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POLTERGEIST — The first suburban haunted house · MUBI Podcast

• 0:00
  Heads up, this episode includes terrified screams, demonic moans, exploding graves and scariest of all... spoilers.
• 0:13
  All right everybody, your host Rico Gagliano here and I'm talking to you while standing just across the street from a house that, when I was a kid in the 1980s, scared me to freakin' death.
• 0:27
  It is here in Simi Valley, California, just about an hour's drive north of where I live in LA.
• 0:33
  And if you didn't know anything about it, it definitely wouldn't seem scary at all.
• 0:38
  It was built in 1979, and it looks like it.
• 0:41
  It's two storeys, kind of beige stucco shingled roof.
• 0:46
  It's kind of big and blocky looking.
• 0:48
  It's pretty much the same as every other house in this very unassuming, suburban tract neighborhood I'm standing in.
• 0:54
  There's a guy a few feet away from me, you know, cleaning his car this morning.
• 0:58
  But that's exactly what was so freaky about it when it played the starring role in a movie I could not stop watching when it came out in the summer of 1982.
• 1:09
  The house looks just like the one next to it,and the one next to that,and the one next to that. Back then, I was living in an unassuming suburb on the east coast, in a smaller but equally plain mid-century house.
• 1:25
  So even though I was an easily frightened kid, one thing I knew I didn't have to worry about was that my house was haunted.
• 1:31
  Because like, that could only happen in super old houses where people died a long time ago surrounded by, like, gas lamps.
• 1:39
  Right?
• 1:46
  Poltergeist was a kind of haunted house movie I'd never seen before.
• 1:51
  One where the house looked like mine.
• 1:55
  What's happening?!Poltergeist. It knows what scares you.
• 2:04
  I was fascinated and also totally terrified.
• 2:11
  And it's still kind of terrifying looking at it right now.
• 2:14
  But years, actually decades later, on the other side of the world, a very different kind of kid watched that same movie and had a very different reaction.
• 2:25
  Her name was Anna Bogutskaya and she has grown up to become an amazing UK based critic, author, film programmer and podcaster.
• 2:33
  She hosts the horror movie podcastThe Final Girls.
• 2:35
  Her new book, Feeding the Monster, is all about horror culture.
• 2:39
  She's an expert on all things terrifying, is what I'm saying.
• 2:42
  And as you're about to learn in just a few seconds, unlike me, she ain't afraid of no poltergeist.
• 2:48
  In fact, when all of us at MUBI looked at the calendar, and we saw Halloween was coming up, she is the first person we thought of to guest host our new season all about creepy homes, like the one right across the street from me.
• 3:01
  You will be in frighteningly good hands with her.
• 3:03
  I will be back as usual in November, to host our next season.
• 3:07
  Meanwhile, take it away, Anna.
• 3:08
  And now I'm going to get the hell out of here because, frankly, it feels like this house is looking at me.
• 3:19
  Thanks, Rico. It's an honor.
• 3:21
  And people, as far back as I can remember, I wanted to be haunted.
• 3:32
  I know I'd go from rags to riches Ever since I saw my first horror movie, aged nine, which, if you're wondering, was Wes Craven's 1984 dream horrorNightmare on Elm Street, I wanted to know if there were ghosts and where I could meet them.
• 3:50
  But like Rico, I figured that the only houses that got haunted, according to the movies, were ancestral old homes, not new apartment complexes in the Olympic Village in Barcelona.
• 4:03
  That's where I lived.
• 4:03
  That is until Poltergeist.
• 4:08
  My clothes may still be torn and tattered. In which a sweet little suburban house, newly built, paint still fresh, got infested with nasty, meddling ghosts that pour out of the bedroom TV and abduct little Carol Anne Freeling, sending her family into a frenzy, trying to find a way to bring her back from the ghost dimension.
• 4:32
  I had a small box TV in my room and at night, much like Carol Anne, I would often tune in to static, trying to make out premium cable channels through the fuzz.
• 4:43
  Unfortunately, no ghosts ever emerged from that television.
• 4:49
  But that's the TV that I first watched Poltergeist on.
• 4:53
  The movie that took away the safety net of suburbia and made it so that every house was at risk of being haunted, including mine.
• 5:03
  A girl can dream, right?
• 5:05
  They're here. Welcome back to the MUBI Podcast.
• 5:20
  MUBI's the streaming service that champions great cinema and on this show we tell you the stories behind great cinema.
• 5:26
  Today we'll launch season six.
• 5:29
  We're calling it Haunted Homes and for the next five episodes leading up to Halloween, I'm going to tell you the stories behind some of the most terrifying and impactful haunted house movies ever made.
• 5:40
  Get out...House. In the last couple of years, between the pandemic, the housing crisis, the loneliness epidemic, the economic collapse, the other economic collapse, the rising rents, impossible mortgages and just the general state of the planet.
• 6:02
  Our relationship with our homes and our houses has completely fractured.
• 6:07
  And in times of crisis we, well, me at least, turn to horror.
• 6:13
  And there's nothing more terrifying than being scared of your own home.
• 6:18
  It has to do with the fact that the house, of course, is a shelter from the outside world.
• 6:23
  But invariably horror emerges from within.
• 6:26
  So it may be a shelter, but it also becomes a container for the horror that's inside ourselves.
• 6:32
  And we tend to project ourselves on our environments.
• 6:34
  That's Vincenzo Natali, writer and director of such horrors as Cube and Splice, and who's also, in his own words, A Poltergeist expert.
• 6:45
  Vincenzo is one of a bunch of folks I talked to, including Poltergeist star JoBeth Williams, about the making and the meaning of a movie that changed the whole haunted house genre and spoke to the changing state of mind of America in the 1980s.
• 7:02
  It was very exciting for young couples and young families to be able to afford a shiny, new, spanky new home.
• 7:10
  And that's why I think one of the reasons it's so shocking because you think, okay, these spirits can't have lived here that long because this house isn't very old.
• 7:19
  Oh, but they could live there.
• 7:21
  So lock your bedroom closet, trim the tree branches outside your window and cover up any clown dolls that you might have lying around.
• 7:30
  In this episode, we invite ourselves over to Poltergeist house.
• 7:38
  Horror and houses have always been intertwined, even before the movies.
• 7:43
  In fact, horror as a genre comes from Gothic novels, which were named after an architectural style.
• 7:50
  So the first Gothic novel, so named because it took place in a Gothic building wasThe Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole, which was written in the 18th century.
• 8:00
  And haunted house movies have been around as long as cinema itself.
• 8:04
  One of the first horror films ever made was sort of a haunted house movie.
• 8:10
  The House of the Devil, circa 1896, was made by film pioneer Georges Méliès.
• 8:17
  Considered by some more of a trick film than a horror film, with others calling it a vampire film because there's a bat that turns into a guy.
• 8:26
  Regardless of that, the most important part for me is that it takes place in an ancient, dusty building, and with that, it firmly established what a haunted house is supposed to look like in a movie.
• 8:39
  Even now, when I ask my guests,"What do you think of when you think of a haunted house?" The answer was nearly universal.
• 8:47
  To this day, I think it still conjures a Victorian house or an older house.
• 8:52
  Yeah, I probably think of a old Victorian house at the end of a street.
• 8:59
  It's night and there's a storm brewing behind it and probably a flash of lightning.
• 9:04
  That would be my classic.
• 9:05
  And it looks like everything inside...
• 9:07
  from the outside, you can tell everything inside would be covered with a thin layer of dust and cobwebs.
• 9:12
  Well, when I think of a haunted house, I think of haunted house movies.
• 9:15
  There was an outlier, JoBeth.
• 9:18
  I think of Poltergeist because I lived through basically feeling haunted for three months.
• 9:27
  But it actually took filmmakers a long time to populate the humble, decidedly not Gothic, American suburbs with ghosts.
• 9:35
  Maybe because they were the last place anyone thought of as scary?
• 9:39
  That is, until the imaginations of two suburbanites who grew up in the '50s, joined forces and made a film that changed haunted house movies.
• 9:49
  It's a movie about tightening your stomach musclesand keeping them there for two hours, you know, until something gives.Either the movie or your stomach. That is Steven Spielberg from an interview in 1982 talking about Poltergeist, which he co-wrote and produced.
• 10:04
  Spielberg grew up in the suburbs, and they formed his imagination.
• 10:08
  Just sort of based the lifestyle on a lifestyle that I'm familiar with.Growing up in suburban Phoenix, Arizona, in tract homes with cul-de-sacsand two car garages,and the suburban lifestyle breeds a certain kind of individual. A child of divorce himself, suburbia, with its promise of safety, coupled with the darkness lurking underneath the white picket fence lifestyle, is what Spielberg knew best, and it informed a lot of his work, starting with his 1977 alien passion projectClose Encounters of the Third Kind.
• 10:41
  What do you want?I just want to know that it's...
• 10:43
  it's really happening. That's the film in which a small suburban community becomes obsessed with the unidentified flying objects that suddenly appear in the skies of Indiana.
• 10:57
  It was a hit, and landed Spielberg his first Best Director Oscar nomination.
• 11:02
  But Steven had a problem.
• 11:06
  The studio that released Close Encounters wanted a sequel immediately.
• 11:11
  That seems like a good problem to have, right?
• 11:14
  Well, Spielberg's issue was that he'd been burned by the sequels to his first blockbuster, Jaws.
• 11:20
  He had no approval or input on them and he wanted to avoid the same happening to Close Encounters.
• 11:27
  So Spielberg was keen to be involved, for... quality control.
• 11:33
  He started working on a dark companion piece to that film, jumping off from the UFO research he'd already done.
• 11:40
  He came up with a story about a malevolent little alien that tormented a family and invaded their home.
• 11:47
  It was to be called Night Skies.
• 11:51
  We will witness the arrival.The search.The desertion. The idea marinated.
• 12:03
  - It developed.
• 12:03
  - The fear. The malevolent alien turned into a nice one.
• 12:08
  A lost little creature trying to get home.
• 12:10
  That, of course, would become the script written by Melissa Mathison, who gave it a new title.
• 12:17
  Steven Spielberg's E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.
• 12:24
  And Columbia Pictures...
• 12:27
  passed on it Because it was too, quote, "wimpy." Spielberg moved the project to a different studio, Universal.
• 12:37
  But E.T. and Poltergeist were birthed from the same germ of an idea.
• 12:45
  The core of Night Skies stuck with him.
• 12:47
  The concept of malevolent forces terrorizing a suburban family.
• 12:52
  The idea morphed.
• 12:52
  The aliens became ghosts.
• 12:56
  Spielberg pitched it to another studio, MGM, who quickly snapped it up,
• 13:01
  which created another problem for Steven: he couldn't direct both movies.
• 13:06
  which created another problem for Steven: Enter Tobe Hooper.
• 13:14
  which created another problem for Steven: Of course, if you're Steven Spielberg and you're about to make a great haunted house movie, and here comes the director ofTexas Chainsaw Massacre, which is made with such cinematic boldness and know how, and it works so well, why would you not hire Tobe Hooper?
• 13:33
  which created another problem for Steven: That's the voice of Mick Garris, a doyen of horror film, screenwriter, producer, director, podcaster, and close personal friend of Hooper.
• 13:43
  which created another problem for Steven: They met, actually on the set of Poltergeist.
• 13:46
  which created another problem for Steven: Mick was the movie's publicist, and it was there that they quickly bonded.
• 13:51
  which created another problem for Steven: On first glance, Hooper wouldn't seem like an obvious partner to Spielberg.
• 13:56
  which created another problem for Steven: In 1974, he had launched himself onto the scene of American independent filmmaking with Texas Chainsaw Massacre, a violent, verité style slasher that channeled the rage that young generations felt about the Vietnam War.
• 14:11
  which created another problem for Steven: He also made the hotel horror Eaten Alive.
• 14:14
  which created another problem for Steven: Into this house of terror comes a handful of unsuspecting innocents. And the circus themed slasherThe Funhouse,Who is mad enough to enter that world of darkness. While spectacle and childhood wonder are the key ingredients of a Steven Spielberg movie...
• 14:30
  which created another problem for Steven: Insanity is certainly one of the hallmarks of a Tobe Hooper film.
• 14:35
  which created another problem for Steven: The idea that, oh my God, are you gonna go there?
• 14:38
  which created another problem for Steven: Or not even having an idea of where "there" is, the marker is so far beyond what your imagination can take you to.
• 14:47
  which created another problem for Steven: Waiting for the harvest and the time of reaping. But characters in both of the Texas Chainsaw movies, are so out of control nuts, and entertaining, and you buy them as actual characters.
• 15:04
  which created another problem for Steven: There's a fearlessness and a relentlessness, but also a really dark sense of humor.
• 15:10
  which created another problem for Steven: And there's politics in there as well.
• 15:13
  which created another problem for Steven: That may be pretty well hidden, but there's social commentary all over the Tobe Hooper movies, and if you're a good spelunker, you can excavate some really good political messages from what he had to say.
• 15:26
  which created another problem for Steven: Hooper, like Spielberg, was also a child of divorce.
• 15:29
  which created another problem for Steven: Like Spielberg, he was a lifelong movie obsessive.
• 15:32
  which created another problem for Steven: His mother supposedly went into labor in a cinema, and like Spielberg, he too spent his childhood in a suburb, in his case, outside of Austin, Texas.
• 15:43
  which created another problem for Steven: Bottom line, it makes sense that Spielberg gave him a call.
• 15:47
  which created another problem for Steven: The timeline here gets confusing, but Hooper said that Spielberg pitched him the dark alien sequel to Close Encounters, but he wasn't interested in aliens.
• 16:00
  which created another problem for Steven: His thing was ghosts.
• 16:04
  which created another problem for Steven: Hooper had been interested in the paranormal for years since his father died when he was just a teenager.
• 16:11
  which created another problem for Steven: He told Fangoria magazine in 1982 that he had been working out of what had been Robert Wise's office in the Universal Studios.
• 16:20
  which created another problem for Steven: Wise had famously directed The Haunting, one of the most influential haunted house movies ever made.
• 16:26
  which created another problem for Steven: The only thing that Wise left behind in that office was a book on poltergeists.
• 16:32
  which created another problem for Steven: Hooper was fascinated by the technical challenge of ghosts.
• 16:36
  which created another problem for Steven: How to get the audience to feel the poltergeist's presence.
• 16:40
  which created another problem for Steven: And so I spent a lot of time going to seances.
• 16:43
  which created another problem for Steven: And they yielded nothing.
• 16:45
  which created another problem for Steven: It wasn't quite close enough to give you, like, what am I...
• 16:49
  which created another problem for Steven: what am I seeing?
• 16:51
  which created another problem for Steven: He worked for a while on his own ghost story with his mentor, William Friedkin.
• 16:56
  which created another problem for Steven: Just the director of The Exorcist.
• 16:56
  which created another problem for Steven: No biggie.
• 17:02
  which created another problem for Steven: But who could resist an offer from Steven Spielberg to work on a big budget studio movie that just happened to align with what you wanted to do anyway?
• 17:10
  which created another problem for Steven: And so Poltergeist had its director.
• 17:14
  which created another problem for Steven: What it needed next was a family for the ghost to terrorize.
• 17:20
  which created another problem for Steven: The first person they cast was JoBeth Williams.
• 17:23
  which created another problem for Steven: JoBeth was mostly a theater actress at this point.
• 17:27
  which created another problem for Steven: She'd done a soap opera...
• 17:28
  which created another problem for Steven: To make money, because theater doesn't pay very much.
• 17:32
  which created another problem for Steven: And a few movies.
• 17:33
  which created another problem for Steven: Kramer vs Kramer, where she played Dustin Hoffman's new girlfriend.
• 17:37
  which created another problem for Steven: And the Richard Pryor, Gene Wilder caper, Stir Crazy.
• 17:41
  which created another problem for Steven: She'd never had a leading role until Poltergeist.
• 17:44
  which created another problem for Steven: Originally, he had wanted Shirley MacLaine for that part, and she turned it down.
• 17:50
  which created another problem for Steven: And she later told me, years later, told me she turned it down because she didn't feel comfortable being involved in anything where paranormal involved children.
• 18:00
  which created another problem for Steven: JoBeth had her own misgivings when she got the script.
• 18:04
  which created another problem for Steven: Frankly, I had never been a fan of horror movies, so when I was offered the movie I said, "Oh, I don't-- I'm an actress.
• 18:10
  which created another problem for Steven: I don't want to do a horror movie." And my agent said, well, it's produced by Steven Spielberg.
• 18:19
  which created another problem for Steven: And I said,"Okay then, send me the script.
• 18:21
  which created another problem for Steven: I think this could be interesting." And it was.
• 18:28
  which created another problem for Steven: JoBeth would be cast to play the matriarch of the film, Diane Freeling.
• 18:33
  which created another problem for Steven: Oh, shit. Tweety, couldn't you have waited for school day? She's a homemaker and a mother to three kids.
• 18:39
  which created another problem for Steven: A teenager who disappears for most of the movie due to being a teenager, not 'cause she's abducted by ghosts.
• 18:45
  which created another problem for Steven: A young boy who is terrorized by the enormous, creepy, clown doll he keeps in his room at all times for... reasons.
• 18:54
  which created another problem for Steven: And little Carol Anne, who is actually abducted by ghosts.
• 18:59
  which created another problem for Steven: Diane's husband Steve, played by Craig T. Nelson, is a successful real estate broker, as his boss never tires of reminding him.
• 19:07
  which created another problem for Steven: I'm just not a developer.You're responsible for 42% of sales,that's almost half of everything down there.Almost $70 million worth of dwelling and properties. He sells houses, likes football and Ronald Reagan, apparently.
• 19:20
  which created another problem for Steven: When their children are kidnaped by ghosts, they are distraught.
• 19:23
  which created another problem for Steven: But they stick together.
• 19:25
  which created another problem for Steven: Their house might be haunted, but they sure aren't.
• 19:28
  which created another problem for Steven: They are a picture perfect nuclear family.
• 19:31
  which created another problem for Steven: If they bicker and tease each other, it's always in a fun, loving way.
• 19:35
  which created another problem for Steven: We would all like to have Craig T. Nelson and JoBeth Williams as our parents.
• 19:40
  which created another problem for Steven: Can you see me?
• 19:40
  which created another problem for Steven: Can you see Mommy? In fact, it was the family angle of the film that appealed to its star, JoBeth Williams.
• 19:51
  which created another problem for Steven: What took me by surprise was how much I liked the script and how drawn into the family itself, I felt.
• 20:01
  which created another problem for Steven: The dialogue with the family and the family story, and the sense of having a child that's gone missing really appealed to me, and I felt emotionally connected to it.
• 20:14
  which created another problem for Steven: Can you find me?
• 20:14
  which created another problem for Steven: Can you find a way home to us?I can't find you, I can't. JoBeth's character, Diane, is the beating heart of the movie.
• 20:26
  which created another problem for Steven: It's Diane who is at first, excited about the idea of paranormal activity in the house.
• 20:32
  which created another problem for Steven: Playful even.
• 20:33
  which created another problem for Steven: Okay, now just look. Just watch.
• 20:37
  which created another problem for Steven: She's positively giddy when she shows her husband how the poltergeist moved chairs around the kitchen.
• 20:43
  which created another problem for Steven: The chairs and her kid.
• 20:54
  which created another problem for Steven: It's worth underlining how important the Freelings are to the enduring success of Poltergeist.
• 21:00
  which created another problem for Steven: They were a fictional family you wanted to root for.
• 21:04
  which created another problem for Steven: They weren't troubled or haunted.
• 21:04
  which created another problem for Steven: Neither literally or metaphorically.
• 21:09
  which created another problem for Steven: You know, often haunted houses in particular surround the concept of troubled people or, you know, some kind of emotional disturbance.
• 21:17
  which created another problem for Steven: So it doesn't follow that usual pattern that haunted house films tend to have.
• 21:23
  which created another problem for Steven: And Steven and Diane, the father and mother of the Freelings family, are ex-hippies.
• 21:29
  which created another problem for Steven: I mean, they're smoking dope in their bedroom, famously, while reading Ronald Reagan's biography or autobiography or something.
• 21:36
  which created another problem for Steven: That scene, incidentally, is my favorite moment of the entire movie.
• 21:40
  which created another problem for Steven: It happens before all of the supernatural shenanigans start kicking off.
• 21:45
  which created another problem for Steven: After Steve and Diane have put the kids to bed and are having some time to themselves.
• 21:50
  which created another problem for Steven: The chemistry between Craig T. Nelson and JoBeth Williams is so charming, warm, effortless, and mostly improvised.
• 21:59
  which created another problem for Steven: I remember Craig coming up with that great bit where he's standing, looking in the mirror, and he's poking his stomach in and out and in and out.
• 22:07
  which created another problem for Steven: And, you know, this was not scripted.
• 22:07
  which created another problem for Steven: This was Craig.
• 22:11
  which created another problem for Steven: Your diving days are over.We're talking Olympics, Diane. Okay?- Let me see your tuck.
• 22:16
  which created another problem for Steven: - We can jackknife into the swan.A twist, turn and splash. You know, I think we felt that these were very hip people who, you know, were parents young and had smoked pot in college.
• 22:42
  which created another problem for Steven: And, you know, that's what allowed me to go with the idea, when Diane is in the kitchen and Carol Anne is sliding across the kitchen floor, you know, it's what allowed me to go,"Wow, this is so cool.""It's so amazing." So, you know, I was kind of able to roll with it because we were young and groovy and...
• 23:05
  which created another problem for Steven: They are the cool parents.
• 23:06
  which created another problem for Steven: We were cool.
• 23:06
  which created another problem for Steven: Exactly, we were the cool parents.
• 23:09
  which created another problem for Steven: The joking around with the ghost stops after they kidnap Diane's youngest daughter, Carol Anne.
• 23:15
  which created another problem for Steven: Mediums and clairvoyants come to their house trying to pinpoint who or what is haunting the Freelings.
• 23:22
  which created another problem for Steven: But in the end, it's Diane who goes into a literal Hellmouth to get Carol Anne back.
• 23:30
  which created another problem for Steven: Carol Anne, listen to me.
• 23:30
  which created another problem for Steven: Do not go into the light.Stop where you are.Turn away from it. Don't even look at it. I loved the idea that she would go into hell to bring her child back.
• 23:47
  which created another problem for Steven: I wasn't a mother at that time, but I wanted to be a mother.
• 23:51
  which created another problem for Steven: And so it called to a certain part of me that thought,"Yeah, that's what mothers do." They undergo any kind of horrible situation in order to take care of their children.
• 24:06
  which created another problem for Steven: So I was very drawn to her and frankly, identified with her in the way I sort of hoped I would be when I became a mother.
• 24:15
  which created another problem for Steven: - What do you think you're doing?
• 24:15
  which created another problem for Steven: - I'm going in after her.We'll come to you. Let me go.- You've never done this before.
• 24:22
  which created another problem for Steven: - Neither have you. A family that even ghosts can't tear apart is the divorce kid's fantasy.
• 24:33
  which created another problem for Steven: But there's more to Poltergeist than just the Norman Rockwell-like all American family.
• 24:38
  which created another problem for Steven: Actually, consciously or unconsciously,Poltergeist is kind of about that.
• 24:42
  which created another problem for Steven: It's actually tracking what's going on in America culturally and socially at that time.
• 24:48
  which created another problem for Steven: When we return in a minute,Poltergeist rips up the foundations of suburbia itself.
• 25:03
  which created another problem for Steven: MUBI is the global film company that champions great cinema, bringing it to you wherever you are in as many ways as we possibly can.
• 25:12
  which created another problem for Steven: We stream movies, we produce them, we release them in theaters.
• 25:15
  which created another problem for Steven: Movies from any country, from legendary auteurs to brilliant first timers, we've always got something new for you to discover.
• 25:23
  which created another problem for Steven: And regular MUBI Podcast host, Rico Gagliano- Hello.
• 25:26
  which created another problem for Steven: - Oh, hi. Didn't see you there.
• 25:28
  which created another problem for Steven: Hi. I've joined you here in this special.
• 25:31
  which created another problem for Steven: Let's just tell everybody it's a giant cathedral and there's, like, a glitter ball.
• 25:36
  which created another problem for Steven: - Why not?
• 25:36
  which created another problem for Steven: - It's absolutely not just a Google Meet.
• 25:40
  which created another problem for Steven: You're doing great, by the way.
• 25:40
  which created another problem for Steven: Thanks for guest hosting.
• 25:43
  which created another problem for Steven: So, anyway, what is up in the movie multiverse this week?
• 25:47
  which created another problem for Steven: This week I'm heading to the theaters.
• 25:49
  which created another problem for Steven: I'm going to see the new movie,The Substance.
• 25:52
  which created another problem for Steven: This is a MUBI release directed by Coralie Fargeat, won Best Screenplay at Cannes this year, starring Demi Moore as an aging film star who decides to take a medicine that will create a younger version of herself and then all body horror hell breaks loose.
• 26:12
  which created another problem for Steven: I'm assuming that this is on your radar, being the horror doyenne that you are.
• 26:16
  which created another problem for Steven: If you think that there's a Demi Moore starring film that I'm not aware of, you have not met me or know me at all.
• 26:24
  which created another problem for Steven: She used to be our favorite actress growing up and she's phenomenal in The Substance.
• 26:28
  which created another problem for Steven: Yeah, I'm glad you saw it.
• 26:28
  which created another problem for Steven: She absolutely kills it.
• 26:31
  which created another problem for Steven: Margaret Qualley plays the younger her.
• 26:32
  which created another problem for Steven: She is also amazing and this movie is so off the chain insane.
• 26:36
  which created another problem for Steven: There's nothing like-- I think seeing it in a theater is essential.
• 26:39
  which created another problem for Steven: - It really is.
• 26:39
  which created another problem for Steven: - By the way-- but actually, one other thing I'm psyched about this week is you have a piece in our online magazine Notebook, yes?
• 26:46
  which created another problem for Steven: I do. Introducing this entire series that we've been doing.
• 26:51
  which created another problem for Steven: It's all about haunted house movies and how they've changed over the recent years.
• 26:56
  which created another problem for Steven: As always, you'll find all the links you need and that we've referenced in the show notes for this episode.
• 27:02
  which created another problem for Steven: - Speaking of which, back to it.
• 27:02
  which created another problem for Steven: - See you.
• 27:13
  which created another problem for Steven: Poltergeist starts with a black screen and then a fuzzy shot of a staticky TV as the station signs off for the night with America's national anthem.
• 27:24
  which created another problem for Steven: The movie opens with the Star Spangled Banner and it ends with a TV being pushed out of a hotel room, like, it starts with the dual American icons of the Star Spangled Banner and television.
• 27:39
  which created another problem for Steven: It's a boomer horror film.
• 27:41
  which created another problem for Steven: That's by design, because Poltergeist is as much about the fake promises of '80s suburban America as it is about an ectoplasm infestation.
• 27:51
  which created another problem for Steven: But in my mind, it was a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans,windswept, God blessed and teeming with people of all kinds,living in harmony and peace. That's Ronald Reagan, former actor and former president, in his infamous 1989 speech defining his vision of America.
• 28:12
  which created another problem for Steven: For decades, by that point, his shining city on the hill largely took the shape of suburbia.
• 28:20
  which created another problem for Steven: After World War Two, there was a real problem with overpopulation in the cities and suburbs started developing rapidly, responding to a huge demand from returning veterans.
• 28:32
  which created another problem for Steven: Large numbers of cheap, identical houses popped up quickly.
• 28:36
  which created another problem for Steven: Malvina Reynolds sang about them in 1962.
• 28:39
  which created another problem for Steven: Little boxes on the hillside Little boxes made of ticky tackyLittle boxes on the hillside Little boxes all the same By the early 1980s, the suburbs were the place to be.
• 28:55
  which created another problem for Steven: The decade started off with a recession.
• 28:57
  which created another problem for Steven: Cities were seen as derelict, corrupt places.
• 29:01
  which created another problem for Steven: The suburbs represented the American ideals of home ownership, safety and complete autonomy.
• 29:07
  which created another problem for Steven: Even Poltergeist's credits take place over a montage of a suburb under construction, with model houses still up for sale.
• 29:15
  which created another problem for Steven: The Freelings completely buy into it.
• 29:18
  which created another problem for Steven: In fact, Steve Freeling's job is selling it.
• 29:21
  which created another problem for Steven: Well, you know, actually we were the first family to set up housekeepingin the Cuesta Verde estates. They're pioneers.
• 29:25
  which created another problem for Steven: With a commission.
• 29:28
  which created another problem for Steven: Yeah, it has that.
• 29:28
  which created another problem for Steven: But I think in a couple of monthsyou're not gonna be able to distinguish phase one from phase three to phase... Families like the Freelings could move to the suburbs and own their own little part of the land.
• 29:41
  which created another problem for Steven: It's the suburban fantasy land.
• 29:44
  which created another problem for Steven: More space. It's clean. It's safe.
• 29:48
  which created another problem for Steven: To me, suburbs seem like a nightmare.
• 29:50
  which created another problem for Steven: I'd never, ever want to live in that place.
• 29:52
  which created another problem for Steven: But for those people, it was an opportunity and kind of a dream come true.
• 29:57
  which created another problem for Steven: And as they are kind of on the up-side of the curve, things are great.
• 30:03
  which created another problem for Steven: And they're looking up and you know, social justice, what's that?
• 30:07
  which created another problem for Steven: You know, we have a saying around here?"The grass grows greener on every side." Yeah, that's the way I feel about it.Honey, I can't tell one house from the other.Made out of ticky tacky And they all look just the same But the suburbs were not all new kitchens and sunshine.
• 30:27
  which created another problem for Steven: How could anyone in the world have a problem with a day like this? The developments that were popping up all around America and the government effort to provide housing were mostly aimed at white families.
• 30:39
  which created another problem for Steven: The discriminatory practices of redlining made sure that suburbia remained mostly white, while African American families and other people of color remain concentrated in urban spaces.
• 30:51
  which created another problem for Steven: The suburbs were idyllic for some, but there was a growing sense that something was wrong with this picture.
• 30:59
  which created another problem for Steven: Actually, if you look at bothPoltergeist and E.T., it's like suburbia is under construction.
• 31:05
  which created another problem for Steven: Oh hi, Rico. Nice of you to drop by.
• 31:08
  which created another problem for Steven: That's, of course, Rico Gagliano host of the MUBI Podcast.
• 31:12
  which created another problem for Steven: It hasn't taken over the entire landscape.
• 31:14
  which created another problem for Steven: It's starting to spread further than it has ever before, but I think in Poltergeist it's also kind of like, yeah, right outside where your neighborhood is, there could be a giant graveyard or just an empty expanse of wilderness and like, you know, forces that are unknown, maybe beyond it.
• 31:30
  which created another problem for Steven: And in Poltergeist, there are literally dead bodies buried underneath the ticky tacky houses.
• 31:36
  which created another problem for Steven: The Freelings have fully bought into the American dream.
• 31:40
  which created another problem for Steven: They're fully selling it to others but they are ignorant of the fact that those pretty little houses are built on death.
• 31:47
  which created another problem for Steven: The entire development is built on a cemetery, which isn't on the brochure.
• 31:53
  which created another problem for Steven: Not exactly.
• 31:54
  which created another problem for Steven: No, but I never heard anything about it, though.It's not the sort of thing one goes around advertisingon a billboard or on the side of a bus. Because the real villains in this film are not the ghosts...
• 32:03
  which created another problem for Steven: It's the real estate company that is building these tract homes on top of graves that they haven't moved, that they haven't told anyone about.
• 32:13
  which created another problem for Steven: They haven't told anyone that they've built this entire thing on a graveyard, and the guy literally says, who runs the real estate company, he literally says,We've already made arrangements for relocating the cemetery.Oh come on.
• 32:25
  which created another problem for Steven: I mean, that's sacrilegious, isn't it?Oh, don't worry about it.After all, it's not ancient tribal burial ground. It's just... people.
• 32:35
  which created another problem for Steven: And even as all of this is going on,"this" being all the ripping off faces, the ghosts kidnaping and creepy clowns attacking children, the big real estate boss is still planning to build more houses.
• 32:50
  which created another problem for Steven: Starting phase five right here where we're standing.All of this can be your master bedroom suite.That can be your view.Interested? The expansion never stops.
• 33:01
  which created another problem for Steven: And it's in this moment that the Freeling dad realizes that...
• 33:04
  which created another problem for Steven: They've kind of, acquired their wealth in an ill-begotten way, even if they weren't aware of it at the time.
• 33:10
  which created another problem for Steven: And so it's saying a lot about, not just that generation, but about America.
• 33:14
  which created another problem for Steven: The Freeling's success literally turns against them.
• 33:17
  which created another problem for Steven: The TV swallows their daughter.
• 33:20
  which created another problem for Steven: The tree attacks their son, and the swimming pool they're building overflows with mud and rotting corpses.
• 33:28
  which created another problem for Steven: Your TV set is a threat.
• 33:28
  which created another problem for Steven: The swimming pool is a threat.
• 33:33
  which created another problem for Steven: And all the nice things that you enjoy in your home, become malevolent.
• 33:37
  which created another problem for Steven: And the film is really great at that.
• 33:39
  which created another problem for Steven: I mean, you basically have a gateway into hell...
• 33:43
  which created another problem for Steven: in the closet.
• 33:44
  which created another problem for Steven: It's not the Freelings that are being haunted it's the whole of suburbia.
• 33:48
  which created another problem for Steven: The whole idea of success.
• 33:48
  which created another problem for Steven: And in a way, the whole of America.
• 33:53
  which created another problem for Steven: I hate you, I hate you.You're gone, I hate you, I hate you, I hate you.Poltergeist was a new kind of horror film.
• 34:03
  which created another problem for Steven: Not only did it move the action to the suburbs, the very image of safety, but it also substituted atmosphere for spectacle.
• 34:12
  which created another problem for Steven: Usually haunted house films rely on atmosphere, it's all about what you don't see, you know, likeThe Innocents or The Haunting being the two, sort of, prime examples of great haunted house movies.
• 34:23
  which created another problem for Steven: It's what's implied that is frightening rather than what is seen.
• 34:26
  which created another problem for Steven: But in Poltergeist you see everything and more, like, it's one amazing visual or mechanical effect after another.
• 34:35
  which created another problem for Steven: And like the movie itself, making it was both a dream and a nightmare.
• 34:42
  which created another problem for Steven: I mean, it was probably the most exhausting shoot I've done in my career.
• 34:48
  which created another problem for Steven: A lot of things were demanded of JoBeth Williams in particular.
• 34:52
  which created another problem for Steven: Take the single line in the script,"Diane's feet lose her footing in the mud,"and she falls into the shallow end of the unfinished swimming pool,"sliding all the way down the wet mud, to the puddle in the deep end." The muddy swimming pool became much more than that one line in the script seemed to indicate.
• 35:12
  which created another problem for Steven: They turned this pool into this muddy hole that was supposed to be our swimming pool, that we were digging behind our house.
• 35:21
  which created another problem for Steven: And they filled it with mud that was made from peat, which was hideous.
• 35:26
  which created another problem for Steven: And it began to smell like...
• 35:26
  which created another problem for Steven: I don't think I even need to say it.
• 35:32
  which created another problem for Steven: They had huge 16 foot fans all around the pool, to blow the wind all around, and I was terrified that these giant electrical fans were gonna fall into the swimming pool while I was in there, and I'd be electrocuted.
• 35:50
  which created another problem for Steven: So Steven Spielberg said,"Look, I will come into the pool with you when we start shooting"and I guarantee you will be safe." And he put on waders, these giant fisherman's waders, and he waded into the swimming pool and stood there on the edge while I was in the middle of the pool with these skeletons that they were popping up around me, which I thought, of course, were prop skeletons.
• 36:24
  which created another problem for Steven: And about five years later, I learned from the prop man that they were not, in fact, prop skeletons.
• 36:34
  which created another problem for Steven: They were real skeletons that had been bought because they were much cheaper than making the individual skeletons.
• 36:43
  which created another problem for Steven: And there was the week-long stint on the gimbal set, a purpose built, fully rotating replica of the parents bedroom that was built to shoot Diane being thrashed around by ghosts.
• 36:56
  which created another problem for Steven: Which was again like a Ferris wheel.
• 36:58
  which created another problem for Steven: So I literally, for 50 takes, got dragged around this set.
• 37:04
  which created another problem for Steven: And the poor camera operator had to-- he was bolted to the set.
• 37:09
  which created another problem for Steven: So, I was kind of staying in place and the set was dragging underneath me.
• 37:15
  which created another problem for Steven: But, Dennis, I think was his name, he had to go round and round, and at one point he had to get off and throw up, poor thing.
• 37:24
  which created another problem for Steven: And of course, all the screaming.
• 37:27
  which created another problem for Steven: Oftentimes screaming at nothing in particular.
• 37:30
  which created another problem for Steven: Steven Spielberg would hold up a stick, a big pole, and he'd say, "Okay, so look up to the tip of the pole and scream." And Craig and I would look at each other and one of us would say,"What exactly are we screaming at?" And they'd say, "Well, we don't know exactly, but it's going to be very scary."Mom. Mom... And scary, it was.
• 38:01
  which created another problem for Steven: Poltergeist took horror seriously, even though at that time movie studios didn't.
• 38:08
  which created another problem for Steven: The studios were very snobbish about the genre audience and they ignored them.
• 38:13
  which created another problem for Steven: They did not give them the information they wanted.
• 38:15
  which created another problem for Steven: They didn't give them access to doing interviews and the like.
• 38:19
  which created another problem for Steven: It was Mick's job to change that.
• 38:21
  which created another problem for Steven: Connecting the movie with the horror community.
• 38:24
  which created another problem for Steven: To have the director of Jaws producing this new ghost story movie with the director of Texas Chainsaw Massacre, it reached both the mainstream and the independent side of fandom.
• 38:37
  which created another problem for Steven: They interconnected at times and overlapped, but never more than in this movie, so it was a very easy sell.
• 38:45
  which created another problem for Steven: And the results were spectacular.
• 38:48
  which created another problem for Steven: Craig and I had a joke between us that it would wind up being, like, a C movie that would show only in drive-in theaters.
• 38:57
  which created another problem for Steven: We weren't seeing dailies, so we had no idea how the movie looked.
• 39:02
  which created another problem for Steven: I mean, we felt okay about what we were doing, but I was actually shocked that it was as big a hit as it was.
• 39:10
  which created another problem for Steven: It was not just big, it was huge.
• 39:14
  which created another problem for Steven: Poltergeist came out on June 4th, 1982, and E.T. hit cinemas just a few weeks later on June 11th.
• 39:22
  which created another problem for Steven: The so-called "Summer of Spielberg" overtook everything.
• 39:26
  which created another problem for Steven: For an entire summer, you couldn't get away from him.
• 39:29
  which created another problem for Steven: It was the Barbenheimer of its time.
• 39:33
  which created another problem for Steven: That summer solidified Steven Spielberg as the movie maker of his generation.
• 39:39
  which created another problem for Steven: He was on talk shows.
• 39:41
  which created another problem for Steven: He was on the cover of Time magazine, he was on 60 Minutes.
• 39:44
  which created another problem for Steven: Spielberg became the poster boy for filmmaking itself.
• 39:48
  which created another problem for Steven: I don't remember there being a lot of coverage of the directors in mainstream American media.
• 39:56
  which created another problem for Steven: It was all about the stars.
• 39:58
  which created another problem for Steven: Between Poltergeist and E.T. that summer was transformative for the movies.
• 40:02
  which created another problem for Steven: It was the beginning of the summer that brought us Road Warrior and The Thing and Blade Runner and Tron and of course, E.T. and many others.
• 40:11
  which created another problem for Steven: So it was a very exciting time.
• 40:13
  which created another problem for Steven: And I also think, although I wasn't aware of it, that that was a moment where culture was transitioning.
• 40:21
  which created another problem for Steven: Movies in particular, because coming out of the 1970s, which was a great era of course, as a 13 year old kid, those films didn't excite me.
• 40:30
  which created another problem for Steven: They excited-- the films that were made in the 1970s excited me as I got older, but in the 1980s it was great if you were a young person.
• 40:38
  which created another problem for Steven: What a time to be a teenager in love with cinema.
• 40:41
  which created another problem for Steven: I remember walking out with my friend, thrilled and amazed by what I had seen, and probably not fully appreciating what I had seen.
• 40:49
  which created another problem for Steven: Not realizing-- like, thinking it was fun and great.
• 40:51
  which created another problem for Steven: Not really understanding oh, that this is something that I would be talking about well over 40 years later.
• 40:57
  which created another problem for Steven: It sounds lovely and simple.
• 40:59
  which created another problem for Steven: A huge success for everyone involved, for Steven Spielberg, for Tobe Hooper, JoBeth Williams, who got The Big Chill off the back of her work in Poltergeist, and Craig T. Nelson, who became the lead in the long running sitcom Coach because of the film.
• 41:14
  which created another problem for Steven: Even Columbia Pictures, the studio who had originally passed on the germ of the idea that would become E.T., won, sort of.
• 41:21
  which created another problem for Steven: They retained a percentage of the profits and made a killing despite not releasing the movie.
• 41:26
  which created another problem for Steven: Top marks for everyone.
• 41:30
  which created another problem for Steven: However, even during production, a rumor started brewing that has continued to plague Poltergeist for over 40 years.
• 41:39
  which created another problem for Steven: And it's not about ghosts.
• 41:39
  which created another problem for Steven: It's about credit.
• 41:41
  which created another problem for Steven: There was a camera assistant who said,"No, no, Steven Spielberg directed the movie,"and he was very actively involved and very visible on set." Because Spielberg was not only the co-writer of the script, he was a very involved producer.
• 41:56
  which created another problem for Steven: But this was not an uncommon thing for Spielberg to do on other sets, too.
• 42:01
  which created another problem for Steven: Like on the set of Used Cars starring Kurt Russell, which Robert Zemeckis directed and Spielberg produced.
• 42:08
  which created another problem for Steven: The same thing happened, and Steven was very involved in suggesting shots and the like, and Kurt Russell said, "Look, I can take direction from one person.""I don't care if it's Bob Zemeckis or you, Steven, but I can only do it from one." And Steven backed off and said, "You're right, you're right, you're right." There was nobody to do that on Tobe's set except himself.
• 42:33
  which created another problem for Steven: The rumors around directing credit have tainted Poltergeist for 40 years now, and at the time, they sparked an investigation by the DGA, the Directors Guild of America.
• 42:44
  which created another problem for Steven: I myself would see Steven on the dolly and working out, you know,"We can push into a two shot here," and Tobe watch and be agreeable to it.
• 42:55
  which created another problem for Steven: So there were certainly times where Steven's influence was strong, but Tobe's was also equally strong.
• 43:03
  which created another problem for Steven: He was an innovator.
• 43:05
  which created another problem for Steven: But you know, when rumors catch fire, they really can spread.
• 43:10
  which created another problem for Steven: And this was one of those that was too delicious for people not to devour.
• 43:18
  which created another problem for Steven: If you ask me, it's much more interesting to look at it as a pure collaboration between two singular filmmakers.
• 43:26
  which created another problem for Steven: Both Spielberg and Hooper brought their unique sensibility.
• 43:29
  which created another problem for Steven: Spielberg, the spectacle and sentimentality, and with Hooper, the visual audacity and political undertones.
• 43:37
  which created another problem for Steven: The appearance, the look of it, the photographic qualities of it, very much show Spielberg's influence.
• 43:44
  which created another problem for Steven: But there is a viciousness to it and a willingness to go there and an explicitness to it that is almost unheard of in a PG-13 movie.
• 43:55
  which created another problem for Steven: The coffins in the rainstorm coming up out of the swimming pool.
• 43:59
  which created another problem for Steven: The ripping the face apart fantasy.
• 44:03
  which created another problem for Steven: By the way, those are Steven Spielberg's hands ripping the face apart.
• 44:07
  which created another problem for Steven: - No way.
• 44:07
  which created another problem for Steven: - Yeah.
• 44:08
  which created another problem for Steven: Those are Steven's hands ripping it apart.
• 44:11
  which created another problem for Steven: Amazing.
• 44:12
  which created another problem for Steven: But there is a sense of, anything goes, here.
• 44:17
  which created another problem for Steven: When you watch Texas Chainsaw, you think anything can happen.
• 44:20
  which created another problem for Steven: And Jesus Christ, it does.
• 44:23
  which created another problem for Steven: In this, it needed to have that sense of tension running throughout that Tobe provided to the movie.
• 44:32
  which created another problem for Steven: It's one thing to set up a shot, it's another thing to conceive of the hills and valleys of tension and release, that make a really great horror movie.
• 44:43
  which created another problem for Steven: And that, that's Tobe Hooper right there.
• 44:46
  which created another problem for Steven: There are plenty of naysayers and Reddit threads out there about who really directed Poltergeist.
• 44:53
  which created another problem for Steven: I say there would be no Poltergeist without either of them and without Poltergeist, the horror and the haunted house movie would not be the same.
• 45:06
  which created another problem for Steven: We can see the influence of Poltergeist everywhere.
• 45:09
  which created another problem for Steven: In the huge exorcism spectacle of The Conjuring films, where a married demonologist couple helps families possessed by miscellaneous spirits, as well as in the Insidious franchise from the same filmmakers, which take its medium and her assistance directly from Poltergeist.
• 45:27
  which created another problem for Steven: Even the kids film Imaginary was hugely inspired by the 1982 film and how it captures childlike fear.
• 45:34
  which created another problem for Steven: And you can even see the influence in the ectoplasm of Ghostbusters, which came out only two years after Poltergeist.
• 45:42
  which created another problem for Steven: Before then, the ghosts were never gooey.
• 45:46
  which created another problem for Steven: But more than anything, before Poltergeist, ghosts mostly belong to the realm of the Gothic.
• 45:53
  which created another problem for Steven: What Tobe Hooper and Steven Spielberg did was bring them into your living room, through the TV, through the crack in the closet door.
• 46:02
  which created another problem for Steven: Your childhood home would never be the same, would never be safe again.
• 46:18
  which created another problem for Steven: And that's the MUBI Podcast this week.
• 46:20
  which created another problem for Steven: Follow us to hear more stories about houses and how they haunt us at the movies.
• 46:25
  which created another problem for Steven: Next week, we'll explore how haunting can be a mystery in Guillermo del Toro'sThe Devil's Backbone.
• 46:31
  which created another problem for Steven: Solve it, and the ghosts will leave you alone.
• 46:34
  which created another problem for Steven: There are things to be frightened of, which are fantastical monsters, ghosts, powers beyond our realm.
• 46:41
  which created another problem for Steven: But there are also things to be frightened of, which are perfectly ordinary.
• 46:44
  which created another problem for Steven: And that's quite often adults.
• 46:46
  which created another problem for Steven: Follow us, so you don't miss it.
• 46:48
  which created another problem for Steven: Until then, this episode of the MUBI Podcast was hosted and written by me, Anna Bogutskaya.
• 46:53
  which created another problem for Steven: Ciara McEniff is our producer.
• 46:55
  which created another problem for Steven: Christian Coons is our editor.
• 46:57
  which created another problem for Steven: Our original music was composed by Martin Austwick.
• 47:00
  which created another problem for Steven: Additional music by the band People With Bodies.
• 47:04
  which created another problem for Steven: Thanks this week to May Tsehay.
• 47:06
  which created another problem for Steven: And if you love the show, tell the world by leaving a five star review wherever you listen.
• 47:11
  which created another problem for Steven: Let them know we're not your standard movie podcast.
• 47:15
  which created another problem for Steven: And if you've got questions, comments, or just want to tell us about how your house is haunted, I'd love to hear it.
• 47:21
  which created another problem for Steven: Really. Email us at podcast@mubi.com This show is executive produced by Rico Gagliano, Jon Barrenechea, Efe Çakarel, Daniel Kasman, and Michael Tacca.
• 47:33
  which created another problem for Steven: And of course, to watch the best in cinema, including some of the films we mentioned in this very podcast, subscribe to MUBI at MUBI.com.
• 47:42
  which created another problem for Steven: Thanks for listening.
• 47:44
  which created another problem for Steven: Stay haunted.