Sinister

You think these are serial murders? I don't know. First one I found dates back to the 60s. The only link between all these cases is the symbol. The symbol is associated with a pagan deity named Bagul. He consumes the souls of human children. I have never been onto something this big before. Early Christians believed that Bagul actually lived in the images himself and that they were gateways into his realm. Children exposed to the images were especially vulnerable to Bagul's abduction. Sweetheart, what are you doing? Painting. Who are you talking about? Stephanie. What's the matter? What's happened? Get the kids in Pactical. We have to leave here now. Hello, Sydney. Hi. Who is this? It's your killer host.

My name is Parker, your resident horror fanatic. I'm Caroline, Scaredy Scream Queen. I'm Ian, Scary Movie Skeptic. And welcome to. What's your favorite scary movie? What's your favorite scary movie is a horror film podcast where we're on a journey to find our favorite scary movie one at a time. Whether you hate them or love them, join us and discover yours. Spoilers ahead, so plan your movie screening every weekend before the episode release. Yeah. What are you scared about, Parker? Well, I don't know if you know, but we're watching the scariest movie ever made, according to science. Science? Yes, I don't know if you turds heard, but Forbes put out an article this year, pretty recently, actually, and it said, based on um average heart rates and spikes in heart rates while watching, that Sinister is the scariest movie ever made.

Wow, I want to be a subject in one of those tests. I know it said that they watched a hundred hours of horror movies. It's like, I'll do that, pay me. The same people? I think so. I'm not quite sure how large the test group was. But like I would have done it. We've watched a hundred hours at the end. I was gonna say, we could have put heart monitors on and sold our data. We should have just told them, like, hey, listen to the podcast. We'll tell you what's the scariest movie. We should, we should, um, as we rate all these movies, we should put our BPMs. We'll figure out. We'll find out on today's episode if Sinister is in fact the scariest movie ever made.

But for now, just know Sinister was released wide in the year 2012. It was written and directed by Scott Derrickson. Scott Derrickson appears to have written and directed a Hellraiser sequel in 2000, The Exorcism of Emily Rose in 2005, and the Marvel movie Doctor Strange in 2016. Do y'all like Marvel movies? I can't remember. I'm not like a big fan, but I'll sit down and watch them. I don't hate them. Yeah, Doctor Strange had like these like crazy psychedelic kaleidoscope things going on, and I saw it with my parents in college, and I was actually sick when I saw it, and I had to close my eyes and not watch it. I thought I was gonna throw up.

So I've only seen like half of it. But Sinister was co-written by C. Robert Cargill, and this was his feature debut. Congratulations, C. Robert Cargill. Uh, he and Derrickson have since written together Sinister 2 from 2015, uh, which had a different director. And he also wrote on Doctor Strange with Derrickson in an upcoming film called Bermuda. Sounds relaxing. Bermuda Triangle. Ooh, I wanna take you to Geometric. Before we move on from your points, um, we both got very excited when we saw the Blumhouse intro. Because I feel like it's been a minute. You missed Blumhouse? We did. It wasn't the last Blumhouse movie we watched. Wasn't it uh Fantasy Island? For the record, it was just Caroline that got excited.

Well, we just we haven't seen it in a while. I feel like we've been going back into the archives. Yeah, you know, I personally I do not feel any tickle of excitement at a Blumhouse uh title card. But you know, go off Caroline. Well, it's mainly because I think it's kind of scary. So I always would like to see that, and I'm like, ooh, is this part of the movie or what? Get a little hyped. Yeah. Alright, back to business. In this movie, we have Ethan Hawke as Ellison Oswald, which is by definition the coolest name I've ever heard. Um Do you know what that name reminds me of? Oswald, Lee Harvey Oswald. No, but throwback for the listeners.

Um, it reminds me of um the Peng one from Batman Returns. Uh, what was his name? Oswald Coppelpie or something like that. Well, I was thinking. Why is it that when I think of one of these assassins, I can't remember the other name? We've had this very conversation before on this podcast. I know, and it just still proves true right now because I can't remember the other one. Okay, anyways, Ethan or Ellison, uh, we have seen in The Purge from 2013. But he's a familiar face, and we probably know him from other things as well. What other things, Parker? Oh, well, have you seen the prov the before sunset, midnight, whatever trilogy? A little romance. Oh, well, they're famous.

Um, I think I've seen two of them. But you know, he's just in so much, and personally for me, when I see Ethan Hawk on a headline, uh, it's not always a selling factor for me. Yeah. Um I feel like Ethan Hawk is um someone who would bully me in elementary school, and then at the reunion, at the I guess high school if we're having a reunion, but at the reunion he'd be like, I don't care that you're gay, but don't look at me in the bathroom. That's the vibe he gives me. That's very specific. Oh, and if you're wondering where we have reviewed the purge, well, you can go ahead over to patreon.com slash scary moviepod where we have talked about Ethan Hawk before.

I just he's he's a familiar face, but also like an easily forgettable face. So moving on. Damn. Uh we have Juliet Rylance Rylance as Tracy. Uh she's been in TV shows The Nick and American Gothic. James Ransone plays The Deputy, which like love him. Um he was in Prom Night from tw 2008. Is that funny? Uh well I was imagining prom, like the Disney Channel original movie, but that is not prom night from 2008. That's a different movie. Yeah. Um James was also in It Chapter 2 in 2019 and drum roll, Christy from 2014. Wink wink. Yes, you might hear us discussing that maybe even as soon as next week, but I don't know. Um we also have Claire Foley as Ashley and Michael Hall Didario as Trevor.

The IMDB summary reads quote Washed up true crime writer Ellison Oswalt finds a box of Super 8 home movies in his new home that suggests the murder that he is currently researching is the work of a serial killer whose work dates back to the 1960s. That was incredible. Alright, the Rotten Tomatoes average critic's rating is six point two out of ten, while the average audience rating is seven out of ten. Or my average score in high school. And critics' consensus is quote, it's a plot hinges on typically implausible horror movie behavior and recycles countless genre cliches, but Sinister delivers a surprising number of fresh, diabolical twists. Oh my god, one take wonder tonight. Now I find that that critics consensus, um I don't know, not necessarily the critics consensus I have in my brain.

So I'm wondering, what is your critics' consensus, Caroline and Ian? What do you think of Sinister? I mean, I agree with science by saying that my heart rate was pretty high during this movie, but at certain points, uh the scares really just fell flat. Yeah. I feel like what frustrates me about this movie is I think the premise was good, but yeah, the scares were kind of too long and too revealing, and then in result, cheapened said scares. Wow. I do have to say, the true crime aspect really hooked me. True crime will hook anybody. I almost feel like, and we can get into this a little bit, if we would have stuck with the true crime aspect a little bit more, I think I would have been more involved.

Yeah, why'd this have to go so para paranormal? You know, I think that I'm on the exact same page as both of you guys for once, because I I too found the first half of this movie pretty gripping. I was pretty scared, and there are a few jumps in the first half that really um got me. I mean, the first time he's walking through the house in the dark and kind of this iconic image of the sun back bending out of the packing box shirtless scared me. Mm-hmm. Yeah, crazy. But I find um, what do the children call him? Mr. Boogie or something like that. Yes. Yeah. I find Mr. Boogie, I can hardly look at him.

I actually think that he's really terrifying to look at. Um, and so I don't love that he becomes, like Ian said, kind of a paranormal, almost like observer instead of more of an active member of the horror towards the end. I also think that, you know, we're getting all of these like blurred images of Mr. Boogie, and I think that's why it's so scary in the beginning. I will tell you, a breaking point for me was when the screenshot of Mr. Boogie on the screen moved and like looked at him and then went back. That was just at that point in the movie, I was like getting skeptical of like, okay, I'm not into this. Mmm.

Interesting. That's pretty early on, if I remember correctly. Um, I think what really works for me in this movie is all of the footage, all of the super eight footage. That part is always really thrilling. The family being hung on the tree. That is, first of all, it's a really bizarre and beautiful kind of image where one side of the tree is lowering and the branch they're on is lifting. Like, I'm not quite sure how that works. Um, but there's this like strange artistry and beauty to all of these uh films, like snuff films, that also make them a little more disturbing and disgusting. Um, the famous one, the one everyone talks about, is the lawn mower.

Uh, do y'all have any favorites? I we both like turned away from the screen at that moment because it's just like that light on the lawnmower, and and at first I was like, okay, a vacuum cleaner, how much damage could this do? And then you figure out what it is, and I like I was so zeroed into that shot, like knowing like, okay, something's gonna happen, and then it does, and we both like turned away. And did you have a favorite little segment? Yeah, I think the lawnmower scene was definitely just totally shock and awing. You had a a good reaction to the pool one too. Yeah, I think that's just a tragic way to go.

Yeah, that that one was pretty disturbing. I think that the one what's hard about this movie is that it's playing it a little bit safe. Actually, I wonder what this movie is rated. I mean, I'm sure it's R. But I thought that the one where they were in the the house, I think it was called like bedtime or something, um, yes, this movie is rated R, so I don't know, they could have gone harder, but there's also kind of a taboo in America for showing children die. Um, I just thought that they they played that one a little safe. And so while some of them like the pool and like the lawnmower can cut away and give us like the thrill of like, oh my god, that person's head just got lawn mowed.

That one felt a little weak to me. Yeah. Yeah. The other thing that we were talking about that really works for me is the mystery, of course. It's always exciting, you know, breaking down the clues, trying to guess what's going on. I mean, this movie you don't necessarily get enough information that you would be able to connect the dots on your own. But the way that it's presented, it feels like, oh, this is a real mystery that we're going to solve here. We're uncovering some real evidence. And then, of course, it gets. And then they don't actually give you the cake at the end. I'm there for the ride. I want to be detective. Chocolate or white cake.

Chocolate. But what do you mean? They they did get we know it happens at the end. I know, but like, I just want a little bit more of the detective stuff and less of him walking around his house and not turning on any freaking lights. Yeah, very, very dark movie. I said this to my mom on the phone. She called me halfway through while I was watching this, and she's like, What are you doing? And I was like, I'm watching a movie, and honestly, I'm just having a hard time seeing it. And I'm a little frustrated because I see light switches all over this house, and this guy in this movie is just choosing not to.

Yeah. Like at any point, you know, his kids' doors are closed when they're sleeping. Turn the lights on, man. I know, and we've talked about before how some movies play with sound to scare us instead of visuals, and there is a very specific scene where it's pretty much completely black, where Ethan Hawke's walking through the house, and the jump scare is purely just a loud bang. And it definitely scared me, but I was kind of like, ugh. Yeah. Well, I think I know exactly the jump scare you're talking about, and I literally said out loud right before it happened, I said there's gonna be jump scare, and then there was. I think this is so I don't believe the science.

I think it's bullshit. You don't believe the what the science. I don't I don't see this being the scariest movie out there. I think that's kind of I think the movies like I mean, I don't know when that study was made, but like movies like The Lodge, in my opinion, are way scarier. You know what really frustrates me though? I feel like this movie had so much potential. You know what people said scarier than it actually was, and it just like didn't quite get there. You know what people say when something's not that good? They say it has so much potential. Well, I actually I agree with Caroline that I think the first half of this movie is kind of incredible.

Like the way it builds suspense, like I said, I think little vignettes are really gorgeous. But I there's a specific moment, my breaking point, Caroline, when he's falling out of the attic, which is a scary sequence, and then he looks back at the footage that he took and their little ghost hands grabbing his shoulders. I laughed out loud. Um, Ian, I can give you the facts. The study I was referring to was published on Forbes on October 17th in the year 2020, and it was conducted by Broadband Choices. And would you like to know what the second scariest movie that they found was? It's one of your favorites. I just I can't believe uh You're about to say Texas Chainsaw Masker, are you?

I study that recent calls this the scariest movie. What was number two? Number two is Insidious. This study's bullshit. No, but I mean we have seen quite a few. I'm thinking that the way that they've done this, it is favoring movies that have kind of infamous jump scares. So, I mean, Sinister has a couple of infamous jump scares, um, like the The Boy in the Box, and Insidious has that super famous jump scare where they're sitting at the table having a conversation, and then the demon is just behind um Patrick Wilson, The Conjuring, same thing. It's got that um clapping game scare. So, like, I think what they're finding here is movies that had the biggest jump scare.

So maybe they should tone it down. Well, Hereditary was up there, so Hereditary has some scary moments. It follows has a moment that scares the pants off of me. I did you find it talks about that movie, and I'm I'm not as into it. Well, let's get back to Sinister. So, as I alluded to a moment ago, there is a moment where the movie hard shifts to being a paranormal story, and honestly, I get this movie confused with Insidious sometimes because they came out close to each other, I think just a few years difference. Um The Conjuring came out in 2013, so the year after this, and Insidious came out in 2010, so just a few years before this.

So I feel like we're getting a lot of very similar movies all at once with these ghost stories, and there's that sequence where Ethan Hawk is in the house and like the rain jacket ghost is chasing him, and I was just completely checked out when all of that happened. I thought that was so stupid. I jumped on the first one where the little girl's face shows up, and then they held it for like a minute, and then the rest of it was just little kids in body paint running around. I know. Um, so I mean that leads me to before we I get to some fun facts, I would just love to know what y'all think of this ending where there's kind of this excuse the pun, but insidious finale where we find out that Bagul or Mr.

Boogie ha is some sort of pagan entity that has been kind of entrancing children into killing their parents, and that all of these killings are connected by a shared um not a shared location but by you know moving into the death house of the previous family. What do you think? Well first of all uh we both called this plot at the beginning You said the the girl was the killer? Yeah. Oh yeah. We like first 15 minutes in this movie we were like oh I bet the little girl is gonna kill the family. So interesting saw that coming but I was thinking through like all of the plot twists that could have happened and I was secretly hoping that when the professor on the call says that anyone can be kind of um what's the word like entranced by O'Ghoul?

Bagul right Baghoul Oh Wow I thought he was saying that different word that entire time um so when he said that anyone could be entranced by him I was like oh I bet Ellison will be and it's gonna throw us all off because we're all expecting the daughter to Ian what did you think? I thought it was the daughter the whole time for sure that's just crazy to me. I was I feel like I was completely surprised and thrilled. I think I have said before on this podcast that I'm pretty gullible with movies. I believe whatever you throw at me and then I'm like oh my god they were dead the whole time I don't know but um I think that I think that that's a surprise ending what I think was frustrating is that the moment when the daughter comes in and like knocks him out is pretty like disturbing and scary and risky I thought because like I said like it's tricky in horror dealing with children.

But then this kind of like like glitchy flashy jumpy um finale where you don't really get to see anyone die and it's just jumping from person to person uh that that doesn't do it for me and I know that I'm a bit of a a gore whore and that I want to see more but I just think that it kind of removed the suspense and I think that the image of Bagul holding her like it's beautiful but it just like I don't feel like I earned that moment. Yeah also the the little brat pack of the kids like not not very intimidating they look like they just hopped off their scooters and came in to ask for some sweet tea or something well do you want to hear some fun facts about Sinister Yeah oh I love that enthusiasm.

So first of all the very first thing they shot for this movie was all of the snuff films and they shot them on Super 8 footage so authentic and help out kudos to the dad for having such an ability to really DIY the the film yeah and also like what a hard journalist you know he's finding out you know information that could solve mysteries and he's like you know what the police don't need to know this wait wait I I have to comment on his note taking ability when he writes down in big sharpie letters where is the daughter question mark see but do you ever are you ever writing notes I mean I'm hardly ever pinning notes to a cork board but are you ever writing notes and you think like what if there's what if I'm in a movie and someone's watching maybe I should just write something big and obvious no sometimes I do never do I just write caps just because well I mean no wonder your life is not as dra dramatic as mine.

I'm always living a horror movie sometimes I just walk through my apartment with a butcher knife just for fun Parker now moving on according to an interview with Scream Geek Cargill the writer says that he got the idea for Sinister after having nightmares from watching another movie we've covered on the podcast The Ring and he had nightmares about finding mysterious tapes in his attic I found that very interesting because you know what movie I also had nightmares after watching The Ring. The Ring very scary movie so I enjoyed that little crossover to uh different episodes. And then my last fun fact for you is that apparently when Cargill originally conceived the idea of Bagul as a he he thought of him as a spooky looking Willy Wonka who could entice children but he was afraid that if he actually made a spooky looking Willy Wonka that it would be too silly and no one would be scared I did think that he kind of looks like the Joker well do you want to know what he was how they actually came up with the look of Bagul yeah well he and the director uh Derricson they searched on Flickr horror and they ended up paying a photographer five hundred dollars to use the likeness of the image they had created which they felt was very inspired by like metal rock um looks nice oh yeah it's definitely got that metal lock metal rock look what is that ACDC?

Kiss KISS there we go yeah well I mean I hope that person is sad that they didn't ask for more than five hundred dollars or happy because he needed five hundred dollars I mean it's true five hundred's five hundred I would like to take the course that the professor teaches he seems like an interesting dude seems like a a a guy I could be friends with. Yeah are y'all going to start writing true crime no but I did see a meme the other day that was like if I ever get murdered I hope two white men on a podcast try to solve it. I I have to admit side note funny story I mean I don't know anyone out there if you listen to true true crime podcasts but I went down this rabbit hole the other day um and I started listen like true crime podcasts are not like this they are like two hours or more long and they are the most boring pieces of podcast journalism ever but somehow they hook you.

Wow and so like I I have so many um storylines of true crime that I've listened to that just are very random. I always start them and then I am no longer interested and I move on. Y'all are really alienating probably a large population of people who might listen oh I'm not saying true crime podcasts are boring it's just the magic of true crime is that it's so enticing because like there's so many like crimes out there that are better than fiction yeah well my closing thought for this movie is that I think that the one thing this movie gets right is that all children suck. Yeah so let's lock them up I'm back to the witches let's turn them all into rats now what would you guys say from Sinister is the most memorable murder I'm gonna have to say I mean I I gotta go with the lawnmower for sure I mean the build up to it you don't you don't see where it's going and then boom lawnmower the head I know it's not like it's kind of like spottily shown but the last family that gets axed up not the actual murder but the drawing that the daughter makes at the end with everyone's bodies separated I thought was quite enjoyable.

But honorable mention to um the little girl in charge of the lawnmower wearing a rain poncho I thought that was pretty funny. Yeah uh you're referring to the main family dying at the end yeah I mean well you don't you don't see it but her artistic expression and the blood on the walls which was a little bit foreshadowed with her painting and then her drawing the family like with the heads not attached to the torsos not attached to the legs I I enjoyed that. You know have you seen the poster for Sinister? I don't think so well the poster is just like kind of a big white background with a girl in a white dress walking across with her hand on the wall and behind her is a big bloody drawing of Bagool.

Uh-huh and I did see that I when this movie was coming out I was in Fort Worth Texas a lot and I would always drive past a huge billboard that that was that poster and I it freaked me out every time I was like ooh gross scary but my most memorable murder I've got to go with Ian it's that lawnmower we all know the scare's coming and it gets us anyway ugh man that I think is really gorgeous and scary I like that they they shocked us that way um on a scary scale one to most scary movie ever according to science five how would you rate Sinister I'm uh hovering between a three and a four and I think I'm just gonna lean towards science and give it a four we believe science climate change is real I'd give it a five for the beginning the the end lost me but the beginning had me I'm pretty shocked are you shook I'm shook I'm going to give sinister a three for me it's kind of middle of the road would you give sinister a smash or a slash I give it a smash I am giving it a slash it's just not my cup of tay when it comes to scary movie just because of paranormal stuff yeah I just don't like paranormal stuff.

I mean I I liked where they were going with the cult thing I liked the true crime thing but then you throw in the paranormal and you lose me a lot of the times yeah I'm gonna give it a smash I think it's exciting it's creative it takes some risks and in the end a lot of those didn't pay off but I appreciate it and like y'all said the first half of the movie pretty good it's pretty killer so I'm into it. Now what would you guys say is your favorite scary movie uh Hellhouse would be my favorite scary movie still I think I'm gonna go with Sinister. Oh my god you gotta tell us after you dragged it what changed your mind I mean well when I'm comparing it to Hellhouse I think we were more scared in Hell House.

Yeah but that doesn't have to go into favorite scary movie. I mean I think I would watch this again and be like excited to watch it even though like once I forget a little bit about it I think I'll remember the scary parts and be excited to be scared again. Interesting uh I'm going to stick with The Witches 1990. Alright brave choice all right so as we alluded to earlier in this episode next week you know what it is what Turkey Day Gobble Gobble so we are going to watch uh a film that I actually had never watched before this year and somebody referred it to me uh Julianne as a great Thanksgiving set horror movie so next week look forward to our discussion of Christie which I believe is streaming for free on YouTube right now so check that out Parker do you like all of my turkey videos that I send you?

Yeah I'm actually kind of um you know on the edge of my seat what's gonna happen next we've seen them two days in a row and they're growing in population yesterday we saw like two and today there were eight oh my god yeah that was a big uh a big gaggle of turkeys in the video you sent me gaggle of gobbles so until next time when we are reviewing Christie you can head on over to Apple Podcasts and leave us a rating and a review and then maybe you'll hear us scream your name over the airwaves so head on over there we do this for free every week so you know you're welcome period um my name is Parker Heron you can find me on Instagram Twitter and letterbox at Parker Del Rey I'm Carolyn you can find me on Instagram at Caro Manifesto.

And I'm Ian you can find me on yeah you can find me here have we given up on YouTube we're taking a pause from you two big big projects in the works that we'll share later on in our life oh well while you're on YouTube watching Christy for next week you can just subscribe to Life Nomading so that you know about those big developments when they happen that's true yeah that's a good idea thanks Parker and if you want more Thanksgiving fun you can head on over to patreon.com slash scary movie pod where on this Friday the 20th of November we will be discussing the cult Thanksgiving classic Thankskilling one to look forward to friends precisely you won't want to miss it you can also follow what's your favorite scary movie on Facebook Instagram and Twitter at ScarymoviePod you can find our website with our calendar and sometimes reviews but not a lot lately at scarymoviepod dot com and you can email us with any questions feedback requests at scarymoviepod at gmail dot com.

All right you guys don't get eaten by the boogeyman