PEL Presents PMP#232: Obsession (for Men?)

Discussing the film Obsession

0:00This is Pretty Much Pop, a culture podcast, exactly what you wish for with no ill effects. Today we're discussing the 2024 Curry-Barker horror film Obsession, which has made over $500 million to date, despite being shot for less than $1 million. I'm Mark Linsenmeyer, and when I wish upon a star, that star is fucked. I'm Sarah Lynn Bruck, and if I had one wish,

0:30I'd wish that my husband loved me just enough to regularly squeeze out the kitchen sponge. My name is Lawrence Ware, and if I had one wish, I would wish for world peace, but who knows what cost it would bring. And our special guest. Hi, I'm Jenny Hansen, and wow, one wish. Okay, my one wish would be to wish for another wish. That's a cheat, Jenny, I think. I don't know if I like that. So Jenny, you knew that Al was going to be traveling during some of this. I've heard Lawrence

1:01on another podcast, the Anatomy of Horror film, is that what it's called, right? That is correct. Spending a full hour talking about this film with one other person. So I could not just, I mean, yes, I want to hear what you have to say, Lawrence, but it's going to be most of the same stuff, but we want to give you more things to react to and actually get into the feminist subtext of this film that I think they, you probably wouldn't do justice to on that show. So probably wouldn't. And Jenny is an actual scholar in this area. She's also is as of this new season of philosophy versus improv is an official co-host. Now three of us are possibly

1:37four. We're in negotiations over there. If you haven't listened to that show in a while and give it a shot, but yes, here obsession. I think Lawrence, you're the one that sort of had pushed this. Do you want to give your, what is so important about this?

Why the film is a phenomenon

1:50I mean, honestly, just objectively, it is just one of the most important horror movies of the last few years. I mean, I would put it up there with the Blair Witch project of like just coming out of nowhere and just being a phenomenon. And I'm interested in why it is a phenomenon. I'm interested why so many people saw it. When I went to the movies, I would not be surprised if women were there because there's like a feminist subtext of this, but why are there so many like basic men there? Like, why are they interested in it? Like what's appealing to it? Because honestly, it's kind of shitting on men in a lot of different ways, a particular kind of man, but

2:23I'm fascinated by it. I'm fascinated by the phenomenon that it is. And I want to know like what happened that it made so much money. So I just think that it's an important film to talk about in 2026, particularly because it's like one of the big, like it's up there with the Odyssey and Spider-Man is like one of the major films of this year. So it deserves us digging into why it is so major. So Sarah, we, we bullied you into watching this. We did not bully her. She, if she wanted to, she could have not watched it. She signed up for this pain. How'd it go, Sarah? I was really glad I didn't have to see this in the theater. I took

2:59many breaks. Jenny, you may not know. I am a horror wimp, horror movie wimp. This is not a horror movie. This is not a horror movie. It is Lawrence. It is. Okay, go ahead. Keep going. Sorry. Go ahead. Anyway, it was scary and I did watch it and, and I understand the hype around it as a film. Like if I were just to be an objective observer, I think it was a good film and I'm glad that it's getting its flowers. And to be honest, it's a movie that I cannot stop thinking about. I'm not sure how I feel about it. You know,

3:32I'm really interested to hear your take Jenny on it being a feminist film because I wasn't sure that I felt that way. I could definitely look at it from multiple lenses and I enjoy looking at art in those ways, but I'm still not quite sure how I feel about it. I think it is an objectively good film, but I don't know if it was a film that I liked and enjoyed. Let's just say. So we had long planned this episode. Jenny, though, I just pulled in sort of at the last

4:03minute thinking, Hey, have you've already seen this and you have a take? Why don't you come and join us? But not only had you not seen, you hadn't even heard of it, uh, yet you jumped in. How? Jennifer, explain yourself. How in the world had you not heard of this? Well, I mean, first of all, with some exceptions, I don't watch a lot of horror films either, but I probably would have seen this and it would have been something I thought my daughter would want to watch and I wouldn't want to watch like just not my jam, but I'm glad that I was asked

4:33to do it. I figured if Mark asked me to do it, there's something interesting about it. And it was definitely a good film, but I also like watched it slowly. I would watch it and then maybe rewind and watch it. I didn't watch it in one take. So I wonder what it would have been like to be in a theater because I was scared, but I think I would have been far more scared if I had been in the theater for sure. Interesting. So I don't remember if I watched it in one go initially, probably not, but, but it wasn't more than two. And I just thought on first watching, this is like

5:06more than a month ago. It's just like a Twilight Zone episode. I mean, it's a good Twilight Zone episode or Black Mirror episode and sort of like better than it had an excuse to be than just last night. And today I was like, I should, it's, I'm not going to remember the details. I better watch this again before we talk about it. And I had felt much more dread about it knowing what was going to happen. It's like a slow motion car crash. And I stopped so many like, like when he initially, she's like, okay, this is the time. Tell me whether you like me or not. And I stopped it there as if

5:41like, let's just imagine a different movie where he said yes, or maybe just gave her the thing, you know, what would happen then? The last half hour just went through like a breeze, but yeah, I was surprised that I found as much dread in this. Yeah. So I guess that's an initial thing.

Debating if it is horror

5:59I know on Lawrence, you're saying it's not even a horror movie. No, I don't think it is. I think there's plenty of scary stuff. I think as these things go, it's got what I want out of horror movies. Not really. Not really. What is the definition of a horror film then? Help me out. Now you're getting into film theory. I don't want to get into film theory because I'm a film critic and I don't want to get that deep into that. I'm just going to say that I saw this movie probably six times in the movie theater. Oh my God. I saw it on the opening weekend. I went back and saw it

6:30with one son, went back and saw it with another son. My youngest son, who is 10, wanted to watch it aside from a few scenes that made him close his eyes and like covered his ears. He watched it. Wasn't scared at all. I don't know. Maybe I've just raised my children to be horror people and maybe they're just not afraid of things, but it is a Twilight Zone episode that has creepy elements and has one gnarly kill. And that just does not make it a horror film to me. Like it makes it more

7:03social commentary or commentary on relationships or commentary on a certain type of masculinity or commentary on what men are willing to do to try to get what they want. Mm hmm. But it's not really scary. It was not scary to me remotely, but maybe I'm just heartened. Can't horror do that? I mean, that's that would be the biggest redeeming quality of horror for me is its commentary on on society. I do like that. But the ride itself is always one that's difficult

7:40for me to get through. Actual instances of fear just to throw out a couple. And then I want to hear Jenny because you guys are newer or not horror people, but I've also seen a lot of horror movies, but just the stuff of she's off in the shadows somewhere. Where is she? You know, you turn and there's her running across the screen, which apparently they had like a different they had like a dancer, you know, who could move really weird. They have a different you have these things out of the periphery. The first time when you see that the door is taped shut, like how freaking

8:12weird that is and him lying in bed. And is she going to wake up or not? Like there's plenty of, I think, traditionally scary moments. All right. There's tension. I had flashbacks to being in relationships with people who not as extreme, like not taping the door, but like I had flashbacks to being in relationships with people. And that was the horror for me. It wasn't anything supernatural. It was just the reality that like, I know that person. I've been in that kind of relationship

8:43and I've never been the guy because I've always been kind of forward, kind of self-assured, but I know guys who are like that. And so that was the horror for me. It wasn't none of the scary stuff, but Jenny, I'm sorry. I'm talking too much. Go for it, Jenny.

Feminist subtext and social commentary

8:57What I can't speak to because I don't watch a lot of horror films is I know that a lot of feminists out there, like in film theory, they look at horror films because it often centers on like cutting up young women and, you know, the women's sexuality. And that stuff I have nothing smart to say about because I don't watch enough of it. But I like what you said about social commentary because the one horror film that I liked in the last couple of years, and I haven't watched any more of his horror films is Jordan Peele's Get Out. And that would be similar, I think, to this in terms of

9:30social commentary. And so the horror is less like gnarly kills and more like the horror of the social environment that we still live in. So before I even kind of went in to look at see what some blog, feminist bloggers were writing about this, I went back and forth whether it was a feminist film or not. And I've decided that it's both. I think that it does have a feminist subtext and I think that they were going for that. But I also think that there's certain entrenched stereotypes

10:01about women. And this is kind of like what you just said, Florence, there are certain kind of tropes out there about the clingy woman or the, you know, she becomes a full on predator. But yeah, this kind of stand by the door while you go to the bathroom. I mean, that's not like unfamiliar trope. That's the way we talk about women still in many ways in our culture. And so I think that the feminist stuff is there and worth talking about, but the stuff that kind of leans into existing tropes about women being crazy or clingy or, you know, under, yeah, exactly. I mean,

10:34the first thing I said was I thought it's like fatal attraction, but it's smarter than that. I just kept going back and forth in my head. It wasn't just the clingy, crazy woman. It was. Me too, Jenny. I, I had the same thoughts and you sent an article. One of the articles that you sent was so smart about how audiences are taking this and what the takeaway is. And even if the director, his intention was one thing was a more feminist message that bear is the bad guy. He's the dick

11:05and she is the victim that audience reactions. Don't they're sometimes they're laughing at her. Sometimes they are going with, Oh, she's clingy. This is why I keep going back and forth to about does this movie like women because of the way that the actress who played Nikki, who is so freaking good. She was amazing, but the way that she's framed and the way that she's shot those exaggerated faces, you know, the frowny face that she makes are absolutely tapping into that woman who is clingy

11:43and obsessed and won't go away. And isn't she terrible? They're going right into those old stereotypes. And I was like, what are we supposed to take from that? What are we supposed to learn? What's the message there? And I can't wrap my brain around other than, Oh yeah, women are annoying and obsessive. Well, I also felt like the exorcist degraded children because children, you know, they're kind of bratty and they swear and they're rebellious and their heads turn up. I'm just, it's probably the right

12:15amount of social commentary in that it is unclear enough to give people like us things to talk about, but yet it doesn't like turn anybody off of the film as a piece of entertainment. It seems like this is a smart way to do it. Uh, I was a little more concerned just as a twilight zone sort of thing. I love the wish trope, you know, and do you wish for more wishes and stuff? It's such a classic, you know, wonderful that Jeannie overdone of course. But as I was looking up what the exact

12:45phrasing of the wish, I wish that Nikki Freeman would love me more than anyone in the entire world. And I was looking at like, well, even semantically, is it that she loves him more than she loves anyone? Or is it that she loves him more than he is loved by anyone? Like those are two distinct things. Or my version is would love me more than anyone in the world. In other words, the entity that is loving him is not as is made clear is not of this world is not an aspect of

13:16Nikki's personality. This is a demon possession film, in which case that's why I was making the joke about the exorcist saying that, you know, the demon Pazuzu has captured the little girl. It's not saying anything about little girls at all. So maybe this is not, you know, there is like, how are the friends reacting to her? How is he reacting to her as something they are reading these social tropes into it of the clingy woman or the crazy woman. But I don't know that that's what the film is trying to do. The film is definitely, it seems like even the demon knows

13:49what the wishes are about, that it is taking over this other person's body. Like it is sort of revealed as it goes on, I think. I mean, I think Mark, you're hitting the nail on the head because it's clear that, so there is a scene and those of you who haven't watched, like stop listening to us and go watch the movie. But there is a scene where he's in the car and he's trying to like call off the wish and he calls the customer service, whatever. And it's clear that like that person is one, like a surfer. I really don't know what, like a very laid back surfer. I really don't know. But also that person-

14:21Or apathetic. Apathetic, that's the word, that's the word. But also like a demon or like demonic or something like that. And you hear her screaming in the background. So it's clear that's not her, right? And whenever she does kind of creep in, she's like, kill me, like release me from this. Like it's clear that's not her, right? It was so sad, actually. But number two, Curry Barker, who wrote and directed this, what he was doing before this was YouTube stuff. And the only thing that was remotely even close to this was this YouTube

14:52video that he did called Milk and Cereals, like a short film. Well, it's like an hour long. I mean, it's like, but anyway, it was a stepping stone to this one. It's a short film. Yeah, it's a stepping stone, sure. But here's my thing. I haven't said this publicly, but it's always been in the back of my mind. Maybe the reason why people are so confused about what the message is, maybe he's just like a young filmmaker and a young screenwriter and he doesn't know what the fuck he's doing. He had a good idea and he did a pretty good job. He did a good job of bringing the idea to life. But as far

15:24as the messaging, like the high level messaging that people who are philosophers or film theorists would dig into, the reason why they're not finding as much as they would like is because maybe it's not there. He had a great idea, but he didn't like bring the idea as far as he needed to bring it to kind of satisfy us. That is my suspicion, but I'm not sure.

Gen Z sensibility and incel tropes

15:45You got me thinking because one thing that's clear. And again, when I said, I didn't think I would watch this, I think my daughter would watch it is it's a Gen Z film. It's Gen Z sensibility. And frankly, I'm not on any social media. So there's millions of TikToks on this that I can't even watch or Instagram. Right. But having said that, Gen Z has more feminist sensibilities, whether they realize it or not, than say my generation, Generation X. It's clear, or maybe it's not, maybe I've been convinced by having read some stuff, but it's clear that there is

16:19an effort there to make a commentary on incels. Right. So, uh, so men who are sort of involuntarily celibate and bear is that character. But he's so dreamy for an incel. That is not true. It's the opposite of dreamy. He's not dreamy at all, but go ahead. I'll let the ladies decide. I mean, I think they got attractive people to play the main actors, whatever. Indy was, Indy was attractive. This dude was, I'm sorry. Go, Jennifer. Sorry. I'm backing up.

16:49Well, no, no, I think, I think you're not wrong. I think he clearly is attractive in real life. They make him look kind of dweeby. He's got a Joaquin Phoenix thing going on. Like, is he weird? Is he attractive? I don't even know. Anyway, go ahead. So we also, though, are supposed to kind of oddly feel sorry for him, like throughout the film. And that's really problematic because on the one hand, I do think... Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Are we? I didn't feel sorry about for him at all. That's good. That is good. Yeah. Well, in the very beginning, you're kind of set up to hate Ian, right? Ian is supposed to be

17:24that guy, like the bro, the sort of generic asshole who uses women, is all about himself. And, you know, like whatever, you know, in that first scene where he's trying to get up the courage to tell Nikki how he feels, I think you can feel sort of like, oh, what a tender guy. But you're immediately like, you know, Ian is supposed to slap you out of thinking that, like, oh, you're just like a loser. But there are kind of moments in the film where it seems like he knows that he has done something very infantile and selfish

18:01and wrong. But then he flips sometimes. And lots of times you don't feel sorry for him where even though he's not even talking to Nikki, right? Like it's clear she's been possessed and that we have these scenes, which are excellent, where she's like, kill me, like, get me out of this. That was pretty far into the movie. But instead of him sticking with this realization that he's created this and that he's responsible for it, he falls back on the worst kind of incel. So somebody who's like, what's wrong with me? Why am I not? Why don't you? Why can't you just love? I can't remember what the line

18:33was, right? There's confusing things about his character, I guess. He doesn't take responsibility. This movie is in conversation with so many other movies. I mean, you mentioned, Mark, The Exorcist, like it's clear, clear connections between this movie and The Exorcist, but also that nice guy trope, you know, he's supposed to be. And we've all seen those movies. We've all seen, I've heard this movie described as if 500 Days of Summer was a horror movie, you know? And it's like, we've all gone along with, yeah, you know, he's in love with this

19:08manic pixie dream girl. And, you know, and we're all sort of taught that that is okay. We know those stories. We've seen them over and over and over again. And they're always from that guy's point of view. And what makes this movie special is they know that we know what that nice guy trope is and how this story is quote unquote supposed to go, but it doesn't. You know, we also know what those

19:39make a wish and, you know, and you regret making that wish. We also know how those stories go and it flips it on its head. And I think what this job does well, which also makes me question whether it's a feminist film, is that we are in the point of view of the bad guy. He is not a good guy. And it's not necessarily, I mean, it's not a great thing that he makes a wish for his objective desire

20:13to fall in love with him. That's not a great look, but once that comes true, every single time he can take the opportunity to make it right, he doesn't. He backs out. He makes it all about him again. And that's what makes him a total douche. Like that's what makes him the bad guy. And I think this movie is meant to, you know, if we're supposed to identify with this guy, I'm hoping that there are people in the audience, men in particular, who are starting to question, hey, when have I, have I

20:49behaved in ways like this before that maybe isn't so cool? I don't know, you know? And so, and in that case, maybe it is more famous. See, I keep going back and forth. I'm not really sure if this is a feminist movie or not. And I can't stop thinking about it. I like that it just being both. Yes, I think so too. Yeah. Maybe the way in which I wish that it would have pulled back on the tropes of the clingy crazy woman is definitely some moments where you see how obsessive she's become,

21:22but maybe there were just so many that it gave some men and a sense of like, oh God, I've dated that girl. Like, oh, you know? And the thing is that no one should have thought that way in my view, because he has decided to deprive a woman of all agency, all autonomy to prop up his own ego. And I think that when he gets irritated with her, which then the audience gets irritated with her, but then the irritation the audience feels misses the point that he's responsible for this

21:56behavior, right? And so what I think is brilliant about the film, if you can get away from identifying with him in the moments where he's like, God damn it. Like she's crazy. She's taping me in and feeding me my cat, which is crazy. But I want to react to something that you said on the other

Supernatural elements and abuse

22:13podcast, Lauren, it's just that we're, so it's a supernatural, some of the things like, okay, I can't bear to be not next to you since I love you so much. And I know that you couldn't possibly love me that much because no human being does. I'm going to freak out when you catch me in one of my lies, just have a meltdown. I was really caught by the, uh, when he leaves and she just stands there like I'm just turned on only for you. And if I have to do something, but that you, you had said that I think that falls in the category Lawrence with the, with the making the cat that is not

22:47explained by some entity that was created out of thin air just to serve his needs. It is also just inherently that this thing is broken, whatever is going on. Maybe it's been given. It's like, Ken does not compute does not. So it was like a program that was written to fulfill this wish and overriding her brain with his new personality, but it doesn't actually, I don't know. I don't know. Like he just obviously wants it to make sense. And her just, he's, he's not like, I'm really

23:18concerned about you. I want you to take care of yourself. He's like, stop being weird. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And I still to this day and Loki, I don't remember what I said on that podcast, but still to this day, I don't really know what to make of that because that is just unnecessary. That doesn't really fit into the clean kind of this person is all about him because if a person, so let's say that, so hypothetical thought experiment here, if person A was really into person B and they

23:49were obsessed with person B, they wouldn't feed that person a dead cat or, or dig the cat up in the first place to make a like, Oh, so because it's a pet cemetery sort of thing, then it also has a fascination with death. That one I did think about a lot. And I think it's because again, here's, here's one of these, like two things can be true at the same time. Right. So feminism as a sort of political movement, but as also a kind of theory has pointed out all the ways in which women living under patriarchy or whatever you want to call it, like misogyny have kind of less possibilities,

24:25like, especially if it's very serious, like, like if you decide to be a trad wife right now, or if you're living in Iran or something like that, where you really don't have any rights, feminism has been pretty good at pointing out the harms of that, but maybe not as good at pointing out that there is just a truth of the fact that people growing up and I'll just put this in like, just like, I don't know, like let's say corrupt societies or societies that have real problems in them will develop personality types that are difficult. So like, when I think back to my grandmother who passed away a couple of years ago, she was like 104, she lived forever. She was like

24:59so passive aggressive. She drove me nuts to deal with her. And I would always try to like calm down by saying it's because she had no power, economic, political, social power and the time that she lived. And the only way she got what she wanted was to use these guilt trippy kind of things. Like, you know, uh, I think Nikki goes way further than that, but there are women, there are real women in the world that do things that are immoral or unethical or even harm men that that's true,

25:29but it can also be the case that we manufacture those women because of larger societal circumstances that have all these tropes about women being unreliable or not smart enough to be running the country or, you know, too emotional or, or, you know, all those, those tropes end up creating people that are, are, you know, maybe monsters. And so I thought about that because one of the articles talked about Amber Heard, right. And I, I may be one of the people out there and this is probably going to be canceled by feminists, but I actually didn't find her a very sympathetic person,

26:03but a lot of the feminist articles kind of take this like a line that no, no, no. I mean, that's just part of the patriarchy and the way that they, you know, they just call her borderline personality and you get away from all of the responsibility that men have had like Johnny Depp, what he did to her. But I actually think there are women that do horrible things or that make false accusations of rape and all of these things actually happen. But I, I think that we don't talk complexly enough about the fact that the reason there are some women like that is because these things kind of work to get power in a situation where power is not really evenly shared.

26:40Jennifer, what you said was really smart, a wonderful deconstruction of that. I just wonder if Curry Barker is smart enough to do that though. Like I wonder if that's on his mind that I'm being honest with you. Like, cause, cause when I look like if you, if you do like just a little bit of digging into his YouTube page, he, he shows no depth like this, right? I struggled with wondering if maybe we are looking at this and reading stuff into it. So for example, when Get Out came out,

27:11I remember I did so many panels on the film. I did a whole bunch of talking, but that film, knowing Jordan Peele, having watched his show, it's clear that he knew what he was doing when he was including this stuff in that film. He had, he had clear ideas about what the sunken place meant and what it meant in relation to black people and the idea of the horror of like white liberals and the dangers they posed to play. Like he had clear ideas. And so therefore those talks and all

27:42that kind of stuff, I felt justified in that. I do not get the sense that Curry Barker has that level of depth and that care in this film because nothing ties up in like a neat bowl. Like what is he saying in this film? I don't know. Maybe circle back to who is this movie for? Like who is the audience? It's clear. It's his generation. That's to be sure. One major thing that this generation has is that they went through a pandemic during a time when they were just developing the skills on,

28:18on how to date and how to be social and how to really be an adult. And here you have a protagonist who I think one of the articles essentially calls him a toddler. And in many ways that really tracks. And even at the very beginning, I think the very beginning when his irresponsibility kills his own beloved cat, that was his fault. That's how he treats other creatures. And that was a major hint

28:48of who that person was. And it's because he just, he can't see beyond his own worldview. You know, he's very contained. And I think that is something that is, it's almost like they've been stunted and in some ways, in other ways, this generation isn't, but I think it might be a commentary on how this generation has been stunted. And now that they are bonafide adults, they're not behaving in

29:19that way. You know, I also think it's a commentary on cat owners and how cat owners are evil. Maybe, maybe that's the commentary. How dare you? I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Jenny. Go, Jenny. I'm sorry. I had to take a dig. I'm sorry. Go ahead. That's funny. I have cats, but I don't like them. I don't want, well, we won't go there. So, um. Oh, Jennifer, what is going on with you? You have cats, but you don't like them? Why do you have cats? That would be like the long conversation, but. Okay. Okay. Nevermind. I just, I liked what Sarah just said because I teach this generation of students.

29:50I have a daughter of this generation. And if you think about sort of the highlights, if you know what this generation's like, I mean, yes. So the pandemic thing is clear, right? There's a kind of rusted development that happened to a lot of these kids. And a lot of them may be very insular because they were online all the time and didn't develop actual communication face-to-face skills. But also, this is a generation that's opting not to go to college as easily. And that was what was interesting about this. You know, like all of these kids are like working, they're like not in high school, but they're working like in a, like a dead end job. That was interesting. Cause that

30:23does speak, I think to that generation. Well, and the third thing is, is that this generation's like at a point that drives me nuts as somebody who is a feminist and cares about issues of race and stuff like that. They are the woke one generation. Like they're the generation that comes in as know-it-alls because they learned everything on the internet and they'll correct the teacher, you know, for using a word that's not allowed to be used, even if it was appropriate in a certain context. So I could imagine all of that informing Curry Barker and bringing that sensibility to the movie, even if he wasn't super aware of it. Two very separate thoughts. The beginning of the movie,

Resolution and the universe of the story

30:59I actually kind of would be a little interested in seeing just a rom-com, can't hardly wait, sort of something with those characters, you know, at that special point in your life where maybe, you know, apparently this crowd were under motivated in high school, but maybe they have a chance to go to college and it wasn't really clear. Like he went somewhere else and he came back in town. He was like, Oh, you were the Nikki, you were the only one who was nice to me when I came back in town. Like, but they all know each other from middle school or something, you know, it's, it's a little unclear exactly what the dynamic is. So that was interesting in itself. And some of those,

31:34like the music that's playing when they kiss for the first time, I was just looking up like good for that kind of thing. And it's not just, I mean, of course, then it's interrupted by her being like, what the hell is going like, that's her first disassociation in his clue that like, okay, this is not actually her, but like, I feel like there is some John Hughes ish sort of talent there that I'd kind of like to see the other end of the film, the end of the film, you're saying Lawrence, you know, nothing's resolved. That's right. I think thematically, maybe it's not wrapped up, but in

32:07terms of the action and the logic of the wishes and stuff, it is just about perfect. Like the amount of adrenaline that is going up in the first, the, you know, the really violent killing, but then the almost offhand second murder that is, and then he's going to kill himself. And I didn't even remember this from the first time watching it, that while he's in the bathroom, taking all these pills to kill himself, that she snaps, she did a one wish that she apparently wished, you know, in her guise as whatever this is, that he would love her as much as she loved him. And if he hadn't

32:39taken those pills, then you wonder like, what, what movie would this be with two people who are programmed to just love each other? Would they be running across the countryside? What is the film where like the, a couple like, like goes on a murder spree, goes on a murder spree, goes on a murder spree. Natural born killers? Natural born killers. I was thinking days of heaven. You guys are going dark. Okay. Yeah. Because they would just have no regard for anybody else in the world. They're like sociopaths in love. Yes. Yeah. It sounds like an, another horror movie. They wouldn't kill

33:14anyone else because they're obsessed with each other. I mean, side note, when that dude was for, for a, what do you say? A billion dollars. A billion dollars. Yeah. That was hilarious. Is, is the money still falling? Cause like a billion dollars in small bills, that is so much money. That is incredible amounts of money. Anyway, that's the side. He should have died under the weight of it, right? He should have. Yeah, exactly. It should not have been a gunshot that killed him. It should have been the money that killed him. I'll again, refer to the conversation Lawrence had before where they were, they were on this other podcast that where you guys were wondering that sort of what, obviously we're not going to hear

33:48more about these characters, but this is like an interesting world. Like in John Wick, the hotel they go to, like, what is this mysterious hotel? What is this society? What is this? The wish upon thing and the people at the end of the call number, like I want, what, what version of hell is this? Like, I'm, I'm interested in that. I want to hear more about it. You want to go visit it? You want to go visit that version of hell, Mark? I could use more stories that surround this basic in this universe. I think they are doing more. I know he's doing another story in the universe. It won't be the same characters we do. He's doing another story

34:20in the universe. I am not terrified, but I'm very concerned that it won't be as good as this. Starring sad Andy Richter. Sorry. Cause he's like the dad of what I couldn't believe that was Andy Richter. Like, like it's Brucker telling me that that was Andy Richter. I didn't, I had no idea that it was Andy Richter. That had to be like half the budget. Cause Andy Richter is like a big deal. But anyway, the thing is you're right that it ties up the wishing and all that kind of stuff. I just wish that, and this is me as a, I would have wished that as a person who teaches film

34:54theory, as a person who is a film critic or whatnot, if he would have tied up the themes as well as he tied up like the plot machinations, if he had tied those things up as well, I would have loved this film. But instead it's like a nine, 8.5 out of 10 for me. Like I really like it. I don't love it though. It doesn't go over into like a horror classic because like, you know, Nightmare on Elm Street, like the surrealism in that film, it ties up beautifully. Like it just does. This one, it just kind of misses that mark a little bit. And it has interesting ideas,

35:28interesting execution. He's like on the precipice of saying something really interesting about feminism and masculinity and all this kind of stuff. He just doesn't land the plane. I kept trying to figure out why, I mean, I know why the cat dies in the beginning because it becomes the way he kills himself. But what about the fact that there's a cat on the box of the wishing stick? Like, I don't know if I didn't know what the connection was there. Okay. I do know that they were very intentional about the production design. And so there has to be

36:02something going on and maybe just tying to the fact that he has a cat. I don't know, but I do know that that was intentional. I don't know what it means though. So the other thing, I guess I would say that I think is interesting from like a feminist standpoint, if we're going to take this, like the feminist part of it, that I don't know that other people have said is it does show how a misogynist or sexist world actually perverts everybody's relationship, right? It doesn't just harm women. And so, you know, when he goes as a last ditch effort to get

36:33Ian to make the wish to free her, like, you know, he hasn't had a chance to tell her him that he immediately just like does what I guess his character would do is just wish for a billion dollars. And we already know that he's been like having hookups with Nikki and he's been trying to discredit her all along too. So it perverts their male relationship. There's a lot of like controlling of when he's allowed to show up at his party or whatever or not. But then it also completely perverts Sarah and Nikki's relationship and like Sarah's relationship with Bear. And so if there is

37:08an interesting feminist plot line there that he did or didn't intend, I think it shows like it's not good for anybody to live in a world where you want one group of people to control completely the autonomy and agency of another group of people. This generation is like getting into being trad wives and stuff like that. And maybe it's a message to those men. Like, is this really what you want? Like, do you really want this? Because if the only goal of this woman's life is to be your ornament or your, to take care of your, your emotional and nutritional needs, is that enough for you?

Misogyny and distortion of relationships

37:42Well, you're also making me think of a plot hole by saying that is, is when he slips away from Nikki and actually then it's the real Nikki talking in her sleep, like, kill me, kill me. And he's just like, ah, I got to get out of here. Cause he's meeting up with the other girl, uh, Sarah meeting up with Sarah. I was just like, when I was seeing the first time he only went to see her because she said, I'm going to come over to your place. If she came over to her place, like she would have been murdered there. And so if, as soon as I showed up with this person, I would be like, look, Nikki

38:12has completely lost it. You are in danger. You need to drive away right now. And the fact that he wasn't doing it, he was just like, oh, I'm just having a little vacation from this horrible thing that was going on. Or getting her sympathy, right? Like another source and extracting another woman's soul. That's how I read it too, Jenny. Yeah. But scenes of extreme violence were always directed at the women. I had a hard time squaring that with the feminist messages I was thinking we

38:43were supposed to understand. Okay. So wait a minute, wait a minute, wait, wait, wait, wait. Okay. So I do know the one scene whenever Nikki bashes Sarah's head and what other scenes does she self-harm, her own self-harm. Yeah. Like smashing her face or, yeah. I didn't read that in the stream, but okay. Keep going. I'm sorry. But she could have like gotten in a, you don't love me enough. I'm going to start torturing you thing like with him. Right. And why did she, apparently she was using Sarah's phone after Sarah was dead to text Ian, the friend again and again and again, come over here.

39:16Like she was planning on shooting him in the head before he actually came in. Like, but why? What, what, I do not understand. I don't think I picked up on it. I don't think I picked up on it. Yeah. That was only in the second. Oh, you only saw it eight times. I don't, you, you, sometimes I clearly missed it. I clearly missed it. Yeah. But this might go back to what I was talking about, about both things can be true that this could unveil the way that misogyny distorts people. But also there are really, really, it produces really bad people like women, including. And so, you know, in the case

39:49when she feeds the cat to bear, or in the case that she wants to set up Sarah as this like dead, bashed in one-eyed person in the room and invite Ian over, if your only purpose in life is to love this person who's not loving you back, then it makes sense that you take out this anger on them too. Right? Like you want to hurt them too. I don't know if that makes sense. Well, that, that goes back into the classic abuser. So it's her as the abuser. And so all of the manipulation, all of the violence and all of that kind of stuff is part of the obsession.

40:28So yeah, that, I can see that. You know, there's a good show that if we followed up on a talk like this, that I just saw called Furious. Oh yeah, we talked about that. Oh, you did? We talked about it. Oh, I know it was so good. We did talk about it. It was really good.

Final recommendations and closing

40:42Let's give our sort of closings. I mean, obviously I think we're recommending the film to one and all. Well, you know, if you're not squeamish, at least, is it, I guess, is it worth it to show it to your friends? Man, okay, back up, back up, back up. Stop, Mark. Stop, stop, stop. Okay, stop. Listen, listen, listener, dear listener, this is your good friend Lawrence Ware, your horror aficionado, the person who you can trust and who loves you when it comes to horror movies. Don't listen to Sarah. Don't listen to Jennifer. I need you to understand this movie is

41:16not that scary. It is not. It will not terrify you. It will not give you bad dreams. Dear listener, go watch the film. It's streaming on Peacock. Go watch it. Have a great time. Happy Halloween. I can only say if I had my wife sit through this, it would not be good for either of us. It would be, there would be repercussions. Yeah. I was really happy to have access to the pause button. It was that bad to you? Really? It's not. It's just, I get, no, I'm jump jumpy. I

41:47know. I mean, even, even with the, okay, now close your eyes for what's about to happen. You know, you know, cause cause you know, even though it's a jump scare that, that violence, like, you know, it's good. You saw it coming. It's coming. It was come. It was telegraphed. This is about to happen. The only thing that surprised me was the dude getting shot. That's the only thing that surprised me. Nothing else surprised me. That was funny. So that was funny. Well, I would say it's not that scary either. I mean, it, thank you, Jennifer, Jennifer. I like you a lot. I like you Jennifer. I mean, it's, but, but I guess maybe part of the scariness though, is all of my ambivalence

42:23about the tortured messages there. So, but it's not as scary as like a really gory film. Yeah. Yeah. You could have seen this getting much worse. Like what she staples her self to him. Sure. Right. Sure. Everybody see that movie Boxing Helena? I did see Boxing Helena. You don't want to see that movie. Oh, no, no. It is not. That's not a horror movie though, is it? I don't think it's no, but it is a, a, a, I really want to control you. People can Google it. I don't even want to

42:55describe it. It's so horrible. Yeah. But I mean, Lawrence, seriously, like, even though, or I guess listeners, even though I am not a horror aficionado, I recommend the movie as well, but go in, go in knowing that it is still horror. It is scary. And if you're squeamish like me, maybe, you know, keep that pause button handy. It is a social thriller. I would not call it a horror film. Much like the social network. I don't know. Much like it. That's a kind of

43:29horror film too. That's the real horror film. That's the real horror film. If you really want to be scared to watch that or watch the AI documentary on Netflix, like those are the real horror films. Exactly. Well, thanks everybody for listening. Thanks Jenny for showing up at the last minute. Thanks. Yeah. Thanks Jenny. Thanks guys. Jennifer, I really, I really enjoyed you. I really enjoyed you. Yeah. I got to come back. Okay. Well, anytime. Thank you. Bye. Okay. Bye. Bye. Bye everybody. Pretty much pop is part of the partially examined life podcast network. Get more pretty much pop at

44:03pretty much pop.com get bonus content for every episode at patreon.com slash pretty much pop.