Speaker 1: On the Beck dol Cast, the questions asked if movies
Speaker 1: have women in them, are all their discussions just boyfriends
Speaker 1: and husbands, or do they have individualism the patriarchy? Zef
Speaker 1: in best start changing it with the Bechdel Cast. Hello,
Speaker 1: and welcome to the Bechdel Cast. My name's Jamie Loftus,
Speaker 1: my name is Kaitlin Durante, and this is our show
Speaker 1: where we examine movies through an intersectional feminist lens, using
Speaker 1: the Bechdel Test as a jumping off point. That's Stan Ray.
Speaker 1: Have you ever heard of it? I haven't heard of it,
Speaker 1: which is really embarrassing at this point. I don't and
Speaker 1: I've been bluffing my way for over half a decade now. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we've been doing the show for six years, James, really
Speaker 1: really a long time. It is March, which means it's
Speaker 1: International Women's History Month. I honestly don't know why international
Speaker 1: has to be like specified, because if you eliminate it,
Speaker 1: the meaning is much the same. But anyways, true, we
Speaker 1: wanted to make sure we were featuring women directors this month, obviously,
Speaker 1: and we had in the works an episode on The
Speaker 1: Women King that we'll be coming out, but it won't
Speaker 1: be coming out until April because of a bunch of
Speaker 1: scheduling stuff, so we wanted to make sure we were
Speaker 1: featuring women directors this month. Yeah, and that is why
Speaker 1: this week we are unlocking a Patreon aka Matreon episode
Speaker 1: that I'm rather proud of. Honestly, we did so much
Speaker 1: homework for this one, and by that I mean we
Speaker 1: read a book. But for a movie podcast reading a book,
Speaker 1: it's not easy. Extra credit. It's hard. Yeah, it's hard,
Speaker 1: and reading is hard. No, but yes, this is part
Speaker 1: of our Matreon theme January aka Austin August aka Jane
Speaker 1: Austen month. Yes on the Matreon. We did it. Last
Speaker 1: year we also covered the Joe Wright Pride and Prejudice
Speaker 1: adaptation with Kiera Knightley and Tom from Succession. However, Joe
Speaker 1: Wright is famously a man, so he doesn't qualify it
Speaker 1: for this and so what we are unlocking is the
Speaker 1: twenty twenty adaptation of Emma starring Annya Taylor Jolie that's
Speaker 1: directed by Autumn deWilde, also written by a woman, Eleanor Katon,
Speaker 1: which we will discuss in the episode as well, but
Speaker 1: too great in my opinion, too great. Jane Austen adaptations.
Speaker 1: Is it and is it? Clueless grade greatness? Nothing is
Speaker 1: that's the best adaptation of Emma. However, this is my
Speaker 1: second favorite and we really enjoyed the movie and we
Speaker 1: think that you will too. If you haven't seen it,
Speaker 1: should check it out. Yeah, go watch it? She wi
Speaker 1: is what are you doing? Also, one other quick housekeeping thing.
Speaker 1: If if you are listening to us for the first
Speaker 1: time right now because you found us through Apple Podcasts, Welcome,
Speaker 1: We're the back too. Hello, Hello, Hello, Hi. We're being
Speaker 1: featured on Apple Podcasts this month. We're highlighted as featured creators.
Speaker 1: So if you happen to find us through the podcast
Speaker 1: search feature, Welcome. We've been around for a while. We've
Speaker 1: been doing the show forever six years now, and we
Speaker 1: hope you enjoy the show. We've been you know, learning, growing,
Speaker 1: and watching a shitload of movies for a long time.
Speaker 1: It's true. It's all true. It's all true. So welcome.
Speaker 1: If you're new, Welcome back. If you've been with us
Speaker 1: for a long time, Welcome medium. If you came kind
Speaker 1: of recently, but you're like, well, I'm not new. There.
Speaker 1: It's a spectrum. Listening to something like well, I'm not new,
Speaker 1: but I wouldn't say I'm old. Well guess what, there's
Speaker 1: not a word for that. But you're welcome there. Yes,
Speaker 1: we we appreciate you. We appreciate everyone who's listening right now. Also,
Speaker 1: if you enjoyed this. If you enjoyed this episode, feel
Speaker 1: free to check out our patreon akamatreon at patreon dot
Speaker 1: com slash Beechdel Cast. You'll notice the discussions are a
Speaker 1: little looser, a little goofier, and normally we have a
Speaker 1: guest on our main feed, but on the Patreon it's
Speaker 1: it's just Caitlin and myself shooting the shit and having
Speaker 1: a nice time. So we hope you enjoy it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: just to foreshadow a little something on this episode is
Speaker 1: how much we talk about Pokemon. Really yeah, all right,
Speaker 1: Well look we were still somewhat locked down when we
Speaker 1: recorded this, so you may notice that energy present in
Speaker 1: whatever's going on, all right Pokemon? Fine, yeah, fine, it's
Speaker 1: not against the lull noise, So please please enjoy this
Speaker 1: unlocked episode of Emma twenty twenty. Okay, it's still January
Speaker 1: aka Austin August aka Jane Austen November. Yes it is,
Speaker 1: and we are closing it out with an episode on
Speaker 1: Emma Period. I did not know at first that this
Speaker 1: movie has punctuation. Unnecessary punctuation. Oh in the title, I know.
Speaker 1: Did you read the reason why too? It's pretty corny.
Speaker 1: Oh no, no, no, I believe it's autumn. deWilde was like,
Speaker 1: it's a period piece, so I put it was like,
Speaker 1: that's kind of funny. It also in any times the
Speaker 1: director of this movie. I was such a pleasure getting
Speaker 1: like acquainted with her as a person and an idea
Speaker 1: because I'm like now fully like just like I will
Speaker 1: go wherever she takes us forever, like she's so cool.
Speaker 1: But yeah, because I because maybe it was an interview
Speaker 1: I was reading with her, but yeah, there's a period
Speaker 1: in it, because she's like at the period beast put
Speaker 1: a period at the end. Wow, I'm like, well, of
Speaker 1: all the reasons to do that, that is at least
Speaker 1: a pretty funny reason, I allow it. Yeah, right, okay, right, okay.
Speaker 1: So we're covering Emma Period from twenty twenty. It's one
Speaker 1: of the last movies that was released in theaters before
Speaker 1: the COVID nineteen pandemic. Ever heard of it? I remember
Speaker 1: I almost saw it and then I didn't, and then
Speaker 1: I experienced regrets. You know what I saw it? What
Speaker 1: I see instead? Oh you know what I saw Invisible Man?
Speaker 1: And yeah, same portrait of a lady on fire. It
Speaker 1: wasn't too you know, I could have done much worse.
Speaker 1: I liked both of those movies. Yeah. One of the
Speaker 1: last movies I saw in theaters pre pandemic was Oh,
Speaker 1: my gosh, what's it called. It's the Pixar movie about
Speaker 1: the like fairy tale creature people onwards. Oh, the one
Speaker 1: with the Chris Pratt pants Dad Dad pants, My dad
Speaker 1: is pants and I'm Chris Pratt right, Yeah, it's just
Speaker 1: what the fuck was that movie? There's gonna be a
Speaker 1: million people at the comments like that movie changed my life,
Speaker 1: And I'm sure, I'm sure it's great, but I only
Speaker 1: know that movie is like Chris Pratt's Dad is pants.
Speaker 1: You're like, I just like, I'm sure that. Like most
Speaker 1: Pixar movies are very heartwarming, this one did make me cry.
Speaker 1: I'm sure, I mean all, like most Pixar movies, that's
Speaker 1: like what they're genetically engineered to do. I just like
Speaker 1: the way this one was marketed specifically. I just thought
Speaker 1: was so weird. I was like, I don't want to
Speaker 1: see the Chris Pratt pants Dad movie, and I reserved
Speaker 1: that right and I and you know, maybe I'll see it.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I think, did you hear a glass shatter? Am? I? Like?
Speaker 1: Just now? No? No, things aren't at all? All is
Speaker 1: not well? There? You know a Stabruary is really bringing
Speaker 1: out in me? Is I want we should go back
Speaker 1: to like naming our houses. I know that it's because
Speaker 1: no one owns property and all these all these books
Speaker 1: are about rich, but even like middle class families name
Speaker 1: their house in Jane Austin World, which is also like
Speaker 1: I'm sure that just happened. Yeah, I didn't realize that
Speaker 1: was a thing. I mean, I guess I knew from
Speaker 1: like Downton Abbey because their huge mansion is called Downton Abbey.
Speaker 1: And then there's like I was like, what's it called?
Speaker 1: I was like, what's the house called? But then, um,
Speaker 1: mister Knightley and this story has an abbey as well.
Speaker 1: I forget what his abbey is called. What constitutes an abbey?
Speaker 1: Like what I don't When you say abbey, I feel
Speaker 1: like it means like extra big, but like I'm sure
Speaker 1: it means something specifically, like there's a mill, or there's
Speaker 1: like a church, or there's a fawm or something. Right,
Speaker 1: what's the difference between like an estate and an abbey
Speaker 1: and a palace and a castle, because all of these
Speaker 1: structures are big. So I don't know what's what bing bong,
Speaker 1: I don't know. You know, I'm no fucking clue he's
Speaker 1: gotten an abbey. I just this, Okay, yeah, so I'm
Speaker 1: going to start thinking of place. You know. I like
Speaker 1: that they name the houses, but all the ways that
Speaker 1: they name the houses stuck. They're like it's like corn
Speaker 1: wall and you're like, okay, that's just a compound word.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Let's just work on it, because look,
Speaker 1: we're never going to own any but I'll you know,
Speaker 1: I'll name my half of the duplex that I read. Sure,
Speaker 1: I'll name that. Why not until I'm evicted any day now,
Speaker 1: I hope not. Well, no, my whatever, But you know
Speaker 1: they can. I'm on a month to month lease. They
Speaker 1: can just they try it. Do you remember matrons over
Speaker 1: the summer of my landlords are like, we're going to
Speaker 1: sell the house and you'll just kind of be shit
Speaker 1: out of luck. But like, we don't know when but
Speaker 1: you could be shit out of luck at any second, right,
Speaker 1: So I was like, oh, and then they failed to
Speaker 1: sell the house. Okay, so well I have a home
Speaker 1: good news for you for now. Just I don't know
Speaker 1: landlords should just fucking explode in Minecraft, of course, which
Speaker 1: I know is something that you have to say. Um, well,
Speaker 1: we're talking about more rich people from England today because
Speaker 1: we're talking about Jane Austen's Emma period period. Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: we're not talking about Gwyneth Paltrow. Did you watch Gwyneth Paltrow?
Speaker 1: You watch you rewatched Clueless? Right, correct? And I really
Speaker 1: thought about watching for the first time because I hadn't
Speaker 1: seen Gwyneth Paltrow's Emma So I was like, yeah, I
Speaker 1: should watch that just in case it's helpful. But what
Speaker 1: did I do instead is play Pokemon? Okay, So well, yeah, matrons,
Speaker 1: we're working really hard for your five dollars over here.
Speaker 1: Jesus Christ, Kate like you've in my defense, yeah, it's
Speaker 1: for my mental health. That's not a good excuse. I
Speaker 1: think it's a great excuse for my mental health. I
Speaker 1: have to play Pokemon for eighty five hours there is Yeah, sorry,
Speaker 1: I'm feeling spicy today. It's good. Um Okay. I saw
Speaker 1: Gwyneth Paltrow. Gwyneth Paltrow Emma. Back in the day, we
Speaker 1: were talking about this with the Pride and Prejudice episode
Speaker 1: where it was like, oh, there was like gen X
Speaker 1: Pride and Prejudice, and then Kiera Knightley is millennial Pride
Speaker 1: and Prejudice. There's kind of not a millennial Emma. I
Speaker 1: think that they did gen X was Gwyneth and then
Speaker 1: this is fully gen z Emma. This is not this
Speaker 1: does not belong to us, but we're allowed to enjoy
Speaker 1: it and look at it. But like Anya Taylor Joy,
Speaker 1: she belongs to them. She does not belonged to us,
Speaker 1: just because she's so young. Yeah, and just like the
Speaker 1: aesthetic of this movie. I mean, this movie is so esthetic,
Speaker 1: it's beautiful. Yeah. Anyways, this is gen Z Emma period
Speaker 1: and I really like it. What is your experience with
Speaker 1: the story, Emma in general? Not much. I had seen
Speaker 1: Clueless a few times. Oh yes, but I don't think
Speaker 1: I knew the first few times I watched Clueless that
Speaker 1: it was a Jane Austen adaptation. I definitely didn't the
Speaker 1: first Yeah, I don't think I knew that until like
Speaker 1: at least college, right, But I haven't read the book
Speaker 1: and I haven't seen the Gwyneth Paltrow Emma. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: this is my first exposure to this story. I've seen
Speaker 1: it three times now between I had some time between
Speaker 1: my Pokemon Pokemon hours that I was putting in to
Speaker 1: watch Emma three times, so I did that. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I did not read the book for this one. I
Speaker 1: read Pride and Prejudice, so I filled my book quota
Speaker 1: of reading one book per year. So I don't have
Speaker 1: much exposure to Emma. But Jamie, you did read the book.
Speaker 1: Reread the book. I reread the book, and by that
Speaker 1: I mean, of course I listened to the audio book
Speaker 1: at one point five speed. And yeah, I guess I'm
Speaker 1: like fully too much Emma this week for old Jamie.
Speaker 1: Too much. But I'm glad I read the book because
Speaker 1: because the changes of the movie makes is really really
Speaker 1: really interesting to me. But like I saw Clueless starting
Speaker 1: in high school, didn't know that it was Jane Austen adaptation,
Speaker 1: so it's almost like it doesn't really even count in
Speaker 1: my brain. Sure, And also Clueless is so different in
Speaker 1: a lot of ways, you know, and I would say
Speaker 1: many better ways. But I read the book in high school.
Speaker 1: I saw the Gwyneth Paltrow movie in high school. I
Speaker 1: think I liked it, I don't really remember. And then
Speaker 1: I was I think this has also been like you know,
Speaker 1: miniseries did and all this stuff. But I was really
Speaker 1: excited for the twenty twenty Emma period because it was,
Speaker 1: you know, an adaptation that was directed by a woman.
Speaker 1: It just looked really I don't know, like you know,
Speaker 1: I was just genuinely excited to see it because sometimes
Speaker 1: you're like, this movie just looks beautiful, like it just looks, yeah, delicious,
Speaker 1: and I want to watch it. And it was, you know,
Speaker 1: like written and directed by women. I like Anya Taylor
Speaker 1: Joy who. I feel like this was like this movie
Speaker 1: came out like right before she popped off, because this
Speaker 1: was pre Chess Netflix. Am I talking about Queen scam Bit. Yes,
Speaker 1: Chess Netflix. That's so funny. I feel like I should
Speaker 1: be dating a guy named Chess Netflix. Oh my gosh,
Speaker 1: that's a great character. Please write something. Yeah, Chess Netflix.
Speaker 1: It's like my new rich boyfriend. I'm like, guys, this
Speaker 1: is Chess Chess Netflix. We met at a party. I
Speaker 1: don't know. He just slid into my dams and now
Speaker 1: it's been four months. Congrats. Speaking of mister Chess, Emma
Speaker 1: or mister Netflix, I guess Emma actually hooked us up.
Speaker 1: She she does these things sometimes, she's a matchmaker like that.
Speaker 1: I'm her Harriet, and she hooked me up with Chess Netflix.
Speaker 1: He's awful. Um Okay, So anyways, I like Annya Taylor Joy.
Speaker 1: I had only known her in The Vivich I think,
Speaker 1: and I hadn't even seen it at that point, but
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, it's the the vivic girl that has
Speaker 1: those big old eyes and oh oh. I was mostly
Speaker 1: excited to see this movie because fucking Bill of I
Speaker 1: Frankenstein Fame is in it, so that was There's that.
Speaker 1: I feel like we texted about it when we both
Speaker 1: first saw the trailer because there's that great trailer moment
Speaker 1: slash movie moment in general where Bill Nigh hops down
Speaker 1: the stairs. It goes like, dude, I caught like best
Speaker 1: part of the movie, and I really like to the movie,
Speaker 1: but it's like the best part of the movie absolutely,
Speaker 1: So I was very stoked to see the movie. I
Speaker 1: watched it on HBO when it was on HBO, and
Speaker 1: then I was excited to revisit it for this. I
Speaker 1: think it's an it's a good adaptation. I really like
Speaker 1: what they changed because the book is very bizarre. I'm
Speaker 1: excited to talk about that a little bit as well.
Speaker 1: The book is like it's it's good and like the
Speaker 1: literary sense and you know, whatever changed the shape of
Speaker 1: the novel forever blah blah blah, like I get it. Sure,
Speaker 1: bookheads don't come for me, but just like this, the
Speaker 1: way the story plays out is interesting to me because
Speaker 1: I feel like and then I frantically googled my own
Speaker 1: opinion to see if I was you know, if your
Speaker 1: opinion was correct. Yeah, to see if my opinion had
Speaker 1: been corroborated by someone who knows who can read a book,
Speaker 1: and it has been corroborated. Is I think the emma
Speaker 1: of the book look ends up regressing by the end
Speaker 1: of the story. But the way that it's been adapted
Speaker 1: for twenty twenty, which I think is smart in terms
Speaker 1: of like you want as a moviegoer to get some
Speaker 1: payoff and feel like the character has grown in the book.
Speaker 1: I don't think that she really grows very much because
Speaker 1: the ending is different and by the end you're just
Speaker 1: like it just is sort of one of those I
Speaker 1: feel like this is like a Victorian novel or just
Speaker 1: like sometimes a novel thing in general, where like things
Speaker 1: move slow, slow, slow, slow slow, and then it's like
Speaker 1: whatever the protagonist is at their slow they're at the whatever.
Speaker 1: The second act, end of the second act of a
Speaker 1: novel is the low point. Yeah. But then but then
Speaker 1: in some but then like things just kind of like
Speaker 1: very abruptly work out sure, and it has kind of
Speaker 1: nothing to do with any action that the protagonist takes. Right, Well,
Speaker 1: let's take a quick break and then we will come
Speaker 1: back for the recap. Okay, we're back, and here is
Speaker 1: what happens in the movie Emma Woodhouse. We get some
Speaker 1: text on screen that she is handsome, clever, and rich
Speaker 1: and has lived nearly twenty one years in the world
Speaker 1: with very little to distress or vex her. Woo. We
Speaker 1: meet her. She's Annie Taylor Joy. Of course, her whole
Speaker 1: thing is that she loves to match make for other people,
Speaker 1: and she has just done this for her I wasn't
Speaker 1: sure exactly who this was at first. I think it
Speaker 1: was her former governess, Miss Taylor. I also don't know
Speaker 1: what a governess is, like a like a tutor or
Speaker 1: like a governess. Yeah, it's like a combo tutor and
Speaker 1: nanny basically. Okay, yeah, got it. And they like live
Speaker 1: in so it's like a permanent the house. Yeah right.
Speaker 1: So Miss Taylor is about to get married and become
Speaker 1: missus Weston, and she is therefore about to leave the
Speaker 1: estate where Emma lives with her father, mister Woodhouse, and that,
Speaker 1: of course is Bill Ni. So at the wedding between
Speaker 1: Miss Taylor and mister Weston, we meet such people as
Speaker 1: Miss Bates, who Emma thinks is very tiresome. Can I Yes,
Speaker 1: there is a thing. And I think it's because we've
Speaker 1: been doing Jane Austen and Cinderella adaptations. And I say
Speaker 1: this as a woman with a kind of longish thin head.
Speaker 1: Anytime in a damn period piece they want to telegraph
Speaker 1: this woman is annoying and not very smart. They cast
Speaker 1: someone that has my head shape, and I don't like it.
Speaker 1: The actors who play there's always one step sister in
Speaker 1: Cinderella that has my head shape, and then Miss Bates
Speaker 1: my head there. Look what I'm saying is you can
Speaker 1: cast me as woman is obviously supposed to be annoying
Speaker 1: because I have the correct head shape. What is that?
Speaker 1: I know what it is. We don't need to talk
Speaker 1: about it, but I'm like, fuck you, it's rude leaf
Speaker 1: I head alone. Yeah, sorry, Miss Bates. So Miss Bates
Speaker 1: is there. Mister Elton is there. He is the vicar
Speaker 1: who marries this couple. And there's also talk of the
Speaker 1: groom's son, Frank Churchill, coming, but he never shows up.
Speaker 1: Who do you think is the hottest guy in the movie? Oh,
Speaker 1: good question? Um, my answer sucks for me. It's probably
Speaker 1: between mister Mister Martin is pretty cute to me, just
Speaker 1: as far as looks goes, not personality, but Frank Churchill
Speaker 1: I would maybe kiss I also, Um, I like the
Speaker 1: actor who plays mister Weston, and oh he's fun. I
Speaker 1: like him. I don't know if I would kiss him
Speaker 1: or not. I would kiss Bill Ni probably. What's do
Speaker 1: you remember when Bill Nigh he said MW two. Uh yeah,
Speaker 1: I will never forget the first time I heard Bill
Speaker 1: Knight say mutwo, I like lost my fucking mind. Well,
Speaker 1: now that I'm a Pokemon expert after playing five million
Speaker 1: hours of Pokemon, and I think it's Arcius Arcis Archaius Arka.
Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know how it's pronounced. I'm
Speaker 1: arresting you, but I know I would get just as
Speaker 1: into it. Wait, I hold on, Okay, I can't stop
Speaker 1: thinking about him saying it now. But we taught We've
Speaker 1: talked about this on the Matreon before. I think about
Speaker 1: how Bill nigh he didn't know anything about Pokemon and
Speaker 1: then he started playing Pokemon Go, and then he was like,
Speaker 1: I know that he became a sentient poke dex um
Speaker 1: and he's just I just love I love that. Okay,
Speaker 1: think about this. Probably probably on the set of Emma
Speaker 1: Bill and he played Pokemon Go. Oh yeah, definitely, because
Speaker 1: he would have been into it by the Yeah. Anyways,
Speaker 1: when he said mewtwo, he just it's because he said
Speaker 1: it like a theater actor, and you just never expect
Speaker 1: to hear someone say it that way. Um, anyways, where
Speaker 1: are we? Um? Oh? Oh? Who would you kiss? Mister
Speaker 1: Elton Josh O'Connor. He's also in the Crown. He also
Speaker 1: plays a fucking He plays young Prince Charles, you know,
Speaker 1: another famously losery guy. But guess what he's got. He's
Speaker 1: got a head shape that I like, and he's having Also,
Speaker 1: I think he's very funny, and he's having such a
Speaker 1: I think a good time in this movie being the
Speaker 1: most annoying man to ever live. Oh. Yes, in no sense,
Speaker 1: I don't. I didn't understand that joke. I'll say it.
Speaker 1: That joke was in the trailer and I was like,
Speaker 1: what's the joke. It's just Bill Nickey repeating something. No,
Speaker 1: he mispronounces it. And then Bill Nile's like, no, it's
Speaker 1: in a sense he said, mew two. Okay. So those
Speaker 1: are some of the main characters. We also meet mister Knightley,
Speaker 1: mister Kiera Knightley. Also, I don't know who that actor is,
Speaker 1: but I kept thinking referring to him in my head
Speaker 1: as slightly less hot Heath Ledger. Oh interesting, you know
Speaker 1: who I think is mister Knightley. And the Gwyneth Paltrow
Speaker 1: one is ermray Er You will Own McGregor? Were You?
Speaker 1: Is Nightly? In that one? Which is? I get it?
Speaker 1: This guy's name, what is his deal? His name is
Speaker 1: Johnny Flynn. His Wikipedia picture is weird. It looks like
Speaker 1: it was taken on a fucking point and sheet fifteen
Speaker 1: years ago. Well, I guess I don't have much to say.
Speaker 1: He was definitely hot, but I you know, he was
Speaker 1: too conventionally hot to hold my attention. I want I
Speaker 1: want a mister Elton. I want to Bill Nile saying
Speaker 1: me two, give me something interesting. Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.
Speaker 1: So mister Knightley visits Emma and her father. Okay, so
Speaker 1: what is the relationship between Emma and mister Knightley. In
Speaker 1: the book, they're like brother and sister in law because
Speaker 1: Emma's sister is married to mister Knightley's brother Emma's I
Speaker 1: think that that's the case in the movie too. It's
Speaker 1: confusing because I keep saying we're siblings, but it's because
Speaker 1: Emma's sister married mister Knightley's brother. So they're in loss
Speaker 1: no Blood. I wasn't sure if it was the same
Speaker 1: thing as it was in Clueless, where they were former
Speaker 1: step siblings no, which I always found really weird. I
Speaker 1: think it's weirdly less weird in the book from the
Speaker 1: eighteen hundreds than it is Clueless. I think I kind
Speaker 1: of forgot yeah that there. It was like a weird
Speaker 1: like step sibling porn line. They're definitely yeah, no, they're
Speaker 1: they're in law and they're brother and sister in law. Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's never made very clear in this movie, right either way,
Speaker 1: mister Knightley and Emma have a like flirty but like
Speaker 1: teasing nagging type of banter. Yeah. Emma befriends a young
Speaker 1: woman named Harriet Smith mia goth fun casting. Emma kind
Speaker 1: of takes her on as a project and plans to
Speaker 1: match make for her. Harriet fancies a young man named
Speaker 1: mister Martin, but Emma doesn't think he's good or interesting
Speaker 1: enough for Harriet. So Emma tries to encourage Harriet to
Speaker 1: like mister Elton the vicar, right, he was kind of
Speaker 1: funny and weird. Is like, so, Harriet's like a local student,
Speaker 1: but the way that Autumn de Wilde chooses to style
Speaker 1: the students is like they're in the Handmaid's Tale. So
Speaker 1: you're like, well, I'm sure that that's like historically accurate,
Speaker 1: but it's just as a modern viewer quite jarring to
Speaker 1: be like, oh my god, where are they taking these women?
Speaker 1: Should we help them? I know I had the same thought,
Speaker 1: but they're just probably just like, oh, they're just you know,
Speaker 1: young women who go to a boarding school look like
Speaker 1: little Red riding Hood slash the women from The Handmaid's
Speaker 1: Tale very weird. Who knows not us. We're not scholars. No,
Speaker 1: we have one brain cell and we have to share it. Okay.
Speaker 1: So Emma and Harriet get closer. They run into miss Bates,
Speaker 1: who is like carrying on about her niece Jane Fairfax.
Speaker 1: We see them hanging out with mister Knightley. They also
Speaker 1: hang out with mister Elton, who loves a painting that
Speaker 1: Emma did of Harriet and it seems like he really
Speaker 1: likes Harriet. Then mister Martin proposes to Harriet via a letter,
Speaker 1: which Harriet reluctantly rejects because of Emma's kind of subtle
Speaker 1: persuasion to not accept his proposal. Every time someone says
Speaker 1: persuasion in this movie, I'm like, that's another Jane Auston buck.
Speaker 1: I know that. Oh that's funny because at least once
Speaker 1: they say prejudice it is I know. I was like,
Speaker 1: I remember that. And then they're also talking about sense
Speaker 1: and maybe sensibility anyway, and they say they boy, did
Speaker 1: they say I'm a lot? And they really say I'm
Speaker 1: a a lot? But there's no mention of Mansfield Park.
Speaker 1: Is that a Jane Austen novel or did I make
Speaker 1: that up? Now? You nailed it? You nailed it. Wow. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I am a scholar after all. Okay, Harriet rejects mister Martin,
Speaker 1: which upsets mister Knightley, especially since it was he who
Speaker 1: encouraged mister Martin to propose to Harriet. I think, right,
Speaker 1: he it is it is and so that's like call
Speaker 1: that more in the book two of like, mister Knightley's like, Emma,
Speaker 1: you shouldn't meddle. I'm like, you literally just came from
Speaker 1: mister Knightley's house to be like, you know who you
Speaker 1: should marry. So he's like meddling with his boys too,
Speaker 1: but whatever calls him out on that good point. Emma's
Speaker 1: sister Isabella visits with her her husband, who is apparently brother. Yes,
Speaker 1: I had no idea, and then their baby, and there's
Speaker 1: also another small child. I think. A bunch of them
Speaker 1: have dinner together, after which mister Elton professes his love
Speaker 1: not for Harriet like Emma is expecting, but his love
Speaker 1: for Emma herself, and she turns him down. She's like,
Speaker 1: I don't want to get married. And he does not
Speaker 1: take this rejection well he like a big baby and
Speaker 1: like dashes out into the snow. He Oh my gosh,
Speaker 1: he's dashing through this now. Fun fun, josh O Connory.
Speaker 1: I like in this movie there's like a few times
Speaker 1: when someone just starts like yelling and you're like, well
Speaker 1: they like just where He's like, oh, by the carriage.
Speaker 1: You're like shit. It really takes you by surprise because
Speaker 1: it normally these rich people are so proper and not
Speaker 1: yelling anyway. So Harriet is disappointed to learn that mister
Speaker 1: Elton never liked her. Then Emma and Harriet spend some
Speaker 1: time with Miss Bates again, the woman that Emma thinks
Speaker 1: is super boring, as well as Miss bates niece Jane Fairfax,
Speaker 1: who Emma is also not fond of and maybe even
Speaker 1: jealous of, which is not as clear in the movie
Speaker 1: as it seems to be in the book. Meanwhile, Harriet
Speaker 1: bumps into mister Martin, hot farmer. She had rejected farmers Only.
Speaker 1: That's that's Harriet, until Emma starts meddling she's on farmers Only,
Speaker 1: and then Emma's like, no, you gotta get on Jane Austin.
Speaker 1: Ye yeah, yeah, wow, Yeah, we've heard of a thing
Speaker 1: or two. So that interaction is super awkward and it's
Speaker 1: clear that they are still in love with each other,
Speaker 1: but they don't do anything about it. And then Emma
Speaker 1: finally meets the elusive Frank Churchill. They make eyes at
Speaker 1: each other, it seems they like each other. And also
Speaker 1: one of the things that I think that this movie
Speaker 1: in this book do very well is that's like I
Speaker 1: feel like you don't see it very often executed effortlessly,
Speaker 1: Like this is like seeing two characters that bring out
Speaker 1: the worst in each other. And that is so Frank
Speaker 1: and Emma where like separately they're like like they still
Speaker 1: kind of suck both as a Frank sucks worst, but
Speaker 1: like they both kind of suck his individuals. But when
Speaker 1: you bring them together, you're like, these two cannot hang
Speaker 1: out together. They're going to like hurt someone's feelings. And
Speaker 1: then they do, and then they do. Yeah, hate them,
Speaker 1: hate them, cancel the friendship. Right Then there's a new
Speaker 1: lady in town. She is the new wife of mister Elton.
Speaker 1: Emma also does not like her. We will come to
Speaker 1: find out that Emma does not like most of the
Speaker 1: women she encounters. Then Frank Churchill's father, mister Weston throws
Speaker 1: a ball in Frank's honor, Emma dances what I thought?
Speaker 1: I was like, he does what? Sorry you meant like?
Speaker 1: I was like, up, he doesn't. I don't see him
Speaker 1: throw a single baseball. Okay, he does not throw any
Speaker 1: poke balls Phil Knight, which is which is a which
Speaker 1: is a shame, because I bet Bill Knight he has
Speaker 1: five hundred at his damn house. I would love what
Speaker 1: if Phil Knight has a poke ball room and that's
Speaker 1: where I keeps all his Pokemon. So too. We should
Speaker 1: cover Detective Pikachu on the podcast. Literally, let's cover I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't know what we really have to Is there
Speaker 1: anything to Actually, there are a couple things to say, okay,
Speaker 1: and I will say them when we cover it. Maybe
Speaker 1: for my birthday this year, maybe I'll do Detective May
Speaker 1: and then we'll do Detective Pikachu and another detective movie
Speaker 1: because every movie is about cops. Yeah, anyway, or we
Speaker 1: could find uh, well, I guess oh I had this,
Speaker 1: Oh God, I had this thought the other day. And
Speaker 1: then do you ever have a thought that you're like,
Speaker 1: I probably don't even want to know the answer, and
Speaker 1: I don't need to go there right now. And so
Speaker 1: in my own for my own protection mentally, I don't
Speaker 1: want to know the answer to the question. Yeah, my
Speaker 1: question was, is Nancy Drew a cop corrob like? Is she?
Speaker 1: Nancy Drew works independently? But I don't remember. I don't remember.
Speaker 1: I feel like she probably then reported to the cops.
Speaker 1: I don't remember either. And I've read so many Nancy
Speaker 1: Drew books. She worked independent twenty five years ago? Uh,
Speaker 1: she like she worked independently, But when she solved the mystery,
Speaker 1: would she tell the cops? I don't remember. Same with
Speaker 1: the same with the mystery team or the mystery mission
Speaker 1: that all those cartoons that got in that car, the
Speaker 1: Scooby Doos, the Scoobies, what were they? God, I can't
Speaker 1: remember a damn thing today. The Scooby did, the Scoobies
Speaker 1: the coalue coalued, that's the word I'm working it. Oh,
Speaker 1: did the Scoobies collued? With? There was there in a
Speaker 1: situation there? You know what, I guess we're just going
Speaker 1: to have to cover scoob No Scoobs or two thousand
Speaker 1: and two Scooby Doo. We should cover two thousand and
Speaker 1: two Scooby Doos. I watched I watched Scoob at a
Speaker 1: low point in my life, and it was stinky, stinky, stinky.
Speaker 1: Not no, no Lillard, right, no Lillard. If it doesn't
Speaker 1: have Lillard in it, I don't care. Trewin Lillard got
Speaker 1: so he got so sad when they recast him. He
Speaker 1: because no one told him. And then they're like, Will
Speaker 1: Fourte voices Shaggy in this one, and I love like
Speaker 1: Will forty is the best, but my love of Will
Speaker 1: Forte is outweighed by my discomfort of the idea of
Speaker 1: Matthew Lillard like having a bad day. So how much
Speaker 1: do I love Will Fourte? I don't know, I really
Speaker 1: love him. Wow. Enough talking about random white guys in
Speaker 1: their forties. Okay, So Frank Churchill's father throws a ball,
Speaker 1: the dancing kind, not the pokemon kind, and at the ball,
Speaker 1: Emma dances with Frank because they're you know, canoodling or whatever.
Speaker 1: But Harriet has no one to dance with, so mister
Speaker 1: Knightley asks her to dance, which Emma thinks is very
Speaker 1: kind and Harriet thinks is very kind. And then Emma
Speaker 1: and mister Knightley says some nice things to each other
Speaker 1: and then they dance together and we're like, oh, what's happened?
Speaker 1: This is another thing I like that the movie does
Speaker 1: that the book doesn't. The book kind of plays out
Speaker 1: more like a detective novel and like who loves who
Speaker 1: you don't know that you can tell on like a
Speaker 1: reread that Nightly clearly likes Emma the whole time, but
Speaker 1: Emma has no idea how she likes mister Knightley until
Speaker 1: like very late in the book. And something that I
Speaker 1: learned about Jane Austen by reading these books and literally
Speaker 1: following along with the spark notes to make sure that
Speaker 1: I was listening correctly, is that, like she has this
Speaker 1: bizarre tendency that I don't even really like. But in
Speaker 1: terms of like adaptation, it opens up a lot of
Speaker 1: creative license for writers or like screenwriters. But like the
Speaker 1: most important moments in the book, she will like summarize
Speaker 1: instead of writing dialogue for characters where it'll be like
Speaker 1: like that whole like mister Darcy, like you've bewitchbe body
Speaker 1: and soul, like that's not in the book. In the book,
Speaker 1: it's like mister Darcy professed his love ardently and Elizabeth
Speaker 1: finally reciprocated, like it's she doesn't say what they're saying.
Speaker 1: Show don't tell Jane Austen, geez, have you never taken
Speaker 1: a screenwriting class? Yeah? Why didn't? Literally, And that's so
Speaker 1: she actually was a bad feminist. She canceled. But anyways,
Speaker 1: because she writes like that, it opens it up for
Speaker 1: a screenwriter to do kind of whatever they want. But
Speaker 1: but I just thought it was funny how that plays
Speaker 1: out with Emma realizing that she loves mister Knightley is
Speaker 1: when Harriet is like, yeah, no, I love mister Knightley.
Speaker 1: I don't feel a damn thing for Frank. Frank kind
Speaker 1: of sucks, which also, like Emma didn't even seem to
Speaker 1: understand Harriet knows that Frank sucks. She's like, no, I
Speaker 1: love mister Knightley. He's awesome, he's cool. And there's a
Speaker 1: single line that's like Emma realized suddenly that mister Knightley
Speaker 1: could marry no one but herself, and like that's how
Speaker 1: you're told that she loves him, Like that's how she
Speaker 1: realizes it. And then she sends Harriet to the dentist
Speaker 1: for a month. I'm just like, oh my god, I
Speaker 1: don't know how long the dentist took back then, but
Speaker 1: not a month. Not a month. I didn't even know
Speaker 1: there wered dentists back then. So that's where I'm a
Speaker 1: stick burn. I actually I wouldn't enough, Like I don't know,
Speaker 1: but she got sent away to the dentist long enough
Speaker 1: that she got engaged. Like that's too long to be
Speaker 1: at the dentist. Oh yeah, weird. Okay, So Emma and
Speaker 1: mister Knightley's relationship is evolving, much like how a Pokemon evolves. Oh,
Speaker 1: she's going Charmander to what's the middle one? Was the
Speaker 1: middle one? Oh? I don't know enough about it yet.
Speaker 1: This is my first Pokemon game. She goes Charming. Okay,
Speaker 1: well I'm gonna skip the middle. Then she's there's that
Speaker 1: shot of him touching her waist where she goes Charmander
Speaker 1: to Charizard like that. She's like, you're like, oh uh oh,
Speaker 1: like it's a good I got. I mean, when there's
Speaker 1: a horny a good horny moment in a period piece,
Speaker 1: it's exciting, it's nice. Oh a touch of the waist
Speaker 1: full Charizard Like, That's that's how I'm gonna that's what
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call boner moments now full ars it hits.
Speaker 1: Yeah it works. I thank god Bill Ni was in
Speaker 1: Detective Pikachu, or we wouldn't be on this gorgeous train
Speaker 1: of thought. Well, it's also thanks to me playing eight
Speaker 1: billion hours. It's true Pokemon Arcius right, they're now a
Speaker 1: fish billable hours. Mew chew, mw chew O so funny.
Speaker 1: So after the ball, mister Knightley runs all the way
Speaker 1: to Emma's estate, presumably to profess his love for her,
Speaker 1: but before he can, Frank Churchill shows up carrying Harriet,
Speaker 1: who is injured. Harriet tells Emma that she's in love again,
Speaker 1: and Emma assumes Harriet means she's in love with Frank,
Speaker 1: and Emma promises not to interfere this time like she's
Speaker 1: done in the past. Then, mister Knightley invites several people
Speaker 1: to his estate for an afternoon, during which Emma lets
Speaker 1: it slip that she thinks Miss Bates is very boring
Speaker 1: to her face to Miss s Bates's face horrible. Mis
Speaker 1: Bates is extremely hurt by this. She all but like
Speaker 1: burst shit like evil, so evil, and mister Knightley is
Speaker 1: also taken aback by Emma's cruelness and confronts Emma about it,
Speaker 1: and she feels awful. Then Emma learns that Frank Churchill
Speaker 1: is engaged to Jane Fairfax and secretly has been for
Speaker 1: quite some time. So Emma feels horrible on Harriet's behalf
Speaker 1: because she knows that Harriet is in love with Frank.
Speaker 1: But then Harriet is like, no, Frank isn't who I'm
Speaker 1: in love with. I love mister Knightley, which like started
Speaker 1: when he asked Harriet to dance at the ball when
Speaker 1: no one else would dance with her. But then Harriet
Speaker 1: realizes that Emma also loves mister Knightley, which drives a
Speaker 1: wedge between them. So when mister Knightley professes his love
Speaker 1: for Emma and proposes to her, She's like, well, we
Speaker 1: can't do anything about it because Harriet loves you and
Speaker 1: I don't want to hurt her anymore. And he's like, okay,
Speaker 1: well I have to go convince mister Martin to propose
Speaker 1: to Harriet again, and Emma's like, no, I have to
Speaker 1: be the one to do it. I have to display
Speaker 1: character growth because the book doesn't do that. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I will say the addition of Emma's nosebleed makes the
Speaker 1: movie The two Emma's nosebleed and Bill and I he
Speaker 1: hopping down the stairs makes it a must watch for me,
Speaker 1: warts and all. It makes it a must watch. Yes,
Speaker 1: So Emma goes and does this to convince mister Martin
Speaker 1: to propose to Harriet. It works, Harriet accepts his proposal.
Speaker 1: So now Emma and mister Knightley are free to be
Speaker 1: with each other. So they cannoodle, they kiss, and then
Speaker 1: the movie ends with them getting married. The end slurpp. Okay,
Speaker 1: let's take another quick break and then we will come
Speaker 1: right back to discuss, and we're back, okay. So I'm
Speaker 1: gonna be talking about the book and movie back and
Speaker 1: forth throughout this episode, because boy, is this a log
Speaker 1: book and it's got to be worth it for me, okay, please,
Speaker 1: by all means. So, the main difference, and we talked
Speaker 1: about this in the Pride and Prejudice episode two, where
Speaker 1: it's like there's a lot of trimming out excess characters,
Speaker 1: storylines that are just going on forever, stuff like that,
Speaker 1: which makes sense. But the big change at the end
Speaker 1: is in Emma period in twenty twenty, Emma has to
Speaker 1: make things right with Harriet because she has like fucked
Speaker 1: up Harriet's life under the guise of like, I'm such
Speaker 1: a good person. And then it turns out that if
Speaker 1: she had just left Harriet alone, Harriet would have made
Speaker 1: the right decision on her own months ago and would
Speaker 1: have gone through much less emotional distress and gas lighting
Speaker 1: and all the kind of just being fucked around by
Speaker 1: weird rich people. Right, and so in the movie, I
Speaker 1: think it's really smart that Emma has to like atone
Speaker 1: for that. It still is pretty abrupt, but at least
Speaker 1: they have her, you know, she has to say I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: She has to go and apologize for being an asshole.
Speaker 1: In the book, that is not what happens in the book.
Speaker 1: When Nightly proposes to Emma, she says yes right away,
Speaker 1: and then she says, yes, but let's not tell Harriet
Speaker 1: what she's so mean. In the book she says she's like,
Speaker 1: absolutely yes, love you so much, my king, but don't
Speaker 1: tell Harriet because whoopsie daisies she's in love with you.
Speaker 1: And Nightly is like, oh yeah, let's not tell her.
Speaker 1: And then Emma sends Harriet away. Emma is like, Harriet,
Speaker 1: don't you have to go to the dentist. You should
Speaker 1: go to my sister's house in London, like, get the
Speaker 1: fuck out of here. She disappears Harriet so that she
Speaker 1: can tell her society, like I'm engaged to mister Knightley,
Speaker 1: but don't tell Harriet yet. She's going to be so
Speaker 1: pissed off at me, Like she feels guilty about it.
Speaker 1: It's not completely evil, but like she sends Harriet away,
Speaker 1: and then you know, in the movie Emma, she gets
Speaker 1: a noseblade, which is so funny. She gets she gets
Speaker 1: a noseblade, and she's like, I want to marry you,
Speaker 1: but I have to make some things right first, which
Speaker 1: it totally makes more sense for the character demonstrating growth.
Speaker 1: And then she has to go, you know, tail between
Speaker 1: her legs. She has to go to mister Martin and
Speaker 1: say I fucked up. I meddled too much. You and
Speaker 1: Harriet clearly belong together and really care about each other,
Speaker 1: and like make it right. She does not do that
Speaker 1: in the book either, So she sends Harriet away, and
Speaker 1: then just kind of while Harriet's away, she runs into
Speaker 1: mister Martin and is like, hey, do you still love me?
Speaker 1: And he's like yes, and then they get married and
Speaker 1: Emma doesn't find out for like where Emma goes to
Speaker 1: the wedding in the end, but like it just all happens,
Speaker 1: Like Emma doesn't have to do anything. She's like rewarded
Speaker 1: for sending Harry it away because if she hadn't sent
Speaker 1: Harry it away, then how would she have gotten back
Speaker 1: in touch with mister Martin or whatever? Like it sucks.
Speaker 1: And then at the very end of the book, in
Speaker 1: the last like what I find so bizarre about Emma
Speaker 1: And again it's I'm not I'm nowhere near Jane Austen,
Speaker 1: like I don't know even like a fishy, and like
Speaker 1: I'm sure we have listeners who have a better understanding
Speaker 1: of this than I do. But I just found it
Speaker 1: so bizarre that, like in this book versus Pride and Prejudice,
Speaker 1: it's a lot of like Jane Austen reinforcing the class
Speaker 1: status quo. By the end of the book, everyone marries
Speaker 1: within their class, and that was the right and morally upright,
Speaker 1: like is like socially and morally correct that everyone remained
Speaker 1: within their class, whereas in Pride and Prejudice that is
Speaker 1: not the case that that novel pushes against it. It's
Speaker 1: interesting because now that we know that, like Jane Austen
Speaker 1: had a lot of complicated feelings on class and definitely
Speaker 1: some class resentment that comes through in her workmen then
Speaker 1: other times it's like she's kind of reinforcing a status quo.
Speaker 1: We're not scholars, we don't know, but like, I just
Speaker 1: think it's so interesting that, like, because it does feel
Speaker 1: true to like born into wealth kind of richness. That
Speaker 1: it's like all of her problems are extremely temporary, and
Speaker 1: that is like how it plays out in real life
Speaker 1: very often. But it's so frustrating to see it, like
Speaker 1: like it's just Ana Taylor Joys, like, oh I was
Speaker 1: being such an asshole, blah blah blah, and then mister
Speaker 1: Knightley runs up. He's like I love you, and you're like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: I guess it all worked out. Yeah. I feel like
Speaker 1: Emma comments on gender pretty effectively, but I find the
Speaker 1: way it deals with class weird because at the end
Speaker 1: of the book, I think the movie does it better.
Speaker 1: I like the things that the movie does. But in
Speaker 1: the book, at the end, Emma and Harriet do meet
Speaker 1: up one more time. She finds out that Harriet's father
Speaker 1: was like a tradesman in bloody Bloo England. And instead
Speaker 1: of saying like I'm sorry, I love you, you're you
Speaker 1: and mister Martin are welcome at Wallcorn or whatever her
Speaker 1: house is called any time in the book, she says okay,
Speaker 1: well bye, and then in like whatever the narration, Jane
Speaker 1: Austen basically says, like Emma and Harriet quickly fell out
Speaker 1: of touch because it would have been socially improper for
Speaker 1: Emma to hang out with a farmer's wife. That would
Speaker 1: have sucked, and like their friendship ends like they're just
Speaker 1: like within a few months, Emma and Harriet didn't talk
Speaker 1: anymore and that was the correct thing to happen, because
Speaker 1: you know, you can't catch Emma dead like hanging out
Speaker 1: with a farmer's wife and the end. And so there's
Speaker 1: a lot of there have been some schoolers who argue
Speaker 1: that in the book Emma is both like limited in
Speaker 1: a weird it almost kind of reminds me of like
Speaker 1: Belle from Beauty and the Beast, where she has this
Speaker 1: dream of like living and doing all these things she
Speaker 1: wants much more than this provincial life. Perhaps yeah, and
Speaker 1: then she ends up moving four feet from where she
Speaker 1: came from, So why even sing that song if you're
Speaker 1: going to end up getting her married four feet from
Speaker 1: where she lived, she literally still lives in the province,
Speaker 1: So why did that happen? And it's not that Emma
Speaker 1: just like Emma is like set on being with her
Speaker 1: father and like that is I mean, there's gender stuff
Speaker 1: in there, but like she wants to stay with her dad.
Speaker 1: But it just seems like the argument is, like, Emma,
Speaker 1: doesn't you know the only thing that's really changed for
Speaker 1: her at the end of the book is that she's
Speaker 1: now like well married, So her like whole independent I
Speaker 1: never want to get married thing is gone, and she
Speaker 1: is still pretty aggressively classised. So there's a lot of
Speaker 1: arguments for the book Emma to be like, well, she
Speaker 1: learned a lot of lessons, but whether she actually applied
Speaker 1: them to her life is pretty unclear. M it was bizarre. Well,
Speaker 1: I find some things about the way the movie ends
Speaker 1: not as bizarre as what you've described, Yeah, the book ending,
Speaker 1: but still kind of bizarre, where like Emma owes several
Speaker 1: different people apologies that she does not deliver, and yeah,
Speaker 1: just I do. I was wondering about mister Knightley's like
Speaker 1: I have to go find mister Martin and like get
Speaker 1: him to propose to Harriet, and Emma is like, no,
Speaker 1: I've got to do it. Yeah, neither of them do that.
Speaker 1: They're like, um, yeah, send Harriet to the dentist, and
Speaker 1: then Harriet's gone for a month. They're like, they said
Speaker 1: Harriet to the dentist for a whole last month, because
Speaker 1: they like, are too chicken shit to be honest. That said,
Speaker 1: there are more apologies issued in the book than in
Speaker 1: the movie, and I feel like there are some, like
Speaker 1: particularly between Emma and Jane. Jane has a much, much,
Speaker 1: much larger role in the book. Okay, wait, who is
Speaker 1: oh Jane Fairfax? Jane Fairfax who ends up getting married
Speaker 1: to Frank, which I'm just like, fuck, Frank can't stay Frank.
Speaker 1: But at least at least the book, the book very
Speaker 1: much knows that Frank sucks and that he is just
Speaker 1: so like mister Knightley. They kind of do it in
Speaker 1: the movie, but I thought it was funny in the
Speaker 1: book where mister Knightley is constantly and I've always am
Speaker 1: like mister Knightley is much older than them, which maybe
Speaker 1: is not obvious in the movie that age gap is present.
Speaker 1: Between the actors. The actor playing Knightly is thirteen years
Speaker 1: older than Annya Taylor Joy, but in the book it's
Speaker 1: very like Victorian and to the point where it gets
Speaker 1: creepy where he's thirty six in the book, Emma's twenty
Speaker 1: one and he's like, oh, I knew I was in
Speaker 1: love you since you were thirteen, and you're like, that's
Speaker 1: enough of that. Like so they make it out. I mean,
Speaker 1: even though that age gap is more or less present
Speaker 1: in the movie, I feel like there's no attention called
Speaker 1: to it, and the actor in his thirties looks pretty young.
Speaker 1: But yeah, then Nightly in the book they really like Jane.
Speaker 1: Austen is very much pointing out like, oh, she's marrying
Speaker 1: a father figure too, which also just doesn't seem very
Speaker 1: I get why mister Knightley and Emma like each other,
Speaker 1: but I didn't. I didn't love in the book how
Speaker 1: they're just like, yeah, he knew, you know, she was
Speaker 1: a child, that he was a man, and now she's
Speaker 1: a woman and he's still a man. But sometimes the
Speaker 1: point is, and I'm about to say something I like,
Speaker 1: which is so I'm being all over the place. But
Speaker 1: in the book, mister Knightley. He's like at least ten
Speaker 1: years older than all of these, like people in their
Speaker 1: early twenties and like late teens, and so sometimes he'll
Speaker 1: talk about them the way that like a thirty something
Speaker 1: person would talk about a twenty one year old's decisions.
Speaker 1: And he's just like, Frank fucking sucks. I can't believe
Speaker 1: that everything like works out so well for him, because
Speaker 1: he's an asshole to everybody. Jane Fairfax is like way
Speaker 1: too good for him. I don't know what she sees
Speaker 1: in him. He's so lucky that he could treat her
Speaker 1: so poorly and that she would still come like mister
Speaker 1: Knightley does explicitly say all of that stuff, So I'm like, okay,
Speaker 1: Jane Austen knows that this is not how you treat
Speaker 1: a woman who is like intelligent and cool the way
Speaker 1: that Jane Fairfax is, but it still has like it's
Speaker 1: just so bizarre, like it's just a weird book. I mean,
Speaker 1: I really, I don't know. Even though it's like aesthetically
Speaker 1: like whatever and time period wise similar to Pride and Prejudice,
Speaker 1: the stories are are very different. It's weird, and yet
Speaker 1: there are some similarities. Who did you think needed apologies.
Speaker 1: I thought that miss Bates was owed a major apology,
Speaker 1: and even though Emma does bring her like a basket,
Speaker 1: she doesn't really address what she did. Yeah and barely
Speaker 1: says I'm sorry. She gets an apology in the book,
Speaker 1: which is weird. The things scout that back. She apologizes
Speaker 1: profusely in the book. I thought that was going to
Speaker 1: happen in the movie, but instead she's like, here's a basket,
Speaker 1: gotta go. And then miss miss Bates is just like
Speaker 1: you are so you're too kind. You've always been so kind,
Speaker 1: and it's like she just made you cry for saying
Speaker 1: something really mean and insulting to you. Miss Bates, right,
Speaker 1: and Nightly was right, like I'm glad. I am glad
Speaker 1: that Nightly like gave her ship for that, and that's
Speaker 1: like that is such a Jane like and I guess
Speaker 1: maybe just like a Victorian male hero thing in general,
Speaker 1: but it's like the fucking binary in this situation is
Speaker 1: like guy with charisma, dirty liar, don't talk to him,
Speaker 1: guy who's sort of mean to you. Now that's the
Speaker 1: love of your life, like right, And then the other
Speaker 1: major apology that I thought needed to happen that didn't
Speaker 1: really is is Emma apologizing to and maybe maybe this
Speaker 1: does happen better than I remember. But so Emma goes
Speaker 1: and makes things right by approaching mister Martin and convincing
Speaker 1: him to propose again to Harriet, which again I like.
Speaker 1: When I saw that in the movie, I was like,
Speaker 1: that's a very active thing for a female character to
Speaker 1: do in a story written in this time period. It
Speaker 1: seems a little too modern for that to be the case.
Speaker 1: And it turns out, yes, correct, Yeah, they I boss
Speaker 1: that part, But I do like, I do like that
Speaker 1: she I think that's way more effective. Oh definitely, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't. I don't. I like the change. I like
Speaker 1: the adaptation change. I like, you know, in general, making
Speaker 1: a female character more active and giving her more agency. Um. Okay,
Speaker 1: So then when she does that, she meddles one last time,
Speaker 1: but it works out and Harriet's and mister Martin's favor
Speaker 1: where they get engaged. Either way, I feel like Emma
Speaker 1: owes Harriet a much more significant apology for meddling in
Speaker 1: Harriet's life and her you know, romantic situation, like her
Speaker 1: romantic life, and Emma does not really give that apology,
Speaker 1: So I feel like, you know, Emma needs to hold
Speaker 1: herself accountable more than she does in general. But yeah,
Speaker 1: that's just me. It's all weird, like if all in
Speaker 1: the book, I thinks I was bummed about that didn't
Speaker 1: make it from the book to the movie mostly, but
Speaker 1: the movie clearly is choosing to focus more on the
Speaker 1: Emma and Harriet friendship, Like there's a lot of emphasis
Speaker 1: given to it, which I do like, and I think
Speaker 1: it's like almost, well, I don't we'll get there. But
Speaker 1: what I was bummed about was I think my favorite
Speaker 1: character in the book is Jane, and Jane does not
Speaker 1: get a lot of playtime in the movie, and I
Speaker 1: wonder if she maybe did in the Gwyneth Paltrow one,
Speaker 1: I'd be curious. But I really really really liked Jane
Speaker 1: in the movie in the book because like you were
Speaker 1: sort of saying, like the people in this movie, like
Speaker 1: in the movie, everyone acts a little silly because it's
Speaker 1: like whatever. Mister Woodhouse is a good example of an
Speaker 1: upper class character who acts very silly. He's a hypochondriac.
Speaker 1: He's very particular, like there's always a draft, there's always
Speaker 1: a draft, and Bill nyghe is like king, like love him.
Speaker 1: So it's not like only people of the lower classes
Speaker 1: are written to be goofy, but it feels more point
Speaker 1: like the way Miss bates Is character is written where
Speaker 1: you do get that moment where it's like, no, of
Speaker 1: course she knows when she's being insulted, yeah, and it
Speaker 1: hurts her. So it's like it's not like those humanizing
Speaker 1: moments aren't there. But I feel like between Harriet and
Speaker 1: miss Bates, you're sort of like led to believe that,
Speaker 1: like women of the lower class are silly and less
Speaker 1: intelligent and like because I would guess, I mean, Tie
Speaker 1: is the Harriet of Clueless, right, And yeah, I feel
Speaker 1: like that is more effectively done and Tie gets more
Speaker 1: humanizing moments than Harriet does, because I do feel like
Speaker 1: it's like, ultimately Harriet is so and also she's a teenager,
Speaker 1: like she's very impressionable. She's being thrown into this world.
Speaker 1: But the I don't know, I don't know, maybe I
Speaker 1: take it back because like missus Elton as a rich
Speaker 1: lady and she's the goofiest woman alive, right, and Elton
Speaker 1: himself is I mean, I guess they're like upper middle
Speaker 1: class like climbered because they're always like my friend mister Knightley,
Speaker 1: and mister Knightley's like rich enough and powerful enough to
Speaker 1: be completely you know, and ask in the way that
Speaker 1: mister Darcy is wearing. I feel like those are very
Speaker 1: similar characters but just very different heroines, which is interesting
Speaker 1: right to the point where I'm like, I don't really know,
Speaker 1: Like I get why he but I'm just like, is
Speaker 1: this a good match? Anyways? What was I gonna say? Oh,
Speaker 1: but Jane Fairfax. So Jane Fairfax, I feel like, is
Speaker 1: a really really good antidote to how Silly Harriet and
Speaker 1: miss Bates are written, because she's from that same class
Speaker 1: and what they get rid of in the movie. I think,
Speaker 1: correct me if this is like referenced in a scene
Speaker 1: in Passing, but that like, Jane's situation is that she
Speaker 1: is firm like she's a Bates, She's of that class,
Speaker 1: she's related to them, but when her parents died, she
Speaker 1: ended up like going to stay with a rich friend
Speaker 1: of her father's and so she grew up in the
Speaker 1: upper class, but she's not of them, and so her
Speaker 1: situation is that she can hang out in the upper class,
Speaker 1: but ultimately, when she turns twenty one, she has to
Speaker 1: become a governess or like she has to have a
Speaker 1: working class job. Do they mention that in the movie,
Speaker 1: because like the stakes are pretty high for her, right,
Speaker 1: So it's like confusing the way she appears in the movie.
Speaker 1: I found a little confusing because it's like in the book,
Speaker 1: her stakes are very high in terms of like she's
Speaker 1: grown up a certain way. It's clear that she doesn't
Speaker 1: want to leave everyone she knows because her parents happened
Speaker 1: to be middle class, but she's going to have to.
Speaker 1: And then you know, she's secretly engaged to Frank for
Speaker 1: most of the book, but Frank treats her so badly
Speaker 1: that she's like at the end, she's like, fuck you,
Speaker 1: I'm going to become a governess. And that is what
Speaker 1: motivates him to Yeah, like all of it, Like, there's
Speaker 1: a lot of Jane's stuff that goes on in the book.
Speaker 1: She and Emma have a lot of scenes together in
Speaker 1: the book that I really liked where Jane you get
Speaker 1: moments of it in the movie. But like Emma is
Speaker 1: jealous of Jane because Jane is just as whatever refined,
Speaker 1: if not more so, is just as talented, if not
Speaker 1: more so, than Emma and is from the middle class,
Speaker 1: and so that's what bothers Emma about it, is like
Speaker 1: Jane doesn't have a lot of the advantages that Emma
Speaker 1: did of birth, but is kind of like better than
Speaker 1: her in a lot of ways. And so Emma kind
Speaker 1: of like weaponizes that insecurity about like how is Jane
Speaker 1: so good at this, this and this, and kind of
Speaker 1: flings it in her face and Jane responds, and like
Speaker 1: there's this interesting tension between them, and by the end,
Speaker 1: Emma grows a little bit and once she realizes like
Speaker 1: Jane was in love with Frank and like Emma was
Speaker 1: totally off about everything, she goes to Jane and gives
Speaker 1: like a really sincere apology and is like, I wish
Speaker 1: that we had been friends all of these years, but
Speaker 1: we were pitted against each other when we were so young.
Speaker 1: And also I was jealous of you, and like I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: and I hope that you have a happy life marrying
Speaker 1: this fucking jerk. But like it was just I thought
Speaker 1: it was a very satisfying. Jane was my favorite, yeah,
Speaker 1: because she just she did what she had to do,
Speaker 1: but she did it with class and she didn't meddle,
Speaker 1: and I just wish she was like ended up with
Speaker 1: someone cooler than Frank, but she loved Frank. So I
Speaker 1: guess sure, fine, Oh, I guess sure. Justice for Jane.
Speaker 1: No no. Yeah. Also, there's too many Janes, because there's
Speaker 1: Jane and Pride and prejudice too, and there's she Jane Austin.
Speaker 1: There were like seven different names back then. I guess
Speaker 1: it's an interesting adaptation because it's been I guess pretty
Speaker 1: thoroughly debated. Whether Jane Austin even likes Emma based on
Speaker 1: the way she written in the book and the fact
Speaker 1: that she Some people view Emma the novel as like
Speaker 1: a full on class satire because Emma learns all these
Speaker 1: things about the world and still acts like a rich
Speaker 1: person at the end of the day. And so like,
Speaker 1: Emma gets everything she wants because of course she does,
Speaker 1: she's fucking rich. Like, no matter how much you force
Speaker 1: onto the like genteel class about the reality of the world,
Speaker 1: things are still going to work out for them. And like,
Speaker 1: so there is a way of looking at it from
Speaker 1: the book of like, yeah, Emma sucks. The author knows that,
Speaker 1: and like, to some extent, that's the point. But because
Speaker 1: of how movies work, and are sold you can't really
Speaker 1: do that, or you can, but like most adaptations choose
Speaker 1: not to over like having Emma display learning, Like I
Speaker 1: feel like this movie takes the I don't think this
Speaker 1: is like unusual, but like this movie takes the route
Speaker 1: of like she learns about class and successfully applies that
Speaker 1: to how she lives her life, and she stands as
Speaker 1: this like symbol that she does in the book as
Speaker 1: well of like you can have the most privileged it's
Speaker 1: possible for a woman to have in this time and
Speaker 1: still be basically fucked, which is which is something that
Speaker 1: I think is touched on more effectively in Pride and Prejudice. Right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: so I don't know. I mean, I I don't like Emma,
Speaker 1: but I like watching Emma, and I'm constantly frustrated by
Speaker 1: like the lack of consequences she experiences. This movie has
Speaker 1: to add consequences to get her to a place where
Speaker 1: it seems like she's grown, and it still feels like
Speaker 1: she kind of gets off easy for whatever. Right, she
Speaker 1: doesn't grow or arc as much as I would want
Speaker 1: to see a character grow. But also, you know, she
Speaker 1: does come from extremely rich and privileged background, so like
Speaker 1: kind of what do you expect from someone like that?
Speaker 1: You kind of just like I would have to like
Speaker 1: suspend my disbelief more that she does have a significant
Speaker 1: arc and that she lets go of some of her
Speaker 1: perhaps prides and prejudices the ha ha. And I think
Speaker 1: it is more believable that she kind of stays a
Speaker 1: pretty static character, right, I mean, if it is satire,
Speaker 1: I mean the movie. I don't think the movie is satire.
Speaker 1: The movie, I feel like definitely isn't satire. The book
Speaker 1: arguably could be seen that way, but also we're not
Speaker 1: talking about the button, but the movie I don't think.
Speaker 1: I think the movie tries to kind of plays it
Speaker 1: pretty straight. Yeah, and like adds in moments to give
Speaker 1: Emma growth. And I thought it was like interesting. I
Speaker 1: read some and watched some interviews with the director of
Speaker 1: this movie, who I man, hope she's listening. She I'm like,
Speaker 1: she's so fucking cool. After Autumn de Wilde, it was
Speaker 1: her first feature, she directed, her first feature in her
Speaker 1: late forties. She walks with a cane that has a
Speaker 1: shot glass built into the cane, which she's just so
Speaker 1: fucking cool, Like it's unbelievable. And she started as a
Speaker 1: music video director. She's like of that pipeline, but unlike
Speaker 1: many male music video directors who I feel like direct,
Speaker 1: you know, like I'm thinking of like your David Fincher's,
Speaker 1: your Spike Joneses, who direct a few successful music videos
Speaker 1: and then are directing movies by the time they're in
Speaker 1: their late twenties early thirties. She had to fight to
Speaker 1: make not this movie specifically, but like to make a
Speaker 1: movie of her own for decades because you know, misogyny
Speaker 1: and what. Anyways, Sorry, we've ben talked about this on
Speaker 1: the show before. Excuse me, and I don't have time
Speaker 1: hang on, but she fucking rocks, Like all of her
Speaker 1: interviews are like she's just she dresses. She just oh
Speaker 1: you'll like this. She described her personal style as Oscar
Speaker 1: Wilde meets Paddington Bear, and it totally tracks. She's just
Speaker 1: she's so fun. Like she sort of made it her
Speaker 1: mission statement of the movie to like create a very
Speaker 1: beautiful movie, which like mission accomplished that I hear based
Speaker 1: on all of the fucking costuming YouTubers I watch because
Speaker 1: I'm a Door is a very period accurate nice because
Speaker 1: all the all the costuming YouTubers they're like this is
Speaker 1: eighteen o four and it should be eighteen o four
Speaker 1: and a half, like whatever, But this one apparently like
Speaker 1: the attention to details, like on point, it's beautiful. It
Speaker 1: looks like a music video in a way that isn't
Speaker 1: distracting whatever. But she said like, oh, I you know,
Speaker 1: you have this flawed heroine in the form of Emma.
Speaker 1: And I'm like that is true, but I and yet
Speaker 1: I really like and this isn't even a criticism of
Speaker 1: the movie or the book. I just am like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't like Emma. Like I'm like not, I'm interested
Speaker 1: in what happens to her, and I want her to
Speaker 1: display growth, but I like, don't really, it's so obvious
Speaker 1: that she's going to be fine, and then at the
Speaker 1: end she's fine, right yeah, where it's like with Lizzie Bennett,
Speaker 1: the stakes are relatively high, like she you know, and
Speaker 1: it is like we talked about in the last episode,
Speaker 1: where it's like, you know, the middle class is not
Speaker 1: a death sentence, but in the society that they're in it,
Speaker 1: you know, the misogyny was much more intense and there's
Speaker 1: all this stuff, but Emma doesn't really It's made very
Speaker 1: clear early on that even though Emma remaining single, there
Speaker 1: is some discrimination against her, which you get in those
Speaker 1: few moments of like well wives first, like single ladies
Speaker 1: to the back, and Emma never wants to get married,
Speaker 1: So this is how she'll be treated her whole life.
Speaker 1: But it's made clear very early in the book and
Speaker 1: I think in the movie too, that like, even though
Speaker 1: this is an unconventional decision, her immediate support system fully
Speaker 1: accepts it and accepts her and thinks she's amazing, and
Speaker 1: she'll be able to do it without her quality of
Speaker 1: life being sacrificed, right because, as we talked about in
Speaker 1: the last episode, one of the reasons that so many
Speaker 1: women were so concerned about, like, oh my god, I
Speaker 1: have to get married, and I have to get married
Speaker 1: right now, and it has to be to a man
Speaker 1: who has a big income, because that was literally a
Speaker 1: survival thing. More than the very tropy. Women just love
Speaker 1: romance and they love getting married for the sake of
Speaker 1: being married thing. So it's just like when Lizzie Bennett
Speaker 1: refuses someone's hand, a rich person's hand, it's a way
Speaker 1: bigger deal than when Emma refuses anyone because she's going
Speaker 1: to be fine no matter what which just for me
Speaker 1: makes it like her a like rich Girl learns a
Speaker 1: lesson is just not a very compelling narrative to me.
Speaker 1: Let me pronouncing the tia narrative, what a bitch, Sorry,
Speaker 1: but it isn't like I just I don't know. And
Speaker 1: again it's like, I'll be damned if I could tell
Speaker 1: you why it works for me. And clue is maybe
Speaker 1: I just like the outfits better. But like, yeah, rich
Speaker 1: girl learns a lesson is just not interesting to me,
Speaker 1: especially because it's like there, I just think, I don't know.
Speaker 1: I'm just like Jane Fairfax is more like her story
Speaker 1: is more interesting, Like I've in my mind, Emma is
Speaker 1: a b character and Jane Fairfax's story, which is more
Speaker 1: laired and more interesting, it has more to say about
Speaker 1: class and gender and like how people interact with each other.
Speaker 1: But I see what you mean. I don't think it's
Speaker 1: the most compelling story ever told. Sure, which is my
Speaker 1: standard for every movie. But if we do have to
Speaker 1: watch movies about rich people, which many movies are, I'd
Speaker 1: rather them learn and have an arc and see the
Speaker 1: error of the ways. But the thing, I think what
Speaker 1: Emma learns more than like I should be more empathetic
Speaker 1: to people of a lower class than me. What she
Speaker 1: learns more than that lesson is she just learns to
Speaker 1: stop meddling in other people's lives. Right, So for sure,
Speaker 1: if she learned something that had more to do with like, oh,
Speaker 1: I should stop treating poor people like they're a little
Speaker 1: project of mine and treat them like human beings, or
Speaker 1: I should spread my wealth meaningfully or something like that,
Speaker 1: I would find that way more compelling than her just
Speaker 1: being like, oops, I played Matchmaker one too many times
Speaker 1: or whatever. Right, And it's like hard because it's like
Speaker 1: I know that. That's why this story is like light
Speaker 1: and fluffy and fun. It is because it's like this
Speaker 1: young woman is clearly like if I was, like Emma's
Speaker 1: clearly projecting, like that's so much of the movie as
Speaker 1: like I don't want to deal with my or maybe
Speaker 1: it's clear in the book. I don't know, Like it
Speaker 1: feels kind of clear that it's like Emma. Part of
Speaker 1: the reason Emma metals and other people's lives is because
Speaker 1: she is not able to see herself as the protagonist
Speaker 1: of her own life, which is interesting, like she keeps
Speaker 1: casting herself as like Judy Greer in her own life,
Speaker 1: and it's like interesting choice because you're literally a millionaire,
Speaker 1: And like, I wonder, I'm sure someone's done Emma's astrological chart,
Speaker 1: because it's so like she does have this like superhuman
Speaker 1: ability to like that I know, like people have, but
Speaker 1: it's just not relatable to me at all. Of like,
Speaker 1: she's able to see romantic issues very like objectively, and
Speaker 1: she looks at romance in terms of class, which I think,
Speaker 1: which is why I wish that I guess that that's
Speaker 1: part of why I ultimately kind of walk away disappointed
Speaker 1: that there's not more said about class, because she is
Speaker 1: very obviously arranging people and doing this like puppetmaster thing
Speaker 1: based on class, like the reason that she wants Harriet
Speaker 1: like and and and then there's also this theme in
Speaker 1: the book that is not touched on in the movie,
Speaker 1: where it's like or she she says it about mister Martin.
Speaker 1: I think that that's the most you get. At the
Speaker 1: beginning of the movie, she talks about like, well, I
Speaker 1: don't give a shit about mister Martin because he's not
Speaker 1: poor enough for me to look like a hero if
Speaker 1: I help him, right, He's not rich enough that he
Speaker 1: can actually hang out with me, so why would I
Speaker 1: give a shit about him? And she's basically like, the
Speaker 1: middle class is useless to me, because right, and so
Speaker 1: it's like she's she's an extremely classist character and that
Speaker 1: is like cannon to the book and the movie and
Speaker 1: like explicitly says like and she says this too, Harriet,
Speaker 1: which makes it clear that Emma's like, yeah, I consider
Speaker 1: you someone worth helping because because you're so poor, right,
Speaker 1: you come from nothing, and you don't even know who
Speaker 1: your parents are. But let's pretend like your father is
Speaker 1: a gentleman. That's just what we'll say, right, And like,
Speaker 1: so it's a game turn her like poor people are pawns,
Speaker 1: and a game that she uses to elevate her own profile,
Speaker 1: a game of chess. Netflix. I gave of my boyfriend chess. Netflix.
Speaker 1: That's what a fun name, mewtwo. You two. I'm so tired? Okay,
Speaker 1: so same oh oh, So, like Emma is like the
Speaker 1: metaiest metaller that ever was, And part of it's because
Speaker 1: she is like you know, like she says, I don't
Speaker 1: want to get married, but then it turns out that
Speaker 1: that's not actually the case. Find that happens whatever, But
Speaker 1: she's she's matching according to class, like she wants Harriet
Speaker 1: to class jump, like she wants Harriett to jump at
Speaker 1: tax bracket. And that is why she keeps trying to
Speaker 1: convince Harriet that she's in love with all of these men.
Speaker 1: And Harriet is very young and very impressionable and kind
Speaker 1: of out of her depth in many ways in this story,
Speaker 1: and so she ends up like experiencing a lot of
Speaker 1: emotional pain as I think, like a late high school
Speaker 1: early college student, right, because this rich girl is like,
Speaker 1: I want you to jump class you know, which, which
Speaker 1: is in the context of this society, Like you could argue,
Speaker 1: you know, Emma wants to secure Harriet a better future
Speaker 1: than she would have if they hadn't met. Sure, However,
Speaker 1: once mister Knightley comes into the picture, obviously that's not
Speaker 1: the case because once she figures out like and this
Speaker 1: is more explicit in the book, but like, once Emma
Speaker 1: figures out that Harriet is in love with mister Knightley,
Speaker 1: technically that is exactly what Emma was trying to do,
Speaker 1: make a match for Harriet that was above her class
Speaker 1: that Harriet felt good about. Right, But Emma's like no, no,
Speaker 1: not no, that's actually he's mine, So you have to
Speaker 1: go to the dentist like for a month, and then
Speaker 1: she like possibly fucks her friend over permanently, and then
Speaker 1: thankfully Harry it gets to marry the guy she wanted
Speaker 1: to marry the whole time. And Emma she doesn't apologize
Speaker 1: to I mean, she does apologize to Harriet in the book,
Speaker 1: but then she never speaks to her again, so it's like, right,
Speaker 1: what was the point I do? Like in the their
Speaker 1: friendship in the movie I think is more effective, but
Speaker 1: it's still just because of like the source material. It's
Speaker 1: like it's just never going to be super satisfying because
Speaker 1: Harriet is just so forgiving of Emma. Everyone is everyone
Speaker 1: she loves Emma. It could be like effective commentary maybe
Speaker 1: if it was like approached differently, but just like people's
Speaker 1: tendency to give rich people so much leeway and like
Speaker 1: forgive them for all of their you know, horrible misdeeds,
Speaker 1: but the movie isn't really commenting on that. It's just
Speaker 1: like presenting, well, the book isn't either, Like right, again,
Speaker 1: a lot of the problems with the movies storyline are
Speaker 1: part and parcel to what the like. I think that
Speaker 1: the I do think the movie does the most I
Speaker 1: can with the story without striking too far from the story.
Speaker 1: Shout out to screenwriter Eleanor Katton, who was a novelist
Speaker 1: who has more recently gone to screenwriting, which is fun.
Speaker 1: Love that for her. I read what was the book
Speaker 1: of hers? I read? I read, Oh, the Luminaries. It
Speaker 1: was good anyways, but there's yeah, there's just like so
Speaker 1: much like Emma Is I guess considered one of Jane
Speaker 1: Austen's more conservative novels because it ultimately kind of ends
Speaker 1: upholding upholding the status quo in most ways where viewed
Speaker 1: from one side, it's like, oh, that's great that Harriet
Speaker 1: married mister Martin because that was who she liked the
Speaker 1: most the whole time, so like, that's her following her bliss.
Speaker 1: But also Jane Austen made these people up, and she
Speaker 1: made it that in every case everyone married from except
Speaker 1: for the only couple that is like has class disparity
Speaker 1: in the way that like dars See and Lizzie Bennett
Speaker 1: do is Jane Fairfax and Frank Churchill. That's the one
Speaker 1: couple actually that is worth But the movie kind of
Speaker 1: chooses not to doesn't really make it clear that that
Speaker 1: that happens because of Jane Fairfax. Erasure right glosses over
Speaker 1: what Jane Fairfax's situation is. I'm going to write one
Speaker 1: of those horrible God, I'm so sick of this happening,
Speaker 1: but I think it would be fun for Jane Fairfax,
Speaker 1: you know, like when I feel like it like peeked
Speaker 1: with like Wicked and like those Gregory mick Whatever's guys
Speaker 1: books where he's like, remember this B character, Well, I
Speaker 1: wrote a whole book about them having sex, And you're like,
Speaker 1: I don't want I don't think I wanted that, but
Speaker 1: they were all bestsellers in like the mid to late
Speaker 1: two thousands. They're like, yeah, remember the like he wrote
Speaker 1: a book about the step sisters. He wrote Wicked. They're
Speaker 1: just like, yeah, I remember this B character. They they're
Speaker 1: so funking horny, and you're just like, ah, okay, whatever,
Speaker 1: I guess. A matron pointed out. Shout out to Abigail
Speaker 1: pointed out on the comments of our Prime Prejudice episode
Speaker 1: that an author named Janice Hadlow wrote a novel called
Speaker 1: The Other Bennett's Sister to flesh out the character of
Speaker 1: Mary Bennett. She was, so see that's the one acceptable answer.
Speaker 1: So that's fine. Mary Bennett and Jane Fairfax are the
Speaker 1: two side characters who are underdeveloped in the books and
Speaker 1: adaptations that I want to write. Oh I want to
Speaker 1: read that Mary Bennett book. Yeah. Oh, Also, someone tweeted
Speaker 1: this at me. I don't know how we missed this,
Speaker 1: you knoww we were like, oh, the actor who plays
Speaker 1: Mary as the least famous of everyone. Apparently she was
Speaker 1: married to Elon Musk twice. Twice they got married and
Speaker 1: then divorced, and then married again and then divorced again.
Speaker 1: So she was busy doing some probably fucked up stuff. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so that I guess that's why she's not acting, because
Speaker 1: she's she was. Look, you're we all on this planet
Speaker 1: have one job, and it's still like not marry Elon
Speaker 1: Musk and many people have um simply failed. As you
Speaker 1: hear that Grimes is La who was married to him
Speaker 1: right now, she did not marry him and then she
Speaker 1: broke up with him, but she did have a baby
Speaker 1: with him. Oh right, okay, okay, And that is unfortunately
Speaker 1: way too much information that I knew. But I'm a
Speaker 1: recovering Grimes fan. I really was. I was a huge
Speaker 1: fan of hers in college and I was like, Wow,
Speaker 1: she's so cool, and then you married Elon Musk. Disappointed.
Speaker 1: Oh you know what, what what I should have said
Speaker 1: instead of that actor who married Elon Musk twice, I
Speaker 1: should have said mute two times. Oh anyway, go on,
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness, Okay, I guess I'm sorry. I don't
Speaker 1: know anyways, Jane Fairfax Rocks Emma is. Emma is fine,
Speaker 1: but she's not the most interesting person in the story,
Speaker 1: I don't think sure. The couple things that struck me
Speaker 1: about her since I wasn't familiar with the book and
Speaker 1: didn't know how this adaptation compared to the book. Speaking
Speaker 1: strictly from watching the movie, standpoint, I found it interesting
Speaker 1: that Emma Her relationship with women was noteworthy in that
Speaker 1: she seems to hate almost every woman she encounters, with
Speaker 1: the exception of Harriet. But that's also an interesting relationship
Speaker 1: because MS sees Harriet and missus Weston right, yes, yes, yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: oh right, okay, So Harriet MS sees more as a
Speaker 1: project than a French person. Yeah, especially in the book
Speaker 1: as you've described it, she was just going to be
Speaker 1: like sorry, mister Knightley's mine. You have to go to
Speaker 1: the dentist now. Right. In the movie, they do change that,
Speaker 1: which humanizes EMA's character more. But even so, m spends
Speaker 1: most of the movie not really treating Harriet as an
Speaker 1: equal and being like, I'm the teacher. I teach you things,
Speaker 1: and you have to do as I say, and if
Speaker 1: you make choices that I don't like, then I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna want to be your friend. So that's a peculiar
Speaker 1: relationship with Missus Weston. Well, Missus Weston is like basically
Speaker 1: her like surrogate mom. So that's right. I think why
Speaker 1: that relationship goes away it is, I do. Yeah, if
Speaker 1: with Emma there is this kind of strong, like she
Speaker 1: has a bit of a guy's gal energy about her,
Speaker 1: where she's much more forgiving and even like celebrates the
Speaker 1: faults of the men around her and is very very
Speaker 1: punitive and judgmental of other women around her. I feel
Speaker 1: like again in the book and at the movie to
Speaker 1: an extent, that's contextualized a little better, where you know, like,
Speaker 1: part of why Lizzie Bennett is amazing is because there's
Speaker 1: constantly this pressure on her to dislike other women and
Speaker 1: She's like, no, fuck you. This is an important relationship
Speaker 1: to be and that's why Lizzie Bennett's the best. Emma
Speaker 1: on the other hand, I feel like experience is that
Speaker 1: same pressure of like we live in a small community,
Speaker 1: everyone's in competition with each other, blah blah blah, and
Speaker 1: she gives into that I feel like in a major way,
Speaker 1: in a way that probably wasn't unusual for that time
Speaker 1: and still happens now, right, But yeah, Emma doesn't really
Speaker 1: push back on that until at the end of the
Speaker 1: book where she issues a series of apologies and makes
Speaker 1: things right, which like sort of happens in the movie.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I wish that had happened more in
Speaker 1: a movie, because if the movie is asking us to
Speaker 1: be endeared and empathetic toward Emma, yeah, she needs to
Speaker 1: grow more and she needs to apologize because the way
Speaker 1: I was seeing it, she starts out hating a lot
Speaker 1: of the women around her, but then sees the error
Speaker 1: in her ways, Like especially after after she's cruel to
Speaker 1: Miss Bates, she offers her a basket and I guess
Speaker 1: that's an apology, but she like kind of she comes
Speaker 1: around on Miss Bates. She doesn't really come around on
Speaker 1: Jane Fairfax in the movie. I would have liked to
Speaker 1: see more of Emma acknowledging that she was being very
Speaker 1: petty and jealous and classics toward Jane, but that we
Speaker 1: don't really see that in the movie, which is weird
Speaker 1: because I feel like it would help the movie, and
Speaker 1: it definitely happens right right with Harriet. Obviously, that's a
Speaker 1: major change in this adaptation, and I think for the
Speaker 1: better because it again does make Emma more empathetic and
Speaker 1: more active. So I'm pro that choice. But I think
Speaker 1: a more effective film overall and like adaptation would have
Speaker 1: shown Emma being prejudice toward the women around her at
Speaker 1: the beginning, but then reconciling with them and like growing
Speaker 1: and having those relationships become more positive by the end
Speaker 1: fresh versus like in the beginning, she's favoring a lot
Speaker 1: of the men around her and like thinking they're awesome.
Speaker 1: She thinks mister Elton is awesome at first. She thinks
Speaker 1: Frank Churchill is awesome before she has ever even met him,
Speaker 1: you know. She thinks all these men are awesome. And
Speaker 1: this is I think done pretty effectively in the movie,
Speaker 1: where she as she gets to know them, realizes their
Speaker 1: actually way worse than she thought, so basically like the
Speaker 1: arc for Emma should have been, like she starts out
Speaker 1: as a very bad, very poor judge of character, and
Speaker 1: then by the end she becomes a way better judge
Speaker 1: of character. And maybe that's and which is like also
Speaker 1: kind of what priend prejudice it is about, but it's
Speaker 1: just better. It's better. I mean, I know that not
Speaker 1: everyone can be Lizzie Bennett, but I'm just like, damn Emma,
Speaker 1: Lizzie Bennett, no contest, honey, I would so be friends
Speaker 1: with Elizabeth Bennett. I don't want to be friends with
Speaker 1: Emma Woodhouse, No, I wish her no ill, But I
Speaker 1: do want to be friends with Jane. And I want
Speaker 1: to talk Jane into divorcing Frank and eloping with me
Speaker 1: because she's awesome. But also it's I don't know in
Speaker 1: this world Jane ending up with Frank is It's funny
Speaker 1: because it's like I kind of in some ways, I
Speaker 1: kind of like and again I'm maybe talking more about
Speaker 1: the book here, but like I kind of like mister
Speaker 1: Knightley more than I like Emma, which feels like a betrayal.
Speaker 1: But like mister Knightley, I see what you mean. Like
Speaker 1: mister Knightley, it has the same amount. I mean, he
Speaker 1: has more privilege than Emma because he's a man, right,
Speaker 1: so like inherently, but personality wise, mister Knightley is way
Speaker 1: more willing, probably also because he's older, way more willing
Speaker 1: to be like you can't treat people like that or
Speaker 1: like in the book especially he goes on some you know,
Speaker 1: too long tears, but like he's he's I think more
Speaker 1: often than Emma presents the morally correct standpoint towards a
Speaker 1: character where he's very quick to be like Frank is
Speaker 1: a bullshit artist, like something isn't quite right there. He's
Speaker 1: like courting you, but it's weird, like he catches on
Speaker 1: to that very quickly. He also catches on quick to
Speaker 1: like Emma, why are you being mean to Jane? She's
Speaker 1: like a perfectly nice person and I think you're maybe
Speaker 1: a little bit jealous of her. And Emma's like no,
Speaker 1: which is which is pointed coming from a man, because
Speaker 1: it's like what does he know? But also he's like
Speaker 1: correct in that situation. And then he also is the
Speaker 1: person that's like, you can't treat miss bates like that,
Speaker 1: and he lays out a pretty like I thought, like
Speaker 1: and this is in the book too, but like a
Speaker 1: pretty gender and class aware argument as to why he's like,
Speaker 1: not only does it mean but you need to keep
Speaker 1: in mind that she does not have the same amount
Speaker 1: of privilege that you have, right, and because of how
Speaker 1: our society is structured, her situation is going to get
Speaker 1: worse with time, So like, how dare you talk to
Speaker 1: her that way? Right, which is also like, well, nightly,
Speaker 1: you could always help her out, You're a fucking bajillionaire.
Speaker 1: But just the fact that he sees and understands gender
Speaker 1: and class issues better than Emma in some ways, and
Speaker 1: then obviously there's other other ways that Emma like Emma
Speaker 1: seems hyper aware of the fact that she will be
Speaker 1: treated differently her whole life if she never gets married,
Speaker 1: and she's already said like, I'm fine with that. It sucks,
Speaker 1: but I'm fine with that, which is I think one
Speaker 1: of the only points that that character has to make
Speaker 1: that was interesting to me. I don't know, I guess
Speaker 1: I'm anti. I just don't like whatever, Like you don't
Speaker 1: have to like her, I don't In many cases, like
Speaker 1: she's supposed to be hard to like, and it works.
Speaker 1: I found it hard to like her, right yeah, Because
Speaker 1: it's also mister Knightley who sees through Frank Churchill right
Speaker 1: away too, and it's like this guy sucks. How do
Speaker 1: you not notice this? And Emma's like, no, he's awesome.
Speaker 1: And in the book, Emma forgives Frank. Frank sends her
Speaker 1: this long letter and he's like, hey, sorry, I was
Speaker 1: like aggressively flirting with you all that time. I assumed
Speaker 1: that you knew that I wasn't serious about it, and
Speaker 1: which in the book is true. So she's like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I do. But it's like, imagine if she didn't know
Speaker 1: how evil that is. And then he's like, yeah, it
Speaker 1: was really mean of me to be like aggressive, like
Speaker 1: because he does it once in the movie, he does
Speaker 1: it all the time. In the book, he's constantly calling
Speaker 1: Jane weird, looking like to throw everyone off his scent
Speaker 1: that he secretly engaged to her. He's like, Jane Fairfax,
Speaker 1: what a weirdo? Hate her, can't stand her, and like
Speaker 1: eggs Emma on to do the same, and then she
Speaker 1: forgives him, and I'm just like, Jane, baby, let's get
Speaker 1: out of here, like I don't know, it's so bizarre,
Speaker 1: like Frank sucks and Nightly Nightly. Then oh so in
Speaker 1: the book, Emma reads the letter and she's like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: you know, Frank, you know, he made a lot of mistakes,
Speaker 1: but I'm glad he apologized, which is true. Men don't
Speaker 1: usually apologize for anything in fiction or real life. So
Speaker 1: there you go, that's good. You know, he did more
Speaker 1: than most people would, but it's still not enough because
Speaker 1: he did a lot of bad stuff. And Nightly reads
Speaker 1: the letter after her, and it's like, all right, well,
Speaker 1: I guess it's good that he apologized, but like, I
Speaker 1: still think Jane is way too good for him and
Speaker 1: I don't want to hang out with him. And I
Speaker 1: was like, yeah, mister Knightley, Well, the other big thing
Speaker 1: for me with this movie is the romance between Emma
Speaker 1: and mister Knightley. I mean, we've already touched on some
Speaker 1: of this stuff, but you know, it starts out not
Speaker 1: unlike the way that like the Lizzie Bennett and Darcy
Speaker 1: relationships starts out where they are, you know, antagonistic toward
Speaker 1: each other. With Emma and Nightly, it's a little more
Speaker 1: like teasy and like they're acquainted already, so they have
Speaker 1: like a rapport that they've had for many years. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's cute. It's cute. And what I find maybe this
Speaker 1: is maybe this is just me, but if I like someone,
Speaker 1: I'm very acutely aware that I like them. I've never
Speaker 1: experienced the thing that seems to happen a lot in
Speaker 1: movies where someone realizes that they've been in love with
Speaker 1: someone for months or years. Has this Does this happen
Speaker 1: to other people? Where they're like, they're just completely clueless
Speaker 1: that they're in love with someone, and one day the
Speaker 1: right clueless, one day a light bulb goes off and
Speaker 1: they're like, wait a minute, I've been in love with
Speaker 1: this person the whole time. Is that a thing? I
Speaker 1: don't know? I mean, I I don't think like in
Speaker 1: this way. I think I find that more. I think
Speaker 1: that that happens more often than enemies to lovers, Like
Speaker 1: I do think that it's like I know, I mean,
Speaker 1: I guess you could argue that that's sort of what
Speaker 1: happened with my parents. They were friends for like I mean,
Speaker 1: granted they're extremely divorced, but my parents were like friends
Speaker 1: for seven years and then they started dating. But were
Speaker 1: they like secretly in love with each other that whole
Speaker 1: time and then they find they like suddenly realized it
Speaker 1: or is it? Probably not, Caitlin, But do I think
Speaker 1: that Nightly has had a thing for Emma forever? Which
Speaker 1: gets problematic because she was a kid for a lot
Speaker 1: of that. But I don't know. I do think that
Speaker 1: they're like, I don't think it happens as often as
Speaker 1: it happens in books, but I do think that, like
Speaker 1: there's plenty of examples in real life of people being
Speaker 1: friends for a long time and then falling in love. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: that I think that's definite thing. But I'm saying, not
Speaker 1: like realizing I've loved you the whole time. I don't
Speaker 1: understand how that would right. Yeah, that sounds made out.
Speaker 1: I mean again, maybe maybe there are people out there
Speaker 1: that that happened, but I don't. I'm just like, I
Speaker 1: don't know. Maybe I'm just so aware of my feelings
Speaker 1: brag that I just know if I love someone, I
Speaker 1: don't know. I anyway, I guess that that well, I know,
Speaker 1: you know what, I think it happens, I do, okay,
Speaker 1: because I was just like, wait, I think that that
Speaker 1: that's actually kind of what happens in my first major relationship.
Speaker 1: I well, I the point I was going to try
Speaker 1: to make was because I like realistic representations of romance
Speaker 1: in media because it so rarely happens. Yeah, so many
Speaker 1: romantic movies just like make up a thing that doesn't
Speaker 1: seem to happen ever in real life, and that's like
Speaker 1: the crux of the relationship, and then convinces people that
Speaker 1: that's how stuff is going to go in their life
Speaker 1: and that it doesn't and then they're just like well,
Speaker 1: and then they're thirty and then they're like, wait a second,
Speaker 1: I guess that wasn't a thing, right, So I was
Speaker 1: just curious, So sound off in the comments. Also, matrons,
Speaker 1: if if it's happened to you where you've loved someone
Speaker 1: for a long time but it took you a very
Speaker 1: long time to realize it and you had no idea
Speaker 1: about your feelings, because if that is a thing, then
Speaker 1: I will I will hold my tongue. I think it
Speaker 1: does happen, but not as often as it does in ficture.
Speaker 1: That's my that's my I don't know, sorry, but that's
Speaker 1: my two little pet. That's should we just end the episode,
Speaker 1: I don't know things are going off the rails. I
Speaker 1: don't think I have anything else to say. Honestly, I
Speaker 1: will say that in the comments of our Patreon someone
Speaker 1: mentioned that Miss Bates and Emma, or their opinion was
Speaker 1: it Miss Bates and Emma was as close to um
Speaker 1: Jane Austen's financial situation, which was that she like had
Speaker 1: some money as a young person, but then when certain
Speaker 1: relatives die, she was dependent and it was single because
Speaker 1: her income from writing wasn't significant enough to like elevate
Speaker 1: her to like Emma's status. So God, just more more grist,
Speaker 1: little to chew on. Yeah, do you ever? Do you
Speaker 1: have anything else here? Just one last really quick thing.
Speaker 1: This is something we you talked about in the ever
Speaker 1: After episode. Yes, okay, I is another movie that paints
Speaker 1: romani people as dangerous thieves. It's not as egregious in
Speaker 1: this movie as it is and ever After I would argue,
Speaker 1: but there's a definite mention of it. And that's something
Speaker 1: that's in the book that I was shocked made it
Speaker 1: to the movie. Shocked, Yeah, because this movie was made
Speaker 1: two years ago and everyone involved should have known better,
Speaker 1: because it's like this movie does take creative license with
Speaker 1: a lot of plot points. Why not that one peepee
Speaker 1: poop poo bad job. Yes, Other than that, yeah, I think, um,
Speaker 1: I guess. My parting word. My parting thoughts are that
Speaker 1: this adaptation could have lent itself to a character in
Speaker 1: Emma that I would be more empathetic toward, had she
Speaker 1: demonstrated more growth by the end, a better judge of
Speaker 1: character by the end, gotten rid of her prides and
Speaker 1: prejudices by the end, especially because so many of the
Speaker 1: people that she was quick to judge or mistreat our
Speaker 1: other women, And had Emma not ended up such a classist,
Speaker 1: anti woman character, which is so hard because it's like
Speaker 1: I don't think that Emma's like anti woman per se,
Speaker 1: but like it's just like it's a very weird, complicated
Speaker 1: thing that the way that this story has been adapted
Speaker 1: makes it hard to be on Emma's side as much
Speaker 1: as the movie would like you to be. I think
Speaker 1: right in the book, I feel like my I forget
Speaker 1: what other but I'm like, I find it very easy
Speaker 1: to believe that the book has elements of satire to it,
Speaker 1: of like rich people are going to be rich people,
Speaker 1: and like, look at all these. I don't know. This
Speaker 1: one is kind of tough because I always want to
Speaker 1: be resistant towards like why doesn't this movie that takes
Speaker 1: place in eighteen twelve have the morals of today. It's like, well,
Speaker 1: we know why, right, But then also why choose to
Speaker 1: adapt something from back then in the twenty twenties and
Speaker 1: not really say anything or do anything about it. I
Speaker 1: felt that way with like, well, I think that she tried,
Speaker 1: Like I that's willy come to the But I do
Speaker 1: think that they tried. I think they changed elements and
Speaker 1: they tried to put you more in the friendship with
Speaker 1: Emma and Harriet. And they try and they did, like
Speaker 1: I mean, and they were successful in putting you more
Speaker 1: in Emma and Harriet's friendship and demonstrating more personal growth
Speaker 1: on Emma's part than takes place in the book. I
Speaker 1: just think it gets a little dissonant, and it gets
Speaker 1: into what was Jane Austen's intent with this character, and
Speaker 1: does the movie telegraph that same intent? So I think
Speaker 1: it's just like it's adaptation wise. For me, it's a
Speaker 1: little messy because I don't think my read of the
Speaker 1: book was that you're not really supposed to be like Wahoo,
Speaker 1: Emma got everything she wanted. It's more like and obviously
Speaker 1: Emma got everything she wanted, where the movie wants you
Speaker 1: to be more like Wallhoo, Emma got everything she wanted.
Speaker 1: And it's just hard when someone is that privileged and
Speaker 1: most of her growth happens through minor inconveniences that affect
Speaker 1: other people more than herself, it's hard to root for her,
Speaker 1: and it's hard to be like Wall who she got
Speaker 1: what she wanted because you're told in the opening line
Speaker 1: she's clever, handsome, and rich. She gets what she wants, right,
Speaker 1: So why am I supposed to be cheering at the
Speaker 1: end when she gets what she wants? So I just
Speaker 1: I don't know. I've it's weird, and it's like I
Speaker 1: want to be careful to not like Project twenty twenty
Speaker 1: two morals onto this story and in the same way
Speaker 1: or like, but Jane Austen has done a better like
Speaker 1: we just covered a story where Jane Austen did, I think,
Speaker 1: like a much more effective job of discussing these same
Speaker 1: topics that feel weird in this adaptation. Right, it's just weird.
Speaker 1: I don't know. My opinion is it's fucking weird. Who knows.
Speaker 1: I mean, honestly, I have had such a good time
Speaker 1: prepping for the It's not to brag, but it's taken
Speaker 1: way longer than it usually does when you're reading a
Speaker 1: whole book and then watching a movie a billion times.
Speaker 1: But I feel really something revisiting Jane Austen's work and
Speaker 1: like having to engage with a period piece like this critically,
Speaker 1: because it is challenging to be like, Okay, you know
Speaker 1: we're an intersectional feminist podcast, but what does that mean
Speaker 1: with this work, and like, how can we analyze something
Speaker 1: without coming to the table with a completely unreasonable expectation,
Speaker 1: and like how does adaptation to I don't know. It's
Speaker 1: been a fun little brain puzzle that everyone's going to
Speaker 1: view differently, but I've enjoyed it. I don't know, But
Speaker 1: I mean Pride and Prejudice way fucking better. And I
Speaker 1: don't think that that's the fault of the filmmakers of
Speaker 1: this movie. This movie is gorgeous. All the performances are
Speaker 1: well done. The only thing that I would really criticize
Speaker 1: about this movie that is the treatment of Romani people.
Speaker 1: And also just like I mean, scaling back Jane, I
Speaker 1: didn't love and removing more effective apologies that were in
Speaker 1: the book but were left out in the movie. I
Speaker 1: thought was bizarre. But but the third act changes, even
Speaker 1: though some of them, like you were saying, were like
Speaker 1: a little too modern, even so I liked the third
Speaker 1: act changes they made. I thought it was like a cool.
Speaker 1: It kind of reminded me of another White Girl reboot
Speaker 1: we saw recently with Little Women, where Gredick Gerwick was
Speaker 1: doing all sorts of funery with the third act of
Speaker 1: that movie, and it worked out in this really fun,
Speaker 1: cool way that had something to say. This one maybe
Speaker 1: didn't have quite as much to say, but I thought
Speaker 1: it was like a cool I don't know, I'm happy
Speaker 1: it exists. I would rather see more adaptations of Pride
Speaker 1: and Prejudice than of Emma. And also, you know, I don't,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I mean, I don't. I don't even
Speaker 1: know that I necessarily feel like no more Jane Austen adaptations.
Speaker 1: I think it's kind of cool that there are these
Speaker 1: properties that get a generational reboot. It's kind of like
Speaker 1: Shakespeare in that way, like Where and Autumn. De Wilde
Speaker 1: says that in an interview where the first question an
Speaker 1: interviewer asked her, was like, so why in Emma reboot?
Speaker 1: Why now? And she's like, no, I've literally never heard
Speaker 1: that asked of a Shakespeare reboots. So I don't know
Speaker 1: how to answer that question, right, So I don't. I
Speaker 1: don't know. It's it's all, it's all weird. Should we
Speaker 1: cover Pride and prejudice and zombies? No? It sucks. I
Speaker 1: never saw it sucks. It's so boring. But Joel Kim,
Speaker 1: Booster and Boie Yang are in that Pride and Prejudice
Speaker 1: reaming called Fire Island that comes out next year. Oh,
Speaker 1: I didn't realize that was I had no idea see it.
Speaker 1: So it's like this is like these are fun stories
Speaker 1: to reimagine and readapt and like still like Clueless is
Speaker 1: the most fun I think in like insightful ly adapted
Speaker 1: version of Emma. But I liked this movie. I thought
Speaker 1: that they did cool stuff and it like it's so
Speaker 1: beautiful it is. I liked it. It It passes the Bechdel test.
Speaker 1: M it does, sure does. What would you rate it
Speaker 1: on our nimble scale? Because I don't know. I think
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go with like two and a half or three,
Speaker 1: like something like maybe three given the time period, because
Speaker 1: it's like centering a complicated woman at the center of
Speaker 1: a story in a movie that's directed and written by women,
Speaker 1: that's adapted from an old ass book by a woman.
Speaker 1: A woman it bears saying that it is all white women,
Speaker 1: you know, right down the line there. However, it's like
Speaker 1: it is. It is rare in that regard, and I
Speaker 1: feel like that's a lot of the reason why this
Speaker 1: story has endured and so for its time specifically. Yeah,
Speaker 1: a complicated female character at the center of a story,
Speaker 1: whether I like her or not, is something. Sure, she's
Speaker 1: no Elizabeth Bennett honey, but I think even Jane Austen
Speaker 1: knows that, you know. So it's like it is it,
Speaker 1: it's complicated. I don't like Emma. I just don't love
Speaker 1: I don't know. These are just like like I think
Speaker 1: that ultimately, like Emma doesn't. She understands what she's done,
Speaker 1: but there's not really any consequence for it in a
Speaker 1: way that I find so frustrating. She's like fucking with
Speaker 1: the like she could have ruined Harriet's life. It's like
Speaker 1: it really like she could have rout like in this
Speaker 1: society specifically, Emma is trying to make herself feel like
Speaker 1: she's doing something, like she's whatever, insecure about whatever it is.
Speaker 1: It's everyone quite clear to me what it is, and
Speaker 1: so she needs to feel like she's doing something. But
Speaker 1: she's ruining the life of someone much poorer than her.
Speaker 1: So I hate that. But I do, like I mean,
Speaker 1: in terms of the class spectrum, there is a lot
Speaker 1: of women of different classes that I think are all
Speaker 1: I still think that Miss Bates and Harriet are made
Speaker 1: to look silly because of their class and made to
Speaker 1: seem like under educated. Yeah, but you do get humanizing
Speaker 1: moments with them. It's not like their total cartoon characters.
Speaker 1: It's just all so complicated. I don't know. But like
Speaker 1: Emma is handsome, clever, and rich. It's on the fucking poster.
Speaker 1: She starts the story that way, and she ends the
Speaker 1: story that way, and she does learn a lesson about meddling.
Speaker 1: But I think, given the fact that she's meddling on
Speaker 1: a class basis, I just wish that this movie had
Speaker 1: word to say about class. It's so it's hard, I
Speaker 1: guess I'll But because Autumn deWilde is really fucking cool,
Speaker 1: I want to see more movies from her. I thought
Speaker 1: the screenplay was pretty well done for like Annie Taylor
Speaker 1: Joy is you know chess Netflix, She's great Bill and
Speaker 1: I he no notes, Like, I guess I'll give it
Speaker 1: three nipples, and I'm giving them all to Jane Fairfax.
Speaker 1: Give her a spare put in her pocket like a
Speaker 1: tire nice. I will agree on three. I think, just
Speaker 1: echoing a lot of your thoughts on it definitely could have,
Speaker 1: especially again an adaptation coming out in twenty twenty. I
Speaker 1: feel like, and I mean, maybe this is just because
Speaker 1: we've been doing this podcast for over five years, but
Speaker 1: I'm of the mind that if you're going to adapt
Speaker 1: something with such old source material, accompany it with some
Speaker 1: interesting commentary or make adaptation changes that update the story
Speaker 1: in interesting and meaningful ways. And I think I think
Speaker 1: this movie does attempt that to some degree, but I
Speaker 1: agree that it doesn't do quite enough. Yeah, Like, I
Speaker 1: don't necessarily want to see like an eighteen hundred story
Speaker 1: with twenty twenty two morals, but like maybe I do.
Speaker 1: But also I'm like, I think I just like want
Speaker 1: to see new story, right, I don't know, I don't know,
Speaker 1: And I guess some things are just there for entertainment.
Speaker 1: And we don't need big whatever or whatever. Mute two mute.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, and this era. I was about to
Speaker 1: make a terrible joke go about the mewtwo movement anyway, Okay,
Speaker 1: sorry everything, mute the hashtag mutube movement. You're evil. Oh
Speaker 1: my god, that's so funny. Okay, three nipples I will give.
Speaker 1: I'll give one to Harriet. I'll give one to miss
Speaker 1: Bates because she deserves way more of an apology than
Speaker 1: she got from Emma. And then I'll give my funnel
Speaker 1: nipple to Bill Ni because I'm dying. You literally said
Speaker 1: the mutube movement. It's the worst thing I've ever said.
Speaker 1: Maybe I need to take a nap. That was unbelievable.
Speaker 1: Wow Wow, well I I well everyone, I hope it
Speaker 1: was worth waiting five years because Caitlin just said the
Speaker 1: mutube movement. Um, I'm gonna get canceled for that. No,
Speaker 1: I truly like we said it in our in our
Speaker 1: pride and pressure this episode. But this was very rewarding,
Speaker 1: very cool. Uh. You know, we're not going to read
Speaker 1: a book for another five years, but thank you. Well,
Speaker 1: we'll do Wuthering Heights in five years. Oh, I don't
Speaker 1: know about that I take it back. Uh, you know,
Speaker 1: it's just, uh, we're not a buck podcast. It really
Speaker 1: takes a lot out of us. But he will be back.
Speaker 1: We'll be back. We'll be back next month talking about
Speaker 1: who knows, maybe Detective Pikachu. Do you do you all
Speaker 1: want that? Do you home want? That's not enough in
Speaker 1: the comments? All right, Well there you have it. That
Speaker 1: was our unlocked Emma episode from our Patreon aka Matreon,
Speaker 1: where you can subscribe to find even more episodes like that.
Speaker 1: You'll notice we mentioned the Pride and Prejudice episode that
Speaker 1: we had also covered that month. That's only on the Matreon,
Speaker 1: So why don't you just, you know, scoot on over
Speaker 1: to patreon dot com slash bactelcast for that episode and
Speaker 1: many many others over one hundred bonus episodes, all for
Speaker 1: five dollars a month. Yeah, and we have such a
Speaker 1: fun um, we have such a fun community over there.
Speaker 1: You also get to kind of at least when we
Speaker 1: choose to not ignore the results of polls, which we've
Speaker 1: only done once or twice and but it's because you're
Speaker 1: all bullies. But anyway, Um, you also get to vote
Speaker 1: on a lot of the movies that we cover. Um,
Speaker 1: you'll get discounts for live events when we're in your area,
Speaker 1: and a bunch of fun benefits. It's a really fun
Speaker 1: community over there. It's a blast, it's blast and a half.
Speaker 1: So UM, we hope to see you over there, um,
Speaker 1: or we'll just see you back here on the main feed.
Speaker 1: We got a lot of exciting stuff coming up and
Speaker 1: with that, UM, have a great I'm trying to think
Speaker 1: of a fun Emma way to oh, but I can't remember.
Speaker 1: I mean bee boop fairly well something something, No, we're
Speaker 1: bill Oh, now I remember where we talked about Pokemon
Speaker 1: because Bill Nii, because Bill Nii is in Detective Pikachu,
Speaker 1: and because I was playing a lot of Pokemon on
Speaker 1: my Nintendo Switch at the time. Yes, that was your
Speaker 1: Pokemon era and that was my talking about Bill Ni
Speaker 1: playing Pokemon era. So that paired pretty nicely. Well, we're
Speaker 1: Bill Ni jumping down the steps in that amazing moment
Speaker 1: in the movie Emma twenty twenty. Yes, and with that
Speaker 1: we fare thee well bye bye.