July 18, 2025 • 59 mins
Martin and Gretchen watch one of the best revenge movies made in the last few decades. Blue Ruin is perfect execution of a film. Especially on the tiny budget they had. Perfect story. Excellent twists. The pacing is superb. It is the perfect movie without all the side plots and lost threads. It's everything a movie should be in the thriller genre. We hope you enjoy!
Martin and Gretchen talk movies and more at Check the Gate.
Martin and Gretchen talk movies and more at Check the Gate.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
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Speaker 2 (00:56):
Clearly, he was like, what the fuck did I just do?
Speaker 1 (00:59):
And there was no plan? Like, what do you do
when it's done? What do you do when you no?
I did it? Why? What the fuck do I do? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (01:06):
And he completely like shaves his beard off and like
goes to seek out help. Hey Martin, Hey Gretchen, welcome back.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
I am so happy to be back.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
This is our last episode in this studio.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
Space it is. We're about to lose our home. This
is the last last episode in the Propulsion Zone studio.
We're looking for a new home.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
But it's also your episode.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
Pick it is we get to finish on a high note, right.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
But first, welcome to another episode of check the Gate
podcast where we talk about films and kind of see
where the discussion takes us.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
It's perfect. Yeah, so I'm excited. I think you had
not seen this film before.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
I've never seen this film before, so I love it. One.
It's a new one for me.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
I love it when it's a new one for you
and it doesn't go bad.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Oh.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Yeah, so I love this film. We watched the Jeremy
Salmier written, directed and shot film starring making Blair Blue Ruin. Yes,
this is an independent film, low budget and it's the
first one that put these folks really on the map.
(02:26):
I love it.
Speaker 2 (02:27):
Yeah, which I thought was really cool because it kind
of goes to show like an audience will pay to
see what they want to.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
Say they used to back in the day. I don't
necessarily believe it right now. I think there's been enough
burned audiences that it's really difficult to get a decent
budget to make something past a short film, and you
kind of have to have an audience installed too. They
did a feature film, barely a feature film. I think
it comes in at like seventy eight minutes, seventy six minutes.
(02:55):
They did a film that's called Murder Party Oh, which
is great, which is yeah, a great film and fantastic film,
absolutely and shot for no money with a bunch of
them all like wearing multiple hats as you do in
those kind of things, and just like cobbling their film
together as best as they could. But it was that
movie that I think sold the idea of them being
(03:16):
able to be worth funding.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
What a different tone of movies those are too, Like
oh yeah, murder Parties like kind of a comedy horror
like I mean, it's I think I remember watching that
on the film film festival circuit. I'm not certain, but
I did come to it like later and I was like, oh, oh, oh, okay,
yeah this is fun. And then I had I just
(03:41):
honestly had forgotten that they had done that film until
you brought it up, because I'm.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
Like, oh, oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
What a weird different style of film.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
Totally, They've never made another film like Murder Party since
there more oh, most of the stuff, well, in my opinion,
most of the things that they have made are more
are similar to Blue Ruin in their tone and how
they are able to build tension and how they how
(04:11):
things are shot. Murder Party, yeah, murder You're right, Murder
Party feels like a horror comedy film and nothing else
that they've done since then as a collaborative team with
Jeremy Somier and Macin Blair, the things they've done together
have not had that same tone. But then they've worked
on other projects separate from each other since that as well. Yeah,
(04:33):
so yeah, I'm excited to dig into this film.
Speaker 2 (04:36):
And this film doesn't have like a huge star power.
I think the most powerful star in it is played
by the what He plays the character of Teddy right,
and he's like the older brother in Home Alone, he
plays like the mean older brother.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
Oh yes, yes, yeah, that's like.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
Yeah, like celebrity in this film.
Speaker 1 (04:56):
I think I'm yeah, the guy who plays the older
brother in Home Alone and the Home Alone movies. Yeah,
he's a friend of one of our characters in this
that has and so a great character part. Yeah, very recognizable.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
But yes, I think that was the only thing that
stood out for me was I was like, is it that?
What is it? The I can't remember the character's name
and Home Alone, but he had like the yeah, his
picture of his girlfriend and he was like.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
Who he was the one too, like had the weird
counting thing. It's like a this is a thing and
two this is and D And it was like, man,
we can see where this kid's going in this film.
Christopher Columbus given us the public education jokes right out
from the beginning. Oh boy, Yeah, but that's a different episode.
(05:51):
We'll get back to Blue Ruin. Yeah, we did not
watch this film together. Gretchen and I watched this film
separately just because of timing, and I watched it last night.
But I've seen this film probably about a dozen times.
Speaker 2 (06:05):
Yeah, I've been busy. We were. We did some stuff
at the Portland Horror Film Festival, so we were. Yeah,
we kept ourselves pretty busy. So getting the time to
pack in movies is sometimes a little hard.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
We did. Yeah, it's and it has been kind of
crazy with things well because it was we got our
Legion time in for our previous episode, so that was
kind of important to be able to get Legion to
land well for us, and so yeah, it just didn't
work out that we but we did get Oh man,
I just I love this film so much. This film
is so my This is like Dinner in America for me.
(06:40):
These are both lower budget indie films. I don't remember
what the budget was on Dinner in America, but they're
they're they like I watched them. These are the films
that make me remember why I became a filmmaker myself
and why I want to make films. And they're the
films that give me hope of being able to find
(07:03):
just enough budget and the right people to be able
to execute something that is well done, that shows that
we're good at what we're doing, that we're excited about
what we're doing, and audiences react to that as well. Yes,
so that's I love these movies for that.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
This movie is an interesting take on the revenge scenario. Yeah,
because I found that, like oftentimes when we see a
revenge scenario film, it's I we see what happens, what
causes it, the cause and effect, those dualities of it.
(07:44):
Like whereas this we're very far into what has already happened,
and we are we were like are that's I thought
that was an interesting way to kind of like like
we're in it immediately. It's hit the ground running, the
story has already already happened, and we're catching up as
(08:05):
an audience member finding out like what's happening in real
time for us.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Yeah, I love those I love all of that because
there's never really no flashbacks. There's no flashbacks, and there's
no exposition dumps exactly either. In fact, in a lot
of ways, this movie it's a little bit of a
slow boil. It builds a lot of incredible tension. It's
very intentional, but it's kind of a quiet film.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Very and thoughtful. And yes, that was kind of what
struck me at the very beginning. Is like the opening
scene is like this homeless guy going to a like
walking into a like a like taking a.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Shower, and yeah, he broke into a home and was
in the bathtub.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
And I thought that was really strange, Like how I
was like, he's not like taking anything, he just took
a shower or took a bath and then hops out,
and then is goes to the boardwalk and is digging
for food, and we just kind of see like it's
very quiet. There's nothing, like there's no like extreme sound
(09:11):
happening other than like ambient noises. Because he realizes the
person's coming home, and then he jumps out of the
bathtub and like runs out the window. But he's like
he seems to be doing no harm.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Yeah, he's a quiet, homeless person for some reason. Yeah,
who just seems to be trying to figure out how
to get by without imposing on anyone, right, And he's.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
Not asking for he doesn't seem to be like busking
or asking for money from anybody or anything like that.
He's just kind of what.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Can I glean off of society and not have anyone
notice and be able or notice me.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
Yeah, that's the other thing. Yeah, it's like it becomes
really clear quickly that this person is trying to disappear.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Mm hmm. It's true. But we do find out after
this first kind of ten minutes of really beautiful setup
with just watching our person exist in this world. Once
we've had that our introduction to everything that's gonna happen,
and I guess this is our the notice of our incident. Well,
(10:13):
he doesn't so much get arrested as a police officer
who knows who he is. They know him by name,
and they come by and they're like, Hey, we just
need to talk to you. Can you just come in
with us.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
I kept expecting that to go terribly ry, right, Like,
I kept expecting him to be losing, losing, like going unhinged,
like immediately when he was like, am I in trouble
and they're like, you're not in trouble, darling.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
Right, we just wanted you to be in a safe
place while we gave you the news.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
What is happening? Yeah, that drew me in immediately.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
Yeah, it's it's such a wonderful setup because it's not
it's it's not painting any particular person or system or
anything like that as a bad guy or or something like.
I think it could have been so easy to go
a different direction, but everything is. It's there's there's a
(11:05):
there's a gentleness to a lot of aspects to this
that are really beautiful, and I think that plays well
when you start finding out the gruesome aspects and as
the gruesome scenes play out. That delicateness that is kind
of there that builds that early foundation for the story
(11:27):
really allows this story to, like, to me, really hit.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
He's never portrayed in a menacing fashion, right, even when
things start to escalate. Yeah, we we always kind of
see him as this like he's just kind of a
gentle spirit that our gentle person that had an unfortunate
series of events take place.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
Yeah, yeah, he's he is never the one liner revenge character.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
That's why I'm saying this feels like I'm not a
big on revenge. I mean, like obviously I liked like
high Planes, Drifter, and uh.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
I'm not big on revenge. But let me list all of.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
These I watched, but like I liked, I like Buster,
like or a you know, like a taking a trope
that would normally be macho power power move type thing.
This is the same director as a Green.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
Room, right, yes have you seen green Rooms?
Speaker 2 (12:32):
Oh? Yes? And again this is.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
That the intensity of that fat.
Speaker 2 (12:38):
Coloration is also in this that I and this I
know it is like like almost a decade before right.
Speaker 1 (12:47):
Uh, between between tea blue Room and between blue Room
or Blue Room and green Room is like four or
five years.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Oh I thought they were like I thought they were
like ten.
Speaker 1 (12:57):
Years apart or no, no, huh.
Speaker 2 (12:59):
But this film is such there you can tell that
this these directors and are getting like destructor is getting
like amp and up because once we get to green Room,
it's like he is like masterful, oh man I and
this is like there was there was examples of things
and it's hard for me to remember. I like it,
(13:20):
keep thinking back to like Murder Party and I'm like, wow,
what a different. But again, his filmmaking is like you
can see that escalation in his work, like until it
gets to like you know, doing green Room and whatnot.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
Yeah, have you seen Hold the Dark?
Speaker 2 (13:37):
No? I haven't.
Speaker 1 (13:38):
That was a so he's got a couple of uh so.
Jeremy Solmier directed a couple of episodes of season three
of I believe it was season three of True Detective,
but then did a feature film called Hold the Dark
on Netflix. And then there is another Netflix feature I
haven't seen yet. I didn't actually realize it was out,
(14:00):
but it's I think it's called Patriot Ridge or something
like that. So I have to go and find that
that most recent one.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
It's the third season of True Detective.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
That one was a good one. That was that came
back around from where the second season kind of didn't
do it. But yeah, but Hold the Dark, So when
you're talking about that progression, Green Room is such a horrifying,
intense film, but it's kind of like a slow boil
that ends up having these peaks like it's just it
(14:30):
has these really great characters, this intensity, and then all
of a sudden, it's like, holy crap, like we've just
hit this spike and it's just it's and some of
the most terrible things happen that you don't actually see.
You see him reacting to it if you. I'm thinking
of the arm through the Door with Anton Yelcher and
Hold the Dark is and Jeffrey Wright is in that
(14:51):
who I adore Jeffrey right, And again this intensity of
a scene and this build up. There's a shootout scene
and Hold the Dark that goes on for a long time.
It's a long and I think in anybody else's hands
it would not have been very good, and it would
have been like a lot of shooting and bullets and stuff.
But he creates this intensity where he is with this
(15:15):
sheriff's department that is coming in and one guy holds
them off and he's picking them off one at a
time outside of his cabin and it is so gruesome
and so intense, and it's and it's takes a it
takes a while to go and do it, but he
it's so masterful and the whole time, like I thought
(15:37):
I was gonna chew my tongue off watching it because
the just the intensity of the scene is so much.
It's such a good film.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
I can see where while we get to that point,
I haven't seen that yet.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
So I'll have to check it out, oh man.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
Because I have to say the there are the quietness
of this film, the intentional build up that we have
that is it's not tension building. It's more like not
and I hate to say disarming, but it's kind of
(16:10):
close to being disarming in a way because this guy
is such a gentle person and you feel like he
even has this like the actor they pick is that.
Speaker 1 (16:23):
You're making Blair.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
He has such a soft like he's such a doe fella.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
Right, Yeah, well he's he's not like a macho No,
it's not like former Marines.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
He's like he was as a very like beta guy,
like very seming, and like he has these big brown
eyes and he has like this just kind of like
kind of a baby face, and so you don't see it,
but when we first see him, he's got like this
big beard. When he shaped his face, I'd say, it
was like I was like, wait, is this the same actor?
(16:59):
Like like it took me a second to figure that
out because I was like, wait, wait, wait, do we
have another character? But yeah, I am, I am, I am.
I really enjoyed this. There was one scene that really
or the very there's a after the conversation he has
with the police officer, and we can get back to that,
(17:20):
but there's as far as filmmaking and cinematography, there is
this forest scene as we're driving into the woods and
it's like the fall, like the fog is rolling in.
This has such a dreamy quality that it almost feels
like we're this is where And this is also part
of the story where the story starts to change, the
(17:42):
arc is changing, and so it's almost like perfect an
idea of like a transition like where like a separation
of self that's happening that he is out of his
body kind of self. But yeah, what leads us.
Speaker 1 (17:58):
To that, well, well, so this I want to kind
of like set the landscape of what this film is
kind of about, because we've got Mac and Blair, as
you had said, is homeless, and he essentially gets the
news that a person is being let out of jail.
Wade Cleveland Junior is the is the character. So this
(18:20):
person is getting let out of jail and people are
wanting to, you know, kind of let him know this
is happening. Now, we don't really directly know in the
beginning what all has happened, but we see him there
at the release of this person getting out of prison,
we see him kind of stalking them a little bit.
And what it ends up coming out to be is
(18:40):
that Wade Junior had been accused and convicted of murdering
both of his parents.
Speaker 2 (18:49):
Right and gruesome. They said it was a very ugly way.
Speaker 1 (18:55):
Yeah, I believe they were both shot and then left
on train tracks, yes, and so but again, what we
have is a very heartbroken person who kind of doesn't
probably have anything to live for since the death of
his parents that way, and it's never been satisfying that
this person was convicted and now they're getting out for
(19:15):
whatever reason they're they're being released from prison. So we
we start out with Dwight kind of stalking this person.
I say stalking, like, you know, following them around. I
don't know that Dwight he's stalking him, but I don't
think he actually he doesn't have a plan. We're not
dealing with somebody that's like, I'm here for the revenge.
You don't know.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
There's no macho bravado like male power, fantasy.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
Driven like he's in a daze, he's.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
Out of himself. Yeah, And that was one of the
things that I mean, not to draw comparison, but to
draw comparison to revenge films in general. That often times,
the one thing that both this movie and Promising Young
Woman share in them is that our main characters are
(20:10):
broken and are have nothing that they have anything to
live for at this point, like it, but Promising Young
Woman she actually had things to live for, but you
know was whatever that was. And then whereas this is
like he has no car and he lives out of
his car. But I had to look up why this
(20:33):
film was called Blue Ruin, and it's based off of
the name of like like a gin, like a or
like a like what happens to you after you become
an alcoholic or something like that. Is that what it?
Speaker 1 (20:45):
Well, it's also it's also a reference to something that's
like being completely bungled or bumbled, like everything is not
working out, so you're just in blue ruin with this.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
Oh like the term like it's all blue Monday's from here.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
It's that kind of similar. None of this is working out,
I'm just bungling one thing after.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
A Gin reference and I was like, I'm confused. Yeah, yeah,
but yeah, it's a there. That was the only thing
that I was like that I thought was interesting as
far as like that was like the promising young woman
and that we have these main protagonists that are damaged
(21:24):
and they but whereas she was able to commit a
seem continuing act of like revenge, his revenge was I
came in the form of opportunistic Like. It wasn't that
he was plotting it, that he was like waiting for
this moment. It was he is broken. They informed him
(21:47):
that this is happening, and he's like taking the opportunity
to figure out what what is next move is going
to be?
Speaker 1 (21:54):
Yeah, and yeah, essentially he's placing himself in this situation
without any kind of a real plan. And I love
that comparison because in promising young woman, she has a
lot to live for, she has friends and a family structure.
There is something there. She's choosing to exact her revenge
on the male culture, and that's the most strategically planned
(22:17):
part of her life. Everything else is how am I
just like paying the rent and hanging out and participating
in society in some way, Whereas Dwight in this one,
he is so grief stricken. He doesn't have a plan,
He's not in anything. He's just really he's just existing,
like you were saying, he's digging around for food, he's
picking up bottles and cants to get a little bit
(22:37):
of extra cash. He really kind of doesn't have a point.
He's just kind of pointlessly existing until he gets the
bad news that he doesn't foresee coming in that this
person is now going to get out, and the grief
is so much for him that he hasn't had a plan,
He's had no anything, and it's as if this is
the only thing that he could possibly have is how
(23:00):
do I rectify this thing? And it doesn't seem to
be anger or anything. It's almost like an attempt at
relief for the years of grief that he's.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
Had well, and then he confronts he doesn't even confront him.
It's like he goes into the bathroom. He follows Wade
to Wade Junior to a bar or whatnot, and he
goes into the bathroom and then Wade comes in and
(23:28):
he has like a small like paring knife and ends
up stabbing Wade in this stomach and then the head
like right in the temple. Gruesome, ye, like and it's
but he is so it's not like he's like a leaf.
(23:48):
He's like totally torn by this. Like this continues to
do like spiritual damage to him, and it's it's hard
because you're like, this is a bumble. Clearly he was
like what the fuck did I just do?
Speaker 1 (24:03):
And there was no plan? Like what do you do
when it's done?
Speaker 2 (24:07):
No?
Speaker 1 (24:07):
I didn't Why what the fuck do I do? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (24:10):
And he completely like shaves his beard off and like
goes to seek out help.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
He does well, But the process of getting to that
is so wonderful because part of that bungling of all
of this. There there's a little bit of a tussle
with Wade Junior he does end up prevailing because he
has he ends up having that advantage because he hits
him in the neck with the knife, but then he
stabs him, so there's kind of a little bit of
a tussle there, but Wade Junior goes down, but they're
(24:37):
like holding onto each other so that when so when
Dwight goes to leave, he's lost his keys to his
car and he can't get out. And this is one
of those beautiful things. We had talked about a little
bit of this stuff too in some of our other films,
especially in when we talked about Legion, these things that
show character and bill all the stuff. One of the
most amazing things that has always stuck with about this
(25:00):
film is after we've done all this, so we've got
the tussle and he's got the little knife and he
does a little shot in the head and all of that.
So I'm gonna go out out on lim and say,
there's almost like a little bit of a confidence boost.
Even though he doesn't have a plan, like he's trying
to put his shit together, what do I do? He
knows he's got to get out of there, so he's
getting out of there. He makes it out the back
(25:21):
and the way he came in, and he passes by
the car that the family of the family has a
family car. Here he's trying to get to his car
that's kind of down the road, and he takes that
little pairing knife and he thinks he's gonna get one
more thing in and he goes to stick it into
the tire and because there is no hilt or anything
on that, when he does it, the knife slides in
(25:44):
his hand and cuts his hand. So now his hand
is cut, which is a thing that he's having to
deal with constantly. On this he's trying to get into
his car. He doesn't have his car keys. His hand
is around yeah, he wears him around his neck and
so that got torn off. So now it's hand is cut.
He's got his blood and the other guy's blood all
over him. And the only other vehicle that he can
(26:05):
steal is the when he just put a knife into
the tire on and just this series of events happening
without having to have dialogue or explain it or anything,
is just so brilliant. It's a thought out world and
it feels so good. It's real.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
It feels like this what an actual like this kind
of scenario happened, This is what would happen.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
Absolutely, it feels I thought that was me. It was like,
of course I'm gonna be the guy who's gonna grab
that knife and try to jam it in there, thinking
like I'm gonna pop this tire. Now I would be
the guy that fucking cuts my hands.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
I would totally need too, or I would like or
somehow the knife would break off and it would stab
me or something. I mean literally that is my life. Yeah,
And I mean that was kind of this whole event,
Like this whole film is this kind of like Sissiphionian
(27:05):
like you know concept of like there's rolling the rock
up and it falls back down. We got to roll
it back up again. And then we have our livery
now by you know, eagles or whatever, and they basically
continually pushing this boulder up the hill as he draws
everybody else into his like what do I do scenario?
Speaker 1 (27:29):
It's so great. Yeah, so yeah, Dwight then goes on
the run and then the issue and so this is
why I again, I love how everything is so well
thought out and this kind of happens in the script
writing and then the film world of what happens next.
I'm sure it happens in novels or anything like this
(27:49):
when you're trying to tell stories. But and then what
what happens next?
Speaker 2 (27:54):
Remember he writes his sister, Yes, and.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
He writes his sister, but then he gets there before
or the postcard does for his sister, so.
Speaker 2 (28:02):
She doesn't know what's happened, right, And he has written
a confession essentially on this postcon Yeah.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
And it's the realization also when he does get to
her that oh, I just committed an act of revenge. Yeah,
which is when we find out that the whole reason
that their parents were murdered is an act of revenge.
And so he's committed an act of revenge. This family
(28:26):
is probably now going to have an act of revenge,
and they're probably going to try to find her because
he's left the car behind, he lost the keys. It's
still registered in her name. He hadn't changed the registration.
She has a life and kids probably could have been
found anyway, So he has set this up for her
(28:47):
life to be destroyed.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
So he feels he has to go and warn her
slash take care of her.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
Yeah, because he knows they're coming. And what a great
set of scenes, like that whole stage on that house.
Speaker 2 (29:01):
Their relationship also is, like you can tell because we
never really get much backstory on what happened after the
parents were murdered, and also we never really know how
old they were, Like I get the impression that they
were like teenagers or something when when the parents were killed.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
Probably somewhere along those lines like early twenties. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (29:29):
In school, yeah, because one of the friend makes a
reference to like, oh, you were.
Speaker 1 (29:34):
They were in high school together. Yeah, yep, they were
in high school together. So sometime at the either the
end of high school or after is kind of where
he disappears.
Speaker 2 (29:43):
Yeah, that he kind of just leaves her behind and
like loses himself, and we see the result of that
being the homeless person he was.
Speaker 1 (29:54):
He just lived in his grief. That's all he had.
Speaker 2 (29:56):
Yeah, And I mean it's just there. Her relationship obviously
feels really strained. The first thing, she asked him if
he need some money, and she's like, are you asking
me for money? And he's like no, I got to
tell you what I did. And she said She's like good,
Like she's like he kills Waite's like I killed Wade Junior.
(30:19):
She was like good yeah, and he was like, well, yeah,
you didn't get the card I sent you? No, okay,
that's boy. And also like that confession of being on
a postcard just like and she said, well, no, postcards
actually take longer than regular mayor and he was like,
oh fuck. But the she I think she even says
(30:46):
like fuck the Clevelands. And I think that's one of
those things this director does a really good job at,
is like portraying these like not good people, like the
Nazi punks and green Room, and I mean there they
feel so real, and so does his family because his
family is kind of like like criminal. As you're starting
(31:09):
to you start to get the impression that they all
have kind.
Speaker 1 (31:12):
Of a criminals.
Speaker 2 (31:13):
Yeah, yeah, that they're like they're kind of kind of
white trash like like kind of family.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
Yeah. Well, and there we kind of find this out too.
Farther along, we kind of get a lot of hints
of their gun nuts. They have their Second Amendment stuff,
so they've got guns, and we actually find out toward
the end they've got guns scattered from Hell to Breakfast
all over their place. But not only are they into
guns and shooting stuff, but they're also into killing things
(31:40):
and we hunting is yeah, so they're they're way into that.
So this is something that's very ingrained. And this is
happening somewhere in the Virginia area, like Appalachian Mountains something
like that, you know, rural aspects of of that part
of the country. So yeah, that it is a facet
(32:01):
of these folks that they are. I guess, like what
you were saying, they are white trashy Second Amendment killing stuff.
That's what you.
Speaker 2 (32:08):
Do folk, Yeah, And I mean and then when they
realize that no police are coming after him, he's like,
oh boy.
Speaker 1 (32:18):
That's right. I love that part. He's scanning the news
while he's hiding.
Speaker 2 (32:21):
Out after Hish not said anything.
Speaker 1 (32:23):
They didn't say anything about their brother being killed. They
didn't report it. Yeah, yep.
Speaker 2 (32:29):
And that's one of the things we glossed over was
like after the prison thing, he tries he takes the
limo and the limo has the young brother in there.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
And that's yeah, that's right, And I love the stuff
with the brother. Will kind of close the loop on
that too, because he does when he steals the limo
that he's that he jammed the knife into the tire
of so he's driving away with this whole thing. Turns
out he's got the young son of the of the
Cleveland family that he's just left behind. Yep, so we've
got we've got and I forget his name, but he's
(33:00):
in there and he's banging on the divider and so
uh uh Dwight finally pulls over and and the kid
gets out.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
Kids like, are you gonna kill me?
Speaker 1 (33:10):
He's like, no, no, but but I killed your uncle. Yeah,
because he killed my mom and dad.
Speaker 2 (33:16):
He was like, I don't think he did.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
I don't think he did it. And then he takes
off running.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
That was like when the seed of descent is set,
like the seed of confusion.
Speaker 1 (33:24):
Yeah, he killed my mom and dad, and I think,
he says, I don't I don't what he said. I
don't think I don't think he did her. He's like,
it's just the perfect line. Yeah, I don't think that's
how it happened, and yeah, oh yeah, And it's just
it's so good. It's just these these subtle moments where
it's just it's so good and yeah, so we've got
the showdown ends up happening with the sister and all
(33:48):
of this and and uh Dwight still just bubbled his
way through it because he had he had his uh
hand that he slashed. But then when the family starts
to close in on him at his sister's place, his
sister's taken off, he ends up taking that crossbow bolt
to the legs. So now he's shutting when they're after him.
Speaker 2 (34:11):
They were the family finds out where the sister's at,
and so they are like they kind of do a
siege on them. Yeah, and the sister wasn't there, thankfully,
because I think he was able to get her out
of the house anything like that. But yeah, then when
he did, the older brothers shoot him or whatever, one
of one of the brothers, yeah, shoot him with the
(34:32):
crossbow bolts two in the legs.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
It was very And then he decides that he's going
to do surgery on himself to remove this cross bow.
Speaker 1 (34:40):
Yeah, oh my god.
Speaker 2 (34:41):
So he goes to like the pharmacy and buys like
a like a like exact.
Speaker 1 (34:46):
Night rubbing alcohol, super glue and all of that. Yeah,
oh boy.
Speaker 2 (34:50):
Yeah, and passes out and the wheel I forgot how
he gets to the hospital though. That was my only Like,
I was like, who took him.
Speaker 1 (34:57):
Well, he passes out at the hospital. He's he's trying
to pull the arrow out, that bolt out of his
leg and he isn't able to do it, so he
gets himself to the hospital. He got Yeah, he passes
out at the counter, and then they get him in
and stable.
Speaker 2 (35:12):
That's what I was trying to remember, because I remember
he like, I was like, how did he get to
the hospital? I guess he had drove himself and then
that's when he I remember that collapsing scene.
Speaker 1 (35:21):
Now yeah, oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (35:23):
But I'm waking up and being like, what the I'm
in the hospital.
Speaker 1 (35:26):
Right, But he's got one of the brothers in the
trunk of the car, and that was the thing. Before
he got out of there, he hits one brother with
his as he's trying to get away, hits one brother,
knocks him out, yes, throws him in the trunk of
the blue Yeah that blue Pontiac. Yeah yeah, yeah, the
bullet holes in it. Yeah yeah. Oh it's so good.
(35:48):
So yeah, it's I you know this, it's so just
watching Dwight have no plan and continue to bumble through
this stuff but have all of the things that do happen.
They're just it's just again, I want to mention just
(36:09):
how I thought I've probably found sound like I'm just
like stroking the ego of this film and the folks.
But I do find it to be so well thought out.
All of these events seem to make sense. Dwight is
not dodging bullets, and he's not a gun hero. And
in fact, there's a point where I'm like, dude, what
are you doing whip into the leg and it's like,
(36:31):
of course you're gonna get shot by this. Like you
were chasing this guy around the yard. You you stole
the shotgun from the other brother. He's got a crossbow,
but he's a hunter. He knows what he's doing. You
don't know what you're doing. And you're running around in
the dark after this guy. Of course he's gonna swing
back around and be able to shoot you. You're lucky,
I mean lucky it's in the leg because that's how
they wrote it. But and that's an accurate thing too,
(36:52):
because it's hard as fuck to hit anything with this shit.
But it's just it's it's just so good because all
of these things feel like very logical progressions, and everybody
just kind of losing their mind in a heightened situation
of ship going.
Speaker 2 (37:08):
Down well and you just like and then they recruits
the help of his friend. Teddy finds who is somebody
who went to high school with, which I thought was
kind of a funny scenario. Is like he was like, man,
you look so normal. Like so I'm guessing that they
were kind of like like hashers or like stoners in
high school. Like I get the depression. He was kind
(37:28):
of like cool, they get long hair, and like Teddy
is obviously one of those people that is kind of
like he peaked in high school.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
Yeah, and Teddy's the name of the of one of
the Cleveland brothers, but it's Teddy that he has in
the trunk.
Speaker 2 (37:44):
Who's the friend Ben Ben Benny. So he gives him
like life lessons, which I thought was interesting. Like they
have this discourse about like he he's like talks about
friendship and having each other's back, and.
Speaker 1 (38:00):
I'm just like remember that time you and I and
that's Tripper. I got a picture of that.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
Yeah. Yeah, but his friend has got his back, like
he gets him a gun and he let me as
I mean, this is like again, this is one of
those dudes that are like the you've seen them. They
kind of peaked in high school and they're still like
the same kind of same kind of dude, still wearing
their you know, T shirts and whatever. I don't right, Yeah,
(38:26):
and he's a he's a gun nut or whatever, and
they he gets him all the gets him kind of
set up, yeah, because he's like, all right, here's the
scenario and tells him what happened. And he's like, they're
going to come for you, and like he's like, let
me help you.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
Yeah, And I got the one in the trunk. Yeah,
so you know, I need a gun because he'd been
trying to get a gun. So he gets a gun. Yeah,
and and the buddy says, I got this property. Drive
out to there. Here it is on the map, go
out there, and then you can take care of this.
And the thing is is Dwight's still trying to like
(39:02):
fix this. He's just like, Okay, I got my revenge.
You guys killed my parents.
Speaker 2 (39:12):
We've all had our everybody's on the same The playing
field has been loved.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
Yeah, I promise you're not going after my sister.
Speaker 2 (39:19):
That's not going to happen.
Speaker 1 (39:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (39:21):
They're like we they were like, we're gonna kill all
of them. Oh yeah, and you know that's where all
mayhem ensues.
Speaker 1 (39:30):
Yeah, and it's and the scene is so great where
Dwight gets Teddy out of the trunk. He's guys a
little flip phone. He's trying to get them, you know,
call him, tell them I'll turn myself in. Yeah, He's like,
or call the plate, Like I'm willing to just don't
go after my sister. He's still trying to. He's he's
negotiating with himself more than anyone else that this can
(39:52):
end if I just give you, you know, if I
just turned myself over, this is all going to end.
And he's he's dealing with people that he doesn't fund
them mentally understand correct and and Teddy shows him that
after he ends up being able to turn the tide.
It was like the tells the truth absolutely Yep. Teddy
is able to get the gun away from him. It's
(40:13):
a cool little trick of like here, take the take
the phone back, No, you can take it. She wants
to talk to you. And then he's able to jump
him and take the gun. And then the guy with
the gun tells the truth is so good. But right when,
right when we think that.
Speaker 2 (40:27):
Tables are turned, We think that this is this is
it for Dwight. Benny comes in with the clutch yesh
assassinates him.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
Essentially another table turns. Oh and again so well thought
out because that guy is standing there and you hear
a whip bang, so you hear the delay of the
report because Benny is a little ways away, and the
guy's like, look around because he's not quite sure what
that was, and then Pap hits him right in the face.
Floads yep.
Speaker 2 (40:55):
My favorite ones when he One of my favorite moments
was then Aft right after that, and he's all like
their packing up, the packing up Teddy's body to to
bury and he's like, he's like, what about all of
his brains and stuff? And he's like, oh, the coyotes
will take care of that.
Speaker 1 (41:11):
Yeah, yeah, harsh.
Speaker 2 (41:16):
Yeah, but he's like, you do have to drag him
off my property? Yeah, because we are in Virginia.
Speaker 1 (41:21):
Yep. I don't want any of this here, get out,
all right? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (41:26):
I mean, and no, I'm from New Orleans, like living
in New Orleans, like there was I remember a cop
saying to me, he goes, well, if you have to
shoot somebody on your property, drag him inside your house,
because then that's the only way you're going to get
away with it. He was.
Speaker 1 (41:40):
At least now you know.
Speaker 2 (41:43):
Playter, i'd eybody officer. B okay, thank you.
Speaker 1 (41:48):
Yeah. Well, and that's actually part of what Benny says too,
because Benny says, yeah, sorry, that took me a second.
I had to wait until he was pointing the gun
at You had to make it legal, yeh.
Speaker 2 (42:00):
Had to make it legal. Yeah, even though he's like
burying them off my property.
Speaker 1 (42:05):
Right, And I don't even feel that it.
Speaker 2 (42:08):
Was like that was for his own like yeah, his
own spirits, his own soul.
Speaker 1 (42:14):
Like is like that was a predator moment. You know,
you go, oh, you've got the gun you're pointing at now.
Now you're now you're at target.
Speaker 2 (42:21):
Now you're a threat.
Speaker 1 (42:22):
Yes, yes, yeah so good so yeah and that's uh.
And again, you know, we're going through all of these
motions through this film and it's still like there are
quiet moments between all of this. It's amazing music.
Speaker 2 (42:41):
Really, Honestly, I don't nothing the music. If there was,
if there was a lot, I didn't notice it.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
There was at times like when the driving through the mists. Yeah,
there was music in.
Speaker 2 (42:51):
There like that, but that was like kind of like a.
Speaker 1 (42:54):
Quiet, droning, quiet music.
Speaker 2 (42:57):
But for the most part, like the score, the soundtrack
of the this is just the soundtrack of life.
Speaker 1 (43:02):
Yeah. Yeah, And again, for as far as we're into
this film, and we're as we've gotten to this part
with Teddy being dead and Dwight's having to leave and
figure out the next move, we're starting to kind of
get close to well, it'll be the first time that
he's actually had any kind of a plan, but we're
starting to get into this third act, and yeah, there
(43:24):
isn't You're right, there's never that music that's like escalating
everything within the scene when they're shooting and stuff, and
nothing's ever been like a shootout where it's like I'm
behind the wall and I'm here, and it's like like
they never do that now, you know, it is like
maybe one or two exchanges of things, and you know,
(43:46):
most everything's kind of missing. Then all of a sudden
it's like, oh, well, shit, now it's over with, because
it usually only takes like one for anything to be
like done, you know. Yeah, so then we just we
have these quiet moments in between where we're with Dwight
having to, you know, watch him like what do I
do next? He's he's never like I don't know what
(44:07):
I do next.
Speaker 2 (44:08):
I would be the same way. I mean, honestly, I wouldn't.
I would not. But I'm not really that built like
that either. I'm kind of the same way as Dwight.
I'm not. I'm not built for revenge.
Speaker 1 (44:21):
Yeah, it's I think about that.
Speaker 2 (44:23):
And revenge is never satisfying in this either. That is
the other thing about this. There is no righteous, righteous
vindications at it, right, There's none of that. That That's
what again when I was saying, this is a genre
busting version of revenge films because there's none of the
like the power fantasy, there's none of the payoff. There's
(44:47):
none of that at all. It's like, it's fucking sad.
Speaker 1 (44:50):
Yeah, well and so, and that's you reminded me. That's
excellent because I forgot with Teddy. Before Teddy dies, we
get the revelation of what really happened with the family,
and that was that Dwight's father had an affair with
the Cleveland's mom and ends up getting her pregnant, and
(45:12):
the Cleveland father, who is a brutal man finds out
she's pregnant, kills both of them, leaves them to die
on the train tracks.
Speaker 2 (45:25):
Doesn't he doesn't, she doesn't. He doesn't kill his wife.
Speaker 1 (45:27):
No, he doesn't kill his wife. He kills Dwight's parents.
Speaker 2 (45:30):
White's parents, right, both of My mother was a was
like a casualty in that.
Speaker 1 (45:35):
Right, yeah. And he was like, oh, yeah, I guess
that was going a little bit too far, but it
was just like, holy shit, you're just like wiping this
away that it's like this person was just casually killed
by your family, because it's just another death for them.
Speaker 2 (45:48):
Right, And it seems like like they're like, this is
not anything new, but their family loyalty. Is what we
hear about, is that Wade Junior takes the fall because
Wade Senior would not have lived through prison, right, he
was dying. He died of cancer. So he said, you've
(46:08):
got your ending anyway, because he died anyways. And he's like,
but that's but.
Speaker 1 (46:14):
He was kind of rubbing it in too, because it's
like he died at home with his grand comfort in
comfort and yeah.
Speaker 2 (46:22):
And you have a brother, a half brother, yeah, congratulations.
Speaker 1 (46:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (46:27):
Wow. That was the younger guy who was in the back,
and that we discovered it.
Speaker 1 (46:31):
Was in the back kid that was back in the
so and that kind of gives us a general idea
of about how long ago that would have been, because
that kid was probably like, what's seventeen eighteen years old
somewhere in there. Yeah, so the conception of that had
been about that far back. So Wade Junior had been
gone through the prison system for about you know, maybe
that long sixteen seventeen years somewhere in there.
Speaker 2 (46:53):
Or twenty years or something like that. Yeah, I can't
remember what they said the length of time. Yeah, but yeah, there,
so there's no satisfying end to it.
Speaker 1 (47:02):
No, Well, because Dwight has the realization that this isn't
gonna end. He even asks any about that. It's like,
this isn't gonna end, is it. They're not, they'ren't gonna stop.
Especially now with Teddy. He's realizing there's there's no way
out of this. Now he set in motion something that
will never end, like it, there will probably have always
(47:23):
been bad blood and bad issues if none of that happened.
But once he killed Wade Junior, that was it. These
things filled the McCoy right, Yeah, and you know, for
the Clevelands, it was completely justifiable for them to go
out and execute two people. But by god, you don't
kill one hours because now the whole family is after
and we don't stop until you're all gone, right.
Speaker 2 (47:45):
And I've seen those kind of people before. Man, those
are those are some scary people. They have nothing to lose,
at least as far as there.
Speaker 1 (47:52):
Yes, that is. I have known some people in my
existence of growing up in a very small eastern Oregon
town of folks that didn't have the mental capacity to
think very far ahead and they kind of really didn't care,
so you know, and it was kind of a hat
Fields McCoy's kind of thought and go to war for
(48:15):
it there.
Speaker 2 (48:16):
My favorite, one of my favorite things was how he
calls the answering machine and leaves a voicemail on the
answering machine that's like basically his.
Speaker 1 (48:28):
K Yeah, he finds his way to their place.
Speaker 2 (48:31):
Yeah that was I thought that was kind of brilliant,
and then like using it as a way to like
like like how he was he hides he lays in
weight for them because he's like this isn't going to end.
I have to end this, and I know that I'm
going to die, but I'm going to end this. And
so he kind of lays in wait for the rest
(48:52):
of the family at like, what is it the mother's house.
Speaker 1 (48:56):
Yeah, it's the it's the Yeah.
Speaker 2 (48:58):
He goes through and clears out all the guns, he thinks,
and then he leaves a voicemail being like, I took
all the guns, blah blah blah blah blah. I I
am I killed Teddy, I killed Wade Junior because of this,
this and this, and they basically the sister, I think,
and the mother the two sisters was two sisters.
Speaker 1 (49:20):
Well, there's a there's a brother, a sister, and then
the mom. Yeah, and Dwight on the message says, I'll
turn myself into you if you leave my sister alone.
And he's even got the drop on him.
Speaker 2 (49:32):
He's listening to them talking.
Speaker 1 (49:33):
Yeah, and it's what they say.
Speaker 2 (49:36):
It is like kill them all, kill her fucking all.
Speaker 1 (49:38):
Are you fucking kidding me? We are coming after her.
And that's where he's like, oh, yep, Nope, this ain't ending, this.
Speaker 2 (49:43):
Is not over here. We go and that's when our
like final siege is happening. Yeah, and we we think
that he has taken everything. And then the mom reaches
under the damn chair. There's a gun that's strapped to this.
There was on the side pocket here taking the gun
out side pocket, right, but this was under this was
strapped underneath.
Speaker 1 (50:03):
But there was one more before that. There was one
more before that because he so Dwight ends up shooting
the brother that's there, and so we've got the sister
and the mom. But what Dwight doesn't see and we
do is that his half brother, the person that we
thought was, you know, maybe a grandkid and part of
all of this, Yeah, he wasn't in the house.
Speaker 2 (50:23):
Yet, and he is stalking around the side and.
Speaker 1 (50:26):
He comes around the side and he gets a shotgun
from somewhere and he comes around the side and then
he ends up, yeah, putting a shot into Dwight right
in the stomach and mortally wounds him for sure, but
then doesn't have the courage to finish it off.
Speaker 2 (50:40):
And he says something like I see my dad and
you and like.
Speaker 1 (50:45):
Yeah, yeah, because the revelation kind of now comes out
to everyone that Dwight Dwight knows.
Speaker 2 (50:51):
And and they kind of have a similar look and
you're like.
Speaker 1 (50:53):
Yeah, and there's a cool line that Dwight says in
there in this moment. This is right before the mom
grabs the under the kickout for the lazy boy, because
he says that it's sad that all of us have
to die because my dad loved your mom. Yes, and
that's where those two folks then just lose their shit.
(51:16):
Pop open that love chair. She grabs it, uzy, and
he ends up dumping them, but not before he also
then gets hit Yeah.
Speaker 2 (51:24):
Yeah, and then we say the card arrive.
Speaker 1 (51:28):
The card arrives at his sister's place. Yep, and he does,
but he does send the boy on his own. He
does say, go down the road. My car is in
the bushes. Just drive out of here, wipe off the gun.
Leave it. You can't just be free of all of this,
let it go.
Speaker 2 (51:43):
I hope that he did, yeah, because we don't get
to see that, but right, we hope that he did.
This was fun, I mean not fun. Okay, I shouldn't
say that this was a good movie to watch. Yeah,
I hate to say when I'm like, this is fun,
Like it was fun to watch in the sense of
like I got satisfaction out of watching this because it
(52:03):
was such a different spin on, like on a revenge scenario. Yeah,
I like again, I love to see somebody push past
like a genre, like break through a genre by changing
the tone and changing the pacing and changing how we
perceive a revenge scenario or whatever. Yeah that was I
appreciate you make me watch this one. Oh.
Speaker 1 (52:26):
I well, and I so I love films like this.
I really like Slow Boils.
Speaker 2 (52:32):
Yeah, same.
Speaker 1 (52:33):
I really like things that, even though this one doesn't
have it, I like things that end up having kind
of red herrings. A really great show that I loved,
or the first two seasons of The Killing, which was
two police detectives that are trying to solve the murder
of a young girl. And it takes two seasons to
(52:54):
be able to do all that. So I think it's
ten episodes a season, but it just has these really
great intric weaving moments where it's like this person was
over here and they did this thing. This that's well,
they would have had motiver they and we kind of
spend this time of like unraveling what this person was
doing as we're starting to see like this other little
bit of stuff that's happening with this other person, and
(53:15):
so it's all this really intricate, weaved character stuff that
starts to really play out, and I love how that
happens and you have your heightened moments. And again with
Blue Ruin watching this and then seeing them go into
The Green Room, which was filmed in Oregon, by the way,
and I had several friends who worked on that film.
(53:36):
I myself didn't get to, but a bunch of folks
that I that I know got to all work on it.
And watching how the filmmakers because Making Blair so Making
Blair with Jeremy Salmy, they've kind of been like a
duo on several projects where they were writing, directing, shooting, producing,
acting in all of this stuff. So Green Room was
(53:58):
the next one. Making Blair is in that one as well.
He is I think like the number two or number
three Hesher Nazi that's in there. He's part of that,
that white supremacist group. And how crazy is to see
Patrick Stewart being an F bomb dropping white supremacist holy
(54:22):
shit like that man that film. But to watch them
progress in what they do well, Making Blair went on
to write and direct I Don't Feel at Home in
the World Anymore, Okay, which was a winner at I
believe was a sun Dance stand out and apparently this
(54:42):
was to Yeah. And you know, even prior to them
doing this stuff, like Jeremy Solmier was a director of
photography on a lot of projects that he didn't write
or direct, so he was kind of making his way
shooting stuff. And so there is definitely a beauty and
an eye in the technical aspects of how these films work.
(55:04):
And I think as a director because he knows that
he's able to set up all of these these moments
of tension and these moments of how people move within
the scenes and how the scene can be just long
enough and how all of this tension can build through
it because he was shooting these things for other people
and himself and seeing how that all plays out, so
(55:24):
he can direct that, mapping that out right, and so
all of them well. And then making Blair. I don't
know if you've seen the trailers for it. He wrote
and directed the Toxic Avenger film that's coming out in August.
That was his follow up from I Don't Feel at
Home in the World Anymore. He was like, I want
to make the Toxic Avenger cool, and so he's got
(55:47):
a there's a Toxic Avenger film, and I'm it's been
on the shelf now for about I want to say,
three years.
Speaker 2 (55:55):
Yeah, it's the one that's got like a light. It's
got Elijah Wood.
Speaker 1 (55:58):
Elijah Wood is Peter Dinkle Beard Englishe is in it
as the Toxic Avenger. Yeah, and uh, and Kevin Bacon
is in it, I think, as the main antagonist. Funny
and it's yeah, and you know it looks schlocky and
crazy and hyper violent, but yeah, I'm excited to be
(56:18):
able to see that one. But it's it's been they
have They've just watching them progress and watching them make
other films. It's very similar to uh, honestly from promising
young woman to then watch Saltburn and just watch that
progression of a director making, you know, exceptional films, even
if it isn't something that necessarily resonates with me or
(56:41):
you at any point in time, you can still see
the craft within the filmmaking.
Speaker 2 (56:46):
That's the undeniable truth about like that director as well
as this one is like you're definitely seeing those that
progression and gosh, it's a beautiful vision. Yeah, they just
have great they have a great eye. I'm impressed wildly, Like, yeah,
when that first scene of them ascending into the woods
(57:09):
and I was like, this is a drone trap because
this is a gorgeous drone shot or if it's on
a gurney, I don't know, I don't know, but it
was beautiful. Yeah, so yeah, thanks for making me watch
this one.
Speaker 1 (57:21):
Yeah. Absolutely. I am so glad that you liked it
after having watched it. So that makes me feel better.
I know I've had a little bit of weird choices
and things, try to mix it up because it's film
and it's an experiment, and so it's always interesting to
try to see where it's going to go to. So
you're a great sport about all of this.
Speaker 2 (57:41):
Oh you are too. I'll make you watch a lot
of horror films.
Speaker 1 (57:44):
I want more horror films. I'm absolutely absolutely all for it.
So the next film, Gretchen, is your choice, and I'm
excited to find out what it is we're going to
be watching. What do you want to talk about?
Speaker 2 (57:53):
We're going to talk about Scorsese's bringing out the Dead
like Nick Cave, Nick Cage, Nick Cave, Nick Cage at
his most crazy dope dub.
Speaker 1 (58:05):
Oh, this is such a crazy.
Speaker 2 (58:06):
Fun film philography. That's happening in that Oh yeah, yeah, that's.
Speaker 1 (58:10):
Our next drug adult film. I saw that one in
the movie theater. Oh and I haven't seen it since
it was released in the theater.
Speaker 2 (58:17):
Oh well, then that's gonna be fun for us to watch.
Speaker 1 (58:19):
Oh my goodness, yeah, I'm excited to see that. Well.
Thank you so much, thank you, yeah, and thanks everyone
for checking this out. Make sure you subscribe and download.
We would love to have you. And just so you know,
we are not only are we losing this space and
looking for a new home, but we are starting to
migrate everything over to a new YouTube channel. We have
a YouTube channel for check the Gate. We have a
(58:40):
brand new website for check the Gate. So we will
be getting all of those and all of our link
trees and in other places. But as we migrate things over,
please feel free to download it, watch it again, send
it to your friends, wrap it up for Christmas.
Speaker 2 (58:53):
We appreciate that, smash, the likes and things like that.
Speaker 1 (58:57):
All the things that help us, and we appreciate all
of that. Thank you so much for being here. And Gretchen,
thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (59:03):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (59:04):
See on the next the Check the Gate podcast is
hosted by Martin Vavra and Gretchen Brooks. The show is directed, produced,
and edited by Martin Vavra. Produced by Galaxy Sailor Productions
twenty twenty five. The show is filmed and recorded at
the Propulsion Zone Studio in downtown Portland, Oregon. Special thanks
to Adam Carpinelli and Aleandro Barragon
Hey everyone, I'm excited to announce that I've joined the
Creator Accountability Network. CAN is a nonprofit dedicated to reducing
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Speaker 2 (00:56):
Clearly, he was like, what the fuck did I just do?
Speaker 1 (00:59):
And there was no plan? Like, what do you do
when it's done? What do you do when you no?
I did it? Why? What the fuck do I do? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (01:06):
And he completely like shaves his beard off and like
goes to seek out help. Hey Martin, Hey Gretchen, welcome back.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
I am so happy to be back.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
This is our last episode in this studio.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
Space it is. We're about to lose our home. This
is the last last episode in the Propulsion Zone studio.
We're looking for a new home.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
But it's also your episode.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
Pick it is we get to finish on a high note, right.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
But first, welcome to another episode of check the Gate
podcast where we talk about films and kind of see
where the discussion takes us.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
It's perfect. Yeah, so I'm excited. I think you had
not seen this film before.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
I've never seen this film before, so I love it. One.
It's a new one for me.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
I love it when it's a new one for you
and it doesn't go bad.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Oh.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Yeah, so I love this film. We watched the Jeremy
Salmier written, directed and shot film starring making Blair Blue Ruin. Yes,
this is an independent film, low budget and it's the
first one that put these folks really on the map.
(02:26):
I love it.
Speaker 2 (02:27):
Yeah, which I thought was really cool because it kind
of goes to show like an audience will pay to
see what they want to.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
Say they used to back in the day. I don't
necessarily believe it right now. I think there's been enough
burned audiences that it's really difficult to get a decent
budget to make something past a short film, and you
kind of have to have an audience installed too. They
did a feature film, barely a feature film. I think
it comes in at like seventy eight minutes, seventy six minutes.
(02:55):
They did a film that's called Murder Party Oh, which
is great, which is yeah, a great film and fantastic film,
absolutely and shot for no money with a bunch of
them all like wearing multiple hats as you do in
those kind of things, and just like cobbling their film
together as best as they could. But it was that
movie that I think sold the idea of them being
(03:16):
able to be worth funding.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
What a different tone of movies those are too, Like
oh yeah, murder Parties like kind of a comedy horror
like I mean, it's I think I remember watching that
on the film film festival circuit. I'm not certain, but
I did come to it like later and I was like, oh, oh, oh, okay,
yeah this is fun. And then I had I just
(03:41):
honestly had forgotten that they had done that film until
you brought it up, because I'm.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
Like, oh, oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
What a weird different style of film.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
Totally, They've never made another film like Murder Party since
there more oh, most of the stuff, well, in my opinion,
most of the things that they have made are more
are similar to Blue Ruin in their tone and how
they are able to build tension and how they how
(04:11):
things are shot. Murder Party, yeah, murder You're right, Murder
Party feels like a horror comedy film and nothing else
that they've done since then as a collaborative team with
Jeremy Somier and Macin Blair, the things they've done together
have not had that same tone. But then they've worked
on other projects separate from each other since that as well. Yeah,
(04:33):
so yeah, I'm excited to dig into this film.
Speaker 2 (04:36):
And this film doesn't have like a huge star power.
I think the most powerful star in it is played
by the what He plays the character of Teddy right,
and he's like the older brother in Home Alone, he
plays like the mean older brother.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
Oh yes, yes, yeah, that's like.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
Yeah, like celebrity in this film.
Speaker 1 (04:56):
I think I'm yeah, the guy who plays the older
brother in Home Alone and the Home Alone movies. Yeah,
he's a friend of one of our characters in this
that has and so a great character part. Yeah, very recognizable.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
But yes, I think that was the only thing that
stood out for me was I was like, is it that?
What is it? The I can't remember the character's name
and Home Alone, but he had like the yeah, his
picture of his girlfriend and he was like.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
Who he was the one too, like had the weird
counting thing. It's like a this is a thing and
two this is and D And it was like, man,
we can see where this kid's going in this film.
Christopher Columbus given us the public education jokes right out
from the beginning. Oh boy, Yeah, but that's a different episode.
(05:51):
We'll get back to Blue Ruin. Yeah, we did not
watch this film together. Gretchen and I watched this film
separately just because of timing, and I watched it last night.
But I've seen this film probably about a dozen times.
Speaker 2 (06:05):
Yeah, I've been busy. We were. We did some stuff
at the Portland Horror Film Festival, so we were. Yeah,
we kept ourselves pretty busy. So getting the time to
pack in movies is sometimes a little hard.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
We did. Yeah, it's and it has been kind of
crazy with things well because it was we got our
Legion time in for our previous episode, so that was
kind of important to be able to get Legion to
land well for us, and so yeah, it just didn't
work out that we but we did get Oh man,
I just I love this film so much. This film
is so my This is like Dinner in America for me.
(06:40):
These are both lower budget indie films. I don't remember
what the budget was on Dinner in America, but they're
they're they like I watched them. These are the films
that make me remember why I became a filmmaker myself
and why I want to make films. And they're the
films that give me hope of being able to find
(07:03):
just enough budget and the right people to be able
to execute something that is well done, that shows that
we're good at what we're doing, that we're excited about
what we're doing, and audiences react to that as well. Yes,
so that's I love these movies for that.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
This movie is an interesting take on the revenge scenario. Yeah,
because I found that, like oftentimes when we see a
revenge scenario film, it's I we see what happens, what
causes it, the cause and effect, those dualities of it.
(07:44):
Like whereas this we're very far into what has already happened,
and we are we were like are that's I thought
that was an interesting way to kind of like like
we're in it immediately. It's hit the ground running, the
story has already already happened, and we're catching up as
(08:05):
an audience member finding out like what's happening in real
time for us.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Yeah, I love those I love all of that because
there's never really no flashbacks. There's no flashbacks, and there's
no exposition dumps exactly either. In fact, in a lot
of ways, this movie it's a little bit of a
slow boil. It builds a lot of incredible tension. It's
very intentional, but it's kind of a quiet film.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Very and thoughtful. And yes, that was kind of what
struck me at the very beginning. Is like the opening
scene is like this homeless guy going to a like
walking into a like a like taking a.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Shower, and yeah, he broke into a home and was
in the bathtub.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
And I thought that was really strange, Like how I
was like, he's not like taking anything, he just took
a shower or took a bath and then hops out,
and then is goes to the boardwalk and is digging
for food, and we just kind of see like it's
very quiet. There's nothing, like there's no like extreme sound
(09:11):
happening other than like ambient noises. Because he realizes the
person's coming home, and then he jumps out of the
bathtub and like runs out the window. But he's like
he seems to be doing no harm.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Yeah, he's a quiet, homeless person for some reason. Yeah,
who just seems to be trying to figure out how
to get by without imposing on anyone, right, And he's.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
Not asking for he doesn't seem to be like busking
or asking for money from anybody or anything like that.
He's just kind of what.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Can I glean off of society and not have anyone
notice and be able or notice me.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
Yeah, that's the other thing. Yeah, it's like it becomes
really clear quickly that this person is trying to disappear.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Mm hmm. It's true. But we do find out after
this first kind of ten minutes of really beautiful setup
with just watching our person exist in this world. Once
we've had that our introduction to everything that's gonna happen,
and I guess this is our the notice of our incident. Well,
(10:13):
he doesn't so much get arrested as a police officer
who knows who he is. They know him by name,
and they come by and they're like, Hey, we just
need to talk to you. Can you just come in
with us.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
I kept expecting that to go terribly ry, right, Like,
I kept expecting him to be losing, losing, like going unhinged,
like immediately when he was like, am I in trouble
and they're like, you're not in trouble, darling.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
Right, we just wanted you to be in a safe
place while we gave you the news.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
What is happening? Yeah, that drew me in immediately.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
Yeah, it's it's such a wonderful setup because it's not
it's it's not painting any particular person or system or
anything like that as a bad guy or or something like.
I think it could have been so easy to go
a different direction, but everything is. It's there's there's a
(11:05):
there's a gentleness to a lot of aspects to this
that are really beautiful, and I think that plays well
when you start finding out the gruesome aspects and as
the gruesome scenes play out. That delicateness that is kind
of there that builds that early foundation for the story
(11:27):
really allows this story to, like, to me, really hit.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
He's never portrayed in a menacing fashion, right, even when
things start to escalate. Yeah, we we always kind of
see him as this like he's just kind of a
gentle spirit that our gentle person that had an unfortunate
series of events take place.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
Yeah, yeah, he's he is never the one liner revenge character.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
That's why I'm saying this feels like I'm not a
big on revenge. I mean, like obviously I liked like
high Planes, Drifter, and uh.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
I'm not big on revenge. But let me list all of.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
These I watched, but like I liked, I like Buster,
like or a you know, like a taking a trope
that would normally be macho power power move type thing.
This is the same director as a Green.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
Room, right, yes have you seen green Rooms?
Speaker 2 (12:32):
Oh? Yes? And again this is.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
That the intensity of that fat.
Speaker 2 (12:38):
Coloration is also in this that I and this I
know it is like like almost a decade before right.
Speaker 1 (12:47):
Uh, between between tea blue Room and between blue Room
or Blue Room and green Room is like four or
five years.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Oh I thought they were like I thought they were
like ten.
Speaker 1 (12:57):
Years apart or no, no, huh.
Speaker 2 (12:59):
But this film is such there you can tell that
this these directors and are getting like destructor is getting
like amp and up because once we get to green Room,
it's like he is like masterful, oh man I and
this is like there was there was examples of things
and it's hard for me to remember. I like it,
(13:20):
keep thinking back to like Murder Party and I'm like, wow,
what a different. But again, his filmmaking is like you
can see that escalation in his work, like until it
gets to like you know, doing green Room and whatnot.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
Yeah, have you seen Hold the Dark?
Speaker 2 (13:37):
No? I haven't.
Speaker 1 (13:38):
That was a so he's got a couple of uh so.
Jeremy Solmier directed a couple of episodes of season three
of I believe it was season three of True Detective,
but then did a feature film called Hold the Dark
on Netflix. And then there is another Netflix feature I
haven't seen yet. I didn't actually realize it was out,
(14:00):
but it's I think it's called Patriot Ridge or something
like that. So I have to go and find that
that most recent one.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
It's the third season of True Detective.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
That one was a good one. That was that came
back around from where the second season kind of didn't
do it. But yeah, but Hold the Dark, So when
you're talking about that progression, Green Room is such a horrifying,
intense film, but it's kind of like a slow boil
that ends up having these peaks like it's just it
(14:30):
has these really great characters, this intensity, and then all
of a sudden, it's like, holy crap, like we've just
hit this spike and it's just it's and some of
the most terrible things happen that you don't actually see.
You see him reacting to it if you. I'm thinking
of the arm through the Door with Anton Yelcher and
Hold the Dark is and Jeffrey Wright is in that
(14:51):
who I adore Jeffrey right, And again this intensity of
a scene and this build up. There's a shootout scene
and Hold the Dark that goes on for a long time.
It's a long and I think in anybody else's hands
it would not have been very good, and it would
have been like a lot of shooting and bullets and stuff.
But he creates this intensity where he is with this
(15:15):
sheriff's department that is coming in and one guy holds
them off and he's picking them off one at a
time outside of his cabin and it is so gruesome
and so intense, and it's and it's takes a it
takes a while to go and do it, but he
it's so masterful and the whole time, like I thought
(15:37):
I was gonna chew my tongue off watching it because
the just the intensity of the scene is so much.
It's such a good film.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
I can see where while we get to that point,
I haven't seen that yet.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
So I'll have to check it out, oh man.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
Because I have to say the there are the quietness
of this film, the intentional build up that we have
that is it's not tension building. It's more like not
and I hate to say disarming, but it's kind of
(16:10):
close to being disarming in a way because this guy
is such a gentle person and you feel like he
even has this like the actor they pick is that.
Speaker 1 (16:23):
You're making Blair.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
He has such a soft like he's such a doe fella.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
Right, Yeah, well he's he's not like a macho No,
it's not like former Marines.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
He's like he was as a very like beta guy,
like very seming, and like he has these big brown
eyes and he has like this just kind of like
kind of a baby face, and so you don't see it,
but when we first see him, he's got like this
big beard. When he shaped his face, I'd say, it
was like I was like, wait, is this the same actor?
(16:59):
Like like it took me a second to figure that
out because I was like, wait, wait, wait, do we
have another character? But yeah, I am, I am, I am.
I really enjoyed this. There was one scene that really
or the very there's a after the conversation he has
with the police officer, and we can get back to that,
(17:20):
but there's as far as filmmaking and cinematography, there is
this forest scene as we're driving into the woods and
it's like the fall, like the fog is rolling in.
This has such a dreamy quality that it almost feels
like we're this is where And this is also part
of the story where the story starts to change, the
(17:42):
arc is changing, and so it's almost like perfect an
idea of like a transition like where like a separation
of self that's happening that he is out of his
body kind of self. But yeah, what leads us.
Speaker 1 (17:58):
To that, well, well, so this I want to kind
of like set the landscape of what this film is
kind of about, because we've got Mac and Blair, as
you had said, is homeless, and he essentially gets the
news that a person is being let out of jail.
Wade Cleveland Junior is the is the character. So this
(18:20):
person is getting let out of jail and people are
wanting to, you know, kind of let him know this
is happening. Now, we don't really directly know in the
beginning what all has happened, but we see him there
at the release of this person getting out of prison,
we see him kind of stalking them a little bit.
And what it ends up coming out to be is
(18:40):
that Wade Junior had been accused and convicted of murdering
both of his parents.
Speaker 2 (18:49):
Right and gruesome. They said it was a very ugly way.
Speaker 1 (18:55):
Yeah, I believe they were both shot and then left
on train tracks, yes, and so but again, what we
have is a very heartbroken person who kind of doesn't
probably have anything to live for since the death of
his parents that way, and it's never been satisfying that
this person was convicted and now they're getting out for
(19:15):
whatever reason they're they're being released from prison. So we
we start out with Dwight kind of stalking this person.
I say stalking, like, you know, following them around. I
don't know that Dwight he's stalking him, but I don't
think he actually he doesn't have a plan. We're not
dealing with somebody that's like, I'm here for the revenge.
You don't know.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
There's no macho bravado like male power, fantasy.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
Driven like he's in a daze, he's.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
Out of himself. Yeah, And that was one of the
things that I mean, not to draw comparison, but to
draw comparison to revenge films in general. That often times,
the one thing that both this movie and Promising Young
Woman share in them is that our main characters are
(20:10):
broken and are have nothing that they have anything to
live for at this point, like it, but Promising Young
Woman she actually had things to live for, but you
know was whatever that was. And then whereas this is
like he has no car and he lives out of
his car. But I had to look up why this
(20:33):
film was called Blue Ruin, and it's based off of
the name of like like a gin, like a or
like a like what happens to you after you become
an alcoholic or something like that. Is that what it?
Speaker 1 (20:45):
Well, it's also it's also a reference to something that's
like being completely bungled or bumbled, like everything is not
working out, so you're just in blue ruin with this.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
Oh like the term like it's all blue Monday's from here.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
It's that kind of similar. None of this is working out,
I'm just bungling one thing after.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
A Gin reference and I was like, I'm confused. Yeah, yeah,
but yeah, it's a there. That was the only thing
that I was like that I thought was interesting as
far as like that was like the promising young woman
and that we have these main protagonists that are damaged
(21:24):
and they but whereas she was able to commit a
seem continuing act of like revenge, his revenge was I
came in the form of opportunistic Like. It wasn't that
he was plotting it, that he was like waiting for
this moment. It was he is broken. They informed him
(21:47):
that this is happening, and he's like taking the opportunity
to figure out what what is next move is going
to be?
Speaker 1 (21:54):
Yeah, and yeah, essentially he's placing himself in this situation
without any kind of a real plan. And I love
that comparison because in promising young woman, she has a
lot to live for, she has friends and a family structure.
There is something there. She's choosing to exact her revenge
on the male culture, and that's the most strategically planned
(22:17):
part of her life. Everything else is how am I
just like paying the rent and hanging out and participating
in society in some way, Whereas Dwight in this one,
he is so grief stricken. He doesn't have a plan,
He's not in anything. He's just really he's just existing,
like you were saying, he's digging around for food, he's
picking up bottles and cants to get a little bit
(22:37):
of extra cash. He really kind of doesn't have a point.
He's just kind of pointlessly existing until he gets the
bad news that he doesn't foresee coming in that this
person is now going to get out, and the grief
is so much for him that he hasn't had a plan,
He's had no anything, and it's as if this is
the only thing that he could possibly have is how
(23:00):
do I rectify this thing? And it doesn't seem to
be anger or anything. It's almost like an attempt at
relief for the years of grief that he's.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
Had well, and then he confronts he doesn't even confront him.
It's like he goes into the bathroom. He follows Wade
to Wade Junior to a bar or whatnot, and he
goes into the bathroom and then Wade comes in and
(23:28):
he has like a small like paring knife and ends
up stabbing Wade in this stomach and then the head
like right in the temple. Gruesome, ye, like and it's
but he is so it's not like he's like a leaf.
(23:48):
He's like totally torn by this. Like this continues to
do like spiritual damage to him, and it's it's hard
because you're like, this is a bumble. Clearly he was
like what the fuck did I just do?
Speaker 1 (24:03):
And there was no plan? Like what do you do
when it's done?
Speaker 2 (24:07):
No?
Speaker 1 (24:07):
I didn't Why what the fuck do I do? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (24:10):
And he completely like shaves his beard off and like
goes to seek out help.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
He does well, But the process of getting to that
is so wonderful because part of that bungling of all
of this. There there's a little bit of a tussle
with Wade Junior he does end up prevailing because he
has he ends up having that advantage because he hits
him in the neck with the knife, but then he
stabs him, so there's kind of a little bit of
a tussle there, but Wade Junior goes down, but they're
(24:37):
like holding onto each other so that when so when
Dwight goes to leave, he's lost his keys to his
car and he can't get out. And this is one
of those beautiful things. We had talked about a little
bit of this stuff too in some of our other films,
especially in when we talked about Legion, these things that
show character and bill all the stuff. One of the
most amazing things that has always stuck with about this
(25:00):
film is after we've done all this, so we've got
the tussle and he's got the little knife and he
does a little shot in the head and all of that.
So I'm gonna go out out on lim and say,
there's almost like a little bit of a confidence boost.
Even though he doesn't have a plan, like he's trying
to put his shit together, what do I do? He
knows he's got to get out of there, so he's
getting out of there. He makes it out the back
(25:21):
and the way he came in, and he passes by
the car that the family of the family has a
family car. Here he's trying to get to his car
that's kind of down the road, and he takes that
little pairing knife and he thinks he's gonna get one
more thing in and he goes to stick it into
the tire and because there is no hilt or anything
on that, when he does it, the knife slides in
(25:44):
his hand and cuts his hand. So now his hand
is cut, which is a thing that he's having to
deal with constantly. On this he's trying to get into
his car. He doesn't have his car keys. His hand
is around yeah, he wears him around his neck and
so that got torn off. So now it's hand is cut.
He's got his blood and the other guy's blood all
over him. And the only other vehicle that he can
(26:05):
steal is the when he just put a knife into
the tire on and just this series of events happening
without having to have dialogue or explain it or anything,
is just so brilliant. It's a thought out world and
it feels so good. It's real.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
It feels like this what an actual like this kind
of scenario happened, This is what would happen.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
Absolutely, it feels I thought that was me. It was like,
of course I'm gonna be the guy who's gonna grab
that knife and try to jam it in there, thinking
like I'm gonna pop this tire. Now I would be
the guy that fucking cuts my hands.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
I would totally need too, or I would like or
somehow the knife would break off and it would stab
me or something. I mean literally that is my life. Yeah,
And I mean that was kind of this whole event,
Like this whole film is this kind of like Sissiphionian
(27:05):
like you know concept of like there's rolling the rock
up and it falls back down. We got to roll
it back up again. And then we have our livery
now by you know, eagles or whatever, and they basically
continually pushing this boulder up the hill as he draws
everybody else into his like what do I do scenario?
Speaker 1 (27:29):
It's so great. Yeah, so yeah, Dwight then goes on
the run and then the issue and so this is
why I again, I love how everything is so well
thought out and this kind of happens in the script
writing and then the film world of what happens next.
I'm sure it happens in novels or anything like this
(27:49):
when you're trying to tell stories. But and then what
what happens next?
Speaker 2 (27:54):
Remember he writes his sister, Yes, and.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
He writes his sister, but then he gets there before
or the postcard does for his sister, so.
Speaker 2 (28:02):
She doesn't know what's happened, right, And he has written
a confession essentially on this postcon Yeah.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
And it's the realization also when he does get to
her that oh, I just committed an act of revenge. Yeah,
which is when we find out that the whole reason
that their parents were murdered is an act of revenge.
And so he's committed an act of revenge. This family
(28:26):
is probably now going to have an act of revenge,
and they're probably going to try to find her because
he's left the car behind, he lost the keys. It's
still registered in her name. He hadn't changed the registration.
She has a life and kids probably could have been
found anyway, So he has set this up for her
(28:47):
life to be destroyed.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
So he feels he has to go and warn her
slash take care of her.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
Yeah, because he knows they're coming. And what a great
set of scenes, like that whole stage on that house.
Speaker 2 (29:01):
Their relationship also is, like you can tell because we
never really get much backstory on what happened after the
parents were murdered, and also we never really know how
old they were, Like I get the impression that they
were like teenagers or something when when the parents were killed.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
Probably somewhere along those lines like early twenties. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (29:29):
In school, yeah, because one of the friend makes a
reference to like, oh, you were.
Speaker 1 (29:34):
They were in high school together. Yeah, yep, they were
in high school together. So sometime at the either the
end of high school or after is kind of where
he disappears.
Speaker 2 (29:43):
Yeah, that he kind of just leaves her behind and
like loses himself, and we see the result of that
being the homeless person he was.
Speaker 1 (29:54):
He just lived in his grief. That's all he had.
Speaker 2 (29:56):
Yeah, And I mean it's just there. Her relationship obviously
feels really strained. The first thing, she asked him if
he need some money, and she's like, are you asking
me for money? And he's like no, I got to
tell you what I did. And she said She's like good,
Like she's like he kills Waite's like I killed Wade Junior.
(30:19):
She was like good yeah, and he was like, well, yeah,
you didn't get the card I sent you? No, okay,
that's boy. And also like that confession of being on
a postcard just like and she said, well, no, postcards
actually take longer than regular mayor and he was like,
oh fuck. But the she I think she even says
(30:46):
like fuck the Clevelands. And I think that's one of
those things this director does a really good job at,
is like portraying these like not good people, like the
Nazi punks and green Room, and I mean there they
feel so real, and so does his family because his
family is kind of like like criminal. As you're starting
(31:09):
to you start to get the impression that they all
have kind.
Speaker 1 (31:12):
Of a criminals.
Speaker 2 (31:13):
Yeah, yeah, that they're like they're kind of kind of
white trash like like kind of family.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
Yeah. Well, and there we kind of find this out too.
Farther along, we kind of get a lot of hints
of their gun nuts. They have their Second Amendment stuff,
so they've got guns, and we actually find out toward
the end they've got guns scattered from Hell to Breakfast
all over their place. But not only are they into
guns and shooting stuff, but they're also into killing things
(31:40):
and we hunting is yeah, so they're they're way into that.
So this is something that's very ingrained. And this is
happening somewhere in the Virginia area, like Appalachian Mountains something
like that, you know, rural aspects of of that part
of the country. So yeah, that it is a facet
(32:01):
of these folks that they are. I guess, like what
you were saying, they are white trashy Second Amendment killing stuff.
That's what you.
Speaker 2 (32:08):
Do folk, Yeah, And I mean and then when they
realize that no police are coming after him, he's like,
oh boy.
Speaker 1 (32:18):
That's right. I love that part. He's scanning the news
while he's hiding.
Speaker 2 (32:21):
Out after Hish not said anything.
Speaker 1 (32:23):
They didn't say anything about their brother being killed. They
didn't report it. Yeah, yep.
Speaker 2 (32:29):
And that's one of the things we glossed over was
like after the prison thing, he tries he takes the
limo and the limo has the young brother in there.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
And that's yeah, that's right, And I love the stuff
with the brother. Will kind of close the loop on
that too, because he does when he steals the limo
that he's that he jammed the knife into the tire
of so he's driving away with this whole thing. Turns
out he's got the young son of the of the
Cleveland family that he's just left behind. Yep, so we've
got we've got and I forget his name, but he's
(33:00):
in there and he's banging on the divider and so
uh uh Dwight finally pulls over and and the kid
gets out.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
Kids like, are you gonna kill me?
Speaker 1 (33:10):
He's like, no, no, but but I killed your uncle. Yeah,
because he killed my mom and dad.
Speaker 2 (33:16):
He was like, I don't think he did.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
I don't think he did it. And then he takes
off running.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
That was like when the seed of descent is set,
like the seed of confusion.
Speaker 1 (33:24):
Yeah, he killed my mom and dad, and I think,
he says, I don't I don't what he said. I
don't think I don't think he did her. He's like,
it's just the perfect line. Yeah, I don't think that's
how it happened, and yeah, oh yeah, And it's just
it's so good. It's just these these subtle moments where
it's just it's so good and yeah, so we've got
the showdown ends up happening with the sister and all
(33:48):
of this and and uh Dwight still just bubbled his
way through it because he had he had his uh
hand that he slashed. But then when the family starts
to close in on him at his sister's place, his
sister's taken off, he ends up taking that crossbow bolt
to the legs. So now he's shutting when they're after him.
Speaker 2 (34:11):
They were the family finds out where the sister's at,
and so they are like they kind of do a
siege on them. Yeah, and the sister wasn't there, thankfully,
because I think he was able to get her out
of the house anything like that. But yeah, then when
he did, the older brothers shoot him or whatever, one
of one of the brothers, yeah, shoot him with the
(34:32):
crossbow bolts two in the legs.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
It was very And then he decides that he's going
to do surgery on himself to remove this cross bow.
Speaker 1 (34:40):
Yeah, oh my god.
Speaker 2 (34:41):
So he goes to like the pharmacy and buys like
a like a like exact.
Speaker 1 (34:46):
Night rubbing alcohol, super glue and all of that. Yeah,
oh boy.
Speaker 2 (34:50):
Yeah, and passes out and the wheel I forgot how
he gets to the hospital though. That was my only Like,
I was like, who took him.
Speaker 1 (34:57):
Well, he passes out at the hospital. He's he's trying
to pull the arrow out, that bolt out of his
leg and he isn't able to do it, so he
gets himself to the hospital. He got Yeah, he passes
out at the counter, and then they get him in
and stable.
Speaker 2 (35:12):
That's what I was trying to remember, because I remember
he like, I was like, how did he get to
the hospital? I guess he had drove himself and then
that's when he I remember that collapsing scene.
Speaker 1 (35:21):
Now yeah, oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (35:23):
But I'm waking up and being like, what the I'm
in the hospital.
Speaker 1 (35:26):
Right, But he's got one of the brothers in the
trunk of the car, and that was the thing. Before
he got out of there, he hits one brother with
his as he's trying to get away, hits one brother,
knocks him out, yes, throws him in the trunk of
the blue Yeah that blue Pontiac. Yeah yeah, yeah, the
bullet holes in it. Yeah yeah. Oh it's so good.
(35:48):
So yeah, it's I you know this, it's so just
watching Dwight have no plan and continue to bumble through
this stuff but have all of the things that do happen.
They're just it's just again, I want to mention just
(36:09):
how I thought I've probably found sound like I'm just
like stroking the ego of this film and the folks.
But I do find it to be so well thought out.
All of these events seem to make sense. Dwight is
not dodging bullets, and he's not a gun hero. And
in fact, there's a point where I'm like, dude, what
are you doing whip into the leg and it's like,
(36:31):
of course you're gonna get shot by this. Like you
were chasing this guy around the yard. You you stole
the shotgun from the other brother. He's got a crossbow,
but he's a hunter. He knows what he's doing. You
don't know what you're doing. And you're running around in
the dark after this guy. Of course he's gonna swing
back around and be able to shoot you. You're lucky,
I mean lucky it's in the leg because that's how
they wrote it. But and that's an accurate thing too,
(36:52):
because it's hard as fuck to hit anything with this shit.
But it's just it's it's just so good because all
of these things feel like very logical progressions, and everybody
just kind of losing their mind in a heightened situation
of ship going.
Speaker 2 (37:08):
Down well and you just like and then they recruits
the help of his friend. Teddy finds who is somebody
who went to high school with, which I thought was
kind of a funny scenario. Is like he was like, man,
you look so normal. Like so I'm guessing that they
were kind of like like hashers or like stoners in
high school. Like I get the depression. He was kind
(37:28):
of like cool, they get long hair, and like Teddy
is obviously one of those people that is kind of
like he peaked in high school.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
Yeah, and Teddy's the name of the of one of
the Cleveland brothers, but it's Teddy that he has in
the trunk.
Speaker 2 (37:44):
Who's the friend Ben Ben Benny. So he gives him
like life lessons, which I thought was interesting. Like they
have this discourse about like he he's like talks about
friendship and having each other's back, and.
Speaker 1 (38:00):
I'm just like remember that time you and I and
that's Tripper. I got a picture of that.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
Yeah. Yeah, but his friend has got his back, like
he gets him a gun and he let me as
I mean, this is like again, this is one of
those dudes that are like the you've seen them. They
kind of peaked in high school and they're still like
the same kind of same kind of dude, still wearing
their you know, T shirts and whatever. I don't right, Yeah,
(38:26):
and he's a he's a gun nut or whatever, and
they he gets him all the gets him kind of
set up, yeah, because he's like, all right, here's the
scenario and tells him what happened. And he's like, they're
going to come for you, and like he's like, let
me help you.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
Yeah, And I got the one in the trunk. Yeah,
so you know, I need a gun because he'd been
trying to get a gun. So he gets a gun. Yeah,
and and the buddy says, I got this property. Drive
out to there. Here it is on the map, go
out there, and then you can take care of this.
And the thing is is Dwight's still trying to like
(39:02):
fix this. He's just like, Okay, I got my revenge.
You guys killed my parents.
Speaker 2 (39:12):
We've all had our everybody's on the same The playing
field has been loved.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
Yeah, I promise you're not going after my sister.
Speaker 2 (39:19):
That's not going to happen.
Speaker 1 (39:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (39:21):
They're like we they were like, we're gonna kill all
of them. Oh yeah, and you know that's where all
mayhem ensues.
Speaker 1 (39:30):
Yeah, and it's and the scene is so great where
Dwight gets Teddy out of the trunk. He's guys a
little flip phone. He's trying to get them, you know,
call him, tell them I'll turn myself in. Yeah, He's like,
or call the plate, Like I'm willing to just don't
go after my sister. He's still trying to. He's he's
negotiating with himself more than anyone else that this can
(39:52):
end if I just give you, you know, if I
just turned myself over, this is all going to end.
And he's he's dealing with people that he doesn't fund
them mentally understand correct and and Teddy shows him that
after he ends up being able to turn the tide.
It was like the tells the truth absolutely Yep. Teddy
is able to get the gun away from him. It's
(40:13):
a cool little trick of like here, take the take
the phone back, No, you can take it. She wants
to talk to you. And then he's able to jump
him and take the gun. And then the guy with
the gun tells the truth is so good. But right when,
right when we think that.
Speaker 2 (40:27):
Tables are turned, We think that this is this is
it for Dwight. Benny comes in with the clutch yesh
assassinates him.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
Essentially another table turns. Oh and again so well thought
out because that guy is standing there and you hear
a whip bang, so you hear the delay of the
report because Benny is a little ways away, and the
guy's like, look around because he's not quite sure what
that was, and then Pap hits him right in the face.
Floads yep.
Speaker 2 (40:55):
My favorite ones when he One of my favorite moments
was then Aft right after that, and he's all like
their packing up, the packing up Teddy's body to to
bury and he's like, he's like, what about all of
his brains and stuff? And he's like, oh, the coyotes
will take care of that.
Speaker 1 (41:11):
Yeah, yeah, harsh.
Speaker 2 (41:16):
Yeah, but he's like, you do have to drag him
off my property? Yeah, because we are in Virginia.
Speaker 1 (41:21):
Yep. I don't want any of this here, get out,
all right? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (41:26):
I mean, and no, I'm from New Orleans, like living
in New Orleans, like there was I remember a cop
saying to me, he goes, well, if you have to
shoot somebody on your property, drag him inside your house,
because then that's the only way you're going to get
away with it. He was.
Speaker 1 (41:40):
At least now you know.
Speaker 2 (41:43):
Playter, i'd eybody officer. B okay, thank you.
Speaker 1 (41:48):
Yeah. Well, and that's actually part of what Benny says too,
because Benny says, yeah, sorry, that took me a second.
I had to wait until he was pointing the gun
at You had to make it legal, yeh.
Speaker 2 (42:00):
Had to make it legal. Yeah, even though he's like
burying them off my property.
Speaker 1 (42:05):
Right, And I don't even feel that it.
Speaker 2 (42:08):
Was like that was for his own like yeah, his
own spirits, his own soul.
Speaker 1 (42:14):
Like is like that was a predator moment. You know,
you go, oh, you've got the gun you're pointing at now.
Now you're now you're at target.
Speaker 2 (42:21):
Now you're a threat.
Speaker 1 (42:22):
Yes, yes, yeah so good so yeah and that's uh.
And again, you know, we're going through all of these
motions through this film and it's still like there are
quiet moments between all of this. It's amazing music.
Speaker 2 (42:41):
Really, Honestly, I don't nothing the music. If there was,
if there was a lot, I didn't notice it.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
There was at times like when the driving through the mists. Yeah,
there was music in.
Speaker 2 (42:51):
There like that, but that was like kind of like a.
Speaker 1 (42:54):
Quiet, droning, quiet music.
Speaker 2 (42:57):
But for the most part, like the score, the soundtrack
of the this is just the soundtrack of life.
Speaker 1 (43:02):
Yeah. Yeah, And again, for as far as we're into
this film, and we're as we've gotten to this part
with Teddy being dead and Dwight's having to leave and
figure out the next move, we're starting to kind of
get close to well, it'll be the first time that
he's actually had any kind of a plan, but we're
starting to get into this third act, and yeah, there
(43:24):
isn't You're right, there's never that music that's like escalating
everything within the scene when they're shooting and stuff, and
nothing's ever been like a shootout where it's like I'm
behind the wall and I'm here, and it's like like
they never do that now, you know, it is like
maybe one or two exchanges of things, and you know,
(43:46):
most everything's kind of missing. Then all of a sudden
it's like, oh, well, shit, now it's over with, because
it usually only takes like one for anything to be
like done, you know. Yeah, so then we just we
have these quiet moments in between where we're with Dwight
having to, you know, watch him like what do I
do next? He's he's never like I don't know what
(44:07):
I do next.
Speaker 2 (44:08):
I would be the same way. I mean, honestly, I wouldn't.
I would not. But I'm not really that built like
that either. I'm kind of the same way as Dwight.
I'm not. I'm not built for revenge.
Speaker 1 (44:21):
Yeah, it's I think about that.
Speaker 2 (44:23):
And revenge is never satisfying in this either. That is
the other thing about this. There is no righteous, righteous
vindications at it, right, There's none of that. That That's
what again when I was saying, this is a genre
busting version of revenge films because there's none of the
like the power fantasy, there's none of the payoff. There's
(44:47):
none of that at all. It's like, it's fucking sad.
Speaker 1 (44:50):
Yeah, well and so, and that's you reminded me. That's
excellent because I forgot with Teddy. Before Teddy dies, we
get the revelation of what really happened with the family,
and that was that Dwight's father had an affair with
the Cleveland's mom and ends up getting her pregnant, and
(45:12):
the Cleveland father, who is a brutal man finds out
she's pregnant, kills both of them, leaves them to die
on the train tracks.
Speaker 2 (45:25):
Doesn't he doesn't, she doesn't. He doesn't kill his wife.
Speaker 1 (45:27):
No, he doesn't kill his wife. He kills Dwight's parents.
Speaker 2 (45:30):
White's parents, right, both of My mother was a was
like a casualty in that.
Speaker 1 (45:35):
Right, yeah. And he was like, oh, yeah, I guess
that was going a little bit too far, but it
was just like, holy shit, you're just like wiping this
away that it's like this person was just casually killed
by your family, because it's just another death for them.
Speaker 2 (45:48):
Right, And it seems like like they're like, this is
not anything new, but their family loyalty. Is what we
hear about, is that Wade Junior takes the fall because
Wade Senior would not have lived through prison, right, he
was dying. He died of cancer. So he said, you've
(46:08):
got your ending anyway, because he died anyways. And he's like,
but that's but.
Speaker 1 (46:14):
He was kind of rubbing it in too, because it's
like he died at home with his grand comfort in
comfort and yeah.
Speaker 2 (46:22):
And you have a brother, a half brother, yeah, congratulations.
Speaker 1 (46:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (46:27):
Wow. That was the younger guy who was in the back,
and that we discovered it.
Speaker 1 (46:31):
Was in the back kid that was back in the
so and that kind of gives us a general idea
of about how long ago that would have been, because
that kid was probably like, what's seventeen eighteen years old
somewhere in there. Yeah, so the conception of that had
been about that far back. So Wade Junior had been
gone through the prison system for about you know, maybe
that long sixteen seventeen years somewhere in there.
Speaker 2 (46:53):
Or twenty years or something like that. Yeah, I can't
remember what they said the length of time. Yeah, but yeah, there,
so there's no satisfying end to it.
Speaker 1 (47:02):
No, Well, because Dwight has the realization that this isn't
gonna end. He even asks any about that. It's like,
this isn't gonna end, is it. They're not, they'ren't gonna stop.
Especially now with Teddy. He's realizing there's there's no way
out of this. Now he set in motion something that
will never end, like it, there will probably have always
(47:23):
been bad blood and bad issues if none of that happened.
But once he killed Wade Junior, that was it. These
things filled the McCoy right, Yeah, and you know, for
the Clevelands, it was completely justifiable for them to go
out and execute two people. But by god, you don't
kill one hours because now the whole family is after
and we don't stop until you're all gone, right.
Speaker 2 (47:45):
And I've seen those kind of people before. Man, those
are those are some scary people. They have nothing to lose,
at least as far as there.
Speaker 1 (47:52):
Yes, that is. I have known some people in my
existence of growing up in a very small eastern Oregon
town of folks that didn't have the mental capacity to
think very far ahead and they kind of really didn't care,
so you know, and it was kind of a hat
Fields McCoy's kind of thought and go to war for
(48:15):
it there.
Speaker 2 (48:16):
My favorite, one of my favorite things was how he
calls the answering machine and leaves a voicemail on the
answering machine that's like basically his.
Speaker 1 (48:28):
K Yeah, he finds his way to their place.
Speaker 2 (48:31):
Yeah that was I thought that was kind of brilliant,
and then like using it as a way to like
like like how he was he hides he lays in
weight for them because he's like this isn't going to end.
I have to end this, and I know that I'm
going to die, but I'm going to end this. And
so he kind of lays in wait for the rest
(48:52):
of the family at like, what is it the mother's house.
Speaker 1 (48:56):
Yeah, it's the it's the Yeah.
Speaker 2 (48:58):
He goes through and clears out all the guns, he thinks,
and then he leaves a voicemail being like, I took
all the guns, blah blah blah blah blah. I I
am I killed Teddy, I killed Wade Junior because of this,
this and this, and they basically the sister, I think,
and the mother the two sisters was two sisters.
Speaker 1 (49:20):
Well, there's a there's a brother, a sister, and then
the mom. Yeah, and Dwight on the message says, I'll
turn myself into you if you leave my sister alone.
And he's even got the drop on him.
Speaker 2 (49:32):
He's listening to them talking.
Speaker 1 (49:33):
Yeah, and it's what they say.
Speaker 2 (49:36):
It is like kill them all, kill her fucking all.
Speaker 1 (49:38):
Are you fucking kidding me? We are coming after her.
And that's where he's like, oh, yep, Nope, this ain't ending, this.
Speaker 2 (49:43):
Is not over here. We go and that's when our
like final siege is happening. Yeah, and we we think
that he has taken everything. And then the mom reaches
under the damn chair. There's a gun that's strapped to this.
There was on the side pocket here taking the gun
out side pocket, right, but this was under this was
strapped underneath.
Speaker 1 (50:03):
But there was one more before that. There was one
more before that because he so Dwight ends up shooting
the brother that's there, and so we've got the sister
and the mom. But what Dwight doesn't see and we
do is that his half brother, the person that we
thought was, you know, maybe a grandkid and part of
all of this, Yeah, he wasn't in the house.
Speaker 2 (50:23):
Yet, and he is stalking around the side and.
Speaker 1 (50:26):
He comes around the side and he gets a shotgun
from somewhere and he comes around the side and then
he ends up, yeah, putting a shot into Dwight right
in the stomach and mortally wounds him for sure, but
then doesn't have the courage to finish it off.
Speaker 2 (50:40):
And he says something like I see my dad and
you and like.
Speaker 1 (50:45):
Yeah, yeah, because the revelation kind of now comes out
to everyone that Dwight Dwight knows.
Speaker 2 (50:51):
And and they kind of have a similar look and
you're like.
Speaker 1 (50:53):
Yeah, and there's a cool line that Dwight says in
there in this moment. This is right before the mom
grabs the under the kickout for the lazy boy, because
he says that it's sad that all of us have
to die because my dad loved your mom. Yes, and
that's where those two folks then just lose their shit.
(51:16):
Pop open that love chair. She grabs it, uzy, and
he ends up dumping them, but not before he also
then gets hit Yeah.
Speaker 2 (51:24):
Yeah, and then we say the card arrive.
Speaker 1 (51:28):
The card arrives at his sister's place. Yep, and he does,
but he does send the boy on his own. He
does say, go down the road. My car is in
the bushes. Just drive out of here, wipe off the gun.
Leave it. You can't just be free of all of this,
let it go.
Speaker 2 (51:43):
I hope that he did, yeah, because we don't get
to see that, but right, we hope that he did.
This was fun, I mean not fun. Okay, I shouldn't
say that this was a good movie to watch. Yeah,
I hate to say when I'm like, this is fun,
Like it was fun to watch in the sense of
like I got satisfaction out of watching this because it
(52:03):
was such a different spin on, like on a revenge scenario. Yeah,
I like again, I love to see somebody push past
like a genre, like break through a genre by changing
the tone and changing the pacing and changing how we
perceive a revenge scenario or whatever. Yeah that was I
appreciate you make me watch this one. Oh.
Speaker 1 (52:26):
I well, and I so I love films like this.
I really like Slow Boils.
Speaker 2 (52:32):
Yeah, same.
Speaker 1 (52:33):
I really like things that, even though this one doesn't
have it, I like things that end up having kind
of red herrings. A really great show that I loved,
or the first two seasons of The Killing, which was
two police detectives that are trying to solve the murder
of a young girl. And it takes two seasons to
(52:54):
be able to do all that. So I think it's
ten episodes a season, but it just has these really
great intric weaving moments where it's like this person was
over here and they did this thing. This that's well,
they would have had motiver they and we kind of
spend this time of like unraveling what this person was
doing as we're starting to see like this other little
bit of stuff that's happening with this other person, and
(53:15):
so it's all this really intricate, weaved character stuff that
starts to really play out, and I love how that
happens and you have your heightened moments. And again with
Blue Ruin watching this and then seeing them go into
The Green Room, which was filmed in Oregon, by the way,
and I had several friends who worked on that film.
(53:36):
I myself didn't get to, but a bunch of folks
that I that I know got to all work on it.
And watching how the filmmakers because Making Blair so Making
Blair with Jeremy Salmy, they've kind of been like a
duo on several projects where they were writing, directing, shooting, producing,
acting in all of this stuff. So Green Room was
(53:58):
the next one. Making Blair is in that one as well.
He is I think like the number two or number
three Hesher Nazi that's in there. He's part of that,
that white supremacist group. And how crazy is to see
Patrick Stewart being an F bomb dropping white supremacist holy
(54:22):
shit like that man that film. But to watch them
progress in what they do well, Making Blair went on
to write and direct I Don't Feel at Home in
the World Anymore, Okay, which was a winner at I
believe was a sun Dance stand out and apparently this
(54:42):
was to Yeah. And you know, even prior to them
doing this stuff, like Jeremy Solmier was a director of
photography on a lot of projects that he didn't write
or direct, so he was kind of making his way
shooting stuff. And so there is definitely a beauty and
an eye in the technical aspects of how these films work.
(55:04):
And I think as a director because he knows that
he's able to set up all of these these moments
of tension and these moments of how people move within
the scenes and how the scene can be just long
enough and how all of this tension can build through
it because he was shooting these things for other people
and himself and seeing how that all plays out, so
(55:24):
he can direct that, mapping that out right, and so
all of them well. And then making Blair. I don't
know if you've seen the trailers for it. He wrote
and directed the Toxic Avenger film that's coming out in August.
That was his follow up from I Don't Feel at
Home in the World Anymore. He was like, I want
to make the Toxic Avenger cool, and so he's got
(55:47):
a there's a Toxic Avenger film, and I'm it's been
on the shelf now for about I want to say,
three years.
Speaker 2 (55:55):
Yeah, it's the one that's got like a light. It's
got Elijah Wood.
Speaker 1 (55:58):
Elijah Wood is Peter Dinkle Beard Englishe is in it
as the Toxic Avenger. Yeah, and uh, and Kevin Bacon
is in it, I think, as the main antagonist. Funny
and it's yeah, and you know it looks schlocky and
crazy and hyper violent, but yeah, I'm excited to be
(56:18):
able to see that one. But it's it's been they
have They've just watching them progress and watching them make
other films. It's very similar to uh, honestly from promising
young woman to then watch Saltburn and just watch that
progression of a director making, you know, exceptional films, even
if it isn't something that necessarily resonates with me or
(56:41):
you at any point in time, you can still see
the craft within the filmmaking.
Speaker 2 (56:46):
That's the undeniable truth about like that director as well
as this one is like you're definitely seeing those that
progression and gosh, it's a beautiful vision. Yeah, they just
have great they have a great eye. I'm impressed wildly, Like, yeah,
when that first scene of them ascending into the woods
(57:09):
and I was like, this is a drone trap because
this is a gorgeous drone shot or if it's on
a gurney, I don't know, I don't know, but it
was beautiful. Yeah, so yeah, thanks for making me watch
this one.
Speaker 1 (57:21):
Yeah. Absolutely. I am so glad that you liked it
after having watched it. So that makes me feel better.
I know I've had a little bit of weird choices
and things, try to mix it up because it's film
and it's an experiment, and so it's always interesting to
try to see where it's going to go to. So
you're a great sport about all of this.
Speaker 2 (57:41):
Oh you are too. I'll make you watch a lot
of horror films.
Speaker 1 (57:44):
I want more horror films. I'm absolutely absolutely all for it.
So the next film, Gretchen, is your choice, and I'm
excited to find out what it is we're going to
be watching. What do you want to talk about?
Speaker 2 (57:53):
We're going to talk about Scorsese's bringing out the Dead
like Nick Cave, Nick Cage, Nick Cave, Nick Cage at
his most crazy dope dub.
Speaker 1 (58:05):
Oh, this is such a crazy.
Speaker 2 (58:06):
Fun film philography. That's happening in that Oh yeah, yeah, that's.
Speaker 1 (58:10):
Our next drug adult film. I saw that one in
the movie theater. Oh and I haven't seen it since
it was released in the theater.
Speaker 2 (58:17):
Oh well, then that's gonna be fun for us to watch.
Speaker 1 (58:19):
Oh my goodness, yeah, I'm excited to see that. Well.
Thank you so much, thank you, yeah, and thanks everyone
for checking this out. Make sure you subscribe and download.
We would love to have you. And just so you know,
we are not only are we losing this space and
looking for a new home, but we are starting to
migrate everything over to a new YouTube channel. We have
a YouTube channel for check the Gate. We have a
(58:40):
brand new website for check the Gate. So we will
be getting all of those and all of our link
trees and in other places. But as we migrate things over,
please feel free to download it, watch it again, send
it to your friends, wrap it up for Christmas.
Speaker 2 (58:53):
We appreciate that, smash, the likes and things like that.
Speaker 1 (58:57):
All the things that help us, and we appreciate all
of that. Thank you so much for being here. And Gretchen,
thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (59:03):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (59:04):
See on the next the Check the Gate podcast is
hosted by Martin Vavra and Gretchen Brooks. The show is directed, produced,
and edited by Martin Vavra. Produced by Galaxy Sailor Productions
twenty twenty five. The show is filmed and recorded at
the Propulsion Zone Studio in downtown Portland, Oregon. Special thanks
to Adam Carpinelli and Aleandro Barragon
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