The Bechdel Cast - Point Break with Anita Sarkeesian

Episode Date: August 9, 2018

FBI agents Caitlin Durante and Jamie Loftus go undercover with special guest Anita Sarkeesian to infiltrate the patriarchy and dissect the gender roles in Point Break. (This episode contains spoilers)For Bechdel bonuses, sign up for our Patreon at patreon.com/bechdelcast.Follow @anitasarkeesian 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. To listen to new episodes one week early and 100% ad-free, subscribe to the iHeart True Crime Plus channel, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Kay hasn't heard from her sister in seven years. I have a proposal for you. Come up here and document my project.

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On the Bechtelcast, 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 Bechdelcast. Hi and welcome to the Bechdelcast. My name is Caitlin Durante. My name's Jamie Loftus. And we talk about the representation and portrayal of women in mainstream movies.

And this, the podcast that we host every week. Every freaking week. Diligently. We're coming up on 100. We are coming up on 100. Coming up on 100. So be ready for a special 100th episode. How will you celebrate?

Will you crackle Mike's hard lemonade? Will you crackle Mike's hard lemonade? That's the only way I could think of how to celebrate our 100th episode. That's pretty much it. Will you ice producer Aristotle? Because we did this morning. However, it is morning and so he's going to hold off for a while. But also, you know, we would have respected his choice to be iced at 11am if that was, you know, worse things have happened. So we base our discussion from the jumping off point of the Bechdel test. The Bechdel test, of course, being the test invented jokingly and then later seriously by cartoonist Alison Bechdel that requires that any piece of media have two female characters

with names talk about something other than a man for two lines of dialogue. Super low bar, but hardly anything passes. Shall we try it? Let's try it. Okay. Hey, Caitlin. Hey, Jamie. Getting iced rules.

I love being iced. Awesome. The scene doesn't have to be compelling. It just has to occur. So cool. Well, I'm so excited for our guest today. And the movie that we're covering today, I've never seen before. What?

And it ruined my life. I'm changed. I'm fully changed. It took me three sittings to watch this whole movie because there's just so there's so much happened. I loved it. Yeah, it's wild. Yes. But let's introduce our guest. Yes, let's do it. Our guest today. She is a media critic and the co-host of the Feminist Frequency Radio podcast, Anita Sarkeesian. Hello. Hi. Welcome. I was not informed that you'd never seen this movie before i'm so excited now oh i've never

seen a thing in my entire life this was like just a thrill ride from start to finish yeah every every line is screamed yes every line it was unbelievable it's crazy how katherine bigelow directed a michael bay movie there's so there's so many twists and turns. I had to keep reminding myself, no, this movie was directed by a woman, but then how is all of this happening? There's so much. It might be the film with the most best single one-liners.

The amount of terribly cheesy, wonderful one-liners in this is just mind-boggling. This also, and not only does it have like kind of the tone and feel of like an early Michael Bay movie, it also has the veneers of any Michael Bay movie. There's a lot of capped teeth. A lot of caps. I know that I, maybe this is a new segment. I'm feeling a little assaulted that this is being compared to any Michael Bay movie, even though I understand it. It's just, it's making me a little sad. We've covered, what, two Michael Bay movies on the cat. We've covered Transformers and we've covered The Rock.

His wife. His wife. His wife. Two very different Michael Bay movies. I'm always on, this is a new proposed segment, Veneer Watch. Jamie's Veneer Corner, where I keep track of all the Hollywood teeth. Sure. Refer back to our Transformers episode for more discussion on Michael Bay and teeth.

Bay is a dick. No, it's Bruckheimer. Bruckheimer's addicted to veneers. He can't sleep without, he canruckheimer's addicted to veneers. He can't sleep without, he can't come without thinking about veneers. So Anita, what is your history and relationship with Point Break? I like it and have seen it a lot.

I don't remember. This is one of those movies that's just been like around. And you just like, I know I had seen it and then I've seen it a bunch of times. And I'm also slightly obsessed with uh Patrick Swayze not really I just I like him in a couple of movies and now think that I'm obsessed with him because of that but don't know that much about him you're so you're burying the lead you love Patrick Swayze I do well I would like to pick a fight with

whoever has already done Dirty Dancing on your podcast because that's really what I want to talk about because Dirty Dancing legit is my favorite movie and you know Patrick Swayze is also in that so these two are my like late 80s early 90s like favorite go-to films and they both happen to star this amazing wonderful buff man yeah I love him as far as I know Patrick Swayze we are it's okay to love patrick swayze yeah yeah well he's no longer with us he can't fuck up now r.i.p exactly and so far we he was married for like 34 years i don't know if that means anything because it doesn't always but uh you know there have been no accusations that have come out against patrick swayze which i don't know if that would be useful to anyone at this point anyways but swayze can't fuck up if you're dead, baby.

He's going to always be Bodhi or Johnny Castle to me. Johnny Castle. It'd be really hard to take that away. These names. The names. Johnny Castle, Johnny Utah, Danny Ocean, Larry Geely. What are these names? Larry Geely.

I would also like to point out that if you've never seen Point Break the film, does that mean you've also never experienced Point Break Live? Yeah, what is that? Caitlin, do you know about Point Break Live? I don't know about Point Break Live, I'm afraid. What's happening? So Point Break Live was this live theater show that was around for many, many years. And it was a recreation of the movie live in a theater. And the way that it worked was the role of Keanu was cast every performance. And the

way it would be cast is that people in the audience would come up to the stage and do their best Keanu impression. The audience would vote for their favorite Keanu. And then that person would be in the show for the night. And the way that they would be in the show is that someone walks out with cue cards and they read off of the cue cards. Wow. The other amazing thing is that the live show turns the homoerotic

subtext of Point Break into text, which is so good. The other thing is that they will sell you a $1 poncho before you enter the theater because they actually like splash the audience. There's a splash zone. Oh my God. I feel like homoerotic theater with a splash zone is the show I want to see every single time. Every single time. That's unbelievable. Yeah. I'm so bummed for all of the people who didn't experience this show

live. Yeah. So you're a huge fan of the movie Point Break. I am a I am a solid fan. Okay. Like I've got facts about the movie behind the scenes info. And Jamie, you had never seen it. I didn't grow up with this movie either. I didn't see it until I think last year on Thanksgiving. I had always heard of it, of course, but didn't know really what, I thought the reputation that it had is that it was like a solid, like really cool action movie and did not realize how cheesy it is

and like how corny all the dialogue is and all the performances are. So I posted on Facebook and I was like, why did no one tell me how lame Point Break is? And I've never gotten so much vitriol hatred about anything I've ever said I can't I think it's one of those things where like when you watch movies that you watched as a kid and like experience them when they came out or when you're you know of that time period if you've never watched them but heard the hype right because

Point Break is a cult classic at this point it's really hard to watch it as an adult like they they just don't hold the same nostalgic appeal and i could that's why i'm super fascinated by the fact that you hadn't seen it and like your interpretation of it is going to be wildly different than mine because i have all these like emotional attachments to it i have no emotions but i ever but no i i don't have an emotional attachment but it this is this is one of those movies and i i guess i'm trying to think of a movie that we've done that is similar to it where it's like the problems are so clear they're handed to you on a platter of like yeah here's something awful stare at it cheer for it even and but it's but it's such a fun movie where i couldn't i was smiling for so much of this movie

because it's just there are so many things where i'm like this is so poorly acted that i thought it was like a plot point but it wasn't of like when gary bucey's in the car laughing at calvin and hobbes like that so he's like cackling and i was like is he i thought he was hiding something oh i thought it was like oh he's he's laughing too hard at the comic because he doesn't want to be emotionally vulnerable with kianu right now but no he really just thought the comic was so funny way too deep yeah and he wanted two meatball sandwiches and we had to watch keanu order the meatball sandwiches for a whole scene of like why it was so just this movie is so weird it's a weird movie yeah my question is is the movie self-aware of being so cheesy

like did they know they were making a cheesy movie? No, I think that's it. Okay. I think they were like, they probably knew that like some of the lines were like a little corny. Young, dumb, full of cum. Right. But I think that they thought that that was kind of cool at the time. They're like, we're just, yeah, we're making this cool action movie. It's about surfers. It's about bank robbers. We're going to have Gary Busey and Keanu Reeves screaming at each other.

Like, I really think the people behind this movie thought they were making. I mean, because it was the early 90s. Like, I don't know, that aesthetic was like considered cool back then. And now we rewatch it and we're like, oh, this is the cheesiest content I've ever seen. Maybe. I mean, a wild stretch of an opinion. I don't think this movie is trying to comment on literally anything except perhaps surfers are cool uh and maybe that's kind of why i'm i don't feel that bad

that i enjoyed it so much in spite of all the very clear issues it's like this movie thinks it's fucking awesome and it's not and that's funny right uh i mean don't get me wrong i i think the movie's very cheesy but i also think it's very fun to watch like it is a fun romp so a little bit about before we get into the recap the like context of this movie is fast i mean it's it's directed by katherine bigelow which i mean if we could make a list of movies I least suspected to have a female director, this would be pretty high. Wait, you mean because it's not a shitty conservative fucking pro-war movie? I mean, Catherine Bigelow is like a polarizing figure. But I mean, this movie is so silly for her, too.

Like, it's silly and dumb as fuck. And this movie, I didn't realize that this movie came out the same weekend as Terminator 2, which was directed by the then-husband, James Cameron. So there's... I just thought that was interesting. So they were competing at the box office together. Yeah. And Terminator 2, I don't know the figures, but I'm guessing

it crushed. Terminator 2, well, well, Point Break was second. But a significant second. However, you know, that makes sense, cinematically. That makes sense. But yeah, so, and I guess James Cameron also did some of the work on this script, which, you know, James Cameron knows how to write a cheesy fucking movie, so that tracks for me. God, his, I i'll never i know i bring it up every other episode but his like first draft of the 2002 spider-man movie still just like makes me cringe so hard every time i think about it whereas i was like oh god james cameron wrote 40 pages about a

teenager's cum why did he do that that's so gross anyways, should I do the recap of Point Break? Sure. Okay. So Point Break is about our hero, Johnny Utah. He is a rookie FBI agent assigned to his first case in the bank robbery department. And he gets partnered up with Pappas, who's played by Gary Busey. And they're trying to catch a group of bank robbers called the ex-presidents because they like all wear masks of like Reagan, Nixon, LBJ, and I think Jimmy Carter. Yeah.

And they go around and they rob all these banks. And Busey has this theory that they are surfers in addition to being bank robbers. So, Johnny. The most logical conclusion caitlin well there's some clues you know they have a tan line there's some like sex wax that they use to like wax up their boards literally a jar the tan line so johnny utah goes undercover and starts to learn how to surf to try to like infiltrate or like figure out who the suspects might be as you do and you don't make up an alias or anything you use your real name right right right we'll get we'll get there because he's constantly getting into fights he's constantly screaming being very disruptive like yeah i mean keanu really i mean

he blows it a lot but he really blows it in this one which is too bad because keanu i feel like everyone loves keanu like he is a beloved person who blows it regularly at work. Yeah, but I like Keanu Reeves. I gotta say, refer back to the Matrix episode. We all, I used to sell Keanu's Sudoku puzzles. Now that you are a hacker, you really need to watch that movie, Jamie. I know, I know. So much has changed. For newer Bechtelcast listeners, that's the one episode where I didn't watch the movie

and I'm lying for the entire episode about knowing what happened. Wait, you haven't seen The Matrix? I still have not seen The Matrix. And you did a whole podcast? No, wow. I have so much respect for you. If you want to go back and really hear someone grasping at straws. I mean, I didn't notice.

You did something to make me not know. I can still feel the sweat on my body from that day. That was a stressful day. Okay, so anyway, so Johnny Utah, he's going undercover as a surfer, and he's really bad at it, so he gets this woman, Tyler, to start teaching him. And Lori Petty, what's up? Lori Petty. Lori Petty rules.

Tyler, she's not like the other girls. Right. No. She's a cool chick. She's cool.. Right. No. She's a cool chick. She's cool. She's an athlete. She's a guy's gal. She can be like, oh, masculinity, but still be down.

But I'm cool. But I'm still best friends with all these bank rubbers. Right. Because, OK, so she's friends with this group of people. Bodie is their alpha male, played by Patrick Swayze. Bodhi. What did they call him? Boda Riffith?

Boda? Boda? Boda Safa? Where did he get that name? This actually reminds me of one of my dear friend's father is in a Southern California surfer cult called the Barbecue Surfers. And I was getting majoria surfer cult called the barbecue surfers and i was like getting major bbq surfer vibes from and i would say honestly that the bbq surfers were a more efficient cult than

the one in point break because they also are not very efficient at all so johnny utah starts hanging out with like bode and his pals he tells everyone his real name and they recognize him as a college football player so like yeah bro come and hang out with us like you're so cool bro meanwhile they're like still trying to figure out who the ex-presidents are and johnny's like oh it's these like bad dudes there's like this group of four guys war child and bunker and like some other dudes and they raid their house but anthony ket out what's up oh from red hot chili peppers yeah he's the singer the red hot chili peppers my favorite part of this whole movie is when he shoots himself in the foot he's the guy with the crazy hair with it's like braids down the side

and then like a long pony on top upsetting information this is an upsetting development wow okay okay yeah okay so that doesn't work out and then johnny he's hanging out with bodie and Setting development. Wow. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So that doesn't work out. And then Johnny, he's hanging out with Bodhi and pals some more. He's a Bodhi. He's one of Bodhi's boys. One of Bodhi's boys. And he's like, oh, my God, Bodhi and the boys are the ex-presidents. And then also, meanwhile, Johnny and Tyler are getting a little closer.

They have some sex on the beach and oh my god that scene where their first kiss scene is so funny because they're both like you can tell just the actors like Lori Petty and Keanu Reeves as individuals are struggling to stay on their boards like they're bobbing up and down and like trying to deliver lines to each other and then he like he touches her leg but I feel like he's also trying to each other. And then he like, he touches her leg, but I feel like he's also trying to steady himself. And then she kisses him, but they're both still bobbing. I was like, this is not a hot kiss, even remotely.

Everyone is so cold and nervous. Yeah, and you see her lip chattering. You're like, I know that they acknowledge that it's cold, but y'all, if you don't live in Southern California, I don't know if you understand how fucking cold the ocean is all the time especially at night maybe one of my least favorite movie kisses of all time it was i mean like you know it it was a consenting kiss right not a surprise kiss but it was bad it was bad because he touches her leg and he's like goosebumps as if like that's his like sweet pickup line and then they kiss it's very romantic i don't know what you're talking about super hot yeah so also who the fuck as an adult doesn't know that you don't fuck on the beach

like you just you don't you've done it once as a teenager and then you never do it again because it's the most awful thing i've never fucked on the beach that sounds cool yeah well you go do it and then you'll learn why you never fuck on the beach okay yeah it's the messiest it's the worst you stand everywhere forever i'm gonna head up the barbecue surfers so johnny's like oh my god my bie boys are the bank robbers they catch them mid-robbery so he blows his cover and then he's like oh no what do i do and they capture tyler because they're like we got to use her as like leverage to like get him to stop chasing them and then they they're like johnny come with us to go skydiving and then also come with us to go on a bank robbery. And it's like, this is where things really fall apart for me.

I was like, the whole plane sequence, I was like, why is this scene so, why are they holding hands? What is happening? Right. He accompanies them on, they're like, you have to come with us on this bank robbery or we're going to kill Tyler. So he's like, okay. And they do it, but a lot of things go wrong and some people die. And then one of the bros dies and it's so fucking sad, dude. Right.

So they like escape and Johnny is like, I got to go after them. So he like tries to catch him at the airport. They escape. He goes after them still. There's more skydiving. And then finally, they release Tyler. But Bodhi and the remaining boys get away. And then we cut to-

See you in the next life. Pick up the body. Such a weird thing. And then the end of the movie is Johnny confronting Bodhi on the beach in Australia. And he's like, I got you now. And he's like, no, man, I can't be in a cage. Just let me catch one last wave, dog. Please.

He's like, okay, bro. Bruh. Sounds fair, bro. Keep it up, bruh. And then Bodhi effectively kills himself by surfing. The end. What a spectacular surfing suicide. Not before Keanu Reeves says, Via con Dios.

Oh yeah, Via con Dios. It's an epic line in the movie. So good. On that spectacular surfing suicide note, let's take a quick break and we will be back in a second. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16, 2017, was murdered. There are crooks everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate. My name is Manuel Delia. I am one of the hosts of Crooks Everywhere, a podcast that unhearts the plot to murder a one-woman Wikileaks.

Daphne exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. And she paid the ultimate price. Listen to Crooks Everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. To listen to new episodes one week early and 100% ad-free, subscribe to the iHeart True Crime Plus channel, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. This summer, the nation watched as the Republican nominee for president was the target of two assassination attempts separated by two months. These events were mirrored nearly 50 years ago when President Gerald Ford faced two attempts on his life in less than three weeks. President Gerald R. Ford came stunningly close to being the victim of an assassin today. And these are the only two times we know of that a woman has tried to assassinate a U.S. president.

One was the protege of infamous cult leader Charles Manson. I always felt like Lynette was kind of his right-hand woman. The other, a middle-aged housewife working undercover for the FBI in a violent revolutionary underground. Identified by police as Sarah Jean Moore. The story of one strange and violent summer. This is Rip Current, available now with new episodes every Thursday. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, fam.

I'm Simone Boyce. I'm Danielle Robay. And we're the hosts of The Bright Side, the daily podcast from Hello Sunshine that is guaranteed to light up your day. Every weekday, we bring you conversations with the culture makers who inspire us. Like our recent episode with dancer, actor, host of Dancing with the Stars, and now novelist, Julianne Hough. I feel really whole. I feel like the last few years I've really unraveled a lot, which is part of what this book is about. And I really feel so content,

which is a word that used to scare the crap out of me. And I love that word now. Listen to The Bright Side from Hello Sunshine on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back from the dead. We did it. We're Bodhi's ghost. Yeah. We did it.

So now you know what happens in the movie. Right. But I feel that we still have not scratched the surface. Not even close. The first thing I do want to say is that, so Jamie, you know how your former Twitter handle was Hamburger Phone, inspired by the movie Juno? Rest in Paradise, yes. This movie, Point Break, has inspired me to create a new Twitter handle for myself. Football Helmet Alarm Clock. There is a scene.

An iconic prop. So yeah, that's my new Twitter handle. So follow me at Football Helmet Alarm Clock. I have a quick one. Okay. It genuinely, and Caitlin, we talked about this a couple days ago. It took me three days to watch this movie. Yeah.

Like, when did you stop? Like, what parts did you stop at? What inspired the breaks? It was never because I was angry. It was never because I was upset. I would just be like, I'm just, I'm full. I feel like I just ate a whole meal and I need to rest like the first night I got 25 minutes in and there was just like a line that Gary Busey screamed which does not narrow it down at all it's oh it's when Gary Busey says 22 and puts up two fingers that's when I shut it off the first

time yes he says 22 and yet his hand says two. That's like 10 minutes into the movie. Yeah. I didn't get very far. And then I watched the most of it. And then, oh, I stopped again when Patrick Swayze's bro died and he was so freaking sad. And he was like, my bro. My fallen bro.

And then I watched like the last 10 minutes, like this morning, the third day. Yeah. One of the first things I want to say is that, so this is directed by Catherine Bigelow, as we mentioned. I find it interesting that a movie directed by a woman is not immune to a lot of the misogyny and problems that most movies that are directed by men have. Because like, like you said, Jamie, this movie kind of hits all the marks of like there's a woman captured to advance the story. There's like some male gaze shots.

There's like all this kind of weird, like an underdeveloped romance. There's all this stuff. There's so much male gaze. A kidnapping. Yeah. Remember the scene where Keanu is staring at Tyler changing under the towel

and it's just like panning her body and then they pan her body again in the video where she's like all of a sudden in a nightie because we've ever seen her in a fucking lingerie little nightie and they pan down her leg. Right, and you're like cool. And then there's so much more male gaze with the, the only other women in the movie are the women

in the house that gets raided. Yeah. And they're like, you know, naked in the shower, that naked chick fucking whales on those dudes though. Feminist icon woman who tries to kill Keanu Reeves at the golf club or whatever. But also the only people of color are in that villain.

It like in that house of like the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad,

the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad,

the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad,

the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad,

the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, the bad, house of like the bad the bad you don't understand the spiritual side they're not searchers like bode you know right right yeah there's and any people of color in this movie almost universally are demonized um as like these aren't the i'm sorry i keep saying

the barbecue servers these aren't like these aren't the cool surfers i hope that like the barbecue servers are okay with me given Anyways, everyone go to the- Just beep out barbecue for everyone to see it. Everyone find out what surf cult I'm most closely affiliated with. But then they're like, oh, but then there's the meth surfers and they're bad. And that's the only time you really see people of color in the entire movie. There's also a character named Alvarez, who's one of the other FBI agents. But he's antagonistic toward Pappas and Johnny Utah.

So he's also kind of villainized. Right. Yeah. Where it's like, you know, every time a person of color appears in this movie, it's to get in the way of Keanu's development as a character. Right. Although Keanu is mixed, he is part Chinese and part native Hawaiian. Oh, I didn't know that yeah yeah and then as well as being i think english irish and portuguese so i just wanted to acknowledge that but i i'll say that i think because he can pass as white he is still able to like get cast

in all the big roles in hollywood because usually yeah usually yeah Hollywood does not know what to do with people who look ethnically not white yeah ethnically ambiguous ever heard of it ever heard of the podcast on how stuff the hazeless what's up network check it out uh well that's I didn't know that about Keanu yeah I feel like The Rock is like a like an exception to the rule but he's an exception to most rules of course but yeah so i just wanted to uh acknowledge that keanu is mixed you are heard thank you getting back to the katherine bigelow thing it's it's tricky because katherine bigelow i feel and if you have different examples to share but like she's the most frequently cited female director when people

are like well women don't direct movies enough. And they're like, well, what about Catherine Bigelow? Like that's the exact. Because it's always the margin of error. Right. Every time. Every time we talk about like marginalized folks, they're like, but the margin of error. Right.

Like the one. The one example. Yeah. So everything's fine now. Exactly. Yeah. She's one of maybe a handful of like women directors who are like kind of household names it's like right her sofia coppola ava duvernay

patty jenkins and even patty jenkins like that that's a newer name and then like nora effron and like nancy myers but that's kind of and that's the thing is like women can make sexist media too right just because you like it's really important but like there's a lot of internalized oppression and that like just because you're a woman doesn't mean that you're automatically a feminist or making feminist media right it's also like part of the problem with the Bechdel test like so before before I was known for video games like the Bechdel test videos that I made were the like the things that people knew me for so I got asked about it all the fucking time which I was like oh my god it's not it does not mean anything

is feminist like it doesn't mean it's good it's just literally giving you a tool to recognize that like we got a problem yes exactly right the sex in the city movies pass the Bechdel test and that's not really what we're going for but is it the pantheon of womanhood? Like I actually got so annoyed that people would pull it out all the time that I added my own rule, which didn't pick up but whatever, it's fine. It will one day. Where the women have to talk for over

a minute because most of the movies that pass just pass because there was literally one sentence. Right, just one conversation. Absolutely. And sometimes like characters we never see again who have nothing like that conversation won't have anything to do with advancing the story in any way yeah well and this is a bit of a sidebar but what is your history with like i mean i'm curious about your history of people getting in your mentions about the bechdel test specifically like is there yeah how is your like

your attitude shifted towards it through the years because I know you've been putting up with people forever I don't know what you're talking about Twitter's beautiful haven of just wonderful tolerance constructive criticism yeah I just so I so I made a video it was like a really short one to two minute long video that explained what the Bechtel test was and showed examples. That did really well because, you know, giving people these like very simple media literacy tools to start recognizing how to look at media differently is really mind opening and expanding for a lot of folks. And that's great. Like this test is very useful on a very very 101 level right which we've

always said yeah which I think you do hilariously at the intro of your podcast um but the thing is then everyone was like every time you talk about anything they're like well does it pass the test does it pass the test does it pass the test as if that is a marker of like actual criticism of a film right right and so I think there's there's value in it, but it's not like the end all be all like it doesn't give us that much information other than showing us a wide scale pattern within Hollywood. Totally. Right. So, you know, I think that we can use it. And I think that like, you know, being able to integrate it in ways that you're using it like is really helpful, but it's not like the end of the end it's not like you know you've you figured out the Bechtel test in every movie

and therefore we're done here kind of thing or like if every movie passes it it automatically means that it's like not oppressive which is also not true exactly and we've we've seen some wild passes yeah uh, I bet. their work as possible yes thank you yes of course but yeah and that's why we talk about of course not only whether or not a movie passes the Bechdel test but a whole slew of other things yeah for example should we just get into Tyler yeah let's get into Tyler so she is the only main female character in the whole story there's a few other women who pop up here and they're usually in the background or if they do have other women who pop up here and there usually in the background or if they do have any sort of significant screen time they are either naked

or selling a meatball sandwich oh was that a woman i didn't even notice it's because you don't see her yes there is a hacker her name is miss deer i think the hacker is she named but is she named in the movie i think they call her miss deer but all right i don't know for sure she's she's a hacker and she wants to fuck kianu and that's what we know about her yeah that's pretty much it yep yeah so this movie is one of a bazillion examples of a man trying to get closer to a woman by lying to her or manipulating her. So for the betterment of the world. Right. To stop bank robbers.

Totally justified. Exactly. And don't worry. He never like it's never like in the way their relationship plays out. That's never really resolved at all because she's kidnapped before it can be a discussion. She does confront him. But I love that she shoots his pillow. Yeah. Okay. at all because she's kidnapped before it can be a discussion she does confront him but i love that she shoots his pillow yeah okay like she knows how to aim a gun what was she trying to

kill she wasn't trying to kill him she's just trying to scare him i'm not sure right she could if he moved an inch she would have killed him yeah so basically so here's how their relationship plays out he's trying to surf he's extremely bad at it. He nearly drowns. She swoops in and saves his life. So we see an example of a woman saving a man. It's not that common because usually men are saving women in movies. A sea save. Very little mermaid.

Right. Then she screams at him. She's like, you have no business being out here. Basically telling him that he's not good enough. But then he basically stalks her and is like you need to teach me how to surf yeah he goes to her job i liked that we saw that she has a job we know what she does like that i was like okay movie most movies don't get that far before that though he is so that we talked about this a little bit already but the

shot of her she's changing out of her swimsuit as the audience we're like hmm this is extremely male gaze oriented and then we cut to a shot of keanu literally gazing at her through binoculars and we're like oh whoa okay so this is like doubling down on the male gaze that's wild but don't worry no commentary is made no none whatsoever so then so he's like following her stalking her then he approaches her at work it's like you have to teach me how to surf she is reluctant at first but then he uses the information that he learned about her from the hacker with a hacker that scene is also great because gary bucey's like oh this is your surfing

contact female 119 pounds black hairs blue eyes do you have to say 119 pounds, black hairs, blue eyes. Do you have to say 119 pounds? Do we all need to be triggered? Like, what? Why? And he's so offended that she's a woman. Gary Busey's like, oh, you found a woman to help you? Which is crazy because in real life, Gary Busey loves and respects women.

JK, he's a monster. Right. So then, so he uses this information information he finds out about her which is that her parents died in a plane crash to sort of like leverage against her to be like well like my parents died in a car crash so you just don't know what it's like I'm finally doing something for myself and then she falls for it and agrees to start helping him she's teaching him how to surf and then they get romantically involved because you can't have a movie where there's just a man and a woman yeah on a professional basis or a friendship basis they have to start having sex

there's a weird awkward kiss there's sex on the beach he keeps lying there's a long shot of kianu just thinking while she sleeps there's do you remember when he tries to tell her and she's like oh my god yeah literally she says you look like you want her about to tell me something and then you don't and then he's like i'm gonna tell you the thing and she's like puts her finger on his lips and is like no no it's okay don't tell me and then she tries to shoot him the next morning and you're like uh wait what a lot of inconsistencies so yeah what happens there is that he's i guess trying to tell her that he's working undercover as an fbi agent to try to find these bank robbers she's like some other time don't tell me now then we cut to a scene which i would argue is a weird like that just is bad writing and weird for the character because a

second ago she wants to know so badly right but then her loins overcome her well because he's like this is so hard for me and she's like men are so bad at. Further perpetuating the stereotype that men are bad at talking about feelings. I mean, it's not, whatever. But I mean, if you had representation of men in movies talking about their feelings and their, you know, vulnerabilities and stuff like that, maybe it wouldn't be so hard for men to do that. There's more ways that, you know, you could, there's also surfing. It's a great way to surf. I really express myself best through my surfing. Right, right, right, right, right. Surfing is art. Surfing is a great way to deserve. I really express myself best through my surfing. Right, right, right, right, right.

Surfing is art. Surfing is life. So he doesn't tell her what his deal is, but she finds out because he leaves his badge lying around. And I do want to get into the list of all the reasons why he is a terrible undercover agent. Why did she say he's a lawyer? Because he's like, I went to law school. My parents wanted me to go to law school. Oh, I thought she was saying, I found out you're a lawyer. And I was like, he's like i went to law school my parents wanted me to go to law school oh i thought

she was saying i i found out you're a lawyer and i was like he's no that's the lie that he fed her got it okay so she finds his badge and then she tries to she shoots at him but the movie frames it because she's like you lied to me are your parents even dead tell me if your parents are dead and then she leaves but the movie frames it as though we are supposed to feel sorry for Johnny Utah for like having been found out rather than us feeling sorry for Tyler for being lied to. Having her traumatic past leveraged against her because surf crime. Right. Yeah. But it's because like the narrative has her go absolutely berserk and nearly shoot him so we're like oh she crazy we're supposed to feel sorry for john utah agree which is not great i yeah that the

the way that scene it's so weird because it's like i feel like we probably all watched that scene kind of the same way of like again it was an irrational story choice to have her shoot a gun like that doesn't line up with who we know that character to be right you know and every other example we've seen her try to talk to him and it's so it's weird that all of a sudden they're like no she's she's mad and she's crazy and we're about to kidnap her anyway so might as well give her a gun yeah it's like how do we make her seem the most betrayed right that she's like this totally wackadoodle like this is the way chicks react and you know bullshit and they're like the big climactic like scenes at the end so it's super inconsistent right but also like

i don't know i feel like i'm so much more forgiving of a lot of this stuff in this film only because like it's so off the rails in every conceivable way from the get-go that you're like oh sure of course she shoots the gun whatever i do agree that everyone is operating at an 11 for the duration of this movie that it's not it's by far not the craziest thing that happens no but then what's like super sucks is then, of course, we get the third act cop out of, oh, let's kidnap the only female character in the movie as leverage so that there's something for the boys to fight for. And then the next time we see her where she's not, you know, like bound and gagged on Patrick Swayze's creepy van computer. Or I was like, what was that plugged into? What is, right?

It's not a wireless computer you have. But anyways. And the whole thing where he's like, Rosie, he just has this gift where he can just go blank. I couldn't do it, man. She was my woman. But like, he can do it and it's okay. And you're like, what is happening right now?

Right. Yeah. That's the other thing. So the movie establishes that Tyler and Bodhi used to go out and have a romantic relationship. Right. Which means that the writers, when they're trying to characterize her and trying to figure out, okay, who is she in the story? What purpose does she serve?

They had to write in that she is Bodhi's ex-girlfriend, which is like not necessary for the story at all. It's just weird. Yeah. For whatever reason. I mean, this happens a lot where they're like, well, why would this woman exist in the story? Better make her the ex-girlfriend, like better establish her relationship to a man in the story. But it doesn't serve the story at all. It could easily just been that they were friends or they hang out in the same surfing circle.

And they keep pushing the point too, right? Like in the party scene where he's like doing the tequila shots off that woman, he says to Johnny Utah, what's mine is yours. And you're like, uh-huh, cool dude. Because women be the people. The property of the men. In the game of patriarchy, women are not the opposing team they are the ball and the scene very much illustrates that yes i feel like that from a story perspective

that wasn't even really necessary because it you know in one of the things this movie i thought did right uh we do know a little bit about tyler like i think we know enough about her that we don't really need that element where we know you know a little bit about Tyler. Like, I think we know enough about her that we don't really need that element where we know, you know, a little bit about her past where she has like, you know, she's an orphan. That's more than we know about a lot of female protagonists. We know that she has a job and a hobby. And we know that, of course, she is not like the other girls. Right.

I suspect it's also, I mean, like, like okay we're talking about you know a very cliched story with the three act arc or whatever is how you talk about stories i totally fucked that up it's fine it's fine keep moving but i suspect there's a thing where instead of just being like oh she's a really good surfer and she just is down she like hangs out with a surfing group like they have to justify her involvement as an ex or else why would there be some woman here? Why would a woman be a good surfer? Why is a woman hanging out in this house that's not just background decoration? I think that that's like too much forethought for the writers.

But I suspect that would be the, you know, they just did it because that's what you do. You just write women as the love interest. But I suspect like if you really force someone to explain it, that would be the excuse. Because otherwise, why would she even be there? God, that's so depressing. I know. Like she could not have come to surfing on her own. Yeah.

And I think the other thing, too, is that her character is very indicative of like the sort of rise that we start seeing in the 90s of perceived, quote unquote, strong female characters where, you know, you have these women who are very conventionally attractive that we start seeing in the 90s of perceived quote-unquote strong female characters where you have these women who are very conventionally attractive and they're sort of mouthy, right? Like she's kind of like tough and cool like we were talking about earlier,

but is still put in her place. She's still a love interest. She's still like kind of this side character in this story about two men. Yeah, she basically only exists in the narrative in the context of her relationship to the men who are the main characters yeah but she's like you know cool right because she gets to comment on like you know they're talking about if you die doing what you love it's worth it and she's like oh too much testosterone

for me yeah like she'll make these these like comments about masculinity and she's like you know she'll she'll talk back um and she'll be quote-unquote tough but like that doesn't really matter because she's not important enough and she doesn't get to do anything with that it's not actualized right that never really pays yeah because she's like big wave riding is for macho assholes with a death wish which is what happens at the end of the movie where Patrick Swayze does kill himself on a big wave. But I mean, yeah, like her like headstrongness, so to speak, doesn't necessarily play into the narrative. It just gives her a little bit more characterization,

but right, it's not necessarily important to the events of this story yeah yeah totally and i feel like you know at the time it was probably like man like she's a really cool female character in comparison to all of the lack of options that we have in media during that time period you know especially because she has sad short hair she's got short hair baldest woman in charge there's not even enough but there's not even charge. There's not even another woman. There's not even another woman. I have a very important question.

Yes. What does speak into the microphone squid brain mean? Wait, at what point does that happen? Busey says it when he like sticks a gun into someone's face. And I was like, speak into the microphone squid brain? Like, really? How do you say that and not die laughing? Does scary music just have like a word cloud of insane things that you can say at any given moment?

I mean, it probably means the same thing as, I'm so hungry I could eat the ass end out of a rhino. Or it means the same thing as, vanish like a virgin on prom night or it means the same thing as are you through mr wizard let me know if you find jimmy hoffa under the seat while you're at it like his lines welcome to sea world kid i did particularly like when keanu said are we gonna jump or jerk off when they're all like dying on

the plane? That was definitely a good one. They also said when they're skydiving and they're like debating like whether or not they should pull the ripcord, someone says, we're going to be meat waffles. Just what? And on that note, we're going to take another quick break, and we'll be back in a second. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16, 2017, was murdered.

There are crooks everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate. My name is Manuel Delia. I am one of the hosts of Crooks Everywhere, a podcast that unhurts the plot to murder a one-woman Wikileaks. Daphne exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. And she paid the ultimate price. percent ad-free, subscribe to the iHeartTrue Crime Plus channel, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. This summer, the nation watched as the Republican nominee for president was the target of two assassination attempts, separated by two months. These events were mirrored nearly 50 years ago, when President Gerald Ford faced two attempts on his life in less than three weeks. President Gerald R. Ford came stunningly close to being the victim of an assassin today.

And these are the only two times we know of that a woman has tried to assassinate a U.S. president. One was the protege of infamous cult leader Charles Manson. I always felt like Lynette was kind of his right-hand woman. The other, a middle-aged housewife working undercover for the FBI in a violent revolutionary underground. Identified by police as Sarah Jean Moore. The story of one strange and violent summer.

This is Rip Current. Available now with new episodes every Thursday. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, fam. I'm Simone Boyce. I'm Danielle Robay. And we're the hosts of The Bright Side, the daily podcast from Hello Sunshine that is guaranteed to light up your day.

Every weekday, we bring you conversations with the culture makers who inspire us. Like our recent episode with dancer, actor, host of Dancing with the Stars, and now novelist, Julianne Hough. I feel really whole. I feel like the last few years, I've really unraveled a lot, which is part of what this book is about. And I really feel so content, which is a word that used to scare the crap out of me. And I love that word now. Listen to The Bright Side from Hello Sunshine on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

And we are back. i want to talk about so there is a trend in this movie and across a bunch of movies where like during the bank robbing scenes or in like other movies if you see like a hostage situation i feel like women are more commonly threatened with violence or they're like thrown around a lot more. They're screamed at more. They're like guns are pointed at them more. They're like thrown to the floor more. And I think the reason this happens, the reason this choice is made, is that women are perceived by society as being weaker and more delicate. So when they're threatened, it like heightens the tension more than

it would if it was like a big macho guy being like thrown to the ground because the implication is always like she can't fight back right exactly so it's like the filmmaker's idea of like how can we like heighten the tension of the scene or how can we like really amplify the stakes and so ridiculous about that is in that scene that you're talking about he's like lady open up the vault and she's like mr manager has the keys and so he's like who's mr manager so then he's like here do whatever they want and gives her the keys to go and do the thing so that it perpetuates exactly what you're talking about as opposed to the dude with the keys just opening up the fucking vault right like he just passes it off to her like that what come on it's so yeah it's bizarre and then if you just see just like different moments of like extras just like women

being thrown violently to the floor pushed around a gun held to her head like we see this all the time in movies like this if there's like a bank robbery or something and we perceive women as a society to be weaker because maybe we just see so much representation on screen of like yeah quote-unquote weak women who can't fight back or who you know are super scared or whatever but like i don't know like if we see stronger and more fearless women on screen, this wouldn't keep happening. Yeah. Well, and also challenging the notion of what strength means. Right. Right. And I think we're seeing we are seeing more media that's doing that, that like this historical notion of strength and toughness that comes from like male masculinity and like the hero hero archetype. Right. Women, they just threw onto female roles and was like now you're strong but like we i think we're slowly starting to see more female

characters who are more nuanced who are more flawed who are more complex and where strength comes from things that aren't just like physical violence or like stoicness yeah and i would extend that same line of thought to the chase scene as well, because you see women sort of threatened with the possibility of violence, but also it's like, oh, we're running through their house without, you know, asking to come in. So, of course, they're going to be naked because we need an excuse for nudity to appear. That always reminds me of Die Hard in the first scene of Die Hard, where there's no reason for a woman to be topless, but they find a reason for a woman to be topless. Yeah, they're like, oh, we'll just have her be having sex with a random man. We will not see his. He's wearing a shirt.

Right. She's totally topless. So, yeah. I mean, it's just, it's shit. Or how, like, every movie tries to throw in. And this happens in video games all the fucking time, where it's like, oh, there has to be a strip club scene. Of course there has to be. Yeah, right.

There'll be, like, a business meeting at a strip club in movies where it's like why are you meeting here it's just it's like an excuse for titties and it's also like a shorthand for like these guys are cool like bad or or yeah or villainous i want to go back really quick we didn't we didn't talk about where the tyler storyline leaves off which is also baffling and frustrating because i just want to make sure we hit on it uh so tyler is kidnapped by swayze's meanest boy and uh the one who would actually kill her right rosie yeah so yes and and swayze's character in order to keep the audience on board enough with him as a character, does this weird thing where he's like, yeah, I could never kill her. Fortunately, I know someone who could, though.

And you're just like, okay, I guess. He's like, but I don't actually want her to die. Like, please, I'm Patrick Swayze. But we see Tyler at the end. She's released or she, you know, and she's wearing this virginal slip. She's wearing the white slip. Runs into Keanu's arm. Keep in mind, the last time they saw each other, she was shooting him.

Exactly. And then you see what one of my favorite shitty, dumb sequences in the scene was, which was him calling her on the phone over and over trying to apologize and just grappling with him he was just like he's a tyler i'm so sorry things got so messed up i was afraid to leave and then he says and i quote fuck why can't i ever say what i really mean and then he puts the phone down and then continues to do the message. I was just like, Keanu, you did not hang up. That's on the message.

Fuck, why can't I say what I really mean? It was so good. I prepped you for that, remember? I was like, pay attention. Yeah, that was the line. Oh, that. I like howled. It was so funny.

But she doesn't talk to him because we're to assume she gets kidnapped immediately after running out of her own house naked with a gun, whatever. But we don't see her again. She runs into Keanu's arms. And as a callback to a problematic scene we saw earlier in the movie, she's about to tell him that she loves him and then he goes shh some other time. So she runs into his arms to say that

she loves him even though that doesn't make any logical sense and then he goes shut up. And then she starts to make out with his neck while he has a conversation with another character. That's the last time we see her yeah that's it bye-bye we have to watch patrick's patrick swayze commits surfing suicide

so the thing about the last scene which again you just gotta not ask questions about this movie yeah uh which is the complete opposite of what we've been doing for an hour. So the FBI has no jurisdiction internationally. Oh, yeah. Somehow, Keanu Reeves, the rookie cop that is already hated by his boss, gets to travel around the world trying to track down this one dude that robbed some banks a couple of times. He finds him.

Then he lets him go. And then he's like, I'm done. And he throws his badge into the ocean as if he wasn't already fired. Right. Did he quit? Like, I don't know what that was supposed to mean. Like, that's the insinuation. Yeah.

Is that he's like, I did the one thing I needed to do and now I can quit. And you're like, yeah. It's like you didn't do it, though. Right. But you didn't do it what but you didn't do it like is is his death satisfaction to you is that what like what you've been seeking for a year i and i interpreted it as well no actually that wouldn't make sense either where he's like i he wanted to watch patrick swayze die but he didn't want to be the one to do it himself maybe well i think he just wanted justice quote unquote right right like you're a bad guy so you have to be taken down and like people died and

shit right yeah and so like yeah but he's still keanu has a soft heart and was like it's okay that you die doing what you love brain yeah and also in the year he's traveling around the world what's Tyler doing? Right. Is she there with him? Did they break up, like, immediately after? Honestly, if she had any sense, she would be like, I'm sorry, I was just overcome with emotion because I was kidnapped. But, like, yeah, this doesn't make a lot of sense. Well, their romantic relationship is very similar to ones that we see in movies all the time where it's so underdeveloped we're not really sure why they like each other aside from the fact that they're both attractive people and that they are near each other so like i guess you could argue that she feels a connection to him because he had

a similar experience with the death of his parents which he didn't actually have and he was just lying to her about that but like other than that she like very quickly falls in love with him they've only been dating for like two weeks like the timeline on this movie is pretty short so hey when you're on the beach though it's time and right in the waves it's so emotional but like bodhi says something to johnny utah where he's just like you know she does love you man like she never felt that way about me like i can tell so it's just like well why do you love him again like it's just so funny i know i know why she like opens up to him and that's because he lies to her about dead parents right because when you have a trauma and someone else has the same trauma you immediately fall in love with you have to be in

love that's that's what the movies have taught me and if they're lying about it too late you're already in love yeah you can't get out of it. You can't go back. I would like to see how many scenes Keanu Reeves is in where he, it's that last scene, you know, like where she runs up and they're like kissing and they're like, we love each other after this horrible thing just happened. Cause it's the exact same scene in Speed. Right?

Yes. I was going to say. Yeah. Yeah. And they make the joke in Speed about how like relationships that are built on uh whatever fucking like a trauma bond traumatic yeah it never lasts and they're like i still love you i'm just like how many movies does that happen in with keanu reeves i would like that super cut so if somebody could make that and send it to me i would really appreciate it it's the implication

there that someone can only fall in love with keanu reeves if they've recently been through a tragedy yes they're like you can't fall in love with him in regular life well in the matrix she falls in them with him because that was a prophecy well I haven't seen that movie so um just as important as talking about the only female character in the movie I do think that it's interesting uh to explore a little bit just how masculinity is and hyper masculinity is portrayed in this particular movie. Because the two central friendships between men that we see in this movie are Swayze and Busey. Or no, that's Swayze. But give me that.

Keanu and Busey and Keanu and Swayze. Two very different friendships, but both are rooted in hyper-masculine adrenaline rushes where Busey and Keanu get off on the adrenaline rush of like, police! We're the police! And then Swayze and Keanu

get off on surfing and planes. And it's two different types of the same relationship. Surfing and planes? Surfing and planes. They're like, we're recreational testosterone planes and like it's two different types of the same relationship planes surfing in planes they're like we're recreational testosterone and we're professional testosterone and yeah you know it's like uh swayze's the weekend guy or whatever but i don't i don't know it's just weird to see both friendships are based in the same like they're always doing stuff instead of talking about stuff. And that's also the root of most of their problems is because they're always doing stuff

and not talking about stuff. I don't know. It's definitely a very specific type of masculinity. The whole film is that, is the same kind of like bullshit, which hilariously Tyler tries to call out, but also doesn't matter at all. Right? Like it it it's just so yeah it's such a throwaway line the only way she calls it out too is by like stating it and then leaving the scene right she's like so continue but this time without me and she's still friends

with them so like if she was that bothered by it she wouldn't be hanging out with these guys but she remains friends with them so it's like okay well you're not that disgusted by their toxic masculinity so it's just like what's the point then if you're gonna have a character make a comment on it but then like there's no follow-through or there's no repercussions it's a it's like a have your cake and eat it too kind of moment where we were talking about this recently in the aladdin episode where it's like there's a bunch of like Disney Renaissance princesses that are like kind of what you're saying earlier Anita of like uh here's a character who will technically say some of the right things but they're saying that has no impact on what happens so it's you know it's almost for like male creatives to be like well we said it so and it's like yeah but it had no impact and nothing

happened as a result of it so why say it other than to be able to say you said it later but you mean when princess jasmine says i am not a prize to be won and then aladdin wins her yeah 20 minutes later yeah yeah it's like just like i don't know if there's a name for when that happens, but it happens so frequently, especially in movies of this era. And then also, okay, so are we, it sounds like Point Break Live references this. The homoerotic undertones direct me to them. Where are the specific moments people pick out in this movie as that? Is it the holding hands jumping out of the plane scene i thought they were going to try to kill keanu in that scene that's where i went

into that scene being like they're going to kill him and then it turns out that they're just they're friends that scene makes no sense in the movie it doesn't need to be there it's so weird serves no purpose except to maybe that it pays off a little later when they go skydiving again but that also doesn't need to happen like i think someone was just like we gotta have skydiving in this surfing movie i'm trying to remember now because i just watched it again yesterday and i feel like i've watched it so many times that i don't even notice it anymore but i know for sure them like being on top of each other in the sky and being like pull the cord no you pull the cord you pull the cord no you pull the cord okay um and and because Swayze is like he's so here's the thing is I think

Patrick Swayze is just like the cat's meow speaking of cats cats do have eight nipples this is cat facts with Caitlin amazing go on great he's just he's so like kind of hippy dippy that he's just like he's got a lot of charm and shit and so i think he's just like hey kind of all the time and kianu is is trying to like get close to that and so there's just moments where you're like i can see this fan fiction very clearly right like it's just kind of around so i feel very underprepared because I feel like I should know the answer to this oh no no I mean that was where I was guessing it was but I just didn't know if there was anything I was missing yeah and also the other thing is like I always

feel like Tina Belcher watching this movie because I'm like butts so many butts look at all of the butts the butt that says I'm not a crook. I was like, this is a wild butt. Yeah, and I mean, and their friendship, it's weird because it's made to be the kind of the pure of the two friendships. But it's also kind of sold out by the fact that Patrick Swayze is also an unrepentant criminal and kind of an anarchist. the line you project strength to avoid conflict which really just like boils down a lot of male character motivation down in a in a pretty crystallized way i don't know it's it's a weird friendship and then keanu also needs the satisfaction of watching patrick swayze dive via surfing and you know he's just got to get that justice because, you know, the victims here are the banks. We all feel so sorry for the banks that got robbed that he's got to make sure there's justice.

I would like to know the psychological profiles of how they determined which president they all wanted to be. Also, addendum or additional statement is that they very specifically created that flaming gas station scene so that they could have Ronald Reagan with a giant fucking blowtorch like blowing up for sure yeah which I mean and I enjoyed watching that sure I thought it was fun sure I think that some of the like the homoerotic stuff people talk about in terms of like masculine relationships and like

masculine love and like the close like trying to get close or trying to figure out how to be close to one another and clearly Johnny Utah has some like admiration and interest in being more like Bodhi right like even though he's trying to like take him down he's like like he's like I'm fucking surfing and like hanging out and having a really good time with them and like trying to get in on this inner circle in a way that's like you could almost see the extension of like i want to be this guy i like i want to be with him or i want to be him or i don't know the difference between these things you know well we all want to be bodhi so i get it yeah clearly especially with the bangs yeah gotta love those bangs oh the bangs

i want to go through my list of all the reasons why johnny utah and papas are terrible at being undercover fbi agents so real quick okay so they both show up in suits looking exactly like cops to a surf shop to buy a surfboard then they're both at the beach there's people all around who can hear johnny say you're telling me that the fbi is gonna pay me to learn how to surf so you know everyone like they're just in plain sight everyone can hear and he's you know screaming about being in the fbi then after tyler saves him he screams out his real name i'm johnny and she's like i don't care which i loved yeah and then a bunch of people who turn out to be the people that he is trying to take down as the ex-presidents all recognize him as a college

football star and they know his real name if they just like did a little bit of research they could like figure out that he's in the FBI. We know computers exist because there's a hacker and there's Patrick Swayze's trunk computer. I was actually thinking about this, though, because I was like, oh, this was pre-wide-scale adoption of the internet, so you couldn't just Google him and know that he was in the FBI.

So I was slightly more forgiving about that, even though it's clearly stupid. But then there's some other stuff that happens, which like Papa's is near the beach, parked in what's clearly like an undercover cop car, scoping things out with binoculars in plain sight. And then Johnny is talking to him on a walkie talkie in the middle of the beach, again, in plain sight.

So they're just like, yeah, let's use our binoculars and walkie-talkies, just where everyone can see us. They both miss the bank robbery that's taking place like 100 yards away because they're so focused on sandwiches. I was like, surely the sandwiches will become relevant at some point. They never do. He's like, I need two meatball sandwiches. We see him order the meatball sandwiches. He comes back with the meatball sandwiches. Busey's like, man, maybe I should have gotten three meatball sandwiches.

Those, okay, so Keanu orders two meatball sandwiches, one tuna sandwich for himself, and two lemonades, and it only costs $7.84. In today's money, I did the inflation calculator, One tuna sandwich for himself and two lemonades, and it only costs $7.84. Yeah. In today's money, I did the inflation calculator, that's equivalent to $14.32, which is still very cheap for three sandwiches and two lemonades. Like, what's that all about? Yeah.

What area of LA are they in truly? The point is, is that they are extremely bad. And then like Johnnyah leaves his badge out where tyler can find it he's so bad yeah it's not yeah everyone knows his identity and he basically tells every single person in the movie that he is an undercover fbi agent this movie is so wild i mean this is this is a movie that is not progressive in literally any way. The world did not move forward really in any way because it was made. However, I really enjoyed it, and I would recommend people watch it and watch it with friends.

Yes. Yeah, I agree. We should find the people who do Point Break Live to come back for like one reunion for us. Yes. That would be amazing. Yeah, and the fact that it did inspire media spinoffs like that also make me happy it exists. Yeah. Yeah.

And what's his face? Hot Fuzz, which I actually haven't seen. Oh, yes. There's so much of Point Break in that. Yes. One of the characters is like talking to Simon Pegg and he's just like, have you ever like pulled out your gun and then shot it into the air and went, ah, and then he doesn't. But then that character gets to do it later in the movie it's great um one last thing i wanted to say

is that i do think it's cool that a woman got to direct like a popular action movie in the early 90s um because that's a genre that women usually do not get to direct because in the off chance that a woman is hired to direct a movie, it's usually either a rom-com or like a romantic drama. I was like, oh man, this is so cool that like a woman directed Point Break, you know, a famous popular action flick that resonates with a lot of especially men. So I was like, okay, that's cool. But as we've said, like... Yeah, I would counter that with

being like i i would wager that the reason she got to do that is because she played the game and directed it like most men would exactly at that time i don't know because again this is a michael bay movie in that the actors are almost always screaming their lines. The lines are extremely corny and terrible. The line reads are bad. And there's like over-the-top action sequences. Like everything screams Michael Bay. I mean, you didn't love the line. I guess we must have an asshole shortage.

Not so far. I loved every single line. I still think, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. This Calvin and Hobbes is funny. Hey, get me a meatball sandwich. That's still one of the wilder trains of thoughts I've ever encountered. Does anyone have any other thoughts about the movie? No, I think that's everything.

I mean, so many. Like, do vaults just have small piles of money in them? Is that what a vault actually looks like? Because I think that's an important question. Yeah, just unsealed, loose money. It's just like the floor is covered in pennies. And this version of a vault is basically the Cave of Wonders. Yes.

If you haven't seen Point Break, add it to the list. When you go to revisit cult classics. This is definitely one to make sure you catch. And don't at me when you don't like it. I don't want to hear about it. Shall we determine whether or not this movie passes the Bechdel test? Yeah, no. No. Obviously no.

Not even close. Two women do not even interact. I think the only scene where there are two women in the same scene together is when they do the raid for all those aggro surfer dudes. Yeah. One of them is wearing- Oh, there's also the party scene. Oh, that is right.

But I don't think any women interact there. I'd like to propose a new addendum to the Bechdel test, which is that if a woman talks to a meatball sandwich, it passes. Oh, yeah. It passes. Even if the meatball sandwich does not verbally respond. Even if the meatball sandwich identifies male, it passes. New rule. I will second that motion.

Thank you so much. But yeah, so women do not interact at all there's the scene in like the raid where there's one woman who's wearing a bikini and one one woman who is wearing nothing and uh they're both I guess they're fighting off the FBI that I mean we didn't that scene is just wild. All the men are dressed like fully dressed, not even like partially dressed. And all the women are not, which is amusing in the opposite of the definition of that word. Yeah. Yeah. It doesn't make any sense why they're both barely wearing anything or wearing nothing at all. But so, yeah, does not pass the Bechdel test. Let's rate the movie on our nipple scale.

Sure. Zero to five nipples based on its portrayal and representation of women. I'm going to have to give this like a half nipple. Yeah. I suppose that Tyler, if you just sort of isolate her and take the things that she says in terms of like not being impressed with toxic masculinity and like not wanting to be around too much testosterone and you know being an athlete women athletes that's pretty cool uh we don't get to see that much in film you know she's good at what she does like a man needs her to help him learn how to surf but those just feel like you actually see her doing it and you see her doing it usually when you yeah like when you hear

that women are good at a thing you just hear it you don't actually see it so that you know that's one thing and there is the absence unless i miss something there is the absence of that moment that i was kind of waiting for which is like the moment where we see her be good at surfing and all the dudes are like whoa she can do what we do because that that that was a moment i was waiting for that fortunately did not come. That's true. It's nice. But those things all feel like shallow victories, especially with all the other. Whoa. Pun not even intended. Super humor.

But considering all the other things that happen in the movie where like basically her existence in the story is only to be the romantic interest and then to later be kidnapped and used as leverage for the male hero, the male gaze shots of pretty much all the women you see in the movie is like very, very stereotypical, like action movies. And it does feel weird that coming from a movie directed by a woman, it's a bizarre paradox. Yeah.

She's basically mistreated or her character is mishandled in every regard throughout the whole movie. And it gets one half nipple from me. And I will give that half nipple to, I'll give it just right back to Lori Petty. Good for her. Yeah. I'm going to give the movie one nipple even for the reasons you stated. I also think that this is an example of, you know, the fact that just because a woman is in a key creative role in a movie does not mean that it's a feminist text. And that that is just a thing that exists in the world. Not all women are feminists. And not all media created by women are pro-woman just on the merit that it was created by a woman, which is unfortunate but true.

I also could understand. I'd be interested in hearing Catherine Bigelow speak on this now, but there's a number of reasons I could guess why her movies were not treating women especially well at this particular point in history. Would the job have been taken from her if she'd brought stuff up? I'd be interested in hearing more about what she thought.

But yeah, I mean, I think you covered it pretty succinctly, Caitlin. And I would just like to bring up the fact that there was a female hacker. And that is... I don't even think she was hacking. I think she was just looking up information on their database that they had easy access to.

Well, as a hacker, I can say that Googling is actually hacking. Oh, right, right, right. Giving your data to Google is hacking and giving your data to Zuckerberg and Bezos is hacking. So I'm a hacker just by having a Facebook profile. Do you have a computer? Yes. Then you're a hacker. Okay.

And then, of course, feminist icon woman who sells meatball sandwiches. So I'll give it one nipple, and I'm going to give the nipple to the meatball sandwich. Great. Yeah. Anita? Can we give minus nipples? I guess that would be the absence of women. Yeah, you can do whatever you want. There were women.

Their bodies were in this movie. High praise. I will do one, maybe three quarters of a nipple. I literally, when you said half nipple, grabbed my chest because I felt the pain of half nipple. Just putting that out there. Okay, I'll round up to one nipple just because I really like Lori Petty. You know, like I remember, you know,

like Tank Girl and stuff. So I just have fond memories of her. And I think she tries to push back even though she can't really because she's a fictional character and they wrote a shitty role for her. But I appreciate the attempts and I appreciate her being good at surfing.

Yeah. Because when you see women who are good at surfing. But I also agree with literally everything else you all said, that this is super objectifying and male gazey and the absence of women in general in any important role. So, you know, you don't watch Point Break for the women. Yeah, you watch it for the hacking. And the hacking. Especially the hacking and the hacking especially the hacking

for the scenes where there's hacking well Ania thank you so much for coming on this was one of my favorite movies I've ever seen in my life I'm so glad I could provide that for you I didn't realize that was true until it was coming out of my mouth

wait except you watched it in three parts it would take me three days to watch it literally I didn't realize that was true until it was coming out of my mouth. Wait, except you watched it in three parts? It would take me three days to watch it literally any time. That said, it is one of my favorite movies of all time. Oh, Alfred Molina. I'm so glad. Alfred Molina could have been any of the surfers. Bodhi. Yeah.

Give me a topless Molina in films. Oh, also, where's the chest hair in the movie? And everyone is a very smooth movie. Can I just say a very smooth movie? Yes. Not a criticism, just an observation. I think Alfred Melina could have really brought some representation of hair. Hairy chest?

Anita, thank you so much for being here. Where can people follow you online? is there anything you would like to plug? yeah, I am at Twitter I'm at Twitter please tweet at Twitter if you'd like to get a hold of me I'm on Twitter at Anita Sarkeesian

you can find out more about Feminist Frequency and our podcast about pop culture and feminism at feministfrequency.com. And I have a book coming out. It's called History vs. Women, The Defiant Lives That They Don't Want You To Know. It comes out October 2nd, and it's about women who have been written out of history. And we wrote them back in.

That's amazing. Congratulations. Thank you. Great. You can follow the Bechtel cast on all the social media platforms, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, which means we are also hackers because we have those accounts. I mean, I don't think you need to say that. I'm one of the world's most famous hackers. Right, right, right.

Well, I'm saying like the Bechtelcast, the entity of the Bechtelcast is a hacker. As a media conglomerate, we also are hackers. Right. Hacking hackers, hacker culture. Hack us by following us on Twitter at bechtelcast yeah good luck hacking us okay you can also you can also hack us by subscribing to our matreon it's five dollars a month and you get two bonus episodes every single month on patreon.com slash bechtelcast and you can rate and review us on itunes helps us out a lot especially if you give us

five stars or five nipples and you can go to our website Bechtelcast.com we have episodes there we have merch there we have all kinds of goodies yo guys do you guys want to go hit the board I'm actually

only if we can hang out with the barbecue servers I gotta call my. I'm actually... Only if we can hang out with the barbecue surfers. Oh my God. I gotta call my boys. I'm actually gonna stay indoors and surf the web. Oh. Oh no. Surf's up, dog. Okay, bye.

Bye. Bye. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th 2017 was assassinated. Crooks Everywhere unnerves 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.

To listen to new episodes one week early and 100% ad-free, subscribe to the iHeart True Crime Plus channel, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Kay hasn't heard from her sister in seven years. I have a proposal for you. Come up here and document my project. All you need to do is record everything like you always do. What was that?

That was live audio of a woman's nightmare. Can Kay trust her sister or is history repeating itself? There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing. They're just dreams. Dream Sequence is a new horror thriller from Blumhouse Television, iHeartRadio, and Realm. Listen to Dream Sequence on the iHeartRadio iheart radio app apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts there's so much beauty in mexican culture like mariachis delicious cuisine and even lucha libre join us for the new podcast lucha libre behind the mask-episode podcast in both English and Spanish about the history and cultural richness of Lucha Libre. And I'm your host, Santos Escobar,

emperor of Lucha Libre and a WWE superstar. Santos! Listen to Lucha Libre Behind the Mask on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you stream podcasts.