Halloween Spirit: Hell House LLC

Continuing the Halloween Spirit, Brian & Cargill venture into The Abaddon Hotel to explore the film franchise that makes scaring you their business: Hell House LLC!

Watch out for that goddamned clown!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's a meaning junk and watching Rabbi sh you gonna
come out and stop me?

Speaker 2 (00:22):
All right? This is Dick Miller.

Speaker 3 (00:24):
If you're listening to Junk Food Cinema, who are these guys?

Speaker 1 (00:49):
What you are about to hear is an audio documentary
on the mysterious event surrounding a haunted episode of Junk
Food Cinema, brought to you by Remember the app dot com,
Come dot com, DoD Hell how snow fury like a

(01:10):
Tully scored? This is the weekly cult and exploitation film cast,
so good it just has to be fattening. I'm your host,
Brian Salsbrand. I'm joined as per usual, by my friend
and colleague. He is a novelist. He is a screenwriter,
a lieutenant of Megapors, the man who haunts the halls
of JFC, mister c Robert Cargill. Hi, how's it going?

Speaker 2 (01:28):
Man? It is going. We are about to run headlong
into my favorite time of year, fantastic fest.

Speaker 1 (01:36):
And then we are fully and still in the Halloween
spirit here at Junk Food Cinema. Halloween, and I'm super
excited for today's episode. But before I can deliver you

(01:58):
the treats, I gotta deliver the tricks in the form
of the Housekeeping pop Keeping. If you would like to
hear more of this horseshit, we have eleven years of
the podcast on your favorite podcast. You can follow us
on social media at Junk Food Cinema. And if you
really liked the show.

Speaker 2 (02:12):
I mean you really liked the show, you.

Speaker 1 (02:14):
Like it as much as I love egging the houses
that give you bags of pennies or dental floss. You
can go to Patreon dot com slash Junk Food Cinema
and financially support the show.

Speaker 4 (02:22):
We greatly appreciate it.

Speaker 1 (02:24):
This is a perfect storm episode Cargo, because yes, we're
gearing up a fantastic fest. Yes we are still in
the Halloween spirit. And on top of all of that,
today's episode was a patron request from Lieutenant of Mega
Force Jason, who wanted us to cover a little film
from not so long ago, a film that kicked off
a franchise that I have to say, I love every

(02:48):
fucking entry of.

Speaker 4 (02:49):
I'm talking about Hell House LLLC.

Speaker 2 (02:55):
What happened that meld at the Avadan Hotel? What is that?
It's everything? Sarah? Have you watched those No? Not so

(03:17):
you have no idea. What's on them? It's not beautifulness.

Speaker 3 (03:21):
How House.

Speaker 4 (03:26):
Always when we started sleeping there that things started to change.

Speaker 1 (03:34):
Hear that right, I'm telling you we have to call
it off right now.

Speaker 2 (03:40):
We have no business being here. Alex. It's more confident
than ever. I think we're next.

Speaker 1 (03:55):
Alright, Cargill, Oh, you know what to begin this conversation.
Let's start by talking about found footage horror, because I
feel like we need to acknowledge ever heard of it?

Speaker 4 (04:16):
You've never heard of it, absolutely never.

Speaker 2 (04:18):
Heard of it. Definitely didn't make a movie that's original
title was found footage. This is not a thing I
am aware of at.

Speaker 1 (04:24):
All about not a found footage movie, but a movie
about a guy who finds footage. It's it's all very
much the serpent eating its own tail. Don't worry about it.
But I do have to acknowledge that these movies are
not everyone's cup of tea. And I even acknowledge that
some horror fans can't stand them. But I gotta be honest.
They work on me.

Speaker 2 (04:42):
Yeah, I don't understand people who don't dig found footage.
I know found footage can be done. There's a lot
of bad tropes in found footage, Oh yeah, the same
way there's bad tropes in all genre. You know, you
do anything cheap enough, you do anything poorly enough, and
you don't develop the characters enough, it's not gonna be great.
Found footage has particular problems like shaky cam, which can

(05:07):
really really mess with audio audience members who suffer from vertigo,
and so not every found footage film is going to
work for some people just physiologically. So I get that.
In terms of found footage, though, I think it is
a wonderful genre that functions in some very interesting ways

(05:30):
and has its own rules set and it's really fun.
And in terms of found footage, I would argue that
hell House LLC is the best found footage series. I
would not I would not go so far as to
say Hellouse LLC is the best found footage movie ever made.

(05:50):
But consistently you're not going to find a found footage
series that delivers on the level of this series.

Speaker 1 (06:02):
I like playing the Eerie Wears Waldo game. You know,
when you have the images that are brought forth from
a found footage movie and it's really up to the
audience to kind of look and see, like what's moving
what's not right here, and with the scary background stuff,
that's a game I love to play. I also think
there's a powerful effect in this perceived removal of the

(06:24):
safety net that is fiction. So when you start kind
of selling the idea that this is based on a
true story or that the things that are happening are real,
you have this dissolution of the fourth wall.

Speaker 4 (06:37):
And in a way, when.

Speaker 1 (06:39):
It feels more documentary, we can't naturally or even subconsciously
assure ourselves that this is only a movie.

Speaker 4 (06:45):
So at least for that split second.

Speaker 1 (06:47):
I mean, of course we know it's just a movie,
but for a split second, the illusion of veritae is
an effective slide of hand.

Speaker 4 (06:53):
And that's something I've always appreciated.

Speaker 2 (06:55):
Yeah, the word that I really hate using because I
hate the way that most people use it, But it
really does work here. Uh Immersion. Sure, these these films
do a great job of immersing you in the narrative
by putting you in that first person perspective. Uh. And
and when it's done right, like the Hell House movies do,

(07:18):
it rewires your brain in an amazing way and becomes
truly truly scary, and you buy into the immersion without
the without making the mistake of what was it called
the Fourth Kind?

Speaker 4 (07:31):
Was that Oh my god, Cargil the Fourth Kind.

Speaker 2 (07:33):
Where where our actress comes out and it's like, what
you're about to see is absolutely real. No, it's not
fictional at all. No, we didn't make it up. This
is real, real, real. And then at the end, see
we told you it was all real, and it's like
that was fake. The fuck are you talking about? Like
every bit of that was fucking fake. Those are really frustrating.
But a movie like this that just opens up and

(07:55):
it's like, hey, on this date, this thing happened. We're
about to watch the foot You're just like, all right,
that is the premise of the movie. Is it is
no more truthful than the opening of were Wolves, where
it comes out it's like last super moon, one billion
people became were wolves and murdered a ton of people,
and tonight is the next super moon. And it's like, oh, well, there,

(08:18):
you know, I have the premise of the movie. You
have set me up in the world that I am in,
and in this world this is supposed to be real,
and I buy it. But then, because it is that
documentary style, we start feeling about it differently, and the
dialogue functions differently and has to be much more naturalistic,
and the camera movements need to make sense. And there

(08:40):
are certain things you have to answer and certain things
you don't have to answer that really work very well.
And because of the set of rules that we have
learned over the I guess, I guess we should say
forty five year life of this genre. Most people would

(09:00):
say the very first found footage film would be The
Blair Witch Project. They would be very wrong.

Speaker 4 (09:07):
The French would have something to say about that.

Speaker 2 (09:09):
They would. But the very first kind of found footage
horror film that really had any connection was Cannibal Holocaust,
a movie that was so divisive and frightening at the
time that people were literally dragged to court and people
had actors had to show up in court to prove
that they were not in fact murdered on film. So

(09:31):
that really kind of kicked off. But you know, because
you know, it requires actual required film to work for
so long, it wasn't something that could be done by
low budget filmmakers until the last broadcast, followed up very
shortly by Blair Witch Project. Did someone rip off the other?

(09:53):
That is an argument for the time, but the last
broadcast did exist beforehand. I consider that the first modern
found footage movie, but that Blair Witch to be the
one that blew it up and made the made it
a functional its own subgenre. So and then from there

(10:14):
we have hundreds of entries. It got a really bad
raps for a while, mostly from fucking critics, and that
was something I was really bitter about, went back when
I was a critic, because people were very many critics like,
oh my god, another found footage film. Why is nobody
tired of these? And it's like, because you're watching like
eight of them at every festival you're at, so you're

(10:36):
seeing like thirty six of them a year, whereas the
average viewer is seeing twos. They haven't had a chance
to get tired of it. You're getting tired of it
by proximity. You're seeing the most mediocre the battles. I've
seen a ton of bad ones, I will I have
probably seen more bad found footage than almost anyone listening
to this podcast that said, I've seen a lot of

(11:01):
really great ones that fell through the cracks too. And
I remember when Hell House LC first dropped, a lot
of people were like, I don't know, and I was like,
I can't fucking wait. And I've been beating the drum
on this one for going on ten years now. So
when you texted the other night and said I someone
asked for Hell House LC, I was like, oh, fuck yes,

(11:21):
So I really was. I was in the audience for this,
you know, in terms of it was made for me,
and have been very happy to see the success of
as has the franchise has grown more or less. I
have my my issues, I have my my feelings on that,

(11:41):
but we will get to that as we move forward
in this review.

Speaker 1 (11:49):
You know, I just rewatched the first couple of Paranormal
Activity movies today as part of Well, let me be
clear about how this actually two years ago. When I
first watched Hell Heal's LLC, I was privileged and that
there were three sequels already out for that movie, I
believe at that point. So I just binge the whole
damn thing. And what I found is, while I really
liked the first one, the more I watched, the more

(12:10):
I liked all of them. It's one of those things
that like, the longer I spent time in this universe,
the more it started to work its magic on me,
and I just trust I love. The thing is Cargil.
I am completely all in on found footage Horder. If
horror found footage horror? You know what episode of Horders
is kind of a found footage horror movie. If you're

(12:31):
a neat freak, That's all I'm gonna say. But you
know what, give me a little verite with my horror.
I'm all about it. I'm verite all vera day. Let's
go in fact. Back when I was going to you
know movies to review them, I saw, like you, I
saw a bunch of found footage horror movies and I
came up with a term, sent them a scare tay,
which is, you know what I called this genre. And
some of them were a lot of fun, and some

(12:53):
of them were the fourth kind, and that's that's upsetting.
But yes, the thing is and anthly upsetting.

Speaker 4 (13:02):
The problem is Cargill, that you know. And I'm not
trying to be cute here.

Speaker 1 (13:05):
Found footage works best selling The reality of a found
footage movie works best when the audience feels like they
came upon it, that they found it themselves. If you're
over selling the reality, we all know it's bullshit. Just
let the audience it. You know what it's like when
we go to a magic show. We know you didn't
really saw that woman in half. But if you stand
up there for thirty minutes and tell us I swear

(13:28):
on a stack of burning Bibles that I am for
real cutting this way, we're gonna tune out.

Speaker 2 (13:32):
Because I talk to people about this a lot, because
it's the same mental mechanism as to why AI is
never gonna fully take over in terms of replacing our creative.

Speaker 1 (13:44):
Space, because found footage can't get fingers right. Wait, wait,
why don't we talk? No, No, it's it is the it.
All of this ties into a ven diagram. The center
of the ven diagram is you know, when you're on
the Internet and you see a video and it's fun
it's hilarious and it's so funny you got to send
it to your friend. And you send it to your

(14:04):
friend and they go, oh, yeah, I've seen this. This
guy makes up all his videos. It's all bake. And
then you feel you're this thing in your chest where
it just kind of falls and you realize you've been hoodwinked,
and that's not funny. If it was made up that
it was funny because you thought it was real, and
it's not funny when you know it's fake.

Speaker 2 (14:26):
Found footage movies are great when they're not trying to
pretend that they're real, that they present themselves as in
their universe as being real, but not that they're trying
to convince you that it's because that was the thing
that disappointed me walking out of Blair Witch. The first
time I was sold, I was told this was fucking real.

(14:47):
We were all told this is real, this has found footage.
They were playing that and I'm watching it, and I
was like, where's the sound guy? I can still hear
the sound They left the side, she dropped her things upstairs,
like I shouldn't be here any of this. Why am
I hearing? Because it's fake? Because there is a sound
guy there, because this isn't all being done fully in camera.

(15:08):
And once I knew that, I was like, ah man,
And so I had to rewatch it later, knowing that
it was fake, that it wasn't was never meant to
be sold as fully real, and I was like, this
is a really good movie. Uh so, yeah. It's one
of those things that the harder you push that this
is real, the more we're going to be trying to
figure out that it's not, and instead we want to

(15:30):
believe that it's real. So just jump in and let
us fucking go, because I will spend an hour and
a half believing this is a real documentary put together.
If you structure it as such, you just don't have
to lie to me doing it.

Speaker 4 (15:44):
Yeah, And then meanwhile, you got me.

Speaker 1 (15:46):
And I think this explains a lot about my Infinity
four found footage is that I was fourteen. I hadn't
even yet turned fifteen when I saw Blair Witch in
theaters and at the time, not only were they selling
this as real, they were taking out like missing ads
in local newspapers.

Speaker 2 (16:00):
Yeah, and the.

Speaker 1 (16:01):
Internet, like the Internet movie culture hadn't really profligated enough
that it was ubiquitous. So I went into that movie
thinking it was totally real, and I was so scared.
I was so terrified at the end of that movie,
thinking that I had actually watched three people get killed
in the woods. That it was one of the rare
moments of my life where I like needed a minute
before I could leave the theater. I was like, I

(16:23):
just I need a minute. I'm so freaked out. Right now,
I need a minute. And I didn't find out that
it was fake until about a year later when Heather
Donahue was in a steak and shake commercial.

Speaker 4 (16:33):
There's more than one way to make a shake, and
we admit their way is more efficient, But when was
the last time you sipped to shake and said.

Speaker 2 (16:43):
That tastes efficient?

Speaker 4 (16:48):
Like, imagine this, You're fifteen years.

Speaker 2 (16:50):
I'm dead and there's steak in shakes in.

Speaker 4 (16:52):
Hell I know. Like, I just was like, that's she
can't be in this commercial. She's dead, She's dead, what's happening?

Speaker 1 (17:05):
I was freaking out. And then that's when the illusion
was shattered. But I think something about that experience kind
of lent me a little bit of benefit of the doubt,
at least for these type of movies. And then, of course,
when the paranormal activities movies came out and like fully
took over Fantastic Fest, I was back.

Speaker 4 (17:21):
I was back on the roller coaster and I was
super excited.

Speaker 1 (17:23):
For those And ever since then, I've I've discovered entries
that are good, entries that are bad. And Hell House
LLC is sort of a mockumentary about this. This whote
disabandoned hotel in Abadon, New York. And this this team
of this, this team of hunters, this team of home hunters,
I don't know what you'd call them. They're guys that
put on the big spectacular haunted houses at Halloween. They've

(17:46):
decided their next big attraction is going to be staged
at this abandoned hotel in New York and it's going
to be called Hell House. And what the movie essentially
is is it's a documentary about that opening night going
so wrong. And I do think it's It's funny, by
the way, that even though this movie came out in
twenty fifteen, they set the events of the Fateful Night
in two thousand and nine, which is the same year

(18:08):
Paranormal Activity came out, which I think is a not
so subtle nod to that.

Speaker 4 (18:12):
And you're right, car Gil, and I feel like we
need to say this up top.

Speaker 1 (18:16):
There are certain trappings of a found footage horror movie
that turn people off, and some of them are alive
and well in this film. Yes, you know, some of
the acting is pretty terrible, and yes they have to
cheat with thoroughly perfunctory reasons for people in high scare
situations to be holding cameras the entire time. I get it,

(18:38):
I get how that breaks the reality for a lot
of people. But there is something so fucking scrappy about
The Hellhouse LLC and its sequels. It feels like the
Little Movie that could. There's just something like, you know,
it was produced for next to nothing. You know, it
feels like it was a Shutter original and it could
be this natural overlap between the fact that the filmmakers

(19:00):
of hell House and the characters within the film hell
House are both fighting against all odds.

Speaker 4 (19:05):
Too open hell House.

Speaker 1 (19:06):
So I think maybe that's part of the reason why
my heart kind of goes out to it.

Speaker 2 (19:11):
Have a I kind of disagree with your assessment and
come to the same conclusion. I think the acting in
here is excellent for a found footage movie. You know,
actors should feel like they're feeling uncomfortable on camera because
they're not real actors. You know, when you have a

(19:32):
camera in a found footage movie, it's like very much
when you shoot stuff on your own, you know, your
friends get people tend to get really uncomfortable when they're
on camera all of a sudden because they feel like
they're being observed in a very different way, and so
I feel like that feels genuine in this movie. I
don't have any problems with the performances in this film.

(19:53):
In fact, I very much feel that Stephen Cognetti is
the best found footage filmmaker we have working today, even
though I feel different about the series than you do.
And I'll just come out and say it. Here my
feeling on the hell House series. I love Hellhouse LLC.

(20:15):
And I feel that the series is a bunch of
diminishing returns. No hold on allow me to retort. I
feel it's diminishing returns in that every for every one
of these is fantastic. They are all the scares are great,
the setups are great, the mechanisms that the craftsmanship is fantastic.

(20:38):
But it runs into a problem that I recently watched
a really great essay on in which it falls into
the trap that a lot of things are falling into
these days, which is the opposite of the plot hole,
which is the film doesn't have plot holes. Instead, the
series spends too much time trying to ensure there are
no plot holes, that we're just being drenched in lore

(21:01):
when we want to be scared and I feel that
after the third film, every Hellhouse LLC should have been
a different haunted house somewhere, a different scary situation, and
not have to tie back into all the same things.
By the time I get to the fourth movie, every
time I hear the piano, I'm like, it's this again.
This was really scary the first time, but now I'm

(21:23):
not scared hearing this because now I'm just being reminded
that it's trying to create this huge, whole Hellhouse LLC universe,
And really, I just want to be watching these really
creepy pound footage movies with different houses and different mythologies,
and not have to spend so much time trying to
explain where the where the doll came from. You know,

(21:45):
this is something Paton Oswell had did a whole bit
on twenty years ago. I don't care where the things
I like came from. I just want to watch the
things I like. And so my problem with the hell
House series is that it's continuously trying to make sure
each entry is relevant, and I think I just need
a Stephen Cognetti found footage movie once a year, like,

(22:08):
please give him, give him the five million dollars he
needs and the equipment and the crew and just go
shoot in another creepy location and tell me it's found
footage and have a new backstory each time instead of
trying to figure out why this creepy clown doll is
shown up in five movies. And that's that's how I
feel about the series. But I do feel that every

(22:31):
time I watch the movies, every movie has a better
scare than the one before it, and has great performances,
and he's developing and honing his craft. And I just
have been wishing since the fourth film, you know, once
I was watching the person moment, I really just want
to watch something new by this guy in this vein,
Like I don't think it's like okay enough with the

(22:52):
found footage. No, no, no, keep bringing it because this
guy knows how to fucking make it. I just have
a problem with the abund and some lore because the
more we get, the less scared of it I've been getting.

Speaker 4 (23:04):
So I want to respond to two things.

Speaker 1 (23:05):
First of all, the problem I have with the performances
in this movie is not that they're too natural or
that the actors don't feel real.

Speaker 4 (23:12):
My problem is actually the opposite.

Speaker 1 (23:14):
The reason I don't think the performances in this movie
are very good is because they feel like they're not
speaking naturally, that they're reading from a script. It's that
classic bad actor thing. If it literally just feels like
they're reciting lines and not having a conversation, I would
be all for it if the performances were just overly
natural and they didn't feel like actors. The problem I
have is they feel too much like actors.

Speaker 2 (23:35):
Do they have big theater kid energy for you?

Speaker 4 (23:37):
They have?

Speaker 1 (23:38):
They have like medium theater kid energy, like you know,
understudy energy is what they have.

Speaker 2 (23:43):
I think is the problem a medium low you know,
a nice four on the dial.

Speaker 1 (23:47):
The other thing I would like to say, respectfully, is
give me more lore or get the fuck out, Like
at this point, telling me that I should there should
we should move on to different haunted houses is like
saying we should move on from the rental family to
a different gang of former DVD stealing road racers turned superspies.

Speaker 2 (24:06):
Like mean, look, I want at all. They ran that
into the ground so bad they literally went to.

Speaker 4 (24:10):
Space, Like you are you using?

Speaker 1 (24:12):
You are saying things that are features but describing them
as if they are bugs and I do not understand this.

Speaker 2 (24:19):
I mean, one of us has really enjoyed the last
few movies and the other rest checked out the minute
a sub broke up through ice like that.

Speaker 1 (24:27):
Is the one bad film in the franchise, and you fucking.

Speaker 2 (24:31):
Know, oh wow, on Twitter, I would like I would
like to record the show. There's only one one bad
Fast and Furious movie.

Speaker 1 (24:42):
I am waving the fucking handkerchief in the fucking drive
a quarter mile directly at me. There is one truly
bad movie in that franchise, and the reason it's bad
is because it doesn't understand what the rest of those
movies are or what its audience really wants. And that
is the great thing about the hell House LLC movies
is because they did figure out what the audience truly wants.
And what the audience truly wants is a fucking tidal

(25:04):
wave of world building and myth banking that is painstaking
and goes to the level of a fucking Fast and
the Furious franchise. Because we are building stories, we are
building offshoot stories. We are building stories about people coming
to investigate the events, what happens to them, and then
what happened to the people who investigated what happened to them,
like we extrapolate out objects in the background of the

(25:26):
Abadon Hotel, and those objects then connect within the sequel.

Speaker 4 (25:29):
This is a fucking cinematic universe.

Speaker 1 (25:31):
And what I love about it, Cargill, is there is
absolutely no fucking need for it. You are not wrong
about that, but that is what makes me love shit
like this. When you didn't have to do all this,
but she did anyway. I guess what I'm saying and
what I will proudly admit on this podcast is I
am a fan of Tryhard franchises.

Speaker 2 (25:49):
Counterpoint, The problem with with the past Naberius is that
they're It's like Star Wars. There are only four good
ones and no one can agree on which foe they are.

Speaker 1 (25:59):
Yeah, because as anyone who says there are only four
good ones is wrong. That's why they can't agree on
which four they are.

Speaker 2 (26:04):
Fallhood.

Speaker 1 (26:06):
God, my god, this podcast almost ended in a heartbeat
right now.

Speaker 4 (26:11):
People don't even know how closely.

Speaker 2 (26:13):
I mean, thank God, presume this could have turned into fisticuffs.
I mean you, you and me, like the Rock, we
would be standing on opposite steps pretending to look at
one another because we can't beat. We can't be taller
than the other in a single shot. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (26:28):
And also it would have been a wrench fight, not fisticuffs.
We all know this.

Speaker 2 (26:32):
All this after these messages, we'll be right back.

Speaker 3 (26:52):
Mew Mix comes in two varieties, original and seafood Middles,
a medley of mackerel, tuna and crunchy centers. First thing
with seafood flavored tastes so good cats ask for it
by name.

Speaker 1 (27:06):
But this is what I love about these movies is
the links that they go to and as you watch,
and we're gonna we're gonna touch a little bit on
the sequels because you have to.

Speaker 4 (27:14):
We have to.

Speaker 2 (27:19):
I mean, you did what When you talk about the
lore of this it gets impacted by four other films.
Have you seen the fifth film yet? No?

Speaker 1 (27:26):
And that's the other reason I'm glad we're doing this
episode is because we're literally getting the fifth movie this
month in theaters.

Speaker 2 (27:32):
The first one is in theaters. Guys, this is film
number five. You think Art the Clown tried hard to
get into theaters? Holy shit, hell house, you know they've
been They've been hooking it for ten years and finally
got one of these into into movie theaters, so God bless.

Speaker 1 (27:51):
Them, I'm gonna say something else controversial. I'll take Bleedy
Eyes Clown over Art the Clown any day.

Speaker 2 (27:56):
Sorry, I just I mean, I'm not gonna disagree with that.

Speaker 4 (27:59):
Okay, fair enough.

Speaker 2 (28:00):
They're very different films. One is gory and fun and
one is, you know, absolutely terrifying. The thing about this film,
I will say this Scott said this one multiple times,
so I have no qualm sharing this. He texted me
one night and he's like, hey, man, I'm at home,
I'm alone. I really want to watch something scary. What's
the scariest thing I haven't seen yet? And I said
Hell House, Elsey, and he goes, oh, that sounds fun.

(28:20):
Where can I find it? I'm like, shutter. He's like, oh,
fuck it, yeah, I'm in it. And he went out
on his porch and just sat out there at night
and started watching Hell House on his laptop, and he
at one point forty five minutes and slapped his laptop
closed and said, nope, no, no, no, no, no, not watching
this alone, waiting till daylight. He got so fucking creeped
out by this movie that he just would not watch

(28:43):
the end of it. And he texted me going, oh
my god, man, this is the scariest shit anybody's made
in a while. And I agree with him. Uh, And
I think the genius of it goes back to what
we've been talking about. You know, there's there's really good
found footage and really bad thund footage, but there's really
great techniques and how to do it. And the brilliance

(29:04):
of Stephen Cognetti is that he understands where your eye
is at all time, and like in this movie, he
appears in the film, he is the camera man. He's
the guy walking around with a camera, so he's directing
and acting as his own cinematographer in this film, and
he knows what he wants to get and he knows

(29:26):
what he wants to see. He's doing the same thing
as paranormal activity, but the paraanormal activity movies often hold
the camera for a while and just wait for something
to move.

Speaker 4 (29:39):
That's the Where's Waldo thing? I was talking the Where's Waldo?

Speaker 2 (29:42):
In fact I you know, I've called it Where's Waldo
for fifteen years now, but here it's it's so subtle
and so quick, and it happens, and it's one of
those wait did you fucking see that. Wait, paus, go back,
go back, go back? Oh fuck me? Oh fuck no, no, no, no,

(30:02):
no no. And so it programs you to start looking
for the little bits in the background as the camera
itself is moving, as these things are going on. So
you are paying active attention to every frame of this movie,
to the point that if you watch this at night
and then walk across your house, your brain is still
wired looking at every shadow in your house every year, like, oh,

(30:26):
I got to turn the light on. I am not
somebody who gets spooked by horror movies in that in
the same way as a lot of people do, because
you know, I just make them. I think about them
in terms of the function of them. But these movies
rewire my brain to the point that I cannot walk
across the house in the dark after I've been watching one,
because my brain is still in that mode looking for everything.

(30:49):
And that's the genius of these films, because he's always
keenly aware of what you're looking at and how to
get you to pay attention to them. And then when
he does give you a MP scare on the rare
occasion that it's a jump scare, it is a hell
of a fucking jump scare. There's one in the fourth
movie that Dear God made me jump out of my

(31:09):
fucking seat, and I was like, that's a fucking proper
jump scare, God bless you. And here the jump scares
are so subtle that they really just get under your
fucking skin.

Speaker 4 (31:22):
Much like the Rocky franchise.

Speaker 1 (31:24):
The fourth Hell House LLC is my favorite, but unlike
the Rocky franchise and much more like a can of pringles.
If I watch the first one, I'm not just gonna
skip to the fourth one, And in fact, I'm not
just gonna dive into the fourth one. If it's been
a while since I've seen any of them, I have
to binge them once I pop, I cannot stop, Like I's.

Speaker 2 (31:44):
Not a bad There's not a bad one in the series.
By the way, I did say they are diminishing returns,
and I agree with that, but they are they are
diminishing levels of great too good.

Speaker 1 (31:57):
I think you mean you stand by that because what
you actually said is I said this, and I agree
with it.

Speaker 4 (32:00):
So just letting everyone know Cargol agrees with Cargoline.

Speaker 2 (32:03):
I agree with myself. You know, I think I made
an excellent point, and I concur.

Speaker 4 (32:09):
You are just like my wife.

Speaker 1 (32:11):
My wife will come up with a plan for the
evening and then she'll talk about it so much that
by the end of it, she goes, yeah, that's a
good idea, and I have to remind her that was
your idea.

Speaker 4 (32:19):
So what you just effectively.

Speaker 1 (32:21):
Did is give yourself a pat on the back and say,
I came up with a good idea.

Speaker 2 (32:25):
See the year. What you're really missing out on is
you should be taking credit for those ideas, because she's
convinced herself that you came up with a great idea,
and you should be like, I'm glad I thought of it.

Speaker 1 (32:34):
It's it's the It's the marital equivalent of stolen valor,
and I'm not against it. I should really start to
enacting that, for sure.

Speaker 4 (32:41):
No, And I understand Stargrove.

Speaker 1 (32:44):
Stargrove, and I understand why Scott doesn't want to watch
these movies on his porch, because as you go through
the movies, one thing you realize is.

Speaker 4 (32:51):
Everything is haunted. Everything has go send. They're all really
mean everything is haunted. And I love that.

Speaker 1 (32:58):
I love that everything in this First of all, the
town is called Abadon. The Abadon Hotel is an Abadon,
New York. Hey, hey, upstate New York. Maybe don't name
your town uh after a synonym for hellmouth, Like.

Speaker 2 (33:12):
You've been upstate New York because a lot of it.

Speaker 4 (33:14):
Is upstate New York. I fucking love upstate New York.

Speaker 2 (33:16):
God damn why my family is from there. I'm the
only member of my family not born.

Speaker 1 (33:21):
Enough that we were just there last summer and we
had around, like, what are you talking about?

Speaker 4 (33:27):
The only hell mouth.

Speaker 2 (33:28):
Is a good joke? You enjoy? You enjoy me make
joke about hell mouth.

Speaker 4 (33:32):
See.

Speaker 1 (33:32):
See, sometimes you just have to go along with it.
Found footage people, Yes, we know it's not real, but
get in the fucking car and enjoy the ride anyway.

Speaker 2 (33:39):
Because and I also agree that Cargo made a good joke.

Speaker 1 (33:45):
My idea for you making that joke was great. And
I will pat myself on the back for you.

Speaker 2 (33:48):
You know what that thank you, thank you, that's a
great joke.

Speaker 4 (33:51):
Brian, I'm welcome.

Speaker 1 (33:53):
I think the best way to talk about the plot
of this movie is to really get into how I
think this movie structure is different from most found footage
movies because at the beginning of the movie at the
beginning of the movie, because I think the structure of
this film is fascinating. We start with a fake documentary.
The whole movie is technically a fake documentary, but we
start with this fake documentary that is then interspersed throughout,

(34:17):
you know, with handheld footage, which creates more of a
true crime documentary vibe than you know, the mere on
screen text of it. Like let's say a paranormal activity
movie that just says at the beginning, like, you know,
we greatly acknowledge the families of the victims. But from
that point on, it just feels like you're watching strung
together footage. It doesn't feel like you're watching a documentary.

(34:37):
This one feels like a like a modern true crime
documentary that you would watch on Netflix or Peacock or whatever.
And yet we see the big final scare right up top.
So the documentary says, oh.

Speaker 2 (34:52):
We we open with the event. Yes, we're like, this
is what happened, and now we're going into what it means.
So you see this scary thing, but it's not so
scary the first time you watch it, because you're like,
I don't know what I'm looking at. And then the
movie starts explaining to you what you're looking at and
what's so fucking scary, and it gets scarier and scarier

(35:13):
and scarier until when you see it again all go
down later in the movie, you're like, fuck this.

Speaker 1 (35:21):
Yeah, we see this big final scare right up top,
which is something most bound footage film safeguard until the
very end. Right, we're building up to that moment we
are slowly climbing the mountain in the peak is going
to be when all hell breaks loose, But at the
beginning we see it from the perspective of a Hell
House attendee who happened to be filming. Then we go
back to the documentary, which is a series of interviews.

(35:41):
It's crime scene photos, it's creepy music again structured like
a true crime documentary.

Speaker 2 (35:46):
It's a character who is dead.

Speaker 4 (35:49):
Yes, yeah, thank you.

Speaker 1 (35:50):
And then it's revealed that the main interview subject is
Sarah Hobvell, who is the only surviving member of the
Hell House crew, and she literally during the documentary hands
them a big bag of tapes and what follows from there.
The tapes follow the crew from the arrival at the
Abadon Hotel all the way to this horrific finale, and
then it's just large stretches of first person narrative via

(36:11):
those tapes that are only occasionally interrupted by documentary interviews.
So again, structurally, this is very different from most found
footage movies. So we get to see then the hell
breaking loose finale again from multiple perspectives, and I really
dig that about it. But that's how this movie is structured.
So we're introduced to this crew as they get to
the Abadon they're setting up their haunted house. You know,

(36:34):
they're they're kind of getting little tidbits of oh, what
happened here? Oh this is a local legend because okay, whatever,
we're setting up our hont house. Wait what happened here?
What's going on here? And the other interesting thing about
this structure, Cargill, is that you're right that in most
found footage movies you do have to kind of pause
and go back, Wait, what was that?

Speaker 4 (36:51):
What was that? I missed it?

Speaker 1 (36:52):
In this movie, because it's structured like a true crime doc,
it literally pauses certain things and goes back and goes
did you see that? Not all, but the really great
scares up top, they literally freeze frame and put a
creepy like music sting underneath it again the way a
fucking true crime documentary would to make sure the audience
sees it. And then from there they start putting things

(37:15):
in the background for you to catch.

Speaker 2 (37:16):
Yeah, because while they may have figured certain things out,
you're catching things that they didn't catch, so you become
the investigator at the same time. And that's that's really
what really works super well with this movie is just
how it gets you invested in finding the things in

(37:39):
the movie. So it really does function on multiple levels.
And again it comes down to Stephen Cognetti's genius understanding
of how the audience wants to engage with the image. Yes,
and it's it's just so incredibly well done.

Speaker 1 (37:59):
And we're told about and Drew Tully, who becomes a
very important figure in the sequels.

Speaker 2 (38:03):
Sequels plural Man.

Speaker 1 (38:06):
Again, we are extrapolating out everything from this movie and
giving it its own story. And as much as I
do agree with Patton Oswald about you know, the space Jockey,
to me, everything that they pull out and the mythst
that they build and the lord that they give us
all feels like naturally connected. You know, It's not like
we find out later that Andrew Tully also worked at NASA,
Like they don't take a left turn. That it's just like, okay,

(38:27):
what's this now? Like the road, it's very much the
same road. We're just kind of taking small you know,
feeder roads as we would call them in Texas. We're
staying on the same highway. We're just on the feeder
road a couple of times. But the one thing I
will say, Cargil, the one issue with this setup that
is hilariously never addressed, almost defiantly never addressed, is that
the hotel looks like it was closed in nineteen oh eight.

(38:50):
Andrew Tully walks around looking like a dry goods clerk
from the eighteen fifties, and we see when we see
him it looks like he drove a horse and buggy
and died of consumption. Nope, they say in the film
he killed himself in nineteen eighty nine. That hotel is
one hundred years behind reality.

Speaker 2 (39:06):
Somehow, I don't think you. I mean, I think in
your youth, your memory of the eighties is more the
Hollywood version of the eighties instead of how people in
the sticks still dressed in the eighties.

Speaker 1 (39:21):
He has an oil painting of his daughter that must
have been painted in nineteen seventy five.

Speaker 4 (39:26):
Was it painted by Vincent Van Gogo? Buy yourself a Polaroid?
Come on, Cargil, I buy it.

Speaker 1 (39:32):
When you consider the construction of that hotel, the way
it looks, it's interior esthetic, the way he's dressed it.

Speaker 4 (39:37):
Only the only way this makes sense is.

Speaker 1 (39:39):
That if this hotel was built exclusively for a live
Elvira TV event.

Speaker 2 (39:44):
I mean, gee, Brian, I thought you know we both
like this series. I guess you don't. No.

Speaker 1 (39:49):
This is the thing that I like about these movies
is they don't give a fly and fuck if it
doesn't make sense, They're going to double and triple down
on this shit. And I love that about these movies.
All I'm saying is a building that looks like it
was shutter during the Hoover administration shut down just before
the release of Tango and Cash.

Speaker 2 (40:07):
One of the things I love about this this series
is how many times characters large march at the movie
Oh yeah, where it's they were not they were dead
the whole time. They pulled that in the second movie,
and it's so good, very good, And I'm a big

(40:28):
I'm a big fan of that, like they were never here,
they died ten years ago tonight when and in this
movie they do that, and we watch a character who
we've been interviewing get brutally murdered before they were interviewed,
and it's so fucking well done, dude.

Speaker 1 (40:46):
In the second one, Andrew Tully apparently one of his
powers given to him by Satan was to go on
Good Morning America.

Speaker 2 (40:54):
No, not even good Morning America, good morning local news cast.

Speaker 1 (40:59):
Wake up Albert or Kirky, whatever. The point is, He's
on a morning talk show and no one knows it's
Andrew Tully for Fox.

Speaker 2 (41:05):
Here, Wake up Muskegan, Hey you, Albany, Good morning to
our twelve viewers in the area. We're interviewing three people
about these strange happenings at the Abaden Hotel. I'm kidder.
That's Abaddon. I'm sorry. Nobody knows how it's pronounced. I

(41:26):
do find I from the beginning. I've always found it
funny that they call it Abadon. Depending on which part
of the world you're in. It's pronounced very differently, and
almost is like COVID levels of people arguing over how
that goes.

Speaker 4 (41:40):
Someone take my soda out of the icebox, so it
doesn't freeze.

Speaker 2 (41:43):
No.

Speaker 1 (41:43):
The thing is, I know I pronounced it pop my
pop out of the freezer, so it doesn't fuh is
I know I pronounce it Abadon because there was literally
a wrestler in aw who was like this weird devil
chick and her name was Abadon, So I just went there.

Speaker 4 (41:57):
That's also how they say it in the movie, so
I just kind of rolled with it.

Speaker 2 (41:59):
It's also the name of one of the lead villains
in Warhammer forty k and the Brits all call him
a Baden.

Speaker 1 (42:07):
They also pronounce it aluminium. Dude, Like, we're not you
have you read how it's spelled. I'm just saying we're
not wrong. They could be wrong sometimes Cargill and that's spot.

Speaker 2 (42:18):
Oh they can. But I mean, like when you talk
about that is a biblical name, so and it comes
straight out of the Bible, which is interesting and also
my one big kind of like I don't know about
the third one is the third movie here is very
much like the third Omen movie where it's like you've
really got to buy into the the you know, not

(42:40):
like it's one of those weird things about horror in
that the minute you sit down and watch a horror movie,
all of a sudden, Christianity is real. Now you don't
have to be a Christian and you don't have to
believe in the Bible, but the idea that if there's
a demon in a movie and someone starts reading from
the Bible, that's gonna fuck with the demon, because this
shit is real. But when you get into the light

(43:01):
of the Lord and that kind of stuff, as the
third movie kind of gets into, and the redemption of
the Abadan and that kind of stuff, that is a
point where some people will check out. And I'm I'm
always kind of mixed when that happens in a movie.
And so the third one's my least favorite of the three,
but again I love all of them, so it's it's

(43:23):
differing levels of love. But I do find that interesting
that this, you know, from the get go, this entire
series has biblical roots.

Speaker 4 (43:34):
Yeah, and this is where I got to disagree.

Speaker 1 (43:36):
And I anticipate this because I've always said horror and
comedy of the two most subjective genres of film, because
the things that scare us and the things that make
us laugh are so idiosyncratic, like they're going to differ
from person to person, And I will tell you straight up,
Satanists scare the hell out of me, because that kind
of willingness to bring such unspeakable evil upon yourself denotes

(43:56):
an even greater willingness to bring an even worse evil
upon others. So I don't I guess what I'm saying is,
I don't know if I believe in God, but I
definitely believe in the devil.

Speaker 4 (44:04):
And it always makes me laugh.

Speaker 1 (44:05):
Like we've talked about this before, the protests outside William
Friedkin's The Exorcist from Christian groups, and I'm like, why
are y all protesting a movie that definitively is on
the side of God is real? And not only is
God real, but Jesus is like the number one prize
fighter who can fucking punch the devil in the face. Like,
if anything, it's a Catholic recruitment video, like what.

Speaker 4 (44:26):
Are we doing here?

Speaker 1 (44:29):
But I also love that the third one has a
little bit of a hallmark it. The ending of that
movie is a little bit hallmark in the weirdest and
I love that about Like that's what I'm saying, man,
I'm not even saying necessarily that the sequels are the
greatest horror movies ever made. When I am saying, is
they tickle me in the perfect possible places?

Speaker 2 (44:49):
Oh?

Speaker 4 (44:49):
Yeah, I like being tickled, That's all I'm saying.

Speaker 2 (44:52):
Who doesn't love being tickled? After these messages, we'll be
right back.

Speaker 4 (45:00):
Don't get that, Frank, It could be the author.

Speaker 2 (45:03):
Yeah, let it ring that.

Speaker 1 (45:07):
Hello, Baxter, It's Baxter now.

Speaker 2 (45:15):
New new meal mixed brand cat food has a variety
of four delicious flavors cats love. In fact, it's the
only cat food that tastes so good. Cats asked for
it by name again and again.

Speaker 1 (45:27):
That song, by the way, Cargo, the eerie song that
becomes a motif not only through this movie, but through
the whole series. It did sound vaguely familiar to me
as I was listening to it, And then my researcher,
Keith uncovered something that made these movies made me love
these movies even more.

Speaker 4 (45:44):
The song goes.

Speaker 2 (45:54):
Is that how it goes?

Speaker 4 (45:55):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (45:56):
That's the fucking meal mixed jingle. They slowed down and
did a minor key version of to.

Speaker 2 (46:10):
Mew yam yom yom yom yom yom yom yom yom
yaom yam, yom yo.

Speaker 4 (46:14):
It's the fucking meow mixed jingle hill is it?

Speaker 2 (46:18):
Is it like minor chord meow mix? Is that what
it is?

Speaker 4 (46:20):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (46:21):
No, they slowed it down and made it minor chord.
But if you listen to it, you will never unhear
it again for the rest of the time.

Speaker 2 (46:25):
No, no, no, you have now rooted hell House l forever. Yeah,
because you're I'm like, yes, that is hell House. That
is the theme that is now mixing Minor. Yeah, that is.

Speaker 4 (46:38):
Both starts me now mixing minor.

Speaker 2 (46:41):
Which is my favorite of his compositions.

Speaker 4 (46:43):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (46:43):
No, absolutely, That's the one Salary killed him over if
I remember correctly, But it doesn't stop that song from
being an awesome motif throughout these movies. And I'd love
that we find out in the second one, car Gill,
there's a person who breaks into the Abadon after all
the ship goes down and then he disappears.

Speaker 4 (47:00):
He has no bearing on the rest of the franchise,
but we.

Speaker 1 (47:02):
Still get a fucking explanation as to when he was
in his youth at it like I have a Christmas
video from ninety seven and he got a keyboard and
he starts playing that song, so it's like the house
was always calling him, even though he has no bearing
on anything else. This is the kind of dedication to
lore and expanded universe that I appreciate so goddamn much.

Speaker 2 (47:23):
Yeah, yeah, I mean it's that's part of the problem
that I have with it, so six and one half does.

Speaker 1 (47:30):
In the other most objective genre, cargill most subjective genre
is horror.

Speaker 4 (47:34):
The thing well, and again you.

Speaker 1 (47:36):
Think, this isn't even the stuff I do, friend, This
isn't even the stuff that scares me. This is just
the stuff that delights me about any type of genre
is when they can really go, like when they can
commit to the fucking bit oh shocking. Brian likes it
when people commit to the bit right right. That's what
this franchise is doing, and that's why I love it.
And one of the greatest bits of this whole franchise

(47:57):
is that clown mannekin.

Speaker 4 (48:00):
Holy shit, what a great design. This weird like it.

Speaker 1 (48:03):
I mean, it's obviously a guy in a suit, but
they keep like referring to it as a mannequin. It's
got this horrible white face and blood coming out of
its eyes. But it's in like this kind of black
and white classic style, like Pagliacci type of suit.

Speaker 2 (48:16):
You know what it reminds me of. Have you ever
seen that horrible, horrible image of the rusted Wendy's sign?

Speaker 4 (48:22):
Oh my god, it's like that.

Speaker 2 (48:27):
It's it's that out of hell like it is. It
is absolutely fantastic design. Like that's the thing is this
whole movie, Like they do such a great job very
early on showing cheesy effects and some cheesy stuff and
then kind of goofing on this stuff, and then when
this stuff becomes creepy, it is so fucking unnerving and effective.

(48:50):
Like it's just like there's not there's not a moment
in this movie that I dislike. Like this movie front
to back is just fucking creepy. And the other movies
also again, when they are going for it, they are
going for it, and you know, sometimes they're restrained by
their budget. I think that morning show on the second

(49:10):
movie looks a little cheap, but again you go with
it because it's like, fuck it, I'm watching a hell
house movie, Like I'm fucking in. I know they're not
trying to be real, and they're trying to do the
best they can and then whenever it's trying to be scary,
it's fucking shot beautifully. It's fucking creepy, and it's gonna
make me unsettled.

Speaker 1 (49:28):
I also buy that morning show because if you told
me that's what wake Up finger Lakes every Morning actually
looks like. Like, if there was a show called Wake
Up finger Lakes that actually looks like that, I'd buy
it one thousand percent.

Speaker 2 (49:38):
Wake Up finger Lakes sounds like one of those creepy
movies a friend recommends that you absolutely will not watch.

Speaker 1 (49:43):
It sounds like when you're in incognito mode, it's one
of the tabs you have open.

Speaker 2 (49:47):
You know, exactly.

Speaker 4 (49:51):
Commit to the bit.

Speaker 2 (49:52):
Yeah, I commit to the bit.

Speaker 1 (49:55):
I love the bits with this clown where they realize
that you don't have to throw things at the camera.
In fact, in the first movie the Clown, you never
actually see the clown walk. The clown is just repositioned,
and it's so fucking scary when it that shot where
the guy is, you know, he's walking through with the
camera and he sees the clown his position so it's
looking down the basement stairs, so his camera looks down
the basement stairs and he pans back and.

Speaker 4 (50:16):
All they did was turn its head. All they fucking
did was turn the clown's head.

Speaker 2 (50:20):
And it's far moment of the movie.

Speaker 4 (50:22):
It's horrifying, that's all they did.

Speaker 1 (50:24):
Like, I love the restraint in this movie, even as
the shit is hitting the fan, Like there is so
much stillness utilized. There is so much, Like there's a
great shot of one of the one of the U
workers who may or may not be possessed, who's been
in bed all day, is suddenly as you're following the
tour group, you just see.

Speaker 4 (50:41):
Him sitting off to the side.

Speaker 1 (50:43):
He wasn't supposed to be there, but all of a sudden,
he's just sitting off to the side, So you know
something is wrong. Like it's just like little things like
that where they utilize stillness. It is is so superb
Like they really do understand how to structure a scare.

Speaker 2 (50:56):
Also, one of the biggest problems with almost any found
footage movie that has a flaw is that it's characters
are fucking annoying. Sure, and this series doesn't suffer from
that problem.

Speaker 4 (51:10):
I would agree with that.

Speaker 2 (51:12):
The characters always make sense even if they're obnoxious, they're interesting,
like in this movie, there's a guy who's just fucking
horny and he just is bummed because there's no one
to hit on and literally has a thing where he's like, well,
there's only one woman up here, and well my boy
ain't sharing, and it's like, well, that's a gross way
to talk about your coworker, dude, your friend, Like Jesus

(51:35):
Christ is like, well, we've got some actors coming tomorrow,
so hopefully some of them are hot, and then of
course he starts zooming in on one of them and
you're like, oh, this guy's so creepy. But it's it's
we're we're distracted by this guy's character development while they
are building and introducing us to this major character who's

(51:55):
going to be important in the movie, and that that
the cameras, the camera's viewing of her and the way
the camera's going to treat her over the course of
the movie is now built into this character. So it
all makes sense, like why is the camera point in
this way because the camera man's a fucking horn dog
and you know, and is you know, literally getting footage

(52:19):
for the spank Bank like that is like you get
that and it grosses you out on that level from
a character perspective, but also he works as a character
and it translates you don't like him, but it allows
you to be scared for him and the other people
that are in frame that he's shooting. And it's very

(52:39):
realistic and there's nobody screaming unnecessarily and there's no like
obnoxious character running their mouth off all the time, and
you know, just getting on your nerves, Like it's always
the proper amount of character building and friends being friends
and then yelling at each other like why did you

(52:59):
fuck that? I don't know what you're talking about, Yes,
you did. You always fucking do this. You're always trying
to do like, don't fucking lie to me, Like you
buy that because you've already seen them like pulling pranks
on one another. So it all really functions well and
uh uh and and hits just right and it he
like that's what I love about this series. It fully

(53:23):
avoids all the other trappings of these types of films,
and I think it really, really, really fucking works.

Speaker 1 (53:31):
I love you know, Stephen Cognetti is definitely the person
shepherding this thing from birth, and you need somebody when
you're building a cinematic universe. You need somebody to really
care about crafting these things. I mean, Cognetti is again
they're from the inception, but I mean you have somebody
like a Kevin Feige or a Justin Lynn, like people
who are like, I'm going to create, I'm going to
build this out, I'm going to care about all these elements.

(53:52):
And yeah, it may go to some weird places, it
may go to some silly places, but there is a care,
there is a dedication to that that I appreciate. Apparently
Cognetti went to an abandoned house in Rockland Lake, New
York in twenty twelve and then started writing this and
he actually shot the movie at a real haunted house
attraction in Pennsylvania called The Haunting at the Waldorf Hotel.

(54:14):
So it's like he's he's so invested in making a
haunted house found footage movie that he goes to a
haunted attraction so that it will feel more haunted.

Speaker 4 (54:22):
Like I do appreciate that. And the sequels, Man, the.

Speaker 1 (54:26):
Sequels are just like the second movie, we're gonna try
and figure out what happened to the investigator investigating what
happened in two thousand and nine, and then the third
movie is there's another guy and this is this is
pursuant to what you're talking about. Character Cargan, I'm falling,
not falling into the character traps, the character tropes, even
of found footage. Is that in the third movie, we're
introduced to a character who feels like you are supposed

(54:46):
to hate, who feels like he is going to be
a paint by numbers tech pro douchebag. And the way
that they adjust that so that you're not just going
along with a cook key cutter type character is so
inspired and so weird at the same time that like,
and then you know, so that's the third and then

(55:07):
by the fourth movie, it's like the first three movies
basically functioned as a complete trilogy, and then the fourth
one is we're going to explain to you kind of
where one part of the abadon relationships and one of
Andrew Tully's like chief enforcer guys, like how that came
to be, Like again, not something we desperately need, but
I'll be damned if I don't appreciate taking that journey.

Speaker 2 (55:30):
Yeah, yeah, And this is a true story, Scott. You
guys have heard part of this story at some point
or another. If you've heard any interviews with me about Sinister,
but the night that I pitched Scott Sinister, I talk
about how he pitched me a movie, and the movie
he pitched me was kind of hell House LLC. He

(55:52):
pitched me a movie about a setting up a haunted
house in a place that actually was haunted and that
we are seeing the found footage from the people going through,
because that was part of the gimmick, was that you
would get a you'd get video at the end of
your experience going through, and that that was the part
of the whole thing, and that we would we would

(56:13):
experience that, and so we kept that in our back
pocket for a long time as we should make that
movie someday. The minute we saw this movie, we said,
there's no need. They already made the best version of
that movie. Like that's what I am saying is hell
House LC made a movie so good. Me and Scott went, yep, work,
here is done. We don't have to touch this. This

(56:34):
is already this is already tread ground, and this is
the best anyone's going to do with this idea. It
can't be improved upon. That's how I legitimately feel about
this movie. I'm looking at it on IMDb. I'm seeing
that it's got a six point four. I think that
is soft. That number is very soft, And anyone who
gave it a lower rating is just playing wrong. And
you're allowed to be wrong in this world. We know this,

(56:55):
but they are.

Speaker 4 (56:56):
We've been doing it for eleven years.

Speaker 1 (56:58):
Look, I know I've been comparing this forranchise to things
like the Marvel Cinematic Universe and Fast and the Furious.
But there's something advantageous about the fact that this movie,
you know, it played at Tell Your Ride, the Tell
You Ride Horror Film Festival, and then it was on Shutter.
It never the first movie never got a wide theatrical release.
It was never a you know, a household name. There

(57:18):
is something about stumbling across this movie that lends itself
to the reality that they're trying to build within the
world of the movie. Like there's something about finding this
movie that feels like.

Speaker 4 (57:30):
Wait a minute, could this be real?

Speaker 1 (57:32):
It really reminds me of there was this weird YouTube
series many years ago called Marble Hornets.

Speaker 4 (57:40):
Do you remember this?

Speaker 2 (57:41):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (57:41):
It was like the whole premise was and again I
stumbled across it. I didn't know anything about it. I
stumbled across it. It's like multiple dozens and dozens and
dozens of short videos about a guy trying to find
an old buddy of his who was making a student
film and then disappeared and he left him all his tapes,
and as he goes through the tapes, it turns out
something was happening in the woods where he was filming
and it's started to infect him. Anyway, it feels very

(58:02):
much like that where it's just like, I feel like
this is something I'm not supposed to necessarily be watching,
and it's just like, what is this Like? As you
delve deeper into you do get that weirded out sort
of like wait a minute, what what's going on? That
lends itself to establishing it, you know, the reality of course,
what we're buying into, but it helps us buy into
that reality because on a certain level we're not sure

(58:24):
what the fuck is going on because this thing seems
to have come out of nowhere. So I guess in
a lot of ways, you know, again, owing to the
scrappy nature of this franchise, the fact that it's not
necessarily a household name is actually of benefit, so will
be interesting to see when they release the fifth one
in theaters, which is called hell House LLC Colon Lineage
that's again coming out this month. If audiences are like,

(58:46):
are they going to be totally lost because they're coming
in at part five? Is it gonna make them go
back and watch all these Are they gonna feel like
they've stumbled across something like?

Speaker 4 (58:52):
It'll be really interesting to see the audience reaction.

Speaker 2 (58:55):
Yeah. No. But also because this was one of those
scrap be you know, do it your DIY franchises, it
has built up a legitimate fan base of people like
us who are just like, we're all in, Like, you know,
because we've never had the advertising on this force down

(59:15):
our throat. We've never had that moment of like, oh man,
they made a fourth Helluse movie. It's like, oh, another
hell House movie is online, let's watch it, you know.
I remember the fourth one in particular, third and fourth
one I found out in advance and night they dropped
me and just sat down and watched them together, like
we've been excited for this franchise. And don't let my

(59:37):
my disparaging comments if you have not gone through the
others turn you off to them. I just personally, I
think this guy is so talented. I think that he
is spending too much time trying to make the lower
work when I just want to watch him spook me out,
Like he's just really fucking good at this in a
way that I don't think there's another direct you're doing

(01:00:00):
found footage like this to this level. You know, I
think everything in Hell House HELLLC run circles around everything,
or in Pelly Did. I don't think there's a paranormal
activity that is as scary as Hell House LLC. I
have other favorites that are favorites in my own way,

(01:00:22):
and in fact, that's my question for you, Brian, what's
your favorite found footage movie that's not a Hellhouse LLC,
that especially an underrated one.

Speaker 1 (01:00:32):
Well, I think we covered a really good one on
this show Behind the Mask, The Rise of Leslie Vernon.

Speaker 2 (01:00:37):
Yeah, yeah, that's a great one.

Speaker 1 (01:00:39):
I think that's my favorite outside of you know, Hell
House LLC. Again, I think the first two paranormal activity
movies hold up, but I will say that they they
lose something in not being a theatrical experience, whereas Hell
House LLC almost gains something in you watching it at
home in the Dark.

Speaker 4 (01:00:56):
Do you know what I mean?

Speaker 2 (01:00:57):
Yeah? I love Afflicted.

Speaker 4 (01:01:01):
Okay, yeah, a.

Speaker 2 (01:01:02):
Movie that CBS Films just bungled, which CBF's Films doesn't
exist anymore. But if you've never seen Afflicted, that's that's
a future episode, which is another great underrated uh found
footage movie.

Speaker 1 (01:01:16):
What is the one? Oh my gosh, I cannot believe it.
It's it's the British one that was on TV that
was made Ghostwatch ghost Watch apps fuck it.

Speaker 2 (01:01:26):
Which finally, finally, like within the last year year and
a half, has has an official release over here. You
had to watch bootlegs for years and I did. I
am not a bootleg guy, but they refuse to release
it over here. Ghost Watch is now available. If you've
never watched ghost Watch, Holy shit. They just they wore
the worlds that shit and freaked people the fuck out.

(01:01:49):
They quite literally made this cool, very creepy, brilliantly put
together hour of television that pretended to be real television
with real BBC hosts from the time, and it was
all fiction. And there was like one little warning at
the beginning, and if you didn't catch that warning, you

(01:02:12):
thought you were watching a real paranormal show. And they
freaked Britain out in nineteen eighty nine, and it has
been a favorite over in the UK ever since. And
it finally has an official release over here. Watch ghost Watch,
Dear God. Is it great? Watch it get creeped out,
then go back and watch it again and notice all

(01:02:32):
the weird shit they put in the background of that movie.
It is very much like hel House Dude.

Speaker 1 (01:02:37):
The original Wreck. The Spanish Wreck is oh yeah, phenomenal.
The VHS movies definitely satisfy.

Speaker 4 (01:02:44):
This just a couple of USHESS movies. What is those?

Speaker 2 (01:02:48):
Oh yeah, no, there's definitely not a great one called
VHS eighty five.

Speaker 1 (01:02:52):
That one's okay. Look this just a couple of years ago,
the post drum My Wall though I'm right next to
flashcrdon a few years just a couple of years ago.
Late Night with the Devil.

Speaker 2 (01:03:04):
Oh yeah, I have problems with that one. Love it,
love it. My only problem is that it starts off
with one of those The following is footage you found
in like it breaks its format in the last fifteen
minutes and had it not been had that thing. I
just don't think it needed that thing at the beginning. Again,
going back to the Hey, we know we're watching and

(01:03:26):
when it steps outside of the format, it's fucking art.
You're allowed to do that, but don't tell us these
are tapes you found and this is the original broadcast.
And then show us go into a character's mind in
the last fifteen minutes, like, let's enjoy the art and
let it be art.

Speaker 1 (01:03:42):
Oh, Cargo, I actually have an update here. We now
have the official pronunciation of the hotel, thanks to musician
David Gray. It's actually pronounced ab a down. Oh, dear God,
You're welcome.

Speaker 2 (01:03:59):
You know, Ryan, your beautiful, Yeah, ye, beautiful, beautiful. It
is true.

Speaker 4 (01:04:06):
I saw her in a haunted house. She was with them,
the clown.

Speaker 2 (01:04:13):
I wonder if you really not high, really high?

Speaker 4 (01:04:16):
What are we doing? What has this show become?

Speaker 2 (01:04:20):
What? What has this show become?

Speaker 4 (01:04:24):
My sweetes is friend.

Speaker 1 (01:04:26):
You want to talk about diminishing returns this junk food
cinema for sure, and that.

Speaker 4 (01:04:31):
Brings us to the junk food parigan for this one.

Speaker 1 (01:04:33):
Car Gil I went with candy corn because, much like
Found Footage, I recognize that candy corn is an acquired
taste and not for everyone. But also like Found footage,
I love candy corn. And I crave it more around
this time of year. So trick or treat monster lovers,
cram that sweet sweet shit in my pillowcase.

Speaker 2 (01:04:52):
I would have this with a cronut.

Speaker 4 (01:04:54):
A cronut, Okay, go cronut?

Speaker 2 (01:04:57):
Uh? And this this is very deep lore. But for
those of you from New York City, you know that
the cronat was so popular for a while.

Speaker 4 (01:05:05):
How popular was it?

Speaker 2 (01:05:06):
It was so popular that people lined up around the
block waiting to get themselves a cronut, the same way
that it was described that while Hellhouse was in New
York City, people were lined up to get into their hellhouses.

Speaker 4 (01:05:22):
I love this.

Speaker 2 (01:05:23):
So this is a food that people lined up for
for an event that supposedly people lined up for that
was a movie that was not released in theaters and
that you did not have to wait in length.

Speaker 4 (01:05:35):
Now, Cargo, was it so hard to commit to that bit?
Because you did a masterful job of that.

Speaker 2 (01:05:39):
Come on, what bit fair? As my friend Dave says,
it's not a bit, except that it's always a bit
until it's.

Speaker 1 (01:05:50):
Not, until it's not, And it's always a bit on
junk Fitzinham until it's not, and then it is again.
Thank you so much for joining us here on the
Halloween spirit, and thanks to Lieutenant and Mega Force Jason
for requesting Hellhouse l See. I don't just recommend that
you watch this on shutter. I recommend you binge all
of the movies in preparationally.

Speaker 4 (01:06:04):
Yeah, for the.

Speaker 1 (01:06:05):
Fifth movie coming out, and then every time it's it's
the Halloween season. I recommend you rebinge it because that
is what I do and I have never let down. Also,
most of these movies are about eighty eighty five minutes,
so it's not hard to binge the whole franchise in
a day.

Speaker 2 (01:06:17):
And I personally, I don't think you should binge it
in a day. I think you should binge it in
a week. I think you start on Monday and you
do the first one, and then you go all the
way through, and then on the fifth day you go
and see the fifth one in the theater.

Speaker 1 (01:06:31):
That's you know what. I don't disagree with this. I
think that's a great plan and I'm excited to be
a part of it. Cargo, please tell people where they
can find you on the interwebs.

Speaker 2 (01:06:39):
You can find me on Blue Sky. It's Rubbercargill dot
Blue skide Out Social. You can find my latest movie,
The Gorge streaming on Apple Plus. You can find my
next movie in theaters very shortly. It is about to
play at Fantastic Fest. It's gonna play at a festival
maybe near you. We're gonna be in Sydney. We're gonna
be in Sitches, We're gonna be in Beyond Fest.

Speaker 4 (01:06:59):
What's it called again?

Speaker 2 (01:07:01):
Black Phone two, Bigger and Blacker. They shot that one down.
I don't know why. I think you know, it's a
great subtitle for that film. But black Phone Too. We
dropped the the So that is the ashtag black Phone two.
We dropped the the That comes out October seventeenth. You

(01:07:22):
can find my latest novella wherever you get your wherever
you were, Actually no, you cannot. You find my latest
novella from Subtrainan Press. You can find my appearances in
the in two books, Hunted Reels two and End of
the World as We Know It wherever you get your books.
And my latest novella, All the Ashley Behind, is coming

(01:07:42):
in audio form from Simon and Schuster any day now.
So that's all the shit that's out there right now.
So that's where you can find me.

Speaker 4 (01:07:50):
Stuff that in your pillow case.

Speaker 1 (01:07:51):
So before we wrap up, I just want to throw
a special shout out to Found Footage three D, which
is a found footage movie produced by our good friend
Scott Weinberg. Yes, just make sure that got mentioned on
the list as well. Go check that one out.

Speaker 2 (01:08:02):
That's a great one that has that has my favorite
trope of of the old gas station guys. That has
my the bit from that film lives rent free in
my head.

Speaker 1 (01:08:12):
I love it phenomenal and I'm gonna go ahead and
wrap this up. I'm here every week playing the piano
in the parlor of the Abadon Hotel. And always remember
during the Halloween season, our hell house is your hell house.

Speaker 4 (01:08:25):
Make yourself it off. There's only something that happened