Happy Hour Flix | HHF
HAPPY HOUR FLIX is a podcast all about the movies you love and love to talk about and hosted by Matt Mundy and Steven Pierce featuring a special guest in each episode. A nostalgic look at what you grew up watching and how they still impact us today.
As always, we invite you to grab a beverage and enjoy the stories, and reminisce with us.
Happy Hour Flix | HHF
FrightFest, London Special Release | The Craft | with guests Jenn Wexler & Heather Buckley
To celebrate "The Dark Heart of Cinema" we are excited to bring you very special "FrightFest 2023 HAPPY HOUR FLIX" episode - as filmmakers from the horror movies HERD and The Sacrifice Game, both showcasing at FrightFest, London THIS WEEK, took a little time to get together and talk about one of their favorite 90's horror films, THE CRAFT.
And if you're in London this week, be sure to look for us all week!!
HAPPY HOUR FLIX is a podcast all about the movies you love and love to talk about. A nostalgic look at what we grew up watching and how they still impact us today.
Today our hosts Steven Pierce and Matt Mundy dive into the nostalgia of the 1996 film THE CRAFT - arguably the iconic film of the 90's... that's right, along side Scream, Pulp Fiction...you name it. Our special guests today, duo director Jenn Wexler and producer Heather Buckley (The Ranger, The Sacrifice Game), hold nothing back and make a convincing case for why this movie about four high school outcasts just might be THE most iconic film of the decade.
And to help us jump into the fun, from our friends over at MISGUIDED SPIRITS, head bartender IZZY at Milady's in Soho summoned the four winds for a heck of a cocktail, "Relax, It's Only Magic" -
to mix it up with us:
1.5 oz MISGUIDED red sky rum
.25 oz smith and cross
.75 oz watermelon Berbere syrup
.75 oz fresh lime juice
Now, shake/double strain into coupe glass/garnish lil watermelon wedge
Hey all, a quick reminder, no matter where you are listening to us, if you could rate us and drop us a review on Apple Podcasts, we’d be so grateful - it really helps us spread the good vibes. Thank you!
HAPPY HOUR FLIX is produced by James Allerdyce and Lori Kay, and hosted by Steven Pierce and Matt Mundy.
Main Title is by Johnny Mineo.
Happy Hour Flix | Movies You Love
Hey, today we have a very exciting episode of HHF In honor of in case you didn't know, this week is Fright Fest London, which is any big horror festival right in the heart of Leicester Square in London, and we happen to have a film premiering there. It's called Herd. You can check out more about it at herdfilm. So we figured, in honor of this big festival and this awesome event, why not bring alongside some other filmmakers, in this case Jen Wexler and Heather Buckley, who made the film Sacrifice Game, also doing the festival run at Fright Fest in London? So today we're talking about a much older horror film, one we definitely all love. So light a candle, kick back. We hope you enjoy the Craft as much as we do.
Speaker 2:It's a movie that begs the question would Nancy be in Slytherin or Hufflepuff? It's the Craft. It's 1996, you've got some popular movies out there Mission Impossible, twister, scream, fargo, from Dust Till Dawn, matilda, Independence Day, a Time to Kill Trainspotting, happy Gilmore, jerry Maguire that thing you do, I mean, come on, the cable guy and swingers. But today we're here specifically to talk about the Craft. I am here, as always, with my co-host, mr Stephen Pierce.
Speaker 1:Holy shit. Okay, so I tasted the cocktail from today. Oh, so we're just skipping ahead. I'm derailing this whole thing.
Speaker 2:You are the earth, to my wind and always on fire, sir.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so let's jump ahead. Yeah, I think I mean, well, let's get, we get to it in a second. I just I couldn't even. I couldn't even like I tasted it while the music was playing and I was trying to not talk over it, because then we have to redo shit.
Speaker 2:No, but you did do a very kind thing, which I appreciate. So since we're audio, only people don't know that you took care of me and adjusted my mic mid-intro.
Speaker 1:I like to you know support you in every way I can.
Speaker 2:I feel very supportive.
Speaker 1:Until we get to the content, and then I say fuck that guy.
Speaker 2:I'm gonna skip straight to the cocktail.
Speaker 1:I'm jumping ahead. No, okay, yeah, no, it was honestly. I have to thank the guests today. Yes, for bringing this film, because I'd seen this film probably the late nineties, but I've not checked it out since.
Speaker 2:Just hadn't really been on the radar.
Speaker 1:But I mentioned it. Yeah, lori, you just chill out. Yeah, I know you're exasperated, but yes, I haven't seen it in a while. And I mentioned it to my wife who's like, you know, like corn feta, corn feta, little annoying girl and she was like oh yeah, we're going to do the movie the craft. I haven't seen her. She's like the craft. I've never seen it. But this like formed so many of my friends' lives. So this is the first movie we've done where she was like I want to watch it with you.
Speaker 3:Oh, nice, usually you know, whenever we're doing other stuff.
Speaker 2:She's like no, you just go ahead and watch that one.
Speaker 1:I'll watch Angels in the Outfield, this one she specifically asked to do. So I have to thank our guests. Yes, today we are joined by Jen Wexler, director extraordinaire and producer extraordinaire Heather.
Speaker 2:Buckley, that's right, we're going to be doing.
Speaker 1:Punk Darkness today, exactly so. Thank you guys very much for joining us.
Speaker 4:Thanks for having us.
Speaker 3:I'm very excited to talk about the most important movie of the 90s. There it is.
Speaker 1:So I think we figured out who picked this movie, like just by conviction. Is it your movie, Heather?
Speaker 3:No, it is our movie.
Speaker 1:It's ours, it is our movie.
Speaker 4:But I'll tell you why I suggested it was only a few days before Heather and I were in a conversation with some of our producers on our movie, the Sacrifice Game, about what is the most iconic movie of the 90s, and we all had different answers. But in that conversation, heather brought up the craft and I was like, oh man, yes, the craft, I agree with that. And then, coincidentally, you were like what movie do you want to do that you're nostalgic for? And that was on my mind. So I said, oh, I know Heather will be excited for this and I am too. Let's do the craft.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, they brought up nonsense answers like Pulp Fiction and things like that and it's like now it's the craft I love it. Because you have to talk about the quintessential quality of like. Is this the 90s? And sure Pulp Fiction is like the independent spirit of the 90s, but the craft is the 90s.
Speaker 1:The first thing watching I was like this is the most 90s intro of any intro to any film I've ever seen and everything just the font alone the clothes they wear, like you can. This is back in the day where you can not only like you know, it doesn't you can smell the clothes through the camera.
Speaker 3:You know what.
Speaker 1:I mean it's like a pack of showering that's happening in the 90s.
Speaker 3:And how does Nancy look so perfect? Nancy looks perfect and it's also well, we'll get into it. Authentic gear Authentic gear.
Speaker 1:Well, I also get into it when she was wearing a wig the whole time.
Speaker 3:What?
Speaker 1:Yes, I didn't know that she did yeah, so she just come off of.
Speaker 2:Oh, robin did right.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, oh, robin, empire Records. Yeah, sorry, not Nancy, not Nancy, yeah, okay, so Robin had just done Empire Records and her hair wasn't grown in yet, and so she was wearing a wig.
Speaker 4:I did not know that, but it makes me feel funny.
Speaker 1:She wanted to do a bald, but the studio wouldn't let her. No, and then Andy said we'll just glamour. So let's get into the cocktail Matt All right.
Speaker 2:So we do have a phenomenal drink today, that's brought.
Speaker 1:It is mad. Good, you guys want to make this one?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're already in, and this is brought as always by our friends at Misguided Spirits, and today was mixed down at Malaides, which is in Soho.
Speaker 1:It's in Soho, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it's 160, so Prince Street. And then it was voted in the top 50 bars in North America this year, which is 2023, and recently nominated for best new US cocktail bar at Tales of the Cocktail and this is famous Tales of the Cocktail.
Speaker 2:Yes, famous and this was specifically made by their head bartender, Izzy, who is just awesome and she's from Jersey but is got away from the family and is now in Red Hook so far away with her dog and cat, Kona and Big Wave, which I just absolutely love, and I guess he probably has a parakeet 4.4 ABV. But you can find her on Instagram at Izzy, underscore C's. That's Izz y underscore S E E S and of course, that'll be in the show notes. But the drink itself.
Speaker 1:All right, so this one is good, guys. It looks like a tropical fruit, you said that like she doesn't make good.
Speaker 2:These are amazing. This one is just exponentially OK, got it.
Speaker 1:I don't do this every time.
Speaker 2:No, this is true.
Speaker 1:This is just a once in a while Once in a while Good time. Ok, ok, ok. So this has a slice of like melon on it and it's looked like a sunset, and she called it relax. It's only magic Dackery. So, jen Heather, what exactly is in this if people were going to make this at home?
Speaker 4:Yeah, you guys want to tell us if you want to make it a home, all you need is 1.5 ounces of Red Sky rum.
Speaker 1:That's our misguided spirits. Red Sky yeah.
Speaker 4:Quarter ounce of Smith and Cross. Three fourths ounce of watermelon bear bear syrup. What the hell is that?
Speaker 2:bear based syrup.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's good it is good, I just where do you even buy that?
Speaker 2:Well, I mean you have to go to your local. I guess we'll have to ask. I'm going to.
Speaker 1:I'm searching on a DM Izzy and make her put in like where do we get well with this watermelon juice?
Speaker 2:You know she's going to crush it and be like. You didn't see that in the shop when the girls went in. It was in the corner.
Speaker 1:I think she's going to be like I made it and I'm like well, okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and what else we got?
Speaker 4:And three fourth ounce of fresh lime juice, shake double, strain into cup of into a glass cup and garnish with a little watermelon wedge.
Speaker 2:That'd be a lot. And so, heather, how is it?
Speaker 3:I like that. It is citrusy sweet, but also spicy, which is appropriate for this movie. Yeah, fabulous, all right, bringing it home, my God.
Speaker 2:Well, speaking of, let's just I want to jump with like one of the best drinks we've had and also, as we're saying, one of the most influential movies of the 90s, if not the like. Quite essential. I kind of want to jump back into that.
Speaker 3:But not even of the 90s, but of like girls lives, okay, and I would even say like guys lives too. Yeah, everybody loves the craft.
Speaker 1:It feels like definitely like a paramount of the counterculture, if you know what I mean, of the 90s at least, because you know it feels like the 90s, but I remember maybe it's a little more late 90s, but like Abercrombie and Fitch and sort of that beach vibe trying to take over everywhere. This is like the and this is the other side of the table.
Speaker 3:It's true. I mean you can say that it's maybe a spiritual grandchild of what John Hughes was doing.
Speaker 1:I wrote down that this is like what happened. This is like the real the expansion of the breakfast club, Like if you see what happens to the characters when they walk out of the building. This is what they're doing.
Speaker 2:This is what happens next. This is what happens.
Speaker 1:This shit is intense yo.
Speaker 3:But no upsetting makeovers.
Speaker 4:No, yes, you have glamours instead of a.
Speaker 1:We are getting into the breakfast club and we're going. When I watched the movie for the first time, this last year at breakfast club.
Speaker 4:I've switched movies.
Speaker 1:Wow, alright, they got to the makeover and they're like she looks worse. She was way.
Speaker 3:Her dead pink has the same problem.
Speaker 1:Yeah, john Hughes has. I mean, I don't know, I don't love all John Hughes movies. I think I'm an outlier on this. Hot take. Yeah, hot take. I think that a lot of I'm not the biggest John Hughes fan.
Speaker 2:Well, that's why Andy came along and said I'm going to do something else with the crap.
Speaker 1:Yeah, good job. So you're moving us back to the thing. Welcome.
Speaker 2:I don't know, I just, but I do. I think it is something you were saying. It resonates and there's an honesty to it that, within the specificity of the story that they're telling that just you can't get away from, it is so integrous to the story itself that really all the relationships are real, the things that they're dealing with are honest, and then it's just told so specifically that you realize that you just can't get away from how Well, like, how real it is.
Speaker 3:They're allowed to be bad girls. They're allowed to be cool. They smoke cigarettes, they had the best outfits on, they were true friends and also the most important thing is that they're outsiders.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 3:And the focus of the film is on the characters who are outsiders, and not on the Amicronian Finch folks.
Speaker 4:For me it was like one of maybe five movies or TV shows that were gateway drugs of this time and it was 1996 and maybe it was the first one. I think I saw this before I saw Scream, which also came out in 1996, also with Skeet.
Speaker 2:With Skeet Ulrich and Neve Campbell and Neve yeah.
Speaker 4:And it was like this Scream I know we did last summer, and like Buffy, which I think was a year later. And then another personal gateway drug was Are you Afraid of the Dark? That was from when I was like five, that was from early 90s.
Speaker 2:It was just a long tunnel after that gateway Exactly.
Speaker 4:But seeing the craft when I was like 10 years old, I really I feel like it was an example of female friendship I hadn't seen before. And then, as every other girl my age was doing, I felt now like this movie was part of my identity and truly, my friends and I would try to call the Four Corners during recess. We would sit there in fifth grade and save the things and try to have seances and hang out in the graveyard, and it was all inspired by seeing this movie.
Speaker 1:That's amazing. I was going to ask is this something that you guys had, like, the experience of, like you know what? Is it? Light as a Feather Stiff as a Board?
Speaker 4:Yes, I would play. My friends and I would, after seeing this movie, would play Light as a Feather Stiff, as a Board at sleepover parties. And there was one time I remember specifically where there were probably like eight of us and there was a girl who was you know the person laying there and we all picked her up and we were like, oh my God, it's working guys. But there were eight of us and she was probably like 85 pounds or whatever. It's not that hard to lift. But we convinced ourselves that she was like really light because we were playing this.
Speaker 2:I do love the practicality of that magic, if you will. Because, yeah, because you could just go do it at a party and you're like, oh my.
Speaker 1:God, we're doing it. It's working. Yeah, I'm not going to do it with you, matt, here in a few minutes, just all the way down on the floor.
Speaker 2:That's right.
Speaker 3:This is just a little prelude to Also, jen, was it the first coming of age story that involved the occult and witchcraft which is, of course, a part of any horror girl's life?
Speaker 4:In existence? I would have to think about that, but certainly, for my viewing at the time was probably one of the first that I saw.
Speaker 3:Exactly and I think that's critical as well is that part of sort of coming into your own power and crystals, magic candles, and that's a part of who you are. I think there's not a lot of stories about young girl friendship that involved the devil, as they should.
Speaker 1:No, not at all. I mean it's central to this one.
Speaker 2:They had a consultant who was Wiccan on the set, which I didn't know when I first saw it, but I was like, well to your point, I think there was an approach to it that's like we're not going to just kind of put something on it and call it witchcraft.
Speaker 1:The witchcraft is authentic. It feels real. That's what makes it sort of scary, at least initially.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and as I was going to say, is that kind of where you're going with that, or do you agree with that?
Speaker 3:I was just thinking as Jen and I are genre filmmakers and just sort of like all the horror filmmakers of the world, the idea that this would be more aligned with our experience of being into that stuff.
Speaker 4:Yeah, feeling like you don't belong, feeling like an outsider, feeling like a misfit for sure, especially as a young teen, you know, pre-adolescent girl. I think it really speaks to that kind of person.
Speaker 1:In terms of the Wiccan stuff, I actually don't know how true to it, how true to Wiccan it is my point is, I mean, it feels real and I think that they did bring a consultant on and I saw some blogs and stuff. There were like 25 weird facts about the craft. I was kind of reading through them and all of them were hilarious. Some of them were like you'd never know, but the actors weren't really teens.
Speaker 3:And I was like oh my God, you're blowing my mind.
Speaker 1:And then they're like they hired a witchcraft expert to be a consultant.
Speaker 3:I was like well, no shit.
Speaker 1:You're going to make a movie that involves witchcraft and you're going to ask Uncle Dave to come oversee it. I mean, it's going to be so shitty.
Speaker 2:That's why John Hughes was not involved.
Speaker 1:That's why John Hughes was not involved. My point is it feels very authentic. There's just too many little details and the symbols and the elemental aspects and the way they stand. It rings true in a way that I don't think I can't really name another film in a teen genre that does anything like that.
Speaker 1:No, because there's usually a send up in the middle of it, or it's like one character. It's like here's the story and the B plot and then here's the C plot character, but you see, once in a while they're doing something fucking weird with a knife and a candle. This one puts them in front and center, and it's because I think it's also very smart, because the way they start everything out is based in their being outside the main circle, not having shitty lives, things that they can't, that are beyond their control they're trying to fight through and it makes total sense. It's a great set up.
Speaker 3:Well, to me it's not even that like the authenticity of the occult in it. It's the idea is like you've decided to make a story and focus on outsider girls that are witches and how fucking cool that is. You've created all these like at a very, like, very surface, but there's also a depth to that. It's like you've created very cool characters. The cast is amazing. Who doesn't want to be like Nancy? She has a cool outfit, she gets to kill boys, it's like all these great stuff. So to me it's like more about like the identity and sort of seeing a reflection of yourself or an inspirational party of yourself on screen. Sure.
Speaker 4:And they all have like yeah, they have real things that they're working through, struggling with working through one of them. It's class with Nancy. I think it's so funny. Everybody in this movie lives in a Hollywood mansion, except Nancy, who lives in a trailer park.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they doubled down. They didn't just be like, but not for long.
Speaker 1:Not for long, not for long.
Speaker 4:She eventually moves to a penthouse. Penthouse apartment or whatever it is, but yeah, like the fact that everyone who goes to this school lives in a Hollywood mansion, I love it. I mean, I love the atmosphere, this like LA gothic atmosphere that the movie captures.
Speaker 2:And it does very well and it reminds, made me think of Sarah as she's coming in. She's the outsider of the outsiders, you know, and then she comes in and her one moment that sticks out. I was going to just say it's the moment where she's in the back of French class and then the pencil starts turning Right and you're like, immediately, no matter what, I'm like, oh shit.
Speaker 1:So that was my real question. So they say the four central characters they're like the four points of the compass or the four elements or something you know. The is in Nancy sort of completes them. But that happens before we see that really get together Right Like they're with the pencil.
Speaker 4:Sarah completes them. Sorry, sorry, sorry.
Speaker 1:Sorry, god, I'm terrible with character names. Sarah completes them, but like we see her with the pencil before, they kind of complete the coven or whatever Right? So is she like?
Speaker 2:well, she says she's like at the shop, it's like you're a natural witch.
Speaker 1:Right, so, but that's, is that what? Is she the one that empowers them, or she just complete this circle of power? For the rest of that's a good question.
Speaker 4:I think, the movie leaves it open ended. I mean, definitely the movie is like she is a natural, which her mom was a witch as well, right, but in terms of like, did they? Were they able to do anything before?
Speaker 1:she arrived.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I think it's a little open ended.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because even in the moment where the they're celebrating the guy getting hit, you're like what was circumstantial, what was not, what was, and so like had that been happening? All the circumstances, because we know to like, we interpret things the way we want to see them. So, up until that moment, until, like, real shit early on in the movie.
Speaker 3:Everyone in the school knows that there's their witches Right. That's what they call them, so I believe that they're doing some sort of magical shit or they're trying to they're like branding themselves as it's, just it's just that's sort of my question is like I feel like as and she completes and maybe they could have never done anything, or maybe she's the.
Speaker 1:I think it sort of posits also that because Nancy I think I got it right this time becomes the sort of powerful breakout one that sort of turns everything over and ultimately sort of becomes the villain, because she does get powers. I think they're saying that she, that Sarah completed the circle right and that's what they were missing was just an actual natural element that they were missing.
Speaker 2:Yeah that's what I was wondering and, to your point, it made me think of the novel Jonathan Strange and Mr Norell, because it's like a study of like. Are we studying the arts and that makes us that you know the magicians, or is it the art that I'm able to complete that makes me the magician? And then so, yeah, then it does then beg the question of Sarah coming in. Is she actually creating or shortening the, the length between the energy that's happening between these girls to actually jump, if you will, or is it already happening and she's just completing what the next level would?
Speaker 2:next level would be Right, because then we see, I mean that beautiful moment with the butterflies, like when they all take the day trip, and then they, you know, hold the knife and they come in, and and then at the end, just when the butterflies come down on Nev's character, and it's just like gorgeous.
Speaker 3:I was wondering how they even did that effect in the 90s.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's some I mean very cool effects in here. I mean even I even dated, like the snakes and the fingers, and some of the things at the end couldn't look a little dated, but they're still cool, it's still very cool yeah that's very cool, like I mean that you know that that wasn't it's all my in it because it's easy, it's so, it's so.
Speaker 2:The effects themselves are so of the time right that it ages with the story. I don't know if that's I don't know how else to say that by the way, can we talk about the bugs for a second? Yes.
Speaker 4:So the bugs. So, seeing this when I was 10 years old, I now, as an adult, hate bugs. I'm so afraid of bugs and snakes and everything. And I realized at some point in the last 10 years that I was like, oh, this is because of the crafts, like that's what. That's what planted that seed of fear in me initially. And then I carried that with me through teenhood and into adulthood and a couple of years ago I put together that that's where that fear that's where it began.
Speaker 2:I mean with the, the cockroaches and things crawling over her feet and the maggots coming out of the greats. Yeah, they're there.
Speaker 1:That's some really good ones. It's real to like very, very fulgy.
Speaker 2:Yes, and they. They sealed off the house. They bred these things so that they couldn't reproduce. So if they escaped to like, I mean, it's kind of insane.
Speaker 1:I read that they had like like Andrew Fleming or one of the director and co-writer said they had 10,000 snakes. Yes, god, I know which. I was like what on this movie, like that's like a half of your budget.
Speaker 3:You know, you say why did it have to be?
Speaker 2:just six.
Speaker 1:Um, I mean yeah.
Speaker 2:Mr Bailey was supposed to be Harrison Ford, but he was like not going to do it now you know the the high school section of this when we arrive.
Speaker 1:You know it's a 90s movie because God, I don't know the guy's name and I should have looked it up. But the guy with the big, swooshy like pompadour hair, he's like the hottest nerdy dude of all kind all time. He's in every 90s movie. You guys know what I'm talking about. He's kind of like the sidekick to the football guy.
Speaker 2:He's like the talk to him later. You're talking about Mitt or the other guy? Breckin Meyer, yeah, breckin Meyer, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Mitt yeah, this guy, he's like he plays, doesn't he in this movie? He's played in one of the cool guys, which totally tripped me out because I'm used to him like, isn't it like Encino man or something? Where?
Speaker 1:he's like the nerd, it's clueless. He's like the nerdy stoner kind of like guy on the side or whatever the movie's like pushing away, and I'm like this, I thought they were going to do that with this movie at first. So I'm like this guy makes a career out of being a nerd and he is like a straight up, just cool, just a good looking dude.
Speaker 4:Yeah, he's like the sidekick of the cool guy.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Who is an absolute, some of the dialogue man, when they drop, like one liners in here. They dropped their version of the N word, which was whoa aggressive. I was like whoa baby. Like that came out and I was like, oh my God, like that is. That is bad, what's happening now. That one stings. Check she's also from a bunch of other stuff. What are?
Speaker 2:you talking about Christine Taylor?
Speaker 1:Yeah she's from Dodgeball Zoolander.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the Brady.
Speaker 1:Bunch, which was also kind of like. And then, yeah, to see a part, somebody that has like that large of a career afterwards just dropped some like real. I literally I was like making dinner last night and it was on that happen. I was like, oh my God, and my wife was like what she was playing with the baby and I was like you just didn't hear what they said, but I'm not going to rewind. It's fine, it's fine.
Speaker 2:She lost her hair. It's fine yeah.
Speaker 4:I think the movie wields racism a little too casually, which I think is emblematic of the late nineties I think a lot of movies did that which you know is not cool. I mean, the movie knows it's not cool but it exploits it for a plot point which is not cool. Now, especially watching it in your, it just feels really really not cool.
Speaker 1:But yeah, that's, and that's the only time that really happens, like something like that the other.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because they make it about that for her. It's not about her as a character, rochelle, it's like I, it's really a racial thing specifically.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, I feel like they're just honest, it goes, probably because of pace. They just wanted to do it quickly, but man it does. I think you said it perfectly, jen. They just handle it. They wield it way too like flippantly like way too easily Like that's just and it doesn't reflect. It might reflect a moment of real life, but it doesn't reflect like that sort of structure of it. It's, it's dastardly, but not like cartoonish, I don't know. It's not like quotable in that direction?
Speaker 4:Usually, yeah, but let me, let me tell you more about that. What happens to Christine Taylor's character? I forget the character name.
Speaker 2:Laura, yeah, laura.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I mean, that is something that, just an image that stayed with me since I was a kid of her.
Speaker 1:Again that shower shower. Yeah, just killer, because they also had just like a little bit of blood and like scarring here and there. It was so affecting.
Speaker 2:Like so I was going to say was the response? Was there just how grotesque it was, or was there like a connection with oh, if this were me or if that you know?
Speaker 4:or it was just like the power of what happened. Sometimes you just see visuals and they stick with you. And I think that visual of her in the shower.
Speaker 2:She's pulling her hair and you're yeah, the scarring gives it a little extra detail that it just and then it's, and then it's doubled down, like when you pull back to see Rochelle and she looks one way and her image looks the same way. Oh, yeah, that mirror. Whoa. I look just every time. I know it's coming, but I don't know. I mean, how does that play for you, heather?
Speaker 3:I mean, I always like when the mean girls get it.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And she's a scumbag, so good.
Speaker 1:That's just. I think we might put that as the subtitle of the film or subtitle of the podcast.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:It's true. Well, when I think, when I think about it, because I think about the sort of more of the, the outsider character stuff, is that, since the craft was so big, much like John Hughes films and stuff like that, if you're sort of like an outsider alt girl you have like your family and other people in the world are able to identify you as a Nancy, and so like there's a word and a construct now in pop culture of what your daughter or child or friend or even like I have a lot of, a lot of guy friends that identify with the movie, like they're also like a Nancy. And so I remembered in my life people would see the movie and they're going like there's this character, nancy. And I would hear the same about girl with the dragon tattoo and also, of course, my favorite. It's like have you seen girl interrupted an Angelina Jolie's character.
Speaker 3:So like that's like the trifecta the trifecta and I would feel that would be my double feature. You watch girl interrupted in the craft. Interesting yeah For insane girl friendships, do you?
Speaker 1:guys remember how old you were when you saw this movie the first time. Ten, wow, like immediate.
Speaker 4:Yes, because this I already talked about. But this and scream I know we did last time where.
Speaker 4:I saw them all when I was 10. And that it really changed my life, because that like taught me that the world of horror existed and it made me obsessed with horror movies and it ushered me. It was like letting me know there was like another world out there and it ushered me into adolescence, essentially. And then my adolescence were just defined by like wanting to watch lots of horror movies. And let me add one more thing to this so in this movie Sarah is the new girl at school and then she happens upon this group and then they become witches together and then, like in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, buffy, because that was another, the TV show was another gateway drug for me. As I said, buffy is the new girl at school.
Speaker 4:But, really, she's a vampire slayer. So when I was 12, my parents moved me to another neighborhood and I had to change schools and I was like, okay, I've been like trained to think that something supernatural and magical is going to happen when I move to this new school and nothing happened, and it was so I feel like I went into this well of depression because I kept waiting for my magical thing to happen and it just wouldn't happen.
Speaker 1:I just picture you like standing outside in a graveyard tonight just spinning around to be like something essentially that was singing from West Side.
Speaker 2:Story no, that was me.
Speaker 1:Sorry gotcha.
Speaker 3:I was still in the graveyard, but I was like well, when we talk about Jen's uvara as a director and when I like read her scripts we work on stuff together like these are so, so critical touch points to a lot of the things that I think that Jen works on, like everything she mentioned, like those core films and are you afraid of the dark and that tone. And also, like when we talk about the craft, when we talk about the stuff that Jen loves because we love very similar things it's like you almost have like a crush on those movies, like I have a crush on the movie, the craft I have a crush on. Are you afraid of the dark?
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 3:And it's something so special and so wonderful. And I also see that, and you just see it in Jen's work, that kind of tone and that kind of work.
Speaker 4:It is funny not to get too into specifics of our movie that we made the sacrifice game, which is coming to shutter soon, but Heather and I were talking about like there are things I didn't even realize consciously that are in sacrifice game and after rewatching the crafts I was like, oh, that's interesting, like that's also in sacrifice game, like I did not realize that I did that, but now that I see it, it's there.
Speaker 2:So yeah, and being open to those, the experience that you had, like what we were talking about earlier with the bugs, and then realizing where did that come from and how does that influence those other things that I'm doing. And, like you were saying, that's central to the stories I want to tell and the aesthetics that I enjoy and also the, the voices that I want to hear.
Speaker 3:You know the voices that 100%, which is why you know, I love, you know and Jen's voice is platform, because I think these are very critical things and girls, critical stories about, critical stories about, you know, friendship, outsiders, posers. Yeah, the craft is also about posers a little bit.
Speaker 2:It is about yeah sure we can go there.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Go ahead, come on.
Speaker 3:Well the well. The idea is that they're all posing that their witches, right, if we go back to what we talked about before. But the new girl's the actual she's a real deal. She's also unassuming as well and I think like when I think about about Jen's work, it's like we're also talking about the person that's unassuming. That's sort of the real deal.
Speaker 4:Yeah, as well, that's true.
Speaker 3:Right, the outsider's outsider, in a sense.
Speaker 2:The one that's going to go for the five finger discount but says, fine, I can pay for it.
Speaker 1:You know one of the things this film does that, I think, is sort out of the norm to, because whenever you watch the first couple acts, it turns when you see the get his name, skeet or whatever now is in.
Speaker 2:Chris.
Speaker 1:Chris is now in love with Sarah and he's like, and I was like, oh no, this is going to be a problem. So immediately, like, my brain, just analytically, is like okay, great. So now the rest of the movie is going to be about how all of these made their choices. All the all the four characters got something they wanted. You know, bite him in the ass and we have to figure out how to walk the magic back. That is not the way it goes. It does not take the typical like format of like put the genie back in the bottle. Learn for what you know. Be careful what you wish for. This movie is much more about like, I don't know, like that's actually. That's sort of a good question. What is the meta for this movie? Like, what is it? What are they saying at the end of the day?
Speaker 4:For me it's like female friendship and real female friendship versus I don't know. I think it's all about female friendship. I think it's really interesting. I noticed on this last watch I did there's so much slut shaming and then there's so much acknowledgement that everyone's slut shaming. So within the group they're like can you believe that people are slut shaming you? Like I know that this didn't happen. And outside of the group, the girls at the school are also slut shaming each other. And then you know it explores friendship and you have in your early second acts like them doing magic together and having sleepover parties together and what their friendship is looking like. And then it looks at the dissolution of that friendship in the second half of the movie and them turning against each other. And at the end of the day, I don't know she, she doesn't, she just I mean at the end of the day she goes back to San Francisco. She doesn't have friends, but she's found her own power.
Speaker 1:And now Nancy's like put away into something else and it's sort of like contained like her, because she kind of exploded beyond what the expectation was for her Right Like where she kind of became in power for a while.
Speaker 4:Yes.
Speaker 3:Also. I think this is something interesting that Jenna and I talk about as well. I think one reason the way the craft resonates is because teenage friendships and girl friendships are messy, they're not this perfect idealizing things. Because it's like thinking the way that Jen's talking about it, it's like we're talking about friendships and friendships. Not about frenemies, not about enemies, not about like we're going to all do it together, but just sort of like this time, you know, when girls become witches and sometimes they turn off they, they, they, they go after each other.
Speaker 4:The time when girls become witches? Yeah Well and maybe it's a special moment of adolescence.
Speaker 2:Well, and I just wonder too, then, does it take, or did it take, and does it still take to say, okay, they have to be witches in order to tell an honest story about adolescence.
Speaker 3:I just think it's awesome. I think it's awesome to give girls the power of of witches these characters, yeah, and you and you say yeah, they're cool.
Speaker 2:And then you see how powerful they get and, like you were saying earlier, when Nancy gets to kill Chris and just like, just just floats right at him and just and he's. You know what were you going to say? It's shocking.
Speaker 1:It's like a shocking Relevation, because you expect, because that guy's a total dick, like, I mean like, and it's very clear.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they do a great job of flesh on that, yeah.
Speaker 1:They flip him on his head, but then you don't expect him to kill him, right, you sort of don't expect that.
Speaker 4:But let's talk about his character, because I think ski Ulrich is such a good job and it's such a different character from his role in Scream and he's he has like range, like he has to do a lot of things in this movie, from like be charming to being a total dick, to being in love with her and desperate desperate, like getting more and more desperate to the, his final scene with Nancy, where he's glamored to think that it's Sarah and and yeah, that's iconic, that scene where you know she storms in and she sees Nancy's in the bed with him.
Speaker 4:It's shot so awesomely you have a trombone shot in there and she's like moving towards him, like floating towards him. It's a great fucking scene.
Speaker 1:That scene again. Like what was Nancy's motivation going into that scene? Like right, because she's like it starts off with like hey, she just like she's off to the party. I'm just going Well, I assumed it was like it felt like I'm going to go punish him or take control of this or exhibit my power in some sort of way.
Speaker 2:And I think that's the thing and this may be kind of Heather, if this is what you're talking about like them being witches, which is so awesome. It's like she can go hunting Like she's got power now that, being an outsider, we're not having Right.
Speaker 1:But what's surprising about it is that she does go there, but then she uses Sarah's body to do it, but it doesn't seem like she or her ultimate mission in that point was to destroy him. It seems like it's more to take something Sarah had.
Speaker 4:Yeah, well, I guess, and I also think it's a sense of validation, because first she's trying to use her. She's trying to use just sexual power herself to hook up with him and and get him to want her, and then when he doesn't want her, that's when he, she, turns into Sarah, kind of as to me revenge, and to get some sort of payback on him and fuck with him because he doesn't want her. Well, she's going to force, she's going to make him think that he wants her.
Speaker 1:Right. Anyway, the only challenging thing to that, and again, like I'm just, I think it works, but I'm like what would have happened if Sarah and the others hadn't interrupted that scene? Because they come and ultimately break up the interaction on the pathway she's going down.
Speaker 4:I think ultimately it would have ended the way it ended. Yeah, even if they could walk in, I think they would have maybe actually had sex and then maybe while he was orgasming, she would have changed back to herself.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it becomes about like her control of him.
Speaker 3:And then letting him know you're also talking about this type of bully. So when I watched it I thought about how many women this character has hurt, Sure. Yeah, Of course the whole school statutory rape, date rape, all that stuff like that, absolutely, he's a fucking scumbag and just like the dream of the outsider is like well, now you're dealt with.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no and like so, my, my mission is not here to justify him, it's just to be like to clarify what she's after. But I think that's what that is.
Speaker 3:But I think that's her mindset of like you're a bully, you've hurt me, you've hurt so many other people, I'm taking, I'm taking you out and not even for herself, and not even for herself.
Speaker 4:But like I felt it was for all of us, but also like let me use you sexually.
Speaker 1:Sure, the thing, the power you you wield on somebody else, let me take from you.
Speaker 4:Yeah, and let me, exactly, let me use you sexually the way you use all these other girls, right, and it's one of the first things, that's set up right, like when Nancy's it confides into Sarah's like I should know you know it's like, and then we kind of tailor away from that.
Speaker 2:But it's established, nancy's like this guy fucks with everybody.
Speaker 3:So it's pretty much like good for her moment, yeah.
Speaker 1:I don't think anybody's watching that scene being like oh poor Chris, you know what I mean. I think Gary recognized that there's something. I think also that scene is structurally supposed to tell you that Nancy's sort of come off of the book, so to speak, of control Right, like you know what I mean, like where her desire for power or thirst of you know, because she is sort of like it's like when all the things show up on the beach and she's like this is a gift, this is a gift for me. It's like her seeking godliness or something to get.
Speaker 3:And the spirit of vengeance, yeah, also a spirit of vengeance that is mostly allowed for male characters, yeah, yeah. And who are?
Speaker 2:normally the predators, the sharks. Even though it's an interesting, it doesn't really tie well, because Rochelle was called a shark by Laura. You know it's like sharks and you know her outline is water. But anyway, I say that just to poke a hole.
Speaker 1:But I love that. Matt's like going on a point, just slowly dripping and dropping in some of the facts, and she's the water element.
Speaker 3:Also, don't bully the goth girls. You see what happens. Yes, yeah, don't bully the goth girls.
Speaker 4:But what a, what an incredible role and I want more female roles like that for like Nancy out there in movies and how cool, a Frusible to just fucking go for it and go crazy. She's awesome, yeah, she's so awesome.
Speaker 1:She should have been in a thousand more things and the only other thing I can think of her in is in Waterboy. I think the Adam Sandler was the only other.
Speaker 2:Well, you know, you know her, she her first, she was 11.
Speaker 4:In Return to Oz, so good, really Return to Oz.
Speaker 2:I tried to get us to watch. It's too scary to watch.
Speaker 4:It's like a nightmare you had when you were a kid, like my memory of Return to Oz is like a nightmare that I had. Is this a real movie or is this a nightmare?
Speaker 2:It's like if I asked you, what did you dream of you had? You're like I had a nightmare and I'm like, well, tell me about it. And you're trying to reconstruct it.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 3:You know, I saw it in the theater, oh my God. But also she was in.
Speaker 4:American.
Speaker 2:History X. Oh right, yes, yes.
Speaker 4:And she should be in many things.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like she is incredible and for that, in fact, her she goes like all the way. You never for a second doubt that you know, and all most actors, at some point you can see the performance. It's hers, you just feel like this is her.
Speaker 3:And who's like that in the contemporary sense, with Mia goth?
Speaker 1:In a goth sense. Well, Mia goth, oh sure.
Speaker 3:And the idea of sort of like that sort of performance where you're embodying the female villain character in a very sort of baroque acting sense and being so free and unhinged.
Speaker 1:And again, you don't see a lot of that performance from a lot of characters she's written you for these words like baroque and like corrected connected sentences here I'm going to have to sharpen up my fucking pencils.
Speaker 2:I feel at home. We need more crazy female villains.
Speaker 4:I think yes.
Speaker 1:I'm all for it. I mean, I think it's, it's interesting that she shifts from friend to villain. I just that's what I think is really fun and unexpected and it works really well because the payoff in the end oh also, can we just jump ahead to the end scene, the in sequence, fucking scared like right, it really is legit. Like I think that the way they shift it to it's not about again thinking about wizards and like witchcraft and this kind of you could easily be like I'm going to conjure up a stone person or I'm going to do this. No, they.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And it's an shaky light savers.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:No, they fuck with each other's heads, which also kind of matches that teen teen girl, teen girl girl girl. But it's fabulous, it is downright. It's scary as shit. You're like what's real and what's not and they're talking into like cutting herself, and I was like, oh my God, this is like it's so hard to watch unravel.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Let it go Peace.
Speaker 4:Ultimate, what's the opposite of female friendship, or what's like the scariest flip side of that is your three friends ganging up on you and, by the way, they're all witches with crazy power.
Speaker 2:Right yeah, Right yeah, and they have. I mean the the flight crash thing and just setting that all up and getting her alone in the house.
Speaker 1:So her, yeah, I need to talk through a few of these elements here. Sure, because this is wonderful, because I do have a few couple of so, the flight, the flight and her parents dying. That was in her head. They put that in her head.
Speaker 4:That was a glamour.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, glamour, fabulous, and then the snakes and the bugs and all that shit. Does she cut herself or does Nancy cut her? Nancy?
Speaker 4:cut her yeah.
Speaker 1:So Nancy cut her and she runs away because that, so that confrontation was real? I think so.
Speaker 4:I have to look at the shots. Yeah, yeah, I think so.
Speaker 2:I think that's the story that's being told. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Because then everything becomes direct battling and then Sarah turns over and takes over Nancy, doing the same kind of thing to her with bugs and things, but more directly to her body, like shaping her fingers.
Speaker 4:Yeah, which is like what's worse than bugs and festing.
Speaker 3:Your home is bugs and festing your body. You Right One level up Props to these writers. And also teen girl cruelty is to like to, because if you have a deep, intimate friendship with each other, the idea to use those things about you to destroy you Against you. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:So what happens? Nancy gets like or sorry, sarah, gets pushed against the wall like they're in, they fight against the wall which is trying to bind her. Then she gets hit by a desk but then vanishes, right, so is this like just an optical illusion or she did like disappear? Because that I found sort of confusing, because then Nancy takes a knife and goes to stab her Because, yeah, what? Comes back and kicks her away. So I'm sorry I'm getting real deep into the shot, I think that that's I.
Speaker 4:As I was rewatching it yesterday, I noted that and I was like I think this is, it's a great movie, but I think that there's a few beats in there that don't quite work. I think it was wasn't staged as well as it could be, because it is confusing.
Speaker 4:The thing hits the wall, Nancy jumps out of the way. Supposedly it hits Sarah, but then the way that the camera is it's like now in a high angle looking into the corner and the chest or whatever that hit them is nowhere to be seen. So I think that's a little bit of like.
Speaker 1:And we can honestly just forgive it because it's an action sequence. So it is what it is. We don't need that, that's like some of these things you don't need, you don't want to look at closely because you don't want to break the aggregate of the feeling. Yeah, so that might. I was just wondering to fight, I want to be sure I didn't miss something and I don't think it reads as it plays.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I think we're all in agreement of how that read.
Speaker 2:So it makes me think, then, what do we, how do we take away from the end with with Bonnie and Rochelle?
Speaker 1:coming back to Sarah, you know, and that was also an interesting choice that they came back, because it's sort of up until then they've each been individuals with their own characters and their own powers, and I felt like in that moment they kind of became the collective, like sort of like sidekicks. You know what I mean.
Speaker 4:But I think that that was part of their trajectory before that. Like in the in the late second act, as they're all starting to gang up on Sarah, those two start to become the sidekicks. I think it starts in the car scene when they're driving through this.
Speaker 2:Right, the lights yeah. Then the girls in the back are like they're just egging it on, yeah, and living through the experience. And then, of course, when Nancy is gone, what is their identity? Because where have they put their identity as friends?
Speaker 3:But I also feel like, after a huge fights where you're like girlfriends, there's this, this, this awkwardness of coming back together. It's like, hey, did this really happen? Do you feel the way, jen, the reason that they came back at the end? There's a possibility where everybody could like become friends again because, also, everyone's too young to have that kind of power, everyone's way too young to be in charge of that.
Speaker 2:Yep, yeah, and they're like oh boy, did we?
Speaker 3:uh, you got to be practical magic level old for that kind of power. This is everybody's too young.
Speaker 4:Well, what I think we need from? I know there was a sequel. Wow, but from another sequel is all of them in their forties now Sure.
Speaker 1:Coming back together. I mean, we do need to sign me up for that. That would be awesome.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think the vibe would probably be like, which is another great movie about female friendship, and chaotic female friendship is her smell. Oh, oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:And when I watched it because, like every, because it's like again like the crap. They are chaotic, they have problems, they like every, like drunk, drinking drugs, but in the end it's like they're back together. It's like the bands back together were friends. Because that's just. Somehow sometimes there's like messy friendships. Friendships are not as we see on sitcoms all the time. They're all like wild. You know, talk to people anymore. Nancy goes to the asylum. Maybe she comes back, maybe she goes like. Maybe maybe she should rethink what I did in the 90s. Yeah, and having on that power, you know it's like.
Speaker 2:I mean, because one of the things that I think that you know I take away is that Oscar Wilde like if the gods want to punish us, they give us what we ask for, and like, so it's like, what is it? You know, what does Nancy ask for? You know, and it's kind of amazing, but I think to your point with with, like, a logical conclusion. Or, as we're growing up, we also saw it too because of how important this film was and what it set off, because those things weren't explored really before this. And then we did explore it more in the witchcraft, I would say more so than in the female relationships, it seems, in a lot of the more mainstream. But there's a lot of that that we could circle back on and that we did see that you were talking about.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and at a very concrete level, just stories about alternative girls, punk girls, goth girls. That's like in a super pop culture movie. It's critical to see that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that's a great point.
Speaker 3:And the music.
Speaker 2:Oh, Grandma.
Speaker 3:Bell friends. That soundtrack is so iconic.
Speaker 2:Yes, the soundtrack is.
Speaker 3:And just when I hear the music at the goth club. It's like the craft.
Speaker 1:You know, I think.
Speaker 4:House to News Now by the Smiths, was another emblematic song of the 90s or late 90s.
Speaker 2:with that, yeah, and math you sweet. You know it's like, and jewel is in there, you know yeah.
Speaker 1:But the composer go ahead, go ahead. Oh no, I was going to say I was going to just jump in here and say like I think I know that our misguided spirits are. When I hit them up about like hey, we're doing the craft and they're talking about doing the cocktail, the guy was like our contact there Hit me back. He's like oh, no way, I was just listening to the soundtrack to the craft yesterday, so I know that they're going to love this one.
Speaker 3:It's a cool movie about cool girls with a cool soundtrack.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And when I was, and when I was very young, I remember I was at the Warner Brothers store at the mall and I saw a picture of Marlon Brando as the wild one and how cool he looked. And I remember asking my mom mom, how come I don't see any images in society of girls looking that cool? So it's always been my path like to see movies, work with filmmakers. It's like fucking cool girls. The craft is about cool fucking girls who have autonomy. Yeah, that's part of it. Their characters have autonomy and their character.
Speaker 4:You know, again it's. It's about other things besides like boys, which a lot of those 90s it's about killing boys, which is important.
Speaker 3:Yes, that's a very good point, you know it does. All the best films are Midsummer Romance X all about killing boys.
Speaker 2:Man yeah, and even the early reference West Side Story. Oh, jesus Christ.
Speaker 1:You're welcome. So my favorite line of the film. I just got to say they bust the mom bust into the room. Has the towel? I got some clean towels. I go mom, are you girls getting high? I was like this is the best fucking line. Good, that is like you know. Whenever you read that in the script and you're auditioning, you're like if I get this part, it's going to make my career. There's no way I'm walking out of this without like a big A plus top of the reel right at the front.
Speaker 2:Are you guys getting high, you guys getting high? I do also want to say I mean, I know we talk about the soundtrack, which is iconic, but also I mean the guy who composed it composed the crow.
Speaker 4:Oh yeah, it makes sense.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it's like there's, you mean, the music supervisor or the score, the score and it's just I don't know so underappreciated and because I'm talking about the needle drops. Oh, yes, yeah, needle drops.
Speaker 3:And also like, because I was just thinking about, like, what are the movies that are iconic during the day? It's like the craft and the crow yeah, the crow soundtrack.
Speaker 2:It's incredible. Grammar Val. I think that's how you yeah, like just nice, yeah it's, and just it changed so much, it influenced so much and we don't even talk about it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it was all, and it was all the great post punk during the time Right. And again, it's not only like post punk for us or like alternative girls like us, or alternative girls want to be witches like us. It was a pop culture phenomenon Like you could see these movies in any kind of mall. You could go to like a Jersey mall and watch the craft and watch the crow and hear this music and everyone heard the music.
Speaker 2:It was playing in every mall, everywhere, all the time, yeah, and in my car. But so I don't know what we're going to say.
Speaker 1:I've got like a couple of fun little things that I noticed while we were going through. Hank. So like in the party scene when they're all come like where Chris, before Chris dies, everybody's drinking beer, I assume, out of like soup to go containers.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:I saw that they weren't solo cups. They weren't solo cups and they're like these little soup to go containers but like the tall ones and if you go back and watch they're all drinking out of those. And I was like that's an interesting, was Walmart out of solo cups this day when the prop shop went down?
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, they were running late on a meal break and they just had to grab all the things.
Speaker 1:They just grabbed whatever was closest, so that was a pretty fun one. I also thought you know in like again, like this, and I always say like doing these. The movie's awesome. I really love fucking watching the movie. It's fantastic. I think that Sarah at the end of the film every time she's running did anybody else know she's running with her arms like directly out to the side?
Speaker 4:It is a weird run.
Speaker 1:She has a very, very odd run. It's like I think you know this is the movie that, like Tom Cruise, saw and got afraid of being filmed running.
Speaker 4:I think he's like I'm going to do it in every movie now you know, I actually was wondering if that was like if the director asked her to run like that or that was an actor choice, like where the choice came from, because it is a very interesting run and it is consistent, like through the house, when she's tripping out and everything she's moving, like her arms are just so wide out to the side.
Speaker 1:It's just a very odd sort of stumble move. It feels like when it may be one of those things where it's like, hey, you're running too fast, so can you slow down so that we can follow it with a camera and time the shot out or whatever, and then it just somehow the timing of her moving through space didn't add up to human. You know what I mean. Added up to cinema fake, you know a?
Speaker 2:little bit. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:I could see that.
Speaker 2:No, no one else, no, no, I'm here for it.
Speaker 4:I had that feeling, that thought as well.
Speaker 2:I had a question for us If we had to tell someone to watch this movie who'd never seen it, had no context for it.
Speaker 4:They would be an alien.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like now from Earth. Well to your point about connecting dots later. Right, obviously they may have had dots connected, but maybe they didn't see it. They've never connected those dots and you're like you need to see this and they say why.
Speaker 3:I would ask them if they watched the Wednesday show first.
Speaker 1:Like the one on Netflix.
Speaker 3:Yeah, because it's the idea. It's like do you want to watch it? Like cool goth girls and a cool stuff. I mean that, Because there is because you can draw an analogy to yeah, you can draw a line from this to that, for sure. Goth girl representation.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean great, Both really great shows. I really enjoyed it a lot.
Speaker 3:And the focus is on a very cool female character. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2:And Tim Burton I don't know how I can relate this, but I'm going to do it anyway. I'm a king of terrible segues Is Tim Burton also admitted that he took Jack from Return to Oz? He is on record and said I absolutely love it. It struck me, it terrified me and it changed me, and I wanted to tell a story about this thing. Yeah, so anyway, interesting.
Speaker 1:So I've got a couple of fun facts here about the movie that I looked up. I thought we're pretty fun. Casting took like a year nine months to a year to figure out. They were really having a hard time figuring it out. Other people considered for these roles Alicia Silverstone, scarlett Johansson and I think she was only 12 at the time, so it didn't seem like a real serious one and then Angelina Jolie. All three were seriously considered for the role.
Speaker 4:For Sarah. For a combinations of all of them.
Speaker 1:I think the only one they had cast in the beginning was I can't honestly remember Like I read, but I can't remember which one it was- Jolie is Nancy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, if you're going to have, so I would think it would be Sarah. I think it would be Robin Tunney is who they probably had first.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I know that god, her name just escaped me now. But the woman ends up playing Sarah wanted to play Nancy. It was like, oh, trying to insist on playing Nancy, yeah, and then they talked her and they're like no, no, no, you need to play the lead role, not the smaller role. Also the lead role that we think fits you better. That was a very interesting sort of thing. So, yeah, we've already talked about they're inspired by the characters are inspired by goddess, archetypes and earth elements. So Sarah is earth, bonnie, with the power of foresight, is wind, rachelle the diver is water and Nancy, of course, is fire and Robin Tunney. This is a fun. I thought this was actually the funnest, one of the funnest facts. She wasn't actually. She wasn't first cast, she's one of the last. Because she was there. She became the reader and so she was reading against everyone else that was auditioning.
Speaker 4:And they're like, oh, we like what she's doing and she ended up getting cast. Whoa, that's crazy.
Speaker 2:Oh, that is pretty crazy. And to be in all of that the whole time being like doot, doot, doot. I'm right here, I'm perfect for this.
Speaker 3:So here's a question for you boys Now, when we watch the craft it was sort of we get the sort of iconic quality of like cool alternative girls which craft the messiness of female friendships. When you see cool girls with cool soundtracks and sort of like their messy friendships, what do you think? Because I know a lot of like alternative guys in my life fucking love the craft and go that those friendships, those girls that's also me.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean I think you know in two stages of this I'll answer stage one. Like 90s version of me wasn't really into wanting really into movies. When I was watching movies they were like from the 70s and the 60s because that's like what we had around my house, so like I remember seeing this at like a friend's house, but it didn't really. I was probably more interested in trying to light something on fire at this point than I was in watching a movie. So you know, like as an adult I would see I love very well made movies with, you know, strong female villains, protagonists I don't. I don't think gender to me matters as much as it's the character to be really strong and be well, well made. I mean that's the same thing. It's like I don't really like big marvel movies all the time because I just don't believe in the stakes.
Speaker 1:The thing this movie does so well is establishes really strong stakes early and that's what I think so cool is.
Speaker 1:They all have these individual pockets of things they're fighting against and then you watch them sort of explore and then it goes a different direction, like it totally then takes a right turn after it sets up all the, all the characters and what they're like things are they kind of get what they want and then it does something else.
Speaker 1:But for me, I think it's super fun and I enjoy watching the fight. You know that they all go through and that's why so honestly, that's why it's scary, because it comes down to the last scene. I love feeling like that you all, somebody you care for, that you're watching, has fought with everything they've got and you feel like they're about to totally lose it all, and then right at the end, they somehow pull it back and bring it back in. I mean I think it's fucking right. No matter, no matter who's in the driving seat, as far as gender or identity or whatever. They come here for the fight and the passion, the willing and the, the risk that, the chance to lose, and when you know. That's what I love about movies like this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, tell me the question again.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I answered like four different versions of it, so I want to know which?
Speaker 2:I'll answer them all.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the idea that this movie is about like cool, cool, witchy girls in messy relationships and that in my life, a lot of sort of like all guys, it's like, as Jen and I are saying, like this is us they have also said the same about them. It's like I get, I get, I get the craft. I am Nancy and they saw it as well, but they're, like you know, punk guys, goth guys, yeah.
Speaker 2:I think anybody who says they don't identify with it it hasn't watched it. I think that they're like no matter or is just not being honest with themselves. And that's what I mean by this, like Nancy's approach, so honestly and just, I'll speak to her and Sarah's relationship specifically that it is messy. And there is the outside girl who you think is going to be, you know, your friend and you're like, wait, but she's more powerful and it's like, and it's messy, it's just, it is what it is. And so I would say, from from my experience to when I for my first reaction was I didn't know I could see stories like this. That was the first. I was like, oh, I didn't, ok. And then number two was very, I was just I realized I had a type and just to get that out there, but also to to look at how Nancy navigated things and as a just a frickin teenager and I was like anybody who's not going to find something to glom on here is not actually seeing the film. They might watch it but they're not seeing it.
Speaker 2:And I think that's where there's an aesthetic that somebody might not want to, you know, talk about. There there's, you know, structure or whatever, but there is just an authenticity that absolutely rings through that you could talk about, nancy, you know, in the, in the same sentence as we were talking about earlier, with a street car, you know, and and I think that that deep wrestling with that kind of messiness, and that's what I mean. I mean street car. You look at what he's doing. He is so frightening and, because you never know, he's light on his feet and you mean a street car named desire?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and because the way he's just like he's fluid, you never know where he's going to go and then when he rips like it's just terrifying and he's just trying to figure out what's going on inside of him.
Speaker 3:So is Nancy, it's like a Max Katie as well, yeah yeah, yes, oh, my God yes.
Speaker 1:This film does have shades of Tennessee Williams when you think about it because it's spirit of vengeance, yes, spirit of vengeance.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the middle of vengeance? Yes, exactly, just something that kind of. I think all the stories we tell, I mean this kind of, goes to that hero's journey, right, like like there's something deep that is just guttural, that's just rich and universal to using it that with that word, that way. But it's just something it's undeniable, it's an. It's an undeniable and a inescapable beauty.
Speaker 3:But do you see this as why this is the greatest film of the 90s?
Speaker 2:No, I mean, I think, yes, there you go. Yeah, we just we spent all this time to make Heather's argument.
Speaker 1:Heather said it since the beginning.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so why she's like it is?
Speaker 1:the greatest film of the 90s. It's about cool girls doing cool, looking cool and doing cool witchcraft.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean she's period. You don't need to talk about the rest.
Speaker 2:I think she's been saying shut the fuck up, razor, that we're done. And we were like, no, we got to do Euclidean geometry.
Speaker 3:And it's not, and the idea that it's not just for us, it's for all of us, right, yeah?
Speaker 4:I think everybody identifies with complicated characters, regardless of gender, and these are complicated characters.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I completely agree. Yeah, so I mean, this is amazing. I want to. Ok, yeah, no, go, go. What do you do? What do you want? No go. What are you talking about? If I start again, are you going to start now?
Speaker 2:No, no, ok, great, you start.
Speaker 1:It was amazing having you guys here. Thank you guys so much for like coming and doing this with us. Oh yeah, very, I mean, we're so excited to see sacrifice game. Yeah. It just came out Fantasia and now about to hit it, fright Fest, where we also have our world premiere. Well, it's world premiere for us. I've heard.
Speaker 4:I've heard We'll be there, so we can't wait to see her. We're so excited.
Speaker 1:We can't wait to party with you guys in London and see sacrifice game.
Speaker 2:It's going to be a great time.
Speaker 1:See sacrifice game.
Speaker 2:Yes, it's going to be a hell of a good time Little Christmas in August.
Speaker 1:So Hell yeah, if you're out there, how do we follow you guys to keep up with everything that's going on with your work?
Speaker 4:I'm on Instagram at bubblegum and blood and the sacrifice game is on Instagram at the sacrifice game.
Speaker 3:I'm on all the social media. You can follow Heather Buckley and you can also follow my company, black Mansion.
Speaker 1:And Matt Mundy. How about you?
Speaker 2:Oh, just come on at me, over at Mo Mundy.
Speaker 1:And on Instagram, right it?
Speaker 2:is on Instagram, yeah, and of course you know our film heardfilm.
Speaker 1:And you can follow me at Steven C Pierce, and thank you guys very much for listening. Hope everybody really enjoys the craft. I think we got to the bottom of it here and I'll see you guys next time. Woo, let's go.
