DZ-131: Negative Character Arcs vs Negative Feelings — Transcript

Chapters 27

27 chapters

1 NOV 2026

0:00 Cold Open

Mel Killingsworth

These are the four films that I have now watched in a row for this. Ugh, brutal.

Stu Willis

Have you considered not watching them?

Mel Killingsworth

Unfortunately, I prefer to be good at my podcasts. I was about to say job, and then I was like, hobby?

Ha ha ha ha.

0:27 Negative Arc vs Negative Audience Feeling

Mel Killingsworth

Hi, I'm Mel Killingsworth.

Stu Willis

Sorry, I was trying. And I'm Stu Willis.

Chas Fisher

I'm Chas Fisher.

Stu Willis

And welcome to Draft Zero, a podcast where two emerging filmmakers and one, whatever I am, try to work out what makes great screenplays work.

Chas Fisher

A dude who insists on eating his dinner every time we're about to start recording.

Stu Willis

Don't set it at dinner time.

Chas Fisher

And today on Draft Zero, we are doing the latest entry in our exploration on character arcs, and we've already done a primer episode on, what is a character arc, we've done steadfast or resilient character arcs, we've done positive character arcs, and now we're doing negative. And the examples that we are doing are Backrooms by Will Soodik and Kane Parsons, written by If I Had Legs I'd Kick You, written by Mary Bronstein, and Anatomy of a Fall, written by, Justine Triet and Arthur Harari. And the reason why I very pointedly just said the word negative by itself and not negative arcs is my big realization from this is, I came into this whole exercise of going, let's look at certain categories of films and then see if we can what we can learn from them in terms of craft tools and emotional effects and now, as we get more and more into this exploration I think I have it slightly backwards in that, what I feel that we've done this episode and our patrons as well by helping us choose the films is that we've chosen films that leave the audience with a sort of down emotional experience, and then we're kind of working backwards from that. There's a difference between a character arc, being negative and an audience feeling negative about the arc. And the same can be said about positive, steadfast, et cetera, et cetera.

Stu Willis

I'm not sure I agree with that statement, because if you're saying that, oh, there's a difference between a character having a negative arc and an audience perceiving that arc as negative, I'm like, how? How do we understand that an arc is negative at all? Because I can understand that there is an arc, but we're imposing negative and positive, is it a value judgment? As in, are we passing a moral judgment on that change? And if we're not, then what is the difference between positive and negative? And if it is, who else but the audience is deciding that that transformation is positive or negative?

Mel Killingsworth

We got philosophical real quickly.

3:18 Distinguishing character shift, world reward, and audience experience

★ Key idea · Distinguishing Arc, Reward, and Audience

Chas Fisher

Yeah. Well, initially we did this arbitrary choice of positive, negative, and steadfast. And negative is more about looking at, I think classically, we came from the idea of tragedies, right? And what might be the emotional effect or the different tools that might come from tragedies. But to answer what you just said is in our Discord pre-chat, it is important to distinguish how a film makes the audience feels as against what characters have gone through, as against whether the characters have a dramatized shift in value change, and also how the world rewards or punishes them for that. So my classic example would be, I mean, going back to Blue Moon, we keep going back to it. The guy drinks himself to death, but Mel and I were arguing about how should we feel about that? Is it a positive arc where he's just refusing to give in to certain aspects or not?

Mel Killingsworth

Or a neutral arc.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Mel Killingsworth

Like I do think it can be neutral.

Chas Fisher

So I think there absolutely can be a difference between... How an audience feels about an emotional experience that they've just been on and whether a character has made, value decisions at the end of the film that they wouldn't have made at the beginning and that either us as a society impose value judgments on those or, the film is doing it through operant conditioning like, is the world punishing or rewarding them are there relationships more intimate or more distant all these tools that we've managed to deepen our understanding of in the past three episodes I think are all different levers, and including whether an arc is positive or negative and it's not necessarily negative arcs equals negative audience experience positive arcs equals positive audience experience.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah because I think the audience can go in and I've had this argument round and round with one of my best mates about Like the audience can feel super uplifted by Wolf of Wall.

Chas Fisher

Street and think it's aspirational.

Mel Killingsworth

But what you have to determine is and like death of the author and all that. But in terms of does the film think or is this character having a negative is the film establishes a baseline. Right. And then it where does the character end in relation to the baseline that was established? And we talked about that a lot with our positive arcs as well. Right. Where like for some characters, if they ended the exact same place that that, you know, Viola Davis, this character ended, for example, that would not be a positive arc. It's positive because of where she was established to be at the beginning of the film and then how she responds to similar stimuli or similar plot events that happen throughout the film. Like that is what determines whether or not it's it's positive, not even how the audience feels about it and not even where she ends up. It's only where she ends up relative to the baseline established and how she has gotten there and how that is demonstrated, demonstricized, demonstrated.

Stu Willis

Coming back to your saying, because we didn't, I don't think any of these films are tragedies, and for whatever reason, we've not picked a classic tragedy. All right, Mel's also giving me that look.

Chas Fisher

Yeah, I feel like if I had legs, it's a tragedy.

Mel Killingsworth

Oh, see, and I don't necessarily agree with that, but anyway, interesting.

Stu Willis

So, okay, one of the stereotypical ideas of tragedy, at least what I learned when I was studying Shakespeare and tragedy in high school, you know it's it's and when we we've talked about it later with anagnorisis is a character coming to a self-realization and it's too late for them to change and.

Mel Killingsworth

That's Anatomy of a Fall yeah.

Stu Willis

Right a character comes to a realization so that I think is one category of negative right the tragic thing where the character realizes, what they should have done and it's too late for them to do anything about it right and so I think there is a negative that is character-based there is a negative that is audience and there is a negative that is like social context and I think these three films back rooms I think is both audience and character, I think if I had legs I kick you is probably tragic in the sense that it's a spiral story a character probably losing control yeah anatomy of a fall which we'll be doing last is is the most complex because I think There is a couple of negative arcs within that, and it's different characters. And the character that I think has the biggest arc that's negative is... Daniel, the son, not our ostensible lead. So I think that's just important because I think that's something that we'll come back to. And also we have tried, we've talked about doing these negative arcs over two episodes with doing negative arcs now and negative steadfast is another episode. Whether we actually do that, I'm not sure.

Mel Killingsworth

I argue we've incidentally done negative steadfast here.

Stu Willis

Because I think maybe this is a difficult thing. And, like, it's not as clear, as I think positive and, like, positive steadfast and positive arcs are. I think negative because negative is the, like, almost an absence of something. I don't know. I think negative is a more complex category of story.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. And we've also chosen three quite complex, us and our patrons have chosen three quite complex stories. And I think we will get better, deeper craft learnings from those stories, but we haven't chosen, you know, a really straightforward, we haven't done Macbeth and Goodfellas.

Mel Killingsworth

Goodfellas.

Chas Fisher

And, you know, like.

Stu Willis

Scarface.

Chas Fisher

Yeah, really clear single protagonist where they start out good and then by the end of it, they've had an anagnorisis that they're bad and it's too late for them to do anything about it.

Mel Killingsworth

They start out Scarface.

Chas Fisher

Okay let's not get into that you know what I mean we could have chosen much more straight forward single protagonist clear dramatizable negative arcs but.

Mel Killingsworth

What fun is that.

Stu Willis

Why didn't we do revenge of the sith guys.

Chas Fisher

Because I think that film so poorly dramatized the negative arc in it, okay as is our new format we are hopefully going to learn stuff through this episode and now would be a good time to figure out if we did actually learn anything from these three very complex stories.

9:58 Why these three films resist a classic tragedy template

10:03 The Relationship Question as a Craft Tool

★ Key idea · The Relationship Question as Craft Tool

Stu Willis

The question that I didn't ask of these films at the very end, but is worth thinking about, is what is the relationship question? We've talked about plot questions before, character questions, thematic questions, but there is something about what is the relationship question. And that may help us think about what arc we're meant to be focusing on.

★ Key idea · Individual Arc Is Only One Lever

Chas Fisher

My key learning from the future is that for a film to feel negative the individual character arc being negative is only but one lever you can pull to trigger the emotional reaction.

Mel Killingsworth

My key learning from the future is metaphors and symbolism are your friends.

Stu Willis

Uh we'll see you we'll see you hear you no you'll hear us when the episode comes.

Mel Killingsworth

Out we hear you first.

Stu Willis

Wow future Stu is much more informed.

Mel Killingsworth

Probably because he stole all of future mel's learnings so to to get to the first one that I actually think is possibly the most steadfast It's back rooms.

11:11 BACKROOMS

From the film

I found something, in the store. Okay. What did you find? The place. I found a place. Look, I know how this sounds, but you gotta understand, it's massive in there. I'm not saying I don't believe you. Okay, I'm gonna come back here with proof. All right, you feel me? Yeah. Follow my lead. Clark, what is this? That's what I'm trying to figure out. I've been here every night since I found the place, and I still barely scratched the surface. All right, just take it slow.

Chas Fisher

Okay. So, Backrooms, written and directed by Kane Parsons, also written with a writing credit as well to Will Soodik. As a broad summary, it's like a science fiction kind of horror film that has a major protagonist shift in the middle. Then hopefully my summary reflects that. We come in to experience the life of Clark, played by Chiwetel Ejiofor. My God, I should not have tried to pronounce his name.

Stu Willis

Better you than me.

Mel Killingsworth

You got Ejiofor, right?

Chas Fisher

Hey! And Clark has, he runs, importantly, a failing furniture store, and he has had a long-term relationship fall apart. He is an alcoholic or at least the film is not said out loud but the film strongly suggests he's an alcoholic, and the the wiring in his furniture store is going a bit crazy he ends up sleeping there overnight to try and find out why the electricity is playing up and what he discovers in the bottom of his furniture store is, an interdimensional space into, a series of infinite absurd back rooms where it is later explained to us that everything that can and will happen or has ever happened is happening, in these spaces kind of on repeat to the point where they, sort of self-referentially destroy each other or fall into the absurd. It becomes like a sort of Cubist or Escherian nightmare.

From the film

It's... Every place that ever was.

Chas Fisher

And as Clark takes, his assistant, store manager, and her boyfriend in to explore the deep rooms, the back room, sorry, and they meet ugly demisers. And Clark leaves a very strange voicemail on his psychologist's answering machine or voicemail.

From the film

Hi, you've reached Dr. Mary Klein. I'm not able to answer the call, so please leave a message, and I'll get back to you as soon as I can. Mary... I opened the window. I won't be coming back.

Chas Fisher

She becomes worried about him. She goes to find him. She also gets drawn into the back rooms, has a confrontation with Clark, and then is chased around and killed by the back rooms. Anthropomorphication of Clark's. I'm going to say self-esteem issues, perhaps. But it is a person-eating pirate, which is Clark's, what would you call it, his TV persona for the advertising of his furniture business.

From the film

Well, ahoy there, mateys! Tired of spending your hard-earned doubloons on overpriced furniture? Looking for deals that'll shiver your timbers? Then come on down to Captain Clark's Ottoman Empire, The Santa Clara Valley's favorite warehouse and showrooms.

Chas Fisher

And then she is rescued. She escapes the back rooms into a research facility that is investigating these, that has discovered them and is trying to map them, or learn more about them. And ends with her being interviewed by a scientist with the vibe that she's never going to be allowed to leave this research facility. Because she expressly asks and he expressly does not answer the question.

From the film

It's like describing a dog to someone who's never seen a dog, and then asking them to try it. And now you want me to describe it. And then he'll write it down, and then what? Mary. You let me go? We all want the same thing here. We do. You know, we just want to find out even a little bit more. What's gonna happen to me, Phil? That decision is not up to me.

Chas Fisher

Is that a good summary?

Mel Killingsworth

Very thorough.

Stu Willis

And that was a negative arc.

16:56 Clark's steadfast refusal disguised as trying to change

Mel Killingsworth

I think Clark is very steadfast about how negative he wants to remain. It sets us his baseline, right? When he's at therapy the first time, which is maybe, you know, five, ten minutes into the film, if that. Because we see the cutaways of like a childhood home and stuff that comes back later. But like ten minutes into the film, it establishes a therapy session where he is clearly looking for therapy to give him an easy out or absolution and not have to change or fix himself.

From the film

Are you interested in forging a new path and see where that leads? Sure. Why not? You know, I'm here. Great. So I want to revisit an exercise we've done before. The role play. Oh, the acting thing? Yeah. I feel stupid doing that. I know. But we have a few minutes. Let's, um, yeah, let's try a little bit. All right. Let's set the scene. Let's go back to the night that Barbara left you. You mean the night she kicked me out of my own house? Yeah. I'm playing myself. And I'll be Barbara. It is my house, by the way. I'm the one paying for it. I know. All right. Okay so um I got home late I don't know how late uh she was already asleep maybe midnight, she usually goes to bed before it doesn't matter the point is I was in the kitchen and um the glass I broke the glass and she comes running down to see what happened and, things escalated. And how do you feel? Well, I was drunk, and I felt stupid. I was angry, because I broke the glass. Can you say that to me? What, to Barbara? Yeah. I'm sorry that I awoke you. Maybe if you'd come home earlier, we could have spent the evening together. I was working. I came straight home after work. Be honest with me, please. I can smell it on your breath. I had a few beers. Define a few. Well, it was a hard day. I needed to wind down. All you ever do is wind down. You're always at the store. You want kids, right? We both do. Well, you know, having a family takes money, which means someone has to work. Unless being a professional student is considered a job these days. That's not fair. You know, I had to take time off. Well, it's not my fault if you can't keep up. How are you going to be a lawyer if you can't even handle law school? Who do you think pays for everything while you're gallivanting around campus like a 30-year-old freshman? I'll give you a hint. It's me. I pay for your school. I pay for your time off school. I pay for the roof over your head. Can I talk now? No, no, because I'd like to know, what do you think happens if you do manage to graduate? You know, you pop out a kid and then you leave me with the bill. Or am I stuck at home changing diapers because you're too busy working for the first time in your life? Now you're being cruel. I'm being honest. I thought that's what you always wanted Just because you didn't get to be an architect I am a fucking architect, God damn it, I'm just stuck selling shit furniture because someone won't get off their fat fucking ass and help me.

★ Key idea · Symbolism and Metaphor as Character Guide

Mel Killingsworth

And that is all in a very different way. That is the conversation that they repeat an hour and a half later when he has her tied to a chair and they're deep in the back rooms. And then he's like, but I don't have to change. I found a way to make myself feel better without having to change. And look, my giant pirate alter ego said so. So I do think that he, now, it's kind of a dual protagonist thing and you have the main, like, who we're with the majority of the time, which is like halfway through, right? So I think she arguably arcs more than Clark. I just don't think he, I think he's a steadfast negative and she's a negative arc.

21:14 Repeated role-play beat as evidence of change or relief

Stu Willis

Agreed.

★ Key idea · Steadfast Refusal Disguised as Effort

Chas Fisher

I'm going to push back on that ever so slightly. I think he's closer to steadfast than a pure negative arc. But I think Clark's repeated beat is that he's trying. I don't know if he is actually trying, but he's going through the motions of trying to change. Right. He's going to therapy. He's listening to the self-help books. He's not changing. He's literally stuck in a loop. Right. That then becomes self-referential in the back rooms.

Mel Killingsworth

He wants to make himself feel better without changing.

Chas Fisher

Yes.

Mel Killingsworth

And doing those surface things makes him feel better, but there's no arc to it.

Chas Fisher

Well, I don't know if they do make them feel better. But in the climactic, where they re-enact the role play, and she is pushed to the point of screaming at him that he cannot change, she cannot fix him, she cannot help him, and then he feels relief that he can stop changing, stop trying to change.

From the film

I'm just stuck selling shit furniture because someone won't get off her fat fucking ass and help me! I'm not your wife! Stay in character. Stay in character! I've never even met her. Say it, Claire! Fuck you! What did you say? You want to know the real reason your wife left you? It wasn't the drinking, or the stumbling home at all hours, or the rage. It was the whining. Nothing's ever your fault, is it? You drink too much? Blame your job. You hate your job? Blame the world. You get kicked out of the house? Blame your wife. You attack me and tie me up? Blame your brain. You are your fucking brain, you dipshit! You say it is my fault. Yes, but it's just the way you're wired, isn't it? Isn't it? How do I stop doing that? Honestly, I have no fucking idea. I can't help you, Clark. As much as I tried. It's just not up to me. I can't save anyone. I don't think I want to change.

Chas Fisher

I don't. She even goes up to his pirate self. We've got to come up with a name for these things. Are they called monsters? I guess they're called monsters. His monster self and says, we're okay. We don't have to change. He looks relieved. So I feel like there is a slight character shift where.

Mel Killingsworth

I think he's just relieved. he doesn't have to pretend anymore because he cares, he cares about perception he cares about what other people think and when he no longer has to go through the effort he's relieved but.

Chas Fisher

That's is that not a change trying to do all is that not a value a demonstrable value change that you give up on it's not a valuable value.

Mel Killingsworth

Change it's it's the fact that like oh nobody can perceive this anymore because that's all he cared about was the external perception and it's like oh I can just live here now where nobody else perceives me and therefore it's not a value change it's give it's finally finding a loophole to, enact the value he has had all along.

Chas Fisher

I would again I I I experience it differently because, he doesn't explain that to her from having undergone the experience of being in the back rooms it's only when she says you will not change that he goes that that sense of relief floods in like even in that big confrontation he is still, literally role-playing role-playing trying to change, do you know what I mean and and so I look I don't think it's a big shift and I agree with you that I think he was like, basically embracing his true self, right? But I think there is a difference in behavior. You know, what we came to, this was your observation, Mel, from our last episode, that one of the ways to dramatize character arcs is to come back to the same beats with a different outcome, right? And they literally do this. They had the exact same conversation repeated at two different points. And at one point, he comes out of it having had a deep, angry, emotional outburst and struggling with the fact that he had that angry outburst. And in the second one, he comes out with deep relief that he just doesn't have to try anymore.

Mel Killingsworth

And to me, the only difference is his physical proximity in terms of, well, I'm in the back room, so now I've been granted the absolution I was seeking before, and you just didn't give it to me. So that's not a value change for him. It's a response to what she has finally said, because she's arcing, right? And then he's gone, fucking finally, I've won. I've got the thing I want all along. Now I'm in the back rooms and not being perceived.

Stu Willis

This film is operating on a partly symbolic level.

26:31 Symbolism of loops and liminal space as character state

Chas Fisher

Right?

Stu Willis

Well, I mean, it's not even, you know, almost entirely symbology or symbolism. And part of it is that the liminal spaces of the back rooms, they make a constant reference to it representing going in circles and getting lost. And he no longer is trying to escape the back rooms. He's no longer engaging in the world. And look, we can call it, like, in the end, we can call it steadfast or we can call it an arc, right? Like, I'm interested in what is the effect of that, and I think it is different with, there's no wibble wobble, right, compared to a steadfast character. And I think that is something that you'll also see if I had legs, I'd kick you. The characters that are spiraling out, right, have a, he is given a choice, which is, you can come out with me, and he's refusing. Yeah, yeah. Would if he, and then he's basically terminating his therapy session. So that does indicate a change that I think if it was framed in a positive movie, like then it's gaining skills or whatever other ways we want to think about how you can show positive arcs. I think you can see it if you want as a arc.

Chas Fisher

There's a change, I think. And I think it clearly dramatized.

Mel Killingsworth

I think the change is situational.

From the film

I like it in here. For the first time in a long time, I feel like I'm, right where I'm supposed to be. Then stay. Right where you are. But let me call.

Stu Willis

I mean, if you stop running away from something and that is just being true to who you are, I mean, I think that's why we perceive it as the reason that we've chosen it and see it as negative is that we know it's not good for him. The characters tell it's not good for him, all these things. But in the operant conditioning sense, he's kind of got a negative reward.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Stu Willis

You know, as in something has been taken away.

Chas Fisher

The pressure to try and conform.

Mel Killingsworth

Well, until he gets eaten by his alter ego.

Stu Willis

But I mean, I just felt like they had to stick the horror movie in there.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah.

Chas Fisher

Yeah, absolutely. But I think the pirate, he has learned to live with the pirate, version of himself. He's not afraid of it, right? They've been living, cohabiting in the back rooms for, I don't know, it's not clear how long, but a couple of days at least. He feels safe around it and it's only when he says we can embrace our true selves like we don't have to change that the pirate goes oh okay I can eat you now. Right so that that to me was like the the horror outcome was an effect of his, anagnorisis and that you know further reinforced the negativity but Stu I'm I'm so glad that this film got suggested to us and that we did it because, Because a large part of what makes this film an engaging experience is not really, the character journeys, right? You know, this is based on a series of YouTube shorts that Kane Parsons has created. And you could sense that almost any characters could be put into this and they would have those liminal spaces, the sort of the horror, the awe, the unease, the dissociation. That would have been like, it felt like Kane Parsons could have brought that in any way. But the choice to have these specific character journeys are what gives this film any kind of theme whatsoever, right? And the theme of both of these characters is coming to terms with their past trauma.

Stu Willis

Yeah, I'd agree with that.

Chas Fisher

And because, sorry, what's the name of the character of the- Dr.

Stu Willis

Mary Klein. Dr. Klein has got trauma with her mother, which we keep on back, and it's confined to spaces, and then we see it kind of, that space be recreated in the back room.

Chas Fisher

Mm-hmm yeah so mary in that same, conflict with clark comes I like mel you and I on the discord had a slight disagreement with this, I felt that she was not saying I can't fix you as a way of getting herself out I feel like initially her tactic in that scene is to play along and to be subservient and it's when she runs when that tactic yields no result that feels like she lets her true self out and she's like she kind of, announces her whole framework that she's created to cope not just as a as a therapist but also to come to terms with her mother's, like her own trauma and she's like well it's not actually real I can't you can't fix everyone.

From the film

As much as I tried, It's just not up to me. I can't save anyone.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah, see, I don't see her saying two things. The first is like, well, yeah, she's tied to a chair. She's going to like, and he started to hack up and eat people. And then she sees a head. And like, you know, there's a lot happening.

Chas Fisher

Oh, yeah.

Mel Killingsworth

There's been a lot going on in the last couple of hours of life. But I also see it as her saying, I, as any good therapist would know, I can't help you if you don't want to be helped. Like I am not this magic button that you push and solve it. So fuck you. If you're going to just lie there like a bump on a log and say, God, I guess I can't be fixed. Then you're right. You can't be. Now let me out. Like I do think that she does. I think there is a couple of lines in there that have a dual. And I remember thinking at the time, this is the furthest distance of any of these that I've had. And I couldn't find a script that seems to be quite accurate. That there are a couple of lines where it shows that she has also not fully faced up to her own things and is trying to use some of this to paper over it right definitely that but I don't see it as her going oh the whole thing is bullshit and nobody can be helped and I also like I'm just like lying I see it her as saying, like I can't help you because you don't want to be helped because you won't do anything about it and you're trying to put this on me you're trying to put this on your ex-wife you're trying to put this on the world well fuck you until you take responsibility ability, nothing can happen. Now, there is, again, elements of her speaking to herself throughout that thing, but I don't think the overall point that she's making there, that she's not, completely invalidating her entire stance or any of her own work or et cetera.

Stu Willis

I mean, I will push- Not push back on it, but it's like the only relationship we see her have is with him, with Clark.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Stu Willis

Her only client.

Chas Fisher

And sort of her mother, somewhat.

Mel Killingsworth

We see some of her mother, but that's also long in the past and quite traumatic. So, yeah.

Stu Willis

It only occurred to me now that If I Had Legs, he's also got a psychologist as a character. Yeah. I already popped into my head now and I'm like, ah. Right. But we see her, Linda, with a Rose Byrne character in that, interact with multiple clients. Like, that is part of her story. In this, one of the striking things about Backrooms is that they've chosen the world kind of doesn't feel full. Like, they've done the David Lynch thing where the real world feels alien and it's just the nightmare world feels even more alien. Like, you know, they're kind of leaning into that. So, I hear what you're saying, and I agree it's not her completely ripping down her worldview, but in the context of is she going through a negative arc, I think her realizing she can't help this man is presented to us as a journey, because she starts off believing that she can help him, she's selling her whole Windows thing, blah, blah, blah, and then she's just like, nope. You know, she's noping out, basically. And then because the. Characters finish changing at that point, at that sequence, they basically have to do a horror sequence, which is her being chased through the labyrinth because the characters have stopped changing. There's no change for her after that point. She learns more about the back rooms when she comes out at Anseq's other side, but the change then at the end of the film is to do with the audience, not with the character. So I think one of the things that I think you can take from these films is the kind of structural decoupling of when the characters change, when the audience's relationship to elements, character or world or the film itself kind of change.

34:22 Decoupling character change from audience emotional change

Mel Killingsworth

Can you expound a little bit on that about what do you mean about the end is entirely about the audience?

Stu Willis

I think, well, because we've been breadcrumbed cuts to Anseq. So, the person who interviewed, I can't remember his name. There's a character.

Chas Fisher

The Marc Duplass.

Stu Willis

The Marc Duplass, yeah.

Chas Fisher

Phil.

Stu Willis

Phil. Phil interviews at her. We're made aware of Anseq's involvement, that there are cameras recording them, blah, blah, blah, blah. So, the audience is following that thread, and we're waiting for that setup to pay off, right? And we want to know how they're involved. So, I think that is changing. Is it enough to say it's an arc between the audience and the film? Maybe not. I mean, I think the question, the Inception-like question of the spinning top of, is this real or is this not, is meant to be, is for the audience. Whereas I think for Mary, for Dr. Klein, it's like she just wants to know if she can escape. I don't think she cares whether it's in the back rooms or not.

Chas Fisher

I think at the end, when she feels like she's going to be a lab rat forever and maybe knows too much and won't ever be released, and that's very clearly the, I would say subtext, but she's asking it openly of Phil. So, I do feel she would have approached that scene very differently if she hadn't had that anagnorisis. At least, I can't put my finger on it definitively, because they didn't have a scene similar to her with Phil earlier in the film. So, there's not like that kind of dramatized contrast. But it did feel that she had a measure of peace, calm, resolve, following that scene with Clark. Like you say, Stu, your sense was that she's stopped changing as a character. They're not dramatizing further character change in that final scene. No.

Stu Willis

And they don't have to. I mean, it's like the Apollo 13 thing, right? Like, we talked about the relationship change ending at the end of the second act. Like, that's the emotional event. And I think here, because if you get rid of the chase sequence, right?

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Stu Willis

What else happens in this film?

Mel Killingsworth

It's a long chase sequence. It's a great chase sequence.

Stu Willis

It is a great chase sequence.

Mel Killingsworth

Oh, that stairway is, oh, I saw it on a big screen and I genuinely got vertigo off of one story staircase. Great stuff.

Chas Fisher

I mean, the... If any listeners are listening to this without having seen the film, it is a spectacular visual and cinematic experience. They make you feel as lost and uneasy in the back rooms. I found myself trying to draw the same mental maps as Clark was wandering in so that I would be like, this is how I would get out. Like I was worried for him because of how well designed those sets are and how brilliantly it's shot and the different kind of the sense of dislocation of time. Like it's a masterpiece. We're just looking distinctly through this lens because- This could have been a film like many other horrors where people come out the other end having survived the traumatic experience and having confronted their demons and feeling better about it. But there's something about this film that made the patrons and ourselves feel, that this had a down ending emotionally. Have we covered why we think that is?

Mel Killingsworth

But see, I think you can have an up and an end. Granted, I don't think we really covered it, but you can have a negative character arc and an up ending. I mean, Goodfellas does it, right? Like lots of other things do it, but we certainly did not pick it. And honestly, at some point, we're going to need to get patrons just for my therapy bills after these last two episodes.

Stu Willis

I think all of The Strangers was us.

Mel Killingsworth

Possibly me All of The Strangers led for me into these three These are the four films that I have now watched in a row for this Ugh.

Stu Willis

Brutal Have you considered not watching them?

Chas Fisher

The Stu approach Unfortunately.

Mel Killingsworth

I prefer to be good at my podcasts I was about to say job, and then I was like, hobby?

Stu Willis

It's just podcasting, it's neither a job nor a hobby.

Chas Fisher

Even better so I think we found that, You know, the fact that they do have, both characters do have a dramatized change and that neither, both of them are, you know, to use the operant conditioning, the outcomes, the way the film rewards or punishes them is to take something away.

Stu Willis

I mean, it literally kills Clark, because once Clark confronts her and says, I don't need to, you, I don't need to change. He is literally murdered by the kind of monster version of his id or whatever you want to perceive the pirate version of him. So the film definitely punishes with him. And then she gets trapped inside.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Stu Willis

Right? So, I think part of the reason this feels negative is the characters have stuff happen to them because of their changes that is negative. Right? Not just, like, one Clark has- stuck in a cycle of behavior that we see is damaging him we are told that it's he's sleeping in the shop it's costing his wife, right like he he has no customers right he's mean and to his employees and then gets them killed like there's a whole series of things that happens because of his behavior that he can't escape and then when he kind of resigns himself to maybe I just shouldn't, change, he is then killed for it. So it's a negative thing. And what happens to Dr. Klein is, I mean, that's a little bit harder to chart because it's a protagonist switch, because basically what happens, for those of you who haven't seen it, and if you're still listening to it, sorry, but this is Draft Zero, guys. The way they do that protagonist shift is that we see kind of the monster, the shadow monster, which at this point we don't even know is a representation of him, creeping up behind Clark. Look, we- I think we hear something is about to go wrong, but effectively we do the cutaway to Dr. Klein that she learns he's missing because he's left her a cryptic, answering the same message, and then she goes looking for him, and we do not see him again until they meet.

Chas Fisher

That voice message to me told me that he had survived and had found a phone.

Stu Willis

Oh, okay.

Chas Fisher

But it's possible- like, the film doesn't make it clear, it's possible that he could have left that message-

Mel Killingsworth

Before I think the logic this is unrelated like I actually think to analyze this script I think the logic of some of the stuff that happens there in the writing is unclear for example the Mark Duplass character like we are essentially shown him, completely irrelevant to the other characters which seems to be that this is an objective truth point of view right this is an objective thing that is happening outside of the back rooms in the world but then some of the stuff he says to her in the room at that very end it feels like, we're gonna hand wave paper over the fact that some of this doesn't make sense with what we've already established because we want to have this cool ending and it just it doesn't all click and they're like well we're just gonna go fast and hard enough that it doesn't matter so I think that, if we're trying to pin some of the character arcs to some of those logic bits that I think the film itself is not concerned with then that's going to be difficult.

Chas Fisher

I feel like you're being slightly unfair like it feels like bold character choices like if we're just watching it chronologically and assuming it's happening chronologically I felt okay like Clark's.

Mel Killingsworth

Voicemail I like the character no no I like the character choices there's nothing wrong with the character choices or the performances or the visualization or and I think the storytelling is good I just think some of the, lore that they that the script tries to establish is, then either nonsensical at the very end, like trying to make that very end work, or... Like weirdly like what why do we need this because it's not it's starting to contradict itself and actually what we care about is the characters and their development and the feeling of the back rooms.

44:09 Mary's window metaphor and inherited trauma

Stu Willis

I mean did you care for Clark at the beginning was there enough was there the equivalent of a save the cat moment where we empathize with Clark so when he spirals down.

Mel Killingsworth

You want him to spot You want him to get out of the situation. Like, I think that you, all of us have been, like, had a Nadir, right? All of us have been in a bad place or sleeping in an undesirable spot after a breakup or in going to therapy and going, God, I don't feel like this is doing anything or like whatever, right? So at the very start, you do want him, whether it's, I don't think that the character himself is particularly sympathetic. He's relatable. Right. No, he's not likable. Other than you have like a, the casting choices are brilliant, right? Because you're also willing to give him a little more slack than you'd give just some, you know, Joe Schmo, like Jared Leto or whatever shows up as the same character and you're like, zero slack whatsoever. Fuck you. Right.

Stu Willis

I mean, yeah, that's just him as a person.

Mel Killingsworth

I just well exactly this is what I'm saying so, like because of the actor we're willing to give a little more slack and there is a relatability to that where you aren't necessarily like oh I like you but you are like hey I would love to see you pull yourself out of this oh you're just gonna like murder your employee okay now what you know, So, yeah, I think at the beginning, I wanted to see him pull himself out of this hole. And then by the end, I was like, I hope your monster alter ego eats your stuffing for breakfast.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. I mean, how does this film produce the emotional effect? I think it does use operant conditioning for both of these character beats. It does repeated beats of the same thing, but with different outcomes for both characters. And it shows for both of them their relationships getting worse like Clark is, has more on-screen relationships, and he lets Bobby be killed, it looks like he personally has beheaded Kat and put her head in the fridge, even though that's not made clear.

Mel Killingsworth

Or at least he doesn't contradict when Mary says that's what happened.

Chas Fisher

Mary, obviously his relationship with Mary, he ties her up and is probably never going to let her go, and then he gets eaten. And Mary, we only see, like you said, Stu, we get her relationship with Clark, which is, Clark gets eaten and she kind of labels him as incurable or unhelpable. And then she's just trapped in the end with Phil. So I think it's clear the levers that they're pulling to give the audience the feeling of negativity.

Stu Willis

I mean, I think perhaps we feel like the reason that she's protagonist for the back half is that I think her backstory, which is revealed through flashbacks, unlike his, is more empathetic. That we feel whatever trauma that she's had put on – well, I'm just – yeah, we feel whatever trauma she has has been put on her by her mother, right? And whereas Clark feels a little bit more the architect of his own demise, for lack of a better word, right?

Chas Fisher

To be a bit more specific about her, so Clark earlier on the film is listening to her audio book and she uses a metaphor of opening the window as to change patterns of behavior and to escape these closed loops.

From the film

Do you ever feel like you're living behind glass, watching life happen, but never really stepping into it? Maybe it's time to open the window within, you can be the author of your own design because we all deserve another chance to fulfill our dreams, the moment you believe change is possible you've already begun order the window within and the companion three-part audio program guided openings by Dr. Mary Klein.

Chas Fisher

It then shows us that her mom was agoraphobic she was trapped in her house and the windows were all papered over she could not as a child open a window right no and then, when Clark leaves her the voicemail he says I have I have, I opened the window right like it keeps coming back around and then you get her at the end and it feels like she's possibly resolved the trauma of being raised by her mother only to still be trapped so even like even though I felt somewhat, maybe that she had a slight positive arc in terms of, I came out of it feeling like she had come to terms with her past trauma, that had zero effect on the plot outcome for her. She remains trapped, whether she's come to terms with her upbringing or not.

Stu Willis

I mean, is that what the film is saying, that you can't escape your past, that it will get- membered and misremembered and misremembered, but it's always there.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah. I'm just looking over my notes to see if I have anything. And I will say like that they talk a lot about, use the term of path of least resistance, paths that you chose, path that, and everything of course in the Backrooms is a loop. I don't think I want to change. I like it in here. Stay right where you are. The path of least resistance again. And so like this idea of like atrophy and and looping nature of it is just so inherent in the script.

Chas Fisher

I'm just gonna run through.

Stu Willis

You're gonna run through the.

Chas Fisher

Questions yes and see if there are any that you guys want to want to do okay.

50:02 How operant conditioning punishes both leads

Stu Willis

So we're gonna buzz if we want.

Chas Fisher

To answer okay so when how did the film teach us to expect the characters to change.

Mel Killingsworth

I think it teaches us not to I mean it is literally amazed that he wanders around and his his best hope is to get to the same place he started that That is the peak, of what we expect, is you get back to where you started and hopefully still have all of your limbs, right? Like, the film is teaching us to expect not change or to expect bad things to happen and progressively worse and worse, potentially, until he can't even get back to where he started.

Chas Fisher

And the cold open does that.

Stu Willis

Oh, yeah.

Mel Killingsworth

That's right. That cold open of the person that we don't see, we just hear them and they're getting lost and they have the tape recording and they're like, I've been here forever going in circles. Like, yeah, the cold open does that as well. That's a great point.

Stu Willis

I mean, speaking of, I mean, that also sets up async, right? Like that's the setup for the audience. We're wondering when they're going to come in. So I do, the other thing I do want to talk about is the emotional event for the audience. Do we... Do we move closer or further away from the characters, right, at the end of the film?

Chas Fisher

I think I feel more intimate with Mary at the end of the film. Like, they've revealed her backstory. We've been with her as she's struggled for her life. Like, it's a very, you know, to use narrative point of view terms, we are very with her. We're not ahead of her. We're not behind her. We are in her experience for that chase in a true sort of horror style. So I don't know about you guys, I felt closer to Mary at the end of the film.

Mel Killingsworth

I felt very existentially bereft by the end of the film. Hashtag complimentary.

Stu Willis

I like how you have to clarify that.

Chas Fisher

I think that's what the film was going for.

Stu Willis

Right?

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah, yeah. like I it was and the interesting thing right is the protagonist switch where you have one person who is steadfastly refusing to change or being negative whichever you look, at it and then you have someone whose trauma is not their fault was imposed upon them and has tried to do more to, mitigate or work through that and still ends up in a similar place again arguably, but it is Because no matter who you relate to, you start wanting him to get better, he doesn't. And then the protagonist switch and you go, okay, maybe I'll cling to this person being able to escape. And then it sort of drops you in that ending and you're like, oh, fuck. So, yeah, that's, I do, I do agree, though, that, like, I think there's one, steadfast negative and one mildly negative, which, as you said, may be positive. But in the end, the reward is the same. You are stuck in the Backrooms.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Mel Killingsworth

Like, one of you is less made out of stuffing and eaten. So I guess that's good. But, you know, we all die.

Chas Fisher

Well, I also, she's not in the Backrooms anymore. She's now stuck in a research facility.

Mel Killingsworth

Well.

Stu Willis

Is she?

Mel Killingsworth

Is she? Because that last shot, that last shot is not the research facility anymore. The last shot is shot like, and she is styled like the Backrooms, which is why, which to be fair is part of what I think doesn't work about trying to do that twist because of the Duplass thing.

Stu Willis

But you'd have to see if there's a window because that's the clue. There are no windows in the Backrooms.

Mel Killingsworth

But yeah. Is she? I don't think that we can say. And Parsons certainly hasn't said. And I think that's where, I think he was tussling with the writing a little bit as well.

Chas Fisher

I think it suits the film to have an ambiguous ending where, like you said, the whole feeling of being in this Backrooms is this sense of inescapability.

Mel Killingsworth

I don't mind an ambiguous ending and we're about to talk about two more ambiguous endings. I don't mind an ambiguous ending. I just need it to make sense with the lore that's come before it. Anyway, I love ambiguity. Speaking of ambiguity.

54:11 IF I HAD LEGS I'D KICK YOU

From the film

Mommy! Hey! Hey, we just got home, and you would not believe... Whatever this isn't supposed to be what it's like this isn't it this can't be it, everything is under control.

Stu Willis

So what's difficult about If I Had Legs I'd Kick You everything I mean it's a it's a difficult movie literally everything uh stuff happens and it's not pleasant.

Chas Fisher

One of the reasons why we chose is it was reflective of a corruption arc. Like we were talking about gangster movies and crime movies like Goodfellas and Emily the Criminal and even though this is not related to crime at all, you've described it already, Stu, as a spiral.

Stu Willis

Yeah.

Chas Fisher

So I think that's why it fits.

Stu Willis

I don't think it's a corruption arc in that she's being corrupted by a group of people that are like fighting for her soul, right? What Linda played by Rose Byrne is a psychotherapist And she's caring for a, super sick daughter who has a feeding disorder. It needs to be fed by feeding tubes. This film, like Backrooms, is kind of definitely influenced by David Lynch. And Linda's husband, Charles, is away on working as a ship's captain, and she only ever talks to him as the phone. And it's done in such a way that there's these moments where you're like, you're not even sure if he's a real person. The kind of the thing that kicks the spiral into overtime. So, that is the, in the five-act structure, that is the state of pre-existing conflict, is that her strained relationship with her husband having to take care of a child, and then the catalyst for everything going downhill is that basically their ceiling collapses and their whole apartment is flooded. And she basically has to move into a shabby hotel where she meets some interesting characters. We got Diana and Jamie, and she gets more and more sleep deprived. And she basically spirals out from that. There is a series of events, but I don't think we even need to, I mean, it'd be too hard to go through them all. I'd have to remember them exactly. Importantly, she does have one of her clients kind of disappear. So that's one of the, the key kind of B plots is what happened to Caroline.

From the film

Well, whether you knew that she was my patient or not, what I'm trying to say to you is that this is an emergency and I really, she left your baby here with me and I need you to come and pick him up. What do you mean? What do you mean? What do you mean what I mean? She's not answering her phone.

Stu Willis

The plot question is that she, her daughter needs to reach a weight. Needs to gain weight in order to have her feeding tube be removed. There's going to be an operation. And her daughter constantly doesn't meet that weight requirement. And then ultimately it leads to a moment where Linda pulls out the feeding tube from her daughter. And the situation just gets awful.

Mel Killingsworth

I mean, it was really clearly foreshadowed in that scene where she's like, oh yeah the procedure and the, doctor's like what do you mean procedure like the doctor will just pull it out and eventually the hole will heal itself and you can just see her eyes light up like wait that's it yeah yeah yeah and you're like oh no but it it it holds its hand for a while like you almost think she's about to go right out and do it there and it it takes a good long while to actually get there.

Stu Willis

That's a terribly great, summary of it but I found this film incredibly stressful and and emma was just like oh that's just the life of a woman and I'm like great thanks for sharing that, so to me it's definitely a spiral and here's the interesting thing I think there's an arc because her situation and her mental state is getting worse and worse, do you think she's really ever given an opportunity to change that She has a moment like Clark, which is kind of confronted with the truth of what is going on and she's able to pull her out.

58:45 Spiral structure and the illusion of available choices

Mel Killingsworth

Well, okay. Here's the thing. The whole point and the constant, her constantly begging people, just listen to me, listen to me. And nobody's listening. Her husband's not listening. Her psychologist isn't listening. Her patients aren't listening. Of course, she starts not listening to them. Lots of people aren't listening. But there are multiple times where she either has an opportunity to be better. Most of that comes through her first conversations with A$AP Rocky. What's his character's name? Jamie.

Stu Willis

He's the superintendent.

Mel Killingsworth

Jamie's the only person at first willing to sort of give her a bit of a hand. And she just sort of ends up, you know, he's possibly the person she treats worst other than her daughter in the whole thing. Right. where it's like, oh, sorry, you've broken your leg. Let me just run away.

From the film

Thanks for checking, Omi. Oh you would not believe the day I had after you just left me all alone abandoned in your spooky ass apartment with my bones sticking out my leg no big deal what else did you expect me to, do I had to get back here to my kid oh mother of the fucking yeah I almost forgot.

Mel Killingsworth

And then again like literally what we were saying with the feeding tube right she has the opportunity resists it has the opportunity resists it finally goes.

Chas Fisher

Fuck it.

Mel Killingsworth

And pulls it out like that is she is trending negative throughout the whole thing she has opportunities to continue to not at least do the wrong thing.

Chas Fisher

Yeah whether.

Mel Killingsworth

Or not it's to do the right thing and yes it's true that nobody's listening to her nobody's helping her and she doesn't have much of a way out but instead of say she just fucking takes her shovel out and keeps digging.

Chas Fisher

Like you you've gone right to the end of the arc which I think is right but the, I think I've got I was wondering when I was watching this like is it the Stephen Cleary version of a melodrama does she have agency in this and I don't think it is like, I think she does have agency I think she is constantly presented with, choices and she keeps taking the quote-unquote wrong choice right like, every night when she can't sleep because of her daughter's feeding machine she gets steadily further and further away from the daughter she's got a sleeping monitor so initially she can hear she's going out and buying wine and eventually she leaves the the monitor's, distance altogether together and and leaves her daughter in so I think it is dramatized as her you know she's told she needs to attend the group therapy sessions with the other moms and she's failing to do that right.

From the film

You keep telling us that it isn't our fault yeah but but it is, Excuse me? I mean, if it isn't our fault, then we're really super fucked. We're just walking around pretending we have power to change something that we don't even understand because it's not our fault, but we know how to change it even though it's not our fault. This is actually good. This is actually good because now we have a lot of time. No, no, no, no. I know. I have to go. No, no, no. It's our fault. It isn't fair, but it is our fault. I mean, that's how I see it. That's it. That's what this whole thing is, is our fault. Stop and sit down. No, no, no. I don't want to talk about it. I already know it and I don't have to meet you because I know what you're going to say which is that she's failed and that I've failed because you set us up to fail no one tries hard if they have a safety net nobody and you should know that Dr. Spring I'm going to be here for the rest of my life pouring shit down that tube, every night until I die do not leave that door and none of this is helping any of us none of it come back.

Chas Fisher

The film is telling us very clearly what this world expects of her as to be the right thing and what the film also does brilliantly is puts us in empathy with her as that it feels like it's an unwinnable, objective that she will do all the right things suffer lack of sleep suffer mental health give all of herself to everyone around her and it still won't be enough.

Mel Killingsworth

And we know she knows what the right thing to do is because she.

Chas Fisher

Tells her patient who has a child.

Mel Killingsworth

She's telling her patient exactly what her patient needs to do.

Chas Fisher

Mm-hmm.

From the film

Okay, I understand. So, so, let's... Do you... Do you really... You really understand? I think so. Oh, no, this is... This is a mistake. This is a mistake, because I thought... I thought that you understood, and that I wouldn't even have to say anything. Let's calm down. I think what we should do is get in a car right now and go straight to the emergency room. Hospital? Yes. Why? Why? It's a safe place to go if you don't feel ready to go home. What about your daughter? My daughter? Where is your daughter? She's upstairs. She's sleeping. I don't want to go to a hospital. I don't want to go to a hospital. I want you to help me. I'm trying to help you. No, because you don't understand. You don't see it.

Mel Killingsworth

And then she's going to the hospital, and that doctor is telling her to do the exact same thing. So she does know cognitively. There are certain steps she could take to make things slightly better for herself, and she's not taking them. Whether she's able to take them, or whether the situation enables, or whether other people around her could just list, like, if they would literally just have some empathy and listen, that would enable the circle to, in theory, spiral upwards, but they don't.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. Even her own therapist played by Conan O'Brien, which is exquisite casting, can't be- can't give her empathy. And- I just feel like my feeling coming out of the film is that she does have agency. She's constantly presented with choices that are hers to make. But then what it also...

Mel Killingsworth

Like what?

Chas Fisher

Well, like don't leave the room. Don't go out and have a drink. Don't like attend group therapy.

Mel Killingsworth

Okay, there's a few things, right? There's a few things. Especially at the very start when she's leaving. And she's self-medicating, right? And you can argue whether or not she should be self-medicating, but I would argue that nobody in their right mind in her situation would not self-medicate in some way, shape or form, right? Where she's not getting, she's not getting it as a script. So she's going, I need to smoke weed because otherwise I cannot sleep. I'm having to put up with this infernal machine, whatever. So, but she, yes, she does allow that to then turn into, I'm going out of range of the monitor, I'm going to buy a Coke, I'm going to, you know, do all these other things. But arguing that the first step is wrong, I think is...

Chas Fisher

I'm not saying right or wrong. Let me be really clear.

1:06:00 Agency versus repeated impossible choices

Mel Killingsworth

Even arguing the first step is negative necessarily.

Chas Fisher

You can...

Mel Killingsworth

Whereas I think...

Chas Fisher

I'm not even arguing... My clear interest in this is I think there is a subtle difference into whether she has agency or not. And there is a clear read of this film where she has no agency, right? You could just say she knows what the right decisions, the quote unquote right ones, the ones she's supposed to make, and she just is incapable of making them, right? That's the sort of melodrama, lack of agency feeling about it, right? Whereas I think as a spiral she starts out with more emotional resources at the beginning of the film than she has at the end of the film.

Mel Killingsworth

What I but but genuinely I'm saying like what are the resources she has at the beginning that she doesn't have at the end.

Chas Fisher

I think she's shown to be a better therapist at the beginning of the film to her patients I think her therapy her own therapy sessions are shown to be more constructive at the beginning like they all of these things like this film goes in cycles which is different than agency, I think the more functional she is the more agency she has.

Mel Killingsworth

I see I think I think she starts as functional and as she realizes how little agency she has her mental health degrades to that.

Chas Fisher

Point.

Mel Killingsworth

Like because she is somewhat smart and somewhat functional she.

Chas Fisher

Realizes.

Mel Killingsworth

How little agency she has and how nobody's listening to her and so the more she realizes that the more she.

Chas Fisher

Self-destructs yeah and and I think that's a perfectly valid read that you could absolutely sway me on. I'm raising the question here because I think it's a very different emotional experience if you think she has agency or not.

Stu Willis

I mean, I think what we're bumping on here is the difference between agency and choices, right? And, I'm just thinking back, I can't remember exactly to the conclusion we came to when talking about Blade Runner 2049, but we're talking about the characters as having presented with choices, but not having agency, because the choices were between bad things. And so I think this idea, I never think this film is showing go the sunny path to the left or go to the shortcut to the right. And that she constantly takes the right. And I think she's kind of given choices, but also like fundamentally she's someone that needs help and help is not being given to her. And the closest is Jamie, A$AP Rocky, but she's effectively being abandoned by her husband who's very dismissive of her I wish I could sit on my ass all day you're just a therapist.

From the film

Right let me just get this straight you aren't going into the program anymore and you aren't going into our apartment anymore that's right why how do you expect anything to get back to normal then It won't. What are you talking about? It won't! All right. Are you... Are you in your right mind now? Are you done? Also, there's a woman missing. What? Who? What are you talking... Who's missing? I'm patient. She's missing. She left and she's not picking up her phone. Okay, okay. L-l-l-l-l-l-l. Let's take a deep breath. Start from the beginning. No, no, no, no, no. I can't talk to you about this. Why aren't you going back into the group? I would just talk to my therapist later. It's fine. Everything's fine. Everything's fine. Everything's fine. How many times did we see that guy? I just looked in the bank accounts. How often... Every day. Every day. Every day? Come on. That's costing us a fortune. No sitting idle in vehicles. Please move the car or yourself. I have a right to sit in my car without you harassing me. What? Yeah. Are you talking to somebody? Yeah, there's this creepy asshole who's harassing me every fucking day. He harasses me. He's obsessed with me. He's back at my window wanting something. You're going to leave the parking lot or get out of your car. Oh, my God. Are you serious? I will call the police. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Call the police. Call the police. Yeah, I'm going to call the police on you. I never want to see you here again. Oh, my God. You're harassed.

Stu Willis

This is harassment. Right. He's completely ignoring the emotional labor that she does as part of her job. And the fact that it is eating her capacity, which is what we're really kind of talking about is that she is pushed to the limits of her emotional capacity.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Stu Willis

And so, yeah, she is self-medicating. And I think there is, by saying, I mean, do you really think that she should just not drink? Oh, no, no, no. I'm trying to work out whether you're presenting a devil's advocate point of view that doesn't actually represent your opinion or whether you are actually just the devil.

Chas Fisher

I think I'm convinced by Mel's view of it because, what the film makes very clear is that even when she has functionality and is doing what is expected of her, shit goes wrong. Right? Like we've already, we're already coming in where I think, there is a lot of wear and tear on her and then the fucking ceiling falls in on her.

Mel Killingsworth

Right the film opens and you have the pizza but like the foot within the first, yeah I don't know seven minutes right of it opening she's tripped on her face the pizza has fallen flat, her a giant hole has opened her ceiling and here's where I want to like read the script because I think the script tells us a lot in the action lines so, it is a disaster chunks of plaster float around the pizza crust Linda was eating floats, we zoom slowly towards the hole it is huge it is dark the water seems to be coming out in endless supply and I think that's really key this is right at the beginning of this of the script and we are already told it is not going to stop right gobs of thick black sludge start to ooze with the water the flow of water begins to take on a kind of pulsation we go further into the hole it is silent we start to hear a sound beep we slowly drift towards the black moldy edges of the hole in. Total darkness beep beep drift further beep beep beep and then she kind of comes out and that's her daughter's machine so it is tying the endless stream of water it's tying this black morass to the endless cycle of her life like very explicitly and this is on like page eight right like it is telling you this has not stopped this will not stop it is relentless and I think that they continually use the imagery like we keep coming back to the whole over and over again and even I do think it's really and this is also I checked this is also written in the script right like we can argue about the wine on a moral level and she's self-medicating with weed and like you know that that's helpful in a lot of ways or whatever but I do think it's really interesting she walks in she opens the fridge and in the script it says she's actually looking at the two wine bottles on the bottom shelf so like the script is telling us like she is sinking lower and lower like the so the water is on top and then the soda below it and then the wine is like on the bottom shelf and she has to like crouch down to get this wine which is very symbolic, and the a lot of again like the beeping and the sound mixing and the whole all of that's written in the script like it's all very intentional of I.

1:12:21 Scripted imagery of the hole as inescapable metaphor

Chas Fisher

Think something that is.

Mel Killingsworth

Unending and inescapable yeah.

Chas Fisher

I I think you're right I think you've swayed me the reason why I'm interested is I think there is a different emotional effect, you know Goodfellas looking at Goodfellas starts with Henry saying I always wanted to be a gangster he is, yes he you know goes on a corruption pathway if we look at Emily the Criminal she doesn't start out wanting to be a criminal but I think you know she ends up in a, the film I think wants us to feel good about where she's ended up having, murdered someone and started her own criminal empire right like she's in paradise teaching people how to do identity fraud, right? I'm saying that there's a big difference in having a corruption arc where the characters have agency. And I think you're right, Stu, and I think you're right, Mel, that this is clearly a film that's saying she doesn't have agency. She's presented with choices over and over again and the you know the melodrama of it, this isn't a I mean it's almost like a survival film where melodrama the constant choice the character is presented with is to survive, this is a spiral because every time she's presented with a choice she can't even survive she gets a little bit worse either time she's.

Mel Killingsworth

Just not functional.

Chas Fisher

Enough yeah.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah it's just like I just need to get to the next day. I just need to keep, if I can keep myself and my daughter alive till tomorrow morning, that's going to be a win for me. And it just keeps getting, not logistically more difficult, but because she's running up against these emotional brick walls, uh and and no one will give her like the parking attendant won't even give her a break right yeah uh is she is she an asshole sure does she also deserve a break from the parking attendant for like very sick kid to go to the hospital also yes you know, yeah it's just it's an impossible yeah it, like you're you're stranded on an island trying to survive so I mean I.

Stu Willis

I think I think one of the successes of the film is that she isn't presented as like, puritanical right like she goes and drinks and smokes and all that stuff I actually think it makes her feel more accessible as a for me.

Mel Killingsworth

More yeah again who would like in that situation you're telling me you've.

1:16:01 Authenticity of experience versus stylized horror world-building

Stu Willis

I mean, spiraling, you know, and the film kind of presents it somewhat without judgment. And it's interesting because in terms of the emotional event for the audience with the character, I do think we feel closer with her at the end.

Chas Fisher

Oh, definitely.

Stu Willis

Than we do at the beginning. But we're pretty aligned with her. The film is so told within her point of view. If you haven't seen it, they don't even show us shots of her daughter, right? Like, the door is played a little bit off screen in ways as a present. Like, this is such a visceral, experiential film.

Chas Fisher

Like Backrooms.

Mel Killingsworth

Like Backrooms, but the opposite techniques. Like, we are so close to her. We are using very different lenses. We are using color washes. We are using no wides.

Stu Willis

My one bit of review in filmmaking is is this if I had legs I'd kick you felt really emotionally authentic from someone who had lived through these experiences Backrooms was like someone's nostalgia about a life they've never lived, that I think is a fundamental difference very.

Mel Killingsworth

Different genres yeah like you know one is a sci-fi.

Stu Willis

Horror I just I Backrooms just felt inauthentic.

Mel Killingsworth

Which I'm not saying that sci-fi horror can't feel authentic. I'm just saying, like, I think it's trying to do something. It also has, like, a giant pirate made out of stuffing. You know, and this film also has its, again, there's a lot of different reads of the whole as you keep going back to it, and the very end where she's hearing the voices and things like that. Is she having a psychotic break, or is it actually something that's slightly more supernatural? You know, there's all of that. But it's a very... And also, I think the film really viscerally gets to, and the script actually does this quite well as well, again, with like the relentlessness of the beeping. If you have ever had like a very, very sick child and you have been like sleep deprived for days and you're literally just not thinking straight and they're crying and they're asking you why they feel like this. And you just you can't even shower you can't even take care of yourself and you have this being that's entirely reliant on you and you just lose it now imagine doing that for what seems to be a couple of years straight at this point for her, and it puts you in just I don't know quite how long this is two hours it puts you so deeply inside of that experience that it is like the craft is wild and I would really don't need to experience it again.

1:18:49 Climax as abandonment, baptism, and ambiguous reward

Chas Fisher

Do you guys think she has an internal value change? It feels like it's just, a relentless breakdown.

Mel Killingsworth

I think someone that desperate just wants out. Like, you're in an animal state at that point where your values are, can I not, which she comes close to. Yeah, I think she does. Can I not, you know, kill my child? Genuinely. I'm not being flippant. Can I... survive and can I get to a point where I do have some age like where I do see a potential for myself getting better she like she is in that survival mode.

Chas Fisher

I mean even at the end what do what do we think about the end like so just to summarize like everything spirals out of control she's caught out on a series of lies that she's been telling her husband her husband actually shows up and starts trying to repair the, the hole in the wall she's taken Jamie to the hole he's fallen through and broken his leg um and she's fled the scene, she's left her daughter alone in the room she said he's she's that that her daughter's with the babysitter she's just lying there is no babysitter.

From the film

Oh god don't tell me you left her here without no no no no no no, Of course I have a, key, Who do you think I am? Hey I'm my dad, I'm Charles Nice to meet you, you must be the babysitter Babysitter? Yeah, James, right? Jamie, right Thank you for... Oh, hell no I'm not doing this shit with you, yo Not doing what? What are you talking about? I'm not a fucking babysitter, dude, Excuse me? Your daughter woke up and was crying, scared shitless. So I pounded on the fucking door till she finally opened it.

Chas Fisher

She gets caught out on all of this stuff and then like runs to the beach, similar to a situation like when Caroline had previously fled her own parental responsibilities. She's doing it again. And it feels like she's either trying to drown herself or at least just have the ocean smack her into a sense of being alive and ends with, we actually get to see her daughter's face and, and she says, I'll do better. Like she's always been trying to do better.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah. Because the idea of trying and the idea of being able to, I think to her, I don't, I don't think she's really been able to distinguish that.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Mel Killingsworth

Because she's in such a place so yeah the the fact is, she really does think in that moment she will but she also thinks I will have the opportunity to or somebody else will help or oh you know your dad's here now to share the burden or the tube is out now or she keeps trying to convince herself that that now that x has changed she will be able to do better because she wants to and she's trying will she, I mean do you think her patient who left her baby is going to be able to do better?

Chas Fisher

No.

Mel Killingsworth

Like, genuine question, like those parallels.

Chas Fisher

I don't think either Caroline nor Linda is going to get better. And it's interesting that she's, like, even at the end, she's still trying, she's still lying to herself, I think, that there is any escape from this, that her daughter can get better or that she can be the person that her daughter needs for her to get better. I don't know.

Stu Willis

I mean, I think the whole climax of the film is her, one, deciding to take action into her own hands about the child, right? And then abandoning her daughter when it goes south, right? That is, to me, two clear changes, and that's why we feel it's the climax of the film.

Mel Killingsworth

Is she abandoning her child, or is she letting her husband feel the weight of what she's felt the last many years?

Chas Fisher

When she runs away, her husband is there with her daughter. That's the thing.

Mel Killingsworth

I would agree with you. and she has abandoned her she abandoned her three hours before that right like she abandoned her well she was going to come back I feel, well she always says to herself she's going to come back right she always tells herself she's going to come back but like you mentioned she keeps getting further and further away every time but the, the very end when she leaves I do think there is a even if it's just in the back of her head a little bit of like you, feel what I have felt the last eight years and see how you can take it so like abandoning your child when her own father is there is a bit strong, but she's certainly done it before.

Stu Willis

Yeah yeah I mean I just feel like they built towards that absolutely.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah yeah like yeah it's it's it's gradual but.

Chas Fisher

I mean they're building they're building towards a climax of where someone gives like cannot function anymore Like that's, she's been butting up against needing help, pleading for help, not receiving help, getting slowly spiraling, making spiraling decisions that doesn't matter, there will always be a negative reward no matter what she does. And then no matter that the fact that she's just potentially almost tried to drown herself is one read of it, but it's certainly, you know, fled her family, thrown herself into the ocean at nighttime, and then is still saying that same line. It goes back to Mel, that, that line that you read out from the script about the sort of. Endlessness and relentlessness of it.

Mel Killingsworth

Of the water yeah which it felt very baptismal to me that the end like that very like oh I'm gonna she's wearing a white nightgown I'm gonna plunge in and come out clean and start again and it's very symbolic and it's also very like, yeah and like you know, uh yeah so again good film great sure hugely.

Stu Willis

Powerful so the question is you talk about that is that a reward or a punishment.

Mel Killingsworth

It's a little ambiguous isn't it.

Stu Willis

And is it additive or is that what makes it feel negative because I don't feel, or maybe nothing there is no additional subtraction maybe that's what makes it darker.

Chas Fisher

It doesn't feel like there's any getting better.

Mel Killingsworth

And she's lost multiple things along the way like I mean the ceiling that caves in the hamster that right like her social standing like she has lost she has been punished in other ways along the way, I don't know that the end necessarily reads as an additive or subtractive punishment. I think it just is, which is, yeah, just about as bleak.

Stu Willis

Yeah, nothing changes. At the risk of derailing us some more, we've kind of covered it, but what has been interesting, and it will set us up for Anatomy of a Fall, because I think Anatomy of a Fall, there's at least two characters, if not three characters, that go through arcs. And we've talked about two characters in Backrooms. If I Had Legs I'd Kick You is interesting because it is definitely absolutely fixated on Linda as the primary character to the point where we don't even really see her daughter until the very final moments. They only humanize her daughter in the very final moments of the film. But she does have patients and she does have relationships. There is the Conan O'Brien character. There is Jamie. So there's actually a world of characters around her, unlike Backrooms. Do any of those have characters, have arcs?

1:26:11 Supporting relationships mirroring the protagonist's decline

Mel Killingsworth

Well, Backrooms has like those two employees who I would call the closest to like the A$AP Rocky here where you do get a little idea of them and they fight with each other just like A$AP Rocky fights with like the-

Stu Willis

That grows closer and then it falls apart and it's it doesn't fall apart because he's left to be eaten by the monster like Backrooms she abandons him he she takes him to come and look at the hole in the roof and he falls through the hole and then she leaves him there yeah you're saying relationship.

Mel Killingsworth

To the protagonist as opposed to like to each other because I think in Backrooms we get an idea of their relationship and we see them bickering and like.

Stu Willis

Talking about his mom.

Mel Killingsworth

You mean to the.

Stu Willis

Protagonist? I mean to the protagonist to the point where the arcs of the other characters inform how we feel about Linda or how we feel as the audience about whether this is negative. Yeah. Because I think part of what makes Anatomy of a Fall feel negative is, as I said, right, like in the opening, I think it's Daniel's arc, particularly more than Sandra. So not the seemingly main character. I'll just use more generic terminology. And so I'm just, I'm just, it's interesting because you bring up Caroline and I just had this moment of like, well, Caroline's journey is really important because it informs Linda. Caroline is in a relationship that is, for lack of a better word, very similar difficulty with a child. Like it's a mirror, like they've made that choice to make Caroline's relationship with her child and her husband somewhat mirror what is going on with Linda. But you've also got James, you've got, which is their set, right? And then there's the other woman that is in the hotel, Diana, I think her name is. You've got her relationship with the doctors. Do any of those things change or have different arcs? Is it just her husband going, maybe you need help and I will get you help? Is it just the husband coming to that realization? Is that enough to be an arc and that reflects on hers? I don't know.

Chas Fisher

I mean, it's- I'm asking. It's- I think she ends up, certainly, in terms of emotional events, she's more distant from everyone around her, including her daughter, right? Although, interestingly, the film shows us the daughter's face right at the end and she feels more connected. The filmmakers are trying to make us feel more connected to her daughter. And maybe that is a cue that she's bottomed out and willing to look after herself. I don't know.

Mel Killingsworth

I have a different read on the fact that that's the first time we see her daughter, but you guys are not the first people I've heard suggest that the end is what humanizes her. Now they're connected, et cetera.

Chas Fisher

But that's interesting. I didn't feel that she had bottomed out and was now on the mend. That was not the feeling the film left me with. But I am interested. I think the only other character that arcs, is Caroline. I think you could argue definitely the relationship arcs between her and her therapist, who's also her co-worker, right? The fact that he goes from being her therapist.

Stu Willis

They just share rooms. I wouldn't know if you'd call them co-workers. Because my impression was that they were working independently.

Mel Killingsworth

Well, he explicitly is like, I'm not your boss. I'm your, he used another term, but like, yeah, co-workers loose.

Chas Fisher

For sure. But like when she has a baby abandoned in the office, he just like literally slams the door on her. Like will not engage with that at all.

From the film

So my patient, she has this baby and she said she was going to the bathroom. And then she left the baby with me. and I, she's gone, I know. I'm with a patient. Please, I need your help. I really need your help. I'm with a patient. Also, I'm not your supervisor. This was a professional issue. This is not a treatment issue. Joking, this is an emergency. Whatever's happening in here is not as important as what is I'm going to do.

Chas Fisher

So, I'm not sure that he has an arc himself as a character. What is clear is their relationship has a negative arc as well. And I think she has, you know, it's possible to say that if she hadn't been caught out in the lie with her husband at the end, that maybe that had a positive arc. Like, she had been clamoring for help and he finally showed up and was like, I'm going to fix the flat. I'm going to get you the support you need. That could have been seen as positive had he not come home and found that his daughter, had been abandoned and was being looked after by a random dude who he didn't even know that his wife was responsible for having a broken leg.

Mel Killingsworth

Well, maybe if he listened once in a while when she talked to him on the phone, he would know.

Chas Fisher

I mean, the film had a chance to present a positive arc in a relationship and chose not to.

Stu Willis

Oh, yeah. This is all incredibly deliberate. Even in the fact that I think the kids kind of has an arc, but also it feels a little bit bullshit. It's hard for me to articulate how they're doing it with the husband, but it's like even the fact that he kind of swans in and he's like, Like, oh, I'm trying to surprise you by repairing the hole in the wall and painting the house. And it's like, you could have actually done the important thing, which is help her take care of her child.

Mel Killingsworth

But then he wouldn't have gotten to feel like a big man swinging his dick around.

Chas Fisher

I mean, Christian Slater is so perfectly cast in that role.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah, he's great. He's excellent.

Stu Willis

Yeah. All right. Speaking of swinging big dicks around. I'm going to go to the bathroom.

From the film

I just want you to know one thing. I'm not a monster. I need you to be precise. Tell me everything. Yes. I don't know what happened. I think you fell off that third floor. The windows open. The autopsy report is inconclusive. An accidental fall is going to be hard for us to defend. That's why there's an investigation for most suspicious death because you were the only person there and of course you're his wife stop I did not kill him.

1:33:46 ANATOMY OF A FALL

Chas Fisher

Now this is the film that I'm most interested to discuss because I think it's the one where, there is the most the strongest argument that the that the character journeys are positive I'm not saying they are I'm just interested in the discussion that is to come.

Mel Killingsworth

So Anatomy of a Fall is a drama about husband wife and their child living in a chalet and one day um.

Stu Willis

Sounds like one of Chas's Christmases.

Mel Killingsworth

Sandra, the wife's student, comes over to interview her and they're interrupted by the very, very loud blaring of a, orchestral version of 50 Cent's P.I.M.P.

From the film

Maybe you don't write everything down. No, no, surely not.

Mel Killingsworth

And this is very important because it will be played over and over and over at very loud volume multiple times throughout the film. And so finally, Sandra, whose character is also named Sandra, says, I don't think this is working. Like, you're just going to have to go. So she leaves. And Sandra's son, Daniel, who is sight impaired, goes for a walk with the dog. And then when Daniel comes back, he finds his dad lying on the ground outside of the house. His head has been bashed in they call the police and then we jump forward a year and there is a trial and the trial is basically did she do it now I think there's six different things that could have happened but essentially, this film concentrates on two things either did he die by suicide. Or did she kill him and the film essentially hinges on, what her son's testimony ends up as being and it goes back and forth and it talks about their relationship but we hear a fight and then we see part of the fight and we hear that they've had a very difficult relationship and so the anatomy of the fall the the title of the film is is a dual meaning of yes he fell off of a roof but also the downfall of this relationship and the film ends, basically shrugging and going does it really matter like what matters is that we can never a hundred percent know, ourselves or our partners or why anyone does what they do.

Chas Fisher

Or our parents.

Mel Killingsworth

Or our parents or our children absolutely really the only person that you can trust is a dog.

Chas Fisher

And only if you give it a good poisoning.

Stu Willis

I think there is a thematic thread in... Crime stories in the same way that ghost stories are often but not always about the impact of the past on the present I think crime stories particularly this where they're trying to solve the mystery or can be, about the need to find an explanation for why something happened our need to form a story to explain and I think this film is very explicit about that particularly at the end. I don't know how many excerpts about this film we're going to get. I mean, it basically moves between French and English fairly seamlessly, so if we have any excerpts of the English, they may be a little bit too... Without missing context but effectively it ends and I'm going to start with this because I think it's important in terms of what I perceive as the journey Daniel is the son he's sighting visually impaired, he has come home to find the body and that and that means he wakes his mother he doesn't really know what's going on at the end of the film the. I don't know what you would describe her Whereas the state has given him like a guardian, for lack of a better word, to take care of him because he's not allowed to see his mother because he's a key witness, right? So what this is also fits into the procedural moment of there's a young child as a witness who has to come on the stand and give their testimony, and it's about their relationship with the truth. And his caregiver, his guardian is basically like, sometimes we don't really know what has happened and we just need to make a decision. We get to decide what is going to be the truth.

Mel Killingsworth

And then he says, oh, you mean you want me to make it up? And she goes, nope, that's not what I mean. Decide.

Stu Willis

Yeah. Yeah, and he decides that he is going to, he has decided in himself that his mother is, not, that his father committed suicide, right?

Chas Fisher

He decides to give testimony.

Mel Killingsworth

Okay, also, can we use the term died by suicide?

Stu Willis

Sorry, yeah, the language they use is committed suicide, just to be clear. That's one of the prosecutor's language, but yeah, I'm happy to add that.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah, but I don't want to use the prosecutor's leg. You know what I mean? Like, he's pejorative.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. Daniel makes a choice to give testimony saying that he believes more that his father died by suicide than... His mother murdered him.

Mel Killingsworth

Now, can I take a quick side note and say the six things that I think might've happened? Because I genuinely think that this is relevant because I think that Daniel's saying that could have multiple different reasons, right? So the main two things are, did Sandra kill her husband or did he die by suicide? There is an option that's floated, but seemingly very quickly dismissed the third option, which is that he was trying to do a house repair and fell. And this is underlined by three things. The first is that like, so he's trying to overhaul this chalet, like they bought it basically to flip it so that they could make money and he hasn't really managed to make much progress on it. And their fight the day before he brings that up, he brings up the house thing that he feels very emasculated by her saying, well, you haven't done anything with this house. And the morning of during the argument with the student, it wasn't just the noise. There's a loud noise of power tools and like power drills and things like that going off upstairs. So maybe he was trying to do something and he fucked up and he's like standing on the ledge trying to like fix this thing and falls off. So there's three things. She killed him. He died by suicide or he was trying to do a house repair and he fell. There's a fourth option, which is that Daniel pushed him. Now, very unlikely, however, Daniel is very aware of how much his parents have been fighting and arguing and there has been to what extent we do not fully know and it does not fully become clear during the testimony but there has been. An element of domestic abuse or self-abuse and it seems to have been very small but Daniel seems to be aware of that right so is it possible that Daniel came back and his dad's outside fixing something and he goes I'm going to protect my mom and push you I think this is the absolute least likely that it is an option so that's number four.

1:39:24 Six competing explanations and the choice Daniel must make

Stu Willis

I'm sure that is already the plot of a crime.

Mel Killingsworth

Movie number five is that Daniel goes for a walk with Snoop the dog so we have by the way we have 50 Cent Pimp and we have Snoop Dogg so like definitely a fan of rappers on this writing, He leans off of the balcony to yell for Daniel because and Daniel, you know, is kind of off in his own little world and he's with Snoop and doesn't hear him and he falls. And Daniel realizes that and feels guilty. And you should say, why would Daniel feel guilty that his dad died trying to yell at him? And I think like it ties back into the whole reason his dad feels guilty about Daniel's sight impairment is an accident that was like a chain reaction that actually his dad was in no way, shape or form responsible for. But it did happen because he was busy riding, so he called a babysitter to get Daniel from school instead of going to get him himself. And because of that, you know, it's one of those butterfly effect things. Because of that car that ran off the road and hit Daniel. And he's like, oh, but if I had gone, he would have been standing on a different spot on the sidewalk.

From the film

After that, Samuel became obsessive about it. He blamed himself on a loop. If only he had gone pick him up on time. Hmm. He was overcome with guilt. And perhaps he never truly escaped that feeling.

Mel Killingsworth

So Daniel knows my dad was trying to call for me and that's why he died. And I feel super guilty and I don't want my mom to bear this weight. So I'm going to lie about it. Again, don't think that's likely, but definitely plausible within the chain of events. And the sixth thing, which I think is actually quite likely, is that he meant to make a small statement. He meant to injure himself. And he meant to break his leg. He meant to sort of be like, oh, I was trying to do a house repair and I slipped. Now everyone really needs to feel sorry for me. Oh, now don't you feel bad that you yelled at me? Oh, don't you feel bad that you were flirting with your student while I was trying to do this thing and now I've injured myself? And also to have like an excuse to not have to write or to have to, you know, do whatever. And, oh, we can move back to whatever without my having to admit that I have failed. And then he completely miscalculated. Because it's very unlikely, right, that you fall from a second story and you kill yourself. Everyone admits if she tried to kill him, it would be difficult. If he had tried to die by suicide, it would have been difficult to... It sounds like it could have been an accidental death in terms of him trying to hurt himself and to get attention. And all of this, I do think, culminates in there are a lot of reasons that Daniel could have lied at the end. And I think depending on which of these six you think happened changes the reason that Daniel lies at the end. Or that Daniel makes up his mind to believe a particular story at the end. And all of this ties into... His arc, his mom's arc, and what I think is the main negative relationship arc of the film, which is the marriage. Like, the marriage is the negative arc of the film. It starts happy, and we see where it ends, and it's in a negative place. And we are constantly told how it has devolved, right?

Stu Willis

You stole my observation now.

Mel Killingsworth

I had this observation first, and I teased it to you.

Stu Willis

Yeah, but you didn't share it.

Mel Killingsworth

I know, because I was hoping to reveal it now. And then an hour before we record, Stu's like, guys, I'm like... Ah!

Stu Willis

The arc is the relationship. Maybe the fall refers to the negative arc of the relationship.

Mel Killingsworth

Absolutely it does. I mean, that's very intentional.

Stu Willis

I mean, what is a fall but a negative arc that stops?

Mel Killingsworth

Because the ground is there and really hard and covered in snow. Anyway, so there's my sidebar where I actually think that there are more very plausible... Reasons for this happening then the movie even has time to examine it because it's not really engaged in that.

Stu Willis

I do not know enough about the French legal system all I.

Mel Killingsworth

Know is it.

Stu Willis

Is different from common law uh.

Mel Killingsworth

It sure is.

Stu Willis

And and therefore I'm like I don't know maybe the prosecution has to, narrow ugly uh nagly what even word that one.

Mel Killingsworth

I really I want to I need to plug a film called Saint-Omer which came out around the time of this which is apparently also a fairly it's slightly less, dramatic melodramatic than this but it also like deals with you are almost entirely within the French legal system and it's a brilliant film as well but it from what I can tell, this is a yeah sure slightly heightened in terms of like how the prosecutors are acting you know a little law and order of saying something objection I withdrawn, but that overall the machinations are fairly true to form.

1:45:59 The marriage itself as the film's true negative arc

Stu Willis

So I I I'm gonna just quickly jump in before Chas does because I think the relationship is is the negative arc but we like and that's gonna be interesting to tease out because we don't even meet the husband, in the opening part of the film So, the fact that we both feel that it is portraying a negative arc in a relationship is interesting. The way that we learn that there's this kind of like- I think it does really well. This story that's kind of, in the same way they talk about this fantasy that's hanging in the air of this relationship is kind of like a completely constructed thing. I think there is a negative arc for Daniel, though I'm happy to interrogate that because I'm like, is it a value change or not? Coming back to one of Chas's observations, is it just that structurally the film is presenting it because of the genre expectations of this being such a procedural legal thriller, the last minute witness having a change of heart or whatever it is, so baked into the DNA of this genre. And then the third negative, I think, arc, is Sandra herself, and I agree with you that she's steadfast negative, in that I think she refuses to change, but she is unrelentingly herself for the worst. There are moments when it definitely affects her trial.

Mel Killingsworth

Oh, man, her lawyer's like, please, God, just change your mind about this one thing. She's like, nope, that's not how I did it. I don't believe it.

Stu Willis

And I think I'm on the line whether or not the lawyer himself sees it as a negative. I don't think he does. And I think maybe this is me sending out to Chas because the lawyer actually says this is the first case that they've won. So maybe he's got like a positive outcome that he's happy about, that he feels good about.

Mel Killingsworth

He doesn't say how many he's tried.

Stu Willis

No.

Mel Killingsworth

But, yeah.

Chas Fisher

Look, I would mount arguments that the individual journeys of Sandra and Daniel are actually positive. At least that's how I felt about them individually. But I agree with you that the overall feeling of the film... Is negative and that's because you know I think, reaching for the obvious analogy is an anatomy of a fall of a marriage not just of his, physical fall because not only is the film very deliberate about like says it out loud that Daniel is essentially to choose a truth, not to lie but to choose a truth. And Sandra's steadfastness, and I agree that it's steadfast, I would just, I think it's steadfast positive rather than steadfast negative, is she will refuse to try and manipulate how she is perceived. She will only speak the truth, right? Her truth, she acknowledges there are multiple truths.

From the film

That recording is not reality. It is a part of it, maybe. If you have an extreme moment in life, an emotional peak, and you focus on it, of course it crushes everything. It may seem like irrefutable proof, but actually warps everything. It's not reality. It's our voices. That's true, but it's not who we are. I don't give a fuck about what is reality, okay? You need to start seeing yourself the way others are going to perceive you. A trial is not about the truth. I didn't know there'd be a trial. Well, there is.

Chas Fisher

Like, it really came to light when it turns out that her husband, Samuel, had been recording moments of their lives and sending them to a publisher, as a possible, like, book for him to come back as a novelist. And that, you know, made her reevaluate maybe the big argument that they had the day before his death had been staged by him, that he'd prompted the fight just to be able to record it and create the drama. But when it's only almost about halfway through the film that we even learn that that recording exists, we don't hear it. We just hear, we just learn about its existence.

Stu Willis

No, we know right at the beginning when she is like, whatever the term is.

Chas Fisher

Indicted.

Stu Willis

They actually say that it's set up they they tell you there's a checkups gun they've got we've got a recording but we're not going to talk.

Chas Fisher

About it.

Stu Willis

There's an you.

Chas Fisher

Know so the the the midpoint that I'm thinking about is the lawyer saying why didn't you tell me about the recording like she's driving away in the car I don't know if it is a midpoint but it felt, you know well into the film you you're right that it's before the one-year time jump, but the night before, she's been telling her son, tell the truth, it can't hurt me.

From the film

But you didn't lie, did you? No. I don't want you to change your memories, you know. You have to tell them exactly like you remember it. They can never hurt me.

1:51:14 Sandra's steadfastness and refusal to manage perception

Chas Fisher

That's her value statement and she sticks with it the entire film, whether it's going to be in her own or her son's best interest or not. That's her value statement. That's her steadfastness. And then when they're talking about the recording, her and the lawyer on the side of the street, she's constantly saying things along the lines of the fight is isn't reality it's our voices but it isn't who we are it's this constant idea of like just because you get in a moment it isn't the whole thing perception isn't the whole thing one aspect of something isn't the whole thing and his response is you need to start seeing how people perceive you.

Mel Killingsworth

Well and at one point in the trial at one point he says something about her husband.

Chas Fisher

That makes her look better yeah and.

Mel Killingsworth

Then And then when he walks.

Chas Fisher

Over to the stand.

Mel Killingsworth

She mutters under her breath, that wasn't him.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Mel Killingsworth

Like, she's like, I know this makes me look better, but you read that moment wrong. She's like, I will say that my husband's a dick sometimes. Like, I disagreed with him, and I think he could be, mean and spiteful and petty, but I'm not going to let you misrepresent something that he did that actually wasn't mean and spiteful and petty. I think she's just steadfast full stop. I don't think she's steadfast positive, per se, because there's a lot of balance there. But I think it's the relationship that's very negative, obviously. We get those. And I think the biggest thing is like, it's one of the few things the film is really clear about being objective, right? Like it has that like title sequence almost where it's showing us all these photos of them in really happier days. And it has moments where both of them talk about having been happy before and both of them talking about being physically attracted before and both of them talk about, I wish we weren't like this now or, you know, I didn't, we didn't sleep together anymore, but sometimes I would come into his office and we would like lie together. Like it, the film is explicit to present those things as this is something that started here and has now slid down to this like inescapable place that they have found themselves like in deadlock.

Stu Willis

Like, we were kicking around the idea. It's not unrelated, but we've been, the idea of negative steadfast came out when we were talking about trying to find comedy characters, whatever, different genres. Like, we've picked three pretty fucking bleak movies here because we couldn't find a comedic negative character. And the closest that we can go with is ideas of, oh, they're just characters that don't change and it just makes their situation worse. And maybe that was a negative, we went, oh, maybe that's the negative version of Steadfast. But it is an interesting idea because when you're taking away the aspect of change, she is a character that does not change, Sandra. And- And do we perceive that as a positive or negative? Does she perceive that as positive or negative? Yeah, it's absolutely going to be about our relationship with her.

Chas Fisher

Yeah.

Stu Willis

Yeah. And she doesn't go to prison, so.

Chas Fisher

Yeah, exactly. I think what I was going to get to is the film does not punish her. You know, it constantly says that she's risking something by not playing the game, by not trying to manipulate perception, by not leaning into these lies. She is risking her life imprisonment by being steadfast, and she is aware of that the film makes us aware of that she does not compromise her integrity and yet at the end in spite of not compromising her integrity is not in prison so the film does not, punish her the world does not punish her for for uh being steadfast which is why I think.

Mel Killingsworth

Going through that trial is a bit of.

Chas Fisher

But having to go through all of that.

Mel Killingsworth

You know, and the way that her perception in the eyes of her son is irrevocably changed, which she's very worried about clearly at the end as well. Like, but I think the film is very much like, this is essentially the worst time of her life ever. And I think the film is of all the, the three we've done is it's certainly the most hopeful in terms of like, this is the worst place and she has capacity to change. For worse, yes, but also for better. And it kind of leaves us with that.

Chas Fisher

Because I would make the observation, it's not just about the marriage as a relationship that's negative, it's also the relationship between Sandra and Daniel.

Mel Killingsworth

Yes.

Chas Fisher

He has not only been confronted with the possibility that his mother murdered his father- Whom the film tells us they had a very deep and loving connection.

Mel Killingsworth

Daniel and his dad had a deep and loving connection.

Chas Fisher

It very rarely shows Daniel and Samuel together, but it tells us that that is the case. And she, at the end, she is resisting going home. Daniel does not get on the phone with her when she's released. And even when she gets home they do hug but he said I was scared you wouldn't come home and she said I was scared to come home.

Mel Killingsworth

I thought he said, I was scared you would, like, for when you came home.

Chas Fisher

Yes.

Mel Killingsworth

And she said, so was I.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. So they're both, I think, there is a potential, like, their relationship has been, even though Daniel has made the choice to give testimony on behalf of his mother, whether he's lying or not, whether that's perception or not, whether that's truth or not. Not he's made that choice but their relationship has been, irrevocably changed by Daniel being exposed to their marriage hearing the recordings and the fights hearing about the open, relationship and then drifting into infidelity hearing his mother's disdain for his father.

From the film

You say I'm stopping you from fucking the way you want. Seriously. Yes. Be honest. Who's been refusing to fuck since the accident? You know damn well I meant before. What did I ever refuse to do sexually? Everything. Everything. Plus I have to accept that you fuck other people. I do not fuck other people. Don't deny it. Once and you cling to it in order to suffer. You have fucked other people several times. You do this all the time. You make yourself the victim. I'm not a victim. I'm a man who's been cheated on, branded and cheated on. I can live without sex, but not forever.

Mel Killingsworth

Which is something that's difficult to understand even as an adult, right? Let alone when you're a child and your parents are talking about, like, you're having to hear them talk about sexual needs or, in his father's case, like, sexual impotence or, you know, depression to the point where he was no longer sexually interested, right? And you're having to absorb all of that and in context of what it means between these two people. It's, yeah, no matter what happens. And this is where I sort of get into, clearly, Sandra is trying to preserve her husband's legacy. Or whatever it might be for Daniel's sake, for her own sake, for whatever. I also think there's an element of Daniel's a very smart kid and there's a difference in your head between your dad being sick enough to say, I need to end everything or your dad trying to hurt your mom in this really fucked up deep way. And I think in some ways, Daniel making the choice he makes also preserves something of his like his father never meant for it necessarily to have this consequence. Whereas if he had been actually trying to do something more sinister, then then they would all have to look on this and then they would have to go on living together as a family with that hanging over them. And I think in a lot of ways, Daniel was trying to take the path, not just that was best for him, but the path that was sort of like that would let both of them. Yes. And you're right. Their relationship move on being the least hindered.

1:58:49 Daniel and Sandra's relationship fractured by testimony

Chas Fisher

Yeah. It's not something that the film goes into, but it was something that I was aware about. Like you said, Mel, the music comes back a lot throughout it, right?

Mel Killingsworth

Incredible choice.

Chas Fisher

And they make it clear.

Mel Killingsworth

Written into the script, by the way. She wanted that song.

Stu Willis

Apparently she wanted Jolene, but couldn't afford it.

Mel Killingsworth

A bongo version of Jolene? Or like what kind of version?

Stu Willis

That's what it says on Wikipedia. And there's footnotes. So I don't read the footnotes. I just go.

Chas Fisher

But the music, it is said throughout that he likes playing music loud, it's his form of escapism, and that it's also clear that he uses it as a weapon in his marriage, right? And that he does it repeatedly. He has a sight impaired son in the house with him when he is using a, he's taking away, he's assaulting the one sense, the one that his son relies upon predominantly. In an attack of his wife.

Stu Willis

The one sense, his son has no others.

Chas Fisher

No, relies upon predominantly.

Mel Killingsworth

I think as well, though, this is a, something that has escalated too, right? Like, again, as their relationship negatively deteriorates, as their relationship negatively, negative and deteriorate, is a syndrome. Okay. As their relationship deteriorates, he has started using it more. He started using it as a weapon. Like, he used to use it just for himself as a relaxation escape. And now he's begun weaponizing it. And then after he started weaponizing it, he stopped caring how it impacted his son or like the student, other people who might happen to be around. Like, again, like this is a negative arc. And some of this we are told and some of it were shown with photos and some of it, it seems like the photos are so strong, how they come through. Like when the lawyer comes over, he talks about their relationship by gesturing to photos, like photos come up. She's looking at a photo at the very end. Daniel tries to, even though he can't really see much, like it seems like he might get some perception of light. They're not really explicit. But before he decides about his testimony, he has photos of his parents and he's holding them like at his nose, just staring and like clearly trying to make up his mind about what he thinks. Like the photos are clearly this objective, like used to be better. Yeah. We can get nostalgic about the past and misconstrue things, but it's quite clear in this film. Like they, they used to have a loving relationship and a deep connection and it has, they've, constantly been losing their grip on that for more and more and more um and it's just irrecoverable at this point so.

Stu Willis

Including speaking of relationship that deteriorates and is possibly irrecoverable it is her relationship with Daniel right there is a reason that the film doesn't end when she like they cut to the credits after it's been announced that she's free that they spend time, with her both celebrating with her lawyer but then coming home and then falling asleep on her couch she is Her relationship with Daniel, such as it is, has deteriorated. So the reason this feels negative, even though that she has seemingly, well, it's not seemingly, she has been acquitted. Right. She's been acquitted, but she even says, I, you know, I expected some kind of reward, but I'm glad it's just over. Right.

From the film

It's just, you know, when you lose, you lose. It's the worst thing that can happen. and then if you win, you kind of expect some reward. But there isn't any. It's just... It's just over.

Stu Willis

Which is a subtractive reward. All that is happening to her is that she's been relieved of the burden of being put on trial. Right. And then her relationship with her son, it ends up with her sleeping like kind of.

Mel Killingsworth

In her husband's bed, which I think is an interesting. And with the dog, I don't think it's irrecoverable. I do think it's clearly been damaged.

Stu Willis

Yeah. have they have they grown closer together or further.

Mel Killingsworth

Apart right right right I I just don't think it's at the point like where her and her partners.

Chas Fisher

Was I would potentially argue they've they've become closer together.

Mel Killingsworth

I think they understand each.

Chas Fisher

Other better.

Mel Killingsworth

I don't think that means they're closer her son.

Chas Fisher

Really well okay just because they again we it doesn't dramatize, her relationship with her son before the fall but the idea is that Samuel the father has been homeschooling and they even in their argument have a back and forth about how, he says I wouldn't ever give up my relationship that I have with Daniel because of my decision to homeschool him and she's like so you're inferring that I don't have a good relationship.

From the film

When you decided to homeschool Daniel I told you be careful it's a beautiful and generous choice and I thank you for it but But you don't have to do it, and I told you it would force you to cut your... What? Forced me to spend more time with my son? I'm glad I did. I wouldn't have the relationship I have with him today if I didn't. Yeah, the relationship, that I don't have with him is what you want to say.

Mel Killingsworth

I didn't say that. No. She's very insecure about the fact that she does not have as good a relationship or close as Samuel does, yeah.

Chas Fisher

And I think as a result of, like, ultimately, Daniel, like, it's changed and been affected, but I think, my feeling coming out of this, this is why I was interested about, you know, possibly causing havoc in the Discord before this recording, like... Is this a negative arc or a negative film? I came out of it with, like you said, Mel, of the three films, this is the one that had the most hope in it.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah, but that's all relative.

Chas Fisher

Yeah, yeah.

Mel Killingsworth

100%. I mean.

Chas Fisher

But I felt Daniel was choosing his relationship with his mother. His mother did not compromise her integrity and yet still didn't go to jail. And at the end, they did embrace each other.

Mel Killingsworth

Deeply well they're all they have left like that is a I I I read it as a again, the the the a lot is made of the fact that even though it was an accident that Daniel being hit by that car had drastically changed all three of their lives and the way that they related to each other and the way that they, managed their own affairs and the way that they saw themselves in the world And so you cannot think that something that has lasted over a year and that involved a death is going to have less impact than that. Right. Like, I think we're meant to see that going forward, they are clearly going to struggle, not even to be in a good place, but just to try to get to an equilibrium.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. I'm not nitpicking here. I think you're right that this film, you come out exhausted in the same way that they are exhausted from this experience. You have been with them. I mean, one of the things that we're not talking about, because it's not necessarily relevant to this lens, but Stu, you mentioned like the French judicial system is so wildly different to what we're used to in common law. Judicial where like our rules of evidence they're doing fucking recreations in front of the witnesses, in their own home trying to prompt a reaction rather than in our systems we would say that that would compromise the evidence and the and the recall like in any witnesses, in interrogation the Sandra is expected to participate she's expected to be asked questions, from the person giving testimony from the judge from the prosecutor from her own lawyer she's expected to she is allowed to just stand up and talk whenever she wants like it is, participatory and interrogatory like she ends up getting in a fight with her with her husband's therapist about, who knew her husband better right like.

From the film

If if I'd been seeing a therapist he could stand here and say very ugly things about some world, but would those things be true?

Stu Willis

And she's right. Oh, 100%. She drops a lot of pretty insightful observations.

Chas Fisher

Yeah. I mean, the fight that she has with her husband that's recorded, everything that she's saying rang true. I was like, yeah, you go get it.

Stu Willis

But also, he was being, I mean, I think he also had an element of truth to what he's saying.

2:09:34 Acquittal as subtraction rather than reward

Mel Killingsworth

And that's what makes it the complexity.

Stu Willis

But look, I guess I'm just reacting to this idea that this is somehow a positive film because I think if you compared it to Widows or Barbie or all of the strangers, I don't think the, emotional impact that I had on the two times I've seen this, is positive. And if anything, it's just relief, right? It's just surviving.

Mel Killingsworth

Yeah, I don't see it positive.

Stu Willis

And I think if they wanted us to be positive, they would have told us whether or not she killed him, right? Or negative. If they wanted to be positive, it would be like, shit, we know that she's innocent and then she's proven innocent. You'd have like a John Grisham kind of triumphant legal moment. And they resist that. They're constantly resisting it. Maybe you can go, this is just literally a neutral arc. This is neutral steadfast. Well, okay, so this is- I would take neutral.

Mel Killingsworth

But I just don't see positive.

Chas Fisher

But, okay, I was, I look, I'm looking at these things, I mean, if nothing else, this exercise, and in particular this episode of our exploration of character arcs has taught me that- the the my focus on the individual arcs is not as important like that's just one lever, in amongst everything else right I agree with you that this film wants you to feel like harrowed hollowed out in the same way that they have and this is why they've chosen it to be like that they've chosen it to be, a negative experience at the end because that reinforces the theme that they're talking about which is none of us can know the truth of another person's lived experience We choose our truth. Perception is not truth. These are all the things. And if they had, like you said, Stu, if they wanted us to feel positive about it and had that John Grisham legal thriller moment, that would have subtracted from the theme that the film is trying to explore.

Stu Willis

Yeah, I mean, they stated pretty early on. Sandra, in the interview, is basically asked these questions about how she blends facts, fact or fiction, and you never know which is which. And then they talk about the idea of this story, and we can't accept it because that is definitely subtitled, but the idea is that there's this omnipresent idea about the relationship that they're forming, but like talking around it that's not backed in the, isn't representative of the evidence. Some of the evidence suggests, like, they keep on having to come back and build a psychological profile of her and the relationship, but her lawyer does specifically say it's a fantasy. And so, it is exploring the fact that part of, it's not just the, like, that whole idea of when we make a decision, we have to make a decision about what our truth. It's also, like, we're also choosing to have fantasies in our lives. Like, I am agreeing with you that it's thematic. I just think it's set up super early.

Chas Fisher

Yeah, yeah. But my point is they've chosen the character journeys and how they're presented and the relationship journeys and how that's represented to tie into the theme that the film is clearly very overtly in dialogue trying to explore.

★ Key idea · Acquittal as Subtraction Rather Than Reward

Stu Willis

Yeah. And I think operant conditioning is a really useful tool to help us understand what's going on. Because even though, I mean, one, as I said, she specifically talks about the fact that she only feels relief. All she has been given isn't a reward. She's just been relieved of the burden for trial. I remember certainly that on the first time I watched it at the cinemas was absolutely the feeling that I came out of, which is like, what an awful experience to go through all that, particularly if you are innocent and you don't even get compensation. You just get congratulations. You spent a year of your life dealing with this, and you've lost your husband. She's lost her husband. Her relationship with her son has been changed. That is for sure, whether it's a positive or negative. I mean, in the context of the film, we've obviously got some ambiguity there. They've lost her father. The son's kind of confronted a whole bunch of, he's gained a whole lot of things, but potentially the things he's added, are they for positive or negative? Or they just are. Like, I think a lot of the complexity around the feelings of it is the way it's manipulating those additions and those subtractions, what they've gained and what they've lost. Right. And it's kind of resisting moral judgment. I mean, maybe that's what it is, that she has integrity, right? But it's an integrity that's not necessarily presented as a moral integrity.

Chas Fisher

I absolutely buy that she might have murdered him. Yeah.

Stu Willis

I think she'd just be smarter. That's my problem about it. There's a lot of- Yeah.

Mel Killingsworth

I don't buy that she'd do it that way, right? Like- you know.

Stu Willis

Like is she just doing this for one of the plots of her books which they kind of raise this idea of and you're.

Mel Killingsworth

Like oh maybe Stephen King a serial killer you know like that sort of yeah.

Stu Willis

Unless she deliberately wanted the ambiguity but there's no implication.

Mel Killingsworth

That the actual chances of him dying the way that she would have had to kill him would be quite low actually like the way that he had his head on the like.

Chas Fisher

The thing that I thought is that you know I would have bought that she went up, stormed upstairs, picked up a wrench, smacked him in the head and he accidentally fell through the window and died. Like that's...

Mel Killingsworth

Right.

Chas Fisher

But then that's not what the splatter pattern expert was saying, that they would have had to have been on the third... I mean, all of that was just kind of showing that, you know, the dueling experts and all that kind of stuff, like, again, goes towards truth.

Stu Willis

Oh, classic forensic evidence, which is just forensics.

Mel Killingsworth

It definitely happened this way. Oh, it definitely could not have happened. Is it possible I could be the president? What about your theory? Like, they're just, yeah.

Stu Willis

Yeah, classic.

Mel Killingsworth

Inside.

Stu Willis

I mean, I even think blood splatter analysis has been thrown into question in the U.S.?

Mel Killingsworth

Why are you asking about the US, though? Because it happens.

Stu Willis

I know. I'm just saying, like, it may be a deliberate thing that she's seen the same truth and crime docos that I've seen.

Mel Killingsworth

Oh, she watches so many crime docos that she references. Absolutely. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Stu Willis

So, I mean, I think, I mean, much like the film itself, it feels like we are ending on a very ambiguous note. And I guess whether that ambiguity is positive or negative is up to you.

Mel Killingsworth

Question mark.

Stu Willis

Dear audience. But it is interesting that we've picked it. Like, I am going to try and take us to key learnings and wrap up.

2:16:21 Key Learnings & Wrap Up

Chas Fisher

I'm not sure if you guys agree with me or not, but my definite key learning from this is to distinguish between, an individual character arc being negative, relationships being negative, and then how controlling how the audience feels about either of those two things. They can be aligned, they can be distinct, and just this exercise reinforced the learnings from the previous episodes about operant conditioning and repeated beats for me. Like, I'm learning, even the way that we're talking about it, getting deeper with each episode, I feel like these tools are embedding in me.

Stu Willis

I feel like the question I forgot to ask... About all three films, but it relates to what I think we should explore about in, in possibly steadfast negative is what is the relationship question, which is just enough. Like, is there a, cause we talked about the emotional event. Like, is there a relationship question that is posed at the beginning of the film? And I think there is an Anatomy of a Fall because did you kill her, your husband, or did you husband commit suicide? Or was it an accident or all forms of relate? Like they all tap into what is the relationship question? And the reason that works is because our focus in terms of the arc is meant to be on the relationship, perhaps, is the primary. I mean, it's literally a title Anatomy of a Fall, right? Is there a relationship question posed in If I Had Legs I'd Kick You? Is it about her and her husband? Is it about her and her daughter?

Mel Killingsworth

I think it's her relationship to the world.

Stu Willis

Yeah. Yeah. Will the world come, will the world be able to help her or will she accept help from the world? I'm not sure what those are. We don't have to sit here and spend five minutes debating them. And then Backrooms, is there a relationship question? I think there is a relationship question in that between the two of them, which is, you, believe Clark or whatever it is. Again, I'm not interested in interrogating them. People might cover up with their own ideas.

Chas Fisher

Will Clark break his loops? Will Dr. Klein help Clark break his loops?

Stu Willis

Yeah. Yeah. Great. Because I think what we're kind of tapping into here, and we haven't fully explored, is, what is the film or the filmmakers, what is the primary arc they want us to notice, what is the arc that we like it isn't always the main character as I said I came to Daniel as oh this is the character whose arc we're meant to experience it with one that's because Sandra doesn't she's so steadfast two it's literally got him coming up on the stand so it's working with the genre of the witness having a change of heart right and even he is the one that's presented with the hero's choice do you you know which of the which path do you choose Daniel what are you going to say so we we are meant to kind I think attach to that, and I think that's the question I mean which is not a key learning a wrap-up but I think, what are we where are we meant to be looking for the arc is, the change is an interesting thing to kind of explore and given that we might use this as for flash forward insights the question that I didn't ask of these films into the very end but is worth thinking about is what is the relationship question. We've talked about plot questions before, character questions, thematic questions, but there is something about what is the relationship question. And that may help us think about what arc we're meant to be focusing on. What about you, Mel?

Mel Killingsworth

Well, I do think like this really, I know I talked about it last episode, but like establishing your baseline early is really good. And then, you know, continually bringing those things up, that still holds. However, what I think that I really learned from this particular episode is, if you're going to do a negative arc, have you considered doing a symbolism and or a giant metaphor? Because all of these films do. Like, Backrooms has a giant pirate and rooms that go in circles and don't seem to lead anywhere. And Anatomy of a Fall has, like, literally a man falling and hitting his head and us not being sure why, but it being irretrievably broken, just like the relationship at the center of the film. And If I Had Legs I'd Kick You has a giant gaping sucking hole in the ceiling and a giant gaping sucking tube in her daughter and like it's so metaphorical and symbolic it's just going hey, here is the message and we're gonna keep returning to it and we're gonna have, recreations of it in the courtroom and she's gonna come stare at it in the middle of the night and it's gonna like whisper to her and he's gonna go round and around in circles again and again and again and then he's going to be able to get out and then he's going to decide go back in like these are so clear, in their symbolism and their metaphors and that's a very helpful guide.

Stu Willis

I mean the opening shot of Anatomy of a Fall is literally a ball ball bouncing down the.

Mel Killingsworth

Stairs yeah that's right yeah this ball like doomp doomp doomp doomp yep and even though it's bouncing every time it gets further down it's not gonna go further back up.

2:21:46 Thanks to our Patreons!

Chas Fisher

Thanks as always to our amazing patrons, without whom there would be even less Draft Zero than there already is, at least in terms of frequency, perhaps not in terms of quantity, but it feels like this recording was actually, tight by our recent standings. But particular thanks to Krob, Theis, Sandra, Jesse, Paolo, Thomas, Jay, Schubert, Malay, Alexandra, Natalie, and Lily. Thank you so much, everybody.

Mel Killingsworth

Woo!

I hope you all feel like arguing with either Stu or myself about anything on this episode or anything in general. And you can find many ways of getting in touch with us at our website at draft-zero.com. At the website, you'll also find the show notes for this and all our other episodes, as well as links to support us and spread the word for free via a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. Very important for spreading the word. Or if you think that what we do here is worth a dollar or preferably more than a dollar, then you can also find links to our Patreon page to support us getting these episodes to you quicker. Thanks. And thanks for listening.

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0:00 Cold Open #

0:27 Negative Arc vs Negative Audience Feeling #

3:18 Distinguishing character shift, world reward, and audience experience #

9:58 Why these three films resist a classic tragedy template #

10:03 The Relationship Question as a Craft Tool #

11:11 BACKROOMS #

16:56 Clark's steadfast refusal disguised as trying to change #

21:14 Repeated role-play beat as evidence of change or relief #

26:31 Symbolism of loops and liminal space as character state #

34:22 Decoupling character change from audience emotional change #

44:09 Mary's window metaphor and inherited trauma #

50:02 How operant conditioning punishes both leads #

54:11 IF I HAD LEGS I'D KICK YOU #

58:45 Spiral structure and the illusion of available choices #

1:06:00 Agency versus repeated impossible choices #

1:12:21 Scripted imagery of the hole as inescapable metaphor #

1:16:01 Authenticity of experience versus stylized horror world-building #

1:18:49 Climax as abandonment, baptism, and ambiguous reward #

1:26:11 Supporting relationships mirroring the protagonist's decline #

1:33:46 ANATOMY OF A FALL #

1:39:24 Six competing explanations and the choice Daniel must make #

1:45:59 The marriage itself as the film's true negative arc #

1:51:14 Sandra's steadfastness and refusal to manage perception #

1:58:49 Daniel and Sandra's relationship fractured by testimony #

2:09:34 Acquittal as subtraction rather than reward #

2:16:21 Key Learnings & Wrap Up #

2:21:46 Thanks to our Patreons! #

0:00 Cold Open

0:27 Negative Arc vs Negative Audience Feeling

3:18 Distinguishing character shift, world reward, and audience experience

9:58 Why these three films resist a classic tragedy template

10:03 The Relationship Question as a Craft Tool

11:11 BACKROOMS

16:56 Clark's steadfast refusal disguised as trying to change

21:14 Repeated role-play beat as evidence of change or relief

26:31 Symbolism of loops and liminal space as character state

34:22 Decoupling character change from audience emotional change

44:09 Mary's window metaphor and inherited trauma

50:02 How operant conditioning punishes both leads

54:11 IF I HAD LEGS I'D KICK YOU

58:45 Spiral structure and the illusion of available choices

1:06:00 Agency versus repeated impossible choices

1:12:21 Scripted imagery of the hole as inescapable metaphor

1:16:01 Authenticity of experience versus stylized horror world-building

1:18:49 Climax as abandonment, baptism, and ambiguous reward

1:26:11 Supporting relationships mirroring the protagonist's decline

1:33:46 ANATOMY OF A FALL

1:39:24 Six competing explanations and the choice Daniel must make

1:45:59 The marriage itself as the film's true negative arc

1:51:14 Sandra's steadfastness and refusal to manage perception

1:58:49 Daniel and Sandra's relationship fractured by testimony

2:09:34 Acquittal as subtraction rather than reward

2:16:21 Key Learnings & Wrap Up

2:21:46 Thanks to our Patreons!