symbol on it and reads some stuff, which is like three heads, King Pyman, gold to the um conjurer.

SPEAKER_02 42:29

Yeah, there's a bunch of stuff about um payman has to be in a male in a male, he covets a male body, and you start to realize that all the whole char Charlie was a failed experiment.

SPEAKER_00 42:39

She goes back to Annie, uh to uh Ann Dowd's, and you see no one there, but you see the symbol on one side and Peter's face on an altar on another side with a triangle around it, the same triangle you saw earlier burned into the floor of Ellen's bedroom. So things start to devolve very quickly.

SPEAKER_02 42:57

You see the symbol of Paymon, which is that that same necklace symbol, it's in several spots. So yeah, so she is chanting words at Peter that even though she's a like off football field away and across like busy traffic, he can hear her words. And she's saying words like satany, um, which is a she's saying words that are I looked this up, they're they're like used in necromancer rituals to expel a spirit.

SPEAKER_00 43:25

She's saying expel Peter.

SPEAKER_02 43:27

And she's saying, Peter, get out. I cast you out. Yeah. So what she's trying to do there is make Peter's soul leave its own body to make room for King Paymon, one of the eight kings of hell. Um, and we do love King Paymon here at Tarrantanum. Haila, shout out to King Paymon. We don't know King Payman of Hellant and the next.

SPEAKER_00 43:45

No, please stop.

SPEAKER_02 43:46

Hail Paymon.

SPEAKER_00 43:48

Um everybody, please help me.

SPEAKER_02 43:50

Peter has uh he he goes back inside, he's feeling real weird. At this point, he's had the root, he's been through the ritual, and he's had the spell cast at him. And he sees the the weird shimmer light.

SPEAKER_01 44:02

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 44:03

And then his he sees his teacher beckoning him inside. He the shimmer light tortures him, follows him around the room, shows him a reflection of himself, and then contorts him into a weird pose of Paymon with his hand and stuff. Now one of it what it says in the book of uh to conjure Paymon is the host has to be worn down and broken and in its most vulnerable state. So this is all Peter being tortured and broken.

SPEAKER_00 44:32

But before he starts to break his physical body, right, we see him turn and look in the mirror and his reflection is sneering at him.

SPEAKER_02 44:42

The face that fucking face on your face. So you have to wonder, has any seen that look on Peter's face before? Because the what's been happening to the family at this time is breaking them down until they are until Peter and and apart from each other, isolating them, breaking them down, mistrusting each other until Peter is, you know, ripe. And he's almost there, folks. He freaks out in school, he bashes his own face into the into the um desk in like an amazingly scary scene in front of his teacher, who we're gonna see again.

SPEAKER_00 45:17

Um and he goes home and he gets put to bed, and then we are left with just Gabriel Byrne and Annie in the house.

SPEAKER_02 45:27

Now, Gabriel Byrne, at this point, he he gets a letter from the um an email from the funeral home, and you see that the whole grave has been dug up. Yeah. There has been a bit of mention throughout the movie of a strange smell in the house, and it's getting worse. Um Gabriel is up to investigate. Then he he gets a call saying something happened to your son at school, and he's like, What? Annie then goes up into the attic to investigate. The moment she opens the attic door, the smell hits her because that is if anyone's ever smelled a decaying body of any kind, it only smells like one thing. There's only one thing that smells like that. If you smell it again, your mind instantly goes, Death. Something died. It's death. There's no other thing than it could be. So she gets that smell, and you hear flies everywhere. And she goes up into the attic, and what does she find up there?

SPEAKER_00 46:19

A decapitated body.

SPEAKER_02 46:21

Which is mom.

SPEAKER_00 46:22

We don't know. She thinks it is. We don't know for sure, but we guessed.

SPEAKER_02 46:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:26

And then above her body is the payment symbol.

SPEAKER_02 46:29

Yeah, exactly. In blood.

SPEAKER_00 46:32

Um and she runs out of there, but she's like hysterically hysterical enthusiastic.

SPEAKER_02 46:37

Yeah, she's just totally manic. She's in a full manic state at this point. She's trying to Gabriel Byrne has just picked up his son, who just had a psychotic episode at school, so he's fully like overloaded. Um, she runs out to the car, starts banging on the car like a crazy woman, begs him to kind of like, oh, come see what I found. Yeah, yeah, it's crazy.

SPEAKER_00 46:57

But like scary.

SPEAKER_02 46:58

It's very so she she takes him into the attic, he sees the body.

SPEAKER_00 47:02

He's like, let's call the police. She says, No, we have to burn the sketchbook.

SPEAKER_02 47:05

We have to burn Charlie's sketchbook. Now, earlier, she did try to burn Charlie's sketchbook. That makes sense, right? You burn the thing from the ritual.

SPEAKER_00 47:15

She's realizing now she made a fucking huge mistake. Big mistake.

SPEAKER_02 47:18

Once she realizes she sees the the stuff where Joan has been friends with her mother for years, that her mother was queen of a cult.

SPEAKER_00 47:25

It's not even concerned for her son. She's not even concerned about her son. She's like, I made a mistake and I have to stop this.

SPEAKER_02 47:33

Um so she tries to burn the sketchbook, and as the sketchbook catches fire, her arm catches fire. So she rescues the book and puts it out, and the fire goes out on her arm. So she realizes if she burns the book, she's gonna die, but she tells Gabriel Byrne, we gotta do this.

SPEAKER_00 47:49

It doesn't you have to do this.

SPEAKER_02 47:51

I'm not strong enough, I can't. She doesn't tell him it's gonna kill her, but she's ready to die.

SPEAKER_00 47:57

Yeah, she's standing there, like in this ready to go of like sacrifice.

SPEAKER_02 48:02

Yeah, like beatific. Yeah. Now she Annie is a s is a stone-cold narcissist. So that's throughout the movie. Everything she does has a tinge of narcissism to it. Everything is comes back to, and they're gonna blame me, and it's my fault somehow.

SPEAKER_00 48:18

But guess what, viewers? We realize that who actually burns when they try to burn the book is the burner.

SPEAKER_02 48:25

Gabriel Byrne decides I'm not gonna do it. Fuck this. Um, I'm not playing in. So she, frustrated, grabs the book, throws it into the fire, and instead of burning up, Gabriel Byrne immediately becomes like fully engulfed in flames, screams and burns to death in front of her. That's when her mind completely breaks. That was the the tipping point, and we see the shimmer of light coalesce onto Annie. We see Annie Tony Collette's amazing acting going from screaming as her husband burns to death in front of her to possess.

SPEAKER_00 48:58

Yep. Because she knows what she needs to do now.

SPEAKER_02 49:01

Well, she's she at her most vulnerable, she's been taken. Yeah. So every Annie's gone from this moment forward. Annie is completely gone. And what we get next in the final scenes of the movie is one of the scariest and just sequences and tragic. So Peter wakes up and he's been asleep this whole time since the incident at school. He's alone, but doesn't know what's going on. He's not alone. Right. He walks downstairs.

SPEAKER_00 49:34

She's in the corner of the ceiling. Uh in the bedroom.

SPEAKER_02 49:37

If you look real close, Annie is up crouched in the corner of his bedroom ceiling like a spider. And before he can look, she crawls silently away down the hall.

SPEAKER_00 49:51

And then it is terrifying. He goes up to the attic, sees what he's gonna see.

SPEAKER_02 49:57

Well, hold on. Peter goes downstairs looking for somebody, and he sees the burned up body of his dad. So he looks at that, which is a lot. Then he turns around, and in the kitchen is a naked man. And it's the smiling guy from the funeral, and he's smiling still.

SPEAKER_00 50:15

And Tony Collette is also in the rafters of the living room ceiling.

SPEAKER_02 50:19

So now he looks up, sees his mom, she chases after him. He runs upstairs into the attic. Tony Colette closes the door. Tony Collette bashes her head a million times against the door in like one of the scariest moments ever.

SPEAKER_00 50:32

And Peter There's also another cult member.

SPEAKER_02 50:36

Didn't realize, yeah, he just locked himself in the attic with a bunch of cult members, a bunch of weird paymon shit.

SPEAKER_00 50:43

But we see when before he wakes up, don't forget, because it has turned night now, we see outside of the house all of the cult members surrounded by the earth.

SPEAKER_02 50:52

In my my favorite shot of the movie, there's a a like a blink transition from day to night. And in the daytime, the house and the woods are empty, and in the nighttime it's surrounded by naked weirdos.

SPEAKER_00 51:04

Yeah. So now he's in the attic with the dead, the no dead body anymore. The dead body is gone. And this new now cult member who we can see, but he can't see.

SPEAKER_02 51:16

And one more thing, his mother. So he hears this horrible sound, like a zipper and a splatter, and he looks up and Annie is floating.

SPEAKER_00 51:30

Well, when he walls goes downstairs, the piano is smashed to bits.

SPEAKER_02 51:34

Yes, the piano is is smashed to bits. That's a good catch. Because uh she has taken one of the wires out and she's garrotting her own head off. She's floating in the room and she garrots her own head off.

SPEAKER_00 51:45

So slowly.

SPEAKER_02 51:46

Well, slow then quick. Um the head falls off, the rest of the cultists step out, Peter freaks, runs, jumps out the window, and falls to the ground. And we have to assume dies. Um I don't think he dies though.

SPEAKER_00 52:02

Not assume. We saw his shadow soul move away.

SPEAKER_02 52:05

I that there's a lot of discussion over that shadow. A shadow passes over Peter's body, but if you notice it doesn't begin in his body, it passes from behind and over, and then in the next scene's neck as if he broke his neck. And in the next scene, you see Annie's headless body floating. So that could be the shadow of her floating above him.

SPEAKER_00 52:26

Okay, but it does look like he died. We don't know. Yes. It's up left to the early.

SPEAKER_02 52:31

What you definitely do see is his body on the ground, and the glimmer floats down, the shimmer light enters him. He wakes up, sees that there is light in the tree house, sees his. His mother's headless body, his his grandma's headless body kneeling in front of an effigy of Paymon using his sister's head as its head.

SPEAKER_00 53:16

Like she didn't know. Wearing a crown.

SPEAKER_02 53:18

Exactly. So the three heads are there. Um, and Dowd, the only one not naked, by the way. That must have been in the contract.

SPEAKER_01 53:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 53:26

Um, she's wearing a little robe. She says to him, calls him Charlie at first, and then says, You're paying on. So, because he's like a little confused, he's looking around, the music is crescendoing. But you see on his face, he starts to understand what's going on.

SPEAKER_00 53:42

He's not resisting.

SPEAKER_02 53:44

Nope. He starts to get it though. It's like he's waking up, like he's being born. They explain, like, you know, we now we've gotten you a male body. Please give us all the riches you promised. And then the movie ends, as all good movies do, with a hearty, hail Payman. Peter is now Paymon. Paimon has found his human host. And Ariaster said very definitively, no, it's not a metaphor, it's not a grief thing. This, this is like real, like you're the king of hell, you know, into a body. Like, that's all, that's all.

SPEAKER_00 54:15

And then when we pull away, it looks like a manger.

SPEAKER_02 54:18

Yes, there's that final diorama shot that looks exactly like a manger only, you know, the dark inverse, the birth of a king of hell. Um now, this movie is so fucking chalk full of information and and and imagery and and symbolism that a lot of what we talked about today, we cobbled together through multiple viewings and a lot of research and slowing down the words that you find written on the wall, um, they all have different meanings. There's liftoic pandemonium. Now, liftoak is a Hebrew word meaning open. Pandemonium is a Latin word or or Greek maybe, meaning um hell, basically. So, like open hell comes from John, you know, John Milton, the city of hell, pandemonium literally means all demons, see like all demons. Um, so um the uh the satany and all of that, those are like real necromancer charms. Paimon is, you know, an actual king of hell. All the lore around Paymon, that's comes from you know, Grimoir's and actual literature and writing. However much you believe in hell and demons, that's up to you. But it wasn't invented by Ari Aster.

SPEAKER_01 55:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 55:39

Um, and interestingly enough, he recently said that he has written a prequel movie, but he just can't find the right time to film it. Hey, Ari, that time's now.

SPEAKER_00 55:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 55:55

Only if it's good though, because this is my favorite movie.

SPEAKER_00 55:58

So um that's lots of symbolism. There's little hidden things, but it's say if you didn't pay attention to any of the symbols at all. What we're watching here is at its core, a family that's being destroyed by grief, and also um a family that is uh being taken over by a cult.

SPEAKER_02 56:22

Um now it it's not a cosmic horror film, but it does have that very crucial element of cosmic horror that you are doomed from the start. You are nothing. There's nothing you can do to stop this. Your whole life and all the decisions you make, sure.

SPEAKER_00 56:38

It was like the lesson of him in his literature class.

SPEAKER_02 56:42

Yes, and there's a lot of that. There's you know there's a lot of foreshadowing. Yeah, foreshadowing he's in his literature class, the themes they're discussing about predestination and fate, and you know, you start to realize you see things like um there's a long shot of Peter smoking a bong out of his window, but in the foreground of the shot, you see um someone breathing. You see like the mist from someone breathing in the cold. You can you get you hear footsteps from above when no one's upstairs in the house. There are talks about like a smell or things like looking a little like off because people are fucking living there dragging dead bodies around. The cult is so integrated. And we have to mention, like, in the final scene when you see everyone kneeling, if you really, really look closely, you will see people from the grief group, you'll see people from Peter's high school, you'll see people like from throughout the movie realizing that like they've never been outside the control of the cult. Yeah, they've always been there. Um and everything that has been happening since you know Ellen's death has just been the plans that she set in motion, like like fucking jigsaw, you know, just put these things in. Yep. Um, at the end of the movie, they have the the the picture of Queen Ellen, you know, so and she was always she tried to do it, so we didn't bring this back up, but the reason her son killed himself because there are people they he said they're trying to put people inside me is I believe that they tried to do this ritual with him. And the same way it broke Peter down, he was around the same age. Yeah. I mean, Peter he just killed himself. So, like, this has been going on for decades, and this is the culmination of it. So, like, there have been mistakes, and there are mistakes in this movie, like the um the flyer for the seance doesn't work, and doubt uh Joan has to chase her down to get her to take her number, and even that doesn't really work. Paymon has to step in to like poke her to do things, like not all of the plans are perfect, but they adapt, and um you really get the sense that they were all doomed. Just all of them. Yeah. Um, you know, someone asked Ariaster, why didn't they just try to do it on Steven? And it's basically in the title, hereditary. There's something about this family, yeah. Whether the mother started it or whatnot, but they can't just do it on an in-law.

SPEAKER_00 59:18

Um he's immune to all this stuff, he seems it seems anyway.

SPEAKER_02 59:22

And you know, in that final scene, Peter makes the clucking sound. Yeah. So it's you find you see that's like that's Paymon's tick. Like that's what Paymon does.

SPEAKER_00 59:30

That's how we know for sure that Charlie was never Charlie.

SPEAKER_02 59:36

Yeah, there was ne there was the soul of a girl named Charlie, but it was pushed out immediately. Yeah, like at birth, basically.

SPEAKER_00 59:44

Yeah. Well, she she was breastfed by grandma.

SPEAKER_02 59:47

Well, tried to.

SPEAKER_00 59:48

Tried to, right?

SPEAKER_02 59:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 59:50

And then um I think But then other rituals could happen because it needs to be a boy.

SPEAKER_02 59:54

Needs to be a boy, yeah. So they they pushed Paymon, and that's why Charlie acted so weird throughout the movie, is because Paymon was like confused in this stunted body that you know didn't agree it didn't agree with it. So Charlie's behavior was always sort of like weird, like kind of a an off-putting person. Yeah. A childish, but like, you know, a little precocious.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:17

Um But Annie didn't find it to be too weird because of her diorama work and Charlie's kind of weird sculpture work.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:25

It wasn't she figured she was just taking after mom. Yeah, yeah. And you know, like my autistic daughter, yeah, or something. But it it it it wasn't so much being on the spectrum as having a king of hell shoved into your body. Um, that'll do it.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:40

But all I think all told, you know, I still feel all the same feelings about the dread and like discomfort this movie makes me feel. A lot of that might be a lot of people. It's like living in someone else's grief for an hour and a half.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:53

A lot of that, you know, you're you're absolutely right. That's what what Ari Astor so successfully did, I think, in midsummer as well, is he he makes he he puts you into the grief.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:03

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:03

You don't observe it, he puts you into it. And for anyone who has ever felt true grief of like a close loved one or or a tragedy, it's hard.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:11

And grief doesn't just come to you and then leave you. No, no. Grief is a thing that you have to like work through and let go.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:18

Yeah, but it never leaves. It always it always leaves some sort of like a stinger or a sliver inside. Some of what you might have been feeling could come from the the original score by Colin Stetson.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:28

Um it does make me feel a little nauseous, also physically nauseous.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:33

Some of that might be from the music by Colin Stetson, um, who used a lot of uh low tones designed to sort of increase your anxiety and sense of dread. You'll notice like some of the ambient sounds, there were this persistent low tones, and then you hear the um throughout the movie, you hear the uh the warhorn sound that's sort of you know like Nordic Viking sound, it's like a summoning of something. Um other um directors have used stuff like that. I've talked about it with Claire Denis using that in irreversible, or no, excuse me, Gaspar Noi, um using that in irreversible, the low tonal music to just make you like um but every frame of the movie has a certain unreality to it because you it's framed like a living dollhouse. Yeah. Um and their lives are are are organized and manipulated to the point it's like watching someone play with human dolls.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:28

Um, and Tony Colette gives everything and more. It's a lot. Seeing the depth of her grief. I mean, you remember when Aaron Paul, like in Breaking Bad, like he hit those levels. It's something you don't see a lot. Right. Um, and it's hard to watch because it is very human and real. And this is a 10 out of 10 movie for me. It's it's one of the best movies I think I've ever seen in my life. It is tied for me with The Exorcist. Um, it won a bunch of and was nominated for some smaller awards, but it really did not get all of the accolades in.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:05

And we talked about her performance a little bit, but um, like how she was robbed. I do have a question. So my discomfort in the film and kind of why I'm like not running to watch this again. Um I've I've spoken about, but you it also makes you discomfort, feel discomfort.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:28

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:29

I have a you really love this movie.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:32

I think a couple of reasons. I number one, this movie is my favorite kind of gift. It's just it it just keeps you keep unraveling it. There's more, there's more. Every time you watch it, there's more to appreciate the the level of craft. Um, I you know, in video game design they talk about like open versus dense. And I always like dense. I'd rather something smaller in scale with tons of layers and density to it, than rather than something grand and epic that's paper thin. You spread it all out too much. Um this movie rewards you for your attention. I also have a very different relationship with those emotions than you do. Um they I'm a human person, I'm not like a bug man, but they do make me feel dread and unease and all of the same things you feel, but I find that exhilarating. That ability the ability of an artist to reach so deeply into me, to pluck my emotional strings like that, to make me feel such strength of emotion and reaction, I can't help but be in awe of that. I admire that in a musician, in a painter, in a in a filmmaker, in a writer. To to truly, and this sounds a little weird, but to truly fuck up my day, you know, like alter my thinking, my emotions, my feelings for hours and days, that's a level of intimacy from a stranger that is that's true power.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:11

And I don't mind engaging in that type of, you know, uh manipulation of my feelings and going there. It's the dread. No, you the adding that element of dread that makes those untenable for me.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:28

That's also my favorite kind of horror movie is the one that makes you feel dread. Like the backrooms was such a great experience because there was a sense of pervading wrongness and dread throughout the movie. There is just something, it's why I've always loved Lovecraft and things like that. There's just something that speaks to me, horror of the that that is just like there's something not quite right. This looks like my room, but it's not my room. And no one believes me, but I'm telling you, this is not my life. You know, that Twilight Zone feel. And hereditary just fucking pulls that off in ways that that no one else has.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:11

And I know right away by watching Backrooms trailer that I was not interested because it conjured the same.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:18

That's why I went with my friend. Yeah. Not yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:20

So anyway, I watched this for the second and last time for this episode, and I hope you guys enjoyed our deep dive into Reeditary.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:30

I mean, honestly, there's so much we didn't talk about. There's so much we didn't talk about. Um I can't recommend this movie enough. It's it's a perfect film.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:41

And of all of these reasons are reasons that you also like to watch movies or you want to, you know, challenge yourself. I also endorse the acting, the plot again, and the the way the the cinematography and everything comes together is really amazing. It is an amazing cinematic achievement. I just don't feel so good.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:07

No, it's like saying Schindler's List is an amazing cinematic achievement, but I it's not my my go-to fun time movie.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:14

Well, if you have any other ideas on what um films you want us to deep dive and maybe to make me even more uncomfortable, send us a DM at Instagram at Terror and Tandem.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:28

Bye, everybody.

unknown 1:07:29

Bye.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:47

Our theme was written and performed by Carrie Denver, and all other music was written and performed by David Sispanic. All opinions expressed on this podcast are our own and should be taken as such. Thanks for listening, and please remember to give us a like, a review, and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. See you next time. We're standing right behind you.