Bonus Episode: Interview with the creators of The Retaliators

Welcome to Popcorn Psychology, the podcast where we watch blockbuster movies and psychoanalyze them.
My name is Bernie Brownfield and I'm a child therapist and I'm joined by
Ben Stover, individual therapist, Hannah Espinoza, marriage and family therapists. We're
all licensed clinical professional counselors also known as therapists who practice out of Chicago.
Even though we are licensed mental health professionals, this podcast is purely for entertainment
purposes and to fulfill our love of dissecting pop culture in all forms. Please
remember that even though we are all licensed therapists, we aren't your therapist.
If you are struggling with mental health symptoms, please find a local mental health
provider. This is a highly different episode than we typically do, but very
exciting. As you guys know, we talk about mental health as it's displayed
in movies of all different kinds, and so if you wouldn't mind having you
all introduce yourself to our audience and kind of talk a little bit about this
movie, The Retaliators. Go ahead, boys, I'm Darren Gear, one
of the Gear Brothers, a writer of The Retaliators. I am Jeff Alan
Gear, brother of Darren co write or of The Retaliators, and my name
is Michael Lombardi and I'm an actor. I produced and directed some on The
Retaliators, and I'd like to think of myself as a third brother in this
family. Sometimes you care a lot about it, guys, and it was
I'm excited to talk about the project because it's a special one, and I
think the tone of your podcast will allow these guys to tell a story and
an inspiration that I think makes us something a little different than perhaps other horror
thriller films. So thank you very much for having us. Oh sure,
thank you for thinking of us. I know we like to take sort of
like we like to take topics and movies that people don't think of that intensely,
and then we just go in and we just pull it apart in a
way that I think is helpful and people seem to enjoy. So I appreciate
you being here and being so game for my questions. So first off,
just introducing the movie for anyone listening asn't seen it. The Retaliators, I
hope I'm going to try to summarize if you guys can add to anything I'm
missing. Is about a family who loses their oldest daughter, their teenage daughter,
to violence, and so in order to try to get justice for that
situation, the father played by you Michael gets involved with a detective who has
a very specific brand of justice and how he deals with retaliating I guess when
things happen in their life. So, is there anything I missed about the
summary that you think will be helpful for the audience to know to give some
context to what we're going to talk about. Yeah, well, I'll let
the writers. I know that they'll have a couple of things, But I
just want to add to that that it certainly is a family. But I
think what's important is that my characters a single dad. So I think I
think that it plays into the story a lot in the relationship with his daughters
and sort of is part of the catalyst that drives him on this tale of
revenge. And I think anyone who has a son, or a daughter,
or or or or a niece or a nephew, you know, he's a
certain a shoe in to the understanding those feelings. But I certainly do feel
like, at least for my preparation for the role, there was a sort
of a heightened sense to what happens because of being a single dad. But
that that you gave it, You did a beautiful description to add that,
you know, and see if these guys had anything to sort of put people,
uh, you know, put people's ears and minds in the right place
when we hit this the rest of this cast. So yeah, no,
I think the the other thing to note about the film that uh, certainly
we found interesting in writing it, and again having to do with Michael's character,
is Michael is a single father in the film, but he's also a
pastor. And we what we thought would be would make for good drama would
be creating a character who is sort of like a sort of throwback to a
sort of classic quote unquote good guy kind of character, like a Jimmy Steward
in a Frank Capra movie, and really make him the real deal and earnest
guy, a very well meaning guy, not perfect, not you know,
no one is, but certainly you know, just a good person and someone
who is a true, true blue Pacifist. Have to then go through them
the the somebody tempting him into crossing some very very questionable moral lines in the
height of being sort of at the height of trauma, and we sort of
thought it would make for again sort of really to kind of amp up the
drama. So when the movie from there, without giving away where it goes
once he's brought to that line, but certainly some chaos ensues in a big
way. And so seeing I think the journey of seeing a character like Michael's
go through that makes for just hopefully very entertained a ride. That's the that's
uh, that was that was the intention, how the psychology or mental health
considered when writing a story that has grief and trauma. Like I noticed too
that there's the scenes in the movie where they're in even a grief counseling group,
and so it made me curious when writing something like that, where I
guess what informs that? Um, yeah, you know, in this case,
well in any case. Um, when it comes to writing, UM,
you know, Jeff and I pride ourselves on doing a lot of deep
research. A lot of things are left up to the imagination in writing,
but I also think there's a responsibility to really dig in and and be resourceful.
Um. In the case of the Retaliators, because the Heartbeat Wash was
based on a real life trauma in our family, we didn't you know,
we didn't have to do any research there, right, We were the nugget
of the first idea. When the idea first popped up, which was what
if there was this? It showed up in the form of what if there
was a service for family members of crime victims that provided them one minute alone
as sort of a healing. It wasn't even really thought of as that original
thought wasn't even it was just as sort of a healing. But then the
title the Retaliators kind of came along with that thought. That happened right as
we were going through my sister was our sister was going through the trial phase
of her whole ordeal, which was very grueling and very long and very difficult
to go through. So there's just you know, it doesn't take too much
of a leap of imagination to figure that, you know, psychologically, that
sort of idea would kind of pop out. Um. So as far as
you know, uh, you know, now we weren't grieving a death,
um, but we were grieving a a trauma, and so we sort of
kind of use the emotions we were feeling and and you know, really one
would feel when someone close to you goes through something as heinous as what our
sister went through. Uh, we were able to sort of tap into that,
uh for you know, dealing with with sort of Bishop and really I'm
also a father and uh and it was sort of it was you know,
it really was in having a conversation with my dad and hearing his experience of
being in the courtroom that made me connect to me being a father. And
then then now imagining this is one of my children. I'd already been sort
of caught up in the you know, the frustration and pain with it being
my sister. Then trying to then put myself into my dad's shoes. That's
what really brought me to, you know, that place. And that's really
kind of where Bishop was born from that the character Michael's character in a movie.
So a lot of the research was kind of more homegrown, like from
like internal exercises. Almost. Yeah, Okay, that's really interesting to know.
It makes me curious. But the question I'll have later but maybe you
can ruminate on it is sort of how do you practice self care when engaging
in a piece of work, a piece of artwork that is not just like
psychologicalically heavy in a general sense. But then it seems like what you from
what you just shared also has a close personal tie to your own story.
Yeah, you know, Jeff, you go ahead, Jeff, I was
baffling. Go ahead, yeah, yeah, No, no worries, no,
no, no. I think it's a great question. Um. It
really got my mind going on it because I never really thought of it that
way. Um, because well, I think one thing we did that didn't,
you know, make it too difficult for us to be that close to
it was that, you know, the story that we're telling is not exactly
the story of our of our sister. Um, so it kind of put
us with some distance to to that. You know, I think if we
had been writing, you know, the true story of what happened to our
sister, Yeah, there'd be a lot of you know, um, concerns
about self care going through that kind of process in a way that that felt
very daunting to me and to me and Darren. And also we don't we
didn't feel like the kind of we were in a position to exactly tell that
that story. It felt like the story we wanted to tell had more to
do with the family members of the victims, but we didn't want to sort
of tell her story through our point of view. Instead, we thought,
well, let's tell the point of view of the victims of family members,
but a different kind of tragic event. And so I think, you know,
it didn't feel very challenging in writing it, even though the heartbeat the
story was that very tragic event. And I think that was just due to
the fact that we didn't we didn't do exactly her story, but still in
a way we're able to tie it in. And that's where I feel like
that was the beautiful thing about it, was that we were still able to
honor our sister um and get our story out there while still making a piece
of you know, entertainment. Yeah. What these guys always said to me.
Look, they want to make a fun, entertaining film. Um,
they're huge fans of the genre. They understand the genre. But it was
an actually a healing uh therapy this is and again they're here so they can
talk, right, And they said to me, you know, because I
fell in love with the script the moment I read it. It jumped off
the page, the characters and the thing is, you write what you know,
and I knew it was good writing. And then to find out the
inspiration of the story, which I think we should get to and uh,
and we will because we've talked touched upon it a little bit. But Darren
said to me, you know, uh, we were going through all this,
and I said to my brother, you know what if there were a
service where you could have a minute alone with the person who harmed your loved
one? And they started to go off on this thought. And the bottom
line is that's the foundation and the number one provocative question of the entire film.
If you had a minute alone with the person who heard or killed your
loved one, would you take it? So this was a now, guys,
please take over. But it was sort of a healing process for you
writing a fun, entertaining story and sired by your sister's tragedy, which is
why it's so real and it makes you think a lot when you're watching it,
even though it's fun. It's a popcorn movie. You definitely think.
But go ahead, boys, Yeah, no, I it's a good segue
to what I was gonna say, Michael, which was writing itself is self
care in general. For I know, for me and and Jeff, I
don't want to speak for you directly with that, but for me, one
of the things coming to discovering writing. Sort of been writing all my life
in a way, but never doing it formally. Um and Jeff and I
made the decision about five years ago to say, hey, let's let's take
this dream we've always had, let's really do it. Let's let's really go
for it. And what I couldn't have imagined was how therapeutic writing in general
is, so even when it would rub up against because there's certainly a lot
of easter eggs. You know, there's this scene in the movie you know,
spoiler spoiler alert, when when the scene when the daughter is killed is
very much a surrogate for you know, the incident that happened with Jody,
you know, the real life incident, and so you know, that's an
example of it's not wasn't an easy scene to write, um, but in
writing it, it felt like therapy, you know, it felt I had
no idea how how sort of therapeutic it would be. I've also lived with
anxiety disorder for most of my life, um uh, pretty severely, and
I writing has is a very very uh sort of meditative has become an extremely
meditative, pleasurable thing. So I mean, I love writing. You know,
I hear a lot of interviews with sort of self self loathing writers that
sort of I hate to write. And I and I we're huge fans of
Almore Leonard and I love seeing him. When he would give interviews, he'd
be like, I love writing, I just I can't wait to write.
That's very much where we come from, like we we love it, you
know. So on the other hand, the film and acting in it is
was actually quite self destructive making this thing during COVID and playing this character,
and you know more more I'm joking because at the end of the day,
what I've gotten out of it it has been therapy. And I guess you
get to do that as an actor when you're looking through other people's sort of
playing different characters and seeing things through an imaginary sort of circumstance and trying to
understand what people go through, you know, to or what they have gone
through to find the truth in it for yourself in a scene or an objective
or of a person. But you know, it was the film notes filming
during COVID and the different obstacles we had making a movie was definitely challenging to
all of us. Yeah, for sure, I bet you know, what
you all are bringing up are actually therapeutic activities or exercises like writing a trauma
narrative give be a very powerful way to process through something that's happened to us.
Also, psychodrama is another therapy technique where you put yourself in the shoes
of someone in your life that you are in relationship with or maybe even caused
harm to you as a way to work through some things. And that's actually
like something people do a lot in family therapy. That's interesting to know,
So I'm not surprised to hear that you are feeling that, even if you're
like not intentionally going in thinking of it as a therapy get exercise, it's
not surprising to me that you're getting the benefits of it. So that's nice
to hear as someone who's just a watcher of things like this, and to
kind of build on what you were talking about, Michael, in terms of
like psychology and mental health. When playing a role like this and having to
get immersed in these experiences, what is there anything that you pull from psychology
or mental health that forms the way that you act in these kind of roles.
Well, I'll tell you this, So getting into the character and trying
to understand what the loss would be. Right, he loses it, So
then what did that feel like? Where what's the shoe into that? Of
course I have a six year old son, so you have to go to
these crazy places that you don't want to, to put yourself in an imaginary
circumstance of something happening. And you do all this work, right, you
do playing a pastor. I went to sermons and you kind of you just
do all this layering I watched. I told Darren I did a lot of
work with Darren too, and we talked about the character because that's the beauty
of having the writers there. If you're lucky enough to have that, it's
pretty amazing to have access to the writers and get in their heads. But
I went to I saw this YouTube video and it was this guy who he
literally if you were to cast a math teacher like a characterature of like a
math teacher, right. He was a very guy, it was, and
this is true, this is a real thing. He was in court and
he had the moment to tell his son's killer to uh, you know,
at the end of the trial, and there were two on each side of
him. There were two court officers, right, they're on each side of
him. And he stood there and the guy who was up on up next
to the judge up in the bench was like a huge guy to it big
and this is the guy who killed this man's son. And he got there
and he stood there and he started to do his speech and uh to him
and express his his words, and he let out this moan from the depths
of his soul. It was like so, and he was like and it
came so, and he grabbed he had a pen and he jumped over the
railing on and he tried to start stabbing the guy and the court officers had
to pull him off, and they kind of they understood, they were careful
with him, you know. And it was the first thing. And it
was that that was my first little shoe into this, you know, Uh,
seeing what happens in this film and the tragedy that occurs with this family
and me and my daughter, that that primal, primal instinct and to see
it with this guy who was so on you'd never suspect this man to enrage
like this, and it gave me the chills. This is just a true
like just in searching finding things, the psychology into this character and this circumstances.
So look, you layer it all in right this other things. We
Darren and I did backstory together of how my guy became who he was,
and then you let it go and you trust it and you trust it's in
there, and you put your two feet on the ground and you listen and
answer in the scene. And it's kind of like like if you try to
play the result of it too much, you know about sort of fine ending
that pinch, not the ouch. So you never want to push in terms
of getting into this because again I'm getting into the acting a little bit and
maybe a little off track. But why I'm doing that is because there's nothing
more important than trying to find the truth in their story and these circumstances and
to sort of tell the truth so it can touch other people in a way
in a way that maybe they can't understand or understand in a truthful way.
So you know, it's like if a person was in a concentration camp,
you know, and you met them at a bar and you were talked to
start at a dinner and started talking. They don't that might come out way
later or conversations later, but it's not like they wear that on their sleeve.
Right. So the point being is we all have things inside of us,
crazy thoughts, things that have happened, things that and and you want
to do this work. If you can't connect or if it hasn't happened in
yours, you create the imaginary circumstance of it, and you layer it in
and then you go and play the scene. Okay, that's great. One
thing I also wanted to ask, and I don't know if this will be
not a provocative question, but a part of the theme of the movie.
I picked up on a sort of the concept of closure, Like you guys
are talking about if you had one minute with the person who wronged your family
or harmed someone you loved, what would you do? And so I'm curious,
does this play into or does this part of like the fantasy of closure
and sort of what are this kind of a big question, But do you
guys have any like personal perspectives on the concept of closure. Therapists were a
bit of jaded about that concept. So I'm just curious if in writing this
film, I guess where your head where are your heads at with that concept?
Well? What I guess I could I couldn't have known until sort of
here we are, because now you know the It started as this script idea
that we approached our sister about and got her blessing, and then it as
Michael alluded to it, it was a very long, crazy adventure, as
making any movie is, but navigating the early days of COVID was herculean to
to say the least. But now having the film, it was before anyone
saw it. When we finally got to see the finished film, and when
I say we, I mean Michael, Jeff and myself with our editor,
we were at the sound stage and watching the finished film. It was a
very it was a very satisfying experience, and not really that we hoped somebody
would connect with the film. If even if a few people do, great,
because you never know how people are going to respond to a film,
and we certainly had no idea from their thirty film festivals, and you know,
just tons and tons of amazing feedback about the film and watching Jody,
you know, we've got to experience now being on two stages with her and
to watch an audience clap for her, and to get to see her walk
around and shake hands and be this be the inspirational force that she is,
and she had. She was the one who had the bravery to say,
hey, use my name. I want you to use my name. I
want you to get my story out whenever however you can. And it takes
a lot of courage. I mean, I don't know if I could say
that. I don't know if if I had gone through what she went through,
if I could at some point in my life go hey, yeah,
just throw my story out there, get my name out. I just want
to be an inspiration for anyone suffering PTSD in the world. I mean,
it's a pretty bold thing. But to experience this sort of people getting a
lot of entertainment value from the film, also having a meaningful and sort of
a profound experience in hearing about Jody's story the inspiration because we've now got to
tell her story and many interviews, and like I said, seeing her on
stage is what it showed me as far as closure goes, is that I
feel like to a degree to you know, never I don't no, I
don't know if you could ever have complete closure on on something that that traumatic.
I don't know, but I can tell you that I have learned that
through art through art and creativity and getting together. Um we I think we
did create a sort of triumphant, cathartic experience for us as a family.
And uh, going back to the origins of Jody's story and talking about art
that also relates to Michael Lombardi and relates to the show that he was on
Rescue Me. Um, you want to take it from there, we tell
what well, Brittany, sorry to interrupt, but I think we need to
hear the story of what happened to Jody. And again, you know,
Brittany, I never want you to think that we're sort of well, these
are her brothers she wants to or told. We never want you to think
we're like sort of exploiting this. It's something that inspiration and something that was
discussed. But I think we've been talking about the inspiration and their sister and
this this uh traumatic, traumatic experience. So if you're if you're open to
it, I think these guys should be able to tell you what happened.
And I think it ties in. It ties in. First of all,
it is the story the film, and it's the inspiration, but it'll tie
into the podcast quite nicely as well. The subject matter sure I'd love to
hear it if you as are open to telling. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
of course. Um So, basically it was essentially gotta get my dates
right on. This time just flies. But it was maybe roughly sixteen years
ago or so. My sister, she was very young. She was walking
home from a friend's house, a couple like a block or two away from
her house, and this is a suburb in northern California town. She was
with her friends. Then she was like alone literally for just a matter of
a few minutes. It was late at night. She thought she heard a
jogger running behind her, and she just heard these really loud footsteps, and
she was walking next to a ravine. There was like a little section that
was sort of near a highway and there was like this ravine as she again
she was walking into her neighborhood, and she said she had a moment of
going, gosh, who's jogging this late at night? And she moved to
the side to sort of give the person space, and literally, next thing
she knows, she is tackled full force down this twenty two foot ravine.
So from there, this is where the horrors really began. This person assaulted
her viciously raped her and really attempted to kill her. She she had a
belt around her neck. Um. She miraculously survived and sort of um outwitted,
fought, did everything she could to get out of there, and she
ended up getting out of there, UM climbed out track um tracked down a
car and was she very luckily survived because the odds of a stranger attack of
that sort, the odds of surviving that are very very low. They're very
low. It's typically a murder um and those kind of attacks are very rare.
That gentleman was a column a gentleman. That person was not caught for
years and years. Um. Ten years went by and he was not caught.
And then after her ten years advancements in DNA, they got a DNA
match because this guy was attempting to do this to someone else. And what's
very scary about the whole thing is that it was in the same area ten
plus years later and he was a taxi driver, so he was caught.
He ended up going to trial and that's when the trial phase began that went
on for a long time. That's when the nugget of the idea was sort
of born and for the movie and then the as I say, there are
sort of multiple happy endings here. One the most important happy ending is that
Jody, our sister, not only survived, but after a very difficult subsequent
years of PTSD, ended up thriving and becoming a very successful, happy,
healthy person. And she happens to be one of the few female fire fire
captains in the United States. And she's just awesome, awesome human. She's
she's she's the best. The second happy ending is the guy was convicted and
he was virtually put away for life. He'll he'll come up for parole when
he's an old man, and hopefully we'll be able to keep him in there.
And then the third part being you know when this all start, this
all right around the same time as we had come up with this idea.
Independent of that, Jody had approached us and said, do we know anyone
in the in the documentary space. She said, you know, after everything
she went through with pe TSD, she wants to give her story out so
that she can be an example that you can get through it, that there's
ways, there's there's pathways through really really severe PTSD. And we attempted that.
We attempted to find you know, jeez, I don't know if I
know anybody in the documentary space. And we did some digging and looking,
and then on a whim, brought up the retaliators as like, hey,
you may think this is a crazy idea, but what do you think.
She went great, I don't She's like, I don't care. Yeah,
if you can make it into a movie and you can use that as the
platform to get my name out, please And we told her, you know,
it's not going to be your exact story, but it'll be a kickoff
point and blah blah blah, and she said, yeah, do it.
Do it. You have my blessing, go do it. So the weird
part where this connects up to Michael is that when we finished the scriptum,
the first person and we sent it to was Michael, and Michael responded to
it very very quickly, and was essentially he was on a plane in three
days. He's on the East coast, we're on the West coast, and
he showed up at our doorstep in three days and was like, Okay,
I'm going to get this movie made where you know, I'm born to play
this role of John Bishop and I'm going to get this movie made and we
formed a partnership basically right away independent of this. What I did not I
was not even aware of, was that my sister in Well, Michael,
why don't you tell this part of the story, because this is sound cool
coming from you. Well, I think you're doing a great job. But
yeah, so so basically, she was in probi school right during the time
of when this happened. She was a firefighter training school. This is when
she was around eighteen, right when the when the attack happened. Darren.
Yeah, she then ended up, as Darren said, becoming a firefighter.
And I was on a television show called Rescue Me, as Darren said,
early, which is about New York City firefighters post nine to eleven and the
issues that they and that sort of the demons that they deal with on a
day to day basis. And it turns out that that was Jody's like favorite
television show and it was, as she tells it, part of her healing
process. It made her laugh and it made her cry, and it made
her see firefighters as real human beings who were fighting these demons and had PTSD
and all these different issues. But we're still going into burning buildings to save
people and still doing their job. And one of the things that was interesting
about about Rescue Me was we the guys had issues in the firehouse, you
know, and and it was funny because we would, uh, there were
firemen at the time who had issues with the show because but but it was
more more like the senior guys did and then they, you know, at
the end of the day, after you know, a hundred episodes, they
got it because we did have you do have to hollywoodize something a little bit,
but it was issues like this, like the Captain and the show,
he's an old man and he's has a gambling problem and he's walking into a
an old woman's apartment and he he's not that old. I said he was
an old man. And he opens he kicks a pot like the cabinets sort
of doors open and money falls out, like that's where she hides her money
and he takes it because of his gamble issue and then he does end up
returning it. But just the different things that these guys had to go through
his human beings on the show, and that's what I'm most proud of of
being on a show like that. Dennis Leary, he wrote it, he
produced it, he started it, he co created, and like in Fires
for instance, it was all smoke. He wanted it, so it wasn't
like man against flame, like Backdraft. He wanted aotic point is very real.
And Jody latched onto this show because she was a probationary firefighter. And
here's the crazy serendipitous part is that I mean it all is, but that
I played the probe. I was the probationary firefighter. So she connected with
my character a lot. And it's so interesting that as these guys tell it
and Jody that I was her favorite character, and then here I am the
lead in her fan. And these guys didn't even know this, right,
I didn't even know it. We didn't know. I figured, well,
knowing she was a firefighter, well she must be a rescue me fan.
And I remember when I first told her I knew Michael Lombardi and I was
working with him. She didn't even believe me. She and she was like,
yeah, right, I said, no, I did because we worked
in music together years before. It's where we met. And come to find
out, she didn't really believe me. She was like, I just couldn't
believe it because she was turns out, completely obsessed with Michael and his character
and was just like you know, she she really credits the show as helping
her in those times. She said she just kind of watched it on a
loop. So when we told her Michael was the star of the film who
was in a way sort of surrogate her father in the movie because you know,
the character's named John, My dad's name is John. Not a coincidence,
you know, um uh and uh, And so you know, it
was beyond we called her. We facetimed her because I finally started realizing she
wasn't believing me, and Michael was over and he facetimed her, and she
was in her firehouse and the show, you know, Rescue Me in a
Firehouse is about as you know, it's about as uh uh you know,
they put it on a very high pedestal, as like the only you know
firefighters show worth its salt. And so she's running around the firehouse showing everybody.
Michael Lombardi's on the phone and freaking out and it's it was, it
was, It was hilarious. So but it really made it like, wow,
unbelievable. Yeah, and I just wanted to add um, Brittany,
because I know you were asking about closure and like how all this sort of
relates to closure and what our maybe our personal opinions are about it, and
um, you know, I you know, I think I'm with you maybe
having some kind of or I don't know if you were expressing that opinion for
yourself or just for the general uh you knows a psychologists. But you know,
I'm pretty skeptical of the concept of closure. I actually I think that
might be what drives people to want to take revenge. You know. It's
this desire to make it all go away forever, you know, this awful
feeling and to sort of settle the score once and for all, and really
like in writing the film and doing all these great things, all these wins
that we really had with telling, you know, helping Jody's story get out
there. I don't look at it as closure, but in a sense,
it's like the writing of the script itself. It's it's this outlet for giving
it some air, you know what I mean, of coping with it as
it comes, you know, And I think that you know, this doesn't
make the traumatic event that happened to Jody go away, you know, but
it but it is a sort of vessel, a sort of you know,
maybe direct or canal to direct that that trauma through as as it becomes more
difficult to deal with, you know, or if it does arise out,
you know, arise it away where it is difficult to deal with. So
so yeah, I think it's It's an interesting way to frame the question because
I do think that in a sense, the you know, one of the
anti heroes of the film in a sense also a villain, Jed. I
think he is someone whom it takes that to the extreme of trying to find
that closure, and the irony is he never finds it because he just keeps
it the violence begets violence, but gets violence. You know. It's almost
like a drug at that point, you know what I mean. Yeah,
that was the point was that you see, if you took revenge to its
furthest depraved, sadistic, and it still isn't enough because it became about right
now, not only could he you know, did he against spoiler alert,
I'll try to be a little big not only did he keep things going for
his own situation all those years, but then he started having to do it
vicariously through others and him taunting h Michael's character and saying it's time for you
to heal, which is a big moment in them. You know, I
believe the character in that moment really believes that. I think Jed believes that.
But we see the audience can see it's not you know, it's not
that easy, right, you know. Well, he's had to trade a
normal life for this very depraved life, and so that obviously ends up being
very having a lot of crazy outcomes. It's hard. It's because we're digging.
We're digging so deep in this psychology stuff. Yeah, it seems like
you know, you know, some people can have a version of healing that
is closure that might be self destructive and you know, perpetuating the pain and
even aggravating it and making it worse. You know. Um, yeah,
I think it's a it's an interesting way to frame it. Yeah. Something
I want to say too is we uh, Jeff and I were committed to
this very early, and then we had many conversations with Michael about this,
and that is that in writing the film, we really, as as writers,
felt a responsibility to not judge the characters or telegraph uh personal opinions in
other words, you know, well, here's what you should do in this
situation, and here's what you shouldn't do. We really tried to let the
characters create characters and then again create a dramatic situation where it would be entertaining
for the audience to wrestle. You know, My favorite scene in the film
is the moment where John Bishop Michael Lombardi's character is confronted with the question,
and without giving things away, it's a long scene and you really see him
struggle, And that's my favorite part of the film because that was really the
essence of what I feel like it was nailed. I feel like through the
directing, the editing, the acting, it all really comes together in that
I don't feel like the camera is judging those two characters. I don't feel
like the actors are telegraphing, uh what they want or or you know,
or what the right thing, or who's the good guy, who's the bad
guy. I really feel like it's a moment where the audience has to stare
down their own thoughts and wait, what would I do? I've had so
many people. I had a really good friend of ours give him a shout
out. His named Rudy writer, an attorney, amazing, amazing guy and
he uh he when he saw the film, he called me and said,
man, I'm I am pissed at you. And I said, I said
why. And this is a I mean, the mensh of all mention of
human beings, this guy. And he's like, you really made me confront
something I never I just you know, He's like, I would never imagine
I could do anything like that. But in that scene was really wrestling with
my sort of cont being confronted with jeez, what gosh, that's not the
right thing to do, and I why do I feel? And you know,
call us sadistic, That's what we wanted, you know, we really
wanted that. You know, I maybe laugh, you know I laughed when
you hear it. But I've heard it from multiple people that said, gosh,
I really felt so conflicted and I didn't know what to think. And
I just that's great. You know, it's just so easy to just this
is wrong, this is good, and it's kind of boring. I like
cinema that sort of challenges you and makes you have to do a little of
the work as the audience. That makes sense. Yeah, And I've been
nodding very knowingly while you've all been talking, because I think what I appreciated
watching the movie like as a therapist is that you're right in that the movie
plays around with the idea of closure and the fantasy of closure. Because as
a therapist, why I was nodding emphatically at times while you were talking is
that I think it's this idea deal about like there's an answer and if I
can find the answer, all of my feelings will go away and I won't
feel bad anymore. And well, we have to all be honest with us
all about is that there isn't really an answer. That's very frustrating when I
as a therapist, when I work with clients, I say, have to
let go of this idea that there's an answer over here, and as soon
as it is closure, it's an action as I say the right thing to
the right person. Sometimes people think I'm withholding the answer from them in therapy,
like I'm just not telling them the thing that's going to make anything different.
And so I think what your movie does, and also what we try
to encourage clients is that there's never going to be one thing that makes this
bad thing just disappear out of your life. It's a part of you now.
When you go through a trauma, it integrates inside of you and you're
never going to be the person you were before that happened. But that doesn't
mean that your life is over. Your life is bad and we have to
radically accept that and reconcile that. And so I did appreciate and watch it
that you guys don't not to spoil you guys, don't take I think what
would be the simplistic turn with that, and that's sort of indulging in that
revenge fantasy and showing that it can eat you up because you don't find the
answers and you're like, oh, well maybe the answer is down there,
and then you're like, well I couldn't find it there, so maybe it's
down here. And then like the jet character you're talking about, now,
you're just wandering around and you don't even know where you are anymore. And
so I think that was all done very well and I appreciate that as a
therapist. It surprised me pleasantly. Yeah, thank you. Yeah, I
never thought of it that there was a different Yeah, because there is,
Look, there are fantasy revenge films that do scratch an itch, you know.
But this is not quite that. I don't want to get too much
away and saying it, but yeah, that was. It was very deliberately
not just that. You know. Yeah, and we're big, we're big
fans of that aesthetic, you know. We love we love the gritties,
seventies revenge exploitation films, we love the Charles Bronson films, and right right
there is there is a there is a satisfaction in that kind of cinema because
it isn't real life, and it is life isn't so clean. And yeah,
I appreciate you saying that because we, uh we One of the terms
that we use with Michael was this sort of we would say thinking Man's hostile,
but we didn't mean. I want to make clear too, because I
love Hostile. I think it's one of the best modern day horror films modern
you know, last twenty years or so. Yeah, I think it's a
masterpiece. So when I say thinking Man's I don't mean a smarter movie than
than Hostile, or a more thought out movie than Hostile. What I what
I mean by that is in Hostile, the horror of that movie is that
these people are torturing people truly for the thrill of torturing people, because they're
so there's such sociopaths, they're so bored with life, they're so you know,
um, you know there. I guess you would just have to be
past malignantly narcissis narcissistic at that point and just be a full sociopath to do
partake in something like that. And it's that horror of humanity that you go,
somebody could do that. That That is for what makes for me,
what makes that movie so like, it just hits me in the gut because
it's really hard for me to put my head around doing that to another human
being just for kicks. So the whole thought of with Retaliators was, well,
what if we built up enough backstory and took time enough to where we
could take an audience member into uh, could you do that? Could would
you? Now? Personally, No, I don't think that's the answer,
right. But the fun of it was to go, let's let's really let's
really go there. You know, Michael, we've been going on and on
where say something. No, I'm I think you're filling the space quite nicely.
Um, I think that you also I've been asked like what would you
do? You know, and and to get back to what Darren said earlier,
I think what's so interesting about this too is they took a man of
the cloth, you know, they took a past and put him in this
situation. Who's who's uh so? So I think you know, it's it's
um. It's hard to answer, honestly, because you can judge this from
a seat pretty easily. Yeah, but if you're really confronted with it,
and that really happened, that kind of loss um and the way in which
it happens, it's uh. I think it's a tough it's a tough thing
to to digest and and and say what you would do either way unless it
would really happened. And you know, the thing is you could be like
I think that's what's crazy about the film is half the people are like,
yeah, get them, get him, get him, and then maybe the
other half sort of the fence right there with but what he's doing is wrong,
but they understand it. And it makes you think, you know,
if you really were if you had this person in front of you, would
you really be able to hurt another human being in that moment right right,
really hurt a person. That's crazy to see, like to hurt skin and
you know and see blood and are you capable? Yeah yeah, And it's
simultaneously could you walk away? Right? It's like that's the and I love
what you said. It's true because there's we've gotten that reaction where people are
they they say, oh, boy, I was about to get upset because
I was so invested in Bishop and I thought he was going to cross over
there and so I was so happy that he didn't do that, and boy,
I was like not And then as Michael said, have had other people,
Man, you know, I just wish you would have done just a
little something, just a little you know, I just because I would,
you know. So it is interesting, you know. And that was again
that's all music for us because uh, and I appreciate your your insights into
that because really what we aimed for. Well, I think if if I'm
listening to Brittany right that that latter half of the audience, UH might need
to get a little helped. They might just you know, have something going
on that I would hope that they would go to a therapist to maybe talk
that through. You. I love all of our audience discouraging Jeff, Jeff,
where I would where I would clap back at you, I'm just no.
But to push back on that a little bit, what Michael was saying
is I think a very good point, which is that it's very easy right
here to say yeah, that's the wrong thing to do. And I agree.
I think the challenge of the film and where people get caught up is
when you play out that imaginary circumstance of you really are going through it,
and here they are presented to you on a plate, right, It's you
are confronted with an animalistic thought of well, wait a minute, if I
am in that emotional state, could I resist that temptation? And that's where
I think because I think, yes, I do think academically, I would
assume most people would would say, well, yeah, that's the wrong thing
to do. And but you know, I think there's something to be said
about when you're in that emotional there's also you know, as a parent,
there's a there's a there's a protectiveness that may be unreasonable sometimes but it is
just sort of there and how do you deal with it? You know?
So anyway, just earlier, you said something really call your therapist. First,
No, no, but I think actually what actually, no, I
met that really is just a joke only because well, look, it's a
film. When you're rooting for a character to do something in a film,
it's not the same as rooting for a person in real life to do something
to another human being as well, So something to be said for that.
And Brittany earlier, you said something very heavy and you were like, look
you uh and the DECI isn't to quote you, but I think it was
leaning into this idea of when something like this could happen, or something dramatic
and traumatic happens, you know you're never going to be the same again,
right. What's crazy is when you said that, like it was like,
wow, you know you're never going to be the same again, right,
Like everything changed. So then part of me just justified why I would want
to do revenge because I wouldn't. I'm never gonna you know what I'm saying
like you, because I'm thinking through the character something now and you know someone
did something like that to my child. You're never going to be the same
again anyway, so you might as well get the guy, you know what
I mean? Your life's changed forever I'm saying things you could think, I'm
not condoned. I'm not saying one way or the other. But I remember
like having to deal with all these questions when I was getting you know,
prepared with the script. So yeah, and I think sort of that like
part of being going through trauma is also there's like a hopeless component to it.
So in thinking of a through like a therapist, that thought process combined
with that could definitely lead to self destructive behavior is probably not to the extent
of this movie, but versions of it. And so where we try to
go in therapy is that you're never going to be the same again, and
that's not necessarily a bad thing, Like you're not going to be a worse
version of yourself on the other side, so you don't have to like dive
bomb your life and very like fuck it mentality, Like it's more like how
do we integrate who you were and who you are now without having to sacrifice
some version of yourself or shut down your emotional self. I think also with
the idea of like closure, is that, like I said, if I
can just do this thing, then hear the pain will go away. And
so it's more like how do we integrate the pain and kind of what you're
talking about with your sister Jody, Like, sometimes part of that growth is
how do I you this pain and my experience to create meaning from that,
either by helping others sharing my story, you know, getting into like more
post traumatic growth, which is a new concept, a newer concept in mental
health that people are talking about more and more, and that part of that
can be like finding meaning from what's happened and then using that in a positive
way that aligns with the values we hold now and the values we held before.
And so with like your character of Bishop, you know, I think
part of how he goes through the movie is by the end melding those things
together. How do I still live by my values and not sacrificing my core
self while also integrating that I am a slightly different person now because something right
wiles happened to me series of wild things in the course of this movie.
Yeah, and Bishop by the end is he is not the same. He
has changed forever. But you know, well, I guess I don't want
to give too much the movie, but yeah, I'll just leave it there.
He's not the same. Well, I know, you guys have been
very generous with your time. Is there anything else you want the listeners to
take away from this conversation or seeing the movie? And also where can the
retaliators be found? Where can people experience everywhere? You can rent or buy
movies. It is available video on demand, so that's Apple, you know,
iTunes, Amazon, Voodoo, Google Play, red Box, a whole
bunch and right now in America and Canada, and we will be going into
more places soon, right. Yeah, I want to say that I realized,
you know, and I've realized this a long time ago, which I
guess just haven't thought about it. How how important you know therapists are.
And I think and I say this in life, but what I meant also
was just because I was thinking about how helpful you would be and would have
been to talk to about this role. Actually, thank you. So obviously
that applies to humans and behavior, right, trying to do as actors and
storytellers. So um, it's interesting because you opened up my thought process actually,
and part of what you said made made me want to take revenge.
You put me on that side to be on would But I know we haven't
had a real session here. Yeah, some of the little tidbits and maybe
it's the mood I'm in or whatever, and that's another thing right like wherever,
And it was like so it was interesting to talk and sort of peel
the onion back with you a little bit and get to the you know,
feel the rawness of some of this topic. So depending on how much you
are for a session next role, I'll send you an invoice. Yeah we
might. We might have to consult with you from now on before we yeah.
Script, but you know, just one thing I wanted to mention before
we go. This just came to me right now, is that, you
know, I think what makes John Bishop's story sort of unique too, is
that he is somebody that in his corner of the world has all the answers
in a way, you know, And I think for some people that have
that profile, they have that personality type where they're usually the educator, the
person that consoles people. You know, we see him in the movie,
you know, talking to people, you know, kind of consoling them a
little bit. It's where do they turn? You know, it can feel
a little like, wait, I'm supposed to have the answers here, and
you know, really therapy really benefits everybody. You know, we don't all
have the answers. So and even therapists go to therapy, you know example,
but retalitied or too mom therapist, it happens. Oh no, where
we could go? Right? Interesting? We'll have more say, probably in
that opinion. Why. But thank you all so much. It's been so
fun to chat. And yeah, everyone keep your eyes out for retaliated.
It sounds like it's widely available, so if this chat has sparked your interests,
I would encourage everyone to check it out. Thank you all for joining
me. Thank you, Darren, Jeffrey and Michael. Thank you so much,
so much, thank you,