Black Phone 2 (ft. guest Scott Derrickson)

34:49And I thought they really, really walked the line beautifully with that. I think my big problem in this film, and it's something I couldn't talk about on the podcast because it is a spoiler.

35:00Chris Hewitt:Now you can. Now I can. You've come to the right place. I thought that setup was great. I didn't mind that we were suddenly in slightly Nightmare on Elm Street dream territory because that has been somewhat established in the first film. My big issue with this film was the first film really put you on edge because it does kill Finney's friend. And a bunch of kids have died. And so you are very, very aware of that throughout and you are very scared for Finney. There's a physical threat. There's a physical and very, very real threat for Finney throughout the film. In this one, I didn't feel like almost anyone was at risk.

35:36I didn't think they were going to kill Finny or Gwen I didn't think they were going to kill their best friend is Eddie isn't it? Ernesto Ernesto yeah because you know he's already lost his brother I just didn't see them killing him I didn't think they were going to kill the girl Mustang because she was not built up enough as a character and clearly there's a bit of a love interest the only personal that it felt like they could kill was some of the adults I didn't care about them as much

36:05Chris Hewitt:Damien Bashir maybe Damien Boucher maybe but he was so lovely as well I was like I don't know that they're going to kill him and I liked that scene he had with the grabber over the radio oh yeah my name's not Bill and he just gave yeah Bill yeah whatever your name's Bill but I think I just felt like everybody had plot armor to a degree and so I wasn't as stressed out for most of the film I'm like these people are going to be scared some bad things are going to happen but I think they're mostly going to be fine and I didn't feel that during the first film and that was that was the big problem for me.

36:37Everything else, I thought, you know, the drama, the interpersonal stuff, the scary scenes were mostly really scary, but I wasn't existentially terrified for them the way I was the first time.

36:48Chris Hewitt:Because the physical threat is removed until the end when I presume that the grabber is able to vaguely manifest in the real world because he's close to the kid's corpses, so therefore he's probably, it's like a battery, he's, you know, that's not how batteries work, but you know what I mean? When he's close to the battery. He's got more power. I put my TV remote vaguely close to the batteries and then I can turn on the TV. And then the TV goes 3D. Yeah, that's how it works. So I'm guessing that's how he was able to manifest or was it a Freddy Krueger type thing where more people believed in him so therefore he had more power so therefore he was able to start hurting people in the real world.

37:24Chris Hewitt:But apart from that, there isn't a physical threat. There's a threat to Gwen but yes, you're very unlikely to kill Gwen off halfway through the movie. I was actually a little bit more on edge for Finney than it was for Gwen. But we'll talk about that in a second. But the first movie, all the supernatural stuff's great. All the stuff with the Black Phone's great. There's some wonderful jump scares where suddenly you realize that someone is behind Finney, but he can't see them. But the audience can, and they trap their pants. But the best sequence in the Black Phone for me, I'll see if you guys agree, is when the grabber is asleep and he's trying to get out of the house because the grabber can physically harm him.

38:06Chris Hewitt:He can physically hurt him. And they've built up this weird, fucked up relationship at that point. And you know how terrifying the grabber is. And there's nothing like that in this movie for me. I think when the grabber first appears in Gwen's dream, that's a really effective moment. And it's fantastic. When he first appears at the phone booth and he has that scene with Vinny, that's great. But I didn't need a death count necessarily because this is a franchise that largely deals with people off screen you know um so i didn't need people to be butchered left right and center but i did need more of a sense of threat what do you guys do you guys agree with that and what do you think about the big switch in this sequel which is the emphasis on dreamscapes and bringing the grabber back and making him more overtly supernatural than he was first time around.

38:59Chris Hewitt:I think it's a really interesting thing that in the present day, or, well, the 70s, 80s, but whatever the present day storyline in the film is, nobody dies. Nobody dies. Even the people who get kind of grabbed to an extent, pulled into the ice, loosely slashed, by the end, you see them all staggering about. They're all okay. They're all still alive. And that's really interesting for a horror film like this. As you say, it may be in hindsight then you go Indiana Jones like the worst Indiana Jones ever the grabber kind of did nothing through this film but also making him a supernatural threat shifting things from him being a corporeal villain to a Freddy Krueger-esque dream stalker I think is really interesting they did that in the first film it was really effective, they did a great job the fact that they completely changed what the grabber is in this film and wrote rules for how that works and how it's going to work visually for you on the screen.

40:02Like, I loved all the switching to Super 8 footage and you know instinctively you're in. The dreamscape, all of that stuff is so well done. So it's a different emphasis. It gives you something different from the first film. And yeah, I mean, I guess there probably is nothing as scary as Finny trying to sneak past the grabber on his way out the house. but it gave me different things and I liked that it gave me something unexpected yeah I agree I think the first the part of what I connected with so much in the first one is it's so visceral it's so gnarly it's so nasty like it feels like it could cut you I don't know it just gives me chills even thinking about it because that's how it feels when you're watching it and I do think Ben that's a really good point that it sort of switched to him being this psychological villain and this is all about their psychology this few years after this terrible terrible event and it's kind of exploring their inner life slightly more than their external life and external threat um so i do i think that is sort of i agree that's probably like my biggest issue with the film in terms of how it made me feel but um i do like that new direction and um to pick up on no one dying um in the present day i not to like repeat what you'll have heard in the interview but i asked scott about that and he said that a studio executive had pushed back on that and said someone should die um and he was like no they were bought they were like no we don't want to do that um he felt like that was the way that you would expect it to go and so he didn't want to do that yeah i mean fair play for not feeling that yeah urge to you know outdo quote-unquote last time and you know always raise the stakes

41:44Chris Hewitt:no one really dies last time either Robin dies but we don't see that happen true I mean so no one the only person who dies really in the black phone on screen again correct me if I'm wrong is the grabber and again the only person who dies on screen this time around you see the kids die in flashback is the grabber again and Finny and Gwen's mum Hope and that's it yeah I think it sort of gives it this really much more hopeful note at the end than it would have done if more people had died. And again, not to repeat what you'll have heard, but the line that stuck with me from talking to Scott about this film is that he wanted to make a horror film out of love, not out of anything else, out of hate or fear or anything.

42:26And you can really feel that throughout this whole film. And I think that's shown in the way he treats his characters at the end and what he sets them up to go on to and the life he wants them to have. And I just, yeah.

42:36Chris Hewitt:He's a very spiritual man, Scott D 'Arc. I've interviewed him a bunch of times. He's got a very, very strong Christian faith, but he's also someone who he's a questioner as well I think he would consider himself a philosopher also so I think it's not surprising that he would gravitate towards that kind of thing and if you think about it Ben you're talking about what impact does a grabber have in the movie he brings he brings Finney's family together in a weird twisted fucked up way yeah sorry and at the same time though as we're saying his role here is the psychological aftermath of the first film and the greatest wound he can inflict is not a physical wound it is that knowledge to gwen of i killed your mom that's the big like psychological wound but also this film that's actually he doesn't realize it but that's not the wound that's actually undoing the wound for that family yeah that is healing and freeing that family because they've felt all this time either she abandoned us i think the kids or I failed her for the father.

43:41And instead, it turns out, no, she didn't leave us. She was taken from us by this outside force. If the grabber tries to harm her with that thing, he is completely misjudged the situation. I guess because he doesn't understand love because he's a sociopathic serial killer. That's a really good point. And it also heals Gwen in terms of her attitude towards her gift or her curse or her burden. It's not going to kill her. it's going to potentially save others. Yeah, yeah. And like, actually, your mum wasn't crazy, not to use that word. Like, she was onto something. It got her killed. Like, it helps.

44:18Yeah, I think that's, I hadn't thought about it that before. It actually is a healing thing rather than a wounding thing, definitely.

44:23Chris Hewitt:The resolution of that, I think, is really, really lovely. And I think it's clearly what Derek Sennig-Hargill were going for in this movie. But it's also a pretty bold retcon. Now, you know, I don't know how much they had planned whenever they finished The Black Phone. I know they've said in interviews, I don't know, I haven't listened to the interview yet, so I don't know, but I know that Joe Hill was the one who kind of called up and said, oh, I've got an idea for this, so maybe fill me in. But how much did they know of, in the first movie, for example, did they know that the grabber had killed Hope?

44:54I don't think so. So yeah, that's what Scott said to me, that after the first one, the kind of starting point for them was Joe Hill calling and saying, I think the grabber killed Hope. And that was kind of their starting point. And as far as I'm aware from what I can remember from the interview, that wasn't the case during the first film. They didn't know that. It was where they started the second film from.

45:14Chris Hewitt:Okay, so that's a Joe Hill thing. So what are you guys standing at? Because I know I've seen, I know James didn't like it. He was talking about it in the podcast last week. I cut it out, don't worry, because I figured, even though I hadn't seen it, I was like, I think that's a spoiler, so I cut it out. And I know a few people, I've seen some people online who didn't particularly like that development either. What did you guys make of it? Were you happy with that? It's a fairly big retcon. It is, but I think in terms of, if this is a film about healing, that is the most healing thing that that family could learn.

45:45And maybe if it was a grittier drama, then maybe, yes, she would have killed herself, but that doesn't mean Gwen has to. That doesn't mean the family can't recover. There are other ways through, but I thought it was quite powerful in tying the historical thread of these murders to the present day through Hope's character and sort of creating that sort of neat circularity to the story. So, I mean, I wasn't mad at it. Yes, maybe it's a little bit, Pat, like, yes, maybe it's a little bit too neat, but I can't bring myself to care too much. No, I was really invested in it. And I think you're right about it in terms of history, because this film seems to explore simultaneously the kids' family history and the grabbers.

46:32And they sort of merged that we didn't realize even before he killed her, they merged at this camp and that's what they're investigating. So it's clear that they're sort of inextricably linked. And so for that murder of their mom to be part of that link, I think doesn't feel out of place to me. And if you want to get into philosophy, then you could see the hand of God in that, for example. You could see, you know, like a force using that family, Hope, Finney, against this evil person to try and you know bring him to justice if you were of a certain

47:10Chris Hewitt:bent i'm just no i true but then you could also go then oh well i don't want to get into it but we'll be here all day if we get into this but yeah i i did have a slight bump up against that i'll be honest but uh largely because i just i was looking at looking at the flashback going what are you doing Hope? Why would you go to the creepy man's lair in the middle of the night without telling anyone where you're going? What? No, don't do that. So it's, you know, just from a kind of shouting at the screen point of view which they didn't appreciate in the audience. It wasn't great. Did she think there was a kid in there?

47:48Chris Hewitt:She knew. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And she finds the kid but then obviously the grabber grabs her because that's what he does. He grabs things. And he's very good at it. You have to acknowledge. He's good at grabbing. He's a good grabber. Shit at everything else. Maybe balloon salesman. Do we see him sell any balloons? He's just giving them to people. I guess he gets the balloons back when he bundles people into the band. It's an investment in his wider scheme. How can that be profitable for Peter Willard? Oh no, he died. Except for not oh no, because he's the fucking grabber. It does feel, it's interesting hearing you say though that that call from Joe Hill to give that little bit of information was the start of the film because it does feel like the nexus that ties everything together.

48:35It is, in its own way, a bit of a Mamma Mia, here we go again. It's a sort of prequel, sequel. You don't even realise initially that the historic killings of the kids is going to tie into their family story which is propelling the sort of sequel story of the kids learning about the history and that it creates this sort of like feedback loop that then ultimately once they've resolved everything, everyone is free.

49:01Chris Hewitt:That's exactly it, Ben. I mean, I haven't heard the interview yet, but my understanding is that Derrickson and Cargill were writing something one day and Derrickson went, do you hear that phone ringing? And Cargill was like, no, what phone ringing? And it just did this weird phone ringing. And Derrickson picked up the phone and it was Joe Hill's disembodied voice going, have you seen Mamma Mia 2? Good movie. how about that only with horror and they were like hells yes yes I am absolutely in well I'm convinced it's me Joe I forgot a great idea sorry sorry about that please just throw it yeah and it turns out this film wasn't silent that's why Cargill didn't hear it but of course the retcon with Hope who gets the beginning of the movie and I guess the end as well that wonderful scene with Gwen where it's a tight shot on Gwen as Madeleine McGraw just lets go of all the emotions she's been building up for the entire movie.

50:04Chris Hewitt:It's just a wonderful, wonderful scene. But that also brings into sharp relief the other big change of this movie, which is it's Gwen's story, not Finney's story. What did you make of that? I like that. I feel like we should do that more with sequels. And obviously there are very good contractual reasons a lot of the time where we don't. Someone signed on as a star, been given a boost by movie success, and therefore is even more the star of number two. But I think it's so interesting to explore someone else's reaction to the same events and to see it from a slightly different point of view and even to see our hero from a slightly different point of view.

50:43Although, actually, of course, he and Gwen were very much a pair in the first film as well. That's what I liked about it because this one definitely does feel more of Gwen's film, that it feels like Finney's. But even in the first one, which was more Finney's film, so much of it was about their bond, their psychic bond as well. And about them being under peril from nefarious adult figures in their life and having that bond with each other to get through it. It was such the core of that first film. And so it makes sense. You can have this be Gwen's film with still a lot of Finny in it, and it does feel of a piece with the first one because there was always that really strong connection between them.

51:29And as we said, to have Finny in this situation starting to go down the path that his dad went of self-medicating and withdrawing and of having violent outbursts, to also then follow Gwen as she's becoming more like her mum and tapping more into her sort of psychic gift and wondering what that's going to mean for her in the future to have this also be about the kids wondering, are we going to be like our parents? And helping each other to navigate that and take the good things from that and try and get rid of the bad things was really satisfying and emotional. Again, not what I expected going into this.

52:12And really try and stop history from repeating itself with both of them. Yeah, they resolve the history instead. They don't repeat the history. they kind of exercise the history and free themselves. It's a very hopeful film, I think, in that way, in a lot of ways. Quite literally.

52:29Chris Hewitt:Quite literally, because of hope. But also just, you know, like in terms of, you know, giving hope to the families who lost those children all those years ago and finally finding the bodies. I mean, the fact that, honestly, the moment I felt like Demian Bachir was going to be fine was when he started talking about I've made it my personal mission to find the bodies of these kids. I was like, I feel like you don't kill a guy who says that. Unless he turned out to be in cahoots with the grabber. Oh, I didn't consider that for a second. Maybe I should have, but no. Black Throat, Phone 3 retcon coming in.

53:03No, no, don't do it. He was so nice. But yeah, it just felt like everybody's getting some kind of closure or at least some kind of progress in this film against the traumas in their past that have shaped them. And I thought that was very sweet and hopeful and warm, despite the setting. I do feel like we could have maybe, I don't know, not shot it all on a soundstage, it felt like. A little bit more, you know, actual lake might have been nice. I've got to be honest, I did not feel that when I was watching it. I don't know if I would on a rewatch be like, this feels kind of indoorsy. but I felt the chilliness I felt the atmospheric frisson of the ice and the cold I really like that as a setting I've never heard of an ice children's winter camp being a thing like it makes sense that Americans are like hey we have summer camp come and do theatre and play badminton if it's a winter camp shouldn't there be like a Christmas tree?

54:10I only know of one during the winter holidays and it's explicitly a Christian camp so they can do Christmas. They could do Christmas. That's absolutely fine. But that then tying into that grabber line of, I can't remember what it is exactly, but like, Hell isn't flames. Hell isn't flames, it's ice. Yes.

54:29Chris Hewitt:A bit of a chill down the spine. Couple things on that. I thought it was mostly on a soundstage, but according to Mason and Madeline, it wasn't. It was mostly on location. Well, like it's on a lake. And there was a lake. Obviously, the finale bit on the lake was there wasn't on a lake. that's the bit I'm maybe talking about yeah it felt locationy to me I don't know because James was banging on about this on the podcast the other day he thought I think I may cut this out as well that he thought the last 20 minutes or so was green screen hell and yeah I kind of get that but it's a very very dark film as well so I guess to get the lighting conditions exactly right maybe too dark I would have said but I don't know whether that was just a bad projection maybe the screen wasn't well lit enough I don't know but it felt very very dark to me and maybe that was the only way they could do that yeah and I think yeah there was most of it was on location and there was a lake but they didn't film all the fighting stuff on the lake because too risky did you talk to Scott about like how personal this movie was to him because the first movie is incredibly personal like Finney's story is in many ways his story except the part of him being kidnapped by the grabber yeah And contacted on the phone by dead people.

55:45Yeah. That didn't happen as far as we know.

55:47Chris Hewitt:Largely, yes. To young Scott. Yes, I did. And we kind of came... His answer was sort of that it is still personal, but in quite a different way. I think he mentioned that he'd been to camps. He'd been to Christian camps. That's one time a bad camp. You won't believe what he did with the flute. Oh, no. Yeah. Come on now. so he was kind of tying that in so it was kind of in a different way and it was moving away from being as specific as the first one was but I think he definitely imbued a lot of personal stuff into it but just from a slightly different perspective I do feel like it kind of in the same way that the first film leaned into those kind of urban legends that went around when you were in school in the 80s like I remember hearing about oh there's a guy in a van going around snatching people and I'm like, dude, we're in Port Stewart.

56:39There literally isn't. But I think, you know, there were these urban legends that went round about, you know, grabbers essentially and men in vans who would steal you away and do bad things. We were very vague.

56:53Chris Hewitt:The word grabber in the Northern Irish accent is just... One step closer to Irish grabber. I go, I tried for that grabber now. I'm not sure we used that word. Anyway, my point is, it was a thing that people talked about in the 80s. It was a myth that was out there. And I feel like a lot of people who have gone to various summer camps, or I guess winter camps apparently in the States, there have probably been stories about kids who went missing, bodies never found in the woods. I feel like this is, again, it is a little bit echoing that idea of these urban legends that kind of go around and sort of playing, riffing on those as part of its plot.

57:31And even just having a camp setting gives you Friday the 13th, that gives you, you know, they very much on that first film intended to make a horror icon out of that Grabber mask in particular. And for this one to go a little bit, well, quite a lot, Freddy, and also a little bit Jason at the same time feels very intentional. And also, you know, Scott Derrickson will have grown up with those films. I'm sure there's an element of that that's personal to him as well, of just paying homage to those iconic 80s slashes. Yep.

58:04Chris Hewitt:What did we make of The Grabber this time around, Ethan Hawke. Good. I liked him. Again, I liked how they used him differently because he can't really be a physical threat. It is very, very Nightmare on Elm Street, especially it's quite Dream Warriors-y. But having the Grabber be able to kind of use powers or like manipulate the dream world in ways I think is really interesting. And I also like that he's a bit of a skelly this time. that he's just like a bit, he's dead and bony and when he rips the mask off and like half of his face comes off with it and I feel like his ankles are always a bit skeleton-y when you see him skate.

58:41In fact, when he's skating on the ice, it almost looks like he's just like shoved blades into his like foot bones. I think they're like, you know, ice blades or something. Yeah, have formed icicles on his feet. Like he's formed icicles on his feet as his blades. I mean, that's just cool. I like all the ghoulishness. And as a horror icon, I'm more into he's like an undead guy in your dreams, then he's just like a horrible pedo man who steals people in a van and murders them in a basement. I always thought it was a slightly strange thing to want to turn into like hey, it's a wacky horror icon he's the child killer with a horrible basement.

59:22So was Nightmare on Elm Street to be fair. He does feel a bit more, I mean maybe camp's a bit too strong a word, but in this one definitely more so than the first one when he skates oh the skating bit I don't know about that I quite like skating I mean I quite like it but it sort of undermines him he used to go to the winter camp he probably was an ice skater back in the day

59:45Chris Hewitt:I don't know Freddy Krueger I can imagine I can imagine being some sort of really really kitsch sequence in one of the later Nightmare in Elm Street sequels where he'd like take the knives off his hands and he puts them on his boots and he's like I'm skating kids and he's skating around and oh god excuse me Jason literally has a hockey mask. I know. The skating seems entirely... He would be shit at skating, no. But you can imagine, like, Freddy going, Torval and dead! You know, something like that. I don't know. I'm available to write a Nightmare on the Mastry sequel if anyone's listening to this.

1:00:15Chris Hewitt:But the grabber who is, I think, a little bit more scary and grounded in the real world, and then suddenly he's skating out of... I wasn't so sure about that. But I did enjoy the fact that he kind of gets suplexed at the end by this tag team of Finney and Gwen. And I really admire that it's Gwen's story. But I also like that Finney isn't left behind. He gets a lot of meat as well. Mason, now it's not Thames, is it? No, which I only realized four minutes before I interviewed him. And I thought, wait, let me just check that he doesn't pronounce it like the river, which I've been assuming it was.

1:00:54Which he should, quite frankly. I mean, he's just Thames.

1:00:55Chris Hewitt:Thames. I watched videos of him introducing himself and it's Thames. Well, we're here to tell you, Mason, mate, it's not pronounced Thames. Does he come to London and go, hey, look at that lovely river, the Thames. It's a Thames, mate. I'm glad it wasn't just me who'd been automatically assuming it was Thames. No, because I introduced him on the podcast as Mason Thames and then I listened to your interview and it was like, Mason Thames. And I was like, what the fuck? Sophie's lost the plot. I checked. But I'm glad he got stuff to do as well. and I'm glad at the end was the two of them just brutalizing the character he's a good actor for the grabber I know Mason Thames Mason Thames I think he's so good he's part of why that and he's so young in that first film but he's why that film is so good he's such a good actor and I really like how it mirrors at the beginning you see him beating the shit out of a kid and it's because he's repressing all this stuff that he's feeling he gets to there's like catharsis in that he gets to do that to the grabber even though you can't even see him.

1:01:53It's this invisible thing that's haunting him. Because for Finny, the grabber is not a physical presence now. He's a haunting, ghost-like presence. And so to see him use that tactic he's been using to repress all of his feelings at the end, really nice way to finish it, I think. There was a line that I can't remember if Finny says it or if somebody says it about Finny, where it's like, he's got no friends. And it's like, he's got Toothless. No, he doesn't need any friends. He has the greatest friend there is. so jealous so jealous

1:02:24Chris Hewitt:I was watching that movie going ah now that Tom Holland's very old they you know yeah like 28 sling your hook Spider-Man we got a new Peter Parker right here and it's Mason Thames but I yeah I think he's very very good in this I'm so glad Madeline McGraw I think is tremendous in this and I obviously Finney's the main character the first one and one you're absolutely tied to in terms of sympathy but she's the most fun character and I Her gift for bad language is excellent. Quite astonishing. She doesn't lose that despite the fact that she's suffering the trauma that she's suffering in this movie is really admirable.

1:03:03Chris Hewitt:She might be Irish. She could be Irish. McGraw, is that an Irish name? I don't know. Can be. It can be. Any name could be Irish if you try it hard enough. But I didn't write it down and sadly none of the quotes have made the IMDb quotes page yet for this movie. But I noted at one point she calls Finny a dick stain, which is good. And she calls Barb, the dreadful Christian lady, a cunt wagon. Excellent. I will say, I say this because I think she's really great. I think she stumbled over some of those insults sometimes. They didn't quite roll off the tongue, especially because she's so great in that first one when she's always praying.

1:03:45And there's that moment where she's like, dear Jesus, what the fuck? which is so great yes but I like that they kept that through line of the character I think she almost I wonder if she almost overthought some of those moments however that phone call at the end with her mum holy shit she is so fucking good in that scene and it's just all carried off her just standing at a phone booth and oh my god yeah amazing absolutely amazing

1:04:13Chris Hewitt:yeah she is fantastic yeah looking at the first movie as well which he calls says to the cops I took him down because obviously I'm the grabber you dumb fucking fart knockers to the cops that's great other things I liked about this movie Miguel Mora who plays Ernesto also played Robin in The Black Phone so last night he played his own brother didn't really I didn't remember that nice little touch isn't it it's lovely good stuff how many days do you think Ethan Hawke did in this movie just you know when he was in like it doesn't need to be him right He can Pedro Pascal, that shit. He could have.

1:04:50I'm not saying he did because he's a very committed actor.

1:04:52Chris Hewitt:Very committed actor. He could have. He's obviously also been working on the likes of Blue Moon in the recent past. But I feel like he's the kind of guy who would turn up and do it. Just to, you know. I interviewed him for the first film and he loved the like old school theater vibe of like, oh, I'm going to wear a mask and I can do different parts of the mask at different times and do different things with my performance. So there was a lot more for him to do. on that first film but I imagine he enjoyed getting to come back and like play with the grabber iconography again and you know he still gets fun stuff to do of different bits of the mask being on different bits of his face being on yeah and also if you were like do you want to come back and you're like a ghoul now and you can like fuck people up in dreams you'd be like yeah yeah I think I think Scott Derrickson calls him up and he'll yeah I'll do anything to him yeah I think you know they're such like strong collaborators I think from what I could gather from my interviews he was there he had the mask on a lot and he had to keep it on Mason and Madeline talked about how they couldn't tell whether he was in character or not and he was being quite creepy on set which you can't really imagine Ethan Hawke being creepy apparently he gave a mask to Rose Byrne's kids apparently they're friends what and her kids are big fans of the grabber of black phone so he gave them a mask nice guy Ethan Hawke we are also all fans of the black phone I don't want a grabber mask yeah Yeah, it's a bit scary.

1:06:16Yeah, it's a bit creepy too. Wouldn't fit over my own mask anyway.

1:06:19Chris Hewitt:Wait, that's a human skin mask? No comment. As his lawyer? Good. All right, let's bring this bad boy to a close, which I believe is a line from the film. Anything you want to say about the, sorry, Blackphone 2, I needed the Blackphone, Blackphone 2, before we wrap it up. One of my questions, I don't know if you did ask this to Scott Derrickson, but you did send me a message like, have you got anything you'd ask him? and one of my thoughts was like did they have to work hard to get a black phone into this movie? The movie almost doesn't need a phone they managed to get a phone into the plot which good on them first up but I also really liked that reveal I guess relatively early in the film you open on the spooky phone call at the camp and you get the one side of the conversation and then the realisation that that's Gwen's in the basement but yeah that it's Gwen on the other end I really liked that yeah that was cool I also just like the look of that phone booth by the lake and I do acknowledge that that looked like a location it's the other lake that pissed me off but I really like that I was like I would like to go and stay there I'm not don't particularly want to sleep in a dormitory or go to Christian camp but that cabin by the lake vibe with the weird light up fluorescent heaters actually looks pretty cool.

1:07:45I'd go in summer. I would be open to winter as long as I was in a smaller room that the heaters heated more efficiently. I did really love all the stuff in the booth because I love, I think they kind of did this a lot in the first film where there was a lot of panning around whoever was on the phone and then like the grabber would appear and then you'd see the kids in the very distance at the lake and then they'd move closer and then they're next to it. It all seemed like one-ers it was really cool that was very cool yeah

1:08:15Chris Hewitt:very cool I'm going to mention real quick before we go a couple of music things I know I'm not a mon but please please give me this moment if you will I really like there's a lovely moment where they're driving into the camp and another brick in the wall part three I believe it is from Pink Floyd's The Wall plays and that's that's such a creepy song as well Roger Waters singing in that one Dave Gilmore's guitar it's really really beautiful and kind of moody and menacing and it's yeah i loved that moment that was great and i also you know i have to say when i heard that scott derrickson's son atticus was doing the score for this i was like nepo baby that's gonna suck but it didn't the score was really good i mean so well done nepo baby i mean sorry atticus derrickson to to be fair a lot of hollywood nepo babies are actually quite good at their job you have been quoting jamie Lee Curtis throughout this podcast.

1:09:12Chris Hewitt:Is she a Nepo baby?

1:09:17You're going to unleash a mini rant from me here. Gen Z is so caught up on thinking that Nepo babies are the cause of all their problems. Nepo babies are a problem when they have no talent. Whichever Beckham child did that fucking photography book and half the photos are out of focus. That was Brooklyn. Brooklyn. Just to single you out. That is bad Nepo baby-dom of like you were given this opportunity that you would never normally have and you don't have the talent to back it up. Elephants, so hard to describe, so hard to picture. As if there's not a million great photos of elephants on the internet.

1:09:53But then, like a Maya hawk is denied that following in the family trade, as many people do. You just have to look at her face. Oh, you mean Minnie Grabber? Oh my gosh. Yes. Black phone three and now Maya Hawke is like the daughter of the grabber. Oh, my God. Make that movie. Make that movie.

1:10:14Chris Hewitt:Make that movie. Jason Blum. Jason Blum. We say his name three times, he appears. Jason Blum. No, it didn't work. Turns out it'd be an old wife's tale. Anyway, Nepo Baby's not the problem. Good music in this movie. Good music. Good music. Maya Hawke in Black Thunder 3. Yes, all the Nepo Babies come together. It's like Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. it's like dream warriors but they're all nepo babies and they all get pulled into the dreamscape and then one of them is like the wizard master or something well Madeleine McGraw isn't either her cousin or her sister is Violet McGraw who is in her sister in all the horror movies yeah Megan 2.0 Megan 1.0 sadly not Megan 3.0 but you know she was also young Florence Pugh in Thunderbolts she was in The Manting of Hill House that's Black Widow as well she's in Doctor Sleep yeah Yeah, she's in both.

1:11:06Yeah.

1:11:06Chris Hewitt:Yeah. So that's good. Well done. Very talented siblings. Very Nepo... Neposis. That sounds like a word. That sounds like a spell, but from the wizard master. Mason Thames, of course, related to the famous river. Apparently not. I'm really freaking out that I've got it wrong now. No, I'm sure you're right. You've got it right. I think I've got it right. The important thing here is, Sophie, he's got it wrong. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, he has his own name wrong. I'm impressed you even had the wherewithal to be like I'm just going to check if you pronounce his name any differently because often you know if you're doing an interview I don't quite know how this person says the name I'm going to check it out but I would have just so like unthinkingly gone for Thames that's why I always had thought it was Thames when I was like he's not he's American is that and it's you I was just like it was just something something in the back of my brain I was like let me check does he think the Nile is a knee leg I don't know I don't know hey guys I just got an order from Amazing Prime my copy of Death on the Kneel A arrived from Amazing Prime alright I think we're out of things to talk about maybe who Mason sorry Mason yeah we like you he is a subscriber famously he subscribed to the Empire Podcast supporter special those guys were shitting on my name well of course shitting in the Thames is a it's a pastime in London it's actually a very very clean river it is by the standards of major if I gave you a glass of water and said it was from the from the Thames you would not drink it I've never heard of Thames so I definitely wouldn't drink that it's Thames don't you know alright that's it bye no I'll bring it to a close properly that's it for our Black Phone 2 Sporta special hope you guys enjoyed it do you think it'll be a third do you think we'd be back in a couple years time did third did okay at the box office over the weekend it did very well I think did it I was going to say I'm not convinced that it will do quite as well as the first one was it yeah I don't think it's an easy like hey everybody it's Halloween let's go and see the Black Phone 2 sorry Black Phone 2 when I came out of the film I was like this is not like an obvious popcorn horror movie no no and I think if Scott does it he'll need to feel like he can take it in a direction that is resonant he just needs to get a phone call from someone with a great idea my hawk I mean, he said that they wanted to make it straight after the first one, and he was like, no, I need to have a break, and he went and made the Gorge.

1:13:41Chris Hewitt:He did, yes. And then came back. So it might just say he needs a bit of time. He needs to recharge the batteries. He needs to make the Gorge 2. With Maya Hawke. Recharges batteries for this. I really like the Gorge. I thought the Gorge was fun. I haven't seen the Gorge. It's good. It's about three different films in one film. I mean, it's very efficient. It's on Apple TV. Nobody's seen it. which is a sad thing if Maya Hawke did play Daughter of the Grabber in the third black film The Grabess that's my question what's her name? This is all very bad Is it the Grabess? Is it the She-Grabber? The Lady-Grabber?

1:14:15The She-Grabber That sounds like something else

1:14:17Chris Hewitt:The Little Miss Grabby I don't know The Grabette These are all progressive names for a progressive serial killer It's the 80s you can get away with it Just like you can get away with like, hey kids, go and drive in this fucking snowstorm to the winter camp where all those kids died. Yeah. On your own? On your own? Absolutely. Yeah. Okay. All right, that's definitely it. All that remains is to say goodbye to my three colleagues of such lethal cunning. Goodbye to the stabber, Ben Travis. Ring, ring, ring, ring. Goodbye. Goodbye to the blabber, Sophie Butcher. Goodbye. goodbye to the gabber I think Helen O 'Hara toodaloo and what am I I've just drooled the slabber will that do that's my catchphrase in these podcasts will that do yeah that'll do thanks for listening see you next time bye bye