The Bechdel Cast - Say Anything

Episode Date: November 9, 2023

On this episode recorded live in Portland, Caitlin and Jamie *say everything* about the movie Say Anything. Here's the link for the 'You Must Remember This' series on Polly Platt: https://www.youmustrememberthispodcast.com/episodes/2020/7/pollyplattarchive28  (This episode contains spoilers) For Bechdel bonuses, sign up for our Patreon at patreon.com/bechdelcast. Follow @BechdelCast, @caitlindurante and @jamieloftusHELP on Twitter.See 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. Wow. Wow.

Wow. Wow. Look at us. Look at us. we're saying anything Caitlin one of the things I've always loved about you is that you'll say kind of anything you know I feel like there's a version of say anything that's about like a shock jock you know this guy'll say anything he's not afraid to say it like it is it's actually a Joe Rogan biopic title when you think about it. Because that man simply does be saying anything. He really does.

He'd be saying so many things. Welcome to the Backstoolcast. My name is Jamie Loftus. And my name is Kaylin Durante and we are doing a little intro for a show that we did live in Portland so most of this episode is the live show and I think that's kind of really all we need to say to introduce it. I think so yeah I mean I we, we were in Portland, Oregon. We were at one of our favorite places, Curious Comedy Theater. Support them if you're in the area. And we didn't have a guest on this show. And that's because we are special. We're so strong and independent. We watched this movie.

We're like, hmm, it's a love story between a father and his daughter. We've got this one. We've got this one. And we put on our little outfits and we doot, doot, doot it out to stage. And actually what I will say before that, if you want to see us doot, doot, doot out on stage, we are announcing a bunch of tour dates for next year coming up soon, as well as in Los Angeles on December 10th. If you're in town, we're covering It's a Wonderful Life. Yeah. At Dynasty Typewriter in Los Angeles.

Ever heard of it? On December 10th. Tickets for that are on sale. You can grab them on our Linktree. Linktree slash Bechtelcast. And yeah, stay tuned for more tour dates. And also, if you want to see us doot doot doot out on stage for this specific show that you're about to hear the episode for, let's say you want a visual aid, or you just want to see more stuff because we cut out some like fun and games from the audio version of the episode but that you can see

in video format you can buy on demand tickets the link for that will also be on our link tree so yes and we looked so cute that night not for nothing so uh so please enjoy that, but if you want to just listen in the car, we had to stand. And here we are, saying quite literally, anything. So before we start the show, I just want to do some housekeeping. We've received some really excellent treats. I feel like, okay, first of all, we love being in portland so much it's the city we have come to most in the country yeah we absolutely love doing shows here we literally do shows here more so than where we live yeah that's true we really love it here we love getting to

hang out with you guys here and uh i will say consistently because we were here earlier this year um and give it up if you were here earlier this year all right welcome back some returning friends uh yeah and so you'll remember that uh you know there were a number of hot dogs brought and i threw a knife at the audience um and portland did not disappoint this time around because uh really i gotta i, I checked my other folder the other day. And that's a dangerous place to be. Yes. Yes, it is.

But I got one of the most pleasant messages in the entire world from a man named Julian from Old Town Pizza next door. Give it up for there um saying what i have been waiting for someone to say to me my whole life which is do you want a hot dog pizza hot and ready next door yeah so i would like to present to you an offer to the audience hot dog pizza like it's and like you can if you're within 50 feet you can smell it yeah does anyone want some okay Wow okay well I'll give some out during the recap I'll come out into the eye we've got some plates I just really want to spread spread the joy here all right all right okay we're here it's a chaotic start to the show it sure is yeah so thanks once again to you for

being here thank you so much give it up for yourselves yeah and give it up to the people watching the live stream from wherever you are they're like oh how stinky is that pizza and you're like oh baby you have no idea it is pizza. And I mean, that is a big compliment. Yes. Yeah. So has anyone here never listened to our show before? Oh, you raised your hand. A couple hands coming up.

This is really fun because I've never heard someone put their hands together. It's just a shameful, shaky raise of the hand. It's fine. Like, it's just a podcast. It's not a big deal it's probably you're like mentally healthier than most of the people here if you don't if you don't listen to podcasts it's fine we should we should tell we should let those three people know what the show that is so true uh we are the Bechdel cast we analyze movies through an intersectional feminist lens using the Bechdel test as a jumping-off point Well, Jamie, what is that? Oh, I will tell you it is a media metric created by queer cartoonist

Alison Bechdel sometimes called the Bechdel Wallace test There's a lot of versions of the test But basically was made as a bit in the 80s for the incredible comic collection Dykes to watch out for I knew I knew we would get a whistle for that. Because Portland is cool. Yeah, there's a lot of versions of the test, but our version of the test

requires that there be two characters of a marginalized gender with names who speak to each other about something other than a man for two lines of dialogue or more. We prefer if it is an interaction of meaning, but I am, I was requested to make an exception for this movie specifically,

which we will get to. But yeah, that's our, our whole deal. Do the three of you feel satisfied? Okay. Oh, a really meaningful nod.

Thank you, King. We do need the permission before we can move forward. And today, we've covered a lot of movies from the Pacific Northwest. I know it's technically disrespectful to cover a Seattle movie here, so we do apologize. But we are covering Say anything for this show who here has seen say anything give it up by round of applause yeah hands hands folks hands all right all right who has not ever seen the movies by round of applause guys it's not a second grade classroom you get you can clap it's fun

okay it seems like kind of halfway split. So we're going to have to do a really good job. We're telling them what the movie is, I guess. Well, I think there's a halfway split on stage as well. Because had you seen this movie before? I had, yes. Okay, what was your history with it? I saw it in college, maybe even in high school.

But I don't know, 20 years ago or so. And not since i didn't feel compelled to watch it again interesting yeah and how about you jamie what's your history with it nothing nothing i had not seen yeah this is like you know i love joan cusack so i was really excited to see her in this movie and then unfortunately i did not to see her in this movie. And then unfortunately, I did not really see her in this movie, which was a letdown. No, I didn't. I didn't grow up with this movie. I didn't have my dad had like a unique dislike of Peter Gabriel.

Oh, and so this was just like never going to make it into our rotation ever. Sure. Ever, ever. I don't know what it was though like i should have i should have asked him before the show but there's sometimes there were just like certain is he british uh does anyone know british see my friend is nodding yes and she's saying yes audibly okay there are just like certain british people my dad doesn't fuck with is that weird i don't know i don't know okay well i'd never seen it okay um and now i have and and and i have some things to say i will say why i i do not dislike this movie

it's it's a weird movie there's a lot of weird stuff going on. I was most tickled, thrilled, and delighted to find that Frasier's dad plays a major role in it. Yes. I was shocked. I heard his voice, and there was like a sense memory that shook through my body. And he's in Seattle? I mean, hello? We gotta get Mahoney in Seattle.

Do you think someone saw Mahoney in Say Anything was like we got to keep this guy in Seattle he's so Seattle we got to make him the dad of the fanciest two boys I just oh I love as a Frasier head I really appreciated his presence okay so Say Anything it's a movie it is uh it's uh written and directed by cameron crowe yeah uh it's produced by james brooks and polly platt give it up for polly platt any you must remember this heads in the house okay not enough interesting interesting uh but yeah it's it's from 1989 kind of a gen x classic yeah stars john Cusack sort of Joan Cusack okay Caitlin I have

do you know how to say the lead actress's name in this movie oh no it was a real Ewan McGregor for me oh yeah because I really didn't

I didn't want to be the first to say her name out loud because I will it's just a lot of vowels I meant to look it up it is spelled I-O-N-E

is that Ewan McGregor I can to look it up. It is spelled I-O-N-E. Is that... Ion McGregor? I can't do it. Eon? Ione? Does anybody know? Ione.

Unbelievable. Wow. All right. All right. We'll take your word for it this time. Can you say Ewan McGregor? Just for me do you mean ewan mcgregor i just don't know that my mouth can make that shape can i watch your mouth can you do it again let me help you break it down yeah you win ewan mcgregor you win mcgregor Ewan McGregor.

Ewan McGregor. Close enough. Ewan McGregor. You. You. You. Win. Win. You win.

You win. You win. We have to move on. okay all right shall i do the recap are we ready for the recap caitlin's famous recap okay all right and and while you do that uh just in the front hands up for who wanted i have uh i have three plates so it's gonna be well i guess it's just you two all right there's someone oh that's oh okay okay okay okay caitlin don't worry about it don't worry okay i'm just servicing my community all right okay it's the day of high school graduation for lloyd played for Lloyd, played by John Cusack. He is telling his two best friends, who are women, what? Their names are Corey and DC.

He's telling them how he wants to take a girl named Diane Court out on a date. And Lloyd's friends are basically like, good luck with that, she's too smart for you. Because Diane Court, played by Ione Skye. Ewan McGregor. She is the valedictorian of her class. She gives a speech at graduation.

Lloyd is like, awooga. He literally is doing, he's really doing the cartoon wolf thing in uh in in that where he's like talking over her speech which we were talking about as we were watching it today it's one of those incredible um movie moments where she gives a speech that I think is like inarguably mid like Like, Oh, it's like Gen X nonsense. It's like, aren't you scared about the future?

Me kind of scared about the future. And then all the kids are like, Oh my God, Kurt Cobain. Like, you're just like, what the fuck is she talking about there? What is she saying?

And then later at the party, everyone's like, really cool speech, Diane. And you're like, that speech was, that was like a second draft at best. Yeah, yeah. It was a flop, I would say. I really wish that she gave one of those really incredible high school valedictorian speeches

that always, the cadence of them is so beautiful to me, where it's like hello students my name is Diane Court wow what a year 2010 are you reciting your own graduation speech Jamie President Obama he didn't become the president this year but he did while we were in high school I have so many good memories of this like I love high school valedictorian speeches and hers was garbage yeah and then meanwhile John Cusack is screaming over her being like look at her eyes you're like wow I hope they end up together yes okay so uh diane's dad aka john mahoney aka frazier's dad he is so proud of diane he gives

her two graduation presidents one of them is a car and the other one is an engagement ring her dad is trying to like fraser's dad is trying to marry his daughter the whole movie it does really feel like that it's very bizarre the car you're like okay this is like kind of a classic i mean it becomes plot relevant but like it's sort of a classic you know like upper middle class uh moment but then when he sort of proposes to her later where he gives i'm like imagine your father giving you a diamond ring yeah i i know i i could not imagine that and then he's like your mom gave this to me as it so his wife gave him a diamond ring. Yeah, but we're not told what the occasion was. Also?

I mean, whatever. Anyone can give anyone a diamond ring question. I don't know why I'm fighting for this right. Give a ring to whoever you want, but there's no way he and his daughter are the same ring size. True. That to me was unbelievable. Yeah.

And I was just really focused on, yeah, it seemed like he really wanted to, and anytime they're on screen together, there's this like romantic music playing. Yes. You're just like, why are the strings swelling when this father is giving his teenage daughter a diamond ring?

I don't, I don't know, but it does happen in the movie so we'll talk about it sure does um okay so then lloyd calls diane her dad picks up so lloyd leaves a message diane then gets another call saying that she won a fellowship to study at a prestigious school in england ever heard of it i love the vagueness of both the scholarship and the school yeah we don't know what she's going to do or where she's going to do it certainly not uh diane calls lloyd back and he's like go out with me go out with me come on and she's like i'm busy and he's like

please please please how about a graduation party that's tonight and she's like okay you wore me down I'll go I think that scene is interesting in in a lot of ways because it's like she she later uh calls back to this scene being like why did you go to the party with Lloyd because he made me laugh I didn't see I didn't see her laugh a damn time. Nope. On that call. And I just, you know, it's fine. It's like she wanted to go to a party. She wanted to get out of her, you know, out of her comfort zone. So, okay.

And it's very funny that she has to look up who he is. In the yearbook. In the yearbook. Pretty humiliating for him. But he does not make her laugh. No. No. No. Not on screen. And I do feel like that is representation of women pretending that men are funny when they're not.

Yeah. Very true. There is this incredible, like, I've done it. I've been guilty of this. Like if you're like, if you're a woman who dates men and, and, and bless your heart, and you're like filming them like for an Instagram story or something and they're doing something and then I'm behind the iPhone eight doing this menacing laugh, right? I'm like, ah, ah, ah, this breathy laugh, pretending that someone's funny. It's disturbing. She, that's she that's that i think that that

was representation of that whether cameron crow realizes it or not cameron crow probably thinks he's hilarious i'm sure he does yeah i'm sure he does but is he anyway okay so he picks her up and they go to the party and everyone there at the party loves lloyd and he is also made to be the key master that's a thing um diane meets a bunch of people lloyd and diane do not hang out at the party at all yeah that is my worst nightmare is going to a party thinking i have an ally and then being suddenly left out to dry yeah um. But they seem fine with it. Whatever. I don't know.

Right. The party ends. Lloyd and Diane drive around all night. They're trying to give this kid a ride home who does not know where he lives. They finally drop him off. And then Diane is like, wow, going to that party was awesome. I finally feel like I fit in. And also, you're a great date, but also you're basic.

And I really liked that. She feels bad about it later, but I was like, that's kind of like the most metal thing Diane does in the entire movie. Yes. Besides bust her father for tax fraud. That's a spoiler. But I really appreciated that because he was so into it and then she was like it i don't know maybe the parlance was slightly

different then but she was just like you're boring you fucking suck and he's like out again fine by me yeah he's dancing in the street i think you know know, if we Buscemi test a lot of the behavior of the John Cusack character. Yeah. Again, the Buscemi test being if Steve Buscemi, age 45, was doing what the character in the movie is doing. Is it weird or is it still romantic? Yeah. You Buscemi test that. It doesn't bear out in his favor.

No, certainly not. Okay. So then Lloyd goes to drop her off and he's like, I want to see you as much as I can before you leave. And she's like, okay, call me.

And then the next date is Lloyd going to Diane's for dinner with her dad and some family friends. And they're like, Lloyd, what do you want to do with your future and he's like I want to be a kickboxer and is that like is that like 1989 DJ or uh or like tick I've been making these TikTok videos and they're really gonna people are gonna watch them any day now i think so yeah unclear yeah because they're all like um okay and then during dinner a couple irs agents show up accusing diane's dad of tax evasion so now diane is very upset i think frazier's dad uh you know kind of

takes it in the stride he was like I'm excuse me I'm having a fucking party I'm like can you say that can you say that to the IRS you're like I'm busy I I don't know so now the family is like going through this turmoil Diane is upset but she and Lloyd keep hanging out and we see her at work where she works at a nursing home that her dad owns put a pin in that yeah Lloyd comes through he shows them cocoon on VHS yeah that's one of my favorite scenes in the movie yeah he's like I've never seen it but you you might like it i don't know seems like the old folks love cocoon so one day lloyd and diane are getting coffee and she's like i'm just like really overwhelmed and i don't think i can have a social life right now and they agree to be friends but

then he's like friends with potential and we're like that's not what she said yeah but it's really not what she said but then he says it and she repeats it back to him right because a man wrote this movie yes and then there's a scene where he's teaching her how to drive her new car because women don't know how to drive. I don't know. And I mean, Oh, cause you don't know how to drive. Unfortunately,

don't awe me. I'm doing fine. I'm dressed like Barbie for no reason. No, no, that's patronizing. There. Continue. no no that's patronizing there continue why am i being so rude i don't know but they're in the car together and they're smooching they're just going and then there's a montage of them kissing and then they have sex in the backseat of a car that is near a body of water.

And we're like, what is this? Jack and Rose in Titanic? She literally says, you're trembling. Yeah. Yeah. Or she doesn't say, I mean, she says, you're shaking. Because she lives in 1989, not 1912. They don't use trembling anymore.

But I was, yeah, I was bowled over at how similar the scenes are. And we mutually agreed that even though this movie came out in 89 and Titanic came out in 97, Cameron Crowe is somehow ripping off Titanic. Yes. In this scene. Absolutely. Yeah.

And also let's just put a pin in the similarities between Titanic and Say Anything. Maybe that'll come back later. I don't know. Okay. So there's a song

that's playing in the car while they're having sex. Will you sing it? In your eyes. I'll do the drums. No. Number one, I don't really know the words. And number two, I'm a bad singer. Okay, but it's In Your Eyes by Peter Gabriel.

And she's like, listen to it. It's a really good song. And he's like, okay, I just busted. And that is always the answer to like, why are you trembling? I'm like, well, you were there. Like, not to blame women, but like, I think you know why I'm trembling.

Okay, so Diane comes home and she's like, the way dad i just had sex oh my god okay we need to talk okay i i know that like i've seen this movie praised repeatedly for like wow a positive like father-daughter relationship for a good chunk of this movie but it's just like okay i okay caitlin i'm gonna ask you a question when you lost your virginity yeah how long was it until your parents knew slash did they ever know my mom never never found out about the instance of me losing my virginity but she did find out find out when i was sexually active when i was in college um because she was like you're getting a lot of utis it's a great conversation starter go laurie i hope she didn't i hope she didn't even say hello and she was like i have a question to ask you are you sexually active and I was like yeah Lucky I am, bro. And then she high-fived me and...

You chest bumped and then you kind of... Exactly. We took like 12 shots of Jameson. I told... So I was trying to like figure out in my head how weird is what happens in this movie. Because I told my mom before I lost my virginity that sometime in the near future I would,

but I needed help buying a plane ticket. And so I needed to use her credit card to buy a plane ticket so I could lose my virginity. And so she like, it was like a whole, it was like a whole it was like you know an fbi operation for me to ultimately get a uti as you're saying um and find out i was allergic to latex but it's i i lived um but but what happens here i like, whether it's like before, after, whatever, in this scene, Diane is coming home to her father, who is Fraser's father,

making her Fraser's sister. Before she is like taking a shower after losing her virginity. She's like, dad, I have to tell you something. I fucked John Cusack. And then he like, to his credit is like oh because how do you react to that he doesn't slut shame her he doesn't say anything he's just but he also seems to find it weird that she has chosen anything I guess he doesn't does he he does not say anything he instead stares at her

saying with his eyes anything which is why are you telling me this before you've taken a shower I like I just feel like you know be as open with your parents as you're comfortable with but if you've just if you've just fucked at any time yeah shower before talking to your dad and maybe that's old-fashioned of me no maybe you want to walk in the house stinking of cum but i just i was just i was beside myself and then and then that scene resolves by her being like, I feel so much better. Yeah.

Because she's like, I can say anything to you, dad. It is, I mean, operates on my theory that the central weird romance in this movie is in fact between Fraser's dad and Diane. A dad and his daughter. His daughter. His daughter. I just rewatched Mystic River.

And so I was like mainlining my daughter for like seven hours or however long that movie is. Just Sean Penn swailing my daughter. Why did you watch that? I was homesick. Fair. Popped it on. But no, the point is, yes,

if you've just been dicked down in the backseat of a car, if you want to tell your dad about it, fine, I guess. But take a shower. You got to hit the showers. And your dad shouldn't be like, I don't know. Again, I would be, if I was sharing that information with my one father, I would not want him to be like thrilled. I don't know.

That scene really is going to stick in my craw for a long time to come. Let's talk about it further in a bit. In the meantime, Diane has told her dad that she has had sex. Meanwhile in a bit all right in the meantime diane has told her dad that she has had sex meanwhile sniffing in the air he's like oh gross um meanwhile lloyd's friends find out that he had sex and his friend cory is like you have to do something really romantic for diane now so he writes her a letter pouring his heart out to her again an incredible moment because cory reads the letter it's two sentences long i love cory i think is like my favorite character in the

movie we'll talk about her i really adore her uh but're her function in most scenes is to tell lloyd he is awesome yeah tell him he's the most amazing person to ever be born and she reads this bogus letter he's written where it's like hi diane you are pretty i love you yeah and she's like oh my god gotten a letter like this from anyone she's like okay shakespeare um and yeah she's just like her function is to gaslight up um when he's being you know kind of just like a guy exactly um okay so he sends off this letter but it's not long before diane leaves for england to go to a school that we don't know city england to go to school subject um and so she's confused about what to do because she loves

lloyd but she decides to break up with him and she gives him a pen as a parting gift she's a stone cold which is also her dad's idea yes the breakup also her dad's idea um here's a little fun little story that relates back to the person i lost my virginity with in high school um which is like government name good no i'm kidding so i broke up with him um at some point and you got snaps for that yeah brave of me and he was really heartbroken about it and i was so cold because he sent me this like essay that he had to write for english class and it was about how he was so in love with me and he he cheated on me back when I believed that monogamy was a thing oh anyway wait now give me his government name. Okay. Anyway, so he sent me this letter, and I proofread it, made a bunch of, like, red pen marks,

and then sent it back. Brutal. That's incredible. Yeah. Did you return it to him? Yeah. Yeah. I said, here were all of your errors

in grammar and spelling that's the coolest thing i've ever heard in my life that's really exciting thank you thank you very much damn yes i got broke i got the guy i lost my virginity to broke up with me because i was taking up the time he needed to practice the saxophone so i guess you know it takes all kinds because I was taking up the time he needed to practice the saxophone. So I guess, you know, it takes all kinds. Yeah. Okay, so Diane has broken up with Lloyd. She is upset about it.

He's devastated. He's driving around in the rain. He's trying to make sense of things. He's kind of recording a podcast at one point he is and then he's like well let's see what some men have to say about this but they give him bad advice on how to deal with including a jump scared jeremy piven oh jeremy piven in like a fedora being like women are bitches you're like whoa, whoa. Okay. Very scary. Yeah. So he's, you know, he's driving around and having feelings. He tries to call Diane several times.

He's leaving messages. And then we get the iconic scene where he goes to her house. He stands outside the window with the stereo over his head playing in your eyes, which is the song they played when they were having sex with each other. And it's AFI's 100 most romantic moments. And then you watch the scene and you're like, she doesn't even get out of bed? She just stays in bed.

He just stands there for a while, cut to inspiring a militia of creepy teenage boys to be like oh just show up show up she'll love that play loud music that's waking up the neighbors um okay okay so the nimby vibe uh then we cut cut to Diane going to see this IRS guy who tells her that they have proof that her dad has been stealing money for years from people at the nursing home that he runs. So Diane goes home. She snoops around her dad's stuff and finds a huge stash of cash.

He thought he was going to fool the valedictorian mistake number one she also at no point takes off her diamond ring even though it's clear that her diamond ring was purchased with dead people money yeah yeah so she confronts her dad being like you're a liar and a thief. And he's like, what's the big deal? I did this for you. It's like, Frazier gets a lot of residuals.

We'll make up for it. It's fine. So she storms out and then she goes to the gym where Lloyd is trying to have a kickboxing career. And she's like, I want you. I need you. I love you. And he's like, okay you i need you i love you and he's like okay cool i really like that scene it felt like very kind of close to authentic of like how um weird teenage doomed

relationships work where he's like are you saying this because you want me or because you want someone and then he like thinks about it for a second and is like i don't want to know the answer to that question can we have sex again and you're like you know that is the appropriate response yeah yeah yes so then uh frazier's daddy gets sent to jail lloyd pays him a visit to be like by the way i'm going to england with your daughter and the thing that i want to do for a living is be her boyfriend okay just so you know let him cook because that's like that's the idea of someone whose job it is to be my boyfriend is incredible and there are no benefits to it no you do not get dental no there's no dental for a boyfriend but i was like all right cool good for

him right um and then diane shows up to the prison yard and she gives her dad the pen that he had that she had originally given to lloyd yeah because like lloyd she's in love with her dad the pen that she had originally given to Lloyd. Yeah, because like Lloyd, she's in love with her dad. This scene also plays out very romantically. Like a breakup scene. Yeah, and Lloyd is on the sidelines being like, nice, she broke up with her dad. And now we can finally be together. And then she and Lloyd go to England there's a scene where they're in the plane she's a nervous

flyer but he's like don't worry babe I'll keep you safe ding the end the end and not say anything you can clap Definitely 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. I felt too seen. Dragged. I'm NK, and this is Basket Case. So I basically had what back in the day they would call a nervous breakdown.

I was crying and I was inconsolable. It was just very big, sudden swaps of different meds. What is wrong with me? Oh, look at you giving me therapy, girl. Finally, a show for the mentally ill girlies. On Basket Case, I talk to people about what happens when what we call mental health is shaped by the conditions of the world we live in. Because if you haven't noticed,

we are experiencing some kind of conditions that are pretty hard to live with. But if you struggle to cope, the society that created the conditions in the first place will tell you there's something wrong with you. And it will call you a basket case. Listen to Basket Case every Tuesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

When you think of Mexican culture, you think of avocado, mariachi, delicious cuisine, and of course, lucha libre. It doesn't get more Mexican than this. Lucha libre is known globally because it is much more than just a sport and much more than just entertainment. Lucha libre is a type of storytelling. It's a dance. It's tradition. It's culture. This is Lucha Libre Behind the Mask, a 12-episode podcast in both English and Spanish about the history and cultural richness of Lucha Libre.

And I'm your host, Santos Escobar, the emperor of Lucha Libre and a WWE superstar. Santos! Santos! Santos! Join me as we learn more about the history behind this spectacular sport from its inception in the United States to how it became a global symbol of Mexican culture. We'll learn more about some of the most

iconic heroes in the ring. This is Lucha Libre Behind the Mask. Listen to Lucha Libre Behind the Mask as part of My Cultura Podcast Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you stream podcasts. Shall we discuss?

Let's discuss. Let's discuss. Should we start with, I don't know, Diane and Lloyd and their relationship? Yes. Okay, with Diane, it is interesting watching this movie because i feel like the way that it's written because i hadn't seen it and based on all of

the marketing based on like the most famous image from the movie and all this stuff you're led to believe that like lloyd is the you know undisputed protagonist of this movie, but like, I feel like it is pretty clearly Diane and the way of like, who has the arc, who are we spending the most time with, whose feelings changed the most over the course of the movie. Like Lloyd is pretty like consistent throughout the way. Like,

I don't think that he, I mean, I think he does grow and change a little bit but like diane's the one who's really like going through it the entire movie and she's not like i think that the you know the most famous images from these movies like you you she's not in it and it feels like a weird example of um how it's it's not necessarily a fault of the movie itself that diane is kind kind of sidelined in the way this movie is remembered,

but the way that the marketing is and the way that it's publicly remembered doesn't include kind of the most impactful character. Right, yeah. It treats Lloyd as if he's the protagonist. And I wonder if that has anything to do with, like, John Cusack going on to have a more substantial career

the way that like many male actors are like, you get to have a career because men are actually written parts in movies and women aren't so much. So it's harder for them to become like notable actors. But like it's frustrating because Diane does have like an i think she's an interesting character and i think it is just more what is focused on that

feels weird because there's a lot of interesting stuff with diane i feel like she and i guess i don't i don't fully think i know how aware the writing of the movie is of this but it feels like Diane is this like character she's like a like brilliant young woman who and the two main men in her life are trying to like live their lives through her by their own rules and that is like the main thing that she's struggling with throughout the movie is like she's with her dad she wants to you know she loves him she wants to make him happy she wants to meet his expectations but it doesn't quite match and then with Lloyd she's repeatedly trying to set boundaries with him uh and you know to be fair it does seem like she wants to be around him and

is doing what she thinks she needs to do but it's like she's just struggling with the expectations of men she cares about for the entire movie which is an interesting premise but it like i it just kind of bears out in this weird way yeah in a way that i don't find very satisfying yeah i as far as like teen romance movies go because the bar is so low and some of them are very predicated on a an extremely scary and predatory you know lie or bet or some kind of just like stalker situation this one feels on the less problematic side yeah that's saying something because it's still like he's not respecting her boundaries a lot of the time. And he keeps kind of like being like, well, yeah, you just said that you don't want a social life and that you just want to be friends. But what if we kiss a bunch and then have sex in the back of a car?

Right. I agree that it was like Lloyd is not the most respectful boundaries character ever. But it also felt like he is like it at least felt reflective of reality enough and like i remember having teenage interactions like that and diane i don't know i just feel like diane kind of gets lost in the shuffle sometimes in a way that's frustrating and then for me like for for teen romance it's really frustrating that Lloyd is not a 100-year-old vampire. And so it's already kind of like, so why would I watch this? I don't understand.

Did that occur to you at any point? He wasn't really a member of the Cullen family, I would say. And so it was kind of challenging to get invested in that romance. So why even set the movie in Washington state? Fucking exactly. Don't waste my time. If it's in Washington state, I'm assuming there is a level of immortality. There's one of the characters.

And I was really disappointed that it did seem like they were you know both mortal mortal um yeah and so that was that was a bummer but but yeah i mean it's it's i think diane is like a really um interesting character but the yeah the way she's treated by the story is kind of i don't know like it's disappointing she doesn't have any friends to bounce stuff off of not that that doesn't happen in high school but i think like for the sake of the movie it would have been i think helpful for the audience and good for just developing the character to have her have someone outside of these two men in her life to get an idea of who she is. It feels like Princess,

I feel like we talk about Princess Leia in terms of that, where it's like, here's this really interesting lead character who is a woman, but we're only going to give her men to talk to. We're not going to give her an interior life outside of her relationship to these men uh for for reasons unclear right and then the movie does kind of address the fact that she does she like hasn't made any friends in high school and it's because she sort of like secluded herself or she didn't put herself out there and this party was like her first chance to meet people and now she finally feels like she

like some people know her but then after she comes to that realization or she has kind of like taken herself out of her comfort zone she proceeds to then get to know exactly one person and it's a guy who's just extremely persistent at her right Right. Well, that was, I felt like there was promise and we have exactly, because I think that in Lloyd's, I mean, in spite of the fact that I feel like Lloyd has less of an arc, we know more people in his life and in his circle.

We know his sister, who is his actual sister, Constance, I think her name is, played by Joan Cusack. We know his best friend, Corey. We know his other friend, DC. know um a number of people in his life and he mostly has close relationships um friendship family-wise with women but yeah and we get one scene between Lloyd's best friend Corey and Diane that I felt like was really cool and promising of like oh maybe they will become friends um and that would be a way to bring her closer to Lloyd if you know they become friends

but the only thing that happens in that scene is like is Corey does the function of her character which is to be like wow wouldn't you say that Lloyd is like the most epic awesome guy in the world and Diane's like hmm you're right about that. And then that's the only scene we get them together, which sucks because it's like seeing two interesting women just pass like ships in the night, you know, on to more boring plot points. And you're like, no, stay.

Talk about your feelings on Roe v. Wade you know like give me something uh but they they give me nothing they don't yeah it's disappointing yes so i guess where i land on it is the romance we've seen worse examples in teen rom-coms but it like you said it's just her it is diane's story she feels like the protagonist to me but it's all about these men who are just kind of like inserting themselves in her life or just like inserting their expectations in her life and she doesn't really challenge them very much and she was just like yep i'll allow it well it's not even i would i would say that she does challenge it at different points but she is like doesn't successfully push out of it right in a way that does the the script doesn't feel fully aware of like it's it's we're made to

believe that like this ending for diane is kind of the best case scenario when there i feel like are a lot of opportunities for her to push back more, make connections with other people. And, and I don't know, I just feel like there were more interesting things. And then also watching the relationship. I also think the most interesting relationship in the movie also does not

involve Lloyd. I think the most interesting relationship is, I know we've like talked a lot of shit about it because he is trying to marry her, but like Diane and her father's dynamic is really interesting and I feel like there is like a really I don't know I can't think of a lot of I mean except the entire series of succession I can't think of like I mean there's not a lot of stories about like a uh daughter getting to know like who idolizes a parent having that illusion completely shattered and having to deal with that like that's a really interesting thing to explore

especially because like diane has really dictated the way that she has lived and we know this about her because she says it um to lloydEleven, which, incredible detail. I'm like, did they get stuff off the rollers? Like when did they get a white claw? Did white claw exist? There are all these things, right?

Yeah. I had a lot of questions. They left 7-Eleven, but they weren't holding a delicious snack. That was interesting. Yeah. I went to 7-Eleven the other night and brag. Thank you.

I was on a date. I was like, I need to make a stop to get candy corn and a buffalo roller. Sorry, that came up involuntarily. I just wanted to know what their order was there and that is my biggest problem with the movie the focus is more on well what the thing you're about to say but then also the parking lot moment where he's

just like watch out there's glass and then he just kind of like kicks it out of the way she walks around it and then later in the movie she's like the reason i know that he's such a good guy is that he didn't let me step in glass that that was so okay uh those scenes are so fun to watch because they are like nonsensical and you can just imagine like Cameron Crowe at his like computer being like yes this is so good like this is what women require um he really thought he was he was he was doing something there um I just and it's like I

mean truly the ultimate a great cinematic example of accepting crumbs is like wow that guy didn't want me to step on glass i could see like i better let him follow me around like just a real a real bummer um but yeah i mean i think ultimately the more interesting relationship if if if this movie absolutely has to choose a relationship between Diane and a man in her life is the relationship with her dad because in that same scene she explains to Lloyd that like it seems like part of the reason she feels so connected to her dad is because she was put in this through this horrible custody battle where she had to choose which parent to live with she chose to live with her dad she says because it

was easier we're not given any information but i don't know maybe she wanted to be able to see frazier she's like i felt more safe she was like it felt like the safe choice we don't know exactly what she means by that but that's that's the only information we have but it's like the safe choice. We don't know exactly what she means by that, but that's, that's the only information we have. But it's like, she's very like at a base level, very invested in making her relationship with her dad work, which he seems to, you know,

want, he wants to marry her. But like examining that felt more interesting to me than this teenage romance. It just, but I don't know. And then you get a scene, one scene with Diane and her mother. And that seems very, what did you make of that scene? Because to me, that was another scene of like Cameron Crowe sitting in a room,

probably with his spouse, not asking her what women might talk about this is one of the scenes i listed under the does the movie pass the bechdel test column yeah because there are a handful of interactions with women in the movie and one of them is this scene where diane is talking to her mom uh here's how it goes. They are talking about her dad being a criminal. And then the mom is like, no, I'd rather talk about you. I don't even know if you've got a young man in your life. And Diane. And Cameron Crowe is like, yeah.

Diane says, what's more important than what's going on with dad and then her mom replies if we could just talk about boys everything would be so much easier and you're like well that's a back to back the scene is not going anywhere and then the mom's new husband I forget his name

he shows up Owen uh huh and then he he's like about to show up so they start talking about him and then he shows up and cut to the next scene so I didn't like it is what I'm saying no and it's that's especially frustrating because that relationship like never comes back, which is bizarre because the reason that that scene happens is because Diane is going to her mom to say, hey, dad is getting investigated by the IRS. If the IRS comes to your door,

please say something nice about him. Like, and she's, and Diane, like, and I really like, I feel for her in that because she's very invested in, like, protecting her father. She very much believes he is innocent. And so she's, like, that's part of why she, like, originally breaks off the relationship with Lloyd is because she's, like, I'm kind of, like, really focused on my dad

not going to white-collar jail right now. And so it's, like, she's really spending a lot of time trying to protect him um and we know that like i mean i don't know how much the mom would know about what's going on but it seems like it would be relevant to diane's mother that frazier's dad goes to jail yeah but she never comes back and we never get any closure on like where that relationship was left or like any, which is frustrating if, if we are viewing Diane as like the protagonist of the movie,

but it just like leaves all of these loose threads in favor of, you know, watching Lloyd. No, no, no. Turn in a circle. What does he even do?

He's so, he's kicking and he's punching. He's doing, he's doing his kicks. Well, let's talk and he's punching. Kicking. He's doing his kicks. Well, let's talk about Lloyd. Sorry. Well, first I spent the past like two minutes trying to, is it?

Okay. Which Durst is it? Is it Robert? Robert. Not Fred. Okay. That's what. Okay.

So Rob, I'm always happy to answer that question. So basically when, uh, when Diane is like my dad, innocent, it's like how you respond to answer that question. So basically when Diane is like, my dad innocent, it's like how you respond to Robert Durst. Okay. I was trying to make that joke. It has come and gone. It's anyway.

There's no point in arguing Robert Durst is innocent anymore because not only is he dead, he was guilty. It's kind of a challenging time for me. Yeah, sorry um but no i found that the relationship with her dad and just the dad character in general his name is james right jim james court james i love that their last name is court and then he goes to jail that's that's iconic writing that's some larry g lee level naming of a character i liked it yeah i found him to be maybe one of the most nuanced characters in the movie because i guess he just defies a lot of just stereotypes when it comes to like dad characters of a teen girl of that era

we already talked about the scene where she comes home after having sex for the first time with lloyd he is like where were you you didn't call but he's like but because he's in love with her he's like i want to make sure you're safe and then he goes he like goes on to just explain you know i care about your safety it doesn't matter what you were doing and then she says like i was having sex dad and he's like okay i would just be like all right can we talk about this like after you like sleep but they have to talk about it now because it's a movie and and she's like i'm just so eager to say anything to you and he goes yay but i guess you know a typical dad character in a movie like this

would have a very like slut shamey response and try to like exert all of this either either a slut shamey response or like where is he i? I'm going to kill him. That's my daughter. You know, exactly. I just watched mystic river. That's what he does. So he doesn't do that. He's just mostly concerned about her safety because she doesn't,

she didn't call like she always calls. Right. And then there's a later scene that also his behavior surprised me where she is saying that she's not sure if she should take this fellowship in england after all and i will say i guess going back to the relationship between her and lloyd i was because i didn't really remember how this movie pans out and i was worried as i was watching it this time that she would be like never mind i don't need to go to england i've got my professional boyfriend who professionally wants to be my boyfriend and i will and as that is not a paying position i will

suppose i will have to support him in his endeavor to be around so i was really worried that like she was not gonna take the opportunity and like pursue her education she does do it he tags along which you know you can feel about any which way but i i was happy that at least she like went through with her plans yeah um in any case so she's like i don't know if i should go to school college school school university to study question mark oh my god which again is like that's a really easy detail to give and we were not given it and i feel like that if it was lloyd we would know what he was studying and what he was interested in because we know that he wants to be a kickboxer even though that has no relevance to fucking anything. Diane's like,

you know, ambitions have a lot to do with the movie and we don't know what they actually are. Right. Yeah. I wonder if like Oxford university read, it was like originally that in the script. And then they're like, don't be smart.

Keep my name out of your fucking mouth crow. That would be really funny. That would be such a weird uh weird antagonistic thing to do in any case okay i didn't like fast times at ridgemont high so she's saying she's not sure if she should go to england and she does kind of it seems like she's implying oh maybe also one of the reasons i don't want to go not only are you under criminal investigation dad but also i love this guy and then when he finds that out when when her dad realizes that she loves him he kind of pivots because prior to that he was like oh he's not good enough for you he's always just kicking and punching and you're too smart for him

and then which is true to be fair true but then he like when she says i love him he respects the gravity of the situation he respects her feelings he doesn't like try to question her feelings he is like oh wow maybe i'm being like really selfish here why am i fixated on this like i owe you an apology he says yeah but then the one sentence we never hear it's amazing yeah but and then a few minutes later, he turns out to be embezzling money from a very vulnerable group of people. So, I don't know. It's complicated, you know. Some of history's greatest monsters were pretty decent parents. And Frasier's dad, well, Frasier's dad was a great dad, but he was a retired Seattle cop.

So, you know, this a sort of a through line. Thank you, Fraser heads for, I was proud of making that connection as well. Yeah. I felt like it was a unique father daughter relationship, but again, I don't know. I don't know. I feel like coding it as romantic was so avoidable and i'm

like not even joking because like down to post-production whoever i don't know off the top of my head who composed the music uh but what the fuck were they thinking like when they were like all right all right father daughter father daughter all right, all right. Father, daughter, father, daughter. All right, we're going to need something a little sexy. Why? Some sort of like longing. Romantic music, the blocking is often weird. Just the writing choice to make. I'm sorry if any of your dads have given you a diamond ring.

No, if your dad is given you a diamond ring, you have to consider he could have been embezzling money from old people. I hope this is a wake-up call for anyone in this room who has received a diamond ring from their father. It's weird. It's weird. Weird choices were made all around.'s talk about lloyd really quick okay i lloyd is an interesting character to me because i do think that like i don't know like

lloyd and this movie have been through so many um rounds of critical appraisal um where i think this movie was pretty beloved when it came out. I think Lloyd does sort of defy a number of common rom-com stereotypes with a male lead where, like you're saying, there's no bet, there's no central lie, but he still is pushy and still pushes past a lot of Diane's boundaries and is rewarded for that behavior.

And then on the other hand, you have, what I like about Lloyd is the fact that something we, I think, very rarely see in teen movies, which is that he has a close friend who is a woman who he is not, like there's no subtext of like yeah she's in love with me or i am in love with her like cory is his closest friend and she's an interesting character in her own right but like there is no like it presents the simple truth that uh men and women can be friends yeah in a way that is like not you know like longing coated or that there's not this like deep heterosexual you know physical pain that comes

with them being around each other and then on top of that that like when that friendship is presented to diane she's like oh that's it's nice to meet your friend versus like meeting that with extreme jealousy or just like all these tropes we very ordinarily see where it just seems like Lloyd is a male character who connects with women easier, which is nice. And that is like not presented as a bad thing. And I also like how Lloyd is from like boys parents aren't really around they're in the military in Germany and really well I

don't like the sound of that right after the fall of the Berlin Wall and in their politics are not made clear but they're in the military in Germany in the 80s. And so they're out there. And so Floyd and his sister, Floyd's sister is a single mom. There is no judgment passed on that. I think my main issue is that they don't let her be a character at all.

She's just vaguely shrill-ill coded to to lloyd in the first she's like why can't you be an uncle and not a playmate and he's like you used to be fun yeah uh but but it was like he he has like a i think like kind of like a latchkey kid kind of upbringing where his parents weren't really around. And I feel like those characters are very often portrayed to be maladjusted and not people to be around. And I like that Lloyd sort of presents that upbringing in a way that it's like he's generally a thoughtful person. And I don't know, like classwise and just upbringing-wise it's like not something i was used to seeing sure so i don't know lloyd lloyd was hit and miss for me but i i do uh i was rooting for him especially when he something is so vulnerable about whipping

a vhs copy of cocoon where i was like oh he's really going for it yeah he doesn't know what he's doing but he wants to do something and this is after and we have to wrap up very soon but this is after diane has challenged him for his ageist beliefs yes and she's like literally calls him out with that exact language she's like you're being ageist and he sits his ass down and then and then he's like right he's like wow you're really making me reconsider and maybe I shouldn't be ageist and it's not clear if he actually is like changing his mind about this or if he just wants to bust right it's October and Bustin' makes you feel good. Precisely. But I mean, unfortunately,

with due respect to men in the room, I feel like it is a fake it till you make it situation where it's like, I will make you repeat my politics back to me until you somehow believe it. And that's how I wear people down. Yeah. and you know it's that's how i wear people down yeah um by talking about housing justice until they believe in it um and that's how i've weaponized my vagina for good uh the other thing i like about lloyd and i know we have to move on is um there is a critical

scene where lloyd is so he like you mentioned, he is recording a podcast. He's driving around in his car, recording his thoughts on a cassette player for Corey, for his friend. He's recording a podcast for an audience of one. It is like kind of true crimey where he's like, I'm in the streets. And you're like, my god i know people

who sound like oh not no i've listened to podcasts like that that the people are millionaires for saying equally fucking nothing you know um i'm in the streets it's dark out you're like he said something like the rain on my car is a baptism we're like wow brilliant metaphor sir when you think about it i am i do him christ like go off king um but when he's doing that yeah like he you you alluded to this in the recap but he says like maybe i should talk to more men everyone in my life is a woman and you're like well that's gonna be a non-starter but let's see what happens but the movie bears that out

where he goes to this group of like guys like high school guys as with any group of guys Jeremy Piven is there if you're gonna go meet up with some guys he'll be there and he'll be wearing a little hat um but the the uh list i know we were both ready to get down as

we were watching it together because uh you know he goes to this group of men they're hanging out at a gas station uh talking shit about women which is beautiful beautiful right uh one says you can't trust them they spend your money and they tell your friends everything and i'm like and is that a bad thing there all you got to do is find a girl that looks just like her nail her and then dump her uh you know what's the mistake you should should have dumped her first. That's Jeremy Piven. Diane Cord is a show pony. You need a stallion man. Literally, Jeremy Piven objectifying women. We hate to see it.

But Lloyd does not respond to this by being radicalized by these gas station losers ideas. He instead challenges it. He's like, oh, that's interesting that you have all these thoughts about women when women aren't hanging out with you and you are at a gas station at night and that's awesome i mean like that exchange is really cool and then and then he respond and then like after realizing that talking to uh men his age is a non-starter and that they hate women and don't understand why he goes back to

his friends who are women and ask them for advice and like i i i liked that i thought that was cool yeah yeah i you know he does blame cory for diane breaking up with him basically he's just like i hang out with too many women and it's your fault, Corey. This is your podcast for you where I'm yelling at you. But I do like that the movie recognizes that all the advice that the men give him is terrible advice and that Lloyd openly challenges them. Absolutely. And then, because we do have to wrap up,

Corey, we'll talk more about her. We'll record more about her at a later time. But Corey is the fucking coolest character in the movie. Do we have any Corey heads in the house? Okay. She's the best. I also feel like she's a very uniquely 1989 character where she is Lloyd's best friend.

I feel like I was like, oh, the character closest to me in high school is Corey where she has had her heart broken by the same loser repeatedly and is writing horrible poetry about it. And that is a very recognizable thing. I think that we'll sort of talk about later on about the way it's presented,

but I really liked her and I felt like we were sort of talk about later on about like the way it's presented but I just I really liked her and I felt like we were given some crumbs on how she like on her her personal stuff towards the beginning of the movie where it's like there is this one guy who later appears at a gas station being a misogynist so

huge loss for her but like this fucking loser who she's written 65 songs about. Joe. Who among us? That she eventually kind of cuts loose because she realizes that he's a loser and a liar. And I thought that was a really interesting start

to her character. But then the remainder of the movie, she mainly shows up to tell Lloyd various plot points and to tell him he's cool. Yeah. And that's kind of the most we get from her after like the 30 minute mark. Yeah, that's true. Very frustrating. Yeah. The last thing I wanted to say is just uh the production of this movie it is like an interesting

movie production wise but i wanted to just quickly shout out one of the main producers of this movie polly platt we've got a picture of her here let's get this is um uh she's really cool i would if you haven't listened to the season of you must remember this about polly platt i would highly highly recommend it it's so cool give it up for her she is she had a fucking incredible life like she I mean she was done a huge disservice by show business um but this movie came out during this sort of second surge in her career where she was working with James L Brooks um she worked on this movie. She basically discovered Cameron Crowe and Wes Anderson, so you're welcome if those are guys you like.

She also, iconically for everyone, discovered The Simpsons and handed it off to James L. Brooks. So we wouldn't have The Simpsons without Polly Platt. She's fucking cool. And she also appears in a cameo in this movie, which is the next slide. You can see that she is in the graduation scene uh so there she is so yay polly um and we'll link to um karina longworth's

season about her when we release this episode but caitlin yes does this movie pass the bechdel test i think maybe on a small technicality but i would say spiritually no spiritually no but it does pass between dc and um it's not a very impactful exchange but between dc and cory there is an exchange in the record store where the large context of the conversation is that Diane and Lloyd had sex yes which is you know not passing the bachelor test whatsoever P and V it doesn't pass um but um Corey is talking over DC and DC is like you never let me talk about anything you never let me speak and Corey's like oh I'm sorry what do you want to say and DC is like well I forget and that was impactful to me and so that passes to me I can relate to I've had many

interactions like that demanding yeah demanding a platform and then being like oh I have nothing to contribute but generally the few times that women do interact in this movie, they are usually talking about Lloyd. They are talking about Frazier's dad. They're talking about some other guy. It's particularly, this is disgusting. Joe,

this is, it's particularly frustrating in the conversation between Diane and her mom, where there is potential to talk about most anything and they aggressively only talk about men right or the scene the one interaction between cory and diane where they talk about cory's ex-boyfriend joe for a while and then lloyd yeah but what about the most important metric to ever exist which is uh the bechtel cast nipple scale yes zero to five nipples based on examining the movie through an intersectional feminist lens i think i'll give

this movie i would say two nipples i think someone gasped is that what happens when you guys listen to this they're like they're like oh they're so wrong for that how could they were you expecting me to say higher or lower i i made a mistake and this happens oh my god no this happens every single time this is why like live shows are nuclear for us because if i look at you the wrong way you're like no no well here's my reasoning yeah this sounds familiar and i'm judging this on 1989 standards and it's like slightly less problematic than teen rom-coms that came out 10 years later yeah for sure there's that um the father-daughter relationship while it is rife with a weird possibly romantic tension um i do

i i know two is wrong i'll go down to one and a half. Stop contributing. We'll never leave. If you can. Yeah, we got it. We're like, wait. No, it should be 1.6, 4. Just because we have to wrap up,

I will simply say one and a half nipples and I give one to, what's her name? Antigone? What? Oh my, oh wait, wait I get it I get it sorry I I only Antigone okay like Mrs. Lynn McGregor we gotta go we gotta go so Ioni Skye and then my half nipple goes to Lily Taylor who plays Corey and Tiffany um I can't I'm gonna give this yeah i'll give it i'll give it like i don't

know one and a half maybe even a little lower 1.25 something like that i think that yeah like there are things that this movie is i'm gonna i need to stop looking scared uh there are there are ways that this movie is um avoiding a lot of tropes that we see in the same era and for decades after but it is still doing you know the pushy thing it's still doing that giving us an interesting central woman who is not allowed to know other women or care about other women and I I truly I do think that like the uh writing of the father-daughter relationship being so bizarrely romantic is just a demonstration that the writer does not know how to write a healthy relationship between men and women and I find that weird it's also I mean I mean it's 1989 so I but it's like it's a it's

not an inclusive movie whatsoever it's very much like a movie in the white middle class. In Seattle, there's no, you know, attempt at inclusion in any way, shape, or form. It's just, you know, it's a really white hetero movie. And I'm going to give it, I guess I'll give it 1.25. And I'm giving it all to Antigone. Beautiful. Well, that'sigone. Beautiful. Well, that's our show. Yeah.

Thank you for coming. Okay, that was the show. Thank you again to Curious Comedy Theater, to Stacey who runs the venue, to all the staff there. And to the All Jane Comedy Festival, which this was the final all jane comedy festival however it was something that i was aware of since i started comedy

as just one of the few festival spaces that was reserved specifically for women and femmes and was very uh welcoming and cool and it felt it was an honor to to do the festival and it's a testament to stacy so um you can't go now but you really missed out it was cool you can't go to the festival but you can still go to curious comedy theater so check them out if you're ever in portland or if you live in or nearby and um also just thanks to everyone who came out to the show who watched the live stream and then once again you can grab on-demand tickets you'll see some of that extra stuff that we cut out of the audio only episode i think some of our best bits yeah some really good stuff some of our best on stage bits you'll want to see it a few things that we didn't get to in the live show really quickly i would be remiss not to

mention the guidance counselor showing up to the high school party yes why a trope we still have not gotten rid of today as recently as book smart we still had teachers showing up to the party uncritically it is so fucking bizarre and i and and also i mean to that point um not really fun live show talk but i feel like really encourages an unhealthy uh relationship between teachers and students that can uh you know, sort of normalize grooming tactics. So yeah, I don't know. The teacher at my high school that went to parties was a groomer. Yikes. Yeah. Teachers don't go to student parties if they're regular.

Don't. Yes. And then we touched on this in the episode, but I feel like it might be worth just saying a little further. The gals in the movie, you know, we've got Corey played by Lily Taylor. She's Lloyd's best friend, mostly just characterized by being obsessed with Lloyd and also being obsessed with the guy who broke her heart. She plays all those songs that she's written on the guitar about him. And I also, I mean, I think that, yeah, speaking to Corey's character, I think that a lot of people, I mean, at least I was seeing just like what's been written about this movie and uh what our audience said after the episode was that a lot of people saw themselves in Corey and also like to the point where it's like we would have even more people would have seen themselves in Corey if she had been given a proper arc because I love like we talked to him what like

I think we talked about during the show like it is cool that she and Lloyd have a truly platonic friendship between a man and a woman something we never ever ever get to see without it being a will they or won't they it never is like she I mean it is an issue that her defining character trait is that she thinks Lloyd is a great guy uh but I I do think it's cool that they both really like and respect each other. And it's a friendship and it like, and it's not presented as a threat or a will they or won't they or something that, you know, even today is still a pretty rare dynamic to see in movies. But I think that like, again, we just have the case with Corey because I like Corey's character a lot but we only

see her really in spite of the fact that i feel like we see her mostly talking to women she exists mostly in relation to men because i have no issue with like writing torrid shitty poetry about a horrible relationship like you know most people have done it at some point sure sure but for that to be like the only thing we get to know about her when it would it would have been so easy to build out a friendship between her and diane between you know her and and dc or like you know people we see her with but we don't know what the friendship dynamic is other than hanging out all day and being like lloyd is slaying so hard today yet again dc a character who we know even less about oh for sure so that was not great and i just wanted to

take a little bit more time than we had in the live show to examine that but yeah that's our episode on say anything and i think you'll agree we said whatever in that we kind of said anything but we also said everything wow well well goodbye no wait you can follow us online at it's on instagram and still twitter sometimes at bechtel cast you can uh sign up for our patreon aka matreon at patreon.com slash bechtel cast five dollars a month gets you two bonus episodes a month yay including access to 150 episodes of backlog of back backlog makes it sound like backwash which makes it sound not good. It's quite good. All bangers. It's good.

And then also, check out our link tree for tickets for the on-demand video version of this Say Anything live show, as well as our upcoming live shows that we're doing kind of anywhere, everywhere. Say anything, say anywhere, say anything everywhere. All at once. That is, that is so true.

The people needed to hear my message. All right. Well, we will talk to you next week. We'll see you next week. We'll see anything later. You later. I don't know.

It didn't work. Free Palestine. Bye. Bye. The Bechdelcast is a production of iHeartMedia, hosted by Caitlin Durante and Jamie Loftus, produced by Sophie Lichterman, edited by Mo Laborde. Our theme song was composed by Mike Kaplan

with vocals by Catherine Voskrosensky. Our logo and merch is designed by Jamie Loftus and a special thanks to Aristotle Acevedo. For more information about the podcast, please visit linktree.com. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist about the podcast, please visit linktree.com. her beloved country into a mafia state. Plus channel, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. her sister or his 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, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Curious about queer sexuality, cruising,

and expanding your horizons? Hit play on the sex-positive and deeply entertaining podcast Sniffy's Cruising 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.