Latest / The Bechdel Cast / He's Just Not That Into You with Anna LaMadrid
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: On the Beck Doll Cast, the questions asked if movies
- 0:03Speaker 1: have women in them? Are all their discussions just boyfriends
- 0:07Speaker 1: and husbands? Do they have individualism? The patriarchy? Zef in,
- 0:12Speaker 1: best start changing it with the beck del Cast. A
- 0:16Speaker 1: word of advice, Jamie, Yeah, if a movie makes sweeping
- 0:22Speaker 1: and reductive generalizations about gender and relationships, it's just not
- 0:29Speaker 1: that good of a movie. The end. Okay, anyway, Sorry,
- 0:36Speaker 1: I can't hear you. I've been locked in a closet
- 0:39Speaker 1: by Bradley Cooper. Actually, could you speak up? I'm trapped
- 0:43Speaker 1: in Bradley Cooper's office closet. There. Oh, here we go,
- 0:49Speaker 1: Here we go. Welcome to the Beck Dol Cast. My
- 0:52Speaker 1: name is Jamie Loftus, my name is Caitlin Drante, and
- 0:55Speaker 1: today we're broadcasting live from Bradley Cooper's office closet. We're
- 0:59Speaker 1: a guest. It's getting crowded, impossible to socially distance in here. Yes. Uh,
- 1:06Speaker 1: this is our episode about He's just not that into you.
- 1:10Speaker 1: This is our podcast about looking at movies through an
- 1:15Speaker 1: intersectional feminist lens, using the Bechtel tests simply as a
- 1:20Speaker 1: jumping off point. And Jamie, I've i forgot what was
- 1:26Speaker 1: I will allow me. Let me ask Alison Bechtel. She's
- 1:29Speaker 1: actually in here too. I'm sorry before I say with
- 1:33Speaker 1: the backlasures I had, I think I just like ended
- 1:36Speaker 1: up just my soul was flying out of my body
- 1:39Speaker 1: when I was watching this movie and it was like,
- 1:42Speaker 1: you know, I was like watching myself watch the movie
- 1:44Speaker 1: from above, and it would have made me laugh so hard.
- 1:49Speaker 1: If Scarlett Johanson when she was being pushed into a
- 1:52Speaker 1: closet by Bradley Cooper, um, if there was like just
- 1:55Speaker 1: a skeleton in there from from another woman who advent
- 1:59Speaker 1: through the same thing, and then maybe he forgot and
- 2:02Speaker 1: then she you know, and this happened in like two
- 2:04Speaker 1: thousand two, and then he's like, oh my god, I forgot.
- 2:07Speaker 1: I pushed Jodie Foster into that closet seven years ago
- 2:10Speaker 1: and she never got out. The Bechtel test is a
- 2:14Speaker 1: media metric, as you said it for our purposes. It
- 2:18Speaker 1: requires that two characters of a marginalized gender with names
- 2:23Speaker 1: speak to each other about something other than a man
- 2:26Speaker 1: for two lines of dialogue. We'll see, we'll see how
- 2:33Speaker 1: it goes, you know, and I guess you're going into
- 2:36Speaker 1: this time you know it's not. It's not a perfect metric,
- 2:38Speaker 1: you know, it's it's not if feminist text just because
- 2:41Speaker 1: it passes the Bechtel test, as we know, not saying
- 2:44Speaker 1: that for any protarget want to reason anyways, that is
- 2:47Speaker 1: the Bechtel test. This is the Bechtel Cast and we
- 2:49Speaker 1: have an amazing guest with us today. Yes, welcome to
- 2:55Speaker 1: the closet. She's an actor. You've seen her on Vida
- 3:00Speaker 1: Love Victor, Call Your Mother, and she is the founder
- 3:05Speaker 1: of Put Me On Self Tape, which is a self
- 3:08Speaker 1: tape and audition coaching studio in l A. It's Anna
- 3:12Speaker 1: La Madrid. Hello. I'm excited to be in the closet,
- 3:16Speaker 1: skin hat, but I'm here for it. Bradley is coming
- 3:19Speaker 1: back any second now, not to worry any time. And
- 3:22Speaker 1: I'm gonna walk out with my red Neglija and not
- 3:25Speaker 1: put my dress on while they're having sex. Two seconds
- 3:29Speaker 1: after Jennifer Connelly left, Like, wouldn't she not realize that
- 3:34Speaker 1: someone is kind? Also like they're going to run each
- 3:37Speaker 1: other in the elevator, right, yeah, yeah, Jennifer Connelly like
- 3:44Speaker 1: is that my husband? It's not my husband's seed. But
- 3:49Speaker 1: I'm also like girl put on your dress. Everybody in
- 3:53Speaker 1: the office is going to know we need we needed.
- 3:57Speaker 1: I just want to have a talk with every character
- 3:59Speaker 1: in this movie about uh, learning to love themselves. Yeah. Good,
- 4:05Speaker 1: so much this I have to say, like as awful
- 4:09Speaker 1: as all of these like ensemble movies of this era are,
- 4:13Speaker 1: because it's also like whatever, I would include this in
- 4:15Speaker 1: the expanded universe of Valentine's Day and New Year's Even
- 4:20Speaker 1: and they're all so bad. But it is. It is
- 4:23Speaker 1: kind of like Ben Affleck isn't in this movie for
- 4:26Speaker 1: a full hour. He just he just disappears, he goes away.
- 4:30Speaker 1: He's not about He's like he gets lost at sea.
- 4:33Speaker 1: Maybe we don't know. I mean one would hope it's
- 4:38Speaker 1: just like a nightmare. It's a nightmare. But um, but
- 4:41Speaker 1: I was very fully um engaged triggered activated fight or
- 4:46Speaker 1: flight response. Um, My fight or flight response was fully
- 4:50Speaker 1: activated by this movie. But let's talk about our personal histories. Anna,
- 4:55Speaker 1: what is your history with this cinematic text? Um, you know,
- 5:00Speaker 1: I remember watching it when it first came out, and UM,
- 5:04Speaker 1: I guess I've, like many of us, have been fallen
- 5:08Speaker 1: trapped into finding romantic comedies um enjoyable. When I was
- 5:12Speaker 1: ignorant and didn't know any better. Um, it was nice.
- 5:15Speaker 1: You know. One of the things that I do for
- 5:17Speaker 1: fun sometimes is I try to watch eighties movies and
- 5:20Speaker 1: then see how they hold up. Most of them don't. Um.
- 5:25Speaker 1: I haven't done this for like early odts movies. So
- 5:28Speaker 1: this was kind of like a revelation to me because
- 5:31Speaker 1: I'm like, holy sh it, there's so much toxic like masculinity,
- 5:35Speaker 1: toxic positivity, like are these girls actually really your friends?
- 5:41Speaker 1: Like yeah, so, um yeah, that's my relationship to it.
- 5:46Speaker 1: I can't believe that I enjoyed it and kind of
- 5:48Speaker 1: normalized these narratives in my head. I mean, two, it's
- 5:56Speaker 1: so depressingly like still feels too recent to would be like, wow,
- 6:01Speaker 1: we really we really did not question all that much.
- 6:05Speaker 1: The only the only thing that felt commonly accepted was
- 6:07Speaker 1: that the movie was bad, but the messaging kind of
- 6:10Speaker 1: wasn't up for debate. I don't know, Caitlin, what's your
- 6:14Speaker 1: history with this movie? Oh gosh, well, I slash book.
- 6:19Speaker 1: So I watched the movie some amount of years after
- 6:23Speaker 1: it came out and promptly forgot everything about it because
- 6:28Speaker 1: when I rewatched it to prep for this, I was
- 6:31Speaker 1: like well, I didn't remember that there were four thousand
- 6:35Speaker 1: Jennifers in this movie. I didn't remember Jennifer any of
- 6:38Speaker 1: the I love when it scenes where it's Jennifer and Jennifer,
- 6:41Speaker 1: You're like, right, my head hurt. I'm just like, where's
- 6:45Speaker 1: Jennifer Lopez? If you're going to get the romcom jen
- 6:48Speaker 1: Jennifer's in there, at least then we would have intersectional right, yes,
- 6:52Speaker 1: because where are the people of color in this film
- 6:55Speaker 1: that they are on the sidelines being the game best friend? Yeah? Yeah,
- 7:00Speaker 1: I was like, literally, it's it's like anyone who is
- 7:02Speaker 1: not white and not straight is not going to be
- 7:05Speaker 1: centered in this movie for even a second. They're just
- 7:07Speaker 1: gonna be there to tell Drew Barrymore how to send
- 7:09Speaker 1: an email. Like right. So I saw the movie at
- 7:16Speaker 1: some point, but I did read the book when it
- 7:19Speaker 1: came out because a roommate I had in college was like, Caitlin,
- 7:25Speaker 1: you gotta read this book. It's gonna change your life.
- 7:29Speaker 1: It's like my Bible. And I was like, oh, okay.
- 7:33Speaker 1: And I didn't like I wasn't a sex in the
- 7:35Speaker 1: City watcher, Like I didn't really know what I was
- 7:39Speaker 1: in store for, and and I don't remember specifics now.
- 7:43Speaker 1: I obviously did not reread it recently, um, but I
- 7:47Speaker 1: just remember the general takeaways of it, which are mostly
- 7:51Speaker 1: like because the book in the movie are are are
- 7:55Speaker 1: very different in the sense that, like the book is
- 7:57Speaker 1: a self help book, the movie is narrative vignettes, but
- 8:03Speaker 1: the themes are all still present. And the themes of
- 8:07Speaker 1: the book are men know what they want and they're
- 8:12Speaker 1: going to go out and get it, but women shouldn't
- 8:14Speaker 1: do that. They should not call a man first, They
- 8:18Speaker 1: should not initiate contact. They should never ask a man out.
- 8:22Speaker 1: Women should wait idly buy for a man to make
- 8:25Speaker 1: the first move. Women should surrender any and all power
- 8:29Speaker 1: and agency and just sit around waiting for a man
- 8:34Speaker 1: to take all the initiative. And I remember in it
- 8:36Speaker 1: like again two thousand five when I read this, when
- 8:39Speaker 1: my feminism was not sophisticated or you know, not really
- 8:44Speaker 1: barely there at all many of our Yeah, I still
- 8:50Speaker 1: was like, this book is the most sexist, regressive piece
- 8:55Speaker 1: of ship that I've ever read in my life. So
- 8:59Speaker 1: I've hated this pretty for a long time now, And
- 9:03Speaker 1: that's my history. That also around the same time that
- 9:07Speaker 1: that book, The Rules came out good question, I would
- 9:12Speaker 1: guess though it feels like the same era. That sounded
- 9:15Speaker 1: very similar to where she was like if they ask
- 9:17Speaker 1: you out on a Wednesday, that's a no. And then
- 9:19Speaker 1: and it was like going around about like how you
- 9:22Speaker 1: need to make yourself be the prize and that they
- 9:26Speaker 1: have to fight for you because that's what men want
- 9:28Speaker 1: to do and that you shouldn't. So that was another book,
- 9:31Speaker 1: So I remember that being passed around my circle. Yes,
- 9:35Speaker 1: oh that's that's from ninety five The Rules, Time Tested
- 9:40Speaker 1: Secrets for Capturing the Heart of Mr Wright written by
- 9:43Speaker 1: two women. So it's two women there are. And we'll
- 9:47Speaker 1: get into this today. Sometimes women can perpetuate sexism because
- 9:53Speaker 1: I don't because question mark, because they don't love themselves,
- 9:56Speaker 1: internalized misogny, etcetera. My street with this movie is that
- 10:02Speaker 1: I was taken to see this movie after my first
- 10:05Speaker 1: breakup ever and it I was This movie came out
- 10:11Speaker 1: when I was I think, like a sophomore in high school.
- 10:15Speaker 1: My boyfriend who had just dumped me to play the saxophone. More. Um,
- 10:22Speaker 1: I was like devastated. I was a mess. I was inconsolable,
- 10:28Speaker 1: and so my friends we didn't know I knew that
- 10:31Speaker 1: it was a book, but we definitely hadn't read it.
- 10:32Speaker 1: But my my friends were like, no, we're gonna We're
- 10:36Speaker 1: gonna cheer Jamie up. And we I think that we
- 10:38Speaker 1: went into it thinking this was going to be a
- 10:39Speaker 1: movie that was like fuck men, the Sack and then
- 10:43Speaker 1: hopefully also the Saxophone. Um but I remember we left
- 10:50Speaker 1: very disappointed. We didn't like the movie. And at the end,
- 10:52Speaker 1: my my friend shoutout Jenny hide Uh. She apologized. She's like,
- 10:59Speaker 1: I thought that was going to cheer you up, but
- 11:03Speaker 1: I don't think it did. And I was like, that's
- 11:05Speaker 1: it was worth the shot. And then we went to
- 11:07Speaker 1: eye hop and that was it. Turns out that was
- 11:12Speaker 1: the medicine I needed. Pancakes. Pancakes always win, true, like
- 11:17Speaker 1: pancakes over toxic masculinity. The movie, um so that was
- 11:25Speaker 1: my And then I revisited it when it was during
- 11:28Speaker 1: the pandemic just to be like, is this as bad
- 11:30Speaker 1: as I remember? And I was like, oh, it's actually worse.
- 11:34Speaker 1: Um and and here we are. So I've seen this
- 11:37Speaker 1: movie several times this year. Um and and hopefully for
- 11:41Speaker 1: perhaps for the last time. You know, we don't know.
- 11:44Speaker 1: So there could be a very sinister twist. Oh god, well,
- 11:52Speaker 1: should I get into the recap and then we'll go
- 11:55Speaker 1: from there. Let's do it. So the movie opened on
- 12:00Speaker 1: a little boy being mean to a little girl, and
- 12:04Speaker 1: then the little girl is told that the boy was
- 12:06Speaker 1: treating her badly because he has a crush on her,
- 12:10Speaker 1: and the voiceover explains how that is a lie that
- 12:13Speaker 1: girls and women have been conditioned to believe. And then
- 12:17Speaker 1: this is followed by a montage of women encouraging other
- 12:20Speaker 1: women saying like, oh, when a man is ignoring you,
- 12:24Speaker 1: it's because of this, or it's you know, let's make
- 12:28Speaker 1: excuses for the guy and all this stuff, or like
- 12:31Speaker 1: you're great, he can't dump you. Like yeah, it was
- 12:35Speaker 1: a sampler bladder of what we were going to suffer
- 12:39Speaker 1: through for the next two hours too, because I'm like,
- 12:42Speaker 1: oh my god, how dare this movie be longer than
- 12:46Speaker 1: two hours? I am furious hours and it really felt
- 12:52Speaker 1: like more hours than two And also, the little kid
- 12:56Speaker 1: just wasn't mean. He physically pushed this. I'm normalizing physical
- 13:02Speaker 1: abuse too. Great. Thanks thanks for letting us know if
- 13:04Speaker 1: he hits us, that means he loves us. Yeah. So anyway,
- 13:08Speaker 1: so you have all this like this montage and this
- 13:10Speaker 1: voice over at the beginning, and then, according to the movie,
- 13:14Speaker 1: the truth of the matter is when a man is
- 13:17Speaker 1: not calling you or paying attention to you, or he's
- 13:20Speaker 1: being a dick to you, it means he's just not
- 13:24Speaker 1: that into you. And then so the rest of the
- 13:27Speaker 1: movie is a bunch of vignettes that are all vaguely connected.
- 13:32Speaker 1: This movie is trying to be love Actually but worse,
- 13:35Speaker 1: which is also you can go back to our episode
- 13:39Speaker 1: on love Actually, I don't have the mental capacity for it.
- 13:42Speaker 1: No today. Also, for this recap, I'm going to use
- 13:46Speaker 1: actors names instead of characters names because there are too
- 13:49Speaker 1: many characters and who cares what their names are. But
- 13:53Speaker 1: most of the actors are famous, so that should just
- 13:56Speaker 1: help clarify things. Okay, So we cut to Jennifer Goodwin
- 14:02Speaker 1: and Kevin Connolly a k from Entourage, which is probably
- 14:06Speaker 1: what I'm going to call him this whole episode. They're
- 14:09Speaker 1: on a date. She seems to be more excited about
- 14:12Speaker 1: it than he is because he is in love with
- 14:16Speaker 1: Scarlett Johansson, who is a singer slash yoga instructor. I
- 14:20Speaker 1: was like, oh, we're hitting the tropes early early Yeah,
- 14:25Speaker 1: who doesn't have yoga pants? By the way, and that
- 14:28Speaker 1: scene where she's teaching people's sweatpants, I'm like, you didn't
- 14:32Speaker 1: even do your research, girl, whoa you know you should
- 14:35Speaker 1: be wearing Lula Lemons or some ship. Her character, her care,
- 14:39Speaker 1: I mean everyone's character. But good lord, this whole movie. Um. Yeah,
- 14:45Speaker 1: So Scarlett Johansson meets Bradley Cooper at a supermarket. Not
- 14:50Speaker 1: just any Bradley Cooper though, Frosty Tips Bradley prosper Tips
- 14:56Speaker 1: pre fame pretty like super super fame Frosty Tips uber.
- 15:00Speaker 1: This was his breakout role. Guys, let's just be honest.
- 15:03Speaker 1: I mean, who could forget him leering at someone in
- 15:07Speaker 1: the grocery line iconic and it would be several years
- 15:11Speaker 1: later when he would become another problematic he. I have
- 15:20Speaker 1: a lot of feelings on Bradley Cooper, most of them
- 15:22Speaker 1: are not very good. Um, but again another day, when
- 15:27Speaker 1: when my when my spirit can handle it, right, Um,
- 15:30Speaker 1: Bradley and Scarlett hit it off, but oh he's married,
- 15:35Speaker 1: but they exchange numbers anyway. He is also friends with
- 15:39Speaker 1: Ben Affleck, who is in a long term relationship with
- 15:44Speaker 1: Jennifer Aniston and she wants to get married, but he doesn't,
- 15:48Speaker 1: and it's a it's a point of contention in their relationship.
- 15:51Speaker 1: And yep, that's pretty much the whole thing, except he
- 15:55Speaker 1: doesn't believe in it. Guys, but he's committed. He doesn't
- 15:58Speaker 1: believe in it. But but don't worry, she's going to
- 16:00Speaker 1: change him because that's how that's how things work. That's
- 16:03Speaker 1: she's going to fix him. I loved so that is
- 16:05Speaker 1: basically their whole story. But just I like the like
- 16:08Speaker 1: sometimes I'll just throw a little bit of like spice
- 16:11Speaker 1: at a storyline that just something else happens that you're like,
- 16:14Speaker 1: like Chris Christopherson has a heart attack and you're like, huh,
- 16:18Speaker 1: why is that happening? And then it's immediately resolved, and
- 16:21Speaker 1: it's like, I feel like we didn't need to give
- 16:24Speaker 1: Chris christophers In a heart attack. Perhaps it's not necessary,
- 16:28Speaker 1: but I thought it was pretty I was laughing. I
- 16:31Speaker 1: was like, what is happen? Why? It was a really
- 16:34Speaker 1: roundabout way for Jennifer Aniston to be around her like
- 16:39Speaker 1: in laws, like her sister's husbands and and appreciate then Yeah,
- 16:46Speaker 1: which like again very roundabout way to go, Like you
- 16:49Speaker 1: could have done that in like a much tighter, more
- 16:51Speaker 1: efficient way. Anyway, how do they filled out those two
- 16:54Speaker 1: hours though they want to the things like, I mean,
- 16:58Speaker 1: I guess that the only the Chris Christophers and plot
- 17:01Speaker 1: heart attack. I was cracking up because I was just like,
- 17:04Speaker 1: what is this for? Like, you know, they're not going
- 17:06Speaker 1: to kill him, so what's happening? I messy? Messy. Meanwhile,
- 17:12Speaker 1: in the movie, Jennifer Goodwin who works with Jennifer Aniston
- 17:16Speaker 1: and also Jennifer Connolly, so all the Jennifers work together
- 17:20Speaker 1: at the same company. You can only what is their job?
- 17:24Speaker 1: They have never all they talk about is that one
- 17:27Speaker 1: nutmet copy, but like, who's the client? Are they? All
- 17:30Speaker 1: they do is sit around and get paid to talk
- 17:33Speaker 1: about guys the entire day. I'm like, wow, I want
- 17:36Speaker 1: to work in that office, which is also wild because
- 17:38Speaker 1: I'm like, ladies, this is a recession. I feel like
- 17:41Speaker 1: there would have been some positions cut if the three
- 17:44Speaker 1: of you are all trying to write one paragraph about
- 17:47Speaker 1: Nutmeg for several months. It just seems seems like, you know,
- 17:52Speaker 1: in the middle of the talk of a pitch meeting,
- 17:54Speaker 1: no stakes, where they're like, we just need to get
- 17:57Speaker 1: him in the same room, and women do be having
- 18:00Speaker 1: jobs these days, so Nutmeg, Yeah, and it's advertising. That's cool, right,
- 18:06Speaker 1: That's something women can do. It's actually the reason why
- 18:10Speaker 1: I studied advertising. I'm not gonna lie that was my
- 18:13Speaker 1: undergrad degree, but because I saw, like the mom on
- 18:17Speaker 1: Who's the Boss was an advertising like Amanda Woodard from
- 18:21Speaker 1: Meller's Place was in advertising. So I'm like, oh, that's
- 18:24Speaker 1: what women do. We do advertising. That's why I'm a journalist,
- 18:28Speaker 1: art curator. Slash there sash she owned a bakery slash Bakery,
- 18:34Speaker 1: a struggling bakery owner. Oh gosh, okay. So Jennifer Goodwin
- 18:41Speaker 1: is waiting to hear from E from Entourage, and when
- 18:46Speaker 1: she doesn't, she decides to go to a bar where
- 18:50Speaker 1: she knows he hangs out a k a stock him
- 18:53Speaker 1: and there she meets a bartender, Justin Long, who is
- 18:58Speaker 1: E from Entourages friend, roommate, I don't know, friend who
- 19:03Speaker 1: like just walks into his house unannounced. I'm like, yeah,
- 19:06Speaker 1: I'm mostly yeah. I was like, I was like, are
- 19:09Speaker 1: they roommates? Because I'm like, oh, you at keys? Or
- 19:12Speaker 1: does he just leave his door open? I was really
- 19:16Speaker 1: confused about Justin Long's character. I mean, first of all,
- 19:20Speaker 1: we've done the definitive Justin rankings before, and we as
- 19:24Speaker 1: a podcast take the stance that Justin Bartha is better
- 19:27Speaker 1: than Justin Long. So whenever I see Justin Long, I
- 19:30Speaker 1: think should have been Justin Bartham. That alone was distracting,
- 19:35Speaker 1: but on top of that, his his life was confusing
- 19:40Speaker 1: because it was like he's a bartender. But then he
- 19:41Speaker 1: was also seen in a large office at one point
- 19:45Speaker 1: that was his house. What everybody's house has like huge loss.
- 19:50Speaker 1: I'm like, where are you living? And what is the rent? Yeah,
- 19:53Speaker 1: everyone is is very wealthy and very wealthy, like his
- 19:57Speaker 1: parents paid for that house for sure, I mean, and
- 19:59Speaker 1: it's also they they have to keep reminding you you're
- 20:02Speaker 1: in Baltimore because there's no visual indication that you're in Baltimore.
- 20:06Speaker 1: And also it's like, oh it's Baltimore. That's like, but
- 20:09Speaker 1: like it's all rich white people in Baltimore with gigantic holms,
- 20:13Speaker 1: and it's like, how why stop confusing? So Justin Long
- 20:22Speaker 1: is telling Jennifer Goodwin, my roommate slash friend or some
- 20:28Speaker 1: guy who sometimes comes over e from entourage isn't gonna
- 20:33Speaker 1: call you because he's just not that into you. Meanwhile,
- 20:38Speaker 1: Scarlett Johansson, who is friends with Drew Barrymore by the way,
- 20:42Speaker 1: calls Bradley Cooper, who is married to Jennifer Connelly. You
- 20:48Speaker 1: see how all the threads are connecting. It's brilliant. The
- 20:52Speaker 1: payoff is so like every time I was like, oh,
- 20:57Speaker 1: like it was just I guess I know joy. No
- 21:00Speaker 1: joy does not spark joy for me. So Bradley Cooper
- 21:05Speaker 1: decides it will be okay and perfectly harmless to help
- 21:08Speaker 1: Scarlet with her music career. Is he a manager or
- 21:12Speaker 1: a lawyer? Right, we don't know, but somebody in his
- 21:15Speaker 1: office is going to help her. Yeah, but we don't
- 21:20Speaker 1: know any more than that. Drew Barrymore can't figure out
- 21:23Speaker 1: how to send an email for the whole movie, Like
- 21:25Speaker 1: she's or it's like just like her co workers being
- 21:27Speaker 1: like Drew Barrymore use my Space, and she's like, it's
- 21:30Speaker 1: so good for using Like she just she's trying to
- 21:34Speaker 1: send a message to someone that's her whole Like, what's
- 21:37Speaker 1: going on with her character besides nothing besides going to
- 21:41Speaker 1: MySpace dot com ads to eat. That's at least she
- 21:48Speaker 1: does one thing that's work related. What if she is
- 21:51Speaker 1: selling Nutmeg and it's all connected. That's it. We just
- 21:57Speaker 1: cracked it. Let's call him up right now, let's them
- 22:00Speaker 1: know that we need the sequel. Yeah, all about not Meg.
- 22:04Speaker 1: He is just that into you. That's my pitch for
- 22:08Speaker 1: the title. Um. Also, this movie was clearly written in
- 22:13Speaker 1: two thousand four or not two thousand nine, and the
- 22:16Speaker 1: screenplay was never updated to reflect two thousand nine technology,
- 22:21Speaker 1: because it acts like everyone still has landlines, everyone still
- 22:25Speaker 1: like leaves messages on answering machines. Nobody text messages each
- 22:30Speaker 1: other like my Space. My Space is dated. People knew
- 22:34Speaker 1: how to send an email by two thousand and nine,
- 22:37Speaker 1: Like they're just all this. Yeah, it's almost like, yeah,
- 22:42Speaker 1: it's so. I mean, the book was published in two
- 22:46Speaker 1: thousand four or two thousand five, I think, and then
- 22:49Speaker 1: the movie comes out in two thousand nine. But whoever
- 22:52Speaker 1: was writing these things, we're using technology from like two
- 22:55Speaker 1: thousand one, and I'm just like this. I was so frustrated. Anyway, Okay,
- 23:03Speaker 1: So Bradley Cooper is like, yeah, I'm gonna help Scarlet
- 23:07Speaker 1: with her music career, and then they start getting closer
- 23:11Speaker 1: and more flirty, and eventually they start sleeping together. And
- 23:14Speaker 1: then he lies to his wife Jennifer Connelly about it.
- 23:19Speaker 1: He's actively gaslighting her over in Jennifer Aniston Land. She
- 23:25Speaker 1: leaves Ben Affleck because he refuses to marry her, so
- 23:29Speaker 1: now she's single. And meanwhile, Jennifer Goodwin keeps calling Justin
- 23:37Speaker 1: Long and asking for more dating advice, and it seems
- 23:41Speaker 1: like maybe he's starting to like her, and he even
- 23:44Speaker 1: invites her to a party he's throwing, which she interprets
- 23:48Speaker 1: as him liking her, but then he's like, no, you
- 23:51Speaker 1: misread this. You've silly fool and she's like, well, at
- 23:56Speaker 1: least I put myself out there, you're gonna be alone forever,
- 23:59Speaker 1: and then she storms out, God, that's so messy. That was.
- 24:04Speaker 1: That was the moment of empowerment. Guys, What a feminist
- 24:08Speaker 1: text that was. That was when she stood up for herself.
- 24:12Speaker 1: That was I was like, oh, we were really supposed
- 24:14Speaker 1: to be cheering when I was like, I can't stand
- 24:17Speaker 1: both of you. You guys deserve each other. Yeah, true,
- 24:23Speaker 1: Like I hope you take yourselves off the market so
- 24:26Speaker 1: no one else has to deal with you. And then meanwhile,
- 24:31Speaker 1: Bradley Cooper finally does tell Jennifer Connolly that he cheated
- 24:36Speaker 1: on her, and she's upset at first, but then she's like,
- 24:39Speaker 1: wait a minute, I'm partly to blame. So she goes
- 24:42Speaker 1: to his office to try to like re ignite their
- 24:46Speaker 1: fire and to have sex with him, but oh, Scarlett
- 24:51Speaker 1: Johansson was already there and she's hiding in the closet
- 24:54Speaker 1: here with us high Scarlet, what's up. So she comes
- 24:58Speaker 1: back out afterwards and she's like, we're done, and she
- 25:00Speaker 1: breaks up with him, and then she goes back to
- 25:05Speaker 1: E from Entourage because they have this kind of like
- 25:08Speaker 1: on again, off again casual thing, but she doesn't sleep
- 25:12Speaker 1: with him anymore. Like she goes to him when she
- 25:16Speaker 1: needs to boost exactly, yeah, which is not a nice
- 25:21Speaker 1: thing to do, but I was like, oh why, I
- 25:23Speaker 1: understand this dynamic, right, So they like then they kind
- 25:28Speaker 1: of get together for a little while, but then she's like,
- 25:30Speaker 1: wait a minute, this guy was an Entourage I don't
- 25:33Speaker 1: like him. Gross, and so she breaks up with him,
- 25:37Speaker 1: and then Justin Long is starting to realize that he
- 25:41Speaker 1: does like Jennifer Goodwin, and then the movie ends with
- 25:46Speaker 1: Jennifer Goodwin and Justin Long getting together. Jennifer Aniston and
- 25:50Speaker 1: Ben Affleck getting back together because she realizes that she
- 25:55Speaker 1: doesn't need to be married after all. But then he
- 25:57Speaker 1: proposes anyway, and then they get married. Sorry, one of
- 26:01Speaker 1: the most one of the all time dufist proposals I've
- 26:06Speaker 1: ever seen committed to film. He put the ring in
- 26:09Speaker 1: his pants cargo, his disgusting cargo, and then she and
- 26:16Speaker 1: I was like, I was really hoping that that would happen,
- 26:20Speaker 1: and then Jennifer Anderson would be like, wait a second,
- 26:23Speaker 1: I'm leaving, like, oh, just the laziest look so gross.
- 26:32Speaker 1: It was horrifying. And then Jennifer Connelly and Bradley Cooper
- 26:37Speaker 1: split up, and then also Eat from Entourage hits it
- 26:41Speaker 1: off with Drew Barrymore and that is how everything concludes.
- 26:47Speaker 1: Let's take a quick break and then we'll come back
- 26:50Speaker 1: to discuss, and we're back, Uh, well where should we? Okay?
- 27:06Speaker 1: I wanna I can see how I can kind of Okay,
- 27:14Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm gonna try to phrase this carefully, but
- 27:17Speaker 1: I can see how some of the things that get
- 27:22Speaker 1: examined in this movie or start to be examined, could
- 27:27Speaker 1: be empowering for some people because there are we see
- 27:33Speaker 1: examples of like women, you know, making their needs known,
- 27:38Speaker 1: their needs and once known in a relationship, you see
- 27:42Speaker 1: challenging of men's behavior, especially when they're being dismissive of
- 27:46Speaker 1: women's feelings. There's some voice over at the end where
- 27:51Speaker 1: Jennifer Goodwin's like, maybe a happy ending doesn't have to
- 27:54Speaker 1: include a guy. Maybe it's just you know, you on
- 27:57Speaker 1: your own, picking up the pieces and and freeing yourself
- 28:01Speaker 1: up for something better in the future. But the movie
- 28:05Speaker 1: only very barely scratches the surface of any of these things,
- 28:09Speaker 1: and um is terrible the rest of the time because,
- 28:14Speaker 1: like they're there are opportunities in this movie to explore
- 28:19Speaker 1: like why men mistreat or are disinterested in women, but
- 28:26Speaker 1: they really don't even touch on that. It's just like, well,
- 28:29Speaker 1: men are just look, I don't know, men are boys
- 28:33Speaker 1: will be boys. I mean there is an article that
- 28:37Speaker 1: I read, God, I'd probably around that was around the
- 28:42Speaker 1: time this movie came out that was titled like if
- 28:45Speaker 1: it's not a hell, yes it's a no, And it
- 28:48Speaker 1: was all and and it kind of mirrors what Justin
- 28:50Speaker 1: Long is saying, right, like, when men are actually interested,
- 28:54Speaker 1: they will show up in the ways like you don't
- 28:56Speaker 1: have to houm them to call you, they just naturally will.
- 29:00Speaker 1: And I remember reading that article and being like, that's
- 29:02Speaker 1: a good compass for me, because I think we do
- 29:05Speaker 1: hear a lot of narrative of like, let's excuse behavior
- 29:09Speaker 1: and make it about So in some ways I do
- 29:13Speaker 1: agree with what Justin is saying, like when guys are interested,
- 29:16Speaker 1: it doesn't mean that I can't approach a guy if
- 29:18Speaker 1: I'm interested, but it has to be reciprocal and I
- 29:21Speaker 1: can't be the one driving. So I do agree with that.
- 29:25Speaker 1: But there's a lot of everybody in this film needs therapy, yes, desperately,
- 29:32Speaker 1: like y'all everybody needs therapy. There's a lot of anxious
- 29:36Speaker 1: avoidant type attachment style. There's a lot of codependency. There's
- 29:39Speaker 1: a lot of lack of boundaries, and none of that
- 29:43Speaker 1: is addressed. Yeah, and I do agree it's it's so
- 29:47Speaker 1: it feels like a half step towards something that I
- 29:52Speaker 1: would agree with, where it's like, you know, I'm very
- 29:57Speaker 1: pro you know, people not playing games with each other
- 29:59Speaker 1: and be direct about how they feel. And I do
- 30:03Speaker 1: think that there there is kind of this tendency of
- 30:05Speaker 1: like I mean, it's it's introduced and like lightly criticized
- 30:09Speaker 1: the immediately walked back in the opening scene of the
- 30:11Speaker 1: movie where it's like if a boy is mean to you,
- 30:13Speaker 1: that means he likes you, which is one of the
- 30:16Speaker 1: largest fallacies that is uh spread to usually young girls.
- 30:22Speaker 1: And I think that it is like encouraging people, like
- 30:25Speaker 1: people of all genders from a young age to be
- 30:27Speaker 1: direct and encouraging when you are in the receiving end
- 30:30Speaker 1: of that to take people at their word. Um, and like,
- 30:34Speaker 1: if someone is being cruel to me, there is no
- 30:37Speaker 1: world in which you should you know, view that as
- 30:40Speaker 1: they like me and I should want to engage with
- 30:42Speaker 1: them further, Like that is such a toxic idea, and
- 30:46Speaker 1: so it's like, yeah, like like you're saying, and like
- 30:49Speaker 1: I do agree with justin long oh God, that sentence
- 30:54Speaker 1: to the extent that it's like, yeah, like if someone
- 30:58Speaker 1: is interested in you, they will make known. And you know,
- 31:01Speaker 1: this isn't like a mind game thing, but it just
- 31:05Speaker 1: has to go, you know, on both ends of a relationship.
- 31:08Speaker 1: Because I feel like where this movie lands is like
- 31:11Speaker 1: and it sounds like Caitlyn, based on what you're describing
- 31:13Speaker 1: about the book, that like men should be empowered to
- 31:17Speaker 1: be direct, whereas women need to be doing like this
- 31:22Speaker 1: calculus problem to figure it out, um, and and they're
- 31:26Speaker 1: not afforded the same amount of like emotional freedom and
- 31:30Speaker 1: directness that that men are agency. Yeah. Yeah, the movie
- 31:37Speaker 1: opening with this commentary about like how women are not
- 31:41Speaker 1: only programmed but like encouraged to think that if a
- 31:45Speaker 1: man is a jerk to you, it means he likes you.
- 31:47Speaker 1: And then so like challenging that notion is like totally legitimate,
- 31:51Speaker 1: but then the movie doesn't. Everything else the movie does
- 31:57Speaker 1: is just trash, so right, Like, there there are occasional
- 32:01Speaker 1: moments when it's I think it's Jennifer Goodwin's I think
- 32:04Speaker 1: she's supposed to be the protagonist question mark, but she
- 32:07Speaker 1: it's her. It's her voiceover saying like what a load
- 32:10Speaker 1: of crap blah blah blah, and it's like, yeah, agree,
- 32:14Speaker 1: totally agree. But then the movie does not really go
- 32:17Speaker 1: on to explore that idea in any meaningful way because
- 32:21Speaker 1: there's and there's also storylines that directly contradict that, because like,
- 32:25Speaker 1: if you think about Ben Affleck and Jennifer Aniston, who
- 32:28Speaker 1: I kept forgetting were never actually a real couple, it
- 32:31Speaker 1: just sounds like it was true, but it wasn't she didn't? Yeah,
- 32:38Speaker 1: were we ever so young? Butt? And then benefit was
- 32:42Speaker 1: him and j Loo? They're both single? Now what what? No?
- 32:48Speaker 1: They're both it's true right now? Yeah, because j Lo
- 32:52Speaker 1: and a Rod broke up. Telling me about my own people, like,
- 32:57Speaker 1: what's not on the up and up on this drama?
- 33:01Speaker 1: She just like showed her wedding ring like a few
- 33:04Speaker 1: months ago. Yeah, Aroon was cheating on her over Zoom
- 33:08Speaker 1: because pandemic get some fun ati here, I'm dead? How
- 33:12Speaker 1: do you cheat? How do you cheat on that woman?
- 33:15Speaker 1: How do you know? How do you change? People? Just
- 33:18Speaker 1: get bored and on zoom Triflin, All right, well I
- 33:22Speaker 1: learned something new, so so you know, benefit it's maybe
- 33:26Speaker 1: it's not too late. Maybe it's come back benefit part
- 33:29Speaker 1: two the sequel all that to say, you know, the
- 33:33Speaker 1: jen Andison ben Affleck storyline is all about him saying
- 33:37Speaker 1: and being direct, saying I do not want to get married,
- 33:40Speaker 1: which is like, you know, even if Jennifer Anderson disagrees
- 33:44Speaker 1: with it, like she should take him at face value.
- 33:46Speaker 1: There he doesn't seem like he wants to get married,
- 33:48Speaker 1: but the movie doesn't reinforce that he changes his mind
- 33:51Speaker 1: and he throws a dirty old ring into his dirty
- 33:54Speaker 1: old pants, and so that like directly contradicts what you're
- 33:58Speaker 1: told in the first seen that like, oh, you know,
- 34:02Speaker 1: when someone's being direct with you take them at their word,
- 34:05Speaker 1: which is not a bad message. But then it's not
- 34:08Speaker 1: always true in the movie. It's it's just because the
- 34:12Speaker 1: way women are written in this movie is that they
- 34:16Speaker 1: are generally just irrational or reactionary, or clueless or any
- 34:22Speaker 1: other number of like stereotypical negative traits associated with women.
- 34:27Speaker 1: The women are all written in these very broad stereotypes.
- 34:30Speaker 1: So even if Ben Affleck, who I can, I can't
- 34:33Speaker 1: believe I'm about to say this, but like, as someone
- 34:36Speaker 1: who like, for me personally, marriage is not something that
- 34:41Speaker 1: I care about doing. I don't really believe in it
- 34:44Speaker 1: as an institution for me personally. So the things that
- 34:49Speaker 1: he's saying about marriage, I was like, yeah, I agree
- 34:52Speaker 1: with you, Ben Affleck. Yikes, But I was like, yeah,
- 34:55Speaker 1: I see where he's coming from. It's it's a valid viewpoint.
- 34:58Speaker 1: And it's like if your partner feel is that way,
- 35:01Speaker 1: you know, it's like it's okay to feel either way.
- 35:02Speaker 1: But it's like, don't really like you're gonna come around.
- 35:05Speaker 1: I can feel it, Like that's so unhealthy. Yeah, and
- 35:08Speaker 1: it's like it's worth at least listening to and hearing
- 35:11Speaker 1: him out. But rather than Jennifer Aniston doing that, she's
- 35:14Speaker 1: just like, well, that obviously means that you don't even
- 35:16Speaker 1: love me, so we have to break up. And it's like,
- 35:19Speaker 1: that's not what he's saying, Like what it's The concept
- 35:23Speaker 1: of compromise in a relationship is completely absent from this movie,
- 35:27Speaker 1: which is bizarre because that is a big part of
- 35:32Speaker 1: being in a long term relationship is talking with each
- 35:35Speaker 1: other and sometimes finding compromises and establishing boundaries. But that
- 35:41Speaker 1: is just not where they're at. But I think again
- 35:44Speaker 1: therapy because Jennifer Aniston is being triggered by her sister's wedding,
- 35:50Speaker 1: which now has become a problem because everyone's perpetually like
- 35:54Speaker 1: her family is pressuring her to be like what are
- 35:56Speaker 1: you doing? It's seven years Like I'm sure if this
- 35:59Speaker 1: would have happened, don't think Jennifer would have been upset
- 36:01Speaker 1: about it. They lived together, they're sharing a home. He's
- 36:04Speaker 1: putting up a painting, like do you know what I mean?
- 36:08Speaker 1: Like he's doing housework. Yeah, So so it's like it's
- 36:12Speaker 1: not a problem until she let outside forces kind of
- 36:16Speaker 1: like dictate what her life should be and then listen
- 36:20Speaker 1: to those things. But then she also is like, I've
- 36:23Speaker 1: been harboring these feelings for five years, and it's like, maybe,
- 36:28Speaker 1: like again, therapy girl learned how to express herself early on.
- 36:31Speaker 1: Exactly do you think that Jennifer Anderson not being married
- 36:36Speaker 1: to Ben Affleck gave Chris Christofferson a heart attack? Is
- 36:40Speaker 1: that what set it off? Is it? He's like, oh
- 36:43Speaker 1: my god, seven years and then he keels over, keels over. Now.
- 36:49Speaker 1: I feel like they were probably like doing the Congo
- 36:51Speaker 1: line or something like they were going to dance, and
- 36:53Speaker 1: it was just too much. That was so out of
- 36:56Speaker 1: I didn't even rewind the scene. I'm like, because I
- 36:58Speaker 1: looked down to take a note for a second, I
- 37:00Speaker 1: looked back up and Chris Christofferson was in cortiac arrest.
- 37:02Speaker 1: I'm like, I can't, I don't, I don't acting to
- 37:04Speaker 1: check me out. It was so dramatic. He was like,
- 37:08Speaker 1: oh and then and then everybody rushed and I'm like,
- 37:11Speaker 1: somebody call the fucking like ambulance. They're all just like
- 37:16Speaker 1: talking over each other and no one's calling an ambulance.
- 37:19Speaker 1: It was yeah, and the music shift where was oh
- 37:22Speaker 1: there was Oh my god, there's so many This is
- 37:24Speaker 1: not related, but the mutes some of the music choices.
- 37:28Speaker 1: So the most two thousand and nine soundtrack I've ever
- 37:31Speaker 1: heard somewhere only we know playing. I was like, oh
- 37:36Speaker 1: that was that was a moment my morning jacket. Karen
- 37:39Speaker 1: Bailey Ray I was like, wow, sophomore year was what
- 37:43Speaker 1: a time. Wilco like just so so much, so much.
- 37:49Speaker 1: It takes you back to a terrible time. Yeah, it
- 37:52Speaker 1: really takes me back to being broken up with by
- 37:54Speaker 1: a saxophone player. Thanks for nothing. I want to talk
- 38:00Speaker 1: about the toxic female relationships in this movie as well,
- 38:03Speaker 1: because it's not just men on men, but I'm like
- 38:06Speaker 1: Jennifer Connolly's toxic positivity with Jennifer Goodwin, like, at some point,
- 38:11Speaker 1: stop telling her he's going to call. She's like, don't worry,
- 38:14Speaker 1: he's gonna call. And Drew Barrymore, girl, you sitting there
- 38:19Speaker 1: telling this woman to go for it for a for
- 38:21Speaker 1: a married man. Yeah, it's and then you end up
- 38:25Speaker 1: hooking up with e who you know slept with Scarlet.
- 38:29Speaker 1: So I'm like, are you all friends or acquaintances. Why
- 38:31Speaker 1: are getting your nails done together? I would never even
- 38:35Speaker 1: like have dinner with somebody who my friend had a
- 38:39Speaker 1: relationship with. I didn't even connect that. Yeah, where is
- 38:42Speaker 1: the loyal she? They're not friends. I don't know what
- 38:44Speaker 1: that is, but they're not friends. Yeah WHOA. I also
- 38:48Speaker 1: did not catch that because I simply could not keep
- 38:51Speaker 1: track of like who knew who in which storylines. But
- 38:58Speaker 1: to your point in it, like these characters are just
- 39:02Speaker 1: like hurling this toxic positivity at each other, which is
- 39:07Speaker 1: like not helpful. No one's being constructive, no one is
- 39:11Speaker 1: being critical about any of their thinking or behavior. Like
- 39:16Speaker 1: it's just like, that's not what I'm like lifting up
- 39:19Speaker 1: other women looks like by like lying to them and
- 39:22Speaker 1: making stuff up. That's not how you do that. And
- 39:26Speaker 1: also like hold space for Jennifer Goodwin to like spin
- 39:29Speaker 1: out and then be like, hey, let's talk about how
- 39:33Speaker 1: how we can make you feel better outside of this,
- 39:36Speaker 1: you know. Yeah, it's it's the the way that this
- 39:40Speaker 1: movie has written. It just has such aggressively rigid views
- 39:47Speaker 1: of what a man's behavior is versus what a woman's
- 39:51Speaker 1: behavior is that sometimes it's like it's just like there's
- 39:55Speaker 1: so much cognitive dissonance in the way characters act. It
- 39:58Speaker 1: feels like sometimes, you know, the writer was like, well,
- 40:01Speaker 1: women be like this, so even if it doesn't like
- 40:04Speaker 1: make logical sense in the plot, even though it doesn't
- 40:08Speaker 1: make sense given this relationship, um, women be like this,
- 40:11Speaker 1: so she would probably do that. Like it's just so
- 40:15Speaker 1: binary driven to the point where it's just I was like, what, huh,
- 40:21Speaker 1: Like what there's like a female writer and a male
- 40:24Speaker 1: writer right on the book and on the movie. Yeah,
- 40:27Speaker 1: different teams. So I just feel like, I don't know,
- 40:31Speaker 1: I feel like the woman was like, sure, that sounds right,
- 40:34Speaker 1: do it? Or maybe well, because nobody advocated for us
- 40:38Speaker 1: in this film in the writing process. They the writers
- 40:42Speaker 1: of the movie, Abby Cone and Mark Silverstein. They seem
- 40:44Speaker 1: to work together pretty exclusively, and they also wrote movies
- 40:48Speaker 1: like Never Been Kissed, Valentine's Day, and How to Be Single,
- 40:52Speaker 1: So they are real connoisseurs of this very specific brand
- 40:57Speaker 1: of poo um. And then the book was written by
- 41:02Speaker 1: Greg Burnt and Liz to Chiller to Silo, who were
- 41:08Speaker 1: like producers slash consultants, you know, behind the scenes people
- 41:11Speaker 1: on sex in the City. So uh, and you were
- 41:16Speaker 1: mentioning this off Mike Rape before we started recording. But
- 41:19Speaker 1: there is like it's always like a little it's frustrating
- 41:24Speaker 1: to see this kind of writing with with a female
- 41:27Speaker 1: co writer. But I think it is like a pretty
- 41:30Speaker 1: clear example that you know, like, representation is important, but
- 41:35Speaker 1: it's not the endgame because there's a lot of internalized
- 41:38Speaker 1: misogyny y. Yeah, especially for writers who have been in
- 41:43Speaker 1: the business for a really long time. And you know,
- 41:45Speaker 1: if you start out in the eighties, that kind of mentality,
- 41:49Speaker 1: it just stays with you. And unless you really challenge
- 41:51Speaker 1: yourself to start seeing storytelling from a different vantage point
- 41:55Speaker 1: versus like what you're used to working, um, it's it's
- 42:00Speaker 1: really hard to move forward. So I think the right
- 42:02Speaker 1: representation matters. And you know, it's interesting because the solo
- 42:08Speaker 1: show that I wrote, the Oxy Complex, kind of mirrors
- 42:11Speaker 1: a lot of the anxiety that comes with dating, but um,
- 42:14Speaker 1: I bring in the scientific facts behind it, and I
- 42:18Speaker 1: feel like that misses that's completely missed in this thing.
- 42:22Speaker 1: You know, like when oxytocin gets released, when we start
- 42:26Speaker 1: forming attachments, it does feel like a high. So I
- 42:29Speaker 1: was like, yeah, Jennifer Goodwin is behaving in a way
- 42:32Speaker 1: of somebody having a flood of hormones that's just kind
- 42:35Speaker 1: of taken over and it does make you a little crazy, right,
- 42:39Speaker 1: But how do you mitigate that without any awareness or
- 42:43Speaker 1: like the paradox of choice that is also a scientific
- 42:47Speaker 1: fact with online dating and having so much more, so
- 42:50Speaker 1: many more options for people to date that it makes
- 42:54Speaker 1: it either a impossible to make a choice or be
- 42:57Speaker 1: it makes you less satisfied when you do ake a choice.
- 43:00Speaker 1: So like, in so many ways right now, we're kind
- 43:04Speaker 1: of being set up not to thrive in relationships. Yeah, yeah,
- 43:08Speaker 1: check out the show. I mean I would love to
- 43:10Speaker 1: send you guys the link just to watch it. Are
- 43:13Speaker 1: you both single? I am always single, hashtag forever single,
- 43:19Speaker 1: as a Zay says famously single, I am bravely I'm
- 43:24Speaker 1: bravely not single, very brave of you. I am trying
- 43:32Speaker 1: to get that affleck to marry me. It's been seven years,
- 43:35Speaker 1: and you know, we're just going to see what happens.
- 43:38Speaker 1: I think I'm going to be on the lookout for
- 43:40Speaker 1: those cargo pants that are going to come in the mail. Yeah.
- 43:42Speaker 1: I can't get over it. It was like I was,
- 43:45Speaker 1: It's so not even close to the worst thing that
- 43:48Speaker 1: happens in the movie. But I was like, oh, so
- 43:51Speaker 1: the disrespect she did not change him if that is
- 43:56Speaker 1: the proposal, she did not change him. Yeah, I feel
- 44:00Speaker 1: we should get into like probably like girl, I don't
- 44:02Speaker 1: want to move my shut out again, so here's the ring. Yeah,
- 44:06Speaker 1: he's like, I don't. I'm I'm tired of fighting because
- 44:09Speaker 1: you know, my girlfriend always be fighting me. But yeah,
- 44:13Speaker 1: I think it might be worth just kind of going
- 44:15Speaker 1: through each um relationship and just look at it more closely.
- 44:19Speaker 1: But before we do that, I wanted to Yeah, I
- 44:22Speaker 1: mean to your point, and about the movie not acknowledging
- 44:27Speaker 1: a lot of the reason that like people behave in
- 44:31Speaker 1: certain ways in like romantic settings, and this movie specifically
- 44:37Speaker 1: hetero romantic situations because five white hetero people, right, But then, like,
- 44:45Speaker 1: there's also no exploration of why do some men tend
- 44:50Speaker 1: to behave in certain ways where they are like dismissive
- 44:55Speaker 1: or they act disinterested or they mistreat women, and it
- 44:59Speaker 1: just it doesn't ever explore that at all, even though
- 45:02Speaker 1: there's a whole wide array of reasons, including but not
- 45:06Speaker 1: limited to good old fashioned misogyny. Well and just like
- 45:10Speaker 1: extremes like social conditioning, like that, which is also it
- 45:14Speaker 1: always is so frustrating when you see these like broad
- 45:17Speaker 1: stereotypes about gender applied as if it is like inherent
- 45:21Speaker 1: to your DNA and not largely a result of environment
- 45:25Speaker 1: and social conditioning, right, and things that like people learn
- 45:30Speaker 1: from the media they consume. But it's yeah, it's like
- 45:32Speaker 1: things like men tending to think that women are disposable,
- 45:36Speaker 1: men valuing women mostly for their youth and looks, men
- 45:41Speaker 1: not trusting women's feelings or don't think they need to
- 45:44Speaker 1: be bothered with, men feeling intimidated or emasculated by women
- 45:50Speaker 1: who they perceived to be smarter or more professionally successful,
- 45:55Speaker 1: things like that, And the movie is just like I
- 45:57Speaker 1: don't know anything about that. To my girls, can we
- 46:00Speaker 1: fix this? I mean, we can't fix this in one podcast,
- 46:03Speaker 1: Like what's going to happen to us trying for five years?
- 46:06Speaker 1: You know, Um, let's take a quick break and then
- 46:10Speaker 1: we'll come back for a more discussion and we're back. Um,
- 46:22Speaker 1: so we I feel is there did anyone else have
- 46:25Speaker 1: anything else to add about the Jen and Ben relationship
- 46:29Speaker 1: that was wait, which Jeffer Jeffer, and there's Jennifer Jennifer
- 46:36Speaker 1: and also don't forget Jennifer. Um, yeah, I think. I
- 46:41Speaker 1: mean there's a part where Jennifer Anderson even acknowledges like, well,
- 46:44Speaker 1: I've been kind of like withholding these feelings because I
- 46:47Speaker 1: didn't want to seem clingy or demanding, which like fair. Again,
- 46:53Speaker 1: oftentimes in hetero relationships, if a woman like does like
- 46:59Speaker 1: make her needs and once known she has met with
- 47:02Speaker 1: resistance and you know, accused of being needy and being
- 47:06Speaker 1: quote unquote hysterical. But so like the acknowledgment of that,
- 47:11Speaker 1: I was like, Okay, maybe this is going somewhere. But
- 47:13Speaker 1: then again, the way she's written is just to like
- 47:16Speaker 1: not listen to reason, just like not be willing at
- 47:21Speaker 1: all to compromise jump to really irrational conclusions. Another thing
- 47:27Speaker 1: I wanted to mention was Jennifer Aniston's character being single
- 47:32Speaker 1: in the movie, Like the part where she is single
- 47:36Speaker 1: after she has left ben Affleck is treated by the
- 47:40Speaker 1: people around her as like being a fate worse than death,
- 47:45Speaker 1: which is something that happens to Jennifer Annister aniston characters
- 47:49Speaker 1: all the time in this era of her movies. It
- 47:52Speaker 1: seems like like thirty what and then they like turned
- 47:56Speaker 1: to dust. It's ridiculous to the point where in this movie,
- 48:01Speaker 1: not one but two different cousins of hers aggressively hit
- 48:06Speaker 1: on her. Yeah, which is disgusting and like why why
- 48:12Speaker 1: would that be in the movie, And like, to be clear,
- 48:15Speaker 1: being pressured from friends and family members to find a
- 48:18Speaker 1: romantic partner and to be in a relationship like that
- 48:21Speaker 1: pressure is a very real thing for a lot of people.
- 48:25Speaker 1: What struck me though about this movie is like she
- 48:29Speaker 1: doesn't really do anything to challenge that. It's not presented
- 48:34Speaker 1: critically at all. Yeah, the movie, it seems like the
- 48:37Speaker 1: movie kind of agrees like, well, this is what you
- 48:41Speaker 1: get when you leave ben Affleck, and you just like
- 48:44Speaker 1: make that choice, Like yeah, you're everyone's gonna think you're
- 48:47Speaker 1: a loser and your cousins are gonna hit on you,
- 48:50Speaker 1: so you better change your ways and get back together
- 48:54Speaker 1: with ben Affleck. The movie is so focused on the
- 48:57Speaker 1: end game of like the whole audience being like, oh, well, clearly,
- 49:01Speaker 1: Jennifer innocent Ben Affleck have to get back together that
- 49:04Speaker 1: if I feel like they take every lazy writing trope
- 49:07Speaker 1: along the way to like reinforce that like foregone conclusion,
- 49:12Speaker 1: and then that means like the takeaway for so many
- 49:15Speaker 1: of these storylines is just like this bizarro, like really
- 49:20Speaker 1: old fashioned, like like for this one, for example, is well,
- 49:25Speaker 1: being single is the worst possible thing that could happen
- 49:28Speaker 1: to you, so you better get back together with the guys.
- 49:32Speaker 1: Let's settle baby, let's do it. And then I like
- 49:36Speaker 1: on the flip side of that, for if you're like
- 49:39Speaker 1: looking at it from ben Affleck's point of view, which
- 49:42Speaker 1: like I just never like ideal, but you know, but
- 49:46Speaker 1: like at the end she comes back to him, she
- 49:50Speaker 1: was willing to compromise and say like, yes, we don't
- 49:52Speaker 1: need this formal legal commitment of marriage as long as
- 49:55Speaker 1: we agree to just to be committed to each other
- 49:58Speaker 1: in this relationship, like that is fine for me. And
- 50:01Speaker 1: he's like cool, great, awesome. But then he also folds
- 50:06Speaker 1: and he's like, no, actually we should get married, and
- 50:10Speaker 1: I just I feel like like this would have been
- 50:12Speaker 1: a good opportunity to show on screen like a you know,
- 50:18Speaker 1: not quite as traditional of a relationship on screen, where
- 50:22Speaker 1: like people do agree to be committed to each other
- 50:25Speaker 1: without the like bonds of illegal marriage. But instead this
- 50:29Speaker 1: movie was like, no hetero marriage that is legally binding
- 50:36Speaker 1: is the end game and should be for everybody. So
- 50:40Speaker 1: that's what's going to be like the conclusion. Yeah, they're
- 50:44Speaker 1: almost like de dey obvious. Yeah, so I just I thought, like, again,
- 50:52Speaker 1: I don't know why I had any expectations about any thing,
- 50:56Speaker 1: but I was like, oh, that could have gone somewhere
- 50:58Speaker 1: interesting there. We could have seen something nuanced here. But
- 51:03Speaker 1: then the movie just makes like the most basic, uninteresting
- 51:09Speaker 1: choice every time. And here's the thing, like why I
- 51:14Speaker 1: find an issue with these stories. I mean, it was
- 51:16Speaker 1: two hours long, but I still feel like when you
- 51:19Speaker 1: try to take on so many narratives, like I have
- 51:21Speaker 1: no understanding what that relationship is even about, Like we
- 51:25Speaker 1: don't know the history. And maybe that's inherent in like
- 51:29Speaker 1: the structure of romantic comedies like can they ever pass
- 51:33Speaker 1: the backdel test or like you know, because they're just
- 51:36Speaker 1: not structured that way, Like that's not what this is
- 51:39Speaker 1: about in terms of genre. But I just feel like
- 51:43Speaker 1: I don't know how they got together why, you know what?
- 51:46Speaker 1: I mean, I need more information, but I guess that
- 51:50Speaker 1: doesn't make it dramatic. I don't know, or maybe they
- 51:52Speaker 1: just like they're like we have been affleck for forty
- 51:55Speaker 1: five minutes total, Like what are we going to do
- 51:58Speaker 1: this in three days so that he can go shoot
- 52:01Speaker 1: the other film? They're like put him on a boat.
- 52:04Speaker 1: They're like, wait a second, what's Chris Christopherson supposed to do? Um?
- 52:06Speaker 1: I don't know. I have a heart attack. Did Um? Yeah,
- 52:10Speaker 1: I totally agree. It's like there there is like if
- 52:12Speaker 1: you're if if they really want you to take something
- 52:16Speaker 1: away from this movie that's like applicable. Um, you need
- 52:19Speaker 1: to have contacts for what this relationship is. And you
- 52:23Speaker 1: really don't get it. I mean I kindly you do,
- 52:26Speaker 1: because he says he says, hey, I kind of was
- 52:29Speaker 1: talked into this marriage. I didn't feel like I was ready.
- 52:31Speaker 1: So at least we hear from his point of view,
- 52:34Speaker 1: even though it's fucked up, like perhaps stand up for
- 52:37Speaker 1: what you want and be like, no, I'm not going
- 52:39Speaker 1: to do this. Because he says, uh, no, guy actually
- 52:43Speaker 1: wants to get married, and when he does get married,
- 52:45Speaker 1: he's just thinking about all the women he's going to
- 52:47Speaker 1: miss out on. And I'm like, paradox of choice, I know.
- 52:50Speaker 1: And I'm like, Bradley, was it your idea or Jennifer
- 52:53Speaker 1: Connolly's idea in regards to the Frosted Tips whose idea
- 52:57Speaker 1: was that? And this? How can we um? Yeah, it's
- 53:03Speaker 1: like I guess you you do get like stray lines
- 53:06Speaker 1: like that. But a character that I really could have
- 53:09Speaker 1: used that background for was Jennifer Goodwin because she has
- 53:13Speaker 1: all of these, you know, very kind of clingy behaviors.
- 53:16Speaker 1: I think she's my My feeling of how she was
- 53:19Speaker 1: written was kind of this very broad stereotype of like
- 53:22Speaker 1: desperate and and there's no context for like why might
- 53:29Speaker 1: she be this way? What is her history? Like there's
- 53:31Speaker 1: it's stuff that you really could use, but it just
- 53:34Speaker 1: seems like the way it's written and the way it
- 53:36Speaker 1: plays out, it just plays out like a very broadly
- 53:39Speaker 1: written character of like a single woman. Yeah, because when
- 53:43Speaker 1: she comes in with the with the diary stuff, like
- 53:46Speaker 1: she's cracked out and she's like, I've gone through all
- 53:48Speaker 1: of my stuff and I'm the exception, I'm the rule.
- 53:50Speaker 1: I'm not the exception, you know what I mean. And
- 53:52Speaker 1: she's like gone through like this type of behavior she's
- 53:55Speaker 1: been accepting for a long time. Right, that doesn't happen
- 53:59Speaker 1: in a void. But again, I don't know that these
- 54:02Speaker 1: are movies are set up to explore those issues. It's
- 54:05Speaker 1: just like, here's the problem, let's fix it with love. Yeah. Yes,
- 54:09Speaker 1: And then where her storyline goes with Justin Long, who
- 54:15Speaker 1: oh my god. I absolutely loathe his characters. Such a smug,
- 54:20Speaker 1: a little asshole. What a what a piece of ship.
- 54:23Speaker 1: He spends most of the movie like either be rating
- 54:27Speaker 1: her or being like down to her a lot talks
- 54:31Speaker 1: down to her. He tells her that, oh, women love drama,
- 54:36Speaker 1: they feed off it, which is another again just like
- 54:39Speaker 1: large generalization, like this is how women be. And he's
- 54:44Speaker 1: like just like treating her badly, not able to realize
- 54:48Speaker 1: that he likes her until it's like almost too late,
- 54:53Speaker 1: and he's like, wait a minute, I've have been dismissive
- 54:57Speaker 1: of women and I and so much so that I
- 54:59Speaker 1: didn't eve even know what it feels like to like
- 55:02Speaker 1: one of them. And then she's like, that's okay, let's
- 55:06Speaker 1: kiss and be together. And I'm like, it doesn't even
- 55:08Speaker 1: ask consent, he just goes for well. But she also,
- 55:12Speaker 1: I mean it's like that that goes both ways. Yeah,
- 55:14Speaker 1: she I mean that other thing, she like jumped on him.
- 55:17Speaker 1: We've got two surprise kisses. You're like, wow, wow, you
- 55:21Speaker 1: guys really are the worst. But they belong together. But
- 55:25Speaker 1: there I mean, and when you put it that way, Caitlin,
- 55:27Speaker 1: that's sort of another storyline that contradicts the opening scene
- 55:30Speaker 1: of the movie because he's being really mean to her,
- 55:33Speaker 1: and then it turns out he likes her. He did
- 55:36Speaker 1: like her the whole time. Yeah, I didn't even that
- 55:38Speaker 1: didn't even pain for me. Of like yet another central
- 55:41Speaker 1: relationship in this movie that contradicts what the opening of
- 55:44Speaker 1: the movie says. Yeah, Well was it that line when
- 55:47Speaker 1: they were at the bar where he's like, don't get excited,
- 55:50Speaker 1: I mean like you like a puppy. Yeah, And he's like,
- 55:53Speaker 1: I feel I pity you. I feel bad for you.
- 55:56Speaker 1: And then and then she comes to the conclusion after
- 55:59Speaker 1: that converse nation that he's into her because she was
- 56:05Speaker 1: watching a movie. I forget what the movie is now
- 56:08Speaker 1: Mary Stuart Masterson's in it. Kind of wonderful, Yeah, and
- 56:12Speaker 1: she's like influenced by the media that she's consuming, by
- 56:16Speaker 1: the rom com and she's like, oh my god, I
- 56:18Speaker 1: had it all wrong. He does like me, and it's
- 56:21Speaker 1: like like, that's this is not a good yardstick to you,
- 56:23Speaker 1: and then goes full throttle. It's like, what do you
- 56:26Speaker 1: know about him? Like, you guys haven't had any conversation
- 56:29Speaker 1: except him telling you about guys that you should leave alone.
- 56:32Speaker 1: Do you know how many siblings he has? Like like nothing,
- 56:36Speaker 1: She's just like he's it for me. Yeah. He just
- 56:39Speaker 1: talks at her for for weeks. And then she was like,
- 56:42Speaker 1: I think I'm in love. Also that her her behavior,
- 56:46Speaker 1: I just her behavior was so confusing to me at
- 56:49Speaker 1: different points where it's like, maybe if we had some context,
- 56:51Speaker 1: this could exist in at least there's some justification. But
- 56:55Speaker 1: when when she goes to his party and she's you know,
- 56:58Speaker 1: become convinced that he likes her, she immediately defaults to
- 57:02Speaker 1: like cleaning up and like being the mom at a
- 57:07Speaker 1: middle school party for some reason, does all these like
- 57:11Speaker 1: You're like, huh, what the I didn't understand because she's like, oh,
- 57:16Speaker 1: he wants me to co host it with him because
- 57:19Speaker 1: we're about to be a couple, and like that's her logic,
- 57:22Speaker 1: but like the jumping to conclusions her mind map of
- 57:26Speaker 1: how she got there, I cannot really follow her logic.
- 57:31Speaker 1: And girl like read the room at the end of
- 57:33Speaker 1: the party. She's sitting here with garbage bags and he's
- 57:36Speaker 1: playing video games with some hot chick like I would
- 57:38Speaker 1: have left two hours ago. Yes, save yourself the aggravation.
- 57:43Speaker 1: And then and you mentioned this earlier, but like that
- 57:47Speaker 1: speech that she gives after she does a surprise guest
- 57:51Speaker 1: lunge just at him. Uh, then she does this thing
- 57:55Speaker 1: that I think that we were supposed to be like
- 57:56Speaker 1: standing at the AMC cheering, she says, I made his
- 58:00Speaker 1: dissect each little thing and put myself out there too much.
- 58:03Speaker 1: But at least that means I still care. And you
- 58:05Speaker 1: think you won because women are expendable to you and
- 58:08Speaker 1: you may not get hurt or make an ass of
- 58:09Speaker 1: yourself that way, but you don't fall in love that
- 58:11Speaker 1: way way either. You have not won. And it's like
- 58:14Speaker 1: I see where they're going with that, but it's still
- 58:16Speaker 1: such a like binary thing of like there's only one
- 58:20Speaker 1: right way to be and like it didn't didn't hit,
- 58:25Speaker 1: didn't hit for me, It was a note. It was
- 58:27Speaker 1: a note for me on the on the lesson. But
- 58:29Speaker 1: I also feel like, you know, as much as the
- 58:32Speaker 1: women are victims in this, the men don't get complexity either,
- 58:36Speaker 1: do you know what I mean? Like I don't know
- 58:38Speaker 1: anything about Justin Long's characters issues and why he decided
- 58:42Speaker 1: to build a wall around his life. You know, he
- 58:45Speaker 1: has a completely code. I mean, he's Jennifer Goodwin's mirror
- 58:49Speaker 1: in the way that he's like lusting over somebody who
- 58:52Speaker 1: clearly doesn't want to be in a relationship with him,
- 58:55Speaker 1: and you know, like he pretty much tries to bait
- 58:58Speaker 1: her with a house. Yeah, you know, he's like, I'm
- 59:02Speaker 1: only gonna talk about an ultimatum. I'm only going to
- 59:05Speaker 1: buy this if you're gonna be with me, So think
- 59:08Speaker 1: about moving in with me, not right now, but like
- 59:10Speaker 1: I and it's like, what, dude, so manipulative. Yeah, I'm
- 59:15Speaker 1: at least glad that she wasn't like if she would
- 59:18Speaker 1: be like, wow, what a nice gesture. Okay, let's be
- 59:21Speaker 1: together forever, and instead she's just like, no, I'm good,
- 59:24Speaker 1: I don't want any of this, goodbye forever. I was like,
- 59:26Speaker 1: I didn't appreciate that, yeah, because I would have had
- 59:29Speaker 1: a panic attack of someone. I was like, do you
- 59:31Speaker 1: want me to what? No? Yeah, but now let's talk
- 59:36Speaker 1: about the ironing board. Oh my gosh. Just what He's like,
- 59:40Speaker 1: that's why I want this hop because it reminds you
- 59:43Speaker 1: of your childhood home. What's get out of here your
- 59:46Speaker 1: soccer but yeah, yeah, but very good. Yeah, I mean,
- 59:50Speaker 1: and you know, we we focus on, or we tend
- 59:53Speaker 1: to focus on the podcast about like how women are
- 59:55Speaker 1: represented in movies, but like men also being written in
- 1:00:00Speaker 1: these very broad, binary stereotypical ways is obviously also very
- 1:00:08Speaker 1: harmful and not doing anyone in any favors. And it's
- 1:00:12Speaker 1: just like another element of the patriarchy is the way
- 1:00:15Speaker 1: that men are there modeling behavior as well, and women
- 1:00:19Speaker 1: are consuming this media. Yes, so men in this movie
- 1:00:24Speaker 1: are like, oh, I hate commitment and oh I hate
- 1:00:30Speaker 1: my wife and blah blah blah, and then women are like,
- 1:00:37Speaker 1: he just hates Jennifer Goodwin. He doesn't think she's hot enough.
- 1:00:44Speaker 1: I hate him to like, yeah, he's the worst. He's
- 1:00:47Speaker 1: they're all the worst through such and can we talk
- 1:00:51Speaker 1: about him trying to dress Okay, yes, let's talk about
- 1:00:55Speaker 1: how this is treated. He's doing weird, weird grow stuff.
- 1:01:00Speaker 1: So yeah, like we already mentioned earlier, the heteronormativity that
- 1:01:05Speaker 1: that is running rampant in this movie is just gross.
- 1:01:10Speaker 1: The whole concept of the movie. You know, it's implying, like, well,
- 1:01:15Speaker 1: the only relationships worth exploring our hetero one man, one
- 1:01:20Speaker 1: woman kind of thing. The movie does acknowledge that queer
- 1:01:23Speaker 1: people exist, but but only, but but only in supporting
- 1:01:28Speaker 1: roles in very broadly written, stereotyped ways. Yes, very much
- 1:01:33Speaker 1: so um and then yeah, so this subplot we're talking
- 1:01:36Speaker 1: about is with e from Entourage Drew Barrymore places because
- 1:01:41Speaker 1: she's like works in ad sales or something like that.
- 1:01:46Speaker 1: She places an ad for his real estate business in
- 1:01:50Speaker 1: like a part of the newspaper that gets a lot
- 1:01:54Speaker 1: of like traction from gay men, specifically because I don't
- 1:01:58Speaker 1: even remember what the ads are, sex like sex act.
- 1:02:01Speaker 1: Yeah right, And he's like kind of weirded out by
- 1:02:05Speaker 1: it at first, and she's like, no, you can tap
- 1:02:08Speaker 1: into this new clientele, so they will come gentrify the neighborhood.
- 1:02:15Speaker 1: Even say that. He's like, this is a neighborhood in transition.
- 1:02:20Speaker 1: It's like, you mean white people are coming in and
- 1:02:22Speaker 1: gentrifying it. Cool. Ye, So to appeal to his gay clientele,
- 1:02:30Speaker 1: he starts dressing differently, and of course Justin Long makes
- 1:02:35Speaker 1: a bunch of homophobic jokes at his expense. Him just like,
- 1:02:40Speaker 1: altering his appearance is just a very It's just supposed
- 1:02:47Speaker 1: to be a hilarious homophobic gentrification joke, like you're just like,
- 1:02:52Speaker 1: what the fuck two thousand nine come. And then the
- 1:02:58Speaker 1: queer characters who use who are either made who are
- 1:03:01Speaker 1: either like explicitly queer or queer coded in the case
- 1:03:04Speaker 1: of like Drew Barrymore's like friends, Yeah there, their office workers,
- 1:03:10Speaker 1: Yeah yeah. They only exist in the narrative to give
- 1:03:15Speaker 1: advice to straight people about their straight relationships. But also
- 1:03:19Speaker 1: the buyers, the couples at the at at Ease open
- 1:03:24Speaker 1: house they were also like and then have their two
- 1:03:28Speaker 1: cents about what she ease straight relationship. And then some
- 1:03:33Speaker 1: of the guys that Drew Barrymore works with go to
- 1:03:36Speaker 1: Justin Long's party and give advice to Jennifer Goodwin. So
- 1:03:42Speaker 1: it's like three different occasions at least of queer characters
- 1:03:46Speaker 1: only existing in the narrative to give straight people straight advice.
- 1:03:53Speaker 1: Makes add up. I mean, the in terms of representation
- 1:03:58Speaker 1: this movie, it would be hard to do worse then
- 1:04:02Speaker 1: this movie does. Everyone. I mean you can if you have,
- 1:04:06Speaker 1: if you have been blessed by not having seen this movie.
- 1:04:09Speaker 1: Take a look at the poster. It's five hundred says
- 1:04:13Speaker 1: white people, and and then the few people of color
- 1:04:17Speaker 1: we see in the movie there's first of all, there's
- 1:04:19Speaker 1: nothing going on there or I mean you have one
- 1:04:23Speaker 1: scene with um, what is the relationship there is it?
- 1:04:28Speaker 1: Jennifer zo. Jennifer Connelly is like they're remodeling their house
- 1:04:34Speaker 1: because yeah, they're gentrifier house. Oh yeah, that was problematic
- 1:04:38Speaker 1: for me. Yeah, which she was like, we have so
- 1:04:41Speaker 1: many undocumented Why why you got to call him undocumented?
- 1:04:45Speaker 1: A has nothing to do with this story, and you're
- 1:04:48Speaker 1: accusing them of smoking in your house. I mean, talk
- 1:04:52Speaker 1: about cringe. She was a Karen back before there was
- 1:04:56Speaker 1: a Karen. I'm gonna say. I was like, wow, any
- 1:04:58Speaker 1: if you were holding on the any sympathy for the
- 1:05:02Speaker 1: Jennifer Connelly character, that's where it goes all the way
- 1:05:05Speaker 1: out the window. Yes, in a scene where she yea,
- 1:05:09Speaker 1: she just like lays into Luise Goosman and like his
- 1:05:12Speaker 1: sty criminal misuse of Luis Guzman. Okay, So this is
- 1:05:18Speaker 1: another example of like a quote rom com that has
- 1:05:20Speaker 1: absolutely no comedy in it. There are like they're not jokes,
- 1:05:24Speaker 1: or if there are, they like completely fall flat. They
- 1:05:28Speaker 1: never laughed, no, no, but there are well, actually I
- 1:05:31Speaker 1: left when Chris christoffers that was a hilarious, but there's
- 1:05:37Speaker 1: a there are a couple of lines that Louis Goosman
- 1:05:40Speaker 1: says that I was like, that's actually pretty funny, and
- 1:05:43Speaker 1: the rest of the movie is devoid of few. But
- 1:05:45Speaker 1: it's just because Louise Scuzman is funny, great and funny. Yes, exactly,
- 1:05:49Speaker 1: they were, but it's also he's highlighting the ridiculousness. He's like,
- 1:05:52Speaker 1: can I go to work? Can I get back to
- 1:05:54Speaker 1: work now? Because I do with you, like, obviously you're
- 1:05:57Speaker 1: projecting your marriage is shoes on me, and either you
- 1:06:00Speaker 1: pay me ninety dollars an hour to be your therapist
- 1:06:02Speaker 1: and you let me get back to work. It's real
- 1:06:05Speaker 1: simple anyway, So shouts out to Luis Gusman. Yes, but yeah,
- 1:06:11Speaker 1: every other BIPOC character in the movie is written in
- 1:06:16Speaker 1: a broad stereotype, very tertiary, barely has lines. You could
- 1:06:22Speaker 1: take all of them out of the story in the
- 1:06:24Speaker 1: movie would not be any different narratively, Like it's just
- 1:06:28Speaker 1: because the only other representation is those two black women
- 1:06:32Speaker 1: kind of talking about how many people were not even
- 1:06:35Speaker 1: people who are not even related to the plot, Like right, yeah,
- 1:06:40Speaker 1: they were, like I don't know what did they say,
- 1:06:42Speaker 1: Like they make it seem like breaking up was my idea. Yeah,
- 1:06:46Speaker 1: they're they're They have like the whole speech about like
- 1:06:48Speaker 1: how you know when you've been dumped. They're acknowledging inception
- 1:06:55Speaker 1: before Christopher Nolan's inception ever even came out. Just blew
- 1:07:01Speaker 1: my mind. Makes you think, Um, who else do we
- 1:07:09Speaker 1: need to talk about? Is there any can we talk
- 1:07:12Speaker 1: about the fact that at the end it's so Eat
- 1:07:14Speaker 1: Pray Love, but like those confessionals at the end, and
- 1:07:19Speaker 1: Scarlett's like, I'm going on a trip to India with
- 1:07:22Speaker 1: my I'm like, get out of here. Girl. You're supposed
- 1:07:24Speaker 1: to be a struggling singer. How you can afford a
- 1:07:27Speaker 1: trip to India? How long are you going for? Like what?
- 1:07:31Speaker 1: Yoga teachers don't make that much. I know, it's like,
- 1:07:34Speaker 1: what what are you making to She doesn't have yoga
- 1:07:37Speaker 1: pants and yet she has a ton of disposable in
- 1:07:40Speaker 1: Yeah what and you're teaching out a why psyeah? So
- 1:07:45Speaker 1: I know you're not making that much money to afford
- 1:07:48Speaker 1: a whole sabbatical. We haven't really talked too much about
- 1:07:54Speaker 1: Scarlett's character because it's just again a confounding character. A
- 1:08:00Speaker 1: lot of the choices I was like, I don't know,
- 1:08:02Speaker 1: like she is, uh, you know, it seems like she's
- 1:08:06Speaker 1: falling for Bradley Cooper who is cheating on his wife,
- 1:08:09Speaker 1: who is Jennifer Connelly, who is projecting her issues onto
- 1:08:13Speaker 1: Louise Guzman. It's all connected. It's all connected like Babel,
- 1:08:17Speaker 1: but which is like that's you know, that's a storyline, sure,
- 1:08:22Speaker 1: but but it's just I feel like you just don't.
- 1:08:25Speaker 1: I feel like I don't know anything about her other
- 1:08:27Speaker 1: than she's supposed to be a yoga instructor. I think
- 1:08:30Speaker 1: they don't show it because it's PG. Thirteen, but there's
- 1:08:32Speaker 1: that gratuitous like, oh, she's taking her clothes off and
- 1:08:36Speaker 1: jumping in the pool, which just feels exploitative in a
- 1:08:41Speaker 1: way that it's like, well, if you're if you're going
- 1:08:43Speaker 1: to do that, like can I know something about who
- 1:08:45Speaker 1: is this person? What she says you have an ass
- 1:08:50Speaker 1: so tight or whatever that it makes me want to
- 1:08:53Speaker 1: dry hump, and I'm like, I'm sorry what And then
- 1:08:56Speaker 1: he's like, I just fell in love honestly as a
- 1:09:01Speaker 1: seeing this movie as a like a sophomore in high school,
- 1:09:05Speaker 1: I was like, I can relate with that, but I'm
- 1:09:10Speaker 1: just like what you want to Like, what part of
- 1:09:12Speaker 1: him do you want to do? You want to dry
- 1:09:14Speaker 1: hump his ass? Like, what are you talking about? The
- 1:09:17Speaker 1: dry hump his ass? I think it's pretty clear I
- 1:09:20Speaker 1: want to I'm trying to picture that. What I would
- 1:09:23Speaker 1: love to do is like sit down with Scarlett and
- 1:09:26Speaker 1: talk to her about her process, Like how did you
- 1:09:29Speaker 1: make sense of these lines? How did you commit to
- 1:09:32Speaker 1: these lines? Like I would love to have that conversation
- 1:09:36Speaker 1: because listen, this was a job for her, bless her,
- 1:09:39Speaker 1: she had to do it, but damn, that's a hard
- 1:09:41Speaker 1: script to like stand behind it. She just yeah, she's
- 1:09:46Speaker 1: just ping ponging between and it's again, it's like there's
- 1:09:49Speaker 1: the like seeds of potentially an interesting story if you
- 1:09:52Speaker 1: know anything about the character, because if you had context
- 1:09:56Speaker 1: for Scarlett, you would be like, oh, you know, she
- 1:09:58Speaker 1: seems to be in this uttern of you know, like
- 1:10:02Speaker 1: pursuing men who are unavailable and then going back to
- 1:10:06Speaker 1: men she doesn't really care about but wants positive validation
- 1:10:09Speaker 1: from that is like reflective of a real life dynamic
- 1:10:13Speaker 1: that exists, but without context it just becomes too She
- 1:10:17Speaker 1: could have had her own film. Everybody here could have
- 1:10:19Speaker 1: had their own film and not be two hours, and
- 1:10:22Speaker 1: we could have gotten into some deep like healing romantic
- 1:10:26Speaker 1: comedy stuff, but the genre just wasn't there back then,
- 1:10:29Speaker 1: you know, um anything else. Oh, I guess we We
- 1:10:36Speaker 1: were referencing this at the top of the movie. But
- 1:10:40Speaker 1: Bradley Cooper does shove Scarlett Johansson in a closet, and
- 1:10:43Speaker 1: that is feminism, the most disrespectful thing ever it was. Oh,
- 1:10:51Speaker 1: I will say that back in my early twenties, I
- 1:10:58Speaker 1: was spending an night at somebody's house and a girl
- 1:11:02Speaker 1: that he was seeing showed up at three am and
- 1:11:05Speaker 1: I heard them arguing outside the front door while I
- 1:11:09Speaker 1: quietly stayed in the bedroom. So I guess I have
- 1:11:11Speaker 1: been Scarlett Johansson at some point. But at least I
- 1:11:14Speaker 1: wasn't at his job in the middle of the day,
- 1:11:16Speaker 1: do you know what I mean? Yeah, like like he's
- 1:11:19Speaker 1: still relinding playbook another groupers, Like, at least I didn't
- 1:11:25Speaker 1: go that long. Yeah. So many people do so money
- 1:11:29Speaker 1: inappropriate things at their jobs in this movie. Yeah. And
- 1:11:35Speaker 1: also he can't find a piece of paper there. He's
- 1:11:40Speaker 1: he's like in here somewhere, what are you doing? Like
- 1:11:43Speaker 1: go to the office next door and ask him again
- 1:11:46Speaker 1: for the piece of paper and be done with He's gross.
- 1:11:49Speaker 1: He sucks um. One last thing I wanted to say
- 1:11:53Speaker 1: was it felt to me like the Drew Barrymore subplot,
- 1:11:57Speaker 1: because she definitely gets less screen time than most of
- 1:12:01Speaker 1: the other women and him one day of availability right
- 1:12:05Speaker 1: her through line. I got the sense that it was
- 1:12:08Speaker 1: there mostly too shame people who use online dating, and
- 1:12:13Speaker 1: the whole thing was like, oh that grows anyone who
- 1:12:16Speaker 1: does online dating. You're just setting yourself up for failure.
- 1:12:20Speaker 1: What you need to do is go back to the
- 1:12:22Speaker 1: good old fashioned meeting people. I r L. Well, that's
- 1:12:25Speaker 1: a very I think that that's like a very of
- 1:12:27Speaker 1: the time attitude too. But again, like I think by
- 1:12:30Speaker 1: two thousand nine was a little outdated as well. Yeah,
- 1:12:34Speaker 1: because that seems like a like sex in the city thing,
- 1:12:36Speaker 1: Like when online dating was new, it was like perceived
- 1:12:39Speaker 1: as unsafe and desperate behavior, when now it's like the
- 1:12:43Speaker 1: norm norm. Yeah, I took it as like tech overwhelmed
- 1:12:47Speaker 1: in a way, which it can be a little bit.
- 1:12:50Speaker 1: And I don't know, ladies, but I'm maybe call me
- 1:12:53Speaker 1: on fashion, but I'm like, I want to get off
- 1:12:55Speaker 1: these apps, like if I want to. I'm to the
- 1:12:58Speaker 1: point right now where i'd if I don't meet somebody,
- 1:13:01Speaker 1: that's okay, and I'd rather it just happen in person
- 1:13:04Speaker 1: at some point because they are exhausting. As someone who
- 1:13:08Speaker 1: is also on the apps, I'd rather not to be.
- 1:13:13Speaker 1: But I just have someone just meet like a lot.
- 1:13:16Speaker 1: But I don't feel any like shame. Associated No, no,
- 1:13:18Speaker 1: that shouldn't be any shame. Absolutely no shame. But you know,
- 1:13:22Speaker 1: for my show, I took a lot of real profiles,
- 1:13:26Speaker 1: but had my friends who are actors give me an
- 1:13:29Speaker 1: image so that I didn't like shout anybody. But one
- 1:13:33Speaker 1: of them said my love language is dot dot dot
- 1:13:36Speaker 1: anal and that was out in the world. So you know,
- 1:13:40Speaker 1: there is a there is a terrible like wasteland of
- 1:13:45Speaker 1: things happening in these profiles that I just want to be. Yeah.
- 1:13:49Speaker 1: My Hinge profile says my love language is making you
- 1:13:54Speaker 1: watch Paddington too. You love it, You're gonna get snatched up,
- 1:14:03Speaker 1: you just want to cuddle. Hasn't happened anyway, Yeah, any
- 1:14:10Speaker 1: other any final thoughts from anybody? I just want to
- 1:14:14Speaker 1: say that I was hell is surprised because I've heard
- 1:14:17Speaker 1: of the Bechdel test but I just it's so minimal.
- 1:14:21Speaker 1: Do you know what I mean? That? When I see
- 1:14:23Speaker 1: the amount of films that don't meet it, I'm like,
- 1:14:26Speaker 1: what in the hell are you writing that you can't
- 1:14:29Speaker 1: have two lines of women talking about something other than guys.
- 1:14:35Speaker 1: That's just ridiculous to me. It's well that brings us
- 1:14:38Speaker 1: to our discussion of whether or not this movie passes
- 1:14:42Speaker 1: the Bechdel test, And I honestly did not pay close
- 1:14:48Speaker 1: enough attention. Did you? Did? They have one exchange where
- 1:14:57Speaker 1: Jennifer Connolly ask somebody if they want coffee and the
- 1:15:02Speaker 1: other one says yes, wow, oh, and then maybe that
- 1:15:06Speaker 1: the whole like, I can't write this copy about nutmeg,
- 1:15:10Speaker 1: And then one of them is like don't Maybe there's
- 1:15:13Speaker 1: there's that one coffee And I'm like, why is coffee
- 1:15:16Speaker 1: important right now? But I wonder if the writers were like,
- 1:15:19Speaker 1: we gotta pass with test, throw in the coffee sequence.
- 1:15:22Speaker 1: I'm also seeing that someone arguing on famous website backel
- 1:15:27Speaker 1: test dot com. Uh, someone says that the scene where
- 1:15:33Speaker 1: Jennifer Anniston and her sister who is named talk about
- 1:15:36Speaker 1: a bridesmaid dress to marriage, I agree, I agree, Yeah,
- 1:15:43Speaker 1: every single conversation between women in this movie is either
- 1:15:48Speaker 1: explicitly or implicitly about men or relationships with men in
- 1:15:54Speaker 1: the entire movie, even the montage where they're showing all
- 1:15:58Speaker 1: the women, I was like to Asian women talking about dudes.
- 1:16:01Speaker 1: So yeah, oh my gosh, that because it doesn't pass.
- 1:16:08Speaker 1: It doesn't, But like the coffee thing was trash. Yeah.
- 1:16:12Speaker 1: We've also been having discussions on the show recently about
- 1:16:15Speaker 1: sort of upgrade because because there's so many different versions
- 1:16:18Speaker 1: of the Bechdel test, and we've kind of been thinking
- 1:16:19Speaker 1: about upgrading ours to having it be like a meaningful
- 1:16:23Speaker 1: exchange which would exclude you know, just like hey, here's this, thanks,
- 1:16:29Speaker 1: or like exchanges like that, because sometimes I feel like
- 1:16:32Speaker 1: little things like that let really hitty movies get off
- 1:16:36Speaker 1: the yes. So I'm gonna go ahead and say that
- 1:16:40Speaker 1: this movie does not pass the Bechdel test. Um, I'm
- 1:16:44Speaker 1: on board, Thank you so much. Let's let's put it
- 1:16:48Speaker 1: to our test. Our nipple scale, a scale of zero
- 1:16:52Speaker 1: to five nipples based on an examination of intersectional feminism
- 1:16:58Speaker 1: as it applies to the MOVIEV. He's just not that
- 1:17:02Speaker 1: into you guess what. I'm just not that into this movie,
- 1:17:05Speaker 1: and I give it. I'll give it a half nipple,
- 1:17:09Speaker 1: because I think that it very very minimally begins to
- 1:17:16Speaker 1: think about starting some conversations that could be interesting about relationships,
- 1:17:25Speaker 1: but because of just how little follow through there is,
- 1:17:31Speaker 1: how there's only space provided to hetero romantic relationships. They
- 1:17:39Speaker 1: are all rich white people who are given any significant
- 1:17:43Speaker 1: storylines or actively gentrifying the entire to more yes um,
- 1:17:51Speaker 1: and just the very broad, sweeping, reductive stereotypes about men
- 1:17:58Speaker 1: and women the the characters are written within. It's just
- 1:18:04Speaker 1: so broad and binary and regressive, and I hate all
- 1:18:08Speaker 1: of it. And now I'm talking myself out of this
- 1:18:10Speaker 1: even half nipple. I think I'm going to give it
- 1:18:12Speaker 1: zero nipples. Yeah, I've I would feel I don't know,
- 1:18:19Speaker 1: because the only thing that I liked about the movie
- 1:18:22Speaker 1: besides Chris Christophers and I need to give it a
- 1:18:24Speaker 1: half nipple because I need to give that to Chris
- 1:18:26Speaker 1: Christopher shark on the movie. So I'll give it, Okay,
- 1:18:32Speaker 1: I'll give it. I'll give it a half half, No
- 1:18:36Speaker 1: no nipples, one half of Chris Christofferson's fictional heart hears um.
- 1:18:42Speaker 1: But it's it's it's like it's it's bizarre, like we've
- 1:18:46Speaker 1: been discussing there are these few like I liked the
- 1:18:51Speaker 1: beginning idea of the movie if like, here's a lie
- 1:18:54Speaker 1: we've been told our whole lives, it's bullshit. But then
- 1:18:59Speaker 1: the rest of the movie is not about that and
- 1:19:01Speaker 1: contradicts that, and there's so much it's just I don't know,
- 1:19:07Speaker 1: like this, this movie was not made to you know,
- 1:19:10Speaker 1: I hope, I mean, but that's maybe not true that
- 1:19:12Speaker 1: like this movie was it wasn't supposed to change anyone's
- 1:19:16Speaker 1: mind about anything or really challenge anything in a meaningful way.
- 1:19:20Speaker 1: And I don't know. It was very successful. It was
- 1:19:23Speaker 1: extremely so that's funny. Yeah, hundred and seventy eight million
- 1:19:27Speaker 1: dollars at the box office, which is quite a lot
- 1:19:30Speaker 1: for rom comps, especially was all Bradley Cooper though, be
- 1:19:34Speaker 1: honest that that was all the frosty tips. Baby, So
- 1:19:38Speaker 1: I'll give it. I'll give it no nipples and then
- 1:19:40Speaker 1: one half of Chris Christofferson's heart and know what about you.
- 1:19:47Speaker 1: I'm gonna give it a nipple ring, a nipple ring
- 1:19:52Speaker 1: a ring because um, it's shiny. It's nice to look at,
- 1:19:56Speaker 1: but it's completely unnecessary, just like the movie. Although the
- 1:20:01Speaker 1: movie is not just nice to it. So, I mean,
- 1:20:04Speaker 1: you know, it was shot nicely, you know, people put
- 1:20:06Speaker 1: effort into it, but then there's there are okay, they're okay,
- 1:20:10Speaker 1: I just have to get into Jennifer Connelly comes in,
- 1:20:13Speaker 1: tries to seduce her husband. He could not be less
- 1:20:17Speaker 1: interested in it, but he's like I guess, and then
- 1:20:21Speaker 1: they like have sex and then the camera like moves
- 1:20:24Speaker 1: over to the door of the closet that Scarlet is in,
- 1:20:29Speaker 1: but not like why wouldn't you see the camera in
- 1:20:33Speaker 1: the closet and look at her face instead of just
- 1:20:36Speaker 1: shows the door, And I'm just like, what the who?
- 1:20:38Speaker 1: Scarlett was not available that day, but it has to be.
- 1:20:45Speaker 1: Here's how much I was into the movie. I was like,
- 1:20:47Speaker 1: that's a nice boost tche Jennifer Connolly like it was
- 1:20:51Speaker 1: why to show up? It's classy, it's cute. And I
- 1:20:54Speaker 1: also had like those do you hear those straps from
- 1:20:56Speaker 1: the late two thousands that were kind of like fringe E.
- 1:20:59Speaker 1: They had had those like fringe E kind of uncomfortable straps,
- 1:21:02Speaker 1: but they looked cool. I was like, oh, Victoria's Secret
- 1:21:06Speaker 1: high School Edition. I remember these fringe straps. What what
- 1:21:12Speaker 1: a journey? You know? Thank you so much for joining us.
- 1:21:17Speaker 1: Thanks for letting me chat with you, guys. I had
- 1:21:20Speaker 1: so much fun. It's our pleasure. Tell us about your
- 1:21:22Speaker 1: show and tell us about other places that people can
- 1:21:26Speaker 1: check out your stuff and follow you on social media. Yeah,
- 1:21:31Speaker 1: my show is called The Oxy Complex. It's running streaming
- 1:21:34Speaker 1: virtually UM through April eighteen. You can go to I
- 1:21:38Speaker 1: am a theater dot com I A M a theater
- 1:21:42Speaker 1: dot com to get tickets. UM. It's set on the
- 1:21:44Speaker 1: five day of Quarantine, which I didn't think we would
- 1:21:48Speaker 1: ever get to but maybe we will. UM. And the
- 1:21:52Speaker 1: character Viviana is kind of dealing with insomnia and stress
- 1:21:56Speaker 1: and starts having hallucinations which kind of take her back
- 1:21:59Speaker 1: to look at her dating life and UM try to
- 1:22:02Speaker 1: heal some core traumas in her life in order to
- 1:22:06Speaker 1: maybe be a better partner in the future. And you know,
- 1:22:10Speaker 1: it's a dark comedy, so I'm gonna make you laugh. UM.
- 1:22:14Speaker 1: You can follow me on Instagram at the Underscore Analo Madrid.
- 1:22:19Speaker 1: And I'm also an acting coach, so if you're an
- 1:22:22Speaker 1: actor and you're looking for community, we created UM a
- 1:22:26Speaker 1: membership platform called the New Triple Threat UM because now
- 1:22:30Speaker 1: actors have to be kind of all about their business,
- 1:22:33Speaker 1: their craft, and their tech. So we have courses to
- 1:22:36Speaker 1: help you set up your self tape studio, auditioning craft.
- 1:22:39Speaker 1: We're gonna do like budgeting for actors, you know, all
- 1:22:42Speaker 1: the things that they don't teach you in school, uh,
- 1:22:44Speaker 1: the actual skills that you need to be a working actor.
- 1:22:47Speaker 1: And you can go to the new Triple threat dot com.
- 1:22:50Speaker 1: So for as little as like fifty seven bucks a month,
- 1:22:52Speaker 1: you get to access to all this information. Yeah, and
- 1:22:58Speaker 1: you can follow us on Twitter and Instagram at Bechtel Cast.
- 1:23:02Speaker 1: You can check out our Matreon at patreon dot com
- 1:23:07Speaker 1: slash Bechtel Cast, which gets you two bonus episodes every
- 1:23:10Speaker 1: month plus the entire back catalog and it is five
- 1:23:15Speaker 1: dollars a month. Wowee wow, what a treat. What a
- 1:23:19Speaker 1: treat indeed. And then our merch is at t public
- 1:23:22Speaker 1: dot com slash the Bechtel Cast. Crab yourself a mask,
- 1:23:27Speaker 1: crab yourself a shirt, other other wares of your life.
- 1:23:32Speaker 1: You know, well, we're not going to stop you. And
- 1:23:36Speaker 1: then yeah, I guess um, we're just not that into
- 1:23:42Speaker 1: He's just not that into you, r I P. Chris
- 1:23:46Speaker 1: Christofferson just kidding. He lives. Bye, bye,