Hausu

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

0:26 Chris I'm Chris.

0:27 Adam I'm Adam.

0:28 Lee And we are here with spoilers and swearing to cover quite possibly the most batshit movie we have covered to date in 200 plus episodes. 1977's Hausu.

0:42 Chris It's certainly in the running.

0:45 Lee I this is a film that Adam and Dean have talked about for years and I'd never got around to. So I bought it about three months ago in prep for this and watched it and just went,

0:59 Unknown Yeah, 20 years of hearing about just how mental it is did not prepare me for how mental this film is. Yeah. Yeah.

1:49 Chris I can certainly see why it left a mark.

1:52 Adam This this is not one that you can condense down into a snappy 10 films that you've won't believe that because it's like, you wouldn't even scratch the fucking surface of how insane this film is. It's wonderful.

2:08 Chris I tell you what though, after about it was like 10, maybe 15 minutes. I was thinking, am I definitely watching the right film? Because that is pretty much all I'd heard and I was like, it's quite nice. I mean, little bit odd, you know, it's not a typical sort of film I would watch at that point.

2:26 Chris But it's charming, you know?

2:29 Adam Because at that at that point, it's just kind of shot weird.

2:33 Chris Because it's kind of.

2:34 Adam Yeah. Because there's a lot of techniques and sort of wipes and a lot of cinematic techniques that sort of because the first bit always reminds me of a Beatles film.

3:27 Lee Yes. And the closing music sounds like the Beatles as well. I was thinking of listening to it today.

3:32 Adam Oh, by the way, the people who did the songs, not the not the piano score bit, but the songs is the band Godeago and they are also the band who did all the music for Monkee.

3:48 Chris Oh, now that's that's quite quite because I just started watching Monkee again.

3:53 Lee All right. Yeah. Just yesterday. I love Monkee so much.

3:56 Chris I thought it's time to show Toby and he he was like what are you showing me at first. I was like you got to stick with it. It just keeps getting better and better.

4:04 Chris But yeah, that's kind of funny.

4:06 Adam Yeah. But then I think that has a similar sort of.

4:08 Chris It does, yeah, definitely.

4:10 Adam But yeah, so the first half feels like a Beatles film like they're a band or something like it's like this just this seven girl pop band from Japan that we don't know, but they've got, you know, we're watching their help or you know, whatever.

4:26 Adam And so it's yeah, it's sort of shot weirdly and has a lot of just artifice to it.

5:16 Adam And then you get to the house and it's like basically same story, but applied to the supernatural and sort of yeah.

5:27 Chris It it really does.

5:29 Adam film but a film where they genuinely get murdered.

5:34 Chris It does grow at the right frequency, so the effects get crazier, the concepts get crazier, the action kicks off.

5:42 Lee The music goes absolutely well. It goes crazy jazz score that's just nuts.

5:48 Adam Yeah.

5:49 Adam Well I just I I love the fact that Kung Fu has her own theme.

5:53 Chris Right, so I was going to say, she could absolutely be spun off into her own film.

5:59 Adam Well, they all can.

6:01 Chris potentially, yeah.

6:02 Adam Because that was the other thing as well because I was thinking pop band, I was also thinking Spice Girls.

6:07 Adam So you've got like Kung Fu Spice, Gorgeous Spice, Prof Spice.

6:12 Chris Yeah.

6:13 Adam Mac Spice.

6:14 Chris Melody, yeah.

6:16 Adam Melody, yeah.

6:17 Adam in that same sort of way, but yeah, but yeah, it is just like, I would.

6:21 Adam We'll just give him seven personalities.

6:23 Adam Also.

6:23 Adam Also they are particularly cruel to Mack because when she disappears, they just keep going on about maybe she's going to eat some more potatoes.

6:32 Chris She's just gone to the bins.

6:33 Adam Yeah.

6:33 Lee Yeah.

6:34 Adam Yeah.

6:35 Chris Yeah.

6:36 Adam They're really quite so I mean, they clearly love her and it's affectionate, but there is no.

6:42 Lee Yeah.

6:43 Lee They're just like if she isn't here, she's eating somewhere. She's fine. Don't even sweat it.

6:49 Lee As soon as the next one goes missing, all hell breaks loose.

6:52 Lee They try and find Angel when she's gone.

6:55 Lee But Mac, they just go, it's fine.

6:59 Lee Despite the fact one of them saw her decapitated head floating around in the courtyard.

7:05 Adam Yeah, but.

7:05 Adam Yeah, but hopefully that's fantasy. So she could easily see that in a daydream. So they're like, oh well, she's...

7:12 Chris Fantasy.

7:12 Adam So she could easily see that in a daydream.

7:16 Adam Which I think is one of the because I really like the aunt, the aunt is...

7:21 Adam He's talk like constantly looking out.

7:23 Adam He's talking like constantly looking out at the audience and sort of talking sort of acting to the audience.

7:34 Adam There's a bit where she just looks down the camera and grins because and which is kind of lovely because it's that sort of trickster demon like,

7:42 Adam What am I going to fucking do now?

7:44 Adam It's almost like Freddy or something like that.

7:46 Adam You know where they sort of you know or funny man actually.

7:48 Lee Yeah.

7:49 Adam But, you know, on a slightly classier level, should we say.

7:53 Adam But

7:53 Lee Hopefully.

7:54 Adam But yeah, I.

7:55 Adam So I love the fact that the demon because it's a demon like that or the monster, the ghost, whatever you want to call it. it keeps doing it to fantasy because it knows they won't believe her.

8:11 Chris Yeah, that's funny. Yeah, it does treat her differently.

8:13 Adam So it sort of like it picks on her as like, I'll show her the eye trick.

8:17 Adam I'll do this.

8:18 Lee Yeah.

8:19 Adam I'll disappear into the fridge whilst dancing, you know, and sort of.

8:28 Adam It's.

8:29 Lee It's just so.

8:30 Lee And like some of the choices of things as well.

8:33 Lee So the right from the off, like Chris was saying.

8:36 Lee The bit when they're on the train and she's telling the story of her arm.

8:43 Lee But she's telling them the story and they're all saying things like, oh look at that. she beautiful?

8:52 Lee And I'm like, she's telling the story and you can see her story.

8:55 Lee It's a really strange mechanism.

8:56 Lee But.

8:57 Adam Yeah, well they're sort of going, oh I like all they look great in uniform.

9:01 Adam When they did back then, you know, they're sort.

9:03 Lee What, what?

9:04 Chris I'm not sure the teacher wasn't quite as manly and handsome as they'd present him to be.

9:07 Chris He seemed a bit a bit of a.

9:09 Adam I think, can I just like, I think the teacher is spot on.

9:11 Adam For a teacher with a dune buggy who's taking some of the students on summer holiday.

9:17 Chris Yeah.

9:18 Adam Yeah, that's that is why he's a boling sleeves.

9:21 Adam You know, he's.

9:23 Adam It's like it's like a sort of dodgy Robin Askwith figure.

9:26 Chris I actually that was that was one of the stand out bits of cinematography.

9:31 Chris When he fell down the stairs and they changed it to stop motion and it's like, that's actually looks still like he is just falling down the stairs.

9:38 Chris It's pretty good.

9:39 Lee Yeah. And his head get stuck in the bucket and starts moving around and they drove that in the moving car.

9:45 Chris Yeah, in front of the car.

9:45 Chris But it's like.

9:46 Chris That's that's great. It's just so.

9:48 Adam And the little the little girl who's drumming on the bucket when it starts to move.

9:54 Lee Yes.

9:54 Adam That's the director's daughter.

9:55 Lee Oh.

9:56 Adam Oh yeah.

9:56 Adam Yeah and she's where he got all the ideas from.

10:02 Chris

10:02 Adam So she she's about 10.

10:04 Chris And she's like it'd be great if you did this.

10:07 Adam Well, he he basically went here and said what scares you?

10:09 Chris Yeah.

10:10 Adam And she was like, like the grandfather clock at grandma's house. And getting my fingers cut off by a piano and stuff like that.

10:16 Chris Oh yeah. Yeah.

10:18 Chris Yeah, yeah.

10:19 Chris On the piano, yeah.

10:20 Adam And like, so.

10:22 Chris That's where it really picked up was piano scene from there onwards.

10:25 Chris Like that was like.

10:26 Chris What.

10:26 Adam Okay.

10:27 Adam Yeah, so where is it and and even like the watermelon in the well turning into a head and stuff like that.

10:33 Adam That's all stuff that the daughter came up with.

10:36 Chris Yeah.

10:36 Adam Yeah.

10:37 Adam And so the director is let's hope I'm doing this right. Nobuhiko Obayashi.

10:46 Chris Obayashi, yeah.

10:46 Adam And the the daughter is Chigumi. And but yeah, so.

10:52 Adam The when he did it, it was like what was it?

10:56 Adam I got I had to write down because it was a good quote.

10:59 Adam He asked her for the ideas because it was because grownups can only think about things they understand.

11:09 Chris

11:10 Adam So everything stays on a boring level, like human level.

11:13 Adam Whereas children can come up with things that can't be explained.

11:16 Adam And it's like, I I I know, you know, if you ask an adult, it's like, well what scares you?

11:22 Adam But it's got to be something that could you've got to find a logic to it or whatever like that.

11:27 Adam Whereas a kid it was just like, being buried under futons.

11:30 Lee Yeah.

11:31 Adam You know, and it's like.

11:33 Adam You know.

11:34 Adam And so you end up with this because it's because it's weirdly, it's the it's the Beatles do Suspiria in a weird way.

11:41 Adam So it's.

11:42 Adam So.

11:42 Adam It's so sort of like but in a utterly different vibe to Suspiria because this is because this is fun.

11:49 Lee Yeah.

11:50 Lee It's.

11:50 Adam It's fun all the way through despite the gruesomeness of the fates.

11:55 Adam But even then they're so cartoonishly fucking weird.

11:59 Lee Yeah. Yeah.

12:00 Lee So and that's what I got from this that the second time watching it today because I literally just finished it a half hour ago.

12:06 Lee I was like, I've got a feeling that Evil Dead has a lot of horror to pay to this.

12:12 Lee Like there's so much of that like the over the top blood and all the strange visuals and the weird camera angles.

12:16 Lee Like so much of it.

12:17 Chris Yeah.

12:18 Adam Yeah.

12:18 Lee Like.

12:18 Adam The mirror coming alive and attacking you.

12:20 Lee Yeah.

12:20 Adam And.

12:21 Lee Yeah.

12:21 Lee It's just.

12:22 Lee It's it's such a good film.

12:24 Lee It is one that I.

12:25 Lee I struggle sometimes with weird films and I find them frustrating, but because this is so fun, you're right, that is the word.

12:33 Lee You just go with it and it's just it's it's such a good time. It really, really is.

12:39 Adam And yeah, and and weird because because the girls are all I think it's only Angel or Gorgeous.

12:45 Adam who is the who had done some films before, but the rest of them were all

12:52 Adam like models that he knew the director knew because he did loads of adverts.

12:58 Lee All right.

12:58 Adam He did something like 2,000 adverts, but this was like his

13:05 Chris I'd I'd like to see some of them.

13:05 Adam This is his first feature film.

13:07 Adam And.

13:09 Adam And it's it basically this is meant to be a response to jaws.

13:12 Lee Oh my God.

13:14 Chris Yeah, I didn't see that coming.

13:15 Adam So Toho Studios, who is who produced this, are still going strong and they were famous particularly for Godzilla.

13:23 Adam And but they distributed they did like Studio Ghibli, they did a lot of

13:30 Adam You know, just a lot of cool bits and pieces. where are we?

13:35 Adam yeah, they did like, they released Akira Kurosawa's films and things like that.

13:38 Adam So they were big sort of mighty powerhouse.

13:42 Adam And yeah, they were like, well, there's this thing called Jaws and we need something like that.

13:47 Adam And somehow they got to this.

13:49 Chris They.

13:50 Chris make this and like, yep, we've we've done it.

13:53 Chris That's it.

13:53 Lee Yeah.

13:53 Adam Yeah.

13:54 Lee And it's just The only thing I can think of, it's a cat.

13:56 Chris Oh The only thing I can think of.

13:58 Chris There's a pretty great cat, shout out to the cat.

14:00 Lee Oh, the cat's great.

14:01 Adam The cat's great.

14:02 Adam Although the cat, the surprise on its face when it gets thrown on to the auntie's lap by camera.

14:09 Adam You know, and it's just like they're like, I was over there a minute ago. As she's wheeled past, you know, I just think yeah.

14:16 Adam It's a marvelous cat performance.

14:19 Adam But

14:20 Adam But yeah, I think and that's the thing is I think everyone in it like like the the bloke who does the watermelon, who sells the watermelons, he's the composer.

14:30 Adam He's the one he's the one who wrote the piano bit.

14:33 Adam And so and everything.

14:35 Adam But yeah, it's mostly sort of.

14:38 Adam The aunt is the only person who had a career before this.

14:41 Chris

14:41 Adam She'd been like quite a successful actress.

14:44 Adam But apparently because I've not seen I've not seen any of I've not seen any of his other films.

14:51 Adam But Obayashi in Japan is really renowned and respected and a very mainstream director.

14:59 Adam So I can only think I can only equate this almost to like bad taste.

15:04 Adam You know where you've got like Peter Jackson now it's just, oh it's Lord of the Rings.

15:10 Chris No, no.

15:11 Adam So it's.

15:11 Adam But if you go back and look at bad taste and brain dead.

15:15 Chris Yeah.

15:15 Chris Yeah.

15:16 Adam You know, it's like that's this.

15:19 Adam So I can only assume that this sort of rings a bit weird.

15:23 Adam Although he has done because apparently he does lots of like team comedies and sort of coming of age films.

15:30 Adam I saw someone, I mean, obviously I can't say whether that's true or not.

15:32 Adam But someone described him as always being like Spielberg in Japan, you know, that kind of level of success.

15:37 Adam And sort of mainstream success and everything else like that.

15:41 Adam So I mean, this fuck knows where this sort of sprang from.

15:44 Chris Well, Spielberg attempted it.

15:45 Chris Poltergeist and.

15:46 Adam I suppose he did.

15:47 Chris Got some of the way there thanks to Toby Hooper.

15:50 Adam Toby Hooper, yeah, he needed to get nasty Uncle Toby involved, didn't he?

15:54 Adam Didn't he?

15:54 Adam Dad was fine and then dad had like a couple of days off and then nasty Uncle Toby came around and it got shit scary, didn't it?

16:00 Adam So.

16:01 Adam Next thing you know, real skeletons in mud.

16:04 Lee Yeah.

16:04 Adam Yeah.

16:05 Lee I mean this film still for 1977, it looks gorgeous.

16:11 Chris Yeah. Yeah.

16:12 Lee Yeah.

16:13 Lee I know some of the effects are a little bit chunky.

16:15 Chris But I think they doesn't they're not they don't break it because the whole look is.

16:21 Lee It's so surreal.

16:22 Chris It fits like, yeah.

16:23 Lee Like the bit where they pull up at the bus and there's that background.

16:27 Lee And the bus pulls away and it's just a billboard in the middle of nowhere, nothing like the surroundings.

16:32 Lee And I'm like, what's it what was it there for?

16:35 Lee I don't understand it, but I love it.

16:37 Lee It's great.

16:37 Adam But apparently this was a lot of because this was his first feature film, a lot of this stuff is like stuff that he'd done in adverts and he so he was.

16:45 Chris So he's like let's just use.

16:46 Adam He kind of like right, I want to do all of this stuff, you know, it's like I I it's classic, you know, I might not get to make a movie again, so I'm just going to put everything I want to do, everything that fascinates me, every trick, every and and that's the thing is I think the effects.

16:58 Adam If the rest of the narrative was straight or the rest of the film was straight, they the effects would look worse, but you've already had so much artificialness, you've had stop motion, slapstick and like there's the bit where the sort of the frame moves out like a window and you're into another scene and things like that.

17:15 Adam And it's sort of there's a lot of.

17:17 Chris It's also like a weird slow down when they call you on the phone.

17:20 Lee Oh, yeah, that's weird.

17:22 Lee I don't think they slow motion.

17:23 Chris TV's gone wrong.

17:25 Adam Which which every time gets me because I will tend to watch this film in a sort of state worse for wear and every time it it lasts long enough for me to think, is this.

17:39 Chris Is this.

17:40 Chris Have I.

17:40 Chris Is my.

17:41 Adam Is this.

17:42 Lee Yeah.

17:46 Lee It's just.

17:47 Lee It is it's just everything thrown at one film.

17:53 Lee But because the story is so utterly chaotic and mental, it just works on every level.

18:00 Lee It's just it is.

18:02 Lee It's a great film. I can see why I've heard so much from so many people about it for so long.

18:08 Lee And it's just mental.

18:09 Adam And I also.

18:10 Adam I was going to say and I also know the number of times that me and Dean have obsessed over a film and it doesn't translate to you yourself.

18:16 Adam Because like you say, sometimes they can be frustrating or fucking, you know, just poorly executed or, you know, the tone is different.

18:25 Adam But certainly in this, I think the tone is like it's just.

18:31 Adam It's weird to call a film like a horror film ecstatic, but it is kind of like, it's like a very, it's like you're allergic to coloring.

18:42 Adam And you've had a and you've had a tube of smarties.

18:43 Adam You know, it's got that sort of like jittery sort of that's just you can't help but get swept along with.

18:51 Lee Oh man.

18:51 Lee It just and as you say, like the sound design and everything, it just comes together so like this film flies past.

18:58 Lee This is one of the fastest hour and a half I've ever spent in front of the TV.

19:01 Chris I'm sure I heard a He-Man sound effect at one point.

19:05 Lee Oh, yeah.

19:05 Adam There's.

19:05 Chris Something like that.

19:07 Adam Yeah.

19:07 Adam I the bloke who did the voice of He-Man died yesterday, so that could if people want to time when the podcast was done.

19:14 Adam

19:15 Adam So.

19:15 Adam But

19:17 Adam Yeah, no, it's it's everything's huge in it. Everything's.

19:23 Adam Because everything's artificial, everything's.

19:26 Adam I mean, but also just I love the fact that there's not actually like.

19:33 Adam the the stepmom or would be stepmom is not presented in any way as evil or wrong or anything else like that.

19:42 Adam It's like Angel or gorgeous is the like sort of.

19:46 Adam She's the one who's taken umbridge at that point.

19:49 Adam And and but I just love the fact that again it's like an advert is that whenever you see her, she's in soft focus with a fan on and it's like everyone kind of drifts in from their own.

19:59 Chris Yeah.

20:00 Adam It's.

20:00 Adam Yeah.

20:02 Adam narratives almost.

20:06 Adam So it's kind of like why people have got their own music.

20:09 Adam Like, you know.

20:10 Adam They're all kind of it's it's all kind of they're in their own films that sort of have all coalesced at this point.

20:14 Adam Like the the stepmom should be in some sort of slightly Ferrero Rocher romance film.

20:20 Lee Oh my God.

20:21 Adam But she but she ends up getting burnt to death by a demon wearing her stepdaughter's face.

20:27 Adam You know.

20:28 Lee So.

20:30 Lee And that's the other thing as well.

20:30 Lee It doesn't have a happy ending, but.

20:34 Lee But yeah, but you still come away with a big smile on your face.

20:38 Chris Feeling good.

20:39 Lee Yeah.

20:39 Adam Yeah.

20:40 Lee It's just weird.

20:42 Adam Well, I just love the fact that you've got Robin Askwith in his little buggy like on his way to them the whole way through.

20:49 Adam And fantasy's just like, oh, you know, don't worry, sirs going to come and save us.

20:54 Adam And all of the rest of them are under no illusion there.

20:57 Lee Yeah.

20:58 Adam They're all like fucking ridiculous, we've got to sort this out ourselves.

21:02 Adam He's useless, you know.

21:04 Adam And then he turns up, has a row with the watermelon man, who is clearly something to do with the house as well because he greets him with all the girls have been eaten or whatever it is.

21:17 Adam Then they have it turns into a skeleton that shouts watermelon and he's going, no, I prefer bananas.

21:23 Lee Bananas.

21:24 Adam Bananas.

21:25 Adam And then it cuts, other shit goes on, and then when the aunt comes through, they leave you to your own conclusion that there is a man-shaped pile of bananas in the front.

21:34 Adam in in the driving seat of the buggy.

21:39 Adam So obviously he's been turned into a bunch of bananas, but they didn't even bother telling you that.

21:43 Adam They've just gone, you'll pick that up.

21:45 Lee Yeah.

21:46 Adam Do you know what I mean? Cuz it's like.

21:48 Lee I mean it's a straightforward narrative how can you not follow that.

21:51 Adam Yeah.

21:51 Chris Yeah.

21:51 Lee It's.

21:53 Adam Yeah.

21:54 Adam Yeah.

21:56 Adam Yeah.

21:56 Lee Yeah.

21:57 Adam So.

21:59 Adam I was trying.

22:00 Chris I was trying to follow. So I do think they were getting across something.

22:03 Chris I mean, it seems like certainly the aunt was traumatized by her husband or husband to be dying in the war.

22:12 Chris Yeah.

22:12 Adam From the war, yeah.

22:13 Chris Does seem a bit like it's a you know, men are kind of causing problems and then these are getting placed on to women who then go to war.

22:21 Chris And then now their lives, you know, their potential is ruined.

22:24 Chris And then that's getting passed on to the new generation of girls.

22:27 Chris Who also all of their potential is ruined.

22:29 Adam Yeah, she's praying on them.

22:31 Chris Yeah.

22:31 Chris She's she was ruined and now she's ruining them, she can't help it.

22:36 Adam Yeah.

22:37 Adam Because there's because I can't quite remember what the quote is at the end, but it's like, you know, that.

22:42 Chris Love, yeah, something about.

22:44 Adam It's basically love you will feel the if you love someone, you will always feel what they're feeling, something along those lines.

22:53 Adam And it's kind of like, but in the context of this film, it yeah, well that's it.

22:58 Chris I was like, I'm trying to follow.

23:00 Adam It's like you've twisted a greetings card.

23:02 Lee Yeah.

23:03 Adam You know what I mean, cuz it's like according this film it's like, yeah, he probably felt that as you know, the the parents felt that as she was eaten by the piano.

23:11 Adam You know,.

23:15 Adam Yeah.

23:17 Adam And but I mean but you say also grew up in Hiroshima like he was like six.

23:25 Chris Yeah.

23:26 Adam So obviously he knew.

23:28 Chris He probably did.

23:28 Adam Very much firsthand what war, you know, what war can do and what leave behind and stuff like that.

23:35 Chris Well, the wider implications, yeah.

23:38 Adam But weirdly but still like you say, no happy ending.

23:46 Adam A a fucking mental narrative, but it's just so joyous in that and such a fucking visual treat, you know.

23:57 Chris It's so watchable.

23:59 Adam Because again, I'm I you know, I I like a lot of I like a lot of stuff that has a very artificial look or has also uses weird techniques and things like that.

24:10 Adam A it doesn't always work, but also I don't think that this weirdly enough does feel like anyone could watch it.

24:18 Lee Yeah.

24:19 Adam Do you know what I mean, as long as you don't have a problem with subtitles.

24:22 Adam If you do.

24:23 Adam But.

24:24 Adam No.

24:25 Adam But you know what I mean.

24:25 Adam I think really it's sort of you know, oddly, I think it's just something that would.

24:33 Adam You know, if someone's willing to sit down with it, it will always cut through the sheer sort of like manic well, the mania of it.

24:42 Adam Just the sort of sheer what the fuck.

24:45 Lee Yeah, it was one of those, you know, like I saw it for the first time two months ago, sat down to watch it today.

24:52 Lee And I remembered maybe five minutes of it in clips because it is so all over the place, it is hard to remember that all the scenes are actually linked.

25:00 Lee And it has actually got a fairly straight narrative, despite all the craziness.

25:05 Chris Yeah, it's not complex. yeah.

25:10 Lee No.

25:11 Adam But then but then that's probably what it needs.

25:13 Adam If you started, imagine if you started putting into this an investigation into how the aunt became a demon.

25:20 Chris

25:21 Adam You know, that derail it.

25:22 Adam That you know.

25:23 Adam It happened.

25:24 Adam She was pissed off, she became a demon.

25:26 Adam All right.

25:27 Adam Fuck sake.

25:28 Lee Yeah.

25:28 Adam So.

25:29 Lee How does attacking a painting of a cat kill the cat kill the demon?

25:33 Lee You don't need to know that.

25:35 Adam No.

25:35 Lee Why does the blood fill an entire room like a river so they end up drowning in it?

25:40 Lee Because it does.

25:41 Lee Great.

25:42 Lee Excellent.

25:42 Lee I'm I'm going with it.

25:43 Lee I am not questioning anything.

25:45 Adam Why why are you attacked and stripped naked by futons and end up squashed in a clock?

25:51 Lee Yeah.

25:53 Adam No one knows that.

25:54 Adam How determined are you to kick a painting that your disembodied legs will do it after you've been eaten by a light fitting?

25:59 Lee Oh my God.

26:02 Adam All these all these things are in this film.

26:05 Adam And that's what that's what brings me a lot of joy with this.

26:08 Adam Is there's like.

26:08 Chris I think all of our listeners have just just turned off and gone to start watching it.

26:12 Adam I I hope so.

26:13 Adam I hope so because weirdly enough, I don't know if I don't know if it's a film you can spoil.

26:18 Chris Yeah.

26:19 Adam In a way, you know, there's no there's no twists or anything.

26:21 Adam And our descriptions are not going to do justice to watching it.

26:27 Adam Because the it's just fucking madness.

26:32 Lee And it's everything I love about Japanese cinema in.

26:36 Chris It's it's how to break every rule of cinema and make it work perfectly.

26:40 Lee And I love it.

26:42 Adam Yeah.

26:44 Adam On on paper, it shouldn't, you know, on on paper, this should be something that no one would back.

26:52 Adam No one would put money in.

26:53 Adam And actually, the only reason he got to direct it was because the he he wasn't, although he was hired by Toho, he wasn't one of their directors like staff directors, you know, like.

27:04 Adam or in-house directors.

27:08 Adam

27:13 Adam But none of them would do it once they'd read the script because they were like, no this is a fucking career ender.

27:13 Chris How are you possibly going to do this?

27:16 Adam And probably and that's the thing is really if someone else had taken it, it probably would be quite crap.

27:22 Lee Yeah.

27:23 Adam Or, you know what I mean.

27:24 Adam Because I think it was obviously so much it's so much of Obayashi's vision and his techniques and what, you know, he's going to write what he.

27:35 Adam But no one's going to necessarily take that from the page unless he wrote it out frame by frame as a storyboard or whatever like that.

27:39 Adam You know.

27:41 Adam And

27:42 Adam

27:46 Adam But yeah, so that's and and but even then they weren't keen for him to direct it, so he did like he made a manga of it.

27:46 Adam But yeah, so that's and and but even then they weren't keen for him to direct it, so he did like he made a manga of it.

27:54 Adam I don't know if that's I don't know if it's available in translated form because I'd like to see that.

27:59 Lee Yeah.

28:00 Adam he did a radio version of it.

28:03 Adam That was really successful.

28:04 Lee How would that work?

28:05 Adam Again, I have no idea but obviously it's in Japanese.

28:09 Adam So I can't.

28:10 Chris I'll learn Japanese just to watch.

28:11 Adam I feel I feel the need.

28:12 Adam But, you know, that's yeah, so he did like a radio drama of it that was really well received so everyone's like, oh it looks like you know what you're doing.

28:20 Adam

28:22 Adam I think the the the songs were written by Godeago before the film was made.

28:29 Chris Okay.

28:29 Adam So he could play the music on set and stuff like that.

28:34 Adam and actually Godeago are in it because they're the ones who are they're the ones who like it's like seconds but they're talking to the girls at a bus stop or outside the train station, that's it.

28:47 Adam And there's like guys talking to him and that's the band.

28:50 Adam So again, there's barely anyone.

28:52 Lee Oh yeah, that's random as they go in to get on the train and there's just loads of people waving them off.

28:57 Lee Like that's what happens when you get on a train, loads of strangers just come and wave and cheer you goodbye.

29:03 Lee When you're just some school kids just going about your school holidays.

29:07 Adam It.

29:09 Lee the other thing that I kept thinking the whole way through this is I'm getting my Yokai box set back out again because.

29:17 Lee This film goes so well with the the Yokai movies.

29:21 Adam Yeah.

29:22 Adam We need we need to do one of those or any of those.

29:26 Lee

29:29 Lee on I I think the first one possibly but yeah I mean I I so I bought the box set.

29:29 Lee on I I think the first one possibly, but yeah, I mean, I I so I bought the box set two years ago when Arrow released it.

29:35 Adam

29:36 Lee I picked it up at horror on TV, actually.

29:38 Adam Yes, yes, I remember.

29:39 Lee And yeah, and in a week I watched all four of the movies and three of the movies and the documentary.

29:45 Lee Oh, yeah.

29:46 Lee It's just.

29:49 Lee They're brilliant, but they're just like this, it's just it throws you in at the deep end.

29:55 Lee Doesn't explain anything.

29:57 Lee Nothing ever gets, but it just looks beautiful and you just go with it.

30:02 Lee And you have a fun time.

30:04 Adam Yeah, I mean they're they're not quite on this manic level.

30:08 Adam But certainly.

30:09 Adam But also just that thing of like you going.

30:11 Adam These effects are fucking amazing.

30:13 Adam You know, it's you're not even giving it a for for its time sort of thing.

30:19 Chris Yeah.

30:20 Adam Because some of some of the stuff in like in the the Yokai series, there's like like those living umbrellas and stuff like that.

30:26 Adam They just look really fucking good, they're just weird, they're not like, they don't look even though they're an umbrella monster, so immediately that's already a bit crap or a bit weird or you know, it's not necessarily if someone said to you, oh, there's an umbrella monster.

30:38 Adam You think that's that scary.

30:40 Lee Yeah.

30:40 Adam But they make them so.

30:42 Adam They do genuinely feel real, you know, they they brilliant effects for them and so they actually do become really uncanny and quite sort of like that's just odd.

30:49 Lee It is there's something unnerving about it because yeah, it's it looks so real.

30:53 Lee Because it's not CGI, it's all old, but yeah, it's just.

30:57 Chris

30:58 Adam But they're just.

30:58 Adam But but then weirdly enough, I was watching.

30:59 Adam In the week I found someone has put up subtitled episodes of Ultra Q on YouTube.

31:06 Adam And Ultra Q is like a 60s I've been trying to get me hands on it to watch it was basically a Japanese TV series in the 60s.

31:17 Adam They wanted to make like a sort of monster version of the Twilight Zone, but it basically is more the X files because it's like a group who investigate.

31:21 Adam And it's basically Kaiju of the week.

31:24 Lee Oh, can you set me a link to that?

31:25 Lee Because.

31:26 Adam Yeah, I'll I'll I'll send you a.

31:27 Adam Yeah.

31:27 Adam But it's like yeah, I watched I watched the first episode the other day.

31:33 Adam It's really good.

31:33 Adam But the thing that struck me was obviously.

31:36 Adam the Kaiju monsters because this is they've literally raided Toho Studio's cupboard.

31:42 Adam So the monster in it has got like Godzilla's head with added bits and the body of King Kong and stuff like that.

31:48 Adam So it's all yeah, it's just all sort of mishmash.

31:51 Adam But the actual when I was watching it, I was just absolutely stunned.

31:55 Adam by the model like the model sets that they were destroying.

31:58 Adam Because they were fucking perfect.

32:00 Lee Wow.

32:01 Adam You know, they just they were they looked so good and it sold it so well because there was just a weird moment where I was going.

32:09 Adam That's because you've seen people walk past these things, it wasn't like, you know, it's not just a set that.

32:14 Adam It's not like the city, they they're basically in this episode is they dig up an egg at a mine.

32:21 Adam So they're all around the mine and you've got like the little mine carts next to him and everything and they're all standing there and talking and everything else like that.

32:26 Adam And then this location has then been turned into this model and it's so fucking good that it took me a moment to go.

32:32 Adam Oh yeah, that is a bloke in a suit on a model, is it?

32:33 Adam It was almost like, oh, this fan a really big guy like fucking to and just put him in a suit.

32:39 Adam Is that.

32:39 Adam You know.

32:40 Adam It was but yeah, it was just such such good stuff, but yeah, I'm going to definitely watch more of that.

32:44 Adam So it's it's it's obviously the season.

32:49 Adam So.

32:50 Lee Yes.

32:50 Lee And and it kind of, I don't know why, I had the same, I'm sure I mentioned it on the show before, every now and again, probably once a year, once every two years.

33:01 Lee I will think, I will get a Shaw Brothers film off the shelf and then I will go on a massive Kung Fu movie bender.

33:06 Lee And it happened last week, and just kind of out of nowhere.

33:10 Lee And I smashed through about four or five of those films.

33:14 Lee So but they're the same that so obviously Chinese cinema is very different from Japanese, but again, it's just got that very strange blend of things that are you know.

33:24 Lee The fact that if you can do Kung Fu, you can fly, that is just a given.

33:28 Lee You just accept it, it's just.

33:31 Adam That's that's always that's always in Kung Fu movies that it's always you are quite you know.

33:35 Adam It it's it's always a plus, there's very, there's very there's amazing fights, but there's also acrobatics that are out of, you know, very you know, stuff stuff that's more superhero movie than, you know.

33:46 Adam A a realistic depiction of a.

33:47 Lee of someone's abilities.

33:49 Lee But yes, Asian cinema is just it's so spectacular and it's so bright and garish.

33:53 Lee And.

33:54 Lee Yeah, and and this is the same.

33:55 Lee It's just a delight to watch yeah, and even the story with this film is great.

34:00 Lee But even if it didn't make any sense.

34:04 Lee I'd still watch this just for the visuals, it's such a stunning looking film.

34:08 Adam

34:09 Adam And that's the thing is I think it's yeah, it just bypasses everything.

34:12 Adam In just look and sort of attitude and heart of the film.

34:16 Adam It's just like, yeah.

34:17 Adam And

34:18 Adam So so if anyone was in any if anyone was worried about how they feel.

34:24 Adam I would like to say that I for one think this is quite a good film.

34:27 Lee Yeah.

34:27 Adam

34:28 Lee I'm gutted it's taken me this long to watch it.

34:31 Adam It's I I understand it because it's one of those things where like I say, when people describe it to you like, yeah, I've heard you say this before.

34:38 Adam And this was you know, and you've you've made me sit through some right shot.

34:41 Adam So.

34:42 Lee Even even the back of the arrow release that I've got describes it as like a psychedelic story.

34:47 Lee A a psychedelic teen drama.

34:52 Lee And I was like, I'm pretty sure it's a horror.

34:54 Lee But it does start off as a psychedelic teen drama, it's very yeah, it kind of forget and then all of a sudden you go, oh no, there's ghosts and demons and incredibly gore.

35:01 Lee just explodes out of nowhere and you.

35:06 Adam Yeah.

35:06 Adam Very much so.

35:06 Adam Yeah.

35:07 Adam It has a very it has a very distinct turn.

35:11 Adam And yet somehow manages to maintain that sort of craziness and optimism that is sort of in it at the start.

35:20 Adam Like the sort of.

35:21 Adam The craziness and the sort of energy that you've got in that early section.

35:26 Adam And it's like it doesn't lose that when it brings in the because usually it'd be like, oh something's.

35:33 Adam We see a lot of films where it's like, oh there's a real tonal shift.

35:36 Adam And it'll be like, oh really dark and then it goes fucking dark as all fuck or whatever like that.

35:40 Adam This doesn't.

35:41 Adam Even though it does go dark as all fuck.

35:42 Adam Because.

35:42 Lee Yeah.

35:43 Adam We're still having fun.

35:44 Adam Yeah.

35:45 Adam Yeah.

35:45 Adam But still.

35:46 Adam Yeah.

35:47 Adam Seven.

35:48 Adam Seven children are murdered by demons one by a demon spirit of one of their aunts.

35:55 Adam Because of war.

35:56 Chris We're still having fun.

35:57 Adam You know.

35:57 Adam That's.

35:57 Adam Yeah.

35:58 Adam And but still.

35:59 Adam Yeah.

35:59 Adam Yeah.

36:00 Adam We're no happy ending.

36:02 Lee It is again, it's one of those.

36:03 Lee It's a party movie.

36:04 Lee This is got your mates over, you're having a laugh and a beer, you want something on in the TV, just in the background.

36:09 Lee Just a bit of a talking point.

36:11 Lee This is the one to put on because it's just.

36:13 Lee Batshit.

36:14 Adam I'm not sure if it is to be honest because I think this is one of those ones where suddenly the room is in silence.

36:18 Adam And everyone has drifted in from the kitchen and everything and there's just all of you standing there watching it.

36:22 Chris What is going to go?

36:23 Adam On next.

36:24 Adam Yeah, just like and basically you've.

36:25 Adam And basically you've killed a party stone dead because people are genuinely actually watching the film at that point.

36:31 Chris I mean, I should keep getting flashbacks to everything, but for some reason, it is the poster of the cat with the smiling face at that point.

36:35 Chris Just keep like.

36:38 Adam Oh man.

36:38 Lee Oh man.

36:39 Lee That's great.

36:41 Lee

36:42 Lee Incredible, just incredible.

36:44 Lee yes, so as we say, anybody who hasn't seen this film.

36:47 Lee Although we have told you everything that happens in it, you still need to see yourself.

36:52 Chris You know nothing.

36:53 Lee Yeah.

36:53 Lee Because I cannot describe it in all its glory.

36:57 Adam Yeah.

36:58 Adam Our words are.

37:01 Adam pitiful in front of this.

37:02 Adam In front of this film.

37:03 Lee It's.

37:04 Lee Fantastic film. right.

37:06 Lee So we are going to be back in a fortnight's time for a film I've not seen and definitely should have done. we are going to be covering The Descent.

37:16 Adam Yeah.

37:16 Chris Excellent.

37:17 Lee Yes.

37:19 Lee I've never seen it because I I've never been in a particularly claustrophobic environment.

37:23 Lee But the thought of them gives me a panic attack.

37:26 Lee So that's why I've never seen this film, but it's so highly rated by so many people.

37:33 Lee I feel it I definitely have to persevere and get through my discomfort hopefully.

37:38 Chris You're doing your duty.

37:39 Lee Yeah.

37:41 Chris Admirable.

37:42 Lee He put me in a box with me coat on.

37:43 Adam Don't say do your duty because that's always.

37:46 Adam I always think that's what someone says to their dog.

37:48 Lee Yeah.

37:48 Adam Go and do your duty.

37:50 Lee Yeah.

37:51 Adam Go and do your duty.

37:52 Lee Isn't that American?

37:53 Lee Go and do your duty.

37:55 Adam Yes.

37:56 Adam Of course, yeah.

37:57 Adam Oh your duty.

37:59 Lee Yeah.

38:00 Lee Right.

38:01 Lee So thanks ever so much for listening, everybody, go and check out Hausu.

38:05 Lee It's an amazing time, it's the fastest hour and a half of your life potentially.

38:10 Lee and we'll be back in a fortnight's time with The Descent.

38:12 Lee Thanks very much for listening, good night.

38:14 Chris Good night.

38:15 Adam Good night.