Peeping Tom

Peeping Tom

peeping tom still

Special thanks to Loyal Listener and Patron, Chase, for this week’s recommendation: A classic of the genre often cited as Britain’s Psycho, released the same year as Alfred Hitchcock’s classic (1960). The controversy surrounding this film nearly sunk the career of its illustrious director, which included the very first instance of nudity in British cinema. Enjoy our exposé of Peeping Tom!

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Peeping Tom (1960)

Episode 340, 2 Guys and a Chainsaw

Todd: Hello and welcome to another episode of Two Guys and a Chainsaw. I’m Todd.

Craig: And I’m Craig.

Todd: This week we dive back, uh, down into the 1960s, not an era that we dive into too often on this show. Is it? Nope, because, um, the horror movies, kind of as we know it, unless you’re gonna talk about like Universal monster style stuff or 1950s, uh, you know, cheesy sci-fi horror movies, uh, B films. I guess we did like, um, you know, the remake of The Blob and we talked about The Blob on that.

Generally speaking, um, horror doesn’t start to get too bold on the screen until about this time and Peeping Tom. The movie that we’re doing today was recommended to us by loyal listener Chase. Thank you, Chase, for this recommendation. It came out in 1960 and uh, it was kind of acclaimed as a British Psycho.

I think Alfred Hitchcock’s movie is a considerably more lurid, I suppose, than this movie is. I kind of found it interesting to see where the lines get drawn, you know, between British film at this time and American film making at this time. Even though Hitchcock was a British filmmaker, he shot most of his movies, uh, after a while at least, uh, in Hollywood, especially Psycho because this film as tame as it really ends up being caused a huge stir when it came out and practically ruined the director’s career because it was so controversial.

Audiences really responded negatively to it. Critics responded negatively to it because, um, I don’t know. It’s kind of hard to say why. I just think the Moores social Moores were a little different at this time and, uh, this is sometimes said to be the very first slasher movie, although I think that’s debatable.

Yeah, there’s no blood. In here. And the other notable thing about this movie was that it is supposedly the first, um, portrayal of nudity in mainstream British film. Right. And the nudity in this movie, as it ended up in the theaters, is kind of blinking. You miss it. Yeah. It wasn’t intended to be that way, but it ended up that way.

Um, but it was enough. It was enough to stir a lot of interesting. Talk for us today, I suppose. And yeah, I, you know, I’ll just say I’ve never seen this movie before, but it has been on so many lists of films you need to see. Uh, there’s a Criterion Collection version of it now. It’s, it’s quite notorious, like I said, it’s often compared to Hitchcock’s Psycho, but it’s a very different movie than Psycho.

Mm-hmm. I was super excited, uh, to get the recommendation from Chase to do this because it’s been on my list forever. And, uh, Craig goes like, yep, let’s go ahead and do it. So here we’re talking about it today, so, yep. Definitely my first time seeing it. How about you? Yeah, me 

Craig: too. I feel like I must have heard about it.

I don’t know. Uh, I, I read somewhere that it’s mentioned in one of the scream movies, you know, like establishing rules. Cuz I think that they, I think that they falsely claim in that movie that this is the first film that uses Killer pov. I think it had actually happened a couple of times in the forties, but this is one of the first.

Uh, which is interesting, but I don’t know. I, I didn’t really know anything about it and I didn’t read anything about it going in, but I’m always up for whatever. And like you said, chase has been a really loyal listener, so as soon as you said he requested, I’m like, well, obviously let’s just do it then.

But I didn’t know anything about it and, uh, I went in and I started watching it. Oh, gosh. I just, I don’t, I don’t get it now. Mostly in hindsight, I don’t get it because I really kind of don’t understand why it’s so controversial. What year did, what year did, uh, psycho come out? I didn’t look it 

Todd: up. That’s a good question.

Let me look it up right now. Okay. The reason 

Craig: that I ask is because like, had sensibilities changed significantly. I also kind of thought that British people and Europeans in general were less prudish than Americans about things like nudity. Oh. 

Todd: Well, I don’t know if it’s all nudity. Well, I, no, I’m not sure.

I mean, I think when you’re talking the continent, you’re talking France and, and, um, you know, Denmark in places like Scandinavian countries and things, they tend to be much less prudish. And you’ve seen sex and cinema from, uh, even earlier than this. And, you know, that was kind of a, not just in cinema, just I think like you look at the history of pornography and things like that, you know.

Um, but, but, but when you look at, look, and I’m not gonna pretend to be an expert in this either, but I’m just kind of going from the evidence I’ve gotten. Oh, by the way, uh, psycho came out the exact same year. Okay. 

Craig: See L and and you said that, I don’t remember what word you used exactly, but that Psycho was maybe a little bit more salacious than this movie.

Is that something like that? Well, um, 

Todd: I think it’s more lured is what I said. Lured, and I don’t really mean about the sex. But maybe, yeah, maybe I do kind of mean that. I’m not sure. I don’t know. They’re just, 

Craig: they’re very, very similar. Yeah. There’s no nudity in Psycho. Right? Like you see Janet Lee in the shower, but only from like, high on her shoulders. 

Todd: Yeah. Uh, I mean it’s how do you define nudity? Right? Maybe her legs. She’s nude, but you’re not seeing her nipples and, and any of her private parts.

Craig: Right. And so there’s not a lot of that there, but like the, the psychological stuff, which again, people objected to, like at some point this movie was considered one of the most dangerous movies ever.

I don’t even understand really what that means. It got, it. Just, I think the objections that the, the things that I read that people objected to just seemed like very specific. Like selective outrage, like, yeah. Why, why are you so upset about like, it seems very silly.

Todd: I think it’s a different time. I mean, you know, it’s, it’s still, I don’t wanna say early, but it is earlier than it is now.

You know, in the infancy of cinema, I think there was probably a concern that people would watch a movie and get ideas from it. And so any movie about like a serial killer or somebody like this, you know, would be like, that the, the character is disturbing. Maybe because you could imagine that this guy could very easily be your next door neighbor.

So that can kind of hit you at that level. Now we’ve seen a hundred movies like that since then. Yeah. But, but if this was one of the first to come along, I could see where it would be scandalous. There is a, a fair amount of nudity in like, photography in the movie. Like there’s, I know, I also think that it was a more prudish time and I think the British were a little more prudish than maybe even the Americans because, I mean, think about the video, nasty.

Thing, you know? Yeah. On the shelves here, like where it got slasher movies and new stuff, just kind of up one side and down the other. Drive-in fair was super gross and gory and nobody batted an eye. Whereas across the border at the same time, like are like literally banning films from being shown and distributed.

So there’s must be more of a prudishness to the British, um, sensibilities, especially at this time than there was in American. What was allowed. 

Craig: There must be, I guess, you know, you said people, they’re afraid that people would watch something like this and get ideas. I I, one of the other ways that it’s compared to Psycho is that it features kind of a sympathetic antagonist.

Like the, the, the killer is kind of sympathetic. Um, and I think that people, things that I’ve read, people say, That’s even more true in this. Like I agree. I think so Agree. I, I think that in Psycho, I think that Anthony Perkins is, um, sympathetic because he’s handsome and charming. Yeah. So I don’t know. Well, and he seems really nice, you know, and this guy, like, I could see how he was written that way.

But this actor is creepy 

Todd: as like he is. But, but I think the difference is in cycle, at the end of the day when you’re done watching the movie, you, this is a guy who’s portrayed as a dude with a mental illness. Like he’s got two sides to him. I mean, think of that creepy last shot of him, kind of almost like learing at the camera when he’s in the Straight jacket. But you know, before that you see this totally sweet and nice guy. Like, it’s, it’s like that this guy un unlike Psycho, this movie gives us much more backstory on this character, which right, I think provides a sympathy. Now, of course, psycho was a book and there was a lot of discussion about the backstory of this character in the production of the film.

And of course, by the end of the movie you realize, sorry, spoiler alert guys, if you haven’t seen Psycho, you need to stop right now and go see it. But anyway, like by the end of the movie, we realize that he has this infatuation with his mother to the point where, you know, he’s putting on her clothes and he’s kind of acting like her.

And that’s, that’s just kind of nuts, right? But it’s edible and you know, like we can kind of like wrap our minds around it, but it just, it’s like an impact thing that happens at the end of the movie and then the movie. Whereas this movie, we really kind of dive deep pretty early on in the film into this guy’s weird disturbed childhood.

And so I feel like he’s way more sympathetic because at least you get early in the movie kind of an explanation as to why this kid, this guy is so off. Yeah. And so that floats with you through the whole film. And so yeah, he’s still creepy as but at least you’re like, well God, look at his upbringing.

Look at how he was treated by his father. Like, you know, you have a more sympathy. Whereas Psycho it’s like a, it’s like a twist. Well, right. And I guess like this is a character study, I think more than that I, I’ve 

Craig: been living with Psycho. 35 years. So like I’ve had plenty of time to think about it and I’ve seen all of the sequels.

All the sequels and, and they do get into backstory a lot, especially in like the, I think the last one was four, maybe I, whatever. So I don’t know. Like, I, I just don’t think of it kind of as that shocking ending because I’m so aware of the context. Yeah. If I were. But I feel like if I were to watch this, if, if I could somehow magically go back in time and watch Psycho and this movie, Back to back.

I just feel like you can’t help see the parallels. I mean, it’s the exact same thing. Like, yeah. So, uh, Norman Bates’ mom messed him up somehow, or he is messed up about his mom. All right. Whatever. This guy, mark, uh, Lewis, the main character was messed up by his dad. Like, I mean, that’s just what, what it boils.

It’s true down to, yeah, we get more, well, kind of more, but we, I mean we, but again, it’s just like, again, spoiler alert, you know, like Norman Bates kind of takes on the persona of his mother. That’s basically what this guy’s doing too. Kind of, kind of, well, it’s just his art is different. Like the, the dad’s art, I guess was psychology and, and his art is film, but there’s.

Exploring the same things. You get what I’m saying? 

Todd: They’re very, I know exactly what you’re saying. Yeah, I know exactly what you’re saying. I mean, I mean, like, of course Norman Bates, like, because it’s like a, a man in a wo and, and his mother and, and he’s also taking on like her personality, like he’s dressing like her and things.

There’s also that sort of edible men attracted to their mother perhaps kind of sexual thing that actually gets explored in psycho four that she potentially sexually abused him. This movie, the father is definitely abusing the child, but it’s in this sort of scientific kind of weird way where the father is really trying to explore the meaning of fear and especially how fear affects young children and he’s using.

Kid is like a Guinea pig and he’s documenting all that, you know, so that you get this, this notion that this kid has lived his whole life, you know, in front of a camera because his dad has been kind of tormenting him and playing with him and, and putting him in these weird situations that are really not appropriate for a child.

And filming him for his research. And he writes books and things about this. It’s like a psychological thing. So like, you know, I wouldn’t say that in this movie, like, yeah, he kind of becomes his father, right? Because he kind of continues that word. He’s obsess obsessed. Yeah. He doesn’t have that, that element of like potentially like erotic, uh, you know, context to it.

Yeah. 

Craig: I guess I 

Todd: don’t, but, but, but the movie’s erotic, like it’s, it’s more so than psycho. I mean, the, the, the interesting thing about this movie is that this guy, and I think this is another reason that is cited as to why this movie is so, was so shocking at the time and again, Craig, I’m with you. It’s hard for me to place myself in the 1960s in anywhere, let alone Britain, and be able to understand why I would watch this movie and be shocked.

But what is often cited is that this, um, like you said, it probably wasn’t the first, but this movie definitely has a, a voyeuristic quality to it, kind of like the beginning of Halloween. Yeah. In fact, it’s interesting. I almost feel like John Carpenter must have taken some inspiration from the beginning of this movie because, uh, you know, our first kill is it, the movie starts out with a woman just on a London street.

Uh, she is clearly like a street walker. She’s standing there looking at a window in a window. It’s dark outside, it’s nighttime. She’s the only one there. Uh, and we don’t see the person approaching her. We just see it through a, the lens of a camera and it’s almost like a target on her. Really. It’s like a crosshair.

I wanted to 

Craig: ask you about that because I know that you are familiar with like, Cameras and, and cinema. Why is it that his viewfinder is segmented like that? Is it those 

Todd: kind of segments delineate the rule of thirds where you want to put the most interesting parts of your composition in, uh, uh, a quarter basically of the screen.

You want it to be like a third down and a third over from any one direction. So if you divided the screen, honestly, nowadays a lot of, um, digital cameras have the option to put these kind of overlays up there. If you put everything kind of in the middle, it’s rather boring. But if you put everything a little off center and maybe a little up, so it’s for the photographer’s reference.

Exactly. Yeah. Okay. But it has the handy element of almost looking like a target. Right. Which, you know, I don’t think is accidental here, so, no. Yeah. It comes from behind him. And so all we see is through the lens of this as, as this guy approaches this woman and she says, oh, it’s like two quid. And then he follows her and he actually throws away in the garbage can little paper container that his reel of film was in, which I thought was really funny.

Uh, but it films that as well, him throwing out, I thought, 

Craig: surely. They’re like that, that, that something would come of that, like it would be a clue that the police would find later or something. Oh yeah. But no, 

Todd: I think it was just a thematic thing. And he follows her up the stairs and they go into their bedroom and she starts to strip down.

She’s very dispassionate about it. Oh yeah. Then he gets closer to her and she looks up and is like, wait a minute. And you see this light flickering on her face, uh, which is clearly a reflection of something. And my immediately thought was, oh, that must be a knife. Right. Um, I don’t think it was, but I’ve got other ideas, but yeah.

Um, and then she starts to scream and the camera goes closer and closer and closer. And then we get the title peeping Tom, and the next thing I think we see is him watching the footage back, but we still haven’t seen his. He’s watching it back on a, on a projector in his, uh, dark room. The next thing we see is the police dragging her out.

But we’re also seeing this through the view of this camera, and it’s not until somebody approaches this camera and says, Hey, where are you from? Like, you’re a journalist or something. Where you, which paper are you from? That this guy finally puts down the camera and we see his face. And so long roundabout way of saying that, one thing that’s cited about this movie is that sort of for the first time or something that was shocking to the audiences was it kind of put themselves in the killer’s shoes and implicated them in the deaths of these women by giving a, you know, first person.

Viewing of 

Craig: everything. Yeah. I don’t know. It’s just, it’s, it’s difficult for me to talk. It’s going to be difficult for me to talk about because frankly, overall I didn’t really enjoy it. But I’m just some schmuck sitting in my house, like film people who study films cite this as being like a masterpiece.

Todd: Martin Scorsese’s favorite, one of his favorite films. 

Craig: Yeah. And so obviously there is something going on there that I don’t have the capacity to understand, but like it’s fine. It’s fine. There’s nothing in necessarily wrong with it. I just kind of don’t get why it was so scandalous. And I feel like if it weren’t for the scandal, Would it be as renowned and revered as it is?

I just don’t know. Well 

Todd: put aside the scandal for a minute and just let’s talk about the, the, the movie itself and why it didn’t like it, or you were bored or whatever. Like, we’ve done character studies like this. 

Craig: Well, and it reminded me of that, it reminded me of Martin. 

Todd: What about Oliver? Um, yeah, who’s watching Oliver or whatever.

Who’s watching Oliver? Um, uh, it to some extent Willard in a way, but you know Yes, yes, yes. Willard’s a little more modern and, and 

Craig: I don’t have any problem with that. I just wasn’t particularly invested. Like, I just wasn’t particularly, it’s, it’s, it’s kind of slow. I became more invested with the introduction of Helen, the love interest.

Mm-hmm. I liked her and found her very charming and I really liked their interaction. This guy, uh, the actor’s name is Carl Bom, and he is, Just without question. Clearly German, but he’s supposed to be English and his, he has a th thick, maybe, uh, exaggerating a little bit, but he has a distinct German accent and they never, like, it’s just not commented on.

And that it, it doesn’t pull me out, but it like, it’s like an uncanny valley thing. Like there, there’s something off about him. Hmm. And he just kinda looks crazy. He’s a little, he, I have to admit, he’s a handsome man, but he’s just kind of like affected. He is kind of got like crazy eyes. Yeah. 

Todd: Well also, like, I think this is a time period where movies were a little more presentational.

Yeah. 

Craig: Yeah, definitely. Definitely. You know, it 

Todd: was kind of an unnatural quality anyway, but So they would kind of exaggerate. There’s like a slight bit of melodrama, if not in the plot, in the acting. Right. So I mean, I get what you’re saying, like this guy was creepy and he was obviously creepy and it’s kind of, at some level it was almost hard to believe that Helen would not be turned off by him, but then she’s acting like a little extra lovey dovey towards him.

It just, it’s just sort of the style of the film, which I think was the style of the time. Right. Yeah. But, but actually, I really appreciated the fact that I liked his performance and I thought there were lots of little touches in there that were also sometimes blinking. You miss him, like in that beginning part where that guy, oh no, no.

It’s a cop takes his camera away for a second and kind of looks at it. Mm-hmm. He’s kind of holding it, moving it. When his camera’s in this other guy’s hand, he with his own hands is kind of like mimicking. As though he’s still holding the camera. Like I, I just felt like there was a lot about this guy that was creepy, but it was also, um, very deliberate.

Yeah. In showing maybe in a, a more overt way than we show nowadays. Right. We want to be more subtle nowadays. Right. But I feel like there were a lot of very interesting artistic, thematic choices made by the acting that were clearly put there by the director to make us clearly know that this guy kind of like, almost sees his life as a movie.

He has seen life through a camera. It, it’s almost like as he’s an adult now, he’s taking the power back from his father, you know, who has shoved a camera in his face his whole life and did all these terrible things to him that now he’s got the camera and now he’s gonna make his own documentary. But it’s a twisted documentary.

Craig: Yeah, he’s fine. Like, I, I don’t have any problem with the actor and, and you know, the director, whether it’s, you know, the direction or, or his acting choices, I think it’s fine, especially because. There’s no mystery. He doesn’t have anything to hide. We know he’s the killer from the very beginning. Mm. So it’s not like he has to try to hide that from us.

It just seems, I don’t know. I would’ve thought that he would’ve seemed more suspicious to anybody else. Right? No, but nobody ever, I don’t know. Nobody finds him 

Todd: suspicious at all, ever. I mean, just seems like an awkward guy, right? Like not very sociable, not very comfortable in social situations, doesn’t really know how to relate to people.

I mean, there’s a lot of people like this that you don’t, you know, you’re not gonna think well then they must be killers. Right. Um, 

Craig: I know he’s fine. Like, whatever. Maybe I wouldn’t think he was weird either, but if I were Helen, I would because Yeah. The way that she meets him is that, Peeking in on her windows 

Todd: all the time.

Yeah. 

Craig: And like she finds that charming and invites him in like, oh, hello Mr. 

Todd: Pee, come on in. But I mean, to be fair, like just for everybody who hasn’t seen the movie, it’s not like he was peeping in on her changing. She had a birthday party downstairs in the living room with the, with the curtains wide open.

Like anybody could have like walked by and looked in, but Yeah, I 

Craig: know. But he does it again later. And the mom, it’s creepy, is blind. The mom who’s blind says that he does it all the time. Yeah. And the daughter’s like, and the daughter’s like, what do you mean? And she’s like, well, I can just sense it. Like, because she’s blind.

I guess she has like spidey sensor or something. I don’t 

Todd: know. That mom is Mommy’s the blind woman could see it then why not the rest of them, I thought the mom being blind was, once again, it’s like a very thematic choice, right? They’re trying to, this is what I kind of like about these kind of movies and this is why I think I watched it and I really enjoyed it.

Is. Yeah, I, I don’t necessarily think this is a very representational of real life. It’s certainly not the way we make movies now where we want to be a little more realistic about things, portray things as they might actually happen and have people act the way they normally would. It’s like, not melodramatic, but it’s approaching that end of the spectrum.

But I feel like it still leaves a certain impression with you and it kind of gives you an insight into a particular personality because of these choices that it makes. And yeah, maybe it’s pretty on the nose, but I kind of like that too. Like I like this, this kind of on the nose filmmaking, where’re like, oh, I see what they were trying to do there.

Oh yeah, they’re really, I don’t know if I’m expressing it well enough, but like I really liked all these different choices. I liked the way that the movie deliberately took me through things. I liked that the movie, it felt like it was kind of challenging me to notice stuff. And also, maybe I also kinda like the subject matter because, ah, I like to dive into the CD underbelly of everything every once in a while.

Right. And I thought it was really cool that this guy, and especially in, in any particular era, I’m super curious, you know, what was permitted, what were people really doing behind the scenes? Right. This guy works at a, um, it seems like a, a film studio. Yeah. But also like drugstore, whatever kind of Oh, well 

Craig: he, that, that’s like his, um, side gig, right?

Like, like he, he works at a film studio. He’s a cameraman or something. He does something with measuring tape. I don’t, 

Todd: no. He’s a, I will tell you, he’s a focus puller. It’s one of the most technical but most boring parts of, of filming. And that is when you’ve got a camera, you know, somebody’s gotta run the camera and somebody’s gotta turn the knobs to make sure that it’s in focus when it needs to be.

And that’s what he is. And so, yes, he’s using that measuring tape to measure the distances so that he could be sure to hit the right. Number is on that dial when he needs to for the shot. 

Craig: I knew you would explain what he was doing. 

Todd: I thought that was interesting too. Actually. I thought that was interesting too, that he was like a lowly focus puller in his real job.

I don’t mind, I don’t mean to disparage focus pulling, I mean, but it’s a very. Technical and precise thing. It’s not that creative, but in his side gig, he’s got this little studio above a little drugstore, whatever, that seems to sell more, uh, nude postcards and photographs than anything else. Yeah. Where he just takes lurid, nude, nude, or semi nude of pig cheesecake.

Photos of young women. I was into that. I like, I’d like checking the sound. 

Craig: Yeah. I mean, I like it. It was an interesting subplot 

Todd: that had to be controversial for the day Right. To just was kinda shine a light on this and, and show us an explicit detail. You’re right. But that’s the 

Craig: thing. Okay. Uh, okay.

Several things. First of all, you don’t have to defend this movie to me. I’m wrong. I just have to figure out why, like 

Todd: everybody else is Right. We’re just discussing it. That’s fine. 

Craig: Okay. I’m just saying you don’t have to defend it. I, everybody likes it apparently, except me. So I, I have to figure that out for myself.

But the other thing, like, I don’t understand this drugstore shop because it’s like he sells these naked pictures, like under the table. Like, I don’t know if the drugstore is just kind of really a front for his. I he’s just doing it on the side. That’s what it seems like. But he, he’s, he’s being shady about it.

Like people have to come in and like ask, you know, like for something specific and then he pulls a book out from under the counter and 

Todd: shows ’em and stuff. By the way, I just gotta say this, that hilarious scene where the elderly guy comes in, I’m told by a friend that you have some views for sale. What sort of views?

Hmm? What? This sort? Yes. How much each? Uh, five shillings each, sir. Well, I’ll have that one. Yeah. Oh, and that,

how much would the lot be to you? Five pounds, sir. Well, uh, I’ll tell you what, sir, I’ll make it four pounds, 10, and I’ll throw in the times and the telegraph. How’s that? Thank you very much. You’re welcome. Did you 

Craig: recognize. No, but I wasn’t 

Todd: paying that close attention. We have seen him in two other movies before this.

Oh, was the old black and white movie Dead of Night when we were doing the anthology month. He was the guy driving the hearse who was like looking up one, oh, there’s room for one more Uhhuh. Okay. And then I think we saw him again, uh, in another movie. I believe it was that other, it was another Anth anthology movie.

He’s got a very distinctive 

Craig: look. That is funny. I, I didn’t, yeah. But, but the thing like, he’s being really like secretive about it, but when you see the store from the exterior, the whole front window is plastered with these nudie pictures. Yeah, it’s, 

Todd: I don’t understand that. It doesn’t make sense. I don’t know if the implication is supposed to be that these.

Better pictures, like they show more or something. I don’t 

Craig: know. I don’t know either. But I also like, like one of the nudity was one of the things that was so scandalous about it, which of course I wasn’t around in the 1960s, but when I was in London, Hmm, 20, 25 years ago. Like it. I, first of all, I loved London and would love to have the opportunity to go back.

It was an amazing city, but it was seedy in that, like they probably don’t, I don’t even know if they have phone booths anymore. I don’t know if phone booths are a thing that exist in the world anymore, but like you would, you would go into a phone booth and it would be wallpapered with beaver shots. Like just you, like you were completely enveloped in Beaver and Oh, that sounds nice.

So I know. You’re disgusting. Don’t kick me straight.

So like, I, I assume that that’s, you know, just, I don’t know, maybe the queen didn’t want people to know. I, I’m not sure exactly why it was so scandalous, but it is, and, and like, that’s another thing. There was, you know, they did shoot some nude shots, particularly with this actress named Morris Sheer, who I think they found because she did nude modeling.

Do you mean Pamela Green? Uh, I don’t know. I’m I’m, I’m talking about Viv. Oh no, you’re right. And I don’t remember, there was a story like she did nude modeling on the side or something, and, uh Oh no, 

Todd: she was, this was her. All right. So I also went down to Pamela Green Rabbit Hole because I read the same stuff you did and I just had to learn more.

And she actually, uh, with another guy named, uh, George Harrison, marks, I believe. Started a magazine, a couple magazines of their own, one of them called Camera, which was apparently very, very, very popular. Mostly a magazine filled with Nudie pictures. Also, they did like mail order nude photos and things like that.

It’s super quaint and interesting. But yeah, she was very much into this. In fact, she is a trained actress, by the way. She was like a theater, in theater, dance, all that stuff. Went to school, all this stuff, but was mostly just doing nude photo shoots and things, uh, by the end of it. And this was her very first like film role that she ever got.

And she was super nervous about it. And I think at one point she, she talks about, by the way, I should put a link to her webpage cuz she literally has an essay that she’s written. She died, uh, like 15 years ago, but she has an essay that she wrote that’s up on this website, all about the filming of this movie.

And it’s, it’s not, it’s not too long, but it’s cool. She talks a lot about the director and how he was a weird guy, Uhhuh and some of the weird shit that he put her through. Like, she didn’t even know she was gonna be nude in this movie until it was time to shoot her nude scene. And he came on and says, okay, this is where you disrobe.

And she’s like, Uhuh, this wasn’t in the script. And he’s like, well, but you do this. Like, this is what you do. This is what you do all the time. And she’s like, yeah, like for my photographer partner, for our, our magazines and things, but like, You didn’t say this was gonna be in the movie. So it was kind of awkward.

Very, very pre-me too. But she’s also made a comment in there that like she was really frustrated at one point with the, with the director and she made some comment about how, look, don’t give me this lip. You know what you’re paying me for three days on this shoot. I’m making just one day in my own studio.

So Uhhuh, she was very successful doing this kind of thing and actually sounds like a really awesome person when 

you 

Craig: start reading, I. I liked her in the movie. You know, I don’t know how much of it was her and how much of it was the acting, but she’s very brassy. Yeah. And, and I, I enjoyed her character.

She gets killed, but offscreen because we hardly see any violence at all. Yeah. But yeah, I mean, if you, if you go to IMDB and read the trivia, like there’s a lot of it, and I would say a good half, if not three quarters of it is about her being naked. Like Yeah, I get it. Like, okay, they had to put her makeup on her butt.

Like, uh, like that’s fascinating. Big deal. I, I don’t under. Right. I don’t understand. And I, I kind of, I guess, and if this really was kind of the first instance of nudity, On screen, which I guess it was, that’s another story you can read about how some journalist snuck on set and was surreptitiously shooting her nude until she noticed and mm-hmm.

Said something about it and they got him out of there. But, um, I guess, you know, this journalist was trying to get the first shot of nudity in film or something. I don’t know. It’s just, it’s just, I don’t know, coming from a 2023 perspective, it is so 

Todd: tame. It’s so cute. It’s quaint. And you said 

Craig: it’s quaint and, and you said, I mean, my God, Todd, you and I grew up watching Best Little Who House in Texas.

Yeah. And there are just boobies flopping around Yeah. In that whole movie. And so I just never even really thought anything of it. Yeah. 

Todd: I didn’t either. My mom. Didn’t even realize what she was showing me. 

Craig: Yeah. I don’t know. My, my mom now I think shakes her head at herself, but, you know, my parents were hardworking people.

The TV had to babysit us sometimes. That’s just the way that it was, but it’s just funny. It, it’s almost difficult to believe that anything here could have been. And and to be fair, they toned it down. There was supposed to be more nudity. Um, you actually contacted me and said, I think I may have sent you the American edit, which edits out all the nudity.

I did see her boobs. Yeah. Um, for like a second. She’s laying on her back on the bed. 

Todd: She’s flat on her back, and it’s not, it’s not head on. She’s kind of in the lower third of the screen and it’s kind of from, almost from the headboard. And it’s 

Craig: a really artful shot. And it’s so brief, like, yeah, it’s super weird and it, it, it’s not learing it, it 

Todd: just mm-hmm.

Well, it’s, honestly, it doesn’t, it’s frustrating because then it just cuts from that to now. Apparently she’s dead uhhuh all of the kills in this movie. Happen after a cut. Like there’s no, there’s no blood. Actually, it’s an, another thing that she says in this list is she said she was bewildered when she read the script.

She said, I, I don’t really get it. She’s like, this is a horror movie with no blood. Do I die in here? Yeah. So I mean, it definitely makes some different choices from Psycho where you get this, you know, still pretty extreme shower scene of the knife coming down in blood, going down, you know, screaming and, and I mean, right, right.

Of course Psycho was controversial for the time too, so 

Craig: I know I, and I did, you know, there, there are elements of the movie that I liked, you know, you say melodramatic, I would say in parts it’s kind of campy, but seemingly intentionally, so, yeah. And I like that, like, like Millie, the woman we’re just talking about, she’s campy and, uh, anytime you’re up, really, anytime you’re in that shop, um, it’s a little bit.

On the melodramatic side, not to the point of being outside of realism, but just a little bit heightened. Hmm. Um, and then also on the movie set, when they’re filming, uh, whatever movie it is they’re filming about picking crates or 

Todd: hats or whatever. Right. 

Craig: That stuff like there, some of that with that actress who is playing the terrible, like starlet in that movie, Uhhuh, some of that.

Legit funny. Yeah. 

Todd: Like clearly and, and it clearly intended to be so Yeah. 

Craig: Right. Purposeful. I, I did enjoy that stuff. And like, I, those parts, especially the part, well no, the boudoir set is the same, but on the movie set it feels very old movie. Yeah. It’s very colorful. Beautiful. By the way, was this re, was this released in black and white?

It must have been right? No, no, no, no. It’s a color movie. Gotcha. I I thought maybe it had been recolored colorized later. No. Be and, and I was curious because I really liked it, the, the color in. Yeah. In those certain scenes, like the visual aesthetic matches the. In those scenes just as it, the visual aesthetic matches the tone in other scenes, but in a different way.

Yeah. Like when you’re in Mark’s studio in his house, it’s all very dark and shadowy and just like small beams of light for the lighting. And yeah. I can see technically how there’s a lot of really, really good stuff going on. That’s awesome. I just wasn’t super invested in the story, but it looks great. 

Todd: Oh God.

Yeah. It looks amazing. And, and the shots are really interesting. It’s really interesting. Even, um, so he, he kills this woman at the beginning. Uh, and like I said, we don’t see how she dies. We just see the, her scream into the camera. And then, uh, we, like you said, we get onto this set, which is his, well, first he swings by his, his, uh, not real job, which is, uh, Well, his side job, which is, you know, shooting, um, these, these models, these girly pictures, and Pamela Green and we’re up there and then we see, oh, this guy also, like, he’s a serious photographer.

He’s a focus puller on a big major movie set. Uh, and he’s in there, like you said, with that woman who’s this kind of like starlet and they’re doing this thing about picking trunks or whatever. And then there’s a stand in for this girl. Hold 

Craig: on real quick that, that’s, I wanna talk about that scene too, but real quick, the, the first scene where he’s doing like the boudoir photos mm-hmm.

What was with 

Todd: the hair lip was, yeah. What that was was just shitty 

Craig: makeup. I understand what a hair lip is or what a clef pallet is, or like, I get that, was there a point to 

Todd: it? It was just part of the character or like, it’s supposed to be shocking. Like she’s standing there and the nervous one or whatever.

She turns around and then he looks at it and he sees it and he suddenly fascinated by it. Right. Right, because it’s Uhhuh I figured cuz it’s unusual or because I didn’t know if they 

Craig: were, I didn’t know if they were trying to make some statement about how nobody really cares about her face. You know, they’re not there to see her face 

Todd: or, yeah.

Well that’s, that’s said, 

Craig: right? I don’t know. Or if they were trying to say something about Mark’s appreciation of beauty, like did he find something beautiful that other people would not like? 

Todd: I think so. Cuz I think Mark is, is is fascinated by the grotesque. Right. And so yeah. That, that absolutely fascinates him.

I mean, it’s comical by today’s standards, but like in the shot, he makes his big production of pulling his camera out, Millie from the sides like, doesn’t matter, you don’t need to shoot her face. And he’s like, no, I want to shoot her face. And he just slowly approaches her with the camera. It’s, it’s sadly it’s terrible makeup though.

And, and, uh, according to, um, Pamela Green and her little writeup, she said that that woman’s, it kept coming off. It looked like it was coming off, you know, by the way, up there in the bourgeois, all of that setting, all that scenery, especially that awesome little like, fake Parisian street that was actually from her studio.

Oh, really? The director visited her studio and loved it so much that he was like, can we just use these pieces In the movie? She like got imprints of like, uh, cobblestone streets and walls, like from the actual streets of London to, to build that painted herself and everything. Wow. I’m telling you this, Pamela Green sounds like the most awesome woman.

Yeah, 

Craig: she does sound really interesting. She was, she was good. I liked her. Um, but you were gonna talk about, okay. So that the scene that you were getting ready to talk about, he hangs back with this extra, who is, you know, herself an actress, very beautiful actress in real life. They must have been flirting before this.

Mm-hmm. Because it seems like they had talked about meeting up, spending time together or going out or something. And she seems very comfortable with him and I really liked this scene. Mm-hmm. It was act like up until the point where he kills her. It was really 

Todd: charming. Really? 

Craig: Yeah. I thought so. Anyway, like, you know, she Oh, I agree.

Is just, I mean, it’s just banter. They’re just bantering with one another and he is like, I don’t know, he’s like setting up shots and like marking her mark on the stage, like they’re gonna be shooting us. He’s 

Todd: very workman-like during this and she’s just free and like kind of warming up. And is she kind 

Craig: of, I don’t remember if she’s dancing around.

Yeah, it’s been a couple days since I watched it. She’s, she’s dancing around 

Todd: and. That, that awesome little reel to reel cassette player. Oh God, I love that. 

Craig: Yeah. Yeah. And I, I feel like the, the way that it was shot was kind of sweeping with her movement. I don’t know. Yeah. It was just, uh, a very charming scene.

Todd: Oh, well, I stood alone in front of a studio camera at more than most half ever stood behind one. No 

Craig: Help 

Todd: yourself. Oh, I can see your mark. Perfectly good. Yes, sir. I bet I’m the best camerawoman in the business. Oh, what you’re doing, photographing you photographing me. Oh, mark, 

Craig: you are brilliant. So then it was even more unsettling when he starts filming her and then it becomes uncomfortable and then you, this is where we kind of, for the first time, see his.

Mo, which I think is kind of stupid, but 

Todd: yeah, he, um, so he picks up the camera, which is still attached to the tripod, and he flips out one of the tripod legs directly at her, and he’s kind of coming towards her. And then he yanks off the end of the tripod leg that’s aimed towards her. Yeah. And there’s a knife in there, but also he says, wait a minute, I also, he makes some comment, I can’t remember what it is, and he picks up something else that we never see and also holds it in front of the camera.

Did you catch that? 

Craig: Uh, I think so. You know, I, again, I, I’m, I’m just kind of an idiot because earlier you were saying during the first kill, you’re like, and he shined some kind of light on her face, and it wasn’t until you said that 20 minutes. That I realized what that was. Right. And so it just goes to show that I’m an idiot because No, because it’s not.

They tell you, you find out at the end what it is. Yeah. I just didn’t even put it together in my head. Mm 

Todd: gotcha. Gotcha. Yeah. He’s shining a mirror on them. Well, you don’t find 

Craig: this out until the very end. Correct. Uh, you, you just, uh, it’s deliberately withheld. 

Todd: Yes. 

Craig: Right. It’s al and, and I mean, spoiler alert, whatever, what he wants, he, he not only wants to capture on film their terror in their dying moments, but he wants them to see it.

Yeah. So that he can also get their reaction to seeing their own 

Todd: terror. It’s pretty. It only makes sense in that it seems like this is what his father did to him. Right? Because after he kills her and apparently stuffs her body in the trunk, which leads to some com, I think, comedy, but dark comedy. Yeah.

Later. He goes back because 

Craig: when? Just because later they’re filming on the set and they find her in there. Yeah. Right. While they’re filming. Right. I don’t know. I don’t know how He didn’t anticipate 

Todd: that. Was he not Well, you know, you’d think that he didn’t anticipate it, but I think he actually meant for them to find it or something.

Because maybe 

Craig: cuz he films the aftermath. 

Todd: Oh, he films the aftermath. He’s very interested in filming everyone’s reaction. Just like he goes at the big, at the beginning, back to film. The police coming to the Uhhuh pick up the bodies as soon as they discover the trunk. It’s not like he’s, he does, he takes no effort to try to.

Divert them or hide the trunk or whatever it was, like he purposely put it on the set and he steals away and he goes up to the wrap. Well, in this case, he, he steals away to the side, grabs a camera, and, uh, starts videotaping their rea, filming their reaction as they open the trunk. And then later when the police are investigating, he sneaks on the set, goes up to the rafters and films it yet again from above when they’re looking at the body and discussing it.

Uh, and almost gets caught. Actually, that’s a bit of a kind of a tense moment. I think it’s very interesting that the film never shows us their bodies. And even in that far away shot from the rafters, it’s, it’s clearly deliberately out of focus. Yes. 

Craig: I found in my notes what he says to her when he af, when he films her dancing, when he is menacing her with this tripod knife.

He says, you know, imagine someone coming towards you. He wants to kill you, but just to kill you isn’t enough for him. And then you assume he kills her because it cuts to black. Yeah, 

Todd: that’s disappointing. Oh 

Craig: God. That is literally the halfway part. And, and I know because that’s where I stopped and I marked it.

That’s the 45 minute mark right there. That’s where, and and, and then this is when we meet Helen and her mom who is blind. And it’s just so funny to me. So they don’t know that Mark owns the house cuz it was his father’s house. And so his, you know, his family is dead so he RINs out the other rooms through an agent or something.

So they don’t know he’s really the landlord, but he lives right above them. And God, I think one of my favorite lines is when Helen and her mom are first talking. Mark and the mom says that she doesn’t trust a man who walks quietly and then talks about it for a while. Like, like, like the man who walks quietly has got something to hide.

Todd: Um, I don’t know. 

Craig: It’s hilarious. Then he, and she, and I really like this actress because she’s charming and not like a starlet. She doesn’t look like, no. The other woman that we were talking about, she’s attractive, looks very much like a, 

Todd: but she’s like 

Craig: girl next door, but like a girl next door. Real person that you would know in real life.

Yeah. But charming and for whatever reason drawn to him and they’re drawn to each other and he likes her and he, you know, she invites him to her party and they 

Todd: kind of talk, well, let’s just say like, I feel like this. You’re right. I, I’m sorry, I’m jumping ahead. She invites him to the party. That’s okay. Go for it.

They talk. And then, uh, he goes back up. He, you know, she, he’s, he’s just super awkward and he’s like, no. She’s like, oh, I finally, I meet you. You know, I’ve seen you so many times, but you’d never, you know, stop to say hi, and I’m Helen and whatever. And he just goes upstairs. And then eventually she comes back up and knocks on the door and she’s brought him a piece of cake.

She interrupts him. He’s watching one of his films. Um, yeah. And, uh, snuff films. Yeah. So he like, kind of quickly kind of hides the, the film back in the, the cabinet and gets out of his dark room into his main room and answers the door. And she comes with a, a piece of cake with a candle still lit on it.

It’s like the cutest thing. Uh, and then she just kind of edges her way in and just kind of chats him up. And, uh, she’s curious and interested about him, which is all very natural. But like you say, he’s, he’s still awkward and weird, but 

Craig: Right. And, and in the interest of time, really over the next 20 minutes or so, they have a cute little courtship.

He’s still doing his. Creeping on other women and killing people thing, but their thing is kind of this, you know, uh, cute little courtship. Yeah. And they talk about the things that they are interested in and, and you know, he talks about being interested in film and she’s interested in that and she’s written a children’s book.

But, um, it’s about, you know, somebody who has a ma you know, the book is about a magic camera and, you know, she has this really specific vision of what she wants the pictures to look like, and would he take the pictures and, you know, so they’re gonna collaborate on this thing and it’s all very sweet. But that’s also where he tells her about his dad.

Yeah. And you’ve, you’ve already alluded to it, His dad was a famous psychiatrist, wrote books and stuff, but like you said, he experimented on the kid and we see the video, and you’ve already kind of explained it, it’s him putting the kid in really kind of inappropriate situations. Like at one point the, you know, the, the black and white camera is showing the kid asleep, and then you see a big lizard thrown right onto his sleeping body and he wakes up and he’s scared of the lizard.

And then another one is, um, him, uh, the little boy at his mother’s deathbed because the dad wanted to get his, you know, genuine reaction to his mother’s death and stuff. And he explains it to her as though it’s not an, like a big deal, like it’s just something that happened. And she, I think, is a little bit weirded out by it.

It’s not like a game changer. Like, she’s like, oh, well 

Todd: that’s weird. I think this is what breaks the ice between them, honestly, because she’s immediately has sympathy for ’em. I mean, it’s like a clear explanation why he’s so weird and it’s not his fault. That seems to be the turning point where like he, she kind of accepts this, he kind of like lets her in on this secret.

She accepts it and now she’s more int you know, they just have a, a closer bond because of it. And he lets his guard down. And this was another reason 

Craig: that it was controversial because the director plays the father in these videos. You only see him very, very briefly. He’s usually behind the camera. And he used his own son to play the young mark.

Um, and people I guess were outraged and thought that it was abusive and that he was basically doing with his son the same thing that the character was doing with his son in the movie by exploiting him for his own purposes and whatever. Oh my God. And I’ve read that like, like years and years and years down the line, the.

Son was asked about this and just laughed it off and said it was the most ridiculous thing you’d ever heard. And watching it, who It doesn’t seem, 

Todd: no, it’s ridiculous. It doesn’t, there’s nothing to it. Yeah. But that being said, uh, in her little memoir, uh, Pamela Green mentioned that, you know, after she had chased all these people off and that she had to go back and get makeup applied to her body so she could come out for her nude scene, as she was laying down, there were two young boys sitting down by the bed watching it.

And she was like, what are these boys doing here? And he was like, those are my sons and I want them to watch this. 

Craig: Yeah. So it does sound like he was weak. 

Todd: He was a little weird, I think was weird. Genuinely a little weird. This guy. 

Craig: Yeah. And I think that she was more than anything else, just surprised. Like I read that too.

And it said she didn’t really care. No. You know, and, uh, she was just surprised, was curious that there were children present. Um, but anyway, you know, I feel like, I mean, he kills that girl and she gets found on set. And so the police are investigating and they interview him, but he doesn’t really say or do anything that causes them any red flags.

At some point they figure out that the last two women who have died, the two women that we’ve seen him kill, both died with expressions of extreme terror 

Todd: on their faces. They’re the same expressions. Oh, please. Oh my God. So stupid. 

Craig: But that’s fine. I mean, it’s funny, it’s a plot of ice. Right. That’s fine.

And then he kills, uh, a offscreen, you, you just see him go to take naked pictures of the blonde that we’ve been talking about, and apparently he kills her and then for some reason they’re onto him. And I don’t remember. 

Todd: I don’t either. Why? I don’t remember either. The whole ending of the movie is kind of a blur to me, to be honest.

The whole, the whole 

Craig: ending is very bizarre because he goes on a nice date with his girlfriend, but he comes home and her mother. Is just creeping in his, in his studio. Yeah. In his dark studio for reasons that I don’t understand, aside from the fact that she says, I come here every night. What? 

Todd: No, I think what she, she means, I think she means metaphorically because she has, you know, she’s blind, she’s super sensitive with her hearing.

She can hear him walking around up there every night. And I think that’s what she, I don’t think she literally means she creeps into his apartment. 

Craig: Okay. Yeah, she does. She says, I didn’t understand what she was talking about. She says the blind will always live in the rooms they live under. Yes. So I think you’re right.

Yeah. I think she, it’s like, it’s as though she’s in the room cuz she hears ’em walking around up there. Right. Um, and then this is a really weird scene where like, I don’t understand why, but he puts on his snuff film while she’s there and it even like projects on his back and partially on her and they have kind of this weird interaction ultimately.

She says that she’s worried about her daughter, and he says, you don’t have to worry about her. I’ll never photograph her, I promise. And the mom threatens to move them away, but I, I think that she’s satisfied with his promise. And then, uh, I guess she goes downstairs satisfied. Eventually, Helen brings it, took me a while to figure out what it was, but I think it’s her manuscript that she’s giving him a copy of so that he can take pictures for it.

Um, but he’s not home, so she leaves it in the studio and then she’s just out of curiosity, turns on his projector and we don’t even see what she sees. We just see the horrified look on her face. He shows up and won’t look. Yeah. He says, I can’t, I can’t see you. Frightened. He’s protecting you. I mustn’t 

Todd: see you frightened.

He doesn’t wanna get turned on or wants to start photographing it yet. Right. He’s afraid he’s gonna kill her. Yeah. 

Craig: Right. And they, I don’t know, it’s this weird kind of, she knows now what he is and, and she is frightened, but it’s like she’s torn or 

Todd: something. I don’t know. Aren’t the cops showing up at this point?

I, yes. I don’t remember. I don’t know why I don’t, 

Craig: I don’t know. They’re onto him somehow. They, because Oh, the, he, he did something suspicious and so they started following him and they followed him and saw that he went to that shop. Oh. So I’m guessing that they found her body Oh boy. And knew it must be him.

So they came to his house and then at this point he confesses to her that all of the rooms in the house are bugged. Apparently his dad did that to supply on him. Yeah. And hi, he said his dad was a voyeur. And then, God, I don’t know Todd. Like, I feel like it’s Artie and I don’t get it. Um, he, he’s like, do you know what the most frightening thing in the world is?

It’s fear. Okay, alright. Do you know what the hottest thing in the world is? Heat.

And, and, and so then, so he puts the knife to her throat and, and this is when he reveals that he made them watch their own death. So you see the mirror and her staring into the mirror, but the cops arrive and he busts out his blacked out window to film them. And then he turns on the film of his murders and films himself impaling himself on.

Thing I read somewhere, I don’t even remember where I read it, but it just very matter of, matter-of-factly said, as he had always intended to do. Did we know 

Todd: that? Like, I don’t think so. 

Craig: I, I, I mean it is a good end for his movie. Yeah. Maybe that, maybe that was always, uh, gonna be the end. He just didn’t know when it was gonna happen.

I don’t know. But whatever. I think 

Todd: it’s a fine interpretation. He’s dead. He doesn’t bleed. Yeah, he doesn’t bleed. No, nobody bleeds. But he does 

Craig: fall onto the ground in the most contorted, odd way I’ve ever seen. So weird. And, and she just kind of collapses onto his body and weeps as the police come in.

Mm-hmm. And you hear very faintly in the background, the voice of his father saying, don’t be a silly boy. There’s nothing to be afraid of. And then you hear the little boy’s voice say, goodnight daddy. And then it cuts to black. Mm. 

Todd: A little creepy. 

Craig: It’s creepy. It’s fine. I’m not giving it the credit. It’s due from a technical perspective, it’s very interesting to watch.

And if you’re interested in filmmaking, you should for sure watch it. Um, you know that I’m just not a big fan of old movies. There are some old movies that I really, really, really like, but I don’t go outta my way to watch them. It’s just not my thing. Um, it, it wasn’t bad. I didn’t hate it. I could tell that it was well made.

I just wasn’t particularly invested in the story. I thought the story was a little silly, but, uh, it was fine. And, and I get, nah, I’m not gonna lie. I’m just lying. I was gonna say, I get why people like it so much. I don’t really, but whatever they do. So I guess I’m just missing 

Todd: something as a story. It’s a little convoluted and over the top at times.

Maybe parts of it are a bit on the nose. It’s like, you know, we get it. It feels a little unworldly. But you know what, like I said, a lot of movies at this time were, and so you Right. Things were just a little more presentational. And I actually like watching that every now and then. And so, sure. I, I, I really liked that aspect of this movie.

I love the clean colors and the beautiful photography and the interesting angles, but also, um, I don’t know if we diverge here, but like, I just really feel like it was a, I thought it was an interesting character study. I thought it was at least as interesting a character study as any of the other ones that, you know, we’ve seen and talked about for its time and the limitations of what they were able to portray and show.

Mm. I sympathize with this guy. I was also creeped out by this guy, and I think I was genuinely nervous about what he was ca I was genuinely interested in what he was capable of and what he was going to do next, and what was his end game and what was the point behind all this. And I thought the movie did a pretty good job of eventually laying that all out in small doses while keeping me a little confused at times.

Mm-hmm. When you got a movie called Peeping Tom, that’s about voyeurism and sight, you know, to have a blind woman be a key element of it and a part of the mm-hmm. Like, nobody would dare to do that today. That’s, you know, that’s a little too, uh, that’s, that’s definitely delving into arthouse territory, you know what I mean?

Mm-hmm. So, uh, so I understand like, yeah, some of it’s just kind of, kind of ridiculous in that way, but as a piece of film, as a piece of art, trying to prove a particular point, evoke mood, service, a theme, and explore it a bit, you know, I, I get all that stuff and I enjoyed watching it. So, uh, but also, you know, it’s, it for me, this, watching this movie was very similar to how I feel about watching these glos from the seventies.

I just, I really enjoyed seeing Britain at this time. I liked seeing, yeah, this kind of like weird sexual moors where guys were going into like shady places and in their own coded ways like, Postcards of nude women on them, like, I mean this. Yeah. And this guy who has a little secret studio upstairs where he is, got these half nervous girls up there, and one of ’em who’s like seen it all and doesn’t give a shit, you know?

Mm-hmm. He’s taken their pictures. I don’t know. It just presented this kind of world that I just liked being in for a little while. It was, you know, I can’t time travel, but sometimes through these movies, it feels like a little bit of time travel for. Yeah. 

Craig: Yeah. I’m glad to have seen it because I feel like it’s, oh, I don’t know.

It, it’s, it’s, it’s kind of notorious, you know, it ha, it’s, it’s, it has an established place in horror cinema history, so I’m glad to have seen it so that I can be part of that conversation. Hmm. Um, I, I wouldn’t watch it again, but again, it’s, there have been movie. Recently that we’ve watched that I was mad, I had wasted my time.

And I don’t, I don’t feel that about this. I, I think that it’s, uh, definitely worth seeing. So, yeah, I, I, I appreciate the, uh, recommendation cuz this would never be one that I would’ve picked, but I am glad to have seen it. Well, 

Todd: Thank you again for listening to another episode. If you enjoyed it, please share it with a friend.

Find us on Patreon, patreon.com/chainsaw podcast, find out how you can support our podcast. Be a part of choosing films, uh, for us to watch just like Chase today. Thank you, Chase, for being a patron and thank you for suggesting this film for us. We really appreciate it. Until next time, I’m Todd. And I’m Craig with Two Guys and a Chainsaw.

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