Shownotes
The Invitation (2015) is the third installment of our Dinner Party Series. We've had murder, the multiverse, and it's time for a cult! The similarities are starting to show, and we take a hard look at the similarities between these dinner parties and our protagonists' character arcs.
Show Notes/Timestamps
0:00 New stuff we watched this week
12:04 Intro The Invitation / Dinner Party Movie
14:27 The Invitation Summery
17:58 Trivia
19:12 Discussion
49:00 Comparisons
56:43 Next Time: Silent Night (2021)
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Dinner Party Movie - The Invitation
[:[00:00:09] Frank Roll: Blockbuster, Hollywood and the independent video store
[:Does this hold up? And just, what the hell is a good movie? Anyway, I'm Frank Roll. I'm Scott Moran and we are the
[:[00:00:30] Scott Moran: what
[:[00:00:34] Scott Moran: flat? No, the lumbars fine. Okay, cool. I took that, uh, Stupid massager thing out of it though. .
[:[00:00:43] Scott Moran: try it.
I tried it. It just vibrated. And I was like, well, I guess if I could have an ORs. Well, I think Olympia
[:[00:00:47] Scott Moran: And she was like, what's the, and I was like, I just didn't, yeah, she didn't give her an orgasm either. Definitely not. I don't even know if she did try it. That's my four stars. didn't make me come. .
[:So
[:Uh, what else did you watch? That was the big thing I wanna say. Oh, no. We watched the resort on Peacock. Yes. Six or eight episode miniseries. It's fucking amazing. Who's in that one? It is, uh, I forget her name every time she was the mother in How I met your mother. She was in Palm Springs with Andy Sandberg, the main chick?
Yeah. Oh, I forget her name. She was in Maid for Love. Yeah. I keep looking it up and forgetting. Christian Malloy. Maybe the main chick. I don't know. Yes, the Kristen. Kristen Maloney. The main, the main character. Yeah. And then the guy who played Cheaty in, uh, you're gonna name in the good. Oh, okay. The other main dude, the philosopher,
[:Direction.
[:Yeah. Fuck man. And then they're like, oh, not tonight. Yeah, cuz Dark was one of the best things ever. And that's the show by the creator of Dark. But it's in like six languages. Cause it's a boat full of people from different places. It's like a Bermuda Triangle thing. Mm. But apparently the episodes are like lost.
Like it shows the backstory of each. Character in each episode, same formula. So yeah, there's
[:[00:02:51] Scott Moran: with them. Yeah, I'm real excited about it. Yeah. I'm not expecting it to be dark, but I expect it to be cool. You
[:It was just like, blah, blah blank, blah blah, blank, blank blank. blankety, fucking blank, blank , little dash of blank. Finish it off. You know what I'm saying? Um, no. . Anything else? That was
[:[00:03:23] Frank Roll: I was sleepy getting over the cold, you know, clearing.
So in my head. So your whole life. Yeah. Yeah. Sick all the time. Now . Um, no. I watched, so there's, there was a, that documentary on Netflix called Filthy Rich Jeffrey Epstein, and it was that whole thing.
[:[00:03:44] Frank Roll: It's not just, I wanna say that too. G Galen.
[:Maxwell. I like the way
[:[00:04:08] Scott Moran: guilty. I think when that happened I was like, I'm tired.
So they,
[:[00:04:29] Scott Moran: Man, you're just like documentary.
Documentary. Yeah.
[:Everybody that worked for him was a volunteer, but this Swedish reporter like reached out to him randomly and was like, Hey, I'd like to film you for a story. And he was like, get, you know, buckle up, let's do this. She goes out on the sub with him after documenting for a while, disappears. He comes back, he's like the sub flooded.
Oh, he's like the sub flooded. But then it just gets, it's all over the
[:[00:05:14] Frank Roll: I mean, I'm not gonna say
[:[00:05:20] Frank Roll: say I was not disappointed. I was not disappointed at all.
[:The whole time. It's crazy.
[:[00:05:51] Scott Moran: developing and developing. Yeah. And so Errol Morris, who wrote the book in the seventies, he's being interviewed for the documentary. It's not even him making it, and it's just about how like, he was like, well, this is what I thought then, but now it's crazy.
So that was very satisfying to carry on because it was like a, what happened? Well,
[:[00:06:27] Scott Moran: long.
Yeah, that's how the vow was like you could make the same documentary series as the Vow five episodes. , how many was
[:[00:06:38] Scott Moran: It was two seasons. So like from, and that was the one
[:[00:06:42] Scott Moran: B O Max. Yeah. And the problem is there. Following it as it goes. So like last season was coming out, he had just been arrested, so it was like up to that.
That's right.
[:[00:07:01] Scott Moran: I don't know. Not at my door. I got cameras and shit. . I'm crazy.
[:Might
[:[00:07:17] Frank Roll: Just Lane. J. Lane. That one could have been shorter. The vow. I didn't realize it went like that, but the Elizabeth Smart one,
[:[00:07:31] Frank Roll: Well, the, by the time the Elizabeth Smart one came out on H B O Max in real time, they were just kind of starting the trial.
[:[00:07:39] Frank Roll: fine. So they didn't really know where they were gonna be at when that one wrapped up.
[:[00:07:47] Frank Roll: guy? Yeah. No, I didn't watch that one.
[:Started airing before his trial, but it goes right up to a aha moment.
[:[00:08:06] Scott Moran: and it's a lot more interesting, especially cuz the only reason he let anyone film him in the first place was because they made that movie all good things about him, that ma and then cast Ryan Gosling as him way to butter him up.
Wait, that was about him?
[:[00:08:25] Scott Moran: him. Well, if you want the, the, the real nitty gritty of it, that's the same. Crazy. It's the same guy. Well, that's the thing is he's so weird that you're kind of like, you're like, I don't want him to have done it.
You know? He's like a weird little man with beaty, little bird eyes, , and by all measure of people I like, I shouldn't think he's, wait,
[:[00:08:47] Scott Moran: Oh, that's what I'm talking
[:[00:08:50] Scott Moran: started the jinx. The jinx is my jam. It was good.
I didn't get finished. I didn't
[:[00:09:01] Scott Moran: So yeah, it's, yeah. Sometimes things happen. I've been realizing that shows I abandoned throughout my life. It was because drastic life changes happen in the middle of them.
And I just was like, not going back to that , I gotta leave it behind baby.
[:[00:09:17] Scott Moran: documentary Wednesday definitely contributed to it, but for some reason I was like, I wanna watch the Adams family. And I don't know why in my head it feels like a Christmas movie. And then I started it and there's people caroling in the first scene and they pour that Oh yeah.
Cauldron on the guitar. Yeah. Or whatever it was, whatever it was, where that goes in and it's the credits of the smoke and everything like that. Long credit sequence. Like it's just smoke. I forgot about that. But anyway, I thought it was a Christmas movie in my head for some reason. Like I like it doesn't look almost like the
[:Oh it is. That they used for men
[:[00:10:01] Frank Roll: It's weird how things fall into place like that.
They were
[:[00:10:12] Frank Roll: I want to check it out. I wanna watch
[:[00:10:18] Frank Roll: behind scenes stuff on
[:I don't have anything against Gomez Adams in the Wednesday series or like who they cast as anyone really. They're Girlz. Great. Louis Guzman, uh, Fred Armon plays Uncle Fester. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah. Damn. Damn. I should have just let you fucking stumble into that one. , you would've been stoked. That's crazy.
And
[:[00:10:41] Scott Moran: Catherine Zeta Jones.
[:[00:10:55] Scott Moran: for a second.
I was like, that's all I watched. But, I took down two TV series. I No, that's good. I nailed it. That's good. The resort, though, I can't say enough good things about it. That was a real bounce back and forth thing. But, uh, the resort is like, it's this couple that goes on vacation for, uh, their 10th anniversary and they've like lost a child.
The wife like, kind of goes manic and she finds this cell phone and it ends up being this kid who disappeared 15 years ago. Oh. But dude, it gets fucking crazy. It's so nuts. It was really, I, I can't recommend it enough. Limited series. And what's it on? Peacock. Peacock. It's a peacock original. Peacock
[:[00:11:45] Scott Moran: should just watch that . Otherwise, you're gonna do this fucking Frankie thing where you go a year without doing it. We're saving it. We're saving it cuz we don't have anymore. And then you're gonna be like, fuck, I have to watch the whole thing over again.
Just watch it. You probably don't even remember what happened now. Oh, I remember. Get in
[:[00:12:14] Scott Moran: pace and, and just to continue to bounce back and forth. This week we watched the invitation and that was very Nexium like this time around.
[:[00:12:27] Scott Moran: I'll go through it specifically, but man, I forgot about, uh, some
[:[00:12:34] Scott Moran: the ending man. So far really enjoying Ru. The ones we're doing this month, the dinner party movies?
Yeah, they, they pack a fucking punch, man. coherence too. Like I was like wide-eyed in the dark because I watched that on my computer, like a college student. . Awesome, awesome. The pillow on the bed over Thanksgiving, but yeah, it was like sucked into it. Same with this one last night. I found myself just like mouth open, breathing up all there.
I didn't fall.
[:[00:13:11] Scott Moran: quality. It feels kind of comforting to like pick just movies from a category. That's what I was. I was like, God, I'm really enjoying this. Think about what this is. Dinner party. Movie. And I'm still not
[:[00:13:25] Scott Moran: No. And you're about to have a party.
[:[00:13:30] Scott Moran: gonna happen? . You guys gonna try to indoctrinate us?
[:[00:13:40] Scott Moran: It feels very Christmasy to watch a bunch of dinner party movies, even if they're not about it.
I may watch the Ref just for good measure. ,
[:[00:13:52] Scott Moran: mom wouldn't let me watch that the first time I asked to watch it. No way. Yeah, and she was like, nah. I think she had some sort of idea about who Dennis, Larry was, and it turns out I just would've turned into me sooner.
if had you introduced me to Dennis, Larry? At that time,
[:[00:14:09] Scott Moran: was, I mean, I worked at, at the movie store, , and we didn't sell them, we rented them, and it always bothered me a little.
[:And the last one that was in Lago Vista, I think. Yeah. Lago Vista, Texas. It was like all meth heads , like early
[:[00:14:41] Frank Roll: movie gallery, the door beads.
I liked that shit. Trying to peek through the door beads as they swung . That's not titty. .
[:[00:14:52] Frank Roll: Dude, it would straighten up every now and then . All
[:[00:14:57] Frank Roll: summary. Oh yeah, the summary. You know the film opens exactly like the last two dinner party movies with the drive to the party Will and his girlfriend Kira, headed to the house of his ex-wife Eden, and her new husband David.
Will and Kira have received a fancy paper invitation to the gathering and will comments that it must be an attempt to make up for disappearing for two years. It seemed like in the movie it was a lot more than two years, but it was two years. It didn't seem that way. We find out through snippets of flashbacks and conversations with the other guests that the houses where will lived with Eden before their son tragically died and were Eden in her grief, attempted suicide two years.
The party is a reunion of old friends at first anyway, but soon Houseke Sadie emerges from the bedroom and a friend of David's name Pruitt arrives, is that guy John Carol Lynch. John Carol
[:[00:15:42] Frank Roll: later. Oh God. We gotta talk. John Carroll Lynch, man. Ugh. . . Their other dinner guests are Tommy, Tommy's boyfriend Miguel and friends.
Ben Claire and Gina. Gina mentions that her boyfriend Troy is running late,
[:[00:16:01] Frank Roll: Troy. David and Eden explained that they have been in Mexico with a self-help organization called The Invitation that helped them get past their grief.
They show the group a video of their leader comforting a woman as she dies very intense. While most of the guests are politely taken, aback Will becomes outwardly irritated. It feels too much like a pitch to join their self-help cult, as will explores the house, reliving moments of his past good and bad.
He sees Eden Stash pills in the master bedroom. He shows the pills to Miguel, who identifies them as phenobarbital, though dangerous and high doses, not uncommon to find. While snooping through medicine cabinets, Miguel tells David to stop sulking and join the party. David suggests they play a party game.
He calls I want similar to, I never. And the game starts Innocent with Sadie kissing Gina and Eden kissing Ben. But when Pruit reveals that he killed his wife in a rage and spent time in prison before joining the invitation, Claire Apologetically excuses herself and leaves and lots of spoilers here.
This movie is one big twist and we'd hate to ruin it for anyone that hasn't seen it suspiciously watching Pruitt move his car for her to leave, will is accused by David of being rude and. Because of course racked with uncertainty and a message from Choi who called from the front door before anyone else arrived will shouts his suspicions at their hosts.
Choi's arrival shortly after dinner further makes will question his perceptions. But when the hosts hang a red lantern in the backyard and serve the party, a final glass of wine will trusts his instincts and interrupts the toast, but not before Gina takes a large
[:[00:17:33] Frank Roll: It was. Or they just had the bar with like the liquor. Like the hard stick. Yeah. There were
[:[00:17:38] Frank Roll: there you wanted to believe will just hard made you feel
[:[00:17:49] Frank Roll: Will is attacked by Sadie and the rest of the movie takes a slasher film. Turn is the guest who attacked by the Cultus and Will and Kira look for a. Escape the Locked House.
[:The film was initially announced in 2012 to star Luke Wilson, Zachary Quinto, Topher Grace, and Johnny Galecki, likely at the time having backing from a major studio. The invitation ended up being a fully indie production, and the writer and the director had complete creative control. It was starring Logan Marshall Green, as Will Tammy Blanchard as Eden Michael Houseman as
[:Mihi Huisman, MI Heisman, Michael
[:was the marketing for the movie and suggesting to people that they don't tell their friends, which was probably a good call . Now the last video Clerks ruins that marketing and spoils this entire movie. But man, it was good. I've only seen it the one time I saw it when it premiered on Netflix and that was it.
I
[:[00:19:17] Scott Moran: I was really quick to say that Coherence was my favorite dinner party movie, but I think we just might have picked all three of my favorite dinner party movies for this series. . I don't think I'm gonna say that about the other one, but who knows?
Silent Night might blow me the fuck away.
[:[00:19:40] Scott Moran: movie. I've, I haven't been too into watching like theater, but I feel like both of these movies have felt like they could be stage plays the same kind of intensity.
Like a one scene thing.
[:[00:19:57] Scott Moran: Do you think that she was talking about a Shakespeare. Or
[:Anyway,
[:[00:20:19] Frank Roll: You know, any movie that starts with a mercy kill, you know, they're for real. Like, you know, shit's about to get real.
I feel like it says
[:[00:20:27] Frank Roll: Yeah. I think that was letting us know that Will, wasn't going to hesitate when he needed to do the right thing. You see,
[:I,
[:[00:20:51] Scott Moran: needed resolution.
[:I think that also ties into it.
[:[00:21:08] Frank Roll: didn't, I don't know what
[:She's holding the paper
[:[00:21:18] Scott Moran: No, she's like looking at a physical paper, like nice invitation and he tells her, she's like, wow, this is, people don't do this anymore. This is fancy. And he's like, so maybe it's a makeup for the two years.
[:[00:21:36] Scott Moran: God, God, me and you
[:Yeah. I'm. and I try not to take my eyes off because like I, you know, my experience, my movie.
[:[00:21:55] Frank Roll: spill it on the Off the screen. Off the screen while I'm watching. That's the thing. I'm like, I want silence. I want my dark room. I want no lights in the background.
I thought you were like, oh, frosted flakes, , where the milk turns into strawberry milkshake.
[:[00:22:18] Frank Roll: Uh, . I'm like, in my head, I'm like, don't talk about cereal. . No. Uh,
[:[00:22:29] Frank Roll: now that I have a kid, I buy them all and I eat them all, all the time.
[:[00:22:36] Frank Roll: this week. K. Um,
[:[00:22:40] Frank Roll: gonna take six hours. I know. We're gonna just talk about new product line from them though. Uh, yeah. The man did what he needed to do and, you know, you mentioned it, they're always driving to these parties, like they took themselves there, like in all these, like they're taking themselves to
[:Yeah. To me that just means that I don't get to drink very much. You take a fucking Uber. 2015. Definitely. Ubers already. Mm-hmm. . Especially in the Hollywood Hills. Yeah. It's that Prius. Uber all day probably. Oh yeah. Back then. Mm-hmm. for sure.
[:[00:23:10] Scott Moran: Now they have environmentally friendly Tesla Ubers.
Did you notice he drove a sob? No. Yeah, he drove, they didn't say anything about what anyone does other than. Who was a
[:[00:23:31] Scott Moran: Was Claire the one who left? Yeah. Who's Jean? Who's Gina? Gina's the Asian girl. Troy's girlfriend. And Ben
[:[00:23:43] Scott Moran: first it appeared that. They were sitting on my couch. I immediately was like, now Ben is here alone.
[:[00:23:53] Scott Moran: sex is angry. Yeah. But he's the kind of guy who would go to an old gathering of friends. Alone.
[:Like, it just seemed a little it seemed. But that makes, as soon as I saw that they weren't a couple, I was like, okay, he's got somebody else that we're not seeing. We're, you know, it's all good. How did
[:[00:24:22] Frank Roll: No. That's weird. I can't remember
[:Eden and David, I don't know. Part of me is just like not, I wouldn't be. Comfortable bringing my new girlfriend to like your ex's party. Yeah. But I was unclear about whether they all knew David from before because Gina mentions that he used to have the good cocaine and stuff. Yes. Cause he was a record producer.
Mm-hmm. . So we did know that. And uh, or what he was before he was, uh, in Nexium m Yeah. , before he'd been recruited. Did they know Kira? I was unclear about that. No, I feel like Kira was new to, they were meeting her for the first time. First time. First time Vice. That may have been why Ben didn't bring his wife was it had been in the two year period or something, but Well, he said they had kids though, didn't he?
Yeah, and he clearly, man, that was it. She had to stay with the kids. We'll go with that if the shoe fits. I explained
[:[00:25:13] Scott Moran: fits, but Yeah, when Sadie comes Donald ducking down the hallway. That's our second Donald ducking on this podcast.
[:[00:25:22] Scott Moran: as good as the last one.
[:[00:25:26] Scott Moran: Well, it was full Donald
[:[00:25:30] Scott Moran: the peaches. Yeah. Whereas in fault she had the, the underwear still this was vagina.
[:[00:25:37] Scott Moran: in
[:Like, damn. Is he hallucinating? Yeah. Like he
[:[00:25:48] Frank Roll: she was a perfect cult
[:[00:25:53] Frank Roll: Yeah. I, I made that comparison
[:Eden also struck me as like Den Mothery, Manson family kind of feel.
[:[00:26:08] Scott Moran: these grieving people. We
[:It'd be
[:I wouldn't want him producing my album. I want a guy of like a beard and a top hat or something. ,
[:[00:26:44] Scott Moran: it depends. Yeah. Yeah. What level, if I was gonna record a Beach Boys cover band? Uh, yes.
We talk about Jimmy Buffet a lot on this podcast. I don't know why. I only
[:[00:26:56] Scott Moran: David though, and I don't like Peanut a lot of.
[:[00:27:02] Scott Moran: I noticed that, but now that you mentioned it. Yeah. The tones were very similar. I think some of that is that, uh, production value-wise, like probably dressing everyone a certain way, made sure that they got the same color palette.
Mm-hmm. , because have you ever seen breakdowns of that where it's like, there's like a percentage of, of a dominant color in a shot and then there's like a small percentage of two other colors? Hmm. And they do it in everyth. . It's like a subliminal thing.
[:[00:27:27] Scott Moran: us in. We just like it. It's like the, like later when we talk about my story circles that I made, that happens to be what we like.
[:[00:27:38] Scott Moran: orange look or? Yeah, and I don't like it when they fake that it would
[:[00:27:42] Scott Moran: you know, soft blue sepias.
[:[00:27:48] Scott Moran: Remember traffic? Yeah. I'm trying to connect that to Twilight.
[:[00:28:00] Scott Moran: skin , glistening. They glisten. People don't like the word moist, but I don't like the word glisten.
[:[00:28:11] Scott Moran: I like that splurge. I like Squidly Scooch.
I
[:[00:28:19] Scott Moran: splurge. But then when Pruitt came in, John Carroll Lynch is always. If something's, uh, not quite right there, he, you're like, he's either gonna be a gentle giant and we're gonna misjudge him because he's got a little something under the surface. Or he's gonna go full large psychotic man.
Yeah. He's either the fucking crazy clown from free show, or he's Margie's husband from Fargo. Oh, yeah. That's right. That's always the first thing that pops into my head. So I have a nice, John Carroll Lynch is a nice man. Oh, feeling. But he's not, most of the time. .
[:I'll stop. I'll stop. I'll
[:You invited these people to what felt like an intimate event before this. A reunion. A reunion for sure. A reunion. It was pitched as a reunion with a
[:[00:29:29] Scott Moran: And maybe that's not so bad, but the locking the door.
[:You guys have a good. Take care. Oh, absolutely. I'm fucking out of here. You show me a video like that at like a fucking dinner party, and you're serious about it, and you're trying to tell me like, oh, just think about it. Fuck you. Yeah, because you know what? I know something's fucking coming.
[:He cared a lot
[:[00:30:10] Scott Moran: hard. I don't think he'd given up yet. Really?
[:[00:30:17] Scott Moran: yeah. Cause he said where you been? Yeah. Well she was like, you didn't worry about me, did you?
And he went, I did actually.
[:[00:30:25] Scott Moran: the way he said it was. So, yeah,
[:He was trying, he was moving on. He had a new chick, you know, he, and he came, he's got a new explosion. Yeah, he was trying to move on and this was him trying to be responsible. It was like, okay, old friends, uh, where
[:I love canceling shit. That's my jam. Like, I like canceling stuff. I have to do more than I like. Having stuff
[:I'd imagine that's a scene. You know, that was like a spot that was
[:[00:31:24] Frank Roll: Yeah. Because of the old
[:[00:31:32] Frank Roll: everything. Mm-hmm. . It's just one of those things people couldn't get over, caused the ripples.
[:[00:31:55] Frank Roll: you made me think I should have a dinner party sometime. .
[:And then the fucking cult video. Toby Hus. Arty, strongest
[:[00:32:27] Scott Moran: I shouted Toby Huss in. No one was home at the time. , Toby Huss. I startled a dog. I'm sure I was like Toby Huss.
[:[00:32:38] Scott Moran: Yeah. That's what happens when Bill Sadler comes on the TV and that's what happens. Adobe Huss comes on. I have the same sort of affection for those.
[:[00:32:48] Scott Moran: John Carroll Lynch. I like in a Michael Shannon way. You had to use Michael
[:Yeah, I put him on a pedestal
[:[00:33:04] Frank Roll: about John Carro. That's a one kind face on Michael Shannon face. Don't think
[:Michael Shannon is the lead version of that sort of actor.
[:[00:33:14] Scott Moran: movies. Yeah. Even in like, take Shelter. I was uh, I was like, this man is gonna snap the guy who plays his
[:[00:33:22] Scott Moran: and that guy are in. Oh yeah. Cause this is the, that director probably, ah, was he also in, uh, midnight special?
[:[00:33:42] Scott Moran: then there's like little breathers where, okay, I'm being crazy throughout the.
and then they play the I Want game and I feel like this is after the snooping. I would feel like I could walk around the house. I used to live there. That's where my son died and
[:[00:33:57] Scott Moran: being a dick. He was throwing out the low blows. That actor man, he's a dick.
He is a lot of the time. I think I, I had a weird, uh, I liked him in Game of Thrones. That's right. He was kind of a dick in Hill House, whatever his name is. Homan Usman. Homan Homan. I do like. He's a good actor. He fills that very specific sort of. Too handsome. He can't help it. He, he just got everything real easy.
Yeah. But that's when like Sadie turns on the full on Manson girl and she's like, I'll go first. .
[:[00:34:29] Scott Moran: very Gina reacted like that was a real hot girl. And she was like, oh,
[:Yeah, I just made out with an X meth head. Yeah. May Haps. She was way twi. Great job.
[:[00:34:48] Frank Roll: Even while she was Donald ducking it. I felt that creepy. It was the
[:[00:34:55] Frank Roll: like, she did it. Well, I bet she's like beautiful.
She could just turn on the cult real fast. Yeah. They, they just made her greasy with darker circles under her eyes.
[:[00:35:09] Frank Roll: It's like the movies where the dorky chick who's supposed to be unattractive is just like an a very attractive chick that they've put in a ponytail with glasses.
I
[:[00:35:19] Frank Roll: You can't disagree.
[:[00:35:26] Frank Roll: go, or whatever he says,
[:[00:35:40] Frank Roll: the mood was
[:[00:35:46] Frank Roll: to death.
Well, and from the story, it was a one punch. Yeah,
[:And I love how they did that suspicious,
[:[00:36:07] Scott Moran: just keep that was on, that was time number two. You could have left. Mm-hmm. , like we could all be like, yes, we're all very uncom. And everyone leaves in mass. The video, it was very nice. It was a good try. The video and then the I Want game thing felt like, uh, just the way they conducted themselves was so much like those Nexium meetings.
I'm telling you, man, like I could hear Nancy's we're
[:[00:36:37] Scott Moran: But what they're saying, the like specific things that they said, pain is optional. Expel your emotions, your victimhood is a choice. It was basically like nex Im was teaching people overcome some sort of thing.
But in, when you think about it more that's used for evil , you know, where it's like, don't trust your instincts, your instinct to flee your pain are wrong. And like you don't have to feel those things and it's disregarding why you feel those things, but everyone's real polite and they just.
[:I'm te the video man. Sorry guys. Good to see you. Thanks for the drinks. We, Audi .
[:Mm-hmm. , I'd be like, no, no. , I'm going
[:[00:37:37] Scott Moran: story. We're just all gonna do this. Like this is not the
[:[00:37:44] Scott Moran: Yeah, she did. She should have looked at Will or something and been like, you know what?
I was fucking wrong. I'm trying to be nice, but
[:[00:37:51] Scott Moran: the door. That's what I was gonna ask you. Who the fuck knocked on the
[:[00:38:00] Scott Moran: Okay. That was his reason to lock the door cuz he didn't lock the first time.
He was like, okay. , okay. Mm-hmm. , like he was being crazy . I was like, well, why do you have fucking locks on your door with keys on the inside? People who do that shit are
[:Yeah, and they nailed it.
[:[00:38:17] Frank Roll: a fire? He was still on his tippy toes. He was fresh. He hadn't been on mentally beaten down like completely at that point, and I was with him. I'm a big person who looks for the signs, and so if I'm overly. So be it. I'd catch shit that a lot of people aren't catching cuz I'm overthinking the fuck out of it as I
[:Yeah. And then they're like, okay, fucking dinner. And they actually have dinner. But dinner still went quick.
[:[00:38:44] Scott Moran: It was sort of time lapse. It was when they were having drinks after dinner, when, uh, Will finally loses his shit because
[:Why was he outside
[:[00:39:03] Frank Roll: Yeah. It had those tall trees and it looked like it maybe an
[:It was on a cliff side. Yeah. That was when Sadie tried to, Remember, did that
[:[00:39:14] Scott Moran: that was definitely really happened. It happened, right? Yeah. She went out there and she like wouldn't leave. He was trying to get cell phones, so, so
[:It could have been , but I felt as if the, uh, transition from that scene to the next scene may have been a little
[:[00:39:31] Frank Roll: and then, and then all of a sudden he was just
[:Suddenly his phone connected and he got that message from Choi, and that's when he goes back inside, whether having after dinner drinks. Where the fuck is Troy? He has
[:Something happened to fucking Choi at this house before we got
[:[00:40:01] Frank Roll: Well, no, I mean, she was already, she already didn't. . Oh. Just like let her know what was done. Just been like, Hey. Yeah. That've wouldn't been about me. Before I flip out. Yeah. What do you think about this?
Yeah, because I'm being way too polite. So you didn't get a voicemail, but I did. This is your dude. Are you concerned? Yeah. No, that makes sense.
[:Like, why is everyone being so fucking
[:[00:40:34] Scott Moran: He has it out . But that's the thing is Cho showing up right then. Right Then immediately, like seeds that, oh. I am paranoid.
[:You question it or, I
[:[00:40:55] Frank Roll: it is. He has to calm down. Has to calm down. He's calming down what he has like one more old flashback. He lays down, he's having the flashback kids looking at him, and he just, the tear comes down.
It was shortly after that he's again. He's, I feel like he's wanting to accept. But he's like, I still don't feel right about this fucking situation.
[:[00:41:16] Frank Roll: his son's room is David's office, and then that's when he has the flashback, and then when he pops outta the flashback, he's, he just looks at that desk and he is like, why not Snoop?
You know, let's, let's give her one more looksie over here in the
[:[00:41:35] Frank Roll: So that raises the question, why is David not a screen lock
[:I am
[:[00:41:55] Scott Moran: everywhere. Yeah. Dudes like that. They start to same. Hard drives everywhere.
Nobody's watching them. All kinds of shit,
[:[00:42:06] Scott Moran: So then Keith Ranier, he had like people filming him 24 hours a day practically. They had so much footage. Oh, him playing volleyball, uh, . Oh, and you were right about the karate thing. He was a, he was a ju he claimed to be a judo, uh, a youth Judo champion.
and they found no evidence of that being true. That that had ever happened. Yeah, but that's for sure. Uh, yeah, I remember that point. He was the kinda guy who would show you his karate. See, I don't
[:[00:42:35] Scott Moran: but I felt that a little bit, that Keith Ranier thing when he was sitting next to the laptop while the video was playing.
Oh, his little presentation. Doing his little like Yes, and like turning and smiling at them. This is what we're all about. It's just, it's nice, isn't it? Join the club.
[:[00:42:54] Scott Moran: man. And that's, that's when after he has that freak out and then Troy's there. Yeah. And Troy's there.
Kira goes outside with him and talks him down and gives him yet a third chance to leave. . She's like, we really need to go. That's right. And she's on board. She's like, we, yeah, let's, let's
[:He's like, okay, take the loss.
[:[00:43:21] Frank Roll: Yeah. After making a scene, and I mean, if you're that concerned, try and leave and see if they make a scene then. Like, see if you can like initiate the freak out then.
[:[00:43:39] Frank Roll: So was it lantern then laptop? I think so.
[:[00:43:50] Frank Roll: The, the canter. Get fancy at the dinner table.
[:And that almost made me be like, okay, you stayed to keep your friends safe. Like you felt the danger, but you knew you had to hit that coyote
[:[00:44:18] Scott Moran: Gina was excited about was whatever was coming outta that decanter.
[:[00:44:24] Scott Moran: man. Yeah, she probably done some of that blow by then. Oh, you know, she had it. She had that blow laying around. Yeah. And she's like, oh, pouring up. Yeah. You know how long it took me to chop that up? Two year old blow.
[:The only one to have
[:[00:44:49] Frank Roll: yeah, had that, fuck yeah.
[:[00:44:53] Frank Roll: Ah. And meanwhile you got sneaky David
[:Ben is one of the first ones to go out on the patio. He tries to flee into the backyard. You were about to ask me earlier about Ben, what happened, how Ben, that's right. So it was Ben, Ben and Miguel Choy all
[:[00:45:15] Scott Moran: situation.
Yeah. But I think that's what made it so scary with him hiding in the house. Cuz you were like David. I'm gonna kill him,
[:And you're just in shock. Then you
[:[00:45:46] Frank Roll: with the fucking Michael Meyers walk. Dude, he wasn't. No . He
[:He was Michael Myers walking. Yeah. Up those stairs.
[:[00:46:00] Scott Moran: him. Right. And then, and it turns out exactly like that when he hits him with that fucking, or she hits him when he comes through the door.
When he goes down. Yeah. Yeah. It's before that. When, right when he comes through the door of the theater.
[:[00:46:23] Scott Moran: than him.
He's so big. Yeah. I like that Eden lost her shit after that. Well, she was almost like, I, this isn't what I want. Yeah.
[:[00:46:37] Scott Moran: Like that was, that's how all that was. Like suicide cult shit does not go the way you planned it unless TE's Gate, she
[:[00:46:47] Scott Moran: She was not ready to force her loved ones
[:[00:46:52] Scott Moran: hand to hand. Yeah. If they, if it had all gone smoothly, she might have been fine with that. Mm-hmm. . But they didn't jump on drinking that juice either. No. Gina was the only young.
[:[00:47:11] Scott Moran: the fuck did Tommy come from? It's like he dropped from the ceiling to take David out. Did he come from the bottom of the stairs or what? like they were hiding upstairs and David was coming up.
Uhhuh into that second floor of landing and fucking Tommy came out of fucking nowhere.
[:[00:47:35] Scott Moran: him. Oh, okay. Yeah, I I was like, did he fall from the fucking ceiling, like Spider-Man chips?
[:David didn't put up. I mean, he was like, I mean
[:[00:47:50] Frank Roll: No. When he got Ben, he was fighting with Ben until Pruitt came up and finished
[:Something something. It's something cylinder she fucking hit him with and then, but not a fire extinguisher. Right. It made a bing sound. But no, I don't think it was a fire
[:He said something along those lines, I feel like. Yeah. Which I was like, yeah, get her hyped up. You know, let's set the, let's set the, set the mood here, set the
[:[00:48:34] Frank Roll: Oh yeah. She was breaking down and, and I'm sure she only shot will from her brief pep talk from David.
[:See, I did not
[:[00:49:16] Scott Moran: all over Hollywood Hills.
They were so mane. Yeah. And it wasn't not a be like, it's not like the world, but when you think about it, like the Hollywood Hills and it's this like Nexium m s cult , they're all doing it on this night, like mass exodus shit. Because that's like, uh, Jim Jones, like when he tried to get everybody to drink the Kool-Aid, he had to do it at gunpoint at the end.
Cults are crazy. They are. I broke down the story circles of these two dinner party movies and I know I'm big nerd that I love that there's eight parts to every story. It's just what we like . This is just how we like a story to be told. So it was easy for me to break it down, analyze it, so both movies start with driving there and some sort of signal of the character with her.
It's lighter, it's the broken phone, but she's having the conversation with her boyfriend, incoherence. about this conflict, the coyote, both those things really gave you a quick, this is what that character was. You could almost say in clue, you got little things about each character as they're showing up.
Like not necessarily once they're there, oh, you got a hint, you got a clue. But in somewhere, their arrival gave you a, an indication of who they were. , and then the next step is just always the guess. The only difference really in the way the story unfolds with this is that dinner happens at the midpoint in the invitation and dinner is how we meet everyone in coherence.
Tiny introductions, and then the characters develop. Yeah, by their conversations. Have a little bit more mingling. . Yeah. This was a, a longer dinner party in coherence. Their dinner, they wanted to eat and then drink . And this one they wanted to heavily drink for a long time, eat and then kill themselves.
Both things like power outage were locked in the video. That's like, those are the big catalyst moments for Oh shit, something's fucking weird. Yeah,
[:[00:51:10] Scott Moran: right. And then with that one, the, the others and the doubles. And with this one it's the Pruitt's wife and the party. We start to like be like, what the fuck are these people doing?
And then at the midpoint it's just different de coherence. It's like total fucking, everything falls apart. And at the midpoint after dinner we find out like, oh, Troy's okay. It might, everything might be fine. Still some uncertainty. False victory where it was a false defeat, kinda in the second one. Yeah.
Still just
[:[00:51:37] Scott Moran: what happens next. Yeah. And then we find out we're in the wrong house or the lantern gets. And the paranoia and everybody thinks you're, you're the one who's being paranoid,
[:[00:51:47] Scott Moran: great setup by the host. Yeah. And then I think both characters had to go through some sort of, uh, taking charge.
I think his flaw in the invitation was politeness, whereas hers was the being wishy-washy and not taking what she deserves. And maybe to him, kind of the same thing. He needed closure. That's why. Their politeness. That was kind of the absurdity of the whole thing was, God, stop being so fucking polite to each other.
[:[00:52:13] Scott Moran: Uh, I've met just as horrible Texans as I have of California. We are not better than them. I stay No, no. By that
[:[00:52:25] Scott Moran: we have potlucks and you had to cook and you don't owe anyone shit.
[:[00:52:36] Scott Moran: but did they look good? So the video is when you would've left
[:[00:52:45] Scott Moran: Hey, I sort of understand.
Good luck with that. The idea that he's like something, something dangerous is happening and I'm not leaving without the rest of my people.
[:[00:52:56] Scott Moran: gut. Yeah. Cuz he didn't really indicate that that's what he was doing, but I felt like to some degree he was the kind of guy who puts the coyote out of his misery.
He felt a responsibility to stay and
[:[00:53:19] Scott Moran: I like that. Kira understood. She seemed she, she seemed to really understand
[:What was his ex, what was her name? Eden. Eden. How could I forget? She was just lost thought she found the answer in Mexico with this cool new friend group. She
[:[00:53:37] Frank Roll: and work her way to the top fast. Cuz she's a major contributor.
[:That's a good little detail. I didn't notice. I like that. I like that you noticed that? No,
[:[00:53:49] Scott Moran: Yeah. And that's why those self-help cults take root in California is people with money. Yeah. That's where they.
Easy. That's really what you don't like. It's not California. It's that you don't like people with money. Neither do i. don't like Texans with money either. They're more fun to drink with though. Texans. Yeah, with money. Yeah. .
[:[00:54:12] Scott Moran: house. I would've felt conflicted by him, but I would've left with Claire.
Like that would've been the moment. Yeah. At least me too. We're going, I know that Gina made him feel like we're all here for you. Mm-hmm. like, that's why we came. We're here to support you. And she made that very clear to him when he got there, and I think that probably contributed to his pressure to stay.
See, I've
[:[00:54:44] Scott Moran: What if your wife was, uh, making you feel like you're being, you're the crazy, what if Olympia who was like, dude, you're being nuts.
would you back it a little bit coming from her after
[:Well, he says
[:[00:55:10] Frank Roll: Yeah. No, I mean, he, he acknowledges it. Yes. I'm very strong. I would've been fucking gone right there. Fuck all y'all. Pick your weird ass video. Don't fucking call me again.
[:I think I get why he was staying. Well,
[:[00:55:31] Scott Moran: Okay. Yeah. And I feel like a little bit, he should have protected Kira a little better, even though beat Pruit to fucking death. So I, she didn't need
[:He sure did leave her with them quite a. When he would go, you know, and
[:[00:55:59] Frank Roll: I think it's been a long time since I've been to a party where something like that happened.
[:I think now we're seeing the similarities. Three dinner party movies. Now,
[:[00:56:32] Scott Moran: setups are definitely identical. Old friends or strangers.
[:[00:56:37] Scott Moran: additions, or that ex-girlfriend who shouldn't be.
[:[00:56:43] Scott Moran: Well, it was Amir
But next time we're watching Silent Night with Kira Knightly and I didn't really look up. I
[:[00:56:55] Scott Moran: We'll know it next time.
[:[00:57:01] Scott Moran: Remember? It's not Benedict Cumberbatch. I know. That was my
[:His name is, uh, it's
[:[00:57:12] Frank Roll: like Benedict Matthew. Good. His name is Matthew Good. I knew him from the Good wife. He was in the imitation game with Benedict
[:[00:57:22] Frank Roll: seen. There you go. And I'm excited cause I've only seen it once for sure.
And it was a year ago, so like I remember it. Ah, I'm not saying anything else. I thought it was a good. Close to a
[:[00:57:34] Frank Roll: one. Um, oh fuck. He was in, he was in the watchman. Oh yeah, he is. Ozzy Mandia. Yeah. He's the fucking, uh, yeah, the business one. Ozzy Mandia. Yeah. The one who ran the corporation with the action figures, Ozzy Mandia.
Oh yeah. Ozzy Manus. Thanks everyone for joining us. For the last Video Store Clerks podcast, be sure to leave a rating and subscribe. You can find us on Twitter at Last Clerks Instagram at the last video store clerks, and you can find Scott at dispatchesfromthepit.com.
