345: Cuckoo (2024)

SPEAKER_04 0:04

The opinions expressed by Paris on this podcast, as always, do not reflect anything else except her own dumb bitchery.

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Greetings and salutations, and welcome to Hacker Slash. If you're joining us again, welcome back. Please don't worry about your late arrival. I completely understand. If this is your first time listening, welcome to the party. We are a horror movie review podcast dedicated to telling you whether a movie is a hack.

SPEAKER_04 0:31

Total joke, a waste of time.

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Or a slash.

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Totally killer. Pun intended.

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We believe horror is for everyone, and as such, we're rating these movies with the perspective we've gained from our varying walks of life and the flavors of fear we fancy most. My name is Chris. I'm your friendly neighborhood slasher enthusiast. This week I'm joined by the classic horror connoisseur Sean.

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And I believe that there were more than just architectural plans that were conceived this way.

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And the Scream Queen Paris.

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She's supposed to be focusing on reproduction and breeding.

SPEAKER_00 1:02

This week we're covering the recent theatrical release of a film that takes us to a secluded resort in the Bavarian Alps. The film tells a story of a 17-year-old girl who's thrust into a life far removed from her American roots. And after being uprooted to live with her father, her new surroundings quickly take a sinister turn. Strange noises and unsettling visions start to plague her, leading her to uncover a disturbing secret that's been buried in the shadows. The film is directed by Tillman Singer, who gained attention with his debut feature, Luz, in 2018. With this project, he dives deeper into the horror genre, crafting a tale that intertwines psychological terror with familial mysteries. This week we're talking about Cuckoo. What were you both expecting going into this?

SPEAKER_03 1:47

Well, I feel like if you have seen Tillman Singer's debut film Luz, you're gonna be expecting this one to feel probably a little artsy, something a little bit strange, maybe based on the trailer. I feel like we're definitely going to get something along those lines. I was definitely going into this one expecting a violent, artsy, kind of eerie film.

SPEAKER_04 2:08

Interesting. I have never heard of this man or the film Luce. So I really went into it having seen the trailer honestly so many times because I feel like it played in the beginning of every horror movie this year. And yet the trailer gave very little information. I feel like I had a very vague idea of what it was going to be. I just knew it was gonna be Hunter Schaefer, somehow injured, trying to escape something. And I kind of love a trailer that does that. But for me, I was mostly expecting Hunter Schaefer in a lead starring horror role, which was enough to get me in the seat, regardless of what the context of the film was.

SPEAKER_00 2:40

That's fascinating. You mentioned there being this trailer playing ahead of every movie this year, and I am 100% confident the trailer and I have crossed paths, but I struggle to remember it. What? I don't know a damn thing about it. It was super generic. Yeah, I had zero expectations, honestly, for this movie. In fact, I can really be honest here. I had no idea what the fuck I was walking into beyond understanding that based on the poster and the poster alone, someone was bound to sustain some sort of head injury. Right, yeah. I'm also not even familiar with who Hunter Schaefer is. Oh my god. So I had nothing to go off of.

SPEAKER_04 3:22

Euphoria? Come on.

SPEAKER_00 3:23

I'd never seen Euphoria.

SPEAKER_04 3:25

Wow. Okay. Well, if anything, you know her as a famous, iconic trans actress who's an almost A-lister, I would say. She's definitely in young Hollywood. So part of my expectations were also: is her trans identity going to be a plot point? I hope it's not, but will it be? I kind of assumed it would be. And then speaking of head injury, Chris, I also thought that maybe there was gonna be some sort of like mental thing where they were like gaslighting her and like she was going cuckoo and like she was crazy in some sort of psych ward. I thought that that was gonna play a part.

SPEAKER_03 3:54

Interesting.

SPEAKER_00 3:55

We get some direction of these sensations here. I think cuckoo is something that is felt and probably considered very thoroughly in both obvious and maybe less than obvious ways throughout this movie. But let me tell you, the three biggest things that I felt during this movie confusion, heartbreak, and also disgust. There's a mix of those three things because one of those things is like, what the fuck is going on here? You can say that, and I don't mean this strictly as a negative thing, because sometimes you feel these things and you ask this question during a movie, and you're compelled, you're hooked, you're in it. Other times you can ask this question, and it's kind of like the bag, it's being fumbled, and we don't know what direction we're going we're trying to salvage. I had a mix of both of those things, but this movie also really preyed on me very heavily emotionally.

SPEAKER_04 4:49

Oh, yeah. There were certain parts of this where I was like, I bet Chris felt something here.

SPEAKER_00 4:53

Oh, Chris cried.

SPEAKER_04 4:54

Insert emotion here.

SPEAKER_03 4:56

Insert emotion.

SPEAKER_00 4:58

Mm-hmm. I cried very openly a couple times.

SPEAKER_04 5:02

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 5:02

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_04 5:04

On brand. And I think our loyal listeners probably know exactly what the themes of this movie are now.

SPEAKER_01 5:09

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 5:10

Well, yeah, this film is literally just as cuckoo as its title. This movie did have me feeling a little unnerved at times, a little unsettled at times as well. This movie felt very strange, very off-putting, and not always in an effective way. But this movie also left me feeling, you said, confused. Maybe confused isn't really the right word. Maybe lost is a better way to put it because I did feel lost in this story. There was a lot going on where some of the things that are happening don't make a whole lot of sense or aren't explained well enough. There is less is more, but when you give in this movie, when you give a little, sometimes you gotta give an inch.

SPEAKER_04 5:54

I can agree with the confusion sentiment. Other things that I felt included intrigued. I was down for the mystery here. You could tell that they were building up something, and I didn't really quite expect what it would be, even though I'm the kind of person who usually tries to guess along the way. And then I think I was very impressed by a lot of the performances. I was like, oh, these people are great actors. There's Dan Stevens is a name that I've heard a million times, but is the most generic name, I think, on earth, we can say. So I had no idea who that was. And I'm still not entirely sure which one was Dan Stevens. I think it was the German Doctor.

SPEAKER_01 6:28

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 6:29

But I was impressed by both him and Hunter Schaefer's performances to the point where I was like, okay, good. Acting is we don't have to worry about the acting in this film necessarily. But towards the end, I was feeling a lot of things like confusion. And we're all smart people. We pick up on context clues, we pick up on subtleties, we pick up on foreshadowing, and I see our best. We ended up a little bit lost, it sounds like. I have a lot of questions, and I saw the movie twice, and those questions aren't exactly answered.

SPEAKER_00 6:58

For sure. Paris, if you're unfamiliar with Dan Stevens, I would encourage you to watch a 2014 film called The Guest. Actually, I feel like I've seen this. And I will let you know now that he is very hot in that movie. And that's coming from me. And that's coming from me.

SPEAKER_02 7:14

I love that.

SPEAKER_00 7:15

It's true. But you're absolutely right. It is the amount of unanswered questions, and not in a way that necessarily feels fun and mysterious and open to interpretation, but almost as though it tried so hard to make a point, but I think it relies on you to be on the same wavelength. And that's why I don't think that the story is necessarily as accessible. I think some people will have no problem following it, and that's incredible. That's great. But I don't think it's as accessible for the common audience.

SPEAKER_04 7:47

Hmm. I think I might disagree. I feel like universally everybody was left with some questions and confusion. No matter how smart you are, I think this movie just doesn't answer everything, and it throws in some really weird turns that don't make sense.

SPEAKER_00 8:01

That's what I mean. I think the writer or the creators of the film have a very clear vision of what this is and what this means. And I think no one else is really getting that. Besides, I think that we have a couple folks in our Discord server who are like, yeah, I found this incredibly easy to follow, and I was right fucking there. I think what is it that you're called when you study birds and do bird watching? Ornithologists. Ornithologist. I feel like if you're one of those, you're probably fine. You got it in the bag.

SPEAKER_03 8:27

So that part, I don't know. That part I think they at least mention enough times for you to be like, okay, I get this part, but I think the overall plot reveal, not just that part of it, but the overall plot reveal as it unfolded in the third act was a bit surprising to me. But I don't know why I didn't think about it as as I'm thinking back on the movie. I I really just didn't look too far into the story. I think we talked about the trailer, you don't get a whole bunch, the vague synopsis, you don't get a whole bunch. So as you're piecing it together in the moment, I don't know. I will say this though: the camera work in this movie. The camera work in this movie is super surprising because there are some really great shots in this movie.

SPEAKER_00 9:12

There really is. This movie is absolutely stunning, but I think that's where I struggle, right? Because I wanted to be in it. I wanted to really enjoy it because this movie is gorgeous to look at.

SPEAKER_01 9:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:25

But the one thing that really disappoints me is the level of what in this movie. And I'll explain that by you know, you can think of what? That's crazy and that's great. But this movie's more like what? And it's also complimented then by a bevy of who, when, where, why? And when do you gotta ask the fucking five W's? Listen, something is wrong if you gotta ask all those fucking questions.

SPEAKER_03 9:54

The five W's.

SPEAKER_04 9:55

For me, I feel like it was very much a wait, what? And I feel like the ornithology element of it all, that part I got. Like that, I was like, okay, sure. But I feel like if you start to ask any follow-up questions, like you're saying, Chris, the movie doesn't have answers. The movie doesn't hold up. It's sort of like, hey, here's the general idea. We're gonna do it. Don't take it too seriously. Don't ask too much of it because we didn't think it all the way through. And if you try to, it won't really work out.

SPEAKER_03 10:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 10:20

That's what I got.

SPEAKER_03 10:21

I get it. Yeah, it's like the execution of the film was disappointing. The concept of this film is actually pretty fucking interesting, but the execution of the film is just not it. It just didn't hit.

SPEAKER_00 10:36

Yeah, but I will say this what does hit is the tension in the movie. I watched this with Allie, and she's come to me with everything since Winnie the Pooh Blood and Honey 2. And this is the first time I've really seen her truly jump and like curl into me because she was actually affected by some of the spooky shit in this movie.

SPEAKER_02 10:56

Oh wow. Oh.

SPEAKER_00 10:57

So it didn't really get me, but to see someone else experiencing that, it was really cool.

SPEAKER_03 11:03

That's interesting because I actually heard a couple people say that they were actually scared whether they were like tense or that they were like there was a couple of moments, even from a jump scare standpoint, that got them to react, which I didn't feel that aspect of this film. I think the film has some creepy moments, but it isn't super consistent. I think the movie is, like I said earlier, unnerving at times. It never really lets you feel truly comfortable and settled into the film. I'll give it that, but I wasn't curling up, I wasn't jumping back, but I'm glad that that did that for some people.

SPEAKER_04 11:40

Yeah, that's interesting. I feel like these people are big babies because this movie wasn't scary in the slightest. It felt more like a sci-fi thriller than a horror movie. Even gore-wise, I feel like we didn't get very much. We got some kind of nastiness, but not nothing like really shocking.

SPEAKER_00 11:53

It was giving yeast infection.

SPEAKER_04 11:56

Even the jump scares, they really did nothing for me. And I love to be spooked by a jump scare. I always go into it open and like willing to jump, but this movie didn't even make me flinch.

SPEAKER_00 12:06

But it still made me think, and I can at least applaud this shit for being original as fuck.

SPEAKER_04 12:11

Oh yeah. I feel like this has originality across multiple angles and spectrums, which I think was impressive. That's part of what impressed me in addition to the performances.

SPEAKER_03 12:19

Yeah, I think the formula that we use here is very familiar in its just its delivery. It's like the backbone that keeps this film together, but there is this wild concept or storyline going on that feels definitely unique. And it while it also still pays homage to some of you know, some other films, even certain styles in horror cinema, I feel like Giallo films immediately come to mind when I think of like the way this movie feels and the style of this movie. And Giallo is like an Italian-style horror genre that is usually like gory, gruesome, suspenseful, murder mystery type movies with vibrant colors and stylish and artsy camera work, right? Movies like Susperia, Black Sabbath comes to mind, Black Sunday, of course, The Girl Who Knew Too Much, those types of movies. So I feel like that is kind of like the style that it uses, but it definitely has a story and a concept that really feels unique.

SPEAKER_04 13:17

Yes, and I think there's actually an element of this movie that I won't specify just yet because it could vaguely be spoilery, but I think this movie has done at least one thing that to my knowledge has never been done before, and that is very exciting for me as far as the future of cinema goes.

SPEAKER_00 13:32

Okay, well, I can't wait to hear what that is. See, this movie does a lot of things that are promising, but I guess where my concern is, and I'm really sorting my feelings out here. I like a lot of the mystery that we get, but as we get towards the third act of the film, and as we get to the ending, it starts to fall apart. And so I don't think the ending or the resolution to this movie is bad, but by the time we get to it, my relationship with the movie has changed and has been altered. So I don't know if I in good faith really enjoy the ending of this movie.

SPEAKER_04 14:07

I feel that, Chris. The ending feels loose. It feels like by the time we get to the third act, we're kind of just in a silly giggly mode where it's like, oop, wacky hijinks ensuing. Have fun. Which I like wasn't necessarily mad about, but I do think that there is a version of this movie that stays within the same tone of the first two acts and is bit is a bit stronger for it.

SPEAKER_03 14:28

Yeah, I mean, we've already talked about it. I feel like the ending left me with more questions than answers for sure, and not necessarily in in a really good way. I I feel like, yeah, maybe questions left unanswered or the answer is there, but it feels absolutely absurd and doesn't make sense. You know what I mean? So it it it really isn't that it's like a terrible ending for a film, it just didn't leave me feeling great about it.

SPEAKER_04 14:55

There is a part of the ending that I thought actually was terrible, and I was like, this is so stupid, this is very dumb and bad and stupid, and are you serious about this? And both times I watched it, I felt that way.

SPEAKER_00 15:05

Yeah, there are moments in the ending that really made me think, well, this doesn't fucking add up. This makes no sense. And there's a lot in a movie that I'll overlook, but this movie had at least three of those moments. Some of them big things, some of them small things, and that's where I struggle with understanding how that's going to impact the rating for this film. Now, we have some stuff to chew on, but before we actually start scoring it, Sean, how would you describe the gore score?

SPEAKER_03 15:32

You know, for all the hype that this movie had, and I will tell you, there was a trailer that I watched that really set you up for a very violent and trippy film. This movie really is not that gory at all. It was completely misleading, and maybe I was the only one, I don't know, but you you do have some minor moments here and there. There is some blood, but this ain't getting nothing but a muted low gore score.

SPEAKER_00 15:58

And what about the animal report?

SPEAKER_04 16:00

Well, for a movie named after a bird, uh, not a bird in sight. So the animal report's pretty clean, though your definition of animal may vary.

SPEAKER_00 16:09

Well, let's go ahead and get into our ratings. Cuckoo from 2024. Was it a hack or a slash? I think I actually want to kick things off here just to get it started. I struggle with this movie. I struggle because it's not my cup of tea. So it becomes automatically the kind of thing where I have to watch almost separated from myself to decipher did I just not get it? Is it an objectively good film, and I'm just a hater, or is it really just not great? And this movie has so much in it that is absolutely phenomenal. Dan Stevens, Hunter Schaefer, the cinematography, the sound design in this film. Technically speaking, this movie is fantastic in a sight to behold. There was a lot of talk about long legs and how this movie might actually be the better of the two. I don't know that I agree with that, but what I can agree with is the idea that this movie is fucking trippy. All right. This movie is cuckoo itself, but it does enough to keep things interesting and it gives a theatrical experience that I think can help you be right for conversation after. The things that I did not like in the movie are not so plentiful and so abundant that I am going to actually completely discredit it. Is it something that I'm gonna probably care to watch? Is it the style of film that I'm into? No. But I will say that this movie is an objectively good movie. But I will also say this movie does not get made if these bitches had airpods. Aside from that, it's a slash.

SPEAKER_03 17:39

Alright, yeah. One thing I will say, and I agree, that this film, cuckoo, really does live up to its name because this movie is fucking cuckoo for fucking Coco Puffs. But listen, don't get me wrong, some of the camera work that we get in this movie is absolutely phenomenal. The way this movie looks is great. The performances we get from Hunter Schaefer and Dan Stevens are fantastic, but I found that the story, as unique as the concept is, was just not executed well, and I ended up getting lost along the way. This is a movie that really felt like it was trying to recreate a skin a rink moment, but wasn't able to really evoke that feeling. There are a lot of good things about this movie, but there are a lot of flaws as well. This movie dropped us in this world, but failed to deliver us the rules of this world. There are just things left almost half explained or unanswered. You get this information, but not the why, and less is more in a lot of cases. But in this case, I needed a little bit more, so it's a hack.

SPEAKER_04 18:53

Very curious to hear you elaborate on the skin a marink comparison in the second half, Sean. But a comparison that you made, Chris, to Long Legs also came up for me in that both of these movies build up to something that could be potentially exciting and then, in my opinion, fall apart in the third act. But the way that Cuckoo is different from Long Legs is that Long Legs took itself way too seriously in the third act to the point where it was kind of stupid and I was laughing at it. Whereas Cuckoo felt like it was kind of silly in the end, and I was laughing with it because there were random comedic moments too thrown in there. And I was like, okay, so we're just kind of having fun at this point. I think it's the kind of movie that asks you to it takes you by the hand and asks you to walk down a road, and it also asks you not to question anything. And if you're willing to do that as a viewer, I think you can have a good time, especially if you go in with pretty low expectations here. Like Chris said, the things that I loved about this movie include lesbians. Chris didn't mention that. I was gonna save it until the second half. But they're not plot lesbians, it's kind of just a side thing. And I love when lesbians are a side thing. The other thing, and I sort of alluded to this earlier, this might be the first movie, at least that I know of, and I am quite an ignorant bitch who doesn't know everything, but this might be the first movie with the lead actress being transgender, where her transgender identity has nothing to do with anything. And in fact, she's just a girl. She's just a girl. Let her be just a girl. I was very pleasantly surprised that they did that. And they sort of just let Hunter be a really great actress in this film opposite Dan Stevens. I think the performances from those two were almost better than this movie was. But with all that being said, I was entertained enough to the point that I actually enjoyed this movie even more the second time around, knowing that whatever it was gonna build into wasn't actually that important, but rather the ride to get there could be a great time. So for me, this movie has fewer offenses than it does gold stars. So I'm gonna give it a pretty safe slash.

SPEAKER_00 20:55

Well, with that, Cuckoo from 2024 has earned one hack and two slashes. But there's a lot more to discuss when we return from the break. If you've seen this one already, please let us know what would you rate it. You can join the conversation for free in our Discord server, and you can find the link to join that conversation in our show notes. But if you haven't seen it yet, you can follow the link in our show notes to see where you can watch it right now. Now, when we return from our break, we'll dive deep into the spoiler zone and unpack that convoluted plot. See you in a bit.

SPEAKER_03 21:36

Does the traditional route just seem too ordinary? Welcome to Dr. Cuckoo's Fertility Center, where we turn your dreams into reality. Or well, our reality, nestled comfortably in the scenic Bavarian Alps. We pride ourselves on helping you raise a new generation, literally ours. You see, just like Our namesake, the infamous cuckoo bird, we specialize in a unique approach to family planning. Why go through all the trouble of raising your own when you can experience the joy of nurturing one of our little spawns? Imagine the surprise as your bundle of joy begins to exhibit unique behaviors like inexplicable shrieking. Don't be concerned, they're simply recreating special moments with you. After all, nothing says I love you quite like reliving the same moment on repeat forever. But why do they do this, you ask? Let's just say there's a little bit of cuckoo in all of us. Oh, and don't forget, we love to stay connected with our extended family, so make sure to bring your little birdies back to the cuckoo's nest now and then, so we can see just how well they're adapting to your loving household. Dr. Cuckoo's Fertility Center, where expanding your family takes on a whole new meaning. Now accepting new patients if you're cuckoo enough. Well, you may be surprised by the fact that we have actually like nine kills in this movie. And that might be surprising because five, six, seven, maybe even eight of these nine kills technically happen off-screen and you don't even really see any of them, which is unfortunate. Yeah, it's unfortunate because if we did get to see some of these kills, it might have added to the film a bit more, but that's up for debate. Overall, there are still a few that we need to get into, so let's hear it. Which one of these kills looped you back in?

SPEAKER_04 24:09

I feel like the only one that we saw, which is the hooded woman, our main antagonist, has to be the best one.

SPEAKER_03 24:15

It is. Gotta be the best one for sure.

SPEAKER_00 24:18

Definitely the most climactic. I think the reveal of pulling the wig off was also just disrespectful. It was adding insult to injury in a way that she didn't completely deserve, but I get it.

SPEAKER_04 24:27

Yeah, that kind of boarded it into hate crime territory afterwards.

SPEAKER_00 24:30

Respect women. I know she was trying to fuck you up, but respect women. Not snatching her bald.

SPEAKER_03 24:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:36

It wasn't enough to kill her. You had to desecrate her body too.

SPEAKER_03 24:40

But there's an interesting concept here that I think I don't know, maybe this is a rule in the universe, but I can't 100% confirm this. Like much of anything in this movie, you can't really 100% confirm. But I think based on, okay, we've got the hooded woman, right? And based on these loops that happen, I feel like you have to actually kill someone multiple times before they actually die in this universe. And I'll tell you why, because we see Henry coming back to life, presumably after being stabbed multiple times by Gretchen, right? And he comes back. We also have the hooded woman, you know, herself getting crushed by that library-sized shelf and surviving and coming back. So I'm just, it makes me think are there rules to this universe that they didn't give us?

SPEAKER_00 25:33

Okay. What about Henry's wife who choked on her vomit and died? What about the officer that Henry shot? And what about the doctors that our boy Dan Stevens shot?

SPEAKER_03 25:42

Well were they in a loop, though?

SPEAKER_00 25:44

Okay, they weren't in a loop, but also this whole fucking movie threw me for a loop, so who's to say?

SPEAKER_04 25:49

Yeah, I guess not all of this was in loops. I think Sean's making shit up. I think that that is not a rule. I think based on what happens when Alma uses her power, I think the loop is only perceived by those that hear it. And if you're not in the loop, then actually time is moving in a linear way.

SPEAKER_00 26:08

Because it's just serving as a like agent or a vehicle of for paralysis. It's to stun your prey.

SPEAKER_04 26:15

Yes, disorientation, stunned. Yeah, because from Gretchen's perspective, when Alma is covering her ears and letting out her little squawk, the two of them are just kind of like dizzy and standing there. They're not actually doing the things that they think they're doing on a loop. They're just kind of stunned and disabled.

SPEAKER_02 26:31

Okay. Well, you know.

SPEAKER_04 26:32

But I mean, literally anything goes. I don't think the director of this movie could answer this question.

SPEAKER_02 26:36

I'm with you. I'm with you on that one.

SPEAKER_00 26:39

Well, there are links in the show notes that give some level of explanation. Is it satisfying? That's up for you to decide.

SPEAKER_04 26:47

Were the kills satisfying? Can't say. Not really. No.

SPEAKER_00 26:51

You know, as tragic as it is, I think my favorite kill is going to be the teenage specimen who finally gets some payoff from exiting her house in the middle of the night in the beginning of the movie. Although it is tragic and it is heartbreaking to see something that is really just responding to nature. She's showing up, she was invited, and then she got shot. That's kind of fucked up. And you see this teenager earlier in the movie, she was just a normal girl. She convulses, she seizes, she is affected by the call, and then when she flees, the next time we see her, she gets put down. It's terrible.

SPEAKER_04 27:28

Yeah. It's a real bummer, but I think it's also a really valuable lesson to all of us that if a German man plays a flute at you, don't go.

SPEAKER_00 27:37

No need to fucking respond to the Pied Piper. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:40

Terrible.

SPEAKER_03 27:41

Yeah. Well, the hooded woman definitely was probably up there for me. I do think, man, I really wish we could have gotten the satisfaction of seeing Henry and Air die on screen after that prolonged shootout they have. Yeah. Right? Like you have this whole like segment of this just elongated shootout that's happening back and forth, back and forth with so much going on. And then at the end of the day, obviously we see the standoff, we hear the shot, but we don't see the result.

SPEAKER_04 28:17

And that was a lot of the kills. One, I feel like gun kills generally aren't that great unless there's like a huge buildup and it's more of a release. But a lot of these gun kills, it was like tension, tension, cutaway, bullet gunshot. Right. I'm like, boo.

SPEAKER_03 28:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 28:30

Give us something. Was this movie rated PG 13?

SPEAKER_03 28:33

It's rated R. But I'm right there with you, Paris, because for I feel like what feels like months now, I've been running into this thing where I see PG-13 movies doing great things and rated R movies feeling like PG 13 movies, and I don't know what's happening anymore. Yeah. Where is everybody's head at when trying to make these films? I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 28:56

We do get a lot of bitches and a lot of fucks in this movie, and that's probably where the R rating comes from. Yeah. That and I guess all the presumably vaginal fluid.

SPEAKER_02 29:04

Something.

SPEAKER_04 29:05

Which can we unpack the logistics of the breeding here? Do we have a moment for that?

SPEAKER_00 29:08

Of course we do. We always have moments for breeding.

SPEAKER_04 29:11

So it seems like this is a species who is able to breed with just women. Right. Because one woman kind of scoops up some soup and I guess inseminates another woman, but it wouldn't be insemination, I don't think technically.

SPEAKER_00 29:27

Yeah, it is insemination.

SPEAKER_04 29:29

But like that, isn't that kind of a lesbian dream? You would think. And yet somehow all orchestrated by a man.

SPEAKER_00 29:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 29:37

Jesus is crazy.

SPEAKER_04 29:40

It's odd. It's fucked. It's fucked.

SPEAKER_03 29:42

Super fucked. It's super.

SPEAKER_04 29:44

And yet it seems like no one's actually getting fucked.

SPEAKER_03 29:46

No.

SPEAKER_04 29:47

Which is a shame. Because the child is the worst thing that can happen from having sex. But at least you get to have the sex. Not now. Until now. If you're dating a girl with spooky glasses, a clockable wig, and she can't talk, she might get you pregnant. Be careful, lesbians.

SPEAKER_00 30:04

How fucking great of it though is it though, that we had the hooded woman looking like a hitchcock blonde, and then we had Tippy Hedron in the birds.

SPEAKER_04 30:13

Oh, that's a fun tie-in. And I bet something they didn't think about.

SPEAKER_00 30:18

And if we think hard and remember in the birds episode, I said it should have been a lesbian love story.

SPEAKER_04 30:23

Oh, famously. That's the only thing I remember from that episode. That's great. Because I shared the sentiment.

SPEAKER_00 30:29

Everything's better with lesbians. Including this movie.

SPEAKER_04 30:32

I also believe we have two canonized lesbians or bisexual women with Gretchen and Ed. But then I also strongly believe that those two female scientists were fucking. You can't convince me otherwise. And I also think that that is the reason that the doctor killed them. Because we don't really know what science they were actually doing, but he said, are those recordings you did without my knowledge still under your stairs or whatever? And I think he's talking about them having sex without the goal of procreation. I think he was a homophobe, and I think it was a hate crime. Oh wow. The opinions expressed by Paris on this podcast, as always, do not reflect anything else except her own dumb bitchery.

SPEAKER_02 31:13

Great.

SPEAKER_04 31:13

Now we did have a lot to say about the visuals of this movie. I think one of the things that we all really can agree with like was done well were the visual elements. Specifically for me, I know y'all mentioned the cinematography. I don't think I noticed the cinematography being particularly good or bad, which is generally good for me. I don't want to notice cinematography usually, unless it's like a deliberate thing. But I really loved the character design for Gretchen. So much so that I might be Gretchen for Halloween.

SPEAKER_00 31:43

Incredible.

SPEAKER_04 31:44

Right? I think we start off in a really great place. And then as she interacts with each experience, she takes damage, gets a new bandage, gets a new wound, and she keeps trucking along. And then you get to the end where she's basically fully concussed. She has a broken arm, she's bleeding out from everywhere. And I really just loved the look. The bomber jacket, the arm sling, the head bandage that is going to be the iconic image as indicated by the posters for this film. I really love that as a character design. I think it's a really strong final girl look, probably one of my favorite final girl looks of all time. But my only concern is that for Halloween it's not that slutty. So I might do it and then give it a sluttier pivot by giving it like really, really short, slutty shorts.

SPEAKER_00 32:21

I think you can absolutely pull this off, and I'm so excited to see it. Hunter's wardrobe was something to be admired in this film. And it's looking at the consistent progression you mentioned, right? Like the every scene goes by and it's like she's added another injury. There's a point where her face is so swollen and so fucked up. I was like, geez, I can just imagine how painful that must be to be this character in this world. You know, you mentioned that you don't really want to notice the cinematography, but I thought it was just so stunning. Specifically, their use of shadows. So we have the opening of the film, there's an argument, and you see the silhouettes or the shadows of these parents or these parental figures arguing. So those shadow is cast on the hallway as the camera's pulling back and then takes us into the teenage specimens room. But then we also have that incredible scene, and I'll talk about a little bit later because it's one of my favorites. The scene of Gretchen on her bike after she has left, and the hooded woman is chasing her. But as she's looking down at the asphalt or the pavement, we see that hand start to reach out. And again, it's just the shadow of that. The hooded woman looks incredible. Yes, the wardrobe in this movie is incredible. But there's something about leaving things to the imagination, and we haven't gotten a full clean look at the hooded woman yet at that point. So the idea of something running behind her and just a hand stretching out or a claw-like hand stretching out, it was so fucking chilling.

SPEAKER_03 33:58

Yeah, the use of shadows for sure, I'm right there with you, but also some of the angles, some of the camera angles and those shots, I think is really what made the cinematography as well, really hooked you into those moments. But I I do want to shout out the sound design because I feel like the sound design can't go unmentioned either, because there was something really, I don't know, I I keep saying it unnerved. I think that's the right feeling because the sound design was just that. It was an unnerving kind of like really just spiked in some areas that really added some flavor to the film. I don't know how the score made you all feel, but I feel like it can't go unmentioned.

SPEAKER_04 34:38

I actually like the score a lot, Sean, and that's something that I was thinking about while I was watching it. I also love that because sound is such like a strong part of this monster, this creature's kit or its ability set, it was really fun to see how they leveraged the sounds that it makes versus what it would sound like if you had headphones on, or what it would sound like if you were blocking your ears, or even if you were listening to music while that was going on in the background. I think they did a really good job balancing that out. But all of this just reminded me there was a cinematography element that I actually did notice and did love. And I think we all did, and it was like the looping effect that happens when you hear the cuckoo's call. That was so disorienting from like a viewer perspective, where the first time it happened, I was like, wait, didn't she just do that? And I was like, Oh, wait, I'm getting deja vu. So I think that was a really effective tool.

SPEAKER_00 35:20

So the first time that happens, I did not like it. I didn't love it. But the next time when she starts to get more caught up in it, right? So the first time we see it, it's with Alma, and Alma's hearing the call and she's having this reaction, and Gretchen has her headphones on. But the second time was when we see her in the car with Ed and she's smoking, and she gets a little bit more disoriented. And something that I loved learning after watching this movie is the director wanted to incorporate multiple takes of the same scene or the same shot. So for the looping effect, instead of just planning it and looping back that same exact shot, they used more takes or alternate takes of like just different reactions, different moods, etc. And they worked it out in the edit. But I absolutely loved just like the intentional approach to that.

SPEAKER_04 36:10

That makes sense because I noticed that the line deliveries were sometimes slightly different, and I think that added to the disorientation in a really cool way. I love that.

SPEAKER_00 36:18

Yeah, but it was also that just slight progression because again, the first one, the takes look so similar. So it's also, I think, an incredible look at how consistent these actors can be.

SPEAKER_03 36:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:31

And it really zeroes in on the nuance of changing one small aspect of the take.

SPEAKER_03 36:36

Yeah, it's a good way to look at it for sure. I didn't really think of it that way, but the to Paris, I know you wanted to hear it. I think that the use of the looping effect and the camera angles are what brings me to skin a marink where I just felt like I didn't have the same terror that I had when watching Skinamarink.

SPEAKER_04 36:56

Got it. Okay, I I do see how that's a little skinnamarinky.

SPEAKER_03 36:59

Yeah. There are some moments in this film that I think outside of what we're talking about were pretty I don't know if it's fun is the right word, but there was a moment really towards the end where they're walking out of the hospital or whatever, and Gretchen tried to open the door, but it looked, it it looks like it's locked or whatever. You know how one of those doors is like locked, but the other one is open, and then Alma just opens the other one, and we've all been there, right? We've all had that moment in real life. But that thing that they threw into that scene was just a really fine sprinkling of humor that I think was really well crafted.

SPEAKER_00 37:39

100%. I love that moment because at that point Greshen has now overcomplicated the situation. She's like, How the fuck are we gonna get out of here now? You can see it on her face.

SPEAKER_03 37:49

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 37:50

Were this a different Netflix property? It would have been her 13th reason, maybe. Who knows? But the fact that Alma, just with the simplicity of a child and just like their different perspective, and unbothered by this, bitch, just try the other door. It was fucking hilarious.

SPEAKER_04 38:07

It was great. My favorite scene, I suspect might also be Chris's favorite scene. Oh, absolutely, it is. And it's where Gretchen kind of confronts her parents and the doctor, and she's like, What the fuck is going on? And then the doctor, being a dick, is like, Oh, your package is here. Oops, was I not supposed to say anything? And then we find out that Gretchen's dad sold her mom's house, and we listen back to the voicemails that Gretchen had been leaving for her mom the whole time. And I think that was just such an emotional element that I wasn't necessarily prepared for because obviously we know that she's grieving her the loss of her mother, and we know that she's calling her mom, but seeing like what that looked like and like the catharsis that she was feeling from those calls, and all of that to culminate in the final voicemail from Alma, like actually just being so concerned for her sister and not realizing that the mom is dead and can't pick up the phone, that really tugged at my heartstrings in a way that I wasn't prepared for.

SPEAKER_00 39:04

I was crying so fucking much, and especially because you see her and like honestly, there's so many themes in terms of like the bond of family or chosen family, and then grieving the loss of a mother, but then also sisterhood and the many forms it can take. She starts the movie saying that this sweet little girl who genuinely hasn't done a single fucking bratty thing the entire goddamn time, she hasn't done a single bratty thing, and yet Gretchen calls her a bitch. She's a bitch or she's annoying. And so to hear that voicemail where she's completely oblivious to the way Gretchen feels about her, but then also expresses this deep empathy and just wanting Gretchen to be happy. Oh my god, it was so heartbreaking, and I loved it. It was one of my favorite scenes, Paris. I thought you were going a different direction. It's the one that made me certainly the most emotional. But the second follow-up, the follow-up of like more crying for me was when she earns almost trust back. Oh yeah. And then tells her that her mom called. And then she asks, is she gonna come visit? And she said she can't, but thank you. Oh my gosh. Also, like the emotional healing, and you know, probably the attempt at closure that she's trying to find there. It's so difficult. My favorite scene is absolutely the first chase, and it's the first chase because it's a long stretch of a scene. So we have her locking up, going on that bike ride. I described a little bit ago. We have this hooded woman chasing her on the bike. She runs to the hospital. Immediately, it reminds me of Halloween 2 from 1981 with Lori Strode begging to be let into the hospital. I absolutely love that moment. But then to not just stop there, but to have the beautiful subtleness with which the blood is trickling down her blonde hair. And not only does she get fucked up physically in that moment, but she gets fucked up emotionally the next moment. Because all of a sudden you see exactly where she stands in her family and why she feels so isolated and alienated. Because as she's trying to explain to her father what's happening, they can't be bothered. It's all about Alma.

SPEAKER_03 41:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:19

A lot of great character work in this movie.

SPEAKER_03 41:21

It is a lot of great character work, and what you're saying right there is part of the reason why I think the father was in on the whole fucking thing.

SPEAKER_04 41:29

I think he was just an oblivious cuck. I was gonna say, I think he might have been a cuck.

SPEAKER_03 41:32

I think he was in on it from the get-go. I think the mom definitely wasn't in on it. She was not in on it. No. I don't think she was in on it, but I think the father was in on it.

SPEAKER_04 41:42

But why would the dad be in on it?

SPEAKER_03 41:44

Man, I know we have the whole horror father that doesn't buy into anything, but there is too much fucking weird shit going on.

SPEAKER_04 41:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 41:52

Where he dismisses it and sometimes gets super defensive about it. And I feel like, I don't know. I feel like he might have it going on, and maybe that's just that's maybe that's just tying back to the whole maybe, you know, there's the whole theory that the hooded woman could be Olivia, right? Could be the mother.

SPEAKER_04 42:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 42:12

That's where this whole conspiracy theory of this film, where you know, the film doesn't really confirm anything for you. So that's why you're left with your mind racing for all these possibilities. And some could say that's effective, but sometimes it's just annoying.

SPEAKER_00 42:28

I I got absolutely zero Olivia being the hooded woman energy.

SPEAKER_03 42:33

But she okay, but she takes the wig off and she says Yeah, Gretchen snatches her ball, and then and she has this look like she knows exactly who she's looking at. She recognizes something. And then later on, she says, Mom is dead, which I feel like is a strange thing to say afterward after the whole events that took place.

SPEAKER_04 42:55

But they keep in the words of Gretchen, that's a weird fucking way to put it.

SPEAKER_00 43:00

It is a fucking weird way to put it, but they have also described the hooded woman as the mother, the biological mother that Alma's supposed to be reunited with.

SPEAKER_04 43:10

She's mothering.

SPEAKER_00 43:12

Exactly. So to me, when we say mom is dead or the mother's dead, that's what she was referencing in my mind.

SPEAKER_03 43:19

Could be.

SPEAKER_00 43:20

When she gazes in, it was giving, she's gazing into the abyss, and the abyss abyss was gazing into her. It was a look of familiarity in the sense of like this was probably a woman once, and probably just processing this entire fucking thing, staring at this thing that's been chasing her. But Olivia only recently died for the events of this film.

SPEAKER_02 43:40

That we know of.

SPEAKER_00 43:41

Yeah, but it seemed like a very sudden move according to the conversations that she has on the phone. The fact that they just sold the house. It seemed like she wasn't expecting to be over here in the fucking Alps of all places.

SPEAKER_02 43:53

Husband could have killed her, or wrote you don't know.

SPEAKER_00 43:57

Husband could have killed her, but that That's the biological mother, and alma's eight years old.

SPEAKER_03 44:03

So Beth and eight years ago they took their honeymoon in the Bavarian Alps. Fucking crazy.

SPEAKER_00 44:09

Exactly. But Olivia was presumably alive at that point.

SPEAKER_03 44:12

Yeah, could yeah, for sure. Or who knows? We just don't know. So there's a lot of possibilities. Probably and could be are the key phrases for this movie.

SPEAKER_04 44:23

I definitely thought the same thing, Sean, both times I watched it, because I was really trying to figure out like why Gretchen lingers on her so much. But I think for me, with the rules that we do know, knowing and hearing Olivia's voice on the voicemail so many times is sort of like the one thing that makes me know, like, okay, it can't be her mom because we know that these cuckoo creatures can't talk. These cuckoo hominid these mothers. But I do think that the hooded woman was an interesting character. Even though, Chris, you said you liked the design of her. I kind of didn't. I didn't really I didn't like the Burberry trench with the glasses look. I mean, like it was kind of like old Hollywood glamour, like very the birds, like you said.

SPEAKER_00 44:59

Yeah, there's actually an interview from the with a director there where he talks about the design and the choices they made.

SPEAKER_04 45:06

Yeah. Maybe I'm just not a fan. And that's okay. Not everything is for me. But the thing I really want to know, and this might take us into characters, is why is the doctor putting wigs and lashes on these things? Are they presumably going to the gas station and like interacting in normal society in their spare time? If they're just going to be running through the woods all spooky, like why are we dressing them up? And the moment he took out that shake and go wig for the adolescent, I was like, so he's just been wigging them this whole time for what reason? And it reminded me of the gay doctor from Human Centipede, who was just kind of a little fruity, and he's making these weird creatures and he's just kind of having a little too much fun with it. But I'm like, why are we wigging them? Why does she have a thick lash on? Who was that for? Where did she get this Burberry trench coat? Where did she get these big bug eye glasses?

SPEAKER_02 45:56

Right, right. We don't know.

SPEAKER_00 45:58

I assumed it was some level of disguise because she's around in the public. Obviously, she's hunting, but it was giving like this thin veil or like just some kind of light up lightly obscuring the appearance because the alternative take the coat off, take the wig off, what the fuck does she look like?

SPEAKER_04 46:19

Yeah. Smeagol, I would imagine. Literally Smeagol. But also, if we're gonna do the big glasses, why does she have a lash? Who put the lash on her? And the lip. She had a lip. For who?

SPEAKER_03 46:31

It all tied together, you know?

SPEAKER_04 46:33

He's dragging up these dolls.

SPEAKER_00 46:36

I do want to read this quote from the director who said, I wanted a ghostly character that could exist in the real world. You could see her pass in the corner of your eye and not think too much of her. But obviously, if you look closer, there's something very off with her. I was going for a certain archaic idea of feminine beauty, and when we tried out her costume and her hair and makeup, we were going through all these different wigs. Wigs or fake hair are important for these characters, and at some point they put a Marilyn Monroe type wig on her head, and together with the hood, I was like, that's it, that's exactly it. I don't know why exactly, but it was important that it was a bygone era's idea of feminine beauty. Interesting.

SPEAKER_04 47:17

Interesting.

SPEAKER_00 47:18

A long way of saying, I don't know why. It just looks good.

SPEAKER_04 47:22

It does feel very German. They have a big reverence for the past and like that blonde bombshell 50s Hollywood starlet look. So it it seems like his brand as far as a doctor goes. But yeah, at least there's there was thought put into it, and that makes me a little bit happier.

SPEAKER_03 47:36

So, okay, so now we have this bird woman creature, cuckoo thing that makes these spawns, and I want to know why Alma looks like her non-biological mother. I don't know. How does that even work? Should she be looking like a different creature? Should she be looking like the person that carried her through birth? I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 48:04

Science rules, who fucking knows? Maybe it's like the representation of the cuckoo bird, where sometimes they put their eggs in with uh nests where like they look kind of similar to the other eggs, although not revealed to be imposters. It's all a thin fucking metaphor.

SPEAKER_04 48:20

Well, I think that the two lesbian scientists commented on that. They were like, the the child looks remarkably like the surrogate mother. So that I think was the question that they were asking as well. And the way Dan Stevens' character kind of says that each generation is better and more advanced than the last, this might be an evolution. Because circling back to the part where Gretchen says her sister's a bitch, she says that right after talking about the vanishing twin syndrome and how Alma ate her twin in the womb and how Gretchen always thought that was badass, but maybe she sort of absorbed her twin and then took some of that DNA and was like, okay, let me integrate this so that I look the part. Wow, we just got deep. Did we? Did I pay attention?

SPEAKER_00 49:02

Do we think that Beth was actually pregnant with a child that was naturally conceived? And then when she got inseminated that same time for their honeymoon.

SPEAKER_03 49:14

We got two different fucking babies in here. It wasn't even twins.

SPEAKER_00 49:19

It was predator baby. It was just two babies, not twins.

SPEAKER_03 49:23

Parasitic. It was just the alpha. Oh my lord. This is wild. Alma's a bitch.

SPEAKER_00 49:30

It's fucking hunger games.

SPEAKER_03 49:32

You heard it here first, folks. You heard it here first.

SPEAKER_04 49:35

What do we think about the future of Alma? Do we think that since her mom died and she won't be like fully transformed and activated by the call? Do we think she'll get to have some semblance of a normal life?

SPEAKER_02 49:45

No, she's gonna be a monster. No way. She's gonna be a mon yes.

SPEAKER_00 49:49

I think she's gonna be stuck in this Renesme of the situation where she is kind of half siren, half cuckoo, and half human.

SPEAKER_03 49:57

Listen, we can all fantasize about a nice, happy ending, but in reality, she's gonna snap as soon as things get stressful, and let's face it, the real world is fucking stressful, and some shit is gonna go down.

SPEAKER_00 50:10

Yeah, hit puberty, and it's fucked, I guess. Oh kind of like Brightburn. Okay. Now she's just suddenly reminding me of Sindell from Mortal Kombat.

SPEAKER_04 50:21

Cindell. How? I love Cindell, but I don't see the Sindell had that scream. Oh yeah, okay. Oh, for sure. That banshee call.

SPEAKER_00 50:28

That's what it's reminding me of. But then I was thinking about the movie Brightburn. And I was thinking about a fucking Superman-powered kid going through puberty and just being fucking evil. Something snaps. You rely on a kid to be good hearted and then shape up to be all that they hope to be. But they make one bad decision and then all of a sudden everything's fucked.

SPEAKER_04 50:48

Yeah. Happens every day. Another reason to not have kids. Quote Beatrix.

SPEAKER_03 50:53

Okay, well, I do want to say that I also love the growth and the dynamic of Gretchen and Alma as sisters, if you will, right? I feel like there's in the beginning, Gretchen clearly says, that's not my sister. Like she doesn't want anything to do with this estranged family that she's forced to be in.

SPEAKER_04 51:14

And which to be fair, that's not her sister.

SPEAKER_03 51:17

Yeah, true. Not by well, half, not even full blown. We don't even know, right? We don't yeah, not even full not yet. Just just by circumstance, we'll call it. Nonetheless, by the end of the movie, it goes from that's not my sister to that is my sister, and then Henry saying, That's not your sister. But I love the growth of how, you know, even though you can have this, I don't know if hatred is the right word, but this disconnection from your family that you're forced to be with, you know, every kid's had that feeling, but then you still find yourself protecting the ones that are close to you at the end of the day. I don't it's a very interesting dynamic that they had, and from a character standpoint, I did enjoy what they did with some of these characters.

SPEAKER_00 52:01

Yeah, I think that was also like a sensitive spot for me. So I have two younger brothers who I do not completely acknowledge to be my younger brothers, and there was a moment where I was forced to have a relationship with them after like just learning of their existence, and it wasn't really a vibe for me. But I do remember having that feeling of resentment and just I don't want to fucking do this. I'm the youngest kid, I have my brothers and I have my sisters, and that's the end of it. And when I met the older brother of the two younger brothers that I have, I remember we had this conversation and this realization that he had been lied to his entire life, and we had this moment where I learned that uh somewhere in that house there was a photo album, and that photo album had pictures of me and my family growing up with like my grandparents on my dad's side, etc. And it was really fucking weird to me that this woman that whatever had these photos, so he snuck it out of the house for me. And so he and I don't necessarily have a relationship now. I haven't talked to him in years, but I can see in Gretchen and Alma getting closer and choosing a moment to bond in this kind of fucking circumstance that's absolutely horrowing, and it was interesting for this movie to remind me of a memory I haven't thought about since fucking 2008.

SPEAKER_04 53:26

I mean, in a way, you both shared a kind of insane experience, like the characters in this movie. You were both lied to in different capacities in different ways, and you both probably had a really weird, complicated time trying to navigate that. So that was something you could relate to.

SPEAKER_00 53:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 53:40

Damn.

SPEAKER_00 53:41

We don't talk anymore.

SPEAKER_04 53:43

As far as characters go, I loved Gretchen. I loved the doctor, whose name I honestly don't know. Herr Herr Koenig, I'm just gonna say the doctor. Loved both of them, didn't care for the cop. Cop felt kind of shady, kinda loose, kinda thrown in there, didn't need him.

SPEAKER_03 54:00

Henry you're talking about Henry, right?

SPEAKER_04 54:02

The sh I mean, I guess he served as like a plot device. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 54:06

Yeah, former copy. I think yeah, Henry to me didn't stick to his own like anything motive, I feel like. You know, he went from being this guy that was like, I need to take down anything and everything that has to do with this entire operation, right? And clearly there's this interesting dynamic because Gretchen is trying to. While Henry is seemingly trying to figure this whole scenario out, protect Gretchen, but also kill Alma in the process. That's the motive. It's very interesting how everyone has their own agenda towards when we get into the third act of this film. But at the end, I know that Alma creates like this time loop or whatever, and that's how they ultimately are able to escape, but I do think there was probably a moment of opportunity for Henry to take Alma out during all of this and chose not to, even though his motive was to take all these things down, knowing that Alma would probably grow up to be some kind of monster. So I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 55:22

Sean, I'm so glad you said that.

SPEAKER_00 55:24

You know, Sean, it reminds me of in the Hunger Games when everybody has their fucking alliance and they all betray each other at some point. Yeah. It was just fucking messy and convoluted, and it was giving conflict of interest.

SPEAKER_04 55:35

Yep, for sure. Complex motives, no one's sticking to it. But John, I'm really glad you mentioned that moment because that's actually the worst part of the movie for me, despite how much this movie kind of falls apart in the third act. Specifically the mechanic of Gretchen being like, I have an idea, let me go ahead and just solidify that this is gonna work by being like, Hey, Henry, did you say you were gonna you said you would protect me, right? And he's like, Yeah. And she's like, You said you were gonna protect your wife though, didn't you? Didn't you like you said you were gonna protect her? And then he just kind of like gets pissed off, and then that's enough confirmation for her to do this like weird Jimmy with the cart, where like her back is to Henry, Alma's back is to the doctor, and presumably neither of them want to shoot the one that they can get a clean shot of, and that that's the mechanism by which she's escaping. But that entire time I'm like, you could have gotten a clean shot. Both of you could have shot either one of them in the head at any point. I mean, to be fair, they were both really terrible, lousy shots. But I'm like, that felt kind of stupid. It was supposed to be this really like tense moment of like, oh, it's like a stalemate, but we can't do anything. We're we're we're trapped because she's positioned in such a way. But I was like, this is stupid. That actually doesn't play for me.

SPEAKER_00 56:45

Yeah, I have three fucking complaints, and uh really a fourth complaint would be that. But we have this movie, and the entire crux is that if you hear the cuckoo fucking woman's call, you enter a loop and you're in some state of paralysis, right?

SPEAKER_04 57:03

Oh, I know what you're gonna say.

SPEAKER_00 57:05

So for Gretchen, she's wearing headphones the first time she ever hears this, and so she doesn't hear it, right? It's great. But then you fucking get to the end of this fucking movie and suddenly This does not suffice. This bitch can just swing her arm and barely cover both of those ears? No. Listen here. I've lost a great deal of my hearing. I've lost a great deal of my hearing because of a lack of proper hearing protection in the Navy. Your fucking bullshit bicep finger tap on your other fucking ear isn't cutting it.

SPEAKER_03 57:43

Bicep finger tap.

SPEAKER_00 57:44

It's not doing it.

SPEAKER_04 57:45

And Hunter Schaefer's a skinny girl. Like this skinny arm is not covering that ear. That is not doing a damn thing, except just kind of getting us from one scene to another.

SPEAKER_00 57:56

Not a single fucking thing. You were probably better off shimming your little bandage down, maybe. I don't know. But even then, truly, a little child's hands over your ears? Absolutely fucking not. It's not sufficient. That's the first complaint. Second complaint, this bitch didn't even lock the doors behind her when she was closing up. I know I mentioned it earlier in the episode, but it bears repeating because she literally fucking said, I know how to lock up, and yet she doesn't lock up. Those doors were wide open. Anybody could walk in and just take whatever the fuck they want. You're bad at your job. Okay? I know you don't actually give a fuck.

SPEAKER_03 58:32

She really did say fuck that job.

SPEAKER_00 58:34

Literally.

SPEAKER_03 58:35

Left the doors wide open, propped open even.

SPEAKER_00 58:38

But she didn't rob them until a couple days later. Didn't rob them until a couple days later. What the fuck? Employee of the month. Truly expected more. However, the ultimate worst part of this movie for me, they get there to the resort. Alma goes to see Gretchen, they're signing together, and then it's revealed that there had been a dog just left in the car. What? After a while, so they get there, Gretchen is exploring. Oh yeah. And then all of a sudden she goes back to help Alma let the dog out of the car. And then hot ass car aren't gonna fuck it doesn't seem like it's that cold outside because no one's dressed as though it's fucking freezing. That dog was left in that car.

SPEAKER_04 59:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 59:22

Maybe we need to revisit the animal report. Maybe, but also what the fuck happened to that dog because I never saw it again. Yeah, what was the point of that dog?

SPEAKER_03 59:30

They just should have left it out. It didn't need to be in in the story at all.

SPEAKER_04 59:33

Maybe there's a deleted scene where the cuckoo ate the dog.

SPEAKER_00 59:36

I hope not. Maybe the dog shows up in other like background moments, but I just don't recall ever really seeing that dog for a significant period of time. Those are my complaints. I'm done. Valid complaints. Sean, you have to say a best part.

SPEAKER_03 59:49

Well, I think it's really interesting because, in a sense, after having this whole conversation, we have me as the only hack. You two are both slashing the film. We both like and hate the same things about this film, but kind of ended up on opposite ends here, which I think is just hilarious. Because the best part of this movie, you know, we've talked already about the production elements of this film, so we're not going to go down that road. But the best part of this movie for me is still the concept of the film, despite its many plot holes that we just kind of went through. Because, as frustrating as that is, the idea of some kind of creature feature that's trapping people in time loops and literally impregnating them with its own spawn of whatever in order to have them raise it for you, much like those cuckoo birds do, right? I think is a very unique and very cool concept for a horror film. But the more the film tries to explain itself, the more it gets really off the rails. It's like, how is this happening? Why is it happening? We've talked about all that. What exactly is going to happen if Alma is reunited with her true mother? It's all just very weird. So the execution just didn't land, but the best part is still the concept of the film.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:13

Incredible. And that's fair. But I am curious. Obviously, Paris, you watched this movie a second time today, just before recording. Yes. You said that you liked it better the second time. I don't know that I can do it. Convince me.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:28

Okay, happily. So once you know that you're not really gonna get the answers you're looking for, that's kind of off the table. That's off your mind, which allows you to appreciate all of the little Easter eggs and all of the allusions to the answers we do get that are placed all throughout the movie. Every pretty much every single scene has some form of something, like the fact that the doctor also knows sign language. Why does he know sign language? Well, because he's been communicating with these things that can't talk for years, presumably. Things like Gretchen's love for music being a plot device that ends up saving her later on. She has so many different moments with music, and that also brings her closer to Ed, who ends up being one of her saviors. And also there's a couple more that I can't think of, but you can tell that the answers that they did have, they had conviction in, and there were signs all throughout.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:18

It's interesting.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:19

And also just like the resort being the lover's nest.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:22

Right.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:22

You know what I mean? Like things like this entire resort. Oh, you know what, Sean? Saying this now, I bet the dad is in on it because he's the one fucking building these things.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:30

That's what I'm saying. The more you look at it, the more it feels like it's this dude. I don't know. We don't know. But I love your perspective on that because I literally wrote down that I want to watch this movie a second time, even though I hacked it. I I think it's worth a second watch at least, but I want to watch it now, knowing what the film is going to do, but be able to watch it from a different point of view. And so I love hearing that you enjoyed things a little bit more on the second watch, and I'm very curious to see if that is something that changes my mind if I watch it a second time. So we'll see, but I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:09

Yeah. Whereas like long legs kind of when we do find things out, it's not that those things were already there in the beginning. It's more like they just were like, okay, now there's these new elements. Whereas with this, all those elements were always present, but we weren't looking at them with the right eyes. So watching it a second time, you have a new perspective and you're able to see more than you did the first time.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:30

Okay, you've compelled me to be more open to re-watching this movie, but I think I'll need to give it time and space. Allie really loved this shit when we watched it, so I'm confident it will be watched again at some point in the future. But it's not something that I walked out immediately thinking, yeah, I want to see that shit again. However, maybe with a critical eye, maybe after some time and space, maybe after learning a little bit more, I can give it a new look, a fresh look with new appreciation. But for now, there you have it, folks. Cuckoo from 2024 has earned one hack and two sloshes. While we certainly had a robust discussion here, the conversation about this movie doesn't end here by any means.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:08

Yeah, because if you want to hear some unhinged and off-the-wall conversation, consider becoming one of our patrons to check out the B side of this episode where we discuss monster makeovers, where we put ridiculous styles on some of our beloved horror icons. You can visit patreon.com slash hackerslash to enjoy more of the show with early access, extended episodes, bonus content, and live shows.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:34

And if you think that we're cuckoo for our ratings on this film, leave us a five-star review wherever you get your podcasts. It's actually one of the best things you can do to help us continue delivering great content for you and all of your horror friends out there.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:46

We'll see you next time, folks. And remember, if I were you, I'd stay home until my body was done growing back those cells.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:52

We have to leave now.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:54

Bye.