The Bechdel Cast - E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial

Episode Date: November 14, 2024

Jamie and Caitlin phone home and chat about E.T: The Extra-Terrestrial!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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together. So listen to Still the Place on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. On the Bechdel cast, the questions asked if movies have women in them. Are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands or do they have individualism? The patriarchy's effing vast. Start changing it with the Bechdel cast. Jamie phone home. Okay. Yeah, call me please, Jesus. Jamie phone home.

Okay. Yeah, call me please. Jesus. Call me now. I like how the whole part of the movie is like ET just like trying to text his friends to come pick him up. He's just trying to text his mom. He literally is just like, I need to text my mommy. And it was the 80s. You couldn't just text your mommy back then.

It was a whole thing. You had to build a whole machine and set it up in the woods. Today, ET would have just texted his mommy and it would have been fine. Welcome to the Bechdel cast. My name is Jamie Loftus, OK? OK. My name is Caitlin Durante. Is that okay? That's okay. That's okay. And this is our podcast where we talk about your favorite movies using an

intersectional feminist lens. And today, we're talking about ET, the extraterrestrial 1982. Ever heard of it? Yeah, I have. But what is the Bechtel test, Caitlin? Have you ever heard of that? No. But I'll do my best to explain it. It is a media metric created by queer cartoonist Alison Bechtel, sometimes called the Bechtel Wallace test.

It has many versions. Ours is this. Two characters of a marginalized gender must have names, they must speak to each other, and their conversation has to be about something other than a man. And ideally, it's a narratively meaningful conversation. If this is your first episode, the Bechdel test is not the point of the show.

It's a jumping off point for discussion, as we've said for many years. But this one, I feel like you could make an argument based on, I think that Elliot projects gender onto ET. Yes. Which I think is intentional because I watched the whole behind the scenes documentary, I went deep on ET.

And every time, and obviously, you know, it's like, I think the documentary was made in the nineties. So it was still like Spielberg was using binary gendered language, but he was always saying like, with ET, when they find him or her, like he's always basically acknowledging that Elliot is just pretty, I mean, which makes, I I mean not canceling Elliot I'm not canceling Elliot it's just like he's projecting himself onto his friend and so I feel like conversations about ET do pass the Bechtel test basically in which case the movie does pass. I was gonna make a similar argument.

Yeah and I get it Elliot but like he's, you know, ET has no conception of gender. ET is literally just trying to text mother or father. No, I'm kidding. The genderless, the genderless parent from the great beyond. For all we know, ET comes from a planet that has no concept of gender. He might come from a plant or they might come from a planet. We're going to use he, him pronouns, but we know that ET has not spoken out on this issue. This is true. ET might come from a planet that has a hundred genders, none of which are man or woman. I just found that very, because as we were turning this movie on last night

I was like is Spielberg gonna do the weird minion thing where he's like ET is a boy like like when Pierre Coffin famously insisted that the genderless minions had to be boys, right? They're all boys and Thankfully plenty to criticize about Spielberg, but at least he is not a freak about projecting gender onto ET and alien. ET and just characters in general.

But yeah, I am glad we both thought of that, but I'd never really noticed that until this viewing that like Gertie asks, is he a girl or a boy? And Elliot just says, he's a boy. And you're like, well, he doesn't know that, but he wants his friend to be like him. And they just sort of roll with it. Well, then there's that scene later on,

we can talk about this further, but where Gertie dresses ET in a dress and a wig, like a woman's long wig, presumably. And ET's vibing. Yeah, ET loves it. ET's a drag performer. It is awesome that ET is a drag performer. Did you see?

I just love, I mean, again, we'll talk about it, but I do really admire and appreciate a director who, because I have all these complicated feelings around child actors. Mm-hmm. All three kids in this movie are incredible. Yes. And I really like, you know, in a world where it's like, well, child actor, it's not just gonna stop

because Jamie has complicated feelings about it, but I really admire watching, like, directors who are really thoughtful about, like, directing children. And, like, I just, I don't know, I really enjoy watching, this sounds creepy, I don't mean it creepy. I enjoy watching footage of Spielberg and Shyamalan directing kids because I feel like they're so uniquely good at it and they're just talking to kids like they're people. It's very gentle and thoughtful and you can always like the kid's parent is always like within sight and they get great performances out of kids I think because they kind of like

feel safe and like it's a natural environment and I just really admire that skill and I was like the Henry Thomas performance and this is holy shit, that damn kid. Have you ever seen the video of his like audition tape where he's like crying on cue? It's so fucked up. And then they tell him he got the part at the end of the video. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like that's like the kind of clip that goes viral every so often again. But it always hits. It's so beautiful. Also, Haley's Forrest Gump audition goes viral every so often.

I've never seen that one. He's quite small in it. But the Henry Thomas audition is terrific. It's so, you're just like, how does, how he do that? And he didn't really act very much after that, right? I don't really know what his... No, he like went on to have a pretty illustrious career. Like he... Oh, wow. Oh my God. No, wait, he's chilling.

Never mind. He isn't in any like huge thing really like not much in the way of like starring roles after this, but... He's like a Mike Flanagan guy now, right? Like he's in all of Mike Flanagan's stuff. Yes I need to uh look up who that is exactly but I'm sure you're correct. It's a young person no Mike Flanagan directs like or usually directs like another horror series for Netflix every year so he did like Haunting of Hill House, Haunting of Blind Manor, and yeah, Henry Thomas is in all of them. You're like, hey, I know that guy. That's my friend.

Anyway, well, Jamie, what is your relationship with E.T.? That's a little weird. I did not have any attachment to this when I was a kid. I know I saw it, but I just like I associated this movie with like my older cousins. I was like, that's kind of a them thing and let them have it. And I wasn't scared of ET, but I did think that he was a bit ugly and not cute. Okay, thank you so much. E.T. unfortunately is busted looking. He looks bad. Not to like shame, but like he looks bad. Let's be honest. He's not pretty to look at. And I'll get into this, but that's a large part of why I think I was like not the biggest consumer of this movie as a child. But anyway, go on.

Yeah. I mean, I think I was, like, kind of too young for this movie to be any sort of touchstone for me. I don't remember us having it. I do remember watching it, but it just, like, didn't really resonate with me when I was a kid. And so I never really revisited it. There's a great Lindsay Ellis video on Nebula about, like, how this is, like, E.T. is, like, uniquely,

kind of one of the biggest movies ever to never get a sequel and not have like kind of all the stuff that we associate with all of these 80s movies that we can't stop getting like bashed over the fucking head with where it's like Ghostbusters 45, Jurassic Park Hell or whatever. Like ET they never really did that and it's like a beautiful kind of standalone thing. Anyways. Well, I have a whole story about the ET sequel that never got made. So I'll tell you about that. Okay, she talks about it a little bit. I want to know more about it. And also, I just did cross promo alert. I didn't write the series, but I hosted a series

on I Heart Radio, the network you're listening to right now called The Legend of Swordquest that's about Atari who famously made that bad E.T. game that they like buried a ton in the middle of the desert. Oh yeah, like literally buried, right? Yeah. Yeah, I love that story. I mean, I know it like people love that story because it's like a folk legend that ended up being true. It's like so awesome. Anyways, focus. E.T. I thought he was ugly. I wasn't interested.

I had no, I said that's none of my business. And then a couple of years ago, a group of friends and I went to see E.T. in IMAX. It was re-released very quietly for whatever reason for its 40th anniversary. And I hadn't seen it in like decades. I didn't really remember even the story. I just remembered like Reese's Pieces, Pez, Phone Home, you know, just kind of the cultural osmosis stuff. And yeah, when I saw it two years ago, it like wrecked me.

It was like sobbing. I didn't see it coming that it was going to like hit so hard. And I was like, Holy shit, this is like one of the greatest movies I've ever seen. It was yeah, I came all the way around on ET. I loved watching it as an adult. I think it's also partially a response to like the level of complexity that happens in children's films now, which I think is like less in many cases. But this movie is so sincere and so like just the biggest feelings possible. Yeah, I just, it absolutely wrecked me. And then watching it again, I was, like, thinking about my dad a lot, and I just, I don't know. I really, I've come completely around on this movie.

It made no sense to me as a kid. I didn't get the appeal. And as an adult, I'm like, this is, like, a masterpiece. I think it's my favorite Steven Spielberg movie. Because there is like, I mean, you have the action sequences, you have the sci fi, but it like is just like, such a feelings story. And I just love everything about it is so great. The relationship between the siblings where they're like assholes, but they don't hate

each other. There's no like, I get why people are like, this is like overly sincere and blah, blah, blah, but it's like, I just, I don't know. Right now, I love it, and it was making me feel gigantic feelings, and I was crying, crying, crying, and I love it. What's your history with E.T.? Well, I was thinking about parallels between this movie

and the first Paddington movie, where Paddington is basically ET if ET stays with the family and they adopt him. And I wish he did. But he has to go home. It's the saddest thing to ever happen. And the score, I mean the score, come on. Come on. Anyways, I feel very lucky I got to see it in IMAX because it was like unbelievable.

It was so good. Yeah. So my history, we had it on VHS in my home growing up. And according to my mom, I watched it all the time. Interesting. I do not remember this. I remember it being on sometimes, but I think it was probably my older brother, who's five years older than me, watching it.

And I was in the room. And you were there as well. And it was kind of like before I was really storing memories. The plight of the younger sibling. So I was consuming it, but I think I wasn't as interested in it partly because I thought ET was creepy and ugly, and I thought that was gonna be such a controversial take and for you to share that opinion.

But also, like, Spielberg was like, he's got a face that only a mother could love. They, like, acknowledge how ugly he is. Oh, man. I mean, I also think like, again, that's another choice that as an adult, I was like, what a weird wild choice. I feel like that is such a like Spielberg flex that he was even able to get away with it.

Cause unless you were super successful, no studio would let you make something that ugly. Like they would be like, no, it has to be cute. Like it can't look like that. If this was a Disney movie, they'd be like, make this thing have big, beautiful eyes and little eyelashes and this cute little button nose and all this stuff.

Cause Spielberg was like involved in Gremlins too. Like he made Gizmo. Like he knows how to make something cute, but he's like, but I just don't want to. I want it to look like shit. I love it. ET looks bad. He looks like shit, but he's like, he's beautiful. I saw a clip of, I want to say it was Matt Rogers, not Bowen on Lost Cultures, where he's saying like, if I ever encountered ET like in the forest, I would have like,

No, it's Colin Crawford, my co-worker on Star Trek, Colin Crawford, one of the best comedy writers ever, had a tweet that said, me and my friends would have killed E.T. with hammers. I can tell you that much. That's the tweet. And it's just so true. Most kids would have killed E.Ters. He's so freaky looking.

One of the hosts of Les Cultures said something very similar recently. So it's a common thing that I didn't realize how common. Oh, because this movie is so beloved, and ET is so beloved the character. So I just assumed everyone thought he was cute. But it's coming out that people think he's an ugly. I'm trying to think.

What are other, I mean, I know that kids always were scared of him, but it also kind of reminds me of like the Chuck E. Cheese animatronics. Where like kids were always scared of them, but they were just very ugly and popular. And you're like, well, why was that? I don't know.

I don't know. I don't know. Cause they could make a cute animatronic. We had Gizmo. Well, I guess it was Gizmo after when did Gremlins come out? That was a couple of years after. Yeah. They're just like ET looks too horrible, but it didn't matter because this movie made $800 million

off of a $10 million budget. It was some high-scratching movie basically from like 1983 to 93. Yeah. And then yeah, he like outdid himself with Jurassic Park. And then Jimmy Cameron came around and said, he's just like, I'm ever heard of Titanic. And furthermore, Avatar and Spielberg hasn't been seen in public since. Unfortunately. Sorry, we keep cutting off your experience with ET. No, this is just gonna be a chaos episode, it's fine. Yeah, I watched it as a kid, although it was before I was, like, fully storing memories,

and so I only had very vague recollections of watching this movie as a kid. And then I watched it once as probably, like like a teenager, maybe in my early 20s or something. And then not again until I started prepping for this episode. So it was something from like my very early childhood, but not really. That's like it's just stored in your brain before you could store things in your brain. Right. So I only remembered, I very distinctly remember the scene where Michael finds ET when he's like lying in the river and he's like discolored and like looks very ill. And I remember

being like haunted by that. But most of the other stuff I didn't remember. I forgot when I saw it in IMAX, I forgot that they literally are like ET died. You're like, what the fuck are you talking about? Like, yeah, I really couldn't handle ET being dead last in the body bag. Like they, and then he said, I love you. It was, if I had thought been thinking, I would have been like like maybe let's cover this movie next year instead But it's so like again. Just like that's something that would not be allowed really in a children's movie now for the most part I think you can like handle the themes of death, but it's more of like a Moana like my grandma's a beautiful ghost now Instead of like you're not seeing grandma in a body bag like looking bad.

That's like would not happen. It's wild. I don't even know if I like it, but I think it's really bold that they did it. Did you see also that E.T.'s voice by a woman? Yes, I did. I have a couple of thoughts on that that we can get to. Okay. So you didn't like when you were a kid, but what about later? It's not even that. I mean, I did find him scary looking, but I was like in the room while it was on according to my mom.

You didn't leave. I wasn't leaving. But yeah, and then I watched it as an adult-ish, like, you know, whatever, probably 19 years old or something. And I was like, oh wow, yeah, I remember this. And then I didn't give it much thought until again, prepping for this episode. And then I was like, Oh, I see why this is such a beloved. It's so earnest. And it's so like, yeah, the kids

develop this bond with this little guy. And I love a little movie where they find a little guy and they be friends. I mean, again, Paddington. So I was like, oh, this is really sweet and it's sad. And I felt some feelings. And so I get why it's such a beloved classic. So true. Let's take a quick break and then we'll come back for the recap, shall we? Let's do it. Okay, we'll be right back. Okay. We'll be right back. conversations keep going. That's what my podcast, Post Run High, is all about. It's a chance to sit down with my guests and dive even deeper into their stories, their journeys, and the thoughts that arise

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Star Wars consumer products. Yes. Shall we just dive right in? Let's dive in. So ET, the movie, opens on a spaceship that has landed in the wilderness, not far outside Los Angeles. Ever heard of it? No. Several little aliens are gathering up plant specimens

and bringing them on to their ship and One such alien has kind of wandered off from the group. He's just a little guy. He's just a little guy This is of course the alien we will come to know as ET And he has to run off and hide when a bunch of guys in trucks show up men in trucks show up. Men in trucks, scary. They'll be revealed to be like government agents. We're not really sure from what entity, but they're these ominous, like, bureaucratic. STACEY KAPLAN 80s movies have such a wild attitude towards characters from the government. Like they cannot decide. They

can't decide if they're good guys or bad guys. They're always like, well, there's a few, I feel like kind of the logic of this movie is like, well, there's a few bad apples, but ultimately everyone is doing their best. And you're like, okay, whatever you say. In any case, there are men in trucks and ET has to run off and hide and the other aliens have no choice but to fly off in their spaceship and leave ET behind. We then cut to a house where a bunch of kids are hanging out. We meet Elliot played by Henry Thomas. I think he's nine or 10. His older brother Michael is maybe 13 or 14, played by Robert McNaughton. And a few of Michael's friends are all playing

D&D, I think. And they make Elliot go outside to grab the pizza delivery. And while he's out there, Elliot hears something in the tool shed. He thinks it might be his dog, Harvey. So he like tosses his baseball into the shed and then the baseball gets tossed back at him. And Elliot freaks out. He's like, dogs can't toss baseballs. What's that? Oh, it's so good. But when the boys, as well as Elliot and Michael's mom, Mary, played by Dee Wallace, go to investigate. All they find are some strange tracks on the ground. They think it might be a coyote.

So they go back inside. But we see that it is in fact E.T., the extraterrestrial, hiding in the shed. So later that night, Elliot goes back outside to look for this creature again. And sure enough, he finds him and screams because again, ET looks like shit. He looks bad. I mean, like, yeah, the beginning of the movie plays out like a horror movie. And then it just eventually like a half hour and they're like, oh, he's nice. Nevermind. He's nice. Nevermind. Never mind. It's kind of fun.

Yeah. Don't judge a book by its cover. Whoops. But anyway, he doesn't know this yet. So Elliot is scared and he runs away, but he's also determined to find and possibly befriend this creature. So the next day he takes his bike and some Reese's Pieces up into the woods near his house to look for the creature, but Elliot doesn't find it and he presumably off-screen tells his family that he encountered a goblin he calls it and

They don't believe him especially his older brother Michael. He's like teasing Elliot about it. We also meet Elliot's younger sister, Gerty, played by a young Drew Barrymore, famously. And we also find out that their father is no longer in the picture. He went with Sally to Mexico. Yes, and this is something that their mom, Mary, is having a hard time with.

And then I think it's later that night, Elliot is outside hoping to encounter this creature again, and E.T. appears and approaches Elliot with a handful of the Reese's Pieces that Elliot had dropped in the woods. And so realizing that E.T. is friendly and won't hurt him, Elliot lures E.T. into his room using the Reese's pieces. And we see ET like mimicking Elliot's movements and gestures.

And we're like, wow, they're becoming friends. I just love that he just is doing what like a nine year old would do. He's like, here are my guys. Here's this one. Here's this one. Here's this one. ET is like, yep, yep. Got it. So sweet. Yeah. Yeah. That happens the next day where Elliot fakes being six so he can stay home from school to hang out with ET. And he's like, here's my Lando Calrissian figurine. Here's my Greedo figurine. It's so embarrassing how much Steven Spielberg wants George Lucas to like think he's cool. It's really embarrassing. The Yoda costume,

it's like we get it. We get it. Well, they had collaborated with each other at this point because Raiders of the Lost Ark comes out the year before. In the making of documentary, George Lucas is so taciturn. He appears in it for a second and it's like Spielberg being like, and I put these little things in and I was like, I think George is going to like this. I think it's really going to make him smile. And then it cuts to George Lucas and he was like I saw it and that I thought you know that's nice like he was like not very impressed by it is so I was like wow rude bitch yeah I'm comfortable saying he's a billionaire we can he's a bitch yeah he's a bitch anyway Elliot's siblings Michael and Gertie come home that day and they find out about ET.

Elliot makes them promise not to tell their mom. And then they're pointing to maps and globes telling ET where they are and asking him where he's from. And then ET levitates some like balls of clay or something to symbolize a solar system to show them where he's from. So we learn that E.T. has telekinesis powers. He also can make dead plants come back to life because we see him revive a potted flower plant. We'll also learn that he has healing powers for humans because he heals a little cut on Elliot's finger later.

Meanwhile, the men in the trucks from the beginning who have been searching for the aliens in their spaceship, they're still looking for this creature that they know has been left behind. One of them is this guy with a bunch of keys on his belt loop and his character's name is Keys. So that's really creative. Played by Peter Coyote. So he's, you know, looking for ET. The next day, the three siblings go to school, they leave ET at home, who gets into the fridge, drinks a bunch of Coors lights, or maybe just regular Coors, and he gets drunk. And it also seems to make Elliot drunk in class because there's some kind of like telepathic

or empathic connection between them. So what ET feels, Elliot feels, and vice versa. So Elliot is supposed to be dissecting a frog in class. And first of all, I'm like, did they let 10 year olds dissect frogs in school in the 80s? Like, I didn't do that until I was like a junior in high school. I never even did it. I think they were like, you can watch a video like, you're not a scientist, you're 14. But I was like, and they gave them to them alive. A lot. Yeah. Also, why was that necessary? Every time I've seen a frog dissection, like

even in a movie, like they come dead. Yeah. Yeah. They're like in formaldehyde or whatever. And then they're already dead. Spielberg said that this is something that he did that he released a frog. Oh, I was like, I don't believe you. Well, that's what ends up happening in the movie where ET influences Elliot to save his frog and all the frogs in the class. So Elliot drunk as fuck, lets loose all the frogs. Nicole Sarris He surprised kisses a young girl. We'll get back to that. We are canceling Elliot.

Bekkah Larkin Yeah, Elliot hates drag performances and he surprised kisses a girl in his class. So he's actually bad news. Nicole Sarris Yes, he's a pestilence. Bekkah Larkin Anyway, when the kids come back home from school, they discover that E.T. is learning to speak. He shows Elliot a comic strip where a spaceman is receiving a distress call for help. And this is when we get the famous like E.T. phone home scene. And they realize that E.T ET is trying to build some sort of

homing or communication device so that he can contact his alien friends so they can come pick him up and Michael points out though that ET is looking kind of sick lately and we see him like wheezing and stuff and so we're like hmm what's happening here is earth killing him and it makes you think it makes you think then the kids take et out on halloween they like throw a sheet over him and dress him up as a ghost pretending that girdy is the one under the sheet. And Elliot brings ET into the woods to try this like communication machine that he's built. And this is also when we get the very famous scene of ET making Elliot's bike fly through the sky,

past the moon, and then they land in the woods and set up the communication device and it works and ET is able to send out a signal into space. Although, Elliot is sad at the thought of ET leaving and suggests that he stay. But ET is like, no, I gotta get out of here. It's fucked up here. You're like, who, I gotta get out of here. Yeah, it's fucked up here. You're like, who could blame ET? He's like, Earth fucking sucks. Yeah, so true. So true.

So true, King. So because the kids have stayed out past their curfew, Mary goes out looking for them, which is when the scary men in their suits show up at their house and like bug it, I think. I'm not really super clear what they do here, but they've been surveilling them and then they like bug the house. Yeah, they like descend. It's pretty scary. Especially when you hear it like, yeah, Mary be like, this is my house. And I was like, yeah, yeah. Wait, what? So then Elliot passes out in the woods and when he wakes up the next morning, ET is gone. So Elliot returns home distraught that ET is nowhere to be found.

So Michael goes out looking for him and this is when he finds him all sick and lying in the river. Looking somehow worse. worse. so hard. so michael brings him back but et and elliot are both dying because they have this empathic connection and the kids finally show et to their mom but before she can really do anything about it a bunch of like like NASA astronauts and scientists and

hazmat suits. It's all so like vague but scary. Yeah, very scary and they show up and they set up this like quarantine tent in and around their house and they run a bunch of tests on ET and then Keys approaches Elliot to be like, tell us how we could save ET and Elliot's like, he has to go home. Meanwhile the connection between ET and Elliot starts to sever. It seems like maybe ET sacrifices himself to save Elliot and then ET dies and the kids are devastated especially Elliot and then the scientists put ET's body in some like science coffin and they're about to take him away but Keys lets Elliot spend some time alone with ET and

he's crying and he says I love says, I love you. I love you. Which makes ET come back to life. Awesome. And his heart light is glowing and the potted flower revives. And then ET says, ET phone home. Because apparently his spaceship is on the way. So Elliot and Michael form a plan to hijack the vehicle that they put ET's body in so that they can save him and bring him to his spaceship. And

the cops are chasing them and the kids are on bikes. And at one point they're surrounded. It's that part. I feel like I'd heard this before, but how during that period in the early 2000s when George Lucas and Steven Spielberg were putting bad CG in their older movies, that he edited out the guns and made them walkie talkies. Flashlight. Oh, I thought it was flashlight, but it might be walkie talkies. It's something. Either way, it's something that... So then that whole sequence is weird because they're like, what's Elliot so like, right? What are they gonna do? Like it's like cuts to a walkie talkie and then Elliot's like, ah!

Yeah, and the theatrical cut and the version I watched it was like shotguns that the cops had. They put the guns back. Yeah, I think he was like, okay, that was an overcorrection. It does have to be guns. Yeah. So, you know, the cops with the guns have the kids surrounded at one point, but then ET makes them all fly on their bikes with his telekinesis powers. And they arrive at the clearing in the woods and Elliot, Michael, Gertie and Mary say a tearful goodbye

to ET as his spaceship arrives and he says, I'll be right here. Meaning that he will be there in Elliot's thoughts and feelings and then he flies away. The end. It's so awesome. It's so beautiful. That's the movie. Let's take a quick break and we'll come back to discuss. Okay. Hey guys, I'm Kate Max. You might know me from my popular online series, The Running Interview Show, where I run with celebrities, athletes, entrepreneurs, and more. After those runs, the conversations keep going.

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And we're back. Oh my God. Where do you like where, where where where do you start when it comes to? ET the extraterrestrial I wanted to touch really quickly on yeah, cuz I forget if we talked about this in our The color purple episode. I think that was the last Spielberg movie we covered. Yeah, I think so and any case I just want to acknowledge at the top of the Discussion because it's like something that's made it Yeah, I think so. And in any case, I just want to acknowledge at the top of the discussion, because it's like something that's made it challenging to interact with a lot of Spielberg's work, is that honestly I was having trouble

like getting good information about this in detail, but suffice it to say, Steven Spielberg is pro-Israel and has made a lot of very both sidesy comments around an act of genocide being perpetrated by Israel. And that feels horrible to know and to just have sort of looming over his catalog. And again, like I haven't done a deep dive into Steven Spielberg's politics. I know that he made Munich. I haven't watched it. I really Steven Spielberg's politics. I know that he made Munich. I haven't watched it.

I really have no desire to. So I just wanted to acknowledge that at the top because I love this movie. And I really don't like when Spielberg tries to say something important. It doesn't work for me at all. And now knowing this element of his personal politics, it's horrible.

Yes. Yeah. Definitely worth acknowledging. And as someone who loves a lot of movies made by him, it's very disappointing. Wanted to acknowledge that it doesn't necessarily have a place within the discussion of this movie. Obviously, if we were covering Munich, which we wouldn't, it would be coming up more, but just that we're aware of it. And also, I would be interested in more just information in general because I was kind of having a hard time, but I would be curious what folks think. This movie, however, comes out before Spielberg really says anything political in his work ever. I feel like so much of his early work is just like, and I say this with love, but it is

like, my parents got divorced. That's all of them. That's all of what they are. Elliot is clearly supposed to be him. Dee is supposed to say, I think I've said this on the show before, I'm gonna wait to get pneumonia before I'm gonna watch the damn Fablemen's. I have no interest.

I didn't care for it at all. I also kind of can't believe, if you're like a director who has infinite blank checks, you're gonna make a boring biopic about yourself? Loser. It felt so self-indulgent and I found it really unpleasant to watch. And isn't it also like so many of his early movies have these mirror dynamics anyways? Where it's like, yeah, I think you said that in Close Encounters and ET, like two back-to-back movies

We get it men hate when like I it reminds me of I mean very few people like whether Paris get divorced it's a complicated experience to learn but like I Feel the same way about the damn Safdie brothers where they're like the worst thing that's ever happened to me My mommy and daddy didn't kiss anymore. And you're like, I just find a new struggle. Find a new struggle. Anyways, that said, this is my I think I mean, I'm guessing Jurassic Park or Indiana Jones. What's your favorite Spielberg movie? Oh, it's probably Jurassic Park. Indiana Jones Last Crusade comes in at a close second. I also really love Minority Report.

I've never seen that. And a handful of others that he directed. I think for me it's a tie between this and Jaws. Oh, Jaws is so good too. I'm an early, early Spielberg head. Fair. But, sorry, where do we wanna start? Well, to speak a little bit more

about the development of this movie. So as you mentioned, it was kind of inspired by Spielberg's parents' divorce, where in 1960, when his parents were splitting up, he basically created an imaginary alien friend who he would later recall as a friend who could be the brother I never had and the father I feel like I didn't have anymore. So he created a little friend and based ET off of that, although there were some other bits of inspiration for this movie where some other bits of inspiration for this movie where he started developing a project called Night Skies after he made Close Encounters of the Third Kind, in which malevolent aliens terrorize a family. But in that project, there was a subplot where a friendly alien, the

only friendly alien of this group of evil aliens named Buddy, befriends a child with autism. Oh yeah. Isn't this script like publicly available and is not good? If so, I haven't read it. Nor have I. And furthermore, I won't. It also kind of inspired the E.T. sequel, which, oh, I meant to actually bring that up in my relationship

with this movie. So there is a sequel to this movie that obviously never got made. A treatment was written for it by Steven Spielberg and Melissa Matheson, who wrote the screenplay for the first ET movie. And of course, we want to talk about her. Yes, I cannot wait to talk about her because her life, first of all, too short. I didn't realize that she had passed so young, but also fascinating. But sorry, continue.

Yes, so they co-wrote this treatment, basically just a synopsis for a sequel that would never be made. And it was also partially inspired by Night Skies because the treatment involves evil aliens coming to search for ET knowing that he got left behind on Earth. And in this treatment, Jamie,

I have something very important to tell you. In the treatment, you find out that ET is real name is Zreck. Almost Shrek, but Zreck with a Z. I thought you're gonna say E entertainment T like extra entertainment terrestrial. EET. Nope, nope. It is even better. Shrek. Shrek. I saw West Side Story in theaters at the Academy Museum with an introduction by Rita Moreno last week. And anyways, the police officer is called like officer Shregg. Like it's really close to Shrek. It's just such a tease. And you're just like, just say Shrek, just say it. Well, it's like in Batman Returns when Christopher Walken's character is named Shrek. And you're

just like Shrek is everywhere. Yeah. And at least they go for it. They go for it. Like just say, say his name. Like speak Shrek's name. It's like speak Shrek's name. It's like the end of, oh my God, what's that movie? Never Ending Story. Say my name. Say my name. I was thinking Beetlejuice.

Shrek, Shrek, Shrek. Anyway, okay. So back on track. Wait, that's wild. His name was Shrek. We learned his name is Shrek. The point of this whole story is that I teach him how to speak. I teach him how to speak.

I teach him how to speak. I teach him how to speak. I teach him how to speak. I teach him how to speak. I teach him how to speak. I teach him how to speak. I teach was Shrek. We learned his name is Shrek. The point of this whole story is that I teach this treatment in my screenwriting classes because I have my students do a mock workshop just to get them acquainted with the workshopping process and we read the treatment and then analyze it. And the treatment's not good.

It is kind of a mess, and then they pulled the plug on it. I think it was a combination of the studio being like, oh, I'm not sure about this, and then Spielberg being like, never mind, sequel's bad idea for this, actually. Something he would reverse. But it is interesting, because it's not like he is obviously not opposed to sequels like

Indiana Jones. There's no shortage of sequels. But that there was no sequel for this movie. I really hope there's never a sequel to this movie. It would be very unnecessary. Yeah. Especially when it's like, yeah, something that is like focused on like, well, what's the lore of ET? And you're like, respectfully, it doesn't matter. That's not why we go to

ET to be like, well, but what is the cult? You're like, it doesn't matter. He made a friend and Elliot will never know. So we can never know. Yeah. So in any case, Spielberg had this imaginary alien friend as a kid to help him cope with his parents divorce. And then in 1980, he told screenwriter Melissa Matheson, he was like, yeah, I was developing this project called Night Skies. Here was this subplot I feel like there might be a movie there and then she wrote the script for ET formerly called ET and me then simplified to ET the extraterrestrial and she wrote the first draft in I think like eight weeks or something Spielberg loved it it It went through a couple of rewrites. A few changes were made. But what I want to point out is that this movie was written by a woman. And

I feel like that's something that a lot of people forget or overlook because people so closely associate this movie with like Spielberg and assume that he had the sole creative vision behind this movie. I really love because I honestly forgot as well. And I feel like it's probably partially because we don't talk about Melissa Matheson very much, even though it's like her credits are wild. Like, and I also saw that she was so involved in the day-to-day production of ET. She was writing dialogue on set.

She worked with the kids. She sort of oversaw when the kids could improvise, when they couldn't. She was so hands-on. And her career, it appears, was kind of derailed by being an ally to Tibet. Yeah. Which is unfortunately a very prescient conversation to have right now.

This is something that I want to do more research into, but I feel like it's not something that's very frequently discussed. I read a book a couple of years ago called, I think it's called Red Carpet. There's a chapter in it that basically unpacks a series of entertainment careers that were indefinitely put on hold

because someone was too vocal about being allied with the Free Tibet movement. And the biggest example of that, I honestly don't understand how Scorsese recovered, but he directed a movie in 97 that I feel like so few people have seen called Kundun, which is basically a biopic about the Dalai Lama. And I think the Dalai Lama was like meaningfully included in it. Melissa Matheson wrote the movie and became a close friend of the Dalai Lama while they worked on it for years. And this turned her into a lifelong activist for Tibetan freedom. And at the time she died, she was like on the board for the international campaign for Tibet and just really did like a lot of really effective advocacy work. But you can see after she writes

Kundan, her career like it falls off completely. And I don't know necessarily, I wasn't able to find confirmation necessarily, or if she just wanted to step away to focus on advocacy work. But it just feels like she wrote ET, she wrote the Black Stallion. I mean, and the only things that we really see her right after that is she wrote one more movie for Spielberg. She wrote the BFG. But even that seems like, well, because they had a good working relationship, but there's not other big directors that she really works with after that. Like you see a very similar story with Richard Gere, who also was a very loud advocate for Tibet. Oh, I didn't realize that.

Yeah, it's weird. I don't know why it's not, especially in recent years, I think it would make a lot of sense to just kind of revisit those stories. But yeah, Richard Gere, he was kind of the focal point of that chapter. I've got to remember exactly what the book was called, but that he was such a huge deal in the 80s and 90s. And then towards the end of the 90s, he became a very vocal advocate for Tibet and he stopped getting cast. And you really don't see him very much after that outside of like Chicago.

But like I mean, name of Richard Gere role for the last 20 years, like Nights and Rodan the was he in that? There we go. I bet. Ask. Let's call my mom. Let's see. Let's get my mom on the horn. She would know. But yeah, like Tibet, obviously a very complicated history that I'm not an expert on. But basically

it's like if your blockbuster movies were vocally pro Tibet, they would not play in China, which is a gigantic movie market. And so anyone who is too vocally supportive of Tibet would be kind of soft, blacklisted. I'm curious if there's anything written. Let us know listeners if there was ever sort of this line drawn directly with Melissa Matheson. But anyways, what a cool off. Cinematic masterpiece, Megalopolis? Megalopolis? What's it called? Megatropolis?

I don't have any idea. That movie gave me a lobotomy, so I don't know how to use my brain anymore. Anyway. Megalopoloop? What's the name of the Aubrey Plaza character? It's like Oh platinum Wow Something like that

We can't let him get away with this Not platinum Wow, so Melissa Matheson outside of being gone too soon Just a great Wikipedia experience It's earlier screenwriting and production credits, Dalai Lama, Personal Life. She has a whole section called Dalai Lama, and you've gotta love that. I love it.

She also wrote the screenplay for The Indian in the Cupboard, which I vaguely remember from my childhood, and she was a story consultant on Ponyo, the studio, and I never know if it's Ghibli or Ghibli. So someone please tell me Ghibli. Okay. I think so. But her personal life section is awesome. It's Matheson had an extramarital relationship with Francis Ford Coppola while working as his assistant on Godfather Part Two, an affair that lasted through the production of Apocalypse Now. So that's an affair of five years. Damn.

And then she was married to Harrison Ford for 20 years. Oh my gosh. I did not realize that either. Apparently I did not research enough about Melissa Matheson. They had two kids together. Wow. Harrison Ford was in ET as a principal that they never show on screen. Wait, I didn't know that. But you like hear his voice reprimanding Elliot in the scene where he's like drunkenly letting all the frogs go. Oh.

Yeah, but then they cut it. That's really funny. Gosh, what an incestuous kind of like group. Because I'm like, is that how they met? Like because they got married in 83 the year after this came out. But they were married for 20 years and had two kids. Like, yeah, they married in 83, divorced in 04. So wow.

Look at that. In addition to this movie being written by a woman, it was also edited by a woman, an editor named Carol Littleton. And two of the major producers of this movie are women. One of course being Melissa Mathison, the other one being Kathleen Kennedy. Bekkah Young Kathleen Kennedy produced this damn movie when she was 29. I'm like, shut up.

Shut enough. Bekkah Stop. Bekkah Stop. I was pleasantly surprised to see how many women were meaningfully involved in this movie. And I just, I don't know, everything again, like not to just like geek out about it, but everything about the set and environment of this movie just seemed so sweet and like thoughtful. And there's footage of like they were shooting on Halloween and Spielberg dressed up in drag all day because I think like Henry Thomas like dared him to.

Okay. And he was like, so Spielberg, there's I mean, and honey, he looks great. He really does. And it's like, it's very, I don't know, just like really sweet. Because I think it was like Henry Thomas was like, if you're going to make ET dress up in drag, you have to too. And he's like, I'll do it. And it's very cute.

Wow. Well, speaking of, shall we talk about the gender projections of ET? ET and gender. Yes, let's do it. We talked about it a little bit already. But like we mentioned, when Gertie first encounters ET, she says, is he a boy or girl? And then Elliot very definitively says, he's a boy. And then Gertie asks if ET was wearing any clothes when Elliot found him and he says,

no. So it's just like, yeah, he's just a boy because I said so. And later, Gerde puts ET in women's clothing, a dress, like a pearl necklace, this long blonde wig, a little Mrs. Nesbitt hat kind of thing. And Elliot comes home and finds ET in drag and gets upset and says, you should give him his dignity. This is the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen.

And we're like, okay, Elliot hates drag. Yeah. I think Elliot's denying something within himself. He is a confused child during the Reagan administration. I wanna believe in him. I wanna believe he grows up to believe in him. I want to believe he grows up to do better. But I do think it is not like, I mean, to the point where I never really even thought about it until this viewing, but how all of the kids are trying

to understand ET based on what their limited conception of the world than themselves are. And obviously a big part of that is like the limited gender expression in like suburbia in the 80s. And there's not really a big comment made, but I thought it was like pretty thoughtfully done. Nicole Sarris Right. Because like, Elliot finds this creature who he befriends and presumably he wants a friend who he can closely identify with and that for him would mean a friend who's a boy. Meanwhile, Gertie is hoping that ET is a girl and presumably that's why she dresses ET in a wig and a dress and all that kind of stuff because she wants a little

girlfriend. And ET is like, whatever. And he's like, I don't care. I'm fluid. ET doesn't give a crap. Yeah. I thought that that was like, again, especially for the eight. I think this movie sincerity is so much of why it holds up so well because you think

of even other eights kids movies that would have gone so far in the other direction. And you do get a little bit of like, you know, you need this dignity, but that's like as severe as it gets. And I appreciate that. And ET so he's such a chiller. He just wants to text his mom. Yes. Another reason I think this movie holds up as well as it does is its exploration of the emotional intelligence of the male characters. Because you have Elliot being this generally sensitive, gentle, compassionate kid.

He wants to, again, befriend ET and protect him. They develop this empathic connection where they feel each other's feelings. And that is a power that we'll see in movies, but that is almost always described to women in movies where if there's like a superhero character, I'm thinking of, is it Mantis in like the Marvel universe? Characters like that where like their power is empathic. And again, it's almost always ascribed to women. So it's not typical for a like empathic power or ability to be ascribed to a male character. But we see that with Elliot. And it is generally a nice connection, except that that one time where ET does make Elliot surprise kiss a girl at school. But other than that, it

manifests in a really like sweet, nice way. Yeah. And I mean, that's like another thing that I think is also contrasted between the brothers, because this is definitely not like a movie about women, but it is a movie like you're saying about, especially in the 80s, I feel like that would have made a real difference is celebrating this young boy's ability to express and want to understand how others are feeling. And I really like, again, I feel like the movie

sort of evades this trope of the older brothers just a piece of shit who doesn't get it and blah blah blah where it's like they are different. They're also just at different stages of development. But it's D Wallace is raising these kids right. They care about each other. Yeah. And even though they like whatever antagonize each other the way the brothers do like Michael's a sweet kid. He cares about Elliot. And I just think it's really nice. I'm going to start crying.

And even with their sister, where they antagonize her, but it doesn't feel like, I don't know. Again, it feels very natural. And they all genuinely do care about each other. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I felt that too about Michael who I Think he's probably like 14. So he has a few years on Elliot and has been exposed to more Socialization of like what boys are supposed to be like he's displaying more like quote-unquote typical masculinity Compared to Elliot because you know you know, you see him with his, like, teen boy pals, and they tend to, like... They're smoking cigs.

I'm like, oh, they'll gang up on Elliot and kind of give him a hard time and tease him and call him names and stuff like that. And Michael just seems to be a little bit more, like, easily aggravated and hostile compared to Elliot, but not in a way that is cruel necessary. It's just, again, he's been exposed to more like masculine social conditioning. Yeah, Elliot's embarrassing him in front of his friends.

Yeah, right. His friends who all want to dress as terrorists for Halloween. I'm like, what the But then you see them and you're like, what I was whatever that joke was. I was like, maybe you had to be in 1982, but I was not because I was like, it's a guy with an X through and said, what? Well, I think that's what he changed into because his mom was like, Mary said, you're not going to dress like that. So he switches to a different Like Mary said, you're not going to dress like that. So he switches to a different costume. Well, I don't love that joke. Yeah, I don't know about it.

But either way, yes, Michael has had more like typical social masculine conditioning, but he also has compassion. You know, he looks out for their mom when Elliot makes a comment about their dad being in Mexico with his new girlfriend and he knows that this upsets his mom and he wants to protect her and Michael tells Elliot like think about how other people feel for a change. That's not an exchange that you would usually see in a movie between two male characters. One encouraging the other to consider other people's feelings. So yeah,

I found that to be like refreshing and interesting. And then even for Keys, who is presented as an antagonistic force, a lot of movies I feel like would frame him as just like this blatant, big, bad, cruel, greedy, heartless. But he also displays compassion too, because, you know, he understands that Elliot has this empathic connection with ET and that he would want to say goodbye to ET when he dies. And he gives Elliot some time alone to, to say that goodbye. And in the sequel, treatment that again, sequel never existed, but the treatment for it does have Keys

and Mary getting together romantically, which feels unnecessary and annoying cares. I was like, again, that's like the movie is too good for that. Yeah, like that's another thing that I like where they don't say like, Oh, well, what we need is a new father for these kids. It's like, I really like D Wallace's performance in this movie because it's like, we don't know a lot about Mary, but I feel like a lot comes through in the performance. She's a good mom, but also she's the sole breadwinner.

So sometimes she's, you know, it's like a latchkey kid thing. Yeah. Breadwinner and caregiver. Yeah. Yeah. Their house is so nice. I was like, oh my God, their house probably would cost $2 million today. If not more. But you know, I think that there is room to know more about her, but because we're seeing

this from the kids' perspectives, they wouldn't be like, what is mom's job? Like we just know that she has to go to work. She's around them as much as she can be. And again, it's just like really sort of like a genuine feeling family dynamic where her kids love her, but they're also little assholes because they're kids. But she's not made out to be like the, I feel like a lot, again, another like kids movie trope where it's like the parents are totally goofy and like have no idea what's going on. And she doesn't know what's going on for a while,

but when she finds out what's going on, she takes her kids' feelings about it seriously. And I just like, she, yeah, I like that she is, I mean, a good parent, but also like a complicated person and you get those moments to know like she's also going through a lot. For sure. But they don't try to resolve that by being like, here's a new husband, which is like the laziest thing you could possibly do.

Right. There's one scene where she has a few like close encounters of the third kind. That's the truth. E.T. The scene where E.T. is like hiding among the stuffed animals and she doesn't notice, or the scene where E.T. is literally like right there walking around the kitchen and Gertie is trying to like introduce her mom to ET. And Mary is too preoccupied with like putting away the groceries to notice. And I feel like you could argue, oh, that's like a mother character being written to be so cartoonish that she doesn't even notice

the alien that's right there. I honestly chalked it up to like, she is the sole provider and caregiver for this family. And so she is going to be preoccupied, especially because like, two of these kids are pretty young. And so I'm like, yeah, she's just handling the responsibility that she needs to handle as a parent. So it didn't feel written to me that she was like, oh, women or mothers are so oblivious. It's just that she's like, got a lot on her plate. Right. The things that she doesn't know about, it makes sense and it doesn't make her negligent.

And also just like her having to deal with like, I guess Harrison Ford calling her and being like, Elliot's drunk at school. She's like, what? No. Yeah, I feel like she had like just the right amount of presence in the movie and is still like a very complicated, well thought out character. I also appreciate that you can tell that the kids

miss their dad. That, you know, there's a scene where Elliot and Michael find a shirt of their dad's in the garage and they're smelling it and they're like, oh, it's old spice, dad's old cologne. And then there's another part where Elliot has told his family about finding whatever this creature is before they know what it is and no one believes him.

And he says, dad would have believed me. So you get little hints of that throughout the movie. But there's no sense of like, the kids deeply resenting their mother that the parents have split up or that the like, brothers have like, a desperate longing for a male parental figure. You don't get those like very, I think, tropey senses that you would see. Right. And it's like the reason that it's painful is just because it's different and they feel like abandoned. But yeah, you're told, I didn't even connect that where it's like some divorce narratives involve the

kids being like, well, what did mom do wrong? She must've done something wrong. And I feel like there's another really good moment that I liked between Michael and his mom when Elliot has that moment of being like, well, dad's in Mexico with Sally. And she has a moment and Michael gets really defensive of his mom, which feels just really like,

would totally make sense for the eldest kid because he was the most cognizant of what would have been going on and how it would have affected his mom. And that was just like, I thought a really nice moment between, you know, that you don't really get any moments between Michael and his mom besides hearing off screen that he has a fucked up Halloween costume.

But like that moment you're like, oh, that totally makes sense. And I feel like really endears you to Michael early in the movie where he wants to, you know, be there for his mom, but also he's 14. Right. It's just really thoughtful. And yeah, like effortless where it's like,

his absence is there, but it's not like, ET is my dad now. Like, it's like, you know, like nothing weird like that. I did read that there was a, like, one of those like novelizations of ET, where it's heavily implied that Mary wants to fuck ET. Whoa. That she has a little bit of a crush on ET.

Okay. Kinky. Kind of like, I would read that book. Whoa. That she has a little bit of a crush on ET. Okay. Kinky. Kind of like I would read that book. I was like, yeah, forget keys. Yeah, ET's right there. Let mom fuck ET. Meet your new father. It's ET. Well, the other thing about Mary is that she doesn't believe Michael about finding this like goblin in the woods or whatever, but she doesn't not not believe like it's right. She even says it's not that we don't believe you, but maybe you did imagine it. So she kind of dismisses him, but not entirely. We've talked

about like, children being believed or not being believed in different episodes as sort of a representation of how children are often not believed in real life and not taken seriously about certain matters. So I appreciate that that was addressed and it felt like a realistic response where like, yeah, if a kid comes up to you and it's like yeah, I met a goblin in the field you'd be like Are you sure it was a goblin? So well, but like she takes the concern seriously. Yeah, she doesn't entirely dismiss him But she's also just like mmm. Are you sure though and turns out he was sure because it is an alien So egg on her face.

But I felt like that was handled realistically, at least. I agree. I agree. And then I wanted to talk a little bit about who is inside of ET. Because there were three people who took turns wearing the ET costume. So ET was a combination of like animatronic face stuff that was like done by puppeteers off screen, obviously. And then there were also people inside an ET costume. And so depending on what scene was being filmed,

there were three possible people who it might have been. Two of them were little people. Their names are Tamara Dutreault and Pat Bylon. And there was also a 12-year-old kid named Matthew DeMerit. I didn't know any of this. Wow. Yes. I found it on scholarly journal Wikipedia. So Matthew DeMerera was born without legs and he walked on his hands and he played all the scenes

where ET walked awkwardly or fell over, which is the phrasing that scholarly journal Wikipedia uses. Like when he's like drunk kind of thing, okay. Yeah, I think so. Wow, I did not know that. Yes, so what I to say is that little people and people with other physical disabilities get so little visibility in media. And if they are involved in a movie, it's often in a capacity like this. Like the Lord of the Rings, like force perspective stuff comes to mind where they would have little people playing the hobbits and things like that where it's very rarely characters

who are actually seen visibly on screen as little people living in society. It's actors who are little people playing some creature or something like that. Or it's, you know, other actors with other physical disabilities doing something where they're not actually seen visibly on screen as they are, they're being some creature. So, I wanted to acknowledge those actors and performers for the work that they did on the movie,

and also acknowledge that there's that major lack of visibility for Absolutely. I mean I just like I didn't know at all that they're right and that ET's voice Yeah, Pat Welsh like uncredited. Yes She smoked two packs a day of cigarettes to give her the like quality of voice that ET has it reminded me of the thing we talked about on The Exorcist where Mercedes McCambridge. Oh yeah, just like got fucked up all day long.

Yeah, like would drink whiskey and ate raw eggs and stuff to make the demon voice sound as intimidating as possible. And was like, check in with me later, Friedkin. Yeah, it's certainly an approach. But also I appreciate that the people who brought ET to life also not prescriptive to gender. Like that's further kind of lays out that, you know. ET genderless icon.

ET genderless, ET doesn't give a shit. Like ET's literally just trying to phone home. That's all, that's it. Yeah. Yeah. Is there anything else you wanted to talk about with, oh, well, I guess the surprise, I thought the surprise kiss was so unnecessary in the middle of that.

Like that just felt very dated. And also knowing that like Henry Thomas, I guess was really, really, really uncomfortable being asked to do that. And like didn't want to do it because he was just a little kid who was not interested in kissing. So I don't know.

I mean, it's a smallish thing. In the scope of 80s kids' movies, E.T. is doing almost everything right. But I just did want to single that out as, like, not necessary, especially if they're not gonna bother to, like, characterize. That little girl that... Yeah. It just feels very reflective of the time

where a surprise kiss was considered to be a romantic gesture and the way it's framed in the movie is like ET is like helping Elliot do all these good things such as release frogs from being killed, agree that's's a good thing. Great. But also kissing a girl in his class without her consent, not good, not the same thing. Why would you pair those two things together? It was just all like both seen as like heroic acts to do. Right. And it was yucky. Sorry, I just saw my rug moving on the floor.

I was like, what the fuck fuck Casper got under the rug. Oh, okay. Like turn the leg around. He was scaring my ass. Sorry. I'm safe now. Okay, good. Glad to hear it.

But no, that was really all I had. I'm sure there's some lore that we're missing. You know, there's so much with this movie. But yeah, those were the main points that I had. Did you know, there's so much with this movie, but yeah, those were the main points that I had. Did you have anything else? No, I think just the last, this isn't a discourse thing, but the last thing I just wanted to single out was the creator of ET or like the designer of ET, I guess. Yes.

There's a guy named Carlo Rambaldi, and he just has an incredible resume. I just wanted to share other movies he did special effects on, including he had previously done Close Encounters with Spielberg. He did Alien 1, the 79 one, and won an Oscar for it, I believe. He did Possession the year before ET, which is just wild.

He did David Lynch Dune. He did just all of these kind of incredible, iconic special effects designs. And yeah, won the Oscar twice, once for Alien and once for ET. And also I think that this is a time that just something you don't see a lot or as much of anymore

where it's like this huge blockbuster also got a lot of awards recognition because it's good. And I think hopefully it seems like we're kind of turning a corner there where you can't just make a movie that's so bad. And like I'm just like talking about Marvel stuff, but like you can't just make a movie that's like a big piece of shit and expect to make a billion dollars. Like I think there is a turning audience expectation to you do have to write a movie. Good.

I can't just look like shit. Yeah. Francis Ford Coppola. You can't just spend $120 million of your own money. Embarrassing. I mean, at least it was his money. True. Yeah. He should honestly just redistribute his wealth by making bad movies. At very least when I see someone

like blow that amount of their own personal accrued wealth, I'm like, well, at least they're not using it to hurt anybody. They're just except Caitlin's head. True. But yeah, UT was nominated for nine Oscars. How wild is including best picture? It's amazing. And best director and it won. Score original score best visual effects, best sound and sound editing. So more of the technical stuff. I still feel like Henry Thomas should have gotten like best. I know. It's such a special performance. Yeah. Anyways, yeah, that's all I have to say. I'd say it does pass the Bechdel test because ET is a genderless icon and there is a conversation between Mary and Gertie about ET. Yeah, I would agree with that. So even though they project, you know, man gender onto ET, I think ET rejects that projection.

I think ET is like there's bigger, we've got bigger fish to fry. Can we stop? Yeah. As far as our nipple scale though, the scale where we rate the movie zero to five nipples based on examining it through an intersectional feminist lens. Yeah, I mean, characters of marginalized genders are not necessarily the focal point of ET unless you count ET himself or themselves. But as far as like the human women and girls, which is pretty much only Mary and Gertie, and Gertie gets less screen time compared to her two brothers. And Mary doesn't get a lot of screen time because it's, you know, coming from the

kids' perspective of hiding this creature from their mom. So she's less of a presence than maybe some other kids' movies. But I still appreciate how the movie handles emotional expression from the male characters and how it's presented as a strength and the fact that like the big connection between ET and Elliot is a like emotional one and an empathic one where they feel each other's feelings and you don't really see that in most movies where there's some strong, like, empathic connection between male characters or between a boy or man and anyone else. So I liked that. I liked that the other male characters are similarly compassionate, but also, like, multidimensional.

All the characters feel multidimensional. And I feel like I want to give like three nipples. I don't know why, but it just feels right in my heart light and my and in the tip of my finger. I love that. Who are you giving your nipples to? I'll give one to the scene where ET gets plastered off of like one and a half cans of cores. Iconic.

I'll give one to little Drew Barrymore. She's so cute. Her dad was an abusive parent and not really present in her life. And Steven Spielberg kind of adopted her, became her godfather and felt very responsible. Also wanted to maintain the illusion that ET was real for Drew Barrymore. I love that story. Because she thought he was real and she would like have lunch with him on set and stuff. And one day she found like the various puppeteers and stuff who were controlling the like animatronic stuff with ET. And she's like, what's all this? And Spielberg was like,

don't worry, ET is so important that he has eight assistants. Like those are just his little He has eight assistants. Those are just his little, his assistants. Yeah, they're like, E.T. is a diva. He has a lot of people. Don't worry about it. I really, again, it's like Spielberg is, he's a fucking Zionist. I will say that in the past and still,

I mean, it's hard, I really, again, appreciate, especially if you're, we talk about this a lot, not necessarily with like directors directing children, but like having, you know, like if you are bringing an actor, you know, who is somehow vulnerable into your space, I also think about like when people cast non-actors in their work, it's like you are, to some extent, I think, responsible to like,

look out for them and like realize what incredible trust it takes, especially for a kid to trust you. It's like it's I'm glad that he like provided support even when she wasn't doing okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'll split my final nipple between the three performers who were in the ET suit and made ET come to life in that way. I'm going to go three and a half. I think I'm grading it probably on a curve because I just think it's such a beautiful

movie. Again, I think like there's absolutely not even a shred or a suggestion of any diversity within the casting of this movie, which is embarrassing. This takes place in Southern California in 82. There's absolutely no reason that there shouldn't be a more diverse cast. I mean, I do think, yeah, like you're saying that a movie that, yes, it is a boys on bikes movie, but it's my favorite boys on bikes movie because it is all about like Sensitivity and emotional intelligence, but they're not like Mary Sue kids Like they still are obviously kids and they still kind of give each other shit and like it feels like really authentic relationships between the kids that

Encourages, you know young boys at a time where nothing about culture was encouraging young boys to feel their feelings and not be like ashamed of it and that that's like a strength. And yeah, the way that the family dynamics, I kind of wonder, I mean, I don't think obviously this is far from the first movie that presents a divorced family. But even so, I think doing that on such a large scale and doing it in a way that is not blamey or shamey towards their mom, it's just difficult. I think it's really beautiful. And yeah, I just love this damn movie.

ET looks ugly though. There's no getting around it, but yeah. Even though the characters we generally focus on, well, I mean, Elliot is a boy, ET genderless icon, but I just feel like there is equity, not in screen time, but in how the care that every character is treated with and considered. And that feels so rare. I feel like so many mom characters or little sister characters just fade into the background

or they're the joke. And that's not the case for this movie. So I'm gonna give it three and a half nipples. I'm gonna give one to Melissa Matheson. I'm going to also split one between the three performers. I'm gonna give one to Dee Wallace because I feel like she is so good in this and also like I'm sort of giving the nipple mostly to

when she can't stop herself from laughing when Elliot calls Michael penis breath. That felt like that's just like such a great moment. And I'll give my last half to Pat Welsh and her cigarettes. Yes, indeed. Well, listeners, there you have it. We phoned home, but we didn't phone it in. We didn't phone it in, but we did phone at home to your home and to your ears. What if we recorded the podcast using the same device, like communication device that ET uses.

Karly This whole thing has been recorded with a buzz saw and a spell. So if it sounds bad, that's a lie. Karly That's why. Bekkah Wow. But yeah, thank you for listening. And you can follow us on social media, on Instagram at Bechtelcast. You can subscribe to our matri on.

This month we did the poll and the winners of the poll is women thievesuary, AKA women's wrongs. Women be stealing is the theme because it's the bling ring and oceans eight. I'm very excited. I've seen neither. So I'm very excited to get into that month. We referenced our recent episode on the exorcist that's over there. We just finished our horror month. A lot of good stuff going on on the

matrions. So please go over. It's the best way to directly support the show. People sometimes will ask like what is that is the way to directly supports the show way to do it. So go to patreon.com slash Bechdel cast and pledge only $5 a month. What a bargain for a back catalog of over 150 episodes. You can also grab some merch if you're so inclined at teapublic.com slash the Bechtel cast. And with that, let's freaking go home. My mom just got here. My mom's here to pick me up. My mom's here to pick me up. I gotta go. We gotta go. Bye. My mom's here. Gotta go. Bye. That's what E.T. says. The Bechtel Cast is a production of iHeart Media, hosted by Caitlin Durante and Jamie

Loftus, produced by Sophie Lichterman, edited by Mo Laborde. Our theme song was composed by Mike Kaplan, with vocals by Catherine Voskrasensky. Our logo and merch is designed by Jamie Loftus, and a special thanks to Aristotle Acevedo. For more information about the podcast, please visit linktree.com. Had enough of this country? Ever dreamt about starting your own? I planted the flag. This is mine. I own this. It's surprisingly easy. There are 55 gallons of water, 500 pounds of concrete.

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