Mr. and Mrs. Smith (2005)

00:00:00
Speaker 1: Hello listeners, Caitlin here dropping in at the top of the episode to give you one final reminder about the Shrek Tannek tour which starts next week. And you're also about to find out that this is my birthday episode. So if you would like to give me the most wonderful birthday gift of all, you can do so by buying tickets to the shows on this tour, which are two shows in London on May twenty second, followed by a show in Oxford with the Saint Audio Podcast Festival on May twenty fourth, then Edinburgh on May twenty sixth, Manchester on May twenty eighth, and Dublin on May twenty ninth. Right now, there are still a few tickets available for all of these shows, and it would just really mean the world if you came out to see us live. We have so much fun, goofy stuff planned, stuff you've never seen or heard before. So do yourself a favor. Do not miss these shows, which you can buy tickets to at link tree slash Bechdel Cast. We will see you there. We are so freaking excited. The other thing switching gears here, but the other thing that we want to do at the top of the episode is to place a content warning for domestic abuse and violence, as that is a component of our discussion on this episode. Enjoy the episode.

00:01:32
Speaker 2: On the Bechdelcast, the questions ask if movies have women and them, are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands or do they have individualism? It's the patriarchy? Zeff and vest start changing with the Bechdel Cast.

00:01:47
Speaker 3: Hey Caitlin, Hey Jamie, are you telling me that for the last six or seven years you've also been podcasting in secret? Well?

00:01:58
Speaker 1: Gee, I don't know. I'm gonna be really secretive about it.

00:02:03
Speaker 3: I guess the only way to get to the bottom of it.

00:02:05
Speaker 1: Is to kill each other, or to join forces and do a podcast together.

00:02:12
Speaker 3: Wow, and revitalize our relationship by hot started. God, wouldn't that be I haven't seen the reboot, but what if that is what happens, mister and missus Smith just start a podcast. That would be such a bummer. I really hope that that doesn't happen. Did you watch the show?

00:02:27
Speaker 1: I didn't watch the whole thing, but I saw the pilot, so I can describe the premise based on that.

00:02:33
Speaker 3: Okay, I read about it, but I feel like that's sometimes what happens now on shows where they're just like they're under thirty five. Should they have a podcast? Unclear? Maybe anyways, do do do? Happy birthday to Caitlin. Maybe that's exactly who.

00:02:58
Speaker 1: Oh happy thank you today, Thank you so much. It's true as my birthday. And that's why I picked this movie, Mister and Missus Smith, two thousand and five, because it used to be a movie I really liked and now maybe not so much.

00:03:16
Speaker 3: I'm excited and if this happens to be your first time around here, because you're a huge mister and Missus Smith, two thousand and five fan, Welcome to the Bechdel Cast. My name's Jamie Loftus.

00:03:28
Speaker 1: My name is Caitlin Drante, and this is our podcast where we examine movies through an intersectional feminist lens using the Bechdel Test just to get the dang conversation going, except we wait till the very end of the episode to talk about it. Yeah, it makes sense.

00:03:46
Speaker 3: It really does, it really does. The Bechdel Test is, of course, a media metric created by cartoonist Alison Bechdel, sometimes called the Bechdel Wallace Test because she co created it with her friend Liz Wallace. Lots of different versions of this test. The one we use.

00:04:04
Speaker 4: For our purposes requires that two people, two characters of a marginalized gender, speak to each other about something other than a man for more than two lines.

00:04:16
Speaker 3: Of dialogue, and it should be a meaningful exchange and then we just sort of start the conversation from there. It's thrilling.

00:04:25
Speaker 1: So today's movie is, like I said, mister missus Smith, Jamie, what is your relationship, if any, with the dang movie?

00:04:35
Speaker 3: Easy? Nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing. I had never seen this movie. I feel like I'm coming in completely cold because not only have I never seen this, I had no interest in the reboot because I had never seen this. I really have never had much of an I mean, especially as time goes on, as we'll talk about, I've never really had much of an interest in Brad Pitt or Angelina jo Lee action movies. So this was just never going to be a movie I was good to see. Yeah, fair, even though I think that, Like, I mean, when this movie came out, he was like eleven or twelve, so I feel like I should have been I feel like that's a very like gossip magazine age, but I was also not very invested in the media narrative. I don't know. I guess this one just missed me. I just didn't care. Yeah, and I have to say not to be a downer at the top of the episode. I watched the movie and I care less than ever. Yeah, I didn't like it very much. Although I do get like watching it now, I do get why people liked it at the time. I get it. It's a sexy little movie, yeah, and it has its moments. But yeah, just really was not doing very much for me. Caitlin, what is your history with mister and Missus Smith.

00:05:59
Speaker 1: I saw in theaters in two thousand and five. I was either a freshman or sophomore in college, so you know, I didn't have the most refined taste, and I thought this movie was awesome. I was like, Wow, look at these hot people being so hot, and they're hot near each other, and they're hot on top of each other, and they're fighting and then they're kissing and WOWI wow. These are all the very nuanced thoughts going through my head. And I thought it was a fun movie. And then I bought it on DVD and I watched it a lot on DVD, and I still have the DVD brag for that.

00:06:40
Speaker 3: Your DVD collection is a thing of beauty.

00:06:44
Speaker 1: I really don't stand by a lot of it, but it is there.

00:06:48
Speaker 3: That's growth. That's growth.

00:06:49
Speaker 1: I feel like, thank you.

00:06:51
Speaker 3: It's very alarming when someone's taste never changes. Yeah, if everyone can vouch for their DVD collection from twenty years ago, folks, we've got a problem. You've got to look in word. Yeah, you know, there has to be certain things that you cannot answer for.

00:07:06
Speaker 2: M hm.

00:07:07
Speaker 3: What was it like rewatching?

00:07:09
Speaker 1: I thought that the storytelling was sloppy and the pacing was really bad. Yeah, because since I first saw this movie, I of course went on to get a master's degree in screenwriting from Boston University, something I would never mention, but I have a far better understanding of, you know, narrative structure and pacing. And I was like, oh, this movie like lags. There's a lot of like unnecessary repetition in the exposition, Like this could have been streamlined significantly. I thought the storytelling was just like not very well done, especially in Act one.

00:07:48
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was sort of those movies where I couldn't tell if it was the writing or if I was just bored. But I did find like a lot of the establishing information confusing, right, I mean, this is just movie logic. But I'm like, they didn't know, right then, you guys are a joke. You're bad at your job because you're not being very subtle.

00:08:12
Speaker 1: They are pretty bad at their jobs. The other thing about this movie is that so I teach screenwriting classes using aforementioned degree that I would never mention.

00:08:23
Speaker 5: Plus plus plugs, and the main assignment in my intro level class is for students to write a film treatment.

00:08:34
Speaker 1: And I send them various treatments as an example of what to do and how to write a treatment. And I would say the best one I have found after scouring the internet is the treatment for mister and Missus Smith. Really, a lot of the treatments are either that are available online at least that I have access to. They're either a James Cameron's script Mint, so it's like seventy pages long and he basically just wrote the script but kind of summarized it also, so those aren't useful, or their treatments that just like aren't very good at encapsulating like what the story of the movie is. So even though this is like not a masterpiece of cinema, the treatment for it is at least effective at being a treatment and serving the purpose that a treatment is supposed to serve. So I send this to all my students, and this is kind of like the main one that we study, and so I'm constantly rereading the treatment for this movie.

00:09:40
Speaker 3: Wow. Yeah, So, like you actually have a consistent and like rather intimate relationship with this movie.

00:09:47
Speaker 1: This is wild, right, But I hadn't rewatched the movie probably since like twenty ten, twenty eleven, Like it definitely fell off for me, and it wasn't something I was consistently watching after the first few years of enjoying it. But I do have this kind of like intimate relationship with at least the premise of the movie, and so I was excited to go back and rewatch it to see if it held up at all. And I would say, generally the answer is no, although I don't know if it was just the nostalgia, but I was like, I'm still having fun. There's still some fun set pieces and sequences.

00:10:26
Speaker 3: Definitely, and also I mean like there's certain like images where well, I don't even know if this is necessarily true, but there are a few images in this movie that I'm like, they don't make shots like that anymore. And I'm thinking of Angelina Joe snapping someone's neck basically as Catwoman, then jumping off a building with an umbrella and getting into a cab all in the space of twenty seconds. I'm like, yes, now that was cinema. That was cinema. That was pretty amazing.

00:10:54
Speaker 1: The movie feels like a movie in that moment.

00:10:56
Speaker 3: The movie was really feeling like a movie, because this is not a movie in which magic is a factor. But like Catwoman, Mary Poppins, I know there was some sort of gadget, but I was like, no way, no way. I know, wow, that's passive. Well, I'm excited to talk about the story. I also did a fairly deep dive on the meat because I mean that to me, when I think of mister and Missus Smith, I think of the media cycles around it more so than the movie that I didn't care about, never saw. So we're firing on all cylinders today because it was. I mean, it's probably one of the most famous tabloid sagas of our lifetime that has oh boy been, I think thoughtfully reappraised many times in the last couple of years. And also Brad Pitt is a domestic abuser. We simply have to say it at the top of the show. Whose children hate him? So you know, so much to talk about today, a rich church uterie of discourse.

00:11:58
Speaker 1: Indeed, shall we make a quick break and then come back for the recap. Let's do that, Okay, and we're back.

00:12:15
Speaker 3: We're back. It's still Caitlin's birthday and we are mister and missus Smith. Can I just say before we even start, how I've never like because I didn't outside of Brad Pitt and Angelina Joliet, had no idea who is in this movie. I haven't experienced this in a long time, But when Vince Vaughn came on the screen, I experienced a full body shutter. And I don't even like hate him, but I just like, for whatever headspace I was in when I was watching this yesterday, I was like, not today, No, I can't do Vince Vaughan today. And of course he's the worst character.

00:12:53
Speaker 1: In the movie, Oh my gosh.

00:12:55
Speaker 3: And you're like, why is he here? And then you do a little research and you're like, well, it's the same director as Swingers. That's why he's here.

00:13:01
Speaker 1: Yes, that is why he's here. And he's playing a character that was his like bread and butter during this time, and also in Swingers era.

00:13:09
Speaker 3: Misogynists, Piece of Shit, Loser.

00:13:12
Speaker 1: Wedding Crashers, he plays basically the same character. Oh really Yeah, he's just like spewing hatred toward women in every line of dialogue, and that is his character.

00:13:25
Speaker 3: Also on top of that, it seems like, I don't know, I feel like you see misogynist characters who are meant to look very like smooth, and then you see misogynist characters and I'm just talking about this era of movies who it's clear that they're being hateful out of rejection. I don't like to see either. But right you know, the very like he lives with his mom, which are like, it's just all so lazily written.

00:13:55
Speaker 1: And I feel like this movie falls somewhere in the middle because we're not supposed to be like, Wow, he's awesome and hilarious, but we're also like, he's still an ally to the characters we're meant to be rooting for, and no one ever calls him out on his behavior. So it's just sort of presented uncritically and where I think meant to laugh along at what he's saying.

00:14:18
Speaker 3: I think in two thousand and five seems likely. I don't know. I haven't seen wedding crashers, and I'm God willing I'll never have to. If you're a mad trend, and I hope you are, please never vote for wedding crashers. But it's on the poll. I never want to watch it. If I can get through my whole life with never seeing wedding crashers, that'll be all right.

00:14:45
Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree.

00:14:46
Speaker 3: Anyways, mister and Missus Smith, what happens to this damn movie?

00:14:49
Speaker 1: So we open on a couple's counseling session where we meet a married couple mister and Missus Smith, that's the name of them, who are John and Jane played by Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. And we see them talking to the therapist and they are not on the same page maritally, and they then start to tell the story of how they met. So five or six years ago, they were both in Columbia during a flurry of police activity, so they kind of come together to keep each other safe and they hit it off and have a whirlwind romance. A few weeks past, John is talking to his friend slash colleague Eddie that's Vince Vaughn, saying how he proposed to Jane. They're getting married. Meanwhile, Jane is talking to her friend Jasmine played by Carrie Washington, who is too good for this movie.

00:16:00
Speaker 3: Kerry Washington is too good for so many of her early roles. I just hope that this is the kind of movie where you look at the budget and you're like, I certainly hope she got a good paycheck.

00:16:08
Speaker 1: I hope, but I also doubt.

00:16:11
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I mean I also have such doubts.

00:16:15
Speaker 1: We have such doubts, much like Meryl, Much like Merrill.

00:16:18
Speaker 3: I have such doubts.

00:16:19
Speaker 1: Yes, So they are talking about John aka they're not passing the Bechdel test, and Jane thinks that John is a construction contractor. John thinks Jane works in tech. What they don't know is that actually they're both assassins.

00:16:42
Speaker 3: WHOA. Yeah, I mean so much of this movie plays on I think very tropey views of what hetero marriage is, which is you secretly hate each other, uh huh. But also like this movie just takes it to such a far flung extent where I'm just like, oh my god, what is this writer's marriage. Like, we're like, obviously it's not autobiographical, because then he would be cool. But the fact that they're like they don't even know really what each other does, I don't know, it's funny. It's weird, right.

00:17:14
Speaker 1: So I have a little bit of information on this, pulling, of course, from scholarly journal Wikipedia once again hit me. The movie was written by Simon Kinberg.

00:17:25
Speaker 3: Who's written I think some of the most hated X Men movies.

00:17:28
Speaker 1: Also, oh, I didn't even realize that.

00:17:31
Speaker 3: Throughout Dark Phoenix, I believe or produce Dark Phoenix.

00:17:34
Speaker 1: Ooof well, he wrote and sold the script while he was a grad student, and he had the idea for the movie after listening to a couple of his friends who went to marriage therapy, and he thought that it sounded aggressive and mercenary, and he's like, hmm, this would make an interesting template for a relationship inside of an action movie. So he just like took his friend's marital problems and then put that in an action movie.

00:18:11
Speaker 3: Question mark, So I mean, I don't hate that, Like I get what he's saying, but also I don't know, it's weird. I sort of thought that, like, the therapy was presented less hatefully than therapy often is in movies of this era, So it's interesting to think that he actually didn't feel that way. Well, who knows, but it didn't read to be as like outwardly like I thought. It was like a fun framing device that makes it clear that he's a piece of shit, which I know the movie isn't really capable of showing, but I had no issue with the actual framing device.

00:18:45
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it works for me. So then we cut to five or six years later, and again their marriage is rocky and unaffectionate. They are not open with each other. They still don't know what the other one actually does for a living. Then we see Jane leave one evening on an assignment. She goes to see an arms dealer pretending to be a dominatrix, then kills him. Meanwhile, John assassinates a few guys at a poker game. They both make swift escapes, and they reconvene at their suburban neighbors holiday party, and we're like, Wow, what a contrast between their sexy lives as assassins and suburban life.

00:19:38
Speaker 3: There's a lot of these coming out. I was thinking about the bad sorry frank Oz, but the bad Stepford Wives adaptation that came out like the year before or after this. Like there's a lot of oh yeah, weird attempts. I feel like, with like summery blockbusters to comment on suburban life. And I'm sure there was a good one. I don't know that I've seen it. Anyways, this is another one where you're just like, sure, they're not like other suburbanites, but like, that doesn't mean that we like that. I don't know.

00:20:11
Speaker 1: Well, Stepford Wives was the reason that Nicole Kidman, who was originally considered for Jane Smith oh right, yes, couldn't do the movie because she was too busy filming Stepford Wives.

00:20:24
Speaker 3: Wow. Well, I guess this movie was technically more successful. But I mean, I feel like there would be a rift in the space time continuum if this movie's casting went differently.

00:20:34
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, oh my gosh, yeah, because I mean, I mean, you would probably never have the Branjelina of it all.

00:20:42
Speaker 3: Which might be for the best for all parties, but also like, yeah, if the casting for this movie's leads went different, America, as we know it would crumble, like what would people have talked about?

00:20:56
Speaker 1: True? In any case, So John and Jane then both head off to work at their respective assassin offices, and they both get the same assignment to kill Benjamin Dance played by Adam Brody, who we've already seen receive an assignment of his own, although we don't know what it is.

00:21:21
Speaker 5: See.

00:21:21
Speaker 3: That was my pleasant jump scare was Adam Brodie's appearance in this movie had.

00:21:27
Speaker 1: No idea good for him, good for him for.

00:21:29
Speaker 3: A second when I think you first see him from the back, and I was like, if that is justin Bartha, I'm gonna lose it. But regrettably it was not just. I mean, I'm happy either way. I'm happy either way.

00:21:42
Speaker 1: Yeah. Now it's Adam Brody, and he's also being a misogynist because he's like ordering a woman to bring him a cup of coffee and that's not her job and he sucks.

00:21:54
Speaker 3: Yeah. And if there's one thing Adam Brody's gonna do and he's typecast, it's be a piece of shit.

00:22:00
Speaker 1: True.

00:22:01
Speaker 3: I was like, Wow, it's really been twenty years of Adam Brody being type cast as a piece of shit.

00:22:07
Speaker 1: I wonder what He's like, in real life, we're seeing a pattern, aren't we of male actors being type cast as misogynists? Hmm, wonder what's up with that?

00:22:19
Speaker 3: But the twist is, in this movie, we're supposed to be rooting for at least one of them. Yeah, we're supposed to be laughing, laughing, laughing. Yeah.

00:22:29
Speaker 1: Anyway, So John and Jane separately go to a location in the desert near the US Mexico border where they know Benjamin is going to be, and they're planning their attack, and then they both realize another assassin is there, and they try to sabotage the other one because they don't realize it's their spouse whoa Neither are successful in their mission to kill Adam Brody. Jane flees the scene. Great, Yeah, I think I just started calling him Adam Brody like from this point on.

00:23:05
Speaker 3: I mean, what the hell are we supposed to call?

00:23:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know, Benjamin, you're right now, get a grip. So Jane flees the scene and John takes her laptop to try to figure out who that was. Meanwhile, Jane is at Lady Assassin Headquarters Industries because everyone she works with is a woman whoa feminism alert.

00:23:30
Speaker 3: I mean it's a fun idea. It's a fun idea.

00:23:35
Speaker 1: Although her boss, who they call Father played by Keith David, is I think the only man and he's like, you have forty eight hours to clean the scene, aka find the other guy and kill him, or else she will become the next target. So we cut back to John, who finds out an address for the left and goes there discovers that it's the office of his wife wa Meanwhile, Jane is looking at footage of the other Assassin in the desert and she realizes it's her husband. So they both go home, pretending like everything is normal, but dinner is very tense, and then some wine gets spilled and they both leave under the pretense of they're going to clean it up, but actually John grabs a gun, Jane speeds off in the car and they part ways. So then John goes to Vince Vaughn's.

00:24:42
Speaker 3: House mistake number one.

00:24:46
Speaker 1: Seriously, Jane goes to Lady Assassin headquarters and talks to Kerry Washington. Both John and Jane are relaying that their spouse is the other assassin and that they have to kill them. Although they seem to be contemplating whether or not they can go through with it. The idea is they claim to not love each other, but you can see that they seem to actually have feelings for each other that they're not willing to admit. So John goes to Jane's office to try to kill her, although he can't go through with it, and she escapes. Then he goes to her backup.

00:25:29
Speaker 3: Office question mark, I don't.

00:25:32
Speaker 1: I was also confused, And then she explodes the elevator that he's in, except she didn't really mean to, and now she's sad, and she goes to a fancy dinner by herself and she's having a little tear falling down her face. But surprise, John shows up because he was in a different elevator I guess.

00:25:55
Speaker 3: And I also was like the writing on that was also so confusing. I was like, how did he get? I also did. My favorite character in the movie is the person that Angelina Jolly works with who kills Brad Pitton, and then Angelina Jolly is like, wait, what which First of all, you have to brief the room if you're bluffing. Yes, So another example of just both of these assassins are not very good at being assassins. I don't know why they're so high up in assassining. Assassinating.

00:26:32
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, I think the first one was good.

00:26:35
Speaker 3: But just that there's like an unnamed character who's like, what you said, you said goodbye? Yeah, it's like good for her, she's good at her job. Promote her, right.

00:26:47
Speaker 1: So anyway, John shows up to this dinner and they're sitting together, guns pointed at each other, trying to figure out how to proceed. They dance a violent but also jornie tango, but then she tries to kill him again by planting a bomb on him. Oops, and she escapes and he takes the bomb off or whatever. They both race home, but they're talking to each other on the phone on the way, and John is trying to be sentimental. It's clear that there are feelings between them, but they're not really willing to fully admit it. They get home, they're sneaking around, they're gathering weapons, and then there's a big shootout. Then it turns into hand to hand combat, but in so doing they realize that they can't kill each other. And then suddenly they're making out and then they have sex, and the passion is reignited. In their relationship and for the first time, they're honest with each other about their lives and their pasts, and they're telling each other all of this stuff about who they really are. But oh no, now there's a hit out for both John and Jane and Vince Fawn gets notification to kill them, and other assassins come after them also, So Jane and John steal their neighbor's car and escape. There's a whole car chase. They kill the people chasing them. Then they go to see Vince Vaughn to get some intel on who's after them and how many people, and he's like, basically, everyone from both of your agencies are going to try to kill you. If you separate, you have a shot, but if you stay together, you're dead unless you can find something that they want more than you. So John and Jane kidnap the original target, Adam Brody, and he reveals he was never actually the target that they were because they're agencies found out that they were married, so they set up a sting to get them to kill each other, and Adam Brody was just the bait.

00:29:07
Speaker 3: It's the classic I'm just an intern, I'm just a little stinker and sure.

00:29:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, so he was the bait and he still is. The flock of assassins are approaching, so John and Jane do contemplate splitting up and going their separate ways, but they decide to stay together and fight, and they end up in this like big box store for home goods or something. It's like an Ikea.

00:29:39
Speaker 3: Again, some attempt to like be better than the mall or whatever. They're like, we're built different, screw the mall. You're like, sure, whatever.

00:29:51
Speaker 1: So they're in this store and assassins surround them, but mister and missus Smith take out all of the enemies and they win, and we cut back to them a couple's therapy. Their marriage is in a better place because now they're honest with each other and they fuck all of the time.

00:30:14
Speaker 5: The end.

00:30:16
Speaker 1: Oh, that's the movie. Let's take another quick break and we'll come back to discuss. Yay, we're back.

00:30:34
Speaker 3: Okay, where should we begin.

00:30:38
Speaker 1: I kind of want to briefly go through the various other renditions of this narrative. Yeah, because there are a few. Yeah, they're kind of relevant. I suppose I was more just sort of interested in them. So there's a Hitchcock movie from nineteen four forty one, a rare Hitchcock comedy. Fun fact, I watched this movie back in probably like two thousand and seven or something because I was like, I like mister and missus Smith from two thousand and five, I wonder what the Hitchcock one is like, and it basically has nothing to do with really. So the story is that there's a married couple where the woman finds out that their marriage was never actually valid, and so they have various arguments and eventually split up and she starts dating another man, but her husband, David keeps following her, just stalking her, and she keeps being like, no, I don't want to get back together with you, and he's like, well, what about if we do? And that's basically the story. And then they realize that actually they are meant for each other, and then they kiss at the end, and I guess they get back together. So it's about like a marriage that isn't valid and then they have to decide if they want to actually be together as a married couple or not.

00:32:12
Speaker 3: So very little to do, Okay, a lot of logistics in there.

00:32:18
Speaker 1: Yes, I thought the movie was pretty bad. I didn't enjoy it at all when I watched it, and so great that is that version. Apparently, there is an American crime drama TV series that aired for like two months in nineteen ninety six before it got canceled, oh, called Mister and Missus Smith. It stars Scott Bacula and Maria Below. Okay, minion, Oh, okay.

00:32:50
Speaker 3: First, that better be how she pronounces it, Maria below, Bello, That one I didn't come across. I mean I came across the original, but we interesting.

00:33:01
Speaker 1: So the premise for this one, and I think it again, only aired for like a dozen or so episodes, But the premise is a spy known only as mister Smith. That's Scott Bakula works for a private security organization known as the Factory, and in the pilot a rival named Missus Smith Maria below it comes entangled in a case with mister Smith, and then after losing her job when the mission fails, the Factory hires her and assigns them to work together. And even though they often bicker and they know nothing about each other's personal lives, including their real names, they make a good team. So this one's closer.

00:33:48
Speaker 3: Right, inching toward what we have?

00:33:50
Speaker 1: Yeah, and then as I said, I watched the pilot of the twenty twenty four TV series starring Donald Glover and Maya Erskin, where two strangers independently agree to become secret agents for a mysterious organization undercover as a married couple. So in this series, they know that the other one is a spy from the very beginning. It's just that the marriage is a sham. They are not actually married. I don't know how the rest of the episodes pan out, but I do know that they like start to get to know each other a little bit better. I don't know if a romance develops or not. I didn't watch that far into it.

00:34:33
Speaker 3: I've heard good things about it. I think it's probably worth watching, but this is famously not a TV or reading podcast, and so we simply can't speak to it. I feel like I missed the media cycle for that series, and I am kind of intrigued. I think I will watch it.

00:34:48
Speaker 1: I liked the first episode. I would keep going, and.

00:34:52
Speaker 3: I guess time will sort of tell. With the most recent adaptation, I feel like, at least at the time of this recording, this render of Mister and Missus Smith is the best known yes because it was a really really really successful movie, like kind of more successful than I remembered. It almost made half a billion dollars twenty years ago, which is just I guess everybody saw this movie except for me. Like pretty wild, pretty impressive and one of the kind of I think broiest creative teams I've come across in a movie we've covered in a while. And that's sort of saying something. We've got the director of Swingers and Bourne Identity One, We've got the writer of. Actually I did like this movie, but it is I think bro Cannon guy Ritchie Sherlock Holmes.

00:35:47
Speaker 1: Oh, I also like the movie.

00:35:50
Speaker 3: He directed what I think is considered the worst X Men movie of all time. You know, he's just kind of slaying no. But it just took a really interesting Broie Missus Smith never stood a chance, is what I'm saying. Yeah, in terms of there being any sort of nuance there, I kind of want to talk about the characters first and then get into the media thing because I feel like that's just like almost a whole other podcast. So I don't want to forget to talk about the characters. Yeah, Kiten, what do you what do you think that mister and missus Smith. I don't care for them, and I really don't care for mister Smith. I fucking hate the guy.

00:36:30
Speaker 1: Yeah, he is awful.

00:36:33
Speaker 3: To me.

00:36:34
Speaker 1: What I was getting was like mister Smith, I mean, I think he's way worse at his job. I think that Jane is a more competent spy and you know, a woman in an action movie. I appreciate that she is the better one at her job, and that's a job that in I'm sure real life and in movies is commonly associated with a man doing that job. So I appreciated that she was at least shown as being competent at her job.

00:37:09
Speaker 3: Yeah.

00:37:09
Speaker 1: However, I think that as far as characterization goes, like what even is her personality? I feel like she's so underwritten.

00:37:16
Speaker 3: I feel like that for every woman we see, really because I think it's like even more intensely contrasted between Kerrie Washington and Vince Vaughn where they're playing for sure, mister and missus Smith's respective best friends. And you can just tell that the writer, I mean, Simon Kimberg very well, maybe a nice guy, but I don't think he has any grip on what women would say to each other if left in a room, and it felt clear every time that happened, which was almost.

00:37:49
Speaker 1: Never, it was not very much. But even if she's interacting with her husband, I feel like she just like is a blah nothing like there's no personality there. At least John gets.

00:38:05
Speaker 3: Jokes, Yeah, John and Vaughn.

00:38:08
Speaker 1: John and Vaughn. Whether or not you laugh at them is kind of beside the point. But they're written in such a way that you know they're the funny ones. They get the jokes. And meanwhile, Jane is humorless and she isn't generating any of the comedy in this action comedy aside from maybe one or two punchlines that they give her, but generally speaking, like she's sort of a nothing character, no personality, She's humorless. Meanwhile, the men get to have fun. We were talking about this a lot on the Knocked Up episode, where the men are written to be funny and goofy and the women are like humorless shrews, and I found that to be the case for this movie as well.

00:39:01
Speaker 3: I didn't find them to be I guess as like shrewy in this movie as they certainly as they are in like jud Apatow movies of the same era, I guess I more found them to just be nothing right, like nothing, which is really frustrated because you consider, like Angelaine and jo Lee had an oscar like why didn't you write her a part? Which I know happens to successful actresses in particular all the time, but it's just like, come on, yeah, and I think that you know, she and Carrie Washington do everything with what they're given, but they're not given very much. And I think that the best moments for Angelina and Jolie, I feel like there's references to her. I guess what her persona would have been at the time, where like she's like this famous, gorgeous woman with a history of like publicly being into kink, so I feel like there are like references to that throughout the day. It's like fun, I don't know, I mean, and this happened all the time still, but like you've been given this tremendously talented actor and she's just traded like a body right and totally, which I feel like early on in us doing this show, I like, I feel like I had kind of like an undercooked like she's being objectified and like, which is very, very often true, and I think is often true in this movie. But isn't an inherently bad thing to be sexy in a movie? Like that's yeah, technically right. Part of the appeal of this movie is two hot people fighting. Fine, great, Like I'm seated for that, but it's just you also have to be able to like do other things, or it starts to feel like, well, you're just a body if you're not given any sort of like if you don't have a character, right, and so yeah, like Brad Pitt is hot with a character, and Angelina Jilly is hot without a character, and so you're just like, well, yeah, that's they did the thing.

00:40:59
Speaker 1: That's men writing a movie for you. I am speculating here, but it feels so much to me as I watched this movie that the direction that director Doug Lyman was giving to Angelina Jolie and every scene was be sexier, flutter your eyelashes, do something with your posture.

00:41:23
Speaker 5: Do you know?

00:41:24
Speaker 1: It was like the note was always like be sexier, as if like that's a replacement for having a personality, because that's what you're seeing in every scene. It's him being funny, cracking a joke, being goofy whatever, and then her just sort of like pursing her lips or fluttering her eyelashes or something like.

00:41:47
Speaker 3: That, which it's like she's great at for sure, but also she has a fucking oscar. Like I think that you see a lot of the same stuff like we talked about truly, like probably over seven years ago now the turmb Raider movies, where I think that she is objectively less objectified in this movie than she is in the turmb Raider movies. But that is not really a yardstick that anyone should have to use. Yeah, So, I mean it just feels like a classic example of especially because while Brad Pitt is a piece of shit domestic abuser, he's a good actor. Right, So you have two famously talented actors at this time, the more decorated actor is being given absolutely nothing, and you know, no one really said much about it. And while this movie's coming out, Angelina Jolie specifically is getting pummeled in the media, and.

00:42:49
Speaker 1: So it's just almost like society hates women.

00:42:55
Speaker 3: What it's misogyny and soost like everyone hates women. You know, the show is about very obvious in this movie, this movie, I mean if nothing else. It just feels like lazy and it's characterization of women. It's just like neither director nor writer talked to any women that they knew to see this. I mean, I feel like that's also reflected in how lazy the uh attempted, like Upper Crest suburban commentary is in this movie where you know, Frank Oztepford Wives isn't great, but it's at least specific in like what it's trying to do. It doesn't do a great job, but you can see the attempt. But it's just like men be doing business, women be holding babies and wearing ugly sweaters, and you're like, certainly like the rich upstate New York white upper class like fair game, but like it's not saying anything. I don't know, it was just bizarre. I think one positive thing or maybe just one thing, let's let's see, let's see this that I was surprised. I guess that this wasn't present because I feel like, you know, like there are a couple in their thirties and their homeowners and blah blah blah, there is not any baby storyline between the two of them. I was sort of expecting that just because of what I am trained to expect from movies about heterosexual couples that are thirty or over. And there is like one scene where like missus Smith is holding a baby and she's sort of like I liked that, and I liked that it never came back and you were just like, Okay, they don't want kids, and I think that, given the fact that their assassins and bad at it, that's probably for the best. But that's like, yeah, one of the only nice things I can say about this movie is I kept expecting that to become a thing and it never did. However, so many of the one liners, because like you're saying, like he is supposed to be funny, and maybe in two thousand five people, I mean people seem to be laughing to the tune of half a billion dollars.

00:45:04
Speaker 1: I mean yeah, but.

00:45:05
Speaker 3: Like any like little comment, any quip that he'd throw to her would be like I don't like your cooking, I don't like you. Like they're also his wife codd in a way that like it was annoying because it was sexist and annoying, but it was also annoying because it just was like bad writing, where like he's talking to her, like the quality of her cooking was something that we know is very important to her, when we have no real reason to believe that that's true. Like it just seems like again like the writers being like, well, what would hurt a woman's feelings? And I don't know, it's just so lazy and felt like dated for two thousand and five, like it just sucked.

00:45:53
Speaker 1: Yes, and he's just mean to her.

00:45:55
Speaker 3: He's just mean to her, and then he's slutshames her at the end, you know, just anything you could possibly imagine that you wouldn't want. It's kind of the murderer's row.

00:46:04
Speaker 1: Yes, there's all these examples of him. He like comments on our cooking three times, like why, and then it's revealed that like she doesn't cook, like the women at Lady Assassin Headquarters cook for her or something. But you also like see her preparing food. So I'm like, but we are seeing her I don't know anyway.

00:46:26
Speaker 3: Yeah, so like more bad writing and like inconsistent writing, but also just like counting on your assumption that any woman would be so hurt if her husband didn't like her cooking, and you're just like.

00:46:43
Speaker 1: Right, yeah, at least she's like I don't care what you think about my cooking. Stopped talking about it. Right, There are a few things that I don't hate, and I think are probably why I connected to this movie as much as I did in two thousand five. One of them is her participation in the action where and we've had this conversation many times at this point as far as like, if a woman is allowed to be in an action movie, is she allowed to fight? And if so, what does that look like? And in this case, again we see her being competent at her job. She gets to do stuff. She's doing action movie things. She's shooting guns, she's driving in the chase scene.

00:47:30
Speaker 3: She's allowed to fight her husband.

00:47:32
Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, that's an almost like separate conversation as far as like men and women can they fight each other? But before I kind of dive more into that, there's just like things that she's allowed to do that often aren't afforded to women in action movies. You know, there's a scene during that chase scene where they're in the minivan. John isn't able to take out the last two cars chasing them, and so she takes charge and she's the one to take out those cars, and there might be some like possibly gendered things attached to this, But she's the more sort of like meticulous planner assassin. That's her approach to her job, whereas John is the more like, oh I'll improvise. Oh I'm just gonna wing it. And then that manifests and.

00:48:23
Speaker 3: He is very often wrong.

00:48:25
Speaker 1: He's often wrong, and she's usually right. But when she calls him out for it, I feel like the movie is framing those moments as like she's nagging him and he got the job done, so what's the big deal. So I was feeling notes of that.

00:48:44
Speaker 3: I kept going back and forth on that, yeah, because it's like, I think that you can read it both ways, but I just don't see any reason to give a generous read to this rider or director, right right.

00:48:55
Speaker 1: So I appreciate her involvement in the action. It's something that a lot of action movies before and since this movie wouldn't afford even like a lady assassin to be as involved in the action as she is. And then like we were saying, yes, she and a man are fighting each other, and this is another discussion we've had many times, I think, most recently on maybe the John Wick episode. But it's always been like, should we see a man punching a woman in a movie? Can a woman and a man fight each other? And I think our conversation has evolved over the years, but at least in this context, when they are both trained assassins and their mission is to kill each other, it stands to reason that they would be fighting, and the movie doesn't shy away from that. Again, it shows her just as competent of a fighter ye as him and their equals as far as like hand to hand combat and gun stuff.

00:50:09
Speaker 3: So and gun no, I agree with you. I think that that's something that, like, I wonder, I meant to look more into this because I feel like for years and years, whenever men and women would fight on screen, it would launch a bunch of op eds about like should this have happened? I will say for this one, and I'm wondering. I think that maybe it also has to do with how much I was reading about Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's relationship. It's only in one sequence, but let me know what you think. It was bothering me, and it could be a personal thing. But in the scene where they're fighting in their house, I get it like their assassins. I do feel like there's like erotic fighting, there's wish fulfillment stuff. It's blah blah blah. They're basically b dsming each other with any consent rules because it's blah blah blah. Yah, I get it. I do feel as if though, that like all of her moves or the majority of her moves to me, looked like fight moves, looked like martial arts right training, and I felt like his moves often looked more just like domestic abuse and shoving her against a wall and just throwing her over a table, and like, I don't know, it bugged me, Yeah, the fight choreography, like he did do martial arts stuff, and she didn't break shit over his head. So maybe I was reading into it a little too hard, but there were like several things, especially because it's Brad Pitt and we know he's a domestic abuser, right like that, just like I don't know, Yeah, But then in any other fight sequence they're in together, it's just that long fight sequence where they're fighting each other where it just felt like she was almost always doing clear martial arts stuff. I felt like he was like half and half he was very often just pushing her. I didn't like that fight sequence very much.

00:52:06
Speaker 1: That didn't ping for me because I didn't super notice it. I'm not saying it didn't happen. I would just have to like rewatch and look more closely at that. But I'd imagine it's because of the whole Oh, he's the fly by the seat of his pants assassin and she's the meticulous one, and so maybe that also manifested in the fight choreography. But then if you're a filmmaker making that choice for the characters and for the actors, you have to understand the implications of what that actually looks like and like, what are the optics of a man fighting that way?

00:52:47
Speaker 3: I know, I felt like I was writing the op ed into that as the time I'm I think, but because I do think it is like if they didn't they have to fight each other, like, it's also besogae if they if they don't let her fight, like that's ridiculous. It was just the way there was just like a few choices that just felt yeah, I mean not even necessarily unrealistic if you're fighting somewhat, but like, I just didn't like it. I didn't like it fair, I don't like this spuffee. Let's see what else I will say.

00:53:19
Speaker 1: The one other thing that I appreciate on this watch, although it's perhaps open to interpretation, but I thought it was interesting that of the two of them, the man seems to be the more sentimental one, or at least someone who's more willing to express his feelings. Because there are different scenes, such as when they're doing the tango in the restaurant or when they're on the phone with each other as they're both driving back home. He's sort of like probing to see if she does have feelings for him, and he's being a bit more open about how he does have feelings for her, and he says something like I thought you looked like Christmas morning, right, And she's like, no, it was only ever just work. And so she's like kind of the cold, calculated one, and he's the one more willing to be warm and like try to coax emotion out of her, which is something you don't often see in totally hetero relationships, you know, and it's obviously because of social conditioning, where men are conditioned to be the more kind of closed off ones emotionally generally speaking men are not taught how to regulate or express their emotions very well. So I thought that that was an interesting subversion at the very least.

00:54:53
Speaker 3: Yeah, I agree, And then now I'm gonna be hate again. And I was surprised that, you know, she like she and Carrie Washington very frankly of like Carrie Washington's character is like, well, you don't love him, so that's great, and She's like, I know, I don't.

00:55:06
Speaker 1: But then she like kind of like has a moment to herself where she's like, but do I love him?

00:55:13
Speaker 3: Right, which is like, I guess this goes back to the fact that a character was not necessarily written for Miss Jane Smith as being a core issue because outside of them both being hot and obviously they have chemistry, they like got together because of this movie. But if you're just reading they like, I don't understand what she gained by staying with him. I don't know. I mean, we think this about couples all the time. I just like, he's such a fucking asshole. She's better at what they're doing than he is. And I understand that logistically, like now it's them versus the world, but it almost felt like a prison sentence for her where it's like good that she wanted to stay with him, because it didn't seem like the movie gave her room to leave him really because of what their circumstances, and I just it was weird, and also just the obsession that this movie had with how much the amount of time that he brought up how much they were or weren't fucking was incessant. And then like literally the last line in the movie is like, everything's great now because we fuck every day, You're like great. I don't know. I just think if it was in a different movie, I would be like whoo, But this one just didn't hit for me. I did like when Adam Brody wore the Fight Club T shirt that was.

00:56:36
Speaker 1: Finn I mean, haha, funny joke, get it. Yeah, I have a few more things to say about the characters themselves, and then we can sure move on. There were a few other things that I didn't like and just felt like it was leaning into gendered stereotypes and yeah stuff you brought up him slut shaming her towards the end because they're having a conversation where they're both saying a number of people it's not clear, and I think this is the joke. It's not clear if it's the number of people they've had sex with or it's the number of people they've killed. I think you can interpret it either way, and like the uncertainty is the joke in this situation. But either way, you can interpret it as she's fucked three hundred and seventeen people or whatever, and he's threatened by that because it's a lot more than he has, and he's then making slut shamey comments about her ear things that can be interpreted as slut shamey comments, and and this is just not a funny joke. Conversely, there's a scene where he as they're sort of divulging new information to each other that they've kept from each other all these years. He says something like I was made before, and she gets very pissed.

00:58:03
Speaker 3: Right, because that's what's supposed to matter to her, and sextual partners is what's supposed to have matter to him.

00:58:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, her being jealous of another woman and another romantic relationship he's had in the past, and she gets so mad about it, and it just felt like a very tropy, like pitting women against each other kind of thing. That men do in their writing. There's that there's similar to the he's obsessed with hating her cooking. There's another like runner about curtains, where she's like, look, I got new curtains, and he's.

00:58:44
Speaker 3: Also which to me, says I wrote that that like Simon Kinberg has never done a chore, because it's like also like he doesn't even know how to write about, like if you were a homemaker, what would be important? He's just like a.

00:58:58
Speaker 1: Curtain Like what do women do curtains?

00:59:01
Speaker 3: Right, Like being a homemaker is and doing domestic work in general is a very legitimate way to spend one's life. But the job isn't curtain like. It's just so brain was not on when writing any of the missus parts.

00:59:20
Speaker 1: Down, certainly not. Also the trope of like her guns are in the kitchen because women spend time in the kitchen, and his guns are in a garage because men like cars and they go into the garage.

00:59:39
Speaker 3: And I think it's just like so much of like their relationship is predicated on the fact that it is safe to assume that every married couple hates each other, which obviously isn't to say that like all marriages should be presented as happy and easy.

00:59:55
Speaker 1: Because that's not realistic either.

00:59:58
Speaker 3: Yeah, most people get divorced. But like just that, I find it so depressing just to be like, they've been married for five years and they're that miserable, they should get divorced. Like if I was married to Simon Kinberg, I'd be like, are you fucking kidding me? Yeah, fucking kidding me?

01:00:17
Speaker 1: Do then hate me? Yeah? I guess I appreciate that. The I suppose moral of the story is if you are open and honest with your romantic partner, it will lead to a healthier relationship.

01:00:32
Speaker 3: That's true. That is true. And I think, even in spite of the Kinberg comment that like, the movie is not against couples counseling, and that it seems like it actually amongst other things, like, yeah, the more honest they were with each other, the more deeply they fell in love. And that's a nice precedent. It's all over the place.

01:00:54
Speaker 1: Yeah. Also, I mean, speaking about the guns again, there's a part where after they've decided to like team up and collaborate and their allies, John hands Jane a gun and she's like, why do I get the girl gun? And then he like hands her a different gun, and I'm sure in two thousand and five they thought that was like feminism or something lazy. Yeah, yeah, I didn't really know what to make of that. But yeah, the movie's full of different moments where you're just like, I think they're trying something, or I think they're trying to comment on something or challenge a trope. But for the most part, it's just leaning into pretty gendered tropes over all.

01:01:45
Speaker 3: Yeah, Ultimately, if you're looking for a commentary, she's just not the movie to watch. I wanted to say, because I felt like I was losing my mind because she was then not credited and I didn't have the Wikipedia page in front of me. I just watched the movie straight through. Well, Bassett is in fact the voice of mister Smith's boss, because I was like, oh, so weird. It sounds like Angela Bassett, and it is because I think you just hear her on the phone, right and you're just like, whoa, And then who knows. I'm assuming that she knew the director or something. But there's that. In terms of the other characters in this movie, we don't really have much to talk about, I mean, other than the respective best friend characters, which, as we were hinting at earlier on, Vince Vaughn's character is just obnoxious. Every word that comes out of his mouth is misogynist. We've talked about characters like this in the past. He fucking sucks, and like you were saying earlier, Caitlin, like him, sucking is his personality. But he has a personality which we cannot say a Kerry Washington's character, Jasmine, who is playing a very stock best friend character and I think like also very much plays into the black best friend trope where we know nothing about her other than she is Jane Smith's friend and co worker and is there to ask her questions and to ask her like plot questions that set up Jane's also poorly written emotional arc. Yeah, so, like you said earlier, like Kerry Washington, obviously, I mean not only deserves better, but like Angelina, Julie very much proven that she's way too good for this movie. Other than that, I mean, this movie really does sort of stay locked on mister and missus Smith. I don't really know if I have much to say about any other characters besides them, and they're best friends.

01:03:44
Speaker 1: Vince Vaughn gets more screen time than Carrie Washington does, which is also telling easily. I think Adam Brody also gets more screen time than Carrie Washington. I do like the idea of an old lady assassin agency, but we don't really know anything about it or what the deal is there.

01:04:05
Speaker 3: So a strong idea to introduce. Yeah, that was the kind of thing. My note there was like I really love that, and I wish there was more of it. But also it's not like I want to know what this creative team things happens there, and all women's Assassin Squad would look like you know, there's better movies about it, and some of them written by other misogynists. I'm thinking about kill Bill, great movie about I guess majority women's the Deadly Viper. Yeah, assassination Squad.

01:04:37
Speaker 1: Four of the five of them are women.

01:04:40
Speaker 3: Should we talk about the brandolina of it all?

01:04:43
Speaker 1: Let's do it. I think you probably have more research on this than I do. I just mostly remember like the anecdotal stuff as it was happening in real time.

01:04:53
Speaker 3: Actually, I wanted to start with that before getting into the specifics. This is a sort of a detour into a tiny you're wrong about episode I wanted to know what your recollection was of that media cycle before I talked about it.

01:05:07
Speaker 1: Here's my recollection. I don't know how reliable this information is.

01:05:13
Speaker 3: It's your recollection. So that's the thing. I feel like, probably it's wrong, and that's interesting.

01:05:20
Speaker 1: So I remember Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston being this power couple that everyone was obsessed with and oh my gosh, they're gonna make it and everyone loves them as a celebrity couple. And then Angelina and Jolie enters the picture by way of this movie, because this set is where Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie met, and I remember the kind of media attention around this being that, oh, Angelina Jolie is a home wrecker and she broke up this amazing couple. I also remember something to the effect of the reason that Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston cited as splitting up had something to do with the fact that she didn't want to have children and he did, so I vaguely remember something about that being part of the reason that they split up, but everyone was like, well, it's obviously actually because he fell in love with Angelina and Jolly instead yeah, I just remember that part of it and Angelina and Jolie getting a lot of guff for being a home wrecker. I didn't feel really one way about it or the other because I've never been a celebrity gossip person. I just like let it wash over me and I don't pay attention and like, honestly, until the news broke pretty recently, was it in the past year that Brad Pitt was outed as an abuser? The past year or two, I think.

01:06:58
Speaker 3: In a major way. Yeah, in the celebrity gossip world it was, which is a part of this story. And again, like I'll say, for anyone listening for a comprehensive version of this story, this is not the place. But I think it became more commonly reported in the last couple of years, but the story has been out there for a long time. I believe that the assault.

01:07:25
Speaker 1: That is think twenty sixteen.

01:07:27
Speaker 3: Yeah, so the like as long as this show has been like eight years ago, essentially, like I mean, and who knows what a marriage ending, but that was sort of the final straw. And when I think it's presented that Angelina Jolie was like, this is not safe for me or the kids, and we've got to get the fuck out of here, right. Yeah.

01:07:47
Speaker 1: So my point is I didn't know about that story when it happened in twenty sixteen. I didn't either, and until it was like sort of re reported post me two, I thought they were still married. Like, I didn't even know they got divorced. Like that's the level at which I'm paying attention to celebrity gossip, so it's almost none. I rarely care about it like that, It's just not my thing.

01:08:14
Speaker 3: Well, that's why I was curious, like what your memory of the time was, because it was like, whether you were interested in the story or not, you couldn't avoid it, really, Okay, So yes, the truth thing is that these two met on the set of this movie, began having an affair while brad Pitt was still married to Jennifer Aniston, and that he then left Jennifer Aniston and in quick order was with Angelae Jullie. They didn't get married for years, but there was also and I won't get too deep into this, but there was pretty soon after they were together they started having children and adopting children, and ultimately I think that they have five or six children together, either biological or adopted, and from what I have gathered, none of these children want anything to do with brad Pitt, and that's just the truth anyways, But just trying to keep stuff in order. At the time, I feel like you sort of got this very classic Madonna horror tabloid story with Jennifer Aniston and Angelina Joe Lee. The two essays that I'm pulling from here. The first was published last year in Vox by Constance Grady. Brad Pitt was the only winner of the Aniston Jolie tabloid battle. The other is an older piece by a writer I really really like, Anne Helen Peterson in BuzzFeed. Amember that from twenty fourteenth's almost ten years ago, and that piece is more of a deep dive on how Angelina Joe Lee essentially had to like pr maneuver her way out of this fucking nightmare yea, and eventually, at least at the time it was published, seemed to have successfully done. So both are really good pieces. I'd recommend checking both out, particularly the more recent one. But essentially, I mean, and I remember this even though I was eleven and should not have known any of this, even though I wasn't interested in it. Just you couldn't go to a grocery store without being confronted with this story.

01:10:18
Speaker 1: The cover of every magazine.

01:10:20
Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know, I feel like the story evolved over time, and it started as you know, Angelina Jolie is a man stealer, Jennifer Aniston is the sweet girl next door. Angelina Jolie is this like vampy man stealer, home wrecker essentially, which media of the time really played into ways that she had either presented herself or been framed in the past of like, you know, early Angelina jo Lee kissed her brother and like wore Billy Bob Thornton's blood around her neck, and like she was a weird lady like and I think that anything she did in her twenties, and she also had I don't know a ton about her early life except that she is the daughter of John Voight, who's famously a piece of fucking garbage, and like, I believe they don't have a relationship anyways. Sounds like a difficult upbringing, a kind of like tumultuous twenties that she had, but also very successful. She wanted to oscar for girl interrupted. But either way, they're like okay, Jennifer Anison good, Angelina Jolee bad. However, as time went on, that narrative didn't flip, but it did change where once Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt had a family and Angelina Joe which had already begun. And I want to be careful not to like position any humanitarian work that she's done as disingenuous, Like I don't think that that is true. We don't need to get into the weeds of like, well, what is it, you know whatever. I do believe that the convictions that she's presented, it's been at least on a long enough timeline that whether you agree with the particulars or not, it seems to be a big part of her life. But as that became a bigger part of her life, and she sort of was presented as less of a home wrecking vamp and more of a mother of five who did all of this work, you see the narrative flip. And like all, Angelina Julie is not bad anymore. The more she leans into motherhood, or the more the media leads into the image of motherhood, she's presented better and better. And meanwhile, Jennifer Aniston does not end up having children, and she's presented as pathetic on a longer timeline. Yeah, you're totally right that at the time, it was presented that Jennifer Anison didn't want children and Brady Pitt did so he found a woman who can give him children. It turns out that this is also not true. She had fertility issues and had them. I mean, I don't cannot speak to the timeline that she but it wasn't until like twenty nineteen where she gave an interview that was like, there was this popular narrative about me that like I didn't want to comment on because it's just like fucked up and weird, because whether you want children or not is a very personal decision and has nothing to do with anything. And also it shouldn't have been criticized if she didn't want children, but as it turns out, she did, and it was also just this like big traumatic lie. So it's, you know, one of the more I think famous and fucked up media narratives. Because of course in all of these, Brad Pitt is never presented as bad. It's he was tempted or he was not given the babies that he wanted, so who could blame him, which is a lot of what the vox essay is about of just like it was never even floated or presented that he could be at fault for anything. It has to be the fault of one woman or the other. And there were t shirts sold and all this shit. So I think, you know, Angelina and Jolie and Jennifery Addison's career, you have to imagine mental health are affected by that. And then on a longer timeline, Brad Pitt and Angelina and Jolie have a family together. They get married at some point, and he was an abusive alcoholic person to her, and without getting into I think we have referenced it on the show before and other Brad Pitt vehicles. I don't remember which episode off the top of my head, but essentially, he assaulted his wife and berated one of his children in front of the whole family on a plane in twenty sixteen, which resulted in an investigation. It resulted in police reports, and ultimately it was at least a contributing factor to their eventual divorce. What that looks like now, It was actually in the news as recently as four days before. We're recording this. I think a lot of the reason even though post me to, and I can't say exactly when I remember first hearing this story for the first time, but post me to this story was brought up again because I think that it was reported at the time, but no one took an.

01:15:42
Speaker 1: Interest culturally, we simply didn't yeah, post me to.

01:15:49
Speaker 3: So I guess anytime after late twenty seventeen, this story comes back, but it does keep kind of disappearing like it never stayed. It appears that the reason that is is because Brad Pitt has been repeatedly suing Angelina Jolie to get her to say less about this. Essentially, so the story I'm pulling from Angelina Jolie's lawyers call Brad Pitt's NDA request abusive in winery case, there's also this whole business like they're rich and so they had a winery business and they're in a fight with that. But basically like he's finding all of these reasons to sue her. Because I want to make sure I'm getting this correct. A quote from a Vulture article by Zoe Guy from a few days ago. Jolie's attorneys previously claimed Pitt wanted her to sign an onerous and expansive NDA that would quote cover Pit's personal misconduct, whether related to a Miraval, the winery, or not, including the abuse allegations related to an incident on a plane in twenty sixteen, in order for Jolee to agree to sell her stake in Miraval to Pit. When the deal fell apart over the matter, she sold her shares elsewhere, So essentially he's suing her for selling her shares to this winery she no longer wants anything to do with because she doesn't want to be involved in his life, and he attempted to make it impossible for her to extract herself from their co owned business unless she signed an NDA saying she could never publicly speak about him being a domestic abuser, Which how is that fucking legal? I couldn't tell you. But she just sort of was like It appears that she was sort of like fuck you and sold her shares off anyways, and now he's trying to sue her again. I think the Brad Pitt obviously has a very vested interest in his image and does not care about anybody, perhaps accept himself. Yeah, he is a bitch. I hate him in the bad way. We talked about this. I'm sorry, we talked about this our episode yesterday.

01:17:56
Speaker 1: I want Monsters Inc.

01:17:57
Speaker 3: Yeah, in Munsters Inc. Go to the Matreon.

01:18:00
Speaker 1: Bitch in a bad way, bitch in a bad way, or bitch is in a good way exactly.

01:18:05
Speaker 3: So, while there are you know, I'm sure plenty of criticisms of Angelina Julie that have nothing to do with this marriage. Brad Pitt very much the villain of this marriage and still actively the villain of this marriage. I want to just finally close by reading what their son Packs posted on Father's Day to his Instagram story. He said, Happy Father's Day to this world class asshole. You time and time again prove yourself to be a terrible and despicable person. You have no consideration or empathy towards your four youngest children, who tremble in fear when in your presence. You will never understand the damage you have done to my family because you are incapable of doing so. You have made the lives of those closest to me a constant hell. You may tell yourself in the world whatever you want, but the truth will come to light someday. So Happy Father's Day, you fucking awful human being, and so I see no reason not to go with him there. Yeah, and to believe children of abusive parents. It appears, at least at the time of this recording, it seems like Angelina Jolie has a good relationship with all of her children.

01:19:18
Speaker 1: They have six, By the way, I know that we were not sure if it's five or six.

01:19:21
Speaker 3: I was literally doing the mister and missus Smiths five.

01:19:24
Speaker 1: Or children, It's yeah, it's six, because.

01:19:28
Speaker 3: I think they had twins, And then I kept counting twins as one, which is twin discrimination. And I apologize to the twin community. But yes, it seems like Angelina, or at least their children publicly have a good relationship with her, and they also publicly fucking hate Brad Pitt. So fuck Brad Pitt. I guess is the little bow I want to put on that second.

01:19:51
Speaker 1: Yeah, there are a number of movies that he is the star of that I really like, and I don't consume those movies anymore, or at least not to the same extent that I was. But like you know, and we've talked about, I'm never gonna be someone who like separates the art from the artists. It doesn't necessarily mean that I will refuse to watch certain things. I will just be mindful of horrible people involved in the project. Yeah, it varies project a project or you know, actor or actor what you know. It's very much on a case by case basis.

01:20:31
Speaker 3: But and everyone's on like sort of a personal journey right with that, Like, I certainly don't think anyone who like would watch a movie with Brad Pittknitt is a bad person. I think he's just personally Yeah, I think as time goes on, I find him harder and harder to stummitch.

01:20:50
Speaker 1: Sure, And it's been a journey for me because like, there was a long time where he was someone I enjoyed very much watching on screen.

01:20:59
Speaker 3: And he's a good actor.

01:21:01
Speaker 1: Unfortunate he's a good actor, he is, and he's charismatic and charming the way that a lot of scary bad people are. And this was one of the harder ones for me to be like, oh, I don't fuck with him anymore. Fuck Brad Pitt.

01:21:18
Speaker 3: The end, this movie passes the Bechdel testing.

01:21:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, there are a few scenes in Lady Assassin Headquarters Industries where but although are they ever not talking about John Smith.

01:21:35
Speaker 3: Let me triple check, but I think I clocked a few like barely passes. I did technically pass, I would say spiritually definitely not. So whoever's editing the Wikipedia page these days sort of go with God. I would say, yeah it technically I think may pass between Jane and Jasmine, but spiritually know because neither of them are really characters that.

01:22:04
Speaker 1: Were written true.

01:22:05
Speaker 3: So it's challenging. Actually there's oh, this is one of my favorites because there is a like old website that we consult sometimes to check our own work Bectel test Dott. And every once in a while you find a movie where there is just a rich comment section where they're like, well, sort of and then other people are like, it doesn't. So jury's kind of out on this one that like the official ruling of the website is no. There's a lot of comments you're saying technically yes, I'd say, let's just go with no.

01:22:37
Speaker 1: I'm fine with that because either it's Kerry Washington's character and Jane Smith talking about killing a man that's better than nothing, but they are mostly talking about John Smith, I believe, And then there might be an interaction between Jane Smith and her neighbor, Missus Coleman. They're always talking about the Colemans, and maybe something there passes. But again, that's a very fleeting moment, a fleeting character, not plot impactful. So I would say spiritually know the movie does not pass the Bechdel.

01:23:17
Speaker 3: Test, and possibly technically now yes, but what about the most important media metric of all, Oh, do you.

01:23:24
Speaker 1: Mean the Bechdel cast nipple scale, where we rate the movie zero to five nipples based on examining it through an intersectional feminist lens. I'll give this movie one nipple. There are some things I did appreciate more at the time, and still to some degree appreciate, which is the woman's involvement in the action. I think a lot of other movies that would have an assassin who's a woman would still not let her do much. So I appreciate that she's a far more active participant in the action than we're accustomed to seeing, especially of movies from this era. And there are a couple other slight subversions that I appreciated, like the man being the more emotionally expressive, sentimental one and not that like I'm advocating for women to be closed off emotionally, it's more that a trope is present.

01:24:25
Speaker 3: But it does happen and you never see it.

01:24:27
Speaker 1: And you don't see it, and so I appreciate the subversion of that trope. But by and large, it's a movie leaning into gendered tropes and it's not as good as I once thought. The movie was so one nipple for the few things that I appreciate, and it goes to Carrie Washington. Justice for Carrie Washington.

01:24:53
Speaker 3: I am going to go half a nipple because I don't really I don't have a nostalgia for it. The more I read about it, the BRANDOLINASAKA, the more just like a hostile agridge with it. It's not you know, you cannot blame the movie itself, but spiritually I do. And so I'm gonna give it a half nipple, and I'm gonna give the half nipple to.

01:25:18
Speaker 2: Know.

01:25:18
Speaker 3: I'm gonna give it to Angelina Jolie. And with that, Caitlin, Happy freaking birthday.

01:25:25
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. If listeners want to do something nice for me on my birthday, g me. You can follow me on Instagram. I was just talking about this on the Monsters, Inc. Episode, which may have already come out or maybe it comes out very soon, but either way, on the Matreon, right on the Matreon. Either way. I am trying to do more stand up in LA and elsewhere, and it helps to get booked on shows the more followers you have. I don't necessarily like that that's the case, but it is. But we live the fact of the matter. We live in a society, So just follow me on Instagram so that I can appear to be a legitimate comedian.

01:26:16
Speaker 3: You are dufest wow thing.

01:26:19
Speaker 1: I mean, I know that, but bookers don't. Anyway, Listeners, thank you so much for listening to the show. And you know, I just feel extra sentimental on my birthday and finally free Palestine.

01:26:42
Speaker 3: The Happy Birthday Kitlin.

01:26:44
Speaker 1: Thank you. Follow us also on Instagram at Bechdel Cast. There's our Patreon. Ooh, another little gift you could give me for my birthday. If you're not already a Matreon subscriber, go over to patreon dot com spetl Cast, where you can get two bonus episodes every single month, plus access to the one hundred and fifty bonus episodes on the Matreon for five dollars a mom mentioned and our tour kicks off very soon, so grab tickets to that if you don't already have it at link tree slash Spectel Cast. We're in various cities in the UK as well as Dublin.

01:27:25
Speaker 3: And you know what, I'm not gonna plug anything because it's your damn birthday, Happy birthday.

01:27:31
Speaker 1: But people should listen to your new show, your new podcast, say something about it.

01:27:36
Speaker 3: Wow, only because you ask in your birthday. Yeah, please check out if you haven't checked it out already, we should be a few I guess two episodes deep when this comes out. Sixteenth Minute is a new weekly show doing that comes out every Tuesday. That's a different profile every week of a different Internet character of the day. So I believe this week our episode on the dress just came out. Member, that was it the.

01:28:02
Speaker 1: Dress that people either saw? Was it like white and wet and gold or black and blue?

01:28:09
Speaker 5: Right?

01:28:09
Speaker 3: Yes?

01:28:10
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, I'll never forget.

01:28:12
Speaker 3: Never forget. Yeah. So every episode is like that, just Internet things that have been ingrained in your brain against your will. Every episode's about that, So check it out. We're having a fun time over there, and it's also produced by Bechdel Cast producer Sophie Lichterman, so very nice. Enjoy your birthday, Kaitlin, thank you so much. Enjoy your day, listeners.

01:28:33
Speaker 1: Yes, happy birthday to you also, and we'll be back next week for more episode Bye bye. The Bechdel Cast is a production of iHeartMedia, hosted by Caitlin Derante and Jamie Loftus, produced by Sophie Lickterman, edited by Mola Board. Our theme song was composed by Mike Kaplan with vocals by Katherine Voskresenski. Our logo and merch is designed by Jamie Loftus and a special thanks to Aristotle Assevedo. For more information about the podcast, please visit linktree slash Bechtelcast