40 Days and 40 Nights with Arielle Isaac Norman

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
On the Bell 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. Welcome to
the Bechdel Cast. My name is Jamie Loftus, my name
is Caitlin Darante, and this is our podcast where we
explore the roll up women in movies. Wow. Can I

(00:24):
have a question for you? Okay? Yeah? Can you imagine
a world in which not having sex for forty days
is actually difficult and not just how your life is
the whole We're talking about forty days, forty night day.
I was like, I've gone without having sex for forty days,
Like I can't count. I'm pretty sure I've gone forty months, right,

(00:50):
So it's God, imagine having bangs like Josh Hartnett and
yet people need to fuck you. I just this is
a In this podcast, we use the Bechtel Test. Jesus Christ,
I want to go home. Okay. We use the Bechtel
test as our jumping off point. It's a media test

(01:12):
event to buy a cartoonist Alison Bechtel that asks of
a piece of media that there be two female identifying characters.
They have to have names who talk about something other
than a man for exactly two lines of dialogue, and
boy do we have a humdinger today. This movie was

(01:33):
Caitlin's idea, it was my idea because it's Lent. It's Lent.
So this is our Easter episode for all you Easter
heads out there. Sorry for everyone who wants to do
Passion of the Cry. I still have to wait another year.
This year it's forty days and forty Well, last year
we did shack Law as our bonus episode. Oh yeah,
I guess. We have been pretty Christian about celebrating Easter

(01:54):
on the Bectel, which is crazy because I'm not Christian,
nor am I. We tried out like three religions and
then gave up and it was like baptized Catholic. First
Communion was Protestant. We briefly were wicked, and then we're
just like we're going to just sleep on weekends and
that will be more of our five anyways. Four okay,

(02:15):
so we're doing the movie four days and forty nights.
Should we just get into it? I feel like I
can't not knows. It was like am I allowed to talk.
You know, I have to wait because I have so
much to say. There's so much I guess today a comedian.
You've seen her at Moontower and Laughing School comedy festivals.
She is the host of gender Fluids podcast. It's Ariel

(02:38):
Isaac Norman. Thanks for coming on. Sorry that we maybe
you had to watch this movie. I'd never seen it before,
and this was a perfect opportunity to finally see it.
Can I tell you that when I was a kid,
I didn't see this movie, and I remember it coming out,
I mean to a kid. I guess I was seventeen
because I was a Mormon and we weren't allowed to

(02:58):
watch movies like this, no R rated movies, which I
think it's yeah, yeah, But I remember like looking at
the cover of it, like with the hair dryer, and
like wanting to watch this movie. I remember thinking that
looks really hot. He has to resist sex. But I
remember being like man, because I was a sexual child,
you know, but like you know, not having sex, but

(03:19):
just a very sexual child. So I remember just being like, man,
I wish I could watch that movie one day when
I'm an adult. Well, and now I have so what
I meant to say, was we gave it this opportunity,
and it was. It was illuminating, life changing. Kyleen, what's
your experience with this movie. I saw it when it
first came out in two two. I was also I

(03:43):
was like fifteen or sixteen, not a movie that I
enjoyed by any stretch of the imagination. Upon rewatching it
to prep for the episode, I realized that the only
thing I remembered about it was the scene where he
fakes his orgasm towards the beginning, and then this impressive
Meg Ryan. Oh sure, yeah, that's when I screamed at

(04:05):
my Roku TV last night. And then um, the scene
where he is like dumping ice onto his bone. Ar.
I remembered that scene as well, but everything else I
had forgotten our imagery. But I feel like this is
like one of the last movies of that sub genre
of like teen young adult type movies where people place

(04:30):
sex bets because we've got our cruel intentions are ten things. Yeah,
but this is the tail end of it of this
is when it jumped the shark. Yeah, we had to
bring it back the sinister sex bet. So yeah, that's
my history. Uh, and I yeah, I'm sorry that I

(04:51):
was like, yeah, let's do this for for our Easter
Time episode. And I don't know why I thought it
would be a good idea. I think we're all going
to have a great time. My history of this movie
I texted Caitlin as I was watching a lesson. I
thought this was I was. I was like nine when
this movie came out, so I definitely didn't see it.
I don't know how much of a cultural legacy this

(05:13):
movie really has because I didn't know anything about it.
When you said forty days and forty nights, I was like, oh,
that's I think a movie about the Bible. And I
thought Josh Hartnett was in a Biblical epic too many
movies back then, But I was like, yeah, I was
like ready for and I think I sort of had
it confused with six days, seven nights. But I don't

(05:35):
know what that's about either, So maybe I wasn't confused,
but I thought it was like Josh Hartnett is playing
like the Technicolor Dreamcoat. Like I thought it was gonna
be a movie about the boy. Here's what you texted me. Okay,
so next message, I thought, dot forty days and forty
Nights was a dystopian movie about the Bible. Next message

(05:58):
dot dot Dot It's not it's so weird, and then
you find out it's about like sand for instil It's
like the tech Bro tech Bro showed two two working
in a warehouse with terrible lighting and abusing women. Like
since you're just I was not ready for this movie,

(06:19):
and I'm angry. I had to I know, this is
my bad, everybody. It took me three This movie is
fairly short. It's like it's an hour and a half,
but so much happened that is crazy that I it
took me three hours to watch the movie because I
had to keep pausing it and taking notes because it
was every two seconds You're like, hold on, let's try

(06:40):
to unpack this, and the like there's just so much.
And then you had not seen this. You just watched
it for the for the first time. Yeah, I watched
it with my new girlfriend. We had a great since
she hadn't seen it either. She was quite young when
it came out, so yeah, we had a great time
watching those I mean, you know, we got quite high
and we were like, I thought it was going to

(07:00):
be a very boringly bad movie. It is not a
boringly bad movie. It's a mind blowingly bad movie. This
is the epitome. If you want to know what problematic means,
just any scene in this movie is like dear God.
And because if you watch any movies from back then,
it's like, oh god, that we were pretty homophobic, we

(07:21):
were pretty just like letting things. But this movie takes
I'm like, was everything this bad? Values This feels like
a little worse than even normal, and Normal was bad,
but this feels slightly worse. I think it's because in
those other sex bet movies, they're teenagers, and these people
are like post college, so it's like they're a little runchier,

(07:43):
they're a little more adult. They are actually like fucking
by this point in their lives. There are multiple points
in this movie where I'm like, where are the parents?
Because they're out of control. They're they're twenty four, they
don't need parents. Oh God, should be illegal. This is
like one of the more paranoid movies I've ever seen,

(08:03):
two of Like it seems like the leading character is
like struggling with mental illness, like it's hallucinating constantly, and
everyone's like, you're just horny, And then they make him
sign up for the no fab reddit board, essentially prior
to the no fab reddit board existing the no fat parallels.

(08:24):
I've got I got everyone covered. He does become a
val cell. He's all selling voluntary cells. He knows for
forty days, which but like the culture of no fab
is like it's a reddit board where people mostly men.
But sometimes I'm gonna join, you know, yeah, I did join.

(08:45):
I'm masturbated a lot, like this would be hard for me.
It's like, basically men convincingly, they're like, I'm not going
the longer ago without masturbating. I will become a superhuman basically,
And they're like, I'll become like all my problems will
be resolved. Some people seem to get a lot out
of it. The way the board is run is very strange,
where it's like you lead with a number in parentheses

(09:08):
and that's how long you've gone without coming, like how
many days? Yes? Yes, and so like there's people that
are just starting and they're like, oh, this is great.
I used to have a stand up joke about it
because it's so I tried to infiltrate the boards. Um.
But there's people who have like not faped in years,
and they're like treated so with such reverence in there,

(09:28):
and they're just like, ever since I stopped coming, I
got promoted at work, like it seems to vastly great.
But then other ones that get up in the hundreds
and like, oh, they're like basically murderers, So it's helping
them focus their murderous right, They're like, now I have

(09:50):
time to watch scary videos on YouTube and like make
scary plans. Yeah, so there's a lot this is just
like very proto no fab So I remember I took
an improv class once and the thing that I remember
most is that on our performance night, they said that
if you have to pee just a little bit, it
makes you more creative. And I went ahead and didn't

(10:11):
pee before going on and I did great, So I know,
so I've always thought of that. So I think about
that sometimes if I ever have to pee and I'm
going on stage pretty soon, I'll just be like, all right,
let's just use that energy. So I wonder if it's
a similar thing. If your balls are just a little full,
you're just a little on edge, it makes you a
little bit more creative and focused and everything, because it's
like there's a part of your body. That's like trying

(10:32):
to find a restroom of urgency, distance of urgency. That
kind of like translates, and you're like, if I could
just finish this thing, then I can come be the
same thing with when I ran track in high school.
They're like, if you have to pee before a race,
don't like, don't pee why you're running? That's the cool
people do. They'll know you're serious, and the people behind

(10:52):
you will Yeah, and then you win, so it works out. Well? Yeah,
can we talk? First of all, I mean as y'all
y'all sleep with penis people, so how talking? I'm feel
sorry for all of you. From what I hear, it's
mostly bad. But um, but how abnormal do you think
it is for a man to go forty days without sex?

(11:13):
Probably they're never doing that about masturbating unless they're Mormons
or it's something right. I think I know a lot
of men who regularly go at least forty days I
not a lot longer without sex. But I think they're
jerking off at least three times a day. It's the
jerking off thing, is I think the thing because it's
like basically all of my male friends don't get never fun.
A lot of my boyfriends rarely fun. So but I

(11:38):
think it's yeah, the masturbation thing, which is weird because
it's like, that's not really the route this movie takes.
This movie takes instead that all women are determined to
fuck an awkward looking Josh Hartnett. That's my favorite part
because yeah, they like they explicitly, well, how do do
we shoot? It's so weird to know how to start

(11:58):
with this movie. Well, let me do the recap and
then and then and then we'll jump in. So we
meet Matt. That is Josh Hartness. Oh my god, there
I one of the most relatable like things in this
maybe like who hasn't known two random dudes named Matt
and Ryan who have a codependent friendship and they hate women.
Like there that that is eternal. So Matt was in

(12:21):
a relationship with a woman named Nicole who dumps him
off screen and was the teen from hocus pokis correct? Yes,
So since then he has been having sex with a
bunch of women, but he feels very empty after each encounter.
And there's one scene where he's with the woman and

(12:42):
he has to fake an orgasm and ceilings are cracking,
um and he's going to his brother, who is like
a priest in training, to be like, what's wrong with me,
and his brother is just like, you're an idiot. He's like, oh.

(13:03):
So he finds out that his ex girlfriend Nicole, has
gotten engaged to a rich, handsome man but mostly rich,
and then he goes to his brother, the priest in training,
for advice, and then he gets the idea to give
up sex for Lent because it's the first day of
Lent and he's like, oh, I'll just go without sex,

(13:23):
without masturbation, without any sexual intimacy for forty days in
an attempt to grow as a person and try to
get over Nicole. Sure, which is it doesn't address a
lot of the problems that he's having, Like he clearly
needs therapy and he's trying to better himself. But he's trying. Yeah,
that part, I was like, this is not the worst

(13:43):
thing to do. Everything else that happens is the worst thing. Yeah.
So it's day one. He gets rid of all of
his porn in Victoria's secret catalogs and any lube like substance. Also,
I'm like, you're heck, guy, what's with all this analog porn?
You guys. It's a different time. Yeah, And then he

(14:06):
goes to a laundromatt because his roommates, like his roommate Ryan,
who fucking sucks. He's like, let's go and meet chicks,
and he's like, no, I have laundry to do. There's
that scene in the bathroom where like Matt has just
had a severe panic attack during sex and then runs
into his friend and his friend is like, get big

(14:26):
out there and finish the job. Like he's just like
such a fucking gross just bad writing pervert. He's like
building like toy cars. He has time to make model cars.
That's what they can think of in this second he
stops coming. He's like, I'm really into trains now, which

(14:46):
I have found to teach. So he goes to a
laundromat instead of like going out to the club to
meet chicks, and there he still meets a Q girl,
Shannon's Simon. Here's the thing. She's not like the other girl.
She's not. She's she loves being at the laundromat and

(15:08):
she just wants to get to know cute boys at
the laundro match. Yeah, she's not scared for her life
at the laundro match. She doesn't not maken intact with
anyone at the laundromat like a normal also extremely unprepared
to be there. She's like, can you make change for me?
I don't have anything to read. I need your fabric softener.
But that's like a way to meet people. I never
carry a lighter, so that I have to ask for

(15:28):
a lighter. And it's very effective in that way. You're
always like sharing whatever you have and you know whatever.
So I can see that. But she should have left
one thing at home and had the rest. Now she's
just a freeloader. Yeah, she's she's done her hair and
makeup to go to the laundromatch has not remembered she's
She's really like forcing herself into Josh Hartnett's space for

(15:51):
the scene, and he's trying to be aloof because he
sees that she's cute, but he's like, I'm like yeah.
She tries to talk to him. He's very like and
then she's like see the same time next week, t
he and he's like and then he literally doesn't say
like a word during the whole which is which is

(16:12):
interesting because she goes back to that later and she's like, man,
that first day we met, and like, when he didn't talk,
it was very strange. Yeah, I was like, did I
forget a part where you all had a conversation. She
acts as if they had this moment of connection and
then he but he like reacts to her like what
she's saying is like yeah, that first day, I was like, no,
that was so uncomfortable. Although there is that scene where

(16:35):
he has I do love that. There's some good product
placement in this movie. There's a lot of attention called
to the fact that he has a Mr. Bubble t shirt.
At one point it was interesting Mr Bubble getting in there.
R rated comedy time. That's the real analysis. I have
sure that that's the most way they wanted to be. Yeah.

(16:59):
So then matt roommate Ryan the Shitty Guy, finds out
about Matt's of celibacy, and he's just like what the fuck, Like,
guys are meant to come and fuck jerk off and
you're going against science. And then we cut to a
scene where Ryan has told Matt's colleagues at this like

(17:19):
tech startup they whenever they work at this vague they're like, oh,
this is welcome to computer dot com, Like that's the company.
It's an Internet company, is all they ever say about it.
It's a very convenient way for them not to have
to explain anything. You know, they can do whatever they
want at this company. In terms of the bed, it's
so it's so okay. The art direction for this company.

(17:39):
It is so dark. All the lighting is blue. Men
are always wearing many layers, women are practically naked. It
does seem to be very cold in the building though.
There I was surprised that there were women in tech representative,
but they were all dressed like Barbie dolls. They were
all violently horny and treated like carpege Yes indeed, and

(18:04):
they all have All these people who work in this
office have a bet going where they put money into
a pool and if they bet on the right day
that they think that Matt is going to have sex
or masturbate, then they win all the money in that pool.
So if someone's like I think he's gonna fuck on
day twenty three and they bet correctly, then they win

(18:25):
all the money. I also think it's really funny, like
the way the Internet is treated in this movie is
so Uncanny Valley, where like Matt has sex with that
woman that he fakes the orgasm with and gets to
work the next morning and his co worker is like,
so heard you faked an orgasm last night, and he's
in Matt like how do you know that? He's like Internet,

(18:47):
it was Twitter even around, like that woman would have
had to somehow, Like how would that woman have even
gotten the word out if she wanted to? It is
a blog, so like omnipotent And that comes back later
where what's her name? Erica finds out about the bet
like two seconds later, and he's like, how did you know?
She's like Internet? Yeah, yeah. So then Matt does not

(19:12):
know about this bet at first, but the women in
the office are actively. There's one woman who like at first,
who sexually harasses him in the workplace to try to
get him to like break his vow. It doesn't work.
He goes to the laundromat again. The same woman is there,
Shannon Ssamon, and he introduces himself this time and uh,

(19:36):
she's like, my name is Erica. He asks her out
on a date. They go on a bus date and
then fun montage that that was supposed to be him
being cool and sensitive and interesting. It's like he's like,
where can I definitely not come right. Yeah, but it's
just like, why is she just so happy about the

(19:57):
whole thing? I don't care, but they're having a great time.
Her character is like god like Dixie dream girl. Is
that what we're calling this? I think I think that
she falls into that category pretty squarely, because like, her
motivations don't make sense. She seems determined to fix him
for whatever reason. She hangs in when there doesn't make sense.

(20:19):
Like she's whimsical enough to enjoy a bus date. I mean,
she wants a bus date. She loves hanging out at
the laundromat. She's just yeah, she's just flitting around. She's
she's got a quirky job. She's a cyber nanny um
like Maggie Jillen a poorly dressed mag Maggie Jillen Hall
is her best friend. I lost a notch of respect
for Maggie Jillen Hall in this movie. I'm gonna say, like, damn,

(20:42):
I hope you bought something nice. Yeah. So they're on
their bus date. At the end of the night, she
goes to kiss him, but he's like and he gives
her high five instead because he can't even he can't
even kiss. He runs. So that is against the rules too, right,
because I guess I would fall under the sexual and
a missing category, not if it's like a disconnected kiss,

(21:03):
you know, maybe just like a little just don't on
the cheek, Okay. So then he finds out about the
bet at work because they've created a website with there's
there's ads and everything on the website, and one of
them is a porn site that's protected by the cyber
nanny company that Erico works for. So he does apparently

(21:26):
we're right. So he rushes over there and everyone's like, hey,
there's the abstinute guy. And she's all piste off at him,
and she's like, what is this some kind of bet
not to sleep with me? We'll talk about her what
she gets angry about. So he's like no, no, no,
I like you. And then after a few days she

(21:48):
decides that she's not mad at him anymore. And then
they go on another date out to eat, but his
ex girlfriend Nicole is there with her new fiance. This
is another very two thousand two moments where it's like,
at this time, dating a tech bro was not yet
a sign that like you had a ton of money.
She had like an old school banker. She's got like

(22:10):
a dirt bag banker. And then he's like, oh no,
I just wor get a Silicon Valley starch a loser.
I'm like, do you fast forward? Josh Harnett's guy billions
of dollars and he's like waging wars in foreign countries
on Facebook. So Matt doesn't deal with seeing his ex
girlfriend well, he catches on fire and then Erica fun

(22:33):
Erica gets mad at him again for not telling her
that he had an ex girlfriend. So by now it's
like kind of midway through. It's like day twenty or
twenty three or something like that, and you know, the
other guys at work are like, hey, I'm going to
take a valve celibacy too, because I think that's going
to help me get late. I thought they were just
lying that they were doing that to women. I mean

(22:54):
they were just doing that as a way to get
other cell She was a six hour window. But because
actly so, then Erica isn't mad at him anymore again,
and uh, you know she's actually kind of starting to
fall for this. Yeah, and he goes over to her
house and makes her come by blowing a flower petal
around her I was like that, I don't know where

(23:20):
all these orchids came from. Yeah, but I didn't think
that there is nothing like not being able to have
sex to make that tension really hot. And then if
you had the flower I mean that, Yeah, it was
a sexy I was like, that's something you can do
at home with your lover. You've already had sex. If
you put an arbitrary restriction on not having sex, and

(23:40):
then you can get you can get a lot of
out of flower petals that I liked that. I just
the whole time. I was just like, man, I just
wished it were different people. Yeah, but that was a
hot that was a hot scene. Yeah. And then she's
like I'm in love with him, and Maggiella has like
why and she's like, I don't know the movie that
must ever and then a little bit later, Nicole shows

(24:02):
up at his house his ex girlfriend, and this is
like a major shark job. Okay, well, she's like, my
my fiance broke it off. Let's kiss and he's like, no,
you suck actually, And I finally realizing that you ruin
my life. Even though we know in the opening shots
of the movie that she broke up with him for

(24:22):
very good reasons, right, because he was invading her like privacy,
and he wasn't listening to her, like was being too much,
and she just like I had to break it off.
But then it's slowly framed. It was like you have
to go into two thousand two brain and be like,
oh no, she's the villain. And then in the third

(24:42):
act they make her God, we'll talk about it, so
he's get out of here. I'm gonna slam the door
in your face. And then cut to the final day
of the vow. Nicole goes in and places a bet
for thirty dollars that he will fuck on that day. Um. Meanwhile, Matt,
he wakes up, he's got a boner the likes of

(25:04):
which you never seen. Oh my god, Yeah, the forty
foot boner that he has, and he's like heading to work.
He's imagining all the women being naked because he's just
so horny. By this point, he's withheld from he's abstained
from sex for so long that it's making him sick
like it. Yes, And then at midnight that night, when

(25:26):
the val ends, Eric is supposed to come over so
he can like finally bust his nut into her. I
guess god, honestly, after all that, if someone like, if
someone like if nights, I'd be like, please masturbate first.
I don't want this like thirty second experience of you
like approaching death, Like I just please handle that on

(25:47):
your own. So he handcuffs himself to his bed so
that he won't be attempted to touch himself like Odysseus
and the Sirens. Yes. Um. And then at some point
when he's in this like horny induced days, Nicole comes
back over. Yeah, he's having some kind of dream about

(26:09):
a boob World mountains, which I used to have that dream.
Who among us is not fantasized about a poorly rendered
boo World c g I boom. So Nicole comes back
over and rape. Yeah, we'll talk about that. I had

(26:29):
to rewind that three times just to be like, now,
hold on. I thought that was like, maybe we get
a shot of her entering the house, but we don't.
The audience comes to from boob World with him and
he's just been raped by his ex girlfriend. Yeah, oh
my god. And then I checked. I was like, there's
only like seven minutes left in the movie. How how

(26:50):
could this possibly so? Like Nicole and Erica pass each
other on the staircase after she's leaving. Yeah, the coles
leaving Erica it a criminal is leaving a sex criminals
is fleeing the scene. And then who also just insider
traded that bet? Oh yeah, which they never address the bet,

(27:11):
but so insane and Matt is upstairs being like, when
Eric gets here, she's going to be so mad I
got raped and she is and he's like, I thought
that she was you. She's like, you fucking asked thought
I was being raped by my girlfriend instead of my egg.

(27:31):
It's great? Can you believe this movie was made by Mirramax?
Like checks out, She storms out because she erect right,
and then he has to like figure out what to
say to make it up to her, and he's like
trying to figure out all this stuff and then eventually
he just like goes is it? They make up in

(27:55):
the laundromat, right, she's doing laundry. He comes to the
laundromat and he's like, what I should have done this
whole time? Is this? And then Surprise kisses her and
then she's like I love it. And then the movie
ends with them fucking for like forty seven consecutive hours,
and then all the tech bros are like at his

(28:16):
apartment in the living room, just like placing beds. It's like, oh,
is you going to go another hour? And he's like,
you guys are losers. Get out of here. As far
as I know, that's a realistic depiction of tech bros. Yeah,
so that's the story. Let's take a quick break and
then we will come right back. All right, let's get

(28:41):
into it. But your fort boners away where the discourse begins. Now,
I still don't understand whether he won or lost. Like, no,
I guess I didn't really think about how did the
bet resolve. I can't, Yeah, because I don't address anyone win.
They're still just betting on other stuff. But like I
sure they never addressed like, hey, technically if he gets raped,

(29:02):
does the bet count? Right? I don't want to know
what these tech I just simply tell the movie doesn't
even acknowledge it as rape, it doesn't, you know, Yeah,
it's I mean, I don't think we're supposed to think
of it that way, which is, but that is what happened.
Make no mistake. I think she wins the money. I
think Nicole wins the money. For raping up. I don't

(29:23):
see how she wouldn't have. They never addressed that she plays. Yeah, yeah,
because she makes makes dollar bet and then goes and
rapes him, and she must have won. Yeah, she must
have won like eight dollars the odds, the odds that
they would have given her on the last twelve hours
or whatever. I think she's the real billionaire by the
end of this she is a Silicon Valley billionaire. She raped.

(29:48):
This is just like, this movie is so extremely funked
up that I don't I've never seen a movie that
like treat like it's written. You know, It's like there
is this undercurrent and a lot of movie and a
lot of attitudes of like that women are out to
get you. They're trying to trick you, their duplicitous uh,
they're going to try to entrap you. They'll use sex

(30:10):
to get it. That's the only power that they have.
I've never seen that taken to like an eleven quite
in the way that this movie is. Because every woman
in this movie, it's almost just like having an irrational
fear confirmed of Like his fear is that women are
out to get him, and women are going to quote
unquote betray him like Nicole did when she broke up

(30:32):
with him for a valid reason. And then the way
the movie is written, every woman does that, and every
woman acts like his worst fear, and every woman is
out to get him. And that's just the logic the
movie has is like, you know how you're afraid how
women are out to get you? They are, here's a
movie about it. Like it's just it's because I mean,

(30:52):
there's like, okay, I made a list of women out
to get Josh Hartnett, and yes, it's all of them
at different points. And then eventually Erica at the end
not as much, but Candy, the woman who works at
computer dot com Industries photocopies are asked, tries to entrap him. Nicole,
who it's first implied, is like she's getting married to

(31:14):
like spite him. Everything is a personal like attack on him,
and then she later rapes him for money. Erica there's
a few moments in the movie where it seems like
she's trying to seduce him for her own like needs.
It's also implied that their relationship is more pure because
they don't have sex, which is weird and old school
and whatever. The women that I don't know if we

(31:36):
ever luned name, but that first hookup that he has
um who just like viciously tries to emasculate him by
any means necessary in ways that are like crazy. That's
the one who's like, come with me, and then that
leads him to fake his orgasm, right, and she that
character is set up by being like like she's mean
to a waiter and she's like, this isn't what I wanted,
and then she insists that he prove that he's come,

(32:03):
like it just does. When he goes and get some
white Out, he's like, I need anything that looks like semens.
So he's like white out, and which I guess is
probably a joke, but this movie, maybe the least funny
attempt at a comedy, smells like oh yeah, yeah, I
actually I actually never need to buy white out. I
just like collect men's come and put it a little bottle,

(32:25):
and I like, yeah, I mean I do like that
you line them like next to your bed so that
they can get like moon energy, which is definitely other
women who try to ruin Josh Hard is like the
three women at work in that insane scene where they're like,
you've taken our power away by withholding sex. Women with
ald sex, not you. I was giving the money to check, Like,

(32:48):
can we talk about the full conspiracy theory with like so, so, yeah,
every every single woman we meet in this movie is
out to get Josh Hardnet. Okay, first of all, at
one point two of the women walk in and then
they were like, well, we're going to lesbian kiss in
front of you, and you're not gonna be able to
resist that. Like that's the one where she says she's
basically trying to get the pussy power back. She said,

(33:10):
and she says it pretty explicitly that like, oh, it's
women hold because it's the idea of like, well, men
want to fuck so badly, like their evolutionary impulses to
get us pregnant. So we have this power. And if
you are saying you can resist us even for forty
all of us for forty days, then that means that
we've lost our power on this like fundamental level. It's

(33:32):
so she she's like, I am through. We are threatened,
as as the half of this population that is supposed
to have this power. We are threatened, and so we
have to fuck you or else we lose the and
it just confirms like the belief that that's the only
power that they have ever had. The Okay, so what
do you think we should take that power back? I

(33:53):
think we should. I think women. I mean, I'm already
doing my part not to suck these people, but I
think only about ten percent of them really deserved to
get lay, So I would say it's less than that. Yeah,
I mean tops ten as far as I can tell.
So you know, we should wield that power. I mean,
it's a good power to have, but it's not the
only power to have. And it seems like like that
girl is grasping at straate. She's like, without withholding sex,

(34:16):
I have nothing and nothing. But it's insane that they
do this where she said where he says, Oh, you're
not really trying to have sex for me for this
insane philosophical, like random thing that you do. You know,
this idea that women are gonna lose their pussy power
if if I don't have sex with any of you,
it's you're not doing it for that, You're doing it
for the money. And she's like, no, I'm not. I've
already signed a notarized thing that I'm giving to a

(34:39):
notary to get it. She's so like, that doesn't mean anything.
She couldn't have any motivation except they needed it to
be a pure thing where this woman had to prove
that a man cannot resist having sex with a woman.
So here's here's how that scene plays out. Matt is
in the back getting a bunch of max Cell tapes
because he works at camp dot com. I need a

(35:01):
lot of Maxell tapes. There this woman whose name is Andy,
she is named. She walks in the room and says
something akin to I understand what you're doing. That women
have been doing this since well forever. So we all
know about the power. See us having the power, that's
part of the system. And by you taking the power,
you're fucking with the system. And I think you can
see why we can't let that happen. And then you know,

(35:24):
she she shows her whole notorized document and he's like,
I'm not in it for the money, I'm in it
for the power. And Matt's like, so you want to
have sex with me to get back the power, and
then she says, we're willing to do whatever is necessary
to get the job done. By then a second woman
is in the room who expresses doubt about she doesn't

(35:44):
it love it more? Oscar should have been given. But
there's there's like a second woman who comes in and
it's like, I don't know if we should do this,
and she the other girl, Andy is like, no, we're
doing this and then like starts to like forcibly kiss
her to in trap Josh Hartnett, right, which feels like
another one of those scenes like cool intentions, where it's like, well,

(36:07):
the male filmmakers, we got to make this movie hot.
We gotta make it hot for the boys who are
watching this. Let's put two women kissing so that the
little boys can be like, oh, I mean I appreciated
that scene. You know they're gonna use their tongues, don't
you know, And it was like I used to be

(36:29):
creeped out by the tongue thing. I think it's because
of that two girls, one cup thing that happened, and
ever since then, it just it took me a long
time to heal from. And I knew, like I only
sideways glanced at that ever once, but still just like
what they were doing with their tongues really ruined lesbian
tongue stuff for me for a long time. So I
feel this movie is actually pretty healing. It was the
first time I watched two people just rubbed tongues together.

(36:50):
I was like, you know what, I think I can
enjoy this again. I guess it's just telling that you
rarely see like a lesbian kiss on screen between two
queer women and who are kissing each other because they
like each other and they're attracted to each other. It's
usually for a man. It's usually evil too. We can
assume straight women who are kissing each other to either

(37:13):
seem more attractive to men, to get better at kissing too,
so they can be good at kissing men, or to
like seduce and entrap men. So that's like the only
representation you get on screen in mainstream movies of two
women kissing. It's it's usually under It should be like
a Beachdel test for for lesbian kisses too, and this
one does not pass. You should make that test. Yeah,

(37:38):
there's yeah, that's Norman test whether it is whether two
women kissing is at all for them, which you know,
female pleasure has no part in. At least one of
those women was cute, you know, the one who's like
Josh Harden is not even cute. By the way, which
was great because I feel like they gave him a
worse haircut for that. I remember him being kind of cute.

(38:01):
He looks like dumb and dumber, Like, yeah, I can't
tell if my tastes have changed, or if like I
saw him like on the cover of that movie and
thought he was cute at the time, or if I'm
now looking you know, we're just like people all look
stupid back then, but I'm like now, that haircut was horrible.
His face was not great. It's it is confusing that

(38:22):
he would struggle to not have sex for forty days
with that haircut, is how I feel sure. That scene
is like, aside from the rape scene, that scene was like,
what is going on in this movie? And it's so
he's so clearly the victim in all of these situations.
We're all happening at work. This is all like at work,

(38:43):
like workplace sexual harassment that no one's doing anything about
because the boss is like, why won't my wife fuck me?
That on him? The boss of computer dot com is
first like, cool idea to not have sex because now
you've got the power and you're were holding it. I'm

(39:03):
going to do that to my wife because she doesn't
want to suck me. So I'm just gonna be like,
I'm not gonna fuck you, and she's gonna be like, no,
fuck me. And then John harton it's like, okay, cut
to four Party's like my wife says her life is
way better since I stopped sucking, so happy dude. Can
I just say I related to that guy so hard.

(39:26):
I don't know if you'll know that. I'm twice divorced
and I remember that's honestly though, I remember trying that.
I remember being like, well, if I stopped trying, maybe
then she'll like try to come on to me and
that will be good. So like the fact that that
was in there, I was like, dude, yeah, that's real, man,
these games that you play with women to be Like,

(39:50):
the truth is, I just don't think that we were
sexually compatible. Honestly. I think there's I've been figuring out
a lot of stuff about my gender and sexuality, but like, yeah,
elaborate things in your mind. And I think so many
people do date people that they're not that's sexually compatible
with um. For we date people for a variety of
other reasons, like maybe they're attracted to us or whatever,
you know, and then we have this like sexual dysfunction.

(40:12):
So this poor boss like is having a real problem.
I have no sympathy for him. I didn't. I didn't
like I mean the first scene that he was and
I was just like, oh god, this is so so
like what a waste of a scene. But then when
it like flashed forward to like, oh okay, I'm glad
that they at least point out that this doesn't work,

(40:32):
because it doesn't. But then there's a third scene he's
in where he is trying to look under his employees sir,
and then he lost me again. Yeah right, Well, he's
allowing all this sexual harassment to happen, and then he's
also sexually harassing his employees. His troubles at home, I
think are are he's allowing himself to feel disdained for
women in general because of his wife's rejection. He's also

(40:54):
like and if you've ever worked at a startup where
the boss is twenty years older than you and then
every ayone else is twenty four and they're just kind
of like leering at the general workplace, I've worked for
a bunch of guys like that who are just like,
you know, they frame it like, yeah, we're we're all
friends here. This is a family. If anyone ever calls
your workplace a family, you're in a toxic workplace. But

(41:15):
they're like, yeah, we're all fam here, and like you
don't have insurance? Are you? Guys? Fucking what's going? And
it's just like always a creepy older dude whose home
life is bad. And then he's like, let me see
if I can get my twentysomething your old employees to
funk each other and tell me about it, Like, yeah,
that's for us, just to hear about their fucking Yeah,
it's it's upsetting. And also in the workplace is that

(41:38):
scene where just no women acts rationally in this movie
just blanket statement. So when the three women basically the
fucking what's the group in Greece? Oh? What are they?
The poodle Friends? What are they call? Yeah, that's the
poodle Friends. They're like the poodle friends of computer dot com.

(42:00):
And they're like, hey, did you hear that Josh Hartnett
isn't fucking anymore? And then one is like, well see
about that, which is like why do that? She corners
Josh Hartnett in a room that is the walls are glass,
so everyone in the workplace is watching her and try
to seduce. She photocopies her own embarrassing Before that, she

(42:21):
spreads her legs wide eagle and it's like, check out
my butterfly tattoo right next to my puss. I'm trying
to get another tattoo on the other side by the
Like if women, I also believe, as much as it's
problematic to even care, I also believe that if women
really did want him to lose this bet, they could
have done a much better job. It's like they have

(42:42):
no subtlety. Each one of them is like, I'm going
to make you lose this bet, and here's my boobs,
and it's like, don't tell someone you're gonna make them
lose the bed. You've got to trick them into this.
You don't start with like they're so bad at it.
It's like yeah, I mean well, it's like yeah, because
like women are in the movie are also stupid as

(43:04):
they're just they're malicious and dumb and horny and mean.
All the women you speak in this movie, aside from Erica,
because we'll get into her in a minute, but all
the women who aren't Erica fall into I think one
of like four categories. It's either a conniving bitch, which
is like the ex girlfriend Nicole. It's like the colleague
who like evilly tries to seduce him by being like,

(43:26):
here's my butterfly dad too. Um. They are like a
frigid shrew or a prude type, which would be like
his boss's wife or Matt's mom who we meet. He
was like a very prudish, like you can't talk about sex?
Can I speak to your manager haircut? But she's a
freak in the bed. She's just she's just she's just

(43:47):
trying not to tell her sons about it. It's kind
of strange that they're acting like she's a prude. It's like, well,
her sons are over and her father, the father is
like weirdly trying to like talk about their sex life
to their adult sons now for no reason. To the
priest's son and the guy with a celibacy valve, yeah,
that was oh yeah, because there's like a brief tangent
where like Josh Hartnet's like, I know how to not

(44:08):
be horny hang out with my parents, but then his
parents he brings out like a chart of all the
sexual positions that you can do with his hip surgery
having happened, and so it's still somehow like turning Josh
on to watch the little cartoons of people the mom
does so the mom, I guess I actually does end
up being horny. Yeah, well that's another categories like horny nympho.

(44:28):
Basically all the women, the women in the office, the
women at the coffee shop on like No Bras for
hot women Day was another hallucination. And that's what I
want to talk about. There's a lot of stuff in
this movie where you cannot really tell whether it's a
hallucination or not. And so it makes me if it's
the only thing that can redeem any of this is

(44:49):
if you just pretend that all of it's in his head,
because it's like, at first, the ceiling cracking is ridiculous
and that's clearly hallucination. And then and then sometimes women
are like taking off their shirts in front of him
on the subway, and we know that's a hallucination. But
then No broad Day seems to be real. He tells
his priest brother that it was. It was an official
is it official or unofficially unofficially sponsored? No No Bras

(45:12):
for Hot Women Day for the coffee shop for hot women.
And I'm like, who's the one who determines who gets
to participate in this day? Whose feelings are hurt? Hopefully
it's the honor system like a hot woman? You know it?
You know, we need a revision on this now national holiday.

(45:34):
I think we should do this in general, you know
more no broad Day. I'm fine with that, I think, No. Sure.
The other thing that he thinks his fake is actually
but is actually real as his brother hooking up with
the nut Oh yes, where he thinks he has but
that was real, right, And then his brother is like, actually,
I'm not going to be a priest, which I thought
was kind of funny. He needs psychiatric medication. And that's

(45:56):
the thing, is like, if this movie is all in
his head, he's very sick. And the twist of the
end is this is really sort of a Memento esque thing,
like the whole thing was a hallucination and that's the
only reason that it wouln't make any sense. Also, Josh Harten,
it's like tribal back tach too. Oh my god, oh god. Um.
And then the other the other category that women fall

(46:17):
into is like kind of like the gullible idiot. It's
basically any woman who Ryan tries to date, because Ryan's like, oh,
I'm mind orgasmic, and then she's like, oh, nine, no,
I guess make my set. So like she's just like
believing anything that he all the lies that he's feeding
her to get her into bed. So it's these like

(46:40):
wildly reductive tropes that all these women fall into. Let's
take a quick break and then we'll come back more
to discuss, and we're back. Take your back out now
to take him out, put back, just to keep you
on your toes. I wanna talk about Nicole's character. We've

(47:02):
alluded to this already, but the opening sequence of the
movie is a bunch of home video that Matt took
when he was in a relationship with Nicole, and then
we see him watching it back six months after she
has broken up with him, and he's still stalking her
and broken up about it. But the video is so
weirdly telling where it's like it starts out where it's

(47:24):
like they're happy, they're in San Francisco, they're working turtlenext
it's great, but then you see the video over time
where she he seems to be invading her space. Like
there's he's filming her sleep and she wakes up and
she's like no, stop doing that, and he's like no,
and he gets closer and then she's like stop, and
then it's like she's in the bathroom and a towel

(47:44):
and he's filming her and she like closes the door.
So in my head, it's like, Okay, that is someone
you would break up with who would do that. But
I think we're supposed to think like, oh, she was
like mean to him, like we feel bad she was
pushing him away, right, and implies then it was like

(48:05):
somehow her like it's on her and she was cruel
to him. And then the way he treats her throughout
the movie is like he definitely is obsessed with her.
They're still pictures of her all over the apartment six
months later, not healthy the whole like no, he's planning
for her things like so tired. But I mean it
also is like called out in the movie as like

(48:27):
not good behavior. But I feel like that's that comes
from his roommate Ryan, who and his brother. Yeah, and
those guys are just like I mean, especially the Ryan
character who's just like this toxic dude who's constantly making
statements like men be like this, women be like this.
Men are supposed to come and that's just how men are.
There's like all these like very these are the two genders,

(48:50):
and here's what they do to sex, as we haven't
even thought about gender by this year, just the idea
that like, you start off like watching it now, seeming
like she is a fairly rational person. And then she
does the whole Spider Man too thing where she's like,
I'm mad, I'm getting married now, and that is somehow
canonically the Spider Man too thing, and that even your

(49:14):
engagement is another like strike on women, it's another women
stuck thing, because it's like, oh, this guy is clearly
just a rich dude. She's left him for just for
some dude for his money basically, and that's like, that's
like a weirdly like stock character too of like the
guy that you know she left you for, he's always
like rich and he's always a dick dick he usually

(49:34):
looks like James Marsden. Uh. And then and then the
leap of logically we find out from Ryan that she's
being cheated on, and so it's like the story is
constantly taking revenge on this woman that started out by
not really doing much wrong, and then she's just total
He'll turn at the end where she's just turned into

(49:57):
an absolute rapist in in a way that doesn't make
sense with anything we know about her. But we don't
really know anything. We do see the scene where she
first comes over to be like, well, yeah, we were
not engaged anymore. He's cheating on me. Do you want
to have sex? And then he says no, actually I've
got this forty days thing going. I've got this girl.

(50:18):
And she's like, I am so turned on by being
rejected by you. That like, but that doesn't make sense
with anything we know about her. That it's just here.
Oh it doesn't make nothing makes sense. But it's just
like this is how they use her character to be like, oh,
I'm so turned on by you. Now even if you
close the door, I'm just gonna be out here moaning
even harder because of the rejection. And so somehow that
is her then motivation to go place this bet and

(50:41):
win this money is like the sexual rejection has so
consulted but also turned her on. But that seemed like
leading up to him, like standing up for herself and
then she gets like horned up by someone yelling at her,
which great message before that, like his monologue that I'm
thinking that it's like we're supposed to be like, yeah,

(51:01):
good for you, Josh Hartnett. Is that like she's like,
you're saying no to me, and then he says, you
always do this to me. I must be the idiot
because I keep coming back, but I'm not coming back anymore.
You take everything from me, Like she just broke up
with you because you were a lot, and here you
are being a fucking lot again. But then it's like
her character is not written to follow any That's how

(51:24):
That's how a lot of men feel about women, is like, yeah,
if if they have some kind of relationship, and then
you took everything from me, and it's like, what is
that feeling? That's like a thesis statement on that character,
Like that's how he feels about. Whoever wrote this movie
clearly feels about women, is like, yeah, these vampires are
just out here to get us, right, and then it's

(51:45):
like I'll prove a point by writing female characters to
be this, to be this. Yeah, and then speaking of
irrational behavior, can we get into Erica. Yeah, yeah, let's
get and we haven't talked about her at all. It's
almost like she's boring and we don't know anything better.
It sounds like she's a shell of a character. So
in most scenes that she is in, she is getting

(52:09):
enraged about something for no reason. She's constantly behaving very irrationally,
and it makes little to no sense. So the first
she gets mad at him three different times. The first
time is when she finds out about his vow. I
don't know why she's so piste off again because they've
only met once once or twice maybe before two times

(52:31):
at the laundrom Matt and then she was like, how
dare you not tell me that you're giving up something
for lent? Like and then she is furious. I'm like,
are we are you guys religious? Like he doesn't seem
like and they've met two times and then she finds
out about it on the internet and then she's furious
at him. Her getting so enraged by that doesn't make

(52:54):
any sense, but it's clear like the writer of this
movie is like, well, we have to like find conflicts
them where so it will make her because women be
getting mad all the time. So then for reasons that
are not clear, she decides that she's not mad at
him anymore and she's going to hang out with him again. Then,
for reasons that are not clear. It's like every other

(53:15):
sentences anyone doing anything in this aren't really Then she
gets mad at him whenever she finds out about his
ex girlfriend, and this happens on their second date. So
he has not told her that he has dated other people,
and she is furious about it. So she keeps being like,

(53:39):
you said that you were honest, but you keep lying
about things or withholding the truth, and that's why I'm
mad at you. But like, you're not obligated to tell
someone on a second date. You're an entire dating history.
It's extremely emotionally immature movie. And like because yeah, it's
acting as if as soon as you meet someone you
know at first sight that you're in love with out

(54:00):
having a conversation, and now at this point you should
then tell them everything about yourself. You should each merge completely.
It's a very weird lesbian impulse almost like that that's
how that that's how this should be perceived, that's how
she seems. It's like, how have you not told me everything?
About you. I thought we were in love and getting
married and this isn't him and we should be It's

(54:20):
exactly and like her motivations adjust to his mission in
a way that doesn't I just just I mean, nothing
is realized. This like if you met someone who didn't
seem to like you at the laundromat and continue to
pursue them and they're like, actually, I'm not fucking right now.
I'd be like, I'll see myself out. But she she
just kind of adjusts to him and says instead that

(54:42):
like sex doesn't matter and it's only about the kiss,
and like totally flips the script from like being horny
to being like, Okay, I'll do what you want, I mean,
And then they have the sexy flower funk, which is great. Um,
well before we get to that, because I do want
to talk about female orgasms and their depiction on screen.

(55:04):
But um, so, she's gotten mad at him about not
knowing that he has ever had an ex girlfriend, and
then again for reasons that are not clear, she decides
she's not mad anymore. She's gonna hang out with him again.
And then we see the scene with the flower pedal.
It's blowing around near her puss and she has an orgasm.

(55:24):
And then the final I Got mad at You for
no reason thing happens when Matt gets raped by Nicole
and then Erica, and then she's just like she's so mad,
she's so mad, And it's because the movie does not
treat what happened as rape. The movie. When she comes in,

(55:46):
he says, oh my god, I just cheated on. I mean,
he doesn't say cheated, but he's like, I thought it
was you, and so he doesn't say I was raped.
So really this is actually a good depiction of how
men are not reporting their rapes. You know. Here she
just said I was just raped, Can you call the cops?
And it said he goes though it was you. So
he doesn't believe in his own like, you know, he

(56:07):
doesn't believe that women are capable of agency enough to
even to call that rape. He's just like, oh, I
must have fucked her, yeah, even though I was not
conscious or lucid. So even in his getting raped, he's
not respecting women. That's really insane about that. And it's
like it's it's you know, men are raped, that does happen,

(56:28):
but statistically so much less than women. That it's just
like another victimizing this character in a way that just
enables his bad behavior and doesn't make sense. And it's
more complicated than that. But it's just I don't know,
Like women in this movie are evil, and they do.
As the movie goes on, they do more and more

(56:49):
evil things. And it's only the woman who complies with
exactly what he wants and helps him accomplish this mission,
even while he's lying to her and being in, you know,
doing all this other stuff. She's the one who's like,
quote unquote rewarded with his filthy boner a month and
change later. Yeah. Wait, now that I think about it, though,

(57:09):
when she when when Erica walks into that room and
he's like, oh, I thought it was I thought it
was you and not I didn't know it was this
nicole chick. He's handcuffed to his bedrails at this point,
and so she either has to be like, wow, so
you decided to have like kinky handcuff sex for this,
you know, vow breaking bet losing sex that you had

(57:32):
with your ex, or hey, why are you handcuffed to
the can you what? Doesn't question? It doesn't question it.
It's just like follow ups and could you cheat on me? Yeah,
I guess to be fair, she does not realize that
he had been sexually assaulted, so she's mad on the

(57:54):
grounds that like, oh, you cheated on me, and if
that were true, which is not what happened, but let's
say for argument's sake, that it is. They've hung out
four times, like she yeah, you're not in a relationship yet,
like he's not cheating on you. But again, the movie
is like, well, we have to have like the final
conflict that we needs to be resolved by the end.

(58:16):
So like also kind of like the puritanical thing they're
pushing of, like the longer you don't have sex with someone,
the purer your bond is, and that sex is like
this thing that taints relationships, which you know can be
very true, but it's just the way it's framed is
weirdly religious, like the that that like well, the you
know now that they've waited, it's like almost like the

(58:38):
weird like high school narrative like we have to wait
until the moment is right and then it'll be perfect.
It would be together, ever, and this this movie weirdly
subscribes to that, even though it makes fun of religion
through the brother character. I don't know. I mean, I
can't even say religious undertones because it's specifically lends, you know.
But it's like the forty Days and Nights is there's

(58:59):
like Jesus asked it for forty days and there's they
at one point make it a little explicit that they
kind of are comparing him to Jesus in the ability
to withstand the sex and and but then so it
makes me wonder because he's already made himself in to
a Christ figure. Oh, I'm going to resist sex instead
of food and water. Even says like I look like
I'm on the Yeah, when he's when he's handcuffed to
the bedframe, it's like they've actually you're using imagery Christ

(59:21):
figure imagery. And it's like that's a little much. Forty
days and forty nights. That didn't you don't have literary
themes going on here. I did not hit for me.
That's fucking nuts. Yeah, I mean, and it's like, yes,
Jesus did go without food and water, but he was
jerking off every day. So that's like I've never thought
about how Jesus was jerking off while he was fasting.

(59:42):
You can survive in the desert. You have to drink
your own Are you allowed to drink your own calm?
If you're fastering loophole, that's how you can drink your
own bodily fluid calories. Um. But yeah, basically the movie
is like the movie uses the Erica character as just
a way by which conflict can happen because she's getting
so irrationally mad all the time, and they just have

(01:00:05):
the formula of a bet, a sex bet movie, And
they didn't bother doing any of the work to connect
any of the points. They were just like, she gets
mad every twenty minutes and then we resolve. Yeah, they
just didn't bother having reasons for anything right there, Like
it just has to happen. And like her friendship with
Maggie Jillen Hall is so weird where there's a scene
where they're walking together and Eric is talking to her

(01:00:28):
about how they haven't had sex yet, and Erica is
like trying to act like she's cool with it, even
though it's clear that she's like she would want to
be having sex, and she's like it's great. It's like
I'm being treated like an equal. And then her friends
like that sucks, doesn't it. And she's like it totally sucks,
and you're just like that is how to wait, how
did what's the line right before? They feel like I'm

(01:00:50):
being treated like an equal just that they're not having sex.
I'm trying to follow this logic. There's a I don't
have all the dialog written now that it's uh that
she's saying, like, you know, I think Maggie Jillen Hall
characters like, wait, you guys haven't had sex yet, and
she's like, no, he's like doing this thing. And then
she and then she Maggie Jolan Hall does the obvious
two thousand two jug of like what is he gay? Yeah? Well,

(01:01:10):
they're like he's got a girlfriend. No he doesn't. He's like, oh,
he's gay. Some guys are just different about this stuff.
And that's that's what leads into this conversation, like she's
not saying it sucks to be treated as an equal,
just as she's saying it sucks to have sex. But
I'm just like, man, these are the only some of
the only two two women exchanges you get in the movie,
and it's all about like, well, there's not a single

(01:01:31):
line of this movie that's not about sex first of all,
so and sex as it pertained to Jump Hardnet. She's
specifically at least one man Judge Hardnet. Yeah, there's another
moment of casual homophobia earlier on, where Ryan the roommate
is talking to Matt and he's like, you just never
going to work out for you. You can go on

(01:01:52):
two dates without a kiss and pass it old fashioned,
you go three, You're a home so very cool casual
the phobia of the early two to five people to
find a romantic comedy of the early two thousand's that
doesn't have at least two instances of casual homophobia. Indeed,
another thing I wanted to point out is that a

(01:02:12):
large part of the date that takes place on the
bus is seen in like montage forms, so we don't
hear her talking like this is when we would be
learning things about her character, hearing what she has to say,
her talking about her interest, stuff like that, but we
don't we hear music over a montage instead, So like

(01:02:33):
a deliberate choice was made in the edit of this movie,
or in the writing or whatever that we like one
of the few opportunities we would have to get to
know this character is robbed from us, and we still
we still hardly know anything about her except that she
gets mad all the time, irrationally. Well that's a woman
right there for you. You know, I'm getting mad all

(01:02:54):
the time. We just get mad, and who cares about
anything about And then the and then the final the
way the whole story ends, the final beat is that
Matt is like, oh yeah, it probably even shouldn't have
done this whole stupid vow thing. What I should have
done this whole time is this? And then he pounces

(01:03:14):
on her surprise, kisses her. The movie frames it as
if it's like the big romantic moment, the huge reconciliation.
She hasn't really forgiven him, right, like that hasn't been
a super But as soon as his lips plant on
her baby, she forgives. She's so irrationally mad, she's probably
been on her period or whatever. I mean, yeah, that's

(01:03:39):
she just got off the pill for the first time
in several years, and it's just like she's free bleeding.
Well what are we to make of that as like
a lesson? Like because that's how they're presenting it, by
him saying, what I should have done this whole time?
It's implying that he shouldn't have done this, bet that
that wasn't healthy or good for him. That if you
meet a cute girl who smiles at you with the

(01:04:01):
launch a room, the proper thing, the correct thing to
have done, would have been to just kiss her from
the get go and start sucking when it is all yeah,
that is like the whole logic of like the only
way to get over someone is to get under someone else.
Like that wasn't working because the ceiling was caving in.
But maybe with the right girl. The ceiling caved in
the right at the right girl whose personality we don't
know and we don't get mental gymnastics. It has to

(01:04:23):
be the right look basically, the girl who's hot enough.
This God, this one is just a disaster. I like
I I just wish that Josh Hartnet had stayed in
the room with his trains for a couple of days,
really confronted and dedated, like made some trains, and then
been like, you know, maybe I am ready to get
back out there, but it just wasn't. I mean, he's

(01:04:44):
in that tech bro environment. It's hard to just be
with your trains. Sometimes. I love that the directile dysfunction
doesn't really come up. He can still get it hard.
I think it would be too much for men to
deal with if he couldn't get it hard. We weren't
talking about that. We're still barely talking about that in movies,
and so instead it was just that he can't come.
But boners are not a problem. Always get that, supersize

(01:05:06):
he has a bone, are at work, he has around
It's oh yeah, there's that. He comes in with nar
blazing into a fucking important meeting. If you're like, get
out of here, you're hard, and he's like, oh my god,
um this happens. So they go to a critical business

(01:05:32):
completely erect, horrifying. I don't know. Can we talk briefly
about the depiction of the of the female orgasm? Yeah?
I can't talk about this movie much like I'm so
fascinated about like women straight or whatever, women who have
sex with men's sex lives, because y'all really aren't coming
as much as you should be, right, We're not not

(01:05:54):
to delf too too deeply into my but but your
friends know I'm about to say that man has never
made me come. I've heard that from a lot of
my lovers. Yeah, so anyway. So at least, at the
very very very least, the movie I'll choose to remain

(01:06:15):
side that tells me everything I need to know. So
at the very least this movie acknowledges that the female
orgasm exists, because most movies don't even bother to acknowledge
that it's a thing. I don't think this movie handles
it well. But we do see two female orgasms. One
in the beginning whenever she's like, come with me, we

(01:06:36):
gotta have a simulgeneous come fish. Yeah, so that was
pretty empowering, guess, but she also is made to seem
like a crazy person. I'm surprised she didn't lick the
white out to see if it was coming on. There
wasn't a few things yeah, where it's like, well, she
did initiate the sexty. Don't get to see women initiate often.
But then of course she ended up being crazy, like

(01:07:00):
she was calling the shots during the sex I was like,
that's pretty cool, like, but then it just takes this
very sinister turn right any Like, women initially being presented
as being sex positive ends up that they she's a demon.
She's actually a demon from crazy. So that's the first
female orgasm we see, and that ends up being demonized

(01:07:21):
because she's or the movie wants you to think she's crazy.
The second one is the scene we already touched on
a little bit where he's got Also, I think this
scene with the orchid pedal would violate the terms of
his voweve because he says no sexual intimacy of any
kind if you were blowing around a pedal on a

(01:07:42):
naked woman. This is like more just like, but stuff
doesn't count. Stuff the whole movie, and he's like, yeah,
it doesn't count. It is worth thing. Now I'm like
looking into on the Wikipedia article. Apparently, uh, this sex

(01:08:03):
scene was voted one of the top ten worst sex
scenes in movies. Ever, it is still silly. It's silly.
I don't think I was kind of horny for it.
I was watching it next to my hot girlfriends, so
maybe that, but I was like I was alone and
I was still like pretty good, yeah, talked and worse.
What are they talking about? I mean, well, okay, shamers,
they just hate female orgasms, yeah, they I love it.

(01:08:25):
I mean, this is the only sex scene I've ever
seen in a movie where the women comes and the
man doesn't. That's a good point. There go the becktail test.
But sometimes we can that as close as we get.
But this movie is also perpetuating the idea that women
just come all the time without cliptoral stimulation. It doesn't
show bad habits, So okay, there there may be some

(01:08:49):
women out there who can achieve orgasm if a flower
pedal is blown around near your posts. I don't want
to shame anyone who comes that way, but that is
usually I'm saying, not enough. Yeah, and then the woman
Usually a man's got to flop his hand all over
your vagina for five minutes and then you're like whoa,

(01:09:12):
and they're like, I did it. But then also in
the first thing where we see a woman have an orgasm,
he's not doing anything to stimulate her c literal region
there are he's hallucinating, he's like on panic attack, and
she's she's like, yeah, I think only around twenty per
cent of women are able to achieve orgasm just through

(01:09:34):
vaginal penetration. And joke about this and I'm doing so
it's it's not like, honestly great for that, but for them,
I don't think that's true. I just think that men
haven't figured out how to do it. Like, are the
odds really that, like some of us are special the
chosen people? Or is it that okay? But if men
didn't know that women could come at all until the sixties,

(01:09:55):
if we thought the clip was a you know what
I mean, like that some could come at all until
I was an he want so of course, of course,
like more women can. It's just that like they're the
only ones who've had good lovers, who've been using their
fingers enough and stuff like that, Like I've made women
come vaginally. It's because I'm using my fingers and I'm
like paying a lot of attention and it's not about

(01:10:15):
me coming, so like it's it's just the men, you guys,
and they're not one in five or four women could know.
I'm feeling very empowered. I can't believe how bad women
straight women sex life still are. I really thought men
had gotten better, I thought with all the sexual but
the more I talk to people individually and his audiences,
I'm like, God, no, it's and there it really is,

(01:10:38):
like that fear of emasculating a man by telling him
he's doing Are we afraid of emasculating I haven't emasculated
become violent. But I mean, don't you gotta break up
with these I have a joke about like a guy
getting because this is based on a true story, A
guy like got frustrated and almost mad at me because
he didn't make me come. Yeah, I've that Seriously, I'm like,

(01:11:01):
what the sex story? I think you're mad at yourself? Yeah,
where it out? But like if someone is willing to
do to like blame you for them not making you come,
It's like I don't want to have this discussion with
this person. I don't like because people like kid, I'm
just like you guys are like you guys are dangerous. Yes, yeah,
so I just stop having sex altogether. Yeah, is in

(01:11:22):
forty nights times, however many you need. I might start
dating women. You probably should try it just for this,
just to learn more about your body and sex, and
then try to go back to the men and teach
some things. I also don't see why all women aren't
just having sex with I mean, I'm not I don't
mean this in a hornball way right now. I'm not
trying to come on you guys, but I just mean, like,
why aren't all women just having sex? With each other. Yeah,

(01:11:44):
I am. I think it would be very strengthening because
if we want to win the more against men, which
there is one um, we should probably bond together. We
should probably stop having sex with most of them, get
better genes, for one thing. Have y'all seen Birds the
hitch Cot not the movie, like, I just mean in general, yes,
the birds in Planet or So. I think it's even

(01:12:05):
like in the first episode where it's like the females
of these and there's a lot of different bird species
that are like this right where the females are these
plain brown, ugly little plain brown birds. Not I want
to say ugly, they're just cute. They're so cute. Sure
they're playing little brown bird. And then sorry to shame
our bird listeners out there, female bird listeners, so I
didn't mean to call you ugly. The males of the

(01:12:25):
species evolved to be like blue and green and bright
and do these crazy gay little dances. They're the gayest
little dances. Like these these men are so yeah, they're
doing the most. And then these women just choose between
those and then it's like I found a one bird
species where still the girls are a little plain brown
things and these guys look crazy and colorful. But they

(01:12:48):
also the men build these little rape protection huts for
the women. Okay, so all the little all the gay
little men birds bright purple and pink, and a little
already grow a little blurds create they build these little
rape shield huts. And then the round little birds, when
they're ready, all come and go pick their little rape

(01:13:08):
shield huts. They go, oh, this is mine, this is yours.
And then they sit there and in these things. And
then the male birds come out and do their gay
little dances. And then if they ever, if they get
to the point where they think one of the women's interested,
then they go behind them and then they start to try.
And that's what the rape shildhud comes in, because if
the woman changes her mind at any point, at any
point she changes, she doesn't consent anymore. She just flies

(01:13:31):
out and the little thing protects her from being like
he can't really follow her. She has enough time to
escape because of the design. That's feminism. Now let's go
in that direction. I say why, and this is why
these insults want to kill us, because we have ideas
like this. Seriously, like these birds, they have to cut incredible.

(01:13:53):
I love that. Wait, I want to I know more.
There's a spider species where, you know, because the women
are like large keeping the women and not like females.
I like, so the little men ones um are they
do this thing where they first of all, they shoot
spiderweb around their legs, so there's a kind of bondage

(01:14:14):
element to it so that the women can't immediately bite
their heads off, which is what they will do with
A malee just approaches, but first he ties her legs up,
which seems bad. But then they go down on the
women for up to an hour. Whoa because if he
if they do it well enough, then she'll be too
tired and drowsy to bite his head off. He can

(01:14:35):
get close enough, he can get close enough to shoot
his load, and then she'll be like kind of drowsy
from it and she won't buy his head off and
he can get away or at least they usually still die,
but at least he can get a seat in before
she's able to get his head off. That is incredible. See, man,
what have we done as humans all wrong? I'm the

(01:14:56):
one who's like putting on makeup and like aman, no,
we have to unionize. Yeah, we have to I mean,
we have to have some of the good I just
want to have good sex once in my life and
don't try. I mean, I've heard Lesbian's joke about this
and like tod those like, Honestly, maybe we do need
to do some training camps for men. I mean, like

(01:15:17):
the conversion therapy camps make it how sting and tonguing damps,
like the oral and manual skills really need to be
educating these straight men because I don't realize how good
a sex I was there, you know every time, because
I like have considered dating men and never and straight
women every time I mentioned it are just like, don't

(01:15:38):
why would you even? It's not worth it. You'll get
nothing out of that. So it's a recommend we've got
to wrap up pretty. This movie is so bad, it's wretched.
Uh the other thing you want to talk about? Yeah,
I don't even if I did, I don't want to
talk about this movie anymore. This movie is very it's exhausting.

(01:15:58):
It's bad in every way a movie can dad so
I know, and everywhere beautiful. Uh. Oh. The one quick
person I wanted to bring up was the absurdity of
bagel boy. Um. Bagel Boy that was one of the
because he is he somehow has like the misogynist tea

(01:16:18):
on every woman in San Francisco, knows everything about every woman.
As he's setting up these bagels, which is his job
to go into this tech company and put five bagels
on a bagel stand and leave, he does it. He
talks about fucking a woman and he'll go so there's
always a match on action when he goes, fuck her,
fuck her, fuck her, slamming a bagel onto the holder,

(01:16:42):
and that's over the top. It's edited, and I'm sure
this is done on purpose, but it's so jarring. When
he's placing the bagels, it's edited to be so loud
where he's just like, yeah, you know, so I sucked
during her hole that it's like this loud, like steel
sounding bagel hit. It's oh god, bagel boy canceled. Yeah, well,

(01:17:07):
oh my god. This this is just such a piece
of so people probably we should just no one should
ever watch this. Yeah, do not not even as a
hate watch. It's just it's it's draining. Maybe watch the
sex scene. Yeah, the sex. The sex scene is on
YouTube's keep the rest. You should have your listeners tell
you if they like that sex scene. He's like, I can't.
I don't understand why it's top ten worst just a

(01:17:29):
list made by a man. Yeah, yeah, a man doesn't
come and a woman does. Yeah, this is a goose
sex scene. I've ever seen flowers and I thought, I
truly the more we're talking about them like that was
I was on board for that. And you never get
to see women come on screen ever, true, so that

(01:17:51):
at least there's that. Also, you know, everyone involved in
this movie was a man. Cannot find I hope, so
I was. I was like, if a woman wrote on this,
I don't want to know about it. I know, just
I was like, is this going to be yet another
Catherine Bigelow betrayal of her gender? No? It was directed
by a man, produced by men, written by a man,

(01:18:12):
composed cinematography everything is I'm not, and distributed by Miramax.
So you know, just rapist top to bottom. I'm not
implying everyone who worked on this movie was the last
thing I guess I had to say about it. It's like,
technically the temptation in this movie is supposed to be sex,
but the movie completely conflates sex with women like they

(01:18:35):
treat them like they're the same thing. So women are
the temptation and they like embody the temptation of sex
and nothing else. I'm go go. We didn't even talk
about that scene where it's like, I think his last
day or next to his last day of his vow
and he's just like seeing naked women all over the street.
You see all these topless women. There's so much like

(01:18:56):
male game cinematography in this movie, and it's just like,
are you fine? But it was filmed like a nightmare
secret Yeah it was. He was like running through the
city like there are too many titties. I also think
that if The Boom World were made today, it would
be asked world. That's just myne I think that there
it would be poorly rendered as let everyone baby, Hey,

(01:19:20):
this movie passes the back to test, sure doesn't um.
There are women talking in it, However, they're always talking
about Matt and his sex life. There are I counted
five different conversations between Erica and Maggie jellen Hall's character,
who's I don't know if we've learned her name ever,
but they talked five different times about Matt. Every single time,

(01:19:43):
it's always like, oh, you met this guy? Oh he
gave you high five. Oh he gave you an orgasm.
Oh it's your first time. Oh he brought you a gift.
Jellan Hall is a fucking plot machine. And the only
reason we know anything about Erica at all is because
the cyber nanny job is a plot element to get

(01:20:04):
her to be mad at him, because that's how she
learns about it. Otherwise I don't think we would have
learned about So the one fact that we know about
her in their journey to being in love is this
job that is only a plot device. I bet that that,
like in the writing of the movie, that cyber nanny
thing was added in later when they're like, oh, how
would she find out? Oh, this would make men internet. Also,

(01:20:27):
this is also the same director as Heather's Yes, I
saw that. Well, let's fred it on our nipple scale. Nipples. Uh,
this gets like negative nipples and forty asked cheeks. We're
petting asked checks into the I'm gonna do negative forty
nipples forty butts because that trips off the tongue for pimples.

(01:20:50):
Forty nipples and forty is my reboot. Very White movie
takes place in San Francisco, and yet everyone is white.
There's like a couple. I think she that actress, Um,
Shannon Sesamon is mixed. I know she's at least partially Filipino. Um,

(01:21:14):
but she was hot. We would never find out enough
about Eric. She's sing something else, She's in Rules of Attraction,
She's in A Night's Tale, She's in a bunch of
movies right around this time. And then I was never
seen from or heard from again. This was probably the
last straw. I can't do this anymore. But yeah, very

(01:21:34):
very white, very hetero movie, and um yeah, everything about it,
every fucking last moment of this movie is a disaster. Well, Ariel,
thank you so much for joining us. Uh sorry again
for having made you watch this movie. But then I
know where can people follow you online? Is there anything

(01:21:56):
you would like to plug? Yeah, I mean listen to mine.
If you like podcast, maybe listen to my podcast. It's
called Gender Fluids and it's about sex and gender. But
my podcast co host is a trans chit comedian Austin
Smart and um, she and I are the most disgusting
comics in Austin. And then we started a podcast together
where we talk about all kinds of gender and sex. Stuff,
but don't listen if you're easily offended. Amazing, and then

(01:22:21):
you know you can go to aerial Isaac Norman dot
com a R I E. L Ly I put up
my shows and anything that I'm doing in Austin. I
have a show called off Script that is the third
Saturday of every month at the Fallout Theater and it's
it's just this show where we do stand up but
the audience is encouraged to heckel and I give out

(01:22:41):
prizes to people who are funny at it, and it's
we create and some people are like, oh, is it mean?
And I'm like, well, some people are mean, but I
usually kind of like just make fun of them, and
it's we try to make it into more of an
interactive just a fun time. But on so Austin Bechtel heads,
go check out the show. Check it out. Yeah. You
can follow me on Twitter at poop tampon and is

(01:23:03):
that real? Hell? Yeah? Can you believe no one had
taken that? Incredible a victory for the culture. Amazing. You
can follow us. Unfortunately, our handle is not poop tampon
because it was taken. You took it, but you can't
follow us at bachtel Cast on all the platforms. Uh

(01:23:23):
Patreon slash Matreon. Go to patreon dot com slash beachtel
Cast and sign up for our Matreon. It's five dollars
a month and you get too bonus episodes every single month.
Uh t public for all of our merch are awesome designs,
feminist icon rise with the matriarchy except that ship. Get
that at t public dot com. Slash the bachtel Cast

(01:23:46):
and resume fucking yeah, yeah, finally, Okay, yeah, let's finally
let's go fuck yeah. Bust our nut, bust those nuts,
bust my own nuts. Yeah, I'm the same. I'm gonna
bust my own Let's get out of here. We're gonna
go masturbate, all right. Bye

All Episodes

Episode Transcript

The Bechdel Cast News

Follow Us On

Hosts And Creators

Caitlin Durante

Jamie Loftus

Show Links

Popular Podcasts

Stuff You Should Know

24/7 News: The Latest

The Joe Rogan Experience

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}40 Days and 40 Nights with Arielle Isaac Norman