Speaker 1: Hi everyone. Before the episode starts, we just wanted to
Speaker 1: do some quick content warnings. We want to be better
Speaker 1: about doing those moving forward, so just to let you know.
Speaker 1: In the discussion we talk about self harm as well
Speaker 1: as physical and sexual assault. And now here's the episode.
Speaker 1: On the Doll Cast, the questions asked if movies have
Speaker 1: women and um, are all their discussions just boyfriends and
Speaker 1: husbands or do they have individualism? The patriarchy? Zef invest
Speaker 1: start changing it with the beck Del cast. Jamie, do
Speaker 1: you want to start this one? No? I don't know
Speaker 1: what to say. Okay, me either. Oh here's something okay right?
Speaker 1: Oh oh Jamie, I hate the way you're you sniffle.
Speaker 1: You're always sniffling. Okay, let's have sex. Wow. Welcome to
Speaker 1: the bed Time and iconic intro that passed the vessels
Speaker 1: it did, um well, but welcome anyways. That's literally just
Speaker 1: something that happens in the movie. That was a that
Speaker 1: was just that was This is a re enacting a
Speaker 1: dramatic reenactment. Sniff, Um, so today's movie. Okay, wait where
Speaker 1: are we? This is the backtel cast. Welcome, Um, my
Speaker 1: name is Caitlin Darante. My name is Jamie Loftus and
Speaker 1: this is a podcast about the representation of women in
Speaker 1: movies as well as just an overall examination of film
Speaker 1: through an intersectional feminist lens. We use the Backtel test
Speaker 1: as a jumping off point for a discussion, that being
Speaker 1: a media matric invented by queer cartoonist Allison back Dol,
Speaker 1: sometimes called the back Doll Wallace test that requires that
Speaker 1: to female identifying or or non male genders, characters with
Speaker 1: names talk to each other about something other than a man,
Speaker 1: such as just now when you heard uh, the I sniffed,
Speaker 1: and then Caitlin and I mutually decided to have sex.
Speaker 1: That actually is more than we did, more than with them.
Speaker 1: We actually gave consent. There was Yes, there was consent
Speaker 1: discussed almost instinctually, like that's just like what one would
Speaker 1: do it right, not to tune our real consent heads.
Speaker 1: I love consent. So today's movie is Secretary, and we
Speaker 1: have a guest who we are very excited about. She
Speaker 1: is amazing writer comedian Ashley Ray. I'm so happy to
Speaker 1: be here. I'm so excited to talk about this movie specifically. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I gosh, there's so much to talk about, so much,
Speaker 1: uh This movie has meant so much to me, and
Speaker 1: I haven't watched it in a long time, but watching
Speaker 1: it again it just reaffirmed how much it it just
Speaker 1: imprinted on me as a child. Did you see it
Speaker 1: when it first came out, like what's your full hit? Yeah? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it came out in two thousand, that is when I
Speaker 1: was like ten years old. But I got a laptop
Speaker 1: when I was like twelve. I went to this school
Speaker 1: where they gave everyone a laptop in sixth grade, which
Speaker 1: is a stupid thing to do. And I would just
Speaker 1: like make live journal accounts and download movies, like there
Speaker 1: were live journal account where people would just like share
Speaker 1: indie movies and that's how I would like watch like
Speaker 1: French lesbian films. And then someone put up Secretary and
Speaker 1: I remember the day being like that poster it's like
Speaker 1: iconic with like the stockings and her bent over, and
Speaker 1: I was like, this is something I've got to see,
Speaker 1: and I downloaded it on my laptop and I I
Speaker 1: just remember watching it with headphones and being like I
Speaker 1: cannot let my mom know this is happening. So that's like,
Speaker 1: that's that age when you're like figuring out weird inks.
Speaker 1: I feel like or at least like you know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I now realized probably percent of my canks were
Speaker 1: inspired by this movie, which is bad, probably horrible. The
Speaker 1: point is that it happened exactly. I wonder. I mean,
Speaker 1: I feel like I would be such a different person
Speaker 1: if I had access to a laptop at twelve years old. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I don't know why anyone thought that was a good idea.
Speaker 1: My school still does it to this day. All sixth graders,
Speaker 1: you get a laptop, you get to keep it until
Speaker 1: you graduate. I watched so I watched like Pink, Flamingos
Speaker 1: and just horrible movies at a really young age. Oh
Speaker 1: my god. And this is this is probably why I
Speaker 1: came out as like Queer and Polly. By the time
Speaker 1: I was seventeen, I was like, been there, done it.
Speaker 1: I've seen it. James Spader showed me how Uh Now,
Speaker 1: it's just unlearning. It's a lot of unlearning, all the damage,
Speaker 1: all the movies due to us as young people. Wow,
Speaker 1: I didn't own a laptop until I was well into
Speaker 1: my twenties, so I didn't get one to college. That
Speaker 1: seems like a healthy age. Those seems those are healthy ages. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like by then you're just like, oh, porn is such
Speaker 1: an exciting luxury. It becomes a luxury thing because you
Speaker 1: don't have to watch it on a desktop anymore. But
Speaker 1: then that kind of comes all the way around, and
Speaker 1: then later in your life you're like, I can watch
Speaker 1: you know, once you live on your own, you can
Speaker 1: watch porn on a desktop again, big screen, and then
Speaker 1: it's a different kind of luxury. Yeah, exactly, Jamie. What
Speaker 1: about you? What's your relationship with this movie. I've never
Speaker 1: seen this movie. I've known about it for a long time,
Speaker 1: and I have a feeling that if I had seen
Speaker 1: it when I was in like middle school, high school,
Speaker 1: I would have really really loved it and it would
Speaker 1: have had like a real effect on me. But I didn't.
Speaker 1: I don't know, I just missed it, and I started
Speaker 1: hearing more about it. I think it was like when
Speaker 1: the fifty shape Its movies were coming up, this movie
Speaker 1: was coming up over and over and over. It is like,
Speaker 1: this is the alternative. If you think fifties shade sucks,
Speaker 1: you just gotta go back and watch Secretary. So that
Speaker 1: was kind of like where I would That was like
Speaker 1: my point of entry because we've covered fifty shades on
Speaker 1: this show, and in retrospect, I'm not I'm not totally.
Speaker 1: I'm like the I see what people are saying, but like,
Speaker 1: maybe they should have. Really, it's definitely a better written movie.
Speaker 1: Well so every movie is a better written movie. And
Speaker 1: it's definitely very a very well acted movie too. But
Speaker 1: then but on the relationship level, I was like, I don't,
Speaker 1: I don't quite see it. I'm excited to talk about it.
Speaker 1: He's like the original Mr Gray, like they even have
Speaker 1: the same name. Yeah, this was the watch where I
Speaker 1: was like, oh my mind blown, wow, wow, connecting the pieces.
Speaker 1: It embarrassingly took me until sevent into the movie to
Speaker 1: be like, oh my gosh, a Mr. Pray for an
Speaker 1: hour and a half. I've heard this before. I've seen
Speaker 1: this before, but this time it's with Maggie Jellenhall, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, I mean, I also like dakode to Johnson,
Speaker 1: but it's just she wasn't set up for success in
Speaker 1: that franchise. She was not anyways, Okay, what's your what's
Speaker 1: your heads story with this movie? Um, I didn't see
Speaker 1: it right away because it came out in two To write, um,
Speaker 1: I probably didn't see it until I I think I
Speaker 1: saw it when I was working as an assistant. I've
Speaker 1: talked about this job before on the podcast because it
Speaker 1: traumatized me. I was working as an assistant to a
Speaker 1: literary manager in New York who was extremely verbally and
Speaker 1: emotionally abusive to me and I I guess I was
Speaker 1: just like watching media in which other people are verbally
Speaker 1: and emotionally abused by their boss. I guess, just to
Speaker 1: relate or have something to relate to. I'm not sure exactly. UM.
Speaker 1: I didn't connect very much with the movie at that point,
Speaker 1: and then UM rewatching it. There's a lot I struggled with. UM.
Speaker 1: I tried to because I worked as a secretary every
Speaker 1: summer for like four summers at the Comptroller's office, and
Speaker 1: I was like the assistant comptroller secretary, and it was
Speaker 1: it was I couldn't I mean, just based on my
Speaker 1: own experience, I couldn't plug myself in because I was
Speaker 1: like I just me and Scott. This just didn't exist
Speaker 1: with us. I was a church secretary from like eighth
Speaker 1: grade throughout high school. I wasn't like religious, but they
Speaker 1: paid me ten dollars an hour. It was just a
Speaker 1: really good gig and it was Yeah, it was hard,
Speaker 1: you know, as it was hard to to see myself
Speaker 1: in that role necessarily, but I did understand a lot
Speaker 1: of her duties as as a secretary. I did have
Speaker 1: to use a typewriter. I related to that too. Well,
Speaker 1: you got the full typewriter treatment. Yeah. They it was
Speaker 1: a pretty old church and they were just like, this
Speaker 1: is how we do baptism certificates. Get used to it,
Speaker 1: classy like. Um, So anyway, yeah, I, um, I don't
Speaker 1: like this movie. I'll just come out and say it.
Speaker 1: But but I yeah, I don't. I don't have any
Speaker 1: of the attachment to it or any of like the
Speaker 1: nostalgia or anything. So I was coming in it with
Speaker 1: pretty fresh eyes. Um. But there's a lot to discuss. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there is, so there's so much to talk. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's I I guess like I was kind of assuming.
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, this is like probably one of
Speaker 1: those like cut and dry deals where it's like, well
Speaker 1: it was like written by men about women, and so
Speaker 1: you know, there's just gonna be uh, it's kind of
Speaker 1: a nonstarter to an extent in most cases, but this
Speaker 1: is not the case for this movie. It's there's so
Speaker 1: many there's so many layers. It was really interesting researching
Speaker 1: like the two female writers that like shaped this story
Speaker 1: very differently, including the screenwriter who's like really fixated on
Speaker 1: like women with mental illness and punishing them but being like,
Speaker 1: but it was good for her, Like she's she's got
Speaker 1: a whole it's such a hyper specific vibe. But when
Speaker 1: I was looking at her list of works, I'm like, whoa,
Speaker 1: that is really the theme. Yeah, it's it's this weird
Speaker 1: thing where the character she is she's dealing with mental illness.
Speaker 1: She's she's fresh out of an institution in a hospital,
Speaker 1: but they also treat her like this newborn baby like
Speaker 1: in a pool, who like knows nothing and it's so
Speaker 1: naive and it's just like, oh my god, what is
Speaker 1: a man? And then she's just like a perfect baby
Speaker 1: for James Spader to just like imprint on. But at
Speaker 1: the same time they're like, well, no, see, she's just
Speaker 1: like so brilliant and complex because she has mental illness
Speaker 1: and she could just like understand him, and it just
Speaker 1: like wants to have it both ways. And it's like, way,
Speaker 1: does she this like innocent child who knows nothing or
Speaker 1: is she this like super genius like person who can
Speaker 1: read his mind? Like what what is she supposed to be?
Speaker 1: They pick and choose, and I feel like that actually,
Speaker 1: when I was younger, that those types of characters were
Speaker 1: so appealing to me because they were like parts of me,
Speaker 1: Like when you're a twelve or thirteen, like you want
Speaker 1: to be perceived kind of in both of those ways, like,
Speaker 1: and so making an adult character that way is a
Speaker 1: choice that is going to appeal to that Is she
Speaker 1: an adult? Because look at her? Is she an adult?
Speaker 1: Is like black Swan's like she's like stickers everywhere? Like
Speaker 1: what age is she? If someone told me she was
Speaker 1: like eighteen, I'd be like I could see it, Like
Speaker 1: what what age is she? It's really confusing. I wasn't
Speaker 1: sure if it was supposed to be like she is
Speaker 1: maybe like yeah, like a really young adult and maybe
Speaker 1: she just has her like kid room and she's fresh
Speaker 1: out of high school, or if they were like going
Speaker 1: for a Black Swan kind of thing where they're like, no,
Speaker 1: she's definitely too old for this, but we're just going
Speaker 1: to trap her here to send to say something. But
Speaker 1: I wasn't sure what idea The closest thing to any
Speaker 1: kind of indication is when she's talking to Peter, who
Speaker 1: she knew in high school, who she like ends up
Speaker 1: dating for a little while and then being engaged to.
Speaker 1: But she's like, you're so different from how you were
Speaker 1: in high school, and it seems like about how long
Speaker 1: ago was that? But how long a you don't know.
Speaker 1: Also she has she's in the bathtub at one point
Speaker 1: and she like has this very like childlike snow globe
Speaker 1: that apparently is like part of her like and then
Speaker 1: she's like, no, I'm over this snow glob and then
Speaker 1: she throws it away. I'm pretty sure there's like a
Speaker 1: rubber ducky in there. Like just so much of that
Speaker 1: made it uncomfortable. And it's like if they had just
Speaker 1: firmly kind of like aged her up, like have her
Speaker 1: just once referred to dropping out of college or something,
Speaker 1: I feel like it would have the dynamic a little better.
Speaker 1: But this whole first part of the movie, you're like, Okay,
Speaker 1: so she she is a child who's jealous of her
Speaker 1: sister's wedding, Like right there was like there, I feel
Speaker 1: like they wanted you to look at her as a
Speaker 1: baby to some But but if that's true, then it
Speaker 1: kind of makes the whole thing a little more sinister.
Speaker 1: There were a few of those moments that where it
Speaker 1: was like, again, I was like, if I saw this
Speaker 1: when I was thirteen, I would have been like, holy
Speaker 1: sh it, Like just like symbolism moments when she takes
Speaker 1: the snow globe and she's like the snow glow. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that that one got me. That was the moment when
Speaker 1: I was I was like, yeah, that girl, when she
Speaker 1: threw that snow globe, I was like, I'm in, I'm in,
Speaker 1: this is me, this is my lifestyle now. It's I mean,
Speaker 1: and and I will say watching it now, I did
Speaker 1: hate it. I saw every problem, but I also did
Speaker 1: see this way where I was like thirteen or you
Speaker 1: know whatever, and I was like, oh my god, of
Speaker 1: course I thought this was the sexiest thing in the world,
Speaker 1: like him just telling her what to eat for dinner
Speaker 1: and how of course I'd be like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: that's so hot that that someone would like take the
Speaker 1: time and care to do that. You know. I I
Speaker 1: was a latch key kid. I had to feed myself,
Speaker 1: so that obviously super hot to me. And it's just
Speaker 1: you know, the I feel like it just sexualizes things
Speaker 1: in this kind of non sexy way where you're like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I guess I can work with this, even though I'm
Speaker 1: still really not clear on who this woman is or
Speaker 1: what exactly she wants or why she has decided this
Speaker 1: lifestyle speaks to her. There's a lot to latch onto
Speaker 1: with Lee, which is like part of I don't know
Speaker 1: it was. I was so in and out because it's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that not watching it now, the problems are very clear.
Speaker 1: But it also it's like it's very like of its
Speaker 1: time in a lot of ways, and I don't know
Speaker 1: what about that yet. That masturbation scene very early two thousands.
Speaker 1: This like this like just visually trippy, like as all
Speaker 1: girls know, the way we masturbate as we like vision
Speaker 1: of flower opening and we're sitting in the middle of it,
Speaker 1: and then the boy that we have a crush on
Speaker 1: appears and like washes our hair. Of course that's how
Speaker 1: girls masterbace. It's very MTV two visuals, just like fireworks,
Speaker 1: weird like green screen stuff happening. But then again I
Speaker 1: was just like, okay, so she's like fourteen years old.
Speaker 1: Like that was another thing where you're like, okay, she's
Speaker 1: a baby. She's I think she's probably legally an adult,
Speaker 1: but either way, the the age gap between her and
Speaker 1: Mr Gray is pretty substantial. And that's the other. That's another.
Speaker 1: This is a I hate James Spader. I hate him
Speaker 1: so much that words cannot describe how much I think
Speaker 1: he is the worst. Yeah. I don't know how he gets.
Speaker 1: I just I hate him so much. But anyway, that's
Speaker 1: neither here nor there. If it was, I've heard he
Speaker 1: is a very like, not nice person. Yeah, oh, I thought,
Speaker 1: do you just dislike him as a performer. I just
Speaker 1: hate him because I hate him as an actor. I
Speaker 1: think I just the roles he tends, at least of
Speaker 1: the ones I've seen that he's in. I find him
Speaker 1: loaths some like he's in that movie Crash, like the
Speaker 1: horny car Crash movie. I found him really creepy in
Speaker 1: that movie. I found him really creepy and sex lives
Speaker 1: and videotape like everything he's in. And then this movie,
Speaker 1: like everything he's in that I've seen, I just I
Speaker 1: find him really I feel like this is his last
Speaker 1: like hot movie. This is the last time we saw
Speaker 1: like a hot James Spader, So maybe so maybe we
Speaker 1: celebrate it for that sure, and only that that's so long.
Speaker 1: He's like, I gotta go be an Avengers age of Ultron.
Speaker 1: Now the black List. He had a show called like
Speaker 1: the Blacklist, right, it ran for like ten years or
Speaker 1: something like, He's been on so many things for ten
Speaker 1: years that I didn't know existed. He well, he was
Speaker 1: on the Office to right like after people Stop California.
Speaker 1: Oh that's a good name. Yeah, he was on Boston Legal.
Speaker 1: My mom watched the hat the My mom love Boston Legal.
Speaker 1: He gets a lot of work, and I just don't
Speaker 1: know why I don't. I don't get it. Not here
Speaker 1: for James Spader. I think he's still kind of like
Speaker 1: writing that like his first wave of success because he
Speaker 1: was in so many like he was the sexy guy
Speaker 1: in so many movies and now he's just kind of
Speaker 1: set for life or that that's my guess, Secretary. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's an ode to sexiness. Yeah, Like I feel like
Speaker 1: you're it enriches the experience if you knew, like because
Speaker 1: if I just saw James Spader, I'm like, that's the guy. Like,
Speaker 1: but because you know, like he has this icon like
Speaker 1: sex icon status, which I don't get it just to
Speaker 1: be Mr Gray, Like, at no point in the movie
Speaker 1: is he an interesting or charismatic character. Like She's just like,
Speaker 1: he's so complex, I can see why he's hurting. And
Speaker 1: then James, it just looks like constipated and he's then
Speaker 1: he's just like I gotta go just knock out some
Speaker 1: push ups. And that's him the entire movie. It's just
Speaker 1: like he's running on a treadmill. Yeah, I gotta take
Speaker 1: care of my or kids. So like, where's your personality, bro? Yeah,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, he's like vagina symbol in his office and
Speaker 1: then you have to watch. You know, he's a good
Speaker 1: guy because he can handle the vagina flowers and not
Speaker 1: everybody can do that feminist icon. Yes, they like kind
Speaker 1: of set this thing up in the beginning where like
Speaker 1: it seems like he has a domp. There's like this
Speaker 1: ex woman who comes in and like stomps all over
Speaker 1: his stuff and I was like, oh good, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: love it if like he gets it handed to him.
Speaker 1: But then in the end she's like, no, he is
Speaker 1: a genius and he slipped through my fingers and I
Speaker 1: just wish I had been as smart as you Lee
Speaker 1: to capture him. And it's like wait, so wait, you
Speaker 1: were like so angry and came into his office because
Speaker 1: this guy, who we've literally never heard say anything smart,
Speaker 1: is just so brilliant that you, like you just had
Speaker 1: to storm down there to yell at him to sign
Speaker 1: divorce papers. What. Yeah, because it's a he's like he's
Speaker 1: a genius at what at lawyer? He doesn't even seem
Speaker 1: like a good lawyer by the way, ever, all the
Speaker 1: case notes we heard, Yeah, there's like one time where
Speaker 1: he's just like, I told you to send the notes
Speaker 1: on the case house and it just sounds like something
Speaker 1: like like a writer was like, this is how lawyers talk.
Speaker 1: We'll just have him say it through the door. Just
Speaker 1: he can add live Spader will phill it in. Don't
Speaker 1: even worry. He knows he was on Boston Legal. There.
Speaker 1: The thing I will say about I mean, there's a
Speaker 1: lot of things to say about James Spader, but I
Speaker 1: was stroke. Maybe it's like my TV, but I had
Speaker 1: to turn up the volume and turn down the volume
Speaker 1: so much watching this movie because he speaks like in
Speaker 1: a whisper of the whole kept like cranking my Roku
Speaker 1: to eighty and then like slamming it back down. It
Speaker 1: was so hard to hear him. That was a question
Speaker 1: I actually was going to ask, does it count as
Speaker 1: passing the backdel test if you can't hear the man
Speaker 1: just if you if he's just whispering, technically doesn't count.
Speaker 1: Is Maggie John Hall just talking towards herself? Like right,
Speaker 1: because he'll be like piss all the way step into
Speaker 1: my office. It's so quiet. There are pivotal scenes I
Speaker 1: had to watch like three or four times because like,
Speaker 1: I just I can't hear him, my rocos at a hundred,
Speaker 1: I can't hear him. There's so just I think, all
Speaker 1: the scenes where he's supposed to be. And it's interesting
Speaker 1: because you know, I think it would be better if
Speaker 1: we saw Lee actually consent to a lot of this
Speaker 1: or like approach it with any sort of like passion
Speaker 1: or excitement, like oh you know, but we really just
Speaker 1: see her like headphones on, like listening to one tape
Speaker 1: about being a sub, like being a dom. But most
Speaker 1: of it is just James Spader's character being like you
Speaker 1: do this, you sniffle too much, and I think you
Speaker 1: need to stop touching your hair. And he's just projecting
Speaker 1: all of these things onto her and it's just so uncomfortable,
Speaker 1: and it's like, if you would have just given some
Speaker 1: of that agency to Lee's character, it would have been
Speaker 1: a little better, because his character just isn't interesting enough
Speaker 1: to carry it. And the whole time he's just like,
Speaker 1: I think you'd be happier if you just kept your
Speaker 1: shoes on under your desk, and then we're supposed to
Speaker 1: be like, holy sh it. He totally gets this girl's
Speaker 1: self esteem and what she needs. Yeah, she broke the
Speaker 1: snug glow. Well, before we get too far into it,
Speaker 1: let's do the recap and then we'll and then we'll
Speaker 1: really just let loose. Well, we'll loosen up as she
Speaker 1: is told she needs to do by Mr Gray. Listen up,
Speaker 1: we'll we'll drink a hot chocolate because she's not old
Speaker 1: enough to have an adult beverage. Okay, Um, Actually, let's
Speaker 1: take a quick break and then we'll come right back
Speaker 1: and do the recap. So the movie is we open
Speaker 1: on Lee Holloway. That's Maggie Gyllenhall's character. We see her
Speaker 1: doing you know, some office assistant type work. You know,
Speaker 1: there's there's papers, they're stapling, she's getting coffee. But while
Speaker 1: she's doing all this, she's wearing this kind of bondage
Speaker 1: device that suspends and outstretches her arms to either side.
Speaker 1: This is an iconic intro scene. I feel like it'll
Speaker 1: be remembered throughout her career. It is really cool as
Speaker 1: a scene visually. Yeah, Like really put looks you into
Speaker 1: the world because it does it. I mean, it's not
Speaker 1: until the midpoint of the movie, hello screenwriting degree that
Speaker 1: they enter into any sort of like dom sub relationships,
Speaker 1: so it takes a while to get there. But this
Speaker 1: gives you a nice little, um, you know, foreshadowing of
Speaker 1: what's to come. Yeah, and she's also like smiling while
Speaker 1: she's doing it, so you're in on it. Like there's
Speaker 1: these two moments in the beginning when she kind of
Speaker 1: smirks and at the very end when she looks right
Speaker 1: at the camera where she's like just so you know,
Speaker 1: I'm into this, and I think that's what we're supposed
Speaker 1: to take from it, but I wasn't exactly sure. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I also had a discussion about that. I was like, oh, okay,
Speaker 1: she's breaking the fourth wall to be like, hey, I
Speaker 1: know I never said it. Don't ask me. I'm the
Speaker 1: one who needs to approve these activities like don't look
Speaker 1: at us like. She also stares at the camera and
Speaker 1: breaks the fourth wall at the very end Allah Judy
Speaker 1: Dench and cats, Like I really thought she was like
Speaker 1: about to start singing about cats are not dogs at
Speaker 1: the end of this movie. And uh yeah. She also
Speaker 1: just looks kind of angry like at the end when
Speaker 1: she stares at us, Like at the beginning, it's it's
Speaker 1: like this kind of like funny knowing smirk, like, oh,
Speaker 1: you're judging me, but I'm enjoying this, And at the
Speaker 1: end it's like she's she's angry at us. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I don't know what assumption she thinks I'm making, But
Speaker 1: at the end, I was mostly just like, so you
Speaker 1: went through all of that so that you could just
Speaker 1: be like a housewife? Is that was that the goal here?
Speaker 1: Wasn't that the not what you wanted? I'm confused. But
Speaker 1: you're different from your sister in her marriage because you
Speaker 1: guys are into roaches in your bed. That is so
Speaker 1: like early two thousand movie though, I feel like it
Speaker 1: where it's like, oh, I'm not like the other girls,
Speaker 1: but I want all the exact things of the other girls.
Speaker 1: But I want my wedding goes to be black, and
Speaker 1: we're gonna have sex. We're gonna have sex against tree.
Speaker 1: Would a really hit for me when I was twelve,
Speaker 1: I was like, what honestly, I was gonna say. When
Speaker 1: I was a kid, I watched that scene and I
Speaker 1: was not at an age where I fully understood how
Speaker 1: sex worked. But I just remember being like, the tree
Speaker 1: is a big part of this, Like the trees and
Speaker 1: sex go together. I do love having sex on camping
Speaker 1: trips now all the time. And I didn't realize like, oh,
Speaker 1: the tree is hurting hurting her back, like that's what
Speaker 1: it is. But I was just like, no, I think
Speaker 1: you need a tree involved in this sex act. That's
Speaker 1: how it goes. Yeah, she just wanted to get her
Speaker 1: back fucked up against some tree bark because because she
Speaker 1: fell in love with the world's most complicated man. Oh
Speaker 1: he's so interesting. Ah, he's not like the others. Okay,
Speaker 1: So we see this opening scene and then we cut
Speaker 1: to six months earlier. Lee has just been released after
Speaker 1: having been institutionalized. Um, she's back home. Things are difficult.
Speaker 1: Her parents are fighting, her dad is abusive towards her mother.
Speaker 1: He's also an alcoholic, and we see her inflicting self harm,
Speaker 1: and then we learned that she has a history of
Speaker 1: doing this. Then one day she sees an ad in
Speaker 1: the paper advertising for a secretary job at a lawyer's office.
Speaker 1: So we just say how how she finds it? Though,
Speaker 1: because I feel like it's not like she's just going
Speaker 1: through the paper looking for a job. She's like throwing
Speaker 1: out her kit of like cell of like tools she
Speaker 1: used to to harm herself. She goes to the trash can,
Speaker 1: throws it out, turns around, and then she's like, I
Speaker 1: can't do it, and she goes to get it back out,
Speaker 1: and then she sees this add in the trash like
Speaker 1: this like it's supposed to be some sort of like
Speaker 1: divine intervention, like she's meant to be this guy's like
Speaker 1: sub slave. Because also she does eventually throw them out,
Speaker 1: but only after, like James Spader says, it's okay, And
Speaker 1: it's like, why couldn't that moment have come earlier for her?
Speaker 1: Why couldn't she It's like, couldn't she have just thrown
Speaker 1: it out then and then been like, oh, an ad
Speaker 1: to be a secretary? Okay? Yeah, I felt that that
Speaker 1: whole I mean once it gets to like that James
Speaker 1: Spader scene, which I like, No, it's weird because it's like,
Speaker 1: I know that that scene is kind of like iconic
Speaker 1: in its own right, but it's like he's just like,
Speaker 1: don't do that ever again, and she's like, oh, that's
Speaker 1: why I didn't not do it. I just need to stop.
Speaker 1: I was doing it again, and then I was like
Speaker 1: I never thought don't don't do do it the hospital
Speaker 1: and my family were like, maybe do it. Like it's
Speaker 1: like it's just so my mom was like locking the
Speaker 1: knives away, like but you know, if you want to,
Speaker 1: just come get me and I'll and I'll get it
Speaker 1: out for you. Like I feel so I felt. I
Speaker 1: felt for Lee's mom. I felt like the movie really
Speaker 1: was not very nice to her at every turn, and
Speaker 1: like if I mean, the first time you see her,
Speaker 1: she is being abused by her husband, and then really
Speaker 1: every other time she crops up like she's made to
Speaker 1: look kind of dumb and overbearing and like you never
Speaker 1: really get any closure with her or the family. And
Speaker 1: it's it's kind of interesting because the first half of
Speaker 1: the film to me, felt so kind of surreal and comedic,
Speaker 1: like all the stuff with the sister's wedding. It feels
Speaker 1: like a joke, all the stuff, honestly, with like her
Speaker 1: dad being an alcoholic, it feels like this caricature of
Speaker 1: an alcoholic where he's like stumbling around downtown, wandering into
Speaker 1: phone booths, and it's just like, Okay, is is this
Speaker 1: supposed to be like kind of a funny any like
Speaker 1: over the top? Yeah, like like play like we're making
Speaker 1: fun of suburbia and like the drunk alcoholic parents who
Speaker 1: like you know, and is is are we supposed to be? Like, Oh,
Speaker 1: they're in on it. This is kind of like a
Speaker 1: pro prozac nation moment. But then it makes you feel
Speaker 1: bad for the mom because you're like, oh, no, she's
Speaker 1: dealing with this abuse and wait, can we take these
Speaker 1: characters seriously? But then they're like no, no, this is
Speaker 1: James Spader is way more interesting. Like what we're we're
Speaker 1: all here for Spader, We're not here for these for
Speaker 1: this family. Very confused by this movie tonally, like I
Speaker 1: don't really it's a comedy dress It's like it's marketed
Speaker 1: as a comedy and I don't I'm not seeing that
Speaker 1: much humor in it, or maybe it's just so subtle
Speaker 1: that I'm not picking up on it. I don't And
Speaker 1: then at the and then at the end, it's like
Speaker 1: few like you're just like what is happening? Once once
Speaker 1: the like the wedding dresses on, You're like, this movie
Speaker 1: has switched right. It's like an S and M Julia
Speaker 1: Roberts moment. You have, Like the press, apparently with nothing
Speaker 1: else to report, is just like outside of his office
Speaker 1: for days, like reporting on this woman who you would think,
Speaker 1: like like a doctor would just come in. I don't
Speaker 1: know why. The press was like, no, we need to
Speaker 1: publish her and saying love letter right now like running liked.
Speaker 1: And also that's the thing. Did he tip them off?
Speaker 1: Because he did tip by he tips off the boyfriend.
Speaker 1: Was he like, let's let's get Peter in here, Let's
Speaker 1: get the family, let's get impressed in here, Like I
Speaker 1: I honestly think he's just standing at his creepy masturbation window,
Speaker 1: and I think he was just like, I'm just gonna
Speaker 1: see where this goes. I'm just gonna sleep on the
Speaker 1: floor till this all blows down, Like I guess is
Speaker 1: how he like punishes himself, like oh no, the most
Speaker 1: privileged punishment of all time. He's like, I'm gonna sleep
Speaker 1: on the floor of my lawyer man while he is
Speaker 1: like sitting in her piss for like five days in
Speaker 1: a row because he doesn't want to use his words
Speaker 1: and say, yeah, I like you too. Remember that's what
Speaker 1: starts all of it, is that he cannot stay back
Speaker 1: I like you too. Yeah. She's like a herd out
Speaker 1: and then he's just like, stay there until I come back,
Speaker 1: until I And then he just stands outside the window
Speaker 1: and he's like, I like you do, missus all the way.
Speaker 1: I have done what Maggie Gillenhall does in that like
Speaker 1: extended scene emotionally a lot. I've sat in my piss
Speaker 1: emotionally waiting for someone to say they like me back
Speaker 1: for many times. Physically it would be a first. I
Speaker 1: also think she would have pooped herself to if she's
Speaker 1: there for like three days. It was also her wedding
Speaker 1: day when he picks her up. We're getting so hard
Speaker 1: of ourselves. But when he picks her up and like
Speaker 1: sweeps her off her feet and carries her out of
Speaker 1: the office like that wedding dress should be like brown
Speaker 1: and yellow from all her why is he touching it.
Speaker 1: It's like kind of a break in his character, this
Speaker 1: guy who doesn't want to touch worms. He's all all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, he's all over this like Pisch dressed right.
Speaker 1: Maybe that's part of his king. I watched that with
Speaker 1: my boyfriend and we were just like openly laughing. Once
Speaker 1: it hit the end row, it was like, oh, that's
Speaker 1: so and then we're just like, she's rewarded with a bath,
Speaker 1: and then she's locked in a room and she's like
Speaker 1: and that's when I felt so beautiful, And you're like, also,
Speaker 1: is that that like weird grass table, which to me
Speaker 1: seems like a place where you kill animals. I don't
Speaker 1: know why someone would just have this like fake grassbed,
Speaker 1: uh thing? Why does he have that? And then she's
Speaker 1: like laying there and she's like, she's like, no, this
Speaker 1: is the first time I ever felt whole. And I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, I didn't know you didn't feel whole.
Speaker 1: This is the first time. I'm like hearing this was
Speaker 1: an issue for you throughout the film. Gosh, it's good.
Speaker 1: Would have been nice to know how you were feeling
Speaker 1: about anything. Unfortunately, we never learned that much about her character. Oops. No, Maggie. Okay,
Speaker 1: So she sees the ad in the paper for the
Speaker 1: lawyer's secretary job. She goes in to apply to the office,
Speaker 1: and then we meet the lawyer, Mr. E Edward Gray,
Speaker 1: that's James Spader's character. He interviews her on the spot.
Speaker 1: It's a very inappropriate and weird interview. We can talk
Speaker 1: about that. He immediately it is just like, let me
Speaker 1: just make sure this girl does not know boundaries. He's
Speaker 1: just straight off the bat, like, let me just make
Speaker 1: sure I can manipulate this girl who does not know
Speaker 1: what is appropriate or is inappropriate, right, yes, And he
Speaker 1: gives her the job, so she starts working for him.
Speaker 1: He's mostly a bastard and he makes her do inappropriate
Speaker 1: things like go through the dumpster, he throws away donuts
Speaker 1: that she gave him as a gift. He leers at
Speaker 1: her body inappropriately. I was having some real like fraud
Speaker 1: complex moments, uh during me like her early times in
Speaker 1: that job, where it's like it is so clear to
Speaker 1: the viewer that he is not hiring her because she's
Speaker 1: going to be good at the job. He's kind of
Speaker 1: hiring her because she's going to be bad at the job.
Speaker 1: And then when she's bad at the job, which he
Speaker 1: knew she would be. He like punishes her relentlessly, which
Speaker 1: feels like every early job I ever had exactly. It
Speaker 1: reminded me of just every abusive boss who's just like
Speaker 1: this has too much sugar, not enough sugar, Like, oh
Speaker 1: my gosh, I don't like the way that you type this.
Speaker 1: Oh actually I wanted like this much space on the left,
Speaker 1: and you're just like, oh, you're just a jerk. But
Speaker 1: she's supposed to be She's supposed to be this naive child,
Speaker 1: and that's why she falls for it. Like any I
Speaker 1: think any adult woman would have been like, no, you
Speaker 1: can't ask me if I'm pregnant, would have just stormed
Speaker 1: out of there. But she's like, oh my gosh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I guess, like this is cool and just you know,
Speaker 1: and I think he knows that. And that's why the
Speaker 1: entire dynamic just feels like it's set up so gross,
Speaker 1: because she doesn't even come into the job with any
Speaker 1: sort of like equal footing totally, which is the main
Speaker 1: reason I have a real problem with this movie is
Speaker 1: that we are meant to be rooting for this relationship
Speaker 1: in which a man is exploiting this imbalance of power
Speaker 1: that he has in this relationship with this woman. So
Speaker 1: what follows that is one day at work, her dad
Speaker 1: calls her and he had left Lee and her mother.
Speaker 1: He seems to be hitting rock bottom and this upsets
Speaker 1: Lee and she self harms again at the office and
Speaker 1: Mr Gracie's her doing this because she does it in
Speaker 1: the middle of the waiting room, by the way, just
Speaker 1: like at her desk, in the middle of the waiting room,
Speaker 1: where anyone could have walked into the office, right. Just yeah,
Speaker 1: there was a few. I mean, I don't know, as
Speaker 1: like a former self harmer myself. It's like we go
Speaker 1: to the bathroom. Yeah, it's like it was, And that
Speaker 1: was one of the tonal moments where it was weird
Speaker 1: because we also see like the weird moments where he's
Speaker 1: like popping around the corner and just like peeking at her.
Speaker 1: It's like weird. But then there's this moment where she's like,
Speaker 1: I have to self harm, and obviously she would go
Speaker 1: to the bathroom like we saw her like do this
Speaker 1: privately before, but we know he's going to be peeking,
Speaker 1: and they set it up just to make it so obvious,
Speaker 1: and it's like like it just felt kind of comical.
Speaker 1: The way that he just immediately is just like and
Speaker 1: then she sees and it's like, oh my gosh, I
Speaker 1: didn't even consider that he could have been standing there.
Speaker 1: And she seems so shocked, and it's like, yeah, girlier
Speaker 1: in the middle of your office, like they make her
Speaker 1: so baby. Yeah. Yeah, it's just frustrating. So after he
Speaker 1: sees this um, he starts to really lay into her um,
Speaker 1: yelling at her for typing errors, telling her that the
Speaker 1: way she dresses is disgusting, like she's sniffling, she's fiddling
Speaker 1: with her hair, she does this weird thing with her tongue,
Speaker 1: and she seems to make an active attempt to fix
Speaker 1: these things. And then he asks her about a recent
Speaker 1: date that we saw her on with this guy Peter,
Speaker 1: who she knew from high school, which is a date
Speaker 1: that takes place out a laundromat where they're drinking wine.
Speaker 1: I don't know if this is a thing or not,
Speaker 1: but that's what I know. I thought that was cool.
Speaker 1: And I mean, I don't know if this is just
Speaker 1: a Midwest thing, but in the Midwest, all my white
Speaker 1: friends loved going on dates to the laundromat, So I
Speaker 1: just I was like, yeah, I was like, I guess
Speaker 1: this is a thing I never heard. There are lots
Speaker 1: of white people where they also have like bars too,
Speaker 1: but I was like, I would be into this, And
Speaker 1: also like, it's just creepy that he also uses that
Speaker 1: laundromat because he's supposed to be this like big time lawyer,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, you don't have like a really fancy
Speaker 1: dry cleaner. Are also using like the dating laundromat, and
Speaker 1: at least in a home he'd haven't. Wouldn't he have
Speaker 1: like an in home or like pick up or something.
Speaker 1: But no, he's also just like go into this town
Speaker 1: laundromat and dinner night place, and then he sees them
Speaker 1: and gets like super creepy. He's like peeking behind the
Speaker 1: washers again. So if you don't find James Spader attractive
Speaker 1: in this movie, which I don't, really, those shots are
Speaker 1: so alarming. They're just like, yeah, I don't know where
Speaker 1: what are you doing? I don't know how the Steve
Speaker 1: the Bouschemy test applies here exactly, but it's like, to me,
Speaker 1: I feel like he's sort of for some he's for
Speaker 1: me for sure, on account of how much I hate
Speaker 1: James Spader. But um, so anyway, he's like, hey, that
Speaker 1: date that you wrong? What was that all about? Did
Speaker 1: you have sex? You know you can? You can tell
Speaker 1: me about your problems. Also, don't ever hurt yourself again.
Speaker 1: Don't cut yourself again. And she says, okay, yes, I won't. Um,
Speaker 1: and then she makes another typing error and he calls
Speaker 1: her into his office instructs her to bend over on
Speaker 1: his desk and read the letter. And while she does this,
Speaker 1: he slaps her, but repeatedly, And we'll talk all about this,
Speaker 1: but this is the This kind of initiates the beginning
Speaker 1: of a dom sub relationship between them. Um. He starts
Speaker 1: to tell her what to eat. He has her crawl
Speaker 1: around the office on all fours. We see him strapping
Speaker 1: a saddle to her. Yeah, can we do that? Where
Speaker 1: where did that come from? Is that why he has
Speaker 1: the fake grass bed? I needed more answers there. Oh sure,
Speaker 1: I was like, Okay, this is kind of awesome, but also, like,
Speaker 1: where does he keep that? It's a really small office.
Speaker 1: It's a huge it's for like not a pony. He also,
Speaker 1: I believe there was also Hey, like this was a
Speaker 1: very it was a platform with Hey. Yeah, there was
Speaker 1: hey and carrots. This was like not just your you know,
Speaker 1: I have this saddle hanging around. This was like a
Speaker 1: well thought out like a photo shoot almost. He's very
Speaker 1: inconsistent with like sometimes he's like, oh, I just I
Speaker 1: just want it right now, but then other times it's like, no,
Speaker 1: this would have taken a lot of planning. You would
Speaker 1: have had to decide this a couple of days ago
Speaker 1: in advance. Yeah, And so for him to be so
Speaker 1: wishy washy had points when it's like, no, the the
Speaker 1: amount of probably just preparation involved in this relationship so far,
Speaker 1: Like I'm sorry for you to now say that you
Speaker 1: never had feelings for this girl, Like, I'm sorry, but
Speaker 1: you're in a relationship. It made a bet of hay
Speaker 1: for if you're making a bet of hey, you're in
Speaker 1: a relationship, Okay, go ahead and put a term on it,
Speaker 1: because that's your girlfriend. That's a commitment. That's a commitment.
Speaker 1: After this, though, something kind of changes and he loses
Speaker 1: He seems to lose interest and he stops engaging in
Speaker 1: their B DSM relationship, much to her disappointment. Meanwhile, she
Speaker 1: has been dating Peter. She wants him to spank her.
Speaker 1: He doesn't get it. They have boring sex. She's very
Speaker 1: dissatisfied for Peter. He does that thing with this hand.
Speaker 1: Peter he has this claw hand that he does and
Speaker 1: he has sex to there where he doesn't touch her.
Speaker 1: He just like the like hovering or he's just like
Speaker 1: and then he just she like she like turns around
Speaker 1: like and does the like spank me move and he's
Speaker 1: just like get a cond Like he's just like he's
Speaker 1: just a character you feel so bad for. And she
Speaker 1: does like briefly date some like other people in a montage,
Speaker 1: which I feel like the movie would have been better
Speaker 1: if we'd actually seen her go on these like bad
Speaker 1: s and M dates and like scene that X varience,
Speaker 1: but like very quickly they're just like, yeah, she tried
Speaker 1: like throwing tomatoes at somebody and she did this in
Speaker 1: any way that didn't work, So she must be in
Speaker 1: love with James Bader, so let's move on, right. It's
Speaker 1: like they look like the lamest like s and M
Speaker 1: days you could go on, like, I think she just
Speaker 1: probably picked the wrong people off of Craigslist. In two thousands,
Speaker 1: the newspaper, I guess if you're putting your snm ads
Speaker 1: in the newspaper. You're gonna get some some misses, right.
Speaker 1: So then at work, Lee puts a worm in a
Speaker 1: letter to Mr Gray to try to reinitiate their b
Speaker 1: DSM relationship, and it works sort of in that there's
Speaker 1: like another encounter. But Mr Gray feels guilty about his
Speaker 1: behavior and he thinks there's something wrong with him and
Speaker 1: he wants to severtise with Lee, so he fires her
Speaker 1: and she is devastated. That's when she tries these other
Speaker 1: dom sub relationships with other men. None of them work out.
Speaker 1: She gets engaged to Peter because she doesn't know what
Speaker 1: else to do, but on their wedding day, she runs
Speaker 1: away Allah Julia Roberts in Runaway Bride to Mr Gray
Speaker 1: and she's like, I love you, I want to be
Speaker 1: with you, I want to make love and he's like,
Speaker 1: put your hands on the desk, plant both feet on
Speaker 1: the floor, and don't move until I come back. She
Speaker 1: takes that note very serious. She does not move. She
Speaker 1: doesn't move. He does different things to test her. I guess,
Speaker 1: like we said what He tells Peter where she is?
Speaker 1: She urinates in the wedding dress. He sends like everyone
Speaker 1: he sends the entire castle a movie. Basically everyone we've
Speaker 1: seen up until this point like comes in to have
Speaker 1: like a little monologue with her where they all talk
Speaker 1: about him. It's never like, hey, Lee, are you like hungry?
Speaker 1: No one brings her a snack. Her mom brings her
Speaker 1: four pas, but that brings her some peas, but most
Speaker 1: of them are just like, he is brilliant, isn't he?
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, the worm trick was so smart? And
Speaker 1: it's just like, is anyone like a therapist kind of
Speaker 1: talks to her? And then the only person who really
Speaker 1: gets through to her is her dad, who's like reading
Speaker 1: the Bible right. I was honestly kind of confused. I
Speaker 1: was like, is she hallucinating these because she's so hungry
Speaker 1: and tired? But then it's like, no, these people are
Speaker 1: really here. I think where I got confused, And like,
Speaker 1: how did Mr Gray get his ex wife to participate
Speaker 1: in this like she and compliment to him? And and
Speaker 1: did he call his ex wife before he called the
Speaker 1: press or did he call the press first? Which I
Speaker 1: guess that least I guess their divorce has since has
Speaker 1: been settled off screen, So you seem very upset in
Speaker 1: the beginning, and now she's gone full circle to yes,
Speaker 1: he's a genius, and somehow he slipped through my hands.
Speaker 1: She's like, yeah, I was just showing too much agency, personality, etcetera.
Speaker 1: I was just you know, an actual person a few
Speaker 1: times and that didn't click for him. But you were
Speaker 1: just a perfect, just blank tablet of a human for
Speaker 1: him to imprint on. So those so those people were
Speaker 1: actually there. She gets like five copies of codependency no more,
Speaker 1: she reads none of them. And then and then he
Speaker 1: finally comes back after I believe three days of her
Speaker 1: not sleeping, not eating or drinking water, presumably pissing, and
Speaker 1: shooting herself, and then he comes back. He sweeps her
Speaker 1: off her feet, he takes her home, he gives her
Speaker 1: a bath, um and then they become a couple. They
Speaker 1: get married, They on a tree, goes off to work,
Speaker 1: they fuck on a tree. He you know, he keeps
Speaker 1: being a lawyer. She we're not sure what she does
Speaker 1: with I guess she's not a secretary anymore because she's
Speaker 1: not going to the office, right, did she just stay
Speaker 1: at home? We don't really know. Actually, by the end
Speaker 1: of the movie, the one thing we know about her
Speaker 1: that she is a secretary. We don't even know that anymore, right,
Speaker 1: We actually and the movie knowing less about her than
Speaker 1: we started with. True, we don't even know her job.
Speaker 1: She like like this is yeah, this is pretty disempowering
Speaker 1: in a way, equally angless as when she began. But well, yeah,
Speaker 1: like this was supposed to be a very happy ending. Yeah,
Speaker 1: well that's the movie. Let's take a quick break and
Speaker 1: then we'll come right back for more discussion. And we're back.
Speaker 1: Um okay, so I really quickly, I think I wanted
Speaker 1: to start with talking about the material for the book. Um, Caitlin,
Speaker 1: you read the story. Yes, I did, bravely. I did
Speaker 1: as well. I don't make a habit of reading. But
Speaker 1: it was only liked read this. So I once I
Speaker 1: saw that it was very short, I was like, alright,
Speaker 1: I'll do I can manage this. So this movie is
Speaker 1: adapted from a short story that is, I mean, the
Speaker 1: framework is similar, but it plays out really really differently.
Speaker 1: It's by Mary gate Skill, who I think I had
Speaker 1: read stuff of hers before, maybe in high school or college.
Speaker 1: She's like a famous mostly short story writer. Um. And
Speaker 1: this was from a collection she wrote back in nineteen
Speaker 1: idiot called bad behavior, and it is different. It is
Speaker 1: so the I think most notable ways in which the
Speaker 1: source material is different from the film is that there's
Speaker 1: no mention of any of her self harm behavior in
Speaker 1: the story. There's only a brief mention that her mom
Speaker 1: had taken her to a psychiatrist one time. But aside
Speaker 1: from that, the self harm aspect of her character seems
Speaker 1: to be specific to the movie. In the scene in
Speaker 1: which which the movie would have you believe is the
Speaker 1: beginning of their dom sub relationship, we will talk about
Speaker 1: how how it's just an assault with no prior understanding
Speaker 1: on her part of what was going to happen, no
Speaker 1: consent given on her part. Right during that scene in
Speaker 1: the short story, the character whose name is not Lee,
Speaker 1: I think her name is Debbie in the short story. Um.
Speaker 1: But anyway, that character, that character is crying the whole time,
Speaker 1: and she just seems much more traumatized by the events
Speaker 1: of that in the short story. Uh. The story ends
Speaker 1: with the lead character deciding not to show up to
Speaker 1: work anymore, and she's the one who effectively ends their relationship.
Speaker 1: They don't get together. At the end. He runs for
Speaker 1: mayor of their town and she judges. She's like, this
Speaker 1: town is so shitty. What kind of idiot would run
Speaker 1: for mayor of such a shitty town? And then that's
Speaker 1: pretty much how the story ends. That's very different. It's
Speaker 1: so different. I thought it was like a good story.
Speaker 1: I I felt like it was. I mean it was
Speaker 1: it's very like like late eighties. But it felt like, oh,
Speaker 1: this was like kind of this like slice of this
Speaker 1: young woman's life. She had like a traumatic work experience,
Speaker 1: and there wasn't really any like infrastructure for her to
Speaker 1: like process or report it, so she just took herself
Speaker 1: out of the situation and then looked back on it
Speaker 1: thinking that he sucked and was a loser, which which
Speaker 1: is like a relatable experience. I didn't dislike the story. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know Mary gets call. I mean, I guess
Speaker 1: that there's not too much worth discussing about her here
Speaker 1: because the movie has kind of very little to do
Speaker 1: with what she read. I feel like the story sounds
Speaker 1: so much better, like the whole aspect of the self
Speaker 1: harm and the mental illness. Just the way it's used here,
Speaker 1: it's only used to take away her agency, it's only
Speaker 1: used to make her seem so childish, uh, And it's
Speaker 1: it's kind of used to make it like, oh, this
Speaker 1: is the reason that she is this way. They use
Speaker 1: it as an excuse, like, oh, the only reason that
Speaker 1: she would be into like subdom stuff is because she's
Speaker 1: the kind of person whose self harms, which obviously is
Speaker 1: a really like dangerous stereotype for the b D s
Speaker 1: M community. But also it's just like, like, no, she
Speaker 1: could just like I love this type of stuff and
Speaker 1: want to be in this relationship, but instead you want
Speaker 1: to tie it to her mental illness, and that makes
Speaker 1: me go a looks that he's taking advantage of that, Like, like,
Speaker 1: you guys should have just listened to Mary here, because
Speaker 1: obviously she accounted for that way back in come on, yeah,
Speaker 1: in the way her mental health issues are depicted. And
Speaker 1: this isn't to say the people who have or have
Speaker 1: had self harm tendencies can't get into b D s
Speaker 1: M and use that as a coping strategy in a
Speaker 1: healthy way. I read some anecdotes from people who took
Speaker 1: that approach and it seemed to work out great for them,
Speaker 1: So I don't have a problem with the movie showing
Speaker 1: that as a general thing. What I do find troublesome
Speaker 1: is this character Mr Gray, who is an abuser, seems
Speaker 1: to somehow curely of her mental illness by simply telling
Speaker 1: her not to have a mental illness anymore. I was
Speaker 1: I was bummed from Mary, and I like, on reading this,
Speaker 1: I was like kind of even more confused with some
Speaker 1: of the choices that the movie made because I assumed
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, well, okay, I knew going in
Speaker 1: at the ending was very different in the movie than
Speaker 1: it is in the book. But I'm like, maybe they
Speaker 1: just chose, you know, a bad in for a happy ending.
Speaker 1: Like if she I would almost be a little more like, oh,
Speaker 1: this was done with good intent. Uh if it was like, oh,
Speaker 1: it just didn't adapt well and then the studio made
Speaker 1: us change the ending and so it comes off not
Speaker 1: very well. But that's not even the case. And I
Speaker 1: have a quote from Mary gate Skill who is like,
Speaker 1: she's really interesting. She's got you can look up her
Speaker 1: takes on me too. They're all over the place because
Speaker 1: she's she's all about the gray area of sexual interactions,
Speaker 1: which doesn't translate well to that conversation. Uh, even if
Speaker 1: it turns out, you know, often well in her work,
Speaker 1: But Anyways, she was asked about this movie because it's
Speaker 1: so different, and she was like, pretty I don't know,
Speaker 1: very chill about it. She said that the film was
Speaker 1: quote the Pretty Woman version, very heavy on the charm
Speaker 1: and a little too nice. But the bottom line is
Speaker 1: that if if a film adaptation is made, you get
Speaker 1: some money and exposure and people can make up their
Speaker 1: minds from there. So she very much like it's kind
Speaker 1: of like I gotta check check, and then distanced herself
Speaker 1: from yeah, I like that. She says the movie is
Speaker 1: charming because like, where where is that charm? I didn't
Speaker 1: Her takes are all over the places like this is
Speaker 1: Pretty Woman? Like where like where where is Lee coming
Speaker 1: back to be like I own this? There's never that
Speaker 1: moment she comes back and she's like yeah, she comes
Speaker 1: and she's like I love you and I'm going to
Speaker 1: sit here and do this. But it's only after she
Speaker 1: bears her soul to the press and they like put
Speaker 1: out her statement about how she's the only person who
Speaker 1: understands him and he's so complicated that he like reads
Speaker 1: it and it's like you know what, Okay, fine, I'll
Speaker 1: go back in there and get her Like I was
Speaker 1: gonna just like see how long she do this and
Speaker 1: have fun with it. But now I guess I'll take
Speaker 1: it seriously Like that that was It's not like Mr
Speaker 1: Gray has like such a trust of the local press.
Speaker 1: He trusted more than women. He's allegedly in love with Um.
Speaker 1: So Mary Gaskill writes the story, it eventually gets um
Speaker 1: picked up by this direct or, Stephen Shaneberg, I was
Speaker 1: not aware of. I had never heard of him, and
Speaker 1: I looked up his other stuff and I had not
Speaker 1: heard of any of it. I don't know who this
Speaker 1: man is. For some reason, I thought it was Steven
Speaker 1: Soderberg who directed this, and then I was and then
Speaker 1: I was like, oh wait, no, I read that wrong.
Speaker 1: That doesn't say Soderberg. That said something else. It's like
Speaker 1: it's like one of the You're like Steve Stephenburg, like
Speaker 1: Steve Soderberg, like he had a he had another. I
Speaker 1: think he only made one other movie after Secretary, and
Speaker 1: it also had like pretty mixed reviews. But like some
Speaker 1: big names attached to it, it seems like he just
Speaker 1: he just kind of makes these like boring middle of
Speaker 1: the lane like white like artsy movies with with couples
Speaker 1: that fight. Yeah, it's like I couldn't quite figure out
Speaker 1: what his deal was other than I believe he Oh no,
Speaker 1: he wasn't nepotism. I really can't make heads or tails
Speaker 1: of his life in that case. But the the I
Speaker 1: think the screenwriter of this movie is pretty interesting and
Speaker 1: she has like a lot of pretty well known work.
Speaker 1: She was like originally a playwright named Aaron Crisita Wilson.
Speaker 1: Other stuff she's written include the I think The Girl
Speaker 1: on the Train is probably her most famous other adaptation.
Speaker 1: And then there was a movie named Chloe that I
Speaker 1: definitely saw. It is not It's not good. It's Julianne
Speaker 1: Morriley of Neeson and Amanda sy Free. I totally forgot
Speaker 1: about that movie. I like cut it out of my memory.
Speaker 1: It's a mess. She is interesting to me because I
Speaker 1: feel like I haven't rewatched Chloe in a long time.
Speaker 1: But I feel like this particular writer is drawn to
Speaker 1: a very particular type of female protagonist that we've talked
Speaker 1: about before. But it's or we we're talking about earlier,
Speaker 1: but it's like she is drawn to like upwardly mobile
Speaker 1: white lady with mental illness, but then kind of uses
Speaker 1: that framing device to just punish the character relentlessly throughout
Speaker 1: the work. And I'm sure I'm oversimplifying the girl on
Speaker 1: the train a little bit um. But I did not
Speaker 1: like that movie. Uh wasn't a fan, and it's it's
Speaker 1: like brutal. She's interesting, and so I was looking up.
Speaker 1: This was her first screenplay and she's written I guess
Speaker 1: like twenty plays. I'm not. I don't know. It's like
Speaker 1: good for her, all power to her, but she didn't
Speaker 1: interview when she first wrote this movie where they were
Speaker 1: basically asking her like, oh, have you ever been as
Speaker 1: secretary or have you ever been um in a B
Speaker 1: D S M situation? And her answer is so weird,
Speaker 1: it's okay, So here it is. She says, I have
Speaker 1: had many instances of sexual harassment and jobs I've had
Speaker 1: in the past, but I was young and didn't know
Speaker 1: what I was being sexually harassed in these instances. I
Speaker 1: had absolutely no sexual attraction to the harassers, so it
Speaker 1: was confusing to me. I thought I had been hired
Speaker 1: because these men liked my work, not my ass. You see,
Speaker 1: I went to girls schools for much of my education,
Speaker 1: so I came from a very sheltered and also wonderful
Speaker 1: environment where I was seen for my personality, my intelligence,
Speaker 1: and my talent. When it came to work, I was
Speaker 1: not accustomed to being seen as a sexual object. It
Speaker 1: took me years after college to finally understand that I
Speaker 1: was being harassed. I never thought of myself as particularly hot,
Speaker 1: so I was always ACKed when I realized that was
Speaker 1: going on. I've worked with men I was attracted to,
Speaker 1: and this can be very invigorating and exciting, especially if
Speaker 1: it is never consummated. But that is a consensual and
Speaker 1: more adult situation. This film situation borders on sexual harassment definitely,
Speaker 1: but I think it ceases to be harassment when the
Speaker 1: submissive starts to like it and actually ask for it.
Speaker 1: So it's like, I'm like really with her at the
Speaker 1: beginning of this, and that took some turns, and then
Speaker 1: at the end you're just like, wait, why didn't know?
Speaker 1: Why didn't attractive people can sexually harass in the workplace?
Speaker 1: That's oh, there were so many I was like, I'm
Speaker 1: with you, I'm with you, and then I was just
Speaker 1: like no. And also, there is like a moment in
Speaker 1: the movie where they like kind of joke about sexual harassment.
Speaker 1: Her sisters when they're by the pool, Like one of
Speaker 1: them is like, oh, I'm you should like sue your
Speaker 1: boss for sexual harassment, and then like Lee is just like,
Speaker 1: at least my boss is sexy. He's the best in
Speaker 1: the world. Okay, So that I feel like that is there.
Speaker 1: I feel like that's the movie attempting to show the
Speaker 1: distinction between like actual abuse and b D s M,
Speaker 1: the movie saying these are two different things. I feel
Speaker 1: like this is also why we see Lee's father being
Speaker 1: physically abusive to the mother. That's saying like, that's what abuses.
Speaker 1: What we're seeing in this relationship between Lee and Mr Gray,
Speaker 1: this is different. This is a consensual b D s
Speaker 1: M relationship. However, this is my whole thing with this movie,
Speaker 1: and we already hinted at it, But like, the relationship
Speaker 1: between the two characters starts as him being verbally and
Speaker 1: emotionally abusive towards her in the workplace. This is followed
Speaker 1: by the scene in which he has her bend over
Speaker 1: the desk and repeatedly spank her. Um, she did not
Speaker 1: know this was going to happen. She did not give
Speaker 1: consent to this. In addition, there's also a major you're
Speaker 1: in balance of power in that he is her boss
Speaker 1: and she is his subordinate. There's also seemingly no one
Speaker 1: else there. Yeah. Also, let's I don't think we mentioned
Speaker 1: that the very first time she goes in for the interview,
Speaker 1: there's a woman, his old secretary who's leaving and crying.
Speaker 1: They also like cut to that clip at the end,
Speaker 1: which is a little like, yeah, yeah, we get it,
Speaker 1: we get she got fired and she's also crying. We
Speaker 1: know the reference, we get it. But it's like they
Speaker 1: clearly established like he is an abusive boss, Like even
Speaker 1: outside of b D s M, he's not a good boss. Right,
Speaker 1: Like the thing with this movie, and Jamie you had
Speaker 1: mentioned this at the top of the episode, but like
Speaker 1: this movie is widely considered within the b D s
Speaker 1: M community to be more like accurate and responsible in
Speaker 1: its depiction of b D s M relationships, more so
Speaker 1: than like fifty Shades of Gray at least five years ago. Right,
Speaker 1: Because the thing with fifty Shades of Gray is that
Speaker 1: it and we talked about this on that episode, but
Speaker 1: it conflates very concerning behavior like a man stalking a
Speaker 1: woman as like being part of the kink aspect of
Speaker 1: their relationship, and it's just like, no, this is romantic.
Speaker 1: What he's doing, him stalking her is actually very romantic.
Speaker 1: And it's also just like poorly written, so no one
Speaker 1: likes it. But with Secretary, I'm just like what, but
Speaker 1: there's an assault. He assaults her because, like the whole
Speaker 1: thing with B. D. S M, if done right and
Speaker 1: portrayed accurately, it's all about consent, it's all about negotiation,
Speaker 1: it's all about knowing each other's boundaries and limits. It's
Speaker 1: all about safety, and none of that gets established in
Speaker 1: this movie. They don't talk about the relationship he there's
Speaker 1: no safe words established. In fact, he never uses the terms.
Speaker 1: We don't actually even know if he is well versed
Speaker 1: in like B D. S M. Like the woman in
Speaker 1: the beginning comes in and she looks at Lee and
Speaker 1: says sub which is like okay, so she knows about it.
Speaker 1: And then we see like Lee, you know, she's at
Speaker 1: the diner like listening to a book on tape or
Speaker 1: whatever about subdom relationships. But all we ever hear from
Speaker 1: him is that he's like ashamed of this inherent nature
Speaker 1: that he has, Like is this just is he an
Speaker 1: inherently bad guy who likes to harm people, whether they're
Speaker 1: just his secretary or they're his partner, because he's he's
Speaker 1: engaging in it without any consent or without at least conversation.
Speaker 1: There's never a moment where he's like, hey, I'm into
Speaker 1: this lifestyle or hey, you know, he just is full
Speaker 1: of shame about it. So it's very much like I
Speaker 1: don't even know if we can consider him someone who
Speaker 1: is into b D s M because they never even
Speaker 1: say that about his character, Like we don't even know
Speaker 1: that he that he like uses those ideas of consent
Speaker 1: that are in the b D s M community, because
Speaker 1: he just seems like a creep who would probably be
Speaker 1: a jerk to anyone who worked in his office. Right,
Speaker 1: It's I felt like there there was a moment when
Speaker 1: like he experiences the shame about like the kind of
Speaker 1: sex he likes to have, where you're like, oh, like
Speaker 1: maybe the movie is going to make a like an
Speaker 1: interesting point about that, because that's something that happens, and
Speaker 1: like you know it. There are cases of people who
Speaker 1: are so ashamed of what they want and sex that
Speaker 1: they won't educate themselves because they don't want to acknowledge
Speaker 1: that part of themselves. But that but it but that
Speaker 1: you know, that does not happen. It just kind of drops.
Speaker 1: He doesn't learn a thing. Yeah he could. I mean,
Speaker 1: if he has money for a horse saddle. I have
Speaker 1: to imagine he could pick up a book on B
Speaker 1: D s M or safe Words or just like a
Speaker 1: book on tape on like you know, just being like, so,
Speaker 1: can I spank you? I feel like library cards are free. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I feel like he definitely has access to those resources.
Speaker 1: So just they're afraid to ever like just jump into
Speaker 1: the B D s M conversation and in the end,
Speaker 1: that makes it so much more sinister and just so
Speaker 1: much more confusing about what Lee is actually signing up for.
Speaker 1: I'm curious, actually, maybe you will have some insight into
Speaker 1: this of because it's and I've read like a number
Speaker 1: of like pieces that are sort of like, oh, I
Speaker 1: recognize that uh Secretary has equal, if not worse issues
Speaker 1: and fifty shades of great. I just like it more
Speaker 1: and I'm like more attached to it. And my guess
Speaker 1: is because it was the only even semi mainstream movie
Speaker 1: that dealt with this at the time. Okay, I think
Speaker 1: that's it it's like, I mean, even watching it now,
Speaker 1: I was a little like, wow, this came out so
Speaker 1: long ago, like twenty years now, and I mean at
Speaker 1: the time, it was like so shocking that poster is
Speaker 1: so shocking. You're like, wow, I've never seen a film
Speaker 1: just kind of talk about even just self harm. I
Speaker 1: think for me that was such a shocking thing, like
Speaker 1: mental health and that just being something that like a
Speaker 1: woman can have those issues and you can talk about
Speaker 1: it in a movie. Uh. You know. I feel like
Speaker 1: this was that time period of like really like quirky, cute,
Speaker 1: manic pixie dream girls who were all like you know,
Speaker 1: plan ukuleles, and then there was this like dark girl
Speaker 1: who was like hurting herself and dealing with mental health
Speaker 1: issues and like issues of self esteem. And obviously that
Speaker 1: resonated for someone like me who listened to Torrey Amos.
Speaker 1: So I was like in a prime position to love
Speaker 1: this movie. And you know, I still think it it
Speaker 1: does deserve some credit for doing a lot before anyone
Speaker 1: else did it, but I mean it also still does
Speaker 1: so much wrong. Like it, you know, and I think
Speaker 1: we can say like, yeah, it's great, and I I
Speaker 1: can you know, proudly proudly say, like, yeah, I tried
Speaker 1: to spank myself with a hairbrush because I saw it
Speaker 1: in this movie, and you know, I'm into that, Like, okay,
Speaker 1: think I I owe that to secretary. But at the
Speaker 1: same time, James Spader is creepy and this movie could
Speaker 1: be better written. Sure, two things can be true. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I like I think that it is like definitely good
Speaker 1: that people are able to like discover stuff or feel
Speaker 1: even somewhat seen in a movie like this. I just
Speaker 1: was really I don't know because and I also think
Speaker 1: that the other thing is that it's like it is
Speaker 1: just a better crafted movie the fifty Shades of Great.
Speaker 1: No one wants to watch fifty Great Shades of Gray
Speaker 1: because it's like a shitty movie, even though it is
Speaker 1: you know, we've talked about it in another episode, and
Speaker 1: there's just not the bandwidth the handle it now. But
Speaker 1: there are at least some basic B D s M
Speaker 1: dynamics introduced in fifty Shades of Gray. Whether they are
Speaker 1: actually abided by by the couple, uh doesn't always happen.
Speaker 1: But you are introduced to the just consent and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, what's her name whatever, and so embarrassing and
Speaker 1: as Stasia get an opportunity, and I guess opportunities like
Speaker 1: an overstatement, but like she gets to say, here are
Speaker 1: my boundaries, here's what I won't do, and they do
Speaker 1: that little negotiation and they have some aftercare with each
Speaker 1: other and they cuddle after stuff, and it's just like
Speaker 1: it's very like one oh one, but at least it's
Speaker 1: it's there with yeah, because with Lee there is nothing.
Speaker 1: I mean, she doesn't even read, she doesn't listen to
Speaker 1: that book on tape until after he has ended their relationship.
Speaker 1: She she doesn't go out with other people who are
Speaker 1: into this lifestyle until after the relationship. So she gets
Speaker 1: into it not even knowing what it is. Apparently like
Speaker 1: she's doing these things, she's like happy to crawl on
Speaker 1: the floor and all this stuff, but she actually has
Speaker 1: no idea what she's engaging with until later, and she's
Speaker 1: just being like physically and emotionally abused by this guy.
Speaker 1: Because it seems like for Mr Gray that it is
Speaker 1: just as much of a twenty four seven emotional consumption
Speaker 1: as it's like they're just are no lines. She's given
Speaker 1: no information and because we're introduced to her as kind
Speaker 1: of this childlike character. You kind of assume, well, she
Speaker 1: is not going to be given the agency to figure
Speaker 1: out she doesn't really have anyone else to talk to
Speaker 1: in her life because her family is framed as being
Speaker 1: so I think they're like a joke. Yeah, the family,
Speaker 1: her sister is a character. I don't know why the
Speaker 1: sister is not like a friend or someone she can
Speaker 1: relate to. I don't know why she doesn't have friends
Speaker 1: or just any sort of female character where she can
Speaker 1: be like, I have these feelings about this situation or
Speaker 1: this boy that never happens. We only relate her mom. Yeah,
Speaker 1: all we really know is that Mr Gray is better
Speaker 1: than this other guy who is boring. So that is
Speaker 1: why Mr Gray is good, which poor poor Peter. Peter
Speaker 1: is nice. He cares about you spec her. Maybe he's
Speaker 1: he's really bad at sex, but at least he treats
Speaker 1: her well. He could learn, and maybe you know, he
Speaker 1: just wants to get married and have kids. You know,
Speaker 1: you can teach someone to spank, you can, It's really
Speaker 1: easy to do. Yeah, I feel like he would have
Speaker 1: been game if she'd been like, hey, so I realized
Speaker 1: I'm into b D s M and I want to
Speaker 1: explore this and if she had used the language with him, okay,
Speaker 1: but instead he was just like tape. I feel like
Speaker 1: he would have been like, I'm game to try this
Speaker 1: and figure it out for you. He seems so in
Speaker 1: love with her, and then instead he's just like I
Speaker 1: didn't actually like how they have him confront her in
Speaker 1: that situation, because they tried to kind of paint him
Speaker 1: as the abuser, like he's the only person who manages
Speaker 1: to push her out of that chair and he's like,
Speaker 1: I don't care if you want to stay here, I'm
Speaker 1: going to push you and like physically violate you. And
Speaker 1: that's like a clear moment when they have a man
Speaker 1: like to fire her physical agency and she yells like
Speaker 1: no and like runs to the chair, and I'm just like, wait, no,
Speaker 1: that's so out of character for him. Yeah, Like like
Speaker 1: first of all, like that's out of character. He's never
Speaker 1: been this aggressive person, Like why would he all of
Speaker 1: a sudden just like grab her and do this. But
Speaker 1: also he's the good guy, Like come on, Like, how
Speaker 1: are you going to paint him as the one who's
Speaker 1: like actually now abusive and going against her wishes when
Speaker 1: all he has done has just been like I will
Speaker 1: only touch you with my pinky and you can keep
Speaker 1: all your clothes on and whatever you would like, we
Speaker 1: do this the way that you want to do it,
Speaker 1: like come on. There was also like I felt like
Speaker 1: a kind of subtle like dumping on Peter class wise
Speaker 1: as well, Like I think that they were first of
Speaker 1: all being like Peter isn't something enough for her, and
Speaker 1: I think that, like, you know, sexually masculine is a
Speaker 1: part of that. And then they're also like subtly dumping
Speaker 1: on him for working at j C. Penny all the time.
Speaker 1: They like anytime he comes up there, like and he
Speaker 1: proposed to me in the basement of like they're just
Speaker 1: which is a good line, but that was a good moment.
Speaker 1: I love that scene when they're just sitting there and
Speaker 1: she's like, yeah, I guess I'll marry you. Okay, okay.
Speaker 1: But they're also kind of being like, oh, this guy
Speaker 1: is like he doesn't funk hard enough and he's poor,
Speaker 1: Like he's the nicest person in the movie. He just
Speaker 1: is so sweet and nice. He gives a rides when
Speaker 1: they like when she's like, oh, this wedding sucks, he's
Speaker 1: there to be like hey, yeah, do you need anything,
Speaker 1: Like he just is so sweet and the movie is like, yeah,
Speaker 1: but no, Mr Gray is the is this just really
Speaker 1: complex guy? And she gets him, and I just I
Speaker 1: still don't know what we're supposed to like about the
Speaker 1: guy truly, and contrasting that with like, I mean, like
Speaker 1: I said this a little earlier too, but like how
Speaker 1: her turning point as like a character is when he
Speaker 1: just suggests that she should no longer self harm. So
Speaker 1: it's also like, oh, if you have a crush, that
Speaker 1: will cure your mental illness. Like there's just all sorts
Speaker 1: of bizarre messages being bandied about. He has a polaroid camera,
Speaker 1: she has. She has no more problems, okay, the polar
Speaker 1: and camera thing. I watched this movie with a person
Speaker 1: that I am dating, which was interesting because I forced
Speaker 1: them to watch it, and the whole time I was
Speaker 1: just like, keep in mind, this is like the most
Speaker 1: informative movie to my sexual awakening in my life, so
Speaker 1: just keep that in mind the whole time. And we
Speaker 1: like got into a fight over the polaroid scene because
Speaker 1: I swore there were pictures of multiple girls in that
Speaker 1: book and he had polaroids of like his ex and
Speaker 1: like other secretary he does, and then he burns it.
Speaker 1: Yeah right, And I was like, this shows us this
Speaker 1: is a history of abuse, is a pattern, Like this
Speaker 1: has nothing to do with Lee, this is just this
Speaker 1: guy doing this. But my partner was like, no, those
Speaker 1: were all photos of Lee, so just on the record,
Speaker 1: let's all tell the definitely different people. And then yeah,
Speaker 1: that also is more of and again just like demonizing.
Speaker 1: I mean everyone is kind of demonized in this movie,
Speaker 1: but like it demonizes the b d s M community
Speaker 1: by being like, yeah, they keep things like serial killers,
Speaker 1: like he's has this like serial killer scrapple, like women,
Speaker 1: he's upset, like it's just he keeps their their photos
Speaker 1: and his beautiful orchid garden, and like like b DSM
Speaker 1: people are just inherent monsters who can't control themselves except
Speaker 1: through push ups and treadmills. He is so sweaty in
Speaker 1: that treadmill scene. Oh my gosh. Like they voluntarily flashback
Speaker 1: to that shot a second time. I was like, I
Speaker 1: didn't want to see that again. Also, they also they
Speaker 1: have her flashback to it, but it's not the part
Speaker 1: when she was there, and I was like, how did
Speaker 1: how did she know? He was running that hard? Then
Speaker 1: how did she see it? That is such a heartbreaking
Speaker 1: scene too, and that like when she her so her
Speaker 1: father is sick, she's really upset about it. She's like
Speaker 1: not able to communicate with her mother and her siblings,
Speaker 1: and so she goes to him for like emotional support.
Speaker 1: She kind of has no reason, being as romantically naive
Speaker 1: as she is and also as like manipulous, like she
Speaker 1: has no reason to believe that he won't you be
Speaker 1: nice to her? But then he makes it clear right away,
Speaker 1: like I don't you know that? Like I don't do emotions,
Speaker 1: and it's the hot and the cold. It's that classic
Speaker 1: just like you know. He he made her feel so special,
Speaker 1: made her feel so like, oh, I'm going to fix you,
Speaker 1: and I see everything that's wrong with you. And then
Speaker 1: the second she's like, oh, I actually need your emotional support,
Speaker 1: he's like, I'll read the files in the morning, get
Speaker 1: out of here, right, And then he just sits on
Speaker 1: his bed and like looks out a window, like how
Speaker 1: dare she expect me to show the emotions that I
Speaker 1: promised her i'd show, right, especially when he's like, you
Speaker 1: can talk to me about out your problems. Yeah, he
Speaker 1: like that's the whole opening of their relationships and being like, yeah,
Speaker 1: we can be intimate and you can talk to me.
Speaker 1: And then when she's actually like my dad, which I
Speaker 1: don't I like that they never in the end like
Speaker 1: give us closure on the family thing in terms of
Speaker 1: the dad's like sickness. Like, for all we know, she's
Speaker 1: like fucking on this tree and her dad is just
Speaker 1: dead in a ditch somewhere. We have no idea like
Speaker 1: he yeah, we don't find out if her mom ever
Speaker 1: like gets out of that relationship. And also and then
Speaker 1: it kind of like I just think that that like
Speaker 1: shot of abuse at the beginning ends up being so
Speaker 1: gratuitous because it is never revisited other than like her
Speaker 1: like possibly I could see being like, oh, I don't
Speaker 1: you know, like you were saying, Caitlin, like this is abuse.
Speaker 1: This is an abuse. But then don't bring the dad
Speaker 1: back at the end when she's pissing herself as like
Speaker 1: a good like the best guy. Yeah, the one who
Speaker 1: like understands her like this dad who's abusive is the
Speaker 1: one who's like, I have the Bible Verse you need
Speaker 1: and she's like thank you, daddy, which felt gross. That
Speaker 1: felt like an illegal use of Daddy in that scene.
Speaker 1: I think they should cut it from the film in
Speaker 1: the future, strike it from the record. I also like
Speaker 1: with with her mom, I can't help but feel because
Speaker 1: her mom is painted as being very submissive. Also in
Speaker 1: the fact that she seems to have nothing better to
Speaker 1: do than wait outside of Lee's work for hours on end,
Speaker 1: like we're just waiting for her to be done, to
Speaker 1: pick her up, and I mean, we don't really know
Speaker 1: anything about her except that again she's she just seems
Speaker 1: to be depicted as this very submissive person, and I
Speaker 1: feel like the movie is like wanting you to think
Speaker 1: this is the way not to be submissive, because Lee
Speaker 1: is doing it right. And I think there's like there's
Speaker 1: like I can see a read of this movie and
Speaker 1: all of the defenses of this movie that I've read
Speaker 1: of because people love to write about how Secretary is
Speaker 1: better than Fifty Shades of Gray. So I was reading
Speaker 1: several of those pieces, and a lot of them were
Speaker 1: making the argument that Lee she's given agency. She eventually
Speaker 1: starts consenting and initiating some of these dom sub interactions
Speaker 1: with Mr. Gray. People have written about how she as
Speaker 1: she's becoming more submissive to him. She's actually becoming more
Speaker 1: dominant in her own life and that she's empowered, and
Speaker 1: I can see parts of that. I think her mother
Speaker 1: character is like written the way she is so that
Speaker 1: there's like this stark contrast of like here's the bad
Speaker 1: way to be submissive and here's the good way to
Speaker 1: be submissive. I don't really don't like that. I feel
Speaker 1: about that necessarily, but I don't like it. That does
Speaker 1: make sense to me that I mean, especially I guess that,
Speaker 1: like I mean, every movie you have to take the
Speaker 1: time it came out as context by like maybe especially
Speaker 1: with the movie like this, where this was the option
Speaker 1: for a semi mainstream BDSM movie. And then also there
Speaker 1: are just so few movies about women being remotely sexually empowered,
Speaker 1: even if if you look at the text carefully, like
Speaker 1: are they really? But I feel like this movie was
Speaker 1: very much framed and you were supposed to think that
Speaker 1: she was very sexually empowered, and sometimes that is enough
Speaker 1: if there's not you know, other options. So I mean
Speaker 1: the fact that you see female masturbation, you see female orgasm,
Speaker 1: female pleasure. I feel like she only reaches orgasm when
Speaker 1: she is masturbating and not in anything that she's doing
Speaker 1: with Mr. Gray. No, No, that's true. I mean we
Speaker 1: really only see them have sex, like when they are
Speaker 1: on against the tree. That's the only time. The other
Speaker 1: time is just like him for like going over every
Speaker 1: scar one by one and because she's finally found someone
Speaker 1: so smart that he can understand her scars. That is
Speaker 1: such a I remember that, like not not as sexualized,
Speaker 1: but like I remember a very similar scene on Degrassi
Speaker 1: which was like, oh, like in two thousand two, I
Speaker 1: was very on the Degrassy train and there was there
Speaker 1: was a girl like a character who self harmed, and
Speaker 1: then it was it was Ellie Stacy Farber currently on
Speaker 1: Grayce and Frankie. We love her. She's great, a star,
Speaker 1: she's great. She was the hot topic girl too, but
Speaker 1: she there was like you know that. I feel like
Speaker 1: it is like almost a trophy moment where it's like
Speaker 1: when the person who's self harming finds someone who accepts them.
Speaker 1: They touch your scars and you're like, wow, I finally
Speaker 1: have found love and I am beautiful. And it's corny
Speaker 1: but it's also potent in a way. Like in this movie.
Speaker 1: It didn't really hit for me because I don't value
Speaker 1: like their relationship is so dark and fucked up. But
Speaker 1: in other situations I've been like, that's nice. It worked.
Speaker 1: It worked for me in Degrassi anyways. Yeah, Degrassi definitely
Speaker 1: pulled it off better than this movie did. They could
Speaker 1: have taken some notes, I think, because I don't in
Speaker 1: this scene. I mean, even when he first notices her scars,
Speaker 1: because he notices them before he even tells her the
Speaker 1: whole like stop doing that or catches her trying it.
Speaker 1: She's like setting a rat trap and he's being mean
Speaker 1: about it. And then like her her like dress comes
Speaker 1: up and he sees it. So to me, it's like
Speaker 1: already he is. It's not something where he's like, oh,
Speaker 1: I want to understand this about her. It's like he's
Speaker 1: going to use it against her. It's something that he's like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is another way where I can control her and
Speaker 1: change her and fix her, versus like, oh, I want
Speaker 1: to understand what causes her to do this. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't think he ever asked. I don't think he
Speaker 1: ever was like, so, what's what's the whole? You know
Speaker 1: nothing about each other. In that scene where they're finally
Speaker 1: like having a tender like kissing moment after he has
Speaker 1: bathed her, She's like, who are you? Where did you
Speaker 1: grow up? Where were you bored? What are your interests?
Speaker 1: They don't know anything about each other. Gives the most
Speaker 1: boring answer. He's like, Moine Iowa, I mean, shout out
Speaker 1: to des Moines and our de Moin listeners, But who
Speaker 1: knew that demo des Moines Iowa was like making the
Speaker 1: most complicated men of all time, Like somewhere in a
Speaker 1: corn field, they're just cranking out these just complex beings
Speaker 1: who cannot be understood with our our simple female brains.
Speaker 1: He has no story, like it's they know I feel
Speaker 1: I feel for for Lee, So I am very curious
Speaker 1: of like what does this relationship look like for Lee?
Speaker 1: Down the line a little bit like when she genuinely
Speaker 1: does come into her own a little more and like
Speaker 1: mature's more like, I don't know. I don't see this
Speaker 1: relationship maybe lasting forever. What have ends? When Lee wants kids, like,
Speaker 1: he's like, I've got orchids. I'm I'm good. I don't
Speaker 1: need children. I have orchids them my creepy album, like
Speaker 1: and maybe a horse. He might have a horse, or
Speaker 1: at least the parts to have one. Yeah, he's got
Speaker 1: the accessory everything but the horse. Yeah. I mean, ultimately,
Speaker 1: like with with this character, especially like it's very romantic,
Speaker 1: and I feel like where this movie very suddenly pivots
Speaker 1: into like romcomp territory at the end, like you're supposed
Speaker 1: to believe I guess that she changed him, which is
Speaker 1: just like never an idea that serves anybody is like, yeah,
Speaker 1: he treated every other person he's ever been in a
Speaker 1: relationship with like absolute garbage, deeply hurt them, ruin their
Speaker 1: lives in some cases. But he was just waiting for
Speaker 1: the girl that would for a whole week at his
Speaker 1: desk on TV for the media, and that made him
Speaker 1: fall in love with her. Like it's just so many
Speaker 1: levels of it. You're just like come on, like who God?
Speaker 1: And I know, because I was such an impressionable like
Speaker 1: twelve year old, I would have been like, wow, so
Speaker 1: so that's what we're gonna do. Okay, Like I can't
Speaker 1: say that, I can't say that's not how I've dated
Speaker 1: my entire life. I can't say that this movie didn't
Speaker 1: have that impact where I just want someone who's going
Speaker 1: to tell me what to eat for dinner and carry
Speaker 1: me and feed me carrots. I think that's just like
Speaker 1: what I want, and that is because of Secretary, But
Speaker 1: I don't know, it's just I think it's a little
Speaker 1: dangerous now when I look back, Like, yes, it was
Speaker 1: like one of the first movies to do that. But
Speaker 1: for that same reason, like I as like a young queer,
Speaker 1: I put so much into it, Like I was so like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is this is what you know my experience should
Speaker 1: be like, and oh I need to find So it's
Speaker 1: gonna be tough to find someone who gets me because
Speaker 1: as a woman who's into this lifestyle, I'm just hard
Speaker 1: to understand and I have to deal with someone who's
Speaker 1: hard to understand, and that is something that takes so
Speaker 1: long to unlearn. Like, no, you you don't have to
Speaker 1: deal with men like this. You don't have to deal
Speaker 1: with anyone like this. Actually, you can find people who
Speaker 1: know about consent and use their words and speak at
Speaker 1: a reasonable valume like life can be easy. It's audibly
Speaker 1: like office. Oh god, he says so many like pivotal
Speaker 1: lines of the movie so quietly. That makes a lot
Speaker 1: of sense though, like and and again, if if this
Speaker 1: is the only movie of its kind, like where else
Speaker 1: do you really have to turn for media to like
Speaker 1: it was like this and the L word. That's like
Speaker 1: I think all we had which I had to read
Speaker 1: with the deal word. Well, I like what I find.
Speaker 1: I think there's some pretty problematic ship in that show.
Speaker 1: That's why I rewatched it once a year. It not
Speaker 1: aged well, it's it's just as problematic as Secretary in
Speaker 1: terms of just I don't know. I guess it was
Speaker 1: like the sex sexy period of time when everyone was
Speaker 1: just like, oh, we're hot, sex positivity. You don't need
Speaker 1: to say yes verbally because we just see it in
Speaker 1: your eyes. And now we're at a point where like, no, no,
Speaker 1: you could, you should use the words, you should actually
Speaker 1: have the character because if if I mean if like
Speaker 1: the and this kind of we've kind of been saying
Speaker 1: this for the whole episode, but like if you switched
Speaker 1: the dynamic even two percent so that it's not this
Speaker 1: perfectly calibrated, like these two people meeting each other, meeting
Speaker 1: each other at the exact right time, and this like
Speaker 1: it would be like like a Hollywood Reporter article about
Speaker 1: workplace abuse, like it just I don't know. It's such
Speaker 1: a bummer because you you do have to imagine for
Speaker 1: every person who saw themselves in Lee in a very
Speaker 1: like genuinely felt way, you had some fun and creepy.
Speaker 1: Did that felt like validated by Mr Gray? Of like, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know what, actually, probably when I treat people that way,
Speaker 1: I'm changing their life and making their life way better. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And also I think it shows those men kind of
Speaker 1: who to target. I mean, I think this movie is
Speaker 1: mostly about how Mr Gray selects his victims. It's like
Speaker 1: how he puts his secretaries through this test, like very
Speaker 1: quickly find someone who doesn't understand boundaries by asking them
Speaker 1: inappropriate questions in an interview, look and see if they
Speaker 1: self harm, because that's something you can use. Is there
Speaker 1: anything else where they play with their hair or their
Speaker 1: insecure that you can use against them? I mean, it's
Speaker 1: it's kind of dangerous in this way where I kind
Speaker 1: of think, mostly we know nothing about Lee, but we
Speaker 1: know a lot about how he chooses victims and why
Speaker 1: he chosely. Yeah, and then and then it's supposed to
Speaker 1: by the end you're like, no, but she's changed, and
Speaker 1: now he is changed. Change. But then but actually it's
Speaker 1: like you were saying, we know less about them at
Speaker 1: the end than we did at the beginning, and it's
Speaker 1: just kind of confusing. I will say, though I love
Speaker 1: Maggie Gillan Hall in this movie, I just generally love
Speaker 1: her so much. She can make uh not great movie
Speaker 1: much better. And this was kind of like a turning
Speaker 1: point in her career in a way that I always
Speaker 1: find kind of like interesting slash frustrating of like this
Speaker 1: was her I don't know. I feel like there is
Speaker 1: like this very trackable trend of mostly prior to this,
Speaker 1: like Maggie Gillan Hall has been in a lot, but
Speaker 1: she would mostly play like somebody's daughter or like she
Speaker 1: was like a very side character. She was not a
Speaker 1: leading lady. And I feel like there this happens a
Speaker 1: lot where you have to do like the sex role,
Speaker 1: and once you do the sex role, well you have
Speaker 1: become a legitimized actor, like as a as a woman,
Speaker 1: you mean, like as a Yeah, I think, I mean,
Speaker 1: I think we've seen a million times in like Sunny
Speaker 1: play stops, Funny, you gotta stop, sorry, Sunny Stop. I
Speaker 1: don't I can't speak to what just happened. Sonny at
Speaker 1: it again, bat Sonny doesn't like when women speak for
Speaker 1: too long, but I'll have to say, like I feel like,
Speaker 1: you know, like it's very trackable, and and and and
Speaker 1: Maggie Jillen Hall is like twenty three four when she
Speaker 1: films this, so it's not quite disagregious. But you know,
Speaker 1: it's like when a Disney star or Nickelodeon star graduates
Speaker 1: out of playing kid roles and does an adult role,
Speaker 1: it's always like a zero to one hundred, like the
Speaker 1: most adult role that could possibly play. And this is
Speaker 1: kind of that moment for Maggie Jillen Hall. And she's
Speaker 1: a great I mean, she's a she's so talented, and
Speaker 1: it like, in spite of everything, I still think she
Speaker 1: gives a really good performance. I just wish that didn't
Speaker 1: necessarily have to happen to for her to be another stuff.
Speaker 1: And at least she does sell that that look at
Speaker 1: the end, that that breaking the fourth wall, like that
Speaker 1: is entirely just Maggie being like, I did what I
Speaker 1: could to save this movie. Don't put it on me.
Speaker 1: And then she says a cat is not a dog.
Speaker 1: I yeah, yeah, maybe that's like the best read of
Speaker 1: that end moment is that's Maggie Jillen Hall talking to
Speaker 1: the audience being like, listen, there's only so many ways
Speaker 1: to get ahead, and I promised to be subversive in
Speaker 1: the future. Please just give me a chance. I'll do
Speaker 1: the deuce someday. It'll be great. Yes, she will do
Speaker 1: the deuce, at least for me. Now, I see this
Speaker 1: movie as like her movie. I see it as like
Speaker 1: a thing that made her. It helped her career, and
Speaker 1: it's great when you look at sort of what she's
Speaker 1: done and as an actress. But if I were to
Speaker 1: like teach a class on sexuality and good representations of
Speaker 1: b D s M, I would not include it. No, No,
Speaker 1: I mean I appreciate media that attempts to normalize things
Speaker 1: that are widely misunderstood by you know, the general population,
Speaker 1: as like b D s M still is, I think,
Speaker 1: but like with Secretary, we weren't there with it being
Speaker 1: represented responsibly on the grounds. Especially again that like, there
Speaker 1: is a full on assault that happens, and it is
Speaker 1: framed by the movie as no, this is just the
Speaker 1: start of this dom sub relationship, and it's like, no,
Speaker 1: that is not what happens. That's just a girl who
Speaker 1: got spanked and did not know what a subdom relationship
Speaker 1: even was yet right right, and did not consent to
Speaker 1: it again, like nothing about what he was going to
Speaker 1: do had been previously discussed or agreed upon. And the
Speaker 1: power dynamic of like, I mean, you know, it's not
Speaker 1: like a manufactured B D s M power dynamic. It
Speaker 1: is a real power dynamic. He controls her income and
Speaker 1: takes it away, and like there's just so much actually
Speaker 1: fucked up stuff happening. Oh my god, I forgot about.
Speaker 1: The most annoying part is like her mom take like
Speaker 1: picks her up and waits outside the office for her
Speaker 1: to get off work all the time, and then finally
Speaker 1: one day, James Spader's character is like, you're gonna walk
Speaker 1: home from now on by yourself, and she does it,
Speaker 1: and she's like, I felt like I was walking for
Speaker 1: the first time, and I was like, like, you know,
Speaker 1: you needed a man to tell you you could go
Speaker 1: on a walk. Yes, she needed this man to tell
Speaker 1: her to do so many things, and it's like not that,
Speaker 1: like I don't know, like you know, it just doesn't work.
Speaker 1: It just doesn't work, and it never and just like
Speaker 1: the very specific detail of she has just gotten out
Speaker 1: of like an extended stay in the hospital for self harm,
Speaker 1: like that is never really referenced again. It's just kind
Speaker 1: of used as a convenient like there's a whole other
Speaker 1: set of like you're going through a lot when you
Speaker 1: get out of a situation like that. But she doesn't
Speaker 1: seem to really yeah, at least on screen, doesn't seem
Speaker 1: to process it at all. It never seems to click.
Speaker 1: It's never like her parents are like and then her
Speaker 1: parents seemed cool that the newspapers are there when she's
Speaker 1: having what could be described as a mental breakdown, but
Speaker 1: they don't call it her old therapist. They're not like
Speaker 1: we should like call her old hospital and see if
Speaker 1: they can get someone over here. Right. It's very confusing
Speaker 1: because at the beginning, he's seen as saying he like
Speaker 1: says to her like, if you ever need help with anything,
Speaker 1: like call me, I'll do my best to help you,
Speaker 1: Like where do you go? Yeah, and then he doesn't
Speaker 1: and then we don't see Yeah, they just like bring
Speaker 1: in all these people who are like maybe you should
Speaker 1: read about feminism, dummy, which like a weird way for
Speaker 1: the book to be, like, I that feminists have a
Speaker 1: problem with this movie. And it's like I thought that
Speaker 1: was a very kind of like funny two two passive aggressive, like, ah,
Speaker 1: this woman without middle part and like is giving a
Speaker 1: lot of books. She doesn't get it. She's just angry.
Speaker 1: She's so mad and we don't know why. And there
Speaker 1: I mean, and she's in it for all of two
Speaker 1: I mean literally to see and she's in the scene
Speaker 1: where she stomps on the jacket and then she shows
Speaker 1: up at the end to say he was actually a
Speaker 1: genius the whole time. Um, And what her name is, Trisha?
Speaker 1: Is that right? Um? Sounds about right? But even she,
Speaker 1: I mean, that is such a quickly written like shrew,
Speaker 1: shrew shrew. Seeing that she is there to sort of
Speaker 1: in part. Maybe she's the only person to use b
Speaker 1: DSM like vocabulary in the entire movie. And then we're like,
Speaker 1: but we hate her, but she also thinks he's a genius,
Speaker 1: but who even is she? And I think it would
Speaker 1: have been cool if she had, like if she had
Speaker 1: been his dumb if we'd actually seen like that's like
Speaker 1: why they got divorced or like that, like he at
Speaker 1: least had been in a b DSM relationship before, and
Speaker 1: maybe some of his difficulties with Lee, Yeah, with Lee
Speaker 1: is like now that he's in the dom position, he
Speaker 1: feels bad about torturings. Like if there was any sort
Speaker 1: of context like that, we could have maybe felt bad
Speaker 1: for Mr Gray or like seen where he was coming from.
Speaker 1: But instead it's just like, why why are you so
Speaker 1: upset with this thing that you have done before? Wait?
Speaker 1: Why are you upset that you're into B D S M?
Speaker 1: Like why do you have all of these Why did
Speaker 1: you have you invested so much money? Though? Then why
Speaker 1: are you putting their saddles cost so much money? There
Speaker 1: are a lot of money and it looks like a
Speaker 1: nice one and he has a whole grass bed table
Speaker 1: that in like also that bathtub was very nice. And
Speaker 1: I guess above his office he did home. I don't know.
Speaker 1: He just carries her upstairs, that's truely does just pick her? Yeah,
Speaker 1: that makes me laugh. It's I mean that dress should
Speaker 1: be covered in poop and it should just be a
Speaker 1: more to do. They start framing her letters with like
Speaker 1: spelling mistakes and like put him along the wall like
Speaker 1: a sexy bank wallers and homage. Yeah, which I was
Speaker 1: just like, people not come into your office often that
Speaker 1: you two can just like hang your kinks on the wall.
Speaker 1: Does he have any clients. Um, yeah, well, I mean
Speaker 1: I'm pulling from again our favorite scholarly journal Wikipedia here.
Speaker 1: But the director, Steven Shaneberg, has had said that he
Speaker 1: wanted to make this movie because he wanted to show
Speaker 1: that b D s M relationships can be normal, and
Speaker 1: that he was inspired by the film My Beautiful Launderette,
Speaker 1: which he felt normalized gay relationships for audiences in the eighties.
Speaker 1: So he made this movie with the intention of normalizing
Speaker 1: b D s M relationships and culture. Um did he
Speaker 1: do it? Well? Um, not necessarily failed. I at least
Speaker 1: appreciate knowing that he that is what he wanted to do,
Speaker 1: because there's also a read of this movie where I
Speaker 1: could be like, maybe that's not what he wanted to do.
Speaker 1: So I guess, of the options, I'm glad he at
Speaker 1: least was trying, but he did fail. I mean, I
Speaker 1: guess like that final shot where it like pans out
Speaker 1: and it's like, look at that these b D s
Speaker 1: M freaks could just be any couple in your neighborhood.
Speaker 1: You wouldn't know, like they just they blend in. I
Speaker 1: guess is like, yeah, anybody could be into this, sure,
Speaker 1: but they wouldn't be like these people probably because they
Speaker 1: they misrepresented the whole community. But you know that you're
Speaker 1: probably just like a like a normal woman in your
Speaker 1: mid twenties who likes to get spanked, and you're okay,
Speaker 1: just claiming that for yourself, right right, right, Well doesn't
Speaker 1: even have Is there anything else that we haven't hit
Speaker 1: on yet? I think that's all I had. That's all
Speaker 1: I wanted to touch on. That's all my points. We
Speaker 1: got into all of it. I feel like, yeah, we
Speaker 1: really once again and as an episode the length of
Speaker 1: the movie as all of ours. Um, well, does this
Speaker 1: movie pass the Bechdel test? Oh? I forgot to check.
Speaker 1: I think it does. Between her and her mother, although
Speaker 1: her mother isn't specifically given a first name, I think
Speaker 1: her mother is a present enough character in this story
Speaker 1: that I would count that. I wasn't sure about that
Speaker 1: because I was like, technically, is the scene about the
Speaker 1: abusive dad? But then I guess they don't really say
Speaker 1: anything really. There's a couple of scenes where like they're
Speaker 1: in the car together and her mom says something like,
Speaker 1: I'm so proud of you for like putting yourself out
Speaker 1: in the world and going out and getting a job
Speaker 1: and stuff like that. So there's a there's a couple
Speaker 1: of scenes like that. She also Lee also talks to
Speaker 1: the paralegal woman who I believe is not named. We
Speaker 1: never learned her name, but she says, what even is
Speaker 1: a paralegal? And then the paralegal says and then leaves.
Speaker 1: Also the paralegal here's her masturbating in the bathroom later. Yes, yep.
Speaker 1: The paralegal is used to even to like disempower Lee
Speaker 1: even more or like not the character, but the fact
Speaker 1: that he's like, Oh, I hire someone to actually do
Speaker 1: the work I need, and then I have like the
Speaker 1: person that I'm emotionally abusing on my parents. Yeah, just
Speaker 1: so he doesn't do anywhere. Also a quick shout at
Speaker 1: Lee's mom is played by Lesliean Warren a k a.
Speaker 1: Miss Scarlett and Clue. So, oh, she's kind of she's
Speaker 1: she's blond in this movie, so it's hard to write.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't have made that that connection. But you know,
Speaker 1: she's got range. She's got range true well as far
Speaker 1: as our nipple. Our nipple scale, in which we examine
Speaker 1: how the movie fares looking at it through an intersectional
Speaker 1: feminist lens. Again, the movie shows abuse and assault, but
Speaker 1: it does not frame what happens in the movie as
Speaker 1: abuse or assault. Instead, it conflates it with what b
Speaker 1: D s M is, and the movie fails to acknowledge
Speaker 1: all the important things about a healthy b D s
Speaker 1: M relationship, like consent, communication, safety, establishing boundaries, establishing trust
Speaker 1: after care. She would have learned this in the book
Speaker 1: on tape, right, yeah, and then she would have looked
Speaker 1: back and been like, oh, oh my gosh, there wasn't
Speaker 1: any of that. I this was actually very harmful. I
Speaker 1: should run away and not ever talk to This movie
Speaker 1: is just like her listening to book and on tape
Speaker 1: and being like, oh, oh my gosh, this guy has
Speaker 1: horrible dynamics, just horrible. Wow. She meets a nice guy
Speaker 1: on Craigslist and then they're happy. Yeah, right, and then
Speaker 1: and then she can go and enter into a respectful
Speaker 1: and mutually consensual b D s M relationship if that's
Speaker 1: what she's into. But the movie really does. I think
Speaker 1: it does a huge disservice to b D s M
Speaker 1: and it's community. I think that even though at least
Speaker 1: perhaps not so much any more now that we is
Speaker 1: a just like our cultural climate of having a better
Speaker 1: understanding of consent. Even in within the past few years
Speaker 1: that has lifted, and I would be curious to know
Speaker 1: how people who would originally defended this movie if they
Speaker 1: would feel still feel the same way about it. Um.
Speaker 1: But in any case, I think that because uh, I
Speaker 1: just I think this movie does a huge disservice to
Speaker 1: B D s M relationships because of the of all
Speaker 1: the stuff it completely overlooks. There is very easily a
Speaker 1: way in which you can show an empowered female character
Speaker 1: with agency who is a sub in a dom sub relationship,
Speaker 1: because if you understand anything about dom sub relationships, you
Speaker 1: know that it's actually the sub who holds much of
Speaker 1: the power in the relationship because it's the sub who
Speaker 1: sets all the boundaries and parameters. It's the subs needs
Speaker 1: and wants and curiosities that are being fulfilled by the dom.
Speaker 1: But that doesn't get explored really at all in the
Speaker 1: movie because we never see Mr Gray listening to what
Speaker 1: Lee wants or needs. We don't see really any communication
Speaker 1: between them at all except him being verbally and emotionally
Speaker 1: abusive toward her. For sure, I think that their relationship
Speaker 1: makes no sense, so they don't know anything about each
Speaker 1: other it's just the whole thing is very, very ichy
Speaker 1: to me. I'm going to give it one nipple just
Speaker 1: for the fact that it does attempt to normalize B
Speaker 1: D s M culture. But again again, like I don't
Speaker 1: it doesn't even do better than then fifty Shades of Great.
Speaker 1: At least fifty Shades of Gray talks about consent, even
Speaker 1: if it is horribly written. This did make me want
Speaker 1: to try to watch fifty Shades of Gray again, and
Speaker 1: I just really wanted to. Quickly, I googled the cursed phrase,
Speaker 1: whereas fifty Shades of Gray streaming, and I found this
Speaker 1: incredible click bait piece that someone had really put artistry
Speaker 1: into because it said it was basically all it needed
Speaker 1: to say was fifty Shades of Great is not currently
Speaker 1: streaming in the US, but it was somehow fourteen paragraphs
Speaker 1: long because I'm sure that like I've had those jobs,
Speaker 1: like you're kind of being paid by the word, and
Speaker 1: so she really just like made or I don't know
Speaker 1: what with the gent, but like they just made a
Speaker 1: meal of it, and so they said, like yours in
Speaker 1: the UK may be able to watch the first installment
Speaker 1: of this titilating saga on Netflix. However, if you live
Speaker 1: in the US of A, you may need to go
Speaker 1: somewhere else to find your SNM. And then it said
Speaker 1: in parentheses streaming and movies like that the news and
Speaker 1: you know everyone's got there there and in parentheses streaming
Speaker 1: in movies. I was like, Ah, Pulitzer, incredible. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: just I guess I just long for the movie and
Speaker 1: I'm sure it's out there. So listeners, if you have
Speaker 1: any suggestions on movies that tackle b D s um
Speaker 1: that are actually responsible and not centered around abuse and assault,
Speaker 1: let us know. But it's it's not here with secretary.
Speaker 1: So yeah, one nipple, um, and I guess I'll give
Speaker 1: it to I'll give it to her mom, who I
Speaker 1: feel I was robbed by the story. Um, I'll arbitrarily
Speaker 1: give it one and a half. I don't really know why.
Speaker 1: I appreciate that. I appreciate that in its time, this
Speaker 1: movie was the only of its kind at least uh
Speaker 1: that was semi ish mainstream indie Darling like I, I
Speaker 1: do appreciate that element of its history. I am glad
Speaker 1: that you know there was at least a somewhat honest attempt,
Speaker 1: even though it is so messy like the thing that
Speaker 1: is most frustrating to me, and also it is I mean,
Speaker 1: we haven't even it's like the whitest movie of all time.
Speaker 1: I don't know that we ever. Yeah, that wasn't even
Speaker 1: worth bringing up to me. I was just like, this
Speaker 1: is just not a movie that black people even want
Speaker 1: to be involved with. I think I even I feel
Speaker 1: like there may have been a background character and they
Speaker 1: probably were like I'm gonna opt out. No, thank you, guys,
Speaker 1: got just it's good. This is all you. This is
Speaker 1: all But it's like even on top of that, I
Speaker 1: feel like in Lee's life and in in her orbit,
Speaker 1: there were so many opportunities for her to like speak
Speaker 1: to and like advance her own story of maturity. If
Speaker 1: she had just been comfortable talking to women that were
Speaker 1: already around her instead of like putting all her eggs
Speaker 1: in the James Spader basket where they're like, it could
Speaker 1: be a totally different movie if she talks to Tricia
Speaker 1: and like seeks out Tricia's guidance or advice, which apparently
Speaker 1: she was very willing to give the whole movie, which
Speaker 1: we didn't know. Um, there's this whole, there's this whole
Speaker 1: like catalog of resources and people that she could track
Speaker 1: down and talk to, which I think would have been
Speaker 1: kind of more interesting to me. Is like if she
Speaker 1: realizes at the midpoint, like, oh, this is not good,
Speaker 1: this is not what I thought it was. How do
Speaker 1: I fix this? And then she can like find other
Speaker 1: people who have had this experience and figure out how
Speaker 1: to get ship on track or like get some sort
Speaker 1: of revenge, And then like, there's so many ways I
Speaker 1: can see it going if she or if she had
Speaker 1: just been you know, able to talk with her mom
Speaker 1: or her sister and they hadn't been painted as like
Speaker 1: these like don't be this person. This person is bad
Speaker 1: and submissive in the wrong way, like you're saying, Caitlin.
Speaker 1: So it feels like there's a lot of missed opportunities.
Speaker 1: The relationship is like just generally really bad. It's not
Speaker 1: fair to the b D s M community. If fifty
Speaker 1: Shades of Gray is doing better, that's just really bleak.
Speaker 1: But I appreciate its place in history, and I'm glad
Speaker 1: that movies have continued to do better. I hope that
Speaker 1: they I mean, I hope that you know, don't stop
Speaker 1: at fifty shades please, uh, probably give it a nipple
Speaker 1: and a half, which might be too much, but I'll
Speaker 1: give one to Maggie Gillenhall and then I will give
Speaker 1: the other half to Tricia. Okay, but in the first
Speaker 1: scene we see her, and not the second when she's
Speaker 1: trampling the coach, I found her confusing in the second scene. Yeah, actually,
Speaker 1: what about you? Uh, you know what I'm gonna I'm
Speaker 1: gonna give it to what nipples I am because it's
Speaker 1: the reason why I like being spanked, and I like
Speaker 1: when people tell me what to eat for dinner. So
Speaker 1: I owe it that. That's probably the only two good
Speaker 1: things that came out of this movie in history. Um.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I do think it tries to get people
Speaker 1: comfortable with an idea they hadn't been comfortable with. And
Speaker 1: I do think that it came at this time when
Speaker 1: every mainstream kind of woman in a in a movie
Speaker 1: was so quirky and like carefree and like romantic and sweet,
Speaker 1: and it crushed that idea, which I really appreciate. So
Speaker 1: I'm gonna give it to and you know what, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna give them both to Peter. Peter, he just deserves it.
Speaker 1: I hope. Peter went on to like really find someone
Speaker 1: who could give him the love he deserved. Yeah, just
Speaker 1: in super vanilla, just like the most vanilla missionary person,
Speaker 1: just like maybe the most boring life of all time,
Speaker 1: and loved every second of it. Yeah. I'd rather watch
Speaker 1: that movie than watch any like moment of like James
Speaker 1: Spader and Lee trying to like have a life together. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're like, oh god, it just makes me depressed to
Speaker 1: think about. Yeah. Oh well, Peter always asks for consent
Speaker 1: and they're like, what a loser. You're like, no, but
Speaker 1: Peter's ahead of his time. Oh stupid Peter. He's like
Speaker 1: asking if it's okay to get a condom and like
Speaker 1: spank you first, Like, oh man, Peter's only one in
Speaker 1: the twenty one century. They don't even know it. I did.
Speaker 1: I did laugh at the joke after Peter and Lee
Speaker 1: have had sex and he's like I didn't hurt you,
Speaker 1: did I? And she's like no, she's very upset, did
Speaker 1: not hurt her? But you don't even Ashuley, thank you
Speaker 1: so much for being here. This is so much fun.
Speaker 1: This is my favorite movie to talk about. It was
Speaker 1: everything I wanted it to be. Hell, yeah, um, where
Speaker 1: can people follow your stuff? What would you like, Yeah,
Speaker 1: just at the Ashley Ray on Twitter, Instagram everything. I
Speaker 1: write reviews for The ninety Day Fiance and I may
Speaker 1: destroy you on the A B Club and Vulture go
Speaker 1: check those out. Just follow me on Twitter. That's where
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Speaker 1: public dot com, slash the pectel Cast and us where
Speaker 1: you can get all your merchandizing needs. I think we
Speaker 1: have masks now, there are masks, masks and everything, so
Speaker 1: go over there and get one of those. Otherwise, Miss Halloway,
Speaker 1: please step into my office. What are you are you
Speaker 1: calling me? Said? Spick up? Miss Halloway, please step into
Speaker 1: my office. Okay, bye,