Episode 222
A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night (2014) With Briana Cox
We are joined by author and screenwriter Briana Cox to talk about one of her favorite vampire movies, A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night. Released in 2014, the film is a Farsi language horror film written and directed by Ana Lily Amirpour, and stars Sheila Vand, Arash Marandi, Mozhan Marnò, Marshall Manesh, and Dominic Rains. The film was promoted as the "first Iranian vampire Western" and was partially funded through an Indigogo campaign.
We discuss the vampire as a symbol of both alienation and predation, the vampiric nature of capitalism itself, and attempts to break the cycles of predation and parasitism thrust upon us within this system and the bleakness of Bad City's "dead body ditch" being the only source of community within the film.
You can follow Briana on Instagram or Threads, preorder their book Indigent, visit their website and support them on ko-fi.
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Transcript
Ward: Hello, and welcome to Left of the Projector. I'm your host, Ward,
Speaker:Ward: back at it again with another film discussion from the left.
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Speaker:Ward: of our weekly episodes that drop every Tuesday. Now, on to the show.
Speaker:Ward: This week on the show, we are discussing an Iranian film directed by Anna Lily
Speaker:Ward: Amirpour, A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night.
Speaker:Ward: The film was released in 2014 and follows a young woman who we learn is a vampire.
Speaker:Ward: The film has received praise for its striking cinematography,
Speaker:Ward: soundtrack, and for taking the typical vampire trope and flipping it on its head.
Speaker:Ward: Our guest this week is Brianna Cox, a screenwriter and author who has a novel
Speaker:Ward: releasing in March 2026, entitled Indignant. You can also find their short stories
Speaker:Ward: in the bookends review best of 2020 anthology.
Speaker:Ward: They are a 2020 Tennessee Playwrights Studio Fellow, in addition to being a
Speaker:Ward: 2024 Stage 32 Feature Screenplay Fellow, recently featured on the 2024 Next
Speaker:Ward: List for up-and-coming screenwriters.
Speaker:Ward: Welcome to Left of the Projector, Brianna.
Speaker:Briana: Yes, thank you for having me, and thank you for reading off that laundry list
Speaker:Briana: of stuff. You did not have to do that, but thank you.
Speaker:Ward: Were you going to bring it up?
Speaker:Briana: I wasn't going to bring it up.
Speaker:Ward: Well, somebody's got to that.
Speaker:Bill: Somebody's got to, you know, toot people's horns. Appropriate.
Speaker:Bill: Who's deserve it? You know, toot the horns that are deserving.
Speaker:Ward: Yeah, and I got nothing to brag about. So if I can brag on your behalf,
Speaker:Ward: I'm going to make it happen.
Speaker:Briana: No, that's what the bio is for.
Speaker:Evan: You do have a book coming out. Do you want to tell people about,
Speaker:Evan: I believe, I think we said it's in March, but do you want to tell people about,
Speaker:Evan: you know, what to expect from it, what it's about?
Speaker:Briana: Yeah, definitely. So it is my debut horror novel.
Speaker:Briana: I've been working in screenplays for quite a while now.
Speaker:Briana: So this is me kind of getting back into book publishing.
Speaker:Briana: So I'm super excited. so it is an adaptation
Speaker:Briana: of one of my scripts that has been very hard
Speaker:Briana: to get people to give me money for who knows why it's
Speaker:Briana: called indigence it comes out march 20th 2026 through graveside press and it
Speaker:Briana: is my version of a vampire story which turned into a horrific mutant worm cannibal
Speaker:Briana: story about gentrification.
Speaker:Briana: So if that sounds up your alley, pick up the book or pick up the pre-order now from Graveside Press.
Speaker:Bill: That sounds very good. Very up all of our alleys.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah, I was going to say that.
Speaker:Ward: Yeah, no, absolutely.
Speaker:Evan: For the listeners of this.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah, so it's really appropriate that we're talking about vampires for today
Speaker:Briana: because it was supposed to be vampires going into it. Not sure if it wound up that, but.
Speaker:Evan: That's like actually a good segue. I think like this episode sort of materialized
Speaker:Evan: on threads I think you had posted, I think it was maybe just a post about maybe
Speaker:Evan: your favorite vampire movies.
Speaker:Evan: I don't remember exactly the various specifics, but then I think I reached out and mentioned,
Speaker:Evan: I don't know if I mentioned this movie, but, or maybe, I don't know,
Speaker:Evan: maybe it was like commented on one of your things, but like, what was your,
Speaker:Evan: maybe your fascination with vampires and sort of why you thought this particular
Speaker:Evan: film would be, you know, a good one to discuss or like maybe your history with it or,
Speaker:Evan: Or both of those things.
Speaker:Briana: Now, just generally, I am enamored with vampire media.
Speaker:Briana: So you said, like, oh, you saw me on threads and I was talking about vampires.
Speaker:Briana: And I have no idea what you're talking about because I talk about vampires all
Speaker:Briana: the time on threads. So I don't know what specific thing you're pointing to.
Speaker:Briana: I am very, very enamored with vampires.
Speaker:Briana: And I really, as a writer, love when people try to take like vampire mythos
Speaker:Briana: and like vampire rules and vampire storytelling and like flip it on its head.
Speaker:Briana: So a lot of the vampire media I like is more subversive in this way.
Speaker:Briana: So like A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night is the obvious example.
Speaker:Briana: But there's also like Near Dark and Ganja and Hess and like all these other
Speaker:Briana: more like indie vampire films that really do just some weird shit with vampires
Speaker:Briana: that I really appreciate.
Speaker:Briana: And this one in particular, I think, is really up my alley because I am enamored
Speaker:Briana: with vampires, but I am doubly enamored with vampires in like modern urban poverty settings.
Speaker:Briana: Just because so often vampires are associated with like aristocracy and old
Speaker:Briana: money and opulence with that like gothic vibe.
Speaker:Briana: and I love those as well but I love the subversion of like vampires just being
Speaker:Briana: poor people amongst all the other poor people and this movie really delivers on that. It's like.
Speaker:Briana: It takes place in Bad City, I think it's called, and it is just a bad city. It's not fun.
Speaker:Bill: No, Bad City's not a good place.
Speaker:Evan: No. Well, the thing we were talking offline before this is one of the very first
Speaker:Evan: things you see, and I think, maybe Ward, you said you might have not seen it
Speaker:Evan: initially, is they show just a ditch filled with bodies.
Speaker:Evan: like that's like one of the first things you see and then you see it again later
Speaker:Evan: in the film and like that's just they're really setting up the bad city with
Speaker:Evan: like the ditch of bodies just prominently you know.
Speaker:Briana: It's just like the community garden where she's like, oh, you come here to dump
Speaker:Briana: your body if you need to. And like they do that in the movie.
Speaker:Briana: No one cares.
Speaker:Ward: Yeah, we were joking in the group chat and I was like, there's absolutely like
Speaker:Ward: no communal society in this movie except for the ditch of bodies.
Speaker:Ward: That's the only thing that everybody agrees. That's where you put your bodies.
Speaker:Bill: That's where your bodies are.
Speaker:Ward: Simple as that. I don't know what analysis can be derived from that,
Speaker:Ward: but it is the like one aspect.
Speaker:Ward: I mean, Evan tried to say the club, but I don't know.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah, I mean, we can.
Speaker:Ward: I don't know about that. The ditch though, for sure. Everybody puts their bodies there.
Speaker:Bill: The ditch really, we were talking about, Ward and I were both talking about
Speaker:Bill: how, like, they show it real quick and you barely even notice it.
Speaker:Bill: And then later on, they come back to it and they linger on it.
Speaker:Bill: And it's like the first time, it's easy to miss that, like, this is a body full of ditches.
Speaker:Bill: I'm sorry, this is a ditch full of bodies.
Speaker:Bill: And then, like, the second time, you're like, oh, wait, wait,
Speaker:Bill: that's a, they're throwing a body in there.
Speaker:Bill: I mean, but there's already a body there. Wait, no, that's, those are all bodies.
Speaker:Bill: that's just a ditch full of bodies that's that's all that's there this is not
Speaker:Bill: where like people throw their their old like laundry machines and like mattresses
Speaker:Bill: this is they just put bodies here this is this the body ditch and it really just.
Speaker:Ward: Yeah like first time you see it it's like you're still trying to figure out
Speaker:Ward: like did that guy really just steal the cat you know what i mean like you're
Speaker:Ward: still like that's going through your head and so like unless you're really paying
Speaker:Ward: attention you're not picking up the like the body the ditches it's got you fuck
Speaker:Ward: me up bill i gotta be honest my first thought of bodies if.
Speaker:Bill: This cat dies i'm gonna be pissed,
Speaker:Bill: i was like we are introduced the first
Speaker:Bill: thing we see is him waiting outside and then just like that whole scene that
Speaker:Bill: whole scene was like it was like he was waiting for the cat to like finish its
Speaker:Bill: business he's just waiting outside the building and then he goes in and then
Speaker:Bill: just picks up the cat and leaves and i'm just like if this cat dies i'm gonna be fucking annoyed no.
Speaker:Briana: It's not like an unreasonable thing to think like i'm pretty sure there's more
Speaker:Briana: like dead bodies and dead people in that town than like live people.
Speaker:Bill: Well we only see like like five people yeah we only see like five everyone else is a.
Speaker:Briana: Body in a ditch.
Speaker:Ward: Yeah there's more bodies in the ditches than main characters.
Speaker:Evan: The thing you mentioned brad like the like at the outset of the
Speaker:Evan: film being different where you don't have like
Speaker:Evan: the aristocracy and sort of like the wealthy vampire trope
Speaker:Evan: you have the you know the working class poor vampire
Speaker:Evan: in this and the thing that like struck me initially
Speaker:Evan: as to that idea is you learn that arash's car
Speaker:Evan: he mentions that it took him 2,191 days
Speaker:Evan: of work to be able to buy this car like this
Speaker:Evan: is his pride and joy he worked all these hours and it seems to be like a theme
Speaker:Evan: throughout like each person in this each person you're introduced to is just
Speaker:Evan: really struggling to get by completely and i mean i guess you don't really learn
Speaker:Evan: that much about the people at the party later on.
Speaker:Evan: You just know sort of the rich girl that he's friends with or works for,
Speaker:Evan: I guess. But it really is like a,
Speaker:Evan: I don't know.
Speaker:Bill: The drug dealer is not struggling.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah.
Speaker:Ward: Not at all.
Speaker:Evan: Wait, oh, the vampire is not struggling. Oh, because she has lots of- No.
Speaker:Bill: The drug dealer.
Speaker:Evan: Oh, the drug dealer. Yeah, sorry.
Speaker:Bill: Is not struggling.
Speaker:Briana: Yes, he can afford many an antelope head. So I think he's good.
Speaker:Evan: But like, I mean, I guess, what was I going to, I was, there was something I was getting to.
Speaker:Evan: But, and then you also notice in the background as they're kind of showing the
Speaker:Evan: town, it's very industrial.
Speaker:Evan: There's all these oil rigs. It's clearly this, you know, bad city is,
Speaker:Evan: it reminded me of, and I think in the, in the, an interview with the director,
Speaker:Evan: she mentioned that she got influence, a little bit of the influence from like
Speaker:Evan: the movie Sin City and kind of films like that, which makes a lot of sense to me,
Speaker:Evan: sort of that black and white sort of textural kind of facade,
Speaker:Evan: you know, like the, this very industrial town. And I don't know what to say.
Speaker:Evan: make of that but like do you is this like one of the few vampire films and we
Speaker:Evan: mentioned it like near dark and some other ones where they really do change
Speaker:Evan: the way the like there's such a thematic shift or like what do you make of the
Speaker:Evan: the like the thematic shift of this movie versus any others like are there any
Speaker:Evan: that are comparable to this in any way.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah like honestly and i didn't pick up
Speaker:Briana: on this the first time i watched this movie very very
Speaker:Briana: many years ago at this point but i think
Speaker:Briana: it is like very comparable to near
Speaker:Briana: dark where like both of them are very dusty in
Speaker:Briana: like the middle of nowhere in the desert and like
Speaker:Briana: an oil rig town where vampirism is
Speaker:Briana: kind of treated like a metaphor for like corruption kind of just like boiling
Speaker:Briana: up and over consuming everything where they are very similar in that way and
Speaker:Briana: that is not something i noticed before i don't know how because it's very on the nose on my watch now.
Speaker:Briana: I guess I was just very bad at watching movies when I was 19, shocker.
Speaker:Evan: I need to re-watch Near Dark. It's been a while. It's a hard movie to actually easily obtain to watch.
Speaker:Evan: For anyone who doesn't know, it's Catherine Bigelow. I don't think it's her first movie.
Speaker:Evan: It's one of her first movies. I think it's her second movie.
Speaker:Evan: I don't remember what her first movie was.
Speaker:Ward: I was thinking this was similar to Blade, because they both have club scenes.
Speaker:Ward: in their vampire movies that's all I got.
Speaker:Bill: That's what you that's what you went with.
Speaker:Ward: You got something Bill.
Speaker:Bill: No, um, I, what I kept thinking about with the, the fact that it was like, you know, the, um,
Speaker:Bill: the, like what, but to me, like the thing that the constant theme that came
Speaker:Bill: up throughout this was predation.
Speaker:Bill: Like that is the number one theme throughout the movie.
Speaker:Bill: It's like predation, like strip from, it is the, it's the drug dealer.
Speaker:Bill: um who's you know not just a drug dealer
Speaker:Bill: he's a pimp um who you know
Speaker:Bill: preys on the the community but
Speaker:Bill: also preys on like the prostitute uh ati um but also like the the oil wells
Speaker:Bill: like the the oil wells the the oil wells feature so prominently visually and
Speaker:Bill: like all i all i could think of is every time it's like blood of the earth and
Speaker:Bill: like what are you doing you're just.
Speaker:Bill: Pulling out from the earth this you
Speaker:Bill: know like this thing that destroys it and you're
Speaker:Bill: just continually draining the earth
Speaker:Bill: of a resource and then pumping it back into
Speaker:Bill: the air to then further kill the planet like everything
Speaker:Bill: is about like predation and how
Speaker:Bill: you can benefit off of weakness and
Speaker:Bill: despite the fact that like the girl she uses
Speaker:Bill: her power and like her predation
Speaker:Bill: in the only way
Speaker:Bill: that is like ethical in the movie she uses it to punish the wicked she preys
Speaker:Bill: only on the wicked that we see you know she even resists preying on arash or
Speaker:Bill: the little boy who You know,
Speaker:Bill: obviously he'd be very easy prey. He's a little boy.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah, it is very interesting. Like the girl's character is kept very,
Speaker:Briana: I think, intentionally ambiguous and intentionally vague that we literally don't
Speaker:Briana: even know her name the whole time.
Speaker:Briana: She's wearing the, like, Chador the whole time that's, like,
Speaker:Briana: obscuring her entire body.
Speaker:Briana: So she's a very, like, obscured character where we're not sure of her motivations for the most part.
Speaker:Briana: But it was interesting to me on this watch just seeing kind of what attracted
Speaker:Briana: her to this environment.
Speaker:Briana: Because it's made very clear that she can kind of just leave whenever she wants to.
Speaker:Briana: So just those overarching themes of predation.
Speaker:Briana: And like, oh, this is like a town of just predatory people just predating on
Speaker:Briana: each other all the time. It makes sense why a vampire would be showing up here to live.
Speaker:Briana: And like that predatory-ness like applies to everyone, which I think is interesting.
Speaker:Briana: and i kind of attribute that to this
Speaker:Briana: being like a woman director as well where like
Speaker:Briana: the female characters are like very very
Speaker:Briana: aggressive in this movie in their
Speaker:Briana: predatory behavior like obviously the vampire is a
Speaker:Briana: woman and like the rich girl who like forces
Speaker:Briana: arash to do drugs is very predatory and
Speaker:Briana: even like the prostitute is very very aggressive
Speaker:Briana: whenever she does have power over someone
Speaker:Briana: in like the rare instance that she does so i
Speaker:Briana: think it's really showing just how easy it is to fall into that very predatory
Speaker:Briana: mindset when you're in this situation and like in this town that once again
Speaker:Briana: has a ditch full of bodies so people are very they're normalizing this behavior obviously.
Speaker:Evan: One thing that she said amin poor said about in one of her interviews she said
Speaker:Evan: that she wasn't intentionally depicting obviously it's supposed to depict iran
Speaker:Evan: but it's not it couldn't didn't have to be that and one thing that we were discussing
Speaker:Evan: before is do you think that this,
Speaker:Evan: in the way that is a very sort of nondescript it's just
Speaker:Evan: bad city just this industrial place where it could simply
Speaker:Evan: depict any industrialized location
Speaker:Evan: whether it's the united states or you know abroad based on you know american
Speaker:Evan: imperialism or all these different things and it seemed like a very good like
Speaker:Evan: a blank slate of this and she also went on to saying like as part of that was
Speaker:Evan: that she was referring to like
Speaker:Evan: loneliness and being misunderstood and the isolation and those are like,
Speaker:Evan: Things that you don't, you know, there's no place that that thing that those
Speaker:Evan: feelings are exclusive or exclusive to. Yeah.
Speaker:Evan: So I don't know. Do you do you think that also makes sense to being,
Speaker:Evan: you know, this could have been in anywhere USA kind of thing?
Speaker:Briana: I think one of my favorite aspects of this movie is just how weirdly ambiguous
Speaker:Briana: a lot of aspects of it are, where it could be anywhere.
Speaker:Briana: We're saying it takes place in Iran because the director says it does, but that's really...
Speaker:Briana: the only indication that it does like it could take place anywhere between like
Speaker:Briana: the 50s and modern day and like nothing would change.
Speaker:Ward: It could be damn near anywhere i mean the industrial areas that could be anywhere
Speaker:Ward: lonely empty city streets that could be damn near anywhere ditch full of bodies
Speaker:Ward: kind of limits things but i mean like it could be basically anywhere.
Speaker:Bill: There's metaphorically we
Speaker:Bill: got lots of uh ditch body ditches oh yeah metaphorically we got a lot do.
Speaker:Evan: They show a cell phone in this movie like yeah.
Speaker:Bill: They do show cell phones yeah they show
Speaker:Bill: cell phones they show a flip phone uh arash has a flip phone and at one point
Speaker:Bill: when they uh the the drug dealer he has a collection of cds it's like the timeline
Speaker:Bill: is very like this movie is it reminds me of the
Speaker:Bill: animated Batman movie, the animated Batman series,
Speaker:Bill: and that, like, it is, like, it is anachronistic all over the place.
Speaker:Bill: Like, that car is from, like, the 1960s?
Speaker:Bill: No, I think that's actually 1950s.
Speaker:Bill: And then you've got, you know, just the technology's all over the place.
Speaker:Evan: She has a record player?
Speaker:Bill: She has a record player. I mean, so do I, but that's not...
Speaker:Evan: Right, I know, I know. But to prove your point.
Speaker:Briana: And it's not even just the technology, it's also the people.
Speaker:Briana: It's like Marash is just like James Dean walking around the whole time from
Speaker:Briana: the 50s, and the girl is either a 60s French film character or a modern hipster,
Speaker:Briana: and they have a Dickensian street wave running around and a drug dealer from the 90s.
Speaker:Briana: It's just a bunch of people who don't seem...
Speaker:Briana: temporally to be from the same place.
Speaker:Bill: It's it's very like yeah like it's it's like it's very temporally unhinged it's
Speaker:Bill: just like it's loose it's out there in time who knows.
Speaker:Evan: This is this got me to thinking i've since
Speaker:Evan: you're mentioning sort of the different vibes of different characters the girl
Speaker:Evan: also in her both in her room and in the clothing she wears except for the shadow
Speaker:Evan: are all striped and i was trying to like come up with a theory as to why you
Speaker:Evan: know what that could mean And the only thing I could think of was like the idea of like a,
Speaker:Evan: like a prison jumpsuit where you're wearing stripes or something and she views herself.
Speaker:Evan: And I think she tells Arash later on that she's done bad things.
Speaker:Evan: Presumably like she could be in prison, you know, if she were caught,
Speaker:Evan: I guess. So I don't know. I don't know if anyone else has a better theory.
Speaker:Ward: For me, I'm thinking it was to help stand her apart from everyone else.
Speaker:Ward: I don't remember any of the other characters wearing stripes.
Speaker:Ward: And I know how we're talking about every relationship and interaction in this
Speaker:Ward: show is predation and exploitative.
Speaker:Ward: But I mean, for the girl, I think the biggest resounding theme is like her alienation
Speaker:Ward: is like she's not no longer human and can no longer be part of society due to
Speaker:Ward: her inherent nature as a vampire. And.
Speaker:Ward: We get those acts of predation from her as a twisted form of her trying to connect
Speaker:Ward: to society by righting wrongs that she sees.
Speaker:Ward: Even with the innocent little boy, I'm thinking in her twisted mind,
Speaker:Ward: in her way, she's like, oh, I'm at least preventing another person from engaging
Speaker:Ward: in this predatory, exploitative system.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah, I feel like all of that is much smarter than what I was going to say.
Speaker:Briana: I was just like, oh, it's black and white. So the stripes look cool in black and white.
Speaker:Briana: And she was inspired by Sin City, which is a very stark monochromatic movie.
Speaker:Briana: So I think just aesthetically, it really stands out to have that character be
Speaker:Briana: marked in that way where you can see her in a wide shot and in a closed shot.
Speaker:Briana: And you always know it's her no matter what.
Speaker:Briana: But that's more like filmakery stuff where she's like, oh, this movie is beautiful.
Speaker:Briana: I love it. It's like not thematic at all.
Speaker:Evan: I mean, honestly, that's probably
Speaker:Evan: makes the most sense, especially given it's a very low budget film.
Speaker:Evan: She wants to make it look good, which she does very successfully.
Speaker:Evan: We haven't even really talked about some of the cinematography and it's just
Speaker:Evan: really beautiful to look at.
Speaker:Ward: Yeah, no, I agree that it is visually striking, very distinctive.
Speaker:Ward: It's a fantastic filmmaking choice, but I'm not a filmmaker.
Speaker:Ward: I'm a Marxist, so I got to go with the Marxist analysis.
Speaker:Bill: Which i mean like as a marxist and
Speaker:Bill: not a filmmaker what i and we
Speaker:Bill: discussed this briefly like the other day is like how like on
Speaker:Bill: the floor like specifically says like there's nothing
Speaker:Bill: political about this and i really i think i think that that that is the most
Speaker:Bill: interesting thing about this movie the fact that the creator says that like
Speaker:Bill: they nothing is political about it or at the most like.
Speaker:Bill: She actually says that the most political aspect is the character of Rockabilly,
Speaker:Bill: who is the, I don't think ever named in the movie,
Speaker:Bill: but Rockabilly is the minor character in the background,
Speaker:Bill: the gay man with the makeup and everything.
Speaker:Bill: and like she literally says because if there's
Speaker:Bill: one thing in the there's one political thing in the
Speaker:Bill: film it is rockabilly because it's not
Speaker:Bill: okay to be gay in Iran but like
Speaker:Bill: as a Marxist like the entire you cannot separate politics from like life and
Speaker:Bill: like how like everything about this is political like the material conditions
Speaker:Bill: that those people live in is political the fact that
Speaker:Bill: Arash works for this privileged young woman's family who may or may not live in bad city.
Speaker:Bill: I'm not convinced she lives in bad city.
Speaker:Bill: Um, and you know, he works for 2,191 days to get his car, you know,
Speaker:Bill: like all of that is political.
Speaker:Bill: The fact that, you know, the only person in the town, like the,
Speaker:Bill: the dominance of the drug dealer, like all of that is political.
Speaker:Bill: And to say that like, there's nothing political about this is such an ingrained
Speaker:Bill: part of our culture to ignore the fact that these things are these things are
Speaker:Bill: political like life and material conditions are politics and that's they're
Speaker:Bill: of a result of political systems and to say that,
Speaker:Bill: including the oil wells like and to say that it's just such an ingrained part
Speaker:Bill: of our culture just like we we're taught to not pay attention to those things
Speaker:Bill: and not consider them as important.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah that is interesting i didn't know she said
Speaker:Briana: it wasn't a very political movie i would not have guessed that just
Speaker:Briana: based off of watching it where there is just such like
Speaker:Briana: a hyper focus on their material conditions like even like the cinematography
Speaker:Briana: itself is like very unique in that it seems to be mostly like wide shots where
Speaker:Briana: you're just seeing just the complete desolation that they're in all the time.
Speaker:Briana: It's either wide shots or it's like their faces like super up close in a hyper
Speaker:Briana: close up distorted through something like in car mirrors or anything like that.
Speaker:Briana: So there's always like this continuous vibe of like we're seeing these people
Speaker:Briana: through like the lens of industrialization and in this like industrial hellscape that they live in.
Speaker:Briana: So I know maybe she was just doing it for the vibes, which are immaculate.
Speaker:Briana: So good for her, but yeah, very hard to not see any political messaging there.
Speaker:Evan: Usually my opinion and like this, we've said this in other episodes where a
Speaker:Evan: director's like, I wasn't going for anything political.
Speaker:Evan: It's just, this is just the movie, you know, like this is the movie and i
Speaker:Evan: just like sometimes have a hard time believing that and
Speaker:Evan: maybe she just doesn't want to make it
Speaker:Evan: a political thing you know within interviews or
Speaker:Evan: or whatever i i don't know but and as bill said too the idea of just living
Speaker:Evan: in a world where she's you know she's you know having she's basing this off
Speaker:Evan: a little bit not basing it she's using inspiration from sin city from frank
Speaker:Evan: miller also like spaghetti westerns like sergio leone and these kinds of things i I mean,
Speaker:Evan: all of those have political messages ingrained in them, so...
Speaker:Evan: I just have a hard time believing that she wasn't considering these things,
Speaker:Evan: or at the very least, just didn't realize it was political, but is. I don't know.
Speaker:Evan: I'm trying to do her a favor and say, like, I don't, you know,
Speaker:Evan: I don't know what I'm saying.
Speaker:Bill: This is not a movie where she was like, you know,
Speaker:Bill: she didn't make a Marvel movie and then not,
Speaker:Bill: and then, you know, like slip in like political stuff and then be like,
Speaker:Bill: I don't want to make it political and like talks is going to get like,
Speaker:Bill: this is a movie that like, this is a, like a low budget, like independent film.
Speaker:Bill: Like she wasn't going to like blow up her spot by being like,
Speaker:Bill: yeah, this is, this is political. Yeah.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah no also i wasn't going to mention about
Speaker:Evan: the politics part of it she she also mentioned in
Speaker:Evan: the interview which i thought was interesting is that she you know
Speaker:Evan: she was specifically calling attention to like the idea of
Speaker:Evan: like the decay and post-industrial landscape and mixing it with these elements
Speaker:Evan: of the graphic novel spaghetti western and she referred to it also as like our
Speaker:Evan: iranian fairy tale in some weird way and the idea that the the girl gets to
Speaker:Evan: live forever as a vampire because she had said that she doesn't want to die,
Speaker:Evan: and so she likes vampires.
Speaker:Evan: And so all of those things combined to me tell me that it is a very political
Speaker:Evan: decision or a political-themed film.
Speaker:Evan: And I'm not like, you know, again, the only way to solve this really,
Speaker:Evan: as I say this a lot, is that Annalily Ampour can come on left of the projector, and she can tell us.
Speaker:Ward: Open invite. Defend yourself.
Speaker:Bill: Open invite, yeah.
Speaker:Briana: Now, I'm looking for a specific comment I wrote down that one of the characters
Speaker:Briana: says that also makes it kind of hard for me to believe that she wasn't trying
Speaker:Briana: to do some kind of messaging.
Speaker:Briana: It's in the very beginning where the pimp is just making broad,
Speaker:Briana: general statements about the state of things.
Speaker:Briana: Oh, your father is a man. He enjoys drugs and women and money,
Speaker:Briana: just like all men do. Like, all right.
Speaker:Briana: And then the fact that the vampire is like this young woman who is continuously
Speaker:Briana: mistaken for a prostitute throughout
Speaker:Briana: the entire movie and whose strongest source of kinship is like, A,
Speaker:Briana: another prostitute and B, a man who didn't immediately sexualize her upon meeting her.
Speaker:Briana: Like the feminist messaging or just...
Speaker:Briana: general alienation with gender relations seemed very intentional to me.
Speaker:Briana: So I'm one of those people who thinks that like social messaging counts as political.
Speaker:Briana: Maybe this director doesn't. And she thinks just more like direct politics is
Speaker:Briana: all it takes. But that was a very strong reading I got.
Speaker:Evan: In that same scene when the pimp is in the car after he steals the car from Arash and he's
Speaker:Evan: the other woman and he i think he asks her
Speaker:Evan: like make some comment like how you know like ask
Speaker:Evan: her how old she i think she says she's 30 and she's like oh like you
Speaker:Evan: know shouldn't you be like married and have kids and i wrote
Speaker:Evan: in my notes like he's here like pushing the patriarchy on
Speaker:Evan: this this woman because she's not like settled down and
Speaker:Evan: again i think that's like doubles down on to your point brav
Speaker:Evan: like that's a very you know
Speaker:Evan: patriarchal vision of what
Speaker:Evan: you know she should be and then the girl is like the complete opposite she's
Speaker:Evan: very self-sufficient she doesn't need anybody else eventually she realizes she
Speaker:Evan: can have kinship with someone who actually like doesn't just sexualize her and
Speaker:Evan: actually cares about her in
Speaker:Evan: some way so all of those things are say like political political political.
Speaker:Briana: There's a really frequent underlying theme, whenever a woman character is on
Speaker:Briana: screen, that these gendered expectations are dictating how they can interact with people.
Speaker:Briana: So Arash has the entire conversation with the rich girl, like,
Speaker:Briana: you can't be in your room.
Speaker:Briana: I know this is your room, you can't be in here with me, though.
Speaker:Briana: or it's like all of the interactions with like
Speaker:Briana: the girl when she is just like on the street with
Speaker:Briana: people where they like are just wondering why she's
Speaker:Briana: out by herself and are just like telling her to get home because girls should
Speaker:Briana: not be out at night so this constant like hammering home of like expectations
Speaker:Briana: placed on like how women can conduct themselves and like be appropriate is really frequent i.
Speaker:Bill: Think it's interesting like how you brought up like a rosh and like how he like
Speaker:Bill: plays into that because to like a rush, like seems like an outsider in the entire thing.
Speaker:Bill: It's similar to the girl and that like when he's even saying that to, um, uh, Shad, I believe.
Speaker:Evan: Oh, the drug dealer Saeed.
Speaker:Bill: No. Um, Oh,
Speaker:Bill: It's Sheda, the girl, the rich girl, Sheda.
Speaker:Bill: When he says that about like, oh, you shouldn't be in the room.
Speaker:Bill: He's, he never, it's clear from the way he's saying it, that this is not his conviction.
Speaker:Bill: That he is not, like, he makes it clear that he is not attempting to put this
Speaker:Bill: judgment or onus on her. He is appealing to outside authority that he doesn't
Speaker:Bill: even necessarily like almost agree with.
Speaker:Bill: He's like, I need to tell, I need to do this because otherwise I will be in trouble.
Speaker:Bill: You know, it's like, he seems very much of an outsider in a lot of ways in that
Speaker:Bill: town and that culture in the same way the girl does.
Speaker:Bill: in that like both of them seem to be alienated from that system and like like
Speaker:Bill: just disjointed from the whole
Speaker:Bill: thing and would like you know individually personally separated from it.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah that was actually one of my favorite scenes which is
Speaker:Briana: weird because it's just like a little nothing of a scene where he's
Speaker:Briana: fixing a tv in like a rich girl's house but
Speaker:Briana: i think just thematically it's like perfect
Speaker:Briana: in just getting across that idea because
Speaker:Briana: like you said like he's not saying it because he believes it
Speaker:Briana: he's saying it because he needs her to leave so he
Speaker:Briana: can like steal her jewelry because a drug dealer stole his car so there's this
Speaker:Briana: underlying idea that like these kinds of like more predatory or like patriarchal
Speaker:Briana: ideas are exacerbated and like continued and supported by people's like material needs.
Speaker:Briana: Like Arash wouldn't have like appealed to like weird sexist standards if he
Speaker:Briana: didn't need to steal from her to like get his car back.
Speaker:Briana: So it's just that like theme that I kept seeing throughout that like these people's
Speaker:Briana: material conditions are making them worse and making them appeal to these like
Speaker:Briana: societal standards that they don't even like that much just because it's the
Speaker:Briana: only way that they can survive at the time.
Speaker:Evan: One thing about the i think i don't remember maybe you mentioned one
Speaker:Evan: of you just mentioned the idea that there are that arash and the girl are both
Speaker:Evan: kind of like outsiders and to me that like plays very heavily into sort of like
Speaker:Evan: the spaghetti western where you often have like an outsider you know coming
Speaker:Evan: into this you know town and everyone like just kind of you know,
Speaker:Evan: looks at them funny as they're like going into the saloon and sort of have these
Speaker:Evan: interactions And it seems like they have that same interactions where Arash,
Speaker:Evan: I don't even get the sense that it took him 2,991 days in this town necessarily to buy that car.
Speaker:Evan: I don't think he's been working for that girl for, you know,
Speaker:Evan: better part of what that's, I don't know how many years, I can't do math,
Speaker:Evan: like five, six years, something like that.
Speaker:Evan: I don't know. you know i mean it's it seems like he's like
Speaker:Evan: come into the town and he's working and he's trying to
Speaker:Evan: you know finally maybe get it i don't know maybe it
Speaker:Evan: actually makes more sense that he's from there he's worked to get a car so that
Speaker:Evan: he could maybe leave i don't know it's not even clear that he can leave because
Speaker:Evan: he has to take care of his father who's now you know addicted to heroin because
Speaker:Evan: presumably he took other opiates for pain and then that just got him down this
Speaker:Evan: weird thing too, where it's another exploitation.
Speaker:Evan: The drug dealer is also exploiting him, you know, because he has no other way
Speaker:Evan: to cope with the pain, which that might be a whole nother topic.
Speaker:Ward: See, I was I was thinking that Arash leveraged his father's debts to help buy that car, right?
Speaker:Ward: Because, I mean, every relationship that we get in here is one of exploitation,
Speaker:Ward: whether it's Arash's father exploiting his son, or the son exploiting the father,
Speaker:Ward: or the pimp exploiting prostitute, or debtors, or what have you.
Speaker:Ward: It's all exploitation all the way around.
Speaker:Ward: And so I was inclined to think that Arash used... I mean, that's a 1950s fucking car.
Speaker:Ward: That's a nice-ass fucking car. 2,191 days.
Speaker:Ward: I think it's a bit more than that.
Speaker:Ward: And what work do we actually see him doing? You think that's going to pay for it?
Speaker:Bill: That is the one thing that location actually matters because in certain areas,
Speaker:Bill: those are the cars that are available.
Speaker:Bill: They're not more expensive or less expensive. Those are the cars that are available.
Speaker:Bill: They're not outliers. It's like in Cuba.
Speaker:Bill: You don't see new cars. You see old cars because those are the cars that are there.
Speaker:Bill: It's like, they're not unusually expensive because that's, what's there,
Speaker:Bill: which is like the one thing,
Speaker:Bill: like when I said that does fix it in like a place because it's like,
Speaker:Bill: there are areas of the world where like at a certain point imports of cars,
Speaker:Bill: like they stopped or they like trickle down or they thin out or you could only get certain,
Speaker:Bill: like past a certain year in certain areas because just the way,
Speaker:Bill: sanctions and like trade all that stuff functions.
Speaker:Ward: I mean but like we've already said that like the technology is all hit or miss
Speaker:Ward: all over the place and isn't this like the only car that we see in this whole
Speaker:Ward: movie too i'm pretty sure i want to say.
Speaker:Bill: I think so.
Speaker:Briana: It might be.
Speaker:Ward: Yeah. So, I mean, there's more bodies in that ditch than there are cars in this movie.
Speaker:Evan: Like, I mean, you see, she has a skateboard, which she took from a little kid.
Speaker:Evan: He has a bicycle, too, because he has to use that when he loses his car.
Speaker:Evan: But it's surprising. How come the pimp didn't have a car?
Speaker:Evan: He has this really nice apartment with, you know, all that stuff there, but he didn't have a car.
Speaker:Bill: I'm not convinced he doesn't have a car. He just wanted his car.
Speaker:Evan: Okay. There you go. Okay.
Speaker:Evan: He just wanted his car.
Speaker:Ward: I mean, that would make sense. He walked or got a ride all the way over to Arash's
Speaker:Ward: place because he didn't leave a car in front of Arash's place.
Speaker:Bill: That's a good point.
Speaker:Ward: Or I have a feeling Arash would have punched the fucking windows out instead
Speaker:Ward: of the brick wall in the alley and fucking up his hand.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah, I think that's another one of the things that kind of makes this,
Speaker:Briana: like the director said, very like fairy tale-ish.
Speaker:Briana: where there's a lot of like fairytale logic where it's just like,
Speaker:Briana: yeah, how are you getting around this place? Like bad cities.
Speaker:Ward: There's one car in bad city.
Speaker:Briana: The size of a city, but also just one single neighborhood and people are getting around fine.
Speaker:Briana: And also it seems to be a place where people only exist to want to leave.
Speaker:Briana: Like no one seems to be like living there.
Speaker:Briana: They all seem to be like transitory. like
Speaker:Briana: we're living in these like weird ramshackle like converted motel rooms that
Speaker:Briana: don't have any personal belongings except for like two things except for the
Speaker:Briana: drug dealer whose house is like decked out and stuff he likes why everyone else
Speaker:Briana: just seems like they're here for the moment and are just trying to leave i.
Speaker:Evan: Mean i guess they might only be coming to this town because it's the only place
Speaker:Evan: they can get a job you know they have this industrialized you know presumably
Speaker:Evan: these oil fields and places need workers, right?
Speaker:Evan: I guess they move to the town just to have a place to, they just need a place
Speaker:Evan: to, you know, lay their head at night, I guess. And then, I don't know.
Speaker:Bill: Yeah, it feels very much like a...
Speaker:Bill: like a work town, like a boom town, you know, the kind of thing.
Speaker:Bill: It's like, it might've at one point been economically prosperous.
Speaker:Bill: And then since then has, you know, faded away. And these are the people that
Speaker:Bill: are left over because they couldn't get someplace else.
Speaker:Bill: It's not so much that they like exist there to want to leave.
Speaker:Bill: It's that they're the leftovers.
Speaker:Bill: They're the people that couldn't leave. They're the people that have been left
Speaker:Bill: behind as everyone else left.
Speaker:Ward: This film is location dependent. It's based on the transition to the Iranian nuclear program.
Speaker:Briana: It could be like honestly you could make the argument it's like you said.
Speaker:Bill: That so seriously like i thought you had like literally just looked something
Speaker:Bill: up and you're like no i've discovered a key i've discovered a key plot point as people.
Speaker:Ward: Have complained in comments no i don't look things up while we record.
Speaker:Bill: No that's what i do out there in listener land that's what i do i have two screens
Speaker:Bill: and i look at the one where everyone is on and then i have the other one to
Speaker:Bill: my right where i look stuff up as we're talking this.
Speaker:Evan: Is completely like like totally change of topic but like the one thing that
Speaker:Evan: i also met that i thought was really just generally good about it i noticed
Speaker:Evan: it more this time was the the soundtrack and the music and one thing in particular
Speaker:Evan: there's like a bunch of times where there's like really nice needle drops of
Speaker:Evan: just like the song coming in And there was a lot of scenes, too,
Speaker:Evan: that I noticed this time that had sort of,
Speaker:Evan: this was later in the film, where there would just be sort of like static in the background.
Speaker:Evan: There wasn't even music. It was just sort of static.
Speaker:Evan: And then you would slowly fade, and then you'd get a good song or a longer song.
Speaker:Evan: But the one in particular that I actually looked up the lyrics,
Speaker:Evan: in the scene where Arash goes back to the girl's house after,
Speaker:Evan: I think he's, it's after she takes him on the skateboard, they go back.
Speaker:Evan: and this song called Death by the White Lies plays.
Speaker:Evan: And I'm not going to read the whole set of lyrics, but like part of the, um.
Speaker:Evan: The first verse in the chorus is, I love the feeling when we lift off,
Speaker:Evan: watching the world so small below.
Speaker:Evan: I love the dreaming when I think of the safety in the clouds out my window.
Speaker:Evan: I wonder what keeps us so high up. Could there be love beneath these wings?
Speaker:Evan: If we suddenly fall, should I scream out or keep very quiet and cling to?
Speaker:Evan: And I think later it says, and will I see a new day? Who's driving us anyway?
Speaker:Evan: I picture my own grave because fear has got a hold of me. Fear has got a hold of me is the chorus.
Speaker:Evan: And I don't know. I just felt like that none of the other songs, a
Speaker:Evan: lot of them were also in iranian where i didn't or i couldn't
Speaker:Evan: understand what they the lyrics were but in this one it's the
Speaker:Evan: one english song too and it fits perfectly i don't
Speaker:Evan: know like what you thought of that song or just any
Speaker:Evan: of the the music in it in general and i just
Speaker:Evan: thought it was just a perfect uh you know compliment and
Speaker:Evan: the other thing is she claimed that she already had all of the music picked
Speaker:Evan: out before she started filming which she then gave to the cast to listen to
Speaker:Evan: while they were filming which i think seems very uncommon usually you have to
Speaker:Evan: get like licenses for the songs after the fact so no.
Speaker:Briana: I love that song like the reason
Speaker:Briana: that like i remembered that i watched this
Speaker:Briana: movie like so early on like when it was still in film festivals is because i
Speaker:Briana: bought that song for like my ipod or whatever like after i heard this in the
Speaker:Briana: actual scene so i do think it's just It's like a banger of a song just in and of itself.
Speaker:Briana: And it's also just thematically perfect because there's that English song and
Speaker:Briana: then the girl mentions like Hello by Lionel Richie at some point.
Speaker:Briana: Those are the two English songs that pop up in this entire movie.
Speaker:Briana: They're just both about...
Speaker:Briana: guy just being anxious and like looking at something from the outside just longingly
Speaker:Briana: so they're both very very appropriate to mention so i'm not surprised she couldn't
Speaker:Briana: get hello by lionel richie i'm sure it would have been in that scene if she could yeah.
Speaker:Evan: That probably cost a lot of money.
Speaker:Ward: I like the uh i like the line
Speaker:Ward: um like near like uh near the end
Speaker:Ward: of that song that's why everything's got to be love or
Speaker:Ward: death and i thought that was really like appropriate and succinct
Speaker:Ward: for like arash and the girl because like
Speaker:Ward: yeah we got all these predatory relationships and
Speaker:Ward: exploitation but like at the end of the day what is it really over
Speaker:Ward: it's not tons of money it's
Speaker:Ward: like the same pile of cash the same earrings
Speaker:Ward: the same fucking cat and the same drugs that
Speaker:Ward: all gets pass around throughout the whole movie it's not like any accrual of
Speaker:Ward: anything new because it's bad city it's a city in decay everyone's fighting
Speaker:Ward: over scraps and we literally see the same scraps get passed around through multiple
Speaker:Ward: hands and so for a rosh and the girl it is love or death and we see this in the movie,
Speaker:Ward: Ditch full of bodies. That is the other choice of Bad City. That or leave.
Speaker:Briana: I think it's really interesting what you just said about just like the same
Speaker:Briana: kind of objects and like the same $20 cycling through all these different people
Speaker:Briana: and just keeping them in like these same conditions, no matter who,
Speaker:Briana: quote unquote, is like on top at the time.
Speaker:Briana: And where it stops pretty much being a cycle when Arash gives the earrings to the girl.
Speaker:Briana: She doesn't give them to anyone else after that.
Speaker:Briana: She literally punches them into her head without any earring piercings.
Speaker:Briana: And then she keeps them and she keeps them for the rest of the movie.
Speaker:Briana: And that's the indication that someone's actually going to keep this piece of
Speaker:Briana: wealth. Someone's actually going to keep and benefit from something that was
Speaker:Briana: given to them because no one else really does.
Speaker:Ward: I want to agree, but the girl also takes the cat that takes the cat from Arash's father.
Speaker:Bill: Yeah, but he gets it back. But then he gets back. Yeah, he gets it back.
Speaker:Bill: It's Arash's cat. It's his cat.
Speaker:Ward: He gave up the cat. Yeah.
Speaker:Evan: Well, does he? He leaves it at the father's.
Speaker:Ward: Right? Yeah, when he kicks his dad out.
Speaker:Bill: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Ward: He kicks his dad out, and he's like, and take the cat with you. I don't want it anymore.
Speaker:Bill: And then he gets it back.
Speaker:Ward: Yeah, which causes the whole, like, mental breakdown he has.
Speaker:Ward: He has to pull over the car before the end of the movie. Yeah.
Speaker:Evan: But I do like the idea that the earrings is sort of like the end of, like, a cycle.
Speaker:Evan: It does feel like it's sort of like the end of this cycle, that they break the
Speaker:Evan: cycle by then, like, leaving, obviously leaving the town breaks the cycle.
Speaker:Evan: but it's very clear that he has unclear you know his arash's feelings over the
Speaker:Evan: whole idea of leaving i mean is it also obvious that he knows that the girl
Speaker:Evan: killed his father like it's pretty clear because the cat's there and yeah okay
Speaker:Evan: i mean that's the breakdown not leaving.
Speaker:Bill: The town it's because he knows she killed his dad.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah yeah right i mean yeah it's implied it's heavily so.
Speaker:Ward: I mean it's it's nice because it seems like the earrings are like putting a
Speaker:Ward: nice arc and nice bow on the end of the exploitation arc, but then we have the
Speaker:Ward: cat going, no, no, no, no, no.
Speaker:Ward: You can't just leave town. This will follow you.
Speaker:Evan: They also don't name the cat, which is sad, I don't think, right?
Speaker:Bill: They do not name the cat.
Speaker:Ward: No.
Speaker:Bill: I do know the cat's name in real life, though.
Speaker:Evan: Oh, really?
Speaker:Bill: It's Masuka.
Speaker:Briana: Fantastic cat actor.
Speaker:Bill: That cat was adorable. I loved that cat. In the end, when they were driving
Speaker:Bill: out of the town and the cat was directly between them and the car looking dead
Speaker:Bill: straight at the camera that was a perfect haunting shot,
Speaker:Bill: the cat just stared into my soul it.
Speaker:Evan: Also sits on the on like the desk also when the girl like just perfectly.
Speaker:Bill: Still and masuka deserves an oscar the.
Speaker:Evan: Little the cat yeah the cat is great like what other movies is this cat been
Speaker:Evan: in like consistency you know this cat so well yeah.
Speaker:Bill: It doesn't have a good Peter Page. It's just the cat's name.
Speaker:Evan: Why not?
Speaker:Bill: It just says, cast Masuka as the cat. Okay.
Speaker:Briana: That's unfair. It's actually very hard to find a good cat actor.
Speaker:Briana: So I enjoyed the cat in this movie for staying in a long shot and not ruining it.
Speaker:Bill: I have to assume. I know that there has been debate about this amongst us.
Speaker:Bill: Whether Shada lives in Bad City or not.
Speaker:Bill: And Ward, you said that she said she lives there, correct?
Speaker:Ward: I think so. I think so. I mean, even in the nice part of town,
Speaker:Ward: she says this is bad city.
Speaker:Ward: So, I mean, I think she lives in the not so bad part of bad city.
Speaker:Bill: The girl said that when they were in the nicer part after the party,
Speaker:Bill: but he'd been wandering around.
Speaker:Bill: Also, just because they were at the party, that doesn't mean that the party
Speaker:Bill: wasn't in bad city. But whether Sheda lives in Bad City or not, I think is debatable.
Speaker:Bill: And I think that if you want to really take your metaphor of the diamond earrings,
Speaker:Bill: it is best suited if she does not live in Bad City.
Speaker:Bill: Because it is literally, it is the reclamation of wealth expropriated from the
Speaker:Bill: population of Bad City, given back to that population that then breaks the cycle.
Speaker:Bill: he takes that wealth back, brings it back to bad city, gives it to the girl.
Speaker:Bill: Then they break that cycle and leave.
Speaker:Ward: I like that.
Speaker:Evan: Hmm.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah. We got to get a map of this fairy tale town. They see where everything is.
Speaker:Ward: Where's the sequel.
Speaker:Evan: Well i mean i don't like the idea that there's a sequel of like the characters
Speaker:Evan: but like this universe could easily have like another film in it where it's
Speaker:Evan: not necessarily at all related to any of the characters in the previous one
Speaker:Evan: but just i mean i don't think that's,
Speaker:Evan: in the cards or even being mentioned but would be interesting to like understand
Speaker:Evan: this place more and i will say i clicked i clicked on an article about the cat
Speaker:Evan: and apparently the fans have have dubbed it the Marlon Brando of cat actors.
Speaker:Bill: I'm sorry, what?
Speaker:Ward: I mean, have you ever seen a cat more perfectly play an elephant in a room better
Speaker:Ward: than that cat played in the car?
Speaker:Ward: Have you?
Speaker:Briana: No, I am unironically very impressed with that cat. That scene was like five
Speaker:Briana: minutes long, and the cat did not ruin it.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah. It says in this other thing that it doesn't say who the cat belongs to.
Speaker:Evan: Like who owns the cat, like if it doesn't have any further detail.
Speaker:Bill: Masuka owns Masuka.
Speaker:Evan: I will not rest until I find out. I think it's a Reddit thread they called it.
Speaker:Ward: It's Marlon Brando's cat.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah it's just like it's where all the film.
Speaker:Ward: Budget went to was getting this cat.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah i couldn't find out actually how much the movie cost to make it just said
Speaker:Evan: that it was it made six hundred twenty eight thousand dollars but i couldn't
Speaker:Evan: find out how much it cost i'm guessing it's probably less than that but i don't know um.
Speaker:Briana: I know they had an indiegogo campaign to finance part of it.
Speaker:Evan: So it could.
Speaker:Briana: Not have been that much budget wise i mean.
Speaker:Evan: There's like.
Speaker:Ward: One car one skateboard and one cat like in like five people.
Speaker:Bill: The indiegogo campaign um had a budget a goal of 55 000 which was surpassed
Speaker:Bill: that ended up with a total of 56 903 dollars um.
Speaker:Evan: There you go that.
Speaker:Bill: Is the only um,
Speaker:Bill: That is literally the only budgetary information about it.
Speaker:Ward: Half of it was for the cat and it was worth it.
Speaker:Evan: I mean, my guess is they might have had some, maybe she had some personal finance,
Speaker:Evan: but needed another, you said, $50,000 or whatever to do it.
Speaker:Briana: And I know we are joking about the cat in the end, as is deserved.
Speaker:Briana: But what did you guys think of the ending in general?
Speaker:Evan: Well i mean the thing that i
Speaker:Evan: couldn't help but think about as it's ending
Speaker:Evan: this is like this is sort of maybe a stupid way to think
Speaker:Evan: about it is arash you know likes they both know that each of them have done
Speaker:Evan: bad things i mean it's very clear that she knows that he did not buy these gigantic
Speaker:Evan: diamond earrings he obviously stole them just like how she pushes a bag filled
Speaker:Evan: with like watches and jewelry and stuff that presumably they could sell.
Speaker:Evan: But I mean, I think it feels, again, very fitting to that sort of like spaghetti
Speaker:Evan: Western as you sort of just like ride off in the distance and sort of like you
Speaker:Evan: don't know what's going to happen. It just sort of implied that it could be
Speaker:Evan: a bad ending. It could be a good ending.
Speaker:Evan: You don't really know. It's very ambiguous. But I can't help but think about,
Speaker:Evan: At some point, she's going to have to be like, I can't like be up during the day.
Speaker:Evan: You know, like I can't go out with you during the day. That's just like a thing about me.
Speaker:Ward: Yeah, there's definitely some logistics they're going to have to figure out at some point.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah. But like, yeah, I mean, as far as the ending goes, I think it's like the
Speaker:Evan: very fitting and just like a perfect ending for this style of film.
Speaker:Evan: And it's just like the long shot in the car, too, which is so good.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah it reminded me a lot of the ending of let the right one in if you guys
Speaker:Briana: have seen that movie or read the book yes.
Speaker:Evan: I haven't read the book but i've seen the movie.
Speaker:Briana: Where it also has like oh
Speaker:Briana: it could be a good ending or it could just be awful and we don't know
Speaker:Briana: kind of vibe so maybe this is
Speaker:Briana: just a vampire film kind of archetypal
Speaker:Briana: ending but yeah i do enjoy how ambiguous it is in like we're not sure if this
Speaker:Briana: is like a happy positive yeah they're breaking the cycle ending or not or if
Speaker:Briana: it's just they're going to go to another place that is just as awful and continue
Speaker:Briana: predation elsewhere see.
Speaker:Ward: The marxist in me doesn't like this ending because it is a fitting end for the
Speaker:Ward: movie i think personally because you know the cat is a carryover of the exploitation
Speaker:Ward: and predation and And it's that, hey,
Speaker:Ward: even if you leave, you're not leaving the system, you know, and,
Speaker:Ward: you know, I think it's just kind of weak and selfish and individualistic for them to try to flee.
Speaker:Ward: I think it would have been a cooler ending if, you know, I don't know,
Speaker:Ward: they'd like started some local organizing, started the unions.
Speaker:Ward: I don't know. Like, you know.
Speaker:Briana: You just want the upstream color ending at this point. So I guess watch that movie.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah, spoilers ahead for Snowpiercer. You have been warned.
Speaker:Ward: Yeah, Snowpiercer's the only movie I'll accept where they leave at the end.
Speaker:Evan: We're just spoiling lots of endings in movies now, aren't we?
Speaker:Bill: You don't think they should stay on the train with Snowpiercer?
Speaker:Ward: No, the Mars is in me says no.
Speaker:Bill: I think this movie is like 90% metaphor, like just straight up.
Speaker:Bill: Like this movie is verges on magical realism.
Speaker:Bill: In my opinion, um, where a lot of this, it could be debatable as to like the veracity of any of it.
Speaker:Bill: And I think in the, when it, when it comes to those kinds of like movies,
Speaker:Bill: those kinds of stories, the intentions of the character are more important than anything concrete.
Speaker:Bill: And that the fact of the matter is that, like, the girl makes it clear that
Speaker:Bill: she wants better things for the future for individuals.
Speaker:Bill: Like, when she talks to the boy, the little boy.
Speaker:Bill: Where it's almost like, she has that, like, when that scene,
Speaker:Bill: when she, like, castigates that little boy, and all I could think to myself
Speaker:Bill: was, like, why are you being so mean to him?
Speaker:Bill: He's just a little boy. like he didn't do anything why are you being so mean
Speaker:Bill: to him but at the same time like.
Speaker:Bill: Looking back and it's like the idea it's like it's the frustration you get as somebody who is like,
Speaker:Bill: seeing things and understands the way things can
Speaker:Bill: and should be when you talk to someone who's like blind to
Speaker:Bill: it and you're like just wake the fuck up like just be fucking conscious
Speaker:Bill: of it like could you just do something and it's like that is that's the to me
Speaker:Bill: like that's like the through line of her character and then arash first of all
Speaker:Bill: evan to compare his stealing the earrings to her killing multiple human beings is a stretch.
Speaker:Bill: Like, the bad things he did was sell some recreational drugs to rich kids and
Speaker:Bill: stole a rich girl's earrings.
Speaker:Bill: I don't really think they're in the same league.
Speaker:Ward: Some of those drugs he gave away for free.
Speaker:Bill: Yeah, like, he was like, literally, like, no, it's cool. Just take them.
Speaker:Bill: Like, literally terrible business model. he sold like
Speaker:Bill: we see him sell like we see him do like two
Speaker:Bill: fucking drug deals i think most of what he
Speaker:Bill: does is just use the money from the
Speaker:Bill: drug dealer who has been basically taking
Speaker:Bill: advantage of everybody like this boy
Speaker:Bill: has had nothing and now he's like i have some cash and what
Speaker:Bill: he did with that cash was get a cast on his arm like he got health care he got
Speaker:Bill: cash the first thing he did was get health care number one okay and you're like
Speaker:Bill: he's done bad things too he's just as evil and terrible as a vampire this guy who.
Speaker:Ward: Just wants health care and gave away the majority of the drugs he got for free.
Speaker:Bill: To go back like i think like intentions are what matters in these kinds of like
Speaker:Bill: stories that are it's like it is very magical realism to the point where like
Speaker:Bill: i debate whether the ditch of bodies exists or whether, again,
Speaker:Bill: it is a fucking metaphor because I can't imagine any place just having a ditch of bodies.
Speaker:Bill: Arash clearly wants better. He clearly wants that.
Speaker:Bill: He keeps returning to the pictures of his mother and his father from when they
Speaker:Bill: were happy, when his mother was alive. He keeps coming back to that.
Speaker:Bill: It's that time before For everything, you have to assume before the town fell apart.
Speaker:Bill: He just wants better. And I have to imagine that, like, you know,
Speaker:Bill: I would love it if they became organizers. And like, you know...
Speaker:Bill: you know listen if we could get if we could get vampires to lead a revolution
Speaker:Bill: we'd be great like they're that's a powerhouse right there that's a that's a
Speaker:Bill: that's an ultimate weapon in reality,
Speaker:Bill: they're two people who've like had nothing their entire lives um and there's
Speaker:Bill: no shame in them like moving forward and trying to break the cycle on their
Speaker:Bill: own end before getting class consciousness and bring it to others.
Speaker:Briana: I feel like I have a different reading of the Marlon Brando cat that represents,
Speaker:Briana: the bad city and it being awful.
Speaker:Briana: There's a scene where his dad is... Haseen? I'm forgetting his dad's name.
Speaker:Bill: Yeah, it's the same.
Speaker:Briana: Where he's like, oh, this cat is your mom. It has your mom's face.
Speaker:Ward: Full psychotic break.
Speaker:Briana: Where in In my reading of it, I see the cat as representing just like nostalgia.
Speaker:Briana: And like, oh, the cat's his mom. He's taking his mom and his nostalgia for better times with him.
Speaker:Briana: And he like kicked the nostalgia for better times out when he was in a dark
Speaker:Briana: place with his dad. And he gets the cat back in the end.
Speaker:Briana: So I see the presence of the cats and it's just unblinking stare in the end.
Speaker:Briana: It's a bit more positive.
Speaker:Bill: I wouldn't call that nostalgia. I would call that like, because nostalgia is
Speaker:Bill: inherently leaked to fascism.
Speaker:Bill: I would call that more of the, like, I just, I don't know. I just wouldn't call
Speaker:Bill: it nostalgia, but there's a word for it. I just can't think of it. But just like, yeah.
Speaker:Ward: We don't even know why he took the cat.
Speaker:Briana: No, a hot take. Arash is a fabulous. That's my hot take.
Speaker:Ward: Well, no, it was Arash that took it initially in the beginning.
Speaker:Ward: But I mean, to Evan's credit about Arash being a bad guy in that scene with
Speaker:Ward: the cat, Arash makes like the worst choice ever and kicks his father out when
Speaker:Ward: he's in mid psychotic break and goes, oh, yeah, here's.
Speaker:Ward: Also, like, all the drugs you can do. Have fun. Not a great move.
Speaker:Bill: No, not great.
Speaker:Ward: But not comparable to several murders.
Speaker:Evan: I think I've taken enough slack here.
Speaker:Bill: To be fair, they're bad people. She didn't murder bad people.
Speaker:Ward: Oh, yeah. They're not good people.
Speaker:Evan: Here's another unrelated question. How old do you think, how long do you think
Speaker:Evan: that the girl has been a vampire for?
Speaker:Bill: That's a great question.
Speaker:Evan: I mean, it's clear that she's maybe lived since the town was good and somehow,
Speaker:Evan: or I don't know, maybe she goes from town to town trying to improve them, you know, in a way.
Speaker:Evan: Sort of like, how can I get rid of the elements of this town that have ruined
Speaker:Evan: it? Or maybe she, I don't know. There's also no other vampires, too.
Speaker:Bill: I don't think there's any way to answer that question.
Speaker:Evan: I know. There's no way. This is like a specific question.
Speaker:Ward: That's all so speculative.
Speaker:Evan: You don't have to answer that question. I was just trying to get the key off of me.
Speaker:Ward: I like the idea of her being a sheriff vampire, 30 days a night style,
Speaker:Ward: just going from town to town.
Speaker:Ward: I like it. I'll give you that, Evan.
Speaker:Evan: But to your point, Brianna, of how the ending is very similar to a lot of other vampire endings,
Speaker:Evan: things you know you mentioned um uh what
Speaker:Evan: did you um what did you mention you said uh it
Speaker:Evan: was like let the right one in let the right one in i was thinking also of
Speaker:Evan: um there's another movie i was thinking of that
Speaker:Evan: it also reminded me of sort of this ambiguous ending oh um
Speaker:Evan: it's the one with only lovers left alive
Speaker:Evan: also sort of ambiguous too i feel like
Speaker:Evan: i actually watched like all of those movies and like a there was like
Speaker:Evan: a beginning of covet like 2020 i was we were home watching a lot of movies and
Speaker:Evan: i remember watching probably like 30 vampire movies including this this one
Speaker:Evan: and those and they always have they seem to always end on a very unhappy and
Speaker:Evan: you know ambiguous kind of,
Speaker:Evan: sometimes not you know not fully like that i don't know if you think that this
Speaker:Evan: like just fits in with like the i think you said it's like it fits in with like
Speaker:Evan: the vampire trope ending where it's like kind of hopeful but also it's not.
Speaker:Briana: It's like what you were joking about where it's
Speaker:Briana: like oh they have discussions to have
Speaker:Briana: about logistics at some point where like
Speaker:Briana: that's where kind of like the like pessimism
Speaker:Briana: starts creeping in where she's like all right she is a
Speaker:Briana: vampire and rosh is not a vampire so like
Speaker:Briana: the whole loneliness thing is going to
Speaker:Briana: continue to be an issue unless he is
Speaker:Briana: also a vampire at some point and that doesn't
Speaker:Briana: seem to be a great option so there's this lingering sense that like nothing
Speaker:Briana: is going to work out well even if right now things are looking optimistic that
Speaker:Briana: is very kind of prevalent in vampire media that is like centered on loneliness,
Speaker:Briana: like the only lovers left alive and like let the
Speaker:Briana: right one in are so yeah that's why the endings are always interesting to me
Speaker:Briana: and i guess yeah you gotta yeah i was just gonna say in my vampire not vampire
Speaker:Briana: book i also went with that so just fits yeah.
Speaker:Ward: Just a bit easier to go ambiguous and then try to have to answer all those open-ended
Speaker:Ward: questions that people may have.
Speaker:Bill: There's also the aspect of like she's a vampire like they're immortal like they're
Speaker:Bill: you can't answer all those questions
Speaker:Bill: because she's going to be around presumably for a very long time i.
Speaker:Ward: Mean those car windows aren't even tinted. So if they keep driving for too long.
Speaker:Bill: She's going to get in the trunk. This is also presuming that she is the kind
Speaker:Bill: of vampire that cannot be out of the sun because she's,
Speaker:Bill: That's not always true.
Speaker:Evan: That's true.
Speaker:Bill: Going back to the original.
Speaker:Ward: She sparkles during the day.
Speaker:Briana: She might just be a creep. That could be it.
Speaker:Bill: Rand Stoker's Dracula could go in the sun ward.
Speaker:Ward: I was choosing the worst one to make you upset, Bill.
Speaker:Evan: I'm a twilight. Well,
Speaker:Evan: that's another thing, too, that I like, that they don't really give you what
Speaker:Evan: you get in a lot of vampire movies of just taking the standard rules,
Speaker:Evan: you know quote unquote rules of vampires like you know the
Speaker:Evan: stake to the heart and you know they have to feed and
Speaker:Evan: they have all these things they don't really ever delve
Speaker:Evan: into any of those i mean yes you only see her at
Speaker:Evan: night but that's kind of also you know the
Speaker:Evan: like the basic vampire one and that makes
Speaker:Evan: it even more interesting to me where you just like have lots of questions you
Speaker:Evan: don't really know the op how things are operating and i think that's actually
Speaker:Evan: to the benefit sometimes sometimes they go like too deep into like all the different
Speaker:Evan: rules and unless it's kind of a movie where that's more like a parody or satire
Speaker:Evan: where they're sort of joking about the rules as part of it.
Speaker:Ward: Nah, she's cool like Wesley Snipes in Blade can day walk.
Speaker:Briana: Do they even call her a vampire in the movie? I don't think they do.
Speaker:Evan: No, I don't think so.
Speaker:Briana: So she might not even be a vampire in the end of the day.
Speaker:Bill: I mean, she doesn't grow fangs.
Speaker:Ward: I was about to say, she grows fangs, bites people in the neck,
Speaker:Ward: has super speed and super strength.
Speaker:Ward: But like nothing around her is referenced as a vampire except for the note Arash
Speaker:Ward: leaves her where he's like, oh, Dracula, as he signs at Dracula.
Speaker:Ward: That's only because he chose a Dracula costume. And like the only other reference
Speaker:Ward: to vampires is in the club when the girls want ecstasy and they're like,
Speaker:Ward: oh, we got told to see Dracula. You're a vampire. Look at you.
Speaker:Bill: But I mean, like, there's no reason that anyone would think that. Like.
Speaker:Bill: The only people that see her do anything that would be vampiric.
Speaker:Evan: Die.
Speaker:Bill: They really can't. Yeah, they died. They can't. I mean, the prostitute Ati sees
Speaker:Bill: her kill Hussein, but like.
Speaker:Evan: She doesn't die.
Speaker:Bill: No, she sees, Ati sees the girl kill Hussein.
Speaker:Evan: Right, right, right. Yeah. And then she helps him carry the body to the.
Speaker:Bill: Yeah.
Speaker:Briana: No, that is a good question.
Speaker:Bill: No, she does not. They do not bring Hussein's body to the ditch.
Speaker:Briana: His body.
Speaker:Bill: Is left outside in an alley.
Speaker:Briana: He's the one body that is not in the ditch.
Speaker:Bill: You have the one body that not left in the ditch.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah like does Arash know the girl is a vampire I don't think she does I think
Speaker:Briana: he just thinks she killed his dad there's a lot of explaining to do she's got poor circulation.
Speaker:Evan: Like.
Speaker:Ward: Low iron I gotta get you some supplements there ain't none in bad city.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah well they have they have a doctor so at least they have that not free though,
Speaker:Evan: they don't get free health care and bad city no.
Speaker:Ward: There's a ditch full of bodies you think there's free health care.
Speaker:Evan: I would have liked it if they're driving and like they had a sign that said
Speaker:Evan: like good city i don't know yeah that'd be amazing.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah, they also don't have a drug dealer anymore, which is unfortunate for them.
Speaker:Bill: Hey, that's an upswing. I mean, they're actually throwing the balls rolling up.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah.
Speaker:Ward: You know, Evan might be right that she's not from Bad City, the girl,
Speaker:Ward: and that she's going from town to town because she didn't dump the body in the
Speaker:Ward: ditch like everyone else from Bad City understands that they're supposed to do.
Speaker:Briana: Oh, the social contract is awesome.
Speaker:Ward: Yes, the social contract. She broke it.
Speaker:Bill: Adi was like, we should take it to the dead body ditch. And she's like,
Speaker:Bill: what the fuck are you talking about?
Speaker:Ward: I'm like, what are you talking about? No, we just leave it right here.
Speaker:Bill: Right here.
Speaker:Ward: What does it matter? She left the body. She left the drug dealer's body in his apartment.
Speaker:Ward: Like, she's obviously not from that town. There's a place for those.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah, she's being very uncute.
Speaker:Bill: There's a place for those.
Speaker:Evan: Are you sure that Adi doesn't help her carry the body to the ditch?
Speaker:Evan: Yeah, because. You see a scene where.
Speaker:Bill: The little boy the little boy sees his body.
Speaker:Bill: That's where Arash sees the little boy and questions the little boy and he's
Speaker:Bill: like, did you see somebody?
Speaker:Briana: Is that the scene you're thinking of, the one where Arash dumps the drug dealer's body?
Speaker:Bill: That's the scene.
Speaker:Briana: And he knows he's supposed to do that.
Speaker:Bill: Exactly.
Speaker:Ward: Arash is local.
Speaker:Bill: Yeah, Arash takes the drug dealer's body to the ditch.
Speaker:Ward: Well, he knows that's where those go.
Speaker:Bill: But yeah, when Arash, like they you see like there's like the three other people in the movie,
Speaker:Bill: around Hussein's body and there's a little boy and then Arash shows up and then
Speaker:Bill: questions the little boy and he's like, did you see anything?
Speaker:Evan: Okay, so they move the body and they don't take it to the ditch,
Speaker:Evan: is that what you're saying?
Speaker:Bill: Yes.
Speaker:Evan: Okay, okay, okay.
Speaker:Bill: We're just dumping it out.
Speaker:Evan: That makes more sense. I got you, I got you.
Speaker:Ward: And he gives Evan's theory some credence.
Speaker:Ward: The girl is not a local. She goes from town to town, writing wrongs.
Speaker:Evan: She's a sheriff. She's a vampire sheriff. That's very like the Western-y kind
Speaker:Evan: of thing where, you know, it's like, you know, you're, you're the person that's
Speaker:Evan: coming into town, try and, you know, clean it up.
Speaker:Evan: And then sort of the loner moves on, you know, and goes on to the next town.
Speaker:Evan: And, um, yeah, poor, poor girl. It doesn't, can't even eat hamburgers, you know.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah, one of the things I like about this movie is how, I don't want to say
Speaker:Briana: reliant on because that sounds like a negative,
Speaker:Briana: but how much it taps into genre expectations to like not have to explain things.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah.
Speaker:Briana: So like we said, like they never talk about vampires or anything.
Speaker:Briana: We just have expectations for what vampires look and act like.
Speaker:Briana: So yeah, that's how we know. We don't know the rules of this town,
Speaker:Briana: but we know the rules of Westerns and how just off everyone's rock where everyone
Speaker:Briana: is in terms of law and order in Westerns.
Speaker:Briana: So we know how it works in this movie and we don't need explaining.
Speaker:Briana: So it's really good at tapping into those genre norms in order to do something
Speaker:Briana: more unique and spend its time doing something other than explaining how this stuff is working.
Speaker:Ward: Yeah, I like how you say that it like the genre norms and setting expectations
Speaker:Ward: because it set an expectation in me when it was a when it was a rush giving the girl the earrings.
Speaker:Ward: I was like, oh, man, what are those like silver earrings? And they like burn her hand or something.
Speaker:Ward: And then like nothing happened with that. I was like, oh, damn.
Speaker:Ward: But like I it built up an expectation in me generally.
Speaker:Briana: Only yeah and even like part of the like pessimism of the ending is built on
Speaker:Briana: those like pre-established expectations that the movie just expects us to know
Speaker:Briana: we're like oh we don't know if the sun hurts her or not she could sit in the
Speaker:Briana: passenger side of that seat all day and it'll be fine we don't know right.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah again yeah that's the same thing we just assume that as soon as it hits
Speaker:Evan: light you know she's gonna like burn up into ashes or something because that's
Speaker:Evan: what you expect did Did you guys.
Speaker:Ward: Not see the post-credits scene where Rosh looks over and it's daylight and he
Speaker:Ward: goes, you're so beautiful.
Speaker:Ward: She's just sparkling.
Speaker:Evan: Oh, man.
Speaker:Bill: Brianna, how do you feel about Twilight, Brianna?
Speaker:Briana: Do not ask me about Twilights. I am a Twilight child. I know it's not good. I like Twilight.
Speaker:Briana: We're making it all you want, and I will not be mad.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah, you can go back and listen to it. I have two episodes on Twilight, actually.
Speaker:Evan: We did one on the very first movie, and then I did another episode where we
Speaker:Evan: just did all of the rest of the movies.
Speaker:Evan: That's one just big, you know, jam session. And it was, uh, it was interesting.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah. I feel like one of the potential ways that you got in contact with me
Speaker:Briana: about talking about this movie was me like shitting on Twilight and saying,
Speaker:Briana: you should watch this movie instead.
Speaker:Evan: That is, that is highly possible actually. Yeah.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah, yeah. I mean, there's lots of bad movies that, you know,
Speaker:Evan: that are still enjoyable or that I like.
Speaker:Evan: So I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna, you know, give anyone a hard time for there.
Speaker:Bill: I will.
Speaker:Briana: I do like how this podcast. I'm just waiting for that Criterion Collection to
Speaker:Briana: come out so I can see that ending scene that you're talking about.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah.
Speaker:Bill: There's so many bodies in this ditch. I'm watching, I pulled up where Arash
Speaker:Bill: throws the drug dealer into the ditch.
Speaker:Bill: There's so many bodies in this ditch. I'm sorry.
Speaker:Ward: You don't have one of those in your town?
Speaker:Briana: It's not even a body.
Speaker:Ward: I'm telling you, that is any town USA right there.
Speaker:Evan: You don't have a ditch, a body ditch in your town?
Speaker:Ward: Your privilege is showing, Bill.
Speaker:Evan: No ditch in your town.
Speaker:Evan: But any final thoughts from you, Brianna, on, you know, is there anything that
Speaker:Evan: we missed or, you know, want to share?
Speaker:Evan: before we depart?
Speaker:Briana: No, I think we touched on everything that I thought was really interesting,
Speaker:Briana: just thematically and aesthetically about this movie.
Speaker:Briana: But yeah, I love this movie so much. I haven't rewatched it in a bit,
Speaker:Briana: so getting to come back to it for this was really, really fun.
Speaker:Briana: And it is on Canopy, by the way.
Speaker:Evan: Oh, it is.
Speaker:Briana: So stealing for libraries. Get a library card. Watch this for free.
Speaker:Bill: Yeah, libraries. Libraries are great. That's how my wife pays our bills.
Speaker:Bill: So, you know, listen, go to the library.
Speaker:Ward: Love my library.
Speaker:Bill: Support your local library.
Speaker:Briana: There's some joke about libraries being the social contract the same way a ditch
Speaker:Briana: full of bodies is a social contract.
Speaker:Briana: It is late. I am prepared. Pretend I made a joke.
Speaker:Ward: Oh, it's perfect. I love it so much.
Speaker:Bill: It's the ditch full of the bodies of dead trees that we have written on.
Speaker:Briana: There we go.
Speaker:Bill: We've agreed. They go there.
Speaker:Ward: Yeah. We agree that we keep those there.
Speaker:Bill: Yeah. We agree that we keep those there.
Speaker:Evan: And wait, every town has a library.
Speaker:Bill: Yes, that is true.
Speaker:Ward: Anytown, USA, baby.
Speaker:Evan: But yes, I would also echo the sentiment of supporting your local library.
Speaker:Evan: You should definitely watch this movie.
Speaker:Evan: Anyone who listened and maybe hasn't seen it or hasn't seen it for a long time,
Speaker:Evan: it's well worth your watch and just kind of a different entry into the vampire
Speaker:Evan: sort of films that I think is worth anyone's time.
Speaker:Briana: And it's a short movie, so you're not sitting here for like three hours watching it or anything.
Speaker:Evan: Yeah. Hour 41 minutes. That's short by today's standards, I suppose, nowadays.
Speaker:Ward: Before we go, is there anything else you'd like to say about your book or anything
Speaker:Ward: else that you're working on that you'd like people to look up?
Speaker:Ward: We can plug them in the show notes. Yeah, sure.
Speaker:Briana: I'll just do some shilling, I guess. Like I said, my book, Indigent,
Speaker:Briana: comes out through Graveside Press in March 2026.
Speaker:Briana: please get it from their website and
Speaker:Briana: not from like amazon or anything because supporting
Speaker:Briana: small press is fun so if
Speaker:Briana: you like this movie and you like vampires and you
Speaker:Briana: like cannibalism and gentrification and drug addiction themes my book is for
Speaker:Briana: you because it has all that stuff and it's fun and let's see I just got done
Speaker:Briana: with like production on a historical drama film,
Speaker:Briana: That is going to be coming out in 2026 as well.
Speaker:Briana: So if you do film festival circuit stuff, you can look out for me there as well.
Speaker:Briana: I will be shopping that film around like crazy.
Speaker:Briana: So yeah, I'll see you film buffs in various black film festivals across the states.
Speaker:Bill: Obviously, we're going to have to watch that and talk to you about it when we can.
Speaker:Briana: Yeah, definitely. It is not as fun as a vampire movie, but you know,
Speaker:Briana: it is temporally weird. So I guess it has that in common.
Speaker:Bill: Listen, we watched Red Dawn and that movie is not fun at all.
Speaker:Ward: So it was not fun. Like the title cards were title cards were super fun.
Speaker:Ward: I will be honest there. And then like the actual movie started like right after
Speaker:Ward: and it immediately was so bad. So for so long.
Speaker:Bill: We're not strangers to not fun movies.
Speaker:Ward: Yeah.
Speaker:Briana: All right. You'll love it then.
Speaker:Bill: And I assume your movie is at least good and well-made.
Speaker:Briana: Hopefully.
Speaker:Bill: As opposed to.
Speaker:Ward: It's going to be better than Red Dawn.
Speaker:Evan: But yeah, we appreciate you coming on, Brianna. Yeah. And you can find your,
Speaker:Evan: as you said, I'll put a link to your book on Graveside Press in the notes down
Speaker:Evan: below if you want to order it.
Speaker:Evan: And you've been listening to Left of the Projector, and we will catch you next time.
