In today’s video, we will be going through the 2011’s American Drama- Indie Horror
film, Sound Of My Voice.
Spoilers ahead! You have been warned. Make sure to give this video a thumbs up, comment
on what your favorite part was, and subscribe to our channel for more.
The movie begins with Peter and Lorna arriving at a property following some instructions.
Peter is a substitute school teacher, while Lorna is an aspiring writer. They are in their
twenties and making a film documentary.
The subject of their documentary is a secretive cult led by a woman named Maggie. After entering
the property, they are instructed to park their car inside a garage where a man appears
and confiscates all their belongings except clothes. After frisking them, the man takes
them into the house. That is some way to welcome someone!
They are then given new surgical gowns to change into and a towel. The man escorts them
to separate bathrooms and instructs them to clean their bodies thoroughly with soap.
After the cleaning ritual, the man blindfolds and zip ties them. Peter and Lorna then board
a van where other similar blindfolded couples are already waiting. They are then driven
to a secret location, and at the location, the couples are greeted by a middle-aged man
with long grey hair in the basement. His name is Klaus. He inspects their hands before exchanging
a distinctive, intricate handshake, which they have been practicing. Now, this is some
shady ritual right here! If you observe closely when Peter & Lorna were blindfolded at the
beginning of the film before being driven to Maggie's location for the first time, the
blindfolds changed from being narrow to wide and then back to narrow again.
After passing the handshake stage, Klaus embraces and welcomes them. Peter and Lorna then join
eight other members. They all then bow their heads in reverence as Klaus welcomes Maggie.
A veiled woman wearing a white dress walks in, dragging an oxygen bottle stroller with
her. She takes a seat and unveils her face. Maggie thanks the congregation for taking
the precautions to meet her, implying that the showering and clothing requirements are
to avoid aggravating her illness.
Maggie then proceeds to tell her story. She reveals that two years ago, she woke up naked
underwater in the bathtub of a motel. She didn’t know what she was doing there or
where she was from. She only remembered her name and birthday and nothing else.
She was extremely weak and had a terrible immune system, and she ended up on the streets.
Lost, she kept wandering until one day when Klaus found her. He heard about Maggie and
her peculiar tattoos from others.
He took her in, fed her, and gave her vitamins, and in three, four weeks, she started to regain
her memory. She then shows the members her tattoos on her foot. It is an anchor with
the number 54 next to it. The anchor is the sign of a time traveler, and the number 54
is the year 2054 where she came from.
After the meeting, Peter and Lorna drive back home. They learn that the hidden camera that
they had sneaked in didn’t record anything as the camera’s transmitter in Peter’s
car went out of range after they were taken to a different secret location. Peter notices
Lorna is shaken yet intrigued by the cult. He reminds her that Maggie is a dangerous
con artist who needs to be exposed before she makes any of the cult members kill themselves.
When driving after the first visit with Maggie, the speedometer stays at zero the whole time.
It is then revealed that when Peter was 12, his mother was diagnosed with Cancer. She
was a longtime member of a new age cult and believed that modern medicine shouldn’t
intervene in her fate. She later died on the eve of Peter’s 13th birthday. Peter's backstory
of her mother dying of cancer after refusing medical treatment because she belongs to an
extremist religious sect that forbids it resembles the real-life story of rock band Metallica’s
lead singer James Hetfield.
The couple continues to go to the secret cult meetings. They are made to do peculiar exercises
and meditations. During one such meeting, a cult member takes Lorna to an indoor garden
where Maggie’s food is grown. The member reveals that Maggie is allergic to almost
everything in the current time period. Maggie reveals in the meeting that she traveled back
in time to save the people she loves.
For the next meeting, Peter decides to swallow the camera’s transmitter so it could travel
with him to the secret basement and record whatever the camera hidden in his glasses
can see. Good god, dedication! Later at the meeting, Lorna leads the members through an
intense psychological exercise. Maggie then asks them to close their eyes and travel back
in time to their childhood, a time before they knew words.
Once there, she asks them what it smells like, how it feels like, and how they feel. She
then tells them to live there. The members suddenly start to laugh and act like little
children.
She then calls them back to the present and asks them to eat the apple. Halfway through
eating the apple, Maggie asks them if they know what is in the apple. Uh oh!
Peter and Lorna look at each other worried. Maggie then answers her questions herself
and tells them that the apple signifies logic, bitterness, intellectual bullshit, and many
other things that they acquired in growing up. Phew! I almost thought she poisoned them
or something.
She asks them how much of it they can get rid of. How can they purge themselves of shame,
self-hatred and rise to their calling as the chosen one? They all have the privilege of
knowing the future but are they going to be prepared for it? One by one, the members then
start to make themselves artificially vomit the apple as Peter, who swallowed a hidden
camera transmitter right before coming to the meeting, nervously watches.
Maggie then asks Peter to puke the apple, but he refuses. As she continues to press
him, Lorna pretends to pass out to save Peter. However, Maggie sees through Lorna’s deception
and calls Peter “weak” for relying on his girlfriend to save him. Ugh! Such a classic
and cliched way to get under a man’s skin.
She then asks him why he is so afraid of letting loose. Who made him feel so powerless that
he became so obsessed with being in control? Who hurt him so much that he never wants to
feel that way again? Lorna, seeing her boyfriend being berated like this, tries to intervene.
Still, Maggie continues and asks him if it is something to do with his father? Or perhaps
his mother? Oh, come on! Don’t go there now, Maggie.
Peter reacts angrily and curses her out. Identifying his weakness, Maggie questions him what her
mother did to make him so angry? He irately reveals that she died and left him when he
was a kid.
Maggie continues and asks him what happened to him afterward. Peter reveals that he lived
with his grandparents after his mother’s death. Maggie then comments on Peter’s looks
and speculates that he must have been a good-looking kid and alludes to Peter being sexually abused
by someone. She is just taking it too far at this point.
Maggie continues by asking how it felt not having anyone to protect him? Peter bows his
head down and breaks into tears as Lorna watches in utter disbelief. Maggie comforts an emotional
Peter and tells him that he may have been powerless then but not anymore. He can let
go of it now. Peter then complies and vomits the apple. The members embrace him and Peter,
looking lost, hides the transmitter he puked along with the apple.
Lorna starts getting worried for Peter as she has never seen him cry. She gets skeptical
about going through with their covert investigation as Maggie is beginning to get into Peter’s
head. Peter assures her that he is fine, and he made all those things up and let Maggie
think that she is right so he could get themselves out of that situation.
Peter and Lorna continue to go to the meetings. During one of the meetings, Maggie describes
the future as riddled with war, famine, and struggle. She reveals that her generation
is really comfortable with death as people die around them all the time. But there’s
still beauty, especially in the countryside where there's dancing, music, and theatre.
The new members insist she sings a song from her time. Maggie initially hesitates but then
sings a song, and later, everyone sings along. One of the members named Lam then tells her
that the song she sang was from the ’90s by a band called “The Cranberries”.
Maggie retorts that it could be, but in the future, it was made popular by a singer named
Benetton. Lam then asks her to tell them something from the forthcoming future they could prove.
Maggie, offended, asks him to tell her something from before he was born.
She then asks him what he would do with himself even if she tells him something from the near
future. She continues and says that a mind as narrow as his would have no idea what to
do with that information. Maggie then kicks Lam out of the group and gives his girlfriend
Christine an option to stay with the group or leave with him. Christine stays with Maggie.
Maggie later invites Peter for a private talk after the meeting in her room while Lorna
is driven back home by the cult members. She reveals to Peter that she kicked Lam because
she saw Christine while growing up in the future, but she never saw Lam.
He doesn’t belong to them. Peter then asks if he and Lorna are there in her future. She
answers that it is for them to decide, not her. She then asks him for a favor. She shows
him a picture of one of his students Abigail Pritchett. She is an eccentric 8-year-old
girl.
Maggie asks Peter to bring Abigail to her. Peter is shocked and alarmed to hear her request.
He tells her that he can’t bring an 8-year-old child to a basement. Maggie, offended, tells
him that either he brings the girl to her or he and Lorna can stay away from the “basement”.
He tells her that he first needs to know why she wants her. After a lot of back and forth,
Maggie finally reveals that Abigail Pritchett is allegedly her mother. Holy mother of god!
What a twist.
When Peter returns home, he tells Lorna about Maggie’s demand. Abigail suggests going
to the police, but Peter rebuffs the suggestion. He tells her that if he doesn’t bring them
the girl, they will be kicked out of the cult, and their investigation will not be completed.
Come on, Peter, someone’s life is on the line here, forget your god damn investigation!
Peter and Lorna have a huge argument over it. Peter accuses her of not finishing things
she starts, while Lorna is outraged upon learning that Peter is even considering following Maggie's
orders.
She suspects that Peter, who was initially adamant that Maggie was a charlatan, is now
intrigued by and even attracted to Maggie. She accuses him of falling for Maggie's deception.
Lorna then kicks him out, and they go separate ways. Peter later calls Klaus to let him know
that he is going to bring Abigail. Such determination, sheesh.
Meanwhile, Lorna is extremely upset over Peter. A woman named Carol Briggs approaches her
and tries to comfort her. She then tells Lorna that she can help her restore him to his senses.
She later identifies herself as a Justice Department agent.
Carol reveals that Maggie’s real name is Shelly Whittle. She is wanted in Sacramento
for armed robbery and in Fresno for arson. Lorna concludes that is the reason why Maggie
never leaves her basement.
Carol further adds that they believe that Maggie is arming and her subjects are being
wittingly or unwittingly fashioned into militias. Lorna declines to go back to the dangerous
cult again, but Carol eventually convinces Lorna to help the Justice Department capture
her and hide the plan from Peter.
Lorna then meets Peter and tells him that he was right and they should finish what they
started. She tells him that they should arrange the meeting in a public place instead of bringing
Abigail to the basement. Peter is happy to get Lorna back and agrees.
They again go to the next cult meeting together. After the gathering, Peter informs Klaus that
he will take Abigail and her classmates on a field trip next Friday. Klaus tells him
that Maggie can’t go out, but Peter tells him that it is the best he can do and leaves.
On Friday, Peter spikes the tires of Mrs. Dewitt’s car, the teacher who was supposed
to take the school children to LaBrea Tar Pits for the field trip. No Hollywood thriller
is complete without this act of shithousery!
Abigail is a student from the same school. Mrs. Dewitt can’t get to school, and the
school principal asks Peter to accompany the children on the trip. After getting to the
venue, Peter and Lorna arrange for Maggie to meet the student in public.
Peter takes Abigail away from other students and lies to her that his actress friend Maggie
wants to meet her to prepare for the role of a mother. The cult then makes Peter and
Abigail take off their shoes, and they are called to a dark, aloof room where Maggie
is waiting for them.
When Maggie meets the little girl, they effortlessly perform the cult's intricate handshake as
Peter watches in astonishment. Abigail, surprised, asks Maggie how she knew her secret handshake,
and Maggie reverently responds: "You taught it to me."
Men in police uniforms then burst into the room and seize Maggie. As cult members angrily
accuse Peter of betraying Maggie, he exchanges a glance with Lorna, who smiles slightly,
affirming her role in Maggie's capture. Abigail then asks Peter who Maggie was, and he responds,
stricken, that he does not know.
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