The Beguiled with Alana Hope Levinson

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Speaker 1: On the beck Dog Cast. The questions asked if movies have women in them, are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands, or do they have individualism? The patriarchy zef in best start changing it with the beck Del Cast. Hi, We'll go to the beg Doel Cast. My name is Jamieland. This is our podcast where we talking about the role of women in movies and oftentimes how movies don't treat women very well. Oh rats don't Yeah, as we always say here in the back doonecast, rats and don't. I'm excited for our episode today. I think we uh. I was pushing for this one. I was sending sending texts. I'm gonna be honest. I was ambivalent, but because you wanted it, it made me excited. I'm push sure, I'm gonna pushure. That's what that's a mean girls quote doesn't matter. I push people. I push people, But for this one, I felt like it was worth it. More and more frequently, we have people in our Men shows asking or specific movies that they would like to see disgusted and I saw this movie pop up a number of times, sort of wanted to see it myself and didn't realize at first, So we're okay not to bury the lead because you already clicked on it. You know, you're we're doing the new Bogui Old movie by Sophia Coppola. And I didn't know at first that it had previously been another movie, but my mom was like, oh, I loved the original, So did my mom right, because moms are horny for Clint Eastwood. Yeah, which is you know, there's a generational thing there that will never quite understand. I wonder who that is for our generation, like who, Like when I talked to my kids some day, I'm like, how are you not horny for this guy? And she's gonna be like, I don't get it. I don't see it, and I don't know. When I talked to my kids, I'll be like, why are you still here? I thought I abhorted you. Oh no, I'm gonna have a whole brood and then I'm gonna set them down and make them stare at my frame portrait of alt and be like do you get it? And then if they don't get it, I getta locked the door and we got to stay there until they get it. Well before we get too carried away with that, we should introduce our guests. Are you spitting up a hairball? I's sorry, I just gave birth anyway, So we have a guest, as we always do. She is great. She is a very talented writer and the writer and editor of the men's magazine mel It's show. Thank you excited to be here. Yeah. So, so we all saw the movie together hours ago. Yeah, hours ago. We were discussing it at lunch over Thai food. And also we all saw the first version of the movie that came out in n starring Clinton Eastwood. Well I saw half of it. I kind of fell asleep, but enough enough to get the gist to be angry about the remake, right right, and so and I we were talking about this as well. It's like, I don't know how I would feel about this movie if we had just seen it and it didn't have context of the first movie, because a lot of what we've talked about so far has been pretty like comparative between the two. But the first one better. The first one is so much better. I hated this one. I thought it was not a good movie. I thought a lot of the interesting scenes and interesting characters in the first one were either very glossed over or entirely omitted like the first one handled, just different components of storytelling, so much better rising tension and characters manipulating each other, etcetera. Like, so much better in the first one than in this adaptation. For scenes in the first one, the automatically makes it better. It doesn't pass the factal test if there's not an ancestral orgy scene. I'm pretty sure with the updated terms and conditions. Um, maybe that's the loftest test. Actually is that the loftest test is the baldest woman is in charge? Cool? This movie does not well, there's no bald women. All these women they have elaborate braid they have to yeahs, the braids were a little out of control. The braids come on. Yeah. I was like, we know the civil wars going on, who's braiding your hair? And and and how long? Okay, we will summarize the movie in a moment. But first, who gave l Fanning a crimper in eighteen sixty two? It was so distracted no one else got a crimper. But she's like, I'm the wild and loose gal. She slept with braids in and then it it crimped her hair. But but the crimping didn't happen before. Crimpers you can't do They can't fold your hair like that. You can't do it. She put her hair and braids and then and then and now it's yeah, it looks crimpy. She would had to have folded her hair in very tiny and then she would have had to have another student sit on it, to sit on her face, sit on her hair, sit on her face for several hours to accomplish a look that was for no one except her. I mean she did it for herself. Who gave her a crimper? That is an important question. Thank you for raising it. And it would be cool in the in the light that this was supposed to have been a kind of pulpy movie. Um, but the pulpy is this movie gets is you get a lot of tight shots on Colin Farrell's fucked up leg. Yeah, you see like a little bit of and that is gross and I could not look at it. But some notes I took during the movie include l Fanning and her crimped hair is triggering me. How did el Fanning crimper hair? Crimper as weapon? That would have been cool? She did have electricity or a cripper that happens in the movie Sleepaway Camp. Let's not talk about that. Let's talk about The Beguiled. I just read out the movie because it was so bad. I need a reminder of what happened in there. I'll do the recap, right, So this is the version recap correct. So a young girls in the woods picking mushrooms and she stumbles upon a wounded Union Civil War soldier. He has an Irish accent. Why wait an hour, they'll make up a reason, right, And she's like, I belong to this seminary for girls, this school. I'll take you there because he's wounded, his legs all sucked up. So he goes with this girl and they go to the school, which is run by Miss Martha. And then there's a teacher named Edwena, and there's like something like six other like teenager ish girls. There were the students, with the exception of one child actor. They're all blonde on gin right an. The one that isn't blonde is chubby, right yeah, And it's like, and is a worst child actor I've ever said, Because we've got to take her and bring her into the ocean. I feel bad for her. No, no no, no, no, I actually think she's super cute. I was just saying that is like they just loved like blonde ei kyper thin, like might fall over keep cough around them, kind of a Vibel Fanning. You've got some thought if you Well, no, I'm just saying she like is I feel like one of the more recent incarnations of that exactly Well, when when we're leaving the theater, I do believe, and I love Kristen Dunce and Nicole Kidman in movies that are not this movie and in things that are not this thing. But I do believe that l Fanning, should she actually go on to like have a lifelong movie career, will play a part exactly like Kristen Dunce at some point. And we'll play a part exactly like Nicole Kidman's at some point. Because this is like the path forged for the ethereal blond, they will get you know, yeah, just through the generations, right, it was like sort of three generations of I mean, and you know, depending on what how old is Nicole Kiman impossible to tell, but she doesn't age. She's just like a mythic figure to me. I don't like, I don't know, it could be like she'st so she's great. I wish they didn't put that wig on her in Big Little Lies, But I love that show because I wish we watched that. Big Little Eyes was the best show ever Nicole, which is insane, I know. Um anyways, what we're talking about, who knows? So he arrives at this house that they all have this school in and they're like, well, did we turn him over to our soldiers? But he's wounded in he'll just die in prison. Maybe we should nurse him back to health and then we'll turn him over. And then they decided to bring him in tend to his wound, and over the course of probably a few weeks, he starts to kind of seduce different of these women, from Miss Martha to Edwina the teacher, to one of the older students, although that that's a little tricky because she sort of goes for him first and then he but that he does not resist in any you know. True, that's a tricky and the seduction attempts I think happened more clearly in the n version than they do in this version. But basically everyone's very horny. There's a lot of horny depths to this movie We're back. It's a tone poem. It's a tone poem horny Depp. And you'll find the movies that we apply these tags too are rarely good movies. A tone poe with a lot of horny depth is a way of saying, probably don't see this one, maybe skip it. So different of these girls get jealous and they're like, you like her? I thought you liked me, and Edwina catches him in bed with the Alicia character l Fanning, so she gets very furious because he had been courting her kind of and so she pushes him down the stairs and it sucks his leg up even more. As part is great in both movies. Yeah, it's fun to see an A list actor take a serious tumble. So they decided to amputate his leg and he gets really upset that they cut his leg off me. He gets piste. He well, And also this is a fun call in Ferrell moment in the movie he trashes the whole upper floor of their of their house and makes elephant noises as he does. So he's like, right, he does, He's pissed. Then tension is running thick in the house. Let's say the waist and let me leave. I'm going to kill you all. He's got the only gun. Yeah, he takes their gun, and they're like, oh god, how do Let's just let him go, But also he's dangerous, he might kill us, So they decigned to use his love of mushrooms, not like shrooms, but just that would actually be amazing, that would like this whole move was just about like tripping. So they decided to they like, form this plot to murder him by feeding him poisonous mushrooms. Meanwhile, Edwina is like, but I still love him even though I sucked his leg up. She goes and had sex with him, and then he eats the poison mushrooms and he dies, and that's pretty much it here. Take this body the Confederacy, right, They do sew him a shroud? What was that about? That was weird? In the original version, there's like a full circle moment where it begins with them singing that song. I think it's Clint Eastwood, breath aly singing like, don't go to war, don't fall in love with the soldier. He'll hurt your feeling and war is not good and it's supposed to be creepy, and I think the way I did it was too beautiful. I have tears in my eyes us so much. But then at the end of the movie there take the women in the first movie are taking Clint Eastwood's shroom poisoned body to bury it, as opposed to leaving it out for the Confederacy. I think that in the first movie, the implication is they are just like, this never happened, because technically, who's going to come looking for him there? So, But in the second one, for whatever reason let's just call it laziness, they do not very hop They leave them out. Um, and then there's an excruciatingly long final shot because a few couple of feels that we need it. I did not like this movie. Well, a lot of you pointed out that the plot in this movie is very similar to like it could be like a porn movie where it's just like this hot hand some soldier goes into this house of all ladies and what's gonna happen next? It's like the pizza delivery guy story all over totally. Yeah, I feel like and that's one of its strengths. The first one at least really leans into that element where it's like, what is this. I mean, Sofia Coppola like rewrote it the second one, but the first one was written by a man. The first one was written by a man, and it was adapted by a book that let me double triple check. But was I believe written by a man, right, because I feel like they're like a woman wouldn't dream up this plot, right. It's like there's this house of like starved women because it's wartime. They haven't seen a man in ten years. And then this soldier who's like bloodied and hot, it like, comes hobbling into their home and then convalesces. They nurse him back to health and then just like are immediately just like need the d and all of all of them, even child. I thought she loved me. Oh my god. This reminds me of the part in Monty Python and the Holy Grail where I forget which they're great women, just kidding, No, it's a terrible movie to women. But there's a scene where one of the knights finds this castle with all these horny asked women in it and they're like, oh, you put out the thing. It's just like a bunch of horny women who are trying to fund this one night and he's like, I have a quest to get on I gotta go. And then um, it's it's really funny, good story, cal I love it. I want to know why this story for Sofia Coppola as we discuss it, I will also actively seek out the answer. But, um, why is this a story that Sofia Coppola is like, you know, who needs to update this and whitewash the funk out of it? Me Also, just I do have the Wikipedia page for the Boguil two thousand seventeen pulled up right now, just to put my it resting. It's not making a lot of money, it isn't. But see also film remakes, whitewashing in films attached to this and we and we should talk about that. But this talking about Sofia Coppola is tricky. It's hard to It's just it's hard. This movie debuted at CAN and Sofia Coppola won the Best Director Award at CAN for this movie. For some reason, she has confusing this is it's not a good movie. But she was the first woman in fifties six years to have that distinction and so and and it's only the second woman ever to have it. So it's it's hard because the movie objectively blows. But well, right, good for her for winning an award that does not often go to women. That's nice. Does she handle different parts of the movie, Well, no, she doesn't well a lot of what's your experience of Sofia Coppola in general? I guess yeah. I mean, I growing up was a huge fan because of Virgin Suicides Lost in Translation, Like I think those came out when I was coming of age and I felt really important to me and still are especially Lost in Translation. But I don't know. I kind of was like looking back at her filmography and was she really hasn't made that many movies, especially like since I mean, so there was Marie Antoinette bling Ring, which I didn't know it was a movie, um, and I know that like her entire career. My friend Alana Massey, who just wrote a great book called All the Lives I Want Um shout out, writes a chapter about the Virgin Suicides, and something I remember was just how harsh Sofia Coppola has been treated like by the press, even though you know, she had all these advantages knowing who her father is, but like people didn't take her movies seriously because they were about women, especially Virgin Suicides, which was about teenage girls. But I don't know, I feel like now is the time though, for her to like, like, she can't just rest on that, right right, It's it's hard because I I I the Virgin Suicide was one of my favorites growing up. I I for some reason didn't see Lost in Translation until like very recently. But and then Marie Antoinette is the best music video I've ever seen, even though nothing happens and it's expensive. But like that, she's very she she's very visual. She tells, for the most part what can technically be classified as women's stories, and is part of such a small group of people who have achieved mainstream success as a female director that it's like. But that said, this movie stinks. I hope to one day live in a world where there are you know, just because we're women and she's a woman. We don't have to be like God or some slack like it. I'm not a fan of her work. I don't remember Virgin Suicides that well. I remember being pretty bored by Loss in Translation. Sorry I didn't see well. I don't think I also don't think her movies really age. Well there's another thing. It happened a lot. Yeah, well, but it's like Lost in Translation felt like when you saw it at that time. Now there have been so many movies like that that if you see anything like, I don't get why this is and even like improvements upon that same sort of formula. Where I mean, at the at the time I saw Virgin Suicides for the first time, I was like, you know, because like I've never seen a movie like that before, and it was just like a cool like the ethereal blond is very appealing when you're young and you're especially when you're like the same age as those characters, and you're like, oh, I want to see myself as like this very complicated, tragic like you know whatever. Also, you know, she's she is in her forties now, she's in her twenties when she when she directed Virgin Suicides, and it's like there, I don't know, I just felt like there wasn't a lot of you watch Virgin Suicides, you watch Loss in Translation, and then you watch this movie and there's just like not a lot of growth, right, And I mean for her in her position, I mean maybe this is just me. I don't know, but I feel like she has a responsibility as like one of the very few kind of household name female directors to like make better movies that well, that's a hard thing too then because it's like that, because then we're like doubling down on Yeah, I don't want to make her responsible for all women directors, and like there's so many, you know, it's okay for a female director to have a crummy movie like right and gonna happen in an ideal world, there would just be so many female directors that she's just one of the ones that I don't like, And then there's a bunch of others I do like that because she's one of the more notable ones. She has a lot of attention on her son Ny, where we may be criticize her work more, but also like her stick doesn't really work as well like in seventeen right now, like you just feel you're like really like these like ethereal blonde white women, like it just doesn't it doesn't like work in the current like administration world. It doesn't feel like it's grappling with issues that feel urgent right now, right what I mean right where. I guess that, yeah, because virgin suicides came out at the end of the Clinton era, where it's like maybe maybe we're feeling a little more safe, uh, we're feeling uh and and yeah, like this is I don't understand why this was the moment for her to say, I want to, first of all, make a civil war picture, but I don't want anyone who isn't white to be in it because I don't feel like that's and that's you know, a whole discussion. And it just didn't make sense for me for this to be the story that she felt the need to tell, because for yeah, her signature style isn't super relevant to the world right now, or I don't really think so. But you know, if you're going to if you're determined to use that same format, then find a story where that makes sense. Like, at least for Marie Antoinette, that format works because there's nothing pushing up against it and and and there's not really that much that she had to ignore and actively cut out in order to accomplish the whole you know, pretty music video. I just I didn't understand why this was the source material she wanted to use, right, I don't either, especially because, like you hinted at, she totally deleted. So in the nineteen seventy one version, I'm guessing also in the book, and who knows how many other characters from the book either adaptation left out. But in the Clint Eastwood film there's or the one that he's in, there's a slave character named Hallie and she is the only or person of color in the whole movie. But that character gets completely erased in this version. And there's an article that I already linked to on our Twitter page that I recommend people read by Clarkeisha Kent. It says Coppola explained that she wanted to focus on the gender dynamics rather than the racial ones of this movie. And then the writer goes on to say that I call bullshit on this, mostly because black women find themselves at the intersection of both, and because white women are not devoid of race, no matter how badly they want to be. And then she goes on to say that couple of removing uh, a couple of removing the black female characters ensures that she doesn't have to deal with how white women were complicit in slavery. The counterpoint that she provides to this because people have asked her this question. First of all, we would also like to remind you that Sophia Coupla does not know what the bagdel test us or has in the past two weeks. Whatever. I get that, you know, sensationalism and and click path, that's the whole thing. But her response to that was to paraphrase, and when we'll post the surces for this as well, but that because she is a white woman of privilege, that she felt that she was not equipped to write a character who was black and who was a slave. And I understand that, but I also feel that her job is to tell a story. No one is forcing her to tell this particular story, but it's the one she's deciding to tell. And so if you're deciding to tell a story about the Civil War that takes place in the South in eighteen sixty two, then you're gonna have to fucking do your research. You can't just cut out the parts that aren't immediately relevant to your personal experience. If you know you have to do research, you have to find someone to write the story with you. You have to find someone who has perspective on this issue. You can't just say like, well, you know, I'm a white lady, so I can only write movies that were the ladies who are just like me, or which is what I was trying to say hard thing to But she's wrong. That's when I was that's the point I was trying to make, when I was like, it's her responsibility to make better movies, and I mean better is in like better quality, although she could stand to do that as well, especially considering this big guiled movie. But I meant like she, I think, just has the responsibility because she's like, I have influence in this world. I can get movies made. I can make movies that a lot of people are going to see. I think, then she has a responsibility to do what you're saying, do the research, include the characters that are relevant to the story and put them in there, and or pick a different pick a different story that's more important. Or I mean, if you don't want to make films like that, that's fine. Well it's also weird to take a movie that is essentially like all about race and then say I can't handle this in the movie, like it's set in the middle of the Civil War. So like she can't really take it out of the movie and try. But there's not like a non white character in this whole movie. Yeahs, So you know, maybe she should have just said it in a different time period or something, if she wanted to do that, or like done a different Exactly, it's like an apartment in Bushwick. They're stuck there for some reason. I don't know, because it's about global warming. Like, yeah, I'm trying. The trailer for Manhattan Sinking was stuck and I don't know, I've just spitballing here. No, but yeah, you can't. And I mean also, the reason why I think her reaction has really bothered people and why it really bothers me is like, this is the problem with white feminism is like, oh, well, race and gender. I don't want to handle the race thing because they're not related. It's like, no, they're totally related. And the fact that you deny that is really problematic and just another way of being privileged and not having to do it because you don't exactly deal with And so I mean, for me, it just boils down to regardless of gender, raise anything, do your fucking job, like, and her job is to tell a story. Competently and in a way that because she's choosing to adapt, is faithful to the source material, and she fails to do that in this movie. So no matter, like, you know, she sucked up. And I think that because like some of the major themes of the movie, our agency and the idea of being a prisoner, what that means, etcetera, etcetera, she actually does a disservice to a movie by not including it, Like the character's motivations don't make sense, you don't really understand what's at stake for these people, like their backstory, Like she cuts all that out because I think she's trying to like I don't know, she's trying to get around this, and I think she kind of shot herself in the foot because now just like it just feels like a movie where women are wearing like shirts all the way to their neck and just like are walking around in their house Like I don't know, I just lost all like the depth. Yeah, well, let's let's talk about the way it is adapted a little bit, because I feel like she is, you know, she chooses this story for reasons. I cannot find a concrete reason that she was, Like this is I must I'm whatever. But she has the interesting opportunity of she's adapting a story that was written by a man, that was then adapted by a man, and she's adapting that. So she's in some ways kind of the first female major creative hand to even be involved in this story. But you know, cuts out so much and and I mean most notably cuts out the only non white character in the entire story. And there is in the book halle uh. The slave character was altered from the book to the first movie. But she's still there. You know, she's there, and I would argue is the most interesting character from the film for sure. I mean it's like, you know, she she I mean, she's there. And then there there are a few great scenes between her. I want to make sure I get the actress's name. May Mercer plays her in the nineteen seventy one movie, and there are several scenes between her and Clint Eastwood's character John McBee that are, you know, if not perfectly done, at least thought provoking, and her character is given looking screen time in perspective. There's the scene where she's helping him out with whatever. His leg is always bleeding. It seems like and they have this conversation about being a prisoner and and freedom. Oh and then he's all, he's like, you and I should be friends. We because Clint he's always like a for allies. Hey, that's Clint's hall game. It's basically he's like, who's on my side, implying that like I'm fighting for you, like I'm fighting for the union. So we're trying to end slavery. And she's like, white men aren't killing each other because you care about us, And then she says the N word, which I'm not going to repeat. So because you care about us, black people will say. But she's the best character in the in that version. She's like the truth teller that actually, like she connects all the characters, like the ideas back to the state or the politics, which I think is really important. Like I'm trying to think it's so relevant to like the time and the place that they're in that not having her is crazy. Like there's this one conversation where like he says, we're both prisoners, which is interesting because he sees himself as like a prisoner in that house even though they've nursed him back to health and she's the only different treatment is that I can run away, which is an interesting thing to say because it's like, well, she can't really either, but what does it mean to be like physically held in a place? First? Just right? Right? And I don't know, So it's like all of those. And she's also the only one right that like shoots him down. Yes, So there's a scene late in the movie and this, this exact character switch happens to both Clint Eastwood and then Colin Farrell, who plays his character in the modern movie, but it makes sense in the nine movie and is completely out of nowhere borderline confusing in this adaptation. But towards the end of the movie, mcbee's leg is amputated. Uh, and we are led to believe in both movies rightfully so like they had to do it, but he doesn't believe that. He thinks that they amputated his like for revenge. He realizes his leg is amputated, he freaks the funk out, takes the only gun in the house and basically, you know, now all the women in the house are the prisoner and he's not anymore, and he's yelling, and he's in the first movie, I mean, he is like pretty, he's like I'm gonna rape everybody. Yeah, he becomes like a Farrell beast, like it's extremely he goes Okay. The best scene in the first movie is Little Amy, who rescues him. Also, we haven't talked about how he franches her, but he'll get there, get there. But little Amy, who is in the first movie, especially in love and has like the this crush on Clint Eastwood, has a pet turtle and for some and in both movies, it's like, why would you do that? But she is holding her turtle and Clint Eastwood yanks the turtle from her and flings it across the kitchen and it dies, and and then this and I feel like for that audience, that's the point where we're like, maybe he's not a good guy, after all, he threw that turtle. But after he basically says, okay, you're my prisoners. Now I'm going to have sex with whoever I want or I'll kill you, and then the white women disperse, it's like okay, so he and uh. And then there's another scene between Clint Eastwood and May Mercer where he says basically it's like, well your first like calm down to the basement. We're doing this right now. And she is the only person in the entire movie to openly defy him as opposed to all the you know tricks that the movie is based around, and uh she you know, she basically says, you'd better like it with a dead black woman because that's the only way you're going to get it from from me. Is like, you know, over my dead body, basically, and then he folds and leaves, and that is the last major interaction those two characters have, And that felt like an important thing to happen, not just because we needed more of that character, but also because she's the only character who doesn't probably manipulating, and she's just like, no, all these other women and these stupid white women are like falling for is there'd be no movie if the white women weren't so dumb, right, that's yeah. So she's the only one who like sees right through him, doesn't fall for his tricks and his manipulations. And then all the other women are like, I haven't seen a man and for years the Southern bill and I just want to fuck that's what they say, right, I mean both both versions. I was just like, this guy ain't ship like he's not like he does, like it would be one thing if they set him up, is like really true? He doesn't even He's not even that charming right right. Seems crazy from moment one in the first movie because he first scene makes out with a kid. Yes, he makes out with a kid. Here's what happens. She finds him some other soldiers, like he hears them off in the distance, and he doesn't want to get caught, so he's like, I have to kiss this kid as a diversion. I'm about to die. And he was like, oh, I'm going in and I was thinking of it, like to invoke a past episode of the cast. I was thinking of it like, oh, random, like oh, this is kind of scary, like when Brendan Fraser lunges at Rachel Wise when he's in that cage and the money and it was just like you because I want to do and then you're like that it might have been that, but I think that was motivated by there were soldiers running past. So he's like, if we're just kissing, they won't bother us. I guess year old man French and child. He goes yeah, He's like, here's the soldiers approaching and then he goes, how old are you? And she's like thirteen and sipped him. But and then he's like old enough to kiss and then grabs her face and kisses her old enough for kisses or something like. And then and then from that moment on, because she's, you know, twelve, she's like, I love him because character actually makes the most sense in mind. I agree, But she's the only one where you're like, Okay, I get why you're in love with him because you're twelve, and like this is and he's weird being led to believe a charming, handsome man even though no one's really proved that to us in either movie. But sure sometimes he's irish and well, like Amy, I like character well, and I think outside of that is like the new movie basically just kind of takes out all of the sexuality. I mean it's there a little bit, but in the first movie, part of what makes it so great is it's just like like they're all these like sexual fantasy scenes and flashbacks and stuff. And it's interesting that when when Sophia Coppola adapted it, she took away like all of the female sexuality, Like why would you do that? Unless her argument is like, oh that was because men wrote it and they were like trying to like write in these like porny things. But I think it's just like that now now we just have a boring movie and it's like, for example, l Fanning her character and the first one is like incredibly hot and also just like really really like she does like a like a full blown seduction. Is like you won't like I know more than you think, like I would be his royal penis cleaner called back to coming to America. Wow, I love because she's like I'd clean in places that you wouldn't, and I like, you're such a hussy. She was hussy shamed and I don't care for that. But that's what I'm going to call shaming from now on. But again, that's like another character where Okay, first of all, I this is a fucking Southern Gothic story, and the point of Southern Gothic stories is that most of the people in them are like deluded and strung out. Like that's like a hallmark of of this genre of like you know, and we we have the ingredients for that where it's like these women have been stuck with each other for a long period of time. They're always in danger, but they're also extremely bored. You can see why, and and the book in the nineteen seventy one it's too much. It's like the miss Martha apparently used to fuck her brother and and thinks about that a lot and then goes to Clint Eastwood and is like, well, it won't be the same, but but you'll do sort of. And I mean, but there's like you see the sexuality like play out, because that's really what the story is about. It's a softcore porn well, I mean, it's core. I have a big problem with any rendition of the story. I haven't read the book, but with both versions of the film, it's basically suggesting that there's a group of women and they're getting along fine in its civil war, but they're still trucking along and learning French and everything's great until a man shows up and they just all want to suck him. So they're all they're jealous of each other, and they're like basically everyone's world falls apart because of the introduction of this man. So I think a better version of this story is he comes along, he's an enemy. They take him as like a prisoner of war, and they feel compassion for him, so we're like, well, nurse him back to health. We don't want him to die per se. But then he as as he starts to try to manipulate these women. A better version of the story would be if they don't fall for it, and then they have to retaliate and be like, yeah, if at least one of them doesn't fall for it. For three quarters of the movie, it just goes on for so long, scene after scene after scene. Even in the Good One, it's scene after scene of like a different girl goes into his room, he seduces them. Now he has another ally and then we see a bun to near misses of the women talking to each other, and it's like, are they gonna find out? No, not this time, but at least there's some suspense. This I couldn't stand it. There's no suspense. There's not really any major there's not a major character that has a lot of doubt in him, which I thought was interesting shout out to my favorite movie Doubt. Uh. But there I feel like that, I mean, and this would go all the way back to when the story was originally written, but like, there's you know, six, there's seven women in this house, I think, and not you know, and I feel like there's one of them, like the little girl who plays the fiddle is sometimes like yeah, that's she was the one. Like there is one girl who sort of had some doubts, but she was in no way a major character and was always just there like no, we want to fuck him, shut up, Like it would have been interesting if there was like a little a little agent of chaos trying to figure out what he was actually up to, versus like trying to thug him. But that's a that's a note for everybody, not just for some handco oh. Another scene that was in the original version that was taken out of this one was again Sofia Coppola just erasing any moment of tension that might be. Was when the Confederate soldiers come to the house at night and they're like we we're here to protect you. And they're like, actually, we're okay, and they're like, no, we really think you should be protected by us, and they're giving up very rape vibes and Miss Martha keeps insisting like no, we're fine, please leave now, good night, thank you, and then they're just like they're very persistent, and it's extremely uncomfortable, and it's very tense because all the girls are like scared, and rightfully so, because they're presumably coming into rape them all. I think that, I mean, it seems like they're right like, no matter what soldier comes to the house, regardless of what's eide they're on, they're afraid of all of them. Right, Yeah, I'm pretty sure that. Sofia Coppola, like, do they ever say the word rape? And the new one? They may say rape one time, like maybe in the first scene where someone's like, oh, you know that all those Yankees are good? I think they do say that one time. And then there's another scene where when the soldiers do show up, but Sophia couple is like, you know what moment of attention, You're not going to show it? Don't like where are they? She's like, they're in the kitchen night getting the mike to eat. You know what, I'm Sammy, you know what I feel like? I feel like she it wasn't even that she was like her answer of I just didn't write it in because I don't know the perspective. It's almost like she took that original script and was like I'm going to write out any like I'm not going to touch anything that's gonna get me in trouble on the internet, like I'm going to write out the rape. I'm going to write out and herself and she just kind of like every idea, every kind of thing in the movie that was like interesting and sort of edgy, she just decides to not address, which is super weird because it ends up being just the least edgy or interesting movie in the world. It's weird what she keeps him when she doesn't. And there is like Nicole Kimman does say at one point after she makes the soldiers Sammy's and they're downstairs and we never even see them leave. They're never referenced again that I remember, but there's like one of the little girls leaving and saying like, oh, can I go downstairs and say hi? And then she's like, no, don't tempt them as like remove temptation, right, And the other one you see them like leering around and they look like but right. So there, so it's a very tense and I was like, yeah, I was worried for those girls, and because I was like, they force their way into that, by the way. Then you get the context of like why it's so hot that they have this guy that's kind of their prisoner, because the way that sexuality is framed in every other context in the movie is like them being raped. So it's like kind of cool that, like you you understand, like, oh, there's this guy, he can't walk and he's safe at the very last until I'm threatening for now, and then then I started throwing turtles around now and now we're all in trouble. The old turtle talk back to back to the crimping was any know, it's like the turtles, those pets back there where the fun where they get turtle from the swamp from the swamp. I mean I got my turtle in like San Diego back in the day. I got my turtle at Uh. I got like some boardwalk there's yeah, like I bought it on the side of the street. Anyway. It's a little crazy to me that, you know, during the Civil War there pet turtles who knew uh something that Sofia Coppola kept that that bothered me about the first movie and was like one of those things where I was like, oh, yeah, this movie and its source material is written by a man, So there is that major moment where Edwina catches l Crimped Fanning Alicia Alicia Carol in the first movie and mcbe in bed this is a huge moment and then after uh we we break Colin Ferrell's leg and it's all funked up and grows. There is a brief exchange in both movies where l Fanning lies and it is like he came after me, he attacked me, you know, And so she's trying to get herself off the hook by basically saying that he raped her, to which Edwina responds in both movies by being like, oh, she's such a liar, you know. And then Miss Martha says, well, we don't know. It could be either way, which is just like a dangerous precedent to set no matter what you're doing in it. And but it's it's it's hard because it's like that is crucial to the story. But that bugged me in the first movie and I was like, oh, well, it seems like Sofia Copple is writing out a lot of stuff. Maybe what's she going to do with this? But she's like papped it, keep it. I um. So that character, her name is Carol in the in the why did it want? What's wrong with Carol? Oh? Probably because that movie Carols Carol. No, two characters in any movie can have the same name, So I mean, the character's name is John, after all, he's the first John in any movie, but Carol is that iconic name car Come. But um, I liked that character Carol in the version. I just like that she was in control of her sexual sexuality and she's like, that's a guy I don't want to fuck him. And so what if I'm seventeen, I'm gonna still they say, because they set it up that you know, she just I mean, she's a teen, She's fooled around before. It actually makes sense that she's going to fool around with the like soldier that's convalescing in the next room. It's with like the older characters that it doesn't make as much sense, right and again, it makes sense when Clint east Too does it because he's actively manipulating everyone, But Colin Farrell's version of this character is not actively manipulating everyone, So it's confusing, Like and especially when if we had just seen the version, I would have no idea why he goes to l Fanning's room instead of Kirsten Dunst. That would make no sense, Like, I don't get In the first movie, he's sort of blackmailed by Carol, who gets jealous at one point in the movie and basically tries to sell him out and give him up to the other soldiers and almost gets away with it, and then he finds out that she was responsible for it, and she was just like, well, it don't make me jealous, And so Clint Eastwood in the first movie is like threatened by her and a little bit afraid of her. Better go fucker then, and he's sort of like, I mean, she's really the only character that he seems like threatened by until he loses his leg and he loses his ship. But like, it makes sense why he goes to her in the first one because he feels like she has some sort of power over him and has the ability to funck him over so of all the options he has set up for himself. So even though like Carol isn't an admirable person, I don't know like her identify with her, but I just liked that she was sort of playing his game. She's like, well, if you're going to re people, it was just I actually kind of do. If I had to pick one and I was watching the nineteen seventy one of Like, who do you identify, it would be Carol. Carol's a badass, like you know, yeah, I mean, I think she's a very interesting character. And ed Weena is a little bit frustrating because she's so naive, especially in the first movie. I feel for her. I feel like I most closely identify with Edwena, and I saw Oh my gosh, I hate in the Coupala version, I hate that character. She's I mean everything in a couple of versions worse. But in the first one she's she's like, I'm twenty two and then he kisses her. She's like, I don't know how and I don't know, Like I feel that way all the time, where I'm just like I don't know, don't hurt my feelings, please, and and like I don't know. Her naiveness comes across in a more convincing genuine and a lot of you were saying this earlier, Like for the character Kristen Duns is not of an appropriate age because she's in her early thirties, and it wouldn't make sense that a woman in her early thirties would be she really I thought she was older than that. But but like they don't. They don't stay Edwina's age in this movie. They do in the first one. They say she's twenty two and that she's been in this school for seven years. So it totally makes sense that her attitude towards men would be like, I don't know trust And this is something I wanted to talk about again. It's a big comparative thing. But in the first movie there is this whole built in structure where every major female character it's made clear that they don't trust men, and Clint Eastwood and sort of asked all of them, why don't you trust men? Men are grade? Men are grade? Guy, Fuck you, men are grade. Trust us, We're cool. It's told through sometimes flashbacks, sometimes they just state it, but we figure out why every woman in the house doesn't trust a man. Sometimes it's whoops, say fucked my brother. Sometimes it's like a father issue, and it's like everyone has given some sort of reason of like why they are not so quick to trust him. And that felt like, really, of all the stuff in the in the first movie, something that could be really useful to Sofia Goppola, and these are reasons. They're giving reasons why they don't trust him, but in doing that are also explaining why they end up doing it so easily, Like they have this issue right, so it's like, oh, I had this thing happen which makes me not trust men, but it's also why I'm kind of like just want to believe that you're different sort of exactly right, but which is a relatable totally um. But then they just take that away and you're like, I'm none of that is given in the new one, and I really the thing I really liked about the first movie is that we The first character we meet in both movies is Amy. She's picking shrooms. She comes across like I got to get my psychedelic fix on. Depending on the adaptation, she franches um right and and it's again very like cheesy in the first one, but it's a Southern Gothic story, so it's supposed to be. But where like Amy is talking to Clint when he's I don't remember it's either right before he loses his leg or right after I think right after, and oh, she finds out that he's been hooking up with everyone she's ever met. In her entire life, which must be hard when you're twelve of like, you fucked everyone I know, and it's really just getting ready for what it's sort of yeah, he's like, I'm just prepping you for this scene. Yeah, it's rough out there. Um, but he's like fucked her all the maternal figures she's ever had, and you know, there's like the little child actor and she's just like, but I thought you loved me, and he was like, I do. And then she's pissed and then he throws her hurtle and then she's like, I'm to die. But by the end of the movie, where Amy is sort of the driving force between so many major events, where she finds him and at the request of Miss Martha, she gets the stuff to kill him, um by picking the poisonous mushrooms. And by the end of the movie, you almost get the feeling that it's like, oh, this whole movie is Amy's future flashback to why she will never trust men is because this handsome like we are to believe this handsome soldier who fringed her while he was covered in dirt turned out to be a pretty bad guy. I know, I know, was anyone else Matt like basically when he's around, like threatening them with a gun, and I keep thinking, like there's one of him, there's like ten of you kick him. And then then when they're like we have to we have to poisoned him with the mushrooms, I kind of wanted to. I just kind of wanted them to like get the gun and kill him. And I was like, why did they have to Why did they have to kill him in a like this feminine way, which is like poisoning you with the food we make, right, And maybe that's a that's a function of the time, but I wanted them to go straight up like just that there were hatchets around. There was off, oh, yeah, they cut his mother. We need to kill him in a dignified way by watching him choke to death. Because someone's like, let's hang him, and they're like, let's not resort to such brutalities. It's like you're gonna him. I mean, and maybe this is maybe what they were trying. The closest I can get to Devil's advocate there is like maybe they were trying to express some sort of double standard of because at the beginning, we're like, you should have just let him bleed out not our problem. And then they're like, but we don't want to kill him, even though he's sucked us all and it wants to kill us. I don't know. I mean I think maybe, but I don't know, because I feel like if we're supposed to see this as some story of empowerment, I don't know how we're supposed to see this. That just didn't feel like Harry. I was just kind of like if Sofia couple of head, okay, Okay, I'm not I'm sorry to keep you waiting at her story him into a million pieces right like there was no This was a redo of the first movie with no details changed, but many just left out, like there wasn't much shot in the same house that Beyonce shot Lemonade, adding more insult the fact that she omitted the black character. They're also there's like a scene or like a shot in the new book Guild where l Fanning does exactly what Vivian Lee does in like a scene in Gone with the Wind, and I just I'm just like, I'm going to fight l Fanning and I'm gonna win. What does she do her cheeks, which is what Scarlett O'Hara does right before she goes to meet Ashley. And anyways, this movie stinks. Don't invoke a good movie in a bad movie. That's mean. I have never seen Gone with the Wind, but it like it, Okay, I know that you're like one of the Last thing I'm just saying is that usually when we talk about a movie in the context of this podcast, it's like there aren't enough women in it, or the men out number the women, And that's certainly not a problem that this movie has. But I don't know, this is just a complicated movie to talk about because there are characters that I suppose are somewhat developed, although in this version we don't get a lot of their backstory or their flashbacks, so we don't really understand where a lot of them are coming from. So that's a bit disheartening. But the problems that a lot of movies have in portraying women don't really apply to this movie. But there's there's a whole other thing that's wrong with this movie, which is like a man shows up and everyone fus everything up. Yeah, I mean, if it passes the test, but it also the main problem of the movie is though that like these women have no identity outside of the guy that they want. The man is the inciting and to the movie, So it doesn't It's like cool that there are a lot of women in the movie, but I'd take less women for ones that had more agency outside fucking this guy who sucks. Right, Like, this movie passes the vecteal test, but the issues of why it doesn't pass more are like basically baked into the story itself. So it's which is interesting, that's a that's a new problem for for us. There's always a new problem. There's always there's always something new. It speaks to why the test actually isn't it enough? The test for sure isn't as true you never know, not that you said it was, but saying like you know you can pass and still be like really right, Although most of the scenes where women are talking they are talking about John McBee, there's a few where they're not. They're taking French lessons, they're talking about French, they're talking about stitching, but ahold chores, al those things that are designed probably to make them more attractive to a man. That's why you go to medicate classes. But then you can be like, oh, look, they're not going to France, taking these girls to France. Yeah, all the conversations are like, learn how to stitch so that you can stitch clothes, man, seeing kill a man and stitching a shroud Like you said that. I guess that that was cool. That was fun to watch a child do. But this story could just be so much more interesting if they instead of all just succumbing to his like stupid seduction techniques. Instead we're like, I see right through you. You're not going to trick us a piece of ship. We're gonna fight back. Or if like, if it is about like women's sexuality and them like discovering and they all fuck him and he's not manipulating them into it, maybe he's just like, let's all just have a polly relationship all deviently to be more interesting than the movie that we have here, I mean, and it would facilitate the orgy scene that I wanted. I think for me that this story like it, I don't mind that everyone's horny. I think if there was one character who expressed more doubt shout out to my favorite movie down, if there was one character who was more fucking suspicious of this person who they know is the enemy and it would make sense to be suspicious of the movie would be very different. I mean in that way, it's just like a really sexist movie that basically it's like the second this man comes in, they all lose their minds because because they're smart, they're in school. Like yeah, Like, especially in the first one, they set it up that Martha's like a really kind of like no bullshit kind of balluster because they have that like that moment where where you can hear their thoughts in the first movie sometimes he's like, she does have a point of weakness. I was like, Oh, she's a tough bitch. That's why we're supposed to think. Yeah, it's interesting. Everyone in this movie needs to grow up and get a library card and move on with their lives. Well, in twenty years I will readapt this and make it. There's something I think that someone could have adapted. Like I I don't know a tons of screenwriters right now off the top, but like there is away there's one right here. Do I have a master's degree in screenwriting from Boston University? Yes, I do. You should you should adapt it, but you can see it being adapted in a really cool way, and it's cool yeah, yeah, where it's like but like adapt it, don't just do it again. We should get Quentin Tarantino to do it and make it that's just them blowing him away. Yeah, end of movie. It's more of a short. It's more of a short the way that some people would would. Let's write the movie on our nipple scale. Okay, cool, we have a scale of zero to five nipples, where we rate the movie based on its portrayal of the women characters in the movie. Being the best, I've being the best, zero being the worst. I'm going to give it. God, this this movie is so hard. I would say, who is that? Being too generous? Not generous enough? I don't know. You went first, Okay, up sending the precedent one. I was very annoyed that she that Sophia Coupla got rid of the Holley character, the one person of color in the story who was the most to me interesting character in the version. The fact that, as we discussed before, like a man shows up and everyone loses her ship because like, oh, we want to funk them, and now we're all jealous of each other and we can't handle this competition and we're just petty to each other like that's not good. And a lot of their backstory is just omitted, so we don't really know a lot about these characters are not that well fleshed out or developed, so just overall, like, while women out number men in this movie, buy a lot? It what cost? What if? Then I pulls up like the nipples. I've never said that seriously before. I was like, what is she about to say? It looks really pensive. Sorry. He had a very grim look on her face, and I was like, oh my god, what did I do wrong? I was thinking about the rest of my life for a second. The nipples belong to Okay, well, turtles don't have nipples, so it can't be the turtle. Okay, and that's too bad. That's too bad. I wish that they did, but they are. I suppose they My nipples go to Colin Farrell, whose nipples we see because she scrubs them. She's like, I'm the Royal penis cleaner and I'm going to pull down your andy's a little bit and scrub your hip. But also she scrubs his nipples and that's what my nipples look like. No, yeah, oh yeah, there's a whole thing of like, stop objectifying Colin Farrell. And it's like, honestly, stop objectifying Colin Farrell. I was turned all the way off. If you're gonna objectifying, can you make it not be like his weird hip bone that's not like like the show has open and again, like I would prefer she like doesn't like to fuck or something after seeing this movie, like it's so sexless and even the shot of Colin Ferrell that's supposed to be hot, it's like, yeah, it's like if someone describes sexuality to an alien, they're like, this is what humans like Colin Ferrell's hip bug. It's like, this is not what we like. This is not what we wanted, This is not what we signed up for. Yeah, I just I don't know how she I mean, I feel like most of her work there's like a lot of I think restraint and sexual restraint, and that's a big operating thing. But this, and then again, don't adapt this story. This is a Fox story. Ye know what you're adapting. If you're not, if you don't want to fucking in the movie, that's okay, But then don't adapt the Fox story, right, Yeah, because there you're not going to make anyone any matter than if you take a Fox story and you take all the fucking out of it, they're gonna get pretty mad. You can take the funk out of the Fox story, but you can't take the funk out of the uck. You can't take the story out of the fun something. I'll figure it out and then I'll tweet it okay and be on the lookout for that. Um, I'm gonna give it to as well, although I'm almost tempted to go a little bit lower. Yeah I was too, But I mean, it's hard because I feel like the two versions are so conflated in my head now that there are a lot of things I liked about the first movie that the second movie just does not include and doesn't replace with anything. So it's hard to But anyways, I'll stick with two. I just think that the story is troubled from the start, but with this adaptation, just nothing interesting is done with it. I know that we hold Sophia Copbla to kind of a harsher standard, whether we want to or not, and that is not fair, But if you're an outour filmmaker, I feel like it's not completely unfair either. It's tricky. I hated this movie and it put us all in a bad mood, and I wish that she had chosen a different story to tell for this one. Agree the nipples go to Amy, little twelve year old Amy, hey, old enough to kiss. Leave it in, don't edit it out. I look forward to your response. Okay, I'm giving it zero nipples, and I'm not hard her on her. I mean, think about if this was directed by a man. How if oh my god, you would be like, you know, I'd like to feel these women have no agency, You've taken out all their sexuality. I feel like it would be more exhausted and by if a man I directed this movie and not disappointed, which is sort of what I hate to admit that I feel. But I do feel disappointed that a major female director had all these missed opportunities in this. Yeah. Yeah, I just think just looking at it from pure storytelling standpoint, it was super bad. It just was super bad. None the characters had motivations. Honestly, it wasn't even that beautiful like the way her other movies. You know, it's like marian Toinete, You're like, okay, whatever, like this is to watch? And the costumes, the costumes sucked very quiet. They're kind of like the costumes I liked when they got dressed up. That was cool. Sofia Couple is also known for having cool soundtracks on her movie My God, No sound, silent, silent movie. Oh yeah, not a lot of score. It was better be good if you're not playing any hot time. I was like, I was like, where's the awesome They're like, let the kid play the piano again, let her play a little johnt So what does this happen? What does this? Why am I watching? It's incredibly boring, the moments that could be like milked for tension or just like nope, sorry right, yeah, it's it's a it's a fun story if you're adapting the story. You got a lump fuck and she did a bad job. Wow. I mean even the sexy ninety was not hot. The sext ninety was not hot. The sex scene was not hot. With with supposed to just be like a little I didn't even I don't know. He like fell over because he got one leg. He's like he I guess landed inside of her because he was it was a lucky fall and he was leaving with his hard cock and then they had a scene that you're just like, wait, he's about to die. Yeah, it's just I don't know. I'm sorry, skip this one, gang. Yeah, watch the one version. It's not perfect. It's not even great, I would say, but it's there's no much better if you want to watch an adaptation, that's finely And sorry that we talked as much about that movie as we did about the two seventeen one, So there's the least us. Yeah, I want to thank you so much for being thanks for having me. Sorry, I just don't get your phone face. Oh yeah, my phone's broken all right. I wish I could blame that on the movie too, But unfortunately she got so magy through it. She there had the screen and hi bro during the Colin Farrell hip bunks. Where can people find you online? Um? You can find me at my favorite website. It's really healthy to hang out on it. Twitter, dot com, dot com fun hang at Alana Levinson. Yeah, it's find me and the reader work in mel it's so good. Red work everywhere's the best read our work. I don't have any out there, but hey, watch my cartoons. I don't care anyways. Hey, uh, here's a fun new thing you can do is give us money. And so before we go, you can check out our Twitter, Facebook, all the channels you wouldn't really check to find our new episodes. And if you want to kick us a little donation one dollar, two dollars, one million dollars um. It all goes towards the production costs of the show and we would very much appreciate it and we let me SMA. Yeah. So you know, if you like the episodes of if you like us, kick us a few dollars, that would be great. You can go to PayPal, dot me, backslash, Bechtel Cast to throw a few dollars are um, follow us and goodbye bye.