Speaker 1: On the Bechdel Cast, the questions ask if movies have
Speaker 1: women and them, are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands,
Speaker 1: or do they have individualism? It's the patriarchy, Zephyn Beast
Speaker 1: start changing with the Bechdel Cast.
Speaker 2: Hello, and welcome to the Bechdel Cast.
Speaker 3: My name is Caitlin, my name is Jamie, and this
Speaker 3: is our podcast where we take a look at your
Speaker 3: favorite movies using an intersectional feminist lens, using the Bechdel
Speaker 3: Test as a jumping off point for discussion. Kitlin, it's
Speaker 3: a thousand degrees and we have an incredible movie today,
Speaker 3: So hit them with what the Bechdel Test is and
Speaker 3: then we'll just jump in.
Speaker 2: Happy to do it. It is a media metric created
Speaker 2: by our best friend in the whole wide world, Alison Bechdel.
Speaker 3: Is our way of saying we met her twice.
Speaker 2: Yes, exactly, And it's a media metric. It has many
Speaker 2: different versions. The one that we use is do two
Speaker 2: characters of a marginal life gender have names? Do they
Speaker 2: speak to each other? And is there conversation about something
Speaker 2: other than a man. And we also like it when
Speaker 2: it's narratively meaningful and relevant to the story and.
Speaker 3: Today, we are I think it's been a while since
Speaker 3: we have covered a movie so close to its release date,
Speaker 3: but we've gotten so many requests for this movie and
Speaker 3: we're very, very excited to bring a returning guest to
Speaker 3: discuss twenty twenty five. They wanted only Ryan Coogler's Sinners.
Speaker 2: And our guest today is a comedian and cat mom
Speaker 2: and you remember her from our episode on Tangerine. It's
Speaker 2: mixed Aliabell.
Speaker 4: Hello, Welco, yay, thank you so much for having me back.
Speaker 3: Welcome back.
Speaker 2: Oh, we're so happy to have you.
Speaker 3: Thank you for bringing Sinners.
Speaker 4: That's my specialty. I'm all about sin.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we love sin we love sinning. Over here on
Speaker 2: the Bechdelcast, what's your Since this is such a new release,
Speaker 2: a recent film, there's you know, not much history to
Speaker 2: be had with it, but what's your kind of relationship? Slash?
Speaker 2: Maybe just like overall impression of the film.
Speaker 4: Uh wow, that's so much to unpack.
Speaker 3: So slash like vampire movies in general, I guess Yeah,
Speaker 3: are you a vampire movie head?
Speaker 4: I am gay so I have watched more than my
Speaker 4: fair share of vampire movies For the listeners at home,
Speaker 4: I am also black. So you know, Sinners hits on
Speaker 4: a lot of subject matter and history that's pretty intrinsic
Speaker 4: and personal to me.
Speaker 2: H yeah, excited to dive deeper into that.
Speaker 4: Oh and also, I've had a crush on Michael B.
Speaker 4: Jordan for quite some time.
Speaker 2: I mean, you're not made of stone exactly. He's just
Speaker 2: one of the handsomest men alive.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's like, I'm just I guess that everyone on
Speaker 3: the Zoom Call has a rush on Michael B. Jordan,
Speaker 3: and he's and and here I mean, yeah, what is
Speaker 3: better than Michael B. Jordan? Well two of.
Speaker 4: Them, yes, exactly.
Speaker 2: So I didn't really watch any like behind the scenes things,
Speaker 2: but there are some things that happened in this movie
Speaker 2: where I'm like, how did you do that? I imagine there's
Speaker 2: body doubles and stuff like that. But I'm like, but
Speaker 2: sometimes they're fighting each other and we can see both
Speaker 2: of their faces at the same time, and it's just
Speaker 2: movie magic.
Speaker 3: I just hope it's not AI. I don't know. Oh yeah,
Speaker 3: but I also did not look into it.
Speaker 4: I choose to believe they cloned Michael B. Jordan.
Speaker 3: I think that would be the responsible thing to do. Honestly.
Speaker 2: Mm hmmm, yeah, yeah, like a like a the Prestige style.
Speaker 4: Only without you know, obviously without killing the double exactly.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm saying that he had a good two body
Speaker 3: double named Percy Bell.
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, Jamie, what's your relationship with the movie?
Speaker 3: I saw it right when it came out. We had
Speaker 3: just covered a couple of vampire movies in a row,
Speaker 3: and I was not sure I knew. I guess I
Speaker 3: was bummed. I think this was true for a bunch
Speaker 3: of people. I was bummed that someone tipped me off
Speaker 3: that it was a vampire movie, because I know a
Speaker 3: lot of people were like, c Sinners, don't look up anything,
Speaker 3: because it was not really marketed that way, which is
Speaker 3: kind of brilliant.
Speaker 4: It was not.
Speaker 3: So I was bummed that I knew it was a
Speaker 3: vampire movie going in. I wish I could have seen
Speaker 3: it for the first time not knowing that. But I mean,
Speaker 3: this movie is doing so much in a way that
Speaker 3: I feel like I didn't really fully appreciate until I
Speaker 3: was watching it to prep for this, because it's also
Speaker 3: you know, it's a period piece, and a really thoughtful
Speaker 3: period piece of that. Like, I just I don't know,
Speaker 3: I really loved it. I saw it twice in theaters
Speaker 3: and just sort of let wash over me, and it
Speaker 3: was very fun. It was fun learning how this movie
Speaker 3: was made. Basically, Caitlyn, what About You?
Speaker 2: I also saw this in theaters and I was able
Speaker 2: to go in without knowing jealous that it was a
Speaker 2: vampire movie.
Speaker 3: I thought the day after it came out and someone
Speaker 3: I don't even know who it was, but I placed
Speaker 3: a curse on them.
Speaker 2: I just like kind of stay off of social media
Speaker 2: in general.
Speaker 3: And I also healthy talk.
Speaker 2: To people question work.
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 2: I just like I managed to avoid any spoilers, and
Speaker 2: I was like dazzled by the movie and the twists
Speaker 2: and everything. And vampire movies are like a subgenre that
Speaker 2: I tend to be quite into. I love I love
Speaker 2: a vampire. We've covered a lot of them on the show, and,
Speaker 2: like you said, Jamie, a few recently.
Speaker 3: The vampire movie that felt like most akin to this
Speaker 3: one that I've seen is from Dusk Till Dawn.
Speaker 2: Which Ryan Kogler cites as one of his inspirations for Sinners.
Speaker 2: But yeah, similar in the sense that, like most of
Speaker 2: the movie takes place at some sort of raucous nightclub
Speaker 2: kind of place, and then Vampire's attack.
Speaker 4: Did you think it's important to note that this is
Speaker 4: a very different genre a vampire for sure, you know,
Speaker 4: like we hit Nosferatu, the sort of creepy, mothball parasitic
Speaker 4: type vampire. Vincent Pryce gave us the very dignified kind
Speaker 4: of sexy vampire. Then we had the era of the
Speaker 4: bisexual seducer vampire from an interview with the vampire. You
Speaker 4: had the sparkle vampire of course. Brilliant innovation from Twilight.
Speaker 2: Yeah, incredible.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and now we've made it all the way to
Speaker 4: cultural vampurism.
Speaker 3: So yeah, there's always innovation to be had in the
Speaker 3: vampire space.
Speaker 2: So true, let's take a quick break and then we'll
Speaker 2: get into the recap and we're back.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I guess let's just jump into it because a
Speaker 3: lot happens.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and my recap is quite long.
Speaker 4: Okay.
Speaker 2: So there's a prologue with voiceover talking about people born
Speaker 2: with incredible musical talent that can pierce the veil between
Speaker 2: life and death and conjure spirits between the past and future.
Speaker 2: It's a gift that can bring healing to communities, but
Speaker 2: it also attracts evil ooh, foreshadowing. We're in the Mississippi
Speaker 2: Delta in nineteen thirty two. We meet a young man
Speaker 2: named Sammy played by Miles Ca. He stumbles into a
Speaker 2: small black church. He's covered in blood. He's holding a
Speaker 2: broken guitar. He embraces the pastor, who is his father,
Speaker 2: who begs Sammy to drop the guitar and leave his
Speaker 2: sinning ways in the past, and we're also seeing flashes
Speaker 2: of something scary that has happened, but we're not really
Speaker 2: sure what's going on. We cut to the day before.
Speaker 2: We see Sammy going about his day. He lives in
Speaker 2: a community of mostly sharecroppers who work on a cotton plantation.
Speaker 2: Then we meet twin brothers, Smoke and Stack, both played
Speaker 2: by Michael B.
Speaker 3: Jordan, and they're doing the amazing twin shorthand where one's
Speaker 3: wearing a hat that's one color and one where is
Speaker 3: wearing a hat that's another color. And I just twin media,
Speaker 3: I was getting I will say I was getting burnt
Speaker 3: out on famous men playing their own twins, because that
Speaker 3: was happening a lot, like maybe ten years ago. But
Speaker 3: when Michael B. Jordan does it, it's just something completely different.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's a special street, it.
Speaker 3: Is, and he does an incredible job of like building
Speaker 3: out two very distinct characters. Like when I was seeing
Speaker 3: it for the first time, I forgot a few times
Speaker 3: that you know, it's the same actor.
Speaker 2: I think a lot of people did. They were like, wait,
Speaker 2: does Michael B. Jordan have a twin that no one
Speaker 2: knows about?
Speaker 3: Yeah? Like it's like, nope, Rammy Mallick style. That's one
Speaker 3: of my Like what Rammy Malick has a twin and
Speaker 3: his name is wait for it, Sammy Malick. Whoa wow
Speaker 3: to something I think about a lot.
Speaker 4: That's totally fair.
Speaker 2: Yeah, doesn't Vin Diesel have a twin brother too?
Speaker 4: Oh?
Speaker 3: Really?
Speaker 2: But not identical?
Speaker 3: That's so wild to think of two Vin Diesels at
Speaker 3: once that I don't know if I would want.
Speaker 2: Well, I don't even want one Vin Diesel.
Speaker 4: I don't know. I'm here for it, but I would
Speaker 4: be for us straight to be Vin Diesel's brother. But
Speaker 4: not identical.
Speaker 3: That's true. Oh my god, Vin Diesel's fraternal twin. That
Speaker 3: is a curse of sorts.
Speaker 2: Yeah, in any case, Yes, there's one brother who wears
Speaker 2: blue and that's smoke and the other one wears red
Speaker 2: and that's Stack. They have just arrived back in Mississippi
Speaker 2: from Chicago. We learn that they were bootleggers there. They
Speaker 2: have a lot of cash from that, and they meet
Speaker 2: up with a white man named Hogwood, who sells them
Speaker 2: an old sawmill which they plan to turn into a
Speaker 2: juke joint. And the twins tell this guy Hogwood, like,
Speaker 2: our business here is done. If we ever see you
Speaker 2: or your clan buddies on this property again, will kill
Speaker 2: them parentheses more foreshadowing. Then Smoke and Stack link up
Speaker 2: with Sammy, who's their cousin and who's going to play
Speaker 2: guitar at the juke joint that night, and they start
Speaker 2: getting everything else ready to open the joint, which they're
Speaker 2: going to do that night. And I was like, oh
Speaker 2: my god, that's the fastest turnaround I've ever heard of.
Speaker 3: It's a pop up. It's a pop up.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I mean, and they put together something incredible.
Speaker 2: So good on them. I would not have been able
Speaker 2: to turn that around so quickly, but I.
Speaker 3: Did enjoy sort of the thought experiment of if literally
Speaker 3: one person says no to the Twins throughout this day,
Speaker 3: the plan is pretty thoroughly fucked but they just I mean,
Speaker 3: it's to Michael B. Jordan's. They know no one's going to.
Speaker 4: Say now exactly. You can't say now. Yeah, yeah, yes.
Speaker 2: So Smoke goes into a market owned by a couple
Speaker 2: Bo and Grace Chow played by Yao and Lee Jion
Speaker 2: Lee to place an order for catfish and to commission
Speaker 2: a sign for the juke joint. Meanwhile, Stack and Sammy
Speaker 2: go to the train station to hire another musician named
Speaker 2: Slim played by Delroy Lindo.
Speaker 4: Also no complaints on this side.
Speaker 3: Great casting. Love Delroy Lindo the voice Alion. Yeah, truly, like,
Speaker 3: oh god, he's just the best. I used to I
Speaker 3: wrote fan fiction about him in college, which wow, is
Speaker 3: a lor reveal like erotic.
Speaker 2: Fanfic or no.
Speaker 3: It was literally just fiction about like what do I
Speaker 3: think he's up to at his house?
Speaker 2: Amazing?
Speaker 3: It was for like a class, But anyways.
Speaker 4: That's a beautiful excuse.
Speaker 3: I was just waiting for an excuse to speculate on
Speaker 3: what he's up to and he was. Also I think
Speaker 3: he should have won an Oscar for the five Woods
Speaker 3: and didn't, and I will not let that go anytime
Speaker 3: soon anyways, and.
Speaker 2: You shouldn't They hire him, and they hire a man
Speaker 2: called Cornbread to be the bouncer of the juke joint. Also,
Speaker 2: Stack runs into a woman named Mary played by Hailey Steinfeld.
Speaker 2: She's a former lover of his who he grew up
Speaker 2: with and who seems like he ditched back in Chicago
Speaker 2: like you do, like you do, so their relationship is
Speaker 2: a bit contentious at the moment. Meanwhile, Smoke pays a
Speaker 2: visit to a former lover of his, a woman named
Speaker 2: Annie played by one Me Musaku. They have a lot
Speaker 2: of history as well, some of it is painful, including
Speaker 2: a baby they had together that died. And Smoke shows
Speaker 2: up he wants to reconnect. He asks Annie if she'll
Speaker 2: cook at the juke joint tonight, and then they start
Speaker 2: smooching and having sex with each other.
Speaker 3: A very horny movie. As for me, I mean all
Speaker 3: of the we'll talk about this in the discussion as well,
Speaker 3: but just the costuming in this movie is unreal. Everyone
Speaker 3: looks i mean, I'm assuming period appropriate, but also just
Speaker 3: so profoundly hot. It's wild. As every character is introduced,
Speaker 3: You're just like, this is the greatest outfit I've ever seen, which.
Speaker 4: Is very, very true for the period. I feel in
Speaker 4: African American culture to just always be dressed the nine.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the tailoring and this, I hope this wins her
Speaker 3: another Oscar. But this is Ryan Coogler worked with her
Speaker 3: on Black Panther and Black Panther Wakonda Forever Ruth E. Carter,
Speaker 3: and she won Oscars for costume design on both Black Panthers,
Speaker 3: and she should win again. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Everyone looks amazing, very hot. Yes, so they're they're smooching
Speaker 2: and then and sex and sexing. Then we cut to
Speaker 2: a mysterious white man who seems to fall out of
Speaker 2: the sky and his skin.
Speaker 4: Is burning again like they do, like.
Speaker 3: White people do. This is period appropriate.
Speaker 2: Yes, this is just a universal truth.
Speaker 3: There were cursed Irish vampires falling from the sky.
Speaker 2: This time he approaches a house and he tells the
Speaker 2: white couple who live there, who are clan members, that
Speaker 2: a group of native men tried to rob and kill him,
Speaker 2: so the couple takes him in. Now, the chalk Taw
Speaker 2: people show up a little while later and tell the
Speaker 2: couple that they're pursuing someone very dangerous, someone who's not
Speaker 2: what he seems. Because it turns out this man Remiic
Speaker 2: played by j O'Connell is a vampire who attacks the
Speaker 2: couple and turns them into vampires. Yes, and speaking of
Speaker 2: quick turnarounds, the vampire incubation period in this movie seems
Speaker 2: it's very sweat a matter of minutes.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, as long as long as the plot needs.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And if there was any question if this couple is
Speaker 3: wildly racist, they are sooner to uh let a man
Speaker 3: who's obviously lying and covered in like sores and boils
Speaker 3: into their home than have a conversation with a native person.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and that's called white privilege.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yes, it is covered in sores and boils and
Speaker 3: somehow got in the door.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and had to be invited in which they do.
Speaker 3: Yeah. That it seems to be the one rule of
Speaker 3: vampires here. Although you get the garlic, you got the classics,
Speaker 3: the classic garlic, the sunlight.
Speaker 4: Yes, yeah, they retain the classic.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the stake through the heart, Yeah for sure. Then
Speaker 2: we cut to the Duke Joint. It's opening up. People
Speaker 2: are arriving. The clientele is entirely black, aside from Mary,
Speaker 2: who does have some black ancestry. She says that her
Speaker 2: maternal grandfather was half black, which I believe is also
Speaker 2: true for Hailey Steinfeld as well, thinks so yeah, though
Speaker 2: she passes as a white woman. We also meet Perline
Speaker 2: or I think we've already met her. She's played by
Speaker 2: Jamie Lawson, and she and Sammy are vibing. Then Sammy
Speaker 2: starts playing his guitar and singing the blues, and then
Speaker 2: we get like the sequence of the movie, the one
Speaker 2: where we see people playing music and dancing from the
Speaker 2: past from the future, with the same voiceover from the beginning,
Speaker 2: suggesting that Sammy has this spiritual musical talent that was
Speaker 2: previously discussed and this music seems to attract that vampire man.
Speaker 2: Remic with him is the couple that he just turned
Speaker 2: into vampires. This is Joan and Bert, and they all
Speaker 2: show up outside the Duke joint saying that they are
Speaker 2: musicians and they want to come in and eat and
Speaker 2: drink and play music. Cornbread the bouncer and Smoke and
Speaker 2: Stack and everyone are very suspicious of them, but Smoke
Speaker 2: and Stack and some of the others kind of like
Speaker 2: weigh the pros and cons of letting them in, of course,
Speaker 2: not realizing that they're vampires.
Speaker 3: Well, and also like they make it disturbingly clear that
Speaker 3: they're like, will be right over there, so they're also
Speaker 3: like leering nearby, lingering, yeah.
Speaker 2: And they realize that they could use these white people's money,
Speaker 2: so Mary suggests she goes and talks to them to
Speaker 2: kind of find out what their deal is. And they're
Speaker 2: weird and creepy, and it seems like they're about to
Speaker 2: attack her, and I think that.
Speaker 3: Like they specifically prey on the fact that her mom
Speaker 3: recently died, because that was the one thing that I
Speaker 3: was like, why did we learn that detail? I didn't remember?
Speaker 3: And then it seems like that is like one of
Speaker 3: the tricks.
Speaker 2: Then a short time later, Mary goes back inside via cornbread,
Speaker 2: saying like, go ahead on in, which is how she's
Speaker 2: able to get back inside because she's a vampire now.
Speaker 2: And she seduces Stack and they go into a room
Speaker 2: and start having some more sex, but oh no, she
Speaker 2: bites him and sucks his blood, which Smoke walks in on.
Speaker 2: So he shoots Mary a bunch of times, but she
Speaker 2: gets right back up on account of being undead and
Speaker 2: runs off into the night, and everyone's like, what the
Speaker 2: fuck was that all about? People rush to Stack's aid,
Speaker 2: but he dies kind of in the way that vampires do,
Speaker 2: and Smoke is devastated. They send all of the patrons home,
Speaker 2: though people like Sammy, Annie, Slim Pearlein, Bo, and Grace
Speaker 2: stay behind, but Grace wants to leave, so Bo goes
Speaker 2: out to pull the car around. Meanwhile, Cornbread had gone
Speaker 2: off to use the bathroom and he's attacked by the
Speaker 2: vampires and he comes back. He's acting weird. He wants
Speaker 2: to be let in, and then Stak, whose body they
Speaker 2: locked in the room, starts trying to get out, pretending
Speaker 2: like he's not a vampire.
Speaker 3: I love the shots where they're having like a conference
Speaker 3: outside being like I don't know, Oh should we? I
Speaker 3: don't know, I don't know, And then you cut back
Speaker 3: to him and he's like going full vampire mode at
Speaker 3: this like wild angle. It's just it's awesome.
Speaker 2: He's like, I'm not a vampire? What are you talking about?
Speaker 4: Him?
Speaker 3: He was like, guys, come on, come on, what's the
Speaker 3: where is that gould happen?
Speaker 2: So he bursts out and runs out into the night,
Speaker 2: after Annie throws pickle garlic on him because she realizes
Speaker 2: they're dealing with vampires, which means the plan is to
Speaker 2: stay in the juke joint until sunrise and gather whatever
Speaker 2: weapons they can in case they need to fight. Meanwhile,
Speaker 2: the vampires have turned basically everyone who was at the
Speaker 2: juke joint, so it's like several dozen people into vampires
Speaker 2: and they're all doing an Irish jig. Back inside, Annie
Speaker 2: has everyone eat a clove of garlic to make sure
Speaker 2: that no one is a secret vampire, and it turns
Speaker 2: out they're not. But then Bo comes back around, acting
Speaker 2: very vampirey, and Remick is right behind him, saying that
Speaker 2: he knows everything that Bo knows because the vampires kind
Speaker 2: of share like a collective consciousness, and Remick says that
Speaker 2: Sammy is the one he's after. He wants to absorb
Speaker 2: this musical gift so that he can travel through time,
Speaker 2: so to speak, and be brought back to his people.
Speaker 2: Remick is also caring on about how this vampire group
Speaker 2: is all about like free love and fellowship and family,
Speaker 2: but actually their vibes are very sinister, and Remiic threatens
Speaker 2: to go after Bo and Grace's daughter Lisa if they
Speaker 2: don't let the vampires inside, so Grace starts freaking out
Speaker 2: and screams like, come on in, you motherfuckers effectively inviting
Speaker 2: the vampires inside, so they russian. A battle ensues. Vampire
Speaker 2: Stack goes after Annie and bites her, so Smoke has
Speaker 2: to kill her because he had promised that he would
Speaker 2: drive a stake through her heart before she turned.
Speaker 3: Because Annie is a pragmatist to her core, she is like,
Speaker 3: let's stop being sentimental. This is a vampire movie, which
Speaker 3: is always my favorite character in the vampire movie, right, right.
Speaker 2: So then Stak goes after Smoke so that they can
Speaker 2: be immortal vampire brothers together, and so Smoke has to
Speaker 2: decide if he's going to kill his brother, can he
Speaker 2: do it? Cut to Remick descending on Sammy and he's
Speaker 2: a to turn him, but just then Smoke gets Remick
Speaker 2: with a steak in the heart and saves Sammy. And
Speaker 2: then the sun comes up and they watch as Remick
Speaker 2: and the other vampires burst into flames and perish. But
Speaker 2: the battle is not over because earlier, Remick had revealed
Speaker 2: that Hogwood, the white man who sold the brothers the
Speaker 2: juke Joint, is the Grand Dragon of the KKK, and
Speaker 2: he intended to kill everyone at this establishment. So Smoke
Speaker 2: gears up for another fight as he reflects on the
Speaker 2: day before, we get this montage of all the work
Speaker 2: that went into opening up the juke joint. We're also
Speaker 2: seeing Sammy go into his father's church, the same scene
Speaker 2: that we saw in the beginning of the movie. And
Speaker 2: then the clan arrives at the juke Joint and Smoke
Speaker 2: starts shooting them with his artillery of rifles and machine guns,
Speaker 2: and he kills them all but is shot in the
Speaker 2: process and starts bleeding out and seeing a vision of
Speaker 2: Annie breastfeeding their baby, signifying that he's dying and joining
Speaker 2: them in the afterlife. Then there's an epilogue where Sammy,
Speaker 2: now an old man in nineteen ninety two in Chicago,
Speaker 2: performs regularly at.
Speaker 3: This club and he's also a buddy guy.
Speaker 4: Very important detail.
Speaker 3: Yes what it incredible, I think one of the most
Speaker 3: inspired cameos of our time.
Speaker 4: Also known as dead yes for those.
Speaker 2: And late one night at the club, he has two visitors,
Speaker 2: Stack and Mary, because it turns out that Smoke never
Speaker 2: killed his brother Stack as long as Stack promised to
Speaker 2: never go after Sammy, which he kept his promise, and
Speaker 2: Stack does offer to turn Sammy into a vampire to
Speaker 2: make him immortal, but Sammy's like, no thanks, I'll just
Speaker 2: die the regular way. And then he's like, but before
Speaker 2: all that horrible stuff happened that night, that was the
Speaker 2: best day of my life. You and Stack is like same.
Speaker 2: That was the last time I saw my brother, and
Speaker 2: for those few hours at the juke joint, we were free.
Speaker 2: And that's the note that the movie ends on. So
Speaker 2: let's take another quick break and we'll come back to discuss.
Speaker 3: And we are back Dahlia in the grand tradition of
Speaker 3: the show. Where would you like to start the discussion?
Speaker 3: What's sticking out to you?
Speaker 4: Oh? Oh, there are so many places to go.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I know every time I'm like, oh this is
Speaker 3: Is this a mean thing to do to our guests?
Speaker 4: Oh? A little bit, a little bit. There are so
Speaker 4: many different things to choose in this film because it's
Speaker 4: so multi layered. I guess one thing I would say
Speaker 4: it does. It did strike me as odd because you know,
Speaker 4: you have the grand montage scene that I think we
Speaker 4: all took home with us in our hearts, but I
Speaker 4: did expect there to be more to come of that
Speaker 4: and a bit more exploration of that theme. So that
Speaker 4: struck me as a little strange.
Speaker 2: You mean the scene where it's kind of like we're
Speaker 2: trying through time and seeing all of the musicians.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and we just do it once. We just established
Speaker 4: that it is a power that he has that he
Speaker 4: just happens to have. I don't know that it's particularly
Speaker 4: utilized to any meaningful impact aside from you know, incidentally
Speaker 4: attracting vampire vampires.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, right, because there is mention that, like Remick says,
Speaker 2: I want to absorb this power so that I can
Speaker 2: like access people from my past. Because it's not super
Speaker 2: explicit how old he is slash how long he's been
Speaker 2: a vampire, but he makes reference to living in like
Speaker 2: pre colonized by England, Ireland.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I think it's supposed to go back to
Speaker 3: I was looking into because I was trying to figure
Speaker 3: out like, yeah, this this movie's relationship with like time
Speaker 3: in generational trauma is like you're saying, Dahlia, it's like
Speaker 3: really really complex and also not at least for me.
Speaker 3: I had to like do outside research to understand like
Speaker 3: how much time was being covered because I guess canonically
Speaker 3: the Irish vampire is from like the eleven hundreds, like
Speaker 3: he is ancient, which is like interesting but we don't.
Speaker 3: I don't think we technically know that, right, Yeah, I
Speaker 3: agree with you, Dalliah, Like I think that it's such
Speaker 3: a like it's it's the image that everyone takes home,
Speaker 3: and I feel like the closest you get to a
Speaker 3: meaningful payoff is Buddy Guy. Is that like he is
Speaker 3: the character, which I do think is good. Right, It's
Speaker 3: like he is the character who lives on and like
Speaker 3: I really there is I don't know. I usually absolutely
Speaker 3: cannot stand post credit scenes, but this one's amazing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's one of the very you justified ones.
Speaker 3: Right where it's like he's turning down eternal life and
Speaker 3: I feel like, or I don't know, the way I
Speaker 3: was like seeing the undercurrent to that is first of all,
Speaker 3: that's a curse. We've all seen a movie. We know that.
Speaker 3: But also that like he is immortal in a way
Speaker 3: because he like lived to be able to make art
Speaker 3: and like contribute to culture and like keep the legacy
Speaker 3: of the blues music he was playing at the juke
Speaker 3: joint continued, So it's like he doesn't need to live forever.
Speaker 3: And that's like part of what is so sad about
Speaker 3: the vampires is they didn't get to live long enough
Speaker 3: to to have that.
Speaker 4: I don't know, yeh, And I think it also in
Speaker 4: part this is very esoteric, but it does also in
Speaker 4: a way play into an African sense of time, where
Speaker 4: death is not definitively the end of life. It's just
Speaker 4: a transition into a much larger past.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I just this is very scholarly of me, But
Speaker 2: I watched an Instagram reel what Yeah I watch about
Speaker 2: everyone that was it was a woman talking about the
Speaker 2: African concept of time, and she's explaining that it's the
Speaker 2: idea that like time is comprised of events that you
Speaker 2: experience in the present and events that have been experienced
Speaker 2: in the past, and because it's impossible to experience future
Speaker 2: events that haven't happened yet, the concept of the future is.
Speaker 4: The future doesn't necessarily.
Speaker 2: Exist right right, which I really like. But as far
Speaker 2: as the concept of time, past, present and future in
Speaker 2: the movie, the sequence in the juke Joint where like
Speaker 2: time is being transcended via the music, I guess I'd
Speaker 2: like to didn't think that much about it because I
Speaker 2: was just like, Wow, this is so cool, and then
Speaker 2: I forgot to do my job and think harder.
Speaker 4: But no, no, it's a cool scene that it achieved
Speaker 4: its goal. Clearly it sticks with everyone.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it, yeah, because it's like you're covering
Speaker 3: so I mean again, it's like I don't know enough
Speaker 3: history in general to say, like what the time period is,
Speaker 3: but it definitely goes into the past into the future.
Speaker 3: I like that. It also felt very cool that with
Speaker 3: Bo and Grace, like their culture was represented near them,
Speaker 3: and then there were the creepy white lurkers right outside
Speaker 3: who I don't know. I feel like you're not supposed
Speaker 3: to understand in that moment, but it's like part of
Speaker 3: what makes them so horrible is like they want to
Speaker 3: have that, but they can't conceive of having that without
Speaker 3: taking it from someone.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and I suppose we may as well dive into
Speaker 4: the cultural and racial component of it. I think it
Speaker 4: would be irresponsible of us, not too obviously.
Speaker 3: Wait, what do you mean, No, Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4: I do think it's interesting that they did include the
Speaker 4: Chinese couple, which was not a detail that I would
Speaker 4: have personally thought to include, but it is apparently very
Speaker 4: important historically the connection between the African American and Asian
Speaker 4: American communities, particularly in the South at that time.
Speaker 3: I didn't know that. Yeah, I mean I learned a
Speaker 3: lot about like this specific time in this specific place.
Speaker 3: I knew it was the time of the Great Migration,
Speaker 3: but I wasn't aware of I mean, I know that
Speaker 3: this is like a failure of public schooling to some extent,
Speaker 3: is how diverse these areas were and how diverse these
Speaker 3: communities were, And actually seeing that brought to life in
Speaker 3: a movie is like critical because there's going to be
Speaker 3: kids who are being failed in schools right now who
Speaker 3: will see this movie.
Speaker 2: And you know there's it has a role in it.
Speaker 2: Speaking of being very scholarly, I read a piece on Medium.
Speaker 3: Wow, I'm just getting all that. Wait, what is the
Speaker 3: one thing more scholarly than.
Speaker 2: Real aside from Wikipedia of course, scholarly journal.
Speaker 4: Yes, next thing you're going to like drop a TikTok
Speaker 4: on us.
Speaker 2: I mean, look, there's things to be learned.
Speaker 3: I feel like that's foreshadowing. Wait, are we going to
Speaker 3: hit a TikTok? We'll get there, We'll get there.
Speaker 2: Maybe maybe No. But this piece I found to be
Speaker 2: really interesting by a writer named Brian Vaden, who broke
Speaker 2: down the motif of money and power and control and
Speaker 2: the movie and how all of these things relate to
Speaker 2: each other. I'll just quote this quote. We also meet
Speaker 2: an Asian family running multiple convenience stores that serve both
Speaker 2: black and white customers on either side of a segregated street.
Speaker 2: Its placement in the film is highly intentional. It shows
Speaker 2: how some communities figured out how to navigate and survive
Speaker 2: between two systems, how to offer services and goods to
Speaker 2: both without fully belonging to either. It's a quiet commentary
Speaker 2: on strategy, assimilation, and the complicated intersections of race and
Speaker 2: commerce in the post Slavery South unquote. Which the point
Speaker 2: being that Ryan Kugler made so many intentional choices when
Speaker 2: it comes to the motifs present in the movie. Because
Speaker 2: I do want to talk a lot more about money
Speaker 2: and currency and negotiation.
Speaker 3: And like that, because this Vivie very firmly says capitalism
Speaker 3: will not save us, correct, And I just Ryan Cougler's awesome,
Speaker 3: Like he both says that and directs billion dollar movies.
Speaker 3: And you're like, yeah, it's working for me. I don't know,
Speaker 3: it's complicated. I didn't realize because I didn't watch much
Speaker 3: of the press junket for this movie, but that, like
Speaker 3: Ryan Cougler gave a series of really great interviews about
Speaker 3: various aspects of the movies, and they're like and there's
Speaker 3: so much to talk about, but that this was like
Speaker 3: a pretty personal story for him because he's famously from Oakland,
Speaker 3: but he had his grandfather or no, sorry, his uncle.
Speaker 3: He was originally from Mississippi, and so a lot of
Speaker 3: this story was inspired by both the music and the
Speaker 3: history that he heard from his uncle when he was
Speaker 3: very young. And you know, says basically that he didn't
Speaker 3: really think that much about what this period of time
Speaker 3: would have actually been like in the way that no
Speaker 3: one is actually really listening to their uncles until it's
Speaker 3: too late kind of thing, but that he realized that
Speaker 3: he had this sort of wealth of experience through his
Speaker 3: own family to talk about this period of time in
Speaker 3: the South. His wife, Zinzy Kugler, who I also learned
Speaker 3: through researching this movie that their first date was to
Speaker 3: see Bring It On in Oakland, which I love.
Speaker 2: I know, wait, like back in ninety nine when it
Speaker 2: came out.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they've been together since they were like young. It's
Speaker 3: very very sweet. So that's just a fun fact. But
Speaker 3: that both of their families were really helpful in sort
Speaker 3: of like building out the historical specificity. Ryan Cougler was
Speaker 3: thinking about his uncles, he was thinking about the generation
Speaker 3: before them, and I guess that as Zinzi Coogler also
Speaker 3: had living elderly relatives who had also lived in the
Speaker 3: South in this time, and that this was like very
Speaker 3: much what he was pulling from. And you can feel
Speaker 3: that like historical specificity here even in the middle of
Speaker 3: a vampire movie, which is like who knows how he
Speaker 3: did that?
Speaker 4: And I do guess this is the point where I
Speaker 4: because I want you to give the synopsis first, but
Speaker 4: I will now dive into some of my deeper connections
Speaker 4: with the film.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Please.
Speaker 4: Similarly, my maternal grandfather is from the Mississippi Delta and
Speaker 4: did move to Chicago as part of the northern migration.
Speaker 4: Also may or may not have allegedly hit some ties
Speaker 4: with the mafia.
Speaker 3: Allegedly, it happens, It happens, and we're not judging well,
Speaker 3: as this movie explores, because of the cycle of poverty
Speaker 3: and because of racism and class disparity.
Speaker 4: And also, like many black people, particularly of my generation,
Speaker 4: I had some sketchy uncles I absolutely adored, but they
Speaker 4: were not good role models. Sadly, big bed Bill, who
Speaker 4: went on to be known as Sweet William, passed away
Speaker 4: before he could show me the sights. There were floating
Speaker 4: quotations there for listeners at home, and I feel like
Speaker 4: the sites are alluded to in this film as well
Speaker 4: for those of you who know. But yeah, so in
Speaker 4: a lot of ways, watching the film, it did hit
Speaker 4: on a lot of my own personal family background. So
Speaker 4: it's very personal, very real to me. Definitely touched on
Speaker 4: a lot of themes of my childhood and just the
Speaker 4: legacy that has been passed down through my family. The
Speaker 4: other side of my mom family is also Creole, so
Speaker 4: we do also have an entire section of the family
Speaker 4: that we don't speak to because they were able to
Speaker 4: pass as white and chose to do so.
Speaker 2: And I mean that might relate to a conversation we
Speaker 2: can have at some point about Mary Mary, the Hailey
Speaker 2: Steinfeld character. But yeah, there's so much to dive into. Yeah,
Speaker 2: can we talk about the motif slash theme of class, money, currency, trade,
Speaker 2: and negotiation. So, as we mentioned in the recap, most
Speaker 2: of the characters we see in this movie are black
Speaker 2: people trapped in poverty. They are only a few generations
Speaker 2: removed from slavery. Many of the characters we see are
Speaker 2: sharecroppers working on plantations. We see them use currency called plantations.
Speaker 2: Some of that's like paper money, some of it's wooden coins.
Speaker 2: This is currency that was paid to plantation workers sharecroppers
Speaker 2: that could only be spent at plantation run stores. So
Speaker 2: it was basically just a way to trap black sharecroppers
Speaker 2: in the cycle of poverty and keep them in debt.
Speaker 3: And as well as I mean, I feel like there
Speaker 3: were a series of intentional shots of and this is
Speaker 3: like kind of demonstrated towards the beginning between Sammy and
Speaker 3: the Twins, where Sammy, like many young people, is focused
Speaker 3: on being like I just have to get out of
Speaker 3: where I am, and if I can get out of
Speaker 3: where I am, I'm going to be in a better place,
Speaker 3: because anywhere is better than here, right, Like the character
Speaker 3: we recognize and the twins who have just spent a
Speaker 3: lot of time in Chicago, they have the sort of
Speaker 3: wisdom to be like, okay, But and then as they're
Speaker 3: having the conversation, they're surrounded by how even though you know,
Speaker 3: chattel slavery is technically abolished, they are passing through majority
Speaker 3: black chain gangs. They're passing through prison labor, We're meeting
Speaker 3: sharecroppers who are being ripped off right and left. Like
Speaker 3: the whole environment of this movie is intentionally reminding you
Speaker 3: that white supremacy is finding a way. Regardless.
Speaker 4: You do bring up a good point where the montage
Speaker 4: of traveling through time doesn't necessarily have to be dissected
Speaker 4: more since it is the theme of the entire film,
Speaker 4: since you know, it is ostensibly a period piece, but
Speaker 4: the reverberations of that period are still very much present
Speaker 4: even right now.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and there's that scene where Sammy is, you know,
Speaker 2: he's telling his cousins, I want to leave this area.
Speaker 2: I want to go to Chicago. He seems to think
Speaker 2: that because there are no Jim Crow laws there, that
Speaker 2: maybe he won't have to deal with racism, and the
Speaker 2: twins are like, that is incorrect. And they've been able
Speaker 2: to to some extent escape this cycle of poverty via
Speaker 2: you know, bootlegging and organized crime and things like that.
Speaker 3: But it's also like, is it stealing if it's from
Speaker 3: fucking scumbag white supremacists. It isn't. It is not, but
Speaker 3: it does feel I don't know, let me let me
Speaker 3: know what you both think. It feels like at the beginning,
Speaker 3: the twins feeling is that money is the only means
Speaker 3: of escape, and then the movie kind of dissects why
Speaker 3: that is not true.
Speaker 4: Yeah, And really, what the theme is touching on is
Speaker 4: this phenomenon of black capitalism and the assumption that we
Speaker 4: can wealth our way out of white supremacy.
Speaker 3: Yeah, which is like a I mean it is. I mean,
Speaker 3: I know everyone who made this movie is well aware
Speaker 3: of this, but it does feel, in spite of taking
Speaker 3: place ninety two years ago, still very like we're asking
Speaker 3: the same questions now.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, Yeah, because there are various conversations about freedom, how
Speaker 2: to achieve that as a black person in the gym
Speaker 2: Crow South, And there's a line where Smoke is talking
Speaker 2: to Annie and he's saying something like, I've been all
Speaker 2: over the world. We also learned that Smoke and Stack
Speaker 2: were World War One veterans, and we're presumably overseas in Europe.
Speaker 3: See, this is on my public school education, not to
Speaker 3: say private would be better. This is on my education.
Speaker 3: I wrote down World War two and now that you
Speaker 3: say that was like nineteen thirty two, No, that would
Speaker 3: not have been possible got it, got it.
Speaker 2: But anyway, Smoke says that he's been all over the
Speaker 2: world and he's never seen magic or ghosts or demons,
Speaker 2: just power, and the only thing that can get you
Speaker 2: that is money. First of all, he spoke too soon,
Speaker 2: because he will be seeing demons very shortly. Second, yes,
Speaker 2: money does give people access to power, but he seems
Speaker 2: to be of the mindset that again, he and his
Speaker 2: community will achieve liberation via capitalism. But we know that
Speaker 2: capitalism is one of the major things that prevents black
Speaker 2: liberation or liberation of any kind.
Speaker 4: And again, you know, it's important to note that the
Speaker 4: reason the vampires are essentially invited in is because the
Speaker 4: money that is being used by the black people it's
Speaker 4: ostensibly not good enough. You can't keep the business open
Speaker 4: on the black dollar alone. You also need the white
Speaker 4: dollar and naturally have the Uh, we're going to go
Speaker 4: ahead and continue saying white passing, but also, let's face it,
Speaker 4: white the white woman who has this greater proximity and
Speaker 4: comfort with white culture, who then feels that it is
Speaker 4: safe and ostensibly perhaps even her duty as sort of
Speaker 4: a white savior figure, you know, just perhaps incidentally named Mary,
Speaker 4: to go out and bring in the white dollar to
Speaker 4: ostensibly rescue or lift up the black community.
Speaker 2: Right, it's also gold coins that mister Vampire has, so
Speaker 2: it's it's this sort of almost like universally accepted form
Speaker 2: of currency. But yeah, because we see a man wanting
Speaker 2: to pay for his drink with the wooden nickels that
Speaker 2: he received as payment on the plantation, and Smoke is
Speaker 2: very reticent to accept them, and Stack and Annie and
Speaker 2: pushback say like, we need to accept the money that
Speaker 2: they have so that we can cultivate a space where
Speaker 2: the patrons feel like they belong here. It's for them,
Speaker 2: their money is good here. But there's like all this
Speaker 2: kind of push and pull on what currency is acceptable.
Speaker 4: And worth Noting the earlier scene in the movie where
Speaker 4: Annie's in her store selling groceries to children for random
Speaker 4: scraps of paper.
Speaker 3: Yeah, this movie has such a careful relationship with colonized
Speaker 3: people's across a very wide spectrum, right where I think
Speaker 3: that the colonize people that we don't get to know
Speaker 3: are the native community at the very beginning with the
Speaker 3: chalk Tak characters, the Chalktaw people we meet in one scene,
Speaker 3: which I don't think is like you know, a malicious
Speaker 3: choice at all, but it is. It does sort of
Speaker 3: hit the point home that because the chalk Talk community
Speaker 3: is introduced very intentionally in relation to this fucking clan couple,
Speaker 3: that it would have been I think, like one of
Speaker 3: the notes I have about this movie is that it
Speaker 3: would have been very possible to introduce a chalk Tak
Speaker 3: character who we get to know and who we get
Speaker 3: to know in relation to everyone else in the movie,
Speaker 3: because I think that this movie, we know is capable
Speaker 3: of presenting a very diverse and specific community. I mean,
Speaker 3: we know that because the people that are trapped in
Speaker 3: the juke joint. We have the white woman in the
Speaker 3: form of Mary, we have a majority black clientele and management,
Speaker 3: and we have the Chinese family. And Yeah, one of
Speaker 3: the things that I wish and and could have happened
Speaker 3: is to meaningfully include the chalk Talk characters, because they
Speaker 3: do appear intentionally, but not in a way that we
Speaker 3: know who any character's name is or.
Speaker 4: Yeah, they're just sort of these vague, magical people off
Speaker 4: to the side.
Speaker 2: I know about the vampire and are chasing him, but
Speaker 2: we don't know how they know about or what the
Speaker 2: backstory is there.
Speaker 3: Which is and it's a shame because it's like, this
Speaker 3: is a movie that is open to magic. It is
Speaker 3: a vampire movie. Yeah, and so it's like not bringing
Speaker 3: in the chalk talk characters felt like a clear missed opportunity.
Speaker 4: Agree, But the other.
Speaker 3: The other communities we get to know here. I mean,
Speaker 3: I think that there was a lot made of and
Speaker 3: I have a couple quotes here about the choice of
Speaker 3: presenting the black characters in relation to this Irish vampire
Speaker 3: because the.
Speaker 4: Irish choice is very intentional.
Speaker 3: Very intentional, and like, couldn't be there they are doing
Speaker 3: the dance, and so as an Irish I was like,
Speaker 3: let's let's fight out more. And Ryan Cougler, I mean,
Speaker 3: he had a lot to say about this choice, and
Speaker 3: so I just wanted to share sort of his expansion
Speaker 3: on why he chose that, because I think it has
Speaker 3: a lot to say about how white communities who have
Speaker 3: been colonized make a big deal about having been colonized,
Speaker 3: but ultimately aligned with whiteness over other communities that have
Speaker 3: been oppressed in the same way. So Ryan Cougler told
Speaker 3: Indie Wire, I'm obsessed with Irish folk music. My kids
Speaker 3: are obsessed with it. My first name is Irish. I
Speaker 3: think it's not known how much crossover there is between
Speaker 3: African American culture and Irish culture and how much that
Speaker 3: stuff's loved in our community. It was very important that
Speaker 3: our master Vampire in this movie was unique and specific
Speaker 3: as the situation was. It was important to me that
Speaker 3: he was old, but also that he came from a
Speaker 3: time that pre existed these racial definitions, so that he
Speaker 3: would be extremely odd and that it would all seem
Speaker 3: odd to him, but also that he would see it
Speaker 3: for what it was and offer a sweet deal, if
Speaker 3: that makes sense, and that the music was just as
Speaker 3: beautiful so I mean, and there's a number of other
Speaker 3: interviews he gave to this, but that was how I learned,
Speaker 3: basically that the Irish Vampire was intended to be from
Speaker 3: the eleven hundreds, when the English first colonized Ireland, where
Speaker 3: this character is I think intended to be targeting Sammy,
Speaker 3: coming from the place of I want to steal your
Speaker 3: culture and your music because I want it to bring
Speaker 3: me back to my culture instead of anything else. It
Speaker 3: is from a place of violent assimilation, which I feel
Speaker 3: like comes through in this movie through Christianity and religion
Speaker 3: like the role that religion had in this movie. I
Speaker 3: don't think I fully appreciated at first.
Speaker 2: Say I have a whole spiel on that. Yeah, I
Speaker 2: mean pre the vampire attack. There are many moments of
Speaker 2: this movie that sent her black joy. There's this focus
Speaker 2: on community and music and dance and fun and letting
Speaker 2: loose and sexual pleasure and things basically things that Sammy's
Speaker 2: pastor father would consider a sin. And he very explicitly
Speaker 2: says this to Sammy, where he is like, don't hang
Speaker 2: around those sinners.
Speaker 3: That's the name of the movie. And then everyone cheered
Speaker 3: in the in the crowd, yes, exactly the ticket bar.
Speaker 2: But this ignores the concept of joy as resistance and
Speaker 2: rest and relaxation as resistance.
Speaker 3: And music and art as resistance. I feel like that
Speaker 3: is what that's the whole scene. The quote unquote like
Speaker 3: the scene is about, is about how black art and
Speaker 3: black culture has a role in joy and resistance.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, and I feel like a lot of you know,
Speaker 2: organized Western religion misconstrues these acts of joy and rest
Speaker 2: and relaxation and music and sexual pleasure and things like
Speaker 2: that as sin. And of course there's supremacy very entrenched
Speaker 2: in that in terms of when white people do things,
Speaker 2: it's considered art and culture. When black people do things,
Speaker 2: it's seen as witchcraft or hedonism. So obviously there's a
Speaker 2: huge double standard there. But my point is that rest
Speaker 2: and art and music and joy as resistance is often underestimated,
Speaker 2: but it is very important and can be very effective.
Speaker 2: But then we see the white vampires come in and
Speaker 2: interfere with this night of joy and rest and music
Speaker 2: and try to steal from this community.
Speaker 4: But I do want to know that there is complexity
Speaker 4: to it. There is, and I feel we're noting this,
Speaker 4: but you know, there is the obvious layer of the
Speaker 4: vampires are coming in stealing, but it's more multi layer
Speaker 4: than that, because Remick is offering actual currency and Remick
Speaker 4: is offering to bring in his music as well, So
Speaker 4: there is an exchange. It's not being like a segregation.
Speaker 4: There is a cultural exchange that is attempting to take place,
Speaker 4: and Remick is offering this ostensibly gift of immortality, but
Speaker 4: at what cost. So there is something being offered, it's
Speaker 4: just a steep cost do you make that exchange.
Speaker 3: Which, again it feels very intentional on Ryan Kugler's part
Speaker 3: to establish space like negative space, but space between the
Speaker 3: KKK and the Twins and the Blackmmunity and the sharecroppers,
Speaker 3: where there are like he is like getting into all
Speaker 3: of these shades of gray of Like there are communities
Speaker 3: of white people who have been displaced from their homelands
Speaker 3: who have chosen to ultimately align with whiteness, and that
Speaker 3: is the vampiric quality of them. But they exist in
Speaker 3: this separate, nefarious space that I don't know, Like I
Speaker 3: don't I haven't seen very often addressed that there are
Speaker 3: so many layers to what the characters in this movie
Speaker 3: are dealing with, and that like the vampires are horrible
Speaker 3: and evil and wrong, and they also are existing in
Speaker 3: a different reality than other villains in this story.
Speaker 4: Yeah, they are in fact better than the Klan.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, which is like a very low bar to clear,
Speaker 3: but there they are. Yeah. I that that relationship I
Speaker 3: feel like I had never or i'd rarely seen made explicit.
Speaker 3: And also the role that related, So getting back to
Speaker 3: like religion, the role that religion has as a colonizing tool,
Speaker 3: where there is like a very specific interaction between I
Speaker 3: believe stack they're both Michael B.
Speaker 2: Jordan and the brand One or the blue one.
Speaker 3: I don't know one of them was a vampire already.
Speaker 2: Oh Stack, Stack is the one who turns into a vampire.
Speaker 3: Okay, so Smoke. There is an interaction that Smoke has
Speaker 3: with the Irish vampires that felt in retrospect very explicit,
Speaker 3: where they're saying the Lord's Prayer and they're saying it
Speaker 3: very irishly. They're using trespasses instead of sins, even though
Speaker 3: it's the movie Sinners. And then he says explicitly, like
Speaker 3: I learned you know, I'm summarizing, but like I learned
Speaker 3: that prayer from the people who colonized us. I hate
Speaker 3: them so much, but I still find comfort in the prayer,
Speaker 3: and then he weaponizes it against Smoke, and like that
Speaker 3: sort of level of all of the aggressions that have
Speaker 3: to happen over a period of hundreds of thousands of
Speaker 3: years to get to the point where no one can
Speaker 3: align with each other and that these communities that should
Speaker 3: actually be able to help each other won't. And it's
Speaker 3: because that displays Irish communities are aligning with whiteness because
Speaker 3: it makes them safer, And that's like what Mary's character
Speaker 3: boils down too exactly.
Speaker 4: It's essentially the safety of proximity to one's own oppressor absolutely, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 4: and the invitation to become the oppressor.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, which most people will accept because it will give
Speaker 2: them some sense of power, even if it's not actual power.
Speaker 2: They'll perceive it as, oh, and now I have power
Speaker 2: over others.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but Sinners explicitly makes it power that is tainted
Speaker 3: and a curse.
Speaker 2: Well, speaking of the characters who are women, I wish
Speaker 2: in general that women were more meaningfully integrated into the story.
Speaker 3: Yeah, let's talk about it. Yeah, let's talk about it.
Speaker 3: Who was to go first?
Speaker 4: I'm glad that we fully praised the film first.
Speaker 2: The movie is doing a lot of things right, no
Speaker 2: doubt about it.
Speaker 4: This was not one of them. A great, very reductive
Speaker 4: archetypes in my view. You know you have and I'm
Speaker 4: going to mess this up, which is why I kept
Speaker 4: my Wikipedia window open.
Speaker 3: Hey, we all have, we all have.
Speaker 4: Exactly make no mistake Grace. So we have. Grace and
Speaker 4: Annie are both maternal figures, which of course gives them
Speaker 4: a special sort of status. Parlene, sort of your rudimentary,
Speaker 4: undeveloped Jezebel archetype.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Perline especially pained me because the performance is incredible
Speaker 3: and there and like, you just cannot justify her beyond Sammy,
Speaker 3: and that sucks.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: The one thing I'll say about her that I did
Speaker 2: appreciate is that we see a representation on screen of
Speaker 2: a woman receiving oral sex, which we almost never see.
Speaker 3: It's true I wanted to get off, but that's still
Speaker 3: in really to Sammy.
Speaker 2: To Sammy, Yes, yes, but you could also argue that
Speaker 2: it's like this movie goes out of its way to
Speaker 2: show female pleasure in a way that most movies don't
Speaker 2: bother to.
Speaker 4: And specifically black female pleasure. Yeah, you know. I think
Speaker 4: it's also important to note that Annie is not this petite,
Speaker 4: little Hollywood style vixen, but still absolutely given sexual power
Speaker 4: within the context of the film.
Speaker 2: Mm hmm, absolutely to the point where it took me
Speaker 2: by surprise that she is in a sex scene, just
Speaker 2: because I'm so used to sex scenes in movies being
Speaker 2: between two very thin people. Obviously, I'm not surprised that
Speaker 2: anyone would be sexually attracted to her, like Musaku is gorgeous,
Speaker 2: gorgeous person hot, but I was surprised that there was
Speaker 2: a sex scene with a plus size woman.
Speaker 4: Yes, a plus sized black woman. With Michael B.
Speaker 2: Jordan exactly because most movies cannot conceive of the idea
Speaker 2: that a thin, lean man who's as handsome as Michael B. Jordan,
Speaker 2: for example, would be sexually attracted to a fat person.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it shouldn't be revolutionary and yet right exactly an
Speaker 4: American cinema definitely is.
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely yeah.
Speaker 3: I mean, and Andy's character in general, I mean again,
Speaker 3: it's I think that there are a lot of missed
Speaker 3: opportunities with women in general. But Annie is my favorite
Speaker 3: character in the movie. I think there is so much
Speaker 3: to love about her, even though there couldn't should have
Speaker 3: been more, but I really appreciate it. I mean, I
Speaker 3: feel like her relationship to Whodoo does so much to
Speaker 3: sort of bring us into the world of the movie
Speaker 3: in a way that is very historically. They're living in
Speaker 3: the South. Who do is spirituality that was originally developed
Speaker 3: by enslaved people in the South that both honors the
Speaker 3: time and place we're in and also is like something
Speaker 3: about her that gives her authority. And she is not
Speaker 3: dismissed for this. She is honored for it that and
Speaker 3: and and other reasons. But it is one of the
Speaker 3: major factors that whichever Michael B. Jordan she had a
Speaker 3: relationship with. I struggle with both Smoke.
Speaker 4: I can't believe you can't tell Michael B. Jordan's a part.
Speaker 3: I know that's one is blue and one is red.
Speaker 3: No cancel, be canceled, be no, but that it's something
Speaker 3: that Smoke defers to her for which is another. I mean, like,
Speaker 3: I feel like her character, even going on off on
Speaker 3: what we were just talking about, that she is the
Speaker 3: character that is most connected to spirituality and is never
Speaker 3: dismissed for it, as so often we see very spiritual,
Speaker 3: witchier characters dismissed for She is right. She is by
Speaker 3: a wide margin, the most pragmatic character in the story.
Speaker 4: And genuinely moral.
Speaker 3: Yes, absolutely where I mean, And I think like a
Speaker 3: clear demonstration of that that I hadn't noticed till, like
Speaker 3: my last viewing was that she is both someone who
Speaker 3: when the Irish vampire freaks ask well, why was Mary
Speaker 3: allowed into the Duke joint, Annie is the first one
Speaker 3: to say, because she's a part of our family. But
Speaker 3: Annie is also the first to realize that Mary is
Speaker 3: a vampire now and we have to get her the
Speaker 3: fuck out, Like she is the only person in the
Speaker 3: attire plot, who is able to see things for what
Speaker 3: they are and also still love and feel And I
Speaker 3: just I don't know, I appreciate her character so much.
Speaker 3: The performance is amazing and yeah, I just love Annie.
Speaker 4: Yeah, somehow captures a white spectrum of black womanhood despite
Speaker 4: her limited screen time and dialogue.
Speaker 3: Yes, that's the thing, is like there, and I don't
Speaker 3: hold it against the character that, like, the last time
Speaker 3: we see her, she is very firmly a mother, and
Speaker 3: we know enough about her to know that is not
Speaker 3: how her character is defined. But there's so much we
Speaker 3: don't know about her where like we really only get
Speaker 3: a glimpse of how clearly I mean, like when we
Speaker 3: meet her and she is like doing that interaction with
Speaker 3: the child when Smoke comes back, we get a clear
Speaker 3: indication that she's very important to her community, but we
Speaker 3: don't really get to see very much of that.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Yeah, she gets to be mother, savior and murder,
Speaker 4: but not a lot of time to be a person.
Speaker 3: And that fucking sounds Yeah yeah, well when you put
Speaker 3: it that way, it sucks because we know her for
Speaker 3: such a short time and it seems like, like, I mean,
Speaker 3: it would have been great to see her with a
Speaker 3: close friend, you know, just someone who she was not
Speaker 3: actively feeling either uncomfortable around or beefing with, because I
Speaker 3: feel like those are those are the characters who she's
Speaker 3: mostly put around. It's like someone that she has reason
Speaker 3: to feel a little uncomfortable with.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Also when she I think the first time I saw this,
Speaker 2: when she is bitten by Stack, Stack's the one who
Speaker 2: tries to turn her and then smoke her. Lover has
Speaker 2: to kill her, and he honors her wish of killing
Speaker 2: her before she turns into a vampire. When she is killed,
Speaker 2: my brain immediately went to like, oh, no, like is
Speaker 2: she being fridged? But I think this maybe doesn't really
Speaker 2: count since pretty much every other character in the movie
Speaker 2: dies as well.
Speaker 4: Yes, so it is very thorough in the massacre.
Speaker 3: But.
Speaker 2: Pretty much everyone but Sammy and then the immortal couple
Speaker 2: of Stack and Mary when they show up in nineteen
Speaker 2: ninety two, they're still around. But uh.
Speaker 4: It does also always bring me a special joy to
Speaker 4: see black women survive cinema. Yeah, and we definitely do
Speaker 4: not get that in this film.
Speaker 2: We don't get that.
Speaker 3: Here, no, which it is really frustrating because if we
Speaker 3: meet to like Annie and Perline are both such strong
Speaker 3: con and not to pick one er fore the other.
Speaker 3: But how Annie doesn't get out of this movie I
Speaker 3: will never understand exactly.
Speaker 4: She's the only person with any sense from the start.
Speaker 2: She has all the knowledge, she knows everything. She has
Speaker 2: the best equipped to survive the movie, right, which again
Speaker 2: the movie contextualizes with her background as a who do practitioner.
Speaker 2: I also feel like this is one of the few
Speaker 2: American movies at least that doesn't paint voodoo or who
Speaker 2: dooo or any like African diasporic religions as some kind
Speaker 2: of like evil sorcery, because that's what most of them do.
Speaker 2: We talked about this a lot on the Princess Frog episode.
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, that the villain, Yeah, like the villain of
Speaker 3: the Princess and the front that. Yeah, there's a whole
Speaker 3: song about it.
Speaker 2: But it seems like there was research that went into
Speaker 2: this movie about you know, who do practice and healers.
Speaker 2: I'll share a quote from Wumni Musaku in w magazine.
Speaker 2: She was interviewed and asked about the role.
Speaker 4: You promised us a TikTok video.
Speaker 2: Okay, excuse me, I'm working on it. In the meantime,
Speaker 2: she says this quote. That was the key for me
Speaker 2: with Annie finding her anchor and the source of her power,
Speaker 2: which is her faith and love. Whodo is a practice
Speaker 2: that I didn't know anything about. So we had a
Speaker 2: Hoodoo consultant and I did a ton of research. Just
Speaker 2: being in New Orleans, I met so many people who
Speaker 2: are either initiated or have family members who are. I
Speaker 2: would go to House of Hodoo. I looked into the
Speaker 2: Voodoo Museum in Voodoo Authentica, I met with witch doctors,
Speaker 2: and I read books about the arisius and their powers.
Speaker 2: Learning that history as a Yoruba woman myself, when I
Speaker 2: knew nothing about it at all, really opened up something
Speaker 2: for me. It's a part of the message of the film.
Speaker 2: Knowing who you're from, being in touch with your ancestry,
Speaker 2: and learning how their purpose is now manifested in you.
Speaker 3: I really appreciate that, like in a movie that is
Speaker 3: going out of its way to discuss religion in spirituality,
Speaker 3: that who do spirituality is separated from the religions that
Speaker 3: are forced upon colonized and oppressed people, because again, I
Speaker 3: think that again in a lesser movie, any spirituality would
Speaker 3: be painted as a very broad brush as all religion
Speaker 3: and spirituality is inherently oppressive when the reality is your
Speaker 3: personal relationship to it, and also where does it come
Speaker 3: from in your lineage? And sinners is careful to delineate
Speaker 3: who do is a spirituality and a practice that was
Speaker 3: created by enslaved peoples that came from Africa and built
Speaker 3: upon And whereas when we meet the Irish vampires, they're like,
Speaker 3: so there's this thing called Catholicism. We hate it, but
Speaker 3: here it is, yeah, and like the relationship is far
Speaker 3: less personal and all that to say, I mean, there
Speaker 3: is so much going on with Andy's character and I
Speaker 3: just feel like it wasn't fully.
Speaker 4: She deserves her own film. There should be a sequel.
Speaker 3: Is there any reason Sammy and Annie couldn't have made it?
Speaker 3: Because I understand that Sammy is not just himself as
Speaker 3: a character, but he represents black art and black culture
Speaker 3: and personhood and moving forward and all of these really
Speaker 3: important things that the movie is talking about. But like,
Speaker 3: why not Annie? She should have made it?
Speaker 2: I know, yeah, yeah, it takes us a while to
Speaker 2: meet her as well, and you know, I know that
Speaker 2: you know, the story has a lot to accomplish, and
Speaker 2: it is focused on the Michael B. Jordan's but I
Speaker 2: do feel like there was room to include her more
Speaker 2: in the story. I mean, I do appreciate that she
Speaker 2: is given. She is the character with all of the
Speaker 2: relevant knowledge on how to survive a vampire attack. And
Speaker 2: I also thought it was interesting that at first she
Speaker 2: thinks they are haints. She uses the word haint several
Speaker 2: times and I had to look that up because I
Speaker 2: wasn't familiar with what that was, but it's a term
Speaker 2: in the Gula Geechee language, and then I had to
Speaker 2: look up what that is. This movie gave me an
Speaker 2: excuse to learn about a new culture.
Speaker 4: Yep.
Speaker 2: And I appreciate that all because she says hate and
Speaker 2: I was like, what is that?
Speaker 3: Absolutely? I mean, and it's again like we talk a
Speaker 3: lot about like it is not the job of anyone
Speaker 3: movie to do this, that or the other, but it
Speaker 3: is a benefit of a movie like Senators that it
Speaker 3: stands to introduce. Uh.
Speaker 4: It covers a lot of ground.
Speaker 3: Like kind of an absurd amount of ground, so much.
Speaker 3: I also thought, I mean, another woman who we sort
Speaker 3: of get to know throughout this is Grace, who, while
Speaker 3: I think she is a very proactive distinct character is
Speaker 3: primarily defined through her relationship as a wife and a mother,
Speaker 3: and correct right where it's like legionally gives an unreal performance.
Speaker 3: And I also think, and this is like possibly my
Speaker 3: own like short sightedness, But I can't think of many
Speaker 3: examples in like mainstream like blockbustering media where I feel like,
Speaker 3: very often Asian American characters don't have regional accents for
Speaker 3: some reason for sure, And this was like one of
Speaker 3: the few examples I could think of in a like
Speaker 3: big blockbuster movie where we have Asian American characters who
Speaker 3: have very clearly regionally distinct accents and a clear relationship
Speaker 3: to their culture of origin. And like, I don't know,
Speaker 3: I thought it was wonderful.
Speaker 4: That's good attention to detail, thank you.
Speaker 3: But like Grace, it's a great performance. I like her character,
Speaker 3: but again, it did feel like it was hanging a
Speaker 3: little aggressively on the wife, like and my wife or
Speaker 3: and my mother ye versus anything else, because it does
Speaker 3: feel like her ultimate question is do I go with
Speaker 3: my husband? And the reason she turns against her husband
Speaker 3: is because of her daughter, and we don't really get
Speaker 3: to know too much about her outside of that. And
Speaker 3: again it just feels like a missed opportunity to flesh
Speaker 3: out that character more as a person that exists as
Speaker 3: a singular being outside of those roles exactly.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and a similar vibe with Herlene as the you know,
Speaker 4: necessary sexual liberator of Sammy or whatever. It just seemed
Speaker 4: very odd and I don't feel like anything else was
Speaker 4: explored with her as a person or character at all.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 4: And on the one hand, because I was thinking about
Speaker 4: this right before we started, I'm like, I'm sure some
Speaker 4: people might justify it as well. You know, it's nineteen three,
Speaker 4: so maybe it's a statement on women's place in society
Speaker 4: at that time. But I have a very hard time
Speaker 4: going with that in the case of Perlein, specifically as
Speaker 4: a blues singer. So the majority of blues singers, especially
Speaker 4: women blues singers of the era, would have been extremely
Speaker 4: independent women and by no means defined by their relationship
Speaker 4: to any man.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And we do learn that she is married, because she
Speaker 2: tells Sammy that when he's like kind of approaching her.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but it might as well have not have happened.
Speaker 3: I feel like, as far as I like, I feel
Speaker 3: like that's to establish her as the Jezebel, but it
Speaker 3: doesn't pay off in any meaningfully way.
Speaker 2: That's what I mean. And also like, you know, why
Speaker 2: why can't she be one of these like musicians who
Speaker 2: has this of mystical abilities to connect past and present
Speaker 2: and things like that. But I guess only Sammy gets.
Speaker 4: She's very propified.
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, and like and and again it sucks because
Speaker 3: it's like the performance that Jamie Lawson gives, especially like
Speaker 3: in the musical portion, is unreal. I feels like so
Speaker 3: many of the things that you would want is there,
Speaker 3: Like where okay, she's unhappy in her marriage, or like
Speaker 3: she's whatever, Like she receives pleasure as we see she
Speaker 3: goes a woga, she comes so hard, she's like, I
Speaker 3: have to give a full blown musical performance, and so
Speaker 3: so many of us have felt that way and been
Speaker 3: unable to deliver what she does. And so it's very
Speaker 3: cathartic watching a woman come and be like and I
Speaker 3: can show you how it feels. It's great, like it's
Speaker 3: it's so great, But we don't have enough for her
Speaker 3: to be a full character, because we can really only
Speaker 3: name two or three things about her, and I feel
Speaker 3: like so much of that comes down to like, it's
Speaker 3: a great performance, but what do we know about her?
Speaker 2: What it comes down to is that this movie is
Speaker 2: more concerned with the Smokestack Twins and the Sami characters,
Speaker 2: and so they're definitely they get most of the screen
Speaker 2: time and the important narrative arcs and all of that.
Speaker 2: And then that's just part of a larger problem of
Speaker 2: there just not being enough movies that center black women,
Speaker 2: and especially ones that explore the themes that this movie
Speaker 2: explores as far as like black liberation and what does
Speaker 2: that look like? And black joy and what does that
Speaker 2: look like? And things like that, and you know, it's
Speaker 2: again we always say it's not any one movie's job
Speaker 2: to represent everything and explore everything worthing, but in this
Speaker 2: movie it does feel noticeable. And also this kind of
Speaker 2: is a movie about fathers and sons because I mean
Speaker 2: smoke and talking about their father.
Speaker 4: And do we even mention Sammy's mom? No?
Speaker 2: Do we meet her?
Speaker 3: No, we don't even know. We don't know if she's living,
Speaker 3: dead existence.
Speaker 4: Yeah, there's no reference to her at all.
Speaker 3: Maybe he felt from the sky, we don't know.
Speaker 4: Yeah, he just came forth from his father's preaching.
Speaker 2: I guess yeah, immaculate conception question Mark.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I feel like there's an extremely controversial statement, but
Speaker 4: I would be willing to do with one less Michael B.
Speaker 4: Jordan in favor of do you have one fully developed
Speaker 4: female character?
Speaker 3: I agree? I agree, and I also think, like I
Speaker 3: love Twin inspired tension, but we are not exploring like
Speaker 3: what if he had a fra Turtle twin who was
Speaker 3: a woman, Like how would that mix things up? I? Yeah,
Speaker 3: And this is like sort of goes back to what
Speaker 3: my irritation with Twin stunt casting is is that it
Speaker 3: is like, well, instead of developing other actors or perhaps women,
Speaker 3: because outside of Lindsay Lohan, most of the doubled actors
Speaker 3: are men, they're sort of like, what if we had
Speaker 3: two movie stars instead of one? And this movie is
Speaker 3: not above that?
Speaker 2: Jamian, you're forgetting about the Vanessa Hudgens Princess Switch movies.
Speaker 4: Forget this right.
Speaker 3: You're right, and I have seen them all. That's embarrassing. Yes, Okay,
Speaker 3: I retract my statement, but I do feel like sometimes
Speaker 3: there is a tendency where it's like it's fun, and
Speaker 3: I often like it, but you know, sometimes it's like, well,
Speaker 3: what if we could have two movie stars instead of one,
Speaker 3: and movie stars tend to be men in a movie
Speaker 3: that has a clear invested interest in intersectionality, I do
Speaker 3: feel like women receive the short shrift, which again is
Speaker 3: like this movie is doing so much, it cannot do everything.
Speaker 3: It's not fair to lay at the feet of Mike
Speaker 3: of not Michael B. Jordan, He's already doing so much
Speaker 3: of Ryan Kugler to do everything. But of every intersection
Speaker 3: presented in this movie, it does feel like women are
Speaker 3: generally and Black women specifically, don't have the presence and
Speaker 3: the complete narrative arcs that they should have. We get
Speaker 3: the beginning of a lot of interesting arcs and then
Speaker 3: they die.
Speaker 4: Yes, so.
Speaker 3: I don't love that. I did want to talk about
Speaker 3: I know that it's hot and we're going over time,
Speaker 3: but I did want to just touch on some of
Speaker 3: the conversation around the release of this movie. Yes, I
Speaker 3: have stuff on this as well, because there is a
Speaker 3: bunch to talk about. I think that a lot of
Speaker 3: what I remember seeing and what demonstrates a clear persistent
Speaker 3: racism in the way that not just movies are promoted
Speaker 3: but covered is how I mean Sinners is again, it's
Speaker 3: doing so much because not only is it a major
Speaker 3: blockbuster tent pole written and directed by a black writer director,
Speaker 3: it is also an a ritual story which we are
Speaker 3: seeing so little of. And by all metrics, it did incredibly.
Speaker 3: This was a writer director who is beloved, who historically
Speaker 3: has always had majority black casts, and the movie did well.
Speaker 3: People went out to see it. It broke a number
Speaker 3: of records I mean sort of run down the list
Speaker 3: of but like specifically in recent history for original stories,
Speaker 3: because we've been really plagued by IP stories for a
Speaker 3: long long time and this felt like to me at
Speaker 3: least that like Ryan Coogler had done his time in
Speaker 3: the like IP world, and here is this original story
Speaker 3: that he's writing and directing, and it was doing incredibly.
Speaker 3: It got a ton of word of mouth marketing. It
Speaker 3: made three hundred and sixty six million dollars at the
Speaker 3: global box office. It was incredible. But what we saw
Speaker 3: in terms of how it was covered was a lot
Speaker 3: of like dubiousness of like will Sinners be profitable at
Speaker 3: the box office in ways that you just like would
Speaker 3: not see four blockbuster ten polls written directed and starring
Speaker 3: white actors, directors, writers.
Speaker 4: I mean, it's tradition with blacks andem at this point.
Speaker 3: True, true, I was just like asking the most bad
Speaker 3: faith questions possible to undercut someone's success.
Speaker 4: Yeah, phenomenal black directors and writers are always treated like
Speaker 4: toddlers trying to throw a ball for the first time.
Speaker 2: The New York Times and Fuck Them was very guilty
Speaker 2: of this variety a few others. But it's also not
Speaker 2: surprising that this movie was so popular because ample money
Speaker 2: was spent on marketing to promote this movie, which often
Speaker 2: does not happen with movies by and about marginalized people,
Speaker 2: because Hollywood will assume that no one wants to see
Speaker 2: that movie, so they don't promote it enough. And because
Speaker 2: it wasn't well promoted, no one knows about it, and
Speaker 2: that's why no one saw the movie. So it becomes
Speaker 2: this like self fulfilling prophecy that has these sinister reasons
Speaker 2: behind it. But this movie was well promoted and a
Speaker 2: lot of people saw it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, even when it was well promoted, they're like, well,
Speaker 3: should we have on that, and you're like, yeah, everyone
Speaker 3: loved it.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And then also worth noting is the deal Ryan Kugler
Speaker 2: was able to get for this movie, which was first
Speaker 2: dollar gross, which means that he receives a percentage of
Speaker 2: gross box office revenue starting from like day one of
Speaker 2: the movie's release. So typically it would be something like
Speaker 2: the studio waits until the film starts to turn a
Speaker 2: profit and like make its budget back. But in this case,
Speaker 2: he was making money off the movie from like minute one,
Speaker 2: and that's.
Speaker 3: Just like powerful director shit too, where it's like and again,
Speaker 3: it's like not something that we it's frustrating because it's
Speaker 3: not something that we frequently see with black directors that
Speaker 3: Ryan Cougler did have and was turned against him because
Speaker 3: there's a number of examples of like, well, part of
Speaker 3: the reasons that Sinners might not turn a profit at
Speaker 3: the box office is because the writer director has this
Speaker 3: kind of deal, and so it's just like at every
Speaker 3: single step he's being undercut, even when he is getting
Speaker 3: the kind of deal that he objectively deserves. It's being
Speaker 3: like painted as a craven selfishness when no one would
Speaker 3: say that shit to Scoresese or whoever else any white director.
Speaker 3: But in spite of all of that, the movie did
Speaker 3: terrifically at the box office. It broke all of these
Speaker 3: records for original stories during a time that desperately needs
Speaker 3: original stories doing well at the box office, there was
Speaker 3: a fair amount of fan backlash to the way these
Speaker 3: stories were being covered. There were also a number of
Speaker 3: directors who spoke out in support of Ryan and like,
Speaker 3: why the fuck are we talking about this this way,
Speaker 3: including weirdly, Ben Stiller. I'm like, so, Ben, there's us
Speaker 3: saying Ben Stiller in the Center's episode for some reason.
Speaker 3: And I guess I'm good for that. But I am
Speaker 3: at very least glad that that conversation was being like
Speaker 3: noticed and had, because it was really a great jous Yes.
Speaker 2: For sure, to go back really quick to the deal
Speaker 2: that Ryan Coogler made with the studio. In addition to
Speaker 2: the first dollar gross, he also got final cut privileges,
Speaker 2: which is rare, especially for a black director, and then
Speaker 2: he also got ownership of the copyright of the film
Speaker 2: twenty five years after its released, so basically he will
Speaker 2: own the rights to this movie again impressed after twenty
Speaker 2: five years, which is also quite rare, And I just
Speaker 2: I hope this sets a precedent for other marginalized filmmakers
Speaker 2: because the directors who do tend to get this deal
Speaker 2: are cis white men, and.
Speaker 3: Then just chatting at a few other people in the
Speaker 3: production where while I do like this movie is ultimately
Speaker 3: centered on and prioritizing men, we do have. We have
Speaker 3: the producers. We have Zinzy Kugler, Ryan Kugler's production partner
Speaker 3: and spouse they famously saw Bring It On Together in Oakland.
Speaker 3: We also have a cinematographer, Autumn Gerald Archipa, who is
Speaker 3: also from California, has been working for some time, mostly
Speaker 3: with Ryan Coogler and Gia Coppola. I don't know, but
Speaker 3: she is historically the first black woman to ever direct
Speaker 3: a movie for Imax or to be a director of
Speaker 3: photography for Imax, which is both amazing and while that
Speaker 3: it took that long. And then also we have I
Speaker 3: just wanted to again shout out the costumer who is
Speaker 3: just like a famous figure already, but Ruth E. Carter,
Speaker 3: who has won two Oscars with Ryan Cougler. I believe
Speaker 3: she's the first black woman to win for Best Costume Design.
Speaker 3: But she's also a frequent collaborator with Spike Lee and
Speaker 3: Steven Spielberg. Movies we've covered that include her work Our
Speaker 3: Love in Basketball. She also has done do the right thing.
Speaker 3: What's love got to do with it? Selma Dolomite is
Speaker 3: my name coming to America like she's a legend. So well,
Speaker 3: I do think that this is ultimately a joint that
Speaker 3: focuses on men. There is at least a historical priority
Speaker 3: of Ryan Cougler behind the scenes to include women at
Speaker 3: the highest levels.
Speaker 2: For sure.
Speaker 4: Definitely chose very powerful women. And again, even in our
Speaker 4: critique of their overarching character development, the fact that they've
Speaker 4: still had so much power in their presence and time
Speaker 4: on screen regardless says a lot.
Speaker 3: Absolutely.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's pretty much all I had. Does anyone want
Speaker 2: to have anything else they'd like to talk about?
Speaker 3: That's that's all I add.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think we covered quite a bit.
Speaker 3: It's true, we're all drenched in sweat, and I feel
Speaker 3: like we've fully had the discourse. Yeah, does this movie
Speaker 3: pass the backdel test? I think maybe on a technicality
Speaker 3: once or twice, But we really don't have a lot
Speaker 3: of women in conversation about not either various Michael B.
Speaker 3: Jordan's or vampires that are men. I think in general, Yeah.
Speaker 2: It's a lot of men talking to each other.
Speaker 4: About man business, Yes, about.
Speaker 3: About and stuff.
Speaker 2: It is very little women interacting with each other.
Speaker 3: Little women.
Speaker 2: Yes, honestly, this is another movie where I forgot to
Speaker 2: pay attention to Bechdel test passing.
Speaker 3: I think that it technically does, but like, I don't know,
Speaker 3: like I'm not going to be like Sinners. I can't
Speaker 3: believe like this movie is doing so so much. But
Speaker 3: women do kind of fall into the rare view in
Speaker 3: terms of like their relationships with like their characters and
Speaker 3: their relationships with each other does feel like a big
Speaker 3: missed opportunity, which brings.
Speaker 2: Us to the Bechdel cast nipple scale, in which we
Speaker 2: rated the movie zero to five nipples, examining it through
Speaker 2: an intersectional feminist lens. I'll go with four again. The
Speaker 2: movie left some things to be desired when it comes
Speaker 2: to the black women characters, but as we've discussed, this
Speaker 2: film accomplishes a lot of great things. And I particularly
Speaker 2: love vampire movies, horror movies, genre movies in general that
Speaker 2: center marginalize people and communities, because so much Hollywood genre
Speaker 2: film focuses on cis white men, so it's very refreshing
Speaker 2: to not see that. So four nipples and I'm giving
Speaker 2: them to any Prolene Grace, and then one to the
Speaker 2: music which slaps so fucking hard in this movie.
Speaker 3: I'm going to give this movie four nipples as well.
Speaker 3: And I do think that ultimately the areas where I
Speaker 3: really wish we had seen more characterization were with the
Speaker 3: women characters writ large, specifically black women characters, and the
Speaker 3: chalk talk characters also felt like a big missed opportunity.
Speaker 3: One movie can't do anything, but it felt a little
Speaker 3: frustrated to have these characters there and very knowingly included
Speaker 3: in this very specific moment in time, and then not
Speaker 3: built out upon.
Speaker 4: More with so much potential, Yes to do.
Speaker 3: So absolutely and again just like this movie is touching
Speaker 3: on so much that it couldn't possibly resolve everything. Ultimately,
Speaker 3: I wanted more Annie, yeah, and I wanted a chalk
Speaker 3: talk character we got to know so but but nonetheless,
Speaker 3: this movie is doing so much more than most dows
Speaker 3: and is also wildly entertaining. Is a genre movie did
Speaker 3: incredibly four nipples. I'm going to give two to Annie,
Speaker 3: I'm going to give one to Grace, and I'm going
Speaker 3: to give one to cinematographer Autumn Duould Archapa Dollia.
Speaker 2: How about you?
Speaker 4: So I was going to go Withles, but given the
Speaker 4: additional details of the production staff. I think that does
Speaker 4: earn the film an extra nipple, an extra half nipples.
Speaker 4: So I'm going with four and a half nipples. And
Speaker 4: I know, you know, the production staff isn't necessarily definitive
Speaker 4: of the story itself or how it was told, but
Speaker 4: I think overall there was a lot of attention to
Speaker 4: intersections in a very complex and multi layered way. So
Speaker 4: I give the whole cast and crew collectively they can
Speaker 4: share four and a half nipples.
Speaker 2: Amazing. Thank you so much for joining us again for
Speaker 2: this discussion.
Speaker 4: Absolutely, thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 3: We were so excited to have you back.
Speaker 4: And not discussing this film with like some Super Mayo person.
Speaker 3: Which which was our intent. We want to to bring
Speaker 3: on a British white guy, and then we're like, wait.
Speaker 4: A second, that might be inappropriate.
Speaker 3: Dulia, Thank you so much for joining us again. Please
Speaker 3: come back anytime, bring us any movie lay pleasure. And
Speaker 3: where can we follow you and your work online?
Speaker 4: Yes, so for comedy, which is what I want people
Speaker 4: to know me for. Please follow me on Instagram at
Speaker 4: mix Dahlia bell. I also shit post on Blue Sky
Speaker 4: from time to time. I know, and if you want
Speaker 4: to get way too much insight into my actual brain.
Speaker 4: You can make the mistake of following me on threads.
Speaker 4: All of that is at Mixed Dahlia Bell because I'm
Speaker 4: narcissistic and my manager insists that I have a strong brand.
Speaker 3: In that order same you can follow us also land
Speaker 3: Instagram at Bechdel Cast. You can also contribute to the show.
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Speaker 3: on the main feed, there's a place, There is a community,
Speaker 3: there is a whole expanded universe, so join us over
Speaker 3: there too.
Speaker 2: And with that, should we get out our guitars and.
Speaker 3: Oh yes, oh wait, I thought to say, like deis
Speaker 3: ex daddy guitar. With that, deis because we're told at
Speaker 3: the beginning, Okay, okay, don't that didn't resonate I? Okay,
Speaker 3: we're told at the beginning it is a famous musician's guitar.
Speaker 3: And then at the end, Michael V. Jordan is like, actually,
Speaker 3: that's my daddy's guitar. Oh, and it's they say daddy guitar, they.
Speaker 2: Say, it's Charlie Patton's guitar. Yes, And then Smoke is like, no, Sammy,
Speaker 2: that was a lie.
Speaker 3: It's our follow Let's just end the episode. Let's end
Speaker 3: the episode, Dad, I was.
Speaker 2: I loved it, Jamie, I loved it.
Speaker 3: It's fine.
Speaker 4: I love you both. I love you both so much.
Speaker 3: We love you, We love you so much. Okay, bye,
Speaker 3: bye bye. The Bechdel Cast is a production of iHeartMedia,
Speaker 3: hosted and produced by Me, Jamie Loftus.
Speaker 2: And Me Caitlyn Durrante. The podcast is also produced by
Speaker 2: Sophie Lichtermann.
Speaker 3: And edited by Caitlyn Durrante. Ever heard of Them?
Speaker 2: That's me and our logo and merch and all of
Speaker 2: our artwork, in fact are designed by Jamie Loftus, Ever
Speaker 2: heard of her?
Speaker 3: Oh my God? And our theme song, by the way,
Speaker 3: was composed by Mike.
Speaker 2: Kaplan with vocals by Catherine Vosskrasinski.
Speaker 3: And especial thanks to the one and only Aristotle Ascevedo.
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