The Bechdel Cast - Portrait of a Lady on Fire with Chloe Cunha

Episode Date: June 3, 2021

This week, Caitlin, Jamie, and special guest Chloe Cunha travel to a remote French estate, paint each other, and discuss Portrait of a Lady on Fire. (This episode contains spoilers)For Bechdel bonuses, sign up for our Patreon at patreon.com/bechdelcast.Follow @ChloeCunha on Twitter. While you're there, you should also follow @BechdelCast, @caitlindurante and @jamieloftusHELPHere are the links / articles we referenced in the episode:https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2020/02/portrait-of-a-lady-on-firehttps://www.vox.com/culture/2020/2/19/21137213/portrait-of-a-lady-on-fire-celine-sciamma-interviewhttps://filmdaze.net/permission-to-yearn-the-problem-with-the-popularity-of-white-lesbians-in-period-films/https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/laurenstrapagiel/ammonite-kate-winslet-lesbian-period-movies 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.

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 app, They're just dreams. Confessions. Join hosts Gabe Gonzalez and Chris Patterson Rosso as they explore queer sex, cruising, relationships, and culture in the new iHeart podcast, Sniffy's Cruising Confessions. Sniffy's Cruising Confessions will broaden minds and help you pursue your true goals. You can listen to Sniffy's Cruising Confessions, sponsored by Gilead, now on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes every Thursday. On the Bechdelcast, 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. Bonjour. Okay, that was going to be my one as well yeah and that's the extent of the french that i know i know i i was in french club in third grade

and i learned how to count to 10 and that that's about it i don't know if i could even still do it i dare not go further um so we're fluent in french as you can tell we're extremely fluent welcome to the bechdel cast my name is my name is uh catherine je m'appelle jamie lopez i don't know what the french pronunciation would be caitlin we should paint each other i mean this movie i mean this joke has been made before i'm sure but this movie really gives new meaning to the phrase draw me like one of your french girls wow there it is there it is this is our podcast though it's the bechdel cast and this is a today we're covering a movie that has been requested. I want to say conservatively 5 million times. Everyone wants this episode. Yes. And here it is. Lens using the Bechdel test simply as a jumping off point. That, of course, being a media metric created by queer cartoonist Alison Bechdel. This is one of those movies where the origins of the

Bechdel test really come into play because perhaps a little known fact, although we've mentioned it many times on the podcast in the past, is that the context in which the Bechdel test happens in Alison Bechdel's Dykes to Watch Out For that was published in 1985 is that her characters are basically looking at movies to see if women ever talk to each other about something other than a man, because if they don't, the characters in the comic can ship the characters in the movie that they're watching, ship them together and pretend that they are queer women in love. The context of the comic makes it all the better. If you haven't read, I just just recently read through like the whole collection

of dykes to watch out for and it's it's so good it's so good it's uh some of the best world building in the entire comics planet and they and they're always like the characters in that series are always going to movies they're always giving the hottest takes that hold up extremely well 30 years later. Nice. Yeah. Hell yeah. So our version of the Bechdel test as it's evolved over the years is that two people of any marginalized gender have names speak to each other about something other than a man and ideally their conversation is like plot relevant or significant narratively in some way we're not going to have a problem today today today we're going to be a okay because we're covering portrait of a lady on fire uh yeah again it's a movie we've gotten an incredible number of

requests for and the time is now and we have an incredible guest to cover this movie with us. We certainly do. She is a comedian, actor, a writer whose work has been featured in Reductress, Off Mag, and Plot Twist. It's Chloe Cunha. Hello. Welcome. I'm here. Yay. This is exciting. It was very hard not to say something during the bonjour. Yeah, if you if you have any French that you'd like to teach us or any any. Yeah, yeah, I thought about it. And I think so I think it would be Kathleen Durante. Right? You just, we don't like to just not pronounce letters a lot. So the E at the end, we'd be like, no, we're not going to do it. And then I think it would be Jamy Loftus.

Ooh, nice. That's better. Yeah. You just get a little nasal energy in there. And that's basically French. Yeah. Love it. Bonjour, Jamy.

Bonjour, Kathleen. Yeah, you got it. Yeah. Love it. Bonjour, Jamy. Bonjour, Kathleen. Yeah, you got it. You're crushing it already. Et bonjour, bonjour, Chloe. Bonjour. So, thank you for being here. Yeah, thanks for having me. Excited to chat with you about Portrait of a

Lady on Fire. What's your relationship, your history history with this film? Yes. So obviously I heard about it because it was making huge waves at Cannes and everybody was like, it's gay and it's great. So I was excited about it. But interestingly enough, I had seen another of the same director's movies before and I didn't like that one though I didn't like the one I'd seen so I was kind of like okay well just because I didn't like that one um doesn't mean that I won't like this one and so I went to see it in theaters um this was uh I know we were when we were emailing we were talking about oh this

may have been one of the last for me I think this was the before last movie I saw in theaters, um, with at the time, my girlfriend, we have since split up. Um, so very fascinating to watch the movie again, um, with that, with that perspective, I'm like, Oh no, it's fine. In true, um, queer women fashion, we're friends. Um, so, you know, we're staying friends because what are you going to do? But but it was interesting to watch it again with that context because I watched it again last night. And yeah, so I remember the first time I watched it, I really loved it. I was, you know, very touching, good movie that I enjoyed quite a lot. And it was fun to watch it again, except again, slightly different personal context for me as I watched it. But yeah, that's basically the long and the short of my relationship with it.

Yeah. Very nice. Jamie, what about you? I'm sorry. Jamy? Jamy? My experience with this movie is it was my last movie I saw in the before times

I saw it I think like the week before shutdowns I saw it in an AMC I got some of that like freaky macaroni they have at the AMC so I was like it was like a Tuesday night it was very no regrets I'm glad I did

it I went alone on a Tuesday night, cried my eyes out, ate a bowl of disgusting macaroni. I didn't even know they had macaroni. I'm sorry. AMCs are really stepping it up as far, well, I mean, maybe not in quality, but they're like. Well, maybe not in the macaroni department, but. They have like flatbreads and they have like gourmet sandwiches now i mean in the before time maybe not now maybe not now they were really i don't know what they were going for but it was

interesting uh no i and i i liked the movie when i first saw it i do remember as i was leaving being like i wish the the women in this movie walked a little faster. Everyone's walking so slow the whole movie. Fast walking hadn't been invented yet. Oh, yeah. Very deliberate time because everyone is walking like three steps an hour. I mean, they've got their they're wearing such like heavy. There's so many layers of fabric.

I mean, can you imagine trying to walk with all of those? Me in 2020 with my macaroni, I was like, we got to speed it up, ladies. We got to get to where we're going. But I really liked the movie and it felt a little long the first time I saw it. it was it was um cool to watch back for this show i feel like it's it's absolutely like ideal for our show so it was fun to watch with um my bechtel goggles on certainly what about you caitlin i also saw it in theaters it got a wide u.s release i think february 14th so it's like Valentine's Day everyone's feeling romantic everyone's horned up you know you go to see this romantic movie I think I saw it I saw it with JT

in Boston because we were I think the two both of us were in Boston at that time yeah because we did a show yeah yeah so uh i saw it and i remember thinking this is a beautifully shot movie that is touching and is a half hour longer than it needs to be so uh i'll come out and say i think this movie's boring it's pretty there's always one There's always one person that's like, it's boring. So I understand. I think it has everything to do with the editing. There are so many shots that just go on way longer than they need. I'm like, I don't know. I'm like a spoiled like American movie.

Everything's quick and snappy and the editing's tight and i'm just like used to that type of movies so i and i'm also just a very impatient person so i'm like why is this shot 20 seconds when it could have been 10 you know because they're lingering so much it's sensual it's intimate there's so much looking i don't i don't mind the looking but they should walk faster they should look faster they should walk faster you know at least one of them one or the other if not both um yeah so i i mean i think it's a beautifully crafted movie i teach it in my screenwriting classes like it's especially to use it as an example of a very character-driven sort of slice-of-life narrative. But yeah, I was like, this could be shorter.

Anyway, should we just dive into the recap and then go from there? Let's swim right in. Yeah, can we swim? I don't know yet i love when dialogue especially in a movie like this where you're just like so sucked into it where it's like oh everything's a metaphor oh yeah everything they're saying is a metaphor everything i know that there are so many times where they're talking about painting but are they talking about painting or sex return your gaze are you comfortable i'm uncomfortable now but in a pleasant way it's very horny it's so horny it's you know it's our people the french people we're very horny people what can i say it's just it's part of our thing uh okay so we're in france i believe it is the 18th century

it's the 1700s question mark yeah late 18th century is this post-french revolution do we know oh it's gotta be yeah yeah definitely i i i believe i'm like oh no i don't know anything i realize i don't know exactly what time it is either i probably should have looked that up but i assumed it was like 1820s maybe because just because of the art and like because it's before the impressionists I was also a art history minor so I didn't even mention that before but yeah I know a little bit about art as well but I assumed it was like beginning 1800s but I don't know I could be wrong it's saying end of the 18th century and I just bravely googled it and the french revolution was at the end of the 18th century so maybe it's during we i don't know yeah where are the 1789 to 1799 okay yeah

the movie doesn't make it clear what year the movie's taking place in so yeah that's confusing yeah it's i i wonder i'm sure that celine siama like knows but i am so ignorant of so much history that i was like old dresses okay okay i get it i get it right exactly okay so then we open on marianne i'm just maybe not going to try to do french marianne you're close okay okay great and and she is played by and i will also need help with the actor's name yeah is it uh noemi berlin is that who that is? I'm trying to remember now. I should have. Naomi Merlon? Noemi. Noemi. Okay.

Noemi. Noemi Merlon. Is that right? Yeah. Yeah. Noemi Merlon. Yeah, that's perfect, actually. That's great.

Wow. We're learning. So she is teaching art to girls at a school. One of her students asks about a painting something that marion had painted a long time ago entitled portrait of a lady on fire and we're like this that's the name of the movie i this is like baby getting ahead of ourselves a little bit but uh we now that i know that like celine siama said in an interview with vox with emily vanderwerf that she was really influenced by titanic when making this movie this framing device you're like wait a second an intimate portrait that flashes to the past i know this setup we're just missing a a necklace and And telling us how many years it's been.

Because that's a really important. Yeah, it's true. How many years has it been, Marianne? It's not definitely less than 84 years. Or she looks great. Or she just is 84 years older and looks the exact same. But anyway, so attention is called to portrait of a lady on fire and it seems to stir up some intense memories and emotions for marianne then we cut back to her arriving at a large estate

on a remote island off the coast of mainland France. She has been commissioned by the lady of the house to paint a portrait of her daughter, Héloïse, to be sent to a nobleman from Milan who Héloïse will soon be married to. Marian is greeted by a maid, Sophie, who tells her that Eloise's younger sister, who was set to marry, I think, the same Milanese nobleman. She recently died and that Eloise has returned after being at a convent for several years. So she now is being kind of set up to marry this same man we also learn that eloise does not know that marion is there to paint her portrait she thinks marion is there to be her companion to go on walks very slow walks very slow slowest walk from the face of the planet. Her slow walk companion. This is so like aristocracy, like gobbledygook to me. I'm just like, oh yeah, you're going to hire someone and they have to like go in a boat so that they can go on a really slow walk with you

as a career. You're like, what are you talking about? Honestly, sign me up. Sounds great. Sounds like a good deal. Like they're like, oh, there's this rich lady. She's a little sad. She's a little brooding. And she just needs you to like go across the country to walk with her very slowly. Maybe fall in love with her too. I don't know.

You know, up to you. Whatever happens. Maybe a torrid affair. We'll see how we feel. Couple horny sketches. Give it a try. Yeah. So because Eloise doesn't know that she's being painted, it means that Marion will have

to kind of study her and paint her in secret without being able to look at Eloise while she's painting. And the reason for all of this is because Eloise refuses this impending marriage. So she like refuses to pose for any painting. Then Marian meets Eloise, they go on their first slow walk, although that one, that was pretty fast. They're running at first. Yeah, they do run sprinting. Yeah, it starts it's a it's a definitely uh they get your hopes up at the beginning i was like oh they're gonna speed it up but then it just gets slower and slower and slower maybe they just retired the rest of the movie because they use all their running energy and they're like layers

yeah like that was our one exercise for the two weeks right because the whole movie is in like two weeks i think yeah it's it's pretty short fast yeah they go on their first walk uh she's studying eloise she starts to like sketch and paint her uh they continue to go on walks they get to know each other a little bit they chat about their pasts and futures they seem to maybe be vibing and it's so wild to see this was like it seems like we all saw this movie shortly before we were all wearing masks all the time yes i know and right i was like whoa the scene where they like all of a sudden they're wearing masks and one of them is wearing it incorrectly because you can see her nose yeah i was. The nose. Yeah. I was like, Marianne, get that nose under that mask. They are socially distancing, though.

They're pretty far apart. Until they're not. Until they're not. Until they're kissing. Yeah. They're horny distancing. Yeah. And then at one point, Marianne plays Eloise on, I think, the harps accord.

Is that what that instrument is? I thought so, too. I wasn't sure. And then I think what she's playing is Vivaldi's Storm. think the harpsichord is that what that instrument is i thought so too i wasn't sure but and then i think what she's playing is vivaldi's storm is that the name of that piece as you can tell i'm extremely uncultured and i know nothing it's uh yeah i'm literally reading from wikipedia it's the presto from summer from vivaldi's four cool, cool, cool. It sounds smart when we say it, but you'll hear it and you're like, oh, that. Yeah.

Oh, I know that. Right, right. Yeah. Okay. So then Marianne completes the portrait and wants to show Eloise and tell her the truth about why she's there, which she does. And Eloise feels betrayed. And then when she sees the painting, she's like, is this how you see me? So then Marianne destroys it and begins painting another portrait,

this time with Eloise agreeing to pose for her. Then Sophie, the maid, reveals that she is pregnant with a greg and they help her try to administer like an at-home abortion yeah it's an abortion montage um there's a very fun honestly it's like it's like a nice time there's running there right there's a little bit of running there sophie's running on the beach sophie knows how to keep it moving she's got things to do she's busy you know totally meanwhile marianne and eloise talk about love marianne keeps working on the portrait they continue to vibe they all read the greek myth of orpheus and another name i cannot see cool uh they read that together then they take sophie to would this be like a midwife i don't know what this lady's job is right yeah i think that the the i don't know it's it's it's local female doctor the local abortionist i think it's a midwife because then later there's also a baby which implies that she

helped deliver the baby right i mean right right oh my god when sophie has to get an abortion while a baby is literally looking at her i I was like, cruel and unusual. Can we get the babies out of the room? I loved that. I liked it too. There's so many movies where someone's about to go get an abortion, but they're like, oh no, I just remembered what a baby looks like. I can't have an abortion after all. AKA the whole plot of Juno.

I loved that she saw a baby and was still like no give me an abortion because i don't want to have a child yeah and it wasn't like she was like out of a dislike of the baby she was like hi baby yeah the baby was like comforting her almost yeah the baby was like goo goo yeah i know i actually really I liked it, too, because for the reason that Caitlin gave, but also because it really further brought together like, hey, abortions aren't evil. Like this person also delivers babies. Sometimes you need to deliver a baby and sometimes you need to just get rid of it. it um and it sounds really bad when i put it that way but um but i really like that it's true the movie is like yeah listen this is just a normal thing and it doesn't mean that like you said it doesn't mean she hates babies um in fact right the baby was really cute and yeah and was just clearly a source of comfort i liked i liked it thematically i i guess just in a uh putting

myself in her shoes, I just don't want a baby in the room while I'm getting an abortion. That's fair, yeah. Just for privacy purposes, really. Probably also don't want to get an abortion in the middle of a shack. There's a lot.

It doesn't seem the most clean place. Not very sterile. But that whole sequence is is really interesting yeah i agree there's a lot to talk about there yeah yeah oh so they take sophie to the midwife to see if she's still pregnant which she is so she has to go back a a fire and sing and chant and it's like this beautiful haunting chanting melody during which Eloise's dress briefly catches fire and it's the same image as the portrait of the lady on fire that we saw at the beginning. Then they return to the estate and Marianne and Eloise kiss, but then Eloise runs away and she's like, ah.

Gay panics. They lost 30 seconds. She's like, actually, I'm fine. Yeah, because later that night they embrace again. They kiss. They presumably have sex, but the movie cuts away to the next morning but they are like nude in bed together then they take sophie to get her abortion and later that night marion paints her like a recreation of her getting the abortion marion and eloise have sex

again off screen they also do drugs together I don't know if that's supposed to be weed or what exactly I don't know it seems like they got too high for it to be weed but who knows it was also like administered via armpit which is very strange like why which if it was weed you would think that like because we see Marion like, smoking tobacco out of a pipe. So you think she could smoke it. So, yeah, we don't, who knows what drug that was. For the drug section, I just wrote France? I don't know.

I don't know either at the time that I've done drugs in France. We're not via armpit, so I can tell you. Good to know, good to know. So then the portrait of Eloise is almost finished, which means that it's nearly time for her to be sent off to Milan to marry. Both women resent this. They argue. But then they make up and spend one last day together reflecting on memories that they've shared together. Marianne draws little pictures, one of Eloise for Marianne and then one of Marianne for Eloise. And she does this on page 28 of a book. The next morning, Eloise's mother has returned, and a man is there to collect Eloise

and take her and the portrait to Milan. Marianne and Eloise have to say a very, like, hurried goodbye, and then Marianne leaves. We cut to years later. Marianne is at an art exhibit where she sees a painting of Eloise with a little girl, presumably her daughter, where she's holding a book with page 28 exposed, you know, indicating that she still Vivaldi piece and Eloise is there crying. And that's the last time. She's in there like Phantom of the Opera style in the box alone. Yeah. Oh, so sad. And then that's the last time Marian ever sees Eloise.

And that's the end of the movie. So let's take a quick break and we'll come back to discuss. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 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. 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.

I've been thinking about you. I want you back in my life. It's too late for that. 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. One session. 24 hours.

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listen to dream sequence on the iheart radio app apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts and we're back bonjour we're back bonjour where where do we want to start there's there's so much to talk about here truly well um one thing just kind of general um very noticeable thing about this movie is that there are almost no men in the movie it is just many many well mostly three women and then other characters that we see are also for the most part women like at the coven and the midwife question mark yeah you only see pretty brief glimpses of men at the very beginning and at the very end i saw celine siama refer to it in an interview as the men appear like jump scares in the movie they do though when the men come you're like oh no fuck when there's a man at the table at the kitchen table at the end of the movie it is

those you're just like i remember the first time seeing it yeah you're like what's he doing here yeah because it's almost like you're before that moment you've been transported into this kind of fantasy world where there are no men and you don't need them and they're not which is part of what's so great about the whole midwife thing is it's even in like this medical context there are no men you know you just don't need them yeah and uh you know my little my lesbian bias is showing we don't need men actually we don't need them at all um but but no it's true it is really you're like they're in this kind of domestic fantasy where it's almost like you know sophie and marianne and louise are

a kind of weird family together and that's completely shattered when the when the man appears um yeah yeah super interesting yeah and it's like the the man arriving signals like the end it's like it means that this like this ideal i mean not ideal but you know this life that they're that they've built over the course of two weeks but it feels like longer um is going to be shattered and disrupted by his presence at all i want to pull a quote from a BuzzFeed News article by Shannon Keating. Quote, Though men and their dangerous, undeserved powers

hover ominously just outside the trio's idol, trio being Marianne, Eloise, and Sophie, the faceless, nameless stranger who got Sophie pregnant, the man Eloise is supposed to marry, sight unseen, Marian's artist father from whom she'll inherit the family business, and under whose name she's sometimes forced to submit paintings. The women wield their own powers of generation and destruction, unquote. So it's like all these men are being talked about or like they're looming but we don't have to see them yeah that's true it's really interesting yeah it's like they still

do exist under patriarchy but it's you're you're watching them almost like it seems like every woman in this movie has a male presence that they're trying to navigate around or like exist in spite of where I mean, it's really clear with Sophie's story where she wants to get an abortion and she does not want him to know or be involved. And we don't know a ton about it, but we do know that she's taking control of that situation and even with uh even though she's barely in the movie with um Eloise's mother too like she is using this Milanese man to get home and like she's she's you know giving her daughter away both of her daughters away in an effort to get to somewhere where she wants to be because it's I feel like it's implied that she couldn't just go there on her own she has to make this you know kind of cruel decision against her daughter's wishes because that is how she could get to where she wants to be and how it seems like she thinks that they'll be able to survive. So it's like everyone's playing this game of 4D chess

and it's interesting to watch them, even though it's like, I mean, a lot of the time you don't agree with the decisions they're making, but especially the mother, but they're just having to like, yeah, the men are just like hanging over. I'm glad that they're not there. You don't need them physically there,

but you can still, but it's like, it's especially in this, you know, time in the old, ye old in France, olden days, just like, they don't even need to be there to be influencing the story. Like it's, yeah, yeah, for sure. And some levels levels one of the most interesting roles there is the marianne's dad because i actually had almost forgotten that her dad was a painter and that's the whole reason she's a painter to begin with is it was like the family craft you know that was passed on i had honestly forgotten until the second viewing and i was like oh yeah and then there's that moment at the end where she she's like oh yeah actually i submitted it under my dad's name but it's me surprise um which actually i i really like that in that moment the um the old guy who

compliments it isn't like oh well it was bad actually he's like oh well he's he's just like oh okay that's fine i i like it um which is kind of a nice surprise you're like okay random old guy is an ally um that's nice feminist icon that old man that old guy at the end right there's also that really interesting moment speaking of you know men not being visible it's just a really interesting moment where they're talking about the craft of painting and drawing nudes and stuff. And Marianne is like, yeah, I'm actually not allowed to draw naked men. But we do it in secret and everyone knows and it's fine.

And fascinating because even in that moment, it's almost like secretly drawing men, which for a woman to do is not particularly queer, is all of a sudden queer coded because it's a secret. And it's like, you know, it was very fast. I was interested. I was like, oh, that's kind of fun. That's kind of saucy.

Yeah. And then she says like, yeah, women aren't allowed to paint like nude art of male figures to keep women from being great artists exactly yeah the patriarchy strikes again another power play um i was interested in how because celine siama wrote and directed this movie and i was curious of like what her research process was because i think as we've all admitted at this point this area of history in this region is very like vague to me. So I was like, well, what did she learn? Like, what kind of research did she do?

And I thought like, yeah, in this Fox interview, I just wanted to share this because it was just an area of art history I didn't know about where Celine Sciamma says, quote, I did a lot of research on this period. I chose this moment of art history I didn't know about where Celine Sciamma says, quote, I did a lot of research on this period. I chose this moment of art history because there were hundreds of women painters at the time that had flourishing careers. We're always being told about women's progress and women's opportunity that we're quote unquote getting there. But it's not true. It's cycles.

And we can see it today that we experienced backlash also and they did also at the time there was a strong female critic scene that we never hear about and they were looking at women's bodies of work more than their male colleagues were for instance unquote so it was just like cool to learn that she's she was pulling from a time where you know women's art was unusually accepted and prominent in a way that doesn't seem like it was reflected in history books because guess who's usually in charge of those right yeah another interesting thing about that is which kind of took me by surprise but i also just don't know enough about i mean history in general and specifically french history but when eloise and marianne are talking about like what's in store for them and their futures

eloise is like oh when will you marry and marianne's like i don't know that i will and she's like what you don't have to and she's like and and Marion's like, I'll take over my father's business. Which struck me because I was like, oh, were women allowed to be like business owners and proprietors in that era in that part of the world? Apparently, yes. I guess so. I guess she's kind of like she's almost like a freelance artist, right? Yeah. Just, you know, give me a couple give me

a couple bucks i'll do some uh erotic paintings of your daughter gig economy that she is a gig economy worker oh that would be funny if if task rabbit could send you out and in a little canoe um to go do a gig for a couple of weeks. I do think that, yeah, that like, I guess the way that class is structured in this movie is really interesting. I feel like, I don't know, I'm sure that there's elements of it that are extremely glazed over,

especially where I feel like France is kind of unique in that the class issues have always been a big like national discussion there to say the least they've got those guillotines but all but but all three you know the the trio of this story are all from kind of different class backgrounds and you see the you know benefits and not benefits of like Sophie is you know working class she is very limited in what her options are we see we get a glimpse at her community we know that she doesn't have the access to medicine that Eloise would have she doesn't have the options she has to work for a living and on and on um then i feel like i guess i guess i would call marianne more

middle class where it seems that's right it's like at the time it was kind of a new thing like right like it's this emerging artisan class that didn't really exist before then because it was either like oh you're a peasant or you're a nobleman um right so yeah she's definitely in this kind of in-between middle space for sure and of the three it seems like she has kind of the most choice of what she can do with her life which is i feel like kind of unusual i mean i guess it's like uh we don't live in a country where a middle class exists any longer so maybe that's part of why you're like huh interesting um but then you see like Eloise you know I don't know I every time there's character like tragic aristocracy girls I'm like kind of rolling my eyes but you do see but I but I understand in the context of this time why being of the like why being in the upper class does work against her in some ways like she

has infinitely more options and access than Sophie does but in the same way she has you know no control over her life she's also like weirdly she knows less things like she doesn't have as much yeah she doesn't know about like you know like Marianne teaches her just basic things about culture at the time she's like yeah it's a song I really like it because like all she didn't before that she was in the convent yeah which interestingly is painted as like a better option than like the marriage and you kind of see why um yeah and you could argue that there's well I don't know how blasphemous i want to go but you could argue um that in a queer context the convent is interesting as well because it's uh you know

certainly they're not all banging each other not necessarily i don't know there is that one classic story about the uh the bisexual swashbuckling french noblewoman who uh rescued her girlfriend from a convent it's a long story um but what where's that movie look that one up yeah julie dubini yeah yeah why is it there a movie about that i don't know but it's amazing um her name i believe is julie dubini um i feel like it might have been i've heard this story before episode yeah i feel like who did it come up oh when you did the episode on um uh you know why are there so many um lesbian period pieces i'm sure we'll get into that but oh yeah the one with uh with rachel vice i feel like judy oh the favorite yes yes yes yes yes

yes izzy did tell us about that yeah that's a it's a wild story i mean but anyway i'm getting off track here but all this to say the convent kind of represents in a way a similar idyllic all-female environment except you know in this one they get to bang which is nice um for them and and for the viewers you know i guess uh and if you're into that um i am anyway what well i, Eloise even says, like, I was having a ball at the convent because there was a library, I could hear music, and she says, like,

equality is a pleasant feeling. So because she was among all women and they were all equal among each other, she was like, the convent is actually pretty dope. Pretty cool. Join the convent, kids pretty dope pretty cool join the convent kids that conversation that they because it sounds it's like implied that um marianne also spent

time at a convent and she didn't like it as much and eloise is like well that's because you can do other stuff with your life like you can just go to a library or like i yeah that conversation was really interesting without kind of bashing you over the head about it being a conversation about class because they're also vibing the other interesting class component to me was that even though they're all from different classes and Sophie in particular is from the lowest class of them, they all treat each other for the most part like equals. They bring Sophie into their friendship. They play cards with her.

They read stories together. They help her get an abortion. without it being made a thing of at all like that i feel like it was the abortion storyline is really interesting in a lot of ways but i just i love that it's just like marianne and eloise are just like oh okay you don't want to have a baby let's figure this out and it just becomes a team effort. We can you can join us on our dates. And we'll, we'll have, you know, you know, the classic lesbian date when you help a friend get an abortion on the beach. It's kind of a third wheel situation, but they make the best of it. Yeah, yeah.

Because they do so much. They gather herbs that are supposed to and apparently is supposed to like induce an abortion they have her run around then they take her to this like medicine woman you know there's that there's many attempts involved yeah and i and i like that sophie is so matter of fact about it too she's just just like, I feel like with, with abortion storylines, there's what you were describing earlier, Caitlin, where it's like the last second, like I can't do it.

And it becomes this kind of like pro-lifey subtext, or there's just like this deep inherent shame attached to it, which I would have like props to Celine Sciamma because I if someone was like oh a movie that takes place in you know 1780 whatever I would have guessed that there would have been a lot of shame attached to it but it's just like matter of fact and Sophie doesn't feel shame about it either she's just like this is what i need to do and can you help me out yeah yeah i mean relatedly there's also that really interesting moment where um marianne is like looking away and actually earlier she's like yeah i've actually also had an abobo it happens um

and but there's that moment where she's looking away and louise is like no don't look away and i think that kind of reinforces the the no shame thing because it's like look there's nothing to be ashamed about don't be embarrassed like we're all here supporting our buddy yeah you know no need to look away yeah and then uh Marianne then I remember being kind of like it took me a second the first time I saw the movie to figure out what was going on when she was like oh I want to paint this too and like document it somehow because at first I was like what is going on here and there I did see some criticism around that of like is Sophie okay with this they don't really ask her she's just kind of out of it and like okay I'll pose yeah just like I guess it's been it's been a weird day already so what's one more thing

but in the like abstract I I thought that that was like such a such a cool choice of like not only are they supportive they're like this is you know it's it's especially because abortions are such like a normal part of life but they're never really documented or spoken about especially you know 300 years ago I thought it was really cool that she made an active choice to be like no this is worth documenting and this is like a valid thing that happens in the world and why doesn't any you know why don't images exist of it yeah that's true let's a quick break. And then we'll come back to keep discussing. 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.

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120. She's terrified. Should we wake her up? Absolutely not. What was that? You didn't figure it out? I think I need to hear you say it. That was live audio of a woman's nightmare. This machine

is approved and everything? You're allowed to be doing this? We passed the review board a year ago. We're not hurting people. 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 iHe radio app apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts and we're back i wanted to i guess i i wanted to just we've been talking a little bit about the behind the scenes of this movie but i think it's like the story behind this movie i i remember reading it when it came out but it was interesting to revisit that like this story i feel like it's cool in the way that usually when we see stories that are about like artists and muses it's never a queer relationship it's usually a male artist looking at a woman and it often goes

horrifically wrong you know your phantom threads if you will oh your mother exclamation point your mother yeah like there's so many historical examples of it just becoming like a nightmare of control and there are a lot of control dynamics and like who is looking and who has the power in this situation in this movie but it's not centered on abuse and it's centered on a queer relationship and i i kind of forgot that celine siama and adele oh how do I say her last name? Chloe? Anel. Adele Anel. Holy cow.

It rhymes. I guess it's fun. Yeah. Celine Sciamma and Adele Anel were in a relationship for a long time. And that to an extent, this is a movie reflecting on their relationship, which was like super interesting. Yeah. Yeah. I was like, wow, I that's so healthy.

Yeah, I know. Yeah. They're like, yeah, we broke up. But we're we're still buds. You can still be in my movies. Yeah, it's very interesting. And there is there is like one, you know, conversation that's a little bit about control and kind of the subtext is about exactly what you're talking about. It's like the one moment where they have an actual fight. And pretty much immediately Marianne apologizes and like, I'm so sorry. It's like, OK, it's resolved. Wow. Turns out it's really easy. You just got to say, I'm sorry. And then you're good. Unbelievable. It's like they just listen to each other. Yeah. I mean, it's like I won't get too into it, but I fell down the Celine Sciamma, Adele, Anel relationship rabbit hole. And they just have so much mutual respect for each other uh they've been working together for like a decade

or something like that for something like six or seven years like yeah and they they were broken up by the time this movie existed and it was just like i want to find there's so many quotes about it. So, OK, I'll I'll choose a Celine Sciamma quote because they were like not shy about talking about it as as the movie was on a press tour as well. So Celine Sciamma says, just as the characters in the film discover each other in a painting studio. So Adele and I met on a film set. We talked a lot about cinema during our relationship and we grew enormously intellectually i also wanted to show that in the film the lasting emancipating effect that such a romantic encounter can have on your life uh which and and they're they also have both talked about how it was like very known on set and almost like t he is it this a bizarre situation to be putting this whole crew in but but it's fun yeah it's it's very interesting um that is a very cool thing that they are able to do that um and i since we're on the topic of

a little bit behind the scenes and talking a little bit about more about the about sinisyama and um adele anel i would be remiss not to mention that adele anel is a badass, is like a really, really cool, like outspoken feminist advocate in France and, you know, within acting and specifically caused quite a scene because she, I don't, was it 20, I think it was the most recent one at the César. It was 2020. Yeah, 2020. The César, which is, for those who don't know, is kind of like France's Oscars. I don't know why all these awards are named after men, but whatever. It's an interesting thing to unpack.

I know why. But yeah, the César, she caused quite a commotion because they were giving some kind of honorary award to Polanski and she you know walked out loudly in protests and was basically go I don't remember exactly what she said but she was basically you know mocking the whole thing being like yeah cool let's give awards to rapists fuck you guys um and she was much more eloquent than what I just I hope that's exactly what she said but yeah and so it's a very it's a cool thing she in general is um it's just kind of a badass so i felt wanted to point that out um oh yeah that rules didn't uh selena siama also like join her in walking out yeah i think they the whole crew basically but adele and l was one of the loudest she was the

spearheading it yeah exactly yeah and she's talked a lot about her own experiences with you know abuse in the industry and um yeah she's she's very cool so she's definitely someone to watch in general and yeah and she's a phenomenal actress which is cool as well obviously everyone in this movie has a perfect complexion and it made me so self-conscious that yeah Adele and now she will link to this as well. And how in many ways her relationship with Celine Sciamma was like a healing experience of like having a close relationship with a director who respected and heard her. Amazing. Yeah. There was equity in the relationship. Who knew?

Yeah, I loved learning about their relationship and their working relationship. It's all just like they're both so uniquely cool and the other the other um thing i think worth mentioning in the background of this movie is that there is a female cinematographer claire mathon claire math, let's say. Wait, hold on. Cinematography by Claire, yeah, Mathon. Yeah, I would say Mathon. Claire Mathon, who has also given a lot of interesting interviews around this movie. And that seems to be the real priority for Celine Sciamma throughout her career is to prioritize the female gaze and she i mean because she's been she's been making movies since 07 that i like it seems like there's a a lot of different takes on her body of work but that they have generally prioritized female gaze in in the way that they're shot in a female female gays and the female gays

there's a lot of wow celine siama is all about the female gays oh yeah totally in all ways imaginable yeah there's been a lot of criticism of lesbian love stories directed by men, notably The Handmaiden, Blue is the Warmest Color, Clouds of Sils Maria, and Carol. I mean, the ways in which the women in those movies are sexualized vary from movie to movie. There's a spectrum here. But these movies do tend to focus heavily on kind of sexualizing the women and focus a lot on the sex scenes in ways that could be considered to be like catering to the male gaze and Celine Sciamma has spoken about that and spoken about how like lesbian movies directed by men often do a disservice to lesbian and queer women saying quote these stories are really dangerous for patriarchy that's why the male gaze is obsessed with representing lesbians for instance it's a way to control it our stories are

powerful because they are dangerous we are dangerous so it's a very good strategy to despise us, to undermine us, because it's giving us less leverage for a very powerful political dynamic, unquote. So to have this story written and directed by a woman, a queer woman, to have it shot by a woman, to have the story told entirely through the lens of women, the differences are clear. Like comparing this to, for example, Blue is the Warmest Color or The Handmaiden, which we're also covering The Handmaiden later this month. Oh, cool. A movie I really like and I think is very cool and well written but there are you know pretty graphic sex scenes that are arguably pretty gratuitous yeah no need for

an argument really it's interesting yeah i have a lot of thoughts about yeah about the about there there's a lot there but yeah that's really interesting you just brought up a lot a lot of good stuff um i i have to say i have a soft spot for carol in particular i do i didn't like carol it feels a little different to me from those other movies um maybe in part because todd is that's todd haynes right if i'm remembering correct yes todd haynes is a queer man so that kind of is an interesting twist in a way um sure sure for me that one is a little different but yeah it's definitely a thing we're like you know there's this bizarre element of yeah lesbians

are hot see them do stuff with their legs together um this is not a visual podcast so you'll just have to imagine what i'm doing um but yeah the fascinating thing about this film and I and I actually like a good sex scene frankly but the fascinating thing about this film is I forgot they don't really have a sex scene I forgot until re-watching it that there actually isn't one and I think the reason it feels like there's one even even though there isn't. This whole movie is like one big long sex scene emotionally. You know what I mean? Like there's so romantic and it's so sensual and it's so, you know, all those lingering gazes, you know?

And so, and you do, and you do see nudity. The movie is shy about that. It's just, you don't necessarily see like, you know, thrusting. Right, a very objectifying thing. Yeah, and so that's very interesting because I'm a varying mind about sex scenes. I do like a good sex scene, but it's hard to do a good one. And I think a lot of it does become this weird like let's just have a marathon like a sex session and people are gonna love it it's like okay calm down um

hang out and do armpit hashish together yeah well that's admitted, I think one of the reasons when I first saw this, I was like, oh, this movie is boring. Where's all the steamy sex I was expecting to see? And then I was reading different people's perspectives and reading about this kind of tendency, especially for men directing queer women's stories and their tendency to over sexualize their relationships i was like okay i i now appreciate more why selene siama didn't go there but i also think i would have liked to see like a lesbian sex scene that is through the lens of a queer woman and what that would look like so i'm sure you know those scenes exist yeah there's i can give some recommendations but yeah no it's true part of me is like i wouldn't have said no to a sex scene but also i get why it's not there um right you know yeah i i i wasn't sure where to fall there i guess it's like ultimately i'm like well i respect her decision, I'm sure that she had a, you know, she seems like just based on every interview I've read with her that she does things really, really, really intentionally. And so while I would have been down to see a sex scene, Chloe, you're totally right.

Like it is it's an extremely sexy movie for a movie where you don't see sex and I do like the like level of I don't know I mean it's like in all movies I feel like there's not always like that level of like close physical intimacy and like prioritizing seeing it I would have honestly like I would have i would have liked a sex scene in this movie but there's so but it's so much physical intimacy and like just it's i don't know i i think it's really it's so romantic and oh the the last most important uh behind the scenes note is that Celine Sciamma, as I think we've already mentioned, was influenced by Titanic for this movie. And she spoke about it in that same Vox interview, which we'll link. It's so good.

She says Titanic is the hugest success and it's because it's totally queer. So shout out to queer canon titanic um but uh the the the piece by uh emily vanderworth says uh siama says in an interview she wanted the romance in portrait of a lady on fire to feel like of all things the scenes between jack and rose and titanic which she considers to be one of the cinema's great totally queer love stories um and i think in that way with that it's like oh the physical intimacy without i mean i guess but you do get a sex scene in titanic so like where's the sex scene celine where's the but it's a very fade to black kind of yeah it's a very tame sex scene yeah because i gotta keep it pg-13 steamy it's like same vibe um but yeah the idea that like

titanic is a queer love story because leonardo dicaprio was quote totally androgynous at the time is love it a whole new way to watch titanic yeah just remake tit Titanic with like a cute butch instead of Leo. Let's see. Let's just see. Let's just check it out. Let's see what happens. It would work. It would work.

I would love to hear a Celine Sciamma audio commentary on Titanic. Just wow. Yeah, you got to get her. You got to get her on the pod. You got to get her on the pod for another Titanic episode. We're going to do one, at least one every year.

What if Celine, wait, hold on. Wait, we're stumbling onto something. What if Celine is the one who remakes Titanic? Just a thought, just spitballing, just putting it out there. And then you'll have two Celines on the project. I mean. And then Celine Dion could come back and write another amazing song exactly

two Celines is the world prepared for a two Celine collab I have a cousin named Celine maybe she could get involved somehow yeah shout out to my cousin she could be Mr. Andrews or somebody

yeah why not all female reboot of Titanic. The other thing I wanted to bring up as it relates to kind of a general trend of just like queer women, love stories, lesbian movies. Is it the white lesbian period film trend? Yes, of course it is. So, I mean, this has been talked about, so we're not bringing up anything new on the podcast, but it's still worth mentioning that a lot of mainstream lesbian movies, especially the ones that have like big stars and get a like wider theatrical release, take place in the past during a time when it was not at all tolerated by society for people of the same gender to be together romantically. So with this trend, you can look at it a few ways. And

it's not inherently a negative thing. Because on one hand, it shows something that's often been, you know, overlooked or forgotten about in in history which is that queer people have always existed and it shows to some extent what queer people have had to deal with in societies that were even more heteronormative than society is today but then it also means that a lot of lesbian love stories are about like a doomed clandestine romance in which the characters time spent together is very fleeting in which the characters cannot live happy lives together in which they cannot fully be themselves yeah so this is a trend we see in this movie portrait of a lady on fire in the favorite in car, a couple recent movies, Ammonite, which is the Kate Winslet, Saoirse Ronan movie from 2020.

I haven't seen, has anyone seen Ammonite? I have not, but I will say something really, that really tickled me is when I rewatched Portrait of a Lady on Fire last night, you know, because it's on Hulu. So I was like, I'll just rewatch's on Hulu so I was like I'll just re-watch it on Hulu it was like next suggestion Ammonite I was like what come on like what am I just binging like lesbian period pieces right now what do you what do you want Hulu what are you trying to do to me and then there's another one from 2020 called the world to come which is i watched the trailer it seems like a a sexier like thriller thing that also casey affleck is in what it which is like

why you're like i think you can skip it oh okay because of him being in it no thank you it it does i feel like it does um and we we had a version of this conversation in our episode on carol i believe but it it does sort of i mean it's it's first of all a very white genre and and most of the the relationships focused on are often straight white actresses playing queer characters which i i would just refer everyone to the carol episode for our discussion about that um because i know that's a very complicated topic but it also means that you don't get any like queer joy or celebration by like focusing strictly on time periods where you know it's not gonna happen like it's it's

tragic and the and the interesting thing and i will say is that it's not even a hundred percent historically accurate either because an old-timey queer romance is not necessarily something that's going to end in tragedy either obviously there, there's a higher percentage because, you know, social expectations, you get married to men, all this stuff. But, you know, there are obviously there are historical examples of women living together and very heavily, sometimes explicitly mentioned as being together, you know, in a romantic, sexual way. And obviously, it's a little rarer, but it didn't doesn't mean it didn't happen. Actually, I mean, spoiler alert for Fingersmith, I guess that, you know, you if if you've seen The Handmaiden, you already know kind of the story. But that one is interesting, because it doesn't end in a in a sad way, even though to get there

is really wild. I mean, a lot happens in that story. But that's kind of an interesting example of like, yeah, actually, you know, there were, this is, I mean, here's my very gender 101, like literally I took a gender and sexuality class in college, shout out to NYU. But one of the interesting things about that class that was genuinely eye-opening to me is like, yeah, in a way, sometimes because of the fact that there weren't necessarily labels and things like that, sometimes there were absolutely cases, you know, of communities where you just be like, yeah, that's Isabel and Annabelle. I don't know. Those are I don't know why. Well, that was what attracted them to each other originally. The bell. Yes. Yeah. They just, you know, they live together in this old house and neither of them got married and whatever.

You know, I don't know. I'm not I'm not going to ask questions, you know, like there was absolutely a phenomenon, you know, and even like my, my mom's family comes from, you know, like they were farmers, you know, until my grandparents moved to the city is very, you know, almost a stereotypical, like, yeah, you know, farmers moving to the big city and then my mom grew up in in paris as a result but like her whole family were like farmers and there were absolutely stories of like yeah that's you know everyone knew so-and-so was gay but you just didn't talk about it and it wasn't it was it wasn't like a thing that was like yeah rah rah rah gay but nobody bothered them at the same time yeah so it's not like that didn't exist i mean there's a

whole term boston marriage right that hey you know sometimes they were just old ladies what does that refer to but sometimes they're banging sometimes they were banging you know and so it's it is interesting that the default is it is kind of an excuse to be like yeah well this one's got to be tragic because it's old-timey and it's like well it doesn't and it doesn an excuse to be like, yeah, well, this one's got to be tragic because it's old timey. And it's like, well, it doesn't and it doesn't have to be white either. Right. Like, right. Because it's old timey. You know, this was before this was before people of color were invented. I'm sorry. It's only white people like, no, that's wild. That doesn't make sense. You know? Yeah. It's just it's not true. Right. So, yeah, I think sometimes even though there are trappings of the genre that make that more likely to be the story told it doesn't have to be either yeah and it's sort of

a shame that through the long realm like there's so much history like if we want to do a historical lesbian romance why does it always have to be the same thing you know there's you could do it i want to see a historical lesbian romance about like ancient Egyptians. Why not? I don't know anything about that. That could be cool. You know, just throwing it out there. There's so many opportunities. So many people. So many.

Just went on a full, full-fledged rant there. No, I. And another thing. I'm glad you said that, though, because it is like there is like an element of revisionist history at play there that it's like oh you know I think we're almost conditioned to believe that there was no way for a queer relationship to work out before 50 years ago yeah and even though this movie kind of follows that sort of convention that we're used to Celine Sciamma was also talking about this revisionist element when she was talking about this movie where she said, quote, the tragedy of lesbian life is not the tragedy of lesbian representation. It's not the same. Lesbians have been activists.

They've had the opportunity to live their life more freely sometimes than straight women because they could avoid a lot of things like getting married and having children if you look at the suffragettes for instance lesbians were there the tragedy is we get erased from history and that's like speaking exactly to your point chloe or it's like there are a lot of stories that are not extremely tragic, but they just are not prioritized and they're not taught, I mean, at all. Yeah. And in the case of this story, I think, you know, I mean, it's a tragic story because Celine wanted to talk about her breakup. And obviously that's reducing it a lot. But part of what's interesting to me about this one is that even though it ends with them not together at the end of the day it's about the beauty of their love that's so maybe

that's too corny but it is though right so it doesn't feel as tragic to me for me that the tears at the end of the movie both for the spectator and for you know the character is it's sad but it's kind of bittersweet at the same time it's sad but it's also weirdly a little joyful because it's remembering this thing with so much love you know it's there's so much love behind it so it's kind of an interesting i don't know i maybe i'm just saying this because i like the movie but it feels to me like it it's not quite exactly playing into those tropes in quite the same way i don't know maybe i'm just talking out of my butt but oh i mean marianne at the very end says like she's talking to her one of her students and her student has like drawn her in a particular way and marion's like

oh you've made me look sad and she's like well you looked sad and she's like well i'm not anymore i'm not sad anymore so i think i'm gonna fill in some headcanon where you know eloise was her first true love but you know she went back to to Paris and she met another nice lady. And now they're living together. And Marion's teaching art to girls. Maybe she got like a hot, hot Leo DiCaprio looking butch lady. We don't know. We don't know.

Yes. Hell yeah. It's very possible. Yeah. Fully support that um but yeah the trend is noticeable that it's you know white ladies in the past who rarely get what we would consider by like mainstream hollywood movie standards like a happy ending but uh hopefully we're kind of trending away from that or at least that we get to see just more diversity in the sense of the

types of stories that get told and the people who fill out those stories and yeah because more diversity is certainly needed yes absolutely and it is interesting and and i feel like it's a positive step that it is queer women telling queer stories as opposed to yeah random guy and right blue is the warmest color was very briefly brought up earlier and i think that's a really good example of like like that one just on every level like you know since that movie has come out the actresses have also been like yeah it wasn't a great filming experience you know so there's just like yeah i mean it that one's rough and for a while i was like yeah this is it this is a lesbian movie isn't it great i'm like no it's not though like there's a you know there there's still so much room for progress and it's like this i don't know this movie is interesting because it falls into

that category and then in some ways it doesn't which i'm like okay so incremental steps right yeah I just wanted to talk about Marianne and Eloise's relationship a little bit because I think it's so cool and the the way that they're I don't know like again just having a you know muse artist relationship that is like pulling from a real life dynamic of celine and adele and having there be push and pull and having there be kind of this push for equity in that relationship on top of equity in a romantic relationship is just not something you see in movies really ever or like the power dynamics of how because the power dynamics of their relationship changes over time where you know marianne she she definitely struggles being vulnerable she clearly likes to be in control of

the situation she is the painter you know it's like she's going to see into you but you don't get to learn anything about her and Eloise watching Eloise kind of challenge that and push back on that and be like I'm looking at you too like that scene is so good yeah I just love that agreed that and like there's also this element that is very common in romantic stories involving every one of all genders where like there's some deception at the beginning of it yes and that's the case for this too but like the deception is very short it's only kind of happening by necessity and then basically as soon as possible marianne is like i want to like clear the air here i want to be the one to tell her myself i want to like explain what was happening so i really appreciated that as just like her wanting to be forthcoming about what the situation is and clear the air as soon as possible they handle

conflict really well where it's like anytime they have an issue it's just like discussed right away or they're like they're also good about apologizing to each other when an apology is warranted and like i don't know just like damn, damn, this is... Relationship goals. Yeah. You know, kind of. No, it's true. They have a really interesting dynamic. And I do, I love that, that Marianne is basically like, look, I've done this super secret painting. I'm going to make her the prom queen, but I'm going to tell her first. I don't want to, you know, like, can I make the dorkiest girl in school the prom queen, but I'm going to tell her first. I don't want to, you know, like, can I make the

dorkiest girl in school the prom queen? That's just the first thing that I thought of when I thought of deception. Sorry, it's a weird term. But no, but it really is. It really is like the relationship, the actual romantic part, at first is kind of built on that deception, because there's that really interesting exchange where Louise is like, okay, so that's why you were looking at me like that. I thought you were, I thought you were like checking me out. You know, there's so much subtext where she doesn't literally say, I thought you were checking me out, but it's very clear that that's what she means. Where she was like, yeah, I thought you actually thought I was cute.

But never mind. You're just studying my cheekbones. Okay, cool. And then Marianne's like, no, but I also was doing that. But I also like your cheekbones. Yeah, I'm staring at your lips because I need to paint their exact shape. But also I would like to kiss them. You see, so it's complicated um right so yeah the the the i did really like that she kind of reveals that right away and after that

it does shift the power dynamic again because now first of all the dynamic is a lot more clear because before even though the dynamic was hey louise is the noble lady and this is my companion my walking my slow walking companion um now it's like well okay this is you know actually she's a painter she's painting you you have to kind of obey her there's kind of a low-key interesting kinky thing going on there a little bit yeah very low-key but it is kind of interesting where you're kind of like yeah you gotta you gotta do as i say put your hands over here like this but even then that's very interesting the first time she poses her she does ask for permission she's like can i can i like move your hand it's a very interesting thing because it kind of substitutes as asking for

permission to kiss for example the first time kiss, they don't ask each other, but it's one of those wordless, you know, let's take off our masks because it's a pandemic thing. It is so weird that they have a mask. It's very Vizaria. It's interesting, but very weird. To me, there were no traces of surprise kisses happening here. It was all consensual it was which is yeah pretty rad

um pretty pretty rad red it's an understatement you know what i mean anyway um yeah and that whole that whole part that jamie that you mentioned where she's basically telling her like all about her in-depth analysis of like yeah when you're awkward you like scrunch your nose I don't remember exactly what it is but it's not that but um and then she flips on her as like well guess what I know all of your cool mannerisms too all your little quirks just like your eyebrows move and then she's like oh you noticed my eyebrows move how dare you no one's ever told me my eyebrows move before yeah yeah a lot of really good flirting in this movie really good like excellent flirting uh just a lot a lot of

conversations about looking at each other and then a lot of looking each other right which is what caitlin uh one of the complaints i'm sure is that part of the reason it's so long is that they do look at each other a lot but i personally love it i love it the the like layers of like i don't know i mean this is like i guess part of the the sad the sadness of the relationship is is the whole thing is like predicated on like once Marianne can see Eloise clearly that marks the ending of their time together and that like if she's successful in seeing another person that means that she then needs to give up that authentic image to someone who Eloise doesn't even know and has to like go off to. And that didn't like I mean, I recognize that the first time I saw the movie, but I didn't like really think about it until this viewing.

And it's because of I think I just like didn't think about the Countess very much in the in my first viewing of this movie. But the mom character is interesting. we haven't really talked about her yeah because her because she gives the perfect setup for like what these portraits are accomplishing and like reflects on how she feels about her own portrait where you know you see a portrait of like the younger countess in the whatever den where they're always chilling and and it's like this is like the image that your husband who you don't know receives before you get there and she is like talking about how this portrait of her arrived before she ever did and then she had to arrive and it's like this picture staring at her and she has to like live up to this image that may or may not be an authentic reflection of who she was.

And that her daughter, of course, is going to I mean, but it sounds like both of her daughters were extremely, you know, pushing against that and feeling kind of the the constraint and doom that came with it. Because this is like not really discussed very heavily in the movie it's mostly at the beginning but it's uh sophie i think sophie tells marianne that it seems like eloise's sister died by suicide by wordlessly stepping off of a cliff and eloise later opens up and says that her sister had left her this kind of veiled apology and a letter because she was aware that by taking her own life Eloise was going to have to marry this guy instead but it just it's it's I mean even though it's like men aren't in the movie that like looming cloud of aristocracy patriarchy is very like it's hanging over this family in a really

intense way and as much as it's like I wish that the countess could solve patriarchy and be like you know you don't have to do this we'll just live in this old house forever and don't you worry about it blah blah blah but i think that is like where some of the realism of the movie comes in where it's like the countess is such a tough character because it's like i don't like her i think especially after losing her daughter like why why not reevaluate you know before putting your your other daughter in this exact same position with the exact same guy like it is implied that it's kind of like a selfish decision on her part because she wants

to go back to Milan where she's from yeah but then it's also like what else would they do I don't really know like it's just so and she's not a completely unsympathetic character and that the moments you see her with Eloise I totally understand why Eloise is like I'm gonna keep you at arm's length but you can also see how the countess like really desperately wants to connect with her daughter and can't and they clearly like it doesn't seem like there's been much of a discussion or grieving process about her sister and just like there's all this stuff hanging over this family that they just aren't talking about i mean this movie frames this type of like arranged aristocratic marriage

as a prison a prison which her mother was originally in like and that's why she's like in this big empty house now because she like by the bonds of marriage had to like leave milan and go here and then she had daughters and now she's sort of setting them up in this rose and cow all over again yeah exactly so she's setting them up like with this marriage with this guy and like kind of her escaping her own prison. She's doing that via putting her daughters in like the next generation of this like prison marriage thing. So it's just like this weird cyclical patriarchal thing. Yeah. At the same time, that's part of the reason she justifies it. Right. She was like, well, that's what that's what I had to do. You know, like I didn't like it at first.

But, you know, the things that you grow to like and, you know, and Milan is cool. You like Milan. That's great. When you by the way, when you were talking about uh taitei again i just pictured that um that the milanese gentleman is just billy zane off screen um just totally we can't prove it's not right um so yeah yeah it is a really interesting thing and there's this kind of interesting moment too where um marianne and the mom like bond. They have that cute moment where they speak Italian together, which I had actually also forgotten about. And I do actually speak a little Italian. So I was like, oh, cool.

She's my Italian one on one. But, yeah, there is that really interesting dynamic for sure, because she knows that it's not good but also she's kind of just like well that's how it is that's what you got to do you know that's its own tragedy in some ways that is almost you can't help but wonder like did the mom have her own fun little lesbian tryst like i hope she at least has her page 28 somewhere but probably not probably not but yeah it is very interesting the mom character especially because when she comes back from that trip you know that you well this is the interesting question you almost wonder like does she know like does she understand

what exactly was happening because she kind of seems like she does she kind of seems like she was like all right i'll let you have your lesbian love affair but you better come back with a painting um yeah i'll be gone for five days make sure you make the most of it and then i'll be back yeah that's the end of it um and i also wonder if sophie knows i think sophie does know she's gotta know he's gotta know i don't know how thin the walls are in like old timey like french castles but or not castles it's a little home i guess um but yeah why didn't they share their drugs with sophie that was a little inconsiderate yeah especially because she's probably in some physical pain after her abortion yeah they should have shared their drugs could have been nice uh speaking of physical pain though um menstrual cramps representation yeah i'm actually this is way too much information

and feel free to cut but i'm actually feeling it right now i mean i've never seen, I don't think, a character experiencing menstrual pain in a movie ever, even though it's something that happens to many people very frequently, myself included. And I'm just like, damn, that's representation that we've needed to see. Yeah. And that we haven't. So shout out. It's a nice touch it was another thing that was just like i don't know it makes me glad that selene siama is making the movie yes yeah because that's the kind of detail that wouldn't have been well which is why even though i do understand i do agree that the movie is kind of long part of me is like what would you cut oh you know because like there's so many things that i feel like aren't there's so many scenes that aren't like necessary like quote

unquote but they they're so good and they add like i love the part where they're playing cards is it important really in the long run no but it's a great scene you know like good it's a vibe yeah yeah i don't think any like story needs to be cut it's just like individual shots that go on for way too long just walk faster yeah walk faster shave off some of the the shots that are too long you can maintain the entire story as is this is my my my european side but i love the long lingering shots i'm like yes have that eye sex i love it keep doing it um again i am very impatient so it's it's my impatient american sensibilities that i'm just like okay cut away to the next shot please um another uh just shout out to the artist, Eileen Delmer.

Yes. Yes. Hold on. Is this the person who painted the painting? Yes. She's the person whose hands we see anytime, like any like drawing or painting is happening. So she's sort of like the artist stand in for Marianne's character.

So yeah, just shout out to her. Oh, here we go. Hélène Delmer. Got it. That's exactly what I said. I guess she was like on, it sounds like she was on set pretty frequently.

There was a really fun interview with, oh God, I'm going to say her. You just taught me how to say her name, Chloe. Noémie Merlant where she was talking about how she was like technically painting during all those scenes but the paintings were really ugly I was like I was, I want to see her painting. She's like, I paint for fun. But yeah, definitely was not me painting. My paintings were not very good. That's so funny. It does look really effortless when someone else has already most of it. I could do that. I could just. I could add some green there. Sure. Yeah. So basically,

Eileen is James Cameron because he's the one whose hands we see drawing Rose in Titanic. It makes you think. Wow. Another shout out for this movie being it won the queer palm at Cannes. And it was the first film directed by a woman to win that award so for that it's frustrating but also i did it i'm glad it happened but every year just like what Like, really? Any other thoughts, observations, et cetera, about this movie? We covered so much. I wrote so many notes, but most of them are just like, ooh.

Oh, one last thing I'll mention is that this movie is really banking on the viewer knowing the Greek myth of of osseous and true i again cannot say the name you're this year this year this um i had to look up that myth on wikipedia and learn about what the story is from there because i was like i don't know this story that was a little bit i get like selena siama described it in an interview she's like oh it's like a netflix and chill discussion but in the the late 18th century i'm like sure selene sure i guess i could see maybe maybe but i was also like um this is this is a this is a discussion about art and I know I know it's like metaphorically significant but I was like I'm gonna I'm gonna give myself a pass on this one yeah I I do like that I do like the symbolism of that moment and it is true I like that she

framed it that way because it is funny that moment when they're all kind of reading to each other, right? That's kind of a funny thing. You have to read out loud because you can't just all watch a book together. It's a little different from Netflix and chill for that reason. But I do love that moment where Sophie is like, what? No, screw that. Like, why don't they end up together? I hate it.

She was just like so mad um yeah that scene the moment where they keep having that repeated image of louise in the in the wedding dress and every time she looks back and it's it's a little on the nose it's a little obvious but it's also it's nice i don't know i liked it it's it fits it makes for a nice through line. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Anything else? Yeah, that was everything I had. Yeah, I think we covered everything. You know, we talked about so much. Oh, page 28. Beautiful.

Yeah. It gets me. At the end of this movie, I was like, I was trying to not burst into tears. But, you know, you can't not. You literally cannot not. It's hard. I just, I want to quickly give a shout out to speaking of page 28 to that really great shot where the composition of the shot where

Eloise is like naked, like, Ooh, you need a mirror. Let me just prop it up against my puss. Yep. That shot was so my muscles so that way you can see yourself this is yeah that shot reminded me of my own tumblr in college i was like oh that would have that's like such a like that's that sounds reductive but like i was like that is such a tumblr shot that i was like oh oh, if I was 18 on Tumblr, I would have been reblogging the shit out of that.

It's another one that's a little on the nose, but I liked it. I'm not gonna lie. Yeah, it rocks. It's pretty fun. It works. A lot of good shots. Yeah, shout out again to the cinematographer. I don't know. I don't think

I really have anything else to say. I just, I could talk about this movie forever. Well, like we foreshadowed, the movie passes the Bechdel test a lot. Also another example, we haven't come upon many movies that pass the Vito Russo test, which examines representation of queer characters in cinema, but this one obviously passes. And as far as our nipple scale, our scale of zero to five nipples based on how the movie fares looking at it through an intersectional feminist lens, I think I'll give it like four and a half nipples, taking a little bit off for it being another just kind of example

in the canon of white ladies, middle or upper class living in the past, and the queer joy that they experience is quite fleeting. You know, more movies that aren't that please, but that this movie is one of those examples like, you know, it's still, it's fine. This is a beloved movie. It's very nice. I'll distribute my nipples to Celine, Siyama, Celine Dion. Sophie,

I want to get a nipple. You know, the romance gets a nipple. I'll give my half nipple to page 28. Oh, wow. Yeah, I guess I'll go four, four and a half for this movie. It discusses so much. I agree it does kind of fall into this trope, but I think on the least troubling side of the trope,

where we do have a queer writer-director telling a queer story. I mean, we didn't talk about this, but Adele is also a queer woman. Well, I guess we technically did talk about that, but I think that's kind of a rarity in a prestige work like this. Usually it's two straight white actresses playing queer characters and kind

of making a big deal about it on the press tour and blah, blah, blah. It's conventions we're familiar with, unfortunately. Right. And I, yeah, I think it's just like a beautiful love story. I like that room is made for discussion about things you wouldn't expect. Like there is like a discussion of class. There is like an abortion storyline that is a big deal, but it's not made. Like it's an abortion storyline told with authority and empathy and not tragedy porn

and not weirdly pro-life. That normalizes abortion. Right. Yeah, it's just a very thoughtfully told story. And, I mean, Caitlin, yeah, I'm on board with everything you said about the places where it maybe isn't completely stellar. But it's a pretty story. I like it.

It made me cry um and i hope that you know it because it was such a huge mainstream success especially for you know an international movie a queer movie like on a number of levels the fact that it got such a wide release in the u.s i feel like it's a really hopefully bodes well for queer cinema moving forward so i'll give it i'll give it four and a half why not i'll give one to each of the three of the the main trio um and i'll give the other nipple and a half to their shoes um which moved too slowly for my taste. Yeah, maybe the nipple will help them speed up. I don't know. Add some slippery, add some tread, you know.

Chloe, how about you? Yeah, I mean, agreed with everything said. There was one tiny piece that I missed because my connection went out for a second. So I hope I didn't miss too much. I'll just listen to it in the episode. But yeah, I think for me, I'm also going to give it a four and a half,

you know, for all the reasons listed. It is really interesting, you know, when you said, yeah, it has such a wide release. I meant to bring this up and I forgot, you know, one of the interesting things to me about this movie and the reception it got is I had like straight friends who were like yeah it's so good and i was like why how huh you know about this you know like

i know because i'm gay like i had such a big you know it became such a smash hit that i had so many like straight guy friends that were like yeah i saw that they didn't say it like that but like yeah it was really good it's such a good movie i'm like you don't have to tell me i know an ally um of good movies um but yeah it is interesting that it had it got such a big reception which is cool and i do hope that's foretelling more uh foretelling more you know what i mean i hope it leads to more um but yeah and then so i guess four and a half so in terms of the nipples that i will distribute um let's see i'm i'm gonna give one to uh eloise one to marianne one to sophie one to the midwife abortion provider doctor lady um yes whatever her

official title is um i think i think you nailed it yeah thank you got options then and then let's see i've got a half i've got a half nipple left um i'm gonna give it to billy zane off screen just waiting any people come in as the Milanese gentleman, just he's right. He's a professional. He's in the wings. He's like, you don't need me. You don't, you're short. I'm ready. If you want. So yeah, his offscreen presence is really felt in this film, I think. And I want to reward him for it.

Of course, obviously. it obviously thank you so much for being here Chloe thank you for covering this movie with us I'm very happy that we covered it and also that we had some French perspective on the story we

I mean we're clearly experts but it was nice of you to come thank you so much um no it's my pleasure um no i'm happy to have lent my french perspective i can do that it's fine yeah i uh i'm i'm so thrilled i obviously i am a fan, um, a matron, even you could say, you could wink, um, appreciate that. Yeah. Anybody wants to be a matron. It's, it's pretty cool. Um, so yeah, I'm, I'm really thrilled and this was really awesome movie to talk about. So

thanks so much for having me. Thank you for being here And thank you for plugging our matron. And what you should also do is plug your own things, your own social media, etc. Yeah, let's see. I'm on Twitter. My Twitter is just my name at Chloe Cunha, C-H-L-O-E-C-U-N-H- i'm i'm pretty funny i think i try to be uh i uh i post a lot of jokes and then also like retweet like abolitionist things i don't know it's like a weird medley of like here my politics also jokes um so yeah that's basically what what i what i do um can relate on twitter yeah right um and uh and then other projects and things um well i am i am actually in a lesbian vampire movie yes please tell us about it yeah it's called blood of the tribids it's a very specifically like an homage slash modern retelling of like art house euro lesbian vampire movies from the 60s and 70s so it's very particular

it's definitely not for everybody but it's a it's an interesting film um speaking of nudity a lot of nudity in there some of it is mine just a heads up uh wow we try to tell people before they watch it because sometimes i'll have friends who are like hey I watched it you're naked I'm like I'm so sorry I'm French I don't care um but some people do which is why I try to warn them uh there's a lot actually a lot of equal opportunity nudity oh there's some there's some there's some penises okay yeah so there's a lot going on there I don't i'm talking too much about that but it's a film on youtube it's so it used to be on amazon uh and then amazon is a terrible company and it like everything they made things worse for indie uh filmmakers and basically uh pushed a lot of people out of the platform by basically being like oh remember that money you were getting it turns out we don't want

to give it to you anymore. That's a very simplification of what happened. But yeah, now it's on YouTube, so anybody can just watch it. We'll link to it. Yeah. Yeah. And I also do some acting for a podcast called the Penumbra Podcast, which is like a queer neo-noir sci-fi thing um it's it's cool it's a very cool uh little show

and there there are a lot of like a lot of a lot of cute little gay teen fans um they're they're all like on tumblr and they're so cute and they're so supportive. They write fan fiction. You've made it. I know. And there's fan art and some is really good. But you don't have to be a teen gay to appreciate it. I think it's a fun show. That's just usually who it appeals to at the moment, I believe. Sounds great.

And yeah. Oh, and I guess I could plug. I do also do a virtual comedy show called Queer Comedy Hour. That's the fourth Saturday of the month at 7 p.m. at the 2MB Twitter channel. I'm plugging too many things. But yeah, it's if you see some stand up from some gays, check that out. That's fun, that's fun too amazing oh thanks again for being here yeah and uh while you're at it you can sign up for our mate our patreon aka matreon as well at patreon.com slash bechtel cast you can check us out on all of the major platforms Twitter, Instagram Bechtelcast, go it's where you get updates

anything else? rtpublic.com slash the Bechtelcast is where you can get your merch that's it and I guess adieu

au revoir au revoir bye I guess, adieu. Au revoir. Au revoir. Bye. Bye-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.

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