HORROR BUSINESS Episode 143: KILL LIST & IN THE EARTH Horror Business

Greetings, and welcome back to Horror Business. We have one awesome episode in store for you guys because we’re talking 2011’s Kill List and 2021’s In The Earth, two folk horror-y entries from English filmmaker Ben Wheatley.

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We start by talking about what we’ve done involving horror recently. We talk about the new Demian Rugna film When Evil Lurks, Liam’s rewatch of The Haunting Of Hill House and It Follows, and Justin’s recent spooky trip out west including visiting Santa Cruz and a few filming locations of The Lost Boys, as well as the Winchester Mystery House and a night at Universal Studios Halloween Horror Nights. Justin talks about the films Astral Woods, Suitable Flesh, Dear David, and Where The Devil Roams. We briefly touch upon the series finale of the anime series Attack On Titan.



Up first is Kill List. We talk about how the film is extremely effective at gradually switching up tone and genre almost, in that it starts out as one kind of film and transforms into something else entirely that is still welcome.



We talk about the film’s effective but subtle use of classic folk horror imagery, including a connection to a “blood soaked past”, rituals of power to maintain power, and an emphasis on the “common folk” while also including a connection to the aristocracy.



We discuss the film’s “distractions” from the central theme of fatalism and how effective they are at keeping the film’s main goal under wraps until the finale.



We expand on the film’s examination of fate, and the film’s concept of sacrifices within sacrifices for a larger ritual.



Up next is In The Earth. We discuss the role of the COVID-19 pandemic in the film. Justin talks about how his expectations of how the film was going to be scary were kind used in a way to disguise the true horror of the film.



We discuss the theme of ecology as an interpretation of the mystical, and how the folklore of something is merely an explanation for a biological phenomenon. We talk about the concept of scientists seeking to understand something gradually becoming devotees of said something, and how scary such an idea is.



We talk about the film’s theme on the arrogance of science, and the idea that whatever thing is responsible for the phenomenon in this movie might not be an actual thing but instead a collection of reactions on behalf of the scientists that is being called intelligent by said scientists who are unwilling to admit it could simply be biological reactions.



We talk about how the source of horror for the film is the human reaction to the phenomenon and not the phenomenon itself.