209. It Follows (2015) | Breaking Dawn One Of The Era's Defining Horror Films | Behind The Scenes Of It Follows | Analysis Of It Follows
1-Week Rental | Behind the Scenes Film AnalysisShow Notes
Welcome to 1-Shriek Rental, where your hosts Matt Chokes and Laci Elizabeth* Goth take you through horror films all through the month of October. And this October, Ms. Goth and Mr. Chokes are specifically taking a look at horror movies from the 2010s, starting first with 2015's word-of-mouth sensation It Follows. Writer/director David Robert Mitchell was inspired by recurring childhood dreams about being followed by an amorphous, slow threat. It's a deliciously simple idea: It moves slow, but it's never gonna stop moving toward you. It will be the thing that defines you, the thing you can never escape, the thing that will ruin your life and turn you into a bad person. And it's why we think this movie is actually a metaphor for getting a job. Watch this It Follows podcast in full on YouTube: https://youtu.be/48KBGjG8wzI Next week (Oct. 9, 2026): The Purge (2013)!
Time stamps: 00:10:00 — History segment: Career overview of writer/director David Robert Mitchell; origins of It Follows; casting Maika Monroe; success and legacy of It Follows 00:43:15 — Movie discussion + It Follows film analysis 02:08:03 — Star ratings + final review of It Follows IT FOLLOWS (2015) was directed by David Robert Mitchell. Starring Maika Monroe, Keir Gilchrist, Lili Sepe, Olivia Luccardi, Daniel Zovatto, Jake Weary, and Bailey Spry as Annie.
Sources: "'It Follows': The Story Behind the Year's Creepiest Film" by David Fear | Rolling Stone (2015) - https://bit.ly/4d2GM8s "Exploring the horror of It Follows: David Robert Mitchell interview" by Ben Rawson-Jones | Digital Spy (2015) - https://bit.ly/4hvmg1D "Maika Monroe balances acting with kiteboarding" by Lynn Hoppes | ESPN (2012) - https://bit.ly/4yESRcN "Sundance It Girl Maika Monroe Won't be Going Back to Kiteboarding" by Daniel Schindel | Los Angeles Magazine (2015) - https://bit.ly/4yhTOav "David Robert Mitchell Talks It Follows" by Drew Tinnin | Dread Central (2015) - https://bit.ly/4ym4RQ1 "Myth of the American Sleepover Director on Making a Gentler American Graffiti" by Brian Brooks | IndieWire (2011) - https://bit.ly/4ymhk6h "The Yahoo Movies Interview: 'It Follows' Director David Robert Mitchell on His Surprise Horror Hit" by Gwynne Watkins | Yahoo! (2015) - https://yhoo.it/4xSaKUc
Transcript: https://1weekrentalpod.com/2026/10/it-follows/#transcript Artwork by Laci Roth.
Matt has two monthly spin-off podcasts: PodJob: A James Bond Podcast | Check it out on Apple Podcast (https://bit.ly/4jRL2K1), Spotify (https://bit.ly/4a8jM6E), and YouTube (https://youtube.com/@podjob007). The Sign Post Up Ahead: A Twilight Zone Recap Podcast | Check it out on Apple Podcast (https://bit.ly/4gXjtiR), Spotify (https://bit.ly/4gTE8Ev), and YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/@TheSignPostUpAhead)
Music by Rural Route Nine. Listen to their album The Joy of Averages on Spotify (https://bit.ly/48WBtUa), Apple Music (https://bit.ly/3Q6kOVC), or YouTube (https://bit.ly/3MbU6tC).
Songs by Rural Route Nine in this episode: "Winston-Salem" - https://youtu.be/-acMutUf8IM "Snake Drama" - https://youtu.be/xrzz8_2Mqkg "The Bible Towers of Bluebonnet" - https://youtu.be/k7wlxTGGEIQ
Follow 1-Week Rental, a movie podcast: Twitter: @1weekrental | @MattStokes9 | @LRothConcepts Facebook: @1weekrental Instagram: @1weekrental TikTok: @1weekrental | @mattstokes9 Letterboxd: @loadbearinglaci | @mattstokes9 Bluesky: @1weekrental.bsky.social
1-Week Rental used to be Load Bearing Beams.
*Elizabeth, the bride of Frankenstein in Bride of Frankenstein (1935).
More from 1-Week Rental | Behind the Scenes Film Analysis
Jordan Peele followed up his first film, the phenomenally successful Get Out, with an even more ambitious horror-comedy that ended up being way more divisive, even as it too became an enormous hit. At the time, Matt called it his favorite horror film of the 2010s. Does he still feel the same? How does Laci feel? Does this movie play differently seven years later? Do we still feel like the Tethered mean what we thought they meant back then? And how does this all lead back to Jordan Peele's love of The Twilight Zone? All that and more in the penultimate edition of 1-Shriek Rental 2026. Watch this Us podcast in full on YouTube: https://youtu.be/@1weekrental Next week (October 30, 2026): Ready Or Not (2019)!
Hey folks, 1-Shriek Rental is off today, and we'll return next week (Friday, Oct. 23, 2026) with an episode about Jordan Peele's 2019 doppelgänger horror/comedy Us.
This week on 1-Shriek Rental, Laci Elizabeth* Goth and Matt Chokes continue their examination of 2010s horror films by going through The Purge (2013). It's the best night of the year to buy and sell exotic reptiles. But what other crazy shenanigans happen in this movie? Well, it's mostly a home invasion story. But there's a reason for that! And we tell you all about it by going through the history of this movie and the larger franchise it spawned. Watch this The Purge podcast in full on YouTubE: https://youtu.be/UbMWku0pdAc We are taking next week off, and will return on Friday, October 23, 2026 with an episode about Jordan Peele's Us (2019)!
We travel back in time to the perfect year, 1995, when nothing at all was bad about the world. And it was in that year that you would have met a family unstuck from time, the Bradys, who are here to make sure you have nothing but sunshine days. You might remember The Brady Bunch Movie as a movie that sticks it to the cheesy old '70s sitcom, that injects double entendres and crass humor into those squeaky-clean Bradys, but you will be surprised to find that this is basically an update of the show that mostly keeps the wholesomeness and sweetness, and it works beautifully. The story can now be told! We take you through the history of Brady Bunch ephemera, the weird TV movies and spin-offs that eventually lead to The Brady Bunch Movie and A Very Brady Sequel in the 1990s. Then we take you through The Brady Bunch Movie itself, celebrating its neato blending of past and present and refreshing lack of world-building. Just imagine what a Brady Bunch movie would be like if it were made today. It'd be 2 hours and 45 minutes long, it'd take an hour for you to meet a single Brady, the horse statue would be beneath a dusty old sheet, etc. Watch this Brady Bunch Movie podcast in full on YouTube: https://youtube.com/@1weekrental Next week (Oct. 2, 2026): It Follows (2014)!
Cashing in on well-known intellectual properties is by no means a new thing in Hollywood. Look all the way back to 1985, when Clue opened to disappointing box office with a confusing marketing gimmick of having three different endings. You could go see Clue A, Clue B, or Clue C. This was a bad idea, but today, all three endings are included in the film and follow, one after the other, and it's beautiful. If all IP cash-grabs were as great as the Clue movie, we'd have no problem with them! A loving tribute to classic screwball comedies with a brilliant cast that perfectly matches the material, all of it anchored by an extraordinary performance by the late, great Tim Curry. In the history segment, we take you through the gestation of this movie, from original director John Landis to final director Jonathan Lynn (of My Cousin Vinny and The Whole Nine Yards), to the casting of Carrie Fisher as Miss Scarlet before her dropping out to go to rehab, to the misguided marketing strategy to the disappointing box office and critical performance, to Clue's rediscovery on home video. Then in the movie discussion, we struggle to explain and keep track of everything that happens in this movie, so we instead debate whether what happens in a movie matters, and what does it mean to matter anyway? Watch this Clue podcast in full on YouTube: https://youtu.be/g6g95ChsEWg Next week (Sept. 25, 2026): The Brady Bunch Movie (1995)!