Michael (left) wears: Giorgio Armani jacket and hoodie. Danny wears: Giorgio Armani jacket; Acne Studios T-shirt
WELCOME TO OUR NIGHTMARE, WE THINK YOU’RE GONNA LIKE IT BY DEAN PODMORE AND BIANCA FARMAKIS
“We have such bad ADHD and really bad sleep schedules,” Danny Philippou laughs as his brother Michael leans over to interrupt him on our call. The twin filmmakers are shuffling around in their chairs, arms overlapping as they finish one another’s point or deflect to mention something completely contrary. Boisterous and endearing, the South Australian modern masters of horror boast the kind of warmness that makes you question whether they’ve ever treated anyone like a stranger in their lives.
At times it’s difficult to discern who’s speaking, not because of their similarities – contrasting hairstyles make that easy enough – but because the flow of ideas and visions that emerge from our conversation are so rapid, speaking to the pair is an experience reminiscent of their scintillating, hallucinatory films. Only, off set and at home in Adelaide, humour replaces horror. In 2023, their breakout feature Talk To Me premiered at Sundance and sent shockwaves through the horror and film community at large. A possession story injected with grief, anxiety and startling physicality, it landed with both critics and audiences, grossing more than $142 million worldwide and establishing the brothers as global fixtures in the horror genre. It remains A24’s highest-grossing horror film.
It was the kind of debut that seemed like it came from nowhere. Except it didn’t. The meteoric climb can be attributed to the kind of process you’d ascribe to a mad genius, just multiply it by two. “We edit when we get home, stay up all night, we’re up for two days straight. You have to live and breathe it. Like nothing else can exist,” Danny explains. He says unwinding after a 16-hour shoot can be a destructive force; they prefer to immerse themselves entirely in the process of storytelling until they’re satisfied. And if they disagree, they produce separate cuts to show their tight-knit production team who help make the call. “This is your one shot. This is going to be seen by people. Everything in our lives has led to these moments. I can’t imagine wanting to take breaks or go home.”
Danny wears: Giorgio Armani jacket; Acne Studios T-shirt. Michael wears: Giorgio Armani jacket and hoodie
Danny wears: Morrow jacket
The perpetual desire to create came early in their lives. Obsession hit around age nine: drawing VHS film covers, chronicling film classification ratings in a scrapbook, checking run times with a stopwatch. Michael: “We were very weird kids.” Danny: “So random and weird.” Their first cinematic experiments came courtesy of Dad’s handycam, which they promptly broke. “I just wanted to film all the time. We fucked up that first camera so much that the sound and the colour stopped working,” says Michael. “So we made silent films,” Danny continues. They both grin.
Childhood obsessions turned into cult notoriety. The pair’s success in the cerebral world of modern horror can’t be separated from their first public venture into filmmaking: YouTube. Under the name RackaRacka, they posted stylistically violent, hyper-curated shorts that blended comedy, VFX and chaos – think Harry Potter in gang wars, Ronald McDonald throwing bodies, superhero smackdowns in suburban backyards. The skits were polished yet unhinged, garnering hundreds of millions of views and a loyal international following.
It was coordinated chaos, underpinned by their shared goal. “We wanted to make a feature film,” explains Danny. “The YouTube stuff was fun, and we were able to create our own pathway because initially we were just applying for different funding things and not getting anything,” he says. “It was really hard to rely on that – it just seems ridiculous. I feel bad for people applying for the same grants and continuously getting rejected.”
YouTube offered something the traditional system didn’t: creative control and unlimited experimentation. While studios were slow to trust their vision, their audience wasn’t. RackaRacka became a proving ground for their ability to direct, edit, choreograph and build worlds on a shoestring budget and their own backs. All the while, the bones of Talk To Me were forming. Rather than compromise their originality, they backed themselves and secured a deal with A24, one of the few studios willing to offer final cut and creative freedom. The film retained their fingerprints: no American accents, no forced exposition, no studio polish – just raw, unnerving, emotionally rooted horror.
“I mean, there are new challenges that aren’t funding now,” Michael laughs. “But A24 supported us entirely,” Danny interjects. “Even after Talk To Me, we were meant to do Talk 2 Me next, but I was excited about Bring Her Back. It was bold of them to say yes, because it’s a smaller movie, there’s no hook, it’s not a popcorn horror movie. It was more of a risk.” Bring Her Back – a psychological horror about loss, memory and the supernatural – marks a tonal shift. Less possession, more paranoia. Plotlines and characters that unravel with searing dread and emotional ambiguity. A film that’s ultimately more personal.
Looking back on their RackaRacka days, the biggest evolution, they say, is learning to share the burden of creativity. “A full collaboration felt more relieving than anything – not having to rely on doing everything ourselves,” Michael says. “We had all these insanely awesome artists to look up to that would help us bring that stuff to life.” Adds Danny: “When you’re putting a film together, you need to surround yourself with people you really respect. You can’t feel like you’re better than someone at the job. You have to be in awe of what they’re capable of.”
Their frequent collaborators include cinematographer Aaron McLisky, whose lens brought tactile tension to Talk To Me, and producer Samantha Jennings, who has become one of the pair’s most trusted allies. “She gave us the courage to do it,” Danny says. “We were at this crossroads of, like, one is a guarantee and then there’s this unknown half. So hats off to Samantha Jennings.”
Still, the chaos occasionally returns by design. They describe the infamous opening party scene in Talk To Me, where possession spirals into a violent frenzy, as a pure RackaRacka-style offensive. “Nobody knew what the hell was going on,” recalls Danny. “We had such a little amount of time to pull it off and the energy in the room was chaos. But necessary chaos. It was electric.” Michael agrees: “There are times where it runs like a YouTube thing and that is necessary.”
The pair are never insincere or inauthentic when it comes to discussing their work, but there’s a rare break of vulnerability that emerges when the topic of fear finally arises. “It’s very personal,” Danny says. “That’s the best way to write horrors.” He describes a video he witnessed of a neighbour on the floor having a bad reaction to drugs – and crowds laughing at him during the experience – as a moment that was reflected in Talk To Me. Chronic intrusive thoughts – accidentally killing a relative you’re driving in a car, the sensation of teeth clenching against metal – are all personal fears that seep into the psyche of the duo’s work.
“It’s about tapping into anything personal that makes you scared or uncomfortable,” says Danny. “It’s interesting creating fear, especially when you’re that close to what it is you’re making,” Michael adds. “The confusing part is whether it’s reading or not, because you’ve seen everything so many times, when you’re talking about tension and that. Is it actually landing? That’s always a weird and interesting process.” Danny continues: “Good horror is the stuff that gets under your skin and it doesn’t rely on loud sounds.”
The mood lightens as we discuss Talk 2 Me. The title itself becomes a gag. Danny: “You can thank Michael for that.” Michael: “I thought it was a good idea, but I got roasted. I’d rather that than Talk To Me Two.” Danny: “Or Talk To Me Talk Talk.” There are two competing scripts in development. One is more linear. The other, more experimental. “There are two directions I could go in, but the script isn’t anywhere near done yet – I don’t even think it’s going to be the next movie that we make,” Danny says.
Michael wears: Morrow shirt; Acne Studios T-shirt. Danny wears: Morrow jacket
Danny wears: Giorgio Armani jacket and pants. Michael wears: Morrow shirt
Immediately they tease another horror film in the works – one they claim is just down to convincing A24 to “go down another rabbit hole” before they finally release Talk 2 Me. It’s not from a place of struggling with the sequel, or a case of sophomore syndrome, it’s just symptomatic of the pair’s natural artistic erraticism. “I go for walks at midnight, think of all these ideas, and get super excited, but I just want to come at it super fresh,” Danny assures. Michael jumps in: “You’re automatically going to upset some fans.” They squabble, briefly, before he adds: “The expectation for the movie is to be bigger and better, but we wanted to take the risk with Bring Her Back.”
The renaissance for Australian horror films hasn’t gone unnoticed. Where the country’s output was once sporadic, punctured by the likes of Wake in Fright, Wolf Creek and The Babadook, recent years have paved the way for bold voices reinvigorating the space.
Production companies like Causeway Films have championed bold, original visions, while international distributors like A24 are investing in uniquely Australian stories that don’t dilute their identity for global audiences. What’s emerging is a distinctively gritty, emotionally grounded style – not so much a revival, but a redefinition, with the Philippou brothers at the helm of a movement that can punch just as hard, if not harder, than anything from Hollywood. “There’s a grittiness or a rawness to Australian cinema that I love. I never want any character to feel safe or bubble wrapped. It gives them their own feel and translates really well,” Danny explains.
But their next move may be their most horrific yet, as they wade into the documentary space with an untitled A24-backed peek into underground deathmatch wrestling. The brutal performance art, where participants use barbed wire, glass and other dangerous props in choreographed stunts to shock and thrill spectators, marks a deliberate return to the boys’ roots. The pair were obsessed with backyard wrestling and adrenalin-fuelled stunts. “There’s footage of us as 12-year-olds covered in blood,” says Michael.
Filming included navigating complex insurance protocols so they could legally direct and appear in it. Michael even competed in Detroit, forcing Danny to sign a contract during pre-production for Bring Her Back, promising that he’d return to set after three days of mourning if the worst happened. “I was getting booed at the beginning,” Michael says. “You’re trying to remember choreography, perform for the crowd, and we had cameras in the ring, too. It was insane but rewarding.”
Despite the gore, violence as a spectacle is not a trope the brothers fall into with their horror films. “We toe the line of not feeling like an exploitation movie or just a shock horror film, because it’s always going to be rooted in the character,” Danny explains. “Our YouTube channel is probably the opposite,” adds Michael. There’s a nostalgia that seems to blanket the pair, thinking of their not-so-distant past. To resurrect the platform that built their names and garnered them a following of more than 6.9 million would be a dream – if time permitted. “We’re in the position we are because of the people that followed and supported us,” says Danny. “So we’re so thankful for that. I feel indebted to them.”
Their rise to success was met with an element of snobbery: no one wanted to fund YouTubers, or take them seriously, and they couldn’t possibly be interested in films. “There are so many people that I think are going to be the next set of filmmakers who are exploring online first,” says Michael. When they met legend of Australian cinema and Mad Max director George Miller, he told them that if YouTube existed in his day, he’d be on it. “It changed my perspective,” Danny says. “It was validating to hear that. Every journey is different and YouTube was accessible to us – I think storytelling can come from there just as much as more traditional work.” Even as the scripts multiply, deadlines blur and the world watches what they’ll do next, the Philippous remain anchored in the same place they started – backyards, blood and a camera rolling.
