Speaker 1: On the Bechdel Cast.
Speaker 2: The questions asked if movies have women and them, are
Speaker 2: all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands, or do they
Speaker 2: have individualism? The patriarchy z Eph and Beast start changing with.
Speaker 1: The Bechdel Cast. Jamie, there is no you and me.
Speaker 2: We are one who popped out of Who's bad? That's up?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Who's the matrix and who's the other self?
Speaker 2: Depends on the day listeners, depends.
Speaker 1: On sound off in the comments. Well, it's the Substance episode.
Speaker 2: It is true. I'm very excited. Here we are the
Speaker 2: movie that launched a thousand takes, and here's ours.
Speaker 1: Here's I like it.
Speaker 2: It's fun My propose intro is going to be ah
Speaker 2: the French hmmm like the orson Ball's commercial member.
Speaker 1: Oh no, I don't remember that.
Speaker 2: Okay, well I swear sound off in the comments if
Speaker 2: you remember that and thought it was funny. Anyways, Yes,
Speaker 2: we are covering the Substance. This is the Bechdel Cast.
Speaker 2: We are lining this up to come up right around
Speaker 2: the Oscars.
Speaker 1: H Yes, However, we are recording it in early February.
Speaker 1: The episode will come out like a month later after
Speaker 1: the Oscars. So we're not sure.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so we don't know how they did. We don't
Speaker 2: know how they did. We just know how we feel.
Speaker 1: We know how we feel. But it is nominated for
Speaker 1: Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay,
Speaker 1: Best Actress for Demi Moore, and Best Makeup and Hairstyling.
Speaker 2: So I'm thrilled about this. It all makes sense. I
Speaker 2: am just like, I'm so happy that weird movies are
Speaker 2: being nominated for Oscars in recent years. I feel like
Speaker 2: you have your kind of typical I'm gonna just throw
Speaker 2: a random person under the butt. I guess like most
Speaker 2: people who for biopics to be perfectly honest, like, that's
Speaker 2: an Oscar Baby performance if you do a good job
Speaker 2: and you're of note and of especially if you look
Speaker 2: a little weird and I mean a little weird or
Speaker 2: just not conventionally attractive. But that is simply not what
Speaker 2: Demi Moore is. I mean, it's what she's doing to
Speaker 2: such an extreme that I feel like this is not
Speaker 2: an Oscar bait. This is about as far from an
Speaker 2: Oscar Baby performance as you could get, because this movie
Speaker 2: could have been so bad. True, I feel like in
Speaker 2: the wrong hands or really just like a male director.
Speaker 2: This movie could have been like comically bad, and I
Speaker 2: think bad for to me Moore's career. I'm glad that
Speaker 2: that's not the way it went. Anyways, I love this movie.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so, Jamie, what's your relationship with it? Did you
Speaker 1: see it in theater?
Speaker 2: Google the Bechdels test, Google the Bexxels test.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I forgot about that part of the show.
Speaker 2: If you don't know what the Bechdel test is, you
Speaker 2: have no business listening to our takes on the Substance,
Speaker 2: Like fair, go back to second grade. Okay, I saw
Speaker 2: The Substance in theaters twice. I rewatched it with a
Speaker 2: Bechda lens, which is, I want to say, a very
Speaker 2: different I guess it is a very different experience, but
Speaker 2: not in a way that made me feel less enthusiastic
Speaker 2: about the movie, I guess, But I was just like,
Speaker 2: looking at different aspects of it and looking into the
Speaker 2: production is really interesting. But yeah, I was thinking about
Speaker 2: the first time I saw this movie in theaters was
Speaker 2: the night it came out, because I really enjoyed Cora
Speaker 2: Lee Farsia's first movie, Revenge, which is I think it's
Speaker 2: a French language film, that came out I think in
Speaker 2: twenty seventeen. That sounds right, And I watched it with
Speaker 2: my friend Sarah when we were high on mushrooms in
Speaker 2: a hotel room in Montreal. So we were like, let's
Speaker 2: watch something French, and we watched Revenge and it is like,
Speaker 2: it's a very different movie from the substance, And I
Speaker 2: want to talk about how the ways I feel like
Speaker 2: those movies are in conversation with each other, because Revenge is,
Speaker 2: you know, the revenge genre I think is like very
Speaker 2: fraught with being more interested in rape than revenge. That's
Speaker 2: not an original observation, but Revenge is literally just I mean,
Speaker 2: it's that is what the revenge is in response to.
Speaker 2: But the movie is ninety nine point nine percent revenge.
Speaker 1: Okay, sounds like something that we should cover for Revenge
Speaker 1: bur on the Matreon.
Speaker 2: We really should. Yeah, it's a good contribution to that genre.
Speaker 2: And I feel like it's sort of saying something about
Speaker 2: like external violence towards women and then this movie is
Speaker 2: more like self inflicted violence. Anyways, I really enjoyed this movie.
Speaker 2: The thing I wanted to say was the first time
Speaker 2: I saw it was the night it came out, and
Speaker 2: I know a lot of people who've seen this movie,
Speaker 2: especially early. I think you did too, Like had the
Speaker 2: experience of just like it was a wild theatrical experience
Speaker 2: because no one knew what was going to happen. Everyone
Speaker 2: was like, oh my god, like and there's lot of laughter, yeah,
Speaker 2: because it's a funny movie. But I will say that
Speaker 2: I went with my boyfriend now fiance, and my fiance
Speaker 2: I did it all the time. Now yes he is, yes,
Speaker 2: and as my wife in practiced if not yet, Yeah,
Speaker 2: he's always saying that is that he says.
Speaker 1: That to you every day and I'm always like the
Speaker 1: aggressive guy.
Speaker 2: No, So we saw it together. The audience, I will say,
Speaker 2: was more men than not. And there were fun aspects
Speaker 2: of it, like the movie is so gross, which I
Speaker 2: love because I am squeamish, but I love gross movies.
Speaker 2: There was a guy, you know, I think, like a
Speaker 2: stereotypically like masculine looking like muscular guy who got up
Speaker 2: and left three different times but kept coming back. And
Speaker 2: where he he left during the shrimp scene.
Speaker 1: Truly one of the grossest scenes in the movie.
Speaker 2: I think that was like a submovie. I was really
Speaker 2: enjoyed because he like clearly I really wanted to finish
Speaker 2: the movie, but the movie does not let up in
Speaker 2: getting grosser, and he was just he was struggling. I
Speaker 2: get it. But when we were talking about the movie afterwards,
Speaker 2: I was trying to like articulate a feeling I was
Speaker 2: having about, like I loved the movie. I get this.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's like you, I don't know, everyone gets
Speaker 2: this way about movies. It's maybe a little immature, but
Speaker 2: sometimes I'm like I understood it and those guys did it.
Speaker 2: But I did feel like there were moments that elicited
Speaker 2: laughter in the movie that really felt bad and frustrating
Speaker 2: to me, especially when it's I felt like this movie,
Speaker 2: to me, you're like laughing almost with the characters because
Speaker 2: you can somehow relate to even though this is not
Speaker 2: something you would or could do to yourself. It feels
Speaker 2: like a nightmare you would have about your sort of
Speaker 2: worst intentions towards yourself. But I feel like there was
Speaker 2: a portion of that audience that was laughing at her
Speaker 2: and not with her. And I don't know, like I
Speaker 2: can't describe quite how, but I do wonder if there's
Speaker 2: listeners you.
Speaker 1: Just know you know when someone's laughing for the wrong reason.
Speaker 2: And you know when a guy says they liked the
Speaker 2: substance for the wrong reason, you could just feel it.
Speaker 2: And I was trying to articulate this to Grant and
Speaker 2: like he mostly got it. But it's also like men
Speaker 2: don't really need to contend with that feeling very much.
Speaker 2: Because I love body horror, and I love body horror
Speaker 2: movies made by women. This is no exception. But it
Speaker 2: just felt like there were a lot of people who
Speaker 2: left that movie and they're, like, I love that, but
Speaker 2: they were laughing at her more often than empathizing with her,
Speaker 2: and I don't necessarily I mean, I know you could argue, well,
Speaker 2: that's the director's fault. I don't think so. I think
Speaker 2: I think a lot of the negative takes about this
Speaker 2: movie is people expecting too much of one movie. Like, sorry,
Speaker 2: I'm already babbling. What was your experienceive seeing.
Speaker 1: I too saw it in theaters twice early on. I
Speaker 1: don't know if I saw it opening night. I truly
Speaker 1: don't have a memory.
Speaker 2: And an opening weekend at least.
Speaker 1: Yes, we talked about it shortly after right the first
Speaker 1: movie going experience with it was a raucous good time.
Speaker 2: I mean it is really fun.
Speaker 1: But I was also in a theater where I was like,
Speaker 1: some of these people and some of these men, they're
Speaker 1: not laughing for the right reasons. They're not laughing at
Speaker 1: the right parts or you know. But I didn't let
Speaker 1: that deter me from having a great time. I loved it.
Speaker 2: Nor should it.
Speaker 1: Nor should it? And then I saw it again, maybe
Speaker 1: like a month later it was in theaters for It's
Speaker 1: still kind of I was back in theaters.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, after the nominations.
Speaker 1: So I saw it like a month or a month
Speaker 1: and a half later. I dressed up as Elizabeth for Halloween.
Speaker 1: I saw it a third time during a horror movie
Speaker 1: marathon in October. So like, I've seen it a few
Speaker 1: times now, and each time I've watched it, I've had
Speaker 1: a slightly different viewing experience. I haven't had really different
Speaker 1: feelings on it. I feel like my my takes and
Speaker 1: thoughts are still processing, I will say, and I think
Speaker 1: I'll maybe feel differently about this movie in a year
Speaker 1: and five years.
Speaker 2: Right, which is why we don't usually cover movies right
Speaker 2: when they come up. But this movie is so begging
Speaker 2: to be covered on this show that it's like, no, well,
Speaker 2: we can recover it later if our feelings changed.
Speaker 1: You know, not true. Yeah, give us five years. We
Speaker 1: might hate our original take and we'll just redo it.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I very much enjoyed this movie. It was probably,
Speaker 1: if not my favorite movie of twenty twenty four, in
Speaker 1: the top three. I had a great time, and I'm
Speaker 1: excited to discuss me too.
Speaker 2: Oh, I'm excited for you to see Revenge too. I'm
Speaker 2: curious what you think.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's on my list. Let's just do a revenge
Speaker 1: bur in, I don't know, March.
Speaker 2: Whenever we feel like it. Really, that's the beauty. That's
Speaker 2: our revenge, is our blatant disregard for months exactly.
Speaker 1: Let's take a quick break and then we'll come back
Speaker 1: for the recap.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and we're back, all right.
Speaker 1: Here is the recap of the substance.
Speaker 2: Oh, I wonder if this is weirdly quick recap.
Speaker 1: It is actually kind of long because it's a long
Speaker 1: same movie. It's two hours and twenty minutes. That is
Speaker 1: my one complain about the movie. If it's a bit
Speaker 1: longer than I think it needs to be.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm like, but I wouldn't. I don't know what
Speaker 2: I would cut necessarily anyways, I.
Speaker 1: Wouldn't cut scenes, like whole scenes or anything like that.
Speaker 1: I would just like shave some of the stuff down.
Speaker 2: We see like repetitive.
Speaker 1: Information that I think we could just like trim a bit.
Speaker 2: Sure.
Speaker 1: Anyway, we open on an egg that is injected with
Speaker 1: a Dare I say Shrek colored liquid?
Speaker 2: It is Shrekian and I, which leads to the question,
Speaker 2: has Coraley Fresh I've seen Shrek and.
Speaker 1: On I bet she has.
Speaker 2: I wonder, I wonder if she. I don't know. I've
Speaker 2: watched a lot of interviews with her, and maybe it's
Speaker 2: just because I find French people hard to read.
Speaker 1: They're mysterious, Yes they are.
Speaker 2: And I mean listen, Julia do Carno and Courley Fresh
Speaker 2: like two of my absolute favorites. I'm just like, would
Speaker 2: they watch Shrek? I don't know. We gotta go to
Speaker 2: a Q and A and really disrespect the artist by
Speaker 2: acting an unrelated.
Speaker 1: Have you seen Shrek? I think we should just have
Speaker 1: Coraley on the podcast and ask her there. She's so cool. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: she's our biggest fan probably, so it shouldn't be that hard.
Speaker 1: And I read in an interview with her that she
Speaker 1: grew up on a diet of American movies. So I
Speaker 1: think it is very possible that she has seen Shrek.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, I hope she saw it in theaters anyway, Sorry.
Speaker 1: Anyways, So there is this lime green subs the titular
Speaker 1: substance that is injected into the yolk of an egg,
Speaker 1: and then the yolk multiplies and becomes two yolks. I
Speaker 1: said that word really weird.
Speaker 2: Yolks. You hit the L.
Speaker 1: I mean there is an L in it. Yeah, anyway,
Speaker 1: I thought you did great, so thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Then we see a star on the Hollywood Walk of
Speaker 1: Fame in Hollywood, California. Ever heard of it? It's being
Speaker 1: made for Elizabeth Sparkle. She is a popular star at
Speaker 1: the beginning of her career, but as the years pass,
Speaker 1: we see excitement about her dwindle. Then we finally meet
Speaker 1: Elizabeth Sparkle on screen. She's, of course, played by Demi Moore.
Speaker 1: She currently hosts a kind of like nineties style fitness
Speaker 1: slash aerobics TV show.
Speaker 2: It reminds me a lot of like as someone who
Speaker 2: did the Jane Fonda workout Old day of Lockdown. I
Speaker 2: think that was yeah, like the eighties, nineties kind of vibe.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So the show's called Sparkle Your Life. And after
Speaker 1: the show, she goes into the restroom where she overhears
Speaker 1: her head of the network boss Harvey, played by Dennis Quaid,
Speaker 1: who I.
Speaker 2: Was just like, what are we doing? And also like
Speaker 2: why does he do a good job? Is it because
Speaker 2: he's so familiar with being diabolical? But I didn't want
Speaker 2: to say. I found out in an interview. I don't
Speaker 2: know if you saw this, that the part was originally
Speaker 2: going to be for Ray Liota Lioda and then he died,
Speaker 2: so that I was like, all right, as long as
Speaker 2: he wasn't the first pick.
Speaker 1: I guess. Yeah. But Dennis Quaid, despite him being a
Speaker 1: person with a very bad politics, does a really great
Speaker 1: job as this character.
Speaker 2: He's a really great despicable piece of shit, right, and
Speaker 2: that's just his performance in Reagan, Am I right, lady?
Speaker 1: Anyway, So he's a very loud, obnoxious misogyny and Elizabeth
Speaker 1: overhears him saying that he is canceling Elizabeth's show and
Speaker 1: replacing her with someone younger. Elizabeth is obviously very upset
Speaker 1: about this. There's also the scene where Harvey's eating shrimp
Speaker 1: very grotesquely.
Speaker 2: And like the fish eye lens that they use it.
Speaker 2: It's so yucky. I love it. I also really liked
Speaker 2: I don't know, just like watching it again and looking
Speaker 2: at the way that he talks to her, like, well,
Speaker 2: you knew this was going to happen. I don't know,
Speaker 2: I just I appreciated like that choice of like, well,
Speaker 2: I'm not you know, first of all, he doesn't care
Speaker 2: how she feels, but also I think he does believe
Speaker 2: that she assumed this was going.
Speaker 1: To happen to her, right, because he says something like
Speaker 1: after fifty, it just stops, meaning like, once you turn
Speaker 1: fifty years old as a woman.
Speaker 2: My ability to give a shit about you.
Speaker 1: Because she's like, what stops and he cannot articulate at
Speaker 1: all what he means it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean it's great.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So she learns that she's getting fired. On her
Speaker 1: way home, Elizabeth gets into a car accident, so she
Speaker 1: goes to the doctor, and there a young physician examines
Speaker 1: her and says that she's a good candidate for what
Speaker 1: we wonder. Turns out he had slipped something in her pocket,
Speaker 1: a flash drive labeled the substance.
Speaker 2: And he says it changed.
Speaker 1: No, Yeah, there's a little note. Then a man named
Speaker 1: Fred like jump Scare approaches her on the sidewalk. This
Speaker 1: is someone she knew from high school, and he's like,
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, you're the most beautiful woman in the
Speaker 1: world and you're still beautiful. We should go out for
Speaker 1: a drink sometime.
Speaker 2: And she's like, this does capture a jump Scare person
Speaker 2: from high school? Feeling very well.
Speaker 1: Yes, but anyway, She's like, m yeah, no, thank you,
Speaker 1: and then she goes home to see what's on the
Speaker 1: flash drive. It's basically a commercial for the substance, something
Speaker 1: that will make you younger and more beautiful and more perfect.
Speaker 2: But there's just one rule. You must respect the balance.
Speaker 1: Respect the balance.
Speaker 2: Seven days mean more, seven days mark requality.
Speaker 1: It's like the Ring seven days.
Speaker 2: I thought that too. I was like opening scene of
Speaker 2: scary gross movie that it warns you that you'll die
Speaker 2: in seven days if you fuck around.
Speaker 1: So the way this works is the substance takes your
Speaker 1: DNA and creates a new and quote unquote better version
Speaker 1: of yourself where you live life as your original self,
Speaker 1: which they call the matrix for one week, and then
Speaker 1: you swap with your younger other self and live as
Speaker 1: them for a week, and you keep going back and
Speaker 1: forth week after week. But the important thing to remember
Speaker 1: is that you are not separate people. There is no
Speaker 1: her and me. You are one I thought.
Speaker 2: Of as interesting, and this isn't a criticism because this
Speaker 2: movie doesn't work unless you operate on kind of like
Speaker 2: symbolic dream logic. But that they could not like even
Speaker 2: though they are technically one person, they don't share memories
Speaker 2: like they have to piece together what the other did.
Speaker 1: So I to this day am not clear on that exactly,
Speaker 1: because the movie, it is easy for the audience to
Speaker 1: forget that they are the same person, partly because we
Speaker 1: see them as two different people on screen, like two
Speaker 1: different actors. They're visibly different, but also they routinely forget
Speaker 1: that they are the same person because the substance hotline
Speaker 1: guy has to always remind them there's no her and you.
Speaker 2: That little meddling sicko right at substance HQ.
Speaker 1: So I think there's definitely a read where they don't
Speaker 1: share memories and they have to like figure out what
Speaker 1: the other one has been up to. But I think
Speaker 1: there's also a read where they are sharing memories, and
Speaker 1: it's just that they're resenting each other's choices so much
Speaker 1: that it just seems like they're Oh yeah, that was
Speaker 1: my read of it.
Speaker 2: At least that's the true I guess I viewed it
Speaker 2: as like, because these are two different parts of Elizabeth,
Speaker 2: that she is so out of touch with herself and
Speaker 2: so uncomfortable in herself that like she can't get these
Speaker 2: like two parts of her to communicate because of that disagreement.
Speaker 2: Either way, it explains away this problem, right right. I
Speaker 2: don't think even think it's a problem. It feels intentional.
Speaker 1: Mm hmm.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean, I agree that they're so out of sync,
Speaker 1: but that's why it seems like they don't share memories, sure,
Speaker 1: but that they actually do. I don't know. Again, you
Speaker 1: could read it I think both.
Speaker 2: Ways, but I think both both definitely work. I had
Speaker 2: like all of these alternate pitches of like what if
Speaker 2: the substance was like this in the version where the
Speaker 2: substance is like a very gentle, sweet story of love
Speaker 2: and friendship, they would be like writing each other these
Speaker 2: beautiful letters for the other to read, like a letter
Speaker 2: to my younger sheff bye, And then she'd be like
Speaker 2: it would be kind of like I haven't seen My
Speaker 2: Old Ass, but it feels like that.
Speaker 1: Oh sure, I did see My Old Ass. It is
Speaker 1: kind of like that. Although they're on screen together interacting
Speaker 1: throughout that movie, right, but if they're writing letters to
Speaker 1: each other, that's kind of like the movie The lake House.
Speaker 2: I loved the movie The lake House. I did. Yeah,
Speaker 2: it's like mother daughter lake House or like younger self,
Speaker 2: Older Self lake House. Obviously this is not that movie.
Speaker 2: I also was like, I had a theory that I
Speaker 2: posted to letterbox dot com. Give me a follow over there,
Speaker 2: Jamie alert is my username.
Speaker 1: And while you're at it, give me a follow please.
Speaker 2: Hello, So my theory after watching this of this for
Speaker 2: the third time, Okay, I'm just going to read it please.
Speaker 2: This movie is a Xanax nightmare that Elizabeth Sparkle has
Speaker 2: the day she's fired by Dennis Quaid over shrimp. She
Speaker 2: wakes up the next morning and starts applying to masters programs,
Speaker 2: asking around about ghostwriters for her memoir, and looking up
Speaker 2: the prices of ranches in upstate New York. She lives
Speaker 2: another thirty five years and starts a terrible wine brand
Speaker 2: and a terrible podcast. She is sort of happy, that
Speaker 2: is I think the true ending, because this whole movie
Speaker 2: it just is like a nightmare. Or I read in
Speaker 2: a review from The White Pube it's she said something like,
Speaker 2: it's like a game of the Sims being played by
Speaker 2: the most depressed person in the world. Oh wow, for
Speaker 2: the spaces are weirdly vacant. There's nowhere to go, there's
Speaker 2: no one to talk to, it's weirdly aggressive. There's either
Speaker 2: too much food or no food at all. Like, it
Speaker 2: just is like a really scary game of the Sims.
Speaker 2: And I like that reading.
Speaker 1: I love that reading too. My version of this movie
Speaker 1: would be when she's the older Demi Moore version, she
Speaker 1: just takes like week long vacations every time. It's like
Speaker 1: her turn to exist. Yeah, and then she just like
Speaker 1: has a nice time on vacation for a.
Speaker 2: Week at a time, go incognito mode.
Speaker 1: And then her younger self works and like.
Speaker 2: Yeah, brings home the bacon. But Sue that disrespectful tell
Speaker 2: me about it. Anyways, we'll get we'll get to Sue,
Speaker 2: we'll get there.
Speaker 1: Okay. So Elizabeth has watched this commercial about the substance
Speaker 1: and she learns about what the deal is and she
Speaker 1: is not interested at first, but then she changes her
Speaker 1: mind and calls the number on the flash drive. She
Speaker 1: places an order for the substance, and she's given an
Speaker 1: address In the mail. She receives a key card with
Speaker 1: the number five oh three on it. She heads to
Speaker 1: the address where there are like lockers. One is labeled
Speaker 1: five O three and inside is a starter kit for
Speaker 1: the substance. There's an activator fluid which says single use,
Speaker 1: discard after use, which is important. There's like stabilizer apparatus
Speaker 1: for the quote unquote other self to use. There is
Speaker 1: food for both the like original matrix and the other self.
Speaker 1: And the idea is that you activate once, you stabilize
Speaker 1: every day, and you switch every seven days, and remember
Speaker 1: you are one.
Speaker 2: It's the best like Little Monkey Pa situation in the
Speaker 2: world because you're like, Okay, this would only work with
Speaker 2: someone who had a stable sense of self. But if
Speaker 2: you have a stable sense of self, you would never
Speaker 2: use the substance. Sell what are you getta do?
Speaker 1: So Elizabeth goes to her bathroom and injects herself with
Speaker 1: the Shrek color activator fluid, and then it begins. She collapses,
Speaker 1: Her back begins to split open, and she births Margaret Qually.
Speaker 2: The whole Audiees is screaming, let's go, let's go, let's go.
Speaker 1: And this other self she has a cute button nose,
Speaker 1: thick wavy locks, taut round buttocks. Yes, that is a
Speaker 1: quote from Shrek to thank you so much.
Speaker 2: Well done, well done.
Speaker 1: Well well let's cause did you see that meme going
Speaker 1: around where it's comparing Shrek too with the substance No,
Speaker 1: let me show you. I'm gonna text, wowk you thank you.
Speaker 2: This is what friendship is all about. I did appreciate.
Speaker 2: I didn't know this, but that Margaret quality is like
Speaker 2: wearing a lot of prosthetics to be Sue. Like that
Speaker 2: is not her body.
Speaker 1: Oh I didn't realize that either.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she's wearing like chicken cutlets. The boom are fake,
Speaker 2: the butt is fake. Oh, which I guess was like
Speaker 2: a choice by both her and Coralie, where like, I
Speaker 2: know she like worked out a lot to be Sue,
Speaker 2: but like they physically altered. I think that they made
Speaker 2: slight alterations to her face just to like make her
Speaker 2: feel like an uncanny version of herself.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, yeah, okay. So we meet the other self
Speaker 1: played by Margaret qually, she sews up the original Matrix
Speaker 1: self aka Dememur. She puts the feeding tube in her,
Speaker 1: and she has to remember to stabilize, which requires the
Speaker 1: other self to extract some kind of body goo from
Speaker 1: Demimur's spine and inject it into the other self, or
Speaker 1: else she'll get like a bloody nose and she'll get
Speaker 1: all dizzy and sick. Once she stabilizes, the Margaret quality
Speaker 1: other self heads to a cast and call for the
Speaker 1: new Elizabeth Sparkle, and she nails the audition and lands
Speaker 1: the part because she is Elizabeth Sparkle. Although she calls
Speaker 1: herself Sue. The network executive Harvey loves her because she's young, yep,
Speaker 1: and the.
Speaker 2: Way he talks to her is equally disgusting in a
Speaker 2: totally different way. For sure, is like baby angel, mommy daughter,
Speaker 2: Like it's yeah.
Speaker 1: Sue tells him that she can only tape the show
Speaker 1: every other week because she has to take care of
Speaker 1: her sick mother, and Harvey's like, no problem, you're young,
Speaker 1: so I'll bend over backwards for you.
Speaker 2: Right, and like that was not my experience as a
Speaker 2: woman in the workplace, but sure, they're like no work
Speaker 2: twice as hard there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So Sue starts prepping for her fitness show, but
Speaker 1: before she knows it, her first week is up and
Speaker 1: she has to switch back to Elizabeth, who spends most
Speaker 1: of her week watching TV. She does go out though,
Speaker 1: at one point, to pick up her refill kit with
Speaker 1: more injectable food goo and stabilizer containers. Cut to She's
Speaker 1: Sue again, and you can tell that Sue thinks Elizabeth
Speaker 1: is kind of pathetic. She builds a secret room in
Speaker 1: her bathroom to like Elizabeth the most.
Speaker 2: I love that. That is like the somehow the most
Speaker 2: unrealistic thing that happens in the movie is that Sue
Speaker 2: Elizabeth both know how to build like a secret like
Speaker 2: panic room. It's great, Yeah, I'm on board.
Speaker 1: Where did those skills come from? But it's part of
Speaker 1: just like the you know, very heightened reality thing.
Speaker 2: I really like, this whole movie is just a bad dream.
Speaker 2: Like it's it makes sense.
Speaker 1: Yes. Then it's the first taping of the new fitness
Speaker 1: show of Sue's called Pump It Up. And oh, the
Speaker 1: booties are shaking, the hips are thrusting.
Speaker 2: But it is basically just hornier Elizabeth Sparkle because she
Speaker 2: is hornier Elizabeth.
Speaker 1: Bark Right, Sue goes out with her hot young friends.
Speaker 1: She brings home a hot young guy, but oh no,
Speaker 1: it's time to switch back to Elizabeth. But rather than
Speaker 1: doing so when the time runs out, Sue extracts some
Speaker 1: extra stabilizer goo from Elizabeth to give herself a little
Speaker 1: bit of extra time so she can smooch this hot man.
Speaker 2: And she's on the cover of Vogue.
Speaker 1: And she's on the cover of Vogue. When they do
Speaker 1: switch back and Elizabeth wakes up, she notices that one
Speaker 1: of her fas is different. It's like gnarled, and it
Speaker 1: looks much older.
Speaker 2: It's like a snow white witch finger.
Speaker 1: Yes exactly. She panics and calls the Substance Hotline to
Speaker 1: see if it can be reversed, but it cannot, so
Speaker 1: Elizabeth blames Sue. But the guy, the Substance hotline guy,
Speaker 1: is like, remember, there is no her and you. You
Speaker 1: are one, respect the balance.
Speaker 2: The more you say that, the more I'm like, you
Speaker 2: are right. They must share each other's memories.
Speaker 1: I think they share consciousness, they share memories. They just
Speaker 1: like really resent the hell out of each other.
Speaker 2: Right, They just hate each other so much that they
Speaker 2: are like blind to each other's intentions or something, or
Speaker 2: even at the end where you know, Demi Moore is like, nah,
Speaker 2: I can't kill you because I hate myself and you're like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 2: it's true. But the guy on the other side of
Speaker 2: the substance hotline, he cracks me up. But he's such
Speaker 2: a little asshole. Where she's like, well, she's using too
Speaker 2: much of her time, and he's like respect it. Click,
Speaker 2: You're like, damn, okay.
Speaker 1: He's a bitch. Yeah, voiced by an actor named jan Bean.
Speaker 2: Well, he did great.
Speaker 1: He did a great job anyway, So he's like respect
Speaker 1: the balance. So Elizabeth is furious. She's clearly starting to
Speaker 1: resent Sue. She goes to pick up another refill kit
Speaker 1: and bumps into an old man who she realizes is
Speaker 1: the older version of the young doctor who had told
Speaker 1: her about the substance originally. He kind of reminds her
Speaker 1: that the older versions of themselves still deserve to exist,
Speaker 1: that they still matter. But she's very shaken up about
Speaker 1: this whole interaction.
Speaker 2: I mean, it is very scary.
Speaker 1: It's alarming. Yeah, And she goes home and she calls
Speaker 1: that guy Fred, the one she knew from high school
Speaker 1: who said you're the most beautiful woman in the whole
Speaker 1: wide world. And she asks if he wants to go
Speaker 1: out with her, and they plan a date for that night.
Speaker 1: But as Elizabeth is getting ready, she's clearly feeling very insecure.
Speaker 1: She's applying more and more makeup, she's fussing with her hair,
Speaker 1: maybe trying to look younger. Perhaps there's a billboard of
Speaker 1: Sue that's very prominently displayed right outside her window.
Speaker 2: I love that. I also because this VIVIEO is shot
Speaker 2: in like mostly France, that's all like a painting, Yeah,
Speaker 2: which is cool.
Speaker 1: I mean, so many of the technical things about this
Speaker 1: movie are really awesome, like the production design, the sound design, yeah,
Speaker 1: the cinematography, all that stuff is like just so incredible. Anyway,
Speaker 1: so this billboard is like taunting Elizabeth and she ends
Speaker 1: up having a breakdown and she bails on the date
Speaker 1: and stays home, and like binge eats cut to Sue
Speaker 1: at a taping of her fitness show, and something weird happens.
Speaker 1: There's a big bulge that like temporarily pops out of
Speaker 1: her butt cheek.
Speaker 2: This scene is it was really fun to watch it
Speaker 2: in audience. But also like again, just like the nightmare
Speaker 2: quality of how they're like, wait a sec, like it
Speaker 2: moves so slow, but I don't know. Obviously, Sue is
Speaker 2: not the more empathetic or sympathetic of the characters, but
Speaker 2: I felt so bad for her. Where they're like, oh,
Speaker 2: something looks weird, let's put it up so everyone can see,
Speaker 2: and they're like, let's make it really slow.
Speaker 1: Frame she's panicking, nightmare. She goes to her dressing room
Speaker 1: and pulls a chicken drumstick out of her belly button. Awesome, horrifying.
Speaker 1: I have a belly button thing, any fetish, No, I'm
Speaker 1: so grossed out by belly button things, like the scene
Speaker 1: from The Matrix when they pull the bug out of
Speaker 1: his belly button. I cannot watch it to this day.
Speaker 1: It grosses me out so much. Anyway, so that was
Speaker 1: a horrifying moment in the movie for me. Sue is
Speaker 1: again very frustrated with Elizabeth and she thinks she's about
Speaker 1: to be fired from her show, but it turns out
Speaker 1: that Sue is actually so popular that they're having her
Speaker 1: host the network's New Year's Eve show. This is a
Speaker 1: huge opportunity, which again.
Speaker 2: It's just like right, the New Year's Eve show that
Speaker 2: we all love exactly.
Speaker 1: She's basically Ryan Seacrest question Mark.
Speaker 2: Except Ryan Seacrest hosts something. It's like, it doesn't it's
Speaker 2: so unclear what is supposed to happen at this show
Speaker 2: where they're like there's dancers and there's Margaret Qualley and
Speaker 2: you're like, oh, then that's all we know and that's
Speaker 2: all we need to know.
Speaker 1: I never even thought about that.
Speaker 2: Oh, I couldn't stop thinking about it. Also, it's such
Speaker 2: a small audience, Like it really did feel I know
Speaker 2: that you're not a David lynchhead, but that it just
Speaker 2: reminded me of like all of like the vacant theaters
Speaker 2: that scary scenes and David Lynch movies take place in,
Speaker 2: where you're like, why is this space so small? She's
Speaker 2: the most famous person in the world. What is the show? What? Like,
Speaker 2: why are people so excited about her when she can't?
Speaker 2: I mean whatever, it's all like hyper stylized it, but
Speaker 2: like it's just it's just funny.
Speaker 1: They built that entire set, so that's not a real theater.
Speaker 1: They built the theater set because they knew they were
Speaker 1: gonna spray over five thousand gallons of fake blood.
Speaker 2: And Corly Frejo is holding the blood gun the whole time.
Speaker 2: She's like wearing that that like POV shot is like
Speaker 2: wearing the helmet and this we can link it in.
Speaker 2: There's like a half hour making of featurette that's on
Speaker 2: YouTube that you can see so many most of the
Speaker 2: POV shots that's our Coraley Frego with a helmet, Camon
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, like including the body horror shot where
Speaker 2: Margaret Qualley is in the elevator like that's Coralate Like
Speaker 2: it's just uh, it's so cool.
Speaker 1: Hell yeah. Anyway, So the point is, Sue is given
Speaker 1: this opportunity to host the huge New Year's Eve show
Speaker 1: that the network does, and Sue is not gonna let
Speaker 1: Elizabeth screw it up, and she basically starts living as Sue,
Speaker 1: well past her allotted seven days. Sue does finally let
Speaker 1: them switch and let Elizabeth live for a while, but
Speaker 1: all of that extra time has taken a big toll
Speaker 1: on Elizabeth, where basically half of her body is this
Speaker 1: like just old looking haggish for lack of a better term, aesthetic.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean it is like definitely pulling from like
Speaker 2: hag horror AESTHETICI.
Speaker 1: Right, And there's lots to talk about there, we'll get there.
Speaker 1: But she doesn't like the way she looks, and she
Speaker 1: calls the substance hotline and the guy is like, well,
Speaker 1: do you want to stop? You can go back to
Speaker 1: being just you, although there's no reversing any of the
Speaker 1: effects that this experience has had. So because she can't
Speaker 1: reverse anything, she decides to keep going on with it.
Speaker 1: Elizabeth takes out the French cookbook that Harvey had given
Speaker 1: her as a parting gift when she got fired, and
Speaker 1: she starts cooking up a storm.
Speaker 2: We get a hot dog moment, blood sausage.
Speaker 1: Oh right, because like, this is the grossest version of
Speaker 1: French cooking that you've ever seen on screen. This is
Speaker 1: no Julie and Julia. This is no the taste of things.
Speaker 2: It's like, what if all French cooking was mayonnaise and
Speaker 2: rotisserie chicken. Whatever it is.
Speaker 1: It looks nasty as hell, but on purpose, like it
Speaker 1: purposefully is like part of the horror and grotesqueness of
Speaker 1: the movie. Yeah. This cooking scene is intercut with Sue
Speaker 1: guesting on a late night talk show and she's being
Speaker 1: asked about Elizabeth Sparkle and she's like I barely know
Speaker 1: who that is. Her show is so old fashioned. Oh
Speaker 1: me and my beauty secret. Definitely, it's not the substance
Speaker 1: or anything like that.
Speaker 2: Being myself.
Speaker 1: It was like, I just try to be my authentic self.
Speaker 2: That really did hit because many such cases of that,
Speaker 2: I mean, that's like what the yeah, like what the
Speaker 2: whole beauty industry is predicated on. Is it's like, oh,
Speaker 2: it's just be yourself and give us money for this thing,
Speaker 2: or like celebrities who have had other enhancements pretending that
Speaker 2: they just use this tube that you can get for
Speaker 2: fifty dollars at CBS.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, So we cut back to Sue. She
Speaker 1: decides that she's going to stay Sue for a very
Speaker 1: long time, and she extracts a shitload of stabilizer goo
Speaker 1: from Elizabeth's very infected spine.
Speaker 2: Ugh ugh.
Speaker 1: And this is the part where she lives as Sue
Speaker 1: for three full months.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she has like she's in a long term relationship
Speaker 2: with time.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yes, and she's on top of the world and
Speaker 1: the big New Year's Eve show is the next day.
Speaker 1: But when she goes to take out more stabilizer fluid
Speaker 1: from Elizabeth, it's all discolored and rotten, and she has
Speaker 1: no choice but to switch back to Elizabeth to generate
Speaker 1: more of this stabilizer fluid. When they switch, and when
Speaker 1: Elizabeth wakes up, oh boy, she's like full hag mode again.
Speaker 1: I don't know how health to say it, but she's bold.
Speaker 1: She's very like hunched over.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like a again, like a hyper stylized aging
Speaker 2: for sure, yes, which is like I'm interested to talk
Speaker 2: about that with you because I'm like, that's one thing
Speaker 2: where I'm like, I I don't know how to feel about.
Speaker 1: And we'll talk to the same we'll get there. But
Speaker 1: she calls the substance hotline once again, and she says
Speaker 1: she wants to stop the experience, so she is sent
Speaker 1: a termination kit and she kills or attempts to kill
Speaker 1: Sue with a lethal injection. But then she remembers all
Speaker 1: of her hopes and dreams of being a star and
Speaker 1: of being adored by fans, and she changes her mind
Speaker 1: and she wants to bring Sue back because she knows
Speaker 1: that she needs her to live out these dreams. So
Speaker 1: Elizabeth initiates the switch between them, which does bring Sue back,
Speaker 1: but now they're both awake at the same time, which
Speaker 1: is the first time this has happened in the movie.
Speaker 1: Sue realizes that Elizabeth tried to terminate her, so she
Speaker 1: attacks Elizabeth. They scuffle for a while, and Sue really
Speaker 1: beats and bloodies the hell out of Elizabeth.
Speaker 2: Yeah, just I guess to sell you on revenge. Revenge
Speaker 2: is like that scene for an hour and a half. WHOA, Okay,
Speaker 2: it's extremely violent. Yeah yeah, but it's mostly the young
Speaker 2: woman kicking the shit out of her oppressors.
Speaker 1: Yes, that sounds cathartic. This was not cathartic to watch,
Speaker 1: very troubling and difficult because it's so violent and Sue
Speaker 1: is like trying to kill Elizabeth, but she realizes she
Speaker 1: can't because they are one. And she realizes she has
Speaker 1: to get ready for the New Year's Eve show, so
Speaker 1: she goes to the studio, but Sue isn't feeling too great.
Speaker 1: Her teeth a falling out, her ear falls off, and
Speaker 1: she gets the idea, what if she substances herself because
Speaker 1: she now needs a newer and quote unquote better and
Speaker 1: more beautiful version of herself. So she goes back home
Speaker 1: and injects herself with the leftover activator fluid, you know,
Speaker 1: the stuff that you were only supposed to use once
Speaker 1: and throw away.
Speaker 2: I thought the first time I saw this movie that
Speaker 2: that would kill her and that would be it. I
Speaker 2: thought that that was how it was gonna end.
Speaker 1: Got it? But that's not That is not what happens.
Speaker 2: No, it's actually just the end of act two, which
Speaker 2: I did not see coming. Right.
Speaker 1: So she injects herself with this fluid. She collapses, her
Speaker 1: back splits open, and she gives birth to a grotesque
Speaker 1: body horror combination of Elizabeth and Sue, with like body
Speaker 1: parts all over the place. There are multiple faces and
Speaker 1: teeth and breasts.
Speaker 2: Called monstro Eliza, Sue.
Speaker 1: Yes. She puts her dress back on the one that
Speaker 1: she's gonna wear for the show. She makes a little
Speaker 1: mask for herself, and she goes back to the TV
Speaker 1: studio and she steps on stage and everyone is like,
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, what is that? And then she gives
Speaker 1: birth to a breast from a vagina that's on her head,
Speaker 1: and that's feminism.
Speaker 2: And they're flashing back to like all of these like
Speaker 2: cruel things that men have said to her and Sue
Speaker 2: throughout the movie, where it's like now everything's in the
Speaker 2: right place.
Speaker 1: Yes, I wasn't expecting that to like pay off really
Speaker 1: in any way, but.
Speaker 2: I was like, oh, yeah, she's playing five D chests. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Then you watch a titty fallout of a face pussy
Speaker 1: and you're like whooo, yep, yep. People start freaking out
Speaker 1: and they're screaming freak and monster, and then monstro Eliza
Speaker 1: Sue starts to come apart, like literally that she's spraying
Speaker 1: blood all over the audience. This is the like five
Speaker 1: thousand gallons of fake blood.
Speaker 2: It's like Carrie times a million.
Speaker 1: Is Eventually, Eliza Sue makes her way out of the
Speaker 1: studio and onto the street, where she kind of explodes.
Speaker 1: Although Elizabeth's face is still sort of intact and it's
Speaker 1: surrounded by like flesh and guts and it's able to
Speaker 1: sort of drag her face onto her Hollywood Walk of
Speaker 1: Fame star. Yeah, and then she kind of like imagines
Speaker 1: slash fantasizes about people cheering and praising her.
Speaker 2: It reminded me a little bit of well, there is
Speaker 2: like a few sections of this movie that reminded me
Speaker 2: a little bit of the ending of Black Swan as well. HM,
Speaker 2: where it's like, you know, I mean, even though in
Speaker 2: Black Swan, unfortunately the main character has a little bit
Speaker 2: happier of an ending, you could argue because she does
Speaker 2: this you know, impossible accomplishment and it kills her. Elizabeth
Speaker 2: doesn't get what she wants and it kills her. But
Speaker 2: if like just that whole like gazing up at the
Speaker 2: sky and like, you know, thinking it, it just felt
Speaker 2: like an eye was perfect kind of moment.
Speaker 1: True. Wow, I was reminded, and I have not seen
Speaker 1: the thing in a very long time, but there's a
Speaker 1: similar creature that's just like a bunch of body parts,
Speaker 1: just like a hunk of various body parts in different places,
Speaker 1: and it kind of reminded me of that creature. Interesting
Speaker 1: just from like a visual standpoint anyway. So Elizabeth's face
Speaker 1: drags itself onto her Walk of Fame star and then
Speaker 1: she melts. Yeah, and then the next day the like
Speaker 1: blood and goo is cleaned off, and that is the
Speaker 1: end of the movie. So let's take another quick break
Speaker 1: and we'll come back to discuss.
Speaker 2: And we're back. Where should we start? I mean, there's
Speaker 2: so much to talk about yea here. I mean, I've
Speaker 2: read a couple of them, because this is a movie
Speaker 2: that launched a bajillion takes, there would be no way
Speaker 2: to consume them all. But I did enjoy it, you know,
Speaker 2: like particularly seeing women whose work and brains I admire
Speaker 2: trying to figure out why they either did or didn't
Speaker 2: like this movie, even when I disagreed. But I guess
Speaker 2: my curiosity because there were elements of this movie that
Speaker 2: like I. As I was watching it the first time,
Speaker 2: I was like, there is a clear, I think like
Speaker 2: ablest read of this movie in certain moments, and I wasn't.
Speaker 2: I wasn't able to find an essay or anything other
Speaker 2: been just like an observation about ableism. So I can't
Speaker 2: really speak to that. I'm also not the right person
Speaker 2: to speak to that, but I wanted to mention that
Speaker 2: I guess, like, I've saw a lot of takes that
Speaker 2: were like, the movie is agist, and I guess I
Speaker 2: just like don't agree with that, and I think it's interesting.
Speaker 2: And I'm not like calling anyone specific person out, but
Speaker 2: most of the critics I saw calling this movie out
Speaker 2: as asist were younger women, which I found interesting because
Speaker 2: I think that there is elements of this movie that
Speaker 2: I think if I saw this movie ten years ago,
Speaker 2: I would have loved it, and I probably would have
Speaker 2: thought it's a little agist, But after like especially listening
Speaker 2: to interviews with Cora Lea Fresio, like she is trying
Speaker 2: to and I think successfully, like processing her own feelings
Speaker 2: about aging on screen, and like in most interviews with her,
Speaker 2: because she's in her early fifties I believe now, and
Speaker 2: she didn't start directing until she was well into forties,
Speaker 2: and she talked about, you know, the insecurities that came
Speaker 2: around that and just the feeling that she was just
Speaker 2: getting started. But soon she kept using the term of
Speaker 2: like I just felt like, even though it was irrational,
Speaker 2: I felt like when I turned fifty, I would be erased.
Speaker 2: And that is like what this movie is about is
Speaker 2: that Elizabeth is being slowly erased. And I don't know,
Speaker 2: like I guess, yeah, what is your take on that.
Speaker 2: I understand the read of it. I just that's not
Speaker 2: how I see it.
Speaker 1: So corale Farja is forty eight, Okay at the time
Speaker 1: of this recording, she would have been in her mid
Speaker 1: forties when she was making this movie, because I think
Speaker 1: they started shooting in twenty twenty two. I believe my
Speaker 1: take on this, like does the movie do the thing
Speaker 1: that we have talked about a lot before on the podcast,
Speaker 1: where the horror and grotesqueness that is coming from the
Speaker 1: horror movie is at the expense of the body of
Speaker 1: an old woman, and we generally do not like that
Speaker 1: because of its ageist implications. Yes, the movie is doing that. However,
Speaker 1: this time it's coming from the like writer, director of
Speaker 1: perspective of a woman, so it is happening on her terms.
Speaker 1: You could maybe still argue that her examining all this
Speaker 1: is coming from like internalized agism, But I.
Speaker 2: Think exploring internalized agism is like, I think it's a
Speaker 2: valid thing to do in a movie because, especially because
Speaker 2: she's pretty explicit that, like, this movie was developed out
Speaker 2: of like feelings of anxiety and insecurity she had about herself, right,
Speaker 2: And I know that I've certainly been guilty of this
Speaker 2: over the years of just like expecting the movie to
Speaker 2: provide a comforting solution to this problem that has existed
Speaker 2: forever and is not going to be, you know, solved
Speaker 2: by a single movie. And that's not the purpose of
Speaker 2: the movie. It's not a movie for cybe, it's not
Speaker 2: a movie for children, Like you know, it's it's a
Speaker 2: movie that is like exploring anxiety. But I feel like
Speaker 2: there's sometimes a feeling that a movie that explores in
Speaker 2: anxiety also has to resolve it, and that's not how
Speaker 2: most anxiety works.
Speaker 1: I don't know right for sure. What I'll say is
Speaker 1: that at the very least, the like old woman grotesqueness,
Speaker 1: at least it's not coming from a like cis Man
Speaker 1: director who's simply just like, old women's bodies are so gross, right,
Speaker 1: It's not that this time it's a woman exploring what
Speaker 1: it is to have a female body in the context
Speaker 1: of a world that covets and fetishizes but also hates
Speaker 1: female bodies.
Speaker 2: So like this movie is only exploring CIS women for sure.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, worth noting that definitely. There's an interview I
Speaker 1: read in Offscreen Central with Corale Farjah with interviewer Kenzie Vanenu.
Speaker 1: In this interview, Coraly says about the kind of body
Speaker 1: horror aspect of the movie, quote, I think living with
Speaker 1: our body from the start is a really hard experience.
Speaker 1: The reality of our body, of the flesh, bone and
Speaker 1: the blood of everything, is something that I think truly
Speaker 1: shapes and defines our relationship to ourselves to the world,
Speaker 1: and that is almost not taken into account. They're super taboo,
Speaker 1: like the pain during the period the menopause. We're supposed
Speaker 1: to hide all of this, it's supposed to not exist.
Speaker 1: And so for me, body horror was something that I
Speaker 1: naturally resonate so much with what we experience very much
Speaker 1: in our everyday life, and it's a perfect symbol of
Speaker 1: the violence of all the fears that we can project.
Speaker 1: Society ask our bodies not to change, for it to
Speaker 1: stay the same, to stay perfect, to stay sexy. Of course,
Speaker 1: it's terrifying when your body is changing, because all day
Speaker 1: long we hear that it shouldn't change, that it should
Speaker 1: still be the same. That's the only way that you're
Speaker 1: going to be appreciated or valued. So when the body
Speaker 1: actually lives its life of a normal body, it's totally
Speaker 1: terrifying because we are not taught that it's just normal.
Speaker 2: I think that's like a very clear statement of.
Speaker 1: Intent, right and maybe down the line societally, if we
Speaker 1: ever get there where culturally we just accept aging bodies
Speaker 1: and particularly aging women's bodies, and like people aren't conditioned
Speaker 1: to be horrified by that. Like a story like this
Speaker 1: won't need to exist or that won't be something that
Speaker 1: like an artist would be inclined to explore. But yeah,
Speaker 1: considering just like the cultural context of of how society
Speaker 1: disproportionately values a woman's youth, Yeah, we do need stories
Speaker 1: that like examine the effects that that has on people,
Speaker 1: and not just older people, like people of all ages.
Speaker 1: Like it'll manifest as internalized agism maybe for older people.
Speaker 1: It also affects younger people because they're afraid of getting
Speaker 1: old and like, hey.
Speaker 2: I mean it's like there's so I mean, and I've
Speaker 2: seen takes of like this is very timely and like
Speaker 2: this is the worst possible movie that can come out
Speaker 2: at this time for young women whatever. I will say that,
Speaker 2: like this is the kind of movie that, especially if
Speaker 2: you are a woman, will will probably resonate with you
Speaker 2: because that is how you're perceived. And I was like, embarrassingly,
Speaker 2: like when I left the movie, one of the things
Speaker 2: was like, why don't I have boobs like that? It's
Speaker 2: because they don't exist, U, It's because they made them up.
Speaker 2: And of course, like you bring all your own insecurities
Speaker 2: right to a movie that is explicitly about insecurity. However,
Speaker 2: flawed but an observation I thought was interesting that I
Speaker 2: think was actually from Maya. I watched a couple of
Speaker 2: different videos and red essays it was all blending together.
Speaker 2: I think it was may Ea because I think that
Speaker 2: you know, the reasons this movie doesn't resonate with women
Speaker 2: is also a totally valid read. But we've never been
Speaker 2: wrong before, no kidding, o, no. But Maya made a
Speaker 2: really good point in saying that something that frustrated her
Speaker 2: with regard to this movie was that she couldn't think
Speaker 2: of a movie that showed an older or elderly woman's
Speaker 2: naked body that wasn't a horror movie. I think that
Speaker 2: is a really valid point. I just don't think that
Speaker 2: that is a fault of the substance necessarily. I do
Speaker 2: think that that's a cultural thing, is that we're trained
Speaker 2: to see an elderly woman's body as a site of horror,
Speaker 2: and you can argue that the substance does that. But
Speaker 2: I agree with you, Caitlin, that that is I don't know.
Speaker 2: I can see like if I was very old and
Speaker 2: saw that depiction, especially because it's a younger actor in
Speaker 2: elderly prosthetics, which we see in movies like Pearl, which
Speaker 2: we see it like it is a fairly common thing. Like,
Speaker 2: I think that that is a valid point to make
Speaker 2: that this movie isn't really changing that. But I also
Speaker 2: I am like, if the alternative is casting an older
Speaker 2: actor and treating them as a side of horror, I
Speaker 2: don't like that better. I don't really know what the
Speaker 2: solution is there.
Speaker 1: Counterpoint sort of, So Elizabeth Sparkle, the character is supposed
Speaker 1: to be fifty, like we see her on her fiftieth
Speaker 1: birthday at the start of the movie, right, although to
Speaker 1: me Moore she's currently sixty two. She was sixty when
Speaker 1: the movie started filming, So you know, she's an older
Speaker 1: woman whose naked body at first is not shown to
Speaker 1: be grotesque and horror.
Speaker 2: No, it's just what you see is that she is
Speaker 2: not happy with her body the main takeaway. And yeah,
Speaker 2: I felt like some people being like, well you do
Speaker 2: see Demi Moore's gross body a little bit at the beginning.
Speaker 2: I'm like, well, that's a you problem that you forget
Speaker 2: if you think that's gross.
Speaker 1: Also like, okay, yes, she's sixty and she has a
Speaker 1: beautiful body.
Speaker 2: She's famously hot.
Speaker 1: Demi Moore is famously hot, especially by you know, Western
Speaker 1: beauty standards, but her sixty year old body is I mean,
Speaker 1: she has access as a like rich and famous celebrity,
Speaker 1: she has access to you know, the best like fitness
Speaker 1: training and food that helps maintain a certain physique. And
Speaker 1: I have no idea how many or if any cosmetic
Speaker 1: procedures she has had, but like many many actors and
Speaker 1: celebrities and stuff, do no judgment about that. But like
Speaker 1: the whole thing about the entertainment industry is that you're
Speaker 1: expected to look a certain way. And so Demi Moore's
Speaker 1: six year old body compared to like an average person's
Speaker 1: sixty year old body is quite different. So there's that
Speaker 1: that you have to take into account.
Speaker 2: Right, I agree with you absolutely. I guess another criticism
Speaker 2: I was chafing with is like criticisms that I feel
Speaker 2: like that's kind of the point. Like if it wasn't
Speaker 2: the point, then Elizabeth Sparkle wouldn't be a famous media personality, right,
Speaker 2: it wouldn't be, like I mean, and not to say
Speaker 2: that there aren't actors who naturally age, that's absolutely true,
Speaker 2: and it's like tricky to have this conversation, but I
Speaker 2: think that this movie has it pretty effectively where realistically
Speaker 2: because of the expectations. And I can think of, you know,
Speaker 2: five actors over fifty off the top of my head,
Speaker 2: who are women who are working high up in Hollywood,
Speaker 2: and they've all had to do some thing to maintain
Speaker 2: a look of youth. And that is not a criticism
Speaker 2: of them. I think that that is like, unfortunately, the
Speaker 2: uncanny moment that we're in that if you want to
Speaker 2: still be a leading lady and not a character actor,
Speaker 2: you are not able to age naturally. And I do believe,
Speaker 2: like I think that sometimes we get this messaging of like,
Speaker 2: isn't it amazing that like women over fifty can be
Speaker 2: a movies now? And you're like, yes, because these women
Speaker 2: are unbelievably talented, They've worked for it, and like as
Speaker 2: their career goes on, they can produce their own projects,
Speaker 2: they can have more creative say they deserve that, but
Speaker 2: it would be dishonest and this is again not a
Speaker 2: criticism of these women, but it would be dishonest to
Speaker 2: say that there isn't an exchange for that. Like there
Speaker 2: I can't think of an actor who's a woman over
Speaker 2: fifty in main roles except maybe Francis McDormand, and even
Speaker 2: those are like indies generally, who is the leading actor
Speaker 2: in a movie and has aged completely naturally, It's just
Speaker 2: not something that is permitted. And I think and that's
Speaker 2: part of what the movie is commenting on. And it
Speaker 2: feels like really important to Elizabeth's character of like she
Speaker 2: has done everything quote unquote right, she has maintained her
Speaker 2: body and whatever. We don't know, you know, because we
Speaker 2: don't know a lot about Elizabeth, which I also feel
Speaker 2: like is kind of intentional because she is just this
Speaker 2: like Cipher. But yeah, like she's done everything right, but
Speaker 2: it's not good enough, and so she gets drunk, similar
Speaker 2: to like Jeff Goldblum in The Fly, she gets drunk,
Speaker 2: makes a dumb decision and it ruins her life. You know.
Speaker 2: That's a lot of body orr and especially with Demi
Speaker 2: more specifically, I was thinking about and others have made
Speaker 2: this observation as well, but how Demi Moore is like
Speaker 2: such an interesting choice for this part because her age
Speaker 2: has been the subject of discussion for decades, like when
Speaker 2: she was dating Ashton that it was like she was
Speaker 2: like the quote unquote cougarla. Her age has been a
Speaker 2: subject of discussion since she was like forty and there
Speaker 2: was you know, in the last couple of years, like
Speaker 2: this sort of round of mockery that happens when any woman,
Speaker 2: but particularly an older woman who's quote unquote, you know,
Speaker 2: not what she used to be, and the way that
Speaker 2: people talk about women who are aging and then try
Speaker 2: to quote unquote fix the problem by getting an alteration,
Speaker 2: and then they're mocked for it if it doesn't look
Speaker 2: completely natural. And yeah, another thing I was watching is
Speaker 2: there's a really good Mina let video. I'm a big
Speaker 2: fan of hers. Yeah, her and my Ya I just
Speaker 2: they're the best. But Mina was making the point that,
Speaker 2: you know how there's a lot of you know, especially
Speaker 2: with like really young girls right now, there's a lot
Speaker 2: of fixation on like twelve step skincare routines for twelve
Speaker 2: year olds. There's a beauty trend where you tape your
Speaker 2: mouth shut at night to avoid wrinkling, and teenagers are
Speaker 2: literally taping their mouths shut at night. It's wild, and
Speaker 2: it's like, I think that this movie does effectively illustrate that,
Speaker 2: like it might help you in the short term, but
Speaker 2: it's not gonna save you, and it's not gonna make
Speaker 2: you happy, because this whole movie is about how Elizabeth
Speaker 2: Sparkle has been conditioned and grown to really, really really
Speaker 2: hate herself and it's horrible to watch.
Speaker 1: Right, which is a very interesting arc where, yes, she
Speaker 1: has been conditioned to think that she is worthless because
Speaker 1: she's aging. She doesn't have the same respect and adoration
Speaker 1: she once had from fans. She is fired literally for
Speaker 1: being quote unquote too old and is going to be
Speaker 1: replaced by someone much younger, and obviously that takes a
Speaker 1: toll on her, and it prompts her to do the
Speaker 1: substance so that she can live as a younger version
Speaker 1: of herself. At least part of the time. She sees
Speaker 1: the stark contrast in how much more valued her younger
Speaker 1: self is, and that takes an even greater toll on her,
Speaker 1: to the point where when she's living as Elizabeth, she
Speaker 1: doesn't live her life. She stays inside, She watches TV,
Speaker 1: she engages in disordered eating. You know, she's binge eating.
Speaker 1: You see her like waiting for and longing for the
Speaker 1: moment that she can switch back over to being you know,
Speaker 1: her younger self, to being Sue. But then that flips
Speaker 1: at a certain point and it might partly be that
Speaker 1: man who says, like, don't forget that you're still worthy,
Speaker 1: that you still matter, and then she starts resenting Sue. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: Sue is resenting her older self, thinking that she's pathetic,
Speaker 1: and it's like, but they're the same person.
Speaker 2: Right, it'sny hard. I mean it's like a like even earlier,
Speaker 2: it's like it's hard to remember that there really is
Speaker 2: ten years ago us would be like women are always
Speaker 2: turned against each other. Movie, it's like this is one
Speaker 2: woman's battle with fifty years of being taught that you
Speaker 2: should fucking hate yourself and that it's somehow your faults. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and it's a tragedy, like it's really it's really sad
Speaker 2: and that you know, she can't get herself to leave
Speaker 2: until she's so far gone, and it's just it's really sad.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I was curious what you thought about like the
Speaker 1: moral of the story or like what the takeaway might be,
Speaker 1: because I was like, is it something like don't try
Speaker 1: to cheat changing because you'll turn into a monstral ali
Speaker 1: is as Sue and explode into blood on Hollywood Boulevard.
Speaker 1: And it's more complicated than that, but like for.
Speaker 2: Me, it comes down to like, it's not offering a
Speaker 2: clean moral or solution, but to me, it's like, weirdly again,
Speaker 2: this is a very different movie from Black Swan, but
Speaker 2: it feels like the pursuit of perfection and the pursuit
Speaker 2: of a form of neglecting yourself and completely being reliant
Speaker 2: on the approval of others is a relentless and destructive force,
Speaker 2: and that like is unavoidable to some extent. But it's like,
Speaker 2: if everyone loves you and you hate yourself, it doesn't
Speaker 2: make a difference. And that I think, in like the
Speaker 2: case of Elizabeth, that the odds are stacked against you,
Speaker 2: and that like giving a shit about yourself is hard
Speaker 2: in a world where the older you get, the less
Speaker 2: others will care.
Speaker 1: Right, you can't even blame people for having internalized agism
Speaker 1: when society all around you conditions you to devalue yourself
Speaker 1: and that you are not as worthy as you were
Speaker 1: when you were younger.
Speaker 2: So it yeah, it's broad, but it's like it's supposed
Speaker 2: to be. I mean, it's so funny because like we
Speaker 2: were talking about, there's all of these things that we
Speaker 2: have repeatedly been like ugh, this again, but it just
Speaker 2: works for me. In this movie because there has never
Speaker 2: been a more patriarchy the guy than this Dennis Quaide character. Right,
Speaker 2: Like he literally is like smile, smile, or my god,
Speaker 2: I did laugh when he was like feathers, feathers, feathers.
Speaker 2: You're like, what the fuck? I hate that he's evil,
Speaker 2: but he did slay this, and like, I don't know,
Speaker 2: two things need to be true for a second, but yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean, he's a patriarchy the guy character. But I
Speaker 2: guess it's like you'll either kind of like this or not.
Speaker 2: But like all of the characters we see are kind
Speaker 2: of broad types. We see different types of guys, you know,
Speaker 2: none of them are narratively specific. We don't know very
Speaker 2: much about Elizabeth. We don't know. Something I actually really appreciated,
Speaker 2: and I'll go back to, like the murkier stuff that
Speaker 2: I feel like is likely tied to Corey as a
Speaker 2: person is that there is not a lot made of
Speaker 2: I think that a lesser version of this movie would
Speaker 2: be defined by regret for like the right things she
Speaker 2: didn't do, like get married and have kids. That is
Speaker 2: not a fixation of this movie. And I think a
Speaker 2: lesser movie would have so mommified a cis woman that
Speaker 2: they wouldn't be able to help themselves, but because this
Speaker 2: is a battle with herself, Like the most important and
Speaker 2: defining thing in Elizabeth's life was her career, which is
Speaker 2: also a toxic thing when your career is conditioned to
Speaker 2: dispose of you when you had a certain age. You know.
Speaker 2: Other things that we criticize all the time that this
Speaker 2: movie does is Elizabeth doesn't have any friends. She doesn't
Speaker 2: have friends or a support system. But if that changes,
Speaker 2: it's a different movie. And again it's like, I feel
Speaker 2: like this movie is just showing how she feels versus
Speaker 2: what the world really is, because everyone, like the men
Speaker 2: in this movie are awful, and men can be that awful,
Speaker 2: but there is like the fish eye lens, like it's
Speaker 2: like a heightened version of that awful and being in
Speaker 2: Elizabeth's position would likely be lonely. It probably wouldn't be
Speaker 2: that lonely, but it's all like turned up and it
Speaker 2: just kind of I don't know, like I even though
Speaker 2: this movies doing a lot of things that I've criticized
Speaker 2: a million times, it just makes sense in this world
Speaker 2: to me.
Speaker 1: Because it is a very heightened reality, even though it's
Speaker 1: reflective of patriarchy and agism and different things that very
Speaker 1: much exist systemically in the world. This is still a
Speaker 1: very like heightened story. Of course, if Elizabeth did have friends,
Speaker 1: she probably wouldn't have sought out the substance because they
Speaker 1: would just like get together for like brunches and wine nights,
Speaker 1: and they could have been like ha ha, aging is
Speaker 1: it's hard, but we're getting through it, you know, Like
Speaker 1: they would have had each other to like bounce off
Speaker 1: of and support each other and like validate each other
Speaker 1: and value each other.
Speaker 2: But she lacks that supports us, and it's like it's sad.
Speaker 2: And even though it's like that is not again, it's
Speaker 2: like Elizabeth Sparkle is not a feminist icon, but that
Speaker 2: doesn't make her a bad person or a bad character, right,
Speaker 2: It's like she's very much a product of her environment.
Speaker 2: There are moments where it's like, I mean, I guess again,
Speaker 2: I've seen moments in her character characterized by other critics
Speaker 2: as like you pity her, But I don't really pity
Speaker 2: her because there's like a part of me that really
Speaker 2: connects with her where it's just a heightened version. And
Speaker 2: this is why I'm sort of like when I was
Speaker 2: like exploring, oh, sort of a wide age range of
Speaker 2: critics that I feel like most women, even women over thirty,
Speaker 2: seem to be like no, I understand how that feels,
Speaker 2: and the feeling that like you're no longer young enough
Speaker 2: to start something or be viewed as valued, or you know,
Speaker 2: the whole shedding that I remember, like the first time
Speaker 2: I wasn't the youngest person in a writer's room and
Speaker 2: it like weirdly me where I was like, I'm cooked,
Speaker 2: I'm fucked. You're just like because you're not like the
Speaker 2: cool young girl, and like there's a younger girl and
Speaker 2: the answer is talk to her. She probably needs to
Speaker 2: have an ally in this room. And then I come
Speaker 2: friends and it's fine, but like that is a complicated,
Speaker 2: weird set of emotions to to navigate and it's okay
Speaker 2: that she's fucking off.
Speaker 1: I don't know right, I mean again, I found myself
Speaker 1: very much connecting to Elizabeth and sometimes to Sue, but
Speaker 1: mostly Elizabeth, where you know, I'm pushing forty and I'm
Speaker 1: always like, oh, why didn't me, as younger person stretch more?
Speaker 1: Because now I'm so inflexible and I can't touch my
Speaker 1: toes and I'm so stiff all the time, and did it?
Speaker 1: And why didn't my younger self do this or this
Speaker 1: or that? And I just like find myself resenting my
Speaker 1: younger self as I get old, and so I relate
Speaker 1: to Elizabeth's resentment of Sue. But also I'm just like, well,
Speaker 1: I could start stretching now, and then that's what I'm
Speaker 1: trying to do anyway.
Speaker 2: Right, there's yeah, because there's I think I'm like I
Speaker 2: was struggling in the first watch of this, but then yeah,
Speaker 2: as it becomes clearer that like Sue is a part
Speaker 2: of Elizabeth, the memories think like you, you've reformed me.
Speaker 2: I need to watch it for a fourth time. But
Speaker 2: that like they are a part of each other. So
Speaker 2: it's it doesn't We haven't been led to believe that
Speaker 2: Elizabeth has a history of being violently hateful of younger women.
Speaker 2: We don't know much about her, but I feel like
Speaker 2: we it would be indicated in the way she's treated
Speaker 2: by Dennis Quaid. She's treated by Dennis Quaid as like
Speaker 2: a subservient person, like appliable again, which like ties into
Speaker 2: the whole characteristic of like she does what she's told,
Speaker 2: she works out, she does the thing with her face,
Speaker 2: like she does everything she's supposed to do, and then
Speaker 2: she becomes literally a kind of like girl joker at
Speaker 2: the end, like when it's not enough, she joker fies fine,
Speaker 2: but it's like the reason that she's taking out violence
Speaker 2: on Sue is because Sue is her and I don't know,
Speaker 2: I guess a point that I guess couldn't really be
Speaker 2: made by the movie because these characters only meet once
Speaker 2: and try to kill each other. But it does seem
Speaker 2: like it's at least hinted at that, like Sue is
Speaker 2: valued more, but that doesn't necessarily mean that she feels
Speaker 2: more comfortable about it. There's moments of that where stuff
Speaker 2: like the chicken belly button moment, or like there's moments
Speaker 2: where Sue feels genuinely ill at ease. I think the
Speaker 2: move the part of the movie that makes me most uncomfortable,
Speaker 2: Like the shrimp scene is brutal, but the scene at
Speaker 2: the end where Sue it just felt like a bad
Speaker 2: like again a bad dream, or like the feeling of
Speaker 2: being too drunk in public where everything like her teeth
Speaker 2: are falling out and she's like completely freaking out. But
Speaker 2: she's like I just need to get out of this
Speaker 2: building with everyone thinking I'm normal or yeah, like whatever,
Speaker 2: smoking too much weed or like whatever it was like,
Speaker 2: and just feeling like you are. You are the most
Speaker 2: fucked up person that's ever existed, but you just need
Speaker 2: this weird random man you don't know to think that
Speaker 2: you're normal. I just like, really that really hit for me. Yeah, yeah, I.
Speaker 1: Want to go back to talking about the men in
Speaker 1: this movie while fainest of me, but while we're on Sue,
Speaker 1: something that you very much noticed when you're watching this
Speaker 1: movie is all of the like lingering shots of a
Speaker 1: woman's butt or breasts or just like you know, disembodied
Speaker 1: body parts. That again another thing that we tend to
Speaker 1: criticize because that is like generally male gaze cinematography. But
Speaker 1: the way we see it in this movie, or like
Speaker 1: the way it's framed, or I feel like the implications
Speaker 1: it has is quite different than what we're used to
Speaker 1: seeing when we see this type of imagery because it's
Speaker 1: almost exclusively at the beginning of Sue's arc. We see
Speaker 1: her and she's new, and she's young, and she's shiny,
Speaker 1: and she's oozing sex appeal. There's like a part where
Speaker 1: she cracks open a can of diet coke and drinks
Speaker 1: it and it's shot like a commercial. It's like the
Speaker 1: way that like marketing will manipulate people with like sexy
Speaker 1: imagery to trick you into buying stuff because it's and
Speaker 1: it's all like fake and false. And I think the
Speaker 1: idea is just like, yeah, we're seeing all this, like
Speaker 1: you know, disembodied body parts and butts and titties and everything,
Speaker 1: but it's in the context of this woman who is
Speaker 1: valued specifically for those things because she's young and has
Speaker 1: this taut round buttocks again a lah Shrek too. That
Speaker 1: it feels different than the like male gay cinematography from
Speaker 1: a movie like whatever Transformers. When we're aggling Megan Fox's
Speaker 1: body as she's like bending over a car and like
Speaker 1: basically having sex with the car. It's not the context
Speaker 1: isn't the same, the implications aren't the same. I think
Speaker 1: you could still maybe criticize the cinematography of this movie, but.
Speaker 2: I understand why this would be up for like why
Speaker 2: this would cross a line of like satire into exploitation. Yeah,
Speaker 2: like I can see that. I don't it doesn't bug
Speaker 2: me as much. I think if I liked the movie less.
Speaker 2: I would lean more into that.
Speaker 1: Read right, but they're saying something with this type of
Speaker 1: cinematography in this movie, what exactly are they saying. I'm
Speaker 1: still working on it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think cinematography is one of the few things
Speaker 2: that I could be swayed into being like, Nah, that
Speaker 2: wasn't great.
Speaker 1: That wasn't necessary. Yeah, I feel like it's trying to
Speaker 1: emphasize yeah, like this is what society is conditioning people
Speaker 1: to value about young women and their bodies and their sexuality.
Speaker 1: But that cinematography goes away as the movie goes on.
Speaker 1: I'm still processing it. Listeners are curious what you think
Speaker 1: about it, but I was just like.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I could definitely see different intern I also felt
Speaker 2: like so much of this it feels like corally doing
Speaker 2: sort of like an inside joke of like because it's
Speaker 2: so over the top, because the movie is funny, just
Speaker 2: not for a lot of the reasons that the men
Speaker 2: in the room thought it was funny, which is why
Speaker 2: I have sought out really no men's opinions on this movie.
Speaker 2: But it does feel like a sort of like a
Speaker 2: winky kind of reference to all the ways we've seen
Speaker 2: women portrayed over the years. I can see how that
Speaker 2: still might not work for some people, but it didn't
Speaker 2: bother me. I did think it was interesting that she
Speaker 2: says in the production short that she found this is
Speaker 2: a male cinematographer, Benjamin Kracken, pretty cool name. She saw
Speaker 2: his work. He was the cinematographer for Promising Young Women.
Speaker 2: Oh yes, yes, a movie that has aged weirdly. I
Speaker 2: kind of want to redo that episode. But yeah, it
Speaker 2: wasn't my favorite element of the movie by a long shot.
Speaker 2: But m hmm. I mean I liked more of the
Speaker 2: like experimental fun, like the helmet shots and like the
Speaker 2: bloodshot with the metal music.
Speaker 1: I'm like, again, technically this movie is great. There's awesome editing, awesome. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm just like, I think there's probably like strong intentionality
Speaker 1: behind these like male gayzy type shots. But what exactly
Speaker 1: is it? Going back to the men, Yeah, we do
Speaker 1: have a very like patriarchy the guy type in Harvey
Speaker 1: in a way that feels appropriate because again, this is
Speaker 1: so heightened, it.
Speaker 2: Just feels intentional enough.
Speaker 1: It feels very intenseing, right, But then you have other
Speaker 1: guys that are like because in many movies we see
Speaker 1: like just the one patriarchy. The guy in this movie,
Speaker 1: it's like patriarchy.
Speaker 2: All the guys like there's something and they're like different facets, right,
Speaker 2: Like for example, the Fred guy, the person she knew
Speaker 2: from high school, he says something like.
Speaker 1: Well, now that we're reconnected, we can go out for
Speaker 1: a drink. Meanwhile, they spent one second talking to each other,
Speaker 1: but he thinks that like they've reconnected and that he's
Speaker 1: entitled to her time now. And you know, he seems
Speaker 1: like a quote unquote nice guy.
Speaker 2: But he's what does that mean?
Speaker 1: But he's not treating her like a person. He's like
Speaker 1: putting her on a pedestal. He is like not acting
Speaker 1: as though she's an actual, like equal to him.
Speaker 2: And Fred really quickly. Again, that's like it felt like
Speaker 2: another like layered decision to have her, because she set
Speaker 2: the boundary in the moment she's like okay, you know,
Speaker 2: and like she's like give me your card but intentionally
Speaker 2: doesn't share her contact info. Yeah, but again, I just
Speaker 2: thought it was like a really kind of like sad
Speaker 2: but understandable moment where it's like the way that she's
Speaker 2: been conditioned to feel is like being objectified, is being seen.
Speaker 2: So it's almost like, well, it almost like this movie
Speaker 2: auberates on the assumption that there could not be a
Speaker 2: man who would respect her and see her for her
Speaker 2: who she is, which is quite sad, and that she's
Speaker 2: like I just need to be like perceived by somebody,
Speaker 2: and that's why she reaches out to him versus like
Speaker 2: this guy's gonna be great for my life. It's just
Speaker 2: like I just need to be seen for like fucking
Speaker 2: three hours. Right.
Speaker 1: I didn't read it as like, oh, this is going
Speaker 1: to be a potential romantic partner for her. It was
Speaker 1: just that she needed some kind of validation from someone
Speaker 1: who wouldn't be outwardly cruel to her.
Speaker 2: And that's like, you know, sometimes you need that.
Speaker 1: Look, I've done it.
Speaker 2: Sometimes you just need to be viewed for a couple
Speaker 2: hours and they're awful and then you don't talk to
Speaker 2: him anymore.
Speaker 1: Hmm. So there's his version of patriarchy. There are, of course,
Speaker 1: like the casting agent guys who are only viewing women
Speaker 1: as like objects and bodies and not actual people. There's
Speaker 1: the neighbor guy, Oliver, who is furious when he thinks
Speaker 1: that Elizabeth is making noise because she's old and growth,
Speaker 1: but when it's a beautiful young woman who will.
Speaker 2: Making noise this cool sexy thing that they're all the
Speaker 2: kids are. Yeah, that's like they're all a unique flavor
Speaker 2: of growth that is recognizable. I guess like if this
Speaker 2: was a different movie, and this isn't even a criticism
Speaker 2: of this movie, I do think it would would have
Speaker 2: been interesting to see women who are complicit in reinforcing
Speaker 2: these standards. That's something that I actually do think that
Speaker 2: promising young woman does relatively well. Was like with the
Speaker 2: Dean character being like, yeah, I don't care because that
Speaker 2: puts my job at risk if I, you know, take
Speaker 2: your rape allegation seriously. And you know, I think there's
Speaker 2: certainly room for that, but I don't know, it's just
Speaker 2: hard to argue with how effective that Like, it's this
Speaker 2: is not a movie for nuance. I don't know.
Speaker 1: Yeah. The last thing I wanted to do was just
Speaker 1: like share a couple more quotes from Corley Farja. I
Speaker 1: hope I'm saying her name right, We're saying it different.
Speaker 2: I don't know, I don't know, the.
Speaker 1: Friends, we don't know, we don't know French names. Just
Speaker 1: to share a little bit more about kind of like
Speaker 1: where she was and how she was feeling when she
Speaker 1: was writing this movie. So that same off screen Central
Speaker 1: interview that I quoted earlier, when the interviewer asked her
Speaker 1: what inspired her to start writing the screenplay, Coraley said, quote,
Speaker 1: really what I had felt my whole life about how
Speaker 1: I had lived within my body, how I had been
Speaker 1: led to constantly judge it in a negative way, how
Speaker 1: I had been led to torture it in many ways to
Speaker 1: try and make it look perfect with the beauty standards
Speaker 1: that were presented to me as being the only valuable option.
Speaker 1: And I think at every age I kind of fought
Speaker 1: with something that I didn't like or that I felt
Speaker 1: embarrassed with, until recently, when I passed my forties and
Speaker 1: was going towards my fifties, where I started really to
Speaker 1: have those violent thoughts like now it's over for me,
Speaker 1: Like I'm not gonna be interesting to anyone, I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna have an existence again. Like it was like so
Speaker 1: violent that I decided it was the right time for
Speaker 1: me to do something about all this, which I think
Speaker 1: has strongly shaped my relationship to the world, and I
Speaker 1: believe it's the same for many women. And I wanted
Speaker 1: to really free myself from this or at least let
Speaker 1: it out, like throw it out somewhere in an undelicate,
Speaker 1: no control, not nice, not gentle way, which I think
Speaker 1: is the kind of opposite of where we are kind
Speaker 1: of asked to be unquote. So yeah, this is just
Speaker 1: like just how she has felt about herself informing this story.
Speaker 1: Why she went with Body Horror is basically an act
Speaker 1: of defiance of like, oh, you want me to have
Speaker 1: this perfect body and you want me to be delicate
Speaker 1: and gentle and da da da, Well no, I'm going
Speaker 1: to tell this story in a very violent way because
Speaker 1: that's the opposite of what society expects of me as
Speaker 1: a woman. So I just wanted to share that extra
Speaker 1: context because I think, you know, the criticisms people might
Speaker 1: have about this movie fair, But I do appreciate, as
Speaker 1: we've said, that this is a different version of like
Speaker 1: quote unquote hag woman as horror, but coming from a
Speaker 1: very different perspective, coming from like experiential context, and it
Speaker 1: made for a really enjoyable movie for me the end.
Speaker 2: I agree. I agree, Yeah, I think that like a
Speaker 2: lot of the reads of the movie, and again, it's like,
Speaker 2: if you don't like you don't like it. Also, not
Speaker 2: everybody likes body horror. But most of the questions that
Speaker 2: I had about where the movie is coming from, I mean,
Speaker 2: have been pretty cogently answered by the writer director, So
Speaker 2: I don't really know where you could ask. And if
Speaker 2: you don't like you, you'll like it. If you don't
Speaker 2: like it, you're wrong. And if you do like it
Speaker 2: for the wrong reasons, I really hate you. I like,
Speaker 2: really left with a real bone to pick with some
Speaker 2: of those fucking neck beers in there, who you know,
Speaker 2: don't piss me off.
Speaker 1: Is there anything else you wanted to talk about recording
Speaker 1: the substance?
Speaker 2: No, I mean, I think it's worth mentioning. Although I
Speaker 2: know that if you've seen this movie, it's fairly obvious
Speaker 2: that while I think this movie has a lot to
Speaker 2: say about the standards that are applied to women specifically,
Speaker 2: this also appears to be like a pretty somewhat personal
Speaker 2: story from Coralie Farsha, and therefore it is not a
Speaker 2: particularly inclusive story. This is, while there are you know,
Speaker 2: over arch expectations of women, this is a story specifically
Speaker 2: about an aging white CIS woman, and everyone's version of
Speaker 2: this experience is going to be different. If you're listening
Speaker 2: to this show, you already know that, but it feels
Speaker 2: worth mentioning. But again, that's not even really a criticism
Speaker 2: of the movie, because one movie can't do everything, and
Speaker 2: I really appreciate that, like Coraley is pulling from her
Speaker 2: own anxieties about aging to make this. I feel like
Speaker 2: it's what makes the movie really good, because she also
Speaker 2: clearly has a good sense of humor about how fucked
Speaker 2: up this is, which is like just very refreshing and cool.
Speaker 2: But yeah, I think that was my last thing.
Speaker 1: The last thing I wanted to touch on real quick
Speaker 1: was a lot of people have pointed out the parallels
Speaker 1: between the substance and Death Becomes Her.
Speaker 2: Yeah I had not connected that, but totally.
Speaker 1: Probably other movies too, but I think that was the
Speaker 1: one that people were drawing a lot of comparisons to.
Speaker 1: And I find it interesting that the movies have a
Speaker 1: similar pres but they take on a very different tone
Speaker 1: where Death Becomes Her is like silly can't be fun vibes.
Speaker 1: I had a similar thought, and I want to see
Speaker 1: if this trend continues. But when I watched Anora, I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, this is this is similar in premise
Speaker 1: to for example, Pretty Woman.
Speaker 2: Right, which is like, that's very intentional.
Speaker 1: Right, yes, but it's like you know, from thirty years prior.
Speaker 1: And it also takes on a very different tone. And
Speaker 1: there was a third movie that I had this thought
Speaker 1: about that it came out within the past year or two,
Speaker 1: has a very similar premise to a movie from the
Speaker 1: eighties or nineties, but takes on a very different tone,
Speaker 1: like a darker, more cynical tone. I can't remember what
Speaker 1: the third movie I'm thinking of is, but I'm just
Speaker 1: curious to see if this trend continues where a familiar
Speaker 1: premise from the past gets kind of recontextualized and retoned almost, And.
Speaker 2: I'm like, I wonder how that's going. It really like
Speaker 2: depends on who's doing it, because I've only seen it once.
Speaker 2: But I liked Anora. I didn't love Anora, but I
Speaker 2: do like that how it's clearly in conversation with that
Speaker 2: movie and like a way that is still you know,
Speaker 2: not super punishing to watch. Yeah, I guess I didn't
Speaker 2: even think with Death Becomes Her. I've watched that movie
Speaker 2: somewhat recently. I watched it around Halloween because it just
Speaker 2: feels right.
Speaker 1: But for sure.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I watched that movie around Halloween, and I do.
Speaker 2: I feel like what is also like implied in Death
Speaker 2: Becomes Her is that the central conflict is also sort
Speaker 2: of around a man, whereas like around the women's relationship
Speaker 2: to each other, but there's also a central conflict around
Speaker 2: like who gets the piece of shit guy? And I
Speaker 2: appreciate that the substance has no interest in that, and
Speaker 2: there's just no uh nary a man in sight for
Speaker 2: longer than a minute or so.
Speaker 1: True.
Speaker 2: So yeah, no, that's that's super interesting. I also it's
Speaker 2: like two banger movies in completely different ways.
Speaker 1: Totally. Yes, just wanted to point that out. Yeah, does
Speaker 1: the substance pass the Bechdel test?
Speaker 2: Yeah it does, it does.
Speaker 1: A lot of the movie is Elizabeth by herself or
Speaker 1: Sue by herself. If they're interacting with someone, it is
Speaker 1: often a man.
Speaker 2: Or like talking to the other one well unconscious, which
Speaker 2: unfortunately cannot pass. But I thought that was a funny
Speaker 2: almost pass where it's like, well, there are two women
Speaker 2: in the room and the communication happening is important. However
Speaker 2: one is basically dead right now.
Speaker 1: Responding Yeah, the scene where they're fighting each other toward
Speaker 1: the end does pass the Bechdel test. I don't even
Speaker 1: think they really say much to each other, but I
Speaker 1: think them, you know, beating the shit out of each other,
Speaker 1: that's interaction, that's communication.
Speaker 2: Like, does it pass the Bechtels has if it's two
Speaker 2: halves of the same woman talking to.
Speaker 1: A yes it does.
Speaker 2: And spiritually this movie passes big time. But I agree,
Speaker 2: I think that it's like it's so often Elizabeth's talking
Speaker 2: to her self or making herself smaller to talk to
Speaker 2: a man, which spiritually passes. But it's not as clean
Speaker 2: a pass as you'd expect. But again, flawed metric. We've
Speaker 2: said it a million times. We'll say it again.
Speaker 1: You know it's not a flawed metric. Tell me, Caitlin, Well,
Speaker 1: it's the Bechtel cast nipple scale. It's perfectly metric that
Speaker 1: deserves no criticism whatsoever. No, and we won't be hearing
Speaker 1: any of course. It's the scale where we rate the
Speaker 1: movie zero two five nipples based on examining it through
Speaker 1: an intersectional feminist lens who. Okay, I would say that
Speaker 1: even though this movie does a lot of the things
Speaker 1: that we have criticized on the podcast in the past,
Speaker 1: and if those things put you off from the movie
Speaker 1: like fair. I understand that totally.
Speaker 2: It's not a movie for everyone, and that's.
Speaker 1: Fine, and that's fine, but context is very important to consider,
Speaker 1: and in this case, the context and perspective narratively is
Speaker 1: a woman interrogating her own experience with aging and how
Speaker 1: society has made her feel about aging, and the commentary
Speaker 1: on how society values or does not value women based
Speaker 1: on their age. I feel like that is generally effective
Speaker 1: commentary that the movie presents. The movie is very funny,
Speaker 1: and I'm not even a big body horror person, but like,
Speaker 1: I was on board so happy.
Speaker 2: When you loved this movie. I was like, that means
Speaker 2: it's like good good, Because you're not always super on
Speaker 2: board with body war art. That's a I don't like
Speaker 2: it when.
Speaker 1: It's just there for the sake of being there, But
Speaker 1: if it's there with a function and a purpose, I'm
Speaker 1: fine with it. And it was to me serving a
Speaker 1: very effective function in this story. Yeah, as we mentioned earlier,
Speaker 1: I think there are aspects of this movie, especially much
Speaker 1: of what happens in the third act, that could be
Speaker 1: read as being quite ablest.
Speaker 2: And also if that is like a perspective that any
Speaker 2: of our listeners have we would we would love to
Speaker 2: hear more.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I wasn't able to find a whole lot of
Speaker 1: writing about that specifically. I saw like a few tweets
Speaker 1: to that effect, but not being yeah similar, So yeah,
Speaker 1: I'd like to hear other perspectives on it. But I
Speaker 1: think you could also maybe argue that there's a lot
Speaker 1: of like gratuitous nudity in the movie. But I also
Speaker 1: chalked that up to the director being French, and I
Speaker 1: was like, French people just aren't as pearl clutchy about
Speaker 1: nudity as my like prudish American brain.
Speaker 2: So and I did feel I mean, maybe this is
Speaker 2: me again making an excuse for a movie I like,
Speaker 2: which has happened before we've done it. But I agree
Speaker 2: that there are moments of gratuitous nudity. I feel like
Speaker 2: at least the intention was to comment on how gratuitous
Speaker 2: nudity is presented, even though you I think you also
Speaker 2: could argue that, like, aren't they just also doing it?
Speaker 2: And the answer is maybe. But I like this movie so.
Speaker 1: So whatever, so I don't care. There were so many
Speaker 1: parts though, where I was like, can't they just drape
Speaker 1: a blanket over their other version of themselves. Isn't it
Speaker 1: really cold and it's comfortable? They're all wild my bathroom floor.
Speaker 2: It is literally it awakens so many I have like
Speaker 2: such a fear of I mean, it's because it's so common,
Speaker 2: like slipping and falling in the back and like hitting
Speaker 2: your head on tile. Yeah, which is part of why
Speaker 2: that scene and oh my god, that scene in Titan
Speaker 2: where she breaks her nose, oh, the like. But dem
Speaker 2: and Margaret are like, like, I know that that's probably
Speaker 2: just an expression of like the self hatred shared between
Speaker 2: the two of them. But I know it's like tuck
Speaker 2: her in, like at least get like a little like hey,
Speaker 2: bail or something like I don't know something, Hey yeah,
Speaker 2: exactly hay bail.
Speaker 1: I was gonna say, like silk sheets and.
Speaker 2: An air mattress, like it's not asking the world no.
Speaker 1: But anyway, all this to say, I think I'll give
Speaker 1: the movie on the Caitlin's Rompometer scale ten out of ten.
Speaker 1: On the Nipple scale, I'm somewhere between like a three
Speaker 1: and a half and a four. I think I very
Speaker 1: much enjoy the movie. It is not free from criticism,
Speaker 1: I think again, various criticisms of this movie are very valid,
Speaker 1: But again, the commentary that it does provide I think
Speaker 1: is both effective and delivered in a really fun, enjoyable way. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and like the delivery method of commentary can often determine
Speaker 1: how effective it is. And when you're using comedy or
Speaker 1: satire or body horror, whatever the kind of tone and
Speaker 1: genre as a sort of delivery method for commentary, I
Speaker 1: think the movie does a really good job with that.
Speaker 1: So I'll say three point seventy five and I'll distribute
Speaker 1: my nipples among to me more Margaret Qualy, Corale Fargah
Speaker 1: and the Shrimps.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna go for on this, which might be recency bias,
Speaker 2: and if so, so be it.
Speaker 1: That's life baby, That's life baby.
Speaker 2: But I really appreciate this movie. I feel I've and
Speaker 2: again this is just my opinion. I feel like this
Speaker 2: movie while I agree like there are many valid criticisms
Speaker 2: that I think we will continue to hear more about
Speaker 2: as time goes on. Yeah, I appreciate, Like I just
Speaker 2: especially after listening to interviews with Coral Farghat that like,
Speaker 2: the intent feels very clear that even if it is
Speaker 2: not a message, that is for everybody, and that there.
Speaker 2: You know, should be less white movies that are able
Speaker 2: to tackle topics like these, and there are, But I
Speaker 2: really I just love how it is like both a
Speaker 2: broad nightmare and a weirdly personal story that clearly so
Speaker 2: many people have connected to. And I would also really
Speaker 2: be curious to listeners of your in theater experience because
Speaker 2: I think that what we were talking about earlier in
Speaker 2: the episode of like we were all laughing but we
Speaker 2: weren't all laughing at the same thing, is such an
Speaker 2: interesting thing to interrogate totally. But yeah, I think this
Speaker 2: movie is fantastic. I love body horror, and I love
Speaker 2: body horror that is very intentional and it's like saying something,
Speaker 2: and the performances are amazing. I just think this movie
Speaker 2: fucking rocks. Can't wait to see your next one, can't
Speaker 2: wait to cover Revenge, And with that, I'm going to
Speaker 2: give my nipplesyam and if to do me more when
Speaker 2: a markeret quality, I'm gonna give one two Corley farshat
Speaker 2: and I will give my final one too. Sorry, I'm
Speaker 2: not giving it to the shrimp. There I said it.
Speaker 1: Wow, I almost thought you were gonna say Shrek Shrek. There,
Speaker 1: I guess I'll give my last nipple to Alissa Su
Speaker 1: Wow monstro Elissa Su.
Speaker 2: Yeah, rooting for her love. Huh. And with that, I
Speaker 2: believe that we're sorry you didn't appreciate your experience with
Speaker 2: The Buckle Cast. If you want to uh inject yourself
Speaker 2: with the thing that makes you die, please do so. Now.
Speaker 2: We're sorry you didn't enjoy.
Speaker 1: Yes, but if you did enjoy your experience, you can
Speaker 1: follow us. You can support us by subscribing to the
Speaker 1: Matreon Patreon dot com slash Bechdel Cast, where you get
Speaker 1: two bonus episodes every month, plus access to the back
Speaker 1: catalog of like somewhere around one hundred and seventy or
Speaker 1: one hundred and eighty bonus episodes.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so an absurd amount of content. Yeah, And as
Speaker 2: always the best way to directly support this show. And
Speaker 2: with that, let's slither to our shared star in the
Speaker 2: Walk of Fame and turn in blue misted.
Speaker 1: Let's do it, Bye bye. The Bechdel Cast is a
Speaker 1: production of iHeartMedia, hosted by Caitlin Dorante and Jamie loftis
Speaker 1: produced by Sophie Lickterman, edited by Mola Board. Our theme
Speaker 1: song was composed by Mike Kaplan with vocals by Catherine Vosskrosenski.
Speaker 1: Our logo and merch is designed by Jamie Loftis and
Speaker 1: a special thanks to Aristotle Acevedo. For more information about
Speaker 1: the podcast, please visit link Tree slash Bechtel Cast