His Girl Friday

00:00:00
Speaker 1: On the Bechdel Cast, the questions asked if movies have women and them, are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands, or do they have individualism? It's the patriarchy Zephi. Fast start changing with the Bechdel Cast.

00:00:16
Speaker 2: Hey, Caitlyn Duranday, Hey Jamie, do you have that article for me? You're a reporter and I need you to talk really fast to be so that we.

00:00:22
Speaker 1: Haven't And I didn't do any research because I'm tired, so I just made it up and here it is. Let's put it in the paper.

00:00:28
Speaker 2: Well that's okay. Yeah, let's just keep overlapping and talking like this so that no one can understand what we're saying.

00:00:33
Speaker 1: Okay, then that's kind of the charm of the movie, because yeah, I guess for me, but for me, and it's my birthday. God damn it.

00:00:42
Speaker 2: Not anymore, Jamie, not anymore?

00:00:44
Speaker 1: Oh shit, Welcome to the Bechtel Cast. Say, my name is Jamie Loptis.

00:00:53
Speaker 2: My name is Caitlin Durante. This is our show where we examine movies through an intersecttional feminist lens, using the Bechdel test as a jumping off point. But Jamie what's the Bechdel Test.

00:01:04
Speaker 1: I'll tell you. I'll tell you what it is. I've got it in this big old book right here. It's a video metric created by queer cartoonist Alison Bechdel, often called the Bechdel Wallace test because she co created it with a dame named Oh abroad, a broad name less Wallace. Oh no, sorry, Les Wallas. Lots of versions of the test. The version we use is this, two characters of a marginalized genders with names you hear speak to each other about something other than a fella for for two lines or more. Does it happen in this movie? I would argue, yes, which kind of feels like a miracle. Uh oh does it?

00:01:41
Speaker 2: I didn't even notice because I didn't know who was talking at any point.

00:01:45
Speaker 1: It's like there's conversations between women that eventually divert to be about a man. There's not a full conversation that passes the Bechtel test, but there are exchanges between Hildy and Molly that pass the Bechdel test. Yeah, and other than that, it's like two incidentals account But I do think that there's a conversation between Hilldy and Molly that passes and that's the episode folks. No, just kidding, yod bye see Laos so long It's his Girl Friday week on the backdel cast. I was originally going to choose this as one of my birthday picks on the Matreon, but we went another direction to learn about that direction head over to the Matreon. Wow, but this is still I think a movie that warrants discussion because it's a very famous movie, and yeah, what's your history with this movie? I don't know.

00:02:38
Speaker 2: I thought I had seen it because it's one of those like classic Hollywood movies that you have to see if you want to know about film, you know, say, but twist. I thought I had seen it, and it turns out I hadn't. I think I was getting it confused with Philadelphia Story, which I have seen.

00:02:58
Speaker 1: This does feel, Yeah, I always kind of forget that, which is unfair to Rassalin Russell, who I think gives an unbelievable performance in this movie. I always sort of code this in my brain as a Katherine Hepburn movie, which it is not. But I also think that's somewhat understandable given the fact that at the Howard Hawks movie it feels like a Howard Hawks movie. And I just associate those movies with Carrie Grant and Katherine Hepburn because he did bringing up baby with her. Anyways, so this was your first time watching.

00:03:28
Speaker 2: This was my first time watching it. I wasn't super thrilled with it at the top. I generally like Carrie Grant movies. Say, he's probably my favorite actor of that era, sure, because he's sort of the only one who I know about other than Gene Kelly. Jimmy Stewart.

00:03:49
Speaker 1: Oh, I like Geen Kelly, you do, but you hate Jimmy Stewart.

00:03:52
Speaker 2: I hate Jimmy Stewart.

00:03:54
Speaker 1: Yeah. Honestly, I think that you have slowly moved me against Jimmy Stewart. Yes, yeah, there I said it.

00:04:02
Speaker 2: Well, you're welcome. But anyway, I generally like Cary Grant movies. This is not one of the ones I care for very much, partly because his character is despicable. I think, I mean, we'll have an interesting discussion about this movie, but it just wasn't quite for me. What about you, Jamie, what's your relationship with the movie?

00:04:22
Speaker 1: So interestingly, and I feel like this is just because this show has been on for so long that we're running out of genuine favorite movies to cover. So yeah, I originally picked this as a birthday pick for the Matreon, not because it's one of my favorite movies. This is only my second time seeing it, but because I saw it in theaters last year and I was not watching it critically. I was just kind of letting it wash over me and was like, Wow, that movie was I mean, I also thought maybe I'd seen it in film school. I didn't. I have seen like a couple Howard Hawk's movie before and seen Bringing Up Baby. We've covered gentlemen preferred blondes on this very show, so you know, I sort of assumed that I that I'd seen this before. I hadn't, and I kind of I mean, it's interesting because I think where I generally come down on this movie is I really enjoyed seeing it in theaters. I really enjoyed seeing it with an audience. It was really fun listening to jokes written eighty five years ago still play in a theatrical setting. Like I was very taken in by the experience. I was with people who I love, who loved the movie. It was like it was a blast. And then upon leaving the movie. I was like, Wow, I really love the performances in this movie, and I think that it is like a tricky movie for us to talk about, which is why I want to try, because it, you know, I think, fails as a feminist story but succeeds as a satire, and if a few elements were adjusted, it could be successful as both. And then I did some more reading and it sort of brought back this like latent. You know, early film school talks of the Hoxian woman, and I don't. I honestly don't remember. Listeners, you may be a better authority on this than we were if we talked about the tropes that are associated with the Hoxian woman, like the one of the like a guy's girl, kind of like the original guys girl in film tropes. But I don't know. Like, I think this movie is a super fun watch. I think as a satire it's like really successful and I enjoy letting it wash over me. But if you are watching it for a feminist hero, unfortunately you do not get one, which is which is frustrating. It almost like reminds me of I feel like these kind of like Hoxyan women are in conversation with so many other tropes around women that come up later in film, of like the girl power girl who is doing all the cool stuff, is saying all this stuff. There is the illusion of agency, but it like collapses under scrutiny of like, well, no, she is still very much being heavily manipulated by the male protagonist or by the patriarchal system on the whole. It's so tricky and it's like also quite evil to loop in this brutal manipulation of Hildy with something that she appears to be very good at and loves, which is drill like it's just it's I don't know. It'll be an interesting discussion for sure, because I'm not like super attached to Like, I won't defend this movie. I won't go to the map for it, but I do understand why people still watch it.

00:07:40
Speaker 2: Yeah for sure. Yeah. Hmm, well let's get into it, how we Alrighty, here is the recap, and I'll place the content warning for a brief kind of mentioned slash discussion of suicide. We open on the busy office of the morning Post newspaper from what city I can't tell, not New York, somewhere else ever, heard of somewhere else.

00:08:10
Speaker 1: No me either.

00:08:13
Speaker 2: We meet Hildy played by Rosalind Russell, who is there to see her her ex husband, Walter played by Kerry Grant. He is the editor in chief of the newspaper which Hildy used to write for until she quit, no longer wanting to be in the newspaper business right.

00:08:36
Speaker 1: Unclear why, because it's like this is where it gets so fascinating already, where it's like she's like, it's corrupt, and then you look at how they do business and you're like, oh, yeah, true. But then you're like, but that's but that's not why. She actually loves being corrupt. It's her favorite.

00:08:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, she doesn't mind it all.

00:08:52
Speaker 1: These two are just like there is something interesting about watching two characters that you're like, hmm. These characters are both kind of you're.

00:09:00
Speaker 2: Evil, and they deserve each other.

00:09:03
Speaker 1: They found each other and they're really going to like win a pulis or saying something very fucked up someday, very true.

00:09:10
Speaker 2: Yes, So Hildy goes to see Walter. They talk about their relationship, why it didn't work out. Then he plays a little trick to try to get Hildy to come back and work for him again, because he's always tricking people, double crossing people, manipulating people, doing sneaky and shady stuff to get what he.

00:09:33
Speaker 1: Wants in life and at work.

00:09:36
Speaker 2: Yes, and Hildy is like, I'm not gonna come back and work for you. And if you're trying to get back together with me, I'm not doing that either. I'm engaged, I have a fiance and I'm getting married tomorrow. And he's like, damn, that sucks.

00:09:55
Speaker 1: And then it's just like your first hint that something is amiss is the fact that she's like, and I need to do this in person, and you're like, no, you don't, No, you don't. This could have been an email, you know this. Yeah, why didn't she email him? That's what that's us. This is our twenty fourteen feminist critique. She should have texted him, Okay, So that's weird. I also feel like there is a coding specifically during well not even specifically during this, like throughout romantic comedies that if someone if the like alternate romantic interest, is like an accountant or works in insurance, he is fundamentally unworthy of love. I think they're like this this trope carries through the nineties weirdly.

00:10:42
Speaker 2: Yes, I think there's like a career coded thing and then also a personality thing where if.

00:10:49
Speaker 1: Yes, were you kind right, if you're like you don't deserve if you're romantic and sweet, or on the flip side of it, like the other end of the spectrum, if you're pure evil a la cal Hockley from Titanic right right. There are exceptions, but it's like I just moments ago listeners tested negative for COVID, but I have been a part of a COVID movie club consisting of me and my boyfriend. Who else who has COVID? And okay really exclusive? But we watched Pretty Woman for the first time last night. I'd never seen it, and I mean we that's been a request on this show for years. We've just been waiting for the right guess, the right moment. But I just you know, it's so like the Richard gear character, and Pretty Woman also like a very fundamentally evil capitalist, yes, who like makes one good choice, and then you know it's just like so bizarre. It reminds like the Tom Hanks Jeff Bezos character. And you've got male and you're like, we have to be rooting for someone who's like I guess that. The thing with with Cal Hockley is he's despicable, but he's not charming and the whole like it's like if you have less RIZ than the other guy. I mean you could say he's not try.

00:12:09
Speaker 2: I mean Billy Zane is trying, right, Cal, Yeah, you're right, he's cow.

00:12:13
Speaker 1: Is like a phony, and I feel like it reads to people who are not millionaires. Sure, yeah, but it's just like it's a RIZ contest. It doesn't matter what Carry Grant's values are, He's going to have more RIZ than the other guy, because that's like Cary Grant, right, exactly.

00:12:31
Speaker 2: Yeah, Well, in any case, she is engaged to a different man now. Walter is clearly disappointed, but he wants to meet her fiance. Bruce, an insurance salesman.

00:12:49
Speaker 1: Parentheses will be fucked over and arrested forty times because fuck him.

00:12:55
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, I mean insurance is a scam, so.

00:13:01
Speaker 1: It definitely is.

00:13:02
Speaker 2: But I don't feel feel bad.

00:13:04
Speaker 1: I feel like the job is coded as quote unquote boring, not like corrupt, because it's like Carrie Grant is corrupt as hell, Like, yeah, that's why they love each other because they're both. I mean, she's a less corrupt reporter than the rest of them, but that's like grading on a curve exactly.

00:13:21
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, So Walter insists on taking them out to lunch, where he learns that Hildy and Bruce are taking a train later that day to move to Albany Forever.

00:13:33
Speaker 1: Which does, with all due respect to my Albany heads, which does sound really really unpleasant. Yeah, wouldn't be me, That's all I'll say.

00:13:44
Speaker 2: So Walter keeps trying to concoct a scheme to get Hildy to stay, and he's talking about this unfolding news story that he wants her to cover about a man named Earl Williams who shot and killed a and who is about to be hanged for it, but how his life could be saved if the newspaper interviews him and publishes the interview to show that he's not of sound mind, which would get him off the hook because he has been declared sane by a doctor. So if there's like contradicting evidence to support he is not, you know, quote unquote saying, they could save his life. Although there's going to be another psychiatric evaluation of this man Earl Williams right before the hanging, so keep that in mind, everybody. Now, Hildy agrees to take the later train so that she can do this interview with Earl Williams in exchange for Walter buying life insurance from Bruce so that Bruce will get a sizeable commission. And Walter agrees to this, and he also names Hildy his beneficiary for the life insurance policy.

00:15:03
Speaker 1: And we're like, also, he's like topless in the same like he's just like, it's so weird, Like this, okay, we have not renamed it in five years, but this feels like a Boushemi test thing to me, where it's like, if it's not Carrie Grant getting like shirtless doctors examinations in the room with this other guy and like doing all this stuff that is clearly designed to make him feel threatened and uncomfortable, if it's not like the sexiest movie star in the entire world conventionally doing that, it is like more transparently villainous behavior. But if like, because it's Kry Grant, it's easier to sell in the time it comes out like, well, it's kind of funny because it's carry Grant, right.

00:15:44
Speaker 2: And all these dames watching the movie, we're so distracted by.

00:15:47
Speaker 1: His nipplesmaa humana.

00:15:50
Speaker 2: Right, So anyway this is happening. Then there's it's like something something certified check that Bruce has to put in the lining of his hat.

00:16:01
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a lot of YadA YadA with the money moneys. I had to google. I'd googled bravely. I googled some stuff. Whoa not about the money transfers, but about the the nature of like what Earl Williams was listening to in the park. I had to like check what that was.

00:16:19
Speaker 2: Yes, So there's another thing about five hundred dollars in cash, which Hildy and Bruce have, and he gives that to Hildy, right, And it's all because she suspects someone aka Walter and his minions are going to try to like rob Bruce, which does keep happening. Meanwhile, Hildy goes to see Earl Williams at the county jail. The story with him is that he had lost his job, tried to get another one was not able to. He was living on the streets and one night he found himself with a gun in his hands and he shot a cop, claiming it was an accident.

00:17:04
Speaker 1: Which the movie we'll get to goes out of the way to say it was a black cop, yes, which we'll get to, right, yeah.

00:17:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, And so Hildy, while she's interviewing him, is like, oh, well, you heard a speech in the park about production for use. You know how objects have use, and a gun's purpose or use is to be shot, So that's why you shot the gun. And he's like, yeah, exactly, and the girl right, And so Hildy writes up this interview to be published in the Morning Post, which again makes him seem not quite of sound mind, but it's to save his life.

00:17:44
Speaker 1: Yeah, So she's lying for good question mark where she is like basically saying he heard a socialist talk in the park that confused him so much that he shot a cop, right, and that's why he can't be yeah, executed.

00:18:00
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was a.

00:18:01
Speaker 1: Stretch, but you know, the pros from what we heard was pretty compelling, right.

00:18:08
Speaker 2: Okay, So then we also meet a woman named Molly Molloy, a friend of sorts of Earl Williams. There's this group of reporters at the Criminal Court's Office who have been kind of like harassing this woman. They made up a bunch of stories about how she's like desperately in love with Earl in order to sell papers. In reality, she barely knows him, but it's that she like showed him kindness one night, and she's trying to advocate for him to not be executed.

00:18:43
Speaker 1: And which would be impossible unless you were in love with someone.

00:18:48
Speaker 2: Right according to all of these men. Yes, Hildy leaves and meets up with Bruce, who has been arrested for steel a watch. But it seems like he was framed because Walter has a mister Lovejoy type of undertaker of a man servant, if you will, this guy named Louis who frames people for stealing expensive accessories, just like how Cal framed Jack for stealing the heart of the Ocean.

00:19:21
Speaker 1: A wild guy to have on retainer.

00:19:24
Speaker 2: Yes, truly, and so Hildy finds this out and she calls Walter to be like you double crossing, slimy, no good, So and so I never want to see you again, right, And she rips up the story and is about to leave, but just then Earl Williams escapes from the county jail during his final psychiatric evaluation before the hanging, and so there's all this hubbub and a bunch of reporters are trying to break the story of his escape. Hildy chases down a guy named Cooley. I think he's the warden of the jail.

00:20:06
Speaker 1: I think. So it's really honestly hard for me to tell, but it is really fun to watch hilde tackle his ass. That was, like, I just I remember, like the first time I watched it. I don't know, there are certain subversive like I just was not prepared to see a woman in a movie this old be that active, I know, right, and like, but she like takes his ass down.

00:20:31
Speaker 2: Yeah, like linebacker style tackles his ass.

00:20:35
Speaker 1: Yeah, she Travis Kelsey. I don't know what position he plays. Maybe she potentially Travis Kelsey's him. I don't know.

00:20:41
Speaker 2: We don't know, and we're not gonna look at him.

00:20:43
Speaker 1: Not that kind of show. It's not that kind of show.

00:20:45
Speaker 2: No. Anyway, she's trying to get the story about how Earl Williams escapes, and she does, and she relays this story to Walter. She also wants to be reimbursed for the four hundred and fifty dollars she spent bribing, and Walter does pay her back, but with counterfeit money rats and then he frames Bruce and gets him arrested again. He just keeps trying to put Bruce in jail and it's working, but keep in mind the rule of threes.

00:21:18
Speaker 1: It's not brusus last time, and no it's not.

00:21:21
Speaker 2: Then there are some scenes and I think this movie is a bit guilty of getting too caught up in the like logistics and plottiness of this case where it should be I think, focusing more on Hildy and her like skills as a reporter and journalists and stuff.

00:21:41
Speaker 1: I agree with that. I feel like there's a lot of like I mean, and I know that it's relevant to the satire they're trying to get across, which is like very rooted in the time, but yeah, it almost feels like, I don't know, I feel like there's the same with like a lot of classic novels where you're like in the middle of like a really compelling story and then it just switches to like agricultural law for like forty pages. You're just like what you're like That happens in a lot of Fressian novels. You're just like reading about like a marriage that's failing, and then they're like, and here's what that has to do with agrarian law in eighteen forty, And you're like, I'm sorry, that's none of my business. That's not what I'm here for.

00:22:22
Speaker 2: Yeah. So it's right around here in the movie that there are scenes where there's the mayor, I think, the sheriff. I think a bunch of men are talking about a reprieve for Earl. I think this is like a pardon and this guy named Joe Pettybone comes in to deliver the reprieve that would get now Earl off the hook.

00:22:49
Speaker 1: Now this guy is an MVP of the movie. For me, agree, it is unreal how and then I had to like look the actor up and like, was what a thrilling? Like? Looking this actor up really delivers? Did you look him up at all? No?

00:23:03
Speaker 2: I didn't.

00:23:04
Speaker 1: Okay, For first of all, he's Sneezy the dwarf. Whoa. He's like he was in so many Like he was a prolific famous character actor of this time. He was in something I know I had to watch in college, Laureln Hardy's The Music Box. He's the guy who hates Pianos. He was in The Great Dictator this same year, like he was just in a lot of hit movies, and he got his comic timing is so good. He's so funny, and then he comes back and everyone's like, I don't know that. That was my favorite part of seeing this movie in person was that when he comes back at the end spoiler alert. Although it doesn't really make that much of a difference, but he comes back at the end and everyone's like, whoa, because he's so awesome. He's such a good actor.

00:23:52
Speaker 2: Great and Joe Pettibone is a great character name m hm. Anyway, he comes in to deliver this reprieve to the Mayor, but the may who wants Earl Williams to be executed, bribes Joe Pettibone not to actually like hand over this pardon. Then Earl Williams shows up at the Criminal Court's office with a gun. The only other person there at the moment is Hildy, and she's able to get the gun away from him. She offers to help him, and she hides him in a roll top desk and then calls Walter and Bruce to let them know what's going on. Shortly after a bunch of people show up, first Molly Molloy, then all of those crime reporters that we've been seeing throughout the movie, then Bruce's mother, and they're all yelling about where's Earl, where's this guy? Yeah, and the reporters are bullying Molly. So she jumps out of a window to kill herself.

00:24:56
Speaker 1: It's weird. I've seen this like alternatively described as like an attempt to kill herself. I've also seen it as an attempt to escape the situation. Because she's jumping from a window. That isn't far. I don't buy that, but I just wanted to mention that I've repeatedly seen that moment characterized that way. Interesting.

00:25:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I interpret it as she was intending to die by suicide.

00:25:24
Speaker 1: That was my original assumption as well. I don't know where that's coming from. I don't know if that's like something that's noted in the script. I don't know if that's like something from the source material. And I agree with you. I just wanted to mention that I saw it mentioned that way. I don't know what that is rooted in. Exactly interesting.

00:25:42
Speaker 2: Either way, we never see her again. We don't know what happens to her really.

00:25:45
Speaker 1: And the movie does not care, which is too bad because what the fuck?

00:25:49
Speaker 2: Yeah exactly, So this causes a bit of a distraction, and right then Walter shows up with his Mignon Louis, who kidnaps Bruce's mother and takes her away. So now it's just Walter in Hildy and Earl hiding in the desk. Yeah, Hildy wants to leave to get Bruce out of prison so that they can take the train to Albany, but Walter convinces Hildy to stay and help him break this story, which is also about government corruption in the mayor's office or something. These details were a little foggy for me. In any case, it's a once in a lifetime opportunity that would like make her career, so Hildy is convinced. She starts writing the story. Then her fiance Bruce shows up to be like are you coming with me or what? And she's like nah. Turns out I do want to be in the newspaper business. So he's like all right, bye and he leaves a few moments later, after she sees Walter trick and double crossed yet another person to get what he wants. Hildy's like, wait a minute, what have I done? I should be on that train with Bruce. Then she finds out that Bruce's mother was maybe killed in a car accident, and she feels responsible.

00:27:19
Speaker 1: I also feel like the joke of that scene is that she is not upset about her almost mother in law potentially getting hit. She is upset about herself. Yeah, yeah, which iconically selfish character for.

00:27:35
Speaker 2: Sure, and that's who she is as a character. Again, she and Walter deserve each other.

00:27:41
Speaker 1: It's such a myra they But I also still feel like Hildy's get getting a raw into the deal, you know. But whatever that's I'll tell they're dead.

00:27:50
Speaker 2: They're fictional characters. Then a bunch of men storm into the room, possibly the sheriff. I don't I can't keep track of any of these people, the crime reporter. Probably. They're demanding to know what's going on. They suspect that Hildy knows where Earl Williams is and they start manhandling her. So she pulls out the gun that she took from Earl and the sheriff is like, wait a minute, that's my gun that Earl Williams stole. From me, so you must know where he is. And then Bruce's mother shows up. She is not dead. She tells the sheriff that Hildy and Walter are hiding Earl right there in the office. So they find Earl, and Hildy and Walter are arrested.

00:28:35
Speaker 1: Poor Earl has almost suffer suffocated inside of the desk, which I do think is like, really, I don't know, we'll get to like the commentary on journalism in this movie, but like, you know, could there be a clearer slash in like a screwball comedy, way funnier example of how little the actual subject of the story matters to them than the fact that they nearly let him suffocate inside of a desk.

00:28:59
Speaker 2: But yeah, yeah, So in any case, Hildy and Walter are arrested for harboring a murderer. But then that guy Joe Pettybone shows up again.

00:29:13
Speaker 1: And everyone's like, who give him an oscar? He's so good? Oh god, what an amazing and then he kills it again. He steals the whole damn scene once again.

00:29:27
Speaker 2: For sure, because what happens here He has decided to refuse the mayor's bribe.

00:29:33
Speaker 1: Because of something his wife told him to do. Yes. Yeah, missus pettybone feminist only feminist hero in the movie never meet her.

00:29:42
Speaker 2: Absolutely, He's there to deliver this reprieve pardon thing after all, and to not accept the mayor's bribe. So now Hildy and Walter know about this bribery attempt and that the mayor wanted Earl Williams to be because he figured it would get him reelected. That information lets Hildy and Walter off the hook. They are unarrested, and then Walter tries to kind of show Hildy away, saying that she should catch that train and go be with Bruce, and she's like, well, I want to stay and write the story. And so she seems disappointed that Walter doesn't want her there. And then Bruce calls he has been arrested for a third time trying to spend the counterfeit money that they got from Walter, which makes Hildy realize that Walter does love her. He was trying to get Bruce arrested so many times because Walter's trying to actually win her back.

00:30:47
Speaker 1: This is so confusing because I was like, read, they're so messy, Like it's confused because There are analyzes of this movie, and this is how I read it the first time I saw it, that somehow Hildy has been playing this game of like forty D Chess to yield this result. But there's too many There's too many X factors, like how could she count on the story of her career falling into her lap at this exact moment, Like I don't. I feel like it maybe is somewhere in between or more likely the writers were thinking about her motivations very hard, but like how she first of all evil of her to be like I am willing if it is her intention to almost get married to someone else, to have Walter wake up and ask for her back, which it seems like she there is some desire that she wants that to happen, but she wants it to come from her. She doesn't want to be the one to come back to him, so she has to orchestrate this. But I was like she in order to accomplish that, she would have to be willing to ruin Bruce's life, which she is. We know she is, yes RP. Bruce rotting in jail for no reason. But and so even if that's her plan, like it doesn't quite come together as like this is a you know, I don't know, and then he is I think he is very conniving in all of the beats of what he does. Manipulative stuff actually does track a little cleaner than to me. Then what Hildy would have to do to oh for sure?

00:32:19
Speaker 3: But she I don't know. I don't know. I don't quite understand what her plan is because what if he had, like, wasn't at work that day, like, what would she do?

00:32:31
Speaker 2: I don't think. My read is that Hildy never has a like, she has not premeditated trying to get back together with Okay Walter, that she just gets duped the way that he dupes everybody. I mean, I read it as she was about to embark on a life that she probably didn't actually want, but had convinced herself that maybe I do want this, and then by being batter in the newspaper business, she realizes, oh, I could not actually leave this line of work in this lifestyle.

00:33:07
Speaker 1: Which would be an interesting story if it wasn't orchestrated by her conniving ex husband, right, but it's not. It's so weird. It's such a weird movie. See, I guess I always put like a little more. Maybe it's because I've conniving like tried to get Ment to say things to me via a series of tricks in the past. I'm willing to admit that it's true. It often doesn't worry, usually doesn't work, but if it works once or twice, it's like it's addictive. But I guess I sort of that because and again, this might just be like the movie that feels like a movie of it all, But the fact that she goes in person to me says that she wants some reaction out of him, that she wants to witness, because this could all be handled over the phone, but it isn't. And the fact that she brings Bruce with her like means that she wants him to bear witness to some dynamic as well. Like I don't think what she's doing is healthy or like commendable, but I do feel like she like wants some sort of cathartic release from having shown up. Like, I think you're totally right that I was giving an over you know, like planning on her part to say that she would expect the rest to happen, that she would expect the day to end with her her fiance in jail and her re betrothed to her ex husband. But it did feel like she went there for some sort of catharsis. And I'm not saying that critically because again I don't know this stuff with Bruce that's like beyond the pale. That's fucked up to bring someone who, for all intents and purposes, as far as we can tell, worst crime is being boring and just like wave him around and sort of open him up to all of this like ridicule and abuse for no reason. But I do feel like her showing up with him something's afoot.

00:35:00
Speaker 2: I think she has intentions that are maybe subconscious and sure, but I don't think she's actively necessary. I think it's more of a passive, subconscious thing that she's going for.

00:35:15
Speaker 1: I think she's I think she's brat summer.

00:35:19
Speaker 2: Well, let's take a break to discuss. So the movie ends with Hildy realizing that Walter was getting her fiance Bruce arrested all these times because he was actually trying to win her back, and he actually does love her, and this is his way of showing that he loves her. Yeah, yeah, He's like, you're right, let's get married again. This time we will go on a honeymoon to Albany. And she's like, sounds great, okay, bye.

00:35:48
Speaker 1: And then the movie's over so wild that the whole time all she really wanted was to go to Albany. It's anyways, Yes, let's take a break, say, and we'll be back in a moment. You hear h.

00:36:11
Speaker 2: And we're back.

00:36:12
Speaker 1: You hear you see you see. Gosh, this movie is so weird and fun to talk about. I would like to start, with your permission, with what I think this movie is successful at. Okay, on a story basis. What I think this movie is very successful at, and sometimes at the expense of certain characters or certain story logic, is the satire of both politics and journalism of this time. But I also think it's very applicable to current day politicians and journalists, kind of an evergreen thing to be like, the media and the politicians are corrupt, yes, and that like occasionally justice can be achieved, but usually it's a mistake or just happens to work in one or the other's interest. I feel like that point is illustrated very clearly in this movie, where there's no point in the movie we're weird because I do think that there's a lot of movies later on, I know, if we get into like All the President's Men and stuff like that, that present journalism as wholesale, a noble profession that people don't fuck up, you know, that cannot be bought, you know, all of this stuff where you know, journalism at its core, of course, is a noble endeavor, but it is very often not performed that way.

00:37:37
Speaker 2: Because it's carried out by humans, and hungman's are often not on their best behavior.

00:37:46
Speaker 1: Well and even more so there there's a number, I mean, there's two super famous movies in this one year span, like This and Citizen Kane address the you know, not exactly yellow journalism, well, I mean Citizen Kane does, but you know, flawed get the story versus get the truth style journalism that was very prevalent in the late eighteen hundreds, and then there was another huge bout of yellow journalism in the twenties and thirties, which I think it's more likely these movies pulling from with you know, how much of the Spanish American War was fueled by bad reporting, and that bad reporting was fueled by making sales and competition and all this stuff that we still hear about today because this is what happens in capitalist societies, and the you know, fallout is normal people, which in this movie is illustrated through Earl Williams, and that portrayal is also flawed, but I feel like that comes across very clearly where our romantic heroes are journalists, and so we side with the journalists more than the politicians because we know them better, they're hotter, we like them, for sure. But I appreciate about this movie that it doesn't, at least for me, it doesn't really ever make any bones about the fact that what they're doing is not true or like ideal. Like they are kind of two con artists that are very fun to watch and deserve each other because you know they're both lying and in different ways. And that's interesting where it seems like, you know, Hildy generally is lying in favor or at least in the case of this story, is lying in the hopes of achieving justice in a roundabout way. But still it's not. No one in this movie is doing good or like laudable reporting. They're all lying, they're all making shit up, and I feel like it's yeah, it's like a direct commentary on the state of media at this time. Also because this movie comes out at the very beginning of World War Two, so of course people are thinking a lot about media accuracy of a war that's taking place overseas. And I don't know, I think that it works. And the politicians are equally corrupt, and they try to, you know, buy off our king and it doesn't work. And by our King, I, of course do mean Joe petty Bone. I do not mean Carry Grant. I mean Joe petty Bone, the hero of the movie. Yes, you should have been on the poster, but yeah, I mean I on that level it works for me. But on a feminist level, it very clearly doesn't.

00:40:37
Speaker 2: It sure doesn't. And I've got a lot to say about it, starting with a little bit of context, which is that this movie was adapted from a play called The Front Page from nineteen twenty eight that was written by Ben Hect and Charles MacArthur, which was also adapted into a nineteen thirty one film of the same name, The Front Page. Those versions of the story have it so the person who had quit their reporting job and who the Carry Grant character, tries to recruit back into the newspaper business is a man his girl. Friday gender swaps it so that the reporter is a woman and the ex wife of, you know, the editor in chief of the newspaper. So this was a pretty significant change that critics loved, audiences loved, Like this movie was a success, and so it's interesting that this story introduced a woman into the picture and it was well received. But by doing so and writing this character in the way that she's written, leads to some problems.

00:42:03
Speaker 1: Yes, right, because like it sounds like an interesting choice on it's I mean, it's weird. It's like a lot of quote unquote gender swapped reboots of stuffing where it's like, I see what you're going for, but it doesn't quite come together.

00:42:19
Speaker 2: Doesn't because what happens is she has convinced herself that she no longer wants to be a reporter. She doesn't want to work for her ex husband anymore. She has found another man as a romantic partner, and she's going to go off and live a different type of life. So there's all these moments in the movie where people are discussing Hildy quitting the newspaper game because she wants to be a quote unquote woman, meaning she wants a traditional domestic life. She wants to you know, make a home, have babies, have like a far more traditional gender woman's life, especially for this era, right.

00:43:03
Speaker 1: Which seems to be like consistent with how Howard Hawks talks about women in all of his movies, that like the concept of woman is a job, which is like.

00:43:16
Speaker 2: Huh, okay, yeah, I mean, I think it's interesting that the movie is acknowledging this like traditional gender role of what a woman is expected to do and how for a while and then again later on or you know, throughout the movie. She is subverting this expectation because in the backstory she was a skilled reporter. This is how she met Carrie Grant's character. They get married, the marriage doesn't work out, and she decides, Okay, I'm gonna find a more stable slash traditional situation for myself. But she gets kind of seduced by being a newspaper man and falls back into it. And we're led to believe, based on how the story ends, that she is getting back together with Walter and that she will continue to be a reporter for him. Right, So you have this story now that seems like at first, it seems like it's being set up so that like a woman is prioritizing her career over a relationship with a man, which, as we've always discussed, like, isn't inherently feminist, Like feminism is all about choosing what you want for yourself and.

00:44:37
Speaker 1: Right, it's all which is really muddled at this movie because we don't it seems as if based on even like the first conversation she has with Walter, which for all of its flaws, I love to watch. I have no idea how you block and act a scene like this. It's like how the fun Like, yeah, I guess I'll just say it. Like the performances in this movie are just so estere to me, where I just like don't understand how they were physically possible. Right, But in that whole first scene, like you kind of understand why they got together. You definitely understand why they broke up, and it seemed at least that in their marriage, like Hildy wanted both but was not right. And you know, in the very in the way that you know you're led to believe it. You know, long after this movie comes out, it's you know, it's almost a radical choice that this movie presents that you could have one or the other. Usually, you know, and in movies that come out ten years later. And I don't know if it's because this is like a wartime movie, that it's like a more palatable concept for a woman to be a working professional, and the fact that I'm sure that it makes it seem like it's more palatable for her to be a working professional because she's married to someone who's doing the same thing, which you see a lot, But it seems like she's always wanted both and is being forced to pick one or the other and felt diminishing returns with her career because of how her husband treated her and also her opinions on how dirty a lot of the journalism was, and so she's choosing quote unquote the other thing, which is not fair but probably reflective of the time. But it just seems like she, you know, she dumped him because of his inflexibility to have both with her, which is a great reason to get divorced.

00:46:29
Speaker 2: True And again, if what she in her heart of hearts once is to be with Bruce and to it seems like she would be. She's describing her future life as though she will be a homemaker and if you know, again, if that's what she wants, great, But there's this component of this movie where you have all these men being like, that's not what you actually want. You're a newspaper mayan. Just accept it. And so there's this idea of like, oh, a woman doesn't actually know what she wants and men are telling her what she does want, and they turn out to be right, and it turns out that she was tricking herself. And this is something that women are so often accused of and assumed to not know what women want with their romantic or personal life, what women want with their career, with their own bodies, like yeah, and so that was very frustrating that all of these men who kept telling her like, you're never gonna succeed in that lifestyle of like a domestic homemaker, you're in the newspaper business. Just accept it.

00:47:41
Speaker 1: And the ending is left fairly ambiguous as to what I meant. And I would guess, based on what we know abou him that Walter probably hasn't moved on that, and that will be an unfortunate argument taking place in front of Niagara Falls. But yeah, like I one of the first things I wrote down, you know, like why this movie critically, it is like all of the internal logic of their relationship is based on no means yes, And her coming to you know, for the divorce is actually like a test and her you know and like taking in you know, human weirdness and blah blah blah. But like, yeah, the logic of the relationship depends on when she says I don't want to be a reporter, I don't want to be married to you, that she actually means try and change my mind, and you know, like and keep trying. And I mean she mentions repeated like and it's like alluded to that he's heavily stalking her. He's calling her NonStop or something. She is like actively shielding her present life because he doesn't know Bruce exists, you know, and it's like she's built this whole life without him, and so you know, on its face, it's just like he's again and if you BOUSHEMI test it, It's like he's stalking her. He is not respecting her boundaries. He is assuming his conception of her is more accurate than what she is telling him to his face, like it's just the whole relationship depends on him hearing no and assuming yes, and then the fact that the logic of that ends up to be basically correct is very clearly demonstrated that this movie was men top to bottom because it's like a fantasy. I feel like it's like a you know, sort of a traditionally masculine fantasy that no means yes and that your wife who divorces you secretly wants to, you know, like test you and doesn't actually you know, blah blah blah blah, and wants to do exactly what you want her to do. And the fact that this story ends, which you know, I know is accurate to the time most likely, but that you know, this still ends with she's his girlfrida. She is his employee, his girl, Yeah, his girl, but like that's like his go to reporter. She's his employee still, and so it's just like she is. I don't understand other than a re affirmation that I'm sure he's lied about the thing is like, I don't know. I just feel for Hildy, even though she is quite evil and like Bruce just catches so many strays. That is, I feel for Bruce big time. I'm like, buddy, buddy, he'll be fine or not. Maye where he's in jail forever. Uh.

00:50:22
Speaker 2: He seems to get out and go off to Albany's movie.

00:50:26
Speaker 1: Gel, but like, I don't know, It's just I feel like he's duped her yet again. I mean, he has duped her yet again. And I don't think that we have any reason to believe that Walter wouldn't just say anything he needed to to get what he wanted, which is to get Hildy back. I don't believe that he's like and yes, I am fully supportive of you being a mother and a journalist, Like I just I just don't see it.

00:50:52
Speaker 2: You know, it would be one thing if over the course of this movie he realizes he needed to be more flexible and less horrible as a person and more respectful of her wishes and boundaries and stuff like that. But he doesn't learn anything, and instead we just you know, see him manipulating and exploiting and deceiving people. He makes sexist remarks, he makes xenophobic, anti immigrant remarks, He threatens a woman with violence on the phone, He makes ablest remarks. You know, it's just the list goes on for all of the horrible things.

00:51:29
Speaker 1: Do I expect more from a nineteen forty movie. No, However, I mean it's it's just so tricky too, because it's like, I don't think that we're supposed to believe that these are morally upstanding people, but because they're played by the most charismatic movie stars of the day, you're still like kind of permissive.

00:51:47
Speaker 2: You're rooting for You're meant to root for.

00:51:49
Speaker 1: Them exactly exactly, and you know that's a complicate especially when it's a movie for adults. It's like, yeah, you can root for someone who kind of sucks because you know your brain is fully developed you can handle it. But but it is, you know, it is telling that it's like you're told visually with time, with who's cast with all this stuff, who is more worthy of being rooted for when it's just like Bruce for sweep Beruce. This this brings me to the idea of the hawksy and Woman, which I'm pretty sure we did not discuss in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, although.

00:52:23
Speaker 2: That was eighty four years ago, so we don't.

00:52:26
Speaker 1: It's true a movie I remember quite liking. I haven't seen it in a while. Uh, and one that I definitely feel like falls in under the category of Howard hawks being like their job is woman because they're like almost women in like a I don't know, they're just they talk to each other like, I mean, like friends, but also like weirdly like they're doing a job and the job is a woman. We're right.

00:52:49
Speaker 2: Were they dancers? I don't remember that movie at all. I remember them being on like a cruise ship at one point, but yeah, I could not say anything else about it.

00:52:57
Speaker 1: That's okay, let me pull up. So there was a great piece I read in Little White Lies Rip. I believe that sort of unpacks this trope and why it can be very frustrating for you know, feminists who watches movies and feel like oh oh oh, because it's like for nineteen forty Hilty does feel pretty remarkable in terms of what you get. On the surface. She is very active. She's like nagging the hell out of any man she comes into contact with. She very often gets the upper hand. She's an active reporter. She tackles someone like stuff that you're not used to seeing, or it is stuff that at least that I wouldn't expect in a movie from nineteen forty where you know, and into the fifties and on and on, where it's like you sort of expect a degree of traditional wives and mothers, passivity and hysteria quote unquote that you don't get with Hilthy and I feel like it's almost like you're You're like, oh, then she must be a feminist character. How Yeah. This is a great piece by Sarah Cleary called who is the Hawxyan Woman. I'd like to share a couple passages from it. That also explains where this term came from, because the term of the hoxy and woman didn't exist until nineteen seventy one. So from this piece. Film critic Naomi Wise, who coined the term Hoxyan woman in nineteen seventy one, argued that in Hawks' cinema, quote, good girl and bad girl are fused into a single heroic heroine unquote. This assertion is certainly true of Bonnie, a different movie, whose worldliness and irreverence might have easily marked her as a fallen woman. In another film of the nineteen thirties, upon her arrival in fog shrouded Baranka, she isn't at all scandalized by the sexy dancing she happens upon in the down and Dirty saloon. Instead, she sings along with the band and shoots the dancers a cheeky aok hand gesture. Despite the customary mid Atlantic accent, She's assault of the earth girl from Brooklyn, moving on in the piece a little bit. It's endings like this talking about the ending of His Girl Friday, which usually put the kebash on reading Hawks's heroines as feminist figures, tempting as those readings may be. Quote, it's been said like there's a new women's lib unquote, Hawks told a German documentary crew in nineteen seventy seven. But they don't talk as much as the people today do. Despite this characterization, Hawks's leading ladies are usually rather for both articulate and witty, none more so as Rosalind Russell and His Girl Friday. His Girl Friday is frustrating when viewed from a feminist's perspective, in that it comes tantalizingly close to being a feminist work. Russell caughts a thoroughly modern silhouette, and one gets the sense that Hawks sincerely believes that she's a tough nut who belongs in a tough business. She ought to be there. He does, not, however, trust her to make her own decisions. She continually asserts and reasserts that she wants to quit journalism to settle down with her new dul fiance, Bruce, but Walter wants her back in his newsroom. Not to mention his marital bed. Grant plays Walter so irresistibly, and his chemistry with Russell is so sparky that one hardly notices quite how cruel his manipulation of Hilty really is. Moreover, we want to see Hildy' scuffle and snoop her way to a big story. If we squint, it almost looks like emancipation. The piece goes on, I would I would recommend checking it out. But what the Hoxy and woman kind of boils down to that really reminded me of many movies we've covered that feel like kind of a feminist bait and switch over the years, is that Hoxy and women are generally guys girls. Which is Hilty to a tea you know she's to some you know she is She's a woman who is successful in a world of men. She can hang with the guys, She can walk into the room of like crooked journalists and say like the boy, and she is accepted. She is respected in this world, which is what is remarkable about her in the opinion of the writer and the director, But there's no follow through on like what is she like with other women? We get very little and we get again more than zero, which was surprising to me, but like it's just very like proto guy's girl stuff. And at the end she is still at the you know, operating at the whims of a man in a patriarchal system, whether she realizes that or not. So it's like the illusion of feminism. It gets so like I totally get because when I got when I walked away from this movie, I was like, was that And then when you see the end, you're like, oh, never mind, uh right.

00:57:38
Speaker 2: No, But I totally agree that if you're watching this maybe only kind of half paying attention, or if you don't know that much about feminism modern feminism, you'd be like, wow, again, a movie about a woman who prioritizes her career that she's really good at over a relationship with a boring man whooh feminism, but because she ends up with a different man who is way worse of a person and who manipulates her and everyone around him. And again it's like this idea of like, well, you know, women actually can't have it all. So feminism looks like women in career, not women as a homemaker or like woman doing domestic things, and that is not what feminism is. Again, it's all about choice, and it's all about choosing what works best for you. But I understand why you'd have the notion of, oh, well, choosing career over domestic things, Well, that's feminist because women were expected to take on this role of traditional domestic homemaker, and so choosing career, which is the opposite of what women were traditionally expected to do under the patriarchy, well that must be feminist. And that is not the case. But that is sort of the logic, right, I think this movie is operating under.

00:59:08
Speaker 1: Totally like it's like and I understand, like, particularly if you're a viewer of the time, why if you would if you reactionally would be like this is way more than I'm used to, Like, sure, she gets to talk, but I mean, you know, also movies of this day, it's weird, like how World War two movies and movies of the forties like women generally do tend to have more agency when like Katherine Hepburn is at her peak of fame and all of this stuff, and then there is like a pretty severe pullback of that in the fifties as women's roles changed. So this kind of is the most you know, agency you might see a woman with in a big movie for some time in the early forties. There's movies that are you know, still all made by men, but you do have like more you know, women that have there's a dual protagon. I would still argue that Hildy is the protagonist of this movie. She gets more screen time than Carry Grant. I would argue, like, so, yeah, and she is driving the narrative more. You know, he is doing his Greu shit. He's very gru code, he's doing evil stuff. Grew interesting, nicer to his wife than Carrie Grant is in this movie. Interesting. He does have a Kevin yes, But yeah, that, like, she you know, is driving the narrative. She has a job, she's good at it, she's respected for it, she's desired professionally, not just as a but all of that is undercut by the fact that like that, you know, this movie does not suggest any radical ideas in terms of like a woman can have quote unquote at all. It just doesn't. But I still think for nineteen forty it's it's doing. It's doing a lot. I didn't think it was going to do. Agree, But it's not a feminist movie. Sorry, folks, no, it's not.

01:00:57
Speaker 2: In my research about this movie because again, when Howard Hawks got his hands on this play slash screenplay and was like casting the movie, he originally intended for it to be a pretty faithful adaptation to the original source material as far as like having both the interesting editor in chief and the reporter be both men. But when he was doing auditions, Howard Hawks had his assistant, who was a woman, read the reporter's lines in the auditions, and he was like, wait a minute, I like the sound of this. I like that it's you know, a woman with those interesting these lines. And so it was rewritten for the reporter to be a woman, and then they made the changes that the backstory was that they were formerly married now divorced, and which is.

01:01:55
Speaker 1: Also like, oh, you know, there's no other way to get a woman into the story than his wife and him to some extent.

01:02:02
Speaker 2: Right, So that's a little bit more of the context. A little bit more is that in his comedies, Howard Hawks would often let his actors improv some of their lines. So this ability to improv allowed Rosalind Russell to basically she hired a ghost writer to punch up some of her dialogue because she felt that she didn't have nearly as many like good lines or little quips or whatever as Carrie Grant was given, because the screenwriters were like, well, women are boring. The man should get all the good lines.

01:02:42
Speaker 1: And I didn't know this, This is so cool.

01:02:44
Speaker 2: Yes, She talks about this in her autobiography entitled Life is a Banquet. So she was upset that she wasn't given as good of dialogue as the man. So she hired a ghostwriter to punch up her lines. And because they were allowed to improve a little bit, she would not really improv because they had been pre written for her, but she would slip in these lines. And the only person who knew this was Carrie Grant, and so he would like go to her on set every day to be like, what have you got today? Meaning like, what did the ghostwriter write for you for this scene?

01:03:17
Speaker 1: Oh? So, and so he was like supportive of it and seem like he did.

01:03:21
Speaker 2: He didn't seem to like nark on her at least.

01:03:24
Speaker 1: That's so that's lovely mm hmm.

01:03:28
Speaker 2: I mean sucks that she was not written to have better lines in the original script, but cool that she had the freedom to kind of and the instinct to have better lines written for her.

01:03:39
Speaker 1: That's fascinating. I wonder how common a practice that would have been. I mean that that makes a lot of sense because you have so few women working as screenwriter. I mean it speaks to completely to how much diversity behind the scenes makes a difference that for the fact that she had to out of pocket, I'm assuming hire a ghost writer to write her better lines. I mean money well spent ultimately shouldn't have been money she had to spend. But like she I feel like, you know, Carrie Grant, his character is evil and if you can accept that, I think his performance is really really funny, like there's like so many expressions or like Deliverered, I mean, they're just both so good. The only person that is better than them at any moment is Billy Gilbert Joe Petty Bone, who just drowns them all and kills them yeah, but I mean that's that's fascinating. And Rosalind Russell is in another movie that we've been threatening to cover for years that came out the year before The Women. She's one of the women. Wow, that's fascinating. Yeah, we have a couple other women in this movie, which again was brave of the filmmakers. But now knowing that, that's fascinating because you can tell that the rest of the women in this movie are reading the dialogue is written, not a criticism of them. No one should have to hire another writer to write their lines better. But the other three characters you have are I think the most prominent is Molly molloy. You have Bruce's his mom, and you have a character who appears very briefly named Evangeline I believe, who is one of Walter's minions who he sends her again. She's hanging out with the with Kevin's. It seems like they're both minions on retainer for various illegal hijinks Walter wants to pull.

01:05:40
Speaker 2: Louis is the Kevin le Mignon. I think this other this woman the not to reduce a woman to her hair color, but that's what everyone else in the movie does. But these she's blonde woman.

01:05:50
Speaker 1: Yeah, hawks also has a whole thing about blondes.

01:05:55
Speaker 2: I mean, gentlemen prefer them. Obviously, it's been said she is I guess she's the Stewart or the Bob of the group of the uncle. Yeah, and she I mean, I guess I mean she is deployed in a gendered way, right, because she is sent to seduce Bruce, seduce Bruce.

01:06:14
Speaker 1: Bruce, Yeah, to get him arrested a second time, basically like and I guess Hildy knows that this is a part of Walter's minion playbook. Who knows if she has also, you know, used It's unclear that because we only see Hilldy returning to reporting, and we don't see what she was like before, it's unclear how on board she is with this stuff. I'm assuming, mih that's the feeling I was gonna. Yeah, I still wouldn't say she's an ethical reporter because the only reports we sear writing are fake, but at least you know there is moral intent behind them than a lot of the men she works with. But yeah, we are given a name for this character. Carrie Grant kind of mumbles it, so I had to look it up, but her name is Evangeline. But then she's just referred to as that blonde lady that is paid to seduce people. So they go to jail question Mark, So not much going on there. I would say Bruce's mom's character is treated in a pretty ageist and gendered way. You know, she's the hysterical mother even though she's right. Obviously she's like which I mean it is? Is it pity women against women? Yes, but Hildy is being despicable to her son. Why would she side with Hildy in this situation? She's just like, you are a little brat, and she's like me, and then she gets kidnapped. She's like, well, it's brat's summer, so what do you expect nineteen forty brat summer.

01:07:46
Speaker 2: I would also argue that the way Molly Molloy jumps out of a window is leaning into like women be hysterical.

01:07:54
Speaker 1: Tropes, and that matches any read I think whether it is being characterized as an attempt on her own life or if it's being like as like a hysterical attempt at escape, either way it leans into tropes around women. And again I think that like Molly Malloy's character works with the satirical bend to this story where she you know her and earl her in a more gendered way, which I feel like is at least an attempt or maybe accidental commentary on how women are treated in reporting of like, oh, she's a woman who he knew, so of course we're going to make up that there was like this whole affair and they're in love and blah blah blah, and then they lie to her and say, well, that's what Earle said when it's clear that that's not true. Like and so she is. I can appreciate her character where she is just beside herself that there is no she cannot get anyone to take her seriously. She is very much like upon in this narrative, a narrative that she's on board with because she doesn't want Earle to be killed, but you know, like no one is listening to her, and the closest she can get to anyone listening to her is when Hilty takes her aside and takes her out of the room and sort of extracts her from this really traumatic, upsetting situation she's in. But even Hildy doesn't really do much to know. I think she like calms her down, but doesn't do anything to meaningfully alter that narrative. And we know because of how you know like she what we know about Hildy. The one thing I'll say for her is that she she doesn't reproduce the sexist here's a woman, Earle knew, they're in love, they have a loved as blah blah blah. She does more accurately characterize Molly as someone who just really cares about him and would be very upset if he was killed by the government, which which is more true. And that is like the I think, the most sort of noble thing that Hildy does in the course of the movie. But Hildy is still despicable in that, Like her reporting is less bad than everyone else's, it's more empathetic than everyone else's, but she still leaves this guy to die in a desk, you know, after it makes sense too, Like there's a part of like, at least I like there there's a hyjinx portion where no one can know Earls in the room because he'll be arrested and then he'll be killed. Okay, fine, he has to stay in the desk for that portion, but they also leave him in the drawer while they're just having a conversation about how she's going to win an award for writing this, and while they're like hashing out their relationship, like he is suffocating. So I don't know. But with Molly, she's I don't know. Molly's just underwritten and under thought. Yeah. I feel for her character because and I think that like she is presented as a character who is worthy of consideration, but like the writing just isn't there and it falls into tropes around hysteria, and then ultimately the plot does not care what happens to her after this late And part of the reason that we don't know what her motivation narratively is for jumping out of the window is because we never hear about her again, right, yes, because I think that all they say is like, oh, we think she's going to make.

01:11:23
Speaker 2: It, Oh she moved, she wasn't killed, and yeah, we don't know. We don't know if she survives or not. I do like the monologue she gives to that group of crime reporters where she's like, oh, you wouldn't give me the time of day or listen to me until it's like serving you and your story. Now you're listening to me, that's some bullshit hypocrisy, and that's really cool. But then again, two seconds later she jumps out of a window and we never see her again.

01:11:50
Speaker 1: So it's all very mellow, dramatic like the way it plays at even though I yeah, I agree like that what she's saying makes a lot of sense, and I feel like, unfortunately, is still very applicable to true crime reporting that you see today, which just is so largely base and scary, with like the lack of consideration it gives to anybody dead or alive. So it's definitely like relevant commentary. But again it's like, because it's like written and orchestrated by men, it just seems like they can't help themselves. They as far as Earl himself goes, I don't know. I feel like there are some tropes around the working class in general at play, because the two working class characters, or I guess the three working class characters we get to know are Molly Molloy, who is treated I think unkindly in a more gendered way, and then with Earle and our boy Joe petty Bone, they're just made out to be. They are made out to be sympathetic, we're not rooting against them, but they're also not made out to be very smart correct, and are just being actively manipulated by politicians and journalists. And I guess what I can say is that both of those characters do seem aware that that's happening, because Joe Pettybone comes back and is like, wait, no, fuck you, you know I will I will not be bought.

01:13:13
Speaker 2: But he is presented as being like quite doofy.

01:13:17
Speaker 1: Exactly exactly I mean, And that's this actor's bread and butter. And I do feel like the two working classmen that we get to know are presented to be pretty malleable and like easily manipulated and unintelligent, which is just never a trope I like to see. It is I think an attempt at commentary, but it certainly like rubbed me very much the wrong way. The way that it's The plot goes out of its way to say that Earl, like we are led to believe that Earl, you know, did shoot someone by mistake, but they go out of their way to say that it was a cop who's a person of color. I think we're led to believe a black cop.

01:13:56
Speaker 2: Yeah, the language they use, which is you know, very outdated, but it's specific to black people, so.

01:14:03
Speaker 1: Right, And so they they mentioned that, and then the attempt at commentary that follows is that politicians will want to hang Earl whether he's guilty or not because they value the black vote, which I don't know. I see what they're going for, but it just is like, not, it's not well done at all, especially because there are no movie where no black people.

01:14:28
Speaker 2: Black characters having any perspective on the matter whatsoever. Every single actor and character we see is a white.

01:14:35
Speaker 1: Person, so right. So it's like, you know, bringing race into the conversation at all when there's not going to be any attempt which I don't know, this is Hayes code era, but it's still just like if if you are unable or unwilling to cast any people of color in your movie, that doesn't need to be there. I don't know. It just felt like a throwaway attempt to commentary that didn't sit very well with me.

01:15:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, very of the era, Yeah, dud, do you have anything else you wanted to talk about?

01:15:09
Speaker 1: I don't think so.

01:15:13
Speaker 2: Yeah.

01:15:14
Speaker 1: Ultimately, I feel like the real tricky thing for me with this movie is making Hildy's career that she does seem to love inextricable with this marriage that she's being coerced into re entering. Just makes this, you know, at least from an analytical point, I still think it's a blast to watch. I'll watch it again. It's a movie to watch with soup, I think. But yeah, as a feminist work, it just making those two things inextricable from each other. It just, you know, it's unfortunate because I think it is preventable.

01:15:55
Speaker 2: I think there could be a modern retelling of this that using a lot of the same kind of foundational story beats, could be a feminist text, but this was nineteen forty, so it was never really gonna happen that way.

01:16:11
Speaker 1: Yeah, but I do. I mean, it's like I also just like I'm a sucker for a movie about girl reporters, girls spies, blah blah blah, Like I'd love it all. I'm a sucker for it. And it's a bummer when I mean, I guess, you know, going into nineteen a movie made at this time, you don't really expect a feminist masterpiece, but it's this movie feels like it's teasing you with the fact that, with some adjustment, it could have been way closer. Yeah.

01:16:40
Speaker 2: Yeah, and for all we know, it might have been considered a feminist masterpiece in nineteen forty.

01:16:45
Speaker 1: For the time it might have been, because I mean, yeah, hard to.

01:16:49
Speaker 2: Say, we're way too young, we would We don't know if we were.

01:16:53
Speaker 1: We weren't alive in nineteen forty.

01:16:55
Speaker 2: Yeah. So this movie, as we've already hinted at, does pass the Bechdel test.

01:17:03
Speaker 1: Kind of very fleetingly, but in a way that does feel plot relevant because it's between Hildy and Molly, and those those are consequential interactions, but they're brief.

01:17:13
Speaker 2: Right, And then when Hildy speaks to her mother in law, Missus Bruce whatever, Missus Baldwin, I think it's always about Bruce. So yeah, that's never gonna work.

01:17:26
Speaker 1: I agree.

01:17:27
Speaker 2: As far as our nipple scale, where we rate the movie zero to five nipples based on examining the movie through an intersectional feminist lens, I'll give it like a one point five, maybe a two, because of what it seemed to be attempting to do. As far as like, look, a woman can have a career but it's presented as though she doesn't actually know what she wants, and it takes a bunch of men to convince her what she wants, because a woman can't be trusted to know what she desires for herself and her life. Oh and the fact that as I was watching this and seeing all of the horrible things that Walter the carry Grant character does and says repeatedly in every single scene he's in, I was like, if she ends up with him, I'm gonna be so pissed, even though I knew that was bound to happen. And then she does, and I was so pissed.

01:18:29
Speaker 1: But by the end, I'm not even convinced that she deserves better. Now, that's not something she does deserve better, But it's like she does so many garbage things. I don't know. I don't know. It's the way she treats Bruce, not me being team Bruce, but like unforgivable. The crime of being boring does should not lead you in jail three times in a day.

01:18:48
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you know, left by the person who was supposed to marry you tomorrow and all his money is gone and his money's gone.

01:18:56
Speaker 1: The crime of being boring, unreal.

01:18:58
Speaker 2: The other thing I have to say about this movie is so Howard Hawks was. He was very interested in like overlapping dialogue. He thought it resembled the way people actually speak more realistically, which is true. Yeah, but he was determined to break the record for fastest film dialogue, which was a thing I guess, the Olympics of film dialogue. He wanted to get the gold medal. And I am reminded of a quote from one of my favorite movies which I just rewatched last night, Jurassic Park. And here's what I'll say. The director was so preoccupied with whether or not he could he didn't stop to think if he should trying to break this record for fast It gave me such a I had such a headache after watching this. I didn't know what anyone was saying. I couldn't parse out anything, so headache inducing.

01:19:56
Speaker 1: Different strokes Baby at think air Rocks bring it back.

01:20:01
Speaker 2: I don't mind like quippy, fast back and forth dialogue, but there are some scenes where ten people are talking all at once, and I just I was like, to what end? I can't I don't know what any of you say.

01:20:14
Speaker 1: Making Jamie smile, Marylyn frown. Wow. Another classic episode of the Basketball Cast.

01:20:21
Speaker 2: So true anyway, I'll give it one and a half nipples. I think it seemed feminist ish for the time, for nineteen forty, but obviously nearly one hundred years later doesn't really cut the mustard. Is that an expression?

01:20:40
Speaker 1: I think it's an old timey It sounds like an old timey expression.

01:20:43
Speaker 2: Appropriate. And I'll give one nipple to Rosalind Russell, and I'll give my half nipple to Joe pettibone.

01:20:55
Speaker 1: King of him, King Joe Pettybone. I'm going to get I'm going to do this, but done the middle. I'm gonna give this two and a half nipples. I think that, you know, taking into consideration the time, the two and a half nipples are cleanly cut off by the fact that really the whole of this character's false, like Hildy's false liberation is you know, her being kind of pulled back in by this manipulative x husband and predatory system. However, for the time, I think you're seeing so much of you know, like women's agency and capability that wasn't considered kind of verboten in a lot of earlier movies. There's no time in this movie, which I feel like also in any sort of I mean, this is a rom com, but it's also a crime movie, which is interesting. But we don't see Hildy ever damseled in any way. We see her actively moving the story forward. She's really good at her job. I mean, even though a lot of this is surface level, I think for the time the surface level is pretty subversive, and I like that Rosalind Russell. I hate that she had to resort to having to pay someone under the table to give her good lines, but I love that her performance, I mean, almost against the wishes of the creatives. She steals the show except when Joe Pettibone is in the room, and then she loses those scenes. But she, for me, like steals every scene. She's in such an amazing performance. I love movies about women journalists, so kind of a sucker for this stuff plenty to be desired. You couldn't call it a feminist movie, but I do think that it's subversive, and I want to give it some credit for I think really effective and unfortunately still relevant commentary around how politics and media are inextricably linked in a way that makes it impossible to get justice on fair terms. So I'm going to give it two and a half nibbles. I'm going to give one to Rosalind Russell. I'm going to give one to Slim Keith, who Howard Hawks was married to, I believe at the tie or he was dating at the time, who was just a really fascinating historical figure who later gets entrenched into the world of Truman Capote's Swans, which was there was a terrible mini series about earlier this year, but a really great book that I read. And she's just like a fascinating person who was said to be sort of an inspiration for a lot of haxy and women as someone who was very self possessed and assertive and cool. And I will give the other half nipple, of course to King Joe Patty Bone, mister Sneeze himself. We love him. It is ultimately his movie.

01:23:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, no arguing that.

01:23:40
Speaker 1: And that is his Girl Fridays, Wow Friday. I know it's because I would say his his fems on Friday was what I was going to say about us.

01:23:52
Speaker 2: I think it's about the restaurant franchise Fridays, His Girl Fridays.

01:23:59
Speaker 1: Tgi Friday Wow Wow. And it makes you think it does. You can watch this movie also. If you haven't seen this movie, I would still recommend it. I mean, and you can watch it really wherever because it's in the public domain. I watched it on to b Wow. To be or not to be?

01:24:19
Speaker 2: That is the question.

01:24:20
Speaker 1: I just love watching eighty commercials, so I watched it on to be. But you can watch it like ad free in a lot of places. All right, Caitlin, I guess that that that's that's a case cracked. Let's get married in Niagara Fall.

01:24:33
Speaker 2: That's all, folks. This is not a Learney Tunes. I don't know why I said that.

01:24:41
Speaker 1: Well, if you'd like to hear more of our basic reparte right up there with Howard Hawks's Best, you could follow our Patriot aka Matreon joined for five dollars a month, which will get you access to two new episodes a month with Kaitlyn and myself about frequently requested episodes, often on a ridiculous the Way Makeup, and it also gives you access to over one hundred and fifty episodes in our back catalog. How do you like that?

01:25:11
Speaker 2: I love that. Yes, thank you so much for listening. You can also follow us on Instagram. At Bechdel Cast you can buy our Little merch designed by Jamie Loftus.

01:25:23
Speaker 1: Ever heard of her, The Little merch Maid. Yeah, I'm sorry, I'm riding on this negative COVID test. Let's get silly. I'm going to go see trap.

01:25:37
Speaker 2: Wow Yeah Merch at teapublic dot com slash the Bechdel Cast and we'll see you back here next week. Yes see, so long, So long, folks, see yes see, bye bye. The Bechdel Cast is a production of iHeart Media, hosted by Caitlin Drante and Jamie Loftis, produced by Sophie Lichterman, edited by Moe laboord. Our theme song was composed by Mike Kaplan with vocals by Katherine Voskresenski. Our logo in Merch is designed by Jamie Loftis and a special thanks to Aristotle Assevedo. For more information about the podcast, please visit link tree slash Bechtelcast