Speaker 1: On the Doe Cast, the questions asked if movies have
Speaker 1: women in them, are all their discussions just boyfriends and
Speaker 1: husbands or do they have individualism? The patriarchy? Zef invest
Speaker 1: start changing it with the Beckdel Cast. Hello and welcome
Speaker 1: to the Backtel Cast. My name is Jamie loft It
Speaker 1: my name is Caitlin Dronton, and this is our podcast
Speaker 1: about women. We talked about specifically how well or poorly
Speaker 1: women are portrayed and represented in movies, and wouldn't you
Speaker 1: know it, women are usually not portrayed very well. I
Speaker 1: don't understand how could this be? And this economy, in
Speaker 1: this society, this amazing society and economy, how could this
Speaker 1: possibly be? So we use the Bechtel test as a
Speaker 1: jumping off point for our larger conversation the Bechtel test
Speaker 1: for us, The Betel test is invented by Alison Bechtel,
Speaker 1: a famous cartoonist, interpreted in a lot of different ways.
Speaker 1: Our interpretation of the Bettel test currently, as it is
Speaker 1: always a faulting, is that there has to be two
Speaker 1: female identifying characters in a movie that speak to each
Speaker 1: other about something other than a man. They have to
Speaker 1: have names, and it has to be for exactly two
Speaker 1: lines of dialogue. How hard could it be? It couldn't
Speaker 1: be hard because it's a very low bar. And yet
Speaker 1: it only recently started passing regularly, and even then usually
Speaker 1: tenuously between waiters with name tags on oh Stasia is
Speaker 1: her name, and she asked do you like egg? Feminine
Speaker 1: and then female identifying protagonist as me like egg over
Speaker 1: easy please, great example of the same passing the battle test.
Speaker 1: Do you like egg? Me like egg? Both have names?
Speaker 1: It passes. Indeed, I'm so thrilled. Okay, we recorded two
Speaker 1: episodes today, just a little peak behind the scenes, and
Speaker 1: we could not be doing two more different movies today.
Speaker 1: I am so excited on this movie. This movie is
Speaker 1: fully activated me on every single human level it was
Speaker 1: possible to. It took me two days to watch this movie.
Speaker 1: I couldn't watch it in one scene because I was like,
Speaker 1: it's so much. It's the cast alone. You're just like
Speaker 1: Lillard's here, Ussure Easier, Kim's er Gabrielle unions here. The
Speaker 1: stars are out, but like the b stars are out,
Speaker 1: no a star is out for this movie. I would
Speaker 1: argue at all the biggest star is Paul Walker. Rest
Speaker 1: in power. That's literally it. This is like nineties, early
Speaker 1: two thousands, b stars to the max. It's so I'm
Speaker 1: so excited for you today. So to help us discuss
Speaker 1: this wonderful movie, we have a guest, as we always do.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much more in advance. Thank you so much,
Speaker 1: thanks for bringing us this movie. She a producer at
Speaker 1: How Stuff Works and she's one half of the podcast.
Speaker 1: Ethnically Ambiguous and Hello, I just want to say this
Speaker 1: is growing up. This was one of my favorite movies.
Speaker 1: And yes, I p Paul Walker. Oh my god. Paul
Speaker 1: Walker is such a wild character in this movie. He
Speaker 1: takes you think originally like oh, he's not going to
Speaker 1: come back, but he keeps coming back with increasing importance.
Speaker 1: So you've brought us She's all that. Yes, when you
Speaker 1: were like, granted me my wish of being on this show,
Speaker 1: I was like, we will talk about She's It's the
Speaker 1: perfect bectel Cast movie. I would argue it delivers on
Speaker 1: every problematic level. It's a masterpiece of crap. Like it's
Speaker 1: like somehow a Marvel in the worst postle. It's like
Speaker 1: it's part of the Marvel extended. Well, that's the best thing.
Speaker 1: It's it's so fast moving, like it just goes, goes goes.
Speaker 1: Every senior like what why? And then they also I
Speaker 1: learned a lot of lingo from this movie up like
Speaker 1: wig in, like why are you wigging? And like it.
Speaker 1: There are a few references that I was like, is
Speaker 1: this too smart for this movie? Or am I stupid?
Speaker 1: Like there are there's some high level and when when
Speaker 1: Caitlin and I watched this within twenty four hours of
Speaker 1: each other, I watched it a little bit after her,
Speaker 1: like literally like twelve hours after she did. It took
Speaker 1: us forever to watch it because if we had to
Speaker 1: keep pausing to be like wow, there was a weird
Speaker 1: amount to unpack and that single scene with Freddie Prince Jr. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it took me like three hours to watch or more.
Speaker 1: And it's only an hour and a half movie, Like
Speaker 1: I had to keep it's a it's it's perfect, perfect length, couldn't.
Speaker 1: I mean, this movie is weirdly perfect for everything that's
Speaker 1: wrong with it. Well, yeah, I almost wasn't gonna watch
Speaker 1: it again because I was like, you know, every goddamn
Speaker 1: scene in this movie, and then I was like, nope,
Speaker 1: I got to watch it again. I need my like
Speaker 1: ten pages of notes and then every scene I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: so good, so nostalgic of it, and like I watched
Speaker 1: it like you in the morning last night because I
Speaker 1: just had to. Like I was just like, you know what,
Speaker 1: it's time. So when did you first see it, because
Speaker 1: it came out. I saw it when I was in
Speaker 1: junior high for the first time, and I think I
Speaker 1: was like really discovering Paul Walker. At that time, Fass
Speaker 1: and the ferries had come out, and I was like, well,
Speaker 1: who goes and then I discovered she's all that. And
Speaker 1: then I think I watched it maybe a thousand times,
Speaker 1: Like I've seen this movie so many times. I own
Speaker 1: it on DVD. I just just kept rewatching. I thought
Speaker 1: it was genius. I was like, Freddy Wins Jr. I mean,
Speaker 1: you got to make that girl beautiful. Art is weird,
Speaker 1: you know. That's the big thing in this movie. Was like,
Speaker 1: if you're an artist, you're a fucking weird weird and
Speaker 1: I just love that. Also, the art is also very dark,
Speaker 1: like it's like either like clown based, like it's like
Speaker 1: a lot of weird. I was personally driggered, Yeah, this
Speaker 1: is like oh yeah. Also, like the meme girl artists
Speaker 1: like Clio Duval. That character she everything to me Like
Speaker 1: I when I was scared to go to high school,
Speaker 1: thinking I wouldn't meet a clear Duval who would like
Speaker 1: tell me to kill myself so I could become a
Speaker 1: famous artist, which is one of my I was texting.
Speaker 1: I was telling Cale, I was like, this is one
Speaker 1: of my new favorite because some well occasionally propose an
Speaker 1: asterisk to the Bechtel test of like I feel, even
Speaker 1: though it technically does pass the Bechtel test that if
Speaker 1: two named female characters have a conversation about why one
Speaker 1: female character should kill herself, it shouldn't pass the Bentel test.
Speaker 1: That seems too violent. That's the first then that technically
Speaker 1: passes the Bechtel test for me, where it's clear Deval
Speaker 1: tells like that she should kill herself, just like who
Speaker 1: does that? Right? I was just like, WHOA a new conundrum? No,
Speaker 1: just the onion continues to reveal, Yeah, that's just the beginning. Crazy,
Speaker 1: it was so that's so early in the movie, and
Speaker 1: then it's and then the movie, Yeah, the whole rest.
Speaker 1: There's no there's no character actor in this movie that
Speaker 1: you're just not like, whoa okay, wait to hold on
Speaker 1: a second. Where in the middle, I was like, Oh,
Speaker 1: Karen Culkin is the child Karen my favorite Culkin. Karen's
Speaker 1: pretty good. Also the dad character, Kevin Pollock Pollock probably
Speaker 1: the best character. He has multiple podcasts on how stuff Works.
Speaker 1: I see him almost like three days a week, and
Speaker 1: I saw him and it just agreed. I was like,
Speaker 1: holy sh it, that's Kevin. Now, I can't wait to
Speaker 1: go this next week and be like, dude, well, last
Speaker 1: time I saw him, I was like, oh, you're the
Speaker 1: brother in Better Things that the mom doesn't like. And
Speaker 1: he was like, yeah, now I get to be like, dude,
Speaker 1: you're the checked out pool cleaning mother and she's all
Speaker 1: that night never connection. Literally, Mr Pool. Kevin Pollock has
Speaker 1: one especially really good scene in this movie, and then
Speaker 1: there's one scene where he's like, yeah, Freddie Prince, come
Speaker 1: into my ass. I'm wearing a baseball cap. Also, I'm
Speaker 1: getting ready for bed, but I'm not going to take
Speaker 1: my hat off. Also, I'm still wearing my name tag
Speaker 1: this is Mr Pool on my bathrobe. Anyway, I Was'm
Speaker 1: gonna let Freddie Prince Jr. Into my house and way
Speaker 1: to French my daughter Karen Calkins also here if you're interested.
Speaker 1: It's just like she may have also almost gotten raped,
Speaker 1: right O. God the narrative at the end where it's like,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, Paul Walker almost ripe me, but thank god
Speaker 1: I had a foghorn with me. I'm just like, we'll
Speaker 1: get there. But I have so much to say about
Speaker 1: the whole third act of the movie. It's bananas come together.
Speaker 1: I mean it comes together like the movie. Like my
Speaker 1: top note for this movie. I scrolled back up to
Speaker 1: my very long ever note for this movie and I
Speaker 1: was like, Okay, this is the movie where in the
Speaker 1: next last scene, ironically, the protagonist says, you know, sexual
Speaker 1: harassment is still a big issue these days. Took a
Speaker 1: screen grab of that and literally says it as a joke,
Speaker 1: like it is wild. And you've seen this movie many, many,
Speaker 1: many times, Jamie, you had never seen it. I slash
Speaker 1: the night before it came out. I was like thirteen,
Speaker 1: so like peak age to be watching this. I don't
Speaker 1: think I saw it right away. I definitely didn't see
Speaker 1: in theaters. I probably saw it maybe probably within the
Speaker 1: year of it coming out, but I think that was
Speaker 1: the only time I had two very specific memories from
Speaker 1: the movie. One was the kid who eats the pizza
Speaker 1: with pubs on it. I remember that being a thing,
Speaker 1: and I like a reference to like a legal case
Speaker 1: that happened in the early nineties. But oh, whoa, I
Speaker 1: didn't realize that. I listen, I have an encyclopedic knowledge
Speaker 1: of pupe related crime. So I did recognize that right away.
Speaker 1: Good to let me just really quickly google and I
Speaker 1: won't find out what I'm talking about. Continue, okay. And
Speaker 1: then the other memory I had from it was Rachelie
Speaker 1: Cook's line towards the end where she's like, am I
Speaker 1: a bed Am? I a bed am? I? At second that, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I just for some reason that steered into my memory
Speaker 1: Anita Hill versus Clarence Thomas. That's what I'm thinking about
Speaker 1: when I think about how in the nineties pube related
Speaker 1: crimes do show up in movies again and again and again.
Speaker 1: Because Anita Hill rightfully did sue Clarence Thomas because of
Speaker 1: pubs on a coke can. But there you we see,
Speaker 1: it's a huge case and it's something that I learned
Speaker 1: about for some reason. I learned about it at a
Speaker 1: very young age. On that v H one show I
Speaker 1: love the nineties. Everyone's like, wow, it's not hilarious there,
Speaker 1: like I need a Helen Pies and it's very pube shamy.
Speaker 1: But as a lifelong pube's advocate, I was like, oh interesting,
Speaker 1: and I was like that my antenna was up. So
Speaker 1: throughout the nineties, especially in a shamy way, pubes are
Speaker 1: brought up again and again and again as a form
Speaker 1: of punishment. And I had never seen this movie, and
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, weird. So and I n nine,
Speaker 1: We're still punishing people via pubs and it does from
Speaker 1: what I can tell, like Guanita Hill versus Clans Thomas
Speaker 1: case was so big because it is, from what I
Speaker 1: can tell, at least on a large scale, the first
Speaker 1: time pubes are discussed in a court of law like
Speaker 1: acknowledges a thing that every human being has in a
Speaker 1: serious way. And the way that it was covered in
Speaker 1: the press at the time is very like, oh God,
Speaker 1: this woman's losing her mind about this dude putting his
Speaker 1: put because it was like he was putting pubes on
Speaker 1: her stuff as punishment and like coercion and ship like that,
Speaker 1: and so anyways, we see in nineties culture. Anytime you
Speaker 1: see pubes show up in popular media poste as a
Speaker 1: way to punish someone. It is indirectly a reference to
Speaker 1: this specific legal case. Just a fun the more you know,
Speaker 1: thank you now you know? Now anytime you get a
Speaker 1: pubes question? Oh boy, Well anyways, that's your new backtalk.
Speaker 1: Hast Jamie's pupercorner? Uh should I do the reecap? Okay?
Speaker 1: So she's all that is about. Rachel Leie. Cook's character's
Speaker 1: name is Laney Boggs. They're on high school. She's an
Speaker 1: art kid. She's a dork and she's not popular. But
Speaker 1: who we should say? Recent episode the lead of jos
Speaker 1: the Pussycash. Yes, a much better movie than this. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: there's a character named Zach Siler played by Freddie Prince Jr.
Speaker 1: And he is the class president. He's one of the
Speaker 1: smartest kids in the class. He's a star athlete. He's
Speaker 1: super handsome and super popular and he's dating the like
Speaker 1: hottest girl in school until she breaks up with him.
Speaker 1: His poor fragile male ego is very hurt, so he's like, oh,
Speaker 1: what do I new? He is coerced by Paul Walker.
Speaker 1: Let's be straight, right, so Paul, but he agrees to it.
Speaker 1: Which is he's coerced by Paul Walker. And I'm gonna
Speaker 1: stand out for Freddie Prince Jr. Threat because, Okay, I
Speaker 1: know that Zach and Freddie Prince Jr. Are not the
Speaker 1: same person. I understand how monies, But every time I
Speaker 1: see Freddie Prince Jr. On screen, I just am so
Speaker 1: proud because Freddie to overcome so much adversity. He's the
Speaker 1: son of Freddie Prince. Never met his father, who was
Speaker 1: like a comedian who killed himself, never met him, died
Speaker 1: before either right before right after Freddie Prince Jr. Was born.
Speaker 1: Freddie Prince, who was like this prodigal, prodigal, prodigal, very good,
Speaker 1: very good stand up comedian who's very involved in the
Speaker 1: comedy store scene in the seventies, seventies and eighties, killed
Speaker 1: himself when Freddie Prince Jr. Was very young. By all standards,
Speaker 1: Freddie Prince Jr. Should never have es, you know, because
Speaker 1: he came from tragedy, had this very difficult upbringing. Freddie
Speaker 1: Prince Jr. I think, overcame so much. Freddy Prince Jr.
Speaker 1: Has been in a thriving marriage with Sarah Michelle Geller,
Speaker 1: who has a great cameo in this movie for seventeen years.
Speaker 1: He has three children. I was reading about him last
Speaker 1: night and I was just like, oh, I like had
Speaker 1: a feeling in my stomach of just like, I'm just
Speaker 1: so thrilled for Freddie Prince Jr. That he has a
Speaker 1: stable life. He really owned the nineties. He really did
Speaker 1: and he and I would say he's a charismatic guy.
Speaker 1: He I mean, for this, for this terrible character he's playing,
Speaker 1: I would say, Freddie Prince Jr. He knew how to
Speaker 1: be the exact person he was in a few movies.
Speaker 1: And then he married Sarah Michelle Geller after Scooby Doo.
Speaker 1: And also this establishes a clearer I don't know why
Speaker 1: I'm being okay. This also establishes a connection between Freddie
Speaker 1: Prince Junior and Lillard, and we see them later in
Speaker 1: the Scooby Doo franchise as fred and Shaggy. Another critical
Speaker 1: So anyways, we establish the Prince Lillard aesthetic here, and
Speaker 1: I just think, anyways, I'm very proud of Freddy and everything.
Speaker 1: You can't help root for him in the film, Like
Speaker 1: you know, he's doing a bad thing, but you're like, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know what, get her to fall for you man,
Speaker 1: and then you learn about as strangers, like he's his whole,
Speaker 1: his whole like real like privileged issues of like oh
Speaker 1: darkout dark, which I just like. And then his dad's
Speaker 1: actually quite understanding well if it's really the stressful is
Speaker 1: very hot understanding that Oh my god. The end the
Speaker 1: way that that like side plot ends where it's like
Speaker 1: Freddie Prince, your we found up very early in the
Speaker 1: movie has been accepted to every college in a very
Speaker 1: manic acceptance style where when he's like, there's no way,
Speaker 1: unlike very cheap paper. They didn't even bother to print
Speaker 1: it out. It was horrible, and it was just like,
Speaker 1: oh you know, Harvard, Freddy, They're all like all caps congratulations,
Speaker 1: like what. And then at the end, Freddy says something
Speaker 1: like it's not that easy. You can't just sift through
Speaker 1: a pile of papers and choose one. And then his
Speaker 1: dad goes like, that's what being at all is. You
Speaker 1: sift through a pile of papers and you choose one,
Speaker 1: and you know what, he's not wrong, like, yeah, that's
Speaker 1: what you do. And at the end I says like, oh,
Speaker 1: his dad, you know. The whole time, it's like we're
Speaker 1: really the plot is really trying to justify why Zach
Speaker 1: is such an asshole, and at the end it is
Speaker 1: not successful and being like well and at the end
Speaker 1: he really was just being kind of avoidant and his
Speaker 1: dad was pretty understanding about his choice. Is like, Dad,
Speaker 1: I'm stressed, and his dad's like, well, why didn't you
Speaker 1: say so it was like all the entire like it's
Speaker 1: almost as if men have probably him expressing their feelings. Okay,
Speaker 1: So the rest of the story, slash, the whole story
Speaker 1: is that Zach Siler, you know, class president star of
Speaker 1: the school, gets broken up with so he is coerced,
Speaker 1: but he also agrees to it like a bet basically
Speaker 1: by his friend Dean played by Paul Walker. Arrest in
Speaker 1: Power is as I like to call him, and Dean says, oh, well,
Speaker 1: is it Zack that suggests us where he's like, I
Speaker 1: could make any girl here prom queen and you know
Speaker 1: I don't need that much time to do, and he's like, okay,
Speaker 1: I'll prove it. I'll bet you. So it's Freddie Prince
Speaker 1: Junior's character who suggests the whole thing, So he's not
Speaker 1: that much of a feminist icon is is Jamie, you
Speaker 1: would lead us to believe I'm proud of him. I'm
Speaker 1: not proud of this character. I'm proud of Freddy. Okay,
Speaker 1: So Dean's like, okay, Dean and their friend Preston played
Speaker 1: by jule A Hill, who is my favorite. He plays
Speaker 1: Sam in Holes and he's the cutest. I can't wait
Speaker 1: till we do holes and then I don't know who
Speaker 1: plays kissing Kate Barlow in that movie. Who plays his
Speaker 1: love interest? I forget her name? Oh let's say, um
Speaker 1: British art God, what fun. I'm like I would pay
Speaker 1: for that sex time. Okay anyways, okay, so um, Dean
Speaker 1: and Pressed In to a lesser extent, are like, okay,
Speaker 1: we'll but you we you know, we'll pick out a
Speaker 1: girl for you and you have to turn her into
Speaker 1: prom queen within the next eight weeks, just to see
Speaker 1: if you're as big of a big man on campus
Speaker 1: as you say you are. So they pick Landy Boggs,
Speaker 1: the weird art girl who great art girl name? I
Speaker 1: will say so. Zach starts to pursue her in an
Speaker 1: attempt to like, befriend her and maybe think that he's
Speaker 1: romantically interested in her, so that he can take her
Speaker 1: to prom and make her prom queen. She's resistant first,
Speaker 1: but for reasons we don't necessarily entirely understand, she starts
Speaker 1: to be receptive to his basically stalking her, and then
Speaker 1: they hang out more and more. He takes her to
Speaker 1: a party. It doesn't go well. She gets makeover to
Speaker 1: fix her quote unquote we'll talk about that. UM, I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: Are you suggesting that being a relationship cannot fix someone?
Speaker 1: Because if not, I have no I'm suggesting that all
Speaker 1: women need to be made over to feel more confident
Speaker 1: about them until I take my glasses off and lose
Speaker 1: your mind. Just how beautiful? Will you let your hair down?
Speaker 1: And you took your glasses off quite beautifully? Oh my god? Wait?
Speaker 1: Did Anna pack win Body shamed you into characterization as
Speaker 1: someone who regularly wears glasses. I find this movie very
Speaker 1: offensive suggesting that women who wear glasses can't be hot.
Speaker 1: Care for what if I told you had a moment
Speaker 1: in the mirror this morning where I took my glasses
Speaker 1: off and I was like, oh my god, who is that?
Speaker 1: Like gaslight? She's But then you did a little pratt
Speaker 1: fall and you're like, I ain't so speaking of Landy
Speaker 1: Bugs falls no less than three times in this movie.
Speaker 1: Oh God, such a weird, stupid thing that happens in
Speaker 1: all of these movies. Is like, just to remind you,
Speaker 1: even though she's hot now, she's still the whole Bella
Speaker 1: Swan thing McGuire, etcetera. She's always wearing like ankle length aprons.
Speaker 1: You took that apron off, you wouldn't be as clumsy,
Speaker 1: you wouldn't be tripping on this floor length garment. You're
Speaker 1: constantly right. Okay, So the rest of the story is it.
Speaker 1: So she's hanging out more and more with Zach Siler.
Speaker 1: He starts to realize maybe he's actually into her because
Speaker 1: she's beautiful all of a sudden, and maybe she's also
Speaker 1: into him, and also for reasons we don't necessarily understand,
Speaker 1: because as far as we know, they're not compatible in
Speaker 1: any way, but they like each other because they're both hot.
Speaker 1: So he asks her to or he doesn't get to
Speaker 1: ask her to prom. She finds out about the bet,
Speaker 1: then she agrees again for since we don't understand, agrees
Speaker 1: to go to prom with Paul Walker. Everyone gets winned
Speaker 1: of the fact that he's only taking her out to problem,
Speaker 1: so that he can try to score with her. Zach
Speaker 1: finds out about this because Laney's friend Jesse I was like, hey,
Speaker 1: you go save woman and why did you go to
Speaker 1: save woman? And he's like, okay, I'll go save a
Speaker 1: woman and then um, and then a bunch of scenes
Speaker 1: that should play out on screen are just skipped over,
Speaker 1: and then we see the scene at the end where
Speaker 1: Zach is like, oh, I didn't. He doesn't even really apologize,
Speaker 1: He's just like, you know, I made that. That does
Speaker 1: not I went back to be like, wait to fucking second,
Speaker 1: does he at any point even remotely apologized. He explains
Speaker 1: why he did the bad things he did, but never apologize,
Speaker 1: says I made the bet before I got to know you,
Speaker 1: and what I lost in the bet was my best friend,
Speaker 1: she being his new best friend. But never did he
Speaker 1: say I'm sorry for manipulating you anything like that. No,
Speaker 1: I made triple short that he didn't. He doesn't, right,
Speaker 1: So then they kiss and they're fine and they're in
Speaker 1: love and the movie is over. We don't mention the
Speaker 1: thick male icon from The Mighty Ducks, who does appear
Speaker 1: throughout this movie, Who I Really Love? Who Peers has
Speaker 1: character Jesse James who ends up with Anna Paquin, who
Speaker 1: dresses like a bride to the prom. Uh and they
Speaker 1: do end up together. That is a couple I personally
Speaker 1: am rooting for by the end of the movie is
Speaker 1: thick kid from the Mighty Ducks and Ana that because
Speaker 1: she fat shames him throughout the film everyone stop eating
Speaker 1: that you fucking fatty, Like it's just like what a why?
Speaker 1: They're the first scene on screen together. She's like, are
Speaker 1: you really eating before ten am? And the thick kid
Speaker 1: from Mighty Ducks is like, um I and then he
Speaker 1: immediately started to apologize. I'm like, I'm on his side,
Speaker 1: was like, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to eat before
Speaker 1: lunch and he has some weird tweinaking. He's like they're delicious,
Speaker 1: and she's like, you said you would lose weight. It's like,
Speaker 1: back off, it's not a great president. It's one of
Speaker 1: the first thing she says in the entire movie is like,
Speaker 1: what about losing ten pounds? Right? Like, she immediately fat
Speaker 1: shames her best friend, her best friend who's a friend,
Speaker 1: her only friend, who's a thick icon And I really,
Speaker 1: I really was like, oh my god, it's the guy
Speaker 1: from the Mighty Dugs, and I'm just like, I haven't
Speaker 1: attached me to him. I okay, I would argue there's
Speaker 1: a lot of shades of gray in this film. And
Speaker 1: I don't sorry for calling it a film. It's a movie.
Speaker 1: It's a movie. Isn't that barely introduced by Miramax? By
Speaker 1: the way, I hope anyway, Harvey and Bob and you're
Speaker 1: just like, oh no, Harvey and Bob on the scene
Speaker 1: for this one. They're the ones signing off on this.
Speaker 1: But I I feel like, and again, there's so much
Speaker 1: wrong with this movie. The few things it does right.
Speaker 1: She does fat shame her only friend scene one after class,
Speaker 1: shaming her brother for being like, there are kids in
Speaker 1: I forget what country who have been working in factories
Speaker 1: for three hours already. I'm going to spit in Kieran
Speaker 1: Culkin's juice. And so it's like, Okay, she's a little uptight,
Speaker 1: you know, Like that's how it. When he's like they're
Speaker 1: at the beach, He's like, check out that water. That's
Speaker 1: literally what he says, check out that water, which is
Speaker 1: like every time do you know how much like like
Speaker 1: gallons of waste is dumped into the ocean, and he's
Speaker 1: just like, why can't you just be chill? She's like
Speaker 1: sorry quickly, you know. Okay, I'll get to that in
Speaker 1: a second. Remind me about intelligent shaming, okay, But first,
Speaker 1: I do think it is slightly positive, even though she
Speaker 1: is body shaming him the entirety of their friendship. It
Speaker 1: is lightly positive to see a female male both straight
Speaker 1: friendship in a high school movie that is non sexual
Speaker 1: and involves no pining on either party, because that is
Speaker 1: something that I feel like it's very rare to see
Speaker 1: where Originally when you see this Jesse character, it's like, oh,
Speaker 1: he's probably secretly in love with her, and you fall
Speaker 1: into this kind of John Hughes like, oh he probably
Speaker 1: loves her and she's unattainable and all this stuff. But
Speaker 1: throughout the movie they do remain firmly friends, and at
Speaker 1: one point it's like, well, I've none you for so long,
Speaker 1: I don't know how to view you that way. It's
Speaker 1: like a sexual being and he mostly pushing her to
Speaker 1: Freddie Prince Jr. Zack Tyler, which is problematic, but ultimately
Speaker 1: I feel like for a high school friendship that sort
Speaker 1: of like, oh, date the popular guys why not. There's
Speaker 1: no sense of like, oh, she friends owned me, which
Speaker 1: is exactly which I think is a very common trope.
Speaker 1: And I had so many friendships like that in high school,
Speaker 1: with like two people who in theory could be attracted
Speaker 1: to each other but just aren't. And and that being okay,
Speaker 1: I feel like that does not happen in movies almost ever.
Speaker 1: And I thought that was, like, oh, that kind of
Speaker 1: reminds me of me and my best friend in high
Speaker 1: school who just never had the desire to french each
Speaker 1: other and felt weird about it because all media said
Speaker 1: that we should want to french each other, you know,
Speaker 1: So that I thought was good intelligence shaming. Next point,
Speaker 1: in these teen movies, every time a woman is smart
Speaker 1: and has very specific knowledge, like Rachel Lee One Piece
Speaker 1: Cook does, it's made to make her look uptight, Whereas
Speaker 1: every time in a rom com were a male character
Speaker 1: is very smart, he is made to look sensitive. So
Speaker 1: intelligence used is used to like demonize female characters very often,
Speaker 1: where it's used to like give depth to male character.
Speaker 1: That's very true. Okay, Sorry, so you're saying that does
Speaker 1: not happen in this movie, That absolutely does happen almost exclusively.
Speaker 1: So smart. Can you see how quickly he improvised that
Speaker 1: this performance right right right? Whoa he is deep, which
Speaker 1: is just just like it's just to happen. And that's also
Speaker 1: that scene where Rachelie Cook's character is like, I'm not smart.
Speaker 1: If you're coming to me because you think I can
Speaker 1: tutor you, I can't because I'm not smart. I'm just
Speaker 1: a dork but I'm not smart, and it's like artist,
Speaker 1: but she is. She is, but she's constantly playing it off.
Speaker 1: And then every time she displays it with those specific
Speaker 1: facts of like check out that water and then she
Speaker 1: knows a specific fact about that water, it's like, oh,
Speaker 1: you're such a bit as opposed to like, oh she
Speaker 1: just knows something, you know. Yeah, she's a bit of
Speaker 1: a buzz kill, though she knows exactly what to say
Speaker 1: to bring the moment down. And you're like, Laney, she
Speaker 1: is a buzz I feel like is fully bogs? I
Speaker 1: love that the dad like the Kevin Pollit character. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think his best scene is when he is doing
Speaker 1: the jeopardy and then looks up to like random JV
Speaker 1: soccer players and it's just like, who are you people?
Speaker 1: Doesn't do anything else? Is I don't think there's that
Speaker 1: much comedy in this movie, Like, I don't think this
Speaker 1: movie is that funny, but that scene is very funny
Speaker 1: to me because you're saying, like, what are probably like
Speaker 1: deliberately wrong funny joke answers to all the Jeopardy questions,
Speaker 1: but it's so deadpan about it. I'm gonna ask him
Speaker 1: this week tell me about the inside. So the movie, yeah,
Speaker 1: it does like maybe a small fraction of a good thing,
Speaker 1: but for the most part, it's just like ripe with
Speaker 1: like very problematic stuff because at it, at its core,
Speaker 1: this movie is about a boy tricking a girl into
Speaker 1: dating him so that he can quote unquote fix her
Speaker 1: to turn her into the prom queen so that he
Speaker 1: can win a bet, which is miraculously in spite of
Speaker 1: the specificity you just gave something that happens in multiple movies.
Speaker 1: It's a common premise, especially for like very Asian romance
Speaker 1: kind of things like that, And I understand it makes
Speaker 1: for a good story that has a lot of conflict
Speaker 1: and there's a lot of secrecy and all that, but
Speaker 1: it's not good storytelling and that it means that a
Speaker 1: female character usually is being manipulated by a man who
Speaker 1: will later end up being her love interest who she
Speaker 1: ends up with, just a relationship built on lines. Yeah, exactly,
Speaker 1: Like I think that this in some ways, And there's
Speaker 1: so many variations on this exact theme of like altering
Speaker 1: a woman to your specifications and then accepting her and
Speaker 1: apologizing in retrospect or in the case of this movie,
Speaker 1: not apologizing well. I made a list of all, like,
Speaker 1: of many many movies where this happens, where a woman
Speaker 1: gets a makeover to quote unquote fix her. We go
Speaker 1: back to Cinderella at this one. Cinderella is at the
Speaker 1: top of my list. She's all that clueless, Miss Congeniality,
Speaker 1: Princess Diaries, Greece, Never Been Kissed, Devil Wears Product, Pretty Woman,
Speaker 1: My Fair Lady, What a Girl Wants, Josie, and the Pussycaster.
Speaker 1: There is a makeover seen. It's not as egregious as normally,
Speaker 1: but Rachel is relevant, Working Girl, Sabrina, Breakfast Club, Jawbreaker,
Speaker 1: Last goes On. I said that one. Sorry. There's also
Speaker 1: like well visible because this movie is supposed is intended
Speaker 1: to be an adaptation of which My Fair Lady is
Speaker 1: so Yeah, There's there's also this aggressive amount of like
Speaker 1: girl on girls shaming, like the women so mean to
Speaker 1: each other, like the cattiness levels. There's a female friendship
Speaker 1: that barely gets explored, and which it was explored much more.
Speaker 1: But between Gabrielle Union's character and Josie, not Josie, Laney,
Speaker 1: Laney and fort where like basically we don't ever find
Speaker 1: out what Gabrielle Union's character his name is the Gabrielle
Speaker 1: Union is fully twenty six years old. Her character's name
Speaker 1: that we know via looking at IMDb is Katie. But
Speaker 1: I don't think I find ever the same with Little
Speaker 1: Kim's character. You do hear her name at the very
Speaker 1: very end in the situation ceremony whenever. Her name is
Speaker 1: Sebastian Seawater, and they call a number of wild names
Speaker 1: that I wrote down for her name. So Little Kim's
Speaker 1: character's name is Alex. And then Gabrielle is Katie, so
Speaker 1: Katie and Laney. Katie basically decides that Taylor, the popular
Speaker 1: girl who breaks up with Zach Siler, Katie's I would argue,
Speaker 1: is to an extent and inadvertent feminist icon. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: probably disagree, but I'm willing to hear your argument Taylor
Speaker 1: is Taylor yet she's rough. We'll get there. But Katie's
Speaker 1: have an argument for Taylor. But Katie's like, I don't
Speaker 1: want to be friends with Taylor anymore. She's a bully
Speaker 1: and I don't really like her. I'm gonna be friend
Speaker 1: Laney and it seems like she's generally pretty nice to her,
Speaker 1: And I wish that was explored more or at all, really,
Speaker 1: but it hardly is. No, it's not a lot of
Speaker 1: development within the character. That's a bit he's been she's weird,
Speaker 1: he's hot, and Pope learned has a parking spot right
Speaker 1: where It's like the plot doubles down on Laney in
Speaker 1: a way that it's sometimes to me is confusing, to
Speaker 1: the point where like even the art girls are very
Speaker 1: aggressive and mean towards her in a way that I
Speaker 1: don't think is fully explained. That's what I understand is
Speaker 1: what is Clea Duval's character's problem, what her parents? Why
Speaker 1: is she so fucked up everywhere? And why does she
Speaker 1: Why does she appear so many times in the movie
Speaker 1: to shame Landy when it's like, in theory, this is
Speaker 1: Landy's circle, So why does everyone hate her so much?
Speaker 1: It's just it's like just her, like she's just a
Speaker 1: weirdo and that's that. Like when Taylor sees her at
Speaker 1: the party's like walks over, like I don't think I've
Speaker 1: ever seen a mean girl care that much about another
Speaker 1: person being at a huge part. It's like without like
Speaker 1: a very specific because I feel like the only time
Speaker 1: we see mean girls and we're girls in conflict in
Speaker 1: movies is when it's established like they used to be
Speaker 1: best friends or there was some sort of context, but
Speaker 1: there's no think, there's no connection between at that point.
Speaker 1: It doesn't even seem like she knows that Laney's there
Speaker 1: with Zach right because she's like appeared to her and
Speaker 1: Matthew Lillard showed up wasted. So let's talk about the
Speaker 1: scene where they Okay, so the bed is made between
Speaker 1: Freddie Prince Jr. Who I left and Paul Walker rest
Speaker 1: in Power Delay is also there, but he is of
Speaker 1: course sidelined the entire movie, even though he is the
Speaker 1: voice of reason in that friend group, and it is
Speaker 1: repeatedly the one that's like, hey, this might be funked up,
Speaker 1: and everyone's like shut up. But there is like there's
Speaker 1: a scene where Paul Walker presents Freddie Prince Jr. With
Speaker 1: the central challenge of the movie, which is like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: you know, Taylor broke up with you. And first, the
Speaker 1: central plot of this movie is based on the fact
Speaker 1: that Freddie Prince Jr. Finds heartbreak emasculating, and he is
Speaker 1: when Taylor breaks his heart, which I will argue it's
Speaker 1: like not the worst thing you could do in the
Speaker 1: whole world, and she's kind of ashamed for it. But
Speaker 1: like you know, Freddie Pincr. Is hurt and emasculated and
Speaker 1: feels bad about being broken up with this girl who
Speaker 1: he dated, who he cares about, but he has to
Speaker 1: prove that that is not the case. When Paul Walker says, well,
Speaker 1: the only way you can show me that you're not
Speaker 1: a fun game pussy is by choosing a random girl
Speaker 1: and exploiting and gaslighting her into being hot to your
Speaker 1: standards and going to prom with her, which is, you know,
Speaker 1: a very specific ask from Paul Walker, which I think
Speaker 1: reveals that Paul Walker's character is a full associated path
Speaker 1: because he comes up with the top of the dome.
Speaker 1: He's like, you know what you should do? I wrote
Speaker 1: that in my notes as Paul Walker's a sociopath really,
Speaker 1: because even at the end he was just like guys,
Speaker 1: who got this hotel room four oh nine or like whatever,
Speaker 1: which was like I'm going to fuck her, and you're
Speaker 1: just like what it all seems very planned. Yeah, he's
Speaker 1: a full on sextual. Like I just Paul Walker's character
Speaker 1: is fascinating. But but basically he like challenged his friend like,
Speaker 1: if your heart broken and if you show emotion, you're
Speaker 1: a pussy, So do this instead, and Freddie Prince Jr.
Speaker 1: Takes the bait says Okay, I'll do it, and then
Speaker 1: there's a scene where it it's literally the male gaze
Speaker 1: first like two minutes where they're just looking at various
Speaker 1: high school female characters and criticizing. They're speaking about them
Speaker 1: so actively as they like, I'm talking about you and
Speaker 1: you're walking by me, and I'll be like, well, she's
Speaker 1: interesting because she's got a nice rag kind of short
Speaker 1: jelse Clinton vibe going it's right there, and she's like whatever,
Speaker 1: I'm just like my own business. And like their objective,
Speaker 1: they stayed explicitly, is to make her a prom queen, right,
Speaker 1: and so because that's what all women strive to be,
Speaker 1: and when they land On Landy Bogs, who I'd be
Speaker 1: remiss not to notice, is hot but wearing glasses and
Speaker 1: an apron and has extensions and the worst extensive America.
Speaker 1: At some point it's a hair, it's a horse's mane
Speaker 1: that she has Scotch tapes and even calls her like
Speaker 1: it's a horse's mane or something like this Maine has
Speaker 1: to go and it's like, we all agree it's not hers,
Speaker 1: but there's there's a line. Or Freddie Prince, he has
Speaker 1: already criticized five or six women, and he says, fat,
Speaker 1: I can handle weird boobs, bad personality, maybe some sort
Speaker 1: of fungus. I mean, scary and inaccessible is another story
Speaker 1: which explicitly states the state of women at the time
Speaker 1: of this movie in a very and just like there
Speaker 1: it is, they really go out of their way to
Speaker 1: be like these women are so thirsty for Freddie Prince Jr.
Speaker 1: Because he remember, he like walks in looks at a
Speaker 1: photo of himself. She's like, oh, looking good me and
Speaker 1: then says hey, Connie, and some girls like, oh my,
Speaker 1: come you talk to me. And she's already turned on
Speaker 1: her friends to be like, you bitch, how dare you
Speaker 1: point that out, say that almost passes the bactal test,
Speaker 1: except we don't learn the other girls name, so it's like,
Speaker 1: but they're all no, they're talking about a man, so
Speaker 1: never mind. It creates this vibe that all the women
Speaker 1: are like for themselves and they're out to get each
Speaker 1: other over dudes, and it's just such that whole high
Speaker 1: school is a bad vibe and you got ussher talking
Speaker 1: ship over all of it, which is just like what
Speaker 1: school would let this DJ continue? In defense of the
Speaker 1: casting director of this movie, can you find in a
Speaker 1: better cameo a Jason role for someone giving the school
Speaker 1: announcements at a high school than Usher in the same
Speaker 1: year that You Got It Bad comes out and then
Speaker 1: he comes back in a Fedora to d J the
Speaker 1: prom for one of the Like I freaked out during
Speaker 1: this scene. I was like in my kitchen last night
Speaker 1: watching this scene and had like ran out of breath headed,
Speaker 1: like you know what the dance sequence, the Rockefeller skank sequence, Yes,
Speaker 1: of course I had. Why is there five minute dance
Speaker 1: scene and moving and there's not enough time to develop
Speaker 1: a friendship between Gabrielle Union's character and Lady bog sc
Speaker 1: scraping cut those scenes as a feminist. Give me more Rockefellers.
Speaker 1: That's the second dance sequence in the film. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: I honestly think Matthew Lillard is so funny in this movie.
Speaker 1: Like his whole character is the absolute worst human being,
Speaker 1: is a tattoo of himself on his arm, like and
Speaker 1: then he just continues to have no sense of reality,
Speaker 1: like every line about him like he got paid to
Speaker 1: eat his own toenail clippings, like there's no reality to him.
Speaker 1: And he's an adult man dating a high school or
Speaker 1: which no one no, yeah, no one has any like
Speaker 1: none of these like rich kids parents care. And there's
Speaker 1: also only one teacher in the entire film, which is
Speaker 1: the art teacher who just like shames Laney's like aggressively
Speaker 1: dark art. And this shows up every she shows up,
Speaker 1: I think three times. It provides exposition. There's a scene
Speaker 1: with her at the end that I really want to
Speaker 1: talk about because it is wild. But yeah, like she
Speaker 1: shows up, one of the few women of color in
Speaker 1: the movie who shows up, and it's like, here's what's
Speaker 1: happening in the movie. Anyways, gotta go. He disappears that
Speaker 1: she appears in this scene, right before Rachelieu was told
Speaker 1: to kill herself, right, She's like, hey, anyways, we're an
Speaker 1: art class, gotta go. She's like, why don't you open
Speaker 1: up to other people and express art about your self harder?
Speaker 1: And then some other grouples like yourself. It's just like, God,
Speaker 1: why would you keep going to this class? And then
Speaker 1: this movie, this movie does like Disney Princess Rachelie Cook's
Speaker 1: character by saying also her mom died, and Kevin Paul
Speaker 1: like it doesn't know what to do because he has
Speaker 1: a hat and it's Mr. Pool but he is the
Speaker 1: most checked out father he and he calls her pumpkin nose.
Speaker 1: But even when he comes down to talk to her,
Speaker 1: he's kind of like, hey, you know like kids go
Speaker 1: to the prom right, You're like, thanks, that did remind
Speaker 1: me of I got emotional during that scene because I
Speaker 1: was just like, my dad would also know how to
Speaker 1: talk to her. Well, Landy's character there's okay, So there's
Speaker 1: not there's a problem with Laney's character being written in
Speaker 1: a way that she's an empathetic character that we want
Speaker 1: to care about, and that she does a bunch of things,
Speaker 1: whether she's either fat shaming her friend or making decisions
Speaker 1: that make no fucking sense, like the fact that she
Speaker 1: keeps agreeing to go out with guys who seem terrible
Speaker 1: and I disagree. Okay, well, well no, keep going, but
Speaker 1: I do disagree with But then there's also a problem
Speaker 1: with the way that everyone else is treating her, or
Speaker 1: just the way the movie presents her. Were like the
Speaker 1: first thing you basically see her doing after the opening
Speaker 1: credits when she's like painting and stuff, is like bringing
Speaker 1: food to her brother, So it's like, here, girl, have
Speaker 1: domestic chore, bring boy food. And then it's like another
Speaker 1: way that they disney Princess her though, it's like now
Speaker 1: she has to be the smartest person in the room
Speaker 1: and mommy because dad is Mr Pool and him don't
Speaker 1: know how to cook, you know. But iteels like he's
Speaker 1: a business owner and we're so hard on him, like
Speaker 1: what a loser. He's a pool guy, but he also
Speaker 1: seems to own his own business. But that and also
Speaker 1: he knows all the answers to jepardy, so he's clearly educated. Also,
Speaker 1: he lets his children just use any booze in the
Speaker 1: house to make like crappy Margarita's that has never challenged
Speaker 1: when Kieran Clan dresses, Sir Freddie Prince Jr. Alcoholic beverages,
Speaker 1: never question. A twelve year old is making an eighteen
Speaker 1: year old boozy drink and everyone's like, he's just looking
Speaker 1: at his cross work. Do not look up once to
Speaker 1: know what's even going on inside his home. It's like
Speaker 1: I'm wearing a hat. I'm busy and wearing a hat.
Speaker 1: But I mean with Laney, like we hardly see her
Speaker 1: on screen for the first eighteen minutes of the movie.
Speaker 1: She's barely there because the protagonist of the story is
Speaker 1: not her. Zach Siler Freddie Prince Jr's character is the
Speaker 1: protagonist and that he has the strongest desire because Laney
Speaker 1: has no like central goal. The story is happening to her,
Speaker 1: so she has no agency. Things are just sort of
Speaker 1: happening at her and she's going along with whatever. But
Speaker 1: she's not doing anything really to drive the narrative. It's
Speaker 1: all Zach and his story. So she's stripped of all
Speaker 1: this agency. So that means then the sympathetic character that
Speaker 1: we're rooting for the protagonist of this story is someone
Speaker 1: who's actively manipulating a woman. So it's just like it's
Speaker 1: really hard to get behind. But for some reason, like
Speaker 1: everyone who watched this movie were like, yes, this is great,
Speaker 1: I love this because they're like, but you never it's
Speaker 1: all about him going to school, Like is she planning
Speaker 1: on going to college? We don't know. Never at the
Speaker 1: end that she has applied to a number of art
Speaker 1: schools and has been recommended in the scene that I
Speaker 1: find very interesting. See this is where I disagree a
Speaker 1: little bit. And again I did not see this movie
Speaker 1: at the correct time for me to see it. But
Speaker 1: Lady Bogs to me strikes me as and at any
Speaker 1: point if anyone feels differently, let me know, but as
Speaker 1: like kind of an Avatar kind of character. Where this
Speaker 1: movie in is not meant with the intention of, Oh,
Speaker 1: a ton of boys are going to see this movie,
Speaker 1: like this is a girl's movie, and it's a young
Speaker 1: girls movie, and girls are meant to plug themselves into
Speaker 1: Landy Boggs, who feels weird, who feels out of place,
Speaker 1: who is not fully characterized, I think, very intentionally. And
Speaker 1: then we learn more about this popular male guy who
Speaker 1: like basically it's just like the oppressor coming down to
Speaker 1: the weird girls level and change in her so that
Speaker 1: they meet in the middle. But I do feel like
Speaker 1: this movie is made with the intention of young girls
Speaker 1: plugging themselves into landy box just like, oh, this is me,
Speaker 1: And I feel like, like the cool boys in school
Speaker 1: don't like me, and why is that? And maybe it
Speaker 1: was I was really into performance art when I was like,
Speaker 1: I'm not even joking, well yeah, and I was like,
Speaker 1: I mean not her kind of performance And I I don't
Speaker 1: think I necessarily understood that one, but right, But it's
Speaker 1: something adjacent where it's like when I was in middle
Speaker 1: school in high school in like formative years, like wearing
Speaker 1: a fucking back brace and being like a weird like
Speaker 1: a weird girl who genuinely like popular boys would never
Speaker 1: have just because of how of high school works. You
Speaker 1: don't know, you could have been someone that they're like,
Speaker 1: should we do the bed on her nush? That back brace?
Speaker 1: You seem like that girl, Like you seem like potential
Speaker 1: bet reject. You don't know, like you seem like the
Speaker 1: girl that someone could pick out of a crowd of like, oh,
Speaker 1: this would be a very hard person to want to fuck,
Speaker 1: like literally, And that's how Laney is presented to the audience.
Speaker 1: And I feel like that, and because young girls are
Speaker 1: brought up to feel so insecure about themselves as people
Speaker 1: and to view themselves strictly based on their bodies, which
Speaker 1: this movie does endorse by changing her body and her appearance.
Speaker 1: I think that we're meant to go into this movie
Speaker 1: thinking like, oh, I'm Landey bogged, and maybe if I'm lucky,
Speaker 1: Paul Walker will rest in power take me out of
Speaker 1: a crowd. It's like, here's the most unfukable person in
Speaker 1: the entire world, and then maybe someone who is deeply problematic,
Speaker 1: not fully like who we're glorifying this movie will dare
Speaker 1: to take a second look at me, and and and
Speaker 1: so it's like these movies for me, it's like it's
Speaker 1: so fun, but it also breaks my heart because it's
Speaker 1: like you will so easily see how you can be
Speaker 1: pulled into this movie for all the wrong reasons. Sure,
Speaker 1: and I get that, And I also like, I think
Speaker 1: that using the excuses under developing a female character so
Speaker 1: that a wide range of girls can plug themselves into
Speaker 1: is like the avatar of the story is just bad
Speaker 1: writing and not a good excuse for a character in
Speaker 1: a movie. Like I think that like, you can still
Speaker 1: depict a human experience and depict an experience that a
Speaker 1: lot of people can latch onto and identify with and say, oh,
Speaker 1: I wish I was in this scenario with also still
Speaker 1: fully developing a character and like making her feel like
Speaker 1: a real person. I agree, But I also think that
Speaker 1: there's no like the way that this character is written
Speaker 1: vaguely enough and broadly enough where it gets to the
Speaker 1: point of like, yeah, like, performance are sure painting dead mom?
Speaker 1: Like I feel like that's done very intentionally to bring
Speaker 1: in as many girls who would identify as not normal
Speaker 1: as possible, and that's done as a very intentional like
Speaker 1: it is bad writing, but it also does feel very intentional. Sure,
Speaker 1: I feel like a lot of movies in the nineties
Speaker 1: did that, though that was their whole like the whole
Speaker 1: arc of the film. It would be a poorly written film,
Speaker 1: but a character you could somewhat relate to because she
Speaker 1: was a weirdo or he was a weirdo or an outcast,
Speaker 1: and so you're like, oh, I directly relate to the
Speaker 1: outcast and the popular persons like, oh I relate to
Speaker 1: Zach because God, what a life all these women want me?
Speaker 1: Like there were characters, but because like they actually exist though, right,
Speaker 1: but don't you like I never really hung out with
Speaker 1: like popular people in school. Maybe, I mean, clearly there
Speaker 1: were no popular kids like how they're portrayed in that film,
Speaker 1: but there were still those people who you could kind
Speaker 1: of tell definitely like we're peaking in high school and
Speaker 1: then there's just nowhere for them to go after that.
Speaker 1: It was a very yeah, that felt like a very
Speaker 1: popular trope of the night, like I recently saw do
Speaker 1: know if you've seen Love Simon, But I feel like
Speaker 1: it was a much more accurate. I mean, I've been
Speaker 1: out of high school for years. Um, I don't know.
Speaker 1: I actually kind of just got there, so congratulations. But
Speaker 1: like so I don't know what high school is like
Speaker 1: now really, but um, if feels like a much more
Speaker 1: accurate depiction of what high school is where there's not
Speaker 1: And like with that movie, there's like several female characters
Speaker 1: who feel like real people, but it's still a human
Speaker 1: experience that like, even if you know people are watching this,
Speaker 1: I saw this movie and I am not a gay person,
Speaker 1: but like the experience of hiding something about yourself is
Speaker 1: so universal that I feel like there's no excuse to
Speaker 1: underdevelop any one character in a movie for the sake
Speaker 1: of being like, Okay, well, it's because we have to
Speaker 1: be able to the little girls have to plug themselves
Speaker 1: into this, like I just and that I think kind
Speaker 1: of comes down to, like the problem of making movies
Speaker 1: for young people is like, at a minimum, if you're
Speaker 1: at a point in your life where you can make
Speaker 1: a movie about anything, you're like ten years out of
Speaker 1: high school, your te and so you have like a
Speaker 1: ten year amount of dissonance of like what it is
Speaker 1: like to actually be a young person and feel those things,
Speaker 1: and you have ten years worth of you know, bitterness
Speaker 1: and additional life to heap upon whatever that experience it was.
Speaker 1: So it is hard to make an accurate depiction of
Speaker 1: high school life because by the time you're able to,
Speaker 1: you're so far at Yeah, I don't know who she's
Speaker 1: all that was made for, because I feel like I
Speaker 1: was too young watching There's so much stuff like pubes
Speaker 1: on pizza, Like that part is confused. There's just like
Speaker 1: drinking and weird telling people to kill themselves. Like there's
Speaker 1: a lot of dark stuff in this movie that I
Speaker 1: don't understand why I was watching it at a young age.
Speaker 1: The audience is like fifteen to eighteen years, Like, I
Speaker 1: don't know, it's such a small demographic of people. Um,
Speaker 1: I want to talk about like the third act, basically
Speaker 1: the whole third act of the movie, where we are
Speaker 1: basically robbed of a scene so it's prom. They're a prom.
Speaker 1: We see this scene where Paul Walker is like, oh,
Speaker 1: I'm totally going to nail her. I paid three hullars
Speaker 1: for this hotel room, and then out of a flask
Speaker 1: in the bathroom and Laney's friend, um Jesse overhears this,
Speaker 1: so he runs and tells Anna Paquin's character, who is
Speaker 1: Zack's tiler's sister to the troubled sister who has to
Speaker 1: go to a private schools too, and then they run
Speaker 1: off and tell Zach. So now everyone knows about this
Speaker 1: plan for Paul Walker to try to have sex with
Speaker 1: Laney except for Laney. Then we cut to a scene
Speaker 1: where we're at Laney's house. We see her dad and
Speaker 1: her brother talking about pools. Laney comes home, she's like, oh, man,
Speaker 1: I did have fun. That was a fun night. You're
Speaker 1: right I should have gotten to prom and I'm glad
Speaker 1: I did. And then she's like okay, by I'm going
Speaker 1: to go to bed, and then they're like, just kidding.
Speaker 1: Freddie Prince Jr. Is here and then we see her
Speaker 1: tell him about her interaction with Paul Walker. Why we
Speaker 1: do not see this play out on screen is insane
Speaker 1: because does this scene exist somewhere? I have to believe
Speaker 1: it does and that it was just cut out, because
Speaker 1: the reason we need this scene is that it's one.
Speaker 1: It's just like a bad writing that it's not there
Speaker 1: because it propels a story forward, and then to leave
Speaker 1: it out is just like, Okay, wait, what the funk happened?
Speaker 1: But then it would have given her an opportunity to
Speaker 1: like display some agency, which we see her have almost
Speaker 1: none of throughout the entire movie, and it would have
Speaker 1: let us see her save herself from the manipulation that
Speaker 1: she's been experiencing throughout the whole movie, where she's like, wait,
Speaker 1: you're trying to trick me. No, don't do that. I'm
Speaker 1: my own woman, and I am figuring this out and
Speaker 1: I don't want you, like I don't want this. But
Speaker 1: we don't see a play out on screen. We only
Speaker 1: see her kind of mention it later on when okay,
Speaker 1: Kevin polygraph, but like the scene where she's like sort
Speaker 1: of slow dance like allowing Freddie Prince Jr. To not
Speaker 1: apologize for gas lighting her and outside of her own
Speaker 1: in ground pool pulls popping upright and left, and then
Speaker 1: Kevin Pollock says, I'm still wearing my hat, but you
Speaker 1: know what, I do have time to do pop on
Speaker 1: this ambient light for you. And then he like winks
Speaker 1: of like, yeah, Freddie Prince Jr. French my daughter, you're
Speaker 1: not apologizing to And that's the last we see of
Speaker 1: him in the movie. Yeah, And then maybe they were like,
Speaker 1: we really can't have her attacking Paul Walker in this film,
Speaker 1: so they cut it out because I don't get it,
Speaker 1: because I remember the first time I saw this, like
Speaker 1: I was like, she's gonna get riped. I thought this
Speaker 1: movie was gonna take a whole another like angle and
Speaker 1: just take a left turn and Paul Walker was gonna
Speaker 1: go to jail, Like I don't know what I thought
Speaker 1: was going to happen, But for the longest time, I
Speaker 1: like would just be like, how come she doesn't react
Speaker 1: like if that I had been in that situation right
Speaker 1: to like blow a horn someone like Dad one up,
Speaker 1: But I'm home and then he was like, well, good news.
Speaker 1: I let Freddie Jr. In Already, So in case you
Speaker 1: weren't triggered already, more dudes for you, I've let someone
Speaker 1: else in. And then she makes the joke sexual harassment
Speaker 1: a big deal and then says, don't apologize. We're dating bonkers.
Speaker 1: It is bananas. Well, I wonder if there's like if
Speaker 1: they did shoot that scene with Paul Walker and it
Speaker 1: was maybe deemed too because you had like right, he
Speaker 1: would have had to come at her in such a
Speaker 1: way where she ear horn blows him in the ear
Speaker 1: like we do see the repercussion of that in the
Speaker 1: graduation because he can't because he's sitting next to I
Speaker 1: think he's sitting next to a a little Kim and she's like,
Speaker 1: you're calling. He's like, what, I tried to rape someone
Speaker 1: last night and it didn't work. He's actually graduated disabled
Speaker 1: him like he's in capable, Like he's like chewing, Like
Speaker 1: there's something weird. Happy. I have a theory that yeah,
Speaker 1: so good. Her brother, Simon, Karen Calkin's character is s
Speaker 1: wearing what I think is Simon. He's wearing what I
Speaker 1: think is a hearing age. But the entire movie, which
Speaker 1: I have a theory. I have a theory that she
Speaker 1: keeps that foghorn around and maybe when they were younger,
Speaker 1: she blew it in his ear and she permanently also,
Speaker 1: so I do question the relationship just because I grew
Speaker 1: up with a little brother who I think would be
Speaker 1: about the difference between Lady Boggs and her little brother
Speaker 1: would to be like four or five years. And it
Speaker 1: does bother me that it's like Kieran Culkins little brother
Speaker 1: character ends up viewing Freddie Prince Jr. Zack character as
Speaker 1: like an ally and someone he can really rely on,
Speaker 1: where her family like, both the two males and her
Speaker 1: family unit end up pretty clearly allying themselves with Freddie
Speaker 1: Prince Junr. The person who it appears that they know
Speaker 1: is lying to her as like, here's someone you should
Speaker 1: end up with. And I found that to be like
Speaker 1: kind of like jarring of like man if I was
Speaker 1: only growing up with my dad and my brother and
Speaker 1: they both push this same dude who was tricking me,
Speaker 1: you know, like realistically, and again I feel like we
Speaker 1: have to realistically plug ourselves into a sixteen year old
Speaker 1: girl trying to relate to Laney Boggs at this time
Speaker 1: in what world? But you'd be like no, like there,
Speaker 1: It's like if everyone in your life is like here
Speaker 1: he is. We led him into the house. We're turning
Speaker 1: on the ambient line, and it was like, of course
Speaker 1: you're gonna want to be with that person. They're like
Speaker 1: just being like you're such a wet blanket. Like even
Speaker 1: her best friends like need this, Like you need friend, yeah,
Speaker 1: everyone wants like the little brother, the dad, the best friend.
Speaker 1: Like everyone, even like Gabriel Union's characters like this is
Speaker 1: good for you come to the party like you need this. Yeah,
Speaker 1: even Orati's like come on, man, date like you fucking
Speaker 1: need this. Your art will be better. It's like everyone
Speaker 1: is telling her she has to get out of her
Speaker 1: like bubble and date this popular guy and is that
Speaker 1: and that's how you will make it out of here.
Speaker 1: And if she doesn't, she's an uptight little bit and
Speaker 1: she's obsessed with her dead mother and that's not okay.
Speaker 1: She has to move that. There's a scene that takes
Speaker 1: place at the prom that really stood out to me
Speaker 1: in terms of like a scene that says so much
Speaker 1: with allowing the protagonist to say literally a couple of
Speaker 1: Words Maximum, where Landy is at the prom. She has
Speaker 1: been hotified by Anna Paquin and Freddie Prince Jr. She
Speaker 1: is completely altered from the first way we know her
Speaker 1: to be. Her Our teacher comes up to her and
Speaker 1: says that, like she has, is very talented and that
Speaker 1: she's finally achieved her full potential. And she says, like,
Speaker 1: I've been spending four years trying to open you up.
Speaker 1: Laney Boggs, whoever it is that did it, don't let
Speaker 1: them go and then access the scene because she is
Speaker 1: the queen of exposition. And the only thing Laney says
Speaker 1: in the scene is like when she's like, oh, I
Speaker 1: recommended you to every school you applied to. This is
Speaker 1: the first we hear that Landy has a played schools
Speaker 1: at all and any interest in anything right, And Landy says,
Speaker 1: you're kidding. That's all she says in this entire scene.
Speaker 1: And then the our teacher sees herself out. We here
Speaker 1: that you know we in theory teenage girls here that like,
Speaker 1: whoever opened you up to accepting the fact that your
Speaker 1: mom is sucking dead is like the person you should
Speaker 1: have sex until you die. And then and then we
Speaker 1: see the rest of the scene is wordless. We just
Speaker 1: see this like lingering shot on Landy and she looks
Speaker 1: over at Freddie Prince Jr. Who's also looking over at her,
Speaker 1: and then she just looks and we see her again.
Speaker 1: And in that scene we realize it's like he's what
Speaker 1: made her art good for four years, even though she
Speaker 1: has known him for three weeks and he's been lying
Speaker 1: to her the entire time. Like that scene I found.
Speaker 1: I watched it like three times or just like that.
Speaker 1: There's so little dialogue in that scene, but it communicates
Speaker 1: so much to its intended audience of like, no matter
Speaker 1: how long you've been working towards a goal, and no
Speaker 1: matter what your goals are, no matter what you're good at,
Speaker 1: there is a way to credit it to a loser
Speaker 1: who is lying to you, and people will find a
Speaker 1: way to make that happen. And I just, oh God,
Speaker 1: that seemed dropp me. Fucking That teacher could have easily
Speaker 1: just been like did you get laid because you seem
Speaker 1: so much more chill right like that. It was the
Speaker 1: same idea like whoever opened you up, who man literally
Speaker 1: opened you up? Whoever you into college? For years, I've
Speaker 1: been telling you to just go get that dick so
Speaker 1: you'ld start making depressing hard about your debt. Mom. It's like, okay, teach,
Speaker 1: get the funk out of here. You've been nowhere. They're
Speaker 1: literally students at parties going insane and you were just
Speaker 1: show up to be Like Klige of All was like
Speaker 1: passing out in a pile of her own vomit, and
Speaker 1: I was like, how does it feel? Like? What was
Speaker 1: that good? Like role models at this school because these
Speaker 1: students are all trash, those visibly thirty. She's like, how
Speaker 1: does it feel to make the best start as at school? Bar?
Speaker 1: It's like, I don't know, Here's a few things I
Speaker 1: want to say. At one point, Zach tells Laney would
Speaker 1: it hurt you to smile once in a while? Telling
Speaker 1: her to smile. There's a lot of those moments. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And she's like, did you know smiling can lead to cancer?
Speaker 1: They're like a faculty female faculty member surprise kisses Zach
Speaker 1: after he wins prom king that's not okay, not on
Speaker 1: the mouth, but like she grabs him and pulls him
Speaker 1: in and kisses him on the cheek. Yeah, are we
Speaker 1: to believe that? Sarah Michelle Gellar's cameo is her playing
Speaker 1: Buffy and that that's some sort of like clever crossover
Speaker 1: thing because she looks like Buffy the character in the movie,
Speaker 1: just like she has no lines, though she has no
Speaker 1: lines exactly right. I just have to believe it's some
Speaker 1: like weird like oh, because they're like all in southern
Speaker 1: California and like maybe this town is like adjacent to
Speaker 1: Sonny of Dale or whatever. I think you're actually being
Speaker 1: a big dork by asking a question because I've never
Speaker 1: seen Buffy the Vampire Slayer and I don't know what
Speaker 1: the funk it's about. Buffy is great, you gotta watch. Okay,
Speaker 1: stop triggering me. But there's every loser I've ever met
Speaker 1: is said that, Okay, sorry, guys, I'm sorry, a real
Speaker 1: character in this movie. Guys, actually who you actually and
Speaker 1: then grab your own toeth and be like. There's also
Speaker 1: a scene where after um Laney is nominated for prom Queen,
Speaker 1: Jesse is sort of like directing people where to hang
Speaker 1: up their posters that are like, hey vote for Landy
Speaker 1: for prom queen. And then there's just one moment where
Speaker 1: he's just like you gay students, put yours over there.
Speaker 1: And the banner says something like come out and vote
Speaker 1: for Laney, and it's just like, whoa that, Um, it's
Speaker 1: that's a bad ninety nine Joe. Not that that joke does.
Speaker 1: I kind of thought maybe the best friend might be gay.
Speaker 1: I was like, maybe there's like an angle where he's
Speaker 1: also into Freddie Bruce. I don't know. That was like
Speaker 1: one of things when I when I was originally watching it, like, oh,
Speaker 1: maybe there's something we don't know. But then he gets
Speaker 1: with Anna for Quinn. But then he gets with Anna
Speaker 1: Quinn and they actually get to they hang out, but
Speaker 1: then we don't see them like that because she seems
Speaker 1: into guys. I think her exact line was, Oh, her
Speaker 1: brother is there and he just got kicked out of
Speaker 1: like military school. So that's her vibe. What I hope
Speaker 1: for her is that she grows out of being her
Speaker 1: own brother's stooge, because she seems way smarter and more
Speaker 1: decisive than him, and so in the first thing we
Speaker 1: see her like and this is again how movies constantly
Speaker 1: discards like an initially strong female character's potential where we
Speaker 1: see her initially. The first time we see Anna's character,
Speaker 1: she's nagging him aggressively and it's like calls him a
Speaker 1: bitch magnet. She calls him a bitch magnet, and she
Speaker 1: says like, you gotta go for a different kind of girls,
Speaker 1: blah blah blah. And then the next time we see her,
Speaker 1: somehow something has happened that now she's full on willing
Speaker 1: to give Lady Boggs a makeover, and it's like, this
Speaker 1: is not the character we saw in the first scene.
Speaker 1: This is someone who is suddenly very dependent on whatever
Speaker 1: her brother asks, and she looks like a little dissonant
Speaker 1: at yeah. Yeah, and then at the end it's like, oh,
Speaker 1: maybe she's going to date the friend, which I and
Speaker 1: again I'm rooting for them, but yeah, that character felt
Speaker 1: very weird and underdeveloped, of like she was introduced as
Speaker 1: someone who I thought I was like, oh, this is
Speaker 1: someone who could talk sense into, like the Zach character,
Speaker 1: but then she sort of just ends up folding to whatever.
Speaker 1: One of the first things she says is, so, who's
Speaker 1: the lucky rebound skank? Like she and I want to
Speaker 1: know she's like a big brother icon. Yeah. So it's
Speaker 1: mostly Paul Walker saying horrible things about women, but the
Speaker 1: way several different characters talk about women in this movie
Speaker 1: is bonkers because you have lines like Paul Walker saying
Speaker 1: whoa whoa whoa Lucu's bag from spring break looking all
Speaker 1: phone and ship and then uh dol a Hill, and
Speaker 1: his defense says, in response to that, on behalf of
Speaker 1: all black people. Shut up. Usher is talking about women.
Speaker 1: He calls someone magically delicious, um Paul, which is also okay,
Speaker 1: that's also how you would describe lucky Chtermsey, But he's
Speaker 1: talking specifically about how a woman looks. Paul actual big
Speaker 1: brother because he sees everything. He literally is a big brother.
Speaker 1: Paul Walker later says, how does he see all this?
Speaker 1: And we don't know what his social circle is at all? Right,
Speaker 1: because you don't know if he has friends or if
Speaker 1: he's even in high school. We don't know. Zack says,
Speaker 1: there are two thousand girls in the school and I
Speaker 1: can bump monkeys with any one of them. The lingo
Speaker 1: in this movie, I think Paul Walker at one point
Speaker 1: even says check out the bobos on Super says that
Speaker 1: he says he's like talked about how he like nailed
Speaker 1: a flight attendant like a third year old, right Guynestly,
Speaker 1: he's talking about Taylor, and he says every girl wants
Speaker 1: to be her and every guy wants to nail her.
Speaker 1: But then do like Hill comes around, he's just like, oh,
Speaker 1: she's basically you with tits. So not a feminist icon. Um.
Speaker 1: So it's just like the fact that you see so
Speaker 1: many characters, mostly males, some female when it comes to
Speaker 1: and a pack when through the word skank around talk
Speaker 1: about women so horribly, and it's almost always in the
Speaker 1: context of how they look or just like how desirable
Speaker 1: or undesirable they are two men, and it's really gross.
Speaker 1: And and granted, like Paul Walker ends up being a
Speaker 1: villain and we're not supposed to identify with him, but
Speaker 1: the fact that like, but it's so light a hearing loss,
Speaker 1: and the fact that like Zack stays friends with him
Speaker 1: for so long and agrees to the bet that he
Speaker 1: sort of initiates, and all that stuff is just like
Speaker 1: any young like teenage boy who is seeing this movie,
Speaker 1: it's probably like, oh, those guys are so cool, and
Speaker 1: and that sees how they're talking to women. That they're
Speaker 1: talking about women was sexual harassment to everybody in the room.
Speaker 1: You cannot walk around naked, that is offensive and then
Speaker 1: he volleyball, so you know, junk was straight out. So
Speaker 1: it's like, hello, we're all here. We don't all don't
Speaker 1: want to see you naked. You can't just like flash
Speaker 1: the last frame of the movie. Its like god, and
Speaker 1: if you're lucky, you'll be the girl who naked guy
Speaker 1: throws his dick volleyball to any soccer ball. So sorry,
Speaker 1: but I was like, whoa stead of like yo, like
Speaker 1: put something. It's like, no one wants to see your
Speaker 1: flaccid dick graduations consideration his hard day. Sure we don't
Speaker 1: know how super hard to shape. Freddie Prince j Yeah,
Speaker 1: the moral compass of this movie is crazy and we
Speaker 1: are not. And I think you made a great point
Speaker 1: just now. We are not given really an alternative to
Speaker 1: any men and young men especially who are seeing this movie.
Speaker 1: We're not given any alternative to like, oh yeah, and
Speaker 1: you can also not be the coolest guy in school
Speaker 1: and also be fine like where we sort of see Jesse,
Speaker 1: but he is seen very much in support to the
Speaker 1: main female character, and like, I mean, really, the only
Speaker 1: male ideal we're given is Freddie Prince Jr. Which again
Speaker 1: I'm so proud of him, and he's done so well
Speaker 1: in his life, but Zach as a character h is
Speaker 1: a bad person, goes on to be a full on
Speaker 1: lax bro who does very problematic things for a very
Speaker 1: long time. I wonder if the ending scene is him
Speaker 1: getting arrested for public nudity, someone calling the police, like,
Speaker 1: this is not at this high school or is thirty
Speaker 1: Why is this happening? Jamie, you said you wanted to
Speaker 1: come to the defense of Taylor. I would like to
Speaker 1: come to the defense of Taylor to an extent. I
Speaker 1: just think that at the top of this movie is
Speaker 1: mainly Marie County Taylor's defense, because she does sort of
Speaker 1: very quickly lapse into a violent female on female I
Speaker 1: have to be prom queen character. But at the very
Speaker 1: beginning where everyone's just like, oh my god, she's such
Speaker 1: a bit, she made Zach sad, and then we find
Speaker 1: out minutes later that Zach is willing to exploit any
Speaker 1: woman on campus to prove that he's a man. So
Speaker 1: it's I I sort of felt badly. I can't relate
Speaker 1: with her in that I wasn't a girl like that
Speaker 1: in high school that had access to unlimited men. If
Speaker 1: you can possibly believe if I didn't have access to
Speaker 1: unlimited thirty year old Freddie Prince juniors at this time.
Speaker 1: But like the fact that she is made out to
Speaker 1: be a villain at the jump to again in the
Speaker 1: way that female characters are made to relate to male protagonists.
Speaker 1: She exists to make us feel badly for Freddie Prince Jr.
Speaker 1: So that we can get over the moral jump of
Speaker 1: him being willing to exploit any girl. So it's like
Speaker 1: we are using a female character to justify a male
Speaker 1: character exploiting a second female character. So Taylor is the
Speaker 1: first step in this insidious sequence, and I feel for
Speaker 1: her because in retrospect, if you look at Zack on paper,
Speaker 1: he's not a good guy. Why would you want to
Speaker 1: be with this guy. Not that I'm saying that Matthew
Speaker 1: Lillard's real world care is the better option, but I'm
Speaker 1: just saying like the movie very quickly demonizes Taylor's character
Speaker 1: for not wanting to be with Zack when we find
Speaker 1: out a minute later that Zach is not a good
Speaker 1: person and willing to do anything to get a girl
Speaker 1: in order to prove his masculinity. So I just felt
Speaker 1: like at the beginning of the movie especially, I felt
Speaker 1: badly for Taylor, because I felt like she was you
Speaker 1: know that character, and characters like that who don't exist
Speaker 1: in real life at all, was used as a pawn
Speaker 1: to characterize the male character, and that bugs me, and
Speaker 1: that always bugs me, and her character worsens throughout the movie,
Speaker 1: and that like all she wants to do is kill
Speaker 1: other women to be promptly, but also you know, goal
Speaker 1: oriented woman, so she has she has more of a
Speaker 1: defined goal and desire than Laney does. Again, the story
Speaker 1: just happens to her. She does, she has no agency,
Speaker 1: she makes no choices, and the choices she does make
Speaker 1: make no sense for her character, where she'll be like, no,
Speaker 1: Paul Walker, I don't want to go to the promise
Speaker 1: you except here, I am going to the problem with you.
Speaker 1: Like it doesn't anything she does, I guess well to
Speaker 1: be for Kevin Pollock did say there's a hot guy up,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, and she's just like, well, I might as
Speaker 1: well prom he'll send his daughter out with anyone, like
Speaker 1: he didn't even make the connection. And another guy's here
Speaker 1: and he's just like, hey, look these dudes well that
Speaker 1: night and he's like, well, then I recognize him to
Speaker 1: like him. I think in an ultimate world that Taylor
Speaker 1: and Paul Walker's character should end up together because they're
Speaker 1: both little conniving bitches and go at it. Let's talk
Speaker 1: about whether or not this movie passes the Bechtel test.
Speaker 1: Does it? Does? It does? A few different times. Women
Speaker 1: actually interact a lot in this movie. Oftentimes it's only
Speaker 1: for very very short exchange. Some himes, it's with women
Speaker 1: whose names we don't know. Oftentimes they are talking about men.
Speaker 1: But there are a few scenes that do pass. One
Speaker 1: of them is the one where Misty character, although Laney
Speaker 1: does not respond in that scene, but because there's another
Speaker 1: woman there, Savannah, who's contributing to the conversation, I think
Speaker 1: that there's a scene where, well, I don't know if
Speaker 1: this passes are not, because again, we never learned Katie's
Speaker 1: name in the movie. We only know this from looking
Speaker 1: it up on IMDb. But Gabrielle Union, her character and
Speaker 1: Taylor are talking about her tattoo and then her acceptance
Speaker 1: speech and how Seene It's like, very clearly eight yard
Speaker 1: Taylor is like, what I'm a I'm a shoe in
Speaker 1: for a prom queen, I could win this thing in
Speaker 1: fluorescent light and blah blah blah, my mom was a
Speaker 1: prom queen. A good line. So that scene passes the
Speaker 1: test because there's another character there named Chandler. I want
Speaker 1: to say, that's the girl with the short hair, right,
Speaker 1: she's also there talking. Chandler and Laney had one when
Speaker 1: they're on the beach and she's basically telling Laney that
Speaker 1: she's not fit and can't play so many body shaving
Speaker 1: scenes that passive act. Yeah, that's that scene goes like this,
Speaker 1: I've seen you in Jim class. You run like a girl.
Speaker 1: Laney says, I am a girl. Chandler says, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. Randy says, obviously I don't passes the
Speaker 1: test is not a good pass um the scene where
Speaker 1: what the hell is Anna Paquin's character's name mac mackenzie, right, yeah,
Speaker 1: when when they when they talk about makeup, it passes. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that passes. Yeah. So there's a few scenes here and
Speaker 1: there that technically passed the test. Most of them are
Speaker 1: Taylor bullying Laney more than one time, more than one time,
Speaker 1: and then lots of problematic passes on this movie, just
Speaker 1: like this is the opening of the film really sets
Speaker 1: a precedent and do we know the our teacher. I
Speaker 1: feel like the our teacher is given a name at
Speaker 1: some point. I don't think so, I don't think so. Okay,
Speaker 1: So those scenes don't. Also, the movie, even though it
Speaker 1: does pass the Backtel test, does not pass the DuVernay test,
Speaker 1: suggesting that a movie should have characters who are people
Speaker 1: of color and that exists to not just support the
Speaker 1: white characters. Because in this movie, right there are like
Speaker 1: Taylor has friends who are people of color, Zach has
Speaker 1: friends who are people of color, but they only exist
Speaker 1: in the story to support their white friends. Also does
Speaker 1: not pass the Loftiest test. There is a bald woman
Speaker 1: in the movie at the performance art show that she's
Speaker 1: not in charge. Stupid movie I loved, I did not okay.
Speaker 1: Rating the movie on our nipple scales zero five nipples
Speaker 1: based on its portrayal of women, I'm gonna give it
Speaker 1: like zero to one half nipple. Like it's just like
Speaker 1: very low for me because the You're one female main
Speaker 1: character in any Bogs has no agency, She has no
Speaker 1: specific desire of her own. She exists to be manipulated
Speaker 1: throughout the entire story. Also, there's uh I wanted to
Speaker 1: say really quickly that um of the movies that like
Speaker 1: have women needing to be made over and fixed so
Speaker 1: that they can be more desirable to men. That never
Speaker 1: happens in the reverse of that, where there's hardly every
Speaker 1: movies where like men need to be made to be
Speaker 1: more desirable to women. So it's just like, really, it's
Speaker 1: almost as if men aren't held to that standard of
Speaker 1: like it's because I feel like attend like you know, however,
Speaker 1: many years ago, I'd be like, we should make a
Speaker 1: movie like that. But it's like, no, no one should
Speaker 1: make a movie ye that we should just stop making
Speaker 1: movies like this. And the way that women are talked about,
Speaker 1: the way that so many the female characters are really
Speaker 1: nasty to each other, just a whole slew of problems
Speaker 1: with this movie. I have to give it zero nipple
Speaker 1: rating the end, I would give it one nipple just
Speaker 1: for clear Duval being such a strong, like independent woman
Speaker 1: who just talks whatever she wants. That's the only everyone
Speaker 1: else is just trying to get by. I'm going to
Speaker 1: give it a nipple as well, and as much as
Speaker 1: I am trying to get myself out of the habit
Speaker 1: of giving movies nipples on our iconic writing system for
Speaker 1: having inklings of useful, valid female characters who are not
Speaker 1: constantly exploited by the men around them. I do think
Speaker 1: that there are a lot of seeds of good female
Speaker 1: characters in that if you're a sixteen year old girl
Speaker 1: watching this movie, you at least take away that it
Speaker 1: is okay to like art. At least Landy is not
Speaker 1: stripped of her ability to appreciate art. There are some
Speaker 1: few paltry things that don't suggest you need to become
Speaker 1: a tailor in order to be accepted by the norm,
Speaker 1: but the fact that you are still conditioned to be
Speaker 1: accepted by the norm is very insidious and bad. And also,
Speaker 1: teenage girls should be conditioned to say, like, if someone
Speaker 1: wrongs you, you should expect an apology from them, and
Speaker 1: probably not end up with them romantically, and probably not
Speaker 1: just be like let Kevin Pollack turn in some mood
Speaker 1: letting and just accept your life for the rest of
Speaker 1: what it is. But there are the seeds of valid characters.
Speaker 1: I do like that there are movies out there that
Speaker 1: teenage girls can plug themselves into. I just don't like
Speaker 1: the direction that most of those movies take. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: give it one nipple and I'm going to kick it
Speaker 1: right back to Landy box An. Thank you so much
Speaker 1: for being thank you, thank you for joy. Um. I'm
Speaker 1: on Twitter at Anna host A N N A H
Speaker 1: O S S N I E H. I co host
Speaker 1: a podcast called Ethnically Ambiguous on the House Stuff Works Network.
Speaker 1: I'm also a producer there and I produce a show
Speaker 1: called The Daily Site Guys, which is daily it's news
Speaker 1: and pop culture and Caitlin have been on it. Great episode.
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, listen Ethnically Ambiguous if you want to hear
Speaker 1: stuff about the Middle East and being a brown, a
Speaker 1: modern brown woman in America. It's fun. So yeah, find
Speaker 1: me somewhere awesome. You can follow us on social media
Speaker 1: at Bactokast, Patreon, slash, Matreon, subscribe to it to bonus
Speaker 1: episodes every month. Reviews, Yeah, I'm unemployed now, so please
Speaker 1: give us your money. Um by our merch I we need,
Speaker 1: I need your money, and other is also very nice.
Speaker 1: It's so cute as buttons and stickers and it's so great. Otherwise,
Speaker 1: thanks for listening. We love you all. And By