The Bechdel Cast - Moulin Rouge with Daniel O'Brien

Episode Date: May 3, 2018

🎶 Caitlin and Jamie's gift is their podcast / they hope you don't mind / they hope you don't mind / that they put down in an audio track / how wonderful this episode about Moulin Rouge is / now Daniel O'Brien is the guest! 🎶(This episode contains spoilers)For Bechdel bonuses, sign up for our Patreon at patreon.com/bechdelcast. Follow @DOB_INC on Twitter! While you're there, you should also follow @BechdelCast, @caitlindurante and @jamieloftusHELP  Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th 2017 was assassinated. Crooks Everywhere unearthed the plot to murder a one-woman WikiLeaks. She exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. Listen to Crooks Everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. That's right, the only, Katherine Hahn is joining us on Las Culturistas. That's right, the queen of comedy herself. Get ready for a conversation that's as hilarious as it is insightful. Tune in for all the laughs, the stories,

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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. Hi and welcome to the Bechdel cast. My name is Caitlin Durante. My name is Jamie Loftus. And we are the hosts of the Bechdel cast. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Bye.

Do you want to go home? No, I am excited for today. It's just I'm still getting used to us being in a different space. I think that's part of what it is. Right. We're in transition right now. We're in transition. It's like it just the thing is we're in a space that I would argue is far less oppressive and well ventilated.

And but it's somehow making me nervous. I like being here because my good friend Sammy is recording for us today. Yes. Hey. Hi, Sammy. So the Bechdel cast is inspired by the Bechdel test, and it requires that a movie has two female characters who have names who speak to each other and cannot be talking about a man. Right. Not only do we talk about whether or not a movie passes the Bechdel test, we also talk about all kinds of shit regarding the portrayal of women in movies. We use it as a yardstick to begin a larger discussion.

Ooh. Ooh, jeez. I feel like we're both... Something is weird. We're in a new space. We're sitting kind of in a weirder position. Well, let's introduce our guest. I feel like that will really, you know, equalize things

here. I'm ready. Okay, he has a real intro too, but we need to say our guest did bring everyone but himself a Mike's Heart lemonade, which is truly the most generous thing anyone can do. I have yet to open mine, so

just give me one second here. Oh, can you bring the hiss up? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Hang on. Listeners live for the hiss. Here's the thing. I get emails every day about the hiss of a mic's hard can. Oh, it's so disgusting.

Stop. It's nice, and we like it. I mean, thank you. Anyway, so our guest, he is a very funny fellow and he is the author of How to Fight Presidents, Dan O'Brien. Hi, thank you so much for having me. Thanks for being here. Thanks for coming. I really hope I'm not like the weird element that changes your energy.

No, it's for sure our fault. Okay. We shouldn't be blaming ourselves so much, though. We are strong, smart women. This is something I come up against again and again, where it's just like, okay, I can be a feminist and also hate myself as an individual. And it's confusing sometimes because you're like, do I hate women? No, I just hate me.

And that's okay. Jamie, I want you to love yourself. Well, that's like a whole other podcast. Okay. Sorry. Anyways. So Dan, you brought us the movie Moulin Rouge. I did, yeah.

I'm so excited about it. Tell us, so what's your history with this movie? Is there any particular reason you chose this one? I knew I wanted something musical because I'm a music theater kid and just wanted to play in that world. And like it's really hard to find a group of people that are willing to talk to me about musicals. Oh, my God. I've been waiting. So wait, what kind of musical?

Like high school? Or did you bring it into college? Did you bring it after college? Because that's a move. Oh, it started way early. I started. I'm from Jersey originally. We went to my first Broadway show probably when I was in sixth grade. And then I started doing local community theater immediately thereafter and then was like fully identified as musical theater kid in high school.

And that was my... So you'll be prepared to burst out into song with us. Oh, definitely. During this episode at any time. Great. What was your favorite role in high school? I got to play Sudalis in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, which I wish I would have checked in with myself about why I liked

it so much that this is like a full blown clown. It's a character actor part that for some reason is the lead of the show. And when I was in high school, I just thought the real thing to do is to be romantic lead. That means you're the best actors if you get Tony in West Side Story and you play those kinds of roles. And I should have just

known at the time, no, you're just like a dumb fucking clown. Be a character actor, play clown roles, and bounce around. But that's one of the shows where the goof is the lead. It's like getting Tevye. Oh, here we go. You know who past guest of the podcast, Julia Clare, who you may remember

from our A League of Their Own episode. Yes. She just told me that she saw Alfred Molina play Tevye on Broadway. She mentioned that on that episode. Oh, I wasn't listening. Oh, jeez. Well, she was like, I'm certain I've told you, and I was like, may heaven!

There's audio evidence of it. Oh, unfortunately I am a terrible friend. But I can't But I would kill to see Alfred Molina play Tevye. So, Dan, when did you first see Moulin Rouge? I saw it on a VHS tape. I, for some reason, didn't see it in theaters. I don't know why because I see almost everything that I can. And I, alone in my room, watched Moulin Rouge because all my friends

were talking about it and as soon as it was done I said this is really goofy and then immediately watched it again like I don't think I've ever watched the same movie back to back ever before except for Moulin Rouge and it's strange because it's not my favorite movie it's just a movie that I watched and was like I need to experience this again. Well there's a lot to absorb when you watch Moulin Rouge. Yeah. I mean, it's considered kind of a classic now, right? I think so. Or it's like a movie that everyone remembers, and I don't think anyone remembers negatively, per se.

Jamie, when did you first see Moulin Rouge? Weirdly, this is one of those movies that I think if I had seen it when it came out, it would be such a part of my identity to the point where I may not even be here. But what does that mean? I would be living in France. And I thought you meant dead. I would you would have passed away. You would have deliberately gotten consumption just to be like sateen. And I'm right. I'd be like, you know what's really hot? Terminal illness. I didn't see this movie until like Christmas this year. Oh, wow.

Yeah. Yeah. I just saw it recently and I really like it. But it's one of those movies I'm like, man, I wish I'd seen this when I was like, when it came out because that would have, my life would have been taken over by it. Yeah. I saw it not right when it came out. I think a few years later I did a presentation on it as a freshman in college.

What movie have you not done a presentation on? Hardly anything. But now's a good time to mention that I do have a master's degree in screenwriting. Interesting point. That's a lot of presentations. That's why you have so many presentations. Right. I got two degrees in film. Yeah. Anyway, so this movie really took hold of me in like my college years.

I watched it like several times over the course of a few years. And then I was like, I don't know. And then I kind of forgot about it and stopped watching it. But so, OK, Moulin Rouge, should I do the recap? Yes. Yes. And also you should you should speak like people saying this movie, which is just screaming for no reason. A lot of scream singing in this movie. My gift is my song!

You're like, whoa! Whoa! Edwin McGregor has no concept of volume control, or there's a very deeply sadistic audio engineer who worked on this movie who would bring his levels up and down willy-nilly no i think he was screaming screaming or whispering he goes like even like my gift is my song and he goes and this one for you you're just like there's a middle there's there's others i don't know right yeah he's a fortissimo man i'll cover a bunch of very

specific but very different ground with this. In the way that current basketball superstar Steph Curry is ruining basketball for the youth because all kids now want to be Steph Curry, which means they go very far out and they shoot threes over and over again, ruining the sport on a youth level. I'm sorry. We don't allow sports talk here on this podcast. I'll bring it back then. McGregor did that for a bunch of boys in central New Jersey when this movie came out.

We were all like, that's what good singing then. McGregor did that for a bunch of boys in central New Jersey when this movie came out. We were all like, that's what good singing is. Mac! That's all we did all the time was just like belting. He comes in so hot every single time. What's the song he bursts into at the beginning when he's with John Leguizamo? He bursts into one song.

The hills are alive with the sound of music. Now imagine like a dozen chaotically horny teenage children in a church in New Jersey

doing that being like this is singing. And I love I love when because most movie musicals I think follow this line of like

you're putting movie actors in a musical they usually 95% of the time can't really sing and that's true of basically everyone in this movie but it's always like treated like it's like when Emmy Rossum sings the first song in Phantom of the Opera and everyone's like oh my god and it's like she is a decent high school soprano at best it's the same thing Ewan McGregor and Nicole Kidman, where like every time they sing, everyone's like, but we know objectively like this is like bad. This is not good singing, but it sure is loud. Yeah. So the story of Moulin Rouge focuses

on Ewan McGregor's character named Christian and he moves to Paris. He wants to be a part of the bohemian revolution and finds this group of people who are writing a play called Spectacular Spectacular. Bad idea. And he's like, hey, I'm a writer. And they're like, cool, why don't you write this thing for us? And then they have a plan to put up their play at the Moulin Rouge, which is a bordello, which I had to look up what that is. Oh, what is that? It's just another name for a brothel. So the Moulin Rouge is like a brothel in a dance hall where the creatures of the underworld hang out. And this team of creatives, basically like open mic comedians, essentially.

And they're like, hey, let's like try to get our big break at the Moulin Rouge. So they arranged this meeting with Satine, who is like the... She's a headliner. She's the headliner. Exactly. When she sings poorly, everyone pays attention. She is a courtesan. And they want to pass off christian as a famous english writer

who is writing spectacular spectacular so that she will convince ziddler the owner of the moulin rouge jim broadbent who yes queer icon in this movie yes or a when you're saying asexual icon because jim broadbent character in this movie only works if you assume he has no sexual organs at all. He has a sex lump that gets very hot. But there's nothing he can do about it. An icon. So, yeah, they want to basically convince Ziddler that they should put on their play. Meanwhile, Ziddler is orchestrating this thing for Satine to meet the Duke because they want this guy, the Duke,

to invest in the Moulin Rouge because he's very rich and very powerful. So there's this whole sort of like comedy of errors where this mistaken identity thing happens and Satine meets with Christian thinking that he is the Duke. And then they magically fall in love over the course of one song. No, Caitlin, they fall in love because he's an amazing singer. Well, during... My gift is my song! And then you have to fall in love. You have no choice. Right.

So then she figures out who he actually is and then she's just like, well, you're poor. You're a penniless writer. That song was so good, though. Yeah. So they end up falling in writer. That song was so good, though. Yeah. So they end up falling in love, and the Duke is all like, hey, wait a minute. What about me?

And she's like, she has to pretend to like him also. Meanwhile, they're constructing this play, Spectacular Spectacular, which has the exact plot of the love triangle of Christian Satine and the Duke. Except their play is appropriating Indian culture. Right. So it's like, what if what was happening in our lives, but somehow even worse? Yes. So then like all the truth comes out where the Duke finds out about Satine and Christian's relationship and he throws a fit.

Also Satine, she is dying of consumption she's very sick sometimes she goes and we go oh yeah she's sick she's free bleeding out of her mouth and just having a really bad time anyway so yeah all this uh stuff happens and then um christian thinks that she doesn't actually love him because she has to convince him oh you suck i hate you and it's just because she's trying to save his life and it's this whole thing. And then at the end, they put on the play. It basically turns into a UCB improv show at the end. It's basically a really high production value 301 showcase that they do at the end.

Right. And then Satine dies and then Christian's really sad about it. The end. He's the real victim here. That's the story. Did we miss anything? Probably. Nothing crucial to the plot, I don't think.

I did an excellent recap, Jamie. How dare you? I'm sorry. Well, you forgot. There's the narcoleptic Argentinian that is mostly played for laughs, but doesn't actually have any bearing on the plot. There's a bunch of weird, silly things like that. Right. There's T narcoleptic Argentinian that is mostly played for laughs but doesn't actually have any bearing on the plot. There's a bunch of weird, silly things like that. Right, there's Toulouse.

This is one of these movies that is, plot-wise, about 12 minutes long. Yes. Yeah. Which is fine. That's the nature of the musical movie very often. It's hard to write movies. So you write one, there's a musical within it, just make it the same thing.

Let's double down. just do it again yeah so i guess to jump in the plot i mean at least the plot starts out as being a story where a group of men are trying to trick a woman so that they can get what they want which is their stupid play sounds like open mic comedians to me well even going back a little further than that just like the fact that we're introduced to christian as like this genius who can just improvise classic songs from the past century is so it's really funny to me where all the jukebox musical elements to this movie are just ema McGregor yelling and being applauded. Because especially in that scene where, I mean, and that's an interesting scene to talk about,

the first scene between Satine and Christian where she assaults him a little bit. And then he squirms away and then immediately improvises a very famous Elton John song. And then they're in love. You're just like, this is, I'm almost, like when I saw that, I'm like, I guess I'm glad I didn't see this movie when I was 10. Because that is a very strange precedent. Yeah, like, yeah, she thinks that he is the Duke and because she is a sex worker, she's meant to be seducing him so that he will invest in the Moulin Rouge.

Yes. Which I think a powerhouse comedic performance by Nicole Kidman, who I don't think gets enough credit for being very funny, but watching this movie again last night, she is very funny in it. And that scene is incredibly silly because he wants to do poetry and she wants to do sex and they don't talk about it. And when he starts reciting poetry and she just goes, oh, that's right, this is what I want, naughty words.

And then he just starts like coming all over the couch because he's talking. It's so funny. She's like flailing around like, ah, ah, just ah. She's going to hurt herself, especially because she's terminally ill. She just can't be flailing herself around like that. She's going gonna pass out and then eventually she she uh she fake hornies herself into a dizzy spell right yeah you know that problem when you're trying to hook up with a guy and he's like no

i want to read you a poem this is a problem every day relatable problem but i do appreciate um christian's behavior in this scene because she's like throwing herself at him. And he's like, is this okay? Is this what you want? Because he's there just thinking he's going to recite his poetry for her, not realizing that she is expecting to be having sex with him. Right. So he's like, are you sure? But like he understands consent.

He does understand consent. But also he's like no don't fuck me i'm just trying to trick you like it's a weird in between i'm trying to trick your personality right right so at the end so that scene ends by her realizing that he is not in fact the duke and is actually a penniless writer. And then she's like, oh, gross, an open mic comedian. And then they part ways. But then he's like, oh, my God, I can't stop thinking about her. So he returns to her elephant where she hangs out in.

Yeah, her big hollow elephant in the sky. Scales the walls of the elephant. Scares, not unlike Snow White, and then sings a song at her, which makes her fall in love with him. What?

What? My gift is my one song. Oh, yeah, we were doing... Caitlin and I watched this movie together Friday night and we were doing a mashup of men scaling a wall and then singing it. My gift is my one song. I have a note that I took Friday night, I guess, that just says,

Owen screaming bangs McGregor. And that's the whole note. Wait, how do you say his name? It's Owen. Owen. Owen. I've said you in my entire life. And that's the whole note. Wait, how do you say his name? It's Owen. Owen. Owen. I've said Ewan my entire life. Is that wrong?

As far as I know, Owen. Owen? Yeah. Oh, another note. I had a lot of xylophone in this movie. There are a lot of sound cues in this movie. Very silly. Yeah, I have all caps sound effects as a thing

because it really happens a lot. I think the beginning of this movie has one of the most alienating, wacky, aggressive intros All caps, sound effects as a thing because it really happens a lot. I think the beginning of this movie has one of the most alienating, wacky, aggressive intros of any movie that I can think of. Because once Satine and Christian meet, I think starting from your song, it sort of unfolds like a movie you'd expect it to unfold. It's far school and it's silly and nobody's cool in it. But in the beginning, it starts with bearded Christian writing and it's like, Paris, 1900. It's like, I gotta tell a story now. And then it's like, fuck you, Paris, 1899.

And it goes back to when he meets a teen and he starts writing this story. The cutting is very quick. It's very, very jumpy. And he's talking about, he's sitting at his typewriter, young Owen McGregor, and saying like,

I wanna write a play about love. There's only one problem. Smash cut to his face. I've never been in love. And it's like, this is such a silly, goofy ass thing. Yeah.

And before you could even like, wrap your head around it, it's like, and then a narcoleptic Argentinian man fell through my ceiling with, is that John Leguizamo for some reason? It really seems like a movie that announces itself,

that is like, hey, here's our silliest shit up front, and if you're not ready for it, you should just like, walk out out now because the rest of the movie, you're not going to like it. Then they also have John Leguizamo, who is not a little person playing a little person. And yikes. But there is an actual little person in this movie. One of the women in the.

Oh, yeah. Who works for the sex workers. Another brilliant note I had is 75% of the primary cast is redheaded, which is maybe a Bechdel cast first. Very progressive. Yeah, great representation of redheads. Nicole Kidman, natural redhead. Jim Bradbent, red and out in this one uh emma mcgregor brunette boo he's a dick uh and then wait the duke the duke he's like a strawberry blonde yeah he's a he's a flaming hot ginge i wouldn't go so far as to say that okay i like it i like the duke because

he this movie is so cartoony and the du Duke reminds me of a trope that has been unpacked and examined within an inch of its life, but like the queer villain trope, where I feel like that is the Duke, even though he is also aggro and hetero at the same time. It's like he's stylized like a cartoony queer villain, like a Jafar, basically, with his twirly little mustache, and it's like, ee-hee-hee-hee-hee. But then it's also like, oh no, he's aggressively hetero

and very toxic at the same time. Right. There's a line in the movie where he, I mean, it's very clear that he sees Satine as a piece of property that he is paying for. I think he literally equates her to items. Yeah, he says, he's like, I'm not a jealous man. of property that he is paying for. I think he literally equates her to items. He's like, I'm not a jealous man.

I just don't like people touching my things. Yes, yes. So, at least his toxic masculinity is used to show that he is a villain, because that doesn't always happen in movies where, you know, sometimes there's toxic masculinity, and we're supposed to identify with that character. He also doesn't understand to rape her okay yes there is a

very difficult to watch rape scene that scene is bananas on so many levels because it is also scored to a really poor karaoke version of roxanne by the police which listening to the lyrics now a problematic song. Oh, yeah. Sure, yeah. And speaking of problems, who is Satine eventually saved by? A character named Le Chocolat. That's right.

Le Chocolat. Who is the black man who works at the Moulin Rouge. Only black person in the movie, I believe. I believe so. And his name is basically chocolate. And it's never spoken.

You have to go in the IMDb. We had to go in the IMDb. You hear it one time. Oh, do you? Yeah, someone says, thank you, chocolate. And I've seen it maybe like 12 or 13 times at this point and never picked up on that.

And then last night paused it and was like, surely they said Jean-Claude or something like that. And I really wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt and then went to IMDb and it's le chocolat. Yes. There's also a character played by an Asian woman named China Doll, which we don't find out in the movie, but it's on IMDb. Yeah. Yikes.

So there's some really problematic things about this movie. And the whole play where they're just appropriating the fuck out of- Appropriating Indian culture and there's all white people in that play. Well, not great. Not a great precedent to set back okay so back to the back to the rape scene i hate that i have to say that yeah we're edging away from racial appropriation we're getting back to the rape scene at this point got it got it got it so that scene i think it's the documentary misrepresentation that talks about this, where oftentimes in movies, a rape scene will be framed not that dissimilar from an actual like consensual sex scene where it's like kind of sexy almost.

You know, obviously, that's a horrible way to frame rape. And I think that at least this movie doesn't do that. I don't think that's necessarily true there we're this whole time in this whole so it's done to the roxanne song oh yes and we're cutting so that whole scene you're cutting back and forth between the duke basically attempting to rape satine uh and then we're cutting back to like a very sexy musical number i think that that definitely contextualizes it in a very bizarre way i don't think you know that to me says drama but it doesn't say danger necessarily i don't know i mean i think when you're watching it you do get the sense of like

she like it's really hard to watch and yeah like she's scared and it's definite I don't know it is I see your point I just think putting rape to a musical like that is a very it's a shaky precedent choice for sure they also do a really strange like pre softening of it or an attempt to pre soften it I guess with uh before this Jim Broadbent and

the Duke do a cover of Madonna's Like a Virgin because Jim Broadbent is trying to explain why Satine has not come to the Duke to sleep with him. It's like, oh, she's confessing. She wanted to confess her sins and be pure because the Duke makes her feel virginal. And then they both growl at each other very wet-mouthedly about how great virgins are.

And then... Which is crazy because Jim Broadbent's character is neutered. Yeah. So Jim Broadbent's character is neutered. Yeah. So Jim Broadbent like dresses up like a woman in that scene. And the Duke chases her around. And it's played like a Benny Hill goof-em-up thing. Like look at the Duke chasing around this woman.

Isn't that funny? He's going to do it for real later. The dance and waiters. Yeah. I didn't even think of that as. Yeah. That is kind of like a warm up

of like a very goofy scene featuring the rapist and then you see the rape in the next scene. Yeah. Didn't even think of that. Yeah. Man.

At the end of the rape scene she is rescued by Emma McGregor's character. Christian comes and No she's rescued by Oh she's rescued by LeChagelot. And then he comes in and she's like i was scared blah blah and so the conclusion to the rape scene is like and she could not save herself and the character that is a whole other issue this movie

has rescues her for the second time because he also catches her at the beginning when she goes, and then she falls off of a circus swing. Not to make light of consumption. I think that we can make light of consumption, right? Consumption is not a problem anymore. No, isn't it the same thing as tuberculosis? It's tuberculosis, yeah. Okay, yeah, which is still a thing.

We just don't call it consumption anymore. So not to make light of a serious illness that some people do. Sorry for tuberculosis, yeah. Okay, yeah, which is still a thing. We just don't call it consumption anymore. So not to make light of a serious illness that some people do. Sorry for tuberculosis shaming. But yeah, so yeah, she does have to be saved. I have conflicting feelings about scenes like that where, like, a lot of times when a woman has to be saved in a movie, it's because, like, the supervillain captured her and she has no agency and she can't do anything for herself and she needs the male superhero to come and fix everything and to save her it feels a little

bit different in a situation where a woman is being assaulted and someone intervenes and steps in to save her so like i obviously i want that to happen If there is an assault taking place, I want someone to intervene, assuming she isn't in the position to do that for herself. I deeply dislike the scene on every level because the takeaway from that scene is also like it uses in sort of the classic way that media often does uses rape as a plot device. And that is the final thing that launches her into realizing she truly loves Christian because she was almost raped by the Duke. Yes. And that is so, like, that happens all the time, using rape as, like, the final thing to convince the woman that she's actually in love with someone who hasn't attempted

to rape her, even though that person is very possessive and weird and yelling all the time. Which, yeah. That was also one of my least favorite parts about it, that the reason that she fought him wasn't because she didn't want to get raped for the violation aspects of it and the removal of power and just everything terrible about rape.

It's because, she explains to Christian later, I just couldn't go through with it because I really love you. I didn't want to pretend anymore. It had nothing to do, yeah. Right. She doesn't even tell him that he attempted to rape her. Yeah, she just contextualizes it as like, I don't want to be this person anymore.

I don't want to have to like sell my body to please men. Which perpetuates the message that that was a necessary thing to happen to her to get her back to the protagonist. And that's just like, you see that when you're super young, that's like just a nasty little precedent. Right. To set. And I want to talk more about Christian being extremely possessive of her because both of the characters that are vying for Satine's love are extremely possessive of her. It's villainized more in The Duke, obviously.

Well, then also Jim Broadbent's very possessive of her in a non-sexual way, in a business way. Right. It's true. She is the business. Yeah. Yeah. So Christian's arc goes from he quickly falls in love with her and she sort of acts like

she loves him and then she actually does fall in love with him. And then they're canoodling behind the scenes and like having this clandestine relationship. Meanwhile, he is upset that she has to be spending time with the Duke because Ziddler keeps being like, hey, you know, he's he holds the deeds to the Moulin Rouge. You have to appease the Duke. And to be fair, Satine is does seem to have a vested interest in the Moulin Rouge succeeding. And she's not pushing against Ziddler that much because she's she has a vested interest in the Moulin Rouge succeeding. And she's not pushing against Zittler that much because she's, she has a vested interest in the business's success as well. Right. So she's going to do her job.

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And we'll get into a whole other conversation about sex work. I spoke to a sex worker and I was just like, Hey, can you give me some insight? And in anticipation of this episode?

Yes. Wow. Yeah. I do my research research that's so legit so i want to get into that in a moment but um so sateen's character she understands what her job is and christian knows also the nature of her profession and that she has sex with other people for various reasons and it makes him very jealous in several different scenes throughout the course of the movie to the point where his arc sort of ends with she has

convinced him that she doesn't love him anymore in an attempt to save his life because the duke's like i'm gonna get my manservant love joy sorry titanic reference to murder christian so she like sends him away and he's like depressed and having an emo episode about it in his bed god oh that emo episode is such a go away go away please stop yelling at john leguizamo please so then he's like wait a minute there's something weird about this i have to go see what's wrong so he sells his typewriter gets all this cash drama confronts satine in the middle of their play throws money at her and he's like i've paid my whore and it's a wow so hot loving people screaming at me when i'm in the middle of doing something he's clearly a feminist icon in that moment but she also told him in song in the beginning of the movie that they shouldn't be together because

you will be mean. And he was like, no I won't. And then smash cut to the end of the movie where he's throwing money at her and calling her a whore and like storming off on her opening night. Yeah, foreshadowing. So he is not respecting like the boundaries of her work and not respecting the nature of her work. He can't hang.

He cannot hang. His problem is he cannot hang. And so is he cannot hang. And so that is a huge problem because, so Satine, I have a lot of conflicting thoughts about this movie where I think it's interesting and even cool that we see a movie where one of the main characters is a sex worker and it is like hyper glamorized and, you know, it's very flashy. And her life is made to seem like really extravagant. And a lot of times when we're seeing depictions of sex workers

in movies, they are like tattered women who are addicted to drugs, and they're like working the streets. And that is true for some sex workers. There's some sex workers where they do live sort of an upscale, glamorous lifestyle. And then there's a whole other kind of branch, I suppose, of sex work where it's kind of middle class. And this has been ushered in by the Internet era. today basically advertises her services online, is able to screen her clients, feels very liberated in her job. This job is her choice. She wants to be doing this. She wasn't forced by anyone. She's not doing it to support a drug habit or anything like that, which is what I think a lot of people have an understanding of what sex work must be or that's the means to that end. So there's a whole ton of people doing a type of sex work where it's like on their terms and this is what they want to be doing and they are proud to be doing this. And media almost never touches on this or portrays this in any way. Right. So I was basically just asking like,

how do you feel about depictions of sex work in movies like Moulin Rouge? And she was just basically saying like, it's treated as something that both male characters are trying to save Satine of, and trying to, like, get her out of this lifestyle. And even Satine in the movie is like, oh, I can't wait to be a great actress, like Sarah Bernhardt. She has, like, desires outside of being a sex worker. And again, that might be true for a number of people in the sex work profession, but that's not necessarily true. So, and granted, you also have to consider the time that this movie is taking place in. It's turn of the century France.

Right. Although I would argue probably not a thoroughly researched part of the movie because they are singing Fatboy Slim a lot of the time. Really strict. Just on the historical accuracy level, I never understood why John Limuzauma plays Henri Toulouse-Lautrec, who was a real person who lived at this time and was a little person that had a cane. That's a real person who existed in the art scene.

I didn't know that. And no one else in the movie is real. But they picked this one person and they're like, well, we need, like for some verisimilitude, we need Toulouse-Lautrec in there. And then Christian and Chocolat and Satine and a bunch of other made-up people. I don't understand why. I think that you bring up the idea that sex work is something that Satine would have to be saved from. This kind of reminded me of, this is a fun roundabout plug. We recently did a bonus episode on The big lebowski and i recognize a similar theme here where there's two very

specific types of toxic masculinity presented in this movie and it's clear which kind the movie favors you know so we have the duke who is a capitalist and entitled and a rapist bad across the board bad bad bad but then you look at the christian character and he's not a good guy he is still very entitled uh he is still jealous and possessive and that form of toxicity is not challenged in any way by the movie and in fact the movie is like this is what you want yeah you know you need to end up with him i and i'm also just so tired of like movies being like you should date a loser and it's like you know what actually i don't want to satine is out earning him to like an absurd degree in this movie i'm like why are you putting up with this loser who's just like hey stop kissing

other boys i'm like get a job there anyways. You're going to ruin my romantic life as an unemployed writer who screams a lot. This movie is huge for me. An unemployed screaming icon. Owen Middlepart Screamer McGregor. I can't take it. I can't take it.

If there's one saving grace for this movie, if I want to give the movie more credit than it probably deserves in terms of being clever, which I shouldn't. The framing device of the movie is still, this is the story as told from Christian's perspective. So what we're seeing is what he has written out on his typewriter, his play or movie or book

called The Moulin Rouge. He's writing a screenplay. How many degrees is he at? You know what? He doesn't have a master's from BU, that's for sure. I don't know if I want to give Baz enough credit for this, but if I'm being generous, I would say, Baz, you made this so very clearly a male's story

with women that need to be saved because the guy who's writing it is wrong. And that's if I want to go two levels in and give him extra credit. I don't think that was the thought that went into it. wrong. And that's if I want to go two levels in and give him extra credit. I don't think that was the thought that went into it. I don't think they thought, let's make a love story, but let's make sure that it's written

from a male's perspective and problematic because of that lens. Buzz. A little buzz. Buzz is a polarizing guy. He wears aviator sunglasses a lot. He's Australian. This is the third movie in his red

curtain trilogy he's just boss you know i'll say it boss is a piece of work and he needs to chill out and the great gatsby's sucked eggs oh yeah what are the other in the red curtain trilogy strictly ballroom from 1992 which i don't know what that is. Romeo plus Juliet, Claire Danes and Leonardo DiCaprio, lots of Hawaiian shirts. Jamie Kennedy. Jamie Kennedy! The Jamie Kennedy experiment. I want to marry into the Kennedy family so badly.

So I, and then I want to become the dominant. I want to get into a fight. Wait, he's not of the Kennedys, is he? No, no, no. That would be so funny if he was their skeleton. His Kennedy family. No, I want to marry into the Kennedys. Okay.

Here's my plan. I need to marry into the political dynasty Kennedys and then become a more powerful Jamie Kennedy. Oh, okay. And then fight Jamie Kennedy. That makes sense. Yeah. There's a more powerful Daniel O and, oh, okay. And then fight Jamie Kennedy and win. That makes sense. Yeah. There's a more powerful Daniel O'Brien in the world.

Really? Yeah, he was an orphan who went on to become a gold medal winning Olympic athlete. Wow. Well, shit. Yeah, there's nothing I could do. I've topped the Jamie Loftus who's a really successful realtor in St. Louis. Shout out, fuck you. I'll fight her any day.

But now it's like, well, I got to. Step one, marry Kennedy. This will be easy. Step two, figure out Jamie Kennedy's contact information. This will be harder. Step three, challenge him to a public fight. Step four, get very strong. Step five, beat Jamie Kennedy up.

Step six, start a show called The Jamie Kennedy Experiment. Step six, or seven? Seven. Step seven, have my version of The Jamie Kennedy Experiment go on exactly one episode longer than the original Jamie Kennedy experiment

that's the plan okay great that's the that's the real Jamie Kennedy experiment great best of luck to you in that thank you so much you're welcome so yeah you're right the story is totally from the male perspective and a side note, the opening shots you see in the Moulin Rouge of all the dancers, it's a lot of disembodied female body parts and women lifting. And it just feels like very headless women of Hollywood objectifying. You're not going to believe this, but every major behind-the-scenes player in this movie is a man. Right. Directed, produced, screenplay, cinematography, editing, all dudes.

And most of the characters are men. You would think that a movie set in a brothel would feature more characters who are women. And yet... What is the name of the other female character who... Okay, I wanted to talk about her a little bit, but I don't know what her name is. Marie. Marie? I keep calling her old carpet bangs

because she has these crazy tassel bangs and she's mean and that's all I know about her. Oh, that's Nini. Nini is the one who talks to Duke and is like, why would she get with a penniless writer? I mean, sitar player. That's Nini. Honestly, fair point.

By old carpet bangs. I identify closely with all carpet things where she's just like why is she dating that fuck boy why is it what and it's like okay fair carpet things but like who are you and why are you so angry where she's the only other employee of the moulin rouge who's a woman that we really meet and she is and this is again like something we see over and over she is just baselessly very hateful and antagonistic towards Satine because women be hating women and you know it's like in my I feel like the implication is and it's never explicitly stated but the implication is well Satine is the big star so everyone's going to resent her because she's the big star and everyone else is trying to get ahead. But it's so shoehorned in just because basically Carpet Bangs is there to deliver a plot point, which is to tell the Duke that Christian and Satine are hooking up.

Like, that's why she's there. And then she's also in that she's the one they're cutting back to when Satine is getting raped. And it's like Carpet she's the one they're cutting back to when Satine is getting raped. And it's like carpet bangs. You deserve better. Yeah, I well, I definitely took note of how there was an obvious sort of like lack of sisterhood or like sense of family among the sex workers in the Moulin Rouge. And I asked the woman who is a sex worker about this. And I said, like, what's your take on that? I would imagine that there's more of a just like sense of camaraderie among these women. And she said that,

yeah, brothels probably did sort of operate like families, but because they were all kind of in competition with each other because they were working for a man and the man was collecting most of their wages, they were not independently operating and therefore did sort of have to be in competition with each other. So it actually kind of tracks that Nene was so antagonistic towards Satine. But the movie does not make any, I feel like that's giving the movie a lot of credit. Sure. She was there to deliver a plot point.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. The movie doesn't really explore the intricacies of sex work from that time. And I would guess probably has no fucking idea they existed. The female characters are not who they're invested in at all. Right, right, right. I didn't even really know that it was specifically a brothel and sex workers. I know the play within a play is about a courtesan and that's a sex worker.

But I thought Moulin Rouge was more like a burlesque hall. Like I learned from you that this is a brothel. I thought it was a burlesque haul. I learned from you that this is a brothel. I thought it was a burlesque haul, and they were not formally selling sateen to the Duke, but just sort of like, if you marry this guy. But yeah, now that I know that it is about sex workers, it's a bad job movie. In the opening voiceover where Christian's typing

on his little typewriter, which he apparently had to buy another one of because he sells his first one to throw money at Satine. Yeah, for a bit. Oh, yeah. Sells it for a dramatic bit. I'll show you. I'll sell my...

Oh, I had a note of that too. It was like, oh, no. White male writer quit. No. Horrible. What a loss. So he buys another typewriter, and he starts typing up his story about him and Satine,

and he is explaining what the Moulin Rouge is, and he calls it a bordello, and I had to look up what that is, but it is synonymous with a brothel. So I think the first time I saw this movie, I knew that they were sex workers. I was like, oh, that's what they were. Maybe not like... Right.

I feel like I knew that, but just because I I was like, oh, that's what they were. Maybe not like... Right. I feel like I knew that. Yeah. But just because I knew what Moulin Rouge was. Right. Yeah. You also wrote up opening shots of them where you just see legs of women dancing and they lift up their skirts and you see underwear. Just in Googling a little bit last night, originally they wanted that to be...

They would have no underwear. So it would just be like a parade of headless vaginas and then they wanted the pg-13 rating so they decided not to do that but that's almost how this movie opened that's horrifying but i do love as a nickname the headless vagina um i wanted to mention because i i just double checked because i was like okay nini i did not catch that name, but she is credited as her last name, NeNe Legs in the Air. Oh, unbelievable. Great. God. It's like I get that you're trying to have a fun time, but please stop.

Please stop. Oh, Kylie Minogue is in this movie as well. I'm the green fairy. Well, that's an original. Okay, so let's talk a little bit about how Bohemia is presented in this movie, because it is a very utopian thing for a very specific kind of person, where at the beginning where they're like, beauty, freedom, truth, like 400 white guys are on a balcony screaming beauty, freedom, truth, and love, and then there's a gyrating

Kylie Minogue grabbing in her own tits and being like, yeah, they're so right. And it's like, it's just, I don't know. I just didn't, that sets the precedent for what the movie is.

Cause then they're, cause when they're singing that, they're like, let's go trick a lady and they're going off and then they try to do it. Yeah. I don't know. That was, I was just like, man,

this movie sure did come out in what, 2000, 2001? 2001. 2001. Geez. Same year as Shrek. The year everyone... 2001, people are like, a difficult year for us because of Shrek. Why to Shrek?

Why to Shrek? Why Shrek 2 is the better question. I own Shrek 2 on DVD. Anyway, so. It's actually, I would say better than the first one. I would agree. I would agree with that too. Where's our Shrek 2 episode? Most likely 5

because 5 is in production. 3 through 5, scrap them. Don't need them. Puss in Boots, you'd be surprised. I haven't seen it. Hey, speaking of Puss in Boots, though, did you know that cats have eight nipples? Oh, nice. This is Cat Facts with Caitlin. There was a cat in this movie for like a second.

Is there? Yeah. Yeah, it was like in one of the bohemian apartments. Oh, sure. I didn't pick up on it. Wow. I was surprised you didn't squeal when we watched the movie together. You know me, always squealing when I see cats in school.

That was a poor characterization of who you are as a person. Just a little bit more on Satine and how, because she is framed as the object of several different people's affections in this movie, and she's given agency, but a lot of her behavior is also like kind of wild and she's a sex worker who is portrayed not well i would say no but perhaps better than sex workers in a lot of movies where she has some degree of agency and she does stand up for herself toward the end whenever she's about to go run off with Christian and she's you know confronting Zidler and says something like you've only ever made me feel like I was worth what someone would pay for me and she's like I'm tired of your games like I don't I'm sick of the Moulin

Rouge we're leaving and then he Jim Bradbent does not tell her she is going to die. Yes, he knows. Big problem. And that's when he reveals it to her. He's like, you're dying, Satine. He's got, I mean, which we were saying when we were watching the movie. We were like, oh, he's got a trump card. He's got a trump card.

He's got a trump card. Which is so manipulative. Like, the fact that they were withholding that information from her is insane. I mean, I am going to do that to jamie kennedy sure but also i view that as reparations also like a bizarre i guess this i don't know if this is reflective of 1900s france or not but she'd been going to that doctor for a while and it was just one point where the doctor was just like is there a man that i could tell about her condition like like even the doctor doesn't tell her it's just like is there like an older male figure around like a policeman or something that i could just about her condition? Even the doctor doesn't tell her. Is there an older male figure around

like a policeman or something that I could just tell? I wouldn't be surprised if that were a standard in a bordello of like, oh, we're not going to communicate directly with the patients. I'm sure that it wasn't ethical. But that was a while because you knew, like the audience

knows that so early on. And Satine is just like, I have this persistent cough. And it's like, no. Also, women be fainting. But I guess in this movie she's fainting for. It's a motivated faint, but still. It's just like, okay. So my point is, I like that you at least get to see her stand up for herself finally.

At least we get to see her stand up. At least we get to see her tight five. She's a headliner. She's doing 45. Yeah, she's doing. She's working after her hour. She gets free french fries. She's going to submit her half hour to Comedy Central any day now.

It's going to be great. She could do great. So at least you get to see her stand up for herself you know it doesn't really get her anywhere and she does in fact die at the end of the movie oh and can i say i did really admire the way that she dies which is again very plot driven and informs the entire framing device of the movie but with her dying breath satine gives christian a homework assignment which is super dope, and I will remember that when I am dying. To be like, before I go, write a novel about me, goodbye. You're just like, he has to do it now, or he's the biggest asshole in the entire world.

And there was no room for him to be like, I can't, I sold my typewriter to call you a whore in front of your friends. Oh no. Hold on. Wait a second, I can't read. I cannot wait to A, die. B, give someone a homework a very complicated homework assignment that is basically a shrine to me as I die. Like,

make sure there's clean water for everyone dies. Like, oh shit. Yeah, maybe. Oh,

yeah. Can't wait to die. Anyway. No, I'm kidding. So sweaty doing bits, I'm sorry. Dan,

sweaty bits, I'm sorry. Dan sweaty bits. All right. That's going to be of my lifetime of trying to get nicknames to stick. Dan sweaty bits. That's going to be the one.

That's going to be the one. It's never the one that you want. No, it's not big dragon. It's going to be sweaty bits on my tombstone. Have you, sorry, have you tried for big dragon?

I did. Well, yeah, tried for Big Dragon? I did. My life is super not real. I'm not a real person. I don't legitimately think I should be called Big Dragon. I think the idea of a person insisting on being called Big Dragon is very funny to me. So I was like, wouldn't it be cool if I was a character who did that? And I just do it

in real life because life is a movie. Everyone's an artist. Some people do. That's exciting. I'm going to put that into ether. Everyone should start addressing me as Jamie Kennedy and just put that vibe out there and then I'll marry Kennedy and kill the other Jamie Kennedy. Do you know, are there

a bunch of young Kennedys running around still? There are. Taylor Swift is fucking some of them. They're around. They're around and they are erect and they are ready for you. You just have to locate them. Great. Caitlin is strategically already deleting this from the podcast in her mind.

No, what do you mean? I'm trying to figure out what my thesis statement for this episode is. Because I can't really... I just don't know how I feel about Satine and her... I don't know. The one argument I would make for this movie, because it does make so many missteps in terms of representing literally anything, is that it is so extremely silly and removed from reality that i

would hope and again it's different when you have a very young audience coming to a movie like this but i would hope that for the every man adult basically that you wouldn't leave this movie being like oh a blueprint of how to behave in reality. Right. You know, where some movies I feel like are more problematic on a deeper level because they're portraying normal people behaving very toxically, where at least everyone in this movie is so cartoonishly removed from what reality is now or probably ever at any point in time because people will be singing in eggs or elephants or whatever it is,

that it's presented as a farce and that doesn't make the problematic parts less bad, but it does make them easier to dismiss. Totally. And I think that's one of the reasons I like this movie so much, because as we all know, I don't like musicals generally. But I really like this movie and I think it's because the reason I don't like a lot of musicals is that I just have a really hard time suspending my disbelief for like people just suddenly bursting into song. But because this movie is so cartoonish and so far removed from everything that we recognize as reality, then I'm like, because I mean, everything between the production design and Baz Luhrmann's like, hey. Oh, yeah. Everything between the production design and Baz Luhrmann's like, hey, for like half of the scenes in this movie, Baz Luhrmann's like, get every red gel in Hollywood and put them on the lights. And then for the other half, get me every blue gel in Hollywood and put it on the lights. So like the movie just looks so wild, like the costumes and the set design and everything about it is just like so flashy and wild that we don't like that's why I'm able to like suspend my disbelief for this movie and this movie was like influential

in that it put the ability to make a Hollywood movie musical briefly back on the map as a viable thing you could do it was only for like five or so years and then by the time we hit rent and like rock of ages everyone's like oh yikes you know what bury it for a couple decades and we'll try again yeah but this and then a few years later chicago were the two hit movies that's like maybe we can and then they made phantom of the opera and rent and they're like perhaps we should put it a little too close to the sun on those yeah but that i i like that the same reason that you do, Caitlin. And there's a Baz Luhrmann quote about,

and I'm not a big Baz Luhrmann guy because I agree that Gatsby is full trash. You're not a Baz boy? I'm not a Baz boy, no. But he was influenced by, and it's insane that he didn't let this influence spread into the casting, but when he was in India working on something

and he saw a bunch of Bollywood films, he was really heavily influenced by that and how much joy there was in the cinema and how the audience was participating. And he was saying, would we ever be able to do that in the West? Would we ever be able to be not cool and just lean into uncoolness

in service of just sharing this story with a singular voice? And I hate coolness. And I think most movies are too cool for school these days. And I like the idea of someone's writing like this. Wow, Dan, Big Dragon O'Brien, what a statement. Movies are too cool. Be my friend.

You know what? Movies these days, they're too cool. So he went to Bollywood and he's just like, hmm, I could appropriate this culture in my white movie. What if I stole this? That's interesting. I didn't know that. That totally makes sense,

especially given the play within the play is sort of like reflecting that directly. You know, it's like I am not upset this movie exists at all. I enjoy watching it. The problems are very clear. I don't know what it is that you're just like, ah, but it's Moulin Rouge. Yeah. I know what it is that you're just like oh but it's moulin rouge like yeah i think it's also like you you're both probably pretty lucky that it didn't

come to you in high school like it came right to me right around september 11th because it did make us all very insufferable for a while like yeah i mean well people are looking for escapes yeah i me shrek i loved moulin rouge and then for a couple years distanced myself from it because the cult of people who are really into Moulin Rouge was like, oh, that's not, I don't want to be, we're annoying. Is there a fan base issue with this movie? That makes sense. I think it's rolled into the broader fan base of really irritating theater kids in general. We're going to go to Fridays after the show.

We're still going to have our old line makeup on our foreheads. And we're going to sing Rent. And everyone's going to love it. The rest of the restaurant is going to be like, what a treat. Does anyone have any final thoughts about the portrayal of women in the movie Moulin Rouge? I don't think we talked about Marie, who's one of the other named women who has a couple of lines in the movie. She's sort of like the den mother of the brothel, I suppose. Just like non-sexually running it with Jim Broadbent.

And you would think, I feel like if this movie was made today, she would have had a way more prominent role. Yeah. Well, let's talk about whether or not this movie passes the Bechdel test because several conversations take place where Satine is there and Marie is there and they sort of sometimes talk to each other. You know we've got I feel like you and I have to make a sort of call of whether a scene should pass the Bechdel test if when the conversation that arguably could pass happens we know both names because I think that when the arguable scenes unless I'm mistaken we don't yet know marie's name but we figure it out later and then it's like well does this scene pass in retrospect really getting into the weeds here yeah well okay so the scene where they first interact it's after satine has fainted caught by le chocolat right and

then deposits her in this room marie is holding some smelling salts up to her, and she wakes up. Classic revival. And you don't know this unless you are watching the movie with subtitles on, which I always do brag. You do always do that. I love subtitles, you guys. What a weird thing to be into. How dare you subtitle shame me? Okay.

Sorry, bitch. So, Satine wakes up, and it's so breathy that you don't really know what she's saying but she says marie does she say her name she says her name oh i totally know these silly costumes and then so she says her name but you hardly know that it's there and then marie says just a little fakingting spell. And then, and that's the, that's the line that we don't really know what she says, unless you're watching it with subtitles on, because it's so kind of garbled that it's hard to tell what she's saying. Right. Before that, Nini says to, oh, Nini legs in the air. Nini legs in the air. It can't pass the Bechdel test if the

woman's name is Nini legss in the Air. True. New rule. And she talks to another woman, and I don't remember exactly who it is. Nini says something like, don't know if the Duke's going to get his money's worth tonight. She's also Michael Caine. It's like, hold on a second. And then the other woman says, don't be unkind, Nini. But that doesn't pass the Bechdel test because they mention the Duke.

And also we don't know that other woman's name. The scene where Satine says, oh, Marie, these silly costumes. And then Marie says, just a little fainting spell, I guess, passes. But we also hard to tell what any of them are saying. And then later on, there is a scene where Marie says to Satine that Twinkle Toes Duke has really taken the bait. And then Satine giggles.

And then... Thank you. Wait. I was like, wait a second, what is giggling? And then Marie says with a patron like him,

you could be the next Sarah Bernhardt. Speaking of patrons, please sign up for our Patreon. Okay. Satine responds, oh, Marie, do you think I could really be like the next Sarah Bernhardt. Speaking of patrons, please sign up for our Patreon. Okay. Satine responds, Oh, Marie, do you think I could really be like the great Sarah? Marie says, Why not? You've got the talent.

You hook that duke and you'll be lighting up the great stages of Europe. And Satine says, I'm going to be a real actress, Marie. A great actress. I'm going to fly far away from here. That does pass. I mean, they do talk about the Duke, but because we have a, you know, just two line exchange. Yeah, there are two lines where they are not.

And yes, the team's talking about her goals and Sarah Bernhardt, how she wants to be just like her. With regrets, Moulin Rouge does pass the Bechdel test. It would seem so, yes. It does. I do think that ultimately it is bleak that we are shown a majority female workplace that sidelines every woman in the movie so significantly, except for body part shots. Also sidelined, do you guys have thoughts? Forgive me if it's Aubrey or Audrey. It's the original writer who I believe is a man wearing a woman's wig.

Audrey. Audrey? Yeah. He plays Faramir in the Lord of the Rings series. Really? I've never seen a Lord of the Rings. I know. I saw them and I was like, this is for geeks. I can't believe how much you're shaming me today. I'm sorry. I don't know what's you're shaming me today. I'm sorry.

I don't know what's wrong with me. Anyway, so yeah, Audrey. Audrey, I didn't know if they were trying to present this as like, this is a potential trans person or I'm reading into it. It's just maybe that's his natural hair. But it felt like a Bob wig that he was wearing in 1899 France. Hard to say. not a masculine name so i didn't know what they if they were trying to present a trans character and then if they were bad on you movie

for replacing it with the straight white male ewan mcgregor immediately right but i don't know trying to always suppress queer voices there is a very quick shot you see of two men, very heavily tattooed, dancing together in the Moulin Rouge. Oh, I missed that. Oh, yeah. There's just like a quick moment of queerness that you see on screen and then it's immediately cut away from. A moment for queerness. I wrote gay panic in my notes, but I don't know why. I wrote it in all caps right after sound effects.

And I'm trying to remember. That's early in the movie. So maybe it's. Is it when. I didn't write down the exact moment, but there is a moment where there are a few tasteless jokes in regards to like, I think it's basically any scene where there are men hanging out together as friends, there is some sort of like, what is this? Oh, because the unconscious Argentinian puts his hands on Christian's crotch.

Yes. And then he's just like, I love talent. And he's like, nothing funny, I's crotch. Yes. And then he's just like, I love talent. And he's like, nothing funny. I just like talent. Yes. And then. Which is across the board bonkers thing to do in 1900s Bohemian France, really.

If you're like this big artistic community and you're like, no, we're in truth, beauty and love. But like, no, gay people, obviously. Right. Right. Yeah. Also, he is one of two people who grabs Christian's crotch in the movie because later Satine is like, you've got a huge talent.

And they're like, wow. And then all the people who are spying on them, which is Toulouse and the other, the Argentinian and their other crew. You know when your freaking boys are just watching you kiss? And then also separately, Zidler is watching them through a telescope. And it's crazy. There's so much voyeurism and male gaze in this movie. It's insane. Ziedler is thinking, I'm going to watch Sassine have sex with the Duke, and that's going to save my business.

I have a vested interest in this. She is my employee or property or whatever terrible thing it's going to be. Those other guys just assume Christian is going to do a poetry reading, which is a weird thing to watch. And then when they discover that it's not a poetry reading, which is a weird thing to watch. And then when they discover that it's not a poetry reading, they're still on board to watch. So I don't understand any of their motivations. Imagine if the twist was Jim Bradman was watching the whole time. Like, that's such a wild, like, oh yeah,

Jim Bradman's just casually surveilling me with his periscope. He always is. Because then he always finds a reason. He sees what's happening, and then he's just like, I have to go intervene. He's always watching what Satine is doing, because he does view her as property. As property and business.

Oh, God. Anyway. Also, Kylie Minogue plays the Green Fairy. Ozzy Osbourne plays the Green Fairy's laugh. Hmm. Weird way to use your money movie. Interesting use of funds. Baz and Ozzy.

Baz and Oz. Baz and Oz. A new podcast. Shall we rate? Yes, let's rate the movie on our nipple scale, where we rate based on the movie's portrayal of women on a 0 to 5 nipple scale i guess i have to give this movie one and a half two i don't think it fares very well but again i'm still i'm still confused about this movie because i feel like it's just like wild wackiness is like oh it's fun and i like it but

at the same time most of the female characters are completely sidelined Satine is treated as property by almost all of the main male characters and while she does have some degree of agency where she is making her own choices and pursuing her own love story and things like that she's often dictated what to do by other men and isn't allowed to have any sort of cathartic moment because she dies in the end before she gets to do anything she actually wants to do. And then, yeah, just like the depiction of sex work is really complicated because, I don't know, it's just a really Hollywoodized, glamorized version of sex work that ignores a lot of what sex work actually

is. And granted, you could say like, oh, well, you know, this is, you know, fictionalized, bohemian, turn of the century, Paris version of all of that. So things were much different. But I don't know, I just, it just drives me crazy when people have the opportunity and the platform when they're making a movie to depict something more positively and better, but they're like, actually, instead, I'm going to make a movie set 100 years or more ago and then appropriate the fuck out of Indian culture. So, cool.

Yeah, I think I'm going to give it a one and a half. One nipple goes to Satine because she deserved more and her story is told from the male perspective. And I want to see her side of it all. I want to see the story told from her ghost, her consumption ghost. Moulin Rouge! Wow. More like Moulin Rouge! And my half nipple goes to, I guess, Marie, because she's also very much ignored for most of the movie.

Yeah, I'm going to give it a one. And not because I don't like this movie. Again, it's that complicated thing we come up against every time but Satine is given some agency but never enough that she actually gets to make her own decisions her decisions are always informed by the fact that she's dying and doesn't know it because men won't tell her yeah her decisions are informed by the fact that she is raped into realizing she should date Owen McGregor like just I feel like she has kind of a series of empty moments where it's like, oh, she's realizing something and has agency, but it's only because the movie is telling her what to do at every single point.

So it feels like almost kind of like a hollow sort of agency that she's given by the movie because her hand is sort of forced anyways, almost every time. The depiction of sex work is certainly very complicated. Also the fact that we are in this, really this building full of women with different perspectives and we see none of the,

I mean we see NeNe legs in the air who is very antagonistic and are given very little context for anything other than the fact that Satine is being battled over by three or four different men right uh so yeah not not a progressive movie for women I'd argue but it's you know it it it's tricky because I do enjoy it it is a fun movie to watch. But in terms of how it portrays anything other than straight white guys, this movie fares incredibly poorly.

So I'm going to give it one. And I'm going to give my nip to Le Chocolat. You deserve better. But you are great at catching people. I'll go one and a half nibbles as well. Nibble is not a word that I say often in my life, and it's going to just feel very... It's a very

strange mouth feel to me right now, saying it into a microphone. I can't stop. But one and a half nipples. We're always talking about nipples. I agree with everything that you guys said, and I know that the time this movie came to me in my life and my perspective with whatever my background is means that of course I'm going to find certain parts of it very

enjoyable. Ewan McGregor taught me how to sing very poorly. But yeah, it's not, it's really bad at portrayal of women. I had a different perspective on it until I learned from you guys because I went into the movie thinking like Nicole Kidman is very capable in this. She's the only one who seems like she knows what she's doing.

She's always improvising on the fly and getting people out of sticky situations. She knows how to, like the scene where she has with the Duke where she's like, the writer is just in love with me, that poor penniless idiot. We just need him for the show, and then I'm going to discard him. She's like, you can do anything. You're a politician. You can talk your way out of anything. You're smart and capable.

But listening to this podcast that we just did and just seeing how much of her agency has been taken away by everyone, I agree that past Daniel and, calling my shot, future Daniel, and we'll be wrong. Future big dragon. Humble dragon. But I'll give my half nipple to Nicole Kidman, because again, I think she's a comedy powerhouse

in this and nobody talks about it enough. She's great. She was nominated for an Oscar for this movie. Yeah, I totally forgot about that. That's great. Yeah. I don't know if this is against the rules or not. I want to give my remaining nipple to the Lady Marmalade cover

that came out in association with this movie. Totally allowed. Okay, good. Because that song fucking bangs. And there's like 19 women

singing in that song and it just seemed like a very empowering, it just lit up my school. Amazing music video too. Yes, the music video was great. Oh, what a music video.

I saw a tweet somewhere where someone was saying like if that song was remade today they named three contemporary artists and then they were like and still Pink

would be the fourth member. She's, you know, you gotta hand it to Pink. She's got staying power. That's true. Anyways, that's a good note to come on right

well dan we're happy to have uh been here to educate you and and change your mind about everything and and thank you so much for being here oh thank you i'm such a huge fan of the show this is a real big day for me i'm very happy oh my god thanks so much for having me thanks for bringing us mike's heart oh of course i know i'm i'm a little drunk. Oh, good. Yay. Is there anything you would like to plug? Where can people follow you online? On Twitter at DOB underscore INC. I'm currently trying to get Cardi B to notice me.

She gave an interview recently where she talked about being obsessed with presidents. I have published two books about presidents. Cardi, I would love to talk to you and do a podcast with you about presidents. Well, Cardi is our biggest fan. Oh, good. So she will hear this. Wow. You can follow... That was such a checked out wow. I just got very distracted by something.

You can follow us, the Bechtelcast, on Twitter and Instagram and Facebook. Check out our website where you can buy our merch. You can subscribe to our Matreon, which gets you $5 a month. Nope, it gets you... Okay, let me start over. I'm so drunk. Are you fucked up from a Mike's Harder?

I think that what I just did was directly informed by Mike's Harder. We are all disasters. Okay, you donate $5 a month to us and it gets you two bonus episodes of the Bechtelcast That's directly informed by Max Harder. We are all disasters. Okay. You donate $5 a month to us and it gets you two bonus episodes of the Bechtelcast every single month. And it helps us out. And then you get extra content. And it's good for you, honestly. Good for you.

Welp, I just want to say that my gift is my song. I'm sorry. I don't understand that phrase at that volume. I hope you don't mind that I put down in words how wonderful life is. Now you're in the world! Bye! Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017, was assassinated. Crooks everywhere unearthed the plot to murder a one-woman WikiLeaks. She exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. Listen to Crooks Everywhere on the iHeartRadio app,

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