This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:01] Jesse McAnally: A man came to the Prophet and asked, who is most beloved to us after you? The Prophet said, your mother. The man asked, then who? The Prophet said, your mother again. Then who? The Prophet replied, your mother. Three times? Yeah. The man asked again, who is next? And the Prophet replied, and then your father.

[0:58] Jesse McAnally: And Sarah, tell us a little bit about that film.

[1:01] Sarah Matthews: I'm so excited about this movie and to talk about it today. Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother is the story of a father trying to find a new role in his life after the loss of his wife. And recontextualize what fatherhood looks like in conjunction with his faith and the other activities he may have been up to previous to that in the face of this tragedy. And we follow him as he is offered a job and makes a decision about that job that ends up impacting his family's life as well as his own.

[1:45] Jesse McAnally: That's a very nice way of dad just tries to go out and get some milk.

[1:49] Sarah Matthews: Yeah, yeah, it's the milk journey. I didn't know what to go into this. So you and I chatted a little bit before we went and saw this. And I did not quite know the history of this, that this is basically the makeup film of this director, Mahershala Ali, since they didn't get to make Blade together, as was originally intended.

[2:10] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, I think it's a very exciting and personal project that we would have never gotten, you know, if they had been still operating under that Marvel machine. So I think it's very exciting to have something so very different because this clearly this is a pair who understand a certain level of each other's language.

[2:32] Sarah Matthews: It's really cool to see. I believe it's Basim Tarek and Mahershala Ali's collaboration here because it's the kind of thing you would see in the 70s, I would say. If you think a little bit De Niro Scorsese in terms of just saying, I mean, if you're thinking about the way that you can encompass a person who may not be an obvious hero necessarily or not a hero that you get to see often. And what his life and his community looks like. I think it's a really nice deep dive.

[3:08] Jesse McAnally: I agree. And I in the last few minutes, it definitely has its Scorsese influence worn on its sleeve a bit more than it does the rest of it.

[3:21] Sarah Matthews: I we say this and it sounds pretty heavy and we didn't really even talk about like the different patterns of religion represented where we have Mahershala Ali, a very devout Muslim man that is doing things against his faith. And then you have John Cho, another devout in his own way, Christian man. And then we have the Mormons down the hall. And it's very serious and very sincere. But the humor really works in this in a way that you forgot you could in a movie this dark.

[3:51] Jesse McAnally: Oh, definitely. I think that you get such a lightness within the younger generation. The two children that are speaking, there is also a baby. The baby has no real lines here, so can't really speak to his personality. But or her personality. Yes. But Qadir and I think it's Fatiha. Yeah. So, Jalil Kamara and Adia are just bringing a level of lightness to the story, even though they're playing children who have recently lost their mother.

[4:25] Sarah Matthews: I think that there is an understated different understanding of life from that part of childhood that is so fun and interesting to look at, even because it's so relatable, even in a community that may not look like much of the audience's community there. And another thing that is like a feeling that is hard to get conveyed in real life, let alone in film, is the post something traumatic and life going on where you're trying to find the new normal after it.

[5:05] Jesse McAnally: And it's so interesting. Like, there is a scene very early on where the father and daughter have a very serious conversation, but it was started with him catching her watching porn. And that is, you know, like, very interesting familial stuff going on, but also not really something you want to dive into after her mom died. It's like, they're walking a tightrope already. And it's an interesting kind of emotional landscape to be playing in.

[5:59] Sarah Matthews: I think there's a lot going on in this movie in terms of who's allowed to be a prophet. Just thinking about the three groups that you get to see between the Muslim community. Technically, you're seeing two Muslim communities, but we can also get into that. This evangelical kind of cult that has formed around this man, who experienced some version of a miracle by his own account. And then these Mormon kids who are sleeping, I don't know how many are staying in that apartment, but it's a lot, kind of being sent out into what is quipped about at some point is not a great neighborhood to kind of dismiss some other action that we see. So, interesting parallels between those three groups.

[6:48] Jesse McAnally: And I don't know if you feel this way, but when you and I were walking out of the theater, I feel like our opinion was, you know, it was all right. And the more I think about this, and the more I've kind of let this movie sit with me, the more I've liked it, and the more difficult it has been to describe to other people.

[7:06] Sarah Matthews: Yes, I was trying to pitch this movie to a friend at work, and I included, listen, I don't know how you market this, because there's so much going on. And I do think there's something, there's a hint, there's a nice little tip of the hat to Rambo in this movie. It's very small, and it's quick.

[7:25] Jesse McAnally: But I think that it made me think about those 70s thrillers, or thrillers action movies, and how we always, the things that people think about when they think about Rambo, or they think about Death Wish, or some of those other darker films that are dealing with loss, and responsibility, and pushing these men to the edge. People always think about those movies in the context of their sequels, and kind of the places they get to. You know, Rocky gets a robot eventually, but that was not what was going on in Rocky I.

[8:01] Sarah Matthews: The first Rambo is definitely a story about a man who's been failed by his community, his government, and is put in a difficult position. So I think harkening back to those films, that's kind of the only way that I could find the language to explain this to someone else.

[8:18] Jesse McAnally: The thing is, with those, they were so much more clear-cut. Even that first Rambo, as much as it is a real film in comparison to the other sequels, it had very clear, like, here are the people we're playing with. Here, it gets real muddy.

[8:35] Sarah Matthews: The thing that I struggled and bumped on on first watch was the emotional swings it takes in the last third are a little confused, like, narratively, for me. And when I think about it now, I just think about how well they were executed, and not how much they bumped on me.

[8:59] Jesse McAnally: I'm trying to speak against this so I don't spoil, so forgive me if I feel like I'm- but I think you and I know which moment I'm talking about.

[9:06] Sarah Matthews: Yeah. So I thought about that a little bit more, actually, after we spoke about it, directly after the movie. And I think that moment is very much in parallel with something that is said about Pastor Juan early in the film. Which leads him to have a bit more understanding for that character after a certain point. So I think that him finding something in Latif that he relates to is interesting. I think that the moment you're speaking to is actually- it's set up a little bit, but so subtly you'd never think about it.

[9:41] Jesse McAnally: Right. It may be a film that works better on several watches. And I'm grateful that Mahershala Ali is using the star power he still has from his two Oscar wins to make a film that is not marketable in the traditional sense, but still a crowd pleaser. I feel like audiences will have a very good time watching this.

[10:01] Sarah Matthews: Yeah, I think that you draw them in with the action, especially a- there's a certain audience that would have been excited to see Blade and to see that kind of action who may go and see Your Mother, Your Mother, Your Mother on that reputation. But you're running into these questions of what does it mean to be a man in this society? What does this role of a father look like in the modern world that I think are good for those audiences to see? It's healthy.

[10:31] Jesse McAnally: So, I'm interested to see what that response is like because it- yeah, there's just a lot going on. I'm very excited to watch this one again in the future because I keep- there are just these moments that I keep thinking about. There's a moment as he's struggling with his faith that he leans down in prayer and is remembering making love to his wife. It's just like a quick, split-second, beautiful parallel. Everything around him reminds him of her and her absence is so suffocating.

[11:22] Sarah Matthews: Yeah, I think there's also a level of honoring the mother that it- you're putting her on such a high pedestal, but it's also that there's so much devotion that should be going to her.

[11:49] Jesse McAnally: How much leftover goes to him? How included is he in the picture of this family beyond provider, which is the role he's fulfilled up until now?

[11:59] Sarah Matthews: And he provides through murder, which is not- despite what we're hearing in political ads, is not something that Islam preaches at all. In fact, they go into the proper definition of jihad in this, which is not what we have interpreted.

[12:18] Jesse McAnally: No, I think that there's a lot of misconceptions about Islam that are touched on in this film, but it's not too explanatory. I think that letting audiences do their own research there in terms of, well, what is this thing? And how- what- let me look this thing up. How is it parallel to things I know? I think that's nice because if you're going back to Scorsese, talking about, you know, these Catholic Italian communities, they're not over-explaining what's happening in those films.

[12:50] Sarah Matthews: It's either you understand what the ritual of the mass looks like, or you're expected to be able to pick it up through context clues. So I really liked not getting, hey, don't you remember? Here's the thing you need to know about.

[13:06] Jesse McAnally: And also, they're not explaining the religious customs. Like, I believe this film takes place during Ramadan, which means they cannot eat while the sun is up. And despite Lateef's crisis of faith throughout it, he follows that. And then we cut to him calling his daughter who is just eating potato chips, and she's not having dialogue about how she has this crisis of faith and how she's like all this. It's just showing the different ways that they value it.

[13:35] Sarah Matthews: Yeah, yeah. And that's, I think, another way that she's kind of finding solace in the Mormon missionaries in terms of their- they would have an understanding of customs that you have to follow and restrictions.

[14:51] Jesse McAnally: Playing a caricature, an effective caricature, but he would not have been the first choice looking at this character on paper, but he really brings it and has action chops as you brought up.

[14:57] Sarah Matthews: Yeah, I was trying to think about when we've seen him do action before, and I could only come up with the Cowboy Bebop live action series.

[15:04] Jesse McAnally: Didn't he like have a sword in Star Trek or something?

[15:09] Sarah Matthews: Uh, yes, I think it was a reference to the original series episode of "Mock Time," where Sulu's running around fencing when they all get a disease, a space disease that makes them do things.

[15:18] Jesse McAnally: Man, you are the total Trekkie and I keep forgetting that is something about you. I forget and then we talk and I'm like, oh, she just spit that out. Oh, yeah.

[15:25] Sarah Matthews: Nerd button activated. Yeah. But there's such subtle things to his character in this film, too. The film is set in the Houston area that's not necessarily called out in any way beyond giant Texas flags, which as someone who spent a little time in that area, that's just what it looks like. But there's subtle things too, because Jon Cho, despite being this preacher, has cross grills through the entire movie, which is very much that's kind of a type of ornament that started in that area. So just the little touches and he's so he's so bedazzled. All of his clothes are just so blinged out. It's great.

[15:48] Jesse McAnally: And he doesn't overdo the accent, which is always I don't know, like you didn't expect, you know, like, I don't know, a boy to hold Brooke in this role or something like that. And that would have been a very easy choice. And here it feels like I still struggle to imagine this man having this cult the way that he does. But I still I don't know, I really, I really dug him. But he does just kind of enter the movie at a certain point as opposed to like feeling like he naturally was built up.

[16:19] Sarah Matthews: Yeah, he's so menacing too that I think it's you can't overstate that when we're so used to a certain level of Jon Cho comedy or reassurance. His leading work in something like, oh, I'm forgetting. Is it "Searching"?

[16:29] Jesse McAnally: "Searching," thank you. This is such a different turn for him. And it's very exciting to see. I also really enjoyed someone else who comes into the movie at a certain point, who had the book Abu Bakr Ali.

[16:41] Sarah Matthews: Abu Bakr Ali. Yep. Who has done from my understanding, some theater and maybe an Amazon Prime. He was in "House of Dynamite." Everyone's favorite.

[16:49] Jesse McAnally: Oh, right. Right. Right. But he is just a love to hate him guy in this movie. And he's having so much fun being just a little scumbag. But he reminds me of a character pulled out of something, oh God, like "Euphoria" and just dropped into this world where we have all these very devout men and his only religion is debauchery and money.

[17:10] Sarah Matthews: Yeah, yeah. But I think that's another response to those higher, not higher control, like higher, higher level of devotion religions where you're seeing there are these rules and there are these tenets to be followed. And so when you have Latif engaging with this boy who he taught in Quran class, who has now become this, you know, porn prince, you can kind of see his daughter dealing with the idea that these are her pathways. This is what it looks like to follow as she's been taught. And this is what it looks like to rebel against what he's been taught, but still be in community because he's still under the protection of his uncle. He's still engaging with people in their community. So it's interesting that we kind of get these different parallels of what believing everything or believing nothing can look like.

[19:05] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, and I, but then you also have like, you know, everyone's kind of having a crisis of faith. And even like the most faithful people are kind of not good people. Strangely, I think our hero and our villain have more in common than this character Hattie. But it's still we find them compelled to protect each other in a weird way. It's not so black and white where I understand everyone's character motivation, but I emotionally understand it, but logically don't.

[19:43] Sarah Matthews: Um, I do think that there's something interesting about the refusal of the call and that the call might come for you anyway. How did you feel about the representation of sex workers in this movie?

[19:57] Jesse McAnally: I think it was a little complicated. I think that there's a discussion we had about the representation of women in this movie. But I also think that they it's not I don't necessarily want some of these characters to be learning lessons about feminism in the context of this narrative. I don't think it's the place for it. But yeah, I they're largely not speaking roles, minus a woman who has been involved with the porn production and then has left and joined to this church. Also the takeover of a strip club. I'm sorry, but if you go into a strip club, and it looks like you're in the Black Lodge, you're having a bad day.

[20:37] Sarah Matthews: Maybe that was just a production thing where it's like, this looks too strip clubby, maybe?

[20:41] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, yeah. But it felt like you were going into the Black Lodge a little bit.

[20:46] Sarah Matthews: Yes. And that's when the movie kind of takes a big old turn into a different film, from like a kind of down to earth kind of dead on a mission film to like, an action film.

[21:03] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, yeah. So maybe it is, I guess that visual kind of descent into hell is appropriate at that point. But the reality of this being a strip club, and it looks like this.

[21:14] Sarah Matthews: Yeah, yeah, I'm so intrigued by the choice to have these, this evangelical group kind of take over areas, but not really change what they are. It's something they talk about from early on in terms of their, their purifying these spaces, they're cleansing these spaces and coming in and doing worship. So it's, it's better now, but they're not changing anything about the reality of the space, which is an interesting statement.

[21:41] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, I mean, you also felt that about the final scene, without spoilers, that you felt it should feel a little bit more Scarface in production design.

[21:50] Sarah Matthews: Well, that's just personal preference. I think that based off the bleach job and the hoodies that that kid wears that he would probably have a big world that lit up with neon that scene, just that just feels correct to me.

[22:04] Jesse McAnally: Fair enough. Is there any other last things you want to say to wrap it up before we give our overall thoughts?

[22:09] Sarah Matthews: Hmm, I would say it's definitely a film worth watching for action fans, even if they're beginning to hear that it's not, you know, it's not, oh, we got this movie instead of Blade. So it's a blade replacement. He's running around doing blade stuff. It's a much quieter movie than that. But I think we're lucky that it got made. I'm it's definitely meaty. And it's definitely something that I'm going to have to go back to. I'm excited to revisit it, because I think I'm just going to see different things. Now that I kind of know where the narratives headed and kind of maybe see some of those points that we were talking about earlier, that may hint towards that journey a little more and tie in a little bit more.

But it's beautifully shot at the end of the day. I'll also say that it's so rare that you get to see people be sweaty in a movie. I mean, honestly, you see so many films that are people running and doing action and they're going to be in, they'll be in like the jungle and everybody is dry. Everybody is matte. Everybody's got volume lighting. So it's just kind of gray and nothing. But Houston's a sweaty place. And I think that the physical reality of that is apparent through the whole movie. Those are the kind of details that really popped for me.

[23:29] Jesse McAnally: And also, like, I like that the moon was white. I like that we had proper moonlight coming in through windows and like this beautiful on their skin tones. Like, you could see everything in every sequence. It was intentionally made. This was not a lazily made film, which makes me I've not seen budget projections, but I can't imagine this is going to be like a box office success. Like in a major way, but I think it's going to have a cult life and a big life beyond this as it should. I am actually really excited to see it again. I tried describing the plot to my fiance and she's like, You're not making any sense. I'm like, No, it works, though. It works.

[24:15] Sarah Matthews: Yeah, you're it's this meets. This is going to be five. Thanks. And they all it fits together. The only thing that I bump on is the ending. The ending felt a little a little too derivative for my taste, a little too. I don't know. I don't want to say it, but the ending didn't work entirely for me and kind of left me thinking I like the movie less than I really did upon thinking about it more. And if we had just recorded this while walking out of the theater, I think we might have been a little bit more negative than we're turning out to be today.

[24:43] Jesse McAnally: Mm hmm. It really sticks with you. It just has been rolling around in my head since we saw it because there's so many things that I come back to and I'm like, What was it about that? So I'm excited to see it again. I think I bump on the ending a little bit less on, you know, full brain marination, partially because of some parallels that we see with another character. So I'm interested and curious to see what that would feel like on a second watch.

[25:09] Sarah Matthews: I I'm excited to watch it again. Now, Jesse, what's your overall thoughts and your cheese rating?

[25:15] Jesse McAnally: Overall thoughts? I think that this is a it's a new kind of dad movie. I'll say that movie.

[25:23] Sarah Matthews: Yeah, well, some dad movies are sad, but it's just dealing with fatherhood in a very interesting way. And I guess my cheese rating would be Borson. So you would get those nice things that you expect with cheese up front. It's creamy, it's cold, it's a nice spread, but that garlic and those spices are going to linger and kind of change the texture of the other things they're interacting with over time.

[25:54] Jesse McAnally: All right, that's much better than what I'm giving it. I enjoyed this film a lot. I think that it stays with you a lot more than I thought it would. I think that it's going to be an important film as far as like cultural representations and bringing Mahershala Ali back to proper leading roles that aren't like the third lead in Jurassic Park, whatever. I am giving this Tillamook halal cheese because I think that's what these people would probably like to be eating.

[26:25] Sarah Matthews: I agree with that.

[26:29] Jesse McAnally: Sarah, thank you for joining me. Please promote where people can find you and follow you and hear more of your wonderful thoughts and see some of your wonderful films.

[26:33] Sarah Matthews: Oh, let's go ahead and send people to the 52 Scripts YouTube channel for now. We've just done another 48 hour film project and took second place in Detroit this year. So I would love to send people in that direction. There's a kind of another story of grief relating a little bit to this one that we just put out this summer. So that would be the latest and greatest.

[27:01] Jesse McAnally: Oh, that's exciting. And I've seen the film. It is a lovely, lovely short. I am always impressed with what you and your team do. I am a fans first. And I'm a real, real big fan of you, Sarah. Thank you for joining me to watch this. I hope you had a good time. And was it a big disruption to your evening? And hey, we saw a good movie. How rare is that?

[27:20] Sarah Matthews: We did see a good movie. How fun. Well, thank you so much for having me.

[27:24] Jesse McAnally: Always, Sarah. Thank you so much. And we'll see you next time on Cinema with Cheese.