HOUSE HAUNTING: Join me and filmmaker Derek Wayne Johnson (the upcoming Bloodstreams, 40 Years of Rocky: The Birth of a Classic, John G. Avildsen: King of the Underdogs), as we talk Poltergeist and House, two movies about, well, haunted houses.

First, I have to apologize to my audience and my guest. I was recording this on an old computer because my main computer got wet and couldn’t be used. I made a mistake and at about 11 minutes in, you can hear an echo when my guest speaks. I tried to erase it, but couldn’t figure out how, so I’ve just minimized it the best I can. So, please forgive me and I don’t think it’s so disruptive you can’t enjoy a really great discussion of these two seminal films.

“They’re here.” From Ghoulies and Ghoosties, long-leggety Beasties, and Things that go Bump in the Night, Good Lord, deliver us!…Sounds like it’s time for Episode 105 of Pop Art, where we find the pop culture in art and the art in pop culture. It’s the podcast where my guest chooses a movie from popular culture, and I’ll select a film from the more art/classic/indie side of cinema with a connection to it. For this episode, I am happy to welcome as my guest, Hollywood hyphenate, director, writer, editor, producer Derek Wayne Johnson, who has chosen as his film the Steven Spielberg produced haunted house movie Poltergeist, while I have chosen the cult classic Japanese haunted house movie Hausu or House, both films about, well, haunted houses.

And in this episode, we answer such questions as: What is it about haunted houses anyway? What changed when it came to where horror films took place in the 1960s and 70s in Hollywood and why? Just WTF is happening in this House movie anyway? Who directed Poltergeist: Hooper or Spielberg? How successful was House in Japan? What happened in Denver in the late 19th century that might have influenced the plot of Poltergeist; and what about that Twilight Zone episode? Where is the director’s daughter in House and what influence did she have on the film? Where is the Wilhelm Scream in Poltergeist?