Speaker 1: On the bel Cast, the questions asked if movies have
Speaker 1: women in them? Are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands?
Speaker 1: Do they have individualism? The patriarchy? Zef in best start
Speaker 1: changing it with the Bedel Cast. Hello, and welcome to
Speaker 1: the Bechtel Cast. My name is Caitlin Torante, my name
Speaker 1: is Jamie Loftus, and this is a this is our
Speaker 1: episode about um, well, it's about a lot of things.
Speaker 1: What is it about? I don't know how many years
Speaker 1: have we been doing this? Five years? What is it about? Really?
Speaker 1: Who are we really? Jamie? Do you ever? Who am
Speaker 1: I who? This is the thing that my my boyfriend
Speaker 1: will say a lot. This is not passing the Bectel tests,
Speaker 1: by the way, but something something my boyfriend will say
Speaker 1: a lot about the podcast he likes. I'm like, well
Speaker 1: what is that podcast? Like, what is the podcast about?
Speaker 1: And he'll say something akin to like, well, it's about this,
Speaker 1: but it's really about friendship. And I was like, Okay,
Speaker 1: first of all, that's annoying. Second of all, maybe that's
Speaker 1: what we'll say from now on. We're like, well, it's
Speaker 1: technically about movies, but it's really more about our fringe.
Speaker 1: That's so nice speaking, which I, uh, well, wait, we
Speaker 1: should say what the podcast is. I was it's going
Speaker 1: to be a countdown for me until we can start
Speaker 1: talking about the parallels between Idris Elba's character in this
Speaker 1: movie and Macavity. Oh my gosh, I had a lot
Speaker 1: of a whole analog to how this movie is basically
Speaker 1: the movie cats. He's basically well, I I didn't pick
Speaker 1: that up, but I was like the Cavity energy. Anyways,
Speaker 1: we should say what the podcast is. Okay, this is
Speaker 1: our podcast about movies. We examine movies through an intersectional
Speaker 1: feminist lens, using the Bechtel test simply as a way
Speaker 1: to just inspire the concept of talking about film through
Speaker 1: this lens. And Jamie, what on earth is the Bechtel test?
Speaker 1: I don't know. Well, in this movie, it's when your
Speaker 1: mom comes in your room when you're using a vibrator
Speaker 1: and tells you that your career can't keep you warm
Speaker 1: at night. But what it technically is, but it technically
Speaker 1: is is it's a media metric invented by a queer cartoonist,
Speaker 1: Allison Becktel, sometimes called back the Wallace test, that requires,
Speaker 1: for our purposes that two people of a marginalized gender
Speaker 1: with names speak to each other about something other than
Speaker 1: a man. Uh and and most movies don't pass it.
Speaker 1: And I would say holiday movies it gets even harder
Speaker 1: to pass yeah, because everyone's like, why don't you have
Speaker 1: a husband yet, daughter of mine? This a movie does?
Speaker 1: I mean, this movie does. Like spoiler, this movie does
Speaker 1: pass the backtel test. But there are some really funny ones,
Speaker 1: um like when mcdeer comes in and says, your vibrator
Speaker 1: isn't going to keep you warm at night, you know,
Speaker 1: and she goes mom, and then you're like, well, I
Speaker 1: guess maybe, but they talk about batteries, batteries, genderless icon batteries. True,
Speaker 1: let's pay our guests in. Yes, we've returning guests. We've
Speaker 1: we've rolled down the one am I saying, when the
Speaker 1: what is the wording we use? We we've taken down
Speaker 1: the embargo. Yes, we've we've unlocked the cage that we
Speaker 1: keep all men on. Jesus, So I guess today returning
Speaker 1: from you remember him from the Rock episode, which is
Speaker 1: where a lot of running gags in our show were
Speaker 1: born between Gregnant between his wife, lots of lots of gems.
Speaker 1: You could say that the Rock episode was gregnant with
Speaker 1: and gave birth to several running gags of the Bad
Speaker 1: Book Cast. Anyway, The Ark was a very gregnant episode
Speaker 1: ext eight months gregnant, that whole episode, much like this one.
Speaker 1: There's a Gregnancy in this one. I was. I was like,
Speaker 1: there's better be a Gregnancy in this movie. And you know,
Speaker 1: thank god, it's a little late in the game, but
Speaker 1: the Greatnescy comes through its present. Um and you know
Speaker 1: him as one of the hosts of the Daily Zeitgeist.
Speaker 1: It's Miles Gray. Oh, thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1: I'm I'm I'm truly honored to that you allowed me back.
Speaker 1: When you even asked you like, hey, do you want
Speaker 1: to talk about a movie on I was like, on
Speaker 1: your podcast Bechdel Cast, where my sort is not allowed
Speaker 1: At the moment, I was very confused, But you know what,
Speaker 1: I'm honored that you have welcomed me back into the
Speaker 1: kingdom and offered me safe passage through the cinematic universe. Um.
Speaker 1: So yeah, it's always a pleasure. And I happen to
Speaker 1: happen to people who I could talk to endlessly about
Speaker 1: anything anyway, so it's hardly any kind of a task
Speaker 1: for me. So when we decide, I mean, this is
Speaker 1: the same. This is happening the same month that Alfred
Speaker 1: Molina has been welcomed into the m c U. So,
Speaker 1: you know, Miles Gray's no cannon in the bc U.
Speaker 1: It takes two appearances to become canonically bc U. Thank
Speaker 1: you so much. That's I feel honored. You know, Molina
Speaker 1: it has re entered the m c U. Uh now
Speaker 1: Miles Gray is entering the b c U. So it
Speaker 1: feels like a new day from me, Miles, great Leon
Speaker 1: has aunt is here. Also shout out to my sponsors
Speaker 1: right theon that gave me, gave me twenty dollars to
Speaker 1: change my last name. But it's worth it. That's incredible.
Speaker 1: I mean, honestly, I think you could have gotten more.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I didn't want to be greedy, you know,
Speaker 1: I think, you know, little Company, a little mom and
Speaker 1: pop organization, just destabilizing the whole sections of the earth. Um, Miles,
Speaker 1: what is your relationship with this Christmas? Well, oddly enough,
Speaker 1: which is the movie by the way, this one very
Speaker 1: tortured relationship with this current Christmas, with this particular Christmas. Um,
Speaker 1: I you know, oddly enough, it's a movie I've watched.
Speaker 1: When it came out in two thousand seven, I was
Speaker 1: in a really weird place at the time, getting off
Speaker 1: of getting out of college to an economy that was
Speaker 1: like vaporized, and then also like awful break up where
Speaker 1: like I didn't know who the funk I was anymore.
Speaker 1: So I was I was. I was watching a lot
Speaker 1: of corn unplugged in the dark on my bean bag chair,
Speaker 1: especially with with Amy from Evanescence comes out to do
Speaker 1: freak on a leash um, So that was sort of like,
Speaker 1: that's like the vibe I was operating in, so I
Speaker 1: I So I watched it then, and oddly enough, when
Speaker 1: you asked me about this Christmas, I was like, I
Speaker 1: just watched it last night, like the night before you
Speaker 1: had asked me about doing it, So it's I don't know,
Speaker 1: it was just it's it's there. But I hadn't seen
Speaker 1: it in years, so it was like going into it new, Sure, sure, Jamie,
Speaker 1: what about you? Uh. Like many movies, I've seen like
Speaker 1: chunks of this movie over the years on like T
Speaker 1: n T and like when friends were watching it or
Speaker 1: roommates were watching it, but I never like sat down
Speaker 1: and watched the the entire thing, which, honestly, I mean
Speaker 1: this movie really does like demand a hundred percent of
Speaker 1: your attention if you're trying to follow. There's so many storylines.
Speaker 1: It's like love that it's love actually level number of storylines,
Speaker 1: but worse because they're all in the same house, and
Speaker 1: you feel more like, well, I should know everyone because
Speaker 1: we're not just like going across the country to these other,
Speaker 1: like desperate story lines. I'm like, wait, is that a
Speaker 1: kid or a boyfriend or a spouse of the There
Speaker 1: are so many times where I'm like, did I miss something?
Speaker 1: Do we not know who's who's? Like? What job does
Speaker 1: this person have? Whose? Whose child is this? It took
Speaker 1: me a second to figure out who. I thought that
Speaker 1: it was Kelly's children for a second, but it turns
Speaker 1: out it was Regina King's children, and then I was
Speaker 1: like did I And then I went back. I'm like, no,
Speaker 1: I was just supposed to know that. I was supposed
Speaker 1: to know that, right right right. There's also like a
Speaker 1: cousin Fred or something that shows up now and then,
Speaker 1: but he's like not important at all, but important enough
Speaker 1: to take shot at how many kids he has? Like
Speaker 1: how many kids? For you? Guys six seven. Also Madere
Speaker 1: has six children, Like, what is she passing judgment? At
Speaker 1: least she had it with Senior. You know, I guess,
Speaker 1: like I think they're trying to make it look like
Speaker 1: Fred has a bunch of baby mommy. There's a lot
Speaker 1: of weird, shitty tropes in here, but you know, it's
Speaker 1: but that's what Christmas movies are about. It's usually not
Speaker 1: a nuanced discussion of fucking anything. So and Chris Brown
Speaker 1: is there. I really hate to see Chris Brown and there.
Speaker 1: It was my pleasure to fast forward through all sixty
Speaker 1: thousand Chris Brown musical Monton. Yes, credit to his manager
Speaker 1: or agent who basically when they negotiated that was like
Speaker 1: he will sing entire songs in this movie and you
Speaker 1: will not edit them down one fucking bar. Because yeah,
Speaker 1: Chris Brown, this is like I mean, and this is
Speaker 1: sort of like shortly before his career and his like
Speaker 1: he starts to really be called into question, right, because
Speaker 1: that happened in the late two thousand's, But like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that was like she's that was a nine. Nay, it
Speaker 1: was after this movie, but I don't know exactly when, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't. I mean, he was still you know there
Speaker 1: he was still just had minimal tattoos. His neck wasn't
Speaker 1: tatted yet. You can always tell like where you're at
Speaker 1: because like as the tattoos fielding, and you're like, okay,
Speaker 1: now we're getting into like scum Chris Brown phase. Um
Speaker 1: so yeah, I don't know, it's he's he definitely brought
Speaker 1: people into the theaters that Like when you look at
Speaker 1: that line, if you're like, we're letting an algorithm tell
Speaker 1: us how we're going to get as many asses into
Speaker 1: the seats. Yeah, and he's so prominent on that. I
Speaker 1: was looking at the posters where he's like takes up
Speaker 1: a third of the poster even though there's twelve people
Speaker 1: on the poster. Right right, it's like Chris Brown's this Christmas. Thankfully,
Speaker 1: he's actually not in that much of it, like it's
Speaker 1: mostly other people. But but almost every second he's on screen,
Speaker 1: he's just singing, singing, singing. That said, I enjoyed this movie, Caitlin,
Speaker 1: what's your history with this movie? I hadn't seen it before. Um,
Speaker 1: I liked it, okay. But generally movies that are like
Speaker 1: character driven, family narratives that don't really have a distinct
Speaker 1: plot aren't really my type of movie, so it's not
Speaker 1: a rump that's kind of rumpy. I would say that
Speaker 1: Adris Elba's uh storyline is very rompy. It's like in
Speaker 1: Ocean's eleven in the middle of a family movie. They
Speaker 1: give you all kinds of you. They give you even
Speaker 1: like Star Wars Daddy Issues reconciliation vibe. But there's also
Speaker 1: there's like more melo drama than I enjoy in a movie.
Speaker 1: So I'm just like I was here for it. I
Speaker 1: love I love the melo drama. I'm it's a it's
Speaker 1: generally a pass for me. But also and I don't
Speaker 1: generally the only Christmas movie I like is Muppet Christmas Carol.
Speaker 1: Every other one you liked print too, sort of did
Speaker 1: you like? Have you seen New York Christmas Wedding? I
Speaker 1: have not seen New York Christmas. The lgbt Q one
Speaker 1: that like Netflix put out where it's basically this like
Speaker 1: woman who's like about to get married to a man
Speaker 1: is visited by an angel who sends her to a
Speaker 1: parallel reality where she could have come out to her
Speaker 1: best girlfriend that she was in love with and play
Speaker 1: out a life where she would have just honored her
Speaker 1: like feelings about her friend and had like this beautiful
Speaker 1: love affair with this other woman. But then like the
Speaker 1: thing ends and it's like all right, now choose. Oh
Speaker 1: my god. It's like a very very weird way to
Speaker 1: present that sort of quandary for a person of like
Speaker 1: this angel being like, Okay, you want to test drive
Speaker 1: this other version where you embrace this relationship. Maybe not,
Speaker 1: but anyway, those are some steaks I didn't know that existed. Yeah,
Speaker 1: check it out. I mean, because this is the thing
Speaker 1: I love about Christmas movies is that they're so just.
Speaker 1: They can be anything. They can be like sincere and
Speaker 1: earnest and you're like, oh, this just happens to be
Speaker 1: happening during Christmas. But for me, the best ones are
Speaker 1: like absolute trash where there's so many plot holes and
Speaker 1: you're being like, they didn't even think when they were
Speaker 1: writing this. I for whatever reason, that's like a salve
Speaker 1: on my like like tortured creator wounds and don't like
Speaker 1: see people can get absolute shit made. It is like
Speaker 1: if a Christmas movie took more than forty minutes to write,
Speaker 1: it took too long period done. Michael Keaton's Jack Frost
Speaker 1: took eleven minutes to write the entire screen. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: movie was fully improvised. So I went to high school
Speaker 1: with one of the snowboard bullies from that movie. Wait,
Speaker 1: I think you've told us this before. That's iconic, that's incredible.
Speaker 1: He was Unfortunately, that kid was living in his sister's shadow,
Speaker 1: who played the daughter in Jack Frost, And he only
Speaker 1: got the part because his sister was one of the leads,
Speaker 1: and we made fun of like that's how toxic l
Speaker 1: A School was, Like, dude, you only got it because
Speaker 1: your sister was a lead fool and you barely You
Speaker 1: don't even have like a U five part under five lines, um,
Speaker 1: Like I don't know, wow, growing up in l A sense,
Speaker 1: I mean yeah, I think it's also jealousy because he
Speaker 1: also had like he like brought us snow. I feel
Speaker 1: like he bought brought like a snowboard jacket from the
Speaker 1: set to school in like the l A heat and
Speaker 1: we're like, dude, we get it. So then we just
Speaker 1: turned on him or like whatever, bro, your sister got
Speaker 1: you the gig roll like a twelve and ship. Well.
Speaker 1: One of the things I appreciate about this movie is
Speaker 1: that there's l a Christmas representation because so many Christmas
Speaker 1: movies take place in like New York or Chicago or
Speaker 1: any other place where it's like cold and snow eat
Speaker 1: during Christmas time. So I appreciated that you have just like,
Speaker 1: you know, mild weather Christmas, like you know, yeah, like
Speaker 1: Jacket's it, and you know, some people can overdo it.
Speaker 1: I think it's like if it was truly Angelina, though,
Speaker 1: we would be dressing like it was negative forty below
Speaker 1: just fully costplay. Yeah, because like our Overton window in
Speaker 1: terms of what's hot or cold is completely screwed up.
Speaker 1: So we're like, yeah, what is it? It's below Vandy
Speaker 1: where mittens right now? Oh? Good grief? Um, should I
Speaker 1: do the recap story to the best of my ability? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's kind of a lot. There's a lot going on.
Speaker 1: It's a lot curious how you're going to do it
Speaker 1: with it and have it be very cogent and succinct. Yeah,
Speaker 1: everything's happening, and yet nothing at all is happening. The
Speaker 1: stakes from character to character are so wildly different that
Speaker 1: like they're just like wait a second. There's like in
Speaker 1: a wall pregnancy scandal, and then there's someone who's like
Speaker 1: should I get back into the dating world, Like everyone
Speaker 1: stas I got a camera, but mom doesn't like that
Speaker 1: I sing? Are these steaks? And then like Rosalba is
Speaker 1: like being beaten up in every same season. But Buddies
Speaker 1: with his like transgressors. He's got to like they act
Speaker 1: like middle school bullies, but they are like thirty eight
Speaker 1: years old. They're like, yeah, moan, dude, They're gonna get me.
Speaker 1: Like this sounds like a seventh grade problem that he's having.
Speaker 1: I think Joe Biden wrote these characters. You know. It
Speaker 1: was Mo and Dude, you know bad dudes, you know,
Speaker 1: associates of corn Pop. Yeah, messing with my boy Quentin Jr.
Speaker 1: Who was a jazz pianist. Like all right, Joe, this
Speaker 1: sounds very contrived, Like all right, Grandpa, let's go to bed, right,
Speaker 1: Um okay. So this Christmas the film is about the
Speaker 1: wet Field family. Madear is the matriarch. She has six
Speaker 1: sons and daughters who are all grown up and who
Speaker 1: are all getting together for Christmas for the first time
Speaker 1: in four years. And because this is a more kind
Speaker 1: of character driven story than a plot driven story, my
Speaker 1: recap might be kind of all over the place. So
Speaker 1: just bear with me here. But um so, it's a
Speaker 1: it's a few days before Christmas. Madear that's Loretta Divines
Speaker 1: character lives in l A. She owns a dry cleaners,
Speaker 1: and her romantic partner, Joe played by Delroy Lindo, is
Speaker 1: the kind of step father figure to her kids, although
Speaker 1: they are not married and a lot of them don't
Speaker 1: know that Joe lives in the house with Madear, and
Speaker 1: everyone's being very like two thousand and seven about it
Speaker 1: in a way that is very weird to me. I
Speaker 1: was just like, why can't just be happy for Medear?
Speaker 1: Like why are we whatever? The main thing is like, well,
Speaker 1: we'll get to this, but Quentin, you just Elba's character
Speaker 1: hates Joe and like that's why she's like keeping into
Speaker 1: secret anyway. It just Elba's character is secretly twelve years old.
Speaker 1: That's like, my that's the only way I can rationalize
Speaker 1: some of his some of his choices where he's like
Speaker 1: I don't get it. Why aren't you married to my
Speaker 1: dad anymore? And it's like, this is twelve year old culture.
Speaker 1: This is not like oh and literally telling Joe you're
Speaker 1: not my daddy. Oh okay, sir, we got that part
Speaker 1: when we knew that. I think you're also in adult
Speaker 1: and we don't need to talk like that right now,
Speaker 1: right Like, I feel like people should come down. The
Speaker 1: things that people come down Quentin hard for, like being
Speaker 1: a musician, don't make sense. And the things that they
Speaker 1: take really easy on him, like being aggressive towards Joe,
Speaker 1: who has never done a thing. People are just like, well,
Speaker 1: you know, he's sad about the divorce. You're like, he
Speaker 1: needs to he needs to, you know, grow up, figure
Speaker 1: out by by all measures. Quentin Senior sounds like a
Speaker 1: piece of ship. If I was on the family to
Speaker 1: be a fucking musician. Uh, that's not an honorable person.
Speaker 1: Sorry so, but but again that's but that's the thing,
Speaker 1: like we don't have these fucked up relationships with our parents,
Speaker 1: and even though on paper it's bad, we still idolize
Speaker 1: them and wrong. There's so much depth to that. It's true.
Speaker 1: It's true. I like Joe. I like Joe too. I
Speaker 1: love Delroy Lindo, you know, and whenever when he puts
Speaker 1: a good performance, like it felt weird. He felt like
Speaker 1: he was classing up the joint acting like I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: you're too good right now, this is a little this
Speaker 1: is a little bit of holiday trash, and you're like
Speaker 1: earnest performances like Shakespearean wait to the whole thing, even
Speaker 1: like when he would have it out with interest elbow,
Speaker 1: these tense moments were like he's like, you probably should
Speaker 1: stay away while I'm around, because you know, I don't
Speaker 1: want you to hear what my mom is, Like why
Speaker 1: don't you take that up with your mother? And he's like,
Speaker 1: I will. And then del Roy Leno just does like
Speaker 1: great like reaction acting when he's like yeah, like about
Speaker 1: to say something, measures dials back and then goes on.
Speaker 1: You're like, wow, okay, del Roy, he really that whole scene,
Speaker 1: there's like just a scene where he's just hanging up
Speaker 1: lights and getting a little frustrated, and I was captivated
Speaker 1: because we're supposed to focus on what's happening in the background,
Speaker 1: which is Kelly coming home from a one night stand
Speaker 1: with McKay peiffer, who proceeds to stop her for the
Speaker 1: rest of the movie, but in a cute way, but
Speaker 1: in acute way when he's very suddenly like dressed up
Speaker 1: as Santa with her niece and nephew, I'm like, this
Speaker 1: is like this is the end of that story line.
Speaker 1: And if we can't depin you, but we did in
Speaker 1: the normal world. There's a text that's a girl. You're
Speaker 1: not gonna believe this motherfucker showed up in Santa outfit.
Speaker 1: I didn't even call him. I'm trying to get him
Speaker 1: to leave right now. No, just the one time, not
Speaker 1: since then. No, he brought gifts and ship too like
Speaker 1: once they like as if he knew what they wanted.
Speaker 1: This is you run even a cursory bushemy test on
Speaker 1: that it all falls apart. Stu Bushemy comes the next
Speaker 1: morning into Santa Suit. You're like, it's not going to
Speaker 1: end well, You're like, get out of my house. Um, okay.
Speaker 1: So we meet Madeer and Joe, we meet Baby. That's
Speaker 1: Chris Brown's character. He is the youngest member of the family.
Speaker 1: I think he's a senior in high school about to
Speaker 1: graduate because he still lives it. They like make it
Speaker 1: seem like he's still in high school right even though
Speaker 1: he's yes, but he's acting like again, he's acting like
Speaker 1: he's tent like he's always like hunched over like he
Speaker 1: and also twenty five because like I'm singing at a
Speaker 1: nightclub snuck out the age right. They never like, they
Speaker 1: never specify really how old anyone is supposed to be,
Speaker 1: which works to the movie's advantage because I'm like, I
Speaker 1: don't know what I would believe. And then the rest
Speaker 1: of the family starts to arrive at Madeir's house. Lisa
Speaker 1: that's Regina King. She arrives with her husband, Malcolm that's
Speaker 1: laz Alonso. They have two kids together, who could not
Speaker 1: be in the movie less if they tried. That's fucked up.
Speaker 1: It was weird. And another like moment when I was like,
Speaker 1: I'm so fucking confused, like when I was watching it
Speaker 1: last week and I'm like, wait, who, who the who's
Speaker 1: fucking kids are these? And why are they being neglected
Speaker 1: the whole film? Like they don't exist in the reality
Speaker 1: of the film. The fact that they're even there is
Speaker 1: introduced so late in the movie, and then I was
Speaker 1: still like, wait, who whose kids are these? And then
Speaker 1: you're like, oh, like, oh, okay, that makes sense that
Speaker 1: I don't know. The way that they're introduced was very confusing,
Speaker 1: and then they're like in the background of two scenes,
Speaker 1: they don't even sit at the table, Like the table
Speaker 1: I honestly thought in the first like soul Train dance
Speaker 1: line that they did as a family, Like when Quinn
Speaker 1: comes home and one of the kids was there, I
Speaker 1: honestly thought it was an intruder. I was like, who
Speaker 1: the funk is? And like, y'all aren't really you're just
Speaker 1: gonna act like okay whatever. I'm like, this family is
Speaker 1: on some other ship. You know, those infamous child intruders. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know exactly. I'm like, Yo, one of these
Speaker 1: little cutesy thieves is in your house on Christmas. You've
Speaker 1: seen this a hundred times. You know the script already,
Speaker 1: that classic Christmas troupe. Hey, it's me, your other little grandchild.
Speaker 1: You're gonna take the presents, you ink. I don't know
Speaker 1: why they talked again New York Burglar from the twenties,
Speaker 1: but given Adris Elba's character, you know, I believe almost anything, right, Okay.
Speaker 1: So then we also meet Kelly. That's Sharon Leal. She
Speaker 1: works in New York. I think in advertising. She went
Speaker 1: to Harvard. Her main thing is that she's a terrible cook.
Speaker 1: A lot of jokes are made at her expense about
Speaker 1: her being really bad at cooking. Don't forget she also
Speaker 1: has a vibrator, and she has a vibrator. Yes, she's
Speaker 1: one of those Harvard non cooking knows how to pleasure
Speaker 1: herself types. Huh, a modern feminist think. But we're told
Speaker 1: we don't like that. She's gotta she's gotta marry the
Speaker 1: first Santa she has sex with. Right, Look, you beggars
Speaker 1: can't be choosers, especially when you suck up making cool aid.
Speaker 1: The fact the fact that she's literally like a Harvard
Speaker 1: grad who happens to be single and doesn't seem to
Speaker 1: be bothered by it, And the movie is like, m
Speaker 1: she's gonna start dating Santa. You're just like, what, yeah,
Speaker 1: for this character, what you're laying out for me? I
Speaker 1: do like that they did honor the trope of talking
Speaker 1: about Harvard all the time, because like it's one thing
Speaker 1: like when a black person goes to Harvard, it's always talked.
Speaker 1: It will never not be spoken about. So I really
Speaker 1: appreciated how like Harvard was constantly getting beat over the
Speaker 1: head once in the same way. Like, and I think
Speaker 1: in like more like white culture that it's the trope
Speaker 1: of I went to school in Cambridge or what is it, Boston,
Speaker 1: went to school in Boston what's the vague thing that
Speaker 1: people say, did not say they went to Harvard to
Speaker 1: small college in Boston. Okay, well, this feels like a
Speaker 1: great time to bring up that I went to a
Speaker 1: school in Boston. It's called Boston University, and I did
Speaker 1: get a master's degree in screenwriting from that institution. But
Speaker 1: I would never bring that up never. What did you
Speaker 1: think of some of the writing? Sorry to derail you.
Speaker 1: I know we're still doing this synopsis, but there are
Speaker 1: some lines of dialogue that I was like, there were
Speaker 1: some head scratchers there. I had some fun ones that
Speaker 1: The writing to me was pretty decent. I think I
Speaker 1: would say some of the soundtrack choices were what we're
Speaker 1: really puzzling to me? Yeah, Well, the interesting thing is
Speaker 1: that Marcus Miller was the was the person in charge
Speaker 1: of music. And Marcus Miller is like, oh fucking well,
Speaker 1: well respected jazz musician um and like played with like
Speaker 1: Miles Davis and Ship. So when I saw that pop up,
Speaker 1: I was like, Ship, Marcus Miller is like the fucking
Speaker 1: musical director. Like he's a talented bassist. But it had
Speaker 1: that like stale jazz brunchie vibe to the soundtrack. It
Speaker 1: was very Yeah. I was kind of I was like,
Speaker 1: I don't know how much of this is like two
Speaker 1: thousand and seven talking, but it just it did sound
Speaker 1: very like generic. I had my favorite line um was
Speaker 1: there because I generally like I thought, I mean, it's
Speaker 1: super tropy, but whatever, it's a Christmas movie. But my
Speaker 1: favorite line that was bad was anytime Malcolm, the like
Speaker 1: cheating husband is talking. The way he talks is so
Speaker 1: business vague in a way that I thought was really funny,
Speaker 1: where he's like, at some point, like Kelly realizes that
Speaker 1: he's cheating on her sister, and he's like, you know,
Speaker 1: I gotta fly back to San Francisco signed some papers.
Speaker 1: It's business. There's a sentence and then he says on
Speaker 1: the phone, I'm in escrow. Let him know he's doing deals. Man,
Speaker 1: he's in escrow himself right now. Sorry, I'm in escrow
Speaker 1: right now. Probably when I get out, Like it sounds
Speaker 1: like business to me. I don't know the other thing
Speaker 1: he said I was. I think when we were talking
Speaker 1: off Mike the other day, j B. I was like,
Speaker 1: there's some business investment tropes or just takes that are
Speaker 1: just really weird where Malcolm says that buying a Cadillac
Speaker 1: Escalade is a good investment. And that was like the
Speaker 1: most two thousand seven shift I've ever heard, was like
Speaker 1: a good investment. I'm like, that is not appreciating in value.
Speaker 1: How is that a good investment in any way? It's
Speaker 1: also like one the most famous like gas guzzlers. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: I think also for me to at that time pulling
Speaker 1: up an escalade, there there was no higher vehicle in
Speaker 1: black culture, you know, like a Cadillac and then big
Speaker 1: body SUV Cadillac. But I just love that he was
Speaker 1: so like insistent in that seems like damn, I've got
Speaker 1: the good investment. I'm just like, that's don't even have
Speaker 1: a character say that out loud. The car is not
Speaker 1: an investment unless it's like to get you to and
Speaker 1: from work or some kind of classic car. Right. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I suppose there's some questionable writing choices. I think, like store,
Speaker 1: like the emotional arc of different characters. Yeah, but that
Speaker 1: is fun the Yeah, there there were a few things
Speaker 1: here that were kind of like, oh, this happens right
Speaker 1: before a big recession, and you can kind of see
Speaker 1: You're like, oh, I don't know how this ends, and
Speaker 1: how does this where you know, where are the wit
Speaker 1: Fields in two thousand nine? We never we don't know.
Speaker 1: He didn't get a sequel. Yeah yet, I mean maybe
Speaker 1: they had they sold their business just to get liquid.
Speaker 1: That's true. That's true, right, and let's see that's a
Speaker 1: follow up. We don't want we don't need that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's like, I don't want to know they live in
Speaker 1: two thousand seven forever for me, Like what if they're
Speaker 1: like yeah? And then baby became Chris Brown. Also at
Speaker 1: the end of the movie where there's a really long
Speaker 1: dance sequence and then you're like, oh, it's not even
Speaker 1: the characters anymore. It's just it's just the actors. It
Speaker 1: took me a second because I was like, they just
Speaker 1: did someone just accidentally call him Chris? I was like, oh, no,
Speaker 1: I guess we're just actors now. Yeah. It's just like
Speaker 1: it's like like the end of a play where the
Speaker 1: cast comes out and gives like a like a fun bow.
Speaker 1: Was like the movie equivalent, like let's do all do
Speaker 1: some dancing. And then I feel like I was kind
Speaker 1: of turning up the volume because I feel like there
Speaker 1: was some like ship talking going on. I'm gonna have
Speaker 1: to watch that again. But there was a moment where
Speaker 1: I feel like someone made fun of someone else is
Speaker 1: dancing and they're like, I don't give a fuck like
Speaker 1: someone I felt like there was an exchange like that,
Speaker 1: whereas I was like, oh, wow, you're really doing It's like,
Speaker 1: come on, I'm sucking trying. Like there was like a
Speaker 1: dismissive grunt that I think is audible. A cast at
Speaker 1: that large you have to think that like there has
Speaker 1: to be like some pairing that doesn't work well when
Speaker 1: there's a cast of over ten people, You're like, okay,
Speaker 1: two of these people don't like each other, right, but
Speaker 1: you just never know who like Lauren London and Delroy
Speaker 1: Lindo hate each other there. Well, I feel like Delroy
Speaker 1: Lindo still sends everyone Christmas cards. He just seems like
Speaker 1: he would. Oh he seems like a you know, as
Speaker 1: you're like, they come visit me, man, Please visit me anytime,
Speaker 1: Please come visit me. Remember that movie from thirteen years ago? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was just I was just telling you. I was
Speaker 1: just calling you have to tell you how much I
Speaker 1: like the Five Bloods. Yeah. Remember this Christmas Man? You
Speaker 1: said we were going to hang out after that. I
Speaker 1: know you're busy. No, it's fine, it's fine, it's fine,
Speaker 1: it's fine, And you don't want to hang out with
Speaker 1: an old guy like me. You know, I was in Congo.
Speaker 1: He played a very weird like everything, like like central
Speaker 1: African general in it. Anyway, I digress. Yeah, let's return
Speaker 1: to the Actually, let's take a quick break first and
Speaker 1: then we will come right back. Um. So next to
Speaker 1: come home as Claude. That's Columbus Short. He's in the military.
Speaker 1: I think that's really all we learned about him for
Speaker 1: a while. Then Mel that's Lauren London, comes home. She's
Speaker 1: in college studying pre law. She brings home her boyfriend Devon.
Speaker 1: And then last to arrive is Quentin Idris Elba's character.
Speaker 1: He's a jazz musician who we've seen get into like
Speaker 1: a brawl prior to this birth breakaway glass in the
Speaker 1: first scene, like he smashes a bottle over someone's face
Speaker 1: and then jumps up window. You're like, oh, this mcavity.
Speaker 1: I remember I was watching with her Majesty, and we
Speaker 1: paused it after that because we're like, is this a
Speaker 1: Christmas movie? He just glassed the guy in a club
Speaker 1: and ran for his life, like it had the didn't
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess the jazzy Christmas piano would give
Speaker 1: you a hint, but like it had the oddest energy
Speaker 1: for the opening for Christmas pilem. It was such a
Speaker 1: weird that being the first scene really does not set
Speaker 1: you up for it establishes the tone that does not
Speaker 1: maintain itself throughout the kind of you don't know, what
Speaker 1: would you say, doctor Durante about the writing there, or
Speaker 1: what would Robert McKee say as such heavy handed ex
Speaker 1: please call me Master Durante, And I would say that
Speaker 1: the point of attack of a film, which is like
Speaker 1: basically the opening, what how we opened the story? How
Speaker 1: the world and the characters are first introduced to the
Speaker 1: audience generally does a few important things, and one of
Speaker 1: those things is to establish tone. And would you establish
Speaker 1: a tone that then is deviated from for the rest
Speaker 1: of the story. It's a bit jarring. But what if
Speaker 1: Mo and Dude come back every once in a while
Speaker 1: and say, hey, remember us punch? Punch? Is that nice?
Speaker 1: Is that word that provides a little bit more fluidity
Speaker 1: and consistency? However, it is I will say, a strange
Speaker 1: choice as a way to open the film I'm glad
Speaker 1: to know that was verified by someone with a master's degree.
Speaker 1: You're welcome. Um okay. So now the whole family is there.
Speaker 1: So this is like the first evening they're all there together,
Speaker 1: and this is where the drama really starts to ramp up. Um.
Speaker 1: Part of it is that Kelly has a strained relationship
Speaker 1: with Lisa. She thinks that Lisa is weak willed and
Speaker 1: easily influenced and is too accommodating to her shitty husband, Malcolm,
Speaker 1: who Kelly openly hates. And that's one of my favorite
Speaker 1: aspects of this movie is how open, openly hateful she
Speaker 1: is to Malcolm, right to his face. So meanwhile, Lisa
Speaker 1: wants to sell Madear's dry cleaning business, and this is
Speaker 1: an idea that we realized that Malcolm put her up to.
Speaker 1: No one else is really on board for this idea,
Speaker 1: but this is kind of like a running thing throughout
Speaker 1: the movie. Um Quentin hasn't seen his family in four years,
Speaker 1: and probably the main reason that he came home this
Speaker 1: time was that he is on the run from these
Speaker 1: bookies who he owes twenty five dollars too, and so
Speaker 1: he's like in hiding at his mom's house and the
Speaker 1: reason he's estranged from his family is one of my
Speaker 1: favorite bizarre specifics about this movie, which is that because
Speaker 1: Quentin Senr ditched the family to go be a musician,
Speaker 1: Madear feels that there is a bit of of a
Speaker 1: music musician related curse on her life that if any
Speaker 1: of the men in her life even go go with him,
Speaker 1: I think canonically, within like six ft of a piano,
Speaker 1: um that they will abandon her. And um. So she's
Speaker 1: so it's it's almost she's like a little bit of
Speaker 1: like foot loose when it comes to women playing music.
Speaker 1: It's like, this is the movie Coco. I was like,
Speaker 1: did Cocoa see this Christmas and lift that very Cocoa
Speaker 1: famously wrote the movie Cocos. But I was watching this,
Speaker 1: I was like, wait a minute, Miguel from Coco, this
Speaker 1: is like his whole problem. His his like a matriarch
Speaker 1: and his family was abandoned by a musician. And she
Speaker 1: thinks that there's like this now, this music curse on
Speaker 1: the family. So she forbids anyone in the family from
Speaker 1: like playing music or singing or doing anything. And I
Speaker 1: was like, wait a minute, there's there's a parallel here anyway,
Speaker 1: it truly is. And then so Quentin has a strained
Speaker 1: relationship and part of it is is what we just described,
Speaker 1: this um kind of music related curse that Madear perceives
Speaker 1: to be on the family because like Quentin has kind
Speaker 1: of followed in his father's footsteps as a musician. Um. Okay,
Speaker 1: So then everyone goes to a club that night. I
Speaker 1: think we're two nights before Christmas at this point. Um,
Speaker 1: and a lot of stuff goes down at this club. Um,
Speaker 1: it starts, all goes down. It starts with Claude wanting
Speaker 1: to go there to meet someone in secret, and we
Speaker 1: realize that this person is a girlfriend or it turns
Speaker 1: out that she's his wife and he's kind of keeping
Speaker 1: her a secret with an eye and the implication is
Speaker 1: that he's keeping her a secret from his family because
Speaker 1: she is white. But all his siblings tag along to
Speaker 1: this club outing, so he still has to like hush,
Speaker 1: like he's like, oh home, Sandy, go back to the
Speaker 1: hotel and by home. Yeah, it takes a I feel
Speaker 1: like was I not watching carefully enough or does it
Speaker 1: take a really long time to figure out what their
Speaker 1: relationship actually is, because at first it's like it took
Speaker 1: me a while to figure out that she was his wife,
Speaker 1: and then and then also he's like making her live
Speaker 1: in a hotel. Like it just took me a long
Speaker 1: time to figure out what exactly the situation was there,
Speaker 1: and that whole storyline is so fucking bizarre. I wasn't
Speaker 1: sure what I was like. At first, I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: is he like, is he has like a lover? That
Speaker 1: clearly I was like, there's a lover. And then I
Speaker 1: forgot that it was a white woman, and I was like, oh, ship, okay,
Speaker 1: does this have some like LGBTQ flavor? And then I
Speaker 1: was like, all right, this is a black Christmas film,
Speaker 1: so we're gonna go into she is white, a white woman.
Speaker 1: He's meeting up at the club, and I honestly thought
Speaker 1: it was it felt like groupie ish or something like
Speaker 1: not a relationship because it's like, go to the hotel,
Speaker 1: I will meet you. Yeah, it seems like a casual.
Speaker 1: I was not getting white. I was like, oh, oh,
Speaker 1: he's dating a white girl. But then it was like, no,
Speaker 1: she's his wife and she's pregnant and she lives in
Speaker 1: a hotel. You're like why here? What? Yeah, that whole
Speaker 1: storyline was baffling to me. Also, shout out to the
Speaker 1: l Ray Theater where that club is, because it's like
Speaker 1: every fucking movie, like like in l a like, it's
Speaker 1: always like it fucked up people's idea of what a
Speaker 1: nightclub was, which is basically just being like we can
Speaker 1: basically only shoot at the l Ray Theater. Like in
Speaker 1: the Mask where he does like his like cocoa bongo thing.
Speaker 1: I think it's the l Ray too. It's just a
Speaker 1: iconic theater, which I in my mind was weird. That's
Speaker 1: set up with like stages, like a stage and tables
Speaker 1: is what I thought a nightclub was from like movies
Speaker 1: in the nineties that were shooting at the l Ray
Speaker 1: and then you went to one, You're like, oh no,
Speaker 1: it's a it's a really just shitty big room with
Speaker 1: couches in the corner. It stinks. Yeah, you can't you
Speaker 1: can't smell a building on in a movie. Unfortunately, No,
Speaker 1: that could change. But when I'm done in this industry,
Speaker 1: that's all going to be a little different. There was
Speaker 1: like a smell a vision thing in in theaters for
Speaker 1: a while. It was wildly unsuccessful, but I learned about
Speaker 1: it in film history class. Really. I remember in the
Speaker 1: nineties Fox TV on Sundays they would have like these
Speaker 1: events where you'd go to a seven eleven to pick
Speaker 1: up like whatever thing you needed to enjoy it. Like
Speaker 1: they would do like three like in Living Color in
Speaker 1: three D and you would get like those blue and
Speaker 1: red three D glasses and you would like they would
Speaker 1: broadcast like the three D version on the TV. If
Speaker 1: you didn't have them, you were shipped out. But then
Speaker 1: they also did a Smell a Vision one where like
Speaker 1: you bought a there's a scratch and sniff card and
Speaker 1: like in an episode and be like, all right, now
Speaker 1: smell that because Al Bundy did sort of like one
Speaker 1: character on TV and it was Jankie Analog Smell a Vision,
Speaker 1: Thank you seven eleven, and do that for Nickelodeon cartoons
Speaker 1: at one point to like you had to like buy
Speaker 1: an issue in nick Glodian magazine and then you could
Speaker 1: like smell a SpongeBob episode and be like, wow, Patrick,
Speaker 1: time to time to smell it and exciting damn it,
Speaker 1: I already sniffed up all the smell off of this car.
Speaker 1: Doesn't sound like anything anymore. Okay, so we're at the
Speaker 1: club the siblings have tagged along. There's also an open
Speaker 1: mic night that was I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: just the idea of like an open mic being like
Speaker 1: sprawled like some kind of show of with like full
Speaker 1: of amateurs a Christmas imagine doing a Christmas Eve open mic.
Speaker 1: I just I mean I could because I longed to
Speaker 1: be in a room full of like other people, like
Speaker 1: in strangers again. But yeah, that I think people have
Speaker 1: experienced this, like going out where it's a surprise open
Speaker 1: mic and you didn't know you were at a thing
Speaker 1: that was about to turn into an open mic, and
Speaker 1: you're like, fuck no, I seriously don't want to be
Speaker 1: here for this. Well, we've been on the other side
Speaker 1: of that hundreds of times as comics who will be
Speaker 1: on a bar show that no one else at the
Speaker 1: bar knows a comedy show is about to happen, and
Speaker 1: then suddenly someone walks up to a microphone. They're like
Speaker 1: com when he starts in five minutes, and then everyone
Speaker 1: at the bar is like, I don't care. I'm going
Speaker 1: to keep talking at regular volume and I right with
Speaker 1: the TVs are still on. It's a mess. Um. Yeah. Anyway,
Speaker 1: So there's this open mic night and like the first
Speaker 1: to perform is their brother baby, who sings a full song. Uh,
Speaker 1: and they're like, oh my god, we didn't know he
Speaker 1: was a singer and wow, he's so good, but he's
Speaker 1: been keeping it a secret because of this music family
Speaker 1: curse thing. Also at the club, this is when gerald
Speaker 1: A K. McKay peiffer is making Google eyes at Kelly
Speaker 1: and then she goes home with him. She doesn't he said.
Speaker 1: He's saying to who can have fun? Could fuck? Oh Santa?
Speaker 1: Fucks honey, blew my mind. And then there's like that
Speaker 1: scene where Lauren London is like, did you fox Santa?
Speaker 1: And then Kelly's like, yes, sure. And then also at
Speaker 1: this club, a few guys were seen hitting on Clode's
Speaker 1: lady friend. Again, we don't really know their relationship at
Speaker 1: this point. Um, so he pulls a gun on them,
Speaker 1: He pulls his surface pistol on them, and then later
Speaker 1: on he gets arrested, and that's when everyone finds out
Speaker 1: that he's a wall right, And that's also when they
Speaker 1: find out that Sandy is his wife. For someone who
Speaker 1: has no plot for the first hour, the stakes for
Speaker 1: Claude go through the roof like really quickly, you shouldn't
Speaker 1: have gone to that club, you know, he shouldn't have.
Speaker 1: If he hadn't, we would know nothing about his character.
Speaker 1: But also I think it's a lesson, right, you know,
Speaker 1: if had he just alleviated the stress of deceiving his
Speaker 1: family and keeping his relationship hidden, he may not have
Speaker 1: pulled it the strap out at the club on the guy,
Speaker 1: you know, because his family wouldn't know, like, oh, here
Speaker 1: was s meet up saying, oh what's up saying, but
Speaker 1: instead he's like, you get the fuk away from me.
Speaker 1: We tried, and he's already just like talking to and
Speaker 1: now my brothers is doing this thing. He's singing. My
Speaker 1: mom thinks it's a curse. I think he had a
Speaker 1: lot going on. And then when those two dudes are like,
Speaker 1: hey man, no hard fearing bro, you know because the
Speaker 1: white girls they got booty, but they got the strong
Speaker 1: knees or whatever the funk that line was that set
Speaker 1: him off, Like okay, oh toxicity all around that. Like
Speaker 1: then it was just like now, fucking dick, this gun
Speaker 1: motherfucker's like, whoa this has big dude? Who is keeping
Speaker 1: secrets energy? Who should have just just been communicative and
Speaker 1: forth threat I feel like a lot of stress would
Speaker 1: have been tamped down. And then Eatsala was like, you've
Speaker 1: always had this temper and it's like, what has he
Speaker 1: We haven't seen that, Like that should have been set up.
Speaker 1: He was so nice for the like he did not
Speaker 1: drink real pleasant and then said he's like pulling a
Speaker 1: gun on people, and we're like, where is this coming from? Well,
Speaker 1: that's what it shows you. That's what happens when you're
Speaker 1: with a white woman. I think that's what that was
Speaker 1: being told to everybody else. And see they'll be like, see,
Speaker 1: see that's like that's like our cousin Randy. He's like
Speaker 1: that it's nothing, but it's Sandy and Sandy. It's so
Speaker 1: weird because he because later when Sandy shows up at
Speaker 1: the house, like there's a moment of discomfort, but then
Speaker 1: she's pretty much immediately accepted for the rest of the
Speaker 1: movie and worried about basically nothing. Yeah, it was a
Speaker 1: weird thing where it's like my family could be, you know,
Speaker 1: really closed off to this ship and like those were
Speaker 1: the steaks and like you kind of but it was
Speaker 1: in that time, like in the two thousand seven mindset,
Speaker 1: especially for me, is like a you know, a personal
Speaker 1: color who dates like white women and all kinds just
Speaker 1: anybody really don't discriminate romantically. But like that idea was like,
Speaker 1: oh ship, she's white, Like you're like back then, you're like,
Speaker 1: oh oh, you know, like it felt their worst because
Speaker 1: I think now we're in a bit of a we're
Speaker 1: more openly talking about things like that, where this was
Speaker 1: very much being like it's taboo and like that was
Speaker 1: really like the thing driving it, whereas now we're like,
Speaker 1: I mean, biracial relationships have been going on since well
Speaker 1: before this film, but it was still kind of like
Speaker 1: one of these things. I felt a little like old
Speaker 1: school cultural trope that doesn't it's not work in the
Speaker 1: same way. But even then in the end, the family
Speaker 1: was doing the thing that was pretty much what most
Speaker 1: people are. I'm like, oh cool, Okay, you're in our
Speaker 1: family and you're gonna you're also the mother of one
Speaker 1: of my descendants. Now great. But then there's a weird
Speaker 1: component where you part of it where you learn that
Speaker 1: her family doesn't know about her Gregnancy because she's like,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, they're not fans of Claude because he's black.
Speaker 1: So she comes from this like wildly racist family. So
Speaker 1: it's like again, so they attached these like really significant
Speaker 1: steaks that it's like you can't just say that and
Speaker 1: then not explore it at all, Like, oh you can't
Speaker 1: because you can't. I'll tell you why because it's the
Speaker 1: black holiday film and all you needed is that moment
Speaker 1: where you go, yeah, I told you white people ain't ship.
Speaker 1: That's really what it did. And she's like, you see
Speaker 1: because they embraced her me while her ain't ship family
Speaker 1: was like we're racist as funk. You know. I think
Speaker 1: that was like that gives because every holiday film, no
Speaker 1: matter what, like whether it's the length, like the lens
Speaker 1: of like an orphan or someone like, you need that
Speaker 1: moment of like yeah, we're a good guy, like you
Speaker 1: see that felt good right there. So I felt that
Speaker 1: was that moment. And also for me, I remember I
Speaker 1: just when it happened, I sort of reverted to this
Speaker 1: like thing of like, yeah, see exactly, that's how just
Speaker 1: how should be sometimes I think for me too, because
Speaker 1: I've dated white women where like when I was younger,
Speaker 1: it was like, oh, like you know, I don't really
Speaker 1: want to like post anything on like foot Facebook or
Speaker 1: some ship like that and I was like well, and
Speaker 1: I was like, okay, yeah, I just I get it.
Speaker 1: I'm you're just getting off to me. You're just getting
Speaker 1: off to my physical presence. M yeah fuck I anyway,
Speaker 1: but let's not digress because they embraced Sandy and that's
Speaker 1: what this is all about. They do. Christmas is all
Speaker 1: about opening your arms and your hearts and your homes
Speaker 1: to everyone. Mo and Dude, Oh, I'm sorry, let me
Speaker 1: I'll let you keep well. Speaking of them, this is
Speaker 1: also around the time that those two bookies Mo and
Speaker 1: Dude show up. Yeah, beat the ship out of Quinton
Speaker 1: for a while, and then they stick around and even
Speaker 1: almost stay the night. There's a very weird dynamic there.
Speaker 1: But basically they will punch Quentin when no one's looking,
Speaker 1: but the rest of the time their masquerading is Quentin's
Speaker 1: friends and everyone buys it. It always feels like a
Speaker 1: home Aloney, Like it's like the tone is like they're
Speaker 1: just kind of the Robbers, where they're like, yeah, we're friendly,
Speaker 1: but we're gonna keeck yes. If you don't get the
Speaker 1: good pal here right, Quinn gut punches. There's just such
Speaker 1: a weird they weren't even flying like the tropes of goons,
Speaker 1: like who are just like stupid guys who were just
Speaker 1: going to be like the threat of violence that exists
Speaker 1: in the background, Like they suddenly became like these goofball
Speaker 1: dudes who are also being like, let's also funk with
Speaker 1: him by like pretending we're friends and also like offer
Speaker 1: them a ride to the police station to get their
Speaker 1: brother out of jail. Like I was like, wait, are
Speaker 1: you in now? It was really confusing what they're like.
Speaker 1: We know what their endgame is, but the way they
Speaker 1: were trying to get there really made no sense. I
Speaker 1: was like, are they just lonely? Do they just want
Speaker 1: to like spend time with somebody? Can we just sort
Speaker 1: of break out the financial aspects of them seeking restitution?
Speaker 1: Because where where was Quentin coming from? New York? San Francisco, Chicago?
Speaker 1: And they showed the Golden Gate Bridge that's to show
Speaker 1: where Lisa's from. Lisa and her husband and her family
Speaker 1: live in San Francisco. I think I think maybe Chicago
Speaker 1: is where, So it was definitely clear him not it wasn't.
Speaker 1: It wasn't a quick jaunt away, so I'm thinking, Okay,
Speaker 1: so what are their travel expenses? Okay, well, how are
Speaker 1: we eating into this twenty dollars or trying to get
Speaker 1: back you know, gas lodging food. I'm thinking you're there's
Speaker 1: like there's probably what i'll call it three grand. Now
Speaker 1: you're looking at twenty two? Um, and who's that? Ohd too?
Speaker 1: Is that specifically you guys? Are you splitting that twenty two?
Speaker 1: I started getting into goon math when I was watching it.
Speaker 1: They got to keep those south clean, yeah, exactly, And like,
Speaker 1: are you keeping receipts or expenses for your goon boss?
Speaker 1: I don't know, Yeah, yeah, because they do have a
Speaker 1: goon boss. I forget that his name, but they mentioned
Speaker 1: the goon boss that they're like collecting the money on
Speaker 1: behalf of Big Goon in the Sky. Oh gosh, okay Um.
Speaker 1: Then I am a little lost on the timeline here.
Speaker 1: I think it's maybe later that night or maybe the
Speaker 1: next day, not sure, but basically there's now a big
Speaker 1: there's a big fight in the rain between Kelly and Lisa.
Speaker 1: They're pushing each other. Kelly's like, you're her husband's a
Speaker 1: piece of ship and you're you're a pushover and he's
Speaker 1: cheating on you. And at Lesa's like, wait a minute,
Speaker 1: maybe she's right, and then she goes and destroys his
Speaker 1: aforementioned Cadillac escalade drives it into the l A River. Yes,
Speaker 1: big moment for the l A River right, which is
Speaker 1: for anyone who is not familiar with the l A
Speaker 1: River is mostly concrete with a tiny little stream of water,
Speaker 1: which is even weirder because it's a concrete stream and
Speaker 1: then a cutout concrete stream inside of it. Like when
Speaker 1: you look at it's like, this looks like a sidewalking
Speaker 1: Like where is the stream? It's like, Oh, it's that
Speaker 1: other weird thing. That's the depression in this concrete block
Speaker 1: we're standing on. That's the river, that little Pepe stream,
Speaker 1: that river, that's our river. Um. So, then Baby finally
Speaker 1: tells Madeir about wanting to be a singer. She does
Speaker 1: not take it well. Meanwhile, Quentin leaves on Chris us
Speaker 1: even night. The Bookies catch up with him at the
Speaker 1: train station and beat the crap out of him, but
Speaker 1: Joe swoops in to save the day. Then we cut
Speaker 1: to Christmas morning. Lisa confronts Malcolm about being a piece
Speaker 1: of shit and beats him with a belt like pours
Speaker 1: baby oil over the floor to like humiliate him all
Speaker 1: this stuff. That scene really like kept going on. Dude,
Speaker 1: that s he was. I was like, this scene, but
Speaker 1: you know you need that. That's the that's the like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's like the thing that see that hap people cheering
Speaker 1: into thousands. I had a note of that too. I'm like,
Speaker 1: I think that this scene is kind of longer for
Speaker 1: for like the theatrical experience and like watching it in
Speaker 1: a group, I think I'm guessing based on how we're
Speaker 1: all talking about this, we all must have if we
Speaker 1: were watching with someone I know. I turned to her managiny, like,
Speaker 1: this is getting a little bit a lot now. This
Speaker 1: is with the whipping of the black man in the bathroom, Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: but get yours though. I get it though, is you know,
Speaker 1: in the logic of these films, cheater equals bad, So yeah,
Speaker 1: I get your ass beat this is I mean, this
Speaker 1: is I guess. Yeah. Like Regina King, she's so amazing
Speaker 1: and she's so talented, and I feel like she's asked
Speaker 1: to play a spurned wife too frequently. It's but she
Speaker 1: does it well, right yeah. Um. And then immediately after
Speaker 1: that is a scene of the whole family in church
Speaker 1: where baby sings and then Madear is like, oh, wow,
Speaker 1: he's really good. Maybe I should be okay with him
Speaker 1: pursuing music, which she says all of this with her
Speaker 1: facial expression, um like it truly is like, like you said,
Speaker 1: it was so capulus, Like I get it because it
Speaker 1: was so clear when you went and she's crying. She's like, Oh,
Speaker 1: everything's gonna be okay. And then the family sits down
Speaker 1: for Christmas dinner together. They have a nice toast about
Speaker 1: no matter what, we are family. And that is the
Speaker 1: end of the film. Let's take a quick break and
Speaker 1: then we will come right back. Where do where does
Speaker 1: whose storyline should? I mean, we've covered we've sort of
Speaker 1: covered in some of it throughout the recay, But where
Speaker 1: should we start maybe just kind of starting in a
Speaker 1: in a sort of the general scope of things worth
Speaker 1: discussing a little bit. And we've talked about this on
Speaker 1: the many many Christmas episodes we have covered on the
Speaker 1: show in the past, that this is a particularly white genre.
Speaker 1: Usually the cast will be entirely white, or that any
Speaker 1: characters of color will have only very tertiary role kind
Speaker 1: of things. So for this to be one of the
Speaker 1: few mainstream films that features a black family worth noting,
Speaker 1: doesn't happen much, doesn't happen often, but it's still puffing
Speaker 1: that same old tropium of these Christmas films of like
Speaker 1: gender normative bullshit and like all this like Judeo Christian
Speaker 1: whatever the funk it is stuff, which is funny because
Speaker 1: it's always like to say, it's like it's still the
Speaker 1: same kind of flavor, you know what I mean, But yeah,
Speaker 1: it's But it's funny because there are moments where, like
Speaker 1: I've definitely looked at it differently as a black person
Speaker 1: that other people just see like certain moments differently. But
Speaker 1: I think those are the moments that you're like, oh,
Speaker 1: thank you a movie that was kind of made for
Speaker 1: me as an audience member, pointing to things that I
Speaker 1: are significant to me or maybe seem insignificant to other people.
Speaker 1: But yeah, right, but like you said, they're like, well,
Speaker 1: it's a Christmas movie, so we still have to make
Speaker 1: it palatable to audiences and really maintain a lot of
Speaker 1: tropes and holiday movie troops specifically, and like, yeah, so
Speaker 1: it's kind of it's in this strange place that also
Speaker 1: feels very two thousand seven. Yeah, yeah, extremely it's and
Speaker 1: then then as as far as that, I mean, there's
Speaker 1: so many characters too to talk about, but I think, Myles,
Speaker 1: you're totally right where it's like, it's amazing that there's
Speaker 1: like a widely released black Christmas movie, but then within it,
Speaker 1: it's all those Christmas tropes that are in. Like it's
Speaker 1: everyone is the most hetero person who has ever lived,
Speaker 1: and they need to be married yesterday, like that Christmas like,
Speaker 1: which I feel like is such a common like I
Speaker 1: mean that's every Christmas movie. It's like, why aren't you married?
Speaker 1: Why don't you marry? Hey? Look at that guy? Why
Speaker 1: don't you marry him? And then she goes okay, and
Speaker 1: that's where's the Christmas movie where like everyone just gets
Speaker 1: fucked up drunk? Because that's more real to me than
Speaker 1: anything that's my Christmas. Yeah, Like I just remember going
Speaker 1: to other people's Christmas and I'm like, Yo, this is
Speaker 1: fucking dope. You guys just get fucking turned up and
Speaker 1: like that's what you do for Christmas? And he's like yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know, Like we don't really go to church
Speaker 1: or anything. We get together, it's cold and drink. I'm like,
Speaker 1: where is that movie? Like that even feels more real
Speaker 1: than sort of like it's it's like almost portraying the
Speaker 1: Christmas people want to avoid, which is like I don't
Speaker 1: want to go to my fucking house because of my
Speaker 1: aunt is gonna be like what are you gonna get married?
Speaker 1: Or like what are you doing for work? And that that,
Speaker 1: And I guess that's real to a certain extent, but
Speaker 1: it's weird. I was saying this in another show, like
Speaker 1: it's it's like these Christmas movies like their lack of flavor,
Speaker 1: Like is the flavor? You know that it's not. It's
Speaker 1: not going to be too confrontational or subversive or make
Speaker 1: you question anything at all, aside from whether or not
Speaker 1: an escalated is a good investment. But like that's what it's.
Speaker 1: I think that's the draw is like it's a Manila
Speaker 1: envelope that won't offend you but also has a bow
Speaker 1: on it so it feels festive, but it still a
Speaker 1: Manila envelope. And it's a it's an autour film. It's
Speaker 1: Preston a Whitmore, Whitmore's Whitfield. It makes you think President
Speaker 1: a Whitmore the second directed, produce and wrote this movie.
Speaker 1: Um so it's safe to say and like the research
Speaker 1: I did of like the interviews done at the time,
Speaker 1: it seems like this is like based on his family
Speaker 1: at least to some extent um, probably not all the
Speaker 1: same Christmas, but who knows. The thing that mainly, the
Speaker 1: thing that mainly stood out to me in terms of
Speaker 1: like the many threads that we have going on here,
Speaker 1: is that I just wish that, like it's for for
Speaker 1: the women in this movie, most of their steaks are
Speaker 1: attached to a like romantic relationship with a guy, and
Speaker 1: then with with the with the men that the stakes
Speaker 1: are like very varied. There's like music curs guy, there's
Speaker 1: a wall guy. There's like there's a wall Nation guy.
Speaker 1: There's like jazz on the run guy, like there's there's
Speaker 1: The stakes are so all over the like in a
Speaker 1: way that's really fun and engaging. But when it comes
Speaker 1: to Lisa and Lillie and Mel and even to an
Speaker 1: extent Madei, it's like they're all of their steaks are
Speaker 1: like something about my marriage or like I need a
Speaker 1: marriage or Mel I mean weird. I feel like Mel
Speaker 1: had kind of an interesting threat introduced at the beginning
Speaker 1: of the movie that kind of goes nowhere. She kind
Speaker 1: of gets lost in the shuffle, and so I want
Speaker 1: to I wish that they were like the same kind
Speaker 1: of like silly Christmas movie steaks for for the women
Speaker 1: in the movie that that the suns have right, but
Speaker 1: even those stakes too and like the traditional Christmas think
Speaker 1: it's tied to like their role as homemaker or something.
Speaker 1: It's like I have to get the gift for the kid,
Speaker 1: or like this Christmas dinner has to be good, which
Speaker 1: is like what I feel like the steaks are in
Speaker 1: like our traditional just vapid ship Christmas films, but yeah,
Speaker 1: it is all the steaks are like he's cheating on me,
Speaker 1: or like Santa fuck I hope Santa will fuck me,
Speaker 1: or it's just like a very odd thing. Oh one
Speaker 1: weird one weird moment that really stuck out to me.
Speaker 1: It was this moment between Joe and Baby when the
Speaker 1: first day, Like I think it's one of the first
Speaker 1: scenes where Chris Brown gets a camera, so I got
Speaker 1: a night it's like the Rose Roy Sick cameras. I'm like, well,
Speaker 1: are we talking full format? I mean, is it a
Speaker 1: hustle blot or a momma? I mean photographers might actually anyway,
Speaker 1: that's a whole other Archtuk discussion. Um, but with him
Speaker 1: when like Joe Delroy Lindo comes out goes you got
Speaker 1: a camera? Huh Yeah. I remember when I was your age,
Speaker 1: I wanted to watch but we couldn't afford it. And
Speaker 1: I was just like, what, at least the camera offers
Speaker 1: babies some kind of mobility like that, it can create work,
Speaker 1: but you just wanted some superficial like class signifier of
Speaker 1: a watch, like it just seemed like a It was
Speaker 1: like it just they just said it and went forward,
Speaker 1: and I was like, that didn't I actually positive, like
Speaker 1: that didn't make sense as finding common ground, like I
Speaker 1: don't understand aside from just being like I desired things
Speaker 1: and I got it. I had that kind of stuff
Speaker 1: happened a lot where it's like to like, You're like
Speaker 1: I think, I think, I like, I might understand what
Speaker 1: that conversation was supposed to be, but it's just like
Speaker 1: sometimes characters just kind of miss each other in this
Speaker 1: very bizarre way where I'm like, I guess we're still
Speaker 1: having the same conversation. There. Another thread that I thought
Speaker 1: was interesting in terms of mel and then it that
Speaker 1: kind of flames out right away is the relationship with
Speaker 1: Mel and Devon and how there's that conversation at the
Speaker 1: dinner table towards the beginning of the movie where Devon
Speaker 1: goes to Moore House and Malcolm kind of comes at
Speaker 1: him and like interrogates him for going to a historically
Speaker 1: black college and like he went to Yale and Kelly
Speaker 1: went to Harvard, and I was like, oh, this is
Speaker 1: like an interesting conversation. But then it never that just
Speaker 1: goes away, like that whole that kind of disappearing. And
Speaker 1: then part of the conversation is people being like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: Mel has been in school for oh along, because she
Speaker 1: just keeps switching her major based on whatever guy. And
Speaker 1: it's just like, well, Kelly, Kelly has this huge problem
Speaker 1: with Lisa because she thinks she's like weak willed and
Speaker 1: easily influenced. But what like, look at what Mel is doing.
Speaker 1: Why weren't you taking take to like miles of comments
Speaker 1: on the financials You're like, okay, they're they're like like
Speaker 1: when Lisa's like, we need to sell off our like
Speaker 1: we have to liquidate our part of the business because
Speaker 1: she's concerned that madear like that she's not gonna have
Speaker 1: enough money. But it's like, well, then a great way
Speaker 1: it would be for mel to stop going to an
Speaker 1: expensive college for seven years in a row. That's a
Speaker 1: great way to cut back on expenses for the family.
Speaker 1: Is not seven years of a private college, Like it's
Speaker 1: just the money stuff is very confusing, right, yeah, it's
Speaker 1: all I think even with um the Harvard Yale versus
Speaker 1: HBCU thing is like they were that was a quick
Speaker 1: way to be like, those are the the black people
Speaker 1: in your family, like the ones who got went to
Speaker 1: Ivy League schools and forgot who they were or like
Speaker 1: you know, that was a very quick brushstroke culturally to
Speaker 1: be like that's who they are, and they came for
Speaker 1: the person who went to more House, who then has
Speaker 1: like the much more articulated response as to why they
Speaker 1: go to more House, meaning you know, you sure you
Speaker 1: went to the place that people know about, but for
Speaker 1: my values as a black man and like I want
Speaker 1: to go to this school, but like it very much
Speaker 1: set the table like Okay, he's here and your Ivy
Speaker 1: lead people are down here because he just put the
Speaker 1: smack on you by explaining why he preferred that over
Speaker 1: your school, and it makes us like Malcolm, like it
Speaker 1: makes it makes Malcolm's character clearer of like, oh, he's
Speaker 1: like an elitist asshole. But and but it made like
Speaker 1: that scene really I was like, Oh, Devin's cool. I'm
Speaker 1: excited to see where his story goes. But then you're
Speaker 1: just like, where does it go anywhere? It was funny though, too,
Speaker 1: for him to basically like recite the schools like Mission
Speaker 1: Stayment and like really explain his beliefs in this way
Speaker 1: that everyone's like, wow, he's got a great head on
Speaker 1: his shoulders, because the scene right before that is him
Speaker 1: barely able to say his own name. Yeah, right there
Speaker 1: with him would say I feel like we're just with you,
Speaker 1: come on, man, and then he's ready for like this
Speaker 1: intellectual battle at the dinner table scene, like and then
Speaker 1: the way that scene resolves is like, well, one thing's
Speaker 1: for sure, mel sucks and that's like the end of
Speaker 1: the scene. Here. It's like all right, just so many
Speaker 1: so many threads that you're like, oh, I guess that
Speaker 1: didn't come back, didn't Well? Yeah, Really, despite all of
Speaker 1: like the women's steaks and storylines largely being attached to
Speaker 1: romantic interests as trophy and heteronormative as it is, I
Speaker 1: will say that I liked the women in the movie
Speaker 1: way more than I liked really any of the men,
Speaker 1: and I do appreciate it, at least with there being
Speaker 1: a focus on these these relationships they have with the
Speaker 1: men in their lives that we there's like a sex
Speaker 1: positivity component to this family that I appreciated that Uh,
Speaker 1: Lisa doesn't have as much because she does call her
Speaker 1: sister a hoe, but they're like openly talking about sex
Speaker 1: and batteries to a vibrator. She's like, you really should
Speaker 1: switch to the woman either, honey. I like how my
Speaker 1: dear is like I want my kids to come, but
Speaker 1: I don't want them to sing. Like all right, I
Speaker 1: guess because I appreciate that, especially because a lot of
Speaker 1: like Christmas movies are so like and it makes sense
Speaker 1: because there are a lot of them are like family, children,
Speaker 1: family move like appropriate for the whole family. So they're like,
Speaker 1: this is just so sex doesn't exist in these worlds,
Speaker 1: so that they that they talk about sex and like
Speaker 1: talk openly about it and generally have a sex positive
Speaker 1: attitude among the family. I was like, Okay, I like this, yeah,
Speaker 1: and it's like that not as I mean, even like
Speaker 1: in that opening montage where like my dear and Joe
Speaker 1: or I mean, it's not like they're not fucking, but
Speaker 1: you're like, oh, this this movie is like more open
Speaker 1: and like less I don't know, yeah exactly, Like you're
Speaker 1: saying just less holier than now about everything, and it's like, yeah, families,
Speaker 1: do you have sex? Not with each other? I don't know.
Speaker 1: If Fred has that wild ass line in the beginning
Speaker 1: was a girl. If he wasn't my cousin, I was like, Fred,
Speaker 1: why and then I was then in the middle of
Speaker 1: the movie, I'm like, where did that guy go? Because
Speaker 1: he was like he came in so hot at the
Speaker 1: top of the movie and it disappeared. Yeah, if you
Speaker 1: you can't start any sentences if you weren't my cousin,
Speaker 1: unless it's like if you weren't my cousin, you would
Speaker 1: be someone not related to me. That's like the only
Speaker 1: way that send like you started anything off like what okay? Good?
Speaker 1: You ended it with a very literal description rather than
Speaker 1: like checking her ass out and being like so weird cousin.
Speaker 1: I'm like, y'o, don't do all that ship. But again,
Speaker 1: that's uh. Those are like those moments where the script
Speaker 1: writer is not really checking about like what that means
Speaker 1: to be like, and this character is like openly just
Speaker 1: making his cousin uncomfortable because he's objectifying her at the
Speaker 1: Christmas thing right well speaking, so we touched on this
Speaker 1: a little bit too, but like the way that McKay
Speaker 1: peiffer his role in the story, where like he's like
Speaker 1: aggressively staring at Kelly at the club and then they
Speaker 1: go home together. But then the next morning he calls her,
Speaker 1: then she ignores his call, and then he shows up
Speaker 1: as Santa Claus uh, and she's like, what are you
Speaker 1: doing here? This is weird? And then I guess they
Speaker 1: make plans later that night that she has to bail on.
Speaker 1: I don't but I don't remember that even being discussed.
Speaker 1: She she ends up, it's because all the clod stuff happens.
Speaker 1: It's like the stuff happens, and then she and Lesa
Speaker 1: get into a fight, and I think she just ends
Speaker 1: up kind of like understandably dropping the ball, right. But
Speaker 1: then he shows up again after she doesn't show up
Speaker 1: to whatever plans they had, and then he's just like hey,
Speaker 1: and then he spends the night because he's like I
Speaker 1: saw you when you were in ninth grade and I
Speaker 1: liked it. Oh yeah, that was so you're like, oh,
Speaker 1: ship full from Oh he was also in high school,
Speaker 1: but I think he was like a bit older, right,
Speaker 1: But it was like, I've never forgotten this thing since
Speaker 1: I was fifteen, and you're like, oh, damn full for
Speaker 1: real and you came up to my house just as
Speaker 1: Santa Ship. Okay, that was so so Tropes on Tropes.
Speaker 1: On Tropes, I'm like the guy from your past who
Speaker 1: won't stop showing up. That's actually a good thing and
Speaker 1: that means love and nothing's scary about that. But Kelly
Speaker 1: in general, like the way her characters. I guess, of
Speaker 1: all the ways the characters are written, I found Kelly
Speaker 1: to be the most confusing and just kind of like
Speaker 1: the way that story treats her is strange because I'm
Speaker 1: not even totally sure what she does. She mentions that
Speaker 1: she went to Harvard and something something perfume, but then
Speaker 1: I'm not even totally sure what she does. More of it,
Speaker 1: there's more time dedicated to the fact that she's a
Speaker 1: bad cook than informing us what she does for a living. Well,
Speaker 1: that's what she does. I think that's what they're s
Speaker 1: is the occupation is irrelevant. What you need to know
Speaker 1: is she's the one that can't cook, like very like
Speaker 1: that's the framing of it for us, and then the
Speaker 1: relationship between her. I I it was a kind of
Speaker 1: like a something I can see a number of ways.
Speaker 1: But I liked that Kelly and Lisa, you see, they
Speaker 1: have like an arc. Like it's you know, it's not
Speaker 1: even a guarantee that two women or two sisters will
Speaker 1: ever even get an arc in an ensemble movie like this,
Speaker 1: So I like that there was time that was like
Speaker 1: allotted for that. But then the conversations are so kind
Speaker 1: of like basic where it's like you went to school
Speaker 1: and so you're a careerist and you stayed at home,
Speaker 1: so you're not as good as me, and yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: when it's like what Lisa is saying to an extent
Speaker 1: like made sense, where she's like I had to help
Speaker 1: with the family business because everyone else kind of went
Speaker 1: their own ways. But like, why is she only mad
Speaker 1: at Kelly about this when like Quentin went off his
Speaker 1: own way, like everyone left. Why why is like Kelly
Speaker 1: bearing the brunt of this grudge? I don't know, I
Speaker 1: just their whole their whole arc was kind of so
Speaker 1: touch and go for me where I'm glad it was there,
Speaker 1: but I just thought it was weird, right, because like
Speaker 1: Kelly is kind of presented as like the feminist of
Speaker 1: the family. She's the one she's focused on her career,
Speaker 1: she has a vibrator. She's calling out. She's calling out
Speaker 1: Lisa first like being us believable, but then she's also
Speaker 1: like the so you you are to accommodate your Also,
Speaker 1: it feels like she's there's almost like a I don't
Speaker 1: know if it's like victim blaming exactly, but like Lisa
Speaker 1: is in a bad relationship, like her husband is awful,
Speaker 1: she's cheating on her, she knows about it. What's that
Speaker 1: doesn't she say a line that kind of sums up
Speaker 1: her entire view on why she's okay with like they're
Speaker 1: being a mistress, because like there's a moment she's confronted
Speaker 1: and there's something to the effective like well, you know,
Speaker 1: like she's like, I don't want to start over. I
Speaker 1: won't be appealing in the dating pools and I'm not
Speaker 1: trying to start over, so I'm just gonna stay in
Speaker 1: this like miserable life. And then and then Kelly's like,
Speaker 1: that's a horrible excuse, like stand up for yourself that
Speaker 1: I mean, that does happen though, I was like, well, yeah,
Speaker 1: well that's the thing, Like that's what's interesting about the
Speaker 1: movie because it does touch on things that you're You're
Speaker 1: angry sometimes with the characters and you're like, but that's
Speaker 1: kind of that's real ship though, like keeping secrets, being
Speaker 1: ashamed of a relationship, being in a shitty relationship because
Speaker 1: you don't have the self confidence to like break out
Speaker 1: and do you know, advocate for yourself. There's real ship,
Speaker 1: although it's done poorly sometimes and like my oh what
Speaker 1: about my kids? What about my Like I'm going to
Speaker 1: look the other way because I want my kids to
Speaker 1: blah blah blah, Like it does happen. But because Kelly's
Speaker 1: constantly calling Lisa out and like being hostile to her
Speaker 1: for like, again, Lisa is in this bad relationship and
Speaker 1: it feels like Kelly hates her because Malcolm sucks. And
Speaker 1: it's like, I don't know that, I don't maybe I'm
Speaker 1: misinterpreting that, but well, I think in a way, like
Speaker 1: what you're describing sounds like when you're mad at your
Speaker 1: friend because you know they can do better and you've
Speaker 1: seen them do better, yet they're not. And like that's
Speaker 1: sort of where it's at, where it's like, yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean obviously fuck Malcolm, but also like girl, like you
Speaker 1: can do way better than this. But but it comes
Speaker 1: off in a weird way. I don't know if there's
Speaker 1: a way to elegantly like the whole movie would have
Speaker 1: to be about that kind of relationship to pull the
Speaker 1: nuances out of like being upset with your friend for
Speaker 1: not like being in a bad relationship or your family
Speaker 1: right and because there's eighteen other storylines happening, like not
Speaker 1: enough time as dedicated. They even use the wonderful tropium
Speaker 1: of the day sex black enough uh in the Mo
Speaker 1: and Dude bathroom scene, we're sucking dough or lintles, like
Speaker 1: was it twenty five grand I got it right here
Speaker 1: and I leave him alone? We got Christmas dinner. I
Speaker 1: was like, damn, that was solved very quickly. A pastor,
Speaker 1: like the pastors the deacons have twenty five thousand dollars
Speaker 1: at all, absolutely, even to a black church. The collection
Speaker 1: plate comes around, I was like, where did that money
Speaker 1: come from? Me? You got he has twenty five thousand.
Speaker 1: The pastor always has twenty five thousands. That's a whole
Speaker 1: other movie. Yeah, that's and that's a whole other movie.
Speaker 1: That's why I'm like, oh, like it's funny, like because
Speaker 1: I think of those tropes, even going to black church,
Speaker 1: like when my grandparents were dragged me and I was like,
Speaker 1: why do you give him all the money? I remember
Speaker 1: as a kid, I'm like, how come the pastor has
Speaker 1: the nicest car? And they're like, well, that's because know
Speaker 1: they lead the congregation or whatever. I'm like, this sounds like,
Speaker 1: oh sick ass job. Just scream for a couple of
Speaker 1: minutes on Sundays and you get a Mercedes. This movie
Speaker 1: should have been a like TV series and not a
Speaker 1: movie based on like everything that gets set up about
Speaker 1: all these family members. So we want to go into
Speaker 1: the Whitfield universe, Yeah, if where is it? Um? But
Speaker 1: to go back to the Kelly at least a relationship
Speaker 1: I do appreciate, and this, you know, again, the nuances
Speaker 1: aren't explored as much as they should be. This feels
Speaker 1: kind of surface level, but I do appreciate at least
Speaker 1: that Lisa comes around and realizes like, oh shoot, I
Speaker 1: should see my worth. I should see my value, I
Speaker 1: should leave my cheating husband, whatever that means for for
Speaker 1: me in my in my life. And they end on
Speaker 1: like a beat of kind of reconciliation and appreciation for
Speaker 1: each other because at least the lesson is like, I
Speaker 1: don't know, girl, like men are going to cheat. The
Speaker 1: lesson is like, yo, if they're doing something, you can
Speaker 1: you can fucking pull up for yourself and do like
Speaker 1: actually take action for yourself. Right. I like where it
Speaker 1: lands and then it's like it does. Yeah, it just
Speaker 1: seemed like there was just like a lot of interesting
Speaker 1: threads in this movie that they just didn't have the time.
Speaker 1: I would imagine that like a lot of stuff because
Speaker 1: it's two hours long and there's still so much more
Speaker 1: that you could explore just based on like what is
Speaker 1: kind of foreshadowed at the beginning, where Yeah, it just
Speaker 1: seemed like the movie maybe didn't have enough time to
Speaker 1: get to every like every interesting thing that was presented.
Speaker 1: But I did like where their relationship landed. Um and
Speaker 1: sisters can like I don't know, I'm glad, I'm glad
Speaker 1: that Lisa got out of there, and you know, is
Speaker 1: it really going to affect her children? Where are her children?
Speaker 1: The movie does not give a ship. There mostly mirages.
Speaker 1: Yeah the figments. Um, we're running out of time? Is
Speaker 1: there any is there any other like kind of big
Speaker 1: things we want to touch on. Uh the I guess
Speaker 1: to like put a little bow on on the Quentin stuff.
Speaker 1: He is acting like Macavity. Um he is that's cats. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's just elba is the villain and cats. He's Macavity.
Speaker 1: The is it like the mystery cat? I forget what
Speaker 1: it is, but he's he plays a cat in a fedora?
Speaker 1: Um who does? And so when he jumped through breakaway glass,
Speaker 1: I was like this is Macavity energy. But but speaking
Speaker 1: to how him and madear where they land where Quentin
Speaker 1: like he and his mom having a strange relationship because
Speaker 1: music bad. But then he like comes at her in
Speaker 1: a way that it's very clear, like Madeira is in
Speaker 1: no uncertain terms being like he was a bad father,
Speaker 1: he's a bad husband, Like I've been with Joe for
Speaker 1: seven years? Like what if if? Because they say that
Speaker 1: they started dating when mel went to college, which was
Speaker 1: seven years ago? Like can you just accept this? And
Speaker 1: he's like no, Dad might come back, which seems like
Speaker 1: a thing he's holding out for is like the potential
Speaker 1: return of senior. But I don't know. I mean, I guess,
Speaker 1: But that's another thing you know that's real though too,
Speaker 1: like of your like son father son, you know, relationship
Speaker 1: like this of just idealizing your parents and then not
Speaker 1: being able to see like like looked at them objectively
Speaker 1: as a human being, where they're like, that's not how
Speaker 1: a person should behave if they're a father. That actually
Speaker 1: fucked me up, and I'm I'm traumatized by it, but
Speaker 1: you're still so caught up in it that your trauma
Speaker 1: is only telling you like, he'll come back, He'll come back,
Speaker 1: and then everything will be okay because then if he
Speaker 1: comes back, I don't have to process any of this
Speaker 1: ship that I've been going through the last twenty odd
Speaker 1: years because he will come back. But again, that's another
Speaker 1: thing that's very nuanced and like I'm looking at him like, well,
Speaker 1: there's a way to look at that being deep at fuck.
Speaker 1: And there's another version where it just sounds like I
Speaker 1: dress elbow being like you're not my dad, and then
Speaker 1: it just ends there. They just don't have the time
Speaker 1: to like tackle that story, like it just sounds weird
Speaker 1: to Caitlin's point, like, yeah, if it were like an anthology,
Speaker 1: like you could tackle like each of these almost could
Speaker 1: be like a very poignant film around Christmas that you're
Speaker 1: really like, you know, working around from most of the storylines.
Speaker 1: But yeah, it ends up kind of getting a little vogue.
Speaker 1: Well then also with Idri Salma's character and arguably all
Speaker 1: the men in the movie. And we've talked about this
Speaker 1: too on Christmas episodes we've done of um, a lot
Speaker 1: of stories revolved like a Christmas movie with a male protagonist.
Speaker 1: Often redemption is a huge theme there. There's often these
Speaker 1: like huge redemption arcs, which I generally find to be
Speaker 1: pretty tired and annoying. And it's also like, well, men,
Speaker 1: if you tried harder the first time, maybe you wouldn't
Speaker 1: have to be constantly redeeming yourself all the time. Um,
Speaker 1: but you know, men will always be given second chances anyway.
Speaker 1: Male redemption stories are a very popular Christmas narrative between
Speaker 1: Scrooge and the Grinch and Tim Allen in the Santa
Speaker 1: Claus and Michael Keaton and Jack Frost and so on,
Speaker 1: And it feels like that applies to this movie as well,
Speaker 1: where like Joe and Quentin sort of redeem each other
Speaker 1: in each other's eyes. There's like this redemption sort of
Speaker 1: with Claude being like, oops, I got arrested and oh
Speaker 1: I have a secret wife. But now everything's fine. They
Speaker 1: also don't have time to resolve this plod stuff. But right,
Speaker 1: but like Joe calls in a favor with some military
Speaker 1: guy he knows, so like that just gets like steamlessly resolved.
Speaker 1: Joe did that again? Yeah, Joe says like, oh I
Speaker 1: know some dude, Yo, he really is des x Blackina
Speaker 1: and this whole film. Yeah everything. You let me call
Speaker 1: Colin Powell real quick, already have it an envelope in
Speaker 1: this way home my left pocket. That's thirty granted the
Speaker 1: other one here right, because he's also the one who
Speaker 1: arranges for Baby to sing at church so that Baby
Speaker 1: can kind of redeem himself in Madear's eyes. So all
Speaker 1: these sixes everything for every son right, and all of
Speaker 1: the men have these have these redemption narratives, whereas all
Speaker 1: the women are just like man or no man? Which
Speaker 1: man who boy like sex kissing? Yeah that was my
Speaker 1: last thing? Is I wish that because most of Madear's
Speaker 1: most of Madear's stories as well, are dedicated to her
Speaker 1: relationship with Joe, her relationship with Baby, her relationship with Clenton,
Speaker 1: and really the only times you see her interact with
Speaker 1: her daughter is her or any of her daughters. She's like,
Speaker 1: how is your marriage or where is your marriage? And
Speaker 1: those are really the only things that we So I
Speaker 1: wish that you had there was a little more time
Speaker 1: with Madear and and her dollars too, but you know,
Speaker 1: we just needed an anthology. We needed more time. You
Speaker 1: think he went a well because he was like a
Speaker 1: conscientious objector to the Iraq war, Like, Yo, that would
Speaker 1: have been lit. I'm like, yo, hold on, let this
Speaker 1: man speak real quick. He's not wrong though, but like
Speaker 1: but but he never Yeah, I don't know, Like I
Speaker 1: don't know if we could what's the what's the reason behind? Yeah,
Speaker 1: that would be amazing. If this was like late Bush administration,
Speaker 1: like political. He's like, why am I going to go
Speaker 1: to another part of the world just to fight on
Speaker 1: behalf of corporations that are invested in my downfall in
Speaker 1: this country and collectively our entire family and our people.
Speaker 1: No funk that I'm not spilling my blood for petrol
Speaker 1: dollars anymore. I'm taking a stand. God damn it, Like
Speaker 1: it would have been like, yeah, well that's not that's
Speaker 1: a redemption. No, I take too hot for a two
Speaker 1: thousand seven though, that two seven that would have been
Speaker 1: Dixie Chicks times five million. What the fund did this?
Speaker 1: What did this? This person saying the Christmas movie instead
Speaker 1: Petro war the truly the monologue we needed and we
Speaker 1: didn't get. The reason we get instead is that he
Speaker 1: went a wall because he requested a leave, which was
Speaker 1: denied because he didn't tell his like military people that
Speaker 1: he got married. And he went in a wall because
Speaker 1: Sandy would have been disappointed if they So he's like
Speaker 1: kind of blame. It's almost like the blame is being
Speaker 1: put on her for the reason he went a wall,
Speaker 1: because he said, well, I like my secret wife that
Speaker 1: I haven't told anyone about would have been disappointed. Hell yeah, clod,
Speaker 1: you know, we just needed the Claude the Clode thing.
Speaker 1: That's a whole series all its own, Like there's just
Speaker 1: so much going on. I'm like now officially fully opened
Speaker 1: to a mini series that writes out baby yes, eliminates
Speaker 1: where he goes to that camera he becomes Terry Richardson,
Speaker 1: you don't want to see it. Actually it's pretty it's
Speaker 1: prettyasy grim like we just don't talk about anymore. Yeah,
Speaker 1: does this movie pass the Bechdel test? Yeah, but you
Speaker 1: think it would pass more. You think it would. There
Speaker 1: are quite a few women in the movie, and they
Speaker 1: do interact, but often the conversations revolve around husbands and
Speaker 1: boyfriends and stepdad figures, etcetera. Um, but there are things
Speaker 1: to talk about, like sisterhood and being bad at cooking,
Speaker 1: which technically counts batteries vibrator batteries. Yes, um, as far
Speaker 1: as our nipple scale zero to five nipples based on
Speaker 1: an examination of intersectional feminism. So for me, I don't know.
Speaker 1: I'm kind of torn on this one because on one hand,
Speaker 1: it really adheres to some just you know, holiday movie tropes,
Speaker 1: some two thousand seven tropes two thousand seven tropes, the
Speaker 1: way women are presented in media tropes in terms of
Speaker 1: like the women all have like stakes and narratives surrounding
Speaker 1: like romantic relationships with men, So coming at it from
Speaker 1: that perspective, it's like. But on the other hand, because
Speaker 1: this is typically such a white genre and Christmas movies
Speaker 1: so aggressively, like like I don't know, like Hollywood is
Speaker 1: just like only white Christians celebrate wintertime holidays, right, So
Speaker 1: it's just it's nice and refreshing to see a Christmas
Speaker 1: oriented movie that features a black family. The fact that
Speaker 1: it's written and directed by a black filmmaker who based
Speaker 1: a lot of these characters on either members of his
Speaker 1: family or himself, so it's a black creator telling his
Speaker 1: own story. I really like the women in the story.
Speaker 1: I wish we had gotten to know them better. I
Speaker 1: wish we had they had narratives outside of romantic pursuits.
Speaker 1: We do learn a little tiny bit about each one
Speaker 1: as far as like interior exterior lives, but it's always
Speaker 1: pretty vague. So it's like, I don't know, do we
Speaker 1: know that much about them? So I don't know. There's
Speaker 1: just it's kind of a mixed bag for me. Uh,
Speaker 1: Like I said, I think this would have served better
Speaker 1: as like a series. I would have I would love
Speaker 1: a show about this family. We had like ten bottle
Speaker 1: episodes about each character. That would be like all the stories,
Speaker 1: all these stories or most of them like that Chris
Speaker 1: Brown one probably scraped that, but like all of them
Speaker 1: wore like you're like, oh, this is really something, but
Speaker 1: then where it is it go? So with that in mind,
Speaker 1: I don't know, maybe like a two and a half
Speaker 1: or three. I'm leaning I just like I said, I
Speaker 1: really like the characters. The performances are amazing, especially Loretta
Speaker 1: Divine is incredible, Regina King amazing. Each of those characters
Speaker 1: deserve better. So I'm gonna land on a three, I think,
Speaker 1: And um, I'll give them all to Idrisalba's Ma Cavity
Speaker 1: just kidding, yeah, I think. Also just split them among
Speaker 1: the four main women in in the story. Whatever that
Speaker 1: fraction works out too. I'm leaning around the same at
Speaker 1: a two point five three, uh, for much the same reason.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess it really is like it is.
Speaker 1: It's amazing to see. Like I think We've been having
Speaker 1: this conversation um over the past several months more and
Speaker 1: more like movie is about black joy and movies about families,
Speaker 1: and movies about the American black experience that is not
Speaker 1: really deeply shaped by trauma. And this is the perfect
Speaker 1: genre to explore that, and but it's so rarely done.
Speaker 1: This movie's um existence and success is like incredible, especially
Speaker 1: like this fucking cast is unreal, Like it's just just
Speaker 1: the careers that the vast majority of this cast has
Speaker 1: gone on to have. It's just like minus Chris Brown,
Speaker 1: you know a lot of upward trajectories and a notable
Speaker 1: downward one. Um. But all I said, like, the cast
Speaker 1: is so incredible, the chemistry between everyone is so good.
Speaker 1: And then yeah, my my note is kind of the
Speaker 1: same thing of like, if you're going to bring in
Speaker 1: such an amazing group of female actors, don't just give
Speaker 1: them stories about husbands and boyfriends and like it's a
Speaker 1: waste of the talent. And I really, I mean, I
Speaker 1: don't think that we really know anything about these women
Speaker 1: outside of their relationship to men and sons outside of
Speaker 1: the Lisa Kelly Um sisterhood, but all of their conflicts
Speaker 1: revolve around their relationships towards men. So I just I A,
Speaker 1: I was frustrated by that because it's like, you have
Speaker 1: fucking Regina King, she can do anything, like let's see more,
Speaker 1: let's see like questions I had as I was watching.
Speaker 1: I was like, well, what what would Lisa have done
Speaker 1: if she didn't feel like she had to stay back
Speaker 1: with the family, Like did she have an aspiration that
Speaker 1: was kind of ruined in her view by the fact
Speaker 1: that Kelly went on to have her career follow up question,
Speaker 1: what is Kelly's career? What does she do? Why do
Speaker 1: we talk more about whether she's fucking Santa or not
Speaker 1: then what her job is like? There were just so
Speaker 1: many especially given the variety of the mail plot and
Speaker 1: how I think pretty much, without exception, all the male
Speaker 1: plots were at least tethered in some way to their career,
Speaker 1: where like Claude is a Wall, Macavity is Macavity, ng uh,
Speaker 1: all of their stories are related to their careers. And
Speaker 1: we don't even really know what the female characters do
Speaker 1: or wanted to do outside of Madear owns a cleaners,
Speaker 1: but we don't know anything about that really either, Like so,
Speaker 1: and then on top of I mean, and I wish
Speaker 1: that we saw more of Madear and her daughters selfishly
Speaker 1: because I want more scenes with Loretta Divine and Regina King,
Speaker 1: but like that's a meeting. So I think that this
Speaker 1: movie is really good, and it's it's especially for its time.
Speaker 1: It's like it's very of its time in a lot
Speaker 1: of ways, and we can tear that apart all day,
Speaker 1: but it's a movie it's a joyful movie about black
Speaker 1: American family. We don't get that a lot, and um,
Speaker 1: I hope that we continue to get more in this genre.
Speaker 1: It care about what women are doing that aren't with men.
Speaker 1: So I'll go I guess I'll go a three as well,
Speaker 1: and I will give my nipples to give two of
Speaker 1: them to mel because I want. I also, I really
Speaker 1: liked her, and she disappeared about halfway through the movie,
Speaker 1: And I will give my other nipple to my dear
Speaker 1: because Loretta Divine rocks truly. What about you, Miles, Uh,
Speaker 1: maybe two and a half three? Maybe I'll go three
Speaker 1: rather than just to give a slight advantage because it's weird,
Speaker 1: like half of the film negates the other half, so
Speaker 1: you're like, but also like, I'm also looking at this
Speaker 1: through the lens of it being a Christmas film, so
Speaker 1: I'm already like, this is not like a movie. Really.
Speaker 1: I I really consider these kinds of films like absolute
Speaker 1: background noise during the holidays, because none of them know
Speaker 1: there's it's really hard to find any film that's offering
Speaker 1: anything of substance. And just like the way the genre
Speaker 1: has like morphed over the years, as it is like
Speaker 1: flavorless is the flavor. Uh, so I'll give it. I'll
Speaker 1: give them three and just you know, maybe I would
Speaker 1: knock them down because for that escalade line about being
Speaker 1: a good investment really fucking kissed me off. No, fuck
Speaker 1: it too to wow. I don't know why. No, no,
Speaker 1: no no, I'm sorry, but that has nothing to do
Speaker 1: with the representation of women. So I will still keep
Speaker 1: it through. I'm sorry, I have to keep I have
Speaker 1: to sort of compartmentalize one must Hell yeah, well, myles,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for for being here, for talking
Speaker 1: this Christmas with us. Where can people follow you? Check
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Speaker 1: two miles again, and we'll be back with another holiday
Speaker 1: disaster next week. Indeed, bye bye bye