0:18

Hello everybody , welcome back to another

0:20

episode of the lunatics radio hour

0:23

podcast . I'm Abby Branker sitting

0:25

here with Alan Kudan .

0:27

Hello .

0:28

And we are so thrilled to be

0:30

joined by Jen Wexler and Sean

0:32

Redlitz . Welcome .

0:33

Hello , thanks for having us .

0:35

Thank you guys so much for being here . I'm sure people

0:38

are aware of who you are , but

0:40

just in case anyone isn't , jen Wexler

0:42

is an incredible filmmaker , writer , director

0:44

, sean , also very much in the horror

0:47

world , writer , marketer , worked

0:49

at Shutter for many years and we're thrilled to be

0:51

able to talk to them today about horror and

0:53

about how their most recent film

0:55

ties into demonic summoning . So

0:57

, jen , let's start with your credits a little bit here

0:59

. So you were the writer and director

1:01

of the Ranger in the sacrifice game

1:03

, which you co-wrote with Sean , and these

1:06

are two incredibly

1:08

and I'm not saying this to gas you up but really influential

1:11

horror films , I feel like in the

1:14

indie horror world community . So it's

1:16

very exciting to be able to talk to you .

1:18

Wow . Well , thank you so

1:20

much and I'm excited to be here to chat

1:22

.

1:22

So we do something a little bit

1:25

cringy for most of our guests on the podcast

1:27

, which is kind of ask a few icebreaker questions

1:29

just to kind of get everybody acclimated

1:32

with who you guys are . So the first

1:34

thing that I always ask is if you

1:36

guys have ever had any sort of

1:38

paranormal or unexplained

1:40

experience in your life .

1:42

I feel like I've always been

1:44

on the search for them . When

1:47

I was young , around 10 years

1:49

old , which was the time that I

1:52

was seeing the crafts for the first

1:54

time my friends

1:56

and I would like hang out in the local graveyard

1:59

after school and we'd

2:01

have slumber parties and do like ledges of feathers

2:03

to fizzle board and I

2:06

feel like it worked . But at the same time

2:08

it was like eight of us all carrying

2:10

the girl , so maybe it didn't

2:12

actually work , but in our like 10 year old

2:14

minds we were like , oh my gosh , she's so light

2:16

. Obviously this is working

2:18

. And we'd also do like , say , ounces and

2:20

play with a Ouija board , and I contacted

2:22

George Washington once , obviously

2:24

as you do when you're 10 .

2:26

Can you tell that story ?

2:28

Yeah , I said hey

2:30

, george Washington , if you're here , turn

2:33

on the TV . But the

2:35

TV was already on , so obviously I had to go

2:37

turn it off first , so I walked

2:39

over , turn it off and then a

2:41

couple moments later turn back on by

2:43

itself . It's possible

2:45

that I had accidentally pressed it twice really

2:48

quick , but I don't think

2:50

I did that . I think that it just turned

2:52

on by itself .

2:53

Okay , so yeah , I'm glad we probed because

2:55

that feels a little spooky .

2:58

This is our first George Washington horror story .

3:00

Oh , yes , well , also , the

3:02

night before it was

3:04

my 10 year old birthday party

3:07

and I had all these girls over my house

3:09

, and the night before we

3:12

spoke to Hitler .

3:15

And from one extreme to the other , really all

3:17

the historic figures .

3:19

And half the girls got scared and went

3:21

home .

3:22

You know , history class would have been so much more interesting

3:25

if there were just say ounces , yeah , interest first with the history

3:27

lessons .

3:28

Oh my god , why not talk to who you're learning about directly

3:30

?

3:30

Yeah , An excellent lesson on primary

3:33

versus secondary history sources . There you

3:35

go , there you go .

3:36

Sean what about you .

3:38

I also have never had a true paranormal experience

3:40

. We live in a building that's over

3:42

100 years old , so I have to assume , if there's

3:45

a good chance maybe somebody died there there could be ghosts

3:47

. So I allow the things that

3:49

lurk in my peripheral vision to possibly be ghosts

3:51

. You know , was that

3:53

a lamp over there or was that a ghost girl sitting on

3:55

the mantle ? I don't know , it could have been . But if

3:57

she's a ghost girl sitting on the mantle , she's welcome . It's

4:00

her place as much as mine . So , you

4:02

know , I try to give the ghosts their

4:04

space if they're real , or give them space in my

4:06

imagination if they're not .

4:07

Fair enough , I will open minded to

4:09

it , but nothing sort of concrete has ever happened

4:11

.

4:12

In the sacrifice game set . We

4:15

shot in this old abbey and

4:17

Some of the crew said that

4:19

they were experiencing some ghostly

4:21

things , like the

4:23

producers were in a room in the middle of the night and suddenly

4:26

all these candles were just knocked down by themselves

4:28

. And other

4:31

people said there was weird lighting going on in

4:33

the basement , like lights turning on and

4:35

off by themselves . But I was very

4:37

much and I think this is like just kind of who

4:39

I am as a person in terms of paranormal

4:41

stuff . I totally believe

4:43

in it , but I'm also like don't

4:45

fucking get in my headspace , ghosts especially

4:48

. Then I was like I'm trying to direct , don't get in my

4:50

headspace . But

4:52

just in general I'm like yo , if you're out there

4:54

, I'm cool with you , but let's just like keep

4:56

our distance from each other .

4:58

Fair enough . Fair enough so in

5:00

terms of horror , because you guys , I will say

5:02

Sean , you and I met

5:04

many years ago now . I can't quite

5:06

2018 , 2018

5:09

. And what really brought us together , besides

5:11

working on a project at work , was

5:13

our love of horror . So I know that

5:15

you have a love of horror . Obviously

5:17

, jen , you do . So , first of all , what

5:20

drew you both to the genre

5:22

? Because I think you guys both , specifically , are

5:24

quite invested in horror when it comes to filmmaking

5:26

.

5:27

In my particular case , as a kid , it

5:29

was always those movies that were on TV after school that

5:32

I watched . It was the Universal Monster

5:34

movies , it was the Vincent Price movies , it

5:36

was the Hammer Horror movies . Very

5:38

often I would find those things Even Planet of the Apes , I would

5:40

say was kind of scary to me as a kid . So

5:43

I fell in love with that . I had monster posters

5:45

. I was really invested in Dracula . I

5:48

had a whole Dracula get up for Halloween

5:50

as a 12-year-old 11-year-old

5:52

. So that was really a big influence

5:54

on me at the time . And then , professionally , I've

5:56

had opportunities to work . Maybe

5:59

it was drawn to them or maybe I just got lucky , but I have

6:01

had opportunities to work in science fiction and

6:03

fantasy and horror and television and film . I

6:05

worked at Sci-Fi back

6:08

in the day . I worked at another

6:10

streamer slash network called Furnet . That

6:12

unfortunately is no longer with us but was a fun place to be . That's

6:14

where Jen and I originally met and

6:17

I got to spend four great years at Shutter . So

6:19

it's been really a privilege to both be a horror fan

6:21

and in the horror industry .

6:22

Yeah , that's awesome . I fell

6:24

in love with horror when I was five years old

6:26

. I watched Are you Afraid of the Dark

6:29

. I became obsessed with that

6:31

TV show and I

6:34

know I have friends who have been

6:36

introduced to horror through people

6:38

, through parents , through friends . But

6:41

for me it was always such a solo experience

6:44

and I think that's why

6:47

I gravitated towards it , because it was like this

6:49

special thing that belonged to me , like watching

6:52

Are you Afraid of the Dark by myself when I was a kid

6:54

and then later watching like Buffy

6:56

, the Vampire Slayer and like all the

6:59

late 90s teen slashers

7:01

. Sometimes I would

7:03

watch them with friends , but really it was

7:05

this spiritual

7:07

experience that aligned

7:10

with my going into adolescence

7:12

. That was like I was discovering

7:15

this world by myself

7:17

, and so it became this really special

7:20

thing to me . It's interesting to hear like

7:22

of Sean's solo experience as well

7:24

with horror . I think there's just

7:26

something about it where you

7:28

can connect to the genre

7:30

on your own . You don't necessarily

7:32

need a community when you have that initial

7:34

gateway experience . But

7:37

then later on , when I was in college

7:39

, I started doing an internship for

7:42

Fearnet which

7:44

, once I graduated , later became my

7:46

first official real

7:48

job . I worked in the marketing department as a marketing

7:50

coordinator and honestly

7:53

I've never had

7:55

like since graduation , since

7:57

that became my first real job . I've

8:00

never had a normal

8:02

job . I've always worked in horror

8:04

in one way or another Like

8:06

. First I was at Fearnet for a couple of years

8:08

, then I worked at Larry

8:11

Thessenden's production company Glass Eye Picks

8:13

for several years and now

8:15

I'm making horror movies . So

8:17

I know what it is to have a . You

8:20

know , before all that I had normal

8:23

jobs . I worked in restaurants and stores and

8:25

all the things . But since then I haven't

8:27

had a normal job and I don't want to go back

8:29

to normal jobs .

8:31

Fair enough .

8:31

And while we're talking about the Fearnet days , shout out to our friend

8:33

Drew Daywalt , who is now a very successful children's

8:36

book author but has also made some amazing

8:38

horror shorts , including some . You've definitely seen

8:40

the one about

8:43

the woman who thinks she's in bed with somebody

8:45

but turns out there's a very creepy . Anyway

8:47

, I won't spoil all of it , but while

8:49

we were both at Fearnet , drew was making

8:51

these shorts with his friends , very kind

8:53

of guerrilla style , and inspired

8:55

, I think , jen to take a whack

8:57

at it because it was something we'd talked about for a long time . But you

8:59

often wait for somebody to like unlock the keys

9:02

to the kingdom for you like okay , now you can be

9:04

a filmmaker . But really to be a filmmaker you just

9:06

have to go out and make films , whether with whatever you can

9:08

, whatever you have . And it was really exciting to

9:10

see Jen kind of get that first tone in the water and

9:12

then learn so much more with Glass Eye Picks and

9:14

now , kind of , you know , doing her own thing

9:17

and also helping others along the way .

9:19

Yeah , I mean , and you know it's really interesting to me

9:21

actually . So my

9:24

experience with horror and why

9:26

I'm drawn to it , I think is a

9:28

little bit different from what you guys both said , which is that

9:30

I have this like very intense fear

9:33

growing up and I was very afraid all the time and

9:35

despite that , my family was really into horror , like

9:37

abnormally . So so

9:39

it's kind of this weird juxtaposition , but

9:42

like when you were talking about your like solo

9:44

experience with horror , I was just thinking you

9:46

were the bravest kid . Like I was

9:48

upstairs like having a mental breakdown

9:50

because I could hear the X-Files theme song

9:53

, like that my parents were watching downstairs

9:55

, like . So you guys are both , I feel , like very

9:57

brave . I don't know that everybody has that experience

9:59

with their like solo discovery

10:01

of horror . It feels very adventurous

10:03

to me .

10:04

How about you , Ellen ?

10:06

I always liked horror . I

10:08

didn't fall in love with horror until I met Abby and

10:11

that just opened the whole whole

10:13

realm of possibilities , kind of . Similarly

10:16

, it was always like a very personal

10:18

thing because I didn't have anybody like . Unless

10:20

you have someone who's like gung-ho about horror , it's

10:22

kind of tough to be like yeah guys , let's sit down and

10:25

watch this

10:27

like awful gory slasher . You

10:29

know , most people , most people don't

10:31

like that , but

10:33

I did so . It was like just something

10:35

that every so often I would dabble on my own . But

10:38

then , like , once you have a partner

10:40

that is gung-ho about it , it's

10:42

like super fun . And in terms of

10:45

being able to like crack into making

10:47

horror , I've really

10:49

I've always felt that horror lends

10:51

itself very well to shorts , whereas

10:54

not a lot of genres do that Like . I

10:56

feel like short films , like the biggest categories

10:58

, are either just like horror or drama

11:01

, and a drama usually serves

11:03

a purpose . It's like it's telling

11:05

a bigger story , it's trying to tell a bigger story , it's

11:07

leading up to the feature version of it . Well

11:10

, like a horror short can be like a super self-contained

11:12

things like cool on to the next , let's do it . And

11:14

that's just always felt like a very accessible

11:16

way to break in .

11:19

And when you're watching horror as a kid , it serves a particular

11:21

purpose . Usually it's either because you have

11:23

fears and anxieties in your life that it's helping you

11:25

kind of cope with , because

11:28

it gives you a safe outlet for them , or because

11:30

you're , you know , lonely

11:32

and interested in mysterious , weird stuff or

11:34

supernatural stuff , and it gives you an avenue into that . It

11:37

kind of lets you test yourself in a really safe

11:39

way . As a kid , some people like roller coasters , some people

11:41

you know jump off the roof on , you know , off

11:43

the garage roof . Horror

11:46

was something that I could tap into and push

11:48

myself but also feel safe doing so . And then

11:50

when you get to be an adult especially if you're an adult who makes

11:52

films or is interested in watching a lot of films you

11:55

realize how open the genre is

11:57

for just about any kind of storytelling you want to do

11:59

. You want to tell a comedy , you want to tell

12:01

a romantic story , you want to tell a really

12:03

deep psychological story . Horror can go

12:05

to places that traditional

12:07

dramas , traditional comedies can't . Now

12:10

, it's not everybody's cup of tea and sometimes they go to places

12:12

some audiences don't want to go to . But if

12:14

you watch a lot of horror or if you're friends

12:16

with somebody who really knows the genre and can guide you to

12:18

the things that really resonate with the kinds of horror you're interested

12:20

in . You know that takes you far . I'm

12:23

not somebody who is super deep into slashers , so

12:25

that was never my thing . But give me

12:27

, you know , a folk horror or a

12:30

world in which the characters are doomed from the start

12:32

, and you know it like Blair Witch , you

12:35

know , like I just eat that stuff up .

12:36

Yeah , yeah . Also , as you get older

12:39

, you start to realize there's

12:41

a whole community of

12:44

people just like you . People

12:46

gravitated towards this stuff Like I didn't feel like

12:48

I had . I felt like I was

12:50

the person in my friend group when I was a kid that

12:52

was like let's watch a horror movie . But then

12:54

, obviously , as I got older and

12:56

the internet became a thing and I started

12:58

coming in chat rooms and all the things

13:00

I , like you know , I

13:02

started to meet other people who

13:05

were into horror and then , certainly now

13:07

I mean it's so easy

13:09

to find the horror community I feel

13:11

like yeah , the other interesting

13:13

thing that I thought about when you were

13:15

talking , sean , is that there's

13:18

studies that they do , and probably

13:20

most people know this , but I find it really interesting .

13:21

There's studies that they do around like spikes

13:24

in horror , like when

13:26

the general public is interested , and

13:28

it's always like the Great Depression , world

13:30

War II , right , like when there's like really tragic

13:32

, terrible things happening in the world , which I

13:35

know is steady state for

13:37

a lot of the time recently . But

13:40

it's because there's people find

13:42

like an escape , like a safe escape in

13:44

horror , when they need that kind of release right

13:46

, and like going to a theater or on a roller coaster

13:48

, like you said , is even for us adults sometimes

13:50

is a way to kind of cope with what's

13:52

happening in the world , you know , in a safe

13:55

, confined space .

13:57

I just can't get over the fact that you're able to watch Are you

13:59

Fair the Dark on your own ? Really , it's terrifying

14:02

.

14:02

Oh my , it was really scary but it was like some of

14:04

the most exciting emotional

14:06

adventures I went on as a kid were

14:08

just like watching . Are you Fair the Dark ?

14:11

I've recently tried to dive back into Goosebumps

14:13

and that's too much .

14:15

Goosebumps is also .

14:17

It's a lot scarier than I remember it .

14:20

Well , the before our amusement park episode

14:22

a few months ago , what was the name of

14:24

?

14:24

it One Day in Horrorland .

14:25

One Day in Horrorland he was actually legitimately like struggling

14:28

to get through it . It's terrifying , oh my

14:30

gosh . Okay , I know this is like the most

14:32

obnoxious question , but can you

14:34

give us just like a handful of

14:36

your like Desert Island horror films ?

14:39

The Shining definitely

14:41

Suspiria .

14:43

Desert Island is a really good way to phrase it , because I get

14:45

asked a lot like what are some of your favorite horror films and

14:47

those ? You know I have a lot to pull from recent

14:50

classic , but the kinds of that you

14:52

want to watch and rewatch and kind of live and relive

14:54

over and over again . Return of the Living Dead would

14:56

probably be on that , because it's so entertaining

14:58

to me . You know

15:01

it gave us the zombies , the deep brains , which people

15:03

don't always realize was not always part of the mythology

15:05

. Send more cops . Yeah , exactly . So

15:08

that's

15:10

when I think I can watch endlessly . I

15:12

have others that are like you know , they leave me a little more

15:15

shaken or I might want to set them aside for a

15:17

few weeks or months or years before I revisit

15:19

them . But

15:21

that's when I can watch over and over again . And

15:23

I really love Dead and Buried , which has Dan

15:25

O'Bannon in common . Oh , he didn't really write Dead and Buried , he's

15:28

a credited writer on that . I think that was just

15:30

to help them get the financing . I mean , he acknowledges

15:32

that he was not the major force behind that . But Dead and Buried

15:35

you know people have talked about

15:37

the Sacrifice game is having some good twists in it . Dead and Buried

15:39

, to me , has the quintessential twist

15:41

and great ending of all time and horror

15:43

, if it's not one . You see , and I'm not gonna spoil it for you here today

15:45

. But essentially the premise

15:48

is that a sheriff who

15:50

used to be a cop in the big city returns back

15:52

to his small I wanna say New England , but basically

15:54

coastal , foggy town and

15:57

where weird murders are taking place , in which mobs

15:59

of people are descending upon the victim

16:01

and filming , photographing , otherwise

16:04

documenting the murders as they happen .

16:06

But you don't know why ?

16:08

Wow , okay , well , we'll have to watch it .

16:10

Yeah , I haven't even heard of this movie Directed by Gary Sherman , who

16:12

also did Poltergeist 3 and a lot of other great stuff

16:14

. He did us Raw

16:16

Meat , which is a London-based

16:18

subway underground horror

16:20

. So he's a good guy .

16:22

I also just going back . I'm also

16:24

, you know , usually I'm

16:27

asked what are your favorite horror movies . So I just have this list

16:29

that . I just go to , but I agree

16:31

, phrasing it as like Desert

16:33

Island you don't make anything else , so you're

16:35

gonna be watching these movies over and over Again

16:38

makes me think about this question

16:40

a little differently , and so

16:42

I would answer with movies I have literally

16:44

watched over and over again , which include

16:46

Heathers I've watched that movie

16:48

probably more than any other movie I've ever watched in my

16:50

life and also Halloween .

16:52

Yeah , we're similar , jen . Halloween

16:55

is my ultimate horror

16:57

film . Like just every year since I was

17:00

born , I've watched that movie on Halloween . Like

17:02

it's just like my family's . Everything

17:04

you need to know about my family is that .

17:06

This says a lot about Abby . She's like two years old and they're

17:08

making her watch Halloween .

17:10

And I'm like this is a lot better family

17:12

. It's pretty cool family .

17:14

Yeah they are . My mom is like into

17:16

the universal , like it's just it's

17:18

. Yeah , it was obvious that

17:20

I would end up a big fanatic

17:22

of horror .

17:22

I'm gonna throw out one more please . Alien . It's

17:25

got your sci-fi . It's got your sort of monster

17:27

and haunted house , except it's a spaceship . It's

17:29

got phenomenal cast , great acting

17:32

, Can't beat that one . It checks a lot of boxes , it

17:34

does .

17:35

We were overdue for a deep

17:37

dive . We've been trying to do it for a few years now in

17:39

the podcast and like because every once in a while we'll do

17:41

, we'll pick a franchise and we'll watch every film

17:44

and we'll do like this big deep dive

17:46

into the history of it . Usually around Halloween

17:48

and Alien has been kind of

17:50

floating around , so it's

17:52

one of Alan's favorite franchises

17:54

. I'm less familiar with it beyond

17:56

the first one , so hopefully , hopefully

17:58

soon , we'll get to it .

17:59

I hope so .

18:00

The other thing I wanted to say about Heather's too is that

18:03

I have a very specific

18:05

love for academic horror and

18:08

it's very prevalent , I feel like , in a lot of novels

18:10

. But Heather's is one of those rare films

18:13

where it kind of evokes that academic

18:15

world of being on a specific

18:17

campus and having things devolve in a

18:20

way in this teen drama type way

18:22

that always happens in these academic

18:24

horror novels and stories , and I love

18:27

it so much .

18:27

I love academic horror . I

18:30

don't know how much

18:32

that term is used .

18:34

I've never heard that term before .

18:35

But I love it and I'm going to start sharing it .

18:37

I wrote a little blog post about

18:39

some of my favorite academic horror

18:41

novels . I'll send them . I'll send it to you because

18:43

I'm curious if you have additional

18:45

ones . I'm missing .

18:46

I feel like usually one would say like teen

18:49

horror , like slashers or whatever

18:51

, but or we've been saying with Sarcophase

18:54

Game boarding school horror . Yeah , yeah

18:56

but academic horror is just a great term that

18:58

I think we should use more often

19:00

, yes , yeah , and it's like .

19:02

it's almost like you want to watch it in the fall , like

19:04

when you would be returning to school and the leaves

19:06

are turning and you're on a campus

19:08

, you're away from home , you know , and it's all

19:10

of that that's happening . It's like a contained universe

19:13

.

19:13

Yeah , Halloween H2O is

19:16

academic horror .

19:18

You talk about Halloween , h2o all the time . The faculty I know

19:20

is on your short list of favorite movies .

19:21

I love the faculty . We also love the faculty

19:23

here . Yeah , yeah , also disturbing behavior

19:26

. Oh , so good , katie

19:28

Holmes , ok .

19:29

I'll have to watch that one .

19:31

Speaking about . Just you know , horror

19:33

being a very personal thing . Every so

19:35

often , like you'll meet people that

19:37

you know , you've known

19:39

them for a while , but like you've never discussed

19:42

horror . But when they find out that

19:44

, like you're into it , it just like the

19:46

floodgates open and they're like oh my god , do

19:48

you ? Like I've never had someone to talk to you about this

19:50

? And this happened a little while

19:52

back , when there was someone that I worked with , I've been working with

19:54

for years . Then , when it came up , the fact that

19:56

we have like a horror podcast is like

19:58

, oh my god , have you seen the faculty

20:01

? Like yeah , it's

20:03

great . And then we just bonded over the faculty

20:05

for a while . It's like these little things that just like

20:07

connect people .

20:08

It's so good . Yeah , it's just such a well

20:10

made , well written

20:13

movie . It's really smart

20:15

. Good job , robert .

20:16

Rodriguez . While there's so

20:18

many endless great horror films in

20:20

the world , I want to talk a little bit more about the sacrifice

20:23

game , which came out

20:25

in December of 2023 . Is that

20:27

right , correct ? It's a little bit Christmassy

20:29

, but don't let that stop you from watching it now , if

20:32

you were not going to spoil anything , because , you know

20:34

, probably not everybody listening

20:36

has watched it . But if you haven't watched it , please go

20:38

watch it . It's on Shutter currently . Is

20:40

it anywhere else ?

20:42

It's now on VOD , so . Amazon most

20:44

of the places you rent a movie . Amazing .

20:46

OK , and I'm just going to

20:48

read the log line here to kind

20:50

of illustrate in a contained way

20:52

. It's bad enough that boarding school

20:54

students Samantha and Clara can't go home

20:56

for the holidays , but things take a deadly

20:58

turn when a murderous gang arrives

21:01

on their doorstep . So , sean

21:03

and Jen , you both wrote this film together . Could

21:05

you describe for us a little bit about

21:07

the essence of the movie ?

21:10

I like to talk about the movie like

21:13

Last House on the Left by

21:15

way of Buffy the Vampire Slayer .

21:18

We love that , and one of the reasons

21:20

why we're talking about the Sacrifice

21:22

game this month as opposed to every other

21:24

month is that we're just coming off of a big

21:26

series on the podcast about demonic summoning

21:28

. So one thing I want to talk about a little bit

21:31

is kind of the lore and the rules

21:33

of the world , because

21:35

you do have entities

21:37

and demons to some extent . Again , I don't want to give

21:39

too much away , but one thing that Alan

21:42

and I talk about a lot because Alan specifically

21:44

loves films with rules

21:46

and so it doesn't seem arbitrary

21:48

when things are happening , and I think the Sacrifice

21:51

game does that really well . But can

21:53

you tell us a little bit about how you came

21:55

up with , like , the parameters of the world

21:58

, the rules of the world , the lore of

22:00

this kind of legend and how it all came

22:02

to be ?

22:05

We're very influenced by

22:07

a lot of these kinds of movies

22:09

and we love

22:11

horror . We watch horror movies together

22:14

all the time . We're very aware of all the tropes

22:16

, and something that's really exciting to me

22:18

as a writer and a

22:20

horror fan is when

22:22

you can find ways to take the tropes that everybody

22:24

knows and then twist them in new ways that we

22:26

haven't quite seen before . So

22:28

when we were writing , that was something that Sean and

22:30

I were really excited about doing

22:33

playing with the Sacrifice

22:36

trope , the

22:38

trope of demonic

22:40

sacrifice , virgin sacrifice . We've

22:43

seen this in horror so

22:45

many times and some of the movies we

22:47

were influenced by include , like Rosemary's

22:50

Baby and the Exorcist , and

22:53

so just kind of gathering everything that we

22:55

know about this trope and

22:57

playing with it , and

22:59

not to give too much away , but

23:01

just to say that you have this

23:03

gang of Manson-esque cultists

23:06

who come to this boarding school and

23:08

they're there because they believe

23:11

they can raise a demon in

23:14

this space . So it was really

23:16

fun to think about everything that goes

23:18

into that from you know , that's

23:21

why I mentioned Last House . On the Left you have

23:23

this home invasion and

23:25

this gang of bad guys who

23:28

think that they have all the power

23:30

in the world and they can do whatever they want , and

23:32

they're going to get more power when they raise

23:34

this demon . And

23:36

then things take

23:39

wild turns once they

23:41

actually get to the place .

23:44

And in terms of the writing of it and the creation

23:46

of the mythology and the lore behind it , I'm

23:48

with Alan . I love when there's a good , a good , solid

23:51

concept , a cool concept that I haven't seen before

23:53

, ideally in a movie . We , like Jen

23:55

said , we watch a lot of horror , so we've seen a lot of things , so we wanted

23:57

to do something that was different . But I also love

23:59

it when they don't over explain it . I don't need to have my

24:01

hand held , I don't need to have the movie stop and have , you

24:04

know , a long expository passage where

24:06

we talk through all of the nitty-gritty . But

24:08

I think that as an audience you can sense when

24:11

a filmmaker knows the lore and

24:13

gives you enough tidbits so that then they hang together

24:15

and it feels consistent but is not over

24:17

, you know , slowing the movie down

24:19

or weighing it down with too much of that . So we

24:21

tried to keep that balance and there

24:23

are a lot of clues in terms of what the

24:25

origins of this entity

24:27

might be and what

24:30

happened along the way and what's happening

24:32

now . What is . We catch up with them in the movie , but

24:34

a lot of that might not be apparent on first viewing

24:36

because it's sort of teased and sprinkled

24:38

in different places . So our hope is that

24:41

if you don't necessarily come up with exactly the idea

24:43

that we had , you at least come up with an idea of

24:45

your own that fits those breadcrumbs and

24:47

makes sense to you and makes the world feel

24:49

like it's bigger than what you're seeing in the movie .

24:51

Yeah , yeah . And did you guys do any

24:53

research into demonic

24:55

legend or mythology in general ? Or do

24:57

you feel like you have seen enough horror that

24:59

you were able to kind of do that without diving

25:01

into textbooks on mythology ?

25:04

I read up on the Lesser Key of Solomon

25:07

Demons and I didn't

25:09

want to base our demon

25:11

on one of those because , going

25:13

back to earlier in our conversation , I actually

25:15

do believe in this stuff and

25:17

I didn't want to piss off

25:19

a real demon and I didn't want to accidentally

25:22

summon a real demon .

25:24

Or their publicist .

25:26

So we made our own invention

25:30

but stole traits

25:32

of some of those demons and

25:35

that was really fun creating

25:37

our demon . His name is

25:40

Seraalq . It was really fun

25:42

, and when we were making

25:44

the movie , I make look books for

25:46

all the different departments and

25:48

it was really fun putting all that together

25:50

for our makeup

25:53

effects and prosthetics department

25:56

and being like this is what their

25:58

sigil looks like . And this

26:00

is the history . This is what you can expect if

26:02

you summon a demon . I've also spent

26:04

way too many hours on the internet

26:07

just going through weird

26:09

forums and reading

26:11

creepypastas and just seeing

26:14

other people's experiences of

26:16

trying to summon demons

26:18

, and I've also been really interested in

26:21

the idea of first of all

26:23

to summon a demon . Usually these rituals are really

26:25

complicated and I would say our ritual

26:27

is also complicated , Like it's really hard to

26:29

do our ritual . You need the

26:32

exact right circumstances for our ritual

26:34

that we've created to work . It's really

26:37

complicated to summon demons

26:39

and I'm also interested

26:41

in the idea that you could summon

26:43

a demon and not even know if it worked

26:45

or not , and suddenly there's

26:47

this force in your life . That's not . Things

26:51

are different than how they used to be , so

26:53

that was really attractive to me when

26:55

we were developing this .

26:57

It's a very interesting concept , thank you , you

27:00

know , from like classical film

27:02

, I guess , when this demon summoning happens

27:04

, the portal opens and like the big thing

27:06

comes out . But I guess , yeah , through , like you

27:09

know , like specifically Go like

27:11

which trial text and everything like when

27:13

the demon comes , you , you don't

27:15

know . It's just because , yeah , things are

27:17

now different .

27:18

That's such an interesting concept and there's a lot of

27:20

like trickster demons yeah , there's

27:22

a lot of them who like to

27:24

fuck with you . So if you happen

27:26

to summon one of those , then

27:29

you could be in a lot of trouble .

27:31

And , as Jen mentioned , we have a somewhat complicated

27:33

ceremony that we feel like carries

27:36

the weight of what these sort of lesser key of Solomon

27:38

kind of classical demon stuff does , but really

27:40

like , like they're , they go way beyond

27:43

it's it's it's weeks of preparation and

27:45

there's a movie that I'm sure you've covered

27:47

or are covering as part of the series , a

27:49

dark song that is all about how

27:52

to summon a demon and and why , and

27:55

it's , it's , it's Beyond

27:58

esoteric , it's so much work , but it's such a great movie

28:00

and it is is maybe the best one On

28:03

the list of even demon movies that I've

28:05

seen in terms of really getting it . What

28:07

the sort of medieval scholars who thought they

28:09

knew how to do this were up to . Ours

28:12

is a sort of light version of that by that standard

28:14

, but still a lot more involved than maybe

28:16

your typical , your typical movie where

28:18

they just say a few magic words and a demon you know

28:20

the drop pentagram say a few words and a demon pops

28:22

up .

28:23

I , because I one of the reason

28:25

why I really like specific

28:27

rules and lore is because you

28:29

can have a Seemingly

28:32

omnipotent being of some , you know some supernatural

28:35

force that breaks all these

28:37

conventions about like how do you defeat this

28:39

thing ? But once you

28:41

Put it in

28:43

some kind of box , you've now given

28:45

it some kind of critical flaw and

28:48

then like that's , that's

28:50

how you get your you know overarching

28:52

story when the protagonist

28:54

can now rise to the occasion and , you know , fight

28:57

back against this seemingly unbeatable

28:59

thing . And one thing that

29:01

always Like kills

29:03

sequels for me is when they establish

29:06

the rules of this , of something , and

29:08

then they just say , and then you have some new Director coming in for

29:10

, like I'm thinking of , like Nightmare on Elm

29:12

Street , like five or something , but that's a bad

29:14

example because they still adhere to rules pretty well , that's

29:16

, it's a great franchise for rules . But

29:18

you know they throw that away and like actually this

29:21

thing is can just Break

29:23

, break the rules . Now you're kind of starting from

29:25

scratch , because now it's you know , quote-unquote scarier

29:27

.

29:28

Yeah , I'm trying to think of like Hellraiser , you know

29:30

, but I think those are the kinds of things we love

29:32

, and I think that's true of anything like if you put

29:34

any Thing in a box , like even when

29:36

you're working on a creative project , having

29:38

any kind of limitation .

29:40

Always like breeds more creativity

29:42

, I feel like yeah , and having having an antagonist

29:45

or a monster that's not all powerful , that has

29:48

constraints , and set sets around

29:50

what they can do , is helpful and

29:52

Not every horror franchise has to do

29:54

this , but , but when you can , when you , when

29:56

you can create a monster that also has

29:58

an agenda , that has a point of view , that has Feelings

30:01

and opinions , and those could be even changed over time

30:03

. They're not just set . You know , I Freddy

30:05

is by far my favorite slasher , but you know , I feel like

30:07

he's got one thing on his mind which is killing teens

30:09

and that's all he's

30:12

really there for and he doesn't really care too much and that doesn't

30:14

change too much . In our particular movie

30:16

we wanted to play around with an idea of like is

30:18

the monster necessarily evil ? Is the monster

30:20

just out for themselves ? Is that ? Are there other

30:23

things governing what's going on ? So that's

30:25

some of the fun we had .

30:26

I love when the monster becomes a little bit

30:28

of an antihero . Anytime you can root

30:31

for the monster , and not simply

30:33

because the characters are just

30:35

so unlikeable . When you have likeable characters

30:38

and a likeable monster , but still

30:40

there , everyone's like at odds and it's scary , it's

30:42

, it's difficult to pull off and I felt like the sacrifice

30:45

game really , really did it and thank you

30:47

. I when I was because

30:49

we watched it separately because Abby was able

30:51

to go to the screening and when I was like watching

30:54

it by myself , Abby was in the other room

30:56

and I'm just like kept calling out like

30:58

they're doing it . Yeah .

31:00

I Came home

31:02

and the first thing I said to Alan was you're

31:05

going to love the sacrifice game

31:07

. There are so many rules . And

31:10

the next day he watched it and he loved it

31:12

and it was great because we watched it in December

31:14

and it was Christmas themed and it was perfect

31:17

.

31:17

We do a lot of like holiday horror stuff

31:20

, lunatic , so it was , it was ideal

31:22

and we set it in 71 because

31:24

we felt like , hey , that was the right time to tell the story . But so many

31:26

of our influences and Jen has already mentioned Rose

31:28

Marie's baby , the exorcist you can absolutely put black Christmas

31:30

on that list War from that era

31:33

, so it just really clicked for us is to to set it as

31:35

well .

31:35

Yeah , that's an interesting thing to

31:37

talk about , to a little bit , just as filmmakers

31:40

and writers how you guys think about Influences

31:43

, because I think for for me , right , it's hard

31:45

to separate that out because

31:47

we love horror , we watch so

31:49

much horror and so much film in general and as

31:52

we work on our own films , you

31:54

know it's just there , it's in your brain , right . But I

31:56

know other filmmakers who , like specifically , won't

31:59

watch Films

32:01

that are really close to what they're working on , because

32:03

you know they feel like it's too close .

32:05

I wonder how you guys think about that most

32:07

of the time I embrace the

32:10

influences and I like

32:12

having like the library of films

32:14

in my head and Even

32:16

if the movie comes out , like right now while

32:19

I'm writing something , yeah , by the time

32:21

the thing I'm writing is Done

32:24

and then actually gets financed

32:27

and then actually goes into production , like we're

32:29

talking like four years from now , if

32:31

we're lucky it's actually coming out

32:33

. Yeah , so by then

32:36

that thing that came out right now

32:38

is again part

32:41

of the genre that you're working

32:43

in . Sometimes I do feel like , okay

32:45

, that's too close for me to be watching right now

32:47

, but Ultimately

32:50

, like I don't wait that long . I wait maybe a couple

32:52

months and then I I check it out . I

32:55

like having those influences and

32:57

it was really cool . Is like when I'm writing

32:59

, if I'm writing in a certain genre , first

33:01

of all I'll be like , okay , this is this meets

33:03

this . So that's like top of mind

33:05

. And then , as I'm writing , I'm like , oh my god

33:08

, in this scene it's like if I take a little bit of this

33:10

and then I mash it with this , but

33:12

it's its own thing here . That's what this scene

33:14

is . So I think it's like a really fun part

33:16

of the process .

33:17

Yeah , pulling from various

33:19

places , yeah , yeah and

33:21

it may seem Horetical to say this on a horror podcast

33:24

, but I think that you know , if you're a horror

33:26

fan and you want to make horror entertainment Watching

33:28

steel from non horror movies too yeah

33:30

, and you know , make them your own

33:33

, don't just copy stuff . But you know , there there's

33:36

been some great examples recently obviously a

33:38

happy death day franchise and , and

33:41

was it freaky or

33:43

great examples of pulling from body

33:45

switch movies or time loop movies . But

33:47

saying , what if we make them horror ? Whatever your favorite

33:50

movie is , it can be fast

33:52

and furious , all right . Well , what's a horror element that I could

33:54

add to that that would make it exciting ? You

33:57

love musicals great , and the apocalypse is

33:59

. So when you can bring

34:01

everybody that is working in the horror space is

34:03

also probably seen and loved the same horror movies you

34:05

have . But they haven't necessarily watched the other genres

34:07

that really fascinate you , whether it's westerns , boxing

34:09

movies , whatever it is . If you can find something

34:12

from those other spheres documentaries that

34:14

inspire you when you think , hmm , what

34:16

if I put a horror element in this ? What does it give me ? You

34:19

could go to some really cool places .

34:21

Yeah , and to your point earlier , sometimes

34:23

it is purely just a horror film , but

34:25

so often , especially now , I feel

34:27

like it's a horror plus . Right , it's

34:29

a horror drama , it's a horror comedy , it's

34:31

a horror zombie film , it's a horror whatever it is

34:33

. There's like endless combinations . That

34:35

and as they should . Right , because

34:38

why not ? But horror can be layered

34:40

with so many other things . And so , to your point

34:42

, like pulling inspiration from anywhere

34:44

and everywhere makes perfect sense .

34:46

I am just so excited to see a horror

34:49

street racing movie or a horror boxing

34:51

movie now . Well , you wanna work on it . That

34:53

sounds amazing but after we're done recording we'll

34:55

go brainstorm . Sorry , I'm so

34:57

distracted thinking about this now . Demon Car

34:59

is the car haunted ? Alan ?

35:01

has a specific love of that Is it

35:03

a Christine sort of scenario .

35:05

Or oh , geez oh geez .

35:07

Or are they competing with the devil to win somebody's

35:09

soul back in a car situation

35:11

?

35:12

It has to start just like a perfectly normal

35:14

street racing movie Establish all the

35:16

stakes and halfway through the switch flips

35:18

and becomes supernatural .

35:19

Sure so , like from Dust Till Dawn . But street

35:21

racing , yeah , all right , great

35:24

Done Vampire street racing gang . Great

35:26

, we'll put it on the books .

35:28

I mean it's you know any other

35:31

genre sets itself

35:33

up for , like franchising and

35:35

sequels and everything . Was

35:38

that a consideration during

35:40

the process of making it , or

35:42

just yeah , what's the state ?

35:45

Well , certainly now . We just love being

35:47

in this world . So we're like oh , how

35:50

can we make sequels or prequels or TV

35:52

spinoffs or whatever ? But while

35:54

making , while writing it and while making it

35:56

, I wasn't thinking about any

35:58

of that . I'm and

36:01

I felt this way with the Ranger too I'm

36:03

just focused on I want to make like a

36:06

complete story . I'm

36:08

hopeful that the story will feel like it

36:10

expands beyond the beginning

36:12

and the start , the start time and the end time

36:14

of the movie and the first and the last

36:16

page of the script to feel like

36:19

a whole world . But I want

36:21

the movie to feel totally complete

36:23

. Yeah , so that was my goal

36:25

with it .

36:26

Yeah , at Q and A's we get asked a lot about could

36:28

the story go on , where could it go from here , and we're

36:30

entertaining some ideas , so we'll see what the future holds

36:32

.

36:33

Yeah , I mean , I will say it's sort of a

36:35

perfect ending in that way , because it

36:37

lends itself very well to

36:40

kind of what is the next chapter , but also

36:42

I can assume what I think the next

36:44

chapter is and I feel like I've seen the movie

36:46

and I'm satisfied with that , you know , and it's

36:48

kind of it works well both ways . Yeah

36:51

, it's interesting you know interesting

36:53

thing about sequels while you're working on it . So

36:56

though the Ranger , your

36:59

first film , is not super relevant

37:01

to demonic summoning , I would be remiss

37:03

to not corner you about it while I have you here

37:06

. So the Ranger is

37:08

an incredibly fun film

37:10

and it was your first feature , is that right ? It was my

37:12

first feature as a director . As a director and

37:15

again I'm gonna read the log line for

37:17

anyone who hasn't seen it Teen punks

37:19

on the run from the cops and hiding

37:21

out in the woods come up against the local

37:23

authority in unhinged park

37:25

ranger with an axe to grind , which is

37:27

a perfect description . And

37:30

I will just say right off the bat that this

37:32

film stars our friend Jeremy Holm

37:34

, who is an incredible actor , an incredible

37:37

human , and this

37:39

it's just like such

37:41

a surprising

37:43

and beautiful and horrifying

37:45

performance from Jeremy in this film

37:47

, so I just wanna start with

37:49

that . So okay again , how would

37:51

you describe the essence of the Ranger ?

37:54

With the Ranger I was really . I

37:57

wanted to bash together 80s

38:00

punk movies and 80s slashers

38:02

and then give the whole thing

38:05

a Lisa Frank color palette

38:07

.

38:07

Yeah yeah , that's fun .

38:08

That's exactly how . That

38:10

feels , exactly right . What was

38:13

the process for making the Ranger compared

38:15

to the sacrifice game ?

38:17

The Ranger was much more handmade

38:21

. It was a

38:23

group of friends got together

38:25

, all my buddies at Glass

38:27

Eye Picks , we all we

38:29

had been working together on a couple of movies

38:32

. So I had made a movie called

38:34

Like Me , james C , where it was the

38:36

DP . On that he came over to the Ranger

38:38

. There were a couple of other people

38:40

that we'd just been making movies

38:42

together and we went out into

38:44

the woods and we made this movie together . The

38:47

sacrifice game was a union

38:49

crew in Canada , an

38:51

amazing crew , but they were all

38:54

people that I met for

38:56

the first time when I went to Canada

38:58

. The producers introduced me to people , so

39:01

it was just a different kind of process .

39:03

Yeah , yeah . The Ranger is kind of like you

39:06

got a punk band in a garage and you're all learning how to play

39:08

your instruments and you're making killer

39:10

sounds , whereas the sacrifice

39:12

game it's like you've gotten together like

39:14

a , like a roadies

39:16

and a whole tour and now you're like putting on big

39:19

arena concerts .

39:20

Yes , yes , not

39:22

to give anything away again for anyone who hasn't

39:24

seen it , but the Ranger , the

39:26

role of the Ranger , again played by Jeremy

39:28

, is such a specific

39:31

role . How did you come

39:33

to figure out like who the right person would

39:35

be for that ?

39:36

So the Ranger I co-wrote it

39:39

. It was originally written by my friend

39:41

, jaco Farino . We were in

39:43

college together , we were both majoring

39:45

in screenwriting and this was

39:47

his like senior thesis in 2008

39:50

. And I was just a fan of

39:52

the idea . I was like yo , that's awesome

39:54

, I hope you get an A on your thesis . I

39:57

wanna see that someday . Then

39:59

, fast forward to 2014

40:02

. I produced a couple of things

40:04

and I wanted to figure out what I want to

40:06

direct as my first feature

40:08

and I remembered the Ranger and I was

40:10

like yo , jaco , can you find that script ? Can we work on

40:12

it together ? Fast forward to

40:14

2016

40:17

, which is , the script's done and we're starting to

40:19

put it together and

40:21

talk to producers and financiers

40:23

. And

40:26

we're talking about casting . And Jaco

40:28

had worked with Jeremy

40:31

and he suggested him

40:33

to me and I was like , of

40:36

course , like I knew Jeremy from House of

40:38

Cards and from Mr Robot I had watched

40:40

both of those shows and

40:42

we met with Jaco

40:45

and I met with Jeremy and

40:47

his manager , lori . I

40:49

feel like Jeremy and Lori

40:51

were trying to scope us out and

40:54

are they real ? Is this ? But

40:56

they were into it and Jeremy really

40:59

liked the script and Jeremy

41:01

. As soon as I met Jeremy in person . He

41:03

gave me a big hug and that's just

41:05

his essence for anybody who meets him . There's

41:09

just so much love emanating from

41:11

this man . He's so amazing

41:13

to hang out with , to be in the same

41:15

space with , he's just so much fun . And

41:18

I remember that he was

41:21

in preparation for the movie

41:23

. He's just started watching horror

41:25

movie after horror movie . He's like I'm gonna be

41:27

the expert in horror by the time we shoot

41:30

. I'm going to have seen . I think

41:32

he watched maybe 200 horror movies

41:34

in anticipation of

41:36

shooting this . And also his background

41:38

is like he grew up in the

41:41

mountains , I believe in Colorado

41:43

. He has a very mountainy background . He lives

41:45

in Vermont now . He just totally

41:48

understood the character and it was such

41:50

a blast to get to dive into it with

41:52

him . Yeah .

41:53

I love that , I love the origin story of that and

41:55

I also , speaking of actors , chloe

41:58

Levine is in both of your films , which

42:00

I always kind of look out for with filmmakers

42:02

, because it's such a testament to the actor and

42:04

the experience you had together . But you

42:06

tell us a little bit about Chloe and your relationship

42:08

there .

42:09

Yeah . So

42:11

I met Chloe at

42:14

South by Southwest in 2017

42:16

, which was when we were

42:18

casting for the Ranger and

42:20

she was in a movie called the

42:23

Transfiguration which was playing

42:25

South by , and I saw

42:27

it and I was like totally

42:29

loved her vibe . And then we met

42:31

there at South by and

42:33

we just totally clicked

42:36

and I knew , leaving South by , I was

42:38

like I want her to play Chelsea and

42:40

we were gonna be shooting like the next month , so

42:42

it was a very quick turnaround

42:45

, but she was really into the script , she

42:47

was really into the role . We

42:49

started bonding over music and I

42:52

do this with every actor . I

42:55

like to create playlists for them and we pass

42:57

music back and forth and stuff and we

42:59

had a great time on

43:01

the Ranger and coming out

43:03

of the Ranger , she became like one of my best friends

43:05

. She was a bridesmaid at my

43:08

wedding Sean and my wedding

43:10

and when

43:12

we started writing the Sacrifice game , I was writing

43:15

it with her in mind for the role of Rose

43:17

. And it's really cool when you get to work with

43:19

somebody who you've worked with before , but also

43:21

somebody who's just become a really good friend

43:24

, because you just know

43:26

their nuances

43:29

, you know the way their

43:31

voice moves . You know their inflections

43:33

, the kinds

43:35

of looks that they give . You

43:38

know it's just like it's . So I

43:41

think it was just so lovely when we got

43:43

on set for the sacrifice game . We

43:46

just sank right back into

43:48

our creative relationship super

43:50

easily , super fast , which

43:52

, on a movie

43:54

with eight and ensemble

43:56

piece with eight characters

43:58

. It was nice that I was like okay

44:02

, chloe , I'm good with , I can begin

44:04

forming my relationships with the other actors

44:06

, who were all people that I hadn't worked with before

44:09

. So yeah , both the Ranger

44:11

and sacrifice game , it was

44:13

a total blast getting to work with Chloe

44:15

.

44:15

Oh , that's great , and , alan , you've actually worked with Chloe

44:18

before .

44:19

I did , we did King Jack together .

44:20

Oh , so cool .

44:22

Is it fair to assume that it's better to

44:24

be able to write a role with the

44:26

actor in mind , or do you like

44:28

the process of making the character , then shaping

44:30

the actor to meet the role ?

44:32

I don't feel like I ever shape anyone

44:34

to meet a role . First

44:37

of all , I feel like it comes very naturally when

44:40

I'm writing . I'm either thinking

44:42

about the role as somebody that I know

44:44

, an actor that I know , or

44:47

an actor that I'm aware of

44:49

Like there's some actor . That's usually

44:51

how I write and it's very instinctive

44:54

and I'm not really thinking too

44:56

much about it like logically . I'm

44:59

just like , oh , this is obviously this type of person

45:01

and this is that type of person

45:03

and I'm just kind of casting them in my mind

45:05

, whether or not that actually turns into a reality

45:08

ever .

45:09

Or even could , I think we

45:11

can say , in the Sacrifice game there's a character

45:13

who's a Vietnam vet , who's fallen

45:15

in with this gang , played by

45:17

Derek Johns . The character name is Grant and in that

45:19

particular case , when Jen and I were working on that script together

45:21

, we talked a lot about the

45:23

Vincent and Afrio character in Full

45:26

Metal Jacket . That

45:28

not to say that we copied that character , but that was sort of

45:30

like a template for us to start with . Yeah

45:32

, going back to looking outside the genre for influences

45:35

, and we didn't know if we could find

45:37

somebody who had Vincent and Afrio energy , those

45:40

are big shoes to fill . But we were really thrilled when

45:42

we saw Derek's audition and we're like , yes , this

45:44

guy captures what

45:46

it was we had in mind and bring so many other new

45:48

things to the role .

45:50

And same thing with Laurent

45:53

, who plays Doug in the Sacrifice game we were

45:55

thinking of like a Steve Buscemi type . So

45:57

when we were writing , I had Steve Buscemi's

45:59

voice in my head , like young Steve Buscemi

46:01

, and I was like I don't know , are we ever going to find

46:04

that guy ? And then we found

46:06

Laurent and it was very exciting with Laurent

46:08

and Derek , just the feeling of like , oh

46:10

my God , you guys exist . And

46:12

then , of course , they took those roles and

46:15

poured themselves into it and brought so much life

46:17

, like our writing they were more

46:19

like caricatures and then they breed the

46:21

life into the roles . So

46:25

, yeah , but with Chloe , specifically

46:27

on Sacrifice game , yeah

46:29

, knowing she was who I

46:31

had in mind . So it was kind of like this

46:33

world of like oh , what if you have young Vincent D'Onofrio

46:36

and young Steve Buscemi and Chloe

46:38

? Is this character , just this weird

46:40

combination of people ?

46:43

Very cool .

46:43

The interesting thing is to tease a little

46:45

bit about a project we're working on . We're

46:48

working on a feature and it

46:50

won't be in the world , I'm sure , for a very long time

46:52

. But the one character that

46:54

, or the one actor we knew was sort

46:57

of on board before everything was finalized

46:59

, was Jeremy Holmes character . So he's

47:01

the one character that I

47:04

sort of wrote knowing that it would be him , and

47:06

it's interesting , you know , it's , it's

47:08

. They're both great ways to do it , you know , but it's , yeah

47:11

, it's fun to hear how other people think about it . So

47:13

we've hinted at this already , but I

47:16

would I have to ask about this because I think it's

47:18

such a fun mechanic . Both

47:20

the Ranger and the Sacrifice game are period

47:22

pieces and I think what you

47:24

how you kind of handle making period

47:27

pieces in an independent film way is also

47:29

very brilliant and we've talked about this a lot . You guys have talked

47:31

about this a lot like having contained worlds

47:33

and you know setting something in the woods or in an abbey

47:36

, and so it makes sense financially and other

47:38

things . But what draws you

47:40

to setting

47:42

a story in a specific time period

47:44

versus , like , in modern day ?

47:46

For both the Ranger and Sacrifice

47:49

game . I felt that those time periods like made a

47:51

lot of sense emotionally

47:53

to the stories that we were telling . Like

47:56

I don't feel like I have

47:58

to forever only do these

48:01

kinds of period pieces . I'm

48:03

excited for someday getting to do something

48:06

modern or futuristic or something

48:08

really dating . You know , doing

48:10

1800s or 1600s

48:12

would be cool , but it's kind of like I

48:14

like to think about it like what is this ? What

48:16

world is the story you want to take place

48:19

in ? And then I always find that I'm enthusing

48:21

my and that's what I think

48:23

is actually really cool to look

48:25

at a time period through a modern

48:27

sensibility . That I find that really fun

48:30

.

48:31

And I think it helps projects stand out because you

48:33

know it takes a little bit of effort and

48:35

it takes a little bit of creativity and ingenuity to

48:38

create a period . You know , maybe

48:40

you don't have access to cars , maybe you don't have access

48:42

to wardrobe Like it's . It can be challenging

48:44

, but not insurmountably so . No-transcript

48:51

now . And there's a handful of movies that came out

48:53

that were set then .

48:55

Sure , yeah , it's

48:57

also selfishly just like a fun

48:59

experience to get to

49:01

dive into a time period . And

49:03

then , while you're making the movie , the whole process

49:06

, literally from prep through the

49:08

movies coming out , is like , well

49:10

, what you know , would this card made

49:12

sense in that time period ? Oh no , it came

49:14

out too late , so , no , we can't use that . Or like every

49:17

single detail of the movie . You're constantly

49:20

like asking yourself these questions . You're diving

49:22

into the world

49:24

of that time period , of that year

49:27

. You're talking

49:29

to each of your department heads about what makes

49:31

sense , what is the right production design

49:33

, what are the right set dressing , what's

49:35

the right costumes . And it's

49:37

not just like that year , but

49:39

it's everything leading up to that year

49:42

, because we , the clothes

49:44

we wear , the things we keep around us is not just

49:46

like the things that came out right this

49:48

year , just things that we've accumulated

49:50

over the course of our lives . So

49:53

all of that is just very fun to

49:55

think about .

49:56

You have to think about it and work on it . But you

49:58

also have to recognize that there's going to be limitations

50:00

and not be a perfectionist about it . There are going to be somebody's

50:02

going to spot oh , that style

50:05

of coat didn't exist at that time . Or

50:07

you know that light fixture is really

50:09

from 10 years later than when you say it's from . And

50:11

you know that's as long as it's not something egregious that takes

50:13

you out of the movie . You show

50:16

your script to people who are alive at that time . Talk

50:18

to them about what it looked like . You know one of the things

50:20

we learned along the way there's a phone call to the

50:22

police in our movie . It's not a phone call to 911

50:24

, because in 1971 there was no 911

50:27

. You had to call the operator or call the police station . So

50:29

, like you know , if we put 911

50:32

in there , a few people might have picked up

50:34

on that not too many , but we're happy we caught that particular

50:36

detail .

50:36

Yeah .

50:37

And you didn't know that , yeah , somebody

50:39

had to invent 911 and it came around at a certain

50:42

time . And then Jen's been really creative with music

50:44

in terms of period appropriate music and then

50:46

knowing when to break with that and being

50:48

, you know , now , music to sort of make

50:50

that connection between the era and contemporary

50:53

because that's what feels right for the scene . So

50:55

you can make a whole soundtrack

50:57

of nothing but period songs if that's what your

50:59

movie needs . But these , these movies

51:01

are sort of fantasies as well as period

51:03

pieces . So we can , we can , we can break

51:05

with that a little bit and Jen , I think , does a really fun job of

51:07

mixing it up .

51:08

Yeah , I'm very concerned about the emotional logic

51:11

. Yeah , that's like the number one concern

51:13

is like , okay , maybe this song wasn't exactly

51:15

from this

51:17

era . It's like it's finding

51:19

that balance because sometimes

51:21

you know , for instance , talking about

51:24

music , maybe the song wasn't from , wasn't

51:26

from that era , but it captures

51:29

the era and it's , it sets

51:31

the scene on the right emotional

51:33

foot and it puts the viewer in the right place

51:35

to go on this very specific

51:38

emotional journey . So

51:40

finding that balance between

51:42

being period appropriate

51:45

or period accurate , but emotionally

51:48

like what's emotionally right

51:50

for this journey is , is a

51:52

fun thing to explore

51:56

.

51:56

Both films , too , just have such great soundtracks

51:58

, and I think you do a great job with all

52:01

of that . It's that's like was . The next

52:03

thing I wanted to talk about was the music , because they're

52:06

perfect , Like they're . It's just so much fun Like

52:08

. I've left both of them being like okay , these are songs

52:10

now that I need to like look up and listen to .

52:12

Yay , well , we have great

52:15

music supervisors . We worked with a great music

52:17

supervisor , mita Goodwin , on the Ranger

52:19

, and then a company , amg

52:22

, on the sacrifice game , and

52:25

in both situations , one

52:27

of my favorite parts of the process is when

52:29

, like , you have your whole cut and then you start

52:31

working with your music supervisor and they just start

52:34

feeding you music and and

52:36

you get to start playing and and seeing

52:39

well , what , what is this ? What

52:41

happens to the scene if you put a song

52:43

like this ? underneath it or how does the

52:45

tone change if you put this other kind

52:48

of song underneath it ? And that's just

52:50

always like when I get to that stage I'm always

52:52

just having so much fun . Yeah , yeah .

52:56

And Mita is such a great , you know , unsung hero of the

52:58

Ranger because in it , you know , not

53:01

always a music supervisor I don't actually don't know how many other music supervisor

53:03

credits . Mita has maybe a ton , but what ? Mita

53:05

was a punk , a

53:07

booker and promoter . Yeah , he was a promoter on

53:10

the West Coast from the more or less the era

53:12

where where the movie is set . So he knew all

53:14

of these bands . He was able to reach out to them and

53:16

said hey , do you have anything on released ? We're

53:18

making a punk rock horror movie . Unsurprisingly

53:21

, a lot of punk rock musicians love horror , go

53:23

figure , and they would you want your song to be

53:25

in it . So many of them said yes . They sent over tons

53:27

and tons of songs for Jen to listen to .

53:29

And like the .

53:30

Avengers , you know , like really Really iconic bands

53:32

you've heard of , and it just

53:34

it's such a terrific soundtrack because of

53:36

Mita's personal relationships and able to facilitate

53:39

getting getting those guys involved .

53:41

That's so cool .

53:42

Love lurking with professionals , just like when people really

53:44

know their craft and just they're going to give

53:46

you a good options of like good or better

53:48

.

53:49

Yeah , good or better , that's what we had

53:51

. It was great .

53:52

Do you ever scare yourselves when you are

53:55

writing filming a scene

53:57

? Like , do you does your work ever scare

54:00

you editing a scene ?

54:01

For me . Sometimes the research

54:03

scares me . Sometimes

54:06

the like lonely

54:08

experience of

54:11

diving deep into the

54:13

subject when you're doing the research to

54:15

tell the story is is scary

54:18

and haunting and stays with me .

54:20

I would say heartstrings . You know , sometimes you'll

54:22

see a scene where you thought like , oh , we're going to kill this character

54:25

. And then you actually see the character Like hits you

54:27

way harder than you thought it would

54:29

because of the performance , because of the way the

54:31

music and the sound design and all of its clicking

54:33

, like that's you know , you

54:35

kind of know where once you know where all the scares are . It's

54:38

hard to have that that surprise

54:40

element , but the emotion I think

54:42

if you're , if you're doing your job right , still hits you , even if you see

54:44

, you know it's coming .

54:45

Yeah , yeah .

54:48

I'll I'll just share . Going back to

54:50

my mention of how research

54:52

scares me , I'm I'm

54:54

developing a project about serial

54:56

killers right now and I'm diving

54:58

deep into who serial

55:00

killer history . It's

55:03

fucking scary as hell and

55:05

haunting , and I feel like every day

55:07

I'm carrying all this stuff with me .

55:10

Totally can relate . I'm a big true crime person

55:12

but I went through a year or two where I was like

55:14

really a true crime person and I was

55:16

reading , like Ted Bundy's biography and

55:18

all these books which are that was a bad year it was

55:20

a bad year and they're so fascinating

55:23

and like in cold blood , right Like

55:25

there's , but they're so scary and

55:27

it's hard to like unlearn that stuff once

55:30

you've learned it . And there's still

55:32

scenes from like in cold blood that , like , I will always

55:34

remember and vividly in my brain . You know it

55:36

. Really , that stuff can really imprint

55:38

on you .

55:39

Yeah .

55:40

Thank you guys so much for being here . This was a

55:42

treat for us . It was beyond fun to be

55:44

able to talk to you guys about your amazing

55:46

films and and kind of how you

55:48

think about it . You know , and for us to like , really

55:51

the core of our podcast is like

55:53

tracing back horror tropes and understanding

55:55

the history behind them and like what they have

55:58

been like in real life and how they evolved

56:00

throughout the genre , and so to be

56:02

able to talk to you guys about demonic summoning

56:04

on your end of it right and kind of

56:06

to illustrate how you think about it in the opposite way

56:08

, has been really illuminating for us . So thank you

56:10

guys so much , thank you .

56:12

This is a lot of fun , thank you . Thank you for having us .

56:14

Yes , and tell us where we can follow you on

56:16

Instagram , where we can follow your films on Instagram

56:18

and where we can watch your movies .

56:20

I am at bubble gum and blood

56:22

on Instagram , the sacrifice

56:25

game is at the sacrifice game on Instagram

56:27

and the Ranger is at the Ranger movie

56:29

on Instagram .

56:31

Awesome , and I'm at the Redlets

56:33

in most places , but I don't

56:35

know why you'd follow me because I'm not that interesting on any of

56:37

those places . But you're welcome to if you want to .

56:39

And we will link everything in the description so

56:41

you guys can find everything really easily , you

56:43

can follow , follow them really easily

56:46

. And both films currently are on Shutter

56:48

, yes , and on VOD , yes

56:50

, amazing . Thank you guys again for being

56:52

here and we'll talk to you soon . Thank you , bye

56:54

, bye .