Speaker 1: On the Bechdel Cast, the questions asked if movies have
Speaker 1: women and them, are all their discussions just boyfriends and
Speaker 1: husbands or do they have individualism? It's the patriarchy, zeph
Speaker 1: and best start changing it with the Bechdel Cast.
Speaker 2: I killed her, I killed the teen dream. Deal with it, Jamie.
Speaker 3: Oh. I was thinking that whole time. Wouldn't it be
Speaker 3: awesome if that was in a build a bear?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 3: That's where I wanted it, because did you ever have
Speaker 3: like I remember I had like a friend at school
Speaker 3: who it was like a teenager's dating thing, and the
Speaker 3: guy gave the girl a build a bear that was like,
Speaker 3: I love you, Megan.
Speaker 2: I never had one as a youth, but when I
Speaker 2: had the whole sludge debacle and I got my gall
Speaker 2: bladder surgery, my friend Nikki gave me a build a
Speaker 2: bear and when you like, press its little paw, she
Speaker 2: had it make me ups So it's a teddy bear
Speaker 2: that he's like.
Speaker 3: Now you used to be able to. I mean it
Speaker 3: sounded horrible, but you could put your own voice in it,
Speaker 3: much like the uh Chekhov's card that we have yes
Speaker 3: in Job Breaker. That's my one note for Job Breaker
Speaker 3: the rest is perfect, The rest is flawless. It should
Speaker 3: have been a Build a Bear. Agree, Yeah, we should
Speaker 3: start putting more murder confessions in Build a Bears. I'm
Speaker 3: gonna smile that away.
Speaker 2: Honestly, I think we should record the Bechdel Cast on
Speaker 2: Build a Bears.
Speaker 3: And just distribute it that way. We're getting back into
Speaker 3: tangible media because the digital revolution's gone too far.
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, if you want to hear any more
Speaker 2: episodes of the Bechdel Cast, you have to. I don't know,
Speaker 2: we'll send them to you. We'll send you a bear.
Speaker 3: It would get really expensive, really fast. Yeah, but one
Speaker 3: of us will confess to a murder in every episode,
Speaker 3: and that's the beel Cast guarantee. Whoa yeah, okay, yeah.
Speaker 3: I think my favorite lene in this movie is you
Speaker 3: know how girlfriends kidnap their girlfriends on their birthday? Well,
Speaker 3: we did that.
Speaker 2: You're like, yeah, time old tradition that we all know
Speaker 2: and love.
Speaker 3: Oh it's the best, I guess. Welcome to the Bechtel Cast.
Speaker 3: I derailed your very funny intro immediately.
Speaker 2: No, I loved it. Well, I'm Jamie Lott, I'm Caitlin Dorante,
Speaker 2: and this is the Bechtel Cast, our show where we
Speaker 2: examine movies through an intersectional feminist lens, using the Bechdel
Speaker 2: Test simply as a jumping off point. And you know,
Speaker 2: we have limited time today. If you want to know
Speaker 2: what the Bechdel test is, listen to another episode, look
Speaker 2: it up. I feel like we just have to get
Speaker 2: right into it today, truly.
Speaker 3: I mean spoiler alert. Don't worry about the Bechdel Test
Speaker 3: for this movie. There are women and people of marginalized
Speaker 3: genders talking to each other the entire movie and it's
Speaker 3: all horrible. So it has a lot of fun passes
Speaker 3: in this movie.
Speaker 2: Very much so. Oh the movie we're talking about today
Speaker 2: is Jawbreaker nineteen ninety nine. Call classic, long time request.
Speaker 2: It's like a request we've been getting since the beginning
Speaker 2: of the show.
Speaker 1: Hmm.
Speaker 2: And our guest today, returning guest. You know Crystal as
Speaker 2: a drag artist who's known for RuPaul's Drag Race UK
Speaker 2: Season one Ever heard of it, and more recently for
Speaker 2: successfully suing right wing troll Lawrence Fox.
Speaker 4: It's Crystal, Hi, welcome back, thank you. I'm so happy
Speaker 4: to be back.
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, you've gone through a legal saga since
Speaker 3: you last appeared on the show.
Speaker 4: Congratulations, I sure have putten the in litigious, as they say,
Speaker 4: love for that.
Speaker 2: That was great. So you've brought us Jawbreaker. What is
Speaker 2: your history and relationship with the movie.
Speaker 4: I've been trying to remember that all week, but I
Speaker 4: definitely I think I saw the movie when I was
Speaker 4: around twenty, but like I would have seen it posts
Speaker 4: mean Girls as kind of like one of those movies
Speaker 4: that you get shown when you come out. It's like
Speaker 4: someone sits down AND's like, you're gonna need to watch this,
Speaker 4: and heathers and you're gonna need to watch But I'm
Speaker 4: a cheerleader and we're gonna watch the first season of
Speaker 4: ab fab and then you'll be complete as a homosexual.
Speaker 3: Man's part of the starter kit that's distributed.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it gets handed out along with a bottle of
Speaker 4: poppers and Madonna's greatest sts. I don't know. So that
Speaker 4: was kind of when I saw it, and then I've
Speaker 4: watched it probably a few times in the intervening period,
Speaker 4: but it's been a long time since I watched it again.
Speaker 4: And I did that yesterday, which was interesting. Basically, I
Speaker 4: suggested this movie just because I'm desperate to hear what
Speaker 4: you both think about it. I kind of need I
Speaker 4: needed some outside I need some outsided butts.
Speaker 2: Honestly, I was relying on you to be like, what
Speaker 2: are you.
Speaker 4: Think about this?
Speaker 2: Because I don't know what to make of it exactly.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we get to the bottom of it today.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, Jamie, what is your relationship with the movie?
Speaker 3: Weirdly had not seen it. I don't know why it
Speaker 3: had been missing me for so many years. I love
Speaker 3: this genre of movie. I love a violent click. I
Speaker 3: love it. Yeah, I'd never seen it and it was
Speaker 3: I mean, it's tricky. I like it. I like it.
Speaker 3: I think it is very funny. We'll talk about because
Speaker 3: there's been like two oral histories written about Jawbreaker in
Speaker 3: the same three year span. Who can say why, But
Speaker 3: I do think it's very funny that the director of
Speaker 3: this movie is very defensive about being like, it's not Heathers,
Speaker 3: and You're like, Darren, but not.
Speaker 2: Only that, it's like, it's not Heathers, But what's this
Speaker 2: Mean Girls all about? It's so derivative of my.
Speaker 3: I know, he's like, Mean Girls is ripping me off.
Speaker 3: I was like, Darren, every thing I read from the director,
Speaker 3: he kind of he was cracking me up because I
Speaker 3: was just like, sir, come on. But but the movie itself,
Speaker 3: I mean I thought it was like it's very dark.
Speaker 3: I thought it was like super funny at times and
Speaker 3: then other there's I don't know. For a lot of
Speaker 3: this movie I was thinking about, like, wow, I really
Speaker 3: have to rewatch Heathers. But I feel like Job Breaker
Speaker 3: does mostly does a thing that I appreciate where it's
Speaker 3: like women are running the show the whole time. There
Speaker 3: is one plot boyfriend, who I think we could have
Speaker 3: done without. But outside of Zach, I do like that
Speaker 3: this is a world mostly devoid of men at all
Speaker 3: in terms of like power, influence, And I mean, you
Speaker 3: can't hate too hard on a movie that features detective
Speaker 3: Pam Greer doing some like career worst detective work, doing
Speaker 3: just a really bad job. Pam Gregor's doing great, yeah,
Speaker 3: but her character is useless.
Speaker 4: Pam Grier's hair, especially.
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, the bangs.
Speaker 4: Doing the most thes.
Speaker 2: My head canon is that she is like, the cops
Speaker 2: are fucked a cab. I'm deliberately doing it.
Speaker 3: You're really gonna not solve this murder.
Speaker 4: She actually just knew what was coming from Marilyn Manson
Speaker 4: and just wanted to lock him up.
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, that plot points specifically ages stunningly well.
Speaker 4: You're like, leave him there, leave him, no need to
Speaker 4: revisit that.
Speaker 3: I honestly didn't even recognize. It wasn't until I was
Speaker 3: like reading through the fun facts about this because I remember, like,
Speaker 3: I don't know, he's prominently featured in the opening credits
Speaker 3: and you're like, oh, and then at the end, I
Speaker 3: was like, I don't think I know what he looks.
Speaker 2: Like without his like makeup, right, because he's not in
Speaker 2: his makeup in the movie. You're just like, that is
Speaker 2: I guess that is Marilyn Manson, but a bummer I
Speaker 2: devember to tad to see him. Anyways, I hadn't seen it.
Speaker 2: I have mixed feelings about it, but like not feelings
Speaker 2: that are so negative that I mean, it looks amazing.
Speaker 2: You have the same costume designer as like Rome and
Speaker 2: Michelle and clueless, like, there's a lot to love about it,
Speaker 2: but I'm excited to get into it.
Speaker 3: Caitlin, had you seen this movie before?
Speaker 2: Okay, I don't know. I thought I had seen it
Speaker 2: the whole way through. I had a friend my freshman
Speaker 2: year of college. Shout out Tina, who exposed me to
Speaker 2: some of my still favorite movies. She showed me Josie
Speaker 2: and the Pussycats, she showed me American Psycho a few others.
Speaker 2: But she had this very like eclectic taste in movies.
Speaker 2: And some of it was like, you know, fun mainstream
Speaker 2: bops that I just hadn't seen. Some of it where
Speaker 2: were your things like Jawbreaker, which have a cult following.
Speaker 2: Some were like movies that most people have never heard of,
Speaker 2: such as Happiness of the Categories. Like o any Bechdel
Speaker 2: heads out there are familiar with the Happiness of the Categories,
Speaker 2: please let me know. Anyway, all this to say that
Speaker 2: she showed me Jawbreaker, or at least I thought we
Speaker 2: watched it all the way through together, because I have
Speaker 2: the image of the trunk popping and Liz in the
Speaker 2: trunk dead with like the bulge of the jaw Breaker
Speaker 2: in her throat.
Speaker 3: Like that image whoever was doing the practical effects in
Speaker 3: this movie ooh, like truly one of the most bone
Speaker 3: chilling corpses.
Speaker 2: Yes, And that image was like seered into my brain
Speaker 2: and my memory for all times. So I was like,
Speaker 2: of course I've seen this movie. I remember that very well,
Speaker 2: but that happens in the first five minutes, and I
Speaker 2: didn't remember any of the rest of the movie. So
Speaker 2: I don't know if we like started watching it and
Speaker 2: then we just started like talking over it and not
Speaker 2: really paying attention. I don't know if I did sit
Speaker 2: through it and just didn't remember anything except for that
Speaker 2: one image.
Speaker 3: I don't really know.
Speaker 4: I feel like you'd remember the last shot as well,
Speaker 4: if you'd seen.
Speaker 2: It all right, you would think, yeah.
Speaker 4: Those are the two that like are the most memorable,
Speaker 4: the top and tail for sure. The middle of what
Speaker 4: happens Who's I'm still not sure, YadA YadA.
Speaker 3: Zach.
Speaker 2: I will say that the scene that's like a flashback
Speaker 2: when like Rose McGowan is having sex with Marilyn Manson
Speaker 2: and the dead bodies under the bed, I was like, well,
Speaker 2: I kind of remember that too, So maybe I just
Speaker 2: I simply don't know how much of this movie I've seen.
Speaker 2: All this to say, I've had some exposure to it before,
Speaker 2: but not much, and watching it this time for the
Speaker 2: podcast was basically like I was watching it for the
Speaker 2: first time. So I'm excited to talk about it again.
Speaker 2: I really don't know quite what to make of it,
Speaker 2: both from a like personal taste point of view and
Speaker 2: a like talking about it for the podcast point of view.
Speaker 2: But again, we're gonna crack the case.
Speaker 3: We're gonna get to the bottom of it. I can
Speaker 3: just feel it.
Speaker 4: We're going to get to the center of it some much.
Speaker 2: Oh the job. I wanted to go get some like
Speaker 2: gobstoppers to be you know, rattling around in my mouth
Speaker 2: during this time.
Speaker 3: But I've never understood the appeal of those candies. I'm
Speaker 3: a soft candy girl all the way. It's candy corn season.
Speaker 2: We do like candy corn. Sorry to say that with
Speaker 2: so much judgment, but it is the.
Speaker 3: So bitchy the way you said that.
Speaker 2: I am the Rose McGowan of this episode.
Speaker 3: Yeah, grow up, bitch. There is like a little baby
Speaker 3: I do. I love the pumpkins. I just bought the
Speaker 3: amount of like bad for you things I've had before
Speaker 3: nine thirty in the morning. I'm finishing a root beer. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I'm going to stop talking about personal taste at this time.
Speaker 3: I'm realizing.
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, sorry, sorry to be so mean about it,
Speaker 2: but candy corn is objectively the worst thing that was
Speaker 2: ever invented.
Speaker 3: You're out of your mind. That is a really sick thing.
Speaker 4: That I'm not waiting into this one. You two are on.
Speaker 3: Fair well. I guess we got to talk about Jawbreaker.
Speaker 2: Yeah, let's take a quick break and then we'll come
Speaker 2: back for the recap.
Speaker 3: And we're back, okay.
Speaker 2: Before the recap, I will place a content warning for
Speaker 2: rape and specifically false rape accusations that will come up
Speaker 2: in the recap as well as our discussion. So we
Speaker 2: open on voiceover narration from a teen girl talking about
Speaker 2: this group of the fore most popular girls at her
Speaker 2: high school. They are Marcy played by Julie Ben's played
Speaker 2: by Rebecca Gayheart, Courtney played by Rose McGowan, who is
Speaker 2: the queen Bee and the meanest one of the group
Speaker 2: and the nicest one, the most like quote unquote perfect
Speaker 2: one is Liz Perr played by Charlotte Ayana. Now the narrator,
Speaker 2: who is a character who we will soon meet named
Speaker 2: Fern Mayo played by Judy Greer. Great character name, I think.
Speaker 3: Oh my god, Formeo great early Judy Greer role great.
Speaker 2: But Fern Mao seems to be infatuated and obsessed with
Speaker 2: Liz purr saying how she dreams of what it would
Speaker 2: be like to be Liz because, unlike these four girls,
Speaker 2: Fern is not popular. She goes unnoticed by her peers.
Speaker 2: She's you know, nerdy. So then on Liz's seventeenth birthday,
Speaker 2: she's kidnapped from her bed a huge jawbreaker, the titular
Speaker 2: jawbreaker in fact, kind of.
Speaker 3: A character in the story when you think about it.
Speaker 2: Okay, Also, when you think about it, it passes the
Speaker 2: Bechdel test when this jawbreaker is shoved into the mouth
Speaker 2: of one of the.
Speaker 3: Characters, silencing women. Interesting.
Speaker 2: I think it's like intellectual discourse to be sucking on
Speaker 2: a job breaker.
Speaker 3: So that's my take on the matter, classic non candy
Speaker 3: corn eater take. Okay, So a jawbreaker is shoved into
Speaker 3: the mouth of Liz and covered with duct tape, and
Speaker 3: then she's thrown into the trunk of a car, and
Speaker 3: then we get a reveal that the three kidnappers are
Speaker 3: actually just her three best friends, Marcy, Julie, and Courtney,
Speaker 3: who are playing a little like surprise birthday prank on Liz.
Speaker 4: And this the thing you both did right like this
Speaker 4: is all teen girls have kidnapped their friends.
Speaker 2: Yeah, all teen girls.
Speaker 4: In more and more elaborate ways every year.
Speaker 2: Right, right, right, and more dangerous. I will say that
Speaker 2: one year and I don't remember. This would have been
Speaker 2: I think my sixteenth or seventeenth birthday. My friends they
Speaker 2: didn't kidnap me. I knew they were coming, but they
Speaker 2: did then linefold me and drive me to I forget
Speaker 2: which mall but a mall a few tons over, and
Speaker 2: then we went to I want to say Spencer's Gifts
Speaker 2: because I had never been to Spencer's Gifts before.
Speaker 3: Wow, a little naughty, Caitlin. I know I've went into
Speaker 3: a Spencer. There's a Spencer's Gifts on the third floor
Speaker 3: of the Glendale Galleria. You have to really like navigate
Speaker 3: carefully to find it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know about this.
Speaker 4: I've been to the Glendale GALLERYA and I've Spencer's Gifts.
Speaker 4: A sex shop.
Speaker 3: No, it's more it's like the idea of a sex shot.
Speaker 4: Right. They sell draws that are shaped like penises.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's more like it's like a jokey shop.
Speaker 4: For like dude brosh. Yeah, it's about a.
Speaker 3: Twelve year old.
Speaker 4: Well, I don't know.
Speaker 3: There's a lot of stuff for they've really diversified their
Speaker 3: perverted things. And I could say having been there recently. Anyways, Yeah, wait,
Speaker 3: so you were brought blindfolded to a Spencer's kid.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then I took off the blindfold and I
Speaker 2: was like, oh, this is cool. I actually probably really
Speaker 2: enjoyed it at the time.
Speaker 3: As a whatever sixteen year old, I used to love
Speaker 3: getting in the trunk of my friend's cars and scaring them.
Speaker 2: Okay, I've never done that.
Speaker 3: Like after dance rehearsal, classic hilarious joke. I would Yet
Speaker 3: I was the Captain Bragg woman and there was this
Speaker 3: girl who's a year younger, and I would just get
Speaker 3: in the trunk of her car because you don't leave
Speaker 3: her car unlocked. Again in the trunk of her car,
Speaker 3: it surprise her when she put her stuff away.
Speaker 4: Wow, I feel like that could have gone really badly
Speaker 4: for you.
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, but it's but I want everyone to know
Speaker 3: that I'm willing to put my body on the line
Speaker 3: for a bit.
Speaker 4: Uh huh.
Speaker 2: I mean I've seen it before. I'll see it again,
Speaker 2: I'm sure.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean if I make it, we'll see. Anyways,
Speaker 3: they do kill their friend, and this is I think
Speaker 3: that's like one of the best jokes of the entire
Speaker 3: movie that they're like, of course everybody does this, this
Speaker 3: is what girls do.
Speaker 2: It is very funny, right, So what happens They throw
Speaker 2: in the trunk with no nefarious intentions or anything, but
Speaker 2: when they open the trunk, they discover that Liz is dead.
Speaker 2: Apparently she had swallowed and choked on the jawbreaker, which
Speaker 2: was Courtney's idea to shove into Liz's mouth. So Courtney
Speaker 2: is the most culpable in Liz's death. They start panicking.
Speaker 2: They try to figure out what to do. Julie wants
Speaker 2: to go to the police and tell them about this incident,
Speaker 2: which is effectively an accident. You know, they didn't mean
Speaker 2: for her to die, but Courtney knows it's her fault
Speaker 2: and she doesn't want to get in trouble, so she
Speaker 2: coerces her friends into just going along with this plan
Speaker 2: to keep it a secret, to go to school and
Speaker 2: pretend like everything is normal. Courtney suggests that to get
Speaker 2: them off the hook, they put Liz back in her
Speaker 2: bed and make it seem like she was raped and
Speaker 2: gagged with a jawbreaker and that's how she died. Unhinged again.
Speaker 2: Julie tries to object, but Courtney is like, no, we're
Speaker 2: doing this.
Speaker 3: It is so wild to me. Like one of the
Speaker 3: more bizarre elements of the job Breaker world that I
Speaker 3: feel like Heathers and mean girls does and this doesn't,
Speaker 3: is like give you a sense of like the other
Speaker 3: people in this world. You meet a couple of characters
Speaker 3: outside of the main characters, but it's like with Courtney especially,
Speaker 3: you're like, where did this girl come from? Like I
Speaker 3: feel like part of the reason that the Heathers and
Speaker 3: Regina George are so like they're horrible, but you at
Speaker 3: least know that they have like some like core wound.
Speaker 3: And you meet Regina George's mom, You're like, oh, of
Speaker 3: course she's fucked up like this environment. But Corney just
Speaker 3: like exists in this evil void. It's weird, yeah.
Speaker 4: But everything about it is very dreamlike, like the fact
Speaker 4: that Fern is somehow the captain of the cheerleading.
Speaker 3: Squad, but when did that happen?
Speaker 2: How and when.
Speaker 4: When did that happen? And who was involved in that?
Speaker 4: And like it all exists in this kind of like
Speaker 4: the way a dream almost works, where you're like, I'm
Speaker 4: popular now so now these things have happened to me,
Speaker 4: but we didn't have to go from A to B.
Speaker 4: We just magically transported ourselves there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there are many scenes that feel like they should
Speaker 2: have taken place on screen that just happened off screen,
Speaker 2: such as like Julie deciding not to be their friends anymore,
Speaker 2: which is about to happen, right. You think you would
Speaker 2: have like seen a confrontation where Julie's like, I'm not
Speaker 2: going to be a part of this, but that just
Speaker 2: suddenly she's like not walking with the popular girls anymore.
Speaker 3: It's just visually communicated to us by the fact that
Speaker 3: she starts wearing Denham, and that's like how we understand
Speaker 3: that she's no longer friends with them?
Speaker 4: Yes, exactly is your friend wearing Denham? Check on them?
Speaker 3: Right? They might have accidentally killed someone and don't know
Speaker 3: what to do.
Speaker 2: Okay, So they go to school, and at school, a
Speaker 2: teacher named Miss Sherwood played by Carol Kane asks Courtney
Speaker 2: to pick up Liz's assignments at the end of the day,
Speaker 2: knowing that Liz isn't in school, though she doesn't know why,
Speaker 2: of course, but Courtney is late in picking up the assignments,
Speaker 2: but the narrator, Fern Mayo, happens to be right there,
Speaker 2: so Miss Sherwood asks Fern to take the assignments to
Speaker 2: Liz's home. The other girls find out about this, so
Speaker 2: they race to Lizz's house before Fern can get there
Speaker 2: to set this like a Lie Jude rape scene up.
Speaker 2: It's very chaotic. They're kind of freaking out.
Speaker 3: Sorry this is I was just thinking about Carol Caine.
Speaker 3: I was like, where have we seen Carol Caine play
Speaker 3: a kooky teacher before? And the answer is Confessions of
Speaker 3: a teenage drama Queen. Oh my gosh, anyone else. I
Speaker 3: was like, I've seen her play this exact character and
Speaker 3: it's a couple of.
Speaker 2: Years later in a Lindsay Lowhand role that is not
Speaker 2: Mean Girls.
Speaker 3: But did come out in two thousand and four. Makes
Speaker 3: you think the Matrix.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yes, okay. So anyway, they're setting up this scene.
Speaker 2: It's very chaotic. Julie finds this birthday card with a
Speaker 2: recording of Liz's voice that's saying, what are you doing
Speaker 2: to me? And then Fern comes into the house and
Speaker 2: overhears Courtney saying that she killed Liz. Then Fern sees
Speaker 2: Liz's dead body.
Speaker 3: Which is looking rough so bruised.
Speaker 2: I don't know how it got bruised after her death.
Speaker 3: I hadn't a jobbreaker was like full of battery, acid
Speaker 3: or something.
Speaker 2: Yes, So Courtney coerces Fern into not telling, saying that
Speaker 2: if she doesn't rat her out, they'll turn her into
Speaker 2: one of the pretty and popular girls just like them,
Speaker 2: which is what Fern has always dreamed of. So they
Speaker 2: give Fern a makeover. They give her a new name, Violette,
Speaker 2: and everyone thinks she's a new student. No one realizes
Speaker 2: that this is actually Fern who has been transformed. Meanwhile,
Speaker 2: Julie has left the group off screen. She wants nothing
Speaker 2: to do with this.
Speaker 3: She bought a jacket at the gap and she's just finished.
Speaker 2: Uh huh uh huh.
Speaker 3: And for some reason, another one of the more dream
Speaker 3: logic key elements of this movie is like, at some point,
Speaker 3: I really don't understand why Julie doesn't just tell, I.
Speaker 2: Know, like because Courtney threatens her.
Speaker 4: Courtney says they'll all gang together and say it was
Speaker 4: all It was all Julies Yeli, who did it?
Speaker 3: Yes, that's right, which I understand is scary, but I'm
Speaker 3: most like, if Courtney's outed as a murderer, she can't
Speaker 3: do shit like anyways.
Speaker 2: But yeah, I guess that's why Julie stays quiet for
Speaker 2: a while. Meanwhile, Courtney teaches Fern slash Violette how to
Speaker 2: be cool and popular like them, and violet is loving it.
Speaker 2: Then Liz's parents come home from whatever trip they were on,
Speaker 2: discover their daughter's body and call the police. Enter Detective
Speaker 2: Pam Greer. So we've got several Greers. We've got Judy Greer,
Speaker 2: We've got Pam Greer, David Allen Greer, though, where is he?
Speaker 3: Nowhere to be seen? Nowhere to be seen? And I'm
Speaker 3: glad you brought that up.
Speaker 2: Also, my other big criticism of the movie that it
Speaker 2: lacks David Allen Greer.
Speaker 3: Come on, Darren, it's the rule of threes exactly.
Speaker 4: I'm googling David Allen Green.
Speaker 2: Oh you might know him from Jumanji.
Speaker 4: Okay, you might know him.
Speaker 2: He had a show, his own show for a while
Speaker 2: that I think was called DAG which are his initials,
Speaker 2: and then he's in other stuff that I don't remember.
Speaker 3: Anyway.
Speaker 4: Well, I'm with you so much.
Speaker 2: Okay, So Julie starts hanging out with this guy named Zach.
Speaker 2: She also tries to connect with Fern slash Violette, presumably
Speaker 2: to kind of help her get out from under Courtney's clutches.
Speaker 2: It seems like they used to be pretty good friends
Speaker 2: in elementary school, but again, Courtney's tyranny is not letting
Speaker 2: that happen. Then there's a scene where Courtney is fooling
Speaker 2: around with her jock boyfriend whose name is Dane, I think,
Speaker 2: and then makes him fulate a popsicle, And that's that scene.
Speaker 3: Then I guess we'll circle back to that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess. Then Detective Pam Grier starts questioning Courtney, Marcy,
Speaker 2: and Julie, but they deny everything. Meanwhile, people are noticing
Speaker 2: and wanting to befriend Violette, and still no one realizes
Speaker 2: that she's Fern Mayo who's been transformed. Courtney tells her
Speaker 2: she needs a boyfriend, and she picks someone out for
Speaker 2: violet Zach Tartak, the guy who Julie has been seeing.
Speaker 2: He's a drama kid. So Courtney signs Violette up for
Speaker 2: the school play and she like gets cast in the
Speaker 2: lead role. She's also the lead cheerleader. Now again, we
Speaker 2: don't know quite how these things happen.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think so. I think you're that the dream
Speaker 3: logic is just like, oh, yeah, she just becomes what
Speaker 3: everyone thinks of being popular, and like, don't worry about
Speaker 3: how she's don't worry about the fact that she's twenty
Speaker 3: five years old. It's fine, right.
Speaker 2: Well, Also, this movie's a satire, and you can get
Speaker 2: away with a lot of things when you're doing satire.
Speaker 2: So yeah, anyway, then Courtney goes back to Detective Pam
Speaker 2: Greer and tells her that Liz was actually into some
Speaker 2: very kinky stuff. You'd never know from her sweet and
Speaker 2: innocent demeanor, but she used to go to bars and
Speaker 2: take home random guys and one of them must have
Speaker 2: gotten too rough and that's why she's dead.
Speaker 3: Courtney is so diabolical, just slutshaming from like beyond the grave.
Speaker 2: Right, because as she's saying this to Detective Pam Greer,
Speaker 2: we are seeing a flashback of Courtney doing exactly what
Speaker 2: she's describing Liz to have done. Where Courtney goes into
Speaker 2: a bar, she picks up Marilyn Manson, who was Rose
Speaker 2: McGowan's then boyfriend and She's like, do you want to
Speaker 2: be in the movie, and he's like sure. So Marilyn
Speaker 2: Manson is there and she takes him to Lizz's house
Speaker 2: and has sex with him on Lizz's bed while Lizz's
Speaker 2: dead body is hiding under the bed, or has been
Speaker 2: hidden under the bed. It's not like her dead body
Speaker 2: got up and hid that.
Speaker 3: So like, yeah, I was confused about the timeline of
Speaker 3: that for a while. Did she do that? So she
Speaker 3: did that before Lizz's parents got home? I think so.
Speaker 4: Yeah, seems like there was maybe an extra night. Was
Speaker 4: it the day she died? Maybe she did it that night.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think she went back.
Speaker 3: I was reading in the production about this, like that
Speaker 3: that sex scene in particular, like nearly got the movie
Speaker 3: in NC seventeen ratings. I think that they like maybe
Speaker 3: the editing around it is a little confusing so that
Speaker 3: people could see the movie right.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So it's at this point that Violet starts just
Speaker 2: kind of wiling out with all this newfound popularity and power.
Speaker 2: She gets a guy to give her a red Corvette
Speaker 2: convertible again. She's been cast as the lead in the
Speaker 2: school play and tries to seduce Zach, but it doesn't work,
Speaker 2: and then Zach goes to Julie and is like, who's
Speaker 2: that Violet girl? She's weird, what's up with her? And
Speaker 2: then Julie proceeds to tell him about the whole situation,
Speaker 2: how Courtney killed Liz and Fern Mayo found out about it,
Speaker 2: so Courtney gave Fern all this social status and transformed
Speaker 2: her into Violet so that she wouldn't tell anyone about
Speaker 2: this death, this murder.
Speaker 3: And then out of nowhere, this random guy has become
Speaker 3: the moral compass of the entire movie.
Speaker 2: You're like, this right, and the fact that they give
Speaker 2: him like the big thing. I'll get to it, but like,
Speaker 2: I'm like, that should have been one of the girls.
Speaker 2: Why does he get to do the thing with the
Speaker 2: sound recording anyway? So Zach is like, well, you have
Speaker 2: to tell someone, Julie, so she agrees, and they try
Speaker 2: to find evidence, like the polaroid photo that Courtney snapped
Speaker 2: of Liz when they opened the trunk, but they can't
Speaker 2: find the photo anywhere.
Speaker 4: They look really hard, though, they.
Speaker 5: Don't hard the parking spot, and they're like, wow, Wow,
Speaker 5: I don't know, meanwhow I honestly though, I don't know
Speaker 5: that Pam Greer's character would have done much better.
Speaker 3: I don't. She's like, yeah, some guy, we've got Marilyn
Speaker 3: Manson in custody, and uh yeah, another hard days work.
Speaker 4: Yeah right.
Speaker 2: So what happens next is Julie ends up going to
Speaker 2: Detective Pam Greer anyway and is about to tell her
Speaker 2: what happened, but Pam Greer is like, well, we already
Speaker 2: have Marilyn Manson in custody, so don't worry about it.
Speaker 3: And in retrospect, yeah, keep him there, right, But there's
Speaker 3: also an evil Rose McGowan character on the.
Speaker 2: Loose, right, So Julie realizes that Courtney must have done
Speaker 2: this thing where she went back to Lizu's house and
Speaker 2: framed Marilyn Manson more or less, so it's up to
Speaker 2: her to take Courtney down. Meanwhile, Courtney doesn't like how
Speaker 2: popular and beloved Violette has become, so she decides to
Speaker 2: expose violet by posting all these photos of her when
Speaker 2: she was still Fern Mayo.
Speaker 4: I love that The breaking point for her is Violette
Speaker 4: sitting on the car and like dancing. She's like, that's it,
Speaker 4: this is gone too far. Violet's bobbing.
Speaker 3: It's so funny that like that has everyone again just
Speaker 3: like the idea of hero worship, because you're like, I
Speaker 3: loved it. When Judy Greer comes to school with a
Speaker 3: vanity plate that says bitch and also a T shirt
Speaker 3: that says bitch, I'm like, yeah, yeah, exactly those scenes.
Speaker 3: I'm like, this is the greatest movie ever made. And
Speaker 3: then like, based on the Judy Greer aesthetics alone, it's great.
Speaker 2: For sure.
Speaker 4: Courtney is in the bathroom with Marci and Marcy's like
Speaker 4: she's gone too far, She's out of control, and Courtney's like, no,
Speaker 4: everything's fine, and then literal seconds later she's like, this
Speaker 4: is it. We're over just because we have to kill
Speaker 4: Violet's on the hood of her cars, like you're you
Speaker 4: were right, this is all it's all gone too far.
Speaker 4: I must destroy her.
Speaker 3: The fact that like Violette is basically like Courtney's Frankenstein's monster.
Speaker 3: I guess she's Courtney's monster, and then she decides that
Speaker 3: she has to kill her own monster. That is at least,
Speaker 3: you know, different from Heather's in Mean Girls, where it's
Speaker 3: I guess if we're thinking Mean Girls. This movie also
Speaker 3: was like I got to rewatch mean girls. They like
Speaker 3: Katie is kind of Janice's monster. She's not really Regenis.
Speaker 3: She's kind of like planted in there by the uncool kids, right,
Speaker 3: but this one is just the calls coming from inside
Speaker 3: the click. They're like, you're just the new girl.
Speaker 2: More like clueless. I guess where. Well, Alicia Silverstone is
Speaker 2: like hey, Brittany Murphy, right, but like Alicia Silverstone is
Speaker 2: nice and not mean like Corney's.
Speaker 3: Did you see the weird I think it was like
Speaker 3: a TikTok thing or maybe an Instagram thing where Alisa
Speaker 3: Silverstone was recently like walking around and ate poisonous berries
Speaker 3: like out of someone's yard.
Speaker 6: She was like, it's so funny, kayle, it's funny. She's okay, okay, okay,
Speaker 6: but like I don't she's I don't know where she is,
Speaker 6: but she's just she's like making this like really puckered
Speaker 6: face and she's like, hey, guys, I just ate these berries.
Speaker 3: Off of someone's tree and they tastes weird. Can anyone
Speaker 3: tell me? Am? I sick? Like it was so bizarre, and.
Speaker 4: Then she just went quiet for like twenty four hours,
Speaker 4: and I was like, is she dead? Is she dead?
Speaker 4: From berries.
Speaker 3: Thankfully, the berries didn't get her, and once everyone found
Speaker 3: out they were alive, they're like, why would you just
Speaker 3: eat berries off of Like do you have no self
Speaker 3: preservation instincts? It's why?
Speaker 2: Well, there is that like I don't remember what it's called,
Speaker 2: but like there's this movement where people are like, yeah,
Speaker 2: we should eat the food that's on the trees grow,
Speaker 2: especially in like La where they're like avocado trees. There's
Speaker 2: citrus trees all over and people are like, we should
Speaker 2: be allowed to eat this ray food. And so maybe
Speaker 2: she's just like a part of that movement where she's like,
Speaker 2: I'm going to eat.
Speaker 3: The street, but also like no one's like and you
Speaker 3: should eat food off the trees and not confirm what
Speaker 3: it is before I eat.
Speaker 2: People who were doing that know what they're eating all
Speaker 2: berries famously fine according to her.
Speaker 3: I guess it's like a parable anyways.
Speaker 2: Anyway, Okay, so what happens in the movie is that
Speaker 2: Courtney exposes Violette as the nerdy, unpopular Fern Mayo, and
Speaker 2: everyone is like ew yucky, gross, and Fern freaks out
Speaker 2: so hard that she passes out. Been there, but Julie
Speaker 2: and Zach come to Fern's aid, and they team up
Speaker 2: to take Courtney down, but they don't really know how
Speaker 2: until Julie's mom is like, hey, Liz's mom dropped off
Speaker 2: some stuff that she wanted you to have, and one
Speaker 2: of the things is that birthday card with Liz's voice recording,
Speaker 2: except now it has a recording of Courtney's saying I
Speaker 2: killed Liz. I killed the teen dream deal with it, which.
Speaker 3: Does explain Earlier I was like, why are they why
Speaker 3: and it's like, oh, because that's the evidence. It needs
Speaker 3: to be really, it has to be admissible in the
Speaker 3: cord of Pam Greer, which that is.
Speaker 2: Yes. So that night is prom because every teen movie
Speaker 2: has to end in prom. So Julie, Zach, and Fern
Speaker 2: go to Prom. Zach rigs up the sound system to
Speaker 2: play that recording of Courtney's confession over her prom queen
Speaker 2: speech when she inevitably wins prom Queen and everyone hears
Speaker 2: this and they're like, oh my god, Courtney is such
Speaker 2: a bitch from murdering Liz, and they're throwing their corsages
Speaker 2: and stuff at her in a scene that reminds me
Speaker 2: of Serce Lanister in Game of Thrones, like, oh, Wow,
Speaker 2: I don't remember what happens in that show, even though
Speaker 2: I've watched every episode, but she's been disgraced as queen
Speaker 2: or something, and so everyone's like throwing stuff at her
Speaker 2: as she walks through the town naked, and I was like, hmm,
Speaker 2: it's like that.
Speaker 3: It's like that. I was thinking of the aesthetic of
Speaker 3: that looks a lot like the cover of that whole album.
Speaker 4: M Yeah, Live through This. Yes, And actually Courtney is
Speaker 4: named after Courtney Love, according to Darren, So okay, Darren,
Speaker 4: maybe that's on purpose.
Speaker 3: I see you, Darren.
Speaker 4: It's obviously also very Carrie, isn't it very Carey?
Speaker 3: Yeah? God, I mean, Caitlyne. I know you hate a
Speaker 3: prom scene. This one worked for me, though at least
Speaker 3: it ended. I hate when the prompt scenes when they end, well,
Speaker 3: I'm bored when they end terribly. I like, Yeah, I.
Speaker 2: Don't automatically hate any movie that ends in prom or
Speaker 2: any movie that ends in a wedding. I know, I
Speaker 2: like bring it up a lot, but it's more that
Speaker 2: I hate that it's become a trope because writers don't
Speaker 2: have enough imagination to think of another way to end
Speaker 2: a movie. But if there's like narrative purpose for it,
Speaker 2: or it makes sense in the context of the story.
Speaker 3: Fine, in the context of all that is.
Speaker 2: But the point here is that Julie got her ass,
Speaker 2: and Courtney is disgraced and her empire is over the.
Speaker 3: End, and you're just not supposed to think about like,
Speaker 3: so are Julie and Marcy on the hook for this
Speaker 3: at all?
Speaker 2: I don't don't know, doesn't matter, I guess, yeah, but
Speaker 2: that's the movie. So let's take another quick break and
Speaker 2: we'll come back to discuss.
Speaker 3: And we're back. Yeah, where do we want to start?
Speaker 3: What's jumping out?
Speaker 4: I feel like there's so many ways to cut this cookie.
Speaker 4: I don't know. I forgot how bizarre it is, just visually,
Speaker 4: like the way it's edited, the way the dialogue is.
Speaker 4: There's so many things about it that are very unique
Speaker 4: and that was fun to watch.
Speaker 2: It's more visually stylized than a typical teen comedy.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I guess it owes something to Heather's for all
Speaker 4: of that, like this overstylized costume and the bizarre affected speech.
Speaker 4: I think a lot of this movie kind of doesn't work,
Speaker 4: but it's almost got like so many other things that
Speaker 4: are so great that they kind of balanced themselves out.
Speaker 4: But I can imagine watching this, especially if you're not
Speaker 4: like queer or have never really been in any way
Speaker 4: exposed to queer stuff, that you might just be like,
Speaker 4: this is a terrible movie. This sucks. I don't feel
Speaker 4: that way, but I can kind of understand why you might, Right.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's interesting. I mean, like I feel like a
Speaker 3: lot of what was helpful, like just learning more about
Speaker 3: Darren Stein and like he was first of all, in
Speaker 3: his twenties when he made this movie, which always makes
Speaker 3: me feel very depressed about my own life. But this
Speaker 3: is the second movie. He had made another movie called
Speaker 3: I Believe Sparkler before this, and was very inspired by Heathers,
Speaker 3: even though years on he was like, who's that what?
Speaker 3: And I don't know. He's like an openly queer filmmaker
Speaker 3: in the nineties, which was not a common thing. And
Speaker 3: going back into it, there's two oral histories. One was
Speaker 3: in Vice, one was in Entertainment Weekly. I'm mostly pulling
Speaker 3: from the Vice one since it is kind of redundant
Speaker 3: between the two, but the fact that you know in
Speaker 3: Rose McGowan sort of speaks to this point that he
Speaker 3: was sort of pigeonholed as a queer filmmaker and like
Speaker 3: sort of is like, oh, well, he's like on the Fringes,
Speaker 3: But really the only reason that that was was because
Speaker 3: he was openly gay at a time where it was
Speaker 3: just less common to be. So I don't know. I mean, like,
Speaker 3: I can appreciate where he's coming from the movie looks amazing,
Speaker 3: and there's things I don't know. I wanted to get
Speaker 3: your opinions on this where I kept going back and
Speaker 3: forth on like I wish I knew more about these characters,
Speaker 3: But then I feel like, do I wish I knew
Speaker 3: more about these characters? I'm not sure because it's like
Speaker 3: the Courtney example of like she is just absolutely evil.
Speaker 3: We don't know why, we don't know how she got there,
Speaker 3: we don't know how she maintains it, but she just is.
Speaker 3: And I'm like, do I want more? I don't know.
Speaker 3: There's movies where you get more and I like them,
Speaker 3: but I don't know what did she think of, like
Speaker 3: how the characters are set up, because you just get
Speaker 3: so little about their lives outside of this situation.
Speaker 4: I would say, Yeah, they're all kind of archetypes, aren't they.
Speaker 4: They're like caricatures their art. They're not like anyone you
Speaker 4: actually know. And I saw a quote from Rose McGowan
Speaker 4: saying that, you know, if this movie were made now,
Speaker 4: you would have Courtney's backstory and she wouldn't be allowed
Speaker 4: to just be evil for no reason. It would have
Speaker 4: to be like the story behind it. And so I
Speaker 4: kind of like that she's just a villain just for
Speaker 4: villain's sake, and it's all quite cartoony. But then the
Speaker 4: movie also tries to give you some emotion old beats,
Speaker 4: which then don't work, I think, because these characters aren't
Speaker 4: kind of real, And so like the relationship that Julie
Speaker 4: ends up having with Zach, you're like, what the hell
Speaker 4: is this about the scene where she's like at the
Speaker 4: pool and she's thinking about Liz, were you friends? Because
Speaker 4: I don't know, it seems like the day she died
Speaker 4: you started dating someone. So I don't know how sincere
Speaker 4: your relationship really was. Yeah, So there's kind of problems
Speaker 4: as a result of these characters being kind of underdeveloped,
Speaker 4: But then there's also benefits to it as well, which
Speaker 4: is kind of the cartooniness of it, I think, right.
Speaker 3: I was also thrown by the like Liz and Julie
Speaker 3: were best friends because and I feel like it's stated
Speaker 3: after that scene too, where she's like I think she
Speaker 3: tells Zach, you know I was closest with Liz. You're
Speaker 3: like news to me.
Speaker 2: Didn't know right well, because Fern Mayo's voiceovers like Courtney
Speaker 2: and Liz were best friends, but Courtney hated her actually
Speaker 2: because she was so perfect and sweet and it's just
Speaker 2: like what is going on here? And then to me,
Speaker 2: Julie felt kind of all over the place where you
Speaker 2: think she's gonna be a Courtney type in the sense
Speaker 2: that she's mean and dismissive of her peers who are
Speaker 2: less popular and have less social status, because you see
Speaker 2: that image of them walking down the hall at the beginning,
Speaker 2: and Fern Mayo has like dropped her books and they're
Speaker 2: scattered all over the floor, and you see Julie just
Speaker 2: like stepping over her very callously. But then as the
Speaker 2: story goes, you find out that they used to be
Speaker 2: friends in elementary school and they'll say hi to each other,
Speaker 2: where Courtney will be like, get out of the bathroom,
Speaker 2: this is our space, and like is like extra cruel
Speaker 2: to Fern, And then you know Julie is the one
Speaker 2: with the moral compass, and she's the one who's like,
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna be a part of this. We should
Speaker 2: tell someone. She's the one who tries to be friend Fern.
Speaker 2: So I didn't really have a handle. It feels like
Speaker 2: a little inconsistent in the way that she was characterized.
Speaker 2: But maybe that's just like part of this satire again,
Speaker 2: like satire kind of in this case at least like
Speaker 2: muddles the story and the characterization.
Speaker 3: I feel, yeah, I was confused by jul I think
Speaker 3: Julie's character maybe worked the least well for me because
Speaker 3: I agree with the crystal like Courtney being of Vartex
Speaker 3: of evil like at least it didn't really ch like
Speaker 3: whatever the most evil thing to do in the scene
Speaker 3: is Courtney is going to do that, or perhaps think
Speaker 3: of something so evil you yourself could not conceive of it,
Speaker 3: like all of the horrible things she does to Liz
Speaker 3: immediately after her death. But Julie, Yeah, Julie being positioned
Speaker 3: as like quote unquote the good girl. I mean, there
Speaker 3: was like good girl, bad girl broad tropes that were presented,
Speaker 3: but I didn't feel like really, I feel like they
Speaker 3: were just presented, it didn't even feel like they were
Speaker 3: really being satirized, where like Courtney is hyper sexual and
Speaker 3: kinky and she's the world's worst person, and then when
Speaker 3: it comes up later in the movie that actually Liz
Speaker 3: was a virgin, Like, I don't know, I just feel
Speaker 3: like it's these classic ways of characterizing who is good
Speaker 3: and who is bad and how it's connected to promiscuity
Speaker 3: in a way that like some parts of the movie
Speaker 3: felt like I feel like the Fern Violette story that
Speaker 3: felt like clearly satirically, you know what he's going for.
Speaker 3: But there were other ways that the girls were talked about,
Speaker 3: or like their morality was evaluated that felt like really
Speaker 3: undercooked and just here's this trope the good girl was
Speaker 3: a virgin and the bad girl has a lot of
Speaker 3: sex and those elements, and I feel like Julie would
Speaker 3: often sort of be involved in those if like she's
Speaker 3: dating a nice guy from the drama club, she's good
Speaker 3: or even though if you like like you're both saying
Speaker 3: if you look at what Julie does, you're like, is
Speaker 3: she good?
Speaker 4: Like it's that's kind of one of the issues when
Speaker 4: you're making a movie that's very pastiche e and it's
Speaker 4: like referencing Grease, and it's referencing Rocky Horror, and it's
Speaker 4: referencing Heathers And you know, how do you avoid those pitfalls?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 4: You know, you're winking and nodding to those things, but
Speaker 4: you're also trying, I don't know, how do you make
Speaker 4: it also fresh or avoid the yeah, the slut shaming
Speaker 4: ideas or making a movie that's almost entirely white in
Speaker 4: nineteen ninety nine. You know, lots of things like that
Speaker 4: that you're like, you forgot to think about this.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, there's just elements of it. I mean, it's
Speaker 3: like he was like twenty eight when he made the movie.
Speaker 3: But it does feel kind of undercooked in a lot
Speaker 3: of areas or just like kind of confusing, where it
Speaker 3: felt like the like style was like eclipsing me understanding
Speaker 3: what was happening in the story, which also, if I'm
Speaker 3: not watching a movie for this show is totally fine,
Speaker 3: But yeah, I did find it a little tricky. The
Speaker 3: stuff that did work for me was, you know, and
Speaker 3: it's like a very dark view of teenage girls. But
Speaker 3: the like narrative of like Fern of like how much
Speaker 3: are you willing to compromise yourself to be socially accepted,
Speaker 3: and like, I mean that, I felt like the style
Speaker 3: and the script were like cooking together. I don't know
Speaker 3: what did everyone make a Fern she's evil. I think
Speaker 3: she's also evil, and I feel like she and Julie
Speaker 3: kind of scooed out of this story like we did
Speaker 3: it and you're like, you guys are also terrible, like yeh,
Speaker 3: friend can be on the hook for withholding information from
Speaker 3: the authorities.
Speaker 2: Right and it, Yeah, it seems like she's just as
Speaker 2: corrupt as Courtney potentially, but just like hasn't been given
Speaker 2: the power and social status to enact any horrible evil things.
Speaker 2: But yeah, she's seduced by the idea of popularity and
Speaker 2: status and she doesn't hesitate to take it and only
Speaker 2: when she's exposed as like being a fraud and oh
Speaker 2: she's actually Fern Mayo and she's kind of left with
Speaker 2: no choice but to And she doesn't even like revert
Speaker 2: back to her old style. She like maintains the esthetic,
Speaker 2: at least of Violet.
Speaker 3: She's like, I'm keeping the die job, I'm kissing the
Speaker 3: die job.
Speaker 2: They kept complimenting her hair, like different characters, and I'm like,
Speaker 2: I mean, I guess that was a popular style in
Speaker 2: the late nineties, but I was like, I.
Speaker 3: Feel like this movie is like intentionally kind of takes
Speaker 3: place out of time because it's like the outfit we
Speaker 3: see Fern in at the beginning of the movie felt
Speaker 3: the closest to like actual nineties like grunge aesthetic closed.
Speaker 4: When had never been kissed come out.
Speaker 2: I think also ninety nine.
Speaker 4: Okay, because I feel like Drew Barrymore is basically dressed
Speaker 4: as Violette. Everyone's like, everyone's like, what the fuck you
Speaker 4: wear it, which is a more accurate take on what
Speaker 4: they're all dressed. Like like imagine seeing a girl in
Speaker 4: a hot pink rubber skirt at your high school. You'd
Speaker 4: be like, this is weird. Yeah, but I love I mean,
Speaker 4: obviously the costuming is incredible, incredible, but it helps to
Speaker 4: show that like this isn't real, right, right, what you
Speaker 4: were saying about Violette though, Like I totally agree. I
Speaker 4: think there's a lot of handwaving, like she's learned her
Speaker 4: lesson and now she's good again. We don't actually see
Speaker 4: any of that character development take place. She just gets
Speaker 4: knocked over and has a bump on her head and
Speaker 4: like that's enough, and we're supposed to just accept that
Speaker 4: she's like learned her lesson, I guess, right, But I
Speaker 4: think I think she is a really interesting character, and
Speaker 4: I think there's a lot of the drag queen in
Speaker 4: her and I can see a lot of myself in her,
Speaker 4: where when you're a gay man and you're twenty, you
Speaker 4: idolize the Courtney and you think that's who I want
Speaker 4: to be because I want revenge and power on all
Speaker 4: of the people who've wronged me as a weird teen.
Speaker 4: And then you realize that you're actually the Marsie and
Speaker 4: you're not doing anything particularly original. And then you realize
Speaker 4: you're actually the Fern, and you've like created this thing
Speaker 4: around yourself and you've got to kind of work to
Speaker 4: figure out what the real you is under that. I
Speaker 4: think there's a lot of like probably a lot of
Speaker 4: like trans allegory in there as well, but it's something
Speaker 4: that I kind of definitely relate to as like someone
Speaker 4: who's actively built an alter ego. M right, and then
Speaker 4: you have to kind of take a look at that
Speaker 4: alter ego you've built and be like, what is that
Speaker 4: informed by and like, is that okay, have I just
Speaker 4: absorbed a lot of misogyny and like I'm now projecting it?
Speaker 4: Or is it like is there some kind of balance
Speaker 4: between all of those things.
Speaker 2: Well, it's tricky because, like, on one hand, because social
Speaker 2: status is like such an important currency for so many teens,
Speaker 2: because of the emphasis we have placed on that cultural
Speaker 2: you understand to some degree why Fern would be seduced
Speaker 2: by that and intrigued by that, and the context for
Speaker 2: why she ends up doing it is obviously like, oh god,
Speaker 2: it's not worth it. You're covering up a murder. But
Speaker 2: because this movie is very heightened and again fantasyish and
Speaker 2: dream like and satirical, you're like, okay, I feel like
Speaker 2: it works knowing the tone of the movie, but it
Speaker 2: does make it hard to then talk about her or
Speaker 2: the characters.
Speaker 3: I wonder I'd be curious to see like previous drafts
Speaker 3: of this script because it seems like it changed a lot.
Speaker 3: It used to be more overtly like Hoarry, and then
Speaker 3: it sort of transformed into a black comedy. I feel
Speaker 3: like Darren Stein couldn't decide which way. The ending for
Speaker 3: Fern was really confusing for me because it's like, if
Speaker 3: the core message of this movie is the very dark,
Speaker 3: like anyone could be seduced by Courtney's offer, and that
Speaker 3: like within every teenager is the capacity to like turn
Speaker 3: into a Violette, then okay, stick with that, because at
Speaker 3: the end it felt like Julie and Fern had turned
Speaker 3: into the good guys in a way that like didn't
Speaker 3: really track for me. I feel like it would have
Speaker 3: been more interesting and still a consistent move at the
Speaker 3: tone of the movie is to like have another beat
Speaker 3: after the prom and have them all realize like, oh,
Speaker 3: like right, we're all fucked. And speaking to your point, Crystal,
Speaker 3: I'm curious, like what Fern is gonna do now in
Speaker 3: terms of like does she want to maintain this persona
Speaker 3: It seems like she does to some extent. What does
Speaker 3: that mean for her? And like in whatever broad satirical way,
Speaker 3: But it was I just felt at the end like
Speaker 3: it was turned into a very clean ending where it's like, Okay,
Speaker 3: we've we've killed the villain basically and not the Courtney
Speaker 3: doesn't have a coming. She absolutely does, but everyone else
Speaker 3: sort of went under examined that point was emphasized versus
Speaker 3: having a clean dismount for anyone else, and Marcy too.
Speaker 3: I thought Marcy was for the most part, she's not
Speaker 3: really allowed to do much except be like ha ha
Speaker 3: yeah exactly, which is her? Like she's like the Gretchen Wieners,
Speaker 3: I guess at the operation, right, But you get one
Speaker 3: scene of background for her, weirdly, which like her single
Speaker 3: down interesting. I was like, more of whatever that was, please, Like, yeah,
Speaker 3: can we talk about that scene? Because of all of
Speaker 3: the girls, to get a family background scene, I mean,
Speaker 3: you do see Julie's mom in passing, but like very briefly,
Speaker 3: but you get a whole scene with Marcy and her
Speaker 3: famously single dad and it's a really good, really.
Speaker 2: Weird scene yet almost doesn't make sense within the context
Speaker 2: of the rest of the story. But I was like,
Speaker 2: it makes her look worse, but right, I guess it
Speaker 2: characterizes Marcie a bit more. But yeah, I was like,
Speaker 2: why is this scene here? Exactly? Similar to like why
Speaker 2: is the scene where Courtney makes her jock boyfriend, yeah,
Speaker 2: give oral sex to a popsicle? I guess to show
Speaker 2: how twisted and sick she is.
Speaker 3: She kind of coerces him into doing it.
Speaker 2: Too, Yeah she does.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I feel like.
Speaker 3: This further proves that this movie is meant to be
Speaker 3: consumed as vibes only, because why we cut from that
Speaker 3: scene with Marcy and her dad to Liz emerging from
Speaker 3: the pool and apparently she and Julie were best friends,
Speaker 3: and you're like, huh what Anyways, I really enjoyed the
Speaker 3: scene with Marcy and her dad. It felt like it
Speaker 3: was so weird that she sort of the like lowest
Speaker 3: ranking character on the like character I need to know
Speaker 3: more about tier gets this scene. But I really enjoyed it.
Speaker 3: I mean, the dad being like I was watching Oprah
Speaker 3: and I think you might be a follower and she's like,
Speaker 3: shut up, dad, Like it was cool. I don't know,
Speaker 3: Like having that scene made me realize and just think,
Speaker 3: like how the movies this movie is compared to has
Speaker 3: more of that and has more of the like the
Speaker 3: heightened entire society. And like then I was thinking of
Speaker 3: the funeral scene at Heather's. Why didn't we get to
Speaker 3: go to Liz's memorial, Like just stuff that you think
Speaker 3: would be there that just sort of happens off screen
Speaker 3: and isn't really referenced.
Speaker 4: Well, it's possible that this entire movie takes place in
Speaker 4: like three days.
Speaker 2: I think, so true.
Speaker 3: Yeah, maybe the memorial hasn't happened.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's like it's very hard to say how much
Speaker 4: time has passed. Like it's simultaneously been enough time for
Speaker 4: Violet to become the queen of high school, but all
Speaker 4: so like not enough time for there to have been
Speaker 4: a memorial or like a proper investigation. I don't know.
Speaker 4: It's confusing. It's stretchy movie logic time.
Speaker 3: Yeaheah. I'm sure someone's made a seven hour YouTube video
Speaker 3: about it, Like I've cracked the timeline and I would
Speaker 3: watch that.
Speaker 4: What do we think about Courtney and that sex scene
Speaker 4: with her boyfriend, not the Marilyn mensenone.
Speaker 3: I agree with Caylin. I don't know why it's there.
Speaker 3: I mean, I get it. It's like making the point
Speaker 3: of like she is hyper sexual, and that is like
Speaker 3: a part of why I feel like we're kind of
Speaker 3: encouraged to like celebrate and judge her at the same time,
Speaker 3: because it is fun watching Rosmagowan be evil. Yeah, but
Speaker 3: also I think she is like coercing the other character.
Speaker 2: I mean, I guess the function of the scene is
Speaker 2: to reinforce how coercive she is not only with her
Speaker 2: like girlfriends, but with her like hetero man partner, and
Speaker 2: he he doesn't protest really, so it almost is suggesting maybe, like,
Speaker 2: look at the power and control she has over everyone.
Speaker 2: We already know that, though, So I don't really know
Speaker 2: why we need to see another scene.
Speaker 3: I mean, I don't, like, I'm not like upset about
Speaker 3: a sex scene itself, but yeah, the way it's presented
Speaker 3: is like. The thing that I liked about Courtney's relationship,
Speaker 3: if you could call it that, with that guy, is
Speaker 3: that she is very clear headed about what high school
Speaker 3: relationships are and she's like, he I don't care about
Speaker 3: what happens to him in forty eight hours. He is
Speaker 3: a status symbol for me. That's and I feel like
Speaker 3: that was at least something I don't think I've seen
Speaker 3: a lot in teen movies, is like teen girls in
Speaker 3: these like very movie hetero relationships, treating the guy like
Speaker 3: garbage an accessory. Yeah, yeah, true, So there's that.
Speaker 4: This was the first time I watched it, and I
Speaker 4: wondered if Courtney was maybe gay.
Speaker 3: Interesting.
Speaker 4: I mean, Fern is very maybe gay, I agree, yeah,
Speaker 4: but maybe Courtney too, And like, but maybe she hasn't.
Speaker 4: She's even like deeper in the closet in a way. Yeah,
Speaker 4: but like the creating of a woman and using sex
Speaker 4: as like a tool rather than like seeming to have
Speaker 4: any real interest in using a man as like a
Speaker 4: social status tool. I don't know, there's there's kind of
Speaker 4: lots of that. And then like having her own fallis
Speaker 4: with that popsicle.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's like this is this is.
Speaker 4: Really gay for Courtney, this whole scene.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, with the dynamic with Fern and Courtney too, where
Speaker 3: I mean Courtney is obsessed with control no matter what.
Speaker 3: But it's like when her creation is out of her control,
Speaker 3: she that's where it seems like it becomes personal for
Speaker 3: her in a way that we rarely see things be personal. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I buy into that theory. And also, yeah, Fern is
Speaker 3: like heavily. I mean, I don't even know if you
Speaker 3: could really call it coating. It's not like I don't know,
Speaker 3: I mean, we don't see if Fern have the only
Speaker 3: love interest she pursues that is a man, is because
Speaker 3: Courtney told her to do it. It wasn't because she
Speaker 3: had any actual interest. She was just doing what her
Speaker 3: Frankenstein said to do. Right.
Speaker 2: Meanwhile, she's telling Detective Pam Greer like I used to
Speaker 2: smell Liz's hair and look at the birthmarks on the
Speaker 2: back of her neck and salmon, salmon and the sea creatures,
Speaker 2: and so you know, it seems like she's very like
Speaker 2: amorously infatuated with Liz.
Speaker 3: Which is like a fine I like that. You know,
Speaker 3: everyone in this movie is evil, so it's not like
Speaker 3: she's being set up to be a queer villain necessarily,
Speaker 3: but that, just like that also just gave me a
Speaker 3: story problems where I was like, why wasn't she more
Speaker 3: upset that Liz died if she was with her?
Speaker 4: Yes, but it's the constant gay conundrum of like am
Speaker 4: I in love with you? Or do I want to
Speaker 4: be you? And so someone's now giving you you've only
Speaker 4: got one choice left because she's dead, and someone's saying, well,
Speaker 4: you could be her, you could be Well, I guess
Speaker 4: we'll try it.
Speaker 2: The next best thing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, brutal. I mean those line reads that Judy Greer
Speaker 3: gives Detective Pam gear Wow, two geers. Yeah, the Greers,
Speaker 3: two Geers, one room about you know, like their version
Speaker 3: of It's Chinatown Jake, Like they're like it's high school.
Speaker 3: No One is a Friend? Really good reference, Janie, thank you.
Speaker 3: I've never seen that movie, but I do. Let me
Speaker 3: be clear, I haven't seen If you've.
Speaker 2: Seen Who Framed Roger Rabbit, you've basically seen Chinatown.
Speaker 3: Great, then I've that. I have definitely seen then I've
Speaker 3: seen it one hundred times. But yeah, I mean, like
Speaker 3: you get those lines of like is anyone in high
Speaker 3: school really a friend? Which is a very dark I
Speaker 3: don't know, like all the click movies have to sort
Speaker 3: of abide by that logic, and it's especially if you
Speaker 3: like had a hard time in high school, is very
Speaker 3: cathartic and fun.
Speaker 2: That relates to a separate, kind of broader issue. I
Speaker 2: have with the idea of like mainstream movies about teen
Speaker 2: girl friendship, because so many of them have a premise of,
Speaker 2: like they're very mean and cruel to each other, if
Speaker 2: not violent and murder each other. And this is one
Speaker 2: of those movies. You know, Obviously Mean Girls is another one,
Speaker 2: Obviously Heathers is another one. They all exist in the
Speaker 2: same like they're all kind of inspired by each other.
Speaker 2: And then you've got like more contemporary examples like Do
Speaker 2: Revenge and I'm just sort of waiting for teen girl
Speaker 2: movies that center on their friendship, because another version of
Speaker 2: teen girl movies is their hetero love interest.
Speaker 3: I mean, they do exist. So you've got your Sisterhood
Speaker 3: of the Traveling Pants, you've got your guys, like yeah.
Speaker 2: But those people are just kind of few and far between.
Speaker 2: Like I'm always like, why aren't there more stories that
Speaker 2: celebrate female friendship and don't have them be outwardly cruel
Speaker 2: and or violent to each other?
Speaker 3: So I don't know, I mean, I agree with you,
Speaker 3: but I do think those movies are out there, and
Speaker 3: I find them more boring.
Speaker 2: Well, there aren't enough of them. There could be more
Speaker 2: fun ones, and like they could be in different genres.
Speaker 2: They could be fun like adventure movies, they could be
Speaker 2: you know anything. I guess there's quite a few horror
Speaker 2: movies to that effect. But again, like ones that center
Speaker 2: on friendship and like girls working together, and sure there's
Speaker 2: gonna be misunderstandings or arguments along the way. That's how
Speaker 2: friendship works.
Speaker 3: I'm going to see Harriet this by this weekend. I'm
Speaker 3: so excited. Oh nice.
Speaker 4: Basically you're pitching this movie, but it turns into weekend
Speaker 4: at Bernie's.
Speaker 2: Yes, actually a movie I've never seen also, but I
Speaker 2: know the premise.
Speaker 4: They just have to they have to get Liz to
Speaker 4: graduation hijin.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they gotta get her to troum.
Speaker 7: She's got to win from Queen anyways, just put some
Speaker 7: sunglasses on, a scarf around her neck, a little cravat
Speaker 7: if you will, and uh yeah, I mean more dark
Speaker 7: high school comedy is revolving around functional, well not functional,
Speaker 7: but like common goal friendships between teen girls.
Speaker 3: Like I think one thing that I wish, I don't know,
Speaker 3: if I could change one thing about Job Breaker, I
Speaker 3: would replace Zach with another teenage girl like Plant, a
Speaker 3: character that Julie can become friends with, someone who can
Speaker 3: be you know, like it plant her earlier in the movie,
Speaker 3: Does fern have one friend who she's completely bailed on
Speaker 3: who is now like where the fuck is Fernad and
Speaker 3: Julie can connect with her, Like I feel like there
Speaker 3: is space to sort of address what you're not completely
Speaker 3: because Courtney is going to Courtney and Marcy's going to
Speaker 3: Marcy all that, but to have at least a positive
Speaker 3: connection between teen girls in this movie, or a functional
Speaker 3: connection between teen girls, because I agree that like Zach,
Speaker 3: I don't mind being in a world where it's like
Speaker 3: everyone hates each other and its evil. But if that
Speaker 3: world is if the only person who is not that
Speaker 3: is a random boyfriend, then I feel like you've kind
Speaker 3: of got a problem right where because Zach all of
Speaker 3: a sudden, has a ton of agency and is like
Speaker 3: the moral center of the movie, and almost everyone else
Speaker 3: you see is an evil woman, Like you're just like, well,
Speaker 3: what is this? You know, I feel like replacing him
Speaker 3: with a teen girl that Julie can genuinely connect with
Speaker 3: instead of just being told that she was Liz's friend.
Speaker 3: Like we're told about positive connections between these girls, but
Speaker 3: we never actually see it and it never has any
Speaker 3: narrative consequence, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And it still bugs me that he's the one
Speaker 2: who like rigs up the whole sound system thing, Like
Speaker 2: that's not his victory to accomplish, Like he again, he's
Speaker 2: just like this random dude. And to give the boy
Speaker 2: like a like technical technology thing to do, kind of suggesting, well,
Speaker 2: girls don't know how to do technology. It just annoys me.
Speaker 4: Yeah, maybe the problem I feel with this movie, which
Speaker 4: is also its strength. You know, we've talked a lot
Speaker 4: about how these are kind of cartoon characters, and therefore
Speaker 4: they're kind of missing what you've been looking for, Caitlin,
Speaker 4: which is like deeper connection. And I think that's basically
Speaker 4: going to be a limitation of a man writing a
Speaker 4: movie about teen girls. This is true, and he's got
Speaker 4: a leg up because he's gay, and so he's kind
Speaker 4: of hitting some of the marks, but he's not hitting
Speaker 4: all of the marks. And I think there is a
Speaker 4: bit of a feeling that I come away with with
Speaker 4: this movie that all of the women in this are
Speaker 4: kind of being treated like barbies or dolls for him.
Speaker 4: They're acting out these tropes and these scenes and these
Speaker 4: ideas that he's got, but there's a little bit missing from,
Speaker 4: you know, the meat, And I think that's what makes
Speaker 4: me feel a little bit of a lack. On the
Speaker 4: other hand, like I don't know anyone other than a
Speaker 4: gay man who could write a Courtney, And it's like
Speaker 4: she is a gay man's revenge fantasy, power fantasy. She's
Speaker 4: like the Frankenfurter. She's got so much to her that
Speaker 4: I'm so glad exists, and it's like fun to see
Speaker 4: villains like that who exist. So I don't know that
Speaker 4: I necessarily want anything to change. But like, as you say,
Speaker 4: it's almost like a different movie made by a different
Speaker 4: person would solve some of these problems and potentially over
Speaker 4: correct some of the good things.
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, it's tricky. I do feel like it's possible
Speaker 3: to make movies in the like dark teen comedy John
Speaker 3: that avoid some of these mistakes. But I think like
Speaker 3: viewing it as playing with Barbies actually kind of does
Speaker 3: even with the dream logic aspects, this could be staged
Speaker 3: by barbies. And yeah, there's like certain parts where it's
Speaker 3: like Rose McGowan is just going like full Joan Crawford
Speaker 3: and it's great. I don't know, I don't know what
Speaker 3: I want this movie to do that it's not doing.
Speaker 3: It doesn't feel like a movie that can really go
Speaker 3: another way. But yeah, I agree with you, Caitlin that
Speaker 3: like having some sort of functional or just like more
Speaker 3: layered relationship between women, because I would say, like Mean
Speaker 3: Girls has a lot of the similar problems of this,
Speaker 3: but at least we like do understand why these friendships
Speaker 3: aren't functioning and that they're not like just inherently evil.
Speaker 3: It's like you understand what the communication breakdown is between
Speaker 3: Katie and Janis or like whatever it is, which does
Speaker 3: just feel like something that comes from experience.
Speaker 4: Probably Yeah, and like more money and more time with
Speaker 4: this script and right edits and a big red marker
Speaker 4: and lots of that. You kind of do all of
Speaker 4: that to Jowbreaker and you get mean girls.
Speaker 3: Yeah right. I don't know, I feel that because it's
Speaker 3: like I really did enjoy this movie and I know
Speaker 3: how like beloved it is, and it's like a classic
Speaker 3: like bombed at the box office and then found its
Speaker 3: footing at sleepovers, which is like as it should be.
Speaker 3: It is tricky. I don't know. The biggest swing for
Speaker 3: this movie that I was like was that necessary? Was
Speaker 3: just the fundamental plot element of like we need to
Speaker 3: make it seem as if she's been raped. Yeah, because
Speaker 3: again it's like, yes, that is something that is the
Speaker 3: most evil character in the world, who is Courtney would do?
Speaker 3: But again, it just like makes all of the other
Speaker 3: characters that we're supposed to be rooting for look really terrible.
Speaker 3: And like I understand why Darren Stein is taking that swing,
Speaker 3: because it is like it's an edge lord writer decision.
Speaker 3: I feel like, of like, what is the most extreme,
Speaker 3: potentially offensive thing I could make this character do. But
Speaker 3: I it could have been literally anything else. It could
Speaker 3: have been something else bad. I just didn't I don't
Speaker 3: know that decision just like didn't sit well with me
Speaker 3: at all.
Speaker 2: Me either, because it's movies like this that contribute to
Speaker 2: the perpetuation of the idea that reports of rape are
Speaker 2: actually often false and made up and you can't trust
Speaker 2: anyone who says they've been raped, when in reality, it
Speaker 2: is not very common for a rape allegation to be false,
Speaker 2: and it is statistically far more likely for a rape
Speaker 2: to happen and not be reported than it is for
Speaker 2: a rape to be reported and have it be a
Speaker 2: false accusation. But there's all this media like this movie
Speaker 2: that supports this idea that rape accusations tend to be
Speaker 2: bogus and that has like really horrible real world consequences,
Speaker 2: And so that is the big thing for this movie
Speaker 2: that rubs me the wrong way. I feel like, kind
Speaker 2: of similarly Courtney, and again, this is like the evil
Speaker 2: character having this behavior and having these ideas, but that
Speaker 2: she tends to kind of conflate kink with rape. And
Speaker 2: I can't really tell how the movie feels about it,
Speaker 2: or if it's just like, oh, this is the evil character.
Speaker 2: But because to me, that distinction isn't very clear as
Speaker 2: far as like how the movie feels about it, and
Speaker 2: that should be a clearer distinction. I don't know. It
Speaker 2: just we've covered a lot of movies from this exact year.
Speaker 2: It's a big year for movies for lots of movies,
Speaker 2: and then specifically teen movies that have like at least
Speaker 2: one fundamental, highly problematic element. I'm thinking, like cruel intentions
Speaker 2: and she's all that and never been kissed and stuff
Speaker 2: like that. But you'll have characters in those movies who
Speaker 2: are just dropping very of the era, like casual homophobia,
Speaker 2: casual racism, and the movie's not challenging it, and it's
Speaker 2: just like, yeah, this is just reflection of the culture
Speaker 2: of the time. In this movie, you do have characters
Speaker 2: making disparaging remarks about like girls how much they weigh
Speaker 2: and having eating disorders, and disparaging remarks about queer people,
Speaker 2: about people with disabilities, but I think those are always
Speaker 2: like the evil, mean girl characters, and the satire of
Speaker 2: the movie I feel like suggests, oh, well, the movie
Speaker 2: is not endorsing these attitudes. But I don't feel the
Speaker 2: same way for how it handles this like false rape
Speaker 2: accusation component of the movie.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I just feel like he was not the writer
Speaker 3: to even attempt something this extreme, just based on how
Speaker 3: it's executed and the fact that, like it could have
Speaker 3: been something else and the movie would not have had
Speaker 3: to change, right, I think that honestly, going for a
Speaker 3: more Weekend at Bernie's gag there is like still tonally consistent,
Speaker 3: can still be really dark and would not yeah, make
Speaker 3: a pretty like broad negative statement about rape allegations, especially
Speaker 3: in a movie that you know, it's not that anyone knew,
Speaker 3: but that prominently features Marilyn Manson. You're just like, ah
Speaker 3: yea yui. Yeah, feels like a good reminder. Yeah, I
Speaker 3: just wish that they had done a Weekend at Bernie's
Speaker 3: style gag instead of that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, It's like so many of the choices in this
Speaker 4: movie are silly or campy or over the top or
Speaker 4: like you're clearly kind not meant to take it that seriously,
Speaker 4: and then they throw in this like actually, really, I
Speaker 4: don't know why I feel that like a death is worse,
Speaker 4: but it doesn't feel as bad because it's it's also
Speaker 4: portrayed in this really silly way, and that actually Courtney's
Speaker 4: sex scene with Marilyn Manson, it's like all of that,
Speaker 4: it is all hard to watch. And yeah, maybe maybe
Speaker 4: Darren wasn't quite the right person to be taking on
Speaker 4: that topic, but.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it's like this isn't like a specific
Speaker 3: problem with Darren Stein. I mean, like Kitle, like you
Speaker 3: were saying, in this year alone, there were a lot
Speaker 3: of big swings and teen movies that just aged spectacularly bad,
Speaker 3: and this is the one that this one does exactly.
Speaker 3: I do think I wish that Darren Stein. I mean,
Speaker 3: he should have been directing more stuff. I'm kind of
Speaker 3: surprised that we haven't seen as much from him, and
Speaker 3: that always kind of especially when you have a marginalized director.
Speaker 3: I'm always kind of like side eyeing, why haven't they
Speaker 3: made more? When they made Sure it didn't do great
Speaker 3: at the box office, but it came this big iconic movie.
Speaker 3: And you know, whenever if you have a straight white director,
Speaker 3: how many flops are they permitted to unleash upon the world.
Speaker 3: I don't know what this story there is. Maybe he
Speaker 3: took a step back. I'm not totally sure, but I
Speaker 3: always do just kind of side eye that kind of thing.
Speaker 4: Totally, especially when he's clearly got so many ideas. Yeah,
Speaker 4: so many choices are made in this movie that like
Speaker 4: it needed someone creative and visionary to do. You know,
Speaker 4: the way the sound editing is is just like one example,
Speaker 4: it's like someone was really like creatively running on both
Speaker 4: cylinders when they made this movie.
Speaker 2: There's so many goofy like yeah, sound effected during like
Speaker 2: scene transitions.
Speaker 3: And this is the second movie we've covered recently that.
Speaker 3: We also recently covered sixteen Candles, which he does side
Speaker 3: like the John Hughes teen movies as an influence. But
Speaker 3: we just covered sixteen Candles the other day for the
Speaker 3: Matreon and there is boy is the Howard Stern soundboard
Speaker 3: out on that movie kind of on this one too. Yeah,
Speaker 3: the sprayings. There's like one time when the jock is
Speaker 3: like learingly looking over at Courtney and you hear like
Speaker 3: some creepy I don't know noise.
Speaker 4: That could work. I wasn't going to try that.
Speaker 3: I've seen Roger arrive at one hundred times and it
Speaker 3: just kind of comes to me naturally.
Speaker 4: But even like the wooshes for like the wipes as well,
Speaker 4: so silly. Yeah, and the whole makeover scene, which is
Speaker 4: like something out of poor things like gothic Frankenstein in
Speaker 4: vibrant jawbreaker colors, Yeah, potions and spinning chairs and like, yeah,
Speaker 4: it's so psychedelic. It's really cool. So I totally agree. Basically,
Speaker 4: he should have been allowed to do more and make more.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and he's like in his early fifties. I hope
Speaker 3: that happens.
Speaker 4: Yeah. There is a movie called GBF, which my friend
Speaker 4: actually wrote and Darren directed, which is kind of of
Speaker 4: oh wow. Yes, it's almost the gay version of your
Speaker 4: teen movie, and it's got gay protagonists in high school
Speaker 4: and it's exploring the idea of popularity as well. But
Speaker 4: you don't need to imagine yourself as Courtney. You can
Speaker 4: just see yourself.
Speaker 2: That's a beautiful thing.
Speaker 3: I remember hearing about that movie. I haven't seen it, though.
Speaker 2: It says for Gay Best Friend, right, yeah GBF. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: I remember when it came out. I feel like it
Speaker 2: may be worth at least briefly acknowledging Rose McGowan and
Speaker 2: the history she has with being a turf where if
Speaker 2: anyone's not familiar. Back in twenty seventeen, she went on
Speaker 2: RuPaul's podcast and said some very turfy transphobic things. I
Speaker 2: didn't know that, although even before that I was reading
Speaker 2: that she a couple of years earlier said some remarks
Speaker 2: either too or about Caitlin Jenner that were also transphobic. Then,
Speaker 2: at a book event few months after this podcast appearance
Speaker 2: in early twenty eighteen, a trans woman confronted her about
Speaker 2: her remarks, and Rose McGowan told her to shut up
Speaker 2: and then proceeded to go on a transphobic rant. Sometime later,
Speaker 2: she gave what I feel is not a great apology.
Speaker 2: Others might feel differently. You know, who of us can
Speaker 2: actually know how a celebrity who has a very like public,
Speaker 2: performative kind of life how they actually feel personally. But
Speaker 2: I feel like she realized that being transphobic wasn't great
Speaker 2: for her image, so she walked back a lot of
Speaker 2: her comments in order to restore her image. Or maybe
Speaker 2: she genuinely learned and listened and feels differently. We haven't
Speaker 2: really heard anything about it since, I don't think, because
Speaker 2: the following year it was when she was in the
Speaker 2: news again, but this time revolving around the Me Too movement.
Speaker 3: Thank you for sharing that because I was not aware.
Speaker 2: Oh I remembered when it happened, So I like that
Speaker 2: was just in the back of my mind as I
Speaker 2: was watching the movie.
Speaker 4: I've just skimmed her apology from twenty nineteen. I don't
Speaker 4: know if that's the one you're referencing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, from I think Pink News.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and you know it's not certainly not my apology
Speaker 4: to accept, but I don't mind it. It's an apology.
Speaker 4: But I am skimming while we're on the.
Speaker 2: In real time.
Speaker 4: So yeah, I completely forgot all about that. Yeah, I
Speaker 4: mean she's put her foot in it a few times,
Speaker 4: I feel, yes, And she's also done a lot of
Speaker 4: really cool and brave stuff, so she's.
Speaker 2: A complicated figure. Well she has leave it at that,
Speaker 2: I suppose, yeah, she is. Do we have any other
Speaker 2: thoughts about the movie?
Speaker 3: I don't think so. I mean I wanted to echo
Speaker 3: what Crystal said earlier and that like, this is a
Speaker 3: very white movie. I think the only people of color
Speaker 3: who have any I mean, it's really just Detective Pam
Speaker 3: Greer and she's doing a terrible job. And there's a
Speaker 3: Tatiana Ali character as a Tatiana Ali fan named Brenda,
Speaker 3: who appears for a hot second.
Speaker 2: Oh, she tries to befriend Violet.
Speaker 3: Yes, and she's just like, you're so awesome. Also, my
Speaker 3: name is Brenda, and then she's gone, your your.
Speaker 4: Like she was in Fresh Prince right.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, she's a Titan of Nicked Knight to me.
Speaker 3: But yeah, outside of that, it is like a very
Speaker 3: very white movie in a way that is in no
Speaker 3: way necessary, Like not that it's ever necessary, but there's
Speaker 3: no like historical context. We have no idea where this
Speaker 3: movie is necessarily taking place, Like it should be a
Speaker 3: more diverse world with a more diverse cast, and instead
Speaker 3: it is nineteen ninety nine, and these kinds of creative
Speaker 3: decisions were made all the time.
Speaker 2: Yes, as far as the Bechdel test goes, not a problem,
Speaker 2: not a problem, passes a lot. In fact, they're rarely
Speaker 2: talking about boys. They're almost always talking about how do
Speaker 2: we cover up the murder of our friend that we did?
Speaker 2: And I'm gonna make you a star?
Speaker 3: Yeah, why do we hate each other? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, so that is nice. I do appreciate that boys
Speaker 2: are not the center of their worlds, the way a
Speaker 2: lot of media about teen girls like presents boys as
Speaker 2: being so much of their focus and every thing. But
Speaker 2: like the prom king character, this good looking jock boy
Speaker 2: is like an afterthought in most scenes if he appears
Speaker 2: at all, and the only time he gets prominently featured
Speaker 2: is when Courtney kind of forces him into filating a
Speaker 2: popsicle and you know, feel about that how you want.
Speaker 3: But outside of Zach, though, I I mean, yeah, men
Speaker 3: really have no consequence in this world exactly, And that's
Speaker 3: a rare thing to see in a movie's fun.
Speaker 2: As far as our nipple scale, man, this is another
Speaker 2: one of those movies where I'm just like, I don't
Speaker 2: know two and a half. I'll just do again the
Speaker 2: backdol cast cheat code, which is just split the diffs,
Speaker 2: split down the middle two point five. I appreciate its
Speaker 2: legacy as a cult movie with a following that is
Speaker 2: largely She's the A's and gays kind of thing. It
Speaker 2: does center women by and large. The women are misbehaving,
Speaker 2: and I do appreciate that. I like to see girls
Speaker 2: doing bad things sometimes.
Speaker 3: Wow, that's really brave stance to take.
Speaker 4: Girls gone wild if you will.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I love it when girls go wild.
Speaker 3: Yeah, rarely behaved women history make make said somebody.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Fritz magnet.
Speaker 2: So I do appreciate that, and I don't mind that
Speaker 2: it's like an entry into the like ouvra of mean
Speaker 2: girls being mean to each other in high school. I
Speaker 2: just wish that there were more examples of that not
Speaker 2: being the case that do center teen girls having like
Speaker 2: solid friendships. But it's an interesting movie. It's way too white.
Speaker 2: The way it handles the concept of rape allegations and
Speaker 2: false rape allegations is very, very messy, and the thing
Speaker 2: that holds up the least well about the movie, I
Speaker 2: think because of that, I'll drop it down to two nipples.
Speaker 2: I'll give one to Pam Greer and I'll give the
Speaker 2: other to Judy Greer. The Greers get my.
Speaker 3: Nips, I'll do two and a half. I think that
Speaker 3: this movie is like taking a lot of big swings.
Speaker 3: It is. I wish it had done better at the time.
Speaker 3: I understand maybe why it didn't, because there were a
Speaker 3: lot of movies like this and just such a glut
Speaker 3: of teen movies in this particular year. But I also
Speaker 3: think that you know, very often with marginalized directors, they
Speaker 3: don't get the marketing power behind their work that they deserve.
Speaker 3: And I admire what Darren Stan's going for here. I
Speaker 3: think that there's a lot of the big swings do
Speaker 3: not connect for me, but you know, I think it's
Speaker 3: earned its place in the Sleepover pantheon. So I'll go
Speaker 3: two and a half nipples. I'm gonna give I'm given
Speaker 3: a full set to Pam Greer because she just was
Speaker 3: cracking me up. Her character also wildly inconsistent, where she's
Speaker 3: like really onto the girls and then just drops it
Speaker 3: for what who knows, And I'll give my final half
Speaker 3: nip two. I guess I'll give it to the Denim
Speaker 3: Jacket that Rebecca gay heartwars because it does a lot
Speaker 3: of narrative heavy lifting. The jacket didn't know it had
Speaker 3: to work that hard, and I respect that.
Speaker 4: Yes, I'm going to go a little higher. I think
Speaker 4: I'm going to go three and a half nipples, And
Speaker 4: that's partially, I think because of the nostalgia I have
Speaker 4: for this movie. But I agree with everything that you've said.
Speaker 4: You know, a lot of the swings don't connect, but
Speaker 4: I think a lot of them do, and I think
Speaker 4: it's kind of a really important stepping stone movie for
Speaker 4: a lot of what we've got today. So I'm really,
Speaker 4: really happy it exists, and it's been a formative movie
Speaker 4: for me in lots of ways, so I'm glad about it.
Speaker 4: I'm going to give a half nipple to that stillborn chick.
Speaker 3: Thank god. Dad is great.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and I'm going to give the three nipples to
Speaker 4: the goth girl. Oh yes, who puts her finger in
Speaker 4: the ball.
Speaker 3: Yeah, bless her heart.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Oh my gosh. Well, Crystal, thank you so much
Speaker 2: for joining us.
Speaker 4: Thank you for I don't know if we cracked it,
Speaker 4: but we kind of did. It turns out it's complicated,
Speaker 4: it's tricky, it's chicky.
Speaker 2: We didn't break the jawbreaker, I would say, but we
Speaker 2: gave it.
Speaker 4: Are all we peeled off a couple layers.
Speaker 2: Onions have layers, jaw breakers have layers. What would you
Speaker 2: like to plug? Tell us where we can find your stuff?
Speaker 4: Ah, thank you. You can follow me on all the
Speaker 4: channels at Crystal We'll see you now. And I've got
Speaker 4: all kinds of content all the time, So check.
Speaker 2: It out, please do. It's great, and you can follow
Speaker 2: us on Instagram at Bechdel Cast. You can subscribe to
Speaker 2: our Patreon aka Maatreon at patreon dot com slash Bechdel
Speaker 2: Cast where you'll get two bonus episodes every single month
Speaker 2: with Jamie and myself. We're talking really cool themes, we're
Speaker 2: talking really sassy sex. See episodes. You know you don't
Speaker 2: want to miss them.
Speaker 3: It's a friggin blast. I'll say it. I'll say it. Yeah.
Speaker 3: In this month, I mean, we're obviously getting into scary
Speaker 3: movie season, so we are covering Pearl and the Exorcist,
Speaker 3: and you also get the backlog of over one hundred
Speaker 3: and fifty episodes going on two hundred at this point.
Speaker 3: I think so join the Matreon. It's a fun community,
Speaker 3: and if you're looking for a way to support the show,
Speaker 3: that's the best way to support the show truly. You
Speaker 3: can also get our merch at teapublic dot com. Slash
Speaker 3: the Bechdel Cast, get all your holiday needs whatever. None
Speaker 3: of our business. It's none of our business. Okay.
Speaker 2: Oh, we have spooky seasons coming up, and so you're
Speaker 2: gonna want our beetlejuice wet scabs, dry scabs shirts.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I was thinking a suspicious lack of what scabs.
Speaker 3: We should have been pushing those shirts ahead of the
Speaker 3: new movie.
Speaker 2: But beetlejuice, beetlejuice.
Speaker 3: Slip laugh love with that.
Speaker 2: Shell, we get in the trunk of our friend's car
Speaker 2: on per.
Speaker 4: I'm getting on the hood, okay.
Speaker 2: And then we'll have a little fun road trip.
Speaker 3: We'll see you next week.
Speaker 2: Game by Hi. The Bechdel Cast is a production of iHeartMedia,
Speaker 2: hosted by Caitlin Derante and Jamie Loftis, produced by Sophie Lichterman,
Speaker 2: edited by Mola Board. Our theme song was composed by
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