In this week’s episode, Todd and Craig delve into the 1982 Australian horror film, ‘Next of Kin.’ Directed by Tony Williams and praised by Quentin Tarantino as Australia’s answer to ‘The Shining,’ the film presents a gothic mystery that unfolds in an old house turned care facility.

While Todd appreciates its stylistic cinematography and slow-burn narrative, Craig finds the story less engaging. We duo explore the film’s plot, characters, and unique visual elements, discussing whether it’s a hidden gem or an overlooked oddity.

\Tune in for a thorough analysis and share your thoughts on this intriguing piece of horror cinema!

Episode #454, 2 Guys and a Chainsaw Horror Movie Review Podcast.

Todd: Hello, and welcome to another episode of Two Guys and a Chainsaw. I’m Todd.

Craig: And I’m Craig.

Todd: Well, this week’s movie I chose and I can’t really tell you why. I stumbled across it a little while ago, and I think. I was entranced by the idea that this might be some eighties horror movie that we have overlooked. Quentin Tarantino has cited it as, uh, Australia’s version of The Shining and as extremely complimentary of it.

In fact, apparently based a couple shots in the one of its Kill Bill movies directly on some of the shots in this film. So we hadn’t done an Australian movie, I think in a while, if ever, I can’t remember. But, uh, this is actually an Australian film directed and written by New Zealanders, but it was filmed in Australia, and it is 1982’s, Next Of Kin.

Hadn’t seen it until now. How about you, Craig? Have you ever heard of this one?

Craig: No. I couldn’t even remember what we were doing when I was trying to get ready to watch it yesterday and I pulled it up and I saw next of Ken and I was like, surely not that Patrick Swayze movie. My dad was a big fan of Patrick Swayze’s, like.

Tough guy movies like Roadhouse and Next of Kin, and I thought, surely it won’t be that. And it’s not. And it’s not. I kind of wish it was, to be honest. Oh no. So you weren’t a fan, huh? No, I, I told I texted you. You did. I just don’t get it. And honestly, I, I was watching the movie and I was distracted. There’s a, I’ve got a lot going on, but I kept thinking I must be missing something.

I’m, I’m clearly, I, I looked away at the wrong moment. I’m missing something. And I finished the movie feeling that way, and then I went and read the plot summary on Wikipedia and I was like, no, I don’t think I missed anything. I just don’t get it. Like, as far as the, the narrative is concerned. I get it. I think it’s convoluted.

I just didn’t, you know, I’m a big fan of Quentin Tarantino. I think he’s a weird guy, but I think he makes. Really cool movies. Yeah. So I have a lot of respect for his opinions on film and I get it. Like it’s definitely got a grindhouse feel and it’s shot in such a way that I’m like, I see that, I see where Tarantino’s, you know, taking inspiration from that.

I don’t know, I just, I couldn’t get in. I couldn’t get into it. Did you really feel this was grindhouse? Not grindhouse, just No, no, no, no. That’s probably the wrong word. I’d probably throw that word around to, because it’s not like super violent. Maybe just more seventies, the way that it’s shot. Like, yeah. I, I think maybe it’s more the cinematography than.

Any kind of particular genre, but it, it reminded me of other movies that we’ve done that have tried to emulate that, like House of the Devil. Mm. Or, or it reminded me of, I mean, ’cause it’s, it’s kind of, or at least at, at at points you think it is kind of a haunted house kind of movie. It, it kind of reminded me of burnt offerings.

It just had that very seventies feel to it, which. I think Tarantino tries to emulate. Right? He loves that and it’s cool and I like that. So I get where he’s taking inspiration there. As far as it, you know, I read probably the same thing that you did and he talked about it’s pacing and whatnot, and I just, I found the pacing to be really slow.

Sure, yeah. It’s a slow burn. Maybe that was deliberate and that’s fine. Maybe I just wasn’t in the mood for it, but it, it just didn’t do a whole lot for me. I have a feeling you feel very differently. 

Todd: Yeah, I kind of do, but I did sit down. I have to admit, I sat down and watched it. I was already feeling tired, but I had to watch it for.

For us to be, to do this in the morning, and I’m, uh, I’m a little jet lagged as well, so I sat down to watch it and I watched the first hour and I was very focused on the movie. I was by myself. I had it mostly full screen while I was typing notes in on the other side. And after about an hour, in realizing I had about a half an hour left to go and the movie hadn’t really picked up.

You know, right at that point I said, you know what, I’m gonna have to, I’m falling asleep. I love, I liked it. I really was enjoying it, but I, because of the pacing, I was like, I’m gonna have to turn this off and finish it in the morning, which is exactly what I did, and I’m glad I did that because I think I probably would’ve missed things or, you know, or I might have fallen asleep because it doesn’t really kick in.

Until the very end. But you know what, that actually reminds me of a lot of films that we really like. I have, I was getting strong Gilo vibes from this. I think this movie definitely is pulling inspiration from Ello. I think it’s pulling inspiration from Kubrick. I do feel like there’s a lot of the shining inspiration in here.

I thought that the cinematography, and I think it was the cinematography and the style that really pulled me in at first because I was like, this is a really. Really well-made film. The color is gorgeous. The lighting is gorgeous. The camera angles and the way that they, it has a very dynamic camera that moves in very interesting ways, and I was pulled in by that alone.

And I sort of let that wash over me and as it was going on, I said, you know, this is almost, this is almost Susperia. Susperia follows a similar pattern of, it’s very stylish. We’re really in this woman’s head. For the majority of the film, it’s very gothic in scope and in a sense it’s very much like susperia where this woman, it’s about a woman who comes to an old house and creepy things are ha are maybe happening, but there’s not a lot of evidence that anything terribly sinister is going on.

But there’s just, you can tell she’s unsettled and you’re not exactly sure why. Where this is all going until the very end where it kicks into high gear and it turns out, yep, there was a mystery and there was a murder thing happening, and, and now she’s in trouble. And then it gets really intense for, you know, the last, uh, 10 or 15 minutes or so.

And I didn’t mind that at all actually, because, uh. I was really pulled in to the movie before that, just by the setting and the, and the pacing and just this feeling that there is probably something here going on that’s all gonna come together by the end. And did it. I. I think it more or less did. I’ve seen reviews online that said, one I had to pull out.

I think this was just some user review on IMDB, but this person said, next of kin is a slower than slow developing thriller with only a few worthwhile moments, but sadly, a whole lot of pointless filling and meaningless mystery building. I mean. I suppose this, that’s kind of how I feel about it. Frankly.

It’s a take, but you could take that same review and tack it onto The Shining, you know? 

Craig: I don’t know. No, I think The Shining was far more visually stimulating and there was just a lot more. Intrigue. Sure. There, there was a lot more going on and it was far more suspenseful. I didn’t really find this, all that suspenseful.

I, I think to compare it to Susperia as being very generous because I’ve seen Susperia exactly once, probably 20 years ago, but I remember it being highly stylized. And I remember so much going on with, you know, experimenting with color and, and, and, and you said something about the color in this movie.

Nothing stuck out to me in that really way. I mean, I didn’t think it was poorly shot. Wow. I didn’t think it was poorly shot. I just thought it was fairly typical. Oh God. I didn’t feel that way at all. No. Well, you are more of an expert on that kind of stuff than I am. I’m just your casual 

Todd: viewer. I don’t think you have to be an expert.

I mean, either. Either you felt something or you didn’t. I mean, it should be invisible. You know, I, I think there’s an argument that if, if the cinematography calls too much attention to itself, then it takes you out of the story, right? Like, 

Craig: yeah, that’s fine. You 

Todd: don’t want a movie where all you’re doing is, man, that’s a great shot, man.

That’s a great shot, man. That’s a great shot. Instead of just being engrossed in the, in. The film itself and, and letting the shots do their work invisibly. I don’t know. I just thought there were a ton of really amazing shots and it was an interesting use of slow motion. There was a lot of light and shadow play.

I thought that there were some just beautiful camera moves that we’ll probably talk about as we walk through the plot, but 

Craig: maybe you’ll have to. I, I mean, I’m not trying to be contrary, I’m just. Like, yeah, I know. Talking about the, the lighting, there were a couple of scenes that were so dark that I couldn’t see anything at all and I was watching it in the pitch black.

Todd: The sex scene. 

Craig: The sex scene, yes. And at least one other one too. I don’t know. We can, when, when we get to the sex scene, I still thought it was hot. ’cause we can talk about it later, but like, almost. Almost pitch black, at least that one. And then, and again, I’m, this, I’m not being critical. This is a thing that was very typical of these movies.

There were lots of day for night shots that were clearly day for night. Sure. Ew. So I just didn’t, I just wasn’t blown away by it. And I’m, I’m, I’m sitting here and I’m, I’m being critical. I don’t think it’s a bad movie at all. In fact, I think it’s a good movie. It just didn’t. Right. It just didn’t do much for me.

I’m sitting here thinking of the, the comments that I’m gonna get. Like, he’s so stupid. He just didn’t get it and he didn’t give it a chance. Like, I get it. You don’t have to come at me. You don’t have to come at me. You’re probably right. You’re probably right. It’s probably a masterpiece and I just don’t get it.

Well, but I don’t get. 

Todd: No, you’re not the only one that feels that way. So I mean, you know, don’t, don’t self-censor here, bud. We’re okay. I mean, I think, I think this is definitely, and I will say it straight out, I think this is a movie that’s definitely gonna appeal to some people and it’s gonna not appeal to others.

And I don’t think it’s quite as universal as The Shining, which just kind of everybody loves, because you’re right, there’s a lot more intrigue inserted in there. And this one is a far slower burn. There’s not a lot of mystery left at the end of the day. Whereas with The Shining, you know, you’re just kind of left with so many questions.

Craig: But with The Shining too, I feel like the source material is so good. Like it’s a, a really interesting, and, I mean, haunted houses aren’t original, but it’s a, a fairly original take on it. Yeah. And this story. Ultimately typical. It’s, it’s typical. And it’s also, I would say it’s more typical for film than it is for literature.

Maybe that’s a difference between the two also, but it’s convoluted. Like you can put all the pieces together, but ultimately it’s. Stupid. Now, wait a second. 

Todd: When you said this is more typical film than literature, I found this to be just a gothic tale through and through. I mean, 

Craig: come on, I’m talking very sp not, not necessarily in, so I’m talking specifically in plot and I, I guess you’re right.

I, I, okay. So the closest thing that I would. Compare it to, off the top of my head would be Jane Eyre. Yes. Where spoiler alert for Jane Eyre, if you care about, you know, Victorian literature. But it’s this romance between this girl and this handsome, wealthy, aloof man. And this girl keeps thinking, she’s like seeing this ghostly woman around.

And he’s like, no, no, you’re, you’re crazy. It’s nothing. And then finally she finds woman being kept captive. In the attic. Yep. And it’s his crazy ex-wife who he keeps locked in the attic. I would say that. In terms of story, this is somewhat similar. Like it’s kind of seems like it’s one thing for a while and then it, I don’t know.

I, I thought that the big reveal at the end I thought was just kind of 

Todd: corny. Well, woman gets a letter that now her mother is dead and the inheritance of the mansion that her mother owned is now hers. She goes off to the mansion out in the countryside. Lots of rain and storms and things like that.

There’s uh, some red, that location was gorgeous, by the 

Craig: way. It was, it was, it was, uh, man, this big Ivy covered tan brick mansion. It was, it was so cool. 

Todd: It’s funny, this is an Australian movie because this is not what you think of Australia, you know? This looks like an English countryside type manner or whatever it does.

And then comes and then it turns out her family has secrets. There’s history, there’s a diary that she discovers, you know, that she reads about her mother, which, uh, alludes to secrets in the family past. There’s like memories of hers as a child that are suddenly coming to the forefront based on things that she’s finding in.

There 

Craig: were those diaries lined up like encyclopedias. Labeled by year and printed on the bookshelf. 

Todd: And that was, I was, I’d like to think you could probably buy a blank, uh, diary that is printed and embossed with your name and the year on it, you know, that you could fill in. I suppose that’s a thing. 

Craig: I just loved the idea of them being like an like encyclopedia, like she’s pulling them down by year and apparently this woman wrote in her diary from the time she was very, very young because she, the, one of the first things that she reads is like.

Did she have a sister? She has a sister, right? Or 

Todd: something. Her mother or her. 

Craig: Her mother? 

Todd: Yes. Her mother has a, yeah, she has an aunt. That’s key to the whole story. Yeah. 

Craig: Right. But I was a little bit confused by that. But she talks about how she and her sister were talking about how they’d like to make the house an, I think they call it an old folks home, which is what I would probably call it too.

But that’s maybe not the nicest thing to say, and it is. So, so when she inherits it, it’s not just a big house for her to live in. It’s actually care facility, 

Todd: right? There’s still residents in there. Quite 

Craig: a few, yeah. But it looks like a nice place and it’s ran by this woman named Connie and some doctor.

And I didn’t write down anybody, any of the actors’ names ’cause they didn’t know any of them until I read the trivia because eventually, and this happens a little bit later, she gets established in the house. Kind of weird things start happening, but eventually she. Meets up with this guy that she knew apparently before she left Barney, who’s played by John Jarrett, who is from probably the only, or at least the biggest Australian horror franchise, the Wolf Creek franchise.

He’s the bad guy in that movie. It’s crazy. Yeah. He’s very young and very handsome. Here, but he’s good looking in those movies. I mean, that’s, that’s part of what makes him a good villain. Is he True initially comes across as kind of very charming. I, I feel like you’re not a big fan of those movies. I liked them.

Todd: I think. Yeah, you probably remember I said I, I absolutely hated the, I mean, we are gonna have to do at some point, and maybe I’ll revise my feelings about it after. 450 horror movies under my belt. Right. But I just remember thinking that was the most, um, just a brutal movie with just celebrated brutality.

And there, there was, didn’t have much else going for it. That’s, that’s how I felt about it. 

Craig: I disagree, but I think it’s a fair, or I think it’s a fair assessment. But, but what did I skip? I mean, the mom’s diary also, uh, new, a new resident shows up. 

Todd: Yeah. Yeah. A new resident shows up and she’s a little creeped out by that, but you don’t really know why.

You know it’s just a woman being pushed in a wheelchair by a younger man who, uh, yeah. But weird 

Craig: stuff happens. Like, yeah, lightning strikes a tree that falls right in front of the car that’s bringing the new resident. I’m like, well, that seems ominous, by the way. How did that, how did they do 

Todd: that? I don’t know.

That was amazing. That was a straight on shot, no cutaways. A medium shot of this van pulling up and lightning strikes this tree and it falls down in front of it. It was so convincing and I, I just was just like, how did they do that? It’s not animated, I don’t think. It wasn’t, I thought it was cool. But Yeah, yeah, you’re right, you’re right.

I, I didn’t think about that, but yeah, that was a bad omen. And he pulls her out of the car and sticks a wheelchair out and pulls her outta the car, puts her in the wheelchair, but then they can’t get the wheelchair going. So then Connie just comes out with an umbrella, ushers her in with a, with a cane.

Right. 

Craig: But, but the other ominous thing that immediately happens is they. Somehow get locked out of the house. 

Todd: Oh yeah. 

Craig: Like the door slams and they get locked out and somebody has to come let them out from inside. Now, I don’t know if. They were going for this, but I mean, ultimately you could make an argument that it would make sense, like something is trying to keep them out.

Hmm. 

Todd: That’s a good point. Although, you know, this is kind of downplayed because we don’t really see much of, well we don’t really don’t see any of this woman again. 

Craig: No. 

Todd: We see the guy again. She’s just a very 

Craig: un she’s just an old woman in a wheelchair. Yeah, I, I thought her son. Seemed like a weirdo from the beginning.

I’m like, oh, who’s this weirdo? 

Todd: He’s like the first person I suppose that we can attribute to who is this strange figure that she keeps seeing. She keeps seeing this strange figure usually in silhouette, in the distance somewhere, maybe outside in the woods, maybe she sees figures in the, in the garden.

When she’s upstairs looking out her window, she sees a figure in the window at some point once or twice. So there’s this kind of idea she’s being watched 

Craig: or. That she’s crazy. Yes. Or that the house is haunted because her mom’s diary says that she has seen somebody wa seen and heard somebody wandering around the house, which when 

Todd: you think about it, I mean, it’s an old folks home.

I mean, like if there’s a whole bunch of people living in there, you know, it’s not like you’re by yourself and you hear. Creepy footsteps and things. Well, 

Craig: when people say that to her, like when, when she says to Connie or whatever that lady’s name is, like, you know, I, I heard somebody walking around. Well, yeah, that was probably Mr.

So-and-so, he walks around at night, like there’s another part where she walks into a bathroom and all of the faucets are running and the, the sink and the tub are overflowing, and that’s spooky or whatever. And Connie’s like, well. I guess it must have been one of the residents, like 

Todd: Yeah, 

Craig: it, it’s, it’s 

Todd: all easily explained.

Exactly, which I liked. I mean, I thought that was good. You, it’s subtle, but, but you know, then you can just say, well, not a lot happens, right? I mean, you’re either gonna be kind of creeped out by it or be a little intrigued by what could be going on, or you just be like, all right, well, show me the, show me the interesting stuff.

I, I think one of the more. Interesting things that happens is that at some point she gets in her car and drives away, and as she’s going down the road, that guy is leaving with the van, that young guy who had dropped off the resident and he pulls up beside her and it’s hard to tell if he’s like. Trying to hit on her if he’s trying to drop her off the road, if he’s just weird, but they exchanged some looks and he seems to be just wanting to ride alongside her for a while, and he’s giving her this creepy grin and eventually he just pulls ahead and disappears.

Craig: No, that that 

Todd: scene was ridiculous. 

Craig: I would’ve called the police. Like I don’t even know if I, I don’t care if that was my sister. Yes, he was. He pulled first. He ran right up on her in the back and then veered around next to her. Now I think, I may be mistaken, but I think this is a dirt road is around on dirt roads.

No. Yeah, and he’s in a huge van, a huge full size. Seventies rape van with the, like, I think the windows all blacked out. Right? And she’s just in a regular car and he’s not, I mean, yeah, he’s just kind of looking at her like, ha ha, isn’t this funny? But then he’s all, he’s veering towards her a little bit more than once.

I mean, it’s not a little bit like, oh, oh, just a little bit. Well, no big deal in his huge van on a dirt road going 40 miles an hour. He’s just veering towards her a little bit. That’s. Yeah. That’s funny. It’s hard to tell, but then she acts like, I don’t feel, I don’t think she ever mentions it again. Exactly.

Well, that was a weird thing that 

Todd: happened. Yeah. Well, one thing about this girl that I liked is that she’s kind of a blank slate like. You could maybe even say she was a flat character, but I would just say she’s an everyday person. She’s just kind of an ordinary gal, and there’s nothing wrong with that, you know?

In fact, maybe that’s a good thing because it gives her this credibility. We don’t have any real reason to believe she’s crazy. No, except for the fact that weird things are happening and. It could just be her, but there’s nothing to indicate that she’s got some, her, she herself has this weird past or whatnot, but she is having these dreams, right?

Craig: Yeah. 

Todd: She’s having these dreams of, and that are getting more, more intense of her as a child. And so you solely start to realize that she’s had experience in this house as a kid. I thought it was interesting that, you know, she’s going through the house at one point, she goes up to the attic, she picks up a ball that’s like a, it’s like a red volleyball, and then seems interested in it, but then tosses it aside and you’re, I’m just kinda like, what’s that about?

And later in her dream we realized, or maybe she. Remembers for the first time, which is, I think what it is, is oh, maybe that triggered something in her memory, because as a girl, she played with that ball. Mm-hmm. 

Craig: There was some discussion that somebody in the mom’s diary it, it, it talked about who gave her that ball.

It was some man, I don’t remember who it was and I don’t know that it’s necessarily important, but yeah, we’re told about it and then we see it eventually. So like we see it a few times I feel like, but eventually, like, and it’s always just her in this hallway. This hallway in the house where she is now, and it’s exactly the same now as it was then.

But eventually she like ends up in the bathroom and the shower curtain is pulled, but she throws the ball into the tub and when she goes to retrieve it, she finds a bloated. Dead guy there. Yeah. But then that happens in real time too. 

Todd: We see that dream in pieces. We don’t see that she has actually discovered a bloated dead body until much later in the movie when other stuff has happened.

And so the idea is that this girl had some kind of trauma that was directly connected to this house when she was a girl. She just forgot about it. I mean, what’s kind of, what’s more gothic than that? You know? I mean, right. It’s something that haunts her and she’s, up until that point, she’s not quite sure.

Why she’s so afraid of the hallway and why these things that are just unsettling her so much until one of the residents that she’s kind of friendly with named Lance. I think she has a history with him too, right? ’cause she immediately, maybe 

Craig: he gave her the ball. I don’t know. You 

Todd: might be him, right?

Because what? She’s one of the first people we see. She has a fondness for him. Yeah. And he’s an older guy who’s getting along. Seems to be okay, but. There’s a scene later where he gets in the bathtub of, I guess this is a shared bathroom. Yeah. On this hallway. It must be. I think so. And he gets in the bathtub.

I thought this was a very creepy scene. Again, a little reminiscent of the shining in some ways. Yeah, it was creepy. He’s taking his clothes off and he goes to step in. By the way, shot for shot. This whole sequence was gorgeous. Like so Well done. 

Craig: Yeah, it, it looked really good. 

Todd: He steps into the tub and then we see underwater his foot step onto this bloated dead body.

Mm-hmm. Which was so shocking. That was creepy. And then we see it from above. And then there’s this immediate transition, which is. Incredible. From above where they are now. She’s not there. She’s off seeing Barney, but it’s, uh, Connie and, and a bunch of the other people, including this doctor who we haven’t mentioned yet, who, uh, is taking him out of the tub and checking his body so he’s dead.

So it turns out, as she’s reading the diary, this is not the first time someone had been found dead in the top. Mm-hmm. In fact, it’s not even like the third or fourth time. No.

So indeed that sent, I think, I think that event happening, pieced together with her, reading her mother’s account, completes the memory for her. And then we see that she, in fact, had discovered someone in the tub. That’s right. At first when she was a girl. So, uh, you know, that’s intriguing, right? So it’s starting to build towards something, but gosh, it takes a while to get there.

But it is dropping, you know, little bits and pieces in place so that, I think when we do get to that moment, I felt satisfied. I thought, oh, okay. Now we’ve, we’ve found out what the dreams are about. Now I understand the connection between this ball and why she. Freaked out. I guess I would be too, if I had repressed memories of finding a dead body while I was playing around in this house when I was a girl, I 

Craig: suppose.

I mean, that’s mostly the exciting stuff that happens in the beginning. I mean, more spooky stuff keeps happening, but then there’s a little interlude where she meets her man, I guess. Barney. Barney, 

Todd: yeah. 

Craig: John Jarrett, who, again, very handsome, very charming, 

Todd: favorite 

Craig: part of the movie. Um, yeah, and they, they hang out.

They. Go swimming. They visit the her mom’s grave and she says something like, my mom and I had a weird relationship. She had secrets. 

Todd: Mm-hmm. 

Craig: Okay. So there’s some, there’s some kind of history with the mom, which also is very. To me ambiguous. Uh, I don’t know. 

Todd: Yeah, you do kind of wonder, well, what happened?

What, when did you not, did you just grow up and then move or, yeah. Like 

Craig: why did she leave? 

Todd: Yeah. Right. Like 

Craig: they, they make a big deal out of the fact that she left. I mean, people remember her, you know, she’s got this guy that she clearly has history with. Other people remember her from when she was young, but at some point she left and never came back.

And I think that they say like, she never even like called or like, yeah, she completely separated herself from it. Why, like, 

Todd: good question. 

Craig: I, I, I don’t think that’s ever explained 

Todd: true. 

Craig: And, and that’s fine ’cause it’s not really all that important. Whatever. She’s back now. But again, they’re hanging out and they’re just like traipsing through the woods and she thinks she sees somebody watching them.

And we do too. Are we seeing from her perspective, is this an objective perspective? We don’t know. But when she points it out to Barney, he doesn’t see anything and he goes and checks and there’s nobody there. Yeah. So again, there’s all these, I’m gonna go ahead and call them Mr. X, because I feel like we’ve already alluded to the fact that there is something going on.

Todd: Right. 

Craig: But up until this point, we don’t know. She could just be crazy. 

Todd: Yeah. Probably about halfway through the movie at this point, when everyone leaves on a, on a scenic tour somewhere, basically. Yeah, everybody, it’s convenient way to get everyone out. Mostly everyone outta the house, they’re, they’re all getting on the bus except for LANs.

This is weird. This is when things started to get really strange, right? 

Craig: I, yeah, I feel like, are you jumping ahead? ’cause I don’t feel like they all leave yet, but I thought you were just talking about how like Barney goes off to a party with another girl. 

Todd: Oh yeah, Carol, that’s true. There’s the whole Carol thing, which I don’t get.

Craig: And then there’s like Linda overhears, Connie, the woman who. Is kind of the head nurse or something, I guess. And, and the doctor who we haven’t talked about much, I mean he seems, he’s very friendly with her, with Linda and Nice. He doesn’t seem threatening or to have any agenda, but she overhears those two talking about some sh Should we tell her, 

Clip: shouldn’t we tell Linda at least what for?

It’s just a coincidence if you are sure. I was here then you weren’t 

Craig: trust me. So I again, ultimately I don’t really know what they were talking about. I do. Okay. Well then maybe you can reveal it at the appropriate time. Yeah, yeah. But it just seems very suspicious to her. And then she starts looking through records, like through a ledger, and she keeps seeing this name of like Dr.

Rb with like Rita in. Parentheses and I didn’t know, like did she already know who that person was? 

Todd: Yeah, she did, but we, we have no idea. That’s maddening. ’cause it takes a while for her to bring it up, I guess if we were really paying attention. She does refer to her Aunt Rita once or twice, I mean, early when she finds a diary, one of the first things she sees is a photo of her, her mom and her mom’s sister together as, as girls.

And some one or two lines that her mom references her sis. But that’s about it. You’re right. She sees that in there. And so we put a pin in that until later and this morning everyone goes on this tour bus and Linda can’t find Lance, 

Craig: you are, you are. So excited to get to that tour, and I’m not exactly sure why, but there, there was a whole series then of very, of spooky things that happened that ultimately nothing came of like there’s cat scares and she hears like she’s on the phone with Barney and then he gets cut off and she hears heavy breathing on the other line.

Yeah. 

Todd: And the in the water. Water in her bath, in her bathroom, I mean, 

Craig: right. She has another, the water in the bathroom, she has another dream where she sees like the naked guy outside her window, but like it’s water and he’s swimming and then, oh, that was cool. And then somebody actually does sneak into her room and you don’t know who it is, but it just turns out it’s Barney.

And that’s when they have that sweaty. Sex. Sex scene. 

Todd: Yeah. Okay. Can I, can I talk about the tour now? 

Craig: Well, I wanted, I, I wanted to mention the sex scene because it was so dark and I was all you could see, and to be, again, I’ll, I’ll admit I found it kind of sexy. All you could see was the glisten. Of their skin.

Yeah. And the fine glisten of the fur of his back.

And so it was just kind of like a, like silvery silhouettes, uhhuh. That you could see. But I was disappointed because it looked really sexy and I wanted to see more of it. But 

Todd: your mind filled in the blanks a little bit, I’m sure. Yeah. Okay. All right. So I’ll be on this. No, I did too. I wanted to see more of her and, and, and it’s funny, she takes her shirt off a couple times and takes some showers in here, but they’re very modest about the nudity.

I mean, there’s just like a little side boob once or twice, and that’s it. 

Craig: Yeah. She takes off her clothes a couple of times, wants to get dressed, and wants to get in and out of the shower, but I don’t think you ever see her from the front. No. I think, uh, she’s always shot from the back. 

Todd: It’s very tasteful.

You know, that kind of el I would say kind of elevates in a way the, not, not the tasteful movies can’t have nudity in them. Absolutely not. But, you know, you know. Right. Just kind of like separates it from Grindhouse there, for example. Fair. Yeah. I, yeah. Yeah. But okay. So yeah, you’re right. So all this happens and there’s these creepy things and stuff, and my point is, we’re halfway through the movie now, so it’s, it is a slow burn, but it’s not like a whole bunch of stuff doesn’t happen.

You know, before we get to the 45 minute mark, you know, which I’m just addressing, like that comment I read from. From online. I mean, either you’re intrigued by it, you’re happy to get these things dripped out to you and, and trusting that they’re all gonna make more sense later, or, you know, you’re getting impatient.

And I think I can feel that I would watch this movie in a different setting, maybe in a different mood, and I would maybe fall on the more impatient side. I can totally get that 

Craig: I was on the impatient side because it’s, you know, I just listed off a bunch of things that happen, but they all just seem random and ultimately they are Whoa.

Not really. I mean, you know, we, well, we, we keep, they all have a drawing comparisons to the Shining in, in, in the Shining, the things that happen. I don’t know, you know, I’m such a fan of that movie and I’ve seen it a bazillion times. Maybe if I was seeing it now for the first time, I would feel differently.

But it seemed like all of those things were connected, like they were all building. Towards something or 

Todd: they are in this movie too. But I just think The Shining is more focused because it’s just three people. Yeah, that’s fair. It’s three people in an empty house. It doesn’t bring in their family history real.

I mean, you know, it’s the alcoholism, whatnot. What is they? Yeah. But you know, aside from that, like that’s really not. There’s no mystery there to unpack. It’s just like this house is slowly getting to them, to this guy in its way. And, uh, you know, this I think is just, again, it’s just more of a gothic mystery where there’s a past and it’s coming back into the present to haunt this person, and it’s all gonna come to a head and, and become present, you know?

So, yeah, I just think it’s a different kind of narrative than the shiny, I guess. That’s fine. 

Craig: It does. I mean, it does all ultimately kind of tie together. I just think that the way that it ties together is silly. Like, 

Todd: okay, 

Craig: the person who. Or. Person, persons, whatever, who are responsible for all these weird things happen, just happen to be like bathroom obsessed generationally.

Todd: Right. 

Craig: They had a definite modus operandi, didn’t they? Okay, that’s fine. Yeah, whatever. Anyway, so then they, all the old folks get on a bus. 

Todd: You’re right. Thank you. Finally, Jesus, all the old folks get on a bus, but this is the whole reason I just wanted to jump here is because this is where everything I think starts to pick up and get even more strange.

And there’s some things here that I am not even sure I understand. Linda can’t find Lance since he discovered the body. I think he’s had a bit of a stroke and so it doesn’t seem like he’s gonna go on the trip, but he is. In the fountain and he fishes a red hat out of the fountain, which must be very important because there’s slowmo, there’s a nice bit of slowmo use in this movie that I really like.

But um, he fishes this red hat out of the, outta the fountain and she sees it and she’s disturbed by it. I was thinking, don’t look now right away. Yeah. Absolutely, and I was again later too. I have to think that this movie is just deliberately putting some nods towards that. I don’t know. I don’t, I still know what the deal was with that Red Hat.

I don’t know why there’s a Red Hat. I do. Was that supposed to be Connie’s? Carol’s? Carol’s? 

Craig: I mean, it was Carol’s. Carol’s, yeah. Carol Carol was the girl. She’s not even a character in the movie. She’s just. This girl who shows up and takes the boyfriend to a party. Oh, she was wearing it and she was wearing it.

Oh. And then soon after this, and I may be jumping ahead a little bit, but it, it connects it. Soon after this, Linda is in her room and she hears a car horn honk. She looks out out of her window and it’s. Carol’s red convertible, and Carol is in it, but somebody else is driving. The camera does not zoom in on it.

We only see it from the same distance that Linda sees it, but I thought it looked like Carol’s head was tilted way back and I was like, is is she dead? Oh, and Linda runs down, but as she runs down the car speeds away and then she goes and talks to Connie and she’s like, 

Clip: did you see who was driving Carol just now?

Was she here? Of course. She was here a be was in the pond this morning. Oh, there was someone in the house last night. Someone turned off the lights and all the taps in my room were left running. Why would she do that? She, you said Carol was here. It’s probably one of the old folk. 

Craig: Carol was dead in that car.

Todd: Oh yeah. 

Craig: I’m almost a hundred percent sure. And then later when she’s running around in the last part of the movie, she stumbles upon Carol’s dead body. In the fountain. 

Todd: Yeah. With 

Craig: its with her 

Todd: throat cut. That was real poetic. I don’t know why the killer decided to bring Carol’s body back here and, uh, throw it in the fountain at that particular moment.

I don’t either. I, I first thought that that was Connie actually cut. By the throat, because that was the only thing that made sense to me at the moment. But yeah, you’re right. It, it’s definitely Carol. Okay, so it’s, there’s a little premonition too. Yeah, it’s a little bit like, don’t look now in that way as well, I guess.

Yeah. Okay. So, but while she’s out there talking with Connie in the laundry, which again. Some very inspired shots here as well. You know, it’s very evocative of trying to work your way through a maze the way that they’re talking to each other. But there are these multiple lines of sheets hung up between them and they’re kind of walking in and amongst them, but never really in this.

Same. Mm-hmm. Line. You’re always separated. There’s this one point where it’s just made perfectly clear that there’s a wall between them, which I alludes to the psychological wall between I, I just thought that was such a great bit and Connie is like shady. Totally shady. Yeah. I mean, you could say maybe she’s not, but she feels really shady here and she asked Connie about Aunt Rita.

She says, why didn’t anyone tell me Aunt Rita was dead? Because she had just come from. Lance’s room, and she asked Lance about Aunt Rita. Do you remember Aunt Rita when she died? And Lance says, not dead. Uhhuh not dead. So now she’s confused. Is Aunt Rita not dead after all? And she asked Connie why did tell when?

And she’s like, well, she isn’t, she. And she is. Okay. So then she goes to visit the doctor about Aunt Rita. And the doctor too is, feels very shady about this. Um, but ultimately his explanation is just like Lance is just an old man and, and he’s confused and he is living in the past sometimes. But no, you know, your mother couldn’t cope because your aunt was a very, very sick woman.

And Aunt Rita had to be sent away to a home, and that’s where she died. She couldn’t handle her illness anymore. 

Craig: Right. 

Todd: And she’s like, but I saw that you, that even up till recently. In the ledger payments have been being made to her in your name, and that’s what you know was in the ledger. That’s where we finally figure out the significance of that, and the doctor’s just like, uh, yeah, I don’t know.

Now it’s starting to coalesce around this mystery of Aunt Rita. Maybe Aunt Rita’s not dead after all. And what does that mean? Is that the figure she thinks she’s seeing and all this stuff and immediately she pulls up to the house a little bit later and through her window blurred by a sprinkler. It’s funny, she stops in the driveway right where a sprinkler is going over her windshield and as it kind of swipes away in between the swipes, she looks and she sees, thinks she sees up in the corner of a window on like the second or third floor, I think in her room, a figure who was wearing a red coat.

Again, so much like. Don’t look now, and she runs up into the house and looks for it. I’m like, okay, we’re an hour in. Finally we’re getting somewhere. She goes in the room, looks inside, can’t find anyone, only Connie is there and she’s like, oh, it’s only, you know us. And Lance, Connie seems super shady. Mm-hmm.

Linda finally finds the red coat sitting there in the room and it’s on top of an open page in the diary. And what a cool transition this is like, she picks up this diary and she’s reading it, and this is referring to the events of. Of like 20 years ago. And there’s this cool bit where she’s reading the diary and the camera pans through the wall to the other room where Connie is standing there kind of pacing and looking out the window as well as she’s reading it.

And this is where the diary is explaining the strange noises in the house, lights going on and off. Doors opening and closing. You know, her mom’s able people dying in the 

Craig: bathroom. 

Todd: Yeah, she’s something is evil. And so then this is where we get that flashback to Linda as a child where we’ve realized that she has in fact discovered a body.

Dead when she was there. Three found dead in the bathroom in the past, I think. And so now Linda’s on a mission, right? She’s gotta figure out, is this happening again? Why? Why is it now happening again? What’s going on? So she runs into what I thought was the doctor’s office. Maybe it was, maybe it’s Connie’s office, I don’t know.

And while the doctor and Connie are occupied. In fact, they, they p she, she grabs like some records off the top. This is so typical, right? Going through old records and, uh, listing the different causes of death. She overhears the doctor telling Connie perhaps she found out I was lying. 

Craig: Yeah. It seems very conspiratorial.

Yeah. Like they’re conspiring against her somehow. Well, 

Todd: it very much 

Craig: is 

Todd: really in a way 

Craig: kind of, but I, I don’t even understand why I, I don’t understand what. Uh, they’re keeping something from her and I don’t understand why. 

Todd: Well, I’ll tell you why. Because the doctors listed these odd reasons for death here.

The doctor’s been covering up, okay? The doctor in the past has been covering up, and so he is still kind of covering up again, you know, to kind of. Save face for the family or to kind of brush things away for the family. 

Craig: Okay. And for the facility, I suppose? Mm-hmm. Okay. So all those people who died in the bathroom, he was making up fake causes of death.

Correct. Like 

Todd: coma. 

Craig: That makes sense. I mean, I guess it kind of, it kind of makes sense. I mean, ultimately. Ugh. Anyway, carry on. We’ll, we’re, we’re, we’re leading right up to it anyway, but go 

Todd: ahead. Well, this is great. This is where Linda freaks out, like she thinks she’s kind of sorted it. And so she runs out.

There’s this great sweeping shot. As she tears off outside of the, out of the house, there’s this great sweeping shot down the hall past the doctor, past Connie, up to Lance, peeking through the door. I mean, I would steal shots from this movie if I were to ever make another movie. I just thought this was so great.

She gets in her car, she runs to Barney, or who’s in this fire brigade meeting. It’s so funny that she can interrupt this meeting and they just kind of like talk over her. Carry on. Yeah. 

Craig: Like maybe that’s she and, and she is a mess. Like she’s filthy. Yeah. Like she, she’s just run through the woods. She’s run and she must have fallen several times because she’s just.

Covered in dirt and like there’s dirt all over her face and her hair is a mess. And she walks in and she’s acting crazy and they all just ignore her. 

Todd: Is this an Australian thing? Is this a cultural thing? We don’t get, you know, maybe the politeness of just like, you know, carry on and let the crazy person be crazy until it affects us.

Craig: I like that part, but doesn’t nothing come of it. Doesn’t he just take her back? That like. Well, this is the beginning of the end really. She’s like, something’s going on. And he’s like, okay, let me take you home. And like they just go back there, right? 

Todd: Yeah, yeah. She sends him in to collect the paper. He’s like, well, you know, we can get the papers.

And she’s like, they’re down there in the thing. And he is like, all right, let’s go. And she’s like, I would rather not go in. Can you just do it? So he goes in, you know, he’s being the calm. Reasonable boyfriend where she’s clearly having this panic attack. And then there’s just this beautiful sequence where she’s just outside and she’s kind of looking around and there’s this fountain there.

There’s this stream of water spraying up outta the fountain, and she’s looking at it, and then suddenly the stream of water turns red. And we look at the fountain and we see the fountain is covered with blood. And I thought she was imagining this. Mm-hmm. But somehow while she was standing there, apparently somebody slipped, slipped Connie’s body into the fountain right there in front of her, Carol.

Carol, sorry Carol. This is the typical, you know, run around and find the bodies at the end kind of deal. 

Craig: Yeah, I, I loved that, that that shot of Carol with her throat cut was beautiful. I mean, it was gruesome obviously, but it was a beautiful shot. But I love, this is an an old school thing too that I love when you see these kinds of practical effects on people, and she’s obviously meant to be dead and her heartbeat was so evident.

Yeah. Throat, well, 

Todd: like her 

Craig: throat 

Todd: was just pulsing. I thought she was just freshly dead. ’cause I saw the pulsing. I thought she was gonna run up and try to help her. And then when she keep, when she runs away, I was like, wait a minute. Wasn’t that woman like dying back there because I saw her, her neck moving.

Craig: No, she was for sure meant to already be dead. She was dead a long time ago when she was in the car. I’m pretty sure. Yeah. 

Todd: Now it makes sense. You had to explain that bit to me. I didn’t quite get all that. 

Craig: The, the next part that I found really surprising is because Barney doesn’t come out. She goes in and she’s like Barney and she’s looking all around and she is standing in one room and she looks across the room and there’s like an open door, but it’s dark in there so she can’t see anything.

But then a wheelchair comes rolling out at her really fast. With dead Barney in it. Yes. Like 

Todd: that was fast. I 

Craig: was 

Todd: shocked. I was too, I was shocked. And it that kind of hits the step or whatever, and flies up and over her. Oh my gosh. How didn’t we just recently see something where a body kind of improbably fell over somebody?

Oh, was the girl? I don’t remember. It was the girl in the basement of, of Dolly Dearest. Yeah. Oh, yeah. But yeah, she’s freaking out. See, this, to me, this was where I felt very susperia because the angles, the light, especially the color and everything, it just, it got very, very stylish, really, really fast. Here.

And I liked it. I thought there were a lot of red lights coming in with a little bit of blue and the, and the darkness and the shadows and, oh, I, I, I just love this bit. But yeah, this is the panic bit. And then she runs into Lance’s room and he’s still in there and there is somebody running after her in the hallway.

You, you can just hear the steps for sure. So she quickly barricades the door and somebody’s banging on the door and she ushers lance out the window slash fire escape 

Craig: and he gets away. I thought that was really sweet. Yeah, it was like she makes sure she gets him out of there. Mm-hmm. And he does. He goes down the fire escape.

We never see him again. Presumably he’s fire at this point. She’s running around, she’s getting chased. She runs into another room. This is when you see an old woman silhouetted from behind. 

Todd: Well, first. No, you were right. I think you were about to say she finds the key and locks the door. She does. Okay.

Because there’s still somebody out there pounding on the door and they try it again. And there’s this really, really suspenseful moment where she’s up against the door, she locks it, she’s trying to do it quietly. ’cause it sounds like whoever was chasing her was down the hall. But clearly they can. He they could hear it because there now there are slow steps toward the door and then somebody tries the, the knob.

And I actually, you, you could see the, the key turn a little bit. I thought maybe they were gonna unlock it from the other side. Oh, right. Yeah. But then you’re right. No, once it seems like she’s okay, she turns around and looks into the room and like you say, there is a silhouette of somebody in there. I was shocked by that.

I, that, that scared me a bit. Well, 

Craig: I don’t know. I mean, it was spooky, but I was like, okay. He, this is it. This is where we’re gonna find out what’s going on. And it is, but it was giving me very shoot psycho vibes. Yeah. Yeah. I was thinking, who is the Norman Bates under this wig? 

Todd: Mm. 

Craig: And I would’ve rathered it been someone else.

You know, like I, I would’ve rather it have been more of a surprise, more of a shock. I would’ve rather it have been the doctor or Connie, or, I don’t know. It just ends up being Aunt Rita who. Was in disguise as that old woman who we saw brought in at the very beginning of the movie and never saw again since then.

Mm-hmm. Now we’ve read all about this history and the doctor said she was crazy and you know, we had to send her away. And if you, as you just did for me a couple minutes ago, if you put all the pieces together. Apparently it was Aunt Rita that was killing everybody and they were covering up for her, but to save face and to eliminate the problem, they sent her away.

But she’s pissed because she feels like this is her place too. And so now she’s come back with her son. Oh yeah. I wasn’t sure who this guy was. Maybe. Maybe. Or was this 

Todd: just some other loon that she like hooked up with at the loony van? That was the most frustrating part about this whole thing is we still don’t know who this freaking guy is.

Was he killing for her? You know, I, I just, 

Craig: I think so. 

Todd: In 

Craig: the past 

Todd: though, 

Craig: or just. No, probably not. I don’t know. Yeah. I’m just making this up in my head now. I like, I just kind of went along with it like, oh, she has a son. I, I, but they, I mean, the son was never mentioned by the doctor or by the diary and like it in the 

Todd: IMDB.

It gives him a name and says it is her son. Uh, okay. 

Craig: Well that’s fine. 

Todd: Kelvin. 

Craig: I would prefer to think that they put her away in a loony bin and she recruited some other loony to break her out and bring her here, but, 

Todd: mm-hmm. 

Craig: Whatever, who cares? They’re there and they’re pissed and they’re trying to kill everybody.

Todd: Well, he’s a loon because, you know, he’s got a hammer and he’s, he ends up getting in the door and he comes in and he’s more tormenting her than anything at first. Like she’s backed up against the foot of the bed and he’s like crouch in front of her, like, 

Craig: yeah. And he’s got like a mallet and he’s kind of like menacing her with it.

Todd: Oh, that’s so dumb. I, 

Craig: but yeah, he’s just crazy. 

Todd: Yeah. She overpowers him, ends up running into the bathroom and comes into the doc. I think both doctor and. Connie at this point are dead in the tub. Right? 

Craig: Oh, I only noticed the doctor, but you’re probably right. Yeah. But it’s very, it’s, it’s gross. It’s like, oh yeah.

A display like it, like a display of bodies. It’s disgusting. It looks fantastic. It does. 

Todd: I could, again, I couldn’t help but think black Christmas, there’s just so many things. Maybe we just see so many movies. Yeah. That there’s hardly anything original anymore. But this woman is looking through, you can see her eye looking through the keyhole.

I 

Craig: actually really liked this part, so Linda is standing. On one side of the door holding it, propping it shut with her body. And there’s that gross display of bodies on the other side of the room, like in the bathtub. And you hear crazy Rita say, I can see you. And Linda looks across the room and sees the bathroom mirror and I think through the bathroom mirror she.

See Rita’s eye in the keyhole. 

Todd: Mm-hmm. So 

Craig: she real quick covers the keyhole with her hand and scoots over to where she can reach a hair pick. 

Todd: Mm-hmm. 

Craig: It’s like a comb with a pick on the other end. 

Todd: So cool. 

Craig: And, and she scoots back over and she just takes it and just stabs it directly into the keyhole. She has great aim, excellent aim.

That’s a real fol move there. Yes, and that was my favorite part. I loved it. And she pulled it out. It was all bloody, and then she opens the door and Rita like falls to the ground and is like clutching her eyes 

Todd: or whatever. At this point, I kind of felt like maybe she’s gonna be fine. The big mistake she made was like, she disabled the guy in the bedroom.

He, she like whacked him on the back of the head with a. Chair or something, which seemed to knock him out, but you don’t really know, man, if she had just finished a job, 

Craig: she barely hit him with like a little footstool. Like that was not a good, 

Todd: it 

Craig: was 

Todd: dumb. 

Craig: That was not good. Yeah. 

Todd: But there is this awesome, again, another awesome shot.

This shot of her running away. It, it, it all gets slowmo again and. There’s the sound of her running away from her and there’s this overhead shot down the hall and she’s running down the hall and almost everything except for the hall of the carpet just seems to fade into black. And her running down it, like she’s just going down this, this tunnel.

She goes down the spiral staircase and she runs out of the house. She gets in her pickup and speeds away, and I’m like, well, she’s fine now. Right? More or less. But she doesn’t think so she comes to that diner that she arrived at, at the very beginning of the movie. Everything Starts that we didn’t talk about at all.

We didn’t do 

Craig: the, the movie. The movie actually starts at the end. You see her all beat up at this cafe and like driving away from a cafe. 

Todd: That’s right. And, 

Craig: and then it flashes back and you see her like going to this cafe and she’s very friendly with everybody there, blah, blah, blah. So anyway, she’s going back there now.

Todd: This little kid, Nico lets her in because the Harry, his dad, who, who owns the, the diner is not there at the moment. She’s locked the door and she goes over to the pinball machine and waxs it open like, like we saw earlier. And then she just sits there and she’s just, she, they’re just waiting for Harry, but she’s like, get his gun.

Harry’s out rabbit hunting, apparently. She’s like, get his gun. And I thought this was so cute. Like she’s sitting at this table just staring off into space. And Nico is there dressed in military gear. He’s got a helmet on. He’s got like an army shirt on and he is got the, the rifle sitting there like he’s ready for it, but she’s just staring off into space.

She’s just. Broken 

Craig: building a giant pyramid of sugar cubes. Now the, the scene was interesting, but it was so weird as far as pacing is concerned because all of this huge fighting and stuff at the house, and then she flees and she gonna get away and she gets away and then she gets to the cafe and they.

Sit there and wait. Yeah. And the, the movie even tells you, like, they don’t make us sit there with them for a half an hour, but they tell us by showing that he has changed his clothes and they’ve barricaded the door and she has built an enormous pyramid of sugar cubes like they have been there. A while.

So the movie tells us that they’ve been there a while and then just out of nowhere, that black rape van bursts through the wall. 

Todd: Yeah. 

Craig: Nico tries to shoot the guy, but he’s clearly never shot a gun before because he doesn’t come anywhere close. But he does shoot the gas tank. Yeah, 

Todd: classic with 

Craig: a rifle, but somehow.

It. The gas tank gets hit with buckshot because it starts shooting out in a bunch of different directions. 

Todd: She stands up, grabs the rifle, walks right up to that thing and blows that guy’s head clean out. That’s right. That was cool. I, I don’t understand why she didn’t just keep driving down the road, honestly.

Yeah. I think she could have even gassed up there. Well, 

Craig: it is Australia. 

Todd: Yeah, that’s true. Drive for 

Craig: days. That’s 

Todd: true. You’re probably right. You’re probably right. I mean, there was probably a good reason why she was. Sitting there and waiting, I suppose, but I like that she just stands up and blows that guy’s head off and we are done.

That was a great shot too. It was really fast, but his head just explodes. Yeah, it looks really good. So then like she just kind of stumbles out and even the kids like, we gotta get going. We gotta get going. I mean, she’s still kind of not right in the head, but uh, he ends up pulling her out into the truck and like you said, this is the beginning.

This is what we saw in the beginning of her coming, and that was satisfying. I love a good bookend. 

Craig: Yeah, 

Todd: sure. She gets in the car and drives off. And now apparently this next shot, which blew me away, this next shot was apparently a total accident. This is all one shot. Like she gets in the car, she sits down, she starts it up, the camera’s like in the backseat, basically of the pickup from behind them.

They pull out, they drive down the road, and then she turns around and looks back and you hear an explosion. And I thought, Ugh, this movie couldn’t afford. To show us the explosion because there’s not even a flash of light or anything. But the camera pans sideways in just enough time to catch a flash of light come off of the sign that they pass.

They pass by this white sign and it continues to pan around and you see that it, the building is in the process of exploding. And I was like, oh my God. That was an amazing shot that they caught that light just in that moment. It turns out that was just a happy accident. The camera was supposed to turn around and then we were supposed to see it explode at that moment, but the special effects guy shot it off too early, but it’s way more effective that way.

The tension of just like hearing the explosion, turning around, suddenly seeing the flash, and then continuing around and you see it blowing up behind him. I was so impressed by that. Yeah, it looked good. Yeah. And I love the closing music. It’s, it’s immediate credits, it’s closing music. All the music through this whole thing was done by, um, Klaus Schultz, who is a, a German guy.

He was part of Tangerine Dream, which makes sense. It’s very evocative of that. It’s, it’s a synth score, but it’s a really nice synth score. And, uh, I really liked it. He’s done a couple movies. He did this one, he did, uh, horror movies. I mean, as a solo artist. He scored this, he scored Barracuda, which was kind of a jaw slash piha knockoff in, in the late seventies.

And I, and I, you know, I thought the music in the movie was very judicious. Appropriately judicious. But when it came on in some ways, again, uh, it was so giallo, it, it almost felt like, uh, the kind of thing that Goblin would’ve come up with if they were just a little more hy and sparse, you know, with the, with their arrangements.

But, uh, yeah, man, I don’t know. I, I, I, I really liked it. I don’t know what I was expecting. I don’t think I was expecting a big, uh, action pack slasher. I wasn’t exactly the shining either. As we talked about, but I walked away from there going, wow, like this movie. This is a movie I’m gonna remember. I really enjoyed it and I did wonder if you were gonna like it or not.

So 

Craig: yeah, no. As is often the case with these movies, it was a lot more fun talking about it with you than it was watching it for me. I don’t. Think that I will remember much of it. If anything, maybe that, that cool stabbing the eyeball part. Maybe a again, I, I would never, well, I would rarely intentionally steer people away from a movie.

It’s fine. It’s not bad. We’ve a hundred percent seen worse. It’s, as far as filmmaking is, is concerned. Well beyond competent, it’s, it’s good. In terms of filmmaking, I just didn’t particularly care for the story. I didn’t find it particularly engaging. I didn’t really care what was going on. I didn’t really particularly care about the characters, so it doesn’t get a strong recommend from me.

But if you’re curious. You could waste your time in far worse ways.

Todd: What a lovely way of putting it. I mean, I’m gonna go against you on this one. I highly recommend it, but obviously if you’re the kind of guy who just wants like an 80 slash or some kind of modern, very twisty, very action packed. Thing, it’s probably not gonna float your boat if you like, uh, the old Hammer horror films, if you like a slow burn, if you, uh, like a kind of a Victorian style gothic mystery and, and you know, can kind of sit through that, I think you’re gonna be rewarded with some beautiful imagery.

Haunting feelings. And uh, obviously if you’ve listened through this far, we’ve kind of spoiled the whole thing for you. Right. But, uh, you know, that being said, if you were watching this for the first time, I, you know, if you’re that kind of person, I think you would really dig it like I did. And I think certainly as far as filmmaking goes, man, when you consider this time period and what was going on, you know, in the world of horror around this time with a lot of cash grab movies, in fact, a lot of Australian cinema around this time was quite extreme and ridiculous.

This is a bit of a diamond in the rough. I think for that reason alone, I’m sure, I’m sure is, is a reason why Quentin Tarantino honed in on it so much and maybe gave it a little more prominence than it would’ve had otherwise if it hadn’t had him mentioning it a few times. 

Craig: Yeah. I just feel like if people go in thinking, oh, it’s, you know, Quentin Tarantino loved it, I, I feel like you may be kind of disappointed.

Todd: Oh, your expectations might be. A little different. 

Craig: Yeah, I, I just, I mean, yeah. And maybe that was the problem for me. Maybe I wouldn’t, maybe my expectations were too high. So, temper your expectations. Fair enough. Well, 

Todd: thank you guys so much. We’d love to hear what you think of this movie, if you’ve even seen it.

It’s definitely playing on streaming services now. I think you can watch it on Tubi. So, uh, check it out next of kid and let us know what you thought. Uh, you can leave us a [email protected]. You can find us anywhere. You know, just Google ‘two guys and a chainsaw podcast’. Leave us a message on social media.

You can speak to us directly by clicking Speak to us on our website and just record a quick 92nd clip that we will play on air and respond to if you choose to go that way. You can also get some private audience with us back on the Patreon page, patreon.com/chainsaw. Horror just. Five bucks a month. We have lively conversations going on there.

We have a book club back there where we read horror and horror adjacent books, our minisodes and short reviews, and all kinds of stuff we put back in patreon.com/chainsawpodcast. We love your support. Until next time, I’m Todd. And I’m Craig with Two Guys and a Chainsaw.