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The Big Picture
The 10 Best Horror Movies of the Year … So Far. Plus: The New Scary Movie Royalty, and ‘Obsession,’ With Curry Barker!
02:09:04
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- [00:16]
Sean Fennessy
I'm Sean Fennessy and this is the Big Picture, a conversation show about the horror. Today on the show, Chris Ryan joins me to talk about the huge wave of horror movies that have hit already in 2026. Later in this episode, I will be joined by Curry Barker, the writer director of Obsession, a delightful new horror film about a boy cursed by his own infatuation with a girl. To say more would spoil too much about this incredibly fun and intense parable about what is and is not love. Curry got his start like so many recent horror directors on YouTube, and he has been tabbed for some big things, so stick around for that chat. But first, we're talking horror with CR right after this. This episode is brought to you by the Autograph Journey Credit Card from Wells Fargo the Autograph Journey credit card from Wells Fargo is built for travel. You can earn rewards wherever you book your favorite hotel site, your go to airline and more. You get five times points with hotels, four times with airlines, three times on restaurants and other travel, and one point on other purchases. Whether it's a big vacation or a quick getaway from booking your stay to that first meal when you arrive, you're turning your trips into rewards with the Autograph Journey credit card from Wells Fargo. Learn more@wells fargo.com autographjourney Terms apply for
- [01:22]
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- [02:24]
Sean Fennessy
okay bud, we do this like twice a year. How do you feel right now?
- [02:27]
Chris Ryan
It's halfway to Halloween, man. This is where we have to start training. This is where we start getting into
- [02:32]
Curry Barker
shape for the spooky season.
- [02:34]
Sean Fennessy
What are you more into? Jiu Jitsu taekwondo, Tae Bo, extreme fasting
- [02:39]
Chris Ryan
and searching for demons just for fear
- [02:43]
Sean Fennessy
of not wanting to vomit all over everything. There's been a lot of vomiting in films recently, for sure. There's some intense vomiting in Lee Cronin's the Mummy, not yet discussed on this show.
- [02:53]
Chris Ryan
Puking and obsession.
- [02:55]
Sean Fennessy
Lots of vomitus behaviors. You ever been to a vomitorium?
- [03:00]
Chris Ryan
No. I've seen an ancient one in the city of Split in Croatia, where the rich and powerful would gorge themselves and then stick a peacock feather down their throat.
- [03:13]
Sean Fennessy
Is that a fact?
- [03:14]
Chris Ryan
Yeah.
- [03:14]
Curry Barker
Yeah.
- [03:15]
Sean Fennessy
And did you participate in ancient ritual? That's gross.
- [03:18]
Chris Ryan
And Croatians, God love them, they eat, like, heavy stuff. Like, it's like bready pastas. Like really, really, really. Like a lot of gnocchi, you know?
- [03:26]
Sean Fennessy
You know these, Sam, they often lead to you and I pitching horror movies. I think the vomitorium shot and set in Split, Croatia. There's something there.
- [03:36]
Chris Ryan
A couple on their honeymoon.
- [03:37]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, that's really nice.
- [03:38]
Chris Ryan
Puking on each other.
- [03:40]
Sean Fennessy
You make Croatia sound so exotic.
- [03:42]
Chris Ryan
Croatia was amazing in 2014. Don't know what it's up to now. You know, I can't say.
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Sean Fennessy
Has it descended into fascism?
- [03:47]
Chris Ryan
No. I just don't know whether it's become, like, more, well, trodden, like, with tourists. When we were there, the funny thing was, like, you were starting to see this. I'm sure you experienced this in your international travels with your lovely wife, but, like, you realize that there are several couples having the exact same trip as you.
- [04:04]
Sean Fennessy
Right.
- [04:05]
Chris Ryan
And so it's like, ah, you also are going to the Blue Pool or whatever it is, you know, like.
- [04:09]
Sean Fennessy
Well, they made a film about that. It's called Speak no Evil.
- [04:11]
Curry Barker
Yes.
- [04:12]
Sean Fennessy
And then things went terribly awry.
- [04:15]
Chris Ryan
Speaking of which.
- [04:16]
Sean Fennessy
Speaking of which, let's talk about how horror is going, how things are feeling. We were talking about last week and I kicked an idea to you that it feels like for the young and exciting new voices in this space, there are two tracks that people can go down now. Right now it feels like you can either start making stuff and putting it on YouTube and start putting it on social media and hoping that you build a following and then hoping you can get the attention of the moviemaking world. Or you can use a slightly more traditional, though not that traditional, approach of making independently financed horror features and eventually hoping to kind of build your way up to getting distribution on a platform like Shudder and then using that experience on Shudder to then vault into the major studio horror. Does that sound right? Roughly.
- [05:01]
Chris Ryan
I would imagine that's that's. I can't think of a third way right now. And, you know, you have your like, small horror focused labels like XYZ or RLJE or Breaking Glass. Like, you'll see their sort of them at the front of a lot of horror movies. But the YouTube thing is pretty interesting because I wouldn't go as far as to say you skip the line. But it does feel like some of these YouTube creators who become horror filmmakers go from nothing to a Tour very quickly, 100%. And it's not like they. They kind of arrive like, if you want me, it's my vision, rather than, hey, I finally got this big break, but I'm going to have to play the game with Blumhouse or whoever, you know, like, whatever studio I'm working with.
- [05:46]
Sean Fennessy
There's something exciting about that. You know, I had the Filippo Brothers on for Talk to Me and then they had Bring Her Back last year. I think Curry Barker's in his mid-20s.
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Chris Ryan
Yeah.
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Sean Fennessy
I mean, some of these folks are incredibly young that are getting an opportunity. And I think a big benefit to this genre is just that these films are just not that expensive to make. I mentioned Lee Cronin's the Mummy. It's Cronin's third film. It's his biggest film. It still reportedly only cost like 22 to 25 million dollars. And he gets a tremendous amount of scale out of that modest budget. And the movie's made a bunch of money. And so it just seems like you can go to the front of the line, like to the top of the heap in a really short period of time. I'm sure for somebody like Lee, it doesn't feel like a short period of time because he's been working hard for a long time. But Curry having this movie distributed by Focus that was bought out of Tiff, where he got a huge reception for the film in his mid-20s after five years on YouTube, is extraordinary. It's just fascinating that it's been able to happen that quickly.
- [06:43]
Chris Ryan
And he was making sketch comedy. And also, like we talked, I think in 1924 when we did this, we might have talked about milk and cereal.
- [06:51]
Sean Fennessy
We definitely mentioned it. Yeah.
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Chris Ryan
I think the YouTube short. But even though it's an hour that popped for him and it's 800 bucks. And if you watch Obsession, you'll see some familiar faces or one familiar face in Milk and Cereal. Cooper Tomlinson, who's his sort of. Who's his sketch comedy partner and appears in a lot of his stuff and works with him A lot is an obsession.
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Sean Fennessy
Yeah. I think there's something genuinely really exciting about it. And you know what it reminds me of? This is probably overstating things a little bit, but that wave of crime movie directors coming out of Sundance in the 90s where it was like fast, cheap and out of control, was the energy that a lot of those movies had. And some people went on to become Tarantino and some people went on to become. Not that, but it does feel like we're in the middle of a little bit of a wave.
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Chris Ryan
Do you do much scouting? Do you send your guys out there to watch some young lefty? No.
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Sean Fennessy
Only one of us has an army. That's what I'll say. If only I had more people who are doing some advanced scouting for me.
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Chris Ryan
I do the kind of cheat of Googling Best Horror YouTube Every once in a while. I. You know what surprises me about it, I think, you know, this is a pretty common experience on YouTube, is you'll come across something and it will have like a million and a half views in two days. You know, it's a very, very, very passionate audience. And I think with Iron Lung and Shelby oaks, like to two YouTube creators who ported over to features, you can see that in some ways, you know, having that kind of fandom and having that kind of highly connected and activated fandom is almost like having ip. So you. Most people are like, hey, go make a mummy movie. Because enough people out there are like, mummies. I know what those are. I'll go see the movie. But if you're like, hey, from the guy who you've been subscribed to for nine years, it's kind of 11 in their pocket already or 15 bucks in their pocket.
- [08:48]
Sean Fennessy
I couldn't agree more. I more broadly think this is where all culture is going. I talked about it a little bit on Plain English with Derek Thompson a couple weeks ago, and Markiplier's success with Iron Lung is proof positive of this. I mean, my sister introduced me to him 15 years ago and was like, this is my favorite YouTuber. And she has been more or less along for the ride with him over that time. And so she is, even if she's not as interested in his content as she was when she was a teenager, she was just in on Iron Lung. She was just going to go see it. She felt like she had to because of the commitment that she had made. And. And that is also kind of the business that we're in. That's the business that most people, I think, that are just kind of Making things for entertainment and enjoyment and insight are doing. And so it's this unusual situation where crowdfunding never felt like it was a sustainable model for unknown people because it was all about this kind of Shark Tank esque proof of concept. But if you have a little bit of a foothold on social media or a streaming platform, you can make your thing get it out in the world and a lot of people can go see it.
- [09:51]
Chris Ryan
There's an interesting thing also I wanted to mention about the aesthetic of YouTube horror that I've seen. Curry Barker is a little bit different because I feel like he is doing almost social commentary in a lot of his videos and especially in obsession. But milk and cereal. But I was watching one this morning called Avaloop from a director named or a creator named Nick Crowley. And uh, it's basically formatted like a rabbit hole exploration. Like a guy finds a website and keeps going deeper and deeper and deeper into like what was this website selling? It's like from the 90s and the further you go, there's a really great twist later on in it. And you know, I think there is like a degree to which the comment section seems to be almost like treating it like it's a documentary. But there is like this utilization of true crime podcasting, of Internet deep dives, of you won't believe what happens next mechanics that I think a lot of YouTubers use like to basically tantalize you to keep coming, like to stay, keep watching. And it's slightly changing the genre a little bit and I think the Philippe brothers are a really good example of this. And they, they come out of Utah, YouTube. And you know, one of my, my favorite part of Bring Her Back is the opening where you're like, you guys, what is this Russian resurrection angel video that you found?
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Sean Fennessy
I wish the movie had that energy a little bit.
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Chris Ryan
That's that kind of shit. It's the digital ephemera that has been like quote unquote found and discovered that I think is like pretty breathtaking when it's done right.
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Sean Fennessy
We're going to see an incredible test of this later this month with backrooms, which is Kane Parsons adaptation of his own kind of expanded YouTube series Short film Creepypasta, that he compelled Chiwetel Ejefor and Renata Rheinzeva to come and be involved in it. And I think James Wan and Shawn Levy and all these big names are all really interested in this 20 year old kid. And it feels like this amazing transitional moment in the genre's history. But also the stuff is pretty good.
- [12:07]
Chris Ryan
I mean, did you watch any of his YouTube stuff?
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Sean Fennessy
I've seen Back Rooms now, which I wish I had. Not now, because I'm, you know, now I feel like I really know the contours of the story, but also felt like to be a part of the experience of being excited about it and to do that thing that you where you're sort of like, along for the
- [12:24]
Chris Ryan
ride to $35 million. Like, I think it's going to be important to say this wasn't just a good trailer. Like, it was also like a legion of people who are interested in it.
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Sean Fennessy
Totally. Which I think is quite interesting.
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Chris Ryan
He's another person who I think, like, he flirts with kind of like this maybe more art school side of the. The YouTube, like, video art kind of side of it. Like, at least some of the stuff I've seen. It's a really exciting space. You know, I too, was pretty skeptical of, like, the idea of, like, we just need to raise $2 million to make our, like, Slasher in the Woods. Because it was either like, well, if it doesn't, that's money down the toilet. And if it does, what are the chances that I'm going to be a co executive producer on your.
- [13:08]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, yeah. No, but I think like, like we talked about In a Violent Nature a couple years ago and like, how that was. There was something very standard and also something very form breaking about that movie at the same time. So it's just. It's really about the novelty of the idea, the commitment of the artist and getting like either 5,000 people or two really successful people to really get behind it. And you can't really compare any other movie genre to this. There's not really any other genre because some bigger movies need more scale and more funding. Smaller movies are harder to market and harder to draw young people into just like a classical chamber piece drama, which you can make at this scale, but it's just harder enticement. So, yeah, it does feel like we're at this amazing moment this year and you've got all of these people, some of whom are at the intersection of comedy. And I find that really interesting this year, too.
- [14:01]
Chris Ryan
Well, you know, it's interesting that you mention basically the farm system of YouTube to the majors because that was the same thing for comedy, you know, in and around the Comedy Central. Boom.
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Sean Fennessy
That's right.
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Chris Ryan
Workaholics, you know, like all these people who are making post college humor sketch comedy shows in their apartments. I mean, that's. That's Sunny in Philadelphia.
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Sean Fennessy
Like I mean, like, the whitest kids, you know, is Zach Kreger.
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Chris Ryan
Yeah.
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Sean Fennessy
Yeah.
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Chris Ryan
So I think that the. The infrastructure was there.
- [14:31]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah. You know, Mad TV and Key and Peele for Jordan Peele. You know, those are two people that are obviously the biggest crossover figures in that space right now. There's always been a very obvious relationship between comedy and horror because they both are kind of drawing on human behavior and high emotion. Right. This, like, really convulsive, reactive experience that you have when something is really scary or really funny. The idea of gut busting kind of working as a double entendre. Yeah.
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Chris Ryan
If people are just interested in maybe the best example of comedic horror or horror comedy that I've seen in a really long time, it's Widow's Bay. It's the Apple Show.
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Sean Fennessy
I watched the first episode on your strong recommendation. It was good. Yeah, I think Matthew Reese is amazing. So it was great.
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Curry Barker
Yeah.
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Chris Ryan
That's Hiro Mirai and. And Andrew DeYoung and Ty west also directed on it. So it's like. It's really, really good. It's one of my favorite shows of the year.
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Sean Fennessy
I enjoyed it. Eileen and I are gonna stick with it. On the movie tip, I'm curious who you think is really at the top of the heap? Who are the 10 or 20 people that are at the vanguard of this? I was looking at upcoming blu rays and 4k, something I do from time to time, and I noticed that John Carpenter's Vampires is getting a 4K steelbook, as it should, which is, of course, is deserved because it's a phenomenal movie. Some fine work from James woods in the film. But 10 years ago, the idea of we need a $48 edition.
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Chris Ryan
Yeah. Any giant Daniel winning, crystal clear bitrate.
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Sean Fennessy
Yeah. It just seems ridiculous. But there is something. The past, the recent past, which felt fun to kind of excavate, has shifted from cult to canon. And now I think we're starting to look at this recent era of filmmakers and saying, like, okay, well, who's going to be the next Carpenter? Craven, Tobe, Hooper, George Romero? You know, the people that we can really claim as, like, generationally, the loudest and strongest voices. I just mentioned Craigger and Peele.
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Chris Ryan
I think those are the two number one seeds in each conference. And, you know, Peele, I think that there used to be an idea that you could start with horror because it was a way to get your movie made, and then you could move into the things you really wanted to do. And now I think Cragger is the example of somebody who Obviously just really loves this genre and has Resident Evil coming this year. But a space horror movie called the Flood, apparently shooting already or it's like, it sounds like it's in progress. And when you see the Resident Evil trailer, while I wouldn't put him past him for that to only be like the first 10 minutes of the movie that we're seeing, it's. That's hard horror. Like that is like, that is like follow this guy as he descends into hell, AKA Raccoon City. And that's. There's no, like, there's no pulling punches there. So I really, I love the fact that he is tripling down on like his credibility in the genre right now.
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Sean Fennessy
I will say for both of those guys too though, there is something slightly Spielbergian about their approach and the way that they write characters that I think has somehow made them seem both really, really grounded in the genre and also really elevated to the point where a performance in the film can win an Academy Award or you can win the original screenplay Oscar. These two guys are now Oscar nominated Oscar winning filmmakers and we don't really, we didn't have that really for the previous generation, you know, give or take like De Palma doing Carrie. Like there's some examples over the Exorcist with Friedkin. But those guys were not purely horror filmmakers. So the idea of somebody who's like, my stake is in the ground. This is my home genre. Whenever I'm making a movie, nine times out of 10 it's going to be one of these kinds of movies. And also I'm critically acclaimed and also it's one of the 10 biggest movies of the year. This is really rare error for the genre. Beyond those two guys, who else do you think is belongs in the discussion?
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Chris Ryan
I think we have to talk about Mike Flanagan because he's probably been the most consistent and prolific horror director working. But is an interesting case where seems to have turned himself entirely over to the Stephen King universe or grand IP excavation. So his slate upcoming is Dark Tower, which I think is going to be a miniseries if I remember correctly. How they.
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Sean Fennessy
I hope so.
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Chris Ryan
It's hard to do as one, but more more notably he's currently shooting Exorcist. I saw Sasha Calle on. On set for that with she looks like she's a police detective and there are rumors that it's going to have a little bit more of a like police procedural bent to it. He's doing a mini limited series of Carrie. Not sure that Carrie needed a limited series treatment, but we'll see and he signed up to do the Mist, which is amazing. Frank Darabont movie from. Of an adaptation of a Stephen King novel from years ago. But I'll be very curious to see what he's gonna do with that. Then he got the ball rolling with Clayface, which. It's worth noting that D.C. is like, what we need is a hard horror title in our. In our portfolio.
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Sean Fennessy
Very exciting. Did you watch that trailer? Yeah. Yeah. You were into it?
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Chris Ryan
Yeah.
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Sean Fennessy
Okay.
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Chris Ryan
What'd you think?
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Sean Fennessy
Yeah, I'm. I'm all in. And I just wish more not just superhero stories, but all kinds of IP could be pivoting into that. Pretty dramatic. And not just horror. There are other ways of approaching those stories. But that one in particular felt very natural. And I've said it before, one thing I love about that trailer is no one says Bruce Wayne in the trailer. There's no image of Batman.
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Chris Ryan
No.
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Sean Fennessy
It's in that world. It's gonna be in. It has to be in that world.
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Chris Ryan
Yeah. It's Gotham. Right?
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Sean Fennessy
It's Gotham. But I don't really. I appreciated that it didn't. There was no jingling keys. Few other people that we should probably talk about. Oz Perkins has another new film this year, the Young People. Now, the success of his Neon films has descended since the Long Legs explosion. But. And I found the last film to be a little bit. Had some moments.
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Chris Ryan
So his monkey paws. And then. What was the monkey?
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Sean Fennessy
It was. First it was Long Legs, then it was the Monkey, then it was Keeper.
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Chris Ryan
Yeah.
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Sean Fennessy
And Keeper had a couple of images that I thought were incredible. But the movie didn't really hang together for me. But those three films were all kind of made in a tight succession over a short period of time. The Young People, which I saw just a little bit of a peek at. At Cinemacon, looked really cool. And I'm hopeful that that's not good. Do you know? I don't know.
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Chris Ryan
Okay.
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Sean Fennessy
But that's from Neon. Later this year. I think it's gonna end up becoming like the Halloween movie this year. There are not a lot of Halloween movies coming this year in October. I don't know if you noticed that.
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Chris Ryan
I didn't. That's good.
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Sean Fennessy
Clayface is one of the big Halloween movies. This would be the second year in a row where we were really over indexed on April and May and March.
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Chris Ryan
When does, like, you think that there's gonna be like a violent nature? Cause I know violent nature 2 is coming, but that is happening. Yeah. I wonder if Shudder is saving like two or three big indie Releases for that time, presumably.
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Sean Fennessy
I mean, we didn't even talk about, you know, Terrifier and Damien Lyon and that whole era and the way that he kind of used that crowdsourcing fandom to grow his stuff. And I think terrifier 4 is probably not at the end of this year, but maybe Finn Parker.
- [21:47]
Chris Ryan
Smile.
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Sean Fennessy
Those are two of the biggest horror movies of the last 25 years. I'm a little bit more mixed on them. He is remaking Possession, which feels like a big risk.
- [21:59]
Chris Ryan
Who's playing the female lead in that? Is that. It's not Jenna Ortega, is it?
- [22:02]
Sean Fennessy
No, the male lead is Margaret Qualley. Margaret Qualley, yeah. And Callum Turner is the other lead. We'll see. Yeah, we'll. We'll see. I. I hope it works out.
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Chris Ryan
I'm trying to think of the best. Why did you need to remake this horror movie that I've seen? Because, you know, like, we. I thought Speak no Evil was fine.
- [22:23]
Advertisement Voice
The.
- [22:23]
Chris Ryan
The James Watkins English doesn't improve on the original. It doesn't improve. And it is also like gives away the entire movie. And the, the trailers. We talked about that a lot. I know that Noah Hawley is talking about directing a remake of the Damian Rooney movie.
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Sean Fennessy
Oh, terrified.
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Chris Ryan
Terrified, yes.
- [22:43]
Sean Fennessy
Don't think we need to remake that movie. Right. Happens often.
- [22:47]
Chris Ryan
Yeah. But I'm trying to think of the best version of it. It's not coming to me right now.
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Sean Fennessy
I mean, there's. That isn't good.
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Chris Ryan
No, the one that's like, wow, you really did it. Nice job. I'm so glad you guys went back to this situation.
- [22:57]
Sean Fennessy
No, there's far more examples of remakes that we didn't need. Some people like the Platinum Dunes era of the 80s slasher remix. But some people are sitting across from you. Yeah, I'm not as into those movies personally. We mentioned the Filippos. I mean, Scott Derrickson, still a very successful.
- [23:13]
Chris Ryan
I think you gotta talk about him just because of how commercially viable he is. And yeah, the Gorge at least has some fans in Aubrey Plaza. And Black Phone 2 did very well. You know, it wasn't my favorite film, but like, I thought it was inventive in places. And I'd be curious to see if he continues to go down the horror road or whether or not he wants to go back into blockbuster filmmaking because he was, you know, did the Doctor Strange thing.
- [23:39]
Sean Fennessy
I respect him wanting to use horror as like a prism through which he can tell bigger stories. Like the Gorge in Doctor Strange. I just wish that those movies were just a Little bit better. James Wan.
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Chris Ryan
I had him lower on this list. If this was actually a power ranking, you could argue he would be up there with cragger and Peele just because of the. He's the water diviner, you know, like,
- [24:02]
Sean Fennessy
I mean, he's had more success than anybody.
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Chris Ryan
And the Atomic Monster merger or whatever or joint partnership with Blumhouse, I think, changes Blumhouse. And Blonde has obviously got his eye out for people like Kane Parsons and probably could turn around and make the most hotly anticipated horror movie of the year anytime he wants.
- [24:24]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, I mean, he was the EP and, you know, I'm sure had plenty to say about the Conjuring Last Rites, which was like a $500 million movie last year. So in terms of just like, pure industry clout and power, he's incredible. But when he deigns to direct a horror movie, they're usually really good.
- [24:41]
Chris Ryan
That's what I'm saying.
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Sean Fennessy
Yeah. So, yeah, I. Look, I don't know. I guess there's been a long time rumor that he's making a Creature from the Black Lagoon movie. I don't know if that's actually going to happen. I hope it does be interested to see. But, yeah, he's got his name on a bunch of movies. There's a new insidious movie this year, Other Mommy Comes from Atomic Monster in Blumhouse, the Revenge of La Llorona. Like, there's a whole bunch of movies. I don't know. Did you ever hear anything about what happened to Soulmate? Which was supposed to be the spin off of Megan, but after Megan 2.0 flailed at the box office, they basically shut it down.
- [25:13]
Chris Ryan
Were they shooting it? They were like, I think it's done.
- [25:15]
Sean Fennessy
Oh, wow. We saw a preview of it at CinemaCon in 2025, and it was supposed to come out in January of this year, so I saw, like, two minutes of footage.
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Chris Ryan
Was it, like, how did it iterate on M3GAN?
- [25:28]
Sean Fennessy
Well, it was very similar to the film Companion.
- [25:30]
Curry Barker
Oh.
- [25:31]
Sean Fennessy
Where it was about a robot Companion girl, but it had an even more, I would say, violent bent. And it seemed less comic.
- [25:40]
Chris Ryan
Okay.
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Sean Fennessy
Than Companion was. But that movie is now off the schedule. I'm waiting for the announcement that, like, it's just been sold to Netflix or something. But I'm quite curious.
- [25:52]
Chris Ryan
Yeah, I had a couple of other people here, Watkins, we mentioned James Watkins, who did some really decent B movies leading up to the Speak. No evil remake, but Eden Lake and Blackcoat's Daughter, and then is directing Clayface, and it Seems like they let him make a horror movie, so I'm excited about that.
- [26:11]
Sean Fennessy
I think he's a really good. Not black hood's daughter. The woman in black. Black's daughter was Oz.
- [26:16]
Chris Ryan
Oh, sorry.
- [26:17]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, I think he's a really good craftsperson. You've got Julia Ducarnau here. Should also mention Coralie Farja, the twin French queens of body order baddies. Yeah, I was not as high on alpha. I don't know if you saw Julia Ducournau's new film, which is not so much horror as it is. Mm. It's kind of a body psychosis drama that is also a parable about aids, which, you know, you don't see a lot of stories about AIDS in the 2000s. And there was something interesting about trying to explore that. But the movie was not nearly as successful and has, like, a very dour tone and didn't have, like, the mania that I think was so exciting about Ra and Tan. But I really look forward to seeing what she does next.
- [27:06]
Chris Ryan
Brandon Cronenberg, he's got a space horror movie that he's apparently working on called Dragons.
- [27:12]
Sean Fennessy
No kidding.
- [27:12]
Chris Ryan
Which is about, like, alien. Alien DNA becoming like, a drug of, like, a recreational drug for people. And so people are out hunting aliens in space to, like, keep. Keep snorting that stuff, which is a good idea for a movie, honestly.
- [27:30]
Sean Fennessy
Just like, horror movies are gonna live forever. There's so much stuff out there.
- [27:37]
Chris Ryan
What if you smoked space dragons? That'd be fucking good, right? Why has anybody done that yet? I do think it's notable that Brandon and Kreger are doing space horror. And my Event Horizon homies are sticking their head up above the parapet with no eyes.
- [27:54]
Sean Fennessy
This conversation is not about Mortal Kombat, but James Wan is a producer on the Mortal Kombat movies, and. And Paul W.S. anderson directed the original Mortal Kombat film. And Mortal Kombat is kind of loosely related to horror. I bring up Paul W. S Anderson because of Event Horizon.
- [28:12]
Chris Ryan
Well, this is the funny thing. So, like, you know, when we were talking about Star wars the other day, I was very conscious of the fact that we're obviously speaking from a certain, like, generational, like, spot. Like, we're like, okay, it's the first three than the prequels. Like, I had a harder time with. Than you did because you're a little bit younger. And I think that those were, like, a big deal. And now you're introducing all these. These movies to your child. But, like, I wonder whether we're going to feel A similar generational shift in what is, quote unquote, cool and what is being influenced or referenced in horror. So when we were doing Alien Predator stuff, when Badlands came out, if you go online, there's a lot of Alien versus Predator defenders. I mean, they may be in insane asylums, but they are out there.
- [29:00]
Sean Fennessy
They have access to the Internet, logged
- [29:03]
Chris Ryan
into a public library console. But it's funny how, like, different.
- [29:08]
Sean Fennessy
So that actually explains the existence of CR heads. You just, you just figured it out. Well done. We're in insane asylums. Yeah.
- [29:17]
Chris Ryan
They've logged on in an Internet cafe.
- [29:20]
Sean Fennessy
The only access to is Reddit.
- [29:23]
Chris Ryan
They have an Interpol red alert on them. No, I wonder what horror movies and what like micro genres of horror, like space horror will become a little bit more in vogue as, as Curry Barker and Kane Parsons become like the kind of alphas of the genre.
- [29:41]
Sean Fennessy
You know, I mean, what was the wave in the 2000s? I mean, it's notable to me.
- [29:45]
Chris Ryan
It's, it's Marcus Nisbel Corps. It's like.
- [29:48]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, well, I mean, one thing that I think is helpful here is. We'll talk about Undertone shortly. But Ian Tuison, who directed Undertone, was hired to direct the reboot of the Paranormal Activity franchise. And that is an era of movies, not just found footage, but that kind of run and gun, low budget style that, you know, Jason Blum, I think, really kind of built his business on that. All the people who saw those movies are all 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, thinking about their first horror features. And I'm sure they're feeling the influence of those movies the same way that we felt the influence of Halloween and Nightmare on Elm Street.
- [30:23]
Chris Ryan
Poltergeist. Yeah.
- [30:25]
Sean Fennessy
What other names do you want to mention?
- [30:27]
Chris Ryan
I would just mention for people who are looking further down the rung, there's a family of people in the Catskills, the Addams Family, I guess, to not put too fine a point on it, who make a bunch of indie kind of almost duplass style. It's just us making me and my family members and our friends making these movies. And there's a couple of really cool titles, Hellbender and Where the Devil Roams, so you can look around for those.
- [30:56]
Sean Fennessy
And did you watch the Mother of Flies yet? That's their new film.
- [30:59]
Chris Ryan
No. Is it good?
- [31:00]
Sean Fennessy
Very disgusting.
- [31:02]
Curry Barker
Very effective.
- [31:02]
Chris Ryan
Disgusting.
- [31:03]
Sean Fennessy
Yes, Very effective.
- [31:04]
Chris Ryan
Okay.
- [31:06]
Sean Fennessy
It's amazing how extreme this family, mother, daughter and father are willing to go in their movies. I would recommend it's on Shutter right
- [31:15]
Chris Ryan
now and Another person who I think is up and coming that I. It's worth mentioning, Brandon Christensen had two movies that technically came out in 2025, although I consider body cam more of a 26 movie. And the other one was Night of the Reaper. He's really good. He's made it. He's pretty prolific. Super host. Came out in like 2021, but I could see him. I could see him graduating to an even bigger budget project soon.
- [31:39]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, Body Cam was interesting. It was only 75 minutes and it felt like it was stretched a little bit longer. It was basically like a really good episode of Tales from the Crypt or something. And I. Yes, I wanted to say Tales from the Crypt, which is also extremely formative, I assume for you and definitely for me, is now available on Shudder. The first season of that show, which aired on HBO when we were growing up, which I watched religiously and lied to my parents and said I wasn't watching it.
- [32:05]
Chris Ryan
It's basically our Twilight Zone.
- [32:06]
Sean Fennessy
Yes, exactly. And it was the closest we got. And it was kind of a horror spin on Twilight Zone inspired by EC comics and spooky stuff produced by Robert Zemeckis. And it's just a blast. The show's a really fun time.
- [32:18]
Chris Ryan
You can feel. The one thing I'll say about a lot of the YouTube creators is you can sometimes feel the uncertainty about like runtime and about like, how much story do I have here and where do I want to take it? I wouldn't necessarily say that about obsession, but I could see a 50 minute version of Obsession.
- [32:39]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah. If there's a flawed obsession. And to me there are not many. I really, really like is a. It is a touch long. And there is something really interesting about these young filmmakers who are used to working in brief expanding.
- [32:53]
Chris Ryan
Yeah.
- [32:53]
Sean Fennessy
And you mentioned milk and cereal was.
- [32:55]
Chris Ryan
Was an hour and a minute. Yeah, it's like one on one.
- [32:58]
Sean Fennessy
And this movie is more of a movie movie. Right. It's like, I feel like it's like 100 minutes, 105 minutes.
- [33:02]
Chris Ryan
Yeah. But there is. We'll talk about obsession in a second. But there is a very clear point where I'm like, there needs to be like a. A third thing happening in this movie. Like instead of just like this three hander or four hander that it basically is. Other than that, I think that's pretty much it for my like power rankings. I mean, I want to see a Lee Janiak movie. She hasn't done something since the Fear street trilogy. And then she executive produced Fear Street Prom Night. But I'm sure we're missing people. I mean, you know, maybe one of these days we should do a horror mailbag. Or maybe we could do that with Halloween. And if people have recommendations or people that they love.
- [33:43]
Sean Fennessy
Ciara, that's a great idea. A horror mailbag in October. I love it.
- [33:47]
Chris Ryan
Especially if we don't get a lot of big releases in October.
- [33:50]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, I'm just gonna look at my October really quickly. Just consult my board here. Well, Digger, yeah.
- [33:58]
Chris Ryan
I mean, it could have elements of horror.
- [34:01]
Sean Fennessy
If it turns out to be bad, it will be horrifying. Other Mommy is a big one, obviously, and Clayface, and I think those are the only two wide release horror movies that are on the calendar for October, which is quite strange. Yeah, Resident Evil, of course, comes out in late September. Okay, let's talk about some movies. A bunch of stuff has come out. We've talked about some of it here on the show over the last few months, but not everything. Obsession is the headliner. I'm so interested to see if this movie takes off because it seems like anybody who's gotten a chance to see it has really clicked with it. As I said, it's from Curry Barker, written and directed. It stars Michael Johnston and Indy Navarette, Cooper Tomlinson, Megan Lawless. A little cameo from Andy Richter.
- [34:39]
Chris Ryan
Yeah, fun cameo.
- [34:41]
Sean Fennessy
The story is as follows. After breaking the mysterious quote, one wish Willow to win his crush's heart, a hopeless romantic finds himself getting exactly what he asked for, but soon discovers that some desires come at a dark and sinister price. What do you think?
- [34:56]
Chris Ryan
Really, really effective. How much spoilery stuff do you want to do here?
- [35:00]
Sean Fennessy
Let's try to give some, but not too much. There's a lot in the trailer, if you haven't seen the trailer for this film, but it is. It goes to much deeper extremes in terms of its style than I expected. And I was impressed with its willingness to be very, very dark. I think I was expecting a little bit more comedy in this movie and it's not very funny. It creates, like a real sense of discomfort. It has a little bit of that barbarian feeling of not just in terms of how the story wrong foots you a little bit, but more specifically, like, this is so nuts that I'm laughing very hard.
- [35:35]
Chris Ryan
Yeah.
- [35:37]
Sean Fennessy
But I might have been the only person in the theater doing that.
- [35:40]
Chris Ryan
I think that there were a couple of chuckles. I mean, first and foremost, I'll just say Indy Navarrett. Kind of like, I don't think she makes the movie, but she is clearly the person who Jumps out, not as a final girl, although, kind of. She's just responsible for essentially the terror of the movie and the heart of the movie, which is rare in a horror movie, that the sort of villain, quote unquote, is also the tragic hero. So her performance, you know, like, we've had a couple of really great performances by actresses over the last couple of years. I was thinking about Naomi Scott in Smile 2, but she's incredibly physical. Like, the face acting, the terror in her eyes as she is doing a lot of these scenes. While she is also. All of her body is compliant. Her eyes are like. This is terrible. Yes, it's just like a really fantastic performance.
- [36:34]
Sean Fennessy
I thought she's really amazing. I think Barker does a couple of really smart things with the performance. First of all, in the first 20 minutes of the movie, she's kind of your classic manic pixie dream girl, where she's like, young guy has a best friend who's a hot girl, and they've got great chemistry, but she probably views him as in the friend zone. And, you know, she's like, she can hang and she can drink and she's a good time, and they work together. And there's something very common, relatable cliche about the way that the movie sets up. And Navarette's performance through that stuff just feels very in line with what you've come to expect. You know who she reminded me of is Mia Sarah and Ferris Bueller's Day Off.
- [37:13]
Chris Ryan
Great.
- [37:15]
Sean Fennessy
And then as soon as the One Wish willow snaps and the movie goes into high gear, the way that Barker shoots her is fascinating. This is going to seem like a bit of a stretch, but I just watched this morning, Tony Xu and Taylor Ramos, who do every frame of painting, put up a new video analyzing Yasujiro Ozu's use of color in movies. Hang with me for a second here and go.
- [37:41]
Chris Ryan
And he.
- [37:42]
Sean Fennessy
Tony in the video talks about how as Ozu moved from black and white to color, it took him a little while to figure out how to choose the tone of the colors that he was using. And he shifts to using a different cinematographer after a couple of color features. And the use of shadow becomes really, really important to him, even more so than when he's making black and white films. And in several of those films, those Ozu films, you can see the characters faces covered in shadow. So you can see maybe their eyes, but barely even that. And Barker does this over and over again with Navoret, who is a, you know, very pretty young girl who has Like a real, like a brightness to her.
- [38:17]
Chris Ryan
Yes.
- [38:18]
Sean Fennessy
And when you, as soon as you cloud that, and the movie keeps clouding it, it keeps hiding her. And when it hides her, it makes her very, very scary. There's a couple of moments in the movie where you feel like anything can happen, that she could do anything violent and intense and crazy because there's a couple of times where she does something either in the frame or out of the frame and we don't see it and we return to a home where she's done something. And there's something very gross about a lot of the things that she's doing. Like she has no control over her orifices, over her bodily function.
- [38:47]
Chris Ryan
She's trapped. Yeah, she is trapped inside of her own body and is not in control of her own movements and.
- [38:53]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, and the actress is really, really game for doing all this disgusting behavior in a way that you just don't often see a figure like that in a movie like this. And so I was really, really impressed by her and impressed by the energy that the movie has because she's willing to put herself in those situations. And then the other thing is just like, it's just a smart movie about a certain kind of incel y guy, you know, a certain kind of guy who's like, I deserve to have love with a hot girl and I'll do what I have to do to make it so. And then as soon as you do that, you realize like, at what cost?
- [39:23]
Chris Ryan
I liked the fact that this movie was relatively free of explanation and, or origin story and or original wound for any of the characters. So these are essentially like four twenty somethings working in a music store. Seems like maybe not, you know, like far, a little further away from like Portland, but like somewhere like they're. They're just like banging around this town where the highlight of their week is going to a trivia night at a bar and going to karaoke afterwards when they're wasted. And they all have designs on getting out of town. But that's really it as far as their, like, character biographies. And I thought even in the places where I was. I think what that allows you to do is watch this movie and read it from a bunch of different angles. So you could see it as a rebuke of the incels kind of film. You could see it as a guy who makes an impulsive decision and now has to deal with the consequences. And you could also see it as a little bit of a. There is a thread in there that if you wanted to pull at it is like the creepypasta deep dive. Like, what is this trinket that he breaks and what are the rules of it and who made it and who else has experienced, like, disaster from. From breaking. From breaking. The same thing.
- [40:45]
Sean Fennessy
The other thing that it does that is really smart that I think modernizes it as a monkey's paw story is everything in the world is very Gen Z laconic. When he calls the helpline to figure out what is going on with the one Wish Willow, the guy who picks up the phone and has the conversation with him is different than you would have found in a super intense James Wan movie. And to me, it felt like that was a shift, like there was something kind of changing about the genre. Watching someone tell one of these stories and even, you know, I haven't even talked to Curry yet, But just knowing that he got inspired by watching an episode of the Simpsons where their monkey's paw was featured and not reading the 1902 short story is the way that the characters are.
- [41:29]
Chris Ryan
This is what I was talking about where I was like, what is the next level of. What's the next wave of influence that's gonna hit people? And it's not gonna be, I was watching black and white Bela Lugosi movies or I was watching, like, you know, Argento movies. It's gonna be, I watched an episode of the Simpsons that referenced this thing. That moment that you're talking about where he calls the customer service line for the Willow trinket is both the funniest and the scariest moment in the movie because it actually gives you a little bit of a peek into what happens to the indianavarak character. And it's terrifying, but you're like, it's just enough. And I wonder whether or not the previous budgetary restrictions that Barker's worked under, like the $800 milk and cereal kind of world where he's like, I can't now go to a call center in hell. Wherever this guy is is working from. Yeah, I can't do, like, a road movie for this guy's. Trying to find the answers.
- [42:32]
Sean Fennessy
Yes.
- [42:32]
Chris Ryan
And so you kind of come up with these creative solutions to your point earlier about, like, the Sundance crime wave from the 90s when we were growing up. Like, man, man, this is real invention to do that stuff.
- [42:43]
Sean Fennessy
It's the laws of gravity. It's amongst friends. It's Reservoir Dogs. It's like, we got five locations. We got five actors make the absolute most. And it can help movies like this a lot. It really can, because it pulls you down to make it feel more grounded. Even though the premise is so fantastical and magical, I think this movie is really cool and I'm really. I don't know what I was expecting when I was seeing it. And expectations play such a big part for me personally with horror movies, if I hear something's going to be hot, I tend to get disappointed. And if I hear something is not that great, I tend to overrate it a little bit in my mind. But. But this was one where it was just right. I felt like I heard just enough about it. I saw one trailer and I went in being blown away by a performance and really excited about where a director is going next. And Barker, you know, is taking on Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Like, this is pretty crazy.
- [43:31]
Chris Ryan
It's also like, I want to talk about that. But he's really good at durational horror. So, like, basically scenes will go on for a bit longer than you would expect them to. A lot of the script or the dialogue is people repeating phrases back and forth to one another with increasing levels of desperation or terror.
- [43:50]
Sean Fennessy
And that's so. That's so YouTube social media. That's so like TikTok gag. Like a lot of that stuff if you look at. Is it. That's a bad idea.
- [43:58]
Chris Ryan
Yeah.
- [43:59]
Sean Fennessy
Is the name of his kind of comedy viral video YouTube channel with Cooper. A lot of the gags are oriented around that kind of repeating style. But that repeating style is David Mamet. That repeating style is Preston Sturgeon. It's a skill, it's a tool to be like.
- [44:14]
Chris Ryan
But it's like, what's wrong with you? What's wrong with you? What's wrong? But then you get into like the third minute of the conversation and you're like, this is now just becoming these two people chanting each other as they're losing their minds. I actually like, I really enjoyed it. I have no idea what he is going to do with Leatherface. And it's interesting because one person we didn't mention as a real person to watch is J.T. molnar, who did Strange Darling and then wrote the Long Walk and has also got a. I don't know if it's competing or complimentary TV project on Texas Chainsaw with Glenn Powell. So I. I don't know if both things will come to fruition or if we're going to get two Texas Chainsaw IP things soon, but Curry doing it is. Is interesting because there's a couple of set pieces in Obsession. Maybe like three, you know, like action Y scenes. I associate Leatherface with a lot of running and a lot of chasing.
- [45:12]
Sean Fennessy
Yes.
- [45:13]
Chris Ryan
So it'll be a little bit of a different flavor from him.
- [45:15]
Sean Fennessy
Before he does Texas Chancellor Massacre, though, he has another movie coming out next year from Focus called Anything But Ghosts. And the thing that distinguishes that movie, which is about two paranormal investigators who find actual ghosts, is he's starring in it.
- [45:30]
Chris Ryan
Yeah.
- [45:31]
Sean Fennessy
And he's the star of all of his YouTube films, including Milk and Cereal. And he's not the star of Obsession, which is interesting. And you noted this after you saw it. It was one of the first things that popped in my head when I saw Obsession.
- [45:41]
Chris Ryan
I think it would give the movie a different film. And I don't know if it would have been better or worse. It would have been just different. And Curry has, like, a kind of desperation and perhaps. I. Forgive me for saying, like, there is a malevolence to his performances.
- [45:54]
Sean Fennessy
It can be a little unnerving.
- [45:55]
Chris Ryan
And I think it would be different to watch him interacting with the woman rather than this guy who's like, kind of like this basically, like, Garden State
- [46:05]
Sean Fennessy
type dude who's just like, Michael Johnson, real beta.
- [46:08]
Chris Ryan
I'm wearing, like, a sweater and like. Yeah, right.
- [46:10]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah. I agree. The new movie, Anything But Ghosts, also features Aaron Paul and Bryce Dallas Howard. So it'll be interesting. Okay, let's talk about Hokum, because I feel like it's actually on the other end of the spectrum, which feels like it is completely informed and influenced by the classics. It's not as influenced by this sense of YouTube change. And so when I was thinking about this episode specifically and this, you know, the diaspora and the ways in which they part to shudder and to YouTube. Damian McCarthy is like the classical shudder filmmaker, Irish director, a real formalist, squeezing
- [46:46]
Chris Ryan
everything he can out of atmosphere.
- [46:48]
Sean Fennessy
Yes.
- [46:49]
Chris Ryan
Like, really, really, really dialed in on set design, production design, eerie feelings, back of the frame thing, moving in the shadows kind of stuff. But very, very precise and patient and sometimes too patient with his scares.
- [47:07]
Sean Fennessy
I agree. I have liked his movies and not loved them. And that is also how I feel about Hokum. His two previous movies, Caveat and Oddity, are definitely worth checking out. Oddity has one of the great scares of whatever year that was, 2024. Always very accomplished. Also visually very precise, symmetrical. Really has an incredible sense of the frame creating, like, putting an image in front of you that you can't get out of your mind. That is a skill. Like, I really acknowledge it. I often feel like his stories are just a little bit samey and a little Bit that there's like an ancient power that may or may not be spooking someone. But actually it's human fallacy.
- [47:45]
Chris Ryan
It's human false. The finality of the characters is actually scarier than the whatever is waiting in the basement. It's worth noting that in Hokum, Adam Scott is the star. He plays a dickhead author. I thought of like George R.R. martin type thing.
- [48:01]
Sean Fennessy
A fantasy style writer. Yeah.
- [48:03]
Chris Ryan
And it's a cool performance from him because he has not played an asshole in a really.
- [48:08]
Sean Fennessy
He's a great asshole actor.
- [48:09]
Chris Ryan
Yeah. I mean. Shout out to Eastbound and Down. Gold Card versus Black.
- [48:14]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, it's me, your dad. Yeah, I'm your fucking dad.
- [48:19]
Chris Ryan
This gets you Jonah's brother's tickets. Yeah. It was a refreshing turn from him. I felt like perhaps what I didn't need from Hokum is the thing that Obsession wonderfully lacks, which is original wound trauma story of what this guy is trying to correct in his life.
- [48:39]
Sean Fennessy
Yes.
- [48:39]
Chris Ryan
And then an additional framing device which I thought was like, cool in it.
- [48:44]
Curry Barker
Like.
- [48:44]
Chris Ryan
Oh, I see. Like how like this thing from earlier in the movie is now wound up in. This is him writing the end of his trilogy that he's writing. And it's like a fantasy. It's basically a fantasy adventure sequence that opens and closes the film.
- [48:59]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah. So it's about this writer who goes to this Irish hotel, which is very clearly a haunted hotel because it's a place of great importance to his family and he's spreading the ashes of his parents. So he is kind of haunted by his. And what happened when he was a young boy with his parents, but also seems to have found himself entrenched in some sort of scary plot inside of this hotel. The design of the hotel, as you said, the production design, is really, really cool. He gets these really good performances out of an array of Irish actors, including Peter Koonan and David Wilmot. And, you know, it's one of those things where, like, I kept waiting. You mentioned the third missing piece in Obsession, the sort of like the third act elevation.
- [49:41]
Chris Ryan
Yeah.
- [49:42]
Sean Fennessy
This movie has like the right structure, but it never feels like it goes to the next level.
- [49:46]
Chris Ryan
Yeah. Yeah.
- [49:47]
Sean Fennessy
You know what I mean?
- [49:47]
Chris Ryan
That's a really good way of putting it. I mean, in some ways I. I feel almost like tortured by this because in Obsession I. There was a part of me that wanted there to be more lore. And then Hokum is exactly that. Where it's like, there's a lady in the basement and I don't know why Did Robert Shaw from Shaw's there. And everything is explained to you in Hokum. The only ambiguity comes with the idea that basically all of it could have been a psilocybin trip, but obviously not.
- [50:20]
Sean Fennessy
I think if it had. You know, you mentioned here that there is a psychedelic quality to it, that it is a folk horror riff in a way, and that there's some Wicker man going on in here. I think it probably, for me, it might have been more appealing. I don't know if general audiences would have found it as appealing if we had kind of like upended our. Created more doubt about what had transpired. I felt like it was a little too tidy by the conclusion of it, but I did really enjoy Adam Scott and I do want folks like Damian McCarthy to get to make movies that come out in movie theaters.
- [50:51]
Chris Ryan
When I was watching it, I was like, this is a pretty good story. I like the whodunit aspects of it as much as I liked the horror aspects of it. And in fact, I thought the whodunit was maybe even better realized than the
- [51:04]
Sean Fennessy
horror stuff, you know, I think I agree with you.
- [51:07]
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- [51:38]
Sean Fennessy
All right, Sierra, let me tell you about a few that I've seen in the last few months or so. I already mentioned Lee Cronin's the Mummy, which I wrote about in the newsletter a couple weeks ago, which I think
- [51:48]
Chris Ryan
is Lee Cronin's projections.
- [51:50]
Sean Fennessy
And Lee Cronin's projections. Yeah, he's taking it over. Thankfully. It's been only three weeks and I need some help. And I think it was not a bad horror film, but not a good mummy movie.
- [52:05]
Chris Ryan
He did the previous Evil Dead.
- [52:06]
Sean Fennessy
He did. Which I really liked. Evil Dead Rise, which was that sort of all in one apartment kind of zombified family movie. And it's the same energy. It's incredibly gross. It feels very high stakes, high tension. He gets a lot out of a little. It felt a little bit like it was made in the 80s in terms of the way that it portrayed Sort of like the Egyptian culture and its relationship to Western culture. I was kind of surprised. And I haven't really seen that too much in the criticism. And that can be a little bit of a Hackney criticism. I get it. But I was like, how many times can we just do, like, Egyptian family puts the zap on a Western family, and then they go home and they gotta deal with this curse.
- [52:45]
Chris Ryan
All right, I guess it's a girl who disappeared. And then they're like, we found your daughter. She's a mummy. And they're like, great, bring her back.
- [52:52]
Sean Fennessy
That's it. That's the movie.
- [52:53]
Curry Barker
Okay?
- [52:53]
Sean Fennessy
And they bring her back, and guess what?
- [52:54]
Chris Ryan
She's a mummy.
- [52:55]
Sean Fennessy
She's a mummy. Bad shit. Bad shit's gonna happen. And in that way, it really is ultimately more of an exorcist movie because she is a demonically possessed little girl who is saying disgusting things and creating a vomitorium in her grandmother's home. And a lot of nasty stuff happens. I wanted to like it more. The biggest sin is it's 2 hours and 17 minutes long, which is just completely unnecessary. It's just unforgivable. But Cronin is talented. You can tell he's got a real knack for super disgusting stuff happening in movies like that, which I enjoy.
- [53:26]
Chris Ryan
And he is not doing Evil Dead Rise.
- [53:28]
Sean Fennessy
Evil Dead Rise is Sebastian Vanichek, who did the French spider horror movie Infested, which is pretty sick.
- [53:37]
Chris Ryan
Not a fan of the Experience, but I thought the movie was pretty good.
- [53:41]
Sean Fennessy
He has some juice, is what I'll say. And what I saw at Cinemacon of Evil Dead Burn was exciting.
- [53:47]
Chris Ryan
The trailer is awesome. When does that come out?
- [53:49]
Sean Fennessy
Like this summer, July 24th.
- [53:51]
Chris Ryan
And I'll see you there.
- [53:52]
Sean Fennessy
The birthday movie. That's how we'll celebrate, you and I, sharing old fashions, watching demons kill people bash brothers.
- [54:00]
Chris Ryan
Almost.
- [54:02]
Sean Fennessy
But let me tell you a little bit about Exit 8, which I think is yet another film from Neon Neon released Hokum. They're releasing the Oz Perkins movie later this year. Exit 8 is, I think, a pickup for them. It's a Japanese movie by Genki Kawamura, and it is an adaptation of a video game. And it is evidently an adaptation of a video game. When you watch the movie, it's about a man who has just gotten off the subway, and he's gotten some personal news. His wife is pregnant. And he receives this news, and he starts walking through the subway, and he finds that he's not able to escape. And he also keeps experiencing these recurring images he keeps walking past the same businessman over and over again.
- [54:44]
Chris Ryan
This happened to me on mushrooms and nights, 1995 in Philadelphia.
- [54:48]
Sean Fennessy
Well, it is a feeling in the first act of the movie of just being lost somewhere. Somewhere anonymous. An anonymous public place that feels labyrinthine and you can't get out. We were just at the opening of the Geffen Galleries at LACMA on Sunday. I don't know if you're aware of this new extension of LACMA which is really a beautiful new museum space.
- [55:06]
Curry Barker
I am aware, yeah.
- [55:06]
Sean Fennessy
But it is extremely large and confusing inside. Very easy to lose a five year old. Just a heads up on that.
- [55:12]
Chris Ryan
It's a brutalist design, right?
- [55:13]
Sean Fennessy
It is very brutalist design and is very kind of shadowed and darkened. And so the way that you're observing the art is maybe more the way that it was created when in the 1500s or the 1800s. Really cool museum. But it kind of reminded me of
- [55:26]
Chris Ryan
the experience of watching Young child also brings getting lost into a new light.
- [55:32]
Sean Fennessy
Museums are complicated. Don't touch. That is something that comes up a lot. You know, you don't want to touch the 4th century sculpture. But this movie creates that similar vibe of just kind of being trapped somewhere that is cavernous and large and repeating. And the movie is mostly successful. But it does have me thinking about the other strain of the future of these kinds of movies. Because like Cragger's making a video game horror movie. Yeah, this is a video game horror movie.
- [56:03]
Chris Ryan
It was interesting to see people's response to the Resident Evil trailer. Did you get into that with Amanda? Did you guys talk about that?
- [56:10]
Sean Fennessy
I haven't spoken about it, no.
- [56:12]
Chris Ryan
Because I saw plenty of people responding to. You're not paying enough deference to the. The mythology and lore of Resident Evil, which is something I actually like am pretty a fan of like in the game. It's kind of an interesting like running storyline. But I thought Cragger's maybe not response to the response, but statement about like the movie is supposed to like feel like how I feel feel when I play the video game. Not like what the video game is.
- [56:47]
Sean Fennessy
Yes.
- [56:47]
Chris Ryan
And you know, obviously taking liberties with people's beloved video games is a complicated thing in the 21st century. But I wonder whether or not directors will start to indulge and they. I think they already have in a lot of ways indulge in that first person. What does it feel like to play these iconic games rather than like. I'm very deferential towards how like the cutscenes in God, I'm just forgetting the name of the zombie show that's on hbo. Last of Us World.
- [57:18]
Sean Fennessy
The Last of Us.
- [57:19]
Chris Ryan
And, you know, I know Noah Hawley's doing Far Cry, I think, you know, there's a bunch of these coming out.
- [57:24]
Sean Fennessy
It's a really, really good question. I think it's all about whether or not the filmmaker who's in charge of the movie has a vision or not. And a lot of the time, a vision can work in opposition to what fans of a game want from a movie. Resident Evil. There have already been eight movies, to me, that should be open terrain. Reinvent it, try something new. The Legend of Zelda. There have been zero movies. If the Legend of Zelda film that is coming out next year doesn't feel like playing the Legend of Zelda in
- [57:50]
Chris Ryan
some way, if Link isn't in this,
- [57:51]
Sean Fennessy
by the way, that's going to be a huge disappointment to a lot of people and probably is a mistake. And I don't think they're going to make that mistake. But I think in the case of Mortal Kombat was interesting. The first Mortal Kombat movie. One of my gripes with it is I was like, this doesn't feel like playing Mortal Kombat at all. Mortal Kombat is not a movie with a fascinating external and internal world. It's a movie about a fighting tournament.
- [58:12]
Chris Ryan
Yeah.
- [58:12]
Sean Fennessy
Isn't it like, it should be all fighting?
- [58:13]
Chris Ryan
The first one is all about getting to the tournament.
- [58:16]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah. It's like Scorpion's origin story. I'm like, that's not. No. I want Scorpion and Sub Zero to be ripping each other's heads off. And the new film is more what the game is. The trailer for the Street Fighter movie is the same thing. And the Street Fighter trailer, I'm like, fucking, yeah. 50 Cent is Balrog. That's what I'm talking about.
- [58:35]
Chris Ryan
Is Sentineo in the Street Fighter movie?
- [58:36]
Sean Fennessy
He is, yeah. Yeah. He's playing Ken. It's great. Very excited about that. So much stunt casting in that movie, but I'm into it. Cody Rhodes is playing Guile. Yeah. So I think the same is true for horror stuff, where, if you're able to reinvent. I haven't played the game Exit 8, so I can't pretend to be an expert on what it's like to play it. But experiencing the movie feels like getting stuck in an rpg, where you're like, oh, shit. I don't. I thought I was already here. Like, I already saw this. I already experienced this. I already inquired with this wizened old man who's holding a staff that's supposed to tell me where to go. Even that experience of playing Zelda in the 1980s.
- [59:12]
Chris Ryan
Well, that's the thing is, it's like I remember playing Perfect Dark. It wasn't that. Perfect Dark is such like a cool story. This is like basically like a espionage action first person shooter that you could play in N64. It was. It was the fact that you would like Blackout and it'd be like seven hours later. You know what I mean? And you know, when I was in my early 20s and me and my boys would just stay up until like three in the morning playing.
- [59:38]
Sean Fennessy
Who were among those boys?
- [59:39]
Chris Ryan
It was Greenwald.
- [59:40]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah.
- [59:41]
Chris Ryan
Sean Howe.
- [59:42]
Sean Fennessy
Sure.
- [59:43]
Chris Ryan
Sean had a triangular apartment on Flatbush Avenue before Barclays was there above a taco place. And we would listen to Wu Tang Clan and play Perfect Dark.
- [59:53]
Sean Fennessy
It sounds like a wonderful night. Honestly, wish I could go there right now. Being 24x88, I would recommend. I think you would enjoy it. I think it runs into a similar problem that so much modern horror does, which is like, let's explain the emotional arc of this character with trauma. But for the first 75 minutes, I felt like I was in somebody's extremely brutal nightmare that got increasingly worse over time. Blood dripping from the ceilings. There's one moment where there's a giant wall of lockers and he hears the sound of a screaming baby. And it turns out that there are many, many babies in those lockers. That one got me. That one got me really good.
- [60:39]
Chris Ryan
Do you find that there's. You're scared of different stuff now?
- [60:43]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, it's.
- [60:45]
Chris Ryan
I don't mean child endangered.
- [60:46]
Sean Fennessy
It's such a cliche with the kid stuff, but yeah, the kid stuff is bad. But you know what? In the Mummy, I wasn't like, oh my God, don't take that eight year old girl. Cause I was like, we're in a movie called the Mummy. So with Exit 8, it's different because you don't. It just seems like an ordinary man riding the subway on his way to work. And then terrible things start happening to him. So I think it's about the presentation. What about you?
- [61:06]
Chris Ryan
I. I don't know. I. I haven't been like up scared in a while since like Speak no Evil. But I found that Speak no Evil spoke to a kind of like middle age, like malaise and anxiety about like money and travel and like friendship and like the way that it exploited a lot of the stuff that I think is probably like the way our lives are now is, you know, a little bit more on the nose than camp counselors.
- [61:38]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, I don't. I didn't think.
- [61:40]
Chris Ryan
Promiscuous camp counselors.
- [61:41]
Sean Fennessy
I didn't think that weapons had many scares, classical scares. I think it had about three real scares, and I really liked those scares. But its idea of people, of parents being way too preoccupied with their own bullshit and letting something like this happen in a community which is really outsized. And if you took a very little approach to understanding the movie, you might be like, this is unrealistic. But this does happen. Where people, you know, grown people, especially people I find that are in my position. Where you waited a long time to have kids and you got really used to your own freedom.
- [62:14]
Curry Barker
Sure.
- [62:15]
Sean Fennessy
And then you're in your late 30s, and you're like, yeah, let's have kids. But I only know how to be myself at 38 instead of myself at 28. When you're confronted by new responsibility and you have to change your life, but when you get really ingrained in your behaviors that terrible things can happen if you don't keep your eye on the ball.
- [62:30]
Chris Ryan
Yeah.
- [62:31]
Sean Fennessy
I thought that was such a novel idea, but it didn't haunt me the way that watching the exorcist at 14 haunted me, where I was like, is this really happening? Is the devil real? Because the movie made you feel like that.
- [62:41]
Chris Ryan
Yeah. I mean, it's the question of, like, what's scarier? Or what's the scary thing about the first Texas Chainsaw Massacre? Is it Leatherface? It is. Or is it being with your friends somewhere where you're not supposed to be, where you've never been before, and watching the friendships dissolve and break down and get destroyed in that moment. And, like, I think it's the. When you have two things working, that's when the movie works. It's like, that's why, like, in some ways, the weapons gimmick with Alden Ehrenreich getting stabbed by Austin Abrams Needle is like, the scariest thing that happens in the movie because, you know, it's like. It's a very real, real piece of horror. I'm excited for Resident Evil, though. I am. I'm. I'm pretty pumped.
- [63:27]
Sean Fennessy
I am as well. What are we going to do? How are we going to celebrate?
- [63:30]
Chris Ryan
When does that come out?
- [63:31]
Sean Fennessy
September 18th.
- [63:32]
Chris Ryan
I don't know. I mean, like, we'll probably pot about backrooms, right?
- [63:36]
Sean Fennessy
I sure hope so.
- [63:37]
Chris Ryan
Yeah. And then we'll. I mean, I definitely want to pod about. About Resident Evil. Should we do any Resident Evil? Like, Like Twitch Stream stuff. Should we play.
- [63:48]
Sean Fennessy
No.
- [63:48]
Chris Ryan
I've been promising ii on my PS4. I, like, downloaded it.
- [63:54]
Sean Fennessy
You still have your PS4? Yeah.
- [63:55]
Chris Ryan
I mean, I want to get a
- [63:57]
Sean Fennessy
4K camera in your. In your house.
- [63:59]
Chris Ryan
Do I want to get a 4K camera in my house?
- [64:01]
Sean Fennessy
Shoot an episode. Me and you playing. Just shooting. Shooting the breeze.
- [64:04]
Chris Ryan
Jack, we should do this in the movie theater. No, we should do it in somebody's fucking living room. You want to do it in your living room?
- [64:13]
Sean Fennessy
Okay, here's what we'll do. We'll have a house.
- [64:15]
Curry Barker
Yeah.
- [64:15]
Sean Fennessy
Bill will buy us a house.
- [64:17]
Chris Ryan
You're gonna smoke a menthol cigarette? Yep.
- [64:18]
Sean Fennessy
We're some heaters. We'll take it back. We'll take it back to 2002 and we'll do it the way that we used to do it.
- [64:24]
Chris Ryan
We're going to do a case of PBR.
- [64:27]
Sean Fennessy
No, we'll do Edward 40 Hands first, and then we'll play Resident Evil for six hours and we'll listen to the entire Wu Tang Clan discography. And we'll smoke a fat blunt right in the middle of it. After the completion of the first game.
- [64:39]
Curry Barker
No.
- [64:39]
Chris Ryan
We'll play roulette, where one of the blunts are dusted.
- [64:45]
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- [65:16]
Sean Fennessy
This episode is brought to you by LinkedIn ads. Ever invest in something that seemed incredible at first but didn't live up to the hype? Marketers know that feeling. They optimize for the numbers that look great. Impressions, reach and reacts. But when they don't show revenue, well, that's a not so great conversation with the CFO. LinkedIn has a word for bullspend. Instead, why not invest in what looks good to your CFO? LinkedIn Ads generates the highest roas of all major ad networks. Reach the right buyers with LinkedIn ads. You can target by company, industry, job title, and more. So cut the bull. Spend. Advertise on LinkedIn, the network that works for you. Spend $250 on your first, campaign on LinkedIn ads and get a $250 credit for the next one. Just go to LinkedIn.com thebigpicture that's LinkedIn.com thebigpicture Terms and conditions apply. Let me tell you about a couple more movies, please. Have you considered centering women in horror? Have you thought about this?
- [66:10]
Chris Ryan
I tried, yeah. I thought I advocated for several female directors and you blanked me.
- [66:17]
Sean Fennessy
That's not true. You said, take them straight to the vomitorium. I saw two movies this week, both of which I really liked and I really want to strongly recommend to people. One is called Maruyama, which is directed by Towa Stappard, which is about a young Maori woman who travels to Victorian England in 1860 to go look for her sister. And she's gotten a letter from a kindly man who knows her sister and says, you have to come and visit her. And she travels, and because it's 1859, it takes 90 days to get there from New Zealand and she shows up and shit is not so sweet.
- [66:59]
Chris Ryan
This guy. Not so kindly, no.
- [67:00]
Sean Fennessy
Well, the guy who wrote her the letter's not there. And there's another fellow who owns the house. And it turns out the guy who wrote her the letter worked for the guy who owns the house. And this fellow who owns the house, no bueno. He's up to no good, and he is really interested in this young woman's culture. The actress's name is Ariana Osborne, and he speaks Maori and he understands the history and some of the cultural traditions, but also has a very nefarious. It's very clear in the first 20 minutes where you're like, this is not. This isn't gonna be okay. But Osborne's performance is amazing. The movie has extraordinary style for such a small budget. It's a real chamber piece that takes place primarily in this house. Lots of shadow, most sequences taking place at night, but beautifully lit, that sort of like darkened blue light that you get in nighttime scenarios. I think this is xyz, the company that you mentioned earlier, who is putting this out. And I had not heard of Toa Stappard and was really, really impressed by this movie.
- [68:00]
Chris Ryan
Awesome. I'll check it out.
- [68:01]
Sean Fennessy
The other one is sort of horror, sort of just like pure revenge exploitation thriller with a little bit of a social bent. It's called Is God Is. It's based on the OBI winning play by a woman named Alicia Harris. Have you seen the trailer for this movie?
- [68:19]
Chris Ryan
I haven't.
- [68:19]
Sean Fennessy
Okay. It comes out today, May 15th, in movie theaters. It's from Amazon, which is so fascinating that they put their money in the movie. They're putting it in the singing, or
- [68:25]
Chris Ryan
they put it in theaters.
- [68:26]
Sean Fennessy
They're putting it in theaters. I don't know how many theaters. It stars two young actresses, Carrie Young and Mallory Johnson, as twin sisters from the deep south who as young kids, along with their mother, were burned alive by their father. All three of them survived, but they are left with brutal scars. And these two sisters have this kind of psychic connection where they are finishing each other's sentences and are always referring to each other as twin. And the dialogue that Harris writes and the tone and the pacing, like the speed that she writes the dialogue reminds me a lot similarly of some of those 90s movies that we're talking about, where sort of like fast talking characters who are really in sync with each other. Actors who clearly had a lot of time to figure out their tone. And then the twin sisters are summoned to see their mother, who they call God, and she tells them on her deathbed, you must find your father who did this to you and track him down. And their father's played by Sterling K. Brown.
- [69:22]
Chris Ryan
Oh, shit.
- [69:23]
Sean Fennessy
The mother's played by Vivica A. Fox. And it becomes a kind of Kill Bill revenge road movie where they go find different pieces of the puzzle. Dude, it's fucking good. Extremely violent. Very much like from a. It's a very singular voice. Like, even though the movie is inspired by a lot of 70s stuff and 90s stuff that you and I both really like, clearly only this writer could have written this movie this way. And for a first time feature, I was pretty darn impressed.
- [69:49]
Chris Ryan
Yeah, I can't wait to check that out.
- [69:52]
Sean Fennessy
And it has some violence and some gore that I think is very much in keeping with a lot of the movies that we're talking about here. And also this idea of what is beauty, what is desire, especially when one of the actresses faces, I think it's Mallory Johnson's face, is really, really severely scarred for the entire film. So I encourage people to check that one out. Okay, so you watched Undertone.
- [70:16]
Chris Ryan
I watched Undertone. I watched Dolly, which is another one you got here.
- [70:19]
Sean Fennessy
Let's talk about Dolly and Undertone.
- [70:20]
Curry Barker
Okay.
- [70:23]
Sean Fennessy
Two sides of the same coin. One movie that is extremely violent, shows everything, makes you sit in the agony and the pain. That's Dolly, which comes from Rod Blackhurst. And then Undertone, which shows nothing, gives you nothing, is largely without incident, but does have atmosphere.
- [70:41]
Chris Ryan
Yeah. And also I would say Undertone comes from the sensibility that we were discussing earlier with some of the YouTube deep dive. Wait, there's more. Podcasting style of horror where this one we can talk about whichever one you want first.
- [70:59]
Sean Fennessy
Well, I mean, they're both interesting to me in that they both don't totally work, but they both have things to recommend about them. Let's talk about Undertone.
- [71:06]
Chris Ryan
Okay.
- [71:06]
Sean Fennessy
I saw Undertone, I think the right way. And it was the same way that I saw Skin and Marink years ago.
- [71:10]
Chris Ryan
Knowing nothing.
- [71:11]
Sean Fennessy
Knowing nothing at home on a laptop.
- [71:13]
Chris Ryan
Okay.
- [71:14]
Sean Fennessy
And a link got passed to me. Cause it had been making the rounds at the horror festivals. And a film like that scene with AirPods in. In a darkened room, which is exactly how I watched Skinamarink some years ago. And I was like, this is pretty effective. You know, it's kind of dumb. Like, I wish more happened. But that sense of dread that the movie is trying to stoke, I think actually works better.
- [71:40]
Chris Ryan
I think there's lots of different ways to watch this stuff. I don't think that only in a movie theater with a bunch of other people. In fact, sometimes those situations can be ruined if people aren't taking the movie in the right spirit.
- [71:51]
Sean Fennessy
But even Undertone, if there were a lot of people in the room, like, screaming and throwing their popcorn everywhere, like when something was scary, I actually don't know that it was that exact kind. There's a different kind of scare that the movie is in pursuit of.
- [72:01]
Curry Barker
Yeah.
- [72:02]
Sean Fennessy
That is intimate and odd. And Whereas Dolly is like, a little bit more of a ripper. Like, there's just.
- [72:07]
Chris Ryan
It reminded me a little bit more of In a violent nature in some ways. You know, it's like, got a really, really great central malevolent, villainous figure. And Fabian Therese is a really good, like, horror actress.
- [72:19]
Sean Fennessy
She is very good.
- [72:20]
Chris Ryan
She was southbound a bunch of years ago, I think.
- [72:21]
Curry Barker
Yeah.
- [72:22]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, she's very good. I just felt like both movies are like 80 minutes and feel like two hours. And that's, you know, that's an issue. I just watched another movie last night that had an interesting premise and a really good Jessica Roth performance called Affection that goes to some really wild places where a woman wakes up in the middle of the road and she's clearly been in some sort of accident, and she can't remember who she is, and she can't remember why she's there, and she's picked up on the side of the road by a man who says that he's her husband and that they have a daughter. They go back to the house and something is not right. And she can't really. It reminded me a little bit of Seconds, the John Frankenheimer movie with Rock Hudson. And she's trying to figure out why she doesn't feel like she's in the right place. And she feels very angry, and she's having kind of like, these physical convulsions that she can't control. And the first 40 minutes of the movie are excellent, and you really, really want to know where it's going. And then at the 50 minute mark, it tells you where it's going. It tells you what it is, tells you what the story is. And you're like, oh, that's it. I don't love that. And then you got to watch the movie for another 45 minutes. So it's one of those things where when you take a chance on a smaller movie like this, you got to try to get your head around it. The last one that I, you know, I think Faces of Death is kind of fascinating.
- [73:41]
Chris Ryan
Yeah. Faces of. I mean, that's probably the best horror movie I've seen this year.
- [73:44]
Sean Fennessy
So tell me what you thought of it.
- [73:46]
Chris Ryan
I just thought it was an exploration of our own fascination with this stuff. In some ways, it's like, very much a meta commentary on, like, guys like you and me chasing a feeling that we have to go to more and more extreme measures to get.
- [74:03]
Sean Fennessy
But I will say I don't ever go to snuff. Like, that's not something that I'm interested in. I want produced, you know?
- [74:10]
Chris Ryan
Yeah, you want production value and story.
- [74:12]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, yeah. If I'm gonna see a vomitorium, I want it to be beautifully rendered.
- [74:16]
Chris Ryan
But the ide. Somebody out there moderating that content that we get in some ways, and such a good idea. Urban Legends and whether or not things are spoofs or viral or deepfakes or whatever. And I just thought. I mean, I'm such a huge fan of that director. So it's like, I thought it was awesome. And in some ways, not unlike the way that Cragger has talked about Resident Evil is. This is supposed to make you feel like. I felt, playing the game, I felt like this was almost the filmmakers talking about how they felt coming across Faces of Death as kids or as teens or whatever.
- [74:54]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, I think that's right on. And I really responded to that, too. Goldhaber's. He's got some juice. I hope he gets a chance to do something bigger after this.
- [75:03]
Chris Ryan
I almost wonder whether or not with the marketing in this movie, they should have pushed the movie Nobody wants you to see. They're scared to show you this kind of. It got a limited release. It was weird to hear a lot of theaters were only playing it at 10pm And I don't, you know, like, I don't.
- [75:23]
Sean Fennessy
I know, I know. It felt like it could have just played as a straight up traditional slasher. Despite the, you know, media commentary that is a component of the movie. I think you would enjoy it just as Barbie Ferreira trying to survive in this deranged environment. But I really liked it and I think also once it hits Shutter, a lot of people are gonna watch it. We already talked about 20 years later the Bone Temple, which I think is probably my favorite of these movies.
- [75:49]
Chris Ryan
Yeah, I guess 28 years later, Bone Temple would be. It might be my favorite movie of the year so far. So it kind of. I guess I consider it horror. It's terrifying.
- [75:58]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, I had a ball with Primate. Yeah, I had a ball with Duba with Send Help. But I wanted to tell you quickly about Dooba Duba. Do you know about this?
- [76:05]
Chris Ryan
I have heard about this. Is this kind of skinamarinki?
- [76:08]
Sean Fennessy
Very. Yeah.
- [76:09]
Chris Ryan
It's like just cctv. It's like security cam footage, right? Correct, Right.
- [76:13]
Sean Fennessy
It's about a young woman who takes what appears to be a normal babysitting job and she learns that the girl who's in her care has a lot of emotional struggles and also that she can't leave the house. And another movie that is like 75 minutes feels a little bit long, but when it's scary, it's fucking scary, really. And then it gets really silly at times too. So it's kind of trying to strike this tonal balance that we're talking about throughout this episode of like, there's a comedy component, there's a discomfort, there's a little bit of. We didn't mention kind of life after Too Many Cooks and the Christmas Yule Log movies. Those Casper Kelly movies. Those movies too, I feel like, are kind of a soft influence on what's been happening in the last five years. Casper Kelly had a movie at Sundance this year called Buddy that I haven't seen yet that I'm looking forward to, but Dooba Duba was kind of interesting. You had a few others here that you might.
- [77:05]
Chris Ryan
Yeah, I just thought I would mention Cold Storage. It's like kind of a almost like an 80s feeling. Sci fi, mildly horror, but more gross out creature features. Joe Keery's in that. That's was really fun. I enjoyed that movie.
- [77:22]
Sean Fennessy
It reminded me a little of the remake of the Blob.
- [77:24]
Chris Ryan
Yeah. Yeah. And I'll. You know, we talked about Body Cam, and, you know, just because we mentioned Marcus Nispel and Platinum Dunes, like, I thought Do Not Enter was like, what is that? I haven't seen that. It's about a group of, like, social media, like, stunt adventurers. Like, people who try to break into, you know, abandoned buildings. Taking on a abandoned casino in Atlantic City where there was, like, Bugsy Malone hid a bunch of money. So they're, like, looking for treasure, and it's haunted, and it has mole people running around it.
- [78:00]
Sean Fennessy
Wow.
- [78:01]
Chris Ryan
So old people.
- [78:03]
Curry Barker
Yeah.
- [78:03]
Chris Ryan
But they're really getting a lot of mileage right now out of influencers and YouTube vloggers going into places that they shouldn't. Like horror movies in general. Are.
- [78:14]
Sean Fennessy
Do you want to start getting into that? Like, want to be invited to space?
- [78:17]
Chris Ryan
I think I. I don't. I don't think I. I don't think I should do that. No.
- [78:21]
Sean Fennessy
Because one thing that I'm enjoying doing on this show is, like, I went to this thing, and I want to tell you about it.
- [78:26]
Chris Ryan
Oh, like an event.
- [78:28]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah. Yeah.
- [78:28]
Chris Ryan
But do you want to go to an abandoned casino and do battle with mole people?
- [78:32]
Sean Fennessy
They can make for a good episode. What do you think? Me and Amanda together.
- [78:38]
Chris Ryan
I'm trying to imagine Amanda being like, we went to this casino. It was amazing. The gronis were great. Could be good.
- [78:45]
Sean Fennessy
The social content would be good, right, Jack? Yeah, it would be amazing.
- [78:49]
Chris Ryan
Anything coming out this year that you want to tell me about? Get the Pump Prime. Does anything we haven't mentioned yet?
- [78:54]
Sean Fennessy
I sadly am going to miss the first screening that was made available to me of Leviticus, which was a queer conversion therapy horror movie that played at Sundance that apparently is quite good. And they showed the trailer to that at Cinemacon. It might even be available widely, that trailer. I'm really looking forward to that Aussie film. So, yeah, backrooms. Evil Dead, Burn, Resident Evil, Other Mommy, Clayface, the Young People. We've talked about all these teenage sex and Death at Camp Miasma.
- [79:21]
Curry Barker
Great trailer.
- [79:22]
Sean Fennessy
Jane Schoenbrunn's new movie. Yeah, I really like the trailer, and that is playing at Cannes, and I'm very excited to see it at Cannes. I think it's in uncertain regard. I don't think it's in competition, the main competition, but I'm very pumped about that. You know, I don't know if Whale Fall is horror.
- [79:40]
Chris Ryan
Is that Austin. Austin Abrams is in that.
- [79:41]
Sean Fennessy
He is.
- [79:42]
Chris Ryan
It's. If a guy gets Swallowed by a whale.
- [79:43]
Sean Fennessy
That's it. You got it. That's it. We saw five minutes of it in Vegas. Absolutely riveting.
- [79:50]
Chris Ryan
Is he in the whale the whole five minutes or is he thinking about other stuff and like, here's what happens.
- [79:55]
Sean Fennessy
Spoiler alert for 1 minutes long sequence of whale fall. There's a guy who's deep sea scuba diving and he spots a giant squid. The squid swims by him and he's terrified. He's like, holy shit, I do not want to be zapped by that squid. And then right behind the squid is a giant whale. He eats him and the whale eats the squid.
- [80:18]
Chris Ryan
And a guy, or just the squid?
- [80:20]
Sean Fennessy
Well, the guy in the moment where the squid is sucked up. There's that kind of like wave that pulls toward. Yes, pulls toward the whale. And he's being drawn into it. And it's this incredible moment of survival where he's inching closer and closer to the gullet of the whale. And then they cut it off. And I was like, show me this movie immediately. It's based on a novel by a guy who just won the Pulitzer Prize yesterday. But not for Whalefall. He won it for something. Daniel Krause. Okay, just sharing that news with you.
- [80:50]
Chris Ryan
Do you think I should buy a giant house in Hancock park with all my Austin Abrams stock money?
- [80:57]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, that's where we're going to play Resident Evil. He's going to come over and play
- [81:00]
Chris Ryan
it with us right next to Bill.
- [81:02]
Sean Fennessy
Sony, if you're listening, buy us a house. Invite Austin Abrams to the house. Yeah, we're going to play at Resident Evil with him.
- [81:08]
Chris Ryan
I will have RZA come over and play the W on an old cdr.
- [81:12]
Sean Fennessy
Yes, Chris has several copies of Ghostface's Fish Scale on CD that he wants. He's burned several for you. And will you be offering weed? No, you would never.
- [81:24]
Chris Ryan
I don't have to. I mean, it's legal in California. You can pick it up anywhere you want.
- [81:27]
Sean Fennessy
You could have some in the States,
- [81:28]
Chris Ryan
have some next to homestate, you know.
- [81:30]
Sean Fennessy
Wow.
- [81:31]
Curry Barker
I don't know.
- [81:31]
Chris Ryan
I don't know.
- [81:31]
Sean Fennessy
You want to cater it with homestate?
- [81:34]
Chris Ryan
Oh, yeah, that'd be good.
- [81:35]
Sean Fennessy
That'd be nice.
- [81:36]
Chris Ryan
Yeah.
- [81:36]
Sean Fennessy
How do you feel about homestate being the number one choice for toddler birthday parties for parents to eat?
- [81:43]
Chris Ryan
I'm good with it, I guess. What would the alternative be? Like Hot Wings.
- [81:48]
Sean Fennessy
That sounds bad.
- [81:48]
Chris Ryan
Yeah.
- [81:49]
Sean Fennessy
Okay, cool. Any other thoughts about horror? You feeling good about the genre?
- [81:55]
Chris Ryan
Yeah, I am.
- [81:56]
Sean Fennessy
I am I feeling really good.
- [81:57]
Chris Ryan
I think it's Like a pretty exciting time. And I think that the opening conversation that we had really speaks to some interesting places it could go.
- [82:04]
Sean Fennessy
Ciara, thanks as always. Let's go now to my conversation with Curry Barker. Very happy to have Curry Barker here for the first time. You're such a young man. You make me feel very old. Are people telling you that on this tour?
- [82:21]
Curry Barker
Yeah, kinda.
- [82:22]
Sean Fennessy
Okay. Yeah. How does that make you feel?
- [82:25]
Curry Barker
Like I am excited that I used to. I mean, even when I was like 21, I was like, oh, I'm getting older. I gotta. You know, there's always that clock ticking right. Where you just want to accomplish thing like as fast as, like, like Timothee Chalamet. Like, like I was. I remember being jealous of that kid when he was a little younger and just being like, oh, he's acting, he's already getting Oscars.
- [82:47]
Sean Fennessy
And you have that same pursuit of greatness that he talked about. That's, that's inside you.
- [82:51]
Curry Barker
I hope so.
- [82:53]
Sean Fennessy
Tell me a little bit about where you come from. There's not a lot of filmmakers that come out of Alabama. I'm curious, like what it was like growing up for you.
- [83:01]
Curry Barker
I mean, I grew up in a small town where if you want to act in film, you pretty much have to make it yourself. That's the only really opportunity that you have. And then there's local plays. I did a lot of local theater and stuff like that. But like I kind of learned pretty early on that if I wanted to act in film, I had to create it. And it was actually just means to an end because I've been wanting to be an actor since I was like 4 years old. That's what my mom tells me.
- [83:30]
Sean Fennessy
What spurred that? Do you remember? Did you see something? Did you watch a movie or go to a performance?
- [83:35]
Curry Barker
Harry Potter, probably.
- [83:36]
Sean Fennessy
Really? Yeah.
- [83:37]
Curry Barker
Like I was so obsessed with Harry Potter growing up and it's kind of like being transported to another world that couldn't possibly exist and wanting so bad. I became such a big pretender. I was such a big pretender as a kid. Sword fights, you know, with my brother outside in the woods. We had huge imaginations and we would just let them. Action figures were a big thing, right. Like Lego sets, building those and like playing and it felt really real. When you're a kid, you know, you really play the scenes out.
- [84:11]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah. Did you. How did you get a camera in your hand? Was it phones? Was it a video camera? Like what happened?
- [84:18]
Curry Barker
First camera was like this little red. I guess it was called a dslr.
- [84:23]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah.
- [84:23]
Curry Barker
Sure. Where it's got, like, the electric lens that comes out.
- [84:29]
Sean Fennessy
How did you get that? My dad. Okay.
- [84:30]
Curry Barker
Yeah.
- [84:31]
Sean Fennessy
And did he say, you should try to make something?
- [84:34]
Curry Barker
Yes. My dad was so encouraging. Like, there was a really. As a matter of fact, I give a lot of credit to my parents because I feel like if in a world where they were discouraging, I might have listened to them. You know, I might have been like, all right, I guess they're right. Like, this is silly. But they were always being like, do it again, do it again. And like, wow, this is so good. And even if it sucked, they really were encouraging.
- [85:03]
Sean Fennessy
How old were you when they put the DSLR in your hands?
- [85:05]
Curry Barker
I was probably, like, 10.
- [85:07]
Sean Fennessy
And so was the idea that since you'd wanted to be an actor and that you knew you'd have to make things for yourself, was it sort of like this will vault you out of Alabama? Was there any kind of mentality around that? Or was it just expressing yourself in a way that you felt happy about?
- [85:22]
Curry Barker
I mean, it. In a small town, there's always that we gotta get out of this town mentality that a lot of people like you. Like, people will DM me and say, you did it. You got out of here. Like, it's some sort of jail or something.
- [85:37]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [85:38]
Curry Barker
But no, I mean, I loved Mobile, but, yeah, I aspired to be what I had seen on the big screen and what I wanted to, but I never. It wasn't until later that I realized I've been directing for a while. You know, like, you learn about what is a director? What do they even do? What does that mean? Like, are they in charge of, like, the camera angles? You know what I mean? These are the questions you have as a little kid, but you don't. But I didn't realize that I was doing that and, like, being in charge of this production and kind of telling people what to do.
- [86:15]
Sean Fennessy
And do you remember the first time you saw a movie where you could kind of feel the director making choices or that there had been, like, something different about one movie from other movies?
- [86:24]
Curry Barker
That's a good question. Yeah, I'm sure, like, that bug of this is good versus this is bad had to start hitting me at some age because I think your opinion is the most important thing as a director.
- [86:40]
Sean Fennessy
What do you mean by that?
- [86:41]
Curry Barker
Well, like, it's not about. I have this strong vision for something. Me, me, me. It's more about, like, I know what I like and I know what I think is really good. I know what I want this movie to be. And then that kind of opens you up to other people, by the way. Right. Like, anyone could have an idea. The sound guy could have an idea. It's not about that idea came from the sound guy. So, no, it's about, is it a good idea or is it a bad idea? Some ideas are good and some ideas are bad, but what is a good idea? And, like, learning what your taste is.
- [87:21]
Sean Fennessy
When you were making things at a young age, were you making with friends? Were you doing it by yourself?
- [87:26]
Curry Barker
Friends? Yeah.
- [87:26]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah. And did you have that mentality back then, too? Were you guys collaborating or did you feel like I'm in charge of this thing?
- [87:32]
Curry Barker
I mean, I felt like I was running it, but only because I was the one who, like, cared the most. Like, I was the one that was gonna edit it. I was the one that was coming up with most of the ideas. So it was almost like it felt like mine in that way. But it was still a collaboration. Sure, yeah.
- [87:55]
Sean Fennessy
How much of this was about trying to actually materialize an acting career and how much of it became. What I actually want to do is be a filmmaker. So I'm curious about that as you stand right now, too.
- [88:06]
Curry Barker
Yeah, yeah. Like, I mean, it's a good question if it means anything. I moved out here to a college that was a filmmaking school, but it was. I was in the acting program, so I was really focused on the acting. But I'd already done a couple films and. And like, little short films that I really enjoyed, and I was already so into editing, like, so it was something that I knew I enjoyed quite a bit. But it was. Yeah, it was kind of all means to an end. Like, I moved out here to be an actor and then. But then I. I kept making films and I don't know, man, it took off. Like, as in, like, in my head, like, it took, but my passion for it took off.
- [88:55]
Sean Fennessy
So at the top of this episode, my colleague Chris and I talked about this undeniable YouTube transitional moment, especially for horror. Something has been happening for the last five or six years. You are a signal example of that happening. Can you just talk to me a little bit about when you first started posting to YouTube, what your intention was when you first started doing it? Was it a strategy that you had?
- [89:16]
Curry Barker
Yeah, it's interesting to be, like a face of this thing. Right.
- [89:22]
Sean Fennessy
I.
- [89:25]
Curry Barker
When I first started, I was actually in Alabama still, so we had a channel called Popcorn Culture. It was me, Cameron, Noah O'Reilly, my little brother Riley, and just we would make These funny videos. And it got to the point where, like, in drama class in high school, we would like to. Our teacher would, like, show the. The videos for the class sometimes, like, as part of the class, which was really. Yeah. Interesting. So, I mean, the YouTube thing was kind of go. I never, like, wanted to be a YouTuber because I just was so obsessed with film. But I wanted. I already knew the platform and the potential of, like, spreading the awareness. And then when I moved out here, I met Cooper, and then we started that's a bad idea. Which fun fact is popcorn culture. Like, we totally just, like, just changed the name. Subscribers from that.
- [90:19]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah.
- [90:19]
Curry Barker
And change the name.
- [90:20]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah. Happens in podcasting, too, for the record.
- [90:23]
Curry Barker
Oh, wow. I'm sure. But so we took. We made That's a bad idea. And we just. It wasn't like, oh, eventually we're gonna trick everybody and we're gonna make movies. You know, it wasn't. It was just, let's do a funny channel where we just do sketches, and eventually we'll do, like, a web series that has a little bit more story to it. And every now and then we'll make a horror short film or we'll make a short film that. That's a drama or something that will be. That will have the platform to throw on. There was no. I mean, I was still auditioning. I had an agent, and I was, like, out here, and I was trying so hard to break in, and we were doing film festivals and stuff, so I was still, like. I had. It felt very separate for me. It was the YouTube world where I started to get friends that were, like, in this world too. Right. And then there was, like, the. The world where I have my little agent and I'm trying to do these auditions. And so it did feel like separate worlds, and they, like, design it that way.
- [91:33]
Sean Fennessy
Well, did you. So I'm interested in how you design the actual work for YouTube. Because are you thinking about kind of what is successful, what tends to work historically, the length of pieces, the tone that you're pursuing versus, hey, here's like, kind of a reel for what a film might be if I were ever to pursue it. Because I look back at the. Some of the that's a bad idea stuff, which is really just good YouTube sketch comedy. And you can see a little bit of obsession in it, but it's, like a pretty far leap, right, to especially some of the most intense moments of the film. So I'm curious how you thought about making the YouTube videos.
- [92:07]
Curry Barker
I mean, I'm not like, a YouTube strategist. As a matter of fact, some people kind of treat me like I am. They'll be like, oh, what's your expertise? And I'm like, I don't know. I'm not the guy. Like, I.
- [92:22]
Sean Fennessy
You just made, like, successful stuff that people like to watch, so then they immediately think that you are that, right?
- [92:27]
Curry Barker
Yeah. But I didn't, like, check out the algorithm. Like, Cooper got into that a little bit more. And of course, like, there's a point in the YouTube world, which really started off as TikTok, by the way. Like, we really took off on TikTok. And in that world, you're chasing the views. You're like, oh, my God, this one got half a million views. That's so crazy. Then it becomes, this one got a million. And, like, you. You get that rush, and you're just chasing the next. Like, how can we get 10 million views? Can we get. And, you know, you hit those milestones. So you. In that journey, you figure out timing, you figure out the tricks of, like, how to get someone's attention in the first three seconds. Because you learn that, like, the first three seconds are the most important, and if. If they swipe away, you've lost them. Right. So you learn a little bit of that. But we always were like, no, screw. Like, I was actually so disappointed to even ever do vertical. Cause I was like, I'll never do vertical. I'm always gonna do horizontal. And the goal for us was always to make Key and Peele quality sketches that felt like they could be part of a movie or felt like they could be part of a TV show. So they had that high quality production value. We never wanted to shoot it on our phones. Like, we had rules for ourselves for the Very early on. We were like, we're doing something higher quality.
- [93:42]
Sean Fennessy
Why? Like, in an effort to eventually be doing something, like, in a feature film format.
- [93:47]
Curry Barker
I guess so. I guess so.
- [93:48]
Sean Fennessy
Okay.
- [93:49]
Curry Barker
But, like. Yeah, but more, we wanted people to be like, oh, this is not Internet content. On the Internet. You know? I guess so. Yeah. I guess you're onto something there.
- [94:03]
Sean Fennessy
Well, it's interesting because it is, though. Like, I watch the YouTube videos, which are very well made and very well edited, but they are YouTube sketch comedy videos. And they're definitely in a tradition of Key and Peele and SNL and the long history of sketch comedy on television, but they do have, like, a certain kind of editing vibe.
- [94:22]
Curry Barker
Totally.
- [94:22]
Sean Fennessy
And I don't want to say that obsession, like, transcends it, but it evolves it a lot. So, like, maybe you can tell me a little bit about milk and cereal. And, like, because you mentioned that you were thinking about trying a horror film on those same channels, and there is some. There's obviously some creative connective tissue between that film and the sketch comic videos. But, like, it is also different.
- [94:42]
Curry Barker
Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's true. There's a certain editing that you kind of do when you're doing those. Like, you get these instincts of, like, okay, we've lost. Which is really helpful in film because you're constantly thinking, like, you've lost me, but you have to think like that all the time. And so. But when I made milk and cereal, that's actually a funny story of how that came about. I was going through this world of trying to get my acting reel together. And so I had made a bunch of little scenes from what I was trying to trick people that I've. Look at me. I've been in all these different movies, but they weren't movies. There were little scenes I had written that looked like they could possibly be a part of an entire film. So I had a cowboy scene. I had, like, me being a bully at school, high school scene. And, like, at the bottom, it said, like, the name of it. Like, it was a movie with a new logo. And, like, I made a new logo for each film. And I did this. I wrote this one where I play a serial killer. And I'm, like, sitting on the chair and I'm, like, talking to her, and it's really disturbing. It's basically the scene in the movie. But I caught. For some reason, I called it milk and cereal. And I spelled cereal like that. And it just. That's all it was. It was just a scene that I'd written for my acting reel. And then I kept thinking, like, whoa, what an interesting concept. A guy that's using YouTube to get famous for being a serial killer. Like, whoa. And how messed up that could be. So I just started writing it and went down and what if it's a prank show? And what if the whole movie is a prank? And it just became like, oh, my God, how has this not been done? So I just started writing that. And then Cooper was out of town. I was like, as soon as you get back, we're shooting this movie, we're gonna get some friends together and we're gonna shoot this. So. But yeah, I mean, that kind of allowed it to be that YouTube choppy type of editing, because it kind of is that style, you know, it makes sense. Yeah, it makes sense for the plot.
- [96:46]
Sean Fennessy
It's so interesting, though, that you then. Did you get the. Like, come and do general meetings with us? What is Milk and Cereal? Like, did that open up doors in the way that you. Did you even think it would?
- [96:55]
Curry Barker
The chair did. Like, I hadn't released Milk and cereal yet, but the Chair was a short film that I did that, like, really put me on the map as, like, oh, this is a director. And that's how I found my manager, Aaron. Like, Aaron had been watching our Internet stuff for a while and then was already interested. And I was like. And I sent him the chair. And I was like, what about this? And then he was like, oh, shit. You know? And so that's when I started getting. Once I had a real manager, when I. That's when my life kind of changed, honestly. Like, I started getting generals with. And I was just like, oh, my God, I'm meeting with Platinum Dune, or, like, whatever, right? Like, I'm meeting with these companies. And then you kind of. And this was like, this is kind of my whole journey, right? Like, that was when I started getting that manager, was the start of something, because he is the one that found James Harris, or James Harris, I guess, reached out to my manager, Aaron, and was like, hey, I have this, like, program where I take, like, new up and coming filmmakers and give them, you know, a very, very small budget to do something, and I'd love to do a feature version of the chair. And I was like, oh, my gosh. Like, this is amazing, but can we do. I have this idea. It's called Obsession. Can we do that instead? Let me pitch it to you. So I pitched him Obsession, and he liked it enough to let me go. And he's like, all right, go write it. We'll see. And so I was just start working on the script and just. Just working and working. And really, like, I remember the drive back then. It's like, oh, you know, like, this is my one chance. So, like, that all happened because I got the manager and it's just like, it.
- [98:50]
Sean Fennessy
That's so funny that you frame it that way, too, because it indicates that it's not always just about how creative you are, even the work that you've done up until that point. It's about often meeting a person who can put you in a room. Probably that allows you to break down a door, right?
- [99:03]
Curry Barker
Yeah, probably. I mean, I know for sure that that was the moment for me that I started to feel like I was in the industry when you're meeting people in the industry, and my Friends kind of knew it around me too. And then Cooper got a manager, and then Cooper also started going on generals. And you're like, whoa. We're kind of like, is this happening? Is this really breaking in?
- [99:24]
Sean Fennessy
That's so exciting.
- [99:24]
Curry Barker
Yeah.
- [99:25]
Sean Fennessy
So would you think of yourself, or did you and Cooper think of yourselves as like, hardcore horror fans or scholars or, like, was it your favorite genre?
- [99:34]
Curry Barker
It was mine.
- [99:34]
Sean Fennessy
It was. Tell me about, like, your interest in it and your history with it.
- [99:39]
Curry Barker
I watched. Even as a little kid, I watched Goosebumps. It's like all I was allowed to watch. Right. Because my mom was super, like, she's the most chill mom ever, but for some reason she was really strict about horror. But I think it was mostly because she was nervous that I was gonna get scared and have to sleep in her room or something, which it did happen. Like, I'd get nervous, scared.
- [99:59]
Sean Fennessy
And do you think that stoked your interest in it, though, that she was keeping it from you?
- [100:02]
Curry Barker
Yeah, like, it's like kind of that forbidden fruit.
- [100:04]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah.
- [100:04]
Curry Barker
And it was like that for a while and I would. I remember, like, sneaking downstairs one night and the adults were watching the Ring, and I, like, snuck behind the couch and watched a little bit of it, and I was terrified. I was, like, regretting it because then I couldn't tell my mom that I snuck down, so I was scared, you know.
- [100:29]
Sean Fennessy
You couldn't tell her you were scared that you saw the Ring, which is also weirdly, kind of the plot of the movie, interestingly.
- [100:36]
Curry Barker
Oh, yeah, exactly, exactly. You shouldn't watch it. But the first movie she allowed me to watch, it was a certain Halloween. I think I was 10 or 11. And I was like, mom, come on, it's Halloween. Can I pick out one horror movie to watch? And I picked out Texas Chainsaw, the 2003.
- [100:55]
Sean Fennessy
Okay.
- [100:58]
Curry Barker
And.
- [100:59]
Sean Fennessy
And that was like, Nispole version. Is he the one who did that one?
- [101:01]
Curry Barker
It was. I don't know. I know it was.
- [101:04]
Sean Fennessy
It's Platinum Dunes, right?
- [101:05]
Curry Barker
Yeah, yeah, yeah. The. It's the one where, like. Have you seen them all? I don't know.
- [101:13]
Sean Fennessy
I have.
- [101:13]
Curry Barker
Yeah. You know the one where. Where this girl just gets popped in the. In the head in the first, like 10 minutes. Which, by the way, not okay for a 10 year old.
- [101:21]
Sean Fennessy
Like, I was pretty intense.
- [101:22]
Curry Barker
It was intense.
- [101:23]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah. This is what makes you fall in love with this stuff, though. I have the same experience with horror. I'm obsessed with horror movies, and it's because I saw them very young and they get in your bloodstream yeah, right, right.
- [101:33]
Curry Barker
Because now you're like, I need to feel that again. That disturbance that I felt at 10.
- [101:37]
Sean Fennessy
That's exactly. How do I go back to that feeling, which is so rare to experience.
- [101:42]
Curry Barker
Totally. Yeah. But the science of it apparently is that there's something called being safe. Scared, which is where you're scared, but you're in the safety of your own home. And there's an adrenaline that you get from it, but you know that you're never gonna be in danger. Actual danger.
- [101:58]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah. So it's like, I mean, I totally buy into that. I found with Obsession that you did do this. And I'm like a pretty tough critic about horror movies. And there are. There's a lot of really impressive formal stuff. A lot of it is in the way that you clearly. How you directed Indy and how you filmed her. And I just, I think I want to hear a little bit about coming up with the story and then that character and then getting that performance out of her. Because the movie really lives and dies on that, I think.
- [102:31]
Curry Barker
Yeah, yeah, totally. And I knew that from the start. Well, it's funny cause the chair was kind of an inspiration to this movie in a way. I did this thing. I don't know if you've seen the chair.
- [102:43]
Sean Fennessy
I have.
- [102:44]
Curry Barker
Well, the girl, I don't even. Julie, I think her name is. I don't even know her name or the character's name, but the girl in that like does this thing where she like snaps into different emotions and stuff like that. And I already kind of had this idea for a while in my notes of like an obsession movie about a boy and a girl that were just both obsessed with each other. And it didn't really go anywhere because there's no conflict. Like their story is rooted in some sort of conflict. It's like, oh, they live happily ever after. So, but, but like I was intrigued by this idea of like, what if there was a movie where the scary girl from the chair, that was the whole thing. Like, what if there was a movie where I could really lean into that? And so once I got the wish fulfillment of it, I was like, oh my God. A girl who's like not trapped in her, she's trapped in her own body. And that's the movie. Like, that's awesome. And I can really play with that. So I was trying to play to my strong suits of like what I had just done with the chair. What was your question though?
- [103:53]
Sean Fennessy
No, just. And then how you're able to get a performance like that out of that Character. Because, you know, if you overplay that, it's a little bit. It could seem silly.
- [104:03]
Curry Barker
Yeah, exactly.
- [104:04]
Sean Fennessy
How do you create this idea of, like, a person who is simultaneously tortured and torturing. And you mentioned in the chair, like, that snap of emotions, like, the way that her character elevates very quickly to a very unsafe place where you feel like something really terrible could happen to Bear that she doesn't even really understand is happening. I don't. It was a very unique sensation watching the movie. I felt like it was a real invention on your part.
- [104:29]
Curry Barker
Thanks, man. Yeah, I'm, like, really critical, and I think that I. Like, I know I was kind of saying this earlier, but, like, I think the most important thing you can do as a filmmaker is having an opinion. And when you watch a movie, you should be very critical, but not for the sake of, like, that was a bad movie. You needed to be able to dissect it. Like, why was this bad? What didn't work for you? What could you have done better? Constantly thinking about. And so, you know, when I see those moments in horror movies that make me, like, roll my eyes or make me like, oh, that was cheesy, or whatever, I just try not to do that stuff.
- [105:10]
Sean Fennessy
Right. It's easier said than done. I know. Totally. Totally.
- [105:15]
Curry Barker
But, like. And exactly that's. I strive to do it. You can only try to do what you set out to do. But for me, the thing that kind of makes me roll my eyes is, like, the demon aspect of. Or not having a motive for, like, why. Why are you doing it? You know? So if she, you know, this movie could have easily just been like, she becomes possessed and she goes on a killing spree because everyone's a threat to take away my bear. Right. And that would just be like, okay, but why? Like, really? So instead, I wanted to lean into. She will do anything to keep Bear, and if nothing goes wrong, she won't do anything.
- [105:59]
Sean Fennessy
Right.
- [106:00]
Curry Barker
Like, she's. She. There's a world where this worked out for Bear, and he just had a super clingy girlfriend. Right. But it didn't work out that way.
- [106:10]
Sean Fennessy
Well. So I'm wondering if you think about the movie in this way. Cause there's an easy way to read it, too, that it is not just, like, a judgment of Bear, but a judgment of an entire male mentality around what you think happiness is, what you think a healthy relationship is. People's inability to communicate what they really want.
- [106:25]
Curry Barker
Totally.
- [106:26]
Sean Fennessy
Which is a real challenge for, I think, a lot of guys. Was it important for you for the movie to have that kind of social weight? Or is that just the natural byproduct of a cool idea you had about a girl who's becoming possessed?
- [106:38]
Curry Barker
I mean, it's all things I get excited about after I've had the idea, like, seeing the potential of. Of how deep and how many questions you can make someone ask after you have this idea, you're like, oh, my God. And then you could lean into this, and you could lean into that. But it's not like I. It wasn't important to me from the get. What was important to me is to be relatable in some sort of aspect of, like, the movies I look up to. Like, for example, in Midsummer. So relatable when you see Dani, I think her name is, and them and the boyfriend, like, fighting, and you're like, oh, my God, this feels so, like, real.
- [107:21]
Sean Fennessy
You know?
- [107:22]
Curry Barker
That to me was like, I wanted that to feel real. And I wanted. But, yeah, I mean, mostly for indie neveretti, it was kind of always saying, like, okay, so there's magic in this world, fine, whatever. But the magic is that it is just that it worked. So let's forget that it's magic. And right now, I just want you to play crazy jealous girlfriend. I don't want you to play possessed demon. So with that comes a lot of, like, whininess and, like, desperation. And, like, that's what we were always striving for. Instead of, like, this, I'm a robot. I'm gonna kill you. I'm a demon. I'm angry all the time.
- [108:03]
Sean Fennessy
I know, but that's such a. It's such a great insight because I'm sorry to explain to you what you're probably already thinking, but it's okay. One of the reasons why I think a lot of men are afraid to get into relationships is because they fear having that dynamic where, all right, even if you've convinced a person to be with you, who you want to be with, if things don't go right, then you get this shrewish, difficult series of emotional conversations that you don't want to have to deal with. But then also the idea that her character is so vulnerable and trapped and stuck because of this guy's own insecurities is this fascinating push, pull in the dynamic. The other thing, too, is I read that you saw the Simpsons episode and that you had the kind of monkey's paw idea for the movie, in part inspired by that, which is so interesting to me as somebody who's a little older than you, because the monkey's Paw is a 115-year-old short story. There have been a lot of movies that have explored aspects of that story before. Yeah, I couldn't think of any, really, that had it in this relationship dynamic.
- [109:01]
Curry Barker
Yeah. I mean, even if there was, they never tapped into, like, the potential of, like, how messed up and how far you could go with, like, forcing someone to love you. That's such a. Like, that concept was untapped, really. I know people say, like, this feels like something that's been done before, but, like, not really.
- [109:23]
Sean Fennessy
I was trying to think of a movie. I mean, the idea I think of someone sitting in their car and wishing someone would love them is, as you said, incredibly relatable. That's something that a lot of people experience, especially when you're in high school or college. But the dark downside is really impressive. Also, I'm curious what it was like to just have more money and working with a bigger crew. And even though it was still an indie, I felt like you really leveled up stylistically in ways that I really appreciated.
- [109:53]
Curry Barker
Yeah, I mean, like, it hasn't been. People don't really know or realize how cheap this movie actually was. Like, under a million is like, an understatement, really. You know, I feel like we had nothing, but at the same time. Well, it was so amazing. Like, let me start by saying, holy shit, did I have more tools than I've ever had? Like that. And it was life changing for me. And I mean, even just the aspect of having a schedule, Monday through Friday, 12 hour days every day of the week, and then for 20 days and just showing up and doing your job, and everyone knows that we're making a movie. I've never had that before. So I've got nothing to complain about as far as, for me, being life changing. Right. But there were some challenges because it's almost like there's some things, like every time I make a movie, I realize that you can do things, but you just have to do them the illegal way or you have to do them the wrong way. Like, there's so many. Like, even just for this last movie I shot, even just shooting a scene in the car going down the road. Now we have police escorts, we're on this big trailer. If it was me back in the day, I would just be in the car shooting. Right. So there's these hula hoops you have to jump through with more money. So sometimes more money hurts you in aspects that I'm learning.
- [111:39]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah. Maybe when you come back in the future, we can talk about how things have changed from when you were making movies for less than a million dollars. Because it seems like that's not gonna be the case much longer.
- [111:47]
Curry Barker
Oh, that'll be great. A follow up of like.
- [111:49]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah, yeah. Well, whether it's better or not, I'm sure making more money will be better. But also the constraints of working inside of systems like, this is, you know, this was a true indie and then it got acquired out of a festival. What was that experience like?
- [112:04]
Curry Barker
I mean, dude, we didn't know
- [112:08]
Chris Ryan
where
- [112:09]
Curry Barker
this movie was gonna end up. We really, like, we're on set, we're making this thing, and there's no guarantee of anything. There's. And you're trying as the director and as like the person that everyone looks at, you're trying to convince everyone this is gonna be huge. And this is like Indy. This is gonna be big for you. Like, just listen to me. Right? Or Michael. Like, whatever. Like, you gotta, you know. And people did. Like, everyone showed up because of that kind of mentality. And Taylor Clemens, my dp, really helped rally his team. Right. The camera team. And like this, we're onto something here. Right. But there was no guarantee. I mean, we kind of thought once, once I was in the editing bay for a while, I was like, this movie sucks. Like, I was like this, which I do with every one of my films. I think they suck. And then I go through phases where I. But even just getting into TIFF was a huge deal for us. Like, we went to dinner, we celebrated. We're in the Toronto International Film Fellow. This is huge. And the news just kept getting better. We were at the. We're in the Midnight Madness section. We've got the Friday slot. I think it was, you know, we're on the biggest screen or whatever. And it just became like, this is. Not only is this at tiff, but like, they're advocating for this movie.
- [113:30]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah.
- [113:31]
Curry Barker
It's like they're almost advertising it.
- [113:33]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah.
- [113:33]
Curry Barker
And it was like, what? You know, same slot that the substance had, which, like, won a bunch of Oscars. So it just became no way. You know what I mean? And then that night, you know, finally made it to the night, had a stylist for the first time. I'm getting like a very expensive watch that is not mine that I'm wearing, you know. Yeah. And like, felt surreal. And you watch it, but, like, everybody's been building up that the Midnight Madness audience is the best audience in the world. And so when you're told that it's like, well, great. So then they're just a bunch of, like, then what does that mean for me?
- [114:19]
Chris Ryan
You know what I mean?
- [114:19]
Sean Fennessy
They would have liked anything.
- [114:20]
Curry Barker
Yeah, right, Right. So, yes, I knew that, like, the performed. Well, in the theater, the reactions were great, but, like, I just said, I was kind of like, I had no idea of, like. I had no frame of reference of, like, was that a good thing? Or was that just, like, whatever? And so it did feel good to watch the screening, but still nothing. Then the next morning, I wake up, and I have, like, missed calls from my agent and my manager, text messages. I'm like, what's going on? And I finally get on the phone with somebody, and they're like, bidding war. Neon a 24 Focus. I'm like, no, like, I mean, my life was changing before my eyes. It was one of those things you read about, and you're like. Like the Filippo Brothers. And you're like. And you're like, I can't believe this is happening. You know? And it just. It was. And then you go to like, this just happened. I know.
- [115:20]
Sean Fennessy
Four or five years.
- [115:21]
Curry Barker
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just happened. And I've shot a movie since then.
- [115:26]
Sean Fennessy
Right. I was gonna ask you about that next, actually, before I ask you about that. You're starring in the next movie. Yeah. And I was wondering if there was a moment when you were thinking about starring in Obsession or if that ever came up. Because we were talking, Chris and I were talking about your acting style and the presence that you have, and if Obsession might have been. How it would have been different.
- [115:47]
Curry Barker
Yeah, totally.
- [115:47]
Sean Fennessy
If you thought about doing that, they
- [115:49]
Curry Barker
would have let me. It was a conversation where James Harris was the producer. He said if I wanted to play Bear, I could. But at the time, I had done milk and cereal warnings in the chair. Two movies that I was in and one movie that I wasn't. And I felt like my best friend work was the chair. And I was kind of like, man, it felt really good to, like, relax and not be. Not try to, like, put on so many hats. And this felt like a really big opportunity for me as a director for the first. And I wrote it like, this was my baby. Like, I wanted what was best for the project more than anybody.
- [116:28]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah.
- [116:29]
Curry Barker
And so it's not like I felt like I couldn't do it. As a matter of fact, I may even admit that when I wrote Bear, I kind of wrote him in my voice of, like, I could totally play this character, but I didn't want to. At the end of the day, I was like, no, this is my Opportunity to show the world that I'm a director.
- [116:47]
Sean Fennessy
I think it was a smart choice.
- [116:49]
Curry Barker
Thank you.
- [116:49]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah. I think you got a good performance out of Michael. Obviously.
- [116:52]
Curry Barker
He's great. He's so good.
- [116:53]
Sean Fennessy
But it kind of shifts the dynamic of what even just to expect from you. From somebody like me, too, where I'm not sure if there's ever been a horror auteur who cast himself in films. Have you thought about that? Exactly.
- [117:06]
Curry Barker
That's why I think I was thinking about my heroes, like, the people I look up to. And it's like, all of my favorite directors and filmmakers I look up to, they don't star in their movies.
- [117:16]
Sean Fennessy
Jordan Peele could be in one of those movies.
- [117:18]
Curry Barker
So good.
- [117:19]
Sean Fennessy
But so then when you're making this new movie, how do you think about what you've learned from making the first one, but then still being able to give a good performance and make the movie make sense?
- [117:25]
Curry Barker
Well, the thing is, Obsession was the Curry Barker movie, right? Like, it was my thing, and it was my baby. Anything but Ghost is a film idea that me and Cooper had for a long time. That's a buddy comedy where we were always supposed to star in it. So it was one of those things where it was like, no, no, no. This is the movie where we put on those. We are Cooper and Curry. Like, the people on YouTube. Like, we are those two. And we were ghost hunters. And everything goes horribly wrong. So it was like, I have to. I have to play this character. And there was a time where when things started getting really real, I didn't tell anybody this. Cause I knew that the moment I put it out there, it might become bigger and bigger. I was scared, right? But there was a time where I was like, maybe Will Poulter could play my part, or someone that's awesome could play me. And then Cooper can still play Cooper's part and whatever, but maybe we bring in someone like Will Poulter. That's funny. But no, I was like, screw that. I'm gonna do this. And it's one of my favorite things I ever did. He's very different than, like, the Internet that I play. I mean, milk and cereal. You got to see me play a more kind of serious role. And then on YouTube, I play, like, really silly, right? This was, like, kind of in between.
- [118:54]
Sean Fennessy
Okay.
- [118:54]
Curry Barker
Kind of an awkward guy, but also kind of an asshole in the way of, like, there's just a. There's like. It's like, he doesn't compute, that he's being so selfish that. And it was so fun to play that because there's an innocence to his selfishness. That was really fun to, like, play with. Like, he. He says these words that are so rude, but he says them in a way that he's like. Like. Right. Like, everyone doesn't understand that. Do you realize what you just said and how messed up that is? So it was really fun to play that, and I didn't want to give that away, and I don't think it hurt the movie at all. But it was a challenge. I'm not gonna say it wasn't a challenge. Yeah, crazy challenge.
- [119:40]
Sean Fennessy
You think you'll keep acting in your films?
- [119:42]
Curry Barker
Yeah. Yeah. But not forcefully. Never forcefully. Like, I'm not gonna force myself into Texas Chainsaw or write myself apart. Right. Like, but then again, me and Cooper wrote that movie together as kind of. It just. It feels different when you're like, no, I'm gonna play, you know.
- [120:04]
Sean Fennessy
Right. In the voice of your partnership.
- [120:06]
Curry Barker
Yeah, exactly.
- [120:08]
Sean Fennessy
I have to ask you about Texas Chainsaw. When you came in, you seemed a little concerned about how you've been communicating. It's a big burden to be taking on something like this. We were talking about how this is three consecutive originals that you've made, and now this is something. Horror has this long tradition of remakes, reboots, reimaginings.
- [120:28]
Curry Barker
Yeah, totally.
- [120:30]
Sean Fennessy
What can you tell me about it?
- [120:31]
Curry Barker
I mean, I haven't. Here's the thing. I guess the reason I'm kind of saying I'm going to start keeping my mouth shut is because I haven't even started writing this thing. I haven't even. I've got a bunch of ideas in my phone. Really excited about it. Here's how I know I'm excited is because anytime I have a bunch of ideas all the time, that's just what a filmmaker does. They have a bunch of ideas. But you know when an idea has kind of taken over, like, oh, I might have an idea about this. Haunted this, or I might have an idea about a killer this. Right. But then when you have that one idea that's like, oh, my God, you keep going back to that note section and adding things. That's what's happening to me right now with Texas Chainsaw. So, like, I know that. I'm so excited about this.
- [121:23]
Sean Fennessy
It's such a challenging text to reboot, though. Like, I've watched everyone like you said, and I'm interested in them, but very few non Tobe Hooper movies click for me in this strain. Like, they're really. I love two as well, and Two is actually weirdly very. In your tone of, like, blending horror and comedy in a very, like, outsized way. That is a lot of fun. But this is a hard world because the first movie is. It's not just that it's so iconic, but that it is doing something so singular. So I don't know. That doesn't psych you out at all, huh?
- [121:57]
Curry Barker
Well, I mean, it is now because people. Because of the.
- [122:00]
Sean Fennessy
As people are saying that too, the
- [122:01]
Curry Barker
world of reading the comments and putting yourself out there, and then people kind of. People will just get personal with you. They'll be like, you have a punchable face that doesn't even have anything to do with the movie. And these are people.
- [122:18]
Sean Fennessy
You've been online for a while, though.
- [122:19]
Curry Barker
I know, but I'm not used to. Most of the time it's either, look, you like my stuff or you don't like my stuff. And it's kind of like, whatever. But now I'm touching something that's very dear to someone, and I'm kind of like the target. Like, there's a target on me.
- [122:37]
Sean Fennessy
You're gonna have to put a flak jacket on and try to find a way to ignore it, because I don't think you can really consume all that when you're doing something like this. I'm excited about it.
- [122:44]
Curry Barker
Yeah. And to me, I watch those movies and see, there's really only one or two of the. See, I can't. I'm like. I've been scarred now, but, like, there's. There's. There's a lot of material out there, but only a little bit that's, like, worth being explored. And then the rest of it's not really canon. I mean, even the name Wyatt, like, the name Sawyer is not even, like, consistent. Like, the 2003, they changed it to, like, I think Wyatt's or something. The Wyatt family or something. I mean, I'm gonna use Sawyer. That's gonna be. That's easy, right? But, like. But it's just. There's not really a consistent canon with Texas Chainsaw. It's kind of like an open book.
- [123:35]
Sean Fennessy
It's very true. We did an episode of this show, I think I wanna say, back in 2022 when there was a Netflix remake or reimagining of the movie, and we were kind of, like, trying to piece together if there's any coherent lore. And one of the things that Chris and I were saying in this episode was one of the great things about obsession is you could have spent a lot of time on Lore exploring the character's trauma, gone back and kind of, like, psychologize all this stuff. And you dispensed with all of that, and it makes the movie so much stronger to not get hung up on that. So I'll just encourage you. Just please keep doing that.
- [124:06]
Curry Barker
Well, I think the key is, like, to live in a world where that lore feels like it exists. That's the key.
- [124:12]
Sean Fennessy
Because it doesn't have to be explained by a person.
- [124:15]
Curry Barker
The key is to have, like, the one wish. Willow should feel like there's so much story behind it, but never go into it. And that way you feel like a world that's lived in instead of living in a world that just is very empty. And, like, the characters don't feel lived in. And so it's about not over explaining, oh, like, this friend group clearly has been together for a while. One has an opinion about this person, this person. But never being like, I've got an opinion about you.
- [124:46]
Sean Fennessy
Totally. Don't lose that, please. That's very insightful. And I think about that all the time. When watching a movie and I hear a character dig into five consecutive lines of dialogue that explains the entire premise of the movie.
- [124:57]
Curry Barker
Do you see me just roll my eyes? I know what makes me roll my eyes. And I try.
- [125:01]
Sean Fennessy
I find it's that it's filmmakers or studios or whoever is working on the film that is, like, the audience isn't smart enough. And the audience is smart enough. That's the thing.
- [125:08]
Curry Barker
And that's what YouTube taught me, like, the common, the chair, all these things. I would always throw in these little things and be like, nobody's gonna notice. And they always notice. And it kind of unlocks your brain of, like, people aren't just smart, they're really smart. And that allowed me to always treat my audience like. And you know what? It also allows me to not care. Like, oh, well, what if half of the people don't get it? I don't care. You know what I mean? I almost don't care if half the people don't get it, because the person next to them that does get it might explain it to them, and then it just becomes better. Right.
- [125:46]
Sean Fennessy
It's a very healthy mindset you have. Thank you, Curry. We end every episode of the show by asking filmmakers what's the last great thing they've seen. Also, people often say when they start making movies, it's harder for them to watch movies. Have you found that?
- [125:59]
Curry Barker
Yeah.
- [125:59]
Sean Fennessy
Yeah.
- [125:59]
Curry Barker
I mean, well, I try really hard to allow myself to sit back and watch it for a story. But I'm always just studying the cinematography, the acting, the, like, the coverage, even the music. So of course it's harder to accept it as a story and not as like a technical piece of what becomes art. Right.
- [126:23]
Sean Fennessy
So have you seen anything recently that has taken you away and not gotten you focused on fixating on those things?
- [126:30]
Curry Barker
Yes, I watched. Well, I mean, weapons was kind of a long time ago, but I loved that movie.
- [126:38]
Sean Fennessy
It's amazing.
- [126:39]
Curry Barker
Yeah. And Aunt Gladys is great and just unsettling and kind of like everything I'm fighting for. Like, Aunt Glad I was like, dang, that's awesome. You know what I mean? I was kind of like, yeah. And me and Zach are friends. I wouldn't say. I mean, we've only ever talked on the phone. We've never met in person, but he's awesome. Resident Evil looks nuts.
- [127:04]
Sean Fennessy
I know. We're really excited. We were talking about it in this episode too. And you guys have something in common, right? Obviously your backgrounds, the kind of tone where you'd think that these movies would be a little bit funnier based on your backgrounds. And yet there's something really funny about how severe they are that only the real ones really understand. I mean, I really love Zach's movies and have had him on a couple times, but yeah, work in that tradition. That's a good one to go in.
- [127:32]
Curry Barker
Yeah. I mean, there's this, like, fine line between the comedy I do online and the comedy that I allow myself to put in these types of movies. And the difference is, like, when I'm doing comedy online, it's a three minute video. So, like, the stakes and the danger for these characters don't matter because maybe they are going to jail. But, like, you're not gonna see that. Cause the video's over.
- [127:58]
Sean Fennessy
Right, Right.
- [127:59]
Curry Barker
But like, when you're making a movie, the consequences should feel real and the danger should feel real. And the moment that you do something that feels like that's not true anymore, you've lost me at least as an audience member. Right. So be as funny as you want and have as much as many jokes as you want, but never at the expense of, like, losing the consequences or the danger of the world.
- [128:25]
Sean Fennessy
Right.
- [128:25]
Curry Barker
Or like, if it's two ghost hunters that are conning people, don't be so silly that like, that you'd have to be dumb not to see that. You know what I mean? Then you're like, oh, that's so silly. They would have known that that wasn't real. You know what I mean?
- [128:40]
Sean Fennessy
It's a great insight. Keep credibility in mind at all times when you're watching something. Curry, congrats. Thanks for doing the show.
- [128:46]
Curry Barker
Thank you so much. It's been a pleasure.
- [128:53]
Sean Fennessy
Thanks to Curry. Thanks to CR thanks to Jack Sanders for his production work on this episode. Thanks to Lucas Kavanaugh for his support. Next week we'll be drafting again. CR will be there. What year are we doing?
- [129:03]
Chris Ryan
76.
- [129:04]
Sean Fennessy
1976. We'll see you then, Sam.