TIH 571: Paul Tremblay on Horror Movie, Knock at the Cabin, and Writing Across Genres

Video transcript. Add around 5 minutes and 30 seconds for the audio.

00:00:01.84
Michael David Wilson
Paul, welcome back to this is horror podcast.

00:00:05.92
Paul Tremblay
Thank you. It's a pleasure to be back and a pleasure to see your beautiful faces. If you're listening to this as a podcast, you just have to imagine they're beautiful faces, but yeah.

00:00:14.41
Michael David Wilson
Yeah. Although you probably don't have to imagine cause you could go to youtube dot.com forward slash at this is horror podcast.

00:00:24.94
Michael David Wilson
And you know that that's been growing quite a lot recently.

00:00:29.08
Paul Tremblay
That's great.

00:00:29.53
Michael David Wilson
So I think more people, ah enjoying the video interviews so good yeah well not not yet to you but thank you subscribe but yeah that's kind of how i feel and i'm not sure if it was an upgrade putting me on the camera but we've got bob so you know you get something good and something not so good but

00:00:36.65
Paul Tremblay
I think my my appearance is better left to the imagination, or at least... second yeah

00:01:00.50
Michael David Wilson
As always, I like to talk about changes since we last spoke. And I know that a pivotal one for you, the last time we spoke, you're about to have your one year sabbatical from teaching. And I believe that you've now had that year, you're now back teaching. So how did it go? How was that for you?

00:01:26.75
Paul Tremblay
Uh, it was lovely. That's funny. I'm just finishing my my first year back. Yeah. So it's been, geez, I guess maybe two years since I've been on with you guys.

00:01:34.45
Michael David Wilson
Yeah.

00:01:35.49
Paul Tremblay
Uh, no, the sabbatical.

00:01:37.11
Bob Pastorella
Thank

00:01:37.22
Paul Tremblay
Um, I mean, I was super productive writing wise. Uh, I had just started horror movie maybe in like April, March of 21.

00:01:47.99
Paul Tremblay
And then I started my sabbatical in June of 21. You know, I finished horror movie. Really the, I finished my first, I finished a full draft. Yeah, sorry, this part's boring, but yeah January of 22. two Yeah. ah Yeah, anyway, and then I ended up writing like a short middle grade novel um as well. but That was sort of unexpected. So no, I definitely got a lot of writing done. ah For the first time in my life, it was, you know, other than summers, it was was it was sort of nice to have like a writing routine as opposed to just trying to squeeze in writing when I could. um I did find

00:02:26.20
Paul Tremblay
I could write more and for longer when that happened. um But also at the same time, I don't know, like I think a lot at a lot of different times is one of the most stressful years of my life. You know, some of it just relating to the to the movie adaptation. Then also maybe the self-realization, like, oh, maybe it's not great just to be alone in my head for too many hours in a day. It's kind of nice to be teaching and worrying about other people. But that said, like yeah I think in the next few years, I'm i'm hoping to make ah make writing a full thing ah full- time thing.

00:03:04.27
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, yeah, I mean that you have anticipated the next question, which was, of course, what you were looking to do going forward. And I mean, I wonder because you said sometimes it's not so great to just be alone and in your head for, you know, vast periods of time for days on end.

00:03:26.61
Michael David Wilson
So are they going to be things that you put in place? I mean, might you do some part-time teaching or just deliberately curate, I suppose, social experiences to kind of mitigate any of the problems from isolation?

00:03:45.03
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, I mean, that's something I think I will have to seriously consider. ah um you know if and when that time comes but for now I think you know I've i've signed up to teach another year or so we'll see how that goes um yeah I like the idea of deliberate social interaction to avoid isolation although there's also always like just lean into the hermit lead into the old cranky hermit lifestyle but I don't know we'll see

00:04:12.74
Michael David Wilson
yeah yeah it's all about really seeing what works for you i mean i took what about 18 months or so where i was just full-time writing and podcasting. And I was surprised at the effect on my mental health that that isolation had, because I i didn't before feel that I necessarily needed so much social interaction.

00:04:39.80
Michael David Wilson
But it it turns out, even if you enjoy the recluse lifestyle, that there are limits to it. And I know that David Moody a horror author in the UK, he had a similar thing. So, I mean, I found for me probably the sweet spot was writing almost full time and then going and teaching once a week is like, right, I've got a little bit of social, of socialization, but then I've got a lot of writing time and I know that to some people the idea of planning social interactions it it might seem like just really ridiculous and it's like what do you mean you're having to plan that in but I think when you get so focused and obsessed over a project I mean if you don't have that plan Then then months can go by you realize wait i haven't actually done something so i guess it depends in terms of how you build but if you have that kind of weekly commitment of something i think it goes along way to protecting ones mental health.

00:05:36.91
Paul Tremblay
Right.

00:05:53.17
Paul Tremblay
For sure. And even just from like the purely writing side of things, I mean, I've always found it helpful to be around students, you know. ah Yeah, I just, you know, get lots of ideas from them or just you know, hearing them talk and like they've always been like a great lesson in voice, um and you know, just their energy and stuff like that. um But like I said, like, I mean, it was definitely my most productive year as a writer. And I feel, you know, quite proud of the two books that were sort of that came out of that year off from writing. So I don't know.

00:06:24.91
Michael David Wilson
Yeah. Yeah.

00:06:28.03
Bob Pastorella
Yeah, I did that. I did basically almost three months during the pandemic where I couldn't work.

00:06:34.39
Bob Pastorella
Uh, you know, they closed this down and, um, I don't think that was a very productive time because there was a lot of fear, you know, um, being, being a diabetic, um, and knowing, knowing what could happen. Um, and at first I was like, well, I'll just write.

00:06:53.91
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:06:54.37
Bob Pastorella
I've got all the time in the world and they're going to pay me how silly of them. And I guarantee it within probably 45 days, not a week went by when I was calling him. Can I come back to work yet?

00:07:06.83
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:07:07.56
Bob Pastorella
What? Any word, any word. And they're like, no, no. Um, and then I got involved in a project. And then they call me and said, Hey, you know, you can, you can come in and do, you know, eight hours, um, you know, four days a week, uh, dealing with customers through customer care. And I was like, pass.

00:07:27.22
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:07:27.60
Bob Pastorella
I'm not going to deal with that. Not, not during a pandemic, you know?

00:07:30.90
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:07:31.24
Bob Pastorella
Um, but I was, I was very, at first I was very happy about it. Spent a lot of time doom scrolling after that. And and then got involved in a project. And then when I finally got back to work, i was it was kind of a bittersweet thing. I was like, yeah, I'm glad to have some type of social interaction with with other humans now. And, uh, you know, at least in the same room, you know, but, uh, man, I'm involved in something now, you know, this is, this is bad timing guys, you know, but, uh, I don't, I don't think I could, I could do the, the lean into the Hermit thing.

00:07:53.27
Paul Tremblay
Right.

00:08:05.63
Bob Pastorella
Um, I'm, I'm happy being alone, but I do need some type of social interaction with people sometimes. And I know exactly what you mean living in your head. That's not a, I don't think yeah that can be a very unhealthy thing.

00:08:20.96
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:08:23.67
Michael David Wilson
So I know that another thing that you were beginning to do around the time that we last spoke and you wanted to do as part of the year sabbatical was screenwriting. Now I'm wondering. Where are you at with that? I mean, you've obviously said that in that year, you wrote two novels. So I'm not sure how much room that actually left for screenwriting.

00:08:46.88
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:08:51.49
Michael David Wilson
But then, you know, interestingly enough, as we will get onto horror movie, half of it is a script.

00:08:59.87
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:09:01.15
Michael David Wilson
So it's like you you almost like you you did the screenwriting and the novel at the same time they became one.

00:09:01.31
Paul Tremblay
Right.

00:09:06.66
Paul Tremblay
yeah Yeah. So no, that really became the only script that I wrote. Uh, You know, at the time though, like my first, like the hope was, oh, maybe with the adaptation, there would be more Hollywood interest. You know, and I suppose there was, but nothing that's really come to fruition. But I spent a chunk of that first summer with a couple of filmmaking friends, you know, super talented people, ah Natasha Carmani and Bria Grant. And we were pitching one of my short stories and an expansion of it, the short story, of The Getaway.

00:09:41.89
Paul Tremblay
um And so that's something, you know, we're still we've been working on on and off, but we never, you know, we haven't sat down and wrote a screenplay. It's really more like we wrote like ah ah a pitch or a 20 minute pitch slash treatment because, you know, we don't want to write a screenplay until someone offers to pay us essentially. um But we have done a lot of work on that. um So, yeah, ah I guess that part of the the grand plan didn't really come to fruition, but that's OK. Weirdly, ah You know, nothing I can officially talk about, but another producer with another short story, which I won't name since the deal isn't really official, wrote a really great ah screenplay for it. And he let me sort of rework it, rewrite it. But that happened the spring, not during the sabbatical. So, yeah, you never know when opportunity might strike, I guess.

00:10:32.11
Michael David Wilson
Yeah and I suppose too that during that time there was of course the writers strike which then just sent yeah the the kind of screenwriting and the Hollywood world into absolute chaos I mean that I should clarify and people who have listened to these episodes and long-term listeners know obviously the strike was completely the right thing to happen you know the writers weren't being paid fairly I would argue still and not being paid fairly if you

00:10:49.30
Paul Tremblay
That's true. Yeah.

00:11:03.17
Paul Tremblay
Absolutely. Yeah.

00:11:12.35
Michael David Wilson
you know, compare it to what the big studios and the streamers, the producers are getting.

00:11:15.14
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:11:20.29
Michael David Wilson
But obviously now we're still coming out of that. So there's a lot of projects being canceled and there's a lot of great uncertainty. So I suppose this is the most volatile time to be screenwriting anyway.

00:11:33.86
Paul Tremblay
Yeah. Now, for sure. In the mood around Hollywood is still fairly grim, like it doesn't seem to be like many new things being purchased, you know, just talking to different writers and other friends. It's It's kind of hard out there right now. ah Yeah, like even like right after the strike ended, I had a studio interested in ah another short story in the first offer that came through. My representatives described it as punitive, ah as though the the studios were sort of angry of having pretty much lost the strike um and wanting vengeance.

00:12:10.47
Michael David Wilson
yeah yeah yeah i mean that the reality is that even when the studio loses they don't really lose you know they they find another way so they're like right well we are going to pay

00:12:11.32
Paul Tremblay
But anyway, yeah, just, you know, Uh, the fun times of of writers to get treated so well. And I'm talking to the screenwriters in particular, but like, yeah.

00:12:30.32
Paul Tremblay
Hmm. Right.

00:12:35.82
Michael David Wilson
writers with marginally fairer terms oh but surprise we're going to cancel a load of projects and now there's less opportunities for writers so even though the ones you know you're being paid more fairly per project you've got less projects so you you've lost anyway and hope hopefully better times are coming but hope is probably the operative word there

00:12:42.12
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:12:54.54
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:13:02.28
Paul Tremblay
Yeah. Yeah, ah yeah, I'm somewhat hopeful for at least on the Hollywood side of things. I'm not talking about me personally, I'm just talking in general of um things picking up but uh, you know, and that's more based on off of what like my my reps have said people who know way more about what's happening.

00:13:20.41
Michael David Wilson
Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, talking about Hollywood at the point we were talking previously, knock at the cabin was being made. There had been some shoots for it, but you hadn't seen the final film.

00:13:38.25
Paul Tremblay
Right.

00:13:38.92
Michael David Wilson
Well, now you have. so and and this isn't a trick question.

00:13:41.91
Paul Tremblay
Yes.

00:13:46.04
Michael David Wilson
So if you've spoken about this at length before or if, to most people, your feelings on the film are widely known, then I apologize for my ignorance, but I'm wondering what your reaction to the film is.

00:13:54.01
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:14:00.06
Michael David Wilson
And I'm crossing my fingers that, as I say this, that you don't feel as Stephen King feels about The Shining, or I've created an awkward moment.

00:14:06.52
Paul Tremblay
ah Yeah, no, no, no, no, I mean, yeah, like, ah it's happy to answer it, you know, and I have sort of talked about it, but, ah you know, it's fine. ah Yeah, I would say generally, I like the movie, but I really don't like the ending. You know, I think, you know, the performances are great, you know, it's, you know, sort of beautifully shot film. You know, when I first saw it, there were parts like I got emotional, like, you know, it was just so mind bending to see like you know things that I had written like almost said verbatim at times on the screen and you know it never felt like he had dipped into my head because what I imagined was so you know is quite different than what's on the screen just even in terms of like you know I imagine what the characters look like and things like that so no uh yeah no I mean I'm like I said i I like the movie but like that last act it's kind of hard to swallow for me uh

00:14:59.31
Paul Tremblay
You know, you know, the funny part is like, I know, you know, certainly there were discussions and I don't think this is like super secretive, you know, with night in the the studio and the producers about like, Oh, because of what happens to, you know, sort of when in my book, they were really sort of afraid of that. And they wanted a quote unquote happier ending. Um, and I don't know if this qualifies as irony, but I, I think their ending is way darker or his ending is way darker than my ending. I don't know, I might be in the minority and thinking that but um just sort of the implications, ah you know, of, of having no ambiguity and the implications of like, Oh, these two people just had to have one of their loved ones killed.

00:15:39.61
Paul Tremblay
And they have to live with that knowledge and live with the knowledge of this incredibly cruel, capricious, you know, God, essentially. I mean, to me, that's like, that's cosmic horror and its essence.

00:15:54.03
Michael David Wilson
Yeah. Well, let's get into massive spoiler territory. I mean, we kind of already did because you you said the film ending, but for those who aren't familiar, I mean, let's talk about, you know, the last act of your book, the last act of the film and you know, just get into complete specifics.

00:16:17.44
Michael David Wilson
If there's a compromise that you would have been happier with and

00:16:20.56
Paul Tremblay
Sure.

00:16:22.61
Michael David Wilson
you know why we think they went that way.

00:16:26.19
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, the fulcrum was, you know, what happens to one in the story compared to what happens to one in the movie. And I know, like, earlier attempts to make the novel. There was a screenplay in which one dies, but like, at the time, no, so none of the studios, the producers that approach would touch it because of that. Um, it was kind of strange because I don't know. I mean, kids die in movies, not all the time, but it happens. Um, I know. And I think Knight was really, you know, hesitate to talk for him. Uh, so like, I'm not quoting him, you know, when I'm saying this, but it seemed to me he was really drawn to the idea of just the choice. That was the thing that he was obsessed with. Like when I say the choice, like, you know, who would choose to, to off themselves to save humanity kind of thing. So I think that sort of led.

00:17:14.03
Paul Tremblay
Historian to going into a not ambiguous place becomes very clear in the film that you know, there is an apocalypse happening that these things are You know if they see on the TV screen or are sort of real and have like a supernatural source ah For lack of a better term Yeah, so I don't you know, I know nice if he grew up Catholic and you know that comes through in a lot I'll say a lot of his movies, but certainly it's something like signs and I think it comes through in this movie, too you know, so that was And when I say it's disappointing for me, just because I really worked hard for the novel not to to go to that sort of spot. um you know right And partly because, like I said,

00:17:58.40
Paul Tremblay
ah you know the I wanted to keep my so my book ambiguous, partly because like it was supposed to be mirroring like how it feels every time you look at your phone or like doom scrolling as Bob said earlier, like, you know, it feels like the world is ending, but like, you know, you don't know for sure. And I wanted the the whole story to sort of feel that and never give you that answer. um You know, sort of just sort of live in that idea and then ultimately have the two, you have the two dads, Eric and Andrew sort of reject the choices just flatly immoral. Like, no, F you, this is wrong.

00:18:32.51
Paul Tremblay
yeah we refuse to participate. And and i find I find that to be hopeful, whereas I find yeah the movie's ending to be you know just my worst nightmare, frankly.

00:18:44.72
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, yeah. And I mean, I rewatched the movie yesterday, in fact, in preparation for this conversation.

00:18:52.86
Paul Tremblay
Yeah. ah

00:18:55.61
Michael David Wilson
And I mean, I i would agree with your assessment. I mean, always a strength of a Paul Tremblay book is that ambiguity that you You can come up with your preferred answer, but you can never have a definitive answer.

00:19:11.14
Paul Tremblay
Uh-huh.

00:19:14.97
Michael David Wilson
And in this one, there is a definitive answer and mate. I do wonder, and particularly with you saying about night being raised Catholic, I wonder if this is a more hopeful ending for somebody who is religious, for somebody who absolutely believes in God, but for people such as myself who you know at worst don't or at best are very very confused and unsure it just feels that in the decision for them to actively decide one of them dies that that's bleak that's hopeless humanity has lost love has lost and the way that it's spun in the film is that love has won but it's like no it's actually lost so

00:19:47.21
Paul Tremblay
Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah

00:20:08.30
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, I think it's a pretty devastating ending and and and it's also a lesser one for the story because the ambiguity has gone.

00:20:19.06
Paul Tremblay
Well, yeah, thank you. I appreciate that. Yeah, you know, it's funny, I'm interested, like, you know, because I know a lot of people don't like ambiguity. And I know, as a writer, it's a big ask, especially if it's a novel, right? I think movies, you know, studios are clearly afraid of having an ambiguous ending, which I don't get because so many, you know, every once in a while, you know, there's a movie, people just love talking about like the ending, like, what does it mean? Like, where does it go? Like, I don't understand why people are afraid of trying to, to get that sort of organic, you know, I don't want it to ever to be like a cheap parlor trick. Like it has to be part and parcel has to be part of the theme of the story. It has to be why it's told that way. um So yeah, I don't know, like the the snarky, like petty side of me, after seeing the movie was kind of thinking, geez, I wonder if all the people who were hated on the ending of cabin, like are are happy with this ending of the movie. ah I, you know, i I try to avoid like reading like sort of just the general reviews from folks, but like,

00:21:16.62
Paul Tremblay
I didn't notice like a groundswell of, ah, see, this is much better.

00:21:20.14
Paul Tremblay
I don't know. Maybe there is.

00:21:22.65
Michael David Wilson
Yeah. And I was just going to say, I would say that overall though, like I really enjoyed the film and I thought that You know, Dave Batista's acting was elevated to an even greater level and he he just keeps getting better and better. So I was very, very impressed. And, you know, overall, it was a great experience and certainly a film that I would watch repeatedly.

00:21:44.58
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:21:53.42
Paul Tremblay
Cool.

00:21:54.21
Bob Pastorella
Yeah, i I liked it. I think with the ambiguity thing, the thing that that i I've noticed, and it just seems to be getting worse, is that we're catering to an audience who doesn't want to think about anything. And I mean, that that kind of bugs me. um the I love ambiguity in in anything because it gives the story an opportunity to grow even more in your mind, in your imagination, which is where you're going to you know where you first experience it anyway.

00:22:34.25
Bob Pastorella
And so, and it gives, it gives you some fodder to talk about with other people who have experienced the movie. So there there's a connectedness there. And so um'm I've gotten to where whenever I like ah a new film or a new book coming out and it it it hits and it's in ah audiences are 50, 50 don't like it, especially if there's ambiguity, I'm probably going to like it.

00:22:59.07
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:22:59.27
Bob Pastorella
And I look for polarizing stuff because if it's to me, if, if, especially if people take into social media, if they're, you know, have a strong enough opinion about it to complain about it or praise it, then it made a reaction. And that's what movies are supposed to do.

00:23:17.76
Paul Tremblay
Right.

00:23:19.94
Bob Pastorella
That's what books, that's what, you know, media is supposed to do is create a reaction. Why studios don't want that. man, it's beyond me. I would, I would crave it.

00:23:29.57
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:23:31.57
Bob Pastorella
I would like, how can I hit that right there in the middle every time?

00:23:35.36
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:23:36.24
Bob Pastorella
So I can, and it I can of imagine for you, it's finally extreme. and It was, it was quite frustrating probably because, you know, me and, me and Michael said before, you know, you're, you're kind of like the master of modern ambiguity and horror right now. And I was like, cause there's everything you do. It's like, Oh, okay. What really happened? And it makes you think, and I love that.

00:23:56.55
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:23:56.89
Bob Pastorella
I just love that. And, uh, man, just, I don't know. it It really bugs me.

00:24:01.50
Paul Tremblay
Yeah. oh Well, thanks. I mean, honestly, like I'm not like super frustrated. In fact, I mean, I do sort of enjoy talking about the differences between the two. um You know, part is that I had a long time to sort of come to grips with it. You know, night was very upfront with me. you know, in a phone call, ah you know, the first time I talked to him was November of 21, about sort of broad strokes, what he was planning on changing. um So I knew like, almost two years, and more than a year before the movie came out that, you know, that part was going to be different. I was actually, when I saw the movie, I was pleasantly surprised. He stuck with the ambiguity for as long as he did. I mean, because it really does, you know, last for almost like, I guess, the first two thirds, you know, of the film.

00:24:45.68
Paul Tremblay
But yeah, just to throw a second, or I agree with the Dave Bautista performance, all the performances. I mean, that's really sort of my favorite part. And they were all super friendly when I got to go to set for a couple of days, and also at the movie premiere. So I mean, all those are sort of like really cherished memories.

00:25:07.06
Michael David Wilson
Yeah. Yeah. I remember you saying last time, because you had met Dave Bautista at that point, just like um how physically imposing he is, um even more so in person.

00:25:13.32
Paul Tremblay
Oh, OK.

00:25:20.06
Paul Tremblay
For sure.

00:25:25.94
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, I think he actually gained weight for the role, too. ah Yeah, so yeah, he was like a big dude or is a big dude.

00:25:28.66
Michael David Wilson
Right.

00:25:32.93
Paul Tremblay
I would say was he definitely slimmed down by the time I saw him at the premiere. But, you know, on set, he was a hulk of a man.

00:25:37.63
Michael David Wilson
Yeah well I think you know another aspect as to why he's such a good actor is he is like a character actor in the sense that he will get into that mind space he will change his physique if need be kind of in you know the same way people like Chris Christian Bale will is like they're gonna

00:25:56.20
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:26:02.55
Michael David Wilson
you know, put on the weight or lose the weight, change the muscle definition.

00:26:05.74
Paul Tremblay
Right.

00:26:06.96
Michael David Wilson
And obviously being a former pro wrestler, he's going to know about bulking and cutting.

00:26:13.37
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, for sure.

00:26:13.56
Michael David Wilson
So yeah, he's in a good place for that. But yeah, he he definitely did seem like a meatier dude in that particular performance.

00:26:23.30
Paul Tremblay
Yeah. yeah

00:26:27.38
Michael David Wilson
So the last time that we spoke was coinciding with The Pallbearers Club. And that seems to be a book that has really divided people in terms of the reaction. And I'm wondering, you know, what what your feelings are towards The Pallbearers Club, to the response to that book as a whole?

00:27:00.17
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, that's hard, I mean. Obviously, you know, it's hard for me to, I guess, to be objective about that. I mean, it remains one of the favorite things I've, I've written, uh, you know, and maybe it's the kind of thing I've already feel like I've seen more people sort of discovering it or, or connecting with them. You know, it's funny when, before it came out, uh, one of the, one of the U S trade publications, the publications that, you know, aren't like newspapers, but specialize in talking about the publishing industry.

00:27:33.77
Paul Tremblay
you know, one of the trade publications had posted a review that was generally positive, uh, but said like, Oh, you know, blah, blah, blah, you know, interesting, but you know, it's it, this is niche, you know, but for people who like it, will like it kind of thing. And at the time I was like sort of really annoyed by that, like partly because like, I don't understand like how, like, well, the state of sort of reviewer, reviewership or reviewing, ah you know, today is like, you know, is that even like a review of the book? Like, are you talking about the book or are you trying to describe like who would like this? You know, I mean, to me, that's not, again, it's like, you know, for the trade publication, it was probably like a hundred word review with that. But anyway, I know I was a little annoyed by that. I don't know why. Maybe because it, maybe because I knew it was true. You know, it's very sort of Gen X and it's, you know, a strange,

00:28:30.44
Paul Tremblay
you know, more app smashing together of a memoir with something else with some weird fiction, you know, and probably of the recent spate of novels, maybe the lightest on horror elements, like, yeah because it's not there, like, on every page, like, there's maybe three big sort of scenes that it that it works on. um So I don't know, like, I'm very thankful, you know, when the book does connect, connect with people. I mean, It sort of really connects with them, which is really cool. And if it doesn't connect with you, I can sort of get it. Like I think a publisher mistake too, at least in the US was, you know, they were promoting it or publicizing it as like, Oh, a psychological suspense, almost like thriller language. And like, I can totally see if you were expecting a thriller and you read that you would, you wouldn't be like, wait a minute. This is, this isn't what I was promised. Uh, yeah. So I don't know. Uh, like I said, I get,

00:29:26.61
Paul Tremblay
It remains one of my favorites. I don't know about everybody else. Like what are you going to do? Yeah, just try it the best you can.

00:29:34.47
Michael David Wilson
Yeah I think in terms of expectations for a Paul Tremblay novel the only thing one can expect is you're probably going to do something completely different to the previous one and you're going to you know almost like reinvent or subvert different tropes and

00:29:48.07
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:29:56.35
Michael David Wilson
ah ideas I mean a head full of ghosts and everything link you did for the kind of exorcism ghost genre is kind of spectacular and you know I mean if we think about I mean yeah like cabin was effectively the home invasion novel um

00:30:08.19
Paul Tremblay
Oh, thank you. Right now, for sure.

00:30:19.85
Michael David Wilson
Paul Bearers Club. I mean, it's probably very difficult for people to know what to expect, because I think we said before, how do you pitch it? It's part memoir, it's part vampire story. and but But even that, it doesn't really do it justice, but it's like, if if you like memoirs, if you like vampires, if you like Mark Daniel Lusky, this could be for you.

00:30:33.61
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:30:45.87
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, yeah, niche. I guess which is fine. I'll totally accept that. But yeah, no, thanks. Yeah, i don't I don't know what else to say about that that crazy little book, but I do love it so.

00:31:02.27
Michael David Wilson
Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, when you are in discussion with your publisher in terms of what you're going to put out next, is there much input in terms of what they want to see from you? Or do you ever, you know, say, right, I've got these three different ideas and these three different books.

00:31:24.62
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:31:26.34
Michael David Wilson
And then they tell you the one that they want or the one they absolutely don't want.

00:31:31.62
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, so I say the general answer is no, like, ah I'm extremely lucky ah to have my editor Jennifer Brel, you know, who's just brilliant and has been around in publishing forever. So she really has, you know, she's probably one of the leading editors at Moro. So she has a lot of say, which is great. um you know, she's never been heavy handed. She's always like stepped in and helped me with drafts when when they really needed it. But she's also been confident enough to to know like when she didn't have to say anything for for something like just for the sake of saying something. um So like, you know, I'm super it's fine. She just happened to call me today and we were just talking about I was telling her how lucky I was to have her because she's never once been like, hey, you have to write something like this or

00:32:20.58
Paul Tremblay
um I've never felt pressure to, yeah, I don't know, to write something that I didn't want to write. Now, like when I first signed up with Moro with a head full of ghosts, I didn't know what the second book was. So at that point, I was like, you know, brand new to her and Moro. So I did send her like a whole bunch of stuff thrown against the wall, like four or five different novel ideas. And we we landed together on one. But that was more just like, hey, I want to make sure this relationship works out well. But since then, I'm probably going too much in the other direction where I just surprise her with things like, hey, look, it's an anthropomorphic animal movela stuffed into this collection. What do you think? Or yeah, I'd say I tried to warn her a little bit with Paul Barron's club because I did. I didn't feel it from her, but I felt like it I felt it from the marketing sales side of things that after cabin in a survivor song, I definitely felt like, oh, like, you know, you're starting to make inroads into Thriller and

00:33:19.31
Paul Tremblay
And I was like, well, I mean, it's, I'm not a thriller writer and I, you know, I'm not using it as pejorative. It's just like, I, you know, I just happened to write two books that had like sort of like these tighter plots and over shorter timelines, like, Oh, this next novel is definitely not going to be a thriller. Uh, and they're like, what do you mean? I'm like, God, I don't want to freak you out. Hopefully it's still good. You know, I was thinking about the Paul Berus covers, but you know, in my head, I'm like, this is going to be take place over decades and have a much more expansive inner sort of life. Uh, you know, she yeah never balked at it. You know, the only time. The only thing that's sort of like this ritual that Jen and I go through is when I turn in something, she's like, does it have to have margin notes? I'm like, yes, read the whole thing and you'll see we need it. Or even with look with horror movie, after she read like the first 20 pages, like, ah it does it have to be in the screenplay format? I'm like, trust me, you know read it and then you know see what you think. ah But, you know, I sort of joke, but I know it is an ask, an extra ask to the publisher to have to you know put more into the interior design of it. but

00:34:19.55
Paul Tremblay
I just can't help myself. So I'm sorry, that was really rambly. But the short answer is I'm incredibly fortunate that I i haven't experienced those pressures that you had described. um And I know that is not the case for many a writer. So I definitely feel like the luckiest writer in the world.

00:34:36.15
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, yeah, and I mean that the screenwriting, the script format is of course integral to horror movie. It would be, I mean, it would be a different book.

00:34:44.99
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:34:47.65
Michael David Wilson
I mean, it would, I don't know, it would be such a different book that it, yeah, a different story almost.

00:34:48.17
Paul Tremblay
Right.

00:34:55.20
Michael David Wilson
So yeah, but I wonder as well, like kind of hearing you talk talk about the pallbearers club and before there was cabin and there was survivor song. I wonder whether conscious or unconsciously if writing something so different was reactionary in a way to be like, right, you absolutely can't put me into the thriller category if I do this.

00:35:22.65
Paul Tremblay
yeah I think it certainly a little bit, but it was more honestly, just as a writer, I was like, oh, like I've done this like, you know, ticking clock thing for two books in a row. I, you know, I just wanted to do something different. um So, don you know, for good, for good or for bad, I did something different.

00:35:40.00
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, yeah, which then brings us to horror movie. I mean, there's no question for people about this genre that this one falls under, clue being.

00:35:50.46
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, no, it's definitely like my most horror book in a while.

00:35:54.62
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, but I mean, yeah, yeah.

00:35:55.91
Paul Tremblay
Or fully horror, I should say, or the most horror in it. Yeah.

00:35:59.73
Michael David Wilson
And for those unfamiliar, I mean, could you give us the elevator pitch?

00:36:06.00
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, sure. So I guess it's a, you know, a riff on the cursed film genre, which is, I mean, it's so fun to see like, within like, the last few years, there have been so many cursed film sort of books come out. I don't know. It's just, It's just neat that like so many different writers are are sort of thinking and in the same way, just like tapping into the zeitgeist. But anyway, ah so in 1993, a group of you know twenty mid-20s year olds in Rhode Island make a low budget, independent, arthouse, disturbing, pretentious horror movie, which is sort of my favorite kind. ah you know And something happens on set late late in filming that prevents it from actually coming out.

00:36:47.53
Paul Tremblay
So in present day, the the man who played the Thin Kid in the original movie, he's never named, just called the Thin Kid, is the book is actually his, this is not a big spoiler, but the book is presented as his audio book of the Thin Kids. you know Basically he's narrating the experience on set originally, sort of what happened in the years in between. 1993 and present day because in present day a studio is trying to make a larger budget version of this movie. So, you know, it sort of bounces around, you know, so it's a, hopefully it's a, it's a mix of, of horror, some grim horror plus a little bit of Hollywood satire too.

00:37:31.40
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, and in terms of the presentation, I mean, we we flip between yeah the prose and then the screenwriting in in terms of like get kind of alternating chapters.

00:37:39.31
Paul Tremblay
I should have mentioned that. Yeah. Yeah.

00:37:46.36
Michael David Wilson
So we we are discovering the film, we are watching it as it were as it is being discussed.

00:37:53.84
Paul Tremblay
Right.

00:37:55.33
Michael David Wilson
And yeah, so there's a lot of reveals and timings and in terms of you know the way that that is done. and yeah ah This is why if you were to remove the the the screenwriting, the script format, it it falls apart.

00:38:13.40
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:38:16.57
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, no. And, you know, to my editor's credit, as soon as she got a little bit deeper into the book, she was like, OK, yeah, I guess we have to have the screenplay. You know, and some of that was just from I knew I i wanted the reader to know like the whole movie was like ah it struck me as like drudgery and for the reader to be like, oh, just tell them and this is what happened in the movie is like, no, how about if we actually include the whole screenplay, you know, cut up throughout the book. And to me, it to just seemed like the natural It's really the only way to tell the story to tell this story anyway.

00:38:46.08
Michael David Wilson
Yeah. Yeah. I i know when i first when I first started it and after the introductory chapter we have horror movie written by, is it Cleo Pecane? I'm not sure how you pronounce it.

00:39:04.17
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, I think that's right.

00:39:05.06
Michael David Wilson
Yeah.

00:39:05.21
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:39:05.80
Michael David Wilson
yeah so So then I thought, oh wow, are we now getting the entire script? I did i did wonder if you like,

00:39:13.45
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:39:15.54
Michael David Wilson
and I have the intro, then the script, then we're going to get, but no, that was not how it panned out.

00:39:18.15
Paul Tremblay
who Yeah.

00:39:20.94
Michael David Wilson
But I know oh that that is an intense move.

00:39:23.32
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:39:26.54
Michael David Wilson
But and in terms of the writing itself, I mean, I know that you've said before that in terms of the screenplay, you deliberately break so many of the so-called screenwriting rules.

00:39:42.30
Paul Tremblay
yeah

00:39:43.15
Michael David Wilson
I mean, if anyone Would, were to get that, I mean, for first of all, there's not enough dialogue on the page and there's so much in terms of the pros, but I mean, what was it like to be consciously writing? You, you, you have phrased it like this yourself, a deliberately flawed script.

00:40:04.75
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:40:08.02
Paul Tremblay
I mean, that part was fun. I mean, honestly, like since I know nothing about screenwriting, it was like my permission to write like a screenplay that I would want to write. You know, knowing like and it's not like every page of the screenplay that breaks the rules. It's just, you know, certain times or there's some interiority. ah Yeah, maybe describing camber angles like that's sort of a no no. um you know, other little minutia like that, but that I think wouldn't necessarily bother readers. But you know, there are sort of like expansive bits and pieces that you wouldn't, you know, maybe some parentheticals within the dialogue that that sort of do more. But yeah, I wanted it to sort of like become its own thing. And, and when I wrote it, ah

00:40:50.62
Paul Tremblay
What helped me was I didn't write the whole screenplay at once. like I wrote it in chunks. I wrote the chunks that i where I thought they would be. So the preceding chapters of of the prose, of the action, you know outside of the movie would help sort of inform, you know help me figure out how I wanted to approach like the next chunk of the screenplay, if that makes sense.

00:41:13.40
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, so the way in which it is presented is, in fact, the way in which you wrote the book.

00:41:21.25
Paul Tremblay
Right. Absolutely.

00:41:25.44
Michael David Wilson
And so, I mean, I have to imagine that there was like a lot of planning and, you know, you I can't imagine you pants this one in any way.

00:41:38.08
Paul Tremblay
Uh, I sort of did this one. Um, like, cause I think we've talked before, uh, that like for some of my earlier novels, especially I would write like a plot summary first, but I didn't do that for this book.

00:41:50.38
Michael David Wilson
Hmm.

00:41:51.35
Paul Tremblay
I mean, I sort of, I pantsed the plotting or like I would write, I ended up with an outline sort of, but like I did it as I went. So I just kept like ah notes with little peaks ahead. Um, you know, and I think that was the way to go with this book. Uh, you know, hopefully it feels a little bit freewheeling slash dangerous at times, you know, if that's the right word. Um, that's what, I mean, it felt like to me, oh, I say dangerous, dangerous for me. Cause it's like, Oh no, this is going completely off the rails. I don't know. Uh, but I just sort of stuck with it.

00:42:28.05
Bob Pastorella
I think that probably helps maintain moment momentum, you know, and that's sometimes that's, you know, Hey, ah having that gets the words on the page, sometimes more than anything else.

00:42:40.61
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, ah for sure. I mean, I definitely don't want to do that every time with every book. I mean, for me, it's, you know, I'm in this sort of fun place, fun for me and weird also that I've written, you know, a whole bunch of novels now. And so part part of Part of the experience for me now is trying to make each one feel different in some way. So like to do something that feels like, okay, I have to curate this somehow to me to put me in the mood for this book. And it felt like having this larger notebook, usually I use like smaller notebooks, as but also as opposed to writing out ah a, as I mentioned, instead of writing a summary first, I thought, okay, this is what I need to do for this book.

00:43:17.58
Paul Tremblay
you know, in some in that, you know, sometimes that's just a pure artifice. But, you know, half half of writing is fooling yourself into doing things anyway. So it seemed to work this time around.

00:43:30.90
Michael David Wilson
And you mentioned there being almost a revival of the cursed movie ideas. I wonder if there's something in the collective consciousness at the moment, if there's something going on that is seeing people return to it. I mean, it was very popular in the nineties, particularly the mid and later nineties, but

00:43:55.13
Paul Tremblay
Hmm.

00:43:55.56
Michael David Wilson
You know, you are right that up until very recently it had almost gone out of fashion.

00:44:02.93
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, I mean, it's sort of hard to explain, like, ah just even like last year. ah Last year, Josh winning a British author. had burned the negative. And that sort of weird part of that was he sent me his book to ask me to read it for a blurb. And I was happy to do so. And I said, well, let me finish. Let me finish my draft first, because I didn't want because I was in the middle of writing a curse movie and he wrote a curse movie book. So I told him, OK, I'm going to be done with my draft soon, and then I'll read it. And when I read it, the stories are so wildly different, but there's like some, there was like a few weird like samenesses, just in some of the details, like his movie was a 93. In his, in his movie, like, I don't know, a fortune teller, like the paper thing. Apparently that happened in in

00:44:52.38
Paul Tremblay
in England as well but like I don't know in the 80s and 90s like kids would make these notes folded up and you would move them around so anyway that featured in Josh's novel of mine too so ah I wasn't freaked out but like I gave Josh a blurb because I really enjoyed his book but I also sent him attached my novel I'm just like hey You don't have to read a blurb this, but I just want you to know there's a couple of things that are very similar. I just want you to read read the draft so you know that I just didn pluck it from your book, um which was kind of fun. you know And then Josh was very helpful. He gave me some initial feedback for my draft too. So it was a fun way of tricking somebody into reading my rough draft.

00:45:31.00
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, yeah, I like that tactic. And yeah, I understand you're sending it to him as well, because you're like, oh, I need to show you this now, because I don't want there to be any doubt and that I didn't take this.

00:45:42.09
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, sure. yeah. yeah

00:45:48.07
Michael David Wilson
yeah i Yeah, I guess that's the danger of, you know, reading one another's work. But I always think as well, like, Even if, you know, all three of us were to be given a synopsis and told, right, write that novel, it would be so wildly different because we're the ones approaching it.

00:46:05.19
Paul Tremblay
Oh yeah.

00:46:11.09
Michael David Wilson
So, I mean, when people say, oh, this person stole my idea, it's like, oh, I do. I mean, I don't think there's that many original ideas anyway, so i'd I'd refute that, but it's like you can take the same idea, but you can't take the voice.

00:46:21.94
Paul Tremblay
Right.

00:46:28.61
Michael David Wilson
That is what makes it uniquely you.

00:46:28.89
Paul Tremblay
Right.

00:46:31.47
Paul Tremblay
Absolutely. Now, and even like ah here in the U.S., Craig DeLouis has a novel coming out a week after mine called How to Make a Horror Movie and Survive, you know, with almost like similar font and cover.

00:46:44.72
Michael David Wilson
Yeah.

00:46:45.27
Paul Tremblay
ah I just started dipping into it today and it's a lot of fun. Yeah, again, totally different story. And it was never a concern for me that it wouldn't be totally different and and fun and and new. Um, so yeah, I'm just, I'm just glad like all these publishers are like, yeah, let's throw out some more cursed movie books. Um, and because there's, you know, yeah you know, there's an interesting appeal to that thing.

00:47:03.49
Michael David Wilson
Yeah.

00:47:08.86
Paul Tremblay
Like, I don't know. I'd love to hear your guys' opinion on that. Like, but you know, the appeal, like why are you so many people are interested in the quote unquote cursed movie, you know, or even like, you know, sharing. You know the the legends that oh the exorcist was cursed or poltergeist was cursed just you know You know, what is it about horror fans that? What not only want their movies to be scary, but like they seem to be attracted to the idea of oh, not only is this a scary This is actually in real life cursed Hmm

00:47:38.49
Bob Pastorella
I don't know. I mean, I think my first experience with that curse thing was, um, ancient images by Ramsey Campbell, where there's, you know, a researcher who's looking for a lost or has someone that's found a lost Karloff Lugosi film. And there's, it's been a long time since I've read the book, but I know that that, that was kind of like my first instance that I remember reading that. And I was, I was like, I don't know. There's something attractive to cursed things. It doesn't necessarily have to be a cursed film. Um, and then, um, I didn't really see anything too much after that. Um, I know that there's a a book called a flicker.

00:48:37.05
Bob Pastorella
I have it on my Kindle. It's taken up so much space. Um, but, uh, I think it's like five, 600 pages.

00:48:43.76
Paul Tremblay
Oh well.

00:48:43.88
Bob Pastorella
And then we have, you know, night film, which is not really a cursed film, but about just some extremely weird stuff going on with, with that particular director.

00:48:55.27
Paul Tremblay
Right, right.

00:48:58.21
Bob Pastorella
But, uh, probably to me, the ah cigarette burns from master ah of horror series, John Carpenter, cigarette burns short, you know, a film that, you know, people watch this film and went mad.

00:49:10.61
Paul Tremblay
Mm.

00:49:12.26
Bob Pastorella
And I don't know. I just, there's something about that. And that's what that, that came out like, what, in the late nineties, early two thousands.

00:49:20.34
Paul Tremblay
I think so, yeah.

00:49:21.22
Bob Pastorella
So here we are 20 years later and we have like three books already that have cursed films. And it's like, you know, it's like, we're bringing it back. I don't know. Um, I just, I think that there's like a general attractiveness to things that are cursed. And then, you know, the the reality of like the exorcist, you know, all these people got hurt or, you know, whatever, man, it's like, what, it's like, let's list out every single coincidence we possibly can. I bet you I can find of a romance film where people got hurt.

00:49:53.43
Paul Tremblay
yeah

00:49:53.97
Bob Pastorella
You know, I mean, so it's not just that it's just, it's, oh, it's horrible, man. It's cursed. I don't know.

00:50:00.35
Paul Tremblay
yeah

00:50:00.50
Bob Pastorella
I don't buy it.

00:50:01.39
Paul Tremblay
ah

00:50:02.19
Bob Pastorella
It's, it's interesting to, to read about and and watch and not in documentary style, but nah. I don't know. What do you think about that kind of stuff? mind

00:50:12.42
Michael David Wilson
Well I think you know the one glaring omission is of course Ringu which came out in 1998 and then you know Koji Suzuki's novel before that.

00:50:17.55
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:50:19.48
Bob Pastorella
Oh, yeah. Yeah.

00:50:20.49
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:50:24.84
Michael David Wilson
I think if you think of the cursed videotape that is the one for me and I think that did

00:50:26.91
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:50:29.25
Bob Pastorella
Right. Yeah.

00:50:34.80
Michael David Wilson
you know, spiral a lot of knockoffs, which is ironic phrasing because one of the sequels was called spiral, but nevermind.

00:50:40.21
Paul Tremblay
Hmm.

00:50:45.10
Michael David Wilson
And you know, like the the question as to why, why are we attracted to these cursed videos? And it is probably you know, tied into why we're attracted to horror in the first place is that kind of fear of the unknown, fear of these things that we're powerless to stop. it It is ambiguity and not knowing how did this come into play and why, you know, why.

00:51:10.99
Paul Tremblay
Ugh.

00:51:19.08
Michael David Wilson
And it's just, if you're being, attacked by something as innocuous as a video tape. I mean, what what chance do you have? At least if there's a monster, there's the idea that you can potentially kill it, but a video tape that's gonna be different rules that apply I suppose too I mean as technology has advanced there's like a fear of technology so then just making that more literal making it not only be a concern but it is now the antagonist but I mean you know maybe maybe the why we're re attracted is unimportant and what is important is that

00:51:52.81
Paul Tremblay
Mm.

00:52:08.70
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, I absolutely love them. And I know that if I see, you know, a book or a film coming out that has the cast tape, then I want to see it. I want to consume it.

00:52:21.91
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, it's really king and yellow riff, right?

00:52:25.70
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, yeah.

00:52:26.42
Paul Tremblay
Although I so I don't like I have no idea if this is, you know, holds any water or not. But I think maybe we're seeing. Seeing a spate of these books coming out now, partly because it's also a reflection of ah genre fandom in general, like how intense it's become and how pervasive it's become. um and sort of like, the I guess, the demands of that, maybe on the creator. ah and And I say that with like horror movies started with me being a total Texas Chainsaw Massacre fan and going into a rabbit hole and like, you know, after seeing a YouTube video to people, you know, discussing it, and like, Oh, I want more information. I want more, I want more, like, to a point where

00:53:15.07
Paul Tremblay
Like it's this weird, and I think it's sort of, ah ah and I say this as a fan, like, wouldn't that be cool if it just slipped over into reality somehow? Just a little bit. Like even if something as horrible as the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. You know, there's something like ah of loving this piece of sort of art so much that you want it to bleed over into your life a little bit. And, you know, I think that comes out in horror movies somewhat like that fear or that thing, you know, with, you know, there are a couple of chapters where the thin kids at a convention, right, you know, dealing with that a little bit. I mean, it's certainly like.

00:53:48.15
Paul Tremblay
You know, the weird idea that this movie that was never screened is now like this weird cult cult phenomenon because of the little bits of pieces of information that's gone out there. So, yeah, I think there's definitely something to. You know, sort of our Internet you know overexposed art overexposed media overexposed lives that I think is is sort of bringing our interests back into the the cursed the cursed film or the cursed piece of art sort of story.

00:54:17.62
Bob Pastorella
Mm-hmm. I'm thinking too, because right now found footage has kind of had a revival and this is definitely, horror you know, horror movie definitely falls into found footage to some degree.

00:54:24.86
Paul Tremblay
Hmm. Hmm.

00:54:30.50
Bob Pastorella
And, um, you know, and we're just trying to find different ways to present a found footage. And so I think yeah is if horror movie was made into a horror movie, it would it would probably there would definitely be some of that those those those scenes that were released you know on YouTube would be would be part of that.

00:54:53.02
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:54:56.08
Bob Pastorella
And I think there's something about lost and or lost films or found films that, I mean, think about it. If someone actually found London After Midnight, like an actual restored copy. It is the most famous, you know, lost film ever.

00:55:13.89
Paul Tremblay
of

00:55:15.10
Bob Pastorella
And if they found that one, it would be worth, you know, a lot of money, millions, but, um, just the, the, the internet, um, horror fandom upheaval that that would cause would be massive. So, you know, in every once in a while someone will pop up saying, Oh, it was found in Switzerland. And it's like, no, no, it was burned in a fire and it's gone. And, you know, if there, if there is a remaining copy, whoever has it is rubbing their hands together going, it's mine. You know, so, but to, I've always thought that would be like a really cool story is some researchers get it, get it like a real,

00:55:59.34
Bob Pastorella
thing that would be in it. And then it's actually a cursed film. Wow. See how popular that could be.

00:56:04.02
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, you shouldn't you shouldn't have shared that.

00:56:05.28
Bob Pastorella
Yeah.

00:56:05.88
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:56:06.27
Bob Pastorella
Yeah. So fan, but to me, I think a lot of it has to do with film footage being kind of hot again. And, um, you know, everything cycles. So yeah, it makes sense.

00:56:20.26
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, and mentioning Texas Chainsaw Massacre. I mean, of course, there was that period where there were so many you know, relatively mainstream films, horror films, where, you know, when you dig into the conditions that they were filmed under, I mean, Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Day of the Dead are probably the two most famous ones, but yeah, there was less kind of regulations back then.

00:56:39.13
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:56:51.93
Michael David Wilson
So, I mean, yeah, you almost got the horror behind the horror and then the the conditions and the horror in which it was filmed in was was worse than you know what was well to a point worse I mean nobody was actually

00:56:59.29
Paul Tremblay
Right.

00:57:09.97
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, yeah. No, 100%. You know, when I read Chainsaw Confidential, which was Gunnar Hansen's book on his experiences on set. Yeah, I mean, that's the thing that I was endlessly fascinated by is like, here's this movie, you know, as you said, where they took not only yeah they took all sorts of risks, financial risks, but also, you know, physical and probably mental risks, too. I mean, there were plenty of scenes that were way too dangerous with what they were doing with the chainsaw. And I was just fascinated at the idea of, okay, you know, one as as a writer who generally works alone, like the idea of the collaborative thing, right? um I was, you know, very interested in, okay, like what, how does this collaborative thing work? And like, how does it work, especially when they start all moving toward like, you know, blurring lines of safety?

00:57:59.24
Paul Tremblay
uh, or blurring lines of like, Hey, when does, you're making these group decisions that are maybe beneficial for those things they're making, but, but at what risk to individuals. Um, yeah. And I was just really fascinated by that, that sort of idea.

00:58:16.25
Michael David Wilson
Yeah and I mean you you don't often hear about that so much these days I mean it probably that's a good thing although you know I know that the film Prisoners that came out in 2013 I read the other day that I mean I don't know have either of you seen it?

00:58:26.13
Paul Tremblay
Yes.

00:58:38.17
Paul Tremblay
I have not.

00:58:39.48
Michael David Wilson
Yeah so it's about a That there's a guy's daughter who goes missing and the guy decides to take ah the investigation into his own hands rather than let the police take care of it. And well, I mean, it's called prisoner. So there's a clue as to what's going on, but there's a bit where Hugh Jackman is getting very intense with the person who he suspects.

00:59:02.47
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, yeah.

00:59:10.28
Michael David Wilson
ah kidnapped his daughter and he he went off script and night just started getting so intense and like kind of brandishing weapons that the person who was playing he aid it the prisoner actually was like physically shaking and getting quite a reaction to it now.

00:59:23.00
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

00:59:34.65
Michael David Wilson
It made for great cinema. I'm not sure that ethically it was the best, but it it certainly ah created a moment.

00:59:41.21
Paul Tremblay
yeah

00:59:44.85
Michael David Wilson
And I guess that, you know, rightly or wrongly, there is something fascinating just for us as human beings to hear about, you know, these moments and these things that weren't really meant to be.

01:00:00.91
Paul Tremblay
Absolutely, yeah.

01:00:03.25
Michael David Wilson
I mean, I wonder if in a way it's kind of linked to why white people are so interested in in true crime and in true crime podcasts and documentaries, not that I am likening what Hugh Jackman did off script of being Jeffrey Dahmer, just so we're clear on that.

01:00:07.48
Paul Tremblay
Mm.

01:00:21.69
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

01:00:25.12
Paul Tremblay
OK.

01:00:26.47
Michael David Wilson
but you should both see Prisoners. like Many people don't seem to have seen it. um I don't know, did it not get a wide release?

01:00:35.40
Paul Tremblay
Yeah, i can't even I don't even think I've heard of it. Yeah, that's interesting.

01:00:38.90
Michael David Wilson
It's directed by, I always get the pronunciation of this guy rung. He did Dune and Blade Runner, is it Dennis?

01:00:48.16
Paul Tremblay
Oh, really?

01:00:50.12
Michael David Wilson
and

01:00:50.70
Paul Tremblay
Villeneuve?

01:00:50.76
Michael David Wilson
what what What's his second name?

01:00:53.21
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

01:00:54.06
Michael David Wilson
that's the and I can do the Dennis part.

01:00:56.00
Paul Tremblay
Yeah. Villeneuve, I think.

01:00:59.43
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, yeah, so he he did this back in 2013 and for me it's...

01:01:00.17
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

01:01:06.10
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, I think it's the best movie that he's done, but you know, that is for my taste.

01:01:09.53
Paul Tremblay
Hmm.

01:01:12.93
Michael David Wilson
You know, I'm very into these dark thrillers, so it's a...

01:01:13.29
Paul Tremblay
Yeah.

01:01:19.56
Michael David Wilson
Highly subjective comment and you know Probably many people disagree seeing as he's done Dune Blade Runner and Arrival Pretty strong trilogy Yeah,

01:01:22.05
Paul Tremblay
Yeah. Yeah. I'll have to check that out.