‘Something In The Dirt’: Benson & Moorhead Talk Their Trippy, “Down The Rabbit Hole” Film, ‘Moon Knight’ & More [Sundance]

Directors Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead go way down the rabbit hole in their new film, “Something In The Dirt,” one of the big standout films from the Sundance Film Festival. A pandemic brainchild of necessity—what can we shoot during the pandemic which is relatively inexpensive but still doable, so we don’t lose our marbles and can stay artistic—“Something In The Dirt” is a trippy, DIY, sci-fi-ish film about a pair of loser (played by the two filmmakers themselves) dudes in dystopic Los Angeles who stumble upon the unexplainable. They experience and witness a strange, inexplicable phenomenon in their apartments. Unsure of what they’ve seen—perhaps something supernatural, otherworldly, perhaps something scientifically reality-warping, all borne from some odd quartz rock—the pair, who aren’t friends but live in the same apartment complex, becoming bonded by this experience. Freaked out, but jazzed by the weird adrenaline hit of it all, they decide to make a documentary to try and chronicle the strange phenomenon (along the way, there’s also a meta-leveled documentary within the movie about the documentary the characters are making that further adds to the intrigue, humor, and mystery).

READ MORE: ‘Something In The Dirt’ Review: Benson & Moorhead Land A Darkly Funny Sci-Fi Gem About Galaxy-Brained Paranoia & Conspiracies [Sundance]

In trying to solve the riddle, the obsessive bros go down a rabbit hold odyssey of conspiracies upon conspiracies— as if stoners fall into a Reddit thread and never escape it, adding layer upon layer of inter-connecting theory, conjecture, and a kind of supercharged Pareidolia (seeing patterns in things that are not there and then trying to impose meaning upon them).

The movie is wild, hallucinatory, and hilarious, and  When you think of the film, you think of a famous conspiracy theory rant. “You imagine that famous meme of Charlie Day [from “It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia”] in front of a whiteboard will all these threads,” Justin Benson laughed. “That’s what the hallway [outside the apartment where all the production shot lists were kept] actually looked like to keep the movie together in our heads.”

Obviously, the stars of the film, on top of being the directors, creators, writers, actors, cinematographers, producers, etc., the filmmakers are handsome men too, but they purposefully gave themselves amusingly odd looks and doofus haircuts; Benson sporting something of a Cali-burnout surfer dude, and Moorhead shaving his head to a thin stumble, sporting tight, tiny glasses, a beard, and looking like a maniacal shut-in.

“And [my character’s] look is weirdly based off of Oscar Isaac in ‘Ex-Machina,’” Aaron Moorhead explained. “You know, a person who is just brilliant and focused and figuring out something that will blow the world away.”

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‘But there’s another level to the whole thing,” he laughed. “Which, by the way, I got to tell Oscar Isaac all about. The problem is the flaws in his personality prevent him from being one of those brilliant, successful people. [My character] wishes that this was a documentary about one man’s obsession, like ‘Jiro Dreams Of Sushi’ or ‘Free Solo,’” who has a perfect quest, but his personality prevents him from ever being that person.”

Speaking of Oscar Isaac, the duo is referring to their recent collaboration. Benson and Moorhead directed episodes of Marvel’s upcoming “Moon Knight” limited series starring Isaac as a vengeful anti-hero who suffers from multiple-personality disorder—not at all your typical Marvel superhero. However, the directing duo didn’t find the filmmaking experience drastically different from what they already do.

“They really complement each other,” Benson said about working in DIY indie films and then moving to bigger budget projects like “Moon Knight” or Netflix’s supernatural series “Archive 81,” of which they also directed episodes. “They fulfill you in different ways, but then they’re also incredibly similar. When you go onto a gigantic set, once you walk past all the trailers and the giant trucks, the craft is basically the same. You got a camera; you got actors, you have to tell people what to do all that.”

Moorhead also suggested they were tapped for things like “Moon Knight” and “Archive 81” for a reason: it’s very much in their wheelhouse of the weird, strange, dark, and paranormal. “The phone also isn’t ringing to go do ‘Two And A Half Men,’” Moorhead laughed, discussing the kinds of big-budget projects they are asked to work on. “It’s stuff that’s kind of like what we already do.’ Archive 81’ definitely shares DNA with [our previous films] “The Endless” and “Resolution.” You’ll see with same with ‘Moon Knight.’”

It’s tempting to say that the galaxy-brained, Qanon-theorizing of the main characters is political and nature and their kind of commentary on a world whose reality distorts beyond belief.

“The conspiratorial thinking thing was oddly less than you’d think, for us, especially in 2020 [when we shot it],” Benson explained. “That wasn’t really on our radar as like a political or social thing so much.”

Their angle, they said, was more of an “X-Files” type vibe, which may explain why the film is so entertaining and not a severe commentary on those that might gather at a rally expecting JFK to appear out of nowhere. “Information used to be fun,” he continued. “It used to be fun to dig down those rabbit holes—the ‘X-Files’ of it all. Conspiratorial thinking used to be advantageous to homo sapiens ages ago. It used to be a form of protection, but now we’ve got too much access to information.”

“Look, we all get a little dopamine hit from the thrill of UFO news,” he explained. “It doesn’t mean you believe it. It doesn’t; it doesn’t mean you immediately jump to these elaborate conclusions.”

Perhaps to be completely clear, given how everything is misinterpreted these days, Moorhead quickly explained their intentions. “We do hope; obviously, the film inspires enormous amounts of discussion,” he said. “But we hope nobody thinks that what the moral is, ‘Hey, you should stop thinking critically because going down those rabbit holes is pretty dangerous!’ Almost everything is an act of moderation. My dad had this quote written on his workshop wall, and it read, ‘Be mindful of whose lyrics you craft your life by,’ and it’s just that. You have to figure out what to believe because that’s pretty important for your worldview.”

XYZ Films are distributing “Something In The Dirt” later this year, and we’ll have more from this interview then. In the meantime, you can check out their Sundance conversation below, explaining the movie, and also listen to a piece of the movie’s psychedelic/ambient score from the composer The Album Leaf.

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