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0:00 Unknown

0:23 Lee Good evening and welcome to horror. I'm Lee.

0:26 Chris I'm Chris.

0:27 Adam And I am Adam.

0:29 Adam And we are here as promised for our first episode of 2025.

0:35 Adam we're going to be doing a bit of what we've been watching. We've all been watching a lot of stuff, I gather, so plenty to be cracking on with.

0:44 Adam to open up, don't want to go too far into it, partly cuz Chris hasn't seen it, but also because it only aired a week ago.

0:53 Adam I thought a good place to kick off would be this year's ghost story for Christmas, which has become a bit of a tradition for us to cover.

1:01 Lee Always, yeah.

1:02 Chris And next next Christmas I think we should go back and do some of the old ones cuz we never, we haven't done them all.

1:09 Adam And there's still great ones. Yeah, we still haven't done some of my faves, so yeah, I'm definitely up for that.

1:16 Adam so Adam, as you don't know the original story, what did you think of the ghost story for Christmas this year?

1:24 Adam Well, so obviously, once again, it's Mark Gatiss, so, you know, that's that's always a pleasure.

1:31 Chris Cuz I was Does it have a specific name or is it?

1:34 Adam It's called Woman of Stun, but the actual story that it's based on is called Man-Sizing in Marble.

1:41 Chris Okay.

1:42 Adam which Lee's familiar with. I wasn't, and it's written by E Nesbit, who did Five Children and It.

1:48 Adam And I'll be honest, this is how little I know, it wasn't until I watched this that I found out that E Nesbit was a woman.

1:55 Lee yes.

1:57 Adam So, you know, and having read about her, I can see what all the references to were about her like her husband, cuz he sounds like a.

2:05 Lee Yes.

2:06 Adam An absolute arsehole. So anyway, but.

2:08 Chris To put it lightly.

2:09 Adam Yes.

2:10 Adam And but no, I I kind of think I might have heard it or on something, you know, like an adaptation or a reading or something like that, like fear on four or something, price of fear or something like that.

2:25 Adam But yeah, it's not necessarily one I was familiar with and yeah, I thought it was absolutely fucking brilliant.

2:31 Adam I mean, it's a very classic sort of story in the sense of that's kind of why I felt I might have seen it before, whether it's people have ripped it off or it comes from legend or other people have done some other things, you know, which is likely.

2:46 Adam But yeah, the the idea of statues or sarcophagi coming to life and wreaking their revenge.

2:58 Adam I think it was done really well.

3:02 Adam I liked the sort of I liked the sort of female perspective take that it took.

3:11 Adam because I mean I don't I don't having not been familiar with the original, I don't know how much of that is in there, but it definitely felt that there was a a point to be made there when you've got again, a husband who's a total arse.

3:24 Lee Yeah.

3:25 Lee So all of that, I think that's why they renamed it because Man-Sizing in Marble is only 16 pages, I re-read it today.

3:33 Adam okay.

3:35 Lee because again, it's that strange synchronicity, about a week before they announced that they were doing this, I was buying Christmas presents and bought Jennifer a compendium of E Nesbit ghost stories.

3:49 Adam Oh, wow.

3:50 Lee I just ordered it and then it turned up, so so I re-read that today.

3:54 Lee yeah, and as I say, I've heard a couple of different radio adaptations of it, one of the Essex Witch Museum books uses it as like a launching off point to somebody.

4:07 Lee It's they they all go to a church at the beginning, it's like a a writer's club, so to get them all in the mood, they all go and sit in the local church and read the book and then the next morning they wake up and someone is dead with something in their hand. So it's it takes that same thing.

4:24 Lee but yeah, so the story itself doesn't have any of that thing about the husband. It's all from the husband's perspective.

4:32 Adam Right.

4:33 Lee so he gets the story from from their house lady.

4:39 Adam Housekeeper.

4:41 Lee yeah, he forgets all about it and it's set it's all Halloween Eve that it takes place in the short story, and it happens at 11:00 and he forgets all about it and he's outside smoking his pipe and he's halfway to the church when he hears the bell ring and that's the jumping off.

4:56 Lee So there's none of that domestic abuse element of it, which I I assume is why they renamed it, because it it it has made it a much bigger thing.

5:05 Lee But as I say, at 15 pages long, if you just shot it without any of that, this would have been, you know, five minutes long.

5:12 Adam It's a sketch at that point, yeah.

5:14 Lee Yeah, like a lot of the best ghost stories. A lot of them they do have to expand out.

5:18 Adam Yeah.

5:19 Adam You know, even the the old ghost stories for Christmas did it.

5:22 Adam And I think that Mark always does a blood good job and it looks looks the part, you know.

5:27 Adam It really, you know, it held in that sense. I think it's just another good, another good entry in the tradition.

5:35 Adam Cuz I mean, I think maybe the past couple of ones have maybe missed or whatever like that or they've just been. I think the Mezzotint was the last really good one that they did.

5:47 Adam and this I thought was very sort of back on form with that.

5:52 Chris Yeah.

5:52 Adam I thought it was very good.

5:53 Lee Yeah, very sinister, yeah, good act, great cast.

5:57 Chris Who who was in it?

5:59 Adam Monica Dolan was the is in it as the housekeeper and she is amazing. I mean she's great anyway, but she's really good.

6:07 Lee Yeah, always excellent, yeah.

6:08 Adam Yeah, yeah.

6:09 Adam And also Celia Imrie plays E Nesbit right at the start of it.

6:13 Chris Okay.

6:14 Adam and yeah, and like I say that was that was that was my moment of like, oh, I didn't know that.

6:21 Adam You know, and you think I've got got 46 without knowing that E Nesbit was a woman.

6:24 Lee That's it.

6:25 Adam That's it feels a bit wrong. It just does, you know.

6:29 Lee yeah, but I I liked that bringing her life into it at the beginning, and at the end, yeah, it was that kind of wrap around as well.

6:38 Lee But I'd completely forgotten cuz I rewatched it today as well, I'd forgotten that that you get the the short shots of the nights before the wrap around even starts.

6:49 Lee So it's kind of in like five acts with the main narrative all just right in the center of it.

6:56 Adam Yeah.

6:57 Lee yeah, I thought it was really good and I I like the way it expanded it. I liked that he added I would say I liked that he added that in.

7:04 Lee But I mean, it fitted with the story and it did give it more of a Yeah.

7:11 Adam It gave it more, it gave it more of a cultural retail type edge.

7:15 Adam Well, it gave it more of a twist and also it was it was good that as part of it, as you know, cuz the actual thing an innocent party suffers.

7:27 Lee Yeah.

7:27 Adam But but in a weird way, at least a non-innocent party also suffers.

7:32 Lee Yeah.

7:33 Adam You know, that that, you know, it didn't feel in a weird way not quite as bleak in that sense.

7:38 Adam That it would just be, you know, the the sort of plainness of just someone dying because they happened to live in a certain house.

7:46 Lee Yes.

7:47 Adam Yeah.

7:50 Lee but yeah, so we will leave that there cuz I say we've Chris hasn't seen it, I'm sure we'll be discussing it again shortly.

7:59 Lee as well as our listeners.

8:00 Lee Adam, you said that you and Chris had also seen something you wanted to discuss.

8:05 Adam We, yes, well, I I don't I don't know when you saw it, Chris, but literally this afternoon, myself and my good lady wife.

8:11 Chris Okay.

8:12 Adam Went to see the new Nosferatu, the Robert Eggers's Nosferatu.

8:17 Chris I went on the second, so two days ago now.

8:20 Adam Yes.

8:22 Chris The the cinema was quite full.

8:22 Adam But.

8:24 Adam Yeah, I mean, what do you what do you think, Chris?

8:26 Adam I mean we're cuz obviously this is part it's Robert Eggers who did The Witch and The Lighthouse and The Northman.

8:33 Adam So it's something that it's someone that we have enjoyed all their stuff so far.

8:39 Chris For me, it's becoming hard probably to be fully unbiased, I would say.

8:44 Adam Okay.

8:46 Chris which may come out during our our conversation here.

8:49 Chris So having seen the original once, which we covered, couple of Christmases back, yeah.

8:56 Chris Yeah, and certainly it still holds up as a very impressive film.

9:01 Chris I thought, as I was watching this, that it was very much based on that original, in that a lot of the shots were reminiscent of, you know, very harsh shadows and light and using using the shadow of his hand.

9:17 Adam Yeah.

9:20 Chris A few times and while bringing it up to a modern look.

9:25 Chris But yeah, just still so gritty and real as is similar to say The Witch in in that it it it's.

9:33 Chris For me, it works so well as bringing me into it as if I'm perhaps there as well, which not always try to do that necessarily.

9:44 Chris yeah, so so I still I do love his ability to bring both a supernatural stylistic feel while keeping it very realistic.

9:55 Adam

9:56 Adam Oh, absolutely. I mean, I was watching one of the things I got for Christmas was was there's a documentary just come a documentary's come out of about Werner Herzog called Radical Dreamer.

10:07 Adam And in that that and he obviously was made remade Nosferatu in the seventies.

10:14 Adam which if I would I would propose now that if we cover Robert Eggers's Robert Eggers's Nosferatu, we pair it with Werner Herzog's Nosferatu.

10:24 Chris Yeah.

10:25 Adam They're different enough.

10:27 Chris Okay.

10:28 Adam you know, and I think that they are two very distinct takes on the original, both of and both of them also drawing a bit more from Dracula than Nosferatu necessarily does in different ways.

10:45 Adam I mean, certainly obviously, but in that documentary, someone said, oh, like Werner Herzog's early films, they were saying, oh, it's like, it's like you're watching a documentary of these extraordinary events or something like that.

10:59 Adam It's like you've, you know, they were sort of saying, we don't know how he did it with the budget, but it looked like you've just traveled in time to, you know, South America when the conquistadors are rampaging through and stuff like that.

11:11 Adam And I think Robert Eggers has a very similar aesthetic.

11:14 Adam He's like you're watching and with this, the one thing I thought was really interesting is because it's in color, but feels still feel like black and white.

11:22 Chris Yeah, especially some parts of it really do. Yeah.

11:26 Adam You know, it's very sort of it's there's a lot like you say, they've they've sort of emphasized the shadow. I mean, the take on Orlock physically and character-wise is different.

11:38 Chris Yeah.

11:38 Adam Yeah.

11:39 Adam And actually, the thing that it reminded me of a lot of bits and pieces was Bram Stoker's Dracula, like the Francis Ford Coppola, Gary Oldman one from 92, whatever it was, and there were certain bits where I was like, oh, that's almost how they do it in that rather than how they do it in Nosferatu and stuff.

11:59 Chris I should probably rewatch that.

12:01 Adam It's again, we'll we'll do we'll we'll need to do it at some point.

12:05 Lee Well, I mean, I know that it that's part of the the vampire style that you're less keen on.

12:12 Adam It's it's not it's not so much that. I just thought the casting was all wrong.

12:17 Adam The effects didn't look great.

12:19 Chris I mean, wasn't it Carrie Reeves and Winona Rider, yeah.

12:22 Lee Yeah. Which it does seem a bit odd.

12:24 Chris Yeah.

12:25 Adam I mean, Gary Oldman's excellent in it, but everyone else is hugely cast and some people seem to think they're in a different film.

12:34 Adam That said, I've come to the conclusion that a Dracula film, and not just because I've come I've also looked in the mirror and realized, I'm not playing Dracula, am I? You know, I'm not tall enough, I'm not sexy enough, I'm not thin enough.

12:48 Adam But I reckon Renfield I get my teeth into.

12:51 Lee Yeah.

12:52 Adam Right? And similarly, I always think now I'm almost like Dracula movies live and die on their Renfield.

12:58 Adam And obviously, in that you had Tom Waits in Bram Stoker's Dracula, and I think he was fucking spot on. He was great.

13:06 Lee I'll take that.

13:07 Adam And and similarly in this, I can't remember the actor's name.

13:11 Chris I didn't recognize him, okay.

13:13 Adam He's he's in a few things. He was in Utopia, he was a guy who was like part of the chemist he was like the chemist in Utopia.

13:23 Adam And weirdly enough, he's also the serial killer in Gregory Dyer of a Nutcase, the comic strip presents.

13:32 Lee Okay.

13:33 Adam but it's oh, hang on, my scientific advisor might be coming in here with a late.

13:40 Adam With a late entry. Thank you, my dear.

13:42 Adam What are we doing here?

13:44 Adam oh, bollocks, not on that list.

13:47 Adam There we go. Come on.

13:50 Adam Talk about yourselves, you know, that's the best way to do these things, isn't it?

13:52 Chris So I know we're not going in and find out who that is while you're.

13:57 Adam Simon McBurney.

13:59 Chris Okay.

14:00 Adam That's it. Simon McBurney.

14:02 Adam and it's also great. I mean Willem Dafoe's in it as the Van Helsing figure. He was brilliant.

14:05 Chris Yes.

14:07 Adam Ralph Ineson's in it as well.

14:10 Adam Which is just again, of course he is it's a you know, it's a Robert Eggers film.

14:16 Adam Much in the same way as Willem Dafoe turning up really.

14:18 Lee Yeah.

14:19 Adam So Lily Rose.

14:20 Chris And Lily, yeah.

14:22 Adam She was good.

14:22 Chris I thought she was amazing. Some of her were quite impressive.

14:26 Adam I mean let's face it.

14:27 Adam Let's face it, it would be very disappointing that a very good actress daughter turn out to be a very shit actress.

14:33 Lee Yeah.

14:34 Chris But but she may not have done a film necessarily like this effectively. She might have been good at something totally different.

14:40 Chris And yeah, it does seem like she's picked up perhaps with Edward Scissorhands a bit of his, you know.

14:46 Adam Well, I mean, I think it's just that gothic aesthetic, isn't it?

14:48 Adam You know, it's just sort of kind of, but there were lots of, when I saw it, there were lots of like young adults in in the room.

14:58 Adam And I was kind of pleased because I was almost it was almost like yes, come and see this. This is proper Gothic, not that Tim Burton sort of flowery bullshit, you know, this is this is proper Gothic, you know.

15:07 Lee Yeah.

15:08 Adam and yeah, but the, I mean sort of but the character of the count is just far more horrific in a different way.

15:20 Chris Yeah.

15:21 Adam It's more his malignness as a creature.

15:27 Adam But also his viciousness as a creature.

15:29 Chris So good good balance between him being a sort of rotten corpse plague and being very powerful seeming at points.

15:39 Chris So there's like a strength there that you can't mess with and yet, yeah, he's also kind of disgusting.

15:44 Adam I don't want to give too much away on that though as well.

15:46 Adam Because obviously he's it's quite weird when you watch it, he doesn't really appear properly at all, almost.

15:56 Chris Okay.

15:57 Adam But it takes a very long time before you see him like his face essentially or so you can make out his face.

16:06 Adam It's a lot of shadow.

16:07 Chris Which was that's what made me think of the original Nosferatu again, it seemed like, yeah, very stylistic in that sense and just giving you an impression of something and letting you fill in the gaps.

16:20 Chris I mean, I don't know how much detail I want to go into, but I I liked again what I think Robert Eggers tends to do is leaves it open for potentially being explained as not supernatural at all if you so wish.

16:35 Adam Well, I thought I thought it was fairly explicit.

16:39 Chris Yeah, well, that's fine.

16:40 Chris But there were several points where I thought, that's I think that's great that he's included that in that way because it allows you to explore it further.

16:49 Chris So, I we can save all of that for when we cover it properly.

16:52 Adam Yes, yeah, cuz I don't want to you don't want to spoil it for people.

16:54 Adam I would say I would say go and see it definitely.

16:57 Adam You know, if you're a fan of if you're a fan of Robert Eggers, definitely, if you're a fan of vampire movies, definitely, and if you and you are not going to feel it's you know what I mean.

17:09 Adam I mean it's it's not the very original, like the original black and white one, but that is so alien to filmmaking now that it couldn't possibly be anyway.

17:20 Chris Yeah.

17:21 Adam You know.

17:22 Adam so yeah, no, I think definitely a recommend.

17:26 Adam I mean, I always say, probably could have shaved a bit off the running time, but then I'm like that with most films, you know, to be honest, I think it's just my age. It's like two hours. I could be dead by the end of that.

17:38 Chris I actually yeah, I didn't feel that for this one, but perhaps I was just in the right mood for it.

17:44 Adam Yeah.

17:45 Lee Yeah, I was but I'd just been out there.

17:48 Adam I was, but I just downed one of their big cups of, blind folks. I probably also needed a piss quite bad during the denouement.

17:59 Lee Yeah, I say now I'm over the lergy, I'm hopefully going to try and get out and see it as soon as it's humanly possible.

18:05 Lee But we'll see how it goes.

18:07 Adam And we'll let it percolate down and then at some point we'll cover that, we'll cover Herzog's one and we'll cover.

18:13 Adam I I think give Bram Stoker's Dracula a go.

18:17 Adam You know, whether we cover it on the show or not, but if you've not seen it.

18:20 Chris But add it to the yeah. It would add a bit more to the discussion.

18:23 Adam If if anything, everyone's seen it, so it's a good one that people come in and listen to and people don't mind if you rip the shit out of it.

18:30 Adam So, you know.

18:33 Lee Sounds good.

18:34 Lee Right, so if if we run through what we've been done what we've been doing.

18:39 Adam What we've been doing.

18:40 Lee See you can tell I'm still not fully over this.

18:44 Adam Yeah.

18:46 Lee I can't even think straight.

18:47 Lee yes, so if we run through quickly what we've been doing, just kind of a little bit quick, fiery.

18:54 Lee so let's start with Chris. Is there anything you've watched over this?

18:57 Chris Yes, well.

18:58 Chris Fortunately, I've been watching this rather amazing Dr. Terrrible's House of Horrible.

19:05 Adam Hey.

19:06 Chris A very nice gift from Adam, Claire and Ted.

19:10 Adam Oh, Merry Christmas.

19:11 Chris Now, you thank you Merry Christmas. So you may have mentioned it before.

19:15 Chris I don't know.

19:16 Lee Possibly.

19:17 Chris But I didn't remember it.

19:18 Adam Possibly a thousand times.

19:20 Chris Yeah, it's many things that mentioned it's hard, you know, they don't necessarily become salient until you can actually match them to something you've seen.

19:27 Chris So yeah, so I've watched two of the episodes and I can safely say I'm feeling pure and zesty after just having watched Friends with Tongues.

19:37 Chris Limehouse 1911, Gentleman Adventurer, Nathan Blaze, Locks Horns with Hangman Chen, the sinister bony-fingered menace from the east.

19:47 Adam Yeah.

19:48 Chris Yeah, and and like and it is it's just it's such a good blend of funny and moments of horror like sprinkled throughout and just the dialogue is fantastic.

20:00 Adam It's just a show where it's like, right, if you if you love Hammer, Amicus.

20:07 Adam That sort of era of horror film making, probably moving into Witchfinder General sort of territory, so sort of 50s, 60s, 70s British horror.

20:17 Adam it's definitely worth a watch cuz they I think they do one of every sort of take there. They've got they've got an anthology one in there, which is possibly my favorite.

20:28 Adam I don't know.

20:29 Adam but yeah, and then you've got a a lesbian vampire one, a sort of a Fu Manchu one.

20:38 Adam a weird rare a rare reptile one and.

20:43 Lee I think my again, it's difficult to say, but I think possibly my favorite is actually the very last episode, which is the witchfinder one, with Angela Pleasant. He just turns up it.

20:59 Adam Oh, yeah.

21:00 Adam Yes, yes, of course, yeah.

21:02 Lee yeah, I was very pleased cuz I was with Chris when he unwrapped it and he opened it. I was like, oh, yes. That's great.

21:08 Lee Yeah, I think we managed to wait about half an hour before we put it on, did we?

21:13 Adam Oh, well, I am glad.

21:15 Lee The whole family there. Just one episode, it'll be fine.

21:19 Adam Yeah.

21:21 Adam And did that end up becoming five episodes, six episodes?

21:24 Lee No, no, unfortunately not, we didn't start it too late.

21:26 Lee So it was a bit.

21:27 Chris Yeah, if there weren't kids involved, almost certainly.

21:33 Adam Adam.

21:34 Lee Adam, what have you been watching?

21:37 Adam Well, just to, just in case you weren't aware, I think Shudder are putting themselves in for a similar strand to Ghost Story for Christmas.

21:46 Lee Oh.

21:47 Adam they've started something called The Haunted Season, and only one has gone up and that went up over Christmas, so I'm kind of assuming that it's sitting there waiting till next year to add another one to it.

21:59 Adam Because The Haunted Season, I'm assuming is Christmas.

22:04 Adam you know.

22:06 Adam And but they've they've done one called it's To Fire You Come at Last.

22:13 Adam And it's written and directed by Sean Hogan, who did the Devil's Business, not did the Devil's Business, that sounds like he took the Devil's poo.

22:23 Adam but also wrote the two books that I absolutely adore called England Screaming and Twilight's Last Screaming that are sort of like League of Extraordinary Gentlemen for horror, where it's like they they're books where they take characters from horror films and twine it all together into one big narrative where like sort of Richard Burton from the Medusa Touch confronts Damian from The Omen and so on and so forth.

22:48 Adam It's yeah.

22:50 Lee

22:51 Adam And but yeah, so this to to Fire You Come at Last is basically it's like sort of

23:01 Adam 1700s set and it's basically a group of people have to take a body down a corpse road.

23:11 Adam And what corpse roads were, were they were roads designed for smaller outlying villages, so that you could get to the main parish, because you wouldn't necessarily have a church in your village, so if you were burying someone on consecrated ground, you had to take them there.

23:30 Adam So they had these things called corpse roads, which were just sort of means of getting there. They were sort of the corpse road was one word from they were also briar paths and stuff like that.

23:41 Adam But it was a means of being able to get to the local church or place of worship or whatever, and it's yeah.

23:49 Adam So it's four guys taking a body down there and there's rumors of things bad happened to you on the path.

24:01 Adam But basically they all start getting at each other.

24:06 Adam And sort of it breaks down from there and it really has that old ghost stories for Christmas vibe to it.

24:15 Lee Excellent.

24:16 Adam They could they they could have put this on, you know, not instead of the Woman of Stone, but, you know, if this was the one that they put on next year, you'd go, oh, that's very much in the vein. It's very much in the tradition. It's right.

24:30 Adam But it but as I say, it's an original piece.

24:33 Adam So it's like it's not not like based on a story, a previous story.

24:38 Chris And they plan to do this every year.

24:40 Adam that's what I'm kind of assuming. I'm not quite sure cuz there sort of it seems to be a bit vague what I've seen about it.

24:46 Chris And that's a good start.

24:47 Adam it's one of the people in it is James Swanton, who was the mummy in last year's Christmas, Ghost Story for Christmas.

24:55 Adam And Mark Carlos was really good as the Squire in it and I mean everyone's really good in it.

25:01 Adam But it's yeah, and it's about 40 minutes, so it's the right sort of length, definitely worth a watch cuz it's just those it's it's one of those little atmospheric pieces that you sort of think, oh, is that going to it just works.

25:08 Adam It's just a 45 minute shiver down the spine, you know.

25:11 Lee Fantastic.

25:12 Lee Yeah, I'm definitely going to have to look that up then.

25:14 Lee That sounds great.

25:15 Adam Yeah.

25:15 Chris And it's good. Shutter does seem to, you know, they keep on working their own stuff again. It's been it's been consistently pretty good, so.

25:26 Lee Excellent.

25:28 Lee I rewatched, I can't remember if I mentioned this when I first saw it, I don't think I've ever review, seen it, but a friend of mine said, messaged me about two weeks ago and said, I've just watched a film. If you haven't seen it, you need to. Boys from County Hell.

25:42 Adam

25:42 Adam Oh, no.

25:44 Lee It's fantastic.

25:46 Lee So it's the story of a small village in Ireland, there's got a major road going through it, and basically they claim that the story of Dracula by Bram Stoker wasn't based on Vlad the Impaler, but was actually based on their local vampire, who is buried in a field with a massive pile of stones on top of him. so for the new road, they have to go and knock this pile of stones over to make way for the new road, releasing the vampire under the ground and it all goes mental. it's hilarious, it's really gory, it's really atmospheric, it's it's good, it's just a really it's sort of Shauna the dead type comedy but with the that same darkness and stuff.

26:52 Adam

27:01 Lee yeah, it's it's a really, really good film. I say I was it was one of those ones where you mention it and I was like, I have seen it, but I'm so glad you message because I only saw it once about five years ago. and then I rewatched it and yeah, I was like, oh, I'd forgotten how good this is. It's such.

27:37 Adam It's nice when that happens.

27:39 Lee Yeah.

27:40 Adam We do it we do it sometimes on here where it'll be like, you go back and I forgot this was fucking cracking.

27:45 Lee And it is, it's one of those I think I watched it bookended by a lot of stuff, so it just kind of so I kind of forgot about it to some degree.

27:54 Lee yeah, so it was good to go back, but yeah, it really is a great film. So if you get a chance, boys from County Hell is really good, fun horror movie for the evening.

28:02 Adam Yeah.

28:02 Chris Excellent.

28:04 Lee Chris, back to you.

28:06 Chris Right, so I decided to go for Squid Game season two. So I've seen episode one.

28:13 Lee Oh, God.

28:14 Chris Now, you know, may not be exactly horror, but I think there's enough scenes.

28:20 Adam I think it borders quite quite harshly in the horror, yeah.

28:22 Chris Yeah, it does get very intense and so I started watching it.

28:26 Chris I thought, oh, last time we talked about this, or last time I talked to anyone about it. I think was Adam saying, I really hope they don't do a series two because it was great. Leave it at that.

28:38 Adam Yeah.

28:39 Chris And I and at the time I agreed. I thought, yeah, no, I think that's good to do that sometimes.

28:44 Chris Re-watch or watching it now, I started to think, why do why can why can't people leave things alone more and more, it seems.

28:53 Chris And is it that like say, say they had left it, there's so much content that comes out nowadays.

29:00 Chris That would it just pretty much get forgotten. Like if you then mentioned good games to be, they'd be like, oh yeah, that was that good series. Yeah, you know. No one would ever watch it again because there's so much more things coming out to watch.

29:11 Chris So nothing becomes a classic anymore.

29:13 Adam I'm not sure if it's that.

29:14 Adam I think it's much more because you're trying to get seen in that world, you better you're better off going with something that's got a name.

29:20 Lee Yeah.

29:21 Chris Well, yeah, yeah.

29:22 Adam You know, a lot of horror, horror sequels where they're like, someone wrote a horror script. I mean, particularly Hellraiser, where it's like someone wrote a slightly weird horror script and then someone to go, if we punk in that, we'll make it and call it Hellraiser four or Hellraiser 16 or whatever like that.

29:38 Adam And I think it might be the similar sort of thing, the reason they don't leave things alone is because it's like Squid game got a name.

29:43 Chris If yeah, well, but if it got that many numbers, like let's try it again and until it starts to drop, they'll just keep on doing it.

29:50 Chris Now, after after having watched the first episode, I would say they're getting things right still, because I was at first, it's like, oh, this is fun and and it reminded me at first, like, yeah, it's like they had a good combination of fun, and tense and with a sort of layer of darkness there that you know is going on.

30:03 Chris And then when there's two scenes in this episode, when they hit, it was like, yes, now I remember exactly why you worked so well before, because they just to me, they just got it so perfect as the intensity builds and the sort of the profound idea of what is your decision going to be now?

30:18 Chris Is it, you know, is it for yourself or others or how are you going to play this out?

30:23 Chris And and yeah, I just think they they get it just right in this.

30:26 Chris So they've hooked me back in.

30:27 Chris And I'm quite happy to now watch the rest of this.

30:29 Adam They're like Michael Corleone, they've dragged you, dragged your left, they dragged you right back here.

30:35 Lee yeah.

30:36 Lee I I I I love the first season, so I'm definitely going to be watching the second season.

30:40 Lee I haven't started it yet.

30:42 Chris Okay.

30:43 Lee but yeah, it's definitely on the watch list.

30:46 Adam I might I might wait I might wait a few episodes, see what the general feeling is because you you'd hope they'd come back fairly strong and they made the first season.

30:55 Adam They're not going to be it's not going to be unwatchable, you know what I mean?

30:57 Adam It's like it's got to be yeah.

30:59 Adam It's got to be something there.

31:00 Adam So.

31:01 Lee Absolutely.

31:02 Lee Adam.

31:03 Adam my next one is another original that I've just obviously been getting my money's worth on there.

31:09 Adam just quick, this is just a quick one, go and watch it Black Cab.

31:14 Adam directed by Bruce Goodison.

31:18 Adam Have you seen it, Lee?

31:19 Lee No, I haven't.

31:20 Lee But I saw I I I again, it kind of got missed and it was only because Nick Frost posted about it on Instagram.

31:27 Lee And I was like, what he's done a horror film and I watched the trailer.

31:29 Lee I was like, yeah, that looks worthwhile.

31:31 Adam It is definitely worth seeing.

31:33 Adam Nick Frost is brilliant in it. I mean, you wouldn't expect anything else, but Nick Frost is really good.

31:40 Adam It starts off and he's quite, you know, he's Cuddly Nick Frost, he's your friend, and then you go to the point of, actually, he is a really big bastard, and when he turns nasty, it's fucking scary.

31:49 Chris Yeah.

31:50 Adam And basically, a couple who are less than favorably getting on with each other, take a cab home after a disastrous night out and Nick Frost is the cabby and he effectively kidnaps them and takes them to a haunted road.

32:00 Lee Wow.

32:01 Adam To give more to give more away, I think would be sort of churlish to be honest, because it was I went into it just knowing Nick Frost has done a horror film.

32:09 Adam And I thought, well, I'll give it a whirl and yeah, it's really, really good, really sort of creepy it's it's weird because he is menacing, but the the the ghost threat is something different and menacing in its own way and it's yeah, there's a there's a lot to it.

32:27 Adam And the music's the that was the other reason I wanted to watch it because the music is Gazelle Twin and her scores are fucking brilliant.

32:37 Adam I mean musically she's fucking brilliant.

32:39 Adam But yeah, when she does I always check out any film she does the music for cuz I'm like, cuz she's got excellent movie taste as well.

32:46 Adam So and yeah, and but yeah, well worth check out Black Cab.

32:48 Adam Do you know and then who knows if if we if we go for it.

32:50 Adam We could do it on the show at some point.

32:51 Adam Or something like that because yeah.

32:53 Lee Yeah.

32:53 Chris Yeah.

32:54 Adam Yeah.

32:54 Lee Excellent.

32:55 Adam Definitely worth seeing.

32:56 Lee Awesome.

32:57 Lee I've gone back and watched a classic because I'd never seen it and I don't know how I'd never seen it.

33:03 Lee I'd never seen The Faculty from 1998.

33:06 Adam I've never seen it actually.

33:07 Lee Oh.

33:08 Lee Dude, watch it.

33:10 Lee It's really fun.

33:11 Lee it's basically it's a load of kids at high school, realize that something's up with their teachers, yeah, and basically it doesn't give too much away. You find out in the first 10 minutes one by one they're being replaced by aliens. And nobody believes them, obviously. So they have to fight them.

33:35 Adam

33:36 Lee yeah, I mean it's it's an incredible cast.

33:43 Adam I was going to say, I remember it having like a really good good lot of people in it.

33:48 Adam Who's it who's it directed by or written by?

33:49 Adam Cuz it was like someone who.

33:50 Lee That's Robert Rodriguez.

33:51 Adam Oh, it is Robert Rodriguez.

33:52 Adam Oh, fair enough.

33:54 Adam I knew it was someone who's like at the time where it was like, oh, it's slightly different to what else I'd seen, but it was still sort of like, yeah, you know, a good night.

34:01 Chris Does it give too much away to say what the alien's plan is?

34:05 Lee it's just domination.

34:06 Lee As it always is.

34:07 Chris Okay.

34:07 Chris And they're trying to start with.

34:09 Adam But I remember at the time a lot of people seemed to refer to it as Buffy the Body Snatcher.

34:14 Lee It was like that sort of thing of, you know, like.

34:16 Lee Precisely what it is.

34:17 Lee but yeah, I say I've never seen it. It's Josh Hartnett, Helma, Salma Hayek's in it.

34:24 Lee yeah, it's just it was it was one of I've never seen it.

34:25 Lee Maybe there's a reason, maybe it's crap. And I thought, you know what, I'll bung it on and I'll give it a watch.

34:31 Lee yeah, and just thoroughly enjoyed it. I had a really, really good time with it.

34:36 Lee Usher's in it.

34:37 Adam Oh, right.

34:38 Lee Because why not?

34:40 Lee but yeah, no, really good. Again, really good fun, not a comedy horror, but doesn't take itself too seriously.

34:46 Lee Cuz it knows it's a bit of a daft concept really.

34:48 Adam It kind of knows it's a B movie, so it's sort of like, you know, it's not going to yeah.

34:52 Lee

34:52 Lee Yeah.

34:53 Lee but yeah, yeah, great film and again, I I'll definitely go back. I's definitely one I'll rewatch again at some point when I'm in the right mood.

34:58 Lee Right, we got four minutes.

35:00 Lee So let's rush through quick, what you've watched title and would you recommend it or not? Chris.

35:06 Chris I've blessed everything.

35:09 Lee Okay.

35:10 Adam Adam.

35:12 Adam Right, one last thing. Red Iron Road, watched it the other day on prime.

35:18 Adam It's six episodes. It's animated anthology horror series of European folktales.

35:25 Adam And they're all done in different styles. There's one that's like Mike Mignola did a heavy did the film Heavy Metal.

35:30 Adam There's sort of Akira style dystopia, very traditional stuff. Some of it's laugh out loud funny, it's and yeah.

35:39 Adam He's absolutely well and they're like sort of 10, 15, 20 minutes each.

35:40 Adam So you you blast through it in about two hours.

35:42 Lee that sounds excellent.

35:43 Lee I should be checking that out.

35:45 Lee I watched yesterday for the first time, I'd never seen it, but it was discussed on The Lawmen podcast.

35:50 Lee The Black Cauldron, the Disney movie from 1985.

35:55 Adam Have you never seen it?

35:56 Lee No.

35:57 Adam Right, we'll do it on the show.

35:57 Lee It's full on horror.

35:59 Adam Yeah.

36:00 Lee And it's brilliant.

36:01 Adam Oh man, it's so fucking good.

36:04 Lee Yeah, I don't know how I'd never seen it.

36:05 Lee I think yeah, no, 1985, so I would have been the right age as well.

36:11 Lee I don't know, I think it was that point where if you didn't see them at the cinema.

36:14 Lee Nothing was getting released on VHS.

36:17 Lee So if you didn't see it there and then, you missed out.

36:21 Adam I think it was also that thing that Disney would only release only really promote stuff if it had been a success.

36:26 Lee Yes.

36:26 Lee So that kind of fell by the wayside. No one was asking for it to come out on rental. It wasn't like Snow White or Robin Hood or Jungle Book or something like that.

36:35 Lee It was one of their flops.

36:36 Lee So.

36:37 Lee Well again, I'm not surprised the flop. It cost like 40 million, they were saying on Lawmen.

36:41 Lee I saying ridiculous.

36:42 Adam Oh yeah.

36:42 Adam And it's dark as and it's dark as all fuck.

36:45 Lee Yeah, it is.

36:45 Lee You couldn't I mean, you could show it to kids.

36:47 Adam But I'm thinking of showing it with ted, but I don't know, you know.

36:50 Lee So.

36:52 Lee Oh, yeah, it was fantastic.

36:53 Lee I loved it.

36:54 Adam Yeah.

36:55 Adam But no, when I saw that as a kid, I was like, because the trouble was I saw it as a kid and then it was one of those ones that never fucking showed up.

37:02 Lee No.

37:03 Lee So I was like, but I still remember this one.

37:04 Adam And it had like the guy with the hood, with the horns and the little scruffy cat bear dog thing.

37:12 Lee Yeah.

37:14 Lee Oh, yeah.

37:14 Lee Loved it.

37:14 Lee That was great.

37:16 Lee right, so let's wrap it up there, gentlemen.

37:18 Lee happy New Year to everybody.

37:20 Lee We'll be back in a fortnight's time, horror on C's happening in a fortnight.

37:24 Lee So we will be going to that and discussing it.

37:28 Lee but it's actually on the it's actually we're going on the night that we would normally be recording, so we might be a couple of days later than usual with the release, because we'll probably go on the Saturday and then discuss it on the Sunday or whatever.

37:40 Lee but we'll get it out to you as soon as we can.

37:42 Lee Bear with us. I'm certain it's going to be worth the wait.

37:45 Lee

37:46 Lee Yes, can't wait for that.

37:48 Lee Always highlight of the year.

37:49 Adam And it might be the feature debut of some exciting young new actors and artists. So we'll stay tuned for that.

37:59 Lee Oh, I can't wait to talk about that.

38:01 Lee Right, anyway.

38:02 Lee That's enough of that.

38:04 Lee Thanks very much for listening, everybody.

38:06 Lee Good night.

38:06 Chris Good night.

38:07 Adam Good night.