This message comes from Critics at Large. Culture moves fast. Opinions move faster. Critics at Large from The New Yorker takes a smarter look at the books, films, and ideas everyone's debating. Thoughtful, witty conversations every Thursday wherever you listen to podcasts. The setup of the new film obsession is a familiar one, but hear me out. Yes, Guy makes a wish, wish comes true, things go bad. But what sets this twisted little movie apart is just how bad things go, and how much of that badness is rooted not in special effects, but in the astonishing, terrifying performance of its lead actress, who is playing a woman so desperately in love that she becomes a danger to, well, pretty much everything. I'm Glenn Weldon, joining me today on NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour is Jordan Krushiola. She's a writer and producer and the host of a podcast Feeling Seen on Maximum Fun. Hey, Jordan. So glad to be back on our summer kickoff horror run that we're on right now. Yeah, it's a theme. Also with us is Monica Castillo, film critic for the AV Club. Welcome back, Monica. So thrilled to be here for this one and many more spooky, scary movies. We're running it back with this trio. The gang's all here. All right, let's do this. So if you are a comedy nerd, you've probably had Curry Barker come across your feet at some point in the past few years. He's part of a comedy duo that made viral sketches on TikTok and YouTube. Obsession is the first theatrical feature he's written and directed. And while it's creepy as hell, he's also brought his serious comedy chops to the mix. Obsession stars Michael Johnston as Bear, a shlubby music store employee who's in love with his co-worker, Nikki, played by Indy Navarrete. He can't summon the courage to confess his feelings, so he makes a wish on a cheap magic gag gift called a one wish willow for her to fall in love with him. Nikki does fall in love with him, but that love soon proves to be the kind that is jealous and all consuming and that comes with a body count. Obsession is in theaters now. Jordan, kick us off. What'd you think? Really, really liked this one. Really impressed by it. I understand it was a pretty modestly budgeted movie and looks excellent. It's a beautiful looking nighttime horror movie. These people must not have slept in the night for a couple of weeks on end making this. There's just so much about this movie that really fantastically skewers the tropes of the longing romcom behavior best friend guy and the dream sassy, not quite manic pixie dream girl, but vision of this boy from right next to her who's been longing for her. And it sends up so many tropes that I have talked about ad nauseam about the things in movies that conditioned women to expect less and accept bare minimum. He made a really good movie that on the surface is just going to make you so upset. Like I'll watch this again in three to five years. But if you want to really engage with a metatextual read on how narrative indoctrination got us to this point in pop culture, it can also be that. So it's working on a lot of levels. And like you said, Indy. Never retay. Oh my God. Yeah, we'll talk more about her. But first Monica, big picture thoughts. Would you make it three to five years? I've already revisited this twice. I loved it so much. Oh God, that's a lot. I really enjoyed it. I was also really surprised because I wasn't familiar with Curry Barker stuff heading into it. Me neither. And so this is my first sort of like jumping into the deep end of his work. And wow, I was just so impressed. Just the way that he uses shadows and darkness, but also there's a lot of color and lighting going on. So you're not totally lost in the dark and it doesn't look like mud on screen, but it's beautiful and tragic and sad. And God, is it so emotional, but not in a, oh, this is trauma kind of way. This is just a unleash of just very raw emotions. I was so, so impressed with Indy. I know we're going to get to her in a bit, but wow, this is her show all the way. She owns this movie. She rocks. I'm so, so thrilled for her. And I can't wait to see what she does next. In addition to Curry. Absolutely. I mean, this thing starts off, it hits some very familiar narrative beats. The Tales from the Dark Side, the Twilight Zone, a tidy little morality place. Who expected to hit those beats? It does take its time. I think it's fair to say in the early going, it's doing that for a reason. It wants you to invest in these characters and wants these characters to register. So you're there and you're nodding along and you're thinking this has to happen and this has to happen and this has to happen. I know the arc of this, but then there starts to be these little moments of weirdness, of just idiosyncrasy, of little bits of texture that set it apart, that signal to you. Okay, we're not just going to hit the beats. We reserve the right to find these little pockets of individuality, I guess. And then they start piling up those moments and it's stuff you haven't seen before. We call them tropes, but like it's making fun of romantic tropes. It's also creating horror tropes. Right now they're horror triggers because they haven't been done to death. There's a scene where she carries a flower pot. It's so creepy. One of the most unsettling deployments of a flower pot you could possibly come across. It's so weird because that's new. And you know how like whenever you see anybody in a horror film do the upside down crab walking from the Exorcist. Right. It's creepy as hell. It's always creepy as hell. It's unnatural. But your brain automatically slots it into this kind of preexisting groove that the Exorcist carved. And you're like, OK, this movie is carving some new slots. There's like cousins to that thing that happened that are really affected. Yeah. And I don't want to. We're going to talk about Indy Never. I think but like you have to give over so much of your pet project, your vision to give one actor to have this entire movie rest on her shoulders. Like this movie doesn't work without this bravura. Absolutely fearless performance. Let's talk about Indy Neverette here as Nikki. An interesting jumping off is like the one thing I have heard Gary Barker say. I didn't even see it out. It just popped up in front of me was he initially wrote her. It's just like a pure little sweet girl that like you couldn't deny how sweet and wonderful she was. And the way he said it was and the reason why I don't want to read anymore is because he was like, you know, just a girl that any guy could fall in love with. He said. But what Indy brought to the part was this sassiness was this edge, this sharpness. Because when I was watching it, I was like, oh, she is like, she's like slightly heckling guys. She's giving as good as she gets like she's giving money to the unhoused person. But like the moment she had me was when she looks at the bartender. She's like, oh, yeah, close it out, babe. I was like, oh, okay, this girl's a nuclear bomb. And that he saw that and he embraced it so smart to work with his actor and collaborate her to let her just turn into the hurricane that she becomes in this movie. It was just an absolute breaks off, but does not go to a point. I feel like of cartoonish or caricature. Right. There is agony inside every wild decision that Indy makes that Nikki makes as the movie builds and builds and builds. And the amount of just like horror inside the performance and the way that the movie tips us off to horror that is going on behind the scenes within Nikki, I thought was really smartly deployed. I mean, put her on the cover of Andy Fair, new now next. Like this girl has arrived. I really agree with Jordan's assessment of like the collaboration between Indy Navarrete and Harry Barker. Because I think there's a level of trust that an actor has to put in her director. There must have been like, we are mind melding on this. You have to. I mean, because she goes in some really dark places and as well as some really just strange, wild places in terms of just like the intensity of her performances. I've seen it twice. So I've seen the audience react to it a few times now. And one of the parts that gets most people to jump is actually when she's still, she's laying next to bear in bed. And she screams at him at the top of her lungs to stay, to just keep him in bed. I was wondering if you were going to say that part. If there's a second of this movie, like some really graphically horrific things happen in this movie. But like the thing that has pierced my nightmares is that scream. Her eyes are closed. She's completely, it looks like she could be asleep, but she just, he's barely inching away from her about to leave the bed. And she just yells that stay. Octaves, I didn't know possible. And then it like everybody winces in the theater like, oh my God, now you're scared for bear. Now things are really looking uncertain. And it just crescendos from there. Like she not only holds that intensity, she keeps building on it. I'm just so impressed. I mean, you do get that sense of who her character was beforehand. You know, like you were saying, Jordan, like this sort of soft, gentle person, but also, you know, a sass and like the jokes, but also the care and the tenderness and vulnerability. You get a sense of her relationship with bear beforehand, her dynamics in the group ahead of that. And that's all within just a few minutes of meeting her. That rolls so quick. It's really efficient how they handle that establishing. And when things change, it is a market difference. Her body language changes the way she holds her head is different. I also really love, Curry Barker does a lot of like backlighting with her. Once she kind of falls under the spell and you don't see her face and you don't see any part of her. It's just her body, it's just her outline. And she carries herself in such a different way that you already know like, oh, this is not the Nikki that we met at the beginning of the movie. This is not the Nikki that we saw five seconds ago. But it is a way to show that bear has fallen for this idea of her. Exactly. And it's not really her fullness is it's not who she is. It is the idea of her and he settles for that. And he for a while there, it looks like things might be okay, but then clearly, things go horribly awry. Yeah. And both director and actor are fully in control of the stuff that's happening is funny and horrifying. But there is, as you both touched on, there is tragedy here. I mean, the last time we got together, talked about Hockam, talked about how, you know, horror works on a metaphorical level, takes metaphors, makes them literal. Here, we're hitting on issues of consent at kind of an oblique angle, but we are definitely steering right into toxic relationships and mental illness. And it doesn't feel cheap or exploitative because those moments you're talking about, where we see them suffering. And it's horrifying in a way that has nothing to do with blood and guts and violence. It has everything to do with sudden, horrifying empathy. And it's both director and really the actor who really bring that home. Michael Johnston, I hated Bear God so much. And I'm inclined to hate Bear. I probably dislike Bear more than the average Bear. But I was still afraid for him. What he was doing was like, there was that, oh, I'm just a passenger in my own story energy the entire time where my God, ladies and gentlemen, the amount of opportunities that Bear is given to step up and just be honest and just be somebody in that moment who will take responsibility for their feelings. Be a grown up? Yeah. It was just like, by the fourth time, I looked at my friend who went to this with me and I just went, I am going to explode. I whispered it in his ear. What the performance resultant is such a perfect foil for what Nikki is doing. This little ensemble does a very good job of not competing with each other for their very distinct character attributes because best friend collaborator, Kuba Tomlinson, he's a really big personality. And he kind of like, he sort of steals the space whenever he's on screen. And that kind of guy is exactly who would steal the space. Whenever he's in a break. He's a ham. He's a ham. He's a ham. You could feel like he maybe peaked in high school a little bit. And like, it felt like something that a young person had to make because it felt like somebody who was of the age and like social experience of the ensemble that was on screen too. And I really appreciate that the digital pipeline of all these guys who were having all this success, Curry Barker, Kane Parsons, the Philippo brothers, like that they are getting pulled out from a new pipeline, even if the kind of result of that pipeline is a bunch of people who look the same as the people who came before the new pipeline. I appreciate at least that young people are given the chit being given a chance repeatedly. We can handle budgets. We can handle crews. We know what we're doing. You can't talk down to us and tell us that we don't know how because your studio sanctioned notion of what a professional filmmaker looks like is stuck at like this strange level of experience that's like impossible for people to get and just like runs people out of the industry before they're allowed to have this kind of success. Yeah. I mean, this is that's a really good point, Jordan. Because I mean, the pipeline used to be you go to film school, you spend a few years as a PA running coffee or schlepping a van around LA. Now it can be. Be funny, be smart, stand out on your own, get noticed, get an opportunity, knock it out of the park like this guy did. Imagine if the world is a meritocracy for a moment. Imagine if that happens. And I'm encouraged. I don't know about this industry just yet. But it's nice when it happens. It's nice when it happens. So much of Shiva baby is the youthful energy of Senate and Seligman collaborating together. And they got that right out of NYU. And there's something to be said for, yeah, when you have your eye on the ball of a certain kind of emotionally wracked experience of like, hey, I'm right in this phase of my life. So let me tell you all about it in this really fun way. We should give opportunities to that younger generational perspective to do so before they've like processed it and they're looking back and they're like reflecting on their time 10, 15 years ago. This movie feels so immediately of like a heartbreak or a longing. That's why it's such a brick to the face as one could say. I'm not sure I have the right take on this. So check me on this. But I think this movie is really smart about its premise, which is a guy wishes a woman loved him. Now, he wishes she loved him more than anyone in the world, but he's still just making a wish, right? And it is a wish that removes consent, but he doesn't know that because he lives in our world where wishes don't work, wishes don't do anything. It is not a moral transgression to wish something. The script knows that. So it builds in for him those moments you mentioned of actual really acute moral failure where he could. This script gives him so many opportunities to tell Nikki how he feels in the real world before the wish happens. He doesn't do it. Thankfully so. Uh-huh. He could realize what he's done and decide to end it, but he doesn't. He bargains. He normalizes in those moments where he destroys everything. I think what's really fascinating about this, it's not the he transgresses so he gets his comeuppance. That's not the classic horror infrastructure here. It's he fails to take accountability for what is essentially an accident. That's the thing. That's the moral transgression. And I think that's much chewier. It's much more interesting. That's a good point. Yeah. And I think Cooper Tomlinson has a really great moment where he kind of calls out Michael Johnson's character for continuing this sort of sham relationship that develops. And he's like, you know, things aren't going right and it kind of looks like you're taking advantage of her. And he's actually having the conversation that it's really uncomfortable and like we probably don't see enough of in media. So it's actually kind of surprising that there is another voice that's kind of, you know, at least calling him out for the fact that he is writing this coax tails of the wish, even though he's freaked out by it, doesn't fully agree with it. But hey, at the moment, it kind of benefits him and it works for him. So he's going to enjoy that. There's that moment that I think of the first teaser maybe that was put out for the movie is Bear in the car calling the hotline for one wish willow. And he's like, can you take it back? I'd like I want to change my wish. And they're just like, yeah, hi, like, how may I help you? Bear is struggling with what he has done. And he's trying to enumerate it clumsily. And the guy says to him, just because you chose this for her doesn't make it less real. And that, I don't know, that line just hit me so hard. The bigness of it and the small preciseness of it was just so good. And that notion of like, hey, man, just because you made like, you could just hear like a buddy telling that to him too. And like over a beer being like, hey, dude, bro, just because like you picked this for her, like doesn't make it fake or something like that. That like notion of that socialized encouragement of how you can coax someone or co-worse someone towards something and tell yourself you're still a good person the entire time. And getting to that, what Glenn said about like the inability to just take responsibility and the number of opportunities that he has to do. So like that one line, I was like, that was fire. Like Curry Barker slayed it right there. Really the stuff about the wish and the gimmickry of the wish is some of the funniest parts in this movie. Oh, it's so good. That is where you can see the chops from his comedy troupe kind of kicking in. Like if you're a comedy nerd like me, you've been seeing this guy around for a long time. I feel this kind of parasocial pride where I feel like, you know, I told the director this the other day was like, I'm just so happy for you as like as a millennial woman. I'm just like, I feel so proud of you. I get this. I get this. My indie band has just gone mainstream and I'm not mad at it. I'm like, yes, more people should be listening to this band. Well deserved. Well, I mean, I, you know, I think we agree. This movie hits on writing, it hits on directing, and it has at its center a unforgettable horror performance. No, scratch that an unforgettable performance period that is really worth checking out. So you got your weekend planned up next. What is making us happy this week? This message comes from Vogue fashion culture, the people who define both on the run through with Vogue. Hear from designers, Vogue editors and icons like Halle Berry and model Alex Consani. New episodes every Tuesday and Thursday, wherever you listen. This message comes from WISE, the app for international people using money around the globe. You can send, spend and receive an up to 40 currencies with only a few simple taps. Be smart, get wise, download the WISE app today or visit wise.com, tease and seize apply. What is making us happy this week? Monica, what is making you happy this week? So about a year ago, I embarked on this really long project to finally get around to reading Robert Caro's The Power Broker. And I am so happy to report that about a year later, I finally finished The Power Broker. That's the way that works. Believe the hype. It's actually really good. It's also helped me appreciate a little bit more of my city's history, but it also has opened the door to, you know, bigger conversations about how policy affects day to day life and especially as, you know, midterm elections are ramping up, paying attention to the local elections is just as important as it is the broader, bigger picture. So I've also appreciated following the Instagram account segregation by design, which has a lot of videos kind of explaining Robert Moses' approach to public policy and what he did throughout the city. So if you're not into reading an over a thousand page book and don't want to carry it around, there are little shorter videos, learn a little bit about, you know, that whole side of the story of both New York City history, but also, you know, the effect of urban renewal throughout, you know, cities across the country. That's great. That is Robert Caro's The Power Broker, a book that has also been sitting on my virtual bedside for I'm going to go for a decade now. Is this thing like the size of the Encyclopedia Britannica? It's definitely a doorstop. Thank you very much. Jordan, what is making you happy this week? Well, what is making me happy this week? I'm really enjoying Margot's Got Money Troubles on Apple TV as I sit in anticipation for the return of Zyloseason 3 on Apple TV. I am a sucker for L. Fanning. I am so happy to see Michelle Pfeiffer. And I just have found the ways in which it handles these very like today and yet timeless emotional slings and arrows of this young woman. And there's just been so many moments where I, somebody who has not created an only fans account to supplement income for the child that I have as a single mother, not being in that scenario, I still find myself really feeling like, wow, this really is like, this is for everyone. You don't have to have created an only fans account to understand the struggles that Margot has and the light and joy that she finds in all these things. And the way like when you know that like a friendship isn't going to be the same going forward as it was in your past and like the heartbreak and the loss of that. So yeah, I just think it's doing so and Greg Keneer has made me cry like three times. Greg Keneer, the most every man that has ever every man, a blessing that he is for like a 40 minute dramedy that watching every episode, I feel like it's packing in so much and I'm just really loving it. It's making me very happy. Thank you very much. That is Margot's Got Money Troubles on Apple TV and we've got a terrific episode about that very show, which you can find a link to in our episode description. What's making me happy this week, Legends is a British series on Netflix that's kind of what if the Brits did the wire or a task? It's about a small task force of customs officials who go undercover to infiltrate and bring down some drug gangs in the UK in the early 90s and the title Legends refers to the false identities that they have to adopt to go undercover. And it's about the physical and emotional costs of living undercover, you know, doing bad things. And there is a really healthy British cynicism that keeps course correcting every time you think it's about to slop over into some of the kind of pat moralization that many American cop shows do. It reminds you of the wire because it's very clear that the thing driving all of these anti-drug efforts is politicians like Margaret Thatcher who want to score points and improve their reelection chances. And Steve Kogan plays the guy training the recruits and he kind of runs the ship. And this is one of those roles where he's playing it straight. And he's also playing a tough guy. You sold me on Steve Kogan. It's just a period piece then set in the era of of Maggie 90s. It's certainly early 90s. Yeah, and it's really it's suspenseful. It moves along. That is Legends on Netflix. And that is what is making me happy this week. And that brings us to the end of our show Jordan Cruciola, Manacastu. Thanks for being here. We'll have you back the next time. There is a really great little indie horror. I look forward to it every time. Oh yes, let's keep this going. And just a reminder that signing up for Pop Culture Happy Hour Plus is a great way to support our show and public radio and you get to listen to all of our episodes sponsor free. So please go find out more at plus.npr.org slash happy hour or visit the link in our show notes. This episode was produced by Liz Metzger and Mike Katziff and edited by our showrunner Jessica Reedy and Hello! Kim and provides our theme music. Thank you all for listening to Pop Culture Happy Hour from NPR. I am Glenn Weldon and we will see you all next week. We flush a lot of things down the toilet. You know, the obvious ones. But drugs like cocaine are also going down the drain and into our waterways. That's changing the animals that live in it. It's definitely present in most ecosystems on earth now, unfortunately. We're only sort of really starting to scratch the surface and do understanding the potential consequences of that. Forget cocaine bear. Learn about cocaine salmon on shortwave, in the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts. This message comes from Avallera. What's it like running a business with Avallera? No thinking about tax and compliance. It's handled. Calculating, filing, validating, accurately and audit defensively. Avallera, a genetic tax and compliance with confidence.
