Picnic at Hanging Rock with Jane Schoenbrun

[MUSIC]

On St. Valentine's Day, in 1900, a party of school girls set out to podcast at hanging rock.

Some were never to return.

>> That's the tagline. >> That's the tagline, I've been podcasted.

“>> This original poster, I think it's so sick, beautiful.”

>> It's so good. >> But it is funny how much that tagline. >> How do you not want to see that movie? >> It's so much more of a horror film. >> Well, of course.

>> Yes, but I love the pink border. >> It's really good. >> I just think it's so good. >> It actually sells the aesthetics of the movie pretty well. >> Yeah. >> It visually represents, I didn't Google or I think I clicked

through on Wikipedia, St. Valentine's Day, I was like, what is St. Valentine's Day? Is it different? >> No, it's just Valentine's Day. >> They're just saying a lot of things about it. >> Honestly, honors the Roman St. Valentine's Day.

>> Yeah, you know, we gotta give it up for her. >> Shout out. >> You know, excuse me, I celebrate an agnostic Valentine's Day. The only God I respect on Valentine's Day is the Lord of Hallmark. >> Okay, well, do you know who what St. Valentine is the patron saint of?

>> Fucking no. >> What, logistics? >> Excuse me. >> Epilepsy and beekeeping.

“>> May I ask, how the fuck is guy got the romance holiday?”

>> I don't know, it sounds like a war. >> He died in the year 273, I don't think he really knew this is all going to happen. >> Offense to our epileptic listeners. >> No, I just don't know why, but isn't there like a more romantic saint? Isn't there like a Saint Pepe Lepu or something?

A character who hasn't ever done anything wrong? Pepe Lepu, can I defend him? >> 206. >> Sure, he's back. >> He's back.

>> He's Pepe Lepu back. >> He's back because, because, woke died, so Pepe Lepu turned. >> Yeah, yeah. >> He's got a podcast on the gas network. He's headlining to Game Fest.

>> Here's my, here's my thing about Pepe Lepu. >> Also, Pepe Lepu, the frog is back.

>> I never liked Pepe Lepu when I was a kid because I always found those cartoons born.

>> Yeah, that was the same thing, there was another one of these. >> Yeah, and it's like, okay, he's going to try and kiss the street lamp or whatever it is. He's obsessed with this time, right? >> Well, no, excuse me, excuse me, he's trying to kiss a cat. >> It's always the same cat.

>> He thinks it's a skunk, right? >> Right, and then she's trying to get away with him. >> It's a street lamp and it's used to dumb to recognize that he's kissing a street lamp. Now that we're breaking it down, it's kind of very funny. >> Yeah, that's good.

>> It's actually really good.

“>> But, and I remember, you remember the paint on the tail.”

>> The paint was the good bit. >> Yeah. >> I do think there was perhaps a conceptual flaw in the format where, like, road runner and Wiley Coyote, they had something to do, you could do some variations on a theme, change the exact word I was going to use.

>> Yeah. >> Even if the structure was the same every time the variation of the traps and the devices was huge, Pepe Lepu, it's always the same cat. >> Yeah. >> So, he removes, and the more they bring them back, the more you just feel terrible

for her. >> Totally. >> This hell she's living in. >> Sure. >> Well, then, fuck it.

Pepe is cancelled. >> So, it's like, we're going to cancel Pepe. >> The ice king is a post-pepe Lepu. >> In cartoon character. >> In cartoon character.

>> In cartoon character. >> Yeah, I like this character. >> I like this take. >> 'Cause he's like, in cell Pepe. >> Yeah.

>> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> It's the same thing. He's just kidnapping princesses.

He's got the sort of, I know we learned his backstory later, but current ice king has the kind of the deep insecurity, right? So he's shaking. >> Yeah. >> Right.

>> I love adventure time. I have not thought about it in quite a long time. >> That would be an interesting one to throw at your daughter. >> She has tried it, and she digs it, but it obviously disturbs her because it ventured times, like, you know, at a certain point it becomes weird for, at the right.

>> Yeah. >> Exactly. My wife, actually, forbade me from showing it to her. >> Really? >> Because she was like, this is too disturbing right now, and my daughter was pretty

interested in it, but we'll wait a year to see her. >> She's also, I was digging it. >> I was digging it. >> Been to watching the wire right now, right? >> Yeah.

>> You got to install it. >> Controls warp tour is the way to work. >> What does she think about a season two? >> Of the wire? >> Yeah.

>> She's like, "Why do I have to care about the Sepaka?" >> And then later she's like, "You know what, season two might be the best one." >> The journey everyone goes on with the wire. >> Did you go through, I guess, world tours, too.

Did you do the first tour?

>> The first tour was once, she loves trolls war, something I really struggled with. >> Trolls were all the war. >> True trolls, world tour, because she loves the hard rock trolls. She loves the villainous, you know, heavy metal troll. >> Rachel Bloom, Rachel Bloom and Ozzy Osborne, all right, Pete.

>> The minions are from a different, they are, they are not at all.

>> So what trolls is about a bunch of trolls, who sing, and then trolls, trol...

reveals that there are genres of trolls based on the kind of music that they sing.

“And the trolls, we know are the pop trolls, but there's also classical trolls, country trolls,”

heavy metal trolls, techno trolls, funk trolls. >> Is this poster pre Barbie? >> It's pre? >> Pre? >> Well, yeah.

>> Yes. >> And the heavy metal trolls are trying to take over and turn all music into heavy metal. >> Oh, that's fine. >> Which is the very trolls? >> Oh, I mean, what about, I feel like this is also a spider, spider verse.

>> Look, got a little bit of a spider verse, but it's just post, the big legacy of trolls world tour already, semi-forgotten, was it was the canary in the coal mine, the first straight to streaming. >> That's right. >> It was supposed to come out end of March, and it was the first movie, like 10 days

into lockdown that studios announced, this will be a $30 rental on Apple tomorrow. They probably made a ton of money. >> They made a ton of money. >> They made a ton of money. >> I made a ton of money.

>> Now my daughter watches an MP-cock about twice a day. >> Wow. It sounds like you're living through a really fun time.

>> It's a little-- >> Or some people who can't make a never-and-it-one.

>> Yeah, some stuck in pandemic hell. >> It's okay. >> It's okay. >> I don't mind trolls world tour, although I do mind saying it. >> Yeah, it's terrible.

Welcome to Blink Check. >> I'm sorry. >> What are you saying? >> I'm one of those. >> Say that?

>> Well, you say it then. >> Can you say please? >> Yes. >> Please. >> This is Blink Check.

A podcast about ethnographies, directors who have mass success early on in their careers. And are given a series of Blink checks to make whatever crazy passion products they want. And sometimes those checks clear and sometimes they bounce baby one time we covered the first trolls movie on Patreon. This is a mini series on the films of Peter Weir at David's insistence.

It is called "Podneck at Hanging Cast." >> That's right. David thought "Podneck" was a really funny word. >> I don't know what it was funny. >> I thought "Podneck."

>> "Podster and Cast" mander the pod side of the cast. >> You hold too much. >> Bullshit. >> That's a prem slice of pizza. >> That's all the toppings.

>> Yeah, the dead pod cast society. >> I'm similar. >> That's very melancholy that makes you want to sit by the powerful for stand on the desk. >> Yes. >> A noble tier.

>> Was that a big movie for you that you've mentioned to twice over? >> No, not at all actually. >> Yeah, I've seen it once and I've seen it years ago. >> Peter Weir is such an interesting, he's a Weir. >> Weir?

>> Weir one. >> And I have to admit. >> Kind of works in every genre. >> This is me being a guest reverse racist. >> I can't wait to hear that.

>> I cannot wait to hear this.

>> I always get his filmography confused with Nicholas Rogues filmography.

>> That's interesting. >> That. >> I don't think that's reverse racist. It is kind of, what is the commonality between those two guys? They feel like guys who wear carvots, but are free.

>> There's something like aboriginal, though. >> Sure, sure.

“>> Or like, I think it's walkabout is maybe the key of walkabout.”

>> That makes a lot walkabout and I'm thinking about like the thing, there's this thing, especially because then I looked up the Peter Weir filmography and I was like, oh, I can't talk about, what's the one with Albert Einstein and Marilyn Monroe? >> Perform, no, performance is one. >> Eureka?

>> Eureka? >> No, no, no, no, no, no, it's not called the conversation. It's called, these are all movies, though. >> They are. >> I'm going to find it.

>> That movie rocks, but that's one of the more quietly insane movies, I think. >> They're really the film. >> They're really the film. >> Wonderful name, too. >> It was-- >> Easy to remember, of course, Teresa Russell.

>> Yep, I think there's another one right. >> Gary Bucy, as I think, Joe Dimash, yeah, that's right. >> Yeah. >> Where have you? >> Gary Bucy.

>> Who played Dimashio in blonde? >> In blonde, also Gary Bucy. >> In blonde, back. >> Wasn't it Adrian Brutin? >> No, isn't it, boy.

>> I remember thinking they got Dimashio wrong, in blonde. Gary Bucy was Albert Einstein. >> In blonde, Gary Bucy did come back. Is Gary Bucy alive, or did he recently leave us? >> He's alive, he's alive, but let's just say, this episode's a month away.

>> Right, right. >> As a Peter Weir.

“>> Peter Weir is alive, retired, and I truly think like a gardening and chilling.”

>> Yeah. >> He seems to be taking it easy. >> Yeah. >> What was I going to say? So, I think, because there's this thing, especially in the Australian Peter Weir movies,

at least the ones that I've seen, where there's like, there's like something grotesque, or there's some kind of like like the guy from the, what's the plumber one, the plumber, the plumber, the titular plumber, I feel like I relate that to the like, there's a lot

Of that kind of guy in the Nicholas Road.

>> Nicholas Road is like, I think a classic dangass freak through and through, whereas Peter Weir for a guy, he left him behind, he left him behind, that's interesting.

“>> I do think there's a baseline darkness to his guess, I think so.”

>> I think part of what was good was he was able to jump over to Hollywood and work with big stars, but what they appreciated was that he brought a surprising amount of edge in depth and darkness. >> And in this way, there's a little bit of like, Milosch. >> Yes, yes, he does have a kind of bifurcated, the Australian half, and the Hollywood

half of his career, this is absolutely his guarantor in the terms that we usually apply on this podcast.

>> This film, this film, his second feature film, which is basically canonically accepted

in Australian culture as the great Australian movie. >> I think it was named the number one Australian movie in some survey. >> Yeah. >> I can, more than a Mad Max, or have a link here. >> I guess the question is right, now we get into the question of what's the competition.

>> I think it's a little bit because this is seen as a supreme artistic achievement. >> Yeah. >> And Ben and I were watching some of the special features, Bruce or Ben and I, on the second-site box, and we were talking about that in the sort of reconstructed Australian new wave in cinema, they had like comedy breakthroughs.

Mad Max, of course, is my inspired by the cars that ate Paris and comes after we're a kind of concurrent in this time, but they were like succeeding in genre, they were succeeding in character-based comedy, and there was this feeling in the industry of can we identify our in Marburg, man. Can we have our elevated O-Tor, who we can point to the other countries and go, we got

“a guy, and this movie was sort of received as, I think we finally have found that we found”

our guy. >> Yeah. Other people come out kind of like simultaneous with him, but I think this is culturally

seen as such an important breakthrough of kind of serious legitimacy.

>> I mean, who are, I mean, George Miller obviously mentioned him, who are the other big guys, that bass, is Alex Prius, Australia, he is, he comes later, who's identified as part of the Australian New Wave, for like Waken Fright has been maybe reclaimed as a significant one. >> But he's interesting because that's Ted Coach, he jumps over to America very quickly

and then does like first blood. >> He does like, Drick at a per-me short, Dallas 40. >> Waken Fright is really cool though, that's like, but like that's, there are those Australian movies that would pass over there, but basically like, you know, Australia is basically just like a burning wasteland filled with like people with sticks who will hate you.

>> Yeah, people are like, I guess it is, right, you know, like the, and then Paul Hogan comes over and he's like, "No, it's just a bunch of mates, love to have a big band!" >> Yeah, you know, like, there was that. >> Gillian Art Jones.

“>> Yes, it's part of that same wave, but I think a lot left over season three, yes.”

I do think Peter, we're kind of stands out as the guy who made the translation over to the studio system the best, as I was saying.

Phillip noise becomes first and foremost kind of like hired hand elevated, adult thriller

guy. >> Right. >> Right. >> Damon Lindeloff has cited this week and hang your act, that's right. I read that actually.

>> Yeah. >> Season two of the left. >> Yes, yes. >> The best, the other thing about this movie is like the cultural tale of its influence on other major works is humongous.

>> Sure. This feels like such a turning point movie of helping to define. >> It's a fascinating, I was, I watched this movie for the first time, hi, I'm Jane by the way. >> Yeah.

>> This is what's a group of who's our guest. >> Our guest today is Jane Schoenberg, returning to the show for the second time, director of "I Saw The TV Glow," and "I Saw The TV Glow," and "I Saw The Voice," we're all going to the world's favorite. The title of your next film is, it's teenage sex and death that can't be asthma.

I was going to get like 60% of that right, but I did want 'em. >> Somebody said teenage death camp. >> This is why I didn't want to take that. >> That sounds touchy. >> Yeah.

That sounds like we could be going in the wrong direction. >> Yes. >> I definitely would have just said, like, can't be asthma. >> I would have not been sure. >> Can't be asthma for short.

There was a moment early in production or prep when some emails were being sent in. They were just being sent with a short hand teenage sex. >> Right. And I said, "Act, you know what? Go with the camp." >> Yeah. Have you figured out what the acronym is? >> Is there a catchy kind of--

>> Yeah, yeah, no, it's great. >> It's even better that it is to-- >> You have some good, yeah. But then your TV Glow, you could just call it TV Glow.

>> Yeah, well, it's called it--

>> It's me asthma, you know, we've been saying me asthma. >> You do have a long title. >> I've been accused of this, and, you know, you have things to say, and you're going to start saying them-- >> You call your next place like home for 'em.

“>> I think it comes from like God's speed, you black emperor.”

>> Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. >> If you're skinny fingers that haven't-- >> Yeah, or whatever, that's something that's called, or album. Remember, death from above 1979? >> Sure, sure.

>> Remember them? >> They were great. >> But Jane, thank you for coming here, thank you for doing this episode. >> I'm Steve. >> We were trying to find the right person for this one,

because it feels like such a big one.

And I forget what it was, I stumbled upon first,

but you sighting this as kind of like an important-- >> Yeah, synthesizing of kind of dream language in cinema. >> It was in a modern way. >> What I was going to say is I feel like I had this period in my 20s where I took my kind of random film video store,

teenage year film nerd dumb, and I was like, okay, I got to like, if I'm going to go toe to toe with the boys, it metrograph, I got to watch them all. >> You got to level up. >> I got to, they shoot pictures, don't they, top 1000,

and just like work my way down, and this was very early in that. For me, like I watched this one pretty early on in like learning film history in the canon, and this was like an early one where I was like, well, they're films like this from the '70s.

>> What's interesting about it, because I also like first watch it, probably in college or whatever, it's like, it's so hooky. >> Yeah. >> Yeah, that you do, like there's no barrier to entry

“with this movie, 'cause you're like, oh fuck, what the hell?”

>> Yeah, mystery, and then you watch it, and you're left with a completely different set of feelings. Then what you might have imagined of like, it's definitely not about like, you know, trying to figure out where the girls went in a meaningful way.

>> Like, it's not a practical film. >> We'll take into this further, but the great anecdote that Peter Weir tells about showing the film to an American distributor

for the first time after it had like broken out in Australia,

it was buzzy title, and the movie ends, and the guy throws a cup of coffee at the screen, and goes, there's no fucking answer. >> Yeah, yeah, yeah. >> But that's the whole reason we want to make the movie. The dream film syllabus that you wrote.

>> Yeah, yes. >> So what was this for? Was this for TV? >> This was before, I mean, maybe even, yeah, this was definitely before TV, the friend who had a site,

I think called the syllabus, or the syllabus project. >> Yeah, that's right. I was asked to write a syllabus of my choosing, and I was like, okay, I'm gonna write a short syllabus of movies

“that I think I called it like the owneric, you know,”

like a film language. >> Yeah. >> And yeah, I would update it if I was writing it now. >> But I mean, I had seen this when I was scanning for a potential gas.

I hadn't looked at it, and so I'm glad she did. >> And looking at this list again now, these were the things I was thinking about, many of the titles I was thinking about, well, watching this, trying to understand,

or kind of plays the entire movie coming in there. >> No, because, oh, this is the point you were making, which I think is correct, which is like, there was a kind of dream logic that existed primarily in the silence in Emma, when it was harder

to tell more conventional narratives, because you didn't have dialogue, and things tend to be more visually expressionistic, and dream-like, and then there was a sort of formalizing, and a normalizing of stories,

that it does feel like picnic at Hanging Rock started to break again, and to like, 'cause you put in here like trip to the moon, cabinet, Dr. Calgari, and Shaandaloo, meshes of the afternoon, like,

there is something very indebted to that era. >> For sure. >> And I think like, the John Vigo movies, which have sound obvious. >> The next movie's ever made.

>> But that's like, people watch those now, and they're like, when the fuck was this made, why this feels so modern, and things start to get more nervous. >> No, it's not like that after that.

>> Golden age of like, cocktail, and all those go as to. >> Yes, but I have three that looking at this movie now, like, I was thinking a lot about Antonioni, right? This is like, love and terror. >> It's love and terror, but more people manage.

>> It's like, love and terror meets the wicker man. >> Which, like, fuck, yeah, totally. >> No, totally, yeah. >> But like, post-Australian accents,

which just like, love and terror will always have black and white,

and Italian, and it's back pocket where you're like, this is classy, where's Australians? You're always like, this is Earthier, 'cause like, the way people talk in Australia just feels different.

>> But I think that's part of the fasting truck's position of this movie, where you're like, oh, it's like, dainty upper class Australian period film. >> Yeah. >> At a time where everything else that coming out

of the Australian new wave was like, Earthy, first and foremost, like, dirty, ragged, there's an oddness to, like, from a distance, is this American Ivory movie, and you're like, no, there's that Australian chaos to it.

Yeah, and like, there's obviously the line from this

to all of Sophia Copa, is so direct and social.

Straight to just like, Virgin Suicide's being her first movie.

>> Oh, sure. >> Feel so iterative of this, but influenced by this and she has cited it as being like a big turning point movie for her, but I also think, Malik is, like, on the same spectrum as this,

and obviously is just a couple years away. >> I thought of Memorial. >> Well, absolutely. >> Yeah, and that's maybe the other best movie I've ever made. >> Yeah. >> Am I crazy?

>> I love Memorial. >> That movie is the best movie ever made. >> Certainly of the decade. >> I should've put it first. >> I should've put it first.

>> Like what was I doing? >> I've shared my fuck up with that movie, right? >> What? >> I went to New York, even worse. I went to see it with an ex-girlfriend at the Almo Draft House.

That is the worst movie to see as a dying in experience. >> God bless, yeah. >> God forbid, an emotionally charged, are we getting back together? >> Crunching by the end of my hair.

>> It was a stick. >> Yeah, it was like a reconnection point that ended with me bad night. >> Everybody made me want to just run into the street. I was so happy, at the ending.

I was, yeah. >> Instead, I was just like very self-conscious about when I took bites of my chicken tenders.

“But this is a weird, this feels like sci-fi, right?”

>> The technique of hanging around. >> The unique, absolutely. >> At moments, it is really flirting with that. >> It was one of the coin brothers movies where you said this David and I thought about a lot,

or it's like-- >> Very point by me. >> Well, wait until the show, what it is. The point was, I'm big and smart. No, the point was, you said something like,

this movie just feels like it has the answers. >> What movie was our favorite? >> I'm trying to remember, it might have been LeBowski's. But these movies that somehow feel like, is the more going on, is it like retaining secrets?

It's not sharing with me. And beyond the fact that this movie is like, completely unsolved. >> Right. >> I think there's something to watching this

where you're like, is this religious? Is this supernatural? Is it existential? Is it all of-- >> Is it like, there's something of like,

like the 60s and the 70s and the 70s and the 70s and the 70s and something of like that generational moment that it's coming to the end of. But there's something really magical to a movie like this where you're like, you watch it and you get the feeling

of confidence that it knows what it's about, but it's just not telling you.

“Versus sometimes, I think, when people try to affect”

the style of a movie like this from the outside in. And you're like, you're just being vague. >> There's the Lynch quote where he says, I wanted it to feel like the answer was like, in the next room over.

>> Yeah, perfect way of saying it. >> Yeah, isn't it crazy though to watch the John Vigo movies all like one and a half of them? >> Yeah. >> And just be like, this was the best I ever got.

>> Like, and I'm not like a pessimistic way, just in a kind of like, oh yeah, this is right.

It was all there pretty early and we've never beaten it.

>> That's how I feel about that. >> I dropped out of film school very quickly, but my favorite teacher in my very short period of time was a guy named Gary Meher's at Cal Arts who before screening us lots a lot said,

if what was his phrasing? It was something, I'll paraphrase it, but it was something to the effect of, if one percent of movies were one percent as good, as lots a lot every year,

we would be living in a perpetual golden age of sentence. >> Yeah, it's crazy. [LAUGH] >> I think it's like, who is, like, and I do feel that relationship

between Laventura and this film, where it's like, it's how I feel about the Blair Witch Project, also, which is like, you weren't, like, let's make a found footage movie, you were like, let's make a movie,

and here's like, like, you invented the language and so. >> Yeah, we've not even totally mentioned it. >> I feel a bit like Elliot Smith songs versus like a, like a litany of like other singer-songwriters who are sort of like occupying a genre.

You know, there's like something like, it was inside him and then everyone else copied it, or something, and yeah, Laventura to picnic and hanging rock, 'cause I feel like I don't watch this movie, and maybe it's just that I know,

we're not gonna get the mystery solve. >> Laventura is like, the essence of that,

like, what if the third act didn't come?

>> Right, yes, right, right. What if it's like, and that's that, and I leave you with your thoughts, like not with the answer or explanation.

“>> Or is this almost feels like it's like playing in that genre?”

>> Like that genre existed for this, this could swim and run and make it a little sci-fi. >> Well, and also that's like, feels like a simulation, so don't you? >> A bit, yeah.

>> Something to the fact that it is so seismic, stylistically, and in terms of what contributes to the modern film language, and yet unlike what you're talking about, someone like Malik or Antonio Ni or Sofia Coppola,

Or Elliot Smith or whoever where you're like,

this is the only way they would know how to make something.

They're not looking to break the form. This is just the purest expression of the way they view the world and their emotional landscape, and all of that. You get into the making of this movie,

and Peter weird, like just breaks it down logically. This is not a style that's really shared by any of his other films. He gets there incrementally,

“in terms of problem solving the best way”

to adapt this novel and serve the material and also make something that is sellable, and ends up sort of like bumbling into this. Right, it's like the guy who creates silly putty wall trying to remove wall paper

or whatever. >> Yeah, where which project is actually, it is a great comparison to this movie, also because it is another movie

that you watch where you're like,

this isn't real, right? 'Cause my wife was like, is this based on a true story and I'm like, no, people didn't vanish in the mystical way, but you watch it and you're like,

this is a real thing that happened in Australian history. >> It feels weirdly real and there also was the cultural reputation that preceded this movie of the book being framed almost as like a mini-fargo is this real, right?

>> Like what inspired this? >> Right, how clear which is the best. How do we, I guess we would do the series on Patreon?

“>> Yeah, that's what we've talked about.”

>> So we're going to move you to talk over. >> But yeah, anyway, I could do that. >> You're like, watch, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah. >> All right, we're not doing my watch. >> I still hate this scariest stuff in Blair Witches

at the beginning.

I don't, or maybe I, that's crazy,

but I do, I love that movie. It's incredible. (upbeat music) >> Say I'm gonna ask you about the story, or this school of blacksmith,

just like some rats, and then I hope that it's stimmt. >> Paul, no, I can't. Like this story is so my safe space. >> Mm, do you know what it's all about?

>> Yeah, yeah, no. >> Because story is so deep story app that I just understand. Egalobstudium, job, or unzug. >> Custom.

>> Cras. >> I feel like I don't have a story on it. >> Story on a ledic. >> Save. >> With this story, yeah.

>> I'm going to open the dossier about Payton King and hanging rock. Lady Joan Lindsay wrote this book. She was a painter. She studied art at the National Gallery of Victoria Art School

in Melbourne. She wrote unpublished plays, and then she wrote a debut novel under a pseudonym, and didn't, and this is all in like the 20s and 30s, and didn't become successful until she was in her 60s

and 70s. She wrote a book called Time without clocks. Sounds cool. Facts soft and hard. I assume nobody has read these books.

>> Say that last time. >> Facts soft and hard. >> CTS. >> It sounded like you were saying Facts like Facts Domino. >> Facts Domino fast.

>> Domino's. >> No, I don't know what those books are about, but those came before 1967's picnic at hanging rock. She was labeled a bit of a mystic by her friends, sort of said that she could see things others couldn't.

New things that up being told could tell what had happened in the past, I mean, what? Apparently this is what her friend said about her. Time without clocks refers to the fact that she could sort of stop clocks and watches in her presence.

I mean, cool. And I mean, she sounds cool. >> Yeah, get her on the pod, guys. >> Yeah, she might be very dead, but maybe we can come, you know, someone her from another time.

>> I think she can summon it to her. >> And also, she probably likes lead with her own. >> Now, hanging rock is a real place. She'd had a weird dream about a picnic there. She knew this place well from her childhood holidays,

and she wakes up from this dream, and she can feel the breeze blowing through the trees and hear the laughter and like, she starts writing and wrote this in 10 days supposedly. >> Yes, enough. >> As though the zest correct.

>> Now, the novel opens with whether picnic at hanging rock is factor fiction, my readers must decide for themselves. As the faithful picnic took place in the year 1900, and all the characters who appear in this book are longs instead, it hardly seems important.

And the book was warmly received, but much like the opening of Fargo, it like sparked a bunch

“of fucking conversation of is she trying to convince us this is real?”

Is this a con? Is this like a scandal that's been covered up, et cetera? >> Now, here is a painting called "At Hanging Rock" by William Ford that inspired her. >> As well, as well.

>> Exactly, and indeed, as you point out, she kind of does the Fargo thing of like, is it true or not? So her true is different, that's how she puts it.

So, you know, the Peter Weir had made home-stale, right,

Griff, which is like-- >> Yes.

“>> Is it a short film or is like a TV movie?”

It's like 50 minutes long. >> Yeah, he made a couple of 50 minutes guys. I haven't seen home-stale yet. I watched his section called "Michael of an Omni-Boss" about young people in Australia.

>> Okay. >> That's very good. But home-stale is seemingly the one that got him on the map. >> And it was the movie that attracted the attention of Pat level who was like an Australian sort of show-busy person.

She was like a TV person. >> Yeah, and she kind of takes the book to Peter. He was writing cars that he Paris, right, so he hadn't, you know, even started working on that. And she leaves the book with him.

He reads it late into the night, can't put it down. He loved that it was open-ended. Like, he's basically reading the book being like, "They better not solve this and then they don't." >> But quote, I heard it's not Sherlock Holmes.

>> We always thought about Hitchcock saying

that a mystery was the hardest kind of story to crack. But in his experiences of viewer, he always felt disappointed when mysteries had to solve themselves. >> Well, because Sherlock Holmes, it is annoying. >> When he's like, actually, it was a robot, you know,

and then-- >> Sometimes it's awesome. Sometimes it's awesome.

“>> Yeah, excuse me, David, if Sherlock Holmes said,”

it was a robot, that would be awesome. >> I know none of the basketballs was a big fucking robot. >> That would be cool. No, but it's very hard to make the ending that is more satisfying than the anticipation and the mystery,

which I think what he was saying, that often it feels like, yeah, even if an ending is like surprising or catchy, that it still isn't as exciting as the tension at the center. >> Right, right, I felt about weapons.

>> Interesting? >> I mean, yes, I mean, you know, I was like, you know, I hope I don't find out where these kids went, then they were like, it was a witch. >> It was a witch?

>> It was a witch. >> It's a witch, it's a specific thing, and it's a very common stuff. >> She did some very specific things. >> She had a very particular set of skulls. >> She did.

>> Tangling here around a stick. >> Yeah. >> Cutting waters involved. >> A bowl of water. >> Yeah.

>> But yes, he read this and was like, I fucking love that this just doesn't have an ending. >> Yes. >> That it doesn't solve it. That's my perfect kind of mystery movie.

>> He meets with her, because he has to be approved by her to make the movie. They meet, and at a certain point he says, forgive me, but can I ask you, I'm not supposed to ask you this, but is it true?

>> Oh, you looked in the novelist. >> In the novelist. >> He asks the novelist. >> Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. >> He was, in fact, specifically,

he was told to go into the meeting,

“the only thing we forbid you from doing is asking her”

if it's real. And she said, I really don't want to discuss that, please don't ask again. >> Wow. But then she also said, she still was into it.

She was like, you can make the movie. >> I believe she says something to him to the effect of, it feels true to me in a way. And that his interpretation of it was, this is in some way in conversation,

with some experience she had that she would not share. Obviously, it is set in a time she didn't, you know, it would not have lived through in that way, but it felt like in the same way that it came out of a dream,

it was some processing of something that she had deeply repressed,

which is why she was so non-committal always.

And it was sort of a warped interpretation. >> And then for us watching the movie, like watching someone else doing their best to like honor that experience that someone else had. >> That's interesting.

>> Yes, and he also asked her, he said, you don't need to explain to me, can you tell me, is there definitive answer in your mind? And she said, yes. >> Wow.

>> Right, said portal. >> He was like, do they mention-- >> I mentioned I said, the fucking dimension or the alien, something supernatural happened, whatever. And she goes, I know what it is.

>> Yeah, Thanos. >> Which is kind of what he needed to know, even if he didn't need to be told. >> Right, he needed that mood to exist in some way. >> Yes.

>> He's recommended David Williamson in Australian playwright to write the book. It doesn't happen, but that guy does end up writing Galipoli and you're if a living danger. So he's going to do a work together.

But he suggests a guy called Cliff Green, who wrote the screenplay, who said the whole thing was a magical experience. This is what I like about him. This is the quote I like, JJ highlighted.

The first 20 minutes of the film were easy to write

because it's straight line chronologically. But the moment when Edith comes screaming down the hill, becomes a more complex story. So much of it is atmosphere and setting. It's really a book about the atmosphere of Australia.

Love that that's, again, that this guy just reads the book and gets it that I'm not being asked to make this more linear, or make this more about something in a way that a movie needs to be about something in our name. >> It could be so easy to read this book and be like,

okay, but it can't just be about the atmosphere of Australia, whatever that fucking means, it's got to be more about like, no, and then a bunch of guys came with metal detectors and wave them around hanging rock and then a bunch of spiritualists

Came, or whatever that, I mean, there was a TV mini series

version of this series, I kind of wanted to watch.

“>> What was that like, I mean, I don't know,”

what does that do to the story, if it was a musical that has been like, it just finished a run here in New York. I was trying to get to it. >> But it's been like 15 years of redevelopment, this is a story that people keep coming back to.

I just want to throw out a little bit and just move back one step for one second. The bizarreness of this project coming together in the way that it did. Patricia Lovell, the person you mentioned

who reached out to where after seeing his short film, was like, as a bad analog, like the Kelly Rippa of Australia. Like someone who had started in radio and then was like a children's TV presenter and then was like a morning television person.

And like, did not have a footing in film reads this book, decides, I should option this and I've seen the short film. >> And I guess I shouldn't hate a feature yet. And I'm going to reach out to where Peter Rears like, when I got the call, it didn't even fucking make sense.

What was being presented to me? Why she was the person, why she would believe in me. And then when she brings him to meet with John Lindsay, he and John Lindsay hit it off immediately. And she was by all accounts a very kind of tough guarded customer.

And everyone's just like, this feels like the right accommodation of people even though it belies any sort of traditional thinking. >> They could barely subscribe to the other budget. Obviously, they're promising to make a movie with no resolution.

It's not an easy sell. The book had was at least famous in some way. They get 220,000 pounds is how he puts it by 440,000 Australian dollars. You know, their money is laminated.

Yeah, it's like plastic because they all go in the beach. They all go in the water. Australian ticket gets so mad at me on this mini series. Because all everything I know about Australia is from uninformed opinions that British people had that I learned what I lived in Britain and blew me.

>> And like I'm like, I'm like, and blew me presents a very YouTube movie. >> We make you present there the best of us. >> Right. >> And I have noticed any time we talk about Australia on this podcast, your British upbringing comes in the place where you're like,

they're very, you know, they look down on me. >> But you describe them like they're a bunch of looney tunes.

“>> That's how what British people talk about.”

>> It's like British people are English people, I should say. Because it's not British people.

English people are basically like Scottish people are like drunk madmen.

Welsh people are like simple tunes. Australiaians are just like raving criminals living in this like semi-lawless lands. >> You make side swipe comments as if. >> It's so much under their mouth. >> It's toned down from the every day when you watch a modern atmosphere.

>> You're like, oh, what a fine place this is. >> They solved emotionally telepens, are they the ones. The McElroy brothers, my brother, my brother and Peter Wier. Hal and Jim McElroy who produced this and also produced cars that ate Paris. And later produces, it produced the last wave.

They said they were having such a hard time getting cars that ate Paris off the ground. They knew how difficult it was for that movie not having a clean hook and a weird title. And like a murky plot that one of the strategic decisions they make is we're already thinking about how to sell this movie that's not going to satisfy an eventual mystery way. Let's make the girls who disappear as like ethereal and poetic and enticing as possible.

Just so we can put them at the center of the poster, but so that the tensioner of the movie comes from the rug pull of oh shit they're gone, right. >> Right. >> Right. >> Right.

>> Right. >> It's really cool into these girls. >> Right.

A psycho framing that they pitched to Wier and he's on board with, like, how do we make the first

30 minutes so intoxicating and even just the visual language of this fucking pan. >> He's girls and they're flowing white dresses in front of the poster with these extremely color scheme and then we're going to freak you out.

“>> And I think that on rewatch, a thing that I kind of like vaguely remembered being left”

with, I think this movie maybe peaks in those first 30 minutes for me, it is, there's nothing like it. >> That's the thing. >> I don't know if you can sustain that mood. >> Yeah.

No, 100%. >> Right. So it's sort of unavoidable. >> Yeah. >> But you are a little bit like taking me back, you know, when it's right.

I just, it isn't movie where I'm like, I'm not sure I care who's sleeping with each other or who's having a conversation right now. >> Mm-hm. >> But that's not true because I love the movie. You know, of course I do.

You know what I like? I want to go to the movie. >> I love the movie. >> Yes.

>> And those first 30 minutes are like, that's the thing that if you don't watch it for

four years, you're like, yeah, you're falling on. >> But it's also why her screaming is so upsetting, even though nothing, you know, violent

Happens and nothing, you know, nothing really at all happens, but it's like G...

screaming in Twin Peaks. >> Yeah. >> And of course, has discussed on the show with us, where you're just like, "Jesus, why is she making that?" No, I don't know.

“Like, it snaps you out of the reverie in a really disturbing way what?”

>> I know. I also forget which ones were which and hopefully JJ has which. >> Which one was this? >> Which one was this? >> No.

>> Okay. >> I see women as different people. >> No. >> I think I could not, you know, they're like, there are some characters at the picnic.

You know, you're like, "Oh, glasses girl, but..." >> Yes. >> No, what I was going to say, "Where is Jackie Jackie?" >> Jackie is the first. >> Jackie, we just...

>> Yeah. >> She's not one of the girls. >> Oh, wow. >> She's the maid getting a little something on the show. >> Oh, sure, sure, sure.

Yeah. >> But it is, she is one of those people where, you know, Jackie, we've heard in the present tense. >> Sure. >> Right.

>> Reintroduced as like... >> Yeah, you don't mean that. >> Yeah. >> You don't mean that. >> Right.

Kind of like one of the weirdest two-time opera nines. Oh, rules. But like, she's in this. She has a run of Australian work. That she kind of like disappears from Australian film for a long time.

>> What's the second non-form?

>> What was the next playbook? >> Right. >> She's like, "I'll fucking have you." >> Yeah. >> What was she like in that one?

>> Yeah, that's the one. >> Yeah, that's the one. >> She said, "Go Eagles." "I'll fucking have you have Eagles." >> Yeah.

>> What? >> What? What? >> What? >> What?

What? What I was going to say. >> I'm just pissing off Philadelphia's too, now. >> Yes.

“I think five-year engagement is the movie she makes right after getting the animal kingdom nomination.”

>> Yeah. >> That was her first Hollywood film ever. >> Right. >> Right. >> And even before animal kingdom, she hadn't done a movie and like a decade had mostly been doing theater.

>> Sure. >> Like she's in the most iconic Australian film in a supporting part. And then even so has this drips and drabs career doesn't even become like Australian character royalty until decades later. >> And you see her, you hear that she was in picnic at Hanging Rock. And you just looking at her face present there, like, it's going to be so hard to pick out who she is.

Because there's no way she looked like this when she was alive. >> I think I even like Google, like totally what character she plays and then was like, "Well, you're not Sarah. You're not Sarah." >> Right. >> Who fucking knows?

>> You're not Irma. >> Irma. >> Irma. >> Have you seen fear listing the Peter Weird movie with Jeff Bridges? >> No.

>> It is another movie where I think the whole thing is very good. And the first 30 minutes feel transcendent. >> That's true. >> He's similarly dreamlike. I mean, not similar to this, but just, you know, just in a few key kind of say.

>> He's come to replicating this style and has a similar like, well, >> Yeah, movie rocks. >> Reality, it's a splash water in your face. This tone can contain forever. And it is one of these movies where you're like, it's not like the movie falls off a cliff after the first 30 minutes.

But the first 30 minutes are just activating something that is, like, yeah, it's thrilling. It's a miracle. It still feels.

>> It's funny that we're saying that, right, the, oh, no, he never really replicated this tone again.

And I'm like, no, you're right about fear. Listen, like, the Truman show is like that. >> This show, especially before the show has a similar kind of structure of life. >> Right.

“>> 40 minutes of, like, what is this for your transmission from space?”

>> Yes. >> And the reason I was thinking about Dead Poets Society is because I imagine, like, the big difference is that, like, this doesn't have, like, characters like that movie has maybe. >> No, but, but also, but it certainly has this, like, boarding school.

>> Yeah, that's the question. >> Right. >> Yeah. >> You watch Dead Poets Society now and you're like, that's even Hawke, that's Robert Hunter and Leonard, but, like, I don't know if you felt that way as much when that movie came out.

There was a bunch of boys. >> Part of those guys, but coming those guys was that movie takes its time to, like, sell you on each of those guys individually versus the inverse of this, which is, like, we need to sell you on a vibe and an energy of what these girls represent. >> Right.

>> That is enjoyable for you to watch because we don't have time to build them individually as characters. >> Don't have time. Like, I feel like the movie is disinterested in, like, it's just kind of nasty. >> It's always true. >> And, like, even, like, those men, like, the school mistress and then at the end of the movie,

when you just, like, find out in quick succession that, like, the two main characters left, like, die. >> Yes. >> Very, it's like, it's not logical. It's not emotionally logical or it's clear that it's, like, clearing space to do something else. >> Yeah.

>> So, when they're, like, an everyone died, I'm like, yes, right.

I suppose you would never get over this experience.

>> Everything's on. >> Right. >> Already at this point. When you were saying, like, I don't really care about the conversations towards the end of, who's sleeping with who, when it gets into the, this,

>> Don't be a hate gossip. >> You hate gossip. >> This movie is in that, like, somewhat limited canon of, decade plus, later, director's cuts that take footage out. >> Interesting.

>> It trimmed it down about 10 minutes.

>> It is hard to find out the theatrical version now.

“Like, the criterion has always only put out the director's cut, which is about 10 minutes shorter.”

And the ten minutes that are cut out are mostly in the last 30 minutes of the film. >> Mm-hm. >> And are kind of shoe leather stuff. >> Yeah. >> It's, like, more stuff with the coachman and shit.

And none of it's bad, but it does feel interesting that he makes this film in 1975, and then in, like, 97 or 98, he's, like, in decades of rewatching this film as part of retrospectives. Maybe we just get to the end faster.

>> Maybe past the first act I could have taken this up.

>> Right. >> Well, because it's, like, it's such a spell for those first 30 minutes. >> Yeah. >> And then it's not exactly that the spell is lifted. It's more that, like, this spell just has this, like, slow, like, denue mom.

>> Yes. >> Yeah. >> Just give you a little more context on the film. >> Yeah. >> Obviously, money comes from Australia Film Development Corporation in South Australia.

You know, like, government money. >> Mm-hm. >> But he says, like, the Australian with New Wave is basically happening, concurrently with, indeed, dramas being made in Australia. If that makes, he's, like, the people came first then came the money.

>> Mm-hm. >> Like, I feel like the country starts to get aware of, like, oh, there's something artistically happening here with Australian film that is brand new. And we can give a little money to him, not, like, a ton of money to it. We recalls it kind of, like, this sort of hippie hang, you know, like post hippie.

>> Yes. >> Kind of thing is, you know, like, these people, the flower children, the antiwar movement, are now kind of just rabbling around, getting a little older, and some of them are starting to make movies. >> It's similar to what, like, easy rider kick started over, and Hollywood.

And he said, like, that's, they wanted to put the money into that. To angry young person movies, character studies, things that were kind of, like, sexually charged social comedies. And when they were pitching this movie, even though the book was successful,

“people were like, who the fuck wants to watch a period piece?”

That, that they were facing so much opposition to, like, that's not what's going on in the culture right now. And that he was so frustrated that there was this limiting in a, like,

film market, a film scene that had finally, like, opened up.

And they were already trying to pigeonhole it to. This is the only thing we export. And that after picnic at hanging rock, people were angry that he was making the last wave, and that he wasn't sticking with period films. Because picnic had such a big impact that everyone flipped the other way.

>> Wears take is that the rock literally opened up and swallowed them, by the way. >> Wow, he's got a, he's got a. >> Because he says, over the years he talked with her a lot, over, you know, as after she, he makes the movies, she sort of trusts him more, where she's, like, basically, like, if course she made it up,

it's like there's some, the rock opened up and swallowed him. >> Just what, just what, the rock people. >> It's not on the other. >> Right. >> Yeah.

>> So we're gonna hang in rock more, like, hungry rock. >> Hungry rock. >> And like, then eventually, at one point, he's like, did a UFO get them and she's like, maybe, and he's like, all right, you're too much, like, and then she dies,

but then Peter Weir is like, he's like, I just had to have an answer in my head. And I'm just excited that they just got swallowed by essentially the Earth. >> I love that. >> Right. >> But I don't know.

>> And he also was basically, like, she was kind of shocked by the movie

when she saw it for the first time and said, like, he kind of changed the tone. And I didn't really write it with that kind of feeling, which is interesting to think about, but like, you know, what, what she was imagining versus this sort of dreamy thing that she's seeing. >> Yeah.

>> But they were friends for life. But that's part of the, this is a dream that felt really real to her. >> Totally. >> You know, she doesn't need that translation in tone to sell the laps in logic because it makes emotional sense to her, which is the part that I think made.

Him, we are feel like this was in conversation with something real. She had experience. >> Some emotional truth. >> Yes, right. >> Peter Weir is like, obviously a bunch of girls didn't just vanish.

That would be in the news, even in 1900. And there's no evidence that that happened.

“>> But that's what I think he was smart about talking about him, kind of”

landing on the style pragmatically is like, she thinks of this, like, it's the French connection. And if I present this as the French connection, people are going to ask 8,000 questions. What do you mean, where did they go?

If it feels unreal from the beginning, that's part of the juice. He also said that when he went to the real location, once he had signed on to make the film, he was like, oh fuck. >> Everyone's like in energy. >> Everyone, when they shot there said, like, it was Spooky's helmet hated it.

>> When you see it in the movie, no offense. I was like, that's hangin' rock. >> It's all that good. >> It's just, it's like, there's like going on this long trip to hangin' rock.

>> Yeah. >> Extremely sucks guys. >> No, I'm kidding.

I'm totally kidding.

It seems to rock. They get these girls mostly from Adelaide from fancy schools. He basically realized, as they looked at lots of girls, but they realized, like, no, we need kind of like posh private school girls who are 16 years old.

>> Oh, this was the thing I was gonna say. >> What?

>> Before I lost my point, a thing that has never happened

before in the history of this podcast, that they dubbed over a majority of the school girls. >> Mm-hm. >> Because for him, he was like, I'm ready to cast two different parts. >> The look and the energy is so important.

>> It's so important. >> Yeah. >> I will cast based on that, even if they can't deliver lines, and there's a lot of them. >> And get voice over actors to like sell the line delivery later,

because it's not like they have that much dialogue. >> Well, it seems it's one of the things that I love about the first 30 minutes of the movie is, and the quality continues on, but this, that painterly quality, where it's like,

you're almost looking at these wide shots that look like these old, these old like impressionist paintings, you know, like these like groups of girls in nature. >> Yeah. >> And like literally holding fabrics over the lens

to make things feel more, not synthetic, but like, pointedly artificial. >> Yeah. >> And unreal. >> Yeah.

>> I'm just going to keep using the word unreal. This movie was made using Unreal Engine, right? This was the original. >> Mm-hm. >> It's actually an unreal tournament.

>> Mm-hm. >> Yeah. >> But like, the way the producers and we were just, you know, it's like, they were a bunch of historical teenage girls.

“Like in the best way, like they just had the right energy.”

Once you got them all together,

most of them never act again.

>> Yeah. >> One of them has a story about like the author seeing her and calling her Miranda and being like, it's been so long. Everyone seems a little high on like how insane it was

to make this movie and how it felt like it was real. Do you know what I mean? >> Mm-hm. >> Like, and I'm not being dismissive of this. >> I was going to say, I love your dance between

loving movies more than anything. >> I love it. >> And sometimes you read shit like this and you're like, fuck and get over your ass. >> So what?

You made a 10 out of 10 masterpiece. >> No, it's gone. >> It's not that. It's more just like you're telling this anecdote of like, the author was looking at me with shimmering eyes.

Addressing me as this long-loss girl in her past or whatever. And like that was obviously very meaningful. But it does feel like everyone got kind of like intoxicated by, like being in this location, being in these costumes. >> It's cool.

>> You make movies. >> I make movies. >> You make great movies. >> That's exactly how it feels. >> It's kind of needed too.

If you're going to make a fucking movie, you need to be like-- >> It gets very tarot cardy. It gets very like, whoa, this must be cosmic. >> It's so funny how people only talk about movies like that.

Right? Where it's like, yeah, we kind of got like-- >> Something's happening. >> Something's happening. >> Or they were like, yeah,

making that sex scene was really weird. They had to put baby powder on me. >> Right. >> Every take and like every setup is really bored.

“>> You know where you're like, wasn't it awesome to do this thing?”

Of like, no, boring and technically. >> It doesn't sound like that. >> It doesn't sound like that. >> It's like there is, there is the like, like the marvel, like the Robert Downey,

Jr. Land. >> Oh, I'm making a movie. >> Oh, I'm making a movie. >> You know, there's the like, all right, we're, you know,

call me out when you're ready for me. >> You have a trailer in land, right? >> Yeah. >> The Jane Land is just a big box of jelly beans. >> You're inside the box.

>> Like it's a fucking box. >> Yeah. >> But then like, if you're, yeah, the other option for making a movie is that, like, you care a lot,

and everyone is not sleeping, and you enter a state that's like, one step below war level psychosis. And by the end of that, yeah, you're going to be like that fucking rock.

>> I mean, I, I guess it was because I was, I was digging this movie, and then the surrounding stuff, but I ended up watching last night, a peak pandemic, zoom, 20 year reunion of the Virgin Suicide's cast.

>> Sure. >> Okay. >> Heartnut. >> Heartnut. >> Donst.

>> Donst. >> And the other daughters, most of whom. >> Right, didn't really. >> Right.

>> One of them was young Jenny and Forescum, but that was kind of her last major major role. >> Isn't one of them AJ Cook? >> Yes. >> Who knows, like, the criminal mind's girl,

for the next, she's still on that show. >> Yes, because I watched it. Fucking final destination two, and I was like, what happened to this person? She's really good.

And you're like, oh, she made $47 trillion on $800. >> She's been on criminal mind since I started college, and I'm 40 years old.

>> Here's what's so crazy about this.

If I can go off for half a second here. She joins, like, four or five seasons in, and you're like, oh, late. She only did 600 episodes of criminal mind.

“She's now on a criminal mind's spin-off, I believe.”

>> No, you are incorrect. Criminal mind has merely been retitled criminal mind's evolution. >> Insane. >> Yes. >> Okay, and the other thing that happened is at one point.

>> One point, by the way.

>> Because criminal mind's went off the air for two whole years,

and CBS was just like, need it back! >> Yeah. >> So they just brought back the same cast, Montana's back. AJ Cook is back.

They called it criminal mind's evolution, I guess, to distinguish just something that happened. >> Well, also something that happened. >> Because Charmander used to be on the show. >> Right, now he's terminally.

>> Yeah. But they at one point kicked her off the show, because they were like, I got to tighten the budget. >> Yes, they kicked her off. >> And fans protested so much they brought her back, and she even still, you're like,

she joined late, she was kicked off the show died, and yet she's been doing it for--

“>> Why are you bringing up the urgency as I'd assume?”

I'm sorry, what was this original? >> They were talking about how, like, for, like, danced and cartonit, they had done other things, but those things felt way more traditional up until that point, and this was the first kind of, like, cool artsy movie

they had worked on, and the rest of the group were either, like, non-actors or actors who were kind of at the beginning of their career. >> Right, well, James Wood. >> The young cast.

>> Yeah, sir.

>> And they were all, like, it was kind of incredible

how well you established an energy, right? Like, not in a woo-woo way, but you created this feeling of, like, we're all this together. This is the vibe, it is safe, it is protected, it is experimental.

>> It's such a huge part of, like, because it's, you know, it's like circus shit. >> Right. >> And, like, it's not just, like, for the viewers at home. >> Yeah.

>> It's, like, if you, you got to, you know, we talked about portals a lot on this new movie. >> Cool. >> It's just, like, we're going through a portal, guys. Welcome to the portal.

>> Right. >> And the other side of the portal now, and, you know, everyone is so sleep deprived and also, like, in a manic state of something that, like, people are ready to buy into that.

>> I feel like Paul Tomsey Anderson always talks about time travel,

“that, that, like, that's what he's trying to push everyone through.”

>> Yeah. >> And, even less, like, because he's not literally depicting periods in a very accurate way, most of the time, it's, like, the feeling of that. But, but it is, like, there are things that are just

feel, like, the technical work, and still through everyone being on the same page, they have a consistent energy to them. But, this is a movie where, as much as it doesn't feel, like, we're trying to design that by purpose,

everyone was kind of in this suspended state the whole time. There's a thing, like, uncanny in both, in the energy, yes. And then, part of that is Rachel Roberts, who we can talk about how she got involved in this.

But, like, seemingly was a, Jean Hackman and Royal Tanabam's S. Terror, to this young cast and this young director, in a way that, like, only helped the movie. >> She's an Oscar nominee from the sporting life,

and they structure everything around. It was going to be this actress Vivian Merchant. She was the original actress from Alphazard. >> She's the, like, the woman, the boarding school. >> Yes, the, yes. >> The mean woman. >> Miss, Miss, this is Alphazard.

>> Yes. >> And Vivian gets ill. >> What's can't come to Australia?

“>> She's a British actor. >> Was married to her old painter?”

>> And famously, super chill guy. >> And we're, what's like, the way she would perform his material is what I was looking for in the intensive, in the sharpness. Getsill, they lose her, like, 10 days before she's supposed to arrive in Australia. They have to find someone in less than 24 hours,

basically, to get them on a plane. Rachel Roberts says, yes, immediately.

But also says, I won't, arrives and says, I won't wear her wig. >> Correct. >> Courageous fare. >> Right. She said there's a supernatural kind of, like, a tradition in the British theatre, that if you wear a wig designed for another actor, your production is cursed. >> Yes. >> And Peter we are, like, well, we're in Australia,

and this is a movie. So maybe that doesn't count. And they were, like, she was so fucking strong headed about it. And beyond that, shows up in Australia with her own wig, which is the wig she wears in the movie, and everyone's like, well, we hate that. >> I'm, I'm team her on this.

>> I agree. >> She's right. >> But they all talk about being, like, and she's also just, like, I'm fucking with their, you know, best laid plans, and then you get this, this time she's pulling rank. >> Come on.

>> That was the role thing, but, like, how much of this is pulling rank versus, much of this, is she's on her own wigs and wigs. >> Well, let's say you're doing a movie. >> Uh-huh. >> Let's say, Thomas Middleton.

>> Okay. >> Good job, Casnec. >> Thanks for going good. >> Yeah. >> And he's got his own wig.

>> Yeah. >> Probably does. >> Then they hired you. >> Yeah. >> 'Cause he drops out last minute.

>> Yeah. >> I would ask, would you wear that wig? >> I first, I would ask, did you ever wear this wig in his personal life? I would wear this wig in his personal life.

>> I would wear this wig in his personal life. I would wear this wig in his personal life. I would wear this wig in his personal life.